Of course, Hannah found out. First, without upsetting her, she switched Missus Nussbaum’s post to cover further down the street, reassigning Missus Zovanovitch to watch the upper portion of Louise Street that included Jane’s house, saying that as Ukrainians came from far deserted plains of endless vistas, their eyes were keener. Besides, now her children were grown, they wouldn’t swallow things anymore.
“Ninnie, God was looking down on you for sure. Here, have some,” Hannah cut her a piece of strudel.
Jane shrugged, “I was just lucky.”
“What? You tink it was just a lucky ting dat exact morning you washed all de windows, scrubbed all de floors even?”
“Well …”
“‘Well’ nutting! You were being protected, you silly girl! One day you will learn dat God look out for you, even when you never tink He does. When dat day come, I want to be around to see your face!” She poured more coffee. “What I still wonder, can’t get out of my head, is why dey come to John! He’s a long time big shot. De Boss knows his name and everyting!”
“Maybe because we’re Italian—or, maybe they made a mistake?”
“Dose kind of snoopers don’t make mistakes … but maybe you got someting dere wit de Italian idea. I hear dey always examine dem first. Den it’s de Low Irish, de Russian Jews, de Hungarians and everyone else like dat before dey get around to de Germans like us and all de others who keep clean.”
Wanting to help, Jane decided to join the Watchers—in a roving capacity. On specified days, she deposited Michael at Johann’s house into Henrietta’s care, then made her way to the Italian sections clustered near the Ford plant, walked the streets looking for the signs of a parked T, its driver waiting.
With Frederika, who was so bored she welcomed any distraction as long as it was ladylike, and some of the other wives, Jane also began a sewing circle, stitching samplers that after Fritz framed them, were handed out to families at risk to be hung in strategic places to catch a Ford inspector’s eye. Cleanliness Is Next to Godliness was, of course, the one they did mostly. But there were others. Duty Before Pleasure, Err Today—Repent Tomorrow, Gambling Is Father of Despair and Son of Avarice. Serafina, who sometimes found time to help, once blocked out one that read, Lie Down with Dogs and You Get Up with Fleas, but Henrietta stopped her just in time. Like schoolgirls attending an embroidery class, they often laughed together while thinking of proverbs they would prefer to be stitching for the suspicious eyes of Ford inspectors. Smiling, Missus Fillapelli looked up from her embroidery frame. “How about Mention the Devil and in He Walks!”
Henrietta rethreaded her needle. “I’ve got one—Search Others for Their Virtues, Yourself for Your Vices.”
“Seek Not What You Should Not,” volunteered young Missus Kretchmer.
“The Road to Hell Is Paved with Good Intentions,” murmured Missus Sullivan, to which, Missus Zweig added, “What Can’t Be Cured Must Be Endured.”
After that, the women stitched in silence. As her husband continued in his blinded adulations of his God, Henry Ford, Jane began to see him in another light less sanctified.
Before Easter, Jane’s flower border at the end of the yard rewarded her care by producing six tulips. Erect as soldiers, egg yolk yellow, she tended them like newborn chicks. Hannah had suggested she cultivate a vegetable patch, but now she was glad she had splurged—planted flowers instead of sensible green. Carl’s Rosie gave birth to twins, turning him into a boasting Papa. On hearing the news, Serafina was terribly upset, wringing her hands, wailing that as her clairvoyant power had forsaken her, all was lost she would fling herself off the highest cliff as soon as she found one. But when Stan explained that all she had gotten wrong was who had twins, not their actual arrival, she calmed sufficiently to accept their birth, even bringing each a twig of thyme, suspended from a silver ribbon, assuring the new mother that if hung above their beds, henceforth her offspring would be protected from all infections of the eye. Frederika, who was now with child, was heard to whisper to Rudy that she hoped Rosie’s fate was not due them—for if she had two, at one time, she was sure she’d die; to which Serafina, hearing her, prophesied that as she would produce only one, her death, though a tragic one, would not occur for some years yet, Frederika had nothing to worry about. Dora, who had wished for children during her first marriage to the baker, still had not conceived in her second to Peter, began staying close to Rosie, hoping her aura of proven fertility might benefit her.
Everyone, even Zoltan, came to see Carl’s new family, complimented the proud parents on the beauty of their two little girls, asked what names had been chosen for them. When Carl replied that because his daughters resembled delicate flowers, one was to be Violet, the other Rose, after her mother, Jane was reminded of her first American friends, wondered how they were, if they were still flowers residing with their generous aunt in that pretty house in the City of New York.
Rumpelstiltskin returned, didn’t even stop to say hello, rushed into the Geiger parlor, flung open the piano, spun up the stool, flecked his fingers, pounded out a lilting rendition of “When You Wore a Tulip,” singing the lyric in an amazingly rich tenor for so tiny a man. Finished, he justified his explosive entrance by explaining to a startled Hannah that, having just been taught this salute to the Easter Season, he needed to set it in his mind and fingers before it eluded him. He had also learned the latest hit “Shine on Harvest Moon,” but that he knew and would perform it after supper. Hannah hugged her Ebbely before allowing him to escape to unpack, take a nice hot bath in her Pride and Joy.
Everyone was asked to attend the naming of Carl and Rosie’s twins. A Catholic christening in itself impressive, an Irish-Polish one in a cathedral during Holy Easter made it that much more of an occasion no one wanted to miss.
Having seen an illustration depicting Mrs. Rockefeller attending the races, Jane copied her ensemble, using genuine imported chambray in the shade of ecru.
Stan at the wheel of his Touring, Serafina beside him in Easter finery of deep purple trimmed with jet, came to pick up Johann and his family. He in a new suit of light gray and matching derby, Henrietta and the girls in identical dresses of white batiste with china blue sashes.
Rumpelstiltskin, resplendent in a vest of cobalt blue embroidered in tiny fleur-de-lys, having only room enough for one passenger in his Runabout, drove Hannah in her summer white to the church.