The Hope Chest

by Karen Schwabach

  “I know,” said Chloe with a sigh.

  “And at that meeting I went to last night, that Senator Candler, the way he was talking, I think he really hates females. He doesn't think we're too good to vote, he thinks we're too bad.”

  “I know,” Chloe repeated. She was looking more tired by the minute.

  “Oh, and here are these stupid pamphlets I'm supposed to be passing out at the train station this afternoon.” Violet dropped the stack of leaflets on the table.

  Chloe picked one up. “ ‘Beware! Men of the South! Heed not the song of the suffrage siren!’ ” She managed to get all the exclamation points in without raising her voice. Chloe had always been good at making her voice expressive. Violet thought fondly of the stories about Alaska that Chloe used to tell her.

  “Read the inside,” said Violet.

  Chloe did and then dropped the pamphlet back on the table. “Oh, that old argument,” she said. “That there are more colored women than colored men in the South, so giving women the vote will increase the colored vote. ‘Save the Anglo-Saxon race!’ Most of those states don't even let colored people vote anyway.”

  “How come there are no colored suffragists?” Violet asked.

  “There are tons of colored suffragists,” said Chloe. “But they've been asked to stay out of sight.”

  “That's not fair,” said Violet. She felt she'd had a pretty thorough lifelong experience of what it was like to be seen and not heard, and being neither seen nor heard had to be even worse.

  “Of course it isn't,” said Chloe. “Drink your soda.”

  The bells on the door of the pharmacy jingled. A moment later Mr. Martin sat down next to them.

  “Do you mind if I join you?” he said belatedly.

  “Oh, hello, Theo.” Chloe instantly looked less tired.

  Violet studied the slowly turning wooden ceiling fans overhead while they talked. She would have liked to go somewhere else, because she was beginning to suspect that Myrtle was right and that Chloe had no intention of sending Mr. Martin to the rightabout. In fact, Chloe had probably told Mr. Martin they were going to be at the drugstore. The whole thing embarrassed Violet. She didn't understand it either, because both of the Mr. R.'s had been much better-looking and more suitable than Mr. Martin, not to mention richer. Plus they hadn't been Bolsheviks and they hadn't had Palmer agents looking for them. Violet got up and wandered over and looked at a display of boxed candies.

  “What do you mean, you have to go to the movies?” Mr. Martin was saying. “You don't even like movies! You don't like the grainy little lines running up and down the screen. They give you a headache.”

  “I know,” said Chloe, sounding like she already had a headache. “Maybe I'll take him to the burlesque instead.”

  “Just who is this fella, anyway?”

  “I don't know. We'll be assigned them this evening. We have to make sure the legislators have a good time so that they don't leave town over the weekend.”

  “Make sure they have a good time? Exactly what is that supposed to mean?”

  “Theo, please. You're causing a scene.”

  Violet drifted farther away. She tried to interest herself in a display of Sure-Fire Liquor Cures. She was aware that everyone in the drugstore was watching Chloe and Mr. Martin quarrel, and she wished Mr. Martin would remember that there were Palmer agents looking for him.

  Then she thought of something. If Mr. Martin was here, maybe Myrtle was around somewhere. Violet wanted to see her—and it would be a relief to talk to someone her own age after all the boring adult conversations she'd had to listen to lately.

  Violet found Myrtle hiding in a recessed doorway beside the drugstore, under a sign advertising Underwood Typewriters—The Machine You Will Eventually Buy.

  Myrtle was happy to see her, and they sat down on the stoop and exchanged news. Myrtle was jealous of Violet's job as a spy.

  “Because it's important,” Myrtle said. “I'm not doing anything important. I'm just waiting for them to vote.” She nodded upward at Capitol Hill.

  “You're keeping an eye on Mr. Martin,” Violet pointed out. “That's important. He needs someone to keep an eye on him.”

  “He sure does,” Myrtle agreed. “It's bad enough he has a scar on his face and three fingers missing. He doesn't need to go telling people how to change the way they do things all the time. It makes them remember him.”

  Violet thought Mr. Martin probably did need to go telling people to change the way they did things or he wouldn't be Mr. Martin. “He's in there making a scene right now,” she said.

