A White Room Read Online Free PDF Page B

wondered what type of prospects I’d face as a destitute woman living in one room with my mother and three sisters.
    “My point is, maybe you’re just a little scared. I’m sure if you give this John Dorr a chance, he’ll end up just fine, and if he doesn’t…” He stood and pulled me up by the hands.
    I popped up. “Yes?”
    “I’ll come get you.”

Three
    January 1901
    Labellum, Missouri
    M y eyes moved across the steamboat passengers. Death lingered on the tip of everyone’s tongue, and everyone was clad in black crepe and taffeta. What an odd time to be newlyweds. I looked at John and considered him, clinging to the hope that affection would grow with time. I touched the ring he had given me—a tiny pearl atop a gold band surrounded by a circle of white opal spheres. Florence had eyed it after the ceremony. “Emeline?” she said as her smile turned. “Pearls mean tears.”
    John had recently graduated law school, and his father wanted him to mentor under a friend, Mr. Lewis Coddington, who had a firm in Labellum, Missouri. On January 28, 1901, a few weeks after our private ceremony and only six days after Britain’s Queen Victoria had died, my new husband and I sat silent and still on a steamboat bound for the distant town. Not only were my family and I in mourning, but people all over the world were mourning the queen. A marriage was supposed to be a happy occasion, but the dark curiosities surrounding death twisted the minds of everyone around us.
    We docked at the edge of the little town, nestled between two bluffs that gave it the appearance of a hole in the side of the world. I had lived in the city for my entire life, and now my best option was to live in a hole. We plodded off the boat, and John led me to our surrey, a plum-colored boxy carriage with a fringed canopy top and bench seat. The gray-haired driver made sure the horse clopped through town quickly.
    “Just wait until you see the window molding.” John went on and on about the house he had found. “Oh, and the parlor. It truly is an architectural wonder!” He had explained that the previous owners had left all their furniture and decorations. I didn’t know why anyone would abandon their furnishings, but I imagined it was a sad story. Still, if the house was lovely, I knew I could be happy. The town was tiny and my husband a stranger, but I could be happy running a beautiful home. It was the one thing I would have authority over. I’d always detested my mother’s décor. Whenever I complained about it, she reminded me that when I got married, I could decorate however I wanted and I didn’t have to use a single thing she had chosen. It wasn’t as if I could—those things were all gone now.
    “We’re getting closer.” John held himself up to see how far away we were, but the rocking surrey pitched him back onto the seat.
    I observed him as he grinned, bobbing around to see past the horse and driver. At least he was twenty-five. Women in my situation had often found themselves married to fifty-year-old widowers. I hoped he thought well of me. We hadn’t had much time to become acquainted during a brief engagement that got swept away with moving arrangements and the holidays. I hoped he didn’t find my apparel unappealing. Unlike those who might mourn the queen for a few weeks, I would wear blacks, purples, and eventually white mourning garb for almost another year because of my father’s death.
    “We’re here! We’re here!” John shouted and unsuccessfully tried to stand again.
    I lifted my head and sat taller to see, struggling to glimpse through trees flashing past. When I finally laid my eyes on it, I saw a structure that was not what any home should be. The driver veered right at a break in the trees and took us on a straight path toward the monster. When we stopped, John jumped off to fiddle with something before offering his hand to help me out. If he had offered it immediately, I wouldn’t have taken it because