CHAPTER 2: THE CROW'S NEST
Back in Vienna the next afternoon, Maria turned diligently to her embroidery until just before midnight, when her back began to ache intolerably. She had just crawled into bed and turned out the light when Lolly crept in.
"I'm sorry, Maria, did I wake you?"
"No, no, that's all right, Lolly. Where have you been?"
"At work, at the Crow's Nest, remember? My third night and I haven't made less than twenty shillings a night. And I was right! They are looking to take on another girl, and they told me to bring you along tomorrow. Honestly, Maria, the people there are a decent sort. Who knows, we might even find ourselves boyfriends there!"
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Maria didn't want a boyfriend, but she did want a job, which was why, late the next afternoon, she found herself trailing Lolly through a warren of crooked, crowded streets in an unfamiliar part of the city. In the two years she'd spent in Vienna, Maria rarely ventured far from the college and its surrounding neighborhood of boardinghouses, cafes and bookstores. Short on time and money as she was, there was no point in her venturing to the north, where the great museums, theatres, palaces, opera houses and mansions of the wealthy lay. Now Lolly led her in the opposite direction, to the south, where, block by block, both the people and the houses grew shabbier. The shop windows were half-empty, the streets were poorly maintained, and there were even a few horse-drawn wagons clattering about. This, Maria realized, was Vienna's version of Dusterbach: short on hope, long on despair.
They entered a vast, untidy park, crisscrossed by winding paths that were nearly overgrown with tangled shrubbery. "This is the tricky part, this park," Lolly explained. "It's fine during the day, but at night, there are a lot of dodgy characters around. But you mustn't worry! Willem – his father owns the Crow's Nest – he and his friends always seem to be somewhere in the park at closing time, so we feel safe on the way home."
"We?"
"Us barmaids. There's Marthe, and Anna, and me and now you. You'll meet them. And then there's the owner and his wife, of course, the Winklers. And Willem. He runs a kind of delivery service with his friends. And here we are!" Lolly announced with a grand gesture.
As they exited the park, Maria found herself facing a row of ramshackle brick buildings. Most appeared to be empty, but the one on the end closest to them bore a crooked yellow sign identifying it as THE CROW'S NEST. Double doors were flanked by tall, shuttered windows, their bright-blue paint peeling only slightly at the edges. The whole effect was cheerful, if more than a little dilapidated.
The rest of Maria's first evening at the Crow's Nest was a blur. Herr Winkler greeted her warmly, while his wife served up supper to Maria, Lolly and the other barmaids: Anna, whose jet-black hair hung down her back like a silky curtain, and Marthe, whose red hair was cut short like a boy's. The Winklers' son Willem, tall and reed-thin, with hard black eyes and a wispy mustache, greeted her with a curt nod and pointed out his friends, both improbably named Fritz.
When the customers began to trickle in after six, Maria quickly got the hang of taking orders, reporting to the bar where Herr Winkler got drinks while his wife dished up the food, and then returning to serve her tables. It wasn't hard, since there wasn't any fuss with menus: there was only one beer on tap, and one kind of cheap whiskey, and the supper was limited to the same thing she'd eaten herself. The customers appeared to be good-natured working men in twos and threes, stopping by after a hard day's labor. At worst, they treated her as though she were invisible. At best, they spoke to her politely and one even left her a shilling for a tip.
The work kept Maria busy without overwhelming her, and there were enough times in between when she could get herself situated. The Crow's Nest was one big room, with a bar running across the back, and a dozen tables scattered about. All of it – bar, tables, wall and floor – were cobbled together out of dusty, scuffed wood. With the shutters closed tight over the windows, there was very little air, and the only light came from a few scattered overhead fixtures. Willem and his friends huddled at the near end of the bar, smoking continuously. Anna and Marthe occasionally disappeared through a door behind the bar, into what must Maria assumed was a storage room.
As the evening wore on, the business changed. The room filled with young couples, the girls wearing too much makeup and short skirts, the men swaggering and boastful in front of their dates. Maria found the preening and flirting annoying, so it was a welcome distraction when, shortly after eleven, a very different sort of customer entered the bar.
He was handsome in a severe sort of way, tall, blue-eyed and broad shouldered. He would have cut a most distinguished figure, Maria thought, had he not been wearing the most ridiculous suit of clothes she had ever seen: a long-tailed black coat, a black satin sash in place of a belt, a blindingly white shirt, white waistcoat and a white bow tie. Despite his outfit, which made him look like a penguin, the man carried himself with confidence and authority as he stalked to the far end of the bar, seated himself on a stool, and downed a whiskey that Herr Winkler had waiting for him. Within a minute, he had started on his second drink.
"Who is that?" she whispered to Lolly.
"They call him the Captain," Lolly whispered back. "I don't know why, though. Apparently, he comes in here once or twice a week, just an hour before closing, and manages to drink a great deal, very quickly, without ever getting drunk. I let Herr Winkler see to him from behind the bar. He doesn't look very friendly, does he?"
Maria was too busy to notice when the Captain left, but shortly thereafter, a bell rang from behind the bar, and the Crow's Nest emptied out. She lined up with the others as Herr Winkler doled out the evening's pay.
