Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In a better, gentler world, a young lady on the morning after a dance would awaken slowly, sweetly, roused by nothing rougher than cheerful birdsong and a kindly sunbeam; smiling as pleasant dreams give way to happy memories of the previous evening’s merriment — and of, perhaps, a particularly attentive and agreeable partner.

Kitty Delgado did not live in that world. The morning after the festa, she was dragged out of sleep by the shrill of the five-thirty whistle, and any pleasant dreams she might have been having vanished away as she swung her feet out of bed and then actually opened her eyes. It was time to get ready for work.

She set about the tasks of the morning — washing her face, fastening her garters, putting up her hair, buttoning her blouse, lacing her boots — in terse choreography with her younger sister Dora and all the other members of the family all preparing for their day. She ate a quick breakfast of bread and jam and coffee, gathered up her lunch-pail and a fresh apron, put on her everyday straw hat, said her good-byes, and hurried down the back stairs with her sister. 

In the haste of the morning, Kitty had not had even a moment to turn her mind to the events of the day before. As she rounded the building, she thought that perhaps, as she and her sister waited for their friends, she might get a quiet minute to think — specifically, to think about the folded paper hidden in her reticule, and the young man with the nice hat who had given it to her.

But it was not to be. Flossie and the others were already waiting out on the sidewalk, waving and smiling. There was nothing to do but join them.

There was only one topic of conversation that morning — the festa — and despite Flossie’s sincere efforts, a great deal of the conversation was focused on her and her visitor from New Bedford. Who was he? Who were the young men with him? How had she met him? What was he like? Did he dance well?

As the older girls gathered around Flossie to pepper her with questions, the younger girls found themselves crowded out. Dora happily came to their rescue, sharing what Kitty herself had told her the night before with reasonable accuracy. 

The time passed quickly, and soon the group began to split into little detachments to the various mills in the neighborhood. Kitty, Flossie, and Dora were in the group that joined the hundreds of other people — men and women, girls and boys –  funneling through the iron gate to Mayrick Mills. 

Inside the gate, the river of people separated out again into streams flowing toward the great brick buildings that made up Mayrick’s. Smoke was already floating from the chimneys of the engine rooms. Kitty walked with Flossie and Dora to the entrance of Building 2.

“See you later,” she said. To Dora, she added, “Be good! And be careful !” Dora sighed wearily, but suffered Kitty to give her a quick kiss on the top of her head and even returned Kitty’s quick hug. 

“See you at lunch!” said Flossie. She ushered Dora into the building. 

Kitty knew what they would do next: they would climb the stairs to the third-floor spinning room;  they would hang up their hats and their lunch-pails; they would punch their time cards and don their aprons. Then they would go to their stations: Dora to her assigned spinning-machines; Flossie to her post at the end of the room, where she would supervise the young doffers as they darted about to replace full bobbins with empties. Elsewhere in that same room, Delia and Luisa were putting on their own aprons and going to their machines.

Spinners, 1911, Fall River

Spinning Room, Indian Orchard Cotton Mill, Indian Mill, Massachusetts, 1916

Kitty no longer worked in the third-floor spinning room, or even in Building 2. She crossed the yard to Building 3, climbed the stairs to the second floor, and went down to a room at the end of the corridor. Now it was her turn to hang up her things, punch her card, and button up her apron. She gathered her tools and her instructions. As she sat down at her station, her memory showed her again the folded paper hidden in her reticule, and for the briefest of moments she felt an odd, light sensation somewhere around her heart.

And then the whistle sounded. She double-checked her instructions, her notes, and the work she’d already done. Then she picked up her tools and set to work. 

Kitty had started at the mill five years ago, the summer of the year she turned fourteen. She’d started as a doffer and was, in time, promoted to spinner, just like Flossie, Addie, Delia, Luisa, and now Dora. 

Late last year, though, she’d been offered a promotion: an apprenticeship in the drawing-in room. She’d accepted without hesitation. She’d felt a twinge of regret at leaving Dora behind — Dora had been working barely six months and was still a doffer — but Dora was doing well, and then Flossie had just been promoted to doffing-mistress and it was easy to get Dora moved to her group. So after four years of walking back and forth minding a bank of spinning machines, Kitty left the spinning room behind, hung her lunch-pail on a new peg, and set about learning the skill of drawing-in. She’d picked it up quickly, and last month she’d begun working by herself at her own drawing-in frame.

The frame consisted of two iron verticals holding horizontal rails. The tops of the verticals bent towards Kitty, so that viewed from the side they curved something like a swan’s neck. Two rails at the foot of the frame held the loom beam, which resembled a spool of thread taken from the sewing-basket of a giantess. Instead of a single strand of thread, though, a loom beam carried thousands, wound side by side in perfect parallel. The beam was mounted horizontally, supported from its ends; the ends of the threads were passed up and over one of the higher rails, to Kitty’s side of the frame.

