“Exactly,” Rahel said.
She was already reaching for pen and paper, already making plans.
Yetta loved having a sister who was a revolutionary.
Jane
Jane Wellington was on her way to tea in Washington Square. She was late, because the traffic was abominable, and because Miss Milhouse had found fault with Jane’s grooming.
“Sally, those tendrils are going flat already,” Miss Milhouse sniffed. “And is that a tangle I see hiding at the back? You simply must do a better job with her hair.”
“Yes, miss. Yes, miss.” Sally bowed and scraped and did everything but throw herself on the floor and beg for mercy, like a repentant criminal in one of the novels Jane wasn’t supposed to read.
Miss Milhouse was Jane’s chaperon, and had been ever since Jane’s mother died seven years earlier, when Jane was nine. Sally was Jane’s new Irish maid. Jane had a feeling that Sally wouldn’t last long.
It took forever for Sally to take all the pins out of Jane’s lank, dark hair and recomb, recurl, recrimp, and repile the entire mass back on top of Jane’s head. It took forever for Miss Milhouse to inspect the new hairstyle and pronounce it “adequate.” The chauffeur was waiting at the door, fortunately, but then he drove down Fifth Avenue, where the cars inched along as slowly as horses.
“Remember,” Miss Milhouse lectured, “Miss Aberfoyle’s brother has just married Sylvia Van Rensselaer, whose family is quite prominent. Why, the Van Rensselaers were part of Mrs. Astor’s Four Hundred from the very beginning. . . .”
It was a source of great anxiety to Miss Milhouse that Jane’s family was not one of the old New York society families. The Wellington name had not been on the list of those who truly mattered when it was leaked to the society press in the 1890s. In the 1890s, Jane’s father was only beginning to accumulate his fortune.
“But I could buy and sell most of those families now,” Jane had heard her father brag once when he’d had too much port to drink.
Sometimes that was enough in society, to have that much money. Sometimes it wasn’t. Miss Milhouse was very eager for Jane to understand all the rules and unspoken rules of society. But the rules mostly made Jane feel like she was about to break out in hives.
“If you could perhaps contrive to sit next to Miss Aberfoyle, that would be most wise,” Miss Milhouse was saying now.
“Perhaps I shall,” Jane said, though she was thinking, Oh, please, anyone but Lilly Aberfoyle. Lilly Aberfoyle was a prissy, brainless bore. Lilly Aberfoyle also made Jane feel like breaking out in hives.
Barely listening as Miss Milhouse droned on, Jane peered out the window. They were almost to Washington Square now, and the sidewalks were packed. Suddenly a great crowd of girls about Jane’s age piled out of one of the buildings. Their cheeks were rosy and their eyes bright, and they were chattering away excitedly. They looked like they were having a lot more fun than Jane had ever had going to tea.
“Is that a school?” Jane asked, pressing her face close against the glass. “Meeting in the summertime?”
“It’s not a very good one, if their clothes are any indication,” Miss Milhouse said scornfully.
For the first time, Jane noticed that some of the girls’ skirts were ragged; the flowers and feathers on many of their hats were limp and bedraggled.
“Can you see a sign anywhere?” she persisted. “I just want to know. . . .”
“It’s a factory, miss,” the chauffeur said from the front seat. “Triangle Waist Company. Sign’s up there, at the top of the building.”
“Oh.” Jane leaned back against her seat but kept watching. “Girls work in factories?”
“Yes, miss,” the chauffeur said. “My niece started in a factory when she was twelve, sewing buttons on coats, and now she makes—”
“Mr. Corrigan!” Miss Milhouse scolded. “I’m certain that Miss Wellington doesn’t care to hear the particulars of your niece’s employment!”
Jane didn’t, not really. But there was something about those girls spilling out from the Triangle Waist Factory. Something she couldn’t quite name but almost envied.
