and Chad â had been assigned to cover the morning ablutions of The Great Patriot himself, Jack Donovan, who slept alone in the master suite directly across the hall.
Amy returned a short time later, materializing as if by magic through the wall just to the left of my bed. A door-sized portion of the woodwork â wallpaper, wainscoting, chair rail and all â yawned open and I nearly dropped my cup. âYikes!â I squeaked. âYou scared the life out of me!â
Amy laughed. âSorry.â She carried a tea kettle on a flat, padded pillow, steam drifting lazily out of its spout. âThat door leads to the service staircase. Itâs a shortcut to the first floor, and to the kitchen. I thought you might want to wash up first,â she added, heading for a washstand I had overlooked the previous evening. Carefully, she poured boiling water into a bowl in the washstand. She added cool water to it from a matching pitcher, tested the water with a fingertip, then draped a flannel cloth over the brim. âItâs ready whenever you are.â
âIâd kill for a cup of coffee,â I told Amy as I dipped the flannel into the warm water, squeezed it out and applied the refreshingly warm cloth to my face. âA shower, too, but I realize thatâs out of the question.â
While I washed, Amy set the tea kettle down on the floor near the hidden door, just discernible as a thin crack, now that I knew where it was. She opened a leather trunk at the foot of the bed and pulled out one of my everyday gowns â an apple-green linen that Iâd previously seen hanging in the wardrobe trailer with Katherine Donovanâs name on it.
âWill this dress be suitable for today, madam?â
When I nodded, she draped the gown carefully over the arm of the chair Iâd just vacated. Amy handed me a pair of stockings, a fine white silk, and knelt on the floor in front of me, ready to assist, as if I were an invalid. âI think I can manage,â I said with a smile. âWhy donât you find my stays?â
While Amy dug the stays out of a dresser drawer, I rolled the stockings up over my knees and secured them there with a fat elastic band. âWhy it took until the nineteen sixties to invent panty hose, I canât imagine. Iâm hoping I donât get gangrene below the knee in this get-up.â
Amy watched while I stepped into the under-petticoat. After Iâd tied it around my waist, she handed me the stays. I slipped the corset-like device over my head then turned so she could lace me up the back. âIf you donât have a maid, or a husband, youâd never get into this contraption,â I said, regretting my words almost the moment they fell out of my mouth.
Husband
. Shit. Amyâs husband was dead.
âIâm so sorry,â I said. âI wasnât thinking.â
âThatâs OK,â Amy said, her voice hoarse. She gave my laces a final savage tug before tying them off. âItâs not like I havenât
noticed
that Drew is dead.â
I indicated a chair, the mate to the one Iâd been sitting on. âIâve upset you. Iâm sorry. Here, sit down for a minute.â
Amy eased her full skirts onto the chair and sat. For a long moment, she simply stared at me. Then she said, âIt hasnât been easy.â
âDo you want to talk about it?â
She sat quietly for a moment, hands folded, as if weighing how much to tell me. âDo you know what a death notification team is, Hannah?â
âI can guess. Sounds awful.â
âIt is. An official car pulls up in front of your house and an officer, a chaplain, a medic and a JAG, all in uniform, step out of it.â She looked up at me through a film of tears. âSounds like a bad joke, doesnât it? âAn officer, a chaplain, a medic and a JAG walked into a bar . . .ââ Her voice trailed off.
âI knew right away, of course.