These threads would become the warp threads — the threads running from end to end — of a piece of fabric. Before they could be woven into fabric, though, the thousands of threads had to be passed, one by one, through heddles: dangling wires with eyes in their middles that would lift or lower the warp threads as the weft thread passed from side to side. Kitty’s job was to draw the ends of the warp threads in through the eyes of the heddles. Once she had finished, the loom beam and its heddles would be taken to a loom in the weaving room, and a new beam and new heddles would be brought to her frame.

Drawing-in, Fall River, 1916

It was painstaking work. The warp threads were stiffened with sizing, the heddle eyes were larger than the eyes of hand needles, and Kitty had long hooks to catch the threads and draw them through, but the job was effectively threading needles — thousands of needles — one after another after another after another — while keeping the threads in alignment.

And there were patterns to be followed. For one set of heddles, Kitty might draw only the odd-numbered threads through the eyes of the corresponding odd-numbered heddles, so that when the heddle moved up and down, it would lift and lower only the even-numbered threads. Then, for the next set of heddles, she might thread only the even-numbered threads through the even-numbered heddles. Every piece of fabric required at least two sets of heddles; more complex patterns required more sets of heddles threaded in still different patterns. Any mistake would spoil the weave of the fabric. Kitty sometimes went home with aching eyes and head and shoulders after a day of concentration.

It was worth it, though. The job paid better, and she could sit down to work instead of walking back and forth ten to twelve hours a day. The drawing-in room was quieter and cleaner than a spinning room, with no lint flying about. If her attention faltered for a moment, she would be in danger of losing her place in her pattern and losing a great deal of time fixing the mistake, but she was in no danger of losing a finger in a spinning-frame.

This morning, Kitty was drawing-in for a flannel that would eventually become men’s shirts for the winter season. The winding room had taken care of getting the red and white threads in the correct order on the beam; Kitty’s work would result in a tiny diamond pattern woven into the stripes. 

One thread after another, after another, after another — draw, skip, draw, skip, draw, skip skip skip skip skip, draw, skip….  As she worked, everything else — the heat of the room, the morning sun, the other drawing-in girls, the rumble of the drive shafts and the clacking of the looms in the weaving room next door, the thought of the paper in her reticule — faded away. There were only the patterns, the warp threads, the heddles, and the counts she was keeping in her head. When the lunch whistle sounded, for a moment she was almost dizzy as she became conscious again of the rest of the room.

She took her lunch with her old friends back at Building 2. As she ate her sandwiches and drank her lemonade and followed the conversation, she was able to keep back a little of her attention for the note in her reticule, just enough to contemplate its presence.

The whistle blew and Kitty went back to work: draw, skip, draw, skip. At around 3:30, she finished her last heddle. As her supervisor checked her work, she got her cup from her lunch-pail and went to the tap in the corner for a drink of water. The supervisor seemed satisfied; instead of calling her back over, he went to the door to the weaving-shed. Kitty filled her cup again. She would get a short break while the tacklers took away the setup she’d just finished and brought the next beam and harness for her frame.

Her thoughts went immediately to the festa . There was The Boy, of course; Kitty had a pretty good idea of what she would say about him to Flossie.

And then the other question: Mr. Nice Hat Sousa, who wanted to come back and see her. She wanted to say yes.  He seemed a respectable young man, but seemed wasn’t enough, she needed to know more about him. He expected her to: another point in his favor. But how was she going to do it? Her instinct warned her against asking her parents — it was too soon — and as far as she knew they didn’t know anyone in New Bedford…. 

She had a sudden vision of herself taking the streetcar to New Bedford, knocking on doors and asking questions, like a detective in a story — perhaps wearing her best straw hat? with her reticule dangling off her arm? She smiled at the thought.

She’d ask Flossie. It was only fair: Flossie was the reason she was even in this little pickle. 

The tacklers were loading the new beam on her drawing-in frame. Kitty finished her water, put her cup away, and went back to her station.

The clock ticked forward; the slant of the sun grew more acute; the five o’clock whistle blew at last. Kitty put her tools away, punched her time card, picked up her hat and lunch-pail, and hurried out to Building 2 to meet Flossie, Delia, Luisa, and Dora. In another minute, Addie arrived from the winding room, and together the girls started towards home.

This was a treasured time of day. Their families were more forgiving than the mill whistle, so they could walk at their own pace, enjoying one of the hundreds of little conversations that knit up their friendship, 

They walked more slowly than usual that day, for there was still so much to discuss: the festa , and everything that had happened, and all the news from their friends, and all the details they hadn’t had a chance to review together yet, and all the details they wanted to review again, what a shame it was that the four young men lived so far away…. Kitty listened attentively for anything that would help build the report she was preparing for Flossie — and the new report she had begun for herself.