  Myrtle looked apprehensive. “Maybe we should go in and stop him.”

  Violet shook her head. “I think that would just make it more of a scene.”

  Myrtle nodded, seeing the sense in this. “I don't know what's going to happen to him after this is all over. He's no good at hiding.”

  At the thought of “after this is all over,” they both lapsed into silence. Violet was thinking about Chloe, who had yet to say that Violet could come and live with her. Violet didn't want to go home. She didn't miss it at all. All right, she missed her own room, and her bed with the green chenille spread, and her shelf full of Oz books. But she didn't miss the empty, echoing loneliness of a house with no one in it but Stephen, who wasn't really there, and Father, who never talked except to issue edicts, and Mother, who had betrayed Violet.

  She supposed Myrtle was thinking about the Girls' Training Institute, and how she didn't want to go back there, and where she would go if she didn't.

  “When will it all be over?” said Myrtle.

  “No one knows,” said Violet. “The Senate might vote on the amendment today. Or they might not, which would mean maybe they'd vote on it Monday, or maybe not. And then the House might vote on it Monday, but they have to wait for a committee to recommend it—” She broke off, noting that Myrtle was laughing at her.

  “You sound like a politician or something,” said Myrtle.

  Violet shrugged. “ 'Cause I've been listening to so much political talk lately.” She thought of how sick she was of political talk. “I should come visit you and Mr. Martin where you're staying, and maybe we could go—”

  “No,” said Myrtle.

  Violet looked away, stung. A colored man in overalls was sweeping the edge of the sidewalk, his broom making gritty swishing sounds as he swept clouds of dust into the gutter.

  “It's just not that interesting a place. You'd be bored,” Myrtle said, sounding half apologetic.

  Before Violet could reply, the door to the drugstore burst open and Mr. Martin stormed out. Violet could just imagine the eyes of everyone in the place following him and his scar and his missing fingers that the Palmer agents had such a good description of.

  Myrtle jumped to her feet and waved a hasty goodbye to Violet. Violet was sorry to see her go, but Mr. Martin clearly needed supervision.

  “He just refuses to understand,” said Chloe when Violet sat back down at the marble-topped table. “I told him back in New York that nothing was more important than winning the vote. I don't know why he thinks I should have changed my mind now.”

  Violet decided this remark was not really addressed to her. “What's going to happen today?” she asked. “Are they meeting in the capitol?”

  “The Senate will probably vote today,” said Chloe, pulling the paper straw out of her strawberry phosphate and looking at it disconsolately. It was coming apart.

  “Really? On the Susan B. Anthony Amendment?” Violet thought this was great news and couldn't understand why Chloe wasn't more excited.

  “It's only the Senate,” said Chloe. “That's just half of the legislature. There's still the House to worry about. And they're what we are worried about. We know we're going to win the Senate.”

  All anybody on either side ever seemed to say was that they knew they were going to win, so Violet wasn't very impressed by this. “I don't think Senator Candler is going to vote for the amendment. He despises women.”
/>
  Chloe smiled and stuck her limp straw back into her drink. “No, I agree, Senator Candler will vote against it. But I still think we're going to win it. Then we'll have thirty-five and a half states, and the Antis will be more desperate than ever, and the battle will just get hotter.”

  Violet was relieved to see her sister smile and decided to bring up something that had been on her mind. “Chloe, when we go back to New York, can I—”

  “Violet, I really can't think about that right now,” said Chloe. She picked up the pamphlets. “Do you want to chuck these in the trash barrel, or shall I?”

  The Ferocious Mrs. Catt

  WITH HER WHITE DRESS AND PURPLE SATIN sash, Violet was suitably dressed to eat in the dining room at the Hermitage Hotel, and that was where she was on the evening of Saturday, August 14. The Antis must've had plenty of money, all right, because there were at least a dozen of them sitting around the dinner table. None of them seemed to make anything of the fact that Violet was there too, or to be worried about the expense.

  They had had rack of lamb, tomato consommé, scalloped potatoes, creamed cauliflower, and hot slaw, and now they were waiting for dessert. The orchestra was playing, and waiters in white uniforms with white gloves were zipping to and fro carrying platters with silver covers.

