Angels of Mercy

by Duncan, Alice

  “Oh. Yes, I suppose I’m still a little wan. But I’m feeling better than I did only a week or so ago, so that’s a good thing.”

  “A very good thing. I hope you’re eating well and taking lots of fresh air and exercise.”

  “God, Mercy, you sound like my doctor.”

  “The doctor knows best, Chloe. I hope you’re eating apples. I read in some article somewhere that that old saying ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away’ really applies. Apples are supposed to be very healthy for ladies in your condition.”

  “Pregnant, you mean?” Chloe occasionally got peeved with me about what she called my prissiness. So did Ernie.”

  “Yes. Pregnant women.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m eating tons of apples. I got really constipated, and the doc said to eat apples for it. I must have eaten ten pounds of apples in the last week.”

  Ick. I hadn’t really wanted to know about Chloe’s bowel problems, although I was pleased to know they were being solved, and by a remedy recommended by me, at that. “Good. Glad to know you’re feeling better.”

  “Hey, Mercy, Harvey and I are going to dinner tonight at the Ambassador, and I thought we’d stop by to see how you’re getting along. You hired a cook and that guy who cleans at the Figueroa Building as handyman, right?”

  “Yes. The Bucks. And so far they’re working out really well. Mrs. Buck can cook better than anyone I’ve ever known.”

  “Even Mrs. Biddle?”

  Mrs. Biddle was the Nashes’ housekeeper and an excellent cook in her own right.

  “Well, Mrs. Buck cooks as well as Mrs. Biddle, anyway.”

  “Glad to hear it. Is it okay if we stop by?”

  “Of course! I miss you, Chloe.”

  “I miss you, too, Mercy. In fact, I wish you’d agreed to move to Beverly Hills with us. God knows the house is big enough for an army to live in, and I just keep rattling around in it and feeling sorry for myself.”

  “Aw, Chloe, don’t feel sorry for yourself. In a few months, you’ll have a brand new baby to love.”

  It was kind of flattering to know I was missed, but I didn’t like the note of loneliness in Chloe’s voice. What she needed to do was get a job. I was never lonely because I got to go to work every day and meet people. I sensed she wouldn’t appreciate a suggestion along those lines, so I said only, “It’ll be wonderful to see you and Harvey again.”

  “Want to go to dinner at the Ambassador with us?” I detected a hopeful lift in her voice.

  “I’m sorry, Chloe. Mrs. Buck’s already got dinner cooking, and I want to do a few things in the house. I’ll show you when you get there. What’s more, I have two more tenants! That makes three, counting Lulu.”

  “Wow, I’m impressed. You worked fast. Are you sure about these women? They are women, aren’t they?”

  “Of course, they are! I wouldn’t rent rooms to a gentleman.”

  “It’s the guys who aren’t gentlemen you need to worry about,” said my sister drily.

  “I know that.” Darn it, did Chloe, too, think I’d just come across the Atlantic on the boat that transported the Puritans? Probably. What a lowering reflection.

  “Just teasing,” said Chloe, who might have meant it, although I know she tended toward Ernie’s conviction that I was too naïve for my own good.

  “Do you know what time you’ll stop by?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Probably somewhere around ten, if that’s not too late. This stupid dinner is for some bigwigs on the picture Harvey’s studio is going to produce next. All sorts of stars will be there. It’s sort of an opening gesture, welcoming them all to the Nash Studio fold or something like that. Harvey told me, but I don’t remember everything he said. All I know is that John Barrymore will be there, and so will his sister Ethel.”

  “I hope Mr. Barrymore behaves himself.”

  “He’ll have to. The Ambassador honors Prohibition.”

  “Really? I’m surprised.”

  “They have to,” said Chloe. “It’s a public place. I’m sure lots of drinking goes on in the rooms they rent, but they can’t overtly serve alcohol in their dining room.”

  “That makes sense. Sure, come on over at tennish. I don’t have to work tomorrow, because tomorrow’s Saturday.”

  “You don’t have to work on days other than Saturdays, either,” Chloe reminded me. She didn’t disapprove of my working as our mother did, but she didn’t see any point to it. After all, as she’d pointed out approximately seven hundred times before, I didn’t need the money.”

  “I love—”

  “I know,” she said with the hint of a sigh. “You love your job. How’s Ernie, by the way?”

