A Haunting Reprise

by Amanda DeWees

  “I suppose so, now that you remind me. You were wonderfully tolerant of her and her gloating.”

  “Well, I thought so,” I said primly, and he laughed and kissed me, two activities that did not combine terribly well, so that he had to do the kissing over again. Then he sobered.

  “Aurelia was a married woman, yet in love with Martin,” he recalled. “Is that why her husband murdered her?”

  “I’m afraid so. Martin said he was a violent sort and mistreated her even before she took up with Martin. If he had been able to persuade her to leave her husband, she might still be alive today. Or even if she had been able to send for him that last evening so that he might have gone to her and defended her against her husband’s violence. I cannot bear to think how she must have suffered.” I shuddered and nestled closer to Roderick, feeling safe and protected... and very, very fortunate.

  He tightened his arms around me, holding me close, as though similar thoughts were playing through his mind. His voice was sober when he said, “I won’t make jokes about our having an affair anymore. It isn’t a laughing matter, not when it is always the woman who pays—in some form or another.” Taking my chin in his hand, he tipped my face up so that he could look into my eyes, and I was touched by the sincerity in his gaze. “We can speak to the press if you really wish to. From now on, I won’t mislead anyone at the Langham when you come to me there.”

  Touched, I reached up to lay my hand against his cheek. “Thank you, Roderick.”

  Then a new thought seemed to distract him. “I don’t think this Martin fellow is quite as fascinating as he makes himself out to be. I’m sure he puts something to his hair to make those streaks. They can’t be natural.”

  “Well, you shall probably find out for yourself,” I said mildly, “for everyone says that marrying a spirited woman will turn your hair white.”

  His smile was indulgent. “A small price to pay, at that,” he said.

  Chapter Six

  Polly was making more progress than I had once thought possible. She had finally caught on to the correct way to use breath to support her voice, so that her corset became an ally instead of a hindrance. She was summoning up some reasonably convincing emotion—at least, as long as she was working from a script that she liked. I found that she was more animated when reciting shocking crime stories from the Illustrated Police News than from Shakespeare or Dryden. And success agreed with her: the more I praised her, the better she became.

  Every day since our arrival she had begged me waste no more time but to speak to my father about her. As far as I could tell, his condition had changed little since that first day. Granted, I had paid him only brief visits, so as not to upset him—for seeing me made him restless and ill-tempered. But my mother seemed no more anxious about him than before, and the atmosphere of the household overall had not grown more somber.

  Despite Mother’s urgings to the contrary, I felt it was time.

  I waited for an afternoon when she and Mollie were out paying calls. She had never invited me to accompany them, though I could tell that Mollie would have liked to; no doubt having an actress for a daughter, even a successful one, might be something of a detriment among her circle of respectable folk.

  When I rapped at my father’s door I had to listen hard for his hoarse “Come in.” He was propped up on his pillows, staring listlessly out of the window when I entered. He did not seem to be any more pale or gaunt than before, but something in his face, some shade of expression, whispered to me that he was closer to death. I hoped that would incline him to think more generously of the children he would be leaving behind.

  “I hope I’m not disturbing you,” I said.

  His eyes, so curiously large in his wasted face, showed no displeasure upon seeing me, but I saw in them no welcome. “What is it?” he asked, and the exhausted voice told me that anything I wished to ask him could be put off no longer.

  I took a seat at his bedside. I wondered how he could endure the boredom, but evidently he was too weak even to appreciate being read to; Mollie said that he had told her it made his head hurt to try to follow a story. So here he lay with nothing but his thoughts and the view from the window to occupy him.

  “I wish to speak with you about Polly,” I said. “Did Mother tell you that I might?”

  One thin hand made a restless motion, then lay still against the white coverlet once more. His eyes had wandered to the window.

  Fighting discouragement, I said, “At the risk of being indelicate, it is important that you give Polly your blessing before you die to follow her own path.”

  “And what path is that?”

  “That is immaterial. She deserves the right to make her own choices, whatever they may be.”

  “I never heard of anything so ridiculous,” he grumbled. “As her father, I make her choices. She knows what I expect of her.”

  “Does it not seem unfair to you that she should be restricted to doing only what you wish for her? What if she discovers an affinity for something outside those confines?”

  “Such as?”

  Whether he was deliberately being obtuse or not, it looked as though I would have to be plain. “Such as the theater,” I said.

  “The theater!” Now the startlingly large eyes were fixed on me, and their scrutiny was uncomfortable. “Polly knows that I expect better from her. I’ll not have her following your example and bringing shame on the family again.” This long speech made him cough, and I flinched at the horrible liquid sound. As different as our views were, it was still painful to see him suffer.

  But I thought about Polly and made myself press on. She had many years yet to live, and I would not have her live them under the shadow of a father’s disapproval.

  “I don’t feel that I have done anything shameful, Father. Indeed, I’m proud of who I am and the life I’ve shaped for myself. I have made my way on my own terms in a difficult and chancy profession, I have married a man whom I love and who loves me, and now I’m helping people—”

  But here I managed to stop myself before I mentioned being a spirit medium, since I suspected he would disapprove of that as much as my being an actress, and if he did it might destroy any hope I had of winning him over to my point of view.

