Compromise with Sin

by Leanna Englert

  After meeting with women in eight rural communities during a whistle-stop tour of Nebraska, Louise arrived in Kearney, her last stop. There she had been aided in setting up a speaking engagement by a doctor’s wife, one of the few who had taken a petition the day of Louise’s first speech. The setting was the Kearney Public Library, decorated for the season with cornstalks and pumpkins inside and out.

  Attendance in Kearney, as in other communities, was high, no doubt due to Helen’s article. As usual, Louise’s strategy was to speak briefly, touching on the same points highlighted in Helen’s article. Then she invited the audience to express their concerns.

  “It’s an outrage that legislators just dig in and refuse to consider a bill,” a woman said.

  Louise had learned that if she didn’t say everything she knew in her speech, chances were the opportunity to make her points would come up during the question-and-answer period. She responded to the sympathetic woman’s comment. “Telling them the human stories of children like Vinny who are needlessly blind hasn’t moved them. But we expect to make progress as we compile statistics about the cost of educating a child in the Smithville Asylum versus the cost of prevention. We believe the state could provide silver nitrate for every hospital, every doctor, and every midwife at a cost less than keeping one child in the Asylum.”

  After the program, Louise comforted a tearful mother who said her child’s sightless but normal-looking eyes brought stares and gossip which she blamed on the campaign. “I can sympathize,” Louise said. “I’ve been the target of vicious tongues as well. Be strong, and know in your heart that you are pure.”

  It wasn’t the first time she’d met a mother who felt she and her child were maligned, that the campaign planted false assumptions. Louise always encouraged those mothers to tell her their stories. The poor women needed someone who would listen and understand. It was in these moments that the campaign’s failure to win legislation weighed most heavily. She pitied the blind children who suffered ridicule and vowed it must not be for naught.

  Arriving home exhausted from Kearney, Louise was nevertheless buoyed by the number of women who were receptive to her message. She passed through the lobby and acknowledged the three blue-haired widows who sat at their regular table working a jigsaw puzzle. They smiled and returned the greeting. After collecting her mail and newspaper from the front desk, she was looking forward to a steaming hot bath with no end of hot water.

  She summoned the elevator, and when its doors opened one of the housekeeping girls got off pushing a Whirlwind Maid. It was a familiar sight, yet it always aroused a touch of nostalgia.

  Shortly after she entered her apartment, a porter delivered her bags. Louise first opened the one that held Sunny. Clutching the doll to her breast, she pictured Marie cutting out the felt skirt, the movement of her mouth synchronized with the scissors. She returned Sunny to her special place and decided the rest of the unpacking could wait.

  After drawing a bath, she eased into the tub, enjoying the sensation of water so hot it stung her legs. She closed her eyes. Relaxation set in. Resting her head on the tub, she let idle thoughts go where they would. Twirling a finger in the water caused whorls to appear and vanish, like thoughts that flowed easily and gently without leaving a trace of their existence on her mind. She reveled in the forgetting, the emptiness, a welcome contrast to the campaign’s intensity.

  She stepped from her bath, put on her nightgown and Frank’s robe, and made a pot of tea. Seated at the breakfast room table with her tea, the mail, and the newspaper, she sighed, so grateful to be home.

  One item in her mail was an envelope with Bernard Feldman’s return address, different from the envelopes in which he sent checks for her share of the Whirlwind Maid profits. It was a short ink-smudged note.

  Dear Mrs. Morrissey,

  I write to you with a heavy heart, as though I carry the weight of a giant boulder. I cannot bear to live with myself since the passing of Frank and Marie for I failed them and you. I was with Frank that fateful night at the hotel. We were in our cups, and I said something that hit him wrong. I should have done everything in my power to prevent him from driving. I went to bed thinking he would sleep it off. I should have done more to stop him.

  My sin of omission leaves me with as much guilt as if I had been driving that truck. I wish G-d had taken me instead of them. I am not asking your forgiveness, for my actions were unforgivable. If there is ever anything I can do for you, do not hesitate to ask.

