A White Room (11 page)

Mrs. Bradbridge instructed her driver to a yellow Queen Anne. A butler answered the door, stiff and judgmental. He peered down at me over a large pointed nose.

“How do you do? Are the ladies at home?”

He motioned for me to enter. “Are you expected?”

I placed my card on the silver receiving tray. “I’m afraid not.”

He scrutinized me for a moment longer and escorted me into an oversize yellow sitting room. He read my name from the card and stepped aside.

I crossed the threshold into the canary-colored room, its walls frosted with tiny etched flowers. The parlor was like a field in spring. I introduced myself and explained who I was to Mrs. Francis Williams, her mother, Mrs. Ella Grace, and Francis’ fifteen-year-old daughter, Annie. They welcomed me with rosy cheeks and an immediate request to use their first names. Ella poured the tea and I admired her honey-colored hair, which looked like a braided crown atop her head. She seemed too young to have a grown daughter and a granddaughter.

“You’ve come from Mrs. Bradbridge, haven’t you?” Francis asked before I could explain. Francis had fair skin and sandy-colored hair. She looked similar to her mother but had a smaller nose that tipped up slightly at the end.

I blushed. “I’m afraid Mrs. Bradbridge subjected me to an impromptu initiation and assignment.”

Ella chuckled. “Margaret is something of an abrupt woman.”

“A wretched woman.” Annie dropped three sugar cubes into her tea. Annie’s features were a mixture of her mother’s and grandmother’s, but she had strawberry-blond hair.

“Annie.” Francis’ voice hardened. “That’s enough sugar.” She turned back to me. “You are not the first unannounced caller we’ve received.”

“Oh.”

“Sugar?” Francis removed the bowl from her daughter’s reach.

“Thank you.”

Annie held out a tray of tiny flawless cakes spiraling around a silky layer of a cream. “You must try one of my grandmother’s tea cakes.”

I took one from the tray and took a bite. The spongy pastry melted into the sweet cream, dissolving my defenses. “Um…Mrs. Bradbridge wanted me to convince you to attend the emergency meeting.” Why disguise it now?

“Oh…Margaret.” Ella sighed, still cheery, while Francis rolled her eyes. “Her little games may work on the younger women, but I’m no fool. Her count is sufficient.”

I admired Ella’s resolve, but she didn’t have a husband who expected her to win Margaret and Ida’s approval. “Um—uh—”

“Oh, you poor thing. She’s gotten you as well.” Ella flashed me a compassionate smile.

“Looks that way to me,” Annie said.

I looked at Annie, and my stomach sank with humiliation—even a fifteen-year-old thought I was pathetic. I thought it, too. I didn’t want to obey Margaret’s commands, but I had to if I wanted to fix the whole mess with Ida and make it up to John.

“Well, I don’t see why we can’t make an appearance,” Ella said.

My eyes shot back to Ella.

“Just for you, Emeline, to keep you on Mrs. Bradbridge’s kinder side, although I cannot say it will last.”

“Mother, we have good reason not to go. We need to make a stand.”

“We can make a stand next time.”

Francis closed her eyes and shook her head, just barely.

“Ugh.” Annie slumped.

“Annie!” Francis barked.

I leaned forward. “Thank you so much.”

“Still, we’ll wait until the last moment,” Ella said. “Our appearance needn’t be long.”

“That’s fine. Thank you again, so much.”

“It’s our pleasure, Emeline. Have you met anyone other than the charming Mrs. Bradbridge?”

“I’m afraid I didn’t have many letters of introduction.”

Francis sighed heavily before she sipped her tea, clearly irritated, but I ignored her.

“We are well known. Perhaps we could send some letters of introduction on your behalf.”

“That would be wonderful.” I struggled not to lick my lips or reach for another cake. I considered Francis and how to regain her favor. “What does Mr. Williams do?”

Francis lifted her head. “He owns Williams’ Logging Company.”

“Logging?”

