The Lawless
It is a time of rebirth. America resounds with the
crystal echoes of high society ... the rugged
thrill of the cattle-drive out west ... the roar of the
great railroads, spanning the nation from coast to coast
But, at the heart of the glorious land is the throbbing
pulse of corruption, and caught in its unrelenting
rhythm, the family Kent:
Matthew, the artist, caught up in the ferment of the
Paris art world and the struggle of choosing between his talent
and his love for Dolly ... Jeremiah, the
fugitive, whose love of violence sets him again on
a trail of desperation and murder ...
Gideon, the reformer, caught in his fiery struggle
at the expense of his happy marriage ...
From Chicago and the fury of its great fire ...
to New York, where Gideon's scathing
denunciation of society will be heard ... to Bill
Hickok's gun-toting Abilene and Deadwood
... to Jeremiah's final rendezvous with a deadly
prophecy-The LAWLESS wend their way into the house
of Kent
The Kent Family Chronicles
With all the color and sweep of American history
itself, THE LAWLESS continues The Kent Family
Chronicles coma mighty saga of heroism and
dedication, patriotism and valor, shining spirit and
abiding faith.
Here is the story of our nation-and an amazing family
living in the turbulent times that began the American
Experience.
This magnificent series of novels is more than
absorbing, entertaining reading-it is a resounding
affirmation of the greatness of America.
NOVELS IN THE SERIES
THE BASTARD 1
THE REBELS 2
THE SEEKERS 3
THE FURIES 4
THE TITANS 5
THE WARRIORS 6
THE LAWLESS 7
JOHN JAKES
THE KENT FAMILY CHRONICLES Volume
VII
A JOVE BOOK
A Jove book still published by arrangement with the
author
PRINTING HISTORY
Jove edition still April 1978 Eighth printing still
March 1982
All rights reserved. Copyright [*copygg'1978
by John Jakes and Book Creations, Inc.
Produced by Lyle Kenyon Engel
This book may not be reproduced in whole or in
part,
by mimeograph or any other means, without
permission.
For information address: Jove Publications, Inc.,
200 Madison Avenue, New York, N.
Y. 10016.
ISBN: 0-515-06408-7
Library of Congress Catalog Card
Number: 77-91235
Jove books are published by Jove
Publications, Inc.,
200 Madison Avenue, New York, N.
Y. 10016.
The words "A JOVE BOOK" and the J with
sunburst are trademarks
belonging to Jove Publications, Inc.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF
AMERICA
In memory of my father
Contents
Prologue
The Dream and the Gun11
Book One
Matthew's Mistress37
Chapter I "A Dog's Profession"39
Chapter II The Prussian53
Chapter III Reunion63
Chapter IV Dolly's Secret72
Chapter V Strelnik's Flight80
Chapter VI In the Studio of the Onion92
Chapter VII Someone Watching102
Chapter VIII The Callers112
Chapter IX Colonel Lepp
Insists123
Chapter X Shadow of Death131
Chapter XI The Hidden Roombleadj
Chapter XII Sanctuary154
Chapter XIII On the Chelsea
Embankment168
Chapter XIV Dolly's Gift175
Interlude
"And Thou Shalt Smite the
Book Two
Gideon's Cause209
Chapter IN-IGHT Attack211
Chapter II Breakage229
Chapter III Tinderbox243
Chapter IV Julia at Home257
Chapter V "The Lucy Stone Brothel, West

Chapter VI Invasion at Ericsson's280
Chapter VII Lucifer's Match296
Chapter VIII Into the Inferno308
Chapter IX Guilt320
Chapter X Uninvited Guest333
Chapter XI Decision in the Rain349
Interlude
A Shooting on Texas Street359
Book Three
Margaret's Wrath385
Chapter IM-OLLY387
Chapter II On Newspaper Row397
Chapter III A Hard Taskmasterbledjd
Chapter IV The Hearts of Three Women 414
Chapter V Tompkins Squarebledcj
Chapter VI In Bostonbleddc
Chapter VII Among the Goldhuntersbledec
Chapter VIII Death in Deadwoodbledfg
Chapter IX House of Angerbledgh
Chapter X Free Spiritsbledid
Chapter XI The Man in Machinery Had512
Chapter XII Vision of America526
Chapter XIII House of Hurt533
Chapter XV The Birthday553
Chapter XVI House of Madness568
Chapter XVII Voyager584
Interlude
Summer Lightning601
Book Four
Eleanor's Way" 625
Chapter I "100 Years"627
Chapter II Imprisoned635
Chapter III The Tommer648
Chapter IV "Hell with the Lid Off"661
Chapter V The Punishers674
Chapter VI Hatred687
Chapter VII Call to Forgiveness704
Chapter VIII Call to Courage713
Chapter IX From out of the Fire723
Chapter X Two Farewells739
Chapter XI Sky Full of Stars756
Chapter XII Julia's Fate772
Chapter XII The Law and the Lawless778
Afterword796
Genealogical Chart798
"Pistols are almost as numerous as men. It is no
longer thought to be an affair of any importance
to take the life of a fellow being."
October 13, 1868: Nathan A. Baker,
editorializing in the Cheyenne Leader.
"What is the chief end of man?-to get rich. In
what way?-dishonestly if we can; honestly, if we
must Who is God, the one only and true? Money
is God. Gold and Greenbacks and Stock-father,
son, and the ghost of same-three persons in one; these
are the true and only God, mighty and supreme
... his
September 27, 1871: "The Revised
Catechism" by Samuel Clemens, published hi
the New York Tribune.
Prologue The Dream and the Gun
THEY HUNTED BUFFALO and lived in the open,
away from the settled places. That sort of life
tended to keep a man fit. But sometimes even the most
robust constitution couldn't withstand foul weather. So it
proved with Jeremiah Kent in April of 1869.
Three days of exposure to fierce wind and pelting
rain left him sneezing. Two days after that, he and
his companion made camp in a hickory grove.
Jeremiah rolled up in his blankets and
surrendered to fever. Kola, the Oglala Sioux with
whom he'd traveled since early '66, kept
watch.
After sleeping almost continuously for forty-eight hours,
Jeremiah woke late at night. He saw
Kola squatting on the other side of the buffalo
chip fire, a dour look on his handsome face. Between
Jeremiah and the Indian lay the cards of an
uncompleted patience game Kola had started
to pass the time. Over the past couple of years,
whenever they'd had nothing else to do, Jeremiah had
tried to teach his friend all the card games he knew.
The Indian liked cards and had learned
to shuffle and deal almost as fast and expertly as his
mentor.
Jeremiah struggled to rise on one elbow. The
fever still gripped him, distorting sounds: the rustle of
new leaves in the spring breeze; the purl of water
out of a limestone formation behind the grove; the occasional
stamp or snort of one of their long-legged calico
ponies. From his friend's expression, Jeremiah
knew something bad had happened.
He licked the inside of his mouth. The fever made

teeth feel huge, his head gigantic. "You ought
to sleep once in a while," he said.
"The sickness has not passed. I will keep watch."
"That all you're fretting about, the sickness?"
The Sioux glanced into the wind-shimmered flame.
"Something's sticking hi your craw. What is it?"
The Sioux was three years older than Jeremiah,
and his true kola. His sworn friend for a lifetime.
Jeremiah had found the Indian on the prairie,
nearly beaten to death by one of his own tribe; the beating
was punishment for adultery. He'd cared for the Indian
until he recovered, as Kola was caring for him now.
The young man's bleary stare fixed on the Indian,
prodding. "Come on. What?"
Kola sighed. "I did sleep a little tonight. While
I slept, a vision came,"
The various branches of the Sioux tribe put great
stock in visions. Clearly Kola's had upset
him. Jeremiah tried to put him at ease with a
laugh and a wave:
"Listen, I'm the one with the fever and the dreams."
"Dreams of what?" Kola asked instantly.
Jeremiah's grin widened. "Women. Plump
women."
Kola grunted. "Better dreams than mine. I
dreamed a dark thing."
"Tell me."
Looking at him with eyes that brimmed with misery,
Kola said, "I dreamed I saw you with your guns
again. I saw the guns in your hands."
Anger and fear started Jeremiah shivering. Almost
without thought, he glanced into the dark where the ponies were
tethered. His revolvers were wrapped in oilskin in
one of his saddlebags. The same bag carried the
last of the money stolen in the ill-concvd payroll
train robbery up near North Platte over a
year ago. He'd been going by the name Joseph
Kingston then.
"Well, it must be a false vision this time.
I packed the guns away last winter."
7 killed eight men and one woman before 1 came
to
see that always settling things with the guns was a sickness.
A sickness that would whip me one day if 1 couldn't
whip it first.
The faces of the dead whirled through his mind, each
vivid and never to be forgotten. Some were faces from the
Georgia plantation owned by the man who had been his
commanding officer. Before Lieutenant Colonel
Rose had died outside Atlanta, he'd begged
the young Confederate soldier to leave the beaten
army-desert- in order to be of some real use in the
last days of the war. He'd implored Jeremiah
to head straight for the plantation named Rosewood and
help protect it and the colonel's family from
Sherman's horde.
Jeremiah had done so. Or tried. At
Rosewood, one by one, he'd killed
Skimmerhorn, a Yankee forager. Price, a
trouble-making ex-slave. And Serena, his commanding
officer's daughter. Killing her had given him the
greatest pleasure. Hurt him the most, too.
Serena had lied to him. Said she loved him when all
she really cared about was the Kent money he'd
told her about The money he stood to inherit one day
if he went back home-
Which was impossible after the killings at Rosewood.
He fled west.
Some of the faces of the dead were from Fort Worth. A
monte dealer who'd tried to cheat him. A law
officer who'd tried to arrest him after he used his
guns to give the dealer his comeuppance.
There were faces from his prairie wanderings. The
busted-luck cattleman, Major Cutright. The
major's hired hand, Darlington. A third belonged
to a member of Cutright's party whom Jeremiah had
foolishly spared and released after the major tried
to steal a load of freshly shot buffalo.
Jeremiah could still see the terrified, furious face
of the boy named Timothy who'd
promised to remember him. Remember the deaths.
Find him one day and repay him.
Finally there were faces from the Union Pacific
railhead where he and Kola had sold the buffalo
meat. A sharp named Butt Brown and his dimwitted
helper. Those two and all the rest were dishonorable people,
deserving death.
But in the end, giving them what they deserved created
too many problems. So last year he'd set
about overcoming his desire to mete out punishment.
He'd taught himself not to need the kind of joy that
accompanied killing.
With effort he went on:
"Why, hell, I haven't so much as threatened
anybody with a gun since we held up the U. P.
special in Nebraska and then agreed that kind of
thing was too damn dangerous."
Slowly, Kola nodded. "I hear all you say.
Nevertheless, I dreamed I saw you with the guns."
"That's over!" A bitter smile. "Sometimes I
think I'm the only one who believes it. My mother
used to talk about a crazy streak in the family.
Inherited from someone way back, a grandmother, maybe.
Fletcher blood was what she called it. The
woman's name was-Fletcher. My mother never came
right out and said she saw the streak in me. But I know
she did, else why would she have brought it up? I
guess what I did at the end of the war and right afterward
proves she was right. But I've licked it, Kola.
I may have it, but it isn't going to push me where I
don't want to go."
He sounded more confident than he felt. Sometimes his
mother's words stole into his thoughts and brought a sad
conviction that he was a prisoner of something
inescapable. He grew vehement again:
"I'm changed for good. The other way makes a man
scared all the time. Scared of arrest, scared of every
stranger he meets, scared of answering when somebody
says an ordinary hello-was
Kola averted his eyes. That angered Jeremiah
all the more:
"What the hell's wrong now? You don't believe
me either?"
"I want to believe you with the fullness of my heart,
so you will be free of the hurt those kill-the past has
brought you. But-was
"Come on. Say it!"
Kola swallowed, then whispered, "In the dream I
also heard a voice."
Jeremiah's spine twitched. "One of the holy
voices?"
"Yes, wakan. Holy. When I woke, I was very
careful to recall everything it said." Kola's eyes
focused on the dark beyond the fire and his voice took
on a singsong quality. "It said to me, once you
take up the guns again, you will never put them down.
There will be no end to the killing. The guns will bring
great luster to your name for a while, but then it will vanish
as swiftly as the light of a winter afternoon.
Finally the power of the guns will fade and you will be killed
by-was Bleak eyes found Jeremiah's. "One of
your own."
"One of-?" He gaped, torn between fright and an
urge to guffaw. "You mean my family?"
Kola's tone was normal again. "I suppose. I
only heard the voice say exactly what I
told you. There is no more."
Jeremiah wiped his perspiring forehead. "That's the
most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.
'Specially the last part. It couldn't happen! My
mother's gone and the rest of my family think I'm
dead. The only person who knows Jeremiah Kent
is still alive is my father's friend Boyle, the
Irishman we ran into at the railhead in
sixty-six. But he swore never to say a word about
meeting me. I couldn't stand to have my father or brothers
know
the things I've-well, I don't plan to look
any of them
up. Ever! So it couldn't happen."
Kola ran a finger through the dirt beside the fire. "I
hope that is true. I cannot say whether it is.
Nothing was explained to me in the vision."
"Then it's a stupid vision! You hear?
Stupid?"'
The strident, fever-dry voice hurt the Sioux,
who stared down at the cracked toes of his boots.
Jeremiah's exertions had cost him too much energy.
He fell back, dizzy and breathing hard. His
voice took on a rambling, sleepy quality.
"I'm through with the guns. People hunt you. Put your name
up on posters-you've seen those, Kola. I'm all
through with that kind of life. It-was He coughed. "It
costs too much."
And yet, a taunting inner voice persisted, there is
that indescribable moment when the hand is fused to the gun
and the gun becomes part of you; when the bowel-loosening
fright spreads in the eyes of the one facing the gun and you
feel so powerful-
"No," he said, "I'm through."
Motionless, Kola contemplated the fire.
Jeremiah's eyes closed. He welcomed the
fluffy black of fever-induced drowsiness. It
saved him from thinking about his friend's words. He was set
on a different course, for good. No matter how
poor the season or how meager the profits at the end
of it, hunting buffalo was preferable to running and
wondering who was pursuing.
"Dream," he mumbled, slipping
into unconsciousness. "Dream-was wrong."
He didn't slip away fast enough. He heard
Kola whisper with unmistakable doubt, "Perhaps.
Perhaps."
In another twenty-four hours, the fever still lay on
him. Kola woke him gently. A red sunset
light was spearing down, fragmenting in the shade of the
grove. Touching his shoulder, Kola said:
"This has lasted too long. You cannot eat, everything
comes up. I cannot help you. I must find someone who
can."
So dizzy he could barely fight his eyes open,
Jeremiah said, "No, that's not safe."
Kola acted as if he hadn't heard. "There is a
town nearby. I will find a man who practices
white medicine and bring him."
At that moment Jeremiah felt a surge of
emotion- love or something very close to it. He was
startled to find he was still capable of feeling affection
of the kind he'd once felt for his older brothers.
Kola was risking much on his behalf. The other man
well knew the dangers of riding into a white
settlement, one scruffy Indian hi white man's
clothing. It was especially dangerous in this part of
Kansas, which had been plagued by raiding
Cheyenne and Arapahoe and Kiowa the preceding year.
"Kola, I don't want you to take a chance and-was
The Sioux pushed Him down, interrupting. "I must.
I will be safe enough. It will take only an hour
or two."
Apprehensive, Jeremiah watched Him ride
into the blurred red dusk.
He never came back.
On the following Tuesday evening when Jeremiah
rode along the Kansas Pacific rails to the
settlement, he was still suffering from a slight fever.
Although the gusty wind was cool, perspiration gathered
under the
brim of his low-crowned plainsman's hat. He
swayed slightly in the saddle, a tall young man of
twenty-three who gave the appearance of being much
older.
He had his mother's fair hair and his father's gaunt
cheeks and a weathered, pleasant face spoiled only
by his mouth, which was so thin it sometimes took on a
cruel cast. His good-weather clothing consisted of a
collarless cotton shirt, blue once but now faded
to ivory; a dirty gray buckskin vest with
pockets; checked wool trousers reinforced with
buckskin at the places a saddle tended
to chafe the worst-the seat and the insides of the thighs.
On his boots he wore plain American-style
spurs called OK'S. The rounded, filed rowels
were easy on the flanks of a horse.
Wind blew dust clouds through the darkness and drove the
grit into his eyes, making vision that much more
difficult. He passed a siding that led to chutes and
pens of unpainted lumber. Perhaps nothing symbolized
America's resurgent postwar economy so well
as the huge herds of Southern cattle beginning to reach
Northern railheads. In keeping with the mood of
optimism sweeping the nation now that Grant had
taken charge in the White House, this town had
evidently expected to share in the coming livestock
boom. But something had gone wrong. The new pens
contained only little whirlwinds of dust. There were no
cattle, and no sign of any. Sweat continued
to accumulate under the band of his hat. He wanted
to take the hat off but he didn't. It concealed the
one mark which made him easy to identify- the streak of
white hair starting above his left brow and tapering to a
point at the back of his head. The streak had been
white since Chickamauga, where a Minie' ball
had grazed his scalp. He often disguised the streak
with a mixture of dirt and boot-polish.
Tonight he hadn't troubled; he'd been too
preoccupied by worry.
He rode straight up to the tiny frame depot beside
the single track. The depot was dark except for an
exterior
lantern on the far end. A sign was nailed to the
roof peak below the lantern:
ELLSWORTH
Ellsworth, Kansas. Not much of a place from what
he could see. A single street with a few
pitch-roofed houses and a handful of commercial
buildings of unpainted clapboard, strung out to the
north of some cottonwoods growing on a bluff
along the Smoky Hill River. A rutted
trail meandered down to an easy ford.
Only a few lamps glowed in the village. At
the far end of the street, music drifted from one of the
largest buildings. A polka, played on a
twangy, out of tune piano. Despite its raw,
impoverished look, Ellsworth was civilized enough
to possess a dance house where a man could have a rousing
gallop around the floor with one of the hostess-whores
such places employed, and while dancing complete
arrangements for later in the evening. Jeremiah saw
six or seven horses in front of the dance
house. Trade was light, but then it was a week
night.
"Giddap, Nat," he said, barely touching his
calico with one spur. He walked the pony through a
billowing cloud of dust and then abruptly reined in.
Light leaking from a cottage to the line of trees
showed him a still form turning slowly in the wind.
His belly began to feel as hot as his forehead. He
rode close enough to be sure, and when he was, bowed
his head. "Jesus," he said under his breath. "Oh
dear Jesus."
He could appreciate what Kola must have felt,
reaching the end so despicably. He could imagine his
rage and humiliation. Except for the meanings of
dreams, nothing mattered more to a Sioux than a
proper death of which the tribe would be proud to speak for
generations. Such a death had to be met bravely,
even flamboyantly,
in combat with fierce and respected enemies. Instead,
Kola had died like a common horse thief.
The anger rising in Jeremiah seemed to banish his
fever and clear his head. He scanned the street
to be sure he wasn't being watched. Then he
climbed down and tethered the calico on the river
side of the trees, where the animal would be
bidden from casual observation.
Reaching to his boot, he yanked out a buffalo
knife. He scrambled up into the lowest fork of the
cottonwood and cut down the hanged Indian.
IV
A sleazy cafe, The Sunflower, was open, though
without customers until he walked in. The old
man tending the place regarded him with the familiar
suspicion reserved for new arrivals in a small
town.
Jeremiah locked a smile on his face. He
ordered some food-stew with too little meat and too much
chili powder-and a cup of bitter coffee. He sat
eating and drinking at one of three rickety tables
while the rheumy-eyed, weary old man watched
him.
He hated the delay; this pretense. But he needed
information. As he lifted the cup to his mouth, his hand
was steady despite his sickness. So was his voice when
he forced conversation.
"Nice little town you have."
"Glad somebody thinks so."
"I can't be the only one. Someone spent quite a bit
on those cattle pens and the spur track."
"Plenty of fools in this town, mister.
They're the ones who squandered the money. Even
persuaded the governor to lay out a special
drover's highway up from Fort Cobb in the Indian
Territory. A highway exempted from the
quarantine law. We don't need exemption, you
understand. We're not in the quarantine zone. But the
highway's supposed to show that Ellsworth is
interested in Texas trade--"
He wiped his nose. "The Texas hoys aren't
interested in Ellsworth, though. They won't drive
their herds this far north. Too much risk of
Indians, Fellow who started the local paper last
year, he found out. Printed his sheet for exactly
three months, then packed up. He came to understand
Ellsworth'd blow away if it wasn't for the
soiled doves at the dance house bringing in business.
Mostly drunkards from the military reservation."
"Oh, there's an Army post here?" "Fort Harker.
East a ways." The man leaned across the plank
counter. "You don't sound like you were in the Union
army. You a Southron?"
Yes, you prying son of a bitch. I fought the war we
had no chance of winning.
Amiably, he said, "Maryland. We kept no
slaves. Our family was loyal to the
Union, but my pa was crippled. I had to tend the
farm. Cost me three hundred dollars to avoid
conscription, but I had no choice. Two months
after Appomattox, pa died and I sold the place
and came out west to hunt buffalo. Name's Jason
Gray."
The convenient story had served before. It satisfied the
old man. After a last bite of stew, Jeremiah
added: "I noticed an Indian strung up to one
of the cottonwoods."
A shrug. "He should have known better than to walk
into the dance house like a white man. I mean, it
wouldn't sit well most any place but it
definitely didn't sit well here. The Cheyenne
hit Ellsworth a year ago. After we recovered
from that, the K. P. canceled the roundhouse we were
promised. Next we got an outbreak of Chinese
cholera. And there won't be any cattle trade in
the summer, that's all going to Abilene where those
scoundrels ignore the quarantine line and bribe the
legislature to do the same. The truth is just this,
Mr.
Gray-and I quote our lately departed editor-
Ellsworth is puking to death."
Jeremiah grimaced. "Guess all that
trouble would put anybody in a peevish mood. People
here took it out on the Indian, is that it?"
"Way I got the story, he refused to leave the
dance house when he was ordered. Kept jabbering that he
needed a doctor. Sergeant Graves took
offense and roused some of the citizenry."
"Sergeant Graves," Jeremiah repeated.
"Yes sir, from the post. He's down at the dance
house most every night. Lends a lot of money to other
soldiers. It's a sideline of quite a few
noncoms in the Plains Army. Graves charges
interest like billy-be-damned. Must be rich by now."
"And he whooped up enthusiasm for the hanging party?"
"He led it. Tied the noose personally."
"Could your police force have saved the Indian?"
"What police force? All we have so far is a
volunteer chief. And he's away riding the
Kansas Pacific half the time. He's a
conductor. Off working right now, in fact."
"I see."
"What you don't see is that nobody wanted to stop
it. Besides, Graves had every right to do what he did.
He lost a brother when Custer took the Seventh
Cavalry down to the Washita last year to punish the
Cheyenne."
"To massacre them," Jeremiah murmured.
The old man's eyes flickered with suspicion.
"In Ellsworth, Mr. Gray, we think Custer
did right. It wasn't any massacre. It was
protective action. When the Indians broke out of
their treaty lands, they raised the very devil all over
Kansas. Not twenty miles north of here, they
struck Mr. Shaw's homestead on Spellman's
Creek. Thirty or forty of them kept Mrs.
Shaw and her sister prisoner for most of a day.
Subjecting those two poor women to the grossest
possible indignity. Over and
over, the grossest-possible-indignity." He
emphasized the words so his customer was sure to understand.
"Not only did they do that," he went on, "they
ruined our cattle business before it even commenced. The
Texans won't come here now. When General Custer
and the Seventh rode to the Washita, they gave the
savages what they had coming."
Jeremiah forced the smile back on his face. "I
guess it all depends on who's the killer and
who's the victim. If I was to shoot the right
person-was The old man started; Jeremiah almost
chuckled. "coman Indian, for instance comv few hi the
nation would blame me."
He laid out a shinplaster; one of the pieces of
paper money printed during the late war. "Thanks
for the meal. IT! be traveling on now."
"Buffalo hunter," the old man grunted, half
a question, as Jeremiah received his change.
"That's right." Jeremiah stared. Something hi him
took pleasure in seeing the old man bite his lip
and avoid the unwavering, almost hostile gaze.
Amused, he walked out into the dark.
With the dust clouding around him, he comforted Nat. The
pony was fretting with Kola's corpse slung
belly down over his back.
Slowly Jeremiah unlaced a saddle bag and
pulled out the packet containing the remainder of the
proceeds of the train robbery. Two hundred
dollars in shinplasters. He held the packet in his
teeth and removed the next pouch, and the next. Each
contained an Army-issue .44 caliber Starr
revolver. The second also held ammunition.
He thrust both revolvers into his belt,
replaced the two empty pouches and the full one,
loaded the guns and said to the calico:
be back soon."
He walked toward the dance house. 25
You swore y8d never do this again. You you were
done with it.
voice went unheeded as he tramped along in the
blowing dust with the cottonwood leaves hissing in the
dark of his right flank. He was gripped by a mounting
excitement, yet by a certain melancholy too.
He'd been a fool to think he could never change
what he was. What the wax had made him.
He put it all out of his mind, composing himself;
readying himself for the work to be done. With the barrels of the
revolvers gouging his belly at every step, he felt
whole again. It was as if a missing part of his body
had been miraculously restored.
While he approached the dance house, the piano
player swung into a mazurka. Loud laughter
drifted through the open upper half of a Dutch door.
He paused a moment on the dark porch, carefully
counting and appraising those inside.
Only four soldiers were present, three quite young.
Boys of seventeen or eighteen; new recruits,
off duty and unarmed. The fourth soldier was a
paunchy veteran.
Next he noted three men in nondescript
civilian clothing, and the same number of women in
tawdry dresses. Two men were dancing, one young
soldier and one civilian, each hauling one
of the women around the floor with clumsy, exuberant
steps. Another of the civilians, a fellow in a
threadbare frock coat, sat by himself at a rear
table. The piano player was decrepit, the barkeep
round-shouldered with a consumptive's face. Smoke and
amber chimneys on the ceiling lamps softened the
figures as if they were images in an old, soiled
painting.
He suspected his quarry might be present. The
paunchy 26
man wore yellow chevrons and was engaged in
animated conversation with one of the younger soldiers.
Jeremiah buttoned his vest over the butts of the
Starrs, noting that the paunchy man had come into town
without a sidearm.
He reached for the handle of the Dutch door.
Amber-flecked eyes turned in his direction, but just
briefly. The monte man was the only one who
continued to watch as Jeremiah strolled to the bar, his
palms damp and his ears ringing. When the monte man
realized the new arrival hadn't come in search of a
game, he resumed his concentration on his deck of
cards.
Jeremiah ordered whiskey. One of the whores
approached. She stood close, so his right
hip fitted between her legs. Even with the thickness of
her shabby velveteen skirt intervening, he could
feel the contour of her. A quiver in his groin
reminded him it had been a long time since he'd
enjoyed female companionship. But he shook his
head.
"Fine thing!" She pouted. "You could at least buy a
drink for someone trying to welcome a stranger to our
fair-was
Belatedly, she fixed on Jeremiah's eyes.
Then her gaze dropped to the almost lipless line of his
mouth. The commercial smile faded and a shiver worked
across her bare shoulders. She backed away from him.
The dancers whooped and stomped. Their motion stirred the
smoke. Jeremiah picked up the dirty glass
full of whiskey but didn't drink. He was straining
to overhear the paunchy sergeant's conversation down the
bar.
"coman' that money's yours till a week from Friday.
Then she's due. No leeway."
"Jesus," the young soldier said. "You're worse
than a Jew."
The sergeant chuckled. "No sir, I'm a land
heart There's your receipt." Paper tore. "Just
in case you forget how much you owe."
"When Fm handing back twenty percent on it?
Jesus."
The young soldier made straight for the card table. The
monte man welcomed him with a warm grin and a call
for refreshments. One of the whores served them.
Loud enough to be heard by the paunchy man, Jeremiah
said to the barkeep, "Pardon me, I'm hunting for a
Sergeant Graves."
The barkeep nodded his head. The paunchy man
pivoted, beaming.
"Amos Graves? Right here, sir." He couldn't
have been over thirty, but the seams in his face and the
discolorations on his nose made him look much
older. Jeremiah had heard the Plains Army was a
haven for men who couldn't control their craving for
alcohol.
"Sergeant Amos Graves," the man said, his
huge belly jiggling under his dark blue jacket as
he approached. A pudgy hand waved a small
block of paper. "Unofficial banker of Fort
Marker and friend of the needy." He had puffy cheeks,
mustachios drooping past his mouth, and a whiskey
stink. He planted elbows on the scarred wood
next to Jeremiah. "New arrival in
Ellsworth?"
"That's correct."
"Well, if it's a loan you're after, I don't
ordinarily extend privileges to those passing through.
Not unless they can offer me some collateral." He
surveyed Jeremiah's clothes. "You a Texas
boy? Sound a bit like it Now if you brung a
hundred head of cows up this way, I might be
willing to-was
"I came to ask about the Indian you hanged."
Despite the music and the thump of boots, most of
those in the place heard the remark. One couple
halted in the middle of the floor and turned to gape.
The piano player missed a beat, mangled the
next notes, then quit altogether. In the silence even
the hiss of rapidly shuffled cards died away.
Again Jeremiah fixed a smile in place. He
didn't 28
want to prod things to a conclusion too soon. He
reminded himself to be wary of the barkeep. He
suspected the man kept a weapon hidden for
emergencies.
Sergeant Graves chuckled in an uneasy way.
"You mean that greasy buck strung to the
cottonwood?"
"Yes." Jeremiah's smile broadened,
so Graves would relax. "Just curious about what
happened to him."
It worked. Graves waved for a drink, then said,
"Why, he marched in here saying he needed a
doctor. To treat his pox, I "spose. All
them red men got the pox. When we told him
nicely this was a dance house for white folks, he
wouldn't leave. Got plain feisty, in fact.
That's when me and a couple of the lads took him in
hand. I'll give him this: He wasn't armed, but
he fought like a catamount."
"You mean to say he came in here looking for help,
trusting that someone would give it to him?"
Graves gulped from his refilled glass; grinned.
"Yeah, damn fool." A thoughtful pause. "I
think he was a Cheyenne."
"He was a Sioux."
Graves" eyes flickered with uneasiness. A
yellow jewel of sweat oozed out on his brow;
another. Jeremiah thoroughly enjoyed making this
drunken whale twitch and wonder.
Quickly he checked the three young soldiers. One was
still on the dance floor, one at the card table, one
leaning over the bar. He dismissed them as potential
sources of danger. He was feeling more
exhilarated by the moment.
"You know him?" Graves asked.
To keep the sergeant fretting, he evaded:
"I took a look at him and recognized he was a
Sioux, not a Cheyenne. Difference in height and in
the nose and cheekbones."
Activity hi the dance house had come to a complete
stop. Jeremiah noted the barkeep's hands hanging
in
front of his apron. Within reaching distance of whatever
weapon might lie on an unseen shelf.
"You recognized that," Graves said. "What
trade you in, mister?"
"Buffalo hunter. Tell me about the hanging."
Once again a friendly tone lulled the heavy man.
He shrugged. "Oh, the whole thing didn't take more
than ten minutes. But we did have some mighty good
jollification with him before we strung him up."
"Jollification," Jeremiah repeated,
unbuttoning his vest.
Sergeant Amos Graves saw the butts of the
Starrs and swallowed. His right hand twitched. The
whiskey glass fell, rattling and rolling on the
bar. The spilled liquor reflected amber light.
The smell of the whores' perfume filled
Jeremiah's nostrils.
"So you had jollification with him, did you? Let me
tell you why he was here. Because I was laid out with a
fever and he wanted to find a doctor to help me."
"Well, now-look. If you knowed him, why didn't
you say-was
"I wanted to hear your explanation first. You murdered
an innocent man, sergeant. My partner."
His right hand moved, crossing over to the left side of
his belt. Before Graves could so much as gulp, he was
staring at the drawn revolver.
With that odd, lipless smile, Jeremiah flicked his
glance toward the barkeep. "This muss is only between
the sergeant and myself. You'll be wise to stay out of
it."
"All right. Sure," the barkeep nodded.
"Anyway, I wasn't on duty the night it
hap-was
"Shut your mouth."
Jeremiah returned his gaze to the sergeant. He
pointed the revolver at Graves' too-tight
belt.
"You killed a fine man. I don't care if you
did lose a brother to the Cheyenne, you had no
call to do it."
"How-how did you hear about-?"
"Never mind."
con"I-I dunno what you-what you want now-was
Graves" voice trailed off.
Jeremiah smiled. "You know."
"Wait. Wait." Fat white hands flew up
to protect his face. With the Starr barrel Jeremiah
knocked them down. Graves squealed and sucked on
a knuckle.
Jeremiah's eyes swept the rest of the customers and
employees. "I wouldn't interfere. I don't
want to deal with anyone except this dishonorable
gentleman. But I will if I must, is that clear?"
A townsman nodded vigorously. No one else
moved.
Spittle glistened at the corners of Graves'
mouth. "Listen, I'm sorry about your friend. I was
liquored that night." He stared at the motionless
Starr, then at the unresponsive face behind it.
"Listen. Nobody out here takes a gun to an
unarmed man, you know that. An unarmed man isn't
fair game. It's cowardly to-was
Graves yelped as Jeremiah took two long
strides backward. The younger man's left hand
darted under his vest, yanked the other Starr
free of his belt, slammed it on the bar and slid it
just hard enough so it skidded to a stop beside the sergeant.
"Now you're armed. You have an advantage my partner
didn't enjoy."
"No." Graves' cheeks shone as though covered with
oil. "No, no-was
"Pick it up, you yellow bastard."
Seconds ticked by.
Jeremiah's field of vision included an
overweight whore with a hand pressed to her mouth; a
townsman with his fist trembling at the seam of his
trousers; the young blue-clad borrower leaning back
in his chair, petrified; the other two soldiers
blinking at one another in confusion; the monte man
with a pale hand locked
around his cards and a bemused spectator's smile
curving his mouth.
Amos Graves looked into Jeremiah Kent's
eyes and saw no reprieve. He turned: a
clumsy, heavy motion. He practically fell
against the molded edge of the bar, slumping over it and
clawing the Starr with both hands. Off balance and
poorly positioned, he tried to pivot back with the
revolver. But he could never have gotten off a shot and
Jeremiah knew it. No man could say his
adversary was unarmed, however.
While Graves was fumbling, Jeremiah fired.
Graves screamed and lifted off his feet, the Starr
spinning up from his jerking hand and thumping on the floor
next to his boots. Someone retched as Graves
toppled backwards, his dark blue blouse wet and
smoking. that instant, the foolish barkeep stabbed his
hands beneath the bar.
What weapon he'd concealed, no one ever saw.
Jeremiah shifted slightly and fired. The
barkeep's right temple exploded. Bits of hair
and bone spattered on the mirror behind him as his
spasming hand dragged down six bottles.
One long step and Jeremiah had retrieved the
Starr he'd thrown to Graves. One glance and the rest
of the dance house patrons knew better than
to attempt to stop him. Graves flopped on his
back, still, and Jeremiah hurried toward the Dutch
door, knowing the patrons were all too shocked and
terrified to move very quickly. But the moment he was
outside, he sprinted. They'd recover soon
enough.
The cafe' owner appeared against his smudgy yellow
window, calling questions into the wind. Jeremiah reached
Nat with no difficulty, swung up from the
right, Indian fashion, and galloped out of
Ellsworth.
VI
He rode northwest for seven or eight miles
until he located a suitable clump of trees
on a hillside well away from the dairy farms
he'd glimpsed in the neighborhood. Under the white
of the April moon, he used his hands and his knife
to break and cut branches and build a platform in a
high fork of a tree. Even though pursuers were
surely abroad by now-even though he might be
caught-there was simply no question about taking the time
needed to prepare Kola properly.
As he worked, the cold joy he'd experienced when
he shot the two men drained away. He had tried
to change, but he'd been an idiot to make the
effort. There would always be some dishonorable son of a
bitch to send him back to the guns.
His tally now stood at eleven. Fewer than the tally
of that Army scout, Hickok, who'd become the
darling of the Eastern press. But Hickok was a
Yank, and most of his victims had been former
Rebs, which helped him kill with impunity.
Jeremiah wasn't so fortunate,
The cynical thought did little to relieve the
sadness sweeping over him. Puffing and struggling, he
carried his friend up into the tree and gently laid him
on the platform. He folded the Sioux's hands on
his breast Then he descended, fetched a buffalo
robe from his gear, climbed again and carefully covered
the Indian. He tucked the robe beneath the stiffening
legs and around the shoulders.
Soon the birds would peck at the dead thing in the
tree. They'd tear the robe, the garments, and finally
the flesh. The seasons would batter and destroy the
body. But all of that was proper. Kola was resting
exactly where tribal custom said he should-close
to the sky so the ascension of his spirit would be easier, and in
the open air so his physical remains would fall
back to
earth. His body would be reborn in the new buffalo
grass that would feed the herds. When his own tribe or
another killed and ate the buffalo, his substance would
complete the great cycle of the universe and return
to his people while his spirit rejoiced hi heaven.
Jeremiah wept over his friend's remains. Then he
got himself under control, climbed down and searched and
listened for indications of pursuit. There were none,
He galloped north, pushing the already exhausted
calico much harder than he should. By morning
he intended to be far away. Relatively safe and
able to stop, sort his thoughts and decide where he should go
for sanctuary. East? West? Kansas City?
San Francisco? He had two hundred
dollars' worth of shinplasters in the saddle bag.
Money wasn't a worry.
A memory shook him all at once. For the first time
in hours, he recalled Kola's dream.
He tried to laugh the prophecy away but he
couldn't. The first part had already become a reality.
Riding fast on the lathering calico beneath the vast*
moon-whitened Kansas sky, he couldn't quell a
rising fear of the prophecy, or shake a conviction that
somehow, in ways he couldn't begin to foresee, the rest
of it would come true, including the very last part.
But who among the Kents would want to strike him
down? His father who preached the Christian gospel?
The idea was ludicrous.
Gideon, then? His oldest brother who had moved his
family to the North after the war? According to the
Irishman, Boyle, three years ago Gideon
had still been struggling to make a place for himself in
New York City. Was he still there?
Or could it be Matt, the middle brother, who had
served on a Confederate blockade runner
and then, after Appomattox, traveled to Europe
to study painting?
Fiercely he shook his head. Such thoughts were not
only morbid, they were foolish. He would never see
any of them again. Unless the vision also meant to say the
future was decided, no matter what he did.
He couldn't get the prophecy out of his mind:
There will be no end to the killing.
For a while the guns will bring great luster to your name.
Finally the power will fade and you will be killed-
The words sang on the wind whistling past his ears and
muttered up from the calico's rhythmic hoofbeats:
Killed by one of your own.
One of your own.
Book One Matthew's Mistress
A Dag's Profession"
LA VILLE LUMIERE never glowed more brightly
than in that last spring of the Second Empire.
It was almost twenty years since Louis
Napoleon, nephew of the original Bonaparte,
had elevated himself from President to Emperor in the
December coup, and begun to recreate the grandeur of
half a century earlier. For nearly two
decades now, he had succeeded. For nearly two
decades Paris had been the most
glamorous capital in the civilized world.
There were treasures on view hi the remodeled and
expanded Louvre. There were delightful public
concerts in the garden of the Tuileries palace. There
were thousands of lanterns and gas jets to bedazzle the
eye on the night of the emperor's birthday, and the
greatest courtesans of Europe stopping at the
Meurice and the other fine hotels. There was a wink
at financial chicanery, and a forgiving shrug for
sexual excess or deviation- and there was plenty of
each to be found.
There was an opulent court that moved annually from
Paris to Saint Cloud to Fontainbleau
to Compiegne to Biarritz and back to Paris. There was
a splendid new look to the central city, which had
literally been ripped apart under the supervision of the
Prefect of the Seme, Haussmann. At the
Emperor's behest, he envisioned and created new
plazas and broad new boulevards and installed a
much needed new sewer system. He turned a dark,
tangled forest into the Bois de Boulogne.
Medieval Paris vanished and what replaced it was
much finer-never mind the carping of those who said
Napoleon III was the worst of dictators, and
essential freedoms were gone, and
Haussmann had only made the new avenues
broad and straight so that Imperial troops could
easily rush down them to crush a radical
rebellion of the kind which had terrified the
bourgeoisie in 1848 and put it in a mood
to eagerly accept Louis Napoleon's discipline.
Those on the left used the term repression, but
seldom in public.
For those totally disinterested in politics-and Matthew
Kent was one-Paris offered a different sort of
ferment. The art world was in a continual uproar. Each
year's government-sponsored exhibition, the
Salon, brought new assaults on the accepted and the
conventional. The bemused public didn't know whether
to be appreciative of all the new forms of art being
displayed, or outraged by them, and so held several
contradictory attitudes at once. Thus the
shockingly realistic paintings of Matt's friend
Edouard Manet could be denounced as "the art of
democrats who don't change their linen," or it
could be dismissed simply as "nasty," while Edouard
himself was treated almost as a celebrity. There were a
dozen practicing painters who were intimates in
Manet's circle, or on the fringes of it.
Matt was privileged to be one of them and
to join their gatherings around the marble-topped tables of their
favorite cafe several times a week.
Of these men, some were dignified and some were just the
opposite-like Matt's good friend Paul Cezanne,
who the critics said "painted with a pistol."
Collectively they were rocking and destroying the
foundations of established art. They were throwing safe
historical and religious and allegorical
subjects into the dustbin and painting what they saw in
the contemporary world. Peasants tilling a field.
An audience awaiting a Tuileries concert. Or
just the artist's impression of a light-splashed dirt
road in the country. Content was
radical, technique was radical, and Matt thought
it was the most perfect time in all of history to be in
Paris learning to be an artist.
Never mind that Bismarck's ambition lay like a dark
cloud over Europe, and that the Prussian generals
were perfecting a new, lightning-swift style of
warfare based on use of the railroads and the
telegraph, two innovations employed for the first time
in the American civil war. Never mind that behind the
brilliantly lit facades of the public
buildings lay seething slums where rats crawled
over the cribs of infants. Never mind that
angry proletarians held endless meetings in
Belleville and quoted the first volume of Das
Kapital by the journalist and social thinker Marx,
or the older but not much less radical pamphlets
of Proudhon attacking the concept of private
property. The poverty, the fear, the rage went
all but unseen in the festive glare of the lanterns
and the shimmering gaslights. Napoleon III and his
empress, Eugenie, had created a gaudy show
to divert the attention of both the French and the world.
But what was unknown to a majority in that last,
lovely spring was the fact that the Second Empire
had been created fifty years too late. It was
obsolete the moment it came into being, and that it had
survived for almost two decades was a remarkable
piece of luck. Now, in Berlin and Belleville
and across the world, forces were moving which would bring it down.
Those forces would touch even the Americans who thought
themselves safely isolated behind an ocean. They would
touch even Matt Kent, who thought nothing could touch
him except his two loves-his chosen profession
and a young woman named Dolly Stubbs.
Like the Empire itself, one of those loves would be blown
away before the winter came.
Out in the stubbled field, the brewer's boy
scowled. The stoop-shouldered man crouching on the bare
patch of ground glared right back. He gripped the
piece of tree limb so hard, his knuckles
turned white.
The man's sagging trousers were shiny with grease and
daubed with paint. The sun lit a bald spot at
the back of his head and the warm wind played with his
jutting beard. Some four feet behind him, Matthew
Kent knelt in the dirt. He was supposed to be
catching for the game, but right now he was hurrying to finish
his sketch. Asking his friend to come along on the regular
Saturday excursion had been a disastrous idea.
Paul was just not the sort who could function as a
member of a team. The game was liable to end hi a
riot.
"Come on, throw it, you piece of moldering bird
shit!" the batter cried, thumping the tree limb on
home base and raising dust. The brewer's boy who
was pitching bent over and spat on the ground with studied
contempt.
"We know you can curse, Paul," he called.
"We know you have a large vocabulary of filthy
words, and are passionately fond of every one. You
don't need to spout them to make me dislike you,
though. I already dislike you as much as I could
possibly dislike anyone."
Ignoring the scarlet that rushed into Paul's cheeks,
the brewer's boy turned his back on him and began
tossing the ball up and catching it. One by one, he
surveyed his four teammates. Two were in the outer
field. One stood close to the rock serving as first
base. The other had his pants open and was urinating
on third. The three players on Paul's team
had returned to their watercolor easels and wine
bottles. They had no interest in encouraging the
bearded man, even though he was on their side.
Frowning, Matt pushed a strand of sunbleached brown
hair away from his pale forehead. Dolly was
returning from her holiday late this afternoon, and before
meeting her, Matt wanted some advice from his friend.
Paul was certainly the last man on earth to ask about
personal relationships, but Matt did respect his
opinion of artistic talent, bizarre though
Paul's own work sometimes was.
Paul had come up from Aix-en-Provence hi
preparation for the wedding of his good friend Zola, a
pugnacious little journalist who wrote everything from
art criticism to melodramatic novels. On the
spur of the moment, Matt had invited Paul to join
the group of students, practicing artists and
working-class boys who tramped out from Montmartre
every Saturday for an American-style baseball
game. He'd been surprised when Paul accepted
the invitation. But then Paul was moody and given
to impulses. Mart definitely felt his own
impulse had been ill-advised. Paul was at
bat for only the second time, and the other team was
baiting him unmercifully. Of course Paul's
bad manners and utterly foul language begged for
it.
"Come on, come on." he screamed.
The brewer's boy glanced over his shoulder. "When
I'm good and ready."
Paul gritted his teeth, plainly wanting to rush out
to the pitcher and throttle him.
While the deliberate delay continued, Mart's right
hand kept moving, making slashing strokes with the lump
of charcoal. At least the antagonism of the other
team gave him a chance to finish his sketch. It was a
recognizable likeness of the batter, but no one would have
called it a faithful portrait. It was done hi
Mart's usual style-a blend of a few graceful,
flowing lines and sudden, interrupting angles which
perfectly abstracted the essence of the subject and
conveyed Mart's highly personal
impression of it.
He had put Paul in profile, facing an
invisible pitcher. He'd exaggerated the jutting
beard so that it resembled a cluster of stiff
horizontal wires. Shading heightened the dark
quality of Paul's face, and a highlight in the
pupil of the eye glowed like a tiny fireball,
suggestive of hostility or madness. As drawn,
Paul resembled a furious Italian peasant more
than what he actually was-an unsuccessful
thirty-year-old painter whose father was an altogether proper
banker and landowner.
Quickly he put a last shadow on the temple and,
at the lower margin, jotted Vecorche, wondering if
he'd spelled the word properly. He was usually
too busy to worry about correct spelling. But he
wanted Paul's nickname on the picture. Man
without any skin was an apt description of his highly
sensitive friend.
He added Paul-June, 1870, and then M.
Kent, just as Paul bellowed, "If you don't throw
that thing, I'll come out there and shove this piece of
wood straight up your backside!"
With his left hand, the brewer's boy made a
contemptuous gesture. "Your mother is an
old whore so ugly the moths nest between her legs!"
Paul screamed another obscenity and started to charge
into the field, brandishing the bat. He'd taken two
steps when the pitcher threw the ball.
It whizzed past the astonished artist. He stopped and
goggled. Matt dropped his charcoal and shot his right
hand over his head. The pad slid off his knee as he
caught the ball in long, thin fingers.
"Out! Paul? You're out."
Paul spun around. "What does that mean, out??
"I told you the last time you were up and the same thing
happened. He struck you out-your turn's over."
Matt stood up. The sleeves of his loose white
silk blouse flapped hi the wind. He waved at
the team in the field, all of them clustering around the
pitcher as if ready for
a fight. "You were the last batter, so that ends the inning
and begins a new one with the other team at bat."
One of Paul's own teammates called from his
easel, "Ah, he's too stupid to ever understand it."
Mart's friend looked increasingly furious. "I
demand to know how my turn can be over. I didn't
hit the ball I That turd-eating, lice-ridden little
nitwit was distracting me!"
The brewer's boy took a step in toward
home base. Matt held up a hand and he stopped
reluctantly. "You can be put out on strikes,
Paul. We go into the next inning now. They're
ahead, two aces to none."
Paul looked at Matt as if he wanted
to assault him. Sometimes Matt thought his friend was quite
mad. The very names of his dark, troubled pictures
suggested it. The Orgy. The Autopsy. The
Strangled Woman. Even in the circle of friends and
acquaintances who'd been christened the
Batignolles Group, Paul was only marginally
accepted-and the group wasn't exactly made up of
what could be called conservative men. Still, Matt was
absolutely convinced the bad-tempered Frenchman
possessed a gigantic talent. He saw it
particularly in Paul's paintings of his Uncle
Dominique.
"You absolutely mean to say I'm finished?"
Matt nodded. He was a slender young man of
twenty-six with an oval face said to resemble his
late mother's. He had large brown eyes and a
scraggly mustache as sun-streaked as his hair.
Wide, solid shoulders offset the slimness of the
rest of his body and saved him from any hint of
effeminacy.
"Yes, Paul, I'm sorry." He started
to clap a hand on his friend's shoulder, then remembered
Paul despised having anyone touch him. At the
pitcher's mound, one of the other team shouted:
"Hey, let's play, uh?"
"A bloody wasted day," Paul grumbled, shuffling
away. The brewer's boy heard:
"Come on, thin-skin. You had nothing better to do.
Certainly your work's just as much of a waste of time."
His teammates laughed and applauded. Paul went
rigid. He shoved a hand into the pocket of his
soiled trousers.
"You whoresons!" Paul cried, and jerked out a
clasp knife. He opened it with his teeth and walked
rapidly toward the members of the other team, the
blade flashing hi the sun.
Panicked, Matt flung himself against Paul and
held him back, "Look, it's only a game.
I'm sorry I got you involved!"
"Let me pass!" Paul pushed, strong and
wild-eyed. "I've had enough of their insults." Which
Paul himself provoked, Matt thought sadly. It was
almost as if the artist wanted people to despise nun, so
that he would have proof that he was rejected; isolated;
special.
No one on Paul's own team made any move
to help him. They clearly wanted him to fight with the
five players huddled at the pitcher's position.
Two had picked up rocks. Matt shoved at
Paul with all his strength, aware of the brandished
knife just a few inches from his arm. The members of the
other team didn't help matters:
"What's that you're brandishing, sweetheart, one of the
tools you use for painting?"
"Oh no," came another jibe, "he uses
brooms and trowels, that's what all the critics
say-was
"Everyone calm down!" Matt shouted. "This has
gone too far."
The brewer's boy shrugged. "Tell that to your crazy
friend. If he wants to end an inglorious career right
here, we'll accommodate him."
Paul let out another enraged growl and shoved
Matt's shoulder. As the younger man staggered back,
Paul
bolted around him. The knife glinted and flashed.
Desperate to prevent a brawl, Matt lunged and
caught Paul's free hand. He hung on with all
his strength, braced his boots in the stubble and yanked.
Paul swung around to curse Matt,
flailing wildly. Suddenly he stumbled. He
started to fall forward, the knife inadvertently aimed
at Matt's midsection.
Only Matt's clumsy leap backward kept the
blade from ripping his belly. As it was, Paul
gashed Matt's blouse, then toppled to the ground
nearly impaling himself as the knife slipped from his
fingers.
In a sudden burst of temper, Matt grabbed the
knife and flung it away. Paul seemed to come
to his senses and realize what he'd done. Matt
glared at him, then at the other team:
"I'm the umpire and I say the game's over."
"Splendid!" the pitcher responded. "It's ruined
anyway."
"You won, for God's sake," Matt exploded.
Then he too began to calm down.
"We'll play again next Saturday, as usual,"
Matt said.
"All right," the brewer's boy agreed. The thought
of the victory seemed to mollify the rival team.
"But not if you invite him."
Cursing under his breath, Paul climbed to his feet
and stormed off to collect his easel.
IV
For the next few minutes Matt moved among the
players, quietly apologizing on Paul's
behalf-his friend would never do it himself-and restoring the
atmosphere of friendliness that usually characterized the
Saturday outings. Soon the players started back
across the fields toward Paris, chattering amiably
again and leaving a cloud of sunlit dust behind them.
Matt's anger
with his friend was passing. He knew better than
to expect any admission of bad behavior from
Paul, even in private.
Ah, well. He'd invited Paul to join the
Saturday expedition for a more important purpose
than learning baseball or practicing salon
courtesies. He needed advice-before Dolly's
train arrived.
He walked to where his friend stood motionless in front of
his easel. Before the game, the artists in the group had
spent an hour working. Paul had begun a study of a
clump of alders in the middle distance. Just as Matt
approached, he ripped the linen off the frame and
flung it out of sight behind him.
"Wretched. Wretched!"
Then he kicked the easel, knocking it over. "Why
in Christ's name do I even trouble myself?
Camille tries to encourage me to get out of the
studio and master this painting in the open air, but I
can't get the hang of it. I make botch after
botch. This is a dog's profession!"
Matt had an uneasy feeling Dolly was beginning
to feel the same way. In the past few months her
remarks about the casual, raffish life they lived
had grown more and more frequent-and more pointed.
"Here, that wasn't so bad," Matt said as he bent
to retrieve the unfinished landscape. "I'll bet
your friend Pissarro would agree with me-was
"Leave it alone."
Paul's eyes had that dangerous glint Matt had
come to recognize and respect. With a slight lift
of one shoulder, he drew his fingers back from the
discarded work. Paul shot out his hand.
"Let me see what you did!"
Paul studied the sketch Matt showed him without
expression, then handed it back. "I look like
Satan." He sounded proud.
Matt helped his friend pack up his pots of pigment,

brushes and bottles of dilantent. Then he put
his own sketch in a lacquered case and fell hi
step beside the older man. They walked
southward, toward the looming butte of Montmartre
dominated by the lazily revolving vanes of the oldest
of its several windmills, the Moulin de la
Galette. The roofs of Paris were largely hidden
by the hill on which a drowsy little working-class suburb
had grown up in recent years.
Matt wondered what time it was. Early afternoon,
to judge from the light. He owned neither calendar nor
pocket watch. He was about to raise the question on which
he wanted Paul's advice when the latter
blurted:
"Do you like that silly game you tried to teach us?"
"Yes, a lot of Americans like it. If my
country sank into the sea tomorrow, just about the only real
loss would be our baseball teams."
"Why don't you ever take part?"
"I used to, but now I'd rather watch. The only
way I can draw is to stay out of the game.
Paul-did you mean what you said a few minutes
ago about painting being a dog's profession?"
"Absolutely! It's insecure, it's scorned
by the masses, it's degrading because you live in
poverty and it destroys the soul because illiterate
critics are constantly showering verbal piss on
whatever they don't understand. A dog's
profession! I'd give it up instantly, except
that every other profession is so much worse." Suddenly
Paul's voice grew more temperate, showing an
unexpected concern with his friend's state of mind. "Why
do you ask? Are you feeling the same way about it?"
"Sometimes," Matt admitted. He couldn't get
used to his friend's abrupt swings of mood. But as
long as Paul had calmed down, he might as well
take advantage of it. "Dolly seems pretty
damn unhappy lately."
Paul's face softened even more. "A lovely young

woman, Miss Dolly. Is she still in England
visiting her parents?"
"She'll be back tonight."
"And she's dissatisfied with the way you're living?"
"I think so. She hasn't said it straight out, but
I'm beginning to suspect she'd like me to take up a
steady occupation. Maybe I should. I haven't
made much progress lately. I've been working
on one painting for almost three months but nothing's come
of it."
"A painting of what?"
"The woods at Barbizon."
"Why did you choose that subject?"
"Because so many good French painters have done fine
landscape work down there."
"Yes, but you're an American, not a Frenchman.
Does Barbizon have any special meaning for you?
Does it generate any feeling within you?"
"No, but-was
"That's the trouble, then! Paint what you are. Paint
what you know! Paint what stirs your heart and
excites your eye. Unless you do that, there'll be no
passion in your work. No juice of life-was
"Are you saying I should paint something American?"
Paul shrugged. "Perhaps, if nothing else will
satisfy the requirements I just set forth."
"Spoken like a teacher!" Matt said with a trace of
pique.
Paul didn't take offense. "How is old
Fochet, by the way?"
"Just as confused as I am about what's wrong with my
work."
"Fochet is good." It was a pronouncement. "An
intolerable man as regards his disposition-he's
crankier than I am-but he only hectors a
pupil to get the best out of him. Tell me,
Matthew-why do you hate America so much?"
Matt was unprepared for the sudden change of
subject. But he didn't have to ponder his answer:
"Because it's become a country of parvenus and social
climbers. Because money is all that's important
over there. And because of that damn war!" There was a rising
fervency in his voice that held his friend's full
attention.
"I saw too much of it, Paul. There should have been
another way to end slavery, but the leaders on both
sides were too stupid and arrogant and self-serving
to find it-just like politicians everywhere. So five
hundred thousand boys lost their lives while a few
profiteers got rich. Half a million boys,
Paul! One of them was my youngest brother."
"Ah," Paul murmured. "I never knew that. It
explains a great deal."
They walked on in silence, Matt thinking over what
Paul had said. As a matter of fact, he had
grown tired of French subjects-landscapes and the
figure models engaged by Fochet, the teacher in whose
studio he took instructions and rented space.
Fochet sensed his dissatisfaction, but was at a loss
to offer a remedy.
Paul's suggestion struck a chord because Matt had
been thinking of trying a picture with a subject
rooted in his own experience. He'd abandoned
the idea because he was contemptuous of virtually everything
American, and because such a picture would be too
close to lowly genre painting-works depicting everyday
life.
Was Paul right? Was he making a mistake
by rejecting subjects from his own past? He'd even
been having trouble with a small portrait of
Dolly. Perhaps there too he was striving for a final
effect that was overly refined. Squeezing the juice
of life out of the subject, to use his friend's phrase.
Of course that still left the essential question to be
answered. He stated it tentatively:
"I guess what worries me most is wasting my
time and Dolly's. Wasting good years in a worthless
effort. Sometimes I wonder whether I have the ability
to justify going on."
"Do you feel you do?"
"Yes."
"Well, I share your opinion. You have a genuine and
formidable talent."
Matt felt a knot loosen within him. At least
he'd gotten the reassurance he sought, and could face
Dolly's occasional jibes with a little less
self-doubt He felt better comb only for a
moment. Paul's face grew dour.
"Don't preen and congratulate yourself on having
talent, my friend. If you haven't learned it by now,
talent's a cruel mistress. She'll bring you just
a few very brief moments of supreme happiness, and
all the grief you'll need for ten lifetimes.
She'll be very demanding, too. If your young lady ever
decides to test whether she or your other love is the
more important to you, you'll discover how cruel a
mistress painting can be."
"Oh, Dolly would never push me to that kind of
choice," Matt said, though without great conviction. It
seemed to him that over the past few months, she had
been tending just that way.
Hoisting his easel to rest it more comfortably on his
shoulder, Paul trudged on with his melancholy
gaze lost in the golden stubble ahead. Matt
followed in silence, grateful that his friend had been
willing to offer encouragement. It was just what he needed
with Dolly returning this evening. He did love
her, and only hoped that after a good holiday with her
parents, she'd be her old tolerant self again.
But he found Paul's ideas about what was wrong with his
work difficult if not impossible to accept.
America meant nothing to him any longer. It was just the
accidental place of his birth and the benighted
address to which he sent mail for his brother and his father.
He
would never have any desire to paint American
subjects, nor any compelling reason to go home
again. Ever.
CHAPTER
The Prussian
PAUL AND MATT climbed the butte and parted
company near the summit, Matt turning off toward
his quarters while Paul kept on toward the church
of Saint-Pierre and the nearby Place du
Tertre, where he was to meet his mistress at a
cafe backslash How the young and pretty model
Hortense Piquet could stand Paul's abrasive
disposition, Matt didn't know. But he was glad his
friend had found at least one person to share his life.
Matt washed, took off the ripped shirt and donned
a fresh one, wholly oblivious to the Uttered state
of the two rooms he shared with Dolly. He napped
for a bit, then asked his landlady Madame
Rochambeau what time it was. Four thirty, she
said. He set off down the south slope of the butte,
intending to walk all the way to the Gare du Nord.
Dolly's train, which had met a channel steamer at
Calais, was due at quarter to six.
A lovely panorama of Paris spread before him as
he descended the hill. The late afternoon sun bathed
the right bank in a mellow light, while in the west,
dark clouds sped toward the city, white streaks
flickering in their centers. Matt was unaware of all
of it. He was thinking about his work again.
Matt had been sketching for as long as he could
remember. Where he had come by the ability, he
couldn't
say. Certainly he hadn't gotten it from his father or
mother.
Looking back, he recalled that his earliest
experiments with drawing had been a means of retreating
from the turmoil in the Kent household in
Lexington, Virginia. That was before the war, when his
mother Fan and his father Jephtha, a Methodist
minister, had differed strongly on slavery and
secession. Their differences finally sundered the family.
After a period of involvement with the Underground
Railroad, Jephtha fled for the North.
Matt remained with his mother and his brothers, Gideon
and Jeremiah, in the valley of the Shenandoah. And
gradually the sketching became more than a method of
escape from painful reality. It became an end in
itself; something which challenged his mind and hand and
prodded him to search for the essential nature of a
subject, then discover the few lines which would
recreate the subject and comment on it at the same
time.
In 1859, at age fifteen, he left home.
He had his mother's permission and that of his new stepfather,
an actor named Edward Lamont whom he didn't
like very much. He was poor in school so Fan had
agreed to let him go to sea on a cotton packet
operating out of Charleston. He'd taken to the life
at once, and to the vessel's captain, Barton
McGill, a man who seemed to know a good deal about
Mart's family but never explained how.
Of course he'd taken his drawing materials
along. When war broke out, McGill shifted
to blockade running. Matt stayed with him. After a
dangerous run, Matt was always grateful for the
release he found in doing sketches of West
Indian blacks or stevedores and soldiers in
wartime Wilmington. McGill was generous with his
praise of the work.
Captain McGill had drowned in a storm in the
Gulf 54
in the last days of the war. The incident shook Matt
profoundly, and affected his life on two
counts.
When the schooner broke apart and went down, Matt
spent several minutes floundering in the black water.
He'd never been a strong swimmer, and for that brief
time he could find no timbers to which he could cling. The
storm growled and screamed and the raging sea was as
black as the sky. He realized he was going to die.
Finally he caught a floating spar and clung to it
until he was washed ashore. But that time in the water
had given him a harrowing sense of his own mortality
and made him realize that the only way to beat the
game was to create something death couldn't destroy.
Most men sought immortality in their children, but he
wanted more than that. He decided he could find it in
his art.
The second effect of the storm was a radical
deepening of Ms dislike of his native land. The
cause was McGill's death.
Despite a pose of cynicism, Barton
McGill had impressed Matt as a wise and
honorable man. Even though be had believed that the
Southern cause was hopeless, and the war itself a grand
lunacy, to the very end he'd persisted in making runs
under sail from Havana to Matamoras. The more
prudent Confederate greater-than captains
had put their feet up on tables hi Cuban
cafes and waited for an armistice. As a result,
they were alive today comand rich--and McGill was dead.
That was the way it went in America, Matt came
to believe. The selfish prospered while the
virtuous perished, forgotten. The politicians
stayed safe and grew fat behind the lines while the young
men they sent off to carry out their deranged policies
died-just as Mart's younger brother had perished. By the
time Grant and Lee met at Appomattox
Station, he was convinced Europe was the only
worthwhile place on the globe. And since that was the
center of the art world, that was where he would go to learn the
techniques of the profession he meant to follow.
Besides, Dolly was in Europe.
It took a while for him to achieve his goal. He
spent months on the Texas coast in '65,
recuperating from the injuries he'd suffered in the
sea. Several bones had been broken.
From Texas he traveled overland to New York,
and a surprisingly warm reunion with his father, who had
abandoned a temporary career as a journalist and
returned to the ministry. Mart's mother was dead.
Jephtha had remarried. And while Molly Kent
would never generate the special affection he
felt for Fan, Matt genuinely liked her.
He found he no longer had any serious differences
with Jephtha on the subject of the war. Dolly,
whom he'd met in Liverpool while McGill was
having a ship built there, had persuaded him the
South was wrong on the matter of black slavery.
His mounting contempt for the raw, amoral country of his
birth had made him an easy convert.
Unfortunately Jephtha still believed America had
a solid, if difficult future. Matt
tactfully refrained from identifying that belief for
what it was- an illusion.
Jephtha had readily agreed to let his second
son have a portion of the California inheritance that would
one day be his in full. Matt meant to use the
funds to pay for his study. He set out for
Liverpool, and Dolly, in a fever of
enthusiasm.
Together they laid plans for going to the continent. For a
short time they considered Rome or Munich. Each
had a flourishing art colony. Both cities finally
lost out to the preeminence of Paris.
They'd convinced Dolly's nervous and proper parents
that they would be married before they left England. But they
said they couldn't linger long enough to arrange a
full-scale ceremony in Liverpool because Matt
was expected to report practically overnight to the
Ecole des Beaux-Arts. The truth was,
Matt hadn't even
tried to meet the entrance requirements of the renowned
state-sponsored school of the French Academy of
Fine Arts. He'd made inquiries and found out that
the institution's techniques were formal and
old-fashioned. Students spent months just copying
from paper silhouettes or plaster casts
representing parts of the human body. The true
adventurer in the field of art studied independently
in the atelier of a good private tutor.
Matt and Dolly had arrived in Paris in '66,
deeply in love with each other, wickedly in love
with the notion of living without benefit of wedlock, and
instantly in love with the city of light. Matt found
a fine teacher, Etienne Fochet. Dolly soon
located a good job which she enjoyed and which gave her the
satisfaction of helping with their expenses. Down in
the city at a private academy called the
Ecole Anglais, she taught English to the children of
businessmen and diplomats planning to spend a year
or so in England or America.
It had been a wonderful, ideal life for
three years. There were quarrels, yes. But they were
quickly settled, usually by Mart's ability to bring
Dolly to an almost frenzied state of physical
arousal. His work progressed reasonably well under
Fochet's abusive guidance: "Do it over, do it
over! My God, you won't even be a tenth-rate
colorist unless you develop a better palette!
Go study Delacroix! And if you can't improve,
go home to America!"
Fochet used it as a threat because he knew Matt was
temperamentally unable to go home. Mart's dislike of
America had been strengthened by his acquaintance with
another American artist, some years older, who
visited Paris occasionally.
Jim Whistler was a pugnacious little dandy, just five
feet four, and the grandest raconteur Matt had ever
met. A failed West Point cadet, Whistler was
fond of telling how his military career had come to a
sudden end. He'd been asked to step to the
blackboard and
discuss the properties of silicon. "I began
by saying, "Silicon is a gas." If it were,
I'd probably be a major general."
Where claimed he couldn't function in the stultifying,
tasteless environment of his homeland. He was
a brilliant artist, Matt thought, even if he
did bestow curious titles on his paintings-almost as
if he wanted to deny that they had subjects.
Studies of fireworks exploding in a night sky were
"nocturnes." A portrait of his mother Mathilda
who lived with Mm and his mistress in London--a
picture he'd been struggling with since '66, he
complained-was an "arrangement in grey and black."
Matt now shared Whistler's contempt for the United
States. For that reason he rejected appealing
subjects from his past whenever they came to mind. Now
Paul had suggested that might be a mistake. But
he didn't see how he could find good art in bad
memories.
He had to do something about his work, though. Even a
simple portrait of Dolly was foundering. Was it
because there were problems with Dolly?
The change in their relationship had been gradual.
He couldn't recall a specific time when it had
started. Perhaps, after three years, the novelty of a
Bohemian existence had worn off, and Dolly had
started to think about the future. He never did that.
He seldom even thought seriously about the present.
In fact, when he was working, the real world was little more
than a peripheral haze. Dolly had
begun to let him know that although she understood that, she
didn't like it.
Today he was no better prepared to meet her
objections than he had been when she left on the
holiday. Well, maybe a visit with her parents
had relaxed her a little, he thought anxiously as he
made his way through the neighborhood near the Gare
du Nord.
The storm clouds had moved in, bringing a sudden
shower. He wove his way through crowds near the station
entrance, first avoiding a couple of street
musicians playing a flute and a curious new
instrument called a saxophone, then an open-air
dentist who was striking his portable chair and
umbrella. He jumped off the curb and across the
gurgling water in the gutter so as not to interfere with a
couple of the Surete specials who were becoming more and
more visible as street crime increased. The
specials were trussing up a howling, kicking man in
rags. A purse-grabber, probably.
A flower girl who would have been pretty except
for the sores around her lips interrupted her chant of,
"May your love life flourish!" long enough to sell
Matt a bedraggled bunch of violets. She
glanced into his eyes, then down at his
trousers in case he was interested in an additional
transaction. He smiled and shook his head but felt
an embarrassing physical reaction to the girl's
invitation. Problems or not, three weeks was a
devil of a long time to be without the woman he loved.
He darted out of the rain into the tumult of the station. In
an atmosphere of smoke and noise, people rushed to and
fro, knocking against one another like balls striking
tenpins. Parisians were constitutional hurriers,
he'd discovered. Even a pair of sweet-faced
nuns almost bowled him over.
A local train arrived with a scream of iron
wheels and an eruption of steam. There were several
trains standing on the tracks which ran right up
to barricades within the central area of the station. He
didn't know which track would receive the Calais
express, so he sought the schedule board hanging from
iron rafters at one end of the hall.
He found the Calais train and its designated
track. 59
As he gazed upward, he became aware of a man
standing just to his left, rattling off the numbers of
all the listed trains, as well as their arrival or
departure times. The man was speaking accented French
and had his back to Matt. But there was something
familiar about his sleek yellow-brown hair.
A second, gnome-like fellow was copying down the
information the first man rattled off. Paris was
tolerant of the eccentric, so no one paid any
attention except Matt, who thought the man might be
carrying a watch.
"I beg your pardon-was Matt began. The man
pivoted smartly. Matt recognized him at
once, even though this afternoon he was turned out in
expensive civilian clothes, including a tan
sack coat with dark brown edging, fawn spats on
his dark brown pumps and, tucked under his arm, a tan
felt hat with a round-blocked crown and wide brown
ribbon.
The man had twice been at the cafe where Matt and
his friends congregated. The first time he'd evidently
come in by accident. He'd gotten interested in the
barmaid, Lisa, and had come back to see her again.
On both occasions he'd been wearing a uniform of
dark blue with polished jackboots, a sabre and
sabretache and a pickelhaube with an ornate
Prussian eagle plate on the front and a
wicked-looking vertical spike on top.
Lisa hadn't been impressed or even slightly
interested in the man's heavy humor, his
heavy palm slapping her bottom or his heavy-handed
announcements that he was attached to the Prussian
diplomatic mission in Paris and, therefore,
important. Both times, the Prussian had left
the cafe in very bad humor.
Damn funny crowd, the Prussians, Matt
thought as the fellow removed a monocle from his eye.
They'd whipped the Austrians hi '66 by utilizing
the railroads effectively. And here the officer
was, boldly copying French railroad schedules
in one of Paris' major depots.
"Well, hello, my friend!" the Prussian said with a

lingering look at Matt's mouth. Uneasily,
Matt wondered whether the officer was one of those
types who found pleasure with persons of either sex.
The Prussian was just a few years older. He had
healthy pink cheeks, bright pale eyes and a dazzling
grin. "It was the Cafe' Guerbois, wasn't it?
You're one of that Batignolles crowd-was
"Good memory, Herr Lepp," Matt nodded,
trying to be cordial despite his dislike of the
man's mixture of arrogance and smarmy charm. The
officer stood with one knee turned out and slightly
bent.
"Colonel Lepp," he corrected. "To be quite
precise about it, von Lepp. May I ask what
you want? I'm rather busy."
Matt burst out laughing. "Doing what? Fixing up
an invasion timetable?"
It was meant as a joke, but Lepp lacked a sense
of humor. He stiffened. Turned red hi the face.
The gnomish older man hovering near him scowled.
Abruptly, Lepp realized he'd reacted too
strongly. He tried to smile:
"Oh, no. I'm merely putting together some information
for a commercial study."
Matt didn't believe it for a minute.
Prussian officers didn't study rail
schedules in order to facilitate freight
shipments.
"Believe me," Lepp went on, "if there is ever
any- difficulty between France and the new, unified
Germany, it shall not be Prussia who is the
aggressor. But it shall not be Prussia who is the
loser, either."
"Look-was Matt raised a placating hand. He
forgot he was carrying violets. Lepp snickered.
Matt fought to hold his temper. "comall I wanted
was the correct time. I'll ask someone
el-was
Lepp interrupted with a snap of his fingers. The
gnome took out a cheap plated watch and showed
Matt the dial. Twenty-five until six. He
was in time.
He murmured a thank you and started away. Lepp
caught his arm, closing his fingers on Mart's
sleeve in a way Matt found repellant.
Lepp's anise scented breath washed over him.
"Wait one moment, please. Tell that charming if
slightly grubby young woman at the cafe that I still
think of her. Twice refused, I do not consider
myself refused permanently."
A chuckle, a squeeze, and then he let go.
"You must remember Prussia and the Prussian people
are accustomed to getting what they want these days.
Remind her of that, if you please!" Though he was still
smiling, the words had a marked undertone of command.
Matt resented the officer's tone and manner.
"Tell her yourself, Herr Lepp. I don't pimp
for anyone, Prussians included. Good evening."
Lepp snarled something in his native tongue as
Matt walked away. Damn fool to indulge your
temper that way! he said to himself. But he'd disliked the
Prussian from the moment the man had walked
into the cafe, acting as if he owned it.
He turned and saw Lepp studying him, his
monocle back hi his eye. The officer's
expression was not at all friendly.
The Prussian pivoted sharply again and returned
to charting the train schedules. Matt hoped he'd
seen the last of the fellow, but in view of Lepp's
remarks about Lisa, he doubted it.
The Calais train came chugging in at five
forty-five on the dot. By then the prospect of
seeing Dolly had Matt hi a state of
physical and emotional excitement But it was a
state tinged with a good deal of tension.
Reunion
DOLLY WASN8T AMONG the first passengers
who came streaming up the platform. Matt went through
an agonizing five minutes as he stared
into Gallic eyes and Gallic faces. Had she
missed the steamer? Or thought about their life together and
decided she wasn't coming back?
His spirit began to feel as wilted as the violets.
Then, suddenly, he glimpsed a round English
face and pink cheeks, and large, lovely eyes of a
blue that looked lavender in a certain light. He
recognized the neat but out-of-date clothing
she was wearing. The plush pelkse; the little Windsor
cap of straw with its ostrich- ornament perched on her
yellow curls. She spied him at almost the same
moment, dropped her portmanteau, rose on
tiptoe and waved.
He started running against the tide of passengers.
He had to travel three car lengths to reach her.
What he felt as he rushed along-a powerful,
soaring emotion that quite eradicated his
apprehension-told him how much he truly loved
her.
"Oh Matt, Matt love!" she exclaimed,
reaching up for him. Her little gray gloves clasped
at the back of his neck. Her cheek, smooth as
heavy cream, pressed his darker, sunburned one.
Dolly Stubbs was a head shorter than he. She
tended to plumpness, but he liked her plump.
He could feel the swell of her corseted breasts
against his shirt. Only a couple of passengers paid
any attention as they kissed. He wouldn't have cared
if they had an
audience of ten thousand. All he wanted to do was
savor the sweetness of her parted lips.
"Oh!" she said again, out of breath when they broke the
embrace. "Oh, I've missed you so
terribly!"
"So have I. My God, Doll, three weeks is
longer than I ever imagined."
She understood, laughed and whispered, "Far too long
for me. As you'll discover when I get you alone."
He raised his hand, offering the violets. "Not as
pretty as your eyes, but the best I could do on
short notice."
That was said in French. It seemed a more
appropriate language in which to frame such a
high-flown, if heartfelt sentiment. She inhaled
the scent of the flowers, slipped her arm through his and
squeezed against him.
"Thank you, my darling."
He picked up her luggage. They walked to the
clamorous central area of the station. Lepp was nowhere
to be seen now, Matt noted with some relief.
"Have you taken care of yourself?" she asked as they started
outside.
With a vaguely surprised expression and perfect
sincerity, he said, "I don't know. I
suppose."
She frowned. "Still having trouble with your work?"
"More than ever."
"Well, we shall have to talk about that. And some
other things, too. The holiday was good for me,
Matt. It helped me get some of my thoughts in
order." It was all said in a very light way. Yet
he was disturbed, somehow.
As they left the station, the shower stopped. In the west
over a long row of chimney pots, a blue sky
worthy of a Constable began to appear between racing
clouds.
They walked arm in arm in the newly washed spring
evening. An old man selling mussels broke his
chant, leaned on the handle of his cart and smiled at
them.
"We'll catch an omnibus up to the butte-was he
began.
"Nonsense, we'll walk. We're both in good
health, and we don't need to squander our money-even
if you will be a California Midas one day."
He chuckled. He seldom thought about the huge sum
he would inherit when his father died. He had no
appreciation of the value of money, and placed little
importance on having more than a few sous in his
pocket.
"We've been having unsettled weather, Dolly.
Was the channel rough?"
"A bloody tempest!" she declared with
uncharacteristic vulgarity. "I couldn't so much as nibble
a biscuit till we docked."
"How did you find Liverpool?"
She wrinkled her nose. "Grimy as ever."
"How's your pa?"
"Still at the Birkenhead." Her father was a steamfitter
at the famous Liverpool shipyard of the Laird
brothers. McGill's last steam-driven
blockade runner had been built there, as well as
the great Confederate raider Alabama.
"Is the rest of your family well?"
"Yes, fine-though of course they think we'll be
celebrating our wedding anniversary again this year."
She turned to look into his eyes. "Speaking of that,
Peg's found a fellow."
"What? Is it serious?"
"The wedding's planned for October. I told them
we'd be there if we could."
He felt a flare of resentment. He hated even
having to think about taking time from his work to attend such a
meaningless social event. He tried to tell himself it
was important to her, but he wasn't wholly
successful in overcoming his irritation.
"Certainly, we'll try." His voice sounded
strained. 65
"Your father had been worrying about your sister's
prospects, hadn't he?"
"Yes, Peg's thirty-three. Well, she's
taken care of now. That leaves only me."
He bent to kiss her cheek. "A poor, benighted
twenty-four."
"Practically an old granny!" Her smile
seemed forced.
"As long as your family believes we're married,
they won't fret about-was
"Matthew Kent," she interrupted, stopping by a
news kiosk. "Let us not debate that again. You know
we don't agree. I came with you to Paris of my
own free will, but that does not change certain facts
about our situation. My parents believing we're
married and the two of us actually being married is not the
same thing and never will be. Really-was She gave a
little shake of her head. "Sometimes you're terribly
stubborn. We really must sit down for a serious
discussion about this whole situation-and soon."
Right then he would cheerfully have bashed her sister Peg
square in the face. The holiday hadn't helped their
relationship at all. It had only exacerbated the
unhappiness developing in her. His worst fears were
coming true-though he was puzzled about one thing.
It didn't seem like her to be upset by her older
sister finally catching a man and scheduling a wedding.
Was there anything else behind her quietly determined
statement of a moment ago?
They lived in two rooms in a house on the Rue
Saint-Vincent, a pleasant, winding street. The
house belonged to Madame Rochambeau, a widow whose
husband had been the well paid manager of one of the
gypsum quarries on the Butte de
Montmartre. She spoke of the departed gentleman
fondly. A lusty spouse, she said,
though always with gypsum dust in his pores-the "plaster
of Paris" known the world over.
Madame Rochambeau had been left in
reasonably comfortable circumstances. She owned the
house without debt. But it was still necessary for her
to supplement her income by taking in boarders. She
fulfilled the duties of concierge herself, thus
realizing an economy. She liked Matt and
Dolly, but was less enthusiastic about their friends the
Strelniks who occupied the other two rented rooms
with their infant son Anton.
"Ah, Madame Kent!"
The landlady jumped up from the flowerbed she'd been
cultivating and rushed to embrace Dolly.
She was a huge bread loaf of a woman with a cheery,
mole-dotted face. Matt closed the door to the
street and leaned against the wall.
Madame Rochambeau was a militant Catholic,
and didn't like a great many modern things, including the
land speculators who were invading her little suburb,
and the Bohemians who practiced "free love."
He and Dolly had felt it prudent to fib about their
marital status to her as well. To reinforce the fib,
Dolly wore a cheaply plated gold ring on her
left hand. Matt had bought the ring from a junk
dealer.
"I am delighted to see you home." Madame
Rochambeau pinched Dolly's cheek. "Your mama
and papa fed you well. There is a little extra under the
chin, eh?"
Old meddler, Matt thought, smiling. Always saying
what she thinks!
"Oh, maybe just a little, just a little-was Dolly acted
quite flustered about having a weight game pointed out.
Matt hadn't even noticed.
"There is a piece of mail for your husband,"
Madame Rochambeau said with an admiring glance at
Mart's wide shoulders. "The late post brought it.
The
quarters have been swept and all the dirty laundry
put in a pile."
Ruefully, Dolly looked at him. He was
supposed to have maintained the rooms in reasonable
order while she was gone but of course had completely
forgotten, being occupied with the problems of his work.
"Well, I'm home," she said softly with a" wry
little smile. "And nothing's changed." She started
inside.
Matt swung the portmanteau onto his shoulder and
squeezed Madame's arm affectionately as he
passed beneath the branches of the old plane tree. The
landlady turned scarlet and covered a giggle with her
hand. Above the garden, the vanes of one of
Montmartre's windmills turned lazily in the
fading light.
Their rooms were in the south wing, which they entered from a
door directly off the garden. Pattering
footsteps ahead of Dolly told Matt the
Strelniks" child was romping in the corridor.
"Ah, Anton, you imp!" she exclaimed, bending
to pick up the year-old toddler. She laughed and
patted the gurgling child. His face curved into an
immense, snaggle-toothed smile. She kissed him
and rumpled his thick russet hair.
From the doorway across from theirs drifted the odor of
boiling cabbage. A woman in her late twenties
appeared. She was slender; drably dressed. Her
delicately pretty face resembled that of an
Italian Madonna, though in fact she was
Russian.
"Dolly! Matt said you would be home today!" she
cried in halting English.
"And you've been practicing, Leah. That was very good."
The young woman blushed. Because Leah's husband
talked about emigrating to America some day, Dolly
had volunteered to teach her the language.
Leah dabbed her sweaty cheek with an apron. "But
while I was practicing, it seems my son was
scampering
about naked again." Dolly handed the little boy to his mother
with a particularly fond and lingering look, Matt
thought. Tartly, the English girl said:
"Whatever you're doing, you should make Sime tend the
baby once in a while."
"Here, don't pick on the poor man when he can't
defend himself!" Matt laughed, slipping past her
to open their door. He slid the portmanteau in.
Bless Madame Rochambeau for straightening up after
he left for the station!
A gruff, amiable voice said, "But he is able
to defend himself. Welcome back, Dolly."
In French more correctly pronounced than his,
she said, "Thank you, Sime."
Matt waved. "Hello, Sirae. Figured out
how to overthrow the Emperor yet?"
Leah hung Anton from the crook of her arm and put
her other hand to her lips. "Sssh! That sort of thing
isn't safe to say, even in jest."
Sime Strelnik scratched the front of his
wine-spotted shirt. He was a short, overweight
man in his mid-thirties. He had round,
innocent-looking dark eyes and a beard and hair the
color of fire. Strelnik had been born in
Russian Georgia and had come to Paris via
Berlin, the home of his only living relative, an
older brother. Both of them were active in the
workingman's movement. Strelnik carried a card in
the First International founded in London in 1864.
He spent half the day sleeping, the other half
reading or writing pamphlets, and most of the night
attending meetings with people Madame Rochambeau
characterized as "atheistic, unwashed and sinister."
For Matt's benefit, Strelnik had several times
tried to differentiate between the various hues and
tints of radicalism found in those with-whom he
associated. There were Jacobins, Proudhonists,
Internationalists, Blanquists and several other
variations. It was all a meaning
less and uninteresting hodgepodge to Matt. But not
to his landlady.
"One doesn't need labels to know what they are.
It's simple. They're rapists and criminals.
Lawless anarchists bent on stealing the wealth of
hard-working men and the virtue of decent women. I
admit Mr. Strelnik doesn't look like that, which
is somewhat confusing, but I know he'll show his true
colors if the Reds ever stage another insurrection
such as the one in forty-eight. I suppose he
wants to bring that mad revolutionary Blanqui
back from exile in Brussels, too. And where do you
suppose he gets the money to send all those thick
letters to Berlin and St. Petersburg? The
authorities will inquire into that mysterious
correspondence one of these days, you mark my word!"
Leah passed the child to her husband. "Kindly see that
he gets a diaper before he catches cold. I've
supper to fix, you know. Dolly, it really is
wonderful to have you home again."
She disappeared. Strelnik dangled the child from
one forearm and wedged a cigar stub into his mouth with his
other hand. He lit the cigar. The smoke set
Anton to coughing. Dolly's eyes narrowed with
disapproval.
The paunchy man hoisted the baby over his shoulder and
patted the bare rump. "I don't know why you make
snide jokes about the Empire, Matt," he said
in a rather prickly way. "Of all people, Americans
should understand the evils of a repressive government.
You fought your way out from under one a hundred years
ago."
Matt shrugged. "That spirit's long gone in my
country. Now all the people care about is money."
The other man smiled. "Perhaps you'll let me take
your place as a citizen, then. I'd love
to expropriate and share the wealth of some of those
American capitalists."
"Such as my father?" Matt grinned. He genuinely
liked the little Russian, but teased him because he found
his pronouncements so pretentious. "Sime, I
don't think you have the nerve to strip so much as a sou from
anyone. You're a man with a conscience."
"Exactly!" Strelnik retorted. "And because I
have a conscience, I can't tolerate what I see
around me. A worker receiving only two or
three francs for a twelve-hour day while that
harlot the Countess de Castiglione gets a
million francs for giving herself to some English
milord for sixty minutes. The only way
to redress such injustice is by force! By-was
Anton shrieked. The smoldering cigar stub clenched
in the corner of Strelnik's mouth had briefly
touched the wiggling infant's bare leg.
"Oh my God," Strelnik gasped. Anton
howled. The bearded man's eyes filled with tears.
"Leah? Leah, help me! I've hurt the
baby-was
Strelnik rushed into his quarters. Matt shook his
head, his smile growing cynical.
"Well, Dolly, there's the marital bliss your
sister's leaping into. I'm glad you're not interested
in that kind of clerically approved misery."
It was quite the wrong thing to say; nearly as bad, in its
way, as his remark to Lepp about an invasion. And it
produced the same sort of angry reply.
"I know you and your friends sneer at any kind of
convention. But the truth is, I've changed my mind.
I am interested in marriage. That's another
subject we must talk about. Perhaps it's the most
important subject of all."
With an intense glance from those lovely eyes, she
hurried into their rooms. Stunned and shaken, he
stood staring at the open door. This was worse than
anything he'd anticipated. Far worse. Something
drastic had changed her while she was away.
Dolly's Secret
POOR STRELNIK WAS still wailing for Leah to come
to his rescue-which she always did. While he
scurried from meeting to meeting, agonizing over
political schemes and Utopian programs, she
provided the family's income by working six hours a
day in a laundry which serviced the fine hotels down
near the Rue de Rivoli. The moment Leah
closed the hall door and took charge of Anton,
the little boy stopped crying.
Matt walked into the quarters he shared with Dolly.
He'd wanted rooms with northern light but hadn't
been able to find any. The large outer room had a
slanted skylight facing the southwest. The spring
sun cast elongated, slow-moving shadows of
windmill vanes on the whitewashed wall at the
skylight's east end.
Directly under the glass stood Matt's easel
and two small cabinets of equipment. On the
easel rested the unfinished portrait. The
subject of the portrait had already retired to the
bedroom with her portmanteau. He could hear her
unpacking.
He walked around several tall stacks of books
to the one decent armchair in which Madame Rochambeau
had piled the dirty laundry. He flung the
laundry on the floor, sat down and glumly stared
at the work on the easel.
The painting was done on a linen support he'd
prepared with a coarse textured ground. He'd posed
Dolly in her best dress-the new realism forbade
classical drapery-but the picture still looked
stiff and unnatural.
So far he hadn't progressed beyond endless repairs
on the underpainting.
Dolly returned to the outer room, having put her
pelisse and hat aside. She seemed more composed.
A scattering of light from overhead created a kind of
nimbus around the top of her head. Her face,
by contrast, was darker; in shadow. The result was a
softening effect that made her features
indescribably lovely, and seemed to enlarge and
diffuse her eyes, as though Matt were gazing at her
under water.
He glanced at the portrait. He'd
completely missed the living, breathing reality of his
subject.
Her eyes seemed touched with sadness as she sank
onto a rickety stool and uttered a little sigh.
"Oh, my. The trip was more tiring than I thought."
She brushed back a stray yellow curl. "I owe
you an explanation for what I said outside."
"I'd just as soon wait. Or dispense with it
entirely."
Firmly, she said, "We can't, Matt. You see
what the post brought while I pour some wine. Then
we'll talk. It won't become any easier if
we wait."
She patted his hand as she walked by. Somehow he
felt as if she'd announced an execution.
Dolly rummaged in the little alcove that served as a
combination kitchen and dining area. "I can't find the
wine. I can't find anything in the middle of these
mountains of dirty dishes. Didn't you wash
anything while I was gone?"
"My face."
She wasn't amused.
"I forgot about the wine," he said. "Madame
Rochambeau borrowed the last bottle yesterday.
She had company unexpectedly."
"I'll be right back."
The outer door dosed. He was gripped by a feeling
of panic. He didn't want to sit down for a
talk of the sort she had in mind. What she wanted
to discuss was obvious from her remarks about her sister.
He loved Dolly, but he resented this new and
unexplained thrust toward domesticity. He was
frightened by it, too. He felt as if a trap were
closing. He didn't want to be pushed into choosing
between mistresses, as Paul put it.
Well, then, he had to get her off the subject.
At least for this evening. He decided to try a not
unpleasant strategy that had worked before and surely
would again.
Nervous, he paced to and fro in front of the easel.
He spied the letter lying on a flimsy taboret.
The handwriting and the franking registered slowly. From
Gideon!
He ripped the letter open. Scanned the paragraphs
of family news. Gideon's wife Margaret was
well, and so were the children, eight-year-old Eleanor
and the baby, Will, born in 1869. Jephtha and
Molly were in good health too, though Jephtha
occasionally complained of pains in his chest. He was too
busy to see a doctor, Gideon said.
The real purpose of the letter was to convey some exciting
personal news. Rather than take a position with The
New York Union, the highly successful
daily newspaper which had come back into the fold after
Louis Kent's death in late 1868, Gideon
had decided to use a portion of his inheritance and start
a small journal of his own. A journal devoted
primarily to the cause of the workingman, in which Gideon
was vitally interested.
"Oh God," Matt said aloud in disappointment.
"Not a Strelnik in the family."
But it was true. The paper would be called Labor's
Beacon. Gideon planned to buy typesetting and
printing on a bid basis, but do the editorial work.
His office was to be a small rented loft in lower
Manhattan. The family
had moved to the island from New Jersey a few
weeks ago. Another surprise!
Gideon claimed the times demanded a militant
response on behalf of the common man who worked for a
living. All such men were exploited by those for whom they
worked, Gideon believed. Matt was sorry to hear
about his new crusade for two reasons. He
considered it wasted effort; Gideon could not hope
to pit his opinions against powerful business
interests and win. More important, he considered it
reckless. Gideon could be hurt-physically
hurt-if he offended the wrong people. And he had an
established family to think about.
Matt wasn't the only one with that reservation, as it
turned out. Just at the end of the letter, Gideon
wrote:
comand 1 might note, in confidence, that Margaret's
reaction to the decision has been odd and not a little
upsetting.
As I have so often said before, it was she who brought me
to the threshold of the world of ideas, and taught me not
to be afraid to enter. It was she who read to me hour
after hour in the evening, neither smiling at my inability
to understand unfamiliar concepts nor at my
clumsiness when 1 first attempted to pronounce
difficult new words which I learned from those readings.
It was she who gave me a thirst for knowledge-which in turn
generates a thirst to employ that knowledge to some useful end.
To accomplish something. Bring about change!
Nowhere is change needed more than in the affairs of the
average laboring man. I began to realize that when
I worked as an Erie railroad switchman.
Margaret used to agree with me-if not outwardly, then
tacitly. Now she has begun to exhibit
a different attitude. She expresses fear about
my establishing the little paper-
Not fear for my safety, though some of that does seem
to exist. But her chief fear seems to be that I will
become too fond of my endeavor-
Matt was struck by an unexpected feeling of
kinship with his older brother. Margaret's reaction
to the labor journal sounded much like Dolly's
reaction to his painting. Women were not so different after
all.
--too embroiled in producing the Beacon, and thus
too inattentive to her, and to the needs of the family.
The fear is unfounded, Matt. I must do my best
to convince her.
He started as a shadow fell across his legs. He
hadn't heard Dolly come in. She was carrying two
goblets of white vin ordinaire. She saw his
strained expression.
"Not bad news, it it?"
He folded the letter. "It may be. You can decide
for yourself-was He rose and gently lifted the goblets from
her fingers. "After we have a proper welcome
home."
He bent to kiss her cheek. Slipped his left arm
around her. She struggled away.
"Matt, we must talk!"
"Plenty of time for that later." He pressed her
face with his free hand. A shade too roughly,
perhaps, but he was desperate.
"Matthew Kent, I bloody well won't have you
trying to get round me this wa-was
He put his mouth on hers.
The kiss was long and intense. Her skin smelled
sweetly of the lilac water she wore. He ran his
fingers up into her blonde hair, mining the carefully
created curls.
Her mouth felt cool; unresponsive. He
didn't break the embrace. She breathed in-an
angry little sound-
then pulled back abruptly. Tears shone as she
exclaimed:
"Oh, you're not fair. Not fair at all."
He kissed her again, ferociously. He worked his right
hand behind her, stroking her back while the pressure
of his lips bore her head back. She uttered that
angry little gasp again, then suddenly went limp against
him. With a moan, she flung one arm around his neck.
Her mouth opened, eager.
Dolly Stubbs was far from being as starched and proper as
all the daughters of Victoria were
supposed to be. That was a bounty which had brought him
great happiness. Once warmed, her passion was
boundless-and this evening was no exception. Her corseted
breasts crushed against his shirt as she moved in his
arms. When she felt how huge and stiff he was,
felt him prodding her through layers of clothing, she
moaned again.
He spread his legs, lifting her off the floor and
kissing her eyelids. She moaned louder.
Surrendering.
He carried her to the other room, and the bed. The room
was tiny and without windows. The only illumination came
from the fading skylight glow. In moments, he had her
outer clothes off, then her corset and undergarments. As
he bent to hold and kiss one of her soft white
breasts, he knew again that his strategy wasn't mere
expediency. He cared for her; deeply.
"Oh, oh," Dolly was exclaiming, arching her bare
back. "Oh, you're so damned unfair, Matt
Kent. You know how I melt when you do that-was
"I do it because I love you," he whispered, mouth
against the warmth of her ear. Her unbound hair
tickled his nose.
"You're-a terrible man," she laughed as he spread
himself over her, the softness and the roughness of her
at once familiar and wondrously new. "A
terrible man to make me-so addled-I can't think about
what we must-must-oh. Oh!"
She brought her body up and forward, a motion urging
him to hurry. Eyes closed and clinging to him, she
cried, "I love you. still love you-was
The end was splendid, as always. And when they rested
afterward, the light in the bedroom all but gone, he thought
he'd successfully diverted her from discussing
domestic matters tonight. He let himself doze off.
Yawning, he woke in response to a gentle tug
of his naked shoulder. He heard her whisper:
"That was absolutely lovely, Matt. And it
told me all over again how much I care for you. But
we must still talk."
He'd failed! Feeling trapped again, he sat up
in bed. Then came the thunderblow. Her voice
affectionate and her hand caressing him again, she added:
"It won't take long. I'd just like us to agree
to get married."

He was suddenly ashamed of his simple-minded
strategy, and of his arrogant assumption that she could be
so easily diverted. Sometimes the strength and
single-mindedness of the female sex terrified
him.
He swung his legs off the side of the bed. "I
gathered that was it. You want to exchange all this for an
arrangement like Sime and Leah's."
was "All this?"' was she repeated, then gave a
short, brusque laugh. "Two rooms in
Montmartre and some doubtful prospects for a career
as a painter? It's not all that magnificent, Mr.
Kent! So please don't sneer at me."
He fought to keep the anger out of his voice:
"Except for my work, it's exactly what the
Strelniks have."
"Oh no, my dear. For one tiling, they have the
legal right to give Anton their family name."
He scrambled to his feet. "Dolly, will you
kindly tell 78
me what the hell happened to you in Liverpool? Why
has a marriage certificate become so damned
important all at once? I thought we agreed
marriage was nothing but a legalistic fiction. I for
one still don't believe the Almighty will smite us
dead just because we go to bed without benefit of clergy!"
"No, I don't either," she responded quietly.
"On the other hand, certain-changes have put the whole
question into a new perspective."
"Your sister snaring some lout and dragging him to the
altar, you mean?"
"Don't be cruel," she whispered. "Don't
pull that trick you and your friends are so good
at-rejecting anything you're not capable of
appreciating, or anyone who doesn't think you're
doing the most important work since the bloody
Creation!"
In the darkened room, her naked body was a pale
blur. She reached for his hand. He was angry enough
to pull away but he didn't. She squeezed his
fingers.
"I'm sorry, Matt."
Silence for a moment.
"So am I."
"I really didn't mean for this to get so heated. We
just have to do some serious thinking, that's all. There is
something new to be considered." She drew in a breath.
"I'm speaking of a legal name for our baby."
Strelnik's Flight
HALF AN HOUR later, they were seated on
opposite sides of a glowing candle set on the
taboret in the outer room.
Hundreds of stars spread above the skylight.
Somewhere on the butte, a man and a woman
argued loudly. The voices faded. A cat meowed
in the stillness of the night.
Matt cupped his hands around the warm, fragrant
cup of tea Dolly had brewed. But he had no
desire for it.
He had put on a shut and trousers, she an old
quilted dressing gown several sizes too large.
Her hair was disarrayed, and her cheeks pink from the
lovemaking. She sipped her tea and almost fell
into a fit of giggling.
"I'm sorry, darling, I really am. But you still
look as if the Emperor himself had placed you under
arrest."
"That's exactly how I feel," The shock
produced by her announcement was slow to dissipate.
Certain things were coming into focus, though. The glances
at little Anton. Her displeasure at a reference
to her weight.
"Well, there's nothing so unusual about a baby.
It's only by sheer luck that I haven't gotten
pregnant before this. As best I can estimate it,
I've been carrying him- or her-for about two
months. I saw a doctor in Liverpool to be
sure. But I didn't tell my family,
Matt. You must believe that."
He nodded, but avoided her eyes.
"I do want the baby to be raised properly," she
went on. "I know that may pose some problems in
connection
with your work. I'm sorry about it, but when a man and
woman love each other, and they have a child, the
responsibility changes things."
Not for me, he thought, torn by pain. Much as he
loved her, he couldn't sacrifice his time and his
concentration on the altar of parenthood. He would not
give up the life he'd come to Paris to find.
Wretched and fraught with problems as the profession
was, to be a painter was what he wanted most of
all.
And if she'd been with him in that dark, cold water
of the Gulf for even one instant-choking, flailing,
thinking death was only moments away-she would understand.
She reached around the tiny flame and touched his face.
"I don't think I'm asking for anything so
unusual, Matt. Just what millions of men and
women already share."
Settle for! he thought angrily, but kept silent.
Confusion overwhelmed him. He loved her and he
loved his work. He was face to face with the grim
dilemma Paul had talked about. Which
mistress?
She saw his torment, and relieved it:
"We needn't decide tonight. But we will have to decide
soon. I must tell you again-this is all my own
idea. Not my mother's. Not Peg's. All mine.
I do want my child born with a legal name. But if
that's not possible comif you don't want the baby-there
are women in Paris who can solve the problem."
A shudder of revulsion shook him. "Christ, that's a
foul thing to propose! Murder-was
"It's an alternative, Matt."
"A damn vicious one."
She bowed her head. "I know. I'm not proud of
it."
A moment later her gaze lifted and locked with
his. Her voice strengthened. "But neither am I
entirely ashamed of using it to get a commitment from you.
A commitment isn't just to my benefit any longer.
Oh, I'll
Strelnib's Flight
HALF AN HOUR later, they were seated on
opposite sides of a glowing candle set on the
taboret in the outer room.
Hundreds of stars spread above the skylight.
Somewhere on the butte, a man and a woman
argued loudly. The voices faded. A cat meowed
in the stillness of the night.
Matt cupped his hands around the warm, fragrant
cup of tea Dolly had brewed. But he had no
desire for it.
He had put on a shirt and trousers, she an old
quilted dressing gown several sizes too large.
Her hair was disarrayed, and her cheeks pink from the
lovemaking. She sipped her tea and almost fell
into a fit of giggling.
"I'm sorry, darling, I really am. But you still
look as if the Emperor himself had placed you under
arrest."
"That's exactly how I feel." The shock
produced by her announcement was slow to dissipate.
Certain things were coming into focus, though. The glances
at little Anton. Her displeasure at a reference
to her weight.
"Well, there's nothing so unusual about a baby.
It's only by sheer luck that I haven't gotten
pregnant before this. As best I can estimate it,
I've been carrying him- or her-for about two
months. I saw a doctor in Liverpool to be
sure. But I didn't tell my family,
Matt. You must believe that."
He nodded, but avoided her eyes.
"I do want the baby to be raised properly," she
went on. "I know that may pose some problems in
connection
with your work. I'm sorry about it, but when a man and
woman love each other, and they have a child, the
responsibility changes things."
Not for me, he thought, torn by pain. Much as he
loved her, he couldn't sacrifice his time and his
concentration on the altar of parenthood. He would not
give up the life he'd come to Paris to find.
Wretched and fraught with problems as the profession
was, to be a painter was what he wanted most of
all.
And if she'd been with him in that dark, cold water
of the Gulf for even one instant-choking, flailing,
thinking death was only moments away-she would understand.
She reached around the tiny flame and touched his face.
"I don't think I'm asking for anything so
unusual, Matt. Just what millions of men and
women already share."
Settle for! he thought angrily, but kept silent.
Confusion overwhelmed him. He loved her and he
loved his work. He was face to face with the grim
dilemma Paul had talked about. Which
mistress?
She saw his torment, and relieved it:
"We needn't decide tonight. But we will have to decide
soon. I must tell you again-this is all my own
idea. Not my mother's. Not Peg's. All mine.
I do want my child born with a legal name. But if
that's not possible-if you don't want the baby-there
are women in Paris who can solve the problem."
A shudder of revulsion shook him. "Christ, that's a
foul thing to propose! Murder-was
"It's an alternative, Matt."
"A damn vicious one."
She bowed her head. "I know. I'm not proud of
it."
A moment later her gaze lifted and locked with
his. Her voice strengthened. "But neither am I
entirely ashamed of using it to get a commitment from you.
A commitment isn't just to my benefit any longer.
Oh, I'll
gain something if you agree we can get married.
Something wonderful-you're a fine, talented man. Not
perfect, God knows. But you're exciting to be with,
and you're kind and attentive when you think about it. But
as I say, I don't have just myself to consider now. I
know your family was founded by a bastard, old
Philip, but he was an extraordinary chap
to judge from all you've told me. Suppose our
child's a boy. He might not be as strong. And
bastardy is not widely accepted nor lightly
tolerated with our dear Victoria setting the world's
standard of morality-no, I will not put that burden on
any child of mine. So tell me what we're to do,
Matt. Get married or-not be troubled by the baby.
I want you to tell me by a month from now. July.
Surely you can reach a decision by then."
"No, God damn it! It's an impossible
choice." "Yes," she said gently, and he saw the
terrifying strength in her. The strength of womankind,
beside which the posings and prattlings of his artist friends
seemed puerile. "Yes, it is. But my father always
said there were many impossible choices in a lifetime.
Being able to deal with them makes you an adult, I
suppose. So does dealing with the pain they bring. A
month, Matt. I think that's time enough." She
finished her tea. "Now shall we go back to bed?"