  I trust this finds you well.

  Yours truly,

  Bernard Feldman

  Louise remembered having felt unnerved when Bernard looked at Marie’s eyes. In the course of his medical studies had he learned to recognize the characteristic scarring from gonorrhea? Did Bernard say something to Frank about gonorrhea in a drunken argument? Something happened that night to make Frank think Yonder was Marie’s father. She had no idea what to make of this letter, much less how to respond to it.

  36

  January 1908

  Louise left the January meeting worried about the morale of the dedicated Committee, which, following a couple of disheartening announcements, had dissolved into petty bickering. Doc announced that after a year of providing silver nitrate for midwives and Riverbend Hospital, Argent Laboratories was withdrawing its financial support due to “dismal prospects for passage of legislation in Nebraska.” Bonita was taking a leave of absence from the Committee. A state senator wrote a letter about his own child, blinded in an accident, who he feared would become an object of ridicule if the public suspected gonorrhea had caused the blindness.

  Louise thought about her sphere of influence. Helen had played her part magnificently. Daisy would continue to help her understand the workings of the legislature and Bureau of Hygiene. Jerrylynn was compiling statistics on the economics of providing drops versus the cost of housing a blind child in the Asylum. Doc worked doggedly to win over doctors. Perhaps he should turn his attention to hospitals. Alice was busily writing to clubs to arrange speaking engagements and petition drives. Irina was doing a creditable job with the midwives. Madge helped Louise reach nurses and state senators. She also relentlessly corresponded with the press but to little avail. Newspapers remained in the dark ages regarding matters of sex.

  What the Committee needed was a major donor whose funds would provide silver nitrate for multiple hospitals and midwives. Of course. Bernard Feldman. His letter has been nagging me for months. He would do anything to assuage his guilt.

  Bernard’s spacious office in the Feldman Building in Omaha housed a veritable Chautauqua museum. A blackboard with diagrams from a “germ” chalk talk sat on an easel, and photographs covered an entire wall.

  Louise found Bernard even more exuberant than usual. He almost bounced when he walked. She displayed polite interest in the memorabilia, but she was on edge. She’d intended her visit to be about soliciting funds for a demonstration project at Riverbend Hospital, but on the train to Omaha she’d agonized over the meaning of Bernard’s letter. She would have to get at the truth.

  Bernard directed Louise to a group of pictures. “I’ll never forget this day.” He pointed to a photograph of Frank and himself helping Marie and Helen fly kites. “Look at those faces, will you?”

  “Tell me the truth, Bernard, was Marie happy?”

  “We all adored her—Frank, Miss Keller, Mrs. Macy, Mrs. Ryder—everyone in the Chautauqua family. We smothered her with love.” His face and voice filled with sadness. “Oh, but I have pictures in my mind of her when she got homesick and missed her mama. When I was a lad I loved my mama so much I got lonesome for her at school every day and couldn’t wait to get home to see her.” He brightened. “But I tell you Marie was as happy as any sighted child.”

  Louise then noticed a picture of Marie straddling one end of a seesaw at its peak, laughing, her head thrown back. The girl on the other end obviously shared her delight.

  “When people come to my office and look at this wall,
I watch for their reaction. It happens without fail, when they come to that picture, their faces light up. The joy of those youngsters is positively infectious.”

  Louise could not speak, caught in a bittersweet emotion, seeing the companionship shared by Marie and another child and having never witnessed such a moment.

  Bernard grabbed the picture off the wall and thrust it at Louise. “You must have it. Take it, it’s yours.”

  He placed the picture in her hand and clasped her other hand in both of his. His eyes glistened with tears, and his voice broke. “I am so sorry. I’m to blame for Marie and Frank not being here today. I should have stopped him.”

  “I don’t blame you. But what did you say that angered him so?”

  He looked away. “I don’t remember.” He removed a wadded up handkerchief from his pocket and wiped first one eye, then the other. “I was too drunk—as drunk as Frank.”

