The Forgotten Room(81)
Until she laughed and turned away. “Fetch my gloves, Olive, and be quick. My father is waiting downstairs to lead me into the ball, my ball, where I will dance and laugh while you serve drinks to my guests and mop up the mess when they spill, because that’s what servants do. Isn’t it, Olive?”
“I—I—” Olive swallowed back the response that rose to her lips. What would Prunella do if she were crossed? Tell Harry? Of course she would. She would tell Harry, and Harry would know. He would look at her with bewildered eyes, a confusion that would turn to betrayal and then to hatred. “Yes, of course,” she whispered, and her hands turned into fists at her sides.
Prunella laughed again. “You’ll do whatever I say, won’t you? You haven’t any choice, because I know your secret.”
Olive felt sick. She stumbled to the dressing table and searched for the gloves, while Prunella went on behind her, in a voice high with triumph. “I am going to be married, don’t you know, into one of the oldest and best families in New York, right about the time you find yourself alone and abandoned, living in some miserable tenement downtown. Perhaps you’ll read about me in the papers sometime, Olive. The wedding’s in October. I’m sure the photographs will be everywhere.”
Olive stalked back toward Prunella and thrust the gloves toward her beautiful cream-satin chest, then walked without pause straight on to the door, eyes blurring, while Prunella’s vertiginous laugh rippled the air behind her.
The grand second-floor drawing room had been transformed into a ballroom, filled with all the glittering jewels of New York society, but Olive—balancing a dozen glasses of champagne on a single silver tray—saw only one man: Harry Pratt, who was dancing with the most beautiful girl in the world.
Well, maybe the lady in question wasn’t quite that beautiful, not on objective study. But she seemed so, swirling about the room in the shelter of Harry’s arms, beaming and blushing at something he was saying to her, as if the glow of Harry’s attention contained magical properties that altered its object into something better and more perfect than it was before.
Like Olive herself.
Olive looked away, because the sight was too much to bear. The girl had light brown hair set with brilliants, and her dress was made of a filmy pink stuff, so pale it was almost white. Not the sort of girl who would allow Harry Pratt to have his way with her on an attic staircase: oh, no. That was Olive’s weakness, Olive’s shame, though it hadn’t felt like shame until this instant, when Harry danced with another girl. The sort of girl he was supposed to marry.
Harry had spoken often of Italy over the past week, and the eternal summer that awaited them there. But he hadn’t mentioned marriage. Of course he hadn’t. She had pretended not to notice the omission; she had perhaps convinced herself that the promise of marriage was implied in his offer.
But maybe it wasn’t. Probably it wasn’t. You ran off with housemaids, but there was no need to marry them, was there? No need to make it all legal and proper and binding. In case you changed your mind. In case you met another girl, a suitable girl.
Olive made her way along the edge of the crowd, bearing her champagne. A few hands reached out to pluck the glasses from her tray, without thanks, without recognition, without a single exchange of glances. And maybe this unexpected wound was the one that hurt the most: her invisibility. Once you donned a servant’s uniform, you became invisible, not even quite human. This was necessary, of course, for the entire system of human servility to operate without friction, but still it rankled. She wanted to scream, I’m just as good as you are! I speak French and I dance, I play the piano beautifully and recite poetry from memory and enunciate every consonant without flaw. A year ago, I was almost one of you!
But that didn’t matter, did it? If you fell, you fell.
On the other side of the room, along the windows, the crowd was thinning. Olive, stepping carefully so the bubbling glasses wouldn’t tilt onto the polished parquet floor, approached a pair of men, identical in portly middle-aged formal dress. They stood next to one of the grand French windows, heads bent together, smoking forbidden cigars, which they tipped out the open bottom sash in furtive gestures.
“. . . magnificent, to be sure, but it will all go to the receivers quick enough if even one of his damned railroads fails . . .”
Olive slowed her steps.
“. . . which ones . . . invest . . . ?”
The other man was speaking, the nearest one, who faced away from Olive’s line of approach. She couldn’t make out the words very well, but the lift in his voice suggested a question.
She was at his elbow now. She held out the tray, and both men, without a glance, without missing a single beat of their conversation, reached out in unison to swipe away two sizzling glasses of champagne.
“. . . but the chiefest part is held in the damned P and R. He’s up to his silly neck in it.”
The other man laughed. “Fool.”
“And so I told him, but he’s got all this confounded faith in McLeod, thinks the expansion will pay off before they run out of money—”
“And the patience of creditors—”
“Well, that too, of course—”
Olive was forced to step away now, because even invisible serving maids might attract attention if they lingered too long. But she moved slowly, as if taking extreme care for the safety of the crystal, as a good servant should.