The Shoemaker's Wife

Chapter 13

A WOODEN CLOTHESPIN

Una Molletta di Legno

The leaves of the old elm in the courtyard behind the Zanetti Shoe Shop on Mulberry Street had turned a dull gold and fallen to the ground like confetti at the end of a parade. Ciro propped the door open with a can of machine oil. The cool autumn breeze floated over the worktable, rustling the pattern paper. Ciro adjusted the overhead light to illuminate the book he was reading.

The scar on Ciro’s hand from the accident with the lathe had taken almost six years to fade. By the fall of 1916, the thin red gash that crossed his lifeline on his palm had faded to pink. Ciro was concerned about the mystical implication of the placement of this wound, so he had his palm read on Bleecker Street. As Gloria Vale held his open palm, she assured him that he would have more riches in this life than his heart could hold. But, he noticed, she never told him how long this blessed life would be. When Carla heard of the palm reading, she sniffed, “Another woman charmed by Ciro Lazzari.”

“I finished the order,” Ciro said without looking up as Remo entered the shop.

“What are you reading?”

“A manual about how to build women’s shoes. A salesman left these samples, and it got me to thinking.”

In response to Remo’s quizzical look, he added, “There are a lot of people in New York City, and half of them are women.”

“True,” Remo said. “And you’d be the first fellow to count them one by one.”

Ciro laughed. “Look.” He fanned a dozen small squares of leather out on the table. There was soft calfskin dyed pale green, a pebble leather the color of red licorice, and a deep brown suede the exact shade of pot de crème. “Bella, no? If we make women’s shoes, we double our business on the spot. But Signora doesn’t like the idea.”

“Carla doesn’t want women in the shop. She’s afraid you’ll take your mind off your work.” Remo laughed. “Or that I will.”

“She has it all wrong. I don’t want to make ladies’ shoes to meet women, I want to make them to challenge myself. And I’ll take any advice you have for me. A master must be a master to the apprentice in all respects. Benvenuto Cellini said so in his autobiography.”

“I haven’t read a book in twenty years. Once again, the apprentice surpasses the master. I’m almost obsolete. You’re not only smarter than me, you’re a better shoemaker.”

“Then why is your name on the door?” Ciro teased him. “You know, Cellini dictated his autobiography to his assistant.”

“You should write down my wisdom before I die and it’s forgotten.”

“You won’t be forgotten, Remo.”

“You never know. That’s why I want to sell everything and go home to Italy.” Remo admitted, “I miss my village. I have family there. Three sisters and a brother. Lots of cousins. I have a small house. I have a crypt with my name on it.”

“I thought I was the only one who dreamed of home.”

“You know, Ciro, if there’s a war, we don’t know what side Italy will be on. It could make it very difficult for us here.”

“We’re Americans now,” Ciro said.

“That’s not what our papers say. We’re welcome to stay and work; beyond that, it’s up to them. Until you pass the test for citizenship, you are here at the whim and fancy of the United States government.”

“If they threw me out, I would be happy to go back to Vilminore. I liked that I knew every family in my village, and that they knew me. I remember every garden and street. I knew who owned the best ground to grow sweet onions and who had the best spot to plant pear trees. I watched women hang the wash and men shoe the horses. I even watched people pray in church. I could tell who was truly penitent and who was there to show off a new hat. There’s something to be said for life on the mountain.”

“You dream of your mountain, and I dream of the port of Genoa. I spent every summer there with my grandmother,” Remo said. “Sometimes I go through the leather and look for the exact blue of the Mediterranean.”

“And I look for the green of the juniper trees. Everyone on the mountain had the same view of Pizzo Camino. We looked at the world in the same way. I can’t say that about Mulberry Street.”

“So many layabouts here. They don’t work hard enough. They want the sparkle without doing the polish.”

“Some, not all,” Ciro said. Ciro heard the men leaving for construction jobs before sunrise, and watched the women tend their children. Most of the people in Little Italy worked hard to keep their families secure. “I’m lucky,” Ciro admitted.

“You made your luck. Do you know how many boys I tried to train in this shop? Carla never liked anyone I tried to apprentice here. But she’s never said a word against you. I think you work harder than she does.”

“Don’t tell her that.”

“Do you think I’m crazy?” Remo looked at the doorway, hoping Carla was not coming through it.

“I am very grateful to you, Remo. You didn’t have to take me in.”

“Every boy deserves a second chance.” Remo shrugged.

