“Because these industrialists own the newspapers! You think a man like Hearst cares about workers? He wants to keep the unions far from his own business,” Aron sniped.
“I could get my father to write about it,” Mabel offered.
“No offense, Mabel,” Arthur said, “but anybody reading The Proletariat already sympathizes with the workers. We need to get Mom and Pop in their comfortable living rooms to care about these people, to see them as fellow human beings, not rabble-rousers the way they’ve been painted by powerful people with money to lose.”
“What’s this?” Gloria asked. She’d pulled the drawing from Mabel’s bag and was examining it closely. “It’s terrifying.”
“It was given to me by a woman on Carmine Street. She wrote to me that some men had taken her sister away from the garment factory where she worked. This was months ago, and she’s still missing. The girl had some clairvoyant abilities. A Diviner, I guess you’d call her.”
Aron scoffed. “If anything embodies the dangers of capitalism, it’s those so-called Diviners, claiming to have powers that elevate them above the rest of us. And now they’re making money from it and spending their nights in hotel parties being photographed by reporters on the payroll—like that Sweetheart Seer.”
Mabel knew she should stick up for Evie, but she had just met these people. Besides, she was irritated with Evie. “They’re not all like that,” she said with a shrug.
“If this woman was a Diviner, why couldn’t she see the men coming to take her away?” Luis asked.
Gloria was looking at Mabel as if she were on the witness stand and failing. “Why did this woman come to you for help?”
“She said her sister had seen in a vision that I should help her.”
Gloria stared for a minute. And then she laughed. “You fell for that line? Oh, Arthur. Honestly. You found us a real Girl Scout.”
Mabel’s face went hot again. She wished she could unsay everything.
Arthur’s eyes flashed. “Gloria. Try not to be a barracuda, will you?”
“Probably she wanted money. She tells you that there’s something threatening you, and then she offers to take away the curse if you pay her. It’s an old trick,” Luis said sympathetically.
“She seemed genuinely frightened,” Mabel insisted. But now she wondered if she had been naive. What did she know about Maria Provenza? Nothing, really. And she had asked for money, hadn’t she? Maybe Maria Provenza could tell that Mabel was an easy mark, a girl desperate to be seen.
Aron pushed his glasses up on his nose. “I’m not concerned about a bunch of hocus-pocus types. We’ve got real troubles to solve.”
“Perhaps Mabel could get her Diviner friend to solve it for us!” Gloria cooed.
Mabel had had enough. Arthur could keep his stuck-up, phony friends. Angry tears stung her eyes. “Well. I’ll leave you to it, then,” she said, marching over to the vestibule and retrieving her coat and hat from the hook. She hoped she could get out of Arthur’s flat before she started to cry and really embarrassed herself. “I’ve got to conduct a séance for workers’ rights.”
The wind whipped across the wet cobblestones of Bleecker Street and eddied about Mabel’s legs, cutting right through her woolen hosiery, but Mabel’s anger kept her warm. Those Secret Six phonies acted as if she had never even been to a strike, when Mabel was practically born on a picket line! She almost didn’t hear Arthur shouting after her. He was jogging down the street in the rain without a coat. “Mabel! Mabel, stop!” he shouted, and she let him catch up to her. “Please don’t be angry.”
“I’m not angry,” Mabel said.
“You’re a terrible liar.”
“Add it to my list of faults.”
“No. I like that about you. You are exactly who you seem to be. That’s… rare.”
“Oh,” was all Mabel could manage. She still felt the fool and she was afraid anything else she said would only add to her embarrassment.
“Look, don’t pay any attention to Aron and Gloria. They want to change the world, to make it better, and sometimes they can be a little rough around the edges—and blunt.”
“You forgot rude and insufferable,” Mabel grumbled, forgetting her earlier promise to herself to keep quiet.
“That, too.” Arthur’s smile was sheepish. “So. Will I see you again, Mabel Rose?”
“I’m not sure I’m welcome here.”
“I said, will I see you again?” Arthur slipped two fingers beneath her chin, lifting her face back up to his. His eyes were a mix of brown and gold, two different reads depending on the light. “Give them a chance. Show ’em what you’re capable of. You’d be a good influence on them—you’ve been inside the labor movement forever. And those workers out in the tent city sure could use all the help they can get.”
She’d wanted to make a difference, hadn’t she?
“All right,” Mabel said, feeling a little breathless.
“All right?”
“I’ll do it.”
“That’s swell. Because I’m gonna need somebody to help me, kid.”
“I’m not a kid,” Mabel groused. “Besides, how old are you?”
“Does it matter?”
“I suppose not. Wait! Yes. It does.”
“I’m twenty.” He spread his arms wide. “I’m allowed to make all my own decisions. I even cut my own steak. Well, when I can get steak.”
He gave his lopsided grin again, and Mabel found herself softening. He offered his hand for a shake. “Welcome to the messy underground, Mabel Rose.”
Mabel shook Arthur’s hand. Across the street, she noticed a man standing under a street lamp. He was reading a newspaper. Or pretending to. Mostly, he seemed to be watching the two of them.
“Arthur, don’t look now, but I think somebody’s keeping tabs on us.”
Arthur stopped smiling. “What? Where?”
“Over there. Under the lamp. Man in the brown hat. Don’t make it obvious,” Mabel said, training her eyes on the ground now.
Arthur pretended to tie his shoe, looking over his shoulder. He stood up, shrugged. “Nobody there now. Unless you mean old Sal from the pizzeria. I suspect he keeps an eye on me to make sure I come in for his pizza.”
Mabel looked up again. The space under the street lamp was empty. But the man had been there, and he hadn’t seemed like a casual bystander. She thought about Maria’s words: They are out there, watching us.
At the end of the night, the Tea House emptied; the CLOSED sign was hung. Ling’s mother counted up the day’s receipts while humming a song from her native Ireland. From the kitchen came the clanging of dishes, laughter, and Cantonese as her father worked alongside the cooks. After the last pot had been washed and put away, Ling and her family returned to their apartment. Ling removed her leg braces, letting the air cool the chafed skin above and below her knees.
“How was your science club meeting?” Mrs. Chan asked, placing Ling’s crutches within reach for the morning.
“Good,” Ling said, feeling a little guilty for the lie.
“And how was our dear Henry?”
“Also good.” Ling was pretty sure her mother had already married them off in her mind.