Chapter 11
A knock comes at the door and I snap awake, staring into the mouth of a now-cold fireplace framed by glass tiles the color of money.
So it wasn’t a dream. I have inherited my employer’s fortune, and now I must figure out why, starting with the murrelet’s nest.
The knock grows more insistent.
I quickly arise, head swimming. A white nightgown with plenty of lace falls in soft folds around me. Last night, deciding the bed was too fine, I curled up on the shearling rug before the fireplace.
Turns out even the rich can wake with cricks in their necks and arms gone dead.
“Who is it?” I call, my throat parched. Morning light pours in through the picture windows, where I had neglected to draw the curtains.
“Flossie,” says a muffled voice.
“Come in.”
Flossie enters, carrying a tray with oats, brown sugar, cherry compote, cream, and coffee.
Her thick frizzy hair is once again braided tight about her head.
She glances around, mouth ajar, taking in the unslept-in bed and the stunning view from the picture windows.
Of course, she’s never been to this side of the house.
“Mrs. Bonefat said I should bring your breakfast to you,” she says timidly, green eyes bright with questions.
“Thank you—set it there.” I glance toward the sitting room table.
After depositing it, Flossie stands before me. Her apron is cinched tight around her neatly pressed uniform, giving her straight figure some dimension.
“Flossie, I will need a lady’s maid.”
“So it’s true, then.”
“ ’Fraid so. Are you up for the task?”
“Yes, miss.” She squares her oxford pumps together, bringing her to her full height—just over five feet, a couple of inches under me.
“Then you’re hired.”
She stares hard at her toes, her eyes suddenly wet.
Mouth tight, she nods. Many Irish families hadn’t recovered after the Great Hunger and still sent their children to the land of the plentiful to work.
It can’t be easy, toiling day in and day out without the support of a family.
Had Mr. Sanders been thinking similar thoughts about me when he promoted me to research assistant?
The promotion was a break in the clouds that had gathered after Daniel’s death.
Perhaps this is a break in the clouds for her, too.
I pretend not to notice and open Mrs. Sanders’s armoire, hoping fresh scouting duds will magically appear inside.
“I have an, er, pressing errand to attend to and will be skipping Sunday services. I will need Oh-Lolly saddled. Oh wow.” A silk gown seems to float of its own accord into my hands, and I curtsy with it.
Its floor length clearly hails from a more elegant era, before words like “doughboys” and “poison gas” made their way into conversations.
“Ain’t that a toe-stubbing man-tamer of a party frock,” Flossie murmurs, curtsying back.
“But it’s a good riding habit you need, not a gown.
” She moves toward a second armoire and finds a crisp oxford jacket with cinched waist and a split skirt.
“It will need airing, miss.” She snaps it out.
“And hemming. Seems Mrs. Sanders bested you by a few inches.”
It will take time to find the murrelet’s nest. Then I will have to speak with Koa and Cookie and meet with Mr. Cosmos. I pray he can tell me how to run the business or at least find someone to do it for me. Perhaps then I could attend the university, though would it feel like I was abandoning ship?
Money is supposed to give you options, yet somehow I feel more stuck than ever. My breath seems to rattle through my lungs, like an air current through brittle ferns. “Never mind that for now. Just help me get into it.”
By the time I descend the staircase in a riding habit too long for me, the house is in full swing.
The heavy drapes have been pulled, china rattles, and the perfume of bacon stokes appetites.
I’m tempted to return to my room and make a quick exit through my secret closet door to the servants’ staircase.
You are not a sand beetle, flying off at the first sign of trouble. How will I run this estate if I cannot even manage the stairs?
Moving heel to toe, I make my way down the round staircase into the reception room.
Our footman, Yates, is whispering angrily, arms pumping in indignation, while the butler tries to quiet him.
Neither notices me until I step off the last stair, and then Yates’s fleshy mouth parts in shock.
Is he remembering how he waved a potato in my face?
Quickly he lowers his gaze, and his flat feet carry him off.
The butler, upon whom Mr. Sanders bestowed the nickname Buddy, pilots his polished shoes in my direction. Despite the casual moniker, he is a reserved man of middle age with a hollowed-out look about him, a concave stomach, and eyes the color of fog under white-blond hair.
“Good morning, Miss Lucy,” he says in his whispery voice, gaze brushing my neck kerchief.
Our paths rarely crossed until my promotion, when he’d catch me sketching late into the night at my desk by Mr. Sanders’s office.
“Mr. Cosmos has asked if you are free to meet him in Mr. Sanders’s office at one p.m. today. ”
If he has any misgivings about my new role here, they do not show. He never says more than necessary.
“Yes, that would be fine. Buddy, do you know when Mr. Sanders-Byre will be leaving?”
“I am told the five o’clock Anacortes ferry.”
I would’ve been on that ferry as well. “Thank you.”
“Your horse is ready. May I get you a parasol?”
I hide a scowl. Naturally, heiresses must carry parasols to protect their complexions. But a parasol would just weigh me down, the way these clothes and this hat already do. At least the boots fit like a second pair of socks. “No, thank you. I will take a shady route.”
He opens the main door. Stepping across the threshold, I can’t help feeling as if I am in some sort of farce, like the playacting troupes Mr. Sanders would bring in from Seattle to entertain his visitors.
When will the curtain come crashing down?
The glare of daylight shines a spotlight into my eyes, and my limbs begin to jitter.
But then Oh-Lolly whinnies from the driveway, throwing back her head in greeting. As the groom leads her to me, my stance firms. Mr. Sanders was a man of secrets, even to those who knew him best. But now is the time to unravel them. Before they unravel me.