Love and Other Consolation Prizes(70)

Ernest thanked his friend and said goodbye. Then he sat thinking about Gracie, about Madam Flora, and the nights of his youth, filled with celebration and echoes of madness. He remembered running through Chinatown in search of dried bamboo flowers that would be mixed with red wine, just one of many home remedies, strange concoctions born out of desperation. He thought about visiting an herbalist in the morning to get foxglove tea and red yeast rice and all the other things old men and women in the neighborhood used these days to treat a nervous condition, even bouts of hysteria.

Tomorrow, Gracie would be sent home, wherever that was. And he was at a complete loss about what else he could do to help her.





CARDBOARD AND LACE


(1910)



Fahn had left the only real home she’d ever known, leaving Ernest alone to console Maisie about her fate. If she was still upset, though, she didn’t let those emotions show anymore. Not since that tearful breakdown days ago with Madam Flora.

“You don’t have to do this,” Ernest argued. “Miss Amber is just using you to solve her problems. Madam Flora—your mother, if she were able to think clearly—you know she wouldn’t make you go through with this.”

Maisie sat at her mirrored vanity, brushing her hair. She’d taken to wearing parlor dresses regularly now, and Ernest could hardly remember the tomboy she used to be.

“No one can make me do anything I don’t want to,” Maisie said. “It’s my choice and it’s just one night. I can tolerate anything for one night. Especially if it means getting my mother the treatment she needs—the medicine, the specialists, whatever is required. And if I can help keep a roof over the heads of everyone else, so be it.”

Ernest knew next to nothing about Louis Turnbull, but he now hated the man. If he was so rich—so vastly wealthy—and if he cared that much about Madam Flora, why didn’t he help her without strings attached?

Ernest asked, “And what if I don’t want you to go through with it?” He remembered how she had felt standing next to him, high above the city.

Maisie stopped brushing her hair and stared back at Ernest. Her words cut like blades. “It’s just one night, Ernest. One night doesn’t mean anything.”

—

ERNEST THOUGHT ABOUT Maisie’s words as he worried about Fahn. He missed her terribly. She’d been gone only a few days, but no one had seen her, no one had heard from her. Everyone hoped for the best—certain that she’d calm down and return. But Ernest had scoured the neighborhood, to no avail.

In the meantime there were preparations to be made for Maisie’s big night. And if the finest parlor joint in Seattle was hard-pressed for money, Miss Amber didn’t acknowledge such concerns as she gave Ernest precise instructions. Maisie was not to settle for a frilly one-piece sorority dress, even the elegant kind offered at Frederick & Nelson. Instead a tailor at J. A. Baillargeon’s would take care of her personally.

When they arrived at the clothier, Ernest parked the motorcar out front and opened the door for Maisie. He helped her alight to the curb like he’d been taught by Professor True, and he tipped his hat to the uniformed valet who ushered them along a purple carpet on the sidewalk and through the double doors into the posh clothier. Ernest’s leather heels clicked on the polished wooden floor, and his dark uniform stood out in sharp contrast to the rows of glass display cases, and the columns of white marble that supported a pressed tin ceiling. Dozens of elegantly dressed mannequins stood in repose beneath an array of crystal tulip lighting, backlit by sconces that looked like glowing seashells.

Ernest stood next to Maisie, hands behind his back, feeling conspicuously out of place as she handed Madam Flora’s calling card to a slender man who wore a monocle around his neck.

He bowed and then kissed Maisie’s outstretched hand. “You must be the one and only Miss Margaret Nettleton—I’ve been so looking forward to meeting you. For years I’ve worked with Flora, and it is such an honor to meet her spirited little sister.” He fished out a silver pocket watch. “And you’re right on time.”

“Please, call me Maisie.”

The man then said, “Your boy can wait outside.”

“This is my driver and colleague, Ernest Young,” said Maisie. “He has excellent taste, so I value his opinion. I’m sure you won’t mind if he has a seat.”

Ernest smiled, silently cheering Maisie for her refusal to be pushed around. Even as the clothier sneered down his nose at Ernest’s outfit, his black leather gloves, and the driver’s cap, which he’d removed and tucked beneath his arm.

“Of course, be my guest,” the tailor chirped as he donned an obliging smile, one reserved for wealth. “Let’s begin this little adventure of ours.”

Ernest sat on a tall stool and watched as the tailor put a shellac record on a windup Victrola, playing an Italian ballad. Maisie was offered a cup of English tea with milk and honey as the slender man discussed her preferences. Then the real work began as she stood on a platform and was measured in every way imaginable. Ernest looked on as Maisie disappeared behind a large Coromandel screen, followed by a trio of seamstresses, who attended to her like a flock of fairy godmothers.

Maisie periodically reappeared, each time wearing a gown more elegant than before. Ernest loved them all, even the heavy white linen dresses that Maisie rolled her eyes at. She finally settled on an elegant design of white satin. Over her bare skin she wore a guimpe of lace that had been held in place by pearl-topped dress pins. The sheen of the new machine-made fabric was all the rage, and made her lightly freckled skin look like creamy silk, almost translucent, shimmering beneath the humming electric glow of the store.