by Megan Chance
When Gideon was falling asleep, I whispered to him that I was so happy he belonged to me, and he roused and kissed me and said we belonged to each other, and that I must remember it always.
APRIL 24, 1875—Last night I went to sing for Mr. McAlester—whose Christian name I don’t know even now. He has a small house near Telegraph Hill, and there are many lovely things within it, and when I arrived I saw the dinner he had laid out and the fine china and silver and all the little touches in the decor and I thought he must have a wife or sister or mother to have done it for him, but he said no, he was quite alone.
It was not until we were halfway through the main course that I realized he had meant it literally. There was not even a servant about, and a thought began to grow in my mind that I resisted. But when dinner was over Mr. McAlester listened to me sing with such divine attention that I was reassured it was all he wanted.
But then he began to talk about how he might be willing to rethink his percentages if I could convince him. I knew the whole company was counting on me, and The Royal is a fine theater, and every other is already booked. I remembered what Gideon had said about how expensive the tour was, and how he was paying the company only to sit about, and I thought of the house I wanted to buy in Manhattan, and I told Mr. McAlester that I was quite certain he would come to see our side of things, and then I unbuttoned my gown.
I let him fuck me there on the carpet before the fireplace. He agreed to Gideon’s terms, and I made him sign a piece of paper to that effect, and then I left. I felt like a whore—this wasn’t as it had been with Leonard, but was so purely business without any charm or liking to disguise it, that I was repulsed and angry.
I pushed the paper beneath Gideon’s door, but I didn’t wake him. I went into my room and I vomited in the chamber pot, and then I took the bottle of brandy Gideon keeps there because sometimes a hot toddy soothes my throat, and I drank it until my trembling stopped and I thought I could sleep.
Then I dreamed of Barret. His eyes were clear and gleaming and knowing, and he said that he knew what I was even if no one else did, and I could run from it all I liked but in the end I knew it too. He asked if there was anything I wouldn’t do to advance myself and Gideon. “Will you give up your soul, Sabine?”
MAY 7, 1875—Mr. McAlester has asked us to extend our stay (oh yes, he is doing very well even with our higher percentages, as Gideon told him he would—I wish one could write sarcasm as easily as one could say it). But Gideon said no, and I was relieved. Though the crowds love me, and I am called the Angel of San Francisco, the city no longer holds the charm it once had for me. I dislike the theater—though the acoustics are nice enough, I must pass Mr. McAlester nearly every day and now and then he paws me as if he thinks I would consent to lie down with him on the backstage floor.
What is worse than all that, however, is the fact that Gideon and I are barely speaking. I practice with him every day, of course, and he is how he always is when in a temper of this sort—very exacting and most unfair. I am straining, my legato is not legato but staccato, the cadenza is excessive, & etc. I would ignore him as I always do, except that I am angry with him. I have done everything he wished for me to do, so I don’t know why he should be so furious with me. We come together at practice, and glare at each other over the dinner table and I would hate him with every part of myself if I did not yearn for him so badly to love me again that I cry myself to sleep every night.
MAY 10, 1875—How is it possible to love someone so much and yet hate him equally? It’s true what Gideon once told me, that when I punish him I only hurt myself.
Last night, our last performance, was the best house we’d had. I was so moved by the audience’s cries, and feeling in such charity, I vowed I would speak with Gideon tonight and do my best to mend things with him.
But then I was in the wings, taking bouquets from the stagehand before I went out to take my final bow, and I saw Gideon and Leila in the corner behind the curtain. She was clinging to him, and he was kissing her, and I went cold and faint. The stagehand had to push me out onto the stage to take my bow, and I must have bowed and smiled & etc., but I don’t remember any of it. All I remember is coming offstage and Gideon coming to help me with the flowers, but before he could I gave the bouquets to the stagehand and turned to Yuri, who was coming offstage too. He came to kiss my cheek in congratulations as he always does, and I turned my face and met his lips, and he, like the full-blooded Russian he is, took advantage and kissed me back. I grabbed him to keep him from pulling away and kissed him very deeply. He was laughing at the end, and he bowed and said, “My dear Sabine, you have made certain I will have very sweet dreams!”
