The Way of Beauty

by Camille Di Maio

  “Is Vincenzo here today?” asked Pearl. “He promised to make me an espresso on your new machine next time I was in.”

  “No, my brother is off looking at new locations with an estate agent.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re moving.”

  “Well, not yet, at least. But he is always thinking about expanding either into a second location or just a bigger one. Maybe near Broadway where all the theaters are going in or maybe on the west side.”

  “I’ll follow you anywhere, Sebastiano. You know that. No one makes risotto like you.”

  “Ah, you are in luck, then, Miss Pilkington. We have the most delicious truffles that came in, and we’re serving them with large prawns over risotto.”

  “Perfect.” She turned to Vera. “I assume you don’t mind if I order one for each of us?”

  Vera did not know what risotto was, let alone truffles, and trusted Pearl to make the selection. She’d never eaten in a restaurant like this, though she’d gazed through windows at diners who laughed and conversed over glasses of wine. A world so close but one that might as well have been thousands of miles away.

  Sebastiano led them to a small table in the back. Vera followed Pearl’s lead in placing the cloth napkin across her lap. Pearl slipped her gloves off by pinching the tips of the fingers one by one and loosening them first. Vera watched every detail, every movement, marveling at the ease with which Pearl made such gestures. Vera was certain that she would fumble over such things.

  When her routine was complete, Pearl leaned in. “Caruso dines here when he is in town.”

  “Caruso?” Vera asked.

  “The opera singer. The Metropolitan Opera is not too far. He never fails to stop at Maioglio’s. I’ve seen him here twice already.”

  Vera remembered now. Posters of Rigoletto years ago and others since. She wondered what it would be like to go inside. She’d seen pictures of the grand balconies and golden proscenium. To be dining in the room that such people would come to made her nervous. She clasped her hands together, staving off the instinct to bite her nails.

  “Want a bit of gossip?” Pearl leaned in as she spoke. “Some years ago, Caruso was arrested at the zoo. He pinched the behind of a woman in the monkey exhibit. He blamed it on a monkey but was fined ten dollars when no one believed him.”

  Vera gasped audibly both at the image and at someone like Pearl Pilkington relaying such a tale.

  Pearl’s smile was wide, and Vera had the feeling that she might have told the story as a means of breaking the ice. Their eyes met, and Vera relaxed.

  Pearl grew serious. “You may be wondering why I asked you here.”

  Vera nodded with the intimidation of a schoolgirl. She did indeed think that it was unusual.

  “Of most importance, of course, is the fact that you are very dear to Angelo. He says you’re like a little sister to him.”

  The word stung Vera’s ears. She didn’t want to be his sister. But how could she expect to be anything else?

  Pearl continued, possibly noticing her confusion. “He’s told you about Stephania, didn’t he?”

  “No.” Vera’s heart beat with a sense of foreboding.

  Pearl put a hand to her mouth. “Oh, dear. I didn’t mean to say something I shouldn’t. But now that I’ve started, I hope Angelo can forgive me. You see, Stephania was his sister. His real little sister. She would be just a bit older than you are now. She drowned at Brighton Beach when she was just five years old. Angelo had taken her out for a swim, but she got caught in a current. He still weeps just talking about her. I imagine you came along not too many months after it had happened. Sweet young girl with a scraped knee. And Angelo so thoroughly remorseful for what had occurred.”

  It was all she could do to stay composed. Vera had known none of this. She’d never heard the name Stephania. Or known that he’d had a sister. She’d always assumed that Angelo saw her as a friend. Someone to have adventures with and break the boredom with during slow times during his shift at the family newsstand. But that wasn’t it at all.

  Vera had been no more than a proxy for a dead girl he couldn’t save. A substitute. She’d basked in his affections, thinking that they were real, but they were probably no more than guilt-filled attempts to pour attention onto the first child to come along.

  She felt deceived.

