The Downstairs Girl Read online

  “Oh? It must be the rides. Sweet Potato has grown wings on her feet.” It’s a wonder that Six Paces Meadow is still standing after our searing afternoon rides across it. Thankfully, Merritt’s work at the mills has kept him from intruding.

  “Seems so.”

  After today’s jag, I allowed the mare to carry me north to where the streetcar tracks bend toward Piedmont Park, the site of the upcoming race. With her nose up and ears forward, it was almost as though the thoroughbred in her were drawn to the sweat of her kinsmen emanating from that oval shrine. If I had not drawn up on the reins, she would’ve sailed through the stone pillars and past the stands.

  “And Miss Caroline, how are her rides?” Old Gin tacks on casually as he watches a jay bully away a titmouse.

  But why would he ask me separately about Caroline, as if my first answer had not included her? Surely he couldn’t know that we take separate paths unless he had followed us, which he could not possibly do without my noticing. The longer I don’t answer, the more I hang myself. “Fine, I expect.” Before he can throw me more rope, I pull out the Pendergrass’s elixir from my damask bag. “Got this for you. Robby says they can’t keep it on the shelf. The instructions say to drink the bottle for three days—you can see they marked the lines—and when you finish, you should feel ‘strong as a horse.’” I’d decided not to tell him about Billy Riggs, as he would worry, maybe even feel compelled to do all the shopping himself.

  He skims the ingredients.

  “Cost fifty cents, but it comes with a money-back guarantee if it doesn’t work, so we have nothing to lose and everything to gain.”

  He fills his lungs, but noting my crossed arms, his protest slips away. With a sigh, he uncorks the bottle and gulps down a mouthful. “Strong as horse, hm?” He smacks his lips. “Please let me know if you see a tail growing.”

  As the streetcar approaches, Maud Gray hobbles up, still wearing her blue-and-white-striped milkmaid apron. Her cap has gone askew, and her mussed hair puffs out like dandelion fluff from her dark skin.

  Old Gin nods to her. “Evening, Mrs. Gray.”

  “Didn’t think I’d make it. Something spooked the cows, and they wouldn’t let down till noon.”

  Sully halts in front of our stop with a single clang of his bell. It is an ominous sound, different from the ka-klank, ka-klank that the children make with their eager hands, milking the clapper for every last ring. Tonight, everyone seems to sit too rigidly in their seats. No one is talking, not even chatty Mrs. Washington.

  Old Gin slips into a middle row with enough space for both of us, while Mrs. Gray moves to the front as usual, in order to warm her old bones by the coal heater.

  “There ain’t room for you here,” says a crabby gardener whom I never liked, with his eternally sunburned face caused by a too-small hat. What kind of a gardener wears a one-inch brim? He shifts his lanky frame, closing off the empty space next to him. “I suggest you set your pins farther back.”

  A ball of anger gathers in my chest. Old Gin stiffens beside me.

  “She always sits there,” says someone, though it’s hard to tell who.

  “Hm.” Old Gin’s usually musical utterance comes out curt and disapproving. People in the front rows have begun to glare at Maud, who plucks at her shawl with her thin fingers.

  Something cold pours through my veins, running all the way to my clammy toes. It occurs to me that all the faces in the front are white. A child in the back whimpers, and his mother squeezes him to her.

  Maud stares down at her shoes. “My hands are so stiff. I just wanted to warm them.” Her husky voice has lost its bounce.

  The gardener flips up the collar of his coat. “Well, warm them in the back from now on.”

  “Sit down already,” Sully throws over his bony shoulder. “I’ve got a schedule to keep.”

  “Come sit by me, Maud,” says a young maid from the row behind us.

  Maud gives the coal heater a longing glance. Then, with a sigh that crumples the stripes of her apron, she scoots in beside the maid.

  The streetcar carries us off in our unnatural silence. I sit still as a bottle, attuned to every curbed whisper, every tight glance. Atlanta has always had her rules, but tonight, someone has planted a foot on her back and yanked the stays even tighter. I want to talk to Old Gin, but he looks busy in his own thoughts, his pupils tracking a fence heavy with snowy Cherokee roses.

