The Unfortunates

by Laurie Graham

  ‘The nose is cancelled,’ she said. ‘And the singing lessons and the French and the cotillions. There’s no sense in exerting ourselves in that direction anymore.’

  The husband hunt had been called off. Still, I had rather enjoyed my singing lessons.

  I said, ‘Shouldn’t you like me to be able to sing for you sometimes, Ma?’

  ‘Not at all,’ she said. ‘I should like you to read to me sometimes from the Home Journal. And mend stockings.’

  She tried to stroke my hair, but her fingers caught in it. Standing in the rain had given it a particularly vicious kink.

  ‘We’ll just live quietly now,’ she said. ‘No more dinners.’

  Dinners had always been a trial to her, as she clambered the foothills of society. She had once committed the solecism of following a potage crème with creams of veal en dariole. It was only the dessert, a Prune Shape, produced by Reilly, our cook, in a moment of whimsy, as a substitute for the Almond Shape that had been ordered, which saved Ma from the social ruin of presiding over a completely beige meal.

  As far as I know she never descended to the kitchen. Her negotiations with Reilly were conducted entirely through a speaking tube that connected the parlor to the scullery. The temperature of their exchanges rose as the dinner hour drew near, and neither party ever seemed to understand that they could not only hear and be heard. They could also be overheard.

  ‘Reilly has been nipping at the brandy,’ was one of Ma’s favorite asides.

  Reilly herself was fond of the prefix ‘fecken’’, as in, ‘I’ll give her fecken’ fricandeau of sweetbreads, all right.’

  I took this to be a quaint usage from Reilly’s home country and sometimes repeated it, in imitation of her. I had no idea what it meant, and neither did Ma, so no harm was done.

  On the day of a dinner, Ma required an extra dose of Tilden’s, for her nerves. The day after a dinner, her shades were kept tightly closed and she took nothing stronger than seltzer water. That Pa’s death meant an end to all this was no cause of regret to me.

  I said, ‘What about the backboard? Do I still have to wear that?’

  ‘Good posture is always an asset,’ she said, ‘even in a homely girl.’

  I sensed, though, that this was the moment to strike as many bargains as possible, and I was just about to sue for a ceasefire in the war against my protruding ears, when Aunt Fish appeared in the doorway. In her hand were the ashes of my corrective nightwear bandeaux.

  ‘Dora!’ she said. ‘I have had the candle removed from Poppy’s vanity table. I fear she is not yet to be trusted with unguarded flames.’

  FIVE

  Like Great Uncle Meyer, Aunt and Uncle Fish had not been blessed with children of their own, and perhaps they had expected Ma and Pa to follow Grandpa Minkel’s example and hand over their spare. At any rate, Aunt Fish seemed to believe she had some lien over me and the bigger I grew, the more forthcoming she was with her advice and opinions.

  On the subject of molding and polishing Honey, she had deferred to my mother. Clearly she, the elder sister, understood better than Aunt Fish, a younger and childless person, how to raise a daughter, especially a daughter as perfectly pink and golden as Honey. But my aunt sensed the moment would come when her talents for, as she put it, ‘the handling of more difficult cases’ would be gratefully received. If Aunt Fish ever had a career, it was me.

  After Pa’s death she deemed her normal daily visits to be inadequate and she moved into our house for an indefinite period, to spare Ma the burden of household decisions and make good my deficiencies as a tower of strength. Ma suggested that this might be a great inconvenience to Uncle Israel, but he insisted that nothing could be more convenient to him. He would dine at his club, he said, and be occupied until late every night going through Pa’s complicated business affairs with Mr Levi, ensuring everything was in order.

  Complicated was a word that filled Ma with terror.

  ‘Are they not all in order, Israel?’ she asked him, handkerchief at the ready.

  ‘Nothing to worry about, Dora,’ he said. ‘I’m just going through things to make sure. Abe would have done the same for me.’

  I said, ‘Are we ruined, Uncle Israel? Am I still a mustard heiress?’

  ‘Poppy!’ Aunt Fish said. ‘That is a thing to have said about one. One should not say it of oneself!’

  ‘Never fear, Pops,’ Uncle said, ‘you’ll come into a handsome amount.’

