Read The Velvet Shadow for Free Online

away from Roger as she turned to answer. “Yes, Charity. Hop on down, and Mr. Haynes will walk us in.”
    “You can’t blame a man for trying.” An easy smile played at the corners of Roger’s mouth. “After the official engagement then.” He stepped out onto the carriage block, then extended a hand to help Flanna alight.
    “After the wedding, you mean,” Flanna answered, taking his hand and descending as gracefully as she could. “A lady does not kiss a man until the wedding band is on her finger.”
    “Is that so?” One of his dark brows arched devilishly. “Then three-quarters of the young women in Boston aren’t ladies.”
    “That may be, sir,” Flanna answered, falling into step beside Charity as the maid moved toward the house. She turned andflashed a bright smile over her shoulder. “But you may rest assured that I am.”

    Flanna pressed her hands to her cold cheeks as she stamped her feet on the entry rug to dislodge any lingering clumps of snow. The rhythmic creak of the housemother’s rocker halted for a moment, and Flanna called out, “It’s only me, Mrs. Davis. Charity and I are safely returned from the Haynes house.”
    Charity helped Flanna slip out of her pelisse, then gathered it in her arms as Flanna smoothed the wrinkles out of her skirt. Mrs. Davis liked her girls to look modest and tidy at all times, for the widow had a sterling reputation to maintain. Though she had probably found it difficult to swallow the idea of a female medical college, for the past twelve years her girls had lived and studied under intense scrutiny without a single moral failure. Practically every time Flanna went out the door, Mrs. Davis’s farewell included a cheery reminder that the college’s fate and reputation rested upon her students’ shoulders.
    Flanna lifted her chin and walked through the parlor, pausing politely before Mrs. Davis’s rocker.
    “A nice evening, my dear?”
    “Very nice, Mrs. Davis, thank you for asking. Mrs. Haynes is a gracious hostess.”
    The widow nodded, her white cap framing her pinched face. “You’ve been seeing quite a lot of her son. How long have you two been keeping company?”
    “Oh, about a year and a half, I suppose.” Flanna gave the landlady a careful smile. “Long enough for me to know he is quite a gentleman. You need not fear when I am out with him, ma’am.”
    “A woman can never let her guard completely down.” The old woman’s voice rattled like the wind against the windowpanes. “Shouldn’t he be writing a letter to your father soon?”
    Good grief, had the woman been listening at the window? Eager to retreat from the prying questions, Flanna shifted her weight towardthe staircase. Her bell-shaped hoop skirt swung forward, betraying her eagerness. “I expect Roger will do whatever a gentleman should do. But he understands I intend to finish school and return to Charleston.”
    The old woman closed her eyes and shook her head slightly. “I suppose it’s his mother that’s preventing him from proposing. She cannot approve the match.”
    Flanna had taken a forward step, but at Mrs. Davis’s last comment she halted, shocked by the woman’s bluntness. “Why would she not approve the match?” Though she knew from firsthand experience that Mrs. Haynes did not approve of slavery, she
did
approve of Flanna’s plans for a career in medicine. And despite Flanna’s conviction that tonight’s dinner had not gone entirely well, she had not yet met a person she could not charm—if given enough time.
    Mrs. Davis let out a three-noted cackle. “A proud son of Massachusetts marrying a Charleston girl? It could never happen. Not anymore. Why, at this very moment the name of South Carolina is as reviled as the devil’s.” The smile she wore was no smile at all, just a wrinkle with yellow teeth in the midst of it. “In a month you’ll be fortunate if you’re received in a single parlor in Boston.”
    Flanna stared at her landlady in total