The Shinnery by Kate Anger

Author:Kate Anger [Anger, Kate]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC033000 FICTION / Westerns, FIC014000 FICTION / Historical / General
Publisher: Bison Books

19

Jessa laid out the tea things. She’d knocked the sugar bowl over, and her hand hurt from where she’d splashed boiling water on it. Last night had rattled her. Will had chosen sides, no confusion on that, and she’d barely escaped the back-of-the-saloon business. Most pressingly, though, she’d promised Levi money that didn’t exist. She’d racked her brain all morning trying to think of something she could leave him. Something valuable, identifiable, so that when she tipped off Mr. Martin to the “thievery,” Levi might be caught red-handed, and then punished, banished, killed. She didn’t know exactly how that would unfold, how she’d tell Mr. Martin without incriminating herself. Her head started to ache. First things first, she told herself: steal something. She placed the silver teapot on the serving tray and considered its worth—something she didn’t know much about. The pot was heavy, but likely too bulky for Levi to slip into his coat.

“You can pour now,” Mrs. Martin called from the parlor.

Mrs. Garrett and her daughter Oneida, the red-headed beauty who’d been to the Martins’ end-of-summer party, had come to tea. The trio was planning the menu for a Twelfth Night party, the last of the Christmas celebrations, which would christen Rayner’s town hall. Jessa was too distracted to follow their chatter. She’d heard the girl speak French when they’d come in the door—at least that’s what the missus called it. Since words often failed Jessa, she wondered if speaking two languages would increase the odds of being able to find the right ones or if it would make one’s failure to grasp them twice as humiliating.

“And how fares your sister Nellie?” asked Oneida.

“Uh, she is well,” she said, pulling three starched white napkins from the sideboard.

“Such a lovely girl. We must have her over—oh, and you too of course.”

Jessa couldn’t imagine being a guest in the Garrett home, sitting to tea and having another girl, a Jessa, wait on her.

Oneida continued, “She must be in the thick of preparing for her teacher’s exam.”

Jessa remembered Oneida and Nellie chatting at the Martins’ party but hadn’t realized they’d become fast friends. Jessa felt bad; she hadn’t even inquired about Nellie’s studies the last time she’d been home. “She must be,” was all she could muster.

“Maman thinks young ladies don’t need a vocation beyond wife and mother, but I, for one, admire your sister’s ambition.”

“So do I,” Jessa said sincerely. Then she put out the saucers.

Mrs. Garrett leaned over to Mrs. Martin. “We send her to finishing school and she returns speaking of suffrage.”

“Toujours en évolution, Maman,” said Oneida. “The world is changing, always.”

Jessa felt the truth of this in her bones, and her belly—just this morning, the top button of her skirt had popped off under the strain and skittered across the floor.

Mrs. Martin stepped in as the diplomat. “Party talk is so much more pleasant.”

“Twelfth Night is dreadfully old-fashioned,” Oneida said. “C’est démodé.”

Jessa placed the delicate cups on their saucers. She considered the china as a lure for Levi: valuable, but not easily transportable.

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