After removing the paint tube, Kate shoved the toolbox back into the closet. She padded softly to her room and went immediately to her hope chest, the one Aunt Elsie and Uncle Adalbert had given her.
She placed the paint tube onto one of the top trays, wondering again what her brother’s message meant. The mere hint of a new mystery made her want to check on the Kopciuszek dresses. She wished she could shrink them down and carry them with her wherever she went so she would always know where they were and that they were safe.
Perhaps all the Keepers of the Wardrobe had felt this heavy weight. Her grandmother certainly had. In fact, she had at first refused the role before changing her mind. But by then Aunt Elsie had already taken over.
The hidden panels of the chest slid easily, evidence they were made by a master craftsman. Kate removed the blankets and tablecloths and sheets she had started collecting for her future home. Then she pressed firmly on the bottom until it gave way and the wood pressed back against her fingertips. She removed the panel and confirmed the packages were still neatly lined up together like three best friends at a sleepover.
Her hand hovered over the middle package. The ball gown. The most important dress of the three and the one that the Burgosov family would do anything to get. Though the two Burgosov men who tried to steal it were in jail, their mother, Ludmilla, was still out there plotting. Kate could almost feel it, that sense when someone is watching you. Knowing she was alone in the apartment, she resisted the urge to look over her shoulder.
The amber necklace around her neck began to warm. It always did when the ball gown was near. The pine scent floated up, making her room smell like the forest where the amber originated. She wondered what Poland was like, especially now, after the devastation of war. Was anything left from the days of Kopciuszek? How many other treasures of theirs had been lost?
Floyd had been amazed at all the stolen artwork the Monuments Men uncovered. He said it was proving difficult to find the proper owners for so many of the pieces. It was especially hard when an owner had been killed, and they had to track down the next of kin. Too many families were receiving boxes of trinkets instead of seeing their precious loved ones walk through the door.
Like the box the army had sent Mom, which lay untouched on her dresser.
Kate had asked her once, “Why don’t you open it?”
“Lots of reasons,” Mom had said. “If I look at the mementos he took from home, along with the items he collected on his travels, it would be like I know all there is to know about your dad. And that would be the end. No more mystery. At least, not that we could ever learn. I would be holding the last items he had touched, maybe learn the last bit of fun he had. See the last words he had written. I can’t handle that. It would be overwhelmingly sad.”
“It might also be healing,” Kate had countered. Yet the box still sat, sealed and unopened. Dad’s box . . . that’s it! Dad’s box.
Kate dashed into the bedroom. The box was at its usual place on her parents’ dresser between Mom’s jewelry stand and Dad’s catchall tray. It wasn’t very large. About the same size as a shoebox. Mom had told them to give away Dad’s clothing, just save whatever he had in his duffel bag. It had to be the box Floyd meant, and why he’d sent Kate the telegram, not their mother.
Kate wrestled with her conscience. She felt like she needed permission to cut through the tape, but the one person she ought to get permission from would say no.
Without stopping to talk herself out of it, Kate went straight to the kitchen, grabbed a knife, and sliced through the four sides.
With shaking hands, she opened the box. Sorry, Mom.
At first glance, the items inside could have belonged to any soldier. Shaving kit. A postcard of some city in Italy. A few Italian coins. But upon closer inspection, she found items specific to her dad. Three small books of art prints. A leather-bound sketch journal. A small stack of V-mail with Mom’s handwriting.
Kate sat down hard on a kitchen chair. There was no jewelry. No diamond. If this was the box Floyd was talking about in the telegram, he was wrong. And Kate had opened it for nothing.
Curious to see what she had written her dad, she flipped through the V-mail sheets to see if he had kept any of her letters. To save space on transport, letters were first censored, then transferred to microfilm before being sent overseas. There, they were printed out before going to the soldier, but at only 60 percent of the original size.
