by John Jakes
At first he thought raindrops had splattered her cheeks. But he was wrong. She was weeping.
“Forgive yourself. The past is gone. All that matters is what’s ahead. If we make the future good for Will and Eleanor, it will be good for us too. Now kiss me goodbye.”
His mouth pressed hers with aching hunger.
Clanking and lurching, the train began to move. The expressman called to him a second time. He broke the embrace and ran up beside the slow-moving car. He seized a handrail to the left of the door and vaulted up to the opening as the car gathered speed.
Getting drenched as he had on that long-ago afternoon, he hung in the open door and watched Julia’s figure diminish. Dear Lord, how he loved her. How sane and compassionate she was!
And she was right. He’d already accepted his share of the blame for the failure of the marriage; it was he who had gone to Julia’s arms, after all. He had to find absolution, and get on with the task of making a new home, a new life.
But not on Fifth Avenue. She was right about that too. Perhaps Boston would be the ideal place. If 100 Years was even moderately successful, Kent and Son would need good management. Theo Payne had run the Union before he got there, and the editor could do it again. Payne would keep the paper flourishing forever. He’d never die; the alcohol flowing in his system would make him immortal.
Yes, Gideon thought, Julia was altogether right. He must look forward, not back. Forgive himself, and get on with rebuilding the Kent family.
ii
In the little Watertown cemetery, four workmen put the coffin into the ground.
It was a warm, clear day. All the rain had passed on to the south. The brilliant blue of the sky and the sweet odors of damp grass and loam refreshed his spirit.
Oddly enough, so did the large square of ground surrounded by the low fence of ornamental black iron. Here the Kents lay. Here there existed a sense of belonging, and of purpose. Standing near his father’s headstone, he knew he hadn’t been wrong to print the Beacon or go to the Union and do what he’d done with each of them. Those things had been wrong for his marriage, but he would never be ashamed of them in principle. He was proud of his work, flawed as it was and negligible as the results sometimes seemed.
There was renewal in this balmy midsummer day, and in this Massachusetts earth. It was time he stopped pitying himself. He wasn’t the first Kent who had suffered. One way or another, all of them had.
Philip.
Anne Ware Kent.
Philip’s second wife, Peggy.
Gilbert Kent.
Amanda.
His father.
They had known defeats, but they had persevered and conquered in the end.
As he must with Eleanor.
She was the primary challenge now. He admitted he’d neglected their relationship because of his anger with Margaret. He must break through her resentment somehow, somehow.
Realistically, he supposed Eleanor blamed him too much ever to wholeheartedly love him as most daughters loved their fathers. He’d be content if he could just restore her life to something close to normalcy. The first step was to try to overcome her hostility.
A formidable task. Yet here among his own people, he didn’t feel helpless about it. To the contrary. For the first time since the memorial service, his face was composed. The wind blew his hair as he held his hat in his hands and watched the coffin being lowered slowly into the freshly dug hole.
Soon the workmen began throwing earth down into the opening, their spades glinting in the sun. A little longer to mourn the dead, and then he must get on with the task of restoring a decent life to the living. Thank God for Julia. She was his anchor and his hope. He couldn’t imagine how he could have come through this difficult period without her—or, for that matter, how he could face the months ahead if she weren’t with him.
He bowed his head as the gentle mound was tamped by the graveyard workmen. “Forgive me if you can, Margaret,” he whispered in the windy silence. A bird began to sing as he turned and slowly walked away.
Chapter VIII
Call to Courage
i
DURING THE NIGHT that Gideon was en route to Boston with the casket, Eleanor had difficulty sleeping. She was still upset by the shameless way her father’s mistress had appeared at the church. Then he’d had the audacity to try to effect a reconciliation in the carriage. And at supper, according to what Will had told her afterward, he’d announced that he intended to marry that Sedgwick woman and move her into this very house.
That and all the other events of the day had completely shattered the facade she’d worked so hard to maintain ever since those men had invaded the mansion and—
And—
Her mind refused to put words to what had happened in the parlor.
Though she couldn’t verbalize it, she could never forget it. She had nightmares in which it was repeated again and again. Sometimes, quite without realizing it, she’d even slip into a daydream in which she was lying on her back on the hearthstone, feeling the terrible thrust of—
Again her mind veered away from the memory of the frantic pushing. The pain. The sudden wet mingling of her blood and—
“Stop!”
Crying out softly, she wrenched over onto her side, seized her pillow and hugged it between her breasts. Lying that way, her eyes shut, she shuddered for several minutes, making small, whimpering noises.
Finally the terror began to pass. Shame crept in. When that happened, she was able to assert self-control again.
She released the damp pillow. Sat up in the dark and breathed deeply until she could think of other things. She was hardly aware of a slight paling at the edges of the bedroom curtains. A picture of her father’s mistress was forming in her mind.
Eleanor had to admit Julia Sedgwick was lovely. Independent and tough-minded, too, she supposed. Undoubtedly someone who lectured for the suffragists had to have those qualities to be successful. Eleanor could almost see what her father admired in the petite, dark-haired woman.
