Searching for Silverheels - Softcover

Mobley, Jeannie

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1481400304 ISBN 13: 9781481400305

Verlag: Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2015

Inhaltsangabe

A starry-eyed girl and a gruff suffragette decipher the myth of a dancer-turned-local-hero in this gorgeous novel from the author of Katerina’s Wish that Kirkus Reviews called “an engrossing, plausible story of several unlikely feminist heroines with a touch of romance and intrigue.”

In her small Colorado town Pearl spends the summers helping her mother run the family café and entertaining tourists with the legend of Silverheels, a beautiful dancer who nursed miners through a smallpox epidemic in 1861 and then mysteriously disappeared. According to lore, the miners loved her so much they named their mountain after her.

Pearl believes the tale is true, but she is mocked by her neighbor, Josie, a suffragette campaigning for women’s right to vote. Josie says that Silverheels was a crook, not a savior, and she challenges Pearl to a bet: prove that Silverheels was the kindhearted angel of legend, or help Josie pass out the suffragist pamphlets that Pearl thinks drive away the tourists. Not to mention driving away handsome George Crawford.

As Pearl looks for the truth, darker forces are at work in her small town. The United States’s entry into World War I casts suspicion on German immigrants, and also on anyone who criticizes the president during wartime—including Josie. How do you choose what’s right when it could cost you everything you have?

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Jeannie Mobley is an archaeologist and professor who lives in Colorado. Her first novel, Katerina’s Wish, received three starred reviews, won the Colorado Book Award, and was a New York Public Library 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing selection. She is also the author of Searching for Silverheels, which received a starred review. Visit her at JeannieMobley.com.

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Searching for Silverheels

CHAPTER 1

It’s strange how sometimes, even though the whole world is changing around you, everything can feel so much the same. President Wilson had declared war on Germany just two months ago and had called upon every citizen to step up and help out with the war effort. Women were planting victory gardens, and young men were talking of enlisting. My own father had gone up onto the mountain to mine the zinc needed for shell casings. But here in the Silverheels Café, life just moseyed on, same as always. Each morning, the old-timers gathered at their table in the corner and talked at length about nothing in particular. My best friend, Imogene, hovered by the counter, trying to flirt with my big brother, Willie, who only had eyes for his breakfast. And I was spending my days taking orders, hauling plates, and refilling cup after cup of coffee, without anything new or interesting crossing my path.

“Order, Pearl!” Mother called from the kitchen. I went to retrieve the plates of eggs and bacon for the old-timers. Mother fed them nearly every morning, come rain or shine, whether or not they had money to cover their bills. Neighbors do for neighbors, she always said, and it seemed to be true. Those who never had the cash always seemed to find other ways to pay—fresh fish or game for the kitchen, or a load of firewood for the stove.

I stepped from the kitchen back out into the café just as George Crawford and his mother walked through the front door. Imogene glanced at them, then turned a pointed stare at me, her eyebrows bobbing. I tried to ignore her and offer a polite good morning to George and his mother, but I’m sure George noticed the rush of blood that flooded my cheeks.

“Good morning, Pearl,” he said with a smile. George had the most stunning smile in all of Park County. Even girls who had no interest in him said so, not that there were many of those. Possibly the only girl who claimed no interest was Imogene, and that was mainly because she was my best friend and knew how I felt. Besides, she was sweet on Willie.

Mrs. Crawford directed George to the table in the opposite corner from the old-timers and began to peel off her kidskin gloves. Why she bothered to put them on at all mystified me; Crawford’s Mercantile was only just across the street and a block down, but Mrs. Crawford was always a lady. At least, in her appearance.

“Coffee, please, Pearl,” she called, even before she sat down. I carried my load of plates to the old-timers’ table, then I went behind the counter to retrieve the coffeepot from its warmer. Imogene leaned across the counter toward me and whispered, “George is watching you.”

“Shh!” I said.