She found one of her letters:
Hi Dad,
Hope everything is all right where you are. We are doing fine here. Floyd is being a little overprotective but Josie has figured out a way to get past him. Don’t worry. It’s not like we are trying to do anything wrong, we just don’t want him along. Mom gets to organize the Spring Fashion show next year. I bet she’s already told you. Holy Toledo, but it’s all she talks about. School is good. We’re going to a movie tonight—Above Suspicion. Wish you could go with us.
Kate
She couldn’t read any more. The tightness forming in her throat threatened to choke her if she did. To think—the everyday things she’d written to him when in a few short months he would go missing. She should have said more. Told him she loved him and was proud of him for what he was doing for the world.
As she was putting the letters back, her hand nudged the journal and she noticed a piece of paper sticking out. It was the drawing she had sent him of the amber necklace so he could have a copy made for Mom. Names and numbers were scrawled in the corner. She turned the page over and read the words: diamond and Elsie. A shiver traveled up her arms. Whenever Elsie was involved, the trail inevitably led to Kopciuszek. It was possible Dad stumbled upon a connection when he was looking for a matching amber necklace.
She flipped through the journal, sketch after sketch of the Italian countryside, some houses, some people. No drawings or other mention of a diamond. She closed the book and stroked her hand over the leather. It was Dad’s favorite brand of journal, but expensive. He liked to go outside, find a comfortable place to sit, and sketch with the 2B pencil that he always carried tucked into his shirt pocket. Her fingers traced over a bump sticking out of the spine near the binding. A rock must have gotten in. She needed to dig it out so it wouldn’t leave a dent in his sketches.
It was slow going, as she didn’t want to puncture the leather. But there was a small hole in the seam, and she worked and worked the small rock down until she could pick it out.
She gasped as she held it up to the window. It sparked with blue light like ice crystals on snow. That was some rock, all right.
It was the diamond.
Chapter Four
“You girls need anything?” Kate’s mom asked as she breezed through the apartment. “Josie? Anything you want me to tell your mom?”
“No, Mrs. Allen. Just that I’ll see her later.”
“All right. And Nessa, thanks for taking Kate to the airport later today. Josie’s mom had me committed to this fund-raiser weeks ago. You girls enjoy.”
The door shut, and Josie jumped up to turn on the radio. She danced a little jitterbug back to the sofa where the girls were working. Nessa had come over to help teach Josie how to tat lace. Apparently tatting was also a skill passed down in the Kolodenko family.
Aunt Elsie had taught Kate the art of lace-making as part of her education to be the Keeper. The ball gown was trimmed in lace, as was the matching shawl. Kate needed to know how to fix any holes that might develop and teach the next Keeper how to make the complicated pattern. Despite being all thumbs at first, Kate had developed quite a talent for it. The rhythm of the shuttle and the thread felt comforting. But Josie was having as much trouble getting started as she had.
“It won’t flip,” Josie complained. She was firmly planted between the two of them, which was appropriate, since she liked being in the middle of the action.
Kate held back her giggle. She knew exactly how frustrating it was to try to get the thread from the shuttle hand to flip onto
the ball thread as you gently pulled. “Loosen your left hand. You’re holding it too tight.”
“Honestly. If I loosen it, it falls off my fingers.”
Nessa held out her hands to demonstrate. “You’ll get the hang of it with practice. Are you nervous, Kate? I know I’d be, meeting my boyfriend’s mother for the first time as he flies off in a plane, leaving you there, having to, what is the word?” She leaned over and asked Josie.
“Chitchat.”
“Yes, chitchat.”
“I wasn’t very nervous until you brought it up.”
“Nah, it works out perfectly, since we’re coming along,” Josie piped up. “You get to say good-bye, and meet the mom, with the support of your good friends to back you up. Then later we all get to help Nessa do more shopping.”
Nessa and her grandmother were returning to Italy via ship later in the week so Nessa could finish getting ready to move to America for college. Their current trip to New York had been unexpected, as they left straight from a vacation in France when they’d seen a photo of the famous Cinderella Window in the fashion papers. They had thought they’d lost the dress forever until that photo appeared. Nessa wasn’t prepared to stay in New York. She wanted to go home for the summer and finish her packing.