"Twenty-four shillings!" Lolly crowed, shaking her apron pocket as it jingled, as Maria stared, dumbfounded, at the money in her palm.
"Ten shillings?" she tried to keep her voice from trembling.
"That's all any of the girls get from me, Maria. You're all family here, but I can't afford any more than that," Herr Winkler said sorrowfully. "We would not be able to keep this place open if it weren't for Willem's delivery service. I do what I can, but the rest, you must earn in tips."
"Tips? My tips were a single shilling!" Maria turned on Lolly. "You didn't say anything about tips!"
"It's easy to earn tips, Maria. All you have to do is act like you're happy to see them."
"That's easy for you to say." Maria studied Lolly, her curvy figure, her blond curls, her easy grin. "I'm more the solitary type. And I'm definitely not the kind of girl who-"
"What kind of girl?" Lolly hooted. "No one's asking you to do anything indecent! Just smile once in a while, Maria. Chat them up a bit. Come, now. Willem and his friends have already gone out to the park."
"Don't worry. You'll get the hang of it," Herr Winkler patted Maria on the shoulder. "At least you're safe here. My boy Willem's watching out for you girls, and it's a good thing, too. Time was when that park was a lot of trouble. Pickpockets and worse."
"What about the police?" Maria asked.
"We don't see a lot of the police around here," the old man shrugged. "They're too busy protecting the posh parts of Vienna to bother with people like us. Years ago, when we were first open, a fistfight broke out here – here at the Crow's Nest, if you can believe it! – and I called them, and do you know how long it took them to get here?"
"How long?"
"I'm still waiting for them!" Herr Winkler guffawed and Maria joined along with everyone else's laughter.
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After a week or two, things settled down, and Maria found that working at the Crow's Nest suited her well enough after all. The late hours allowed her to keep her music students in the early afternoon. And, slowly, her tips began to improve. She got the hang of it by watching the other girls: greeting the customers with a smile, commenting on the weather, asking after the men's days, complimenting the women's dresses. She still didn't make the kind of tips the other barmaids did, and she knew why: she wore her hair scraped back into a long, girlish braid, and she wore sensible skirts and an old jumper while the others wore fluttery, silky dresses even as the nights began to grow cool. She didn't imitate the way the others swung their hips as they walked about or copy their habit of using far too much makeup. She'd never have Lolly's curves, either, being more the sturdy type. The other girls pretended to complain about the occasional pinch on the bottom from an enthusiastic customer, but Maria was just as happy to be invisible among them, to stay in the background and stick to her plan.
Evenings at the Crow's Nest began with the staff meal, followed by the first wave of men on their way home from work. Willem and his associates, all clad in black, clustered at the near end of the bar like a bunch of crows, smoking and murmuring among themselves. Once or twice each evening, the boys would amble out of the bar to make a delivery, returning a quarter hour later with a handful of bills which disappeared into Willem's pockets while the whole group cackled and cawed in delight. On a couple of occasions, sometime during the second wave of young couples, the Captain, wearing his odd penguin costume, arrived, unsmiling, took his seat at the far end of the bar, and knocked back a half-dozen whiskies in quick succession.
Throughout it all, Maria took orders and waited for them to be filled, lingering with the other barmaids in between the crows at one end of the bar and the occasional penguin at the other. When the bell rang and the customers left, it was time to line up, get her pay, count her tips and join the other three barmaids as they crossed the park, which at the late hour was always deserted, desolate and vaguely menacing. But it was just as Lolly had promised: Willem and the two Fritzes lurked nearby, not joining the conversation, but enough within occasional sight to be reassuring. And once safely on the other side of the park, she and Lolly turned off for home.
The first sign of trouble came on one uncommonly warm October evening. Perhaps owing to the fine weather, the Crow's Nest was more crowded than usual, leaving the Winklers scrambling to catch up on their orders. The smoky air was thick with the smell of beer and beef stew, the crowd loud and demanding, and Maria decided that instead of waiting for her orders at the bar, she'd slip outside for a breath of fresh air. The bar's doors had just swung shut behind her when Willem and the two Fritzes emerged from the park across the street. Willem was tucking a wad of cash into his pocket while his companions cackled uproariously.
"Did you see his face?" one Fritz asked, and the other replied, "Before or after?" before they nearly collapsed in gales of laughter.
Meanwhile, Willem snapped to attention when he spotted Maria, standing alone on the sidewalk. "What are you doing out here?" he demanded bluntly.
"Oh!" Maria startled. "I'm just – ehrm - just getting some air."
"Don't you know it's not safe for you to be out here on your own?"
While his tone was far from friendly, Maria reminded herself that the three boys had been looking out for her and the other girls, prompting her to make a courteous gesture in return.
"What sort of deliveries do you boys make, anyway?" she asked politely.
The two Fritzes exchanged uneasy glances as a fearsome expression spread across Willem's face. He reached for her braid and gave it a single, sharp tug. "Nothing for you to be asking about, little sister. If you know what's good for you, you'll stay inside the bar and stick to serving beer. And take my advice," he leaned in close enough that Maria took an involuntary step back, "Take care in the park, whatever you do. Bad things happen to folks who go in there alone. Now," his voice took on a distinctly threatening edge, "you ought to get back inside."
