I would be very pleased indeed to receive a few lines with your reply. I have already given you my address in Hamburg. You will also find it on the back of the envelope to this letter. With hopes of a positive reply, I remain,
Yours sincerely,
Steven Miles
Lauscha, 9 September 1892
Dear Steven,
Thank you for being so kind as to write. Your letter was delightful! (If one may say this sort of thing of a letter.) I would be very pleased if we could meet in Sonneberg on the 29th of September. Of course I plan to accompany our Christmas decorations—after all, I must make sure that they don’t end up in a ditch by the side of the road somewhere between Lauscha and Sonneberg! Do you see now what you have done to me? No sooner do I have dealings with you than I begin to behave like a silly woman. Or at least write things that sound silly. Please ascribe this to the fact that I have as little experience in writing letters as I do in business affairs.
I, too, find myself thinking of our meeting every day but I do not have the words to express my feelings as beautifully as you do.
Perhaps I should tell you that the work is proceeding apace. Marie can hardly wait to sit down at her lamp every day. I believe that for her, it is more a pleasure than a chore. Johanna and I greatly enjoy the work of painting and finishing the pieces. It is quite another thing when we are producing the wares for ourselves, rather than working for someone else. It is a very fine feeling to be able to be proud of what one has done. Especially since my husband does whatever he can to humiliate and hurt me. He comes to our house almost every night, drunk, demanding that I come out. Once he lay in wait for me on the way to the village store and grabbed me roughly by the sleeve. I’ll get what is due to me, he said. Thank God that some of the villagers happened to pass by just then. I was honestly frightened. What if he does something to Wanda one day, simply to cause me pain? When I look into his eyes, all I see is rage. Impotent rage. He recently asked me, in all seriousness, why I left him. Can you imagine? Until he understands what he did wrong, he will not leave me in peace. Enough! Over and done with!
Do not worry, dear Steven, I am not about to burst into tears again and tell you my sad story. Even today I feel quite ill at ease when I recall how I behaved that evening. I am still most grateful to you for your kind understanding. The only way I can explain my candor is to say that from the very outset I had the feeling that I could trust you wholly and purely. When you consider that in truth I have little experience with men—and that what little I have had could hardly be called joyful—this is in fact quite astonishing. But deep inside I know that you are different. And that is why I am already looking forward to seeing you again, By the way: when you look out of your window, please give the ocean liners my greetings. It must be a fine feeling to be so close to the “big, wide world”!
With warm wishes from the Paradise of Glass,
Ruth
Hamburg, 15 September 1892
Dear Ruth,
Your letter made me the happiest man in Hamburg!
I must protest strongly against one thing that you said; you are a most gifted correspondent. The lines that you write are as lively and engaging as your conversation in person. When I read them, I feel almost as though I were sitting with you in the workshop while you and your sisters create your baubles with skillful hands. How I would love to be there with you in your Paradise of Glass—and what a beautiful name that is! Instead I threaten to drown under a mountain of paperwork. The greater the proportion of foreign goods offered for sale in Mr. Woolworth’s shops, the greater, alas, the workload. Yet I do not wish to complain. It is always exciting, with every day that dawns, to watch how he is building a great business empire through his cunning maneuvers. Indeed, I feel honored to be allowed to work for such a great man as Frank Winfield Woolworth. And yet there are times, such as now, when I yearn to be able to pack my case and travel wherever I will. But, alas, life is not that simple. Yet when I hear, dear Ruth, how your husband mistreats and molests you, then I burn to depart with the next coach and tell this villain just what I think of him. What kind of life is that, if every day you must live in fear? You do not deserve this. Nobody deserves this.
By the time you read these lines it will be just a few days until we see one another again. Thus I know I cannot expect to receive another letter from you in the meantime. I can hardly wait to sit across the table from you once more, to look into your velvet brown eyes and then never look away. Dare I imagine that you, too, think of me from time to time? You, the Princess of the Paradise of Glass?
I remain, in joyful anticipation,
Yours sincerely,
Steven Miles