“It’s like I put something in order,” Ruby overheard Grimsbury telling Daddy. “And the girls scramble it up again! I need some extra hands.”
Ergo, Miss Mayhew. She was a local girl, plain as water, but nice in that Nantucket Quaker way.
“The guests are arriving,” Miss Mayhew told them. “But they seem inappropriately early. Shall I make them wait? Mrs. Grimsbury is in a right fit about it.”
“No one made me wait,” Hattie said, and looked up from the bundles of wool in her lap. “Well, the old bird tried, but I sailed right past.”
Miss Mayhew pulled an odd face, as if stifling a sneeze.
“Mind you, I have all the manners of a field cow,” Hattie said. “So you shouldn’t count me as a legitimate guest.”
“Too true. Mrs. Young, what’s your decision? About the early arrivers?”
“Oh, um…” Mary hemmed.
“For Pete’s sake tell us who they are!” Hattie said. “Who’s arrived? The fun ones or the dullards? Any of the lunkheads, make ’em wait.”
Ruby tittered and turned her work. Miss Mayhew took in a sharp inhale, struggling to maintain her composure. Mrs. Grimsbury hadn’t warned her about this.
“It’s Miss Macy and Mrs. Brooks,” she said. “But I really don’t think…”
“Good grief, bring them out!” Mary said with uncharacteristic fire as she lifted from her seat. “Who cares if it’s two o’clock or one fifty-three? For the love of puppies, there’s a war happening.”
“As you wish, Mrs. Young.”
Miss Mayhew turned on her heels and padded back into the house.
“Sakes alive,” Mary muttered.
As she sat back down, a strong gust hoisted up a chunk of coif. An impressive feat, given how doggedly Mary plastered it to the side of her face. Finger waves or corrugated metal, there really was no difference. Meanwhile, the very wind also kicked a mostly used ball of yarn into a nearby gooseberry bush.
“Whoops!” Ruby said, and rushed to retrieve it. “If not for the bush, we could’ve lost that one to the sea.”
“More likely the tennis court,” Hattie observed.
“Ruby Young Packard,” Mary chided. “You need to take more care. We might be under ration soon. Wool doesn’t grow on trees.”
“Nope. Sheep, I think,” Hattie said.
Mary shot daggers at them both. Here was the old Mary, pre–Red Cross style. Pigeons would soon start roosting on her shoulders.
“Mary, just sit down,” Ruby said.
Her sister-in-law gasped.
“Oh brother.”
“Ruby Packard, as I live and breathe,” Mary said. “Look at what you’ve made! Blankets and socks and knit caps.”
She bent to fetch one, appearing quite like a jackknife.
“These are marvelous.”
“Well, thank you.” Ruby blushed. “I still have room for improvement but at least I’ve accomplished something.”
“Yes, buckets of room for improvement. But I’m tickled! All this time we’ve been so worried about you.”
“Who’s ‘we’?”
“Oh, you know. Everybody.”
Hattie glanced up.
“Worried about her?” she said, jabbing a needle in Ruby’s direction. “Why?”
“Pish. No one’s concerned.”
“It’s the war.” Mary lowered her voice and plopped down onto a nearby ottoman. “Ruby was an isolationist as of last week.”
“Not an isolationist,” Ruby said. “And I haven’t changed my views, necessarily. Dang it! I dropped a stitch! Again!”
“Isolationist, huh?” Hattie smirked. “I didn’t take you for that kind of gal.”
“Listen, I don’t ascribe to one particular notion or another. I simply feel we should be cautious about the issues we get ourselves enmeshed in. More so when our involvement might result in casualties.”
“Might result?” Hattie balked. “Might’s gone clear out the window, doll. Just ask a European. Especially a queer or a Jew.”
“That’s quite enough of that talk, Miss Rutter,” Mary said. “Let’s just be glad that Ruby is finally seeing things in the correct light. I know her husband is pleased as pie.”
“My husband?” Ruby said. “And how did you get his take? I don’t recall you two exchanging much more than table salt.”
Old Talon-hands, Ruby could almost hear Sam say. Her husband was inexorably polite, but Mary Young was not a person whom he could abide. A walking cadaver, he called her. All the charm of a lamppost.
“The information came to me secondhand,” Mary said. “Philip met up with Sam and Topper for lunch last week. In Boston. Have you heard the latest? Topper’s scratched the naval career concept. He wants to be an airman.”
“Hold on.” Ruby blinked. “Topper? And Sam? In the same room? Voluntarily and without my aid? This war’s good for something, apparently.”
“Heavens, Ruby! What a thing to say!”
Just then Miss Macy and Mrs. Brooks pattered out onto the veranda.
“Hello ladies,” one of them said. “Your girl runs a right ship. Made us sign some sort of book. Thought she was going to ask for a piece of jewelry as a security deposit.”
“That’s Mrs. Grimsbury for you,” Mary said. “Carries out her orders to the letter. Well, thank you for coming. There’s plenty of yarn on the table. Help yourselves.”
“So who’s this Topper person?” Hattie asked as the women went to choose their yarn. “Lord, what a name. Let me guess, he’s some kind of privileged milksop. Thinks the whole world is Harvard and summer homes. Wants to join the war because it sounds romantic but can’t tell the difference between a foxhole and the crack in his rear.”
“Hey!”
“That’s about the gist of it,” Mary said.
“Excuse me,” Ruby snipped. “Topper is my baby brother. His real name is Robert. He’s a senior at Harvard and he’s smart and handsome and…”
At once an idea formed. A glistening, star-shine of a plan.
Topper was smart and handsome. And Hattie Rutter was ideal: gorgeous, well schooled, and with a sly side he’d not be able to resist. In sum, she was the exact kind of girl who could keep a fella from war, even Ruby’s little brother, who never stayed locked on one broad for long.
That was the problem, Ruby realized. Topper was anxious for adventure because nothing tethered him to the States. He’d be graduating soon and didn’t have a girl or any solid occupational plan. No wonder he wanted to fight. Poor boy needed some meaning in his life.
Ruby cleared her throat.
“Well, the first thing you should know about my brother is that he’s handsome as the devil,” she said.
“Acts like the devil, besides,” Mary added. “And watch out because he’ll snap your photo when you least expect it. Lord knows what he does with all the prints. I’m afraid to ask.”
“Topper is a gentleman of the highest order!”
“Of the highest order?” Hattie said. “What a shame.”
“Ruby can’t see it,” Mary said. “They’re Irish twins, ten months apart, but are like rascally little brothers Mark Twain might write about. Now, if you’ll please excuse me, I have more guests to greet.”