Romancing the Past

by Darcy Burke

  “We hope you enjoy the special service.”

  “What is the occasion?”

  “Uh, well, I—”

  “It is a saint’s fiesta,” Seb supplied, his face stone.

  “What a wonderful fête,” Mrs. Cooper cooed. “I did not know this was how one celebrated.”

  “We strive to bring you the full Manila experience,” Moss said.

  “Saints in Chinatown, that’s us!” Mrs. Cooper ordered two bottles of Moet & Chandon—seven dollars Mex each—and returned to her table.

  “We may make a profit yet,” Moss told Seb.

  “I told you, it will work.” Seb assumed his most reassuring stance, and even his mustache held firm. “You should sit down and eat.”

  Moss could not remember when he was last hungry. “There is too much to do.”

  “That is why you are standing here.”

  They smiled at each other because Seb had always joked about how easy Moss’s job was—until he saw what it involved. Now he understood better than most that these five minutes of inaction were the exception.

  “Take advantage of the peace while you can,” Seb added. “You shall not have another lull until after the dinner service.”

  “If we have any food left for it.” No matter. If they needed more eggs, Moss would send someone out to buy them. It would be refreshing to trade the panic of today for the inconveniences of last week.

  Moss did as he was told and ate a full plate of baked beans that were practically candied and crêpes that were already rubbery. The dalandan butter sauce was perfect. They would have to use it again, maybe make it a signature.

  They packed the dining room solid from seven in the morning through one in the afternoon. Experienced servers like Ko glided between the tables, replacing soiled dishes with clean ones that begged to be filled again. Families ate, paused, and ate some more. A line formed through the lobby.

  Moss sent bellhops to the upstairs hallway to grab a few decorative settees and bring them down into the dining room to line the far outer wall. Those who claimed the extra seats balanced dishes on their laps as they gossiped and ate. As each table emptied, Fernando, José, or Anastasio led a team of omnibuses to wipe it down only seconds before fresh banqueteers claimed it.

  The kitchen staff had trouble washing dishes quickly enough, so patrons repurposed saucers like the small plates local Chinese restaurants used. The kitchen ran out of potatoes and bacon, so a pan of Vienna sausages replaced the hash. Luz’s bread was a hit. Tables claimed it by the loaf, along with bowls of dalandan butter and marmalade.

  When every cup of flour had been baked and eaten, Seb and Moss laughed and hugged each other in the kitchen, which amused the staff. By noon, the sugar ran out, which disappointed those who sweetened their calamansi juice or coffee. Moss apologized, but the regret did not reach his eyes.

  At half-one, all that the kitchen had left to offer was eggs: boiled eggs, scrambled eggs, poached eggs, and omelets. And that is exactly what Moss told Representative Holt when he and Colonel Wilder, the Chief of Police, showed up. Holt looked around at the clean dining room.

  “I want to see the real menu,” Holt said. “You have been skylarking me since I arrived, and I know why.”

  “All we have is eggs, sir.”

  “Show me your storeroom,” Colonel Wilder said.

  “Of course,” Moss said with a polite smile.

  “Search the whole place,” Holt directed. “Including that Cooper woman’s rooms.”

  “I cannot let you violate the privacy of my guests.” Though if the police went upstairs first, Fernando, José, and Anastasio might—just might—have enough time to sweep the storeroom.

  Holt beamed like he had caught Moss with his fly-buttons open at the maître d’hôtel station. “Start there, Wilder.”

  “Sir,” Moss said patiently, “please understand that I cannot let you into occupied rooms. You are welcome to search the others—though I am not sure what you are looking for.”

  “We shall tell you when we find it,” Holt answered for Wilder. “Step out of the way, North.”

  “There are ladies staying alone at the hotel,” Moss tried again. “Including Representative Holt’s granddaughter—”

  “She is safe at the editorial offices of the Manila Freedom, where, trust me, she is ready to make you the headline.”

  Moss smiled against the threat.

  When Colonel Wilder spoke, his voice was a soothing baritone compared to the shrill excitement of Holt: “We will announce ourselves properly before any guest, and they may vacate the room before we enter. But I do not need a warrant in Manila, Mr. North—not even against American property.”

  “Not that this hotel has any respect for American property,” Holt chipped. “And where’s your man, Lopa?”

  Seb was not Moss’s man, quite the opposite. “Judge Lopa does not interfere with the hotel’s daily operation.” He had finally headed home an hour ago.

  “We need to question him too.”

  “For what?” Moss drew in a breath and leaned close, as if betraying a confidence. Forgive me, Seb. “Lopa is merely a folly in the garden of the Oriente.”

  Holt hesitated, but his prejudice made it possible to believe the Filipino ornamental, and he let it go. Moss gently let out a sigh of relief, an eighth of a breath at a time.

  “Mr. North,” Wilder interjected. “If you will accompany my lieutenant to the David Street Station, he has some questions he would like to ask while my men are conducting the search.”

  “I cannot even stay to ensure respectful treatment of my guests?”

  Wilder said slowly and carefully: “I know who you are, and that is why David Street is a courtesy.”

  Instead of taking Moss directly to Bilibid, he meant.

