Those Harper Women

by Stephen Birmingham

  “A hairbrush?”

  “Yes,” she laughed. “My hair.”

  “This is blackmail, then, isn’t it?”

  “Blackmail? Blackmail? I do not know what that means. All I want is three thousand Danish kroner, so I can leave this island. Three thousand Danish kroner, and a hairbrush, please.”

  Slowly, Edith went into the house. She took a hairbrush from her dressing table. On the dust divider, underneath one of the dresser drawers, was where, in those long-ago days, she and Charles kept the envelope of household cash. She would have to justify the money to Charles somehow if he ever discovered it was missing. Then she went downstairs again and out into the garden.

  “Oh, that’s a pretty brush. Silver,” Monique said.

  “I might have known you people would think of something like this,” Edith said. “Just tell me one thing. Did you get your—information—from Louis?”

  She laughed gaily. “I do not know of what you speak!” she said. Brushing her hair, sending out spatters of water like sparks from the brush, sparks that flew through the sunlight and settled on the walk—her hair was a waterfall of those bright sparks—she said, “It didn’t take much thinking, really. All I want is to be able to leave this place. When you didn’t give me the money freely, I had to think of something.” Brushing, brushing, her golden hand holding the long silver handle of the brush like a pistol, she brushed her hair until it gleamed flat against her skull.

  “Here are your three thousand kroner,” Edith said. “Take it and get out. Leave this island and never come back. Don’t you ever, either of you, dare to come back!”

  “Thank you, Edith,” Monique said, taking the money.

  “Call me Mrs. Blakewell.”

  She gave Edith a droll look. “Mrs. Blakewell,” she said.

  For a long time after Monique had gone, Edith stood at her window, absolutely still, her temples pounding, unable to move, staring out at the garden where the silver hairbrush lay on the grass by the stone bench, exactly as though Monique had thrown it there.

  Looking at its gleam, the silver object assumed a queer significance. She thought: Must my whole life be trapped forever in that moment there, in the gatehouse, that August afternoon years ago? Even though, looking back, it seemed such an unimportant moment?

  That night, at the Governor’s Ball, Edith and Charles passed through the receiving line to the strains of Strauss. Then, after a glass of champagne, with his arm resting lightly around her waist, they joined the dancers. The Governor’s wife spoke to them. “How beautiful you look together,” she said. “Beautiful young people …” They danced on.

  A little tipsy from the champagne, she held Charles tightly and told him what she had decided that afternoon. “Charles, let’s leave this island,” she said. “Let’s sell the house and go back North. It was a mistake for us to stay here. It was a mistake for you to work for Papa. You’re miserable here and so am I. It’s a rotten place.”

  He smiled at her and started to speak, but they were interrupted by a roll of drums, and turned to face the orchestra. There was a toast to President Wilson, and to the King, and the glasses were shattered. Then, reverentially, the two anthems were played—first “The Star-Spangled Banner” and then the stately and mournful “Der Er Et Yndigt Land”—“There Is A Lovely Country”—the Danish hymm. Throughout the ballroom, ladies touched white handkerchiefs to their eyes, and the men stood stern and stiff as ramrods, letting their own tears fall unheeded, but Edith Blakewell, holding Charles’ arm, was too excited with the simplicity of her solution to be moved by the ceremony of changing flags—under one flag or another, the island would always be the same—and she thought, yes, there is a lovely country somewhere, and we fill find it, you and I.

  When the anthems were over and the dance music began again, Charles said, “Come out onto the terrace for a minute. I want to tell you something.” She followed him and when they were outside, away from the music, he said, “I’m joining the Army.”

  “What?” she said, not comprehending it. “What did you say?”

  “I’m going to the war.”

  “But why?” she gasped. “This is Europe’s war! America isn’t in it. This war has nothing to do with us.”

  “We’ll be in it before long.”

  “You’re doing this—just to get rid of me!”

  He shook his head. “It has nothing to do with that. I leave in three weeks for New Orleans. Then to Fort Leavenworth, for my commission—”

  “You can’t leave me! You can’t leave Diana!”

