Secret Sisters

by Joy Callaway

  He stopped, no doubt waiting for signs of fury or embarrassment, but I only shrugged and took the letter. I still hadn’t received an assignment and had quite resigned myself to the fact that I wouldn’t have one. The return address was handwritten, from a Hospital for Women and Children in Chicago. I’d never heard of it.

  “I mentioned you to my stepfather,” he continued. “He remembered you from the board meeting and was furious that you’d been turned down by so many institutions on account of your gender. The letter is from a physician and surgeon, Mary Thompson. She started the hospital in ’Sixty-five to treat indigent women and children, but the structure burned down in the ’Seventy-one fire. My father assisted her in securing a new building a few years ago. The institution is practically swarming with patients and they need help.”

  I slid my finger under the seal, removed the letter, and read it.

  Dear Miss Carrington,

  My name is Doctor Mary Thompson. I’m a surgeon by trade, a graduate of the New England Female Medical College, and the founder of the Chicago Hospital for Women and Children. As Mr. Torrey may have been kind enough to relay on my behalf, we are significantly understaffed. Our wards fill to overflowing daily, but unfortunately, our ability to recruit skilled physicians to our cause has been crippled by other hospitals’ recruitment efforts as well as the sort of patient we treat—impoverished women and children whose needs and care are so often ignored.

  It’s my understanding that you are one of the brightest pupils in your class. It has also come to my attention that you’re seeking an apprenticeship. I would value your service should you find a hospital such as mine a satisfactory environment in which to learn.

  Sincerely,

  Doctor Mary Thompson

  I looked at the letter again, hardly believing my fortune. My hands would be working after all; I’d be learning.

  “Thank you so much for doing this for me. It means the world. How lovely you are—to our Lily, to me,” I said.

  “You’re very welcome.” He straightened his jacket and glanced over my head at the door.

  “She’ll be coming out soon enough,” I said. “And please tell your father how grateful I am for his help and that I’ll write to Dr. Thompson straightaway.”

  “Very good. Say hello to Buchannan for me,” Mr. Langley called out as I made my way through the aisle of oaks and down the hill. He and Will had become friends since Mary’s death. Together, they’d kept us fed and occupied in the dark days after the funeral, forcing us to keep up with our classes, reminding us that we couldn’t wallow in despair.

  I passed under the arch and walked the long way across the quad. Black-robed professors and faculty scurried back and forth from the chapel on the other side of campus to Old Main. I looked across the plain of flat green grass to the chapel’s stone walls and towering steeple—at the cheery ribbons of fuchsia, lavender, and green swooping down from the door, and the vibrant bouquets of peonies, irises, and hollyhocks at the base of the steps. The Women of Whitsitt had done a remarkable job decorating the chapel. It was hard to imagine that it was the same grim place we’d said farewell to Mary.

  I ran my hand along the boxwoods as I passed Old Main and walked under the arch toward the Iota house. Most of the brothers had already dressed for the day and were congregating on the porch in their tuxedos, smoking foul-smelling cigars. Absorbed in their conversation, no one took notice of me.

  I snaked around the side of the house, watching Mr. Stephens lean back against one of the pillars, gray rose flopped sloppily against his black vest, cigar clutched in his teeth. The pungent scent of peat and earth drifted toward me in a cloud, and I coughed as I walked through it, relieved when the house blocked the wind. A horse whinnied in the distance—a breathy snort from the stable down Hideaway Hill—and I paused at the basement window. Closing my eyes, I saw Mary’s face as clearly as if she’d just been in front of me—eyes fixed on James’s robed figure, mouth turned up as though she couldn’t wait to poke fun at him for his compliance with Grant’s schemes.

  “I will always remember you,” I whispered.

  I walked into the house, and paused in the drafty dimness. My fingers rested on the carved mahogany railing, eyes fixed on the lion mural. It was a bit improper to walk right in, but it was a much easier way to Will than through his brothers on the front porch. I doubted that anyone would be keen to abandon their cigars to fetch him for me anyway.

