The Sisterhood by Helen Bryan

year about women who are ‘Old Southern Money, New Southern Politics and the Power behind the Throne’? That woman is politics all the way.”
    Becky munched sugar cookies. “Why doesn’t she just cut out the middleman and run for office herself?”
    “Oh, you know, she can go all fluffy and talk about politics being a man’s game, but I think she likes the string pulling, fund-raising dinners and stuff. Thanks to her the Bonner family’s got political contacts up the ga-zing. I don’t know whether Theo really has ambitions, anyway. He talks about it, but he’s only just passed the bar exam. He wants to spend a couple of years working at the legal advice center.”
    “The indigent’s friend? And speaking of indigent, are the two of you planning to live on what he makes there? You’ll have to get a job won’t you?”
    “Well it is peanuts, but Pauline took me to lunch after we got engaged at Christmas and explained that Theo’s trust fund would support us. Don’t look at me like that! I have plans, of course I’m going to work! It’s just that it’ll be a help if I don’t have to work full time while I write my scholarship thesis.”
    “A junior college and you practically have to write a master’s dissertation. Sheesh!”
    Menina nodded. “Yeah, it’s harder than I thought it would be when I applied.” Her scholarship had been a big one—with its small classes, well-equipped studios, and high ratio of teachers to students, Holly Hill was expensive—but it had a condition attached that meant few girls applied for it. The scholarship was the gift of an art-loving Holly Hill alumna in the late nineteenth century. She wanted to encourage Holly Hill’s “lady” scholars to contribute to the study of art history without engaging in unseemly competition with men. Recipients signed a pledge to write an original thesis on an original art-related topic of their choice after they graduated—the scholarship included a special grant for travel if further research was necessary. These theses were then privately published by Holly Hill and available to the academic world at large. Thestinger was in the penalty clause. If a scholarship recipient failed to deliver her thesis within a year of graduation she had a legal obligation to pay back her scholarship.
    Menina had been so excited about giving her parents the good news about her scholarship she hadn’t mentioned that part and she still hadn’t.
    “Sure focuses your mind,” said Menina, “but once that’s out of the way, I’ll finish my degree at the University of Georgia. Then maybe graduate school. I really like art history, and I’m planning to work in a museum someday. We’ll see. There’ll be a lot to juggle with classes, a part-time job, cooking dinner, all that stuff, but Theo’s pretty busy so I have time. We saw some cute apartments near the campus, in that section of old houses. A lot of Theo’s married fraternity brothers live in the neighborhood, and everyone takes turns to have the others for dinner. Mama’s already copying recipes for this and that for when it’s our turn.”
    Menina didn’t mention that she had come away from her lunch with Pauline with a rather different view of Menina and Theo’s married life. To Menina’s dismay, then irritated astonishment, Pauline had made it clear that Theo was working on building his electable image for the future. As Mrs. Theo Bonner III, Menina would join the Junior League, do volunteer work, and attend charity lunches to network with the wives of prominent businessmen, the kind who made large political contributions. Menina knew it would be waving a red rag at a bull to repeat Pauline’s words to Becky. She would just have to think of a tactful way to stick to her own plans.
    Menina sighed and crunched the ice in her glass. “The hardest part was finding an original topic, but at least now I’ve got one. When they were cleaning out the library at Holly Hill a few months ago, the