A Fair Maiden (7 page)

And now, belatedly, Katya was made to realize that her mother was drunk, and in no mood to be contradicted or even reasoned with; and Katya was anxious, seeing that Mrs. Engelhardt was peering out at her through the kitchen doorway. Mrs. Engelhardt was naturally suspicious of any employee receiving telephone calls during the day, during her "hours," for she was being paid to work for the Engelhardts during these "hours," though at least the caller was the girl's mother and not a boy or a man—that, Mrs. Engelhardt would not allow. (And disapproving this morning of Katya, who'd returned to the house after eleven o'clock the night before, letting herself into her room on the ground floor with her key, quietly, it might've been stealthily, as Mrs. Engelhardt lay upstairs in her bed listening closely to determine if the nanny from south Jersey was bringing anyone back to the house with her, a boy, a man—any stranger was forbidden on the premises—but Katya was alone, Katya was defiantly thinking,
It's my half-day off, I have a right,
though knowing that Mrs. Engelhardt disapproved of her staying out past 9
P.M.
, imagined her drinking, smoking dope, partying with boys. How much more Mrs. Engelhardt would have preferred a hired girl who didn't attract boys or men and who stayed close to the house even on her days off, watching late-night TV movies with Mrs. Engelhardt weeknights when Mr. Engelhardt was in the city working.)

"—listening, Katya? You're so quiet! Why I called, it
is
an emergency. Can you send me a money order for three hundred dollars? I need it by—" and Katya was too stunned to follow this, asked her mother to repeat what she'd said.

"You must have some money saved by now, Katya, it's been two weeks, two weeks' pay, you could ask those people there, Eggensteins, for the rest of it, explain it's a family emergency, honey, which it is."

Katya stood listening in dismay to her mother's pleading and yet reproachful words, through a roar of blood pulsing in her ears, for as her mother continued to speak, it developed that she wasn't in Vineland but in Atlantic City and Katya would have to mail the money order to her there. She was in the Silverado Motel on Eleventh Street, where she'd gone with "my friend Ethel"—unless it was "my friend Edsel"—and there was some misunderstanding about the motel bill, and "wear and tear" to the room, and the manager she'd thought was her friend was now threatening to call the police, and if so, Essie Spivak would be arrested and get prison time, and Katya couldn't let that happen to her mother, could she? "Honey, I'm desperate. It was a mistake to come here, but I got talked into it and now, this motel bill, it's a mistake but what can I do, it's like blackmail, honey, I'm fucked if they call the cops, you know that—"

When Katya was twelve years old her mother had been arrested for forging checks. Essie and certain of her friends had fallen into the habit of borrowing from Pay Day Loans, which charged such high interest rates, crazily high interest, like 11 percent? 12 percent? This was when Essie worked weekends at the Mirage Casino in Atlantic City as a blackjack girl; she developed a drinking habit, a codeine habit, borrowed money from men friends and from Pay Day Loans and then more money to repay the high interest and at last, in desperation, she forged checks. She was immediately caught at a 7-Eleven in Vineland and arrested, taken away to jail, booked, and she pleaded guilty and was sentenced by a county judge to eighteen months' probation. But now, if Essie Spivak was arrested again, her old record would be held against her, she'd be sent to Glassboro State Facility for Women.

"I will kill myself first, Katya! I promise I will! You won't let that happen, honey, will you? As soon as I'm paid what is owed me—there are people here who owe
me
—I'll send a check to you right there in Bayhead, honey. I swear I will. Put that Mrs. Eggstein on the phone, let me explain to her, she's a mother like me, it's a family emergency, a medical emergency, which is no goddamned lie, three hundred dollars will be repaid with interest. Honey, help me! I need your help. I love you, Katya"—sobbing now, pleading and desperate and yet still aggrieved, angry—"—my only girl left now, my only baby, the others have grown up and moved away and don't give a shit about their mother, that they have broken her heart—" and Katya said, "All right, Momma. Give me the address there."

Heimweh:
was that the word? Homesickness.

In Bayhead Harbor she'd missed home. Yet she was never so homesick as when she was home in the house on County Line Road in Vineland.

She'd have liked to ask Mr. Kidder about this. How you could be homesick when you were home...

