The Accursed

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Unspeakable! The individuals gathered about the table in the president’s outer office stared at Wilson, and at one another, in bewilderment; yet almost at once, bewilderment melted into a kind of shared horror, and profound embarrassment.

  “Mr. Eddington, whom some of you know is the master of West College, has come to me with a very upsetting report; as, just yesterday, his assistant Mr. Tremain came to him, with a very upsetting report.”

  At this, Wilson passed his fingertips over his eyes, as if for a fleeting moment he felt faint.

  Eddington and Tremain sat rigid as statuary, as the others gloomily regarded them; of these, most were sitting with their arms folded tightly across their chests, like a kind of armor.

  (It should be noted here that, unknown to Woodrow Wilson, rumors had been racing like wildfire through the university community, that he’d had a “nervous collapse” of some kind recently; this collapse believed to be related to the mysterious/scandalous incident involving the granddaughter of Winslow Slade who’d been allegedly “abducted” from her wedding ceremony in the Presbyterian church, in which Wilson’s daughter Jessie had been a bridesmaid. Since very few individuals associated with the university had been invited to the wedding, much was speculated, but little was known.)

  “Mr. Eddington, would you like to speak?”

  But Mr. Eddington, looking miserable, could only mutely shake his head. Wilson regarded him sympathetically, with an expression of some relief.

  “Mr. Tremain, then?”

  But Thomas Tremain, a bony-faced boy of twenty-nine, in an ill-fitting suit of the kind worn by undertakers’ assistants, could only shudder, and swallow audibly, and shake his head no.

  “It seems, there were—there are—boys—that is to say, undergraduate men—involved—as well as, I am very sorry to say—several preceptors.” Wilson paused, to allow the weight of such a revelation to be absorbed: preceptors!

  “But the facts, as reported to me, or rather as presented to me, not in words precisely because, as I have said, the situation is unspeakable, are clear enough: grounds for immediate expulsion, and all records expunged, regarding the undergraduates; and immediate termination of contracts, regarding the preceptors. So that, so far as the world will know, not one of these unspeakable persons ever stepped foot on our campus, still less was expelled from it.”

  This statement was uttered with steely control. Yet you could see, if you were seated close by President Wilson, that the man’s grainy eyelids trembled, and the chalky dryness in the corners of his mouth gleamed like arsenic.

  “Gentlemen, we will have to—proceed. Are we in agreement? We will want to end this meeting as quickly as possible, I think.”

  “Sir? May I—”

  “Yes? Yes? What is it, Dean Fullerton?”

  The dean of the faculty was sitting with his arms tight-slung across his chest, and seemed to be having difficulty breathing. For one who looked ill, he spoke bravely, almost recklessly—“Granted the situation is unspeakable, and we would not wish to speak of it, yet, still, under civil law, the accused would be allowed to defend themselves, you know—before they are punished. Mr. Eddington, how many boys are involved?”

  Miserable Mr. Eddington squirmed in his chair. Wordless, he lifted his hands—two hands—wriggling his fingers as if to count: exactly ten?

  No, twelve. Thirteen.

  Thirteen!

  “That is—well, that is . . . shocking. That is . . . not what we would wish.” The dean of the faculty, who had spoken so bravely a moment before, now seemed to have lost his way; his eyes were blinking rapidly, downcast.

  “None of this is ‘what we would wish,’ ” President Wilson said cuttingly. “We are agreed, what is unspeakable cannot be articulated, yet, it must be acted upon—swiftly. ‘Justice delayed is justice denied.’ ”

  “The boys—that is, the young men—will be expelled? So quickly?”

  “In fact, they are expelled. They have been asked to vacate their rooms this very morning.”

  “So quickly?”

  “Sir, you need not repeat yourself: we have heard you, the first time. ‘Justice delayed is justice denied’ and so the boys involved in the unspeakable have been asked to leave, and may in fact have left already; or are awaiting their parents’ arrival, to help them vacate their rooms and depart. As for the preceptors, who have crassly violated the university’s trust in them, as young gentlemen of intellectual and moral distinction, they are—gone.”

  “Gone?”

  “Is this an echo chamber? Is this mockery? When I say that these sub-human creatures are gone, I mean precisely that they are gone. And where they have gone is not Princeton’s concern.”

  “Sir, on this matter of—‘defense’—”

  “What is unspeakable is also indefensible. I think we are in agreement?”

