Love Comes Calling (25 page)

T
he next morning I slept in longer than I had for ages and finally stumbled down to breakfast at ten o'clock. Afterward, as I sat in the parlor working a crossword puzzle, I heard the doorbell ring. I ignored it. Someone would get it. And besides, I needed to think of a seven-letter word for “faces.”

Aspects?

I filled it in, but it didn't match up with the word that ran across it. Oysters and clambakes! I erased it.

Facets?

No. That was only six letters. But . . . maybe the puzzle was misprinted. If I marked over that last box, then it would fit just fine. I started coloring in the extra box with my pencil.

“Miss Eton?” The maid called from the front hall.

“Hmm?” There. Almost done.
F-A-C-E-T-
S
. Perfect! Now I just needed to find a five-letter word for enraged that ended in an
S
. But . . . I couldn't really think of any words that ended in an
S
. At least not for enraged.
Were
there any? Maybe I shouldn't have marked out that extra box.

“A Mr. Feeney is here for . . .” She took a step closer. “Janie Winslow.”

“ . . . a Mr. Feeney?” I ought to go root around in Mother's sitting room for a dictionary. There had to be a word that ended in an
S
in there that had five letters and meant the same thing as enraged. I wondered if anyone ever checked these puzzles for spelling errors. Maybe the word wasn't really five letters. Maybe they had misspelled it. Wouldn't that be rotten luck? I didn't know how anyone ever finished one of these! I tossed it onto the desk, then turned around to face the maid squarely. “I'm sorry. What were you saying?”

“I told him Janie doesn't live here, but he keeps saying she does.”

“Janie?”

The maid colored. “Miss Winslow.”

“Who is looking for her again?”

“A policeman. Mr. Feeney.”

Jack? Here?! “I . . .” Jack couldn't be here! He still thought I was Janie, and I needed him to keep thinking that until I could figure out how to save Griff. I leaned out to look around her but didn't see anyone. Good! That meant he couldn't see me. “Tell him you can pass a message to Janie for him. I'll see that she gets it.”

“Miss?”

“If he gives you a message, then we'll forward it.” And when she went back to the hall to speak with him, I'd hide behind the desk.

“If you say so, but with Mrs. Winslow dead . . .”

“I said we'll get it to her and we will. Now . . . go on!”

I moved to duck behind the desk, but then the maid reappeared . . . with Jack right behind her. Too late to hide!

The maid gestured to him. “I was just going to get him something to write a message with.”

“There you are!” Jack stepped in front of her and came over toward me. “I kept being told you weren't here.”

I motioned for the maid to leave.

She screwed her face up in a puzzled frown, then turned around and left.

“I came to—”

“Ellis? Ellis!” My mother's footsteps sounded on the stairs.

Oysters and clambakes! I grabbed Jack by the hand and pulled him down behind the desk with me.

“Why are we hiding?”

“Because . . . because . . . because I'm not supposed to be here.”

“Why?”

“Because I'm Janie. And Janie doesn't belong upstairs. So if she finds me . . .” I held my breath as I heard my mother's footsteps fall silent.

“Who finds you?”

“My moth—I mean—that woman.”

“Why would she want you?”

“Why wouldn't she?” I wished Jack would stop asking questions!

The footsteps went away down the hall, and I heard the door to the office shut.

I stood and pulled Jack up beside me, then pushed him toward the door. “Time to go.”

“But I didn't even—”

“Let's talk outside, shall we?”

“But—”

I opened up the front door and shoved him out. Or tried to. My, but he was tall! “I told you—I'm not supposed to be here.”

“Fine. I'm going.”

I went with him. Or I was going to until I saw Griff jog down the front steps of the Phillipses' house. What was he doing home at this time of day? He turned. Raised a hand. “Hey, El—”

I grabbed Jack by the hand and tugged him back into the house.

“But you just—”

“Hush!” I paused inside the door. Was my mother still in the office?

“Hey!” Griff's voice sounded closer. Was he coming over? I didn't dare to look.

I closed the door behind us. Now. Where to hide?

“Ellis? Is that you?” Halfway down the hall, the office door swung open. It was too late to make a break for the stairs. I sprang toward the parlor and the refuge of that desk, pulling Jack with me. “Get down!”

He crouched beside me. “Weren't we just here?”

