The Ringmaster's Wife (10 page)

“Remind me again why I agreed to two performances in one evening?”

Sally flounced back in a baby-blue chaise lounge, fanning her hand at her face while she laid her head back in dramatic fashion.

“You'd think sea air would be better in summer. But look—” Sally pointed to the vase of pink roses—her favorite—on the dressing table nearby. Their petals were wilted and sad, having gradually succumbed to the heat. “Even our roses lose their luster in this heat.”

Mable stuck her index finger in her copy of
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
to hold her place. She looked over the top of the binding to the withered roses, then to where her friend lay stretched out on the chaise.

Sally was staring up at the filigree ceiling vaults, with her hair pulled back in wavy tendrils that spilled about the high collar of the marvelous buttercup-yellow dress she wore. It was indeed hot, but not so much as to justify the drama Sally was making of it. Especially when she wasn't the one wearing a woolen uniform skirt in the mid-July heat.

The thought made Mable grin. Her friend certainly was suited for the stage.

“But we can't really complain, can we? It's a full house tonight.” Mable winked at her. “We're poised to see some greenbacks, dearie. And if your gentlemen callers keep sending roses backstage, you can't claim the evening as a total loss.”

“Don't be pert.” Sally tossed a velvet bolster pillow at her. It bounced off the top of Mable's chair and fell down, sliding across the floor. “You're a cashier who's not interested in greenbacks. Who ever heard of such a thing?”

“I'm not a cashier anymore. I'm a management candidate now, remember? And maybe I'm not interested because there are more important things in life than money.”

With that, she turned back to her book.

“Like what?”

Mable breathed in deep, letting out a sigh of mock exasperation. “Freedom, for one. And beautiful experiences. Like sitting in an elegant room at the Marlborough-Blenheim Hotel on the iron pier, talking with a friend. How many people would love to be in our shoes right this very moment?”

Sally attempted a laugh, though the action drove her into a near coughing fit.

“You talk of freedom? But money can buy that too,” she said, wiping a hand at moisture the coughing had brought to the corner of her eyes.

Mable sighed and looked around, feeling the weight of Sally's growing bitterness against what she viewed as the confines of their downtrodden lot.

The backstage area was immaculate, as was everything in the Queen Anne–style castle of a hotel. The sheer size and opulence of their surroundings just couldn't make Mable feel anything less than grateful, even if she merely worked at the hotel instead of being a guest in it. Life hadn't issued her the same trials that her friend had been through, but still, being around the grandeur, she couldn't allow her thoughts to dip to the level of resentment that Sally had developed over the past few years.

“Money can buy just about anything, can't it? Except love, of course. The one thing it can never lay claim to,” Sally breathed out on a sort of tragic whisper. “You seem to be the only one not plagued by the want of it.”

“Of love?”

Mable held the book in her hands, but lost interest and gazed off into the distance, soon curling the binding under her palms. The other side of the room faded into a crowd of revelers, with the great White City behind them. And she saw in the foreground the same thing she always did: an impeccably dressed man with serious eyes, a hard-won smile, and an aura of mystery all around him. A man whose presence dwarfed any bowler-hatted suitors who had waltzed her way in the years since.

It was the vision of what might have been from many years before that still pricked her heart, asking,
What if?

“I'm not immune to it, Sal,” Mable whispered back, overcome with the vision that had already begun to fizzle across the room. She shook her head, willing the picture of the circus king to fade and leave her in peace. “But I'm also not going to wait around for it. I intend to live a full life with or without it.”

Sally sat up with a rustle of crepe and lace. She braced her hands on the row of nail heads lining the edge of the chaise, staring back at Mable with a somber look painted on her face. Dark violet half-moons shadowed the underside of her eyes.

“You mean to tell me you'd turn love away if it walked in your door? What gives you the right?”

Mable felt a twinge of empathy at her friend's sullen appearance. The hollowness in her eyes spoke volumes. Still, Mable felt she had to speak truth. She'd always spoken from the heart with those whom she loved, and Sally was dear to her.