  “It seems like years since you came in that first time.” My gaze lifted from the silver rose to see Grant, who was sitting on the other side of the stairwell. He rose from a small wooden chair. “You could have come through the front door, you know.”

  “Why start now?” I asked. Grant smiled, a handsome complement to his black tuxedo adorned with silver threading—the graduation suit of an Iota Gamma.

  “Beth, I . . . before I graduate, before I leave this place, I need to thank you. You changed me.”

  I shook my head.

  “That’s not true,” I said. His forehead wrinkled in disagreement. “It’s not. You always had it inside of you, the capability to do the right thing.”

  “Perhaps. But I didn’t. Until you . . . and until . . .” He reached into his pocket, withdrew a gold locket and opened the hinge to a miniature of Mary nearly identical to Beta Xi Beta’s shared portrait. In the few times I’d seen him since her death, I’d caught him looking at it, forcing the reminder of the sister he’d never really known.

  “She would be proud of you,” I whispered. “She doubted you’d come to our side, but always hoped you would.”

  “My redemption came at the cost of so many,” he said, his voice faltering. “Father will be here today. He wants me to take him to Everett Hall and to the music college. To see where she lived and studied before we depart tomorrow.”

  Grant had just turned down a position working on his uncle’s political campaign to accept a post running the New York operations of his father’s company. He’d resisted the role at first, not keen to work alongside his mother, but had eventually conceded that his family’s company was where he belonged.

  He cleared his throat. “I know it was Miss Adams’s wish to keep Mary’s paternity a secret to the rest of the world, but would it have been hers?”

  “Yes,” I said immediately. It hadn’t been the first time I’d thought of it since Judith had asked Grant to keep the secret of Mary’s paternity between him and his father. She’d been right to ask. The news of a deceased bastard child of a well-known coal tycoon would be a scandal, one Judith wanted to avoid—mostly for herself as well as for the Richardsons. “As much as Mary loved a good rumor, I don’t believe she’d want the cost of the world knowing hers.”

  “What cost?” Grant’s eyes narrowed. “Our reputation? It would be nothing compared to a life . . . to the lives I’ve destroyed. Mary is gone and Sanderson will never be the same, I—”

  “James leaving Whitsitt was his choice,” I interrupted. “Katherine says he’s doing well at Washington and Lee.”

  “He left because he couldn’t bear the reminder that the woman he loves is dead,” Grant said.

  “Stop.” I clutched his hand and let it go. “Remember all the good that you’ve done, all the lives that you’ve changed by fulfilling Mary’s last wish.”

  The morning after her funeral, I’d gone with Grant to petition the board to officially establish Beta Xi Beta. With Grant’s promise to finish his degree at Whitsitt and his money, they’d granted our request, even agreeing to help us secure a charter when we felt it was time to expand Beta Xi Beta to other campuses. I’d been amazed, standing there, at the ease of it all, at the way greed ruled over the otherwise antiquated ideals of Whitsitt’s board members. Mr. Torrey had given a standing ovation when President Wilson finally gave his consent, a gesture that prompted the president to immediately retreat to his office.

  “I should have helped when you asked the first time,” he said. “In any case, I did nothing but throw my mone
y at the board.”

  He leaned on the banister, closer to me. The scent of coconut and palm eclipsed the slight fragrance of cigar smoke, conjuring the memory of the time when I found his arms home, an echo of days that now confounded me in light of my love for Will.

  “It doesn’t matter how you did it,” I said. “You made our dreams a reality. You changed the course of history for women studying here.”

  “Hardly,” he snorted. “Don’t give me credit when it should be given to you and your sisters. What will I do when I’ve gone back to New York and you’re not there to talk me out of my guilt?”

  I smiled.

  “You and I both know that I haven’t had to do that for some time. You’re managing quite well on your own.”

