Four of a Kind: A women's historical fiction

by Russell, Vanessa

  Rarely a living day went by for his mother that she didn’t remind me the house remained hers. You see, on my wedding day, I simply moved from one parents’ home into another. And just as my own mother told me what to do for the first seventeen years, Robert’s mother told me what to sew, what to wear, what to cook, and how to clean, until her dying day ten years later.

  As I stepped down from the verandah stair, I glanced up at her former bedroom window, the same bedroom where Robert was born, and then his five children.

  Life is an endless cycle, his mother had said over the birth of Bess. Birth, death, rebirth. She had pointed to her ringed finger. This wedding ring, this circle, symbolizes this cycle, you know. Endless. The year before, on the day she died, she reached a trembling hand to me and dropped her thin band into my hand. First time I’ve taken this off, she whispered. Pass it down to Bess.

  Back then I was so quick to nod, always wanting to please. But pleasing made me feel like I was emptying my vessel into others without allowing me to quench my own thirst first. This last year had helped me slowly evolve into my own woman with her own thoughts. Surely there was more than a ring to pass on to our children?

  I recalled this as I hurried next door, refusing to look back, but continued to look down. I knocked on Aimee’s door.

  The knocking had created quite a stir from inside. Padded feet could be heard running, a dog barked, and children called out to their mother. I peeked through the chipped screen door toward the commotion, and then stood back, embarrassed by my poor manners. My visit was not expected and my mother-in-law would have been aghast. (Remember how to present yourself in public. You do not wish to become a blot upon nature.)

  I turned to walk back down the porch steps when the front door opened. Only slightly. Aimee remained in its shadow. The screen door stayed closed. Her head peeked around the edge of the door.

  “Oh my … Ruby! I had no idea. I thought it was another peddler, was going to send him away.”

  “Hello Aimee. I must apologize - but your invitation for tea - was it today or ...” I felt dreadfully uncomfortable by now. I was not accustomed to visiting outside my home and now on my first social outing in years, I’d already made a discourteous move. I wished to flee but the desire to be steadfast was stronger so that instead I heard myself stammer, “It’s the day of the tea, you see. I-I will come back another … or p-perhaps you could come over …”

  “Oh no, the tea, of course! You just caught me in an inopportune time is all. A sick child, you see.” Aimee waved her arm toward the interior of her home. The curtains were still drawn and the inner room appeared gloomy. Just then her door was opened farther and I saw a young toddler pulling it while reaching toward the screen door. Aimee stepped forward, clearly clad in her nightgown. She snatched her toddler up, scolding “no, no” and retreated back into the shadows.

  But not soon enough. I saw Aimee’s bruised eye and red swelling on her right cheek.

  My stomach twisted. The houses on this street were only ten feet apart; windows opened often year-round to air the coal and gas, the smoke from the fireplaces, and the cooking smells. That’s why I had heard a man’s shouting voice, loud slaps, and a woman’s cries. On one such night, I rose from bed and asked Robert if we could go next door to offer assistance. He refused and forbade me to go.

  “This is strictly between a man and his wife,” he had insisted. “It is none of our business how he sees appropriate to manage his home.”

  Aimee held tight to the child squirming to get down. “Another time perhaps. I really should get Anthony out of this draft.” Her tone was subdued. Without waiting for an answer she closed the door.

  I felt my face blush, decidedly rejected. But then I realized I was on my own and could do as I thought best, better yet, as I wished (odd to think but it seemed that in simply knowing there were women out there thinking more freely, gave me permission to do so, too). I raised my hand to knock again, to offer assistance this time. After all, Robert wasn’t here to hold me back. But then I lowered it. Perhaps I was intruding. Hadn’t I embarrassed my husband and his mother’s spirit enough for one day? Besides, Aimee looked embarrassed enough already. With reluctance, I turned away.

  The sun had come out, but I felt as gloomy inside as Aimee’s living room. For lack of knowing what to do, I returned home; at least here I knew well enough.

