Page 38 of If Looks Could Kill

I hurried back to the others. “We can go in,” I told Cora and Freyda. They nodded and headed for the door. I supposed no strange old woman could hold any terrors for them after what they’d been through.

“Go ahead, Pearl,” I told her, but she clung to my arm. It melted me a bit.

“Who is this person?” she whispered to me.

“I’ll explain,” I told her. “In just a moment.”

How to answer, in Mike’s presence? What, in fact, to do with Mike? We were here because Miss Stella, I thought, I hoped, was a Medusa. And that was the absolute last conversation I wanted to have with him.

Mike seemed to read my apprehension.

“Is it just that old lady who lives here?” he asked. “No one else?”

Come to think of it, I hadn’t asked. “So I assume.”

“I’m going to wait for you,” Mike whispered.

“I’ll watch a few minutes, just to make sure nothing happens.

Then I’ll disappear for a bit, in case someone is looking for you.

Warm myself up. But I’ll come back. Find a way to slip outside in an hour or so to tell me you’re safe, and then I’ll be on my way. ”

Gratitude overwhelmed me. It meant the world to know that in all this dangerous city, someone knew where we were and was looking out for us.

“I’m not sure it’s safe for you to go home tonight either,” I told him. “Anyone may have seen you.”

“I’ll be here, for now,” he said. “After that, I’ll figure it out.”

I took Pearl’s hand, and together we entered the house through its tall, dark door.

We found ourselves in a narrow vestibule paved with mosaic tile and paneled with dark wood. Faint light came from a wall sconce in a corridor up ahead.

“Where are we?” Pearl asked dully.

The outer door swung shut behind me on some kind of spring mechanism with hinges groaning. I jumped at the sound of its clanging latch.

I gripped Pearl’s hand tightly. “At the home of someone I pray can help.”

“Someone you know?” asked Pearl.

“No,” I admitted.

The air felt dank and musty. Closed doors flanked us on either side of the corridor. Their woodwork was rough with chipped paint and fuzzy with dust. The corridor ended at a narrow staircase. We heard footsteps and voices above, so we proceeded up the stairs and through a door at the top.

We came out into a grand foyer. I felt, more than saw, its size from the way my footsteps echoed, since the only light came from a candelabrum on a side table.

The pale glow cast a misty dimness over all that wasn’t close by.

As my eyes adjusted, I noted soaring ceilings and an ornate, sweeping staircase leading up to a third story.

An enormous chandelier hung over our heads.

Heavy drapes along the front wall hid what seemed to be nearly floor-to-ceiling windows.

To one side of us was a parlor and, beyond it, a dining room.

The furniture would have been elegant a century prior.

Now it was shrouded in cobwebs. The room was warm, almost unnaturally so, though I saw no fires burning.

At the center of it all stood the person I hoped could protect us and keep an armed criminal gang at bay.

Scarcely ninety pounds, from the looks of her, frail but erect, she was clad in a high-waisted gown of dark velvet that was fashionable, perhaps, during the age of Napoleon.

She herself may have been fashionable during the age of Napoleon, for she was as ancient as any person I’d ever seen living.

Her features were craggy and aristocratic, with tissue-thin skin folded over high cheekbones, a prominent nose and chin, and a heavy brow.

Despite the warmth, she wore a neck muffler of white fox or mink and a high turban of crushed silk, dotted with pearls.

The large rings on her knobby fingers clinked against her ivory-handled walking stick.

Cora and Freyda huddled together before her. She turned to Pearl and me as we drew nearer.

“Ah,” she said. “Here she is.” She looked to me for confirmation, and I nodded.

Pearl clung tighter to my hand.

“Everyone,” I said, “this is Miss Stella.”

“Ladies,” replied she, with a little formal bow.

We all curtseyed and mumbled “ma’am” toward her.

“We’re much obliged to you,” I added, since no one else said anything.

She turned her hawklike face my way. “Tell me your names. Where you’re from. Who your people are.”

I did the honors, as best I could for myself and Pearl.

My father was a newspaperman; the Davenports were Pennsylvania farmers.

We were Salvation Army girls. Cora explained that she was Cora Kralik from Milford, Connecticut, and that her people were glaziers.

Freyda gave her particulars and added that her family were in the garment trade.

What Miss Stella thought of our antecedents, I couldn’t guess, but she nodded gravely toward us. “How do you do?”

None of us spoke. We did not “do” well at all and hadn’t the heart to pretend otherwise.

“We’ve all had a terrible fright,” I said.

“So you explained.” Miss Stella frowned at us awhile. She seemed to be chewing on a thought. “You, Miss Pearl, and you, Miss Tabitha, met through your, er, religious work. How did you come to be acquainted with Miss Freyda and Miss Cora? And how did you all come to invade a brothel this evening?”

I did my best to abbreviate those stories to their essentials. Each of my friends there would be pained by these details.

“And you all saw her?” Miss Stella demanded, pointing her walking stick at Pearl. “The three of you saw her in this transformed state?”

I watched to see if Cora and Freyda would admit to it. Almost as if, if they denied it, I could tell myself I’d imagined it also. But we all nodded.

As for Pearl, she still seemed remote and far away, as though we spoke of someone else. I suppose, in fact, we did.

Miss Stella thumped her walking stick against the tiled floor. Echoes reverberated around the cavernous space. “This is the strangest story I’ve heard told in many a year, and I’ve lived a life of strange stories, I assure you.”

I held my breath and waited for her to turn us back out into the cold.

“You may stay for the night,” she pronounced. “After that, we will see what there is to be done.”

I felt myself sag with relief.