  Ma said, ‘Not that you’ll have any need of it, since you will always have a home here and be provided for. You might think, Poppy, when you are of age, of making donations and helping with good works.’

  ‘There’ll certainly be plenty for that,’ Uncle said. ‘The Education Alliance is doing fine work with the immigrants. And The Daughters of Jacob. Both very worthy causes.’

  Aunt Fish said, ‘Dora didn’t mean that kind of cause, Israel. One has to be careful in selecting one’s charities. They reflect on one so. Poppy might do better sending money to the little black babies in Africa.’

  I’m sure it’s very easy to spend someone else’s inheritance. I didn’t bother to tell them I intended spending mine on silk harem pants and a gasoline-powered automobile and cake.

  So Uncle dined at the Harmonie Club every night and Aunt Fish moved in with us and began nursing my mother through a carefully planned convalescence. At first, no callers were received. Ma stayed in her room and toyed with a little calf’s-foot jelly. I was allowed to brush her hair for fifteen minutes each day, and sometimes Honey came and read to her from Fashion Notes.

  The name Minkel had only appeared in the first list of survivors published in The New York Times. By the time the next edition went to press, the phantom Mrs Minkel had disappeared and Ma seemed to be none the wiser. Harry Glaser had done something useful for once in his life.

  By the middle of May, Ma had progressed to a small, baked fillet of sole with bread and butter fingers, followed by vermicelli pudding or perhaps an orange custard, by way of variety, and she felt able to receive Mrs Lesser and Mrs Schwab, and eventually the Misses Stone.

  Mrs Schwab was herself a widow and understood what was appropriate, but Mrs Lesser was unpredictable. Sometimes she simply reported on the refreshments and gossip at her latest crush – she was very keen to be known for her afternoon teas – but sometimes she would canter off into more dangerous territory. Would there ever be a funeral for Pa, she would suddenly wonder out loud. If not, could there be a funeral monument? And if there could, what form should it take?

  One of my duties was to anticipate this kind of conversational turn and head off Mrs Lesser at the pass, but sometimes my attention wandered and before I knew it Aunt Fish would be fanning Ma and tutting at me and suggesting to Mrs Lesser that she had already given us more than enough of her valuable time.

  The thing was, I had questions myself, most of them far more macabre than Mrs Lesser’s. I knew, for instance, that the bodies of drowned persons were often hooked out of the East River and the Hudson, but I suspected things worked differently in an ocean. Still, sometimes I imagined Pa’s poor body, slowly finding its way to Pier 32. And other times I imagined he had never boarded that accursed boat. That he was still in London, inspecting his subsidiaries, and Irish Nellie had been, as usual, telling whoppers.

  None of these ideas could ever be aired, of course. They were merely evidence of the unhealthy state of my mind and I knew better than to draw that kind of attention to myself. Apart from my sleeplessness and loss of appetite, daily life had become easier with Pa gone. Since April eighteenth my hair had been left au naturel. This alone gave me such a fierce appearance, I doubt even Aunt Fish would have dared to suggest resuming the applications of neck-whitener. We had reached a kind of accommodation. No one troubled me with beauty regimes, and I troubled no one with my questions. Then the Misses Stone came to call.

  ‘It occurs to us,’ one of them began, ‘we might be of assistance, at this sad time, in the … disposal of … u
nhappy reminders.’

  The Misses Stone were collecting unwanted clothes for their Immigrant Aid Fund. It had never crossed my mind that Pa’s things wouldn’t hang forever in their closets. I visited them every day and buried my face in the cloth of his coats, to smell his cologne. The possibility that the Misses Stone might bundle them away and give them to strangers hit me much harder than the news of the sinking. I sprang from my chair while Ma and Aunt Fish still sat, pudding-faced, absorbing the request.

  ‘We have only happy, treasured reminders of my dear father and there are no plans to dispose of any of them’ was what I intended to say. But it came out as ‘They’re mine, you hateful crows! Pa’s things are mine! And no one else shall ever take them.’

  They were unnerved by the sight of me, I know. Even diminished by grief, there was enough of me to make two of the birdlike Misses Stone, and then there was my hair, which weeks of neglect had turned from a deformity into an instrument of terror. They fluttered toward the door under cover of Aunt Fish’s bosom.