  At the second-to-last stop before ours, Old Gin nudges me and then points his nose to the front, where a man has just unfurled the Constitution. The headline reads: RESOLVED: STREETCAR SEGREGATION OK.

  Eighteen

  “It’s not right,” I whisper once we have reached the warm shadows of our basement. “The streetcars are for everyone.” I set about switching on our lamps while Old Gin boils water.

  “There have always been lines drawn. Lines will just get darker.”

  “When will it be enough?”

  Old Gin glances at me holding my elbows, the kerosene lamp I’ve just lit moving the shadows. “In China, there are many social orders as well.”

  “China is not a democracy.”

  He alights on his milking stool and unties his laces. “Sometimes, things must get harder before they can change.”

  “But why?”

  “Pain drives progress, hm?” After removing his shoes, he takes our broom and sweeps the dirt we’ve tracked in. “When I was a boy, there was a drought in my village that lasted three years. Food was scarce for everyone. I remember seeing a dog wandering the streets, so hungry, he bit into his own leg. It was only after he drew blood that he let go.” He works the dirt into a neat pile. “Sometimes, we are so driven by our own needs, we do things that hurt ourselves. But eventually, the dog must let go.”

  If there aren’t enough rows, the colored will have to give way, just as on the sidewalks. And where are Old Gin and I supposed to sit? Somewhere in the middle once again. Old Gin has always steered us away from trouble.

  I rouse myself from my frozen state and fetch our rusty dustpan, holding it so Old Gin can sweep in the debris. An itchiness has crept into my soul, and it’s as if my insides are full of shifting debris that no broom can hope to sweep away. I wish the water would boil faster. I wish the Pendergrass would work quicker. I wish the dog would release its mangy, flea-bitten leg.

  I pour tea, and my eyes catch on Shang’s letter, which I had set in the catch-all basket hanging from a wall hook. “Who is Shang?” I set the letter before him.

  His glances at the letter, lingering on the loop of the signature. “Where did you get this?”

  “It was in the pocket of the coat I found in the rug.”

  Before speaking, he presses a thumb over a pressure point in his palm, then slowly lets it go. “Shang was a groom, like me. He left in search of silver in Montana, after the tragedy,” he says, referring to the hanging of the gentle fieldworker who paid for the Rabid-Eyes Rapist’s crime. He sighs, closing himself the way a heron collapses its neck and wings after a long flight.

  “Was Shang the man who owed money to Billy Riggs’s father?” I can’t help asking.

  He nods.

  “How much did he borrow?”

  “Much more than he could afford.” Something dark crosses his face, like a crow’s shadow as it passes over land.

  “Who sent the letter?”

  “Many questions. Sometimes it is better not to get involved. The river travels fastest—”

  “Around the stones, yes, I know. But the river always feels the stones, no matter how it travels.” My voice tightens as wounds open. “And sometimes they are sharp, yet we are to pretend it doesn’t hurt, just keep our heads down as always. But how will things ever change if we always act like rabbits, hiding away and being afraid?”

  “Jo!” His bright face rebukes me. “We are not rabbits.” He refolds the letter and sl
ides it back to me. “Do not speak of this again.” His chest rumbles, and he retreats to his corner, removing the cough like a wayward child to its nursery.

  I press my sleeves to my face, caging the sob that wants out. The only person who cares for me does not seem to care at all tonight.

  * * *

  —

  THE NEXT MORNING the confusion on the streetcar has only grown. More protests are voiced and silenced; more people shuffle about. Some choose to walk, an avenue not open to the weak or infirm. Old Gin sits beside me in the middle row, his shoulder twitching, which only happens when he’s tired. I try to let go of the injuries of last night; however, the mystery of Shang still pulls at me. With Old Gin’s refusal to shed light on the matter, the mystery seems to double in size.

  When we arrive at the Payne Estate, Noemi’s kitchen smells of bacon and . . . sour mash? At the kitchen table, Merritt hunches over a glass of something yellow. Noemi sits across from him, picking gravel from a sack of cornmeal.