For it was an earlier time, before Katya's father had left, that she missed. She'd been only nine when he'd disappeared from their lives, and only vaguely could she remember Daddy lifting her in his arms, laughing at her frightened expression, calling her "Pretty Baby" and kissing her, promising her he'd be back for her birthday, but the worst of it was, Daddy had been so often away, returning and then leaving again, and it was a secret where Daddy was when he was gone—unless Katya's mother blurted out in drunken fury that Daddy was staying with another woman—and then gradually it became a fact that Daddy was gone. And Katya asked,
Gone where?
and the answer was blunt and ungiving:
Gone.

7

S
HE KNEW
: this was a mistake.

Even before the knife-blade frown appeared between Mrs. Engelhardt's dark-penciled eyebrows.

Katya spoke of a "family emergency," a "medical emergency," and at once her employer became upset, indignant: "Katya, you aren't leaving us, are you? We are counting on you"—for Mrs. Engelhardt was a woman to seize an emotion and wrest it from you and run with it, appropriating it as her own, to intimidate and confound—"at this time in mid-July we couldn't possibly replace you with another girl." So that Katya was forced to say quickly, apologetically, "No, no—I'm not leaving, Mrs. Engelhardt. Of course not. I would never do that," and Mrs. Engelhardt said, incensed, "Well! I should hope not! That would be highly unethical."

Haltingly, as if Essie Spivak were close beside her, nudging her in the ribs, Katya tried to explain that her mother had called because there was an "emergency situation"—money was needed for medical care—but Mrs. Engelhardt stared at her without evident sympathy and did not speak. Katya said, "I have some money saved. I would need to borrow only two hundred thirty dollars—from my salary, I mean—for the next two or three weeks," and Mrs. Engelhardt said coolly, "'Only' two hundred thirty dollars! Katya, your salary is one hundred eighty-two a week before taxes and other deductions. This is well above the minimum-wage guidelines for minors, and we provide you with what we believe to be quite generous room and board here, as one of our family practically. No, Katya, borrowing from your future salary is not feasible. I know exactly what Max would say: 'What if she quits? We're hardly likely to sue a nanny for unearned wages.' That's how Max is, Katya. So I'm sorry. But borrowing such a sum of money at your age is not a good idea in any case, and I'm surprised that your mother would ask such a favor of me—she has never even met me—and of you, a minor. Your mother must have many other sources to borrow from, I would think—relatives? neighbors? I'm sure you understand and that this was not your idea, Katya." And so Katya had no choice but to smile numbly: "I guess so, Mrs. Engelhardt. You are right. I'm sorry for asking..."

Katya went away shaken, shamed. A flash of disgust for both her mother and for smug Mrs. Engelhardt left her weak. A vision came to her of the showy split-level house on the channel bursting into flames ... The Engelhardts would be trapped in their bedroom and could not escape. But the children would be trapped, too. And the Hispanic housekeeper. Not just the Engelhardts, whom she hated, but these innocent victims, too, and so Katya relented, the burning house vanished and was gone. And yet a cruel smile distended her face, which felt masklike, brittle. For such power lay within her if she wished to execute it.

She heard the death bell knelling.
And every stroke did seem to say,
Hardhearted Barbara Allen.

8

S
HE CALLED THE MAGIC NUMBER
. On the back of Mr. Kidder's card.

She had not thrown the little white card away. She'd kept the little white card, knowing it might be precious.

Thinking,
Momma would approve. Momma would be impressed!

It was a shock to her that her mother had returned to Atlantic City, as she'd promised not to do; yet it was not truly a surprise. You did not want to inquire too closely into what Essie Spivak was doing in Atlantic City, but there was no doubt: the raw appeal in her voice, her fear, her terrible need, could not be mistaken. Katya smiled to think how, in Atlantic City, if you didn't have money yourself, the next best thing was to be connected with someone who did.

The phone rang. There came a woman's voice: "Hello. Kidder residence."

Katya had an impulse to hang up quickly. This would be the housekeeper, Mrs. Bee. But she said, "Mr. Kidder, please."

"And who shall I say is calling?"

"Katya."

A brief, chill pause. Invisible Mrs. Bee frowned. "Katya who?"

"Just Katya. Mr. Kidder expects me to call, and he will know who Katya is."

And this turned out to be so.