He left Montmartre about mid-morning Sunday.
Dolly was accustomed to his disappearing for hours at
a time, either to Fochet's atelier or on long
walks during which he developed, sorted and
rejected ideas about his work.
This morning he could barely think about painting, so
full of conflicting feelings was he in the wake of
Dolly's announcement. One moment he wanted the
child, but the next, he knew it would represent the start
of a shackling process which would ultimately rob him
of the absolutely vital freedom an artist
required.
Pondering, he roamed the right bank from the great
triumphal arch at the Place de Petoile to the
esplanade south of the Louvre where fishermen dropped
their lines into the sunlit Seine. Coal barges
moved slowly up the river as he strolled on toward
the lie de la Cite and, crossed the bridge
to Notre Dame. He was not religious in the
conventional sense, but he slipped into the cathedral by the
door directly beneath the magnificent rose window
and stood in the cool, vaulted darkness listening to a
priest chant the mass far, far down in the immense
nave. Something of the peace of the church stole into him, and
his thinking slowly clarified.
As he walked out he dropped a few sous in the
poor box. He had reached two decisions. He
would not give in to Dolly's demands that they marry, but
he would not permit her to do away with the child.
He would find some way to persuade her to deliver the
baby out of wedlock. She really didn't understand
all the implications of her threat to go to one of those
women he'd only heard about-old, frequently
unclean women whose instruments helped a young girl out
of a predicament, in violation of the laws of France
and of the Church. He must make her understand and reject
that alternative.
He sat a while in a cafe" near Notre
Dame, sipping red wine in the summer sunshine.
He began to feel better; more confident. He even
turned his thoughts to a new piece of work. Something
along the lines Paul had talked about. Not an
American subject-that would be going too far-but one
from his blockade-running days. His mind focused on
an image of a smoky, crowded cantina in the
Mexican town of Matamoras on the Rio
Grande. He recalled a dancer he'd seen perform
there. A lovely, dark-eyed wench with a sinuous
body. Soon the organization of a picture
suggested itself. Then, ex
cited, he began to expand the mental canvas
to include a few spectators and then the whole of
one side of the cantina. He had never planned
anything half so ambitious.
Toward the end of the afternoon he drifted north again.
Presently he reached the Cafe Guerbois at
number eleven, Grand Rue des Batignolles.
Usually the group gathered late on Friday, so he
didn't expect to find anyone; not on a Sunday
evening when the cafe' had no other trade. But
Edouard Manet was there.
The unofficial head of the Batignolles group was
in his late thirties. He came from a bourgeois
family just as Paul did. At that point the
resemblance ended. Manet's dress and deportment
were impeccable. His light brown beard was always
meticulously trimmed and combed. Next to his wine
glass lay an expensive walking stick and a pair
of yellow gloves. He hardly looked like the sort
who would scandalize established authority, but since
the early 1860's he had been doing just that with
paintings such as Concert in the Tuileries Gardens,
Olympia and Luncheon on the Grass, the
provocative study of two gentlemen in conventional
daytime attire enjoying a woodland picnic with two
young women- one in a diaphanous drapery, the other
stark naked.
Manet's infamous picture, so realistic and yet
so outrageously fantastic at the same
time, had been refused by the jury of the 1863
Salon. Manet and so many other artists had
protested so forcefully about the unimaginative
rejection of anything the least bit new, Napoleon
I'll had done a surprising turnabout and announced
that the rejected works would be shown in a second,
unofficial exhibit-the Salon des Refuses.
Ever since, Manet had come to be the acknowledged
leader of everything revolutionary in French painting.
The cafe group-Renoir, Degas,
Fantin-Latour, Monet, Pissarro, Paul and
others-drew inspiration from his talent and encouragement
from his friendship. Some
of Manet's work was even tiptoeing around the margins
of respectability. Luncheon had been hung in
the '69 Salon. But the artist himself was still not
acceptable. This spring, Salon jury selection
procedures had been revised so that the jury would
include practicing painters. Manet's candidacy
had been rejected because of his radical views.
"Well-Matthew!" Manet extended his hand; shook
Matt's. "How goes it?"
"Not very well," Mart said with a shrug and a grin.
"Pity. I've had the same kind of day myself."
He turned and raised his voice
slightly. "Lisa?" There was no response from the
back, where Matt could hear the splash of wash water
and the clink of dishes. "I've been meaning to ask you
how you fared in your little experiment a few weeks
ago."
Matt pulled a face. "The cocaine made me
sick for three days. I don't see why people are
convinced it frees the mind. All it did was muddle
mine. I have trouble enough turning out work without trying to do
it dead drunk or delirious from an injection."
"You sound as if you're having a good deal of trouble
right now."
"Nothing's coming out right. I've been tempted to chuck
the whole business."
Manet frowned. "That would be a loss. I hope
you'll reconsider. Your work is still rough, but it shows
great vitality. And unmistakable promise."
A damp hand speared over Matt's shoulder, taking
him by surprise. The hand closed on his groin and a
coarse, teasing female voice said, "I know something
else that shows a lot of promise."
She let go. Matt kissed the reddened hand that
smelled of strong soap. Lisa rumpled his hair.
She was ten years older than Matt-closer
to Manet's age- always disheveled, with her
hair falling in her eyes. She leaned over to set
a glass and a new carafe of 85
wine on the marble table. "Eh, Matthew, my
Virginia dove-was She pronounced it
Var-ghln-ya. "Why can't you and I ever be close
friends?" She caught his head in the crook of her
elbow and squeezed him against her blouse and her large
breasts. "You know how close I mean."
Manet coughed and examined the ceiling. She released
him. "Believe me, if that English girl ever
turns her back on you, I'll snatch you away."
"You'll be too busy avoiding all your other
suitors, Lisa. I saw one of them yesterday."
She brightened. "You did? Who?"
"That Prussian, Lepp."
"Oh, God. Spare me!"
He described the encounter at the Gare du Nord,
including Lepp's promise that he'd be back
to see her. At that, she shivered.
"Let's hope not. After he was in here the last time,
I made a few inquiries. Some of the-ah-working
girls in the neighborhood know a little about him."
She proceeded to describe some of Lepp's
aberrations. Manet grew increasingly embarrassed,
but the barmaid paid no attention. She said
Lepp had been heard to boast about a secret
pied-d-terre somewhere on the left bank. "He
reportedly pays both prostitutes and
impoverished students from the Sorbonne to spend an
hour satisfying his peculiar needs. I want no
part of that fellow, I tell y-was
"I didn't expect anyone to be here!" a
bellowing voice interrupted. "Hortense and I have
had a terrible fight!"
Matt stood up. "Hello, Paul." His friend
looked even more wild-eyed than usual. Manet
sat motionless, as if wanting to be inconspicuous.
He and Mart's friend didn't always hit it off.
"Lisa, you unwashed slut, get me some wine!"
Paul yelled, grabbing a chair and sitting down.
She made a face and told him to get it himself.
She flounced out. Paul didn't move.
Manet made an effort to be cordial; extended
his hand:
"How are you, Ceanne?"
Paul glared. "I do not shake your hand, Mister
Manet. I have not washed for a week."
The other man sighed. "Really, Cezanne, your
rudeness is unbelievable sometimes."
Paul fixed the other artist with a murderous
eye. "I've nothing to say to you. I'm not
intelligent enough to speak on your level. I don't
even know why I sit at this table. I don't fit
in. I don't dress or speak like a smug
provincial lawyer!"
Manet snatched up his stick and gloves. "In
one of your insufferable moods, are you? I shouldn't
wonder Hortense had her claws out. She'd be
happier living with a wild orangutang. Good
evening!"
Manet stalked out. Matt stared after him, then sighed
in an annoyed way. "Why do you insult everyone,
Paul?"
Paul slammed his elbows on the table and covered his
eyes with his palms. "Shut up. Just shut up and
leave me alone."
It was sensible to give in to Paul's wishes when he
was hi such a state. Matt slipped away from the
table. For a moment he was able to appreciate
Dolly's feeling that a normal existence was much more
preferable than a career among such emotionally stunted
people. It was difficult for Matt to make outsiders
understand that outrageous character flaws in a man such as
Paul were more than made up for by incredible talent.
Indeed, the flaws had probably helped
nurture the talent. They were its price.
He was halfway to the arch leading to the kitchen when the
front door banged open again. Paul's head
had sunk onto his arms and he appeared to be dozing
as Matt turned, saw the new arrival, and
exclaimed:
"Sime!"
Carrying a carpetbag in one hand, Strelnik rushed
toward him. "Thank God. I left the house hi
such a rush, I didn't have a chance to ask Dolly
where you were. I was hoping you might be here."
Matt had seldom seen his friend so agitated.
"Sime, what's wrong?"
"I'm afraid I may be in very serious trouble."

Lisa strolled up behind Matt and leaned on his
shoulder, absently reaching down with her left hand
to tweak his rump. Strelnik couldn't see. He
gave the barmaid a suspicious stare, then said
to Matt: "I must talk to you privately." "All
right. Excuse us, Lisa."
She shrugged and disappeared again. Matt led the
agitated little man to a table against the far wall, six
or eight feet from Paul, who was snoring and making
maudlin noises.
Strelnik jerked off his shabby cap and twisted it in
his hands as he leaned forward. "I have to be gone for a
few days, Matt. Will you look after Leah and the
baby for me? See that nothing happens to them?"
Matt started to laugh. "What do you mean? What could
possibly happen to them?"
"I don't know," Strelnik replied, nervously
raking fingers through his bright red beard. "But I fear
I've become a dangerous man to know. I want you
to be aware of that before you agree to anything."
Strelnik's statements struck Matt as
pretentious and melodramatic. Yet what he
saw hi the Russian's round, dark eyes was the
kind of fright that precluded laughter. "I wish you'd
explain that, Sime." 88
"I'll try. I'm still rather shaky. This afternoon certain
comassociates of mine sent a coded telegraph
message. From Berlin."
Matt was slow to realize the significance.
Strelnik blurted, "My brother's been
arrested!"
"Your brother? I'm sorry to hear it. But how
does that involve you?"
"I'm not sure. But I was advised to go into hiding.
You see, Matt, my brother Yuri is
allied with certain groups which oppose the monolithic
state Otto Bismarck is attempting to build in
Germany. Yuri had been trying to discover what
position the premier has taken in regard to the throne
of Spain."
Matt didn't understand, and said so. Strelnik cast
another anxious look toward the street entrance, then
explained.
The throne of Spain had been left vacant after a
political upheaval in 1868. It was still vacant
because various claimants and candidates were maneuvering
behind the scenes. Yuri Strelnik had learned that
Bismarck was promoting Prince Leopold of
Hohenzollern Simaringen, a member of the ruling
house of Prussia, for that kingship.
Bewildered, Matt shook his head. "Sime,
forgive me. I still don't follow."
"No, I realize you don't take politics very
seriously, Matthew. But some men take it with deadly
seriousness."
"I know. I lost a brother because of men like that. Go
on."
"Yuri and his comrades wanted to expose the
Hohenzollern candidacy. If it became a matter
of public record, France would react
violently, since the news would mean Prussia's
sphere of influence may soon extend to Spain."
"I never imagined you and your crowd here in Paris were
friends of the Emperor, Sime."
"Definitely not! We're interested solely in the
people's cause. However, any international friction which
embarrasses Bismarck and blunts his drive for
power works to the advantage of the German people.
Bismarck wants to enthrone William, the
Prussian king, as kaiser of a unified,
militaristic Germany. By hampering his plan we
foster ours, which is the eventual overthrow of
Bismarck's regime."
"And your cause is helped by exposure of a
meaningless candidacy for a meaningless throne?"
"Believe me, the exposure would not be meaningless.
France will not view it that way. The Emperor will
consider Bismarck's maneuver to be
provocative. And doubly insulting because Bismarck
kept the candidacy a secret until the Spanish
parliament approved it."
"You don't mean France would declare war over a breach
of protocol-?"
"Oh, no, certainly not. That would be going too far.
But severe diplomatic repercussions-those
are virtually guaranteed."
"All right, Sime, that's reasonably clear. Just
explain why you have to go into hiding."
"Because Yuri finally obtained documentation of the
Hohenzollern candidacy!"
"Have you seen it?"
"I have not. But the Prussians may think I have.
Yuri and I correspond all the time. You know that.
I'm sure they do too. And the Prussian eagle
has talons that reach a great distance," Strelnik
declared with breathy emphasis. "A great distance."
That much Matt was willing to grant, given the
presence hi Paris of men such as Lepp. Perhaps
Strelnik had good cause for fear, though Matt
did find it ludicrous that there could be such furor
over an obsolete kingship. On the other hand,
Jeremiah had been lost because of hot-headed
partisanship for slavery, an out moded
and immoral institution, and for secession, a windy
debating platform topic not worth one human
life.
"You can count on Dolly and me to watch out for your
wife and boy. Don't worry about them."
Strelnik put on his cap and picked up his
carpetbag. "I'll try not to,
Matt."
"Does Leah know where you're going?"
"No one knows but the people who will be hiding me. I'll
come home as soon as I'm told that it's safe.
Meanwhile-was He pumped Mart's hand. "Thank you
from the bottom of my heart. Yesterday you paid me a
sort of reverse compliment. Now it's my turn-was
One more swift look at the street door. "You are
a decent man, Matthew-even if you do have no
comprehension of what powers actually move the world.
One of them isn't a paint brush, that much I'll
tell you. I fear that long after the cleansing
revolutionary fire has burnt out the old order
you'll still be standing in the ashes scratching your head and
wondering what happened. And you'll never understand why the
old order had to die to make way for the new."
"No, I won't," Matt agreed. "In case
there's an emergency, I do think I should know where
to find you."
"No you shouldn't!" Strelnik shot back with an
alarmed look. "It will be safer that way."
He picked up the carpetbag, paused at the door
to look both ways along the avenue, then rushed off
into the gathering twilight. For some reason, the little
man's last remark made Matt shiver.
In the Studio of the Onion
NEXT MORNING HE woke before dawn,
trembling in the spell of a dream in which he'd
clearly seen himself standing before the finished painting of the
Matamoras cantina.
The painting had been equally clear-a huge, crowded
canvas conveying a sense of boisterous and bawdy
life. From the central figure of the dark-haired
dancing girl to the dim groupings at the around the
perimeter, the images seemed to pulse with a kind of
arrested motion. In the work room of his dreaming mind,
the painting had come out perfectly. But then Fochet was
fond of saying, "Here is a truth that will prevent
disappointment and self-satisfaction. The picture
on your canvas is never as good as the one in your
head."
Details of the dream began to fade almost immediately.
He left the bed quickly. When Dolly murmured and
reached for him, he was already in the outer room. He
lurched about, lighting a lamp and locating paper and a
stick of charcoal.
He began scribbling a series of little scenes from the
dream painting. A fat proprietor with mustachios
like opposing horizontal question marks. Three
Confederate captains bent over cards and
tequila at one of the tables. A flamboyantly
dressed vaquero practically crosseyed with drink,
reaching out to pinch the dancing girl. He finished four
sketches before the dream slipped completely away.
In the summer he always slept naked, arid tonight was
no exception. Though the flat was cool, his body still
felt warm from the fever of excitement. His heartbeat
was unusually fast, his breathing quick and raspy. He
glanced up at the skylight; saw only
brilliant stars against blackness. It wasn't even
close to morning. But he knew he couldn't sleep.
He dressed, then bent to kiss Dolly's
temple.
She lay on her side, snoring lightly again.
Gently he touched her upraised hip, as if to bless
and protect the unborn baby in her womb. In some
curious but certain way, he already knew the child would be
male.
How in God's name could he let her even think about
destroying their son? He couldn't. At the same
time, he could not-would not-surrender his independence.
All at once he had what struck him as an
inspired idea. Perhaps Fochet would help resolve
the dilemma! The more he thought about the idea, the more he
liked it. He was whistling as he passed from
the garden into the Rue Saint-Vincent and set off at
a brisk pace. Just as false dawn broke, he
let himself into the building which housed the atelier of
Etienne Fochet on its second and topmost
floor. The building was located halfway down the
east slope of the hill crowned by marble columned
Saint-Pierre de Montmartre, the old church which
elderly residents of the village said had once
been a Roman temple. At the head of the stairs
Matt unlocked the outer door of the studio. All
the walls on the second floor had been knocked
out to create one huge, loft-like room in which he quickly
got to work.
u
By lamplight he hammered a frame together, using
scrap lumber Fochet kept for that purpose. The
frame was six feet high, nine feet wide. Then
he stretched and
tacked a huge new piece of linen onto the
frame. By nine o'clock, when the other students began
to drift in, he had the linen prepared and the frame
fitted into two small easels. The top of the
frame leaned against the studio's east wall.
Matt stood on a small box, applying the ground
with swift, broad strokes. For the moment
he'd forgotten everything else-Strelnik; Dolly;
the problem of the baby; the fact that he hadn't eaten
breakfast; even where he was. The fever, the joyous
fever, had claimed him again.
Soon, though, activity hi the atelier made it
impossible for him to totally shut out his surroundings.
Fochet had thirty-one students. About half were
present on any given day, the rest off doing copy
work at the Louvre, sleeping with their mistresses,
recovering from drinking bouts, or just loafing. Only
ten of the students were still receiving formalized instruction.
They and all the others paid the teacher a small fee which
went toward the rent and the wages of whatever model he
hired off the street that week. Fochet actually
charged nothing for his occasional lectures or for
individual instruction. A good thing, too, the
students joked. The teacher's usual manner was one
of outrage, as if he really hated to be burdened with
pupils. The truth was, he preferred teaching above
everything else.
Shortly the atelier was hi a state of hubbub.
Matt kept working away at the ground while the
day's first fight broke out. Three students who had
been loudly debating the artistic merits of
Offenbach's highly popular music
decided to settle their differences by punching, kicking
and biting each other. Most of the other students paid no
attention. Two were guffawing like donkeys over a
sketch one of them had done. The picture was a
cruel caricature of the pendulous breasts and
scraggly pubis of the naked fat girl who sat on
a box on the dais hi the center of the room. The
poor creature looked
baffled and vaguely alarmed as she stared out at the ring
of young men around her, the clutter of easels and work
cabinets, and the combatants tussling and screaming
obscenities in the background.
All at once a door crashed open. Fochet
stormed in to break up the fight:
"Louts! Farmers!" He flailed about him, boxing
ears. "Get to work or get out of here!"
The three brawlers separated, called him all
sorts of filthy names, then went placidly back
to their easels. Fochet shook his head in disgust and
moved on, stopping here to observe, there to deliver a
scathing critique. He lectured one pupil for
five minutes. Seized the brush from another's hand
and made a few swift corrections. No matter
how harsh his criticism or how brusque his
manner, the pupils didn't complain. He
was fierce, but he was respected.
Etienne Fochet had come from Limoges, the home
city of a member of the Batignolles group,
Auguste Renoir. Fochet had served an
apprenticeship in the decorating rooms of a
Limoges pottery factory, painting
eighteenth-century swains and shepherdesses on an
endless array of plates, jugs and cups. Renoir,
coincidentally, had held a similar job as a
boy, though in Paris. Renoir, however, was still a
year shy of thirty. Fochet would never see fifty
again.
As a much younger man just come up to Paris with ambition
but no training, Fochet had studied with Cour-bet,
who was almost exactly his own age and already doing
revolutionary work. Courbet had rid his own painting
of literary and mythological elements, and taught his
pupils to do the same. He had forever changed the
direction of contemporary art by painting subjects from
everyday life. In fact, Fochet claimed to be
one of the people depicted in what was perhaps Courbet's
most famous work-The Painter's Studio, his 1855
canvas showing the artist at work in his crowded
atelier. Fochet said he was the bearded man seated
next to a pair of dogs at the extreme
left. Matt had seen the picture several times and
didn't consider the resemblance pronounced.
Courbet had emphasized traditional technique
blended with fidelity to observed detail. Fochet's
theory and practice went one more step. Slavish
adherence to old-fashioned rules of technique was
entirely secondary to what the artist observed.
Only that which was optically apparent should be included in
a painting. As he often put it, "The impression,
only the visual impression matters! Nothing
else is reality!"
A powerful smell told Matt the teacher was coming up
behind him. Fochet constantly munched bits of stale
red onion which he carried in a pocket of his
paint-spotted blouse. His pupils called him
I'oignon half derisively, half
affectionately--but always behind his back. He was a
short man, barely five feet, with an immense
belly, kinky gray hair and lively brown eyes
that could be fiercely intimidating. In his youth he'd
worn a beard, but it was gone now, revealing heavily
pitted cheeks.
"Well, Kent!" he exclaimed. "A picture
in work at last! Good, good. You haven't done much of
anything for the last six months. In fact
I was planning to ask you to move out so I could
replace you with someone actually interested in painting.
I had reached the conclusion that you continued to rent space
here merely so you wouldn't have to spend a hard winter on
the streets."
Matt was too excited about the new painting to let the
sarcasm bother him. Fochet took notice of the
huge frame. Circumscribed it with choppy
motions of one hand as he went on:
"Ambitious. I doubt your talent's up to handling
anything that large, but I'm glad you're trying.
What's it to be?"
Matt put his palette aside and wiped his hands
with a rag dipped in diluent. "A cafe in
Mexico."
Fochet brightened perceptibly. "Something you've seen
first hand?"
"Yes, I drank there quite often when we took cargo
up the Rio Grande river during the war."
"Capital! I've always thought you were an idiot
to ignore all the fascinating subject matter in
your personal experience. Not to mention that in your
homeland. When I was younger, Captain Catlin and his
Indians convinced me America was a veritable
trove of colorful subjects."
"You mean George Catlin?"
"That's right, the fellow who traveled and painted the
western part of your country twenty or thirty years
ago. He came to Paris in the forties.
Exhibited his canvases and a band of Iowa
Indians. My sister was a chambermaid at the
Hotel Victoria where he kept the savages.
She smuggled me in so I could observe them. The
beds were removed so the Indians could sleep on the
floor. The sight of their sharp teeth gave my
poor sister nightmares about cannibals. But
Catlin made quite an impression over here. Quite an
impression on me, too. I sometimes think
Frenchmen are more appreciative of your country than
you are, Kent."
"I agree," Matt grinned. "I don't care
if I never see it again."
"Stupid attitude."
Matt stopped smiling, red-faced.
The teacher gestured at the linen half covered with the sand
colored ground.
"Tell me more about what you're planning."
"The central figure's to be a young Mexican
dancing girl with combs in her hair. Here, I did
a few preliminary studies-was
Fochet popped bits of onion hi his mouth. He
chewed while he examined the sketches. Presently
he uttered a
few monosyllabic grunts. Matt felt almost
delirious with pleasure. Fochet's grunts were
virtually his highest form of compliment.
The tutor handed the drawings back, picked a
speck of onion from the corner of his mouth and said with
mock innocence, "Then I really needn't concern
myself with renting your space to someone else?"
"Oh, yes, you still may have to think about that. I don't
know how smoothly this is going to proceed. Dolly's
given me something besides work to worry about."
Fochet frowned. "Is there trouble between you and your young
lady?"
"Yes, I guess you'd call it trouble."
"'I can't imagine that. She's always seemed to be
a fine sort. For a woman, that is."
"She is a fine woman," Matt nodded. "You know
how I feel about her-was
"Don't get too fond of her, Kent! I keep
telling you that's very bad for a painter. Sometime, if you
wish, you may tell me the nature of your problem."
He shrugged as if it didn't matter much. That was his
usual way of inviting a student to pour out
his deepest woes.
Matt lost no time: "The trouble is, we're going
to have a child."
"Unexpected?"
"Yes."
"And you're certain?"
"Dolly says she is."
"Hmmm. Well, I suppose congratulations are
in order." He sounded dubious. "Just don't spend
too many hours dandling the infant on your knee-was
Pieces of onion flew as Fochet waved at the
oversized frame. "Not if you really plan
to complete a painting the size of one of Manet's."
"I do. But Dolly wants the child to have a legal
name. She wants us to get married."
The teacher's hand stopped halfway to his lips.
Then, abruptly, he flung the onion away.
"What the devil is the matter with women? Do they not
understand that it's very difficult to serve the easel and the
hearth at the same time? No, not difficult-
impossible! Some few seem able to do both, I know.
Manet, for instance. On the other hand, you wouldn't
call his courtship exactly conventional. He met
that Dutch girl, Miss Leenhoff, in
1852-eleven years before the death of his father
made it possible for him to ignore family
objections and marry her. Someone knocked her up
eleven years before the ceremony, too. Very
mysterious. Well, at least she wasn't hounding him
to surrender to domesticity for all that time. Most
women would have reminded him of his moral obligation every
hour on the hour-God, some characteristics of the female
species are just insufferable!"
Matt was astonished at the vehemence of the little teacher,
and even more astonished when Fochet blurted, "I know
what I'm talking about! I've had five wives;
did I ever mention that?"
Dumbfounded, Matt shook his head.
"Well, I meant to do so, but you know how my thoughts
wander-was That was true enough; Fochet was notoriously
absent-minded. Again this morning he'd forgotten
to button his trousers.
He went on, "Each of the five wanted me to spend
more and more time with them. Which meant less and less time hi
the studio. Of course they all launched their
campaigns after we left the altar. Beforehand, they were
very solicitous about my chosen vocation-oh, I tell
you they're clever, Kent. When you're courting, they
pretend the two of you can reach an accommodation in
any disagreement. But after you have stood up
before a droning priest, and after the lady has revealed
her little treasures in the marriage bed, it's you and you
alone who do the accommodating. I'm not blaming them.
I
believe such tactics are part of their nature. But
a man must learn to be wary. Especially a man in
this profession. Five times I failed to heed that
same advice which other unfortunates had given me.
Four times hope triumphed over the warnings of
personal experience. And wouldn't you know it? Every one
of the bitches loathed onions, too."
After a rueful laugh, Fochet spoke with more kindness
than Matt had ever heard from him-and he pitched his
voice low so nearby students couldn't possibly
eavesdrop:
"Has Miss Dolly confronted you with a request that
you marry her? Or is it a demand?"
He pondered a moment. "No matter what you call
it, the end result's the same, isn't it?"
Fochet nodded in a grave way. "Yes, I
suppose you're right. How do you feel about her
wishes?"-"Independence is the last thing I want
to give up." "Splendid!"
"But I don't want to give her up, either." At
that, the teacher looked downcast. "Well.
I do hope you can work things out without surrendering your
freedom. If at all possible, I would like you
to be spared the kind of painful choice many painters
cannot avoid."
"Paul calls it choosing between two mistresses,"
Matt said quietly.
"I'm not sure I like your crazy friend's
metaphor. It smacks of the vulgar. It's
degrading, hi fact. Art is a high calling. A
priesthood whose members are privileged to show mere
humans their common traits instead of their differences.
Privileged to show them beauty in a world that has
made them weary with its ugliness. Privileged, in
short, to help them endure. And you know as well as
I do-priests are celibate. For a very good reason.
They know they can't successfully serve both God
and the flesh. Obviously that's what Cezanne is
getting
at with his prattle about mistresses. But, he's right
about one thing. You don't want to make a choice between
a girl and your career. I've seen such a choice
tear many a talented fellow apart. Ruin his
composure and his work for months-years-sometimes forever.
The secret of avoiding that is to find a young woman
who loves to copulate but who is also
basically stupid and slovenly. One of those very rare
and precious girls who not only don't give a
fig for respectability but don't even know what it
is."
"I'm afraid it's too late for that, Fochet.
I love her."
"And you don't think she would be content to bear the child out
of wedlock?"
He remembered the chilling threat about certain women
who could solve the problem. "No. Once I thought
she might, but over the past few months, she's
changed. I think she's started to consider the future.
When she found out she was pregnant, that convinced her
to do something decisive-was A rueful smile. "And so
she has. We either marry or-was He hid the worst.
"Or separate. You know she's a strong-minded
girl."
"Yes, I have gotten that impression." The teacher
sighed; scratched the tip of his nose. "Let me
talk to her. Let me see whether I can convince her
it's disastrous to try to fetter someone in this crazy
profession-why are you smiling?"
"Because I meant to get around to asking you to do exactly
that."
"Of course! Why not? It's logical.
I'm older. I know much more of the world than you do;
you're just a callow boy-was
"She respects you, too."
Fochet blinked. "She does?"
"Very much so."
The teacher swelled visibly. "I8full
definitely speak to her. Just don't get your
hopes too high. Women are difficult.
However, I can certainly make the effort. And if
she does respect me, as you say--"
"She does! You can convince her if anyone can. How
can I thank you, Fochet?"
"Very simple. By doing some work for a change."
The moment of sympathy was gone; the tutor was on the
attack:
"I say again-I believe your ambition exceeds your
ability. Prove me wrong if you can. Show me your
talent is as big as that-was He waved at the
canvas. "com expression of your confidence in it. In
other words, as big as your ego."
Having thrust the spear in, he turned and walked
away, regal as any king. Suddenly his jaw
jutted. He broke into a waddling run, headed for the
other side of the studio where another fight had
erupted.
Matt went back to work, hoping that the teacher might
indeed be able to persuade Dolly to change her
decision. Soften her attitude.
At least the problem was temporarily out of his hands.
He could turn to the Matamoras painting with all his
concentration and energy-which was the only way a painter could
accomplish anything decent. Dolly had to hear that
again.
Hear it and accept it-so their son could live.
CHAPTER
Someone Watching
BY MID-WEEK, Mart's work on the Matamoras
picture had almost reached a state of frenzy. He
was painting for fourteen or fifteen hours at a
stretch, sustained only by his young man's strength.
But even
that flagged eventually, and after the long sessions he
went limping back to the Rue Saint-Vincent,
totally spent.
Dolly grew short tempered because he wanted to do
little more than eat and fall asleep when he got
home. He wasn't eager to hear the day's
happenings at the English school, or a lengthy
account of her first visit to the doctor who'd been
recommended to her, a peppery young
physician named Clemenceau. He had returned
from a stay in Connecticut the preceding year, brought
an American wife with him, and set up a
Parisian practice. Matt listened with a frown as
Dolly took ten minutes to describe how Dr.
Georges Clemenceau bad examined her and
pronounced her pregnant. She recognized his
annoyance and voiced hers: "I should think you'd be
interested in the welfare of your own child."
"I am, Dolly. But your sawbones hasn't
told us anything we don't already know."
"I suppose you don't worry about poor Sime,
either." "Of course I worry." It was only
partially true. In the studio there were long periods
when thoughts of the child-or of his vanished neighbor-never
entered his mind. He was slightly ashamed of that, but
he. couldn't change the fact.
He'd told Dolly everything Strelnik had said that
evening at the cafe". She had immediately started spending
as much time as possible with Strelnik's wife,
to ease her through the tense period. "Has Leah still not
heard from him?" Matt asked now.
"No, not a word. She's so upset, she's almost
ill." "I shouldn't wonder. I assume he's
all right, though. If he weren't, his friends
would have contacted us."
"How very considerate of you to spend a moment
expressing that thought!" Dolly's voice was oddly
husky. In the light of the candles by which they were eating
cheese and drinking wine for a midnight supper, her
lovely eyes glowed with resentment. "I mean to say
I know how highly you value your time, Matt. When
you give up even one precious second on behalf
of others, it's deeply appreciated by lesser
mortals."
Rage and sadness mingled as he rubbed his forehead.
"Oh, for Christ's sake, Dolly. Please
don't start again-was
"Start what? It's true. An expression of
human feeling is a rare thing from a man whose only
mistress is his work."
Mart's eyes grew bleak. "What the hell's
gotten into you tonight?"
Suddenly her hostility melted. "I'm frightened.
I'm frightened of having a child. I want the baby but
there's so much to learn about having one-was She bent her
head, tears glistening. "I'm just being bloody
bitchy. I do apologize."
"I understand," he said, though he didn't, fully.
Softly, she went on, "It is true about
your work, though. If you were in love with another
woman, I could fight that. I can't fight a woman
like the one you're thinking about every moment these days."
She meant the cantina dancer. He'd been trying
to solve a problem of arrangement of the painting's
central figure. He'd even been doing some little
drawings tonight, before she'd set out the cheese and wine.
The pad, charcoal and several discarded anatomical
sketches lay at his feet.
For a moment her glance rested on them with unconcealed
loathing. He was infuriated by her suggestion that the
problem was unimportant. Before he could say so, she
glanced up from the sketches and sighed.
"No, I can't fight that. Come, let's go to bed.
I'm worn out, too."
His anger faded. No doubt the pregnancy was
upsetting and tiring her. He supposed that was the
case when any woman had her first baby. But this
pregnancy
brought a special burden. She didn't know whether
it would go to its full term.
July was approaching. The deadline she'd set for his
decision. There'd been no further discussion of that
decision, but obviously it was much in her thoughts.
Fochet hasn't spoken to her. When he
does, she'll calm down. Maybe July will come
and she'll back off and there'll be no need for a
decision.
He clung to Fochet as a solution to his
difficulty almost as tenaciously as he'd clung
to the spar that had kept him from drowning in the Gulf.
As tenaciously, and with fully as much desperation.
The remainder of the week went by and the under-painting of the
Matamoras scene began to emerge. As he saw it
in his head, in his sketches, and then in broad
outlines swiftly laid on in black, it would be a
canvas full of sweeping line and swirling motion.
The dominant color would represent a sinister
amber lamplight which had flooded the actual cafe.
He only hoped he could successfully transfer that
light from his memory to the canvas.
He'd finally solved the technical problem with the
dancer. The problems with Dolly persisted. She
seemed exhausted even when she woke in the morning and
was increasingly prone to snap and quarrel over the
smallest imagined slight.
On Saturday he decided to try to do something
to make her feel better. That evening he persuaded
her to put on her best frock, and they ambled up to the
Moulin de la Galette, which had long
ago been converted from an actual mill to an open
air restaurant and dance hall.
The spot was one of the most popular in Montmartre.
Guests entered through a gate into a deliberately
overgrown garden. Then they passed along a narrow
hallway in the old house attached to the mill, which
some said had first started grinding grain in the thirteenth
century. The door at the end of the hall revealed a
whole series of pleasing views on the hilltop:
beds of daisies and bright morning glories in a
broad lawn; an orchard; a vegetable garden.
And, surrounded by these charmingly rural aspects, there
were clusters of white-painted outdoor furniture,
a raised dance floor and a small band shell.
To their surprise, they found Paul and Hortense
at one table. "Join us, join us!" Paul urged.
Matt and Dolly did so, though not without some
unspoken fears about an unpleasant evening. Paul
and his mistress had apparently reconciled, however,
and both were in quite good spirits. Occasionally Matt had
seen Paul completely forget his practiced
truculence. Perhaps tonight would turn out to be one of those
grand occasions when some curious chemistry took over
and released Paul from his need to make people reject him
so that he could continue to believe he was
special.
The Moulin soon grew crowded. They ordered good,
cheap couldtes du Rhdne in a large pottery
carafe with a brown glaze. After consuming two large
glasses, Matt all but forgot his difficulties
with Dolly.
The lanterns strung in the trees glowed in the
summer dusk. The musicians arrived, started
exchanging jokes with the guests as they tuned up.
Zola dropped in and stayed half an hour, chatting
with Paul and the others about plans for his forthcoming
wedding. Dolly sent one or two pointed glances
Mart's way, to remind him that some who were involved in
the arts didn't find it prohibited marriage.
He just poured more wine and said nothing.
Auguste Renoir arrived and pulled up a chair.
An unusual young man hi many ways, Matt
thought. Renoir's father had operated a tailoring shop
hi Limoges,
but the business had failed so he'd come up to Paris
when his son was quite small. Young Auguste had painted
china just as Fochet had, meticulously copying
scenes by Fragonard and Watteau in a dingy
warehouse on the Rue du Temple. But to finance his
education at the Beaux-Arts, he'd done
all sorts of commercial jobs of the kind most
aspiring artists scorned. He'd painted figures
and ornamental designs on fans; decorated the
blinds of shop windows; produced endless copies of
coats of arms for important families; and
created murals for the walls of obscure little
taverns. He was still knocking out commissioned
portraits to pay for his living expenses.
Matt believed Renoir had ability equal or
superior to Paul's or Edouard's and that his paintings
would one day be famous. But the young man from Limoges
unconsciously made light of his talent
by frittering it away. He incessantly scribbled
cartoons and caricatures on anything from napkins
to his own paper cuffs. Tonight he started off
by surreptitiously doing a sketch of Zola as a
dirty, swag-bellied laborer. Renoir didn't
care for the journalist or his novels. "He thinks that
he fully describes human beings merely by saying
they smell," was his comment after the writer had gone.
Auguste Renoir had a tough air sometimes, almost as
if he had grown up as a Paris gamin-which in fact
he had-and would remain one until the end of his days.
Yet mingled with that street-smart cynicism was something
pensive and gentle-as now, when he forgot his
pique, tore up the nasty cartoon and began
another showing some of the Saturday evening
celebrants. The Moulin was one of his favorite
subjects.
Matt and Dolly waltzed under the lanterns,
whirling round and round the raised wooden floor to the
melodies of Johann Strauss the younger. The
orchestra played the Viennese music with
apolitical enthusiasm. At the end of one
number, they walked back to the
table to find Renoir just completing a cartoon of them
pressed close together, as though dancing languidly
to some very slow piece. The lines of the drawing were few
but eloquent, and there was no mistaking the models
he'd chosen.
"Auguste, that's grand!" Matt exclaimed. "You
must sign it!"
Renoir ripped the drawing off his pad. "Why?
It's trivial." He started to crush the cartoon
into a ball. Dolly rescued it from his hand.
"Not to me. It's splendid. May we have it?"
The young man seemed flattered. He glanced down in
a modest way. "Of course, if you like it that much."
He put his signature on it and handed it to her.
She gazed at it with obvious pleasure
while they rested during the next few dances.
She really is feeling good tonight, Matt thought when they
went back to waltz again. She'd actually shown a
liking for a piece of work done by one of his artist friends.
Usually her approval was limited to a cool word
or two-if that. He often thought she was afraid
to display enthusiasm for fear it might imply
approval of the profession as well.
Around and around the dance floor they spun, Dolly's
eyes sparkling from all the wine and her cheeks pink from
the warmth of the summer night. Unexpectedly, he was
reminded of the child as he rested his hand on her waist.
He seemed to detect a slight thickening there.
Soon the child would begin to change her figure
visibly. That would be just the first of many changes in their
lives. It was an awesome thing for a man
to contemplate the birth of his first offspring, But under the
gay lights of the Moulin, it was a happy thing
to contemplate, too.
For three short hours, neither he nor Dolly said
a cross word. All was right with the world,
Laughing and clinging to one another, they were weaving along
the Rue Saint-Vincent as the bell of
Saint-Pierre's chimed midnight. Slowly the
last tolling died away between the summer stars
and the twinkling lights of Paris below the butte. The
thickly shadowed street was silent except for the meow
of an unseen cat on the prowl.
Mart's curiosity was getting the better of him. The
wine he'd drunk finally overcame his caution. In
a voice just slightly thickened, he said:
"You're in wonderful spirits tonight, Dolly."
"It was a wonderful evening. You know how much I
love to dance. I won't be able to do it much long-
oops." She slipped on the cobbles. He grabbed
her around the waist to keep her from taking a spill.
Giggling, she collapsed against him. Renoir's
cartoon rattled in her hand. Her weight pushed him
back against a wall two houses down from the one
protecting Madame Rochambeau's.
Inadvertently his fingers came in contact with the cheap
ring she wore. The feel of the metal prodded him
again.
"What did Fochet have to say when you spoke to him?"
"The Onion? I haven't set eyes on him
since that party at his studio, just before the Salon
opened. Was he supposed to be coming to call on me?"
There was something brittle and deceptive in her
voice, Matt thought. The ring of pretense.
Or did the wine make him imagine that?
He decided she was telling the truth. Fochet
hadn't gotten around to talking with her as yet.
Undoubtedly it had slipped his mind. Many other
things did.
For a moment Matt was intensely angry at his
teacher. Then he realized he was being childish. He
knew Fochet's erratic ways. The Onion
needed a reminder, that was all.
Well, he'd get one. He definitely would.
Dolly had to 109
be persuaded to forget marriage-and without mistakenly
concluding that he didn't want the child. Only
Fochet had the wisdom and experience to make that
delicate distinction apparent to her. And if he
didn't do it, Dolly might go to one of those women
who-
"God!" The very thought brought a shudder of horror.
"What did you say, Matt?"
"Nothing, nothing."
"Well, I asked you whether Fochet was supposed
to be calling on me."
"Yes," he said abruptly. "Yes, he was."
"Why?"
He didn't dare reveal that. Trapped, he
blurted, "He didn't say. Maybe
he's planning another party."
"My, you sound positively grumpy all at
once!" She squeezed his hand against her side as they
stood in the darkness beside the wall. He knew she
didn't believe his explanation. What was he going
to say?
Something spared him the need to say anything. He jerked
his hand away.
"Matthew Kent, what's wrong with you?"
Quickly he shushed her.
"But it's bloody rude of you to-was
He pointed down the dark street to explain the sudden
diversion of his attention. She shook her head.
"I honestly don't understand what you're so worked up
about-was
"Sssh" He pressed his mouth against her ear. "Can't
you see? There's someone standing across from our gate. In
the little alcove beside the fountain. You wait here."
He turned and started walking diagonally across the
street toward the spot where he'd spied the pale
blur of a face. He was halfway to the
alcove-close enough to hear the old fountain
trickling-when a figure burst from its deeper
darkness. Matt had an impression of a
long-skirted overcoat and a floppy hat.
Curious clothing for a summer night.
Unless the watcher wanted to disguise his appearance.
The man went racing up the street with one hand
clapped to the crown of his hat. "Here, hold on!"
Matt shouted. Before the echo died, he broke into a
run that would have enabled him to overtake the watcher
easily, except that his foot suddenly slipped in
the street's drainage channel. He cursed as he
sprawled on hands and knees.
He struggled up just as Dolly reached him, the
cartoon still flapping in her hand.
"Are you all right, Matt?"
"Fine," he snapped.
"What on earth was that man doing?"
"I think it's pretty plain he was watching the
house."
"Our house? For what reason?"
Everything else was forgotten, even their differences, as
he answered, "I can't guess the exact one. But
I don't think anyone would be interested in the place
because Madame Rochambeau lives there. Or because we
do, for that matter."
With an ominous feeling, he added, "I suspect
they're watching it because Strelnik lives there."
He was sober all at once. So was she.
They both slept badly.
Ill
The Callers
ANOTHER WEEK PASSED. Summer air lay
over the city, breathless and sultry. Le Figaro
printed reports of damage done by violent
thunderstorms along the shores of the North Sea. But
no storms rolled down to relieve the late June
humidity that oppressed Paris.
Fochet's atelier was an inferno by day and not much
better by night. Matt didn't care. The
Matamoras canvas was emerging slowly, and he
worked on it for as long as eighteen hours at a
stretch. During the night he set up half a
dozen lamps to approximate daylight, and only
concerned himself with details that weren't critical.
He worked stripped to the waist with rags tied around his
wrists and forehead to catch the perspiration.
When he wasn't working, he slept. One time he
arrived back at Madame Rochambeau's at
three in the morning and found Dolly asleep in the
good chair, her shift plastered to her breasts by the
dampness. After a glance at the unfinished
portrait, he carried her to bed and stretched out beside
her. Tense with the excitement of his work, he
couldn't doze off. He rose again at five and
started back to the studio, feeling refreshed even
though he hadn't slept. The work itself was a tonic.
Twice more he thought he noticed suspicious men
loitering in the Rue Saint-Vincent. Twice he
approached them with the purpose of asking questions, and both
times they hurried away. On Tuesday hi the
final week of the month he discovered Madame
Rochambeau was also aware of the watchers.
He hadn't been home the previous night. He'd
worked straight through, completing the hands and clothing of the
trio of Confederate captains. The blockade
runners formed one grouping in the background of the
painting. Along about eleven hi the morning, he
finished and headed back to the flat for a nap.
He saw no one unusual in the street. As he
closed the door in the hall, he heard Madame
Rochambeau's voice grating in the corridor
outside the rented apartments:
"comsincerely regret to say it, Madame
Strelnik-was
The landlady didn't sound all that regretful, he
thought as he sauntered across the garden, yawning.
"comb on three separate occasions in the past four
days, I have gone outside and seen men one
could only describe as layabouts. All of them have
been observing these premises. Why, they've been
posted across the street like sentries, bold as
brass!"
Inside the Strelniks" rooms, Anton cried
fretfully. Poor Leah, pale and perspiring,
stood in the doorway. She looked miserable,
completely at a loss for words. She'd lost
weight since Sime had left. Her haggard
appearance grew more pronounced every day.
The landlady didn't let up:
"Really, Madame Strelnik, I can only
conclude that such unsavory persons are hanging around
because of your husband's presence. Or should I say his
absence? Where is he, pray tell?"
With a desperate glance at Matt, Leah
murmured, "I don't know."
"I regret to say I find that difficult
to believe."
"But it's true," Matt put in. "Sime
talked to me before he left, and he said he was telling
no one where he was going."
Madame Rochambeau fixed him with a dour stare.
"Did he also tell you the reason for his absence,
Mr. Kent? Or its probable duration?"
Again Leah cast a pleading look at the young
American. He needed no prompting to protect
Strelnik with a lie:
"No, neither one, Tm afraid."
After a deep inhalation that produced an imposing
lift of her bosom, the landlady declared, "Well,
my attitude has always been one of live and let
live." Matt could have disputed that. "I don't
doubt Mr. Strelnik has been forced to go into hiding
to avoid inquiries from the Hotel de Ville. I
imagine the authorities want to question him because of his
political views and his association with that anarchist
crowd."
Matt wanted to tell her the watchers were probably
in the employ of premier Bismarck's government,
not the French, but for Leah's sake he again decided
to keep quiet.
"In any case, there's a dead fish around here, and
it stinks worse by the hour. Well, all right-a stink
is unpleasant but harmless. However, if this
household becomes involved with the authorities as a
result of your husband's dubious activities,
Madame Strelnik, I shall instantly ask you
to find other lodgings."
She turned and sailed past Matt with a
last glance that said he too was included in the warning.
Madame Rochambeau's massive shadow diminished
on the floor of the hall. Matt hurried over and
clasped Leah's hands in both of his. She rested
her forehead against his forearm, close to tears:
"Where is he, Matt? Where is he?
"I wish I knew. But he said he'd be hi touch
when it was safe." He tried to reassure her.
"I'm sure he will."
She raised her head, her dark eyes fearful.
"I've seen those ruffians who frightened Madame
Rochambeau. She's right, they're practically
camping in the street at all hours of the day and
night. Who are they? What could they want?"
Your husband,
"I honestly don't know, Leah." Far off,
summer thunder boomed and reverberated. "Let's not
try to find out, either."
ii
He slept for two hours, splashed tepid water
on his face, ate a stale croissant, donned a
fresh shirt and stood for five minutes examining the
unfinished portrait on the easel.
It was too stiff. Too formal and lifeless. Even
though the Matamoras project was
currently occupying all his time, he didn't want
to abandon Dolly's portrait permanently though
he knew he might have to. He understood the
problems, but no solutions came to mind.
Outside, he searched the street but this afternoon saw
none of those whom Madame Rochambeau characterized as
layabouts. He started for the studio, making an
unpleasant face over the motionless, stale smelling
air.
Abruptly he reversed his direction. He'd been
working damn hard and he felt like a drink. Several,
in fact.
After a brisk walk that left his shirt sodden, he
reached the Cafe Guerbois. He entered and stopped
short. Minus his cravat, jacket, gloves and
Malacca stick, Edouard Manet was seated
opposite Paul Cezanne, who looked
particularly antagonistic.
Manet had a platter of assorted cheeses in
front of him. The cheeses smelled rank hi the
heat. The painter didn't seem to mind. He was
fastidiously slicing slivers and popping them into his
mouth. After each cut he carefully wiped the
knife.
Paul shot a hostile glance at Matt,
then exclaimed to Manet. "All of you are
idiots! The only cause to which an artist owes
allegiance is the cause of his own hie and career.
As for everything else, it's so much smoke! You
won't find me dying for someone's holy cause.
Politicians only create causes so they can
savor the thrill of
sending other poor assholes off to die for them."
Again he looked at Matt in an almost threatening
way. "You think I'm right, don't you?"
Paul was being watched by several gaping gentlemen,
all fully and respectably dressed despite the
heat. Bankers, perhaps. Importers. Brokers of
insurance-the sort who had begun to invade the quarter
for lunch. Matt ignored them and walked to the table
where the other two were seated.
"That's a pretty florid way to put it, Paul.
But yes, I do. My older brother's starting a
labor newspaper in America. I hate
to calculate the grief he'll suffer for the sake of
ideas that are probably very noble but absolutely
unworkable."
"Old Courbet's going to get himself arrested because of
such ideas!" Paul cried. The mention of the famous
painter turned heads again. "He's a
goddamn idiot to run around proclaiming he's a
socialist."
Manet tucked another tiny wedge of cheese
into his cheek, dabbed his mustache with a napkin, and
only then nodded.
"I agree that he goes to excess. Still, one can't
remain entirely neutral. I haven't kept
silent on what I consider the repressions of the
Imperial government. If it came to a test of
loyalties, I know where mine would lie."
"With the Emperor?"
"With the tricolor."
"Merde, you'll be a lonely martyour. There's
nobody else in our crowd who'd go to war for
France."
"You're wrong, Paul. I think Renoir would.
Degas. Perhaps Bazille-was
"Well, they'll never put me on the conscription
rolls. Ill go into hiding before they can find me."
Manet looked disapproving. He glanced at
Matt for support.
"Surely you don't agree with him now, do you,
Matt? You fought for a cause in which you believed."
"I was an idiot, just like several million other
people." He held up his hand. "My
loyalty is right here." He wiggled his fingers.
"To what I can. put on a canvas. The rest is
rhetorical hogwash. Or smoke, as Paul
calls it."
Manet sighed and shook his head. "You and your brother
must have some lively debates."
Matt shrugged. "I haven't seen him in years."
The flippancy of it hid a quite unexpected and
painful sense of homesickness. He laughed at the
feeling silently, and in that way deadened it.
"By the way," he said, "Where's Lisa?"
Something unpleasant flickered across Manet's
eyes. "In the back." There was a faint undertone
suggesting Matt would be wise not to disturb her.
He ignored the warning and walked toward the kitchen;
he was thirsty, and he'd never known a bad mood
to prevent Lisa from working. He started speaking before
he even reached the door.
"Lisa, my love, how about a pitcher of wine for
an old and favored-my God."
She was in profile, bent over a tub of water in
which she was washing plates and goblets. On her right
cheek, held in place by a strip of linen wound around
her chin and the top of her head, was a bloody bandage
For a moment he could think of nothing but the
image she presented to his eye. The weary line of
her rounded shoulders was reversed and repeated by the line
of her breast sagging within a none too clean blouse.
Wash water glistened on her red knuckles and
forearms. Her hair was so disarrayed, she seemed to be
peering at him through strands of a curtain.
There was an air of exhaustion about her, but something more,
too. A sadness in her eyes that spoke of her
advancing age, and her awareness of it. Of her death
and her realization that when it came to her, she would
probably still be what she was now--a tavern trull.
He was ashamed of the way he looked at her as a
subject instead of a person who'd been hurt.
Yet the image still had a powerful impact. His
spine was still prickling as he said:
"What happened to you?"
"Oh-was A shrug. She dried her hands on her
filthy apron. Her smile was wan. "Last evening
I was a little too choosy. I refused a
gentleman's invitation to go to bed. He demonstrated
his displeasure with a sword he pulled out of his
cane."
"God," Matt said again. "Who was the son of a
bitch?"
He forgot all about the artistic considerations
of the meeting when she answered with a sigh:
"Your friend Lepp."
Matt put his arms around her. "You mean he did
come back after all? Oh, Lisa, I'm sorry."
Her spirits much improved all at once, she
snuggled against him. Laughed deep in her throat.
"Listen! I guess a little scar is worth it if
I get a squeeze like this." Her hand slid below his
belt. "Tell me, Virginia. How much of you
feels sorry for me? And just what are you willing to do
to express that sympathy?"
He disengaged, his cheeks red. She laughed again.
He sat down on an empty wine keg used for a
stool. "Where did it happen? Back here?"
"Oh, no. Right out in front. The sword slid out
of the cane quick as you please and nicked me just as
fast."
"And no one tried to stop him?"
"Don't look so stupefied, my dear boy. A
waitress isn't important. She's handy for a
laugh and a feel, but she isn't really a person.
You understand? Our patrons hesitate to get
involved on behalf of a nobody." Her
callousness had a false, forced quality, but he said
nothing. "Besides, none of my good friends was
here. Not Paul. Not you-was
"If I'd been here, I'd have made him goddamn
sorry," Matt declared, with only a trace of
posturing. He meant what he said. She laughed.
"Here, I thought you avoided crusades and
causes!" "Causes are one thing, friends another."
"I wish you had been here, then. The surgeon who
stitched and dressed this-was She touched her cheek.
"comhe said I'll be marked for life. Still, I was
lying a minute ago. The wounds to my pride were the
worst ones. I got the first wound when nobody tried
to stop him, and the second when he strolled out,
snickering as if he'd just played a great prank."
Her voice began to quaver. "I'd like to make him
pay for what he did, the preening whoreson!"
Matt was startled by the sudden change. The coarse but
pleasant face grew harsh, the eyes cold, the
voice steadily louder:
"I'd like to see him dead! Or castrated! No,
both! In reverse order!"
IV
Upset by the account of Lepp's cruelty, and in no
mood to listen to Manet and Paul debate, he
stayed at the Guerbois for only one drink. Then
he headed back toward the studio.
As he climbed the butte, a light rain began.
He turned and gazed over his shoulder at a rampart
of black storm cloud in the west. Relief from the
heat might be on the way.
At the entrance of the studio building, he encountered
Fochet coming down the stairs. He decided to say
something about the older man's promise to talk with
Dolly.
"Hallo, Kent!" Fochet crowded next to him in
the tiny vestibule. He blew the scent of onions
into Matt's face and tried to open an umbrella.
The vestibule wasn't wide enough. Two
umbrella ribs touched the wall and bent. It
didn't make much difference since the umbrella had
half a dozen big holes in it.
Outside, the street shone with a greasy look as the
light rain continued. Matt dodged back to avoid
having an eye put out by the end of a rib. Fochet
squeezed by. "I'm on my way to interview that
new model I met at the Brasserie of the
Martyrs. If I can just remember the damn
address she gave me!" Fochet's interviews
usually consisted of an all-night visit in the
model's bed.
As the teacher left the vestibule, Matt
called, "You promised to speak to Dolly. Did you
forget?"
Fochet skidded to a stop just outside.
"Now I ask you-would I forget something so
important?" There was annoyance as well as
immense scorn in the question, to which Matt silently
answered, Yes indeed. By then Fochet was gone.
Matt didn't chase after him. He thought the
reminder would do the trick.
Upstairs, he worked an hour, completing the detail
of the card-laden table at which the Confederate captains
were playing poker. Tomorrow, when he had daylight, he'd
finish the dancer. She was merely sketched in, a
sinuous figure outlined by thin black brush
strokes.
After cleaning up and carefully closing the case
containing the large, clear bottles which held his dry
pigments,
he locked the studio and walked back to the Rue
Saint-Vincent, arriving a good half hour before
Dolly was due home. Or so he guessed. It was
hard to be sure of the light on such a day.
The drizzle had stopped. The black clouds had
dissipated. But the sky above Montmartre still had a
rainy look, and the air was hot and
saturated with dampness. He noticed an
expensive phaeton standing a short
distance beyond the gate to Madame Rochambeau's but
thought nothing of it because the vehicle was so obviously
expensive and the driver well dressed. It was
definitely not the sort of rig that would be used by one
of the layabouts, as the landlady called them. There were
none visible on the street today.
He paused and leaned against the wall, his mind
drifting back to Lisa. He wished he could think of
some way to help her gain revenge without inviting
further reprisals. He couldn't. Lepp no
doubt enjoyed diplomatic immunity. Even
reporting the original attack to the police would
almost certainly be a waste of time.
An old woman carrying two fragrant
baguettes went by, frowning in disapproval at the
young man lounging in the street with a faraway look in
his eyes. Matt never noticed. His thoughts had
turned back to the vivid picture of Lisa in the
kitchen. Another abrupt, unexpected intuition
prickled his spine. Somewhere in that compelling image
lay the solution to the problem of Dolly's
portrait!
He was absolutely convinced of it. But
how, specifically, would the solution work? How did
the older woman relate to the younger, and how could both
be blended into one composition? He was pondering the questions
as he walked on to the door in the wall and absently
lifted the latch. He was halfway through the opening before
he jerked his head up, realizing he'd interrupted
some sort of argument or confrontation.
"Run, Matthew!"
Leah Strelnik's cry terrified little Anton,
who'd been clinging to her skirt. The boy wailed.
On Matt's left, a burly, bearded fellow in
a tight striped shut jumped forward. The man could
only be described with Madame Rochambeau's
word-layabout.
He grabbed at the little boy, who darted out of the way
and wailed louder than ever. From behind the thick
trunk of the old plane tree came a voice all
too familiar:
"Leave the little wretch alone, Josef. People are
used to hearing brats cry in a residential
neighborhood."
All of that happened in a matter of seconds.
Matt stood stunned, beginning to grasp more of the
details of the scene. With them came a consuming sense
of physical danger; the kind of
gut-hollowing reaction he hadn't experienced since
the war and had hoped in 1865 that he'd never
experience again.
He remembered it now. He felt it now,
exactly as he had on nights when McGill's
gray painted ship had run into Wilmington past the
rosy glares of Union cannon and the blue showers
of Union star shells and the white geysers erupting
as the projectiles struck near the hull.
He started to back into the street so he could summon
help. A voice on his right barked in accented
French:
"Don't, Herr Kent."
Matt saw who it was. The gnome-like fellow
who'd been copying down train schedules at the
Gare du Nord. Instead of a pad and pencil, this
time he held a nickeled revolver. It looked
gigantic in his tiny hand.
Leah bent to comfort her crying child. Matt hesitated
in the doorway. The little man, who wore a derby,
shook his head.
"You will stay. Colonel Lepp insists."
The Prussian walked out from behind the tree which had
concealed him. His monocle reflected the hazy
white sky. He was hatless and elegantly
attired in a pearl-gray suit with matching cravat
and spats. In his right hand, whirled around and around
by supple motion of his wrist, a cane blurred in a
circle.
Lepp smiled without humor. "Indeed I do.
Close the door, if you please!"
The gnome gestured with the revolver. Matt obeyed.

Colonel Lepp Insists
ANOTHER LIGHT RAINSHOWER
began suddenly, pattering on the flower beds and the
limp leaves of the plane tree. With the slow grace
of a cat stalking some smaller creature, Lepp
strolled toward Matt. It was eerie to watch the
Prussian avoid muddy places without so much as a
downward glance.
The gnome and the layabout exchanged smirks of
anticipation. Abruptly, Matt wondered about
Madame Rochambeau. He glanced toward the door
to her quarters. Lepp noticed, stopped and
responded with a languid smile:
"The landlady? Out on some errand, evidently. If
she returns, she'll cause no trouble." He
began to slowly unscrew the handle of the cane.
When he separated the sections, he had a
long, needle-like sword in his right hand. He whipped
it in an arc in front of Matt's nose. The younger
man jumped backward, landing in a bed of poppies.
One heel crushed several of them. Lepp laughed and
lowered the sword till it was parallel with the seam of his
trousers.
"Be so kind as to tell me the whereabouts of your young
woman," Lepp said. For the first time in his life,
Matt wished he owned a watch. What time was it?
His lack of response irritated the officer.
Lepp flicked the sword up and rested it against the
point of Matt's chin. "Answer me! Where is the
young lady?"
"Working." He jerked away from the sharp point. "She
won't be home for at least an hour."
He saw Leah react to the lie. But the others were
facing him and missed her look of surprise.
The rain fell harder. Clouds darkened the garden.
He hoped his face didn't reveal his panic.
How soon would Dolly be coming up the street and through
the gate? A bad shock could have a damaging effect
on a woman carrying a child, couldn't it? Even
cause her to lose the baby?
"An hour, eh?" Rain streaked Lepp's
monocle. He tossed the empty barrel
end of his cane to the layabout, then removed the
monocle and slipped it into his breast pocket.
"Well, then, we can get on with our business. And
let me say this, my young friend-was
The point of the sword darted out again. Pricked a
bright drop of blood from the back of Matt's left
hand before he could move.
Again he stepped away. The blood kept oozing as
Lepp murmured:
"Anyone who wastes our time-who delays and
inconveniences us-shall suffer for it."
White-faced, Leah hugged Anton closer to her
skirt. The tip of Lepp's tongue moved along
his lower lip as he glanced at the thread of blood
running down to Matt's fingers.
"You, for example, Herr Kent. You are a
painter, are you not? Come, don't look so
astonished. You're
II-ALWAYS with that crowd at the Guerbois. But
I know a
good deal more about you than that. I know where you study, when
you generally come and go around here- yes, a good deal.
Let me ask a question." The bright, merry eyes
fixed on his. "Could you paint with both hands
permanently injured?"
Somehow he found the nerve to say, "You'd enjoy using
that sword on me, wouldn't you? Just the way you used it
on Lisa."
"Don't mention that unwashed slut! She got what
her arrogance earned for her."
"Her arrogance, or just her refusal to lift her
skirt for a Pruss-?"
"For God's sake don't bait him!" Leah
cried. She was close to breaking. He could hear raw
fright in her voice as she leaned against the trunk of the
plane tree and begged him, "Let's find out what
they want and perhaps they'll leave us alone."
She turned tearful eyes to the poised Prussian;
he was idly swinging the sword again.
"If you're looking for my husband, he isn't
here."
Lepp smiled another of those dazzling smiles.
"Yes, madame, we're aware of that. We
removed your husband from the place in which his Red
comrades had hidden him. We have him right now."
By the end of the sentence, Leah Strelnik's mouth
hung open. Her eyes had an hysterical glaze.
She made peculiar choked sounds. Lepp was
immensely amused.
"In case you don't believe me,
Madame Strelnik-was
"I don't either," Matt interrupted. "If you
abducted Sime, why didn't his friends report it
to us?"
Lepp shrugged. "They've all gone into hiding,
too, I suppose. Terrified. Three of them
got badly shot up when we took him. Be
assured, we do have Herr Strelnik." He
snapped his fingers. "Show them, Josef."
From a back pocket, the blue-chinned layabout
produced a wad of checked cloth. He shook it
out. Held it aloft on his index finger and then started
to spin it. Matt recognized the shabby cap Sime
Strelnik had worn at the Guerbois. Now,
however, there was a huge blackish stain on the cap's
crown.
Leah Strelnik stared at the dried blood and
jammed the edge of her right hand between her teeth and bit
down.
Lepp sighed. "Really, madame, these exhibitions
are dreadfully tedious. They waste so much time. I
insist you get control of yourself. If you'll just give
us what we came for, well be pleased to leave you
alone. We want the correspondence from your
husband's brother, Yuri Strelnik,
documenting certain confidential political
initiatives undertaken by my government."
The Spanish candidacy? They really were concerned that
its announcement would create difficulties with the
French, then. And the fact that Lepp was conducting a
search for the documents meant he was indeed attached to the
diplomatic mission, or at least acting as its
unofficial agent.
Almost at once, Leah Strelnik began shaking her
head. Lepp ignored her:
"Naturally your husband claims he has no such
documentation. We know he's lying."
"He isn't," Matt said. "But he was afraid you
might assume he had letters or papers like the ones you
described."
For the first time, Lepp grew nervous. "Did he also
describe the information contained in those documents?"
"No, of course not. He didn't have them! He
went into hiding because he knew you wouldn't believe that."
The Prussian relaxed. Lifted one shoulder in a
broad shrug:
"We might expect to hear such lies on your friend's
behalf. Well, we shall take you at your word-
temporarily." He ran the ball of his thumb
along the sword, a slow, almost sensual
motion. His eyes strayed briefly to Mart's
waist, then back to his face. "When we are
suspicious of someone's veracity, however, we have
certain highly refined techniques for confirming or
denying
that suspicion." He turned slightly. "Ah, but
perhaps those are best saved for your husband, Madame
Strelnik."
Lepp glared, his eyes bright as gas flames. The
pale young woman couldn't bear to meet his gaze.
She leaned heavily against the plane tree, staring
down at her little boy's head in a numb way. Again
Lepp switched his tactics from quiet threat
to feigned cordiality.
"Of course there'll be absolutely no need for
unpleasantness if we find what we want."
Leah screamed: "It isn't here! I don't even
know whether it exists!"
Disgusted, Lepp bobbed his head at his helpers.
"Get on with the search!"
The blue-chinned fellow ran to Madame
Rocham-beau's rooms, the gnome to the door on the
other side of the garden. Soon, from both areas, there
came the sounds of drawers being hurled to the floor,
furniture thudding over, crockery
shattering. The layabout took special pains
to wreck Madame Rochambeau's parlor. He
pitched a valuable vase through one of the tall windows
overlooking the garden, then tossed out a Madonna
she kept near a small altar. The head of the
statue broke off and rolled, part of its gilt-edged
blue drapery chipping away. The head came to rest
with the sad painted eyes turned up toward the rainy
sky.
When the statue broke, so did Mart's temper.
He lunged forward. Lepp pivoted, bent his right
leg at the knee and extended his sword arm full
length. He was incredibly fast. Matt nearly
impaled himself on the point.
"Yes, do charge hi heroic outrage," Lepp
said. He put weight behind the sword. The point
dug into Matt's shirt. The blade bent into a
slight curve "A grand gesture! And your last
one." Before the point pierced to his skin, Matt
pulled 127
away. He snarled the dirtiest epithet he knew.
Lepp threw his head back and brayed. In both
Madame Rochambeau's quarters and the rented
rooms, the sounds of destruction continued.
"For God's sake, Lepp," Matt
protested. "You don't seriously think he'd hide
anything in the landlady's flat?"
Another shrug. "It's possible. These anarchists
are devious."
He seethed. The banging and breaking went on. Four
minutes. Five-
Lepp grew bored and began to examine his sword.
Three times he swung it hi a hissing arc.
Matt was literally aching from tension. Facing away from
the wall, he kept listening for the rattle of the door
latch. If Dolly arrived, he'd only have a
second to shout. He had to warn her to stay outside.
God knew what these bloody-minded bastards would do
before they left.
The layabout, Josef, returned first. He shook his
head hi a glum way. Then the gnome emerged from the
door on the south side of the garden.
"Well?"
"Nothing interesting, Colonel." The gnome folded
and pocketed a clasp knife. The tiny eyes
flicked to Matt. "Well, nothing except a very
nice half-finished portrait. Faulted by the young
gentleman, I suppose. I fear it'll never be
finished now." He giggled as he retrieved the
revolver from the side pocket of his coat.
Lepp's ruddy cheeks took on even more color.
He executed a crisp right face so that he was again
turned toward Leah Strelnik. She had her son
hi her arms and was practically jamming his head down
on her shoulder so he wouldn't cry out. The
Prussian transferred the sword to his left hand
and kept it pointing in Matt's direction, ready
to fend off any sudden rush as he said:
"Madame, I insist you answer my question now. Where
is the material from Yuri Strelnik in Berlin?"
"Insist all you want, I don't have it!" Leah
cried. Tears began to streak her cheeks. "There's
nothing like that in this house. Nothing!"
The Prussian took two long strides to the
tree. "I won't tolerate any more lies, you
Red whore." He slapped her face so hard, the
contact sounded like a pistol shot. But it was Anton,
not she, who screamed in fright.
Matt knew he should stand still, but he couldn't. There was
no telling what Lepp would order next. A
beating? Torture? He started for Leah's side,
only to have the gnome cock the revolver.
"I'll shoot you if you take another step, Herr
Kent."
Matt halted in mid-stride. A jaw
muscle writhed on the left side of his face. The
gnome giggled again.
It felt as if a rope had been wound around his
forehead and was being steadily tightened. The feeling of
frustrated rage grew and grew. Lepp took a
moment to draw out a silk kerchief and dab
raindrops from his forehead. Doing that enabled him to get
control of himself before he spoke again.
"An impasse has been reached, it seems. Perhaps
we need to try a different tack with you, Madame
Strelnik. Give you time to reconsider your rash and
foolish answers to my questions."
"I don't need to reconsider anything. I've
told you the tru-was
"Be silent and let me finish! We shall permit you
to ponder your ill-advised behavior for the next
forty-eight hours. At the end of that time, another of
my associates-someone you have never seen before-will call
on you to receive the documents. If you fail to surrender
them, your husband will be killed."
"My God, why can't you understand? I don't have any
documents to give you!"
Now Lepp hammered at her, quietly but without
pity. 129
"Then get them. I know they're somewhere in
Paris despite your husband's denials."
"He's telling the truth! I'm telling the
truth.88ationonsense," Lepp whispered.
Leah closed her eyes. While Anton fretted
and clutched at her neck, she sank to the ground at
the base of the plane tree. She cried in silence.
Lepp retrieved the barrel of the cane from the spot
where the layabout had dropped it. He rammed the
sword back into the sheath and screwed down the hilt.
"Of one more thing I should particularly warn you,
madame. Do not report this visit any time during
the next forty-eight hours." He swished the cane
at the plaster head of the Madonna. "Do not report
it to the police in this arrondissement. To the Surete
detectives-to anyone in authority"-We shall know
if you do. And we shall take immediate, appropriate
action."
He extended the cane and used the ferrule to pluck
the bloodied cap from the layabout's back pocket.
Deftly, he spun the cap through the air. It landed
on the hem of Leah's skirt.
Her eyes flew open. She stared at the cap as if
it were contaminated. Wide-eyed, little Anton studied
the cap too. A radiant smile spread over his
face: "Papa's. Papa's!"
"Clever child." Lepp tucked his cane under his arm.
"Let us hope he'll have more than a cap to remind
him of his father as he grows up. It's entirely up
to you, madame."
He barked something in his own language and marched
toward the door in the wall. The layabout and the gnome
fell in step behind him, almost like trained soldiers.
Relief flooded over Matt then. Once the
three left the house, he and Leah would have time
to think. He kept his eyes on the men, relaxing just
a little for the first tune in twenty minutes. The men
blocked his view of the latch as it moved.
Too late, he realized what had made the
clicking sound. The gnome whipped the nickeled
revolver toward the door opening inward.
She came into the garden in a rush, her arms laden with
packages. Matt's reactions were slow. Before he
could make a sound, the gnome jumped sideways, out
from behind Lepp. The maneuver gave the gnome a
clear target. The revolver leveled, pointing to the
center of Dolly's forehead.
CHAPTER X
Shadow o backslash Death
DOLLY STARED AT the gun in disbelief. One
of the packages slipped from her hand. The
string broke, the paper fell away, and two thick
pink chops landed in the dirt of a flower bed.
Matt watched the gnome's finger drain of color the
little man applied pressure on the trigger. He
knew Dolly was going to be shot and killed, and the
fear he felt was as consuming and profound as his fear
had been when he'd thought the Gulf of Mexico was
going to pull him to his death.
He started to hurl himself toward her, to get in front
of her if he could. His body felt lethargic, his
movements impossibly slow. It was as if time itself
had been suspended in the garden; the natural laws
of the world repealed. When the gnome's mouth opened, a
sadistic little grin revealing the gold crowns on his
teeth, it seemed to take an hour for the smile to form.
The gnome's finger whitened. One after another, the
parcels kept spilling from Dolly's arms.
And he couldn't move fast enough! 131
But somehow Lepp did, jabbing his cane into the
gnome's shoulder. The revolver exploded. The
illusion of suspended time shattered. Dolly fell
sideways. Matt yelled her name and rushed to catch
her.
He bumped Lepp, who shoved him away. Dolly
crumpled to the ground. He was certain she was
shot, and he knew what an incredible fool he'd
been to try to deny how he felt about her.
Lepp seemed momentarily nonplussed by the sight
of the fallen girl. Then rage wrenched his face.
He shoved the gnome through the open doorway into the
street, cursing him for shooting unnecessarily.
The layabout didn't need to be ordered to leave. As
the gnome scuttled away in the direction of the
phaeton, the blue-chinned man shoved between two
elderly women who appeared outside the door.
They'd heard the shot. They weren't the only ones.
Across the way, shutters banged open. Voices
cried questions. Lepp grasped the door frame,
spun and said:
"Nothing is changed. Forty-eight hours. He's
dead if you say anything."
Then he bolted, savagely kicking one of the women
out of the way.
Matt dropped to his knees next to Dolly.
She was breathing in a loud, uneven way.
Directly above the door, a large pock in the
wall showed where the deflected bullet had lodged.
He'd been wrong. She hadn't been hit. But the
emotion generated by those moments of utter terror
wouldn't leave him. Painters frequently
symbolized death as a winged angel. The shadow of that
wing had fallen over him for the second tune in his
life, and also for the second time, the effect was
profound.
He slipped his hands under Dolly's neck and
shoulder. Her eyes were still half closed. She began
to breathe noisily through her mouth. He barely heard
the clatter of the escaping phaeton, or the cries of
neighbors
trying to stop it, or Leah Strelnik's sudden
renewed sobbing. As he knelt in the rainy garden,
nothing mattered but Dolly. Not the Matamoras
painting. Not even Strelnik himself.
"I love you, Dolly," was all he could say.
"My God, I never knew how much."
He lifted her head against his shoulder, bending his
back as he did so, protecting her from the rain.
"We'll get married. We'll give the child a name,
I promise."
Her eyes came fully open. For a moment she
looked puzzled, as if her mind couldn't hold all
that had happened so quickly. Slowly, though, her
expression changed. Grew more alert. There was an
almost ecstatic glow on her face when she reached up
with her left hand. Her caress told him
she understood what he was repeating with such fervency:
"I love you; I couldn't bear to lose you; we'll
get married as soon as you want."
He said it without the slightest reservation.

The next hour and a half were chaos.
More and more residents of the neighborhood arrived at
the street door. At first they merely asked what
had happened. Matt replied with polite evasions,
which were unsatisfactory. The neighbors had heard
a gun discharged! The questions grew angry. He heard
a mention of gendarmes. Finally he slammed the door
in the faces of the people shouting and shaking their fists at
him.
During the next few minutes he told Dolly
what Lepp had said before she arrived. He put
Anton into her care and helped Leah to bed in her
ransacked flat. He gave her several swallows
of brandy to make her sleep. He also gave her a
rash promise that he'd make sure Strelnik
came back to her safe and whole.
By then someone else was knocking at the street door;
someone with the authority to insist upon being admitted. A
gendarme from the local precinct. Matt hustled
Dolly out of sight and let him in.
Matt argued heatedly with the young policeman, who
wanted to question all the residents of the household. That
wasn't necessary, Matt insisted. It was a trivial
matter. Yes, there'd been some struggling, a lot of
things thrown, even a gun discharged. Still, the cause was
merely a quarrel with his girlfriend. Matt said he'd
discovered she had a new lover. The gendarme could
understand how that enraged a fellow, couldn't he?
Being French, he could. He perched on a bench near
the plane tree, prepared a little statement on
several small sheets of paper, and Matt signed
it. The statement contained the name and address of an
entirely fictitious rival lover which Matt had
thought up to add authenticity. To verify Mart's
story, the lover would be questioned, the policeman
promised. Matt hoped the search for the fictitious
lover would last at least forty-eight hours.
The policeman left. Ten minutes later
Madame Rochambeau arrived, in an overwrought
state. Several neighbors had seen her coming up the
Rue Saint-Vincent and generously informed her that
all sorts of disgraceful violence had taken
place during her absence.
When the landlady saw the destruction, she went into a
purple-cheeked screaming fit. Even her
tiniest facial moles seemed to throb with fury.
After she'd bellowed and stormed up and down for several
minutes, Matt managed to make her listen to him,
and she began to calm down a little.
The calm was temporary. The moment she heard him
say the vandals had come in search of some papers they
thought Strelnik possessed, she headed for the south
side of the garden, bellowing that she didn't care
whether Satan himself had kidnapped her tenant, the
family had to move out at once. And pay for all
the damage!
Matt held Madame Rochambeau back
physically until she no longer insisted on rushing
in and waking Leah. He pleaded, wheedled and finally
convinced her Strelnik's wife was in no condition to go
anywhere, and that to force her would be unchristian.
The appeal to the landlady's Catholicism worked.
Without going into detail, Matt was then able
to communicate a little of the urgency of the situation.
Fie also promised to pay for every bit of damage out
of the allowance he received from his father. Why, he'd even
add twenty or thirty francs for emotional
suffering on Madame Rochambeau's part.
Mollified, she said Madame Strelnik would still have
to leave-but not immediately. The landlady picked
up the head of the Madonna and flounced into her
quarters, where the sound of a broom and little exclamations
of dismay were soon heard.
In the disorder of their sitting room, Matt finally
managed to get a moment alone with Dolly. He
didn't care for the responsibility that was weighing on
him.
"I guess I'm the one who must try to find
Sime."
Dolly's momentary silence was agreement. Then she
frowned,
"Suppose Lepp was bluffing. Matt. Suppose
they don't really have him."
He thought about if. They might have gotten hold of
Streinik's cap but not the man himself. In a fight,
for example. A fight from which Strelnik had
ultimately escaped. There was no the Prussian
was holding anything except that cap, which could easily
have been stained with animal blood.
"You could be right." He said with "But can I take the
chance and do nothing? I don't so. They may have
hire, and he may have only forty-eight hour*
to live."
"What are you going to do, then? You can't go to the
police."
He shook his head. "I wouldn't want to take a
chance. Lepp probably has informers inside."
But that wasn't the extent of his dilemma. He
couldn't call on any of Strelnik's radical
friends, either, for the simple reason that he didn't know
who they were or where to find them. Strelnik had never
brought a one of them to the Rue Saint-Vincent. Had
never even mentioned their names or revealed where he met
them hi Belleville. Because Strelnik's
politics were dangerous- and his associates were
presumably scattered after the kidnapping-Matt was
alone.
It made him angry. A bit of the anger was even
directed at his friend who was hi danger, until he
realized how shameful that was.
He didn't know where he'd begin his search. Dolly
understood that problem as well:
"They could have hidden him anywhere in Paris, couldn't
they?"
"Anywhere." It had a gloomy sound. A moment
later, he enunciated the one idea that had been
flitting at the back of his mind. "There's just an
outside chance Herr Lepp used some place which he
already had available."
"Is there such a place?"
"I've heard there may be." He sounded distinctly
reluctant as he added, "I'm going out for a
while."
"Where?"
"To see Lisa at the Guerbois."
He kissed Dolly hi front of the unfinished
portrait. The gnome had ruined it. Slashed it
to tatters.
"But don't be jealous, Doll. It's you I'm
going to marry."
For just a moment, while their lips touched, he had an
uneasy feeling that by making his promise to her, he'd
consigned himself to failure as an artist.
The unfounded pessimism quickly passed. He loved
her, and he would marry her if he came out of his
imbroglio alive. How Paul Cezanne would
snort if he knew Matt had gotten mixed up
in politics.
No, that's not really it, he thought as he patted
Dolly's arm, glanced at Anton who'd fallen
asleep in a chair, and left the flat. It isn't
really politics I'm embroiled with, it's people.
One of those could be ignored without the slightest twinge
of conscience. One, but not the other.
m
He spoke with Lisa in the alley behind the cafe:
"Do you want to settle with the Prussian?"
She replied with an obscene word. "Do you even need
to ask?"
"All right. I need the help of ever right-brace
one of those friends of yours. The ones you call working
girls."
"Tomorrow?"
"Tonight."
"Impossible, Matthew. They'll lose business."
"Are they friends or aren't they? Do you want Lepp
or don't you?"
Heat lightning flickered in the sky in the direction
of the Bois de Boulogne. A bad storm was on the
way. Her voice grew harsh.
"All right, go on. What are the girls to do?"
"Help me find that private place you mentioned
once. The place where Lepp sheds his public
face and amuses himself."
"My God, you're asking to have the whole left bank
searched. I don't know that many whores!"
"Ask the ones you know to recruit as many others as they
can. The whole left bank needn't be scoured. You
said you'd heard that Lepp buys the favors of
students."
"Fave girls work the Latin Quarter first pieces
near the Sorbonne where idlers congregate-the
Ivlaiibe, the Mich. I know it's a slim chance.
But there"" No other skirting If anyone by this time
tomorrow--this time later pay a hundred francs to the
girl and another hundred francs to any informant
she uses."
Lisa whistled, "Why didn't you mention those
prices before? They're better than what the most
popular girl gets for a whole night with some rich
man at the Hotel Meuriee! We won't have
any trouble putting platoons of young ladies on the
street. Indeed, I venture to say every slut from here
"o Marseilles will want to join the search-was Her
cynical jocularity disappeared all at once.
"I shouldn't be laughing. This is urgent business,
it?"
"Urgent," he nodded. "Bad, too, uh?"
"Yes, ugly."
"I thought so. new seen you so wrought up when you
discuss artistic theories with, your colleagues, of
course."
"The life of my friend Strelsnik may depend on
what your girb earn, Lisa." As,;" if Yuri
Strelnik's claim that Insmarc. was
maneuveiiris to put a Hohenzollem on the
Spanish throne oxer reached Louis Napoleon's
bands in documented the lives of hundreds of His,
greater-than knowledge; affected by the diplomatic for
Strelnik's abduction Though he found it idiotic
men cared and of influence, proof they did. you know shop
Lisa's girlfriends spread out through the student section
of the left bank before the night ended. By eight o'clock the
following evening, one returned with what she said was a
reliable address. A tenement in the Rue Cujas
just a block from the Boulevard Saint Michel and the
Sorbonne.
The girl had obtained the address from a young
Alsatian boy she met in a cafe. The boy, a
philosophy student, had hired himself out to a
German. The boy remembered the German well, and
bitterly regretted ever agreeing to spend a night
in his rooms. He was ashamed of the incident, he said,
but he didn't keep quiet about it because he wanted
to warn others to stay away from the man, whose name was
Gruen. Even by the liberal standards of the Latin
Quarter, Gruen had depraved tastes.
Matt paid the young prostitute and gave her the
agreed upon price for the informer as well. Then he
set out for the left bank in a heavy rain that
had started shortly after his talk with Lisa the
preceding evening. The air had turned sharply colder
during the day, and still the rain came down. His teeth
chattered as he crossed the Seine by the Pont
Neuf.
God, how he wished he weren't out on such a
miserable night. And on such a dangerous errand. He
remembered a letter his father had sent him shortly after
he'd arrived in Paris. Jephtha had spoken of the
Kents as people of conscience. Cursed if he wasn't
right.
Bent against the wind, he hurried on. In one
pocket of his shabby overcoat he had a scrap of
paper with the tenement address jotted on it. In the
other he had a .41 caliber LeFauchaux
revolver, model 1861, bearing the mark and
identification of the arms company's Belgian works.
The revolver was fully loaded.
The Hidden Room
"NO, I HAVEN'T any tenant named Gruen.
Now go away!"
Hard rain pelted the small window in the front
wall of the ground floor foyer. A caleche with its
top raised against the storm and its running lamps
alight went clattering down the incline of the
Rue Cujas toward the Boul" Mich. The
concierge, a sour little woman with a flickering candle in
her hand, had obviously given Matt the answer she
was paid to give.
He decided to try a bluff. He hoped his
smile was suitably sleazy:
"But he's expecting me. He paid me to come here."
The concierge's old eyes gleamed with rheum. She
squinted at him, searching for truth or falsehood
in what he'd said. Her candle provided the only
illumination in the foyer. Up the stairs lay a
darkness full of rustling sounds, creakings, faint
cries of passion or pain. The whole four story
tenement seemed astir with unseen life.
Suddenly the concierge said, "He told me it was a
young lady. And that she wouldn't arrive till
midnight."
Matt kept the lewd smile in place. "Oh,
he changed his mind, you see." He winked. "On
both counts." With a faintly shaking hand, he slipped
a few sous into hers.
"Well-all right. But if there's any difficulty,
I'll say you slipped past my door without my
seeing you. Do you know where it is?"
"No."
"Top floor. All the way back." 140
She scratched herself in a vulgar way, turned and
began counting the sous as she returned to her
foul-smelling room. Lightning whitened the street
outside. Thunder rocked the building, loud as huge
howitzers firing close by. The concierge's door
slammed, blotting out the candlelight. Matt
shivered; his overcoat was soaked. He reached into his
pocket to grasp the revolver.
During the war he'd carried a pistol for protection
in certain ports. On calm days at sea he'd
practiced marksmanship off the stern and found he had
a fair eye. But shooting at a bobbing barrel for
sport was one thing, defending yourself quite another. Never
hi his life had he fired a shot in anger. He
didn't know whether he could.
Reluctantly he started up the stairs hi total
darkness relieved intermittently by a glow of
lightning through the foyer window. By the time he reached the
first floor landing, even a brilliant burst down
below provided very little light.
He felt his way around the walls of the landing. He
gasped when his right foot struck something soft. A
pale flicker from below showed him a ghost's face, a
gaping mouth wet with saliva.
His heart pounded. He stepped over the outstretched
leg he'd bumped. The derelict didn't stir.
Matt could smell wine in the darkness. But he could
hear no breathing. His scalp crawled. Was the man
dead? He didn't linger to investigate.
On the next landing he heard a faint squeal and a
ticking of claws behind one wall. He touched the
walls. Damp. Springy with rot. The ticking
continued. Rats running?
He kept climbing, sickened by the stenches of the
place. Rotted meat. Slops. God knew what
else. If Strelnik was being kept in another
location, could he force the Prussian to tell him
where? Was anyone with Lepp
this moment? The questions seemed to turn his mind to soup.
Sweat broke out on his forehead although the rest of his
body still felt cold.
On the top floor, he crept down the hall
until he'd gone as far as he could. He found
Lepp's door with an outstretched hand.
Sidled closer.
Listened.
He thought he heard the Prussian laughing against a
curious background noise-heavy rhythmic
grunting.
He wiped his wet forehead. Drew the
LaFauchaux from his coat. The thunder boomed. The
tenement actually shook on its foundations.
As the reverberations died away, he knocked.
The curious rhythmic sound stopped. There was a long
interval of silence within the fiat. On a lower
floor, a woman or a child screamed. Matt
rapped again, using the muzzle of the revolver this time.
He heard a whispered colloquy. Two voices,
the words unintelligible. Once more he pounded the
door.
Rapid footsteps approached. They sounded light,
as though someone small were coming to answer. Then he
heard the gnome say:
"Who is it? Herr Gruen isn't expecting
anyone at this
Ithour."
He disguised his voice as best he could, lowering and
roughening it. "Tell Lepp to open up. There's
trouble."
"Who is that? Who's out there?"
"I said there's trouble. They know we have Strelnik.
Open the damn door!"
More conversation. Matt chose an imaginary point hi
the darkness, approximately where he thought
the gnome's head would be, and fixed his eye on that
spot. It was a wise precaution. When the door
jerked open
suddenly, he was prepared-looking straight at the
gnome's torso, and the nickeled revolver rising
hi front of it hi dim light.
Matt shoved the gnome against the door jamb, pinning
his gun hand between his side and the wood. If the little man
fired hi that position, he risked putting a
bullet into his own ribs.
The gnome wriggled, stamped on Mart's foot,
squealed, "Colonel, it's the American from the
Rue-was
Matt jumped back suddenly. The absence of his
weight threw the gnome off balance. Matt grabbed
the little man's stiff collar and dragged him outside.
With his revolver he whacked the gnome's forearm
twice.
He caught the nickeled gun as it dropped from
slack fingers, then laid the barrel of the
LeFauchaux against the gnome's temple, stunning
and felling him in the hall. He felt only faint
guilt over assaulting someone so small. He
knew the gnome would have shot him if he'd had the
chance.
He darted into the apartment. Bolted the door. Then
he caught his breath, unprepared for the cleanliness of the
place, or the furnishings, or the play of soft
multicolored light from paper-shaded lanterns.
Artifacts from China and Japan had become a
craze in the west in recent years. Jim Whistler
crammed some of his pictures with Oriental
objects and costuming, and his fondness for good Chinese
porcelain was practically a mania. Someone with
similar tastes had decorated this hideaway. There
were ornamental screens around the room, low lacquered
tables, bamboo mats instead of carpet, and on the
walls delicate brush paintings of gardens with
willows and lily ponds and graceful bridges.
Matt was still recovering from his surprise when he
heard a door open. The door was concealed by a
screen standing in front of the wall to his left. The
screen fell forward-pushed-and Lepp stared at him.
Mart's belly began to ache. He didn't see
Strelnik anywhere.
Lepp's bright eyes flicked past him, hunting for the
gnome. Then the Prussian darted a look at
Matt's revolver.
Lepp was barefoot and clad in a black kimono
with two Oriental characters painted in white
on the left breast. Through the open doorway Matt
glimpsed a bedchamber where layers of
sweet-smelling smoke moved slowly. The room's
sole illumination seemed to come from a metal statue
of a fat little god with a cavity in his belly. Lumps
of charcoal glowed in the cavity.
On a pallet, a beefy young man with blond
curls and immense forearm muscles lay belly
down, his head turned toward the outer room and a
drowsy, half-witted smile on his face. The
charcoal which made the whole flat insufferably hot
put red highlights on the young man's sweaty
shoulders and biceps.
"Heaven knows how you found me, Kent," Lepp said
at last. "It was rash of you to come here, you know. Rash
and stupid."
He took a step toward Matt, his smile blazing
suddenly. "I don't believe you'll shoot me.
I don't believe you're the sort who can murder
an unarmed man."
Desperately Matt scanned the room again.
Strelnik wasn't herd He was aware of Lepp
taking a second step but didn't realize how
close he'd gotten until the Prussian gave
a hard exclamation and jumped him.
Lepp's hands shot out Just as he'd predicted,
Matt jerked the revolver up in a protective
way but didn't fire. Lepp seized the gun,
tore it from Matt's hand and rammed his bare knee
into Matt's groin.

Lepp uttered a short, self-satisfied laugh as
Matt reeled backwards. The Prussian
pressed his advantage. He crowded the American
against the wall and drove his knee in and out again, harder
this time.
Matt managed to turn aside and take the third
blow on his hip. He was in hellish pain. Everything
around him was tilting. The paper shaded lanterns
multiplied and transparent pastel rainbows arched
between them- or was that only in his dazed head?
Lepp's kimono came undone. His naked body
was hard and muscular; the body of a splendidly
conditioned soldier. The beefy young man in the
bedroom started asking questions in French, in a
surprisingly girlish voice. Lepp didn't
answer. His attention was fixed on Matt, who was
swaying back and forth, barely able to stand.
Lepp still had the revolver. With a smug smile he
dropped the gun on the floor behind him.
Shouts and loud pounding came from the corridor. The
gnome, trying to get in. Lepp ignored that,
too.
With blurring eyes, Matt saw Lepp's guest
creep across the doorway, bare-butted and with his
clothes hi his hand. The young man vanished,
evidently fleeing through some rear exit. Lepp
stepped back. His bare instep came down on the
revolver handle. Angered, he bent over and tossed
the gun a yard away.
"I don't need that to deal with a foolish person like
you, Herr Kent. First, however, I8full show you
something."
He paced swiftly to a corner. Lifted a
wooden framed paper screen aside. Strelnik
lay motionless on a mat. Large bruises
discolored his face.
"Oh, don't worry, he's breathing," Lepp
said. "We keep him pacified with a special
draught concocted by a chemist we know. You came to the
right place, you see." He stopped smiling. "But you
shouldn't have." He still had one hand on the frame of the
screen. Without warning, he threw the screen at
Matt's head.
Matt tried to keep the thing from falling on
him. His fist tore through the paper as he flung the
screen off, unhurt.
But Lepp hadn't meant to hurt him, only
distract him. The Prussian grabbed Matt's
left wrist, whipped him around and hurled him against the
wall with terrible force.
Matt shook his head and pushed off from the wall. The
collision had started his nose bleeding. Something warm
trickled over his mouth to his chin. He tried
to focus his eyes as he turned back to face the
Prussian.
Lepp was closer than he'd anticipated. The
Prussian rammed his knee toward Matt's
genitals again. Without thinking, Matt caught
Lepp's leg and lifted. The Prussian was
unprepared. He rumbled over, landing on his spine with
an outburst of breath and skidding on a bamboo mat
on which he'd fallen.
Matt staggered toward the glint of the revolver.
Hardly a hair out of place yet, Lepp grinned
like a white-toothed wolf and snapped over onto his
belly. He grabbed Matt's leg in a vise of
two hands and used his adversary's own tactics-a
lift that sprawled the American on the floor.
The back of Matt's head hit the corner
of one of the low tables. Behind his eyes he saw
patterns of light like the shellbursts in a Whistler
nocturne. He groaned; extended his right hand
toward the revolver. The gun was tantalizingly
close, but he couldn't quite reach it.
Lepp had regained his feet. He was breathing a
trifle roughly.
"Let's see-how you-paint-with a ruined hand-was
Frantically, Matt started to draw his fingers
back. Lepp's bare heel slammed down. He
missed Mart's hand by an inch. The impact made the
Prussian grimace and scream:
"Little bastard."" He leaned over, grabbed
Matt's hair, banged his head on the corner of the
table. Matt's left hand flopped out. Lepp
laughed and stamped on it.
Matt didn't want to yell but he couldn't help
it. He 146
brought his hand toward his side just as Lepp hammered his
heel down again. A miss. The Prussian grew
even more enraged. He started stamping with greater force but
less control. His knee rose and fell, the foot
moving so fast he seemed to be doing some kind of mad
dance. Matt managed to keep jerking his hand out of the
way.
He shoved his right hand outward again. His fingers brushed
the revolver's hatched butt plate. Lepp kept
slamming his heel down, crash and crash.
Concentrating on the gun for a moment, Matt didn't
pull his other hand away fast enough. Lepp's heel
caught him. He yelled. Then his face contorted with
rage. He extended his arm until he thought it would
tear from its socket. But he caught the butt of the
LeFauchaux and brought the gun back across his body
and fired upward once, twice, three times.
The first bullet pierced Lepp's left ribs. The
second missed. The third tore into his groin.
Shrieking, the Prussian was knocked backward.
Blood poured over the flapping hem of the kimono.
He sat down in a corner, shuddering violently.
The Light went out of his eyes the moment his spine
settled into place.
Matt's right forearm began to shake. He grew
aware of voices bellowing in the corridor.
Smoke from the revolver floated past his face.
For a moment longer he stared at the dead man. The
anger hi Matt's eyes became disbelief, then
consternation.
He rolled onto his stomach and hid his head,
fighting sickness. He'd never killed
anyone before. And to kill a man as he had-to blow
huge, grisly holes in him- God almighty, that
was a vile thing, no matter what the justification.
"What's going on in there, Colonel? Who fired
that shot?"
The commotion outside wrenched him back to reality.
The gnome or someone else was battering at the
door. The hinges looked as if they might tear
loose from the wood any second.
Matt lurched to his feet. A ringing in his ears
diminished. He stowed the revolver in his belt and
pushed tangled hair out of his eyes. His left hand
throbbed.
In a moment he was kneeling beside Strelnik. He
put his ear close to the little man's mouth. He felt
faint, warm breath.
"Sime, can you open your eyes? Sime, it's
Matt."
He shook Strelnik's shoulders several times and
got only a slight groan for his effort. All at
once he was unbelievably angry. Who was this
man who dared to make him feel responsibility
he didn't want? He could have died in this room, for
God's sake! As it was, the Prussian had come
close to destroying his baud, then turned
him into a murderer, and he wasn't out of danger
yet. Far from it.
The door shivered, struck hard again from the outside.
Wood was splintering around the top hinge. The
concierge's shrill voice joined the others, howling
questions and threats. Fear quickly diluted Matt's
shameful anger.
He lifted Strelnik to his feet. Fortunately
his friend didn't weigh much. He slipped an arm
around Strelnik's waist, then looped Strelnik's
arm over his own neck and half carried, half
dragged him through Lepp's incense-laden bedroom.
He had no trouble locating the escape route the
beefy young man had used. A door stood ajar; a
door leading to a short hallway which in turn opened
onto the landing of a rickety outside stair. The
staircase was attached to the building's rear face.
The stair swayed and sagged in an alarming way as
Matt stumbled downward with his burden. Rain lashed
his face and made the steps slippery. Several times
he almost lost his balance. When it happened on the
sec
and floor landing, he grabbed the rail with his right hand.
Rotted wood gave and broke.
He teetered on the edge, gasping, and would
have plummeted into space if Strelnik's legs
hadn't given out. The dead weight of the little man
pulled him backward, out of danger.
Finally he reached the ground. A policeman's
whistle shrilled in the darkness. To his left,
lanterns bobbed in a passageway leading back to the
Rue Cujas. Strident voices called for him
to halt. He yanked the revolver and fired two
shots over his head. The voices went silent. The
forward motion of the lamps stopped.
Strelnik's free hand plucked at Mart's
overcoat. Rolling his head around and gulping air, the
little man was waking.
The rain slacked off suddenly. "Come on, Sime,
we can make it," Matt whispered, not fully
believing it.
He sank to his ankles in mud and garbage as he
helped Strelnik stagger through the darkness. All at
once a grim thought occurred to him:
Now that "Herr Gruen" was dead, his real identity
would not remain a secret. Nor would that of his
killer; the gnome would see to that.
IV
In the garden on the Rue Saint-Vincent, a
bedraggled and badly shaken Matthew Kent
accepted a glass of wine from Dolly. Leah
Strelnik hugged and kissed her bruised husband.
Hovering nearby with a lamp, Madame Rochambeau
demanded to know what madness was being perpetrated by those
who were-forthwith- no longer tenants.
Matt looked like someone who made his living by street
robbery. He ignored the landlady, finished the wine
and stumbled into the hall leading to his quarters.
Dolly followed.
He could barely flex the fingers of his left hand, and the
entire back of it was mottled with purple and yellow
patches. His spine hurt. So did his arms and his
groin.
Yet none of that mattered. All that mattered was the
man he'd left dead in the Rue Cujas. A
member of the Prussian diplomatic mission.
He made up his mind.
"Dolly, pack whatever you need for travel.
We're taking the first tram to the Channel."
She stopped a pace behind him, looking as if she
doubted his seriousness.
"Damn it, I told you what I did to that man!
The Prussians will turn this city on its head
till the police give them satisfaction."
She hesitated only a moment longer.
"All right, love. All right-we'll go."
He slashed the air. "In half an hour!
Less, if we can."
She nodded, slipped by him and vanished down the
hall. He rested against the wall and rubbed his eyes.
The Strelniks had come in and overheard. Leah said,
"You're going to England?"
"Yes, and you'd be wise if you woke Anton and
left with us," Matt advised.
Madame Rochambeau's lamp glowed somewhere beyond the
garden door. They heard her approaching, asking her
repetitious questions. Matt was astonished at
Strelnik's reaction to his statement:
"You're right. We'll come."
Leah's eyes widened. "What?"
"Now, now, no objections. Remember, I could be
held as an accomplice." He almost sounded
pleased.
"Accomplice?" Madame Rochambeau repeated in
an alarmed voice. "Who's an accomplice?
Me? I insist that someone inform me about the reason for
all this commotion!"
But no one did; it wasn't safe. So the landlady

lurched into view and stood in the garden
door, her expression rather forlorn.
Matt was surprised at Strelnik's ebullience
as well as his recuperative powers. The little man
looked as if he'd been dragged through the Paris
sewers but said he felt remarkably good. On the
frantic flight back across the Seine, he'd
gasped out the story of his captivity. Part of it
remained a mystery. Lepp had refused to say how
the Prussians had found Strelnik's original
hiding place. There were hints of an informant, but
nothing specific. Once on the Rue Cujas,
Strelnik had been subjected to a long and severe
beating interrupted by periods of questioning. He thought the
questioning had gone on for three or four hours. Finally,
when he continued to deny any knowledge of documents dealing with the
Hohenzollern candidacy, Lepp had stepped in,
slapped him a few times and contemptuously said
Strelnik's silence didn't, matter, he knew
an easier nut to crick. Leah.
"My God, Matt, I thought it was a cheap
bluff," was the little man's only comment on that.
After the initial abuse, he hadn't been treated
too badly, though he had been forced to swallow
endless doses of some narcotic which kept him
pacified. Now that all the horrors were behind
him, he seemed happy as a child with candy.
He clapped his younger friend on the shoulder. "I am a
man who makes quick decisions in a crisis. I
feel like -? dead man reprieved And I don't
care to flirt with reversion to (he other state."
There was an emphatic nod of his head for Leah's
benefit. "We're going."
"Going?"'" Madame Rochanibeau bleated from the
doorway. Her jowly face far less truculent
now.
Streak sniffed. "Predsey. madam. You ordered
us to do 5.0."
"In the heat of anger a person sometimes says--"

