Awake Unto Me (16 page)

“Shut up, Mac,” Danny said sourly. “You try doing this with your head fit to split.”

“Oh, I have, boy, I have,” Mac said with a sadistic grin as he poured oil into a hot pan.

Suddenly Chef Henri stormed into the stove area and thrust a pan of bad onions under Danny’s nose. Whenever Chef discovered bad food in the cold storage, he unerringly knew to whom to bring it and how to present it for the maximum negative effect upon the culprit.

“You, Hanlan. I thought I told you to throw this out?” The onions had gone very bad. The pan was liquefied, odorous goo.

Danny looked down and gagged before bending over and throwing up on the floor.

“Agggh. You are a worthless piece of shit! Leave my kitchen. Sammy, clean this up. Kerry. You come, take this idiot’s place. Hanlan, come back, I have changed my mind. You will sober up by washing dishes. See! I have given the girl your place. Idiot!” Chef Henri stalked out of the kitchen, and Kerry hurriedly grabbed an apron.

The
sous-chef looked at her, his beefy arms folded over his chest. “Let’s see if you can take it, split tail.”

Kerry faced the sous-chef and looked him in the eye. She had been called worse, and growing up on the Barbary Coast had given her a thick skin. “Just be sure you call out the orders loud enough so’s I can hear you. You tend to mumble.”

The cooks hooted and catcalled, this time at the expense of the sou
s
-chef, a sour-faced rascal named Jim who didn’t cook nearly as well as he thought he did and played the petty tyrant with the other cooks while kissing the chef’s ass.

Kerry scrambled to her station. By the end of the service, she had executed forty pieces of sole or steak nearly perfectly. Chef Henri’s mustaches twitched and he ordered Danny demoted to dishwasher. She had her chance.

*

Beth went to dinner at the Grants’ house as often as she could politely get away from her parents. Though they no longer reacted much to her lack of attention to them, she felt guilty. She helped out in the store and with housework so they didn’t complain. Kerry issued a standing invitation and she gladly took her up on it, although she always felt slightly ill at ease if left alone with Laura, who looked at her like she was a bit of fluff attached to the furniture.

“Please call me Beth,” she said to Addison one evening early in the summer. She had been shy with Addison at first, since he was the only doctor she had ever seen socially, but he worked at putting her at ease by asking her questions and treating her as though her opinions mattered.

“With pleasure.” Addison grinned. “If you’re sitting at my table, I don’t see why we should stand on formality, eh, Laura? By all means, please call me Addison. If we ever work together in a hospital again, we shall revert to the standard form.” It was unprecedented for a doctor to be so informal, but Addison, as Beth knew, was quite unusual. “I’m entirely happy to have you become Kerry’s friend. I was concerned at her lack of them. She knows no one but Laura and me, and she was in sore need of company. I can’t think the various employees of the Palace’s kitchen look upon her with anything but resentment. Although she’s never mentioned anything or named anyone particular, I imagine it’s not a welcoming environment for her. She’s quite determined to stick it out though.”

Laura pushed the food around on her plate silently, and Kerry gave Beth an amused and tender smile, which sent her stomach to doing flips. Beth quickly returned her attention to Addison’s story, afraid someone might notice the sudden flush she felt creep up her cheeks.

Addison returned to his tales of the Presidio. “It’s more crowded than ever. Waves of fresh troops arrive every day and there’s no place for them. The army can’t keep up with the demand for supplies. The army medical officers are at their wits’ end with fully one-third of the troops on sick call at any one time. I believe the army may be reaching a level of desperation where they may be ready to entertain the idea of female nurses. I’ll speak to Major Owen this week. Beth, if I should manage to persuade the major where his salvation lies, I invite you to come apply and I shall offer my strongest recommendation on your suitability and industry.”

Beth felt a twinge of hope and returned Kerry’s encouraging smile, thinking that working with Addison also meant she would be able to see Kerry more often. As it happened, they had planned a day out together to the Sutro Baths, and she couldn’t wait.