  “But, President Wilson, sir, it might be that the charges are—inaccurate? Or exaggerated? Fabricated? Until we organize an investigation, and allow the accused to speak in their own defense, we can’t be certain that—that—‘justice’ will be done.”

  These bold words fell into an abyss of silence. Such was the stillness in the president’s office, over which portraits of several of President Wilson’s distinguished predecessors—(Reverend Jonathan Edwards, John Witherspoon, James McCosh)—brooded, each man became acutely aware of his own breathing, heartbeat, and digestive processes; Thomas Tremain, in a state of sheer nerves, swallowed hard with a gulping sound, and a spasm of his Adam’s apple. You could see that the stricken young man, himself guiltless of the unspeakable, had yet been tarnished by his proximity to it; and his contract with the university, very likely, would be allowed to dissolve, somewhere beyond the current term.

  With a barely restrained air of sarcasm President Wilson continued: “And how do you propose to allow these unspeakable individuals to—speak? It is just not possible, in decent company, and in civilized quarters.”

  “But—granted it is unspeakable, yet, still, there must be a way . . . It seems unfair simply to . . . expunge these persons, who were a part of our university family until just yesterday.”

  “Yes. That is the horror of it—‘part of our university family until just yesterday.’ ”

  A shudder seemed to pass around the spare Colonial table, touching each man in turn. And Thomas Tremain most conspicuously, who had to jam his knuckles against his mouth, to keep from coughing louder.

  Yet still, the faltering objection was voiced: “If you have already ‘expelled’ and ‘expunged’ these individuals, President Wilson, why are we meeting? It would seem to be ex post facto.”

  “We are meeting, sir, because I have called a meeting of the chief university administrators. Because I am asking you to ratify an ex post facto action of the executive, as it were.”

  “Yes, but, sir—”

  “May I revive your memories—for perhaps some of you have forgotten—my much-reprinted speech Princeton in the Nation’s Service concluded with the words ‘As we at Princeton are in the nation’s service we are obliged to be not merely good, but great.’ ”

  President Wilson glanced about the table, eyeglasses glittering.

  Like abashed children the men seated at the table made no more objection.

  “Then, I think this meeting—which never occurred, and will never be spoken of—is adjourned.”

  With visible relief the men departed. Wordless.

  THE CRUEL HUSBAND

  (From the secret journal of Mrs. Adelaide McLean Burr; June–October 1905)

  _____ . Cruel! Very cruel. My hand trembles so that I can scarcely hold this pen.

  Though six hours have passed since the ignominy; the bafflement; the inexplicable hurt.

  For it seems to have come about, as in a malevolent tale of the Brothers Grimm, that my beloved Horace has turned—he is not himself—on the very eve of our fifteenth wedding anniversary; while my love for him remains as unsullied as when I was a bride.

  _____ . I shall
not weep another tear, for I have none. He loves me no longer—& I must die.

  _____ . “One day, Adelaide, you will see, they turn,” my own dear mother whispered in my ear, when I was a girl. “Husbands turn because it is their nature: they cannot help themselves, & we cannot help them. & then there is little solace but the grave.”

  _____ . Handsome stout-bodied curly-mustach’d husband Horace who has always adored & prized & pampered his dear little Puss; & laughed at her little breathless ways; & made light of her terrors; after 15 years of Christian matrimony of uncomplaining devotion, why, he has revealed another side to himself—a lewd & unlook’d-to aspect of the masculine soul.

  _____ . “Horace,” I inquired of him, in a voice so faint it could hardly be heard over the sound of the man’s hoarse breathing, “why are you but partly clad? Why have you burst into my room in the night, & so afflicted me with the sight of you, my poor heart is near to bursting? And—can it be, you smell of spirits? Horace, please—come no closer! Or I shall ring for a servant!”

  _____ . Or was it but a nightmare; the work of Dream-Hawks that swoop & stab & claw . . . This morning finds me disheveled & fainting, too weak to tolerate my new medicine, coaxed upon me by Hannah, who is very worried on my account; & midmorning Mrs. Joris our housekeeper ventured to see me, greatly troubled—for all the staff whispers of Mrs. Burr’s crisis of health.

