The Glassblower(117)

Steven raised his hands in surrender. “Stop! You’ve convinced me. Marie’s baubles are a great deal more work to make, that’s true.”

At last they agreed on a price. Woolworth would pay one mark twenty pence for every dozen baubles, which came to six hundred marks for six thousand globes. Six hundred marks! She and Johanna and Marie all would have had to work for Heimer for more than a year to make that much, Ruth told herself jubilantly. Of course they would have to pay for materials and the gas they used, but even so there would be a tidy sum left over

The dining room was long empty by now, and the waiter was hovering so obtrusively over their table that Steven took a golden watch from his pocket.

“Good gracious me! After ten already. Time simply flew by in your company!” He looked at her with concern in his eyes. “How thoughtless of me to keep you here for so long. Is there even a train back to Lauscha at this hour?”

Ruth laughed. “Have you forgotten, Mr. . . . Miles, that we’re countryfolk out here?” She would far rather have called him Steven. “The last train left a while ago. At this hour, the only way to get back is on foot.”

“I cannot allow you to walk such a distance in the dark. We’ll get you a room here in the hotel.” He was already waving the waiter over. “If that’s all right with you?”

Before Ruth could say anything, he was already giving orders. She thought of Wanda and hoped that she was all right, but even as the thought formed in her mind, she was already looking forward to sleeping in a hotel for the first time in her life.

A few minutes later, she held a wooden ball in her hand with two keys dangling from it. Steven explained that one of them was for her room and the other was for the front door of the hotel.

She giggled. “And when I think that at noon today I was sneaking in through the service entrance. I still can’t quite believe that Mr. Woolworth didn’t throw me out on my ear!”

“I have the feeling that they want to throw us out of here now though,” Steven said, nodding toward the waiter, who was putting the gas lamps out one by one and looking over at them quite obviously as he did so.

“What a shame,” Ruth heard herself say. “I would have liked to spend a little longer talking. Given that you know all about me by now, and I know hardly a thing about you . . .” She fell silent, embarrassed. What on earth had gotten into her?

Steven Miles seemed to hesitate. He looked from her to the waiter and then back again. “Let’s leave this pit of vipers before that one starts to spit venom at us,” he said and held out his hand.

It was the first time in her life that a man had helped her up from a chair. Feeling thoroughly pampered, she briskly stood up.

After she had collected her basket from the reception desk, they stood on the stairway that led up to the guest rooms, looking at one another. It was an awkward moment.

“I . . .” Ruth began hesitantly.

“I’d like . . .” Steven said at the very same time.

They both laughed and the moment passed.

“I don’t quite know how to say this without . . . giving you the wrong impression.” Steven smoothed his moustache with finger and thumb.

“Yes?” she croaked. Her knees felt suddenly weak, and she knew that it was not because of the long day she’d had.

“Oh, please forget that I spoke,” she heard Steven say, to her disappointment. He waved the thought away.

“I wanted to ask you whether we might not continue our conversation in your room, or perhaps in mine. But goodness knows that’s not a suggestion one can make to a lady—not even with the purest of intentions. Please forgive me for even having thought of it.”

Before Ruth could answer, he had taken her basket over his shoulder.

“But I can at least take you as far as your room.”

As they climbed the narrow stairs, Ruth didn’t know whether to be disappointed or pleased.

They reached her room before she had a chance to think of some way to spend more time with Steven. She turned toward him one last time and gave him a wry grin. “Thank you—for everything. And do please thank Mr. Woolworth on my behalf, from the bottom of my heart. He has no idea what this order means for me and my sisters.”

“I shall do that,” Steven assured her. “Thank you for a lovely evening.”

She could feel his breath in her hair.

Ruth swallowed hard. “I still don’t know anything about you except your name, and who you work for.”

For a tantalizing moment, she thought that he would kiss her.

But Steven simply stroked her hair gently.

“That will change. Sooner than you think, perhaps.” His eyes locked onto hers. “You won’t get rid of me so easily. I promise you that.”