Rattled, Maria returned to her customers, but for the rest of the evening, she felt Willem's eyes on her whenever she approached the bar to fill her orders. During one of those trips, he sidled along the bar until their shoulders were nearly touching. "Staying out of trouble, little sister?" he said lazily, but the implied threat sent a little shiver of fear through her.
"Do excuse me," came a deep voice from behind her. Maria felt the brief touch of a hand at her back. She turned to find the Captain, enroute to his seat at the far end of the bar, where Herr Winkler already had the first whisky waiting. The Captain had barely touched her, and Maria knew instinctively that this had been no disrespectful bottom pinch, but a gesture intended to reassure her. She shuffled aside obligingly, but the Captain remained still, glancing at her, and then giving Willem a long, appraising look before brushing past them and sliding into his customary seat.
"Stuck up snob," William muttered, "Why don't you stay with your own kind?" But the Captain seemed oblivious to the insult.
By the time the four barmaids left the Crow's Nest that night, the day's warm temperatures had dropped, and it was possible to sense the sharp edge of the autumn to come. A crisp breeze sent leaves skittering across the pavement. While Maria was preoccupied by her unsettling exchanges with Willem and the Captain, the other girls took no notice. They were too busy comparing notes about the unruly behavior of a customer, a visitor from Bavaria who had spent the evening making one indecent proposal after another. The three girls laughed together about the vanity and stupidity of men in general.
"Men," Marthe shook her head. "Most of them are fools, and they don't even try to hide it."
"Smile at them the right way, and it's another two shillings," Lolly said.
"Wiggle your bosom at them, and that's five right there!" Marthe crowed.
"Five is nothing," Anna rolled her eyes. "Ten minutes in the back room, and you've made an easy twenty!"
"What back room?" Lolly asked.
"Anna, don't," Marthe pleaded, but Anna shook her head.
"Poor innocents," Anna said. "You haven't noticed me and Marthe taking men back there?"
Lolly's eyes went wide with horror that Maria was certain mirrored her own. "You don't mean that you- you-"
"No, no, nothing like that," Anna laughed. "Just a kiss or two, maybe a little squeeze here and there. You ought to try it someday," she winked at Lolly and gave a tug to Maria's braid. "You know who I'd like to get back there? Our friend the Captain," she declared, earning a giggle from Marthe and a nervous shriek from Lolly.
Over the next week, the Captain visited the Crow's Nest nearly every night. Although she seemed to find herself lingering more frequently at his end of the bar – the better to avoid Willem, whose unnerving gaze still followed her everywhere – the Captain seemed to pay Maria no mind. They didn't even make eye contact, and she wasn't sure what she'd do if they did. But the memory of his touch and his deep voice followed her home to the boardinghouse every night.
She told herself that it shouldn't have come as a shock, but it did. One night, Marthe, grinning widely, intercepted Maria on her way back to the bar. "Maria! Look! There goes Anna, just like she said!" Maria followed her gaze to see Anna approach the Captain, smiling and tossing her black curtain of hair about, all wriggling hips and ample bosom spilling from her emerald-green dress. Maria watched Anna place a proprietary hand on his arm. Even at a distance, Anna exhibited a brash confidence that Maria could not imagine for herself.
No, Maria thought, she shouldn't have been surprised. Nor was there any reason for her to feel dizzy with disappointment when the Captain stood, utterly expressionless, and allowed Anna to take his hand and lead him into the back room.
She just needed a moment, was all, Maria told herself, fleeing to the toilet where she splashed cold water on her face and regarded herself in the mirror. What was happening to her, to have developed a crush on anyone, let alone such an unlikely figure? Perhaps Lolly and Father Leo were right, perhaps she did need to find herself a boyfriend. A suitable one, not a stuck-up snob in a penguin suit.
Meanwhile, she couldn't stay hidden in the toilet forever, not with customers waiting. She hadn't been away for more than five minutes, not even long enough for her customers to notice, and although she fought to keep her eyes away from the bar, she couldn't help noticing that the Captain was making his way back to his seat, tucking his wallet into a jacket pocket, wearing the same non-expression he'd worn on his way into the back room.
Later that night, the girls walked across the deserted park under bright moonlight. Willem and the Fritzes prowled nearby, in the shadows.
"Well, Anna?" Marthe demanded.
"Well what?"
"The Captain, silly. How was it? How was he? What was he like?"
Maria held her breath, at once dreading the answer and longing to hear it.
"Well." Anna hesitated. "He was - ehrm - he was fine."
"Fine? That's all you have to say?"
"That's all I'm going to say in front of these two," Anna gestured to Maria and Lolly. "Don't want to scare them off or anything." She turned away, but not before Maria caught sight of the haunted look in her eyes.
She and Lolly made the rest of the walk home in silence. Maria's mind was a jumble: the memory of the Captain's fingertips at her back and his dark, silky drawl. Curiosity, tinged with apprehension, about what, exactly, went on in the back room. And the troubling realization that the Crow's Nest was not such a cozy and homey place after all.
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