  “He’s fine. He’s . . . but I’ll tell you all about it tonight.”

  “On a case, is he?”

  “You betcha. It’s a good one, too.”

  “All right, then. See you tonight, Mercy.”

  “Bye, Chloe.”

  Oh, boy. I wanted to know what Chloe thought about my plans for her former home. Besides, I honestly did miss her.

  Chapter Five

  I learned shortly after their arrival that Chloe and Harvey didn’t merely want to see how their former house was getting along under my supervision.

  “Your Roadster!” I all but bellowed. “I can’t take your Roadster, Chloe!”

  “Why not?” asked my sister, grinning like an imp. Chloe was very pretty. She had lovely blond hair and perfectly regular features with an oval face and blue eyes and looked very much like a rather languid angel. To all these assets with which she was born, she also had a fabulous fashion sense, a great hairdresser, and always looked like a million bucks. Maybe more. She was lots prettier than I, but neither of us cared a hoot about that. We loved each other. “It’s way past time you learned to drive, Mercy, and I’ll pay for your instruction. If, of course, Ernie doesn’t decide to teach you himself.”

  “Ernie?” I said, dumbfounded.

  “Sure.” Chloe gave me a sly wink. “I bet Ernie would love to teach you how to drive.”

  Chloe was positive there was more to Ernie’s and my relationship than that of employer and employee. Besides, she liked him a lot, so I suspect she wished her suspicions were true, even though they weren’t.

  “But . . . but, Chloe, you need your machine.”

  “Not that one, she doesn’t,” said Harvey, also grinning at me. “It’s too small.” He put his arm protectively around Chloe, who returned the favor. “Pretty soon, she’s going to have a wee tyke to care for, and I want her and the child to be absolutely safe.”

  “You think the Roadster is unsafe?” I asked weakly.

  “No, he doesn’t,” said Chloe, elbowing her husband in the ribs.

  Harvey only grinned some more. He was very excited about his impending fatherhood. “But I want Chloe to have a big car with a chauffeur, so she won’t have to divide her attention between the kid and the road, if you see what I mean.”

  “Oh,” I said, still bewildered. “I guess I understand that.”

  And just wait until I told Lulu Chloe’d given me her Roadster. She’d probably faint. The gap between the rich and the poor in what was supposed to be a nation of equals flashed through my mind, but I resolutely shoved it aside. It wasn’t Chloe’s fault she’d married a rich man, any more than it was my fault I’d been born to a rich family. Well, so had Chloe. But I just want you to know I understand how unequal everything was. Still is, for that matter. But there I go: wandering off the topic again.

  “He bought me a brand new 1926 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost,” said Chloe, a touch of awe in her voice. “He had it shipped to Los Angeles all the way from England.”

  “Oh, my!” Inequities aside, boy, was I impressed. I’d seen pictures of the Rolls Silver Ghost, and it was some machine. Not that Chloe’s Moon Roadster was any slouch in the automobile department. A 1924 model, it had been the latest thing until now, two years later. Shoot, the car was practically new. “But do you really want to give me th
e Roadster? Can’t I buy it from you? It’s such a . . . a huge gift. I mean, all I’m giving you guys for Christmas is a poodle.”

  Both Chloe and Harvey laughed at that, and I decided it had been a silly thing to say. But . . . my own automobile? Good Lord. And I couldn’t even drive.

  “Take it and learn to drive, Mercy,” said Chloe. “Consider it a gift from me because I miss you so much, and now you’ll be able to visit me more often.”

  I threw my arms around my sister. Since she and Harvey still encircled each other’s waists, this meant that poor Harvey got jostled a bit. Still, what a lovely gesture. In fact, I got a little teary.

  “I don’t know how to thank you,” I said with a sniffle.

  “You don’t have to thank us,” said Harvey, straightening his tie, which I guess I’d knocked askew when I’d knocked him askew.

  “I’m sorry, Harvey,” said I, contrite. “I didn’t mean to shove you.”

  “That’s perfectly all right,” said the ever-genial Harvey. “It’s nice for me to see sisters who love each other. My own two sisters haven’t spoken to each other in decades.”

  “Really? That’s hard to imagine.” I felt sorry for Harvey and his sisters.

