Ten
Six Days Left
The sound of the factory bell down by the river woke her, as it did every morning. Vivian shivered, feeling like it had only been minutes since she had crawled into bed. Yawning, she pulled the quilt that she had restlessly kicked aside back up to her chin, burrowing into its warmth for a few more minutes. She sighed, her eyes drifting over the meager furnishings that made up her home, almost beautiful in the pale dawn light that trickled through the window.
She missed Florence the most in the morning, when she had to wake up alone and persuade herself out of bed for the day. She would miss her second-most when she walked into the dressmaker’s shop and saw a new girl sitting in Florence’s old spot, head bent over rows of tiny stitches or trays of glass beads. Miss Ethel, the shop’s tyrant of an owner, had always told her workers that there were hundreds of girls in the city who’d be grateful for their jobs if they put a toe out of line. It wasn’t an idle threat—it had taken her less than three days to find a replacement after Florence gave her notice.
Before her pregnancy had put an end to it, Florence had helped out in the kitchen of the Chins’ restaurant, eager to become part of the family business as a sign that she was part of the family itself. Vivian had been invited to move in when Florence did. But the house on Spring Street was already crowded, and it would have been a challenge to squeeze her in there too.
Sometimes Vivian wished she had someone waking up next to her—that when she woke up shivering, she could bury her cold nose against warm skin and slowly drift into the morning. She had thought a time or two about asking Leo to stay. But the neighborhood was filled with cautionary tales: women who started having babies when they were too young and too poor, and who kept having them, their lives narrowed to survival and hope that one day, at least one kid would manage to escape.
Vivian still dreamed of her own escape. She still believed there was more to life than a cold morning, a cramped home, and long hours of work. She wasn’t willing to risk that dream.
Gritting her teeth, Vivian threw off the quilt and staggered out of bed, teeth chattering as she fumbled for a second pair of socks and pulled Florence’s tattered old dressing gown around her shoulders.
When Florence had been there, their days had begun with breakfast, silent and brittle for years, quiet and comfortable at last. On her own now, it was hard to summon the energy to eat anything so early in the morning. But there was a can of peaches at the back of the pantry and a little water left in the kettle from the night before, ready to be heated and turned into a cup of coffee.
She should buy more fruit after work, Vivian decided as she stuck her fork directly in the can, the syrupy sweetness a shock after the bitter taste of the coffee. Who knew how many days of peaches she had left.
Setting aside the grim thought and the empty can, Vivian squared her shoulders and pulled out her clothes for work. She hesitated when she was dressed, then pulled out the locked cashbox that she kept under her bed. There wasn’t much in it—money saved up for next month’s rent payment, a handful of nickels that could become subway fare if she needed them, a little extra from tips. She pulled out enough for a few groceries, then, hesitating, grabbed an extra quarter before she could talk herself out of it.
She needed the money. And she might need more of it than she planned for if she found herself with bribes to pay over the next week. But she had a thank-you to deliver after work, and she wanted to do it right.
Vivian could hear a baby fussing before she knocked. Before she could knock a second time, not sure whether anyone had heard over the noise, the door was yanked open.
“Don’t you dare,” Bea hissed, her eyes shadowed with weariness. “Nathaniel’s stupid dog has been yapping all day, so the baby hasn’t slept. He finally got home from work and took it out, so Alba’s trying to get the baby down. She’ll murder us both if we make any noise.”
“When did Nathaniel get a dog?” Vivian whispered. Bea’s family didn’t live in the same building as Vivian did—the landlord refused to rent to Black folks—but they were only a few blocks away. It was bigger than the single room where Vivian lived, but the heat was just as unreliable, the gas sputtered, and the common tap was out in the hall washroom.
Not long ago, Bea and her mother had shared one bedroom, while her younger sister and two brothers had taken the second. But Bea’s uncle, who had been working at the Nightingale, had died the previous summer, leaving his girl Alba pregnant and with nowhere to go. Now, she and the baby had one room to themselves, while half the Henrys crowded into the other and the boys slept on the floor in the main room.
Bea rolled her eyes as they slipped out into the hall, pulling the door shut behind them and sitting on the top stair. “He found it last week. Poor thing was half-starved, and some boys were throwing rocks or trash or something at it. He gave them a walloping and brought it home. I can’t blame him for that, though it’s ugly as sin, even now it’s cleaned up and fed.”
“Nice that your mom didn’t make him get rid of it.”
