She’s moving before she’s even really decided. She catches up with the cleaner as he nears the final turn before the servants’ wing. He doesn’t hear Jane behind him, just slinks smoothly around the corner and out of her sight again.
As she nears the corner, Jane hears a conversation start up between the cleaner and Phoebe, who seems not only to have beaten him to the servants’ quarters but to have done so without getting winded. Their voices stop Jane; suddenly Jane can’t think what she imagines she’s doing, pursuing the cleaner, spying on Phoebe, eavesdropping. How will she explain herself?
“Hello,” Jane hears Phoebe say, in a casual, even tone. “Where are you going?”
The man clears his throat. “To the bathroom.”
“So far from where you were a moment ago? There’s a toilet beside the main staircase on every floor.”
“Why does it matter to you which bathroom I use?”
“When a theft has been discovered,” says Phoebe, “everyone’s movements become fascinating, don’t you think? Interesting that you’re sneaking away while a member of the household is making a scene and everyone’s distracted.”
Jane can’t stand there listening anymore. Where does Phoebe come off suggesting that this random guy might be involved in the theft, just because he has to pee? She stomps around the corner. “Phoebe!” she says. “What are you doing?”
Neither one seems surprised to see her. “Janie,” says Phoebe, raising an eyebrow at her. “Come to play Robin Hood?”
“What does that even mean?” says Jane. “I’m here to tell this guy that he can use the bathroom in my rooms. If that’s your idea of Robin Hood, then, yeah.”
“All right,” says Phoebe. “Go on. Do your ‘tired masses yearning to be free’ routine, but I’ve got my eyes on this fellow. I’ve half a mind to tell Ravi, or Mrs. Vanders.”
“Tell them what?” says Jane. “That you can quote the poem on the Statue of Liberty? That you’ve been stopping people from going to the bathroom? That you hate immigrants?”
“It’s ‘huddled masses,’” says the man, interrupting.
“What?” say Jane and Phoebe.
“‘Yearning to breathe free,’” he says. “‘Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.’”
“Oh,” says Jane.
“Whatever,” says Phoebe. “I’m British.”
“So?” says the cleaner. “I’m South Korean.”
“Well, I’m American,” says Jane, “and I’m kind of offended by the poem now that I’m hearing it. My ancestors were not wretched refuse!”
“Perhaps the wording was chosen for alliterative purposes,” says the man, with a brief, comprehensive look at Jane. His eyes take in her boots, her red-orange ruffled shirt, her striped skinny jeans, her boisterous hair. She feels oddly . . . catalogued.
“I’m getting a headache,” says Phoebe. “Are you taking this cleaner to your toilet or aren’t you?”
“Ugh!” says Jane, disgusted by Phoebe; floored, really, that some people are actually this snobbish. “My rooms are at the other end of the house,” she tells the man.
“Thanks,” he says.
“What’s your name?”
“Ji-hoon.”
“Ji-hoon,” says Jane, extending a hand. “I’m Janie. Do you know a lot of poetry?”
“I have a remarkable memory,” he says. “I use mnemonic devices.”
Phoebe watches Jane and Ji-hoon walk away.
*
After Ji-hoon uses Jane’s bathroom, he takes his leave, bestowing upon her the parting gift of a recitation of “I Hear America Singing” by Walt Whitman. It’s a little weird, but by now Jane is beyond expecting anyone to be anything but weird. Ji-hoon holds her eyes for a moment, nods briskly, then goes.
Scratching her head, Jane goes back to her Aunt Magnolia Coat umbrella, filling her hands with metallic and iridescent fabrics, letting her work tug at her, and thinking things through. Espions sans frontières. Spies without borders. Jane is no expert on the world of espionage, but she’s pretty sure spies wouldn’t even exist if there weren’t any borders.
Maybe she heard Grace wrong.
Before too long, her stomach informs her it’s lunchtime. Jane has no idea if Tu Reviens has an official lunch hour and she decides it doesn’t matter. She’ll go to the kitchen and bring something back to her rooms. She’ll eat while she’s working.
“Hungry, Jasper?” she says to the bed as she walks through the bedroom. Jasper pushes an inquisitive nose out into the light and snorts. “I’m going to the kitchen, if you’re interested.”
He bolts out eagerly, sticking so close to her that Jane feels a bit unsafe on the stairs and holds hard to the banister. On the second-story landing he almost trips her. “Jasper! I need my feet to walk. I can’t walk when there’s a sixty-pound dog attached to them. I want your company, you banana-head, but we can’t actually occupy the same space, do you get that?”
He hops on his front legs once, in a manner heralding an ominous intention to charge. Jane’s instinct takes over and she legs it across the bridge. But he doesn’t charge. He stays there on the east landing, hopping around in front of that tall umbrella painting, howling delicately, like an opera singer holding herself back before the big climax.
“Fuzzball,” Jane calls across to him, “you fit right in with everyone else in this house.” Then she continues on into the west wing, because she’s just had a thought. If the Thrashes and guests are currently at lunch in the banquet hall, Jane wants nothing to do with it. If there’s a back entrance to the kitchen, it might be at the bottom of the staircase at the end of the west wing. She’ll try it.
She isn’t paying much attention to the art on the walls, until something familiar brings her up short. It’s Aunt Magnolia’s photograph, blown huge.
Backing away to get a better vantage point, Jane soaks it up.
A tiny yellow goby peeks out from inside the cavelike mouth of a big gray fish. Aunt Magnolia took this photo in the waters near Japan. Jane remembers. And she feels like the little fish right now, bright and determined, but not altogether safe.
Jane is so proud of Aunt Magnolia, she could burst.
Then her perspective shifts and she notices a bulge in the matting behind the photo, as if the matting is way too small for the print. She’ll have to mention it to Mrs. Vanders. A framing mistake like that will damage the print, and Aunt Magnolia’s work deserves better care.
*
Jane was right about the back entrance: At the bottom of the staircase is a big metal door that deposits her into the kitchen. The dumbwaiter and a pantry are to her right. Two huge appliances to the left, presumably a refrigerator and a freezer, block her view of the rest of the room. She eases around them, then stops.
Patrick and Mrs. Vanders stand near the stoves with their backs to Jane, blocking her view of the person they’re speaking to. But Jane recognizes the voice of Phoebe Okada.
“Yes,” says Phoebe. “I think he’s the one. He says he’s South Korean, but I don’t believe him.” Then Phoebe hands a distinctive black thing to Mrs. Vanders that Jane also recognizes: Ivy’s camera.
Mrs. Vanders peers down at the camera and says crisply, “Yes, I’ve wondered about him. Patrick, find out what Ivy’s learned.”
“Now,” says Phoebe, “what about my appointment?”
“Mr. Vanders is busy,” says Mrs. Vanders. “He’s digging holes.”
“I saw,” says Phoebe. “Why, exactly?”
“He’s pretending to garden,” says Mrs. Vanders.
“So, my appointment is canceled because Mr. Vanders is playing make-believe?” Phoebe says blandly.
“We got a tip that Grace might’ve buried it in the garden or the backyard,” says Mrs. Vanders. “Mr. Vanders is looking for it.”
A tip that Grace buried something? Jane saw Grace herself, digging holes in the rain. Jane mentioned it to Mr. Vanders this morning; she said to him, “I saw a little girl digging in the garden yesterday.” Then Mr. Vanders froze in astonishment. So is it Jane, then, who provided this “tip”? About what?
“You’re kidding,” says Phoebe.
“No,” says Mrs. Vanders dryly.
“She’s a clever pain in the ass, isn’t she?” says Phoebe. “How old is she, eight?”