  Chloe tutted. “Honestly, Mercy, you sound like a Salvation Army lady. Would you speak to George if you didn’t have to?”

  As mentioned earlier, George was our awful brother. I felt my lip curl. “Right. If either of your sisters is as horrible as George, Harvey, I don’t blame them for not speaking to each other.”

  “They’re both horrible,” said Harvey. “I don’t like either one of ‘em, so I don’t talk to them, either.”

  Goodness. Small wonder Harvey was looking forward to creating a family of his own, since his birth family seemed to have failed him in the companionship department.

  “Well,” said Chloe, yawning. “I’m tired. So show me all these wonderful changes you’ve made, and then Harvey and I need to get home.”

  Home. Oh, my. Until a little more than a week ago, this had been Chloe’s home. Feeling a trifle sad, I led her and Harvey through the house, pointing out pictures I’d put on the walls and rugs I’d bought for the tenants’ rooms. I’d decided that, while I was renting out apartments, the furnishings still belonged to me, so I’d chosen things I liked.

  “Good Lord, is that a Bukhara?” Chloe stared at the carpet upon which she stood, which graced the floor that would be, after tomorrow, Lulu LaBelle’s sitting room.

  “I think so,” I said, squinting down at the rug. “I bought it because it’s pretty. I’m not sure where it came from. Somewhere in Persia, I guess.”

  “I guess. It must have cost a fortune.”

  I shrugged. “Even though I’m renting apartments, this is still my home.” I smiled at the thought. My home. All my own. No Mother to boss me around. No Father to look at me over his spectacles as if I were a worm he’d have squished if I didn’t belong to him. Mine, all mine.

  “Good taste,” muttered Harvey, eyeing the rug with a connoisseur’s taste. Harvey was the chief decorator in the Nash household, Chloe not much caring one way or another how her home was furnished as long as she didn’t have to do it herself. Not that Chloe was lazy, exactly. She was, however, a trifle indolent, and if she didn’t have to do something, she was happy. “I think this one’s Caucasian,” he continued. “I recognize the pattern. It’s gorgeous.”

  “Thanks, Harvey.” I didn’t know the difference between a Caucasian rug and a rug from Bukhara, but I was pleased to know Harvey approved.

  “Where’d you get it?” he asked.

  “At a little store in Chinatown.”

  His eyes opened wide. “Really? What’s the name of the place? I’ll have to pay them a visit.”

  “Chung Lo’s,” I said. “Um . . . I paid twenty-five dollars for it. Did I get taken for a sucker?”

  “Twenty-five bucks for this?” Harvey’s eye’s popped wide open. They appeared huge behind his eyeglasses. “Good God, Mercy, if this is genuine, you got the deal of the century!”

  I perked up. “That’s nice to know.”

  Harvey knelt on the floor, lifted up a corner of the rug and peered at it closely. He shook his head. “By God, you have an original antique Caucasian rug here, Mercy. I’ve got to visit that place. Let me write down the name.” So he took a notebook from his breast pocket and wrote Chung Lo’s name and approximate direction on it.

  “Are you sure you want this to be in Lulu’s room?” asked Chloe. “If the rug’s worth that much, maybe you ought to move it to your room.”

  “That’s not very nice,” I said, although I’d been thinking the same thing.

  “Nuts. You need to protect your investment,” said my sister, who’d never had to worry about an investment in her life. Well, neither had I, but it seemed I’d actually purchased something worth a little money, and somehow that made a difference.

  “Let’s take a look at the rug in Mercy’s room,” said Harvey reasonably. “If this rug is worth more than that one, we can switch them.”

  “Who’s going to switch them?” asked Chloe doubtfully.

  I looked at Harvey, who gazed back at me.

  “Harvey and I can do it,” I said with conviction. “Heck, Chloe, these rugs aren’t that heavy.”

  “I don’t want Chloe helping,” Harvey said firmly.

  “Of course not,” I agreed. “Not in her delicate condition.”

  “Delicate condition!” Chloe sniffed. But I knew good and well she wouldn’t have helped lift anything even as relatively un-heavy as a rug from the Caucasus even if she weren’t pregnant.

