Fallen Beauty (20 page)

There was another clear sky, full of stars and crisp air. I pressed my hand to the warm skin on my chest, trying to cool the heat that had risen there. I walked to the window and touched a pane to feel the chill, lifted the sash and leaned out. Glancing around town, I saw that many lights in upstairs rooms were out, and most of the town slept. Dr. Hagerty’s downstairs light was on, however. Caroline’s silhouette darkened the window. She held a book, and John sat at his table behind her, bent over his work. I wondered if she read to him while he repaired frames and polished lenses, and this glimpse of their intimacy touched me. After a moment, he stood, walked to her, and turned her chair to face him. He reached down and lifted her, and then disappeared from sight. My skin tingled from where the night air found the tears that slid down my face. The Hagertys’ companionship moved me, and I realized that I shouldn’t pity Caroline. I should envy her and everyone in town and up the mountain who had a partner, even with all of their imperfections. At least they had another person with whom to share ideas, a book, or a simple meal.

For the first time, I thought of Agnes, alone in her large house, her husband dead, her only child married, her grandchildren too weak to come into the world. Perhaps her losses had hardened her, and being alone, she had no one to challenge her or soften her rough edges. Maybe loneliness had chilled her and closed her heart, and caused her to envy others who had anything she did not, even if those others appeared to have less than she.

I shuddered at the thought of how much we had in common.

•   •   •

VINCENT

I
cannot be satisfied.

I long for visitors, but wish them gone as soon as they’ve arrived. I desire city energy, but can’t bear it once I’m there. I wish my husband would go away and leave me alone, and I am helpless without him.

This capricious, dizzying response to my world is only quelled by Laura. When I desire that she come and she does, I am calm. She seems to feed the good things in me. I knew I could tame her eventually, but the result is not what I expected. The softening of her heart toward me hasn’t further ignited my desire for her. Strangely, it has cooled it. But it is not a frigid cooling; it is like the river in the spring. After the thaw, before the heat, when it is refreshing. Cleansing.

The feelings I have for her resemble mother love, with our roles reversing. I want to be her mother. I want her to mother me. I want to hold her hand and sit in silence working next to her—Laura with her needle and thread, and me with pencils and paper. I want a Sapphic relationship, abundant with mutual admiration through creation.

But I know that sexual love is what fuels me, so it is George I desire. George must come to me. I won’t wait any longer. I will command that he come.

I write to him on Steepletop letterhead, reminding him of what poetry is born from our passion, chastising him for letting our love turn dry and cold, telling him that this is the anniversary of when our two galaxies collided and why the hell can’t he revisit that place? Suddenly I am savage, writing that he isn’t big enough for our love, that he is nothing but a child, that his palate is not refined enough for my sophistication. But I know exactly what his lips are capable of, and I am again reduced to begging, pleading, caring not that I sound like a madwoman, only hoping that he gets the letter soon, sees the urgency, and makes the trip. If he does not, I will. I will go to Chicago.

But I know he will come to me. I know it.

LAURA

I awoke in the morning to a fresh blanket of snow. The following day provided even more. I’d already tromped through the frigid mounds to post the order for materials for Millay’s reading tour wardrobe, but day after day of terrible weather prevented trains from delivering the fabric. While I waited for their whistles, I poured over pattern books and designed my own, selected linings that might complement the colors, refined details on bodices and necklines.

I pulled Grace around town on her sled, stopping at Marie’s house to help her finish sewing diapers and bibs for the baby, and then started for the hills near the school to sled. Gabriel didn’t look up while working on the back of Our Lady’s robes, but I noted that his eyes didn’t appear as dark as usual. He’d also trimmed his beard and lost his scowl. Did meeting the musicians have anything to do with that?

Before I passed, he spoke. “Will you come tonight?”

He was crouched down at the base of the slab at Our Lady’s feet. There was no one else nearby, so he had to be talking to me.

“Pardon me?” I asked.

He did not speak for a moment, and it dawned on me that he must be referring to the musicians. He’d seen me. I felt like a fool for spying on them.

“You’d be welcome, you know. Both of you,” he said. He stood and brushed off his dungarees, and finally met my eyes. “You don’t have to hide.”

“Hide and seek?” asked Grace.

“Do you like that game?” he asked her. “I know some kids who do too.”

Grace nodded. “We sled now.”

I was troubled by his words, torn in two by a strong impulse to go and another that scolded me for even considering it.

“They are good people,” he said.

I couldn’t help my curiosity. “How do you know them?”

“I met Sam, the guitarist, at the lumberyard where I’ve been doing some side work. He invited me. How did
you
find them?”

“I heard the music while I was walking by the pond.”

“I never hear,” said Grace.

I had almost forgotten that she sat there listening to us. She shook the rope and I looked down at her. “I never hear,” she said.

“Maybe sometime you will,” I replied.

Gabriel redirected his attention to the statue. I said good-bye, and he nodded as I walked past him. Just before he was out of my sight, he turned and caught my eye. I paused and he held my gaze longer than I could his. I resumed our trek to the hills. At the last moment I turned back. He was still watching me.

