“I am too, sir,” Ciara said. “Whenever you need me.”
“First you will rest and heal from your honorable wounds,” Theodore Roosevelt said firmly. “You too, little Luz,” he added less formally. “And that’s an order. Agent Whitlock has instructions to arrange things just as you please.”
* * *
• • •
Several hours later Luz heard Ciara gasp as she leafed through the folder.
“Luz!” she called.
“Yes, querida?” she said, her eyes still closed as she leaned back in the padded chair.
So good to rest . . . So good to be clean . . . So good to be home . . . So good to be myself again . . .
The easiest way to avoid the baying mob of reporters around the White House who might wonder who the two of them were was simply to stay there overnight. Some of the reporters thought they had a bribe-oiled conduit into the building via members of the service staff. Those were actually working on retainer for the Chamber, and told the journalists just exactly what they needed to know in the president’s opinion, or the Chamber’s. Nobody had dared to actually leak anything private for quite some time, especially not when they got to keep the bribes anyway. Uncle Teddy had always known how to handle the press, one way or another.
“Luz, this says I have a bank account that’s been paid into since the beginning of the year! There’s a checkbook and slips and a billfold with an ungodly amount of cash and even a receipt from the IRS for paying a hundred dollars in income tax!”
Luz nodded. “It’s automatic for Black Chamber operatives,” she said. “Your weekly salary gets deposited straight into it, with the taxes deducted if you’re over the triggering limit. Very Progressive, you know. Efficient . . . modern . . . clean . . . untouched by human hands.”
“But . . . but . . . Luz, thirty dollars a week?”
“For your probationary year. Plus two weeks paid leave and reasonable sick time—very reasonable, for injuries taken on the job, and we have a special medical section with a good staff alienist I’ve used myself. And the pension that goes with the Black Eagle Medal we just got adds another fifteen dollars per week, by the way, for life, and that’s tax-free.”
“Forty-five dollars a week?”
She opened her eyes and looked over. They were in a parlor outside the two guest rooms Aunt Edith had found them, probably originally for the Roosevelts’ now-grown children. Like most of the White House residential sections it was done in a pale neo-federal white-and-gold, with an electric overhead light in chandelier form. Ciara was at the oval mahogany table, examining the contents of the folder.
“But . . . Luz . . .”
Luz smiled; what Ciara was exclaiming over was a solid middle-middle-class salary even in these days of rising prices and taxes, about twice what a coal miner made, or a third again a high school teacher’s pay. That made it just above the lower limit for paying income tax at all.
It was very much in excess of what most working women made, but the Chamber had had equal pay for equal work from its inception—something the rest of the civil service was just starting to establish, and which was only a dark cloud on the horizon for the private sector for the present. A year of it wouldn’t quite buy passage across the Atlantic on an airship like the San Juan Hill.
Luz herself used her—considerably higher, given her rank and seniority—income from the Chamber as found money, to be squandered on impulses like the automobile she’d bought last year. For that matter, most of what she got from her inheritance went back into more shares in Du Pont and U.S. Steel and General Electric and Ford Motors and Treasury bills.
You could buy a Model T on what she’s getting, though, Luz thought with satisfaction. And get a nice flat too, or a mortgage on a house in L.A., and buy books and a few pretty things and tickets to plays. Or enroll at a university. That’s a do-what-you-want income, a life pension if she didn’t want to join the Chamber for real.
“Querida,” she said. “Please, control your Irish Catholic guilt. That is yours, and yours alone, by right and merit and your own accomplishments. You bled, and sweated, and went under the shadow of an ugly death, and you fought and won for America. ¡Tu lo mereces! Or at least the President of the United States thinks so, and the Director of the Service.”
“So do soldiers risk their lives and suffer, and they don’t get anything like this!”
A private’s base pay was a dollar and a half a day, fairly good wages for an unskilled laborer. Though it was steady and they didn’t have to pay for their food or shelter or clothing, of course.
“They should get it, it’s just the country couldn’t afford it. And you ran risks soldiers don’t, as well as the ones they do,” Luz said.
Ciara opened her mouth, closed it, sighed, and relaxed. “To tell you the truth, I’d just started to think of such things as buying groceries and shoes and paying rent again. It was like an engine starting up after long disuse! And a bit of a relief, in a way, as if to say I could be a real person again, with ordinary things going on that couldn’t be put in one of those magazines with the bright covers full of flashing swords and aeroplanes and such. Life can’t be all adventures. Mother of God, I hope it can’t be!”
Then, slowly: “So . . . what shall I do now?”
Luz met her eyes, turquoise-green as the flickers of sunlight in a deep summer forest, and quelled a quiver in her own stomach and a sudden impulse to bolt for the door.
“Well—oh, por Dios, this is harder than I thought it would be—well, querida, I was hoping . . . hoping very much . . . you might want to come and stay with me.”
Ciara smiled and tapped the folder. “But you didn’t say a word of that until I had money of my own, and could choose what I did freely. Am I right, now?”
A long moment while Luz nodded and then looked away. Ciara chuckled and went on:
“See, you’re not such a hard woman as you think, Luz! And yes, I would like to stay with you, just the two of us. Where?”