  He folded the white square so the corners met perfectly, aligned the edges just so, and returned it to his pocket. “We were quarreling, the way men do, trying to outdo the other guy. It’s that dumb animal instinct that comes out after men have a few drinks. I haven’t had a drop to drink since that night.”

  “And you don’t remember what you said?”

  Bernard took a step back and shook his head. “Like a shot he charges off to the telephone, I go after him, and I hear him threaten to kill Yonder.”

  Louise sighed. He can remember Frank’s threat but not his own words. “I don’t blame you for the accident. You put Frank to bed for the night. You did what you could. But in your letter you referred to a burden of guilt. Is it due to not stopping Frank or to saying something that made him so angry he wanted to kill Yonder?”

  Bernard shrugged, a move that left his body slumped.

  “I have to know. Did you say something about Marie’s blindness being caused by gonorrhea?”

  He looked at her, tears welling in his eyes. “Forgive me, Louise. Yes, I accused Frank of having gonorrhea. I had no idea─”

  “It wasn’t Yonder.”

  Bernard looked puzzled.

  “And it wasn’t Frank.” The confession, which she had not divulged to another living soul, left her feeling weak. “I need to sit down.”

  Bernard took her elbow and guided her to an armchair. Then he pulled up another chair and sat across from her.

  “My burden is this,” she said. “If I had been truthful with Frank, I don’t know what would have happened to me. But I know that he and Marie would still be alive.” She sobbed and reached into her handbag for a handkerchief.

  The photograph slipped from her lap. Bernard reached down, picked it up, and handed it to her. He, too, was crying. She propped one elbow on the chair’s arm and dropped her head in her hand.

  When she was able to speak, she looked up but away from Bernard. “I do know this. We human beings are very complicated creatures. We cannot begin to fathom our capacity to do harm and, by the same token, we cannot fathom our capacity to do good.”

  She heard herself spewing platitudes. In that moment, truth found her, not the truth of what sent Frank into a rage, but a liberating truth about herself. She stopped in the midst of a vacuous sentence. “What I am trying to say in a roundabout way is that having come to grips with my own capacity to do great harm and to do great good, I cannot judge you.”

  “Thank you.” Bernard took her hands in his and gave her a look that told her he grasped the significance of her words, that she was sharing an excruciatingly private part of herself. “Now, you came to ask for help from the Feldman Brothers Foundation.”

  Louise sat facing the easel with the germ talk diagram on a blackboard several feet away. She described the Committee’s work and its ultimate goal of preventing blindness which she felt would square beautifully with the mission of Bernard’s foundation. She described the interim steps toward the goal. Specifically she addressed the demonstration project at Riverbend Hospital, the training of midwives, and attempts to mobilize doctors and citizens. “We’re at an impasse. Argent Laboratories was supplying silver nitrate for the hospital and midwives and funding for some of our administrative costs. But just as we were planning to expand our demonstration to six other hospitals around the state, Argent pulled out, citing our slow progress. It’s going to take a grassroots demand for legislation, but most Nebraskans have never heard of babies’ sore eyes.”

  Bernard looked inspired. “Newspaper advertising, have you tried it?”

  “I’m not sure what we’d advertise. Our cause doesn’t meet their standards of decency.”

  “Advertise announcements of your meetings. ‘Come learn how you can protect the health of your family and community. Free refreshments.’” Bernard’s voice rose and his eyes flashed as he talked through his idea. Louise was reminded of how Frank used to relate new schemes at breakfast.

  Bernard continued, “Feldman Enterprises advertises in newspapers all over Nebraska. If the Feldman Brothers Foundation sponsored your advertisements, I assure you that our dollars would trump their editorial policy.”

  Had she been too subtle in stating the need to fund drops? “Your support and influence would mean a great deal.” She hoped he hadn’t detected disappointment in her voice.

