Children of the Storm

Sonya had previously mistaken for a light switch, and sent the machine slowly along the steps. It was attached to the wall on an inset track, moved slowly, and would save Henry all the effort of lugging those bags to the second floor.
        The old man said, “I'll put them in your room, later. First, I imagine you'd like to meet the rest of the staff.”
        “Of course,” Sonya said.
        “This way, then.”
        “I'll tag along,” Bill Peterson whispered to her.
        “I'd appreciate it,” she said, smiling thankfully at him. She hoped the rest of the staff was more like Bill than like Henry.
        They followed the red-carpeted corridor to the rear of the house, went through a white, swinging door and into the kitchen, which was fully twenty-five-feet on a side and equipped with all the latest gadgets and conveniences. All the appliances were new, white and chrome, the pots and pans all copper-plated. In the middle of the room, at a heavy, built-in table that contained a double sink, a woman Henry's age was grating a block of swiss cheese into a large porcelain bowl.
        She looked up, her chubby face slightly red, her dark eyes alive and young, put down the block of cheese and said, “Who have we here?”
        “Sonya Carter,” Henry said. “The woman who'll be taking care of the children.” He looked at Sonya and said, “This is Helga, the cook.”
        “Glad to meet you,” Sonya said.
        “Same here, same here,” Helga said. She had stood up, from her tall stool, as if this were a formal meeting, and Sonya could see that the chubbiness extended beyond her face. She appeared to be the sort of cook who constantly sampled her own preparations.
        “There's not a cook in the islands compares to Helga,” Bill Peterson said. “Thank God for the sea and the boat and all the other things to do around here. If there weren't a lot of ways to exercise, we'd all be as stout as Helga herself.”
        The cook blushed proudly and sat down again, picked up the cheese and looked at Sonya under her eyebrows. “Nothing really that special,” she said, shyly.
        “Helga's also too modest for her own good,” Peterson said.
        She blushed even more and returned to grating her cheese.
        At that moment, the back door opened, and a small, tidy woman in her mid-fifties came in from outside, brushing her small hands together more as if to satisfy herself that some chore was completed than to actually clean them. She appeared to be the sort of woman who would never have to wash her hands, simply because she was also the type of woman who would never get them dirty in the first place. Her hair was nearly all white, drawn back from around her sharp face and tied in a bun at the back of her head. She wore no lipstick or makeup, but had a flawless complexion for a woman her age. She wore a simple, light blue dress that vaguely resembled a uniform, and she moved with a sprightliness that Sonya had often seen in career nurses who enjoyed their jobs and were like new girls in the hospital after even thirty years of service.
        “My wife,” Henry explained to Sonya. And the girl thought that, for a moment, some of the old man's vinegar seeped away, as if this woman could sweeten him merely by her presence. To his wife, he said, “Bess, this is Sonya Carter, the kids' teacher.”
        Bess crossed the kitchen and took Sonya's hands, looked up at her like some concerned mother assessing her son's fiance. She grinned, glanced past Sonya at Bill Peterson, then back at the girl, and she said, “Well, I'm sure Bill couldn't be more pleased.” There was a tone of mischief in her voice. “After all, until now, he's had to take the boat to Guadeloupe and even farther to look at pretty girls. He'll be saving himself the trip, now.”
        Sonya felt herself blushing, as Helga had blushed earlier, and she wished she had a block of cheese to grate, something to hide herself in.
        But if Bess were mischievous, she was also considerate, and she relieved Sonya's embarrassment as easily as she had caused it, by asking questions about the trip down from the States. For several minutes, they stood there in the kitchen, talking, as if they had known each other for years and were only catching up on things after a short separation. Henry continued to soften noticeably around his wife, and Sonya felt certain that the center of the Dougherty household was probably not Mr.