28 

Sarah stood frozen outside Simon’s office door.

All morning she had tussled with not coming.

She could say she was sick, but Simon would know she was not. Eventually she would have to face him.

Leaving things the way they were with Jane caused a physical pain in Sarah’s stomach.

Ending the class abruptly—never going back—seemed cowardly, and the last thing Sarah would allow herself to be was a coward.

So she exhaled, smoothed her skirt, and knocked as she did every Friday afternoon.

Simon, sitting in the chair behind his desk, looked up and she met his eyes. The questions he did not ask hung between them, a thick but transparent wall. Sarah waited to see if he would speak—undecided whether she wished he would. She twisted both hands around the strap to her handbag.

“I came a little early today.” Sarah broke the silence. “I thought I might try using the machine.”

Simon stood up and walked around his desk. “Very well. I’ll open the room.” He fumbled in a pocket for a ring of keys.

“Also, I want to explain about the other night.” She might as well get it over with.

Simon stopped his steps and sat on the corner of his desk, his feet planted solidly on the floor and his arms crossed.

“Serena Cuthbert—she just happened one day.” Sarah was talking too fast, but she could not stop. “I met someone new, and she asked my name, and that’s what came out.”

“I don’t understand.” Simon measured his questions. “Why would the name of someone who does not exist be the first thing to come to your mind?”

“It just did. Then she wanted to be friends.” Sarah’s breath caught. “No one has wanted to be my friend in a long time.”

Simon uncrossed his arms and held his palms up. “I rather hoped you had noticed that I wanted to be your friend.”

Sarah had no response and settled for focusing her eyes on a globe between two thick books on the credenza under the window. Of course she knew.

“What would make you persist with this fiction?” Simon’s voice had softened. “Clearly you thought that party was something other than what it was. You couldn’t get out of there fast enough once you realized the truth.”

“I . . . miscalculated, that’s all.”

“Why do you deny yourself, Sarah?”

Sarah swallowed. He had it all wrong. “I don’t think of it as denying myself. I think of it as finding myself.”

“In a life you made up?”

“In a life I hope someday to have.”

“I see.”

She was not convinced he did. “What do you see, Simon? Do you see a girl who is deluded, or one who is determined? A woman who has lost her mind, or one who is using her mind to find a better life?”

He spoke quietly. “I see a woman who wants to be loved. A woman who was well loved as a girl and has been afraid ever since that no one will ever love her again. So she gives up on love, even God’s love, and chases the next best thing.”

“You don’t understand.” Sarah broke her fixation on the globe and looked at Simon through misty eyes.

“Don’t I?” He moved toward her, took both her hands in his, and pulled her to him.

The gesture sent a shiver up her arms. When he leaned in, her breath caught.

“I feel as if I have waited years for you,” Simon murmured. “I’m not going to let Sarah Cummings disappear into Serena Cuthbert without letting you know my true feelings.”

His hands moved to her face, and Sarah trembled. She had not been touched with love in so many years she had nearly forgotten the mystery.

When his lips touched hers, she briefly thought she ought to be offended, but she wasn’t. This was not like the kiss Kenny had attempted when she was sixteen and he was an under-coachman on Prairie Avenue. Nor was it like the one a footman had once offered in the back hall. The softness of it, the gentleness. This was a kiss of love that layered trustworthiness and security and faith.

But it was not Brad’s kiss, not the one she had been dreaming of.

Sarah pulled away and put two fingers to her lips.

“I suppose this is where I am supposed to beg your forgiveness,” Simon murmured, “but I would be insincere in doing so.”

Sarah tried to catch her breath, but had no words.

“Will you have dinner with me on Wednesday evening?” He held his face close to hers. “That is still your day off, is it not?”

Sarah nodded.

“Yes, it’s your day off, or yes, you’ll go to dinner?”

Sarah nodded again.

“I’ll wait for you outside the servants’ entrance at six.”

They walked awkwardly to the classroom, where Simon unlocked the door, then left Sarah alone. It was still early. Sarah sat at the sewing machine and pulled out the instruction sheet. She studied the diagram for how to thread it. It seemed to her that threading the contraption was the most difficult task. If she could do that properly, working the treadle with her feet would just be a matter of discovering an efficient rhythm.

When she sensed a presence in the doorframe, Sarah looked up expecting one of the girls had arrived early.

“Hello,” Lillie said.

The instruction sheet fell to the floor as Sarah lurched to her feet. “Hello.”

“I’m not sure what to call you,” Lillie said.

“I’ve missed you,” Sarah blurted out, because it was true.

“I’ve missed you, too,” Lillie said. “I mean, I’ve missed my friend Serena. I don’t really know you.”

“Yes, you do.” Sarah took a tentative step toward Lillie. The table consumed the space between them.

“I’m here for the class.” Lillie ran a gloved hand along the table’s edge. “I realize it’s awkward for both of us, but I’ve decided I’m not giving up on it because . . . because—”

“Because I lied to you.” Sarah moved around the end of the table, closer to Lillie.

“Well, yes. I suppose that’s it. But I do want to help with the children, and clearly you are a talented seamstress and I can learn a great deal from you.”

“You’re welcome to stay.” Sarah was standing beside Lillie now. “It would be nice to spend some time together.”

“Do you seriously still expect we could be friends?” Lillie paced around the table until she was again staring at Sarah across its width.