“I didn’t think I needed one. I didn’t do anything wrong. But I learned that it doesn’t matter what I think. It’s what the padrone believes—that’s what counts.”

“We all have a boss.” Remo pointed up the stairs. “Thirty-seven years with her taught me to keep my mouth shut and follow instructions.” He lowered his voice. “Don’t marry a padrone, Ciro. Pick a quiet girl who likes to take care of you. An ambitious woman will kill you. There’s always something that needs to be done. They keep a list. They make you a list. They want more, more, more, and trust me, more, more, more leads to an ulcer.”

“Don’t worry about me. I make shoes for a living, and love . . . only when it suits me.”

“Smart boy,” Remo said.

“What are you two talking about?” Carla asked as she entered the room with the mail. She pushed the leather samples aside. “What are these doing here?” she barked, then glanced back at Ciro.

“We’re not going to make anything in this shop but work boots. Get those pipe dreams out of your head.”

Ciro and Remo looked at one another and laughed.

“It’s a good thing I keep the books,” Carla said, undeterred. “If I left this business to you two, I might come home one day to find you making cannoli instead of boots. You’re a couple of dreamers.” Carla gave Ciro a letter before she climbed back up the stairs.

Ciro was thrilled when he saw that the return address was Eduardo’s seminary in Rome. He excused himself and went out to the garden with the letter, put his feet up, and carefully opened the envelope. Eduardo’s perfect penmanship was a work of art. Ciro handled the letter reverently.

October 13, 1916

My Dear Brother,

Thank you for the work boots you sent. I laced them up tightly and tested the steel toes you mentioned like a prima ballerina. Our old friend Iggy would not have been capable of en pointe. Of course, I examined the boots as closely as Sister Ercolina would have and was happy to see that you are every bit the craftsman you claim to be in your last letter. Bravo, Ciro, bravissimo! Though I wear the sandals of Galilee, I can still appreciate a good pair of boots!

I have some news regarding our mother.

Ciro sat forward in the old wicker chair.

This information has been relayed to me by letter from the abbess in a convent near Lake Garda where our mother has been living for the past several years. I know this will come as a shock to you. Mama was so close to us, just a few kilometers from Bergamo. But she was very sick. She went to see a doctor in Bergamo the day she left us at the convent. He made his diagnosis and sent her to the nuns. They have a hospital and a sanitarium there. Our mama suffered from mental distress so severe she could not function. Papa’s death had put her in a grief state she could not overcome. Sister Ercolina made sure that Mama got the best care, and now, I am told, she works in the hospital there. I wrote to her and told her about you, and about the seminary. As you know, seminarians are not allowed any contact with family members except by letter. If I could fly over these walls to see Mama in this moment, I would, if only to write to you to tell you that I had seen her and was assured by my own eyes that she was safe and healthy. But, sadly, I have only the promise of the sisters to go on. We must trust that they are taking care of her, as they always did for us.

Ciro’s heart felt heavy. He began to cry.

The news that Mama is alive is a blessing to me. I feared that we’d never look upon her face again, not even learn what became of her. We must be grateful for this news, and pray that we will all be reunited someday. I keep you in my prayers, my best and only brother, and remember how proud I am of you. Nor am I penitent about that pride. I know what you are made of.

Yours, Eduardo

Remo stood in the doorway to the garden and watched as Ciro wiped his eyes, carefully folded the letter, and placed it back in the envelope. He remembered the day Ciro had come off the ferry from Ellis Island. Despite his size and abundance of energy, Ciro had been an innocent boy. As Remo observed Ciro now, he saw a man in the wicker chair, a man any father would be proud to call his son.

In the intervening years, Remo had grown to find as much purpose in the exchange of knowledge from master to apprentice as Ciro. This experience would be as close as Remo would ever come to being a father himself, and he savored the role.

“Ciro, you have a visitor,” Remo said softly. “He says he’s an old friend.”

Ciro followed Remo back into the shop.

“You never write,” Luigi Latini said to Ciro. Luigi had cropped his black hair, slicked it back with pomade, and grown a small, fashionable square mustache under his small nose.

“Luigi!” Ciro embraced his old friend. “You could’ve written to me! Where’s your wife?” Ciro looked over Luigi to see if he had brought her.

“I don’t have one.”

“What happened?”

