“The highest-flying kite,” Finn added.
Once they started dreaming, the goal of becoming a shop owner was within sight. With Finn at her side, the possibilities seemed endless.
Finn got a second job cleaning the cannery at night, and Delia started working ten hours a week while going to school during the days. The smell was atrocious, her hair and clothes stank likecod, but she earned thirty cents an hour. At the end of each week, she was able to add three more dollars into the Mason jar where they kept their money for the shop.
The only time she or Finn dipped into their savings was to buy supplies for making kites. Their store would require plenty of inventory, and on rainy days when they couldn’t go to the park, she and Finn made kites. They cut, sawed, and sewed all manner of them, and Sister Bernadette let them use the attic at the orphanage to store their inventory.
Then in December of 1903, everything changed. The Wright Brothers completed their first flight in a faraway place called Kitty Hawk. Finn read every newspaper he could get his hands on. He still loved kites, but his passion for airplanes soon became an obsession.
And it was worrying for Delia. Finn reassured her that he still wanted to open the kite store, yet his enthusiasm waned. It seemed all he wanted to do was talk about airplanes. Every week she felt him slipping a little further away, like water dribbling through her cupped hands. His fading interest had awakened her deepest fear. She wasn’t bold and confident like Finn. She could never keep up with him, for he had set his sights on airplanes and flying.
Most worrisome was a daring new aviation company located only a few hours north in Hammondsport, New York. Glenn Curtiss was the major rival of the Wright Brothers, and he was hiring. When Finn mentioned quitting at the fish cannery to move to Hammondsport, it was terrifying. What would happen to them if he moved so far away? There would be other girls there, prettier girls who didn’t stink like fish or worry all the time. How could she hold on to their dreams if Finn abandoned her to chase after airplanes or any of the other temptations in Hammondsport?
Finn was determined to move there, which would be a disaster for them both. The skills necessary to fly or design an airplane had nothing to do with kites, and she didn’t want Finn’s heart to be crushed.
“People who work on airplanes have money and connections and degrees,” she told him. “All we know how to do is gut fish. They won’t be interested in you.”
Finn hated it when she doubted him. “Quit trying to talk me out of it, Dee,” he said. “What’s the harm in trying? Why are you so afraid?”
She was afraid that if he moved away, he would never come back. She wanted to pursue the dream of their kite shop in their own neighborhood where it was familiar and safe. Why wasn’t that enough for him?
Delia shook away the old memories. Finn certainly found a way to make his flying ambitions come true. It cost her three hundred dollars and her faith in him.
Owning a store had always been a whimsical dream; she just didn’t realize it until Finn stole her money. Store ownership was risky and uncertain, and she was right to have found a safer means of supporting herself.
She folded the newspaper and returned it to the shelf. None of the employment openings was tempting, but she had a long weekend ahead of her during which to mull over her options before having to face Wesley on Monday.
10
Delia braced herself all weekend to confront Wesley on Monday morning. Fantasies about marching into his office to recklessly quit played over and over in her mind.Perhaps you can hire Mrs. Beekman to be your assistant, she dreamed of saying.
And yet she’d never do it. Instead, she would give the standard two weeks’ notice because quitting abruptly would reveal the depth of her hurt. Delia’s heart was in her throat as she entered the office, prepared to announce her intention to resign to Wesley’s face.
Reginald let her know otherwise. “He telephoned this morning and said not to expect him today. He’s spending the day with his daughter.”
“That’s convenient,” she muttered, throwing her bag onto her desk and knocking over her pencil cup.
“Wesley asked me to remind you about the CRB board meeting this afternoon. You are to bring the file about international shipping lanes and meet him at Mr. Hoover’s town house at four o’clock sharp.”
She sighed while restoring order to her desk. Why couldn’t Wesley come to the office to pick up the shipping lane documents?Why did she have to continually jump and scurry and burn the midnight oil to keep him happy? There were important men on the CRB’s board of directors, and Wesley would look flat-footed without the documentssheprepared and for which he would surely take credit.
She left work well ahead of the appointed meeting, but the subway was running late, so she was ten minutes overdue as she hurried down the street toward Bertie’s modest town house. It was a classic three-story design, with wrought-iron railings lining the steps before a discreet front door. Ever since the war began, Bertie had been sailing between New York, London, and Rotterdam to carry out CRB business. It meant he now lived in rented town houses rather than in his mansion in San Francisco.
She rapped the brass knocker and waited. To her surprise, Wesley himself answered the door.
“Where have you been?” he asked in a harsh whisper.
She handed him the briefcase and walked inside without a word. He ought to thank his lucky stars she came at all.
The main room was filled with wealthy men and reeked of cigar smoke. The men of the CRB’s board of directors exuded money and power with their glinting watch chains, bespoke suits, and gold walking sticks. Among them were two bank presidents, the owner of the New York Yankees, and Congressman Donnelly, the representative for Manhattan who held the city in the palm of his hand.
Wesley grasped her arm and steered her farther into the room. “I’m sure you all remember my assistant, Miss Delia Byrne. She’ll be taking notes of our meeting.”
“Good to see you again, Delia,” Bertie said warmly. “Can I get you something to drink?”
She demurred, and the meeting quickly got under way. There was only room for six people in the upholstered chairs circling the room. Delia automatically took the window seat that overlooked the lush greenery in the walled back garden.
She propped the clipboard in the crook of her elbow as the meeting began. She was primarily here to take notes and jog Wesley’s memory of details regarding the international shipping lanes.