  “Good morning.” She gives me a tight smile. I wonder if the new streetcar rules are on her mind.

  “Good morning, Mr. Merritt, Noemi.” I get busy assembling a tray.

  Merritt claps his hands over his ears. “Quit hollering.”

  He is the source of the sour-mash stench. Violet crescents hang under his eyes, and his hair leans to one side like wheat in a breeze.

  “Hold your nose, and throw it back,” says Noemi. “Like you did your daddy’s good Scotch last night. I heard you told everyone about the first girl you were sweet on.”

  Merritt groans. “What?”

  Noemi drops an especially large pebble onto her pile, then gets up to stir a pot of oatmeal. “Don’t worry, you didn’t mention names, only that she had raven hair and pearls for teeth.”

  Merritt squints at me through bloodshot eyes, then holds up the glass to me. “Well then, here’s to first love.” He gulps it down with several jerks of his Adam’s apple.

  Merritt sniffs at his glass. “Smells like a sewer. What’s in it?”

  “Egg yolks, Worcestershire, and a pinch of white pepper. Pepper is power. It solves a lot of problems you don’t expect it to—swelling, bruises, and hangovers.”

  Merritt coughs, and his empty cup strikes the table with a thud. His chest heaves, and with one hand clamped over his mouth, he runs out the door to the courtyard.

  Noemi shrugs. “Works every time.” She spoons oatmeal into a bowl. “Today’s oatmeal and peach preserves, and that porcupine can take it or leave it. August was the last straw, especially now with that mess of a streetcar. I needed that bicycle today.”

  “She will send it back.”

  Pots clang as she moves them around the stove. She sighs. “Fine. I made a ham. Cut a few slices if you want.”

  I hop to the task for both of our sakes.

  Noemi wipes her fingers on her apron. “I’ve been thinking about those suffragists.”

  “What about them?”

  “The Fifteenth was supposed to improve our lot, giving our men the vote. But then the man started taking it all away. It’s like they put a plate of hot biscuits in front of us, but before we get a chance to eat, they say, that’ll be five dollars. And if you come up with the five dollars, they say no, no, no. You gotta tell us, if you got sixteen hens and thirty-seven roosters, where is Rutherford B. Hayes buried?”

  “I don’t know about the poultry, but Rutherford B. Hayes was from Ohio.”

  “Wrong. It’s a trick question. Hayes is still alive. Point is, they make it so hard. Now, if women got the vote, maybe that gives us a second wind. Adds our fists to the fight. Those suffragists say the Fifteenth gives the vote to all citizens, not just the men. But we got to insist on it.” She gives a pot of chowder a stir. “Imagine, Jo, if women got a say, that could change the whole stew.” Bang goes her spoon, punctuated by the clang of a closing lid. “They’re meeting Monday night at Grace Baptist. You could come with me.”

  I imagine the suffragists, reform-minded women of the middle class, their starched skirts dragging the pavement. Women with whom I have little in common. Those who dwell in shadows get along by not standing out, not by raising their fists to the sky. And even if women are given the vote, Chinese will still get left behind.

  Noemi steers her hopeful face toward me.

  It is one thing to speak under the safety of Miss Sweetie’s name. Quite another to take a public stance under Jo Kuan’s. “I’ll think about it.”

  Nineteen

  Old Gin must stay at the Paynes’ the next few nights, citing much work. Though he maintains this work concerns the horse race, I can’t help taking it personally. Things have not been the same between us since our skirmish over the letter. Perhaps my stand-in father expects to marry me off soon, so why bother trying to smooth things between us? I hunker down in the middle row of the streetcar, too tired to walk and feeling cowardly for my weakness. The stench of sewage and overworked bodies smells extra foul this evening, locked in by a layer of brown clouds that float like the scum off boiled bones.

  Once home, I give myself a thorough scrub with barley water. It is already Wednesday, and Nathan might be wondering whether he scared Miss Sweetie away.

