The Giver of Stars(48)

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Well, given the number of coloured folk you got over there at your mine …’

There was an intake of breath.

‘I do not.’

‘I know most of them by person, as do half the good people here. You listing them as mulatto on your books doesn’t change the facts.’

‘Oh, boy,’ said Fred, under his breath. ‘She went there.’

Margery leaned back against the table. ‘Times are changing and coloured folk are being employed in all sorts of ways. Now, Miss Sophia is fully trained and is keeping published material in commission that wouldn’t otherwise be able to stay on the shelves. Those Baileyville Bonus magazines? You all enjoy them, right? With the recipes and the stories and all?’

There was a low murmur of agreement.

‘Well, those are all Miss Sophia’s work. She takes books and magazines that have been spoiled and she stitches what she can save back together to create new books for you all.’ Margery leaned forward to flick something from her jacket. ‘Now, I can’t stitch like that and neither can my girls, and as you know, volunteers have been hard to come by. Miss Sophia isn’t riding out, visiting families or even choosing the books. She’s just keeping house for us, so to speak. So until it’s one rule for everyone, Mr Van Cleve, you and your mines and me and my library, I will keep on employing her. I trust that’s acceptable to y’all.’

With a nod, Margery walked out through the centre of the room, her gait unhurried and her head held high.

The screen door slammed behind them with a resounding crash. Alice had said nothing the whole journey back from the meeting hall, walking a way behind the two men, from where she could hear the kind of muttered expletives that suggested an imminent and volcanic explosion. She didn’t have long to wait.

‘Who the Sam Hill does that woman think she is? Trying to embarrass me in front of the whole town?’

‘I don’t think anyone felt you were –’ Bennett began, but his father threw his hat on the table, cutting him off.

‘She’s been nothing but trouble her whole life! And that criminal daddy of hers before her. And now standing there trying to make me look a fool in front of my own people?’

Alice hovered in the doorway, wondering if she could sidle upstairs without anybody noticing. In her experience Mr Van Cleve’s tantrums rarely burned out quickly – he would fuel them with bourbon and continue shouting and declaiming until he passed out late in the evening.

‘Nobody cares what that woman says, Pop,’ Bennett began again.

‘Those coloureds are listed as mulatto at my mine because they’re light-skinned. Light-skinned, I tell you!’

Alice pondered Sophia’s dark skin, and wondered, if she was sister to a miner, how siblings could be completely different colours. But she said nothing. ‘I think I’ll head upstairs,’ she said quietly.

‘You can’t stay there, Alice.’

Oh, God, she thought. Don’t make me sit on the porch with you.

‘Then I’ll come –’

‘At that library. You ain’t working there no more. Not with that girl.’

‘What?’

She felt his words close around her like a stranglehold.

‘You’ll hand in your notice. I’m not having my family aligned with Margery O’Hare’s. I don’t care what Patricia Brady thinks – she’s lost her mind along with the rest of them.’ Van Cleve walked to the drinks cabinet and poured himself a large glass of bourbon. ‘And how the heck did that girl see who was on the mine’s books, anyway? I wouldn’t put it past her to be sneaking in. I’m going to put a ban on her coming anywhere near Hoffman.’

There was a silence. And then Alice heard her voice.

‘No.’

Van Cleve looked up. ‘What?’

‘No. I’m not leaving the library. I’m not married to you, and you don’t tell me what I do.’

‘You’ll do what I say! You live under my roof, young lady!’

She didn’t blink.

Mr Van Cleve glared at her, then turned to Bennett, and waved a hand. ‘Bennett? Sort your woman out.’

‘I’m not leaving the library.’

Mr Van Cleve turned puce. ‘Do you need a slap, girl?’

The air in the room seemed to disappear. She looked at her husband. Don’t you think of laying a hand on me, she told him silently. Mr Van Cleve’s face was taut, his breath shallow in his chest. Don’t you even think about it. Her mind raced, wondering suddenly what she would do if he actually lifted his hand to her. Should she hit back? Was there something she could use to protect herself? What would Margery do? She took in the knife on the breadboard, the poker by the range.

But Bennett looked down at his feet and swallowed. ‘She should stay at the library, Pa.’

‘What?’

‘She likes it there. She’s … doing a good job. Helping people and all.’

Van Cleve stared at his son. His eyes bulged out of his beet-red face, as if someone had squeezed him from the neck. ‘Have you lost your damned mind as well?’ He stared at them both, his cheeks blown out and his knuckles white, as if braced for an explosion that wouldn’t come. Finally he threw the last of the bourbon down his throat, slammed down his glass and set off outside, the screen door bouncing on its hinges in his wake.