  Although maybe that wasn’t fair. What friendship existed that didn’t fill a need of some kind? Friendships might be built on a desire for companionship, company, laughter, solace. Was it really so terrible that Vera was some kind of alternate for a beloved sibling? Had she not felt love and regard from Angelo? It was her own fault for ever hoping for more, for something that was so obviously impossible. He had never given her a reason to hope for more.

  “So you see,” Pearl said, breaking into her thoughts, “you’re like family in a way. And as I am not close to my own, I am grateful for any opportunity to create one for myself.”

  Vera wrung her hands under the table. Besides her parents, Angelo was the only family she had known. Why not include Pearl in her small circle?

  “Of course,” Vera answered timidly. Sometimes conviction followed the saying of things.

  Pearl clapped her hands in a ladylike way. “Excellent.” She smiled. “I have no sister of my own, so you will be mine as well. And now, my second reason for seeking you out.”

  Vera couldn’t imagine what more there could be.

  “I don’t mean to be indelicate,” Pearl said, “but Angelo told me how your mother died.”

  “My mother?” Vera whispered. That had not been what she expected. If anything, she thought that Pearl might have been luring her here to this luncheon with the intention of telling her to stay away from Angelo now that they were engaged. Though how she would think that Vera could ever be some kind of competition, she didn’t know.

  “Yes. At a shirtwaist factory, if I am correct?”

  “Yes, but not in the fire at Triangle last year. It was long before that.”

  “Exactly. Angelo told me that she died of exhaustion. Long hours. Bad working conditions. Collapsed on the floor and never woke up.”

  Vera nodded again, holding back tears.

  Pearl reached across to her. “Oh, dear. I was indelicate, wasn’t I? I’m always being told that I speak without thinking, that I’m hopelessly brash, but it’s just because life is too short to waste it away on social pleasantries when there is so much work to be done.”

  Vera looked up. “Work?”

  “Yes. That is why I wanted to speak with you today. Your mother was one of many poor women who died in factories. Unfortunately, they didn’t get the attention that they so desperately deserved, and then it took a tragedy like what happened at Triangle and the loss of a hundred forty-six souls to draw attention to the deplorable conditions that exist all over Manhattan. You see, Vera”—Pearl pulled a handkerchief from her purse and dabbed her eyes—“I was there.”

  Vera sat up straight. “You were there? At the Triangle?”

  Pearl nodded. “Not at the building itself. I was lunching not far away at Washington Square Park when we heard the alarms. I could see smoke from the restaurant windows. I ran outside to see what was happening, and it was the stuff of nightmares. Flames, screams, and—” She paused and took a deep breath. “Women jumping.”

  Vera’s own heart clenched. She had heard the stories, but not from one who had been there to see it. “Women jumping,” she echoed under her breath. It was too terrible to think of, let alone to have seen.

  How did one decide in that moment that falling to one’s death was a better option than facing the fire?

  Pearl’s voice quavered. “Here I was enjoying a lunch that I didn’t have to work for, served on china, and tea in silver, and suddenly there was the horror of watching fifty women—can you even imagine?—plummeting from the ninth floor.”

  She wiped her eyes again, this time with a buttoned sleeve. “I won’t say any more. I didn’t even mean to go into that, es
pecially when we are enjoying such a nice day out together. But sometimes I can’t help myself. I will never forget them, Vera, crumpled as they landed on one another. And I knew then that this life of privilege that I enjoyed—much due to workers just like them—was over as I knew it. I could not live with myself if I didn’t try to do something.”

  Vera nearly reached out her hand to comfort Pearl but held back, fearing that their friendship was too new for such a gesture. She wanted, too, to know what Pearl’s family thought but dared not ask. Pearl raised the subject on her own, though.

  “I joined other women who had already been fighting for unions and safety. Clara Lemlich and Rose Schneiderman and Pauline Newman. Much to the embarrassment of my family, I might add. Big businessmen like to watch out for one another. My father told me to stay out of their company, but I’ve never been one to listen well.”

  The names meant nothing to Vera, though she’d heard the word union spoken in her home years ago.

