Violet knew that, even if she had been sulking when they’d said their goodbyes at the train station on New Year’s Day.
She would wait. She’d promised.
It was no use. The thought of her in that red dress washed over him again. Stanley shut his eyes and pictured Violet standing across the street on her porch just before midnight on New Year’s Eve. There she’d stood in that dress (oh, how he loved her in red), no coat, laughing, waiting for someone to open the door. “It’s my turn to be the first-footer,” she’d called out, rubbing her arms for warmth. According to Welsh tradition, the first foot to cross the threshold in the New Year should belong to someone with dark hair. “I almost forgot,” she’d said, grabbing the coal bucket from the steps. Fuel in the hand of the first-footer symbolized work and warmth, two gifts all mining families needed.
Violet hadn’t waved Stanley over that night. Her parents didn’t approve of their relationship. Owen, her father, had loved Stanley for as long as he’d known him; he’d carried the boy out of the mine the day he’d lost his hand, but even he couldn’t abide a mixed marriage. “Unevenly yoked,” her father had said. “Protestants should marry Protestants. Catholics, Catholics. Says so in the Bible.”
After Stanley’s father died, the widow Lankowski raised the ten-year-old as her own son. She brought him to live in the only Polish home on Spring Street, across from Violet and her family, so Stanley understood Owen’s way of thinking. Most Catholics from up at St. Stanislaus felt the same way.
That’s why Stanley had to finish school before asking Violet’s father for her hand. The lot of a lawyer’s wife was far better than that of a miner’s, and Owen Morgan knew it. Would he rather she end up with someone poor just because he was Protestant? Someone like Tommy Davies? A nice enough fellow who’d lived next door to Violet all her life, baptized in the Providence Christian Church. But what did any of that matter if Tommy Davies would never be able to give her the life she deserved on a miner’s wages, or worse yet, make a widow of her before her time? Owen understood the dangers of that life, and Stanley was convinced that like most fathers, he wanted better for his daughter.
His purpose renewed, Stanley turned his attention back to his textbook and began reading.
“Don’t shoot!” The door inched open, and a pasty arm poked into the room, waving an envelope like a flag of surrender.
Stanley watched as Evan Evans stepped inside, laughing good-naturedly as though they’d shared in the joke.
Evan Evans had been the neighborhood bully as far back as Stanley could remember. Bad enough they’d grown up one block away from one another, but fate had somehow thrown them together in the same rooming house a few months earlier, when Evan took a job with the railroad.
“I’m trying to study.”
“My mistake.” Evan held the envelope to his nose and inhaled loudly. “I thought you’d want to hear from . . .” He paused. “Now that’s odd. It’s the widow’s return address,” he held the letter up to the light and squinted, “but the signature reads, Your Violet.”
“Where did you . . . ?” Stanley jumped up and grabbed the envelope.
Evan shrugged. “Someone must’ve seen the Scranton postmark and put it in my box.”
“I’ll bet.” Stanley sat back down with the letter in hand and turned toward his books. He’d had it with Evan Evans and his dirty tricks—in grade school he’d tell on classmates any chance he got, running his mouth about the gossip his no-good mother concocted, and worst of all, picking on Violet after her sister died.
Sniffing the air, Evan remarked, “You can still smell the perfume.” He snickered. “I’d say she’s sweet on you.”
“Stay out of it. I’m warning you.”
“Whoa! I’m just the messenger.” He pivoted his foot as if to leave but continued facing forward. “Of course, I have to wonder what her parents would think if they found out.”
Stanley shot up from his chair and the letter fell to the floor. He pinned Evan against the wall with his handless arm and gripped his throat with the good one. The fact that Evan stood a head taller made no difference. “Tell anyone about this,” Stanley paused to give his words weight, “and, swear to God, I’ll kill you.” He held Evan a moment longer before letting go.
Evan smoothed his shirt, adjusted his collar, and finger-combed his hair. “Nice way to treat an old friend,” he said.
“We were never friends.” Stanley picked up the letter and sat down on his bed. “Now get the hell out.”
“I won’t forget this,” Evan said, and he skulked out of the room.
Fifteen minutes passed before Stanley finally began to simmer down. He held the envelope the whole time, but chose not to open it in his agitated state. Violet deserved his full attention.
Threat or no threat, by Monday morning, Evan Evans would have a letter in the mail to his mother Myrtle who would claim it was her Christian duty to call on Violet’s mother, Grace.
The news would upset Mrs. Morgan, but it probably wouldn’t shock her, or Owen. They’d spent a considerable amount of time over the years trying to thwart the most steadfast kind of love—that which is rooted in friendship. Stanley and Violet had been playmates in childhood, fishing up at Leggett’s Creek, calling birds in the woods alongside the dairy. But when adolescence struck, society’s mores and a newfound self-consciousness created a natural distance between them. Mrs. Morgan seized her chance, nudging Violet toward more feminine pursuits such as painting, needlework, and Bible study with the girls from Sunday school. On the occasions when Stanley did stop by, Mr. Morgan would say, “It’s too nice a day to be cooped up inside,” or, “Go have fun with your buddies,” before sending him on his way.
Fortunately for Stanley and Violet, the widow Lankowski favored romance over practicality. “You were destined to be together,” she often said when recounting her part in their courtship. “I knew it the day I caught the pair of you playing hooky down at Murray’s store. You couldn’t have been more than eight or nine. There you both were, trembling in your boots over getting caught. But neither one of you turned against the other. You faced what you had coming together. God’s hand is in that kind of love.” Just to be sure, the widow had explained, she decided to put her hand in as well.
“I hear Violet’s been working over at Walsh’s,” she said on the Saturday Stanley returned home from his freshman year in college. When he didn’t bite, she added, “The studio,” then another pause, “on Lackawanna Avenue.”
“I know where it is.” When had Violet taken an interest in photography? For some reason this irritated Stanley.
“She’s coloring the portraits.”
At least that part made sense. Violet had always had a steady hand. “I know what you’re doing, Babcia.” He called her grandmother in Polish. Although the widow wasn’t related to Stanley by blood, he’d started using the name soon after she’d taken him in. It seemed fitting, given her age and importance in his life.
“I’m telling you about an old friend. That’s what I’m doing,” she’d said, peeling a lace tablecloth off a pile of linens and handing one corner to Stanley. “An old friend.” She searched the outstretched lace for the portion in need of repair. “With a new job.”
“There.”