“Hush.” I put my hand over his mouth as I listened for my mother and peered out the window. Griff was there, standing on the sidewalk. He stepped forward. Stepped back. Raked his hand through his hair. And then he shrugged and went back toward his own house.

Thank goodness!

“Where did she go?” My mother. “Ellis?”

I heard the maid come back in. “Ma'am?”

“Have you seen Ellis?”

“She was here just a minute ago, but I haven't seen her since.”

“When you see her, can you tell her I'd like to speak with her?”

“Of course, ma'am.”

There were two sets of footsteps now, going in opposite directions. I chanced a look. The front hall was clear. I couldn't risk the front door again because the maid was sure to hear me, and we couldn't go out the back because then we'd have to walk past the office and risk Mother noticing us. The only way out was up.

“How are you at climbing trees, Jack?”

“Trees?”

“Come on.” I took his hand and led him out of the parlor, toward the front stairs. “Only step where I do.”

“What are you—”

“Is that you, Miss Eton?” The maid poked her head around the corner.

Oysters and clambakes! I stepped off the first stair and planted myself in front of Jack. “No, it's not.”

She blinked.

“And I have this police officer with me. He needs to inspect the windows. Upstairs.”

“I do?”

“He does?”

I jabbed my elbow back and gave Jack a poke in the ribs. “Yes. So we'll just be going up now.” I held my chin high and started walking up the stairs.

Jack lumbered up behind me, stepping on all the squeaky places as he went.

“Didn't I tell you to step where I step?”

“Would you let up!”

“Just—” I waved my hand toward the top of the stairs. “Come on.”

Down below us, I heard a door swing open. “Ellis? Is that you?”

I took Jack's hand and hurried us up to Lawrence's room at the back of the house. And then I pushed aside the curtains and unlocked the window, inspecting it as I did so. It looked fine to me.

“Ellis is what that girl at the club called you. Why is everyone calling you Ellis?”

“Well, she . . . they . . . think I'm Ellis. She always has. Because I look like Janie.”

“What?”

“She doesn't understand. No one understands.”

“
I
don't understand.”

“See what I mean? But that's not important.” I hit the sash with the heel of my hand and then pushed up. There—finally! “What's important is that you leave. Now.” I pointed toward the tree outside the window.

“You want me to climb out the window?”

“There's a tree. You'll have to lean forward a bit and then jump for it, but I think you'll make it.”

“You want me to climb out your window? Like some thief?”

“Yes.” To put a point to it.

“Tell me how I got mixed up with you again?”

I helped him put a leg out over the casement. “I was work
ing down at Central and patching telephone calls through, except too many of them came in at once, and I meant to transfer one through except another one came in at the same time and I forgot to flip the switch for the first one and then—”

“Never mind.”

“So if you just—see? Lean forward a little bit.”

“I get it, thank you.”

“And please don't come visit me here anymore.”

He swung his legs, pushed off the ledge, and grabbed the tree branch. “But I wanted to tell you that—”

I pulled the sash down and locked the window.

“Janie!” He was still trying to say something.

I pulled the curtains shut and collapsed onto Lawrence's bed. Thank goodness that was over! But . . . why had he come in the first place? He hadn't ever said, had he? I thought about it for a minute as I stared at the ceiling. No, he never had. And it looked like a spider was building a web up there at the corner of the wall. I'd have to tell the maid.

I wandered downstairs and as I was going, my mother came out into the hall. “There you are!”

“Here I am. Did you need something?”

“I need you to start packing for the shore so you're ready to go by Friday.” She turned and went back down the hall toward the office.

The shore. A long, bleak summer stretched before me. I was supposed to be getting ready to leave for Hollywood right now, only I didn't have any money anymore.

The maid came around the corner as she left. “Mr. Phillips stopped by. He asked for you. I told him you were having the windows inspected.”

I thanked her and then went back into the parlor and found that crossword puzzle. I supposed I ought to assume the newspaper had gotten all the clues right and spelled all the words correctly. That meant I still needed a seven-letter word for “faces.”

I
worked at the puzzle while I ate lunch and tried to figure out what to do about Hollywood and Griff and that telephone call. I only had three more days before I'd be trapped at the shore for the rest of the summer. I'd already decided the men must have been mistaken when they'd talked about doing whatever it was in plain sight because Griff didn't seem to be planning to go anywhere with great crowds of people . . . although I really ought to make sure about that.

