The Woman in the Photo

by Mary Hogan

  “We must move quickly,” I say, turning. “I’ll be back at the cottage waiting for you.” Without wasting another moment, I hurry back to the path. My bicycle, with its muck-encrusted tires, is nearly impossible to pedal. Yet I somehow manage. Such is the force of my determination.

  Early afternoon has settled in by the time Nettie makes her way back to the cottage and to me. No one is there, thank goodness. Ida, our cook, and Ella, Mother’s maid, are working teatime at the clubhouse for the day. Extra hands were required to ensure the Tottingers wanted for nothing. I shut my eyes for a moment in exasperation. The only thing that Tottinger fellow needs is an ample serving of humble pie.

  We don’t have much time. Surely Mother will come looking for me once she hears of my folly in the birch thicket behind the clubhouse. If she hasn’t heard gossip about it already. I will be reprimanded severely, I’m sure. Which is why I am willing to do what I plan to do next. The rules have already been broken. Why fret over breaking a few more? If we move hastily, I will make it before teatime and before Mother returns to thwart me.

  “What happened to your face, miss?” Nettie asks, alarmed. We meet in the cottage hallway. In the mirror behind the coat-rack, I see a smear of dried blood directly in the center of my cheek. There is also mud on my forehead and brambles in my hair. Mother would lock me away if she saw such a sight. The very last thing a proper lady would ever do is allow her face to get so dangerously close to a hedgeful of bristles.

  “I had a mishap,” I say. “But you and I will undo it.”

  The preparations begin in earnest. Nettie races to the kitchen to heat water. Then she returns to the parlor and sits me down on a sturdy chair. Squatting in front of me, she works her magic with a buttonhook. The laces on my leather boots are rigid with mud.

  “You decided to go out after all, then,” she says with a wry smile.

  “Indeed.”

  “Did you see the royals?”

  Sighing with exasperation, I repeat, “The Tottingers are not royal.” Then I sigh in an altogether different manner. “But James may as well be.”

  Nettie grins. At last, she is able to release my feet from their muddy bondage. “Mercy,” she says. “I’ll have to use saddle cleaner to restore any use of these.”

  “Perhaps your stable-hand friend has some to spare?”

  Now she blushes. Hoisting herself up, my maid dangles my dirty shoes away from her dress. In a commotion of fabric, she is out of the parlor and on her way to the kitchen where my bathwater is hopefully near a boil.

  “Hurry!” I call after her as I race up the stairs to my bedroom. “We don’t have a moment to waste.”

  If this were any normal day, I would accept Nettie’s help in undressing. But, today is far from ordinary. Thankfully, my clothes are easy to remove. The shirtwaist has but five buttons down the front; the simple skirt but one in the back. And my hair is already tumbled from any semblance of containment. By the time the bathtub is full and sufficiently warmed, I am stripped down to my scandalous bloomers and camisole. Since we are alone in the cottage, I have no worry of anyone seeing my near nakedness. Though, of course, Little Henry would no more notice underclothes than I would notice the manner of steam propulsion on a train.

  “Here.” I meet Nettie in the bathroom and hand her the bottle of lavender oil I purchased on a recent trip into Pittsburgh. “I am told that two drops will scent an entire bath.”

  It’s true. The room soon fills with the sweet aroma of purple flowers.

  Unlike the large bathroom next to my bedroom in our Upper St. Clair home, the cottage bath at South Fork is scaled down but serviceable. There is a washing stand near the curtained window, a rolled-top bathtub next to it, and a commode against the facing wall. Admittedly, the commode is the one luxury that makes staying in our cottage worth it. The clubhouse has only an outhouse—though it is a two-story structure, and more modern than one might expect so far into the woods. In our cottage bathroom, there is no need for a fireplace since we are rarely here once summer has passed. Still, Nettie warms my linen towel in the kitchen oven.

  “Shall I wash your hair, too, miss?” she asks, helping me out of my undergarments and into the warm, floral water.

  “Not today,” I say. “I must be ready by teatime.”