Eventually, it was time to part company. The girls bade each other good-bye; Addie, Delia, and Luisa started north, and Kitty and Flossie turned toward their own neighborhood. They walked on a block or two before Flossie spoke up. 

“So what do you think? About Rob, and his… friends.”

“The important thing is what do you think?” said Kitty.

“I’m still thinking.”

“What about your parents?”

“My mother thought he was a very nice young man. And my father said he didn’t seem like a complete dummy.” 

Kitty snickered. “And his friends?”

“They said they looked ‘respectable enough,’ even —” Flossie mimicked her father’s voice — “ ‘the one in the ridiculous shirt.’ ” Kitty laughed. 

“But what about you? Come on, Kitty.”

“I don’t know what else to say! He doesn’t talk very much, but there’s nothing wrong with that. Like I said, I think he honestly likes you. And I don’t think he could fake something to save his life. ” 

Flossie beamed. “What else?”

“He seemed to pay attention when you talked. He’s not a show-off, but he’s not a bad dancer.” 

Flossie seemed pleased. “And how about his friends?”

“His brother seems all right. He seemed to be there as a friend, he wasn’t there to tell Rob what to say or keep him from walking out in front of a streetcar.”

“And Mr. Vento?”

Kitty pressed back a smile, and Flossie laughed. “They’re very different, aren’t they?” said Flossie. “It seems strange that they’re even friends.”

“They’re from the same neighborhood. I think they play baseball together. — I asked him,” Kitty explained, seeing Flossie’s questioning look. “Anyway, he’s not just hot air. He was very friendly, and he didn’t try to talk over us, and he’s a good dancer. Mr. Sousa said he thought he had common sense.”

“What about Mr. Sousa?” asked Flossie.

Kitty quickly related the story about how Lino’s friend Mr. Sousa had filled in at the last minute for Rob’s friend. “He said he doesn’t know Rob all that well, and that he’d just met Mr. Vento for the first time that day. But he said he thought Mr. Vento had common sense, and that he knows Lino and the father from their club  and that they’re all a good family, and that the father and Lino don’t complain about Rob getting into trouble.”

“He knows their father?”

“That’s what he told me. Maybe he even knows their mother!” Kitty teased. “I think he’ll say nice things about you. Does your Tia know him? …Or Mr. Vento?”

“Maybe,” said Flossie. “I can ask her. She’ll want to know how it went, anyway.”

Kitty stopped walking. The calm she’d felt earlier was gone, replaced by a hollow, floaty feeling in her stomach. She took a deep breath. “Can you ask her, please? Because… don’t tell anyone, but —” her voice dropped — “Mr. Sousa said he’d like to see me again.”

“He did ?” Flossie’s face lit up, but before she could press for details, Kitty grabbed her forearm. 

“Please! Don’t say anything!”

“I won’t! I promise .” Flossie took a quick look around: they were still out of sight of their homes. “What did you tell him?”

“I didn’t have time! He didn’t seem to expect an answer right away.” Kitty sighed. “He seems nice, but I should find out more about him,  and he’s all the way in New Bedford.”

“Well, who do you know in New Bedford?”

“Nobody.”

“Oh, you must know somebody . You just don’t know that you know them. And you know me, and I know my tia and my tio and my cousins.” Flossie squeezed Kitty’s hand. “Come over tonight, after dinner, and you can help me write her a letter.”

“I don’t want to put her to any trouble —”

Flossie scoffed. “Are you kidding? She’ll eat this up! I have to write to her anyway to tell her how it went, and you know I’d be in trouble if I didn’t tell her about Rob’s friends and ask if she knew them. It’ll be easy as pie. You’ll see.”

Chapter Text

View of New Bedford looking east, 1906

Frank Sousa punched his time card and returned it to its slot. He hung up his hat and jacket and walked down the long drafting room, greeting along the way the few other draftsmen who had already arrived.

At his desk, he put away his lunch-pail and spread a cloth over the little chest that held his supplies. There was ready-made ink available in the supply cupboard, but Frank preferred to make his own. He rolled up his sleeves, took out his ingredients and equipment, and set to work: a tiny smudge of Prussian blue rubbed into the mixing saucer to thicken the ink; a few drops of water and one of vinegar; a few more drops of water, and the first gentle grinds of the ink stick.

As he waited for the ink to dissolve, he glanced out one of the tall windows arranged along the north wall of the drafting room. He did so out of mere habit, not out of conscious intention; there was no pleasing view, only the tall fencing along the edge of the Stroudwick and Sons yard and, on its other side, the brick warehouse across Gordon Street. Beyond it were the mills and warehouses further up the river, and the silhouettes of masts and utility poles and smokestacks. Above it all rose a brilliant blue sky.

