Lawless (58 page)

She was truly pleased for him, though. He’d gotten into one of the best amateur acting associations in New York. Small, but with a fine reputation. A great many such clubs flourished in rental quarters all over town. They usually restricted their membership to males. Their occasional productions were done with minimal scenery, or none at all, and were financed by members’ dues. Most of the associations were named in honor of popular actors.

Charlie pointed to the line of carriages at the Fourteenth Street curb in front of the Academy of Music. It had originally been constructed as an opera house, but New York wouldn’t support a full season of such heavy fare, so concerts and limited engagements by famous theatrical personalities were required to keep the auditorium lit.

“The hacks and carriages are already here,” Charlie said. “That means we arrived just in the nick. Follow me to the actors’ entrance. I know right where it is. I’ve been here a
hundred
times.”

The declaration was emphasized by a gesture that nearly knocked her hat off. Eleanor was sure Charlie had exaggerated. It was a forgivable fault, but she wondered whether it was common to most actors.

Excitement mounted within her as they crossed Irving Place. She glanced toward the main doors and noticed a boy of seventeen or eighteen watching her.

He had black hair, and one of the handsomest faces she’d ever seen. It was redeemed from prettiness by his cocky smile. He wore a duck jacket with the name of the hall stitched on the front; he’d been sweeping the walk with a cornhusk broom. Now he was inspecting her—and not merely her face. His gaze wandered down her throat to her breasts. What he saw, he approved.

The cocky smile spread warmth through her middle. It thrilled her and frightened her at the same time. But it really wasn’t polite of him to stare at a girl so brazenly. Probably he was a Latin, like the hot-blooded Tommaso Salvini.

The boy suddenly gave her a big wink. She gasped.

“What’s wrong?” Charlie asked; he’d been looking elsewhere.

“Why—why”—the main doors of the Academy abruptly opened outward; the boy with the broom darted to one side as a rush of theatergoers emerged into the gray afternoon—“you were right about the time,” she finished in a lame way.

The boy was quickly hidden by the departing patrons. Many were scowling. Eleanor wasn’t surprised. The attraction at the Academy was a three-week run of
Othello
with the celebrated Italian tragedian, Salvini, in the title role.

The same production had been staged in ’73, and had caused a sensation. During the climactic murder scene, Salvini’s staging called for him to seize his leading lady, Signora Piamonti—no American actress would play Desdemona opposite him—hurl her on a low bed and fall on top of her, snorting and growling while she writhed beneath him. Every critic in town had been outraged. Charlie said the
Tribune
had called Salvini’s initial production “carnal,” and Eleanor knew the
Union’s
drama writer, William Dawes, had attacked the revival as “a degrading and unprincipled exhibition of unbridled lust performed solely for profit.” Naturally, with notices like that, both the first run and the revival had done turnaway business—though it was clear many members of the matinee audience had been angered by what they’d seen.

Charlie led her to a cul-de-sac behind the Academy. The actors’ door was at the end. The narrow space was already filled with well-wishers. And the crowd grew. All at once Eleanor realized she had nothing on which Signor Salvini might sign his name.

Charlie was better prepared. He’d brought an old handbill from Wallack’s Theater. He tore it in half and said he’d share his pencil.

“Here they are!” someone screamed. Eleanor thought she’d faint with excitement as the great actor emerged. He was incredibly good looking, with a mane of dark hair, deep-set eyes and a blazing white smile.

Salvini walked slowly and majestically down four steps into the throng of admirers. All of them were clapping and shouting his name. They began thrusting bits of paper and pencils at him. Eleanor got elbowed and stepped on. She didn’t care. She was mesmerized by the actor’s handsome face—so enraptured, she never noticed the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, or the bulge of fat at his waist when he swept his cloak back over his shoulder, the better to sign his name.

Despite Charlie’s appearance of softness, he was determined, nimble, and, on this occasion, ferociously strong. He elbowed the bellies and ribs of older men—and women—till he got the actor’s signature. Then, shrieking, “Take it, Eleanor! Give me yours!” he performed a miraculous exchange of papers in the surging crowd and secured a second signature for her.

None too soon, either. Salvini waved, abandoned twenty or thirty other autograph seekers and escaped into his carriage at the end of the cul-de-sac.