  For nearly two weeks after Mary’s funeral, whenever I was consolable enough to emerge from my studies or the dormitory, Will and I would hover around Grant, reminding him of Miss Adams’s sentiments—a practice that had often been a balm to my own regret and immense heartache. Grant hadn’t wanted to come out of his room; he’d refused to go to his courses. And then one day, he woke up and told Will that he hadn’t been living for Mary and had decided to begin. Even he hadn’t known the reason for his perspective suddenly changing, but we were all thankful that it had.

  Grant looked down at my dress.

  “It’s a landmark day for the sisters of Beta Xi Beta,” he said. He unpinned the gray rose at his lapel and fastened it next to my ivory one. “This is how it should be. Always. Just as you’re sisters, consider Iota Gamma your brothers. We met on the matter last night. The others are in agreement. Well, most of them.”

  He grinned, and then his eyes met mine.

  “I’ll see you at the ceremony.”

  I watched him walk toward the foyer—the proud broad shoulders, the upturned chin, characteristics of a confident man—hoping that someday he’d feel the same inside.

  “I haven’t missed it, have I?” Will’s voice was hoarse with sleep. I looked up and found him standing on the landing above me. He was still wearing his nightshirt, which he’d tucked sloppily into gray trousers. Of course he’d wait until the last possible moment to dress for the ceremony. He descended the steps to find me, and his hands instantly engulfed mine. “If I have, I—”

  “You haven’t,” I said, grinning at his worried expression.

  “Thank goodness,” he said, pulling me closer to him. I knew I should resist—he wasn’t even properly dressed—but the rest of the men were either on the porch or on the way to the ceremony, and I wanted to be close to him. The light scent of sandalwood engulfed the stench of dirty laundry and cigars as I sank into his chest, reveling in his body warm against mine. “I’d forever regret sleeping through Beta Xi Beta’s inaugural graduation ceremony.”

  “I have some news,” I whispered against his cheek. “I’ve been offered an apprenticeship.”

  “What?” He leaned away from me and smiled.

  “I’ve just received a letter from a Doctor Thompson at the Hospital for Women and Children in Chicago. Mr. Torrey helped her obtain a new building after the fire in ’Seventy-one and knew they needed help. He contacted Doctor Thompson on my behalf.”

  “I’m so happy for you, but, I’m going to miss you terribly.” Will had decided to serve as an apprentice to his grandfather’s practice in Newark after turning down a few offers from smaller physicians in Chicago. “I suppose this means you’ll have to tell your father about your studies?”

  I startled at the thought. In the excitement, I hadn’t considered the consequences, but of course I’d have to tell him. I’d be living with him after all, venturing out early and returning late.

  “I . . . I suppose it does,” I said, suddenly nervous. “He could turn me out, Will. He could stop funding my schooling. He could—”

  “He could do a lot of things, Beth, but he won’t.”

  “Surely you don’t believe he isn’t capable. He barely allowed me to go to Whitsitt in the first place. You know how he is. His reputation is supremely important to him, and fine families don’t have physicians for daughters.”

  Perhaps I couldn’t accept the apprenticeship after all. I couldn’t risk my father’s disapproval before I’d earned my diploma. After that, he could do nothing to hinder my ambitions.

  “My parents know about your studies and find your aspirations altogether honorable.”

  “They do?”

  “Do you think . . . do you think there’s a chance my father already knows?”

  Will shook his head.

  “Probably not. At least they wouldn’t have heard it from my parents. I told them to keep your progress close to the chest. But it’ll be all right,” he whispered as he circled an arm around my waist. “If your father threatens you or your future in any way, go to my house. My parents will keep you. They’ll take you in and they’ll see to it that your education continues, though I’m certain that the moment your father realizes his boss has offered to pay for it, he’ll come to his senses.”

  He was right. My father both idolized Will’s father and loathed the thought of charity.

  “Are you sure your parents would do that for me? If he doesn’t come around, I mean. My tuition would only be a loan of course, but—”

  “Beth,” he said, stopping me. “It wouldn’t be a question. They love you . . . they know how much I love you. And they love us together. I’ll write them about the matter today.”