“I went to Mingo Junction as planned”—Luigi nodded sadly—“but I knew the photograph was too good to be true. I couldn’t get past her nose. I tried. But I just couldn’t do it. So I made up an excuse. Said I was dying and that I had weak blood. I told her father that his daughter did not deserve to be a young widow. I practically climbed into an empty casket and clutched a lily to my chest. Before they could figure out I was lying, I’d hopped a freighter and gone to Chicago. I’ve worked there ever since, on the roads, mixing cement. Six years I’ve been working on a crew. And I could work another twenty out there. They’re building roads all the way to California.”

“How did you find me?”

“I remembered Mulberry Street,” Luigi said. “We worked so well together aboard ship, I thought maybe we could work together again.”

“How touching.” Carla stood in the doorway and fixed a red bandana in her white hair. “You can’t stay here.”

“Mama,” Ciro teased, winking at Luigi. Ciro only called Signora “Mama” when he wanted something. He knew it, and so did she.

“I’m not your mother,” Carla said. “There’s no room here.”

“Look at him. You can see the bones in his neck. Luigi barely eats. He’ll have one spoon of cavatelli and no more.”

“Not likely. When he tastes my cavatelli, he’ll eat a pound.”

“See that? Signora has invited you to dinner,” Ciro said to Luigi.

“There’s a boardinghouse on Grand,” Carla said as she wrote down the address. “Go get a room there and be back in an hour for dinner.”

“Yes, Signora,” said Luigi.

Enza’s sixth anniversary on Adams Street in Hoboken came and went without a glass of champagne or a slice of cake, and there was surely no acknowledgment from Signora Buffa.

A few months after Enza settled in with the Buffa cousins in Hoboken, Marco Ravanelli left Hoboken for the coalfields of Pennsylvania to take a job in the mines. He was six hours away by train, and sent his pay to Enza faithfully. She, in turn, would take the money to the bank, deposit it with her own paycheck, and send a money order to her mother in Italy.

Each Christmas, Marco managed to visit his daughter. They would celebrate quietly, attend a mass, share a meal, and he would return to work, and so would she, making overtime on the holiday shifts.

A lucky break came a year into their plan. Giacomina had been willed a small parcel of land above Schilpario. The plot was just large enough to accommodate a house, but Marco seized on the opportunity. Instead of buying one of the modest storefront houses along Via Bellanca, Marco and Enza decided he would keep working in America until they had saved enough to build the kind of house Marco had dreamed of. Not a grand home, but one with a deep hearth and three windows for sunlight and five bedrooms so that Enza and her siblings could all stay and raise their families under one roof. Enza knew this change in plan would keep them in America longer than they had hoped.

Six years of combining Enza and Marco’s salaries, less their expenses, was slowly beginning to fill Giacomina’s money box in Schilpario. Battista and Vittorio carried on Marco’s carriage route and picked up small jobs wherever they could, but without the money made in America, they would never have survived.

The letters on thin blue paper that crossed the Atlantic were filled with details of the home that was to be: a porch with a swing; two gardens, one facing east for vegetables and herbs, and the other facing west, where a patch of sunflowers would tilt their heads toward the setting sun; a common kitchen with a long farm table and many chairs; a basement to make and store wine; a deep brick oven with a hand-turned rotisserie.

Enza and Marco’s venture to America would make it all possible, down to the small grace notes like handmade lace curtains. The Ravanellis were brilliant savers, used to deprivation, only spending money on their basic needs in America; everything else went to Giacomina and the house fund. The house would be the castle that would shield them from want, hurt, and further loss.

Enza longed for satin shoes and elegant hats, like all young women, but when she thought of her mother, she put her desires aside for the family’s dream. She sent her father a letter each week, after she received his pay, in which she only wrote good news. She told humorous stories about the girls in the factory where she worked and the church she attended.

Enza said little about the Buffa family, because life with them was barely tolerable. She was mistreated, overworked, forced to do the cleaning, cooking, and laundry for Anna Buffa and her three daughters-in-law, who lived in the apartments above her own. While the Buffas were blood relatives of Giacomina’s, they were distant third cousins, only discovered when Enza and Marco looked for connections to help them make the move to America. Anna did not consider Enza family, and she let her know it.

Enza was given a small room in the basement, a cot, and a lamp. It was indentured servitude, and the only happy moments she knew came from the friendships she made at the factory. Enza promised herself each night before sleep that once the house money had been secured, she and Marco would return to Schilpario, and life would be as it once had been. Papa would manage the carriage, and Enza would set up her own dressmaking shop. She put aside thoughts of her illness on the voyage over, vowing that she could survive a return trip. Enza’s dreams of the mountain, her determination to return to the security of her mother’s arms, and the memory of the laughter of her brothers and sisters got her through each day—but just barely.

