Mother Knows Best

By Edith Wells

It’s the fall of 1902, and Violet, recently widowed, is left to run an abandoned boat turned hotel in San Francisco. Many, including Violet’s mother, push Violet to sell, but Violet continues to hold onto the hotel and the memories that occupy every room. The hotel is filled with guests, and the event room schedule is packed with events including a traveling museum. When the museum arrives early to open its weekend exhibit, Violet begins to regret booking the museum at all. With an over-tired staff, Violet’s doubts about running the hotel on her own are doubled when the museum’s opals go missing and a hotel guest is murdered. Violet knows the police have arrested the wrong man, but how will she prove it? Meanwhile, Violet’s mother has contacted a relative and prospective buyer though she knows Violet doesn’t intend to sell. When the prospective buyer shows up, Violet dreads telling the distant relative it’s all been a mistake. But the prospective buyer turns out to be someone who can help solve the murder, and Violet soon admits - Mother Knows Best.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Edith Wells
• Release date: Aug 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005017019

Edith Wells

Edith Wells collects and cooks antique recipes. Visit the website for more old-fashioned recipes. The vlog features old-fashioned dessert recipes made paleo, spiced up antique vegetarian recipes, and old-time bean pot recipes. On the blog, you'll find old-fashioned menus for an old-fashioned dinner night, crazy old-time recipes, and antique recipes recreated. Books include: Old-Fashioned Salads, Old-Fashioned Fruit Salads, Old-Fashioned Dinner Menus, and Old-Fashioned Afternoon Tea.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Grape Baskets and Old Crocks

Violet found the grape basket at the bottom of the crockery closet. She pulled it out and placed it on the round oak breakfast table. Violet had always been thankful for the apartment's small kitchen. When Otto had bought the boat-turned-hotel back in 1862, he'd combined three of the rooms into a small apartment for them to live in. Though there was a hotel dining room where they often ate with guests, Otto had had the foresight to put in a small kitchen at the far end of the parlor. She'd taken advantage of it, and she'd made an early, very early, breakfast for them almost every day for the last 40 years. It had often been the only quiet time they had together before the start of another busy hotel day.

Violet returned the bean pot and crock she had shifted out of the way back into the crockery closet. She wasn't sure why she kept the cracked crock except that it had been the first piece of cookware she'd bought for their new home forty years ago. As she did, she spotted a wrapped box. She pulled it out brushing off a bit of dust. Tears sprang to her eyes. It was a birthday present from her late husband, Otto. He’d probably hidden it there to surprise her on her birthday. But, of course, he had not made it to her birthday that year. She placed the present gently on the counter to unwrap later when she had a quiet moment.

What are you searching for? asked Violet's mother, looking up from the skirt she was mending. She sat in the heavy library rocker she'd brought from St. Louis. Baskets of knitting and mending were piled on either side. Her mother, an expert sewist, had also brought her old cabinet sewing machine. According to her mother, none of those new machines were as good. Mr. Harris had helped move the reed rocker to Violet's bedroom and removed the reception chair to the lobby to make room for both. The rest of the parlor suite: the crushed plush sofa and arm chair as well as Otto's tapestry upholstered arm chair remained where they had always been since Otto moved them in 25 years ago.

I found it, said Violet. She swung the grape basket in her hand. I saw something at the rummage and bake sale and needed a basket to carry it in. Actually, she had seen two things. She hoped to get a slice of Washington Pie which she knew her mother fancied, that would be a surprise, and a second helping of the fig pudding she had tasted much earlier as the bake sale set up. It reminded her of a fig pudding she had eaten in a small tea room in New York while she and Otto were visiting an East Coast doctor.

Don't tell Cook, said Violet's mother with a sniff.

She went out for the day to visit sick family, said Violet. Hazel, the kitchen maid, and Maude put together lunch. But Cook will be back to make a late supper. That gives me an hour or two to get rid of the evidence.

Before leaving, Cook had informed anyone who would listen not to waste money at the bake sale. She insisted she could make anything better for them when she got back. And she probably could. But the rummage and bake sale was for a good cause. The proceeds would go to the poor to help purchase coal for the winter. With coal miners striking in Kansas and abroad, the price of coal was bound to leave those without means with cold homes and increased sickness. English coal prices had already risen, and the newspapers spoke of a rush of coal orders due to the French strike.

I thought you might like to join me, said Violet. Hopefully, what I want is still there. Nora said they would end at six, and it's just after five now.

I've promised to meet someone, said Violet's mother. They check in at 5:30.

Anyone I know? asked Violet.

Not yet, said Violet's mother. Your second cousin Helene's eldest son. But I'll be sure to bring him by for you to meet him. Try and avoid the cake. Awful messy moving it about in baskets.

Violet laughed. When they were setting up this morning a woman had a decadent French chocolate cake, said Violet. The woman had been right next to the Washington Pie. A young boy took a liking to it and bought the entire cake. Then the poor thing realized he had no way to carry off his prize. He seemed about to take it by hand when the woman had pity on him and gave him the basket she'd brought it in.

Fig Pudding

Practical Housekeeping (1887)

½ lb. figs

¼ lb. grated bread

2½ ounces powdered sugar

2 ounces butter

2 eggs

1 tea-cup milk

Half pound figs, quarter pound grated bread, two and a half ounces powdered sugar, three ounces butter, two eggs, one tea-cup milk; chop figs fine and mix with butter, and by degrees add the other ingredients; butter and sprinkle a mold with bread-crumbs, pour in pudding, cover closely, and boil for three hours; serve with lemon sauce. Florence Woods Hush.