  Pearl took a breath. “There I go again. Vera, if we are to be friends, do not hesitate to interrupt me. My mother tells me that I speak faster than a locomotive, and I daresay she’s right.”

  Sebastiano approached holding two small cups on saucers. “Espresso for the ladies, my compliments.” He set them on the table. “Your risotto will be ready any moment.” He walked back toward the kitchen.

  Vera watched the genteel way Pearl picked up the cup and did the same. It was hot, but Vera didn’t flinch. She inhaled the steam that rose from it and felt immediately intoxicated by the aroma. Surely it tasted as good as it smelled. She put it to her lips and grimaced at the surprise of its bitterness.

  Pearl laughed. “Espresso isn’t for the beginner. I should have warned you. You might want to order it in the future with steamed milk foam. Angelo likes it that way. He calls it cappuccino. It’s named for the Capuchin monks with the brown robes and their shaved white heads.”

  One could always rely on Angelo knowing little things like that. But Vera did not interject to point out the obvious: it was unlikely that she would ever be able to afford to dine in such a place again.

  “I advise you to finish it, though,” Pearl continued. “Stiffens you up and gives you fortitude for hours and hours. And as I said, there’s a lot of work to be done, so you’ll need the reinforcement.”

  Vera sipped at it again, letting it just brush her lips until she got used to the taste. It felt like a rite of passage—this was a drink for a woman, not a girl.

  “Anyway, let me tell you about the work and how you fit into it.” Pearl finished the last of her espresso before Vera was even a quarter of the way done. “Basically, the horrifying working conditions in factories—not just the shirtwaist ones—became too much to ignore, and it brought about the oddest marriage of people. Clara, for example. She’s a socialist from Ukraine, and one of my good friends.” Pearl pulled a cigarette out of her purse and held a match to it. She curled her lips in a rosebud manner and made a nearly perfect circle out of the smoke.

  It was such a glamorous gesture, and Vera thought that perhaps she might buy some and try to imitate it. Cigarettes were not too much of an extravagance, and Vera allowed herself so little as it was.

  Pearl tapped her ashes into a tray. “Clara introduced me to my first husband, may his soul rest in peace. The man was a socialist at heart, and although I’m born of blue-blooded capitalists, I did learn a thing or two about bridging the two worlds.”

  The espresso caught in Vera’s throat, and she coughed. “Husband?”

  “Yes, I’m sorry. I must have given you a shock. I’m a widow, and the mother of a little boy to boot, but I don’t suppose there’s any way you would have known that, as we only just met. So, here’s the story briefly. Ready to keep up? Dear old Owen Bower captured my heart when Clara took me to see him on his soapbox, railing against Tammany Hall. He’d once been a ward boss for them, gathering votes from immigrants, but he grew tired of the corruption he saw. He was what people call charismatic, and I was not the only young woman enthralled by him. I’d like to think that I stood out for more than my beautiful clothes, but I think he was intrigued by a society girl who liked his message. We married, I argued with my parents, then I had a baby, and shortly after . . . Owen was killed by a passing motorcar.”

  “Pearl, I’m so sorry! How awful!” Vera reached a hand across the table. There was a sisterhood to grief. She’d seen enough of it with her parents to know what it felt like to force a smile through the pain of loss.

  “It was awful. The motorist didn’t stop and was never found, but it was a luxurious vehicle, according to witnesses, so I suppose it’s only fitting that he died at the hands of the very people he spoke out against. It made a martyr of him. My grandmother saw me through that time, and it’s her house that I live in on Madison Park. Wanted to rehabilitate me from my pedestrian ways. My parents barely spoke to me, and we’ve only just begun to talk again.”

  She took a final long drag of her cigarette and ground the end into a tray. “Well, that will probably change now that I’m marrying Angelo. Dear Angelo. He’s nothing like Owen. The absolute opposite, in fact. My husband was brash and passionate and sometimes reckless.” A look that could only be described as wistful passed across her face, though Vera could not tell if it was meant for her former husband or her future one. “Angelo is just goodness through and through without the chip on his shoulder.”

