"Tommy," she repeats, confirming and acknowledging, picking her coat back up from where she set it to deal with the gun. The box under her arm now, she raises her chin a little, becomes more serious as she turns to face him.
"I should go and see about lodging, and give you time to speak with your family, then. When shall I return to learn if there are indeed any duties at all for me to perform, and what those should be?"
Polly and John, she repeats to herself, nods for him as she follows.
"I think that will do nicely, exactly as you say. I look forward to meeting your kin." She isn't surprised, as Roma, that Tommy's family puts love in his voice and his eyes. She's still curious about them nonetheless.
He lets her leave, gives her some advice about which direction to go in,
and then closes the door behind her.
He gets dragged right back into the business, like a river swallowing him
up, but he manages to tell his family members that there's a meeting later
on. They meet before dinner: John, Ada, Polly, Arthur, all together. He
tells them the story, and John and Arthur immediately agree: a nurse like
that, every soldier knows the worth of. But Polly is more paranoid about
bringing people in, and has a better eye besides, and she demands a private
conversation with her before they decide on anything.
Which is why, when Letty knocks on the door that evening, it's just Polly
and Tommy in the kitchen. There's tea in a pot on the table,
and Tommy clear his throat.
Letty uses her time as wisely as she can; she uses the last of the money she'd been saving back for when she struck out for home to buy herself a room for the next week, indeed in one of the businesses Tommy suggested for one reason and one reason only: she has to be able to trust the gun being left behind there, and if she's gravely misjudged this entire situation, it won't help her anyway. She hides it, scrubs off in a small basin, and does her best with what she has - which isn't, after everything, much.
And she's still not quite sure what to expect when she turns back up at the house on Watery Lane, but she's wearing a different dress anyway and her hair is combed and knotted back more neatly than it was earlier, and she's been careful not to worry her lip. She's never put stock in appearances over substance, but she's very much interested in earning the job that Tommy has offered, and that means showing pride in herself. So she does the best she can, and then she's being introduced to Polly - just Polly, which she doesn't know what to make of until she really takes a look at the woman and she knows right away that however Tommy had spoken earlier this meeting is every bit as important as the one with him had been.
She smiles, an expression she's not skilled at calling up out of nowhere and it shows; she can laugh and she can tease and she can be affectionate or fond or pleased, but she is not good at smiling to be polite. She nods deeply enough to be a shallow bow of her head, but her back is straight.
"A pleasure, ma'am. Tommy has spoken well of you to me."
Polly doesn't stand up to greet her; she's sitting at the table with a cup of tea, a cigarillo burning steadily away between her fingers. She looks cold, and stern, and like this Letty might wonder why Tommy's voice goes warm when he speaks of her.
"It's only because he knows I'll make him pay if he doesn't speak well of me," she says, her voice just as thickly accented as Tommy's. She nods at the chair on the opposite side of the table.
"Sit down, girl. Thomas- you can go now." And Tommy sends her a faintly annoyed look, but shakes his head and leaves, closing the doors behind him.
"Well, he does seem the type to do well before very clear consequences."
She wonders a lot, honestly, but she's never been a timid woman. She does take the seat, both because it's polite and because it's what she's here for, and she doesn't look away from Polly when Tommy leaves.
She actually bites her tongue to avoid correcting the girl, allowing it here, now, from her elder and potential employer. It won't stand in the long run, but Letty knows to put her work before her mouth.
And then there's what she learned from being around soldiers: after the brisk dismissal of formalities, Letty expects anything she has to say or ask to be brushed aside as well, and she's not willing to step out as a fool. So instead she says nothing, and waits expectantly, chin raised.
"He told me you were gypsy," she says, archly, bringing her cigarillo back up to her mouth now. "I shouldn't have wondered if he was right. You're darker than anyone we've ever had around here."
Which isn't a bad thing, and her voice certainly doesn't indicate that she thinks it is. But it will make things harder for her here, where so few people are. Even the Shelby's are fair-skinned, light-eyed, especially Tommy.
She almost laughs, for all that it isn't funny; she hears the unspoken point loud and clear, because it's one she's intimately familiar with. After all, she's lived with this skin, and this hair, and these eyes her entire life, and Small Heath is not notable for having this particular obstacle for her.
"I find it quite useful," she says instead, because they both know Polly's side, but Letty has discovered this: she can be angry and resentful about it or, like so many things, she can use it to her own advantage. "No one looking at me ever has to wonder, and so I never have to wonder what, in turn, they'll hold for me when they find out. Easier to dodge the kick you see coming, wouldn't you say?"
