An Heiress to Remember (The Gilded Age Girls Club #3) - Maya Rodale Page 0,29

not intend to finish that sentence, just let it hang there and let the others explain why not. But then she realized that would make her no better than Mr. Stevens, dismissing women’s ideas out of hand.

So Beatrice thought for a moment why not, and instead ended up thinking why she should.

She could hire wives and women, dozens of them. Scores of young women were leaving farms and small towns and coming to the city to find work and, perhaps, independence and time to find true love rather than marrying the richest man who would have them. Could Goodwin’s give them the chance she had never had?

She could hire people who shared her vision and wanted to work with her rather than resist her at every turn. And they, too, had families to support or lives to live.

She had no good reason why not.

“I would love to. Full stop.”

Harriet beamed at her. “A store by women, for women. Imagine that.”

“There would be decent facilities, if you know what I mean,” Daisy declared. “And I’m not just talking a private place to reapply their lip paint.”

“That was the first thing on my list!” Beatrice exclaimed. She got the idea after Dalton’s was the only store to provide clean, sufficient space for women. It grudgingly earned her respect and, if she were another shopper, her endless devotion. “But Mr. Stevens told me that ladies should not stay out long enough to need them or better yet, they ought to stay home.”

“Outrageous!”

“You really must fire him, Beatrice.”

“He inadvertently has an excellent business point, though,” Ava mused. “If you are going to provide facilities, then women can stay awhile longer. It would afford them more time to shop.”

“You could have a restaurant or tearoom. A place for women to go and enjoy being served by someone else for once.”

“And delivery of packages so she might buy more than she can carry, of course.”

“A place to leave the children so a mother might shop in peace for Lord’s sake,” another woman said.

“Perhaps a space to just be. For a moment.”

The ideas were coming fast and furious by women who had never been asked what kind of experience they wanted to have from the world. Being a woman at large meant always adapting to a world built for men, which meant always contorting themselves to fit. But what if they had a space that was built for them to enjoy? Someplace safe, clean, elegant, and built for them to linger in comfort. None of these suggestions were incredibly novel or particularly impossible, but taken all together—and with the right merchandise—she could create something new and wonderful. Something more than a department store, a destination store.

Or she could fail spectacularly in front of everyone in New York City—especially all the girls watching her ascent with bated breath.

That was if she could even bring herself to do what she knew needed to be done.

Chapter Thirteen

Goodwin’s Department Store

A few days later

Beatrice knew what she had to do. But . . . oh, she was not looking forward to it. There would be greener pastures on the other side, just as soon as she traveled through hellfire and agonies to get there.

It was not unlike how she’d felt when she’d decided to pursue a divorce from a duke. But that was a testament to how bad things had become; she would rather crawl through hellfire and agonies on the chance that she might survive rather than remain for the all but assured death of her spirit.

So she had summoned her courage with the last spark she had left.

She had succeeded.

So she could do this.

Beatrice approached Mr. Roger Stevens, a man who had helped her father run the store, who had known her since she was yea high, who had attended her wedding, who had loyally served her brother, and who had simply always been there.

“Mr. Stevens, if I might have a word with you.”

“I’m busy at the moment, sweetheart.”

Sweetheart. Like she was a mere barmaid or secretary and not the president of the establishment that employed him.

Her confidence faltered. Slightly.

But then she remembered she had survived the hellfire and agonies before. She had taken on a duke and won; this man was one she could certainly manage.

“Now,” she said firmly.

And then, involuntarily the words “If you please” fell out of her mouth and drifted into the air. Worse, they came out softly when she needed to sound firm. If she had to say them at all, then it must be