  My mind raced, sure there was something else, something that would prevent me from accepting the apprenticeship regardless of the Buchannans’ overwhelming generosity. “Stop fretting, my dear. There’s nothing to worry about and you’re ruining your day.”

  “Please don’t inhale too much ether this summer,” I said suddenly, and he laughed. “I can’t do without you and I’d like you to remember me when we come back in September.”

  “Anesthesia wouldn’t have the power to take you from me. Even dead I’d never forget you.”

  He threaded a hand around the nape of my neck and kissed me. Though we’d made a habit of stealing kisses when we could, the mix of tenderness and ferocity still made me weak. I touched his face, palm resting on the sharp stubble. Brushing his hair back, I kissed his temple. His arms constricted around me and then his hands drifted slowly up my back. My body tingled at his touch.

  “You, my love, are the most glorious sight I’ve ever seen,” he whispered, and pulled my face to his. “And as much as I’d like to continue . . . this,” he said, running his fingers over my arms, “it’s not proper, nor is the stairwell suitable. Not to mention that I absolutely refuse to be responsible for the President of Beta Xi Beta appearing rumpled at the ceremony.”

  I laughed.

  “So that’s why your suits are always wrinkled?”

  “No,” he said. “I blame the armoire for my suits. It doesn’t hang them for me.”

  “Buchannan! Where the hell are you? It’s time.” Grant’s voice boomed from the front of the house.

  Will rolled his eyes and grinned.

  “I’ll be there when I’m ready, Richardson,” he yelled back. Since Mary’s death, Grant and Will had both softened, and now tolerated each other nearly to the point of friends.

  “I love you,” I said. I started to turn away, but he pulled me back.

  “Did Richardson give you that rose?” He tipped his chin at the gray rose fastened next to my ivory one.

  I nodded.

  “He said that he’d like Iota Gamma to act as a brother fraternity to Beta Xi Beta.”

  “And we will,” he said, and lifted his hand to my face. “I’m rather thankful that I’ve got something for you. I wouldn’t want to be outdone by another man. He may still love you, but I love you more.”

  Will reached into his pocket and withdrew a black velvet box.

  “What . . . what is it?” I asked.

  “I’m not asking you to wear my ring, if that’s what you’re wondering,” he said. “Not that I wouldn’t marry you
this moment if you’d say yes. But I think you want to wait?”

  I nodded and took the box from his hand.

  “I thought you could wear it today,” he said.

  I pushed the lid back to find a silver pendant etched with the Iota Gamma letters. Will turned it over, revealing Beta Xi Beta’s on the other side. “I went to have a lavalier made, but it didn’t seem right for you to wear my letters without your own.”

  I ran my fingers over the indention of our letters in the silver. Tears burned my eyes, but I blinked them away.

  “It’s lovely,” I said. “Would you put it on for me?”

  I turned so he could fasten it around my neck.

  “You can wear it on either side to display your letters or mine.” His lips pressed against my nape, and he let the clasp go. “I expect that you’ll want to wear your letters most, but I want you to remember when you do, that there are letters behind it. Those letters have promised to support Beta Xi Beta, as I will always support you.”

  I sighed, fingering the new pendant.

  “I suppose I should go up to change now before Richardson has my head,” he said, then squeezed my hand and let it go before stepping around me to open a small closet door beneath the stairs. There was a lone jacket, just pressed, hanging on the rack. He grabbed it and started up the stairs to dress.

  “You had your jacket ironed?”

  “Of course,” he said, hastening past me. “There are going to be quite a number of men in black tuxedos. I can’t risk you finding another more handsome.”

  * * *

  “Hold it just out from your chest,” I said as I wiped a bead of sweat from my forehead and pulled Anne’s arms down, dropping the wooden Xi to a position right in front of her.

  The line snaking toward the chapel moved forward, and I glanced up in time to catch Will’s wink at me as the black-jacketed Iota Gammas filed past the bouquets and through the ribbon-adorned doors.

  Victoria craned her neck around me to look at Anne.