“Yes!” Carmella sounded like a teacher praising an astute student. “It was Nico’s idea. You are as much a part of the business as he is. You have done so much for the store, he readily admits that. He wanted your name as clearly identified as his. In fact, he insisted. And he is even talking about changing the sign over the door.”
Carmella carried the cards and the basket of pastries to the round mahogany table in the center portion of the back room. The room, which ran the width of the building, was partitioned into thirds with the office at one end and a glassed-off area for music lessons at the other. To make room for her basket, Carmella pushed aside an overflow of invoices and a case holding a clarinet with bent keys that was awaiting repair. “You are like family to us, Inez. You and Antonia. I don’t know how we limped along before you came.”
Inez didn’t know whether to be flattered or concerned. The cards, slipped into orders and handed out individually, would enhance the visibility of the store and increase return business. But still, having her surname printed prominently in black and white, or rather in black and a robin’s egg blue, made her queasy.
She had not divulged much about her previous life to the Donatos or indeed anyone in San Francisco. No one knew she was part-owner of the Silver Queen Saloon along with her ex-husband, nor that she was a silent partner of a high-end parlor house, both in Leadville. And she had most certainly not divulged that she was personally responsible for a number of deaths, all well deserved, in her estimation. But others might not see it that way. Too, Stannert was an unusual surname. Spelling it out on the trade card made her feel conspicuous when all she desired was to remain unknown.
“Very nice, Carmella, I am overwhelmed and grateful for your brother’s vote of confidence—and yours too, of course, ” said Inez, thinking a talk with Nico was in order.
She would have to tread carefully. On the one hand, be appreciative and acknowledge her part in making the business thrive—after all, it would only buttress her position here as time went on—but also indicate, modestly and self-effacingly, that she preferred to stay in the background. It wouldn’t be hard to convince him that he should continue to occupy center stage as the “public face” of the store. If nothing else, perhaps she could forestall a change in signage, at least until her half-ownership was official.
Carmella turned her attentions back to the pastries. “Eat, Mrs. Stannert! Have another! You are thin as a rail. I should cook more, and be plying you with zeppole, svogliatella, cannoli, cornetti alla marmellata. Men, they like women with a little more to them.”
Inez blinked, thinking how fast Carmella swung from being a naïve, relatively sheltered young woman to talking like she was Inez’s formidable Aunt Agnes, always clucking, always plotting. And the inconsistencies! Railing against the tyranny of men one moment, then turning face-about faster than a merry-go-round to chide Inez for showing not the slightest interest in re-marrying.
Carmella persisted, “You can be so charming when selling pianos, an organette, music boxes, or even a box of woodwind reeds, Mrs. Stannert. If you put your mind to it, you could find another husband. Aren’t you close to the end of your half-mourning? You have been in black, gray, and lavender since you arrived. It is time. You should be wearing vibrant colors now—green! Blue! Burgundy! Green especially would bring out the hazel in your eyes.”
Inez decided to put an end to the discussion. She brought the basket to the big table, saying, “Carmella, you sound as if I should go about turning over rocks in search of someone who can accompany me to the plays or musical arias. I am quite comfortable with my life as it is. Antonia, the store, the music lessons I provide, they fill my time and are all I need right now.”
There were also her side agreements with women like Mrs. Nolan, determined entrepreneurial women—laundresses, milliners, bakers, printers, dressmakers—who needed “a little extra” to improve their businesses, and who found their way, by word of mouth, to Inez’s back door. But that was a part of her life she tried to keep separate from the Donatos, lest Nico think she was not giving “her all” to his store.
Inez continued, “I have no desire to, as you say, ‘find’ another husband.”
Carmella’s fine black brows swooped together, like bird wings. “Is there no one who agrees with you? Of all the men who come through here,” she added hastily. “Gentlemen of fine breeding and refined tastes, do you not see how much they admire you?”
Inez turned and stared at her, dumbfounded.
The only men who came to mind were Carmella’s admirers—Jamie; Jamie’s boarding-roommate, cornet player Otto Klein; woodwind virtuosos William and Walter Ash; a few others. All single, all young, all obviously enamored of Carmella. Well, there was also pianist Thomas Welles, about her age, in his thirties, but he was happily married with four children. Or, it would be happily, he intimated, if the money were more forthcoming and the work more steady. Rounding out that group was Roger Haskell, forty-ish, odd man out as the publisher of a small, vociferously pro-labor newspaper, who had a special affinity for the music scene. He and Inez shared a healthy respect for each other, but that was as far as it went. Besides, Haskell smoked the vilest cigars in existence. Aside from that, there were the clients Nico sent to the store. Husbands looking