“The Mississippi is one of the country’s finest trading routes. They ship logs down the river and sell them to lumber yards. It’s quite lucrative, I assure you.”

“I imagine so.”

“What does Mr. Dorr do?”

“He’s a lawyer.”

“I’ve heard such distasteful things about lawyers. Does he enjoy it?”

I hesitated, thrown by her statement and unsure of the answer to her question. “I believe so.” I glanced at Annie, who delicately bit into her fourth tea cake. “Are you in school, Annie?”

“Of course.”

“I’m sure you are very popular.”

She shrugged. “With boys.”

Francis’ head snapped in her daughter’s direction.

“Boys?” I teased. “You are far too young for boys.”

Annie grimaced. “It so happens that I am quite old enough for boys.”

“Oh—I didn’t mean—”

“Emeline?” Francis grabbed my attention, obviously to apologize for her daughter. “Do you have children?”

“Uh, no.”

“Then I highly doubt you know anything about what young ladies have to handle these days.”

Annie grinned.

“Well, I have three sisters of all ages, not to mention I was her age once.”

“Having sisters is not the same as having a daughter, and just because young men showed you little interest at her age does not mean my daughter wouldn’t have any prospective suitors.”

I drew back in surprise. “No—I—”

“I’ll have you know, she not only has suitors, but we are expecting a proposal any day.”

“Francis,” Ella said under her breath.

I opened my mouth but couldn’t think of what to say.

“Emeline,” Ella stuttered and lifted her tea. “You said Mrs. Bradbridge recruited you unwillingly?”

I saw an opportunity to redirect Francis’ disdain. “Oh my, yes. She practically forced me. I offered one Sunday a month, and she had the audacity to say that was good for a start.” I tittered a little too loudly. “I tried to tell her I couldn’t because I am terribly busy, but she is relentless.”

“I’m surprised you are so busy without children,” Francis snipped. “I have two young boys and a maturing daughter, and I volunteer twice a week. Imagine what I would do with your time.”

“Well, um, the house is quite large, and with only one servant for only a few days a week…”

“This house is far larger than your own.”

“What? I—” I stammered and then stopped. “Pardon me, but how do you know the size of my house?”

“It might be hard for you to believe, but other people have lived in that house, and people stepped foot in it before you graced our town with your presence.”

Ella’s eyes flashed toward Francis as if ordering her to stop, but Francis had locked onto me.

“
I have
been inside your house,” Annie said, tilting her head and grinning.

My stomach tightened, and my face grew warm. I tried to remain calm. “Forgive me, Francis, if I said something to offend, but you have many servants, and I’m sure your mother and daughter—”

Francis’ eyes bulged and she sat straighter in her seat. “I can say with great certainty, I do not enslave my mother and children.”

I swallowed. “Um—well—I’m trying to adjust.”

Ella came to my rescue. “A new wife faces many challenges.”

“Actually, I do not remember having any difficulty.” Francis kept her eyes on me. “I slipped into the role of wife and mother the way a princess slips into a little glass slipper.”

I curled my toes in my boots.

“A brief period of adjustment is reasonable,” Ella said.

“Is that so?” Francis’ eyes were still fixed on me.

I opened my mouth to respond but couldn’t think. I awkwardly held my face down and to the side, blinking rapidly to keep my eyes dry.

“Forgive me, Mother.” Francis stood. “I will not attend the meeting, as I have other responsibilities far more important than submitting to some crabby old woman because someone else doesn’t have the strength to refuse.” She stalked out.

Annie snickered under her hand.

I touched my face, looked away, trying to hide my tears.

“Emeline?” Ella reached over. “Are you—?”

The butler entered with a woman and her daughter.

I had to get out without revealing my hot, wet face, my utter humiliation. With my head down, I stood and bowed quickly to the next two callers and then rushed out. I opened the door for myself, scuttled down the steps, and blubbered to Margaret’s driver that he was to take me back to my surrey, not back to the committee.

