by Dara Horn
“Mr. Williams had arranged for me to take the role there, and I told Papa I was visiting a friend in the next town,” she was telling him, her smile radiant. “But Papa saw the review of the performance in the newspaper. It was a wonderful review, too. Apparently I was quite convincing in my portrayal of the dead maiden in Act Five. Of course Papa had no appreciation at all. He told everyone he knew that he was ready to strangle Mr. Williams, and after that he barely let me leave the house. But a month later he went to New York—to meet with you, I suppose—and Mr. Williams and I performed an illusionist show in Petersburg. Fortunately Papa was still in New York when they printed the review.”
She laughed, and Jacob tried to laugh with her. But he couldn’t. Instead he coughed, and watched as she waited for him, her laughter fading. She saw that something had changed.
“Miss Levy,” he said abruptly, “I hope you will forgive my prying, but I have been mad with curiosity. What are your intentions with Mr. Williams?”
To Jacob’s surprise, Jeannie did not seem at all caught off guard. She paused, then ran a hand through a curl along her ear, and smiled. He wondered if it were his imagination that made her seem relieved.
“Why do you ask?” Jeannie replied, perfectly calm.
He swallowed. “Well, it seems to me that a gentleman in his position ought to be more eager to propose,” he said. He fidgeted with the chain of his watch, unable to control his nerves. He thought of the latest note from the bakery: YOUR PROGRESS IS ESSENTIAL TO VICTORY, he had been grandly reminded. THE LIVES OF YOUR FELLOW SOLDIERS ARE IN YOUR HANDS. But somehow the officers’ vague threats seemed secondary now, irrelevant to the presence of this woman before him. To hide his nervousness, he stood up and took a few steps toward the corner of the room, pretending to straighten a picture on the wall.
“You’d like to know my intentions with Mr. Williams?” Jeannie asked. He had turned back to face her now, from his spot near the corner. For an agonizing moment, she twisted a lock of hair around her finger, refusing to reply. Then, just as he was about to shrivel into the wall, she laughed out loud. “Oh, please!” she said, after a breath. “Mr. Williams is just—just—well, Mr. Williams, I suppose. He cares for me quite a bit more than I would ever care for him.”
Jacob didn’t know whether to believe this. She had followed him a bit when he got up, moving from where she was sitting toward a tall ladderback chair just a few feet away from where he stood in the corner, and now she settled down on the chair. Immediately he noticed that the skirt of her dress had gotten caught on the knob on the edge of her seat, which hitched her skirt up so completely that it revealed her leg to the knee.
Jacob looked away, and coughed, watching her out of the corner of his eye and waiting for her to notice and pull the skirt back down. But he was shocked, and shaking. She wasn’t wearing any stockings. He hadn’t seen a woman’s leg since he was a child. Jeannie’s skin was silk-like, gleaming, surely never once exposed to the sun. He allowed himself a glimpse, and couldn’t look anywhere else. Her skin shone in the room’s dim lamplight.
“Miss Levy, pardon me—but your—your—oh—” he stammered. It was only then that he understood that she had done it on purpose.
She rested a hand on her bare knee. “Forgive me, Jacob. It’s so stifling here,” she said. “You can’t imagine what it’s like to have to be under all these skirts all the time. A lady can hardly stand it.”
Jacob had never before heard her say his name, except as “Mr. Rappaport.” His eyes bulged.
She noticed. “Of course,” she said, “it’s not nearly as hot here as it is on the stage. Do you know how many lights are used on a theater set?”
“N—no,” he mumbled. Her leg seemed to stretch on infinitely. He envisioned it continuing well beyond her hand, up and back and underneath.
“Almost a hundred. They have gas lamps set up along the edge of the stage, and on the ceiling too, and there’s no breeze at all,” Jeannie was saying. “One can’t allow any kind of breeze, actually, because then the lights might dim and the audience couldn’t see a thing. You can’t imagine how sweltering it is to be surrounded by those lights, and with everyone watching you, too. And doing all sorts of things onstage, and pretending to mean them all.”
