bottoms of pantalettes. When they left Ohio, Mamma decided to leave their spinning wheel behind. She said, “My girls, the days of spinning flax are coming to an end. That’s the future. But the days of sewing will never end. Women like us will sew until we’re too old and too tired to lift another needle, but then our daughters will sew and when they are too tired, their daughters will and on and on.”
Clara was already tired of jamming the needle over and under, over and under, over and under. Fifty-one ruffles done. Sixty-one still to go.
Papa burst into the Blue Room. “I need Clara down at the Spirit Room. Billy’s already there. Isabelle and Euphora, you keep at the sewin’.”
Flying out the door behind Papa, Clara felt like a parakeet let out of its cage. When they got to the Spirit Room, which was a short walk from their boardinghouse, Papa took a few items from the bookcase. Gray eyes twinkling behind his spectacles, he presented them to Clara.
“Billy and I are goin’ to work on some mechanical things. This is what you’ll need to make the alphabet sheet like Mrs. Fielding had.”
He handed her a small stack of folded papers with a few inkbottles and metal tip pens sitting tentatively on top.
“There’s some handbills the letterpress man gave me that you can trace over to make the letters look nice. Can you put them in an arc like Mrs. Fielding did?” He drew a curve in the air.
Splendiferous, thought Clara. This was much better than sewing. She smiled and nodded at him, then looked around at the vacant room. Hands in trouser pockets, Billy was stomping with his boots lightly on different spots on the wood floor, like a square dancer, but slower. She carried her materials near the center window, settled herself on the dusty floor in a warm patch of sunlight, and began to unfold the papers.
Papa wandered about the room, tapping on the blue and green striped wallpaper, speaking loudly, then softly, saying, “Hallo there spirits,” and “Dead people, come here.” Clara laughed. He said he was “scrutinizin’” the way his voice resonated. Then he got on his knees and pounded with his fist on a few of the floorboards.
Suddenly he shot up like a firework and started rattling off instructions to Billy. Go down to the waterfront. Get this. Get that. When Papa had finished giving orders, Billy raced back and forth from the Spirit Room to the foundry, the carriage maker, the cabinetmaker, the blacksmith, and even the shipwright, and each time he returned with an assortment of things—pliers, a drill, iron rods, hinges, levers, screws, and other odds and ends, mostly metal.
Papa was going to rig up a secret knocker. He wanted the sound to come from some place in the room far enough away from where the table would be that people wouldn’t think about the rap noise being made by her or Izzie. So he came up with the idea of removing a floor plank and running a long pole out of sight underneath.
He stood near the imagined table. “You or Isabelle will sit here. You’ll step on a pedal under the rug.” He stomped his foot down onto the floor. “The pedal will be hooked to a long rod by a hinge and a spring. It’ll have extra punch, like the trigger on my old Colt Walker.” He held up his hand up, finger pointing, thumb flexing, like a pistol. “Bang. The metal plate on the far end of the rod will hit the floor joist way over there.” Smiling like he just shot a wild turkey, he blew at the tip of his finger, then pointed toward the three windows. It was surely the cleverest thing Papa had ever come up with.
Papa was full of sunshine those few days of fixing up the Spirit Room, not drinking at all as far as she could tell, and singing and whistling like the old days while he cooked up his ideas and tried them out. When he found out that Mrs. Beattie, the milliner landlady from downstairs, had some extra wallpaper, he dug a small hole about
Clara was already tired of jamming the needle over and under, over and under, over and under. Fifty-one ruffles done. Sixty-one still to go.
Papa burst into the Blue Room. “I need Clara down at the Spirit Room. Billy’s already there. Isabelle and Euphora, you keep at the sewin’.”
Flying out the door behind Papa, Clara felt like a parakeet let out of its cage. When they got to the Spirit Room, which was a short walk from their boardinghouse, Papa took a few items from the bookcase. Gray eyes twinkling behind his spectacles, he presented them to Clara.
“Billy and I are goin’ to work on some mechanical things. This is what you’ll need to make the alphabet sheet like Mrs. Fielding had.”
He handed her a small stack of folded papers with a few inkbottles and metal tip pens sitting tentatively on top.
“There’s some handbills the letterpress man gave me that you can trace over to make the letters look nice. Can you put them in an arc like Mrs. Fielding did?” He drew a curve in the air.
Splendiferous, thought Clara. This was much better than sewing. She smiled and nodded at him, then looked around at the vacant room. Hands in trouser pockets, Billy was stomping with his boots lightly on different spots on the wood floor, like a square dancer, but slower. She carried her materials near the center window, settled herself on the dusty floor in a warm patch of sunlight, and began to unfold the papers.
Papa wandered about the room, tapping on the blue and green striped wallpaper, speaking loudly, then softly, saying, “Hallo there spirits,” and “Dead people, come here.” Clara laughed. He said he was “scrutinizin’” the way his voice resonated. Then he got on his knees and pounded with his fist on a few of the floorboards.
Suddenly he shot up like a firework and started rattling off instructions to Billy. Go down to the waterfront. Get this. Get that. When Papa had finished giving orders, Billy raced back and forth from the Spirit Room to the foundry, the carriage maker, the cabinetmaker, the blacksmith, and even the shipwright, and each time he returned with an assortment of things—pliers, a drill, iron rods, hinges, levers, screws, and other odds and ends, mostly metal.
Papa was going to rig up a secret knocker. He wanted the sound to come from some place in the room far enough away from where the table would be that people wouldn’t think about the rap noise being made by her or Izzie. So he came up with the idea of removing a floor plank and running a long pole out of sight underneath.
He stood near the imagined table. “You or Isabelle will sit here. You’ll step on a pedal under the rug.” He stomped his foot down onto the floor. “The pedal will be hooked to a long rod by a hinge and a spring. It’ll have extra punch, like the trigger on my old Colt Walker.” He held up his hand up, finger pointing, thumb flexing, like a pistol. “Bang. The metal plate on the far end of the rod will hit the floor joist way over there.” Smiling like he just shot a wild turkey, he blew at the tip of his finger, then pointed toward the three windows. It was surely the cleverest thing Papa had ever come up with.
Papa was full of sunshine those few days of fixing up the Spirit Room, not drinking at all as far as she could tell, and singing and whistling like the old days while he cooked up his ideas and tried them out. When he found out that Mrs. Beattie, the milliner landlady from downstairs, had some extra wallpaper, he dug a small hole about
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