Chapter 15 - Sophie Met Margaret Through Letters
Two years after the gala, Sophie was ten.
For a school project, she chose to write about Rose House.
Laura worried the topic was too personal.
Sophie insisted.
“I’m not writing about the fight.”
“What are you writing about?”
“The women who lived there.”
Laura smiled.
“Good.”
Henry gave Sophie copies of public archive material.
Denise agreed to an interview.
Victoria contributed letters Margaret wrote during Rose House’s early
years.
Through those letters, Sophie discovered a woman different from the
grandmother-shaped villain in the Bennett version of history.
Margaret was funny.
Impatient.
Terrible at spelling.
She once drove across Baltimore at midnight because a Rose House
resident went into labor.
Eleanor’s journals showed similar contradictions.
The two women had done meaningful work.
Then fear, loyalty, pride, and secrecy damaged it.
Sophie’s project ended with a sentence Laura did not help write:
People can do good things and still make mistakes, so history should
tell both.
Her teacher gave her an A.
Victoria attended the school presentation.
So did Laura.
They sat three seats apart.
Afterward Sophie walked over.
“Did I get anything wrong?”
Victoria shook her head.
“No.”
Laura added:
“You left out how bossy Grandma Eleanor was.”
Sophie rolled her eyes.
“That wasn’t relevant.”
Victoria laughed.
Laura did too.
For Sophie, the two families were no longer enemies connected by stolen
pearls.
May you like
They were people connected by a shared piece of history.
That was a healthier inheritance.
