It was after eight o'clock before she left them that night. As she did, Father Tim was standing at the door, talking to a policeman. He had just brought a little girl in, she was two years old, and she had been raped by her father. Grace hated cases like that … at least she had been thirteen … but she had seen babies at St. Mary's who had been raped and sodomized by their fathers.
“Rough day?” Father Tim asked sympathetically, as the policeman left.
“Good day.” She smiled at him. She had spent most of it with kids, and then the last few hours, talking to some of the women, just being there, listening, trying to give them the courage to do what they had to. No one could do it for them. The police could help. But it was up to them to save themselves. And maybe, if she talked to enough of them, she told herself, they wouldn't have to go to the same lengths she had. They wouldn't have to wind up in prison to be free. It was her way of repaying the debt, of atoning for a sin she knew her mother would never have forgiven her for. But she had had no choice, and she didn't regret it. She just didn't want anyone else to have to pay the same price she had.
“You run a great place here,” she complimented him. She liked it even better than St. Mary's. It was livelier, and in some ways warmer.
“It's only as great as the people who work here. Can I interest you in coming back? Sister Eugene says you're terrific.”
“So is she.” The nun had been tireless working there all day, as was everyone Grace had seen. She liked everyone she had met there. “I don't think you'll be able to keep me away.” She had already signed up for two nights that week and the following Sunday. “I can come in on Thanksgiving too,” she said easily.
“You're not going home?” He looked surprised. She was awfully young to be so unencumbered.
“No home to go to,” she said without hesitation. “It's not a big deal. I'm used to it.” He watched her eyes, and nodded. There was a lot there that she wasn't saying.
“We'd love to have you.” The holidays were always rough for people with bad home situations, and the number of people they saw come in often doubled. “It's always a zoo here.”
“That's just what I want. See you next week, Father,” she said, as she signed out on the logbook. She was going to be reporting to Sister Eugene, and she was thrilled that she'd come here. It was exactly what she wanted.
“God bless you, Grace,” Father Tim said as she left.
“You too, Father,” she called, and closed the door behind her.
It was a long, cold, somewhat scary walk back to the subway again, threading her way through the bums and the drunks, and young hoods looking for fun. But no one bothered her, and half an hour later, she was home, walking down First Avenue to her apartment She was tired from her long day, but she felt renewed again, and as though at least for some, the horrors in her life had been useful. For Grace, knowing that always made the pain she carried seem worthwhile. At least it wasn't wasted.
Chapter 10
Grace spent Thanksgiving at St. Andrew's Shelter, as she'd promised them. She even helped to cook the turkey. And after that, she fell into a familiar routine, of going down there on Tuesday and Friday nights, and all day Sunday. Fridays were always busy for them, because it was the beginning of the weekend, and paychecks had come in. Husbands who were prone to violence went out and got drunk and then came home and beat their women. She found that she never left the shelter before two a.m., and sometimes later. And on Sundays, they were trying to deal with all the women and kids who had come in over the weekend. It seemed like it was only on Tuesday nights that she and Sister Eugene had a chance to chat. The two women had become good friends by Christmas. Sister Eugene had even asked her if she'd ever thought of herself as having a vocation.
“Oh my God, no! I can't even imagine it.” Grace looked stunned at the idea.
“It's not very different from what you're doing now, you know.” Sister Eugene smiled at her. “You give an awful lot of yourself to others … and to God … no matter how you view it.”
“I don't think it's quite as saindy as all that,” Grace smiled, embarrassed at what the nun was saying.
“I'm just repaying some old debts. People were good to me at one point, as much as I let them. I'd like to think that I can pass it on to others now.” Not very many people had been good to her. But a few had. And she wanted to be one of the few people in these people's anguished lives who made a difference. And she did. But not enough so to want to give her life to God, only to battered women and children.
“Do you have a boyfriend?” Sister Eugene had asked her once, giggling like a girl, and Grace had laughed at the question. Sister Eugene was curious about her life and Grace seldom offered any information. She was very closed about herself, but she felt safer that way.
“I'm not much good with men,” Grace said honestly. “It's not my forte. I'd rather come here and do something useful.”
And she did. She spent Christmas and New Year's with them, and sometimes she had a kind of peaceful glow on her face after she'd been there. Winnie noticed it sometimes at work and always thought it was a man in her life. She seemed so happy and so at ease with herself. But it came from giving to others, and sitting up all night with a battered child in her arms, crooning to it, and holding it, as no one had ever done for her. She wanted more than anything to make a difference in these children's lives, and she did.
Finally, after they'd worked together for nearly five months, Winnie asked her to lunch on a Sunday, and Grace was really touched but she explained to her that she had a standing obligation on Sundays. She would never have canceled. They met on a Saturday instead. They met at Schrafft's on Madison Avenue and then walked over to watch the skaters at Rockefeller Center.
“What do you do on Sundays?” Winnie asked her curiously, still convinced that Grace probably had a boyfriend. She was a pretty girl, and she was so young. There had to be someone.
“I work on Delancey Street, at a home for battered women and kids,” she explained, as they watched women in short skirts swirl on the ice, and children fall and laugh as they chased their parents and friends. They looked like such happy children.