  “I’m doing it for your own sake.”

  “Well you can’t. I won’t let you!”

  “Edith—”

  “You can’t!” she screamed. “You can’t! I won’t let you!”

  The next afternoon Monique Bertin reappeared in the garden. “It wasn’t enough,” she said with her little smile. “I need two thousand more Danish kroner.” She held out her hand.

  And so who was there left for Edith to appeal to but her father? They sat in his office and, once more, they were holding little glasses of Kentucky whisky. He listened to her for a long time, saying nothing, and, while she talked, his eyes grew sadder and more remote. He interrupted her only once, when she told him about Charles and the Army. “He’s wrong about that, of course,” he said. “I have friends in high places in Washington, and they assure me that America will stay out of the war.”

  When she finished he said, “Then it’s true about you and Bertin.”

  “Did she tell you?”

  He drummed his fingers on the top of the desk. “Ah, Edith,” he said, “I can see you’d never be able to run the sugar business. What in the world ever made me think you could?”

  “Just help me, Papa.”

  “I’ll see that you get your five thousand kroner back. That part of it is no trouble at all.”

  “Do you need any more proof of how destructive those people are? Will you get rid of them now, Papa?”

  He shook his head. “Poor little Monique,” he said. “She’s a silly, headstrong child. No, your problem goes deeper than that. These stories she threatens to tell—they’re becoming a little more widespread, I’m afraid, than I think you realize.”

  “Started by the two of them!”

  He waved his hand. “That’s not important. The important thing is to keep Charles from hearing them. For your sake and the baby’s sake—for the family’s sake. If there weren’t some basis of truth in them, it wouldn’t matter.”

  She nodded.

  “Let me think about this,” he said. “Give me a little time. Come back tomorrow. Meanwhile, I’ll take care of Monique.”

  She stood up to go. His eyes were still far away. “At least I’ve been relatively discreet in my little affair,” he said. “It’s a pity you couldn’t have been as discreet in yours. No, you would never have been able to run the sugar business …”

  When she came back the next day, he said, “I have found the solution, quite a simple one. It solves both problems—the problem of Monique and the problem of Charles.” He pulled open a desk drawer and pulled out a thick stack of papers. “Charles was never cut out for this business either,” he said. “And so,” he riffled through the papers, “I’m going to set things up for the two of you a little differently …”

  “Charles is tired of having you set things up for us. That’s part of the trouble.”

  “I’m setting things up so that both of you can be independent of me. For the rest of your lives you’ll be free to go and do as you wish. I’m going to give you, now, the share of my estate that would normally come to you under my will when I die. Do you have any idea how much money I estimate that to be?”

  “No,” she said softly.

  “A million dollars. That’s quite a bit of money, isn’t it? This is a favorable time for you to take it, too. Until the Treaty of Cession becomes final in March, we are still operating here under the laws of Denmark. You will probably be able to avoid this new Unit
ed States tax on incomes if I set it up now the way I plan. And as for Charles—”

  “What about Charles?”

  “I gather he has been disturbed by the thought that he is living off a rich wife. So I am giving him an equal amount, free and clear.”

  “He won’t take it.”

  “He’s taken money before. He can’t refuse this much. They won’t let him refuse. His family is not that well off. Yes, this will keep him with you, Edith. You’ll both have everything you want. As you said yourself, this island is no place for either of you. If Charles wants, he is welcome to any position he chooses in my New York office, but that will be up to him. He can do as he pleases.” Then he said, “Aren’t you going to say thank you, Edith? I’ve solved all your problems and made you a rich woman.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “Well, then.”

  “I just don’t know what Charles will say.”

  “I do. You see, I’ve already gone over all this with him.”

  “And he said yes?”

  “He asked me only one question—what you thought of it. That’s all he cares about. If you agree, he agrees. And you do agree.” He stood up, and his eyes clouded over. “You’ll both be free,” he said. “Free of me. Whom you hate so much.”

  “Don’t say that, Papa.”

  “I do say it. Now run along.”

