Tiffany Girl by Deeanne Gist Page A

door, wishing she could simply sit at the man’s feet and listen. Already she’d been able to apply what she’d learned from him to her painting techniques. If she could just shadow him, she’d be able to learn so much more. Especially since it was going to take her forever to save up enough money for tuition to the School of Applied Design, much longer than she’d originally thought.
    She wondered what he and Miss Northrup were discussing. Was he critiquing her work? Miss Northrup had been with Mr. Tiffany since 1888 and was the manager before Mrs. Driscoll. Nan said the woman had hated it and complained it interfered with her designing. So Nan was to have taken her place. Then Mrs. Driscoll, who had worked for Mr. Tiffany before, swooped in and swiped the managerial position. Miss Northrup had become a full-time designer and been given her own personal office. Nan was given nothing—no promotion, no special working space, no title. She was simply a Tiffany Girl, just like the rest of them.
    This morning Mrs. Driscoll had moved Flossie and Nan from the storeroom to the workshop with the rest of the girls. As muchas Flossie loved putting the glass away, it was a rather lonely affair. Out here, she not only enjoyed the camaraderie of the other girls, but she was able to see all the other tasks they performed.
    Pressing down with her stylus, she outlined each individual color on a giant cartoon Grace de Luze—a designer who’d been with Tiffany for three years—had painted with watercolor. Finding a spot of rich blue, Flossie ran the point of her stylus around the edge of that single color. She was careful to exert a good deal of pressure on the stylus, for underneath the cartoon were two sheets of carbon transfer paper atop two sheets of heavy manila paper.
    When she was finished, Mrs. Driscoll would pull back the cartoon. Underneath, on the manila sheets, would be a perfect outline of where each fragment of colored glass would eventually be placed. Before the two sheets of manila were separated, however, one of the other girls would number each individual section Flossie had delineated. Nan told her they would use those numbers over and over when putting the window together.
    Stepping out of Miss Northrup’s office, Mr. Tiffany clapped his hands together. “How are my windows coming along, ladies?”
    Flossie wondered if he changed into his fine clothes every time he wanted to visit the Women’s Department, for she’d never seen him looking anything less than the gentleman.
    “What do we have here?” he asked, stepping up to watch two girls cut templates with three-bladed scissors.
    They were cutting around carbon lines on manila paper that someone else had already traced and numbered. Their special scissors cut an eighth-of-an-inch border around each piece to compensate for the lead that would be soldered there. The glass cutter would eventually use the numbered pieces of paper as her templates.
    “Wait a minute. What’s this?” He frowned. “Mrs. Driscoll, this looks like the western section of our Adoration window.”
    Weaving between the tables, Mrs. Driscoll approached him at a sedate pace. “That’s exactly what it is. They’re cutting out the wreath the woman is holding.”
    He pulled out his pocket watch and popped it open. “But, we’ve twelve windows to make before May. How can we still be cutting out templates for the first one?”
    “The men’s tasks are new and unfamiliar. Our speed will improve with time.”
    “But we don’t have time.”
    “Nor can we afford careless errors because we are hurrying when we should be paying attention to detail.”
    His lisp became pronounced. “Well, then, let’s give the ladies a little incentive, shall we?”
    Mrs. Driscoll folded her hands in front of her. “What did you have in mind?”
    “The two girls who do the best work, who complete their tasks quickly and without errors, and who never miss a day of work will be sent to the fair. By