Stephen took off his goggles. “I could go to a poetry meeting with you, if you want company.”
“No,” Jacob replied.
“If you’d like to hear Jacob’s work, forget it,” said Elizabeth. “Even his poetry group probably hasn’t heard any of his poems yet, and he’s attended their sessions for ten years.”
Twelve years. Jacob was a founding member of the Dreamers Guild. And no, he did not share his poetry there, either. No matter how much his friends prodded him.
“It’s not good to be stretched so thin all the time,” Kuni insisted. One of her hands rested on her own stomach, just below the row of hidden blades stitched beneath her bodice.
Jacob knew she and her husband, Graham, were hoping for children of their own. He also knew better than to ask about it. If there were any news, he would be the first to hear. Some things took time—and luck. He understood how uniquely frustrating it was to be hounded about when he planned to achieve something that was ultimately outside his control.
“We’re all stretched thin. So if you’ll excuse me—” His head jerked toward Elizabeth, who had taken a step backward to whisper to her husband. “What did you just say?”
“It’s this fellow Sir Gareth Jallow,” Stephen said helpfully. “Elizabeth is obsessed with—”
Elizabeth elbowed him in the ribs. “I saidnotto mention him out loud.”
Jacob’s entire body tensed. “I thought you didn’t read poetry. Balderdash for romantics, you said.”
She coughed into her fist. “I don’t. That is, not usually. But everyone reads Sir Gar… who must not be named.”
He sighed. “I can hear the man’s name.”
“You really can’t,” said Kuni. “You explicitly warned us never to say those syllables in your presence.”
Jacob crossed his arms. Was he jealous of Sir Gareth Jallow? Absolutely. Bone deep. But did hehateJallow? Yes. Maybe. Sometimes. With self-loathing. And anger. This was not who he wanted to be.
In other words, it was complicated. Which was why Jacob would rather not discuss his feelings. There was no telling what unedited words might burst from his mouth.
He glanced at his pocket watch. Blast the interruption! It was time for the next mission already. “Stand clear of the exit, please.”
The others scrambled aside.
Jacob pushed the barn doors open wide and gave the whistle.
Ferrets began to stream down the barn’s walls and across the dirt floor from every shadowy nook. They arranged themselves in rectangular formation behind Jacob as he marched from the barn like the Pied Piper of Hamelin.
“Close the door when you’re done cleaning up!” he called out without looking back. There was no time to delay.
He and his scampering furry army had a legal trial to disrupt.
3
The next morning, with Rufus underfoot, Viv cooked breakfast while straining to read snippets of the new novel she was enjoying. The book was propped up against a water pitcher and held open with a rolling pin. Between cracking eggs and flipping fried potatoes, the scene she was reading was rising to an exciting apex—when it cut off mid-word because the rest of the paragraph was hidden behind the wooden rolling pin.
She reached out with her elbow to nudge the rolling pin out of the way when the front door flew open. Quentin strode inside, the morning newspaper beneath his arm and a new mountain of letters piled in his hands.
Viv served breakfast for herself and her cousin but picked up a handful of correspondence rather than her fork. She broke the wax seals with a knife. “Question for the advice column… Question for the advice column… Another question for the advice column… And new letters from my colleagues!”
Using the wordcolleaguewas the opposite of brutal honesty. “Colleague” was a big fat fib. Viv’s playwright friends were paid professionals, who’d all had at least one play performed in a major theater.
Viv had never received so much as a flicker of interest from a minor theater.
Or even successfully tempted the amateurs who acted out scenes at parties or in parks for a lark.
But these talented playwrights were the best friends she had. They weregoingto be her colleagues. She just had to work harder. Be better than everyone else. And eventually, by God, someone, somewhere, would have no choice but to give her a chance.
It was hard enough to convince the male-dominated world to take a female seriously. Much less an immigrant. Much less a Black woman. Much less a would-be playwright. There were unspoken rules about whose stories deserved to be told, and people like her did not qualify. No matter how fine the writing might be.
