Love and Other Consolation Prizes(30)

“Nice to meet you,” Ernest said as he noticed the gemstones on the man’s fingers. The largest rock was the size of Ernest’s thumbnail. He glanced at Hanny, who was beaming and bouncing with excitement.

“Dad,” Hanny said, “Rich is a lawyer, but he’s also my fiancé.” She held up her fingers and pointed to a tiny diamond of her own. “It belonged to Rich’s grandmother. She survived the sinking of the Titanic—can you believe that?”

Ernest paused for a moment, hoping Allen Funt would step out of the janitor’s closet with his Candid Camera crew in tow. “Wow, that’s a lot to comprehend,” he said.

Then he hugged his daughter, wishing her congratulations as best he could, despite the shock. He shook Rich’s hand again, wishing him all the best. Ernest chatted and doted and tried not to imagine what Gracie, lucid or otherwise, might think about this news. He wished she were here and able to say something that would help him make sense of all this, or at least signal a warning to Hanny about the impending iceberg that lay in the path of this relationship. Hanny had always had her choice of suitors—ever since high school—and yet somehow she’d settled for…this guy.

Ernest realized he was grinding his teeth and relaxed his jaw. Then he drew a deep breath, clapped his hands, and rubbed them together. He wouldn’t allow himself to doubt his daughter, to be that cynical.

“You know—I believe Rich is absolutely right,” Ernest said. “This is no place to celebrate. Why don’t we all go out and get a late supper?”

“We flew first class,” Hanny said. “We had chicken Kiev on the plane. But you know me. I can always go for a little dessert. How about the Jasmine Room?”

Ernest smiled. “That would be perfect.”





MAYFLOWER ROCK


(1909)



Ernest’s heart was still racing, his mind still spinning. He swore he could still feel Fahn’s kiss, even after eating a bowl of porridge. It had been delicious, topped with grated dark chocolate and toasted coconut. And the dairy—Ernest was astonished at the taste, the rich creamy texture of real milk. All those years at boarding school, he’d rarely drunk anything other than tea and the powdered junket they’d served daily, which was supposed to make them healthy and strong, but tasted like warm milk mixed with chalk.

Ernest wasn’t sure what Mrs. Irvine had been so worked up about.

I wouldn’t leave this place to go to Heaven, Ernest thought, as he tried to catch a glimpse of Fahn, who was busy in the kitchen. She caught his eye, winked, and then disappeared. Ernest waved back at no one, but smiled nonetheless. At the children’s home the girls lived in a separate building, and in class they ignored him. But here, his new life was off to a roaring start.

He didn’t even mind spending the next hour shoveling coal in the basement. He whistled, hummed, practically danced in the dusty coal bin as he worked. Then he changed his clothes, cleaned himself up, and helped Fahn and Violet set up breakfast for the working girls. Ernest observed the precise way Fahn arranged the polished silverware, the breakfast plates, elegant eggcups, juice glasses, and different sets of china for tea and coffee. He followed along as best he could while Violet arranged the plush chairs, opened the curtains and blinds, and tended to the flower vases set about the formal dining room. She retrimmed the stems that hadn’t yet bloomed, then weeded out the wilted and the dead.

Ernest stood at attention as Madam Flora and the rest of the upstairs ladies swept into the room in messaline tea gowns. A baker’s dozen, Ernest thought, counting Maisie, who looked her tomboyish best in a porkpie hat too big for her head. Miss Amber followed behind, now elegantly dressed and sporting long auburn tresses.

“You know the rules, girl. No toppers in the house,” Miss Amber snapped. “Now take that ugly thing back to the lost and found. Someone just might want it back.”

Ernest noticed Fahn rolling her eyes as she sighed wearily at Maisie, Miss Amber, or perhaps both—he didn’t know for sure. He looked away, suppressing a laugh.

Meanwhile Madam Flora introduced Ernest to the ladies of the manor: Ruth, Pearl, Lillian, Emma, Josephine, Beatrice, Hilda, Cora, Hattie, Mary Alice—many of whom he’d already met casually when he arrived. Madam Flora beamed as each young lady bowed slightly with a polite smile. “My Gibson girls: these are the finest women in all of Seattle. Have you ever seen such grace, poise, beauty, and refinement? They are elegance personified, perfection in thought and deed…”

Ernest smiled and waved, thinking that they did look like the Gibson girls he’d seen rendered in magazines and on advertisements—fragile but voluptuous, empowered with confidence and high-spirited, yet joyful—the opposite of a traditional suffragist.

“Ah, don’t be fooled, boy,” Miss Amber interrupted, laughing. “They’re mutton dressed as lamb, every one of ’em.”

And with that Violet and Fahn took their leave as the ladies set to their breakfast, laughing about the parade and the scene in the street that morning. They giggled and cursed and told jokes Ernest didn’t understand. They deliberately slurped their tea, elbowing each other, some of them eating with their hands, stirring their coffee with their butter knives, just to tease Madam Flora, who shook her head and sighed, drumming her painted fingernails on the table.

“I’m afraid the girls are just letting their hair down a bit, so to speak. The ones not wearing wigs.” Madam Flora winked at Miss Amber as she spoke. “But I assure you, these girls have the most class—literally and figuratively. Now, ladies, eat up—you have elocution lessons in the salon in one hour. Then classwork, then music.”