  After quickly plucking bits of scrub from my hair and pinning it atop my head to keep it dry, my maid commences scrubbing my back and arms with carbolic soap and a hand-sized cut of cotton fabric. Next come my feet and legs, which she washes with both diligence and care. I cleanse my private areas while Nettie rushes back to my bedroom to retrieve my traveling satin robe. Before she exits, I say, “I’ll be wearing my best corset this afternoon. And the white silk stockings in my second trunk.”

  Stopping, Nettie wheels around with a furrowed brow. “White silk?”

  “Yes.” Then I shift my back to forestall further discussion.

  Unlike my usual half-hour soak, today’s bath takes less than ten minutes. The moment I step out of the water, Nettie is there to wrap me like an Egyptian mummy in a length of absorbent cotton. The warm fabric feels glorious on my washed and scented skin. Nonetheless, I welcome the unfurling. I am nearly completely dry when Nettie hands me my robe and we both dash back to my bedroom.

  With the clamor of the clubhouse a good half mile away, it is silent in my bedroom. Even with the window open, I hear only the chatter of birds. Still, I can almost hear snippets of gossip about me.

  “Ah yes, Elizabeth Haberlin has always been a bit of a rebel.” (Francine.)

  “I heard she once betrayed a confidence.” (Untrue.)

  “She once refused to apologize for unladylike behavior.” (True.)

  From my second-floor window, I see that the sun is orange. Afternoon is fast slipping away.

  “We must move swiftly,” I tell Nettie, “or all will be for naught.”

  With expert movements, Nettie opens my wardrobe and mines for my finest set of drawers and prettiest silk chemise. On my direction, she retrieves the crinoline cage and pink satin corset I bought on my last trip to visit Tilly in New York. Mother adores this corset. Its boning is so stiff my waist is a full three inches slimmer than normal. If it weren’t an emergency situation, I would never subject myself to such torture. But, today, I can endure pain and suffocation for the greater good. Thank heavens I had the foresight to pack an extra trunk with such finery.

  “All this for tea at the clubhouse, miss?”

  I answer with a question of my own: “Are there still fresh wildflowers behind the cottage?”

  “I believe so.”

  “Good. Please bring me several cuttings of baby snapdragons. Heliotrope, if possible. The best you can find.”

  Nettie nods and scampers off. While she is gone, I dash into the kitchen for a lemon. My fingernails are a horror. My bath wasn’t nearly long enough to coax out the mud beneath my nails. After cutting the lemon in half, I return to my bedroom and sit before my vanity mirror. Inserting each finger into the lemon’s center, one by one, I twist and squeeze until the citrus juice has cleansed each nail and bleached away any discoloration, leaving only the scent of sunshine.

  “We had a good crop,” Nettie says, returning with an apronful of purple snapdragons. “For your hair, I assume?”

  “Yes. Work your magic.”

  Deftly, Nettie sets the flowers on my dressing table and proceeds to brush my unruly hair with speed and expertise. Once it is smooth, she coils it into a tight French twist. Holding the style in place with her left hand, she inserts pins with her right. Then, with fingers waggling like an upended centipede’s feet, she frazzles my forehead fringe in exactly the manner I prefer. A light waterfall of tendrils in uniform density above my eyes, barely brushing my brows. Nothing as old-fashioned as finger waves or ringlets. Heavens, no. In a matter of minutes, I am transformed from forest nymph to debutante. Perfect. After Nettie tucks baby snapdragons down the length of the coil, I swivel my head left and right to note the swinging of the
ir bell-like shapes.

  “Stunning, miss,” Nettie says, admiring her work.

  “I agree.” I clap my hands like a child.

  Turning me away from the pier glass, Nettie commences work on my face. First, she smooths on a jasmine pomade I had sent all the way from the Orient. Its milky hue, infused with the faintest hint of glimmer, is an excellent canvas for the restrained application of beet juice on my cheeks and lips. With her smallest finger, Nettie dips into the ground charcoal I brought from Pittsburgh. Ever so lightly she brushes it across my lashes. Finally, I see her hurry over to the open window and lean all the way out. Just as I’m about to grab her foot, she pops back in the room holding a tiny feather. “There is always one about,” she says, dipping the quill end into my basin water, then twirling it in the charcoal. “Look up, miss.”