Gideon was very angry. He deserved it, so I did not feel the least bit sorry, not even when Yuri left and Gideon grabbed my arm and asked me what the hell I thought I was doing? I wrenched away from him and said he should look to his own behavior. By then, everyone backstage was staring at us. I didn’t care, but he is too aware of what others think, and he told them curtly to go to dinner, and then he took my elbow hard and whispered in my ear that we would speak in my dressing room. He told the stage manager there would be no backstage visits tonight, and that I would wave from my balcony in the morning before we left.
When he closed the door of my dressing room, I turned and slapped him as hard as I could and screamed that he was fucking Leila and I wouldn’t have it and I went to slap him again, only this time he caught my wrist and said very low and quiet to watch my voice. I told him I’d seen him kissing her tonight, and he said it was her kissing him, and that he’d been only trying to console her because she was jealous of how many encores I got, and she had taken advantage.
I called him a liar. I said she was in love with him. He said he couldn’t help it if she was, and that he hardly went around fucking every woman who was in love with him when the one he most wanted was me. But he said it as if he hated that it were true, and then he backed me up until I fell onto the chaise. My bustle sprang and bit into my back; he pushed up my skirts and unfastened his trousers and then he was inside me. I dug my nails into his back and shoulders; I wanted to cause him pain. My release when it came was unsatisfying. We were both so angry it seemed the air was quivering.
He made a sound deep in his throat and got up as if he could hardly wait to be gone. And then he walked out and left me there, and I buried my face in the stinking cushions of the chaise and once again sobbed until I lost my voice.
I don’t care if I never see San Francisco again.
CHAPTER 14
Seattle, Washington Territory—July 1881
All the rest of that night, and through Saturday, I told myself I would not sing in the choir. And then, when Sunday morning arrived and Charlotte came to walk with me to church, I told myself it was only right to tell Mr. Anderson in person I’d reconsidered. Charlotte and I hovered outside the doors, which had been kept open for the faint breeze. As I watched the women in satins and taffetas and calicos, men in morning coats and frock coats—Seattle’s upper class, along with the usual merchants and storekeeps and butchers—I grew more and more convinced I was making the right decision.
Then the choir came out and I saw how their voices blended—Mr. Anderson was right when he said he knew how to make a chorus. They harmonized beautifully, no one voice standing out, and they looked a piece in their purple satin robes. And if I felt a wistful longing and thought that no one would pick me out from the others, all I had to do was remember how Johnny had looked Friday night to remind me of what was at stake.
We drew back into the corners as the service ended and the congregation filed out of the church, and the preacher with them, all of them lingering about the narrow yard while they said their good-byes in the mellow late morning air. Then Charlotte and I slipped inside.
The church still smelled of perfume and tobacco. The choir mulled about; most had already taken off their robes and laid them over the back of the pews. Mrs. Anderson was bustling about, picking them
up, shaking them out.
Mr. Anderson was leafing through piano music. He glanced up when we approached. “Miss Olson! Miss Rainey!” he said with real enthusiasm. “Come, come! Let me introduce you to the rest of our choir.”
I grasped Charlotte’s hand and pulled her with me. “Mr. Anderson,” I began. “I’m afraid—”
“Here they are!” He walked to where a group of men and women waited. They were talking and laughing among themselves, obviously well acquainted. I had no choice but to follow him. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said before I could stop him, “I would like to introduce our newest member, Miss Marguerite Olson.”
They looked up with interest, and I felt my attempt at refusal die in my throat. I could not embarrass him now, in front of all of them.
“We’ve been in dire need of a soprano since Mrs. Davis left last spring,” said a dark-haired man with sparkling dark eyes who Mr. Anderson introduced as Dr. Robert Marsdon. “Dare I hope that’s the part you sing?”