“You do?” Winnie looked surprised by Grace's admission. “Why?” She couldn't imagine a girl as young and beautiful as Grace doing something so difficult and so dismal.
“I do it because I think it's important. I work there three times a week. It's a great place. I love it,” Grace said, smiling at Winnie.
“Have you always done that?” Winnie asked her in amazement, and Grace nodded, still smiling.
“For a long time anyway. I did it in Chicago too, but actually I like the place here better. It's called St. Andrew's.” And then she laughed and told her about Sister Eugene suggesting she become a nun.
“Oh my Lord,” Winnie looked horrified, “you're not going to do that, are you?”
“No. But they seem pretty happy. It's not for me though. I'm happy doing what I can like this.”
“Three days a week is an awful lot. You must not have a lot of time to do anything else.”
“I don't. I don't want to. I enjoy my work, I enjoy working at St. Andrew's. I've got Saturdays if I need time to myself, and a couple of nights a week. I don't need more than that.”
“That's not healthy,” Winnie scolded her. “A girl of your age ought to be out having fun. You know, with boys,” she scolded Grace in a motherly way, and Grace laughed at her. She liked her. She liked working with her. She was responsible and efficient and she really cared about “her” partners, and Grace. She acted almost like a mother to her.
“I'm all right. Honest. I'll have plenty of time for boys when I grow up,” Grace teased, but Winnie shook her head at her, and wagged a finger.
“That comes a lot faster than you think. I took care of my parents, all my life, and now my mother's in a home in Philadelphia, so she can be with my aunt, and I'm all alone here. My father's gone, and I never got married. By the time he died and Mama went to Philadelphia
to be with Aunt Tina, I was too old.” She sounded so sad about it that Grace felt sorry for her. Grace suspected that she was very lonely, which was why she'd met her for lunch. “You'll regret it one day, Grace, if you don't get married, and have a life of your own before that.”
“I'm not sure I will.” She had come to think re-cendy that she really didn't want to get married. She'd been burned enough, and even her brief encounters with men like Marcus, and Bob Swanson, and even her probation officer, had taught her something. She really didn't want any of it. And the nice ones like David and Paul still didn't make her feel any different. They were both good men, but she really didn't want one. She was satisfied to be alone. She didn't make any effort to meet men, or to have any life other than her volunteer work at St. Andrew's.
Which was why she was utterly amazed when one of the other junior partners, who worked in an office near hers, asked her out to dinner one day. She knew he was a friend of the tax men she worked for, and he was recendy divorced and very good-looking. But she had no interest at all in going out with him, or anyone else at work.
He had stopped at her desk at lunch hour one day, and in an embarrassed undervoice had asked her if she would like to have dinner with him the following Friday. She explained that she did volunteer work on Friday nights, and couldn't but she didn't look particularly pleased that he had asked her, and he retreated, looking awkward and feeling somewhat embarrassed.
She was even more surprised when one of her bosses asked her the next afternoon why she had turned Hallam Ball down when he asked her out to dinner. “Hal's a really nice guy,” he explained, “and he likes you,” as though that were all he needed to qualify for a date. None of them could understand her refusal.
“I … uh … that's very nice of him, and I'm sure he is.” She was stammering. It was embarrassing having to explain why she had refused him. “I don't go out with people at work. It's never a good idea,” she said firmly, and the young partner nodded.
“That's what I told him. I figured it was something like that. That's smart, actually, it's just too bad, because I think you'd like him, and he's been really down since the divorce last summer.”
“I'm sorry to hear it,” she said coolly. And then Winnie scolded her and said that Hallam Ball was one of the most eligible men in the law firm, and she was a very foolish girl. She warned her that she'd be an old maid if she didn't watch it.
“Good.” Grace smiled at her. “I can hardly wait. Then no one will ask me out anymore, and I won't have to think up excuses.”
“You're crazy!” Winnie scolded. “Silly fool,” she clucked at her, and grumbled, and when a legal assistant asked her out the following month and Grace turned him down too, and gave the same reason, Winnie went absolutely crazy. “You are the most foolish girl I've ever known!” the older woman railed at her. “I'm absolutely not going to let you do this! He's an adorable boy, and he's even as tall as you are!” Grace only laughed at her reasoning and refused to reconsider, and in a very short period of time, it became well known that Grace Adams did not date men from the office. Most of them figured that she had a boyfriend or was engaged, and a few decided to meet the challenge. But she never changed her mind, and she never gave anyone a different answer. No matter how attractive they were, or how seemingly interested, she never accepted their invitations. In fact, she seemed totally indifferent to all men. And a number of people wondered about her.
“And just how do you plan to get married?” Winnie almost shouted at her one afternoon as they were about to leave work.
“I don't plan to get married, Win. Simple as that.” Grace looked touched but unmoved by the older woman's concern for her. Winnie was livid.
“Then you should become a nun!” Winnie yelled at her. “You practically are one.”
“Yes, ma'am,” Grace said with a good-natured smile, and Bill, one of “their” partners, raised an eyebrow as he left his office and overheard them. He agreed with Winnie and felt that Grace was missing opportunities. Youth and beauty couldn't last forever.
