by Megan Chance
I was not in a mesmeric trance. I tried to make my mind blank, but the door of my thoughts blocked the way. I remembered Dorothy’s disappointment at supper, my own plans for my future. I opened my eyes. “Could we try again, please?”
“Another hymn?” Dorothy asked.
“If you would. And perhaps the prayer.”
But even then, my mind would not obey my will.
“Perhaps I could call them,” Michel suggested.
“They’ll come to me, I know it. If I could just clear my mind—”
“Of course.” He rose in a fluid motion and came around the bed toward me. I frowned as he stepped behind me. “Allow me—” He placed his fingers on my temples, stroking back into my hair, and then down, tracing the bones of my face, reminding me forcibly of last night. “Close your eyes,” he whispered, and I found myself doing so. I found myself falling into his rhythm. I heard Dorothy begin a hymn very quietly, a lone voice in the room, and I was slipping into a dream created by his soothing touch; the door was opening; I was wafting through it.
Here I am.
She was waiting for me, and she was angry. You don’t know him as I do. He’s using you. He knows just what to do to keep you.
“Is there a spirit here?” Michel asked.
I heard her voice pushing through my throat. “Yes, dear heart, I am here.”
“We wish to speak to Johnny or Everett Bennett. Can you find their spirits for us? May we speak to them?”
“No. I don’t wish to bring them. It’s my turn to speak.”
Dorothy cried out in dismay.
“Then speak, spirit,” Michel’s voice was preternaturally calm. “Tell us why you’ve come.”
I felt her struggling to feel his touch through my body. I felt her greediness, her failing. “I am Adele.”
“What do you want with us?” Dorothy asked. “Why can’t you bring my boys?”
“I won’t leave you again, dear heart.” Adele’s voice—my voice—was low and vicious. “Now that I’m here, I’m staying. You can’t send me away this time. Not ever.”
I watched from a distance. I felt my own dismay like a foreign sensation. I began to cross the divide. She held me at bay, her fury impossible to penetrate. No. He belongs to me. You cannot come back. I won’t let you in.
“Evelyn.” Michel’s voice, soft and powerful. “Control her.”
I could not find the door. I could not push inside.
“She cannot get back,” Adele said. “I’m more powerful than she is.”
“Evelyn, force your will,” Michel said.
His voice was like a beacon. I followed it. I found the door.
“She must bend to you. She must be your servant,” he said.
No.Adele fought me. I will not go.
“You’re stronger than she is.”
I pressed through. She filled my head; she would not give way, but my body belonged to me, and in the end I knew it better. “Control her,” he had said, and I did. I forced her back. I pushed her out. Her fury was her weakness, and I used it to command her. Bring me the boys and go, I told her, and though she fought me, though she hated me, she did as I beckoned. I felt her fade; I felt the benignness of a young man’s spirit pressing close, begging entry, asking permission. I let him inside, but I didn’t surrender myself; I kept vigil.
When I woke, it was to find Michel’s hands still on me, and Dorothy beaming. I was sweating and exhausted, and when he withdrew his hands, I heard myself make an involuntary sound of protest. I felt immediately vulnerable, as if he were withdrawing his protection, and that was so contrary to what I knew of him that I was confused.
“I’ve something to give you, child,” Dorothy said, and she held out her hand. Michel stepped around me. He reached into his coat pocket and drew out a box, which he put into her hands to give to me. From Tiffany, I noticed as I took it and opened it. Within lay a necklace so beautiful that I gasped. It was emeralds and diamonds, strung together in an elaborate web of gold. It was valuable, and ostentatious, and so completely to my taste that I could only look at her in surprise.
“I asked Michel to pick it for you,” she said. “Look how it matches your eyes. Another little reward, eh? For bringing the boys.”
I looked at him, startled and overwhelmed.
“It seems you need me after all, Madame,” he said, and there was no mockery in his tone, but only a matter-of-fact truth.