A part of Frank’s mind automatically noted the exact shade of blue of the sky, the look of the clouds, and the direction of the wind. In less than a moment, they were incorporated into all the other elements of life that Frank observed and monitored without conscious thought: the day of the week; the tides, and the phase of the moon; the state of the shipyard outside the drafting room; the habits of fish and of the people who bought them; the locations of his father and uncles’ fishing boats; the river, the bay, the islands. In the brief time it took Frank to look out the window and then back down to the ink saucer, his mind had looked everything over and delivered the conclusion that the day promised to be warm and sunny, with no rain likely.

He carefully swirled the saucer, dropped in more water, and ground in a little more ink. A warm, sunny day with no rain: like yesterday, then, in Fall River. Was it warm and sunny there, too? Specifically, in whatever part of Fall River Miss Delgado might be at the moment? And what was she doing? And how soon could he see her again? He imagined going straight from work to the westbound streetcar, taking a seat as the car pulled forward and the bell clanged….

He peered at the ink: he could still see the bottom of the saucer, so he gave the ink stick another grind.

It was reasonable to be hopeful, he thought. Miss Delgado hadn’t seemed put off by the idea, and she wouldn’t need to do much to say yes if, as seemed likely, Rob Cabral and his Miss Pavao saw each other again.

Before she’d say yes, she’d probably want to check up on him. He’d given her the key information, trying to save her some time, but it still might take a while, depending on who her family knew in New Bedford. So if she approved of what she heard, the absolute earliest he might hear anything might be… two weeks? 

He stirred his ink and looked closely: it was now opaque enough to completely hide the bottom of the saucer. He took a dropper and began to decant it into his working bottle.

Two weeks then. At least. He dropped the last of the ink into the bottle and pressed in the stopper.

…He hoped she’d say yes.

Chapter Text

That evening, after dinner was over and everything cleared away, Flossie sat at the table in her family’s main room and started her letter to her aunt. Kitty sat next to her, working on her crochet, helping with spelling when requested, and politely chatting in Portuguese with Flossie’s parents as they asked her about herself, about her crochet and what she was making and what she would use it for, about her parents and brother and sister and everyone else in the family, about whether or not she’d enjoyed the festa….

When Flossie finished the main section of her report, she caught Kitty’s attention and nodded toward the paper. Kitty put down her crochet and leaned forward — as she’d been asked — to read over Flossie’s shoulder.

…His friends seemed very nice. Do you know them too? Or know anything about them? One is named Johnny Vento.

“His real name is João,” offered Kitty. 

“How do you know?”

“Mr Sousa told me.”

…His real name is João, Flossie added. He lives in the same neighborhood as the Cabrals. He is a builder, I don’t know what kind. The other friend is Lino’s friend. His name is Frank Souza.

“Sousa with an S,” Kitty urgently spoke up. “And his first name is Francisco.” Flossie wrote it all down and continued, He is in the same club with Lino and Mr. Cabral.

“The Monte Pio Society,” added Kitty. “And he goes to St. John the Baptist, and he works in a shipyard. Stroudwick.”

Flossie's eyes widened, but she didn’t say anything until she’d finished writing. “He told you all this?”

Kitty nodded. “He was pão pão, queijo queijo.” Bread bread, cheese cheese. She gestured, her palms turned up, demonstrating how plainly Mr. Sousa had offered this information.

“It’ll help my Tia Rafaela for sure,” said Flossie. “Maybe the others will know something, too.” She dipped her pen in the inkwell and resumed her letter. My mother and father thought they seemed —“How do you spell ‘respectable’?” — respectable  They all said they had a good time.

Flossie looked up. “Mãe, Pai, is there anything else you want me to put in the letter?” She added their news and questions, signed her letter, blotted it, and sealed it in the envelope. “Here, I’ll walk you part way and put this in the mailbox.”

It was dusk now, and the neighborhood’s rooflines were silhouettes against the ink-blue sky.  Crickets chirped from their little havens in gardens and crannies under porch steps. Lamplit windows and neighbors sitting on balconies kept a friendly watch over the street. 

Kitty and Flossie walked to the corner, which was supervised by a glowing streetlamp with a built-in mailbox. Flossie pulled down the slot door  and dropped in her letter.

“There,” she said. “It’s on its way.” The two girls said their good-nights and turned toward their homes. 

As Kitty walked on, she thought about the letter in the box. The next morning, the mailman would come and put it in his bag and take it to the main post office downtown, where it would be taken out of the bag and put with the other letters going to New Bedford…. She imagined the letter’s journey: the train to New Bedford, the train station to the post office, a mail-bag, and finally Flossie’s aunt (and whichever one of Flossie’s cousins was reading the letter to her.)