  In a fragment of looking glass that Old Gin uses for shaving, I study the lower half of my face, with my pearl lip and rounded chin. Is it possible to identify someone as Chinese based only on a few bits? It was dark. Well, Miss Sweetie is not the sort to be intimidated. She is like an old rash that keeps coming back, each time more cranky and twice as determined.

  I lift my chin and put my fists on my hips. The face in the mirror loses its injury, though my ache over Old Gin persists on the inside.

  Though I want to write about the streetcar rules, the topic is even more controversial than “The Custom-ary.”

  Only two sheets of paper remain in Old Gin’s dresser. I should’ve picked up more when I was at Buxbaum’s. I peek in the fabric drawer, and to my dismay, the silk pieces have conjoined and transformed into a jacket with a breast pocket. The sleeves are still unfinished, though Old Gin has neatly squared the collar. Old Gin does everything with precision. Why should giving away his daughter be any different?

  I tuck it away, and my fingers brush a tiny box, the second item that had belonged to Old Gin’s wife. I lift the lid, and the sweet scent of cedar fills my nose. A silk padding still holds the shape of the snuff bottle that once lay there. The bottle has been lost, but its top remains, a jade bead with an attached spoon for drawing out the snuff. I once asked to use the box to hold ribbons, but Old Gin shook his head. “A turtle shell may one day hold soup, but not before the turtle has moved out.”

  In my chambers, a solitary spider builds her web where two walls meet the ceiling. I pull my quilt around my lap, watching the spider connect two strands. She doesn’t need a mate. She’ll do fine on her own.

  Caroline’s scowling visage appears in my mind. With her wealth, every door will open for her. But maybe what she wants is not for doors to open, but for the walls to come down. When one grows up with walls, it is difficult to dream of a world beyond. Who knows what Caroline—what any of us—could accomplish without the constant pressure to get married? Without the walls, we could be like this spider, who can go anywhere she wants.

  THE SINGULAR QUESTION: IS IT SO WRONG NOT TO MARRY?

  It seems to me that in the rush to the altar, few who marry give much thought to how they got there until it is too late. And then they are stuck with a lifetime of disappointment, not to mention an exponential growth of laundry. We are all well-schooled in why women supposedly should marry: A husband will take care of her and secure her respectability and prestige; bearing children is every woman’s divine privilege and responsibility; without marriage, society would decline into barbarism.

  Yet, little thought is paid to the benefits of remaining single, or at least delaying
marriage. While some women are spinsters simply because life has not dealt them the marriage card, I submit that many women are single by choice, though it may not be obvious. It is one thing to be single and miserable, and quite another to be single and content. We cluck our tongue at the former and brand the latter as “off her onion.”

  Sometimes Mrs. English’s clients would tell her, “A fine widow like you surely deserves to remarry,” to which she would always demur, “Perhaps I shall be so lucky one day,” and then turn to me and whisper, “Do I look like I deserve a kick in the teeth?” And then there are women, like Miss Culpepper, who have never seemed to be interested in men.

  So what are these benefits to remaining single?

  1) Singlets do not risk a lifetime of being shackled to a bore or, worse, wondering whether she is the bore.

  2) Singlets are free to pursue whatever activities interest them, and to be industrious without having to share their wealth.

  3) Singlets grow more robust in constitution than married women, having only to look after their own welfare. Furthermore, with no man to “protect” her, she learns to walk with steel in her spine, and a confident mind lights a dark path.

  Invisible fingers stretch the golden thread of my candle to the ceiling, where the spider has completed her web.

  We are all like candles, and whether we are single or joined with another does not affect how brightly we can burn.

  Respectfully submitted,

  Miss Sweetie

  * * *

  —

  “MISS SWEETIE?” ONLY one sleeve of Nathan’s oak-brown sweater is pushed up this time, exposing an ink stain that looks like a paw print. The fireplace casts a halo around his thatch of hair. “Would you like to come in, or are we still strangers?”

  The blazing fire in their hearth beckons me forward, but I remain fixed to my spot halfway between the door and the stairs.