I let the necklace fall back into the box, and I replaced the lid and rose, clutching it in my hand. “I’m overwhelmed at your generosity. Truly. I hardly know what to say.”
Dorothy said, “The two of you have given my days peace at last. The best thing I ever did, child, was to bring you here to help my boy. Now you must let him help you become what you’re meant to be.”
He had cemented his place even further and used me to do it. Willingly or no, I was bound to him, and the necklace in my hand was meant to be the manifestation of that bond—I knew that. I knew what he wanted from me: a partnership, both of the mind and the body. “You and me, we’re alike, chère,” he had said, and perhaps it was true.
Perhaps he was the spiritual affinity I was meant to find.
But I could go no further with this. I could not commit myself. Not to Dorothy, not to him, not to the game we played together. Not until I knew the truth.
WHEN CULLEN CAME, I was waiting on the front stoop, shivering. I did not mean for anyone to hear our conversation, nor did I want anyone to stop me. As he came up the walk, I stepped onto the stair before him.
He started, stopping short. “Ma’am?”
“Thank you for coming,” I said. “It was very kind of you, given the circumstances.”
“I never blamed you for it, ma’am,” he said. “And I found a good situation. Not the same as working for Mr. Atherton, but good enough.”
I saw a dark movement across the street, the police watchman. “I’m in trouble, Cullen. You know they’re accusing me of murdering my husband.”
“None of us believe it, ma’am.”
“That means a great deal to me.”
“Whatever I can do to help you, Mrs. Atherton, I will.”
“There is something,” I said, lowering my voice, not knowing how well it might carry on the chill air. “I’ve recently come into some information about Mr. Atherton, and I wanted to ask you a question.”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“That night, the night he died, Peter didn’t return here, did he?”
“No, ma’am.”
“He went to the waterfront, didn’t he?”
Cullen hesitated. “Well, ma’am—”
“The truth, please, Cullen. If you want to save me from the gallows, you’ll tell me the truth now.”
“Mrs. Atherton, I don’t think you want to know this.”
“Oh, but you’re wrong. I need to know it. In fact I think it’s the key to what happened to him that night. I need you to take me there.”
He looked alarmed. “It ain’t no place for a lady.”
“I must go there. There’s a man I need to talk to. Tommy Miller. Do you know of him?”
His shock was almost humorous.
“You do know of him. Please, Cullen, you must take me there. If you care anything about what happens to me, you must.”
I felt guilty trading upon his loyalty, but my guilt quickly faded at his slow acquiescence. He said, “Should I call us a carriage, ma’am?”
It took little time to hire a cab, and soon we were seated within it, leaving the Bennett house behind. The police watchman followed at a discreet distance, and for once I was happy for it. I had no real idea where we were going, or how dangerous it might be.
Twilight sheathed the streets in gray. As we went, the lamplighters made their rounds, their shadowed figures bearing flames on long poles. One by one, the gaslights flared to life, and the streets and nooks beyond their halos grew darker and harder to penetrate. I felt a tug of nervousness and pulled aside the leather curtai
n of the carriage to look out as we made our way into lower Manhattan. The thaw had left the streets more impenetrable than ever. Now, instead of hard ruts and ice, there was mud, and mud of the most viscous, sticky kind. The big square Belgian paving stones settled within it, and there were potholes everywhere.
The buildings began to change from the partitioned mansions and boardinghouses of the financial district to narrow-fronted stores with their filthy, sagging awnings and sidewalks littered with garbage from the barrels and boxes that had cluttered them during the day. Pushcarts and wagons began to appear on the corners, where peddlers sold the last of the oranges and lemons hanging in bags, straggling bunches of vegetables and onions, bruised apples—all at bargain prices. The upturned faces of the tired and haggard women gathering round them looked ghostly and disembodied, lit as they were by the small oil lamps hung at the corners of the carts. Match girls and hot corn girls, newsboys and men hawking tobacco called out their wares, and street Arabs lurked in the corners, waiting for an opportunity to steal an apple or pick a pocket.
