A little too brightly, Jemmy took back the note and dismissed the porter. “It seems I no longer need you to find Miss Snodderly. She is standing behind me. Of course, you may keep the coins.”
Aunt Tilly-Lilly held out her hand for the undelivered message. Jemmy backed up. Aunt Tilly bopped Jemmy’s bad ear the same way she had popped the young robber on the train. Jemmy found herself owner of a painful reminder of how dangerous an umbrella could be when plied by skillful hands.
After due deliberation she said, “Ow.” She did have enough presence of mind to crumple the note. Aunt Tilly noticed.
Aunt Tilly’s umbrella ribs stung the back of Jemmy’s hand. Jemmy dropped the note.
Aunt Tilly speared the crumpled paper and lifted it up to read. “I see you were planning a trip to local newspaper offices.”
“Yes, Aunt Tilly, I hope—”
Aunt Tilly cut her off. “Quite impossible.”
“But Aunt Tilly, it’s my job. I work for—”
“Quite so, but first things first.”
“You don’t understand. I was on the scene for a very exciting—”
“I’m afraid you’re the one who lacks understanding.”
“Papers across the country will pick up my arti—”
“They shall have to pick up your ‘arty,’ whatever that might be, after we have been picked up and properly settled at the Koock home as befits guests.”
“The whole reason we came here is—”
Aunt Tilly smacked Jemmy sharply atop each shoulder like Queen Victoria bestowing knighthood. But Aunt Tilly-Lilly’s umbrella bestowed rain spatter instead of honor. The conversation was at an end. Aunt Tilly-Lilly delivered orders in the voice of a monarch. “You will precede me outside.”
On the station platform, the three travelers stood waiting with some degree of impatience for the Sedalia relations to arrive. Well, they weren’t exactly Sedalia relations—not of Hal, or Jemima, or even Miss Snodderly.
Aunt Tilly-Lilly had served as chaperone on the European grand tour for the unmarried daughter of Mr. Erwin McBustle’s business acquaintance. The daughter then became wife to another business acquaintance, a Mr. Obadiah Koock, who had already outlived two wives and was at that very time shopping for a third. As the young girl’s duenna, Aunt Tilly-Lilly paved the pair’s bridal path. Result: the duly-wedded Koocks would host the St. Louisans for the upcoming week.
Ordinarily, distance traveled determined length of stay. Travel one hundred miles; stay one week. The party from St. Louis should have planned to stay two weeks in order to make the stay worthwhile and to let the Koocks know their hospitality had been well-appreciated and would be reciprocated at the Koocks’ pleasure.
However, Jemmy persuaded Mother that the Illuminator couldn’t get along without herself and Hal for two whole weeks. Since she believed as much, though for different reasons than she gave Mother, her pleas sounded true and sincere. Fortunately, Mother didn’t discuss Jemmy and Hal’s value to the newspaper with their boss. Suetonius Hamm placed Jemmy on his likability scale somewhere between cockroaches and death.
The rain eased to a cool mist as two little girls of about three and four came running across the platform. They wore white hair bows and navy blue sailor dresses. White piping and square sailor collars had become all the rage since those horrid Spanish had sunk the Maine and started the splendid little war in Cuba.
Trailing the pair was a woman in her mid-twenties who would have been pretty if she could have had a nose replacement. Almost any nose—button, pug, turned-up, even aquiline—would have been an improvement over hers. It resembled a turnip. It ended in a pointy droop—like a wilted tuber.
The woman had gathered her skirts to keep them out of water puddles on the platform. She shuffled to keep up with the tykes while keeping her ankles covered as befits a genteel lady.
Her driver ran past her to corral the little girls before they jumped on people or off the platform—whichever they had in mind. The driver grabbed one, but was too late for the other. The taller of the girls yelled at Hal as she leaped up, “Catch me.”
He dropped his Sears-Roebuck catalog in time to swing her in a circle and park her gently back on terra firma—or at least woodplanka firma.
