Blessed Assurance (29 page)

Confused, she frowned down at the toddler. What was a baby doing in this awful place? And the baby was barefoot. She snatched the child off the filthy floor.
That can't be healthy
. She carried the baby over to the nearest table. She leaned close to one of the women. A slimy blot of fish insides landed on Cecy's cheek. She exclaimed, flicking it off.

More horrific noises descended from the floor above. Cecy couldn't make herself heard above the din. The women at the table all motioned her back toward the middle of the room.

Queasy, she put the child on her hip and picked her way through the crowded room, filled with tables and frantically laboring men, women, and children. In the center of the room, a stove had been stoked and feeble warmth hung around it. Boxes had been set around the stove—away from the chill seaside drafts.

She glanced down into the boxes. Babies? Babies wrapped in tattered blankets slept in the boxes. A dilapidated pram stood to one side with two babies. A lone wooden chair sat by the stove. Had they just dumped their babies here? With no one to care for them? Bewildered, Cecy sank onto the rickety chair.

Within seconds, more sleepy, shoeless toddlers in soiled dresses crowded around her. Each grabbing a piece of her skirt, they clung
to her, leaning against her, knuckling sleep-crusted eyes. Some crying; some sober.

Poor children
. Her heart was wrung. She clumsily patted a dark-haired child whose tears ran down dirt-lined cheeks. “There, there,” she murmured into the surrounding maelstrom. The child looked up at her solemnly and used Cecy's dress to wipe its eyes and nose.

A warm wetness oozed over Cecy's lap and down her legs. The toddler sitting on her had no diaper. She closed her eyes in resignation. Surrounded, she couldn't move without disturbing, distressing the innocents further. She felt their abandonment. Their eyes pleaded, “Why doesn't mama hold me? I need her.” Cecy stroked another small, downy head.

Cecy wanted to escape, but how could she abandon these little ones? They'd been deserted just as she had in faraway Boston. Left to cry all alone.

Hours later, Linc found Cecilia sitting by the stove. Her hair had come loose. She had fish guts smeared down one cheek and dirty fingerprints on the other. Her white collar was grimy. In her arms, she held a swaddled Chinese baby. She'd never looked more lovely to him. “Cecilia.”

“Linc,” she said the word with what sounded like heartfelt relief.

A short Chinese couple stopped beside Linc, bowing. The woman lifted the baby from Cecy and said something in Chinese.

The husband translated, “Wife say thank you hold baby. Our first son. One week old.”

“Congratulations.” Linc shook the man's hand, then pulled a dollar from his pocket. “This is for the baby.” The couple smiled, bowed and then straggled out. Noise still rattled and groaned above them.

“We've been here forever.” Cecilia stood up and stretched.

“Eleven hours.”

“Please can we go?” Her hair slid completely down to her shoulder as he led her outside into the sunshine. Cecilia paused beside his auto.

“What's wrong?” He held the door open for her.

She looked down at herself. “I'm too filthy to sit in your car.” She
started to cry in little gasps. “Why did you bring me to this awful place?”

He stared into her eyes. “Have you ever been filthy before?”

“What has that got to do with anything?”

“Everything. Have you ever been filthy?”

“I've never even been allowed to be smudged.”

“Exactly. How else could I make you understand how awful it feels to be filthy?” He motioned around him. “Did you imagine a cannery being anything like this?”

“I imagined men doing something with fish—”

He pressed her. “Not the children, not the babies—”

“No!” Gazing, she turned around in a complete circle. “Why do people let awful places like this exist?”

Free to voice his passion at last, Linc gripped her shoulders. “That's why I must write. God has called me to shout for justice for the helpless. This is why I came to San Francisco. People must understand this. It's bad enough for the men and even the women—but what about the children, the babies?”

She gazed into his eyes. “I'd like to meet the man who owns this disgusting place. And tell him
just
what I think of him.”

In one of her new “journalist” outfits, a severe, brown gabardine suit, Cecy sat behind the imposing oak desk in her father's office, a room in her house that she'd previously avoided, awaiting her business advisor. After she'd called his office for three days, he'd finally returned her call. Miss LaRoux's question remained—how rich was
she? And why was Mr. Edmonds avoiding her?

And who owned sardine canneries near Monterey? That day, she'd come home, stripped off her clothing, told her maid to burn them, then she'd scrubbed herself clean with a brush. If the heartless factory owner didn't change the filthy conditions there, she'd expose him in Linc's journal. For the first time in her life, she found herself passionately concerned about something besides music.

