The knock at her door startled Clara awake instantly. It wasn't Eddie's soft rap. He's the only one who approached her door these days, and usually only when she had a phone call or a delivery or there was a message from her father. A wave of nostalgia hit her as she stumbled out of the blankets. She missed the days when the knock was just as likely to be Jimmy's fast knock accompanied by a 'Hey, Clara, open the damn door' or Richard's precise rhythm and his voice rasping 'It's Richard. Harrow' every time, like there was another Richard who regularly knocked on her bedroom door. She moved warily. She also missed living her life with less dread.

Margaret stood at the door. She took a deep breath as it opened it, revealing Clara dressed in pink silk pajamas with her hair in a messy braid over her shoulder. She looked about fifteen. It made Margaret's sense of purpose waiver.

"Margaret?" Clara asked, worried about what circumstance could have possibly brought Margaret to the door to her room at this early morning hour.

"May I come in?"

Clara stepped out of the way, and Margaret walked into Clara's room for the first time. Suddenly it struck her that this girl grew up here, in a room on the eighth floor of the Ritz-Carlton. Bookshelves were crowded with pictures, keepsakes, and books ranging from children's novels to classic tomes. The door to the balcony was open, letting in both a sea breeze and the sound of the relentless beat of the ocean against the shore. The desk was covered with notebooks, a typewriter, and a stack of files.

"Is there anything wrong? Clara inquired, her voice heavy with sleep and concern.

"No." Margaret took a deep breath. "Clara, I wish we had taken the opportunity to become better friends before I came to ask you this."

Clara tilted her head. She owed Margaret a favor, so it mattered not what she was going to ask her, but now she was very curious."Margaret, you once did a very great kindness and I am indebted to you. What do you need?"

"Oh," Margaret was startled, uncertain what kindness Clara could be speaking of. "Do you know who Marie Stopes is?"

This was an unexpected twist, Clara thought. "I've read Married Love. It was passed around between the women in the War Office like a dirty novel."

Margaret nodded. If Clara read the book she wouldn't be terribly shocked by her proposal. "So you've also heard of Margaret Sanger?"

Suddenly the conversation began to make sense to Clara. "Margaret, do you need a birth control device? I know there are underground clinics, I might know someone..." Because I'm in need of one myself, Clara thought, and have been writing letters all week.

"Yes, dear, I do. This doesn't seem a fortuitous time for your father and me to have a child."

Clara was thrown by the idea of her father having children with Margaret. It seemed wrong, somehow. It was the time in her life for nieces and nephews (Tommy would turn four over the summer), her friends' babies, and thinking about when and how she might have a family of her own. Not for baby siblings. But of course, she thought, Margaret was only five or so years older than she was. There was no reason Margaret and her father wouldn't have children.

"A friend in the temperance movement shares friends with Mrs. Sanger and has booked me an appointment today in New York. I made two appointments, Clara. One for myself and one for my stepdaughter. I lied and said you plan on marrying this summer."

Clara blinked hard.

"I know about your mother, dear, and I also know what it is to be a young woman. The world doesn't look kindly on ambitious girls," Margaret waved her hand at the desk covered in writing materials, "nor young women determined to carve their own path. If you think this would help you make your own choices in life than I hope you'll accompany me."

Out of every possible thing Margaret could have come to tell her, this was the last thing Clara would have guessed. It didn't mean, though, that she couldn't recognize an opportunity when one was dangled before her.

"I just need to bathe and dress," Clara said.

Margaret used the time to look around Clara's room. The shelves had multiple framed pictures in front of the haphazardly stacked books. Nucky had dismissed the idea that Clara considered Jimmy her brother, but the pictures didn't lie. Clara and Jimmy as babies. Clara and Jimmy as schoolchildren. Clara and Jimmy as teenagers. Clara and Jimmy graduating from high school with a beaming Nucky standing between them, an arm around each. Jimmy, in his uniform, and Clara - both trying to look brave. Clara with Jimmy's wife and little boy, and more pictures just of the little boy. A picture of Clara, Jimmy, his wife, and Mr. Harrow. Who could miss the way the Tin Man looked at Clara, or the way her head and eyes tilted toward him like the Darmodys weren't even in the picture?

Whatever fortune had in store for these two, Margaret was certain of one thing. When Nucky finally-and at this point she thought he might be the very last person to put it together in all of Atlantic City- realized the daughter he planned on marrying into a political dynasty was in love with Richard Harrow all of New Jersey would hear his fury. She felt a flash of sympathy for Clara. When Nucky told her about the conspiracy she had considered Clara an unfaithful daughter who chose her friends over her father. But looking at pictures of the girl's life... Clara was well and truly caught between the people she loved best on all sides.