“Next to Edwin Booth’s performance, that was the most thrilling thing I’ve ever seen!” Eleanor clutched the signed scrap of handbill to her breast. “Thank you, Charlie. Thank you!”

“It’s nothing,” he said with exaggerated magnanimity. “I’ll take you to a real matinee if you can ever get out of the house long enough to—”

They stopped, face-to-face with the dark-haired young man with the broom. He’d evidently followed Eleanor and now, grinning at her, he said in the most beautiful baritone voice she’d ever heard, “Thought Signor Salvini was pretty handsome, did you? Well, I work here, and I can tell you for a fact, around the middle he’s big as a whale. He wears a corset.”

“See
here!”
Charlie said, inadvertently wriggling his eyebrows. “No one asked you for any comments.”

“No, but I thought the young lady might be interested.” The boy hardly took his eyes off of her. That queer, tingling sensation started in her hands, then in her legs. She found herself thinking,
He’s as good-looking as Salvini.

A panicked knot formed in her throat even as her breasts began to feel tight inside her clothing. These reactions were dangerous.
Dangerous.
She need only remember the quarrels heard through closed doors at home.

Charlie gripped her elbow and said in a pompous way, “Eleanor, come along.”

“Eleanor?” the older boy repeated. “That’s a pretty name. But then you’re a pretty girl. My name’s Leo Goldman. Do you like the theater?”

“Very much.”

“So do I. That’s why I took a job at the Academy. I’ve decided acting is the fastest and easiest way to make a fortune in this country. I hear managers are clamoring for actors with nice features and good elocution.”

“They’re not clamoring for anyone as conceited as
you,
sir!” Charlie huffed. He walked away very quickly in case the dark-haired boy took offense.

He didn’t. Eleanor reluctantly followed her friend. She was unexpectedly sorry to have the conversation end. She glanced back and saw Leo Goldman walking toward the theater entrance. His face was glum.

“He was only trying to be friendly, Charlie—”

“With you, not me.”

“Don’t be silly. Why did you take such a dislike to him?”

“I don’t trust
anyone
that good looking.”

“But he seemed very nice.”

“Too cocky, Eleanor. A slum type. I can tell them every time. His pretensions to an acting career are lamentable.”

“I wouldn’t say so. He has a lovely voice.”

“But he’s a Jew.”

“I don’t see what difference that makes.” She was growing annoyed.

Charlie compressed his lips. “You’re
impossible.
A naive
child.
His kind would
never
be admitted to a club like the Booth Association. I say amen. Let’s forget about him. Got your list?”

“Oh my.” Panic set in. The boy named Leo had completely driven the shopping from her mind. “Yes, and we’d better hurry. I must buy linens, and oodles of thread—if I don’t get it all before Stewart’s closes, Mama will have my hide.”

“I said I’d
help,
didn’t I?”

Charlie led the way through the traffic on Irving Place, jerking Eleanor somewhat roughly as a brewer’s wagon bore down on them. She suspected Charlie was irked by her interest in the other young man.

Well, jealousy was ridiculous. She’d never see the boy again. Besides, that sort of interest only led to trouble.

Still, her feelings had been delicious when—

No.

The brewer’s wagon veered. Charlie had to give her a second tug to get them safely to the curb. The wagon went by, rumbling toward another couple a half block up Irving. The object of quite a few Manhattan drivers, it seemed to Eleanor, was to crush as many pedestrians as possible.

When they were on the sidewalk and moving at a brisk pace, Charlie begged for more applause. “I trust seeing such a famous actor was a tonic and an inspiration for you.”

“Oh, yes. Thank you again for bringing me. I couldn’t have come alone.”

“No, that’s right,” Charlie declared with that ponderous air which came so easily. “Wouldn’t be safe. Now I know you love and respect your mother—”

Don’t say that word,
she thought.
I don’t
love
anyone, and I mustn’t.

“—but I do hope you can find a way to visit the Booth Association as soon as I’m settled in.”

“I’ll be there, I promise.”

“Good, good. An amateur acting society is the
only
place a respectable young woman can learn the fundamentals of the profession.”

“I’ll find a way to visit you, Charlie,” she said with sudden fervency. “Believe me, I will.”