“I’m not expecting you would want to have anything to do with a parlor maid,” Sarah said flatly. She moved back to the machine and picked up the instruction leaflet again.

“You said you’ve missed me.”

“I have. You were my friend.”

“Friendship is based on truth,” Lillie said. “You said it yourself. I am not hesitant because you are a maid, but because you deceived me.”

“You haven’t walked in my shoes.” Sarah tossed the instructions at the machine and spun toward Lillie. “You’ve never wanted for anything. You don’t understand.”

“Being in want is no excuse for deception.”

“I did not set out to hurt you.”

“Nevertheless you did hurt me. I trusted you.”

“You still can,” Sarah said.

“You grew up in an orphanage, and I grew up in a big house in Cincinnati,” Lillie said. “But if you think that makes any difference in who I really am, then you don’t understand me.”

They regarded each other in silence.

“Brad deserves to know the truth,” Lillie finally said.

“Truth comes in many colors,” Sarah answered. What color was Brad’s truth, she wondered. Even as she spoke, though, Simon’s kiss lingered on her lips.

A gaggle of girls tumbled through the doorway.

“Did we get any new fabrics?” Melissa asked.

Mary Margaret went straight for the cabinet. “Let’s just look.”

“Girls,” Sarah said, “let’s get out your projects and see where everyone stands. We’ll sort things out from there.” She looked at Lillie, then clapped her hands to command attention. “I’d like you to meet Miss Lillie Wagner. She’s come to help us. Miss Wagner does some very nice stitching herself.”

The girls murmured a polite welcome.

Jane was missing. A few more girls straggled in, and in another ten minutes everyone was hard at work. Jumping right in, Lillie undertook to help Melissa measure a hem. Sarah had to concede that Jane was not coming.

It was because she knew, Sarah thought. And despite her own journal, Jane’s color of truth was the same as Lillie’s.

Kenny.

Jane.

Simon.

Lillie.

Too many people knew. If Lillie was so committed to the truth, how much longer would it be before she crossed paths with Brad and revealed the secret?

Sarah’s stomach burned, and she lost the flavor of Simon’s kiss.

On Saturday morning, Sarah laid the table for breakfast as usual. She glanced at the clock, calculating whether she had time to inspect the newspaper before Leo would come downstairs expecting to find it in pristine condition. Cautiously, she opened the pages, scanning for election news.

What caught her eye was an advertisement rather than an article. Reward! The Democratic National Convention offered a five hundred dollar reward for evidence and conviction of anyone bribing or attempting to bribe a voter, or coercing votes.

If the Democrats were offering the reward, obviously the Republicans were the target. Was this the sort of political maneuvering Brad thought Serena could not understand? Of course, Brad would not personally approach anyone with a crisp five-dollar bill. Sarah had seen how smooth Brad was in action. He would not sully himself with direct contact with the working class.

On the other hand, he would not think twice about providing the funds for whatever it took for his candidate to win the election. But bribing voters? Sarah hated to believe Brad was involved.

Five dollars a head does not seem too much to ensure we win the election, he had said to Mr. Sattler at the ball.

Five hundred dollars—the reward was easily four times what Sarah earned in a year.

Sarah scanned the articles around the advertisement but found nothing incriminating or suggestive of foul play. No mention of specific names. No quotations from anyone who had been approached and offered money to vote for William McKinley. But what little doubt Sarah tried to muster about Brad’s involvement dissipated.

She was so absorbed in the paper that she did not hear Leo coming through the lobby. By the time she realized he was in the room, he was lowering himself into his chair. Rapidly, Sarah folded the paper and placed it beside his plate.

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Leo. I should not have been reading your paper.”

“Do we have eggs today?” he asked, unperturbed. “What were you reading about?”

Sarah moved into action at the sideboard and spooned scrambled eggs onto a plate, then added some mixed fruit and a roll. “Would you like coffee, sir?”

“Yes, please,” he answered. “You haven’t answered my question.”

“Sir?”

“What were you reading about that was so absorbing?”

“Nothing of consequence, sir.”

“You can tell me, Sarah. I won’t let on to Penard.”

She lifted and lowered one shoulder. “Is it true the Republicans are buying votes and the Democrats are offering a reward to anyone who can prove it?” She set the plate before him and turned back to the sideboard for the coffeepot.

“I suspect it’s true, yes,” Leo said, “though I doubt it is on a scale large enough to influence the election results. It’s a scare tactic, more than anything. Big business has a lot at stake in this election. Mark Hanna has organized a money machine for the Republicans.”

Sarah poured coffee. “If you don’t mind my saying so, Mr. Leo, you don’t seem very political.”

Leo laughed. “You mean, for a resident of Prairie Avenue?”

Sarah blushed.

“You’ve served enough dinner guests here,” Leo said, “to hear for yourself what the conversation is like. My father represents his share of big business clients. I have no doubt that people like Mr. Pullman are working closely with Mr. Hanna. But I’m an engineer and a scientist. I’m interested in manufacturing technology on a research level. As much as Pullman and the others dislike it, the labor force is changing. The way things are manufactured in Chicago is changing, and economic policies will have to adapt.”

“Yes, sir.” Sarah wondered whether she was supposed to decipher from Leo’s explanation which presidential candidate he favored. She could not bring herself to voice what was really on her mind. Bradley Townsend was almost certainly among those trying to buy votes.