“Will they—?” He’s not certain he’s heard the bizarre question correctly.
“Will they tan the hide and bind a book with it?” For such a distressing query, the tone is as commonplace as if the child were asking whether cows ate grass.
“What would give you that horrible idea?”
“That’s enough idle talk,” another warder orders, but the little boy ignores the directive, chirping away in the same pragmatic manner.
“It’s what they do here when someone dies. Or the person’s carted off to the anatomical colleges—”
“Enough, I said!”
“They make us eat maggoty meat—when we get it—and when we die they make a handsome profit from our remains. Findal said so.”
Kelman looks at the boy and then at his companions, who are now intently watching the visitor’s reaction. Aware that the warders are also staring, and that it will go hard with the child if his pronouncements are accepted, he decides to treat them with disbelief. “Your Master Stokes must be a great personage for you to believe everything he says.”
“His father made leather things. For horses. So Findal knew all about hides and such.”
“A harness maker,” Kelman says in the same false manner. “Well, that’s certainly a fine trade.”
None of the boys reply, although their eyes regard Kelman with another kind of hunger. The need for acceptance and approval haunts every face.
“That young Stokes was a one for trickery and deception,” the fat man with the hairy neck growls, then laughs as though there were no more explanation necessary and escorts the visitor from the room, opening a calloused paw for a monetary reward that fails to materialize. “Mind how you go, sir,” Kelman is told, and the words have the ring of a threat.
A QUESTION OF THIEVERY
PERCY VANLENNEP SITS CROSS-LEGGED IN the Harrison Crowthers’ withdrawing room and accepts a cup of chocolate from Dora’s outstretched hand. Their fingers touch, providing both with such a physical thrill that they blush in consort, then slide guilty glances toward Miss Lydia, who’s serving as chaperone, Theodora’s parents being absent—attending a performance of Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore.
“You may kiss the girl, Percy,” Lydia states in her overloud voice. “Goodness knows, you children are to be married soon enough. You should learn what lips are for.”
Dora giggles and toys with her chocolate cup in order to conceal her embarrassment. Percy crosses his legs tighter and prays that the growing bulge in his trousers doesn’t show.
“I have the greatest respect for Theodora, Miss Crowther,” he says, which words the elderly lady inexplicably hears.
“Respect is a fine sentiment, but affection is better. And ardor, too.” She leans back within a high-backed wing chair, which, like the room’s other furnishings, harks from an earlier age when delicacy of shape was in vogue: a Chippendale chest-on-chest, a tea table with cabriole legs, an inlaid and japanned Hepplewhite sideboard, and two Sheraton settees positioned on either side of the mantel and covered in a rose madder shade that was popular thirty years prior. The only concession to the modern era is three vapor lamps, which burn with a muzzy glow, unsuccessfully illuminating the swagged bleu de Saxe draperies that are closed against the dark street outside.
“You view me as an antique personage, Mr. VanLennep,” Lydia continues, “unwed, and therefore untried in matters of the flesh. But such is not the case—”
“Oh, Aunt!” Dora interjects, but her great-aunt appears not to have heard her.
“I was a great favorite of the general, Mr. VanLennep. Whenever he entertained at one of his levées or soirées, he always sought me out in order to offer a pleasant compliment on my attire or on a little frippery that had caught his eye. He was an exceedingly handsome man and always wore a uniform that fit him impeccably.” Lydia Crowther sighs, momentarily lost in time, and Percy and Dora share a clandestine look, then start backward in their two seats when their chaperone resumes her speech.
“Do you know that Mrs. Washington came to visit me one day, Mr. VanLennep? My dear papa was away from home, and I was forced to entertain the august lady alone. Alone! And no older than Dora. The purpose of the visit, Mrs. Washington explained, was to view a portrait of the general that my father had recently acquired.” Miss Lydia pauses; the mantel clock strikes the hour: nine chiming bells that echo through the still room and recall her from her reverie. “It was by the painter Gilbert Stuart and hung in a place of prominence in our withdrawing room. When Mrs. Washington spotted it, however, she declared it deficient. ‘I have the original,’ she told me, ‘which I shall keep until I cease to draw breath!’ A strange statement, don’t you think, sir?”