P
HILADELPHIA WAS PACKED
with visitors and dignitaries who’d come for the opening ceremonies in Fairmount Park beside the Schuylkill River. Hotel space was at a premium, but Gideon had made an advance reservation for two rooms, on separate floors. Julia confessed in a letter that she didn’t think the subterfuge would fool a boy as old as Carter, but at least she was trying to maintain the illusion of propriety.

On the night before the exposition opened, she stole down to Gideon’s room and they satisfied the intense physical hunger a separation always produced. Afterward, as they lay in each other’s arms, she said in a quiet way, “Will you tell me what’s bothering you?”

“What do you mean, bothering me?”

“There, you see? You’re snapping again. You’ve been doing it ever since you met us at the depot. What on earth’s happened?”

“Nothing.”

Silence followed the vehement denial. It lasted five or six minutes. Several times Julia was tempted to speak, but thought it wiser to be patient and wait for him to continue. She was virtually certain he would.

Sure enough, he began to pour it out in a halting monologue. Things were not well at home. Margaret was not only hostile, but beginning to behave in a way that made him worry about her sanity. Even his two children seemed to be turning against him. He feared his son was growing up spineless, and his daughter becoming a partisan of his wife.

Julia stroked his chest lightly. “It’s good that you got all of that out. Now that you’ve identified the problems, the next thing to do is to look for the causes.”

“In Margaret’s case I needn’t look any further than the liquor cabinet or the wine racks in the cellar. She turned me out years ago—at least figuratively. That doesn’t mean I want to see her suffer. I’ve begged her to see a doctor about the drinking. She absolutely refuses.”

His voice had grown agitated again. Julia kept her hand moving on his skin in a soothing way as she said, “Perhaps she can’t do anything else. We all find our own ways to cure pain. If I hadn’t found Lucy Stone after I left Louis, I might have picked up a bottle of whiskey instead. I was hurting. I’m sure your wife is too.”

“Well, there seems to be no real remedy for it. I’ve given up. I’m about to give up on my children, too.”

“Oh, Gideon, no—”

“Yes. I’m losing them, Julia. I don’t know why. I give them every advantage. Everything they want—within reason, anyway.”

Softly: “How much of yourself do you give?”

“What?” He thought a moment. “I see them whenever I can”—a pause—“although I admit that isn’t very often. Since Margaret started acting peculiar, I think I’ve invented excuses to stay away from home.”

“There, you’ve found the heart of the problem. Think back. When did you last talk to your children at any great length? Or look in to wish them good night?”

His voice was faint all at once. “It’s been longer than I care to remember.”

He turned on his side. Laid his palm against her cheek gently. “You’re an astonishing person—do you know that? Most women in your position would be scheming to break my ties with my family, not trying to help me repair them.”

“I must admit there are times when the former would be more to my liking. To the liking of the old Julia, anyway. She’s still present from time to time, I’m sorry to say. But contrary to what that poor murdered miner said in Deadwood, I really don’t want to be a home-wrecking harlot. I don’t think I am. What—damage there is in your marriage began to occur long before you and I met in Chicago. Still, I can’t stand by and see you run so far from your wife that you also lose what you care about most—your children. Think about trying to give them more of your time, Gideon. More of yourself.” She kissed the corner of his eye. “I know what a wonderful gift that is.”

He was quiet again. Then, at last, he grew a bit more cheerful.

“Yes, I think you’ve seen what I couldn’t. I’ve been neglecting them. I’ll start doing something about it the moment I get back to New York.”

“Good.”

He planted a kiss on her lips. “You’re a wise and loving woman. Thank you.”

“Think nothing of it. It’s merely a part of the complete service provided by your surrogate wife”—she touched him, and her voice grew husky—“who craves you shamelessly again.”

Few material things moved Gideon Kent any longer; he had become a lover of intangibles. Words. Ideas. But he was moved to awe and admiration by the scope of the Centennial Exhibition whose gates opened to waiting thousands at nine the next morning.

He had an admission card for a roped enclosure near the Main Hall, a section set aside for reporters. He’d gotten tickets for Julia and Carter in an area of special guest seats. And a good thing, too. By ten past nine, every unreserved inch of ground near the Main Hall and the equally mammoth Machinery Hall adjacent to it was packed with people eager to see the President of the United States and the Emperor of Brazil.