That pulls a very, very small smile from her- just a twitch, pulling at her mouth, but it's there. Polly, when you know her, isn't that hard to win over.
"But it's easier to run from those kicks, after some time. You came here from where, exactly?"
"If there are enough of them," Letty agrees, although she's also well aware of the fact that her face will speak for her as to how good she is at knowing when to start running.
She doesn't hesitate to answer, though: "Manchester. I was making my way south, to London, when I remembered the conversation I had with Tommy. I was already basically here, and the worst he could have done when I asked for my pistol would have been to laugh in my face, or call the coppers - and I know how to get out of that particular corner, should I find myself in it."
"You've been wandering," she observes, looking at her again. A woman like that, who was in the war- she wonders if she'd stay longer than a month before she'd get that itch again. She has never felt it herself, but she has known far too many women and men who do. Who need the travel to stay alive.
"Not like you think." Letty knew wanderlust in her family around her before the war; and maybe saying it hasn't helped her to keep moving afterwards would not be entirely honest, but that also isn't it.
"I was trying to go home. If I've nowhere else that will have me, I thought it best to at least be somewhere familiar."
"Where is home, Miss Ortiz? The continent?" She crosses her legs, resettles, but in that movement some of the judgment has fallen off of her. She expects something from her, but it's not quite clear yet what.
"My mother's kumpania travels the lands south of Andorra, between Spain and France. I knew if I could get back to the area, I could find where they are in it."
Letty doesn't do well with being judged, but she tolerates it, especially when it seems to be lessening. For her own part she doesn't fidget or shift, her hands settled neatly in her lap for now.
"She raised you to be strong. A fighter. You volunteered, when the war came along."
Polly knows, better than anyone, how many of their people did sign up and never got any kind of recognition for it. She remembers helping her boys forge papers, in lieu of birth certificates, and feeling their impatience, feeling how badly they wanted to contribute.
And here Letty does hesitate, because she didn't tell Tommy this, didn't tell any of the soldiers she helped during the war this unless they already had cause to know or she needed something from them. Didn't tell any of the FANY volunteers unless she worked directly with them long enough for it to matter.
But it must come out sooner or later, and she draws a deeper breath, steels herself.
"My brothers. They knew if we didn't stop the fighting it would spread down to meet us, and none of us wanted that. I followed them the only way I could."
Her eyes flick from Letty's eyes, to the way she shifts, to the way she's clearly preparing for a confession.
There's no disappointment in her eyes when she says that. If she'd been young and foolish enough, she might have done the same thing. She reaches forward to stub out her cigarillo, looking right at her. "And where are your brothers now, Miss Ortiz?"
Not the confession: the inevitable question that must come after it, and the hard edge her own voice takes when she answers it. She hasn't had to answer for it to so many, yet. However many others might share a story similar to her own, this is hers, and she has pushed it as far back from her mind as she can.
"Buried under names not their own, ma'am. Dead in the battlefields at Epehy, nearest I can tell."
She went to war to take care of her family, but in the end, she's the only one coming back.
It isn't pity in Polly's eyes, because she only pities the worst people. It isn't sympathy, either, not exactly. But she shifts when she hears it, and even if she doesn't reach out to comfort her she nods.
She'd had no doubts that Letty had felt pain, but that kind of loss does something to a woman. It either destroys you, or it makes you strong enough to survive.
Letty has clearly chosen the latter. It cements it for her. "I have no doubt they fought well, just like I have no doubt that you did."
Letty would accept neither pity nor sympathy anyway; she's shored herself up and locked it down like she had to just to get out of the war alive herself, and when she'd started out she'd been determined to make it home so that her brothers could know at least some peace, their names remembered in the stories of their family.
She's lost her drive for that, though, and a little afraid that it is the first of many prices she'll pay as she wanders now, trying to find a place where she fits, well aware that such a place might not exist anymore.
"They did their very best, as did I. As I still am." She almost leaves it there, but while she's dry-eyed - she's undeniably tense, not the least bit happy, but there are no tears to wipe away - something about leaving it there is untenable to her, and she adds: "I was going home, but I've no immediate family there. I could still find a place, they wouldn't turn me away, but a Roma woman with no inheritance and no men to defend her is little better than a beggar, her only worth in being married off."
She knows Polly likely knows this, but she's been going over it in her head all afternoon, making sure this makes sense, making sure this isn't just her getting tired and not knowing what else to do, making sure this isn't her accepting - or, from Polly's side, seeking - charity.