They arrived at the tea party and made their apologies for being late. All the usual girls were there: Lilly Aberfoyle and Mary Stewart and Iris Ferrier and Pearl Kensington and Daisy Cornell . . . Jane had known these girls all her life; they all went to the same finishing school, where they learned how to curtsy properly and select the proper utensils at fancy dinner parties and write proper thank-you notes afterward. The conversation today centered on dresses and dances and the details of Lilly’s brother’s wedding. Somehow, today, Jane wasn’t interested. She stared down at her delicate bone china cup and thought she could see the rest of her life, all those afternoons spent drinking tea with these same girls, every one of them so carefully obeying all the society rules. Of course, there’d be a flurry of excitement when they all got married and had children. But husbands went off to work every day—or to yacht or hunt or play polo or golf—and there would be servants for raising the children. And that would leave Jane with her tepid tea and her bone china and these girls who could make an hour’s conversation out of nothing.
“I saw some factory girls on the way here,” Jane blurted suddenly, rudely interrupting Lilly’s description of the gold crest on the dinner plates at the wedding.
The other girls stared at Jane as if she’d suggested they discuss water closets or head colds or something else equally unpleasant and unmentionable.
After a moment, Daisy Cornell, the hostess of the party, replied, “Oh, yes, they’ve put factories in some of the lofts near Washington Square. My father says it’s simply appalling, to have that kind so close by.”
The other girls tsk-tsk-ed or murmured “What a pity!” and “Such a shame!” Jane saw that they’d completely misunderstood her.
“I don’t know,” Jane said. “These girls looked rather . . . interesting.” She shifted in her chair a bit, rustling the layers of her skirts. “I wonder what they think about, girls like that?”
“Oh, please,” Lilly said, tossing her head and shaking the perfectly curled tendrils that dangled from her coiffure. “I’m sure they don’t think, not exactly, not like us. They’re more like servants, who aren’t capable of thinking about anything more advanced than dusting and polishing and washing dirty dishes. And sometimes”—she giggled prettily—“my mama says they’re not even capable of that.”
Jane watched the servant girl who was refilling Lilly’s teacup at that very moment. She had the red hair and the pale, freckled skin that were so common among the Irish servants; she might well be the twin of Jane’s maid Sally. An angry blush crept up the girl’s cheeks; Jane could tell she was biting the inside of her lip the same way Jane did when she was trying not to cry.
If I were that servant, Jane thought, strangely, I’d make sure I spilled that whole pot of tea all over Lilly’s white dress.
The servant did nothing of the sort, only finished up pouring and walked briskly back to the kitchen.
“You sound just like my cousin Eleanor, wondering about such curious things as what factory girls think,” Pearl said to Jane. “Ever since Eleanor went to Vassar, she’s had the oddest ideas.”
“Vassar?” Lilly said. “Your cousin Eleanor is attending college? My father says college is too taxing for a girl’s delicate constitution. Not to mention that education would be completely wasted on a female.”
It probably would be, on you, Jane thought bitterly. And then she felt guilty. How was she so much better than Lilly? What did she know about, besides curtsying and dinner parties and prim, proper thank-you notes?
Daisy cleared her throat, somehow managing to make it a delicate, feminine sound.
“Oh, Lilly, I did so want to hear the rest of your description of the dinner plates at the wedding,” she said.
I need new friends, Jane thought, and the force of her conviction surprised her. These had been her best friends all her life. If they were a little
tiresome today—well, weren’t they always?
At her earliest opportunity, Jane leaned over to Pearl and said quietly, “Would it be possible for me to meet your cousin Eleanor?”
Bella
Bella snipped another thread, imagining that, as it fell, it turned into a grain of wheat pouring into a bucket in Mama’s hands. The next thread became a grape, one of a huge bunch of grapes that Bella’s brothers were cramming into their mouths—cramming, because now they had so much food that they didn’t have to eat slowly or savor each bite.
