Weeping Angel

by Stef Ann Holm

  “But I always oversee the town meetings!” the mayor blustered, refusing to move.

  “Come over to the Moon Rock after this is settled and oversee me making you a gin cocktail—on the house.”

  “Mr. Brody, you may have the podium.”

  “I had a feeling you’d see things my way.” Frank turned to the crowd to deal with the problem himself, galling Amelia. “Grenville Parks here, our ticket agent for the Short Line, seems to think this meeting is necessary in order for me to take ownership of a piano I bought.”

  “That I bought,” Amelia amended.

  “All right,” Frank said, looking pointedly at her. “The piano we both bought, but had the damn luck—”

  A rush of feminine gasps befell the congregation upon his slip of the tongue in the Lord’s house.

  Frank frowned, his gaze growing dark as if he didn’t put merit in the eternal consequences of swearing in a church. But at least he had the decency to rephrase, “Had the bad luck of having only one piano delivered.”

  “I can vouch for the one crate,” Herbert Fisk, the porter, added.

  “Me, too,” said Hardy. “Heard the chords strike when we put her on the dolly.”

  Lew Furlong sneezed, then blew his nose so loudly the boys pulling the fans broke into peals of laughter over the honking sound. Rubbing his watery eyes, he sniffed. “I helped get the one and only crate off my train.”

  Grenville scratched the back of his head. “That still doesn’t change the fact only Miss Marshall has shown documentation for the piano.”

  Amelia sat straighter than ever before. That was right! Frank Brody hadn’t produced his receipt. Quick as a whip, she dug into her purse and retrieved the voucher. “Here is my proof of sale,” she said, holding it between her gloved forefinger and thumb, going so far as to wave the paper a tad for emphasis. “See?”

  “Don’t start moving furniture yet,” Frank advised, looking at her with a bland smile. He slipped his hand into his trousers pocket and withdrew a folded piece of paper. “My receipt. Who wants it?”

  “I’ll take it,” Mayor Dodge said, and relieved Frank of the sales slip. After scanning the paper, he nodded. “It says Mr. Brody did indeed buy the piano.”

  “Not the piano,” Amelia corrected. “A piano. His piano might not be this piano.”

  A murmur of agreement rose from the mothers of Amelia’s students, and she felt a moment’s triumph. The men thoughtfully put their fingers on their chins, as if thinking of a plan to contradict her observation and douse her supporters. After all, they had everything to lose if the piano went to her.

  Mayor Dodge’s seasoned face became somber. His mouth dipped into a frown and he drew his light brows together in thought. Then, without preamble, his eyes twinkled with purpose. “I know what to do! Compare the dates on the receipts. If the date on Mr. Brody’s is prior to the date on Miss Marshall’s, the piano will go to the Moon Rock. But if the date on Miss Marshall’s receipt is before Mr. Brody’s, she will take the piano.”

  “I would have gotten to that,” Grenville grumbled. He took Amelia’s bill of sale. “But Mr. Brody didn’t have his receipt on him, so I couldn’t.”

  The ticket agent approached the pulpit and handed the mayor her slip. Fisk resumed his seat and folded his arms across his chest to brood.

  Amelia waited with her heart in her throat while Mayor Dodge compared the two pieces of paper. She hoped her strained smile hid her anxiousness. No one knew what dire straits she was falling into. She’d die of shame if they did. She’d pretended not to be concerned by her bank balance in front of Mr. Hartshorn and had implied to him she had funds elsewhere.

  “Same dates,” the mayor muttered. “Must be why there was a mix-up.”

  Thank goodness. She hadn’t lost the piano. But neither had she won it.

  “I think Fra—” Emmaline Shelby cut her sugary voice short to amend, “That is—Mr. Brody,” she cooed, “should have the piano.”

  Amelia caught Frank’s wink at the laundress. She craned her neck to see what kind of reaction the audacious gesture had on Emmaline. Emmaline blushed, her cheeks turning the same shade as the number-three red dye she used to color linen ticking—a startling contrast to her alabaster skin and raven curls. Amelia was instantly reminded of a riddle young Daniel Beamguard had asked her: What’s black and white and read all over? If she’d known in advance how profusely the laundress could blush, Amelia would have answered: Emmaline Shelby.