And then from her house, the word would go out. Flossie’s aunt — and probably her uncle and her cousins — would ask a friend or two, and they might ask a friend or two…. Like telephone or telegraph wires. The wires were all connected to each other somehow, and they carried messages a long way. 

But those wires seemed so long and straight, and they had to stay high up on their poles — they were dangerous to touch. That saying about “the grape-vine”, though — it really seemed more like that: something alive and growing, with old branches and new branches, some of the branches and leaves curling up to meet and talk with other parts of their own vine and others reaching out to curl up and talk with another vine. Was this a Fall River vine reaching out to a New Bedford vine? Or was one vine Flossie’s family, and another vine the family of Rob The Boy and Lino The Brother? And then hadn’t she heard somewhere that a branch of one vine could be stuck on the branch of another, and become part of the new vine? But wouldn’t it still be a part of the old vine, just growing in a different place?

She could see the house now. Her father talked sometimes about the big garden he was going to plant once the family had saved up enough to buy their own house, and there was always a grape-vine in his plan. As she got closer, she could see him standing at the rail of the balcony of their second-floor apartment, smoking a pipe, surveying the neighborhood, and keeping an eye out for her.  She could see his smile as she came up the front walk, and could sense his gaze following her as she turned the corner of the house to go down the side path. She knew he would stay outside and listen until he heard her start climbing the back stairs. Then he would take one more puff on his pipe and go back inside to welcome her home. 

As she climbed the back steps to the second level, she thought about what would come next. Her parents would ask about Flossie and Flossie’s family, as usual, and she’d tell them. They probably wouldn’t ask for details about what she and Flossie had been up to, but if they did, she could tell them — truthfully — that she’d been helping Flossie with a letter.

And as for what that letter meant for her…. No, she decided. She wouldn’t tell them anything tonight. It was too soon. And if Flossie’s aunt wrote back with a bad report, that would be the end of the matter, she’d never have to tell her parents anything. But if the report was good….

If the report was good, it would still only be the first step, she reminded herself. It was too early to be thinking about anything beyond that. She took a deep breath, turned the heavy doorknob, and stepped back into a normal Monday evening.

Chapter Text

Roberto Cabral had not made the decision to go to the festa in Fall River lightly. It had meant giving up a Sunday (and all the things he liked to do on Sunday) and taking the streetcar and going to a new place and talking. Talking a lot. To people he didn’t know, including Flossie’s friends, who (on top of everything else) would be girls. It wasn’t that he didn’t like girls — he did , especially when they smiled — but he never knew what to say to them. Johnny Vento was good at talking to girls, and somehow always said things that made them laugh, but sometimes those things didn’t make any sense. To Rob, that didn’t seem any better than not knowing what to say. 

It was different with Miss Pavao, though. He liked that about her.  And he liked the idea of spending time with her outside of his Tia Anabela’s front room, and away from Tia Anabela and her friend Mrs. Miss-Pavao’s-Tia. So he concluded that the trip would be worth the investment of time and carfare and talking.

He knew that if he made the trip to Fall River, he would be expected to make a full report to his parents: it was just part of the natural order of things.  He also knew he would have to make another full report to his Tia Anabel: that, too, was just part of the natural order, and it was only fair. She was his aunt, after all, and she had introduced him to Flossie in the first place, so she had a legitimate interest in the progress of the venture. So when he learned that family dinner on the Sunday after the festa would be at Tia Anabela and Tio Morrie’s house, he knew exactly what was coming.

But to his surprise and relief, Tia Anabela got it over with quickly. Soon after they arrived, she  left others in charge of the kitchen for a few minutes and pulled him to a quiet corner for a chat, just the two of them, and asked him how the trip had been, and what they had done, and how was the food, and how was Flossie, and what were her friends like…. He remembered the names of all the girls and that they all seemed nice, but wasn’t able to describe their clothing, except that their dresses were all in pale colors and Flossie — Miss Pavao, he meant — had a pretty dress and one of her friends had a big hat with a heap of flowers that was falling apart by the time they were dancing. Tia Anabela laughed at that but didn’t say anything about how he should have noticed more about their dresses. Instead she asked him about his friends: Who had come with him? 

Rob was on surer ground there. Lino, of course, and then Johnny Vento — João — friends for years, his parents knew him — a plasterer and painter — and yes he liked stylish clothes and people made fun at him for it,  but Rob knew that he was also putting by a respectable amount of money and that he got called to go on some of the most important jobs at work, and he played guitar but wasn’t in a band right now. 

Lino’s friend Frank Sousa had also come with them. They were friends from Monte Pio — yes , he knew he needed to join officially, he had the application — Rob hadn’t known him well before — well, yes, there were a lot of Sousas out there, he didn’t know which Sousas. This Frank Sousa was a draftsman (a note of appreciation came into Rob’s voice) at Stroudwick and Sons. And Rob was pretty sure their fathers knew each other.