  I look up. With the precision of Gustave Courbet, Nettie touches my cheek once with the charcoal-tipped quill. Then she turns me to the mirror. I gasp at the sight of me. The jasmine pomade has created the most beautiful white sheen. And the charcoal dot conceals my thorn wound with a thoroughly modern beauty mark. “Oh, Nettie!” I squeal. Behind me, she smiles and squeezes my shoulder. Then we quickly get back to work.

  With the nimbleness of a cotillion waltzer, Nettie stands me up and inserts me into my white silk stockings, petticoat, chemise, corset, and bustle. “Hold still,” she says, circling around to my spine. Bracing herself against my bedpost, she rears back and draws the laces of my corset into her chest as if attempting to stop a team of runaway stallions. I groan.

  “Apologies,” she says.

  “Harder,” I gasp.

  Grunting and wheezing herself, Nettie uses her considerable heft to pull mightily. As if escaping a torture chamber by the only available exit, my breasts heave upward, nearly brushing my chin.

  “Well done,” I say, feeling faint.

  At last, we are ready for the final layer. My crowning glory.

  “Are you sure you want to do this, Miss Elizabeth?”

  “Absolutely,” I say, without so much as a glimmer of doubt.

  With that, my maid takes pains not to ruin my hair as she dresses my body in the finest silk and lace. She fastens the satin-covered buttons down the length of my spine and slips my stockinged feet into delicate silk shoes. Onto each hand, she carefully slides lace gloves from Paris. The gloves I have been saving for my debut. No matter. I’m quite sure no one will be noticing my hands. Nettie encircles my neck with a pearl choker and adorns my earlobes with fire opals. Of course I wear Grandmother’s bracelet. My lavender bath has made the diamonds gleam. Assisting me down the cottage stairs, Nettie follows me out the back door to the formerly muddy access road that has, thankfully, dried to dust.

  “Allow me, miss.”

  Trundling ahead of me, Nettie clears the path of fallen branches and large stones. She points to shallow puddles and directs me around them. It’s warm out, but not too terribly hot for a late summer’s afternoon. The earlier sun has softened. We make our way to the clubhouse. As we get closer, I hear laughter and bluster. Teatime is upon us. The boys will have buttoned their sports jackets; the girls will have fluffed the sleeves of their shirtwaists or dusted off their jackets.

  A cooling breeze stirs over the lake. By the time I reach the clubhouse’s rear entrance, it is half past four. “Perfect timing,” I whisper to myself. Tea will be in full swing. By now, my family and friends will have assumed I’d taken a nap instead of joining them. Perhaps Mother had heard about my foolishness in the foliage. Maybe she’s glad I have chosen to stay at the cottage after such a spectacle. Little does she suspect the scene that awaits her now.

  “I can manage on my own from here,” I tell Nettie. She nods and stands back with her hands again clasped at her waist and a worried expression on her face. I take a step toward the open clubhouse door, then quickly wheel around and scamper back to my maid.

  “I couldn’t have done this without you,” I whisper, throwing my arms around her neck.

  “Promise you’ll tell me all about it?”

  “Every detail.”

  Nettie squeezes my shoulders and says, “Good luck.” Inhaling deeply to steady my nerves, I turn to face the clubhouse. Through the open threshold of the back door, I hear a jumble of conversations merging into one.

  “. . . archery competition? Wondrous ide—”

  “Another round, old sport?”

  “. . . as was last year’s debu—”

  “Will you be sailing to Southampton?”

  Extending my neck to its full length, with not even a hint of a slouch, I gather my wits and confidently march through the doorway. As expected, all conversation stops short.

  “Elizabeth,” I hear Mother sputter. There is also an audible gasp or two. I smile serenely. With my head erect, I slowly walk past the clubhouse bar in the lounge feeling my gown brush against the men’s trouser cuffs. Mr. Phipps, Mr. Frick, Father, Mr. Vanderhoff, and several other men hold crystal glasses of amber liquid in their hands. Father seems to be frozen in place. Mother is seated with Mrs. Mellon, across the room near the window. Her porcelain teacup is also perched midair. It’s as if time has stopped and turned everyone to stone.

  My calm smile remains affixed. My heart beats as fast as a jackrabbit’s. Inside my head, I squeal. But my exterior betrays no such immaturity. Floating through the entire length of the room, making certain everyone sees me, I ask a passing server if I might trouble him for tea. “Please forgive my tardiness,” I say.

