Chapter 28 Cynthia
Cynthia
Cynthia could not remember a time when she had felt so tired.
All she wanted to do was peel off her uniform and climb into bed.
She didn’t think she even had the energy to wash the makeup from the fashion show off her face before sprawling out on her bunk.
As she entered the room and glanced up at the bed, her heart sank. She still needed to make it up.
When Iris had shown her to the room she was to share with another employee, she had not been put off in the least by the thought of clambering up into the top bunk.
Now the idea of handling even one more set of bed linens left her close to tears.
Still, she couldn’t imagine flopping down on the bare mattress without even a pillow.
Not to mention that even though it was the second week of June, nights at the lake could turn chilly.
She didn’t relish the idea of waking herself—or her roommate—up in the wee hours with the sound of her chattering teeth.
She turned and headed out into the corridor and began cautiously opening one door after another until she spotted the linen closet. She grabbed a set of sheets—much more utilitarian than the ones she had seen in the guest rooms—a calico bedspread, and two anemic-looking pillows.
Somehow she found the will to properly make the bed, tucking the ends of the top sheet under the mattress and smoothing the coverlet evenly across.
She had just tucked the second pillow under her chin in preparation for slipping it into its case when a young woman of about her same age stepped though the doorway.
She wore the same blue maid’s uniform that was still clinging stickily to Cynthia’s slim frame.
“You must be the new girl,” she said. “I’m Dolores.”
Cynthia dropped the pillow into place and slid down off the bed. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m Cynthia.”
Dolores looked her up and down like she was a Christmas goose hanging in the window of a butcher’s shop.
She reached up and loosened her honey-colored hair from a ponytail and shook it out, leaving soft waves framing her freckled face.
She slipped her feet out of her shoes and left them where they lay as she crossed the room and perched on the windowsill.
She pulled a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of her skirt and lifted the window screen by several inches.
She held out the pack to Cynthia, who shook her head.
She had thought about starting to smoke.
Many of her classmates did and claimed that it killed their appetites and kept their figures trim, but Cynthia still felt unsure.
Even if they weren’t terribly expensive, cigarettes cost money, and she had better things to spend hers on than a habit that most people said was hard to break.
The smell of sulfur curled and wafted into Cynthia’s nostrils as Dolores struck a match and touched it to the end of a cigarette before slipping it between her wide lips.
She took a long drag, then blew the smoke out the window.
She held the lit cigarette as far out the window as her arm could reach.
“Miss Arden doesn’t allow smoking in the staff quarters, so if you smoke you had better make sure you don’t get caught doing it in here,” Dolores said.
“I didn’t realize that Miss Arden was on the premises,” Cynthia said.
Her heart raced in her chest. When she had accepted the job, she had hardly dared to hope that she might have the opportunity to meet the famous beauty expert and, indeed that rarest of characters, female business tycoon.
Perhaps she would have that chance in the immediate future.
“She’s not. But Mother Hubbard has taken to her new position like a woman possessed, and she is hell-bent on enforcing every single one of her boss’s rules. She’s only been at it for about a month, but it feels like forever. I cannot believe I’m saying it, but I actually miss Old Lady Merrick.”
A creak on the floorboards sounded out in the hallway, and Cynthia froze.
Would she lose her job for something her roommate was doing?
Dolores stubbed out the cigarette and left the windowsill to open the top drawer of one of the dressers.
She pulled out a squat mason jar and, after unscrewing the lid, dropped the butt inside.
A mosquito flitted in through the open screen and hovered nearby as Cynthia waited for the sound of a second creak from the hall floorboards.
“She seems nice enough to me,” Cynthia said. “After all, she gave me a chance at a job here.”
Dolores crossed to the bed and flopped onto the lower bunk. “You only have that chance because she just fired one of my friends.”
Cynthia’s heart sank. Maybe she and Dolores would not hit it off. Not that it mattered all that much. Regardless, she was there to make money, not friends.
“I’m sorry that was why the position was available,” Cynthia said.
Another mosquito whined past her ear. She stepped over to the window and eased the screen closed, hoping Dolores would not take offense.