•   •   •

A
fter Grace and I baked and ate raisin bread and shared an apple for dinner, I tucked her in early. Our snow play had exhausted her, so she went without a fight. I looked out the window toward the woods, trying to decide what I should do. Young Laura—Laura before the change, as Marie had pointed out—would have gone willingly and with enthusiasm. But I wasn’t that girl anymore.

As I walked downstairs, I noticed my boots next to the back door, pointed toward the forest. How could going hurt my reputation any more than it already was? It couldn’t. No one would know, first of all, and second, there were families there—nothing sordid except maybe a little taste of gin, which I could refuse. Grace would want to make the adventure, and if she weren’t so sleepy, I would have taken her. If I was ever going to take Grace to the forest people, I should learn more about them first. Without thinking beyond that, I checked Grace once more, bundled up, took the bread I’d wrapped in a towel, and locked the door behind me.

Moonlight bathed the landscape, making the covered hills and snow-burdened trees appear frozen in time. I placed my feet in the tracks that preceded me in the snow. Before long I arrived at the bend, and the revelers came into view. All the usual visitors encircled the fire, including the children, too cold to venture far from its warmth. The beautiful woman sat next to Gabriel and passed him a cup. They hadn’t yet struck up a song. A branch near where I stood shook in the breeze, causing a rush of snow to fall beside me, and Gabriel saw me standing there. He stood, and they all turned their attention to me.

Suddenly the group surrounded me. Many of them embraced me, a few mentioned that they’d hoped I would come, and the heavyset man thanked me for the bread, which he proceeded to pass around the circle. The young man with the guitar, Sam, invited me to sit next to him and his husky, Blue, and introduced me to the group.

“For those of you who don’t know, this is Laura, the woodland fairy we thought was watching over us. She has actually turned out to be a beautiful woman bearing baked goods.”

A cheer went up in the crowd, and I colored from the heat of the fire and the embarrassment of being known in spite of my hiding.

“I’m glad you finally joined us,” said Sam, patting his dog on the head. The husky looked at me out of wise blue eyes. “Gabe told us you might, one of these days.”

“I’m Sam’s wife, Callie,” said a young woman wearing a cap over her blond hair. “And while I’m glad you’re here, I’m a little sad you aren’t actually a wood nymph.”

“If it makes you feel any better,” I said, “while I watched you, I often thought you were just such creatures.”

“I’m glad,” she said.

The colored man dipped a ladle into a steaming pot over the fire, and filled a tin cup for me. The scent of the cider tickled my nose as he placed it in my hands and gave me a shy smile.

“I’m Darren,” he said. “I work a farm, just north.”

I nodded at him, a little wide-eyed at seeing him with a group of whites in the woods.

“Tim,” said the large man. “When I’m not making music with these people, I’m at the post office in Austerlitz.”

The kids began to grow restless and started slinging snowballs at one another on the periphery of the clearing. I thought of how much Grace would love to be here with these warm people and a dog in this secret place, and was pleased with myself for coming. The woman with the long brown hair spoke last.

“Liza,” she said, extending her hand to me. “I work in set design for the Colonial Theatre and some other local theater companies.”

I felt a rush of envy, but I took her hand and attempted a smile.

“And it’s your turn,” Liza continued. “Tell us who you are and what you do, besides being a voyeur.”

“I’m just a seamstress,” I said. “I work in town.”

“Ah,” said Callie. “If we ever get that Chatham theater group going, I know who we’ll call for costumes.”

“Look at us,” said Sam. “Gabe’s a fallen-away papist. Tim’s a moonshiner. Darren is a colored farmer. Randall there is a Jewish lawyer.” A tall man with glasses and a bow tie raised his violin at me before directing his attention back to tuning its strings. “Is there any more base creature than a lawyer?”

“You’re nuts,” said Randall, with a half smile.

“But we’ve all got one thing in common. The music. So we meet and let the rest fall where it may.”

“You play?” Liza asked me.

“No.”

“You have ears that can listen?” asked Tim.

“I do.”

“Good,” said Sam. “Then let’s stop chattering and start playing.”

For the next couple of hours, I sat among them and allowed the music and the laughter to mend me in places I didn’t know could be healed so close to town. I sang along to some of the tunes I’d heard before; I drank the cider and absorbed the fascinating conversation and debate that rose between sets. Blue had come to sit next to me and nuzzled me until I began to pet her thick, warm coat. I could see her swollen belly, and thought she must be pregnant.

Gabriel sat next to Liza, across the fire from me. Our gazes barely met, but I was acutely aware of his presence. When I did gather the courage to look at him, I noticed that he seemed calm here. His intense eyes were softer, and he laughed more than once.

After almost no time at all, Darren announced that it was approaching midnight, and a great grumbling arose about early work times and long walks home in the cold. I felt suddenly nervous about how long I’d been away from Grace, and said my good-byes. While I stuffed my bread towel into my jacket, I saw Liza whisper something to Gabriel, and he laughed and gave her a hug before she waved to all of us and started up the snowy path with Callie, Sam, and their girls.

“I’ll put this out,” said Tim, shoveling dirt and snow over the fire.