It’d been three months since Bella had left home, nearly three months of working and sending money back. She was good enough at her job now that while her hands raced through the shirtwaists, her mind could travel anywhere she wanted to go. She’d mentally returned to Calia a million times, watching her family go about their improved lives-eating feasts three times a day, buying a new hoe to replace their rusty one, maybe even splurging on a bit of ribbon for Guilia’s hair. She loved to imagine Mama’s reaction every time more money arrived from America: Probably Mama would throw her hands up in the air, crying out, “O, grazie, Madonna mia. Grazie, Dio mio. Grazie per la mia figlia Bella!” Probably she’d weep tears of joy.
Bella had no way of knowing what was actually happening in Calia. Neither she nor Mama could read or write, of course. The priest in Calia was grouchy about writing letters for villagers; even if Mama talked him into sending one, Bella knew no one in America who could read it for her. So Bella’s daydreams about home didn’t change much—it was the wheat, the boys with the grapes, Guilia’s ribbon, Mama weeping for joy, over and over and over again.
More and more, as she sat hunched over the shirtwaists, Bella found her mind traveling in other directions. She tried to puzzle out the words she heard the other girls using— when they called Signor Carlotti an “allrightnik,” their eyes rolling and their noses scrunched up, that was an insult, wasn’t it? And what was this “union” they kept whispering about?
Mostly, though, Bella thought about Pietro. Pietro . . . Just the thought of his name was enough to cheer her up when her back ached and her eyes blurred and her fingers throbbed from her grip on the scissors. In real life, she barely saw him. He walked her to and from work, before and after his own job digging ditches. In the evenings he went out. Just about every conversation they had was in the midst of dodging peddlers, pickpockets, and horse droppings, or in the midst of the Luciano baby crying, Signor and Signora Luciano screaming at each other, the dirty Luciano children punching each other in the stomach.
But in her daydreams, Bella and Pietro sat on the fire escape together, just the two of them. The laundry fluttered and the stars twinkled above them. They gazed into each other’s eyes. They—oh, please, don’t even imagine this! It will make your hands tremble, you’ll cut the shirtwaist! Oh, all right, go ahead. Just be careful—-they leaned in together for a kiss.
Oh, be still, my heart . . .
Bella had heard the other girls talk about going out with boyfriends to dances, or to the movies—she knew what they were saying because they demonstrated bits and pieces of the dance steps, they gestured the scope of a huge movie screen. So she tried to imagine that, too. The dances made for dizzying daydreams, but she’d never been to a movie, so she couldn’t picture that at all. She planned to ask Pietro this very evening if he’d ever gone. And if he thought she was hinting at anything, if he thought she was flirting . . .
So be it, Bella thought, blushing in spite of herself.
“Bella?” It was Signor Carlotti, not screaming at her for once. “A girl is sick. We need you to operate one of the machines.”
“Me?” Bella squeaked out. “At the machines?”
She could understand Signor Carlotti better now, though she still thought he was speaking some other language besides Italian.
“We’ll pay you more. We’ll pay . . . four dollars and twenty-five cents a week.”
Twenty-five cents more a week? That was hundreds more grains of wheat for Mama, dozens more grapes for Bella’s brothers. And a ribbon for Guilia for sure.
“Si,” Bella said, jumping up. “I’ll do it.”
Signor Carlotti showed her to the vacant machine. He showed her how to make the needle go up and down, how to feed the material through. All she had to do was sew one straight seam up the side of a half-sewn shirtwaist, and then pass the shirtwaist to the next girl in line.
“You try,” Signor Carlotti said.
Bella wasn’t prepared for how hungrily the machine gobbled at the material. The thread snarled; the delicate shirtwaist tore.
Signor Carlotti snarled and swore.
“That’s a shirtwaist ruined,” he said. “That’ll come out of your salary, young lady!”
Twenty-five cents extra minus the cost of every shirtwaist I ruin? Bella wondered. I could end up losing money on my new job !
“But it’s my first time!” Bella protested.
“And it will be your last if you don’t do better,” Signor Carlotti growled.
Bella bit her lip. This time, she fed the shirtwaist through the machine more carefully, pumping the needle as slowly as possible.
“All right,” Signor Carlotti said. “But if you don’t get faster soon, you’ll be back cutting threads.”
