The Tutor and the Senator's Widow novel · Chapter 20 of 24
Chapter 20: The Union Hall
The union hall on Hull Street smelled of coffee and floor wax, and every folding chair in it was taken.
A hundred and fifty people, maybe more, sat in rows under a faded banner.
The banner read, in white letters on blue, FITZHUGH LUMBER WORKERS, LOCAL 114.
The woman with the cane and the Fitzhugh cap met us at the door.
"I'd have called you," she said to Eleanor.
"I didn't have your number. I had hers." She nodded at me.
"The receptionist wrote it on a card."
"We came as soon as we heard," Eleanor said.
"Good. Because Mr. Lowell's people mailed a letter to every one of us yesterday."
She gave me a copy.
It was on company letterhead, and it said that the state had frozen the plan at the demand of "a single trustee acting alone." It said pension checks could be delayed.
It said the trustee in question was the senator's young widow.
"They want you angry at her," I said.
"They got that part right. We're angry." The woman rubbed her knuckles. "We just aren't sure who at."
Eleanor took a breath, and walked down the center aisle.
I followed with a stack of paper against my chest.
A murmur went along the rows.
I heard "widow," and "the girl," and "Fitzhugh," and none of it was kind.
She climbed three steps to the little stage and stood behind a lectern with a union bumper sticker slapped on its side.
She did not have a speech.
She took off her reading glasses and held them.
"My name is Eleanor Fitzhugh," she said.
"I married your senator. Some of you came to my wedding. I can't promise I remember your faces, and I am sorry for that."
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