City of Light (49 page)

I stood on the woodland path beside the ruins of an old stone wall, waiting for the father of my child. The ground was soft underfoot, cushioned by centuries of pine needles. After about ten minutes, he turned onto the path. He was about fifty feet away, walking toward me. He was much changed, which I knew to expect from the pictures I’d seen, but nonetheless the transformation was shocking. Although still a big man, properly attired in a suit and straw hat, he looked deflated, like an overpressured balloon that has gradually lost its air and become wrinkled and pockmarked. His mustache, while still walrusy, had turned completely white. Liver spots dotted his cheeks. Instead of the curves of fat I remembered, he had a real chin now, his skin snapping oddly back toward his throat before sagging down to his neck. Rumor was that he’d been ill, that during his second term he’d had surgery for mouth cancer, although all had been hushed over at the time. His steps were cumbersome—he clutched a thick walking stick made from a rough-hewn tree limb. In his other hand he held his ubiquitous cigar.

I felt sympathy for him, made easier because, surprisingly, I saw nothing of Grace in him. He simply looked weak. Vulnerable. His wife’s wariness seemed now a tender attempt to shelter him. This figure who had loomed so forcefully in my imagination had become nothing but a tired old man. Time had rendered him frail. For so many years I had feared him and anguished over what he had done to me, yet somehow in the process I had become the stronger of us. Heartened by that realization, I stepped forward, unashamed.

“Mr. President, I’m Louisa Barrett, headmistress of the Macaulay School in Buffalo.” Despite my resolve, an image of Mrs. Halpin imprisoned in an insane asylum flashed through my mind.

“Louisa Barrett?” He said the name slowly, puzzled but not alarmed by my presence. “Do I know you?”

“We met in Buffalo, some ten years ago now, when you visited in May of 1891. I was a teacher then.”

“Ah, yes. We met at one of the receptions?”

“Indeed. At the Cary house.”

“Ah.”

He seemed to relax. Of course the reception at the Cary house was the most prestigious of those he attended. My presence there would make him lower his guard.

“I remember one of those little birds made a mess in what I had intended to be my dessert,” he said. I was taken aback by the kindliness in his eyes. The newspapers reported that he was wonderful with children. He would painstakingly teach them to tie fishing flies, and would amuse them with stories for hours. I could imagine him entertaining his children with the story of Miss Love’s canaries. Grace would have enjoyed that story too. “Not the sort of thing one forgets.”

“No.”

“And how is my friend Miss Love? Still doing good deeds?” he asked, chuckling.

“She’s quite well.” I forced a smile. “Doing more good deeds than ever.” I braced myself. “Sir, in addition to meeting at 184, we also met afterward, at your—at the Iroquois Hotel.”

Something seemed to dawn in his memory. “Did we?” he said cautiously.

“Yes, sir. Mr. Gilder brought me.”

“Ah.” He thought this through. “Have you come for a repeat performance?” he asked, not unkindly. “Have you been dreaming of me all these years?” Gentle indulgence filled his voice. There was even a twinkle in his eye. “You’ve come out here like some forest sprite to trap me on a lonely path and seduce me away from home?”

I hadn’t expected the easy charm, the natural flirtatiousness. “I’m hardly laying a trap, sir. Mrs. Cleveland told me that I might find you here at this hour.”

His anger was swift and startling. “You went to my home? You spoke to my
wife?
”

Surprised, I said, “Why, yes. Of course.”

“A woman such as yourself? How dare you set foot in my home and show yourself to a virtuous woman? Have you no shame?”

Now I understood him. I saw the double standard he practiced, which allowed him to retain his much-proclaimed moral probity while still doing exactly as he pleased.

“Well, sir, please remember that I am the headmistress of a school and not—well, not something else. If you have the virtue to present yourself to your wife, then surely I do as well. For everything I did was done with your contrivance. Does not shame reflect upon us both, if it should reflect on one?”

“I hardly think—” he began.

“Furthermore the truth is that I went to your hotel all-unknowing. Completely naive—as I was raised to be. What I remember best is you, sir, threatening the innocent girl who was my former self.”

