The Operator

Dedication

For Elaine Gladys McAnaney Stoddard, Grandma

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Epilogue

Author’s Note

Acknowledgments

P.S. Insights, Interviews & More . . .*

About the Author

About the Book

Read On

Praise

Copyright

About the Publisher

Chapter 1

DECEMBER 15, 1952

Vivian Dalton’s worn old ankle boots crunched over the packed snow in front of Freedlander’s, the bright lights of the department store spilling right out onto the sidewalk and mixing with the glow of the streetlamps. Vivian gave a quick, polite wave of a gloved hand to Betty Miller, who’d caught her eye through the flocked glass of the main display window. Freedlander’s fancied itself right up for the holidays with the lights and the bells and whatever it was they put on the window to make it look like it snowed inside.

Vivian had heard it called flocked glass but couldn’t tell you what flocked was. She might’ve guessed something to do with geese. Flock, flocked. Who knew? Vivian just knew she would’ve liked to be inside the bright store, on the other side of that flocked glass, herself, all nice and toasty, instead of out freezing her toes off walking to work in the boots that might as well’ve been made of Saran Wrap, for all the good they were doing.

Betty Miller didn’t have to work, did she? No, she was nice and toasty inside the department store with her two youngest, Little Bitty and Charles Junior, waiting in the long line to see Santa Claus, and that didn’t surprise Vivian one bit. This year’s Santa was a pretty good one, Vivian had to admit. Fat, jolly, and sober, at least, so the Millers were there, and the lines were much longer than they had been last year. Last year, Jimmy Hixson had said Santa’s breath smelled like the Sunoco filling station. Jimmy’s older brother Albert worked at the filling station, so he would know.

When she’d heard what Jimmy Hixson said, Betty Miller had been the first mother to boycott the Santa line and the other mothers quickly followed her lead, like they always did. She hadn’t bothered with a courtesy phone call, politely explaining to Freedlander’s with all her over-enunciated consonants, “Your San-ta Claus seems to be fright-fully ahem em-balmed.” That would’ve taken up too much of her time. Vivian didn’t know exactly what it was Betty did with her time, but she knew Betty thought her time was more precious than anyone else’s. Betty Miller knew the boycott would work, and the other mothers knew it, and soon Freedlander’s knew they’d better get themselves a new Santa Claus. No matter what Little Bitty and Charles Junior said to Sober Santa, up there on his shiny red North Pole throne, Vivian Dalton knew the Millers were going to have a marvelous Christmas this year. The Millers had a marvelous Christmas every year.