Page 42 of The Number of Love
He nodded and slid the hand with the coins into his pocket. “Thank you, miss. I’m grateful. I won’t spend it on anything but food, I promise you.”
Yes, definitely new to his current plight. She nodded and kept her features schooled. “I trust not. Have a good evening, Mr. Holmes.”
“You too, miss. Thank you.”
He hadn’t asked her name, and he backed up again to give her room to go by. She nearly smiled. In the French sectors of Belgium, people tended to get much closer than the English did in general. Stop to ask someone for directions, and they all but embraced you. But she’d taken rather naturally to the more generous spaces between people, and she appreciated now that he was obviously taking pains to keep from alarming her.
A nice man, she would guess. On hard times thanks to whateverbattle had stolen part of his left leg. Of no more use to the army. She could only imagine how long he’d been recuperating, the agony as he learned to use a false foot. But none of that showed on his face now. No pain, other than that of failure. He must have been trying recently to find work and been turned away.
There ought to be something though. It was a simple matching operation. Perhaps when he told her the name of the Go player, she would ask him what skills he had.
And in the meantime, she could at the very least provide him with a better scarf. Maman always had a stack of extras.“You never know when you might see a neck in need of warmth,”she’d said no fewer than eight times.
She hurried home, checking over her shoulder to be sure no one was following—cold or not, she wouldn’t have the fellow finding out where she lived. In the door, up the stairs. Noting absently the squeaky stair, the missing rung, all the markers. She kept her stride open and long as she moved to 3E. Three of E. Three of—no.
Just 3E. No more equations there.
She let herself in and locked up behind her. With one hand she turned on the low gaslights while she dropped her handbag on the table with the other. Then she turned and made it two steps toward the bedroom doors before she stopped.
The scarves were all in Maman’s room. Behind the door that she hadn’t opened in a week. The door she’d not really planned to open again until someone called her on her cowardice. In a month or two. Or three. Or four.
She hadn’t said anything to Red Holmes about the scarf. He wouldn’t know if she changed her mind.
Butshewould know.
Margot stood rooted to the spot for five seconds. And then ten more. And another thirty before she drew in a long breath and forced herself forward. Right foot—one. Left foot—two.Another halt.
“You’re stronger than this, Margot.” She clenched her hands into fists and wished she hadn’t spoken aloud—it made the flat seem all the emptier.Just go.
Go—white stones and black, the outlines of squares. Strangers in the park.
Go-Go—innocent little eyes in deepest brown that wouldn’t look upon theirgrand-mèreagain.
Go!
She rushed forward—one, two, three, four, five—and gripped the doorknob. Pushed it open.
Cold air wafted out, and on it rode the light, floral scent of Maman’s soap. Lily of the valley.
She blinked and fumbled for the knob that would turn on the low lights.
It looked the same as it always had, each and every time she’d come in here. Someone had made the bed. Righted the disorder that had been caused when they came to remove her. Dot, she’d bet. Or Willa. Lukas wouldn’t have had the heart.
But it didn’t look like Dot or Willa. It looked like Maman, smelled like Maman. She wasn’t sure if it brought comfort or pain.
Best not to dwell on it. She went for the chest of drawers and opened the topmost one. A rainbow of clothing met her eyes. To the left, various scarves and even a shawl. Whites, greys, browns, a black. She pulled out a grey one, but before she could command herself to close the drawer and retreat, she saw blue and red and pink and yellow articles to the right of the scarves, all with slips of paper pinned to them.
Christmas presents. She knew it the moment she pulled out the little cardigan withZuriepinned to it. As if Maman had really needed to remind herself for whom the tiny thing was intended. But she’d always been meticulous about the oddest things.
Margot turned and set the gift on the bed, along with the scarf. Zurie would get it for Christmas. One last gift from her grand-mère. Turning back to the drawer, she saw that the next slip saidLukas. A new scarf in masculine blues and greys, with gloves to match. Moving that aside, she saw a beautiful shawl for Willa. Then stared at the last slip.Margot.
She blinked, and blinked again when the first one didn’t clearher eyes of their blurriness. At first all she could see was the bright red. A color she never would have chosen for herself, but exactly the sort of brilliant hue Maman always pushed her to wear. It wouldn’t be a shawl—Margot never wore shawls. It was too wide for a scarf. With hands trembling more than she cared to admit, she extracted it. Fold after fold lengthened. Sleeves shook themselves out.
A long cardigan, belted, open at the front, cabled on the sleeves. The sort of thing that would be perfect on a spring day, or an autumn one, when a coat was too heavy but the air too cool for nothing. The sort of thing that Margot had wished for, though the words had never crossed her lips.
But she’d known. Maman had always known. She’d known, and somehow she’d found the time to knit this without Margot ever seeing her work on it. The evenings when Margot had the night shift, probably. Or after Maman had shut her door and supposedly retired.
She took off the pin and let the paper flutter to the floor. She slid her arms into the sleeves. She buttoned the belt into place. And then she looked up, catching her reflection in the mirror.