The other child yelled up to him, “Now me. Now me.”
Hal looked to Aunt Tilly for guidance. She dissuaded him with an ever-so-slightly raised eyebrow. The deprived child burst into tears and flopped down on the wet boards.
The mother, who turned out to be Mrs. Obadiah Koock—given name Dorothea—fussed. “Fanny, you’re soiling your new white leggings. Stand up now and meet Miss Snodderly.”
The child sobbed noisily without producing a single tear. Mrs. Koock pleaded. “Get up now and stop caterwauling.”
The child buried her face in Hal’s knees and wailed even louder. Hal’s face turned so white, his freckles all but disappeared. In stark contrast, his ears turned puce—then crimson—then vermillion. Any minute Jemmy thought they might burst like a thermometer tossed in boiling water.
Aunt Tilly rescued him in the nick of time. Aunt Tilly-Lilly’s umbrella came down on Fanny’s head. The little girl let go of Hal’s legs and turned around in surprise. Before she could recommence bawling, Aunt Tilly’s umbrella under her chin persuaded her to move. With a pert prod to the child’s backside, Aunt Tilly commanded, “Stand behind your mother. And not another peep.”
Fanny did as bidden. Though from time to time she peeked out from behind Dorothea’s skirts. The other little girl answered to the name “Sissy.” Jemmy never did find out her actual name. Sissy looked terrified. A single glare from Aunt Tilly sent her scurrying to join her sister. Both girls cowered behind their mother’s skirts.
Dorothea said, “I can’t imagine how you do it. They don’t mind me in the least.”
Aunt Tilly cocked her head. “I’ll see what remedy I can devise.”
Dorothea smiled a feeble welcome. “I do hope you’ll accept my apologies. We were late on account of the girls. They don’t like wearing new clothes. I am mortified to have caused you to stand here in the rain.” She turned to her driver, “Jean Max, would you see to their trunks, please?”
Hal broke in. “I sent them on by a drayman. I hope he’s careful. My trunks have more than fifty pounds of glass photographic plates.”
“Well, then. Do come with me to the carriage. It may be something of a squeeze, but if the young man will ride with Jean Max in the front, I think we can all manage.”
Jemmy said, “Mrs. Koock, do you think it would be possible for us to—”
Aunt Tilly pointed her umbrella at her protégé. Jemmy didn’t relish the idea of another clip on the ear. She thought better of asking for a side trip to the local newspaper office. She finished her sentence with “take a nap? I know it’s gauche of me to ask, but the trip has exhausted me.”
Jemmy barely listened to the reply. She was imagining herself slipping away from the house and taking her story to the Capital. It would be a snap.
They arrived at the Koock house, a redbrick two-story with a wide front porch. It stood in a handsome location on the corner opposite the main entrance to Liberty Park. Dorothea installed Jemmy and Aunt Tilly-Lilly in the guest room with a park view from its own balcony atop the porte cochére. She packed Hal off to a loft in the carriage house.
Not until past four thirty did Aunt Tilly-Lilly and Jemmy finish tucking their wardrobe in the armoire and their unmentionables in bureau drawers. Dinner was to be at seven o’clock followed by a musicale in the travelers’ honor. Jemmy had little time—six o’clock at the latest—to have any chance of her story being run on Wednesday morning.
She hoped to sneak out with the aid of a little subterfuge. “Aunt Tilly, these trunks are in the way. I think I’ll ask Mrs. Koock to store them for us.”
As she started to drag them into the hall, the driver startled her with, “I take ze trunks, mademoiselle. Madame Koock, she say I put zem down cellar.”
With Aunt Tilly hearing every word, Jemmy needed a new escape idea. “I’m famished. I think I’ll go downstairs and see if I can find a snack.”
Aunt Tilly said, “No need. Dorothea has most thoughtfully provided us with a bowl of fruit. Perhaps you didn’t see it.”
“Are you sure it isn’t wax? Too pretty to eat, isn’t it?” Jemmy tried to sound hopeful.
