Part 15 (1/2)

”Blackjack. What did she make you bet?”

I cringed. ”Robert, please stop shouting at me.” I tried to sit up in bed, hands holding my throbbing head. ”She said something about playing the piano on bridges.” I tried to get up, but if I moved, my head pounded like someone was beating it with a drum.

”Louisa, you've been had by a card shark.”

”What does that mean?”

”Ada cornered you into playing the piano at her bridge parties. It's a card game for the socialite set.”

”You could have warned me. She seemed like such a nice lady.”

”I did! The day she first arrived I said to be careful of her.”

”But you didn't say what to be careful of. You never said anything about Blackjack and Ouzo. I'm not blaming you. Good heavens, I'm a grown woman. I'm a Resistance Worker. I have no one to blame but myself.” I was thoroughly disgusted with myself.

”She's pretty smooth. I've been a victim of her charms myself.” He went over to open the curtain, letting the merciless suns.h.i.+ne in, piercing my eyes with pain.

Wincing, I asked, ”What did she get out of you?”

”Preaching. Two sermons a day for a week at her church's revival meeting. Under a tent. In Phoenix. In August. No air conditioning.” He shuddered at the memory. ”Drink up. She's almost ready to leave so you'll need to come downstairs as soon as you can.”

I scowled at him which only got him laughing. His face was annoyingly bright with good humor. ”Hurry up, she's waiting for you,” he said. He stopped when he got to the door and turned toward me with a wicked grin. ”Such a pity. Who would've thought? A Resistance Worker, succ.u.mbing to the oldest trick in the book. You're losing your edge, Lulu.”

My sentiments precisely.

I took a shower, dressing slowly so that my head wouldn't explode, and then went downstairs. Robert's concoction, whatever it was, did help settle my stomach. A little, anyway. As I stepped into the kitchen, Ada rushed over to me with open arms. ”There's my darling Lulu!” She was apparently unfazed by the Ouzo.

Miss Gordon's eyes swept over me. ”What's wrong with you? You look like death warmed over.”

”She's got a touch of the flu,” Robert offered quickly.

Miss Gordon eyed him carefully then whipped around to look over at the kitchen sink. There lay a broken egg sh.e.l.l, a can of tomato juice, vegetable oil, and some hot pepper sauce. She spun on her heels to Ada. ”A touch of the flu, my foot! Ada! What did you do to that girl?”

”Nothing, Marty Girl. Nothing at all!” Ada smiled the sweetest smile, gave everyone enormous hugs that left us reeking of heavy rose perfume, and swept out to the Hudson. Dragging her heavy suitcases, Robert followed behind to take her back to the train station in Tucson.

Miss Gordon watched Robert load up the car with Ada's behemoth suitcases. There wasn't even room for William to tag along. ”I'd like to give that woman a dressing down,” she muttered under her breath. Then she turned to me, with ever so slight a hint of sympathy in her voice. ”Louisa, I blame myself. I should've warned you. That woman can't be trusted. Given a bottle of Ouzo, she could charm the spots off a leopard.”

That remark got me wondering if, like Robert, she had once been the unfortunate victim of Ada's gambling savvy, but I doubted I would ever be privy to that story. I looked out the kitchen window as I saw the Hudson pull out of the driveway, Ada chattering away to her captive chauffeur. Dog followed the car down the street, barking angrily, grievously insulted, anxious to get the last word in at Ada's visiting feline.

”Louisa, I've been thinking. Since you've got your heart set on it, I suppose you could teach piano an afternoon or two here at the house.”

I turned around and looked back at her, astonished.

”Well, Mrs. Wondolowski has been badgering me to have you teach her son, Arthur. I suppose it wouldn't really hurt the church's image to have the parsonage be used for a commercial enterprise,” she grudgingly conceded.

I smiled, feeling cheered, and went over and gave her a big hug, not caring if she liked it or not.

Chapter Ten.

With the blessing of Miss Gordon, my piano teaching career began. Two afternoons a week, I taught a few neighborhood children the fundamentals of piano.

And in the nightstand next to my bed was a drawer, my version of a bank account, collecting money for my return trip to Germany. Miss Gordon called it a ”saving my bacon” drawer. I suppose I could've opened a bank account at Mueller's bank, but I wanted no interest from Herr Mueller, financially or otherwise.

”Can you imagine?” I said to Robert one morning at breakfast, pointing to the front page of the newspaper. After a three year blockade, the Russian city of Leningrad was finally freed from the Germans. ”Nine hundred days under siege! The Germans couldn't overtake them because their resistance was so strong. It says that the Russian people carried on with their life, attended school, and took exams, even though they experienced daily bombings. The death toll had reached over 600,000 people...starved or killed. So immeasurably sad. But they did it! They beat back the n.a.z.is.”

I inhaled a deep sigh of satisfaction, a.s.sured that Allied victory was just around the corner.

Long after midnight one night came a knock at the door. I heard Robert go downstairs to answer it so I rolled over to fall back to sleep. A minute or so later, he rapped on my door and opened it. ”Louisa, come downstairs. There's someone here for you.”

I threw on my bathrobe and went down to the parlor. There on the davenport sat a woeful young woman, bruised and bleeding, eyes cast downward.

”Glenda?” I asked. ”What's happened to you?” I rushed to her side and pushed her hair back from her face to examine her bruises. ”Robert, please get me some hot water and clean cloths. Bandages and peroxide, too.” I turned back to Glenda. ”Do you need a doctor?”

She shook her head. ”No, don't call no doctor. I just can't go back there no more.”

Robert brought me the supplies to clean her up.

I looked at him and said, ”You can go back to bed. I'll explain more to you in the morning.”

”Sure you don't need help?” he asked, concerned.

”No, thank you.”

As he headed back up the stairs, Miss Gordon stood at the top, arms crossed like a general facing battle. Robert cut her off before she started on a tirade. ”Tomorrow. We'll talk about it tomorrow. Go back to bed, Aunt Martha.”

She turned and firmly shut her bedroom door.

I bathed Glenda's bruises and cuts, swabbed peroxide onto the swelling lesions, bandaged her as best I could, and gave her some aspirin for the pain. ”You're safe here,” I said, as I settled her in for the night in my bedroom.

In the morning, I woke to hear a loud whisper in the kitchen. It sounded like the buzzing of an angry bee. Still sleepy, I walked into the kitchen and saw Robert and a dour looking Miss Gordon. Conversation ceased as I walked in. I filled up a coffee cup, sipped it, and braced myself for Miss Gordon. As if on cue, she launched a verbal blitz.

”Was that you sleeping out there on that sofa? I thought it was that girl. Do you mean to tell me that you gave up your bed for a common harlot?”

”She needed to rest. She's badly hurt. I knew you and Robert would be up early. I didn't want you to awaken her.”

”Louisa, where did you meet her?” Robert asked.

I took a sip of coffee. ”In the library. When William and I would be in the children's department, I often saw her over in a corner. Her name is Glenda. She's been trying to teach herself to read. That's how we became acquainted. I've been helping her learn.”

”And you haven't said a word? How long has this been going on?” asked Miss Gordon.

”A few months.”

”You've exposed William to that girl!” she accused.

”But it's not like that. She's trying hard to make a change. Sometimes people end up in circ.u.mstances that they'd never dream they'd be in. I'm only trying to help her.” I put down my coffee cup on the counter.