Sister Noon Read Free

responded with some heat. “She was a queen.”
    “And if she was not?” Mrs. Radford watched his face closely. She was looking for true love. She thought she saw it.
    And also rising comprehension. “You know where she is.” Mr. Bell reached excitedly for her arm. “Take me to her at once.”
    “No. But if she were invited to the MacElroys’ ball, I would deliver the invitation. Then you could take your turn with every other eligible man in San Francisco.” She meant this quite literally, but she allowed a familiar, teasing tone to come into her voice to hide it.
    “Dear Mrs. Radford,” he said.
    “She is a working woman,” Mrs. Radford warned him. “With a different name.”
    “She is a queen,” Mr. Bell repeated. “Whatever she does, whatever she calls herself. Blood will tell.”

    Mrs. Radford was in black. Mrs. Smith wore a gown of pink silk. It was fitted at the bodice, but blossomed at the hips with puffings and petals. The hem was larger still, and laced with ribbons. The MacElroys’ drawing room had been cleared for dancing, and she entered it like a rose floating on water. Couples were just assembling for the grand march. Every head turned. Mr. Bell made a spectacle of himself in his effort to get to her first. He was slightly shorter than she was.
    “Mrs. Radford,” he said politely. “How lovely to see you here. And Madame Christophe. I mustn’t imagine that you remember me, simply because I remember you.”
    “Though I do,” she said. She glanced at Mrs. Radford and then looked back to Mr. Bell. “And my name is not Madame Christophe. I owe you an explanation.” There was a pause. Mr. Bell rushed to fill it.
    “All you owe me is a dance,” he assured her. He was eager, nervous. He drew her away from Mrs. Radford, who went to sit with the older women and the married ones. The music began. She watched Mr. Bell bend in to Mrs. Smith to speak. She watched the pink skirt swinging over the polished floor, the occasional glimpse of the soft toes of Mrs. Smith’s shoes. She attended to the music and the lovely, old sense of being involved in things.
    Some of the men seemed to know Mrs. Smith already. Young Mr. Ralston engaged her for the redowa, and everyone knew he never danced. Mr. Sharon took the lancers, his head barely reaching her shoulder. Mr. Hayes chose her for the waltz, leaving his wife without a partner. And Mr. Bell dancedwith no one else, spent the time while she danced with others pacing and watching for the moment she came free.
    In her own small way, Mrs. Radford also triumphed. People approached who hadn’t spoken to her since her husband’s death. Innocuous pleasantries, but she could no longer take such attentions for granted. Eventually every conversation arrived at Mrs. Smith.
    “That lovely woman you came with?” said Mrs. Putnam. “I’ve not seen her before.”
    “She’s an old friend,” Mrs. Radford answered contentedly. “A widow from New Orleans.” She said nothing else, although it was clearly insufficient. Let Mrs. Putnam remember how she had accused Mrs. Radford of talking too much!
    At the end of the evening, Mr. Bell went to find their cloaks. “I so enjoyed that party,” Mrs. Smith told Mrs. Radford.
    “You’ll have many nights like this now. Many invitations. You were such a success.”
    Mrs. Smith had a gray velvet cloak. Mr. Bell returned with it, settled it slowly over her shoulders. He was reluctant to release her. “About my name,” she said. They were walking outside, Mrs. Smith in the middle, the women’s skirts crushed one against the next, like blossoms in a bouquet. On the steps, they joined a crowd waiting for carriages. To the right were the Mills family and that peevish, gossipy attorney, Henry Halleck. “I had a need to change my name to get out of New Orleans. I was born into slavery in Georgia,” Mrs. Smith said. Everyone could hear her. “I became a white woman to escape. Ellen Smith isn’t my real name, either.”
    And