That silenced him. He resumed his walk, and I took the place beside him. With each step he pressed the stick hard into the ground. His legs seemed stiff, wooden. He puffed on his cigar, and smoke surrounded us, blocking out the forest scents. The path led along the edges of the house’s clearing. Frances sat in a rocking chair on the porch, knitting. With a look of longing, and a trace of satisfaction, Cleveland tipped his hat to her. She stood to wave, holding her needlework against her abdomen.

On the far side of the clearing, we entered the forest once more. When we were safely hidden by the foliage, he grudgingly asked, “And what brings you here, lurking at my doorstep?” Disdain filled his voice, along with a touch of peevishness.

“I have an appeal to make. For the daughter I bore. Your daughter. She is the only reason I feel entitled to come here.”

“A woman like yourself cannot give assurance that such a child is my daughter. A woman like yourself cannot know such a thing—innocent though you claim to have been at our first acquaintance.”

On this he seemed confident, not at all taken aback by the notion that he had a daughter he had known nothing about until now. Most likely he had wide experience with this situation; perhaps many women had accused him of paternity, and he had his answers ready.
Ma, Ma, where’s my Pa? Goin’ to the White House, ha, ha, ha
—obviously the election ditty applied to more than one unfortunate child.

“A woman like myself can know such a thing, although I understand your reasons for hoping not.”

“If you want money, I don’t have any. Even if I did, I wouldn’t give it to you. I’m far beyond blackmail now. Mrs. Cleveland is the only one who concerns me, and she will believe my word over yours. And I hardly think the newspapers will care anymore.”

I could remember him naked. The mush of his stomach. His thighs white and dimpled. His face twisted with arrogant passion. “I don’t need money. I would never come to you for money. My daughter—our daughter—was adopted into a fine family, where mercifully she has no need of money.”

Angrily he turned to face me, blocking the path. “Why then, miss, have you come here?”

“Because some … knowledge has come to me. Knowledge that threatens our—our daughter.” I tried to be forthright, but I could barely go on, overwhelmed by a sudden yearning for Grace and by the necessity to keep her safe.

“What knowledge is this?”

“About the power station. At Niagara.”

He turned thoughtful. “Yes, I’ve followed the work being done there,” he said slowly. “I’ve been reading about the bombing in the newspapers. Now the police are leaning toward the nature lovers as the most likely culprits. I had assumed the unionists were responsible.” He became suspicious, his eyes narrowing. “And what relationship do you have, my dear, to a power station? Have you thrown your loyalties to the fanatics? Have you come here to plead their cause?”

“Hardly. The family which adopted your daughter is a family with … an interest in the power station,” I fumbled. The image of Grace filled me; an image of her half-sisters, playing here in safety, tossing a ball to one another.

“And?”

“There has developed a … tension among the investors and the … implementors of the project, about how the electricity should be used. Threats have been made to try to … force policy in a certain direction. Threats even against your daughter.”

“I find that hard to believe.” He paused. “Not the threats—standard procedure there. But threats against a child? That I don’t believe.”

“But it’s true.” Suddenly I felt like a child myself, stamping my foot petulantly.

“And who is making these threats against this putative daughter of mine? What big man, going after a little girl?”

As I studied him—smug and self-righteous, smiling condescendingly at my concern—something held me back from telling him the full truth. Something told me the truth would be dangerous in his hands, because it wouldn’t be sacred to him. He would toss the truth in the air as a conversational gambit among his cronies.

Carefully I said, “Your associate—your friend—Mr. Stetson, has been involved with this … policy-making. He acts on Mr. Morgan’s behalf. I’m sure what I’m saying is familiar to you. Perhaps a discreet word …”

He snorted. “Believe me, miss, my voice will do nothing against the forces involved in the construction of that power station. You truly are naive to think that it could.” Choking on cigar smoke, he enjoyed a moment of sardonic mirth. As president he’d always claimed the same thing. He’d credited himself with no power except the power to acquiesce passively to the wishes of the wealthy. “No, I’m out of it for good. The country’s heading down the road of that vaudeville act who managed to get himself elected vice president. Roosevelt!” He spat the name. “Well, any country gets the leaders it deserves.”