Luz forced herself not to gasp in relief, or go limp, or giggle hysterically.
Or all three at once and grin like a demented chipmunk too, she thought. And no pouncing, Luz, despite how utterly adorable she looks. Not yet. Be gentle, wait for exactly the right moment. She’s understandably nervous about all this.
“Mmmm . . . my home in Santa Barbara, for starters? It’s . . .”
She waved at the White House around them. “A bit more private. I’d like to get away from the war and peering eyes for a bit.”
“Oh, yes!”
Luz nodded: “The headlines and public life are going to be full of thunder and storm. We’ve earned a little respite from that too, I think.”
Ciara smiled, a long slow expression that came with a flush. “That sounds very nice. A bit . . . scary, to be sure, but nice.”
“Not too scary, I hope,” Luz said.
A laugh. “Scary in a good way, I think. And an adventure of a better kind.”
NINETEEN
Near Santa Barbara, California
United States of America
OCTOBER 21ST, 1916(B)
Ciara looked up at the letters in the wrought-iron arch as Luz vaulted easily out of the auto to open the gate; the car had been waiting where the presidential train dropped them off.
“Casa de los Amantes . . . House of the Lovers?” she said as Luz returned to the wheel.
Luz nodded. “It was, too.”
She pulled through and looked up as she came back from closing the gate; big coastal live oaks stood on either side of the laneway, their branches meeting overhead to make a tunnel of shade.
“Ah, they’re early this year. I hoped so. See?”
Ciara followed her finger, and gave a little gasp. “So many!” she said. “God, Luz, they’re gorgeous!”
Monarch butterflies were drifting between the branches o
f the trees, or resting with their wings gently moving like living jewels of orange and black. A swirl of them went by at head height, bound about their own business, and Ciara passed her hand through the swarm with a look of delight.
“They winter here—more so as we planted more trees. Clouds of them, sometimes, until they leave in the spring. Mima loved them and put in the things that draw them. She had a gift for gardens.”
Green lawns surrounded the house, and banks of flowers—gladioli, dahlias, late roses trained up trellises on arches over graveled paths. There were trees, single towering palms or the great evergreen oaks that had been growing before the first Spanish missionaries came, clumps of tall branching sycamores just beginning to turn toward autumn and edging green with gold, thickets of bamboo and banana and deodars and umbrella-shaped stone pines and more. Rows of orange and lemon were setting golden fruit on the south side of the house nearer the beach, in a little orchard that included almonds and apricots and figs and trellised grapevines.
Toward the outer edges of the property the trees grew into open woods, amending nature less and half hiding a few outbuildings in the same style. The ground right beneath the house eaves was planted to Cashmere Bouquet, trained to chest height and starred with masses of red-purple flowers that filled the air with a warm, languorous scent that she remembered from a hundred nights of summer and fall. The deft hands of Taguchi Gardens kept them so while she was away.
The building itself had a single central block of two stories of pale yellow stucco and Roman-tiled roof, with wings extending backward on either side to surround its court and make a long asymmetric H-shape. The driveway curved up to a set of four semicircular steps that led to the arched doorway; there were windows to either side set with wrought-iron grills, and a row above with a balustraded balcony above the entrance. The studded oak doors were open, leaving only the inner ones of wrought-iron and brass fretwork in the shape of peacocks locked—she’d wired ahead instructions to have the house aired out for today, and the kitchen stocked from Diehl’s Grocery on State Street.
Through the hall and the arched inner doors you could see the fountain playing in the central court, bright with cubano tile. Sheets of purple and crimson bougainvillea climbed the trellises between the arches of the loggia around it.
“Luz!” Ciara said, looking around as they carried their bags in; what they’d sent ahead would be unpacked and ready, but they had the building to themselves. “You didn’t tell me it was a palace!”
“Oh, this isn’t a palace; that’s Arcady or Piranhurst up in the hills. Those are palaces, and it must be like living in a hotel. This is just a big house, sixteen rooms counting kitchen and storage. But it’s . . . home.”
Luz stopped and looked around the entrance hall; the floor was warm brown Saltillo, and the walls pale for better contrast with the paintings and the exposed redwood beams above. More bright-colored cubano tile in Moorish geometric patterns marked the risers of the twin staircases curling up on either side of the arched passageway to the courtyard, up to the landing and the second story.
“It’s like being inside a jewel box,” Ciara said wonderingly.
Luz took her hand and spoke slowly.
“My father . . . was a poet, in his way; a poet of made things, of the things that are seen in the mind and then made by the work of our hands, as he made my rocking horse and dolls and swing. This house was his gift to my mother, the vision in his heart made physical—a new home in place of the one she gave up for him. The central bit here was finished just in time for me to be born in it, and the rest over the next ten years as time and money allowed. He never left it to contractors; it was all done under his eye and some of all of this with his own fingers.”
Ciara’s hand tightened on hers. “This is his love letter to her, isn’t it?” she said wonderingly, looking around to catch each detail.