Dolly poked her head into the corridor, her
voice overlapping:
"What about your paints and things?"
For the first time, Matt thought of the Matamoras
canvas. Leaving that was like leaving a part of himself; like
abandoning a precious child of his imagination. It pained
him to shrug:
"I'll write and ask Fochet to send everything if
we get out safely." Fochet who'd never gotten
around to talking with her,
"Matt, are you sure?"
"Yes! The paints and the pictures don't matter
now."
In truth they mattered very much. He hated what had
happened tonight. He hated himself for making the choices
he'd made, and be hated the necessity of making
them, even though he could have made no others. That was the
goddamned trouble. He could have made no others.
An uncontrollable bitterness crept in as he
added:
"Oh, but pack that cartoon of us that Auguste did,
will you? After spending several years of my life in
Paris. I'd like to take something with me. Something besides
a hand that may be useless."
With a melancholy look, she disappeared into their
rooms again.
Strelnik and Leah rushed away to pack. Matt
stood leaning against the wall, studying his numb hand.
He heard Anton wake with an anxious cry.
"Leaving," Madame Rochambeau murmured. "I
won't have any more income."
He listened to her heavy footsteps retreating across
the garden, and her murmured exclamations over the
sudden financial calamity. He closed his eyes,
thankful just to rest a moment longer.
Little Anton's voice made him think of
his promise to marry Dolly. He'd fulfill that
promise. Stop wallowing in self-pity; stop
speculating about whether things would
have come out differently if Fochet had remembered
to speak to her. The promise had been given. Besides,
a part of him did want to go through with it.
But another part of him felt deep regret; the part
that would be squeezed and shorted.
He heard Fochet:
A priesthood.
Priests are celibate for a very good reason. They
can't successfully serve both God and the flesh.
I've seen such a choice tear many a talented young
fellow apart-
Goudarnii it, if Fochet had only spoken to her!
Ah, what was the use? That was past. Finished.
The whole confused situation seemed summed up in
two facts. He thought the Matamoras painting was
the best work he'd ever done. And he had to leave it
behind.
Before he and Dolly and the Strelniks set off through the
darkness, Matt apologized to Madame
Rochambeau for the trouble they'd caused. He gave
her half of his remaining money-a decent sum-and she
lapsed into maudlin murmurings of regret
about their departure. Matt didn't tell her they were
going to the Gare du Nord, When the police
called, as they surely would, she could honestly deny
any knowledge of their destination.
She was so agreeable now, she readily consented
to carry a message to a woman who worked at the
Cafe Guerbois. Shand did say she hoped the
message had nothing to do with Mr. Strelnik's
subversive interests or the mysterious turmoil of the
past couple of days.
"No, it's personal, not political," Matt
assured her. "Just tell her I said the obnoxious
German customer would never bother her again. She'll
be pleased to hear
it. She'll probably give you a complimentary
carafe of wine."
"She will?" Madame Rocliambeau's brows shot
up. "Perhaps I'll take my friend Alice when I
go,"
She dabbed her eyes. "I must say, Mister
Kent, you're really a very-a very nice young man-for an
American. But you certainly do get involved in some
curious affairs."
He smiled to hide hurt.
"I do, don't 17 Not always on
purpose, though, Goodbye, Madame
Rochambeau."
CHAPTER XII
Sanctuary
A NIGHT LOCAL carried them northwestward.
Amiens, Boulogne, Calais. Matt was still
feeling the physical and emotional effects of the
struggle in the tenement. The memory of it was clear enough
to start him shivering and bring Dolly's hand over
to clasp his. The two of them were sharing one of the
benches in a second-class compartment. Strelnik and
his wife sat opposite. Anton was a blanketed
bundle in his mother's lap. Both parents were
unusually" quiet, and Streinik's face had lost
its earlier enthusiasm. He had grown somber, in
fact. Matt wondered: Was the little man
contemplating the family's past or doubtful
future-his Either way, he felt sorry for his friend.
Repeatedly, his thoughts returned to the Rue
Cujas. To stop it, he rested his forehead against the
compartment's outer wall. Shut his eyes. Tried
to doze. It proved than he'd expected.
Suddenly he *z in
the midst of a dream fully as vivid as his
memories of Lepp's pied-iterre.
He saw a foul, littered room. A zinc topped
table on which Dolly lay with her skirt twisted above
her legs. She wore nothing else below the waist.
A wizened woman in her seventies appeared. She
had one filmy white eye and no teeth. She held
a knife up near the unshielded gaslight, a
huge, triangular bladed knife that flashed like a
sheet of silver. A knife for slicing bread.
Chopping meat-
Or helping girls in trouble.
Coming half awake, he tried to yell. He couldn't
break free of the nightmare. A shadowy assistant
grabbed Dolly's wrists. Yanked her arms back
over her head so she couldn't interfere with the old
woman, who first tested the knife's point with her
thumb and then pushed Dolly's pale legs apart.
Dolly's mouth came open. She screamed without
sound. Matt started to flail. It did no good; no
one paid the slightest attention. The old woman
held Dolly's legs open with one hand andwiththe other,
slowly and expertly inserted the knife up into-
Crying out, he bolted upright. He snapped his head
away from the wall so hard that he hurt his neck. His
eyes felt wet.
Dolly clutched his arm. "What's wrong,
Matt? You were groaning and making the most awful
faces-a bad dream?"
"Yes, a nasty one."
"What about?"
"Why, ah-was He rubbed his face. "The
Prussian."
He apologized to the Strelniks, then looked
into her eyes. The compartment lamps had been
extinguished but this far north, there were no more rain
clouds, and moonlight flooded through the dirt streaked
window onto her face. He whispered to her:
"As soon as we're in England-the moment we get
up to London-I want us to be married."
A curious, apprehensive light filled her
eyes. "Are you sure you mean that?"
"Sure," he said after a pause so slight it might
not have been a pause at all.
Dolly glanced at Leah Strelnik who smiled
at her almost like an approving mother. Dolly
squeezed Mart's hand and leaned against his shoulder as the
train rattled on through the silver and black night
toward the sea
u
As dawn broke, a pair of provincial
policemen surveyed the passengers boarding
the ferry at the Calais wharf. Matt didn't know
whether the police were watching for him or for someone
else, but he took no chances. He hunched over
to minimize his height and walked between Leah and Sime
carrying Anton hi his arms, just as if they were all
part of a single family.
He went up the ferry gangplank, buffeted by the
fierce wind blowing off the Channel. He wanted
to look back at the phlegmatic policemen standing
on the quay, arms folded and short capes snapping
at their shoulders. He didn't dare.
Presently the small steamer weighed anchor and
turned into the whitecapped water. Matt got
violently seasick on the rough trip across the
Dover Strait. He still had a bilious countenance
when he staggered off behind the others at Folkestone.
He hardly saw the little seaside village with its
quaint cottages scattered over low hillsides.
Strelnik fetched a pint of beer from a tavern near
the rail depot. At first Matt couldn't get any
down. The Russian kept insisting it would brace
him up. Matt took several small swallows, but
it didn't do much good. He was still feeling
miserable when the train of sooty cars departed for
London.
Once they reached the city Matt planned to head
directly for James Whistler's house at number
seventeen Lindsey Row in Chelsea. During one
of their conversations in Paris, the artist had once
extended an invitation; Matt was welcome to drop
in if he ever visited England. Certainly the
painter wouldn't be expecting four bedraggled people and a child
to arrive on his doorstep. But Matt didn't know
where else to turn.
They arrived in the big, bustling city about three in the
afternoon and located Lindsey Row about an hour later.
A charming Irish lass with lovely dark red hair
answered their knock. The girl obviously didn't
recognize Mart's name. But she smiled,
introduced herself as Jo Heffernan, and told them
Whistler had gone for a stroll with his friend Rossetti.
Matt was familiar with the name of the poet and painter,
and with hers as well. She was the painter's current
mistress.
Yes, of course she could recommend a clean but
inexpensive hotel. Soon the tired travelers were
settled in two rooms just off Oxley Street, a
couple of blocks north of the Thames and the busy
Chelsea Embankment. Matt fell into a
stuporous sleep practically at once and
didn't awake until noon the next day.
Feeling much better, he shaved, dressed and walked
to Whistler's. He received a warm and boisterous
welcome from the little American whose monocle
reminded him unpleasantly of Lepp.
Whistler insisted Matt sit down and share a late
breakfast of strong black coffee and stacks and
stacks of the artist's favorite buckwheat cakes.
Naturally Whistler wanted to know the reason for
Matt's sudden arrival. The younger man said he and
Dolly had wanted a change of scene. His work had
gone stale in Paris; ennui had set in. And
Dolly was fretful about the war talk heard so often
on the Continent of late.
The little artist, who was thirty-five or
thirty-six, jammed a forkful of buckwheat cakes
into his mouth, patted his lips with a napkin, and
asked:
"Is your stay going to be temporary or
permanent?"
"Permanent, I think."
"First-rate! We must start hunting for a suitable
studio."
Matt was unenthusiastic: "There's no hurry."
Whistler asked about the other couple Jo
Heffernan had mentioned. Matt replied with a story
about the Strelniks wanting better employment
opportunity. Here or in America.
The word brought a malicious grin to Whistler's
face. "Set "em straight, Matty. England's
the only place. They don't want to emigrate
to the land of the free and the home of the gauche. Jo told
me they looked like nice, honest people. If that's
true, they won't be able to make a damn nickel
back home."
When Matt left Lindsey Row, he walked
till he located a shop selling Paris
newspapers. He bought one; the preceding evening's
edition. There was nothing in it about a murder.
Two days later, though-July 1-a brief
story appeared. Colonel Green von Lepp, a
military attache connected with the Prussian
diplomatic mission, had been found floating in the
Seine near one of the piers of the Pont de Alma.
The information had been released jointly by the
Prussian ambassador and the French
authorities, which indicated to Matt that the location and
all the details of Lepp's death had been cleaned
up for public consumption. The concluding paragraph
said no suspects were presently in
custody, though an unidentified American art
student was being sought for questioning.
Shivering, Matt threw the paper into a trash bin.
How long would it take the police to follow the
trail of his passport and track him to London?
As it turned out, the police and all the other
citizens of Paris soon had no interest in
cooperating with the Prussians. On the second of
July, late editions broke the very story which had
led to the arrest of Yuri Strelnik and the harassment of
his brother. The Spanish parliament, the Cortes,
had adjourned without taking a vote on the candidacy
of Prince Leopold Hohenzollern, and through an
error on the part of a code clerk, word of the candidacy
leaked. Matt often wondered later whether the clerk,
like Yuri, was a member of an anti-Bismarck
apparatus.
Just as Sime had predicted, the story was a
political bombshell. French editorialists
reacted with outrage. So did the foreign minister,
Gramont. Unbelievably, he went so far as
to say there would be a declaration of war unless the
Prussians withdrew Prince Leopold from
consideration by the Spaniards.
"I told you such matters were taken
seriously!" Strelnik said. The young American just
shook his head in amazement and horror.
The Prussians didn't deny that Bismarck had
been promoting Leopold's candidacy at least
since early spring. But the newspapers were soon
full of dispatches from Berlin which were obviously
designed to minimize the impact of the revelations.
The Prince didn't want the throne of Spain
anyway, one story stated. He would refuse it
unless he received contrary orders from his father, King
William. Another dispatch said William was
disinterested in the whole question. While London basked
in bright summer weather and Mail's memories of the
Rue Cujas began to fade, it seemed for a little
while that the whole affair might blow over.
Strelnik predicted otherwise. He warned
Matt to hurry and write Fochet if he wanted
his paints and the
Matamoras picture crated and shipped while
France was still at peace. "Don't worry about giving
the old man your address," he said. "You don't
imagine the Surete's going to lift a hand to find
Lepp's killer now, do you?"
Strelnik himself was agonizing about sending a
telegraph message to Berlin. A
message asking about Yuri. The little Russian
claimed that the arrival of such a message might
further compromise his brother. Hence, he
hesitated. Matt suspected the real reason for the
hesitation was fear of a grim reply.
Matt finally did mail a letter to Fochet. It
certainly looked doubtful that the police would
pursue him to England, considering the victim's
nationality and the comic-opera turns the diplomatic
affair was taking.
The French ambassador, Count Benedetti,
pursued King William to Ems where the king was taking
mineral bath treatments. Benedetti demanded that the
Prussian monarch order Leopold to withdraw his
candidacy. Ruffled, William publicly
refused, despite widespread press speculation
that a private order for the withdrawal would shortly be
given if it hadn't already.
Frightened by the specter of a unified Germany with a
highly trained army at its disposal, the French
weren't satisfied. They wanted not only open
apologies but open guarantees that no such plot
to expand Prussian influence would be repeated in the
future. King William rebelled and refused
to grant all the demands, saying they were
meant to humiliate the Prussian people. The king even
refused to permit Benedetti to continue the discussion
in his presence. That was the thirteenth of July.
The worsening crisis finally pushed Strelnik
into sending a coded telegraph message to Berlin.
The reply was, in a way, good news. Yuri
Strelnik's associates did not know-what had
happened to him. They had been trying to find out for
days.
The message closed with mention of a rumor current
in Berlin; one which the radicals felt should be
communicated to the whole world. A telegraphic
dispatch from Ems reporting Benedetti's demands
had supposedly been revised and expanded
by Bismarck before its release for publication. The
purpose was to make it seem as though the French
demands had been even more insulting comand insultingly
worded--than was actually the case. Thus, said
Yuri's friends, the power-mad premier oiled the
Prussian war machine and gave it a big push
forward.
On the eighteenth of July a large crate and a
second, smaller one arrived at Whistler's
residence. The artist put them into storage for their
owner, who was vague about when he would
remove them. Matt told Whistler that he'd lost
interest in his work. The unfinished Matamoras
canvas, safe in the large wooden box, no longer
meant anything to him.
Whistler didn't mince words. It was all very well
for Matt to show this queer lethargy and to rant about
giving up painting altogether. But he needed the space.
All right, Matt said, he'd claim the things as
soon as he found permanent quarters. The thought of
searching for a studio was still unappealing, though. He
preferred to spend the daylight hours just walking back
and forth across the great city, or lounging in some pub,
getting drunk. He didn't admit all that
to Whistler.
The same day that the crates arrived, a letter from
Fochet was delivered to the hotel. First the teacher
gave the pertinent shipping information, in case the
crates had gotten lost. In Ms second
paragraph he reported that a detective
inspector had appeared at the atelier a week
ago, inquiring after one of his students without explaining
the reason for his interest. Fochet had told the
policeman essentially the truth-he never kept
track of the whereabouts of his pupils. The inspector
hadn't
returned, Fochet hoped the foregoing made some
sense to Matt, because it made none to him.
Then Fochet went on to talk briefly about the
unbelievable political situation. The artistic
community was polarized and in an uproar over the talk
of war. Wanting to avoid possible conscription,
Mart's friend Paul had already left the city with his
mistress. Meantime Renoir was telling everyone that
he hoped to be drafted, preferably for a
cuirassier regiment. Such madness! Fochet said.
Matt agreed. But evidently a great segment of the
North European population was afflicted with the
madness. On the nineteenth of July, over what some
called no more than a matter of protocol, France
declared war on Prussia, and the Emperor's troops
prepared to take the field against the armies of
General Moltke.
Matt and Dolly learned of the war declaration late
that night, when they returned to the hotel after a
series of frantic visits to various government
departments. They had spent the day taking care of the
last requirements for a marriage in Britain.
Matt was tired and not in any mood to hear about a
war. Europe was no better-no more rational-than his
own country. It was disillusioning and even
infuriating to realize that.
He was in a bad mood for personal reasons.
Certain secret thoughts produced intense guilt
feelings. Yet the thoughts persisted. He knew it was
necessary to marry Dolly, but he'd lost his enthusiasm
for it. And more and more often he found himself thinking of the
forthcoming ceremony as some kind of execution.
Painless, but an execution nonetheless.
iv
On the twenty-second of July, Matt and
Dolly were married by an Anglican priest. The
ceremony took
place at St. James's, the little Wren church on
Piccadilly. Strelnik and his wife stood up for the
couple. Whistler and the lovely Jo were present as
well.
The newlyweds treated their friends to a fine supper at
a splendid fish restaurant in nearby St.
James's Street. But they'd planned no
honeymoon. It seemed superfluous. Besides, after
buying the meal and the wine, Matt was nearly broke.
Paying hotel bills and living expenses for the
penniless Strelniks had been a big drain on his
carefully budgeted allowance. He'd already written
his father for an advance on the funds for the
next six months. He hoped the money would arrive
soon.
Matt saw Dolly was uncomfortable as they left the
restaurant and put Whistler and Jo into a hack.
He finally got Dolly to admit she was suffering from
cramps undoubtedly caused by the pregnancy. He
spent his last few shillings on a second hack
to carry them back to the hotel. He helped her
undress, put her to bed, kissed her forehead and
laughingly dismissed her worried statements that she'd
ruined the most important night of their lives.
He sat beside her in the twilight until she fell
asleep. Then he went downstairs, overwhelmed again
by the mental malaise which seemed to be his lot these
days.
He found Strelnik seated in the hotel's tiny
lobby. The Russian had his hands pressed against his
knees and his eyes focused on a blank wall
opposite his chair. Matt punched his shoulder:
"Come on, my friend. Even if the bride's sound
asleep, we should have some kind of celebration.
Let's go around to the Hart and Crown. I'll stand you
to a-was
Belatedly, he realized why Strelnik's cheeks
glistened.
"Sime, what happened?"
Slowly, Strelnik wiped his eyes. He drew a
wrinkled telegraph blank from out of the pocket of his
threadbare jacket. "This arrived while you were
upstairs."
Matt unfolded the sheet. The collection of
unrelated English words made no sense. "What
does it say?"
"It says-was Strelnik's voice was feeble; dry
sounding. "It says Yuri was executed the same day
I went into hiding in Paris. The same day! And
it's taken all this time for the crime to be discovered!"
Gently, Matt gripped his friend's arm and lifted
him out of the chair. "I'm sorry. Come out into the
air. I'd say we both need a glass of beer."
"Several of them." He snatched the message out of
Matt's hand, flung it away. Then he repeated
in a fierce whisper, "Several!"
As such things sometimes have a way of doing, the future
of the Strelnik family worked itself out after Matt and his
friend got drunk.
Their drunkenness manifested itself in different ways.
Matt grew pensive, then downright melancholy, as
if he were the one mourning the loss of a brother. The
little Russian grew progressively more
angry:
"Bastards. Prussian bastards. They're out
to swallow the whole world. Room to live-that's all
they talk about! I hope Louis Napoleon
crucifies them. I doubt he will, though. That
damned Moltke's too good a general. Well,
what's left for me in Europe?" A callous
shrug. "Nothing."
Matt wiped foam from his upper lip. Blinked
twice. Said in a sarcastic voice, "Why don't
you emigrate to America? Hell, it's no worse
than Europe now."
"Listen, I've thought about it. Consh-uh- constantly
sometimes. I don't see the United States with the
same cynical eye you do, Matthew."
"I try not to look in that direction at all."
It was a miserable joke. As miserable as everything in
his life lately. Christ, look at him! Spending
his wed
ding night in a London grog shop. On second
thought, why shouldn't he drink till he keeled over?
He had nothing better to do.
Much to Matt's disgust, Strelnik seemed to be
growing excited.
"I'd like to go to America. I think Leah
would too."
"I gave you credit for more-wait a second.
Miss? Refills here."
The serving girl shrieked as he flung his empty
glass. She just managed to catch it before it hit the
floor. Two dart players gave him sour
looks. The owner scowled.
"Matthew, you're drunk," Strelnik whispered.
"Drunk and disorderly."
"So what? So are you. To repeat-I gave you
credit for more intelligence."
"Come on! At least America isn't run by a
gang of bloodthirsty imperialists, the way
Prussia is. At least she hasn't got a
goddamned skirt chasing emperor, like France. In
America the workingman gets a fair shake
occasionally."
Matt snorted. "Not according to my brother. Oh, but
don't let me shatter your illusions. William
Marcy Tweed and his gang will take care of that when you
arrive."
"Tweed? Who's he?"
"Oh, just the fellow who sets the standard for public
and private morality, that's all. I only know
what Gideon tells me about him, but
I'll be damned if that isn't enough. Bill
Tweed is the political boss of New York
City. The Tiger of Tammany-America's greatest
spoilsman. You'll find out!"
Strelnik refused to be daunted by the sarcasm.
"My family and I must do something soon. We're
living on your dole, and that's not right. If I could just
find a job, I could earn passage money within a
year or two."
Matt sighed. "Hell, I'll loan you passage
money when 165
my father sends the advance on my allowance." That would
probably be cheaper than maintaining the Strelniks
for an indefinite period. his you're really serious."
"Yes, Matthew, I think I am."
"Then I'll give you a letter to my brother in New
York. He's starting that labor paper I mentioned.
Maybe he needs some part-time help. At least
it's someone to go see when the ship docks."
Strelnik studied Matt a moment, smiled a sad
smile and shook his head. "You know, Matthew, for a
man who presents a cynical face to the world, you
are really quite soft hearted."
"Is that a fact! And here I thought I was a ninny
scratching my head in the midst of the cleansing
revolutionary fires, or some such shit."
"Well, yes, there's that. But you are very generous."
"And you are very sozzled. Finish your beer and we'll
go tell Leah you've lost your mind."
He raised the heavy glass which the serving girl had
refilled. "To your new homeland. May it give you
more than it's ever given me-which is exactly nothing."
VI
In the second week of August, Dolly and
Matt accompanied the Strelniks to the train that would
carry them to Southampton. The emigrants had
purchased space in steerage aboard a vessel
sailing directly to New York.
There was a tearful farewell between the two women;
fervent handshakes and hugs between the men. Strelnik
had carefully packed a letter Matthew had written
to Gideon.
"We'll see you in America on your first visit!"
Leah exclaimed as the conductor shouted for them to get
aboard.
Matt laughed. "I'm afraid you'll be waiting a
long 166
time, I don't expect to go back there till I'm
buried. If then."
The Strelniks clambered into their compartment.
Leah held Anton up to the open window, grasped
his arm and waved it. The little boy soon got the
idea, waving with great enthusiasm as the train began
to move.
The moment it had chugged out of sight, Dolly
slipped her arm in Matt's. She had tears in her
eyes:
"Oh, Matt, did you see their faces"? They
all looked like children about to be visited by St.
Nicholas!"
"I suppose you call that innocence, eh?"
"Or hope."
"Whatever it is, they'll soon lose it over there."
"I wonder. I think they see a great many good things
about your country. Genuinely good things you choose
to ignore.
"Yes, I'm sure Sime's excited about the
so-called freedom of expression he'll find in
America. Just wait till he stands up on a
crate on some street corner and starts spouting off
about dismantling the fortunes of the capitalist warlords.
Wait rill he says those fortunes should be
redistributed to the working class. He'll find
himself exercising his freedom of expression in the
lockup. Maybe for the rest of his life."
Dolly sighed. "I believe that's one of the
qualifies I hate most about painters. They're
so disagreeably cynical sometimes."
Irked, he started to retort. Before he could, she
held up a glove:
"Darling, forgive me. I shouldna have started on that
subject."
He was astounded. It wasn't like her to surrender.
She drew @l. deep breath. When nib anger
abated a little, he noticed the quality of her
face. Pregnant women were supposed to look
nauseatingly healthy. weren't they-She looked as if
worry were wearing her away.
"We have other, more personal things to discuss," she
said.
He managed a chuckle. "We do?"
"Yes. Will you take me for a walk along the
Embankment?"
"Good God, Doll, it was raining when we came
into the station."
"I'd just like to be in the fresh air when we talk."
"Talk about what?"
Looking straight ahead, she said, "About us. Now that
the Strelniks have gone, I can do what I've been
planning to do for some days now."
He didn't understand the sad, tender expression on
her tired face. Touching him, she added very softly:
"I'm going to leave you, Matt."
CHAPTER
On the Chelsea Embankment
THEY LEANED AGAINST the stone railing above the
Thames. Patches of blue showed in the west-clearing
weather-but light rain still dappled the river. There was
steady barge traffic. The boats of the watermen
scooted back and forth carrying passengers between the
public stairs at the bridges. South of the river
in Lambeth and Southwark further east, rows of
factory smokestacks and great construction cranes
jutted into the sky. Vehicular traffic clattered
in the road behind them. They neither heard nor saw
anything but each other.
"It's goddamned insanity!" Matt cried.
"My dear, that's the fourth or fifth time you've used

the same word. But it isn't insanity. The marriage
was a mistake."
Dolly seemed very tense, as if keeping her
emotions under control only by the greatest effort.
Raindrops showed as black dots on her dark
green dress, and sparkled in the yellow
curls over her ears. Despite the full cut of
her skirt, her pregnancy was beginning to show.
"I must be the one to call a halt because you won't,"
she continued. "Your conscience won't let you. But you
haven't done any work since we arrived in
London. You haven't even gone to inspect the
crates old Onion sent to Jim Whistler's. I
know the cause-one silly, mistaken idea that
affects you even though it shouldn't. Well, I
learned long ago that you weren't perfect, or even
sensible all the time. God knows I'm not either-was
"You've lost me. What's my mistaken idea?"
She reached up to touch his cheek. Her wry little
smile vanished. "You persist in thinking everything's
ruined for you because you have a wife."
"Dolly, that Isn't so!" he lied. "I married
you because I love you."
"And I love you. I8full never love any man so
much. But I do know the real reason you went through with the
ceremony."
Her tone was matter of fact. A passing waterman
leaned on his paddle and waved. She lifted her
glove but Matt didn't respond. He stared at
her, then blurted:
"Why?"
"Because you thought Td destroy the baby."
He started to deny that, too, then closed his mouth and
watched the f ailing rain and the smoke of the chimneys
staining the southern sky like the harbinger of a mechanized,
dehumanized world.
"Of course I thought about it," she admitted. "I
threatened you with it, and I can only beg you to forgive
that. I was desperate. I could never have gone through with
it."
He turned to see whether she was telling the truth.
Her eves said yes. Her next words reinforced it.
"Not in a thousand years. Matt.. But-was Up came
her chin. Those lovely eyes had a bright glint now.
"Neither did I want our child to be born without a
legal name."
"Our son. It will be a boy."
"You think that?"
Matt nodded. "I know it."
"Somehow, so do I. That makes a legal name
important. That's why I can't thank you enough for going
through with it."
Humiliated, he slapped his palms on the rough
stone railing. His left hand still bore bruises. His
face was scarlet as he breathed, "You make it sound
like some almighty deed of altruism. I
love you!"
"I know you do. But I also know how you feel
about-domesticity. You're convinced it has no part in
a painter's life. I think you're in error, but I
doubt I could ever change your mind, and I'm certain
it would be disastrous to try. Yet feeling as you do, you
still went through with it. You gave of yourself-the most you could
give-and that says a good deal about you, love. I'll
be forever grateful. Moreover your chil--your son will
be grateful. I'm going to have the baby at my new
place of employment, you see."
"Your new-his You mean you've got a job someplace
outside of London?"
She was amused. "A good distance outside. I'm
leaving England."
"To go where?"
She thought a moment, then chose her words with care.
"The Empire is very large, you know. I've
secured a position in a rather remote part of it.
I've been looking quite hard since I made any
decision. two days ago, I chanced across an
employment bureau that works for the government. The
bureau liked my experience teaching
English in Paris, and we struck a bargain on the
spot. The employment contract's being
drawn now. I discovered there's a need for women with
some knowledge of literature and grammar at military
posts overseas. I'll be teaching the children of officers
at-one of those posts," she said with a slight catch in
her voice. Inadvertently, she'd almost revealed
her destination.
He grabbed her arm with thoughtless roughness. "Listen,
Dolly. You've got to tell me where you're going!"
Without any reproof, she glanced down at his hand.
Red faced, he released her. She gave a small
shake of her head.
"I don't believe it would be advisable for you to know,
Matt. Your conscience might push you into coming after
me." She brushed at her nose, tears in her
eyes all at once. "Then-was She swallowed.
"Then think of all the fine paintings that might never be
finished."
"Do you want a formal divorce? I don't know
what's involved, but-was
"I don't want that unless you do," she broke in.
"No!"
He studied her then, his spirits sinking steadily. He
knew what a determined person she could be; underneath
her softness was a layer of iron. He thought of a
half dozen things to say, all of them
inane. All he could do was mutter:
"At least let me send you money."
"Absolutely not. I8full be well paid where Fm
going. And I didn't marry you because your grandfather owned
a California gold mine and your father made you heir
to one third of it! If I ever need a little for the
baby, I'll get hi touch with you somehow. But I
doubt that will be necessary."
"I doubt it, too. You're a bright woman. Bright
and capable and strong-was
"And plump," she teased, laying a palm over her

stomach. "I wouldn't have spoken so soon, but I have
a long journey, and I must travel before some
doctor forbids it-or before there's any danger to the
baby. There'll be no danger once I arrive.
My destination's quite civilized, I understand. With an
excellent military hospital. I'll be sailing
in a week, after I've had a visit with my
family in Liverpool. I don't know what
I'll tell them. I suppose it's best to say
we're obtaining a divorce. They'll be
unhappy, but much less so than if they thought I was
bringing an illegitimate child into the world. Thanks to you
he'll be born a Kent."
"But why the hell won't you tell me where you're
going?" He felt bludgeoned, nearly as
physically stunned as when he'd fended Lepp's
attack. His voice grew almost boyish: "Why do
you have to leave at all?"
Very crisply, she answered, "So you'll be free.
I wanted our child to have a name, but-was Tears brimmed
again, unchecked this time. "Oh, I'm so ashamed of this
silly crying!"
She flung herself against him, her head deliberately
turned outward from the center of his chest so he had
trouble seeing her face. "Even before you said you were
willing to marry me, I knew I couldn't stay with
you. Not as a wife. That would destroy you. It's
cruel and sad that you don't want or need what
most people do. Affection. Companionship. A
family. It's cruel and sad for you, is what I
mean to say. But regardless of what caused it, the
truth is, you don't need anything except your work.
Fochet made me understand."
"Fochet!" Another thunderblow.
"Of course. One night in Paris, he talked
to me for three or four hours."
"When? That is-I thought-was
"That he'd forgotten? How could he forget so
important a favor for one of his most talented
pupils? He just didn't feel it was necessary to tell
you everything, that's all."
"When did he speak to you?"
"The night before you took me dancing at the Moulin
de la Galette."
"But that night I asked whether you'd seen him, and you
pretended to be surprised!" He did remember a
suspiciously brittle tone in her voice. "Why
did you lie?"
"Because I didn't want to believe what Fochet
had told me. I knew it was true, I think, but
I didn't want to believe marriage would destroy
you. He admitted other men-Manet for one-could
handle their work and the responsibility of a family as
well, but he doubted you could. He said I might
think that was wrong-I do- but I could never undo it.
Then he gave me a better sense of the scope of
your talent. A sense of all the great work that might
never be done if I kept you worrying about patching a
roof or paying for baby shoes until you died of
misery and a sense of failure. It was bloody
cruel of him to put that kind of burden on me! I
was still resenting the fact that night when we danced. I
got over the resentment-well, somewhat. I
now know that most of what Fochet said was true. He
thinks you have an immense talent, Matt. And you
did make your work secondary when you married me.
I can't be any less unselfish-was
Her arm curled around his neck, squeezing as she
wept and whispered:
"You're free. You're free now."
"I don't want to be free that way!"
She dabbed her eyes. "But it's all settled."
"Nothing's settled. I can't get along without you!"
"Well-was She laughed, not unkindly. "There is a
good deal of the helpless boy left in you, Matt. But
I think you'll find you can cope with the world on your own.
You'll have your work to fill whatever emptiness you feel
occasionally. I'll have our son. Actually, I'm rather
the luckier one, don't you think? It's not every
girl who can fall in love so wonderfully, then
give a fine painter to the world, and still have his son
too-was
"Fine painter? I'm a dauber, that's all! I'd
rather be married to you than paint so much as one more-was
On tiptoe, she pressed her glove against his
mouth. "Don't. Say it too often and you'll act
on it. Then you'd come to hate yourself for the rest of your
life. It's settled."
She tugged his arm again. "Come on, love. Let's
walk a little-so people will think all this mess on my
face is just the result of rain."
Clouds scudded ahead of a freshening wind from the west.
A shaft of sun speared down, gilding a section
of the Thames. They walked slowly along the
Embankment, both of them too bound up in their love
and grief to speak another word.
In the little hotel off Oakley Street, they made
love twice that night. It was done a bit
clumsily because of her size, and with extreme care.
Yet it was concluded more tenderly, more satisfyingly,
than he could ever remember. When he awoke in the
morning, he discovered the note.
My dearest Matt:
You will know where to find me for a little while in
Liverpool. But please don't because that would merely
cause problems with my family. My sister Peg
had written to ask whether I would be in her wedding, and
now I shall have to tell her I'll be gone. I don't
suppose she would want me anyway comby then I shall
be swelling like a melon!
I don't care about any of that now. There is great
happiness in the midst of the sadness I feel over
losing you. But then, as I tried to tell you
yesterday
I shan't be losing you, really. A part of you will
remain with me always. I shall try to make you proud of
your son. Please make him proud of you through your
work.
You have always had the ability to be a fine artist. Now
you have the opportunity. To that you must bring the will.
Try not to be too disappointed when you experience
failures, as you surely will. You have chosen to live
with a demanding and capricious and even cruel
mistress. But I know that in the end, she will reward you
far more than I ever could.
God keep you, my dearest.
Yours always-
Dolly
CHAPTER XIV
Dolly's Gift
HE AWOKE TO FIND his feet were numb. The
quality of the light was all wrong, even for a winter
morning. Why was the loft so dark?
Because the sky itself was dark, he realized. Overhead,
the glass was wet with wind-driven snow. He watched
for a moment or so. A regular damn blizzard!
What day was it? Tuesday? Wednesday? He
wasn't sure. He'd worked sixteen
hours straight to complete the new picture. When
night came, he'd resorted to his trick of
finishing less than critical areas by lamplight.
He'd worked feverishly because he had an intuition that
the picture would be good, and also because concentrated effort
helped drain away some of the pain that
had been his lot ever since Dolly's departure
last summer.
He crawled out of bed. Stamped on the cold
floor till his toes began to tingle. Lit one of the
four lamps arranged in a semicircle on the
floor of his work area. Then he staggered to the old
stove and tossed a few lumps of coal onto the
embers.
He coughed as he shut the small grilled door.
The fumes were abominable. He recalled he'd
disposed of some food scraps in the stove a day or
two ago. He found the long pole and used it
to lift the hinged section of the skylight. Freezing
wind tore into the loft. Snowflakes came in as
well, whirling on an icy gust one moment,
drifting slowly down the next. What the hell day
was it?
He believed it might be the twentieth of January.
Or possibly the twenty-first. His head was
a muddle-just like the loft with its heaps of discarded
clothing and disorderly stacks of books. Dirty
dishes stood everywhere. Recent mail was scattered
all over the floor.
Wind flowed through the skylight opening and down a wall
where Renoir's cartoon hung from a nail. The
cartoon rattled Matt heard the noise but
didn't turn. He couldn't bring himself to throw the
drawing away because it was such a faithful and touching
likeness of Dolly. But neither could he bear to look
at it often.
He used the chamber pot in the corner, carried the
pot to the kitchen alcove, opened the window and dumped
the pot into a howling gray abyss that stretched down
four stories. The ground was invisible.
He slammed the window and returned to the main room,
passing the scrap of mirror glass he used-
infrequently-for shaving. He paused, startled by the
unpleasant image in the glass. He saw a man
who'd lost weight because he had no appetite and
only ate once a day, if then. A man who'd
let his beard grow to an in
credible tangle. A man with ugly dark circles
under his eyes.
He turned the glass mirrored side
down on the little shelf.
He sat on the edge of the cold double bed and locked
his hands between his legs, pushing his nightshirt down
to create a trough where he could generate "a little heat
for his ringers. His left hand hadn't regained its old
flexibility and perhaps never would. But his right functioned
normally. That is, it did when his brain was alert enough
to provide proper direction. The proof stood hi
the work area, immediately behind the semicircle of
extinguished lamps and to the left of the huge
Matamoras painting, which he'd finished in
December. The new picture, considerably
smaller, had been started on New Year's day and
completed sometime after four this morning.
It was a study of a woman, painted in the new,
unromanticized style of the Batignolles group.
The woman was washing something in a tub. She was seen
in three quarter view, with the tub indistinct in the
lower foreground. The visible sliver of water was done
in blue of a dark value, so as to be subdued, like the
tub itself.
The picture had several sources. The woman's
tired, bent body was Lisa's as he remembered it
from that moment at the Guerbois when he'd come upon her
with her hands immersed hi the dirty
dishwater. The clothing was Lisa's, too. So was the
straggly hair falling over the eyes, and the faint
look of grime. There the resemblance ended.
The woman dominated the right hand two thirds of the
painting. Most of the background was extremely dark,
although there was clearly a secondary light source
somewhere to her right. An irregularity in the siding of the
building hi which she was working, perhaps; a gap admitting
highly diffused sunshine.
The strongest light came from above and behind the 177
woman's left shoulder. There he'd placed a
large open doorway. Outside lay a meadow where
two ungainly colts ran in the first radiance of
day.
The flanks of the horses glowed with light. He'd
used short, overlapping brushstrokes there; a
technique with which Renoir and some of the others were
experimenting. The effect only worked when you stood a
good distance from the finished canvas.
Behind the horses rose blue foothills, quite
distant and barely suggested. The splashes of light
and the feeling of exuberance in the meadow were meant
to contrast with the gloom and tedium inside the imaginary
barn, where the woman was trapped by drudge work.
The woman was looking straight out of the
picture. Matt fancied that she'd risen early,
before anyone else was up, because she had so many chores
every day. She was already tired but there was still strength in her
arms, and in her back, whose breadth he'd exaggerated
slightly. She had a defiant tilt to her chin but
a resigned sadness in her large, cornflower
colored eyes.
Dolly's eyes. It was her face.
The meadow, the horses, the hills barely sketched
outside-those, too, came from memory rather than
imagination. Many times he'd gazed on similar
scenes in his home valley in Virginia. After his
first reluctant experimentation with the familiar
elements, he'd been astonished at how superbly
they fitted into the overall composition.
Finishing the picture hadn't purged all of his bad
feelings, though. Standing up suddenly, his untidy
flannel nightshirt falling down to mid-calf, he
was at the apex of a triangle whose base points were
the portrait easel and Renoir's cartoon. No
matter which way he looked, he saw her. It was
true even when he was outdoors, or sleeping, or-
Angrily, he shook his head and turned away,
Over the past months he'd located and visited
virtually
every employment bureau in London. But if any of
them had sent a Mrs. Matthew Kent, or a
Miss Dolly Stubbs for that matter, out to some
godforsaken part of the British Empire, to teach
officers" brats to parse sentences and appreciate
Wordsworth, no bureau would admit to it. She might
have dropped into the pit of hell, for all he could
learn.
He thought of the image he'd seen in the fragment of
mirrored glass. Might be well to scrape his
cheeks clean above the mat of his beard. He
rummaged in the litter of books and
correspondence, hunting for his razor case. In the
search he knocked over a small stack of letters that
included one from Gideon. It had crossed the
Atlantic on a fast United States mail
packet. The letter contained the usual family news
and a greeting that had made him feel good:
comyour old friend Strelnik sends you his regards. He
is proving to be a splendid part-time helper,
albeit several shades too "Red" for my taste.
His bare foot slid past three long letters from
Fochet. He stared at them with pensive eyes,
wondering whether the Onion was all right. Or even still
alive. Conditions were frightful in Paris these
days. Matt had realized belatedly that he and
Dolly were lucky to have gotten out when they did.
Fochet's first letter had been written immediately after the
scandalous September 2 surrender of the Imperial
forces-and the Emperor himself-at Sedan. The war so
frivolously declared by France had led to that nation's
undoing in slightly more than sixty days.
After Sedan, Louis Napoleon had been hustled
off to internment in some German fortress. The
Prussian troops had celebrated their momentous
coup by looting all available wine from homes and
cafes. Even General Phil Sheridan,
accompanying General Moltke as an oh-
server, had raised an eyebrow at the "sotted"
condition of the soldiers, Fochet said.
Well, they must have been sotted indeed if Little
Phil had been shocked. The former Union
cavalry officer, now an important man in the
U. S. military structure, was in Mart's
opinion a ruthless and foul-mouthed son of a bitch.
Of course Matt had never met him. The
impression was left over from the war.
Sometimes he was surprised at the potency of his
lingering hatred of damn Yankees. The war had been
a stupid and immoral one, and yet he
loathed the enemy generals. It was embarrassing,
unsophisticated-and forever a submerged part of him, like
the memories of Virginia that had come filtering through
his head and hands to the portrait.
According to Fochet, the Prussians hadn't been too
drunk to scream, "Nach Paris!" And General
Moltke had been only too happy to lead them.
Soon the French capital was completely encircled
and besieged. There was no means of escape save a
dangerous flight above enemy lines in a hot air
balloon.
Fochet's other two letters, sent about a month apart
by balloon post, showed the degeneration of the mood of the
Parisian populace. At the start of the siege,
Fochet sounded pugnaciously cheerful. He said there
was a spirit of ebullient patriotism in the air, and a
resulting widespread optimism despite the
city's predicament. The Paris mob had already
proclaimed the repressive Empire dead, and the
Republic reestablished. The political leader
Gambetta had successfully escaped in a
balloon basket to set up a government in
exile. The "Red" clubs-the Socialist and
anarchist groups with which Strelnik had consorted-were
pouring out a steady stream of courageous, if
whimsical, ideas for breaking the Prussian
stranglehold. One Red suggested dumping poison
into the Seine where it left Paris. Another wanted
to unleash all the animals in the city zoo.
A third submitted a design for a weapon
similar to a Gatling gun, but with an added musical
capability. The gun would lure the enemy into the open
by playing Beethoven and Schubert, and then the gunners
would blast the Prussians to pieces. The inventor
didn't bother to specify how the gun would cause the
Prussians to suspend their judgment and leave their
fortifications in order to hear the music more clearly.
By the time Fochet wrote his third letter and got it
into a pouch on one of the last balloons to leave
Paris and sail away over the enemy lines, the
earlier pugnaciously cheerful tone was gone:
-General Trochu is a lily-liver who stages
sorties which jail to break the Prussian grip.
The mob grows progressively more ugly as food
grows progressively more scarce. The bourgeois
is hated because he can afford to buy whatever he needs
on the illegal market. The petit bourgeois
grows rich because he sells the bourgeois what little
is available in his shop. Meantime the populous, those
from the dark underbelly, growl at both and
listen more attentively to agitators from the "Red"
clubs who have begun to condemn everything-the provisional
government, the Republic-everything except their own
dubious panaceas. You wonder whether I
exaggerate? Three brief examples will show you how
bad things have become. Yesterday I saw a new
shop with a sign reading "Feline and Canine
Butcher." The famous Jockey Club has begun
serving delicacies such as salmi de rats. And
last week a pundit said, "Civil war is a
few days away, famine, a few hours." Be
thankful you are not here.
But he wasn't. He wished he were back in
Paris, waltzing with Dolly at the Moulin under the
lanterns of
summer. Holding her in his arms on a night that
somehow would never pale into morning.
Just as she'd promised, he was completely free.
And unhappy most of the time.
For a few weeks after she'd gone and he'd located
the loft in Chelsea, the return of that freedom had
pleased him. He'd been filled with the excitement of
wanting to work again. Excitement had carried the
Matamoras painting to completion. Then the passion had
cooled, and old emotions had come back.
On occasion he still fell into the frenzy of complete
concentration. It had happened yesterday-all last
night-when he was finishing the portrait. But that kind
of excitement was by no means constant any longer.
Oh, he took satisfaction from work well done.
But the loft was frigid and lonesome, the bed hard and
cheerless, and he had to haunt Whistler's house or
sit hi the taverns to find a little companionship. A
man couldn't paint twenty-four hours a day.
Shivering, he studied the portrait of Dolly. were
a few daubs on canvas worth what he was going
through? Worth the chill misery of-
Loud thumping startled him.
"Matty? You in there? Are you dead drunk?
Fornicating? Answer me, for God's sake."
"Jim?"
He turned just as the door from the landing burst open.
There stood Whistler, snow melting in his handlebar
mustache and condensation fogging the monocle in his left
eye. Every time Matt saw that monocle, images of
Lepp dying flickered hi his head.
The painter fairly bounded across the loft. He always
moved as if he were in a state of agitation, and he
usually was. His friends had to accept the fact that his
temper was a bomb with a burning fuse of
unknown length. Matt well remembered one of the first
times he'd met Whistler in Paris. Whistler had
thrashed a street workman who'd spilled plaster on
him. A day later Whistler had chanced to meet his
brother-in-law, whom he disliked, and had pitched the
fellow through a plate glass window.
Whistler was strong; a diligent student of boxing.
Other men seldom got the better of him
physically. He was quick-witted, too. Judges and
prosecutors who tried to punish him for his
peccadilloes seldom got the better of him, either.
During that violent visit to Paris, he'd talked
fast and gotten off with nothing more than a small fine.
Now Whistler shook snow from his fashionable fur
collared paletot. The heavy three-quarter length
coat was sprinkled with white from top to bottom. He
took off his hat and knocked more snow from its broad
brim as he said, "Rotten day to be out, Matt.
Wouldn't have come, but this looked impor-was
He stopped, spying the portrait. He drew his
hand from within his overcoat where he'd been searching for
something. He whistled through his teeth.
"By God that's good, Matty. Insufferably good."
The compliment lifted Matt's spirits a little. He
murmured an acknowledgement as the older
man marched to the easel,
"Turn up that damn lamp, won't you?"
Matt did so Whistler dried his monocle on a
dry place on his sleeve, fitted it back under his
brow and bent close to the picture, examining the
binhvork.
"I need to do a little touch-up hers and there-was Matt
bepan.
"Hell you do." Whistler pointed with his monocle and
issued his decree. "Thai is going to the next
Royal Academy Show jury. Bet they'll
accept it, too. Now
don't argue. You know I punch out anybody who
argues with me. Hahhah!"
He barked the two syllables. Matt was accustomed
to Whistler's enjoyment of his own remarks. But some
never got used to it, and found it one more evidence of the
man's conceit.
Whistler wiggled his monocle at the background
area. "What's that stuff? Doesn't strike me
it's France."
"No, it's a bit of the Shenandoah Valley."
"Virginia?"
Matt nodded.
"Thought you were dead set against home grown
things in your pictures. Matamoras is on the
south side of the Rio Grande, after all."
"You're right, I was opposed to American
subjects- for a while. I've changed my mind.
No, I guess it's better to say that portrait
changed it for me. I've decided I can paint what
I know without being a part of it."
"Hell you can. Not and do it well."
"We'll see."
Whistler shook his head, the final word on the
subject. He rooted inside his coat again. As
he produced a crumpled envelope, he cocked his
head at the portrait:
"Got a title?"
"Just "Woman of Virginia." his
"Pretty damn prosaic."
"Well, I don't think I should exhibit it as
"former mistress of the artist." his
Whistler barked, "Hah-hah! Caught you,
Matty. You said exhibit! You know it's good!"
Mart's face reddened. "When I finished, I did
feel it was pretty f air-was
"Fair? It's more than fair, it's goddamn fine
work! Quit acting like a reluctant virgin!
Nobody'll boost your paintings if you
don't do it first. Speaking of former mistresses-was
He thrust the envelope at Matt. "The hand that
wrote this has a decided feminine slant."
Matt snatched the letter. Whistler warmed his hands at
the stove and grumped about the snow falling from the open
skylight. Matt all but forgot his visitor. On
the soiled envelope, Matthew Kent, Esq. had
been inscribed above Whistler's address. When
Matt deciphered the address of the sender, his mouth
dropped open:
"India? Is that where she went?"
"Don't ask me, sport, I didn't steam it
open. Listen, can't you afford more heat than this? Ask
your father for a bigger allowance next time you write
him."
The voice sounded miles away. Matt tore the
envelope open. He was almost afraid to unfold the
thin sheet inside, for fear there'd be terrible news.
"Don't suppose you've heard Paris is close
to capitulation," Whistler was saying as he bent from the
waist and scrutinized various sections of the
Matamoras canvas through his monocle. "Don't
suppose you care, but the Telegraph says there'll
be hell to pay. There's talk of Bismarck's
jack-booted Dutchmen staging a surrender
ceremony in the Hall of Minors, maybe. Or
parading past the Arc de Triomphe-why, the Reds
who claim the resistance was botched will have a field
day. And every excuse to take over-Matty? You
fall asleep on your feet?"
Matt whispered, "Where's Lahore in the
Punjab?"
"Northwest, I think. In the mountains. My
grasp of geography's about as complete as my
understanding of silicon. Sending you greetings from there,
is she?"
Matt nodded. His face glowed with a strange kind of
smile. Whistler didn't know what to make of it.
His young friend was either in a state of exaltation or about
to bawl.
Matt's eyes were indeed a little damp. At last
he knew the location of the military post where she was
teaching.
But he knew something far more important: 185
-Thomas Manhew: Kent came into the world with no
difficulty on Christmas Day, He was early
by almost a month but shows no ill effects and, oh
dear Matt, I do think he already resembles you. You
will think so too, one day when the time is right, and you
see him-
But when would that be? Months? Years?
"What's that silly grin mean, Matty? It's from
Dolly, isn't it?"
"Yes, it is."
"What's it about?"
Wanting to dance for joy, he grinned and handed the letter
to his friend. Almost as if he were making a joke, he
said, "Immortality."
For once the dapper artist was caught short. He
scanned a line or two. "Oh, I see.
Guess congratulations are in order. You've got a
bastard running around-was
This time it wasn't embarrassment that made Matt
redden. "He's my legal son, Jiin. Dolly
and I are still married."
"Oh, sorry. No offense. Just don't get
carried away," He pointed at the portrait.
"That's the only sort of immortality that matters,
you know."
Less angrily but with complete conviction, Matt
answered, "You're wrong. She taught me that much."
Bui when will I see her again? And when will I see
my son? He vowed he would somehow do both.
He put his arm around his friend. "Let me get
dressed and then we'll go have something
to drills, My treat."
"My Lord, it's only ten m the morning! On the
other hand, it's damn fine weather for finding a snug
fire and drinking a snootfuLike"
"Sure is."
Matt's voice broke when he thought of all she'd
given 186
him. The freedom to think-to create-without
responsibility. She'd given him her love. And
one other priceless gift every man wanted, deep in
some timeless center of himself, when he began to think of the
generations that would live after he went to the dark.
All at once he beamed. He sounded almost giddy
with happiness.
"I can paint a damn picture any day of the
week. But it isn't every day I have a son."
Interlude
"And thou shaft smite the Midianites as one
man"
ON THE FIRST warm weekend in June of the same
year, the Reverend Jephtha Kent relinquished his
pulpit to his assistant and traveled down to Long
Branch to open the summer house. It was usually
referred to as a cottage. The term was applied
to all the homes along that increasingly
fashionable section of the New Jersey shore, even
the most opulent mansion.
The Kent house was no mansion; it had a mere seven
rooms. It stood about a hundred yards back from the
high tide line, facing the ocean. It occupied the
south end of a row of cottages, and was by far the
smallest of them.
Jephtha had bought the place three years earlier,
in 1868, feeling that his second wife Molly
needed a refuge from the stench and clamor of New
York summers. Although his duties as a Methodist
pastor kept him in town during most of the warm
weather, there was no need for Molly to suffer or
to risk her health and perhaps her rife. All the
medical experts agreed disease was carried by the
miasmas-the odors of garbage and waste that reached
their ripest point in July and August.
On this particular weekend, Molly had decided
at the last moment to stay behind. She was suffering from a
bad spring cold. She'd asked her husband to be
sure to hire someone to help him with the work. One of the
local boys he'd engaged a couple of times before.
He murmured vague replies as he left, not
lying but not exactly saying he would, either.
Molly worried because Jephtha had been
having some pains in his chest for the past couple of
years. She'd finally pushed him into visiting a
doctor. The physician had delivered a tedious
lecture warning him to avoid undue exertion and the
cigars which he admitted he puffed on the sly.
Thus her concern over his doing manual work at the
summer house was understandable. But when he reached Long
Branch, his basically thrifty nature asserted
itself and he decided not to hire a helper. It was
foolish to squander money that way; money was too hard
to come by. At certain times Jephtha Kent was
wholly unable to comprehend and accept his status as a
millionaire many times over. The weekend was one
such time.
He moved most of the summer furniture to the front
veranda all by himself. Then, after nipping inside
to smoke half of a good Havana, he began taking
down the shutters. First the ones at ground level,
then those on the upper story. The longer he worked,
feeling only minimally winded, the more convinced he
became that Molly's fears were groundless, and the
doctor's warnings merely the duckings of a
professional hen. Except for the occasional pains
he experienced-severe enough, all right, but not very
frequent-he felt fit.
He looked it, too. At fifty-one, despite
the streaks of white in his long, straight black
hair, he fooled many people into believing he was five
or ten years younger. His parishioners joked about him
resembling an Indian, and for good reason. His mother
had been a fine Shoshoni woman named Grass
Singing.
As he was removing a second floor shutter, the
pain swept over him suddenly. Constricted his chest;
crushed it, as though a heavy weight had been
dropped on him.
His ears rang. He heard the hissing surf with
unusual 192
clarity. Smelled the salt spray with unusual
intensity. He swayed on the ladder, eight feet
above the ground.
He dropped the shutter but barely heard it thump in
the weedy sand. He bent forward, clutching a rung
to keep from rumbling off. Although he was frightened,
prosaic thoughts flashed through his mind.
You can't do this. Murch is only expecting to take
over for one week, and you know he hates preaching. The
Reverend Murch was his assistant pastor.
Finally the pain and then his fright passed. He managed
to make his way down to the ground. He stood
leaning against the ladder, breathing without the tight feeling
under his breastbone or the spotty numbness in his left
arm.
Three small girls, ten or less, went
scampering past the front of the house and on down the
beach. They were carrying wooden buckets for crabbing.
Their laughter faded. Then out of the sunny haze to the
south came drumming hoofbeats. Jephtha saw a
light, two-wheeled trap approaching. The mane
of a splendid bay horse stood straight out in the
wind.
The driver wore a plug hat and duster. A cigar
jutted from his mouth. A trail of smoke faded
away behind him. Slowly his face took on
definition.
The man was in his late forties, with a graying chestnut
beard and mustache, and a wart on his right cheek that
became visible at closer range. His shoulders were
slightly stooped, a trait of those who'd spent a
great deal of time on horseback.
Jephtha had met the man at a small reception
given last June by one of the wealthier summer
residents, the Philadelphia newspaper
publisher George Childs. Jephtha had found the
guest of honor a painfully shy man, and
was somewhat surprised now when the man lifted his
plug hat to acknowledge that he recognized
Jephtha.
The trap went racing on up the beach, hidden by the

veranda. Coming as it did on top of the pain, the sudden
appearance of President Ulysses S. Grant
put Jephtha Kent in an exceedingly bad mood.
ii
President Grant had chosen Long Branch as his
family's summer retreat. The sight or the thought
of him usually depressed Jephtha. Of course he
was somewhat ashamed of the reaction, but there was good reason
for it
Theo Payne was the alcoholic editor-in-chief of
The New York Union, the daily paper that was
now back in the family along with Kent and Son,
Boston, and Payne said Grant was unquestionably
lost in the labyrinths of Washington politics:
"He's an honest man and expects others to be
honest, which is part of his trouble. He's constitutionally
unable to distinguish between true friends and favor-seekers
who just flatter him. He's the wrong man for the hour.
We need a chief executive who's a schemer-or
at least can recognize one-because scheming's
the style down by the Potomac. Do you know what the
cynics call the capital now? The auction room.
Every man or woman with his or her price. Every one of
them peddling something. Votes, influence, contracts,
honor, physical favors-and the whole country's
starting to get into the same spirit."
Jephtha trudged around to the veranda. The slight
effort tired him, which was both unusual and annoying.
He picked up a book from a chair where he intended
to do some reading later. He sat down with a loud sigh.
It depressed him that he had so little faith in the
current administration, since it had come into office
on an almost unprecedented floodtide of
optimism.
Grant's campaign slogan had been, "Let us
have peace." People had expected him to end
Republican
factionalism and the political torment generated by the
programs and personality of Andrew Johnson.
People had expected him to set new, higher standards of
morality in government. People had expected him to run
a vigorous, effective administration because his war
record proved he knew how to choose able
lieutenants and put them to work. Grant would do this,
Grant would do that, Grant would do everything
and do it superbly.
We Americans do have an unfortunate talent for
expecting our chief executives to be kin to the
Almighty, he thought. I'm as guilty as the next
that way.
And, like millions of others, he had been cruelly
disappointed by Grant's performance to date.
No one doubted the personal integrity of the
Union's greatest hero. But Grant's judgment was
in question only weeks after his election. He'd packed
his cabinet with cronies and incompetent party
hacks. Theo Payne maintained there were only two
first-class men in major administration posts,
Jake Cox of Ohio who headed the Interior
Department, and Hamilton Fish of New York,
the Secretary of State.
Last autumn the President's judgment had
become even more suspect. Jay Gould, a man
who had entertained the President socially, had
nearly cornered the United States gold market
with the connivance of Grant's own brother-in-law, a
lobbyist named Abel Corbin. At the last moment
the President had been alerted to the scheme and had
ordered Treasury Secretary Boutwell to sell
government gold to break Gould's comer. But
the national consciousness still held the memory of
Black Friday, when the price of gold
plummeted and speculators who'd followed
Gould's lead were wiped out. Grant had not been
shrewd enough to detect the plot on his own.
Lately it seemed to Jephtha that Theo Payne's
remark about the auction room was right. It seemed to
him that a trend toward dishonesty was accelerating- and
rapidly-everywhere from legislative chambers
to private board rooms. But what supposedlv
concerned the President most? According to Pavne and his
equally sarcastic colleagues, two things. Keeping
French cuisine off the White House table, and people
who told off-color stories out of his presence.
Lincoln's fondness for outhouse humor had been
an all but unbearable cross for General Grant.
Now, as President, he still knew a great deal about
blooded horses, purebred bulldogs and quality
cigars. He seemed to know little or nothing about how
to control spoilsmen. Especially those in his own
Republican party.
Of course corruption wasn't confined to the
Republicans. Anyone who lived under the control
of the Tammany Democrats and their grand sachem,
William March Tweed, krjew that. For
years, New York City and New York County
had been bonanzas of boodle. The common council
to which Tweed had first been elected had been
jocularly referred to as The Forty Thieves. And that
was in 1851.
Under the genial Boss Tweed political swindling
had been refined to an art, made possible because of the
immense power Tweed had acquired. He dominated
Democratic politics not only in the county but in
the state. His hand-picked men occupied the
governor's mansion and the chair of the speaker of the
Assembly. He himself was a state senator, and it
was said that nothing of consequence happened in Albany
unless it was first approved in the Boss's
seven-room suite there.
But he kept his local positions, too.
Commissioner of the New York city schools.
Assistant commissioner of streets. President of the
board of supervisors. Using all his offices
to advantage, Tweed and his cronies had mined a
veritable Golconda of graft.
The extent of that mining operation had lately been

revealed in the Times, with some support from the Herald
and the Union. Theo Payne was contemptuous
of the small number of newspapers willing to attack
the Boss. Payne said that the silence of at least
89 other papers in the state, both dailies and
weeklies, had been bought with fat advertising
contracts arranged by Tweed.
Still, certain papers had begun to print documentation of
Tweed's crimes. Appalling documentation. It
seemed the Boss and his "ring" had really begun
to function on a truly grand scale two years
earlier. The ring's other members were City
Chamberlain Peter Sweeney, Comptroller
Richard Connolly, and Mayor Oakley Hall.
In '69, they had apparently decreed that every
invoice rendered to the city or county had to be
fraudulently inflated by fifty percent.
Lately, it was said, the amount was up to an incredible
eighty-five percent. The boodle was divided
five ways-one fifth to each of the four ring leaders,
with the final one fifth going for assorted political
payoffs and favors.
The scope of Tweed's thievery would have been amusing
if it weren't so appalling, Jephtha thought. The
Boss had long since become a Murray Hill
millionaire. He maintained a law office he
seldom visited, but prestigious clients
such as Jay Gould of the Erie paid the firm huge
sums just to assure then-right to do business locally.
Railroads, insurance and ferry companies were
required to patronize a printing house in which
Tweed owned an interest. The Boss had become a
director of numerous street railway and gas
transmission companies without investing a cent of his
own money.
And if the newspaper revelations were true, the ring's
masterpiece, and its biggest source of revenue, was
the new county court house being built of marble
supplied by a Massachusetts quarry owned by-who
else?-the Boss. The town was still agog over one
story concerning court house graft. It had been
documented that a plas-
terer named Garvey had routinely submitted bills
for wages of $50,000 a day-and been paid. Mr.
Garvey, this "prince of plasterers" as the crusading
editors called him, had earned a total of
$2,807,464.06 in a single season of work! It was
assumed that he shared most of his wealth with the ring.
Now, however, a shamed public was beginning
to respond to the Times stories, and to Thomas
Nast's relentless cartooning in Harper's
Weekly. There was talk of a mass meeting
to demand legal action. It looked as if Bill
Tweed's heyday might be coming to an end. But that
didn't spell the end of local corruption,
Tephtha was sure. It would continue to flourish with
greater subtlety and less flagrant disregard for the
law.
Jephtha's pessimism veered hi a new
direction as he fingered the book in his lap. It was
one of his favorites. Innocents Abroad, the
surprise best seller of 1869. The author was a
young Missouri born journalist who was giving
Artemus Ward stiff competition on the lecture
platform. He wrote under the name Mark Twain, a
term Mississippi river boatmen used for calling
out the depth of water.
More than slightly irreverent, Mr. Twain.
Amusing, though. Jephtha couldn't have admitted it
to his congregation, but he relished Twain's comment about
the arid Holy Land:
"No Second Advent-Christ has been here
once and will never come again."
Why hi thunder couldn't Kent and Son publish
authors of Mr. Twain's obvious talent? He
knew the answer. The editor and general manager,
Dana Hughes, was a solid
craftsman. But he lacked imagination and nerve.
The Boston book company needed a strong hand and a
bold mind to direct it. The Union needed the
same thing, because Theo Payne wouldn't live forever
comespecially not at the rate he consumed whiskey.
What the family properties needed was a young
fam-198
ily member in charge! Alas, there was no Kent
to shoulder the responsibility.
Matt was living the dubious life of a Bohemian
in London. One of his pictures had been
accepted by the British Royal Academy for its
annual exhibition, but that success was balanced by a
personal loss. In one of his wretchedly spelled
letters, he'd reported in a casual way that he and
his wife had brokin up. Where Dolly was now,
Matt didn't say, but the news of an apparent
divorce distressed Jephtha greatly.
And Gideon-well, that was even sadder. Thanks
to God-given intelligence, a bent for
self-improvement, and the encouragement of his wife
Margaret who had helped him learn to read and understand
difficult material, then write down his own thoughts
in acceptable prose, Jephtha Kent's oldest
son definitely had the ability to guide
one or both of the family businesses which had been
repurchased from Louis Kent's estate after his death
in '68. Unfortunately, Gideon wasn't
interested in the daily paper or the publishing house.
After the war, he'd worked for a short time as a
switchman in the Erie Railroad yards over in
Jersey City. During a winter storm, a good friend
of his had died in a work related accident. Gideon
had seen the effect of the tragedy on his friend's
family. He'd also seen how reluctant the Erie
owners were to pay so much as a penny of post-mortem
benefits. Gideon had finally forced a payment from the
railroad, and ever since, the tragic accident and the
indifference of the bosses had influenced and directed his
life. All he cared about was the cause Of the working
man.
A worthy cause, certainly. But narrow.
Dangerous, on occasion. And almost universally
scorned. Jephtha had never grown accustomed
to hearing his own son sneered at as a Red or an
anarchist.
Now Gideon was busy editing a little labor
newspaper which he'd started with an advance from his
inheri-
tance. Only a relative handful of
railroad workers read Labor's Beacon, but
Gideon seemed unperturbed. In a way,
Jephtha was proud of his son for following his
conscience; the best of the Kents always did. At the
same time, he also hated to see his son squander his
talent. By taking a position with the Union or even
with Kent and Son, Gideon could promote many
worthwhile causes, not just one. He could reach and
influence many millions of people, not just two or three
hundred. And if ever there was a time in which the country
desperately needed men of conviction and principle
who were willing to speak out, it was now.
ui
Jephtha's mood persisted throughout the weekend, as
he went to worship at a Long Branch church and
then returned to the house and threw himself into finishing the
spring chores. He got most of them done, leaving
only the remaining shutters to be taken down by the boy
he hired on the way to the depot on Monday
morning.
As he climbed the steps of the coach of the Raritan and
Delaware Railroad, the pain struck him again.
The conductor leaped forward to steady him.
"Sir, are you all right?"
Obviously he wasn't, but he was too
short of breath to reply. He clutched the hand rail
and dragged himself up into the vestibule, then inside.
He collapsed on a hard wooden seat in the
grimy car. The pain persisted for the first twenty
minutes of the northbound trip. It had never lasted so
long. Never. He was terrified.
When it finally passed, his thoughts focused again on his
own mortality. And on the family. The brightest
spot in the whole picture was the presence of
Michael Boyle, the Irishman who'd served
Amanda Kent so faithfully as a clerk and
surrogate son.
After Jephtha's youngest boy, Jeremiah, had been
lost in the war, he had prayed and pondered and finally
willed Jeremiah's share of the California fortune
to Michael. He had never once regretted it. The
Irishman had immediately taken Kent as his legal
middle name, and he was a better member of the family
than someone like the deceased Louis had ever been.
Still, Michael would never play an active role in
making the Kent family useful to society on a
broad scale. The Irishman was hundreds of
miles to the west, permanently settled in the town of
Cheyenne, in the Wyoming Territory.
He was married to a fine young woman named
Hannah, the daughter of a German immigrant.
They were raising a family and managing an expanding
chain of general merchandise stores along the Union
Pacific route. Recently they'd begun to branch
out into feeding and finishing Texas beef cattle for the
Eastern market.
The Boyles did their share to better conditions around
them. Hannah had helped raise money to start a
new church in Cheyenne. She'd also worked on a
committee which had helped make Wyoming the first state
or territory to grant women the right to vote. That
had happened in 1869.
Michael was Cheyenne's volunteer fire warden,
and a member of a club called the Men's Literary
Association. He was astute, industrious-the
perfect paradigm of a prosperous townsman.
Jephtha knew Gideon resented Michael because
he wasn't a Kent, and perhaps because he was so
successful, too. The gulf between the younger men was
another disappointment to which Jephtha had resigned
himself.
Presently a slight pain returned. He began
to have difficulty drawing deep breaths. To keep his
mind off the implications of that, he opened the Bible
he always carried in the pocket of his fusty
black coat and immersed himself in the search for a text
for next Sun
And 1 brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the
fruit thereof and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered, ye
defiled my land, and made mine heritage an
abomination.
An overstatement of the immorality beginning to pervade
the nation? He didn't think so.
He knew he mustn't blind himself to positive
aspects. In many ways, he and all Americans
were living in an undisputed age of miracles.
The transcontinental railroad, the wonder of the
century, had been finished at Promontory,
Utah, in '69 with the driving of four commemorative
spikes-two of gold, one of silver, and a fourth
made of gold, silver and iron-into a special
tie of polished laurel. Another spike,
ordinary iron but wired into the national telegraph
system, was hit with a maul to tell the world the oceans
had been joined. Now the line from Omaha
to Sacramento was carrying passengers and freight on
a regular basis.
Petroleum oil to light and heat homes was surging
from the ground in Pennsylvania. Bonanzas of
silver were being torn from the earth in the far
west, and bumper crops were ripening on prosperous
farms all across the great mid-continent.
Manufactories were churning out marvels of
technical ingenuity. Out in Chicago, a city whose
tenfold growth in recent years showed the steady
ascendancy of the middlewest. McCormick's
reaper factory could barely keep pace with orders.
A meat packer named Gustavus Swift was
reportedly developing a refrigerated rail car
that would make long distance shipment of dressed beef and
produce feasible at last. And only two weeks
ago, Molly had told him about one more Chicago
chap who'd patented a suction cleaning device he
claimed would revo-
lutionize the mundane chores of housekeeping. A
"vacuum cleaner," the fellow called it.
The miracles were numerous and by no means confined
to his native land. The great canal of Suez was
now open, materially shortening the passage to India.
Cyrus Field's Atlantic cable was in operation,
carrying telegraph messages beneath the sea all the
way to Europe. Such developments had forced
Jephtha to conclude that America could not forever
isolate herself from world problems.
And there were problems. Pestilence still ravaged
Asia. Political butchery still reddened the cobbled
streets of the Continent. The worst excesses of
recent years had taken place hi Paris this very
spring. After the fall of the city, the Prussian
conquerors had imposed humiliating peace terms before
withdrawing. When the Prussians were gone, the
radical elements in Paris reacted-violently.
They screamed of incompetence on the part of their own
officials, and of betrayal to the enemy. They
overthrew the recently formed Republic and
proclaimed a new city government called the
Commune.
The Commune had controlled Paris for about sixty
days. In May the established political machine
headed by Adolphe Thiers and operating out of
Versailles had sent French troops against French
citistens. The Paris Commune had been overthrown
with such savagery- so many mass executions-that the
country might bear the scars for a century, just as the
United States would probably bear the scars of
its own civil war.
And certainly the labor radicals would never forget
the inspiration of that brief time when the flags of the
Commune had flown over the Hotel de Ville.
Nor, despite their own bloody
excesses, would they forgive the ruthless extermination
of the men and women who had helped raise the solid
red banners.
The old men-Jephtha's generation-had consis-203
tently blundered. In the United States, they'd
wracked the land with a war of unbelievable ferocity, and
botched the peace-making afterward. They had carried out a
holy crusade to end black bondage and preserve
the Union, and had sunk into the squalor of
profiteering from the very first day. To make black men and
women full citizens, they had passed postwar
laws and damned and vilified one another as they did
it. They had made pirates like Pierpont
Morgan respected members of the best clubs, and
tried to hound a well-meaning if sometimes misguided
President out of office. They had smashed the
machine of democracy and rebuilt it without one of
its worst flaws-the inhuman slave system- and in
the process they had somehow lost their own souls.
The nation, and the world, needed the leadership of a new
generation of strong, moral young men. What was the
prospect for the future if America's best
political mind belonged to a Grant, and its most
successful entrepreneur was a John
Rockefeller? Out in Cleveland, the young
Baptist businessman, nicknamed the Deacon, was
building an oil refining monopoly. The son of a
quack who peddled bogus cancer cures, Deacon
Rockefeller apparently saw no conflict whatever
between the teachings of Christ, which he studied diligently
at an adult Sunday School each week, and
driving competitors to the wall with every dishonest
economic trick at his disposal. No one seemed
especially concerned, or even conscious of the
doctrinal paradox. Sometimes Jephtha thought he was
the one who was out of step. Or crazy.
The times cried out for new young leaders brave enough
to light lanterns of truth in the darkness rapidly
covering the land. In that darkness, Jephtha heard
certain dominant sounds.
The cynical laughter of lawless men who
manipulated or ruined others.
The rustle of currency and stock certificates.
The clink of gold.
Why couldn't Gideon see the darkness falling? Why
couldn't he realize he could help roll it back?
Would he be forever content to publish a shabby little sheet
dealing with just one small segment of the problem?
Pondering those questions ruined Jephtha's concentration and
put him in an utterly bleak mood by the
time he reached the city via a ferry boat which
crossed the North River and docked at the foot of
Murray Street.
Just before the boat bumped against the pier, he
remembered something from Scripture. Filled with a
sudden and soaring excitement, he located the
passage. He bracketed it with his pencil. Then
he wrote on a slip of paper and tucked it hi
to mark the page.
What he'd recalled was a particular verse from the
sixth chapter of Judges. A verse that pertained
to the role he thought his son could and should take in the
world. Better than anything in Jephtha's own words,
it conveyed his vision of his son's potential, and it
clarified in precise language the
responsibility that went with being a Kent
It was a responsibility for leadership. Somehow,
he must begin to make Gideon understand that.
Using the verse as his guide, he needed to have some long
talks with his son. And he needed to do it soon. The
prospect was exhilarating.
He drew a deep breath without difficulty and
joined the passengers leaving the pier. In just a few
moments he'd been filled with a renewed sense of
purpose and a heightened, almost heady
confidence. That was God's spirit moving, he thought in an
awed way. A smile spread over his face as he
walked.
He'd taken nine or ten steps along Murray
Street when he dropped the Bible, clawed at his
coat, gasped for air and fell dead.
Presently Jephtha was identified. Through
Molly, his son was summoned to take charge of the
body. Gideon broke down and wept when he saw
his father's corpse lying on a mahogany bar under the
gaslights of a Tenth Avenue saloon, just around the
corner from the ferry pier.
He sent a boy off into the summer night to fetch an
undertaker's wagon. The barkeep said, was Twas the
owner, Mr. Callahan, who reached him first We
felt we should move him inside."
"I'm obliged to you."
The barkeep handed over Jephtha's effects
wrapped hi a handkerchief. "You might be wanting
to keep these safe." He gave Gideon the Bible.
"This too, It's plain he was a God-fearing
man."
"He was a preacher."
"Oh. Protestant, then-was
"Yes."
"Well, it's all the same in the Lord's sight,
I suppose," the barkeep said with a shy smile of
condolence. He went off to wait on his subdued
customers.
Gideon noticed a slip of paper protruding from
a page in the Old Testament. He opened the Bible
and pulled out the paper. There was something written on
it, hi his father's hand:
Speak to G.
He saw a verse marked in pencil. He read it
once, then again:
And the Lord said unto him, Surely I will be with thee,
and thou shalt smite the Midianites as "one
man.
What in the world was his father getting at? What had he
meant by bracketing that particular verse in which God
encouraged the Biblical Gideon?
The eerie sensation continued there in the badly lit
saloon whose customers remained quiet in the
presence of death. Gideon was certain his father had
wanted to speak to him about some symbolism he saw in
the verse from Judges. But the essence of the message
eluded him. He gazed at the still, suntanned
face. Suddenly he exclaimed in frustration:
"What is it?"
Heads turned. He paid no attention. Gideon
felt that, in his ignorance, he'd failed his father.
"What did you mean to say to me? What did you
mean?"
Book Two Gideon's Cause
Night Attack
SOMETIMES IT ASTONISHED Gideon Kent that a
transplanted Reb could love New York with such
fervor. But he had come to love it-the squalor
along with the splendor.
He loved the racket of streets such as lower
Third Avenue, where he and Sime Strelnik were
walking now, just at twilight on a sultry evening
in September, 1871. The sidewalks were packed
with pedestrians chattering in English, Gaeh'c,
German, Italian, Yiddish, and several
dialects he couldn't even begin to recognize. The
avenue was filled with drays and private vehicles
of the sort that made Manhattan one huge traffic
jam six days a week. At intersections,
telegraph lines leading uptown and crosstown
laid black grids against the reddening sky.
Gideon loved New York's raucous energy and the
way the city somehow conveyed a feeling that here, indeed,
was the place where the nation conducted most of
its important business. He loved the beauty of the
city's splendidly dressed women and the
knock-you-down brashness of its young men on the rise.
His affection even included acceptance, or at least
tolerance, of certain unsavory aspects: air that
reeked of garbage and sewage; hogs that ran
squealing on some of the main thoroughfares; sad,
sullen slums filled with thousands of men and women
too illiterate or too thwarted and weary to rise
in the world. That kind of blight needed to be excised.
Yet sometimes it seemed almost inseparable from the great
mural that was New York.
Gideon loved the city's enthusiasm for innovation,
typified by the three year old West Side
Elevated Railroad which connected Battery
Place to Thirtieth Street via Ninth Avenue,
and by the great bridge whose first granite piers had
been sunk the preceding year. When the bridge was
finally completed-fifteen years was the shortest
estimate of the time that would be required-it would span the
East River from Park Row to Brooklyn. The
idea itself was impressive. But even more than engineer
John Roebling's concept, Gideon liked the
execution of that concept. Roebling intended to keep the
span clean and functional, free of the
ornamentation which disfigured so many public projects.
There was much in New York City that was cheap and
meretricious, but Roebling's bridge
to Brooklyn was lasting proof that-on
occasion-imagination and excellence could carry the day.
Gideon had become enough of a New Yorker
to believe that no other city in the United States
could begin to appreciate-or build-such a marvel.
One recent innovation he didn't care for was the
paper tube filled with tobacco which dangled from the
lips of his companion. Sime Strelnik had all
but given up cigars in favor of the cigarettes that were
just catching on in America. Gideon knuckled his
blue right eye, coughed and pointed at the cigarette.
"I'm a believer in foreign commerce, Sime. But
by God that's one European import we can do
without." At twenty-eight, Gideon still had the soft
accents of Virginia. He walked with the
unconscious swagger of a cavalryman. A leather
patch covered his blind left eye. He'd lost the
eye while locked up in a Yank prison during
the war.
Although Gideon was Strelnik's employer, the little
Russian was seldom intimidated by him. "My
boy, don't be provincial. The whole
country will be puffing these before long." But he did
switch the cigarette to the op
posite side of his mouth. "Besides, you're changing the
subject."
At Timilty's Twelfth Street Saloon,
they'd eaten a cheap supper of oysters and beer before
starting back to the office. They'd been arguing about the
basic thrust of the labor movement. Strelnik was a
disciple of Marx and carried a card in the
International. Those credentials plus his experiences
in Europe tended to make him pontificate.
"Reformism is failing all over the world.
Correction. It has already failed. Can you deny
that?"
Gideon shook his head. In America, the three
major reform movements of the 1840's and "50's
had lost their vigor and most of their spokesmen as
well. The cooperators were gone; they had tried
to create small industrial plants owned by those who
did the work. The associationists-ideological
disciples of the Frenchman, Fourier comwere largely
gone along with their plan for creating a sense of
mutual need between workers and employers. And the foremost
proponent of agrarianism, George Henry
Evans, was dead. His scheme to divide
all the free land in the West among the working class
had never been realized, although his Congressional
lobbying had led directly to the 1862 Homestead
Act giving 160 acres to any man who would
occupy and cultivate it.
All three movements had been well intentioned but
contrary to the flow of the times. They were meant to help
workers caught in the harsh realities of the expanding
industrial system escape from that system.
Reformism proposed to substitute life in a
pastoral experimental community such as Brook
Farm for the day-today struggle hi a factory. Now,
most men actively involved in promoting working
men's rights had redirected their thinking. The new
approach was rooted hi reality. It said that
to survive in the modern world,
workers had to accept and deal with industrialism and
industrial bosses.
"Revolution's the only answer," Strelnik
insisted. "The trade union movement is failing,
too, and our paper should be honest enough to say it straight
out!"
"Failing, Sime? I don't agree. The
movement has three hundred thousand members!" They
crossed at an intersection. Gideon
fended oSo a chestnut seller who nearly ran him
down with a pushcart. A drayman blocked by a
police van swore elegant oaths.
Strelnik scoffed at the point just made: "And the first
tune there's a slowdown in production-the first time
there's a panic or a depression-they'll quit the
unions to scramble for available jobs. And in those
jobs, promising not to belong to a union will be a
condition of employment. All the bosses understand what
Jay Gould meant when he said, "I can hire one
half of the working class to kill the other half." his
True enough, Gideon knew. One of the major
problems confronting the movement was a lack of unity
and unanimity. The National Labor Union, a
loose confederation of trade and craft locals,
eight hour leagues, and groups of last-ditch
reformers, had been founded in 1866 with the idea of
presenting a common front on behalf of all. It
hadn't worked. Craftsmen saw themselves as superior
to unskilled laborers. Some workers were against
admitting European immigrants- greenhorns,
as they were called-to their unions. Almost all
opposed the admission of blacks.
Strelnik grew excited, thoughtlessly waving the
cigarette in Gideon's face. "I
tell you, one of these days you're going to learn a hard
lesson! There's only one way to deal with the
bosses, and that's ruthlessly. You'll end up doing
that, mark my word. The bosses will drive you to it."
"That's nonsense," Gideon began, but the little man
bowled right by the objection.
"They will, Gideon. They'll exhaust your
patience, your sense of fair play, your
strength-everything. They have every resource on their side.
Wealth. Public opinion. The willingness to play
the hypocrite-why, you know they don't abide by the
law, but they always pretend you must. That's the way they
gain their biggest advantage! How can you even
suggest it's otherwise when American workers are still
subject to arrest under conspiracy laws if they so
much as mention a strike?"
"Sime, if that happens, the arresting officers and the
courts that uphold them are breaking the law. The
idea that a strike is a criminal conspiracy was
thrown out in 1842! The case of Commonwealth of
Massachusetts versus Hunt specifically
prohibited-was
Strelnik interrupted with a rude sound that made
Gideon laugh in spite of his annoyance.
"Gideon, I've only been in this
country since last year. But don't try to tell
me the conspiracy weapon is never used."
"Of course it's used by dishonest judges."
"My very point! The bosses are hand in glove with
government-especially the courts. We both know it."
Gideon didn't argue. His companion was right.
They turned down Fourteenth to the loft near the East
River where Labor's Beacon was written and put
together twice monthly.
"In fact," Strelnik continued, "the courts are
the very instruments by which the owners-and the damned middle
class, for that matter-let it be known that they have a
strong opinion of the labor movement. Namely-was
He stuck out his thumb and inverted his hand.
"I'll tell you one reason that's true,"
Gideon retorted. "The public perceives those hi
the movement as a pack of mad dogs. They reckon
we all want to follow Karl Marx's program,
and they certainly assume we're the spiritual heirs
of the Commune."
"Most of us are, most of us are!"
Gideon shook his head. "Not I." 215
There was mock ferocity in Strelnik's voice:
"Then why have you got an avowed Communard working for you,
may I ask?"
"Because you're blessed with a beautiful wife and a handsome
son, and no self-respecting Southerner would permit
nice folks like that to starve. Also because my brother
wrote a fine letter of introduction in which he said you were
mostly bark and not much bite."
The teasing infuriated Strelnik, who hated to be
revealed as anything less than a practicing
revolutionary. More soberly, Gideon went on:
"Besides, I like to have you around because your ideas help me
crystallize mine. Listening to you, I've decided
what I really think about the Commune." He wasn't
teasing when he added, "It was a disaster."
"I object! That's the uninformed opinion of-was
"Uninformed, hell. The Thiers government may have
committed murder when the Commune was overthrown -"
"They did!"
"Let me finish, will you? The Communards resorted
to murder first. To me it makes no difference that the
Commune killed fewer than the Tbiers crowd. Or
for a supposedly noble purpose. They resorted
to murder so they're equally guilty. But even if the
Communards were morally immaculate, I still don't
believe in their program. I believe in
capital, and property, and making a profit so long
as you don't exploit others to do it. I
believe workers can win their rights within the system. I
don't believe they must tear it down. Resort
to burning and butchery-was
"Wrong," Strelnik declared. Gideon started
to argue, but their arrival at the narrow doorway of the
loft building put an end to the dispute.
Well, no matter. It would continue another time.
Arguing was a fundamental part of their relationship, and
in just a few months Gideon had grown quite ac
customed to it. In fact it was like the wretched stenches
that permeated the city: something that would be instantly
missed if it were suddenly removed.
He disagreed with virtually every point Strelnik had
made. He most especially disagreed with
Strelnik's prediction that he would one day become
so embittered that he would resort to violence.
Violence was no stranger, to be sure. Sometimes, as
a matter of survival, he had to resort to it
to defend himself against hooligans hired to disrupt his
speeches to workers' groups. But an act of revenge
against one of the bosses? An act of revenge brought
on by failure and frustration?
Unthinkable.
A dark stair led up to the third floor of the
commercial-building in which Gideon had
rented two rooms now crammed with old
furniture, papers and books. The building was
silent. All the other offices had emptied for the
night.
On the solid door facing the landing, the words
Labor's Beacon glowed in gilt. The words were
separated by a drawing of a switchman's lantern
shooting its beam right and left. The lantern appeared
on the paper's masthead as well. Having the name and
symbol done in gold had been Gideon's one
extravagance when taking the quarters.
He touched a match to a lamp wick, then raised a
window to let out the smoke already accumulating.
Strelnik returned from checking something in the other
room, where he kept his desk. He lit a
second cigarette from the stub of the one in his hand as
Gideon sat down at his own cluttered desk.
Among the scribbled sheets of foolscap, old
proofs, invoices, he saw his father's Bible. He
frowned. The
Jephtha Kent had been buried in the family
plot at the small cemetery in Watertown,
Massachusetts. The message he'd meant
to convey by means of the Bible verse still eluded
Gideon. He had gotten over the worst
of the grief associated with Jephtha's death, but he
hadn't gotten over the sense of having failed his
father.
To Gideon's left, the wall was covered with bits
of paper-ideas, quotations, notes to himself, and a few
overdue bills-all hanging from nails. Some of the
items were there to remind him to mention and promote
certain ideas on a regular basis. One such was
an eight hour work day. The campaign to reduce the
working day had been spearheaded by a Boston machinist
named Ira Steward; a self-educated man, as
Gideon was. Some anonymous poet had put the
economic justification for the eight hour day into a
piece of doggerel, and it was this which Gideon had
jotted down and stuck on a nailhead.
Whether you work by piece or work by day, Decreasing the
hours increases the pay.
Some items were displayed on the wall because they
expressed his personal credo far more succinctly
than he could. At its 1869 meeting, a small
group of delegates to the National Labor Union
had enunciated its policy of favoring equality
among all working men in the form of an address to the
convention. The majority of the delegates had refused
to endorse the policy by resolution.
Gideon had saved a key portion of the address because
he agreed with it
What is wanted Li for every union to help
inculcate
the grand enabling idea that the interests of labor
are one; that there should be no distinction of race
or nationality; no classification of Jew or
Gentile;
Christian or infidel; that there is one dividing
line, that which separates mankind into two great
classes, the class that labors and the class that
lives by others' labor.
And on a bent nail there was one piece of paper which
was Gideon's source of encouragement whenever he was
damned as a lunatic and got to wondering whether the
battle was worth it.
"Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They
may be beaten, but they may start a winning game."
-Goethe
Strelnik puffed his cigarette, awaiting
instructions. Finally Gideon said, "What's left
to do this evening? I mean besides the impossible task of
convincing me that I'll one day be driven to knock the
brains out of some capitalist?"
Soberly, Strelnik said, "Don't
laugh; you will be."
Gideon stopped smiling. Often there was a curious,
sanguinary streak in his assistant's conversation.
Strelnik even hinted that he and Matt had been
mixed up in some political trouble in Paris, right
before the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian war, and that
the trouble was the reason the Strelniks, Matt and
Dolly had fled to London. Gideon hadn't had
a chance to ask Matt about it, since his brother could not
be home for Jephtha's funeral.
Gideon had sent a message to Matt on the new
Atlantic cable. It was shamefully expensive-the
minimum charge was $100-2 fifteen words a minute
could be transmitted via Newfoundland to the receiving
station in Ireland. In the message, Gideon had
urged his brother not to feel he must instantly embark
for Amer-
ica; even the fastest ship would barely be underway by the
time Jephtha was buried.
Gideon did wish Matt would come home for a
visit, though. His brother's career seemed to be
going well. The British Royal Academy had
accepted a painting called "Woman of Virginia"
for its exhibition this year-the first public
recognition Matt had received. Yet
Gideon sensed an underlying melancholy hi his
brother's occasional letters. Dolly had left him for
reasons Matt had never explained. And with every year that
passed, he seemed to grow more cynical about his
homeland.
"Did you examine the returned copies of the last
issue?"
Strelnik nodded.
"And you pulled the names off the circulation roster?"
Another nod.
"What else is there?"
"Proofing that article about the Crispins." The
Knights of St. Crispin had been founded by shoe
industry workers hi 1867. A revolutionary
machine, the McKay pegger, made it possible for
factory owners to replace skilled help with
greenhorns. The Crispins had organized
to resist the trend. Theirs was a secret society,
and with that Gideon had no quarrel. But it was also
exclusionist. The Crispins openly attacked the
notion that all working men were equal. To preserve the
shrinking number of jobs hi their industry, they no
longer permitted the advancement of apprentices. They
were not really brothers in the cause, but bitter and
selfish men desperately trying to deny an
inexorable future.
"All right, proof it," Gideon said. "Then you can
go home to your son and that beautiful wife of yours.
I only plan to stay long enough to finish up the
editorial."
Strelnik bobbed his head and walked into the other 220
room, smoke drifting behind him. Gideon reached for
his pen but didn't pick it up. The mention of
Strelnik's wife Leah had unexpectedly
produced a feeling of melancholy.
Gideon had never once let on to his father or
stepmother, but for the past eight or ten months he
hadn't been going home to his own wife with the joy
he'd once experienced. Ever since he'd started
Labor's Beacon, Margaret had grown more and more
critical of his interest in the cause-something he found
astonishing, since it was she who had originally
encouraged him to study and write and take an interest
in the world.
He didn't like to admit it, but he had begun to see
certain disturbing signs hi her behavior. They
made him think of her late father. Willard Marble-the
Sergeant, as he'd preferred to call himself-had been
crippled hi the Mexican War. After that he'd
taken to drink. He'd spent his last days
hi a perpetual stupor.
Lately Gideon had detected the smell of wine
on Margaret's breath when he came home in the
evening. She normally drank very little, A glass of
wine with a holiday meal was usually her limit. He
was fearful she was resorting to the same mind-deadening
nostrum that had turned her father into a raving sot.
Even though she'd professed a hatred for the
Sergeant's behavior, Gideon had an eerie
feeling she was emulating it, whether she was aware of it
or not.
Why? That was the tormenting question. He knew a couple
of possible answers. She was upset by his work. And
she was upset by the modest surroundings hi which he
insisted they live. She found their circumstances
particularly galling because she knew there was so much
money available now. When Jephtha died,
Gideon had inherited four and a half million
dollars, plus a quarter interest hi both the
Boston book publishing firm, Kent and Son,
and the New York Union. Jephtha's will had
divided everything equally between Gideon, Matt, that
damned Irishman Michael Boyle, and
Jephtha's second wife Molly, who was now
living permanently at Long Branch.
Labor's Beacon could attract no advertisers.
Hence every issue lost money. But Gideon's
fortune was invested and managed by experts at the
Rothman Bank in Boston. Using investment
income alone, he was able to keep the paper going and
at the same time provide a decent home for
Margaret and the children in a good suburb. More
ostentatiously than that, he would not live. To have done
so would have created suspicions and doubt among the
laboring men for whom he traveled, spoke and
wrote.
Molly nominally operated both the newspaper and the
book company on behalf of all four owners, though
in truth each firm was run by professional
managers. Gideon had a standing offer from his stepmother
to move into management of the Union, but he'd never
even considered it. That upset Margaret, as did a
certain inevitable danger in his work.
Her displeasure had been making their household very
tense lately. The mention of Leah Strelnik
reminded him that he and Margaret hadn't made love
in five or six weeks. The thought of it produced
a stir in his groin, then an unexpected and
slightly embarrassing image in his mind.
Julia Sedgwick. The late Louis
Kent's former wife.
Louis, Amanda Kent's only son, had gotten
involved with Jay Gould and Jim Fisk in the
'68 Erie stock war. About that time, Gideon had
confronted Gould and demanded post mortem benefits
in the form of payments for the families of Daphnis
Miller and another Erie worker. He'd managed
to bluff the financier into making the payments
secretly-just about the only occasion anyone had
gotten the best of Jay Gould, Jephtha said
later. Gould had needed someone to blame.
Apparently he'd chosen Gideon's relative,
though there was never
any proof of his being connected with what had happened
next.
On a street hi a dingy section of New York,
Louis had been stabbed by an unknown assailant.
The attack had left him paralyzed below the waist.
He'd slipped into a coma and died during the summer.
Gideon had met Julia when she'd come to the
funeral with her son Carter; she had gotten
custody of the boy when she'd divorced Louis during
the war.
Julia lived hi Chicago, was wealthy hi her own
right, and used her money to finance her work as a
lecturer for the American Woman Suffrage
Association-a cause nearly as unpopular as
his. He recalled how impressed he'd been at
their first meeting. He'd been taken with her poise,
her intelligence, and most especially with her interest
hi public questions. It was an attitude hi sharp
contrast with Margaret's. Once Gideon's wife
had been much like Julia, but now she was retreating from
the world, seeming to want nothing so much as the security
of a comfortable life with a husband who was in a prosperous
and respectable business.
Yes, Julia had impressed him. And not merely
on an intellectual level. She was physically
attractive. In a guilty way, he realized the
attraction hadn't lessened since that first meeting.
"I say, Gideon-was Strelnik had spoken
loudly. "The proofs are marked."
"Good, good," he answered, coming out of the reverie. "Go
on home."
"Don't you think I should stay till you're
finished?" There was concern in the little man's voice.
Despite his arguments with his employer, Strelnik
liked Gideon. The feeling was reciprocated.
Gideon shook his head, trying to clear it of
pictures of Julia Sedgwick even as
his hands cleared a working space on the littered
desk. Strelnik objected to the dismissal.
"Listen, it's safer with the two of us here. We got
four more in today's mail, don't forget."
With exaggerated significance, he pointed to a
small stack of letters on the desk. They totaled
twelve now. Only three were signed, and the rest
contained threats ranging from mild to maniacal. All
the letters had come in response to an editorial
Gideon had written in the last issue. He'd
criticized the Washington railroad lobby
directed by Henry Cooke, brother of Jay
Cooke who headed the huge New York investment
banking firm bearing his name.
More and more, it was becoming apparent that the railroad
lobby was buying favors and preferential treatment from
state legislators and jurists. Labor's
Beacon printed news of all trades. But the
railroads were emerging as the country's most
important industry and thus received the most
coverage.
Gideon had heard the railroad lobby was deeply
mired hi a truly spectacular scandal involving
the Credit Mobilier, the company which had financed and
constructed the Union Pacific section
of the transcontinental railroad. He'd unearthed
no facts; no one had. But sources he trusted,
sources such as Theo Payne, kept telling him
Washington would explode like a bomb if the truth
about gifts of Credit Mobilier stock ever came
to light.
Gideon's editorial had suggested the need for a
railroad worker's lobby to offset Henry Cooke
and his associates. It had only alluded
to potential scandal. Still, the editorial had
produced those twelve letters, some quite hateful, and a
brief, exuberant feeling that someone read his little
paper.
"I'll be fine, Sime," he said. "No one's
going to show up here."
Strelnik looked dubious but finally shrugged. He
lit one more cigarette, blew out the match and asked,
"Still planning the trip to Chicago?"
"Yes, the workers on the Wisconsin and Prairie
want me to attend their organizational meeting, and
I think I should."
"Is Mrs. Kent still against it?"
Gideon nodded. "She hates every trip I take.
In fact I think she hates all of this. She's
told me several times it was too
dangerous."
Well, it wasn't exactly tame. He'd been
set on by ruffians three times hi other cities,
and shot at once. But General Jeb Stuart had
taught him how to fight; he held his own. To deal with
unwelcome visitors, he kept a loaded
Confederate cavalry revolver in the drawer of his
desk.
"I heard it's been hot as a furnace out in the
middle west, Gideon."
The younger man smiled. "Sime, you needn't hang
around to nursemaid me. I'll be out of here in half
an hour. Now go home! Tomorrow we'll carry the rest
of the issue to the typesetter."
Strelnik cast one more glance at the pile of angry
mail, pulled his cap out of his coat pocket and
reluctantly left.
ui
Gideon inked his pen, found several sheets of
foolscap and printed hi capitals at the top of the
first one, THE TRAGEDY OF PARIS.
He chewed the end of the pen. He knew what he
wanted to write but he had to phrase it properly.
The Versailles government could never be condoned for
what it had done in the third week of
May; Bloody Week, it had come to be called.
In an orgy of fire and shooting that had left much of
Paris a corpse littered ruin, the government had
overturned the Commune and executed as many as twenty
thousand of its supporters.
In spite of the May bloodshed, public sympathy
seemed 225
to remain with established authority. It was the Commune
itself, not its overthrow, which struck fear into most
Americans. And an obvious but irrelevant
connection was still being made between the Commune and
American labor. The bosses played up the
fact that Marxian Socialists had led the Paris
revolt and would, if permitted, lead similar
revolts in the United States. There were constant
references to the horrors of an earlier French
Revolution. The Commune had raised a specter not
easily banished, and one which would harm American
labor for a long time to come.
Slowly, Gideon began to write:
The American working man was ill-served by the late and
unlamented Paris Commune. From the outset it must be
made clear that although American labor does
include within its ranks a few who support the
international, and who would see all private
enterprises dismantled and given piecemeal into the
workers' hands, such men are in the minority.
The bosses have foolishly tried to make it seem as
though American labor is entirely composed of such
radicals. That is a lie deliberately
fabricated to set back the just cause of workingmen's
rights. Most native workers are not Communards in
fact or even by disposition. They have no conflict with
legitimate enterprise, and no antagonism
to capital, but only desire to receive a full and
proper share of the capital which their toil creates.
Although certain bosses would wish it, we must not
assume that what was wanted in Paris is wanted in
the streets of American cities and-
Abruptly, he glanced up. Absorbed hi trying
to get the editorial to flow smoothly, he'd paid no
attention to
his surroundings. Hadn't there been a sound a moment
ago?
A sound out on the landing?
He laid the pen down. His palms grew damp.
Through the grimy windows he saw that it was nearly
dark.
Voices murmured beyond the door. Two, perhaps
three men. His heartbeat picked up as the
door handle rattled. He'd forgotten to throw the
bolt after Strelnik left.
As he leaped to his feet, the door crashed back.
Three ragged, scowling men crowded inside.
"Yessir, here's the one," said the biggest of them,
hefting a short length of lumber in his right hand.
"Eye-patch, ain't that right?"
"Right, James," said the second, a wiry fellow
with a sling shot in his fist.
Gideon's heart almost broke; for a moment he was
too sad to be frightened. Here was a perfect
example of Gould's statement that he could use the
working class itself to destroy anyone who fought
to improve the plight of the class. These three men were
no criminals but poor, ragged city dwellers whom
all the craft unions barred from apprentice
programs, and thus from decent job
opportunities.
Men with families, he supposed. Desperate men
as yet unacceptable to the rest of the labor movement.
All three of the men were black.
Sorrowful, he still reminded himself they'd do what they
had been hired to do. He eyed the desk drawer where
he kept the cavalry revolver. The burly man
in charge drew a folded Beacon from his
sagging trousers. Waved it under Gideon's nose and
delivered a message Gideon was sure had been
rehearsed.
"Certain gentlemen don't like you printing things about
Mr. Henry Cooke down in Washington."
Quietly, Gideon said, "Who paid you? Why are
you doing this? You're working men, aren't you? I'm on
your side."
When they heard his accent, the wiry one sneered:
"On our side? Lord God. You hear him,
James? He's a Southron an' he says he's
on our side! No, Mr. Southron, we ain't
working men, much as we'd like to be, "cause this old
city don't seem to have many jobs for those who ain't
got white skin. You come up here after the war just like we
did, Mr. Southron? You come here 'cause they
wouldn't let you keep niggers as property no more?"
"If it makes any difference, my family never
owned a single slave in Vir-was
"No, it don't make no difference," the wiry
man interrupted, and lunged.
He swung the shot-loaded sock. Gideon
ducked but it grazed his forehead. He grabbed the
drawer handle as they surged around him.
He stabbed his hand inside the drawer.
Closed his fingers on the butt of the revolver. The
leader spotted the gun and kicked the drawer shut.
Gideon cried out when the drawer caught his wrist.
"No more stuff about Mr. Cooke, hear?" James
said, and slammed the length of wood against Gideon's
right temple.
His good eye blurred. He punched the black's
belly, but underneath the old shirt the man's gut was
rock solid. While the third one held him, the
wiry one hit him again. They beat him for three or
four minutes and left him gasping and floundering on the
floor.
Then they tore up books and papers and, just before they
ran off down the stairs, they smashed the office
windows. By then Gideon had collapsed,
unconscious.
Breakage
AFTER LEAVING THE precinct house, he had to run
to catch the last car of the evening on the Third Avenue
Railroad. Every step hurt, and set his head
to throbbing. His second-hand frock coat was torn,
and because there was no running water hi the Beacon
office, he'd had to clean up with a rag and some
bourbon whiskey he kept on hand. So he
smelled and looked like a ruffian when he
jumped aboard the car. He didn't recognize the
conductor.
The man was new on the run, and might have denied him
passage except for the peremptory way Gideon
slapped the fare into his hand. Gideon sank down
on one of the wickerwork seats and stared at the passing
street. The conductor clanged the bell. The
horse walked a little faster.
It was a long trip north through the country on the
eastern side of the island to the growing village of
York-ville, and home. He had ample time
to think about the evening's events. He was less concerned
about the physical damage to the office, most of which
could be repaired, than he was about the prospect of
arriving home so late, covered with cuts and
bruises. He knew it would cause trouble. And
there'd been too much of that hi his household of
late.
Perhaps he should head off the trouble by telling Margaret
he was suspending publication of Labor's Beacon.
For a few moments he felt like doing just that.
Then he thought of his friend Daphnis Miller.
He closed his eyes. Inevitably, his mind
turned back 229
to that winter night in the Erie yards when
Daphnis had died, crushed between two freight cars
they'd been coupling. Daphnis had slipped on
ice while a fierce storm raged. He'd never
forget the sound of his friend's scream as the car bumpers
snapped his ribs and broke his back. He could still
see the sleet spattering Daphnis" wide,
lifeless eyes as he lay beside the track like a
broken doll.
The memory of that night hounded Gideon like some
infernal animal, chasing at his heels and forever
making him run faster. He had dreams about
Daphnis dying; the sound of his friend's scream or the
sight of his dead eyes slipped into Gideon's
thoughts when he least expected it. Daphnis had
been a decent, non-violent man of limited
learning; be wouldn't even have understood the word
Communard. It insulted his memory to say that any
effort to take care of his family after his death was a
radical conspiracy.
The Daphnis Millers of the world had precious few
to speak and fight for them. Gideon would not-could
not-diminish the already thin ranks by stepping out.
Margaret had taught him to understand what justice
was, and to care about it. If it no longer mattered
to her, it did to him. Labor's Beacon
would continue its work.
And damn the consequences.
Dressed in a plain cotton nightgown, Eleanor
Kent sang to herself and danced on the worn carpet of the
parlor in YorkviUe.
She held the hem of the nightgown up around her
calves, trying to remember the step one of her
school friends had shown her.
She was nine years old. A sum, well-formed
girl who already showed signs of growing up to be a
beauty.
Large brown eyes dominated an oval face. A
large mouth revealed dazzling white teeth when she
smiled.
Upstairs she heard her mother's voice, raised
loudly because Eleanor's baby brother, two year
old Will, had cried out with a bellyache that had been
troubling him since noon. Mama was in a terrible
mood tonight.
Of course, Eleanor thought, missing a step and then
stopping altogether, that wasn't unusual lately. More
often than not, her mother and father seemed out-of-sorts.
They were always arguing, too. About things which puzzled
Eleanor.
Papa's safety. Or his traveling too
much. Or mama wanting some particular article for the
house and not being able to buy it out of the allowance he
gave her. Or mama simply saying she didn't
have everything most wives had.
Eleanor glanced around the parlor. The room was
jammed with furniture and potted plants, as
current custom dictated. Nearly every inch of
space on the papered walls was crowded with
knicknacks, ornamental plates and framed
pictures. On the tables there were more plants in
smaller pots and a Rogers group-one of those highly
realistic little sculptures reproduced by the thousands
in gray or brown plaster finish. Every
well-furnished American home had at least one
John Rogers piece: his famous slave auction,
or President Lincoln reading a proclamation,
or some farmers playing checkers.
They had a lot of things, Eleanor thought. Yet
Mama wasn't satisfied. And lately she'd
been acting very peculiar. Sometimes she vanished for
an hour, and Eleanor would hear rattling in the
cellar. A bottle or a jar, she didn't know
which. Then she'd hear crying. Finally mama would
reappear, her eyes slightly red and her breath
smelling in a strange way. She didn't
walk steadily, either.
Once Margaret had lectured her daughter on the

evils of drink. She'd used as her example a
town idler who could frequently be seen weaving up and
down the streets of Yorkville. This evening, quite
without warning, it struck Eleanor that her mother's
lurching walk was just like the town drunk's. Her
cheeks burned, and she felt ashamed of thinking that, but
she couldn't help it.
She stared at the parlor mantel. On the wall
above it hung an old sword and an equally old
musket. Below them stood a green bottle filled
with some dry tea, and a glass display case with
wooden ends. The case contained a medallion and a
piece of tarred rope.
All were things which Eleanor's father said were important
to the Kent family-just like the picture in papa's
study showing that ferocious ancestor of hers,
Philip Kent.
Tonight Eleanor paid no attention to any of the
mementoes. She glanced at the clock. Papa was very
late coming home. And mama had been in a stormy
mood ever since the afternoon post brought a letter and a
photograph from the Territory of
Wyoming.
Mama had examined the photograph with tears in her
eyes. She'd angrily refused to answer
Eleanor's questions about it, except to say that it had
been sent by Uncle Michael's wife. Eleanor
knew very little about Uncle Michael and Aunt
Hannah except that their last name was Boyle, not
Kent, and that papa didn't like them and said so.
Hoisting the hem of her nightgown again, she began
to sing softly.
"Listen to the mocking bird, listen to the mocking
bird, "Oh the mocking bird is singing all the
day-was
Her feet moved in rhythm. At last she had the
step. She kept dancing and singing. She delighted in
both.
Papa had taught her to love to sing, and she'd
watched street dancers in the city. She loved
performing for people, but her practicing was not well
tolerated by her mother, who disapprovingly called her a
little showoff. In theaters-places she'd only heard
about-people were actually paid to sing and dance and show off!
Papa had offered to take her to a theater, but mama
disapproved of that, too, even though she had once
enjoyed attending plays when she was a young
girl in Richmond. Some things about mama had
certainly changed, Eleanor thought. She didn't
know why, but she was very sorry about it.
Papa had a fine voice. Sometimes he sang with his
daughter-another cause of arguments with mama.
Lately Eleanor had concluded that she didn't
want to fall in love and get married if what she
saw and heard around her every day was the result. Even
though she was taught that girls were supposed to become
wives and mothers when they grew up, that wasn't for her
if so much quarreling and bad temper went along with
it!
She finished the song and turned her head toward the
table which bore their one Rogers group, the rustics
seated over a checkerboard. Next to it lay the
wrapped photograph which had caused so much
distress. With a hesitant glance at the darkened
hall outside the parlor and an ear cocked to the sound
of mama berating Will upstairs, Eleanor drew in
a long breath. She reached for the picture.
Heavy boots on the veranda startled her. Her hand
jerked and hit the piece of statuary. As the front
door opened, the Rogers group fell off the table.
She tried to catch it
She wasn't fast enough. The plaster
shattered.
Horrified, she covered her mouth. There was no
possession her mother prized more. She'd nagged papa
for weeks before he finally brought it home as a
Christmas gift.
Yet the moment Eleanor turned and saw Gideon,
she forgot the damage and the certain punishment that would be
hers. "Papal" She hurled herself against him. He
was dirty, his coat was torn, and his face was covered
by cuts and two huge, purpling bruises.
"Papa, what happened to you?"
He managed to grin as he hugged her. "Never mind
that, young lady. Why are you still up?"
"Cause Will's got the bellyache and he's making
so much noise, I can't sleep. Papa, please,
please tell me who hurt you!"
He ruffled the lustrous dark hair that hung loose
around her shoulders and shimmered in the lamplight. He
walked to a chair and collapsed in it, his blue eye
looking a trifle glassy. His shoulders slumped
as he said:
"The same kind of men I've run into before, sweet.
Only this time they really took me by surprise."
He sat forward, wincing. Eleanor stood in front
of the pieces of the Rogers group, so he
wouldn't notice. He probed his side with his
fingertips. Oh, how she loved him! He was so
handsome and tall; still as dashing as any soldier. She
wished he and mama could he happy together.
He sighed and sat back. "Don't think anything's
broken."
Rapid footsteps came down the stairs.
Eleanor turned toward the hall, still shielding the
plaster bits by standing directly over them and tugging
her nightgown down as far as it would go. The hem was
an inch above the carpet.
Her mother rushed in, stricken first by the sight of
Gideon slumped in the chair, bruised and dirty,
and then by Eleanor's bare toes poking out from under the
gown. Margaret Marble Kent was her husband's age,
twenty-eight, with brown hair and eyes and a pretty
though snub-nosed face. Her bosom and waist had
thickened and now had a matronly look.
Flour whitened Margaret's gingham skirt and
bodice. Strands of loose hair flew around her
shoulders. She let her anger win out over her concern
as she turned on her daughter.
"Why aren't you in bed?" She grabbed Eleanor's
earlobe, hurting it. Eleanor stumbled, pulled off
balance. "I ordered you to your room an
hour ag-was
She saw the fragments of the sculpture. Her dark
eyes filled with tears. "Oh, no. Oh, no!"
She pushed Eleanor aside, knelt and tried
to fit two sections of the statue together. Gideon
stared at her, a stunned expression on his face.
Then color rose in his cheeks. Anger animated
his shoulders and arms with a quivering tension.
Suddenly Margaref exclaimed. "You did this, young
ladyl You broke the only Rogers group we
own!" She slapped her daughter's face, and not
lightly.
Eleanor reeled back. She was more shocked than
hurt All she could think was, Mama smells
funny again-what's wrong with her?
"For Christ's sake, Margaret!" Gideon
roared, leaping to his feet. Margaret reached for her
daughter's shoulder as if she meant to hurt her
further. Gideon jumped between them. He pushed
Margaret away from the terrified girl.
"Eleanor, go to bed. This instant!"
Eleanor fled up the stairs while Gideon shook
his wife by the shoulders.
"Control yourself, Margaret. Control yourself!"

She tried, dabbing her eyes with the back of her
wrist. "I-I'm sorry, it's been a terrible
evening."
"Obviously." He was weary of wondering why her

breath smelled as it did. "What have you been
drinking? The port from the cellar?"
She looked as stunned as Eleanor a moment ago.
Quickly, she backed away. She started to cover her
mouth but realized what she was doing and dropped her hand
back to her side. Her tone grew defensive.
"Drinking? Nothing!"
The lie shocked him, then filled Him with a confused
sadness as she faced away and put a hand over her
eyes, gasping out her words between bursts of crying:
"But it's a wonder I don't drink after all
I've gone through. Will's been sick most of the day, and
you didn't come home and didn't come home, and
Eleanor's so willful, she refuses to go to bed when
she's told; all she cares about is practicing her
singing and dancing in secret-was
Margaret's eye fell on the shattered statuary.
She sobbed harder than ever.
Again Gideon's face showed anger. He overcame
it, walked to her, drew her against him. She
caught the odor of the liquor with which he'd cleaned
up. She wrenched away.
"You're a fine one to make ridiculous accusations
about drinking! You smell like a distillery. were you in a
saloon brawl?"
"How kind of you to ask! I thought you were more concerned about
the Rogers group than about me. No, I was not in a
saloon brawl. The Beacon was visited by some
gentlemen hired to protest my editorial about the
Washington railroad lobby. I managed
to survive their tender inducements to stop writing about
Jay Cooke's brother."
"I've told you before, Gideon," she breathed,
"it's going to keep happening unless you quit. Over
and over, it's going to keep happening. Beatings. People
shooting at you on dark streets-was
Staring at her, he was struck by a sudden insight.
During their courting days in Richmond early in the
war, he'd known little of books, or of the kind of
ideas which shaped and moved the world. In terms of those
things, he'd been much like an infant barely able
to crawl.
After the war, Margaret had helped him learn
to walk. She'd read to him at the supper table.
Encouraged him to try to read increasingly
difficult material on his own, then to attempt
to write short paragraphs expressing his personal
convictions.
Perhaps, she regretted all that, as Jephtha had said
parents regretted their children growing to adulthood.
Margaret had taught him to walk so he could leave
home and, intellectually, he had done so, moving
into a deeper and deeper involvement with the world. He was
like the grown child who would no longer be directed and
controlled.
And she was the parent who would not gracefully let go-
The
insight made his scalp prickle. He knew it was
right. Didn't she tend to be domineering with her
daughter and her son? Her fury over Eleanor's
disobedience demonstrated that all over again. Somehow
he had become not merely her husband but also another
of her children-the most independent one; the most troublesome
one. God, why hadn't he thought of it earlier? It
explained so much about her recent violent moods.
It disturbed him, too. Profoundly. All at
once he craved a drink.
In the regular liquor cabinet, none of the
bottles seemed to have been disturbed. He poured a
generous shot of bourbon and drank it
to ease the aches in his body and the newer one in his
mind.
She was staring at him, awaiting a response, her
eyes sullen. With all the patience he could muster,
he said:
"You mustn't take everything so seriously, Margaret.