Enza sealed the envelope addressed to her mother carefully, then tucked it into her apron pocket.

“Vincenza!” Signora Buffa’s voice thundered from the kitchen.

“Coming!” Enza shouted back. She slipped into her shoes and climbed the basement steps.

“Where is my rent?”

Enza reached into her pocket and handed Signora one dollar in cash, for the rental of her basement room. The original agreement had been that Enza would work in exchange for her room and board, but that plan had quickly died when Pietro Buffa took a job in Illinois, taking his three sons with him, to build train tracks on a crew in the Midwest. Enza only stayed because she had heard stories of immigrant girls who left their sponsor’s homes only to find themselves in the street, without a position or a place to stay.

“You’re behind on the laundry. Gina needs the baby clothes.” Signora Anna Buffa had thin black eyebrows, a turned-up nose, and a cruel mouth. “We’re tired of waiting for you to finish your chores.”

“I hang the laundry when I leave in the morning. Gina could take it down.”

“She’s watching the baby!” Anna shrieked.

“Maybe one of the other girls could help.”

“Dora is in school! Jenny has children! It’s your job!”

“Yes, Signora.” Enza lifted the laundry basket and entered the kitchen.

Anna called after her, “The sun will go down and the clothes won’t dry. I don’t know why I took you in, you stupid girl!”

Late that evening, Anna stood by her phonograph player in the living room. She sorted through stacks of Enrico Caruso’s records, shuffling through them like cards. She chose a record, placed it on the turntable, and cranked the wheel. The needle settled into the grooves as Anna poured herself a glass of whiskey. Soon the air was filled with Caruso’s artistry, long, luscious notes, arias sung in Italian. The scratches on the wax records only made his voice sound sweeter, the grooves deepened from wear.

Anna played “Mattinata” over and over again at top volume, until the neighbor yelled, “Basta!” Then she changed the record, playing music from Lucia di Lammermoor until she fell asleep, the needle scouring the innermost track of the wax in an endless hiss.

Enza checked the strands of fresh pasta she had made that morning, hanging them up to dry on wooden dowels. As they dried, the powdery scent of flour wafted through the kitchen. These were the things that made Enza long for the Ravanelli kitchen in Schilpario, on days when Mama would cover the table in flour and they would knead fluffy ropes of potato pasta to make gnocchi, or roll small, delicate bundles of crepes filled with cheese and bits of sweet sausage.

Enza tried not to think about home when she did her chores. She would rather be helping her own mother than this ungrateful landlord.

Enza walked through the piles of dirty laundry on the sunporch. None of the Buffa women worked in the local factories, nor did they perform any of the usual household chores. They considered Enza their personal maid. They had adjusted quickly to having everything done for them, as if they came from homes with servants.

Enza lifted the tin washtub, filled with wet laundry she had scrubbed and rinsed by hand. She pushed the screen door open and stepped out onto the patch of grass behind the tenement, where she had strung a clothesline across the courtyard. Every bit of space behind the building had been negotiated and bartered, including the open air. Lines of rope choked the sky like strings on a harp.

Enza lifted the corners of her apron, tucking them beneath the sash. She filled the pocket with clothespins. She lifted a bleached white diaper out of the bin, snapped it, and clipped it to the clothesline. She yanked the pulley and hung the next, and the next. Enza’s laundry was always the most pristine in the courtyard. She used lye soap, and finished the job with a soak in hot water and bleach.

Enza hung the underpants, pantalettes, and skirts of the Buffa women one by one. When she had first arrived, she would drop lavender oil into the rinse as she had when she washed the family’s clothes in Schilpario, but after a few months, she stopped. Her extra efforts were neither appreciated nor acknowledged. She only heard complaints: there was a wrinkle in a hem, or the laundry wasn’t finished fast enough. Four babies had been born in six years on Adams Street. Enza could barely keep up with the workload.

Anna Buffa played a duet from Rigoletto at full volume as Enza heated chicken stock on the stove. She chopped a carrot into slim discs and dropped them into the broth. Enza carefully ladled a cup of pastina into the pot, then another. The tiny dots of pasta, as small as rice, would make a hearty soup. Giacomina had taught Enza that all ingredients in soup must be chopped and diced similarly to create a smooth texture in order to feel uniform in the mouth, no one ingredient overpowering another.

