Chapter 21
Taking a deep breath, Maggie raised her hand to the knocker of Mrs. Stein’s stately home.
It was the afternoon of the tea party, and Maggie’s stomach felt as if it were positively writhing with nerves.
She’d taken great pains with her appearance—a modest dress of fine white lawn with a blue satin belt at the waist, and an elegant but similarly modest hat of straw with a matching bow and small sprig of bluebells.
While she knew when she’d received the invitation that she would have to model one of her own designs, she recognized instinctively that none of her future patronesses would wish to be outshone by their milliner.
Whatever she wore had to be modest, discreet, appropriate to her station and yet still possessing the innate elegance she hoped her creations would become known for.
Releasing her pent-up breath, she knocked.
It had been only a week since she’d received Mrs. Stein’s note and it had started to feel as if the future were opening up in front of her like a butterfly from its chrysalis.
That evening, she’d been bubbling over with excitement, and even though things had been so strained between her and Brendan, she’d felt the need, as well as the desire, to share her good news with him.
“Maggie, that’s wonderful.” He’d taken her by the shoulders, smiling down at her and seeming so genuinely pleased for her that for a few precious seconds things between them had felt normal again, the way Maggie had remembered and missed.
She’d opened her mouth to say something—she knew not what, save for that it wouldn’t be about the party or her hat-making ambitions—but then Brendan released her shoulders and, still smiling, turned away.
The moment, whatever it had been, had passed, and with her heart too full of confusing emotions to understand, Maggie tried not to mind—or seem like she minded.
“It is, isn’t it?” she’d agreed, unable to keep from sounding slightly brittle. “But now I will have to impress!”
“You always impress,” Brendan had replied, lightly enough that she couldn’t tell if he was being serious or not.
“Well, I can’t impress too much,” she had remarked in the same whimsical tone. “When these ladies will surely want to be the most impressive in any room.”
“And so they will be, wearing a Margaret O’Halloran original!”
He spoke with such determination, such certainty, that for a second Maggie couldn’t speak.
She was catapulted back to the moment they’d met, when she had been utterly destitute and alone, with no prospects at all.
And yet, somehow, here she was, and so was Brendan, and all along he’d believed in her.
“Thank you,” she’d whispered, and then busied herself tidying her sketchbooks and pencils, trying to ignore the lump in her throat.
And now she was here, waiting to step into her future.
The door opened.
“Yes?” The maid who answered the door was the same one Maggie had met before, McCullough, but she didn’t seem to recognize her, and so she gave her the kind of quick up-and-down Maggie was well used to, a hint of dismissive derision in her eyes.
“I’m here for Mrs. Stein’s tea party,” Maggie said with as much dignity as she could muster. “Miss Margaret O’Halloran… Milliner.”
“Oh, you.” The maid nodded, not altogether in a friendly way. “I remember you. Seems Mrs. Stein did, too.” She opened the door wider. “I guess you ought to come in.”
Maggie would have liked to put the impertinent maid in her place—she was a guest of her mistress, after all—but she knew she couldn’t spare the effort, or risk doing such a thing.
Until she had a dozen commissions, a workshop on State Street, and a name for millinery known throughout the city, she could not let herself be bothered by disdainful maids, or really, anyone else.
“Thank you,” she said in a dignified voice, her chin raised high, and she stepped into the foyer.
The maid led her down the front hall to a parlor that faced the back garden, a pleasant room dressed in light blue and ivory, with plenty of potted plants and several women in various silks, satins, lawns or brocades assembled around, their skirts spread out, their heads cocked to the most fetching angle.
“Ah, here she is!” Mrs. Stein exclaimed, clapping her hands lightly. “Our very own soon-to-be celebrity.”
Maggie laughed lightly, embarrassed and pleased in equal measure. She was hardly a celebrity; in reality, she was little more than a glorified maid. Still, she smiled graciously at the women, half a dozen in total including Mrs. Wyatt, as she moved into the room.
“Thank you so much for inviting me,” Maggie said, glancing around the room but directing the words to Mrs. Stein, who was seated on a throne-like chair by the tea table. “It’s such a pleasure to be here.”