  Violet was being seen and not heard, just like at home, although she had long since realized that what this really meant was not being seen either. The Antis were talking about the Senate vote, which they had lost, and the House vote, which they expected to win.

  “There's no way we can lose in the House,” Miss Josephine Anderson Pearson said. “A week ago the Suffs had two-thirds of the House members on their side, and now, thanks to us, they haven't even got a simple majority.”

  “But we lost the Senate, didn't we?” said Miss Escuadrille, looking confused.

  “We always expected to lose the Senate,” said Miss Pearson dismissively.

  “Did we expect to lose it twenty-five to four?” Miss Escuadrille asked.

  “Never you mind, Annasette. Everything's under the control of wiser minds than yours,” said Miss Pearson as a white-gloved waiter set a dish of caramel custard in front of her.

  A week ago, Violet thought, she had telegraphed her parents from Washington. Nine days ago she had still been at home. It seemed much longer.

  Mrs. James S. Pinckard looked after the waiter, who had gone to get more custard. “Nothing but white servants are visible at this hotel. They guarantee it.”

  “There are colored waiters downstairs in the Grill Room,” said the man sitting to Violet's left, who Violet thought was named Mr. Garlick. “In fact, they're all colored.”

  “Oh, well, waiters.” The man to Violet's right spoke, to her considerable surprise. He was dressed in a Confederate army uniform, which he had dribbled some tomato consommé down the front of. He had a bushy white mustache and long white hair combed over a bald spot on top. He had spent most of the meal staring off into space, although occasionally he stared at the other people at the table as if he was trying to figure out who they were. “People expect waiters to be colored.”

  Having spoken, he stared straight ahead of him again and dropped his spoon on the floor. Violet got down under the table to retrieve it for him.

  “Speaking of dark colors, isn't this paneling beautiful?” said Mrs. Pinckard. “It's Circassian walnut. Made in Russia by the same factory that did the woodwork for the Titanic.”

  “Ha, you didn't hear anything about equal rights on the Titanic, did you?” said Mr. Garlick. “Now what are we going to do about the Bolshevik?”

  “Which Bolshevik?” said Mrs. Pinckard. “They're pretty much all Bolsheviks.”

  Violet had seen the spoon next to Mrs. Pinckard's high-heeled pump, but she froze and listened.

  “That foreign Jew,” said Mr. Garlick.

  “Oh, the Jew,” said Miss Pearson.

  There was something about the way they both said “Jew” that made Violet's skin crawl.

  “He can be made to disappear,” said Mr. Garlick.

  “Mr. Garlick, I really don't think we need to go as far as murder,” Mrs. Pinckard whispered, and gave a nervous laugh.

  Something glopped coldly down on Violet's arm. She looked. It was caramel custard. Someone must have given the Confederate veteran another spoon.

  “I'm not talking about murder,” said Mr. Garlick, sounding both affronted and amused. “All we need is for the Jew to disappear for a week or so. That'll throw the Suffs into at least as big a tizzy as they were in when they lost Seth Walker.”

  “Can't they lose the Jew the same way?” said Miss Escuadrille, sounding like she was desperately trying to keep up with the conversation.

  “He's not for sale,” said Miss Pearson dismissively. “Do you know he actually claims to have no interest in politics? Ran for the legislature for this special session merely so he could vote for the Susan B. Anthony Amendment. No hope of making him disappear till it's over.”

  “Sure there is,” said Mr. Garlick. “How about if he wakes up Monday morning with a big bump on his bald head, locked in the hold of a tramp steamer headed south out of New Orleans?”

  Violet had heard enough. She crawled out from under the table, squeezing carefully between the Confederate veteran's gray-clad legs and Mr. Garlick's spats without touching either of them. She slid along the Circassian walnut–paneled wall and hurried through the busy lobby and out the women's entrance. She had to tell Chloe what she'd heard right away.

  Chloe had been assigned to squire around a fella named Harry T. Burn, a legislator from McMinn County. He was no older than Chloe was and had had a question mark next to his name on yesterday's list. She had taken him to the burlesque and then to supper, but she must be done with him now. Violet ran down Union Street to Polk Avenue, then turned the corner and went downhill to the Tulane Hotel.