And before they left, they wanted to get in a few more purchases. Apparently certain goods were still hard to come by in Europe.
“Girls, that reminds me,” Nessa said. “Did you hear the news? Princess Elizabeth is engaged. There have been rumors about it for ages, but now it is official. I must find something to wear to the wedding.”
Josie’s mouth gaped. “You got an invitation to the wedding of the future queen of England?”
“Not yet, but we go to all the royal weddings. I’m sure we’ll get one.” Nessa said it without any guile as she continued to study her tatting pattern. Being used to such events, she couldn’t relate to how that would sound to two average girls living average lives in an average apartment building in New York.
Looking bug-eyed at Kate, Josie grinned. “I hate when I don’t have the right dress to wear. You don’t want to overshadow the bride, but with all the royals, you can’t be demure either.”
Nessa looked up and smiled at Josie. “Exactly. You understand my problem.”
Josie winked at Kate. “Why don’t you wear the ball gown from the Cinderella windows?” she suggested.
Kate pulled too tightly on her thread and made a knot. The Cinderella dress wasn’t a dress to be worn willy-nilly. She picked out the knot, listening for Nessa’s response.
“I hadn’t thought of that,” Nessa said. “What a great idea. I’ll have to ask Babcia what she thinks.”
No, not a great idea. Nessa didn’t know enough about the dress to wear it in public yet. What if something happened to it? The princess would have to take it to England all by herself and get it back to Kate in one piece.
“Isn’t a ball gown too fancy for a wedding?” Kate asked.
“A royal wedding,” corrected Josie.
“I’ll see what the other girls are planning to wear before I decide.”
The knot in the lace Kate had been working on fell out, and with it the little bit of tension she had been feeling. She was being overly protective. Nessa always dressed immaculately and was driven around by a chauffeur. Surely the girl could manage a ball gown. Or Kate could travel with her. She would hobnob with the other servants in the back halls of Buckingham Palace while they waited for the dancing to be over. Kate hadn’t realized how much she still didn’t know about the Kolodenkos’ expectations of her until now. Since she hadn’t grown up knowing the secret, she had a lot to learn. It seemed everyone assumed she knew what she was doing. They forget that Elsie’s explanations were spotty at best.
“That’s one problem solved,” Josie said. “Kate, did you ever figure out what Floyd’s strange message was about?” Josie returned her focus to her tatting, but Nessa looked up sharply.
“What strange message?”
Kate kept her eyes on her shuttle and thread. She hadn’t planned on telling anyone about the diamond until she had worked out its purpose, and why her dad had hidden it inside his sketchbook. It was such an unusual gem. A blue diamond. She wouldn’t have known it was a diamond if Floyd hadn’t said so. She wanted to take it to Tiffany to see what the jewelers there thought of it. They had the famous canary-yellow diamond in the store, but she didn’t want them asking any questions. She’d learned her lesson with the dresses—unusual things should be kept secret until you knew all the facts.
Having to keep secrets about killed Josie, so Kate was reluctant to say anything to her. If the diamond were an anniversary gift for Mom, no big deal. But if the diamond were linked to something else, like the reason Dad went missing in action, that would be a detail she should keep quiet until Floyd could give her more information.
“Kate? What message?”
“Oh, uh . . .” she started. She pretended to be sidetracked by a particularly difficult stitch in her tatting. Could Nessa be trusted? Her own mother and grandmother hadn’t told her about the Cinderella dresses until a few weeks ago. It was Nessa’s older sister who’d known about them and was to inherit them. Kate looked up to see both girls staring at her. If only Josie hadn’t said anything. But how was her friend to know the underlying currents in her family?
“Her brother sent her a cryptic telegram mentioning the words ‘Dad’s box’ and ‘diamond.’” Josie put down her tatting and opened her eyes wide at Nessa. “What do you make of that?”
