Angel's Flight (A Mercy Allcutt Mystery) (6 page)

      Eventually Mr. Easthope cleared his throat and smiled at me. I jumped a little bit, but that’s only because I hadn’t expected it.

      “Fortunately for me, your daughter has offered a couple of excellent ways to delve into the spiritualist problem and thwart the d’Agostinos’ evil influence.”

      Dramatic, but well put.

      Mother eyed first Chloe and then me. Her gaze rested upon me, blast it. She knew of old who the troublemaker in the family was. “I presume you mean Mercedes Louise.”

      Undaunted, which I consider gallant of him, Mr. Easthope continued to smile as he said, “Indeed I do. Not only has she offered to attend the next séance at my house, but she’s offered for employment a young man of her acquaintance. He can serve as my houseboy while he investigates the d’Agostinos.”

      “Well,” I said, suddenly remembering that I didn’t know Rupert Mullins from Adam, “I don’t actually
know
him, exactly. But he’s Lulu’s brother—you know Lulu, the receptionist? Well, she’s bringing him to work with her tomorrow, and you can pop by and interview him. Unless you want him to go to your home for the interview.” I attempted a smile bright enough to match Mr. Easthope's, but I’m certain mine fell far short of the mark. “If you think he’ll work out, you’ll be giving him employment, and he’ll be helping you rid your house of the spiritualists. He can be sort of like a pest exterminator.”

      Chloe giggled, but Mother didn’t think my little joke worthy of so much as another huff. She stood, precipitating a flurry of masculine foot shuffling as Harvey and Mr. Easthope rose, too, being polite fellows. “I,” she said magisterially, “am going to bed. I’m perfectly exhausted after that long train journey across the country.” She pinned first me and then Chloe with a razor-like glance. “I will speak to you two again tomorrow.”

      Hallelujah, I’d be at work tomorrow! I didn’t sing or anything, but just said, “Good night, Mother,” in my most sugary tone.

      Before I could breathe a sigh of relief, Mother’s eyes thinned, she glanced at me once more, and she said, “Mercedes Louise, show me to my room.”

      My heart, which hadn’t exactly been soaring at the thought of being at work while my mother was on a rampage and Chloe was her only victim but had come pretty close, fell with a sickening thump. I got up on shaky knees. “I thought Mrs. Biddle showed you to your room earlier.”

      Narrowing her eyes still more into an expression I recognized, Mother said, “I wish to speak with you. Now.”

      With a last glance at the other occupants of the room, feeling like a French aristocrat being hauled to the guillotine in a tumbrel, I followed my mother with dragging steps. I appreciated everyone’s expressions of commiseration, although I knew they weren’t going to help me through the perils awaiting me in the immediate future.

      Mother and I didn’t speak until we were inside the Green Room and I’d shut the door. I didn’t want to shut it, but Mother gave me a look and I knew I’d better.

      “Mercedes Louise Allcutt, you’re a disgrace to the family. I want this
job
nonsense to cease at once.”

      Blunt, but not unexpected. I straightened and took a deep breath. This wouldn’t be the first time I’d defied my parents, but before this I’d generally done so either behind their backs or from a distance of a couple of thousand miles. This act of defiance to Mother’s face was testing my courage a whole lot.

      “My job is not nonsense, Mother, and I shan’t leave it. And I don’t believe I’m a disgrace to anyone. If more people in our family worked, perhaps they’d be more understanding of others who aren’t as fortunate as they.” So there. I stood straight, but my insides felt kind of like not-quite-set Jell-O gelatin.

      Her glare got icier. “You’re speaking to your mother, Mercedes Louise. How dare you use that tone with me?”

      Feeling really resentful and really scared, I didn’t back down. “Mother, I’m using no particular tone with you. I’m telling you the truth. We aren’t living in Queen Victoria’s reign anymore. Anyhow,” I said, thinking of what I considered to be a salient point, “we aren’t British. We’re Americans. America is supposed to be a classless society.” So there again.

      “There is no such thing as a classless society,” Mother said, eyeing me as if I were a bug in need of being stepped on. “Quality will always rise to the top. You are deliberately choosing to be less than your station in life demands of you.”

      “It seems to me that the quality of which you speak was already at the top when I was born. There’s no earning it.”