*

Along with what seemed like half of San Francisco, Kerry and Beth rode the train out to the Sutro Baths. Adolph Sutro, millionaire lumber baron, sometime mayor of San Francisco, and full-time entrepreneur, had built his palace of pleasure at the end of the San Francisco peninsula. He also made sure to build the means to bring the crowds to it. The Land’s End railroad ran from downtown all the way out to the northeast corner of San Francisco. After leaving the downtown depot, the tracks wound through sand dunes along the Bay and finally climbed up the cliffs facing the Golden Gate—the great entrance to San Francisco Bay—so named by the explorer Fremont after the beginning of the Gold Rush. An amusement park stood right next to the Sutro Baths since Sutro was never a man to pass up a chance to make money.

“Do you know how to swim?” Beth asked Kerry on the train ride.

“Yes, I learned when I was a kid—in the Bay. We used to dive off the wharfs.”

“Oh, dear. I never did. There was no water anywhere close in the Mission neighborhood.”

“What did you do for fun?”

“I went to the library and I played the piano.”

“That’s all?” Kerry asked.

Beth fixed her with a stern eye. “I was going to school or I was helping at the store. That’s all I had time for. What did
you
do besides swim in that cold, probably filthy, water?”

Kerry was uncomfortable. “Welllll. I didn’t go to school. I don’t know exactly. We went to downtown San Francisco or to Chinatown, but we stayed around home, mostly.”

“Who is ‘we’ and where was home? You still haven’t told me.” Beth sounded plaintive rather than angry, and Kerry was at a loss to explain her upbringing, but then they arrived at the end of the line.

“Oh, look. Here we are,” she said, brightly.

Beth filed her curiosity away, resolving to try again at another time. They debarked from the train and walked past a row of businesses designed to attract the bathgoers to spend still more money. Down the hill, they could see a large imposing building nestled against the cliff and beyond the huge Cliff House Hotel facing the restless Pacific Ocean.

Beth and Kerry stood open-mouthed in front of the entrance flanked by towering Greek columns. It was said Sutro wanted his baths to replicate those of the Roman emperors in size and splendor. They walked in through the imposing entrance and stopped just inside the door. They were a couple of floors above the huge swimming pools. Through the windows to the west, they could see the waves crashing on the Seal Rocks.

Beth swallowed nervously. She had looked forward for days to this outing, but the full significance of what they were about to do was just dawning on her.

They followed the signs downstairs to the ladies’ changing rooms. A woman in a little booth gave them two worn-out swimsuits. Sutro required his bathhouse patrons to rent their swimwear from him, under the guise of it being healthier than allowing patrons to bring their own.

“Ladies’ changing room that way,” the woman said, “unless you want a private room. That’ll be twenty-five cents more.”

Beth and Kerry looked at each other and back at the bathhouse clerk. Beth said, “Yes, we do.” She handed over the two-bit coin.

The woman gave them two wire baskets for their things and a key to a dressing room.

Beth realized with a combination of anticipation and an attack of nerves they were going to be in a room together alone, and they were going to have to take off their clothes. She didn’t understand why this unnerved her so, but she was determined not to let her feelings show. Not only that, but she would have to get into the swimming pool and had never been in one. She braced herself, unwilling to do anything that would make Kerry think less of her.

Beth followed Kerry down the walkway and waited while Kerry unlocked the door. They entered a tiny bare room with a cold cement floor and one wooden bench.

Beth sat on the bench and removed her shoes. She wore a plain, light green dress that buttoned up to her neck and turned away from Kerry to unbutton it. The quicker she got through the changing process the better.

We’re going to have to go through the entire process again later,
Beth thought as she swiftly took off the rest of her clothes and got into the bathing costume, her back turned to Kerry. It was slightly ragged and an unpleasant grayish-blue. When she finally turned around, she saw that Kerry was already clad in her bathing suit and looking at her with an unreadable expression.