Her butler said, “Miss Jackson, your business advisor.”

In a starched white shirt and black suit, Mr. Edmonds marched in. “What's this all about? I'm a busy man.”

She smiled, but kept him standing, reminding him he worked for her. “What is the extent of my wealth?”

He bristled like his stiff, broomlike mustache. “Your father left you and your mother secure. Business is too weighty a subject for a woman.”

“I want a detailed list of my stocks, property, and where all my cash is deposited.” She waited, serenely composed like photographs of Queen Victoria.

A red flush crawled up his neck. “You don't need to get your nose into my business—”

“Now, why are you behaving as though you don't want to give me information about my own finances?” She gave him a narrow look.

“I have nothing to hide.” The red flush suffused his bulbous face now.

“When may I expect to receive a complete accounting from you?”

“Next Monday.”

“Fine. Oh, another matter, would you look into who owns sardine canneries north of Monterey?”

He looked as though he were about to ask her why, then changed his mind. “If you wish.”

“Until Monday, then.”

He left.

I did it. I'm taking charge of my life.
She stood. Thinking about finances had not been a part of her life before. Rays of light were
piercing the darkness in her life. Millie Anderson would come forward soon and she might, at last, have more answers about the past. In the hall, Cecy met her mother.

“Cecilia, what did Edmonds say?”

Cecy stroked the silky kitten her mother carried everywhere over her arm. Cecy lowered her voice, “Is there any specific concern you have about our finances that I should know about?”

For once, her mother didn't look away when asked a direct question. “Cecilia, money is power and freedom. Men know that. That's why they keep it from us. Never forget that.”

The words nearly brought tears to Cecy's eyes. It was the very first real exchange of ideas with her mother. “I won't forget. I'm going to see Linc now.”

Her mother's face brightened. “Please invite Susan and Meg to tea again.”

“I will.” Cecy felt heartened by her mother's cheerier expression. For the past few days, she'd seemed depressed again.

Her mother looked into her eyes. “Have you had any answer to your advertisement about Millie Anderson?”

“Not yet. Linc says these things take time.”

“You'll be home this evening, won't you?”

“No, I've made arrangements to attend
The Mikado
with friends, followed by dinner.”

A shadow of concern clouded her mother's face.

“Linc will be my escort. Don't worry.” Cecy smiled.

The lady turned to join the nurse. “Just remember a lady must guard her reputation jealously.”

Cecy winced at this blow. Everyone had agreed to protect her mother by remaining silent about the scandal. “Don't worry about me, Mother.”
I've already lost my reputation, thanks to Hunt.

 

“Miss Cecilia.” Meg opened the red front door and grinned. Cecy stepped inside, warmed by the child's welcome. Meg frowned. “Del left without asking permission.”

“Good day, Miss Jackson.” Susan had walked up behind Meg. “I'm sorry but Meg can't miss her study time.”

“But Del's not here,” Meg grumbled.

“That's Del's problem.” Susan turned Meg by the shoulders toward the dining room.

Linc came jogging down the walnut stairs. “Cecilia, I'm sorry I have to go out now.”

“I'll come along.” Cecy smiled her challenge. “My car's right outside.”

Linc hesitated on the bottom step, resting a hand on the curved balustrade. Linc gave the deepest frown she'd ever seen on his face. “Older called me. He saw Del at the Barbary Coast.”

He opened the door to show her out. “You can't—”

“I'm driving.” She marched out to her shiny green car, past the pink azaleas along the drive.

“I can't let you drive to the Barbary Coast. Your reputation—”

“Is quite ruined already.” She positioned her driving goggles.

He put his hands on his hips, flaring both sides of his drab driving coat, then got in. “Go! I haven't time to argue with you.”

Triumphantly, she secured her veil and headed down to the waterfront, the notorious Barbary Coast. A rush of forbidden excitement coursed through Cecy. Whispered phrases about Mickey Finns, Shanghai-ed sailors, opium dens, and ladies of easy virtue flitted through her mind. But by daylight, the Barbary Coast disappointed her. Derelict buildings, scruffy-looking men with black hats pulled low, slatternly women in bright garish dresses, and sneaky-looking mongrels slunk in and out of alleyways. “This isn't where Del should be.”

“Del's been confused since our move here.” Linc looked at her as though testing her. “He can't understand why his color makes him count for less in the eyes of the world.”

Before she could answer, she glimpsed Del and stomped on the brake. “Del!”