Aunt Tilly handed her a pear. “Now for a nap. I’m sure it will be a relief to get out of your corset. I’ll help you unlace.” The tiny buttons on Jemmy’s shirtwaist seemed to fly open by magic under Aunt Tilly’s expert touch. She hung up the bolero jacket and shirtwaist as Jemmy slipped out of her skirt.
Jemmy tried another tactic as Aunt Tilly loosened Jemmy’s corset. “Aren’t those little girls a terror? Mrs. Koock must be thanking her lucky stars you’ve come to lend your knack for schooling youngsters.”
“This evening will be soon enough. I need to rest from the train trip.” Jemmy hoped Aunt Tilly would nap, but had no luck. The chaperone sat in a chair reading Harper’s Magazine and tut-tutting over the shameless females displayed in the latest fashions.
Jemmy couldn’t sleep for fretting about the undelivered story. She became so anxious she even considered asking permission, but couldn’t bring herself to say the words. No doubt Aunt Tilly didn’t deem a newspaper story as a “first” enough thing to put before a wholesome nap.
She clenched her teeth and stormed inwardly over her imprisonment. Aunt Tilly-Lilly was a born freedom-fighter. She was against it—for females. She could tolerate freedom well enough in men, and she often remarked, “Boys will be boys.” But she drew the line at freedom for women. As for girls, they’d best not dare to be anything but modest, silent, and obedient.
Aunt Tilly-Lilly stood ready to do her part in seeing to it that the world functioned in the right and proper way, the biblical way of ancient patriarchs. Without a word of request or bidding, she took upon herself the management of the young girls of whatever home she happened to inhabit. She ruled over her charges with glycerin soap to cleanse mouths of sassy speech and Epsom salts to clean everything else.
At six o’clock, Aunt Tilly announced it was time to dress for dinner. A half hour later, Jemmy stood thoroughly corseted, combed, and curled. Aunt Tilly pointed to the chair at the dressing table. “Practice sitting with your back straight and your hands folded. You have the unfortunate habit of fidgeting. It will not do. I expect you to be seated in exactly the same spot when I return after seeing to the Koock girls.”
The instant Aunt Tilly breezed out, Jemmy dashed to the window to see whether she might spy an errand boy to take the story to the Bazoo or the Sentinel. She had missed the morning deadlines, but perhaps she was not too late for tomorrow’s evening edition.
Only street dust greeted her. The Koock house was out in the suburbs, delightfully free from the coal smoke of trains and generators, but distressingly far from the bustling streets downtown—and newspaper offices.
Jemmy resigned herself to the inevitable and tried to situate herself in the precise position she had been ordered to maintain. With a surge of futile anger, she relived the agonizing imprisonment of her seventeenth summer.
She had been a frustrated girl caged in grandmother’s sickroom. She felt time nibbling at her precious youth like the Mississippi tearing away bits of soil to be lost forever in the ocean. A year later she found herself trapped by an old woman again. Her chin quivered, but she refused to give in to tears.
At ten minutes until seven exactly, Aunt Tilly returned and scolded Jemmy for moving from her assigned spot. “A girl without self-discipline is like a horse without a rider. Pretty—but it never gets the mail delivered. In consequence of your feeble will, I will expect you to eat two bites of dessert, no more. Beginning the habit of self-denial now will stand you in good stead in later years. I trust you wish to keep your figure.”
Jemmy had to bite her lip to keep from sputtering annoyance at receiving advice on weight control from the stout-and-then-some Aunt Tilly.
Jemmy had no choice but to be silent. Could being married be any worse than this? She regretted the thought as soon as it sailed into her head. She knew well enough the power men could wield—all with the full blessing of custom, law, other men—and yes—women, too.
As she followed Aunt Tilly into the hall, the sound of tromping feet and jingling spurs drew Jemmy’s gaze over the banister. Coming up the stairs was a tall boy of thirteen under a dark head of curly hair. He dropped his hat on the rail post and reached for the knob of a back bedroom door.