She turned back to face her companion and perched on the edge of the wide windowsill despite her aching desire to stretch out on her own bunk.
Her legs felt like lead, and her feet swelled against the insides of her shoes.
Dolores rolled over onto her side and propped her head up on her hand. “It isn’t your fault. But you had best be careful not to make the same mistake, or you’ll be out on your ear too. And I don’t imagine you are busting your hump here for the pleasure of it.”
Cynthia smiled. She thought it likely that by the end of the summer, she might well have developed some sort of hump—or at the very least, a hunch—busted or not. Maybe Dolores could give her some advice.
“I definitely am not here for the fun of it. I need to make all the money I can over the next few weeks,” she said.
Dolores’s eyes widened, and she patted the bed. Cynthia went to sit with her.
Dolores dropped her voice. “You don’t need the money to get yourself out of ‘the family way,’ do you? If Mother Hubbard finds out you’re expecting, you’ll be fired for sure.”
“No, nothing like that,” Cynthia said. She blushed just to be asked such a thing.
She had heard about a few of the girls she had known at college who dropped out of school and married straightaway, but she had never put herself in the position where that was even possible.
Getting her education mattered far too much for that sort of thing.
“Then what are you doing here? You aren’t local,” Dolores said, fixing her blue-eyed gaze on Cynthia’s face.
“I need tuition money if I want to return to college in September.”
Dolores snapped her fingers and laughed. “That’s it. You look like a coed. What happened? I thought Daddy always paid for girls like you.”
Cynthia shrugged. She wasn’t sure exactly what to say. It didn’t sit well with her to air her family’s dirty laundry to a stranger, but she couldn’t think of any reasonable explanation besides the truth.
“I had a scholarship to pay for the first two years. If I want to finish my education, I have to find a way to pay for it myself.” Saying it out loud to a girl her age made it feel all the more unlikely.
It was one thing to mull it over with Pauline or even Glenn and accept their help and suggestions.
It was quite another to mention it to someone who was not associated with the college.
Dolores whistled. “You had better be on your best behavior, then. And you had better make some big tips.”
“Are tips a real possibility?” Cynthia asked.
“Sure. Depending on who you meet, you can make more in tips than in your regular wages by the end of the season. Why do you think the regulars return year after year? It sure isn’t on account of the working conditions.”
“Have you ever made that kind of money yourself?”
“I started to, once I got moved from general duties to being assigned as a maid in the guest rooms. Every time I turned around, someone was handing me a dollar or two. If one of our wealthy ladies takes a shine to you, it could make your summer.”
Cynthia thought back to what Calvin had said about receiving tips from the guests for fetching alcohol from town or driving them off the resort for some reason or other.
She hadn’t expected to make much working as a maid, but if Dolores had had a similar experience, she might too.
Some of her tiredness seemed to shift, and she felt the most lighthearted that she had since arriving in Mount Vernon.
“Do you have any suggestions for me? I really do need the money.”
“Be respectful to the old biddies, but don’t set your sights on them for any money. Most of them don’t seem to ever carry any. You’re better off making nice with the jet set. They’re younger and like to show off their wealth.”
“So far, I haven’t met any of the guests.”
“I bet you’ll get assigned to the guest rooms since you’re taking over for Velda. She was a guest-room maid, after all. Not that the position will do you much good if you have the same misfortune she did.”
“Is there anything I should be aware of? Are there any particular no-nos?”
Dolores held up her hand and began counting them off on her fingers: “Don’t pay too much attention to the guests’ belongings, don’t slack on the job, don’t help yourself to samples from the beauty spa when no one is looking, don’t look at one of the guests in a way that offends her…”
“I’ll keep all that in mind. Thanks for the advice.” Cynthia climbed up onto her own bunk as Dolores fetched her a shower cap from the same drawer where she’d stashed the mason jar. She plucked her dressing gown from the foot of her bed and announced that she planned to take a shower.
As Cynthia stared up at the ceiling, swatting away a mosquito that buzzed next to her ear, all feelings of sleepiness fled. She had no intention of taking things that did not belong to her, money or supplies. That said, how could she be sure not to do something that would offend one of the guests?