  Vera’s heart beat faster at the sound of his name. She’d almost forgotten about Angelo during their exchange, enthralled as she was by her companion. Pearl’s description indeed sounded like the Angelo she knew. He sold newspapers to everyone who came by his stall. The rich, the not so rich. He treated them all the same, and more than once she’d seen him slip a chocolate bar into the hand of a passing child who couldn’t afford it. She smiled at the thought.

  But there was one question that had been weighing on her. She’d thought she knew everything there was to know about Angelo. He’d worked at the family newsstand ever since he was her age. Served at Mass on Sundays. Played bat-and-ball games with his cousins in his free time.

  How had he met Pearl?

  She asked, hoping the wobble she felt in her voice wouldn’t betray what she felt.

  Pearl explained. “Well, the Italians are usually reluctant to join unions. Most of them plan to go back to Italy when conditions are right, or they’re just here to send money back to Mama. So they work hard and don’t get involved in politics. But people like Angelo want to change that and convince them of the opportunities here. It starts with unionizing and later voting. He was volunteering at an event, and I met him there. My Lord, my family’s going to call me a slummer when they find out about him. Maybe they’ll hope for another automobile accident and pray that the third time’s the charm.”

  She must have noticed the horror that Vera felt rise from her chest.

  “Oh, my, I was being uncouth again. Please don’t think I feel so casually about dear Angelo. I love him dearly. Lost my head about him. He came along just as I was feeling so lost without Owen.”

  Remorse pierced Vera as sharply as any sword over not knowing about this side of Angelo. How many chances had she missed in all these years to ask him about his interests? She’d assumed that he was as plain in his pursuits as she was—eking out a living, taking care of family. She mourned the loss of not having joined him in such endeavors. Maybe she would have liked to do noble things, too.

  But how could one afford to be noble when their kind could barely afford to prepare the next meal?

  She wanted to know more, but she couldn’t ask Pearl about Angelo without fighting tears. So she changed the direction of the conversation.

  “And doesn’t the estrangement from your parents bother you?” Vera couldn’t imagine being separated from Mutter and Vater by choice.

  “Please don’t misunderstand what I’m going to say,” said Pearl. “But this is just one of the things that divides our given, well, classes.”

>   Vera tried not to wince. There were a thousand reminders every day of the division of the haves and have-nots. Adding to that litany was not necessary.

  Pearl lowered her voice. “There is no true comparison to be had here, and I know that. Please know that I am not trivializing of those less fortunate than I have been. They are what I am giving my life for. But growing up wealthy isn’t everything you might imagine. Our house is so large that my parents’ bedrooms were on separate floors even from one another. They never stopped calling my room ‘the nursery,’ and I had a nanny until I left home and married Owen. Father was away for business most of the time, and Mother is a socialite with a calendar that rivals the president’s. If I had been a son, it would have been different. But I wasn’t born with the correct parts, I suppose. We women have lost that lucky coin toss. So I grew up lonely. Loneliness is its own poverty.”

  Vera wanted to point out that loneliness didn’t make you go to bed with an ache in your belly from having to skip a meal, but Pearl seemed earnest in her words.

  “So now you can see why I was drawn to Owen and then Angelo. I created my own family. Working together for a cause is a bond tighter than blood, in my opinion. Clara and Rose saw me through my childbirth, while my own mother didn’t even send flowers.”

  It was heartbreaking that a woman would shut out her daughter and grandchild so thoroughly. Maybe there was a certain poverty in riches. Maybe this kind of understanding that Pearl was trying to create across the classes was exactly what would heal the divide.

  “And this is where you come in,” she continued, sitting up straight. “I want to ask you to join this sisterhood. The stakes are higher than they’ve ever been, and I’m going to be called away more and more to help. I thought of something that might benefit us both.”

  Pearl leaned in, and Vera responded in kind. She held her breath, anticipating what Pearl might be asking of her. To join the cause? To attend rallies and register voters? It might be exciting. And she warmed at the thought of a lady like Pearl Pilkington choosing her among so many to assist in the work.