“Who’s he in cahoots with?” Nessa said, looking to Josie for slang approval. “Diamonds are one of my favorite topics.”
“The message didn’t make much sense,” Kate said. “Hopefully he’ll send a follow-up letter explaining it better.”
“But if he sent a telegram, timing is important,” Nessa persisted.
Kate avoided looking at Josie. “We searched in his toolbox but didn’t find anything.”
“Where else could we look?” Nessa asked, pulling her thread taut to close off a ring. She stood, hands on hips, to survey the apartment. “We’ll help.”
“No, it’s okay. Floyd’ll send a follow-up letter. With him, the message could mean anything.”
“Does your brother often play tricks?” Nessa asked. “I’ve only a sister to compare, and she wasn’t much for tricks. She was always so serious.” She blinked rapidly, her brown eyes swimming with tears. “I am sorry, it still hits me every so often.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” Josie asked.
Nessa shook her head so slightly, Kate knew it was a sensitive subject. It was the same way she felt when well-meaning friends wanted her to talk about what happened to her dad.
Lots of people refused to discuss what happened during the war. It was as if they needed time to process, and if they spoke about it too soon, they’d be releasing the memories too quickly.
“We should probably get ready,” Kate said. She put her tatting supplies into a bag.
Josie grabbed Kate by the shoulders and shoved her in the direction of the bathroom. “Hair and makeup first,” she said. “This is the last time you’ll be seeing your honey for a while and you want to leave the right lasting impression.”
“Honestly, Josie.” Kate rolled her eyes.
“May I remind you about Italian girls? Starving for some fun after a brutal war?” She put her hands on her hips. “Trust me on this. I’ve seen how flirty my sister can get.”
Kate caught Nessa’s eye, and the two burst out laughing.
“What? What did I say?” Josie asked.
Giggling, Kate answered. “How flirty your sister can get? How about you?”
Josie gave an exaggerated bow. “Fine. I stand accused. But you know I’m right. Let me just tidy you up a little.”
As Josie set to work, Kate tried not to let Josie’s words get to her. Johnny never seemed to pay too much attention to the girls who were trying to be noticed, but some girls were
awfully persistent. Like Fran. How long could he hold out before he noticed them? Her?
Either Kate and Johnny’s letters would sustain them over the summer, or things would fizzle. She’d never perfumed her letters, but this summer she might need to.
Chapter Five
Nessa had a hired car that she had been using during her visit to New York. A smooth Cadillac with a divider window separating them from the chauffeur just like in the movies. Kate and Josie were surely seeing a side of life they had only dreamed of before. Kate glanced at Josie’s rapturous expression as she burrowed into the tan leather seats, and she stifled a giggle. Josie might never recover.
“Sorry about this, Kate,” Nessa said for the hundredth time on the way to the Memorial Hospital. “I tried to explain we were in a hurry, but my babcia wouldn’t listen. She wants to see where the planes leave America.”
“We’ll still make it,” Kate said, hoping her voice sounded more optimistic than she felt. They were driving so slowly she could watch the car’s reflection in the buildings they passed. When the turrets of the castle-like hospital came into view, she volunteered to run up and get Princess Kolodenko.
The atmosphere in the tower room was subdued, with nurses walking whisper-quietly between beds. Elsie’s eyes were closed, her white hair fanned out over her pillow. Princess Kolodenko was rubbing hand cream into her friend’s gnarled fingers while Uncle Adalbert sat opposite like a sentinel, reading his paper. He nodded at Kate as she approached.
“Hi,” Kate whispered as she pulled up a chair. “Is she asleep?”
“No, just relaxed,” Princess Kolodenko said. In silence, she continued to massage Elsie’s hands. She pressed her thumb into her friend’s palm, stroke after stroke.
Kate tried not to tap her foot to show it was time to go.
Elsie cracked open her eyes. When she saw Kate, she smiled and closed her eyes again. “That girl, you are,” she said in Polish, her voice quiet like she was waking from a dream, or falling into one.
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