Aunt Tilly stopped him. “Young man, I trust you do not intend to leave the various articles of your apparel hanging about to disorder the house.”
As he turned back to claim the hat, he cast a sly grin in Aunt Tilly’s direction. “No ma’am. I leave my hat out here, but I generally keep my drawers on.”
To his great surprise, Aunt Tilly clipped him a good one atop his head with her cane. She was as skillful with a walking stick as she was with an umbrella. That fact didn’t surprise Jemmy, but it came as quite a shock to the insolent young man. He squinted in pain as though he wanted to ease his noggin by rubbing it but had too much pride. He stood with sober expression, hat in hand.
Aunt Tilly said, “If you customarily sit at the children’s table, you are too late. They have already dined.” She looked him over and scowled. “We will expect you to present yourself in proper attire and good order to escort us to the musicale at eight o’clock, precisely.”
“I eat at the main table.”
“Indeed. You are in danger of missing dinner with the adults as well.”
He tossed his hat into the room and started down the stairs. His lack of manners earned him another crack on the head. “Young man, I am appalled at your actions. Go into your room at once and dress in suitable habiliments for dinner and the musicale. The very idea. Going down to dinner in mud-spattered shirt with no neckpiece and wearing spurs.”
She said the word “spurs” as if someone had dropped lye on her tongue. “Completely unacceptable. It will not do.”
With a nod to Jemmy, she said, “Come along. We do not wish to tax our hostess’s good will by being late.”
When Aunt Tilly moved aside, the uncouth young man saw Jemmy. His eyes bulged with unabashed admiration. He evaporated behind his door but didn’t shut it all the way.
Jemmy suppressed a chuckle when she stared back. Her eyes met one of his as he peeped through the crack. He reminded her of her sister Miranda peeking out from the covers on Christmas morning. Randy had to wait until the room was light enough to risk dashing downstairs. She couldn’t sleep at all because she was too eager to see whether Saint Nicholas had left her a palomino Shetland pony and a diamond tiara.
Aunt Tilly marched down the stairs with Jemmy in her wake. Dorothea met them at the landing and escorted them into the dining room where the table had been set for six. Dorothea took her place at the end of the table nearest the kitchen door. She pointed to the chairs on either side of her own. Aunt Tilly paused. “Are you sure you wish us to sit there? Are the other two places for female guests as well?”
Dorothea’s eyes brimmed with tears. “No. The other places are for Mr. Koock’s two sons. But I never know when they will come. I find it best not to count upon them.”
Aunt Tilly prompted, “And Mr. Koock? Will he be dining with us?”
“He’s frightfully busy at the shops. You know railroad cars must be built and painted and repaired. I always lay a place for him, but he seldom fills it.”
Jemmy’s heart went out to this shy girl with the turnip nose. Poor Dorothea must have eaten countless meals alone in this properly elegant dining room with its dark red wallpaper, the color most suitable for proper digestion.
Dorothea motioned to the chair on her right. “Please do sit down. Cook has made a very special dinner to welcome you.”
Aunt Tilly said, “Are you accustomed to wait for . . . ?” The three ladies exchanged glances at each other as they heard the young man clomping down the stairs. His speed almost matched his transformation from muddy horseman to dapper gent. He entered the room plastering down his hair with a more-or-less clean hand. The boy reeked of bay rum and Macassar oil.
The Koock son started to take the chair by Jemmy until Aunt Tilly’s meaningful look told him to sit next to her instead. He stood behind the chair where her arrow eyes pointed him to go.
To his credit, he made no motion to sit down before the ladies. To his discredit, he simply smiled and gawked at Jemmy instead of seating the ladies until Dorothea said, “Miss Snodderly, Miss McBustle, this young man is my stepson Lilburn Boggs Koock. Lilburn, this is Miss Snodderly and her niece, Miss McBustle. Miss Snodderly graciously attended me on my grand tour of Europe.”