Of course I got hurt a little tonight. But the men
didn't mean to do me any permanent injury."
"What about the shooting?" she blazed at him.
"In Baltimore?" He structured a careful
distortion. "That was an isolated case. One random
shot, late at night. I'm not even positive it
was aimed at me." That was an outright lie-to spare
her.
"Well-well-was She staggered to a chair. Sat
sideways in it, her head averted, her eyes
closed. "comy know what happened to my father in the
Mexican War. Then I nearly lost you to the
Yankees, and not just once. Manassas. The
Peninsula. Yellow Tavern. That damnable
prison-was
Her eyes flew open. "Now I'm hi danger of
losing you all over again. I worry all the time!"
He doubted it, but felt unkind for thinking
it.
"comand-and-was Half speaking, half crying, she let it
pour out. "comI'm so sick of it, Gideon. So
sick of- the way we live. Grubbing-when there's-so
much money- And a job waiting at the Union. A
high-paying, safe job-if you'll just-speak
to Molly-was
He was angered that she brought up the same old
requests again tonight. But he fought the anger and went
to her side a second tune. She recoiled from the
touch of his ringers on her shoulder. Forcing himself, he
spoke in a calm voice.
"Margaret, I have explained again and again that if we
lived any more lavishly, no one would take the
Beacon seriously."
"Who cares if they do?" she cried softly. "Who
cares? I don't!" Suddenly more coherent, she
gazed at him, something hard and uncompromising in her
dark eyes. "I want you to give it up,
Gideon."
still don't want you to grow up and leave me,
Gideon.
"You know I can't."
"Won't. You mean won'tl"
"What's happened to you, Margaret? There was

time-and not too long ago-when you encouraged me. You were
the one who taught me to read and write and think, and
now you act as if you hate the result."
She whispered, "I do. I made a mistake. A
dreadful mistake. Believe me, Gideon, I
never would have helped you if I'd realized your main
concern in life would turn out to be the welfare of a
lot of greenhorns and niggers. Your work has taken
you away from me, and I'm facing the very same situation
I faced during the war. I'm facing the
possibility of losing you. I don't want that. I
won't tolerate it. Above everything, I demand that you
think about this family and put this family first!"
The measured words told him he was right in his
assessment of her motives. Deep within her, there was
some unhealthy need to be obeyed; some compulsion to be
the dominant partner. He tried to reason with her:
"I do think about the family. It's one of my most
important concerns-was
"I want it to be the only one! I'm sick of being
poor!"
"Margaret, please. I try to see that all our
needs are met-that we live comfortably. Can you
imagine how I'd be received at a meeting
like the one coming up in Chicago when word got around that
my wife and children were ensconced in a Fifth Avenue
mansion?"
She sprang up and rushed to the wrapped
photograph. "But that's the sort of house we should
have! It's the sort of house I want! We've
been married nearly ten years and haven't lived in
a decent place yet!"
He started to protest but didn't. He was alarmed
by the near-hysteria in her voice:
"Look what arrived today-from Cheyenne. From the
Boyles-was
Gideon stiffened. He hated to hear that damned
Irishman's name. Boyle had greedily utilized
his portion of the inheritance to build and expand his chain of
retail
stores. Even Matt, who'd used his share to finance
his art studies in Paris, hadn't spent a tenth as
lavishly. And Gideon had only drawn on the
money to finance the Beacon and provide minimum
subsistence for himself and Margaret.
Margaret thrust a brown-tinted print at him. He
saw why she was envious. The photograph, taken from
a point some distance from the subject, showed an
immense three story Gothic house with a
wide veranda, dormers and a corner tower. The two
stiff figures posed on the veranda--the Irishman
and his wife Hannah, the latter with a swaddled
infant in her arms-were dwarfed by the huge
residence.
"It's their new house, Gideon. Hannah's letter
said they've just moved in."
He flung the photograph away. "Damn
braggarts."
But he felt a shameful stab of jealousy as he
helped himself to more bourbon.
His head was pounding. His whole body throbbed. He
wanted to lie down and sleep, and was alternately
furious with Margaret and fearful because her nerves
seemed in such a precarious state.
"Well, Gideon," she said. It had a forbidding
sound of finality. "I believe we might as well
thrash this out. And right now. It's tune you decided
what's important."
He almost laughed in disbelief. Then, abruptly,
he hurled the bourbon glass to the hearth, where it
shattered. He stalked toward her.
"Three hired thugs beat the hell out of me tonight,
Margaret. Three men I dutifully reported at
the precinct house, even though I know the
police will never find them. Then I crawl home and
you deliver ultimatums!"
"Yes," Margaret said in a voice so controlled,
his backbone crawled. She pressed a white fist
against her skirt. "Because I am tired of scrimping.
Because I am tired of being afraid for you day and
night-was
Because I am tired of your not doing what I say!
God forgive him, such thoughts were despicable.
Farfetched, too. And yet when he looked in her
eyes, he wondered.
"I think," she went on in a low voice, "we should
draw a symbolic line and see whether you're
willing to cross it. Chicago. Let's make
Chicago the line. You've been planning another one
of your foolish trips. If you want to show me the
family comes first, don't go. If you do, you mustn't
expect to come home and find things as they were."
"Margaret, you can't ask me to make such a
choice!"
"I can and I do, Gideon." She was trembling;
even her face was white now. "Your work or this
family. The Beacon or this family. Chicago
or this family."
"No, I refuse. You're being unfair.
Three years ago, we agreed I would work on
behalf of the movement. We agreed I could do that and
we could still have our home life."
He reached out to grasp her arm, hoping an extra
measure of gentleness might save the situation and
bring her to her senses. It didn't. She wrenched
away a third time.
"People change, Gideon. And kindly don't touch
me again."
"What?"
Something absolutely unfamiliar and terrifying shone
in her eyes as she bent forward at the waist, her
hands clenched in fists again.
"I said don't touch me. I'm sorry I had your
children. I'm sorry I have to bring them up this way. I
can promise you there'll be no more children to suffer the way
Eleanor and Will suffer."
"Damn it, Margaret, you aren't even making sense
now!"
"Yes," she said, "yes, at long last I am being
sensi241
he never saw Eleanor's gleaming, ingmcutu caret
caret greater-than watching from between the stair posts.
IV
His father had once told him that if a
married couple went to sleep without patching up an
evening quarrel, even worse bitterness would result
in the morning. He didn't know whether it was actually
true, but he'd always acted as if it were and had made
sure neither of them said goodnight still bearing a grudge.
He'd always made it a rule to be first
to apologize, no matter who had started the argument.
Tonight he broke that rule.
Except for the occasions when he'd been out of town,
or she'd been recovering from bearing the children, it was the
first night since their marriage that they had slept
apart. It marked the real beginning of the trouble between them.
many uncomfortable places during the war, nis
"iaiddi8had undergone a change and he could no longer
sleep anywhere except in a bed. Since he
hadn't paid extra to ride in one of George
Pullman's special cars with the unique hinged
seats that converted into berths, he was worn out by the end
of the trip. Worn out from sitting up all night.
Worn out from thinking about Margaret.
The morning after their quarrel, he'd resolved
to apologize and had done so. During the hour before he
boarded a car for the city, she'd refused to answer
him. When he came home that night and tried again, the
apology was acknowledged with a slight nod.
Her out-thrust cheek had signaled that he could plant
a kiss there if he wished.
Damn generous of her! he'd thought. But for the sake of
harmony, he'd done it. He hoped to God the
turmoil of the preceding evening hadn't really been the
product of some emerging need for dominance. He
hoped it had only been the result of an
especially fatiguing day.
On the night the apology was accepted, he'd
returned to the large bed they shared. Their affection had
been perfunctory ever since, and their lovemaking
nonexistent. Margaret kept her temper and, as far
as he could tell, stayed away from the bottles of
port in the cellar. Nevertheless she clung to her
position that the trip to 243
ble. You've made your choice. Don't come to my
room or my bed again. Ever!"
Red-faced, he roared, "By God, I won't!
I'll sleep in the goddamn shed rather than roll
over like a tame dog every time you snap your fingers!"
He stormed past her, deliberately kicking
fragments of the broken Rogers group out of his path.
Before he limped out of the house, he turned and shouted:
"I'm going to Chicago just as I planned!"
He slammed the front door, so stunned
and furious he never saw Eleanors gleaming,
frightened eyes watching from between the stair posts.
IV
His father had once told him that if a married couple
went to sleep without patching up an evening quarrel,
even worse bitterness would result in the morning.
He didn't know whether it was actually true, but
he'd always acted as if it were and had made sure
neither of them said goodnight still bearing a grudge.
He'd always made it a rule to be first
to apologize, no matter who had started the argument.
Tonight he broke that rule.
Except for the occasions when he'd been out of town,
or she'd been recovering from bearing the children, it was the
first night since their marriage that they had slept
apart. It marked the real beginning of the trouble between them.
Tmderbox
GIDEON TRAVELED TO ChICAGO aboard
second class cars of the Erie and Lake Shore and
Michigan railroads. Perhaps because he'd slept in
so many uncomfortable places during the war, his
habits had undergone a change and he could no longer
sleep anywhere except hi a bed. Since he
hadn't paid extra to ride in one of George
Pullman's special cars with the unique
hinged seats that converted into berths, he was worn out by the
end of the trip. Worn out from sitting up all night.
Worn out from thinking about Margaret.
The morning after their quarrel, he'd resolved
to apologize and had done so. During the hour before he
boarded a car for the city, she'd refused to answer
him. When he came home that night and tried again, the
apology was acknowledged with a slight nod. Her
out-thrust cheek had signaled that he could plant a
kiss there if he wished.
Damn generous of her! he'd thought. But for the sake of
harmony, he'd done it. He hoped to God the
turmoil of the preceding evening hadn't really been the
product of some emerging need for dominance. He
hoped it had only been the result of an
especially fatiguing day.
On the night the apology was accepted, he'd
returned to the large bed they shared. Their affection had
been perfunctory ever since, and their lovemaking
nonexistent. Margaret kept her temper and, as far
as he could tell, stayed away from the bottles of
port in the cellar. Nevertheless she clung to her
position that the trip to 243
Chicago was a symbol of whether he cared more for his
work or for his family.
Repeatedly, he attempted to explain that one
needn't exclude the other, and that to force a
confrontation created pointless pain for both of them. But
something in her cried out for a victory, and he got
nowhere. They'd had another short, loud argument the
night before his departure-and once more they slept apart.
On the long journey west, he thought about his work at
some length. Considering what had happened, he did have
doubts about continuing the Beacon. But the doubts were
banished the moment he recalled Daphnis
Miller's death.
Strelnik had been right that night on Third
Avenue, Reformism was dead as a means of dealing
with the juggernaut of industrialism. The masses of
workers couldn't traipse off to some bucolic retreat
and survive, To put bread in the bellies of their
families, they had to reach an accommodation with the
factory system and the men who controlled it. And a
favorable accommodation only came about through the use
of the strength conferred by unity.
Of course conflicts between owners and workers were by no
means new in America; study had taught him that.
Such conflicts dated to colonial times, when
craftsmen had been scarce and wages high for a
brief period. The worker never seemed
to remain on top for long, though-In 1630, the
Massachusetts General Court had set a
ceiling on craftsmen's wages and established
fines for any employer who paid more. Similar laws
had been enacted in other colonies. When all the
laws began to be repealed, those punishing overpayment
by employers disappeared much more rapidly than those
punishing workers for accepting overpayment.
American craft unions had been in existence at
least since the 1790's. That decade had seen the
organization
of the Federal Society of Journeymen
Cordwainers in Philadelphia, and of the printers in
New York and other East Coast cities.
Various trade and craft groups had come and gone
since then, some strong and successful, some not. They were
always opposed by owners, and the owners always managed
to keep the law and public opinion on their side.
Never had it been more true than in 1806, when
eight Philadelphia cordwainers had turned out-
struck-for a pay raise of twenty-five cents per
pair of boots made. To the alarmed public, the
eight were the harbingers of anarchy. To the leather shop
owners, they were an economic threat. And to the courts
dominated by the Federalists, who drew then"
political support from the owner class, the eight
were men who had to be punished. Thus the doctrine of a
strike as a criminal conspiracy had first been
invoked. The Philadelphia eight had been fined,
and jailed until the fines were paid.
As Gideon had observed to Strelnik, the
conspiracy doctrine had been overturned hi
1842. But it had served for two and a half
decades after that as a means of keeping strikes to a
minimum, and it was still trotted out whenever some venal
judge thought he could get away with it.
Today the cottage industries and the small shops
employing a few craftsmen were largely gone. But
the conflicts remained-and had even been intensified
with the spread of bad working conditions hi the dark,
dehumanizing factories that made Francis
Cabot Lowell's Waltham system a model of
enlightenment. In Massachusetts hi 1814,
Lowell had created the world's first textile plant
with all operations under one roof. He had been a hard
taskmaster, but a concerned one. As his business had
prospered, he had cared for his employees with a
paternalism that was now legendary-and obsolete.
Lowell had designed his buildings to admit
sunlight; the absentee owners of newer
factories crammed their buildings together and shut it
out. He had done his best to protect the morals of
young girls who worked for him. Recently Gideon
had heard stories of men in black-painted wagons
cruising the Hew England countryside to debauch
girls and get them into the mills once they were
stricken with remorse.
The crimes of profit-hungry factory owners and
managers ranged from the horrible to the ludicrous.
Gideon knew of seven and eight year old children
dying of lung disease contracted in airless, sunless
workrooms where textile machinery threw off
millions of fiber particles. He had gotten
reliable reports of mill owners who tinkered with
clocks to make them run more slowly. Of
supervisors who flogged employees stupid and
trusting enough to confess they had eaten breakfast; a
popular theory said breakfast made a worker
"langorous."
In the spread of the factory system, he perceived
national industries emerging-railroads and
textiles and steel to name just three. But he as yet
saw no signs of national organizations
to effectively represent the workers in those
industries. The National Labor Union
was really not much more than a debating forum. And he
didn't have much hope for the newest of the organizations,
the Knights of Labor, either.
The Knights had been founded in Philadelphia in
"69. It was a secret society, originally
restricted to members of the Garment Cutters
Association. The first so-called "sojourner" from
another trade had been admitted to membership last
year, but the society still seemed to put exclusivity
before everything else. Exactly how long it would take
for solidarity to replace exclusivity and lead
to genuine gains in the labor movement for the skilled and
unskilled workers alike, Gideon didn't know.
He was afraid it would be a long time.
Andwitha great deal of violence in the interim. 246
He could understand Margaret's worries about the risks
of his work. He could also understand why she resented their
modest standard of living. Since the night of that first
terrible quarrel, however, he was convinced something else
was at the root of her unhappiness. She resented his
independence, which she herself had helped to develop.
He had a career while she, by tradition, was
required to stay in the home attending to domestic
pursuits.
Still, he couldn't change every aspect of
society at once. And since marriage was a
give and take proposition, he felt it was wrong
of Margaret to force him to choose between
responsibility to his family and
responsibility to others. Especially since the
element of risk didn't matter to him. One time
he'd tried to explain to her that the Kents seldom
shrank from doing what needed to be done just because risks
were involved. That, too, had been the wrong thing
to say.
"Kent, Kent, Kent! I'm sick of that name! I
wish our name was anything but Kent! Being a Kent has
taken you away from me!"
Yes, her fears were understandable. And he would have borne
them, and done his best to soothe them away, except for
her desperate new insistence that he decide about
what was most important in his life. That angered
him. The anger was still simmering when he arrived in
Chicago.
Perhaps it was the anger that made the memory of Julia
Sedgwick pop into mind as the train chuffed into the
large and ornate La Salle Street Station.
At Louis' funeral, he remembered Julia
saying she'd built a home on State Street,
within sight of the lake and near the southern
limits of the growing city. It struck him that if any
human being would understand why he had to continue his work, it
would be a suffragist. They were nearly as unpopular
as trade unionists.
For a few moments he merely toyed with the idea of

calling on Louis' former wife. Finally he
decided to do it. It would be refreshing to chat with a
woman who cared about something more than the size of her
house, or whether a piece of decorative
sculpture was broken. Julia had money, but that
wasn't enough to satisfy her. She had involved herself
in a movement which was trying to change existing
conditions-just as he was.
His cheeks reddened as he stepped down from the car. The
thought of Julia Sedgwick had produced an
embarrassing physical reaction. He swung his
shabby portmanteau in front of him. He realized
how much he missed the physical affection he and
Margaret had once shared so eagerly.
In the jostling crowd heading into the terminal, a ragged
old woman fought against the flow of passengers. A
beggar woman. She reached Gideon's side,
offering withered apples.
"Buy, sir? Only half a dime for
three." "No, thank you," he said with a pleasant
smile, and then started. The filthy old woman was
scrutinizing him closely; particularly his face
and the eye patch.
He walked on. The back of his neck prickled.
He glanced around and saw the woman still watching him,
not offering her wares to anyone else.
Then he remembered his contact, Nils Ericsson,
writing to say he feared Wisconsin and Prairie
management had gotten wind of the organizational
meeting and would attempt to prevent or disrupt it.
That was one more justification for Gideon's invitation;
no regular newspaper in Chicago or anywhere
else for that matter would ever carry a story about
company thuggery. The large dailies generally thought of
unions as instruments of the devil.
From the first, however, Gideon had beKeved the story
could be a good one. An eyewitness account of the
struggle to found a switchman's brotherhood. Now
there was a hint of trouble. If it occurred, he
planned to add
material on the lengths to which management would go
to oppose a trade union.
The old woman was still staring. He recalled telling
Ericsson in his last letter that he could be
identified by the eyepatch. Had someone read the letter?
Or heard Ericsson mention it? There were always
spies among militant workers; men paid to feed the
bosses reports of disloyal employees with
union leanings.
Gideon threw his shoulders back, striding along just
as he'd done when he wore a Confederate uniform.
The possibility that he'd been observed made him
wary, but it lent his arrival a certain zest, too.
More important, it took his mind off the all but
insoluble problems with Margaret.
The limited traveling budget which he'd established
for himself didn't permit him to stay at a hotel as
fine as Potter Palmer's elegant Palmer
House at State and Quincy Streets.
Ericsson had given him the name of a small, clean
establishment called The Dorset. It was located
on Jackson, directly south of a squalid area
of shanties called Conley's Patch.
At the hotel. Gideon unpacked and napped for
an hour and a half. Then he cleaned up with soap and
razor and set out to stroll the town.
Last year Chicago had replaced St. Louis as
the nation's fourth largest city. Only New
York, Philadelphia and Brooklyn
were bigger. Chicago had about three hundred and
thirty thousand residents, and Gideon thought he
met at least half of them that morning. The streets
and sidewalks seemed even more congested than New
York's.
It was Friday in the first week of October; an
exceptionally warm day. Entirely too warm for this
late in the autumn. There was a light haze in the
air, and a light
breeze carrying a mixture of odors that included
the tang of the lake and the heavier stench of fresh
butchered meat. He presumed the latter came from the
Union Stockyards southwest of the business
district.
Cattle, railroads, lumber, grain and the vast
McCormick Harvester Works kept the economy
of the city growing. While still in New York, he had
purchased and read a small Chicago guidebook.
He knew there were various nicknames for the place.
Porkopolis. Slab Town. Wild. Onion and
Bad Stink-people argued about which of the two was the correct
translation of the original Indian name, which he
believed vstz spelled Checagou.
The Chicago River and its two branches divided
the city into three districts. He was staying
on the so-called South Side, and would attend the
organizational meeting on the West Side. He
spent the rest of the morning roaming the south section,
admiring the courthouse with its imposing bell tower
at Randolph and Clark; the fine retail section
along Lake Street; the one hundred percent
fireproof Chicago Tribune building at
Dearborn and Madison; and some of the newer
businesses on rapidly developing State
Street.
Up along the main branch of the river, he saw great
numbers of steam and sailing craft, mostly small
but in total amounting to a huge quantity of shipping
for an inland port. The McCormick works which
turned out the reapers revolutionizing the farming'
industry loomed on the river's north bank.
Bridges at main streets pivoted in the center and
swung parallel to the current to permit commercial
craft to pass.
The river skyline was a jumble of wooden office
buildings, grain elevators, masts-wood
everywhere, Gideon soon noticed. Strolling
southwest again, he observed a great number of lumber
and planing mills, each with its end product stacked
in the yard. Close by the south branch he
saw shavings and wood scraps piled
up outside small homes sandwiched between saloons
and retail stores. He asked a newsboy about the
scraps and shavings. The boy said thousands of people
gathered the waste material of Chicago's lumber
industry and stored it on their property for winter
fuel.
By two o'clock Gideon's stomach was growling. He
decided to omit lunch in order to save money. Like
his late father, he often had difficulty believing the
California gold fortune was real, and he behaved
accordingly. That was another of his traits which Margaret no
doubt found annoying.
He walked back to State Street. There, amid
the carriages, horsecars and pedestrians, he
chanced upon an incredible sight: two houses, resting
on rollers and being dragged along by oxen. He asked
a policeman what was happening; he'd never seen
such a sight in his life.
The policeman laughed and assured him it was common
in Chicago. The city had been platted on low,
swampy ground. To improve drainage the city
council had simply decreed that the grade be
raised. Thus, starting in the mid-fifties, the
existing buildings had been raised too.
Put on pilings, or shifted to new locations.
"Sometimes you see nine or ten houses a day being
moved. The Briggs Hotel was jacked four and a
hah! feet, all twenty-two thousand tons of it,
and new foundations put in underneath, while it stayed
open doing business as usual."
Gideon thanked the officer and moved on. He was
impressed again by the ingenuity of the American mind.
A clerk at his hotel had told him Field,
Leiter and Company at State and Washington was the
city's finest retail store. Gideon headed there
now. By the time he'd been in the store ten minutes,
his New York chauvinism asserted itself: he
silently acknowledged that the store
was a good one, but of course it couldn't match
Stewart's in Manhattan.
Having carefully counted his pocket change in
advance, he bought a bright-colored toy omnibus for
Will and, hoping it would help make peace when he went
home, a bottle of scent for Margaret.
To find something for his daughter, he went to a nearby
row of bookshops. Eleanor was always begging to be
taken to the theater. But Margaret no longer approved
of that form of entertainment, even though she'd once
sighed over the good looks of Mr. John
W. Booth and other leading actors when she sat in
the gallery of a Richmond theater and watched matinee
performances of popular comedies and tragedies.
Gideon guessed that Margaret's new dislike of
what she termed the immoral theater stemmed from, her
general retreat from the world. In any case, he
hoped it wouldn't cause a fuss if he gave his
daughter a little taste of the forbidden fruit. He bought
an inexpensive edition of four of Shakespeare's
comedies.
Eleanor was only nine, but she was a very bright child.
He was reasonably sure she could understand the plots
of the plays and all but the most difficult or
obscure words in the iambic pentameter. How he
loved the roll of that on the tongue! He said it
half aloud- "Iambic pentameter!" The clerk
peered at him as if he'd committed a public
indecency. Gideon didn't care; he was forever
trying out new words and terms.
He discovered it was nearly four o'clock. He was
sweaty and tired as he started back to the Dorset.
On Clark Street he fell in behind a couple of
well-dressed gentlemen and heard one say:
"comI sent my family up to Wisconsin."
"Don't you think you're being excessively
cautious?" the other man asked.
"I do not. How many fires were there last Sunday and
Monday? Five, six every night? Small ones,
I grant
you, but with no more than an inch of rain since July,
we're sitting in a tinderbox. Two hundred and
fifteen firemen aren't nearly enough to control a really
bad blaze if one should-was
The men turned into a building. Gideon recalled
all the wood he'd seen stacked in cottage
yards, and all the wooden structures in the city.
But he forgot about those things the moment he entered the little
lobby of the hotel. The clerk signaled him to the
desk.
"Mr. Kent, there's a gentleman waiting for you hi
the saloon bar. He's been here almost an hour."
Gideon wasn't expecting his contact today. But
perhaps something had come up. "Ah," he said, "is his
name Ericsson?"
"No, sir." The clerk consulted a card.
"Florian. Mr. Sidney Florian."
He showed the card. Gideon scowled. Below
Florian's name was his tide:
Assistant General Manager, Wisconsin and
Prairie Railroad Corporation.

The clerk identified Florian as the tallest,
thinnest man in sight. Gideon found him easily
in the saloon bar-a cadaverous fellow wearing a
tasteless checked suit and a derby hat. Florian
hunched over the bar, a cane tucked beneath one arm.
He was stuffing raw oysters into his mouth and washing them
down with what appeared to be schnapps.
Gideon approached warily. "Mr. Florian?"
The other man was four or five inches taller than
Gideon. He turned and peered down. His
thin-lipped mouth parted in an insincere smile that
revealed several silver teeth.
"Yes, sir?"
"Gideon Kent"
"Mr. Kent!" A moist, cold hand pumped
Gideon's. "The editor of Labor's Beacon-a
pleasure, a distinct pleasure! I've been very
anxious to meet you."
"And you knew where to find me. Did you also have someone
at the train station to meet me? An old beggar
woman, for instance?"
Close-set eyes scrutinized him. "I beg your
pardon?"
"Never mind." But Gideon did wonder
who among Ericsson's associates had taken a
bribe. He supposed they'd never learn that.
"May I buy you a little something to cool you?"
Florian asked as Gideon leaned against the bar.
"This blasted weather dries a fellow out. Damned
unusual for so late in the year."
Gideon figured he might as well end the charade
of politeness.
"I'm not hi Chicago to accept Wisconsin and
Prairie hospitality, Mr. Florian."
A curt shrug, and Florian was no longer
smiling.
"No, you're here to write up what those stupid
yardmen are going to attempt. Write it up and
spread it in that yellow sheet you publish."
Gideon laughed. "I'm flattered my little
paper's known to the bosses of your line."
A nasty chuckle. "Of course. We keep
stacks in the switch yard privies. The paper may
be read, or it may be used. Mr. Courtleigh and
I happen to think it's more suitable for the second
purpose."
Gideon's jaw clenched. "That would be your
president, Mr. Thomas Courtleigh?" He had
never met the man, but he knew a good deal
about him. Courtleigh had inherited the immensely
profitable trunk railroad from his late father.
Reputedly the man lived in high style. He also
ran one of the most repressively managed lines in
the entire country-and bragged about it. When some
Wisconsin dairy farmers had protested about
exorbitant rates for shipping milk-the WandP was
the only
railroad in their region--Courtleigh's amused
comment for the press had been, "Each man is entitled
to the maximum profit he can earn. The farmers milk
the cows and we milk the farmers and that's the way it
is."
"Correct, correct," Florian said, his long,
rather horse-like head bobbing up and down. "Mr.
Courtleigh sent me with a message. He wants
no publicity about the meeting scheduled for Sunday
night."
"Oh, you know about that too, do you?"
"Certainly we know about it. Mr. Courtleigh
wants to get it across to Nils Ericsson that the
meeting had better not take place-especially not in
Ericsson's house."
Sarcasm edged Gideon's voice: "Yes, I
don't doubt Courtleigh would like to see it
canceled with no resistance."
Florian licked his lower lip. Beneath the brim of his
derby, his dark eyes were unfriendly.
"It had better be, Kent, because if it isn't,
Ericsson's endangering his family. His family
and the family of every man who attends. Do you
suppose you could convey that to him?"
"Why doesn't your boss try delivering his
messages in person?"
Florian snickered. "Why, Kent, he can't
bother with the likes of you or Ericsson. Mr.
Courtleigh's an important man! A leader in
society in this town. Right now he's involved in
planning a ball for his fiancee to be held a
week from tonight. He delegates routine matters
to me."
To goad him, Gideon smiled and feigned
innocence.
"I really don't understand, Mr. Florian. K
Sunday's meeting is so routine, why do you bother
maUng threats?" Before the cadaverous man could
reply, Gideon went on, "Of course I know the
answer. The desire of the switchmen to organize and
bargain for better pay and better treatment is
anything but routine to you and Courtleigh. I
should imagine it's got your boss scared to
death. Giving the families of yardmen post mortem
and injury benefits might mean smaller profits for
Wisconsin and Prairie stockholders. A
smaller diamond for your employer's fiancee.
Or a smaller orchestra for this grand soiree he's
planning while his toadies scurry around town doing
his dirty work-was
Florian couldn't believe what he was hearing. His
eyes were wide with astonishment. Slowly, Gideon
reached out and took hold of the tall man's lapel,
his smile rigid and his blue eye glaring.
"If I hear one more such threat, Mr. Florian,
I will kick you in your bony ass, and keep kicking
all the way to the street."
Several customers further down the bar overheard
Gideon and stared. Suddenly Florian jerked
back, whipped up his cane, flourished it and shouted.
"You damn Communard! You'll regret you came to this
town. You'll regret you bucked Tom
Courtleigh- and Ericsson's wife will regret it
even more. You tell him that!"
He shook his cane one more time and stormed out of the bar.
Gideon laughed, but just a bit uneasily. He
glared at those who had been watching the
altercation. They went back to their own conversations.
"Whiskey!" Gideon snapped to the gawking
barkeep. He was unsettled by the encounter, and not at
all inclined to laugh off the threats of the Wisconsin
and Prairie's president. When he met
Ericsson for breakfast, he must tell him what
Florian had said and let him make a decision about
the meeting. Gideon was glad he'd brought his old
LeMat cavalry revolver with him from New
York.
As he prepared for sleep that night he unwrapped
his night shirt which had protected the revolver in his
portmanteau. Far hi the distance, he heard what
sounded like bells on fire pumpers racing through the
streets. 256
He hefted the revolver and, with the tip of his little
finger, removed a speck of dust from the bright barrel.
He listened to the clang of the distant bells and
abruptly recalled the word used by one of the men he'd
walked behind on Clark Street.
Tinderbox.
Chicago wadds that, all right.
In more ways than one.
CHAPTER IV
Julia at Horn
NILS ERICSSON ARRIVED at eight the next
morxihg. He was a big, heavy-shouldered
Scandinavian with fifteen years' experience on
various midwest railroads, and an almost
messianic belief in the need for or caret
iinization. It turned out that he, too, paid his owe
way to the annual meetings of the National Labor
Union, though he and Gideon had never chanced
to meet at one of those affairs. Ericsson said he
liked to absorb the essentials of the N. L. U.
gospel-expansion of the eight hour day from the Federal
sector into the private oh"; ir-rraation of a
Federal labor department; eliminate.to of
abuses in the child labor system-and the a repeat
.8hero to any Chicago workingman's group which would have
him as a free speaker.
lie and Gideon iet'i 'he hotel acd found rather.
restaurant Dearby. T"'caret cy oid-caret
red breakfast. Only then did Gideon mention
"com'loriaa's threat Ericsson didn't take it
lightly. But iidtiicFrom was he cowed by it:
"Mailer at i'act-I'm a bit encouraged,
Mr. Kent."
Gideon stpp greater-than :-xi his coffee, "How
so?"
"Weil," the other man said in his accented voice,

"Florian's visit means Tom Courtleigh is
really fretting that we may get enough men together to start a
strong brotherhood and force the W and P to meet
our demands."
"They got wind of the meeting, though," Gideon
reminded him. "It's obvious you have at least one
turncoat in your crowd."
Ericsson shrugged. "I got used to scabs and
cowards a long time ago. But if you're agreeable,
I won't inform any of the fellows about Mr.
Florian's call. I want as many as possible
to show up at my house." The big man took a
moment to use a wooden toothpick from the little china jar
in the center of the table. "How'd Sid Florian
strike you?"
"I wasn't overly impressedst"
"Don't let his scarecrow looks fool you He's
done plenty of strikebreaking around this part of tluj
country. Used to be employed by Pinkerton's.
Courtleigh hired him away. Pays him a small
fortune, 1 hear. When it comes to bringing grief to the
laboring man, there's damn little Tom Courtleigh
won't do. Yes, sir-Florian trained
under the master. If he or some of his hirelings should
visit us tomorrow night, we could have a royal scrap
on our hands."
Again he didn't sound wholly unhappy; in fact,
Gideon detected a combative glint in
Ericsson's eye. That was a point on which they
differed, then. The war had shown Gideon that violence
was not something jolly and sporting, but a grim,
gritty business which always had sad consequences for
someone. Sometimes violence was necessary; a man couldn't
permit himself to be walked on. But that did not mean
violence was enjoyable or even desirable.
He thought it wise to remind Ericsson about one
specific part of Florian's threat:
"There was a mention of families being harmed. Your
wife, for instance."
Ericsson sobered and shook his head. "That's a grand
demonstration of how much the line knows and cares about its
employees. I'm a widower, Kent. I lost my
wife Helga four years ago."
"I'm sorry."
"I do have my spinster sister to look after. She
helps me out around the house."
"Does she live close by?"
"Yes, Sigrid has a flat on
Sebor Street. That's just a few blocks from my
place."
"Your letters mentioned a sod, as I recall-was"
With obvious pride, Ericsson said, "His name's
Histo "--vald. He wants to stay for the meeting.
I'm going to permit it. He's old enough. Now
let me draw you a little map showing you how to reach
Taylor Street. It's across the south branch of the
river. Not hard to find."
Soon tney left the restaurant, Gideon
having taken care of die bill. Ericsson glanced
at the brass-bright sky. "By damn. Still ho sign
of laJn. It's been a bad summer, Kent.
'Hie lown's bone dryst.""
"So I've greater-than disv: reani."
Abruptly, Ericsson remembered something: "Ah,
bui I meant to ask whether you're busy less-than
his evening. My sister wibbI be cooking supper
at my house. Sigtid and I would be; pleased to have
you join us."
Gideon t greater-than miled. "Very kind of you.
But I've already made pkio? to pay a social
call."
"Oh. you have offd friends in Chicago caret was
"An acquaintance," he replied with a
thoughtful expression. "Ju;-greater-than that an
acquaintance."
u
Shortly before six that evening, Gideon donned a
fresh shirt and cravat and walked to the Palmer
House,
He stepped up to the first hack in the taxi rank and
asked the driver whether by chance he knew the State
Street address of a suffragist named Julia
Sedgwick. He
was startled at the vehemence of the reaction.
"The Lucy Stoner who runs around the country
spoutin' heathen nonsense about women being' equal
to men? 1 surely do know her address-been in the
Trib lots of times. She lives down at State
and Twenty-first. The swank neighborhood,"
His glance said he thought the last place Gideon would
have business was a swank neighborhood. But he
asked, "You want to go there?"
"Yes. I'll walk. Thanks for the information."
The cabby was irate' "Looking for some of that free
love them godless women practice, are you? She
won't fool with your sort, you damn cheapskate!"
Laughing,, Gideon walked south beneath the gaslights
glowing id the dusk. His pace grew
brisk: his footsteps rapped on the wide plank
sidewalks which, together with the softly shining lights,
made State Srrect so up to date and
attractive.
Hij sriiiie faded when r greater-than every thought of
(he emotional language the cnh dri-or bad
u8dded in connection with Julia. All in less-than
*!!, fhf surb-anist cause was almost as badly
tarrf.d as ii-disi" i. caret er famerit.
Tbi-cnbbv had railed her s Lucy Stoner. The
leader of Julia's asxociaficTi had refused
to adopt her husband's name when she got married, and
many women who followed her did likewise.
He had spat out the word heathen. Most of the country's
conservative clergymen oppose*! the women's
movement. Trie Bible specifically said a wife
was required to be submissive and obedient to her
husband in a)! things. This was reflected in the
property and divorce laws in effect in most
states. It also followed that, given woman's
Biblically ordained position of inferiority, any
attempt to change that position and expand her rights, was
an affront to God's natural order,
The cabby had also accused Julia of free love;
260
in mixed company the term free association was
preferred, since it spared the sensitive. Some
members of the movement did boast that they not only
condoned but practiced free love. Inevitably,
the sins of a few- plus a good many imaginary
transgressions-were attributed to any woman
crusading for equal rights. It was all wearily
familiar to Gideon. Dejand vu, wasn't that the
French expression?
Soon he began to fee' s touch of anxiety.
There was no guarantee lalia woukl be home-or that
she'd receive him if she were y?-he didn't turn
back.
Below Sixteenth, tt.": house? grew more imposing,
occupying half-block lots an.d then, after
jie.8J passed Eighteenth, the full block.
At a gabled mansion between Nineteenth and Twentieth,
2, large party was in progress. The place
blazed with light, and he hoard a string orchestra, and
much laughter. Out in front coachmen were tossing
dice while they waited for their employers. The men
observed JJ-IDSOII with ainuscm caret Either, he
was clearly out of place in this district.
He crossed Twentieth and drew in a shaip breath
at the sight of Julia's house. It was a
huge, three story stone structure with a mansard
roof and identical front corner towers. Most of the
lower windows along the front were illuminated, so
perhaps she was home.
Bat she also had company. A hired carriage
hearing the nameplate cf the Parmelee Livery stood
hi the drive. Again Gideon drew a scornful
look from the ear-riageman. Hs glared until the
driver looked away, then marched up the steps,
wiping sweat oil his forehead with a kerchief.
He rang the bell.. A butler answered,
scnalinked him and started to shut itie door.
"Tradesmen or thoss seeking employment are to go
to the rear entrance."
Gideon shoved his knee against the door. The butler
cried, "See here, sir!"
"My name's Kent," Gideon exclaimed.
"I'm-was He hesitated. Did you address a
divorced Lucy Stoner as Miss or Mrs.?
"comI'm Julia's relative by her former
marriage.""
The waxy-faced servant sniffed and stepped back.
"Your name again, please?"
Annoyed, he said, "Gideon Kent"
"She is expecting you?"
"No, I just arrived in Chicago and found myself with a
few moments-was He started as the butler shot out his
white-gloved hand:
""Your visiting card."
"I don't have any visiting cards, you stuck-up
jackass!"
The butler went white. Gideon shoved the
elaborately carved door all the way open and
stalked into a breathtaking foyer where the crystal
pendants of an enormous gas chandelier scattered
brilliant little lights on the walls, furnishings
and marble floor. He pivoted and barked at the
butler as if he were addressing a recruit:
"You march to cousin Julia and tell her Gideon
Kent's in the hall. Or I'll give you what
Jeb Stuart's cavalry used to give you
Yankees-was He shot out his fist as if it held a
sabre and yelled, "Hah backslash was
The butler literally jumped a foot. Gideon
laughed. The other man hurried out, mumbling:
"She-they-you-may be required to wait--Cooke
comrepresentative-is with-was
Pop-eyed, he disappeared into what appeared to be a
library. Could he have been referring to the banking
house of Jay Cooke, whose brother ran
the railroad lobby and who'd personally spearheaded
the drive to sell Federal war bonds, becoming a
kind of financial hero of the North?
If so, Louis" former wife was traveling in the
highest economic circles. Jay Cooke ran
a solid and respected bank, and was the moving force
behind the most spec
tacular railroad promotion of the postwar period--
me sale of a hundred million dollars' worth
or bonds to finance a second transcontinental
line.
The Northern Pacific was to be built along the
Canadian border. To move the bonds,
Cooke's had even dispatched agents to Europe
to set up sales offices in the palaces of the
nobility. The war between France and Prussia had
undone many of those deals, however. So the banking
house had redoubled its efforts at home; had even
hired a professional publicist to write about the
lush land through which the railroad would run. The
publicist's rhapsodies had gotten out of hand,
though, and now there were jokes about Jay Cooke's
Banana Belt, where orange groves and banana
plantations would one day rise from the Dakota
flatlands. Still, Gideon knew thousands of
small investors trusted both the Cooke firm and the
future of railroads, and were putting all their
savings into Northern Pacific bonds.
He began to inspect the opulent foyer more
closely. Everything about it including its sweeping
marble staircase spoke of vast wealth. Julia
hadn't taken a penny of Louis Kent's money, that
much he knew. She was obviously even richer than
he'd thought
Again he recalled his father speaking of Julia's
selfish and willful nature. What had changed her
into a fighter on the barricades of social
revolution? He couldn't imagine.
He did know a bit about the current state of the
women's movement. Earlier in the year, a schism
had split it into two groups. One was the so-called
Boston group led by Lucy Stone and Julia Ward
Howe; the group for which Julia traveled and
lectured. Its proper name was the American
Woman Suffrage Association. The other group,
the National Association, still operated out of New
York under the direction of Susan B. Anthony
and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
The split had come about because the leaders of the movement
had wanted to start a woman's newspaper
to be called The Revolution. A sponsor and
underwriter was needed, and an eager one happened to he
handy- the wealthy and eccentric George Francis
Train. Mr, Train dabbled in causes. In
fact he dabbled so widely and so uncritically,
he'd earned the nickname "the champion crackpot."
Mr. Train had stopped in Paris during the last
days of the Commune. Me was enrou'.e from Britain,
where he'd done a jaii terns for e8pausing Irish
independence, to Japan, where he proposed r.o
sample the pleasures of mixed bathing in che
rbbuUe. He iovcxj traveling, and wherever he
went, he promoted the w.beiievnblc idea that,
ihaaks to modern steam irans'wftation, a man could
circle thi -"Job"" in eithtv davs or
even less. So far no one had.
In Psrif., Train enthusiastically endorsed the
Commune-a position which the Versailles troop;,
sternly disapproved. When ihey closed in on
Train at his hotel, he fled to the balcony,
draped himself in American and French flags
presumably obtained for the occasion, and shrieked at
the soldiers to fire if they dared. They hadn't
dared, and so Train had returned to the States, where
he rushed to the defense of Victoria
Qaflin Woodhull. Victoria and her sister,
Tennessee Claflin, were two of the more flamboyant
members of the suffrage movement. Woodhull and
Claflin's Weekly, which they edited, spoke out for
free love-which Victoria cheerfully admitted
practicing. When this caused her to be charged with
obscenity, Train took up the cudgels so
vigorously, he was arrested for obscenity too.
Lucy Stone wanted no financing from anyone that
disreputable. Susan Anthony and Elizabeth
Stanton were willing to take the needed money almost
anywhere they found it. An argument ensued; the ranks
were sundered.
The scuff of a shoe brought Gideon's head around.
From a rear hallway, a boy of about nine had
appeared, holding a toy locomotive in swarthy
hands. For a moment Gideon experienced the eerie
sensation of gazing at Louis Kent reborn.
But there were differences., as he recailed from the
previous occasion on which he'd met the boy.
Julia's son was a handsome youngster vccth dark
hair, olive skin and intense dark eyes. His
rnourh was less petulant than liis father's and his
demeanor was Vigorous and cheerful rather than
arrogant.
Gideon strode forward and "distended his hand.
"Hello, Carter. You don't remerarer it.-be."
Carter Kent's gaze lingered or i backslash -c
cyeo.neh. "M believe I shouid, but-was
"It was Boston, afier your faih caret rather pa
caret do away. I'm his, second cousin once
removed-""
"That's right" Gideon Keat his
siGocd for you." They clasped hand;
"Of coarse I remember uu backslash very,"
Cnner said with enthusiasm. "You're from the
Virjunu; combbicc or' the tarniJy, You sang
all those cavalry songs for me.""
"Exactly," Gideon smiled. was "Jine the
Cavalry" and the rest. I'm happy to see you
looking so we!!."
"Gideon Kent?" said a lilting female voice.
He turned and his mouth dropped open, and for a moment
he was totally unable to utter a word.

Julia Sedgwick was almost as he remembered her.
Two or three years older than Gideon.
Tiny; no more than five feet, but beautifully
proportioned with well-rounded hips and small, high
breasts. What caused him to be so
astonished was her costume. She wore pale green
slippers and a robe de chambre of emerald silk
with collar and cuffs trimmed in white fur.
As she walked forward to greet him, the robe grew
Taut over her hip. lie saw a hint of a
whalebooed corset. The tfaraat oi: the gown was
discreetly tied, and the sleeves reached to her wrist.
But he could only think of the costume as "advanced."
Although it was undoubtedly cooler than a regular
dress, proper women simply did not greet
callers in attire designed for the bed chamber.
Julia's son probably didn't realize his mother
was being unconventional, Gideon thought. From the glow
in Carter's dark eye?,, it was obvious that he'd have
worshiped her if she'd been clothed in rags. Still,
Gideon could understand why Julia was something of a
celebrity among hack drivers at the city's best
hotel-and why one particular driver had classed her
with society's withered rose petals, as
prostitutes were called in sensational newspapers which
dared mention them at all.
Julia glided up to him, glossy dark hair
trailing around her shoulders. He sniffed and got
another shock. The stubby cylinder trailing smoke
from her left hand was a cheroot!
"Gideon, what a happy surprise!" She
shook his hand, man fashion.
"Yes-yes-was Somehow her appearance made him
tongue-tied. It didn't help to remind himself that
suffragists often preferred avant garde fashions
such as Mrs. Bloomer's trouser outfit. It
didn't help at all; he felt like he'd wandered
into a bordello.
She noticed his discomfort. "Oh dear! I am
sorry if the robe puts you off. Poor Mr.
Robbins who handles my account with Cooke and
Company almost fainted when he first saw it. But I just
despise being uncomfortable around home. And life's
too short to spend it fretting about outdated
conventions." She put her arm around her son and hugged
him with obvious affection. "As long as the only man
in rny life thinks I'm respectable, what do-1
care about the rest?"
Carter gazed a-be her fondly. Julia squeezed
him once more, then walked back to her guest:
"I'm delighted to see you. I've been home four
days and won't be going on another lecture tour
for a week. Carter and I get very little company. Have you
had dinner?"
"No, but I only planned a brief
courtesy call-was
"Nonsense!" Though lightly spoken, the word
carried an undertone of insistence. She was accustomed
to having her way-with audiences and everyone else, he
suspected. "Neither have we. You must join us.
Carter-was
"What, mother?"
"Please run to cook and tell her we'll be
wanting something good in about an hour."
With a look at the tall, tawny-haired man who was
beginning to recover his composure, the boy asked,
"Three of us?"
Julia didn't even bother to glance Gideon's
way. There was nothing overtly haughty about that, just a
calm unspoken certainty that no one would deny her
wants once she'd expressed them. A strong
woman, Gideon thought. A mite too strong,
perhaps. Yet he found himself fascinated.
"Yes," she said, giving Gideon another warm
smile. "Three of us."
The Lucy Stone Brothel West"
nri. v rVery-K caret But Km hi id around
w a.i just'-v i tj ** "comgreater-than Ji
Mr
, 1 T , a'".
less-than was "i H-" " t caret coma
caret but were
r i , very. us. (caret bh less-than not 'c-can.
r
" i Uit . ii disli my V i?-d f
caret .eji-"jig
noxto".
"Pieaswe, I'm sore," the Cooke's man said,
iooklng vaguely disapprovircccaret , of trie
tall and rather raffish young man who compressed
Robbias" lirup hacid in 4 much stronger one,
"What remains to be done, Mr, Robbins8His"'5
Julia asked.
"Very little, madam. "dis" need year initials on the
list of issues which we recommend you buy and
sell."
Robbins extended the sheet of paper. Julia
released Gideon's arm and sigh8ful quiokJy.
"Don't forget the ad-JitionaJust five hundred
thousand ia Northern Pacific bonds," she said.
"Naturally not. I shall telegraph the purchase
order before I leave the city,"
"And I'll see you again next quarter."
Gideon watches! with some astonishment as she took
Robbins" arm as commandingffright-brace as
she'd takra his. She ushered the bank
representative toward the door. Just as he left,
the soberly dressed banker looked at Gideon with
unconcealed envy. As if he thought the younger man was
in for an evening of licentious revelry.
Julia shut the library doors. The windows were
open. They faced north, to the mansion where the party was
in progress, Julia walked to the cold hearth,
discarded the stub of her cheroot and took another from a
blue and white porcelain jar on the mantel.
"I have precious little time for financial matters,"
she said. "And not much head for them, either. I let
Cooke's handle everything. They're the most solid
banking house in the nation, everyone says." Her
blue eyes sparkled as she struck a match and
lifted it to her cigar. "Does it shock you to see a
woman smoking?"
"No, not at all," he lied. "Would you stop if it
did?" She laughed, genuinely amused. "I doubt
it. Perhaps I'd honor another woman's request.
But never a man's." He'd never been much good at
banter, and he wasn't now. He remained silent
as she dropped Jhe match into the fireplace and
sat. down amid a roiling cloud of smoke.. She
pointed to a chair opposite hers. "Do
sit down. Tell me how you've been." "Well
enough, thanks." He sat, beginning to wonder why
he'd coma here-and why he was staying. Dealing with
Julia's quick mind and strong will wasn't easy or
especially comfortable.
"And how is your very nice wife?" "Oh-was
Unconsciously, his voice grew muted. "combusy
attending to domestic matters. As usual. We have
a second child now,"
"Do you! That's grand. A boy or another girl?"
"A boy." Briefly, he described Will's
birth and some of Eleanor's activities. Julia
was smiling in a relaxed, interested way. It put
him more at ease. "Margaret does have a terrible
fear that Eleanor's outgoing disposition will drive her
into something altogether unsuitable for girls."
With a tart smile, she said, "Such as marriage?"
Gideon laughed. "I think it's the theater
Margaret fears most."
"Well, I can understand why your wife might believe
the theater isn't a proper career for a respectable
girl. On the other hand, we live in a changing
world. Every woman must be given the right to do what she
wants, not merely what she's ordered to do by a parent
or a husband-or by custom. I came to that
realization a trifle belatedly, I'm afraid.
I was dreadfully ignorant when I married
Louis. Ignorant and spoiled. I got the first
of a series of very bad jolts when I consulted a
lawyer about divorcing your late cousin. New
York State was and is far more liberal than most.
But I discovered that even under New York law,
ray rights pertaining to property and to custody of
Carter were severely limited--and that I only had
any rights at all because Susan Anthony and
Elizabeth Stanton had worked so hard, and endured
so much humiliation, to get amendments passed to the
1848 Woman's Property Bill. I wonder,
Gideon -"
A slow puff on the little cigar; then a note of
seriousness in her mildly sardonic tone.
"comI do wonder if you or any man can
appreciate the profound shock a woman feels
backslash vhen she is first tokf that, in most
states, raamage renders her a non-person, With
so rights to possession of the children she suffered to bear. No
voice in the disposition of her own property which
became her husband's the moment they spoke the
marriage vows I got a great shock when I began
to learn those things. In fact, after I left
Louis in "62, what I discovered about the status
of women gradually changed my whole existence."
He nodded. "I've always been curious as to how you
became a suffragist."
"To really explain it, I have to admit some very
unflattering things about myself. And I have 1o go
back io the days when I was still married to your cousin.
At that time I divided people into two groups. Those
few- a very few!-whom my wretchedly spoiled
upbringing
led me to believe were my equals, and all the rest-the
great majority-who weren't. Let me give you an
example of which I'm truly ashamed. My
attitude toward black people. Do you know that as a child,
I hardly even realized they existed, except in a
peripheral way? They existed to wait on me.
Hold carriage doors. Fetch and carry my
wraps. Then, early in the war I began to grow
disenchanted with your cousin. I think it started when I
realized Louis could philander without drawing
criticism. But his wife? Never!"
Gideon withheld an ungentlernanly question about whether
she had wanted to philander and with whom.
"Anyway, when my-devotion to dear Louis began
to waver, I started doing things I'd never
done previously. Including paying attention to the
outside world. Just a little at first, but even that, was enough
to make me aware of the tremendous outcry from the
abolitionists. Late in 1861 I consulted an
attorney about my rights if I should decide to leave
Louis, I got absolutely furious when the
lawyer told me I had next to none. Then I
thought of the abolitionists. Here were hundreds, even
thousands of reformers arguing and propagandizing about
setting blacks free-and properly so, I've come
to realize-but who was writing and speaking about liberating
women? Well, of course there were people doing that-and had
been for several decades- but it took me a few more
years and a great deal of study and soul-searching
to decide I wanted to join them."
She'd started her journey out of bondage by reading a
book, she said. "Margaret Fuller's Great Law
Suit. Do you know it?" He did, but pnly by name.
"Just what I'd expect from a man! There's never
been a greater statement of the conditions forced upon women
in this country. Next I went back to old
newspapers. I read some of Fanny Wright's
lectures-that is, the sections male editors would
deign to print! Wright and Fuller
were the two who spearheaded the movement in the
first half of the century. They were both dead by the
mid-fifties, but they'd laid the groundwork. By the
time I'd gone through the horrible wrangle of a
divorce-and those devastating discoveries about women's
property rights-I was leaning toward conversion to the
cause. My God, Gideon, do you realize it's
barely been ten years since women were acknowledged
to be equal with their husbands as guardians of their
children? And that's only in New York. If Louis
had carec the fiiandment thing about Carter, I'd never have
gotten custody of ray son. But Louis never
really wanted a family. Children were a bother. In
any case, it wasn't until .1866 ihat I
really got over the divorce. It's another shock
to the system comand I trust you know it does
stigmatize a woman. In any case, five
years ago I took another major step. I went
to crae of Lucy Stone's lectures."
Her blue eyes looked through the smoke, and through
Gideon, into the past.
"Such a small, petite lady. But a powerful
speaker with that k-vely voice of hers. The crowd was
typical, I've learned, hicstly men. Mostly
rowdy. Lucy shamed thc-m ioi.o vk caret Ke
when she gazed right Me the auditorium
-Figl't iijt-,j their faces, one by one--and
talked about the night she was born. Her mother
described it when Lucy was growing up. If ever there
was a story that damns men as unthinking practitioners
of slavery, Lucy's birth is it. The night she
came into the world, her mother was already in labor when she
had to fix supper for a haying ci ew that was working on the
family farm, Lucy's father couldn't lower himself
to cook a meal-that was women's work. Then, before she could
get on with the business of lying dowu by herself to deliver
a baby, Mrs. Stone had to milk eight cows. But
Lucy's mother accepted aUs ihat. She said it was a
woman's duty to submit! Lucy was horrified.
From that mo tilde
ment on, she knew she'd spend her life trying
to change such stupid ideas."
Julia paused and drew a breath. "I sat in that
lecture hall with my spine prickling and my head
spinning-and I felt I had to have a part in changing such
ideas, too. Because I had lived through a similar
proof that a woman's lot is still a pretty
miserable one. We""re a long way from being as
free as the black people, Gideon. At least there were
a. good many clergymen fighting for abolition. We have
almost none on our side."
"That much I know," he said, and added with a wry
smile, "Book of Genesis, chapter three,"
"Yes!" Julia cried, jumping up and pacing.
"The weapon they use against us aO the time. "And thy
desks shall be thy husband, and he shall rule over
thee." Lucy says she nearly fell into an
apoplectic fit the first time she read that. The
Scripture's full of similar remarks,
Lucy's learned Greek and Hebrew jus: so she
can examine the origins? texts and see whether the
translators were faithful to them, or only to their
male prejudices- oh, but here I am chattering
on and on-was
"I find it very mteiestuig," he told her, meaning
it "When did you move to Chicago?"
"In the spring of 1868. I was happy to come.
Lucy wanted me to cover the central part of the
country, and the East coast had a lot of unpleasant
memories. The contractors finished this house
exactly two weeks before Louis died--" With a
pitying look, she gazed into the fireplace where she'd
thrown the cheroot a bit earlier. "Poor Louis.
In a topsy-turvy way, J owe him a great
deal. 1 would never have found rcy real calling if he
hadn't been such a bastard."
She drew another deep breath; managed a
smile. "But I've said entirely too much-and
haven't even had the courtesy to ask about your
business ia the city."
"Basically, it's my little newspaper that brought me
here."
"Labor's Beacon."
He blinked his good right eye. "You know it?"
"Certainly. The Association keeps track of
all liberal thinking publications. I never knew you
had journalistic inclinations, Gideon."
"Inclinations, perhaps, but not much talent. I've had
to teach myself to write. Hasn't been easy-was
"When Louis was buried, you were doing organizing
work."
"I decided I could reach more workingmen, and do it more
effectively, as a writer and editor. You know my
father bought the Union from Louis' estate-was She
nodded. "I now have a quarter Interest in it. I could
join the staff tomorrow. But I don't think the other
three owners would care for me airing my views in the
paper. You know how unpopular the movement is."
"Indeed I do. On a par with mine. Go on."
"The Union would lose circulation if it took
labor's part too openly or too often.
I hate to see that kind of compromise, but I know
it's a fact of economic life. That's why
I've continued on my own. As to Chicago, I was
invited to write up an organizational effort by men
who work for one of the rail lines headquartered here."
She leaned forward, the green gown pulling taut across
the bodice of her corset. "Which line?"
"The Wisconsin and Prairie."
"What? Tom Courtleigh's railroad?"
"You sound surprised. Do you know him?"
She walked to the window. "I most certainly do.
He's a dreadful prig, and a hypocrite as
well. Prays at the Episcopal church on
Sunday and steals right and left Monday through
Saturday." She pointed across to the huge mansion
brilliant with light. "I have the misfortune to be his
neighbor."
Gideon gaped. "That's Courtleigh's place?"

"I'm afraid so."
He rushed to her side so excitedly, he collided
with her. His leg touched hers for an instant and he
jumped back as if stung. He gazed down at the
sweet smelling luster of her dark hair,
experiencing a sharp physical reaction.
Julia was gracious enough to keep from looking at him,
as if she sensed his embarrassment and didn't want
to add to it.
"I really don't know Courtleigh well," she
said. "Undoubtedly that's a blessing. When I first
moved into this house, I tried to eall on him and Ms
mother. She lives with him, you understand. I did the
same with all my neighbors-a social
courtesy-but Courfleigh's was the only house in which
my cards were returned without a reply. In other
words, no one in there would speak to me. I understand it's
because Courtleigh and his mother are violently opposed
to the movement, and consider me no better than a
whore."
Gideon almost gasped aloud; the word was never spoken
ia polite mixed company. Julia went on:
"I've even beard Courtleigh refers to this house
as the Lacy Stone Brothel, West." She laughed,
"I've considered hanging red lanterns in the windows
some evening, to convince Tom and his mama the joke's
come true,"
Gideon chuckled. "You should hire some shop girls
to parade up and down in their shifts."
58Fhe very thing! j can just see him contemplating a
brothel next door. He'd think plunging
property values and have so. heart seizure-was She
giggled uncontrollably for several moments.
"Dear me, I haven't laughed so hard in
months."
"Nor I," Gideon said, wiping his eye.
She smoothed a palm over her bosom and drew a
deep breath. "You say Courtleigh's employees
are trying to organize the line?"
"That's right, starting with the switchmen who work in the W
and P yards."
She thought a moment, then clapped her hands together.
"Do you know, Gideon-I've never attended a
labor meeting. I think it would be fascinating. A
furtherance of my education, you might say. You'll
take me to your meeting, won't you?"
Coming as it did on the heels of her use of a forbidden
word, the new request left him sneechless again.
What an unsettling creature she was! Perhaps that
was part of the suffragist strategy-to disarm opponents
by addling them with behavior even the most liberal of men
didn't expect from a woman.
His hesitation produced the same glint in her eye
he'd seen when she got rid of banker Robbins.
"Of course you will!"
"No. I don't believe I should."
She was a shade prickly when she said, "Pray
tell me why not."
"Courtleigh has threatened trouble."
In a few brief sentences he described
Florian's warnings. He was again surprised by her
reaction. He'd expected alarm at a mention of
danger. It only seemed to exhilarate her.
"I insisf you lake me. And no arguments. I
assure you I'll come to no harm. I can take care
of myself-why, I've been mobbed off more platforms
than I can remember. Hit with spoiled fruit and
rocks a dozen times-it's settled."
"Now just a damn-was
The library doors opened. The butler looked in
--but not at Gideon.
"Dinner, madam."
"Thank you, we'll be right along." She smiled up
at Gideon, slipped her arm in his and held it
tight, as though they were long-time friends; even
intimates. She was like some natural force, he thought
with mingled irritation and
amazement. She was like a hurricane that blew away
whatever resistance it encountered. He'd never met a
woman like her.
She was laughing as she led him out of the
library.
"Yes, indeed, we shall go to that meeting. Two
scandalous, outrageous, thoroughly immoral thorns
in the side of Mr, Tom Courtieigh. We're
two of a kind, Gideon."
Her blue eyes shone as she looked up at him and
squeezed his arm.
"I'm so filad you came by -"orafit!""
They had a splendid'dinner, and the longer he, "disva
less-than iit her presence, the easier it became
tc-carry on f, "oaversation. She had definite
opinions on "sost issues of the day, from
Grant's abilities as a chief sxecntccve
10 the debate over greenbacks versus gold.
But her wi.ufulnddess showed only occasionally, and
she could Hsteu to conflicting opinions without
interrupting-though t-cl without demonstrating
impatience with a definite pkik cast in her cheeks.
By the end of the meal, she'd so charmed him that, in spite
of his better judgment, he agreed to take her
to Ericsson's the following evening. As she was showing
hbn out, she said softly:
"Thank you, Gideon. I knew you would." He was
able to laugh at his own expense: dis8ally knew I would
because I'm just a mere man, eh? No match
for the Lucy Sioaer juggernaut-was
"Nonsense. 'That isn't, it at all." She was
smiling, but her eyes seemed full of a peculiarly
intense emotion as she gazed at him. Then she
glanced away and murmured. "It's because you're very
nice."
She reddened again, realizing she'd grown too
personal. He was flattered yet uncomfortable.
Glad to have spent such a delightful evening in the
company of a 277
woman who was bright yet feminine; glad at the
same time to be starting for the door.
Suddenly a sonorous ringing drifted through open
windows. She frowned. "That's the-courthouse
bell.""
She listened to the tolling a moment longer. "It's the
fire signal again. I don't know how many more days
we can go without ram-well, good evening, Gideon."
For the second time she grasped his hand and shook it.
"I'll look forward to seeing you tomorrow."
Those frank blue eyes continued to disconcert him, and
he knew why. Because she was lovely, and when they'd
been talking, Margaret had been forgotten. All
too easily.
It made him feel guilty. Made him
let go of her hand very fast.
"Yes, certainly. Good night."
Her coachman drove him downtown to the Dorset and
let him of!. The streets around the hotel were packed
with people streaming toward the south branch of the river. Some
were frightened, some merely curious. Directly to the
west, a bright red glare filled the sky,
"Bad one, looks like," the coachman commented before he
turned his rig around and started away. Gideon
joined the crowds and walked all the way to the Adams
Street bridge. In response to his questions, he
was told that a planing mill on Canal Street
had caught fire. The blaze had spread to a
lumber yard. On the other side of the river, steam
pumpers and hose carts went thundering along fire
reddened streets.
The wind had increased; it was blowing briskly out of the
southwest. Finally the fire seemed to be contained.
He returned to his room at the Dorset.
He found he couldn't go to sleep. The fire might
have been contained but it was still burning. The glare
illuminated the ceiling and one wall. That kept him
awake, and so did memories of Julia.
Her eyes,
Her provocative erne raid-colored
robe.
Her straggle to educate herself; a struggle much like
his.
Her interest in affairs of the world: an interest much like
Margaret's before she had begun to change.
He felt guilty about the images of Julia in his
mind. But somehow that guilt didn't banish them,
He tried to shut out the firelight by closing the
curtains. As he'd feared, that turned the room
into an oven. He opened the curtains again, rolled
onto his side with his back to the windows and the scarlet
sky, and finally drifted off.
The fire burned well into Sunday. It razed a
sixteen-acre, four-block area. Hotel guests
in the Dorset's dining room at noon spoke of
nothing else. The waiters said Chicago
absolutely could not tolerate one more such fire. As
one put it, overheard by Gideon on his way out:
"If Lucifer wanted to bring this town to grief
an" make it burn like a cauldron of kerosene,
all he'd have to do is toss in one match. No,
strike just one spark. That's all. One spark in the
wrong place at the wrong time."
It was another hot day, but Gideon shivered as he
left.
Invasion at Ericsson's
AC AIM GIDEON WALKED all the way
to State and Twentieth. The meeting was scheduled for
eight in the evening, but Julia had invited him fcr
andup-
discc"com.
he began to perspire. The tem less-than vii
,ggve; eighty, even though the huh be :-, scarlet
haze on she prairie west of the city, A stirf
backslash dnd blew from the suathwest, raising
whiterbb* r greater-than so less-than jti the
'at;:, T. caret can sun put red hcc8hogb8ness
Oil the-water.
Dinner was elegant, vvitii a game bird
biiquc, then a choice of Dover s caret ie or
a r less-than sast of Texas beef. Carter
complained tout he liked neither until Juiia shushed
hibbn. She "f;.-bek f"'"e beef vabbh
a Bordeaux, Gideon the fish witii a ctioi
and dcHesnus Uebfraumilch. She had to spell
the name for him twice. He wasn't embarrassed;
he wrote it down on a slip of paper so he'd
remember it.
The hostess was as elegant as her table. She wore
an expensive-looking summer frock of
lavender foulard with long sleeves that flared at her
wrists. Her overskirt bunched up in back over
a French tournure, a device which the British
termed a bustle. In another of the dizzying changes
upsetting the modern world, a woman's appearance from
the rear had become more important than the way she
looked from the front.
Again he was astonished by Julia's grasp of
political and social matters though the cause to which
she was closest came up most often.
"I know it's bad form to speak ill of the dead, but

Gideon, there's just no denying Louis was an
absolute rogue. Why, when I think of the
calumnies about the movement he ordered published in
the Union-was
She was too exercised to continue.
"Ordered, that's the key word," he replied. "The
editor, Theo Payne, had to print that sort of
biige or lose his job. Now that he's running the
paper without so much pressure, I hope you've
noticed the attacks have stopped.""
"I haven't. I quit reading the rag years ago.
Along with .ta.rr greater-than every less-than
Gordon Bennett's Herald-my God,
there's a male supremacist lor you! Gordon
Bennett, I mean. He once backslash vrote
about a member of the movement ",vho-as he put
it-tilde fornv.'ily ran about to suffrage gatherings
but now stavs home because she Anally got beut rights in
the shape of a bahy. Pregnancy, that's what he
ci-nyiders the proper ciirr. for our mania""
"Mother really does hate that man," Carter said from
h8ness side of the table. He was eating the beef with
buttermilk instead of Bordeaux. It was uncanny,
the way he resembled his father yet lacked the
petulance that had marred Louis' good looks.
Influential publishers who opposed women's rights
weren't the only ones who roused Julia's ire.
She could quote verbatim-and with scorn-from the
British philosopher Herbert Spencer, whose
Social Darwinism had become the exculpatory
doctrine of the nation's business moguls:
was "Society is constantly excreting its
unhealthy, imbecile, slow, vacillating,
faithless members"-that is Spencer exactly,
Gideon."
"I haven't read his stuff," Gideon admitted.
"I know I should. I tried Principles of
Biology last year and found it just too
damn turgid. Isn't he the chap who's always
talking about survival of the fittest?"
She threw him an admiring glance. "Good for you.
Somehow people always fancy Mr. Darwin coined the
phrase, but he didn't. Survival of the fittest
is Spencer's claptrap, Well, I say it's
claptrap--" A shrug. "I can't confirm or
deny its scientific accuracy. Darwin may be
correct about the strong surviving and prospering at the
expense of the weak in the animal kingdom. But if
Spencer's right and that's the way it's to be among
human beings in America. Fll move out!"
"But you haven't yet."
"No. Because, thank God, despite the climate
of corruption in this country, there are still some people who
believe the laws apply equally to everyone, and
everything guaranteed in the Constitution is guaranteed
to everyone, no matter how strong or weak, fit or
unfit, popular or unpopular that individual
may be."
Gideon nodded to agree; how much alike in their
convictions they were!
"I don't doubt all of the President's Wall
Street cronies fairly worship Mr.
Spencer," she went on. "Whether Grant
has ever heard of Spencer is debatable. I'm
afraid the only philosophic principle he
understands is "forward-march!" his
"I think he's an honest and well intentioned man,"
Gideon replied.
Carter gaped. "How can you say that, Mr. Kent?
He whipped the devil out of your side!"
"Carter, no swearing."
"Ma, I said devil, not hell."
Affection lit her eyes as she teased him, "Yes,
but I know what you were thinking." He blushed. She
turned back to Gideon.
"That is quite an admission for an ex-Confederate."
"The war's over, Julia."
"And Butcher Grant hasn't changed. He's still
well intentioned and thoroughly naive. I wish we
could get him out of there before the whole country's
plundered."
"You're being unfair," he argued. "I imagine
Grant's doing the best he can. He never pretended
he wanted
the position, or that he was qualified for it. The
Republicans wanted him. The hero. He's
consistently said he's no politician-was
"An honest admission for a change! Pie
certainly isn't a politician. He's also no
president. Any woman could do better."
The disagreement had grown just a little heated, but her
last remark took the acrimony out of it; the
twinkle in her eye said she was teasing again. "You?"
he retorted.
"Mother would make a fine one," Carter put in.
"Well, J'd certainly like to try it," she
admitted. "And I would if I could only figure
out how to live to age one hundred and fifty. By then
the electorate may be ready for a female in the
White House."
Some impulse made him say, "You'd be the
prettiest president ever in office, I'll
bet."
Carter whooped and applauded. Gideon turned
pink. Julia smiled and gazed at him steadily.
Then, turning pink herself, she murmured, "Why,
thank you, sir." He quickly returned his attention
to his silver sherbet dish. He felt as if he'd
walked into an oven.
After dinner, Julia kissed her son goodnight and
then led Gideon through the kitchen and out to the carriage
house. He was just a bit fuzzy-headed from all the
wine, and hot in his frock coat and
waistcoat, both of which he would have liked to remove.
But the frock coat concealed the LeMat shoved down
into his belt near his left hip. He didn't
want Julia to know he was going to the meeting armed.
A groom drove a landau out of the carriage house.
It was the same handsome vehicle which had returned him
to his hotel the preceding evening. He peered around,
hunting for the driver when the groom hopped down.
Julia tugged on mauve gloves. She saw
Gideon's puzzled expression and explained:
"Eustace has the night off. I'll handle the
horses." 283
The landau was drawn by a matched team of splendid,
glossy bays. Julia hoisted her skirts, not the
least embarrassed to reveal sheer lavender hose above
her shoe tops. She climbed the front wheel like a
teamster. In a moment she was settled on the seat.
He reached for the reins. "See here-you must let me
drive."
"But these are high-spirited animals, Gideon."
"All the more reason." "I assure yof 1 know
hew to control them." "Wei!, dsoimir, so do
X!" ss exclaimed, red hi the face,.
Her smile was sweet but her eyes were nyvcking.
"Is that because you're a male, and -"has
ksiincti"less-than beJy a horseman-while
I, being a mere woman, couldr greater-than be:
possibly take charge of such a team?" A sigh.
"You less-than to have ,less-than :"'less-than
less-than "nsty, old-fashioned ideas---
csciciaih 'or s trad?: arsk-ai.sv,
Well have to work on changing *bo"-e ?"' She
patted the seat. "Meantime, climb up."
Redder than ever, he shook his head. greater-than
conTt's a matter of principle. It looks-it
look:", ridioukmj for a man-was ""To ride in
a carriage driven by a wonian? What utter
foolishness!"
Ctace more she patted the seat. He saw the
determination in her blue eyes, and all at once
realized how stuffy and traditional his protest made
nun seem. He burst out laughing. So did she.
"Do come up, Gideon,""" she urged.
"You'll soon get used to it."
Amused, he climbed backslash ip beside lies',
"And for heaven's sake step socking so sfncken,
Wounded pride isn't a fatal disease, even among
men. Giddapl"
She flicked the reins over the backs of the bays and
smartly turned the landau east io the next
street.
Julia had told him she owned the entire Hock
between State and Wabash; the back part of her lot was
mostly shrubs and fruit trees, he saw. She
turned north on Wabash at Twenty-first, the south
side of her property, and the trees and shrubbery
prevented them from seeing another carriage swinging
into Wabash from Twentieth; prevented them, that is,
until they were virtually into the intersection.
Frantically, Julia reined the bays. The
second vehicle, a brougham, would have collided with
them if she hadn't. Both carriages stopped and the
blue-chinned driver of the brougham brandished his whip:
"Watch yer damn team, woman. Better still,
leave the drivin' to those who do it right Menfolk!"
Seething, Julia backslash backslash
hispered, "That's Tom Courtleigh's carriage,"
Gideon's cheeks darkened. He reached across,
snatched the reins and shook them so the bays bolted
forward.
"What on earth-?" Julia cried as Gideon
halted the team again, directly in front of the
brougham. The dosed, boxy vehicle could not move
forward. In the side nearest the landau, a pale
face could be glimpsed at an oval
window. Gideon tossed the reins aside and jumped
down.
"Move!" the other driver shouted at him.
"Not until I speak with Mr. Courtleigh."
Julia folded her hands in her lap. a smile that
was half astonishment and half admiration curling her
lips. Courtleigh's driver hesitated, not knowing
whether to try the whip on such a formidable-looking
fellow. By then Gideon had stalked to the side of the
brougham and was reaching for the door handle.
He saw that the person by the oval window was his 285
young woman, delicately pretty but with nervous
eyes and an unhealthy pallor. He levered the
handle. Latched. The woman grew panicky. Beyond
her, a much less distinct blur showed where
Courtleigh was seated. Gideon could moke out no
details of the railroad president's face.
"Open up, Courtleigh!" He hammered the
brougham's side. The driver warned him off but he
paid no attention. "I have, something to say to you about your
tame dog Florian, so open up." He pounded
again.
Even Julia was startled by Gideon's ferocity.
A
youngster rolling a hoop slong Wabash
paused and
stared at the man beating on the brougham. Suddenly
the young woman was pushed aside. Another face
"loomed in the window.
Thin; long-nosed; aristocratic. Thomas
Cotutleigh had wavy auburn hair, small,
almost feminine ears lying flat against his head, a
narrow and thin-lipped mouth. He was thirty-five,
no more,
He leaned in front of his companion-a relative
or his fiancee, Gideon assumed--and gazed at
(he young man with ugly contempt 5n his haze"
eyes. Then ha lifted his right hand in ihc
vvin-Jcw. He slashed too hind sideways, a
sharp geiVars cf dismissal. Of barxniimest..
Gideon growled something and started to twist "lw handle
back, and forth. Coon'eigh raised a case be: his
left hand and rapped the couldjiog of the brougham,
"Well, ye've had fair waiTuog," the driver
beliowixl at Gideon.
Julia gave a cry of alarm. The whip hissed.
Before Gideon could jump back, the lash laid, a
streak of red on his left cheek.
The insult was worse than the blow Itself. He
lunged for the driver's arm and missed. The
man was already whipping and maneuvering his team aiound the
snorting bays. Within a few seconds, the brougham
went
clipping away up Wabash, leaving Gideon in a
cloud of dust.
Julia got down from the landau and hurried to his
side. He pushed her kerchief away.
"Don't. You'll ruin it."
"Nonsense." She stood on tiptoe and dabbed at
the whip mark. He smelled her cologne as she
added in a husky voice, "That was a very foolish thing
to do, my dear."
But she wasn't chastising him. Her blue eyes
shone with an admiring light as she bloodied the
kerchief to clean his cheek, touching him and lingering over
the small wound longer than was actually necessary.

The working class neighborhood immediately west of the
Chicago River was inhabited chiefly
by Scandinavians, Bohemians and Irish, Julia
said as they took a leisurely drive through the
Lake Street business district. About half of
Chicago's population lived west of the south branch,
in fact.
It was dark by the time they doubled back and
crossed the river on the Van Buren Street
bridge. They proceeded west, then south on
Cana! to Taylor Street, which ran east and west.
The district was a hodgepodge of saloons,
woodworking mills and narrow residences set on
lots no more than thirty feet wide and four or
five times as deep,
Julia brought the carriage to a stop in front of the
correct address on Taylor. Gideon tied the
reins around one of the three-inch posts supporting the
wooden sidewalk. He noticed that Ericsson's
narrow lot had two equally narrow cottages on
it, one behind the other and both facing Taylor
Street. At the far end of the property he
glimpsed a barn, the site of the meeting.

He took out his pocket watch. "Quarter till
eight. We rambled around town a bit more than I
thought."
And he'd enjoyed it. especially after the unsettling
encounter with the president of the W and P. The arrogance
of the man in the brougham made him doubly glad
he'd corae to Chicsuo, No matter what the
outcome of this meeting, he'd give Thomas
Courtleigh a roasting in Labor's
Beaten,
Julia took his arm arsd they started toward the
passage which rail between the Ericsson lot and the one
adjoining. On the porch of uk house fronting on
Taylor, a man and a woman, shadow-figures,
rocted in wooden rockers. Neither ...greater-than
were them spoke. Gideon supposed Ericsson
lived in the rear cottage and rented the curb-side
one. The guess proved right when a skinny ten year
old in old dotting waved from the stoop of the second
house.
"Mr, Kent?"
"That's right."
The boy ran to them. "I'm Torva'd Ericsson
--"'" When he realized Gideon's
i-ompaaion was and woman, be gave her a starthsj
kv.bbk "They're: waiting -h the barn. Not
everyone"1-Here ya."
""Thank you, so ?"
Gideon and Jul ,greater-than have u caret people t
be caret "
caught a whiff of vstco1 -- At J *- *i
backslash * ni greater-than into a huge, white
m.x can. less-than *" *" greater-than diss.
Oi'id cottage. Tti less-than -
"ist" i caret caret * t jit * r. His
freshly cut wood.
Nib Ericsson w caret caret uffcaret
less-than less-than i? I i
dowa bam, silhou * *" to j r greater-than
greater-than backslash - l
eon noted the si j, -- this e vi.
roadf r's face as T! caret - less-than were
"conceal his dismay caret greater-than uc disuc
"I didn't realize you'd bro caret hf. your
wife to "dis."";;eaccz- his
"This isn't my wife----"'" Cideen began,
realii caret riLike b comealess-than suspicious
that sounded.
Julia intervened: "I'm a good friend and one-time
relative. I was formerly married to Gideon's
cousin. He's dead now. I'm very interested in your
cause, Mr. Ericsson. I live in the city, and
when Gideon called on me, I grew
positively rude until he gave in and agreed
to bring me along. You mustn't blame him for any
presence," she finished in a disarming way.
How clever she was, he thought. He blessed her for
avoiding the subject of her morally questionable
divorce, and for not mentioning her suffragist
connections. She had wisely refrained from
antagonizing the already-suspicious men-a dozen or
so-watching them from inside the barn. The men sat or
stood, frowning at Julia and her finery. Kerosene
lanterns cast a dim light over the men. Several
pipes put a fragrant blue haze in the air.
Ericsson gave Julia another doubtful glance and
accepted the inevitable. He ushered the new arrivals
into the barn. There was an awkward period in which
Gideon introduced himself and tried to elicit comments
about the switchmen's grievances. Most of the men knew
Labor's Beacon at least by name, but they were
intimidated by Julia's presence, and said little in
response to Gideon's questions. Julia sensed the
deepening suspicion and withdrew to a gloomy comer.
She found a crate, stocxi it on end and sat
down, hoping they'd forget about her.
Gradually they did. They gathered around Gideon,
beginning to speak more freely. Then, over one man's
shoulder, Gideon saw Julia take a cheroot from
her reticule. She studied it a moment and put it
away He was relieved to see that no one else had
noticed.
He had already decided to say nothing about his warning from
Sidney Fiorian, or tonight's encounter with
Courtleigh. He was particularly afraid that a
mention of Florian's threats might dissolve the
meeting before it began. But he did offer some
heartfelt opinions.
"I don't know Mr. Courtleigh as well as you,
but I do know a little. It's quite obvious he's a
nabob who lives in style while you and your
families lack even the security of a few
dollars' income if you're injured on the job or,
God forbid, killed. I'm glad you're starting out
to change that tonight. I'm glad you're organizing
to get post mortem benefits, shorter hours and
higher wages. Labor's Beacon will be printing the
story of your effort-and, I'm sure, its happy
outcome."
"Fine, just fine," said a man with an Irish hit in
his voice. "But you won't be printing all our names,
now will you?"
There was laughter, loud but nervous. Gideon
smiled. "No, I won't be doing that."
"Here's the last of them," Ericsson announced,
ushering in two more shabbily dressed men.
"Hallo, Bengt. Hallo, Gunther," the others
called. Ericsson's handsome tow-haired son
followed the late arrivals into the barn.
Again Gideon was introduced. Then Ericsson
took a place in the center of the group: "Fellows,
you know there is no official speaker here this evening.
Nor any program except us putting our heads
together and deciding how we might start a yard
brotherhood. I don't think there's much doubt we
need one-was
"None," growled the big man named Gunther. Most
murmured agreement.
"Good." Ericsson nodded. "I do want to remind
you that we have a real honor conferred upon us by Mr.
Kent's presence. As he said, he's going-to
write up the procedures we follow, in the hope
they'll be useful to other men working for other
railroads around the-was He stopped and heads
turned. They had all heard a team of horses
pulling into the alley which ran behind the barn, parallel
to Taylor Street. Torvald Ericsson dashed
to a back door and peered into the darkness. As
the thud of hoofs and creak of axles grew louder,
he spun.
"Express wagon, pa. What are they doing
delivering on Sunday?"
Ericsson scratched his graying hair. "I can't
imagine."
But Gideon could. As the wagon ground to a halt,
he unbuttoned his waistcoat. Someone gasped when
he drew out the LeMat and stepped forward.
"Douse those lanterns. I'm afraid Mr.
Courtleigh's sent us a few visitors, and I
don't think they'll be sympathetic to-was
He didn't have time to finish. The alley door
crashed back. One man managed to reach and blow out
a lantern, but the rest were staring at the cadaverous
figure bending to duck inside. Lamplight flashed
on his small plated revolver.
Tonight Sidney Florian wore patched trousers
and a cast-off black jacket. He swaggered forward,
glancing from face to face. The other men fell
back. Most recognized Florian and were
obviously terrified by the presence of a company man.
Footsteps thudded outside; other men were running
along both sides of the barn, surrounding it.
Florian's eyes came to rest on Gideon.
"Hallo, Kent. Didn't pay attention to what
I said, eh?" His close-set eyes drifted
to Julia. "E caret enough brought a doxy with you.
She must belong to you because she's too finely dressed
to belong to any of these unwashed sods."
He dropped his free hand; licked at a
silver canine tooth. "Well, we can figure out
something to make her regret she tagged along." He
fingered his crotch and grinned. "Damn if we can't."
Gideon colored. Florian laughed loudly, then
waved his revolver.
"Toss that gun to me. There are boys behind you. 291
They'll jam their stickers in your back if you
don't cooperate."
Gideon's belly ached. He was standing six or
seven feet from the main door but facing away from it.
Julia was on his left. Her frightened face and
glances of warning said there were indeed men behind him, though
he had difficulty sorting out the sounds they made;
three more burly thugs were entering noisily by the
alley door and spreading out around Florian. The
W and P workers weren't outnumbered by any means.
But Florian's blacklegs had knives and
shot-loaded socks, and that made all the difference.
The switchmen showed signs of wanting to break and run
so they wouldn't be identified. But if they ran for it,
Florian would shoot them down. Gideon decided
it might be better to try to seize the initiative;
that way, he might be able to help them get away
safely.
Florian's horse-like face contorted.
"Come on, Kent. Hand it over. No? Then I'll
take it."
He stepped forward, ducking to avoid a lantern
hanging from a beam. His revolver momentarily pointed
at the ground.
Gideon nodded as if he meant to give in.
Florian saw that and smiled. Gideon raised the
LeMat in a swift, smooth motion. Too
late, Florian realized what was happening.
Gideon shot at the lantern.
The bullet nicked the oil reservoir. Kerosene
and glass cascaded on Florian, who screamed like
a woman.
"Runl" Gideon yelled. He lowered his head and
raced toward Julia. The barn exploded into a
bedlam of noise.
He whipped his arm around Julia's waist, then
pointed the LeMat at the two hulks who had
indeed been poised hi the barn door, long dirks
hi their hands. One of the switchmen dived through an open
side window, then another. Someone in an adjoining
house yelled a query about the shot. Ericsson was
infuriated.
"Kent, we're not going to run from a bunch of---"
Gideon shouted Mm down: "They want you
to fight! If one or two get hurt, the rest will
never organizel"
He hated saying it, but it was necessary. Ericsson
looked baffled and hurt. The rest of the switchmen
scrambled out the window while Florian's hirelings
waited for orders. The emaciated mac signaled for
them not to interfere with those who were escaping.
He'd regained his composure. He used a blue
bandanna to mop kerosene from his cheeks and forehead.
Torvald crouched near the blacklegs in the
doorway, tense and angry-eyed.
"You're smart, Kent," Florian said as he put
the bandanna away. "Smart or maybe yellow.
Either way, well let the rest go. Bat you're going
to be an object lesson for them. So are you,
Ericsson. You loaned your premises for
activities contrary to the company's best interests.
Communard activities," he added for Gideon's
benefit. He wagged the revolver. "Lads?
Chastise Mr. Kent and Mr, Ericsson first. The
wench you can save for last. A little reward for a nice
piece of work."
The thugs in the doorway nudged one another and
started forward. Gideon shoved Julia behind him as,
somewhere outside, there was strident yelling.
Florian wet his lips, locked both hands on the
butt of his revolver and aimed it at Gideon's
head.
"All right, Kent. Crouch down good and slow, and
put the gun on the ground."
Gideon obeyed.
"Now stand up. Fine. Boys? Bash him some. Then
Fll have my turn with a knife."
Gideon was sure the thugs believed he wouldn't
resist because of Florian's gun. So that gave him
an advantage, albeit a very small one. The
two burly men sidled toward him. One was
slightly ahead of the other, tucking his dirk in his
belt and balling his right fist for a
bare-knuckled swing. Gideon watched the thug's
arm for a sign of sudden movement.
With a grant, the man lunged in. lashing his fist
back, then forward. Gideon ducked. The punch
missed He booted the thug in the stomach and shoved
him sideways.
Just as he'd hoped, the man stumbled toward
Florian and. blocked his line of fire. Everyone
started shouting except Gideon, who waited for the
second assjilmt to come darting in with his knife.
Before the man got within arm's length,
Gideon snatched up the LeMat and fired.
A thunderous explosion--smoke-avid the man went
shrieking and flounderine across the barn, blood streaming
down his sleeve. Ericsson jumped another man
armed with a knife. Gideon spun toward
Florian. The stupefied ringleader shoved the thug
who'd ruined his aim, then got off a hasty shot.
The bullet chipped a big chunk of wood from a
beam above Julia's head.
Gideon was frightened but he tried to do what he'd
learned to do in the war-let the fear heighten rather than
hamper his concentration. He forced his right hand up; forced
himself to take the time necessary to sight, though it seemed
forever. Florian wanted to fire again. But
Ericsson and his adversary kept reeling back and
forth in front of him, locked in a fight for
possession of the knife. Gideon finally saw an
opening and pulled the trigger.
The bullet struck Florian's right shoulder. The
plated revolver dropped between the toes of his
boots. With a groan and a dazed look, he sank
to his knees, almost like a man praying.
He extended trembling hands toward the ground. The
moment his palms touched the dirt floor, his arms
gave out. He collapsed on his face,
half conscious and trying to crawl toward the alley.
He drew his left leg up
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and wrists. Gideon couldn't get a clear shot.
Torvald Ericsson rushed to help his father. He
grabbed the thug's left shoulder. The man drove
hi; right hand across in front of hicccaret chest and
plunged the blade into the-boy's ribs.
Torvald lurched back, gazing down with round eyes
at his red shirt. Then, while his father cried his name,
the boy fainted.
The kiiife-wielder jumped up and fled for the door.
Gideon fired but missed. He stood
shaking while die express wagon rumbled away
along the alley. Abandoned by the men he'd paid,
Korian kept trying to crawl like some crippled
crab. He'd managed to move about a yard,
gnzntiag and snuffling and leaving a swath of blood
on the ground. But his movements were growing more feeble
even' moment.
Ericssoc aad Julia dropped to their knees on
either side of the unconscious boy, Gideon's
gunt mounted. K he hadn't fired the first time,
perhaps Torvald wouldn't have been stabbed. If, if!
Infuriated with himself, he whirled toward the barn
door. Why were Ericsson's neighbors shouting so
loudly, yet not bothering to rush to the bam? Then he
realized it wasn't the fight causing all the
commotioi). It was a bright, ruddy light shimmering
on the wails and rooftops of the cottages facing
Taylor Street.
Gideon looked at Torvald. "How is he?"
Pale, Julia said, "I can't teUs beyond the fact
that he's badly hurt and needs a doctor."
Ericsson's face showed tracks of tears. He
gazed at Julia, then Gideon, but saw neither
one. "Why did I let him stay? Why didn't
I send him to my sister's? Tor-vald's
all I have left-was Impotent rage made him
leap up and shriek at the people yelling in the darkness,
"Why are they making so damn much noise?"
Gideon staggered to the barn doorway. Instantly
he felt the strong southwest wind blowing his hair.
In the distance someone cried, "It's DeKoven
Street. Annie Murray's shed or the
O'Leary barn, I don't know which."
The wind tore through his hair and gusted against his face,
hot and smoke-stinking. He remembered conversations
overheard and had a strange feeling of dread. In a
hoarse voice, he said:
"There's a fire."
"Oh my God," Julia whispered.
"DeKoven Street," he added. "Where is that?"
Ericsson wiped his mouth, his eyes wild. "Only
one block south."
CHAPTER VH
Lucifer's Match
GIDEON SHOVED THE LeMat back in his
belt, gently moved the stricken Ericsson aside
and lifted Torvald's slashed shirt away from the
wound. The cut wasn't wide. But it was impossible
to tell how deep it went. Though clotting had started
at the ends, blood still oozed from the center.
Gideon raised his head and looked at Ericsson.
"Is there a doctor close by? One you
regularly use?"
The man shook his head in a vacant way, as if
he couldn't hear. It was growing hard to hear anything
because of the shouting in the street and the bells of arriving
fire equipment. Gideon shook the other man's
arm:
"I asked whether you have a doctor!"
New tears filled Ericsson's eyes. "Oh,
God-I'm responsible for what's happened to my
boy-was
"No! If anyone's responsible, it's
Courtleigh. We've got to save your son and then
make Courtleigh pay. Now do you have a doctor?"
He'd counted on Courtleigh's name jolting the other
mail out of his daze, and it did. Ericsson wiped
his eyes, then shook his head. "A midwife
delivered Torvald, and the boy was never sick a day
after that My Helga died suddenly, with no one
attending her."
Julia touched Gideon's arm. "My doctor
lives in the country. A mile north of the
Fullertoii Avenue city limits. We could
take the boy there,"
"Sounds like a pretty good distance, and I'm not sure
we should move him at all."
Julia gazed out the door to the sky above the houses.
Clouds of sparks were blowing past, driven from the
fire site by the wind. She said in an emphatic
way:
"Well, this place certainly isn't safe. If
that fire spreads, we're right in its path. And it will
spread unless that wind calms down-was She took
Gideon's arm. "What if we take the boy and his
father as far as my house. Someone can go after Dr.
Boling from there."
Bits of burning matter whirled and danced over
Ericsson's house. As Gideon watched, several
of them fell on its tar paper roof. He realized
what the material was: some of the shavings and scrap
lumber stockpiled in the neighborhood.
And wasn't this near the scene of last night's
fire? Wasn't this a district of lumber yards?
Suddenly he re
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III go for the doctor."
"Torvald, Torvald-was
The sound of Ericsson's renewed sobbing seized
Gideon's attention again. The big man was rocking
the unconscious boy in Ms arms. Gideon ran
to him:
"For God's sake, Ericsson-don't shake him
that way!"
Ericsson kept swaying, cradling Ms son against
his chest, heedless of the blood staining his own clothing,
He was beginning to lose control. Gideon's warning
came as a shout:
"Don't shake him!"
Ericsson turned his head; seemed to comprehend.
He lowered his son to the floor. "What about my
sister, Sierid? She lives in a rooming house
near here. Sebor Street-was
"You told me."
"She lives by herself-was Ericsson finally seemed
to be aware of the red sky full of flaming
wood, "That fire looks bad. I must find
Sigrid and make sure she's all right."
"How far is Sebor Street?"
"Just a few blocks north."
"We shouldn't go out of our way, Gideon,"
Julia put in. "The more bouncing and bumping the boy
takes before someone looks after him-was
But Ericsson paid no attention. He turned away

Torvald andwitha curious shine in his firelit
eyes, walked out of the barn.
His erratic steps took him toward the back of his
cottage. Gideon and Julia exchanged startled
looks.
In the yards on either side of Ericsson's
property, people were shouting at one another as they hauled
furniture from their houses. Sparks were landing on the
roofs of almost every building on the block,
Ericsson tottered up the back steps. Julia
gaped. "What the devil's wrong with him? He's
going back in-sidel"
Gideon ran. He caught the big man just as he
opened the cottage door. "Ericsson, don't be
a fool. These places will go up any minute.
Help me get Torvald into the
carriage!"
Ericsson swung around as a foot-long piece of
burning wood went sailing overhead. It plummeted
suddenly; struck the roof of the barn. Ericsson's
lips glistened. His eyes had an irrational light
in them. He threw Gideon's hand off:
"IL-,VE me alone." "Listen, you mustn't-was
The big man shoved him. "There are things I have
to save! Helga's jewelry. Our wedding
photograph. I have no other picture of her."
"There isn't time!" Gideon shouted, trying to drag
the man off the stoop. Ericsson let out a
deranged howl and clubbed him on the side of the head.
Gideon sprawled in the yard. The rear door
crashed. Ericsson vanished into the cottage.
Stumbling up, Gideon called his name one more time.
Despite the noise around him, he heard
Ericsson lumbering through the darkened house,
overturning furniture and yelling unintelligible
words. Names, perhaps. His son's. His wife's-
Well, first things first. He'd worry about
Ericsson as soon as they moved the boy to the landau.
Back in the barn he smelted smoke. Wisps of

curled around the rafters. The roof was
catching. The alley door banged in the wind.
Gideon pointed at the floor. A snake-like path
dampened by blood led to the rear entrance.
"Florian's gone."
"Good heavens!" Julia exclaimed. They both
stared at the banging door, then at the trail left
by Florian's body. "He crawled out and I
didn't even notice."
Gideon shrugged. "Good riddance." He didn't
really feel as callous as his words made him sound.
A man hurt as badly as Florian would be
helpless out in that raging red darkness.
He handed Julia his revolver. "Hang onto it
in case we have any difficulty. The street sounds
like total bedlam. I need a long piece of your
petticoat."
She laid the gun on top of her reticule,
lifted her skirt and tore the raffle from her
petticoat hem. He carefully wound the cloth
around Torvald's back and chest to soak up the
blood. Then he lifted the ten-year-old and put his
ear close to the boy's mouth, He felt the warmth of
Torvald's shallow breathing. How long they could
keep him alive was anybody's guess.
They hurried down the passage between the
houses. As they stepped onto the sidewalk,
Gideon felt the heat of the wood walk through the
soles of his boots. More fire equipment had
arrived. Directly across Taylor Street,
cottages were burning. Streams of water arcing from the
east and west struck the flaming houses, but with little
effect. The fire seemed to be consuming the entire
block to the south.
People were pouring out of houses along the north side of
Taylor. They carried articles of clothing,
framed pictures, piles of books, small
items of furniture. Most of the people rushed in the
direction of the river.
A shirtless, hairy man staggered out of
Ericsson's rental cottage with a heavy chair in
his arms. A wizened woman followed him onto the
porch. The man made
straight for Julia's landau. Miraculously, the
vehicle hadn't been stolen though it obviously was
about to be.
The terrified bays stamped and tugged on their
tethers, their rolling eyes huge and red. Julia
marched up to the hairy man as he heaved the chair
into the back of the landau.
"Get that out of my carriage!"
From the first cross street to the west, a four-horse
steam pumper thundered around the corner and slowed to a
stop. A two-wheeled hose cart came rolling right
behind.
The hairy man paid no attention to Julia.
"Are you deaf?" she cried. "Remove that chair this
instant! We'll take your children if you have any, but
we're not hauling personal belongings." She pointed
at Gideon with Torvald in his arms. "We already
have one wounded youngster to take. And Mr. Ericsson-was
The man eyed Gideon, then looked at Julia
again. Her reticule was in the same hand as the
revolver and hid it. The man scratched his stomach.
"Well, ma'am, I hear what you say. But it
don't appear either of you people can stop me from moving
whatever I damn please. Martha and I got no
youngsters. We do have some valuable pieces which we aim
to cart away in that buggy whether you like it or-was
Calmly, Julia shifted her reticule to her
other hand. She raised the LeMat and pointed it at
the man's brow.
"Take that chair out of my carriage or I'll
blow your head away."
The hairy man looked as if he might swoon.
He staggered to the landau, removed the chair
and carried it to the cottage porch. Then, with one more
terrified glance at Julia, he shoved his wife
through the front door and vanished.
in
Gideon couldn't suppress a smile as he laid
Torvald on the back seat. Julia didn't
notice. She was in the street studying the sky;
turning slowly from one quarter of the horizon to the
next until she'd made a full circle. She
walked back to him:
"Gideon, I'm no expert on such things, but this
looks very bad. Just that one block of buildings between
here and DeKoven Street is on fire. But the
glare is already so bright, I can read the courthouse
clock. And it's a good mile to the northeast."
She was right. From a few feet out in the street, the
clock numerals were clearly visible. The houses
on the other side of Taylor were crumbling and
disappearing behind a rampart of flame more white than
red. The heat was so intense, sweat poured down
Gideon's face. Paint was beginning to bubble on the
front of the first Ericsson cottage. More fire
equipment swung into the street from the intersection to the
east. Soon two more pumpers were directing streams
of water on the scorching, wind-tossed bed
of embers that had replaced the houses on the south
side.
Sparks rained down on Julia suddenly; a whole
firefly cloud of them. Gideon leaped to her,
jerked her against him, smothered the sparks with his hands. People
kept streaming by, carrying everything from tabby cats
to chamber pots. There were children fleeing with adults, and
some by themselves, their faces confused and frightened. The din
was incredible; he had to shout:
"I've got to find Ericsson."
She nodded, then pointed. The roof of the front
cottage was starting to burn. "Hurry!"
He ran along the side of the first cottage and in through
the front door of the second. He glanced back,
appalled at how quickly the fire consumed these wooden
structures. Already almost the entire roof of the front
house was ablaze-and as he stood in the dark
hallway yelling Ericsson's name, a scrap of
blazing roof paper floated to the front stoop of this
one. Almost instantly, the dry wood smoked, then
burst into flame.
He thought he heard heavy trampling in a rear
room. "Ericsson?"
Wind-driven smoke poured through the house. He
coughed as he staggered along a narrow hall
and looked hi each room. The heat inside the
cottage had risen fifteen to twenty degrees in
less than a minute. As the flames spread, the
smoke took on a cherry glow.
He stopped at the last doorway, on the east
side at the very back. Inside he glimpsed a
hulking form holding something white. He swallowed and
wiped his stinging eye.
The west side of the house began to burn, the fire
leaping out both horizontally and vertically at
incredible speed. Smoke poured through open windows on
that side, but there was enough light for him to see Ericsson
with a silver picture frame under one arm and a
yellowed wedding dress in his big hands. As he
fondled the lace on the dress, tears streamed from his
blue eyes.
"Ericsson, you've got to come out of here!" Gideon
yelled as smoke hid the other man for a moment.
"Is that you?" Ericsson shouted,
"What?"
"Is that you, Helga?"
Gideon whispered, "Oh my God."
"Helga, we must go find my sister. She may be
in danger!"
Gideon darted forward through coiling smoke.
Touched the wedding dress-
Ericsson went berserk. He dropped the picture
frame and flung the dress behind him. He battered
Gideon's head with both fists. Gideon was
hurled against an old
wardrobe. He struck his temple so hard, he
nearly lost consciousness.
Snorting, Ericsson aimed a kick at his groin.
It missed only because Gideon pivoted at the last
moment. Ericsson's boot hit his calf.
Everything-the rosy light, the smoke, his lumbering,
demented assailant-grew more blurred. He was
afraid Ericsson would land a solid blow and leave
him unconscious to die.
But the big man picked up the wedding dress,
secured the framed photograph under his arm and
blundered back into the hall-just as the lintel of the room
opposite burned in half and fell. A heavy
piece of it struck Ericsson's head.
He staggered. His hair caught fire, then the wedding
dress. Gideon rushed to try to save the other man
but flames leaped between and drove him back. Coughing
and gasping, he ran to a window on the east side of the
house. He leaped through headfirst, nearly breaking his
shoulder when he hit the ground. He
managed to gain his feet and run toward Taylor
Street. Behind him he heard Ericsson screaming his
wife's name in a fading voice.
The first ooaape on the lot, almost completely
burned, was. siarting to collapse as he passed
its rear corner. Its side "all bowed outward, the
boards splitting and crumbling into red ash. Gideon
leaped out of the way. He bounced against the wall of the
adjacent house, which had not yet been consumed.
Bits of burning board fell around him but he
missed being inundated by the worst of the fiery debris.
Guided only by his sense of direction, he finally
reached the street. He had to jump over the lire
shooting up between the planks of the sidewalk,
"Gideon? Here!"
He followed the cry and, in the center of Taylor
Street, saw an incredible sight: Julia standing in
front of the landau, reins in one hand, revolver in the
other. In
the carriage, crowding every inch of space except the
seat where Torvald lay, were children from age three
to early adolescence. There must have been eight, ten,
a dozen; hanging off the back; clinging to the
footboards.
"com't'was the O'Leary dairy barn, I
heard that for sure," one youngster shrieked to another as
Gideon dragged himself up to the seat and seized the
reins. There was no protest from Julia. She took
her place beside him. She leaned her head against his
shoulder and held his arm.
"I thought I'd lost you. I collected all these
temporary orphans, but I thought I'd lost you.
I'm so thankful you're all right."
She sounded ready to weep, yet at the same time there
was overwhelming relief-even joy-hi her voice.
IV
Gideon whipped up the team. Julia brandished the
revolver to drive off adults who wanted to take
the children's places. They drove a block east, then
north toward the nearest bridge. The whole sky
seemed alight, though only the area behind them was
burning-nos there was a second large fire several
blocks north. "That's St. Paul's Catholic
going up!" exclaimed a boy in back.
"So it is," Julia said in dismay. "It must be
all the airborne debris-good Lord. I just
remembered something else. The Bateham shingle
mill is within a block of the church. Wood and more
wood-was
Gideon veered the team and narrowly
avoided a collision with another steam pumper racing
in the opposite direction. They fought across a south
branch bridge through terrified crowds. It took
them the better part of two hours to reach the mansion on
South State.
The servants helped unload the children. Some of them
had been driven to safety with the permission of
their mothers or fathers who had loaded them into the landau and
then fled on foot. Others had lost track of their
parents in the confusion and had just been plucked up from
Taylor Street. Most of the youngsters were laughing and
singing as it the whole outing were a lark.
Gideon carried Torvald to Carter's bedroom.
Ericsson's son was still alive, but pale and barely
breathing.
Returning downstairs, Gideon fortified himself with a
good jolt of bourbon. He'd have laughed at
Julia's disheveled hair, sooty face and
torn dress if the situation hadn't been so grim.
"I've got to fetch this doctor of yours. Will you
write the directions for me?"
"Oh, Gideon, it's such a long way-was
"Yes, but the fire's confined to the west side of the
river."
"So far."
"Julia, the boy will die unless we get help!"
"All right, all right. I'm being selfish." She
avoided his eye as she added, "Thinking of you instead of
him. Come into the library."
He left his ruined waistcoat on a chair and
rolled up the sleeves of his sweated shirt as he
followed her. She sat down and began to write.
He consulted his watch. A few minutes after
midnight. He was exhausted. Parts of his hair and
eyebrows had been singed away. His clothing and his
skin smelled of smoke. He'd inhaled so much of
it, his lungs hurt.
Suddenly a servant ran hi; the man who'd been
sent to the highest point of the house, the northwest
tower, as a lookout.
"Madam, the fire's leaped the river to the south
side."
Julia laid her pen aside. "You're sure?"
"Yes, madam, I can clearly see something burning
in the vicinity of the gas works or Conley's Patch."
And the wind's blowing northeast, Gideon thought.

