Clara and Mr. Tiffany Read Free Page B

I taught school in Ohio I learned that the most impertinent ones are often the most lovable.”
    At this close range, I was startled to see that he had drawn his eyebrows on with a sepia-colored grease pencil—artistically.
    “If at any time I could offer you some diversion, I would be honored,” he said, scraping the pad of his thumb with the nail of his index finger, a quick, nervous mannerism.
    “That’s very kind of you.”
    In the hierarchy of the firm, he was the intermediary between Mr. Tiffany and me. I might come to need him to champion my requests.
    “There are two more operas this season,” he said. “Verdi’s
Otello
and Mozart’s
Marriage of Figaro.
”
    “I adore opera. That is, operas from the
Old
World.”
    A long, loud, unladylike sigh came from the studio. We both looked out the double doors. At that moment, Wilhelmina stood up and stretched, her big arms high in the air, her fingers wiggling, her bosoms thrust forward.
    “The cheeky one.” Mr. Belknap tipped his head toward her. “She’ll keep you on your toes.”
    I agreed, knowing that bumpy times lay ahead.
    “Oh, Louis wants to see you in his office right away,” he mentioned on his way out.
    “Then why didn’t you tell me right away?” Exasperated, I grabbed my notepad and pencil and flew out the door.

CHAPTER 3
OPAL

    A WHITE-HAIRED MAN WITH A COTTONY BEARD WAS CROUCHING close to the floor when I entered Mr. Tiffany’s office-studio.
    “What happened? Can I help?”
    “Have a seat,” Mr. Tiffany said, dabbing a paintbrush on his palette, his opal ring shooting out the colors of the wet paint. “I’ve wanted you to meet my father, Charles Tiffany, and he came today to pose. This is Mrs. Driscoll, head of the Women’s Department.”
    “Oh, hello,” I said. “Nice to meet you.” An inane thing to say to a man draped in a classical red robe and wearing sandals. I ought to have exclaimed, “Hail, Caesar,” or implored, “Lead us to the Promised Land.”
    “A pleasure.” The father kept his pose, his craggy face tipped down.
    On the unfinished canvas I recognized Joseph of Arimathea having just lowered Christ from the cross. Barely sketched in with charcoal, Mary Magdalene knelt at Jesus’s feet, and the Virgin Mother looked heavenward. The scene had the look of a Dutch Renaissance pietà, and the father’s face could have been painted by Hans Holbein the Elder.
    “The window is called
The Entombment
. It’s for the chapel. Your department will make it.”
    Mr. Mitchell, the stout business manager, burst in waving a page from a newspaper. “Do you know about this? The city Lead Glaziers and Glass Cutters’ Union is demanding higher wages.”
    “Well, satisfy them.” Mr. Tiffany went right on mixing a touch of yellow ocher into white for the winding cloth draped over his father’s arm.
    “They also want shorter hours, only fifty a week, and a beer break at three o’clock.”
    Tiffany the Elder broke his pose. “Now, that’s a problem. Shorter hours.”
    The splotch on Mr. Mitchell’s cheek in the shape of Africa was redder than usual. “If the union strikes,” he said, “our men will be forced to strike too, for solidarity, no matter what agreement you have with them, wages or hours.”
    “When might that happen?”
    “Only after several rounds of discussion.”
    “The union has to whip up the spirit of strike,” the elder Tiffany said. “That will take a while.”
    My mind did a flip, seeing this man looking as though he stepped straight out of the Bible talking about a labor strike.
    “We can move slowly in negotiation to forestall it,” Mr. Mitchell said. “It’s the worst possible time. Any other year, we could sail through it with our stock on hand.”
    “It doesn’t matter. The experiments in iridescent blown glass can go on regardless. I want them in Chicago.”
    “Don’t be stubborn, son. Let that lie. Your iridescent glass will be in the mosaics. Devote all the furnaces to