But Percy has only been half listening, and so replies with a hasty “You must have many pleasant memories, Miss Crowther.”
“Oh, I do. I do,” Lydia croons while Dora, fearful that her great-aunt will lapse into another interminable tale, interjects a jubilant:
“Just imagine, Percy! We’re to be married in less than one month’s time! Just think of it! Husband and wife—”
But Lydia proceeds as though her great-niece hadn’t opened her mouth. “I’m weary and must retire. You must excuse me, Mr. VanLennep. I’ve exhausted myself with my recollections.”
“Oh, but Aunt, you’re acting as our chaperone while Mama and Papa are at the Musical Fund Hall,” Dora protests. “If you leave us now, then Percy must also depart, and we’re so very happy in one another’s company.”
“You will have to speak louder, Theodora. I cannot hear a word you’re saying. That is, if it’s to me you’re speaking and not to your swain.”
“I said that Mama and Papa wouldn’t permit Percy to remain in our home if we’re left alone,” Dora nearly shouts.
“Goodness, child! When you’re wed you’ll be alone, won’t you? And no one to tell you how to behave. What you choose to do when I’m gone from the room is your concern, but I advise practicing for your wedding eve. Young couples nowadays are far too unschooled in the act of love.”
Dora gasps, but Lydia has already turned her back upon the pair, walking daintily toward the darkened foyer as though she’d just noticed a person waiting there.
“Oh, Percy,” Dora murmurs as she stands. “Now our pleasant evening is spoiled, and you must leave lest Mama and Papa return and find you here without a proper guardian.”
But Percy doesn’t quit the room; nor does he stand. Instead, he pats the silky seat beside him. “I’ll go after you give me a kiss.”
“You know I cannot.” Despite the protestation, Dora tiptoes toward the settee.
“One little kiss. No one will know.”
“I cannot, Mr. VanLennep” is the coy reply.
“Cannot or will not?” By now, Percy has taken both her hands, pulling her body into his until she stands between his knees. “Shouldn’t we obey your great-aunt, Mistress Crowther, and do a little practicing?”
“Oh, but Papa and Mama would be so disappointed in me.” The tone remains reluctant, but she doesn’t pull away; rather, she giggles again, the sound airy and delighted.
“Then we won’t tell them.” He catches her with his knees while his hands draw her down until she sits in his lap. “I’m aching for you, Dora dear. Do have pity upon me. Just one small caress is all I ask.”
Dora leans into him, clasping his neck with her hands as a sleepy child might. “My heart is all aflutter. I fear I’ll cease to breathe if we continue thus.”
“Then you must loosen your stays, dear.” His fingers move to her bodice, and Dora gasps again.
“Oh, Percy, how do you know about ladies’ garments? I certainly never told you.”
“I must have seen an advertisement in the Gazette” is the hasty answer.
“How unseemly that a journal would mention such items,” she objects, then releases a tremulous sigh as her dress is unbuttoned and her stays unloosed. “Oh, Percy, this is so very wrong …”
All at once, Dora lea
ps to her feet. “A carriage! Stopping in front of our house! It must be Mama and Papa returning. Oh, stand up, dearheart, so that we don’t seem so … so …” She glances down at his lap. “What on earth is that object?”
Poor Percy has no time to reply because Georgine Crowther sails into the room at that moment. “Theodora! Mr. VanLennep!” Her voice is thunder, rolling and crashing. Percy expects lightning to shoot from her mouth, as well. The bulge in his trousers disappears in a trice, but the fact is small consolation, because now Harrison Crowther strides into the arena, his opera cape hanging from his shoulders like a cavalry officer’s pelisse. If his wife is irate, he appears apoplectic. His thick face is as purple as wine spilled on a white cloth; his jowls quiver.
“And to imagine we trusted you, Mr. VanLennep!”
“Oh, Papa! Aunt Lydia just now left the room,” Dora whimpers. “Percy was merely saying a courteous good night.”
“A ‘courteous’ gentleman does not take advantage of a young lady as though he were a thief, intent on stealing her virtue—”
“But he wasn’t, Papa! And besides, we’re to be wed—”
“Silence, Theodora! You have no notion what you’re saying.”