Jacob’s eyes were still glued to her leg. She stood up, and the skirt fell back down to her foot. “William was even jealous when I once kissed an actor on stage. Just because it wasn’t him. Isn’t that ridiculous? It was the theater, the theater’s all make-believe. How absurd can he be?”
“I—I don’t know,” Jacob mumbled, mourning the covered leg. Her reference to William, by his first name, irritated him. Then he noticed that he was missing a chance to denigrate him, and tried to recover. “I mean, absurd, you’re right,” he said loudly. He wasn’t making sense, he knew. But he had taken one step toward her, then another. He couldn’t help it.
“Please don’t think whatever you’re thinking about William,” she said. “He’s nothing to me, really. Truly nothing. I can’t explain it to you now, but someday I shall.”
This was astonishing, Jacob thought—though not nearly as astonishing as her spectacular leg. Her eyes seemed filmy, distant. He had only seen her look like that once before, when she had told him about her mother. For no reason, and for every reason, he believed her.
“I haven’t been in a play since before the war,” she said, in a voice softer than he had ever heard her speak. She was standing just inches from him now. “I know it’s wrong to complain about it—the war’s been hard on everyone, and this is such a silly thing. I know no one has a right to complain until they lose an eye or something like that. But I miss it. I really, really miss it.”
“I would be pleased to remind you of it,” he said softly.
Everyone reassures the young that they will know what to do when the time comes. It isn’t true. Jacob hadn’t the faintest clue what to do when he found Jeannie’s astounding delicious lips suddenly pressed against his own. Fortunately, Jeannie did. And he didn’t regret that he had more than one kiss to give for his country.
“MR. LEVY, I HAVE a question for you,” Jacob said to Philip one Saturday morning. “It’s about Miss Eugenia.”
Jacob had by then endured many nights of savage kisses from Jeannie after her sisters had gone upstairs, ones that drove him insane by never going as far as he desperately needed. The woman’s sleight of hand was absolutely maddening. One night she would reveal a leg; the next, her dress’s neckline would be off-kilter, stretched almost to the point of revealing her breast before she would laugh and shift it back into place. In the meantime, while his eyes popped, she would have somehow managed to grab his pipe out of his pocket, or his handkerchief, or once—to his horror—a coded letter (luckily sealed) that he was about to send to his contact, which he convinced her was a business receipt. From then on he buried his unsent messages in the lining of his hat. And still her kisses left him reeling for days. She would invariably excuse herself and retire to her room, insisting that her father might return home and catch them, at precisely the moment when he felt he could never let her go. She was right, too; the tavern closed at ten o’clock, and Philip invariably returned within moments of Jeannie’s escape up the stairs, leaving Jacob only seconds to compose his sweating, stirring body into that of a bored gentleman reading a newspaper. He stopped sleeping; he was burning alive. On other nights she was tender, resting her head on his chest almost innocently and telling him things about her mother and sisters. He told her everything he could about his family, relieved to live without fear. He was surprised how much was left of his life that he still could freely tell her. The little smiles from her sisters made it clear that there were no secrets among the women of the house. Lottie laughed aloud whenever she saw him. Rose sent him scraps of scrambled verse, “from Jeannie,” then giggled when he begged her to translate them; she never complied. Phoebe even whittled a snuff box for him, “from Jeannie,” in the shape of a heart. He was on his knees.
Some things had failed to change. William Wilhelm Williams the Third still came to call quite regularly, and Jeannie still enraged Jacob every time she went out to the veranda with him. She assured Jacob again and again that she was merely letting William down gently, that she was certain that if she told him straight out, he would return to the house with a shotgun and a grudge. Jacob had no choice but to accept what she said, though his face burned every time he heard William’s unctuous voice at the door. He even began thinking about ways to kill him, though he could not determine whether these thoughts were serious. They felt serious to him. His ultimate mission loomed in the back of his mind, but he managed to hide it well behind the vast pillars of desire that had become his reason for living. He sometimes ignored the messages that came through the bakery insisting on updates, replying only to one out of two or three with something vague about how everything was progressing as planned. Except for the fervid meetings between Jeannie and Lottie after Major Stoughton or William Williams departed—which he had of course reported, though the girls were far too cautious for his eavesdropping to succeed—he had almost no proof; in the way of concrete evidence he had collected nil. He still allowed himself to dream that Jeannie might be perfectly innocent, that they could live an actual life together, that his initial intentions would become irrelevant, that someday soon the war would end and no one would ever have to know that it hadn’t always been real.
