Pride's Folly

by Fiona Harrowe

  At McAllister’s a red lamp like a wicked ogre’s eye glowed in the window. I had a moment of trepidation before I screwed up my courage and descended that cabriolet. My knock, a firm rat-a-tat, echoed my heartbeat, and when a neatly uniformed Negro maid in frilled cap and aproned gray gown opened the door, I had the terrible urge to flee. Conquering it, I entered a vestibule where I was relieved of my hat, stick, and gloves. Then the maid escorted me into the parlor.

  Sumptuously furnished with thick red carpets on the floor, gilt-backed velvet sofas, and hand-painted china lamps, the room gave an air of genteel affluence. An older woman dressed in somber brown taffeta that crackled as she moved came in through the portieres at one end of the room and greeted me as though I had been expected.

  “Welcome,” she said. “May I ask—you are . . .?”

  I understood that it was wise not to give one’s real name, so I said, “Mr. Matthews. Abraham Matthews.”

  “So pleased you could drop by.” Her eyes did a quick up-and-down assessment, taking in my frock coat and pearl stickpin. I supposed I passed muster, for she said, “Would you care for some champagne?”

  “Thank you, yes.”

  She snapped her fingers and the maid reappeared. “Champagne for the gentleman.”

  Then she turned to me. “Now, Mr. Matthews, what sort of girl would you like this evening?”

  “Someone young, madam.”

  “All our ladies are young,” she said stiffly.

  I turned a bright crimson.

  “What else would you require, sir.”

  “I—I like brunettes . . . with blue eyes.”

  “Ah, yes. I think I have just the one. Lisbeth. Will it be for the night, sir? Or an hour or two?”

  For the night! I didn’t see how ... “An hour or two,” I said.

  Lisbeth had dark hair and blue eyes, but even to my callow gaze she did not look all that young. Or attractive. Her jaw was too square, her mouth too wide. However, she smiled warmly and told me how delighted she was that I had come to Mrs. McAllister’s and asked for her.

  She sat down beside me on the plush sofa, eyeing the glass of champagne I held in my hand. The look puzzled me, until I realized with a start that it was customary in such establishments to offer the women a drink. The house, I had been told, made money on liquor too.

  “Perhaps you’d join me in a glass of champagne?”

  “Indeed, I would love it.”

  She wore a pink gown trimmed with white lace, the neck cut too low for fashion, but otherwise one that any woman would wear for an evening at home. We chatted about the weather. I felt more and more relaxed and less and less tempted by the need to bed a woman. When we had finished a bottle, she said, “Would you care to go upstairs, sir?”

  I was too embarrassed to say no. She led the way. I followed her up a carpeted staircase, down a gaslit corridor, and past closed doors, each in my imagination hiding a sinful debauchery. But even these passing fantasies failed to arouse me.

  Lisbeth showed me into a small room that was rather plainly furnished compared to the parlor below. Its wide brass-framed bed shared space with a marble-topped washstand, a screen, a bureau, a pier glass, and a slipper chair.

  She said, “I could order more champagne. Or brandy, if you prefer, sir.”

  “Brandy would be fine.”

  Despite all I had drunk that evening I had suddenly become terrifyingly sober. Downstairs, in the company of others, I had managed to act the part of sophisticated sporting-house client. But now, alone with this woman, in the intimacy of a bedroom, I suddenly felt all wrists and trembling knees, a novice, frightened of what would soon be expected of me yet trying desperately not to show it.

  She stepped outside the room and called, sotto voce, “Louise!” There was the sound of hurrying footsteps, the murmur of voices. A minute later she came back in with a bottle of brandy.

  “There’re glasses on the bureau,” she said. “Help yourself while I change into something more comfortable.”

  She went behind the screen. I poured the brandy, clinking the bottle loudly against the glass, to hide the sound of rustling silk.

  She emerged, wearing a negligee of blue satin. When she took the offered brandy from my hand, her negligee gaped open to reveal a pink-nippled, white breast.

  “You are a very handsome young man,” she said, smiling at me. “I like blond gentlemen. And such blue eyes!”

  “Thank you,” I said modestly. “But I’m told my nose is much too short.”