  The Hope Chest was parked out front. But Chloe wasn't in her room.

  “She's gone dancing with Harry T. Burn,” said Miss Lewis. “They're over at the Hermitage Hotel, up on the tenth floor. I'm headed over there myself, if you'll just wait for a minute—”

  “Sorry, can't,” said Violet, turning and running back down the stairs again.

  It was really too hot for all this running, not to mention nearly impossible in Mary Janes, which had slippery soles and narrow straps that cut into your ankle. At least the hotels were only two blocks apart. Violet walked fast, back to the ladies' entrance of the Hermitage and into the elevator, where she told the white-uniformed boy, “Top floor, please.”

  It took them a long time to get there, and as they rode up, Violet's panic lessened. Whoever they were talking about kidnapping—and it was clearly one of the Suff legislators—it didn't sound like a really solid plan. It was just Mr. Garlick talking, and he might be the sort of man who just liked to say things to shock people. Still, whoever they'd been talking about needed to know he might be in danger.

  The elevator stopped for a long time on the eighth floor, where the Antis' hospitality suite had apparently been fully restocked. There was loud singing going on, of several anti-suffrage songs at once. None of the Antis' songs were anywhere near as stirring as the Suffs' songs, Violet thought, even when the singers weren't drunk.

  The top floor of the Hermitage was a big ballroom, with a wide wooden dance floor and an orchestra. It was full of men and women—mostly women—wearing evening dress and red or yellow roses. Violet was momentarily grateful to Miss Escuadrille for dressing her in clothes that wouldn't get her thrown out of the ballroom. She looked around for her sister.

  There she was—wearing a long white gown and a yellow rose and dancing with a young man with slicked-back blond hair, who was wearing a red rose.

  “Miss Mayhew's certainly kept Harry T. Burn busy,” said a lady standing near Violet. “If we have the woman power, we need to keep the Antis away from him. He just might be persuadable.”

  Persuadable or not, Mr. Burn seemed to be having
a good time. Clearly Chloe was doing her work well, Violet thought. In fact, all of the men, whether they wore yellow or red roses, seemed to be enjoying the extra attention they were getting.

  “I don't know, Mrs. Dudley,” said another woman, whom Violet recognized as Miss Pollitzer. “He said something to me about ‘my vote will never hurt you,’ but he was batting his eyes when he said it. I think he's just flirting with us.”

  “He can flirt all he wants as long as he votes aye,” said Mrs. Dudley. “Let's go get some punch.”

  Violet looked up to see Mr. Martin enter the ballroom. He had somehow gotten hold of a necktie and a celluloid collar, which he had buttoned over his Bolshevik soft collar, but other than that, he hadn't made any concessions to the sort of clothing you were supposed to wear in a ballroom. What was the matter with the fella, Violet thought, irritated. Why did he have to keep showing his wanted face in public?

  He marched over to where Chloe was dancing with Mr. Burn. He tapped Mr. Burn on the shoulder.

  “May I cut in?” Violet heard him say.

  Violet knew from dancing school that there was only one way a gentleman could react to such a challenge, and that was to leave as gracefully as possible. Chloe and Mr. Martin started waltzing as Mr. Burn backed away, looking disgruntled. He headed for the sidelines, and Violet saw an Anti eyeing him eagerly. Miss Pollitzer and Mrs. Dudley were nowhere to be seen.

  Violet quickly stepped into his path. “Mr. Burn, please, may I have the honor of this dance?” She held out her hand, wondering if she should bow. The boys had been taught to do this in dancing school, but girls, of course, didn't ask people to dance. They waited to be asked. But Chloe wouldn't want Mr. Burn to fall into the hands of an Anti.

  Mr. Burn looked amused. “Why not?” he said, which was not what the girls in dancing school were taught to say. He took her outstretched hand, and Violet stepped gracefully into the dance with him.

  One good thing about dancing school was that even though there were about a hundred better ways to spend an afternoon, it did teach you to dance. Violet had no trouble following Mr. Burn's steps and felt only a little self-conscious waltzing across the floor among all these adults.