  “By the book,” Wilder added. “Do you understand, Mr. North?”

  He would not be cuffed. He would not be jailed. And he would not return to the hotel if Wilder found a teaspoon of flour against him. “I understand.”

  Chapter 13

  The Grand Tour

  Della knew it would be an odd morning from the moment she knocked on her grandfather’s door. Though she had eaten Moss’s snack service not six hours before, she was hungry again by eight. She was about to suggest the delicious breakfast downstairs, but Holt had other ideas. “The dining room is flooded with commoners.”

  Good. Moss’s evidence would be consumed in no time.

  “I tell you, this hotel gets worse and worse by the day,” he continued. “A nasty business.”

  If getting the congressman out of the hotel would help Moss carry off his caper, she would gladly leave. “I shall fetch my bag. Clarke’s?” She could use some coffee.

  “Town, quick sticks,” her grandfather said. “The Palace.”

  The Marble Palace, or Ayuntamiento, was not really a palace. It was not even the residence of the governor-general, an honor reserved for Malacañang. No, it was just a municipal hall, albeit a grand one, fashioned after two Renaissance palazzos.

  Not that Della had seen it yet. So far, she had not been allowed to venture farther than the Escolta. She did know that it was close to the quartermaster-general’s office. “You will take me with you?”

  For the first time, her grandfather did not look annoyed by one of her questions. “Unless you do not want to go. I have made plans for us. For you.”

  “For me?” Della did not believe her eyes. “You have?”

  Her grandfather nodded unambiguously. “I have a friend at a paper. A contact. He’s willing to meet you, maybe give you some advice.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, Della.” Holt seemed more annoyed by her surprise than her parrot-like repartee. “I told you I would help you meet the right people while we were here, and I keep my promises. It has taken me a while to set it up.”

  “Why?” And why could he not have told her sooner?

  “Well, I first tried the Manila Times, but they wrote that one story about me, you
remember it—and, well, never mind.”

  “The Freedom has twice the circulation of the Times,” she said. “I would have chosen it first.”

  “You must have something prepared,” her grandfather said. “He will want to read it on the spot.”

  “I am ready.”

  “Good.”

  “You meant it. When you said you would help me, you actually meant it.”

  He grunted. “You are my daughter’s daughter.”

  Holt had not seen his daughter in years—and neither had Della. No one in her family had ever come to Washington. In fact, no other Holts or Bergets had been farther east than Harpers Ferry, let alone the Philippines. Della realized that she and her grandfather were strangers to everyone who mattered.

  Everywhere from her eyeballs to her nostrils tingled, but she straightened her back and swallowed the sentiment whole. She would not look back. Her grandfather was offering her a way forward, and she had to take it. “Thank you,” she said.

  “You are welcome.” Her grandfather smiled, and the hallway felt a little brighter for it. “Now get your things and meet me downstairs. We are late.”

  If they were late, so was the rest of the city. Carriages packed the streets. Vendors blocked the sidewalks, balancing everything on long bamboo sticks, from baskets of bananas to water buckets. It took longer to ride past Clarke’s than it would have taken to walk there and order a cup. As their calesa crossed the Bridge of Spain, Della had plenty of time to study the dance of lighters on the river.

  They entered Intramuros through a Romanesque gate, a portal to a Catholic wonderland. If she glanced up, the city was all domes, crosses, and oyster shell windows. The Palace lived up to its name, and Della happily followed her grandfather on his rounds throughout the building, from the health inspector’s desk to the office of the treasurer. He let her sit in on his meetings, most of which she stopped lipreading once she realized how boring they were.

  After the treasurer’s, she asked, “I thought you were concerned about the Barrows affair?”

  “Leave that for the constables,” he said.

  “Where are they now?”

  “I think they found ledgers in the captain’s house yesterday. There was talk of visiting a few bakeries.”

  “Clarke’s?”

  “I do not think so,” her grandfather said—but when he looked at her, Della knew the real reason he could not spare a quarter-hour for decent coffee this morning.

  “What about the Oriente?” she asked.

  “I would have heard,” Holt said.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  “I wrote an article—or the beginning of one. I need to see what happens today. I need to be there.”

  “Della,” her grandfather said, “you need someone to print your articles. First things first.”

  Why was she always supposed to be the patient one? Waiters brought lunch into the hall, and Representative Holt sat Della next to him as if she were the guest of honor. She understood snippets of the conversations, which were on subjects as diverse as troop movements and school curricula.

  After lunch—finally—her grandfather made good. Like a child promised a sweetmeat, she had almost resorted to begging. But as if suddenly in an all-fired rush, Holt hurried her along Magallanes Street and up the stairs of Number 1 to the office of Mr. Fred Dorr, manager of the Manila Freedom newspaper.

  “I have two nieces,” Dorr said upon meeting her. “Just about your age. I doubt they even read a newspaper.”

  “I would very much like to meet them.”

  “We do not have time for that,” Holt said. “Just show Dorr your notebook.” When she looked up at her grandfather’s eyes, they were encouraging. This is business, he seemed to say. Talk business.