“Fighting in the aisles, ladies?” he teased, putting on his coat and grabbing his umbrella. It was March and it hadn't stopped raining in weeks. But at least it wasn't snowing.
“She's a damn fool!” Winnie exclaimed, huffing into her own overcoat and getting all tangled up in it as Grace helped her and the partner laughed at them.
“Grace? My goodness, Grace, what did you do to Winnie?”
“She won't go out with anyone, that's what!” She yanked her coat away from Grace, and buttoned it incorrectly, as the two watching her tried to keep straight faces. “She'll wind up an old maid like me, and she's much too young and pretty for that.” But Grace saw then that she was almost crying, and she leaned over and kissed her cheek in genuine affection. She was almost like a mother to her at times, and a dear friend at others.
“She probably has a boyfriend, you know,” he said soothingly to the older of his two secretaries. In fact, recently, he had started wondering if Grace was involved with someone married. Her constant refusals of all the young men in the office sort of fit the pattern. “She's probably keeping it a secret.” He no longer believed that her reticence was entirely caused by virtue and clear thinking, there had to be more to it than that, and several of the other junior partners agreed with him.
Winnie looked up at her and Grace smiled and said nothing, which immediately convinced Winnie that he was right, and that maybe there was a married man in her life after all.
The two women left each other in the lobby and said good night, and Grace went downtown to Delan-cey Street and spent the night caring for the needy.
And the next morning, she looked tired when she came to work, which convinced Winnie that their boss was right, and she had been up to some mischief the night before. Grace actually thought she was coming down with the flu. After her long walk down Delancey Street in the pouring rain, to get to St. Andrew's, she got soaking wet. And she was in no mood for the favor the personnel director asked her for at lunchtime. She got a call at eleven o'clock and was asked to come to his office. She was concerned, and Winnie was clearly worried. She couldn't imagine what he might be complaining about, unless one of the men she'd turned down had decided to make trouble for her. She had lived through that before, and it certainly wouldn't have surprised her.
“Now don't tell him anything you don't have to,” Winnie warned her as she went upstairs. But he wasn't calling to complain, but to praise her.
He told her she was doing a marvelous job, and everyone in her department liked her, as did the two partners she worked for.
“In fact,” he said hesitandy, “I have a little favor to ask of you, Grace. I know how disruptive it can be to have to leave one's work for a little while, and I know Tom and Bill won't be pleased. But Miss Waterman had an accident last night, on the subway. She slipped on the stairs, and broke her hip. She's going to be out for two months, maybe even three. It sounds like it was pretty nasty. She's at Lenox Hill, and her sister called us. You do know her, don't you?” Grace was racking her memory and couldn't think of who she was. Obviously, one of the secretaries in the law firm. She wondered if it would be a step up or down, and whom she worked for. She only hoped that it wasn't one of the men who had asked her out to dinner. That certainly would have been awkward.
“I don't think I do know her,” Grace looked at him blankly.
“She works for Mr. Mackenzie,” the personnel director said solemnly, as though that said it all. And Grace looked confused as she faced him.
“Which Mr. Mackenzie?” she asked, continuing not to understand him.
“Mr. Charles Mackenzie,” he said, as though she were very stupid. Charles Mackenzie was one of the three senior partners of the law firm.
“Are you kidding?” She almost shouted at him. “Why me? I can't even take dictation.” Her voice was suddenly squeaky. She was comfortable where she was, and she didn't want to be under that kind of pressure.
“You ta
ke fast notes, and the partners you work for said your skills are excellent. And Mr. Mackenzie is very definite about what he wants.” He looked uncomfortable because he wasn't supposed to admit it to anyone, but Charles Mackenzie hated grumpy old secretaries who complained about working late, and his constant demands. The job needed someone young to keep up with him, but the personnel man couldn't say that to her. As a rule, Mackenzie preferred his secretaries under thirty. And even Grace had heard that. “He wants someone fast, who's doing an excellent job and won't get in his way, while Miss Waterman is gone. And of course as soon as she returns, you can go back where you are, Grace. It's just for a couple of months.” He probably wanted to get laid, she thought miserably. She knew his kind. And she didn't want to play. She loved her job, and working with Winnie. And the two partners she worked for were no trouble at all. They scarcely paid any attention to her, which was why she liked them.
“Do I have a choice?” she asked with an unhappy frown.
“Not really,” he said honestly, “We presented three résumés to him this morning, and he chose yours. It would be very difficult to explain to him that you didn't want it.” He looked at her mournfully. He hadn't expected her to resist him. It would look bad for him if she refused, and Charles Mackenzie was not used to being told he couldn't have what he wanted.
“Great” She leaned back in the chair unhappily.
“I'm sure we could arrange for a raise, commensurate with the position you're filling.” But that didn't really sweeten it for her. More than anything she didn't want to work for some old guy who wanted to chase a twenty-two-year-old secretary around his desk. She really did not want to do that. And if he did, she would quit immediately. She'd have to start looking for another job. She'd try it for a few days, and if the guy was a jerk, she was going, but she didn't say that to the head of personnel. She just made up her own mind in silence.
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