“You know she can’t say no to anyone who needs help. Turns out dogs count, too.” Bea rolled her eyes again, though she couldn’t hide her proud smile as she did. Bea admired her mother, and the way she’d held her family together since her husband’s death, more than anyone in the world. “And it’s mostly behaving. But not today.” Sighing, she rolled her shoulders and glanced at Vivian out of the corner of her eye. “You here for some explaining?”
Things had been too busy at the Nightingale last night for them to talk, and then Bea’s fella Abraham had showed up to give her a ride home before Vivian’s shift was done. She owed her friend an explanation for the scene in the alley. She also owed a thank-you.
“First, this.” Vivian handed over the paper-wrapped package she had been carrying under one arm.
Bea gave her a suspicious frown, then carefully unfolded the paper, staring in surprise at the book of poems inside. “Countee Cullen?” she asked, sounding delighted. “Abraham says everyone’s talking about him up in Harlem.” Then her eyes narrowed. “Since when did you start reading poetry?”
Vivian snorted. “You know I don’t,” she said. Books were Bea’s thing—she and Abraham had fallen head over heels for each other talking about poetry and Claude McKay. Vivian could count on one hand the number of times she had walked into a bookshop, and that number was one. “Once my deliveries were done, I went to ask a bookseller what was new, and he handed over this one. He said it had just come out, so I figured you wouldn’t have read it yet.”
Bea ran one hand over the cover, then shook her head. “I know you can’t afford this.”
“Keep it,” Vivian said. “It’s a thank-you for running to get Honor last night. I don’t think that fella was going to play nice if we’d been out there alone much longer.”
“Don’t be dumb, Viv,” Bea said, trying to push the book back into Vivian’s hands. “We look out for each other, you know that.”
“I want to,” Vivian insisted. Her voice caught in her throat a little—less than a week until the commissioner’s deadline—but she pushed that feeling aside and gave Bea a smile. “Can’t a girl just want to do something nice for her pal?”
Bea’s hands tightened around the slim cover of the book. “You gonna tell me what’s going on?”
“Yeah,” Vivian said, staring down at her lap. “It ain’t good.” Taking a deep breath, not meeting Bea’s eyes, she told her what had happened at the Buchanan mansion. Her words stumbled over each other more than once, as she hurried past what she had found in Buchanan’s study and tried to explain what the police had said and thought. She kept her voice quiet, not wanting to risk the neighbors overhearing. But she still felt exposed, as though at any moment someone would swoop in and haul her away.
When she got to the commissioner’s surprise visit, Bea sucked in a sharp breath. “God almighty,” she breathed. “Girl, you are in so much trouble.”
Vivian glared at her friend. “You think I don’t know that?”
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.” Vivian’s gaze dropped back to her hands. “Honor said she can’t help me—not won’t, can’t, and she seemed real upset about it. Any idea what she…” Vivian swallowed. But Bea knew all about her history with Honor. “Why she would say that?”
Bea was quiet. “No,” she said at last. “Honor’s done plenty of hard things to help her people out before.”
The silence between them grew heavy, neither wanting to meet the other’s eyes. They were both thinking of the last time Bea had asked Honor for help—her and Alba both. Vivian didn’t know what Honor had said, or what exactly had happened. But they all knew it had ended up with a man dead.
Vivian hadn’t asked for details, too scared to find out who was to blame. If she didn’t know, she could believe it hadn’t been any of them, not really—or at least, not either of the people who mattered to her. And Bea had never shared.
It was one of the few things they never talked about.
Vivian swallowed. “Anyway, she came when you got her, at least. And I’m sure as hell grateful that you did. I don’t know what that Rokesby fella was going to do next, but I doubt he was planning to ask me for a waltz.”
Bea snorted. “He sure seemed like a piece of—” She broke off abruptly. “Wait, the dead guy. He had a different name, what did you say it was?”
“The dead… His name was Buchanan. Why?”
But Bea was already up and off, slipping back into the apartment and easing the door silently closed behind her. The baby’s fussing had stopped, so Vivian stayed where she was, not wanting to risk waking him up. She didn’t have to wait long; Bea was back in the hall less than a minute later, a newspaper under one arm.
“Abraham brought it this morning,” she said absently, already leafing through the pages. “Mama wanted to find Everett a job, and I saw…” She flipped open a page, folding it back to stab at one of the posted advertisements with a triumphant finger. “Is that the same family?”
Vivian scanned the notice. Mrs. E. Buchanan… 800 Fifth Avenue… Seeking a maid of all work… “I think that’s the same address,” she said, frowning. “But why does it matter?”