It’s so rare that her father calls her by her full name that Dora’s mouth falls open while her mother commences her own attack on her husband. “This is Miss Lydia’s fault, Mr. Crowther. She has subverted this child’s sensibilities—”
“Oh, no, Mama, Aunt Lydia didn’t—!”
“Enough, Theodora. Your father and I know what is best. Now, go to your chamber.”
“And you, Mr. VanLennep, sir,” Harrison adds, “I will thank you to leave us at once. It’s true that you’re affianced to my daughter, but your obvious disregard for her person I find most disquieting. Most disquieting, indeed.”
LEAVE THEM PERCY DOES. WHILE Dora sits weeping in her rooms, he stalks the streets, and his bland and boyish face alternatively turns ashen in shame or blazes with indignation as he considers how dreadful his forthcoming marriage will be. When will he and Dora be permitted to act as they choose? When will it not always be “Yes, Mama. Yes, Papa” and Miss Lydia telling her everlasting tales? When will he not feel like an ill-behaved child? And Dora, too! Or what if his sweet little wife eventually transforms herself into a replica of her mother: huge, redoubtable—and most probably frigid?
Percy grinds his teeth at this horrifying notion. He, who is so young and virile, should not have to suffer this dreadful fate! I should postpone the marriage. No, I must cancel rather than postpone. I’ll own up to my mistake. And if Dora is unhappy for a time, well, she’ll survive.
By now his footsteps have taken him to the corner of Lombard and Sixth streets. A number of fancy houses are found here and farther west toward Tenth and south along Bainbridge. Many of the establishments are of the lesser sort and not frequented by gentlemen of his pedigree, yet they serve his purpose and have been doing so since the day Theodora accepted his proposal of marriage. Custom dictates he keep himself pure for his nuptial eve; and Percy knows that no one in these shabby places will report his wayward ways.
Here again he rails at destiny. Why do I need this lowly house when my companions disport themselves in finer surroundings with more comely girls? If my engagement to Dora is finished, why should I care what people say? Let her father and mother suffer for the wrongful situation they’ve created and the anguish of their only child!
Duty and habit, however, are difficult traits to conquer. Percy was no more reared to a life of rebellion than he was to be a soldier or explore an unknown world. He was bred to be precisely who he is: a young man accustomed to comfort, privilege, and self-indulgence. He turns his path toward the nearest bawdy house.
Dutch Kat’s is the name, the madam being a plump, resourceful Hollander with a saucy tongue and an instinct for what her customers enjoy. Percy couldn’t say whether the woman’s given name is Katya or Katarine, nor does he care. At the moment, he’s preoccupied with pillowy breasts and broad hips and dimples found in hidden places.
In his absorption, he nearly stumbles over a boy perched on the lowest stair leading to Dutch Kat’s front door. The boy holds out his hand as though extracting tribute.
“Please, sir, are you seeking the good lady within?”
Startled, Percy draws back. He doesn’t recall the child, although he feels that he should, for the boy’s ears are oddly pointed.
“I can call her if you’d like,” the urchin repeats.
“No. No,” Percy stutters. Without another word, he passes up the steps, wondering whether to supply a copper or two, then decides against such an extravagant act. Besides, he doesn’t wish to be remembered.
WHEN PERCY WALKS BACK DOWN the same stairs an hour later, the boy is gone. The surrounding alleys remain busy with potential patrons, however, causing Percy to creep away as if his guilt were attached to him like a cheap-Jack’s sign, visible for all to read.
Clear of the area, he hurries north toward home but then pauses in front of William Taitt’s somber mansion, where he notes with surprise that lamps are still burning in several upper windows. Oh, he thinks, if I had a wife like Becky Grey, I’d be awake at all hours of the night, too! And abed as much as we wished during daylight hours.
Hoping to get a glimpse of the fortunate couple—in what he believes might be a compromising position—he crosses the road and stands on tiptoe. But no one appears, and so he trundles glumly on his way, comparing every woman he has known or met to Dora. Why don’t I have the courage to marry an actress like Becky Grey, someone sultry and provocative, a lady with a knowing air and experienced lips? For a moment, he considers returning to Dutch Kat’s, but fear overcomes his need, and he marches along.