When the storefronts gave way to beer cellars and small cafés and theaters and music halls, Cullen had the driver stop. His usually bland face was wrinkled in concern. “Are you sure you want to do this, Mrs. Atherton?”
I nodded grimly, stepping out into the filthy street. “Is it far?”
“The next block.”
The flagstones of the sidewalks were crooked and cracked in this part of town, the piles of sewage and garbage tottering over the curb, great mounds of horse manure steaming in the street. Spittoons had been emptied onto the walk so that strangely sweet-smelling, sticky brown streams wound their way into still puddles that one had to be careful to step over. The acrid urine and blood smell of the tanneries and slaughterhouses was deadened some by the winter air, but still the tangy stink bit my nostrils, fighting with the stench of fried fish and beer. Cullen said nothing as he took me down the block, and though it was early yet, the walks were beginning to fill with dandified Bowery B’hoys and their girls, men looking for whores or entertainment. I heard music coming from the buildings we passed.
Then we turned onto another street, and I realized that the whores skulking in the shadows were no longer women, but men—tall, pretty youths and young boys. There were no longer any Bowery G’hals, but only men—men in rough clothes and working men with their eyes lowered and dandies in their tight trousers and brightly shined boots and colorful vests. Some even wore paint. I was as out of place as a cardinal among crows.
But now things began to fall into place. My memories unspooled: Peter’s friendships with men, which seemed deep and constant and yet changed with regularity; the string of friends paraded through our home—Duncan Granger, whom I’d never seen again, despite their fast friendship, others like him; the intimate suppers where I had never wondered why these men never had wives, or why, after Peter’s mother died, I was always the lone woman at the table; or how, in three years of marriage, I could count on my fingers the number of times my husband had come to my bed. I remembered how indifferent had been his lovemaking—I’d never questioned it; how could I, when I’d never had any to compare it to before now, before Michel? Peter had gone about it as if it were distasteful, a chore to be dispensed with quickly—
Cullen stopped. We were before a building with windows that were boarded and covered with the flyers and banners that decorated every other surface in New York City, notices fluttering and curling in the chill air advertising bathhouses and theaters and something called the Persian Poetry Club. The door was painted green, and peeling. There was no sign indicating what it was.
But then, two men walking arm in arm pushed past me and went through the door, and I heard laughter above the music eking from inside. I caught a flicker of light, a crowd, the smell of smoke and liquor.
I looked over my shoulder at Cullen. “Is this it?”
He nodded. Uncomfortably, he said, “The Neapolitan Club. Mr. Atherton liked to come here.”
“And this is where he came that night?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Now I understood completely. “Very well.” I made to go inside.
Cullen stepped forward. “Not alone.”
I laughed bitterly. “Cullen, I imagine I’m safer here than nearly anywhere else in town.”
“But they won’t help you, ma’am. They recognize me from Mr. Atherton.”
It made sense, and I let him escort me into the Neapolitan Club.
After the darkness of the streets, the room was bright, nearly dizzy with gaslight and clouds of tobacco smoke and music from a piano near the back of the room. It was notable both for the absence of spittoons and the fact that the couples on the dance floor consisted of men. Young men and boys with rouged cheeks and clothes too tight for modesty served drinks and whispered into their customers’ ears. There were partitions along the sides of the room, all curtained, and I did not stop to think of what must go on there, of what Peter—
“Madame,” said a voice near me. “I’m quite certain you’ve come to the wrong place.”
I turned. A woman was leaning against the wall beside me. She wore a cheap blue satin gown with a low bodice. The lace trim was ragged and filthy. I thought at first she was a whore. Then, I realized she was not a woman at all.
He reached out, letting his hand fall against my breast, and when I jerked in surprise, he drawled, “Why, you’re quite real. The sapphists are down the street.”
Cullen stepped forward threateningly.
The man glanced up. “I know you, don’t I?”
I said, “I’m looking for Tommy Miller. Is he here?”
