DEFICITS WILL CALL ON ARRIVAL FRIDAY
BESS
SEPTEMBER 1 1919
WOODSTOCK VERMONT
ARTHUR FINEMAN
MEYERS MILLER AND FINEMAN
PRAETORIAN BUILDING
DALLAS TEXAS
PLEASE SELL ALL STOCK PURCHASED IN MY NAME AND
DEPOSIT PROCEEDS TO MY ACCOUNT AM IN URGENT
NEED OF CASH TO KEEP MIDWESTERN LIFE INSURANCE
COMPANY FROM DECLARING BANKRUPTCY ARRIVING
DALLAS FRIDAY
BESS
September 10, 1919
Dallas, Texas
Dearest Totsie,
Your long, wonderful letter made me forget for a few minutes our abrupt departure from the farm and even feel part of the Labor Day picnic. The turnout was certainly a tribute to you and the affection in which you are held by our friends and neighbors there. I suspect this is the first time any of them has ever admitted to friendship with one of the “summer people.”
The children talk about the farm as if it were just across the street, but the events of the last ten days have made it seem sadly remote to me. Unfortunately, more than time and distance now separate me from the happiness of summer. Financial distress stands like a grim sentinel forbidding me entrance to the palace of peace and prosperity where I once lived. Russia is not the only scene of revolution these days. My life has been overthrown by the armies of death, and no provisional government seems possible. Every cent I have is committed to saving the company, but I am afraid all my efforts may be in vain.
Support has come from an unexpected source, however. The employees have rallied to the cause, giving up part of their sal-aries for the present in favor of stock options for the future. They announced their decision at a company-wide meeting last week after I made a short speech pledging all my personal assets against the mounting debt faced by the company if it continues to pay off all its claims. Perhaps if I had not just gone through the experience of widowhood, I would not feel so strongly about the responsibility of the company toward its policyholders, but I know too well the terror of being left alone in the world and I am determined that no survivor shall be denied the benefits to which his hard-earned monthly payments have entitled him.
Annie found a charming little house for us and we are all living together quite comfortably. The rooms are small but with no man in the house, privacy is a luxury we can ill afford. Fortunately a large, tree-sheltered vacant lot adjoins the house and I can escape there with a book whenever my desire for solitude threatens my good manners.
I will never be able to express adequately my gratitude to you for sharing your New England summer with four frightened refugees from St. Louis. Beyond the basic provision of food and shelter, you were unstinting in your supply of sympathy and kindness. Already I look back on my summer as an island of unexpected tranquillity in a relentlessly stormy sea. But like an explorer of long ago, I have set my course and I cannot turn back. I cling to my belief that the welcoming shores of a still uncharted continent await me—and sail on.
Je t’embrasse—comme
toujours,
Bess
September 20, 1919
Dallas
Dearest Papa and Mavis,
Though we have still not greeted each other face to face, at least we are all living in the same state again. I hope to bring the children for a visit before the end of the month and hear your “welcome home” with my own ears.
Unfortunately, our return to Dallas has not been a homecoming in the true sense of the word. We have come back to a life very different from the one we left behind when we moved to St. Louis. Not many of our old friends even know I am here and I prefer it that way—at least for now.
I appreciate your offer of financial assistance but am determined to face this crisis as bravely as Rob would have done—and without falling back on friends and family.
Manning is still with the company—though openly opposed to the course I have taken. I suppose he looks at the figures more objectively than I do. To me they represent not only dollars but hours spent by Rob organizing the company and planning for its future. To Manning declaring bankruptcy is a means of erasing debt—to me it is a betrayal of everything Rob was trying to do. Manning and I stand divided on the issue and Mother Steed and Lydia understandably are on his side. They met us at the station when we arrived from Vermont, but it took only one brief conversation to establish our conflict over the fate of the company, and we have not seen them socially since.
The estrangement from their cousin’s family and the fact that we are living in an unfamiliar part of town have led the children to believe that we did not move back to Dallas after all. I share their sense of dislocation. Everything is at once familiar yet at the same time strange and different, like a city seen in a dream. I live my days in a nightmare world from which there is no waking—and my nights are even worse. With no routine duties to keep terror at bay, I lie helpless in the dark, wishing only for oblivion.
Somehow I manage to maintain a cheerful façade in front of the children, at least for the hour it takes to get them dressed and ready for school in the morning. I am so grateful I paid their tuition for the first semester in advance. Now I would feel I could not afford it, but fortunately there is no way to reclaim it. And at least at school they have some sense of belonging. If only I had somewhere to go each day where kind people would look after me and tell me what to do. A widow seems to me like some parasitic plant still clinging tenaciously to the limbs of a fallen tree, ignoring the fact that the tree now lies lifeless on the ground.
Forgive me for inflicting my despair on you—but please understand how much better I feel for being able to express it.