Clara came out of the bathroom dressed in a blue suit and cloche hat at the same time that her father walked into her room.

"Margaret, Eddie said you were here in Clara's room. Why?"

"Margaret very kindly asked me to go into New York with her to go shopping," Clara said smoothly.

"Thank God," Nucky said. "You wore that dress last summer in Chicago and I didn't like it much then. Honestly, Clara, you've looked like a complete ragamuffin all year. Go to Bonwit Teller and don't leave until you've run up a substantial bill and actually look fit to be my daughter."

When Nucky left, Clara turned to Margaret and said with a sigh, "Now we'll have to go shopping after our appointments."

Sitting on the train Margaret's stomach was full of butterflies. Clara sat in the aisle seat reading The Age of Innocence. How ironic, thought Margaret, the way Clara sat turning pages you'd think she really was just going into the city for a shopping trip.

"I've heard these exams can be quite gruesome."

Clara turned to face Margaret with a wide-eyed expression. "Yes, I've heard the same."

"And for young women who perhaps don't have a lot of experience, they can be brutal."

"Thank you, Margaret. I'm aware. It's why I was reading to distract myself."

Margaret looked away. "I'm terribly sorry. It's just...you are a very difficult girl to understand." She wanted to ask Clara a multitude of questions. Why fall in love with Richard Harrow, instead of one of the rich boys her father intended her for? How far had she gone with him? Did he take the mask off? Margaret pushed down the desire to shudder at the thought of that damaged face looming over her during intimate moments.

She wanted to ask the girl who almost but not quite her step-daughter if she'd already experienced it. The quick flash she had of his face before Clara jumped in front of him the day he scared Emily was enough to make her realize she never wanted to see him again without the mask, no matter how badly she felt for him. Clara hadn't even seemed surprised, though, Margaret realized. Had she already seen him without a mask before that morning?

"Am I? I don't think I'm such a mystery." Clara smoothed her skirt. She wasn't sure if she could indulge in girlish confidences with Margaret. Not because she didn't want to, but because she wasn't certain how much she could trust Margaret.

"I'm not sure what kindness I showed you."

"I'm not sure I've ever shown you a kindness, yet here you are, doing me one today," Clara said softly. "You made the children love Richard. That was a true kindness, Margaret. If the children had remained terrified of him? I don't think he would have survived it."

"You love him terribly," Margaret said simply.

"Is it that obvious?"

"You announced it at dinner, dear."

Clara smiled sadly. "My father didn't hear me."

No, Nucky didn't seem to hear anything that daughter whom he claimed to love so much said to him, Margaret thought. Fathers not understanding their young adult daughters was, of course, a tale as old as time, yet Enoch seriously seemed to have no idea who is daughter was. He had described Clara to her as a society girl excited to marry Darcy Blaine; yet the girl who moved into Margaret's townhouse last year seemed only excited about writing articles and talking to her bodyguard. Margaret thought that Enoch needed to learn who Clara actually was before he lost all chance of actually knowing his child.

Suddenly she thought back to the picture of Nucky standing proudly with Jimmy and Clara in graduation regalia. Did Nucky understand Jimmy as little as he understood Clara? Is that what led to the conspiracy against him? He was so good with Emily and Teddy and seemed to love their family life, yet before Emily and Teddy there was Clara and Jimmy. Enoch had described how he cared for Jimmy and nursed him through childhood illnesses. A twinge of worry for her children's future nudged at her. Did Enoch only love them because they were little and easy? Once they grew and developed their own ideas about who they were and what they wanted out of life, would he end up at war with Teddy and endlessly perplexed by Emily, like he was Jimmy and Clara?

Clara was standing outside the Lower East Side terrace house containing the secret clinic when Margaret emerged with her dutch cap lodged carefully in her handbag. Clara was pale, Margaret noticed, and as she neared she saw Clara had dug her nails into the palms of her hands, leaving half-moon shaped scratches. She should have insisted on being with Clara during the exam, she thought suddenly. Clara always seemed so self-possessed, but Margaret realized she had no idea if the girl was experienced at all, and what unexpected horrors the exam might have presented to an inexperienced girl.

"Are you all right?" Margaret asked. "I'm not sure how much of a girl you still are, but I found that exam difficult to endure and I've birthed two children."

"I'm grown-up enough to be grateful. I'd been writing letters, trying to find the clinic for a week, so don't fear you've corrupted me. You've just made my life a little easier," Clara took a deep breath. "And now, you must let me buy you lunch. We could go to the Colony before we descend on Bonwit Teller?"

Margaret smiled at Clara, and then reached in her coat pocket to reveal a flask. "I thought we could both use this?"

It was Clara's turn to smile. "Well, if we go to the Colony they'll bring us empty teacups and we can drink our whiskey like ladies."