The man shrugged. The gown he wore slipped from an angular shoulder. Then his eyes narrowed. “You his sister? You look just like him.”
“Yes,” I said. “I mean, no, I’m not his sister. But he’s the one I’m looking for.”
“He ain’t here. He’s next door. Could be with a customer. You might have to wait.”
I was relieved when we were outside again.
“You might want to let me ask the questions, ma’am,” Cullen said as we went next door. It was a café, and like the Neapolitan Club, it had boarded windows that looked dark and abandoned. But Cullen opened the door, and we were immediately assailed with the heavy, greasy aroma of fried fish, the sour hop of lager. The place was full; I saw a few curious glances, but most of these men were embroiled in their conversations and their food, and those glances slid away again.
Cullen made his way to the bar at the back, and I followed him. The bartender there wore the tightest trousers I’d ever seen. He glanced up as Cullen approached; I saw his gaze move over the driver assessingly, and then his brow rose as he saw me coming behind.
“What can I do for you?” he asked.
Cullen leaned on the bar. “We’re looking for Tommy Miller. They sent us here from next door.”
“Oh yeah? Who’s looking for him?”
I stepped forward. “His sister. Do you know where we can find him?”
“I got a good idea. Only my guess is you don’t want to find him just now.”
“I need to find him. It’s important.”
He hesitated. He must have seen the desperation in my face, because finally, he jerked his head toward the narrow stairs behind the bar. “He’s up there. But he’s with someone.”
“I just need to talk to him for a moment,” I told him.
“You in trouble, sister?”
“Nothing Tommy can’t solve,” I said.
He said, “Go on up. Second door on the left.”
I didn’t wait for him to change his mind. I started over to the alcove behind the bar. Cullen put his hand on my arm, slowing me, and when I turned to look at him, he said, “You’d best let me go first, ma’am,” and pushed past me to lead the way up the narrow, badly painted stairs.
They opened onto a hall not much wider than they were. It was dingy, and the plaster was peeling, and there was no light but that from a fl
ickering gaslight at the far end, its globe so thick with soot that it seemed the flame was gasping for breath. The floor was warping, the hallway lined with doors that were all sagging, all seemingly squeezed into their swollen frames.
“Second on the left,” I said, following Cullen to the door. He rapped sharply.
Silence. Then scurrying. Then, “Who is it?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but before I could, Cullen said, “Looking for Tommy Miller.”
“Who wants him?”
“A friend. They sent me up from downstairs.”
There was a curse, and then I heard the sound of staggering footsteps. The door was pulled open, and we were staring into the bland, downy bearded face of a young man wearing only a ragged dressing gown. His eyes were bleary and reddened. He frowned when he saw Cullen, and then more so when he saw me.
“Who’re you?”
“Are you Tommy?” I asked.
He turned to look over his shoulder. “You expectin’ someone, Tom?” and I pushed my way past him. The room was tiny and dim, lit only by a small oil lamp. The single window had been covered by a threadbare blanket. There was a mattress on the floor—other than that, there was no other furniture in the room. Sitting on the mattress, shirtless, with his trousers undone, was a young man, and I stopped, struck by how much he looked like me. He was small for a man, and slight. His hair was dark and long, and his skin was smooth as a woman’s, his mouth wide and mobile. And as I drew closer, I saw his eyes, like mine, were a mottled green that no doubt changed color depending on what he wore. He was lolling against the wall, and he held a bottle in his hand, and he peered at me as if I were an apparition he couldn’t quite make out. The sweetly spicy, medicinal scent of laudanum was unmistakable.
The man at the door giggled and nearly fell as Cullen came into the room behind me. “Oh, me, they’ve sent you a girl, Tommy. How long’s it been since you tried that?”
“I ain’t never tried it,” Tommy said. He squinted at me again and tried to rise, gave up, fell back again to the wall. “Do I know you?”
“No,” I said. I ignored the other fellow and glanced over my shoulder at Cullen, who closed the door. Then I stepped up to the mattress. “But you knew my husband. Peter Atherton.”