"And the FANY has no further use for me, now the war's done, and I've no further use for them either. All of which I mean to say - I am well aware of how generous is the offer to work for your family which was extended to me earlier today. I intend to earn it, and I intend to keep it on merit, because I am not a woman content with the other options that lay before me."
She lets her finish: it's obviously important to her. But in her head she'd already made up her mind, and all Letty's words do is illustrate that Tommy had seen something good in her, had been right about her.
They need more people like this. Women who will understand what the me have been through, but who are strong enough to push through that pain. She isn't thinking of giving her a home, not just yet, but she's thinking of giving her a chance.
She nods when she finishes, and fishes out a notebook, a small ledger just for her private use. There's a pencil she keeps in her purse, and she pulls that out as well. "We're not in the business of offering anyone charity," she starts, as she starts writing down Letty's name in small, meticulous writing.
"We're in the business of betting, and keeping a fine balance in this town. I'm not a generous woman, and Thomas isn't a generous man. The war made him hard, and you should know that. But if you know that and still agree to the terms, then I'll be content to have you work with us."
This is how Letty talked her way into the volunteer corps, too, with her dark skin and her forged papers; not that the papers weren't good of course, but she still stuck out amongst the fair-skinned natives of every land formally involved in the war. She was still suspicious, even offering to go into that kind of danger of her own free will.
All Letty has ever needed is a chance. She does the rest herself.
"I know," she says simply, rather than run her mouth more. The fabric of her skirt is twisted into her fingers, keeping her nails from her palms.
"And I thank you both." She doesn't need generous, or soft. Just a chance.
"How much did that boy promise you, Miss Ortiz?" She looks up at her through her curls, looking sharp, like she's perfectly made up her mind- and she doesn't need thanks for that.
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"I should go and see about lodging, and give you time to speak with your family, then. When shall I return to learn if there are indeed any duties at all for me to perform, and what those should be?"
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He opens the door for her, politely, to let her out of the room as he escorts her downstairs.
"Polly's at the market now, and we've a meeting later on today- if you'd like to share supper with us, we can talk about it beforehand. Say, six?"
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"I think that will do nicely, exactly as you say. I look forward to meeting your kin." She isn't surprised, as Roma, that Tommy's family puts love in his voice and his eyes. She's still curious about them nonetheless.
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He lets her leave, gives her some advice about which direction to go in, and then closes the door behind her.
He gets dragged right back into the business, like a river swallowing him up, but he manages to tell his family members that there's a meeting later on. They meet before dinner: John, Ada, Polly, Arthur, all together. He tells them the story, and John and Arthur immediately agree: a nurse like that, every soldier knows the worth of. But Polly is more paranoid about bringing people in, and has a better eye besides, and she demands a private conversation with her before they decide on anything.
Which is why, when Letty knocks on the door that evening, it's just Polly and Tommy in the kitchen. There's tea in a pot on the table, and Tommy clear his throat.
"Letty, this is Polly."
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And she's still not quite sure what to expect when she turns back up at the house on Watery Lane, but she's wearing a different dress anyway and her hair is combed and knotted back more neatly than it was earlier, and she's been careful not to worry her lip. She's never put stock in appearances over substance, but she's very much interested in earning the job that Tommy has offered, and that means showing pride in herself. So she does the best she can, and then she's being introduced to Polly - just Polly, which she doesn't know what to make of until she really takes a look at the woman and she knows right away that however Tommy had spoken earlier this meeting is every bit as important as the one with him had been.
She smiles, an expression she's not skilled at calling up out of nowhere and it shows; she can laugh and she can tease and she can be affectionate or fond or pleased, but she is not good at smiling to be polite. She nods deeply enough to be a shallow bow of her head, but her back is straight.
"A pleasure, ma'am. Tommy has spoken well of you to me."
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"It's only because he knows I'll make him pay if he doesn't speak well of me," she says, her voice just as thickly accented as Tommy's. She nods at the chair on the opposite side of the table.
"Sit down, girl. Thomas- you can go now." And Tommy sends her a faintly annoyed look, but shakes his head and leaves, closing the doors behind him.
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She wonders a lot, honestly, but she's never been a timid woman. She does take the seat, both because it's polite and because it's what she's here for, and she doesn't look away from Polly when Tommy leaves.
She actually bites her tongue to avoid correcting the girl, allowing it here, now, from her elder and potential employer. It won't stand in the long run, but Letty knows to put her work before her mouth.
And then there's what she learned from being around soldiers: after the brisk dismissal of formalities, Letty expects anything she has to say or ask to be brushed aside as well, and she's not willing to step out as a fool. So instead she says nothing, and waits expectantly, chin raised.