      “You were born into a level of society that requires you to behave in a certain way, Mercedes Louise. You’re deliberately misinterpreting my words.”

      “I don’t believe I am at all, Mother. What you’re saying is that because our family is fortunate and has more money than most, I shouldn’t work for a living.”

      “There is no need for you to
work for a living
, young woman. Indeed, you were fortunate to have been born an Allcutt. Yet you insist upon defying us and behaving in a manner that’s disrespectful of the family name.”

      “How do you figure that?” It was tough, but I put the lid on my temper. If I lost it, Mother would have gained a point or two. At least that’s the way I saw it. “I’m earning my own living. How is that lowering myself from what you call my station in life or being disrespectful of the family name? If more women in our so-called
class
had to earn their keep and got jobs, they might understand what the world is really like.”

      “What is this world of which you speak, Mercedes Louise? Do you mean the world of crime and dirty dealings? Do you mean the world of bomb-throwing anarchists? The world of Irish day-laborers? The world of cooks and servants? Do you mean the world of that vulgar woman in the lobby of the building in which you
work
?”

      “Lulu’s not vulgar,” said I nobly, even though she actually kind of was. Poor Lulu.

      Mother only looked at me for a moment, as if divining my secret thoughts. Then she sniffed and said, “Why in the world should a well-bred young lady wish to see or understand the world of underbred, unintelligent, unmannerly hooligans?”

      “That’s not the world I mean!” I said, frustrated almost beyond bearing. “I mean the world of working-class people, who
aren’t
vulgar. Not being rich doesn’t mean you’re vulgar, for heaven’s sake. There are more of them than there of us, you know, and they’re becoming mighty peeved at not getting what they deserve from life. It’s not only anarchists who are straining at their bonds. Normal, law-abiding, everyday people are demanding more of a role in the leadership of this country, not to mention fair wages for their work.”

      “Labor unions,” said Mother, as if the two words were filthier even than slime in the gutters.

      Shoot, I hadn’t even thought about labor unions until that moment. I didn’t know beans about them, either, barring a couple of articles I’d read in newspapers, but I nodded, believing Mother had brought up a salient point. While my parents would never agree that it was so, I thought labor unions might be helpful to coal miners, railroad workers and so forth, although I couldn’t imagine unions assisting secretaries since our jobs weren’t generally dangerous.

      Mother shook her helmet of neatly marcelled, pepper-and-salt hair. Not even a hair dared stray from its mooring on
her
head. Which means I caused more trouble than a hair, I guess.

      “If you wish to compare yourself to criminal agitators or that person in the lobby of that building in which you
work
, or that miserable worm of a creature, Eugene Debs, so be it. I am ashamed to call you my daughter.”

      That stung, but I’d be hanged if I’d show her how much. Lifting my own little chin, much as Chloe had done earlier that evening, I said, “I’m sorry you feel that way, Mother. Perhaps one day, you will understand my wish to participate in what I consider to be the
real
America.”

      Naturally, I didn’t mention the fact that I was determined to understand the “real” America because I wanted to write books about it. Mother would not merely fail to understand that particular longing, but would probably have me locked up in an insane asylum. There was no way in the entire world my mother would ever be brought to understand that what I was doing wasn’t actively evil.

      I went to bed that night feeling more abused and mistreated than usual. And I was defiantly glad that I wouldn’t see my battleaxe of a mother before work the next day. In actual fact, I fumed half the night, wondering if I should get my own apartment. Other working women did it. Why not me?

* * * * *

      The next day I woke up without the happy anticipation that had become customary for me during the past month. It didn’t take me long to recall the reason for this uncharacteristic mood of gloom.

      Mother. My
mother
had come to town.

      
Chapter Four

That same morning, however, a welcome diversion from thoughts of my mother entered the Figueroa Building in the person of a new tenant. This wasn’t any old tenant, either, but an extremely handsome fellow named, according to the shiny brass plaque outside his office, James Quincy Carstairs, Esq.

      To my mind, this points out the importance of general maintenance and upkeep. When Ernie Templeton first hired me, the Figueroa Building was a most unprepossessing building. The old maintenance man, Ned, did a very poor job of keeping it clean, swept and polished. Mr. Emerald Buck, the maintenance man who’d been hired after I pushed Ned down an elevator shaft—for good reason (it wasn’t merely a whim on my part)—had the place looking like a bright new day. I doubt that Mr. Carstairs, a newly minted but increasingly bright coin in the lawyering business, would have bothered with the Figueroa Building had it retained the aura of dilapidation permeating it when I first started working there.

