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Back The Shoe Queen
Chapters (67)
  1. Cover
  2. “And may I say, those shoes are adorable.”
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. ( I )
  7. ( one )
  8. ( two )
  9. ( three )
  10. ( four )
  11. ( five )
  12. ( six )
  13. ( seven )
  14. ( eight )
  15. ( nine )
  16. ( ten )
  17. ( II )
  18. ( eleven )
  19. ( twelve )
  20. ( thirteen )
  21. ( fourteen )
  22. ( fifteen )
  23. ( III )
  24. ( sixteen )
  25. ( seventeen )
  26. ( eighteen )
  27. ( nineteen )
  28. ( IV )
  29. ( twenty )
  30. ( twenty-one )
  31. ( twenty-two )
  32. ( twenty-three )
  33. ( twenty-four )
  34. ( V )
  35. ( twenty-five )
  36. ( twenty-six )
  37. ( twenty-seven )
  38. ( twenty-eight )
  39. ( twenty-nine )
  40. VI
  41. ( thirty )
  42. ( thirty-one )
  43. ( thirty-two )
  44. ( thirty-three )
  45. ( thirty-four )
  46. ( VII )
  47. ( thirty-five )
  48. ( thirty-six )
  49. ( thirty-seven )
  50. ( thirty-eight )
  51. ( thirty-nine )
  52. ( forty )
  53. ( forty-one )
  54. ( forty-two )
  55. ( VIII )
  56. ( forty-three )
  57. ( forty-four )
  58. ( forty-five )
  59. ( forty-six )
  60. ( forty-seven )
  61. ( forty-eight )
  62. ( forty-nine )
  63. ( fifty )
  64. ( fifty-one )
  65. Acknowledgments
  66. Acknowledgments
  67. Questions for Discussion

And then it happened. Or rather, it didn’t happen. Her “monthly” didn’t appear on the expected day or the following day or the day after that. After five days, Matron asked her if she was “quite the ticket” and instructed the kitchen staff to give her extra meat and greens. On the Saturday morning, in the bath, Genevieve used a razor to make a small cut in one of her shins. She squeezed blood, mixed with a little bathwater, onto a few of her “monthly” towels, putting them out with her laundry so as to fool Matron. On Saturday night she lay awake, agonizing over what to say to Mr. Giles, and then on Sunday she told Matron she had a migraine and stayed in bed all day, too frightened to get up and face the world.

She never doubted for one moment that she was pregnant. They had taken no precautions—hadn’t even discussed doing so. She’d trusted him to take charge of the situation. He surely knew more than her about what was risky and what wasn’t. He wouldn’t take a real risk, would he? He was a married man, after all. And she had enjoyed becoming his creature, doing what he wanted, living in the now. If ever the possibility of conception crossed her mind, it was in an unreal, almost playful way—“What would my parents say!” She thought about her mother crying and clutching her throat, her father rumbling and thundering and exploding with anger, his head actually blowing off his neck in a shower of blood.

What a stupid little fool she’d been.

Three weeks passed in a kind of emotional grayness. She didn’t go to see Mr. Giles, and he didn’t attempt to contact her. She imagined him eating dinner at home with the wife she’d never seen and the son she’d once desired. For some reason she always imagined roast chicken—Mr. Giles tearing a leg to pieces and licking his greasy fingers, his wife—dough-faced and gap-toothed—pulling at the other. Alexander dropping scraps for the dog. She thought about the havoc she could wreak on the cozy scene. But these imaginings were no more real than her earlier fantasies of shocking her parents with the evidence of her “ruin.” Her passion for Giles cooled a little more with each day. She knew now that she hadn’t been in love with him, though she had certainly been under his spell. The important thing was to hide what was happening to her for as long as possible while she tried to come up with a plan. The important thing was to do her absolute best not to fall apart.