  So we inspected the rug in my own sitting room. The way the house worked was that there were suites of rooms all over the place. Two suites, each containing a sitting room, bedroom, another room and bathroom had been built on each wing of the house. Along the broad upstairs corridor was another suite of rooms, only this one consisted of two sitting room/bedroom combinations. Attached to each sitting room/bedroom was a dressing room with a huge closet for clothing. A bathroom resided between the dressing rooms, so Caroline Terry and Peggy Wickstrom would be sharing a bathroom. Lulu and I would each have a bathroom to ourselves.

  Anyhow, I knew, because Lulu had told me, that this arrangement was much more luxurious than most boarding houses she’d lived in or seen. I hoped Miss Terry and Miss Wickstrom would agree, since they’d be the ones sharing the bathroom. I didn’t think they would mind, because their work schedules were each opposite the other.

  The Bucks shared a suite of rooms off the breakfast room downstairs. Their apartment consisted of a sitting room, a bathroom, a bedroom and a dressing room. They’d seemed pleased with their accommodations when I’d showed them where they’d live. I hadn’t actually interviewed the Bucks, since I already knew Mr. Buck (and so did Ernie). Well . . . to be honest, I didn’t interview the Bucks because I didn’t think of it.

  Anyhow, all that’s just to explain the arrangements. What we did was walk from Lulu’s apartment in the west wing to mine in the east wing. Harvey took a good gander at my rug, and he and I ended up switching the rugs.

  “Not that I don’t trust your friend to be neat and tidy,” said Harvey as we grunted, each holding one end of the rolled-up rug. “But there’s no sense in tempting fate.”

  “Lulu’s a good kid,” said Chloe, strolling behind us and yawning every now and then. “But can you imagine her dropping powder or lipstick all over that gorgeous rug? Makes one queasy.”

  Of course, according to Chloe, pretty much anything made her queasy. But she had a valid point, and so did Harvey. And Lulu did wear a whole lot of makeup.

  “So tell me about your other two tenants,” Chloe said as Harvey and I straightened the rug in Lulu’s sitting room.

  Pressing a hand to my back—the rug might not have weighed a whole lot compared to all the rest of the rugs in the world, but it had been plenty heavy enough for me—I told her about Caroline Terry and Peggy Wickstrom.

 
“Are you sure they’re women of upstanding character?” asked Harvey, who was doing a little panting and back-holding of his own.

  “Absolutely. In fact, Ernie interviewed Caroline in order to show me how to do it. I interviewed Peggy myself.”

  That explanation seemed to satisfy my sister and her husband, and they shortly thereafter took their leave. Only then did it occur to me that I probably should have asked Mr. Buck to help Harvey move the rug. Oh, well. I’d learn how to handle this landlady business soon enough.

  * * * * *

  Lulu and her brother Rupert arrived early the next morning with Lulu’s belongings. There weren’t many of them.

  “Golly, Miss Allcutt, this place is swell,” said Rupert, gazing around in awe and admiration.

  He wasn’t as much of a hick as he sounded. In fact, he worked for a dear friend of mine, Mr. Francis Easthope, a costumier at Harvey’s studio, and Mr. Easthope had a swell home of his own. However, Lulu and Rupert came from a small town in Oklahoma where, from what I’d been able to gather, the height of entertainment was tipping over outhouses on Halloween. Rupert definitely wasn’t blasé about the splendors of Los Angeles at this point in his young life.

  “Thanks, Rupert. I love it. I was so happy that Chloe and Harvey sold it to me. Although I miss Chloe a lot.”

  “Say,” said Lulu, putting down a battered suitcase at the foot of the staircase, “isn’t that Chloe’s machine out there in the drive?”

  “Oh! I forgot to tell you. Well, I haven’t seen you, but I should have told you right off.”

  “Quit babbling, Mercy, and tell me what?” Lulu demanded.

  That day she was clad in subdued clothing. I guess not even Lulu LaBelle wanted to move to new lodgings in fancy clothes and get them all dirty. In fact, she wore a pair of trousers that would probably have served her well as she rode horses in Oklahoma. If she rode horses there, which I’m not sure about.

  However, she was correct that I was babbling. “Chloe gave me her Roadster!” I cried with glee.

  “Mercy! She didn’t!” Lulu’s eyes nearly popped from their sockets.

  “She did! Harvey bought her a brand-new 1926 Rolls Royce Silver Ghost, and she gave me her 1924 Moon Roadster!”