  “Right away, miss.”

  He bows awkwardly and backs away from me as if I am royalty. This pleases me enormously, though I don’t let it show in my countenance. I continue my sashay about the room with unshakable confidence. It’s an attitude befitting my gown. A Charles Frederick Worth original. The fawn lace collar hugs the back of my neck, tumbling down in front to the bodice. The sleeves are long and tight to my wrists, with a spray of lace kissing my gloved fingers. Made from cream-colored satin—imported from Istanbul—the gown reflects all the light in the room. Embroidered rosettes skip down the front and sides in floral vines. Inserted within each satin pleat are more rose embellishments—some a complementary yellow to the violet blossoms in my hair, others a muted bisque. The modern bustle is augmented with a large blush-colored bow; the hem an accordion strip of hand-sewn ribbon just long enough to cover the satin tie on my buttery silk shoes. In such a gown, I surely scandalized Mother with my flushed cheeks and charcoal lashes. Not to mention the shamelessly Parisian addition of my beauty mark. Nettie’s inspired touch. In this dress, one cannot help but feel extraordinary.

  “You look stunning, my dear,” Mr. Vanderhoff says as I pass him. “Is there a ball tonight on the sand?”

  Twitters sprinkle throughout the crowd. I dare not look Mother’s way again, though I do spot my sweet brother, Henry, near the dessert table, clapping his hands with delight.

  “What could be more special than summer at the club?” I ask with supreme confidence.

  “Here, here,” says Mr. Frick, raising his glass, clearly attempting to defuse the awkwardness. One of the more prominent members of the Bosses’ Club, Mr. Frick offers his blessing to relax the others. Not that I’m concerned in the slightest. I’m not here for his approval.

  As soon as the waiter reappears with my tea, I thank him graciously, take the cup and saucer in my gloved hand, stop, sip it daintily, then set it aside on a table to continue my elegant promenade down the length of the clubhouse dining room. Having all eyes upon me is a thrill beyond measure. In the silence, I fear the whole crowd can hear my pounding heart.

  As I make my way outside to the veranda, Roderick Vanderhoff is the first of my friends to speak to me.

  “Have you gone batty, Elizabeth?” he asks, overheated in a slightly drunk sort of way.

  “If I have, would I know it?” I say, grinning slyly.

  The chatter level resumes behind me in the dining room—no doubt spiced with whispers about my scandalous e
xhibition. On her teeny mouse feet, Francine Larkin totters over. “Whatever are you thinking?” she asks, softly enough to appear as though she is speaking to me in confidence, yet loud enough for all on the porch to hear. With one raised brow, I glance at her girlish pink dress.

  “One can feel so very homespun out here in the summer,” I reply. “Don’t you agree?”

  Without waiting for an answer, I continue my stroll to the far end of the patio, past Lilly and Vivian, past Oscar and Julian. Past shy Ivy Tottinger, who blushes crimson at the very sight of me and grips her lemonade glass with both hands. There isn’t a moment that I don’t feel her brother’s gaze on me. The heat of James Tottinger’s stare has propelled my feet. The entirety of his focus is upon me still.

  At the end of the long patio, I gently place my hand on the wide railing. The diamonds in Grandmother’s bracelet catch the orange sunlight. With a luxuriant sigh, I take in the beauty of our stunning lake. In the fading sun, the water is the color of mercury. Its soft ripples are folds of fresh bed linen. I can almost feel the undulation of the water in the rise and fall of my breasts. Even the trees on the far shore seem to sway with each inhalation.

  “I think I’ll rest before dinner,” I say to no one in particular.

  Then I swivel on my silk shoes and make my way back through the far end of the parlor lounge. As abruptly as I’d entered, I exit. Without a further word to anyone. On my way out the door, back to the cottage, I have but one thought for the cocky Mr. James Tottinger of Great Britain.

  Who is the fisherman now, and who is the fish?

  CHAPTER 16

  SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

  Present

  For such a small woman—barely five feet—Clara Barton had a large life. Quickly, Lee realized it was impossible to adequately research her on a petite iPhone screen. Valerie had been right to tell Lee she’d go blind staring at that small screen.