Rose runs up the front steps of her Nob Hill townhome, drops her valise in the foyer, and dashes from parlor to dining room and up the carved wood stairway looking for her father.
“Papa! Papa, I’m home.”
She makes one stop to her bedroom and plops like a teenager on her bed. Coming home after two years at a finishing school is like a parole from prison, yet she is grateful and happier for the experience.
“Rose? Rose, where are you?” Percy calls to her from his study and climbs the stairs, anticipating a joyful welcome home for his daughter.
Rose runs to him, and they hug lovingly.
“You look wonderful, Rose. All grown up.”
“And you, Papa. As distinguished as ever.”
Percy sees his daughter, not as a mirror image of her beautiful and stylish mother, but as a young woman with her own dy