  “ ’Tisn’t at all.” She made a moué, then rising on her toes kissed the tip of it.

  I blushed. Damn me! I thought, but I couldn’t help it. She took the brandy glass from my hand, set it down with hers on the bureau, then came back and silently circled my neck with her arms.

  I felt like a dummy, foolish and awkward.

  “Don’t be shy, sir,” she said and, pressing against me, brought my head down and kissed me. The negligee had fallen open, and I could feel the warmth of her flesh through the cloth of my coat. She reached for my hand and led it under the satin robe, placing it over a breast. The button-tipped nipple pressing against my palm sent a shock wave to my loins. My fingers curled convulsively around the silky, swollen globe.

  “Shall I help you undress, sir?”

  I swallowed. “Yes.”

  She went about it swiftly, with a graceful skill that could only have been acquired through experience. I wondered how many men she had undressed, how many kissed, how many hands she had guided toward her breasts. But before such contemplation could cool my desire, she stepped back and let her negligee carelessly slip and fall to the floor. Reaching out, she turned the lamp down to a rosy glow. She had, to my naïve eyes, a lovely body, shapely limbs, round hips, and firm, small breasts.

  “What a fine figure of a man,” she said admiringly, her eyes running over me, pausing on that portion of my anatomy that had swollen to turgid proportions. The shadows gratefully hid my second blush.

  She led me to the bed and drew back the counterpane. Turning, she kissed me again, her hand falling down to my erection, stroking it carelessly. I drew in my breath as her fingers paused, then began again, passing over the moist tip, the soft, insistent pressure igniting a flame that sent the hot blood racing to my head.

  I grabbed her, kissing her frantically, pushing her backward upon the bed, climbing on top, my aching, pulsing manhood bumping at her thighs. Again she acted the guide, sliding me into a soft, moist warmness that brought a muffled cry to my lips. Like one possessed I drove at her, the bed creaking and shaking, my penis sliding in and out, sensations I had never dreamed existed rippling through me, until a tidal wave brought me to a shuddering climax.

  I had done it. I was no longer a virgin. I had been admitted to the clubhood of grown men.

  But when I came down, some fifteen minutes later, the madam was waiting, bill in hand, and the exchange of coin took the glow from my triumph.

  I rode home, I felt less and less the conquering male. Insidious guilt, like the white fog now sifting along the deserted night streets, began to creep into my heart. Once, long ago, I had made a boyish vow that on our wedding night, I would come to Sabrina pure, a chaste bridegroom. I could not do that now. By going to bed with a prostitute, I had betrayed my love.

  But it was more than the boyhood vow that disturbed me. The darkness, the faint lights glimmering behind closed shutters, the clip-clop of the horse’s hooves, the wraith-like, seasmelling fog, all gave me a sensation of unreality. I had an eerie premonition, almost like a peep into the future, where I saw that tonight’s escapade had been only one in a series of betrayals. And the thought cast a pall I could not shake.

  Chapter 15

  My mother had not forgotten about college. Both she and Ian had made up their minds that it was high time I completed my interrupted education. The question was where? Ian was all for sending me to Oxford, his own school. But Mother felt it was too far away. Harvard? Yale? Columbia? In the end
they decided on William and Mary, in Williamsburg, Virginia, some fifty miles from Wildoak.

  I was torn. On the one hand, I dreaded leaving Sabrina, for with four thousand miles dividing us, it might be a year before I could see her again. On the other hand, I was excited by the notion that I would now be close to Wildoak. Could I put Wildoak above Sabrina, Sabrina above Wildoak? This debate, however, was merely a mind teaser. I never really had a choice. It had been made for me.

  The Sunday before I left, Sabrina and I were allowed to spend the day alone together. She had the cook pack a picnic lunch, and we set out at mid-morning, taking the horse-drawn balloon car to Woodward Gardens, one of San Francisco’s most popular Sunday resorts.

  Sabrina and I had been to the gardens many times before with our families, strolling the grounds, visiting the zoo, picnicking on the banks of its artificial lake. But today, because there were only the two of us—no parents herding us along, no younger children squabbling underfoot—we felt as though we had come there for the first time.

