by Rose Lerner
“Don’t worry about it.” She got into bed, flat on her back with one shoulder nudging the wall and her hands folded across her stomach. Sam did turn her head, though, and watch as Talathan removed his jacket and shoes, setting them down by her bureau with his hat. “I should’ve bought you pajamas,” she said, though the image was nothing short of bizarre.
“Only what I’m wearing or holding changes with me. Another set of clothing would only be a hindrance, should I need to escape early come the morning.”
“I hope you won’t.” That sounded bad: clingy. Sam backtracked. “That is, it’d be rotten for you, and the maids might get suspicious. But you wake up early anyhow, right?”
“I wake when the sun does.”
“Like chickens. And hopefully not like the Richardses expect me to. Most people don’t, but you never know with these Salvation Army types. They might think it’s good for my soul.” She shuddered theatrically.
“Are you sure it isn’t?” The question came with another teasing smile, but Sam only got to see it for a moment. Talathan turned off the lamp, then, and was only a slim shadow as he crossed the room.
“If my soul needs me to get up before nine, that’s just too bad for it.”
Talathan lay the same way she did. A few inches separated their actual bodies, but Sam could feel his warmth and smell him: clean masculinity mixed with green, a scent that made her think of pine trees and grass at the same time. She bit her lip and stared into the darkness.
“Sleep well, lady,” said Talathan.
“Good night.”
* * *
When Sam woke, Talathan was gone, and he’d taken all his clothing with him. That was probably just as well. The sun was sneaking in even past the curtains. As she got out of bed, the clock downstairs started to chime: ten. She’d slept twelve hours. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d gotten eight. Her body felt lighter for it, and her brain clearer.
If she got nothing else out of this job, she wouldn’t sneeze at a couple nights in a good bed.
“I’d started to worry, Miss Mitchell,” said Mrs. Richards, when Sam made it down to the parlor. She’d been reading, a small book bound in pale leather, though too thin to be a Bible. Now she set it down on the table and smiled up at Sam. “But then, you really had a shock yesterday. I hope you’re feeling better.”
“Much, thank you.” She’d gotten breakfast brought up while she dressed, and her twinges of guilt hadn’t kept her from eating well. “I wanted to thank you again. This is awfully generous of you.”
“We couldn’t leave you on your own. Not a sweet little girl like you.” Mrs. Richards had a smile that was almost a pat on the head. “I’m sure your father’s a great man, but I don’t know what he was thinking. I never would’ve let my daughters travel alone.”
Sam dropped her gaze. “It was kind of an emergency, ma’am. Like I said, he’s not well, and”—she bit her lip—“well, there are a couple things he needs someone in the family to do. And I don’t have a brother or an uncle or anything like that. I wish I did. Travel’s fun for a while, but…”
Trail off. Don’t bat eyelashes, but blink, twice, hard. Brave little smile.
Mrs. Richards patted her on the hand. “Well, the Lord must have sent you to us for a reason, and I’m glad we can provide.” Suddenly she frowned. “That’s the same skirt you wore yesterday, isn’t it?”
“Ye-es.” Sam stared at the yellow-and-white wallpaper in the parlor. It matched the sofas very well. She let herself look embarrassed. “My trunks went on ahead, of course, and I didn’t want to haul around a whole lot of clothes without anyone to carry them for me. Which was fine, except I snagged my other skirt in a door and tore the hem, and I figured on sending it to the hotel laundry, but—well.”
Mrs. Richards’s frown deepened. For a moment Sam went tense. She might need a story. Running probably wouldn’t help. She felt her heartbeat must be visible in her neck, it was so hard and so fast.
“Goodness, honey, either of my girls can take care of a little thing like that in half a minute. Just leave them on the chair in your room.”
“I don’t want to be any trouble—”
“You’re not. They could use more to do, truth be told—idle hands, you know. Especially where the help’s concerned. You must know how it is yourself, or your mother must.”
