“It’s all right if it is, you know.”
“It’s not. He’s not from here, doesn’t live here. He’s only in town for the week, so …” Dini let the sentence trail away in the guise of eating a guacamole-laden chip. Arya snagged a cube of cheese, and both used the silent chewing interval to cleanse the conversation palate.
“Does that mean you’re not going to make it for the concert in the park tomorrow?” Arya asked.
“Can you promise not to try to fix me up with some random saxophone player?”
“I promise nothing.”
Chapter 4
Excerpt from
My Spectral Accuser: The Haunted Life of Hedda Krause
Published by the Author Herself
I have never had the opportunity to think of myself as a lady of leisure. In fact, for most of my life, I don’t know that I could have presented myself as a lady at all without a healthy dose of irony. If my marriage to my late husband gave me respect—a name, a home, a desk drawer full of monogrammed stationery and calling cards—then my life at the Menger gave me all of the same, with the added elements of desirability and intrigue. My friendships here were transient at best. Fellow lodgers in town for business or leisure might invite me to their table for dinner after light conversation in the lobby. I often accepted, as politeness required, and thanked them with profuse incredulity and sufficient protest when they insisted on charging my meal to their room.
I developed a thriving social life outside of the hotel, heavy with engagements and invitations. I learned of all the grumblings of the coming war while walking with an army officer through the Mexican Courtyard, his whispers no louder than the sound of the wind through the leaves. I joined a group on a walking tour of the surrounding Catholic missions—long abandoned but still holy enough to inspire a convicting reverence. Over the course of a week, a state senator escorted me to two concerts and a charity banquet before he—with great reluctance—informed me that his wife would be joining him for the remainder of his stay, and he would be removing himself to the Beverly Hotel across the street.
I’d also taken up going to the theater. Not to the shows, exactly. To buy myself a ticket remained beyond my budget. Instead, I’d don my finest evening gown (wishing each time that I’d thought to pack more than one) and take myself to the newly opened Empire Theater, timing my arrival to coincide with the show’s intermission, where I could indulge in a glass of champagne and introduce myself to some of the local people of worth. Sometimes, if I lingered long enough, I had the occasion to meet a few actors who would go on to be silver screen stars, though I’ll not name them here. Stardom, like youth, is fleeting.
One evening, during a run of the popular play Sadie Love, which would be the stage debut of the beautiful actress Thalia Powers, after some artful positioning I caught the eye of a burly, unkempt man who was maneuvering through the crowd. He wore a bulky camera strapped around his neck and hoisted it to beckon me closer.
I was on the fringe of a conversation, not quite invited in. Still, I excused myself with a touch of my gloved hand to a tuxedo sleeve and worked my way over.
“Mind if I take your photo, ma’am?”
“My photo?” I held my glass aloft. “Why, I’m nobody special.”
“We can let the readers decide that, I think. I do freelance work for the San Antonio Express. They like pictures of the society people for the Sunday paper. Over here?” He indicated the wide staircase that led to the private viewing boxes. He walked backward, expertly, leading me. “The managers will only let me take one photograph—worried about the crowd and the flash, I suppose.”
“And you’ve chosen me?”
“You’re the only woman here alone. That’s interesting. All the men look alike, and the other women wouldn’t dare be photographed without them.”
Spying the empty tripod at the foot of the stairs, I instructed him to move it. “You’ll want me standing on the first step.” I already knew how I would position my arm on the curve of the bannister. He had his camera mounted in a thrice and instructed me to hold still—very still—until he told me it was safe for me to move.
I was wearing one of my most exquisite necklaces—an intricate design of a brass chain and beads with a heavy topaz pendant positioned perfectly above my neckline. Knowing better than to hold my face in a neutral expression, I tilted my head, thus elongating my neck, and set my lips in an enigmatic smile that would rival that of Mona Lisa. I followed the instruction to look at the camera but focused my eyes beyond it, to the crowd that stood watching, wondering—I supposed—just who this woman was to have garnered such attention. Someone shouted an offer to hold my drink, but I ignored him. Instead, I lifted it higher, careful not to obscure my face, as if offering a toast to whoever gazed upon the photo.
“Three…two…one.” A flash of light then the smell of the burning powder. I willed my eyes to remain open, my body rigid, until my vision cleared. Spots remained as I stepped down where the photographer waited with a small notebook and grubby pencil. “Can I get your name for the caption?”
“No,” I said, mindful of my need for some level of anonymity. “Refer to me as Mrs. K., a widow. Newly arrived to the city, currently residing at the Menger Hotel until a more permanent situation can be found.”
He looked up. “You want all that in there?”
“Of course. The titular character in the play is a widow, as am I. The detail will make the photograph more”—I paused for the impact of his own word—“interesting.”
My photograph appeared alongside a tepid review of Sadie Love. I don’t normally take the paper in my room, preferring to read one abandoned in the lobby. This morning it arrived courtesy of a sharp rap on my door at the ungodly hour of seven o’clock, folded open to the page, delivered by one of the messenger boys on a tray with my customary coffee and pastry.
“Why, thank you,” I said to the boy as both of us tried to ignore my haphazardly belted dressing gown. “What an unexpected surprise.”
“And there’s this, ma’am.” Avoiding my eyes, he handed me the small, familiar envelope. I say familiar because I knew immediately who’d sent it. Mr. Sylvan. He and I had taken to communicating through short missives. In fact, he had warned me about the state senator’s visiting wife in such a manner a full day before the state senator himself did. This too was how we settled my bill. Rather than a common transaction at the desk, he weekly sent up a note with a figure written in his crisp, neat hand. I delivered said amount in the same envelope. What a comfort to do business with a man who understood how crass it is to speak of money to a lady.
“Here you are.” I held out a nickel to the boy. “And be sure to thank Mr. Sylvan for the coffee.”
I kept my smile frozen in place until the door closed completely, then tore into the envelope. Mr. Sylvan’s usual billing, inflated, with this explanation: We have added a $10 fee for creating undesirable attention.
I felt my face flame, as if the man himself were standing beside me. Furious at the distraction from my first appearance in San Antonio society, I dropped Mr. Sylvan’s note into the waste bin, picked up the paper, and opened the curtains to the piercing morning light. I would never describe myself as an unusually beautiful woman. Still, I can say confidently that the image on the paper was stunning. The photographer—one J. P. Haley—framed it perfectly, including the half circle of the crowd who stood with their faces turned to me. I captured the effect I sought, looking mysterious and inviting, glass raised in tribute. Somebody, an editor I presume, captioned the photograph thus: While Miss Thalia Powers might have underwhelmed the audience in her tour as the widow Sadie Love, this widow captured everyone’s attention.