“You’re very young for such a fine mustache,” Benton murmured. “Still got that fine, soft boy skin. Mighty young to be traveling alone.”
When she did not respond, he laid one hand on her shoulder, the other on her hip. Immobilized, she felt him rotate himself around her slight body, his back to the water now, obstructing her view. She turned her face as Benton touched the mustache.
She opened her eyes, stared into his. Benton froze, paralyzed by those eyes.
“You,” he gasped. His hand gripped her arm.
She tore herself free, her hand pushing against him, as he stepped back, floundered on the edge of the step as he grasped at the handrail. The car door swung open. A man raced through the vestibule, arm outstretched. A flash of disorientation. A child’s face at the window of the adjoining car. Off-balance, she threw up her hand. Benton’s slipped from the brass handrail, and his body tilted backward, arms and feet floundering in the open air.
Constance pressed her back hard against the wall, gripping the handrail, as if the passing wind might lift her behind him. She stared at the passing terrain. The fields, the woods, a turn-row here and there, a fence, a barn—all tranquil. As if nothing had transpired.
CHAPTER 2
At the next stop Constance dismounted with her valise. Fear wrenched through her like a knife ripping through tangled yarn. What had she seen? What had she done? Was he dead? Was he injured or mangled and struggling even now for help? The terrible smack of his body hitting the water reverberated in her ears. She envisioned him below the surface, arms akimbo, eyes open, staring back at her.
Outside the depot on a hard wooden bench, Constance sat, struggling to quiet her breath, heaving in shock. The false eyebrows felt as if they might peel her flesh away. She could feel her skin ripped, blood flowing into her eyes like tears, her face a mask of horror. She raised her fingers to touch. The brows remained firmly in place and would until she deliberately removed them and the rest of this disguise. Finding a place to do that consumed her, to become herself again. Fear consumed her. She would never be herself again.
Hand trembling, Constance slid her money beneath the ticket window for a return to New Orleans. A washroom on the train would be less obvious than one in the station. She could shed these tainted clothes and change into her dress, but she must first find a corridor with no witnesses. Her steps mounting the train were unsteady. She tripped and instinctively reached for the hem of her nonexistent skirt. She glanced around in alarm, but no one seemed to have noticed. In fact, there were few other passengers boarding. As the train pulled out, the washroom in that car proved vacant; she entered, heart pounding, and locked the door. The space was cramped, making changing awkward. The floor was dirty where the now discarded trousers lay. The train lurched, and she banged her elbow on the sink, grimaced, grabbed its edge to hold her balance. She felt that her chest might cave in as she struggled into her petticoat, then the seven-gored green skirt. Her hands trembled almost to the point of impossibility as she strained to button her shirtwaist. A sudden horror overwhelmed her, pulsing like the rails below. Her mind saturated itself with the sight of his fall, the look of his eyes, the flailing arms. Constance lowered the wooden seat of the water closet and sat there, her face in her hands, until someone knocked at the door.
“Just a moment, please,” she said as audibly as she could muster.
She rose, smoothed her skirt, buttoned three remaining buttons, and tied the bow at her neck. The remaining spirit gum lifted off with the alcohol, though her forehead was red where she had scrubbed. A bit of skin itched at the corner of her left eyebrow. Removing the man’s wig mussed her hair, hard as she had tried to hold it tight to her scalp with a hairnet. In any event, she had to pull out the soft rolls of her own blond hair around her face and smooth it as best she could.
Another knock.
“I’m sorry. Please. Just one moment.”
Straining to see her reflection in the cracked, heavily smudged mirror, Constance patted the fallen strands of hair into place, hairpins between her teeth, then anchored them in her high chignon.
The knock came again. In haste, Constance mounted her small green feathered toque and rammed the hatpin through. She crammed the man’s fedora atop the rumpled suit and closed the leather case, leaving one buckle half done. Her gloves now donned, Constance opened the washroom door. Clutching the half-secured valise, she murmured apologetically to the elderly woman waiting in the vestibule.
*
The sight of her corner house in the Marigny made Constance weak. How could she greet her children? Analee? She struggled up the steps with packages she had picked up from the church, grappled with the knob, and pressed her hip against the heavy leaded-glass door. A waft of damp heat rushed in before her. With the toe of her sealskin boot, she slammed the door shut, her chin atop her armload of packages in an effort to prevent them from falling. As several toppled onto the wide plank hardwood, Analee scurried out from the kitchen. Scooping up the fallen packages, she stacked them on the polished marble console in the hallway.
“Here now, Miss Constance,” she said, “give me the rest of that load out your arms.” Analee bustled to arrange them on the console. “Now, that’s a good sight better. Want to hand me that satchel?”
Constance’s heart pounded. “No,” she said. “It’s all right.” She shoved the valise against the console, stricken now with panic as she glanced at the hall clock. “Oh, my. I am so behind. Is everything ready for the ladies?”
“Yes, ma’am. All gone be all right. Baking done and everything set on the dining room table with the pink Limoges, like you said.”
“Oh, Analee, this heat is unbearable. I must freshen up. How did I ever allow myself to run this late?” Her mind felt incoherent.
“You be fine, Miss Constance. You just need to cool yourself down a notch.” Analee rebalanced the packages in two separate stacks. “You looking a might peaked, Miss Constance. Mayhap you done tried to do too much. What you need is rest. Only so much time in life, you know. Can’t do everything in one day by yourself.”
Constance knew Analee was studying her. She tried to calm her breathing.
“Something got you upset.” It wasn’t a question. “I bet you run into that old Mrs. Duncan. One what always got something nasty to say, even when she ain’t got nothing to say. She coming this afternoon?”
“No, Analee. I’m just rushed. And hot and tired. Mostly rushed. Or maybe mostly tired.” Constance straightened the small valise beside the console. She needed to get it up the stairs. “And no, Mrs. Duncan can’t be bothered with the orphanage. Too busy playing bridge.”
Suddenly little hands and feet were all about them, dancing and tugging and pulling for attention.
“Mama, Mama,” Delia’s voice squealed up at Constance, “did you bring us chocolates?”
“Did you, Mama? Did you?” a second little voice chimed in. It was Maggie, tugging at her skirt.
Constance laid her hand on Maggie’s soft blond curls, then bent down to kiss both girls. As she put her arms around their trusting shoulders and pulled them to her, she fought back her tears.
“No, angel. Mama didn’t have time for the candy store today.” No, she had killed their father. Trying to steel herself, Constance brushed a loose curl behind Delia’s little ear, straightened her ever-crooked hair bow.
“Oh, Mama.” Two voices at once, disappointment palpable.
“Can we have cookies, then?” said one from sudden inspiration.
“Analee made a lot,” chimed in the other. “We helped. It’s a whole big platter full.”