Dorothy Garlock (13 page)

Carefully pecking away at the keyboard, Sophie tried to concentrate on her task, but her mind kept wandering back to Cole
Ambrose and their brief time together. The memory of him was a powerful thing, coming unbidden yet not unwanted. She thought
of the sound of his voice, of his gallantry in coming to her aid at the diner, of his easy smile, but try as she might, she
could not keep her thoughts from returning to the sight of his crippled leg.

I’m so ashamed that I ran away from him!

Her face already flushed from the heat coming from the Linotype machine, she couldn’t help but fear that it grew a deeper
crimson from the shame that raced throughout her body. Why did that one moment have to color how she felt about Cole? Up until
the moment when she had first looked upon his leg, she’d felt a strong, growing interest in the young teacher. He’d been charming,
witty, and undeniably well-intentioned. Did it matter that he was crippled? Was she truly so shallow that her feelings could
be changed so quickly?

Somehow, she managed to finish typing her line without any errors and now faced the task she most hated: pulling the lever
that plunged the text into the molten metal. The tension of the lever was tremendous. It had seemed so easy the first time
she had watched Walter pull it, but while he effortlessly did it with one hand, she could barely manage with both, straining
with every ounce of strength she could muster.

“You can do it,” Walter said, sensing her unease.

“I’m glad one of us thinks so.”

“Ain’t but one way to find out, now is there?”

Taking a deep breath, Sophie grasped the lever in both of her sweaty hands, said a silent prayer, and pulled back hard enough
to make her shoulders ache. Unlike her previous attempts, she immediately felt the lever begin slowly to move, and soon she
heard the metallic bang of the characters dropping into the liquid metal. With much of the remaining process automatic, she
felt an instant rush of both success and relief.

“Wasn’t that easier?” Walter crowed with an obvious pride in his pupil.

“It was,” Sophie had to admit.

“Before long, you’ll be snappin’ that thing just as easy as you open a door.”

“I doubt that very much,” she said with a sigh, although she could not deny that her heart felt a bit lighter. “Besides, with
as slow as I type this out, being a little faster with the lever isn’t going to make much difference. You can do six or seven
lines in the time it takes me to do one.”

“No one will be pressuring you, Sophie,” Walter tried to explain, his voice reassuring. “Heck, the first time I sat in front
of this contraption, I felt about as outta place as a hog at a high-society dinner! But I just kept at it and learned as best
I could. ’Fore long, I wasn’t half bad. It will be no different with you.”

Sophie knew that no matter how difficult it was for her to learn to use the Linotype machine, she had no choice but to figure
it out! When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, she had known it would only be a matter of time until all of the able-bodied
men were rushed into duty. In their absence, it was every citizen’s responsibility to make up the difference. If the Linotype
was to be her burden, then so be it. Still, she couldn’t help but feel that with Ellis Watts, Riley Mason, and Graham Grier
still in Victory, mastering this piece of machinery was the least of her troubles.

“Let’s try it again,” Walter said, gently coaxing her out of her thoughts and back to the machine.

And so she did.

It was shortly after lunch when Carolyn Glass burst into the
Gazette
’s main office like a tornado. Sophie and Walter had been sitting at his desk, going over ways to avoid errors in the printing
process, when the front door flew open and every head turned to witness the woman’s certain-to-be-ensuing theatrics. After
all, as the wife of their boss and publisher, Carolyn was someone they simply could not afford to ignore.

Twenty-nine-year-old Carolyn was a pretty woman to look at, but as cold as ice on the inside. With high cheekbones, a modest
nose, and tight-pursed lips, she carried the air of a movie starlet with a personality every bit to match. She had a way of
looking down her nose at anyone she thought was beneath her, which ended up being nearly everyone she met. The first time
she had encountered Carolyn, Sophie felt as if she were invisible. Still, being noticed was sometimes even worse. Her tongue
was as lethal as a snake. Her platinum blonde hair was swept up into the latest fashion and she made regular trips to Chicago
and St. Louis to purchase whatever hat, blouse, or purse might catch her fancy. No makeup was too excessive, no bauble too
expensive for Carolyn Glass.