  Entering the main gate, we passed two wooden bears holding flagpoles aloft. Pushing through the crowds, we avoided the museum, which housed the collected memorabilia of old Woodward (a must on our other visits). Hand in hand we climbed the grand stairway to terraces decked with brilliant yellow and scarlet blooms and from there to the zoo, meandering through, feeding peanuts to the bears and laughing at their antics.

  We ate our lunch on a picnic table near the bandstand, where a dozen earnest musicians sweating in heavy blue, gold-braided uniforms blew and trumpeted their way through a series of marches. Over their heads, banners rustled and snapped and pendent baskets of red roses swayed in the breeze. Afterward we watched the seals being fed, oohing and ahhing and applauding as they went through hoop after hoop, arching their shiny black bodies before splashing into the water below.

  In the late afternoon I suggested a row on the lake. I had been saving this until the last, planning all week how I would say good-bye to Sabrina. I had even copied an appropriate poem from one of our library books, something about love being eternal, which I now had in my pocket. Sabrina looked the part of everyman’s lady love, in her apple-green gown and straw-brimmed bonnet. Her face appeared delicate and fragile in the shadow of the green parasol she held in one gloved hand.

  It was a warm, cloudless day, with only a small whisper of wind. To my surprise, rowing took more exertion than I had been prepared for.

  “Why don’t you take off your coat. Page?” Sabrina asked. “You look awfully hot.’’

  “A gentleman does not remove (grunt) his coat (grunt-grunt) in the presence of a lady.’’

  “Piffle!’’ She twirled her parasol. “Your face is as red as a beet.’’

  “I can’t help that.’’ She was teasing, of course, just as she had many times before. But I didn’t want her to tease today. I wanted her to be pretty, sweet, adorable, an angel.

  “Let me row,’’ she said after a long while.

  “No.”

  “Are you angry, Page?” She leaned forward to see my face, now perspiring under my hat.

  I turned away. “Why should I be?”

  I pulled the boat into a small inlet and ran it up on the bank. “Let’s stop here.”

  “There’s some chicken left in the hamper,” she said as I gave her my arm. “We could finish it off.”

  Together we spread the tablecloth. Reaching down into the hamper, Sabrina brought out the chicken, a roll, and two oranges.

  “Chicken is so messy,” Sabrina said. “I should have had Cook pack us roast beef and cheese sandwiches.”

  “I like chicken,” I said perversely.

  “That’s nice to know,” she said, munching on a wing.

  “But then if we had brought sandwiches we could have saved some for the seals,” I added sourly. “I hear they are particularly fond of roast beef and cheese.”

  “Oh, Page! You silly!”

  After we’d finished, she stretched out on her stomach, resting her chin on her hands. “It’s so lovely here, and peaceful.”

  “But hardly private,” I said, looking out on the lake, which was dotted with at least a dozen other boats.

  She gave me a sharp look. “You’re in a funny mood, Page.”

  “It’s our last day today.”

  “All the more reason to be pleasant.”

  We were on the verge of quarreling, but I couldn’t help it. It was as if some inner devil was prompting me. “I wasn’t aware that I was being unpleasant.”

  “Oh, never mind.” She sat up, smoothing her skirts, reaching for her parasol. “Let’s have a short siesta until it gets cooler. Do you mind?”

  “Not at all,” I said, throwing myself down on my back, shifting my hat over my eyes. “This is exactly how I wanted to spend the day. Napping.”

  But I dozed off, despite my annoyance.

  A bird warbling on a branch overhead wakened me. The sun had moved in the sky and was slanting down over the lake at a westward angle. Sabrina was sleeping. She lay on her back, her face turned away, her bent arm cradling her head. The rustling leaves of the elm threw dappled light on her lovely face. A smile curved her lips. Of what was she dreaming? I wondered. I bent over her, studying her features— the molded nose, the lashes resting on her slightly flushed cheek—as if to imprint that face forever on my memory. I loved her. I loved her so much that the thought of parting was now like a pain under my heart. I couldn’t leave her.

  Her eyes opened with a startled look.

  “Page!” She smiled. “Why are you staring at me?”

  I moved back, resting on my heels, without answering.

  She sat up. “You know what you remind me of? The big bad wolf who wants to eat poor little Red Riding Hood.”