“Yes, exactly; to her and me. They wanted a big family, but . . . well, that didn’t happen. And the gardens around it and the life within it, that was her answer to him—if ever he had to go where we couldn’t, for his work, she’d have something new growing for him to see when he came back. I enjoyed our traveling life, but I always felt . . . safe, here. It’s my private place, close to my heart.”
Ciara hesitated, her face white, and then blurted: “I love you, Luz.”
Luz sighed and smiled and touched the forefinger of her free hand to Ciara’s cheek. “And I love you, my darling one. You woke my heart that I thought had turned to dead stone. That’s why I brought you here. It’s a house made for love. And for happiness, and I want to make you happy.”
There was a moment’s singing tension, but without awkwardness.
“Ummm . . .” Ciara said, turning away a little, obviously shuddering with relief that her words had been matched. “I’m glad I consulted Aunt Colleen about this. About us, you and me.”
Luz blinked in surprise. They hadn’t had time, surely, and Ciara had been hurt in Boston and still recovering in Washington . . .
“I remember you speaking of her many times, but when did you have the chance to speak to her?”
“I consulted her in my head,” Ciara said with a shy smile. “I mean . . . I didn’t know what I was feeling except that it was important and very strong, and I so wished I could talk to her about it, she was always the one I took my troubles to, there being no mother and she the best and wisest person I knew . . . and then I realized that she and Auntie Treinel, they lived together all the time I knew them and I’d never made anything of it and just at that moment things sort of clicked in my head and I suddenly knew . . . which was as good as talking to her, you see?”
Luz laughed aloud. “Well, here’s to her and Auntie Treinel for their good advice by example!”
They kissed, and it grew hungrier. Ciara spoke into the collar of Luz’s blouse.
“Luz, you do want to take me to bed, don’t you?”
“Oh, yes, querida. For a long time now. Like a flower wants to follow the sun, or a ripe grape wants to burst on your tongue. Your eyes and hair are like the sky around the setting sun, and your skin is like white alabaster and you fill me with longing and passion and desire. Yes, my love, yes, yes.”
When Ciara drew back she grasped the front of Luz’s jacket and shook her a little fiercely, spots of color high on her cheeks.
“Then why didn’t you say anything! I keep feeling like I’m going to faint or my skin will crawl off into a corner by itself and cry! I don’t know what I want, not exactly, but I keep wanting it more and more! And—”
Luz laughed outright and stopped the words with a kiss.
“I didn’t because I wasn’t sure how I felt; then because I wasn’t sure how you felt; then because I wasn’t sure how well you knew what you felt. Because we were alone among enemies and our lives were in danger. Because you’d taken a knock on the noggin and needed rest. Because I wanted you to be very sure it was as much your idea as mine . . . and . . . well . . . this will be your very first time with anyone, won’t it?”
“Yes. A kiss or two but . . . yes.”
“Querida, you want to share that with me and that’s . . . a wonderful honor. So once I was sure, I wanted to make it very special and beautiful for you, and this is the most special and beautiful place I know. And we have it all to ourselves and we aren’t hurried or exhausted or in danger.”
“Oh,” Ciara said breathlessly. Then: “I’m a bit . . . I’m afraid I’ll disappoint you because I have no idea what to do. I mean I know a little about men and women but nothing about . . . and I so want to make you happy, and . . .”
“Querida.” Luz met her eyes. “You are not going to disappoint me! I am happy, right now. It’s your time to be a little shy and feel a little awkward and strange. And my time to be tender and patient and gentle. And I am going to make you feel absolutely marvelous.”
Ciara swallowed and nodded. Luz
stood back a little, holding her hands.
“Let’s get settled in, and then perhaps a swim, and we’ll change into robes and I’ll make you dinner and we can watch the sun go down together.”
“You cook, too, don’t you, Luz?” Ciara said, her voice trembling for a moment, then firming. “I remember you telling me about it.”
“Quite well, querida, even if I say it myself. You’ve never tasted what fresh means until it’s something right out of a Californian kitchen garden. A salad, and then I’ll make us pollo de coco and plátanos maduros fritos.”
A READER’S GUIDE FOR BLACK CHAMBER:
While Theodore Roosevelt isn’t a major character in the book, the differences in his career from those in our history are very important to all the major characters. How does his returning to the presidency in 1912 affect their lives? Where would they be without him?
In alternate 1916, Luz O’Malley Aróstegui considers herself modern and progressive. How does her conception of this differ from the assumptions we would make about these words today? How is it similar?
Luz regards the German intelligence agent Horst von Dückler as both an enemy and a colleague in the same line of work. She doesn’t feel any personal animosity toward him, because he’s working for his country. How does this attitude reflect on her and her world? Does it make her humane, or ruthless?
In the Black Chamber world, blacks in America would probably get the vote restored to them much earlier, in the 1910s rather than the 1950s and 1960s. Not because of a civil rights movement, but because the quasi-authoritarian Progressive Republican Party imposes it on the South for its own reasons. Likewise, there is an Equal Rights Amendment for women in 1913 that is closely identified with the Party’s takeover of the US. What are the positive and negative implications of these events?
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