Enza prepared a tray for Anna’s meal. She poured a glass of wine from a homemade bottle labeled “Isabelle Bell,” and set out several slices of bread, some softened butter, and the soup. She placed a cloth napkin on the tray and took it into the living room.

Anna Buffa was draped on an easy chair covered in brown chenille, one leg slung over the ottoman, the other foot on the floor. Her eyes were closed; her pale blue dress was hiked to the knees, and her lace collar was askew. Enza felt a moment of pity. Anna’s once-lovely face was now etched with lines of worry, its texture slack from age, and her once-black hair was streaked with white. Anna still managed to put on lipstick each morning, but by nightfall all that was left was a pale stain of tangerine, which made her look more haggard still.

“Your dinner, Signora.” Enza placed it carefully on the ottoman.

“Sit with me, Enza.”

“I have so much to do.” Enza forced a smile.

“I know. But sit with me.”

Enza sat down on the edge of the sofa.

“How is the factory?”

“Fine.”

“I should write to your mother,” Anna said.

Enza wondered what had brought on this civil tone and mood. She looked over at the whiskey glass and realized that Anna had already finished it. This would explain her sudden warmth.

“You should eat your soup,” Enza told her, placing a pillow behind the small of Anna’s back. This was the only pampering Anna had ever received, and she relished it.

Anna placed the napkin on her lap and slowly sipped the soup. “Delicious,” she said to Enza. Evidently, Anna's mood had mellowed in the glow of the amber booze.

“Thank you.”

Enza looked down at Anna’s swollen ankles. “You should soak your feet tonight, Signora.”

“The ankles are bad again.” Anna sighed.

“It’s the whiskey,” Enza said.

“I know. Wine is good for me, but whiskey is not.”

“Hard liquor has no place to go in the body.”

“How do you know this?” Anna’s dark eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“My mother always said that if you drink wine made from the grapes of your own vines, it can never hurt you. But we don’t have room on Adams Street for a trellis.” Enza smiled.

“Evangeline Palermo grows her own grapes and makes wine in Hazelet. She'll live to be a hundred. Watch,” Anna said bitterly. “Play me a record.”

Enza placed Enrico Caruso singing Tosca on the turntable.

“Don’t scratch it,” Anna barked.

Enza placed the needle gently on the outer groove, then lowered the volume dial. “Signora, tell me why you like the opera.”

“I had some talent myself,” Anna began.

“Why don’t you sing in church?” Enza asks.

“I’m better than that!” Anna hissed. “I can’t waste my talent in a church choir. So I don’t bother to sing at all.” She was as petulant as a spoiled girl.

Enza rose from the sofa, returning to the kitchen to finish her chores. She promised herself that she would never run a household like this one. Anna’s daughters-in-law took their meals upstairs at different times, and their respect for their mother-in-law was nonexistent.

Enza thought longingly of her home and how close she had been to her brothers and sisters. They had shared everything, meals, chores, and conversation. Even the mountain itself, with its majestic cliffs, rolling green fields, and well-worn trails, seemed to belong to them. The Ravanellis were truly a family; they didn’t simply share an address like the Buffas.

Enza’s eyes filled with tears whenever she thought of Schilpario. Her talks with her mother would go long into the night, and it surprised her to realize that Anna’s family never sought her out for company or conversation. Anna Buffa doesn’t know what she is missing, Enza thought. Or maybe she did. Perhaps that’s why she drank whiskey and played opera music so loudly. Anna Buffa wanted to forget.

Carla cleared the dishes from the garden table. She had served a feast of rigatoni in pork sauce, hunks of fresh buttered bread, a salad of fresh greens, and glasses of Remo’s homemade red wine under the old tree to Ciro and Luigi, who put in long ten-hour days without a break.

Remo roasted chestnuts on the grill. As they popped in the heat, bursting their glassy shells, he looked over at Ciro and Luigi, telling stories and making each other laugh. Ciro had seemed so much happier since Luigi arrived, as though his old friend breathed new life into him. Remo could see that Ciro hungered for the kind of friendship Luigi provided, one based upon shared memories and goals. Remo didn’t want to lose Ciro in the shop, and he figured the best way to keep his apprentice was to hire his friend.

“You know, Ciro, when you were looking at the leather samples, it got me to thinking.” Remo sat down. “We don’t necessarily need to go into women’s shoes just yet. It’s a good idea, but I see it further down the line,”

“I understand,” Ciro said, but there was no mistaking the quick flash of disappointment across his face.