IF BECKY HAD LOOKED OUT her window and spotted VanLennep’s dejected figure, she might have been amused to imagine herself the subject of his amorous attention. And she’s in dire need of such a distraction; for despite her invisible admirer’s assumption, her husband isn’t romantically sequestered in her rooms but away for the evening, leaving her to the exile of expectant motherhood.
“Damnation,” she swears aloud. “Hell and eternal damnation!” En déshabillé she drifts through her second-floor chambers, taking up her needlework and immediately flinging it aside, reading a page from a newly purchased novel, then letting the book slip from her fingers. She glances at a collection of Mr. Browning’s poems, only to forsake it and resume her restive wandering. She sighs and sighs again until the activity becomes as regular as yawning. “Damnation … Damn … damn!”
It doesn’t occur to her to go downstairs and walk through other rooms rather than these three, or ring for one of the sleeping servants and inquire if her husband has sent word when he would be home. Instead, she keeps to her own suite because she finds it more appealing than the remainder of the house with its ponderous furnishings and its portraits of tight-lipped Quaker Taitts staring disapprovingly down.
At length, she sits at her escritoire to write some grumbling remarks in her journal, but then tires of the activity, pushing away the leather-bound volume in order to riffle through the latest offering from Godey’s Lady’s Book. She peruses the frontispiece and the editors’ names: Mrs. Sarah J. Hale, Mrs. Lydia H. Sigourney, Morton M’Michael, Louis A. Godey, and the address, which is Publishers’ Hall, Philadelphia, 101 Chestnut Street. Those two ladies are permitted to work and have their names displayed on the printed page, she argues. They’re allowed to write poems and stories and commentary. Is that not also rash behavior? As audacious as treading the boards?
Thoroughly irked, Becky studies the monthly fashion plate, analyzing the words printed beneath the models and their costumes as if she intends to memorize them: Dress of India muslin over a pale yellow underdress. Corsage half high. Tight sleeves. A fichu of lace. A drawn capote of sulfur color crepe trimmed with lilac ribbon and ornamented with a plume of feathers, which droop gracefully to the left.
One delicately colored figure holds
a dainty parasol—which causes Becky to sigh loud and long. She turns the page only to be confronted by a mezzotint entitled “Family Devotions” that depicts a humble wife sitting in rapt attention as her husband reads aloud from the Bible. Exasperated by the self-righteous sentiment, Becky flips the page to a story titled “Civility Is Never Lost,” then to another mezzotint melodramatically named “The Elopement Prevented.”
Nothing but insipid instruction! Becky thinks as she releases a groan and prepares to cast the publication aside. But a ballad penned by a J. Philip Knight catches her eye; she follows the scored notes and begins to sing:
“‘I’ve trod the festive halls of light/ When music filled the air—’”
The melody dies in her throat. “Oh,” she wails. Then her cry, accustomed to carrying to the balcony, grows in force until it takes on an operatic pitch.
She throws the book from her hands, thrusts out her arms as though in supplication—but when she opens her eyes again it’s not a stage that greets her, merely her own circumscribed Philadelphia quarters. The ceiling with its crystal chandelier and the walls hung with their myriad gilded frames seem as claustrophobic as a cave.
Your small abode, she recalls the gypsy woman saying. Your small abode is filled with phantoms and apparitions. Becky bites her lip until the color drains.
Then a noise breaks in upon this private storm. In the chamber below, which serves as her husband’s personal receiving room and where he displays his collection of curios and antiquities, something like a large book or a small bronze statue thuds to the floor. She listens, her face now darkening in wrath rather than self-pity.
So William has returned home and failed to come upstairs to my rooms and ask how I’ve fared in his absence. He has been disporting himself and drinking champagne while I’ve been forced to keep my own tedious company. Well, I will not endure this situation a moment longer. Either he permits me to accompany him on his rounds of fetes and musicale evenings, or he must remain sequestered with me until this child of ours is born!
Deception's Daughter (The Martha Beale Mysteries, 2) Page 5