Tia Anabela thanked him, and asked if he and Miss Pavao were going to see each other again, and Rob blurted out that they hadn’t made plans yet but he wanted to. Tia Anabela smiled, and said she was glad to hear they’d all had a good time and she would love to hear more but she needed to see to something in the kitchen, and that was the end of the interview. It wasn’t nearly as difficult as it could have been.  

Soon it was time for dinner. There was good food, and plenty of it, and nobody ordered him to tell the whole story again over the dinner table in front of the whole family. After dinner he went outside to play dominoes with the older men and horseshoes with the younger men and the children. Then it was time to have a light supper of the leftovers from dinner, and then spend more time outside with the family, and finally to go home. 

Rob knew Lino would also have been brought in for questioning that afternoon, but that didn’t bother him. And it never occurred to him to wonder why Tia Anabela was so interested in learning about Johnny and Frank. Aunts and mothers — and uncles and fathers — always asked about those kinds of things. It was part of their job, and it gave them something to talk about with their relatives and their friends, like Tia Anabela’s friend Mrs. Flossie’s-Tia. All in all, Rob thought the interview had gone well. Tia Anabela had been nice about it, he’d given a good account of himself and of his and Lino’s respectable friends, and he’d stated clearly that he’d like to see Flossie again. He left for home that night with a light heart.

Another week passed. The next Monday evening found Frank following his father and brothers through the heavy wood doors and up the stairs of a brick building on Acushnet Avenue. At the top of the stairs, they waited in a short line for their turns to sign an attendance record and pass into a large, open room paneled with wood and filled with rows of chairs facing a low stage with a lectern. An American flag hung on the wall behind the right side of the stage; a Portuguese flag hung on the left. At the center back of the stage, an banner on a stand, stiff with applique and embroidery, proclaimed MONTE PIO LUZO-AMERICAN SOCIETY.

This was the social hour before the monthly meeting, and when Frank had finished greeting his father’s brothers and his mother’s brothers and his cousins from both sides of the family, he turned to go find his friends. He found instead Mr. Cabral, Lino and Rob’s father, standing in wait for him.

“Hello, Frank,” said Mr. Cabral. They shook hands. 

“Hello, Mr. Cabral. How are you? My father’s over there; do you want me to get him for you?”

“Oh, I'll catch up with him later. Right now it’s you I came to find. Morrie —” he turned to the man standing next to him — “This is Frank Sousa. Frank, this is Maurício Fernandes, my brother-in-law.” After Mr. Fernandes and Frank shook hands, Mr. Cabral nodded toward some chairs. “Got a few minutes, Frank?”

Frank followed them and sat down. He thought he had a pretty good idea of what Mr. Cabral wanted. 

“I was telling Morrie that you were  the pinch-hitter for Rob and Lino’s trip to Fall River last week,” Mr. Cabral said to Frank. “It was good of you to fill in at the last minute like that. I hope it didn’t put you out too much.”

“Not at all, I was happy to do it. I think we all had a good time.”

“Glad to hear it,” said Mr. Cabral. “So what did you get up to?”

“Nothing that wasn’t in the plan,” said Frank. He briefly recounted the events of the day: arrival, streetcar, walk to the church, Mass, procession, lunch, dancing, back home.

“And everybody behaved himself?” Mr. Cabral’s tone was light but the question was serious. “What about that Johnny Janota ?”

“Yes we did. — Johnny too,” Frank added with a smile. Janota — “dandy” — must be Johnny Vento’s nickname around the neighborhood.

“Good. Tell me, what did you think of Miss Pavao?”

Frank delivered his report: Miss Pavao pretty, a little on the tall side, clothing nice but not fussy; seemed to be sensible, reliable, a person who thinks ahead. Doffing-mistress at Mayrick Mills. Born in this country; parents from Madeira, seemed pleasant and respectable, spoke English fairly well, father in a club (didn’t catch which one.) Seemed to like Rob.

“Well, if nothing else, he seems to listen to her ,” Mr. Cabral said. “We’ve been trying to get him to join officially for — how long?” He turned to Mr. Fernandes; Mr. Fernandes only spread his hands in a who knows? gesture. “But tonight,” Mr. Cabral continued, “he came as a guest, he marched right over, and he got himself an application.”

Frank grinned. “Well, that’s great news! I’ll sponsor him if he wants.”

“I’ll tell him. What about her friends? Anyone you know?”

“No, I don’t know any young ladies in Fall River. Or any old ladies, for that matter.  Her friends were Addie Freitas, Delia Medieros, Luisa Lopes, and Kitty Delgado.”

“And they behaved themselves too?”

“Yes they did. They were all nice girls.”

Mr. Cabral nodded. “So what are Miss Pavao’s friends like? Did you get to talk to them at all?”