Directly across the route he had to take to the far
north side. Well, it would be a devil of a
lively story for the Beacon if he lived
to write it.
While the servant waited, Julia handed Gideon
the directions and in the next breath said, "Don't
go. We'll find another doctor somewhere close
by."
"Do you know any?"
"No, but-was
"And your neighbors who are so fond of you-are they
going to rush to help? Of course not."
"But you saw the people in the streets, Gideon.
They've gone crazy! You won't get ten
blocks."
Quietly: "I will if I take my gun."
Suddenly he responded to an impulse, squeezed
her arm and kissed her sooty, sweaty cheek-right there
in front of the servant. He murmured, "Don't
worry about me."
She closed her eyes and pressed her face against his
mouth. "How can I help it?"
How natural and comfortable it felt, being so close
to her. But he was aware of the man watching, and drew
away. A wry and weary smile hid his
apprehension as he said:
"I really have no choice about going. You were married
to Louis long enough to know the Kents have a
passion for lost causes."
Then he went out into a night grown brighter than day.
Into the Inferno
WITH THE LeMAT in his belt, Gideon started
up State Street in the landau. The grooms had
changed horses, substituting a gray and a
graceless but sturdy dapple for the spent bays.
The carriage clattered past Courtleigh's. The
place was shuttered and curtained like a fortress. Every
window was draped. Only slits of light showed at
the edges. A man crouching on the roof with a
spyglass kept watch on the fire for his master.
Gideon hawed to the team, driving them on. A few
moments after he passed the mansion he was overcome
by the shock of all that had happened on Taylor
Street; particularly the thought that he'd put a
bullet into Courtleigh's assistant general
manager.
The shock deepened as he recalled Florian
trying to crawl out of the barn. The man couldn't have
gotten far on his own; what had happened to him as the
fire engulfed the neighborhood? The same thing that
happened to Ericsson?
Gideon's arms shook uncontrollably. His
head swam. He pressed the sole of his
boot against the brake for fear he'd careen the speeding
carriage into a fence or gatepost. Then his mind
took cognizance of what he had been seeing for
several blocks-masses of people running south.
The flight reminded him of what he had to do. He'd
worry about the possibility that he'd caused
Florian's death if and when Courtleigh raised the
issue. It might "ever happen. Meantime, reaching the
north side
looked increasingly difficult if not absolutely
impossible. Time and again he was forced to slow the landau
to avoid the people swarming in the street.
As a boy in Virginia, Gideon had often heard
his preacher father refer to Hell. He'd never quite
believed in its existence, and his imagination contained
only a vague picture of what Hell might be
like if somehow it did turn out to be real. Now, just
after one o'clock on the morning of Monday, October
9, Gideon beheld the best approximation of
Hell he ever wanted to see.
The skyline of the South Side was alight with
windblown banners of fire. Clearly the
holocaust had leaped the river in more than one
place. One immense arm of the fire was burning a
few blocks west-the area of his hotel.
Where he'd left the gifts for Margaret and the children,
he thought with dismay. Further north, he could make out
another big section afire, and in the center, the
courthouse. That meant the business district was
threatened.
The wind still blew fiercely from the southwest. The heat
on his left side was scorching. The unbelievably
bright sky was full of blazing wood, glowing ash,
cinders, occasional clouds of oily black smoke,
and great masses of wind-blown sparks. Gideon
had never seen an effect as strange and lovely as
that produced by the sparks. It was as if he were caught
hi a snowstorm in which every flake was lighted from within.
Julia's instructions called for him to get to the
north side via a pedestrian and vehicle
tunnel running under the river at LaSalle
Street. By the tune he'd reached State and Van
Buren, he was positive the courthouse was burning.
He couldn't travel up LaSalle, then. Doing
so would take him directly into the worst of the fire.
Van Buren was packed with people, but perhaps he could turn
right-east-in a block or two. He remembered his
first stroll around the city. He'd seen a swing
bridge over the river at Michigan Avenue.
He could go north and use that.
Everywhere the flurry of sparks was touching off new
fires. He passed a two-story building with a
copper roof, cornice and large windows on the first
floor. Suddenly fire eating through the back of the
building blew the windows outward with cannon-like
force. Men and women around the landau screamed, A
rain of glass fell on Gideon, gashing his
neck. One fragment narrowly missed his good eye as
he fought to keep the team from bolting.
People packed the street, pushing barrows, dragging
trunks and mattresses, lugging bundles of
personal belongings. Several tried to seize the
bits or headstalls of his horses. Others
attempted to put their belongings aboard. Finally he
had to draw the LeMat to keep them back. He
drove with the reins wrapped around his right hand and the
revolver in his left.
He made slower and slower progress. Hundreds,
perhaps thousands were fleeing south along lower State
Street. Although rapidly becoming a prime
business thoroughfare, State still had a large number
of small frame residences. A man wearing five
hats stacked one atop another came running out the
front door of one such house. He had a small
girl in his arms. He spied the landau,
fought his way to it and ran alongside.
"I'll pay you a hundred dollars to hire this
rig."
"I'm sorry, I can't do it," Gideon called
back,
"Two hundred. Five!"
"No. I need it to fetch a doctor for an injured
boy."
Crestfallen, the man limped away. Two of his
hats fell off and were snatched up by people behind him.
Gideon maneuvered the landau around the corner
to Jackson, heading east. He hoped Michigan
would be less congested. He passed several saloons
whose patrons were inexplicably celebrating-singing and
capering in the street. At one such place, a
frantic owner was trying 310
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Behind him, green flames shot from several of
th8copper cornices he'd seen earlier, "flue
night was turning into a mind-numbing chaos of color
and sound. He realized (hat ever since he'd left
Julia's, he'd been listening to a sonorous
tolling without quite being aware of it. Nov." he beard
if distinctly. The courthouse beli Still ringing even
though the building wars burning down.
He heard boat bells and horns, too; faint
clangs and squeaks above the hubbub of the surging
crowds. Probably the horns and bells belonged
to vessels trying to negotiate the Chicago River
to its mouth, and safety.
As he turned the team into Michigan and saw the dark
lake rippling with red highlights not far to his right,
the earth shook and the sky reverberated with thunderous
noise. People shrieked and began to run like animated
dolls-without purpose, without direction. Somewhere
dynamite was being set off. In the hope of creating
firebreaks, Gideon supposed.
And above aJI the cacophony--bells, horns,
detonations, screaming-the fire itself made a
noise Uke a continuous gush of air from a great
bellows. All across the downtown, that damnable wind
was fanning the flames and creating storms of fire that
literally roared. "Damn!" Gideon said in a
despairing voice when some smoke cleared and he
surveyed Michigan Avenue for several blocks
ahead. It was jammed with people and small mountains of
personal items and household goods. Obviously
a great number of residents from fur
ther west had fled with their possessions toward the
lake.
Well, he was cursed if he'd turn back just because
the street was impassable. He yanked the reins and
sent the landau swaying off the wood paving blocks
to the weedy strip of open space between the avenue and the
shore of the lake.
The landau bumped and lurched north across the uneven
ground. There were piles of household things out here as
well, and people camping on them Gideon maneuvered
around one such squatter as a man howled from the
street:
"It's the judgment of the Almighty! He has seen
this city sink in corruption worse than Sodom's.
That's why we're all going to die! The Lord has
cursed Chicago]"
People flung rocks and dirt at the hysterical
doom-cryer, probably because they feared he was right.
Gideon could almost believe he was.
Three poorly dressed men came slipping up from
behind, moving on an oblique line toward the landau's
left rear wheel. Gideon's blind spot. He
wasn't aware of them until heavy boots thumped
on the floorboards and the carriage swayed.
Instinctively, he twisted around to the right so he could
have a wider field of vision with his good eye. But one
of the men had jumped aboard just behind his left shoulder.
The man had a short length of pipe in his hand. Before
Gideon saw him, he brought the pipe down on
top of Gideon's head.
At the impact, Gideon dropped the revolver.
The horses lunged. "Get hold of "em,
Barney!" a man yelled. The one who'd struck
Gideon leaped down and dashed in front of the team.
He brought the horses to a halt.
Dazed, Gideon was trying to stand. His head rang.
Bile rose in his throat. Someone shoved him toward
the right side of the seat. A voice growled, "Every
liveryman
in town's being" offered five, ten times the normal
fare for short hauls." Another shove.
"So a couple of us en-terprisin' lads-was
Gideon tried to punch at the source of the voice but
his head was whirling and he missed. "comwe're enterin'
the livery business. Thanks kindly for helpin' us
get started."
The unseen man grabbed Gideon's shoulder, tearing
his shirt as he booted him off the seat. Swearing,
Gideon dropped into the weeds. He hit hard. A
rock raked his cheek. He heard the three men
laughing and congratulating themselves as they took
possession of the landau.
Then, just before Gideon blanked out, one of the men
bellowed, "Buggy for hire! Take your personal
goods to safety. Buggy for hirel"
Gideon's face twisted with rage as he tried
to push himself up. The roaring fire and the man's shout
blended together. The ground flew up at him and
engulfed him in darkness from which all the firelight
swiftly faded.
No one bothered him where he lay amidst some weeds
whose dry stalks rattled in the hot wind. In about
twenty minutes he came around. As soon as he
regained his feet, he began to think about what he should
do next.
On Michigan Avenue, those attempting
to escape and those arriving from further west combined
to create congestion of unbelievable magnitude.
Northward, in the direction of the bridge, he saw
nothing but a red-lit ocean of humanity. To try to go
all the way to the town limits on foot would take
the rest of the night. He'd return to Julia's,
saddle one of the bays and try a second time.
Provided the whole city hadn't been razed.
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collapsed on a stool, his chest heavin
greater-than greater-than . Servants rushed to gather
around him. Questions dinned in his ears. Finally he
understood one aad gasped a reply:
"No, I-don't think the fire will-come this way.
Not unless-the wind changes," BleariJy, he
swung his
head. "Someone throw a saddle on another horse.
Three hooligans kuocked ine out and stole the
landau."
"Oh, Gideon!"
He heard the voice from his blind spot; swung his
head slightly to the left. Bundled in the emerald
bedroom robe, Julia stood in the doorway.
Her blue eyes seemed full of some emotion he was
too tired to recognize. He had the odd
impression that she would have rushed to him except for the
presence of the servants. "I lost the landau. I'll
have to take one of the horses and try to bring the doctor
back on-was
He stopped. She was shaking her head. Annoyed,
hs exclaimed, "Fire or not, I'm going to get
him here!"
"It isn't necessary, Gideon." Her eyes brimmed
with tears. "About fifteen minutes after you left,
Ericsson's boy died."
Afterward, he was never proud of what he did then. His
mind filled with a shattering rage in which he seemed
to see images of Daphnis Miller and Torvald
and Ericsson-and Courtleigh's thugs-all blurred
together. He swore, jumped up from the stooi and
lurched against tJbe table next to it. He
overturned the table.
A stack of Spode broke to bits. The servants
exchanged alarmed looks. He stormed to the hack
door and leaned his head against his forearm. "I shouldn't
have moved him. I should have gone for a doctor right from
Ericsson's!"
Out of his sense of failure, there came a searing
new sense of resolve. He would settle with the man
who'd caused all this grief. He would settle with
Mr. Thomas Courtleigh, who had dispatched hired
men to the west side, stayed safe at home himself, and
thereby proved the old, sad truths one more time: it was
the Daphnis Millers of the world who always suffered,
because they had none of the protection afforded by money or
position or power. And Margaret wanted him to stop
speaking out on behalf of the Daphnis Millers?
He beat his fist against the frame of the door.
"Impossible!"
When he blurted the word that made no sense
to those who heard it, not one of them scorned his odd
behavior. The events of the night had left them almost
as shaken and drained as he was.
Weariness sapped his anger and the last of his strength.
He was barely aware of Julia reaching his side.
She took his hand and led him back across the kitchen,
and out. He was too exhausted to say a word.
When he was himself again, he found he was sprawled on
a lounge in a bedroom on the north side of the
house. Julia's bedroom? he wondered with a twinge
of embarrassment. But he wasn't so embarrassed that
he moved; he was still too damn tired.
French windows opened onto a spacious balcony.
Beyond Courtleigh's rooftop he saw the panorama
of the flame-filled sky. Somewhere a small clock
chimed four. He made a good deal of noise as he
sat up.
Julia appeared on the balcony, which extended beyond
the left hand window. "Gideon? Ah, you're
awake-was
He rubbed his throbbing head. "Would you like a little
brandy?" He nodded. She swilled past him, the
robe belling back from bare calves, The walls and
ceiling shimmered with firelight. He realized no
lamps were lit because they weren't needed.
With some effort, he got to his feet. She handed him
a goblet. He sipped. Raked fingers through his
cinder-filled hair. When he spoke, his voice was
hoarse.
"I failed, Julia. In everything I tried to do
tonight-- saving Ericsson-saving his boy--getting the
doctor-I failed. And for a finale, I had to lose
my temper in front of your help."
"Please don't talk that way. You did the best you
could. No sane person would expect everything to come out
right on a night like this."
The disgusted growl in his throat said the excuse
didn't satisfy him. He stalked past her to the
balcony. He leaned against the rail of heavy
sculptured stone. She followed. He didn't
see her raise her hand near his back, then
hesitate.
At last she touched him. He stiffened a little.
Once 316
he'd gotten over his surprise and
self-consciousness, he relaxed. She rested her
palm lightly against his shut between his shoulderblades.
It felt wonderfully soothing somehow.
She nodded toward the northern sector of the sky.
"I think the courthouse has fallen.
It's hard to be absolutely sure with so much
Same and smoke. Unless they can stop the advance of the
fire, the whole business district will go. You can
barely see the eighth story of Mr. Palmer's
new hotel-it's going to be wiped out, too." A
small shake of her head as she took her hand
away. "It certainly teaches you not to put too much
reliance on the things of this world. They never last."
He hardly heard: "I should have tried locating a
doctor in Ericsson's neighborhood-was
"Gideon, stop!" She came around to his side,
standing on tiptoe. "Unless of course you enjoy the
pose of the martyour."
Her face turned up toward his. The brief
anger he saw in her eyes jolted him from the mood
of self-pity. Her hair blew against his cheek,
driven by a puff of hot wind. Sympathetic again,
she touched his chin: "There's no need to torture
yourself." He stood gazing down at her as the wind
caught the skirt of her robe and brushed it aside.
A bare thigh glimmered red. Her hand moved up his
cheek, stroking. She felt the sudden excitement of
physical contact and so did he. Her voice
broke as she said:
"You tried. No man or woman can do more
than that."
Later, looking back to tha.t moment, he wondered
whether he could have walked away and thus prevented
everything that happened as a consequence. Yes-if he'd
been less tired; less angry with Courtleigh;
less aware of his own fallibility. In short, more
of a paragon and less of a man.
Perhaps the excitement of the night contributed, too.

During the war he'd heard fellow officers say that
thoughts of the perils of combat stimulated their
sweethearts and made them less cautious. He
recalled a lonely cabin in the Virginia
woodlands where he'd saved a young widow from being
molested by two marauding Yanks. Quite
unexpectedly, he'd spent the night in her bed, and
he remembered how passionate she was in the aftermath of
danger.
And perhaps he was worn out and needed simple human
warmth, and she did too.
Whatever the reason, he found himself staring down at
Julia Sedgwick and wanting her.
He put his fingers on her shoulders. She reached up
with both hands, clasping her wrists around his neck.
He had to bend. He did so-quickly-because her
blue eyes suddenly spoke of her desire.
They were standing on the open balcony. People were still fleeing
along South State. But they paid no attention to the
fine houses they were passing. Gideon didn't care
one way or another. He swept his arms around
Julia's waist. Lifted her off the marble
balcony so her mouth would meet his.
She murmured his name, then kissed him, her lips
opening. Her tongue stole out and touched his with an
ardor he'd never experienced before, not with the widow in the
woodland cabin, and certainly not with Margaret. For
an instant he was afraid he might not be competent
enough for someone so experienced.
Then that didn't seem to matter either. She pressed
against him, the belt of the robe de chambre loosening
as they kissed. The robe came open. She wore
only a light chemise beneath. She was moaning as she
kissed his throat, his cheek, his lips. Moaning and
reaching for him.
"We'd better go inside to the bed, Julia-was
"No, no, there isn't time-hurry,
Gideon-hurry!" Somehow she helped him free of
his trousers. Somehow he left them behind as they stumbled
from the red-lit balcony to the deeper shadow of her
room. She clasped her legs around him and
then they were magically together, she hanging back with her
wrists locked around his neck while he braced against
the wall.
At the end, clinging to him in exhaustion, she said:
"Oh, my dearest Oh, Gideon darling-that was
shameless of me."
"Why-why do you-say that?" He was out of breath. So was
she:
"Because--we shouldn't have. It seems that-in a very short
time-I've grown hopelessly fond of you. But this
is-one of the few times in my life when I'm-a little
ashamed of getting what I wanted." "Don't."
He kissed her closed eyes. "Well-was A
small, pained laugh. "You see that I wasn't so
ashamed that I stopped. Or am willing to stop now.
Make love to me again."
Margaret's face flashed into mind. He thought of the
night she'd first banished him from her room. Of how
he'd come home to Yorkville, hurt, and three
times tried to draw her out of her unhappy mood
by touching her in an affectionate, tender way. Three
times she'd recoiled from him.
"Please, Gideon. On the bed this time." The
memories faded. "Yes," he said, and crushed his
mouth against hers.
Guilt
THEY MADE LOVE twice more that night, each
time with greater ferocity and yet greater tenderness than
before.
Margaret had never been excessively inhibited in
the marriage bed-at least not during the first two or
three years-but she'd always insisted on total
darkness. Julia did not. Both times he took her
by the shimmering light of the sky and watched the gasping
delight sweep over her face. The last time, just
at the end, someone detonated more powder far off hi the
blazing city. It seemed a fitting capstone to the
incredible experience.
Moments later, when they separated, he was so drowsy
he could barely speak: "That was-Julia, that
was-was "What?"
A chagrined chuckle. "I don't know. Beyond
words." She smiled. "I'm glad." She snuggled
her small, firm breasts against his naked back as
he yawned, then apologized for it. In a moment his
eyes shut. He began to snore.
The sound made her laugh softly. She drew back
and rubbed his shoulders until she felt him relax,
Then her gaze drifted to the open windows. She'd
asked the servants to summon her in the
event the fire crossed Twelfth Street. So
far, no one had knocked.
She stared at the smoke and Same in the heavens but
didn't really see any of it. She was pondering the
surprising and incredible joy of what had just happened;
what she had wanted to happen since he first called,
she
realized. He was a person of principle and
determination. A person to whom failure was
unbearable, and whose ambition to change society in a
positive way was as powerful as her own. He was,
in short, a man-in a way poor Louis had never
been.
Yes, she'd wanted him from the beginning. And she'd
gone out of her way to arrange the circumstances so the
want could be satisfied. She'd brought him to her
bedroom when another room would have served equally
well as a place for him to rest. She'd gone to his
side when he stood on the balcony. Touched and
caressed him.
She could admit all that and be both happy they'd
made love and disappointed in herself. There was a streak
of selfishness left in her from her younger days. She
had learned to suppress and channel it, but she would
never completely conquer it.
What bothered her most-for his sake, really-was the
fact that he was married. When the overwrought state that
had brought them together had cooled, he would feel
regret and guilt and pain. Above all, she
didn't want him to feel pain. His happiness and his
hurts were far more important than hers, and she
couldn't recall ever having felt that way about another
human being except her son. Thus Julia came
to realize she was in love with Gideon.
There was a melancholy expression on her face as
she lay staring at the fiery sky, sleepless and
wondering what she could do to ease his inevitable guilt
for which she held herself responsible.
As it turned out, she could do nothing. The instant he
awoke around nine o'clock, Margaret's face intruded
in his memory. This time he found it impossible
to banish.
Stale, smoky air tainted the bedroom. Julia

awake and lying beneath the light coverlet she'd pulled
over them. She read his expression at once, and
unerringly:
"Gideon, it wasn't your fault."
"It most certainly was. I'm a married man.
The father of children-was
"And do you still love your wife? I'd be much
surprised if you said yes."
Her directness and candor stunned him. He didn't
really know how to answer her question. The love he'd
once felt for Margaret could never be wiped out as if
it hadn't existed; a residue of that love would always
remain part of him. So in that sense he did love
her. But not with the ardor of their first years of marriage.
Was it possible for a man to care for two women? One
passionately, and one out of a sense of
responsibility? He didn't know that, either, so he
evaded:
"That's beside the point, Julia. What I did was
wrong."
"Let me accept the blame! I led you to it. I
could have pulled back-stopped it-half a dozen times,
I didn't because I-because I've fallen in love with
you." He caught his breath as she went on. "I know
that isn't permissible in our situation. But I
wanted you to make lovs to me, and I arranged things
so it would happen. You mustn't take the blame on
yourself."
"I must take half of it. I wanted you, too, and
I wouldn't admit it until the very last moment.
What the hell are we going to do,
Julia?" Louder, then; almost angrily: "What the
hell are we going to do?"
She kissed the scraped knuckles of his right hand.
Then the palm, and the flesh below the thumb. He was
astonished to see tears in her eyes.
Tears from one so sophisticated? That struck him as
improbable. But he felt them on his skin as she
pressed his hand to her lips and murmured:
"I can't tell you, my dearest. We can't change
last night."
"I know"
"And it may well happen again."
"I know that, too."
"So I can't answer the question. My conscience wants
to reply one way, my feelings another. Whichever
answer I give, don't you see-it will be wrong."
til
What they did was thrust the whole matter aside and
let the events of the next hours carry them along;
divert them from the dilemma they knew they must
eventually resolve. Gideon concentrated on
Thomas Courtleigh, and on what could be done
to make the railroad man pay for the death of
Torvald Ericsson.
From the moment he began to think about that-on
Monday, when the fire was sweeping the north side
after having razed the business district-he knew the
Chicago police and the Chicago courts would be of
no help to him. Even if the police were willing
to investigate the boy's death, he felt and Julia
agreed that Courtleigh's influence would prevent the
investigation from reaching a conclusion.
But he intended to do something before he left the city.
He brooded about the problem for hours, occasionally
falling into such a rage that he entertained thoughts of
finding Courtleigh and attacking him. Only when he
remembered that Strelnik had cynically predicted
he'd do exactly that did he put the fantasies
out of his mind.
By Monday night the city's exhausted fire
companies had brought the conflagration under control
except for a few pockets still burning at the
northern city limits. In many areas there was nothing
left to burn. On the entire
north side, a returning servant reported,
only two houses had been soared by a whim of wind.
Toward midnight a drizzling rain beean to fall.
When Gideon woke beside Julia on Tuesday
morning, the vista from the balcony was an incredible
one. A smoky pall still darkened the sky.
To the north, shells of burned-out buildings stretched
away like graveyard monuments. The ruins smoldered
and so did the paving blocks of the main streets. A
charred odor permeated furniture, clothing-even
Gideon's hair and pores.
On Tuesday Chicago's mayor, R. B.
Mason, convened the city council and issued a
proclamation fixing the price of bread at eight
cents per twelve ounce loaf. To prevent
profiteering, the price was to remain stabilized for the
next ten days. Gideon and Julia learned that
earlier proclamations had suspended the sale of
liquor and appointed special police to help
control looting. little Phil Sheridan, the genera!
who commanded the Department of the Missouri from its
Chicago headquarters, had telegraphed for two
companies of infantry from Fort Omaha.
That same day Gideon and all of Julia's male
servants tramped to the smoking ruin of the west side
to search for Ericsson's sister Sigrid, and for the
body of the man himself. Neither could be found. When
Gideon and the servants returned late in the afternoon,
dirty and dispirited, they passed the Courtleigh
mansion. Gideon noted a couple of derby-hatted
men loitering in the drive. One turned his
back when he saw Gideon studying him. Gideon
couldn't be positive but he thought the man had been in
Florian's group Sunday night.
He supposed Courtleigh had the guards on duty
to protect his property from the dispossessed who were
wandering the streets. Julia seemed to fear no such
invasion. In fact, when he got to the house he
discovered she'd posted a sign saying campers were
welcome on the 324
back part of her property. A dozen cr so had
already accepted the invitation, he saw.
He went inside and found the kitchen a-buzz with
activity. The cook and her assistant were fixing
soup, gruel, and hot drinks for the campers.
Gideon learned that the head of Courtleigh's
household staff had come over while he was away and
complained to Julia that granting camping privileges
would draw undesirables to the neighborhood.
The cook grinned. "Miss Julia told him to go
home or to hell, whichever he preferred."
Tuesday evening, by lantern light, they buried
Tor-vald Ericsson in an oak coffin one of
Julia's grooms , had hammered together. Gideon
helped dig the grave in a clump of apple
trees ten yards from the campfire of a
homeless family.
Torvald's body had been dressed in one of
Carter's outfits because Gideon wanted the boy's
blood-covered shirt. Julia had performed the grim
exchange. Then she and Gideon had laid the stiff
body in the coffin, and Gideon had nailed it shut.
When Julia asked why he wanted the shirt, he
said:
"As a present for Courtleigh. I'm trying
to decide how I'll deliver it."
"Do you really think you should prolong your feud with-?"
"Feud?" he exploded. "It's a matter of
justice, not a feud. Courtleigh killed that boy
as surely as if he'd handled the knife himself."
"We agreed, you could never bring him to justice in this
town, Gideon."
"I know we did. But the killing isn't going
to remain a secret. I can at least make certain
of that much."
Now, among the leafless apple trees. Gideon
read passages from the New Testament while Carter
clutched his mother's hand and gazed at the oak box with
rounded eyes. Smoke blew in the darkness. Piles
of win
ter coal were still smoldering throughout the city.
The
air was foul; bad to breathe.
Gideon found it, equally bad to stand there reading from the
word of God. He was unfit to do thai; he'd taken
Juiia in adulterous fashion. And while there
might be many excuse* for it, none was powerful enough
to absolve him of guilt. Even granting that
Margaret was a wife in name only, the marriage vow
still meant something. He had broken it.
Wednesday, Joseph Medill managed to publish
his newspaper, though Gideon never found out how; the
supposedly fireproof Tribune building had
fallen victim to the flames. So had the Field and
Leiter store, Potter Palmer's hotel, and
scores of other fine buildings. The business
district comz such was gone. Medill's paper sounded a
note of challenge:
CHEER UP
In the midst of a calamity without parallel in world
history, looking upon the ashes of thirty years
accumulations, the people of this once beautiful city have
resolved that CHICAGO SHALL RISE AGAIN.
Gideon admired that spirit. But it was clear that the
restoration would require a gigantic effort. The
toll from the fire was gradually corning
into focus.
Property worth more than two hundred million
dollars had been destroyed. A hundred thousand people
were without homes. Though only two hundred fifty
bodies had been found, it was almost certain that thousands
had been incinerated in the cottages and tenements,
Ericsson and his sister among them.
The fire had leveled an area about a mile wide
and five miles long, north to south. The destruction
ran from Fullerton Avenue down to Harrison
Street, and over the west side as well.
On Wednesday afternoon Julia's grooms repaired
a disused pony cart. She and Gideon took their
first inspection trip downtown. What they saw was a
landscape from a lunatic's nightmare.
Piles of brick and stone rubble lay everywhere. Here
and there a section of a wall still stood, some of them
surrounding empty window frames. Although the entire
commercial section was gone, one man was already back in
business. A brand new plank structure had been
erected at Number 89 Washington Street. It
belonged to a realtor and was identified by a crude
sign:
W. D. KERFOOT'S BLOCK-FIRST IN THE
BURNT DISTRICT
The building hardly qualified as a business
block in the accepted sense. But a lounger out in
front said all the space had been rented, and the
structure had in fact been up since Tuesday
night! Near the door hung another sign that made
Gideon laugh:
All gone but wife, children and energy!
His laughter faded when he noticed Julia staring
at the sign with melancholy eyes. He suspected
he knew which words had caused her reaction.
One of the reasons they'd come downtown was to locate the
reopened telegraph office. Julia stayed
outside the temporary tent while Gideon sent a
message to Margaret saying he was safe but would be
remaining in Chicago until Friday.
Abruptly he crossed out the last word. He
replaced it with Sunday, then went on to explain the
delay by saying that unfinished Wisconsin and
Prairie business required his attention. In a
way that was true. But he turned pink as he handed the
completed blank to the clerk. He was no good at this
business of deception.
Still, he couldn't have gotten out of Chicago without a
good deal of effort. Those railroad lines still
operating were offering free passage to anyone
who wanted to leave.
Departing trains were packed to capacity, he'd
heard.
Outside the telegraph tent, two men were arguing.
One pounded his palm as he shouted, "Damn it,
Jessie, it is bigger than London in
1666-a feller from the fire department told me!"
Gideon smiled. The scope of the destruction had
become a matter of civic pride. He supposed
that was healthier than letting the sights and sounds of the
ruined city cause depression. He was having
first-hand experience with depression today. The
telegraph message to Margaret, and the mention of
departure, had forced a realization. He must say
goodbye to Julia soon and never see her again.
The smoky streets teemed with sightseers.
Gideon maneuvered the pony cart through them to the
site of the courthouse. There Julia pinned a
notice to one of several large message boards
erected for government and public use. She'd
listed the names of the nine children she'd taken in, and
noted the address where their parents could claim them.
Miraculously, four of the children were called for by ten that
night. As Gideon and Julia prepared for bed,
she told him she intended to care for the rest
until their parents appeared. If the parents had
died in the fire, she'd work with Chicago's
Relief and Aid Society to see that the children were
placed in good foster homes. Gideon was moved
to say:
"Do you know my late father thought you were a very cold and
ambitious person? And now you watch out for stray children
as if they were your own."
"Well, my dear, I suspect that when your father
made his remark about me, it was correct. I hope
I've changed a little. I still plead guilty to being
ambitious,
although I've changed the objects of my ambition.
Once I used to chase after invitations to the best
society balls. Now I chase after the
franchise."
He laughed. "I'd say that's a consideraoie
change. You're a remarkable woman, Julia. A
very strong woman-was
She bussed his cheek in a wifely way. "Kind of
you, sir. May I return the compliment and say the
same about you? Anyone must be strong if they have
ambition to change the world even a little. The ambition
itself is a strength, I've always believed."
He made a face. "I'm afraid my
wife considers that kind of ambition to be a weakness-was
He realized he'd inadvertently stumbled on one
of the reasons he responded so strongly to Julia's
personality and intellect.
He patted her derriere and forced a smile.
"Permit me to say, madam, that you're sounding like a
proper Kent at last."
She laughed and embraced him. "No, I'm just a
selfish, shameless lady who wants her ambition
fulfilled."
"Which ambition? To vote?"
She put her lips against his ear. "To be taken to bed
by a proper Kent-as soon as he can get busy and
remove his trousers,"
Their lovemaking was intense, yet with a quality of good
humor new to their relationship. It added a dimension
of comfortable familiarity he'd never experienced before.
But afterward, his conscience tormented him. He was unable
to sleep. Finally he touched her shoulder and
expressed it in the only way he
could-straightforwardly.
"Julia, you must know something. I can never leave
her."
"Your wife?"
"Yes. I couldn't hurt her that much."
"I understand. It's just one more reason I admire you.
Still-it's difficult for me to curb my hopes com
pJetely. You did say yesterday that she's given
you cause to think of separating."
"She has. That doesn't give me the right to abandon
rny children."
An insistent note crept into her voice.
"Let's take them, then. They can live with us-was
"No, Mia."
It closed a door. She realized it, and sighed.
"You're a decent man, Gideon. Louis would
never have agonized this way. It's always the decent
ones who sufier."
Decent? Hardly, he thought
"That said, Julia, I must also say I can't see
you again once I leave Chicago."
"I suspected that, too. There's a selfish little
girl inside me who's screaming and stamping because of
it-was Sadness tinged the feeble joke. She drew a
deep breath; collected herself. "Well-this is one
tune when little Miss Julia won't get what she
wants. And she's never wanted anything more than you.
Oh, Gideon-I'm hopelessly in love with you,
damn fool that I am. You'd better kiss me before
I break down and bawl."
rv
While Gideon and Julia slept in each other's
arms, Carter was awake and having an illegal
pillow fight with two of the homeless boys still living in
the mansion. Carter thought his mother and their visitor,
Mr. Kent, made a lot of calf s eyes at
one another, but beyond that, he didn't concern himself with
their relationship. It never entered his head that Mr.
Kent could be romantically involved with his mother. Mr.
Kent was married, and that automatically ruled him out
as a potential suitor. Besides, Carter had never
known his mother to be interested in anything except her
work. He never
kept track of his mother's whereabouts. That plus Mr.
Kent's marital status and the presence of new friends
all conspired to keep Carter unaware of what was
happening just three doors down the long hallway.
Mayor Mason had reluctantly c'TH'IDED that
policing the ruined city was beyond the powers of his regular
and special officers. Earlier that day he'd
voluntarily placed Chicago in the hands of the commander
of the Department of the Missouri. General Sheridan in
charge meant, in effect, martial law. During the
night, telegraph messages summoned troops
to Chicago.
Next day the first of the soldiers arrived.
Ultimately the city was patrolled by ten regular
companies of U.s. infantry, seven companies of
Illinois militia, and a specially formed unit of
citizens called the First Chicago Volunteers.
With the aid of bayonets, regulated bread
prices, and rising spirits, Chicago began to return
to normal.
VI
"The hypocritical son of a bitch!"
Gideon flung Thursday's Tribune against the
wall six feet from the long, polished dining table.
"My," Julia said. "I'm glad Carter's
left the room."
The teasing was lost on Gideon. "Murder by night
and pronouncements about his own generosity by day- by God
that's intolerable!"
His outbursts so rattled the serving girl removing the
breakfast things, she almost dropped a tray of
dishes as she left. At the other end of the table,
Julia refilled her silver-edged cup from an
elaborate silver coffee pot. Gideon scowled
and slumped in his chair. His eyepatch
was slightly askew and the night shirt and old robe
borrowed from one of the grooms were much too
large.
"What on earth are you talking about?" Julia
wanted to know.
"Your neighbor! Florian told me Courtleigh
was planning a ball for his fiancee-was
Julia nodded with distaste. "Gwendolyn Strother.
Her father's a chum of Philip Armour, the fellow
who's getting rich off the meat packing business.
Miss Strother's wealthy in her own right, and
reasonably well connected socially. But she's about
as robust as a dried thistle. I've heard she
has a distinctly nervous disposition. Courtleigh
certainly can't be marrying her for her beauty and
stamina. Do you suppose he needs more capital?"
Gideon's mouth quirked. "You're a cynic."
He was recalling the pale, hysterical face he'd
glimpsed in the brougham last Sunday evening.
"A realist," she replied. "I still don't see
why you're so exercised."
"Because the paper says he's going ahead with the ball.
Tomorrow night!"
"This soon after the fire? That's disgusting."
"Oh, you haven't heard all of it." He jabbed
a. finger at the fallen newspaper. "Now the guests
will be charged a thousand dollars per card of
admission, and everything will be donated to fire
relief. The bastardl" he shouted, slamming his fist
down so hard, his cup danced in its saucer. "He can
send men to murder a boy one night and pose as a
philanthropist the next!"
"I believe I told you he was like that-was She
gasped suddenly. He'd boited up in his chair.
"I think I'll go to that ball," he said. "It's the
very place to say what I've been wanting to say
to, and about, Mr. Courtleigh."
"That's insanity, Gideon! You wouldn't dare
accuse him in front of-was
"No?" he interrupted. "You watch." 332
The furious set of his features told her further
protest was futile. She shook her head, her
eyes fuli of wonder and admiration that was tempered
by a cold knot of fear forming in her stomach.
CHAPTER X
Uninvited Guest
ON FRIDAY EVENING, Courtleigh's mansion
glowed with scores of oil lamps in lieu of the still
disrupted gas service. Splendid carriages
began to arrive around nine. Soon the smoky
October air carried the scrape of fiddlers tuning
up and the sweet sound of a harpist practicing
runs.
Julia had managed to outfit Gideon
presentably by enlisting the aid of all of her
servants. She'd come up with a fresh shirt,
trousers, cravat and a handsome if slightly worn
frock coat, plum colored and only a size
too large. He adjusted the cravat and surveyed
the fit of the coat in a pier glass.
"Your people are very good to loan me these things."
She smiled. "They're not used to their employer
having gentlemen friends. Even if they are a bit
scandalized, I think the novelty appeals to them.
IT-IEY'VE taken to you-was She leaned her head
against his shoulder and hugged his waist. "Just as I have."
He held her with both arms, totally content. But the
peaceful moment soon passed. She stepped back and
said in a brisk way:
"I may be guilty of repeating myself, my love.
But I must tell you again that what you plan to do in that
borrowed finery is not only dangerous but
absolutely pointless."
Gideon chewed on his lower lip a moment. "I
think you're wrong. It'll make him realize I
know what he is. Maybe some of his guests will come
to realize it, too."
"Gideon, the railroad industry-the entire city-
already knows what he is. It makes no difference!
He has money. Money creates influence,
assures friendships and, when necessary, even writes the
laws. What weapon will prevail against someone that
strongly entrenched? Certainly not a threat of
exposure in a penny sheet with a worthy purpose
but virtually no circulation. Not Biblical wrath
eith-good heavens! Why are you staring like that? I'm not
making fun of you or demeaning your newspaper-was
"It was what you said. Biblical wrath-was His
voice had grown hoarse. "The night my father died,
he marked a passage in his Bible. He meant
to speak to me about it." He quoted the verse from
Judges. "I've never had a clue as to what he
meant.
"When he marked the verse, you were already tilting at the
railroads, weren't you? And already publishing the
Beacon?"
"Yes."
"Did he want to encourage you? Was the verse an
endorsement of what you were doing?"
Gideon frowned. "I don't think so. If
anything, my father might have wanted to discourage me.
I know he thought the work was largely
futile. Admirable, maybe, but futile. I
suspect the verse applies to something altogether
different."
"Smite the Midianites," she murmured,
pacing. "What do you suppose he meant?"
"I've spent whole nights wondering."
"Do you think he wanted to ask you to-to strike out
against someone else? Devote your energy to some other
cause?"
He looked surprised, then thoughtful. "You know, you
might be right. I can't imagine what it would be,
though. There wasn't any variety of injustice that
didn't anger my father."
It was annoying to have a possible solution to the riddle
reveal itself and by doing so reveal another, deeper
riddle at the same time. "Well, in any case-was
Obviously frustrated, he took it out on his
cravat, jerking it one way, then another in front
of the glass. "I have Mr. Courtleigh to deal
with-despite your scorn for the enterprise."
"Oh, you can be a maddening person! I am not
scornful. I admire you. The Tom Courtleighs
of this country have to be curbed or we'll be so mired
in corruption, we can consign the Constitution to the ash
bin. But you can't fight Courtleigh and his
kind with-was She struggled for a term, then blurted:
"comtheatrical gestures!"
"I disagree. Just on the basis of that Tribune
story, I'd say Courtleigh is very sensitive
to the public impression he creates. If I'm
wrong, why did he change the purpose of this little
party-and then announce the change?"
She blew out the lamp and they left the bedroom.
They started down the staircase, Julia still pleading
her case:
"You're not wrong in that respect. Appearances count
for a great deal with him. So the very thing you're planning will
only make him all the more angry. At you!"
"Excellent. Excellent!" Gideon boomed out.
She shook her head. The volume of his voice
clearly said he was still irked. At the foot of the
staircase he turned to block hei, and revealed the
true reason for his crossness:
"So you don't think much of Labor's Beacon,
eh?"
"Gideon Kent, I told you I was not demeaning
your newspaper!"
"Odd, I got exactly the opposite
impression." 335
She stamped her foot. "Are you this
difficult with all the women you know, or only those
who dare to disagree with you?" He started to retort but
she gave him no chance. "I think Labor's
Beacon is a worthy effort. But by its very nature,
it automatically reaches and influences just a small
number of people. If you want to have the kind of power necessary
to fight a Tom Court-leigh, you must make a great
many people listen. You must have an audience. The kind-was
Sudden inspiration quickened her voice. "comthe kind you'd
eventually have if you took that position with the Unionl"
Gideon saw his father's face. You don't
suppose that's what he meant to say? That the
Beacon was ineffective? That I could do a better
job through an established paper? He knew how
deeply Jephtha had deplored the corruption
inundating the land. How he'd preached against it from his
pulpit-
And how he'd often said in private that he lacked
sufficient reach to do much about it.
Did his father mean for him to broaden his own attack?
Was that the significance of "smite the
Midi-anites"?
Nonsense. He was reading far too much into a Bible
verse and a cryptic message on a scrap of
paper. Yet the feeling he'd stumbled
onto something stayed with him.
"Julia, I told you that even if I worked myself
into a position of responsibility with the Union, the
other stockholders would never permit me to put the
paper strongly behind labor causes. Advertising
revenues would dry up. Circulation would shrink.
When I first discussed the job with Molly, my father's
widow, she made both points and made them
strongly."
"Even so, you'd still have a much better platform than you
have now. You might write about labor less often.
But when you did write, it would carry more authority.
And your views would certainly reach hundreds
of thousands more than you're reaching today. Can't you see the
wisdom of compromising just a little to achieve that?"
He bristled. "The Kents are not known for
compromising."
"They're known for stubbornness and fits of
pomposity!" she exclaimed. "That much you have in
common with Louis!"
Her reaction made him smile. "I guess I
did sound stuffy. I'm sorry." He slipped his
arm around her. "Are you admitting members of the
women's movement compromise their principles?"
"Certainly we do. Every time we lower ourselves
to speak to a thick-headed man!"
He laughed, jollied out of his bad mood. She
kept her voice light, but anxiety showed in her
eyes as she went on.
"Since I can't persuade you to change your mind,
please be careful over there tonight. Please come back
if there are signs of serious trouble. Frankly,
I doubt you'll even get in."
"Oh yes I will. I'll give 'em a shot of the
old Kent pomposity, and they'll fall like
tenpins."
Grinning, he kissed her cheek. She watched him
disappear into the back of the house and suppressed a little
shudder. She knew what he was going after back there.
He called goodbye as he left by the rear entrance.
She dashed into the darkened music room, barely
aware of Carter and one of the homeless boys whooping and
racketing along the upper hallways like wild
Indians. From a window she watched Gideon's
strong, vigorous figure pass along the north
side of the property, silhouetted against the blaze of
Courtleigh's house and the line of parked carriages
trailing around the corner into Twentieth Street-After
he reached State and disappeared up the mansion
drive, she stayed in the music room
trying to say a
prayer to a deity with whom she was not on the best of
terms.
ii
Thomas Courtleigh had withdrawn the guards from his
driveway, evidently feeling secure now that
small squads of soldiers patrolled the
residential streets. A couple of blocks to the
north, Gideon saw the wink of bayonets belonging
to one such patrol.
Some of the carriage drivers stared, but none
attempted to stop him. His mouth grew dry as he
mounted the stone stairs to the brilliantly lit
entrance. With his elbow he compressed the bundle under
the left side of his coat.
An Offenbach melody soared inside the house.
He stepped up to the heavy walnut doors with side
panels of intricately etched glass. Without
bothering to ring, he reached for one of the door handles and
walked in.
He slammed the door on the shout of a startled
coachman. He was in an immense domed foyer.
Three gaping footmen came to life and converged on
him. The music and the gay sounds of guests enjoying
themselves drifted from an open archway on the
left.
As the footmen strode toward him, two couples
emerged from the ballroom. The men were in formal
attire, the women in dresses with long trains, their
hair decorated with jewels. Gideon took
another step and the footmen barred his way. The guests
spied him, noted his clothes and whispered among
themselves.
The oldest of the footmen planted himself in front of
Gideon; he was fifty-five or more. The other
two weren't much younger. If it came to a physical
struggle, Gideon doubted he'd have much trouble with
any of them.
He was beginning to feel overwhelmed by the splendor of the
house, though. Marble pillars reached up three
stories to the perimeter of the stained glass dome.
Veined marble spread underfoot. The air smelled of
costly perfume, expensive cigars-and wealth.
The senior footmen extended a white gloved hand.
"May I see your card of invitation?"
"I'm not here to attend the party. I have personal
business with Mr. Courtleigh."
The footman exchanged puzzled looks. Their
spokesman's tone grew a shade harder.
"Mr. Courtleigh left no word that he was
expecting anyone from the company."
"I'm not from the company. Look here-was In spite of
his nervousness, Gideon managed to smile. It
disarmed and confused them. Beyond the footmen, one of the
female guests was pointing her fan at Gideon's
eyepatch and saying something behind her hand. "I have no
quarrel with you gentlemen. I'd feel bad if I
had to take my fist to any of you." One of the footmen
turned pale. "I merely want to see
Courtleigh, and I intend to do so. If you'll
kindly step aside we can avoid unpleasantness."
"I appreciate what you say, sir." The oldest
footman gave a quick nod, clearly not anxious
to fight. "But we have orders."
"Then I'm sorry." Without warning, Gideon
feinted to the left
The footmen shifted that way. Gideon's hand shot
out, shoving the nearest man. He stumbled. That created
a space he could slip through while the other two stared
in confusion.
The female guests pulled their escorts out of the
way as Gideon walked straight toward the
ballroom entrance. Behind him, he heard the oldest
footman panting for breath. Then the man cried,
"Run get Cully in the stable. Cully
and Jim-they're tough enough to take care of him!"
There'd be roughnecks coming. Well, he hadn't
expected to pull this off without a hitch. He stalked
by the two speechless couples who simply couldn't
comprehend the presence of a tall, tangle-haired
young man
with ill fitting clothes, a patch over his left eye
and a truculent expression.
Gideon walked into the mirror paneled ballroom
and stopped at the top of three steps leading down to the
dance floor. In front of him he saw a blurred
panorama of heavy trains swirling, jewels
winking, men's black button pumps flashing in time
to the music. A young woman near the foot of the
stairs was first to notice him. She clutched her
escort's arm and stared.
Gideon scanned the ballroom. The orchestra
played loudly; Strauss now. The conversation and the
music created a din, and except for the one girl,
he'd gone unnoticed for the few seconds he stood
there.
But every head turned when he shouted:
"Courtleigh? Where the hell are you?"

The ballroom's tall, rectangular
mirrors reflected the hundred and fifty guests
and multiplied their images. A dozen orchestra
players all missed a beat; a dozen other violin
bows hesitated in mid-air. The musicians
stopped in a disorderly way, the viola and the harp
trailing off last of all.
The dancers-some amused, some baffled, one or two
frowning-all swung toward Gideon. At last he
located Courtleigh. The railroad president
had been dancing near the small orchestra stage on
the far side of the room. On Courtleigh's arm
Gideon saw the pale, panicky creature who
had looked at him from the brougham.
From Gideon's left, a white-haired woman
veered toward the steps like a warship under sail. Her
burden of gems was nearly as large as her bosom.
She called to her son.
"Thomas, who is this person? Some drunken
clubroom crony of yours?"
Gideon's hands were trembling at his sides. He
thought of Torvald Ericsson and calmed down. He
took a deep satisfaction from watching the
long-nosed, thin-lipped Courtleigh hurry toward
him. Courtleigh was dressed in evening wear that fit
perfectly. The wide-eyed Miss
Strother hung on his arm and let him drag her
along.
"Thomas!" The white-haired woman turned
completely around and looked toward her son. "I
asked you-was
"Be quiet, Mother." Courtleigh's voice
wasn't loud, but it carried because the ballroom had
fallen silent. The only other noises were the
click of Courtleigh's pumps on the floor and the
swish of his fiancee's train. Suddenly there was a
clang and a muffled exclamation. Straining to see, the
piccolo player had upset his music stand.
Courtleigh cast a glance over his shoulder. His
eyes were venomous.
He walked to within a yard of the lower step and stopped.
His eyes flicked over Gideon's worn coat.
The corners of his mouth twitched in amusement.
To his mother he said:
"This man is a labor agitator from New
York. A Communard."
Those close by heard it and passed it on, whispering
their shock and horror.
"He came to stir up trouble on the Wisconsin and
Prairie." Courtleigh's hazel eyes fixed
on Gideon's face and much as he tried,
he couldn't control his seething anger. "I rather hoped
we might have lost you in the recent disaster, Mr.
Kent. How did you get in here?"
"Why, your servants let me in. At the front
door."
"I'll crucify them for-was The sibilant words were
choked back. He realized his guests were listening
closely. He pushed Miss Strother's gloved
hand off his arm. She caught her breath and swayed.
Courtleigh planted one black pump on the lower
step. He pitched his voice lower.
"If you wish to have a conversation with me, at least do me
the courtesy of retiring to my study so my guests
needn't be offended by your boorishness."
"Oh, no." Gideon shook his head. "I want
your guests to hear all I have to say."
Courtleigh's restraint broke. He took
another step up, and Gideon had seldom heard
such venom in a voice.
"Very well, Mr. Kent. If it's a public
scene you want, it's a public scene you shall have!
We'll begin by discussing the disappearance of my
assistant general manager, Sidney Florian,
in the fire which swept the West Side last Sunday
evening. His body has been lost, but I have
witnesses who know how he met his death."
Courtleigh shook a finger in Gideon's face.
"Witnesses who will testify that he was murdered!"
A kind of surf-like murmur spread around the
ballroom.
"Murder?"
"Who was murdered?"
"What's Tom talking about? Is that fellow a
murderer?"
Gideon said, "I'd be happy to discuss it-was
Thunderstruck, Courtleigh retreated to the lowest
step. His smug expression was gone. The Strother
girl was pathetically distraught. She looked as if
she might faint.
"coms long as you first explain how Mr. Florian
got to the West Side. How and why." He raised
his voice. "The man your host is talking about was one
of his employees, and the leader of a gang of thugs who
invaded a private home last Sunday night.
Their purpose-was
"Shut up, Kent," Courtleigh whispered.
Perspiration beaded his forehead suddenly. "Shut your
mouth."
Gideon didn't even glance at him. He spoke
to the silent throng.
"Their purpose was to break up a peaceful meeting
held by a few men who thought Mr, Courtleigh's
rail line was unfair in the matter of wages and
benefits. The men gathered to discuss organizing a
protest. To discuss it! That's all! Apparently the
Constitutional guarantee of the right to peaceful
assembly is voided when you go to work for the
Wisconsin and Prairie."
The white-haired woman began screaming:
"Thomas, silence him. Silence him?"'
Then there were hisses. Men stepping forward- though not
far-to exclaim:
"Socialist!"
"Communard!"
"Throw him out of here!"
"Break his head open!"
The railroad president looked stunned and
confused. He seemed on the point of rushing up
to throttle Gideon. Yet something-his mother's
hectoring, his fianc6e's distraught behavior,
the shock of what was happening in his own home-kept
him rooted while Gideon roared over the
crescendo of sound.
"Mr. Courtleigh's thugs came calling with guns
and knives. One of them-Florian-shot
at me and I fired back. I wounded Florian and
I'll admit that in any court hi the land-except
the ones Mr. Courtleigh can buy here hi
Chicago. I too have witnesses, and they'll swear
I acted hi self-defense."
"What witnesses?" Courtleigh snarled. "That
slut of a Lucy Stoner?" He was purple from the
humiliation of having Gideon ignore him. But
Gideon knew where his audience lay.
"They'll also swear to what Mr. Courtleigh's
brave lads did to the son of the man at whose house
the meeting took place. A boy named Torvald
Ericsson. He was no more than ten years old. This
belonged to him."
From where he'd tucked it in his waistband, Gideon
drew out the shirt. The garment was stiff with dried
blood. The moment he held it up, there was
absolute silence again.
Behind him he heard heavy boots hammer, then stop.
The stable hands? Evidently so. Courtleigh saw
them, hesitated, finally gestured them back.
Gideon held the shirt at arm's length, down where
Courtleigh could see it clearly. "One of your
thugs put a knife in Torvald Ericsson.
He died the same night."
White, Courtleigh could barely croak, "That-that
is a foul piece of-character assassination, an-utter
lie."
"Now we know how you protect your profits,
Courtleigh. By killing children!"
Courtleigh lost control and fairly screamed at
Gideon. "You're lying, you're a filthy liar!"
"Of course he's lying," a. woman cried.
"Tom would never do anything so despicable. The
man's mad."
"Mad or a Communard, it's the same thing," someone
else yelled. There was more hissing and even some oaths
quite out of place in the mixed company. Courtleigh
heard his friends coming to his defense and skillfully
took advantage of it.
"I don't deny I sent observers to that gathering of
anarchists--"
"Observers!" Gideon exclaimed, but now
Courtleigh had regained some confidence, and out-shouted
him.
"They had no orders to hurt anyone, and certainly
no orders to hurt children. The very idea is
ludicrous!"
"That's right," a male guest bellowed. "Tom's a
law-abiding, God-fearing man. Throw that
lying Communard out of here!"
Other guests echoed it, surging to the foot of the
stairs, their mood ugly. A feeling of defeat
began to fill Gideon as he spread the shirt by the
shoulders.
Women turned away, covering their mouths with their
fans or their gloves. Men cursed him even as their
eyes were drawn to the knife slashes in the bloodied
fabric.
"I hear what you say, Courtleigh." Gideon
pitched his voice low on purpose. It stilled the
angry outbursts and brought the crowd forward in
macabre fascination. "I'm afraid this piece of
evidence speaks louder. You note the size?
Clearly a boy's shirt, not a man's. I took
this from the body of Nils Ericsson's son.
Ericsson himself died hi the fire, so you don't have
to worry about him. But you do have to worry about me. You
can burn this. Bribe all your hired thugs to keep
silent. Persuade a few of your fine friends
to perjure themselves and testify to your impeccable character-was
Growls from the crowd at that; an ugly, animal
sound. Gideon was badly shaken. He hadn't
expected all of them to be on Courtleigh's
side, but they were.
"Perhaps you can even convince yourself none of it happened.
But I know it did. I saw it. And I can't be
bought or silenced. You're a murderer,
Courtleigh!"
Gideon flung the shirt.
Courtleigh leaped back, his eyes fixed on the
garment as if it were poisonous. The shirt fluttered
down next to the hem of Miss Strother's ball
gown. The sight of the ripped and bloodstained fabric
was all it took to shatter her. She started moaning;
softly at first, then louder. She stabbed her hands
into her carefully arranged hairdo, tearing it apart.
Courtleigh shouted:
"Get him out of here. Get him out of this house!"
The crowd roared agreement. The stable hands, both
burly young men, rushed Gideon from behind.
He turned in time to gut-punch one of them. The other
slashed the edge of his hand across Gideon's neck,
making him stumble and bend forward from the waist with an
exclamation of pain. A second chopping blow
drove him to his knees.
The two seized Gideon under the arms of his plum
colored coat and hauled him into the foyer. In the
ballroom, a roar of shocked exclamations
erupted. But loudest of all were two
voices.
Courtleigh's fiancee, shrieking as she tore her
hair.
And Courtleigh yelling at her, nearly as
hysterical.
"Be quiet. What's the matter with you? He's a
lunatic; every word was false! Can't you control yourself?
Damn you, be quiet! BE QUIET-LIKE"
IV
The stable hands dragged Gideon to the front door and
booted him down the steps. He landed hard.
Coachmen formed into small groups. They stood by the
pillars at the driveway entrance as he picked
himself up and moved unsteadily toward the street.
One of the stable hands took a threatening step just before
Gideon passed. Gideon tensed, ready to defend
himself even though he was groggy. The two took note
of the glint in his blue eye and decided they'd
fulfilled their employer's orders. After a couple
of obscene taunts they turned and strolled back
to the mansion.
Gideon dusted himself off as he reached the street.
While he was crossing Twentieth, the orchestra
resumed. Mingled with the melody he thought he
detected a woman's screams. But that
quickly faded and only the lilting music remained.
Hearing it played as if nothing had happened, he
felt a stinging sense of failure.
In the ballroom he'd gotten exactly what he
wanted- for a little while. He'd gotten an
acknowledgment of Courtleigh's guilt through his
violent behavior. Gideon supposed no one had
ever dared to confront the railroad president that way
before-in his own home and in front of friends of his own
class.
So perhaps a debt had been discharged in Torvald
Ericsson's name. But only a very small one.
The music from the mansion swelled, and he asked himself
whom he had persuaded. Courtleigh's friends and
cronies would remain that They would remain the enemies
of working men.
What had he changed, then? Nothing. His accusation
would have no effect on Courtleigh's power,
Court-leigh's style of operation, Courtleigh's
determination to resist unions. He had seen
Courtleigh squirm, but at best the whole thing
was-in Julia's phrase-a theatrical
gesture.
And instead of feeling good about it, he remembered the
rage and loathing in the eyes of
Courtleigh's friends and felt terrible.
He wiped his perspiring cheek. Time to think about the
future. And to do it a little more realistically for a
change: What if he kept right on just as he'd
planned? What if he wrote about Courtleigh's
crime in the Beacon? Who would believe the charges,
or act upon them?
Again the inevitable answer-no one. Courtleigh would
find and pay a score of witnesses to prove he'd
never ordered the missing Fiorian to commit murder.
The last of the stormy satisfaction vanished. He
felt that he, not Thomas Courtleigh, was the loser
this evening. He kept thinking of the hostility of the
guests. The words with which they'd taunted him.
Socialist.
Communard.
It was almost inevitable that people in Courtleigh's crowd
would believe that of trade unionists. No amount of
editorializing would change their minds. But as he
trudged up the front steps of Julia's house,
he sadly realized the great majority of
Americans also held the same opinion. And he'd
never change their minds or break down their
prejudices by writing little articles in a paper no
one bought.
He lingered on the stoop, thinking about Julia's
remarks earlier in the evening. The ends for which he was
working might be worthy, but the means were laughable.
To change even a few minds about the movement was an
immense job. The kind of job which required an
instrument of great authority and influence, not a little
penny sheet, as Julia so aptly called it.
The answer seemed obvious. The immense task
required an instrument like the New York Union.
Quite without warning, he felt an eerie sense of his
father's presence; a sense of Jephtha being close
by and struggling to communicate with him. The Bible verse
suddenly came to mind.
And the Lord said unto him, Surely I will be with thee,
and thou shah smite the Midianites as one man.
Insights flooded into his mind with incredible speed.
Perhaps Jephtha had marked that verse because he believed
Gideon could bring some meaningful changes hi
society. Perhaps his father had wanted to tell him that.
Speak to G.
And was that the end of it? Somehow, Gideon didn't
think so. He had a conviction that his father had believed
he must go about his work differently. Julia had been
the one to suggest that, just as she'd been the one to suggest
the new approach-one which had been in front
of him all the time, yet hidden from him by his own
narrow frame of reference. It had taken the scene in
the ballroom to show him the need for a new means of
attacking and overcoming the Courtleighs of
America.
He drew a deep, exhilarated breath. The evening
might not be a debacle after all. Just the
opposite. He rushed inside to find Julia and
discuss the idea that was becoming more appealing to him every
moment.
As it turned out, Gideon was completely wrong in
one judgment which he'd made. The effect of his
visit to Mr. Thomas Courtleigh's was not nearly
so insignificant as he imagined, though just then he
had no way of foreseeing the extent of its profound,
even tragic consequences in Courtleigh's life.
And his.
Decision in the Rain
LATE THE NEXT afternoon, Julia and Gideon
were taking tea in the second floor solarium on the
south side of the house. Gideon was depressed by the
thought of his departure the next day. She felt the
same way. Both made a conscious effort to hide
their feelings and keep their conversation animated as they
discussed his conclusions about his future, and
how he meant to implement them.
"I realize you were right last night, Julia. It's
better to reach ten thousand people than ten. It's the only
way to get public opinion squarely against
Courtleigh and his kind."
"Don't be too sure it'll be possible. At
least not immediately." He remembered Strelnik's
prediction that he would ultimately experience
frustration which would vent itself in rage. "I'm not saying
the effort shouldn't be made, Gideon. It should.""
"Yes, long as I remember one thing." For a moment
he saw a lifeless face in a railroad yard
besieged by a winter storm. "The man I'm working
for."
"The chap you first met on the southbound train after the
war?"
He nodded. "Miller."
"I'm sure you won't forget him, or what he
stands for. You're not the kind to let yourself forget." A
moment's silence. "Will you speak to Molly soon?"
"As soon as I put a few things in order.
It'll take a couple of months to tie up the
affairs of my penny
sheet, as you called it." He chuckled. "Did you
realize that's what I charge for Labor's
Beacon?"
"Truly? I confess I've never paid much attention
to the price."
"A cent a copy. I guess I'm living in the
past. Inflation killed the penny press years
ago."
She thought for a moment. "I suppose you realize
carrying out your plan won't be easy."
"I've found that very few worthwhile accomplishments
are easy, Julia. In fact I can only think of
one." A grin. "Inheriting several million
dollars."
She laughed. "But you've really marked out a huge
piece of work for yourself. Changing careers-was
"I can learn whatever I need to learn." Even if
I don't have Margaret's help and support any
longer, he thought with sadness.
She smiled. "Yes, I'm sure you can."
They looked up as a servant entered carrying a
salver with a calling card on it. Julia picked up
the card, gave it a casual glance, then sat
absolutely motionless. Gideon set his cup on
the silver tea cart as she said in a small voice:
"Courtleigh."
"Here? I don't believe it."
She showed him the card. Tension tightened his throat
suddenly. To the servant Julia said, "Ask him
to come up, please."
They exchanged anxious glances during the seemingly
interminable time it took the servant to usher their
visitor to the glass enclosed room where October
sunlight fell on potted plants, comfortable
furniture and the bright surfaces of the tea set.
Julia pulled her lace kerchief from her sleeve;
twisted it in her fingers. He knew she was
probably thinking thoughts much like his. Suppose
Courtleigh considered Gideon's behavior such a
gross insult that it could only
be repaid with an act of personal revenge.
Suppose he'd come calling with a small hideaway
pistol.
He rose, patted Julia's arm to reassure her
and moved to a place near the expanse of glass
overlooking open country to the south. The October
light was pale because it was late in the day. A thin
haze filled the sky, partly the result of the
season, partly of the fire.
Gideon fixed his eye on the solarium entrance.
He heard Courtleigh approaching long before the man
bun-self became visible. His tread had
a measured, almost sinister steadiness. Finally he
appeared.
"Mr. Courtleigh," Julia nodded. She rose
and smoothed her skirt. Extended her hand.
Courtleigh made no such effort at courtesy. His
hazel eyes flicked over the outstretched hand.
"Good afternoon," he said in a curt way. Gideon
went rigid.
The railroad president was elegantly turned out
in a beige tailcoat, waistcoat and trousers,
and a maroon-banded hat and gloves of the same soft
shade. He touched one glove to an errant lock of
wavy auburn hair.
"I'll stay only a moment. I find merely being
in this house extremely distasteful."
Gideon thought he could see Julia's spice
stiffen. "Hardly an auspicious start for a social
call," she said.
"Not a social call, Miss Sedgwick. An
unappealing but necessary visit." For the first time his
attention shifted to Gideon, who had rarely seen
such hatred in a human gaze. The eyes reminded
him of Tillotson, the sadistic Yankee jailer
who had blinded him during his wartime imprisonment.
"No matter what you term it,"
Courtleigh went on, "I trust my manners will be
better than this gentleman's last evening. He
gave a performance worthily of a stage
melodrama."
Courtleigh's lips compressed. His gloved fingers
closed on the brim of his hat, crushing the rolled
edge. "But my house is not a theatre, and those at the
ball
were relatives and personal friends, not gallery
hooligans. What you did, Mr. Kent, was
insulting, disgusting, and unforgivable."
Gideon had trouble controlling his temper. "Shall we
compare it to the murder of a ten year old boy?"
Julia could sense the hate crackling between the two
men. Perhaps out of instinct, she fell back on the
stratagems of the good hostess.
"Here, gentlemen! A little more politeness on both
sides. Sit down, Mr. Courtleigh. Let me
pour you a cup of-was
"No, thank you. I want nothing from the hand of a
Woman of your questionable morals."
"You arrogant bastard!" Gideon Strode forward.
Julia stepped hi front of him.
"Let's get this over, Gideon. Clearly it
isn't going to be pleasant."
Courtleigh slapped his hat against his trouser leg,
squinting into the sunlight suffusing the room. "No,
it isn't. I might even manage to overlook your
bizarre performance, Mr. Kent-overlook it and
chalk it up to the lunatic zeal which affects all those
of the Communard persuasion-was Gideon reddened. "I
might, that is, except for the unfortunate condition of
my fiancee. Your behavior had a most
deleterious effect upon her." Every trace of
sarcasm was gone now. "Miss Strother has always
had a rather delicate, even nervous temperament -"
Just what Julia had said, Gideon recalled. The
hazel eyes continued to accuse him,
"comand your threatening manner quite undid her. The sight
of that rag purporting to be the shirt of some dead boy
sent her into a state of complete nervous
collapse."
The shrieks he'd heard when the music resumed?
he wondered.
"Her parents have dispatched her to a private
medi-352
cal facility up in Lake County. A facility
for "the disturbed. Quite a fine place, I'm told.
Excellent staff, the best physicians in
attendance. With a spot of luck she'll be
herself in just a few days. But what you did to her--the
unnecessary suffering you've caused, the hell you've put
her through-that, Mr. Kent, I cannot ana shall not forget.
Your kind are scum. Rabble bent on destroying every
shred of law and order in this country-and the very concept of
private property rights!"
"Now see here--"
"No, you see here!" Courtleigh retorted. "You
hurt the young woman I intend to marry. I pray
to God the damage you did to her fragile nature
is not permanent, but-was
"A man like you praying?" Gideon scoffed. "That's
laughable."
Courtleigh went white. "It's you who would be
laughable if you weren't so dangerous." He started
to draw something from the side pocket of his coat.
Gideon tensed until he saw it was merely a
piece of paper. He recognized a masthead
torn from Labor's Beacon.
"You made a serious error in coming to Chicago on
behalf of your gutter paper, Mr. Kent. You
made an even more serious one when, for some reason I
still cannot fathom, you chose me as the focus of your ill
will. Not to mention your misguided crusade to see every
foundation of society shattered-""
Gideon snorted. "That's the argument you always use,
isn't it? You and the rest of the bosses. Anyone who
asks for a decent wage, or injury benefits, or
shorter hours, or a safe, healthy place to work
is automatically out to overturn society. Out
to trample the American flag and raise the red one
the Communards waved-was
Courtleigh smiled in a frosty way.
"Exactly."
"I'll grant it's a fine diversionary tactic.
And it does work. But it won't work forever."
The railroad man shrugged again. "I doubt you'll
be on the scene one way or another. I predict
a very short life for you, Mr. Kent."
Julia stepped to Gideon's side and took his
arm. If Courtleigh had raised his voice, or a
fist, Gideon might have borne it somewhat better
than he did. Instead, Courtleigh kept his tone
temperate. Only the hazel eyes showed his loathing
for the younger man as he held up the scrap from the
Beacon and went on.
"But while you're still with us, I am going to crush this
rag out of existence." He crumpled the paper and
let it drift to the carpet. "I am going to crush
your family, and your slut here, and I am
going to crush you- though not necessarily in that
particular order, and not necessarily at once. But
I will do it, Mr. Kent. Before God, I will do it
all. That I swear."
Trembling but managing a smile, he tipped his
fawn hat, about-faced as smartly as a soldier and
walked out of the solarium.
Gideon and Julia listened to his footsteps
clack down the main staircase. Then came the
distant slam of the front door. The venomous
hazel eyes lingered in Gideon's mind as he
moveggJ slovstly to Julia and put his arms around
her, feeling her shiver.
Neither of them spoke. At last Gideon leaned
down to retrieve the piece of the Beacon. He
laid it on the tea cart; smoothed it almost as if it
were a fragment of a priceless painting.
"Let him try," he said, wanting to sound much more
confident than he felt.
"I'm sure we won't have to invite his wrath,
Gideon."
"You really think he-?"
She broke in, "I don't think there's any question
of it." And again Courtleigh's presence seemed
to hover
near them, raining their earlier enthusiasm for talk of
his decision to join the New York Union.

The eastbound express was arriving. The time had come.
A cold autumn rain poured down on the roofed
platform at Englewood Junction south of the city.
Wind whipped the rain beneath the eaves, and drove
silver needles through the beam of the locomotive's
headlight. The locomotive was still a quarter mil
greater-than com*r, disin the platform, pouring out steam
and wood smoke ihat added to the murk of an afternoon
already dark and Qieary. Fast-flying black clouds
filled the sky.
Julia's servants had manaeed to find a closed
carriage for the trip. Many eastbound ar-d westbound
trains were using the country depot uddu8i; those in the
central city could be restored to full service.
Riding through the rain with the wind-lashed lake on their
left, Gideon had held Julia's hand tightly
anci thought about the days just past. The discovery of his
love, for her was a wondrous experience, though it had
now become a saddening one. He vas taking the only
sensible course, and he hated it.
Still, he knew he dared not prolong the affair. It
was wrong. That seemed a dismal admission
to make about something so filled with joy and love, bin it
was inescapable. What he and Julia had done was
wrong in the traditional sense, and memories of his
Biblical upbringing would never let him forget it.
But abstract morality wasn't the most compelling
reason for his decision. In his opinion there was a much
more practical and important one. The affair was
wrong because it carried the possibility of pain and
injury for others. For Margaret. For his children, should the
liaison ever corne to light
by accident. For Julia herself if Courtleigh
fulfilled his vow.
No, unquestionably, he had to leave her. Perhaps
breaking things off would have at least one benefit. He
might spare her from Courtleigh's reprisals.
But now, on the platform illuminated by the headlight
of the arriving express, it was proving hard to do what was
right and necessary. Hard because her mouth was so sweet and
eager. Hard because his will wavered.
He lifted her off her feet, kissing her without
embarrassment while waiting passengers gaped or
made disapproving comments. Because the afternoon was chilly,
Julia had worn a little fur-trimmed cape. The
fur tickled his cheek as he pressed his face against
hers.
"Sometimes I wish this week had never happened."
"I know, dearest. It would be easier for both of us."
She drew back. "But what you must think about is-was
A quick glance to see if there were any listeners close
by. She saw none. And the express was chugging in,
trucks rattling, drivers squealing, steam hissing,
bell clanging in a way that sounded mournful, somehow.
She formed a word in silence:
"Courtleigh." Then, aloud, she added, "He'll
do what he threatened."
"Yes, you've convinced me of that."
"You must be very careful, darling. Very careful of your
family, too." A wistful smile as she wiped
rain-or tears-from her face. "Some of my
free-thinking sisters would drum me out of the movement
if they saw me carrying on this way. I-I don't
quite know what you've done to me, Gideon. I've
fallen in love with you, but at the same time, you've
got me fretting about the welfare of the-was She had
difficulty saying it. "comthe woman who's going
to keep you away from me. Well, I can't help that.
She's important to you and so she has to be
important to me. I want her to be safe. Your
children, too. You most of all."
She rested her cheek against his chest as the
locomotive roared by, shaking the platform. "I'm
not so liberal and brave as I pretend. I want
to be an independent woman, but all at once, a
part of me doesn't. The part that's linked to you for good
and all now-was
She was crying. A voice within him insisted, You've
got to say goodbye. Time's running.
"I think I'd die if anything happened to you,
Gideon. I do love you so very much-was
"I."
Say goodbye. End it!
But the words that were torn out of him weren't the ones
conscience and good sense demanded.
"I love you too, Julia."
Unashamed, she let the tears stream down her
face. "Oh-dear heaven, that's-the first time-you've
told me-was
"I'd tell you a hundred times a day if I could.
I love you, Julia. I love you."
The pain of parting consumed them as they hugged each other
on the noisy, rain-swept platform. The smeared and
dirty windows of second-class cars rolled
slowly by, lit from within by hanging oil lamps.
Gideon felt dizzy for a moment. He didn't
want to plunge into a lifetime of
deception, lies to Margaret, silent shame in
front of his children. Those were things no decent, rational
man wanted or sought.
And yet when he looked down into Julia's blue
eyes, so sad and low; h, he knew he couldn't
leave her.
Over the train's roar, he exclaimed as he hugged
her again, "I've got to see you."
"But-you said--"'"
"I know what I said. 1 didn't mean it. Dt
greater-than you want to end it?"
"Yev" She less-than ,", be:. lauehing rrsd
weeping at she saroe cime. ""Yes, bur t
ccctti";: do it eu'icr. Oh, ti'.u
greater-than . backslash knowledge you, cffai ling, Th.ink
yosi, t-greater-than a:-disment, you"
They kissed again, ignoring stares, ignoring mirthful
faces behind the streaked windows. Almost out of breath,
he said, "It will take me three or four months
to close down the Beacon. And that's assuming
Molly and Theo Payne will have me on the Union.
You can write me care of the Beacon till I send
you another address."
"I will, my darimg. I'll write you there once a
week. Daily. Hourly! Oh, God,
you've made me so happy, Gideon. I know we
should stop it. But I don't want to- I don't
want to!"
He picked her up by the waist and whirled her around.
While the other passengers climbed aboard,
Gideon and Julia talked blithely, saying the
foolish things lovers say; things that should never be
Overheard. He was almost able to ignore the nagging
voice of conscience:
You damn fool, you should have, broken it off. You could
have. This way, you'll gain a little joy, and ten times the
grief a quick parting would have caused.
Somehow he didn't care. He loved her. That
swept everything else aside. In his own way he
had become as lawless as Tom Courtleign. And
if that was sinful, why was he so happy?
Finally, the conductor's cry broke through his
euphoria. After one last kiss, he raced along
beside the moving train and jumped to the steps of a
second-class car. He clung to a hand rail,
overcome with the miracle of his love for her, and
watched her small, strong figure disappearing
slowly in the rain, her head high- confident and
unafraid now, as he was.
Her gloved hand rose and moved slowly,
waving in affectionate farewell. He gripped the
hand rail and stayed in the slashing rain until she was
lost from sight.
But he knew he'd see her again. Whatever the
price; whatever his punishment.
A "hoi greater-than iffm ""* "R.vas
Strcsf
ON THE NIGHT the Chicago fire began,
Jeremiah Kent was sharing in the prosperity of
Abilene, Kansas.
His professional wardrobe showed he was doing well.
Just within the last three months, he'd purchased a
new long-tailed coat, checked trousers,
embroidered waistcoat and silk cravat, not
to mention the flat crowned hat in which he kept his
hideout gun. After drifting from place to place for a
couple of years, he'd finally stumbled into El
Dorado.
He'd arrived in Abilene in April, a few
weeks before the start of what the locals referred to as
the summer season. Everyone told him 1871 would be
the biggest year yet in the town's short history as
a cattle shipping center. Optimists predicted
that six hundred thousand Texas longhorns would
move north to the Kansas railheads before
winter again closed Jesse Chisholm's trail through
the Indian Territory. Of that total, the
Abilene stockyards would get by far the largest share.
Ever since the little promoter from Illinois, Joe
McCoy, had stepped off the train and seen a
profit potential on the empty prairie,
Abilene had developed a reputation for
enterprise. McCoy and his associates had
financed and built pens, chutes and scales, then
arranged favorable shipping rates with the railroad.
They had somehow persuaded or paid the governor and
members of the state legislature to ignore the
quarantine line which made it illegal for longhorns
to enter 361
"Wfuueve; a tnd"-weary mar. waived,, from
new red-top boots with svats and ccc caret cm
iiKn caret to s c-jt into tut; ieatiier, cono
giccevsc caret knowledge less-than a to comddath to i
greater-than oniaiv-he could fiiui i; in
Atnkuc, .prostitution ooeidditcu run coniit
ii; the Devil's Ado'mon, the southeast.
(left-brace aaiSer of t-caret wn below the
fracki. Despise the lobbying 01 a certain
sriudl clique whose piety was bad for business, the
City -Coancii refused to vote
to drive out the soiled doves. Instead, the Council
chose to contain them, since the giris were absolute!)
vita! to the success of a combination shipping point and
end-of-tbe-irail resort.
Strong drink was necessary, too, of course. More than
thirty saloons along the Texas Street
esplanade provided it. Some of the Visitors also
liked to buck the tiger. That was where Jeremiah came
in. Within four short months, under the latest of a
succession of assumed names, he'd made himself one
of the best-known gentlemen of Well Street, as the
town's moralistic minority termed the esplanade.
He had done it to -y turning his favorite pastime
into a successful profession. He dealt poker,
monte, and other games of chance.
In Abilene, he was not far from Ellsworth; it was
located just about sixty miles west, beyond the
quarantine line. When he had drifted out from
Kaasas City in the
spring, he'd been concerned that he was returning too
near the scene of one of his crimes. He stayed
alert in case anyone from Eilsworth or Fort
Marker should show up and penetrate the various layers
of protection provided by his new clothes, new
name, and new profession. So far, no one
had. In fact, after killing the sergeant in the
Ellsworth dance house, he'd never seen a sign
of pursuit, which convinced him the United States
Army thought Amos Graves was unimportant, or
that he was. The latter angered him not a little.
Now, in early October, he'd been in Abilene
longer than he'd been anywhere else since the war.
It seemed an ideal spot for a man of his ability
and growing reputation. Besides, the pickings were incredible.
And involved next to no risk. Another itinerant
gambler whom he'd met in his travels-an older
man. wise with experience-had lectured him
convincingly about the best way to get rich and, just as
important, stay out of meaningless fights. The
secret was simple honesty. Not only was cheating
dangerous, it wasn't necessary. The odds favored
tHe dealer, and the Texans were usually besotted when
they played, further heightening the dealer's
advantage. Jeremiah drank too. He'd
discovered gin, and put away a pint to a pint and a
half every day of the week. But he took care never
to be as drunk as his customers.
By cultivating a reputation for honesty, he
attracted a lot of repeat business. Of course
he had to pass a small percentage of his
winnings to the owners of whatever liquor palace he
happened to be playing in-the Old Fruit, the
Applejack, Jim Flynn's, the Pearl or
any of a half dozen other good ones. Even so, he
earned enough to dress well, live comfortably, and
provide himself with all the female companionship he
wanted.
Another aspect of his reputation contributed to his
success. Since arriving in town, he'd taken
pains to establish that part by dropping casual remarks
into card 363
table conversation, and by backing up the remarks with
participation in whatever shooting contests or
exhibitions the saloon crowd arranged.
Jeremiah never won those contests; never pulled off
the most spectacular feats of marksmanship in the
exhibitions. His friend the marshal always bested him.
No surprise there, though. Abilene's marshal
practiced with his pistols for an hour or two every
day. Men such as George Custer and Little Phil
Sheridan called him the best sharpshooter in the west.
The marshal's favorite challenge was to call for a
tomato can to be tossed up in the air. No other
man Jeremiah had ever met could fire at the can with
both pistols, keep it spinning aloft and
score nine or ten hits out of twelve rounds-every
time. The best Jeremiah had ever done was seven out of
twelve. Once.
Nevertheless, he usually ran a good second in the
contests, and that lent an air of truth to his smiling,
modest answers to questions put to him over cards.
Hearing him say certain things about his background, the
Texans always seemed to enjoy their game a lot more.
Jeremiah knew it was because in the West, murder was not
always considered reprehensible. Done at the proper
time and place, it could make a man a celebrity.
It had certainly done that for the marshal. So he was more
than willing to admit to a less than spotless
past-without going into detail, of course.
Jeremiah kept track of his family with an
occasional letter to Boyle, the Irishman he'd met
at the Union Pacific railhead in "66.
He always asked Boyle to write him care of a post
office. Jeremiah signed a different fictitious
name to each letter, but Boyle always knew from flic
content who was inquiring. During September,
Boyle had written to say Jeremiah's father had
died of a heart seizure. He'd wept in his room
and his tears had made the ink run, so that when he went
back lo read the letter, a second time, it
was ueariy illegible,
The Irishman was certainly doing well for himself.
Jeremiah had seen some of his retail stores along
the U.p. route further north, and in June,
he'd played monte with a man who turned out to be a
purchasing agent for Boyle. The man had traveled
all the way down from Cheyenne to pick up five
hundred prime head to add to the herd Boyle and his
wife were building. Jeremiah hadn't let on that
he was acquainted with the Irishman. But he was rather
proud that the only person in all the world who knew
he was still alive was a very prosperous individual; a
solid citizen.
Whenever he wrote Boyle, he kept personal
details to a minimum. He had a lingering fear of
Kola's prophecy, and hence a fear of revealing
too much about himself, particularly his whereabouts. Under no
circumstances did he want to make it possible for
Boyle to slip and accidentally tell one of his
brothers where he was. No matter that they were
hundreds of miles away-in Matt's case,
thousands-he just didn't want to take a chance. So
far, every one of Kola's predictions had proved out.
Since Ellsworth, he hadn't put the guns
away. And they had indeed given a certain
luster to the name he used most often. But Kola had
also said the killing would never stop, and that too was
turning out to be correct. Once having acquired
a reputation, it was periodically necessary to defend it.
So he lived with a nagging fear of the rest of it coming
true: the gradual slide back into obscurity; the
end of his life as the Sioux had described it.
That, he absolutely couldn't bear to think about. Which
was one of the chief reasons he'd grown so fond of
gin.
Abilene's commercial establishments didn't
observe the Sabbath. Doing so would have eliminated one
seventh of a week's profit. So Jeremiah worked that
Sunday night as usual. About six forty-five he
concluded a blackjack game in the town's largest
and finest watering spot, The Alamo.
The place occupied a corner on Texas Street
but fronted on Cedar. A good deal of money had
been spent to make it opulent. The bar was solid
mahogany, the fittings solid brass. A
splendid array of pudgy, pink-breasted nudes in
gold frames decorated the walls. But the
management also believed in appealing to higher
instincts. Two musicians sat in a niche
playing popular airs on the piano and
violin.
Jeremiah had just gotten up from the table and was at the
bar, buying drinks for himself and his victim, a
gregarious, freckled, tipsy young Texan. He
signaled the barkeep.
"Gin for me, Ha!. Whiskey for my friend. Ben,
I'm mighty sorry to have reiieved you of all your
wages."
The boy grinned in a fuddled way. "Pleasure-
pleasure's mine."
The barkeep put down two brimming glasses.
He slid the darker one toward Ben, "Kansas
sheep dip. Best in the house."
""Obliged to you," Ben said. He spilled half
the whiskey before, he got one swal'ow. He wiped
his mouth with his cuff. "Besides," he said to Jeremiah,
"I know you did it fair an" square. 1 don't
mind losiu' to any man who's good friends with the
marshal." The boy belched. "That is the truth,
ain't it? You and Wild Bill are pals, ain't
you?"
"Bosom companions," Jeremiah nodded, stretching
it slightly. "I suppose that's unusual, him
being a former
Yank scout and me a one-time Reb. But
we both like
handsome women. We're both students of the picture
cards. We both shoot pretty well, although he's
the best--" A touch of envy had crept in. He
hunched over his tumbler of gin and lowered his voice.
"His real name's James, you know."
"Is that right!" The boy glowed. The tidbit of
information made him feel intimately connected with the
great, which was exactly why Jeremiah used it with all
his customers.
"Yes, sir. James," he went on. "James
Butler Hickok. I'll tell you one more thing.
Jim just can't figure why people out here, and then the
eastern magazines, started calling him Bill.
It's a genuine, gold-plated mystery."
"You mean he doesn't know how he got the name?"
With great solemnity, Jeremiah shook his head.
"Think of that," the boy murmured. He drank the
rest of his Kansas sheep dip. Most of it wound
up on the front of his buckskin vest.
The piano and violin struck up Just Before the
Battle, Mother. One of the barkeeps who had a
face as innocent as a divinity student's began
to sing the lyric in a clear, lovely tenor. Men
at the tables stopped their games. Several
soon had tears in their eyes; Appornattox was not
that far in the past.
The Texas boy evidently had no strong
emotional memories of the war because he kept after his
companion.
"The fellers back in camp are gonna be mighty
interested to know that about the marshal. They're gonna
think it's mighty exciting that I heard it from Mr.
Jason Kane, too. That I sat right over
yonder and bucked the tiger with Jason. Kane.
You're pretty famous yourself, you know."
He experienced a moment of complete happiness.
"Why, thank you. Thank you kindly." 367
"But I'd sure like to know one thing, Mr. Kane.
That is, if you don't mind?"
He smiled warmly. He knew what the question would
be.
"Ask away."
"Exactly how many men have you sent to the ground?"
No point explaining he'd killed one woman
too; that did nothing for a man's reputation.
Jeremiah let his smile thin out a little, till it
took on that faintly cruel cast. The Texas
boy instinctively stepped away from him. Jeremiah
didn't lie.
"Fourteen, and I guarantee you, Ben-every one was a
dishonorable person who deserved it."
"Fourteen. Lord God!" Pop-eyed, the boy
pumped Jeremiah's hand. "Pleasure, Mr.
Kane. Surely has been."
"My sentiments, too," Jeremiah returned, his
eyes glowing with good humor. He touched the brim of
his oversized hat. "Hope you find work to pay your
way home to the valley of the Red." He warmed himself
a moment longer in the worshipful gaze of the Texas
boy, who couldn't have been more than seventeen or
eighteen. At twenty-five, Jeremiah felt
ancient by comparison.
When Ben staggered out, Jeremiah finished his gin,
called for another and tossed it off with barely a
pause. The bartender shuddered.
"Jesus, Jason. You keep drinking it that fast,
it'll kill you one of these days."
No it won't. I know how I'm going to die,
Angered by the intrusion of the thought from God knew where,
he slammed the empty glass down, making Hal
start and blather an apology. Jeremiah's
temples hint. Why did he have to keep remembering
the prophecy? Why did Kola keep reaching out from
the dead to spoil everything? He fought his
fury and fear, leaned
over the bar and gave Hal a magnanimous pat on
the shoulder.
"Sorry. Not your fault. I was thinking about something
else."
And there's never a day that I don't think of it.
A friendly expression returned to his face, forced
there. "Pour me another, if you please, and I'll
try to follow your advice."
Relieved, the barkeep said, "On the house,
Jason."
The smile grew. "Why, thank you. Thank you
kindly."
ui
Drink in hand, he walked to the end of the bar where the
night manager, Lester Cross, was seated at a
table eating steak and potatoes washed down with beer.
If Cross had observed the little altercation, he said
nothing, Jeremiah was a good source of revenue, and a
dangerous man to anger. Cross knew that as well
as Hai did.
Jeremiah greeted the older man, wrote out a
chit showing his winnings and the Alamo's percentage,
initialed the chit and gave it to Cross along with the
specified amount.
"Much obliged, Jason. By the way-before you showed
up, there was a fellow hi here asking about you."
For an instant, panic made breathing difficult.
"Somebody I know?"
"Doubt it. He wasn't familiar with your name.
He must have seen you on the street, because he came in
and-descnbed you and asked who you were. Maybe he
saw you hanging out with Wild Bill. Anyway-was
Cross chuckled. "Your fame's spreading, my
boy."
But something nervous was ticking in Jeremiah's mind,
steadily worsening his mood.
"You positive you don't know who he was,
Lester?"
"No, sir, I never saw him before. He didn't
identify himself. He was young, though. And there was no
doubt he was a Texas cowpoke-just like those boys."
The manager pointed. He received glares from three
summer visitors dining at the next table. He
grinned in a crow-eating way Jeremiah found
disgusting, then said, "Sorry, boys. Clean forgot
that was a dirty word."
Grudging smiles-one more glare-then the Texans
went back to their food. The word that had riled them was
cowpoke. The newest, greenest hands in a
trail crew were the ones who drew the noxious
assignment of working at the stockyards when their herd was
shipped. The hands used long sticks to prod the
reluctant longhorns and drive them from the pens to the
freight cars. It was tiring, frustrating, dirty
work. In the Texas lexicon a cowboy was someone
to be respected, but a cowpoke was scum.
Jeremiah drew a fine cambric handkerchief from his
sleeve. Touched it to his upper lip several times.
The October evening seemed sultry all at
once. Even though the Alamo's three sets of
double doors were folded open, the place was stifling
hot.
"Did this Texas fellow want a game?"
"Don't know, Jason. Like I said, all he
asked was your name." Cross forked fried potatoes
into his mouth. The next words were muffled. "Hell,
he didn't look dangerous to me. Or even
proddy."
Jeremiah nodded again. "Probably wanted a
game, then." But he didn't quite believe it.
He'd better stay doubly alert for the remainder of the
night.
"Finished for the evening?" Cross asked.
Jeremiah turned toward the ornate wall
clock. "Hell no, it's only a quarter past
seven. I'll try to rustle up at least one more
game. First, though, I thought I'd squander some of
my profits in the Addition. This morning
Little Mattie brought in four new nymphs du
prairie. One's about eighteen, with yellow hair
and a face that belongs in the soprano section of a
Congregational choir."
"Well, you better go get her," Cross said,
"because she'll look sixty inside of a year. Give
me a report on her, will you?"
"You're married, Lester."
"Why the hell you think I want a report?"
Jeremiah laughed and waved goodbye with his hat, being
careful not to dislodge what was hidden in the inner band.
IV
He stepped out of the Alamo and studied the street io
both directions. Thunder rumbled in the northwest.
He sniffed the wind, A boomer corning. It would
put an end to the unusual October warm spell.
He started along Texas Street. All at
once he stumbled. A cowhand ambling by let out a
snicker. Jeremiah glared as he righted himself. The
cowhand hurried on without looking back, but
Jeremiah realized the gin had affected
him. Maybe Hai was right. Maybe he shouldn't
swill the stuff so fast.
He kept moving. The esplanade ran east
to west, just north of the Kansas Pacific tracks.
Tt swarmed with cowhands and townspeople on foot,
and on horseback. The early evening was noisy with
laughter, music., the racket of galloping
horses and racing hackneys that conveyed visitors
to and from the whorehouse district- genial sounds of
prosperity occasionally punctuated by the faraway
bawl of the cause of it .---U, a longhorn in the
herds bedded down south of the Smoky Hill River.
One noise missing from the hubbub was the crackle of
firearms. Early on, the Abilene Council-of which
Marshal Hickok was the reluctant
sergeant-at-arms, responsible for rounding up equally
reluctant members
for meetings-had made it a crime for incoming
Texans, or anyone, to carry a gun within the town
limits. High spirits and fist fights could be
tolerated. But a reputation for violence would send the
drovers elsewhere.
Thus, as Jeremiah was hurrying along toward the
Addition and letting himself relax a little-relax and
think of the angelic face of the girl whose
favors he was going to buy, one thing for which he was
totally unprepared was the unmistakable sound of a
pistol cocking.
He was opposite the depot, on a lightless and
deserted stretch of sidewalk in front of some
shops that had already closed. He'd just passed the
black mouth of an alley. Almost the moment the
pistol cocked back in the alley, a voice
spoke from the same place.
"You, Joseph Kingston. Stop right there."
He leaned forward, shifting his weight in order
to run.
"Better not, Kingston. I got a gun on you."
He stopped, hit suddenly by the stunning power of that
name from the past. The inside of his mouth instantly
parched. He swallowed as he turned and peered into the
alley. He could see absolutely nothing.
Who was hiding there? He suspected it was the stranger
who'd asked about him. But how had the man tracked
him? Waited for him to emerge from the Alamo and then
run behind the buildings along the esplanade,
parallel to the route he was taking? And how could
anyone know Joseph Kingston! Perhaps it was all a
mistake. A coincidence involving someone else of the
same name.
Cold and angry, the voice said, "I finally found
you, you damn murderer."
There was no mistake. Jeremiah recognized the
voice.
The young Texan stepped far enough forward in the alley so
that certain details were visible. A Colt's
Navy model in his right hand. Chaps and a
sugar-loaf sombrero. Then he moved again, and weak
light from the depot fell across his face. The
features leaped at Jeremiah across a gulf of
years.
still should have thought of him when Lester mentioned Texas.
And I shouldn't have let him go back in '66.
The boy was older now; early twenties. Jeremiah
gazed at him with a mixture of disgust and panic.
Would Mr. Jason Kane be brought down by a
wet-eared calf? Would that be the end of everything?
God, that was impossible. Intolerable!
But he was trapped. And the youngster was nervous, if not
downright afraid. Someone in that state, with a gun, was
more dangerous than any professional.
The distant depot lantern gleamed on a trickle
of sweat on the youngster's neck. He shifted his
position; the gleam vanished. The boy was in clear
violation of the gun ordinance. Probably
he'd kept the revolver concealed under his leather vest.
Bear River Tom Smith, the murdered marshal
whom Wild Bill had replaced, had been
scrupulous about policing the ordinance, even to the
point of conducting spot searches of new arrivals,
Hickok was more tolerant. He only cracked down
when concealed weapons were displayed or, occasionally,
used. Jeremiah silently damned his friend for helping
to get him into this tigMore place,
"The first time f seer, you was this morning,"" the
Texan said in an unsteady voice. "Having
breakfast at the Drover's Cotiat'e."
Jeremiah dicln'i speak.
"This is this? third year I've come up to Kansas
with a 373
herd. I signed on mostly to find you. Never really
figured I would."
still never figured you would either.
"Look here," Jeremiah said. "It's a warm
evening. Would you object if I took off my
hat?"
The boy thought about it. "All right. But do it slow."
Jeremiah removed the hat and wiped his n'sht
sleeve across his forehead. The streak of white hair
showed above his left brow; he no longer
colored it.
"I'm not the man you want. My name is-was
"Jason Kane. So they told me at the
Alamo."
"That's right, Jason Kane."
"You're famous, We even heard of you down in
Texas. I never figured you'd be this easy
to take."
You're dead 1or saying that. He barely kept the
rage out of his voice.
"You're changing the subject, boy. I don't know
anything about this Joseph Kingston you're-was
"Hell you don't," the boy interrupted. "I'll
never forget you murdering my uncle, you and that dirty
Indian you was traveling with. You almost killed me,
too." The cocked Navy shook as the boy leveled
it at the front of Jeremiah's waistcoat. "You
should have."
A sigh carried the sound of confession. "You're right."
He began to fan himself with his hat. "Years haven't
changed you much. Your name's Tom, I recall."
"Timothy. Timothy Stirling of Fort Worth."
"Oh, that's right. Your uncle was from Fort Worth,
too, the dishonorable son of a bitch."
"You shut up about-was
"Bull shit," Jeremiah said quietly. "You were
in on it; you know what he did. He lost his
beeves and txied to steal my buffla so the season
wouldn't be a total loss for him. Your uncle got
no more than he deserved. But I suppose that
won't be of help to me now, will it?"
"n-no."
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firearms in this town,, let. slone kills someone,"
He was dismayed ai the steadiness of the reply.
"That don't matter, Kingston-Kane-whatever it
is. Nothing matters except my uncle."
Another sigh, "I'm beginning to combbee that. You a
single fellow, Timothy7"
"No, I got hitched up last winter." "It's
too soon for youngsters, 1 suppose." "There's one
on the way." "Then you should reconsider what
you're-was 'Wo."
"All right, ai! right, don't bust a cinch."
Jeremiah did his best to sound as if he were the
nervous one. "Do you mind if I put my hat
back on before you do what you're going to do?"
Timothy tried to shrug in a casual way. "Go
ahead. Slow, like before-was
All the better. He drew the open side of the
crown in front of his face. He jerked his left
hand up to the hat and jumped a yard to the right.
Timothy Stirling swore and shot, but only once.
A fundamental mistake.
Jeremiah was breathing fast as he tore the
four-barrel Derringer out of the inner band of the hat
deliberately bought too large. He jerked the hat
down. A horse bellowed and fell near the
tracks, pinked by Timothy's wild bullet.
Lightning flashed. Timothy saw
Jeremiah's strange smile and lost his nerve.
He dropped his Colt and dashed down the alley.
For an instant Jeremiah gazed at the youngster's
back. No one shot a man in the back. And he
didn't have to shoot the Texan at all.
Never figured you'd be this easy.
Thunder rolled. "Timothy!"
The shout brought the boy's head around even as he
ran. If Timothy wasn't exactly facing him,
neither did he have his back completely turned.
Jeremiah instinctively observed Hickok's
dictum that concentrated and continuous firepower usually
brought a man out on top. He used all four
shots to blow the running puncher against the wall of the
bakery shop forming one side of the alley.
Blood sprayed from a wound in Timothy's neck and
ran from another in his left.forearm. The two shots in
the left side of his vest would be the ones to kill him,
Jeremiah thought as he trembled with a feeling close
to ecstasy.
By the time Timothy fell down and rattled his last,
Jeremiah was surrounded by a crowd of men. Mostly
angry Texans who recognized one of their own
lying dead. His only hope was that none of
Timothy's trail crew was present or
close by. He faced the growing crowd of cowhands,
Mexican vaqueros and saloon
hangers-on. They didn't know his hideout gun was
empty.
"It was a private quarrel. I'll accommodate
anyone who wants to pick another."
Eyes darted from the Derringer to his belligerent
face. There were some threatening remarks, but no trouble
before the marshal arrived, his usual resplendent and
well-armed self.
Jeremiah had never met another man in the West
who gave more attention to personal cleanliness and
grooming. Hickok kept his drooping mustaches
trimmed and his golden-brown, shoulder-length hair
combed at all times. He was thirty-four, six
feet two and slim, with the light, gray-blue eyes
legend said accompanied a killer's temperament.
Tonight, as usual, he was fastidiously dressed: an
immaculate Prince Albert coat, Irish linen
shirt and French calf boots worth at least
seventy-five dollars. He was always
courteous-even now as he quietly ordered the crowd
to disperse, except for two swampers from the Alamo.
They were to remove the corpse to the undertaking parlor.
Hickok carried the same equipment he
always carried to enforce the peace in Abilene: two
.44 Colts strapped to his hips, a Bowie
knife visible under his Prince Albert, a
sawed-off shotgun in the crook of his elbow- plus,
no doubt, the pair of .41 Derringers he usually
concealed somewhere on his person. He was a terrible
walking arsenal. Many of the visiting Texans hated
him for that, and for his service in the Yankee army.
He bent to examine the body that now stunk of its own
released waste. That was the one thing Jeremiah loathed
about death. The dirtiness.
"You killed him, uh?" Hickok murmured. "Had
to, Jim. He was waiting for me when I walked
by. He was going to finish me if I didn't get
him first. He shot once-was A gesture toward the
stricken horse 377
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marshal beiod.bb'ed a: the Derringer m Jeremiah's
hand. "Yoa broke the law, Kiii caret do a
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Texans won't like what i'sappered. Neither will the
council or the merchants. For your own protection
I'd belter lake you down to the jailhouse a
while."
Sn tlddi.8i" backslash vas the verdict.
Well, it wasn't nearly as bad as the verdict of
his own conscience. Now that the joy was gone ht was
ashamed he'd killed Timothy when it wasn'r
necessary.
And yd. in a way. it had been absolutelv necessary.
Of all men, Hickok should understand. Hickok had a
reputation even more formidable than Jason Kane's.
But Hickok also had a job to protect. And the
advantage of being able to maintain iik reputation through
that job. As a police officer, he was allowed
to kill people. Allowed and encouraged.
In his imagination, Jeremiah saw Timothy
falling. At 378
the moment he'd fired, it had made no difference that
Timothy was unarmed. No difference. He was frightened
suddenly. What the hell was happening to him?
"Come along, Jason," Hickok said in a mild
voice. Jeremiah fell in step.
VI
Many stared, but no one interfered because of Hick-ok's
weapons and reputation. He was said to have killed
forty-three men, not counting Indians shot during
his, Army scout service; Indians were never put
in the same class as white men.
Hickok never disputed the total, either. It made
splendid copy for the magazines that had turned him
into a hero and a legend hack East.
At the jail, Jeremiah explained thai;
Timothy's uncle, one Major T. T.
Cutright, had attempted to steal a buffalo kill from
him five years ago, and he'd shot Cutright and one
of his helpers for it. He'd let Timothy go even
though the boy had sworn revenge. This evening he'd
nearly succeeded in getting it.
Hickok's eyes were emotionless as he surveyed
Jeremiah by the light of the lamps in the jail's
office area. At the end of the story, he asked:
"The boy was with a crew still camped south of
town?"
"He didn't say. I presume he was."
Hickok fingered his mustache a moment. "The crew will
find out what happened. They'll want your bead.
We'll have more trouble. Council won't like that,"
"Jesus, Jim, I thought you were my friend! Is that
all you can say-the council won't like it?"
Hickok looked at him and Jeremiah saw no
trace of friendship. "It's the truth. If you stay
around, there are b'able to be more killings. I can't let
personal feelings 379
influence the way I judge a situation. Or the
way I do my job."
"Hell, you're just afraid you'll get fired if you
take my side against the Texans. Everybody
kisses their feet in this damn town."
Hickok blinked his pale, almost sinister eyes. In
a voice still devoid of emotion, he said, "I'll
act like you never made that remark, Jason." He
drew a breath. "You'll have to hide out of here."
"Whart"
"You heard me. Hide out. Right away."
"There are no more passenger trains tonight!"
"Buy a horse. Bribe your way aboard the
midnight freight. I don't care how you
do it, just leave town."
"But I'll miss the rest of the season! I won't
have enough money to tide me through the whiter."
"Should have thought of that before you shot the boy. He was
running. The position of his Colt said so. You
didn't need to break the law to save yourself. You've
got till the sun comes up to get out of Abilene.
You made your bed."
In the cold tone and the pale eyes, there was no
reprieve.
VII
The thunderstorm broke just as the train of livestock
cars pulled oui at twelve fifteen. Jeremiah
sat in the caboose, listening to the rain pelting the
roof and the steers and vccws lowing from the hsad end.
His cffot5!-bes were soaked. Next morning's
beard was beginning to sprout. On the seat beside him lay
a brown paper package; sthe bottle of gin
he'd bought at the back door of the Old Fruit
before Hickok marched him down to the sio;:"'ccvards
siding. Two brakemen had accepted bribes of a
caret offd dollar each to allow him to get aboard
with his carpetbag.
One of the brakemen had dropped some kind of cheaply
printed newspaper from his pocket as he
went out to get the train underway. Jeremiah picked
up the paper. The masthead read Labors Beacon.
A crude engraving of a switchman's lantern
separated the two words. His mouth dropped open at
what he saw directly below.
Gideon Kent, Editor-Publisher. The train
gathered speed. Lightning flared above the stock pens,
a sea of tossing horns and terrified cattle.
Jeremiah found himself knuckling his eyes as he
examined the little four page paper with sadness and envy.
Some months ago, Boyle had written to say
Gideon was busy organizing groups of workingmen so
they'd stand up to their bosses. Gideon was a-a
trade unionist, that was the term the Irishman had
used.
But Jeremiah hadn't heard about the little newspaper.
Imagine! His very own brother, who'd hated books
and disschool as a young man, writing something good enough to be
published.
Well, didn't that fit with the family motto
that'had originated back near the start of the
century? His father had repeated the motto many times
during Jeremiah's boyhood. Take a stand and
make a mark. The Kents always did that.
I've done, it too. Only I've
left grave stones. Fifteen of them. With
Timothy dead, he'd killed fifteen.
The rear door of the caboose crashed open. Rain
splattered the floor as the two brakemen came
in, complaining about the weather. No, there were three men,
he saw. The last one, a bull-shouldered fellow in
his fifties, hadn't been bribed. He jabbed a
thick brakeman's club at Jeremiah.
"What the hell's he doing on this tra-?"
Jeremiah's motion was sure and smooth. He came
to his feet, stepped over his carpetbag and snatched
the
club with his left hand. He hurled it away.
Simultaneously, his right hand blurred across to his
left hip and drew one of the Starrs he'd put on
after leaving the town limits. He laid the muzzle
against the big man's throat.
"Traveling as far as you are, friend."
Eyes frantic, the brakemau still tried to bluster:
"The hell-the hell you are-was
The joy spread through Jeremiah like a warm liquid
running in his bloodstream. "Want off, do you?
Happy to oblige."
He smiled and cocked the Starr with his thumb.
Thunder pealed. The caboose swayed. One
of the other brakemen whispered to the man under the gun.
"You damn fooi, don't you know who that, is?"
"No. an" 1 don't give a shit."
"Well, you better. This here's Jason Kane."
The brakeman's face looked as if it had been
greased. "K-Kane?" He could barely speak,
"Oh-oh- Jesus-was
Jeremiah's pleasure was almost unbearable. He
wanted to prolong it.
"I'll let you finish this run alive if you behave
yourself. And if you thank me properly."
He pressed the muzzle into the man's throat so
hard, the brakeman could only make choking
noises.
"Let me hear you say it, you jackass."
"This-this-thank you."
"Thank you, Mr. Kane."
"This-thank you. Mister-Mister K-Kane."
A chuckle. He whipped the Starr back so fast,
the brakeman almost fainted.
After he'd bolstered the gun. he dug down and found
another gold piece. He passed it into the
brakeman's damp hand. "There. Same as your friends
got for keeping their mouths shut. Now I'd be
obliged if you'd let me rest and wet my
whistle."
"Sure-certainly-any-anything, Mr. Kane."
His voice childishly thin now, the bull-shouldered
man stumbled to the stove at the head of the car and opened
the iron door. Firelight gleamed on his sweating
face. He chafed hands that still shook.
Jeremiah's eyes looked sullen all at once;
sullen and red in the light of the ceiling lanterns
swaying back and forth. The joy was always so fleeting.
But at least the guns had brought a luster to his name,
just as Kola predicted,
He unwrapped the gin bottle, jammed the neck
between his teeth and yanked the cork. He tilted the
bottle and swilled a hot mouthful of the stuff. Some
of it leaked between his lips. He couldn't keep his mind
off the prophecy. What if the rest of it came
true? What if the power his name invoked began
to fade as-how had Kola put it? As swiftly as
the light of a winter afternoon.
And what if he met death the way- He could barely
force himself to think it: The way Kola said. At the
hand of one of his own family.
Who was the Kent who would kill him? And how would it
happen? When? Where?
With a low, almost hurt cry, he wrenched his
mind away from the terrible thoughts. He grew aware of
his surroundings again. The brakemen gathered at the
stove were staring at him as if he were a madman. He
felt like laughing. He was a madman. At least he
was starting to think like one. The questions kept battering his
head like crasted, imprisoned birds trying to free
themselves. Who will it be? When? Where?
The brakemen were still watching. He let them feel the
fury of his eyes. They quickly returned their
attention to the open door of the stove. He raised the
bottle
and slopped down more gin. He realized he'd let the
little newspaper fall. It lay beside his carpetbag.
The toe of his left boot was resting on the front
page. Resting squarely on Gideon's name.
Was it Gideon? His brother was going ta kill him?
How?
How?
He wanted to scream that it wasn't so. But he'd
said Kola's prophecy was false, and yet it
kept coming true. He stared at the newspaper,
terror-stricken, as the cattle train plunged on
through the lightning-pierced dark toward an unseeable
horizon.
Book Three Margaret's Wrath
Molly
WHEN GIDEON REACHED New York, he
enjoyed a certain notoriety. He was a
survivor of the Chicago holocaust; an
articulate eyewitness to what many called the
century's greatest disaster. He was interviewed at
length by a reporter Theophilus Payne sent to the
office of the Beacon. He gave the reporter a good
deal of material about Thomas Courtleigh and the
disrupted W and P meeting, but he wasn't
surprised when none of it appeared in the published
interview. Well, he'd take charge of Mr.
Payne soon enough.
At home his stories of the fire earned him increased
attention from Eleanor for a while. He was happy about
that. He loved it when she came to his side in the
evening, eager to hear him repeat dramatic parts of the
tale. Carefully edited, of course, to screen out
any references to Julia.
He began winding up the affairs of the Beacon. He
composed a letter explaining his decision to those few
readers who took the paper on a subscription
basis. He didn't immediately show the letter
to Strelnik, though.
Relations with Margaret remained strained.
They deteriorated even further the night he finally
decided to discuss his plan to take a position on the
Union. He thought that exchanging his current job
for a more secure one would please his wife. It
didn't. She digested the news and then asked in a
slurred voice:
"Does this mean I'll see more of you, or less?"
"About the same or a little less for a while." 387
She wrinkled her nose; the expression was close
to a sneer. "I thought so."
She left the parlor, her path a meandering curve rather
than a straight line. He'd detected the odor of
wine again. He sat with his hands folded under his chin,
brooding on what he could possibly do to make her
happy.
In the following days, every attempt to be
solicitous, or even polite, was met with some sharp
remark on Margaret's part. The theme of her anger
or sarcasm was always the same. Ignoring the fact that
he was doing what she had so long begged him to do, she
scored him for being anxious to obtain a position that
would keep him away from home for even longer
periods. One night the accusation led to another bad
quarrel, and he moved permanently into a separate
bedroom.
He didn't explain the move to Eleanor, who was
old enough to notice that a change had taken place.
He wanted to say something to her but he didn't know
how to approach her without making it seem as though he
was speaking against Margaret.
He began to fix many of his own meals, and came and
went without informing Margaret, except by notes left
in the kitchen. It would all have been intolerable if he
hadn't had thoughts of Julia to sustain him.
Sometimes he believed the trouble at home had been
visited on him as punishment for his infidelity. But
in more rational moods, he reminded himself the universe
didn't operate quite so neatly, and that Margaret had
begun her destructive campaign for dominance long
before Julia had entered the picture.
One night in late November, after he'd gone
home, the office of Labor's Beacon was burned
out by a fire discovered around midnight. Two other
offices in the building were also gutted. Gideon
offered to make good on the damage. The landlord
promptly accepted, then sent an attorney around
to say Gideon's lease had been
canceled. Rather than contest, Gideon found cramped
quarters two blocks south. He asked himself whether
Thomas Courtleigh was responsible for the
landlord's behavior. He was surely responsible
for the fire at the Beacon.
And for one at the printer's in early December. That
fire destroyed the just completed press run of an
issue containing a long article about the tragedy at
Ericsson's, and a scathing editorial attack on
the president of the W and P. Once again
Gideon's apologies and a more than generous
financial settlement didn't help much. The
printer gladly took his money to rebuild the
destroyed storage area, but he wanted no more of
Gideon's business.
Even during these difficult times, Julia wasn't
far from his thoughts. He corresponded with her from each
office. Her letters came from all over the midsection
of the country: a hamlet in northern Wisconsin;
Terre Haute; Louisville;
Indianapolis-there, she said, she'd been driven from
a stage by rocks hurled with such ferocity that she
wondered if the men throwing them had been paid. She
reported a pattern of increased harassment. In the
past it had happened only occasionally. Now there was
some sort of trouble at every lecture.
For this reason, each of her letters urged him
to remember one thing above all. If
Courtleigh intended to keep after him-and the mysterious
fires certainly seemed to verify it-Gideon had
to fight back from a position of strength. He
wasn't wavering in Ms determination to join the
family paper, was he?
No, he wrote in reply, he was not. He'd
prepared a final Beacon and carried it to the
typesetter's without telling Strelnik it was the last
one. Nor had he shown his assistant the editorial
which said so. He planned to talk with Strelnik after
he spoke to his stepmother-and he was ready to do that now.
He promised to let Julia know how he fared.
The last edition was being handled by a seedy print shop
just off the Bowery. The night the issue was run,
freezing rain struck the city. The printer's roof
leaked- or so he said when Gideon called the next
day and discovered that the entire run had been ruined.
Yes, the man would be happy to print the papers again
if he were paid. But he avoided Gideon's stare
when he said it. Gideon looked up at the
unusually large hole in the roof. It measured a
yard and a half across and hadn't been there the day before.
It was much too big to be accidental.
His anger changed to weary resignation. He'd
probably never learn how Courtleigh
managed to keep track of his whereabouts, but it was
obvious how Gideon's suppliers were being turned
against him. The printer had undoubtedly been well
compensated for letting hooligans smash the roof and
pour water over the finished papers.
"Do you want me to run the edition again, Mr.
Kent?" the printer asked.
"No. You'll have to be satisfied with the money you got
for ruining the first one." He stalked out while the
printer protested that he didn't understand.
From that day, Gideon began to see an enemy in every
passing face, and a threat in every shadow. He was still
feeling that way in the second week of December
when he took the train down to the Jersey shore
to visit the summer home his stepmother had transformed
into an all-year residence.
Except for those times when he'd ridden into battle,
he could hardly remember having been so nervous.
ii
It was a gray, blustery day, requiring the light of
all the parlor lamps. The sea was running high.
Great white-crested mountains of water rose out beyond
the
tide line, then rushed in and crashed apart as new
peaks appeared behind them. Gideon came
immediately to the point as his stepmother poured tea.
Molly Emerson Kent was approaching fifty.
She was a solidly built woman of five feet
six inches with a matronly bosom and a wide smile
which revealed a good many teeth and made her plain
face radiant. She said she found the size of her
mouth embarrassing.
She handed Gideon his cup just as he finished
speaking. "S. It's to be the Union, is it?"
Suddenly she smiled that dazzling smile. "You would
have made your father very happy."
"What? He wanted me on the paper?" "Let's
say he considered it a shame for you to stay where you
are." She stirred hot milk into her cup as the
cottage creaked and whined in the gale. The verse from
Judges, he thought. Julia was right.
"Of course," Molly continued, "I'm pleased
too. Newspapering has become intensely
competitive of late. It needs young men with vigor
and strength. I must say Theo Payne's a fine
teacher, though. He's managed to pound quite a lot into the
head of an unexceptional lady who once ran a
boardinghouse-was She sipped tea. "I hope you
haven't made this decision lightly, Gideon."
"No, far from it."
"Good. You're not applying for some clerk's position
that can be handled with a minimum of effort. If you hope
to become worthy of the job of publisher, not just fill
it-as I did, out of necessity, when Jephtha
died-you'll need to understand every facet of the paper's
operation. There are more of them than you've ever imagined.
You must also understand the Union's purpose today."
"I'm not sure I follow caret Isn't its
purpose the same as it's always been?"
"Not at all." She went on to remind him that many
newspapers had started as adjuncts of a printing
busi-
ness. It had been that way with the Bay State
Federalist, Philip Kent's first venture in
journalism some eighty years earlier. "In those
days, a paper was founded to promote a specific
point of view-the owner's, or that of the political
party to which he belonged. The pattern held true in the
penny press right up through the war. Then, like everything
else in this modern world, newspapers began
to change. The Union is nominally Republican.
But it no longer exists for the sake of the party. In
other words, like Mr. Dana's Sun and Gordon
Bennett's Herald and a few others, the Union
no longer automatically endorses everything
its party does. You must understand that change to understand the
work you want to do. Today the Union's chief
product, and its most important and prestigious
element, isn't an editorial of the sort you write
so well. It's news. Facts. Information, not
opinion."
He was deflated to hear her say that. His
editorials were his pride, and the main reason for the
Beacon's existence. Except for the Chicago
article that had died a-borning in the Bowery print
shop, he'd never had an exclusive news story
of any consequence.
Molly leaned forward, growing more animated.
"This is an exciting time for newspapers. The
modern paper exists to give people the facts they need
to make sound judgments about local or national
matters. It's a mighty instrument for good-or
evil, for that matter. Since it appeals to the
masses, it can sway them. Its potential power is
frightening. Using that power can be an awesome
responsibility. I'm sorry if all this
startles you-was
"No, it doesn't."
"Fiddlesticks, dear. I can read your face
nearly as well as I could read your father's.
I'm only trying to prepare you for your first encounter with
Payne. I know you've met him."
He nodded. "Twice."
"But you haven't really dealt with him. You two 392
must get along. You won't unless you remember what
it is the Union's selling."
Gideon wondered why it was necessary for a stockholder
to appease Mr. Payne. But he said nothing.
"I'm sure you can learn that lesson," Molly
continued in a reassuring way. "That's always been one
of your tremendous strengths, learning quickly. You
understand grammar and you've taught yourself to have a facile
pen. Now you'll have to master everything from page makeup
to the latest advertising techniques-I trust you know
both Macy's and Lord and Taylor's broke the
tyranny of one column ads last year? First in the
Times, then in the Tribune and the Union."
He shook his head. He thought that all
metropolitan papers still hewed to the
single-column, so-called tombstone style
presentation of both news and advertisements. Of
course he paid very little attention to the advertising content
of the leading dailies. He could recall seeing a
few ad cuts in the Union-trademarks,
mostly-but that was it. It made him realize
he knew precious little about the family enterprise,
other than that it was a morning sheet and sold for four
cents, the current price of most of its
competitors. He renewed a vow to work hard and
base his judgments on the realities of the market
place, not on some lofty notion of what the idealized
newspaper should be.
Seeing how unsettled he was, Molly smiled and
tried to cheer him
"There are scores of things to learn, Gideon, but
they're all fascinating. I think you'll find the
process a pleasure, not a chore. You'll have
to think about features, Poetry, humor-they're
relatively new and readers seem to like them, but
old-line editors believe they have no place in a
news organ. Stunts are becoming quite the thing on some
papers. Young Gordon Bennett claims the
Herald doesn't merely report news, it
makes news, and he's proved it by sending his roving
corre-
spondent to search for that missing African
missionary. He's spending thousands to outfit Mr.
Stanley in Zanzibar right now, and should Stanley
locate Dr. Livingstone, it will be one of the biggest
stories of the decade. Payne grants
that, but he still doesn't care for stunts. You'll
become involved in more than editorial policy,
though. You'll have to make decisions about people- should you
hire women as general reporters? Men may
resent it. Still, Emily Bettey's doing
splendidly at the Sun. Then there's the business
side-such things as the maximum price we can
profitably pay for newsprint. In the last five
years it's cost as little as eight cents a pound and as
much as twenty-six."
By now Gideon was desperate to show Molly he
knew something-anything! Unfortunately he'd left
most of the technical details of the Beacon to the
printer who had handled it for him, and all he could
dredge from memory was one meager fact, lamely
offered. "The paper we use is made from old
rags, isn't it?" With a forgiving smile, she said.
"Not entirely." His face fell.
She patted the back of his hand. "Don't worry,
no one expects you to know everything before you start. There
are new inventions called Keller machines. From
Germany. They shred wood fiber. For the first time they
make mechanical wood pulp an acceptable base
for newsprint. The Union is now being printed on
a sheet that's forty percent mechanical
pulp, sixty percent rags. Two months from now,
those sheets will be traveling through the Hoe Company's
newest and best web perfecting press."
Thoroughly humbled, he said, "What the hell's
that?"
She laughed. "I didn't mean to embarrass you,
dear.
A web is a continuous sheet of newsprint A
perfecting
press prints both sides during a single feed.
The presses
represent a huge investment, but they're the coming
thing. Theo can tell yon anything else yon want
to know."
"Molly, I hate to say it, but I'm getting a
mite tired of hearing the editor's name invoked as if
he's some kind of god."
Her tone grew a shade less cordial. "In
certain circles, he's considered just about that."
"Hell's fire-excuse me-he's only the
editor. We own the paper."
"But he makes it run. Theophilus Payne is
fifty-six years old. He has an
uncontrollable drinking problem. He can be
irascible and insufferably rude. But in my
opinion and the opinion of others much more qualified
to judge, he has only two peers among his
contemporaries. Horace Greeley and Charles
Dana. Payne's lifted the Union from an
average daily circulation of fifty-five
thousand-slightly below the Stoats Zeitung, which after
all is a foreign language paper-to
ninety-three thousand. That's very close to the Herald,
and only five or six thousand behind the leaders, the
Daily News and the Sun. Payne's a
perfectionist. Demanding- sometimes unreasonably so.
He's fired career journalists for what you might
consider a trivial lapse in grammar. I also know
he thinks trade unions are pernicious
organizations-was
"But our printers belong to their local, don't they?"
"They do."
"And the typographers belong to theirs?"
"Yes, your father forced that issue and permitted
organization in 1866, Payne almost assaulted
him, then went on a four day binge. Now let me
finish answering your question as to why he's so
important. It's quite simple. He makes a
profit for us. And he does it in a way we can be
proud of. You don't have to convince me
to accept you on the Union. I'd never deny you a
job there. But you'll have to convince Payne. I have
absolute faith in his judgment. In fact," she
added, very softly, "if he won't have you, I'll
back him up."
Gideon sat all the way back in his chair and
whispered, "Good God."
Her expression was sober. "I thought you'd be a bit
shaken by that. You noticed I delayed getting around
to it."
Benumbed, he nodded.
"Would you like a touch of whiskey, dear?"
"No, thanks. Molly-was
"Yes?"
"I hope you won't take offense. This is said in
admiration, not criticism. I just didn't realize
you'd become such a hard business woman."
"I don't take offense. I do take exception.
I hope I'm a good business woman, not merely
a hard one. There's a significant difference.
I've only become what I had to, Gideon.
You were busy with your own enterprise, and major
decisions had to be laid at someone's doorstep.
By default they were laid at mine. I've come
to enjoy the responsibility. But as I
said, I'd be grateful to relinquish it to someone
younger. You'll become as hard as I-out of
necessity. The New York newspaper industry
is ferociously competitive. And you can't change a
man's mind about anything unless he buys your paper
instead of your rival's."
"I'll try to remember that."
"Theo won't let you forget it-if you pass the
test."
With another of those shining smiles meant to soothe away
his anxiety, she poured more tea for both of them.
"Let's drink a toast to the success of your
forthcoming interview."
They did, but it didn't reassure him that he'd
succeed with Theophilus Payne.
On Newspaper Row
A WEEK BEFORE Christmas, Gideon took
Strelnik to supper at a modest but pleasant
tavern on Ann Street, a few steps east of
its junction with Broadway and Park Row. They
sat at a table by a window. It was just seven o'clock as
they ordered veal chops and ate.
The first flakes of a snow began to come straight down
in the windless air. Strelnik raised the subject
of the. letter to subscribers, which he'd finally
seen. Gideon was compelled to explain. He finished
by saying:
"As a matter of fact, I'm going up to the
Union tonight." He'd been inventing excuses for
postponing the visit, no doubt from fear that he'd
fail to win Payne's approval.
Strelnik shoved his mug of ale to one side and
squinted through the smoke of his cigarette. "And the
demise of the Beacon is final?" Gideon nodded.
"Whether the Union will have you or not?" Another nod.
The bearded man snickered. "The worker's paradise
is here at last. The boss may be rejected by his
own employee. Gideon, I can't believe it.
I can't believe you'll go crawling to the editor of that
capitalist rag." "Who hates Southerners, by the
way," Gideon put in, hoping to jolly the little
man out of his bitterness. "Molly came up
to Yorkville to visit the children last week, and she
again confessed Payne isn't as coldly
objective as she first led me to believe. He used
to despise
secessionists, but since that issue has been
settled he's switched to hating trade
unionists."
Strelnik wasn't amused. He flung
his cigarette on the pegged floor and stamped on it.
"Isn't that splendid. Well, it's very clear
you've sold out."
"Damn it. Sime, I have not!" Heads turned as
he raised his voice.
"Yes you have. You've sold out the movement
completely."
"I've found a better way to promote the
movement."
"Pfaugh. I know what happens when a man
becomes a boss." The word was supremely
contemptuous. "That Mr. Dana who runs the
Sun-you know how much he likes trade unions."
"He loathes them, just like Payne. What's the
point?"
"Twenty or thirty years ago he was a
socialist." Gideon gaped. "Ask anybody,
it's God's truth. Owning things changes people. Power
changes people too. It's done that to you."
Abruptly he stood up. Angry now, Gideon
grabbed his arm.
"Don't act childish. I haven't had a chance
to give you all the details about the closing of the
Beacon. I intend to pay you three months' wages
to tide you over while-was
Strelnik wrenched loose. "We don't want your
charity. Leah does piecework sewing at home.
We can survive. Even if we couldn't, I
wouldn't touch your money now. Go hobnob with your rich
friends. Next tune we meet we'll be on
opposite sides of a strike line."
"Sime, you're wrong. You'll see."
Strelnik laughed in a scornful way. For a moment
more he gazed at his friend with barely suppressed
contempt, then spun and walked away. The tavern
door made a soft, sighing sound as it closed. Its
lower edge was already blocked by a buildup of wet
snow.
Gideon looked out the window as Strelnik's
bearded 398
figure ghosted by, stirring the falling snowflakes.
Strelnik didn't so much us glance his way.
ii
Park Row ran northeast from the intersection of
Broadway and Ann. The city's major papers were
concentrated along the east side, in a short stretch
known as Newspaper Row. It encompassed the
blocks from Broadway up to Printing House
Square, the tiny triangle where Nassau and
Frankfort came in. On the west side
of the street lay the snow-covered expanse of City
Hall Park.
It was a lovely evening, with the fluffy snow continuing
to drift straight down. Gideon was oblivious to the
beauty of tree branches and rooftops piled high
with white like a winter scene in a book of fairy
tales. He was thinking of Strelnik.
He felt wretched about the man's accusations. That was
true even though Strelnik could be almost foolishly
partisan, and Gideon believed his former assistant
was definitely in the wrong this time. Still, he didn't
want to lose Strelnik's friendship. He hoped time
would heal the rift. He planned to send Leah
Strelnik a draught for her husband's severance
pay. She was practical enough to accept the money with
no quibbles about its source.
Newspaper delivery wagons went racing up and
down Park Row in the lamplit darkness. They were
traveling at top speed despite the hazardous
condition of the street. Gideon was twice bumped
by harried men in derbies rushing on some errand or
other. Reporters, he surmised. The telegraph
helped gather news these days, but there was still no
substitute for the reporter's legs.
Soon he began to experience a little of the
sense of intimidation he'd felt at Courtleigh's
house. Here indeed lay power. The power that reposed
in men's minds, and men's published thoughts. The
generally nondescript
buildings hulking in the snow housed some of the mightiest
institutions in the land.
The Herald. The Tribune. The Sun. Times.
Star. Mail and Express. Commercial
Advertiser. Jay Gould's World, acquired as
part of a stock deal.
He couldn't think of all the names. But there among
them, facing the Times and Greeley's Tribune on
Printing House Square, stood the three-story
building with the signboard reading new york union.
The board bore the emblem devised by the family's
founder-the stoppered bottle partially full of tea.
Philip Kent had adopted the symbol when he
started his first printing establishment during the
Revolutionary War. He had owned and prized such a
bottle. He'd collected the contents when he
participated in Mr. Samuel Adams' famous
tea party in Boston Harbor. The actual
bottle, green glass with the old tea still inside,
stood on the mantel in Yorkville. It was one
of a number of priceless mementoes of the
Kent family's past.
The December night felt almost warm because of the
snow's insulating effect. Gaslights blazed all
across the second floor of the Union; the arched
windows of the editorial department.
Gideon gazed at that brilliance and decided his
timidity was not only shameful but foolish. Hadn't
Jeb Stuart proved time and again that fear never won
an engagement for any man or any army? Besides,
he was legitimate heir to some of the power on
Newspaper Row, and the fact that he didn't yet
know how to use it didn't mean he couldn't learn.
He could and he would.
His chin lifted. He strode toward the triangular
park and saw a number of ragged boys huddling around
the base of the statue of the nation's most famous
printer, Dr. Benjamin Franklin.
As Gideon's boots crunched the snow in the park,
heads came up. Cigarettes glowed beneath the bills
of dirty caps. One young face was completely
hidden by
exhaled smoke. Gideon heard comments exchanged
in Yiddish and German. There were about a dozen of the young
Street Arabs, as they were called, seeking shelter
near the statue. On other occasions he'd
seen such boys at the wagon docks of various
papers, waiting to be given stacks of the latest
edition on consignment. The boys hawked the papers
on street corners all over town. And those weren't
the only locations they worked. Since his talk with
Molly, he had started studying the New York
newspaper industry, and he knew the Daily
News had boosted its circulation to eighty thousand
by lowering its price to a penny and sending boys
into tenements to tap a completely new market.
He passed the statue and walked on toward the
entrance to the Union. One of the boys got up and
followed. Gideon heard the footsteps. He
stopped in front of the building and turned.
Dull light from the frosted windows of the ground floor
press room fell across the face of a startlingly
handsome youngster of about twelve. The boy was saved from
prettiness by a cheerfully insolent mouth. He wore
ragged trousers tucked into heavy black knee
stockings, a man's coat with huge holes in it, a
scarf and a cap that he dragged off as he asked:
"Mister, do you know whether the Union will be printing
any extras tonight?" Extra editions were a staple
of the trade.
"Couldn't say, son. I don't work
here."
"Oh, I thought you were a reporter." The boy's
voice startled Gideon because it was really two
voices, a somewhat nasal adolescent one, and a
beautiful adult baritone. The boy seemed
unconcerned about the abrupt shifts from one to the other.
He started away. "Good evening."
What a remarkable voice, Gideon thought. When it
changed permanently, the lad would have all the mak-
ings of an orator. Curious, he called to the
retreating figure, "Out pretty late, aren't
you?"
The boy turned back. "Late?" He grinned.
"I thought you were an American, mister."
"I am."
"Then why don't you know that over here, nobody
bosses you around? You take charge of your own life,
and do what you have to do to make a nickel."
"Where'd you come from?"
"Munich, mister. By way of Bremerhaven. When
I was about so long." He measured a foot of snowy
air with gloves worn through at all the fingertips.
"My father says I lay on my mother's stomach for
most of the trip. It cost them the equivalent of
twenty-five American dollars to buy
two spaces on a mail packet. Two spaces
five feet long and two and a half wide, chalked
out "tween the decks. Father says he and mother got
slops for food, and a lot of the newcomers died on
the way, but the Goldmans survived, thank you
kindly." In a brash and somehow touching imitation of
an adult, he extended his right hand. "My name's
Leo Goldman."
They shook. Gideon felt the cold of the boy's
hand.
"Gideon Kent, Leo."
"Yes, sir, happy to make your acquaintance. You
born hi America, were you?"
"Virginia."
"Well, I'm only an adopted American, I
suppose you could say. But I mean to be a good one.
I'm not so rich as a Rothschild yet, and I still
live on Hester Street-was The name of a
particularly noxious thoroughfare in the lower East
Side ghetto. "comb I'll change both those things
before I'm much older. I'm going to make my fortune
here."
Gideon didn't crack a smile. There was a
determined look hi Leo Goldman's dark
eyes, and he had the feeling the boy would
punch him if he laughed at the sober, almost
passionate declaration. 402
"An admirable ambition. Do you know how you're going
to do it?"
"Not yet, sir. I'll find a way. It's
possible to do it in America, you know. Such an
amazing country. Every man his own king-every man his own
priest. Or hi my case, rabbi. Well, good
evening to you, Mister-was
All at once recognition swept over the boy's
face. He lost his self-assured air and very
nearly stammered.
"Kent, you said. Kent. One of the older fellows
told me the Kents own this paper." A tattered
glove lifted toward the frosted windows and the
presses rumbling beyond. "Are you-?"
Gideon nodded.
"Well! You've made your fortune."
"To tell the truth, it was made for me," Gideon
answered with a smile. "At the moment I'm trying
to learn how to use it properly."
He dug in his pocket and produced a one dollar
shinplaster. "Here. You can't carry a stack of
papers if your hands are frozen. Buy yourself a
decent pair of gloves."
Leo Goldman studied the bill and finally saw its
denomination. His eyes grew huge. His voice
slid up the scale to a near squeak.
"Holy Tammany. I can buy gloves and some bread
for my sisters, too."
"How many sisters do you have?"
"Nine. We all sleep in one room, so I
camp out whenever I can." He began to unfold the
dollar. Then his eyes narrowed, and a suspicious
old man looked out from the handsome face. "I don't
have to do any- special tricks for this, do I? If
I do, I won't take it"
"Leo, it's yours. With no strings on it."
"Thank you, Mr. Kent. Thank you indeed. Good
health to you!"
The boy went racing back across the street to the
statue of Franklin, where his friends crowded around
him to hear of his good fortune. Gideon smiled again.
The brief encounter had restored his spirits.
He turned and entered the building. The rumbling
presses shook the steps leading up to the editorial
rooms. He climbed the steps with confidence, telling
himself there wasn't a Yankee born who could stand up
to one of Jeb Stuart's own.
CHAPTER III
A Hard Taskmaster
THE EDITORIAL OFFICE was one large room
stretching from the high arched windows at the front to a
partitioned telegraph room at the rear. Gas-lit
cubicles lined the wall opposite the head of the
stairs. The hub of the big, dingy room was a large
desk. Two dozen smaller desks surrounding it were
all turned so they faced it. These smaller desks
had tilted tops, and at several of them men in shirt
sleeves or dark jackets were writing longhand
copy with pencils, usually amid a litter of
notes. Most of the reporters puffed cigars and
wore their hats.
Occasionally one of the men shouted for a copy boy. There
were two working, Gideon observed as he slowly
traversed the room. For all the attention he received,
he might have been a derelict instead of part owner.
A few people glanced at him, but no one said anything.
He watched a copy boy hustle a finished
manuscript to the central desk. The man seated
there scanned it, penciled a few corrections, then
wrote something on a separate sheet and pinned it to the
story. The boy ran it to an opening in the wall-a
kind of dumb-waiter-and placed the copy on a
tray. He pulled a cord. The tray
started downward. To the composing room, Gideon
supposed.
There was continuous, low-level noise in the room,
consisting of the rumble of the presses, the chatter of
telegraph sounders from the back, and the intermittent
buzz of conversation punctuated by yelling or a question
called from the central desk. The scene reminded
Gideon of a painting done in dark pigments; the
figures had a blurred look in the low, smoky
gaslight.
His path took him behind the city editor at the
central desk. He knew it was rude to pause and
peer over the editor's shoulder, but he was curious.
He watched the editor print the last of six
decks, or headline subheads. The man was working
on an important story, then. Only two or
three decks accompanied a routine one.
The editor grew aware of Gideon's presence.
"What the hell do you want?"
"I'm looking for Mr. Payne."
A pencil stabbed toward one of the cubicles. "Over
there. The doorway where you see the young man taking his
forty lashes."
Gideon didn't understand the remark until he
approached the open door of the office.
Inside, a coatless reporter, no more than
twenty-one, faced someone hidden by the wall of the
cubicle. The reporter turned an old
stovepipe hat in his fingers. Gideon heard a
grating voice.
"comkindly read the offending seme ace, Mr.
Mordecai. Aloud."
A hand thrust a proof at the young man. Looking
even more nervous, he took it, licked his lips, and
read in a quavering tone.
was 'no pronouncements have come from the Treasury
Department regarding the Granger position on
greenbacks, and none are expected
until-until-" was His voice trailed off.
"You do not deny you committed that rape of the language,
Mr. Mordecai?"
"Sir, it was an honest mistake. I was in a
hurry to finish."
"Never be in that much of a hurry, Mr. Mordecai.
If some semi-literate wretch reads your
imperfect prose and thereby fixes an erroneous
principle of grammar in his head for all time, you have
hurt him. You have done him irreparable harm with your
haste. Pick up a week's wages at the cashier
and carry that thought to your next employer,
whoever it is. Good evening." "But Mr. Payne-was
"Good evening."
The reporter walked out, ignoring Gideon. He
jammed his stovepipe on his head and growled,
"Snotty, pie-eyed little son of a bitch. I'm a
journalist, not a bloody schoolmaster."
Payne heard. "You're both, you ill-mannered
oaf," he called. "The sooner you learn it, the
sooner you'll become a competent newspaper man."
Mumbling oaths, Mr. Mordecai moved away.
Gideon knocked and walked in. He caught the
little man opening a lower desk drawer. The cubicle
reeked of whiskey. Theophilus Payne shut the
drawer with a bang. He was a slightly built man
whose feet barely touched the floor when he was seated.
A nose like a large pink radish disfigured his lined
face; time, dissipation and daily deadlines had all
taken a toll.
Payne recognized Gideon. He greeted him
in an offhand way, stood up and gave him a Limp
handshake. The top of his gray head was on a level
with Gideon's shoulder.
"Please be seated, Mr. Kent. Molly told
me to expect you, but I wasn't sure when.
Haven't fretted about it much. I'm not
precisely thrilled at the prospect of
interviewing a man who wants to replace me."
Gideon was startled by the editor's directness.
Payne 406
waved and gave him a mordant glance. "Oh, come.
Don't play the innocent. Molly didn't say
so, but I'm sure you fancy yourself as the publisher
someday. Should that happen within my lifetime, I intend
to see the title bestowed on a man whose
professionalism I endorse. I will not put a
fool or an incompetent on the staff-even if he
does own a quarter of the stock."
Gideon scowled. "It sounds as though you've made
up your mind about me."
Payne held up a hand. "Not yet, sir. Not
yet! I'm prepared to do so now, however. If you'll
excuse me a moment, I'll adjust my cravat
and we'll go for a stroll. This place is far too
noisy for a confidential discussion."
Gideon started to sit in a visitor's chair.
Payne coughed. "Mr. Kent. When I ask you
to excuse me, that is a request for you to leave.
Don't you understand the nuances of the English
language? Hardly what I'd call an
auspicious beginning."
Red-faced, Gideon left.
He didn't know whether to laugh at the man or
curse him. And what was all that folderol about
Payne fixing his cravat? He understood when he
heard the desk drawer slide open softly. There was
the faint squeak of a cork coming out of a bottle. A
moment later the drawer shut again.
Soon Payne joined him, struggling into an old
frock coat. What appeared to be graham
cracker crumbs speckled the left lapel. The
editor had done nothing to his cravat.
"I'll check with Mr. Staniels to see that all's
under control. We're half an hour from locking up
the final form, but it's a quiet night. Excuse
me once again, if you please."
And off he went toward the central desk, surrounded
by an aura of authority and a scent of bourbon.
The snow had slacked off. Just a few flakes
sprinkled down to sparkle on the tops of the drifts.
Payne's winter apparel consisted of a plaid
muffler, a beaver hat at least twenty years old,
and mismatched gloves.
The two men turned south along Park Row. The
newsboys had left the Franklin statue,
presumably taking someone's paper
to sell. Payne clasped his hands behind his back and
peered straight ahead.
"I wanted us out of the office so we might speak
freely, Mr. Kent. There is no need for us
to act out a farce. You needn't get my approval
for a job on the Union. You know you can force that any
time you wish. However-was He shot a humorless look
at the younger man. "comth much is true. If you do
join us against my wishes, I can make it damned
difficult for you to get cooperation from anyone. I can,
that is, until such time as you discharge me."
"I wouldn't want that, Payne. And Molly would
never permit it."
A little glint shone in his eye. "I fear you're
having sport with me."
"Definitely not. When Molly deferred to you in the
matter of hiring me, it wasn't just a courtesy.
She'd rather have you than me."
"Would she! Comforting, very comforting," he murmured, and
hiccoughed into his glove. Had Payne known all
along that he had Molly's wholehearted backing?
Gideon suspected so. Like a good lawyer,
Payne might be building a case for his authority
a step at a time. He was convinced he was right when the
editor said:
"If it's indeed true, then it's doubly certain
I could make your life miserable-should I choose to do
so. Frankly, Mr. Kent-was
"Look here, I wish you'd call me Gideon."
"If ever I think the time is right, sir, I shall. But
not until."
Despite his flaring anger, Gideon accepted the
rebuke in silence.
"I am not saying I would make things difficult for
you. I am not saying that at all. Yet! However,
it's questionable as to whether we would get along. I have many
opinions to which you might take exception. For
example, I have never been able to feel kindly
toward anyone who hails from a region populated
by former secessionists. No, let's be wholly
candid. By traitors."
"Now just a-was
"Be quiet, sir! I have the floor. Or the
street, to be precise. Equally high on my list
of dislikes is any form of nepotism. Finally, I
know what you have been doing prior to this time, and I must
inform you I detest trade unions. My loathing was
merely increased when your father forced me to accept two
of them under our roof. Jephtha Kent was a
courageous and intelligent man. But every
human being blunders now and then. Your father's blunder of
five years ago can only be termed colossal. As
I interpret the purposes of trade unions, they
ultimately hope to provide a guaranteed wage
for everyone, including the man whose work is slipshod.
A permanent job for everyone, including the indolent-
what's wrong, Mr. Kent?"
Gideon had stopped, fists on his hips. "You,
Mr. Payne. Job or no job-you're a
god-damned bigot."
He was thunderstruck when Payne laughed. "Very
true. So is any man worth his salt.
Bigotry must be confined to the editorial columns,
however, hot slyly sprinkled into the news. That's a
fact you must remember if you come with us."
. He gave it special emphasis. Gideon
growled, "I'll remember." He kicked a
ridge. 409
of snow, scattering it. A police wagon passed.
Women yelled obscenities from behind the barred
windows.
Payne hummed to himself. He acted pleased with his
performance thus far. Gideon felt compelled to speak
again, regardless of the consequences.
"But I can't accept your definition of the
purpose of labor unions. If what you said were
true of all of them- or even a tenth of them-I'd
quit the movement instantly. But you're wrong."
"Am T, now9 I remain to be convinced. And I
shall steadfastly refuse to let anyone turn the paper
into a labor rag. Sometimes I think we should change
the name. But that would be an affront to Amanda, God
rest her. She charged me to start a newspaper that would
promote the Federal union when it was in danger of
being torn apart. She never realized how a noble word
would be perverted. Believe it or not, Mr. Kent,
the world does not revolve around the movement which has
recently bemused you. Learn that lesson, too, if
you please."
What a pompous, obnoxious little wretch he is,
Gideon thought. Well, Molly had warned him.
The editor's strategy seemed to be based on
rattling his opponent. Gideon tried to disarm him with
courtesy.
"I realize there are a great many things I'd need
to learn-was
Murmured sarcasm: "A considerable understatement."
Gideon finished through clenched teeth: "Commencing with the
trivial. Why on earth do your reporters work with
their hats on?"
"So the hats won't be stolen, of course. A
newspaper is not Saratoga Springs or
Baden-Baden. It attracts visitors of all
social classes and moral persuasions. And
criminality is rampant these days. In fact I
believe we are just entering a golden age of
peculation and chicane. Do you agree?"
In a strangled voice Gideon said, "I don't
know what peculation is. Chicane either."
"Well." Payne halted and gave Gideon a
long, keen look. "That's unusual honesty. I like
a man smart enough to admit he's ignorant As for the
words, consult a dictionary."
Gideon wanted to whoop. He felt he'd passed
a kind of test. Perhaps the decisive one.