“Where shall we go?” Kerry asked, leading the way down the hallway toward the pools “You choose. This is the biggest pool, the cold seawater one, and it has most of the toys—the rings, the slide, the ropes, and so on. Shall we start here?” She motioned to it and they stepped in together, gasping at the cold as it hit their legs.

Beth looked on and cheered from the steps as Kerry tried each silly pool toy, one after the other. Then Kerry hoisted herself up the side and sat next to Beth, dripping and panting.

“How about a swimming lesson?” Kerry asked, her eyes shining and the light from the huge western-facing windows reflecting on her wet hair.

Beth’s stomach flipped over and she forced herself to take a steadying breath. “Oh, I couldn’t.”

“So you’ve come all the way out here, put on a bathing costume, and you won’t even get in the water?”

Beth’s temper flared at the implied slight to her courage. “Of course not! Very well. Just please don’t let me drown.”

“No, I’d never do that.”

They stood in waist-high water.

“I don’t want to put my face in,” Beth said firmly.

“But you can’t swim unless you do. Come on. I’ll do it with you. Hold my hand, and when I count to three, hold your breath, close your eyes, and we’ll duck under water for just a moment.”

In spite of her anxiety, Beth couldn’t help but be convinced by Kerry’s certainty. She put her hand in Kerry’s and nodded.

“Ready? One, two, three!”

Kerry almost had to drag her down and they surfaced immediately. Beth sputtered and wiped the water from her eyes.

“Close your eyes!” Kerry reminded her jovially. They did it several more times, and Beth got used to the sensation of being underwater. It wasn’t so bad. Kerry’s firm grip on her hand reassured her.

“Now I can show you how to stroke. Watch me.” Kerry swam a little way away and then came back. She looked like a fish with arms and legs.

“Oh, no, I can’t do that,” Beth said.

“Of course you can. I’m going to hold you. Here. Lay back in the water. I’ve got you.”

Beth leaned back slowly and forced herself to relax on Kerry’s arms. Kerry slid her other arm underneath Beth’s knees, cradling her. “See? Not so bad.”

Beth looked up at Kerry’s face. She was grinning, and it seemed to Beth that Kerry’s expression contained an element of tenderness. She was so clearly anxious that Beth should feel secure and be happy that it was touching. And something else—the feel of Kerry supporting her in the water did help her nerves, but it gave her another feeling, one she couldn’t name but was making her feel warm in unexpected places.

Beth grinned suddenly and Kerry laughed. “Now, turn over and do as I did. Turn your face to the side and breathe, then put your face in the water and exhale. Your arms are like this.” They practiced for another half hour.

Then, without Beth even noticing, Kerry let her go and off she swam for a few feet on her own. Then she stopped and gave a cry of alarm. Kerry rushed to her and embraced her. Beth went limp against her.

“I got frightened when you were no longer holding me,” Beth said. They stood together in the water. Kerry didn’t relinquish her hold and saw that Beth didn’t try to move away.

“Shhh,” Kerry murmured. “All’s well. You swam on your own.”

Beth leaned back and looked at her silently for a moment before moving away from her arms. “Perhaps we better stop.”

They went to warm up in one of the heated pools and sat there quietly, enjoying the hot water and steam swirling through the air. Kerry watched as Beth rested her head on the cement side, water drops on her eyelashes making her look like a water nymph from some old wives’ tale. Kerry resisted the urge to stroke the damp hair from Beth’s forehead and kiss her wet cheeks. She desperately wanted to taste the salt on Beth’s skin, to feel her shiver under her hands like she had in the cold pool, but not because she was cold. Beth opened her eyes suddenly and they stared at one another for a long moment.

Beth looked away first and said, “I think I would like to go home.”

Kerry nodded silently. Nothing she wanted to say could be said without scaring Beth away, no matter how much she wanted it to be otherwise. She shivered in spite of the warmth of the pool. The old worn-out bathing suit clinging to every inch of Beth’s body showed Kerry the outline of her shape in considerable detail. She resolutely tamped down her feelings and took Beth’s hand to help her out of the pool.