  “I had rather you were starving in a gutter than living as an actress,” he said bitterly. “If I were a well man I’d have turned you out of the house the moment you returned.”

  Indignation sparked in me, but I pushed it down. I must return to the matter at hand—Polly’s future.

  “The crucial thing is that Polly is unhappy enough that she may do something rash,” I said. “She has already proven that she will take drastic action if she feels desperate. What if she were to make an incautious marriage, or even elope, simply to change her situation? That could ruin the rest of her life, and in a way that a career on stage would not. You think you are protecting her, but by restricting her so much you are making her more likely to defy you and put her future at risk.”

  An angry flush was creeping into the hollow cheeks. “That is exactly why she must be guided by me,” he said. “As her father, I am her moral guardian. It is up to me to make certain she becomes a virtuous wife and mother, a model of purity, selflessness, and humility.”

  Had he spoken to his daughter lately? It seemed to me that she was far from that ideal even now—and that was not necessarily a bad thing. I wished I could make him see how narrow his idea of virtue was, but I knew that would be futile. All I could do was appeal to his sense of fairness. “It is her life to live, not yours. You are not entitled to simply bar her from exploring what is available to her.”

  He struggled to sit up straighter and jabbed a wasted finger at me. “No one is more entitled to do so than her father. I’ll not have any daughter of mine—any true daughter—heed her own will instead of mine. The very idea of a girl that age thinking for herself is absurd. I forbid Polly to take any fool notion to display herself in a public place for money as you do.”
/>   His voice was becoming so hoarse that I worried for him. “Father, please—”

  “If she does, she has my curse. Do you hear me, girl?” A speck of bloody spittle flew from his lips. “If I have to return from the grave to stop her, I will. And you may tell her so yourself.”

  Aghast, I could only stare at him. His chest heaved with the effort of speaking so forcefully, and he fell back against his pillows. But his eyes still held mine, and they were fierce with anger and determination... and spite. Yes, this was partly for my benefit. That I of all people should ask for greater freedom for Polly was what rankled him most. My efforts had been doomed from the first.

  I felt farther away from him than I had ever been during my travels. Though he was my own parent and I his flesh and blood, it was as though a vast desert lay between us, so far separate were our perspectives on all of the subjects that mattered most.

  Then that melancholy reflection was swept away in a rising tide of anger. How dare this man try to control his child even after death. How selfish, how cruel, to ask me to put that burden on her—the idea that he would be watching her every move as long as she lived.

  “I’m sorry to have tired you, Father,” I said, rising. “More than that, I’m sorry you think yourself justified in holding another human being hostage to your own prejudices.”

  His eyes flicked toward me, then moved away as if I were too insignificant to warrant further attention. “You haven’t a man’s capacity for thought,” he said, “so I would not expect you to understand. Nor are you a parent.”

  From his manner I guessed that he expected me to shrivel up in shame at these observations. “I’m happy to be a woman, and childless, if these features permit me to see other points of view as you apparently cannot,” I said, but without heat. Anger in the face of this terrible illness was not only futile but somehow small. All too soon he would be in no position to argue anything, and I would win by default. A hollow enough victory.

  He did not respond, and I was already at the door and reaching to open it when I thought of something else. I turned back to him.

  “Since this may be my only chance to say so,” I said, “you should know that Mother is not to blame for the course I have taken. She did her best to turn me into the kind of daughter you wished for. But I wanted something different.” Honesty compelled me to add, “Even if I had become the kind of wife and mother you intended me to be, I would have been miserable. I’d have kicked over the traces one day—or gone mad. Some of us are simply not made for that life.”

  Instead of answering, he gave a dismissive flick of his hand, as an emperor might bring an end to an audience, and closed his eyes.

  I slipped out of the room and shut the door behind me with rather less force than I would have liked. Age had not made my father any more open to reason. I had underestimated his obstinacy... and his contempt for his daughters.

  Not for a moment did I seriously consider telling Polly what he had said. Her life was her own to live as she saw fit, and I would not have her rendered self-doubting and afraid because of the lingering stain of our father’s disapproval and prejudice. I refused to believe that choosing the life of an actress was immoral.

  “Well?” she demanded when I found her in the parlor, marking up a magazine with notes as if it were a playscript. “Did you finally ask him?”

  “Yes, I—”

  “And did he consent? Oh, please say he did! Otherwise I’ll never be easy in my mind, and Mother will never forgive me.”

  I willed the tension out of my body and face, and gave her a conspiratorial smile. “He shall consider it,” I said, and she gave a squeal of pleasure and bounced up from the sofa to embrace me.

  It was not even a lie, come to think of it. For I imagined that, for good or ill, my father’s thoughts would be much concerned with Polly’s future now.

  “But you mustn’t pester him about it while he’s so ill or even mention it to anyone, not even Mother,” I cautioned her.

  “Oh, don’t you worry! I don’t want her trying to talk him out of it.” She beamed at me, as happy as I’d ever seen her. “This is a secret that will be quite easy to keep.”