To make matters worse, she was nearly five months pregnant. While she had always been difficult for the employees of the
Gazette
to stomach, being with child seemed to make her even more irritable. She acted as if no other woman in history had ever had
to endure such agony. As the summer progressed, her complaining seemed as constant as the whirring fans strategically placed
to cool the office.

“A woman in my condition shouldn’t have to be out in such heat!” she shouted as she dropped her growing weight into a chair
set just inside the door. Her gaze expectantly surveyed the faces nearest to her, her brow furrowed as if she were wondering
why they hadn’t fallen all over themselves in a race to see who would be first to wait on her hand and foot.

“Carolyn, do you—” Harriet Connor began but was cut off.

“Get me a glass of water!”

“I just wondered—”

“I don’t give a damn what you might be wondering,” Carolyn swore, her body half rising from the chair in indignation. “What
on earth could there be to wonder about? Only a fool wouldn’t know when a pregnant woman needs a drink!”

“I’m sorry, Carolyn,” Harriet stammered. “I just—”

“Stop talking and get me a drink!”

Before Carolyn could heap any more abuse upon the poor woman, Augustus Glass hurried from his office, crossed the newsroom,
and knelt at his wife’s side. Approaching his late fifties, nearly thirty years older than Carolyn, Augustus clearly looked
his age, with a balding head barely covered by wisps of whitish blond hair that had been teased hopefully across the top,
deepening wrinkles that had begun to canvass their way across his face and hands, and an impressive gut permanently perched
atop his beltline.

“What’s the matter, darling?” he asked, his heavy, watery eyes never leaving her face, his hand gently finding her own for
only an instant before she yanked it away in anger.

“How did you ever manage to hire so many idiots?” Carolyn snapped.

“But, sweetheart,” he stammered. “No one ever—”

“I don’t know how this rag manages to stay open in the face of such complete and utter incompetence!”

While not a single citizen of Victory doubted Augustus Glass’s devotion to his wife or their marriage—one look in his hazel
eyes as he gazed upon her would have cleared up any misconceptions—there was more than a little concern when it came to Carolyn’s
motivations. Though no one would have dared to utter the word in her presence, Sophie had heard the woman described as a gold
digger on more than one occasion. She was young and vivacious and Augustus was, with the noted exception of his wealth and
standing about town, not considered much of a catch; such a discrepancy naturally set tongues wagging.

Sophie felt pity for the
Gazette
’s publisher. From the very first day she had started at the paper, he had been patient and kind, encouraging her to learn
as much as she could. Around the office, he was known to have a firm but fair hand. Still, Sophie had always noticed the loneliness
that filled his eyes. So desperate to believe that a woman like Carolyn could truly be attracted to him, Augustus had chosen
to ignore the obvious and had had to pander to his wife in order to maintain the illusion ever since. That she was pregnant
with his child had given him a much-deserved sense of pride, but Sophie worried that Augustus’s servitude to Carolyn was only
the beginning of the misery she would someday inflict upon him.

He’s a much better man when she isn’t around!

“Here you are, dear,” Augustus said as he handed her the glass of water that Harriet had finally brought. Carolyn snatched
it from his hand and, in her reckless haste, dribbled a bit of water down the front of her blouse.

“You old fool!” she screeched as if the fault had been her husband’s instead of her own. The way that her face scrunched up
in disgust, the offending liquid might have been ink instead of water.

“It’s only water, honey,” Augustus said.

“You should still be careful!”

“It will dry, darling,” he added as Sophie’s stomach curdled in equal parts of disgust at Carolyn’s childishness and Augustus’s
desire to make her worries disappear.

“How did he ever marry such a catty broad?” Walter asked out loud at her side.

“Hush!” Sophie whispered. “She’ll hear you!”

“And so what?”

“You’ll get yelled at, Walter!”

“There’s no way it can be worse than what some drill sergeant’s got in store for me,” he said with a shrug. “Besides, if there’s
one thing that there woman needs, it’s the truth.”

Part of Sophie believed Walter; it had surely been a long time since someone had tried to put Carolyn Glass in her place.
She was the sort who demanded her every wish be met without pause. In Augustus, she had found her perfect match; in his desperation
to end his own loneliness, he was all too happy to bend over backward for her, even if it meant that he would be made to look
like a fool. Still, if the day were to come when someone told Carolyn exactly how they felt about her behavior, Sophie hoped
she would be nowhere near.