“But we do need to expand our business, especially if I have to pay another salary.” Remo looked at Luigi.

Ciro beamed. “I’m listening,” he said.

“We need to take the Zanetti Shoe Shop to the job sites. Imagine if we had a cart near the Hell’s Gate bridge operation. You could make repairs on-site as well as take orders for new boots. With another pair of hands, we could get a real assembly line going here, delivering shipments of new goods right back to the job site.”

“We’d get the Greeks from Astoria, the Russians from Gravesend, the Irish from Brooklyn,” Ciro began. “They would all wear Zanetti boots. And then we’d move the cart around the city to the construction sites for more new customers. It’s a great idea.”

“Luigi can be in the shop with me while he trains, and you can be out in the field expanding the business. Eventually, you two can take over,” Remo continued. “The master steps aside, and the journeymen run the shop.”

“This is a great opportunity,” Luigi said. “What do you think, Ciro?”

“I like it,” Ciro said.

“What are you boys cooking up out here?” Carla asked.

“We’re about to put the Zanetti Shoe Shop on the move,” Ciro explained.

“Was anyone going to check with me?”

“Say hello to the new apprentice,” Ciro said. “You might want to ask the bank for an extra green bag, because this man is going to help you fill it.”

Carla beamed at the thought.

Enza finished the last of the dinner dishes, drying them carefully and placing them on the shelf. She went from room to room, collecting the soup bowls and breadbaskets set outside their doors by Anna’s daughters-in-law. When Enza returned from the night shift at dawn, the sink would be full of empty baby bottles, dirty plates, and glasses. After a long shift in the factory, Enza would have to boil the baby bottles, wash the dishes, and clean the kitchen all over again.

Enza packed a hard roll, a hunk of cheese, and an apple in her purse. She tiptoed through the house to the front door, past Signora Buffa, who snored in the bedroom, and let herself out, locking the door behind her.

She walked quickly through the dark streets of Hoboken, careful not to draw any attention to herself, not from the groups of men gathered on street corners, or from the women who sat on their stoops and fanned themselves in the night air.

Occasionally a young man would lean over a second-story balcony and whistle as she passed, and she would hear the laughter of his friends, which sent a fearful chill through her. Enza had never told her father that she worked the night shift. He would be concerned if he knew she walked the streets of Hoboken alone at night.

Enza had developed some tricks to keep safe. She would cross the street to walk near a cop on his beat, and when none could be seen, she would duck off to a side street when she sensed eyes upon her, waiting for the threat of danger to pass so she could continue the half mile undisturbed.

Meta Walker was the largest blouse factory in Hoboken. The rambling warehouse was three stories high, the first floor built of local sandstone blocks, the upper floors tacked on in shingled wood painted gray, as though a cheap paper party hat had been placed atop the stonework. Metal fire escapes snaked up the exterior, with square landings outside doors marked Exit. The runners often used the fire escapes to carry messages to the foreladies running the operators on their machines.

About three hundred girls worked in the plant, split in two shifts, keeping the factory in operation twenty-four hours a day, six days a week. The need for machine operators was constant, as was the turnover, making this plant a first stop for immigrant girls looking for a paycheck.

The factory produced various styles of ladies’ cotton blouses: button-down with round-necked collars, flat-placketed with ruffles on the bodice, lace-trimmed with square collars, shirtwaist-style with half-inch stand-up collars, and the popular tuxedo style, collarless, with a flat bib and a small series of buttons.

Enza gathered a dozen white cotton blouses, tied them together with a ribbon of cotton remnant from the cutting room floor, threw them into a canvas bin filled with twenty similar bundles, and wheeled the bin to finishing. She practiced her English aloud as she pushed the bin, because no one could hear her over the roar of the machines.

“Dago girl,” Joe Neal from the finishing department called out as Enza passed him. Joe Neal was the nephew of the owner. Sturdily built, around five foot ten, with pomade slicked through his thin brown hair, which was parted fashionably down the center, he grinned with the bright white teeth of the milk-fed American rich. He taunted the girls, and most were afraid of him. He strutted around the factory as if he owned it already.

“When you gonna go out with me?” Joe Neal hissed. He followed Enza as she pushed the bin.

Enza ignored him.

“Answer me, dago girl.”

“Shut up,” Enza said, strong and plain, as her friend Laura had taught her.