  _____ . (It has been thus, this crude behavior, laced with spirits, following Horace’s business visits to Manhattan, when he stays overnight at the Madison Club; for it is whispered by Mrs. Cleveland, women of a loose reputation are readily available there, to the most distinguished & dignified of gentlemen. & if the man does not succumb, yet, in his inflamed imagination, he has been tempted; & cannot control himself when he returns to his own household. & in my naiveté I said to Frances—“Ah, but not Horace! Not ever my dear Horace.”)

  _____ . (It is not a secret, the coarse-mannered ruffian Grover Cleveland had “relations” with women before his marriage to Frances; & God knows, very likely afterward. For there is a beast in men, if once released cannot then be confined. & all the world knows, Mr. Cleveland sired a bastard child upon one of these wretched females, yet, our civilization being depraved as it has become, this fact was not held against the man, & did not prevent his being elected President of the United States—not once, but twice!)

  _____ . So lonely & nervous & why does my heart pound so. I am a high-strung young lady, Dr. Boudinot declared, when I became mistress of Maidstone, “to be compared with a musical instrument of such subtlety & artistry as the Stradivarius violin”—for which little Puss was praised & admired, for as a girl of seventeen I had but an eighteen-inch waist without corsetry; & a complexion of such translucence, it was marveled that I resembled a porcelain doll. In those happier years it seemed Horace—& many others—prized me for all that I was high-strung & “sensitive” & prone to fainting spells & required petting & comforting & the gentlest of caresses.

  _____ . (What is happening in this house? In which I am “mistress”—yet captive? Horace is so often away, at his office on Bank Street, or in NYC; here, I am aware of the servants whispering & plotting behind our backs; there is evidence that they are stealing from us, that Horace discounts. Hannah is stiff in my presence & when reprimanded for a blunder, grows resentful; & Minnie has become close-mouthed; the boy Abraham, having grown inches within mere months, from gorging himself in the kitchen, I am sure, is stiff-faced in my presence & rudely mumbles Mz Ad’laide as if the taste of my name in his mouth was most bitter. Just now ringing & ringing the bell, & no one comes to my aid & if I had fallen into a faint, or worse . . . & so I think Why, they could rise up against me, in this very house! Like slave massacres of old, and terrible things perpetrated upon helpless white women, of which no one will then speak for such are UNSPEAKABLE.)

  _____ . Thus the accursed summer passes. Days & nights in hellish succession & poor Puss lies prostrate beneath the attacks of the Dream-Hawks—great carrion birds with wing-spans of ten feet & eyes of blazing coals & cruel talons to rake against my soft cheek & tangle in my hair. & the wisdom of Madame Blavatsky lies fallow in me now, I am not strong-minded enough to comprehend her; the most insipid Sunday school catechism is quite enough, for poor Puss’s strained mental state.

  & nothing is further known of the unhappy Annabel Slade, now Mrs. Annabel Bayard; though it is believed that her brother Josiah has vowed to revenge himself upon her abductor, & reclaim her. Poor dear Annabel!—a mere child, not so canny as Puss; for Puss alone feels deep sorrow for her, & not a frisson of satisfaction, that the high & mighty Slades are in this vulnerable way laid low. For Annabel is lost to all society now, & all decent company; as she is lost to her beloved family. & my unhappy nephew Dabney Bayard has fallen into drunkenness & it is believed lewdness, of which his female relatives are not supposed to know. & Horace says, It is not our concern, Adelaide: do not think of it. & yet, which woman in Princeton, horrified by the public abduction of Annabel Slade, does not think of it.

  _____ . To my horror & disgust I am ever more often visited by Horace, staggering in the dark, & smelling of bourbon; this partly-clad, disheveled stranger who mumbles, begs, threatens me, that I must “embrace” him—“as a wife should.” & in my bed he grovels, & grunts, & squeals, & groans; & collapses, like a sack of flour, weighing so heavily upon me, I am in danger of suffocation. & the shame is such, I must change my own bed linens in the morning, for fear that the servants will know, & pity me; or worse yet, laugh at me—mistress of Maidstone, no more respected than a harlot! & yet stranger visions come to me, in my troubled sleep, the frolicking ghost-shape of Ruth Cleveland who is far more familiar to me now in death than ever she had been in life; & little Oriana Slade, who was flower girl at Annabel’s wedding, now Ruth Cleveland’s nocturnal companion, it seems. & most upsetting, the transmogrified shape of cousin Wilhelmina who smiles at me & lisps Dear Cousin Addie! as she has never done in life; & contorts her young body in a most sinuous way as, by daylight, that high-minded & chaste young woman would never do, I am certain. & most hideous, the naked form of the house-boy Abraham, who is no more than thirteen years old, I am sure, yet, in such visions, a muscled & “developed” youth, & his skin as dark as the ebony inlaid in my bedroom bureau, & his white-rimmed lascivious eyes . . .