For the rest of the day, Bella worked steadily. Her palms were sweaty and her stomach twisted in knots, and she stopped every few seconds to pray for the strength to go on. The sewing machine was a gleaming, glossy black that reminded her of the landowner’s horse back in Italy; sewing, Bella felt like she was holding on to the reins of a wild stallion. She couldn’t risk even a single second of thinking about Pietro or Calia or anything else. But by the end of the day, she’d managed to sew dozens of shirtwaists without ruining a single other one.
Proudly, she stood up to take her pay for the week from Signor Carlotti. He counted out three dollars and one thin dime into her hand. Bella stood there waiting for the other dollar, the other fifteen cents. But Signor Carlotti had already moved on to the next girl.
“Wait,” Bella said. “You said you’d pay me four dollars and twenty-five cents.”
“You ruined a shirtwaist,” Signor Carlotti said.
“Only one!”
“And you were a learner on the machine today. Remember, learners don’t get paid. So that’s only five days of work, minus twenty cents for the ruined shirtwaist—yep, three-ten.”
Bella gasped.
“You tricked me!” she said. “You promised me four twenty-five! You told me I’d make more money on the machine!”
“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Signor Carlotti said. “If you’re too stupid to learn English, at least learn proper Italian.”
Bella glared at him. She knew he knew what she was saying. But how could she defend herself if he wouldn’t even listen? Desperately, she glanced at the other girls around her. None of them were Italian, but they seemed to understand. They peered at her with sympathy in their eyes, but they were shaking their heads fearfully.
“Don’t fight—he’ll fire you,” one girl whispered. Bella could figure out what she was saying just by the resignation in her voice.
“I’m telling Pietro,” Bella said. “He’ll make you give me my money!”
She stalked toward the elevators, but there was a huge crush of workers all wanting to leave at once. Bella was too angry to wait. Wasn’t there any other way out? For the first time, she noticed a door at the other end of the building; she rushed over to it and peeked through the glass pane in the door—stairs! She turned the knob and shoved against the door, but it was locked.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” a man said angrily. He jerked her away from the door, then shoved her back toward the crowd again.
Bella circled the sewing machine tables widely so she didn’t have to go right past Signor Carlotti again. This time, passing a row of windows, she looked out and noticed that there was a small, rickety fire escape leading down toward the ground in the narro
w space between buildings. Fine. She’d go out that way. Bella was just beginning to tug on the window, trying to push it up, when she heard the man yelling at her again.
This time, he clamped his hand around her arm and pulled her through the crowd until they reached the guard who always watched the girls leave, inspecting their purses and their hair, sometimes even patting down their blouses or skirts. Bella had never understood what he was doing, and he’d never bothered her much, since she didn’t have a purse or a fancy hairdo. But now the man shoved her toward the guard and said something like, “Search this one very thoroughly”— Bella guessed that was what he said, because the guard began sliding his hands along her sleeves, then reaching for her waist, even her breasts . . .
“How dare you!” Bella screamed, pulling away.
“Where’d you hide the shirtwaists?” the guard muttered, Bella understanding the word “shirtwaists” and figuring out the rest. And then, with a searing shame, she realized: They thought she was stealing shirtwaists. That’s what the guard was looking for every afternoon when he peered into purses, when he curled his fingers into girls’ puffs of hair, when he felt under their waistbands. And Bella, by trying to leave without going past the guard, had looked particularly suspicious.
This is what they think of me? Bella wondered. They think I would actually do that?
The shame of being seen as a thief mixed with the shame of being groped by a total stranger, and rooted Bella to the spot.
“Go on, then,” the guard said, shoving her forward. “She’s got nothing.”
Nobody apologized. Bella whirled around, past the elevators, just wanting to hide her shame. She stepped through another doorway—oh, here were stairs she could use. She didn’t care if she was supposed to or not; she just took off running down the steps. It was nine flights of stairs down to the ground floor, and she raced down them two at a time. Bursting out into the crisp autumn air, she let the door bang shut behind her.