  Waiting for the spring rainy season to come, there is always a desperately sweet smell in the air, a smell of rain in the wind blown across ripe sugar cane, and mixed with it are the smells of tobacco-plant flowers and perhaps jasmine, and the flamboyant and grape trees in blossom, and through it all the spice of salt from the sea. They rode side by side through this warm wind, and she felt lightheaded and almost sad to be leaving St. Thomas forever, as the cottonwood trees, in green arches, flew by over their heads and sea birds in the sky kept pace and pebbles spurted out from the red earth beneath their horses’ hoofs. “Let’s do more of this when we get North again,” she called back to him. “The way we used to do in Morristown. Remember? Let’s see if we can find a house in the country, Charles, where we can keep horses.”

  “All right,” he said. “Perhaps—someday.”

  “Why someday?” she asked laughing. “Why not right away—tomorrow?”

  “All right—why not? Find your house, if that’s what you want.”

  His hair was blowing across his eyes, and she was still laughing. “Isn’t it what you want too?” she asked him. His lips moved, but she couldn’t hear what he was saying. She slowed her horse to a walk, and called after Charles. “Wait! Come back here a minute.”

  He turned the chestnut gelding and trotted back to her. “What is it?” he said.

  “I asked you if it wasn’t what you wanted,” she said.

  They were facing each other. He patted his horse’s neck. “Edith,” he said carefully. “I’ve told you. I’m joining the Army.”

  “But you can’t. Not now.”

  “Can’t I?”

  She hesitated, trying to translate the expression on his face. “Of course not. We’ve got our share of Papa’s money now. It’s for us—when we get to New York.”

  Slowly, his fingers stroked the chestnut’s mane, and the animal’s neck quivered at his touch, its head went up and its tail swished. “I understand all this,” Charles said. “You have your money now. You can certainly buy a house with it if you like. There’s enough.”

  “It would be your house too!”

  “No. Not yet.”

  “Why not? There’s money for you as well as for me.”

  “Take the money if you want to,” he said. “I won’t have much need for it where I’m going.”

  “Don’t be absurd! You’re not going anywhere—except to New York with me. That’s what the money’s for, for heaven’s sake! And we promised Papa—”

  “I promised him nothing—except once, to help him by being some sort of decoration for his little cake. This little sugar cake of his. And now that promise has ended.”

  She reached out her hand and touched his knee. “That’s not fair,” she said. “Besides, darling—I need you. Diana needs you.”

  “Do you?” His eyes traveled away.

  They were at the corner of the road that led into the old Mandal estate, a vacant ruin used for sheep-grazing. A sheep fence ran around it and, looking at the barred gate, she said suddenly, “Let’s do some jumping. Come on. We can argue about this later.”

  His look followed hers. “Do you think this horse can take that gate?” he said.

  “Of course he can.” She measured its height with her eyes. “It’s not more than four and a half feet. This will be an easy one.”

  “I’m not sure,” he said doubtfully. “I’ve never jumped this fellow before. Have you?”

  “You’ve got to make him take it. You’re the rider—you’re in command. You make him take it. That’s what Papa says.”

  “Is that what Papa says? All right, come on.”

  They started the horses toward the gate, urging them to a canter. Three lengths from the fence, Edith jerked her feet from the stirrups and pressed her knees and thighs hard into her horse’s sides. Leaning forward, giving him a loose rein, she whispered into his ear, “Jump!” And they took off, cleared the top rail nicely, and came down easily on the other side. But the chestnut had veered sharply and refused the jump, the horse was rearing and snorting under Charles.

  “Don’t let him refuse!” she called back to Charles. “Give him the crop! Give him the crop! Don’t let him refuse.” She cantered back, and jumped the gate again.

  Charles’s horse was standing quietly now.

  “Come on—make him try it again.”

  “You want to move people, don’t you, Edith? You always want to move them. Why is that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You want to move me to New York with you.”

  “But darling, we’re rich now—we can go wherever we want. It doesn’t have to be New York.”

  “But I’m not taking the money.”

