Aria turned away. “I do not touch money.”
“She is a princess,” Bill gasped, obviously impressed.
J.T. leaned across his friend and grabbed the elegant little leather handbag from Aria’s lap. It contained a lace-edged handkerchief and nothing else. “Look, I’m putting the money in here. When you get to D.C., get a porter to carry your bags and give him this bill, the one with the ‘one’ on it. No zeroes, understand? Get him to get you a taxi that’ll take you to the Waverly Hotel. Give the driver a five. At the hotel ask for Leon Catton. If he’s not there, have them call him. Tell him you are a friend of Amanda Montgomery.”
“I do not know such a person.”
“You know me and she’s my mother. If you don’t mention her name, you’ll never get a room. Leon keeps a suite for emergencies, but you’ll have to mention her name to get it. It won’t hurt to show a little green either.”
“Green?”
“Show them a hundred-dollar bill, that’ll get their attention, and I imagine your attitude and all that luggage will make them take notice too. Oh, here.” He pulled a box from his pocket and handed it to her.
She opened it to find a pair of earrings consisting of five small diamonds on each one. She held them up to the light of a passing car. Not very good quality at all, but she put them on.
“Don’t you ever say ‘thank you’ for anything?”
“I will give America the vanadium,” she said, looking straight ahead.
“You can’t beat that, J.T.,” Bill said.
“If she gets back to her country. If she can persuade our government that there has indeed been a switch. If she can—”
Bill patted Aria’s hand, making her start. “Don’t you worry, honey, anybody can see you’re the real princess.”
“Don’t touch her and don’t call her honey. She is royalty,” J.T. said sarcastically.
“Lay off, will you?” Bill snapped.
The rest of the journey was made in silence.
Chapter Five
ARIA sat very still in the suite at the Waverly Hotel. Her ears were still ringing with the laughter of the hotel personnel. Never before had she been laughed at and it was not something she wanted to experience again.
The train had been dirty, cramped, and filled with hundreds of soldiers who kept trying to touch her. They had laughed uproariously when she had told them they were not allowed to touch her.
Upon arrival in Washington, she had been so flustered that she had become confused about the money. The porter nearly kissed her feet at the bill she had handed him, but the taxi driver had been abusive and yelled at her because of all the luggage she had.
There was a line at the hotel desk, and when she told the people to move out of her way, they became quite unpleasant. There were also many comments about her huge pile of luggage.
Aria had no idea how to wait in line but she soon learned. By the time she got to the desk, she was very tired and very impatient. Unfortunately, the hotel clerk was feeling the same way. He laughed in her face when she said she wanted a suite of rooms, then to further her embarrassment, he told the people in line behind her what she wanted. They had all laughed at her.
Remembering Lieutenant Montgomery’s advice to show her “green,” she thrust her purse at the awful little man. For some reason, this made him laugh harder.
By that time, after a night without sleep, Aria was feeling awful. She hated America and Americans and she couldn’t remember half of what Lieutenant Montgomery had told her. Also, her command of the English language was failing. Her words became accented as she grew more tired and more confused.
“Amanda Montgomery,” she managed to say.
“I can’t understand you,” the clerk said. “Are you German?”
The crowd had grown utterly silent at that and began to stare at her hostilely.
Aria repeated the name just as another man walked from the back.
The second man was the manager of the hotel and it seemed that the name Amanda Montgomery was magical. He berated the clerk, snapped his fingers at the bellboys, and within minutes was ushering Aria into an elevator. He apologized profusely for the clerk’s rudeness, saying that the war made it impossible to get good help.
/>