I know I am expected to respond, to express gratitude, but it takes a conscious effort to smile, and several moments to form the words. I am not grateful; I am bitterly disappointed. I don’t understand why I need to leave, why Mrs. Murphy can’t keep me if she thinks I am so well mannered. I don’t want to go into another home where I’m treated like a servant, tolerated only for the labor I can provide.
“How kind of you, Mrs. Murphy!” Miss Larsen exclaims, plunging into the silence. “That’s wonderful news, isn’t it, Dorothy?”
“Yes. Thank you, Mrs. Murphy,” I say, choking out the words.
“You’re quite welcome, child. Quite welcome.” She beams proudly. “Now, Mr. Sorenson. Perhaps you and I should attend this meeting as well?”
Mr. Sorenson drains his teacup and sets it in its saucer. “Indeed, Mrs. Murphy. I am also thinking that the two of us should meet separately to discuss the . . . finer points of this transaction. What would you say to that?”
Mrs. Murphy blushes and blinks; she shifts in her chair, picks up her teacup, and then puts it down without taking a sip. “Yes, that’s probably wise,” she says, and Miss Larsen looks over and gives me a smile.
Hemingford, Minnesota, 1930
Over the next few days, every time I see her Mrs. Murphy has another suggestion for how I should comport myself on meeting the Nielsens. “A firm handshake, but not a squeeze,” she says, passing me on the stairs. “You must be ladylike. They need to know that you can be trusted behind the counter,” she lectures at dinner.
The other women chime in. “Don’t ask questions,” one advises.
“But answer them without hesitation,” another adds.
“Make sure your fingernails are clipped and groomed.”
“Clean your teeth just before with baking soda.”
“Your hair must be”—Miss Grund grimaces and reaches up to her own head, as if patting down soap bubbles—“tamed. You never know how they might feel about a redhead. Especially that tinny shade.”
“Now, now,” Miss Larsen says. “We’re going to scare the poor girl so much she won’t know how to act.”
On the morning of the meeting, a Saturday in mid-December, there is a light knock on my bedroom door. It’s Mrs. Murphy, holding a navy blue velvet dress on a hanger. “Let’s see if this fits,” she says, handing it to me. I’m not sure whether to invite her in or close the door while I change, but she solves this dilemma by bustling in and sitting on the bed.
Mrs. Murphy is so matter-of-fact that I am not ashamed to take my clothes off and stand there in my knickers. She removes the dress from the hanger, unzips a seam at the side that I hadn’t realized was a zipper, and lifts it over my head, helping me with the long sleeves, pulling down the gathered skirt, zipping it up again. She steps back in the small space to inspect me, yanks at one side and then the other. Tugs at a sleeve. “Let’s see about that hair,” she says, instructing me to turn around so she can take a look. Fishing in her apron pocket, she pulls out bobby pins and a hair clip. For the next few minutes she pokes and prods, pulling the hair back from my face and smoothing it into submission. When she’s finished to her satisfaction, she turns me around to look at my reflection in the glass.
Despite my trepidation about meeting the Nielsens, I can’t help smiling. For the first time since Mr. Grote butchered my hair months ago, I look almost pretty. I have never worn a velvet dress before. It is heavy and a little stiff, with a full skirt that falls in a lush drape to my midcalf. It gives off a faint scent of mothballs whenever I move. I think it’s beautiful, but Mrs. Murphy isn’t satisfied. Narrowing her eyes at me and clicking her tongue, she pinches the material. “Wait a minute, I’ll be right back,” she says, hurrying out and returning a few moments later with a wide black ribbon. “Turn around,” she instructs, and when I do, she loops the sash around my waist and ties it in the back with a wide bow. We both inspect her handiwork in the mirror.
“There we are. You look like a princess, my dear,” Mrs. Murphy declares. “Are your black stockings clean?”
I nod.
“Put them on, then. And your black shoes will be fine.” She laughs, her hands on my waist. “A redheaded Irish princess you are, right here in Minnesota!”
AT THREE O’CLOCK THAT AFTERNOON, IN THE EARLY HOURS OF THE first heavy snowstorm of the season, I greet Mr. and Mrs. Nielsen in Mrs. Murphy’s parlor, with Mr. Sorenson and Miss Larsen standing by.
Mr. Nielsen resembles a large gray mouse, complete with twitching whiskers, pink-tinged ears, and a tiny mouth. He is wearing a gray three-piece suit and a silk striped bow tie, and he walks with a black cane. Mrs. Nielsen is thin, almost frail. Her dark head of hair, streaked with silver, is pulled back in a bun. She has dark eyebrows and eyelashes and deep-set brown eyes, and her lips are stained a dark red. She wears no powder or rouge on her olive skin.