But she knew she could never accept the woman moving into her mother’s house. No matter how kind or considerate Julia was, Eleanor just couldn’t give Papa’s mistress any affection.
Affection. Her mouth twisted. No one would get that from her. She was more convinced than ever that affection—love—only led to the kind of suffering she’d endured in the past year. And the way in which men and women expressed their love physically—that was agony. She knew from personal experience now.
What if her father did move Julia into the house? Will would like it. He was taken with that swaggering lout Julia hauled around with her. Carter Kent had tried to make one friendly overture to Eleanor, but she’d rebuffed him quickly and unmistakably.
What could she hope to do about Julia? The answer was, nothing. The realization came as a jolt, and compelled her to do some serious thinking about her future.
One possibility lay open to her. One avenue of escape. The thought of taking it frightened her a little, but at least she could accept it. She couldn’t accept living in the same house with Papa’s mistress. Not even if he married her.
She was still mulling the risky plan when she realized it must be close to six o’clock. A cool breeze belled the curtains, and the light around the edges was stronger. She heard a door open somewhere along the second-floor hall. Then footsteps passed, creaking a floorboard here and there.
Too heavy for Will’s tread.
Uncle Matt! This was her chance. She leaped from bed, found her robe, and a moment later slipped down the staircase to the library, where she heard him stirring.
ii
She knocked softly at the open door. “Uncle Matt?”
He turned from the curtains he’d been pulling back and fastening with their velvet ties. The sunlight of a summer dawn was brightening Fifth Avenue. Birds warbled in the Park.
Her uncle looked sleepy but handsome as ever, wrapped up in an old velvet dressing gown, an unlit cigar stuck in the brea
st pocket.
He smiled. “Good morning, Eleanor. You’re up early.”
She brushed hair from her eyes and smiled in return. “I didn’t sleep very well.”
“Nor I. Yesterday was pretty miserable for everyone.”
“Could we talk a little now?”
“Oh, yes, we’re supposed to have a chat, aren’t we?” The hair straggling over his forehead had some gray in it, she noticed. He took out the cigar and waved it. “By all means, let’s do.”
He fished in his pockets for a match, found one, and puffed clouds of harsh-smelling blue smoke as he sat down. Nervously, Eleanor took a chair nearby.
How should she begin? Certainly she didn’t want to reveal everything she’d been thinking. He might tell Papa, and spoil it if she decided to go ahead. She noted his attentive expression, blushed and made a start.
“I guess—that is—oh, I’m afraid I don’t know how to say it right—”
“The best line is a clean line. Just say it.”
His kind expression put her at ease. “All right. I guess I need encouragement, Uncle Matt.”
“About becoming an actress?”
“Yes.”
A slow puff of the cigar. “Sure that’s what you want to do?”
Careful. Don’t let on.
“I think so. Eventually.”
A haze of smoke thickened around him. “We butted heads with this same problem yesterday. You won’t like my first piece of advice. Before you do anything, you should get your father’s approval.”
She reacted with a vigorous shake of her head. “No, that’s impossible now.”
“I see. Is that why you’re asking me instead?”
She faltered a little. “I—I just wanted to know whether you thought it was a good idea.”
“No,” he replied at once. She was startled and hurt.
“Eleanor,” he went on, “you’re a grown-up young lady. Practically a woman. You look five years older than most girls your age. I want to be honest with you because you’re my niece, and because acting is obviously important to you. First of all, I’ll say again that I don’t know much about the theater, except that I enjoy a good show from time to time. But I suppose the theater has certain things in common with all the arts. I know you’ve had some acting experience.”
“How do you know that?”
“After I brought my bag from the hotel last night, Will and I spent almost two hours talking. I heard all about the Booth Association.”
“That blabbing little brat!”
He chuckled. “You mustn’t blame Will. Sounded to me like nobody had been around to listen to him for a month of Sundays—not even my own brother,” he added after a moment.
She was quick to nod. “That’s true.”
“You certainly have the beauty to be an actress. You could carry a whole first act with your eyes alone.”
She reddened again, and fixed her gaze on her folded hands.
“I’m not teasing, Eleanor. You’re prettier than nine tenths of the female performers I’ve ever seen. If you have ability on top of that, I’d say you have a fine start. The question is the same one I asked a while ago—”
Matt’s eyes clouded as he examined his cigar. He flicked ash into a porcelain dish beside him. “Are you really sure you want a start in that business?”
“And I said I thought so. Then you said it wasn’t a good idea.”
“No, not unless you’re willing to give up a devil of a lot.”
“I told you yesterday that I was.”
“Be very sure. If you become an actress, there are some homes where you’ll never be welcome. You won’t be respectable. And you must remember that a lot of people dislike the arts because they don’t understand them. What people don’t understand, they fear.”
“Then you think the stage would be a miserable life?”
“At times.”
“Is being a painter miserable?”
“Compared to being a lawyer or a ribbon clerk? Absolutely.”
“Do you mean that? It’s truly miserable?”
“Often, yes.”
“Why don’t you quit?”
“I can’t do anything else.”