“And a pleasure to have you,” Mrs. Stein insisted in the same jovial voice. “Ladies, meet Margaret O’Halloran, your new milliner!”
A ripple of soft laughter moved around the room as the women all murmured their greetings, and Maggie murmured her own back.
She saw the women slide each other covert glances, their smiles turning slightly sly, and she realized uneasily that she couldn’t tell if Mrs. Stein was being facetious or not.
There was a kindly look about all the women as they smiled at her, but she feared there was a touch of condescension there too, the curious tilts of their heads, as if something about her was amusing.
Maggie had a sudden, lurching fear that she was here not because she was in demand, or even because Mrs. Stein was doing her a favor, but as an act of charity, of pity, and even though she knew she had no choice but to accept her patroness’ largesse, no matter what its motivation, the thought that these women might both pity and be amused by her was difficult to stomach indeed.
She wanted to be here because they were desperate for a hat of her design, because nothing else could possibly do, not because they were being kind.
“We thought it would be amusing,” Mrs. Wyatt explained, her arm draped over the back of her chair, “if we all wore hats designed by you to the Exposition dedication. Of course, they would have to be different enough that we didn’t look as if we were copying one another—disaster!
—but how ridiculously perplexing it would be for everyone, wondering where we obtained our hats.
” She laughed lightly, as if she’d told a wonderful joke.
“And when they learn they were all created by a shopgirl from Field’s… ”
A shopgirl from Field’s… This pronouncement was followed by a general titter, several women covering their mouths with their hands, while Maggie forced a smile to her stiff lips, trying not to let her instinctive horror of the prospect show on her face. Amusing. Perplexing! Ridiculous…
And the delight they seemed to take in the idea of confounding everyone by wearing a hat designed by a mere shopgirl, as if it were all a delicious joke…
And she was the butt of the joke, Maggie realized sickly. She was what was so amusing.
In a flash, she had sudden, piercing insight of how these women saw her.
How Mrs. Stein saw her. Yes, her hat had been a success; she had to believe that, for surely Mrs. Stein wouldn’t have worn it otherwise, but it hadn’t been the wildly different and delicious piece of millinery she had, to her own shame, considered it might be, as if she, with so little experience and knowledge of hat-making, already possessed the talent to make something truly unique.
It had been, she acknowledged, a nice hat, a little different, perhaps, and somewhat inexpertly made, but no more than that.
And while she still believed Mrs. Stein’s motives were kind, there was clearly an element of entertainment to the whole affair that made Maggie burn with shame.
Yet how could she protest or refuse now?
She needed these commissions, now more than ever.
She needed these women to wear her hats to the Exhibition.
And maybe it would make her a complete laughing stock—these women’s jest the equivalent of them wearing their children’s homemade bonnets, laughing in delight at the silly, juvenile creations—but at least it would give her exposure, as well as the payment for half a dozen hats that she sorely needed.
She could not afford to stand on pride, as much as she wished she could, and so she let out a light laugh, tossing her head, and smiling widely.
“How completely delightful,” she enthused, as if she were in on the joke instead of the butt of it.
“How they will all be wondering! Well, ladies, let us make the most of our time.” She turned to Mrs. Stein, determined to take as much control of the situation as she was able.
“Perhaps, over tea, we could discuss the designs? I will need to know the details of your gowns, of course—if you are willing to part with such secrets!” She laughed again, lightly, suppressing the urge to grit her teeth, or even to scream.
This was the situation she had, she told herself, and by heaven, she would make the most of it.
An hour and a half later, Maggie had written down the basic details of each woman’s gown, including color and fabric.
She’d offered to have an initial sketch finished within the week, but the women insisted they didn’t need to see a sketch—it would be amusing, again, if they were surprised by their own hats, and wore them regardless, like children at a birthday party festooned with paper crowns.
Maggie almost thought they wanted the hats to be ridiculous, for that would make the whole escapade even funnier.
“It’s because it’s the Exhibition dedication,” one of the women, a Mrs. Deloitte, said in a sympathetic tone, the look in her hazel eyes suggesting she understood something of the feeling Maggie was struggling to suppress.
