Neferet's Curse (House of Night Novellas #3)(35)

“Excuse me,” I’d said, righting myself. It had been then that I’d noticed what I hadn’t earlier when the Midway had completely captivated my attention—Camille was with the women’s group, as were several of my old friends: Elizabeth Ryerson, Nancy Field, Janet Palmer, and Eugenia Taylor. They seemed to form a solid and disapproving wall behind Camille and her mother.

Mrs. Elcott had looked down her long nose at me. “I see you’re wearing your mother’s pearls as well as one of her dresses, although the reworking of it has very much changed its appearance.”

I’d already been more than aware of how the alteration of Mother’s dress accentuated my body, and I could see by the censorious looks on their faces that while I had been distracted by the wonders of the fair, they had been judging and condemning me.

“And I see you are on the arm of Arthur Simpton,” Camille added in a voice that echoed her mother’s pinched tone.

“Yes, convenient of you to get yourself lost so that he had to find you,” Elizabeth Ryerson had spoken up as well.

I’d squared my shoulders and lifted my chin. There was no point in attempting to explain my jewels or my clothes, and I certainly was not going to hide from these women, but I’d felt I must come to Arthur’s defense. “Mr. Simpton was being a gentleman.”

Mrs. Elcott had snorted. “As if you were being a lady! And it’s Mr. Simpton now, is it? You appear to be much more familiar with him than that.”

“Emily, are you quite well?” Mrs. Simpton had moved to stand beside me, facing the group of sour-faced girls. I noticed she was sending a hard look to Mrs. Elcott.

That had made me smile.

“Quite well, thanks to your son. Mrs. Elcott and Camille and a few of the girls were commenting on what a gentleman he is, and I was agreeing with them,” I’d said.

“How nice of them to notice,” Mrs. Simpton had said. “Ah, Emily, there are our men with the tickets.” She’d pointed to Father, Mr. Elcott, and Arthur. The three of them were walking toward our group. “Emily, you will sit beside me, won’t you? I have a dreadful fear of heights.”

“Of course,” I’d said. As Mrs. Simpton walked forward to meet her son, who was smiling distractingly at me, I’d felt Camille brush up close to me. Behind her I could feel the weight of the other girls’ stares. Her whispered voice had been filled with spite. “I find that you are very changed, and not for the better.”

Still smiling at Arthur I lowered my own voice, hoping that it would carry to Camille and the others behind her, and said with perfectly unemotional coldness, “I’ve become a woman and not a silly girl. As you and your friends are still silly girls, I can understand that you could not possibly find my changes are for the better.”

“You have become a woman—one who doesn’t care who she has to use or what she has to do to get what she wants,” she’d whispered back. I heard murmurs of agreement from the other girls.

The coldness within me had expanded. What did this simpering child, or any of those other empty-headed, spoiled girls know of the changes I’d had to make to survive?

Without turning my smiling face from Arthur I said slowly, distinctly, and loudly enough for the entire spiteful group to hear me, “You are absolutely right, Camille. So it is best if you all stay out of my way. I would say that I would hate to see any of you hurt, but I would be lying, and I’d rather not do that.”

Then I’d hurried to meet Father, who had been so overtaken by the anticipated trill of the Ferris wheel that he’d agreed to us sitting in the same cart box as the Simptons. As we soared two hundred and seventy-five feet in the air Arthur’s mother held tightly to me with one hand, and her son with her other. She’d squeezed her eyes shut and trembled so violently her teeth had chattered.

I’d thought her a fool, though a kindhearted one. Her fear had made her miss the most spectacular view in the world. The blue waters of Lake Michigan stretched as far as one horizon, while before us was revealed an entire city that seemed to be built of white marble. As the sun sank behind the elegant structures, the powerful electric lights that surrounded the lagoon and the brilliant spotlight before the Electricity Building were turned on, making the Court of Honor and the sixty-five-foot-tall Statue of the Republic in the center of the lagoon blaze with magnificent white light that rivaled that of the fullest, brightest of moons. The light had been so bright, it had been quite uncomfortable for me to look at directly, though look I did.

Mrs. Simpton missed all of it, and her son missed quite a bit of the scenery, too, as he’d been so focused on soothing his mother’s fear.

I’d vowed to myself that I would never, ever allow fear to make me miss magnificence.

* * *

Father insisted Mr. and Mrs. Burnham share our carriage to the University Club, which gave me a much needed and unexpected reprieve. Mrs. Burnham had been so excited by the Ferris wheel and the triumph of the electrical lighting, which only served to showcase her husband’s talent, that I hadn’t needed to engage in conversation with her at all. I’d simply appeared to mimic her expression as she’d listened attentively to her husband and Father blathering on and on about every miniscule detail of the fair’s architecture.

Now that we weren’t walking about, and my nerves had settled, I was finding it easier to control the terrible cough that had come so suddenly upon me. I was reluctant to admit it, even to myself, but I was feeling dreadfully weak and lightheaded—and there was a heat within my body that was becoming more and more uncomfortable. I believed I may truly be ill, and had been considering whether it would be wise for me to ask if Arthur could escort me home early. I must wait until after he declared his honorable intentions to Father, and Father accepted, but by the time the carriage reached the University Club, I was having a difficult time keeping my vision from blurring. Even the flickering gaslights in the club caused a tremendous pain to spike through my temples.