“You could leave, you know.”
“It’s not so simple, Vicki. I haven’t any money.”
Mrs. Heath did not pay her a salary on a weekly basis. That would not make much sense here in these hills. She promised to pay Lucy’s salary in a lump sum later on. Mrs. Heath had given her a sum in advance, when Lucy first took the job with her. But the girl had spent it on clothes and paid some old bills. “And Mrs. Heath persuaded me to bank what was left.”
“You could leave if you wanted to,” Vicki pointed out. “Even without money. There are always people who’ll help you, and organizations who’ll help, if you seriously need help in an emergency.”
“Well, I don’t feel I have the right to leave. I promised to stay with her for a certain length of time. It’s more than a business obligation, Vicki. She cares more for me than my grandparents ever did. And Mrs. Heath needs me. She depends on me.”
But Vicki had seen that Mrs. Heath was neither ill nor dependent. In fact, she was a vigorous woman with a decided will. True, the employer had to be considered, but Lucy needed to consider her own welfare, as well. Vicki suspected Mrs. Heath of playing upon Lucy’s sympathies, and her lonesomeness for her family.
“Lucy, how did you happen to strike up such a close acquaintance with Mrs. Heath in the first place?”
“Well, it was rather sudden,” Lucy admitted. At the women’s hotel, Lucy said, the residents easily became acquainted in the lobby, in the dining room, in the television lounge. She and Mrs. Heath had liked each other from the start. She felt complimented when Mrs. Heath decided almost at once that Lucy was exactly the girl she had been looking for, to be her secretary-companion. In offering the job, Mrs. Heath showed Lucy unassailable credentials and identification.
“She comes from Chicago,” Lucy said. “I think she has friends in New York, too. I overheard her phoning once when she had given me an all-morning gardening chore. I ran out of seeds and then the spade handle broke and I came up to her room to tell her about it, only her door was locked. I heard her, though. She was having trouble getting her number. She was trying very especially to reach someone in New York. I guess you think I’m awful to be an eavesdropper, Vicki.”
“Not at all, under these strange circumstances. What did you hear?”