“It’s the perfect time to wear something that is either the height of fashion, or otherwise incredible, even absurd.
And with you we have a chance of one or the other!
” She laughed while Maggie smiled tightly, doing her best not to take offense at the insult, for she was sure Mrs. Deloitte didn’t mean it as such.
She knew, however, she did not want to design hats that were seen as absurd.
“I believe I have what I need,” Maggie told them all as she closed her notebook.
She was aching with tiredness, and despite the significant achievement of having gained six commissions, she nearly had the urge to weep.
Keeping her smile as well as her cheerfully professional manner had utterly exhausted her.
“So I will leave you to your refreshments, ladies, and see myself out.”
She glanced at Mrs. Stein in query, who gave a small nod of acquiescence.
She was not, Maggie understood, a true guest of the party.
She had not even had a cup of tea. And the women would want to gossip and chat without her present, probably about her, the silly little shopgirl who had such fanciful pretensions.
She rose carefully from her chair, the smile curving her lips feeling as brittle as glass, and the women gave her various smiles and waves of dismissal before she walked out of the room on legs that felt both wobbly and stiff.
Out in the hall, a gust of breath escaped her and tears pricked her eyes.
“Stupid…” she whispered, biting her lip. “So stupid.”
“There you are.”
Before Maggie could so much as blink, a hand caught her arm and pulled her into the next room, a library decked out with leatherbound volumes and several deep armchairs.
Theo.
His name slipped out before Maggie could catch herself as she glimpsed his liquid eyes and lazy smile in the gloom of the chamber. “What are you doing here?”
His dark, peaked eyebrows rose. “What I am doing in my own house?”
“I meant at a ladies’ tea party,” she explained stiffly.
“But I’m not at a ladies’ tea party,” he told her, his voice dropping to a husky murmur that felt, as it often did, far too intimate. “I’m in here with you.”
“Which you shouldn’t be,” Maggie retorted. After the afternoon’s quiet humiliation, she had no intention of being trifled with yet again. “Good day to you, Mr. Stein.” She turned to go, and he grabbed her arm again.
“Wait.”
Maggie stilled, her voice sounding as if it were squeezed out through her throat as she said painfully, “Please let go of my arm, sir.”
“Now, now, Maggie, don’t be like that.” He tugged her toward him and reluctantly she came; he was stronger than her, and fighting him, she told herself, was surely beneath them both.
Theo studied her face, his mouth turning down at the corner as his laughing expression dropped.
“Maggie… what’s wrong? I thought you’d be delighted right now, but you look as if you’re down in the veriest dumps. ”
“I’m just tired,” Maggie insisted, averting her gaze. “And I have a great deal of work to do, so—”
“I know that’s not it.” He took her chin between his thumb and his forefinger, forcing her to look at him. “What happened?”
Maggie let out a hiss of angry breath, her whole body throbbing with the indignation of being touched in such a manner. “You take far too many liberties, Mr. Stein,” she told him sharply, “with a shopgirl from Field’s.”
He frowned, ignoring the accusation, her chin still held between his thumb and finger. “It’s the women, isn’t it?” he finally surmised. “You felt they looked down on you.”
Maggie could not bear to answer, and in any case, her throat had become too thick to allow for words.
“They’re just a bunch of useless biddies, my mother included,” Theo told her, an urgency in his tone. “You know that Maggie, don’t you?”
She tried to twist her head away from him, and thankfully he dropped his fingers from her chin. “It doesn’t matter,” she said quietly. “Now, please, I need to go.”
“It matters if you’ve been upset by them,” Theo insisted quietly. “I hate to see you hurt.”
Maggie let out a choking laugh. “And yet it is your behavior that could hurt me, or at least my reputation, most of all!” she exclaimed, finally finding the strength to fully twist away from him. “Now let me go.”
The words came out in a cry that sounded far too like a sob, and in the next instant she was wrapped tightly in Theo’s arms, too shocked to breathe, never mind cry.
“What—?” she finally gasped out, only to have Theo’s mouth come down firmly on hers.