Lilburn said, “I am happy to make your acquaintance, Miss Snodderly, Miss McBustle. I hope you enjoy your stay in Sedalia.”
Aunt Tilly’s lips said, “I’m sure we shall savor it, Mr. Koock.” Aunt Tilly’s eyes said, “Give me a month, and I’ll turn you from sow’s ear to silk purse—or at least to a sow’s ear with decent manners.”
Jemmy murmured, “I’m pleased to meet you, Mr. Koock.”
“Please call me ‘Burnie.’ Mr. Koock is my father.” He showed a mouthful of white teeth in a Cheshire cat grin.
Jemmy smiled but did not extend an offer to let Burnie call her by her first name.
With introductions made, the obvious next step was to sit down, but nobody did. Dorothea had to remind the uncultured lad, “Lilburn, Miss Snodderly’s chair.”
He snapped to and seated them in proper order by age and status—Dorothea after Miss Snodderly and Jemmy last. Dorothea said grace and dipped her spoon into a cold and creamy vichyssoise, the signal for all to commence.
Tasty dishes followed—shrimp in aspic, watermelon ice, roast capon with baked squash, sliced tomato and cucumber salad—each course served with an appropriate wine. Jemmy had never felt as grown up, as sophisticated.
Mother allowed no spirituous liquors of any kind in her house. The only time Jemmy had ever tasted wine was at the Oracle Ball when she made her debut. The less said about how her introduction to society turned out, the better.
Jemmy’s eyes crossed. Her head seemed to float above the table. She felt so good she very nearly forgot how much she hated being hemmed in by family, society, laws, and tradition.
She sobered up a little when she reminded herself what this trip meant to her future. She had to succeed. If she failed, Hamm would have proof that Jemmy was no newspaper-woman—that she had landed her job on a fluke and was keeping it by luck. She had little to gain, but everything to lose, including her one and only chance to be her own woman.
When Dorothea rang a tinkly glass bell, the maid produced coffee in a silver service to accompany marron glacés over ice cream. Jemmy longed to eat every bit of the syrupy chestnuts and cream, but dutifully put down her spoon after her allocated two bites.
Jemmy had not expected such continental culinary flair on the prairie. She tried not to slur her words. “Mrs. Koock, I marvel at the dinner. However do you manage?”
For the first time, Dorothea’s face registered pleasure. “I am blessed to have a fine cook. She learned French cuisine in Haiti. A correspondent of mine who once lived there sent her to me when her employers returned to Paris. They couldn’t take Pélagie back to France with them, but they feared for her life on the island. The revolutions, you see. So Pélagie came to me.”
Aunt Tilly pontificated, “Such turmoil in such a small place. The smaller the place and the larger the number of inhabitants, the greater the need for self-discipline.”
Jemmy tried to bring the conversation back to a happy point for her hostess, “This feast is in every way comparable to the food in Tony Faust’s famous restaurant in St. Louis.”
Dorothea blushed. “Pélagie works wonders in the kitchen, and Jean Max works wonders in the garden. I don’t know what I would do without them. Perhaps you’d like to meet her? You’ve already met Jean Max. He tends our animals and drives our carriage.”
She started to ring for the maid to bring out the cook but stopped with the bell in midair. Aunt Tilly’s eyes put her on notice not to perform such an improper act. Treating a mere servant like a human being was not something Aunt Tilly would endure, much less endorse.
When Dorothea obeyed the silent order, Aunt Tilly gave the lady a reward. “My dear, the dinner was indeed most delicious.” Then she promptly took it back. “Such a shame Mr. Koock had to miss it.”
Dorothea rose above the slur as she described her plans for entertaining her guests beginning with Tuesday night’s musicale at the home of Mr. Koock’s brother Charles. Before she could list anything for Wednesday, the front door slammed with a bang
Red-faced, Dorothea dropped her head nearly into her dinner plate. “That must be Mr. Koock’s other son, Marmaduke.”