I didn't want to go talk to him at his house . . . but I didn't want to leave him on his own either, just in case those men tried something. Maybe if they saw someone—
me
—outside Griff's house, they'd think twice about whatever it was they were trying to do. In the movies, no one ever wanted a witness to their dirty work.

I put the puzzle down and went out to pace back and forth on the sidewalk in front of Griff's house for a while, but then my feet started to hurt. Solving a murder plot was hard work.

I heard the door open and ducked behind our front stairs.

“Ellis?”

It was Griff. If I stayed where I was, maybe he wouldn't see me.

“I see you.”

I stepped out into the open.

“As long as you're there, could you maybe come in and help me with something?”

Perfect! Well, maybe. Was it better to be inside with him or outside where the bad guys could see me? “Why are you home? I thought you were working.”

“I
am
working. But the office is too small for all the records I need to sort through.” He led me into the parlor and shifted through a stack of ledgers, finally pulling several from the pile and opening them.

“Are you still not done with these?”

“It's not just one budget we're investigating; it's all of them. And since we tried for that warrant, they've been even harder to get.” He pulled out a chair. “Could you read the figures in this column to me?”

I sat and read the numbers, then went on to the next column when he asked. With every number, he consulted his own book and then made a notation in a column of a third book.

“How long has this commission been after the mayor?”

“Years.”

“Do you ever think maybe it isn't worth it? That maybe they should just let people be?”

“What do you mean?”

“Don't you think the mayor might get mad at you? And try to do something, maybe?”

“I'd like to see him try! Then we'd get him good.”

“But what if nothing ever happens? What if he never gets convicted?”

“You don't give up at the beginning just because you're afraid of what might happen at the end. If it's worth it, then it's worth it, just like you said before. Nothing can change that.”

Several hours later, Griff finally took the book from me and closed it up, stacking it on top of his own. And then he took my hand in his. “I've been wanting to know what you'd think about something.”

Working all afternoon beside him, thinking about how truly terrific he was, I just knew if he pulled that pin out of his pocket right then, I might very well accept it. “I think . . . it's awfully swell it's the middle of June already, don't you?” I pulled my hand from his and stood, moving to place some distance between us. “You'll be done with all of this and back at school before you know it.”

He gave me a look of such disappointment that it pierced my soul. “Just what is it you're afraid of, Ellis?”

An honest question deserved an honest answer. That's what my mother always said. “I just—I don't—I don't want to disappoint you.” That was the truth of it. I hadn't wanted to disappoint him by leaving, and I didn't want to disappoint him by staying—because eventually that's what he would be either way: disappointed in me.

“You could never disappoint me.”

“I disappoint everyone else. All my life, all I've ever done is disappoint people. ‘Oh, Ellis!' this and ‘Oh, Ellis!' that. How could I possibly not disappoint you?”

“What is it you think I'm expecting you to be?”

“Like everyone else. And I'm just not good at that. I try but—”

“Why would I want you to be like everyone else? Why would
you
want that? You're so good at being you.”

“I'm
not
good at being me. Haven't you been listening? Nobody wants me to be me.”

“I do.”

“And what happens if I am? Do you really want me around in twenty years so people can say, ‘Oh, Ellis.' Or—or worse! They'll probably say, ‘Oh, Griff!' And then they'll say, ‘What did you ever see in her?'”

“No one would ever say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because you're the only one who ever calls me Griff.”

“Well, then . . . then maybe
I'd
say it! I would. I just know it! In twenty years, I'd be so disappointed in myself that I'd disappointed you, I'd wonder why on earth you wanted me in the first place. In fact, you'll probably be asking
yourself
that question in twenty years: ‘What did I ever see in Ellis?'”

He stood and closed the distance between us. “That would never happen. And the other reason I know it won't is because I hope you're around for
fifty
more years.”

He wasn't listening to me. “How can you say that? How can—how can you stand there and . . . want me? Who am I supposed to be, Griff?”

“You. Just be who God created you to be.”

“But I don't know how. And besides, I'm so much better at being someone else.” In fact, I was better at being practically everyone else than myself.

“I know exactly who you are. You're the one girl who's refused to turn me into a prince and the only one who never stopped calling me Griff. And you'll always—and I mean forever—be my Ellis.”

I felt a tear roll down my cheek.

“Golly, I didn't mean to make you cry. Don't cry.” He put a thumb up to rub away the tear, but another rolled down to take its place. “Please don't.”