“Mostly it was cooks with us,” said Sam, cribbing shamelessly from films and novels, and smoothing a layer of knowing amusement over the spark that wanted to flare into anger. She smiled again. “We had one throw a whole roast at the milkman when I was growing up. Mama never would tell me exactly what happened there.”
“I don’t blame her.” Mrs. Richards tsked, smiling now. “Those affairs are generally sordid when you look into them, not to mention confusing. Please do sit down,” she added, patting the cushion beside her. “Reverend Richards has gone up to Santa Maria on church business, so we’ll have the afternoon largely to ourselves. Do you have an appointment with your father’s partners?”
“Noo.” Sam drew the word out, dressing it up in layers of uncertainty. “Daddy said they’d be expecting me, and I should just go in and tell the secretaries that. I’ve got the address, though. It’s in town.”
“Then the reverend can take you tomorrow afternoon. I would’ve offered today, but my husband’s appointment has been scheduled for a while.”
Sam perched at first, only gradually allowing herself to sink into the sofa. With her green blouse and blue-and-white skirt, she suspected the general effect looked like an Easter egg. “That sounds like an awfully long trip,” she said. “I hope everything’s all right.”
“Just fine, but it’s kind of you to ask.” A tightness around her eyes and lips suggested otherwise. “It’s not really so long with a good car, only an hour or two. He’ll be back by dinner.”
“Oh, good.” Sam looked down at her hands, folded primly in her lap. “My daddy used to travel a whole lot on business. It made my mamma nervous, even before he got sick. She said he had plenty of younger men to send on trips for him now, but he didn’t trust anyone else to handle the important things.”
Mrs. Richards laughed. “They never do, dear. But that’s the sign of a great man, I suppose.” She tilted her head. “What does your father do?”
Sam pursed her lips. “Business? I know it sounds silly, but he never let me in on all the details. I know there are stocks, and land, and he makes deals with men in lots of different parts of the country. Bankers, mostly. Only he doesn’t trust the wires these days, so he travels a lot—or he used to.”
The dollar signs didn’t appear in Mrs. Richards’s eyes quite so clearly as they had in her husband’s, but Sam thought her gaze sharpened. “It does sound very complicated. I think I’d be as lost as you are, or more so. Women really aren’t made to get involved in these situations, you know.”
“Oh, I do,” Sam said, with a particularly helpless little giggle. “Daddy says it should be simple enough, though. I’ll check in again with him this afternoon, if I can use your ’phone—I’ll reverse the charges.”
“For Heaven’s sake, don’t worry about that,” said Mrs. Richards.
* * *
Each time Talathan visited, the world shifted. Each time it changed more, though he might be gone a century the first time and only a few generations the next; humanity gathered change like an avalanche racing downhill. Yet there were still wild places enough, to one with the power of flight, and streams in them, and the sun was still warm on his skin while his clothing dried on rocks.
He would have welcomed company at such a time, but Sam had her tasks to carry out, and Talathan envied her none of them. Nor was he certain of her interest, or not certain enough to risk imposition, even with the past experience she claimed. Perhaps especially in that case: he had no lack of desire for her, but no desire to take anything she thought she had to give. This world had been hard on its women for almost as long as it had dealt with his own.
To decide not to act meant considering the action, and the consideration in this case roused Talathan greatly, brought his sex full and hard against his stomach; yet the brook wasn’t wild enough for him to chance the distraction relieving his own lust would require. He bathed in the water for some time, and was glad of its chill.
Controlled, cleansed, and clothed once more, he found food in the town nearby, where the diner’s servants as well as his fellow guests stared but didn’t quite find the courage to approach. The woman who brought him food did ask, after hearing his order, “Where are you from, mister?”
“England,” Talathan said. It was where he’d spent most of his time in this world, and the newsreels had confirmed its existence.
“I thought you sounded kinda like that,” the woman said, though she sounded less than entirely convinced.