  “I can almost see what you’re thinking, Louise. How many children have to go blind before the state will take action?” Bernard stood up. He slapped his hand on the table. “Since when does charity begin with the state? What ever happened to people taking care of their families and neighbors? When I was growing up, it was the synagogues and churches that gave food and shelter to the poor. If you ask me, we have too much government meddling in our lives as it is.”

  Louise wanted the meeting to be over. Bernard would not be the ally she had hoped for.

  “On the other hand,” he said, “I stand for public health. Germs would be the end of us all if we didn’t have public education and programs to prevent disease and epidemics. So I applaud government programs that promote vaccinations for children, and isolation of consumption patients, and the like.

  “But I digress. Bear with me. I’m thinking out loud. What if you put together some numbers, tell me what it would cost to get a dozen demonstration programs like Riverbend Hospital? I can’t imagine a better cause for the Feldman Brothers Foundation.”

  Louise gasped.

  “Of course I’ll have to talk it over with my brother first.”

  The day after visiting Bernard, Louise was surprised by a telephone call from Dr. Vandegrift all the way from Philadelphia. Static on the line interfered with their conversation, and she wasn’t certain she understood, but it sounded as though he was inviting her to be one of ten charter members of the National Society to Save Babies’ Sight. When the static stopped, she clearly understood. He wanted her to attend the Society’s organizational meeting in Washington, D.C., in September.

  It seems she had made a name for herself, first by enlisting Helen Keller to write her piece in The Ladies’ Home Journal, and then by running a top-notch hospital demonstration program and midwives’ training program, both of which were characterized by rigorous documentation and regular audits that made them models for programs in other states.

  She remembered the days when her loftiest goal was to be recognized as a civic leader in Riverbend. She smiled to herself, thinking of the epitaph that came to her in the stairwell the afternoon The Twister struck: Devoted Wife and Civic Leader. Now she was a woman with national influence.

  Sometimes she felt something deeper, not the drive for recognition, but the spirit of the girl in the schoolyard who beat up Charles Baumgartner for teasing Sandy. And the spirit of the woman aiding victims of The Twister.

  But, if anything, the recognition brought her more pain than joy. I am not the virtuous woman they think I am.

  37

  July 1908

  The Independence Day celebration was held on a picture-perfect afternoon in Chautauqua Park with a tolerable performance by the high school
band and only occasional swarming gnats. Louise stood with Dovie and the sculptor, August Potemkin, waiting through reminiscences by Riverbend’s veterans of war for her statue’s dedication. The unveiling, scheduled to occur in full sunlight, was delayed by the long-winded veterans. So when the time came, the sun dropped behind trees, putting Marie in shadow.

  The statue had cost Louise a fortune but was worth every penny. August had captured the expectant moment when Frank held the ruler atop Marie’s head as she stood with her back against the doorframe. From the statue’s position on the edge of the bluff was a view through its doorway of the Chautauqua grounds below. This was its rightful place.

  After the ceremony, children climbed up on the pedestal or scrambled through the doorway. Marie would have explored every inch, jumping up to touch the doorframe, gliding her fingers over her own bronze face, and climbing up to find the perfect niche in which to curl up, then begging for just a few more minutes when it came time to go home.

  The youngsters scampering on the statue watched a girl about Marie’s age limp towards them and try without success to pull herself up onto the pedestal. Louise noticed her withered right leg. The child almost made it, but a boy hanging from the doorframe jumped to within inches of her fingers and laughed when she lost her grip.

  Children can be so cruel. Louise was about to go over and give her a boost when another boy on the pedestal reached for the girl’s hand.

  “Here.” He pulled her up. “Come on. I’ll show you the best place to climb.”

  Walking through wet grass early the next morning, Louise felt her chilled feet squishing in her shoes by the time she reached the statue. Dewdrops on Marie’s bronze cheeks too closely resembled tears, which Louise brushed away with her fingers. The image took Louise from the sweet memory of Frank measuring Marie on her ninth birthday to what followed, the disastrous party and ill-fated pony cart ride. Her “little chums,” Frank had called them. Marie had no little chums. I should have helped her cultivate friendships, but I failed her.