The room rumbled with disgusted murmurs, punctuated by low boos. The man’s voice didn’t carry with it any hint of magic, but there was power there nonetheless. Esta could feel him stirring the souls in the room all around her with nothing more than his words. The people around him were leaning in toward the platform on which he stood, their minds open and willing to accept what he was saying.
“Yes. Their parade is an abomination. Their prophet is a false one, an idol of profit and power created to suppress the voice of the proletariat. You all know this. You have seen it for yourselves every year since the brave porters stood up and demanded a living wage and were crushed by the powers of the bourgeois pigs. Every year the bourgeoisie remind us that they hold our lives in their hands—hands that have never known the weight of a hammer or the sting of labor—but not this year.
“This year we will rise up. This year, with the world watching, with the president himself viewing the spectacle, we must rise up and say enough. We must demand what is ours—with force, if necessary.”
The crowd erupted around Esta, and she lifted her hands in half-hearted applause, so she wouldn’t be noticed. But his words, along with the anger and hatred in his tone, made her uneasy. The room felt like a powder keg about to ignite.
“This your first meeting?” A girl had come up next to her and was examining her with an appraising look in her eyes.
“What?” Esta asked, unnerved at how easily she’d missed the girl’s approach. She was wearing a dress of slate gray that was buttoned up to her chin. The color seemed too severe for how young she was, but the plain cut of it seemed to suit the girl’s stern expression.
“You’re a new face,” the girl said, a question in her eyes.
Esta’s mind raced. “I heard about this . . . this meeting,” she said, improvising as she went. “And thought I’d see for myself what it was all about.”
“Who’d you hear from?” the girl asked. Her voice was soft but determined. And her eyes were suspicious.
“Oh, one of the guys at the brewery told me. Said I might find it interesting.”
The girl studied Esta a long moment more, like she wasn’t sure if she believed the story, but then she relented. “I’m Greta, and you are?”
“John,” Esta said, picking the plainest, most forgettable name she could think of.
“We’re glad to have you, John,” Greta told her as she handed Esta a sheet of paper. “Our movement needs more able bodies willing to stand firm.”
Keeping the notebook clamped steadily beneath her arm, she accepted it without reading it. “Thanks,” she said. “Who’s that speaking now?”
The girl’s eyes narrowed a little. “Your friend, the one at the brewery, he didn’t tell you?”
Esta’s throat felt tight. “He just said I’d be interested . . . didn’t say much else.”
“Where is he?” the girl asked. “This friend of yours?”
“Who knows?” Esta said, and when she sensed that it wasn’t the right answer, she added, “Probably working overtime.” She gave a shrug that she hoped looked tired and frustrated. “You know how it is—when the foreman says stay, you stay.”
The girl’s expression relaxed slightly. “Yes. We all know how it is.” She looked to the speaker and then back at Esta. “That’s Caleb Lipscomb. He’s the current secretary of the SWP. He’s brilliant.”
“What’s this parade he’s talking about?”
“The Veiled Prophet Parade?” the girl asked, and the suspicion was back in her eyes. “They have it every year. . . .” Her voice trailed off like this was something Esta should have known.
“I’m new in town,” Esta told her. “Came because my cousin said there was work, what with the Exposition and all. Only been here about two months.”
The girl’s expression didn’t relax. “Where did you say you worked again?”
Esta felt as though the stiff collar of her shirt were strangling her, but she’d been in tighter situations than this. “The Feltz Brewery,” she said, giving the name of Ruth’s place, since it was the only place she knew of.
The girl made a sound in the back of her throat. “He’s talking about the Veiled Prophet Parade that’s set for Independence Day.”
“This parade . . . It’s a big deal?” Esta asked, trying to get a sense of what the girl thought of it.
“That depends on who you are. A lot of people in town like the spectacle of it, but there’s plenty of us who know the truth.” Greta shrugged. “It’s just a show of power. The Society started the parade back in seventy-eight, after a railroad strike threatened to shut down the city. They couldn’t let a bunch of simple workmen get away with an action like that, especially not ones with skin darker than their own, so they invented the Prophet and the Parade. They use the threat of magic to keep the workers in their places all the year through, and the parade is a reminder of their power—a reminder of who is truly free in this country.” The girl’s expression lit with determination. “We never make it easy for them, and this year’s parade won’t be any exception.”
“I see,” Esta said, glancing at the sheet in her hand. The bold, dark type only accented the anger in the words printed on the page.
“Well, enjoy the rest of the evening,” the girl said. “If you have any questions at all, any of us with the broadsheets can answer them.”
“Thanks,” Esta told her, and turned her eyes back to the man speaking in the center of the room.
Go away, she thought as she felt the girl’s eyes on her.
She pretended to pay attention to what Lipscomb was saying. After a few minutes, she glanced over her shoulder to find the girl still watching her. Inwardly she cursed. As long as the girl was there, Esta was stuck—she couldn’t disappear, and she couldn’t drop the package, not without giving away either what she was or what she was doing. Magic would make what she had to do easier, but with the girl, she couldn’t risk it.
An opening parted in the crowd in front of her, and Esta took the opportunity it presented to slip through, little by little making her way closer to the small platform that Caleb Lipscomb was standing on. Every so often she paused, as though considering his words, and then would take the opportunity some shifting in the crowd offered to slip closer yet. She didn’t doubt that the girl was still watching her, but there wasn’t anything she could do about that.
When she was standing right in front of him, she stopped, keeping the notebook in her hands secure. She’d give it a minute or two before she made her move.
“But we must be vigilant,” Lipscomb was bellowing. “We know there are those who would corrupt our purpose. Undesirable elements that bring with them the feudal superstitions of the old countries: the Catholics with their papist loyalty and those who refuse to set aside their feral magic to join the true proletariat. You know what I speak of,” he shouted, his voice rising in a feverish pitch.
“Maggots!” shouted someone deep in the crowd.
Esta saw the curve of Lipscomb’s mouth at the sound of the slur. “Yes. Why do they come here? Why do they seek to take the jobs we’ve worked so hard for? To disrupt the country we are trying to build with their dangerous ways?” Lipscomb shook his head dramatically. “We must guard against those who would pervert the true proletariat with their shadowy powers.”