Frank felt something bounce inside him — Mr. Cabral and Mr. Fernandes might have other connections in Fall River — but he kept his manner calm and his thoughts organized. Miss Pavao and her friends: all work at Mayrick’s, get together frequently — the girls her real friends, not collected just for this occasion — all friendly and well-mannered; innocent amusements — club events, window shopping, shows and movies. To Frank’s admittedly uninformed eye, their dresses looked pretty but not expensive. Miss Freitas (didn’t catch her real name): came over when she was very young; speaks English well; works in the winding room. Miss Medieros and Miss Lopes: both came over as children, speak decent English, both spinners. Miss Delgado (didn’t catch her real name either): born here (her parents came over); a drawing-in apprentice. Miss Pavao and Miss Delgado both in a club for young ladies at Santo Christo.

Mr. Cabral seemed satisfied. “Well, it sounds like you all had a nice day of it.” He glanced at Mr. Fernandes; Mr. Fernandes nodded slightly. “We shouldn’t keep you any longer. I’m sure you want to see your friends before the meeting starts.”

Frank stood up. “It was no trouble. I wouldn’t mind tagging along again if Rob goes back.” 

This would have been the perfect time for Mr. Cabral to say something like Oh, Rob is going back, he’s just waiting on a reply from Miss Pavao or That’s good to know, Miss Pavao’s aunt was asking about you and Vento . Best of all would be something like, Well, good, because Rob heard from Miss Pavao and you’ve been invited to come with him. But Mr. Cabral only said, with a friendly smile, “I’ll be sure to remind him if he needs it!” He shook Frank’s hand again, stepped back while Mr. Fernandes shook his hand again, and then pointed out the last known location of Lino and Rob.

Frank was thinking about that conversation again two days later, as he walked home from work. He usually walked home; it wasn’t that far, it saved on carfare, and it gave him some extra time to stretch his legs and be alone with his thoughts.  Since the festa , he’d allowed himself the occasional thought about Miss Delgado  — her hand on his shoulder as they danced, her smile — but otherwise he avoided thinking about the Fall River matter. Until he knew that he was welcome to see her again, there was no use letting his imagination run ahead to when he would get to see her again, and what he would say, and where they might go, and what they could talk about. He’d done all he could, and the rest was out of his control. 

On his walk home on Wednesday evening, though, he could think of little else. He’d been up very early that morning, he was expecting to be up very early again the next morning, he’d had a trying day at work, he was tired and hungry, and it seemed like the entire population of New Bedford had chosen that particular afternoon for clogging up the sidewalks, dawdling about, stopping short to peer into shop windows or for no reason at all, getting in his way and in the way of every other honest man and woman who just wanted to make it home for dinner. His reserve of cheerful patience was, at the moment, severely depleted. And it had been two weeks and two days since the festa and he had heard almost exactly nothing. 

He’d done his share. He’d given a good, honest report to Mr. Cabral and Mr. Fernandes at the meeting Monday night. But they hadn’t given him a scrap of information back, not even about how this was any of Mr Fernandes’s business. After the meeting, he’d gone out with Lino and Rob. That had gone a little better for him; he’d told them about talking to their pai and their tio, and they’d explained that their Tio Morrie Fernandes was married to their father’s sister Anabela Cabral Fernandes, and she was friends with Miss Pavao’s aunt. From there he’d been able to find out that yes, Rob wanted to go to Fall River again. That was good, but it wasn’t news; Frank had guessed that two weeks ago on the night of the festa. He’d carefully fished for more information, but got nothing more: no plans, no plans to make plans, no mention of any communication at all to or from Fall River. So he’d casually volunteered to go again and then left it alone.

What was going on? Was somebody answering the questions from Fall River? Had there even been any questions from Fall River? Or were Rob and even Lino both just being blockheads and not noticing what was going on? Frank had to admit that was a possibility. He didn’t want to just ask them directly, not just yet — he wasn’t quite ready to explain his own interest — but if this dragged on, he might have to. How would he — 

He stopped short at a corner. Other pedestrians were bunching up, waiting to cross the street. A horse-drawn wagon was slowly making its way through the intersection. 

It was a calming sight. Frank liked horses, and he didn’t see them as often now that motor trucks were becoming more common. He waited as the horse and wagon passed — the unhurried clop of shod hooves on cobblestones, the heavy squeak of the wheels — and then crossed the street with the other pedestrians.

He would give it another two weeks, he decided. If he hadn’t heard anything after two weeks, he’d be more direct with Lino. And if Lino and Rob still didn’t know anything….

..well, then, he’d just have to find another way. He could get advice from his parents, and his sister and brothers. Maybe someone in the family had some connections he didn’t know about, or someone at Monte Pio or at work. And then that Johnny Vento worked in Fall River sometimes, didn’t he? He might be more aware of things than Rob and Lino were; Frank would just have to check on his discretion….