“I don’t think I can either.”
“Ah.” He smiled again. “That’s what I was waiting to hear. It makes all the difference. Those who can do something else should do it. They’d be fools to pay the price. Those who can’t do anything else need no advice from me, or anyone.”
“But I want advice, Uncle Matt.”
“All right—but take warning. I may get a little smarmy, as my friend Jim Whistler would say.”
He drew on the cigar, exhaled a thin blue plume.
“There’s no lower, more frustrating, idiotic or misunderstood calling than being an artist. Any kind of artist. Pots of pigment or pots of rouge. I don’t suppose it makes any difference. It’s a solitary business. A business in which you’re supposed to create something. A little sketch of a washerwoman, or a believable stage portrayal of a young lady in love. Some days, you just can’t. But you do it anyway. For that reason and a lot of others, there’s no harder life. Trouble is, there’s also no higher calling.”
His voice had fallen to a low pitch. She sat forward, mesmerized. She didn’t know whether he was really speaking to her, or to some ghost he saw in the smoke of his cigar.
“As my old tutor Fochet used to tell me, an artist lifts people out of themselves for a few minutes and says to them, See here. We all share the same misery, but we share the same beauty, too. Behold a small piece of it.”
A supple gesture left smoke traceries in the air. There were no sounds in the house. The birds had hushed their singing over in the Park. All the world seemed to be holding still for one momentous instant.
With a rather bemused expression, he said, “I even found there was beauty in this crass country. Much to my surprise. I owe your father a lot for making me search for it. In any case, Eleanor, I’ve probably confused you more than I’ve helped. I can’t tell you anything about being in the theater, only about being a painter. It can be stinking. Because of what I wanted to do with my life, I lost the one woman I ever loved. You give up so much—”
Nothing that I don’t want to give up.
She didn’t say it. She didn’t dare disturb his train of thought. She wanted to weep for him, his face had been so sad a moment ago.
Then all at once, his shining grin returned. “But there are a few rare moments when you get back more than I think even God planned for. We’re a pretty wretched bunch, Eleanor. I mean human beings. We say we’re modern, enlightened, but I don’t see much evidence. We seem to be just about as foolish and stupid as we were a couple of years after the Creation. But the artists, now—the artists help us get along. They shine a little light in the darkness, and help the whole cantankerous, benighted race survive the mess it keeps making every generation. Survive and endure—”
He took a puff but the cigar had gone out. “To be a successful actress will take every bit of courage that’s in you. You’ll survive on that courage when there isn’t any logical reason for hope. I know, I’ve done it. A while ago, I was being the good and responsible uncle and urging you to square things with your father. Forget that. If you want to go into the theater, you won’t ask anyone’s permission. As I said before, you won’t be able to do anything else with your life. Just grant me one favor, my dear. For God’s sake don’t tell my brother I told you.”
She erupted from the chair, ran to him and flung her arms around him.
“Thank you, Uncle Matt. Thank you!”
He stepped back from the embrace, shaking his head.
“I don’t think I spoke one coherent, worthwhile sentence.”
“Yes, you did. You helped me decide something very important.”
His wry humor took over. “Well, I hope so. It’s too damn early in the day to discuss the insignificant. Wonder if I could be excused a minute? I’d like to stroll out to the kitchen a
nd put a match to the stove for some—”
By the time he was that far, she’d left in a rush, her face joyous for no reason he could readily understand.
Just another of the mysteries that dwelled in the unfathomable hearts and minds of young girls, he thought as he relit his cold cigar and went in search of tea.
iii
Eleanor was dressed by eight o’clock. At fifteen past, Uncle Matt went into the dining room with Will to have breakfast. As soon as she heard conversation and the clink of dishes, she slipped out the front door.
She’d be forever thankful that she’d worked up enough nerve to speak to her uncle when she did. She hadn’t understood some of what he’d said about an artist’s life. Yet the eloquence of it had thrilled her, and set her onto a path to a final decision.
One thing he’d said was very clear. She needed courage to implement her decision. She summoned all she had as she left the house and started downtown.
She had a long way to go. She ran until she was out of breath, then slowed her pace for several blocks. When she’d recovered her wind, she started running again. People gave her peculiar looks. One didn’t usually see well-dressed young ladies dashing down Fifth Avenue by themselves at this hour of the morning. Or any hour, for that matter.
She reached the Paramount Hotel just after nine forty-five. When she asked for Mr. Jefferson J. Bascom, the desk clerk gave her a dirty smile. His eye swept along the curve of her breast.
“Room three-sixteen.” The clerk must have disliked Bascom because he added, “Smallest and cheapest in the house.”
As she left the desk, the clerk turned and whispered to someone behind a partition. Eleanor was sure they were discussing her. What did they think she was, a prostitute come at Mr. Bascom’s bidding? Her face grew red and her back stiffened as she waited for the slow-moving elevator cage to descend. Then she remembered one of the words Uncle Matt had used. Misunderstood. And suddenly, she no longer cared a whit for anything the greasy clerk might say or think. Courage would help her endure that and a thousand other insults.