  ‘Unhinged by our loss,’ I heard her whisper. ‘Perhaps, when a little more time has passed …’ and the Misses Stone made little gobbling noises of sympathy.

  Ma was looking at me in amazement.

  ‘Don’t let them take his things,’ I yelled at her. ‘Don’t let anyone take them. I miss Pa. I have to have the smell of him.’

  ‘Oh Poppy,’ was all she said. ‘Oh Poppy …’

  ‘Well!’ Aunt Fish said, when she returned from seeing off the Misses Stone. ‘That was a fine display you made of yourself.’

  Ma struggled to her feet. I realize now she was only forty-two and not at all the old lady she seemed. She put out her arms and held me stiffly to her jet stomacher.

  ‘Oh Poppy,’ she said, ‘how stricken you are. I think perhaps one of my powders …’

  She turned to Aunt Fish, who was all for smacking me, I dare say.

  ‘Zillah,’ she said, ‘I think poor Poppy needs a powder. Or perhaps some of my special drops?’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Aunt Fish. ‘And time alone, in her room, to compose herself and consider what embarrassment she has caused.’

  I said, ‘I’m sure it wasn’t me who came begging for a dead man’s clothes. I’m sure we are not the ones who should feel embarrassed.’

  Ma released me from our awkward embrace.

  ‘They are crows, Aunt Fish,’ I cried, as I fled the room. ‘They are crows and you are a gull for allowing them.’

  I hid for an hour inside Pa’s closet, comforted a little by its smells but anxious, too, that they might be fading. When I returned to my room, a small bottle had appeared on my night table. Pryce’s Soothing Extract of Hemp, recommended for cases of nervous excitement.

  SIX

  All through June and July our household was run by Aunt Fish, and then she stayed on through the worst of the August heatwave because we had an electric fan and she did not, and she feared she might expire without it. Uncle Israel struggled on without her, quite weary I suppose of having to dine out every night and drink champagne and play cards with other poor bachelors.

  The days hung dead and hopeless. We visited no one, we had nothing to refresh our conversations, and every exchange was hobbled by unmentionable subjects. Water, travel, Europe, mustard, Iowa, money, joy, happiness, unhappiness; these were the main taboos. But to those I added my own secret list: Irish secretaries, gowns by Mr Worth, death by drowning and ghosts.

  I was employed in a series of sewing assignments, trimming handkerchiefs with black ribbon, and turning slightly worn sheets sides to middle, a pointless exercise made all the more absurd by the fact that I had ten thumbs. In the privacy of my room, when I made clothes for my dolls and stitched them with my preferred left hand, I sewed very well indeed, but in the parlor, of course, only the use of the correct hand was permitted.

  ‘How awkward you look, Poppy,’ Ma said. ‘But you must persevere.’

  While I stitched, Ma and Aunt Fish conversed. In the morning, dinner was discussed, and the social events none of us would be attending. Just once a week my aunt would tear herself away from us to attend the opera.

  ‘It gives me no pleasure, Dora,’ she always said, ‘but a box cannot go to waste.’

  Otherwise the evenings were spent considering next day’s luncheon and reviewing our health, two not unconnected subjects.

  ‘An omelette is very binding,’ Aunt Fish would bid.

  ‘But celery is invigorating,’ Ma would counter-bid.

  My only release from this was that once a week I was allowed to visit Honey. She and Harry had a red-brick on West 74th Street with a bay window high above the street that made it lighter and more cheerful than home. The serviceable, dark plum chintz had been picked out on Ma’s advice, and I now recognize, recalling the abundance of valances and frilled portières, other signs of her hand. If society abhorred a naked door frame, who was she to argue?

  Still, I loved to visit there and play Chinese checkers and try on Honey’s new hats, and she enjoyed my being there. Sometimes, without Ma around, or Harry, she could be quite gay.

  But in the fall of 1912 something changed. On my weekly visit there was no gaiety. All afternoon Honey just sat in her cushioned rocker and sucked peppermints. And the next week, and the next. It was December before I found out why. A baby was coming to live with Honey and Harry.

  This news made me very happy. I had often wished to have a brother or a puppy and Honey’s baby seemed to promise a good alternative.

  ‘Where is it coming from?’ I asked, and Honey turned scarlet.