I tried to stop, but I just couldn't. I was so tired of being me. It was just about the worst fate I could ever think of, but his words had made me feel as if I didn't have to try so hard to be someone else. As if Ellis Eton might be all right after all.

He took one long, searching look into my eyes as his hand slid to my neck, and then he bent and pressed a kiss to my lips. One single kiss. It reached down and tingled the very tips of my toes. It might not have been movie perfect, but it was exactly right.

When I opened my eyes, he was staring at me and I found, as I looked into those clear blue eyes, that I liked seeing myself reflected in them. But when he had closed his eyes and would have kissed me again, there came the sound of a discreet cough. “Mr. Phillips?”

Griff dropped his hand, and I tried to hide behind him as he turned.

It was the butler. “There's a gentleman at the door asking for you.”

A man? At the door?

Griff sighed. “I'll be right there.”

I grabbed at his hand. “Don't go.”

“Why not?”

“Just—don't.”

“Ellis—”

I grabbed onto him with my other hand. “Please, Griff. Don't ask me why, but just please,
don't answer the door
.”

He sent a look over his shoulder at the butler and then came back toward me, putting a hand to my shoulder. “All right. Fine. I won't.” He tucked me into his side, then turned and sent the butler away. “You're trembling.”

“I'm fine.”

“What's wrong?”

“I'm just . . . worried about you. About—all those numbers and those books. What if someone wants to take you out of the picture?”

“Take me out of the picture? What a thing to think!” He was smiling as if I'd said something funny.

“You said you're trying to get the mayor fired. What if—what if he found out about it?”

He stopped smiling. Taking up my hand, he pulled me across the room toward the front bay window. “Let's see if we can tell who it is.”

We crept to the window, peeking out between the holes of the lace curtains. We heard the door open. Heard the butler say something. Heard the door shut.

And then someone jogged down the front steps.

“It looks like . . .”

A cough sounded behind us. We turned from the window to see the butler. “A Mr. Freddy Brooks, sir.”

Freddy Brooks? Who was Freddy Brooks?

“He left you a message.” The butler was holding out a note.

“I thought Freddy'd gone back home for the summer. . . .”
Griff took the note, opened it up, and read it. “He's back, passing through town on his way to New York City. Wanted to know if he could stay the night.” For the first time since I'd known him, Griff looked as if he were annoyed with me. “But . . .” he turned the note over. Turned it back. “I don't know where he went.” He looked over toward the butler. “Did he say where he was going?”

“No, sir.”

“Well . . .” Griff looked at the note and then at me.

“I'm sorry. I just didn't want you to get hurt.”

“Honestly, Ellis, this isn't one of those movies you're always going to see.”

That was the truth. It was much worse!

“I used to think you weren't like other girls, prone to all kinds of hysterics. But now I'm beginning to wonder.”

“I had a good reason for asking you not to answer the door.”

He raised a brow as if expecting me to tell him.

“A
very
good reason.”

“Which is?”

I shook my head. “I can't tell you.”

“Ellis! This kind of thing was fine when we were kids, but we're not ten years old anymore.”

“I know, I just—” I shrugged. I couldn't really say anything else. “Well . . . what are you doing tomorrow? Maybe I could—”

He held up the message. “Trying to figure out where Freddy is! In between the hospital opening and the—”

Hospital opening? “Which hospital?”

“Massachusetts General. The heart wing. Remember? The one we built in Mother's memory?”

“Do you have to go?”

“Do I have to—! Of course I have to. Everyone's going to be there. Even the mayor's going to put in an appearance.”

“Mayor Curley?”

“Which other mayor would I be talking about?”

“So it's . . . in plain sight? Where everybody can see it?”

“It's a big event. Father's been working with the hospital on the plans for the past three months.”

“And everyone's going to be there?”

He nodded.

“I need you to promise me something.”

“Will it make you leave?” He looked truly peeved now.

I walked up and took his hand between my own, and then I looked into his eyes, those gorgeous blue eyes that just a few minutes before had been looking at me with such hope and love. “Could you promise me you won't go? I can't tell you why. You'll have to trust me: It wouldn't be safe.”

He pulled his hand from me. “No!”

“No, you won't go?” Well, that was a relief!

“No, I can't promise you. I have to go. Everyone's going to be there.”

That's what I was so afraid of!