“No, Sal. I wouldn't turn it away. But I won't live in a cage while I wait for it either. And I certainly don't think that marrying for money is the same as marrying for love. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I don't.”

Sally's forearms tensed and her knuckles turned white in their grip on the chaise. She'd rebuffed Mable's view before and no doubt would again.

Mable leaned forward and placed a hand over her friend's. “You look tired,” she began, treading as gently as she could. “Did you sleep last night?”

Sally tore her glance away and instead studied the spread of bottles and canisters of rouge on the dressing table. She nibbled on her bottom lip, seeming distracted. “Some.”

“But you were up, weren't you? I heard you coughing again in the middle of the night, even through my bedroom door.”

Sally bounced up and gathered her skirts to cross the room, then sat down on the bench at the oval-mirrored dressing table. She ran her fingertips over the ivory-handled hand mirror and horsehair brush on its surface, staring off in the distance as if lost in thought.

“Maybe I was.”

She lingered with her fingers smoothing over the top of a small group of bottles bunched together in front of the mirror. Though most were near empty, she grabbed one with the printed label
Dr. Bull's Cough Syrup
and pulled out the cork.

Mable watched as her friend put the bottle to her lips and took a long sip. She used the back of her hand to wipe her mouth and looked up in the mirror to find Mable staring back at her from behind.

“Something to say?”

“No.” Mable shook her head, keeping a firm connection with Sally's golden eyes.

Sally was goading her to a quarrel, she knew. And as always, it wouldn't work.

“You may be a starry-eyed dreamer, but you're no better in that uniform than you were in any hostess or shopgirl's uniform before it. Even at the World's Fair. And you were rejected then too, weren't you? Same as me. Rejected by life.” Sally spat the venom at the mirror, then curled her lips around the bottle once more.

Mable tapped the corner of the chaise with her heel, itching to cross the room to her embattled friend. But she stayed put, waiting for the outburst to subside.

Though they came more frequently now, the eruption would eventually pass.

“I'll wear any uniform I'm given—as long as I'm happy while doing it. For now, I like it here.”

“What's to like about this place?” Sally pounded a fist on the dressing table, causing Mable to jump and shaking the vase of roses until errant petals drifted to the floor. “Nothing but the taffy and spun sugar you can buy on the boardwalk, if you have more than two nickels to rub together, that is.”

“You're tired, Sally. This is your lack of sleep talking . . .”

“It's not sleep,” she choked out, her voice cracking.

Sally sniffed loudly, upending the bottle to drink the last of the tonic. She coughed again, choking slightly over a swallow of liquid that caught on an inhale of breath.

Mable rushed to her side and knelt, placing a hand on the space between Sally's shoulder blades. She pulled a kerchief from her skirt pocket and handed it to Sally, whose chest erupted into fits again. She coughed into the kerchief with one hand braced against the dressing table.

“You can't sing tonight,” Mable argued firmly. “Not like this.”

“I have to. We need the money.”

“Not at the expense of your health,” Mable said, lowering her chin to position her face in the sightline of Sally's downturned gaze. When their eyes met, she went on. “I can take up a few extra shifts. We'll stay afloat. And in the meantime, we're taking you to a doctor.”

Sally's refusal was so emphatic that she shook out a tendril from her updo. It fell down to mingle with the beads of perspiration gathering on her forehead. She slicked it back with one of her clammy hands, closing her eyes as she did so.

“Sal . . .” Warning bells were going off in Mable's head.

Something was wrong. Terribly wrong.

This was more than one of her friend's syrup-induced rages. Mable pressed a hand to Sally's forehead, feeling the heat emanating like hot coals beneath her skin. It was clear that this was sickness talking. And whatever it was, it looked to have a firm hold.

Gingerly, she took the kerchief from Sally's hand and dotted her friend's forehead, catching the wetness up in the softness of the cloth.

“You have a fever.”

Sally nodded, squeezing her eyes shut. “I know.”

“How long have you had it?”

“A day,” she mouthed. “Maybe two.”

Sally fell then, crumpling into Mable's arms.