  “Do I?” It was on the tip of my tongue to say, I love you. But suddenly I found I couldn’t. She wasn’t ready, or the moment had passed. I just couldn’t. I had lost my nerve, and the poem remained in my pocket.

  I came to William and Mary as the maples were turning to flame and the birches along the riverbank were losing their yellow leaves. The brisk, clear air resounded with trilling and chirping and the flap of bird wings rising to autumn passage. A luminous sun looking down from a nascent blue sky bathed the elm-shaded brick of the old college in a mellow light.

  It was a beautiful sight, October in Williamsburg, but one I would not come to appreciate until years later. Nor did I appreciate William and Mary’s great historic past. Built in the 1700s, the Christopher Wren-designed main building with its symmetrical dormer and cupola, often pointed out to newcomers and visitors alike, failed to impress me. I believe I did raise an eyebrow when I was told that the college had graduated three United States presidents. But on the whole, William and Mary was simply a stopping place on the way to Wildoak, though sometimes, in my darker moments, it seemed more like a convenient stratagem to keep me under house arrest.

  Needless to say, I scarcely opened a book my first month there, and though my body attended classes my mind was miles away. Before long, as anyone less wrapped up in his own thoughts could have predicted, I was invited into the dean’s office. Words were not minced. Either I buckled down or I would be sent home in disgrace. I might have been able to face Mother’s wrath and Ian’s cold lecture, but not Sabrina’s disappointment. She expected great scholarly things of me.

  So I buckled down. It wasn’t easy. I had no trouble with the sciences but nearly foundered on Latin and literature. Only the letters from Sabrina in which she described her own literary pursuits kept me stubbornly at Ovid and Homer, reading and rereading MacCaulay for some clue, a key to what he was all about. Then one day I chanced upon Dickens’s Oliver Twist— frowned upon by some professors as trash— and I was hooked. That book, like Thackery’s Vanity Fair, opened a whole new world for me, made me realize how insular and narrow my own views had been. Though I did not become a pedant, a bookworm, or a sage, these novels did mark the start of my education.

  In th
e meanwhile, however, Sabrina, Wildoak, and horses remained the true passions of my life. I got away to Wildoak as often as I could. The Gans were still there, getting old, and always glad to see me. They and the farm manager would give me detailed accounts of how the crops—hay, tobacco, wheat, corn—were doing, as if I were already master. It flattered me, but not enough to fuel a burning interest in agriculture. As soon as I could I would slip away from the big house and go down to the stables. These days it sheltered a brace of plow horses, a mare for the buggy, and the manager’s gelding, a brown hunter. It was nothing like Shell Park. Nevertheless, I used to curry the hunter and dream of what that stable would one day be, how I would fit it out, what stallions and brood mares I would buy to fill the stalls.

  In 1881, William and Mary was closed due to lack of funds and falling attendance. The closure was considered temporary, but how temporary no one seemed able to guess. It might be a term or one, two, even three years. I saw no point in hanging about and persuaded Mother to let me return to San Francisco.

  Before leaving the East I spent a few days at Wildoak and then traveled up to Washington, where I planned to catch a train to Chicago on the first leg of my journey. While I sat in the station, the hollow echoing hum characteristic of such high vaulted buildings was suddenly shattered by the explosive sound of shots. A fractional stunned silence collapsed into a roaring commotion: shouts, screams, the blowing of whistles, the stampede of hurrying feet. It was impossible to get a coherent explanation of what had happened. Not until I boarded my delayed train did I learn that President Garfield had been badly wounded by a disgruntled office seeker. Garfield, committed to civil service reform, had been sworn in the previous January. As it turned out, he never lived to resume his duties.

  Conversation all across the country revolved around Garfield, the universal corruption of public officials, the so-called Star Route frauds, and the evils of patronage. These discussions, wreathed in cigar smoke and punctuated by long draughts of whiskey, shattered my youthful idealism. I had somehow held the notion that most men served their country honestly, without thought of personal gain. To hear that our government was run by a pack of thieves gave me a sickening jolt. I was glad when we finally came through the Sierra pass and roared down into California, where I could (at least temporarily) shift my thoughts to less disheartening matters.