It was unlikely to make much difference, Talathan told himself. So long as nobody saw him with Sam, it mattered little how strange his appearance was, and yet he was glad to get away. Men could do little to hurt him in any lasting manner, but the suffering a mob could cause would be no less painful for its transience. Most men feared the unfamiliar, and they had shotguns in this time.
Thinking ahead, he bought a sandwich, wrapped in thick brown paper, and left it in the highest branches of a tree near Richards’s house. He might risk losing it to a passing squirrel, but he’d not provoke more curiosity by another trip to town—and he’d remain near the house to witness anything that could be of use.
And so, shortly past noon, he was present to see Sam open the study door and slip inside. She moved as lightly as she always did, but Talathan thought it was out of habit rather than any wish for stealth; she left the door slightly open behind her, not enough to necessarily catch the eye but more than enough to let noise escape.
The first thing she did was cross to the window. As with the door, she didn’t open it wide: she simply undid the latch and turned the crank until a small gap appeared between the two tall panels. Anyone looking without purpose might not even see it, but Talathan thought he would find it easy enough to use.
Sam stepped back from the window and held up a hand, palm outward: Stop. Wait.
About to glide down onto the windowsill, Talathan halted where he was. Sam gestured to the large brass-and-chrome device on the desk, which Talathan vaguely recognized from the movie as a telephone, then to the door, and finally to the window again. She would use the telephone, then leave; he would come in afterwards.
As if the study were her property in truth, Sam sat down in the huge white chair behind the desk and leaned back, stretching luxuriously. The motion sent her hair spilling down the shoulders of her pale green shirt and thrust her breasts outward; when she closed her eyes and sighed, she brought to mind another sort of pleasure. Talathan’s current form lacked the physical reactions of his normal self, and that was just as well, for the scene would otherwise have been most distracting.
It would linger, he knew that well enough.
Then, opening her eyes, she turned again toward the window and gave a quick, rueful shrug and a similar grin. Talathan could almost hear her voice in his head: A girl’s got to have some fun, or Hey, mister, I never said I was a saint.
As enticement went, that was almost as great, in its own way, as the previous moment.
Then, while he gave idle, foolish thought to the merits and risks of a transformation, Sam picked up the telephone receiver and began to talk. The open window let out bits of what she said; the half-open door, closer at hand, would provide even more opportunity to an eavesdropper.
“I’d like to make a collect call, please...Yes. Mama, it’s me! How’s everything... Oh, no.” She covered her mouth with one hand and closed her eyes. “Oh, thank God. No, not as bad as it could be. I just—if he’d stop trying to—I know, but—I know. I know.” Sam stopped talking for a few minutes. When she spoke again, Talathan couldn’t make it out. She was likely telling her “mother” about her situation, for the next thing he heard was, “...Yes, but the reverend and his wife have been so kind to me, they... It is. It really is. But you won’t tell him, will you? Not until he’s stronger.”
Slowly, visibly, she let herself relax; she made wordless affirmative noises for a minute, reassuring the person on the other end of the line, imaginary though they likely were. “No, I know. Mm-hmm? And I collect the papers, and I give him the letter? He won’t want to change anything?” She laughed. “Well, of course you’d say that, Mama. And I don’t mind talking, so long as everything’s straightforward.”
More sounds.
Had there been windows in the hallway, Talathan could have perhaps known for sure if Mrs. Richards was listening just outside the door, or if she’d commanded one of the maids to do so. He had to settle for thinking it very likely. Sam’s face gave no knowledge away; she didn’t even look toward the open door, but let her gaze cloud over, as if she were truly absorbed in her conversation.
In time she said her goodbyes and settled the handpiece back onto its base. She was shaking her head as she slipped out the door, and though it looked as though she crossed the carpet with no more weight than the wind, Talathan didn’t doubt she made her footsteps heard. He watched as the door closed behind her, counted a hundred, then opened the window and made his own way in.
Without the bright colors of Sam’s clothing, the banked embers of her hair, or the deep blue of her eyes, the study was pallid and washed out. Desk, walls, and shelves were all shades of white or beige; a rich man’s choice, or his wife’s, to show how clean they could keep their furnishings. What few pictures hung on the walls all looked religious, and the large, stark cross above the desk was certainly so. Even Talathan knew that much.
