A scowl mars Jamie’s smooth face, and his chest moves as if a cinder block has been placed on top of it. Strudel stares up at him, her feet jittering, and I swear that little dog knows just what Jamie’s feeling, too. It isn’t easy having to be defended when your instinct is to defend.
“Are you so light of chores that you must stoop to harassing dog walkers?” I ask.
Charlotte tips up her nose. “Chief Purser McElroy himself assured me Jamie could be here as I required.”
Jamie threads his arms tight, glowering ineffectually at the crewman’s midsection.
The crewman coughs, and his kidney-bean nose turns even redder. “I’m sorry, miss. I didn’t know.”
Charlotte’s smile swoops down on him. “Now you do. Good day.”
I push my full glass of lemonade at the man. “Please take care of this for me. It’s not to my taste.”
“Certainly, ma’am.” He takes the glass and makes tracks away.
“I’m off,” Jamie says gruffly, avoiding Charlotte’s eyes. “Good luck.”
Strudel tugs him toward the bow. When he passes the women in the fur coats, he ignores them, though if it were me, I would’ve speared them with a good eyeball javelin. Jamie always outclasses me.
Charlotte leads me in the other direction. A deep alcove with deck chairs is beginning to fill with the after-lunch crowd, their gazes shifting between Charlotte and me. I can see the narrative changing with the observation that the Merry Widow has made a friend. We continue past the alcove to a spot with a single row of four empty deck chairs.
“He favors that one.” Charlotte’s gloved finger points to the chair at the end.
“Then you shall sit between us.” I can more easily make my point by directing my comments toward the man instead of away from him. I raise the back of my deck chair as far as it goes and lower Charlotte’s several inches. Then we wait.
Charlotte removes her hat and places it in her lap, where it rests like a brown turtle napping. A smile rides high on her face between two spots of pink. Crying fish balls, I hope she loses that look soon before she gives us away as mischief makers.
I should attempt conversation. But the things I wish to say verge on impudent, and I’m in no mood to discuss the fineness of the sunny day or speculate on when sea ice will appear.
To my surprise, it is she who opens the door. “It’s so refreshing to meet someone like your brother.”
“You mean, someone who can walk dogs?”
Her face breaks out in dimples. “Jamie makes me laugh. After Mother got sick, I thought I might never laugh again.”
Who’d have thought Jamie could charm someone like her? Ba charmed Mum, but at least she’d been as poor as him.
“What do your parents think?”
“Father moved to Baltimore. The laudanum puts Mother out most of the day.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
She nods.
A middle-aged woman with a high collar of ruffles blossoming around her jaw plants herself right on Mr. Stewart’s chair. She promptly reclines and closes her eyes.
Charlotte gives me a wide-eyed shrug.Now what?If Mr. Stewart sees that his chair is occupied, he’ll leave. Then we’ll have to wait for tomorrow to try again, and with New York just around the corner, we’ve already wasted too much time.
I clear my throat and say in a coarse and overly loud voice, “So when I saw the sign, ‘Healer of Canker Sores, Warts, andOther Burdensome Blemishes,’ I had to go in. You know I’ve had these psoriatic patches on my cheeks for years.” That will not help the Merry Widow’s image, but the truth is a slippery bucket of water anyway, with all the rumors sloshing about. “She gave me an ointment of cod liver oil, pig liver oil, spotty toad liver oil, cuttlefish liver oil—”
Charlotte’s face turns red, and she shakes her head, maybe telling me that cuttlefish don’t have livers.
Behind her, the woman’s eyes unshutter, and her small mouth opens into a tight ring. The feisty Mrs. Sloane had the same kind of mouth, just wide enough to poke in a soft-boiled egg, though she sure could raise a good fuss with it.
Charlotte’s lips move indecipherably, and her eyes slide to one side.
“What?” I mouth back, then continue on with my monologue. “She said to smear it on the patches once an hour.”