They walked in silence to the corner of Broadway.
Heavy snow began to fall again. From behind, a couple
of street boys came running with early editions of the
Sun. Payne bought one and thrust it at Gideon.
"Take this home. Read it. Then read it again.
Try to figure out why the Sun outsells us, and why
I'm working like the devil to catch up."
It was true! Payne had accepted him. With
unconcealed enthusiasm, he exclaimed,
"I suppose one reason is that the Sun only
costs two pennies, not four."
"Nonsense. In addition to being half the price, the
Sun has half as many pages. It outsells us
because it's livelier and better written. It contains
an excellent mix of important news, lurid
crime stories and titillating society gossip.
As the wags say, the Sun makes vice
attractive in the morning and the Post makes
virtue unattractive at night."
Gideon tucked the paper under his arm. The editor
continued, "Now as to starting work-shall we say immediately after
the New Year?"
"Fine."
"Initially you'll be on a twelve to fourteen hour
shift, just like everyone else."
"What?" He knew he shouldn't risk throwing his
victory away. But this was principle. "That's
intolerable, Payne. You know the eight hour day's the
coming thing. 411
The Federal government has adopted it and is
demanding its suppliers do the same. A shorter work
day is one of the major trade union demands-was
"As long as you work for me, Mr. Kent, you will have
to forget about trade union demands and concern
yourself with what I demand."
"Well, if I ever take over, things will be
different." "With any luck I shall be dead by then.
Spared from witnessing the pathetic spectacle of a man
trying to operate a newspaper on which every employee
decides for himself what work he wishes to do, for how
long, and for what wage. I can tell you exactly
what that kind of paper will be like. It will be called the
Daily Anarchy and will consist of one sheet. Both
sides blank."
"By God, Payne, I'll change your mind before
I'm done."
"I doubt it, sir, I sincerely doubt it." But
he was studying Gideon from the left side, and the younger
man couldn't see a look of grudging respect
fleet across the editor's face before he snapped,
"Now do you want a job on my terms? You're not
going to get one on your own."
Gideon felt bad about compromising his convictions.
He tried to remember the larger objective. He
nodded in a brusque way.
"I want the job."
There was a practical problem, though. Margaret would
abhor the long hours. He needed to find something that
would overcome her inevitable opposition.
Something to divert her, in some area of their life where
he could reasonably effect a compromise.
Should it take the form of a gift? If so, Christmas
would be an ideal time to-
"Have you fallen asleep, Mr. Kent? Don't you
have more questions? If so, you may state them, but keep your
socialistic panaceas to yourself."
Gideon got mad all over again. One moment he
liked 412
the prickly little man, the next he loathed him. This
was one of the latter moments.
"May I be so bold as to ask how much I'll be
making on a fourteen-hour shift?"
"That's a fine question coming from a millionaire."
"I've never relied on the inherited money. I
earn my way whenever I can."
"You do, eh? Fancy that." It was not said unkindly.
"To start, you'll receive one half the standard
reporter's salary."
"But I don't know what a reporter earns. Or
an editor, for that matter."
"Reporters receive fifteen to thirty dollars a
week, depending on their skill and the generosity of their
employer. At the Union we pay top men
twenty-eight. As to what editors make,
that needn't concern you for some time. Molly said she was
placing your career entirely in my hands. Very well,
I'll start you on the dock. You'll unload
shipments of newsprint and load finished papers on
the delivery wagons. Since we're a morning
paper, your shift will begin at four in the afternoon and end
around dawn. For the first few weeks you'll probably
go home feeling as though your back's broken. But
if you survive the experience-was
"I'll survive," Gideon interrupted
quietly.
Payne shrugged. "Some don't. In any case,
you'll have a much better understanding of the effort required
to create even one edition of a newspaper." The
editor cocked his head. "Any comment?"
Gideon drew a deep breath. "If you expect
a protest, you'll be disappointed. The dock is
fine. I felt I should start in a menial job."
Theo Payne took the younger man by surprise, and
smiled. Not a cynical smile, but one that was
genuinely friendly.
"Delighted to hear it," he said. "Because you don't
deserve to start anywhere else, Gideon." 413
The Hearts of Three Women
A SUITABLE PRESENT for Margaret
suggested itself to Gideon next day. It was one she'd
been asking for, at least indirectly, over a
period of several years. He spent the remaining
days before Christmas touring the town with real estate
agents, though he took a couple of hours out
to close the Beacon's last office. By Christmas
Eve he had papers covering the first stage of the land
transaction in his pocket and was ready to present the
gift to his wife.
Light snow began to fall about seven o'clock as the
family finished supper. The temperature outside
was twenty degrees, and nine year old Eleanor
begged permission to take her skates to the frozen
pond before the snow covered it.
"Excellent idea," Gideon said, laying his
napkin beside his empty plate. Eleanor jumped up
to hug him around the neck. Across the table, Margaret
watched and frowned.
"See that Will's in his bed before you go, would you please?"
he added, "Your mother and I must have a chat."
He was smiling as he said it, but the remark brought a
look of anxiety to Margaret's face. He was
disturbed. He'd smelled something new on her breath
when he arrived home. Whiskey. The odor even
penetrated the scent of the clove she must have
chewed to perfume her mouth. Why was she drinking more
heavily? Did she suspect?
No, impossible. He hadn't brought any of
Julia's let414
ters home. After he read and re-read each one
until he'd virtually memorized it, he consigned
it to a stove.
"What is it you want to talk about?" Margaret
asked when Eleanor was gone. Her speech was slow;
thick. "Is it the newspaper? Have you decided it
won't be to your liking?"
"Not at all. I'm anxious to go to work."
"Six nights a week." She made a face.
"All night."
"Margaret, I explained before-that can't be helped."
As they left the table, he put his arm around her.
She drew away. He sighed, then said:
"Why don't we go into the parlor? I've a little
surprise for you."
She shrugged in an indifferent way. For the first time he
noticed a faint streaking of white in her hair. Just
a few strands-but she wasn't yet thirty years
old. The gray hair, the apparent drinking in
secret, and her outbursts of anger all combined
to bring her father to mind. A man whose sanity
had been destroyed by alcohol.
Her obvious misery only intensified his guilt.
He touched the side pocket of his coat, as if the
paper tucked there was a remedy that would magically
restore happiness to the household. In a way,
he'd hoped the paper would do exactly that. He
feared the hope had been a vain one.
He heard Eleanor clatter down the stairs with her
skates, call a cheerful goodbye and hurry out. The
parlor was dim and inviting with only one gas
fixture aglow. Gideon found a match and began
to light the small candles on the fragrant pine
tree decorated with cranberry strands and homemade
gilt paper ornaments. Soon two dozen tiny
flames cast a warm, shimmering light over plump
red berries, dark green needles, golden
angels. He dropped the burned matches in the
bucket of water kept handy in case of fire, then
reached to his pocket.
Margaret's distracted expression stayed his hand.
She was seated, staring at the table where the Rogers
group had stood.
"Margaret?"
Her head turned slowly. "What is it?"
"Please tell me why you're so
unhappy. I thought that once I gave up the
Beacon and went to work at something with a better
future, you'd feel better."
The strange, vacant look left her eyes, and
they shone with some of the fire he remembered from their
courting days in Richmond, when they'd argued about the
nature of war.
"I've thought it over and it's my conclusion the
Union is no different from that sheet you published for
those wretched railroad men."
"Wretched? Margaret, Daphnis Miller
wasn't just my friend, he was yours too. Our
neighbor. Our benefactor."
She waved her hand in a vague way. "That was a
long time ago. A very long time ago. This is the
present. The Union is no different. Oh, perhaps
the work's a little safer. For the sake of your children, I'm
thankful for that. But essentially you have the same job.
One which again proves you place the welfare of others
ahead of that of your family."
He hadn't wanted to lose his temper tonight But he
did.
"Damn it, Margaret, you put the most twisted
interpretations on everything I do and-was
"Kindly do not use filthy language with
me, Gideon Kent."
"But I don't know what you want of me!"
"The knowledge that you really care about my wishes."
He stalked toward her. "What does that mean?
What does it really mean? Complete surrender
to your whims? A clerk's job hi some store? A
daily routine in 416
which my most important concern is hurrying home
to chop wood or paint the porch trim?"
"Yes." Defiantly, her head came up.
"That's exactly what I'd like for a change."
"Well, I'm sorry, but you'll never get me
to live that kind of life." A sad smile. "You
taught me too well."
"I wish to heaven I hadn't."
"Yes, I'm aware of that feeling."
"Then give up the newspaper business."
More firmly: "It's selfish of you to ask that of
me."
"No," she retorted, rising, "selfish of you
to deny the request. By doing so you're destroying this
family. You've already destroyed our marriage. I
don't know why I should expect it to be otherwise.
You've always put your work first."
"Margaret, you're wrong!" he shouted.
"That's a deliberate and wicked distortion!"
How had she developed her sick, destructive
need for dominance? He was too angry to care very much.
He stabbed his hand into his pocket, yanked out the
document and slammed it on a table. "Obviously
tonight is an inappropriate time to discuss this."
She stood motionless and gazed at the paper.
Unexpectedly, the candlelight lent her face a
certain forlorn quality that touched him and cooled his
temper.
"What is it. Gideon?"
"A real estate purchase agreement. I've bought
a large plot of ground: A corner lot at
Sixty-first Street and Fifth Avenue,
opposite Central Park. It's prime
residential land, and this very afternoon I engaged an
architect to draw up plans for a big, comfortable
house-was He had been speaking with increasing weariness.
His voice was soft as he finished, "If all goes
well, we'll spend next Christmas in the kind of
place you've always wanted."
She pursed her lips. "How thoughtful. It
certainly 417
represents a compromise. I'd concluded that you
meant to keep us living shabbily forever."
Ignoring her bitterness, he forced himself to walk
to her. To place his hands on her shoulders. This time
she let him touch her, but she stiffened as he did.
Somehow, he felt like weeping.
A candle on the tree hissed and dripped wax on
the carpet. He thought he detected a flicker of
movement at one of the lace-curtained veranda windows.
Then he decided it was a trick played by the
shimmering flames. With all the restraint he could
muster, he said: "I know you've felt I was wrong
in refusing to spend the California money on ourselves.
Perhaps I was. I admit I can be mule-stubborn
sometimes. In any case, to try to make up for that
shortcoming, the house is a Christmas gift. I
spoke to the architect in terms of a construction cost
of a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The very finest
materials and appointments throughout. It will hardly
put a dent in the inheritance, and I'd like you to have a
home you can live in proudly-was
Again his voice trailed off. Her lackluster eyes
and the sour set of her mouth made him drop his hands from
her shoulders. He shook his head. "I thought you'd be
just a little pleased." "Of course I am." She
didn't sound it. "I do question your motives. Why
are you showing me kindness all at once?
What else are you doing that you're ashamed of?" For
one harrowing moment, he was positive she'd found out
about Julia. His face turned ashen. "What the
devil do you mean?"
She laughed, harshly. "You know very well. Deep
down you're ashamed of your selfishness. Ashamed of
putting everything-your wishes, your work, your everlasting
need to crusade for something-ahead of this family. You
know that kind of behavior is a weakness in your character."
"Some might not consider crusading, as you snidely
call it, to be a weakness."
"Who? Your newspaper cronies? Your radical
friends? Never mind! Let's stick to the subject of the
new house. I recognize it for what it is. A
bribe."
"God in heaven-was he breathed. "Margaret, it's a
gift."
"No. You thought you'd bribe me in the hope it would
salve your conscience and change my feelings at the
same time."
Guilt pierced him again. There was an element of that in
the transaction. But he'd honestly wanted to make
her happy, too.
"I'll live in that fine house, Gideon. Ill
live there because you owe me that. It alters
nothing between us. We'll remain husband and wife for the
sake of Eleanor and W. But it will be a marriage
in name only until you put your priorities in
order."
"Until I do exactly what you say, isn't that
the heart of it, Margaret?"
"Until you put your priorities in orderl" It
came out a soft scream. Her hands clenched at her
sides. Her eyes glittered with reflections of the
holiday candles. "Until then you've touched me for the
last time. You have come into my bed for the last time-was
The situation was careening out of control, flogged by her
anger, and by his own that he tried to check but couldn't.
"Oh, I've heard that before. Well, no loss.
You're no bargain any longer, Margaret, let me
tell you." Suddenly he realized what he'd said.
He extended his hand. "I'm sorry-was
It went unheard as she shrieked, "You have
experience, then? A basis for comparison? How many,
Gideon? How many other women have you had? How many
are you keeping? What kind of houses are you building
for them?"
"Margaret, I know you're drinking in secret-was
She stepped back, shaken. Was she so muddled that
she'd convinced herself he didn't know? "I
think it's affecting your mind. God knows something is.
All you have in your heart any longer is venom.
Venom and some kind of warped desire to make everyone
around you, but especially me, do precisely what you
say. I've told you I won't and I tell you
again now. Nor am I going to listen to any more of your
ranting. Not this evening."
He snatched the purchase offer and flung it at her
feet. "Merry Christmas."
He stalked out of the parlor. In his haste to escape
he knocked over a china umbrella stand in the
hall. A moment later his feet hammered the veranda.
He disappeared down the sriuwy street, his hands in
his pants pockets and an expression of fury on
his face.
When Eleanor reached the pond, she found no one
skating. Too much snow had already accumulated.
Disappointed, she returned to the house within a few
minutes of her departure, her skates tied together
by the laces and dangling over her shoulder.
On the steps of the veranda, she paused to pull off her
knitted cap and shake melting snow from it. That was when
she heard her parents shouting at one another. The
strident voices in the parlor brought tears to her
eyes, and filled her with a feeling close
to physical pain.
She crept along the veranda and crouched down by one of the
windows. Heavy condensation on the glass diffused the
Christmas candles into blurs of light. She rubbed
her mitten against the glass with a circular motion, then
stopped as she realized the condensation was 420
on the inside. It was the movement of her hand which
Gideon had seen.
The horrible shouting went on and on. Eleanor
didn't understand why papa caret and mama couldn't
get along. It had something to do with papa's work and his
absences from home. Beyond that, she was mystified.
Eleanor loved her handsome father. She loved his long,
light-colored hair and that eyepatch which gave him
such a unique and dashing appearance. She loved his
gentle hands, and the sound of his fine baritone voice
when he sang to her. But he hadn't sung at all
lately. He was gone too much. Remembering that
brought a flash of resentment.
Resentment of Gideon wasn't an unusual
emotion for Eleanor these days. She spent most of
her time with her mother. She attended to household
chores, which she already found boring, and to little Will's
care, which she enjoyed. Without realizing it, in her own
mind she was beginning to take her mother's part.
After all, didn't mama repeatedly say it was a
father's duty to make his family happy? Papa was
obviously making mama miserable.
Suddenly he stormed out of the parlor. Eleanor
caught her breath. Terrified, she heard his boots
thud in the hall. It was too late to run.
Not three yards to her right, the front door crashed
open. He came striding out, cursing under his breath.
She pressed against the siding between the parlor windows.
Her skates slipped from her shoulder, striking hard
on the veranda. But by then her father was through the gate in the
little picket fence and striding away down the snowy
street. She'd caught a glimpse of his face as
he passed. Angry. He was evidently in such a
rage, he hadn't heard the thump of the skates.
Once more she knelt in front of a mist-covered
window. Inside, her mother moved toward a cabinet
where bottles of bad-smelling dark brown liquid
were kept.
Like the contents of the bottles in the cellar, that
liquid made her mama walk unsteadily after
she'd had too much. And she went to the cabinet at
least once and sometimes twice every morning and afternoon.
Eleanor crept to the front door, made a
noise and went inside as if she'd just
arrived. Her heart was breaking but she didn't let
it show. She seemed to have an ability to put on
whatever kind of face she chose. But upstairs, in
bed, her self-control melted and she wept into her
pillow, wishing the Christmas season would bring just one
gift to the household
Peace.
Love is supposed to make people happy, she thought.
Poems say that. The preacher says it in church.
Men and women who fall in love are supposed to be
the happiest of all. It must be a lie. Love
hurts people. I've seen it for months. I saw it
through the window again tonight. Love hurts people. I'll
never let it hurt me.
A seed had fallen in fertile ground, and from that
night on it began to grow.

Not quite two years later-September 20, 1873-
Julia lay in the bed she'd shared with Gideon on
the night they first made love. The bed and the one in which
her son was sleeping were the only pieces of
furniture left in her mansion. All the other
furnishings had been moved out and auctioned for a
fraction of their value.
Tomorrow morning she and Carter would move out as
well. Then the property would be on the market
officially. If she were lucky, a buyer could be found
who would pay approximately what she was asking,
one hundred and ten thousand dollars. From the proceeds
of the sale she and Carter could live and carry on her

work for years to come, although in a far less affluent
manner.
A day after the panic had started, Gideon had
telegraphed to say that his money, handled for him by the
Rothman Bank of Boston, was safe. He said
he'd provide Julia with whatever cash she needed,
and would do it for as long as she required help. She
blessed him for making the offer even though she could never
accept. No matter how bad her circumstances,
she meant to be self-sufficient.
Gideon had been doing well. He'd progressed
from the dock of the newspaper through the composing and press
rooms to the editorial department, joining two
unions en route. A year ago he'd written his
first piece of copy-an obituary-then rewritten it
three times until the editor, Payne, said he was
satisfied. Gideon's name was now on the masthead
as the Union's publisher. Payne remained
editor.
Of late Gideon had been trying his hand at
editorials and devoting himself to the business side of the
enterprise. He'd raised salaries and shortened
working hours, thereby attracting better writing
talent. His last letter before the start of the panic had
been a long and jubilant one. He'd reported that
the Union had pulled to within two thousand of the Sun's
daily circulation. On the strength of that, he had
boosted the advertising rate to fifty cents an
agate line-or ten cents more than the Sun charged.
He and Payne had worked for a week on a
three-paragraph front page editorial stating that
the Union could command a premium because it had a
quality readership-men arid women who liked the
paper and were loyal to it, and would therefore be more
receptive to its advertisements. Of course,
Gideon pointed out to Juiia with a touch of
amusement, the same could be said by any paper with a
body of loyal readers. The point was, no one
had said it before. The 423
strategy had worked, and in one week the Union's
advertising linage had nearly doubled.
Then came the fourth of September.
The panic began with the closing of the doors of Jay
Cooke and Company at fifteen past
noon. Before the day was over, thirty-seven other
New York banks and stock brokerage firms
had also closed, and the governors of the Stock
Exchange had suspended trading indefinitely.
Cooke's was bankrupt, they said. The nation's most
solid and reputable financial establishment
bankruptl A representative of the house immediately
traveled to Chicago to see Julia. It was not
Mr. Robbins. He too had lost everything and had
put a pistol to his head. The representative
had come to do Julia the courtesy of explaining her
position. Actually, she had none. She was wiped
out.
She didn't understand the representative's roster of
reasons for the collapse of Cooke's. He cited
railroads expanding too fast in Europe.
Currency values inflated there and in America.
Over-production. Feverish industrial growth and
subsequent over-production. Skyrocketing
prices for everything, which encouraged investment in highly
speculative enterprises such as the Northern
Pacific. And lastly, plummeting public
confidence in government and business, brought to a
climax earlier in the year by revelations that the
Credit Mobilier had used gifts of its
own, highly lucrative stock to elicit favors
from members of Congress.
The representative seemed to comprehend all the
interlocking aspects of the disaster. She didn't. But
she did understand when he said a depression lay
ahead. She understood it even more completely tonight, because
tomorrow, she and Carter would be moving to a boarding house
on the rebuilt West Side.
The move should have disturbed her. As evidence of
worsening economic conditions, it did. But after
she'd
gotten over her brief and stormy anger-a vestige
of the past, in which she'd expected her life to be
perpetual tranquility-she'd begun to view the
change as something to which she must and would adjust. She had
her son. She had her lover whom she managed
to see four or five times every year. And she had her
work. She needed nothing else except a little food
and a roof to shelter her-and never mind the size or
location of that roof.
Odd, the way her role and Gideon's had
reversed, she thought as she visualized his face in the
darkness. The house was dark throughout, and silent. All
the servants had been released twenty-four hours
earlier.
When she and Gideon had found one another in the
aftermath of the fire, she'd been living in an affluent
way while he and his family lived very modestly.
Now the publisher of the New York Union
occupied a splendid new mansion on upper Fifth
Avenue-a move undertaken to placate his wife, and
one which had not fulfilled its purpose. He said
Margaret's behavior was growing more hostile and
erratic because of heavy drinking she now hardly bothered
to conceal.
Most of Gideon's wealth had been converted to gold
bars over a year ago. The Rothman Bank had
foreseen a financial crisis on a world-wide
scale. Most of Julia's assets had been on
paper, and were gone. In two years, nearly everything
in her life and his had changed.
Except the most important thing of all: their
steadfast and steadily maturing love for one another.
He said it was all that sustained him in the increasingly
difficult relationship with his wife. And it was all that
sustained Julia through the long periods when she was
traveling, and facing increasingly hostile audiences,
and thinking of Gideon as she lay in lonely beds in
towns whose names sometimes blurred together until she could
no longer remember where she was, or in
what place she'd last been spat on or stoned.
She heard a peculiar noise from the State
Street side of the house. She rose and drew her
emerald colored robe around her. It was shabby now.
Out of fashion. But she couldn't afford to discard it.
She walked quietly down the second floor
corridor to French windows at the front. The
windows opened onto a small balcony.
Outside, the September moon was brilliant.
She clearly saw a band of eight or ten men
skulking along the street. They paused in front of
her driveway. One pointed. He'd noticed the
deserted look of the house. All the windows were bare,
the draperies gone.
She ran to her room. Breathing fast, she opened the
trunk in which she'd packed the only clothes she
planned to keep. She snatched out a small
revolver purchased a few davs ago on the
advice of one of the departing servants who said
looters were operating after dark.
She dashed back down the hall and opened the French
windows just as three of the men started up the drive.
They were unemployed, she suspected. Perhaps discharged
from plants that had already shut down, as thousands were
shutting down in every state.
She pointed the revolver upward and fired a shot.
"Not this place!" one of the men yelled. He turned
and fled. The others followed.
Carter came racing from his bedroom. "Ma, why did
you use the gun?"
"Nothing to worry about, dear. Some vagrants were
prowling around the, house. Thev're pone."
Carter surveyed the empty driveway below. "Y.
shouid have let me shoot. I'd have nailed one of
them."
There was no great conceit in the statement, just an
assertion of fact. Carter Kent was only eleven but
he was already half a head taller than his mother. His
jet black eyes and hair-so like his father's, yet so
different comwere turninp him into a handsome young man.
For a moment, though, his confidence deserted him. 426
"Why is all this happening, ma? I don't like it
much." She ruffled his hair. "I don't either. But
nothing remains the same for long. Change is one
of the few constants in life, and you'll discover that as you
grow older. Bad rimes have come to the country,
Carter. Come very suddenly and unexpectedly-was
"Bad times for us too, aren't they? I won't ever
get another taste of cook's pecan pie."
She smiled. "You'll survive. So will
I." She kissed his forehead. "As long as I have
you." "And Gideon?"
Softly: "Yes, Carter. And Gideon." After the
first time, she'd never again entertained him in her
bedroom. They met discreetly, in other cities.
But now and then Carter saw arriving mail which included
a letter with Gideon's name on it. Once he'd been
bold enough to ask whether Gideon was some kind of
special friend. That much she had admitted.
Probably her son had guessed a good deal more from
the way she spoke and looked as she answered. She
made it a point not to act embarrassed or ashamed
when Gideon's name came up in conversation. She
didn't flaunt him to Carter, but neither did she
deny his importance.
The boy gnawed his lower lip for a moment. "Ma?"
"What?"
"Would you like Gideon to marry you?" "Very-was Her
voice broke slightly. "Very much." "But he can't
ever do that, can he?" "No."
"That's what I figured out. Since he's already
married, you'll just be friends for the rest of your life."
"Yes." Her heart ached. "Friends." Something
oppressive seemed to close in around her then; a
fear whose source she couldn't immediately
locate. She packed Carter back to bed and
returned to the front window, opening it and stepping
onto the little
balcony. She gazed north toward the central
business district, where a miracle of rebuilding
had taken place since the fire. The brilliant
moonlight flooded down on Twentieth Street and
Thomas Courtleigh's mansion beyond.
Naturally Courtleigh had survived the panic.
He was the sort who would. It was Courtleigh who was
the cause of her fear, she realized. He'd
harassed her relentlessly during the past two years.
At least she assumed he was the one responsible for the
almost constant verbal and physical abuse she took
during her lectures these days. Fortunately none
of the other speakers who worked for the Association had been
harassed in similar fashion. If they had been,
Julia would have quit.
For some reason, Gideon hadn't been bothered
since a brief flurry of trouble right after his
return to New York late in '71, Julia
knew better than to think Courtleigh had forgotten
her lover, or forgiven him.
Early in 1872 the railroad president had
married Gwendolyn Strother. They'd
taken a. long European wedding trip. People continued
to say Mrs. Courtleigh was-well, the charitable
used the terms high strung or excitable.
Julia's servants as well as tradespeople
who called at both houses employed stronger
language. They said Mrs. Courtleigh was not quite
right in the head.
In some accounts Julia had heard, Courtleigh's
wife was reputed to have been unstable since
childhood. In others, it was Gideon's visit that
was said to be responsible for her condition. Julia
doubted the latter story, though she supposed the
melodramatic and by now notorious scene at the
ball hadn't exactly helped the young woman's
state of mind.
Julia had seen Courtleigh up close only
once since his call in the solarium. Recent
events had kept her too busy to think of the encounter,
but it came to mind now as she stood in the moonlight
and gazed north and then
west across rooftops and treetops toward the
Illinois prairie.
Just before the Fourth of July, she'd been supervising
the trimming of some hedges along Twentieth.
Court-leigh's brougham had turned out of
his coach yard, and he'd hailed her from the window.
Warily, she'd stepped to the curb. He'd greeted
her with a tip of his hat, though there was no cordiality
in his hazel eyes.
"Good afternoon, Miss Sedgwick-or Mrs.
Sedg-wick? I always get so confused addressing a
woman like you. Ah well. I'd like to remind you that
I made certain promises-was
"I haven't forgotten them," she snapped back.
"The thugs you send to every one of my lectures make
that impossible."
"Thugs?" He blinked. "I'm afraid I
don't understand." But of course he did, and mirth in
his hazel eyes said so. "I wasn't thinking of you so
much as of your- friend," The pause lent a lascivious
quality to the last word. "Remind him that while I
sometimes get very busy with other projects, and thus
may seem to neglect promises, I do not in
fact forget them. I eventually keep every one I
make. Mr. Kent should ponder that each night before
he goes to sleep. So should you. Good day."
Remembering, she gripped the edge of the balcony
rail. For the first time, her confidence in her ability
to endure an uncertain future ebbed away.
"I mustn't lose you, Gideon," she
whispered. "still mustn't."
She shook her head. It did no good muttering
to herself. She must write Gideon. Remind him of the
ever-present threat Courtleigh represented.
A cloud passed across the face of the moon. The
resulting darkness only worsened her fear. She was
ashamed of that, yet the fear persisted. Back in her
room, she couldn't fall asleep. Wild thoughts
went tumbling through her head.
Darkness falling on the land.
Men roaming the streets and roads.
Out of work.
Hungry.
Desperate enough to do anything for anyone who will pay
them.
And Courtleigh hadn't forgotten.
"He hasn't, Gideon," she breathed in the
stillness. "You don't dare think he has, because that's
just when he'll strike."
CHAPTER V
Jompkins Square
"I HAVE NO business attending a rally conducted
by radicals," Theo Payne said as he and Gideon
left the Union one day almost five months later.
"P. J. McGuire is socialist and
so is his Committee on Public Safety."
Gideon laughed as they started toward a hack stand
on Park Row. It was a mild winter day, bright but
cloudy; the thirteenth of January, 1874. "I
think you have your verbs mixed up, Theo. McGuire
may have organized the rally but it certainly won't be
conducted by radicals. The mayor is scheduled
to speak. And Johnny Swinton of the Sun."
Swinton was chief editorial writer for the rival
paper.
"That's the sole reason I'm going. I want
to watch Johnny reveal his new insanity to the world
at large."
There was no point arguing. He could never convince
Payne that the hundreds of unemployed men and women
at Tompkins Square would be voicing demands that were
eminently reasonable. The rally had been ar-
ranged to protest the epidemic unemployment
afflicting New York and other major cities.
Local trade unions wanted the city council
to temporarily forbid evictions by landlords,
appropriate some money for emergency relief, and
start a public works program to create jobs.
Payne and many others considered those proposals
fully as socialistic as some of the men
making them.
Gideon glanced at his watch. They were already twenty
minutes late for the start of the program. He'd been
detained in a meeting with one of those so-called
advertising agents who were popping up everywhere these
days. The agents centralized the purchase of
advertising space on behalf of a list of clients.
Of course they earned a substantial mark-up in the
process, but they offered newspapers a definite
advantage. By paying promptly on behalf of their
clients, the agent relieved a paper of the burden of
collecting from slow-paying or defaulting customers.
The agent who'd called on Gideon, a
representative of the N. W. Ayer firm of
Philadelphia, had placed a large order for
space. He therefore wanted the publisher's
personal attention and he'd gotten it.
As the two men crossed the square, Gideon gave
only slight notice to an unusually tall
Street Arab lounging against the Franklin statue.
In the autumn just passed, he might have scrutinized
the shabbily clad youth more closely. At that time
Julia's letter of warning had been fresh in his mind.
For a few weeks he was very watchful as he moved
around town. Nothing happened. By the end of
December he relaxed again.
The story of Torvald Ericsson's death had never
appeared in the Union. By the time Gideon was in a
position to order it put into type, the charges were not
only unprovable but stale. He'd had a hot
argument with Payne about it. The editor maintained-and
correctly, Gideon had to admit once his anger
cooled-that Sidney Florian's disappearance in the
fire removed the sole
source of evidence io support the charges. Without
evidence, a statement that Courtleigh had sanctioned
murder was only supposition.
"If you want to practice that kind of journalism,
Gideon, let's go all the way. Let's pack
the paper with accusations against anyone we dislike. We
can call your banker a Shylock, my wife a
Bowery chippy, President Grant a sot and a
spoilsman and do it all with a perfectly comclear
conscience."
He was only willing to bow to Payne because he felt
sure another time would come when Courtleigh would err
on the side of repression and get caught at it.
Then Gideon would have his hide. In print.
Payne hailed the first hack in line. Gideon
called to the driver, "Tompkins
Square," and jumped inside. A moment later the
vehicle was speeding north along Chatham Street
and then into the traffic of the Bowery.
The tall street boy had been loitering along behind
them, within earshot. As soon as the carriage sped
away, he dashed for a nearby office that
transmitted telegraph messages to other points
in the city.
Tompkins Square had originally been laid out as
a military drill ground. Though still used
by militia units, it had now become a pblerk that
was being slowly swallowed by the expanding ghetto. The
square's northern and southern boundaries were East
Tenth and East Seventh Streets. The hack
approached along the latter thoroughfare, from the west.
Traffic was so heavy, Payne and Gideon were forced
to pay the driver at First Avenue, then walk.
A huge crowd had been turned out by the trade
unions and socialist clubs. Men, women and
youngsters
packed the square and spilled into Avenues A and
B on
either side. As Gideon and his companion pushed their
way along the noisy, congested sidewalk in front
of Seventh Street tenements, more
socialists came parading toward the site of the rally.
They marched four abreast to the music of a small band.
The winter sky shed a dull light on bare heads and
plumes of breath. Most of the marchers wore some
sort of improvised red sash over the shoulder or
around the waist.
Payne and Gideon took note of three stern
New York policemen on horseback near the
curb. Elsewhere hi the crowd Gideon began
to discern uniformed foot patrolmen. All of the
police were armed with long, thick wooden clubs.
Payne pursed his lips. "Who turned out so many of
our finest, I wonder?"
Gideon shook his head. In the street, another
socialist club was marching along from First Avenue.
A red beard streaked with white caught Gideon's
eye. He stretched on tiptoe.
"Sime?" He waved. "Over here!" Stepping to the
beat of a snare dram, Strelnik swiveled his
head. He saw Gideon. He faced front again
with no sign of recognition. Slowly Gideon
lowered his hand. His face was somber.
"Is the program underway?" Payne asked. His
height kept him from seeing much besides backsides on
the crowded sidewalk. Again Gideon went
up on his toes. "Doesn't appear to be. The
square's full, though. Speakers are on the
platform. Oh, there's Frank Jamison -"
Gideon squeezed by an elderly woman in a red
sash. Payne followed him to the side of the Herald
reporter they both knew. "I thought the rally was due
to start thirty minutes ago," Gideon said
to Jamison.
The Herald man was leaning against the corner of a
small grocery with a closed sign in its window.
He puffed his cigar before answering, "There's been a
delay. Some objection from city hall. The mayor
isn't
going to speak after all. And he's withdrawn permission
for the rally."
"You mean all these people are gathered illegally?"
Payne said.
With a slow nod, Jamison said, "Only no one's
bothered to tell most of them." Suddenly he spied
something back along Seventh. He dropped his cigar
and pointed.
"Jehoshaphat. Look. Those men are forming up-was
Gideon turned. A whole troop of mounted
police was maneuvering into ranks that stretched from one
side of Seventh to the other. Near
Tompkins Square there were cries of alarm. People in
the street scattered. The noses of the police
horses gave off streams of vapor. The hazy
sun shimmered on polished wooden clubs.
Neither Gideon, Payne, nor any other
witnesses saw the signal for the charge that started the
riot.
ill
The demonstrators had come in an angry,
militant mood. The police were equally
militant and equally angry, Gideon realized.
He watched with a stunned look as the first mounted
rank, then the second and third swept into the people still
unluckv enough to be in the street.
A boy slipped. As he rose, a policeman in
the second rank rode by and bashed him with his billy.
The boy reeled back, his temple gushing blood
down the side of his face.
"My God," Theo Payne exclaimed. "They're
going to kill those people."
Gideon said, "Isn't that what they deserve? After
all, they're radicals."
The editor gave him a strange, intense look.
Jamison
of the Herald slipped away. There was
commotion on
the sidewalk, the crowd surging and swaying forward,
driven by half a dozen foot policemen swinging
clubs:
"Clear the walk. Clear the walk and go to your
homes!"
When an elderly man retorted and reached for one of the
clubs, two policemen attacked. Gideon
heard a crunch of bone, then a cry. The man
sank from sight.
What had been a relatively orderly scene
quickly degenerated to howling confusion. From all sides,
mounted and dismounted police poured into Tompkins
Square with clubs flying. Red-sashed marchers
broke ranks and either ran or squared off to fight.
The speakers' platform began to sway. It quickly
collapsed, its supports demolished by the
frantic mob.
Buffeted along toward Avenue A, Gideon
shouted that he wanted to locate Strelnik. Payne
clutched his arm like a frightened child. "Don't abandon
me in this sea of lunatics!" Through a break in the
crowd, he glimpsed a foot patrolman at the
curb. He wedged and shoved till he was facing the
officer. "See here, I'm Theophilus
Payne of the New York Union. Who revoked
the order permitting this assembl-?"
"Watch out, Theol"
Gideon's cry came too late. The
policeman slashed Payne's face with his club.
The editor pitched backward into Gideon's arms,
his cheek bleeding from a break in the skin. The
policeman started for Gideon next. Then he
took note of his size and ran the other way, swinging
his club wildly. Payne could only gasp:
"No one has ever-assaulted me in-my entire
life."
"I expect he mistook you for a socialist
sympathizer," Gideon said with a humorless smile.
"Here, sop up that blood with my handkerchief."
"But I'm not wearing a sash, for God's sake.
I'm doing nothing wrong!"
"Neither are the rest of them, Theo."
Payne gave Gideon another long look.
Something 435
seemed to dawn in his eyes as the first of a volley of
shots exploded in the square.
IV
Anyone who remained on the footpaths or
winter-browned grass of Tompkins
Square was fair game for the charging policemen.
Gideon helped Payne around the corner to the west
side of Avenue A, then down some stairs into a
small entrance area belonging to a basement flat.
Another young man, dark-haired and rather sallow, had
also taken refuge there. He watched the carnage with
stricken eyes.
"The radicals brought this on by staging the rally," the
man said to Gideon. He was in his early twenties
and spoke with a hint of an English accent.
"Sorry. I happen to be on the side of the
unions," Gideon answered as he helped
Payne sit on a lower step. The editor had a
dazed look. He mumbled about needing a bracer.
The poorly dressed young man hadn't liked
Gideon's remark.
"So am I, mister. I'm a member of the
cigarmakers. But I am not on the side of the
socialist fringe that's always pushing for a scrap with the
law."
Gideon started to argue. The young man grabbed his arm
and pulled him down. A large rock sailed into the
entrance area. The rock smashed a narrow window
light beside the apartment door. Glass sprayed
everywhere. "You all right?" the young man
asked. Gideon nodded. "Guess it isn't the
best of places for a debate. I jumped down here
fearing for my life."
With good reason, Gideon thought. Back by the
corner, someone screamed. The noise and confusion
worsened. Out in the square a horseman charged
along a footpath. A figure with a familiar red
beard ran at the
mounted policeman, swinging both fists. The
policeman clubbed the man three times and galloped
on.
Gideon sprang toward the steps. "Would you watch
my friend, mister-?"
"Sam Gompers. Certainly will."
He raced up the steps and sprinted into Avenue A.
Strelnik lay on the footpath, not moving.
A woman came limping from Gideon's left,
hurrying two small, ragged boys away from a
foot patrolman who was pursuing them. The older
boy had a bruised left eye that was swollen shut.
The woman wailed as the officer whipped his club
toward the back of her head.
Before the blow landed, Gideon bowled into the man and
knocked him down. The woman and children escaped into the
melee on East Seventh. Gideon ran
into the square before the policeman could rise, but a
second unexpectedly grabbed him from behind:
"Clear the area!"
Gideon glanced at the club poised over his head.
"Touch me with that and I'll break your back."
The policeman muttered something, lowered the club and
went in search of other victims.
There were shouts, screams, moans of pain from all
parts of the square. Pairs of mounted policemen
started galloping down Avenues A and B in
pursuit of escaping demonstrators. As
Gideon approached, Strelnik stirred.
Gideon helped him up.
Strelnik was groggy; didn't realize who was
grasping his hand. Blood streamed down the right side
of his face from a deep scalp wound hidden by his
hair.
"Sime, it's me. Come along. There's a safe
place over on the side of-was
Strelnik pulled away. "No thank you,
Gideon. I need no help from your kind."
Gideon reached for him again. "Don't be a fool.
Take my arm and lean on me."
"Careful," Strelnik exclaimed, jerking back so
hard 437
he nearly fell. "You wouldn't want a workingman's
blood on that fine capitalist suit."
"For Christ's sake, Sime, it's time to forget that
kind of stupid-was
The paunchy little Russian turned and limped off
toward the north side of the square, clutching his
middle and weaving from side to side. Blood dripped
from the tip of his beard and left bright drops on the
footpath.
Gideon followed him for half a dozen steps;
called his name. Strelnik never paused.
Despondent, Gideon turned back toward the
curb. A policeman on horseback rounded the
corner from Tenth Street and controlled his prancing
horse as he searched the square. When he caught
sight of Gideon crossing the street, he broke
into a smile.
That was a strange reaction, Gideon thought. All
he could see of the policeman's face was a bulbous
nose and a large gap where upper front teeth should have
been. The man carried no club. Abruptly, he
booted his horse into a canter.
Gideon walked faster to get out of the path of the
animal. The policeman thrust his hand beneath his
dirty tunic and pulled a pistol. Now
his intention was unmistakable.
Halfway across the street, Gideon broke into a
run. The policeman kicked his horse harder.
Its hoofs raised white sparks from the paving stones,
On the street's west side, the heads of Gompers
and Theo Payne were visible above the sidewalk.
Payne yeEed. Gideon flung himself
sideways.
The policeman's revolver thundered twice.
Gideon landed on his shoulder, skidding in a pile of
horse droppings. The policeman turned back,
his horse looming like some gigantic beast from a
nightmare. The horse reared. Slashing forehoofs
dropped. Gideon rolled frantically toward the
sidewalk. He could feel the air 438
stir as the great weight of horse and rider came
down. More sparks shot from the paving.
By firing his pistol the policeman had attracted
attention. He saw that, flung the gun away and
galloped south across East Seventh before anyone
moved to stop him. Gideon gave chase but the man
soon swung his horse into an alley and disappeared.
It had all haopened with great speed. The shock of it
finally struck Gideon. Trembling-and stinking like a
stable hand-he walked toward the two men coming
up from the stairwell. The young cigarmaker was aghast.
"That was the first policeman I've seen with a gun."
"If he was a policeman," Gideon
responded.
"What?" Payne was momentarily confused. Then, in
a whisper, he asked, "Is someone after you?"
Gideon managed a smile he didn't feel.
"Very possibly, Theo. Very possibly."
"Who, for God's sake9"
"Never mind that right now. Let's get out of here and
find a doctor for you."
"Balderdash. I'm perfectly fit. Just a little
quivery. It's nothing a few bracers won't
cure. I'm going back and write an editorial
for tomorrow morning."
"What about?"
"The behavior of the police."
"But they were only clubbing trade unionists.
Maybe a few Communards-was
Payne bent down and picked up a piece of red
cotton flannel lying b : conde Sam
Gornpers' left shoe. Perhaps the scrap had been
torn from some marcher's shoulder. A darker patch of
red discolored one end.
The editor gazed at the bit of cloth for a
moment. Then he tucked it in his waistcoat pocket
and looked across a square all but empty of
demonstrators. Near the wreckage of the platform,
the mounted police troop was forming up ai greater-than
ain.
"Yes, the victims may have been that," he said in a

voice touched by hoarseness, "But they do seem to bleed
like anyone else who is beaten without provocation.
They do seem to bleed, don't they?"
Hoofs rang on stone. Half a dozen policemen
spotted the three men and came cantering along a
footpath. Gompers called a hasty goodbye and
ran the other way as Gideon quickly shepherded
Payne around the corner into Seventh Street.
He exchanged his soiled coat for a spare one he
kept at the Union, then spent an hour at
police headquarters. What he'd suspected
proved true. From the sketchy description he
provided, no one could identify the policeman who
had shot at him. A bulbous nose and missing
teeth? There were dozens of men on the force who drank
too much and whose teeth had rotted out.
The officer to whom Gideon spoke was adamant about
one thing. The use of guns had not been
authorized for the men sent to clear Tompkins
Square. When Gideon asked who had authorized
clubs-and why- the officer refused to answer,
except to say the socialists were a menace to the
maintenance of law and order.
"And are the eight and nine year old children who were beaten
also a menace to law and order?"
The other man bit his lip. "I have no comment to make
on that, sir."
"You may not, but I do. What I saw in
Tompkins Square wasn't a labor riot. It
was a police riot."
"I have nothing to say."
"But you'll investigate my charges-was
"Most definitely." The officer's eye was already
roving elsewhere. The headquarters building was in
turmoil. Flying squads of mounted men were being
dispatched to sweep the lower East Side streets of
any 440
demonstrators displaying red sashes-or hostility
to the authorities.
"Yes, yes, most definitely," the officer said.
"We will investigate--"
"As soon as hell freezes." Gideon walked
away.
On his way out, he stopped a policeman leaving with
one of the flying squads. He asked what law was being
broken by the demonstrators the police were going after.
All he got for a reply was a hostile scowl.
He left the station in low spirits.
The man who'd shot at him would never be found. He
suspected the man wasn't even a member of the
police department. It was unnerving to realize the hand
of Thomas Courtleigh had almost touched him again. And
could reach all the way to New York City; could
even plant a man in a policeman's tunic right
in the midst of bona ride officers.
Who had located him for the assassin? He'd
probably never learn that either.
He decided he mustn't say a word to Julia. It
would worry her. Nor did he dare tell
Margaret. Doing so would only send her into another
fit of hysterical anger.
VI
He heard the lamentation long before he reached the pitch
black sixth floor. It was a woman's voice;
wailing.
He stood for perhaps five minutes on the landing of the
Bottle Alley tenement. The smells of old
cooking and urine and dirt all but choked
him. Finally he summoned the courage to knock. The
wailing went on.
He knocked again. It was Strelnik's five year
old son who answered.
The glow of candles in the flat-the only illumination
comput flecks of light in the boy's damp eyes.
But Strelnik's son made an effort to speak without
crying.
"Hello, Mr. Kent."
"Hello, Anton. I saw your father get hurt in
Tompkins Square this afternoon-was He couldn't go on.
There was a heaviness in his belly; a numbness in his
fingers. Somehow, he already knew.
But Anton had to confirm it.
"Yes, sir. Papa was hit." He patted the
top of his head. "It made him sleepy. After he
came home he lay down and he isn't getting
up."
Nor would he ever, Gideon thought as he gazed past
Anton and saw the body lying on the floor amidst
candles set in small dishes. A great shadow
loomed on one rotting wall. The shadow of a woman
swaying back and forth, hands clasped.
Vll
Tompkins Square put a new partisan
of labor on Charles Dana's Sun. John
Swinton, the editorialist who had never gotten
to deliver his speech. It added a similar partisan
to the staff of the Union. Long after Gideon had
arranged to have Sirne Strelnik decentlv buried,
and had borne all the expenses of the, funeral and
given the widow ten thousand dollars besides, he
wondered whether Theo Payne's conversion was worth the
little Russian's life. When he remembered
Anton's eyes and Leah's grief, he thought it was
not.
He wrote a long Setter to London,
describing Strel nik's death and once again asking
Matt to come home for a visit. Once again Matt
refused.
In Boston
THE OLD SCOLLAY Oyster House did not
cheerfully welcome unescorted ladies during the
evening. But when Mrs. Henry Blackwell brought
a member of her own sex there to dine on chowder and
scrod, the proprietors knew better than
to complain. In repose Mrs. Blackwell might
resemble an angel, but certain restaurant owners
who had attempted to bar her from their premises had
been known to call her an adder comor
worse.
Mrs. Blackwell was in her middle fifties, a
tiny woman no taller than the friend accompanying
her. Mrs. Blackwell's eray eyes matched
her hair. Her dress was a plain black
bombazine. She and her companion had come to the
Oyster House on an evening in February, about a
month after the Tompkins Square riot.
The older woman's eyes sparkled with a youthful
enthusiasm as she said. "In spite of the reverses
you've apparently suffered, I've never seen you
looking happier."
How soothing and melodic that voice was, Julia
thought. In a lecture hall it had an almost
hypnotic effect, lulia smiled and spooned up
some of the delicious chowder. The waiter, a
pink-faced young man with thick side whiskers,
approached the table.
"Everything all rieht so far, Mrs.
Blackwell?"
The little lady laid her soup spoon aside. "You
are new here, are you not, young man?"
"I suppose you'd say that, ma'am. Been in
Boston three years, but only in this fine
establishment two and 443
a half weeks. I come off the immigrant boat
in seventy-one, I learned the hotel an'
restaurant trades in Dublin."
"I'm afraid you still have many other things to learn."
He enjoyed the banter. "That so? Pray tell me
what."
"It's true that I'm married to Henrv
Blackwell. But I don't use his name, and that
gentleman over there knows it. I imagine he told
you to call me Mrs. Black-well so you'd get in
hot water." A glance at the smirking head waiter
confirmed it. "It's not your fault, but I go by the name
Lucy Stone."
"And I go by the name Dennis SheeSey," he said
with a grin. "Lucy. Now that's one of my very fav-was
Suddenly it registered, "Oh. You're that one. The
one who thinks womenfolk should vote."
"In one U. S. territory, they already do,"
"Well," Dennis declared, "it surely won't
happen anywhere else--not until the Holy See
turns into a musselman an' the Boston summer
brings forty inches of snow."
Julia spoke up: "Are you married, Dennis?"
"No, indeed, miss. Would you care to make a
proposal?"
"I asked you a serious question."
"All right, here's a serious answer. I am riot
presently married. But I plan to be when I find
the right girl. An' this I guarantee you, ladies.
My wife shall know and keep her proper place-which is
one step behind me at all times, with an attentive
eye upon me so as to detect and accommodate my
slightest wish. That's the role women were born
to play, an' all this hullabal'oo about voting
only stirs them up for nothing. I can't speak for
present companv, but it's generally true that females
don't have the head to understand a subject such as
politics."
A storm was brewing in Lucy's gray eyes.
"Dennis," 444
she purred, "I do believe you had better see to the
rest of our order before I bash you with that vinegar
cruet If I don't, Miss Sedgwick will."
Dennis left, rather irked and clearly wondering what
he'd done wrong other than address the infamous
lady by her married name. Lucy sighed.
"Sometimes it seems to be such a long, wearying
struggle. Americans will rush to embrace any
crazy fad from grahamism to phrenology. But when
it comes to votes for women-an idea that
couldn't be more sensible or fair-you'd think it had been
proposed by Satan himself."
"We'll carry the day eventually," Julia
replied. "I'm sure of it."
Lucy studied her. "You say that with great conviction.
I'm glad. Sometimes I fear women will never help
elect a president until long after my life's
over. At other times I'm convinced we're close
to a complete victory. Perhaps the truth's somewhere
between. At any rate, Julia, I'm delighted you
could arrange to spend a few days at headquarters.
It's a pleasure to see you- especially since
you're obviously so happy."
A moment later, she added, "It's a man, isn't
it?" With a warm feeling in her face, Julia
nodded. "I can tell. Frankly, I've been
fretting about you lately. I noted your new
address in Chicago and decided you must have undergone a
financial setback last fall, Was it a serious
one?"
"I lost almost everything. Surprisingly, it's been
no great hardship."
Because of Gideon-whom she intended to see in New
York as soon as her four day visit to Boston was
over.
She was constantly astonished at the secure foundation
love gave to one's life. A decade earlier,
she couldn't have coped with the changes she'd gone through
since the collapse of Cooke's. Now, with barely
a qualm, she'd exchanged meals prepared by a chef
for stew bowls passed up and down a boarding house
table. She'd exchanged the finest dresses for
bargain merchandise two or three seasons out of
date. She'd exchanged a relatively carefree
attitude about money for a watchful stewardship of every
penny in her small bank account. The State
Street mansion-had brought her asking price, and at
Gideon's suggestion she'd let the Rothman
Bank here in Boston invest the principal. It
appeared that the interest from those investments might cover
what little she and Carter spent.
Carter, She hoped he was doing well at the
public school in Chicago. Would he obey the
landlad right-brace , who was caring for him? He'd
promised he would, but he was becoming an exuberant,
independent young man. Julia not only loved her
son, she admired him.
"That certainly reassures me," Lucy declared as
they finished their chowder. "Since the panic, the
Association has been forced to operate on
a much tighter budget. One of our best girls in
the office, Flo Pernell, quit and moved
to Colorado when her husband lost his job. We
didn't have the money to hire a replacement.
Fortunately, we've been able to preserve the
travel fund to pay expenses for our lecturers."
Dennis approached to clear away the silver
tureens. While he did so, he. studied Lucy
Stone obliquely as if she were some demon risen from
the pit. He shook Ms head all the way to the
kitchen.
Julia decided to raise the subject that had been
troubling her conscience for weeks.
"Lucy, I've been thinking it might be better if
I resigned from the lecture staff."
To her surprise, Lucy didn't act shocked.
Her gray eyes met Julia's calmly. "A
moment ago, you said the change in your style of life
was no great hardship."
"That's right. It isn't money that's prompting me."

"Then what is it? You've never struck me as a
quitter, Julia."
"Lately almost every one of my lectures has been
disrupted. In Cleveland-my last
engagement before I came here-three roughnecks threw
some kind of chemical bomb that spread a dreadful
odor in the hall, and created so much smoke, the
audience went into a panic. A woman broke her
leg running for the exit."
Lucy startled her again by nodding.
"I've read about some of your difficulties in the
newspapers to which the Association subscribes. I
hadn't realized we were confronting a new wave of
hostility in your part of the country. I thought middle
western people were generally open to new ideas-was
"It isn't the fault of the message, Lucy.
It's me."
"I don't understand."
"I'm the target, not the Association or its
program."
"Our lecturers have encountered hostility before-was
"Not so continuously."
Finally Lucy said, "You're right. That was my
reluctant conclusion after an analysis of the
newspaper articles. Go on."
"I angered a very important businessman in
Chicago. I angered him so badly, I think
he's hired men to create disturbances wherever I
speak. I'm doing the movement more harm than
good. When a lecture's disrupted, no one takes
a message away from it. I feel I should resign
so the Association's work won't be hampered because of
something personal."
"Who is this blackguard in Chicago?" Lucy
demanded.
She hesitated, but saw no harm in naming him.
"Thomas Courtleigh. He's president of a
trunk railroad out there."
The older woman shook her head. "The name isn't
familiar. Does Mr. Courtleigh object to your
views on womanhood, or is it something else?"
"A bit of both."
"Are you in any serious danger?" Again Julia
paused before answering. "I don't believe so."
"And I don't believe that," the older woman
responded with a peppery shake of her head. "Your
resignation is refused," "But Lucy-was
"Come, my dear, you know as well as I-most women
are too poorly educated, or too cowed,
to realize they're as cruelly enslaved as the
blacks once were. They need the Association's
message, I won't drive one of our best
speakers off the platform by any act of mine." She
put her fork down, "However, I do think this
might be a good time to broach an idea I've been
pondering. We need someone to do a Western tour.
Nebraska, Colorado-the mountain and plains
states. Such a trip might get you out of this
Courtleigh's reach for a while,"
"That's a wonderful idea!" Then Julia's face
grew pensive. "I'll go anywhere except
Wyoming." "What do you have against Wyoming?" She
didn't want to admit it was the home of a man she
never wanted to face again. She would forever regret the
way she'd behaved with Michael Boyle when Ix
greater-than uis was still alive. In "61 she'd
flirted with Boyle without really caring for him. Anger
and frustration had driven him to a sexual
assault-something she'd wantonly enjoyed after her
initial fright passed.
She was afraid the act had shamed him. For that she
blamed herself. Gideon had told her Boyle was
married now. She didn't want to risk
embarrassing him.
"It's really only Cheyenne I want to avoid,"
she said. She smiled and stretched the truth. "An
old love affair. He lives there."
"Well, you can be spared. Wyoming's the one place
we don't need to carry the gospel."
In fact the Territory of Wyoming represented the
movement's sole victory in the campaign
to extend the franchise. Wyoming women had been
given the vote almost as soon as the territory was
organized in 1869. Wyoming was also proof that,
contrary to predictions from assorted platforms and
pulpits, the social order didn't collapse the
moment women were admitted to polling places.
"I take it you wouldn't object to going anywhere
else, then?" Lucy concluded.
"Of course not."
"We have one letter at headquarters that came all the
way from California. Two married women asked us
to send someone to address a small group in a new
gold camp. Would you undertake that kind of chore?"
A Western junket meant a long separation from
Carter and Gideon. But it also meant a respite
from harassment. "With pleasure."
"Some of those camps are very rough places,
Julia-n
"I couldn't possibly run into anything worse than
what I've encountered lately," she said, not
realizing she was quite wrong.
"Splendid. We'll sketch out an itinerary tomorrow.
If this junket is successful, perhaps we
can make it an annual affair. Two or three
months each time-the West is fertile territory,
and you can cultivate it more effectively than anyone
else who travels for us. Now, where's that benighted
blarney-thrower who waits on us? I've gotten so
excited, I've worked up a fiendish appetite."
Julia scandalized the waiter by requesting a glass
of Moselle with her fish. Dennis acted as if
she'd violated an eleventh Commandment. When he
served the wine, he muttered something that included the word
"disgraceful."
By now the young man's attitudes had become less
than amusing. With a sweet smile Lucy told him
he was a blithering ass. He stomped off.
Unconcerned, she launched into an account of her
conversion to abolitionism during her college days at
Oberlin. In no time at all they'd finished the
delicious food, and then it was seven-thirty.
"Good heavens," Lucy exclaimed. "We'll be
late to the Howes. And we must pick up Henry and
Alice on the way."
She paid the bill and they went to claim their wraps.
Julia had never met the woman who had penned the
lyric for The Battle Hymn of the Republic after
waking in Washington one morning during the
war and seeing Federal troops drilling on the misty
street outside her hotel. On the few occasions
when she had visited the Association's office,
Julia Ward Howe had been elsewhere. Tonight
Mrs. Howe and her husband Samuel had invited
Julia as weil as Lucy, Mr. Blackwel! and
their adolescent daughter, Alice Stone
Blackwell, to spend an evening at their home.
Mrs. Howe wanted to discuss some new ideas for The
Woman's Journal, the newspaper which the
Association published. Like so many activities of the
organization, the paper continually lost money.
The two women stepped into the chilly air outside the
oyster house. The doorman sent a boy for
Lucy's carriage. Just as Julia started to speak,
movement on the dark sidewalk to her left caught
her attention. She blinked.
"Lucy!"
The warning cry was hardly out of her mouth before she
pushed the older woman, tumbling her to the plank
walk, A big, sharp-cornered brick landed where
they'd been standing.
"Jaysus and Mary," the doorman cried. Down the

way, a man whose features were hidden in
darkness shouted at them:
"Stay out of Scollay Square, ye godless
whores. Take yer perverted ideas somewhere else!"
Julia protected Lucy's body with her own as a
second brick came flying at them. It struck
hard, splintering a plank. The doorman grew
cross as he helped them to their feet:
"You ladies shouldn't come here unescorted. The
manager's told you that time an' again."
"See here, Martin," Lucy snapped as she
brushed her skirt. "Are you blaming us for the actions
of some-was She turned toward the place from which the
bricks had been hurled; the man was gone, "comsome
gutter thug?"
"That's right, I am. Women don't belong out after
dark by themselves. Not unless they want to be taken for a
certain class of female, if you get my meaning."
"I get it and I don't care for it," Lucy
retorted.
"I'm sorry indeed, but that's the way it is,
Miss Black-Mrs. Stone-ah, who the hell
knows what a creature iike you's to be called?"
He went inside, neglecting his duty when the
carriage arrived from the nearby vehicle park.
Julia opened the door for them. Lucy
tipped the boy who'd done the running. He bit the
coin and pocketed it as Julia followed the older
woman inside. When the carriage was moving, Lucy
said:
"That really was astonishing. People here have always been
reasonably tolerant of the movement. This town's
bred and nurtured idealists and eccentrics for
decades. If tolerance should nourish anywhere, it ought
to flourish in Boston. Of course I've had
complaints from the Oyster House about going in alone, but
no trouble like that we just-was
"The man threw bricks because of me," Julia
broke in.
"You mean he was sent by that fellow who dislikes you?"
"If I gambled, I'd put money on it," she
answered with a feeling of despair. Evidently there
was no place that offered her an escape from
Courtleieh. That meant no place offered it
to Gideon, either. "What if one of those bricks had
hit you. Lucy? You could have been seriously
injured-even killed because of me."
The older woman sensed Julia's distraught state
and tried to soothe her.
"No need to be all that melodramatic, my dear.
I could also stroll down India Wharf tomorrow
morning and be killed by an accidental avalanche of
whale oil barrels, or by a spar falling from a tea
ship. But it hasn't happened. The bricks
missed."
"But you just saw one of the reasons I feel I should
resign-was
"Julia Sedgwick, I will not hear more." She
grasped the younger woman's hand and squeezed it. "The
matter's settled. We're going to pick up
Henry and Alice and go on to the Howes. Then you're
going out west for us. In fact you're going to remain
with the Association for as long as you believe in it and the
treasury contains money, to pay your travel
stipend. As for this fellow conspiring against you, we'll
both outlast him. We'll outlast any man who
tries to stuff us in a comer with a sauce pan in one
hand and a baby in the other. The puniest woman is
stronger than any man yet born."
Julia laughed, but she only wished banishing the
problem of Tom Courtleigh were that easy.
Among the Goldhunters
ON A BRIGHT April afternoon in 1876, a
Concord stagecoach drawn by a four-horse hitch
headed toward the narrow, mile-long defile leading
to the new placer mining camps in Deadwood
Gulch. The coach, which was operated by the J. S.
McClintock line, led a procession of eleven
raffish riders who straggled out behind.
For the trip up from the town of Custer some forty miles
south, Julia had been given the place of honor-
the seat next to the driver-the better to see the wild,
beautiful scenery of the Bad Lands: the majestic
rock fornlations; the immense conifers with patches of
un-melted snow surrounding their trunks; the clear,
rushing streams that had yielded up traces of gold.
The gold was bringing new arrivals into this part of the
Dakota Territory every day.
The stage driver, a garrulous old fellow named
Fowler, was able to invite Julia to sit beside him because
there was no shotgun messenger on the trip. Usually
only the outbound coaches were held up, Fowler had
informed her. Inbound coaches carried the hopeful, not
the rich.
This particular McClintock coach was only four
months old, but it already showed signs of wear; this was
harsh country. It was one of the vehicles made by the
Abbot-Downing firm of Concord, New
Hampshire. Julia was quite familiar with travel in
Concords. On her two previous trips west,
she'd ridden in dozens of them. She'd
learned that each stage line decorated its coaches
according to its own taste. The McClintock taste ran
to dark blue on the graceful body, vivid yellow
on wheel hubs, spokes, and trim, and
sentimentalized portraits of Columbia on the
doors.
Julia had come to the Bad Lands on her third
western journey. The initial one, in the spring of
'74, had taken her all the way to California, and
from there back to New York by steamship. Her
second a year later had included a month-long
swing across Texas. She'd grown accustomed to rough
rides on muddy roads, greasy food snatched in
railway depots, and hard beds in noisy
frontier hotels. But from the first, she'd fallen in
love with the grandeur of the West. Lucy Stone never
had to ask twice to have her return.
Oh, she ran into the usual rowdy, sarcastic men.
But never were they as vicious as those who'd harassed her
in the east. In fact, after the '74 excursion, there
were no violent disturbances at any of her
lectures, anywhere. Gideon too reported that
Courtleigh seemed to have forgotten him. He'd either
tired of tormenting them, or was too busy for it.
Welcome as the respite was, Julia
suspected it wouldn't last indefinitely.
The coach rolling toward Deadwood Gulch was
packed. Inside, men jammed the forward, rear and
mid-dJe seats. Three more men sat on top,
clinging to the low guard rails. All the way up from
Custer Julia had endured masculine jokes about
her foolishness in coming to this godforsaken part of the
country. She'd also been forced to parry quotations from
Scripture with which she was tiresomely familiar.
Fowler was the best of the lot as a Bible-quoter.
"You know what it says plain as day in Genesis
three, ma'am. "And thy desire shall be thy
husband, and he shall rule over thee." Now just what have
you got to say about that?"
"Three things, Mr. Fowler. I've heard it at
least five 454
hundred times. Even the Devil can quote
Scripture to suit his needs. Tend to your
driving."
At least he chuckled. The men on top guffawed.
The sky was cloudless, with a warm, dry wind blowing.
A chinook, Fowler called it. The caravan of
mounted travelers who'd been with the coach since
Custer started to move up near the vehicle. That was
fine with the passengers. They hadn't gotten
their fill of goggling at the most celebrated member
of the party, the famous scout, law officer, dime
novel hero and sometime actor, Wild Bill.
It was Bill Hickok who was leading the party of
gold-hunters to the new diggings. Julia didn't
think much of the gunman. She had no admiration for
anyone whose reputation was based solely on the
number of people he'd shot to death.
And that reputation was showing signs of age, she thought;
like the man himself. In this year of the nation's centennial,
Julia was thirty-six. She judged Hickok
to be three or four years older. He still wore his
hair long, and dressed like a dandy, but twice she'd
noticed his hands closing around his reins with arthritic
slowness. And sometimes he squinted. If he wore
spectacles, he hadn't put them on even once
during the trip.
This was not Julia's first look at Hickok.
She'd seen him after her trip in '74-acr the
New York footlights. Gideon had taken her
to Niblo's Garden at Broadway and Prince
Street. There they'd watched Buffalo Bill
Cody perform in a new version of a play called
Scouts of the Plains.
The three-act drama had originally been
created to give the famous scout a vehicle for his
stage debut. His self-appointed publicist,
Ned Buntline, bragged that the show had been written
in four hours. The critics said that fact was
obvious. Julia agreed with their opinions, the most
charitable of which called the play "very poor slop."
But audiences overlooked its flaws and re
sponded enthusiastically to everything from the yelps and
barks of the Indian supernumeraries in war paint and
stylish short pants to the histrionics of
Mademoiselle Morlacchi, the ingenue who
played the Indian girl Dove Eyes-with an
Italian accent.
After a couple of seasons of trouping, Cody had
wooed his old friend Hickok into the cast to pump new
life into the show. The night Julia had seen it,, the
fledgling actor had forgotten many of his lines-no
real loss, since the wretched script required
him to exclaim such things as, "Fear not, fair
maid, you are safe at last with Wild Bill!"
To make up for his nervousness, Hickok had diverted
the audience by throwing one of his revolvers at a
spotlight, and firing blank cartridges so close
to the Indians that they shrieked and danced in genuine
pain.
On this trip, Hickok had displayed no traces
of that fear-induced sadism. In fact he'd
remarked several times that he wished he were back in
Cincinnati, riving unrecognized with his recently
acquired wife. Julia thought the protest rang
false. There was a peacock quality about the man;
he covertly watched others to see whether they were
watching him. He liked being admired, as did his
fellow scout Bill Cody, whom small boys
idolized. Gideon said Cody was a
near-alcoholic, and a notorious womanizer even
though he had a wife and family. Hickok seemed
to have neither of those faults.
The mounted travelers had come together solely for
mutual safety. Some of them knew one another, but
Hickok had several tunes made clear that he
wasn't responsible for the behavior of any of them.
There were a couple of really bizarre characters in the
group. One Julia liked very much-dapper Charles
Utter from Denver. Or Colorado Charlie, as
he'd introduced himself at the first station where the
horses were changed. He was a gambler by profession,
following the latest gold strike. 456
He boasted that he took care of his shoulder-length
blond ringlets with a curling iron borrowed
from his wife.
The one member of the party Julia disliked was a
coarse young woman in her mid-twenties. She was just
now riding up beside Hickok, who was on the left of the
coach. The young woman annoyed Julia with her foul
language and coarse ways.
The girl had a blunt, almost masculine face and
coppery hair which she kept tucked up inside a
crushed and filthy cattleman's hat. She wore
denim trousers, drover's boots and an old
Cavalry jacket with corporal's stripes.
Hickok addressed her as Calamity, never
explaining why. Earlier, she'd tried to make friends
with Julia by stating in a somewhat unique way that she
believed in female freedom.
"I do whatever I goddamn please. I once
lived in a barracks at Fort Laramie just
"cause I took a notion to do it. I was there
three weeks 'fore the officers caught me. I never
go to bed sober, and I'll lie down for anything in
britches so long as the pay's good enough."
Julia did her best to be cordial to Miss
Calamity Cannard, but it was hard; she just wasn't
that broadminded.
Letters continued to come to the Boston
headquarters from remote hamlets. The letters usually
asked for a speaker. Wherever possible, Lucy filled
the requests, and she'd done so this time. The letter bringing
Julia to the Bad Lands had come from a Mrs.
Myrtle Gates, who said she helped her husband
operate a hotel for miners. Julia hoped the
itinerant prostitute who'd attached herself
to Hickok wasn't typical of the audience she'd be
facing in Deadwood City.
One thing lessened her worry about the camp's
roughness: among the riders was a slender chap who
seemed to have taken a fancy to her, though in an
eminently polite way. He was about thirty, with a
thin
mouth and good manners that helped her overlook the
puffiness beneath his dark eyes, the unhealthy pallor of
his cheeks, and the swollen redness of his nose. He was
much too young to be a drunkard but he had most of the
characteristics.
Still, his smile was engaging, even if it was
accompanied by breath that smelled of the gin he kept
hidden somewhere. Julia had never met the man before,
yet there was something familiar about him. He seemed
to be a friend or at least an acquaintance of
Hickok's, though they didn't hobnob
much. He'd told her that he, like Wild Bill and
Colorado Charlie, was a student of the picture
cards. Wandering gambler, she supposed he meant.
The young man had mentioned his name when he'd introduced
himself back near Custer. Unfortunately she'd
forgotten it. But his name wasn't as important as the
brace of revolvers he wore, or the buffalo
rifle he carried in his saddle scabbard. She was
glad of his protective presence; he was just now
jogging up on the right side of the rocking coach.
He pointed ahead into the defile. "Won't be long
now, Miss Sedgwick. I imagine you're tired
of riding."
"I surely am." Her legs and derriere ached.
He took off his loaf-crowned sombrero arid
fanned his forehead. A white streak of hair above his
left eyebrow lent him a rakish look. "Sun's
warm for April. I'm anxious for a bath and a
change of clothes." Unlike Hickok, he was
dressed in worn cowhand's garb. "Might attend
your lecture, too. Never heard someone of your
persuasion speak before. Where's the talk to be given?"
"In the dining room of a hotel called the Miner's
Rest."
"Oh," Fowler said, "that's a grand
establishment, that is." His tone said otherwise.
She was about to question him on it when Hickok, 458
who was leaning out of his saddle to hold a match
to Calamity's cigar, suddenly straightened.
Julia had given up the cigar habit because the
smoke made Carter cough, and he said that anything so
noxious had to be bad for you. He was probably
right.
Hickok raised a hand to indicate half a dozen
motionless figures silhouetted against the sky atop
a rock formation about a half mile away. As
Julia gazed at them, she was aware of Hickok
drawing one of his revolvers.
The watching men stepped backward across the top of the
rock; vanished. But not before Julia had a distinct
impression of feathers jutting from their hair.
Hickok kept his gun drawn while he studied the
shadowy pines on either side of the narrowing road. There
was a hard set to his mouth and a disappointed
expression on his face. Finally he slid his gun
back hi the holster.
"Those were Sioux," said the younger man on Julia's
right. He continued to remind her of someone, though she
couldn't place who it was. He had a soft,
musical voice. Perhaps he'd been born
in the South.
She nodded. "I assumed they were."
From the left, Hickok said, "Going to be war in these
parts. The braves have been getting ready all
winter. I heard Bill Cody's old outfit, the
Fifth Cavalry, may be hauled up here from
Arizona. Genera! Merritt wants Bill
to quit play acting for a while and come back and scout
for him."
"I'm not surprised there's going to be trouble,"
Julia said. "When Genera! Custer marched in here
two years ago, he did so illegally."
Hickok clearly didn't like the statement. She
recalled that he'd served in the Army. Been one of
General Caster's favorite scouts, hi fact.
"Well," he said at length, "the hostiles better
not ask for war because they'll get that and a lot more.
They'll 459
get scorched earth. People are sick of the tribes standing
in the way of progress."
Annoyed, Julia said, "I thought the Sioux were
standing where they're legally entitled to stand. Isn't this
area guaranteed to them by treaty? Isn't it sacred
ground?"
"Yes, indeed," said the young man on the
right. "But gold's a lot more sacred to the white
man."
"You can't stop progress," Hickok insisted.
"Progress or robbery?" she replied. "Last
year the treaty commission offered six million
dollars for all the disputed land up here. Of course
that was hardly a fair price. If there's a
bonanza of gold in the ground, the land might
ultimately be worth ten times as much."
The young man chuckled. "Red Cloud and Little Big
Man and Spotted Tail got so insulted, they
countered with a demand for a hundred million, then
walked out of the powwow. Now the government looks the
other way while prospectors come in-was He
grinned in a cynical way. "As well as those of us
who mine the prospectors."
"No disrespect to either of you gentlemen," Julia
declared, "but I think the government's policy is
muddled and despicable."
"The devil it is, woman!" Hickok growled.
"Let me tell you which land belongs to the white man.
Any land "he needs and can take. That's why the
Army's getting ready for war."
Hickok's attitudes infuriated her, but she
decided it was futile to quarrel. She
turned to the younger man:
"Since we're almost to our destination, I must make
a confession. You've been a very pleasant companion,
but I've completely forgotten your name."
Hickok snickered, then spurred ahead. The young
man reddened. "Jason Kane," he said. He
spelled the surname and stared at her as if expecting
a reaction. Puzzled, she replied:
"Thank you, Mr. Kane. I won't forget a
second time. You remind me of someone, but I
can't-wait." She clapped her gloved hands together.
"It's a friend of mine in New York City."
In a strangely hoarse voice, he repeated,
"New York?"
"That's right. You don't resemble him physically.
But your voices are quite a bit alike. My friend's
a newspaper publisher-was
What in heaven's name was wrong? The young man looked
as if he'd been struck.
"Tell me your friend's name," he whispered.
"It's Kent. Gideon Kent. Do you know him?"
For a moment the young man was too stunned to answer.
Then an opaqueness came into his dark eyes. He
jammed the sugar-loaf hat on his head. Then came
another abrupt and mystifying change: a
touch of sadness in his expression.
It was quickly gone. "No, never heard of him." He
touched his hatbrim and rammed his spurs into the
flanks of his calico, making the horse leap
ahead. He cantered away in front of the coach.
"My," Julia said softly. "First I angered
Mr. Hickok, and now I've offended him. In the
latter case, I don't have the slightest idea
what I did."
Fowler stuck a wedge of tobacco into his cheek.
"I 'spect he was peeved that you forgot his name the first
time. He's just like-was A sly movement of Fowler's
eyes indicated Wild Bill. Lowering his voice,
he went on, "Jason Kane ain't no
Hickok, mind you. In a lot of ways, he's
worse."
"I can't believe that, Mr. Fowler."
"Don't be fooled by those la-de-dah manners.
He can lay it on for the ladies if he wants. But
he's nasty as a rattler when he's riled, and it
don't take much to rile him. He's half
slopped with drink most of the time."
"How do you know so much about him, may I ask?"

