frolicked around a maypole, wielded hockey sticks, drew bows, or posed like Greek
statues in a garden, all of it like something out of Mrs. Moore’s
girls’-school books. I picked out my mother because she was the
tallest in every group, but I wouldn’t have recognized her carefree expression otherwise. In one she stood arm in arm with a
blonde girl below an arched doorway engraved with the words
“Blythewood Academy— Tintinna vere, specta alte. ”
Ring true, aim high. It was Blythewood’s motto, which my
mother had often quoted to me.
I noticed a box sitting atop the dresser. Looking into it, I
saw it contained books, ribbons, a blue-and-white willow-pattern teacup, an untrimmed straw hat, feathers—a long black
feather among them—and a familiar-looking green bottle.
“I got your address from the Triangle Company and went to
your lodgings,” Agnes said. “I hope you don’t mind that I took
the liberty of collecting your . . . things. Some of them looked
like mementos of your mother. I thought you’d want them.”
I held up the green bottle. It looked wrong in this yellowand-white room. How had the girl who grew up here ever ended
up as the woman who drank from it?
I looked around the room. A pink-and-gray pennant hung
above the bed. A bow and quiver of arrows learned against the
bureau. Bronze trophies for archery, Latin, falconry, and “bell
ringing” lined the bookshelves. Everything in the room referred somehow to Blythewood.
“Mrs. Hall mentioned an interview,” I said, almost too
afraid to ask the question. “Did she mean . . . ?”
“An interview for Blythewood,” Agnes replied. “Now that
you’re sixteen you’re just the right age. The interview is in three
days. You’d better get some rest. The next few days are going to
be trying. We have a lot of work to do to get you ready.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief that the interview wasn’t for an
insane asylum, but then, looking at the pictures of happy, smiling girls, I wondered if the gulf between them and me wasn’t
even wider than the one between the girl who had grown up
here and the woman who’d died drinking laudanum. A gulf far
too wide to bridge in three days.
5
AGNES WAS RIGHT about the next few days being trying. I
felt as if I were trying out for a part—and one I wasn’t even sure
I wanted. It had always been my dream to go to my mother’s
alma mater, but without her here to see me realize that dream,
going there seemed cruelly ironic. And while the pictures of
frolicking girls certainly made the place look like fun, when I
studied those girls—as I did closely for the next few days—I
saw the cosseted daughters of wealthy families. It wasn’t their
dress, which seemed to be some sort of uniform, but their
carefree expressions. Even though Agnes assured me that Blythewood was a finishing school for girls ages sixteen to nineteen, the girls in the pictures looked younger to me. I couldn’t
imagine any of these girls working in a factory or delivering a
hat by the back door or explaining to the landlady that the rent
was late again. How would I, with my work-coarsened hands
and haphazard schooling, ever hope to fit in?
Even at the dressmakers’ I felt as though I were being measured for more than a wardrobe. Miss Janeway’s establishment was a small first-floor shop off of Stuyvesant Square with
elaborately feathered hats displayed on wire forms in the window, and white paneled cabinets, mirrors, and robin’s-egg-blue
52 \
Blythewood
hangings and carpet in the discreet showroom. I could hear the
hum of sewing machines and women’s voices coming from a
workroom in the basement, a sound so familiar from my days
at the Triangle Waist Company that I felt a pang for those lost
girls.
But this was a very different sort of place than the Triangle. It was exactly the kind of smart establishment my mother
sometimes dreamed of running, but I was surprised that Mrs.
Hall
statues in a garden, all of it like something out of Mrs. Moore’s
girls’-school books. I picked out my mother because she was the
tallest in every group, but I wouldn’t have recognized her carefree expression otherwise. In one she stood arm in arm with a
blonde girl below an arched doorway engraved with the words
“Blythewood Academy— Tintinna vere, specta alte. ”
Ring true, aim high. It was Blythewood’s motto, which my
mother had often quoted to me.
I noticed a box sitting atop the dresser. Looking into it, I
saw it contained books, ribbons, a blue-and-white willow-pattern teacup, an untrimmed straw hat, feathers—a long black
feather among them—and a familiar-looking green bottle.
“I got your address from the Triangle Company and went to
your lodgings,” Agnes said. “I hope you don’t mind that I took
the liberty of collecting your . . . things. Some of them looked
like mementos of your mother. I thought you’d want them.”
I held up the green bottle. It looked wrong in this yellowand-white room. How had the girl who grew up here ever ended
up as the woman who drank from it?
I looked around the room. A pink-and-gray pennant hung
above the bed. A bow and quiver of arrows learned against the
bureau. Bronze trophies for archery, Latin, falconry, and “bell
ringing” lined the bookshelves. Everything in the room referred somehow to Blythewood.
“Mrs. Hall mentioned an interview,” I said, almost too
afraid to ask the question. “Did she mean . . . ?”
“An interview for Blythewood,” Agnes replied. “Now that
you’re sixteen you’re just the right age. The interview is in three
days. You’d better get some rest. The next few days are going to
be trying. We have a lot of work to do to get you ready.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief that the interview wasn’t for an
insane asylum, but then, looking at the pictures of happy, smiling girls, I wondered if the gulf between them and me wasn’t
even wider than the one between the girl who had grown up
here and the woman who’d died drinking laudanum. A gulf far
too wide to bridge in three days.
5
AGNES WAS RIGHT about the next few days being trying. I
felt as if I were trying out for a part—and one I wasn’t even sure
I wanted. It had always been my dream to go to my mother’s
alma mater, but without her here to see me realize that dream,
going there seemed cruelly ironic. And while the pictures of
frolicking girls certainly made the place look like fun, when I
studied those girls—as I did closely for the next few days—I
saw the cosseted daughters of wealthy families. It wasn’t their
dress, which seemed to be some sort of uniform, but their
carefree expressions. Even though Agnes assured me that Blythewood was a finishing school for girls ages sixteen to nineteen, the girls in the pictures looked younger to me. I couldn’t
imagine any of these girls working in a factory or delivering a
hat by the back door or explaining to the landlady that the rent
was late again. How would I, with my work-coarsened hands
and haphazard schooling, ever hope to fit in?
Even at the dressmakers’ I felt as though I were being measured for more than a wardrobe. Miss Janeway’s establishment was a small first-floor shop off of Stuyvesant Square with
elaborately feathered hats displayed on wire forms in the window, and white paneled cabinets, mirrors, and robin’s-egg-blue
52 \
Blythewood
hangings and carpet in the discreet showroom. I could hear the
hum of sewing machines and women’s voices coming from a
workroom in the basement, a sound so familiar from my days
at the Triangle Waist Company that I felt a pang for those lost
girls.
But this was a very different sort of place than the Triangle. It was exactly the kind of smart establishment my mother
sometimes dreamed of running, but I was surprised that Mrs.
Hall
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