Joe Neal had worked in various departments throughout the factory, though he never lasted long. Enza was told by the other machine operators that Joe had been thrown out of military school, where he’d been sent to be straightened out. The girls warned Enza about him on the first day, and told her to avoid him. But this was impossible, since it was her job to deliver bundles to the finishing department.

Joe Neal had first attempted to flirt with Enza. When she did not respond, his taunts escalated. Now he lay in wait to bully and provoke her, choosing his moments carefully, usually when Enza was alone. He hid behind rolling racks of blouses, or stepped in front of her when she turned a corner. Night after night, Enza endured his insults. She held her head high as she passed him.

Joe Neal sat on the cutting table, legs dangling. Instead of a smile, he sneered at Enza. “Dago has airs.”

“I don’t speak English,” Enza lied.

“I’ll fix you.”

Enza ignored the comment, pushing the bins filled with bundles to the end of the line. She checked the clock and headed to the lunchroom for her break.

“Over here!” Laura Heery waved to Enza from the far end of the break room, a concrete box filled with unpainted picnic tables and attached benches.

Laura was slim and reedy, a blazing candle of a girl, a redhead with vivid green eyes, a small nose covered in freckles, and perfectly shaped pink lips. Of Irish descent, Laura accentuated her height by wearing long, straight skirts and matching vests over starched blouses. Like Enza, she made all of her own clothes herself.

The girls in the factory were usually cordial during work hours, yet rarely did the friendships continue outside the cutting-room doors. Laura and Enza were the exception, having recognized their simpatico natures over an argument about fabric.

Every few months, the mill owners cleared the fabric inventory and put out ends, yardage of fabric that hadn’t been used on an order, or samples dropped off by eager-to-please salesmen. These fabric pieces of various sizes and lengths, rolled on bolts, were useless to the owners but could be salvaged by an expert seamstress to create or adorn clothing.

On Enza’s first day of work, she was invited to peruse the ends with the other operators. A piece of pale yellow cotton printed with small yellow rosebuds with green leaves caught Enza and Laura’s eye at the same time. Laura grabbed the fabric as Enza reached for it, held it up to her face, and yelled, “Yellow and green are my colors!”

Enza was about to yell back, and instead said, “You’re right. It’s perfect with your skin. Take it.”

Enza’s act of generosity moved Laura, and from that day forward, they shared break time. Within a few months, Laura began to teach Enza to read and write English.

Enza’s letters to her mother were filled with stories about Laura Heery, like the time they went to the Steel Pier in Atlantic City one Saturday afternoon. Enza had her first hot dog that day, dressed with yellow mustard and sauerkraut. Enza took pains to describe the pink sand on the beach, the one-man band on the Steel Pier, and the bicycle built for two on the boardwalk. She wrote about the wide-brimmed sun hats decorated with giant bows, whimsical felt bumblebees, and enormous silk flowers, about the bathing costumes, sleek, scoop-necked tanks with belts. Everything was new to her, and so American.

Enza had found a best friend in Laura, but so much more. They both loved well-made, fashionable clothes. They both aspired to elegance. They both took time with whatever they made, whether it was a hat or a simple skirt. They groaned when the Walkers bought cheap cotton from a middleman, and the lot of blouses made from it had to be scrapped. They were hard workers, conscientious and fair. The stories in Enza’s letters proved that the values instilled in her by her mother had remained intact.

“You look awful,” Laura said as she handed Enza a paper cup filled with hot coffee, light with cream, just like Enza liked it.

“I’m tired,” Enza admitted as she sat.

“Signora Buffa soused again?”

“Yes.” Enza sighed. “Whiskey is her only friend.”

“We have to get you out of there,” Laura said.

“You don’t have to solve my problems.”

“I want to help.” Laura Heery was twenty-six, had attended classes in secretarial school, and worked as the night manager in the office. It was Laura who had shown Enza how to fill out the forms for employment, where to be sized for her work apron, where to pick up her tools, and how to earn the promotions that took her from operating the machines to becoming the lead girl in finishing. She taught Enza how to add money to her paycheck by doing additional piecework on the blouses during deadline crunches.

Laura broke a fresh, plain buttermilk doughnut in two, giving the bigger portion to Enza.

Enza said, in perfect English, “Thank you for the doughnut, Miss Heery.”

“Nice.” Laura laughed. “You sound like the queen.”

“Thank you kindly,” Enza said with a perfect inflection.

“You keep that up, and pretty soon you’ll be treated like one.”