Taking off his hat, he wiped his brow with his handkerchief. His hair was thin, wispy, and white. His skull was a mottled, sickly pink. We exchanged a glance, and he pressed his hat firmly into place. All at once his mood shifted. “Of course I have always found naiveté charming.” He cocked his head at me, smirking. “My advice to you, my dear, is that you stop troubling yourself with matters like power stations. Leave such issues to the men who understand them. And believe me, such men have better things to do than make threats against a child—whatever her parentage.”

The pine forest protected us from the gaze of the virtuous Frances. Still holding his cigar, he reached out and put his hand on my shoulder, squeezing the bones. Smoke wisped across my face. I stepped away from him.

“I must say, Mr. President, you have been a terrible disappointment to me. I never would have even spoken to you that night at 184 if I’d known that this is what you would become. That this is what you were. I had high hopes for you. That was before the Pullman strike, of course. Before you decided that government had no power except to help the powerful. You could have been a hero. Instead you were nothing.”

He stared at me calmly. Finally he said, “How does that saying go, about a woman scorned?”

With that he turned his cumbersome body in the direction of the house. “Well, well, another battle I must refuse to fight. Good day to you, Miss—” Glancing back at me, he made a play of forgetting my name. “I’m sure you can find your own way to the road.” Walking down the path he chuckled quietly, the blue haze of cigar smoke a ribbon in his wake.

CHAPTER XXXIII

I
began my journey home, carriage to train. Although I was weary, I wouldn’t permit myself to accept defeat, not when Grace was at risk. I puzzled through alternate plans, some of them extravagant, even crazed: to steal Grace away from Buffalo and escape with her to Europe, the school be damned; to offer myself to Franklin Fiske if he would publish the threats against Grace in his newspaper; to make my own appeal to McKinley, in the probably false hope that the president of the United States would have more power than Mr. Morgan; or even to approach Mr. Morgan directly, importuning him at his office—he had children himself, surely he would have sympathy. But even as I reviewed these options I realized they were absurd. For the moment, I would have to assume that Grace could be protected at home, on the grounds of the estate. Tom would have to hire guards, to make certain. I would prevail upon him to do so, and somehow I would explain to Grace the necessity of staying home—she had the equivalent of a city park at her command, with tennis court and bathing pool, even a butterfly garden. She could have friends to visit. Staying home would not be onerous. And then I would see what Krakauer would do.

As to Grover Cleveland, I shocked myself to find that I felt … nothing. His power over me was gone. Disintegrated. I saw that the looming figure he had been in my mind for so many years bore no relation to the reality of him. Seeing how time had rendered him narrow-minded and frail showed me how far I had come, how much I had grown. I remembered a difficult expedition my father and I had made when I was a child, and how much I’d looked forward to returning home at the end of the summer; when I got home, however, my bedroom seemed oddly small, the kitchen almost miniature compared to where I’d been. That was similar to the way I felt now about Grover Cleveland. He’d become insignificant—meaningless and irrelevant—compared to where I’d been. The place he’d occupied in my soul now felt free and soaring. I hadn’t forgotten, or forgiven, the anguish he’d made me suffer, but I could see that anguish objectively now, as if it had been suffered by a different person—and I had been a different person then, inexperienced, with the skewed, innocent confidence of youth.

When I arrived at the train station in Albany, I was not entirely surprised to see the headlines that assailed me from the newsstands:

Arrested! For Shame! A Disgrace to Womanhood!

The stories reported the capture of the persons responsible for the bombing of the power station at Niagara. Each newspaper displayed a front-page litho of a defiant Susannah Riley being led to jail by a police officer who filled most of the picture with his jowly, mustachioed bulk. Quickly I bought a paper and searched for the names of those arrested: Among them were an unrepentant Daniel Henry Bates, but nowhere was there even a mention of Peter Fronczyk. Despite the moral conundrum of his deed, gratitude filled me at his escape.

Please join me at the state hospital immediately, no matter what the time
.