  Emmaline tilted her head, suddenly overtaken with the need to fan her rosy face.

  Narrowing her eyes, Amelia faced forward again, not at all liking the way her insides felt like saltwater taffy—pulling her in all directions, and having no tangible explanation as to why.

  “Thank you, Miss Shelby.” Frank smiled. “I appreciate your vote.” He leaned into the pulpit, resting his elbow on the sheets of Reverend Thorpe’s sermon. “How about a few more votes? Gentlemen, Pap will play the best tunes you’ll ever hear.”

  “I protest!” Amelia rose as gracefully as she could from the pew, clutching her purse by the snap frame. “This isn’t a political rally. He can’t drum up votes with coercion and promises!”

  “Why not?” Mayor Dodge replied. “The president does.”

  “I think we should bring the matter to a vote,” Emmaline said, and Amelia had to keep herself from glaring at her.

  “I don’t think that’s necessary,” Amelia replied. “Aren’t you all forgetting Weeping Angel already has drinking music in Lloyd’s Palace?”

  Ed Vining voiced his opinion, “I wouldn’t call the asthmatic wheeze of that clunker church organ drinking music. Those pipes were condemned before Reverend Thorpe bought them to use until we could afford this new Cathedral Chapel organ here.”

  “But the old one still works,” Amelia hastened to add.

  “Oh, it works,” Ed whined. “But frankly, every time I hear Lloyd playing it, I’m thinking I ain’t ought to be drinking on account of the godly notes being bellowed out of that organ. It don’t matter Lloyd is playing ‘Oh! Susanna.’ It still sounds like ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ to me.”

  “You never told me that,” Lloyd burst in without amusement.

  “I didn’t want to offend you, Lloyd. You serve nickel beer.”

  “That’s right,” Lloyd said crossly. “You won’t find Brody serving nickel beer. He charges a dime a glass.”

  “You come over to the Moon Rock, Lloyd,” Frank suggested, “and I’ll give you a free glass.”

  “Well, I like that,” Amelia declared sarcastically. “This meeting wasn’t called to debate the price of beer. We’re supposed to be deciding where the piano should go.”

  “I say it should go to the Moon Rock,” Ed remarked. “It’s just what that place needs, it being so fancy, and all.”

  “And the vote is the only fair way,” the mayor concurred, “until you both can get an answer from Boston as to whose piano this actually is. And then, they’ll ship out a second one.”

  “In the meantime,” Grenville piped in, “the crate can’t sit on the Union Pacific’s dolly, so we best decide where it goes.”

  Mayor Dodge agreed. “Then let’s call a vote right now.”

  Amelia panicked. The situation wouldn’t have been so severe if the unmarried Frank Brody had been unattractive. The problem was, he was too disarmingly handsome for the ladies in town to take a deserved dislike to. They’d forced Charley Revis out of business, and the only reason they tolerated Lloyd’s Palace was because the rickety building with its washed-up singer was so sorry, it posed no threat to their delicate senses. Besides, the bar had been there since Weeping Angel’s founding, and it was somewhat of a monument with its broken shutters and crooked front doors.

  Though no respectable woman had ever set foot inside the false-fronted Moon Rock Saloon with its rumored diamond-dust mirrors, thirty-foot golden walnut bar, crystal glasses, scarlet carpet, and brass fixtures, Amelia suspected they were dying to. Mr. Brody’s s
howplace was the topic of the day, and she feared anything to help him add luster to his saloon would be at her expense. Allowing all these infatuated ladies the vote could sway the result in his favor. But by the same token, the men had been interested in the Moon Rock since its opening and they would surely vote for the piano to go there so they wouldn’t have to hear the Palace’s secondhand music. “Wait!” she rushed. “I propose only the married couples vote, that way we know the ratio of men and women are equal.” At least she would have a fifty percent chance of winning. Perhaps even greater because eight of the wives had daughters signed up for lessons. Certainly they didn’t want their girls inside a drinking parlor practicing their scales, and would whisper their objective views to their spouses before the vote.

  “That does seem the democratic way,” the mayor remarked in a resonant voice filled with authority. “Do you have any objections, Mr. Brody?”