  Our front door squeaked like the lid of a coffin. A longing from deep within surfaced and bubbled in my ears like the soapsuds in my wash water. As much for myself as for Aimee was the desire to reach out to a friend. We needed each other. The secretariat against the back wall of the parlor gave me an idea. A note! I would write a note to Aimee and slip it under her door.

  With shawl and boots still on, I rushed over to the desk, pulled off my gloves, pulled out the paper and pencil from their cubbyholes, and wrote carefully in my schoolgirl hand, “Dear Aimee, I wish to be your friend. I am only a moment away, if you wish to talk. I’ve decided to come out into the sunshine. Please join me. Ruby.”

  I read it twice and hesitated. Before losing my nerve altogether, I folded the paper and walked back to Aimee’s door and slipped the paper under. Aimee’s parlor windows faced the front, her house being in a similar design to ours, so I hoped that Aimee could see me approaching and might spot the note at once. At any rate, hopefully Aimee would find it before her husband arrived home from work.

  I walked along the boardwalk toward home feeling lighter, in at least making an attempt.

  Now that I was a free-thinker in its infancy, I became so bold as to actually stop on the street and openly examine the houses there. To the right, past Aimee’s house, the cobbled street stretched into a dirt road which if followed for about eight miles led to my family’s dairy farm. On my left, the street eventually reached the center of town. At the end of my block was the blacksmith’s shop, which was slowly converting into a motor car garage to repair those “mechanical beasts that were invading the town” as Robert expressed it.

  I noted very few other changes here the last twelve years; two houses across the street with empty fields on either side; nine houses on my side of the street. All had wood siding painted in white, yellow, or blues; only Robert’s home remained in the darker greens and browns, as if sitting there in a bad mood amongst the bright and cheerful. All had wide front porches or covered verandahs, some which wrapped around one side. Fortunate owners decorated their front yards in welcoming flowers and shrubs. I was taught if you’re going to work at a garden, make it work for you. Thus only a vegetable garden in the backyard was permitted; my only flowers were lavender bushes along the back yard fence that I dried for oils and sachets.

  Construction on these homes had begun some thirty years before, during the building boom following the Civil War. Many who lived here were the original owners, as were my mother-in-law and father-in-law, Margaret and Jonathan Robert Wright. Jonathan had been a cabinetmaker in his living years, and had built all the cabinets and staircases on this street. Our staircase, with its intricate scrolling on the landing post, was the finest in the area, or so my mother-in-law used to tell me (told to her by her husband, no doubt; she wouldn’t have known any other way).

  I wanted to know if this was true; I wanted to know the intricate details of someone else’s life, I wanted to know if other women felt as I did. Surely I couldn’t be alone with all these other homes around me.

  “If I’ve come out into the sunshine, I can’t very well go back into the shadows, now can I?” I said out loud. I found myself walking past my house toward town.

  Why not go to the tea on my own? I will reach out to these ladies as I am asking Aimee to do with me. They may well be the light at the end of my tunnel.

  Cady Pickering’s home was only a few miles away, the Beauchamp Manor, known to be the town’s prettiest. I longed to see its inside. The address was on her calling card.

  The sun touched warm on my face and urged me forward into the daylight.

&nb
sp; “Ruby, wait!”

  I turned to see Aimee running down her steps toward me, her hat in hand, her cape unbuttoned.

  “Thank you for the note,” Aimee said when she stopped, winded, beside me. She began tucking blonde flyaway curls under her floppy hat, her crystal blue eyes shining. “It was what I needed to get me going. I can’t stay hidden forever. And it is a warm sunny day!”

  I looked at the hastily applied face powder highlighting the blues and purples, at once feeling happy and sad. The sun may be warm, but it can be harsh.

  We didn’t stop walking or talking for several miles, not until we stopped outside the white gate of a two-story manor.

  The vast elegance of this estate was overwhelming in those days. The white-washed colonial brick house gracefully adorned several acres of lawn and gardens. A red brick walkway winded its way to the whitewashed porch, its landing armed on each side with a large white column. Two white wrought iron chairs sat to one side, separated by a matching table displaying a potted geranium.

