Page 41 of The Harvey Girls

Thirty-One

Billie was getting very little sleep. Each night, she prayed as long as she could before her mind spun off in a tangle of worry.

What if Da never recovered and became an invalid?

How would Maw pay the bills, even with Billie’s contributions?

Peigi would certainly have to quit school (though she found it boring and spent most of her time doodling on her homework anyway).

Ian was only nine, too young for most jobs and too silly to work very hard even if he got one.

What if her da… passed? Maw would be heartbroken—they all would be—and they’d need Billie to be there for them.

Besides, she didn’t know if she could withstand the immensity of such sorrow without her family around her.

But leaving El Tovar would be absolutely the worst thing for their finances.

She had to stay and earn as much as she could.

This was, however, no easy task. She no longer spilled things (almost never), but there was a certain…

je ne sais quoi with the “upper crusties,” as she thought of them, that she just couldn’t seem to master, no matter how much French Charlotte taught her.

The pace was different here from Topeka, where trains came and went every few hours and patrons generally sat for a mere thirty minutes.

At Grand Canyon Village the trains arrived only twice a day and people often lingered at their tables for hours.

It gave them so much more time to scrutinize and fuss about every little thing!

She had complained to Charlotte about it—for instance, the other day when a man with an overplucked mustache that looked like two bobby pins stuck on his upper lip had commented to his companion in a spotless ivory linen suit that Billie looked so “milk-fed,” she might as well be a newborn calf.

“Right in front of me!” Billie had howled as they took off their uniforms that night. Nerves frayed by sleeplessness and constant worry, she had far less patience than usual for difficult customers.

“I agree it’s quite rude,” Charlotte said calmly, “but they just don’t see you.”

“Charlotte, I am almost six feet tall! Are they blind?”

“The rich don’t see the poor. They’re taught from infancy the fine art of disregard.”

“Why?”

Charlotte had sighed wearily. “I suppose it’s convenient. If you don’t see someone, you don’t have to consider their feelings or circumstances. You can say and do as you like.”

“I hate them!” Billie had flopped down onto her bed. She no longer seemed to care if Charlotte saw her undergarments.

Charlotte had lowered herself slowly. She was a small person who conducted herself admirably in the dining room, lifting huge trays of soup, lugging away dinner plates still loaded with the half-eaten remains of prime rib and Cornish game hens.

But she had not been raised with any kind of manual labor or exercise; to the contrary, she’d been consistently warned against exerting herself for fear of building muscle “like a housemaid.” As a Harvey Girl, Charlotte went to bed with an ever-changing constellation of aches.

“Hate them all you like, but you must never, ever show it. The rich are also trained to spot a social snub at fifty paces. Disdain from a waitress will not be borne.” She rubbed at the small of her back. “And neither of us can afford to lose our jobs, no matter how rude they are.”

Not all of the upper crusties were condescending; most, in fact, were reasonably polite and generous tippers, though they rarely exchanged comments with their servers that didn’t have to do with their meal.

But every once in a while, Billie got a group that was crustier than usual, and try as she might, she felt like she was holding a rattlesnake by the rattle.

Today, a customer threw a cocktail shrimp at her, claiming it was not sufficiently chilled, though it was sitting in a dish of ice.

It was all Billie could do not to pick it up and throw it back.

She’d held her tongue, only to turn and see Nora watching.

Back in Topeka, bad behavior was not tolerated by the management.

Of course, back in Topeka, the customers tended to be regular folks, not the senators, titans of industry, and movie stars the El Tovar catered to and indulged.

Today was Charlotte’s day off (where had she disappeared to, anyway?), and Billie was left to steam furiously to no one after work. Then Henny peeked her head in the door.

“Sunset?”

They headed west from the Grand Canyon Village out along the rim path to Hopi Point.

Billie had only been there once before, and the sky had been overcast, so it hadn’t been quite the spectacle she’d been made to expect.

But tonight the conditions were perfect: the sky was a limpid blue, save for a few frothy clouds that drifted along the horizon, bit players ready to do their part in reflecting the sun’s last rays across the vast stage of the canyon.

Billie spent most of the hour-long walk brooding about nasty customers and worrying about her da.

There had been no word from Peigi, and Maw’s most recent letter had been brief.

Caring for her ill husband and picking up extra laundry work had probably left little time for the kinds of informative, chatty notes Maw usually wrote.

Billie hoped desperately that no news was good news…

The two women arrived at Hopi Point about fifteen minutes before sunset. Gazing out across the timeless tapestry of cliffs and crags and hoodoos, Billie fell silent.

The world was big. She was small. (The shrimp-throwing customer didn’t even exist.)

The sun shimmered, the clouds radiated pink and orange, the sky went purple, and the walls of the canyon pulsed with red and ocher and cinnamon.

She sent a silent prayer for her father into the colorful heavens.

Henny hung her arm around Billie’s shoulder. “It’s something, isn’t it?”

Billie slipped her arm around Henny’s waist and smiled.

Will went off to answer a question for the Randolfs, and Charlotte headed to the back counter where her blanket had been stowed for her. John was there as he had been the last time.