  Frank shrugged. “None I can speak in a church, so I guess this is the way it has to be.” His gaze landed intimately on Amelia and inexplicably put her at odds. Then he moved on to give the whole of the room—the ladies in particular—a lazy smile. His full curving mouth oozed so much masculinity, Amelia felt gooseflesh rise as if it were the dead of winter.

  “All right, everyone who can vote, get themselves a scrap of paper,” Mayor Dodge stated while walking toward his wife to procure a torn-off piece of her grocery list to cast his vote on.

  “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Narcissa asked her husband.

  The mayor cast a glance at Amelia. “Yes, dear. This is the only fair way.”

  Amelia nodded in reluctant agreement, hoping her dearest friend and her husband would be of some help in swaying the decision in her favor.

  As everyone thought on their vote, Frank began to whistle “The Yellow Rose of Texas.” His musical pitch was perfect; and she admitted to herself with reluctance, he had an ear for music—even though he harmonized a common melody.

  Catching her staring at him, he winked, making no bones about the fact that the sparkle in his eye was meant for her.

  Amelia’s mouth dropped open. Aghast, she suddenly knew exactly what he was up to. Whetting the men’s appetites with a tuneful reminder of what they’d be hearing if they voted for him to take the piano.

  She tried to disguise her annoyance in front of the others, wishing she knew how to whistle, too. Since she didn’t, she began to hum Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony in as loud a voice as she dared. She’d barely gotten into the twelfth bar when a hand touched her shoulder from behind.

  “Are you all right, dear?” Esther Parks whispered.

  Amelia immediately ceased her humming and turned her chin a notch. “I’m fine.”

  Grenville cocked his head around and said, “Miss Marshall has phlegm in her throat, Esther. Leave her alone.”

  Amelia wanted to slither from her seat.

  The ushers from the prior Sunday’s service took the ballots. Mayor Dodge collected them, and after tallying the votes, he prepared to read the outcome.

  “My fellow citizens, silence please.”

  The room quieted posthaste, and Mayor Dodge quirked his brow at Narcissa, who shook her head at him again. “When in the course of . . .” Catching Amelia’s anxious gaze, he sobered. “ . . . piano disputes, it becomes necessary to take a vote, which we have done. Now, allow me to report the results.”

  Amelia tensely awaited the verdict. Closing her eyes and clutching her purse tightly, she held her breath until her lungs burned.

  “By a margin of twenty-nine to twenty-one in favor of, the New American upright parlor piano will be going to the Moon Rock Saloon.”

  Amelia’s heart sank. Exhaling, she opened her eyes, only to find Frank Brody’s gaze fastened on her. She wouldn’t show him her defeat. She could take the loss graciously. Facing him, stare for stare, she held her chin high.

  His clear, observant eyes chipped at her composure. Could he tell she was desperately holding back tears? Determined not to reveal her disappointment, she kept all expression from her face. But her blood pounded at her temples, and she couldn’t stop the heat from stealing into her cheeks.

  She thought she saw a sign of empathy in his gaze. How could he identify with her? He’d won the piano. She hadn’t. What made the loss hurt all the more was, he’d been the outsider in town, and she’d been here for six years. Apparently loyalty didn’t count when the issue at hand involved glasses of beer.

  Amelia couldn’t bear Mr. Brody’s false sympathy, so she broke away from his gaze to look around her. The men patted themselves on the backs and the women, who she thought were her friends, were glancing at one another with suspicious guilt in their expressions. Only Narcissa put her hand on Amelia’s forearm for comfort.

  Folding her hands in her lap, Amelia dropped her chin and waited for the meeting to be finished. The strain was wearing her down. She was afraid she’d disgrace herself by crying.

  “Hey, Dodge, come here a minute.”

  Amelia looked up to see Frank conferring with the mayor at the pulpit. Mayor Dodge’s brows rose, and he nodded with a wide smile. “Splendid idea, Mr. Brody. I’ll let you make the announcement.”

  Frank took his straw hat from the lectern and let the band hang on the crook of his finger. “I appreciate the vote coming my way, but I think it needs to be said—Miss Marshall is out a piano until another one can be shipped.” Their eyes met and, half in anticipation and half in dread, she waited for him to continue. “I’d like to offer her use of the upright at the Moon Rock. During my closed hours, she can teach the kids at the saloon.”