I fled home. I wasn’t going to return to Margaret to report my failure and give her and Ida even more kindling. I rushed to my chamber with their words chanting in my mind. I paced back and forth. I tried hard to push down the feelings of despair—down into the basement, where they belonged. I was homesick, a failure as a wife, married to a man who loathed me, and surrounded by horrible, cruel women.

And my father was dead. My papa was dead.

I collapsed to the floor and screamed. No one was home—no one ever was—so I cried, I bawled, I wailed. It was the first time I’d really let myself cry since he’d died. I may have shed tears before, but I’d always held back and reminded myself to be strong for my mother and sisters, who were in the next room or down the hall. I hadn’t fully realized it, but I’d hauled it with me all this way like an anchor dredging behind me. This was the first time I’d let it all pour out. I unfettered. I screamed and cried and wailed as hard and as loud as I could. I shrieked until my throat buckled into a wet choke. I sat there allowing tears to stream down my face and drip. I lay on the wood floor letting droplets fall onto the panels. I stayed there awhile just sobbing.

I wondered what my father would say if he were here. I wondered what he would think of me.

Finally, I sniffed, wiped my cheeks, and rubbed my eyes. I pushed myself up onto all fours and stood in front of the mirror. I studied myself, eyes red and swollen, face flushed and streaked. A scene of a woman in a cascading gown was engraved into the frame of the mirror, the dress section stretching over the left bottom corner of the reflection. Her body twisted as she gazed back while drifting into a sweeping world of metallic wind and butterflies. I often sat in a wicker rocking chair by the window and imagined the white walls reflected in it as a cloud-covered sky above an ocean.

I dropped into my simple chair and stared out the window, swaying back and forth, my lower lip trembling. Something moved outside in some overgrowth. I watched it peek out, but it slipped back before I could see it. I looked at the trees. A bird landed on a branch and hopped around without apparent purpose or care. Then it flew away. It had no obligations in life other than the necessities. All it had to do was gather food, care for its young, and fly, fly free.

Sometimes while sitting there staring out the window, I imagined a place in my mind, a white room. A simple space coated in white paint. The white represented responsibility, obligation. It didn’t require what responsibility and obligation required, but it had the same effect. It maintained the person in the room; it kept the person alive and well, along with everything and everyone that person cared for, but nothing the person held dear existed in the room. The person was alone. The person experienced no joy from bearing the weight of responsibility, earned no prize.

I imagined a particular person in the room—a woman, also clothed in white. This woman constantly faced a dilemma. She longed for freedom. She longed to be the bird.

Her open palms grazed the rutted expanse of the wall. She knew that something lay beyond—beyond the white. She could burst out into the world of grass, sky, and lavender, but she knew that if she broke through the barricade, everything she protected would crumble, suffocate, and wither behind her. Her own freedom would last only moments because she, too, couldn’t survive without the white. Earth and water would smother her, and radiant light would slice through her like a blade.

I imagined her pressing with both hands, weighing freedom against existence and all that depended on her, but in the end she lightened her stance and stepped away. She always chose to stay, to fulfill her obligation.

The rustling in the thicket outside grew louder, as if something were waging battle in it. I blinked myself out of my imagination back into the white room where I sat. I needed to cook supper. I couldn’t serve him like this. I had to collect myself. I had to be strong. I dabbed my eyes and told myself to be strong, be strong like I had all the other times. I tried, but I just wanted to fall apart. My fortitude was gone—in a puddle on the floor. It was as if, when I let go for that one moment, when I unfettered my anchor, the end of the chain slipped away and I lost it.

I was trying to keep my face from contorting and my eyes from bursting into tears when I noticed the rustling bushes again. What strange creature could throw such a tantrum? I envisioned a predator, like a wolf, but not the regular kind. I imagined it with matted fur and scarred skin, like charred red flesh. Its ears were square, as if someone had lopped the tops off. Its eyes were piercing, glowing.