"Why, I been hearin" tales for two
or three years. Wild Bill told me about the
drinking. He said Kane downs a glass of spirits with
his morning eggs."
"I see. Hickok told you. That explains a good
deal."
Fowler missed the sarcasm. "I think they used to be
pals, don't you see. But I kinda get the
impression they fell out at one time. Kane may
fool you with his smile- his
If what Fowler said was true, the young man had done
exactly that.
"comb he's killed plenty of men. Plenty." He
shook the lines over the four-horse hitch. "Hahl
Come on, you slowpokes! Let's hurry on
home!"
"Goddamn right, I'm in danger of expiring from
so-briery," the coarse-faced Calamity yelled,
quirting her horse. She too went racing down the
narrow road ahead of the coach, hallooing to announce
the caravan's arrival.
Deadwood Gulch was a long, rock-walled
canyon bordered by a noisy stream. Several mining
camps had been established along the stream.
Julia's destination, Deadwood City, was the
largest. As the coach pulled in behind those
who'd ridden ahead, she quickly surveyed the
camp.* Her face fell. She'd seen many a
raw new town between the Mississippi and the
Pacific. But she'd never set eyes on any
place as appallingly primitive as this.
Deadwood City was a hodgepodge of lean-tos and
tents with a few unpainted pine buildings mixed in,
the whole straggling out in the trampled mud without
observable plan or pattern. The camp's winter
population had been a few hundred. Fowler
claimed there would be twenty or thirty thousand
present by summer's end.
Her first look at the Miner's Rest Hotel showed
her 462
why the coach driver had been sarcastic. The hotel
was not one of the camp's four or five wooden
structures, but a huge canvas tent. A
secondary sign advertised Upstairs Rooms.
Evidently a second floor had been built
into the tent's upper portion.
The Concord creaked to a halt in the mud, right in the
center of the camp. Grubbily dressed men swarmed
around the coach from all sides. They divided their
attention between Hickok, who stayed in the saddle and
basked in his celebrity status, and
Julia, whom the miners apparently presumed to be
a new addition to one of the Gulch brothels. Jason
Kane couldn't protect her; he'd disappeared.
A bearded fellow reached up to squeeze her leg
through her skirt. She boxed his ear. From the left
side of the coach. Calamity shouted:
"Here, mister. You want to feel somethin', make an
arrangement to buy me a drink. That there's the lady
who come in to give a speech tonight."
"The suffrage lady?" yelled another man in the
boisterous crowd. "Oh, boy. Lute Sims has
a real fine reception waitin' for you, woman."
"Who's Lute Sims?" Julia called, but the
man wouldn't answer.
She uttered a short, impatient sigh, hoisted her
skirts and climbed down the wheel with an assist from
Charlie Utter. Pistols visible beneath his frock
coat kept merriment over his curls at a
minimum.
"Let me help you with your valise, Miss
Sedgwick," he said. "So you make it to the hotel
safely."
"But it's only just over there, Mr. Utter."
"Yes, but I hear this is a rough camp." As if
to punctuate the point, a shotgun boomed
somewhere along the stream behind the tents and buildings.
Julia looked around while Utter claimed her
valise from the coach boot. She said, "Someone was
supposed to meet me."
"Must have gotten delayed."
Frowning a little, she thanked Fowler for letting her
ride beside him, then took the gambler's arm. Most
of the other miners had formed a circle around Wild
Bill, who'd dismounted and was absently stroking his
long hair as he announced that he'd be happy to have
someone stand him to a drink. And could anyone tell him
the best place to gamble?
As Julia and Colorado Charlie labored through the
mud to the tent hotel, she noticed a second tent
standing ten yards behind the main one. A sign on the
rear tent read, Miner's Rest Dining Room. So
that was where she'd be. speaking. Good Lord.
But where was the woman who'd written to Boston?
Julia had clearly stated her day and time of
arrival in a letter sent weeks ago. She was beginning
to feel this part of her tour was hexed.
Colorado Charlie lifted the front flap of the
big tent. He put Julia's valise inside and
bid her good day. A stout, gray-haired woman
with a mole-dotted face stood behind a lobby
counter consisting of a plank laid across two barrels.
The woman eyed Julia with an expression close
to dread.
Trying to act unconcerned about the decidedly
strange reception, Julia walked past a
shaky-looking stair to the second level. The
gray-haired woman began twisting her apron.
Though it was still daylight, the tent's interior was dim,
and it took proximity to the counter and a lantern
hanging from the low wooden ceiling to finally show Julia
there were tears hi the woman's eyes. Instantly,
she curbed her annoyance.
"Mrs. Dates?"
"Oh-oh, yes, ma'arn, I'm Myrtle
Gates. And I know you're Miss Sedgwick. I
heard the coach pull in. I was too ashamed
to meet it. Your lecture's got to be canceled."
"Canceled?" As kindly as she could, she went on.

"I've come a hundred and fifty miles out of my
way to speak here. Why in the world would you want to cancel
the moment I arrive? Don't you expect anyone
to show up?"
"Oh, yes, we'd have an audience," Mrs.
Gates nodded. "Six or
seven-uh-ordinary ladies, and a bunch more of the
chippies."
"That's all right with me," Julia said, struggling
to keep a snappish tone out of her voice. Something
was frightening the gray-haired woman. "The
Association doesn't draw moral distinctions between
its various sisters. Others may. but not-was
"You don't understand. I found out there'll be men showin'
up."
"That isn't a problem." "Men showin' up to cause
a muss!" Courtleigh's name flashed into her mind.
She laughed silently at the reaction. It was
preposterous; his reach wasn't that long, nor his
interest in her that consuming these days.
"Don't worry, Mrs. Oates, it happens
frequently. I've been mobbed, punched, showered with
rotten fruit, had an audience of eight hundred
stampeded by firecrackers, another one panicked
by chemical smoke-if a possible disruption is all
you're fretting about, we must certainly go ahead. I
won't be offended if there's trouble, and I'm sure
I can deal with a few rowdy miners," The woman
lowered her head. Whispered: "One of them's liable
to be worse than rowdy." "Who is that?"
"A terrible, vile-tempered man named
Lute Sims." Julia recalled hearing the name
shouted just after the stage stopped. "Back in Ohio his
wife got hold of a pamphlet by one of the leaders of
your movement, I don't rightly know which lady. But
after Lute's wife read it, she ran off and I
guess that affected him pretty bad. In his head,
I mean."
The tired, red-knuckled woman looked close
to breaking down. "What I'm trying to tell you,
Miss Sedgwick-while I apologize to you in the
humblest way I know-is that I'm scared to death for you
to speak in Deadwood City. For three days Lute
Sims has been going up and down the Gulch telling
everyone he'll cause trouble if you show your face.
Real trouble. He's been saying he'll hurt you.
We've no law here yet. And Lute's the type
who doesn't just jaw. He'll do what he says.
He's a crazy man."
Julia shivered. It might be wise to heed the warning
and-
No. That would make the entire side trip to the
Bad Lands a waste of time and the Association's
money. It would be cowardly to boot. She'd be
hanged if she'd retreat.
She fried to reassure Mrs. Gates
with a smile.
"I'll bet this Sims won't even appear.
He's probably nothing more than a braggart."
"Miss Sedgwick, you don't know-was The woman's
attempted protest was feeble.
"We'll conduct the meeting even if he does
attend. Even if he shows up armed to the teeth."
"Miss Sedgwick-to "
"I am going to conduct the meeting, Mrs. Gates.
I can deal with troublemakers. Nothing will happen-to
me or anyone else."
But her stomach suddenly hurt as she said it.
Death in Deadwood
THE MEETING WENT far better than Julia
expected-at least for the first half hour.
Myrtle Gates' husband had moved the tables out
of the dining tent and rearranged the benches auditorium
style. Then he'd rolled up the tent's canvas
sides and tied them, so the audience could enjoy the
spring breeze blowing along the Gulch. Gates was
a huge, docile man who dutifully posted himself
outside the tent to check on each new arrival. The
one he was waiting to intercept, Sims, hadn't shown
up by the time Julia rose and began her lecture.
She'd wanted Mrs. Gates
to introduce her but the older woman was too nervous.
Julia's audience consisted of fifteen women and the
same number of men. Oates had relieved one of the
miners of a quart of forty rod, and his wife had shushed
two of the prostitutes who wouldn't quiet down
voluntarily; there were nine such women present, all
young, all homely, and all dressed in their best
gowns. Neither the girls nor the miner caused any
serious trouble. Julia spoke from behind one of the dining
tables, on the side of the tent nearest the stream.
Four lanterns lit the airy enclosure. And although
the men smirked at her, and nudged one another, they
paid attention.
As usual, she began with a brief history of the
movement in the United States. She spent a few
moments on the careers of Margaret Fuller and
Fanny Wright, then moved on to the first woman's
rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York, in
1848. She came eventually to
the work of Susan Anthony, Elizabeth Stanton
and Lucy Stone.
Her eyes sparkled as she launched into the story of
Lucy's birth. She was always nervous at the start
of a lecture, and had been tonight. But the feared
interruption by Mr. Sims hadn't
materialized, and she was beginning to feel increasingly
sure of herself because she had attentive listeners. The
women genuinely wanted to hear her message. The
men were content to scoff in silence while they gazed at
a fancified Eastern woman. On her trips
west, Julia had learned that it paid for her
to lecture in her best dress and a fancy hairdo.
It helped keep the men distracted.
"comand from that time forward," she said as she finished the
story about Lucy, "the lady who has been called
the morning star of the women's movement has dedicated
her life to the fight to free the one class in this
country still truly enslaved."
"Oh, jeez, come on," one of the miners groaned.
Some of the ladies shushed him but he paid no attention.
"My old woman don't feel she's enslaved,
Miz Sedgwick."
Julia smiled. "Is she here to verify that
statement?"
"No, she's back home in Missouri, waitin'
for me to hit the pay dirt."
"Maybe she's never told you how she feels. Have
you bothered to ask?"
"Ain't necessary. I already know she's content to do
woman's work. Care for the cabin. Plow our
acreage. Raise our eight boys-I know that
satisfies her."
"It does?" Julia seized the unexpected
opportunity to use one of Elizabeth Stanton's
best rejoinders. "What a pity. I never met a
man worth repeating eight times."
Loud laughter--from all except the miner who'd
interrupted. But even he had a grudging smile after
a moment. Julia was about to resume when she heard
boots plopping in the mud on the far side of the tent

Standing guard back there, Mr. Dates turned
toward the noise. Myrtle Gates, seated on one
of the front benches, craned to see. Julia drew
a tense breath. Was Sims showing up at last?
She was startled when the new arrival came strolling
out of the dark. It was Jason Kane.
He was hatless, freshly barbered, and wearing clean
gray trousers, a bottle-green frock coat, a
linen shirt and flowing cravat. A bulge under the
coat showed he'd brought at least one revolver.
He saluted her with a small wave, and smiled a rather
bleary smile. He headed for a seat at the back but
stumbled over the bench before sitting down. Evidently
he'd gotten over his pique about not being
recognized; perhaps spirits had helped him.
She smiled to acknowledge his presence, but she
wasn't sure he saw, because his eyes closed
briefly. When they came open, it seemed to take
him a moment to focus them.
She continued her presentation with some comments on
antiquated state laws which permitted husbands
to assume virtually complete legal dominance over
their wives. She described the difficulties
women faced in obtaining divorces from brutal
spouses. "The situation is only slightly better
in Ndw York State, where certain amendments
to-was
She stopped. Heads were turning to the left. A
yellow-haired chippy in an orange silk dress
tugged her companion's arm. The second girl's
rouged mouth rounded into a startled O. All at once
Julia saw the cause of the concerned expressions.
Outside the tent, a man had planted himself at the
edge of the lamplight. A short, thin, undernourished
miner in stained gray work shirt and jeans pants
stippled with mud. He had thin brown hair lying
close to a balding scalp, bad teeth, and needed a
shave. He held a shotgun hi hands that were none
too steady.
Myrtle Gates' husband jumped to his feet at
the back of the tent. The miner pivoted to glare.
Julia's palms turned cold.
Like everyone else, Gates saw that the new arrival
was seething. After a moment's hesitation, he tried
to do something about it, though his voice was none too
strong.
"Lute, you're not welcome here when you're in such a
state. Point that scattergun at the ground before it
goes off. Then go home."
Sims ignored him. He gave Julia a
venomous stare, "This meeting's over."
He was about fifty, she judged. A worn-out man.
She felt sorry for him. Yet she couldn't permit
him to take control.
She glanced at the shotgun. How much resistance
did she dare offer? No way to tell. And she
wasn't the only person who could be hurt if he
started shooting. She didn't want to be
responsible for a massacre.
She was uncomfortably aware of heads turning back
her way to see what she would do.
A moment later Julia addressed Lute Sims
in a firm but polite voice.
"No, the meeting is not over. You're
welcome to find a seat and listen to the rest of it."
The man's stubbled face wrenched with rage. He
swept the audience with the shotgun, jerking it from left
to right in a menacing arc. One of the chippies shrieked
softly and clutched her ears.
"Lute, for God's sake put that thing down!"
Gates pleaded. "If your finger gets a mite
nervous, someone could be mortally injured."
Again the embittered, rheum-tilled eyes sought
Julia. 470
"That's exactly what'll happen unless this sinful
affair's brought to a halt." A couple of miners
ducked when Sims brandished the shotgun again. "Go
back to the hotel, woman. Go back to the East with
your wicked, deceiving gospel."
A fanatic, Julia thought. He angered her
unreasonably, as fanatical men always did.
Despite the risks of the situation, she spoke out:
"Nonsense, Mr. Sims. I've heard about you.
I don't intend to let your threats stop me from
talking to these ladies and gentlemen. I've never
liked boors or bullies, and you're both. Now
sit down or leave!"
Sims' tired, ugly eyes reflected the flame
of a lamp. "Hell I will. If you know about
me, I guess you know what happened to my missus
back in Ohio. She read one of your damn
sermonettes-was
"Not mine, sir. I don't write pamphlets."
"Then it was written by one of your scarlet sisters-
you're all the same. My Carrie read it, and it
gave her crazy ideas. Damn shame her pa
permitted her to learn readin' at all. She took
every sinful, blasphemous word to heart and one night just
up and ran away."
"I can certainly understand why."
Several people snickered. Julia instantly
regretted the sally. Sims' glower became even more
ferocious.
"You shut up!" Spittle flew from his lips.
"You're through talking here tonight. It's because of the notions
of people like you that my Carrie ran off. She thought she
had to be free. Thought she had to be equal to a
man, for Lord's sake. Even thought she should have the right
to vote for presidents, can you believe that?"
She'd seldom been so infuriated by an
antagonist. She shot back, "I not only
believe it, I agree."
The miners applauded and whistled, enjoying themselves at
Suns' expense. Julia knew she should
walk out 471
of the tent to prevent the situation from getting worse.
Before she could, Sims screamed at her.
"You're just spoutin' a lot of damn godless shitl"
Silence.
The breeze snapped a piece of tent canvas
back and forth. The respectable women looked ready
to faint. Gates took a step forward, eyes on the
shotgun. Julia was growing frightened. Hoping to force
Sims to strain to hear her, and thereby distract him,
she pitched her voice very low.
"Mr. Sims, I don't believe further argument
would serve any purpose."
Where was Kane? Evidently he'd slipped out of the
tent some time ago, unnoticed. Perhaps he'd been
bored. She wished he were still there. Her knees
trembled under her petticoats as she continued in a
near-whisper.
"I don't think I can change your mind about-was
"Anything!" he cried. "The Bible says a
woman's supposed to submit to her husband!"
"Yes, I'm familiar with that shopworn-that
argument."
Restraint did no good. Sims fulminated at the
audience:
"Why are you listening to her? Can't you tell what she
is? She's one of that free love crowd." He
jabbed the gun in her direction. The violent motion
made her start. "Isn't that right? Don't you
believe in free love too?"
"Mr. Sims," she said, "the Bible states that the
essence of God is love-was She tried to signal
Gates with her eyes, to urge him to get behind the miner
and attempt to disarm him while she kept his attention
diverted. Gates was too upset to understand the
signal. His eye remained on Sims' trigger
hand.
"comand I don't believe in a woman giving herself
away like a piece of cheap yard goods. But if two
peo-472
pie love one another, I see no reason why they
require a piece of paper contrived not in heaven but
on earth just to sanction-was
"You're a whore!" Sims screamed,
triumphant. Myrtle Gates lowered her head and
sobbed into her hands. "A whore preaching a whore's
doctrine'"
Terrified, Julia realized that her attempt
to create a diversion had only enraged Sims to the
point of total irrationality. Something
close to glee shone in his eyes. He licked wet
lips and went on, "I knew that. But I wanted you
to admit it."
The shotgun came up, leveling at her stomach.
Men and women dived for the dirt floor.
"coms I'd have justification for blowing you to-was
"Shut up and turn around, you son of a bitch," said
a voice from the dark behind him.
ru
For a moment Lute Sims acted confused, as if he
couldn't believe he'd heard correctly. Then the
voice sounded again, pleasant yet with a hard edge
to it:
"I said turn around. You've annoyed these good people
long enough."
Slowly Sims pivoted, straining to see into the
darkness. By then Julia had recognized the voice.
Jason Kane took two steps forward, into the
light.
His right hand held back the side of his coat so the
butt of his revolver was in the open. Kane hadn't
left out of boredom, she realized, but because Sims
had shown up and he wanted to get around behind the
miner-exactly as she'd hoped Gates would do.
She was immensely thankful, then
abruptly disturbed by the amusement in Kane's dark
eyes. His body was tensed; hunched slightly
forward. And by contrast, Sims no longer looked
menacing, just scrawny and pathetic. He even seemed
to handle the shotgun clumsily, as if he
were unfamiliar with it. He tried to intimidate the
younger man:
"Who the hell are you?"
"Name's Jason Kane."
Several of the miners and chippies obviously knew the
name. So did Suns. He nearly dropped the
shotgun. His Adam's apple bobbed and sweat
broke out on his forehead despite the breeze. As
soon as Kane reached out and disarmed him, the danger
would be ov-
Julia's hand flew to her mouth. Kane's right hand
was moving with fluid grace toward the ivory grip of
his bolstered gun. Sims gaped, fumbled with the
shotgun and stained the crotch of his jeans pants all
at the same time.
"I want you to remember the name when they ask who
sent you to hell," Kane smiled, the revolver out and
aimed from the hip.
The shot missed.
Sims yelped and dropped his shotgun into the
mud. Kane's face contorted with anger. Sims
ran. Two staggering strides. Three.
His face almost as maniacal as his victim's,
Kane shot.
Shot again.
Again.
Sims shrieked, lurching to the left, then to the right as
the bullets hit. Kane's revolver Vept
roaring. Finally Sims fell face first, a torrent
of blood pouring from the holes in the back of his work
shirt.
Jason Kane lowered the revolver. His hand was
shaking. His eyes had a peculiar glint. It
faded, and the cruel set of his mouth softened. He
took one deep breath and looked around, waiting for the
crowd to come to him with congratulations.
He was disappointed. Perhaps it would have been different
if his first shot had hit the mark. But the miners and the
women were subdued by the sight of Sims' corpse with
four wounds in its back. The people left the tent in
silence, and passed Kane without so much as a word.
Only Gates went to his side, stepping on
Suns' shotgun and then his outstretched arm, half
submerging both in the mud as he pumped the young
man's hand.
Men streamed from the street, drawn by the noise of the
fusillade. Myrtle Dates was the last to gain
her feet. She dried her eyes with the worn lace
at the wrist of her gown, then extended her hand
to Julia by way of apology. But Julia was
hurrying toward Kane. When he saw her coming, he
shoved Oates aside to be ready to receive a
compliment.
He failed to get it:
"I don't mean to sound ungrateful, Mr.
Kane, and I suppose I will. We do owe you our
thanks for stepping in when you did. There's no telling
what that man would have done with that shotgun-was
"Quite right. Miss Sedgwick." He sounded testy;
he saw no friendliness in her eyes.
"But he was beaten. He was running. You didn't
need to shoot him in the back, did you?"
She was shocked at the way he shrugged and said, "He
was worthless. Besides, I enjoyed it."
She could smell the gin on him. And something worse.
Corruption. He had no comprehension of what
heeawas saying,
"Enjoyed if How is thai possible? were you angry
because your first shot missed?"
From his sudden scowl, she knew she'd
inadvertently struck the truth. She retreated a
step, fearful he might take his hand "o her.
Or his revolver.
Fear-that must be why he'd done it, she thought 475
Kane had a reputation similar to Hickok's.
Missing an easy target would probably be frightening
to him. Might make him wonder whether his prowess was
fading. Might goad him to prove it wasn't.
Still, that couldn't justify cruelty. And she didn't
care for the way he'd reacted to what she said.
"Don't look so contemptuous. Mr. Kane.
I'm not the one who did the shooting. What kind of
man are you?"
Red-faced, he said, "Obviously not the kind who's
good enough to be a friend of yours. I hoped we might get
better acquainted. I had some questions I wanted
to ask about-about conditions in the East. I won't
waste my time. Good night. Miss Sedgwick."
He spun away, waving and shouting, "I'll buy the
first round!"
A crowd of miners surrounded Sims" corpse.
At first none of them responded to Kane's offer.
Finally, one man with the look of a derelict separated
from the others and tagged along, a sycophantic grin
on his face.
"Sure enough. Mr. K., sure enough-it'll be my
pleasure to join you."
In the crowd around the corpse, someone muttered,
"Leroy drinks with anybody."
Julia didn't know which of her emotions was the more
powerful-the loathing she felt for Kane as he
swaggered off with the shabby man; or the pity. How could
someone ever take pleasure in killing? How could a
man bring himself to shoot an unarmed man in the back?
Slowly, the miners and the chippies and the merchants'
wives straggled away. Gates began to extinguish
the lamps in the dining tent. Canvas snapped in the
night wind, like echoes of Kane's revolver.
Through a break in the crowd. Julia saw him glance
back at her. A scathing glance at first. Then it
softened and, for a moment, grew sad. He faced
away again. Clapping his arm over the shoulders of the
derelict, he
vanished out beyond the Miner's Rest. That was the last time
she saw him in Deadwood City.
Gates attended to the removal and burial of
Sims' body. The following evening Julia
repeated her lecture for a larger audience, completing
it without incident. The women and a few men who'd come
in from other camps along the Gulch listened
politely, and gave her a solid round of
applause at the end.
Next morning she descended from her canvas-walled
cubicle on the second floor of the Miner's
Rest, said goodbye to the owner, and departed on the
regularly scheduled southbound stage. Just before she
took her seat in the Concord, she heard the driver
say to his shotgun messenger:
"comthe drink's besotted him, Joe. They say he
missed with that first bullet, and then shot his victim the
coward's way. If it's true, Jason Kane
ain't the man he once was."
As the coach got underway, she couldn't get the
killing comor Kane-out of her thoughts. Kane's
voice bore an uncanny resemblance
to Gideon's, but that was merely a distracting
coincidence. What preoccupied her-angered her-was
Kane's character, and her own failure to read it
correctly. She felt deceived; defrauded by his
initial politeness and seeming gentility.
True, old Fowler had warned her all that was a
sham. How right he'd been. She'd never seen
anything so callous as the shooting of Lute Sims,
unless it was Kane's behavior afterward.
The anger faded at last, once more
replaced by pity. The coach rolled on toward
Custer, passing majestic stands of sweet-smelling
pine. She saw only Kane's white-streaked
hair. Dark, sad eyes. Cruel mouth.
The civilizing tide of settlers, schools,
churches, stores, town councils, and police
forces was sweeping 477
westward with great speed. She'd seen that on her
three journeys. Soon even freewheeling camps
like Deadwood City would disappear, and the men who
populated them-the parasitical men who contributed
nothing, built nothing-would have no haven except the
big city slums. Is that where a Jason Kane
would ultimately go?
And what could a man of his stamp look forward
to except having his own life cut short as brutally
as he'd ended that of the miner? What did the Bible
say? Live by the sword, perish by the sword.
An almost occult feeling gripped her for a moment.
It was as if she knew that the end of Kane's life
had already been ordained.
She wondered whether he knew it. He struck her
as unredeemable. Unworthy of compassion. Yet she
couldn't be completely unforgiving. She hoped he
didn't sense what was waiting for him. A
man's awareness of his own, inevitable movement toward
a violent death would, in itself, be a destructive
force in his life. And worse punishment for his sins
than anything a court of law could devise.
Thank God, Kane only reminded her of
Gideon in a superficial way. It would have been
unbearable for someone as humane as Gideon to have a
doomed brute like that for a brother.
CHAPTER DC
House of Anger
IN NEW YORK, that spring began as a
particularly exciting one for Gideon. There was an
important family celebration
to anticipate-Eleanor's birthday on May
thirty-first. He could also look for
ward to being with Julia again; sometime during May, she
was due back from her Western tour.
And beyond those personal considerations lay a public
one. It was the spring of the Centennial.
Despite the gloom generated by recent events, the
nation's one hundredth birthday seemed to infuse the
country with a new sense of pride and confidence.
Virtually every citizen who could afford it planned
to attend the great Centennial Exhibition in
Philadelphia. President Grant was
scheduled to open the exhibition on the tenth of May.
In Gideon's view, enthusiasm over the
exhibition, and over the celebration itself, would help
to offset the widespread disillusionment which had been
chiefly caused by those in'and around the Federal
government. If many of the nation's leaders had failed
to live up to the standards of honorable conduct envisioned
by the founding fathers-and they had-at least the standards themselves
had survived; that was one encouraging message of the
Centennial.
Grant's aura of heroism had failed to carry him
successfully through two terms. The man himself
remained relatively untainted by the assorted
disasters and scandals of the past seven years. But his
once-lauded talent for administration, and for selection
of first rate subordinates, had been proved a
myth. His powers of judgment had been found wanting
again and again.
The attempted '69 gold corner and the Credit
Mobilier scandal of '72 had been followed by the
Whiskey Ring revelations of '75. Two hundred
and thirty-eight people-distillers and bureaucrats
including Grant's own personal secretary,
General Orville Babcock-had been indicted
on charges of conspiring to defraud the
government of alcohol tax revenues.
The current year had brought another bombshell- the
discovery that Secretary of War Belknap had been
taking bribes in return for awarding trading post
fran-479
chises in the Indian Territory. Belknap had
been impeached in the House on the second of March
and had resigned on the same day to avoid trial in
the Senate.
All in all, the President's tenure had been
marked by unprecedented corruption. Gideon
suspected the former general might be enshrined, if that
was the word, as the worst chief executive to date,
even though few ever claimed he was personally
responsible for anything but his own blindness to the cupidity
around him.
Gideon believed Americans wanted
to celebrate the Centennial not only as an
antidote for the corruption in Washington, but for the
country's continuing economic woes, "The panic of
'73 touched off by the collapse of Cooke's had
spread into the worst depression in American
history. People who had managed to hold onto their
jobs had now returned to a reasonably good standard
of living. But at least a million men were
still unemployed. And millions more existed on
starvation wages as employers ruthlessly cut costs
to keep the doors of factories and offices open.
Only on the farms was there any prosperity.
In the cities, hard times had revealed-and swollen
coma dark, diseased underbelly of society. Month after
month, thievery and murder increased in every major
population center as unemployed men resorted
to crime to keep their families from starving. The
slums grew increasingly restive. They were spawning
a new and vicious phenomenon-gangs of
adolescent criminals who roamed at night,
searching for victims to rob or terrorize. New
York's worst youth gangs were the Forty Little
Thieves and the Baxter Street Dudes.
In the open country between the overcrowded cities,
unemployed men roamed the roads in search of work
at any wage. Those who lived in remote areas
locked their doors after dark, for like their urban
cousins, rural dwellers saw a potential
danger in the tramps, as the wandering workers had been
christened.

tfTi
What bothered Gideon most, perhaps, was the
havoc the depression had caused in the labor
movement. All the trade and craft unions together
barely had fifty thousand members left.
Competition for a shrinking supply of jobs had
destroyed union solidarity and, very nearly, the
movement itself.
Protectionist organizations such as the Knights of
Still Crispin had been swept away. So had all
attempts to improve the relationship between owners and
workers. There had been a notable one in '74. Mark
Hanna, an enlightened owner of a bituminous coal
mine out in Ohio, had realized it was far more
productive to sit down and struggle for an
agreement with his workers than to refuse to negotiate,
and thereby pave the way for strikes, violence and
shutdowns that produced neither coal nor pay
envelopes. Hanna had persuaded his fellow mine
owners in the Tuscarawas Valley to join him at the
conference table. But the negotiations had taken a turn
he didn't expect. The other owners voted
to reduce the miners' pay. And that was the end of a
brilliant idea.
The union movement had received another devastating
blow because of the Molly Maguires. The secret,
pro-labor society operated in the
Pennsylvania anthracite regions. It was
supposedly an offshoot of Ireland's Ancient
Order of Hibernians, the organization which had fought
so hard against the British landlords. In
Pennsylvania, the Mollies had been accused of
everything from bearing up mine owners to dynamiting the
mines themselves. No one was ever sure how many acts of
terror members of the Mollies were responsible for,
but the society's reputation loomed larger than the
facts. People everywhere shuddered when they spoke of the
"murderous Molly Maguires." After a
turbulent strike hi late '74, the
Pennsylvania mine owners decided the Mollies
had to be rooted out and destroyed. 481
The instrument was at hand in the form of a private
agency run by Allan Pinkerton. Its purpose
was to provide "industrial protection" for
businessmen. The term was really a code for
organized spying and antiunion terrorism, with
Pinkerton supplying the thugs and undercover
operatives. He selected his best agent, an
Irish Catholic named James McParlan, to go
into the coal fields under an assumed name and
infiltrate the Mollies.
On McParlan's evidence, twenty-four
alleged Mollies had been arrested and indicted.
The Union reporter who covered the trial was no
partisan of the labor movement. But even he said
McParlan's testimony linking the defendants
to acts of terrorism and, at the same time, to the
secret society, was flimsy and unsupported.
That didn't prevent guilty verdicts-or the
hanging of ten of the defendants. There was serious
doubt that all of them were guilty, but even if they
were, they'd been convicted on slim evidence. Such
cavalier justice enraged Gideon, and he said so
in an editorial.
The editorial was clearly counter to the mood of the
times, however. The night after the piece ran, the
Union's office was stoned. And a couple of days
later, at one of the clubs to which Gideon belonged,
he bumped into Charles Dana of the Sun. Dana was
just going in to dinner with two other members. He
paused long enough to say gruffly:
"Read your editorial on the Mollies. Fine
prose but a false premise. Dynamite throwers
don't really deserve justice, do they? Reading
what you wrote, a person might suppose you'd
sold your stock in your paper and joined the
anarchists."
The implication that Gideon was a traitor to the
class of men who owned newspapers stung and
depressed him for days afterward.
Yes, the last few years had indeed been troubled and

disillusioning. Yet as Gideon examined
America's past and speculated about its future,
he saw many bright aspects, not the least of which was the
essential honesty, decency and common sense he
found hi most ordinary citizens.
Again and again, he wished he could also find some tangible
way to express his positive feelings about
America. His faith in the worth of the principles
on which it was founded; his belief in the goodness of most of
its people; his confidence in its future despite the
turmoil of the immediate past.
He wrote a Centennial editorial on the
subject, but it wasn't one of his better efforts,
and it didn't satisfy his craving. He asked
Payne for ideas, but since Payne didn't know
precisely what he was after, the editor could be of little
help.
Well, Gideon didn't know what he was after either-
except that he wanted a way to make a positive
and personal statement about his homeland. Good
ideas about how to do it continued to elude him as the spring
wore on.
By age thirty-three, Gideon had acquired a
few gray hairs at each temple and a reputation
as one of the rising talents on Park Row. As the
encounter with Dana had shown, his fellow owners
disapproved of his loyalty to the labor movement. But
no one denied that Theophilus Payne had taught
him the trade, and done it well.
Working in tandem with Payne, Gideon had slowly
begun to exert a stronger and more personal influence
over the Union. When asked whether his paper
supported the Republicans or the Democrats,
he liked to answer, "Sometimes one, sometimes the other,
but we
always support those who have nobody else to support
them." Daphnis Miller and Sime Strelnik were
usually in his mind when he made the remark.
The Union's masthead now showed him to be the
publisher, and he occupied a cubicle next
to Payne's. He supervised newsroom policy,
watched over the paper's financial condition, wrote
editorials and from time to time traveled out of town
to cover a key story and, not coincidentally, meet
Julia.
During the past year, he and Payne had begun
experimenting with the paper's makeup. They had tried
expanding the headline area of important stories
to two or even three columns. That wouldn't have been
possible in the days when the actual type went on the
press in a curved form. Then, the individual
columns had to be held in place by vertical
rules. But stereotyping, a process borrowed from the
book industry, replaced the form with a solid metal
plate which reproduced the type exactly. With the
vertical rules gone, stories could be expanded beyond
one column just as advertisements had been.
Illustration was becoming more important on daily
papers. The Union began to run two or three
pictures a week, each drawn by the staff news
artist. To supervise production of the pictures
Gideon hired a Frenchman who had experience with the
zincograph process perfected in Paris hi the
late fifties. Line cuts, acid-etched on
metal, were much faster to prepare than the older wood
engravings which had to be laboriously hand carved.
Wood cuts remained better suited to the
illustrated weeklies which had longer deadlines.
In the matter of news policy, Gideon had a
reputation for being much more of a radical than
he actually was. Despite tiresome jokes about
the name of the paper, he hadn't turned it into a labor
sheet. Certainly his sympathies still lay with the
movement. But guided by
Payne, he had begun to see that all causes, from
the eight hour day to female suffrage to matters of
political partisanship, had to be subordinated
to a newspaper's one supreme cause-the pursuit
of truth.
Of course he retained a certain inevitable interest
in railroads, and a bias against railroad owners,
perhaps the most powerful class of industrialists in the
country. He hadn't seen Thomas Courtleigh
since 1871, and had long since stopped worrying
about the man's threats. He wasn't even sure the
harassment of late '71 could be laid at
Courtleigh's door; there had been no repeat
incidents.
Gideon continued to live in the mansion at
Sixty-first and Fifth Avenue only because his children
lived there. Will was now a stocky, brown-haired and rather
phlegmatic boy of seven. He struck Gideon
as timid; unwilling to try anything new for fear
he'd upset his mother, with whom he spent most of his
time. On Sundays, Gideon took his
son on jaunts into the country or down to the piers.
But a father was no substitute for an older brother with
whom a boy could exchange confidences, and Gideon
knew it.
Eleanor was his pride. She would be fourteen on her
birthday. Her figure was filling out, and many people
mistook her for a girl of eighteen or nineteen.
She was enrolled in Miss Holsham's Academy
for Young Ladies, Margaret's insisted-upon
alternative to a public school, but she despised
it.
Further, she had taken a fancy to things
theatrical. She'd been in a playhouse only
once, four years before. Gideon had taken her.
From that time on, Margaret had raised objections about
the godlessness of the theater -- another of the peculiar
ideals generated by her drinking.
To keep peace, Gideon bowed to her wishes and never
again invited his daughter to a play. But there continued
to be friction on the subject. Eleanor's
slight485
est reference to it would send Margaret into a tirade.
Her daughter would have nothing to do with the theater! She'd
better resign herself to accepting the traditional
role of wife and mother! She was to prepare for
it by enrolling in Vassar Female College in
Poughkeepsie at the proper time. Eleanor stated
just as firmly that she would not. There the impasse
rested.
Gideon's reaction to Eleanor's interest was
ambiguous. He was not particularly scandalized by the
Bohemianism of actors and actresses-but he
did not want a child of his, especially a daughter,
drawn into that kind of life. Once when he tried
to express his confusion to Theo Payne, the editor
laughed and said he understood perfectly:
"Men worry about daughters more than they worry about
sons. It's the nature of the creature, I think.
Being father to a growing girl, and wondering what sly
seducer lurks in your parlor, turns any man
into a conservative. I speak from experience thrice
over."
So while Gideon never would have denied Eleanor
permission to attend a matinee if Margaret had
agreed, something in him feared her developing passion
for plays.
Gideon and Margaret hadn't slept in the same
bedroom, or done more than touch in a perfunctory'
way, for nearly five years. Lately he'd even
started to think Will and Eleanor were growing
less fond of him. Less demonstrative. He
wondered whether Margaret had a hand in that.
Sometimes he considered his suspicions despicable as
well as farfetched. At other times he didn't.
His wife hardly resembled the girl he'd courted
and wed in Richmond. She had put on thirty
pounds, seldom wore anything except the plainest
of dresses, left the house only when
absolutely necessary, had no friends, and-most annoying
of all-refused to keep her hair neat. He
didn't exactly know why that outraged him, but it
did. 486
Perhaps it was because it called attention to her slatternly
state.
Repeatedly, he had urged her to see their
physician and ask him to help cure the drinking that
had now become an integral part of her life-and her
means of flight from its problems. Repeatedly,
Margaret denied she drank to excess, though she could
no longer claim she didn't drink at all. Her
erratic step, slurred speech, and occasional
outbursts of bizarre thinking were evident to all those in
the household. Even the children.
Gideon continued to feel responsible for her state.
Sometimes he wished he could give in to her
demands. Could leave the Union and become a
business dilettante, uninvolved and unconcerned
about the world. It was what she wanted as proof that she was
the dominant partner. It was the one thing he could not
give.
He didn't know whether she suspected his liaison
with Julia. He did his utmost to keep it
secret. He no longer loved Margaret, but he
couldn't bring himself to hurt her intentionally. She needed
no one's help hi order to suffer, he often thought
sadly.
But he saw Julia as frequently as possible.
In April of that year a new and disturbing element
intruded into Gideon and Margaret's relationship.
It first mpflifested itself one evening at dinner. He
was home, seated under the gaslights at one end of their
enormously long dining room table. Margaret was at
the other end. Spring rain tapped the windows
overlooking Sixty-first Street, to their right. In a
few minutes Gideon pferraed to o drive hack
to the papei and finish an editorial objecting to the
government's de facto theft, of the Indian treaty
laac-s in tbs. Dakota Territory.
lie sipped at the Jieatiy red Bordeaux which
Matt ordered for husi, .-.-disd shipped
rr-distrri London in case lots. Mdditt's
fcuii'Lcys of American lift;, done from
memory, were finding their way into aa increasing number
of
prestigious exhibitions and private collections.
He'd shown canvases at the last three Paris
Salons, and had submitted another for the collection
of American art to be displayed at the
Philadelphia exposition. The painting-his
largest yet-had been accepted.
Matt's wretchedly spelled letters referred to a
procession of mistresses in London, and only
rarely to Dolly. She was apparently prospering as
a teacher in India, and continued to bear the
responsibility for raising their son Tom.
Matt had a new passion ideally suited to his
talent for making quick freehand drawings. His friend
Whistler had taught him how to do etchings by working
directly with a needle on a wax-covered copper
plate. The process was called dry point.
Matt had purchased an old star-wheel press so
he could produce the plates himself, and Gideon now
had one print on the wall of his office-a superb
study of a London costermonger done with Matt's
usual economy and memorability of
line.
Every time Gideon gazed at the print, he wished he
and his brother could work on some joint project. Perhaps
a volume of Matt's drawings-published by Kent
and Son. The Boston book house over which
Gideon had no direct control was barely meeting
expenses by reissuing old titles. The volumes
were handsomely produced. But as Molly herself said,
Dana Hughes was not an especially imaginative
editor, Kent and Son needed at least one big
success to revitalize it.
All these associated thoughts of Mart whirled through
Gideon's mind as he sipped the Bordeaux and
wondered whether his brother might return to see his
painting on exhibit. He'd submitted it at
Gideon's urging, and said he had no interest in
attending the show in person. Perhaps some way could be
found to lure him to Philadelphia.
Recalling the city brought something else to mind.
Gideon set his wine goblet aside. "Margaret?"
She glanced up from her untasted food. In the
gloom of the April twilight, her sallow jowls
looked even more unhealthy than usual.
"What is it?"
"Just a reminder," he responded gently.
"I don't want you to forget I'll be going
to Philadelphia early in May."
"Philadelphia?" She shook her head, "You
never told me that."
For an instant he was tempted to snap at her.
Instead, he forced patience into his voice.
"I respectfully beg to say I did. More than
a month ago. I'm going to do a feature on the
opening of the exhibition. Don't you recall I
told you Emperor Dom Pedro of Brazil would be
there along with President Grant?"
Again she shook her head, her gaze drifting toward
the rain-speckled windows. "No, I don't
recall that at all. You never mentioned it."
He shivered then, genuinely alarmed. Was she only
trying to aggravate him? Or was her mind succumbing
to the damaging effects of too much alcohol,
exactly as her father's had succumbed years before he
died?
"You said nothing about a trip to Philadelphia
to me," she repeated. Then she focused moist brown
eyes on his face. "When are you going to take me
to the exposition, Gideon? When are we going as a
family?"
"Later in the summer, I promise. I
can't say exactly when I'll get away, but I
assure you we'll go."
"That's good to know," she murmured, glancing away
again, her eyes sleepy.
He left the house a few moments later, deeply
troubled by her lapse of memory.
The moment Margaret heard Gideon's carriage
depart, she hurried upstairs, her anger mounting with
each step she took.
How dare Gideon pretend he'd mentioned a trip
to Philadelphia when he hadn't! It was just another
of his attempts to degrade her and make her feel
miserable. Well, she had her own weapons in that little
game.
Even though she'd taken nothing to drink for nearly
two hours, she felt good all at once. Her
face lost its puffy, lethargic look. Her eyes
grew alert; thoughtful.
Lately she'd become convinced Gideon was
humiliating her with another woman. She didn't
know who the creature was, nor did she have any
concrete evidence that she existed. But a man his age
didn't practice enforced celibacy without a
complaint-or without a reaction.
Well, let him have his slut. So long as
he lived, he was never going to put a hand on her
naked body again. Or enter her bedroom, which she
always kept locked. Those were only two of several
methods she'd devised to punish him for denying her
wishes.
IV
"Blow, wind.!?, and crack your cheek?! Rage!
Blow! You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
till you have drench "d our steeples, drown'd-was
Scowling. Margaret thrust the door of Eleanor's
bedroom open. At coca the imitation basso
voice-Eleanor trying to sound like a man-went
silent.
Dark-eyed and hill comfigured, Eleanor turned a
startled face toward her snoiiier. Crosslegged
on the floor at Eleanor's feet, Will lifted his
chin from his hands. He
looked terrified, as if he'd been caught doing
something indecent.
Eleanor tried to hide the small leather-bound book
behind her. Margaret lunged and snatched it from her hand.
"I have told you a hundred times. You are not to read
and quote playscripts in this house!"
Eleanor's slightly oval eyes flashed back the
gaslight. "Mama, I was reciting from
Lear. Shakespeare. It's fine literature-was
"It comes from the immoral and godless theater, and I
won't have any part of that under my roof. Now get
to your French. I want to see your exercises the
moment you finish them."
While she yelled, Will huddled against the end of
Eleanor's bed, as if seeking protection from the
shrill voice. Eleanor bit back a retort.
Margaret brushed at a loose strand of hair and said
more quietly:
"Now. If we have an understanding about this filthy book,
perhaps I can convey a message. I asked your father
when he planned to take us to the Philadelphia
exhibition."
Will brightened. Eleanor remained red-cheeked and
resentful. Margaret pursed her lips in a
pastiche smile.
"He informed me he is going to Philadelphia for the
newspaper. Alone. He'll have no time to take us
there as a family."
Will's lower lip jutted. He jumped up. "But he
said he'd show me the Corliss engine! And Uncle
Mart's picture-was
Eleanor calmed a little. "Yes, I distinctly
remember him saying that."
"Well, he's changed his mind. You children must
realize that your father completely submerges himself in his
work. He has no spare time-and no consideration-for
any of us. Perhaps I can arrange to take you
to Philadelphia. I'll certainly try."
She gave them a hug. Eleanor acted
unresponsive, Will downright fearful. But Margaret
was too pleased with herself to notice.
Carrying the Shakespeare, she started out of the room.
Will's face changed even as she watched. So did
Eleanor's. Her son looked hurt, and her
daughter annoyed comthough now for quite a different
reason. If Margaret's little strategy had worked,
Eleanor would no longer be thinking about the confiscated
play, but would be directing all her anger at her
father.
Or so Margaret fervently hoped.
She went straight along to her bedroom. The thirst
was goading her. She unlocked the door and slipped
in. The chamber was dark. She kept it that way, the
curtains perpetually closed.
She lit one gas fixture, then flung the little
playbook into the grate. Filthy thing! It would be
burned up on the first cool evening that required a
fire. She relocked her door and
hurried to the cabinet where she kept the bottles of
wine and whiskey. She chose the latter. Poured
half a glass, shivering and breathing in a noisy
way. She shouldn't have waited so long. Her nerves
felt horribly jangled; her palms itched.
She drank the whiskey straight, accustomed to the
raw, hot feeling it produced. In a moment the
effect became one of soothing warmth. The shivering
subsided. Her breathing slowed.
Blinking, she filled the glass halfway again and
carried it to an expensive and capacious rosewood
secretary under the dim gas fixture. She reached
into the pocket of her skirt for a second key and
unlocked the secretary.
Inside, she kept the diary she'd started a few
months ago when her need for companionship had
nearly 492
driven her berserk. She sat down, placed the
whiskey glass in front of her and readied her pen.
She thought a moment. Then, with a faint smile, she
began to write:
Apr. the 21/, A dark day; much rain. Gideon
again cruelly pretended my memory has failed,
dear friend-
The term appeared in almost every entry.
Margaret had quickly come to think of the diary as a
person; an intimate and very real confidante.
But I objected and he left for the evening, his face
showing vexation and puzzlement. Ah, how he delights
in hurting me! He is going to attend the opening of the
great patriotic exhibition. He says he is
to report on it for the paper, but I am sure that is
merely a pretext. He will see HER there. God
protect me from ever learning who SHE is, for I
might be tempted to KILL her-
With slashing strokes, Margaret underlined all three
of the words printed in crooked capitals. She was
breathing hard again. She took a big swallow of
whiskey. Sweat glistened on her forehead.
But no, dear friend, I shall never do anything so lacking
in subtlety. I have more delicate ways to attack
and punish him for refusing to put me ahead of all
others. I asked him whether he would take us to the
exposition as a family. He said he would. But after
he had gone, I told E. and W. that he had said
just the opposite.
Her cheeks had a mottled, mealy look as she
hunched over the desk under the feeble light of the gas.
She
drank again, laughing and clucking softly
to herself. Her pen moved, faster.
He has turned against me. He no longer feels
remorse or pain when he denys my wishes, but he
WILL feel pain-
More furious slashes beneath the capitalized word.
combecause, before I am done with my various plans, and this
account of them to you, my only true friend, 1 will make
both his children loathe his face and despise his name and he
will never know why they HA TE him so!
Oh, it was so pleasing to write that. She drained the
glass, already thirsty for more. It was even more pleasing
to put down the final lines of the entry:
I have been at work to that end only a few weeks
now. But already I see small signs that I am
succeeding. More and more such signs will follow from now on.
More and more and M.
CHAPTER X
Free Spirits
"comAND MAKE SURE you start back the moment
you've bought everything. Lower Manhattan isn't
safe any longer. Too many foreigners. Too many
Jews."
"Yes, mama," Eleanor called, clutching her
hat and 494
hurrying down the rear service stairs
to escape the hectoring voice.
The one thing she couldn't escape was the tyranny of the
clock. It was already fifteen past three. She was a
quarter of an hour behind the schedule she and Charlie
Whittaker had worked out when she found she'd be
permitted to go downtown to shop this week.
What if there were delays in traffic? What if
Charlie failed to appear at the meeting place, or
went on to Fourteenth Street without her? Fifteen
minutes could cost her everything.
She rushed into the coach yard that opened onto
Sixty-first and a vista of weedy vacant lots to the
south. It was a gray Saturday afternoon at the end of the
week in which Margaret had told the children Gideon
couldn't promise to take them to Philadelphia.
Eleanor's shoes, yellow-dyed fabric with
elastic side panels and a small yellow
rosette decorating each, fairly flew over the
bricks of the yard. Mills, the coachman, waited
on the seat of the calash. He glanced at the sky as
Eleanor lifted the hem of her Parisian frock
of yellow silk trimmed with ivory lace. In a
moment she'd settled herself beneath the folding top of the
two-wheeled vehicle.
"Rain looks likely again, Miss
Eleanor," Mills said. "Would you care to have me
switch Pete to the brougham?"
"No, no! Let's be on our way."
Mills flicked his whip lightly over the horse's
ears. "Giddap, Pete." The calash swung out
of the yard, turned right and then left again into Fifth
Avenue, heading south.
Eleanor sat back and tried to breathe slowly and
normally. She couldn't. She was much too excited
over the prospect of seeing Salvini-
 she were in tune.
Naturally she and Charlie would have perferred to 495
see Edwin Booth. But he and his whole company were
doing a grand tour of the South. Salvini was an
acceptable substitute, though. In one way he was a
better choice because his interpretation of the role of the
Moor was thrillingly wicked-quite unlike Booth's
respectable portrayal.
Anxiously she peered around the coachman for signs
of excessive traffic. She so seldom got out
of the house by herself on weekends, she just couldn't have
anything go amiss today. Especially when so many, things
seemed to be going wrong around home.
Eleanor loved her father. But she was very much aware that
lately he'd been paying less and less
attention to his family. The neglect had
visibly affected her mother. She was shunning all
daylight and growing sallow and sickly. And she was
drinking to excess-her tonic, she called it.
Eleanor knew it was liquor. It caused
Margaret to have lapses of memory and periods of
almost violent anger directed at Gideon.
Eleanor wished she had the courage to ask her father
why he quarreled with her mother so often, or what the children
could do to make things smoother. But Gideon was
seldom home. And when he was, he was tense and
tended to snap in response to even the most casual
question. Slowly, and almost against her will, Eleanor was coming
to believe that for all her mother's faults, Margaret
might be right about Gideon no longer caring for them.
Was it really his work causing that? Or did he have a
female friend? What was the word for it? Oh, yes.
Mistress.
She knew what a mistress was because she knew what
men and women did together. The girls at Miss
Hoi-sham's discussed it endlessly-which would have made
Margaret faint and then withdraw her daughter from that
supposedly refined academy.
When men and women removed most or all of their
496
clothing and did that together, and were not married, it was said
to be illicit. Somehow her father seemed too nice
to be involved in something illicit, but what other
explanation could there be for his lack of interest in things
at home?
Eleanor had already formed definite opinions about the
act itself. She was curious about it. She thought it
might be interesting to experience, but she suspected it
was dangerous, too. That is, she had a feeling the
consequences were dangerous. After all, the act was part
of the tangled webwork of actions and emotions which went
by the name love. And love, she had concluded, merely
got people into dreadful difficulties. She'd read about
it time and again, in plays such as the one in which Salvini
was appearing. She'd heard even more compelling evidence
from behind closed doors hi her own house. She'd
heard quarrels so violent they made her weep.
Of course love hi the form of an act performed
by two people who cared for one another was evidently necessary
to make more people hi the world. And there was no denying it
provided dramatists with some of their best material.
But on a personal level, it seemed to her that
love-and therefore the act of love-merely brought pain.
The sort of pain she'd be wise to avoid as she was
growing up.
She did realize that might be hard to do. Lately
she was full of strange impulses and longings she
only half understood. Her body was changing
visibly. Right this moment, beneath her dress and her
chemise, her growing breasts ached from the bouncing of the
calash. And she was full of contradictory
feelings. Why, for example, did she sometimes
yearn to have a boy touch her, then recoil from it when it
happened by accident?
She didn't understand all the changes within herself, nor
all the terrible happenings at home-and together, they
made her fiercely afraid of all that was meant
by love.
The calash clipped along between the green vistas of
Central Park on the right and undeveloped plots
of land on the left. Her father believed the city would
spread north, and that the Kent mansion would one day be
in the heart of the best residential district. It
certainly wasn't now. She read the society
columns in the Union and all the competitive
papers that came into the house. She knew a man as
rich and important as her father should have owned a home
in the area the calash was just now entering-Fifth Avenue
from the Park down to Washington Square. "Two
miles of millionaires," people called it.
Of course it was possible to have a mansion there and still be
called a Shoddyite. That was the case with A. T.
Stewart, the owner of the store toward which the calash was
heading. Stewart had just died, and everyone said he was
worth millions. He owned an immense house at
Thirty-fourth and Fifth. But those at the top of
society-the Astors, the Vanderbilts, the other old
families-looked down on him as a Shoddyite.
A man who could not enter the best circles for a
generation, perhaps more. Stewart had had the misfortune to have
new money, and be "in trade."
Charlie Whittaker's father was in trade, too. He
sold medicines at wholesale and made plenty of
money. But the Whittakers were still Shoddyites. So were
the Kents.
Eleanor didn't care, though. In the shining world to which
she aspired, such false and arrogant distinctions were
of no importance. The theater was not only a
beautiful place, but a democratic one.
It was the blight of Eleanor Kent's life that,
during her nearly fourteen years, she'd only been
permitted inside a playhouse once. Her father had
taken her to Booth's, down on Twenty-third
Street and Sixth Avenue, in celebration of her
tenth birthday. That was in 1872, when they were
still living hi Yorkville, 498
Even that long ago, Eleanor's mother had spoken out
against the theater. Margaret claimed that attractions
today were nothing like the wholesome ones she'd enjoyed as a
girl in Richmond. The New York playhouses
had become the province of Satan. In the last
decade, a veritable flood of immorality had
been undammed within them. The actress Adah
Isaacs Menken had dared to appear in Mazeppa
clad only in a Greek chiton and, beneath, all but
invisible flesh-colored tights. Niblo's had
booked an extravaganza with interpolated songs,
The Black Crook, in which a chorus of young women
wearing black tights displayed their calves and
thighs-to packed houses.
But on Eleanor's birthday four years ago, the
play at Booth's had been both a thundering hit and
eminently respectable. It was Julius Caesar,
with spectacular scenic effects representing not
drab Julian Rome, but the more colorful
Augustan period. The famed actor-manager
Edwin Booth played several different parts during the
run of the show. When Gideon took Eleanor to see
him, he was playing Marc Antony.
Although Margaret had been sick in bed with a
spring cold at the time, Eleanor remembered that her
father had felt it necessary to fib about where they were going. A
travel lecture, he said. Eleanor too had
been sick the night before the excursion, though for
another reason. Sheer excitement.
Even today, she could vividly recall the evening.
Booth's Theatre had three stone towers. A flag
bearing the name of the establishment flew from the central
one. She'd never seen anything more magnificent,
especially with the calcium lights playing over the
exterior.
Gideon had purchased the most expensive seats-a
front box-and to reach it they had to climb the
impressive main staircase. Halfway up, they
paused before the marble bust of the celebrated actor who
had trained
three sons to carry on the family tradition.
Gideon explained that in his day, Junius
Brutus Booth had been famous all over the world.
Eleanor's eyes were huge as she gripped her
father's hand and hung on every word.
Booth Senior had been afflicted with a fondness for
liquor, Gideon said. And he suffered from mental
instability. Perhaps that explained why one of his sons,
John Wilkes, had committed a terrible
act of murder at Ford's Theatre down in
Washington. Still, Eleanor had never beheld such a
noble countenance as she saw on that pedestal.
Nor had she ever seen or heard anything that made
her spine prickle the way Edwin Booth's
performance did.
As Antony, he hit his peak when he denounced the
traitors. He punctuated his oration with an
abrupt leap from the rostrum. The startling bit of
business made the audience gasp. When the speech was
over, Booth got an ovation.
The magical images of the towers, the flying flag,
the staircase, the painted scenery, Booth's burning
eyes and spellbinding personality all blended together
to form one shining memory which Eleanor treasured like a
gem.
She couldn't forget the aftermath, either; the screaming
match four days later. Searching her father's coat
pockets on some pretext or other, Margaret had
found a crumpled playbill, and had confronted him
with it.
From that birthday came Eleanor's fascination with all
things theatrical. Her father had never again taken her
to a performance, because Margaret was so adamantly
opposed to it. The upper tiers of New
York playhouses now had liquor bars, and
Margaret claimed the denizens of the galleries were
all licentious sots. A strange accusation to come
from one addicted to mysterous "tonics," Eleanor
thought. But she didn't argue the point.
Her friend Charlie Whittaker had attended the theatre
dozens of times. He gleefully admitted to having
sat right up there among those gallery denizens. And
yes, they did do sinful, hair-raising things during
a performance, though he wouldn't reveal specifics.
But of course, he concluded with a worldly shrug, only
the performances and not the morality of the players or the
audiences mattered.
Enforced isolation from the theaters only heightened
Eleanor's interest. At Miss Holsham's she
asked to be assigned Shakespeare's comedies and
tragedies, then other dramatic classics, as
extra reading in Literature. In 1874 she'd
devoted a good many weeks to thinking about her future,
and had finally decided she would study to become an
actress.
She began practicing a variety of parts,
declaiming them for Will or for her mirror until her
mother found and confiscated each playbook, as she'd
done this week with Lear. Then Charlie, who
was the older brother of one of her classmates at
Miss Holsham's, would buy her another with money
Eleanor provided from her allowance.
She really wished she could understand the basis for her
mother's objections. Margaret didn't deny she'd
enjoyed plays as a young woman. Eleanor often
asked herself whether Margaret's change of heart could
have something to do with Eleanor's own paternal grandmother
-Gideon's mother-Fan Kent of Virginia, and her
second husband.
After bearing three sons and then divorcing their
abolitionist father-Grandpa Jephtha, the
cigar-smoking minister Eleanor remembered
dimly-Fan had remarried. She'd wed a Southern
actor named Edward Lamont. Eleanor had heard
papa discuss Lament once or twice. But not in
detail, and never with a smile. Lamont had died
during the war. Papa never said how. Had
there been tragic circumstances which had somehow
influenced her mother? Eleanor supposed she'd never
know. She usually had nerve when the occasion required
it, but she'd never have enough nerve to ask Margaret about
Lament.
Still, there was an actor in the family, it only
by marriage. She could take that as an
encouraging sign.
It had also occurred to Eleanor that the approval an
audience expressed through applause was nothing less
than a form of love. A very safe form. It was at
once intense yet distant, without the potential for
hurt that people evidently experienced when they fell hi
love with one another. The love that poured across
footlights at the end of a play could be a highly
acceptable substitute for romantic love, she'd
decided. All the more reason to build a career on
the stage.
Raindrops splattered against her cheeks, drawing
her out of her reverie and making her aware of the congestion
of carriages and delivery vehicles all around.
She recognized Broadway, a little below
Madison Square. They weren't even close
to Union Square, and it must be past four already.
She'd never arrive in time!
The calash stopped frequently, Mills shouting at
the stalled conveyances ahead. He wasn't the only
one. Dozens of other carriage and hack drivers
filled the air with demands, pleas and oaths. The
avenue was redolent with the odor of manure. At one
point, a large heifer wandered between the stalled calash
and a dray just ahead, the cow lowing and clanking
her bell.
Eleanor fidgeted. Finally they got under way again.
After being caught in three more hub-to-hub jams they
reached Tenth Street, and the north entrance of A.
T. Stewart and Company, the city's best retail
establishment.
"I'll find a boy to hold Pete," Mills
said. "Then I'll meet you right over by those doors.
It'll take me no more than five minutes."
"Mills, if I delay one second longer,
Til never get through the shopping list mama gave
me. You must let me go by myself."
The coachman nearly fell off the seat. "By yourself?
Why, Mrs. Kent'd flog me."
She jumped down.
"She'll never know if you don't tell."
"Now see here, I can't-was
Eleanor had been rooting in her handbag. She had
found a ten cent piece. "Have a bucket of beer,
Mr. Mills. You like beer, don't you?" She
knew he did; she smelled it on him often. She
laid the coin on his knee. "Have a cool drink and
I'll meet you by this very same door when the store
closes."
Flabbergasted, Mills stared at the coin and
then at the slender, dark-haired girl who in his
opinion would be a genuine beauty when she grew
to full womanhood. But she was also far too
independent for her own good. Fancy inviting a grown
man to have a growler of beer!
He craved the beer, right enough. But to have it purchased
for him by a mere child-and one he was supposed to be
looking after-
"No, Miss Eleanor, I absolutely cannot-was
Too late. She'd already whirled and raced across the
sidewalk and vanished into Stewart's. He snatched
the dime off his knee so it wouldn't fall and be lost
in the gutter. He'd done all he could. And waste
was a. sin.
Stewart's dry goods store occupied an entire
city block bounded by Ninth and Tenth Streets and
Broadway and the Bowery, the extension of lower Fourth
Avenue. Eleanor fought her way through the crowded
aisles and reached one of the doorways on the Bowery
side. She strained for a glimpse of Charlie
Whittaker waiting in the vestibule. Suddenly she
felt like crying.
He wasn't there.
He'd gone ahead without her. She dashed a few
tears from her eyes and stamped her foot.
Crying was weak-kneed. And it certainly wasn't f
air to blame Charlie because she was so la-
She caught her breath. Charlie was outside! The
crowds had hidden him. He was pacing up and down,
alternately studying the sky and his handsome railroad
watch.
"Charlie, here I am!" she cried as she rushed
to him.
"Wellst1 was just about to leave for the Academy. I'd
come to the conclusion that your mother had penned you up again."
Each sentence was declaimed rather than spoken, with
breathy emphasis added hi unexpected places and
punctuation supplied by sweeping gestures. For
Charlie Whittaker, age sixteen, every moment and every
commonplace conversation was an opportunity to create
drama.
Charlie was a soft, round boy with a pale skin, a
likeable, cow-eyed face and cowlicked hair that
refused to stay in place no matter how much
Macassar oil he applied. He snatched
Eleanor's hand.
"Come along, for heaven's sake, or the matinee will
be over and Salvini gone before we get there. You're
so damned late, I shouldn't tell you my good
news,"
Man of the world that he was, Charlie frequently
chose to jolt his sister's schoolmate by employing
selected profanities. He got the desired
effect with his use of damned. Eleanor's oval
eyes grew huge.
Charlie played to that shock. "For heaven's sake,
Eleanor! What are you going to do when you take a
role some day and it requires that you speak a curse
word?"
"Women's parts don't require that, Charlie."

"Just you wait. The way the playwrights are starting
to treat modern subjects, it won't be long."
He tugged her hand again, but she protested.
"I have to start on the shopping list before I go."
"I'll help you when we get back. Promise.
Now come on!"
He sounded not merely dramatic but a trifle
angry. Yet she hesitated.
Eleanor looked up to Charlie as someone far more
experienced and knowledgeable. He was two years
older-practically an adult-and his parents actually
encouraged his interest in acting.
But Margaret would be furious if she failed
to obtain all the items on the shopping
list. She'd question Eleanor about the reason for the
failure until Eleanor confessed. Eleanor had
never been able to lie successfully. She knew it was
wrong, and on the rare occasions when circumstances
pushed her into trying it, her eyes and her red face
always gave her away.
This time Charlie's insistence won out over fear of her
mother. They hurried north along the Bowery
to Fourteenth, then turned east toward the looming
facade of the Academy of Music in the next
block. Eleanor was nearly out of breath, Charlie
walked so fast. She finally remembered to ask:
"What's your good news? You said you had some." She
could actually see his chest inflate. "Indeed I do.
The Booth Association has accepted me for
membership."
"Oh, Charlie!" She squeezed his arm,
overjoyed. He turned pink. One thing in which
Charlie Whit-taker did not seem interested was
familiarity with the opposite sex. It actually
appeared to embarrass him. Generally, Eleanor was
glad of that. She was with him often, and thus didn't have
to worry about him trying to drag her into fumbling
embraces. On the other hand, his very
predictability made him somewhat dull.
Charlie
never aroused those curious and shameful sensations the
sight of other young men-perfect strangers!-could
sometimes generate within her.
"I'm so happy for you, Charlie," she went on.
"When will you go to your first meeting?"
"Next Tuesday night." He pointed north
along a cross street where they paused. "The group
rents Hutter Hall, just two blocks up Irving
Place. I've only met the president and vice
president. But if the others are just like them, it will be
a grand group."
"Did you ask about female members?"
"They have none."
Eleanor uttered a tiny, "Oh."
"Don't despair. They invite young ladies of
talent to attend meetings and fill feminine roles.
You're welcome to come as my guest any time."
It was the chance she'd longed for-entree, however
modest, into theatrical activities. She could
barely contain her enthusiasm.
"Do you mean that, Charlie?"
"Most assuredly, young lady. You must come and read.
And not merely something from the Bard, or those wheezy
old Greeks. A modern role. Something
by that fellow Ibsen, perhaps. The latest gossip from
Norway says he's all through writing poetic
trash like Peer Gynt and is planning some totally
new kind of drama that will scorch an audience right out
of its seats. That's what we want, eh?"
"Oh, yes." Her eyes sbcne again. Then the comers
of her mouth turned down. "But mama would never let
me go out on a weekday evening. Not the way she's
feeling lately."
He was dismayed by her hurt expression. "Maybe
she would, Eleanor. At any rate, you mustn't
give up. You have a first class talent. And
remember, people in the theater are free spirits. They're
not bound by the laws that shop girls and ribbon clerks
have to obey. 506
Free spirits can always find a way to escape from a
cage."
Smiling in an encouraging way, he flung his chubby
arms around her and gave her a quick, brotherly hug.
Charlie didn't mind physical contact with a girl
when he initiated it for purposes of friendship only.
Eleanor was cheered by his reassurance, but she felt
nothing else; certainly no excitement.
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 hi 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 hi the nick.
Follow me to the actor's 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 broorn. 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-was 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. "comy 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, hi 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 actor's 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 Theatre. 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-was
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 Signer Salvini was pretty handsome, did
you? Well, I work here, and I can tell you for a
fact, around the middle he's big 3and a whale.
He wears a corset."
"See hcreVery 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 Ms eyes off of her. That
queer, tingling sensation started in her hands, then in her
legs, She found herself thinking, Hers 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. Fve 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-was
"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-was
Don't say that word, she thought. still don't love
anyone, and I mustn't.
"comb 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."
CHAPTER XI
The Man in Machinery Half
PHILADELPHIA 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 sub512
terfuge would foo! 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'st"
"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 deni?,!. If 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 tiling 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-was
"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-was
A pause. "comalth 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 rny 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 aiso 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-was
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 hi 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
pepole eager to see the President of the United
States and the Emperor of Brazil.
Because their places would be held, he and Julia
felt free to walk a while. She took his arm as
they strolled. "It's simply marvelous, isn't
it?"
"It is. I wish I'd found some way for the Union
or Kent and Son to contribute to the celebration."
In a sympathetic way, she asked, "Oh, dear,
are you still fretting about that, too?"
"Endlessly. I haven't had a single good idea."

"Well, sometimes good ideas pop up when and
where you least expect them."
"That's true." But he didn't sound hopeful.
As they walked on, Julia said, "My, this is a
huge exhibition."
Gideon was ready with the facts; Payne had put
one man to work assembling them for the benefit of all
Union reporters who would be writing stories in
Philadelphia during the summer.
"Four hundred and fifty acres. Almost two
hundred buildings. The exhibition was funded
by capital stock issued by the Centennial Board of
Finance. Other contributions came from Congress, the
states and territories, the-Julia, why the devil
are you laughing?"
"I'm sorry. It's just that I made a remark and
you launched into a lecture. Mr. Payne has
really infused you with a passion for spreading knowledge."
Gideon turned pink. "Evidently he has. I
didn't mean to rattle on."
"Where's the Corliss engine, sir?" Carter
asked.
"In Machinery Hall. We'll see it right after the
opening ceremony."
The boy's question reminded Gideon that on several
occasions his own son had asked about the
engine, the exhibit which thus far had generated the
greatest interest among press and public. Will had
also asked when Gideon would take him to see it.
Julia had been absolutely right last night.
Because he wanted to avoid Margaret, he'd also been
neglecting the children. He'd start putting that to rights the
moment he got home. He'd arrange a family
outing to Philadelphia.
"I'm anxious to see your brother's painting,"
Julia said, clinging tightly to Gideon's arm so as
not to be buffeted by the crowds on the footpaths.
Most of the opening day visitors were Americans, but
Gideon also saw some whose faces or accents
clearly identified them as representatives of
foreign governments. Nearly every
major nation had built a pavilion. For an
admission price of fifty cents, a visitor could
sample not only a century of American
culture, but the cultures of Europe and Asia
as well.
"It's in the Art Hall," Gideon said, leafing
through a guidebook he'd purchased in advance. "That
direction comno, wait, I believe Matt wrote
that his picture would be in the Art Annex. The Art
Hall is that pseudo-Renaissance
palace. It will stay here after everything else comes
down. American artists aren't being shown there,
however. They've been relegated to the Annex.
Matt was sore about it."
Gideon was intensely proud of his brother's growing
reputation. He had never seen Matt's immense
painting, which had been crated and shipped directly from
London. He did know the picture was titled
Wilmington. Another letter from Matt had said that the
nature of the teeming dockside scene, the uniforms
on some of the figures, and the fog-gray funnel of a
steamship towering in the dark background would make it
clear to any spectator that a slightly different
title would have been more accurate;
"Wilmington-War Time" would be better but 1m
told this exposition is suposed to unite not
divide the contry so I'll leave the tittle what
it is. I dont care one way or another whether
I serve the cause of the "Union" no Pun meant
there Gideon, I have no strong feelings for the contry.
1 take that back I have strong feelings of dislike.
Let "Union" go hang. I submited the
Wilmington picture because it came out well. Its
a war scene but I can only paint what I
remember of America, and I remember that
dam wasteful war a lot better than 1 care to,
almost as much as 1 remember Dolly god bless her.
She made the picture posible. She made all of
them posible, she is in evry one of them. Some day

still will explan what I mean, but I cant take time
now, a very handsome creatur the Duchess of T. is
waiting for me.
ill
The three visitors were soon caught up in the
exciting sights and sounds of the exhibition. The
colorful pavilions were encircled by a special
narrow gauge railroad on the perimeter of
Fairmount Park. Visitors could ride around the
entire exhibition for only five cents. The
Pennsylvania line had built the narrow-gauge.
Gideon sourly supposed that Tom Scott, the
bandit who presided over the Pennsylvania, would
somehow find a way to make his exposition railroad
pay just as handsomely as his regular line did.
"Isn't there a woman's building on the grounds?"
Gideon said as they started back toward the Main
Hall, Julia put the tip of her tongue in her
cheek.
"Oh, you remembered. Indeed there is After
you go back to New York, I plan to spend a
week working there. The pavil'ori ba. greater-than
Us own prmting office. A newspaper for women will
be written and published right on the premises all
summer."
Carter's handsome face broke into a grin. "How
soon are we going to the woman's building? Right after
we look at the Corliss engine? I want to see
the butter statues."
Gideon pulled a face. "Surely you're not
serious."
"Don't snicker so!" Julia said. "The head of a
milkmaid done in butter might be quite
attractive."
"And if it isn't, think of the people it will feed." She
pretended to hit him with her gloved hand. He laughed
and went on, "Butter sculpture. Matt
doesn't know the meaning of avant garde."
The opening ceremonies began at ten fifteen, near
the lagoon in front of the Mam Hall. First the
orchestra
ran through a short program of airs. During one
of the numbers Gideon scribbled a reminder. He
needed to locate and look at the portion of the huge
copper-clad statue which was being paid for by the
French people as a gesture of friendship. The statue was the
work of the sculptor Bartholdi. Liberty's
forearm, hand and upraised torch had been rushed
to completion and shipped to America for the exposition,
although it would be years before the entire 151-foot-high
work would be finished. Where it would finally be erected,
no one yet knew.
Wild cheering broke out. Gideon looked up. A
reporter near him sneered, "The grand panjandrum
himself. Or should I say the chief thief?"
Stocky, plain-faced President Grant had just
appeared on the platform. From all the applause and
shouting, no one would have guessed he had a tarnished
reputation.
Soon the formal program started. The orchestra
played a special march composed for the Centennial
by Richard Wagner. Then came a new hymn
by John Greenleaf Whittier and John Paine,
This was followed by speeches, and then a cantata
by Southern poet Sidney Lanier and Northern
composer Dudley Buck-nice symbolic touch,
Gideon thought. Finally the President delivered a
brief, banal address which concluded, "I declare the
international exhibition now open."
A gigantic flag was unfurled on the
front of the Main Hall. And when the choir began the
Hallelujah Chorus, even the cynical
professionals around Gideon grew quiet. At
the end of the chorus, the artillery boomed and the spring
breeze caught the flag and Gideon felt tears
in his eye and a prickling along his spine. It was a
strong and good country. It had survived a
devastating internal war and all the other
calamities of the past, and come through to show its strength
and pride by means of this grand, glorious-and occasionally
gauche- festival. It was a strong and good country
despite the
scoundrels who tried to pervert its principles and
take advantage of the freedom it offered.
If only he could think of some tangible way-some
project or piece of writing-to express his
convictions. But his mind remained a blank.
IV
Machinery Hall was designed to display American
technology, from small sewing machines to huge
howitzers. The featured exhibit was a gigantic,
1500horsepower steam engine with two vertical
walking beams standing parallel.
At the conclusion of the outdoor ceremonies, people began
to stampede toward Machinery Hall. They
ignored the hundreds of police and militiamen who
attempted to runnel them to the doorways in an
orderly way. Shortly the police and militia
cordons were disrupted. Gideon found himself fighting
as hard as the next person to jam through an entrance in
order to be present for the start-up of the Corliss
engine. He searched for Julia and Carter but couldn't
locate them. They'd agreed to meet immediately after the
indoor ceremony.
At last he squeezed inside. He joined a
stream of reporters rushing to a special press
area marked off by velvet ropes. President
Grant and the bearded Emperor of Brazil were already
on the steam engine's control platform. The platform
was raised several steps above the floor of the hall.
A man with a proud expression- the designer and
engineer, Corliss, Gideon supposed- stood
close to the presidential party.
Gideon tilted his head back. The top of the
mammoth machine looked three stories high. As
yet he had no statistics on the Corliss; he
was supposed to gather those and bring them back to New
York.
For a newsman, the faces of those present were
al520
most a more interesting study than the engine itself.
Gideon saw wonder on nearly every countenance. It
was apparent that the Corliss would be the fair's
number one attraction. He had guessed wrong,
then. He'd thought the most popular exhibit would be
an astonishing new device called a telephone,
which was to be demonstrated by its inventor, Alexander
Bell.
He was busy making notes when he had a sensation of
being watched. He glanced up. He was so
surprised, he almost dropped the little block of
paper. From the other side of the Corliss platform
where he stood among a group of equally well
dressed visitors, a man was indeed watching him.
It was Thomas Courtleigh.
The auburn hair had grayed slightly. The face
was a shade paler than he remembered. But even at
a distance, Courtleigh's hazel eyes had a
compelling power. They almost refused Gideon
permission to glance away.
Five years, he thought. It had been nearly that
long since he'd stormed into Courtleigh's mansion.
And what had that act of bravado accomplished?
Exactly nothing.
Gideon had yet to catch the railroad
man committing any crime of which he could be convicted.
Twice he'd dispatched a trio of reporters
to Chicago to look into Courtleigh's personal and
public life. Both times they'd returned empty
handed. There were rumors in plenty, but no facts.
If Thomas Courtleigh broke the law-and most
business tycoons did, one way or
another-skilled attorneys and intermediaries
covered the track very well.
Both times, Gideon had recalled Strelnik's
prediction that he'd become so frustrated
attempting to curb a man like Courtleigh, he'd
finally resort to violence. Both times, he did
feel something close to that kind of frustration. But of
course having the impulse wasn't the same as doing
the deed.
He hadn't thought of Courtleigh's threats for
months. 521
He'd assumed the railroad president had
forgotten them. Yet now Courtleigh was staring at him
with a fury as great as that which Gideon remembered from just
after the fire. Odd.
"Are you both ready? Then, Your Majesty, will you be
so kind as to turn that handle?"
Gideon wrenched his gaze back to the
dignitaries. Dom Pedro, resplendent in his
imperial uniform dripping with gold epaulettes and
frogging, turned the indicated handle. Slowly, with a
hiss of steam that grew increasingly louder, the first of the
parallel walking beams began to move.
Down, then up. Down, up. The shaft sank into the
ground far beneath the building, then rose from it again.
An ovation shook the hall. People whistled and stamped.
Corliss' great machine would provide the power for
all the other, smaller machines on display.
"Now, Mr. President-mil you turn your handle,
sir?"
With '3 nervous smile, Grant complied. The
second beam started its slow downward motion.
Soon the rhythm quickened. With both walking basins in
operation, the ti'.c'8ofthe hall vibrated.
Another, louder ovation burst forth. The opening
ceremonies were over.
Gideon tried to jot a few descriptive
phrases, but he kept thinking of Courtleigh. When
he glanced back to the spot where the W and P
president had beea stand-lag, the group had
rearranged itself. Courtleigh was no longer visible.
Soon the crowd began to disperse to take in the
exhibits. Gideors headed for the
rendezvous point he and Julia had agreed upon-the
soda fountain located near the band stand in the Main
Hall.
As he walked along, he still had the uneasy sensation
of being observed. And some key detail of
Courtleigh's 522
expression or appearance troubled him. But the
detail remained elusive no matter how hard he
thought about it.
Late in the day they took a crowded horsecar
back to their hotel on Walnut Street. Julia
and Carter went to their room; Carter said he was
tired. Gideon used a desk in his room
to arrange his notes and begin writing his opening
paragraphs. He had to take his dispatch to the
telegraph office by ten-thirty. Theo Payne was
holding space on tomorrow's front page for an account
of the opening day.
He met Julia in the lobby at half past six.
She looked refreshed. She said Carter wouldn't be
joining them for dinner. He'd worn himself out tramping
through the exhibits and was still asleep.
In the dining room, over grilled sole and the
liebfraumilch she'd taught him to enjoy, he
asked her whether she'd seen Courtieigh in
Machinery Hall. She hadn't. News of his
presence cleariy upset her.
"Why would he be here, Gideon? His line has no
official connection with the Exhibition, does it?"
"No, but it is opening day. Anyone's free
to come."
"I suppose you're right."
"He also has contacts to maintain in the railroad
community. The industry's in a turmoil these days.
Mullins, one of our men who covers business
news, keeps bringing in rumors that some of the trunk
lines intend to meet secretly to form a pool."
"Form what?"
"A pool. A group comprised of several
cooperating lines. Usually a pool's organized
to fix freight rates and otherwise squeeze out
any competition the pool members don't want.
Sometimes those in the pool fund a war chest any of
them can dip into if they have trouble with a strike. The
fund usually pays for blacklegs. Strike
breakers. For months, Mullins has been hearing that
a new pool's to be started. And wages cut on every
line involved."
"When is it supposed to happen?"
He shrugged. "No one knows. This year.
Next. Court-leigh might be involved, though most
of the rumors have originated here in Pennsylvania."
He took a bite of fish. "In any case,
Courtleigh hasn't made good on his earlier
threats, so it's pointless to worry about him. I just
wish I could remember what struck me wrong this
morning."
"How do you mean, wrong?"
"Something was out of place when I saw him. Something in
the way he looked. I haven't been able to-was
Abruptly, he drew in a breath. "Now I
remember. He was with a party of well dressed men and
women. But his wife was missing. It wasn't the
presence of something that threw me off, it was the
absence."
"Oh dear," Julia murmured. "I meant
to tell you and in all the excitement, I quite forgot."
"Tell me what?"
"Courtleigh's wife died six weeks ago."
Gideon's palms turned cold. "Are you
positive?"
She nodded. "It was in all the Chicago' papers.
The Tribune got hold of it first, and evidently
Courtleigh didn't act in time to quash the story."
She was confusing him: "Julia, people don't
conceal the death of a spouse."
"No, certainly not the death itself. I'm referring to the
circumstances. At the time Gwen Courtleigh
passed away, she was a patient in a private
asylum in Lake County. The same one to which her
parents sent her after you visited the ball in her
honor. She'd been locked up there for more than a
year, hopelessly insane, and apparently showed no
signs of ever recovering- Gideon." Her hand
closed over his. "You mustn't look that way. I
know Courtleigh made foolish accusations 524
about your responsibility for her condition five years
ago, but they were just that. Foolish. Don't start
believing them now."
Gideon's blue eye was grim. "It doesn't
matter a damn whether I believe them. It only
matters whether he does."
Stricken silent, Julia waited for him to continue.
"In the past, I did a lot of thinking about Tom
Court-leigh's motives, and how his mind must work
to permit him to behave as he does. I believe I
understand him. Look at life from his point of view.
He has money, and power, and those two things will give
him almost anything he wants-with little or no
opposition. They also provide virtually
complete protection against the buffet-ings of everyday
life. The Courtleighs of this world live a
sequestered, unreal existence. Ordinary people are more
accustomed to bad luck. To blind chance interfering with
then-affairs. Courtleigh avoids that sort of thing
year after year after year. Then comes something like his
wife's insanity. He can't order it to heal itself.
He can't write a draught and pay some flunky
to make it vanish. I'm not trying to be clever when
I say he probably found her condition maddening.
Trying to undo it, he might come close to going mad
himself. And when he discovered he couldn't undo it,
I'm sure his anger would demand something on which
to place the blame."
She whispered, "Don't you mean someone?"
Slowly, he nodded. "I think that's what I saw
in his eyes this morning. He remembers he's never
carried out his promise to punish me. And now he
has greater reason than ever to do it."
Vision of America
AFTER A NIGHTS sleep, Gideon felt he'd
been an alarmist. He and Julia returned to the
Exhibition next day, turned Carter loose,
met him again at sunset and had an altogether marvelous
time. Gideon saw no sign of Thomas
Courtleigh.
He'd sent only a relatively short dispatch
to the Union the preceding evening. Out of the day's
notes he prepared a longer piece, and started for the
telegraph office just after ten o'clock. Julia was
tired, but she'd promised to meet him in his room
when he returned.
He was only a few steps from the hotel on
still-busy Walnut Street when someone called his
name.
He paused and looked across the street. A man
waved. "Over here, Mr. Kent!" He was a
small, nondescript fellow. Gideon didn't
recognize him. "I've a message for you."
Suspicious, Gideon hesitated at the edge of the
plank sidewalk. He didn't dare waste too
much time before sending his dispatch. And he absolutely
didn't know the man, who was hanging back near one
of the darkened shops as if to avoid the gaslights of a
restaurant entrance close by.
A carriage clattered past at a fast clip,
momentarily concealing the man as he shouted, "Please,
Mr. Kent. It's most urgent."
Curiosity overcame Gideon's wariness. He
glanced at the hotel doorman who'd been
watching the exchange, shrugged and stepped down into the
street. He was a third of the way across when a hack
drawn by two lath
ered horses came plunging onto Walnut from the
cross street to his left. The horses and the hack
rushed at him like a juggernaut.
The hotel doorman cried, "Watch yourself, sir!"
Gideon flung up his left arm and hurled himself
backward. As he fell, he had a distorted view
of the bobbing, wild-eyed heads of the horses, and of the
slouch-hatted driver whipping them. The street
shook.
He landed on his side, his arm outflung. He
jerked his arm back just in lime to keep it from being
trampled by sharp hoofs and crashed by heavy iron
tires.
The doorman ran into the street, shaking his fist at
the hack.
"Slow down! No furious driving allowed in this
district!"
The hack careened out of sight around a corner. The
doorman rushed to help Gideon to his feet.
"Any serious damage, sir? Doesn't appear
to be- just some dirt on your clothes. Damn cab
men. No respect for the law."
The two moved slowly toward the sidewalk.
Gideon had twisted his left ankle, and limped
slightly. But he'd already decided he mustn't
upset Julia by telling her of the incident.
A few onlookers resumed their strolls. The
doorman was still fuming:
"Don't know why that idiot was traveling so fast.
He had no fare."
Gideon stopped. "You're positive?"
"Yes, sir, the cab was empty. No passengers
that I could see." Suddenly the ruddy face puckered
into a frown. "And Where's that bucko who was hollering
at you?"
"Gone," Gideon said, well before he turned
to scan the far side of the street. He was right. There
was no trace of the stranger.
The doorman shrugged. "Well, it's the cab man
I'm exercised about. Driving much too fast, without
so much as a reprimand. Where are the police when you
need them? Always somewhere else. You could have been
badly injured-killed, even. Nobody cares about
the law any longer. He whipped around that corner on
two wheels and never saw you. Didn't care who was
in the street."
"No, I'm sure he didn't,"
Gideon lied, thinking of Courtleigh's eyes in
Machinery Hall, and of his wife dying in an
asylum. Did Courtleigh still see the bloodstained
shirt landing at her feet? Did he still hear her
terrified shrieking?
Gideon felt incredibly tired as he limped
away toward the telegraph office. The armistice
was over. The war was resuming.
ii
Most newsmen agreed that they got some of their best
ideas at unexpected moments. Julia had said much
the same thing, and Gideon could verify it. Sometimes
he solved a problem he was having with an
editorial, or with a department of the paper, at the end
of an uncomfortably sleepless night, or while
he was stropping his razor, or even while he was
sitting on the jakes with a bellyache. So it
happened that night. He was on his way back from the
telegraph office, still shaken, when he passed a
book shop in whose window various souvenir and
commemorative volumes were displayed against red,
white and blue bunting.
Special Centennial Editions, read a small
hand-lettered placard. He wished Kent and Son were
represented in that window even in a small
way. But the family firm had produced no book
in honor of the hundred years of-
Instantly, the whole idea was there.
A book called 100 Years. An expensive
book. Produced with the finest typography, paper,
and binding. There'd be a minimum of text. He'd
attempt to write it himself, but if he found he
couldn't do an adequate job, he'd hire someone
better qualified. The real focus of the volume
wouldn't be the words anyway. It would be- he searched
the window and saw nothing exactly like it-onand hundred
plates. One hundred wood engravings telling the
story of the republic's achievement since its founding
in this very city a century ago.
The illustrations in the book wouldn't be the hackwork people
were accustomed to seeing in newspapers or magazines.
They'd tell a story, right enough, but they'd be fine
art. They'd be cut by the best wood engravers Kent
and Son could find.
But they'd be based on a hundred sketches by his
brother Matt.
If Matt could possibly be persuaded to undertake
the project, he would easily complete a hundred
of his quick freehand drawings in just a few months.
Then a staff of craftsmen would transfer
them to blocks of boxwood as faithfully as the
medium allowed.
A further thought struck him. Perhaps from the best
twenty or twenty-five sketches, Matt would
prepare a limited edition of etchings. The whole
thing was unbelievably exciting.
Now what about the book's content? Historical
subjects would be included, certainly. A battle
or two. Breed's Hill where his ancestor
Philip had fought. The Alamo mission where Amanda
Kent had nearly lost her life during the straggle
for the independence of Texas. And there had to be a
depiction of at least one engagement from the late war,
so Americans would never forget the horror of fighting
against their own. Perhaps the subject should be
Gettysburg, when the South's high
tide had crested against a sea-wall of steel and
fallen back.
But Gideon wanted more than war to be represented
in 700 Years. Much more. He wanted to create a
panorama of the nation's territorial expansion, and of
its agriculture and industry. He wanted the
sweep of a corn field dark with the shoulders of a
sunburned harvesting crew. He wanted the crowded
aisles of a textile factor right-brace
be the contrast of white fiber and black men in a
Carolina gin house; the bottom of an anthracite
mine lit only by miners" candles; the inside of a
retail store with its wondrous array of goods and
products; the crowded patterns of city
telegraph wires crisscrossing an Eastern
sky, and the isolation of a sod house jutting against a
sky in the West-he wanted one great book that would
capture the panoply of American life as it had
developed in astounding variety since Philip
Kent's time.
And he'd make sure not only the famous were
portrayed, but the people who were the land's real backbone;
the common p. 100 Years. It was the project for which
he'd been searching-and the very thing he needed to take his
mind off Courtleigh.
He could hardly wait to tell Julia. She was as
excited as he; so excited she never noticed he was
limping a little.
"It's a magnificent idea,
Gideon-especially having your brother create the
illustrations. But a hundred of them?"
"Sketches, remember. He can do it. Before he was
twenty, he used to turn out eight or ten a day.
They were some of his best work. Brilliant
art created around a kernel of realism. Of course
there'll be more to this than merely making the drawings.
He'll need to research the subjects. He'll have
to travel the whole country-the Pacific, the
Canadian border, Texas-we'll underwrite his
expenses. He should jump at the challenge."
Provided I can present it the right way. 530
Delighted to see him so happy and enthusiastic for a
change, Julia hugged him.
"Darling, I think you've just turned into a book
publisher without realizing it."

A day after his return to New York, Gideon
took the train to Boston. Dana Hughes of Kent
and Son was enr thusiastic about the idea. He
promised to have a preliminary list of one hundred
subjects ready within two weeks.
Down at the Jersey Shore, Molly was equally
enthusiastic comalth she recognized that thousands of
dollars of capital might be ventured in financing
Matt's research, and none of it recouped if the
book failed:
"After all, Gideon, by the time it's on the market,
the centennial will be over."
"Have you looked at some of the souvenir books
being sold right now? Junk. They'll be forgotten
by New Year's Day. We'll make 100 Years
such a fine book, the delay won't make any
difference. Why, with Matt doing the pictures, the
damn thing will wind up in museums."
"That's a commendable goal," Molly agreed.
"I'm with you. Of course it matters to me if the
book fails and we lose the investment. But it will
matter far less than the fact that the Kents
published it, and did everything in their power to make it
succeed. Are we in agreement?"
"We are!" He gave her a hearty kiss on the
cheek, and danced her around the parlor till she begged
for mercy.
iv
The fourth and final draft of his long letter to Matt
concluded by saying:
still know you have no feelings for this country save a
justifiable contempt for its venality. So I won't
cloak the project in a patriotic appeal. I
present it to you instead as a creative challenge-for
what American artist has dared to attempt so vast
a labor? One whea"simultaneously, wants
to be the finest art, yet suited to the popular taste?
If you should consent to undertake it, I would
only ask that you do so with an open mind. That is, I
would not want you to approach the book from the standpoint of
devastating caricature like Tom Nast's. I would
like to see representative Americans in the
pages-the handsome along with. the ugly-and contrary to what
you might have come to believe since your exile, we do
have a few handsome specimens around. Good God,
you're one yourself. But I expect you are honest enough
to understand what I am saying-that our states are not
peopled exclusively by greedy grotesques.
(it merely seems that way sometimes!)
Finally, I see "100 Years" as the potential
salvation of the publishing house. I am not directly
involved in the management of Kent and Son, but both
of us draw income from it-or should-and therefore if your
mind and heart aren't stirred by the proposal, perhaps
I can fall back on family loyalty and beg you
to do this one thing for the sake of membership in the Kent
clan. Kent and Son was once a proud imprint but
it is third-no, tenth-rate now. Between us, we
might alter that. Forgive me, but if the
possibility of a reversal of its fortunes exists,
I think duty compels us to make the attempt.
And although you'll probably mock me for saying this,
Matt, a well done book of the kind just
proposed might also change a few of the conditions you
find so deplorable. At least it might sweep

away some of the fear and cynicism currently
pervading America.
Can a mere book do that? Yes, I think so. I have
immense faith in, and respect for, the printed word.
Citizen Tom Paine, Gen'l. Washington's
propagandist, rallied an indifferent populace and
turned apathetic men into zealots of liberty.
Mrs. Stone's novel, so detested in our part of the
world, was nevertheless a watershed of social change.
We may not achieve such memorable results. But
1 believe the effort itself is worthy-though perhaps I
have now ensnared myself, since I suspect such
appeals are not compelling to you.
I cannot omit one final one which I confess also
plays a part in my proposal. For years I have
been trying to find a way to induce you to come home for a
good, long visit. I hope I have at last
discovered it.
1 beg you to send me your answer quickly. I pray
it will be a favorable one. 1 shall await it with great
eagerness.
Meanwhile, I remain, as ever, your
affectionate brother-
G.
CHAPTER Xm
House of Hurt
"ELEANOR." WILL TUGGED her
skirt as she fussed in front of the mirror.
"Eleanor!"
"Will, for heaven's sake. Quit that or you'll pull
my bustle out of place. Oh, this pesky,
ridiculous hat!" 533
She couldn't get it on at an angle that
satisfied her. Will ignored her plea and gave
another yank. She swiped at him with her fist,
He ducked back, laughing. Her cheeks turned
scarlet. Brothers could be the most infuriating
creatures in the whole world.
What had come over him this evening? Why had he chosen
to act up tonight, of all nights? Most of the time-he was
quiet and unassertive, afraid to make a peep
around the house. Eleanor knew she was the only
person to whom he dared show any natural
enthusiasm- but blast him., he had no sense of
timing. She was in a frightful rush, and all he did
was pul! her SK-IRT, or leer.
"Who are you meeting at Martina
Whittaker's, Eleanor?"
"The Latin tutor, you ninny. Same as last
week."
"Oh, fizzlejig," He stuck out his tongue to show
his skepticism. "I'll bet it's some bov.
Girls don't get that het up over Latin. Kv
caret ry Tuesdnv you si art actin;:; dizzy
by the middle of 'he v.ficm.rvon.""
The hat still wnddiklii"! s greater-than from. on
"rebb* against her skirt. "* caret uenina to
caret or. K me later "disnan obb.r. W
greater-than 1! Kt-rit, You'".; to the
Whittaker's at seven. It's from.,"- the hall
chimes. Mills is waiting "ncl I still don't
look halfway decent- his
Will made another face. "I'd nsver fix up for
some old Latin teacher GiHave"; are stupid.""
This time it "caret is Fleano* v ho --disrack
out her tongus, Will retaliate caret by poking h
caret thumbs in In-ears, wiggling his finpers,
crossing his eyes and making rede noises-all at
the same time.
"Oh, you're a frightful boy, A brainless brat""
rfse cried, though without any real animosity.
Since her father had returned from the opening
of the Centennial Exhibition two weeks ago,
things had taken a new turn at home. Papa had
with him an armload of souvenirs for each of them.
Jewelry and lace for her, toys and
a small lead model of the Corliss engine for W.
He'd brought presents for mama as well, though
she'd barely thanked him, and had put them in the
closet almost immediately.
Still, papa seemed to be making a special effort
to be kind to Margaret. To all of them, in fact.
He was almost his old self, sitting in the evening with
Will on his knee and Eleanor at his feet as he
described the sights of the exposition. He'd even
started singing again-rousing choruses of Oh!
Susannah, or renditions of My Old
Kentucky Home in which he and Eleanor feigned
great sorrow, and laughed uproariously afterward.
Eleanor didn't completely understand the change in
her father's behavior, but she knew it had something to do
with a book project for which he expressed great
enthusiasm. Uncle Matt, whom Eleanor had
never met, was involved in the project too-or would
be if papa received the right sort of reply from
London.
Uncle Mat? "stjvs becoming a well
known painter in Europe Eleanor feit a powerful
sense of kinship with him. Her fai-ise1 tolerated
her interest in the theatre, but shv: dklr.8ment
flunk he really understood it. She felt Uncle
Mart would xind caret rstand perfectly. He was an
artist. In the past year or so, he'd become a
kind of dream here to her. She imagined him as very
wise. Unfailingly kind. Good-humored.
Toleram of others. And of course daringly
Rob.fiwan.
For more than one reason, she fervently hoped her father
would get the repiv he warded. If he did,
Uncle Msit would come home and she coi8id
rneet him. And the hook project might keep
papa 10 a good mood. It had certainly made a
big difference the past couple of weeks. Most
evenings he was around the house instead of down at the
Union, akhough tonight he'd rushed back after dinner
because a messenger had arrived to report a breakdown
hi one of the huge presses.
He hadn't wanted to go, though. He'd said that when

he kissed her cheek just before he hurried out. She
thought he was sincere. He seemed like a changed man.
He'd even promised several times that the
family would travel to Philadelphia to see the
exhibition. Mama was the one causindga delay
now. She couldn't make up her mind as to when the
trip should be scheduled.
Another thing brightening Eleanor's world was what she
liked to think of as the Tuesday scheme. She'd
concocted it with the help of Charlie Whittaker. At
first she'd felt she just couldn't deceive her mother. Then
practical considerations took over, and she reminded
herself that if Margaret actually knew where Eleanor
was going every Tuesday evening, she'd automatically
withhold her permission. So in the face of certain
rejection, Eleanor had resorted to a whole
collection of untruths.
She was getting punished for them, though. She went through
torture everst time she was forced to fib to one or both
of her parents.
Will continued to make faces, but he prudently stayed
out of her reach. She straggled with the hat until she
had it in a position that was acceptable. Then she
picked up her reticule and rushed into the upstairs
hall.
She nearly collided with her mother. She stepped
aside just in time. Will came rocketing out the bedroom
door, an impish gleam in his eyes:
"I'm gonna yank your bustle again, Eleanor,
I'm gonna yank-was
He saw Margaret's open hand flashing at his
face, but not soon enough to pull back. Her palm
struck loudly. He cried out.
"I've told you a hundred times, Will Kent. You
are not to make that kind of noise in this house!"
Instantly, Eleanor was her brother's partisan:
"If he can't make noise in his own house,
Mama, where can he?"
"Keep out of this, young lady." Her wrathful gaze

turned on the boy. He shrank against the wall.
"Any more outbursts like that and you'll be locked up in
your room for a week, do you understand?"
All the sparkle had faded from his eyes. Very
faintly, he answered, "Yes, Mama."
Eleanor would have defended him again, but she knew it
would do no good. Her mother was in another of her moods.
She'd been wearing the same dress for the past three
days. Strands of hair hung down near the outer
corners of her eyes. She reeked of the so-called
tonic she kept in an unlabeled brown bottle
in her pocket. When she wasn't visiting the
regular liquor cabinet, she took
sips from the bottle-right in front of anyone,
including the servants-and said in that hoarse, slurry
voice she'd acquired that it was medicine
prescribed by the family doctor.
Eleanor fretted as her mother's brown eyes
drifted toward her arid attempted to focus.
"Where are you going?"
"It's Tuesday evening, Mama."
"Tuesday?" Margaret shook her head. "Is that
suppose to mean something?"
Eleanor thought her mother was being difficult on
purpose. Then she looked into Margaret's eyes
again, and saw how pathetically vacant they were. Her
spine crawled. She felt like crying, but she
managed to say:
"Yes, Mama. Don't you remember I told you
Martina Whittaker and I were both having trouble with
Latin declensions?"
"No. I don't recall that."
Eleanor bit her lip. "You don't recall the
Whittakers hired a tutor? And that every Tuesday
evening I go over to their house to work with him, and with
Martina? I didn't go last week because I had that
touch of influenza, but we've discussed the tutor I
don't know how many tim-was
"This is the first I've ever heard of it," Margaret
interrupted. "The very first."
Frustrated and conscious of the rush of time, Eleanor
let her voice grow too shrill:
"You've forgotten. Mills has driven me
to Martina's on three different Tuesdays. He
drops me off at seven o'clock and calls for me at
ten-thirty."
Margaret stepped toward her. "Eleanor, don't
dispute me. No one has told me anything. Not
you, not your father-I know nothing of these sessions." In the
gloom beyond her mother's weaving figure, Will watched from
the door of his bedroom. He was round-eyed and pale.
"You told your father but you didn't tell me,"
Margaret continued with exaggerated self-pity. Tears
sprang to Eleanor's eyes. Margaret's shoulders
slumped suddenly. "Gideon's just keeping things from
me again-was
Then, with a small, resigned shrug, she nirned and
wandered away down the corridor, passing right by her
son as if he didn't exist. Eleanor's stomach
hurt from pity and fright. Why did maroa have to be m
such misery all the tune?
Margaret stupped at the backslash mi door on the
right; her room, past rather backslash few
steps beyoita", her bedraggled figure was
dirtily reflected in a lait ",vbbndow at the
end of the corridor. She reached into greater-than
--rr pocket, furebled and produced the key to open
her cotislatitly locked door. Once
Margaret was inside, Eleanor beard the lock
click again,
"Eleanor?" With a listless step, Will approached.
She wiped her e--dises as he asked, "Whar's
wrong with Mama?"
There was agony and confusion in her soft answer;
"I wish to heaven I knew."
Will shook his head in a baSled way, "She acts
like we don't even belong to her, like-no one loves
her and she doesn't love anyone back."
There it was again. That hateful word. The source of so
much misery. Eleanor was more determined than ever that
love would never entangle her. She wanted no part
of the sorrow it caused.
The situation in the household was still dreadful, and
she'd deceived herself into thinking otherwise. That made her
angry. She began to search for a target for the anger.
A certain logic led her straight to Gideon.
She was furious that he'd fooled her so completely.
"I thought things had gotten better since
papa came home from Philadelphia," Will said.
"Tie's laughed a lot, and sung songs the way
he used to. He's been extra nice to mama-was
Scathingly: "When we're around. When they're
alone, he must be acting horribly. Things must be
worse than ever between them. And he must be the cause."
Somehow she hated making the assertion. But how could she
deny the evidence of her senses?
Will hated to hear it, too. "Oh, Eleanor,
don't say-was
"Look at them!" she broke in, her hands in
fists again. "Look at papa. Then look at
mama. That tells you which one's hurting, and which one's
causing it. That tells you who's in the wrong. Now
leave me alone. I'm late!"
She rushed past Will and ran down the stairs.
Mills drove to the Whittaker town house at
breakneck speed. The Whittakers lived on
London Terrace between Twenty-third and
Twenty-fourth Streets on the west side. It was
another fashionable enclave of new money, the
residences occupied mostly by merchants and other
types of businessmen.
The Whittaker town house always had an exotic
aroma, a blend of the various nostrums
Charlie's father 539
sold in wholesale lots. There were always free
samples to be had of Dr. Helmbold's
Extract of Buchu, or Drake's Plantation
Bitters, or Radway's Ready Relief, or
Dr. Bellingham's Stimulating Onguent, which
Mr. Whittaker enthusiastically claimed had
helped President Lincoln grow his beard.
"See you at half past ten," Eleanor called as
she jumped out of the calash. Mills drove away and
she hurried up the steps. Charlie yanked the door
open before she reached it. He snatched her hand and
practically dragged her inside.
"You're nearly a half hour late! You know how
long it takes to drive to Irving Place. And tonight
we're going to read the play from the stage!" He
paused long enough to look into the parlor. "Goodbye,
mater, goodbye, pater."
Eleanor called a quick greeting as Charlie dragged
her on. The elder Whittakers answered with a cheerful
hello. Charlie's mother and father knew nothing of the
deception being practiced on Gideon and
Margaret. They thought Eleanor came over every
Tuesday evening just so Charlie could escort her to the
meeting of the Booth Association. It was
only proper that she have an escort, New York
being as rough as it was after dark. Margaret never
encountered the Whittakers socially, so there was little chance
of exposure that way. Eleanor was thankful she
didn't have to stumble through weekly lies in front of
Charlie's parents, whom he now affectedly called
poy-ter and may-ter.
In the Whittaker carriage racing back across town,
Eleanor did her best to explain the reason for the
delay. The explanation calmed Charlie's
melodramatic wrath and brought forth a sympathetic,
"How awful. Why is your poor mother so distracted?"
She drew a breath, a bit hesitant to tell her
friend so much that was personal. But she wanted to share her
anguish with someone.
"I can only guess papa treats her abominably
when they're alone."
"I've just met him once, but he didn't seem like
the sort."
"No, he doesn't," Eleanor admitted. "On
the other hand, there's one thing you learn from the theater.
Some people are very good at pretending. There just can't be
any other explanation for mama's condition. Not any
that I can understand, anyway. Sometimes I think papa
must have a mistress."
"What? Are you sure?"
"No, it's just a guess. But it would explain a
lot."
"Mmm." Charlie rubbed his chin. "You could be right.
I've heard newspaper people practice free
association the way actors do. I imagine I'll
have a mistress by the time I'm twenty or
twenty-on2."
That depressed her even more. "You won't fall in
love with her, will you?"
"Why shouldn't I?"
"Because you'll feel wretched if you do. Love
hurts people, Charlie. But it's never going to hurt
me."
Her vehemence shocked him. He quickly sought another
topic.
"Before I forget-you have an unpleasant surprise
waiting for you at the Association. Last week, when
you were laid up, a new member showed his face.
You'll never believe who it is."
"Who?"
"Remember that Jew we saw pushing a broom at
the Academy of Music?"
"Yes!" He frowned at her surprising
enthusiasm. An image of a handsome,
cocky face flashed into her mind. Unexpectedly,
she felt a tightness in her breasts. She was ashamed
of the sensation. It was uncontrollable, and it
contradicted the declaration she'd just made to her friend.
"I thought you told me the Association didn't
admit Jews. I think that's silly, but-was
"Oh, they admitted him," Charlie interrupted.
"Last week he walked in and announced that he'd
heard the Booth Association was the best amateur
club in town, so that's the one he was joining. I found
out afterward why Donald and Percy-was They were the
Association's president and vice president.
"compractically begged the rest of us not to black-ball
Goldman when he stepped out of the room and we
voted. If you can conceive of this, Eleanor, Mr.
Goldman of Hester Street-Hester Street, the
worst slum in New York-spoke to Donald and
Percy in private. He said he'd hold the two
of them responsible if he wasn't admitted. He
said he'd bash their faces in. They claimed he
wasn't testy about it, just very-factual. Did you ever
hear of such a thing?"
"No," Eleanor answered. She was tempted
to laugh delightedly at Leo Goldman's nerve.
She didn't dare or she'd offend
Charlie.
But she admired anyone who confronted obstacles in
a determined way, and did whatever was necessary
to overcome them. That was exactly what she'd done in
order to attend meetings of the Association. For that
reason, and others she didn't fully understand as
yet, it would be far from unpleasant to see the
dark-haired boy again. Of course she didn't dare
mention that to Charlie, either.
The rest of the trip seemed to pass in an instant.
The coachman delivered them to Hutter Hall at
two minutes after eight.
At the Booth Association
AFTER FOUR SPEECHES, Charlie stopped them.
Leo Goldman cleared his throat and peered at his
handwritten side. Eleanor had a similar sheet
containing the lines and cues for her role. Sides were
necessary because no printed text of the complete play was
available.
She was standing next to Leo on a low platform which
served as the stage. The only piece of stage
furniture was a wooden box about two feet
square.
She had never been in such a state of nerves. The
misery of life at home had been
completely driven from her thoughts when she walked
into Hutter Hall.
The moment she'd arrived, Leo Goldman had
hurried over and greeted her warmly. He'd
seized her hand, shaken it, and given her a direct
but not discourteous look that nevertheless made her blush.
Leo's clothing was noticeably poorer than that of the
other members. It consisted of heavy work shoes, old
wool trousers, a cotton jacket from whicKnowledge the
dark blue dye had faded in several places, and a
dingy gray flannel shirt. Every item was clean but
shabby.
Yet Leo's good looks and confident smile
seemed to overcome that. He moved with an intensity,
an energy, altogether lacking in the more affluent boys who
didn't have to scramble for a living. His physical
proximity only increased Eleanor's nervousness-as
did the fact that they were the first couple asked to read.
They'd barely started when Charlie called a halt.
Leo glanced toward the wooden chairs arranged hi
semicircular rows in front of the platform.
Charlie was seated among eleven boys whose ages
varied from fifteen to nineteen. In addition, three
other girls were present as guests. All were at
least three or four years older than
Eleanor, but the difference wasn't pronounced; she
looked as mature as any of them.
The girls were quite taken with Leo, she noticed. She
resented that, though she didn't know why she should; she
disliked her own, quite uncontrollable interest in him.
She wanted no part of him-or any boy. Yet she
frequently found herself glancing in his direction.
Behind the seats stood a crate draped with a piece of
green velvet. On the velvet lay an old
polished gavel, and a copy of the Booth
Association's constitution. On the rear wall hung
a litho portrait of Edwin Booth which, like the
platform, was put up and taken down every Tuesday
evening.
"Let's start over, Goldman," Charlie
called. "Give your character a little mori greater-than
coma little more tension. If you can."
A boy behind Charlie snickered and whispered something
to a girl next to him. Leo scowled. Eleanor could
have punched the club members for being so condescending.
They were just jealous of Leo's good looks and fine
voice.
Charlie Whirtaker could be faulted for his faintly
snide tone, but not for offering criticism. The
Association prided itself on advanced
methods, and tonight Charlie was acting as director of
staging, a job that was just fkiding its way
into professional theaters.
In the past, Eleanor knew from her reading, stage
business and acting technique had been left
largely to the discretion of the actors, and thus to chance.
If the cast was competent and happy, a fine
production resulted. If they were incompetent, or
so jealous that they intentionally blocked one another's
positions or jumped
one another's lines, the result could be chaos.
Stage directors were supposed to take charge,
plan the performance and prevent that sort of thing.
"And Eleanor-was
"Yes, Charlie?" She feffment every eye on her,
including Leo's. His, at least, was friendly,
"When you and Goldman are exchanging your remarks,
don't stand upstage of him. That's a fundamental
lesson you must learn. Position yourself next to him
on an imaginary line from stage right to stage left.
Otherwise, don't you see, you force him to turn
too far. We lose his face. Also, you make him
speak too loudly. Professional acting no longer
consists of a continuous shout. Booth made it
acceptable for an actor to vary the intensity
of his voice. But Goldman's forced to shout if you
make him face the upper wall,"
Her cheeks felt fiery, but she accepted the
criticisms with a meek nod. "All right." She
couldn't be thin-skinned if she wanted to learn. She
was glad Charlie bad-corrected her; she hadn't
even been aware of moving a few steps upstage of
Leo.
Charlie snapped his fingers. Leo began the scene
again:
"Pearl, what does this mean?"
"Oh, it's only a little cloud that I want to clear
up for you." As Eleanor read, she was conscious of the
reedy sound of her voice hi contrast to the richness of
his. She had to get control of her nerves or
she'd botch everything.
"Cloud?" he went on. "How? Where?"
"Don't I tell you I am going to tell you?
Sit down here by me."
She managed to lower herself gracefully onto the
wooden box. She heard a murmur in the gaslit
hall, but
didn't dare look to see whether it signaled
approval or scorn.
She and Leo Goldman were reading from one
of the most successful plays of the melodrama genre-
Augustin Daly's Under the Gaslight. The famous
author-manager had written and produced the drama
during the 1867 season. One of the elements
contributing to its immense popularity was a sensational
spectacle scene hi the third act. Daly's
original mounting at the New York Theatre was still
talked about for its realism; men had cringed and women
had fainted as a train seemed to rush at the
audience, then roar by.
The scene Charlie had chosen came from the play's
first act, which got the needed exposition out of the way.
Pearl's remarks to Ray contained a revelation about
the past of her cousin Laura, who was Ray's
sweetheart. Caught up hi the dialogue and
anxious to make it sound realistic, she soon forgot
her surroundings. The scene only contained thirty-one
speeches before Pearl's exit. They were at the end
almost before she realized it
She swung into Pearl's last few lines, trying
to develop volume without resorting to the bombastic
yelling that was passing out of fashion:
"Mother made me promise never to tell anybody
this, and you would have known nothing had not Laura made me
speak. You see, she would not conceal anything
from you. Ray, why don't you speak? Shall I go after
Laura? Shall I tell her to come to you?"
Leo's mouth opened and closed in a decent
approximation of shock as she went on:
"Why don't you answer? I'll go and tell her you
want to see her. I'm going to send her to you, Rayour
And, with a last challenging look at her partner, she
turned and stalked away, the sheets of the side
clattering noisily in her fingers.
She nearly stumbled and fell off the platform when she
heard one or two of the members applaud.