“She’s a soprano,” Charlotte interjected. “You’re lucky to have her.”
But for Dr. Marsdon, the names of the others slipped by me: there was a tall, thin merchant with sandy hair, two older men, one grizzled in a morning coat and well-tailored vest, obviously prosperous, and a fourth who was a dark-haired butcher.
As for the women: two were young, the debutante-aged daughters of a Mrs. Audrey Lapp, who was bedecked in ruffled taffeta and a widow’s bonnet; one was a spinster, who wore deep puce and held her chin very high—I thought her name was Isabelle Wright. One other was the wife of the butcher. They all looked at me with interest, but it was—thankfully—only that which comes upon meeting a new colleague, and nothing more.
“Do you join the choir as well, Miss Rainey?” Mrs. Lapp asked.
Charlotte shook her head. “No, ma’am. I ain’t much interested. I’m only here as a friend.”
Mrs. Lapp peered at me, and I bent my head, uncomfortable beneath her gaze. “Have you been in Seattle long, Miss Olson?”
“More than three years now,” I said.
“And only just now come to church?”
Mr. Anderson interjected himself smoothly between us. He had a pile of hymnals, which he passed out to us. “Shall we begin? I’d like to work on a new song this morning. If you will all turn to hymn forty-two.”
I took the hymnal into my hand. I would practice with them, as it seemed I had no choice, but only for today. Once it was over and Mr. Anderson was alone, I would speak to him. For now … I threw a nervous look at Charlotte. She only smiled at me and withdrew, sitting beside the merchant’s wife in the pew to watch. Mr. Anderson directed us into position—I was made to stand between the young Deborah Lapp and Miss Wright, who were the only other sopranos.
As we took our places, I felt Miss Lapp’s gaze touch upon my scar, but she was too well-bred to say anything. Miss Wright was not so circumspect. “What a terrible scar, Miss Olson.”
Mr. Anderson saved me from answering. He had seated himself at the piano, and now he laid his hands upon the keys, and we all went still.
I was skilled at this; I’d had to learn new music almost constantly, and this was easy for me. I did not falter as he played the melody, though those around me did, and as a consequence, my voice rang out far too loudly. It startled me, and I was uncomfortable when Dr. Marsdon turned from his place down the riser to look at me. I felt the glances of the others as well, and I made myself look straight ahead, to Charlotte, who smiled in encouragement, and forced myself to sing more quietly—to blend was my goal, I reminded myself. The habit of being distinctive was one I could not indulge.
When the song was over, Mr. Anderson took us each through the parts, the contraltos first, and Miss Lapp leaned close to whisper, “What a divine voice you have, Miss Olson! I’ve never heard finer!”
I smiled at her, but the compliment unnerved me. I had to restrain the urge to leave the church. It was only for today, I reminded myself, and then Mr. Anderson came to the sopranos and took us again through our part in the song, and I concentrated on the sounds of the voices beside me—Miss Wright’s strong clear soprano and Miss Lapp’s softer, more girlish one. Deliberately, I tuned myself to them. I contoured my voice, I brought it to blend—softer, a little breathier. In my head I heard the terse instruction: “No, not that way! Breathe deeper—from the diaphragm, yes, yes!” and I ignored it as I had never done before. I made myself into what they expected me to be, a woman who could sing, but who would never set the world aflame.
After that, despite my intention, I began to relax. I began to enjoy it. As we went through that hymn again, and again, and then once more, and then moved on to the others the choir already knew, I found myself smiling. By the end of the practice, I felt as if a press inside of me had eased; I could breathe again, and yet I had not realized until now that I had not been. I had not felt the press until it was gone.
And suddenly I did not want to refuse this.
I let Mr. Anderson hurry away, and knew I would regret it, and yet I simply could not make myself go after him. The pleasure the singing had brought was too much; already I was thinking how to keep it secret, how to manage it. I doubted any of these people knew Johnny personally. And as for my being recognized … I’d seen already how anonymous they were standing in matching robes, how none of them stood out. I could make myself disappear among them. I could blend my voice and do my hair to mostly cover my scar and stand in the back. No one would guess who I really was. And Johnny would never have to know.