Ostentatious though it might all be in its sparse fashion, there was good craftsmanship in the desk. The drawers opened easily and quietly. The one in the middle held paper and pens, and a locked metal box sat in the drawer on the bottom right. Above that, however, the top drawer opened to reveal a calfskin folder full of papers. None were quite the same; almost all, in the past, had been folded into three parts.
If anything of import existed in the study, it would be in that folder. Talathan glanced at the closed door, then at the open window, and set himself to look, and remember, as fast as he could.
* * *
Dinner had been pork chops and grilled tomatoes, iceberg lettuce and mock turtle soup, and chocolate cake for dessert. Sam had taken a long hot bath, washed her hair with rose-scented shampoo, and now sat on a large soft bed in a warm room, pillows at her back.
It was a good thing her story had a time limit. She could get used to this too easily.
Once again Talathan was lounging in the dresser chair. His long legs stretched out before him, crossed at booted ankles, he’d folded his arms across his chest, and he generally managed to look casually sensual enough to make up for the room’s primness and then some.
He made it hard for a girl to keep her mind on business, that was for sure—even when he was sharing pretty important information.
“All of the letters were refusals,” he said. “The reverend offered to buy land, and the owners refused to sell; he inquired about building in other places, and the authorities—at least, so I presume they were—turned him down. ‘Not compatible with the nature of the neighborhood,’ was one of the phrases.”
The words sounded strange from Talathan’s mouth, and by the amused half-smile he wore when he said them, he knew it.
“Can’t say I’m surprised,” Sam said. “Richards has been taking his act all over the state for a dozen years now. He told me at dinner. And he’s been on the radio for two or three. You might let a rich guy like him buy a house near you, but you sure don’t want him preaching the end of the world there—or the kind of crowd he draws. They’re gonna be more trouble than they’re worth.”
“But he’s far from the only one of his kind, isn’t he?”
“Sure. But the others are either tent-and-truck numbers or they�
��re real big-time operators, like that Semple lady. LA might not bat an eye at Richards’s temple, but buying that much land down there probably means more long green than he can scare up from his congregation—especially if he wants to keep this nice little place.”
Sam leaned back against the pillows and closed her eyes. Patterns danced in the blackness behind her lids. She heard the sounds around her: walls creaking, crickets outside, Talathan’s steady breathing. Slowly they fell into a pattern. Slowly the path became clear.
“I’ll need you to go out again tonight and come back early. I need a building I can stop at tomorrow. The kind with a couple floors. Get me the street name and the number. And it needs to be on the same street as a city hall.”
“Easily enough done.”
When she opened her eyes, Talathan was smiling. Still, Sam felt like a heel. “Sorry. I know the hours are hell. I should’ve planned this better—I’m not used to working with a partner, but that’s not much of an excuse. I hope I’m not taking too much advantage of this magic thing. I can try and work out payment, or a split, once we get the cash.”
In a moment, he was on his feet and right in front of her. “You set me no service I find hard,” he said, then picked up her hand from her lap and kissed the back of her knuckles. “And your company is all the reward I would ask.”
He was gone almost before she could blink. He was definitely gone before her hand stopped tingling, and it was minutes before Sam could think of anything she could have said.
* * *
Men were men. Sam wasn’t green. She got in the car with Richards braced for a “friendly” hand on the knee, or at least a couple of comments, though she thought her made-up father and Richards’s real wife would probably keep him from trying to take matters too far.
She didn’t get even the shadow of a come-on. Either Richards didn’t like women, didn’t like her, or was honestly good at controlling himself. On the way into Ojai, he talked comfortably about the scenery and uncomfortably about politics. He liked gardening. He didn’t approve of the theater. He thought The Voice of Firestone was great music, and his daughters had both listened to Little Orphan Annie right up until they married.