9

I
T WAS ARRANGED
: Katya would go that night to
17
Proxmire Street, to Mr. Kidder's studio at the rear of the house. She was not to ring the doorbell—"Mrs. Bee need not be involved, dear!" She was to go to Mr. Kidder at dusk—that is, as soon as she was free of her obligations to the Engelhardts, and free of their scrutiny. After the children were safely in bed for the night.

Nearly
11 P.M.
when at last Katya slipped away from the Engelhardts' house, from her ground-floor room that opened onto New Liberty Street. In stealth she slipped away. There were lights in the Engelhardts' bedroom, but they would have no idea that their hired girl was gone from the house. Half walking, half running to Proxmire Street, thinking with a thrill of dread,
No one will know where I am. Except Marcus Kidder.

On the phone, he'd been immediately sympathetic. Katya had told him it was a "family emergency," a "medical emergency," and there was a tremor in her voice he could not have doubted.

At this hour Proxmire Street was quiet, mostly darkened. Behind the ten-foot privet hedge the large old oceanside houses of the wealthy were near-invisible. At
17
Proxmire, Katya hesitated before pushing open the wrought-iron gate. Almost she wished the gate might be locked: she would turn away then, and go back to the ground-floor nanny's room. But the gate swung open at her touch, for it was a gate that was never locked.
He will help me,
Katya thought. Her heart beat wildly in anticipation.

Here, so close to the ocean, the air was balmy and windy and smelled of rain. The large shingleboard house loomed up before Katya like a great sail-ship becalmed on land. Most of the house appeared to be dark; only a wan light glowed at the rear. Katya followed the flagstone path toward the front stoop and then walked through the thick damp grass to the rear. How quiet it was! If someone saw her! In Bayhead Harbor there were security patrols, local police in squad cars cruising Ocean Avenue and the secluded tree-lined streets of the wealthy. If Katya were sighted making her way through the grass like this ... But no one saw, no one stopped her. At the rear of the house she saw Mr. Kidder in the lighted room, standing at a rear door looking out. At once the scene was comforting to her: a secret place, a haven. On the flagstone terrace where they'd had "tea-time," an outdoor light shone. There was no moon; the sky was oppressive and opaque. The ocean, which should have been visible on the far side of the dunes, had vanished, except for the heavy sullen
slap-slap-slap
of the surf. Katya hesitated, feeling a strange thrill of excitement, seeing white-haired Mr. Kidder another time before he was aware of her.

She liked it that he was so tall. That he carried himself with dignity. From this distance he was a handsome man, you would think: you could not see the fine creases and lines in his skin. And how thoughtful he looked, standing in the doorway. When Katya stepped forward breathlessly into the light, Mr. Kidder was roused from his dreamy mood, came quickly to seize her by the hands and draw her into the house with him. "Dear Katya! You've come."

Warmth lifted from his skin. There was a fragrant scent of cologne, a smell of something tartly sweet on his breath as he stooped to brush his lips against her cheek.

Katya stiffened involuntarily. This was not a kiss exactly—was it? In her agitated state, she did not want to be touched.

The studio was as Katya recalled it from her first visit: the lattice windows, crowded bookshelves, brightly colored sofa and chairs. On the walls, Mr. Kidder's portraits; in vases, glittering and gleaming like sparks of fire, Mr. Kidder's fossil flowers. At night, by lamplight, the space looked larger, more mysterious; the artist's easel and art things were obscured in shadow in a far corner. There was the smell of paint and turpentine, which made Katya's nostrils pinch.

A private room; no one would intrude. Mrs. Bee had very likely gone to bed.

"Dear Katya! You sounded so upset on the phone. Some sort of family emergency—what is it?"

Katya had prepared a story of medical bills, hospital bills, health problems, but as Mr. Kidder regarded her with his sympathetic blue gaze, the admonition came to her:
Can't lie to this man! He sees into my heart.
"My mother owes someone money. She's in Atlantic City. I hadn't known that. She's terrified. She asked me to borrow money from Mrs. Engelhardt, but Mrs. Engelhardt refused. My mother used to work at a casino in Atlantic City—she was a blackjack dealer. That's where she met my father. Sometimes I hate her, Mr. Kidder, I wish she would die! Then I'm so afraid for her, that something will happen to her and she
will
die. She needs three hundred dollars right away, and I have seventy dollars saved, so I only need to borrow..." In dismay Katya heard her voice, faltering, flat, the nasal Jersey accent that rendered even these heartfelt words unconvincing as if fabricated—and yet she was telling the truth.