  “Do you want us to starve?”

  “Somehow,” he said smiling, “I don’t think you’ll ever starve, Edith.”

  “Don’t be difficult, darling,” she said. “Come on—make him try the jump again.”

  “Why don’t you tell me the real reason why you want to leave St. Thomas?” he said.

  She laughed, the wind in her face. “I’m thinking of us. I want us to be free.”

  “Are you? Or is it the same reason why you wanted to get rid of Bertin and his wife? Why didn’t you tell me why you wanted to get rid of Monique?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me the real reason was because you were afraid of him?”

  It was suddenly hard for her to hear what he was saying, and easier, safer, in the wind to dismiss his words. She let the wind blow them away. “Afraid of him?” she said. “Why should I be afraid of him?”

  “Why didn’t you tell me he was the one?”

  She was too terrified to look at him now. “What one? Which one?”

  “The one before me.”

  “It’s a cheap, disgusting lie!”

  “And you’ve seen him since, haven’t you?”

  “No!”

  “Edith,” he said, “is Diana my child or his?”

  Tears jumped to her eyes. “I refuse to answer such a question!” she cried. “How can you ask me a thing like that?”

  “I guess,” he said easily, “it’s because it’s something I’d like to know before I join, as we say, Our Doughboys Over There.”

  She raised her hand.

  “Are you going to give me the crop?” he said. His brown eyes were steady. “Go ahead. Give me the crop, if it helps.”

  “Damn you,” she whispered. “Oh, damn you!” And then, pleading, she said, “Charles, please believe me.”

  “I can’t. That’s why I want to go away, and why I’m not taking an
y money.”

  “You took money when you married me, don’t forget!”

  He smiled. “That was different,” he said. “I accepted his money then because you were included in the price.”

  “I still am!”

  “It was different then. I loved you then.”

  She turned her horse away. “Come on,” she said. “Make your jump.”

  Once more they turned their horses toward the sheep fence and broke into a canter. Turning to Charles, she cried out, “Who told you all this about me? Was it Papa? I never loved Louis, Charles—only you!” He turned his head to her and laughed. “Don’t laugh at me!” she shouted. They approached the gate, and she lifted her heels from the stirrups. “Jump!” she cried to her mare. And to Charles, beside her, she said “Jump!” But she saw the chestnut’s head begin to shy, about to refuse again, and she reached out and seized the other bridle. Charles seemed to turn in the saddle and to give her a sudden look of intense interest; not fearful, but questioning. Holding his bridle in her gloved hand just below the bit, she cried, “Jump!” and their horses rose together. There was a clatter of hoofs as the two horses touched, their bodies thrown instantly against each other, then flung apart, and then the noisier crash of hoofs and shoes striking the fence rail. Her head snapped forward, and she clung to her mare’s neck, her face in the mane. Her horse struck the ground with its front feet, stumbled, and almost fell; then it leaped up, rearing and whinnying. She had dropped her crop and, while she tried to calm the horse, she realized that she held a broken bit in her hand. She looked back. The gelding stood very still, its nose down, nibbling the grass beside the fence, and Charles lay, a graceless burden, against the lower rail, his legs twisted awkwardly beneath him. One hand clutched at the air and, as Edith leaped from her horse and went running back to him, the hand moved slowly downward.

  The news from the hospital, in the beginning, was confusing. At first Edith understood that both legs were broken; then it seemed that only one leg was broken, but in several places. “Compound fracture of the right lower femur, and simple fracture of the right tibia and fibula,” was the final diagnosis which young Doctor Alan Osborn, who had only recently come to St. Thomas, gave her. It was several days before he would permit her to see Charles. And when at last she was allowed to go to the hospital Alan Osborn met her at the door and said, “We’re quite sure he’ll be able to walk again, Mrs. Blakewell.” They moved slowly down the hospital corridor. “Of course it will always be with difficulty. There was severe damage to the muscle and vascular tissues. But at least we managed to save the leg.” Outside the door to Charles’ room, he said, “You realize that he doesn’t want to see you.”