It was a sunny Saturday morning, and he and Philip were returning from the synagogue—or more accurately, from the little rented house near the bakery that served as one. Philip was hardly the sort to attend services regularly, but that week it was the anniversary of his wife’s death. The entire household seemed to droop. Even the girls had curbed their usual exuberance, their movements and chatter in the front room limited, quieter, as if they were aware of another person seated in the room with them, watching and judging. When Philip mentioned where he would be going that morning, Jacob offered to join him, and was delighted to see Philip actually smile at the prospect. During the service Philip seemed cheered by his presence, though the entire morning was difficult for him. Jacob listened as he stammered through the mourner’s prayer.
But now they were on their way home, and Jacob’s attempts at small talk had failed. In the silence, he had finally dared to broach the subject.
“About Eugenia?” Philip asked. He looked up at Jacob briefly, then continued walking. “Don’t tell me she’s been embarrassing you.”
“What do you mean?” Jacob asked, as innocently as he could.
“I suspect you’ve noticed by now that Eugenia has a certain fondness for embarrassing everyone in sight,” Philip said, his voice fierce. “Me in particular, of course. No one has any idea how much I’ve done for those girls. And Eugenia is completely intent on destroying everything I’ve ever tried to do for her.” He was walking with his hands low at his sides, but Jacob saw how he had balled his fingers into fists.
Jacob thought of what Jeannie had said, how her father had never trusted her, how she and he disagreed about everything. But he had to proceed. He swallowed, and dared. “Then perhaps you would be pleased to know that I would like to take her off your hands,” he announced. “Mr. Levy, I would be honored to have your permission to marry Miss Eugenia.”
Philip was stunned. He stopped walking, and turned to face Jacob. “You—you can’t possibly be serious,” he stammered.
“Of course I am,” Jacob replied.
Philip turned red. “You must be out of your mind.”
This was not exactly the reply Jacob was hoping for. He paused, thinking it through. It had not occurred to him that a strategy would be required. But nothing at the Levy house had gone as he had expected. “It seems that I have approached this with a somewhat different perspective,” he said delicately.
“Do you intend to get behind that other fellow, William William Williams the Ninth?” Philip spat.
“Oh, Eugenia isn’t interested in him,” Jacob said, with a smile.
Now Philip paused. “You think she’s merely leading him along somehow,” he said, eyeing Jacob. “Rather unlikely, if you ask me. Though I suppose a young man is entitled to his delusions.”
“No, I don’t think she’s merely leading him along,” Jacob said brightly. “I know she’s merely leading him along. She’s made that quite clear to me.”
Philip’s back straightened, almost imperceptibly so. Jacob saw his opportunity, and seized it. “Mr. Levy, I think that your daughter Eugenia is a beautiful, bright, talented young lady,” he said, “and I hope that I may be privileged to take her as my wife.”
“You’re mad,” Philip said, and kept walking. But Jacob could see, creeping through his blushing face, the tiniest of smiles.
Jacob kept pace beside him. “Mr. Levy, if there is something about me that displeases you, I hope you will be forthright enough to tell me so,” he said. In a moment of sudden panic, he wondered if Philip somehow knew.
“Other than the insanity of your plans, no,” Philip huffed. “Frankly, I just think you need to know what you’d be involving yourself in. Eugenia is not an ordinary lady.”
“I am quite aware of that,” Jacob said. Then he added, at considerable risk, “And I hope you don’t believe that I am an ordinary man.”