  _____ . (Yet I have learned of bold women of our time who have themselves turned from the merely female, & acquiescent: the poet & suffragette Charlotte Perkins Gilman & the Jewish anarchist Emma Goldman of whom it is said she conspired to assassinate President McKinley! Would that poor Puss had such boldness, & such opportunity; would that poor Puss were not a pathetic invalid which is the most extreme state of that more general malady femaleness.)

  _____ . I shall not forgive any of them. My heart, that is frail, yet pounds hardily, & with pride. I am sickened by Horace in his transmogrified state, when he is cruel & swinish & “not himself”—afterward kneeling in the corridor outside my door & begging me through the keyhole, O my darling forgive me—for he knew not what he did, what pleas he has made to me, having over-indulged at sherry & bitters & smoked oysters at his accursed gentlemen’s club in the city.

  _____ . Thank God for my female friends!—as Mother had warned, in the end you will have only women to rely upon, & to love you. For here is Johanna van Dyck bringing me the sweetest honeycomb, from her groundskeeper’s bee hives; & she & Mandy concerned that I am looking “very pale, & sickly”; & reading to me from Mr. Ade’s amusing The College Widow, & Mrs. Corelli’s The Wicked Suitor; & frothy glamour pieces out of The Smart Set. (When these & other ladies come to visit, sly Puss hides her Theosophical & anarchist texts, & Charlotte Gilman’s In This Our World & The Yellow Wallpaper & Other Stories; it is enough, that I betray to them that I am reading Mrs. Wharton’s The House of Mirth which is faulted, in the very best families of New York & Newport, as a crude & unfair satire of their society, with a heroine who behaves in a most unladylike fashion.) & there is t
he solace of Gossip, that rages unabated through the summer & into autumn, that the Slade family is accursed, in the way of the Hebrew God testing Job; & that the feud between prune-face Woodrow Wilson & Dean Sixty-Two-Around-the-Vest Andrew West grows more heated each week. Tongues wag freely in town, some merrily & some in distress; for it is said, not one, not two, not three, but all four of the Wilson females are suffering Woodrow’s chagrin; & poor Jessie, hardly eighteen years old, has badly suffered the loss of her friend Annabel Slade, to whom she looked as an ideal friend, & a model of behavior. Elsewhere, in Wilmington, the elderly Mrs. Pyne clings fast to her millions of dollars as she clings to her crabbed life, & plays Wilson & West against each other: whether she will leave her husband’s fortune to Princeton University under the direction of Wilson or of West: quite the trick, my girl, to make these pompous “academicians” dance to your tune! A fresh development, however: yet a second elderly millionaire is drawn into the squabble, one Isaac Wyman of Boston, Mass., Princeton Class of ’86, who is said to be leaning “just slightly Westward” with his bequeath of four million dollars. Horace shakes his head over these developments, for he is sympathetic with President Wilson, who is so very earnest a man; yet, Horace is sympathetic with Andrew West too, for Andrew preceded Wilson by many years at the university, and is seen to have been slighted by the board of trustees, in not having been offered the presidency. Wilson’s latest humiliation is that the site he has proposed for the new graduate school, in defiance of the dean’s proposal, has turned out to be unfit for reasons of sanitation; evidently, the acreage had been at one time a sewer field. (& yet it did shock me, that there was anything like a sewer field in Princeton Borough! I am sure, I have never heard of it until now.)

  _____ . Next day, perusing The House of Mirth, I find that the novel is ugly & grating, as it had been suggested; disagreeable for its cruelty toward that very set to which Edith Newbold Jones was born, if I am not mistaken. Hurriedly skimming the pages, I find that it is even worse, that the arriviste Jew Mr. Rosedale should prove in the end gentlemanly—as if in rebuke to the Christians. I shall toss the novel into the trash where it belongs for Mrs. Wharton is indeed a traitor to her class, like her dear friend the buffoon “Teddy” as well.