  I halted, intimidated. “Aimee, what is the proper etiquette for a tea nowadays? It will no doubt be a formal one, from the looks of this place. I’m not suitably dressed!” I touched my hair with nervous fingers. “Mercy, I’m so pale! Do I still have dark circles under my eyes? I tried this new hair design this morning, from Harper’s Bazaar magazine, a Gibson Girl hairdo I think it’s called, some sort of pompadour, but my hair is too thick and long, and oh dear, look at the straggly ends coming down!”

  “Oh Ruby, you mustn’t worry about such things,” Aimee said, moving her own frizzed hair away from her eyes. She was slightly out of breath from our fast walk and constant talk about children. “If these women worried about such trivial matters as appearance, they would be society’s proper ladies clinging to their own homes, serving tea to other properly behaved wives. That is not the purpose of this tea. Why, I see them as hardy soldiers prepared to fight for their rights as women!” She linked her arm with mine. “Besides, we are all pale this time of year and you have such pretty blue eyes and shiny brown hair, nothing else matters.”

  This image of soldiers charged me. I hadn’t a clue regarding women’s rights or the lack thereof, but I willed myself to appear ignorant and ask. One thing I knew for sure; Aimee and her friends would surely understand my own invisible prison. I felt my down-turned mouth slowly turn up into my own defiant smile. I lifted my chin and walked up Cady’s walkway ready to right my world.

  The ladies were assembled in somewhat of a circle so that one could see all. I couldn’t say they were unattractive, but there was a certain austerity that seemed to infiltrate into a statement of take-me-as-I-am. The various shapes and design of white blouses and simple black skirts established their uniform of mixed travels, yet all roads led them to this unity. The air about them sang out with a mission. One on the outside had to fight hard not to feel further intimidated. I wiped my clammy hands on my skirt.

  I hoped they wouldn’t notice these clammy hands, as they shook a how-do-you-do. Their extended hands took me off guard - I had never been offered a handshake before. Was this socially acceptable now among women? It seemed so manly.

  Although hosted in various homes, they had an orderly routine that they adhered to, their time together hard earned and must not be squandered. The meeting had come to order when we entered the front parlor. As unassuming as possible, I sat on an overly stuffed sofa colored in rich hues of flower patterns, and sank deeply into its upholstery. It was not easy to sit comfortably in my tight corset, suddenly understanding why my mother-in-law’s cushions were less generous. I moved to the edge to straighten my posture and from there I could see the high tin-plated ceiling stamped in diamond patterns. A colored housekeeper delivered to the center table a shiny silver tea tray laden with cookies and small cakes, before joining me on the sofa. I was shocked they allowed her to sit with us, as if she were white.

  Soon the sweet tinkle of chatter mixed with teacups was replaced with one voice. That of Cady Pickering. With surprise I recognized Cady as a teacher at my children’s school, and wondered why she was not teaching that day.

  With teacups quietly resting on our laps, Cady quickly captured the attention of the others. I was awed by Cady’s self-confidence. Her tone was neither loud nor overbearing, yet its soft consonants filled the room. She controlled the agenda as a teacher would her classroom. She read from a paper the topics of discussion from their last meeting.

  I could not be attentive for long, not with these elaborate surroundings distracting me. I had not seen anything like it. The two vast windows took my breath away. The window dressing was layered in royal blue brocade satin and white sheer under-panels. The matching blue valance was draped and trimmed in tassels and rosettes. The chairs placed under each window were in the same fabric, a marble table and a golden oblong mirror between the two. From my vantage point, I could see beyond the two open doors of the parlor to the main entrance hall’s winding staircase. Midway up the stairs, above the landing, was a stained-glass window throwing in rainbows of colors onto the lightly stained wood of rosettes, beading, wainscoting, and spiral spindles.

  Suffice it to say that truly my head was fairly spinning, consumed with the overwhelming peculiarity of having tea with these infamous ladies right here in a manor house.

  Cady finished reading the paper (I couldn’t recall a word of it but noted her hand was trembling). She took a deep breath. “Ladies, it is time we take charge and face our enemies.”