All my love,
Bess
September 25, 1919
Dallas
Darling Totsie,
I cannot describe the joy that fills my heart when I see your exquisite penmanship on the outside of an envelope. I am more alive in the presence of a letter from you than in the company of most of the people I encounter in my daily life.
I was amazed to discover that it was as difficult for you to face the responsibilities of fall as it has been for me. Our summer was like an oasis in a desert of never-ending duty. I even had the illusion I had learned to live with grief. But like a clever enemy, it only stayed hidden while I was strong—and waited till I was alone to attack again in full force.
I miss you so much. I have never shared my life so fully with anyone—not even my husband. We would meet in the night like two strangers, having traveled all day from different directions. We seldom knew the joy of watching a whole day unfold in each other’s presence, each moment made richer by seeing it through the other’s eyes.
Annie and I get along very well but it is hard for her to forget our former relationship. During the day while she is busy around the house she is happy and at ease, but once dinner is over, she seems quite uncomfortable sitting in the living room without anything to do.
It occurred to me we could put this awkward hour to good use if Annie would undertake our instruction in the German language. She was delighted and confessed how much she has missed the solace of her mother tongue—it seems Hans never allowed her to speak German around the house. He felt she should devote herself to improving her English so their children would grow up thinking of themselves as American citizens. Annie obeyed him in this as in everything but on the evenings when Hans was away, as he was more and more in the final months of their marriage, she would sing her children to sleep with German lullabies.
Our first language lesson last night was a great success. Annie could not stop laughing at our struggles with the guttural sounds which come so easily to her. It was good for her to be giving orders for a change, and she would not end the lesson until I had mastered the beginning rules of grammar. I hope, in the course of our instruction, to learn some of her self-discipline along with her language. I would undoubtedly be able to put the former to more
immediate use than the latter.
When the lesson was over, Annie got out her wooden recorder, which she had brought with her to this country as a bride, and played folk songs for us, teaching us the words as we went along. To my amazement, the children learned the lyrics almost immediately. But I suppose the lyrics to many of our own songs are nothing more to them than a collection of sounds, and the German songs make just as much sense.
For the first time since we left the farm the children and I had the feeling of being a family again—or at least of being part of something larger than ourselves.
Please give my love to Dwight. I envy him for sharing so many hours of your life.
Je t’embrasse,
Bess
October 15, 1919
Dallas
Mr. Hans Hoffmeyer
7963 Alameda
Los Angeles, California
Dear Hans,
Annie received your letter but refuses to answer it, so, with her permission, I am taking the liberty of speaking for her. You are undoubtedly surprised to be hearing from me again after so many years, but events of the last few months have left Annie and me on a parallel course, and we decided to join forces in an effort to survive our mutual solitude.
When you abandoned home and family to try your luck in California, Annie wrote to me in the hope of returning to my employ, but the death of my husband last spring left me in severe financial straits and I am unfortunately in no position to hire anyone. So for the moment we are sharing a house and she is paying for room and board for herself and your two children with her services. But she has other expenses and cannot continue much longer without some form of financial assistance.
She was frankly dismayed to find your letter unaccompanied by any tangible evidence of concern for your children’s welfare. At the very least you are responsible for half their support—a responsibility dating from the day of your departure, so your debt is already two months overdue. If your conscience does not hold you accountable, I can assure you that the courts will.
I look forward to hearing from you promptly—as do Annie and the children.
Sincerely,
Bess Alcott Steed
November 2, 1919
Dallas
Dearest Totsie,
I am hurrying to write this in the hope it will reach Westport before you and Dwight leave on your trip. How I would love to be with you, motoring through New England, stopping at old inns along the way.
Autumn does not arrive unnoticed in Texas—the oak trees are especially spectacular this year—but we do not enjoy it as you do. Sometimes I am filled with such longing for the part of the country my ancestors left behind. I wonder if I will ever feel as rooted to the land around me as you do. I have such a strange, unsettled feeling living in Texas again—as if I were only here because there was nowhere else to go.
Annie’s husband, Hans, suddenly reappeared two nights ago. By a strange irony, it happened to be Halloween and when she opened the door, Annie shrieked as if she had seen a real ghost. If it had not been for me, I suspect she would have slammed the door in his face, but I insisted she invite him in for a cup of tea. Having failed to make his fortune—or even a living—in California, Hans has returned to Texas for the time being.
In spite of my letter describing my financial reverses, I think he fully expected me to give him a job, or at least to help him find one. I have no idea what to do for him, but I am determined to find a means of keeping him in town. Annie needs his help with the children and we can all profit from the occasional presence of a man in our lives—even an inadequate one.
The children were out trick-or-treating when Hans arrived and so when they returned home and saw him seated by the fireplace, they shrieked as loudly as Annie, but with joy, not terror. Children have no fear of ghosts—at least on Halloween night. I envy their ability to move so freely between the world they see and the one they only imagine. For them it is all one country which they can travel at will, whereas I am halted daily at the frontier of fantasy by the stern border guards of fact and logic who insist on reminding me that my husband has died and I am alone.