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Which isn't a bad thing, and her voice certainly doesn't indicate that she thinks it is. But it will make things harder for her here, where so few people are. Even the Shelby's are fair-skinned, light-eyed, especially Tommy.
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"I find it quite useful," she says instead, because they both know Polly's side, but Letty has discovered this: she can be angry and resentful about it or, like so many things, she can use it to her own advantage. "No one looking at me ever has to wonder, and so I never have to wonder what, in turn, they'll hold for me when they find out. Easier to dodge the kick you see coming, wouldn't you say?"
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"But it's easier to run from those kicks, after some time. You came here from where, exactly?"
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She doesn't hesitate to answer, though: "Manchester. I was making my way south, to London, when I remembered the conversation I had with Tommy. I was already basically here, and the worst he could have done when I asked for my pistol would have been to laugh in my face, or call the coppers - and I know how to get out of that particular corner, should I find myself in it."
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"I was trying to go home. If I've nowhere else that will have me, I thought it best to at least be somewhere familiar."
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Letty doesn't do well with being judged, but she tolerates it, especially when it seems to be lessening. For her own part she doesn't fidget or shift, her hands settled neatly in her lap for now.
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Polly knows, better than anyone, how many of their people did sign up and never got any kind of recognition for it. She remembers helping her boys forge papers, in lieu of birth certificates, and feeling their impatience, feeling how badly they wanted to contribute.
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And here Letty does hesitate, because she didn't tell Tommy this, didn't tell any of the soldiers she helped during the war this unless they already had cause to know or she needed something from them. Didn't tell any of the FANY volunteers unless she worked directly with them long enough for it to matter.
But it must come out sooner or later, and she draws a deeper breath, steels herself.
"My brothers. They knew if we didn't stop the fighting it would spread down to meet us, and none of us wanted that. I followed them the only way I could."
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There's no disappointment in her eyes when she says that. If she'd been young and foolish enough, she might have done the same thing. She reaches forward to stub out her cigarillo, looking right at her. "And where are your brothers now, Miss Ortiz?"
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"Buried under names not their own, ma'am. Dead in the battlefields at Epehy, nearest I can tell."
She went to war to take care of her family, but in the end, she's the only one coming back.
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She'd had no doubts that Letty had felt pain, but that kind of loss does something to a woman. It either destroys you, or it makes you strong enough to survive.
Letty has clearly chosen the latter. It cements it for her. "I have no doubt they fought well, just like I have no doubt that you did."
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She's lost her drive for that, though, and a little afraid that it is the first of many prices she'll pay as she wanders now, trying to find a place where she fits, well aware that such a place might not exist anymore.
"They did their very best, as did I. As I still am." She almost leaves it there, but while she's dry-eyed - she's undeniably tense, not the least bit happy, but there are no tears to wipe away - something about leaving it there is untenable to her, and she adds: "I was going home, but I've no immediate family there. I could still find a place, they wouldn't turn me away, but a Roma woman with no inheritance and no men to defend her is little better than a beggar, her only worth in being married off."
She knows Polly likely knows this, but she's been going over it in her head all afternoon, making sure this makes sense, making sure this isn't just her getting tired and not knowing what else to do, making sure this isn't her accepting - or, from Polly's side, seeking - charity.
"And the FANY has no further use for me, now the war's done, and I've no further use for them either. All of which I mean to say - I am well aware of how generous is the offer to work for your family which was extended to me earlier today. I intend to earn it, and I intend to keep it on merit, because I am not a woman content with the other options that lay before me."
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They need more people like this. Women who will understand what the me have been through, but who are strong enough to push through that pain. She isn't thinking of giving her a home, not just yet, but she's thinking of giving her a chance.
She nods when she finishes, and fishes out a notebook, a small ledger just for her private use. There's a pencil she keeps in her purse, and she pulls that out as well. "We're not in the business of offering anyone charity," she starts, as she starts writing down Letty's name in small, meticulous writing.
"We're in the business of betting, and keeping a fine balance in this town. I'm not a generous woman, and Thomas isn't a generous man. The war made him hard, and you should know that. But if you know that and still agree to the terms, then I'll be content to have you work with us."
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All Letty has ever needed is a chance. She does the rest herself.
"I know," she says simply, rather than run her mouth more. The fabric of her skirt is twisted into her fingers, keeping her nails from her palms.
"And I thank you both." She doesn't need generous, or soft. Just a chance.
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"Six pounds a month."
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