“Fine, just fine.” Her eyes were secretive. Faye wasn’t very clever. “You know, Kate, I’d like to go to Europe.”

“Well, how wonderful! And you deserve it and you can afford it.”

“I don’t want to go alone. I want you to go with me.”

Kate looked at her in astonishment. “Me? You want to take me?”

“Sure, why not?”

“Oh, you sweet dear! When can we go?”

“You want to?”

“I’ve always dreamed of it. When can we go? Let’s go soon.”

Faye’s eyes lost their suspicion and her face relaxed. “Maybe next summer,” she said. “We can plan it for next summer. Kate!”

“Yes, Mother.”

“You—you don’t turn any tricks any more, do you?”

“Why should I? You take such good care of me.”

Faye slowly gathered up the cards, and tapped them square, and dropped them in the table drawer.

Kate pulled up a chair. “I want to ask your advice about something.”

“What is it?”

“Well, you know I’m trying to help you.”

“You’re doing everything, darling.”

“You know our biggest expense is food, and it gets bigger in the winter.”

“Yes.”

“Well, right now you can buy fruit and all kinds of vegetables for two bits a lug. And in the winter you know what we pay for canned peaches and canned string beans.”

“You aren’t planning to start preserving?”

“Well, why shouldn’t we?”

“What will Alex say to that?”

“Mother, you can believe it or not, or you can ask him. Alex suggested it.”

“No!”

“Well, he did. Cross my heart.”

“Well, I’ll be damned—Oh, I’m sorry, sweet. It slipped out.”

The kitchen turned into a cannery and all the girls helped. Alex truly believed it was his idea. At the end of the season he had a silver watch with his name engraved on the back to prove it.

Ordinarily both Faye and Kate had their supper at the long table in the dining room, but on Sunday nights when Alex was off and the girls dined on thick sandwiches, Kate served supper for two in Faye’s room. It was pleasant and a ladylike time. There was always some little delicacy, very special and good—foie gras or a tossed salad, pastry bought at Lang’s Bakery just across Main Street. And instead of the white oilcloth and paper napkins of the dining room, Faye’s table was covered with a white damask cloth and the napkins were linen. It had a party feeling too, candles and—something rare in Salinas—a bowl of flowers. Kate could make pretty floral arrangements using only the blossoms from weeds she picked in the fields.

“What a clever girl she is,” Faye would say. “She can do anything and she can make do with anything. We’re going to Europe. And did you know Kate speaks French? Well, she can. When you get her alone ask her to say something in French. She’s teaching me. Know how you say bread in French?” Faye was having a wonderful time. Kate gave her excitement and perpetual planning.

4

On Saturday the fourteenth of October the first wild ducks went over Salinas. Faye saw them from her window, a great wedge flying south. When Kate came in before supper, as she always did, Faye told her about it. “I guess the winter’s nearly here,” she said. “We’ll have to get Alex to set up the stoves.”

“Ready for your tonic, Mother dear?”

“Yes, I am. You’re making me lazy, waiting on me.”

“I like to wait on you,” said Kate. She took the bottle of Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound from the drawer and held it up to the light. “Not much left,” she said. “We’ll have to get some more.”

“Oh, I think I have three bottles left of the dozen in my closet.”

Kate picked up the glass. “There’s a fly in the glass,” she said. “I’ll just go and wash it out.”

In the kitchen she rinsed the glass. From her pocket she took the eye-dropper. The end was closed with a little piece of potato, the way you plug the spout of a kerosene can. She carefully squeezed a few drops of clear liquid into the glass, a tincture of nux vomica.

Back in Faye’s room she poured the three tablespoons of vegetable compound in the glass and stirred it.

Faye drank her tonic and licked her lips. “It tastes bitter,” she said.

“Does it, dear? Let nie taste.” Kate took a spoonful from the bottle and made a face. “So it does,” she said. “I guess it’s been standing around too long. I’m going to throw it out. Say, that is bitter. Let me get you a glass of water.”

At supper Faye’s face was flushed. She stopped eating and seemed to be listening.

“What’s the matter?” Kate asked. “Mother, what’s the matter?”

Faye seemed to tear her attention away. “Why, I don’t know. I guess a little heart flutter. Just all of a sudden I felt afraid and my heart got to pounding.”

“Don’t you want me to help you to your room?”

“No, dear, I feel all right now.”

Grace put down her fork. “Well, you got a real high flush, Faye.”

Kate said, “I don’t like it. I wish you’d see Dr. Wilde.”

“No, it’s all right now.”

“You frightened me,” said Kate. “Have you ever had it before?”