  MY UNSATISFYING CONFRONTATION with my father made me restless and reminded me of another conversation that had been delayed far too long. Without stopping to think further about it, I put on a hat and mantle, told Polly I was going on an errand, and hailed a cab to take me to my old theater.

  Seeing it again after so many months gave me a bittersweet pang, which was only heightened when I let myself in by way of the stage door. I was not surprised to find it open, only to find the building so devoid of people. The stage door keeper’s box was empty, but I knew that on performance days it would be a hub of activity, with old Blenkins—whom we affectionately dubbed Cerberus—barring entry to unwanted followers and serving as a kind of informal postmaster for mail or messages that arrived for the actors.

  An irresistible nostalgia led me to step out onto the stage itself, the site of so many triumphant performances. Perhaps it was fanciful of me, but I had always felt that a theater in daytime looks embarrassed, as if caught off guard in a shabby dressing gown. Compared to the glamour and excitement at nighttime, it cannot help but be a disappointing sight. The seats in the audience are draped in workaday brown holland to protect the aging plush; flakes in the gilt painting can be seen, as well as the dust that has collected on the moldings. Without the illumination of the footlights and overhead gas batten, the stage loses all importance, and when no scenery is in place the brick rear wall looks like an exit that has been blocked off. When one is accustomed to painted backdrops showing vast mountain vistas and exotic countryside, that plebeian brick wall can make one feel hemmed in. Even though the illusion of open spaces had never been entirely believable, I missed it all the same.

  None of that mattered at the moment, though. If I closed my eyes, I could call up the memories of hundreds of exhilarating nights when I had moved and delighted crowds of people. There had been a triumph in knowing that I was creating something extraordinary. The camaraderie of those performances, the excitement of working as part of a team with my fellow actors, came rushing back.

  What a pity I would probably never experience that again. Even if for some reason I decided to play a return engagement, the old familial bond with my friends could probably never quite be recaptured after all that had happened.

  Curiously, though, the thought did not sting as much as I would have expected. Perhaps because I had gone on to live a rich and varied life since leaving the troupe, both on and offstage, the knowledge that a certain part of my past was truly gone felt less painful than before.

  Feeling lighter for the realization, I went in search of Atherton. His office was locked, however, and when I knocked and called his name—for he had been known to lock himself in for a nap—there was no sign of life from inside. Nor had I encountered a single theater functionary whom I could ask about the manager’s whereabouts. Even Atherton’s business partner, Ivor Treherne, was nowhere to be seen.

  Our reunion would have to be postponed, then. This did not disappoint me terribly, for simply revisiting my old theatrical home had blown away the stormclouds that my conversation with my father had left in my mind.

  On my way out of the building I could not resist making a sentimental detour to visit my old dressing room, even though it was almost certainly fitted out now for Narcissa. As I approached it, however, I heard a woman crying inside and came to a halt. As soon as she spoke, I knew it was the ingénue herself, even though I had never imagined she could sound so vulnerable.

  “He is going to be the ruin of my career, I know it,” she said tearfully.

  I had met Narcissa Holm in person only once, but once had been plenty. On what I had then thought was my farewell performance as an actress, she had walked onstage as I was taking my bows, purportedly to present me with a bouquet but really to try to appropriate the applause for herself. As the more experienced trouper
, I had naturally found it easy to thwart her, but I had never forgotten the cool calculation in the young beauty’s smile and the ruthless self-interest of her attempt to displace me. Narcissa Holm, to put it mildly, was not my favorite person.

  But hearing her now gave me pause. She was so very young, after all—scarcely older than Polly. If it was inexperience that had led her to make an enemy of me, perhaps I could forgive it... for it sounded as though she was paying for it now.

  The deeper answering voice was that of a more mature woman. “He won’t be dissuaded?”

  “I’ve tried and tried, and it’s as if I’m speaking to a wall. He’s so certain he knows better than I what I’m capable of as an actress, but I know I will become a laughingstock—or worse, an object of pity—if he forces me to go through with this performance.”

  “It is a risk,” the second voice acknowledged. With a rush of mixed emotions I realized the speaker was Gertrude Fox, who had been with the troupe since even before my time. An old friend—but one who had been quick to believe Atherton’s lie about me. That still stung.

  “Can you not speak to him?” Narcissa pleaded. “You’ve known him so much longer, he might listen to you.”

  “Not in a matter like this, where I have no right to interfere.”

  “How can you say that, when my failure will mean a failure for us all? Everyone in the troupe will suffer if the play is a catastrophe.”

  There was a pause, as Gertrude seemed to consider this point. Perhaps she was as surprised as I was to hear Narcissa expressing concern for someone besides herself. “Surely your manager can convince Atherton to do what is best,” she said.

  “Ivor is so preoccupied with business worries that he has no time for me at present.” There was a sniffle. “In any capacity.”

  “But as you say, the success of your performance is vital to the entire troupe. He must know that.” Gertrude fell silent again for a few moments. At last she said grudgingly, “I suppose I can try to speak to Atherton.”