He leveled a momentary stare at her. “You’re back,” he said.

“Yes. I’m sorry it took me so long.”

“You had to earn your eight dollars from the tourists.”

“Oh, no, I had it. I just forgot to give it to Will. It had slipped my mind, you see.”

He shrugged. “I suppose I do.”

He wasn’t terribly friendly, was he? Nothing like Ruth in the Hopi House. He lifted the blanket from behind the counter, and as he handed it to her, his hand slipped across it one last time.

“It’s very beautiful, isn’t it?” she said, taking possession and cradling it against her.

“It’s a lot of work. Many, many hours.”

“Yes, I know. I see the weavers at the Hopi House by El Tovar. They’re artists.”

He let out a wry grunt of a laugh. “So you won’t be using it as a dog blanket?”

She glared at him. “Why would I ever …”

“They do, you know. I’ve heard them. Or they say they’ll leave it in the trunk of the car for cold days.”

“I have neither a dog nor a car. I can’t afford them, and I may never in my life be able to. So I suppose I’m left to treat it with the respect it deserves.” She dropped the money onto the counter. “I hope that doesn’t disappoint you.”

He laughed. “Not at all, Miss.”

Charlotte walked toward the front of the store to wait for Will and the Randolfs. The couple was at the register. The clerk was wrapping up a lovely large pitcher they’d bought.

Will came to stand beside her. “They picked a good one.”

“What makes it so good?” Charlotte asked.

“It’s a normal size, for one thing. Most tourists need things small so they can pack them in suitcases for the train.

The Indians started making smaller items to accommodate the market, but they’d never use such tiny pots themselves.

The Randolfs drove up from Tucson, so they can just put their nice big water jug in their car. ”

“Glad they didn’t buy a blanket then,” Charlotte muttered. “Your friend John would accuse them of throwing it in the trunk.”

“Sounds like you and he had some words.”

Charlotte relayed the conversation. Will smiled. “He must like you.”

“Certainly not,” huffed Charlotte. “He was bordering on rude.”

“What were you saying in the car about all the things that author thinks white people should emulate? Something about frankness, if I remember. John is straightforward with people, as many Indians are, when he feels he can be. He’d be much more deferential with tourists, but that’s an act he puts on. Sounds like he was himself with you.”

Charlotte ruminated on this. It was a little like serving customers who treated her as a person rather than just a vehicle for them to get their food.

They smiled and said thank you and maybe even asked her where she was from.

She didn’t have to work so hard to be invisible; her existence was acceptable.

The ride back to Grand Canyon Village was quieter.

The four of them were full of the lunch they’d had at the trading post—piki bread and mutton and roasted corn—and the bouncing carriage of the Harvey Car lulled them.

Charlotte didn’t dare doze, of course. It wouldn’t do for her to nod off on the job.

But when she sensed that the Randolfs were not responding with ever more questions and comments, as they had on the ride to Cameron, she left them to the sounds of the wind in the pines, the rush of the Little Colorado, and the hum of the motor.

Undistracted by her own gabbling about whatever she could remember from those books, she became acutely aware of Will sitting next to her, his strong hands on the wheel, his broad shoulder occasionally grazing hers as they went around a bend in the winding road.

There was a certain bearlike maleness to him.

She imagined for a moment that she was sharing the bench seat with a grizzly bear—physically powerful, able to do damage with the mere swat of one large paw.

And yet he lacked the tightened-coil energy of a predator. Of Simeon.

Will would not strike without provocation; she was somehow certain of this. She felt strangely, unaccountably, undeniably… safe.

When they arrived back at El Tovar, the Randolfs extricated themselves slowly from the Harvey Car. “My goodness,” said Mrs. Randolf. “I feel as if I’ve had my spine tied in a knot!”

“I hope I wasn’t driving too quickly for you.” Will took her hand to guide her out. “I try to get my passengers home in a speedy fashion, but not so much that their heads hit the roof on the bumps.”

She patted his arm when she was safely on the sidewalk. “I can’t imagine anyone doing any better on such a rustic old trail.”

Dr. Randolf tapped his now-dusty pockets to locate his billfold, then pulled two ten-dollar bills off the stack. He handed one to Will and one to Charlotte.

“This is far too much!” Charlotte gasped.

“Not a word of it.” Dr. Randolf tucked his billfold back into his pocket. “The two of you gave us a full day of edifying information and expert guidance. You’ve earned that and more.”

Mrs. Randolf squeezed Charlotte’s shoulder and whispered, “College. You’ve got to finish that degree, my dear.”

As the two professors made their way up the wide stairway to the El Tovar porch and into the Rendezvous Room that served as the lobby of the hotel, Charlotte was struck silent by their kindness. Finally she turned to Will.

“Well, I don’t know what to think,” she murmured.

He grinned. “You should be thinking of asking me for my tenner, since you did practically all the work.”

She let out a laugh. “I don’t think I’ve ever talked so much in all my life.”

“It was a piece of cake for me. All I had to do was drive. And besides”—his dark eyes were on her, the faintest hint of a smile crinkling around them—“I like the sound of your voice.”