There was a part of me that knew this was reckless, that sneered at such wishful thinking, but in the end, the truth was only this: I wanted to sing in the choir, and I wanted it badly enough that none of the rest mattered.
When Mr. Anderson dismissed us, Miss Lapp stepped with me down the riser and said, “I’m so glad you’ve joined us, Miss Olson. Why, I think I was afraid to sing out until I heard the strength of your voice!”
Charlotte came up to us then, smiling. “That was lovely.”
“Quite lovely indeed,” Dr. Marsdon said at my shoulder. “I would have said we needed two sopranos to complete the choir, Miss Olson, but you have filled the void admirably.”
“You’re very kind,” I said.
“Wherever did Anderson find you?”
“You can thank me for that,” Charlotte said. “I heard her sing and insisted she come.”
He turned to her. “Ah. So you’re a member of the congregation?”
Charlotte laughed. The sound was rich and full; I did not miss how it arrested him. “I hardly—”
“I think you’ll see Miss Rainey every Sunday now, Dr. Marsdon,” I interrupted quickly as Charlotte looked at me in surprise.
Marsdon smiled. It brought out well-established laugh lines on his face. He was not so young as I had supposed. “Then I shall look forward to it.”
When he’d gone, Charlotte said to me, “I ain’t much for churchgoing, you know that. Or d’you mean to re form me?”
“I doubt I could,” I teased. “But I’ve no intention of coming here to sing without you.”
“Don’t tell me you’re nervous?”
“As it happens, I am. I suffer terribly from stage fright.”
She laughed again. “You do not!”
“I could never go onstage without a good-luck kiss,” I told her honestly.
“But you’re too old now to need your papa’s blessing.”
“Yours will do.” I led her to the door and out into the day. I had not realized how hot the church had been until we stepped outside. “Besides, I think Dr. Marsdon might find his Sundays much better decorated if you’re there.”
“Don’t tease.”
“I’m not teasing. Did you see the way he looked at you?”
“I saw the way he looked at you. The way all the men do. That scar of yours makes you mysterious. Hell, if you were a whore, you’d make a fortune.”
I ignored that. “It wasn’t me he was looking at when he sa
id he looked forward to next Sunday.”
She put her hand on my arm to stop me. “Don’t, Marguerite. Please.”
I pulled away. “You’re being foolish.”
“I know you meant to keep me from saying where I was from. But I’d rather he know the truth. Then he’ll leave me alone—or he’ll come down to the Palace and pay me for a fuck. Either way’s fine with me.”
“Charlotte—”
“Next time he asks, I’ll tell him.”
“You will not,” I said. “Did you think I was trying to save you from embarrassment in there? Only Mr. Anderson knows about the Palace, and I’d like to keep it that way. The last thing I want is for any of this to get back to Johnny.”
“Oh.” Her voice was small. “I forgot about that.”
“Please don’t forget again.”
“I won’t,” she said, and there was something in her tone I’d never heard before, some little irritation that unsettled me. “You can be sure of it.”
CHAPTER 15
Johnny was impatient and short waiting for Blakely Davis’s decision about investing. I was not. Nothing could progress until we had the money in hand, and the longer it took, the better.
But a week hadn’t passed when Johnny called me into his office.
“I got a letter from that son of a bitch.” He held the pages out to me, dangling them between his fingers as if they were noxious. Mockingly, he said, “He sends Miss Olson his most sincere regards.”
“What else does he say?”
“That he’s thinking about our offer. That he has to go to Chicago for a few months, but he hopes to come to a decision when he returns. That’s what I get for dealing with Daddy’s boys.” Johnny threw the letter to his desk. “Dillydallying shit. Why the hell should we wait for him? What does it matter what the place looks like? If I had Adelina Patti here right now, you could be damn sure people wouldn’t give a damn whether or not there’s a drop curtain.”