Enza laughed.

“Get ready. The next thing I’m going to teach you is how to answer questions on a job interview.”

“But I have a job.”

Laura lowered her voice. “We can do better than this dump. And we will. But keep that under your hat.”

“I will.”

“And Signora Buffa still doesn’t suspect anything, right? That’s how they keep you on a cot in a cold basement, you know. If you don’t learn English, you’re dependent on them. We’re about to spring you from that awful trap.”

Enza confided, “I hear her say terrible things about me to her daughter-in-law. She thinks I don’t understand.”

“See those girls? Millie Chiarello? Great on the buttonholer. Mary Ann Johnson? Best steam presser on the floor. Lorraine DiCamillo? Nobody like her in finishing. They’re competent, hard workers, but you have real talent. You have ideas. You thought of piping a white blouse in baker’s twine, and the stores reordered twice, they were so popular. We don’t need these machines. Real couturiers sew everything by hand. I’ve been doing some asking around,” Laura whispered. “We can get jobs in the city.”

The city.

Whenever Enza heard those words, she was filled with a sense of possibility.

Laura had been born in New Jersey, but she longed for New York. She knew the names of the families who built mansions on Fifth Avenue, where to find the best cannoli in Little Italy, where the best pickles were brined on the Lower East Side, and the times of the marionette shows in the Swedish Cottage in Central Park. But Laura also knew her rights on the job, and how to ask for a raise. Laura Heery thought like a man in a man’s world.

“Do you really think we can get jobs?” Enza asked nervously.

“We’ll take any job until we can get a job sewing. You could be a secretary, and I could be a maid. Can you imagine working in an atelier on Fifth Avenue?”

“I almost can,” Enza says excitedly. Talking to Laura was like opening a treasure chest.

“Well, dream big!” Laura had been waiting for a partner to help her make the crossing to Manhattan. Her family swore they’d disown her if she ventured into the city alone, but now that Enza was game, they could make the leap.

“Where will we live?” Enza’s mind raced.

“We’ll figure that out. There are hotels for women. We could share a room.”

“I’d like that.” Enza had visited Laura’s family in Englewood Cliffs. They were a big family, living in a small, clean house filled with Laura’s nieces and nephews.

Most weekends, Laura hopped on the ferry to window-shop in Manhattan. She was inspired by the windows on Madison Avenue, filled with crystal flasks of perfume, leather satchels, and hand-tooled silver pens. She imagined owning fine things and taking care of them. She stopped and admired the shiny motorcars that seemed as long as a city block, the society ladies in hats and gloves who got in and out of them with the help of a chauffeur. She looked up at their windows and imagined living inside spacious rooms with billowing draperies and paintings framed in gold leaf.

Whenever she heard Laura describe New York City and all it had to offer, it made Enza want to be a part of it too. No matter what happened at work, Laura was upbeat and positive; she lifted Enza’s spirits, bolstered her courage, and looked out for her in every way. Laura was a shot of emerald green in a gray world.

“We just have to pull the money together,” Laura said. “I have some savings. Do you think you could put some money aside?”

“I’ll add a shift and do more piecework. And I’ll write to Mama and tell her not to expect most of my check until I get a new job.”

“Good.” Laura looked at Enza, who had a look of doubt and fear on her face. “Don’t be afraid. We’ll figure it out.”

When the night shift was over and they’d clocked out, Enza and Laura often left the factory through the second-story fire escape so they might watch the sun come up behind the island of Manhattan. The soft silence was broken by the rhythmic chuff of early-morning trains behind them, while in the distance, the Hudson River’s placid surface shimmered like a mirror. Beyond the river, in the first rays of sunrise, Manhattan seemed dipped in silver.

The city, their destination and dreamscape, was made of glass and stone. Would those windows be filled with kind faces? Behind those doors, would they find jobs? And somewhere along the wide avenues and side streets, or tucked in the gnarl of winding lanes in Greenwich Village, would they find a place to live?

Laura encouraged Enza to imagine a new life, to create what she hoped for in her mind’s eye. Enza reserved her dreams for her family and hadn't ever thought to a picture a better life for herself. Now, with Laura's encouragement, she would. One day, Enza would know her dream when she held it. Every detail would be recognizable, and the future would fall into place, like the stitches on a hem, one leading to the next.

They dreamed of one room, one window, two beds, a chair, a burner to cook on, and a lamp to read by, the simplest of requirements; just a place of their own, a place to call home.