  Della handed over her clippings. She held her breath as Dorr paged through them. The only article he lingered over long enough to risk her expiry was an interview of a deaf artist also saddled with a political family.

  “A typical collegiate operation,” Dorr said of the Buff and Blue.

  “Thank you?”

  Dorr sat back and thrust out his chin. “But if you want a regular billet at my paper, I need something bigger. I was told you have a scoop.”

  She looked at her grandfather, who was readying his hat to go. “Talk to the man, Della.”

  Dorr nodded as Holt left. “Take a seat,” the editor said to her.

  She pulled out her notebook and opened it to the beginning of her quartermaster story.

  Dorr’s eyes raced back and forth across the page, but his expression did not move. When he reached the end, he looked up. “Well?”

  “There will be arrests today,” she said.

  Dorr nodded. Of course, he already knew. “I have a hack on it,” he said, referring to a reporter for hire. “But you can split the money because your opening is better than what he will give me. It’s less tortured than I expected.”

  Della had worked with enough editors to understand that too as a compliment. “A split is fair,” she said, “but what I really want is the billet.” She used his military slang for a full-time post.

  Dorr set down her notebook, and she took it back. He watched her, just as she watched him—as she watched everyone. Rarely did the tables turn.

  Had she been too ambitious? She had been mannish, maybe. Was that good or bad?

  When Dorr reached a decision, his fist hit the table like a gavel. She felt the tremor beneath the soft skin of her wrist. “Tell you what,” he said. “Let’s have a go. You shall travel with your grandfather for the next month?”

  She nodded as if she knew Holt’s plans to the minute, instead of wondering whether he planned to include her.

  “When you have something, cable it on,” Dorr said. “The Freedom has an account at every Eastern Extension office in the islands. Send me your stories until I tell you to stop.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I do not expect you to muckrake your own family—I will have other eyes and ears for that—but make Holt interesting, at least. Pay is twenty-five Mex a week to start. If I keep you on after, we can talk about more.”

  She wrote twenty-five onto an empty page in her notebook and held it up to him. “Twenty-five Mex a week?” she asked. It was too important not to be sure.

  “Okay, okay,” he said. “Thirty. But only if I like what you send.” He held up a page with the amount written clearly in bold strokes: $30/wk.

  Dorr showed her to the clerk to give her full name for the payroll, and she sat down to recopy and revise the article she had already composed. About halfway through, she stopped and looked at the words. Would her own article finish with Moss’s arrest?

  She reminded herself that he was ready for the constables. There was nothing she could do to help except keep attention away from the Oriente. And that made her wonder: where was her grandfather?

  Della was about to go hire her own calesa when Holt showed up with a full line of carriages and a few of his hangers-on. “What is all this?” she asked. “Where are we headed now?”

  Della’s question died in the confusion of dozens of conversations from a jumble of mouths, and all at one speed: fast. After a few minutes of trying to sort it out, she was ready for a wordless ride—a twenty-minute nap for her mind until they arrived “home” at the Oriente, where she could check on Moss.

  But instead of turning right off the bridge into Binondo, their calesa went left and stopped at the dock, where only a few weeks ago she had first stepped foot on Philippine soil. Della followed her grandfather to the riverside, hoping they were just picking up a mailbag. But no—Holt motioned her to jump into one of the thatched narrow boat lighters.

  “No,” she said. “Where are we going?”

  The argument in her grandfather’s eyes told Della he had expected resistance, but he gave a serene smile. “We are leaving, dear.”

  “Already?”

  No answer.

  “To go where
?”

  She hated it when the hearing pretended to be deaf. They did it so badly.

  “Grandfather . . .”

  “The grand tour,” he said finally. “You knew that was our plan. You want to see as much of the islands as possible, yes? Send your impressions back to a bona fide newspaper? I assume Dorr hired you.”

  Holt assumed Dorr had done him a favor, but Della knew she was good enough—and the Freedom was eager enough for reporters—that Dorr might want her for her words.

  Before she could reply, Holt continued: “So, you see, I am doing what is best for my granddaughter.”

  “What is best for me is to know where I am going, and why. In advance.”

  Holt motioned for their American entourage to wait and then steered Della back into the relative privacy of the Filipino crowd. “You were in more danger at that hotel than you realize.”

  “What happened?” A seed of panic swelled in her gut. “What did the police do?”

  He shook his head. “Nothing.”

  “If they—”

  “They found nothing at the hotel, Della, not to worry. We are in the clear. Nothing will tie us to the scandal, but it is best to leave town before some sort of fresh trouble erupts.”

  “Nothing?” she asked again.

  “Nothing, obviously! Do you think we could have had the staff free to pack us up and load the carts so quickly if the police had thrown the place into upheaval?”

  She stared at him.

  “I cannot say the same for the folks at the Europa. What a mess!” He pointed to the rear of the lighter. “Look, they are ready for us.”

  They were. She spotted her grandfather’s many trunks and her own two. “How do I know that is everything? I need to check—”

  “Della, I have taken care of it all. Trust me. You have your portfolio, right?”

  Yes, and everything else she owned was replaceable. “But I—”

  He put his hands on her shoulders. “Do you remember when your mother asked me to take you?”