“I just . . . expected . . . more.” Sally was crying now. Unashamed. No longer angry but broken. She shook in Mable's arms. “I didn't think it would be so hard. Life is . . . It doesn't feel worth living when it's so hard.”

“Hush,” Mable cooed, running her hand over Sally's brow. “Hush now. It will be okay.” She kissed Sally's temple and whispered calming words, gentle words, praying they'd break through the pain to reach the broken parts of her friend's heart.

“I'd always been taught that hope could ground a person. Forget dreams. Or money. Forget anything but hope, and you'll still find joy despite life's circumstances. But . . . God . . . has . . . forgotten me,” Sally countered, coughing and hiccupping through every syllable. “He can't possibly redeem me now.”

Mable swallowed hard, praying for wisdom. Praying for the right words to say.

“Maybe He's always been here, we just haven't really looked to see Him. Maybe there's something bigger at work than the two of us.”

Sally's shoulders stilled. She trembled slightly but looked up, chin quivering.

“That's what you're really looking for, isn't it? Money. Status. Power. They're a ruse, Sally. They don't make us who we are. A person has to know who they are to start out with, or all of that will mean nothing, even if the other things are attained.”

The wall clock chimed, signaling the dinner hour with a song that echoed around the room.

Sally squared her shoulders. She broke the connection with Mable's eyes and turned back to the mirror, fumbling with the trinkets on the table. She grabbed up a puff and began quickly dotting powder and rouge to her tearstained cheeks.

“I have to go onstage,” she stated, her voice plain, almost emotionless.

Mable nodded.

She had the feeling her words had almost reached her friend.

They wound in, sinking deep in her own heart. But maybe that was the point. They were two girls dancing around the edges of a dream, never truly finding it. There was a place in her innermost heart that Sally kept protected. Never letting go. And never allowing anything or anyone to reach it.

“Of course,” she said as she stood and turned to leave.

“Mable,” Sally called after her. She flashed a ready smile—one of those heart smiles that made every face beautiful. “I'll see you after the set.”

“That would be nice,” Mable said as she moved toward the door. “Maybe we could take a walk down the boardwalk. Clear our heads a bit. Buy some of that spun sugar they sell on the pier.”

The last thing Mable saw was Sally nodding, the smile slowly fading as she turned away. Her friend would collect her resolve, and the fever with it, and ready herself to waltz out in front of the grand ballroom and sing her set to perfection.

Mable was sure of it.

Sally was strong down to her bones, and that strength was capable of overcoming the storms life brought. But this time, despite what Mable knew her friend possessed, they'd not take their evening walk.

Sally grew dizzy and passed out midset.

The pianist picked her up, and the hotel owner himself rushed her to the nearest sanitarium in his own car. Mable wanted to go with her—she'd even opened the car door to climb in the backseat—but Sally refused a companion, pushing her back in a bemused state of feverish refusals as she was loaded into the auto.

“No. Go to the pier, Mable,” she pleaded, her glassy eyes entreating with tumbling emotion. “Don't waste another minute. Make something of this night. Walk for us both.”

E
LECTRIC LIGHTS ILLUMINATED THE LONG STRETCH OF BOARDWALK
.

The sky was ink that night, and the sea toiled in an endless barrage to meet it.

The pier was alive with tourists and laughter, and the wonderful smells of sugared pecans and hot dogs mingling in with the salty sea air. Tourists thrilled at the rides. Children ran ahead of their parents, weaving through the crowd in front of her.

Music drifted around Mable as she walked, a brass band playing lively tunes from some perch behind her.

She moved down the pier with purpose, holding fast to the old cigar box clutched in her hands. And she didn't stop until her spectator heels nudged up against the aged boards nailed at the end of the pier.

Perhaps her friend had been right.

Dream chasing was not for the faint of heart.

Losing hope in a dream could break the spirit. She questioned hers now. Mable wondered if her catalog pictures and newspaper print wishes had caused her to tread water through her life. She'd moved from job to job and city to new bustling city, but what did she really have to show for it?