As I entered the darkest part of the woods, Gabriel joined me. “I’ll walk you home. I’m going this way too.”

“All right,” I said. As we climbed, the chill began to overtake the luscious warmth of the past few hours. It made me long for the fireside and the kind people. “I’m glad I came tonight.”

“I can tell,” he said. “You looked different down there than you do in town.”

“I felt different,” I said, shoving my hands deep into my pockets. “You seemed changed too, I’d add.”

He made a sound of assent. “Next time, you should bring Grace. I don’t like you leaving her alone while you’re down there.”

I bristled at his comment. “Really? And just who are you to criticize?”

“It’s not criticism; it’s concern. What if there was an emergency?”

“Like what? After my mother died, my father left my sister and me alone as children all the time. I’m less than five minutes away. I can see the house from here.”

“What if a candle catches the rug on fire, or robbers break in, or she has a nightmare?”

I fell silent, suddenly embarrassed and ashamed that I’d left Grace alone so often. What kind of mother was I?

“Hey,” he said, “I’m sure she’s fine. I didn’t mean to upset you. I just want you to bring her next time so she can have some fun. I don’t see her playing with little ones in town.”

I was glad of the dark so he couldn’t see my shame. The back of my shop came into view, and as we crossed the meadow, I felt exposed, and then worried that I’d be seen walking at night with a man while my daughter slept alone in the house. I widened the space between us. Gabriel looked over at me and then back at the town, and didn’t say anything more.

When we reached my back door, he wished me good night and waited for me to go inside. I locked the door behind me and rushed upstairs to check on Grace, who slept soundly. I thanked God for it, and rubbed my temples, alarmed at my bad judgment.

That night I crawled into her bed, holding her close to me. There would be no more leaving her. I would take her with me to the forest at night and let her play with other children. I’d show her what community looked like.

•   •   •

VINCENT

G
eorge has refused me.

I wrote him; I telegrammed him from New York City when we went for the weekend. I begged him to call me or I’d be on the next train to Chicago. He finally called us at the Vanderbilt to calm me, to say he could not get away at the moment, but that he would come as soon as he could.

I know he lied to me to keep me from coming to him, and it makes me want to hang myself.

In the newspapers, I recently read that a scientist used penicillin, a fungus of some kind, to cure an eye infection. The implications are profound, but I cannot help but wish there could be a cure for my emotional suffering. Alcohol and morphine dull me, but they do not fix me. The hurt comes back stronger when the blurring wears off, and it seems I need more and more of the drugs to deaden my heartsickness.

I wait in bed for Arthur Ficke. He is coming to me today, and without Gladys, thankfully. If I have to endure her stuffy, soul-sucking fussiness for another minute, I’ll put a gun to my head. She is the worst kind of female, one who pretends to be open, but inside her a Puritan minister waits in judgment. She is high on women’s rights, and yet she’s crueler to women than to any man, and is an appalling bore, to boot.

Gladys is prone to lecture me when I disappoint her. When Uge and I had decided to stay in the city and celebrate last New Year’s Eve with Deems and Mary instead of going to Hardhack, Gladys had a tantrum that lasted for weeks. I told Uge that she could kiss my derriere, and I’ve tried to avoid her the whole of this long, strange year.

But it is Sunday, and the Fickes are so damnably married to their routines, we can count on them to arrive like clockwork. Sometimes we leave to go somewhere before we know they’ll show up, and make excuses afterward, but today, with the snow in the roads and my strain over George’s refusal to come to me, I cannot leave my bed.

Sunday is the only day when we are free of employees. The servants aren’t here; the farm staff is off. When the weather is nice, we don’t put on a stitch of clothing all day. We work in the garden and sunbathe by the roses, where we’ll put in a pool one day soon. Our skin becomes deliciously dark and freckled, and we make love surrounded by bees and birds in our private Eden.

Oh, we didn’t always mind the Fickes joining us. They would strip with us and flirt. We’d take nude photos and dally with one another. I hope all of that is not over, but it will be if Gladys doesn’t learn to hold her tongue, or at least use it for good.

I giggle at this luscious thought just as Arthur walks in. My robe is open, baring my breasts, and I smoke my cigarette like a butterfly takes nectar from a flower. His face opens in a smile.

“I thought you weren’t well, sweet Vincent,” he says, coming to my side and burying his face in my neck.

“Gladys won’t like this. We can only partake of each other when she’s there. You know the rules.”

“You have enchanted me, you goddess. I am helpless in your gaze. Surely she’d forgive me.”

“Never. And how is your dearest
wife
?”

“She’s fine. Visiting friends. Jealous that I’m spending the day with you.”

“I’m still bitter that you married her, even though it was aeons ago.”

He is taken aback that I have voiced this. I don’t know why he is ever shocked by a thing I say.

“You may be more sensitive than I,” I say.

“You are too inconstant for me,” he says, gruffly. There is dark emotion in his voice and he pulls away. “I require loyalty.”

“All great hypocrites do, love,” I say, and stub out my cigarette. I close my robe over my breasts and cross my legs at the ankle.

He rises from my bedside, understanding that he is no longer welcome.