be seen. They offered amused indifference in response.
Clasping her coat closed, she refused help dismounting, then hurried down the street. The brisk wind combined with the coldair made her nose hurt and her ears sting. Cabs, drays, and wagons slung snow up behind them. Drivers shouted at their horses.
She pressed her lips together. Bustle pinchers. She’d had to deal with them when she was returning home from the School of Applied Design, and she’d have to contend with them now as well. The only way to avoid them was to walk home, but that wasn’t a viable option, either. The winter days were short, and women traveling alone after dark did so at their own peril.
Maybe she’d save a little money each month and buy a bicycle come spring.
PLACE CARD 8
“After giving her a sympathetic squeeze on the shoulder, he went in search of his place card. It had chickadees painted on it, of all things. He hated chickadees.”
CHAPTER
11
T ilting her head to the side, Flossie studied the long, scarred table stretching across the expanse of Klausmeyer’s dining room. The mingled aromas of stew and soda bread drifted in from the kitchen. In twenty minutes the dinner bell would ring and the house’s boarders would descend. Boarders who simply sat down, ate, and then returned to their respective rooms.
And why shouldn’t they, when the table offered no cloth or centerpieces to soften its rough wooden surface? When the seats of its mismatched chairs were sunken from overuse and their uneven legs kept everyone off balance? When the fireplace’s mantle held no decorations or candelabras? When the blank, stained walls had nothing to soothe the spirit or inspire the imagination? And worst of all, when the boarders didn’t offer up anything resembling conversation?
Well, that was going to change. She desperately missed her parents and was more homesick than she was willing to admit. Still, she’d spent her whole life as an only child and now she’d inherited a new family, a very big family. She wasn’t about to sit idly by while they acted as if they weren’t all sharing the same house.
First thing on the agenda was to switch up the seatingarrangement. The same people sat in the same spot night after night, never bothering to engage those around them.
Not tonight. Tonight everyone was going to introduce themselves.
She fingered the place cards in her hand. She’d spent every night of the past week painting songbirds on them, then penning each person’s name. That had been the easy part. The hard part was deciding who to put where.
AT THE SOUND OF the dinner bell, Reeve glanced up at his clock, startled to see it was already seven. Though his exposé had run in the back section of the paper, it had evidently been read by plenty of women—all of whom had strong opinions.
He placed his pen into its holder, then capped the inkwell. Women may not have the right to vote, but it didn’t keep them from being heard. They’d gone to the World ’s office with his article in hand and demanded a rebuttal. The office had invited them to submit one, but Reeve would be surprised if they ran it. He hoped they would, though. The controversy would draw attention to his pieces, and if there was ever a topic that needed attention, the women’s movement was it.
He’d never said anything to their new boarder about the picketers or about her returning home. It would have been wasted breath on his part, and he had no desire to engage in a discussion with her—especially not an unpleasant one.
Standing, he grabbed his jacket from his chair, shrugged it on, and stepped across the hall to Mrs. Dinwiddie’s room. “I believe I heard the dinner bell, Madame. Shall we head that way?”
Setting her knitting aside, the elderly widow lumbered to her feet, her white hair reminding him of spun glass. As usual, she’d twisted it up in an old-fashioned style that had probably been popular in her youth. He couldn’t imagine the time it
Clasping her coat closed, she refused help dismounting, then hurried down the street. The brisk wind combined with the coldair made her nose hurt and her ears sting. Cabs, drays, and wagons slung snow up behind them. Drivers shouted at their horses.
She pressed her lips together. Bustle pinchers. She’d had to deal with them when she was returning home from the School of Applied Design, and she’d have to contend with them now as well. The only way to avoid them was to walk home, but that wasn’t a viable option, either. The winter days were short, and women traveling alone after dark did so at their own peril.
Maybe she’d save a little money each month and buy a bicycle come spring.
PLACE CARD 8
“After giving her a sympathetic squeeze on the shoulder, he went in search of his place card. It had chickadees painted on it, of all things. He hated chickadees.”
CHAPTER
11
T ilting her head to the side, Flossie studied the long, scarred table stretching across the expanse of Klausmeyer’s dining room. The mingled aromas of stew and soda bread drifted in from the kitchen. In twenty minutes the dinner bell would ring and the house’s boarders would descend. Boarders who simply sat down, ate, and then returned to their respective rooms.
And why shouldn’t they, when the table offered no cloth or centerpieces to soften its rough wooden surface? When the seats of its mismatched chairs were sunken from overuse and their uneven legs kept everyone off balance? When the fireplace’s mantle held no decorations or candelabras? When the blank, stained walls had nothing to soothe the spirit or inspire the imagination? And worst of all, when the boarders didn’t offer up anything resembling conversation?
Well, that was going to change. She desperately missed her parents and was more homesick than she was willing to admit. Still, she’d spent her whole life as an only child and now she’d inherited a new family, a very big family. She wasn’t about to sit idly by while they acted as if they weren’t all sharing the same house.
First thing on the agenda was to switch up the seatingarrangement. The same people sat in the same spot night after night, never bothering to engage those around them.
Not tonight. Tonight everyone was going to introduce themselves.
She fingered the place cards in her hand. She’d spent every night of the past week painting songbirds on them, then penning each person’s name. That had been the easy part. The hard part was deciding who to put where.
AT THE SOUND OF the dinner bell, Reeve glanced up at his clock, startled to see it was already seven. Though his exposé had run in the back section of the paper, it had evidently been read by plenty of women—all of whom had strong opinions.
He placed his pen into its holder, then capped the inkwell. Women may not have the right to vote, but it didn’t keep them from being heard. They’d gone to the World ’s office with his article in hand and demanded a rebuttal. The office had invited them to submit one, but Reeve would be surprised if they ran it. He hoped they would, though. The controversy would draw attention to his pieces, and if there was ever a topic that needed attention, the women’s movement was it.
He’d never said anything to their new boarder about the picketers or about her returning home. It would have been wasted breath on his part, and he had no desire to engage in a discussion with her—especially not an unpleasant one.
Standing, he grabbed his jacket from his chair, shrugged it on, and stepped across the hall to Mrs. Dinwiddie’s room. “I believe I heard the dinner bell, Madame. Shall we head that way?”
Setting her knitting aside, the elderly widow lumbered to her feet, her white hair reminding him of spun glass. As usual, she’d twisted it up in an old-fashioned style that had probably been popular in her youth. He couldn’t imagine the time it
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