“Come along now, sweetheart,” Augustus said as he helped his wife to her feet and gingerly led her between the desks of the
newsroom toward his own office. Sophie couldn’t tell if he wished to end her suffering or put an end to his own embarrassment.

“Slower, you oaf!” she snapped. “I’m pregnant, remember?”

“Yes, dear.”

As they neared Walter’s desk, Sophie could not bring herself to tear her eyes from them. Something about Carolyn was mesmerizing;
maybe it was the shock and indignation that anyone could act in such a manner, least of all in public. With every step they
took toward her, she knew she should turn away, follow Walter’s lead and look down at the desk, but she found herself frozen,
unable to move.

Much to Sophie’s horror, Carolyn’s green eyes suddenly rose and found her own, holding her as easily as if she were small
game in the talons of a ferocious predator. Though Carolyn and Augustus were still several feet from where she stood, Sophie
felt that they were much closer and shivers of unease and fear raced wildly across her skin. A sneer grew from the corners
of Carolyn’s lips and she shook herself free from her husband’s grasp, a look of pure disdain upon her face.

“What are you staring at?” she snapped. “Why do you always stare at me?”

“I’m not… not…” Sophie stammered.

“Don’t think that I haven’t noticed you looking, little missy,” she barked, her voice dripping with contempt. “Every single
time I come in here, it’s the same thing!”

“What… what are you talking about?”

“Don’t even try playing innocent with me, honey,” Carolyn said, with a smile less inviting than any Sophie had ever seen.
“You’re judging me! Always measuring your looks against mine!”

“I’m not!” Sophie said, suddenly bathed in a nervous sweat. “I swear!”

“I suppose you think that because I’ve gone and gotten fat and pregnant that you’ll be the belle of the ball in these parts,
but think again!” Carolyn boasted, quickly looking around the small office to ensure that every eye was back where it belonged—on
her. “No matter how hard you try, no matter what you do, you’ll never be half the woman I am!”

Dumbstruck by the woman’s accusations, all that Sophie could do was stare blankly. It was as if she had been transported back
to Karl’s side, watching their family’s barn crumble into cinders, unable to do anything to stop the carnage unfolding before
her; Carolyn’s words had been so destructive. Thankfully, she was saved from any further scolding when Augustus again grabbed
his wife’s arm and gently pulled her toward his office.

“Sophie isn’t like that, darling,” the newspaperman soothed.

“Don’t think for one minute I’m not watching, you hussy,” Carolyn said over her shoulder, choosing to ignore her husband’s
words to the contrary. Her icy gaze never left Sophie until the oak door to Augustus’s office shut behind her and she turned
her fury back toward her husband, her voice still audible from behind the closed door.

For a moment, Sophie stood silently, wondering if by some trick of her mind she had imagined the whole thing. But then Walter
spoke and any illusion she might have had was shattered.

“Maybe you should have let me run my mouth, huh?”

When Sophie left the
Gazette
’s offices at the end of her workday, summer heat still pressed down on the day like a blanket. Though she knew that a strong
storm would eventually break the heat and bring some coolness, she wished it would hurry up and arrive.

Her father leaned casually against the hood of his truck. His hat sat low on his ears and sweat ringed both arms of his shirt
and stained the chest. Picking her up from work had been a daily routine ever since the night of the fire; even with her father’s
desire to act as if nothing had happened, he had proven unwilling to leave his daughter’s safety to chance. Still, she couldn’t
help but feel a bit sad upon seeing him. To Sophie’s eyes, he had looked older ever since the night he’d been struck by Ellis
Watts’s rifle butt; she supposed it was the first time she had ever witnessed her father in a state of vulnerability.

“Are you ready?” Hermann asked.

“I am, Papa.”

“Then we should be going,” he said. “Your mother makes a big dinner.”

Making her way to the passenger door, Sophie felt a trickle of unease shiver up her arms over what had occurred with Carolyn.
She had been worthless to Walter the rest of the afternoon; try as she might, she’d never been able to shake the image of
the pregnant woman berating her in front of the whole office. Walter had told her to keep her chin up and not to worry, but
she doubted she would be able to follow his advice.