“You said you didn’t know what to do next,” Bea whispered, looking pleased with herself. “That’s what you do next. They’re looking for a new maid, right? If you can get that job, you can probably find out what’s really going on in that house. Because if you didn’t kill him—”
“If?” Vivian demanded, forgetting for a moment to whisper.
“Keep your voice down,” Bea hissed. “You know what I meant. The point is someone did. So why not get a job there, keep an eye on everyone, and see if you can find out something helpful?”
Vivian stared at her. “You’re joking, right?”
“Why would I be?”
“Well, because in the first place, I don’t know anything about that kind of work. I’m a dressmaker, not a maid.”
“You think some Fifth Avenue lady won’t snap you up for that exact reason? I bet she’d love to have her own seamstress on staff.”
Vivian paused. “Sure, that’s probably true,” she admitted while Bea gave her a satisfied smirk, one finger still tapping the ad. “But in the second place, if I did get the job, I couldn’t work at the shop too. What happens when this whole mess with Buchanan is over and done and I’m down a job and can’t pay my rent?”
“You’d still be better off than if you went to prison for murder,” Bea pointed out.
“Okay,” Vivian said, gritting her teeth. Her head was starting to pound, and she wished she’d made time to eat after her deliveries were done. “But half the people in that house saw me, including the housekeeper and Mrs. Buchanan. I doubt they’re going to hire me to dust the windowsills, seeing as they all think I—” She broke off, shaking. Her voice had risen as she spoke, and she didn’t want to yell. “They’d probably just call the cops on me, and I’d be thrown in jail again. And I don’t think I’m lucky enough to be released twice,” she mumbled, pressing the palms of her hands against her eyes.
Once they were closed, her eyes felt so heavy that it was a struggle to open them again. When she did, she found Bea watching her.
“I could get the job,” Bea said slowly, looking back at the paper.
“What?” It took Vivian a second to catch up with what her friend had said. “No, you don’t want to put yourself through that. You can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because,” Vivian said, the word coming out strangled.
“I only sing at night,” Bea insisted, her voice growing firmer. “And Alba’s around days now, so I don’t have to worry about the kids being alone while Mama’s at the restaurant.”
“Bea, working as a maid in some Fifth Avenue mansion would be bad enough. But someone was murdered in this one.” Vivian shook her head. “I won’t ask you to do that.”
“You helped me out when Uncle Pearlie—” Bea broke off, and the two of them stared at each other without speaking. That was too close to the things they were careful not to talk about. Bea cleared her throat. “I don’t hear you asking,” she pointed out. “So that’s fine, then.”
Vivian wanted to reply, but she was interrupted by the sound of voices coming up the stairs. She and Bea jumped to their feet—both of them with smiles stretching wide and reassuring—as one of Bea’s brothers and her sister stomped up the steps, schoolbooks under their arms, bickering cheerfully as they came.
“Hey there, troublemakers,” Bea sang out, arms open wide for hugs. Baby threw herself into the hug gladly; sixteen-year-old Everett leaned against Bea with one shoulder, happy for the embrace but reluctant to show it. “Quiet when we go inside, yeah? Georgie’s down for a nap after yowling his head off all day, so if you wake him up you’re risking a walloping from Alba.”
“Bea,” Vivian said, quiet and urgent, as her friend began to usher the kids inside. Bea paused, her sharp glance a clear warning not to say anything that might scare them.
She didn’t need to worry. Vivian knew better than that. “Don’t do anything without talking to me first?” was all she said.
Expecting an agreement that was at most reluctant, Vivian was caught off guard by the sly lift to Bea’s brows. “You don’t get to tell me what to do, Vivian Kelly.”
Before Vivian could say anything else, Bea had shut the door behind her.
Vivian’s heart was thumping against her ribs as she walked slowly down the stairs. She needed to hear back from Leo’s guy at Bellevue, and it needed to happen soon, before anyone else ended up in danger because of her.
God willing, he’d tell her something useful about how Buchanan died. Otherwise, she didn’t know what she was going to do next.
Vivian stepped into the cutting afternoon wind. The sky was growing dimmer, but it wouldn’t be dark for at least another hour. She glanced at the coins in her purse. Buying the book for Bea had taken most of what she had brought with her for the day, but one of her deliveries had ended with a ten-cent tip. That was enough to get her downtown and back home, if not guilt-free, then at least with less worry than she would have otherwise felt.
Vivian snapped her purse closed and headed toward the subway before she could talk herself out of it.