She sat back and spoke in a voice loud enough for everyone in the café to hear. “We have some tourists at the hotel, Pearl. They came in last night and reserved a room for four nights.”

I paused, waiting for her to go on. This was good news. Tourism was likely to be down this summer with the war on, and that meant less business for our café as well as for Imogene’s family, who ran the hotel.

“They look like the type that might want a tour,” Imogene continued. Most years this would have been good news too. My father and I made a few extra dollars in the summer taking folks on excursions. This year, though, with Father away, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to do that, no matter how much I wanted to.

Oblivious to my dilemma, Imogene kept talking. “There are three of them. A fashionable young couple, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Fischer, and a fellow about our age named Frank. Frank is mightily handsome!” She said the last with a hopeful glance at Willie, but he showed no sign of jealousy. Imogene sighed.

“Where’s that coffee, Pearl? And George might want a cinnamon roll, when you are done with your little chat,” said Mrs. Crawford.

“Yes, ma’am. Sorry,” I said, snatching up a cup and the pot and hurrying to her table. George did want a roll, so I cut the very biggest one from the pan, as I always did when it was for George. I don’t know if he ever noticed, but he always gave me that stunning smile when I placed it before him, which was worth more than the biggest cinnamon roll in the world.

I reluctantly turned from George’s smile when the bell on the door clattered. Everyone in the café looked up to see the three tourists step inside.

Imogene was right when she had called them fashionable. The lady’s skin was lily white, her fingers long and delicate, and her corset was cinched so tight that her waist was as thin as a wasp’s. No one in Como had hands so soft, a waist so thin, or clothes so fine, not Mrs. Crawford or even Mrs. Engel who ran the millinery and yard-goods shop. The lady’s hat angled jauntily on her smooth dark hair, the ostrich plume sweeping elegantly behind her. She wore a starched white shirtwaist, all ruffled up the front, and a blue skirt that reached just to the tops of her pearl-buttoned boots, according to the latest fashion. She was exactly what I imagined the ladies in my dime novels looked like. I could easily see her in distress, being rescued by a brave hero.

The man who escorted her, however, struck me as more of a dandy than a brave hero. He wore his hair parted neatly in the center and slicked down tight against his head. From his crisp pin-striped traveling suit and polished leather shoes, I could tell he hadn’t stepped off pavement very often in his life. Nor did he want to, judging from the sneer on his face as he took in the locals in their work clothes and sturdy boots.

The boy Frank tagged along behind the couple. He was close to my age or a little older, perhaps fourteen. Though he looked good natured, Imogene had exaggerated when she called him mightily good-looking. Unlike his companions, he hadn’t bothered much with his clothes and was a little disheveled. His hair needed a cut and a comb. The top button was missing from his shirt, and his collar, where it rubbed his neck, was brown with dirt. He walked with his hands crammed into his pockets and glanced around as if he were eager to see new things. I gave him a warm smile of welcome. Exactly the sort of person who would want a tour, I thought. Surely I could do it on my own if we didn’t go far.

As soon as they were seated, I fetched the coffeepot to their table. The young lady smiled up at me. She was not old enough to be the boy’s mother. She had to be an older sister, or at most, a youthful aunt.

“What smells so good?” she asked.

“My mother’s cinnamon rolls,” I said. “Fresh baked. And there’s hotcakes, eggs with sausage, fatback, or hash. Oh, and oatmeal.”

The gentleman laughed. “That’s the whole menu? No wonder it’s not printed up.”

My face colored. I didn’t have anything against city folks, even if most of them couldn’t tell a pine tree from a horse’s rear end, but I didn’t think they had a right to come to our town and make fun of us. Still, they might want a tour, so I smiled. My politeness paid off, too, because after they ordered, the woman said, “We plan to explore today. Can your kitchen prepare a lunch basket?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “It’s going to be a fine day for a picnic.” I glanced out the window as I said it, only to have my hopes plummet...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Margaret K. McElderry Books
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2015
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1481400304
• ISBN 13: 9781481400305
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 320
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar