“I can’t wear that. It’s for a little girl.”
“It’ll make you look more like a child. I need a young one right now. My last young one left me to be the mistress of one of our regular gentlemen.”
“That’s what they want? Little girls?”
“Some of them do, I’m afraid. I thought you’d understand from what you told me about your father and those two men.”
“I never thought there were others who—”
“You’ve got plenty more to learn,” Mary Johnson interrupted. “I’m afraid your eyes are about to be opened to things about men and women you could never imagine. I won’t keep you in the girl’s dresses forever.” Mary Johnson stepped toward the door, her head nearly reaching the top of the frame. “I’ve no doubt you’ll be stunning in something elegant, but once I grow you into a lady, I can’t take you back to being a girl again. You and Hannah come to the rear parlor at nine o’clock. We’ll open the doors and let the men in around nine-thirty. All you have to do is talk to them or bring them a drink if they are empty-handed until one of them picks you out and brings you up here to your room.” She started away but then hesitated. “And get the girls to explain the champagne and throne game to you and ask Abbie to show you and Hannah the douche before you go downstairs. Lettie makes up the acid solution for you girls. If it hurts you, tell her to change it, and don’t waste your hard earned money on Madame Restelle’s Female Monthly Pills. They don’t do a damn thing for you. Do you have your menses yet?”
Clara shook her head.
“Good. Do the douche anyway. There’s no telling when you’ll start.”
When she had gone, Clara glanced down at the spread out dress. The yellow silk was pretty. A couple of years ago she would have been in love with this dress, would have put it on and twirled round and round. Now she despised it. She would sooner use it to mop the floor than wear it.
At dinner that night, Clara and Hannah met all the girls and began to learn about the house. One girl, named Adeline, was absent. She was at Madame Restelle’s down on Chambers Street getting an abortion. They expected Adeline back in a few days. Hers was the room across the hall from Clara’s. If there were no complications, Mary Johnson brought back girls who had abortions. They always went to Madame Restelle’s or sometimes Mrs. Byrnes’s or Madame Costello’s, but nowhere else. As Clara absorbed all this, she locked eyes with Hannah across the long kitchen table, silently expressing her shock and worry.
Most of the girls had come to eat dinner wearing their shimmys and pantalettes, their corsets on but open and loose, and their hair down. Some had shawls thrown over their underwear. A few had on robes. A short Negro woman with one half-closed, drooping eye and one ordinary eye brought bowl after bowl of steaming food. One of the girls explained that she was Lettie, who ran the kitchen, and was married to big James with the rambunctious hair and beard and the couple had bought their freedom from slavery and been working for Mary Johnson for ten years. If there was ever any trouble, either with the house or with the sporting men, big James and Mary Johnson usually fixed whatever it was.
Stretching across the table and grasping at whatever bowl or platter they wanted, the girls introduced themselves. They had the most splendiferous names, thought Clara. There were three Duchesses, two Princesses, and one who called herself Satin Rose. Delighted that neither Clara nor Hannah had any ideas for their new names yet, the girls set to work. First they considered Hannah. Abbie said her name should have something to do with her beautiful blond hair so they called out names like Cinderella, Princess Star, Stella White. In the end, they agreed Katrina Diamond fit the best. Hannah beamed and looked happy as a clam at high tide.
“Katrina Diamond,” Clara said, smiling at her friend.
One of the girls, who went by Carlotta Leone and said she liked her name because it meant “lion,” somehow got it into her head that Clara should be French like the famous young ballerina, Emma Livry. “A French beauty,” she said. The girls laughed hard about this and started yelling out French sounding names, Babette, Antionette, Suzette, Juliette. They settled on Lizette.
“Do you like the sea?” Carlotta asked.
“I’ve never been to the sea.”
“Never seen it?”
Clara shook her head.
“Then we will call you Lizette LaMer with the “m” capitalized for effect on your calling card. It means “the sea” in French.”
The girls all clapped. “Katrina and Lizette,” they called out.
This was truly a strange world, eating dinner in your underwear, making up names for each other. As Clara ate her biscuits and boiled chicken, she listened to the girls fume about how the Negro servant, Phoebe Ann Holmes, at the brothel across the street, lost her bastard child in court to the father because he had an honest job as a porter for the City Express Company. She was a friend of Lettie’s and they were all irate about it.
Then she stopped listening. She put her fork down and took a deep breath. She wasn’t Clara anymore. There was no more Clara, no more Benton. No more of Papa in her name. She was Lizette—someone new, someone she didn’t even know yet. Lizette. She rolled the name over in her mind. It sounded free and saucy, like someone who could come and go as she pleased, someone who could never be owned or understood, someone beautiful, unpredictable, turbulent, like the sea. Lizette LaMer. She drew the letters lightly with the end of her fork on the table.
At nine o’clock in the evening, in the rear parlor, Clara huddled with Hannah and Abbie. She felt ridiculous in the child’s yellow dress and a flower wreath on her head. Some of the other young women were scattered about the room wearing dainty shoes and fancy low-cut dresses with big hoops. Every dress was a different brilliant color—greens, blues, reds, purples, with stripes and flounces and bows. Their faces painted with rouge and eyes drawn with dark lines, the young women were mostly pretty. There were blonds, brunettes, and redheads with jewels, flowers and ribbons decorating their hair. They were adorned with gold necklaces and bracelets and red, white, and blue glass earrings glinting in the chandelier light.
It seemed she was at the wrong party. Her party had to be elsewhere, next door perhaps, with little rich boys and girls running around throwing pillows at each other and playing tag. What was she doing here with the Duchesses and Princesses?
The room was filled with velvet sofas, divans, chairs, ottomans, lounges, small tables with marble tops, several enormous mirrors with gilt frames, oil paintings of rivers and mountains and one thundering large painting of a nude woman reclining on a sofa. There were glasses and plates, bottles of wine and liquor, fruit, plump meat pies, and small cakes sitting on a fancy lace tablecloth.
Piano music and the high quivery notes of a girl singing drifted in from the other side of the double doors.
Dreams of the radiant hills and sunlit streams,
Dreams of the bright and blue unclouded skies.
Sleep, for thy mother watches by thy side.
“Out there is where the sporting men gather,” Abbie said. “The front parlor. They’re greeted and entertained. Four or five of the seasoned girls set the mood and look tantalizing while Mary Johnson does her business.”
Abbie turned around and took a few steps closer to the mirror that hung near them. First she rubbed at her face paint trying to even it out, then stuck her index finger in her mouth and, with her wet fingertip, smoothed out her eyebrows.
She looked at Clara and Hannah in the mirror. “Mary Johnson is making sure she knows the men. If she doesn’t, she’s getting to know them right now. Now’s when she tells them if there’s anything special going on, like you two, Lizette and Katrina.” Satisfied with her appearance, Abbie rejoined them. “Then she goes to her office and one by one the new gents—or anyone wanting a virgin—go in and she lays out her terms. After that, the men can stay as long as they like until the morning.”
Hannah’s mouth was pinched up like a little walnut. Clara knew her anguish, remembering her own first nig
ht at Minnie Stewart’s with Sam Weston.
“Hannah, it will be over soon. There will be a tomorrow. I promise,” Clara said.
Hannah smiled but she sure wasn’t happy.
Then Abbie explained the throne game—how there was a huge, very gaudy, gilded, red-cushioned chair near the fireplace, and how it was close to the nice warm fire and seemed inviting, but none of the men wanted to sit in it. If they did they’d have to buy a round of champagne for everyone. It was the girls’ mission to get someone to sit there without them thinking about it. Then they could all have champagne and the night would go a lot better.
“Champagne makes everyone laugh and, unless a gent offers you a drink, you can’t take one yourself unless one of us wins the game with our gent,” Abbie said.
One of the double doors opened. Carlotta Leone, dressed in red and black silk, swept in first. Clara swallowed. Cigar smoke wafted in and turned Clara’s stomach to mud. She counted the men. Twenty-two. That was more than the nineteen girls in the house at the moment. How would that work out? At least there wouldn’t be streetwalking tonight.
“The first night is the hardest. You’ll both do all right. Don’t worry. If one of them tries to hurt you, and I don’t mean pretend to hurt you, I mean truly hurt you, scream like bloody hell.” Abbie spoke through the side of her mouth as she smiled radiantly at the men fanning out into the room. “Mary Johnson or James from the kitchen will come and check on you if they hear you. The most important thing, the thing that makes you popular, is you got to act like you love them. You tell them they’re your favorite gent of all the gents that come here. Here comes that sewing machine fella.”
The man approached Hannah. “Good evening. Are you Katrina?”
What the blazes did Abbie mean about the sewing machine fella? He was around fifty, Clara guessed. His bushy beard was grayish. His dark eyebrows swept out toward his temples like little wings.
“I am pleased to meet you. I’m Isaac Singer.” He bowed slightly.
Clara pictured Mrs. Beattie’s sewing machine. It was called Singer and so was almost every sewing machine in the whole world.
“Would you like to come with me and get a drink? I have an awful thirst.” Mr. Singer offered Hannah his arm and led her away saying, “Excuse us ladies.”
In her mother’s silver dress, Hannah looked back over her shoulder with sweet, scared blue eyes at her and Abbie. Clara wanted to run at her and grab her back from this sewing machine fella’s arm, but Hannah was like a leaf falling onto a rushing stream, speeding away with the water.
“He’s got enough money for the virgins, I’ll tell you that,” said Abbie. “They say he has three wives, three families, three different homes. One of them is a mansion on Fifth Avenue.”
Three grinning men, one old and slender, one red-haired and handsome but a little puffy looking, and one swarthy with big round eyes, approached before Clara could ask anything more. She wasn’t sure she liked Hannah going off with a bigamist, but there was nothing she could do. The three men were all dressed handsomely in satin waistcoats, silk ties, trim coats and trousers, and polished boots.
The old one said, “Hello, Abbie. How have you been? This is my friend Freddie.”
