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“Now Ihaveoffended you.”
“Why are you still here?”
“I don’t know.”
They both laughed.
Then Clara proposed a solution to their awkward problem, one each could live with—or so they had believed.
Clara couldn’t change the discovery, but she could disregard it. She suggested they continue meeting discreetly as two friends with certain activities and interests in common—and ignore the rest.
At times, Clara nearly bursted with indelicate questions, but she never gave in to them, and Stella likewise observed discretion.
Their friendship deepened, though Stella’s profession cast a shadow. When Stella’s sister passed away, Clara regretted not being able to pay her respects. And likewise, Stella couldn’t call on Clara when Violet died.
Still, they continued to meet, sharing their grief and eventually, combining their efforts to help others in honor of Violet and Mary.
Every so often, Stella made veiled references to her profession, and aside from a little awkwardness or amusement, they moved on.
Or so Clara had hoped. Today, it appeared otherwise.
“Our arrangement—not to discuss your vocation, I mean—I’m sorry that it pains you. I’ve thought many times of broaching the subject. I don’t know how.”
Stella stared into her tea.
“Stella, what I mean is, I…sometimes Iwishto talk to you about it. I have many questions. But I’m frightened. And…paralyzed by envy.”
Her gaze popped up to Clara’s. “Frightened of what? Envious of what?”
Clara suppressed the urge to shift in her seat or shrug, remembering where she was. “I’m a spinster.”
“Yes, by choice. Why, your brother has rejected offers for your hand many times because you asked him to.”
“Stella, I don’t know how to explain without it sounding as if I’m complaining. It’s shameful tothinksuch thoughts when the LLS helps women who would do anything to trade places with me, even on my worst day.”
“Do try,” she said flatly. “Try to explain.”
“Lovely.Youare angry, and nowIfeel my temper rising in response. Do I not have the right ever to pity myself? You know what my life was like for Violet’s last years.”
Stella’s eyes warmed with compassion. “Forgive me. I don’t mean to say you haven’t known suffering or served others. It’s true, I feel the stirrings of resentment when you say you could feel envy. Tell me. Tell me how you feel, and I’ll try to understand.”
If a lifetime of hammered-in manners didn’t prevent Clara from taking a deep breath and sighing, her corset did. How could she put into words over tea the sinful thoughts she stifled?
“What I’m going to say sounds as if I’m painting your life in romantic colors. But please don’t let my words offend, or mislead you to believe that I make light of the weight you bear.”
Clara’s eyes swept the room, taking in the ruddy-cheeked women working the tea carts, and the bejeweled ladies arranged about the tables. “All of you except the youngest of the girls here have experienced something I haven’t.”
Clara took another sip of tea, this one not as effective against the new lump in her throat as it was in washing down the piece of sponge cake.
“I’m five-and-twenty. All my acquaintances have experienced not only…the marriage bed…but are mothers, several times over. They have three children, if not a fourth, or a few their fifth.”
She brushed an imaginary crumb from the table and continued. “Earlier you said that most days you feel one way; others, another. Most days, I’m grateful my brother permitted me to remain unmarried. Somehow, he understands I cannot bear, at least yet, to disappear into nothingness and be wife to someone who only wants to beget heirs.
Other times,” her voice quieted, “I feel imprisoned, locked away from knowing what other women do. And again, this will sound most ignorant, most romantic—but I envy you yourfreedom.”
“Freedom?”
“Most interesting places bar me completely as an unmarried lady. It requires machinations to attend even the most benign artistic events. I must always arrange for others to accompany me. I must always be someone’s ‘extra.’”
