She looked up with red-rimmed eyes. “Would you tell me one thing more, please, Mr. Osgood? Where was he coming from?” she asked, and gave him her full attention.
“From the harbor, we believe, as it happened in Dock Square. He was to pick up some papers at the docks before… before the accident.”
Her lips pursed and her eyes filled before he could say more. Though he would not have judged any kind of reaction on her part, he admired how Rebecca had neither attempted to put her grief on display nor to hide it. Without thinking, he had taken her hand and held it in his. It was a touch of competence and comfort. It had been the first time he had touched his bookkeeper-any physical contact between men and women being against firm rules. He held her hand just until she had seemed calmer, then let go.
After a week passed and she had continued to come to work without any time off, Osgood invited her into his office, the door left open for decorum's sake. “You know it would be seen as acceptable if you'd take time to grieve for Daniel.”
“I will stop wearing mourning dress to the offices if I am a distraction, Mr. Osgood,” she said. “But I will not leave, if you please.”
“Upon my soul, Rebecca-do not always wear such a brave face,” said Osgood.
“I do not want to disappoint you or Mr. Fields by staying away, Mr. Osgood.”
Osgood knew Rebecca's work meant much more to her than many girls. Some who applied for positions with eager pronouncements counted the days on their desk registers until they could find a man to marry, though since the war women far outnumbered men in the city and the search for suitors could be protracted. He also knew Rebecca was concerned that she show no weakness to Fields, even under the circumstances. The idea of young working women in the office was one thing for the liberal-minded senior partner. Divorced women was another.
“I shall respect your wishes,” Osgood had said, upon which she returned to the tasks waiting at her desk.
The end of Rebecca's marriage had first brought her from the country to the city, with her younger brother accompanying her as both her ward and guardian. Osgood had needed two and a half days to persuade Fields how impressive and prepared she had been in their first meeting, though Osgood would never mention that private campaigning to Rebecca after she was hired. He did not see her divorce as a liability nor did he wish to suggest anyone would. “You say we need employees here willing to fight,” Osgood had told Fields at the time, “and Miss Sand has had to endure the meanest treatment imaginable for a young woman.”
Osgood thought about Daniel's mission that day at the harbor. He was to meet the ship from London, where a messenger would hand him-and only him-the advance sheets for the fourth, fifth, and sixth installments of
For this reason, because of this competition, Daniel Sand's missions to the harbor had been kept quiet. Sending a young clerk would be far less conspicuous than sending a well-known partner like Osgood. Pirates from other publishing houses would loiter at the piers to try to intercept popular manuscripts coming from England before they were claimed by the authorized publisher. This breed of fiend called themselves Bookaneers and had vulgar names: Kitten, Molasses, Esquire, Baby. They sold their services to publishers in New York and Philadelphia or local Boston firms, and Osgood himself had been approached by some of them over the years, though he'd adamantly refused to engage in such techniques.
Daniel had known how important it was to secure the next installments and deposit it into the Fields, Osgood & Co. vault. That is why Osgood had asked Officer Carlton whether any papers had been found on Daniel-and was astounded to learn none had.
Could Daniel have been deliberately forced into the street by one of those Bookaneers attempting to take the papers? Osgood dismissed the idea from his mind as soon as he had thought it. Publishing had known some shady practices in the art of procuring a manuscript-bribery, theft, spying-but not physical assault nor, even by the shadiest Bookaneer,
A few days later, Rebecca paused before Osgood's office door before leaving for the day. She was still wearing black-even the little jewelry she wore had been dyed black, as was custom-but she no longer wore the crepe over her dress. “Mr. Osgood,” she said, her dark hair straying from under a bonnet. As she fixed it, a ragged scar from years before was visible on the back of her right ear. “I need to thank you,” she said, and nodded knowingly.
Osgood, caught off guard, nodded and smiled back. Only after she walked away did he realize he did not know what it was she thanked him for. Was she referring to some business matter that had occurred during the day, for having given Daniel a position there years before, for holding her hand when she had cried, even though it broke the rules? Of course, it was too late now to ask her. He could not stop her the next morning and say, suavely, after giving instructions for letters and memorandum for the day, Oh, and what was it you wished to thank me for yesterday, my dear? Osgood was kicking himself for his slow brain, when a less welcome face appeared in the same place in the doorway
“Ah, Mr. Osgood, still here? No rich dinner parties tonight with the literary sort? No ‘swarry,’ as they're called?” This was Montague Midges, the circulation clerk for their magazines, the
“Midges?”
“Your girl-keeper.” This was Midges's name for the firm's female bookkeepers. “Oh, I won't cry when Miss Two Shoes finally folds the mourning garb back in her drawer. The black makes their ankles look big, don't you think?”
“Mr. Midges, I'd prefer…”
Midges broke into whistling, as he often did in the midst of another person's sentence. “Guess she'll be breaking down without her brother in Boston, poor wretch. Ten to one she wishes now she hadn't given that husband of hers the mitten. Good night, sir!”
At that, Osgood had sprung up from his chair, but he knew if he defended Rebecca in hearing of the other female bookkeepers in the office, whispers would fly. It would only make things worse for her at a bad time. Sitting back, Osgood wondered if Midges had recognized the reality of Rebecca's situation better than he had. The palms of his hands began to sweat. Did the terrible loss of Daniel for Rebecca also mean the loss of Rebecca for Osgood?
REBECCA DIDN'T WANT to move to a new room, but the landlady insisted. With Daniel gone, she was to take her belongings to a smaller one at the top of the narrow stairs of the second-class boardinghouse for which she'd pay an additional one dollar per month.
Rebecca didn't argue-she wouldn't dare. Many boardinghouses did not take single women not living with relatives, especially divorced women, or charged them much higher rates than men. Those houses with too many needle girls from the factories feared being mistaken for brothels, and the landladies always preferred newlywed couples and male clerks when they had a choice. Rebecca's landlady, Mrs. Lepsin, made it clear that she originally had taken Rebecca in for two reasons: because she was not a shiftless Irish girl and because she was sharing the room with her brother. Now, though still not Irish, the other reason was dead, and it was clear Lepsin would prefer Rebecca gone.
Rebecca packed her clothes and her belongings by the light of a solitary candle. There were no closets in the room, so some of her clothes were already folded and the rest hanging by rusted nails on the wall. As she did, she ate a small cake of chocolate she kept with some red and white peppermint sticks inside a glove box for what she called emergencies. Like when she was hungry before bed after a meal downstairs of cold vegetables and watery rice pudding at the crowded table. Or when having to suddenly dismantle one's whole room in a matter of hours, or
