Tackett looked at Blanche for a moment. Slowly, his eyes lit up.
“So it is, Blanche.”
“Seems to me that brooch should go towards the debt he owes you.”
“Why, you’ve a point,” Tackett agreed, eyes bright. “I believe it should.”
“Well?” Blanche said to Cora. “Turn it over.”
Tackett held out his hand. Cora gave Blanche a long, hard stare, then unpinned the brooch and placed it on Tackett’s open palm. He smiled a second time, gaze lingering on Cora’s bosom.
“There are ways to earn it back, my dear,” he said.
At this, Cora’s eyes flashed with hatred, while Blanche appeared freshly worried. Had she miscalculated again? I held my breath.
But before Cora could reply, Tackett suddenly went pale and he lurched away. I believe he meant to bolt to the privy. He didn’t make it: a wretched stream of yellow vomit spilled from his mouth and onto the floor of the hall.
“Horace!” Blanche fussed. “Oh, Horace, you’re still ill. Let me help you to your room!”
Tackett trembled with humiliation, but it was plain he was in no condition to decline.
“Get ’em down to the dancehall,” he muttered as Blanche helped him back up the stairs. “It’s still a workin’ day. And tell the girl to clean that up.”
“You heard him!” Blanche shouted over her shoulder.
Everyone—Cora, Flossie, Mary, Opal, and Henrietta—scrambled out the front door.
I went to fetch the mop and bucket. If I was quick about it, I could get the job done before Blanche came back downstairs. I hardly wanted to cross paths with her; I could only imagine her dark mood.
* * *
—
Later that night I recalled the picture of Tackett doubled over in pain, vomiting onto the floor . . . and I smiled. He deserves it, I thought to myself. I remembered what Cora had said about putting ipecac in his food and almost wished I had done it. As far as I could tell, there wasn’t enough justice in the world for Tackett.
When I readied my bed in the kitchen alcove and went to change into my nightshirt, something fell from the pocket of my smock. It fell with a small, empty thump onto the floor. I picked it up and examined it: it was a bottle. I was both shocked and puzzled.
* * *
—
I looked at it more closely, and saw that it was empty.
5
The empty bottle had me rattled. It couldn’t be mine.
I’d never seen it before—I was sure.
Wasn’t I?
Unable to sleep, I comforted myself with the one distraction that had always soothed me: reading a book. Books were hard to come by—a definite luxury—but Flossie somehow managed to keep me in good supply. She was no great beauty like Cora, but when she put her mind to it, she could get anything she wanted. Luckily for me, Flossie wanted books, and she was willing to share.
During our days in the orphanage, a mutual love of reading had formed the basis of our friendship. Some of the other girls, like Cora, could barely read the letters stamped on a sack of flour. I knew it wasn’t Cora’s fault; she had trouble with the written word. When the sisters made her read aloud, she became instantly flustered, tossing her hair and declaring that books were for boring people. The only words Cora willingly read were printed in gossip columns and on face cream advertisements.
But Flossie and I read ravenously, despite the limited selection available, and eventually found a way to borrow any and every kind of novel we wanted. Or, rather, Flossie found a way and was kind enough to share her secret.
It began when she spied me reading one day and nodded at the book clutched in my hands, asking what it was.
“Thomas Aquinas,” I answered.
Flossie rolled her eyes. Admittedly, it was dry.
“Sister Louise loans me her books,” I said. “But . . . what are you reading?”
Flossie’s lips curled into a smile. It was a curious expression for her. Like the cat that caught the canary, it bore a hint of a devilish secret.
“A story called ‘The Turn of the Screw,’” she said. “It’s by Henry James. It’s very modern, I think.”
“‘The Turn of the Screw’?” I repeated the title aloud. “Where did you get that?”
“The library. I heard people talking about it.”
“I don’t understand,” I stammered.
Flossie scampered over to perch on the edge of my cot. She leaned towards me and whispered the full story: She had ingratiated herself to Sister Edwina; she said Sister Edwina even considered her an unofficial novice of sorts. And sometimes . . . Sister Edwina wished to have access to a book here and there that none of the local convents owned. In these cases Flossie was sent with a handwritten note to the big new public library, and the librarians there almost always found a way to procure them.
“But . . . Sister Edwina reads books like that?” I pointed.
Flossie shook her head and gave that tight-lipped smile again, explaining her true secret: over time, she had learned to mimic Sister Edwina’s penmanship so perfectly that now she could write a note asking for any book she wanted—any book at all! And so Flossie had gained access to an entirely new world of treasures.
“I’ll share them with you,” Flossie promised. “You aren’t like the other girls here.”
I grinned. But then Flossie’s face suddenly crumpled, and she looked forlorn.
“Do you think me very wicked? For imitating Sister Edwina’s script?”
I quickly shook my head. “No,” I decided aloud.
Flossie smiled, relieved.
“I’m so glad you feel that way, Violet. I’ll share: I’ll borrow books for the both of us. It’ll be our secret, so long as you never give me away. You won’t—will you?”
“I won’t,” I promised.
And I didn’t.
Our pact made, Flossie regularly snuck off to the library, eavesdropping on the librarians as they whispered about new titles. When we wound up in Tackett’s boardinghouse, Flossie continued to find ways to borrow or buy books, and our secret continued. During dry spells, we reread early favorites—and even chilling tales like “The Turn of the Screw” grew to be a comfort to me.
I was grateful to Flossie for this, and especially grateful that night as Tackett snored upstairs, waking only to make terrible retching sounds. I methodically turned the pages and lost myself in the young governess’s plight, momentarily putting aside my anxious wonderings.