Chapter 2

Rummage and Bake

Violet's apartment was just down a short hall from the front desk. Lilia, one of the hotel's two maids, had already pulled the rolled shades and lit the oil lamps in the front lobby. The shade's ferry boat landscapes surrounded by stenciled floral borders always made Violet nostalgic for her hometown of St. Louis. Had any of her schoolmates ever guessed she would end up running a boat turned hotel in the Wild West of San Francisco?

Violet thought of her mother’s guest arriving at 5:30. She was glad her mother was settling into life at the hotel. It had taken a lot of convincing to get her mother to move out from St. Louis where she'd lived all her life. After Otto had passed away, the demands of the hotel had taken up every last minute. Violet found it impossible to travel and visit her mother in St. Louis as she used to. She had visited at least once a year after her father had passed away. Violet felt the easiest solution was for her mother to sell her house and move into the apartment's extra room. Her mother had had a different plan. Her mother felt Violet should sell the hotel, and they would travel.

But for some reason, Violet wasn't ready to give up the hotel. It had been Otto's dream – not hers. But the hotel had grown on her over the years, and she enjoyed her job as hostess and event coordinator. However, with Otto gone, the role of sole owner was wearying. She had never truly realized how much Otto had taken care of – even while sick. Mr. Harris, the hotel's steward as Otto liked to call him, had been a big help. He had taken on many of Otto's old responsibilities.

A hotel guest exited the event room. The clatter and chatter of the busy room spilled out with him. He carried a small white paper box tied with a blue bow. He nodded at Violet's grape basket and lifted his own small package.

Everything looks so good, he said. It's impossible to choose just one. Don't tell Cook.

I have two in mind, myself, said Violet. As he headed for the stairway, she chided herself for not knowing his name, why he was visiting, and how long he was staying. She would have known all of that back when hostess was her only responsibility.

Excuse me, Ma’am, said a man closing the front door. Do you know where I can find Mr. Harrington? I’m Mr. Girsch. I’m here about purchasing the warehouse. As he approached a strange smell entered with him.

Down the stairs on the left, said Violet. He nodded thanks and hurried out the door. Violet was surprised. Mr. Harrington had never mentioned anything about selling. Mr. Harrington owned the warehouse below. He had been storing shipments there since the 1850s almost immediately after the boat had been run aground. Gold fever never bit him. His philosophy, which he expounded on regularly, was Easy come. Easy go. The only thing lasting is something you build with effort. In that, he and Otto had been in agreement.

Girsch. The man’s name, and that smell, was very familiar. But she didn’t have time to figure it out now. If she waited any longer, there might not be any Washington Pie left. That would ruin the surprise she had planned for her mother. She hurried into the event room.

Violet had expected to find the women packing up their goods in trunks and baskets. Instead the sale looked like Market Street at noon. The women's black hats, the season’s favorite color, all high-brimmed and trimmed with quills or bows dominated the room as they handed over baked goods for donations and sorted rummage goods. Violet preferred a bit of color and was glad for the occasional glimpse of white or yellow. She had left her own hat, a castor colored shepherdess shaped hat with three crushed roses, in her room, and she felt a bit bare with her hair simply swept up into a pompadour. She hadn't even bothered with a bun.

Beneath those hats were high-collared blouses, walking skirts, and the flash of buttoned or laced leather shoes. It was too warm for coats despite being late in October though a few of the women outside at the rummage part of the sale wore shoulder capes or shawls. With her full suit, Violet felt like the overdressed girl at the party. She was used to that. It was what she always wore in her role as hostess once night-time rolled in. Tonight she had on her tan Venetian cloth suit trimmed with pale blue and black plaid. The only other woman wearing a full suit was Mrs. Hill, the sale-coordinator's mother-in-law. Mrs. Hill sat at the far end of the room guarding the main cash box with a large bloodhound dog at her feet.

It had been the perfect day for a rummage sale: the sky clear and the wind gentle. The sun cast deep shadows through the event room as it took one last glance through the windows from the ocean's horizon. Lilia was busy lighting the oil lamps, softening the shadows as she went. She lit every other lamp where they hung on the decorative tan and blue panels between the tall windows. She'd light the rest once it grew dark. Otto had painted those panels tan and blue to match the colors of the floral carpet Violet had fallen in love with 30 years ago. Otto had mentioned wood was easier to keep clean. He had been right, but even now, she still loved the look of that carpet. It gave the event room a rich, elegant look.

The rummage part of the sale was outside on the dock. An opened door led customers from the rummage sale at the dock up the stairs into the event room where the bake sale was being held. Even the salty harbor air flowing from the open door couldn't disperse the combined smells of old trunk-packed clothes, cedar, and baked goods.

The sale could easily be declared a success. Housewives in simple homemade dresses and plain or modestly trimmed sailor and walking hats from the more desperate parts of town searched for bargains. Young girls, bareheaded or in bonnets, stayed close carrying rummage items and packages of baked goods for their mothers. Outside at the rummage sale there could be found second, third, fourth, and even fifthhand clothing, books, bric-a-brac, odd pieces of crockery, kitchen utensils, and a few musical instruments tested now and then by those with varying levels of skill. The big seller, however, was warm underwear.

Few men wandered through, but street kids, mostly boys of 7 to 9, were plentiful along with a few of the youngest dock hands. Disapproving looks from the women kept young trouble makers in line. Everyone, especially the kids, made out well. The women were not particular in their prices since everything was for charity and the customers