Philip pushed his pince-nez back up on his nose, then stopped walking again. He looked up at Jacob, considering him. The pause was long, almost unbearable. At last he spoke.
“The real shame,” he said, “with this awful war, is that your parents won’t be able to come to the wedding.”
Jacob was quite surprised to find tears gathering in his eyes. Philip took him by the shoulders and kissed his cheeks. Philip’s own face had become wet with tears.
“I don’t know if my wife would have loved what has become of Eugenia,” Philip said, “but I know that she would have loved you.”
Jacob ought to have been disgusted with himself then. But at that moment, he persuaded himself that it was true.
6.
THE WEDDING PLANS SOON TOOK ON A LIFE OF THEIR OWN. THE officers would have preferred that the marriage be immediate, but Jacob had proposed in the thick of summer—days, for Hebrews, of mourning the destruction of ancient Jerusalem; there were three whole weeks when the wedding was forbidden to take place. The girls were thrilled about the delay; it gave them more time to gossip, to plan, and to add names to their father’s list of invited guests. But Jacob grew more and more nervous.
The messages from the bakery since his betrothal had been pleased, but expectant. FAILURE IS TREASON, he was reminded. In his head he heard the three officers endlessly repeating: We doubted your trustworthiness at first. But you are impressively reliable, Rappaport. Clever. Convincing. Devoted to the cause. We know we may depend on you for anything. With no exceptions. He heard their smug laughter behind him each time he touched her. And theirs was not the only presence he sensed. When he sat beside her in the front room, he imagined that he saw her mother watching him, immobile and silent, beside the patched wall near the door. His nights became exquisite, repulsive, fear and desire dissolving together into liquid dream. In his dreams he would pull a bridal veil back from her face like a curtain and reveal, to his revulsion, the face of Harry Hyams, vomiting black bile. He dreamt of their wedding night, of trying to remove her gown, his hands unsteady between her shoulderblades as he undid an excessively complicated series of buttons, panting as he freed her body from its bonds. But when the dress loosened, her flesh finally visible and shimmering in lamplight, he saw papers dropping from beneath her skirt like molted skin. He crouched on the floor to retrieve them and found that they were his own letters from the command, still damp with her sweet sweat. He woke as she laughed in his face.
One day during those three weeks, Philip sent Jacob back to the house in the middle of the day for some important papers he had left behind in his study. At first as Jacob walked toward the house, he anticipated a visit with Jeannie, his bl
ood humming within him. Only as he stepped into the silent house did he remember that the girls had gone off to the dressmaker to find patterns for Jeannie’s wedding gown. The boarders were out as well. He was in the Levy house alone.
It occurred to him to search the sisters’ rooms for evidence, but he had done that several times and had discovered nothing but novels, magazines, pots of face powder, clutches of hairpins, innocuous letters from cousins somewhere in Mississippi—and the far more haunting and delectable evidence of petticoats, stockings, garters, girdles, knickers, corsets. If the sisters had secrets more intriguing than their undergarments, they had hidden them beyond his reach. Instead he hurried through the front door and on to Philip’s study. Then he noticed something resting in the corner of the front room, the corner that Jeannie had consecrated with their first kiss. It was a riding crop, with a delicate carved handle, and something about it looked familiar to him. Then he recognized it: it was the wooden handle Phoebe had made, for William Williams.
The cur, of course, had not dared approach the house while Jacob was home since Jeannie’s engagement; at least he had the sense for that. But the mere presence of this object in the house alarmed Jacob, enraged him—and his heart pounded as he understood that William must have left it in the house deliberately, when no one was home, as some sort of sign for Jeannie.
He looked around the room, considering. The girls had planned to visit the dressmaker at noon; at the moment it was only a quarter past. Looking around once more to be sure no one was home, he hurried into the corner and took the riding crop in his hand. Carefully he unscrewed the handle. There, in the hollowed-out space that Phoebe had whittled, he found precisely what he expected—a rolled-up piece of paper, a letter, for Jeannie. He read it through: