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26

Lizzie

El Paso,Texas

1937

After two long years in El Paso, I had finally carved out a life for myself. Everything started to turn around when I stopped waiting for a door to open for me and started looking for ways to forceone open.

I set my sights on a housekeeping job at the Hilton, and because a sign in the front window assured me they weren’t hiring, I started lingering in the laneway near the staff entrance. From a distance, I noticed staff coming to that back door with their arms loaded with trash, struggling to carry it to the industrial bins a little way down the lane, then having to rest the trash on the ground while they shifted the heavy lids off the bins. A second set of hands made that whole process so much easier, so I turned theirproblem into an opportunity and appointed myself the Hilton’s unofficial trash assistant.

I did this for weeks, right through the worst of a bleak winter, wearing multiple layers so I didn’t freeze. Henry thought I’d lost my mind, until the day the housekeeping manager came to the door and greeted me by name. She didn’t offer me a job right away. Instead, she let me clean the staff room and work in the hotel laundry, places where I’d never see a guest or their belongings.

“I can’t pay you,” she said bluntly. “But I can promise if you’re reliable and prove you’re trustworthy, you’ll be at the front of the line when a position does come up.”

And six weeks later, when one of the maids quit to get married, my hard work paid off. We had one hundred and thirty guest rooms to service and I was the first to raise my hand to complete a task, even if it was onerous or particularly filthy. That ingratiated me to the rest of the team. I wouldn’t say I made friends at work, but I certainly earned the respect of Mrs. Thompson and the other maids—and more importantly, I learned to fit in.

The housekeeping job brought enough income for me and Henry to move back into the rooming house, but better accommodation wasn’t the magic fix for Henry’s mood I’d hoped it would be. His charm had always defined him, but it was impossible to charm his way to employment when he always seemed to find himself at the back of a line of desperate men.

My brother had never lied to me before, so I took him at his word when he said he’d been out looking for work during the day, but I wasn’t surprised his job search was going badly. Even now that he had access to laundry facilities and a washroom, Henry wasn’t cleaning himself up. It perplexed me as much as it frustrated me.

“Maybe if you...you know, got up a little earlier?” I suggested. Then I drew in a deep breath. “Maybe you could shave too. I could give you some money for new clothes—”

“Don’t judge me, Lizzie,” he snapped. Henry had neverbeen one to speak harshly to anyone, especially me. Something was changing in him. There was a dullness to his eyes.

The rooming house was vastly more comfortable than the homeless camp, but I figured that if I had a deposit for rent in advance on an apartment, we’d be well-placed to move once Henry found work. Within a few months, I had a little bundle of bills in that envelope. I was devastated the day I came home from work to find it gone.

“You shouldn’t have left money in the room,” Henry said when I told him we’d been robbed. I recoiled, stunned by his sharp tone.

“Where else would I leave it?” I needed a man to come to the bank to sign for me to open an account, which Henry offered to do, but I worked such long hours that we just hadn’t found the time.

“I don’t know, Lizzie!” he exclaimed. “This place isn’t much better than the homeless camp. I’m sosickof the noise and the smell of cabbage from the damned kitchen and waiting to use the bathroom!”

“But...it’s all we can afford,” I said, stunned. He scrubbed a hand down his face, drew a few ragged breaths, then gave me a miserable look.

“I’m sorry. I never thought it would be like this.”

“I know,” I said uneasily. “Something will come up...”

“Maybe we should try to go somewhere else. I’ve heard there’s more work in California—farmwork, even. We could take some of your wages and buy bus tickets. Try our luck there.”

“Henry, no,” I said, startled. Farmwork did sound much better than housekeeping, but I couldn’t leave a real job for the chance of a theoretical one, especially after how hard I had worked to get it.

“Maybe I should just go, then,” he said flatly. “I lined up to ask about this new unemployment compensation program today. They’ll give me five dollars a week for fourteen weeks. I could save it all. Use it for bus fare.”

“Something will come up,” I said, throat tight. “Please don’t give up just yet.”

I was already working six long days a week, but watching Henry’s mood spiral downward, I grew desperate to change something—anything—that might help him. When I told the housekeeping manager I needed more money, she found me a night shift in the hotel restaurant, waiting tables. And finally, Henry and I moved into an apartment.

It was a fifth-floor walk-up, just three small rooms, but we had our own kitchen and bathroom. I experienced a new level of tired, working double shifts every day, but in addition to the bump in my wages, there were other unexpected benefits. In that little hour between my jobs, I could take the elevator all the way to the top of the Hilton.

The rooftop balcony had been converted into a beautiful outdoor area for the guests. From one side, I could see right over the Rio Grande into Mexico, and from the other, mountains and rocky outcrops and clear, open space. I’d walk to the edge and look out to the northeast, staring until my eyes watered, as though if I just looked hard enough, I’d see all the way up through New Mexico, back to my home in Dallam County.

The top of the Hilton El Paso wasn’t quite as sacred or peaceful as Mother’s moments on that little chair with Elsie, but the idea was just the same. I had to compress all my grief and my longing into those few minutes each day. It was the only time I ever stood still long enough to let myself acknowledge all that I’d lost, and just how lost Iwas in El Paso.

One night, I placed a steaming hot plate of food in front of one of our regular guests. His name was Calvin Miller, and he stayed at the hotel for a night or two each week, sometimes longer. He liked to stay in a room on the highest available floor, and rumor was he was a widower, consulting on new airplanes at Fort Bliss.

I wouldn’t have noticed Calvin if I walked past him on the street. I guessed he was in his late thirties, probably close to fifteen years my senior. He was tall and wiry with a neat dark beard trimmed close to his face, and he wore thick glasses that magnified his hazel eyes. Having serviced his room, I knew he was fastidiously clean and he always traveled with piles of aeronautics textbooks. Overall, Calvin looked and carried himself like someone too clever for an ordinary existence.