  My birdbrain still hadn’t absorbed the importance of this meeting. I simply noted the perfect postures of Cady and Eunice, their spines not touching the backs of their chairs.

  Eunice was as thin and straight as the pen she held poised over clean paper, ready to record today’s discussion. Her black hair was parted down the center and brushed back into a tightly rolled bun, her spectacles on the end of her nose giving her a young granny look.

  The others waited expectantly as Cady took off her spectacles. She had generous sprinkles of freckles on her hands and face. The small streaks of gray through her light brown hair only added to her persona of wisdom. Her hair hung loosely knotted at her neck, threatening to unfurl. She took a deep breath, eyeing each lady with purpose. “Ladies, we have a dilemma. I must be frank here and say we will be required to gather our strength from within, and from each other. We must move forward from our homes into the light of open scrutiny. We have nothing to be ashamed of. Wrapped in the warmth of camaraderie, we must take a stand.”

  Her eyes rested briefly on the lady across from her. Phyllis’ white hair, further highlighted by the sun’s patched rays coming through the parlor windows, gave her a halo. She sat relaxed with knees apart as only Phyllis could get away with and I saw her slightly nod to Cady as if to encourage her to continue. Cady’s eyes shifted to the window behind and I recognized the yearning there; that longing to push forward, beyond the walls.

  Cady continued, her voice shaking with conviction. “We must stand publicly, or else we all stagnate in our stillness.”

  The housekeeper, Lizzie began rocking her upper body next to me, humming ever so softly, her dark brown hands resting on her knees, weathered to leather. I recognized the tune, Shall we gather at the river? No one else seemed to notice.

  Cady paused, clasped her hands together in her lap, and then she smiled. Her tone raised in an announcement. “Ladies, the Women’s Rights Convention is now set!”

  The humming stopped, Eunice’s pen stopped. The rocking chair across from me, occupied by Aimee, stopped.

  “When? Where?” Aimee asked, her pink cheeks pinker, a furrow deepening between her eyes. Her finger froze on her temple, where she absent-mindedly twirled a loose blond curl.

  “July eighteenth, in the year of our Lord, 1910, right here in our little town of Annan, New York.”

  Others remained frozen in time.

  Cady forged ahead. “Seven o’clock in the evening. I have spoken yesterday with the principle of the Franklin
High School, Mr. Whiting. He has graciously agreed to our use of the school auditorium, since the school will of course be closed for the summer holidays. We discussed the afternoon, but as we all know, the auditorium can become very warm. An evening hour should bring us a cooler temperature.”

  Still, no one dared move.

  Placing her left hand on Eunice’s back and her right hand on Lizzie’s shoulder, Cady leaned forward toward the others as if to bring them closer into a huddle. “If Mr. Whiting, as opposite gender, is willing to take such risks, how much more should be expected of us, as the women whose rights we fight for? We are called to arms, ladies! We must each go forth openly and publicly; even to the point of speaking before an assembly. This convention will permit us to bring our lights out from under our beds and into the open where we may shine and show others the way. We can do it, ladies! You each have unique talents to share!”

  At this, I suddenly felt I was back outside looking in. I slightly shook my head. I had no unique talent whatsoever. And public speaking? I hated so much as walking down the church isle to my pew; all those righteous eyes judging my tardiness, or wrinkled clothing, or untidy children.

  This did not go without notice; such was the unique talent of Cady. She could look directly into one’s heart, as if pinned on one’s collar. She gazed at me, heating me to pliable. “You are all hardworking women who have learned to work hard with your hands, but long to work hard with your minds. Now here is our chance!”

  Cady returned her hands to her lap and leaned back against her chair. She lowered her voice. “I also know that to speak publicly at this convention may create tremendous hardships in your homes. Our battles are not only public but also private. Our husbands and family all voice various levels of opposition to our quest for women’s rights; either from a religious perspective where they say women are subservient. Or from a political perspective where they say the Constitution states only men were created equal. Or yet again, from the personal standpoint that the man’s position as head of the household is being threatened.”