  She stared at him in astonishment, too surprised to move. His generosity caught her off guard, and she couldn’t help but wonder what his ulterior motive was for making the offer. Unfortunately, he’d put her on the spot in front of everyone, and she couldn’t exactly cross-examine him. Far worse than the damage done to her pride was the simple truth: She couldn’t afford to refuse his charity.

  “You’re being very gracious, Mr. Brody. I”—she had to swallow the lump in her throat—“I accept.”

  “There now,” Mayor Dodge declared. “Everything turned out just fine. The excitement is over, folks. The special town meeting is adjourned. Miss Marshall, in the meantime, I’m sure you’ll be taking up the matter over at the Wells Fargo office. And Mr. Brody, I’ll be seeing you shortly.” Licking his lips, Mayor Dodge left the pulpit to join his wife.

  Amelia stood, said her good-byes to Narcissa, then filed out of the church with the crowd. Esther Parks met her.

  “Amelia, dear, I’m afraid I was too hasty when I said my Elroy wouldn’t be taking lessons. I’ve changed my mind.”

  Amelia looked at her with surprise, remembering how adamant Mrs. Parks had been. She didn’t have a chance to reply when Mrs. Dorothea Beamguard drew up next to them. “I’ve changed my mind, too, my dear. You can expect to see Daniel.”

  “That goes for Jakey,” Mrs. Luella Spivey added.

  Mrs. Viola Reed chimed in, “Oh, yes. Do count on my Walter and Warren to be there.”

  The twins? Amelia had never seen them with clean fingernails or the bibs on their overalls fastened. Imagining the rambunctious red-haired duo at a piano whacking on the ivory keys frightened her.

  Other women approached as she passed the baptismal font. Students were popping up like spring daffodils.

  By the time she reached the narthex, she’d added ten new pupils. Every boy’s mother who’d turned her down before had a sudden change of heart. They were being so nice, even though some of her lady friends had obviously voted against her. Amelia knew from attending the Thursday Afternoon Fine Ladies Society canasta games, these women did nothing without gain. If Frank Brody had been anything but a novelty, they would have snubbed him and his stale saloon.

  The closeness of people, the stares, and the heat were all overwhelming Amelia, and she sidestepped her way out of the flowing crowd to rest by the coatracks and cold radiator to catch her breath. S
he pretended to be engrossed with the visitor’s register sitting on a small pedestal. Rigidly holding her tears in check, she would not cry.

  Amelia felt a light touch on the small of her back, felt the presence of someone standing so close behind her a book of sheet music couldn’t fit between them. The air suddenly smelled faintly of tobacco and . . . peach. She rapidly blinked the moisture from her eyes as he spoke. “I know you wanted the vote to go the other way.” Frank’s voice held a quiet note of apology she found odd. Even though he’d made a gesture of compromise, surely he’d done so to look considerate in front of the others.

  She didn’t dare turn around and face him. She couldn’t. Not without dying.

  “I meant what I said. You can use the piano. I’m open from four in the afternoon until two in the morning. I thought we could divide the time into twelve-hour shifts.”

  Amelia stared at a child’s knitted blue muffler left over from winter on the shelf above the coat hooks. She fought hard not to tremble and let him see her so emotional. All she could do was nod. She didn’t have a choice.

  He continued in a low tone. “You can have access to the piano from four in the morning to four in the afternoon. Mostly I’m in bed until noon, but don’t worry about waking me with the noise. I sleep like the dead.”

  Pressing a key into the palm of her hand, he closed her fingers around the warm metal. The mere touch of his hand against the thin cotton of her gloves sent a shiver through her. “This unlocks the front door.”

  She mutely nodded again, wishing she didn’t have to know the details of his sleeping habits.

  Then he left, and she almost stumbled backward from the power his close proximity had on her. The world spun and careened, seemingly taking her with it on its axis and making her dizzy. A man hadn’t touched her in such a fashion since . . . Jonas Pray.

  Amelia stayed in the church long minutes after everyone else had left. She didn’t want anybody to see her when she walked home.

  The burning imprint of the key in her palm reminded her of Frank Brody and the implications of its intimate meaning. The key symbolized a connection between the two of them in a secret, wicked sort of way.