While Abbie offered her hand to Freddie, the redhead leaned toward Clara’s ear.
“You’re mine tonight, sweet Lizette.”
He sounded like a Brit. He stood back, looked into her eyes, and gave her a half smile.
Blazes and jo-fire, what was she supposed to say? Was she supposed to say how happy she was? How charmed she was? How lucky she was? She was supposed to be a little girl. Did she have to speak like one too? She glanced quickly at Abbie for some hint, but Abbie was involved with the old man and Freddie.
Then out of nowhere, she heard herself say, “Merci.” Tarnation, where’d she get that? Some book Izzie read to her when she was little, probably.
“Ah, then you are French? That’s smashing. Mary didn’t tell me you were a genuine French girl.”
Now what had she done. She laughed. “No, Monsieur. I am not from France. My mother was.” She smiled, hoping he would drop this line of conversation.
“I love Paris. Women there are very interesting. A beautiful city. I trust your French mother taught you some French ways?”
Holy rolling Moses. What on earth did he mean by that? Clara speedily recounted all she knew about France. Napoleon. Bread. Wine. Joan of Arc.
“She showed me how to bake bread.”
He seemed confused a moment, then laughed. “Of course, ma petite.”
His red dundrearies were long, thick and curly, reaching down to his chin. Leaning toward her again, he whispered, “Come, Lizette, sit on my lap.”
Clara glanced around, spotting the empty throne close by. Why not? She could try. She stepped back away from the others and walked over to the tall, red chair. She didn’t want to be too obvious, so she lightly touched the arm and gave the redhead a piece of a smile, but not too much, as he approached.
“You haven’t told me your name, sir.”
That might distract him.
“John.”
As John eagerly fell into the chair, spread his legs out, and reached for her to sit, just as Reilly had done his first time at the Spirit Room, someone called out, “There, John’s in the throne.” The room broke into applause, cheers, and laughter. “Hooray, Lizette!”
As though burned, John hopped up from the chair faster than a darting rabbit. But it was too late. Clara giggled. He stretched his arms out wide toward everyone. “Enjoy your champagne, les femmes et les hommes.”
A sound popped and there was more cheering. At the large round table, Mary Johnson started pouring the champagne into wide shallow-bowl glasses. After she poured two, she handed the bottle to Carlotta, then picked up the glasses she had filled, and with a huge smile, brought them to her and John at the throne to more cheers.
“On your first night, Lizette. You’ll be very popular, I’m sure.” She kissed Clara on both cheeks, then drifted away into the party.
“Let’s start again, shall we?” John sat in the chair and took a sip of the bubbling pale drink. He patted his left thigh.
Clara sat on John’s leg, wrapped her right arm around the back of his shoulders and sipped the champagne with her left hand. The fizz was delightful. She smelled John’s cologne water as he began to talk about how he had come to New York five years ago without a penny to his name, how he had landed a job at the Metropolitan Bank, how he was already doing well enough to build himself a new house uptown. As he spoke, and Clara sipped the champagne, nodding now and then as though she were interested in him, it all seemed familiar. There was Weston and his peach brandy. There was Reilly and his plain water, talking endlessly about themselves. All the same.
He paused and looking into the fire, he swigged down his champagne. “Little Lizette, what games do you play with your friends?”
Did he really think she was a little girl? It had been so long since she played with Euphora, or Billy, or even Izzie. Her séances had been like games, though. Guessing games. Guessing what people wanted to hear.
“I like guessing games.”
And so they went on drinking champagne and talking as adult and child for a long while, he, asking about her favorite this or that, she making things up or recalling them from her childhood. After a while, Clara noticed that seven of the girls and seven of the men were gone. Hannah was gone. Abbie was gone. The others were lounging in pairs and small groups. One foursome was singing a sailor song by the piano. The extra three men must have left because there were just twelve girls, including herself, and twelve gents remaining.
John’s nose and cheeks had gone crimson from the champagne. Permanently grinning ear to ear now, he was thoroughly pixilated.
“I’m a bit merry. Aren’t you? Let’s go up.”
Clara stood and wavered a moment. The room was fuzzy, voices muffled and distant. She headed for her room on the second floor. He followed close
ly. She’d never had Reilly or Weston for an entire night. Would he stay until morning? Would she have to do the other thing with him over and over? She counted the handrails on the banister as they climbed the steps. Sixty-two.
When she opened the door to her room, he said, “Ah, yes, Matilda’s room.”
As she walked over to her armoire and opened it, she wondered what had happened to Matilda. Did she not come back after an abortion? John sat on the bed and watched her. Grabbing the bow on the sash at her back, she pulled it around to her stomach and untied it. She thought of Hannah with her Mr. Sewing Machine. He’d better be kind to her. The bigamist.
“It’ll be a thunderstorm and you’re scared, see.” John stood and took off his jacket, then unbuttoned his waistcoat. “I’m in bed asleep.” He fell back onto the bed. “Come and get the boots, would you, Lizette? S’il vous plait?” He laughed loud and long.
The Spirit Room Page 45