I am grateful that the children have been spared the sense of isolation that besets me. For them, their father is simply out of sight on some extended trip that could end any day. I doubt if they would be any more surprised to come home and find Rob sitting in our living room than they were to see Hans there. I went to early communion on All Souls’ Day and prayed for the soul of my departed husband, but sometimes I feel the children are closer to him through fantasy than I am through faith.
Je t’embrasse,
Bess
November 20, 1919
Dallas
Dearest Papa and Mavis,
Since Halloween the children have talked of nothing but Thanksgiving. I don’t know how they would measure time without holidays. We will be arriving Wednesday afternoon—by automobile!
Annie’s husband, Hans, has moved back to town and gotten a job as a garage mechanic. In return for my continued support of his wife and two children, he is renovating a used car for me. He was able to acquire it at a very good price from a client who was upset by the constant service it required. I agreed to buy it on the condition that Hans would be responsible for its upkeep, so I trust I will be spared the problems that plagued its former owner.
Though Hans and Annie are still estranged, we have all come to depend on him in countless ways. Annie continues to punish him relentlessly for his ill-considered exit from her life last summer, but their small son welcomed him home instantly. The baby, of course, was too young to know she had been abandoned—even briefly—and will not hold him accountable until she is old enough to be told what happened by her mother.
My children have always adored Hans and his affection for them is uncomplicated by the guilt he feels toward his own offspring. I sometimes think men would make better fathers if they did not happen to be married to their children’s mothers.
Annie will not allow Hans inside the house, so when he comes to see the children, he spends his time outdoors, and our small garden is thriving under his attentive eye. He is building a tree house on the branches of the only tree in our back yard large enough to support it and the children are already threatening to move in permanently.
We can hardly wait for next weekend. We’ll start honking as soon as we cross Main Street.
Much love,
Bess
December 6, 1919
Dallas
Dearest Totsie,
Now that I have a car of my own, I am a new woman. I drove the children to Honey Grove for Thanksgiving, but once there I could hardly sit still long enough to pay homage to the obligatory turkey dinner. After the last piece of mincemeat pie had disappeared, I talked the family into leaving the table just as it was and going for a drive in the country.
The children were restless without a destination by which to measure our progress, but I was elated at the endless road ahead of us. I could have kept going far into the night if I had not had other passengers to consider. When it grew dark we headed reluctantly back into Honey Grove and found the dining table just as we had left it. We were all hungry again, so we merely exchanged used china and silverware for new and sat down to cold turkey and dressing.
Now that I am alone, my father and his wife have reasserted their parental role and I am astounded to admit how much I welcome their advice and concern. In the last few years I had begun to feel responsible for them, but my need seems to have made them strong again, and I am grateful for their renewed authority.
I had an unexpected phone call yesterday from the gentleman who has been handling my financial affairs since Rob’s death. He has been away on business all fall and apologized for his neglect. Since I was forced to sell all the stocks he advised me to buy last summer and am in no position to reinvest, it had not occurred to me to feel neglected. Rather I felt in all fairness my financial position no longer merited his attention. However, he has inv
ited me to have dinner with him next week at his downtown club to discuss my future. Since my financial future is nonexistent—at least for now—I cannot imagine what he has in mind. If common courtesy alone were not sufficient reason, curiosity would compel me to accept his invitation.
Je t’embrasse,
Bess
December 14, 1919
Dallas
Dearest Totsie,
Last night I dined with Arthur Fineman—and he gave me back my future. It seems he chose to ignore the telegram I sent him last summer from Vermont ordering him to sell the stocks he was holding in my name. He confessed to me last night that the check he sent me at that time was a personal loan, undertaken at his own risk and without my knowledge.
Last week he sold all the stock I still owned in a locally-based petroleum company—for four times the amount I paid. The difference was enough to repay my entire debt to him. And I still own the other stocks he advised me to buy. I was absolutely speechless on hearing the news last night—and still am today. Fortunately for my sanity, my pen continues to function even when my tongue fails me. However, there is no one within speaking distance who will rejoice at my good fortune as you will on reading this letter. You have always been close enough to hear a cry from the heart, whether the cause be pain or pleasure.
Until last night, I had no hope of being able to do more than go through the motions of Christmas merrymaking, and I was planning a multitude of holiday activities—stringing popcorn and cranberries, baking sugar cookies, making fudge and divinity—to compensate for the lack of presents under the tree on Christmas morning. Then Arthur Fineman appeared on my horizon, as welcome as a wise man from the east, bearing treasure greater than gold, frankincense, or myrrh. What irony that someone who does not believe in Christ has made it possible for us to celebrate Christmas this year.
When I tried to thank him, he said he had been in my debt for a long time now—and nothing he could do for me on a financial level would ever repay the kindness and consideration I had shown him after Eleanor’s accident. He has not seen Eleanor since that fateful day, so I have invited him to come to tea next Sunday and meet the children.
A Woman of Independent Means Page 11