      Mr. Carstairs had himself a perfect gem of a secretary, too. I discovered this when, along about two in the afternoon, I toddled down the hallway two offices, knocked lightly on Mr. Carstairs’s door, and peeped in. A young woman whom I’d viewed from my office window carrying boxes looked up from organizing her desk and smiled brightly.

      “May I help you?” she asked in a crisp, but friendly, voice. It was the perfect tone for a secretary to adopt in my humble opinion, and already I admired her.

      She looked the perfect secretary, too. Her dark hair was modestly shingled and shone in the electrical lighting. She wore a sober, lightweight gray suit and dark-rimmed spectacles. Her brown eyes were quite pretty behind the glasses, but her overall attractiveness did not diminish her businesslike appearance. Anyone entering Mr. Carstairs’s outer office would instantly know this was a professional woman working for a professional man. Indeed, she personified the image I strove to achieve. In fact, since I had no role models of my own to follow, working outside the home being anathema to my family, I wondered if perhaps I hadn’t just found a model in this woman.

      I walked up to her desk, extending my hand. “How do you do? I’m Mercy Allcutt, and I work in number three-oh-three, for Mr. Ernest Templeton. Mr. Templeton is a private investigator.”

      She shook my hand warmly. “It’s so nice to meet you, Miss Allcutt. My name is Sylvia Dunstable.”

      We remained smiling at each other for a second or two, I on my feet, she on her chair, before she said, “Won’t you be seated, Miss Allcutt? I’m happy to meet another tenant here.”

      “Thank you.” I took the proffered seat, pausing only to remove from it a couple of files. I was terribly impressed. Ernie and I had a couple of files, too, and I kept them in pristine order, but I doubt they were as interesting as these. Even if they were, Miss Sylvia Dunstable had ever so many more of them to work with than did I. Ernie’s business wasn’t exactly booming. “I’m so glad the Figueroa Building seems to be attracting more people.”

      “Yes,” she said. “I must admit I was rather surprised when Mr. Carstairs said we were moving in here, but the building is ever so much nicer than when I saw it last.”

      “Indeed it is. We strive to improve our image all the time.”

      She looked at me with lifted eyebrows, and I think I blushed.

      “I mean the management is taking much better care of the business than it once did.”

      “I see. Well, the management seems to have done a smashing job so far. Mr. Carstairs was perfectly correct to move here. The rent is lower than it is in some more fashionable places, and it’s certainly not what you might call fancy, but that’s a good thing in my opinion, since Mr. Carstairs’s clients prefer to maintain a degree of anonymity that can be difficult to achieve in some parts of the city.”

      “My, yes,” I said, thinking it interesting that Ernie’s clients weren’t the only ones who didn’t want the world nosing into their business. It crossed my mind that perhaps Ernie had selected this building for that same reason, but that notion only lasted a second. The low rent was what had attracted Ernie; I was certain of it.

      We smiled at each other again.

      “Your work must be so interesting,” I said, hoping to hear all about the stars, which was silly, really, since I lived with Harvey Nash and saw picture people all the time. But when those picture folks were at Harvey’s house, they just seemed normal. I guess I wanted to think that movie stars were different from the rest of us, even though I knew they weren’t. I swear, Los Angeles has a lot to answer for. Imagine the whole world having its perception warped like that!

      “It’s not interesting very often,” she said with a laugh.

      I’d actually read about Mr. Carstairs in the newspaper a time or two. He seemed to be establishing himself as an attorney to the people in the motion-picture industry. I’d seen his name in connection with Mr. Thomas MacCready, a fellow who’d acted in a couple of cowboy pictures, and Miss Jacqueline Lloyd, a newish actress who had made quite a hit in the melodrama
Whispering Oaks
. I’d seen that one, and thought Miss Lloyd had been stunning as the orphaned Lillian, a maiden taken cruel advantage of by Mr. Wallace Reid, who had seduced and abandoned her. Well, his character had. I’m sure Mr. Reid is a gentleman of impeccable character. Chloe and I had seen the picture together and cried buckets through most of it.