Such was the note, signed by Francesca, that greeted me when I arrived home early Wednesday morning, September 4, the day of President and Mrs. McKinley’s arrival. At this hour, there was nothing I could do for my daughter, so hastily I changed and went out again, walking through the sparkling morning to the hospital.

As I walked up the sandstone path to the insane asylum’s administrative building, pink roses were everywhere—hanging from trellises, crowding the paths, clustering in beds across the lawns, their sweetness making me gasp. Dr. Hoyt widely proclaimed pink roses to be therapeutic. Once I read about a Roman emperor who smothered a courtier to death with rose petals. Now I understood how such a thing was possible.

In the reception hall, the dark woodwork made the space feel small and cramped. The gaslight added to the lurking sense of darkness. It was only eight A.M. and shadows still concealed the intricately carved central staircase.

The guard at the desk was a young man with a bad complexion. When I told him that I’d come to see Miss Coatsworth, he said I would need to get permission from Dr. Hoyt first. I had assumed that Francesca was here doing some urgent charity work, probably involving an ill orphan, but now a stark fear came to me, that she herself had been brought in as a patient because she’d gone against the wishes of her cousin Freddy or of Mr. Milburn.

After absenting himself for a moment, the guard ushered me through to the inner office.

“Ah, Miss Barrett,” said Dr. Hoyt. This Santa Claus–like robber baron of the insane rose from his paperless desk. “A pleasure to see you.” He leaned across the desk to shake my hand; his own was pudgy and as dry as parchment.

Patience and flattery—these were the ways to reach him. “You’re here very early, Doctor. Your dedication is admirable.”

He blushed. “Yes, yes. Well, well. The times require sacrifice. What a marvelous moment in the history of the city!”

“Yes. Absolutely. Forgive me, I’ve been out of town: Has the hospital garnered any special attention? Is a tour planned for the president, by chance?”

Sadly he shrugged, turning his palms up. “I would be thankful for the opportunity to conduct the president on a tour of the innovative work we do here, but alas, the committee has not deemed my suggestions appropriate. Most likely they are right, however, as the president shall be devoting his journey to the glories of electricity. And of course there are the unfortunate physiological and psychological problems suffered by Mrs. McKinley. A visit here might be too close to home, as it were.” He shook his head in sympathy with her infirmities. “But you know, electricity may someday help the mentally ill. That is my hope. Research is being conducted—not here, alas, but—”

“Doctor, when I returned home this morning from a short journey I found a letter waiting from my friend Miss Coatsworth requesting my immediate presence here at the hospital. I trust her situation is stable?”

“Miss Coatsworth?” He looked confused. “Oh, no, no, you misunderstand. Miss Coatsworth is not a patient here.”

I exhaled in relief.

“No, it is her friend Miss Susannah Riley who has been admitted as a patient—and being kept under police guard, I might add,” he said with braggadocio, as though having a patient under police guard was a sign of his hospital’s importance and fame. He leaned forward, taking me into his confidence. “She was arrested, you know. She’s one of the band of fanatics who bombed the power station. At first she was in the common jail downtown,” he whispered sanctimoniously. “Well, that would never do! An educated woman, a tutor in drawing and painting to the finest ladies of our city, a teacher at your own school! And there was more than a little indication of psycholo … well, suffice it to say, she was transferred during the night. I was honored by a telephone conversation with Mr. Dexter Rumsey that made the situation very clear. Very clear indeed.”

“I’m sure it did,” I said ironically. “Mr. Rumsey is known for his clarity.”

Hoyt ignored my tone. “Yes, Miss Barrett, I agree. I have always found him extremely clear.”

I glanced at Hoyt sharply, to find him looking at me with the same intensity. Now I saw his game: If Mr. Rumsey determined someone to be insane, Dr. Hoyt was glad to concur. Mr. Rumsey had a power equal to Grover Cleveland’s over Mrs. Halpin, when it came to determining insanity.

“Mr. Rumsey asked me to oversee Miss Riley’s situation personally.”

“An honor.”

He flushed. “Thank you. Thank you very much.”

“May I see Miss Coatsworth?” I asked cautiously.