  ‘A little star fell from heaven,’ Ma said, ‘and has come to rest under her heart.’

  I had noticed that the area beneath and around Honey’s heart had expanded recently, but I’d attributed this to the quantity of violet creams she ate.

  ‘And then what?’ I asked.

  ‘The stork will bring it from a special baby garden,’ Aunt Fish cut in.

  ‘Yes,’ said Ma, abandoning her story about the star, ‘and give it to the nurse and she’ll place it in the cradle.’

  I was confused. So next time I was down in the kitchen, looking for company and cookies, I asked the Irish. We had a rosy-cheeked one at that time, quite pretty.

  ‘I wonder where Honey’s baby will come from?’ I said, drawing on the oilcloth with my wetted finger.

  The Irish put down the silver cloth.

  ‘How old are you, Poppy?’ she asked.

  I was just fifteen.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘you know you get your monthly health …?’

  Reilly slammed down a tureen in front of her.

  ‘Wash out your mouth and get on with your work,’ she said.

  The Irish grinned at me and polished on in silence until Reilly disappeared into the pantry. Then she leaned across the table.

  ‘’Tis very simple,’ she whispered. ‘Mr Harry had his way with her and put a bun in her oven and now she’ll blow up and up till her time comes and then she’ll be brought to bed of it and scream and scream and drop it like a sow-pig, and then there’ll be a grand pink little baby.’

  I ran to my room and tried to compose myself before luncheon. I vowed, on my next visit to West 74th Street, to tell Honey what I’d learned. She seemed so calm, languid even, I couldn’t believe she understood what a terrible fate awaited her.

  ‘Harry will do it,’ Ma always said. ‘Leave it to Harry.’

  Leave it to Harry indeed. I might have guessed he had something to do with it.

  My sister was brought to bed of a baby boy on May 28, 1913. Three weeks before, she had taken up residence in her old room, so Ma and Aunt Fish could keep watch for the stork, so I supposed. In the event, things turned out much as the Irish had said they would, with Harry being sent away and Honey screaming, and a nurse arriving who drank quantities of tea, and finally a doctor in a top hat, with something in his bag that put a stop to all the yelling.

  I was allowed to see my nephew when he was two hours
old, and then it devolved to me to start breaking the news to Ma that he would not be named Abe, for his dear departed grandpa.

  ‘How well he suits “Sherman”,’ I said. Honey had suggested this as an opening.

  ‘Sherman?’ Ma said. ‘Sherman? As usual you are quite mistaken, Poppy. In this family we do not name our children after … hotels.’

  ‘Not after the hotel, Ma,’ Harry tittered, when he was finally admitted to see his wife and child. ‘Sherman, as in General William Tecumseh Sherman.’ And he attempted to sing ‘While We Were Marching Through Georgia’, as though that explained everything.

  Ma was quiet for a while.

  ‘It seems to me,’ she said, returning to the battlefield, ‘that if you wish to name my grandson for a public figure, it should be for our new president. Abraham Woodrow Glaser sounds very well.’

  ‘’Fraid not, Ma,’ Harry said. ‘Can’t tar the boy with a Democrat brush. His name will be Sherman Ulysses, and that’s my final word on it.’

  Ma’s knuckles whitened round her handkerchief.

  ‘Tell you what though,’ he said, backtracking a little at the prospect of tears. ‘Tell you what. If the next one’s a girl, we’ll name her Dora, for you.’

  From what I had seen and heard that day, I doubted there would be a next one. I planned to consult the Irish again and see whether such things could be prevented.

  Meanwhile ugly little Sherman Ulysses Glaser cried and slept and cried some more, and eventually I was allowed to cradle him.

  ‘I’m your maiden aunt Poppy,’ I told him, and he curled his little fingers around my thumb. Honey had three weeks lying-in before she took him home to West 74th Street, and Ma didn’t waste a moment of it.

  ‘Abraham,’ she kept whispering to him as he slept. ‘Grandma’s special little Abraham.’

  Down in the kitchen I heard talk.

  ‘Is Mrs Honey’s baby to be cut?’ the Irish asked me.

  ‘Why?’ I asked, and she and Reilly exchanged annoying little smiles. I took the question straight to Ma, who was sitting with Aunt Fish and Honey and Harry’s mother, the senior Mrs Glaser.