“I have little to offer you in the way of food and no servants I may send out to fetch something.”

“That’s all right,” I told her. “We’re not hungry.”

Cora and Freyda cast me rueful glances, as if to say, Speak for yourself .

“There are two extra bedrooms upstairs,” our hostess continued, “though the beds have gone unused and unaired for goodness knows how long.”

“You’re more than kind,” I said hurriedly.

“You’ll find trunks of linens and blankets in each room,” Miss Stella said. “I trust you can take care of making yourselves comfortable.”

“I beg your pardon.”

It was Cora who’d spoken.

“Meaning no disrespect,” she went on, “but why are we here? How is this a safe place?” She avoided Miss Stella’s gaze. “We need someone who can protect us.”

It was the most I’d heard her speak. She had a New England accent.

“Ah,” said Miss Stella. “And you don’t think someone such as I can do so?”

“No, I don’t,” Cora said stoutly. “Ma’am.

Again, not meaning to sound ungrateful, but I’ve been living with, er, them for months.

” Here her voice faltered. “The pimps. I’ve seen what they’re capable of.

They’ll break in here in two seconds. They’ll come after us with an army of muscle.

” She glanced at her feet. “So how are you going to stop them?”

“Hiding is protection,” I said. “This is the last place those Bowery Boys would look.”

“Unless we were seen,” said Cora, “or followed.”

Miss Stella reached one bony hand upward and slowly plucked off her turban.

I thought I saw a tousled mop of wiry white curls. Then I saw better.

Cora and Freyda sank down onto the floor, just as they’d been when I first found them at Mother Rosie’s. Like two people feeling about to faint and taking precautions.

Pearl looked mesmerized, transfixed.

Miss Stella’s crown was covered in sleepy, silky white snakes.

“Why are you on the floor?” demanded Miss Stella, who glowered down in Cora and Freyda’s general direction.

“Because I’m afraid of your head,” Freyda said tersely. “Your snakes make me weak in the knees.”

“If that’s enough to keep us safe,” added Cora, “then why aren’t we fine with just this one here?” She jerked a thumb in Pearl’s direction.

“My name,” said she, with the old annoyance I knew so well, “is Pearl .”

Miss Stella blinked. “You don’t even know each other?”

“I didn’t ask for any of this,” Cora snapped. “They just showed up tonight, and—”

“None of us asked for this,” I said sharply. Freyda, I noticed, looked away.

Cora kept going. “When I told this one”—meaning me—“my name weeks ago, I was looking for help to escape Mother Rosie’s racket. I wasn’t looking to keep company with devils.”

“Miss Stella,” I said hurriedly, “I’m sorry. They—”

“Stop apologizing for them.” Miss Stella turned toward Cora and Freyda. “I assure you,” she said crisply, “that I am more than sufficient, in my wits and abilities, to keep you safe tonight. Especially if you keep your wits about you, stay indoors, and keep still.”

“We thank you,” I said. “Ma’am.”

“Regardless of what you may think,” our hostess went on, “I am not yet in my dotage.”

“No, ma’am.”

“And you are not my prisoners .” The old woman’s papery voice lingered on “prisoners.” “If you have a home or another friend or acquaintance you’d prefer to go to, you have only to take your leave. I will in no way try to keep you here against your preferences.”

“Of course not,” I said.

“Come with me,” Miss Stella said. “I’ll show you the rooms where you’ll sleep tonight.”

She clicked her way toward the stairs, then began to climb, clutching her skirt in the same hand that held her walking stick and holding on to the banister. We followed after her.

At the top of the stairs, she moved past what must’ve been a large bedroom toward two doors nearer each other. “You may use these rooms,” Miss Stella explained. “There may be nightshirts in the bureau or in the closet. I’m not sure.”

“Thank you,” I said. “We’ll make do.”

“We passed the washroom,” continued our hostess. “There’s hot water if you want baths. Towels, too. I think.”

A bath was the furthest thing from my mind, but Cora’s face lit up at the word.

“And now I shall bid you good night,” said Miss Stella. “I am a light sleeper, so if you need me in the night, do not hesitate to knock at my door.” She gestured toward the door we’d passed that likely led to a large bedchamber. “If I am not here, I will be downstairs, keeping watch.”

And back down the stairs she went, stately and slow.

Freyda tentatively pushed open the door to one of the bedrooms, and we followed her in.

Cora found a gas jet and matches above the fireplace and lit the lights.

Two narrow, high-posted beds sat side by side in the room.

This room, too, was dusty and cobwebby, but Freyda found a closet with a dust mop, a broom, and some ancient rags, and we got to work tidying it up.

We shook out the bed-curtains and blankets, coughing at all the airborne dust. I cracked open a window to air out the staleness.

Against my better judgment, I looked down at the street. A shadowy figure moved and nearly stopped my heart cold. Then I realized it was Mike, still coatless, waving up to me. I waved back. He was still here. He was the one bright spot to this awful, awful night.

Finally, we remade the beds. Pearl sank onto one of them. I saw she’d begun to cry.

“Why?” she kept saying. “Why snakes?”

I saw then that the poor thing must be in shock.

“Who?” she asked the room. The heavens. “Who did this to me?”

Cora and Freyda, by silent agreement, left the room, cleaning supplies in hand. I soon heard them fussing about the next room over.

Free of their watching eyes, Pearl’s sobs flowed.

I went to her, thinking she might welcome comfort. I placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, but she flinched away from me as if there were poison in my touch.

All right, then.

“I’ll just go… help Freyda and Cora, then, shall I?”

She said nothing.

“I saw nightgowns in the armoire,” I told her.

I let myself out of the room.