From a few blocks away, a train whistle sounded. Frank could tell that the train was heading west, towards Fall River. If all else failed, he thought, that’s what he could do: he could just go to Fall River himself. He’d buy some flowers and then wait at the gate of Mayrick Mills until he saw Miss Delgado. If she said no, he’d never bother her again. But he wasn’t going to give up unless he was sure she'd said no.

He did not know that the westbound train included a mail car.

Chapter Text

Tuesday evening, after supper was over and everything put away, Kitty joined her mother, her brother’s wife, and her sister Dora on the front porch to do needlework. Her mother, of course,  happened to have a good view of the street below. She waved and called down greetings as the situation required, and then commented to the others on the goings-on.

They had been out about twenty minutes when Kitty’s mother leaned forward to peer over the balcony rail. “Oh, here comes Felícia.” 

Kitty put down her crochet and threaded herself between the chairs to get to the railing. Flossie waved, and waved again as she came up the front walk.

“Good evening!” Kitty’s mother called down in Portuguese. “Are you looking for Cátia? Here she is! Come up and join us.”

“Or I could come down,” added Kitty. Flossie nodded quickly and then greeted Kitty’s mother and the others. She kept Kitty’s mother talking as Kitty hurried inside, grabbed her hat, and ran down the back steps. When Kitty arrived, Flossie politely extricated herself from the conversation, and together the two girls set off down the front walk.

“I have something,” Flossie whispered, and discreetly indicated her reticule. In her usual voice, she made small talk with Kitty until they were well down the sidewalk. She glanced back, as if making sure they were out of sight of Kitty’s house. Only then did she reveal her news.

“Tia Rafaela wrote back! It came today!” 

Kitty gasped. “What did she say?”

Flossie stopped for a moment, took the letter out of her reticule, and walked on slowly as she unfolded it. “My cousin wrote it for her.”

Kitty understood everything Flossie meant by that: Tia Rafaela dictating the letter in Portuguese and Flossie’s cousin doing the writing in English, just as Flossie did for her parents and Kitty and her brother did for theirs.

“The first part is family stuff,” Flossie said, and turned the paper over. “She said she’s glad we all had a good time at the festa, and then she said this…” She showed Kitty the letter and began to read:

“ ‘I asked my friend Mrs. Fernandes about Roberto’s friends. She asked her brother who is Roberto’s father. He says that they are both respectable young men.  He says that the Vento boy is a little silly —’ ”  the girls laughed — “ ‘but that he is very dependable and saves money and does not do bad things.’ ” 

Flossie laughed again. “My cousin has a little note here that he asked her what she meant by ‘bad things’ but she wouldn’t tell him.” Kitty chuckled.

“ ‘…He works for a painter and is a hard worker. The painter always brings him to important jobs like big fancy houses.’ ”

“He must be good at it,” said Kitty.

“My cousin has another little note that says he will ask around too,” said Flossie. She began to read again.

“ ‘Mr. Cabral says that the Sousa boy is not silly and that he has a good job and —’  this part gets confusing, my cousin put a lot of notes in here — ‘Mr. Cabral and Lino Cabral and the boy’s father Mr. Antonio Sousa and the boy Frank Sousa are all in the same club. There are a lot of Souzas in New Bedford. These Sousas are part of the Sousa brothers that fish together.’ — My cousin says he asked her and she said she doesn’t know them and that’s all that her friend said. — ‘They are all in the same club as Mr. Cabral. The boy Frank Sousa has a very good job at a shipyard. He went to the new high school and has a diploma.’ ” Kitty’s eyes widened.  “And then my cousin adds that the new high school has classes for learning skills and trades, and that Tia Rafaela’s friend didn’t know what his job is.”

He is a draftsman, Kitty remembered. She would have to find out what a draftsman did.

Flossie continued: “ ‘... He has this job and he also still helps the ones who catch fish by going to the fish market early in the morning and helping them sell the fish. He saves money and does not do bad things.’ ”

“So there. No bad things. What do you think?”

“I think I wouldn’t mind seeing your Rob and his friends again.”

“He’s not my Rob, ” Flossie scoffed.

“For now, maybe.”

“Hmph.” Flossie pretended to be miffed.

They strolled on a little before Kitty spoke up again. “Did she say anything else? What’s next?”

“Well, she says here that he’d like to come down. I talked to my parents, and they’re satisfied. So now we can tell her that if he asks to come down again, we’ll say yes. And that we would be very happy to see all his friends again.”

“If he asks Mr. Sousa to come with him,” said Kitty, “I think Mr. Sousa will say yes.”

Flossie grinned. “And if Mr Sousa does come, would Miss Delgado like to be in the party?”

“Yes,” said Kitty. “Yes, I think she would.”