Tiffany Girl by Deeanne Gist Page A

of responding, he rubbed his knuckles against the cat’s ear. Closing its eyes, the cat leaned in to the rub and purred.
    Flossie tilted her head. “We’d like you to join us.”
    “I’m afraid I can’t. I need to do some work.”
    She looked again at the clean desk and capped inkwell. “But everyone’s there.”
    “Perhaps next time.” He still hadn’t looked up, but kept all his attention on the cat.
    “Is it because I’m a New Woman?”
    Pausing, he rested his elbows on his knees. “Not at all. I’m sorry about that. I don’t know what came over me.”
    “Don’t be sorry. I asked you a question and you answered.”
    He studied her again. “Why did you ask it? Why was it so different from everyone else’s?”
    “I don’t know.” That wasn’t completely true. “Well, okay. Perhaps it had a little something to do with your articles in the World .”
    “Did it?” He leaned back. “Well, I have a question for you now. What kind of paintings did you surround my slip of paper with—the one Mrs. Holliday read to me, I mean?”
    Looking toward the upper corner of his ceiling, she bit her lower lip. “Well, let’s see. One painting was of a man dragging a woman by a chain around her neck. Another was of a woman being turned away from a university by a pack of men in black robes. Another of a woman in sordid labor over a soap vat. And the last a father pocketing all the money his daughter earned.”
    “Perhaps he needed it to help feed his family.”
    “Perhaps he didn’t.”
    He blew out a puff of air. “We men aren’t tyrants, you know.”
    “No?”
    “I’ve no desire to condemn women to imprisonment in greasy kitchens, forever debarring them from intellectual growth. It’s their best interests I have at heart. Theirs and their children’s.”
    Rather than challenge him further, she decided instead to extend an olive branch. “Then there’s no reason not to join us in the parlor.”
    A beat of silence. “I’m sorry.”
    She supposed she could blackmail him. Tell him she’d report him for harboring a stray, but, of course, she’d never do that. Still, she’d have to think of something, but for now she’d let him off the hook.
    Pushing herself off the frame, she took a step back. “Next time, then. Good night, Mr. Wilder.”
    “Miss Jayne.”
    The cat took a quick swipe, catching him across the hand.
    He jerked it back. “Oh, ho, ho. Easy now.”
    The sound of his one-sided conversation followed her back down the hall.

CHAPTER
    13

    M r. Tiffany poked his head inside the storeroom. “Well, there she is.”
    Flossie rose to her feet. “Mr. Tiffany! It’s so good to see you. I’ve been dying to tell you how much I love your glass. It is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen and such a privilege to work with.”
    With an arm against his waist, he gave a bow. “Thank you very much.” He straightened. “I’ve been wanting to come by, but hadn’t been able to pull myself away from the factory in Corona.”
    She couldn’t imagine that he’d been dressed like that at the factory or he’d have looked as out of place as she’d been on her first day of work. Still, she took a moment to appreciate the quality of his mixed cheviot coat, his brown worsted trousers with a thin dark stripe, and his russet shoes that had gained such popularity men were wearing them with everything but their evening dress.
    “Miss Upton,” he said, acknowledging Nan.
    “Good afternoon, Mr. Tiffany.” Nan picked up a sheet of glass, her owl-like eyes bluer than normal in the bright sunlight.
    He returned his attention to Flossie. “I wish you could have seen the glass we made yesterday. It was the purest of yellows withjust enough red added to turn parts of it the exact orange of the sun the moment before it disappears behind the horizon.”
    Flossie rested a hand against her chest. “Oh, I wish I could have seen it, too. It sounds like it would be the perfect thing to use for flames. Too bad we