A large group of black boys milled around at the head of a dark
alleyway with Del at the center. Linc leaped out of the car. “Del!” The boys ran away headlong into the shadows. His buff-colored coat flaring behind him, Linc chased after them.

Cecy sped around the corner to head them off at the other end. Ahead, the first boy in tattered denim overalls broke out of the alley. She surged forward to cut off the runaways. A couple thudded against her car door; all yowled in shock.

Linc sprinted ahead and grabbed Del by the shoulder. Without a word, he yanked Del to the car, unceremoniously tossed him in next to Cecy, and then got in.

“Hey! You can't grab him!” A few boys threw stones at the car.

Cecy pressed on the gas. Why would a boy so loved want to run away to the company of young toughs?

“I don't want to go home,” Del blustered, almost in tears, pushing against Linc.

Linc pressed Del back into the seat. “You're going home.”

Cecy tried to soothe the boy. “Del, you're worrying your grandmother. Why?”

The boy wrapped his arms around himself and stared at his feet.

“Answer us,” Linc demanded.

On the drive home, both the sulky boy and Linc sat silent and gloomy. She'd barely stopped at their side door when Del vaulted over the seat and darted down the drive.

Linc jumped out of the car. “Del!”

Cecy watched Del disappear from sight. “Shall we go after him?”

Linc looked skyward. “God, I don't know what to do. He's so gifted musically. So much potential to waste. But You'll have to make the difference. I can't.”

Linc stood there as though he actually expected to receive an answer from God. Discomfited, Cecy didn't know where to look.

“Cecilia, you're still set on going to the operetta tonight?” He looked and sounded grim.

She eyed him warily. “I can go without you—”

“No. I'll pick you up about seven.”

Not knowing what she should say, she drove away.

Gripped by powerlessness, Linc stood a long time in the empty drive, dead-sure Del was on his way back to the Barbary Coast. The same helplessness he'd felt when Virginia died filled him. He'd failed Del. “God,” he whispered, “I can't see my way. Help me.”

 

Cecy's smile began to pinch at the corners of her mouth. In the darkened Tivoli Opera House around her sat Linc, Miss LaRoux, Bierce, and McEwen.
The Mikado
made everyone else laugh, but flashes of
Madame Butterfly
and that first earth tremor bobbed in her memory. Finally, the maroon velvet curtains swung closed; its gold tassels swaying; she nearly sighed aloud with relief.

Linc glanced at her. “You said you'd made a reservation at the Palace restaurant?”

She nodded. Outside, she wanted to ask him about Del, but Miss LaRoux, McEwen, and Bierce occupied the rear seat of the Pierce Arrow. The chic Palm Garden Restaurant at the grand Palace Hotel was the crown jewel of the downtown with its glass dome and six tiered stories opened onto the palmed court.

At their table, Cecy nodded to the head waiter. Pink Chablis, the first of seven wines for the various courses, flowed into their glasses. Cecy sipped the piquant wine. When she'd attempted to scale the heights of society, she'd needed a clear head. Now as the scandalous redhead, she could let this wine take away the worries about her mother, and troubling memories of the helpless babies at the cannery. By the light of the many electric chandeliers, she admired Linc's good looks. He was different, special. His clear blue eyes looked out on the world, seeing the truth without flinching.

Everyone laughed. Not hearing the joke, she forced a chuckle to fit in. Why did Linc keep frowning at her so?

When the waiter came to fill Cecilia's glass of champagne too soon, Linc waved the man away. After doing this twice, the waiter held back until Cecilia demanded her glass filled.

Not wanting to cause a public argument, he hid his worry. Certain families were prone to certain sins. Her mother had ended up in a sanitarium with delirium tremens.
Dear God, how can I stop this from happening to Cecilia
?

The evening finally ended near two
A.M
. Gripping her elbow, Linc guided Cecilia out to his Pierce Arrow in the cool night breeze. Her exaggerated gestures, giggles, and missteps broadcast her condition. Eager to go home, he parked outside Cecilia's mansion and escorted her to the door.

“Why are there so many lights on?” Cecilia bumped into Linc.

He steadied her. “Perhaps your staff decided to wait up for you.”

“Mother…Mother might be ill.” He helped her mount the steps. The butler opened the door. “What's wrong?” Cecilia asked.

Linc blinked, adjusting to the bright lights in the large foyer.

“Cecy!” A warm, female voice rang out. “Cecy, my precious!”

Cecilia looked up, mouth wide.

Linc watched a gray-haired woman of generous proportions envelop Cecilia in her arms.

Cecilia gasped, “Nana. Oh, Nana.”