“Yes. Certainly! I will take you myself.” Unlocking a desk drawer, he took out a set of keys. Motioning me out, he locked his office door behind him and led me down a curving, wood-paneled passageway lit by a single gaslight, and then on through a series of heavy doors.

“You see our fireproofing here,” he explained proudly as he unlocked then relocked each door as we passed through. “Each ward is completely separate from the others, so any disturbance is quickly contained.” I was struck by his view of fire as a species of disturbance. What other types of “disturbance” had he experienced here? Unexpectedly he asked, “How is that girl we spoke about some months ago? Hasn’t harmed herself, I trust?”

Was there sarcasm in his voice, or had I simply imagined it? “She’s quite well. Thriving, in fact. How kind of you to remember.”

“Not at all.”

We entered one of the women’s wards. The corridor was unusually wide, but the doorways into the individual rooms were oddly narrow; a person of average size might feel the need to turn sideways to slip into a room. At this hour, the attendants were organizing the patients to wash and prepare for breakfast. Each ward had its own dining room; scents of bacon and cinnamon filled the air. The patients appeared dazed and emotionless, but (on this ward, at least) they were compliant. Each of their small rooms had a long window overlooking the grounds: rolling meadows, huge trees, acres of flowers, farms, and baseball diamonds—an abundance of natural beauty which Frederick Law Olmsted himself had designed to soothe the patients’ tumultuous minds.

Susannah Riley was being held at the end of the corridor, in a kind of suite: two narrow rooms with high ceilings, facing west. A severe but bored-looking police matron stood in a corner of the first room, while Francesca sat at a desk reading what appeared to be a formal report. Dr. Hoyt and I approached the open door in silence and waited a moment before Francesca looked up, startled, when she sensed our presence.

“At last!” she said, coming to embrace me.

“Well, well, I’ll leave you to it, then,” Dr. Hoyt said, taken aback by my friend’s open affection for me.

Francesca pulled away from me and reached to grip his hand. “You are so kind, Dr. Hoyt,” she said in her best
noblesse oblige
tone, which she used only for times of extreme condescension. “What would we have done without you? I’m terribly grateful.”

Gazing at her worshipfully, he patted his stomach. Had Francesca given the hospital a substantial donation to make him so deferential? As Hoyt quietly shut the door behind him, Francesca squeezed my arm.

“Well, I’ve certainly won him over, haven’t I?” she said with bleak humor. “That’s why Susannah was given these
elegant
rooms. I’m hoping that with enough money he’ll conclude that she’s too ill to stand trial, and he’ll release her into my recognizance and we’ll leave the city for a while. But all that takes time, and plotting.” She glanced at the police matron, who stared impassively at the wall, making a show of not listening. For the matron’s benefit, Francesca continued. “Of course all my donations are to the hospital. Dr. Hoyt has never asked for anything for himself. He’s totally dedicated to his work.” Then quietly she explained, “It was Susannah who asked me to write you. She said she needed to see you. That it was urgent. Do you know why? Can you tell me?”

What could I say? That Susannah wanted to tell me that she had forged a series of drawings? Or—this flashed through my mind—did Susannah wish to tell me that the drawings had not been forged after all? I felt the cold sweat of dread. “I don’t know, Francesca.”

She regarded me skeptically, but how could I even begin to explain? Sighing, she said, “I’ll tell her that you’re here.” But there was no need to “tell,” for the two rooms were no more than adjoining cubicles.

Quickly squeezing Francesca’s hand, I went into Susannah’s room and closed the door behind me. She sat on the bed, her hair flowing loose to her waist.

“Thank you for coming,” she said calmly.

“Why did you want to see me?”

Susannah stared out the window at the elm trees. The morning breeze would have been refreshing, but the window was locked shut, the air around us dank and stale. “We were set up—did you know?” Suddenly she turned to look at me, furious. “That man, Peter Fronczyk—Maddie Fronczyk’s brother. We should have realized. So typical!
He
was the one who pushed us whenever we had doubts,
he
was the one who said it was a ‘perfect’ plan. And now
he’s
the only one who hasn’t been arrested.”