Charlie Whittaker didn't join in. Since she
was his guest, that would have indicated undue
favoritism. But even one of the other girls was
clapping. So was Leo Goldman. His applause
was the loudest of all.
Eleanor turned pink. The most wonderful sound in
the world, she thought.
In a moment Charlie stood up. Eleanor felt
warm and content as she took a seat. Leo followed
and sat close by, though he left one chair between
them. He smiled at her. In the euphoria of the
moment, she returned the smile. Then, flustered,
she glanced away, realizing he'd think she
was encouraging him,
Charlie's voice interrupted her thoughts.
"All right, time for a critique." A hand went up.
"Shad?"
"I thought Goldman mugged horribly."
The criticisms ranged from substantial to petty.
Eleanor tried to evaluate each one without emotion,
to see whether it contained some bit of helpful information.
Leo Goldman fared worse than she did, although
she honestly thought he had a more natural talent.
His good looks helped him create strongly
masculine characterizations with hardly any effort.
In any case, she believed he drew an unfair
share of criticism. His eyes tended to flash when the
boy named Shad Conway spoke; he was an
especially sarcastic sort. But Leo accepted the
other criticisms without visible annoyance, and
wrote several of them on a little tablet.
Eleanor looked over at the tablet and was oddly
touched by the block capital heading:
WA YS TO IMPROVE.
That told her Leo Goldman not only had the
looks a leading man needed, he also had the
ambition.
Other couples read the same scene and
received a critique. All of the young ladies had a
chance to try the role of Pearl. Shad Conway's
remarks were uniformly merciless. At one point he
made a disparaging comment about the dress a girl was
wearing. Leo jumped up and called him a cad-a
popular word these days. Conway sneered and started
to turn away, saying Leo was too outspoken for a
"newcomer" but his brashness was understandable since he was
a "Hebrew." At that Leo rushed forward, grabbed
Conway and invited him to step into the street without his
coat.
Conway turned white. Charlie and Donald
Brace, the president, stepped in to make peace.
They forced the glowering adversaries to apologize to one
another. Additionally, Conway mumbled an apology
to the girl whose dress he'd criticized.
"Shake hands," Charlie insisted. They did.
Leo's grip must have been powerful, because Conway
turned whiter still. Eleanor relished every moment. She
was not only learning how to move and speak on stage,
she was receiving valuable lessons in how to behave with
other actors.
Once the readings were over, the boys rushed away
to cluster beneath Booth's portrait-all except
Conway, who sat and sulked. Charlie was
grinning when he returned to make an announcement
whose purpose Eleanor couldn't guess. At the
other meetings she'd attended, only a group
reading, with everyone seated in a circle, had taken
place.
"Members present have voted," Charlie said. "We

declare the following point totals for those guests who
essayed the role of Pearl." He consulted a
chit. "Miss McDuff, four points, Miss
Bartholomew, five points."
Leo grinned in an encouraging way. Eleanor
caught her breath. She couldn't believe it when
Charlie beamed and read the fourth and highest score:
"Miss Kent, eleven points."
A splatter of applause and some whistles. Leo
Goldman silently repeated the name Kent,
surprised by it, somehow. Conway peered at the toes
of his boots and pouted. Charlie raised his hand for
order, then continued officiously:
"Now before all you charming ladies rush pell mell
to the offices of the various producing managers, I
must remind you in my role of stage director for the
evening that the club's evaluation scale consists of
twenty points. So even an eleven is
only about halfway to perfection. The aim of the
Booth Association is to promote practice and
improvement. We shall repeat the same scene next
week, with Mr. Farnsworth as director of
staging."
The president whacked the gavel. The meeting was
adjourned.
Eleanor was still happy over her surprising
success. And for nearly two hours she'd quite forgotten
the real world, including her parents and the pain of living
with their hostilities. No wonder actors loved the
theater.
As she collected her bonnet from the cloak room,
Leo Goldman followed her in.
"Congratulations, Miss Kent."
"Thank you, Mr. Goldman. The success of the
scene was due as much to your efforts as to mine."
How handsome he is, she thought, almost against her will. His
dark cheeks gave off the strong but pleasant smell
of home-made soap. He leaned in the doorway.
"I didn't realize your last name was Kent. I
used to run newspapers from Printing House
Square, and I once met a gentleman there who
had the same name. 549
He was connected with the Union. Handsome
chap. Wore a leather patch-was He touched his left
eye. "My father."
"Your father! What a coincidence. I thought it might
be an uncle or something-was
It had the sound of idle conversation. Leo's dark
eyes kept darting here and there, watching the others coming
and going in the cloak room. Eleanor didn't
understand his nervousness until a moment later, when the
club's vice president and one of the girls walked
out with their wraps and she and Leo were left alone.
He rushed forward, shielding her from observation by standing
between her and the doorway. A strong hand, the back
lightly matted with black hair, closed on her
forearm. He lowered his voice.
"I want to see you again. Call on you in proper
fashion. Bet you've never had a beau from the
ghetto. I won't be there forever, though. One day
I'll be as rich and famous as any man hi
America."
"Wait, wait!" she exclaimed, both amused and
appalled. "You can't call on me, Leo-was
"Parents won't allow it? I'll speak to your father.
I can persuade him."
All at once she was terrified by his confidence.
Over his shoulder she saw Charlie waiting
and watching them. She blurted the first objection that
came to mind:
"I'm not old enough to have a beau."
"You're seventeen or eighteen, aren't you?"
"Fourteen the end of May."
"Come on!"
"It's true. I don't have beaux and-was She
remembered the misery at home, and slowly choked
off the excitement produced by the touch of his hand. "comand
I don't want any, thank you very much."
She started to pull away. His chin thrust out.
"You're fibbing to me. I can tell. I don't know
why you're doing
it, but Fll find out. When I want something, I
don't give up."
She managed to free her hand, and wave. "I'm
coming, Charlie. As soon as Mr. Goldman stops
talking."
She threw Leo a sharp look and brushed by him, still
tingling from the physical contact and telling herself it was
wrong.
Leo Goldman's expression grew angry as he
watched her leave Hutter Hall with Charlie. Then
the annoyance faded, replaced by a look of
determination.

"Charlie, that was absolutely grand."
The carriage was hurrying them back to London
Terrace, where she'd creep in the back door of the
Whit-takers", dash out the front and return with
Mills to that dreadful house. How she wished she
didn't have to do that. How she wished she could lose
herself in a performance every night. If only she were as
old as Leo Goldman thought, she'd be free to do
whatever she wanted. Free to pursue a career.
"Didn't I say you had a first class talent?"
Chastlie replied. "The members endorsed my
view. Say-what did that Jew want in the cloak
room?"
""You mustn't keep calling him a Jew in that tone
of voice. If you do, he'll have every right to call you the
son of a quack medicine peddler."
Charlie bristled. "Taking his part pretty hotly,
aren't you?"
She was aware of warmth in her face again. She
struggled to keep her tone casual.
"I'm only trying to be fair."
"You didn't tell me what he wanted."
She shrugged. "He was just paying a compliment." 551
"Yes, I saw him rolling Ms damned
eyes at you all evening!"
"Now Charlie, don't carry on. Leo means
nothing to me."
The falsehood put scarlet back hi her
cheeks. Shameful images filled her head all
at once. Her mouth against Leo's. Their bodies
touching, without clothing, hi some idyllic, sun-bright
glade where, together, they sank down to perform the
mysterious act she'd only heard about-
Stop. That sort of thing only brought pain. She must
remember that.
She calmed down; maneuvered the conversation hi a
different direction.
"I decided something tonight, Charlie. I'm
definitely going to be an actress."
"You mean you weren't sure?"
"Not entirely. Not until I read that scene."
"Well, I'd say you have an excellent chance
to fulfill your ambition. Maybe we'll even
appear together one of these days." Then, adopting that
man-of the-world tone, he added, "Tell me, how
soon do you plan to leave the family fireside and
take up trouping? Tomorrow? Next week?"
Lamps on a passing carriage cast a harsh glare
La Eleanor's oval eyes for a moment.
Her face lost its soft quality.
"Don't joke that way. Things are terrible at
home. I promise you this. I'll leave as soon
as I can."
"Really?"
"Yes." She pressed her gloved fist against her
skirt "As soon as I can."
Charlie retreated into puzzled silence. Eleanor
had the mercurial temperament of an actress, right
enough. Her declaration just now had been almost as
strident as the one she'd made while they were on their
way to Irving Place.
He didn't understand why she felt as she did, but it
was very evident violent emotions were churning within her.
Charlie liked Eleanor Kent. He hoped those
emotions comor the unhappy situation with her family-
wouldn't bring her to grief.
CHAPTER XV
The Birthday
THREE DAYS BEFORE Eleanor's fourteenth
birthday, Gideon again spent the evening at home.
He was doing it more and more frequently of late. Around
eight thirty he finished reading Will a section of a
new Mark Twain book, The Adventures of
Tom Sawyer. Then he lifted his son
off his knee and shooed him to bed. He went upstairs
ten minutes later to be sure Will had followed
instructions.
Will was hi bed with the sheet pulled up to the collar of his
summer night shirt. Gideon sat down on the
edge of the bed and mussed his son's hair
affectionately. How sober his eyes were. More
appropriate to a man of eighty than a boy of
eight.
"Will, do you ever give any thought to what you want to be
when you grow up?"
"Some," Will admitted. In that reply, as in everything
he said or did, he was hesitant, as if he
might be criticized or punished.
"Can you tell me?"
Another pause. "I'd like to join one of the
volunteer fire companies. But I don't think
I'd better. I think I should pick something
quiet."
Gideon almost burst out laughing until he saw the
seriousness of his son's expression. There was something so
timid about Will, something so cowed and so contrary to the
normal exuberance of boys, Gideon's heart
almost broke with guilt.
"Why do you say that, Will?"
With perfect logic, the boy answered, "Mama
likes quiet children. You don't get yelled at or
whipped when you're quiet."
"But boys need to whoop and holler once in a
while. It's allowed."
"Oh," he nodded, "I do that over in the Park.
By myself."
What have we done to him, me with my inattention and
Margaret with her bad moods? His voice was hushed:
"I see. Well, good night, W." "Good night,
Papa." The boy's hug was unashamedly loving.
Gideon turned out the gaslight and left. He
walked down the corridor to bid Eleanor good
night before she finished her Studies and made ready
for bed. Like Will, she too represented a problem,
though a different one. Of late she'd started to treat
him with a cool reserve he found upsetting.
Oh, she was never disrespectful. And deep in her
eyes he thought he detected affection struggling
to break free. But she would permit no tangible
demonstration of it.
He entered her room quietly. She was bent over
her Latin grammar. He murmured, "Good night,
Eleanor," and reached down almost shyly to touch the
back of her hand. One did no more than that
with a maturing girl, he'd discovered. Physical
contact with parents seemed to embarrass them.
The moment his fingers brushed hers, she jerked her

hand to her lap. She forced a smile at once
nervous and insincere.
"Good night, Papa. Before you go, may I ask you
a question?"
"Certainly." It was unexpected-but far better
than indifference.
"Do you know a boy named Leo Goldman? He said
he met you once down near the paper."
"Goldman. I don't believe-was
"He's two or three years older than I am.
From the lower East Side. He said he used
to deliver newspapers."
"Oh, yes, now I remember. It was five or
six years ago. He stopped me at the door of the
Union and asked a question about an extra edition.
Good looking youngster, as I recall-was Memory
made him smile. "Struck me as a cheeky
sort, but in a nice way. His voice was changing.
He was very excited about the opportunity in
America. His parents were immigrants, and he said
he planned to make a fortune here. I
recall thinking he probably would. Where on earth
did you run into him?"
"Oh, he's a friend of Martina's brother."
"Of Charlie Whittaker's?" Gideon
recognized a fib. His daughter wasn't good at
deception, thank heaven.
He didn't press the issue, just murmured
to acknowledge that he'd heard. But he meant to stay
alert for any further inquiries or signs of
interest. He didn't want Eleanor involving
herself with some street-wise slum boy. Not at her
age. Not at any age, for that matter.
All at once he saw an opportunity he'd
been wanting; chances to converse with his daughter were very
few these days.
"Since I answered your question, will you answer one of
mine?"
Her response was a shrug and, "Of course."

"Why are you so annoyed with me lately?"
"I'm not."
"I'm sorry, but I don't believe you. Is it
because of the trip to Philadelphia? That's all
settled now. We're going next month. I've
booked the suite of rooms. More
important, your mother has finally agreed to the
departure date."
The trip was scheduled for the eleven day period between the
Republican nominating convention in Cincinnati and
that of the Democrats in St. Louis. The Union's
chief political reporter would be doing daily
stories from both conventions, but Gideon planned
to attend a few sessions of each as an observer and
editorialist.
Eleanor turned in her chair and exclaimed, "I
know-Will's already in a tizzy over the trip. He's
driving me absolutely wild."
Gideon chuckled. "Well, I'm glad to see a
response, even if your brother does catch the
worst of it. Things are entirely too grim and
listless in this house. I'm trying to change that. I
hope the excursion will help."
She gave him a hard stare. "I thought you liked
things the way they are, Papa."
He suppressed sudden anger. "May I ask
what you mean? That's a rather impertinent remark for a
girl your age."
"Yes, I'm sorry," she said, and turned back
to her grammar. Her tone clearly said she didn't
think she'd done wrong. Somehow he was being
cast in the role of the family's chief sinner.
Who was doing that? Margaret? She was barely civil
any longer. And sometimes, despite the alcohol
haze in which she lived, she gazed at him in a most
peculiar way. Almost a calculating way.
He hoped to God she wasn't attempting
to influence the minds of the children against him. The thought was a
sorry climax to his aborted effort to come to some
understanding with Eleanor. She didn't even glance up
as he left the room and softly shut the door.
Well, it was only a small defeat. He mustn't
let it ruin his determination to improve conditions in the
family. Will needed the companionship of a brother
or, lacking one, of a father. Gideon needed to start
teaching his son to play checkers. He ought to buy a
bat and ball for them to use in the vacant lot on the
other side of Sixty-first.
And despite Eleanor's hostility, he wanted
to make her birthday a happy one. As yet he'd
gotten no present for her. Tune was running out, but
he'd been unable to think of the right thing.
He wanted to make the gift a special and
important one. The celebration itself was shaping up that
way. Cook had drawn up an extra-good menu.
And Margaret had surprised Gideon
by suggesting she write Molly in Long Branch and
invite her to come up and spend the night, a
proposal he'd enthusiastically seconded.
So far, he'd done no more than scribble a list of
ideas for a gift. Downstairs in his book-lined
study, he turned up the gaslight and tugged the list
from a waistcoat pocket. He ran his eye down
what he'd written.
Brushes.
Combs-moth, of prl. inlays.
Perfume.
There were six other items, equally pedestrian.
What could he get that would excite Eleanor? The
obvious answer was something connected with her developing
interest in the theater. Did he dare buy a book of
some sort? A Shakespearean text? Much as
Margaret disliked the New York theaters, she
surely couldn't object to a printed play.
He'd search the better bookshops starting tomorrow
morning. He would, that is, unless he could think of
something even better before then.
He sat down at his desk. He took out pen and
tablet to compose a message for the Atlantic cable.
He'd had no response to his letter to Matt. He
was beginning to think his brother hadn't received
it, or had received and dismissed it. In case the
latter was true, Matt at least owed him the
courtesy of a refusal.
Abruptly he gnawed the end of the pen. The street
boy-Goldman. Where had Eleanor met him?
He still didn't believe the explanation about Charlie
Whittaker. Had she encountered Goldman in some
kind of theatrical activity? He hoped not.
Reading plays was fine. Harmless. Becoming
personally involved in the seedy, amoral world of the
theater was something else again. It was a possibility
that, as a father, he couldn't tolerate.
He recognized that he was in effect creating a double
standard-one for his children, and one for himself- and Julia. But
more and more, he was coming to look at things from a father's
perspective. And if a double standard was required
to protect a daughter, so be it. Damn what
anyone might say about hypocrisy.
He glanced up at the sound of the study door opening.
"Margaret!"
A surprised smile spread over his face. It
vanished when he took note of her sullen eyes.
How white and weary she looked. For a moment he
felt a stir of the old affection. Or was it merely
pity?
There was almost a whine in her voice as she said, "I
wanted to let you know I saw Dr. Melton today."
Good God. He hardly dared take a breath. Had
she realized at last that the drinking was destroying her?
As if to confirm it, she added, "I've been having
some problems-was
Careful. Don't upset her.
"What sort of problems, Margaret?"
"Why, feminine ones. The kind a woman doesn't
dis-558
cuss even with her husband." That was unexpected; it
jolted him, then brought a feeling of discouragement as
she went on. "Dr. Melton gave me a tonic
that's different from the one I'm taking now."
The one thafs rotting your mind and ruining your life?
Sweat broke out on his forehead. He fought to keep
from shouting at her. She continued:
"He gave me some other preparations as well.
During the next ninety days, he wants me to rest
as much as I can. I wanted to tell you at once,
because going on the trip to Philadelphia will be quite
impossible now."
He tried to conceal his hurt. "I could still take the
children-was
A touch of hostility: "It was planned as
a family outing, was it not?"
"Of course, of course." He was anxious not
to agitate her. "As soon as you're feeling up
to it, we can discuss new reservations for the fall. The
exposition will be open until the tenth of November.
It'll be cooler then. I suppose I'd better
tell Eleanor and Will-was
"I've just done that. Will was upset, but Eleanor was
very understanding. I'm glad you're taking the same
attitude, Gideon."
She turned to leave, her step slow and her face
disturbingly blank. In truth, he was furious over
the news.
After she was gone he raked a hand through his hair, then
picked up the pen with which he'd been about to write
to Matt. Suddenly he snapped the pen in half.
"God damn it," he said softly as tears of
disappointment welled in his eye.
ii
An hour later, Margaret committed her latest
coup to the pages of her diary. She chuckled and
cooed to herself as she wrote behind drawn drapes and a
locked
door in the dsnk bedroom. By her hand stood an
unlabeled brown bottle from which she drank
occasionally.
comand he accepted my He. Tomorrow I shall speak to E.
and W. still told G that I had already done so, but that
is not true. Should he chance to discuss the matter with
them before I do, I shall plead a misunderstanding. I do not
think he will do it, though, as he was exercised, and
appeared to accept my word as final.
When I talk with the children I shall tell them it is their
jather who has once again found it impossible to make
the journey to Philadelphia. I shall say his work
has again taken precedence, and they will hate him. And
why not, dear friend? The blame jor all the woes of
this household is HIS-
She slashed lines beneath the capitalized word.
Unlike the underscorings at the start of the book, the
ones on this page and those immediately preceding were
distinctly uneven. Jagged, Z-shaped lines.
She lifted the brown bottle. Drank. Then, after
using her little finger to dab spittle from a corner of
her lips, she continued writing:
Next, if at all possible, I must find a way
to make it seem he has intentionally ruined
Eleanor's birthday celebration.

Next morning, Gideon awoke angry.
He was sure Margaret had gulled him last night.
He'd wanted to exhibit patience with her. Be
sympathetic and kind when she needed it. So he'd
swallowed
her story whole. He awoke doubting it-and her
honesty.
He suspected her alleged feminine problems were
fictions, invented to once more disrupt the off-again,
on-again trip. That angered him, and so did the
frustration of being unable to verify her story. The
only way he could do it was to go to Melton's
consulting rooms aad ask vulgar questions about a
subject which-as Margaret herself said-husbands seldom
if ever discussed with their wives. She probably
knew he wouldn't set foot in Melton's office
for that purpose.
The suspicion that she'd once again spoiled things in
order to create fiiction stayed with him as he commenced
his trip downtown. As had happened before, a time of
turmoil unexpectedly produced a good idea.
He got an inspiration for Eleanor's gift, and
realized with impatience that he wouldn't be able to speak
with the Union's drama critic, Billy Dawes,
until midafternoon. The editorial people began to drift
in then, although certain staff writers who
did most of their work in the office reported earlier
to prepare and polish filler material.
During the morning Gideon occupied himself with the
previous month's financial statement. He met
with his chief bookkeeper before going to lunch with Payne
at the tavern on Ann Street where he and Sime
Strelnik had parted company that winter night hi
"71.
Gideon had brought along a thick folder of
copy. Eight articles prepared by Salathiel
Brown, the Union's correspondent who
traveled west of the Mississippi. Each article
dealt with some aspect of life in a growing city or
town in that part of the country. Gideon showed Payne
the minor changes and suggestions he'd noted on
each of the first seven features. Then he pulled out the
last one. The front page bore the title Paris
of the Prairie.
"Telegraph Sal to try this one again, Theo. That
is, if you agree we're not in the business of
glorifying card sharps."
"Indeed we aren't," Payne said between bites of a
cutlet. "Haven't read the piece yet. What's
wrong with it?"
"Mr. Brown chose to focus on the
Kansas City tenderloin. Specifically, on the
downfall of one man who's been drawn there by boom
times in the city. Some fellow named-was Gideon
thumbed the copy. "Kane."
"Not Jason Kane?" Payne spelled the last
name.
"Yes. You've heard of him?"
The editor nodded. "He's killed his share, like
Hickok and some of those other desperadoes. What'd
he do to get in trouble in Kansas City?"
"The same thing for which he says he was wrongfully
run out of Deadwood Gulch. He cheated. He was
caught, tarred and feathered."
Payne winced at the painful thought. Gideon went
on:
"The point is, Sal portrays him as a kind of
pathetic hero. A victim of his fondness for the
bottle-was That just slipped out, but Payne didn't
act offended. "comandof his need to maintain a fierce
reputation. According to Sal's view, this Kane had no
chance to succeed after the war because he was a Reb. All
he could do was take up a career as a gambler. I
don't accept that. Choices are open to every man.
Hell, I was a Reb and I swam upstream in the
biggest city in the North for years afterward.
But I didn't drown."
With a melancholy smile, Payne murmured,
"Some of us are not made of such stern stuff,
Gideon."
Then pink spots appeared on his cheeks. "I'm
sorry. That was self-pitying and unkind. You're a
good friend and a good man. My weaknesses aren't your
fault. Accept my apology?"
The younger man waved, but Payne's remark
disconcerted him. If only the editor knew how
often he
doubted his own abilities-and how inadequate and
downright helpless he felt in certain areas of his
life, notably his home life.
Still, he had never forgotten Payne's lecture about
careless writing, and how it might fix some
grammatical error in the mind of a man who trusted
you to be correct. He thought a similar principle
applied here. The Union would not promote
sympathy for a thief.
"Of course I'll accept it, Theo. On one
condition." Gideon smiled. "That you go over these, and
if you agree with my thoughts on the Kansas City
piece, ask Sal Brown to take another
crack."
"I certainly shall."
Back at the paper, Gideon went into a long
session with the circulation manager. When the meeting
ended, his watch showed three o'clock. Dawes should be coming
in soon.
He wanted to ask the drama critic a question about
George Aiken's dramatization of Uncle
Tom's Cabin. The play had first been produced
by the resident acting company at the Troy Museum
upstate, shortly after Mrs. Stowe's influential
novel was published. A year later, in 1853,
Aiken's revised six-act version had been brought
to New York City-again with not one penny of
royalty going to Mrs. Stowe. Loosely drawn
copyright legislation permitted playwrights to pilfer
any published work they chose.
Since '53, the Aiken play had been staged
hundreds of times. The productions ranged from
spartan to opulent. After the war the play's
popularity had. remained undiminished. Even today
scores of companies were always out in the provinces
playing Tom shows, as productions were called.
Gideon had only seen one version, but it had been
a
lavish one. Julia had taken him to it in
Cleveland. He
could never forget the scenic effects, especially
Uncle
Tom's ascension to Heaven in a gilded car at the
final
curtain, and the thrilling picture created by live
bloodhounds pursuing Eliza across the ice in the
Ohio River scene. The bloodhounds were an
interpolation by the producers, Julia said. She'd
seen two other versions which didn't use dogs, and
thus assumed they weren't specified in the text.
Although the play, like the novel, was fundamentally an
abolitionist tract, it was nearly as popular in the
South as in the North. Gideon supposed it was because
in some respects, the drama pandered to, and even
reinforced, stereotyped ideas about nigras.
Audiences tended to ignore the fiercely militant
and freedom-loving George Harris, Eliza's
husband, and fix on the other black characters. But even
the resigned and deeply religious Uncle Tom
would probably not be so objectionable to newly freed
blacks as would Topsy, Gideon supposed.
Topsy was a thoroughly shiftless and treacherous girl
who delighted in tricking whites. Of course
audiences found her grotesque
misunderstandings of proper English to be hilarious-as the
author intended.
Still, there was no getting around one fact. The play was
undoubtedly the single most important social
drama created in America so far in this century.
At the same time, Gideon had found it a thunderingly
good melodrama. Any girl interested in the
literature of the theater ought to own a copy of
Aiken's work-even if it did come to her from a former
Confederate. That was the conclusion he'd reached when the
idea popped into his head earlier. He couldn't
imagine that Margaret would object. The play was on
its way to becoming a classic.
He saw Billy Dawes come up the stairs from the
street, and went to meet him at his desk.
"Hello, Gideon. What can I do for you?"
"Answer a question, Billy. Are there any printed
texts of Aiken's Tom show available?"
"I could be wrong, but I don't think so. Nothing but
prompt scripts for the actors."
"Could you get hold of one? In time for me to put it
on a late train to Boston?"
"You mean a late train tonight?"
"Yes."
"That's a tall order."
"Draw any amount of money you need."
Dawes grinned. "You just shortened the order
considerably. I have friends in most of the playhouses.
I'll see what I can do. WiUs Mr. Payne
think I'm malingering?"
He glanced toward the cubicle in which Payne could be
heard chastising Staniels, the city editor, for what
Payne considered poor opening paragraphs on
several recent stories.
"I'll keep him occupied," Gideon promised.
"Will you get started?"
"Right away."
Gideon next wrote his telegraph message
to Kent and Son, Boston. Dana Hughes wired
back that it was a difficult assignment, but if
Gideon could put the prompt script on a
midnight express, a representative of the
publishing house would meet the train, all regular
work would be set aside in the type shop, press
room and bindery, and the special order would be
delivered by the requested date.
Hughe's message concluded by asking what Gideon
had heard about Mr. Matthew Kent's participation in
the historical project.
Nothing, Gideon realized with a glance at
a calendar. Another day had gone by without a letter or
cable. Where the hell was his brother? In hiding in
order to finish some Important piece of work?
Gideon decided he was either growing old, or growing
conservative, or both, because he certainly didn't
understand the mind of someone like Matt any longer. He
didn't even have much of a desire to try.
iv
True to his word, Hughes had the finished,
cmeof-a-kind book in Gideon's hands by three
o'clock on the afternoon of Eleanor's birthday.
Gideon had been warned that the special edition
might cost as much as a thousand dollars by the time all
charges were in. But he thought the price was worth
it-especially when he unwrapped the layers of paper
and protective wadding and examined the finished
volume.
It was an oversized edition, bound in rich,
maroon-dyed leather and elegantly stamped in gold.
The title of the work as well as Aiken's name and that of
Mrs. Stowe glittered on the spine together with the Kent
and Son colophon, the half filled tea
bottle. The vellum smelled new. So did the
leather.
The text had been set with a ragged right
margin, in twelve point type, generously leaded.
It made for a bulky book but Gideon liked the
effect. He immediately sent Hughes a telegraph
message expressing his pleasure and his thanks.
He left the Union at six, over the protests
of Payne who wanted to have supper at the tavern and
discuss a series of forthcoming articles on the
country's continuing economic woes. "Tomorrow night,"
Gideon promised, and scooted for the staircase with the
gift tucked under his arm.
The gift looked beautiful. One of the copy boys
who aspired to be an editorial artist had claimed
he was good at fixing up fancy presents. The
beribboned package which he'd returned
to Gideon's desk had proved it. And earned the
boy five dollars on top of the cost of the wrapping
materials.
Gideon's carriage clipped north along Fifth
Avenue. He was genuinely excited about the evening
ahead.
With luck it might be one of the happiest in the
household in years.
Again he blessed Julia for urging him to make the
effort to create that happiness. She was far wiser than
he, but he was beginning to learn again that kindness
and patience brought greater rewards than anger.
A spring sky of pale yellow spread above
Central Park. Black thunderclouds were rolling in
from the northwest. Through the open window of the carriage
he felt the chilly brush of an approaching storm
wind. Soon the first drops of what might be a
downpour thumped the carriage roof. But no storm
could dampen his enthusiasm for the coming celebration-or the
sheer joy of being able to go home to children he loved.
The carriage swung into Sixty-first Street, then
into the yard at the rear of the mansion. He said a
cheerful goodbye to Mills, andwiththe package tucked
under the left side of his coat, started inside. At
the back door he remembered something; turned and
called:
"Was the train on time?"
The coachman booted the brake. Shouted back through
the rain and noisy gusts of wind:
"What train, sir?"
"The train my wife sent you to meet this afternoon.
Mrs. Kent's train from the Jersey shore."
Raindrops splashed his forehead, oddly chill.
"Didn't you go down to the ferry station where the
passengers arrive?"
"No, sir, I didn't."
Ah God, Gideon thought as the rain trickled
down his neck and dampened his collar. She. forgot
again. Molly probably had to take a hack from the
North River piers.
Well, if that was the evening's only mishap, nothing
would be lost. He composed himself and went inside. He
took off his light checked MacFarlan with its
separate sleeve capes and his matching brown beaver
hat. The butler, Samuel, juggled those and the
wrapped 567
package as Gideon rubbed a palm over his
hair, which he now parted in the middle and groomed with
Macassar oil, as most men did.
"I suppose Mrs. Kent arrived from Jersey in
good order?" he said with a smile.
"The elder Mrs. Kent, sir?"
Gideon nodded.
"Is she supposed to attend the celebration?"
Samuel asked.
"She is."
"Then I'm sorry to report that she's late."
"You mean to say she isn't here?"
"No, sir. I wasn't even aware she was
expected."
"My wife didn't inform you?"
"No, nor cook either. Only four places are
set hi the dining room, not five-was
Samuel's voice trailed off. He was addressing
the master's retreating back.
Gideon went up the staircase two steps at a
time, heading straight for Margaret's room. A
scowl marred his face. His earlier mood of
anticipation was gone.
CHAPTER XVI
House of Madness
GIDEON KNOCKED ON Margaret's door.
She refused to let him in. Instead, she opened the
door and quickly slipped outside. Their reflections
were dun and distorted in the rain-speckled window at the
end of the corridor.
At least she'd remembered to dress properly. In
fact she looked quite pretty hi a gown of tan
faille silk with a white taffeta drapery. The
dress had a pointed train
decorated with bow knots from the peak of the bustle
downward. She'd completed the ensemble with white
slippers and an arrangement of aigrettes and white
ostrich tips hi her hair.
"What did you want, Gideon?"
For a moment he saw the woman he'd once
loved so fiercely. All the old memories
helped him speak with a degree of control.
"I wanted to ask about Molly. Where is she?"
"Why, I have no idea. Down at Long Branch,
I suppose."
"She was planning to join us this evening."
Margaret looked puzzled. "Are you sure?"
His stomach began to ache. "You were the one who suggested
it, Margaret."
Her confusion deepened. "I? Gideon, I'm very
sorry, but I have no recollection of that."
She blinked once, then again. Through the mask of her
perfume he whiffed whiskey all at once.
He continued to study her by the light of the hissing gas
fixtures. Continued to search for signs of the Me that
was always so easy to detect in Eleanor. God
help him, Margaret seemed sincere.
"You don't recall saying you'd send Molly a
note of invitation?"
"No, because I never said it," she answered in an
ingenuous voice. One plump white hand plucked
at the decolletage of the gown. She seldom
dressed so finely any more; she was ill at ease.
"I'm sure I didn't," she said, smiling at
him in an almost infantile way. A stir
of air moved the bedroom door. The latch clicked
and the door opened an inch or so. She reached behind her
to close it, but not before he smelled the staleness.
Didn't she ever ventilate the place?
He forced himself to speak softly:
"I see. I must have misunderstood." 569
"I hope you're not accusing me of another lapse-was
"No, no." He touched her arm to reassure her.
She jerked away. His jaw whitened a moment. Then:
"It's my fault. Entirely mine. Now if
you'll excuse me, I must change. I'll join you
downstairs."
He turned and hurried away, no longer angry but
alarmed. He kept seeing her forlorn, vacant
eyes. She'd forgotten again!
He shut the door of his room and leaned against it.
For a moment he felt a remarkable kinship with
Thomas Courtleigh. Kinship, and sympathy for him
as well. He understood the agony Courtleigh must
have gone through because of his wife; the agony of wanting
to help and being unable.
What was wrong inside that poor head of
Margaret's? Was it the frustration of not being able
to control him? The damaging effects of the drinking?
Some unknown flaw inherited from her father? Was
it one cause, or several? Who could explain? Who
could help?
He shook his head in despair. There were no
answers.
Silver candelabra all along the table lent the dining
room a festive air. Yet somehow Gideon
knew the evening was foredoomed
Margaret was the last to arrive. She swept through the
entrance and flung a pettish look in his direction.
His inquiry about Molly, and the implied accusation of
faulty memory, had obviously put her in a
bad mood.
He had an impulse to flee and seek saactuary
in the parlor, where the servants were kindling a fire
now that the spring air had turned sharply cooler with the
coming of rain. He would have done that, except for
Eleanor.
She, too, was wearing her best dress, a gown of
vel570
vet. She looked radiant, and far older than the
fourteen years they were celebrating.
Both children sensed the tension between their parents. Eleanor
tried to keep the conversation lively and
inconsequential, chattering about events at Miss
Hoi-sham's while the soup course was
served. Will wiggled in his chair, repeatedly pulling
at the tight, high-standing collar and scarf cravat
he'd been forced to wear. When he picked up his
spoon to dip into the turtle soup, he was so nervou*
the spoon fell and clanged against the silver tureen.
Margaret gave him a withering look. Despite
encouragement from Gideon, he didn't try to taste
the soup again. He sat rigid, darting
apprehensive glances at his mother.
She didn't taste the soup either. When the serving
girls came to clear away the tureens, Margaret
pushed hers away so sharply, soup splattered all
over the spotless' tablecloth. Eleanor kept her
gaze confined to her own place.
As the next course arrived, Will screwed up
courage to ask his father if the paper had received any
new dispatches from the Dakota Territory, where the
Army was mounting a punitive expedition against the
Sioux. Thoughts of soldiers and Indians could always
overcome Will's fear and put a sparkle back in his
eyes-but Margaret quickly took care of that by slapping
the table.
"Kindly do not bring up such distasteful subjects
at this table!"
Gently, Gideon said, "He didn't
mean any harm, Margaret." She just glared.
Will had already shrunk back against his chair.
Reluctantly Gideon turned to him. "Let's
try to honor your mother's wishes." The boy was almost
pathetic in his haste to nod. God, Gideon thought,
how many more times can he be defeated without being ruined for
life? Not many, I fear.
Mercifully, the meal was quickly eaten. They reached the
sherbet and the plates of fruit and cheese in thirty
minutes. Gideon sensed that Eleanor had hurried
deliberately, perhaps wanting to get them to what might
be happier surroundings. But for all its warmth, and for
all the cheerful light generated by the gas and the
flickering wood fire, the parlor too seemed
to lie under a pall--the pall of Margaret's dour and
volatile presence.
Gideon strode to the mantel where the important
family keepsakes were displayed: the small,
stoppered green bottle containing an eighth of an inch
of dried tea and, hanging on pegs above, the French
infantry sword and the Kentucky long rifle. The
portrait of the man who had collected the mementoes
hung on the opposite wall.
Philip Kent's picture had been commissioned after
the Revolution. By then he'd been in his
late thirties; affluent and conservative. Yet the
painted image had a youthful vitality, as if a
pugnacious street urchin was hiding just behind the face
of the splendidly dressed adult.
Gideon stared at the portrait a moment. He was
Philip Kent's heir-and that meant being spiritual
heir to some of the strength which seemed to radiate from the
canvas. He drew a breath, resolving again
to make the evening a good one.
Eleanor settled herself, arranging her skirts. Will
ran in, then skidded to a stop when he saw
Margaret's reproving eyes. Very cautiously, he
advanced to stand beside his sister. He pulled his hand from
behind his back, thrust something at Eleanor and
blurted:
"I-hopeyoulikeitIknowyouwon'tbutyou-knowIdon
'thaveabig-allowance."
Gideon laughed at the breathless words. Sheepish,
Will looked at his father. Gideon summoned him
to his
side with a smile and the boy gratefully went.
Gideon
slid his hand around Will's shoulder as Eleanor exam
ined her brother's gift-a clear jar containing a dead
frog afloat in brine.
From the protection of his father's side, Will added, "I
caught him over in the Park. Gigged him to death
myself."
"How repulsive," Margaret said. "Don't ever
bring such a thing into this house again."
"Please, Mama," Eleanor whispered, sounding
almost desperate. "It's a-very interesting present.
I'll treasure it, W."
Her cheeks were the color Gideon had mentally
dubbed Fibbing Pink. Eleanor's kindness shamed
Margaret. The older woman said in a lame way,
"Yes, I must remember that the intent always counts more
than the gift itself-was
No one commented. Will looked relieved. He
didn't realize his sister had been employing her
acting talent Thank goodness for that, Gideon thought.
An instantaneous change took place when
Margaret became the center of attention. She was
cheerful; almost jolly. She made an elaborate
show of stealing out to a foyer closet and returning with
several beautifully wrapped boxes. The boxes
contained an assortment of scarves and two dressy
hats, one of which was decorated with artificial
flowers and a long plume dyed brilliant blue.
She proudly announced that the gifts were
imported from Paris. They pleased Eleanor.
Then it was Gideon's turn. He reached under a
divan and pulled out the package. Eleanor
unwrapped it, glanced at the gilt lettering and caught
her breath in surprise and delight
Margaret leaned forward in her chair. "What is it,
dear? It looks frightfully expensive."
"Yes, Mama, indeed it does."
"Don't worry, we got a special discount,"
Gideon said with a nervous smile. "I had it
printed and bound at the firm in Boston."
Eleanor a.jed, "It's a deluxe edition of
Uncle Tom's Cabin, Mama."
Gideon hoped that would end it. If Margaret had
taken a stiff dose of her tonic after dinner, it
might have. But she was sober-and curious. She picked
up her train and walked to where her daughter was seated.
Gideon held his breath.
Margaret bent forward. "The Stowe woman's
novel? Why would you give her that, Gideon? Why
on earth would you spend money to bind up that piece of
Yankee trash?"
Even as her mother was speaking, Eleanor was closing the
book to conceal the text. But she wasn't fast enough.
The arrangement of the page finally registered
on Margaret. "Let me see that." She snatched
the book and tore it open. "It's a play. It's
the play version."
Silence. A small log broke in the grate.
Rain pelted the windows.
"I saw no harm-was Gideon began.
"You did this to defy me."
"Please control yourself. I did it because Eleanor
is interested in-was
"To defy me!" Margaret repeated, shaking the book
at him. Eleanor reached for her mother, perhaps hoping
to calm things with a touch. Margaret saw the outstretched
hand and slashed downward with her right arm, nearly
striking her daughter. Eleanor drew her hand back
and covered her mouth.
Gideon was desperately struggling for patience.
"There is no harm in books, Margaret. Not in
any book, whether it be a play or-was
"But you know I won't permit this kind of thing in my
home, this-was Her voice was growing steadily
shriller. "comth kind of filth. Anything connected with the
theater is filthy. Obscene and filthy!" She
flung the book into the fireplace.
Eleanor uttered a cry and leaped to retrieve the
book. Gideon shot out his hand to bur her:
"Please don't."
"But Papa!" She slipped under his arm and knelt
on the hearth.
"Don't, Eleanor." With effort he lowered his
voice. "Let it burn. I'll buy you something more
acceptable."
She looked at him, then at the book. The paper was
charring, the leather wrinkling. Bright flames surrounding
it made the tears in her eyes sparkle.
"Papa, I don't see anything wrong with owning a
dramatization of a famous-was
"Let it bum!"
Quite without wanting to, he had shouted at her. She
showed greater self-restraint. She rose, smoothed
her skirt and stepped back from a sudden eruption of
fire. The paper in the open book ignited and quickly
disappeared into curls of black ash. The leather
darkened. Gideon wiped his perspiring upper lip and
said:
"I really thought there was no harm in a book, no
matter what its origins. I was in error. I'm
sorry." It took immense effort to add, "I also
apologize to you, Margaret."
She sneered. "Why do you bother? You did exactly
what you wanted and you'll do the same thing
again. You always do whatever you want."
With a thin smile distorting her mouth, she marched back
to her chair. Will had ducked behind a divan when the
book was thrown. Now he reappeared, returned
to Gideon's side and clasped his hand.
"Don't feel bad, Papa. Maybe you can buy
Eleanor a present hi Philadelphia if we
ever go there. We're all really sorry we can't go
next month because you have to work so hard writing up those
political meetings."
"Can't go?" Gideon blinked. He turned and
looked at Margaret, who was gazing at her son as
if she wanted to
wipe him of? the earth. "But it's your mother's illness
that-was
He bii of? the sentence, He was beginning to understand.
At first it frightened aim. Then it made hiai pale
with fury.
"Children-Eleanor-was His voice was barely controlled.
"I'm sorry to spoil the party, but I must speak
to your mother alone. Please leave us."
Eleanor and her brother exchanged hesitant
looks.
"T said please leave!"
For a second Eleanor seemed ready
to protest. But she herded Will out ahead of her, and with
her head bowed, dosed the parlor doors.
Instantly, Gideon stormed toward his wife.
"Wlu have you been saying 10 those children behind my back?
You-and Dr. Melton's advice-forced the cancelation
of the trip."
He grabbed her wrist. "Have you been saying
otherwise, Margaret?" Shook the flabby white
arm. "Have you?"
She struggled. "Don't do that. Let me go-was
His voice overlapped hers. "What else have you
been telling them? I should have guessed long ago that you
were up to something like this. Will's always looking
hurt-Eleanor's always angry with me-was
Able to contain his rage at last, he released her and
stepped away. Something turned in his mind like a key
turning in a lock. The drinking hadn't affected her
as much as he'd thought. Her lapses of memory were
coldblooded shams designed to annoy and harass
him. She might go to the liquor cabinet too often,
but she was more scheming than sick-and far more bloated with the
pus of hate than he'd ever suspected.
"I'd like to know," he said, "just how many lies you've
put into their heads."
The pudgy white fingers of her left hand
trembled as 576
they rose to her other arm, and massaged it. "You
hurt me.""
"And what have you been Trying to do to me with your
falsehoods, your deceptions? You've used my owe
children--and yours--comz the instruments of your animosity.
My God, what a wretched creature you've
become."
His voice dropped, hoarse with pain. "You'll find
it understandable if I'm no longer able to stay la this
house with you."
He trembled, because he understood the enormous
significance of what he'd just said. He had severed
all but the last tie binding them together,
Well, so be it. Painful as it was, he'd endure
it. Anything was preferable to trying to live in a house
ruled by a mind as sick and twisted as hers,
He started for the doors. He heard a faint creak.
Someone was outside, leaning against one of the panels and
listening. "You hart me," Margaret repeated as he
rattled the handles to warn the eavesdropper. A
moment later he opened the doors.
Although the gas was lit in the foyer, it was trimmed
low, and shadows clotted the corners. Eleanor
stood two paces from the doorway. Her
face showed confusion.
Behind Gideon, Margaret rubbed her arm so her
daughter would be sure to see. This time she shrieked:
"You hurt me, damn you!"
"She's tricked you, Eleanor," he said. It almost
tore him apart to say that about the woman he'd once
loved. The sound of his own voice was a roar in his
ears, as though winds of unbelievable force were rending
the earth. "She's lied about me. Repeatedly, it
seems."
"Papa, be kind," Eleanor whispered. "She
isn't herself tonight."
"She hasn't been herself for years. She's beyond
help. 577
I can't stay here any longer, Eleanor. She
despises my work and she despises me. She's
been determined to penalize me ever since I made
it clear I wouldn't give in to her every whim." He
extended his hand. "Please try to see my side for a
change-was
Eleanor dashed tears away and stepped out of reach.
Gideon felt as if his outstretched hand was covered
with filth.
"I see a woman who needs support and love,"
Eleanor said. ""And I see you walking
out on her."
"I can do her no good at all. If anyone can-if
it isn't already too late-it's a doctor in some
sanitarium for-was
"I'm not going anywhere!" Margaret screamed at
him. "I'm perfectly fine, I don't need a
doctoi as you so snidely declare all the time!"
Gideon kept his eye on his daughter. She was the
one roost urgently in need of saving; she and her
brother.
"I can't let you and Will stay here. I'll consult a
lawyer. We'll find a way to get you both out of-was
"I'm staying, Papa. No matter what else
has happened, she needs us."
He wasn't strong enough, or, God help him,
compassionate enough just then to respond to Eleanor's
plea. A part of his mind acknowledged the tightness of
her words. But he was much too angry to let that part have
any influence. Too angry, humiliated and worn
out.
It all burst forth in another shout:
"She doesn't need me!"
"She does."
"No!"
"Well, she must have once-were you here
then?"
7 was with Julia.
"Goddamn it, she drove me out! She hates
me!"
"And can you say you've never given her cause,
Papa? Can you say that?"
The blazing accusation made him recall how Julia

had pointed out his own unconscious withdrawal from the
family. He thought of how he'd increasingly come
to depend on the Union as a refuge without even being
aware of it. His daughter's scornful eyes were like
mirrors showing him all his flaws, and there was no
way on God's earth he could in conscience answer,
"No." He could only say in a shaken voice:
"I'm sorry I ruined your birthday."
He ran up the stairs two at a time. In his
room he collected a hat, outercoat and
valise, and a few moments later walked out the
front door into the darkness of Fifth Avenue.
By then Margaret had undergone a remarkable
transformation. She was composed, with no trace of her
earlier hysteria showing save some redness around her
eyes.
She took Will into the protective curve
of her left arm. He stood rigid, afraid
to move. Eleanor faced her mother, fighting back
tears. None of them did more than start slightly when
the front door slammed, and none of them moved to the
windows to see which direction Gideon had taken in the
rainstorm.
Will turned his head that way, but Margaret pulled him
tight against her side and held him there. Eleanor
covered her eyes and began to cry. With no one
to see, Margaret permitted her mouth to set into a
small, satisfied smile.
From the night Gideon moved out, Margaret became
the household's unquestioned ruler. That fact seemed
to restore some clarity to her mind. Only forty-eight
hours after her husband's departure, she spoke with the
butler behind closed doors.
"I want to make doubly sure you bring me the
mail as each post arrives, Samuel. Bring it
to my room. If 579
there's no answer when you knock, slip everything under
the door. I want to see it all before anyone else
does."
"Certainly, Mrs. Kent," the butler murmured.
"And don't mention this conversation to another person.
If you should do so by accident, your job will be
forfeit. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
"Perfectly, madam." His expression left some
doubt that he really did, though. Nevertheless, he
added, "There'll be no slips."
Margaret smiled. "For the sake of your seven children,
I hope you're right."
She'd spoken to Samuel none too soon. Next
day, the afternoon delivery contained an envelope
addressed to Eleanor in Gideon's handwriting.
Margaret tore it open and went into a rage as she
read her husband's blatant attempt to win
Eleanor away from her. Gideon wanted his
daughter to come down to the Union as soon as
possible, so that he could speak with her and prove that it
wasn't advisable for her or for Will to remain in the
house. When the worst of Margaret's wrath had
passed, she tucked the letter into a pigeonhole in the
secretary in her bedroom. The pigeonhole was
large; roomy enough for many more letters.
For a little while she felt very assured. Very much in
control. But she had other moments when she didn't
think she could remain conscious one second longer.
During those moments she thought of her children and of how she'd
manipulated their emotions in order to turn them against
their father. Accompanying the recollections was
a terrible guilt. She even had moments of total
lucidity in which she was ashamed of what she'd done
to Gideon himself. Those moments were rare, though.
As the days went by, her swings between euphoria and
depression became more frequent and pronounced.
She had a tonic bottle in her possession every
waking hour. The damnable guilt began to pervade
her mind so completely, sometimes she felt controlled
by it.
On June 25 there occurred an event which did not
help her mental balance, even though it had nothing
to do with her personally. That day, out in the Dakota
Territory along a river the Sioux called the
Greasy Grass, the famed boy genera] of the
Civil War, George A. Custer, led a
Seventh Cavalry column to disaster. He and 265
of his men were massacred.
Two fundamental errors on Custer's part were
responsible for the slaughter. One was his decision
to fight when he was under orders to await the main Army
force moving up to join him. The other was his decision
to divide his single column into two. Part of his command
survived, but not Custer and those with him. They were
surrounded and killed by two thousand or more Sioux under
their battle leader, Chief Crazy
Horse. The Indians wanted revenge for the invasion
of their tribal lands by the white gold-hunters. They
found that revenge when they found the blue-clad
soldiers who had come to legalize the theft by force.
For days, no one in the East spoke of anything but
what the press christened the Little Big Horn
massacre. All the papers were filled with long
dispatches about it. In secret, Will read every account
he could get his hands on. So did Margaret. She
went over and over the ghastly details in her mind
without understanding why.
The news stories produced a strange new
anxiety within her. At night, as she fell into the
alcoholic stupor which now passed for sleep, the
last images in her mind were war-painted faces and
shiny scalp knives wet with blood.
Certain passages in her diary began to reflect
her disturbed condition. Five days after the Custer
massacre was front page news, she wrote:

-I do not know why I must feel so terrible all the
time. HE is the one-
She paused to ink her pen, then raked the nib
horizontally beneath the capitalized word.
comwho is guilty, HE, HE, HE,
HE, HE-
Even as she printed the word over and over, the guilt
battered her. It wasn't true. She knew it
wasn't true. She was the guilty one. She
drank more tonic. It didn't help.
She wanted to cry out; scream. Instead, she wrote
faster and faster, as if some exterior force had taken
possession of her hand and was operating it like a piece
of machinery. She lifted the pen and began to slash more
lines beneath the fourteen repetitions of the word HE.
She stumbled to her feet, slashing so hard she tore
the paper. Her chair crashed over, then the brown
bottle. Loose hair tumbled into her eyes. Her
face contorted, sweaty and anguished as she raked the
pen back and forth, back and forth.
Like a dagger. Like a sword. Trying to obliterate.
Trying to destroy.
Inside her head, a voice said, You are the
guilty one.
With a cry she fell backwards, fainting.
When she awoke hours later, she was amazed and
frightened to discover her dress was spotted with ink. The
tonic bottle lay on its side on the carpet,
in the center of a soaked place two feet wide.
Her diary was open to pages that were now nothing
but shreds of paper. Shreds stained with crude,
fantastically shaped blots of ink that had flown from the
slashing pen.
She had no recollection of how any of that disorder
had come about.
A few nights later, about one in the morning,
Eleanor heard an outcry from the stairway landing.
She jumped out of bed, hurried along the hall and
stopped short at the head of the stairs. Then, uttering
a soft, "Oh," she rushed down to the source of the
cry.
In her nightdress, Margaret was crouched by the leaded
window on the landing. The window overlooked Fifth
Avenue and Central Park. From high above the
Park, the moon bleached the tops of black trees.
Margaret turned and peered at her daughter. For a
moment her eyes showed no recognition. Eleanor
almost gagged at the cloying odor of the tonic.
Margaret raised a cautioning finger.
"Sssh. They're watching the house."
Eleanor felt icy. "Watching?"
"Yes. They're over in those trees."
"Who, Mama?"
"Men. I don't know then names. They've been out
there for an hour. I heard them calling my
name and came to look. Keep your eyes open and
you'll see the men dart between the tree trunks."
"Mama, there's no one over in Central Park at
this hou--"
"The men are there, Eleanor!" She gazed into her
daughter's eyes, entreating her to believe. She
acted afraid to speak above a whisper. "They were
sent to hurt me."
Eleanor shivered. Despite all the things she'd
said on the night her father left, she found herself wishing
he were in the house. If there were a real emergency,
she didn't even know where he was staying. He hadn't
bothered to communicate with her, or with W. Not so much
as a note.
"Who sent them, Mama?"
"I don't know, but they've come to punish me, just the
way the Indians punished poor General Custer."
Eleanor couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"Punish you like-his What makes you say such things?
Who would come here wanting to punish you? No one."
"You're wrong. They're over there. I swear they
are. I've seen them. I heard them mocking my
name. Daring me to come out, but I won't. I
won't."
She turned huge, horrified eyes
toward the moon-drenched Park. There in the peaceful
silver and shadow of the landing, Eleanor at last
realized Gideon had been right about one thing. All
the stimulants her mother consumed were hurting her. For the
first time, she began to fear for her mother's sanity.
CHAPTER XVTI
Voyager
TOWARD THE END, she always began to swear like a
slut from one of the London rookeries. But they were
seventy-odd miles from that sort of squalor,
sporting in a moon-dappled bed on sheets of
satin.
She squeezed him with her plump pink legs like a
rider clinging to a horse. Her name was Armina,
Duchess of Tichfield. She was seven years
older than he, with practiced hands and big, soft
breasts; altogether one of the most blithely amoral women
he'd ever met. Sometimes that shocked a part of him that
had never quite grown out of a Virginia boyhood
centered around Sunday church and daily devotions.
He should have enjoyed what they were doing. In terms of
pure physical sensation, he did. Yet as he
felt the end approaching, a sadness overcame him in
that sumptuous bedroom above an English garden
drowsing in the summer night. A sadness,
and a sense of futility.
The Duchess had yellow curls, and blue eyes,
and in certain lights a marked resemblance
to Dolly.
"Matt, oh my God, love, go on, go on,
damn your Then she became completely incoherent
except for her cursing.
Her husband the Duke had had a foot blown away
while serving with the artillery in the Crimea. She
liked to tease Matt by forming a little circle with her
thumb and forefinger, slipping it around one of his fingers and
rubbing it back and forth while she winked and said the
Duke had gone to the Crimea and lost his foot and the
iron in his rammer, too. At the moment he was up
in town, occupied with his endless speculation in consols,
or with some business pertaining to his seat in the House
of Lor-
No. That was wrong, a peripheral part of Mart's
mind warned him suddenly. He stopped the
lovemaking, bracing on his elbows with his rump
cocked high in the air. The Duchess protested in
purple language. For a moment all he could see,
through his inner eye, was an image of himself poised above
her with his fundament bare in the breeze. It was
another splendid lesson on the
unintentionally funny attitudes the pretentious
human beast fell into. But he had no time to really
savor the picture.
He twisted his head toward the foyer of the bedchamber.
Was the bolt securely shot? Armina had been so
warm to have him tear away her underskirts and corset,
she'd said there was no need. But now he heard a
fuss and clatter in the hall, and his quickening heartbeat
told him there was.
"Matt, damn you, why have you left me in the
absolute bloody middle of-?"
"Sssh!" He moved erratically, nearly jabbing his
own eye when he jerked a finger to his lips.
Perspiration beaded and cooled in his mustache. "Can't
you hear all that?" He meant the servants chattering,
trying to warn their mistress, and the frumph-frumph
of a man repeatedly clearing his throat.
"God save us, it's the old bugger himself," the
Duchess whispered. She giggled.
"I'm glad you find it so amusing," Matt
snapped as he disengaged and started to slide off the bed
on the side where he thought his pants and smallclothes
lay. His bare foot slipped. He landed on his
rump. The hall door, unbolted, smashed open.
A huge shadow-a beaky head, an arm, a
jutting pistol-was flung across the bedroom wall
by a multitude of lights in jiggling
candle-brackets.
"Show your face, you cuckolding bastard!" the Duke
of Tichfield shouted in his phlegmy voice, and
things were comical no longer.
Matt didn't bother with his drawers. He jumped
to his feet, jerked on his pants and flung a
glance toward the open French windows overlooking the
garden perfumed with roses. Some instinct said that if
he ran that way, a bullet would find his back.
In desperation, he chose the surprise of a
frontal assault. He doubled his shoulder as one
barrel of the old-fashioned pistol discharged, spitting
smoke and sparks. The Duchess shrieked and slid
down in bed and yanked a sheet over her face. The
ball whistled over Matt's lowered head and tbunked
into the wall. The Duke took more careful aim.
Matt ran like a demon, outraged by circumstances:
A promising career may be cut short here, damn
it! He charged in beneath the muzzle the Duke was
attempting to reposition for a close range shot.
His bare 586
shoulder hit the Duke's waistcoated paunch. The
pistol thundered. Something-powder?-stung his
cheek, and he actually felt the bullet or ball
scorch past his ear as he knocked his would-be
murderer head over trousers into the wall. The Duke
fell with a yelp of pain. Matt kicked the pistol
away from the Duke's clutching fingers.
The Duke's right leg seemed bent at the knee, and
his calf and boot folded beneath him in an unnatural
way. That evidently accounted for the Duke's steer-like
bellows. Matt had to shout to be heard:
"Toss me my shirt, Armina."
It came sailing from the far side of the bed. "I
don't know why he came back unexpectedly-was
The Duchess" apologetic cry was barely
audible above the caterwauling. Matt shoved his shirt
into his waistband and swung toward the blinding spread
of candle-flame. Men in the dark behind the small
haloed lights were voices without substance.
"Don't let him through, Alf!"
"Listen "ere, Lysander, his lordship don't
deserve no favors from me, the nasty old son of a
bitch. This way, laddie-was
One of the candelabra appeared to float aside. A
dark portal opened in the wall of light. Matt
sprinted through it, and on to the staircase, and the main
floor, and then the white-and-black of the
moonlit summer midnight.
He ran so hard his chest hurt. He ran till
he felt he couldn't run any more, but he did. A
sudden cloud hid the moon and he didn't see the
stable wall until he bounced off it like a ball of
India rubber.
Inside, rubbing his dizzy head, he roused a stable
boy and demanded a saddled horse. The boy had seen
Matt around the estate on other occasions and knew
he was the Duchess" current lover, so there was no
quibble. But the boy's eyes rolled when he heard
alarms from the
great house. All at once he acted uncertain
about releasing the horse.
"Sounds like "is lordship's callin" for you to
"old up, sir."
"You're mistaken," Matt barked, shoved the boy
backwards over a hay bale, and fairly leaped
into the saddle.
He kicked the animal with his bare heels and went
galloping away through a barricade of wildly swinging
lanterns, a storm of oaths and the roar of an old
fowling piece. If his head hadn't been down over
the neck of the racing horse, it would have been shot
away.
But desperation carried the evening, and Matt was soon
clattering north through the Kentish countryside,
wondering why he indulged in such stupid
escapades. Affairs with married women were
frequently dangerous and always futile.
The trouble was, whenever he met a woman who
reminded him of Dolly, he wanted her. In fact
the only women with whom he trifled were those who
resembled Dolly in one way or another. He'd
realized it consciously only a couple of years
ago.
The realization hadn't put a stop to the behavior,
though. He continued to chase women who were always
Dolly and could never be Dolly. He did it, he
supposed, because she was the only true love of his
lif e, and because she was forever lost to him. He knew
she was lost because, when she wrote to him, she refused
to make reference to lines in his letters in which he begged
her to come back.
Her letters were friendly, polite, full of news of
India and her teaching and of their son. But they contained not
so much as a grain of sentimentality. If she felt
any, she hid it. So his pursuit went on.
With each woman, he hoped anew. With each he was
disappointed and saddened. He supposed the
pattern would keep repeating until he withered
into senility or 588
got shot to death by some outraged husband whose aim was
better than the Duke's. What a damned
depressing future, he thought as he jogged on through
the moonlight toward London.
ii
Two nights later, Matt went to Jim
Whistler's for supper. His friend was in a lather about a
new commission he'd received. He was to redecorate
part of the Hyde Park town house belonging to his
patron Frederick Leyland.
Leyland was a self-made shipping tycoon from
Liverpool. His mother had once hawked meat pies
in the streets of that city, and the man was inordinately
proud of his rise in the world. He threw fistful s
of money around to dramatize it-and as part of this
largesse, he'd given Whistler permission
to refurbish the town house dining room.
Whistler had known Mr. and Mrs. Leyland for some
time. He'd painted stunning full-length
portraits of the couple in "73. There were
gossips who said the artist was more interested in
Leyland's wife than in his money though.
The new commission had developed in an
unusual way. Whistler's painting called La
Princess du Pays de la Porcelaine already
hung in the Leyland dining room. The artist had
complained that the setting was all wrong for the picture.
Very well, Leyland replied, create the right sort
of setting.
Whistler had instantly accepted the offer. Perhaps for more
than artistic reasons; Matt knew his friend was still
seeing Mrs. Leyland. He didn't bring that up
during supper, though. Whistler's newest mistress
was also at the table.
Whistler enlivened the meal by showing and discoursing on his
sketches for tall window shutters in the dining
room. Great fan-tailed birds done in gilt would
decorate each one. He'd already settled on a
basic color scheme of blue and gold, and
referred to the project as his "peacock room."
The new mistress seemed somewhat impatient with
him; uninterested in peacocks or the Leylands. She
tended to be haughtier than the departed Jo, but
Matt had observed that she had Jo's reddish
hair. Perhaps Whistler, too, pursued and loved
only one woman.
The thoroughly enjoyable evening was spoiled when Matt
got back to his quarters. His landlady
presented him with a note which had arrived by messenger
while he was out. He recognized Armina's
handwriting. The landlady then said four gentlemen,
well dressed but quite unfriendly, had called and asked
for him. He didn't understand who they could be until
he retired to his rooms and read the note from the
Duchess. The essential passage said:
He is incapacitated with a broken bone, but rants
that the moment he is up again, he will kill you. I
think he is just enough of a silly fool to attempt it,
my dearest-or to persuade some of his army cronies
to do it for him. Britain is not safe for you for a few
months, I think. Have no fear for my well being.
As long as the old curmudgeon wants to keep me
around him like an expensive watch fob ornament, he
knows he daren't lift a hand near me-except, of
course, to present me with some little bauble or other.
Lovers, alas, are not so favored. Do be careful,
and make haste to leave if you can possibly do so.
He read the note twice more, thought of his landlady's
description of the quartet of callers, and made up
his mind. What the hell was there to keep him in England
anyway? Nothing.
As he was packing a portmanteau and considering where
he might take a holiday, his eye fell
on Gideon's letter.
In it, his brother had described some nonsensical
project involving a lot of quick sketches of
Americans baking bread and threshing wheat and potting
at the redcoats on Breed's Hill a hundred
years ago. Patriotic twaddle. Or
commercialism inspired by the American centennial,
he didn't know which.
He had no intention of lending himself to such an
infantile project. But, unexpectedly, he
realized he had a strong desire to see his brother
again. Talk with him. Find out how he was faring with his
family, andwiththe newspaper. Perhaps it was because he
felt rootless now that the affair with the Duchess was
over. They'd enjoyed an intense month and a half
together; so intense, he hadn't had time to answer
Gideon's letter or do any work except for some
pornographic sketches of aspects of Armina's
naked body. He'd presented her with one of the
sketches and locked the rest in a closet.
He definitely had no desire to see America
again. Still, as long as it was advisable for him to get out
of England for six months, he might as well pay
that visit Gideon was always writing him about.
He didn't care for the circumstances
attending the departure. He had to race back
to Whistler's next day to make arrangements for
shipping certain of his belongings, and for forwarding of mail.
He had to confer with his landlady, and book passage-and
do it all while skulking through obscure courtyards
and dingy mews, in case anyone was watching.
"Just like Paris all over," he grumbled, but it was
not. Dolly was far away in Lahore with their son
Thomas, who would be seven at the end of the year.
She'd sent Matt a small daguerreotype he
treasured. Tom was turning out to be a sturdy,
handsome boy who resembled his mother. Matt hoped his
son didn't waste 591
his life on some clog's profession, as Paul
Cezanne so aptly called theirs. Where did being a
painter get you?--except into "com. sooty
compartment aboard a late train for the Southampton
docks A compartment where you sat alo-e, skulking like
a damned fugitive. A dog's profession,
by God. No doubt about it
ui
July storms plagned the uphill passage of the
Norddeutscher Lloyd steamship Nevi York which
had called at Southamptou to take on passengers.
The Germans were giving the Americans as
well as the Canard Steamship Company fierce
competition on the trans-Atlantic run. But the
bad weather restricted the New York's speed this
(rip. She was fourteen days en route to a North
American landfall-some kind of record for slowness
in this age of steam, Matt thought on the morning they were
supposed to sight the coast of Maine.
He stood forward on the boat deck, awaiting the
first glimpse of land. Leaning into the wind at the
rail, he cut a dashing figure despite his
wretched internal state. It was a steamy day, with the
sun hidden behind a thin haze. Yet the sun's light
was painfully evident in the metallic highlights
on the slopes of the high waves. The light hurt his
eyes. His head throbbed and his stomach ached.
Matt's shipboard conquest, Miss Trautwein of
Omaha, was still asleep in her suite. She
claimed to be a stockyards heiress, but this morning
she was also a disappointed lover. Last night, after
kissing her long blonde hair and embracing her
pale body for the last time, Matt had told her he
was a married man.
Miss Trautwein threw things, then cried and said it
didn't matter. But they'd parted anyway, at
Matt's in
sisfence. Ke'd paid the inaa on duty in the
saloon bar to keep it open, and keep the whiskey
flowing, so lie vouki watch the sunrise while
drunk. The sun didn't rise-- visibly,
anyway--and the-bar man fell asleep and comaddil he
could Chink of was how idiotic it was for a mas to forever
search for the same woman within different ones.
Now, several hours later, a short sleep and a
shave had restored him at least outwardly. He
looked trim, even natty, as he peered toward the
west. Hs'd throws on an assortment of summer
clothes, but they fitted him well. His summer
outfit of the latest English fashion, consisted, of a
navy blue flannel jacket with breast pocket
handkerchief, white flannels and sporty shoes of
sailcloth and leather, A straw boater with a striped
band was tilted over his forehead to keep the light out of
his eyes and prevent an intensification of the headache,
He pondered what he'd do when he reached New
York. His chief objective when he boarded the
steamship was to take himself out of the Duke's reach
until the old idiot came to his senses. He
wasn't going toward anything, he was running from-and as
a consequence, he didn't know how he'd occupy his
time for the next month or so. Oh well,
he'd think about it in New York. Probably there
were blonde, blue-eyed women there, too.
Of course there was always that book of Gideon's,
nonsensical as it sounded.
He went below to his outside stateroom and
rummaged in his belongings till he found the letter.
Back on deck, he reread it. He'd forgotten
all the pressures Gideon had applied. He was
half angry, half amused:
"Save the family farm. Save the family
honor. Save the country and come home to your
brother's arms. You dirty bastard."
Several promenading ladies eyed him with alarm as
he uttered these remarks to the open sea. He
crumpled the letter into a ball and consigned it to the wind.
It was 593
carried far off to port, and plummeted out of sight
between tall whitecaps.
"Are there any other heart-wringers you could have used,
Gid? I don't think so."
Suddenly the ship's whistle sounded. The noise
nearly blew his head apart. Passengers crowded up
on either side of him, pointing and exclaiming in
English and German and several other languages.
The steamship was swinging to run parallel with the
coast. Thus the thin, dark line smudged the starboard
horizon. How featureless the coastline was there in the
haze. How unforbidding compared to the nights he'd
searched for it with one eye, and for Federal gun ships
with the other.
America. He almost felt sentimental for a moment.
Then he sniffed, brushed his nose with a knuckle, and
called himself a fool.
IV
From high at the rail of the New York, Matt
saw his brother down on the teeming North River
pier. Gideon waved. Matt grinned and tipped his
summer hat
All of his uneasiness about getting along with someone
he hadn't seen for years-all Ms carefully
marshaled arguments against joining Gideon in the
publishing project-faded the moment he saw how
pale and emaciated his brother looked. What had
happened to him? The mere passage of time didn't
explain such strain.
In the arrivals shed, Matt unfolded his
passport. The customs official compared the man
he saw with the one described on the sheet of parchment.
Satisfied, he returned the document. "You may
pass."
Gideon was waiting by an iron pillar beyond the
barrier. Matt went straight to him.
"Matt."
"Gideon-good God-was
Neither of them could think of anything original to say.
They hugged one another with fierce masculine
affection, then separated, Gideon the soberly
dressed businessman and Matt the picture of a
dashing young sportsman.
Matt fanned himself with his boater and tapped a toe
on the ground. "The sod of my native land. The
Yankee part of it, anyway. Never thought I'd
tread on it again."
"I can't say how happy I am that you are. I
didn't think 100 Years would really excite you."
"A hundred-his Oh, the book. Well-was Matt
hesitated, unwilling to bring up bad news
immediately.
"I did wonder why you took so long to give me
your answer," Gideon said. "You never really did,
you know." He sounded just a shade sententious, Matt
thought. Probably that came of running a
newspaper, and bossing people.
"Got very busy all at once," Matt evaded.
"But I did spend a bundle to cable you from
Southampton and tell you I w caret as on the
way."
"That you did. By God it's good to see you after so many
years."
"I'm sorry I wasn't here when pa died."
Gideon waved. "He'd have been buried a good
two weeks by the time you caught a ship and got
home. I think his death was an easy one-if any of
them are ever easy. It was certainly quick. But let's
not be so blasted gloomy. I have some good news. The
Wilmington picture's attracting a lot of
favorable comment at the exhibition. I've saved some
articles by two of the leading critics."
"I hope they had nothing kind to say. That's bad
luck for a painter. Among my friends in Paris, I
think the only ones who are certain of lasting fame
are the ones 595
the public hates and the critics devastate.
Paul C6zanne. Manet-was
Gideon interrupted. "You didn't finish what you
started to say about the book."
"Oh. Well, perhaps that can wait until we're at
the house."
The brothers were jostled forward into the claiming hall
where stevedores piled luggage in great
teetering heaps without much concern for order or
damage. Even in the confusion, Matt saw the
unhappiness on Gideon's face.
"I'm not living at home, Matt."
"My God. Since when?"
"Since the first of June."
"Where are you living?"
"At a hotel downtown. Fve reserved a suite
for you there-was
Suddenly he pivoted to face his younger brother.
Passengers streamed by them, some cheerful, some
complaining. "I might as well give you the whole of
it right now. Margaret and I are finished. I moved
out. Things are in a complete mess. I don't
seem able to control events any longer. They control
me."
"Sounds like an excuse for a good bender. Of two or
three days" duration-what do you say?"
His smile faded as Gideon gave him a piercing,
almost injured look. Matt didn't understand his
offense. Why should a reference to drinking upset his
brother? Gideon had never been an abstainer.
Confused, he covered it by hunting for a bill and
flourishing it to summon a porter.
"That steamer trunk, my man. And that one.
To a hack, if you please."
For his part, Gideon was regretting that he'd been so
candid so soon. Somehow, though, just seeing his younger
brother had made him feel that here was the
one other human being besides Julia with whom he could
share everything.
There were changes in Matt, of course. He was
thirty-three now. Time was beginning to cut lines
into his raffishly handsome face. He acted as if
he didn't have a care. For that reason Gideon
felt bad about pouring out his troubles. He wouldn't
reveal any more of them just now. He didn't want
to spoil Matt's homecoming by trying to explain
things like the three notes he'd sent to Eleanor
since he'd moved out.
All of the notes had gone unanswered. One
Saturday morning he'd driven up Fifth
Avenue and asked for his daughter, only to be told
by Samuel that she refused to come to the door and speak
with him.
"All right," he replied in a tired way. "Just
answer one question. I've sent her three letters. Have
they arrived?"
Samuel said, "Yes, sir" and Gideon's world
began to crumble in earnest.
The other man seemed on the point of amplifying his
remark. His eyes darted to one side in a nervous
way. Margaret's voice rang out, demanding to know
who was at the door. The butler leaned forward and
whispered:
"Things aren't healthy here, Mr. Kent. Not healthy
at all. Get the children out if you can."
Margaret screamed at him and he slammed the door
in Gideon's face.
The warning left Gideon frustrated and frightened.
were Eleanor and Will in danger because of his wife's
deteriorating mental state? No, he doubted that.
Whatever else he was willing to believe about
Margaret, he caret couldn't believe she'd
physically hurt her children. He feared Samuel was
referring to some subtler but no less terrible form of
injury.
What could he do? Abduct the children? Nonsense. This
was the nineteenth century, not the middle ages. He
felt unbelievably frustrated, though. He was
power597
less if Eleanor refused to answer his letters or
speak to him when he called.
Gideon had yet to solve that particular problem.
But he couldn't burden Matt with it. In the
hack, he raised a pleasanter subject.
"I've gotten you a guest card at
Salmagundi. That's a very fine private club for
artists and art patrons. It's on lower Fifth
Avenue. Has very commodious rooms, and I think
you'll like the crowd. I've also been searching for a
studio."
"Wait a minute, wait!" Matt held up a
hand. "That's rushing things a bit."
"You'll need a place to do the sketches for the book,
won't you?"
Matt opened his mouth to speak, having decided it would
be far better to tell his brother right now that he
wasn't interested in the project. Somehow, though,
he just couldn't utter the words. Gideon's haggard
face, slumped posture-and most especially his
announcement that he'd left Margaret-made Matt
reconsider.
If there was anything he loathed, it was
responsibility for someone else. But here was a
case that absolutely demanded he take
responsibility. Damn if he liked the idea.
But Gid had been the older brother all his life,
and now he obviously needed someone to assume that
role with him. Matt finally shrugged.
"Oh, I suppose-was
"That's wonderful!"
The instant Matt accepted the responsibility,
he began his retreat from it:
"I'm not sure how long I can stay here, though. And
Fm certainly not sure this book you're proposing
is my cup of tea."
Gideon was already growing more animated.
"Of course it is. There's no one who could do it
half as well. It's also the one thing in my life that
hasn't gone to pieces. Excepting my relationship
with Julia."
Another shock. "Who's Julia?"
"You'll meet her."
"Gid, are your children all right?"
"Yes." He frowned. "They're with Margaret."
That said a good deal.
A little more briskly, Gideon went on, "As
soon as you're settled, I want to show you a list
of proposed plates for 100 Years. I also
want to hear about your work. And about Dolly, and your
son."
With a rueful grin, Matt said, "We seem to be a
couple of homeless wanderers, don't we? Men without
their women, hanging around some hotel with
nothing better to do than plan a picture book-was
The smile faded. "I'll tell you this. It isn't
the splendid, footloose life I once thought it
would be."
"You mean your career?"
Matt nodded.
Quietly: "I feel the same way about the paper.
The book and Julia are damn near all I have
left."
Again Matt looked into his brother's ashen face and
saw the need visible there. Yet something within him
brawled like an infant, and fought the yoke,
"I won't promise to do more than try a few
sketches. You've got to remember this isn't my
country any more."
"Yes it is. Only now you'!! see it with the eyes
of someone who's been away for a while. You'll see
it with fresh vision. You'll see what I miss because
I'm too accustomed to it."
The enthusiasm in his brother's voice bothered
Matt.
"Look, Gid, don't get your hopes up. I
didn't like the idea when I first read about it and I still
don't. If the first half dozen sketches are no
good, I want to be free to quit. You've
got to give me that much."
"Happily, happily!" Gideon exclaimed.
"Once you get started, I know everything will work out."
In a cynical voice, Matt asked, "Have you
gotten re599
ligion while I was gone? You certainly have an
unwarranted amount of faith."
But it was obvious nothing would convince Gideon the
project was foredoomed. Perhaps his was a confidence
born of desperation.
"All right," Matt sighed. "Let's take a
rum through the lower part of the island before we head for the
hotel. I'd like to see some of the changes. I'd like
to see whether I can rediscover even-was He held
his right thumb and index finger a quarter inch apart. "comt
much interest in this damn country."
Gideon laughed. "Anything you say. I feel
better just seeing you. When everything else seems
to totter, at least we have family to hold
onto-oh, Matt, I'm glad you're home."
The carriage bounced on through the traffic of Tenth
Avenue. In the sunless light of the summer day,
Matt thought he detected a touch of moisture in the
corner of Gideon's good eye. He poked his own
with the tip of his little finger. A speck of dust
or perhaps a bit of cinder thrown up from the noisy
West Side streets had gotten in his eye and
started it watering.
"Damn if I don't feel the same way," he
laughed. And then the humor took on a hard edge that
reality demanded:
"Just don't get your hopes up, hear?"
Interlude Summer Lightning
One year later, on a Wednesday evening in July
of 1877, Thomas Courtleigh entertained at his
home in Lake Forest, Illinois,
Courtleigh had built the mansion in 1874. After
his wife's death, he'd stayed there because he preferred
the suburbs over State Street or any of the other
fashionable addresses in Chicago. On
Prairie Avenue, for example, one could be a
neighbor of the Armours, and the Palmers, and other
leading families. But one paid a price, and was forced
to live close to a swelling population of
immigrants and niggers.
That didn't suit the president of the Wisconsin and
Prairie, He'd chosen to stay twenty-five
miles to the north, in the exclusive little village
platted on 1,300 wooded acres beside Lake
Michigan. An architect obtained through
Frederick Olmstead's company in New York had
laid out the winding streets. Courtleigh had chosen
to situate his forty-room residence on,
appropriately enough, Wisconsin Avenue.
This Wednesday evening he was entertaining two dozen
couples. An elegant buffet had been served at
twilight on the terrace of the great limestone house.
Now, as the summer darkness deepened, some guests
sat or stood on that terrace, chatting quietly.
Others had retired to the sweeping green lawn where the
host had provided croquet equipment imported from
Europe. Croquet had become a national craze
after the war. As Courtleigh moved from group to group
on the terrace,
excited cries and applause came drifting through the
warm air. Soon small torches set in
special brackets atop the wickets began
to flicker out on the lawn. Servants were lighting the
torches to permit night play.
"comst andersubscribed for the new stained glass,"
Courtleigh heard one of the men say as he joined
two husbands and their wives. All the male guests
were members of the vestry of St. Margaret's
Protestant Episcopal Church, as was he,
Courtleigh's long, patrician face
remained composed as he moved close enough to make his
presence known.
"Undersuhscribed by how much, Dillard?"
"Why, hello Tom." The man chuckled.
"By twenry thousand dollars, that's all."
One of the women said, "Twenty thousand? A
bagatelle."
Unsmiling, Courtleigh nodded, "Quite right. In the
morning I'll prepare a draught for that amount."
There were gasps, and then Dillard's wife
exclaimed, "Oh, Tom! That's so generous.
Sometimes I think you're the finest Christian in the
whole congregation."
"No," said the second man, "merely the richest."
They all laughed, Courtleigh included. Then
Mrs. Dillard put in a final word:
"Dear Gwen would be so proud of your devotion to the
church."
Courtleigh's bland face concealed sudden rage.
There were so many things she could have enjoyed if it hadn't
been for that damned Kent. Now the wretch was
attracting national attention with some illustrated
book that was soon to be published,
The book had something to do with American history-as
if a Marxian socialist knew anything
about that, or even had a right to trifle with it. Kent
had written the text for the volume. The illustrations
were wood engravings based on sketches by his
brother, an artist 604
who evidently belonged to a crowd of crazy
European daubers.
In addition to the book itself, a limited edition
portfolio of twenty etchings based on the
pictures was being sold by private letter of
subscription. Each of the two hundred and fifty
portfolios cost $500. Courtleigh knew all
about the project because one of his church friends had shown
him the elaborate solicitation materials. They
included a reproduction of a section of one of the
etchings. It depicted Kansas wheat farmers stringing
the new barbed wire which, at long last, was making
farmland safe from trampling by cattle herds. But no
one on God's earth had ever seen farmers of the kind
Kent's mad brother drew-spineless, curving
figures half finished and completely repulsive.
If that was art, Courtleigh was John the Baptist.
But of course one might expect such obscene
insults to the intelligence from a clan like the Kents.
The subscription materials had exerted a kind of
fascination, though. One sheet had listed
twenty-three organizations and charitable institutions
to which the profits from the portfolios would be donated.
On that list Courtleigh saw the benefit funds of
several enfeebled unions such as the printer's and the
typographer's. That was enough to put him in a wretched
mood for two days. At least Kent hadn't had the
audacity to mail him one of the damned solicitations.
The press of business, as well as the ineptness of
underlings, had kept Thomas Courtleigh from dealing with
Gideon Kent as he deserved. But Kent's
punishment had never been rescinded, only
postponed. The subscription materials, and the list
of charities, had so enraged Courtleigh, he'd
decided to make a new effort to finally administer that
punishment. Preferably before Kent had a chance
to see the disgusting, overblown book published by his
company in Boston.
Of course, if Lorenzo Hubble had done his job
a year 605
ago, Courtleigh wouldn't have been forced to suffer such
feelings of frustration now.
Standing among his guests, he cocked his head
suddenly. The others hadn't caught the sound, but he
had been anticipating it, and heard it easily. In
the drive on the far side of the mansion, a
carriage was arriving.
He excused himself. A footman came onto the
terrace and intercepted him, saying quietly:
"He's here, sir."
Courtleigh started for the house, murmuring about an
urgent business matter. A vestryman's wife
broke away from a group and rushed to catch him.
"Tom dear, do set my mind at ease before you go.
This urgent business has nothing to do with that railroad
strike hi the east, does it?"
He lied. "No, Lilly. That's a small,
isolated affair in West Virginia. Of no
consequence."
Actually West Virginia was the lightning heralding
an almost certain storm; a storm which could conceivably
spread over several states and buffet certain
sectors of their economy quite severely. But he
didn't let on. He continued to parrot the
official line of the secret consortium to which he
belonged.
"It's only the work of a very small number of
Marxians desperate to disrupt the status quo."
She fanned her bosom with a kerchief. "Oh, thank
heaven. Several of my friends have been saying those
anarchists would cause riots out here."
"I sincerely hope not, Lilly. And I really
doubt it. As I said, there are just a few radicals
involved."
"Thank you, Tom. You've reassured me. I
told my friends that if anyone knew, it would be you."
Courtleigh nodded and moved on. Actually, he
believed there was a fifty-fifty chance of the strike
reaching Illinois. He was preparing for the worst, and
wished he could have given Lilly reassurances based
on those secret plans.
 it does spread here-or anywhere-decent people needn't
worry. The strike, and the strikers, are going to be
crushed without mercy.
Lorenzo Hubble was waiting in the library.
Hubble was a slovenly young man who weighed nearly
two hundred and fifty pounds. He had a wispy
goatee, a mustache, and a round head already devoid
of hair. He wheezed when he spoke, and his clothes
always fit badly; he was forced to buy for size rather
than style.
Self-educated, Hubble had come out of Conley's
Patch. He was one of nine attorneys in the
Wisconsin and Prairie's legal department, and not
even a senior member of the staff. But in some ways
he was closer to the president than any
other person in the organization. It wasn't
entirely accidental.
Hubble had joined the line several years earlier.
At that time, Courtleigh had been confronting a
crisis. One of his vice presidents, an
important man on the W and P, had been on
the griddle because of charges brought privately by the father
of a fourteen year old girl from one of the poor
sections. The girl was expecting a child, the vice
president was married, and the father wanted fifty thousand
dollars-the first year.
Courtleigh called a meeting of the legal staff.
He stated his position. The vice president had
to be protected, but the payment was a preceder* he
didn't care to set. were there suggestions?
To the distaste of less aggressive colleagues,
Lorenzo Hubble immediately volunteered to assume the
burden of handling the entire problem. He promised
that Mr. Courtleigh would not be unhappy with the
results of his action. Several days later, the
Chicago newspapers published accounts of a
curious and coincidental double death. On her way
home from the office of a physician who had examined
her and found her pregnant,
a young girl had drowned in the Chicago
River, Not an hour later, her father had. been shot
during an attempted holdup,
The police couldn't connect the crimes, nor
locate the man who'd made the giri pregnant.
The victims had no other Irving relative*,
and the gentleman, who'd brought the girl to the doctor
and paid spot cash for the examination to which she cheerfully
submitted, had insisted the doctor turn down the
gas in his waiting room. la that way the man's
face was never seen. All the physician could say
was that the man had a huge belly, and breathed with
difficulty because of his weight-and heaven icr8*-there
were hundreds like that in Chicago.
Courtieiga's trust hadn't been misplaced.
Hubble was not only ruthless beneath the bovine exterior,
he was discreet. After that conference of the legal staff,
he never again spoke to his employer about the girl.
Court-leigh and the vice president b:cc8i
learned that the matter was settled only by reading beh
greater-than just papers.
A few months later, all of Hobble's work was
rendered worthless when a heart seizure killed the
vice president. But at least Courtleigh had
found a valuable aide. The railroad's general
counsel and staff still handled all legal
matters. The president and Lorenzo Hubble handled
the illegal ones.
Hubble had come with a sheaf of papers. He began
to sort various items while Courtleigh closed and
locked the library's black walnut doors, then
its leaded windows. Pespiration shone on Hubble's
cheeks and upper lip as he squeezed himself into a
chair. He pulled a large Havana from the inner
pocket of his linen jacket. The jacket had sweat
rings under the arms.
"Don't smoke in here," Courtleigh snapped.
"You know I can't stand the fumes in hot weather."
Without a complaint or even a flicker of
disappointment, Hubble broke the cigar and tossed it
into the dark fireplace.
"What's hapoened in Martinsburg?" In reply,
the lawyer chose a handwritten sheet from the material
he'd spread on a small table at his elbow.
Courtieigh's eyes moved across the array of
items. When he saw a folded copy of the Mew
York Union with the tea bottle device on the
masthead, he felt rage of the kind that had nearly
overpowered him on the terrace.
Part of that rage was directed at Lorenzo Hubble.
The attorney had botched only one
major assignment since entering into his private
relationship with the president of the W and P. After
Courtleigh had seen Gideon Kent at the
Philadelphia exhibition. Hubble had arranged
the attempted murder on Walnut Street.
Later Hubble claimed he'd hired the best men he
could find. The bungler who'd driven the hack had
vanished afterward without attempting to claim the second
half of his fee. As a result of the fiasco,
Hubble was still not fully back in Courtieigh's good
graces. It was time he tried to get there.
"*-I'm sorry," Courtleigh interrupted,
aware that Hubble had been answering his question about events
in Martinsburg. Firelight from the croquet court
shimmered on the windowpanes. Full dark had
fallen.
"This-was Hubble waved the handwritten sheet. "comis the
text of a telegraph message being sent tonight
by Governor Mathews of West Virginia." "Sent
to whom?"
"To President Hayes. The men I've posted
to Martinsburg spread a lot of money around just
to obtain this copy." He extended the paper.
Courtleigh gestured in an impatient way.
Hubble understood that his employer wanted the
message summarized. He said:
"Mathews is requesting Federal troops to put
down what he terms unlawful combinations and domestic
violence along the Baltimore and Ohio.
To quote him- it is impossible with any force at
my command to execute the laws of the stale."
"Is it really that bad?"
"No, not yet. He's a calamity howler. The
violence has been sporadic, andofa minor
nature. However, large crowds are out supporting
the strikers."
Sharply, Courtleigh said, "Let's begin to refer
to them properly, Lorenzo. Not strikers.
Revolutionaries. Communists."
"Yes, of course." The fat man smiled
nervously in response to Courtleigh's cynical
smirk.
"Is any freight moving around Martinsburg?"
"Not a car."
Courtleigh smacked his fist lightly on the
mantel. "None of us wanted it to get this far. We
feared it might but we hoped it wouldn't."
Hubble again understood perfectly. By using the
plural, his employer meant the consortium. The
small, informal and highly secret group
of railroad presidents chaired by Tom Scott
of the Pennsylvania and including Jay Gould of the
Erie, John Garrett of the BandO, and several
others. Courtleigh had been invited to represent
lines based in the middle west.
The consortium met from time to time at Newport or
White Sulphur Springs or Saratoga
to decide policy matters pertaining to the welfare of
all American railroads. No decisions were
binding, yet the consortium's so-called guidelines
had a way of being widely observed, first by lines that
were represented within the group, then by lines that were not.
"No one thought that son of a bitch Ammon would be so
successful," Courtleigh fumed. "Is he in
Martins-burg?"
"Our operatives haven't seen him, sir."
"Then where is he?"
"Traveling, we presume."
It outraged Courtleigh that the current trouble had
been caused not by some low-class Jew radical, but
by the college-educated son of a prosperous insurance
ex
ecutive. God knew where Robert Ammon had
acquired his dangerous views. But in just a little over
a month, he'd caused unprecedented
damage.
Since early June, he'd been traveling from
state to state organizing what he called the
Trainman's Union. It was something wholly new and
very dangerous in the labor movement-an umbrella
organization covering all railroad workers, from
senior engineers with years of experience to the newest,
lowliest switchman.
Courtleigh's agents said the T. U. was spreading
like a lightning fire on a dry prairie. The
union's actual size was very difficult
to ascertain, however. The wily Ammon had taken
note of how earlier brotherhoods had operated on
a more or less public basis and thereby come under
attack, their members threatened or harassed until
the brotherhood collapsed. To prevent that, he'd
instituted a policy of absolute secrecy in the
T. U., complete with passwords, secret oaths and
hand grips. Still, it was almost a certainty that
radicals from the T. U. were behind the unlawful
strike that had hit the BandO in West Virginia.
The strike had come about as a result of the
implementation of a ten percent wage cut for all
BandO employees earning more than a dollar a day.
The cut had gone into effect the preceding
Monday, July 16. Strangely, there had been
no strike when Tom Scott had instituted the
same sort of cut on the Pennsylvania back
on June 1. Oh, there'd been complaints-even a
grievance committee. But Scott had met with the
committee and glibly talked away all of its
objections.
Or so everyone in the consortium had thought,
congratulating Scott on his victory.
The wage cut had been one of the agreed-upon
strategies of the consortium. To offset shrinking
profits caused by the nationwide depression, the cut
was to be put into effect line by line all across the
country. Courtleigh's chief bookkeeper had already
drawn up confi-
dential schedules which would reduce the pay of all
W and P employees down to the brakemen who
even now received only $1.15 for a twelve hour
day-well below the brakemen's national average of
$1.75.
Obviously the Pennsylvania situation had been
atypical. This past Monday, some BandO workers
had walked off the job to protest the cuts.
By mid-afternoon, however, less militant workers had
gotten a few trains running again. Then,
just during the past forty-eight hours, strike leaders
had reached and persuaded their more timid brethren and the
disruptions had begun to spread.
There were more and more walk-offs and resulting interruptions
in service. Quarrelsome mobs of trainmen converged
at Martinsburg, one of the BandO's main junction
points. Courtleigh believed that all the turmoil
was a harbinger; the lightning visible before the storm. If
matters weren't brought under control, and quickly,
Ammon's damnable new organization could well
launch the first national strike in American
history.
And once there was that kind of precedent for other
unions to follow, the gates of hell were open.
The telegraph message from Governor Mathews
to the White House was encouraging, however Courtleigh
and his fellow owners believed they had a friend in
President Hayes. The three-time Republican
governor of Ohio had in effect lost the '76
election to the former Democratic governor of New
York, Samuel Tilden, who had campaigned as
a vigorous foe of corruption; he'd helped
smash the Tweed Ring.
Last November Tilden had piled up slightly
more than 4,284,000 popular votes as
opposed to a little over 4,036,000 for Hayes. But
those totals didn't represent the end of the story.
While Grant was preparing to leave office and
publicly apologizing for errors of judgment, four
different states-Oregon, Florida,
Louisiana and South Carolina-had come up with
disputed sets of electoral ballots. If
accepted, the ballots for Republican
electors could overturn the outcome of the popular
vote.
The question of the contested ballots was thrown to Congress for
resolution. Behind the scenes, the Republicans
got busy. Promises were quietly made to a
number of Southern Democrats.
If the dispute broke in favor of the
Republicans, they'd see that the last Federal
troops were withdrawn from the South. There were other less
specific pledges, including one whose vague
language seemed to hold out hope of Federal
financing for a program of industrial improvements
in Southern states. But Courtleigh knew it was
Tom Scott's railroad lobby that had carried the
day. Scott's men had swung the needed votes
by persuading Southern Congressmen that approval of a
proposed rail line from East Texas to the
Pacific depended on their decision in the matter
of the disputed ballots. And so, a special
Electoral Commission chosen by Congress had
certified election of a new president- Rutherford
B. Hayes-on March 2. Tilden's followers
cried fraud in vain.
There was no direct evidence that Hayes would be hi
sympathy with the railroad men, or would cooperate with
them. The President had a reputation for integrity,
and a spotless one. Still, he was a Republican-and so
were Courtleigh and his colleagues. Most
auspiciously of all, Hayes had received the news
of his certification while a guest aboard Tom
Scott's private rail car "Pennsylvania."
Hubble saw that his employer was agitated, and tried
to calm him.
"Perhaps we'll locate Ammon in a day or two,
Mr. Courtleigh."
It helped a little. The W and P president sat
down opposite the lawyer. "All right, let's not
worry about that. Let's look at the whole
picture. You've a good feeling for the mood of the
scum we hire to run our
freight and passenger services. Where's this strike
going? Will it spread?"
"I believe it will, sir."
"Will it go nationwide?"
Hubble hesitated only a moment. "If it isn't
nipped, I think it may. First, the tinjes are
ripe because they're so bad. No man can afford a ten
percent cut in his pay. Second, Ammon's
caught us unprepared. He's built a secret
brotherhood faster than anyone thought possible. I
think he's incited the workers on almost every line from the
Mississippi east-including ours. Those men are
ready for violence. And there will be violence- perhaps a
little, perhaps a lot-before this is all over. It's a
watershed, Mr. Courtleigh. Laboring men want
to test the feasibility of a national strike."
Courtleigh muttered an obscene word.
A sycophantic smile spread over the lawyer's
suet-like face. "I'm happy we aren't living in
the ancient world where they killed the messenger who
brought bad news. You pay me for candor, however-was
"And for successful execution of important
assignments," Courtleigh retorted. Hubble's
grin disappeared. His employer never let him forget
the Philadelphia failure for long.
The consortium had expected isolated protests
over the wage cuts, but not anarchy-and
certainly not the widespread support for the strike that
was becoming evident on the BandO. Depressed,
Courtleigh said:
"If those damned troublemakers are indeed looking at
this as some kind of test, it's even more important to have
it resolved in our favor. If this is the first
national strike, it must also be the last. I'm sorry
the issue must be decided in our industry, but I
suppose it's a tribute to the importance of
railroads-in any case, we'll deal with it.
We must hasten our own preparations."
"I've already taken steps," Hubble nodded,
anxious to please. "In fact, pursuant to our
last chat, I've been
out in the dives most of the day, with two assistants-was
"Hiring?"
"Yes. You were absolutely right, Mr.
Courtleigh. There's no need to pay the Pinkerton
mark-up. My helpers and I got all the men we
needed. The W and P now has almost four dozen
blacklegs on call, ready to go instantly if the
trouble spreads to Chicago. Among those I myself
interviewed-if you can call a conversation with a drunkard
an interview-there was one real find."
"Oh?" Courtleigh clearly wasn't
interested, but Hubble sat forward, eager to tell.
"Quite by chance, I hired a man who once had a
pretty big reputation out west. His name's Jason
Kane."
m
Courtleigh replied with a shrug and, "Never heard of
him."
A tolerant smile. "No, sir, of course not.
You don't read the National Police Gazette.
He was famous for a year or two, then he dropped
out of sight. I can understand why. He's a sot. But
he's tough. Killed nineteen men, they say."
Something in Courtleigh responded to that. Hubble
took note and pressed on:
"I think I can keep his drinking under control. He
seems almost patheticallv eager for a job."
"What's he doing in Chicago?"
"He was traveling as a supernumerary-you know, one
of the Indians-in The Red Right Hand."
Another blank stare. Courtleigh never attended
popular entertainments.
"That's the new play Buffalo Bill's touring
in, sir. This Kane used to know Bill Hickok.
That's how he landed the job. Before Wild Bill
got blown to hell in Deadwood last
year, this Kane talked him out of a
letter of introduction. Kane said Hickok owed it
to him because of some trouble they had in Abilene. Kane
booted around down South for a while before taking the letter
to Cody. He worked for him for four or five
months, fetching Cody's liquor and women. But
he started fuc-was A withering stare from Courtleigh
changed that hastily to, "comfooling with a wardrobe
girl Cody liked, and Cody fired him. Stranded
him in Chicago with just a week's wages. Kane
drank and gambled that away in one night. I tell
you, Mr. Courtleigh, I have a hunch about him. A
hunch that we can use him. I gave him two
dollars for a meal, a bath and a decent bed and he
damn near promised to do anything I wanted. I
think he's a little touched in the head. When I started
talking to him, he was pretty drunk. He babbled
that he was being hounded by some Sioux Indian curse-I
didn't quite get all of it. But if I can use his
drinking habit to control him-you know, give him a little
money every day, but not too much-I'd like to try him on
the staff. A guard for the office. I've wanted
to hire someone for headquarters ever since that lunatic
switchman showed up three weeks ago with those
nonsensical grievances and that homemade
infernal machine-was
Which, thankfully, had failed to detonate when the
crazed man threw it into the working area outside
Court-leigh's office. Chicago police had
been paid to haul the anarchist away and break both his
legs. The man was now in jail awaiting a trial
that would send him to state prison for life.
But Courtleigh understood Hubble's point: "You're
quite right, we should have guards downtown. I'm not
anxious to be blown up in my own office. There could
be another attempt, especially these days. This man
you described might be just the sort we need."
Courtleigh gave the lawyer another piercing glance.
"Perhaps he can also undertake the assignment you
failed."
Hubble's cheeks darkened. "I'll take care of
that, don't you worry, Mr. Courtleigh. As a
matter of fact, I intended to bring it up later
this-was
Courtleigh interrupted, "First let's concentrate
on the strike."
"Yes, sir." Hubble's fat white hand fluttered
over the various notes and documents he'd laid out.
"In case of widespread violence, we'll have the
newspapers on our side, of course-was
Courtleigh pointed to the copy of the Union. "With a
few notable exceptions."
Hubble picked up the sheet with great delicacy.
"Our New York informant telegraphed that Kent
is still following his practice of covering certain
stories himself. He's wired for his western
correspondent to immediately come in to Chicago in case
of trouble here. The paper's editor dispatched another
of the regular reporters to Baltimore. But Kent
himself went to Martinsburg."
"Are most of the eastern dailies sending men there?"
"Yes, sir, nearly every one."
That was good. As a group, newspaper owners were
generally opposed to unions and to strikes. They
considered themselves owners first and newsmen second. Of
course there was a dangerous and misguided minority that
included such men as Gideon Kent and his editor,
Payne, who had been caught in the Tompkins
Square riot and been a labor partisan ever
since.
Hubble held out the newspaper. "This contains a
dispatch Kent sent from Martinsburg. But I thought you
might be more interested in his editorial."
The W and P president stared at the proffered
paper. "I'm not interested in any of the
swill Mr. Kent spews forth. You should know that
by now."
Hubble's pink tongue crept across his bow lips as
if to lick away some unclean speck. "But the
editorial is strongly pro-strike, sir-was
Courtleigh guffawed. "Well, of course. And the
sun 617
also rises in the east. Why the hell are you wasting
my time, Lorenzo?"
"The editorial discusses the wages on several
typical lines-including the W and P."
"What?" Courtleigh fairly leaped to grab the
Union. Hubble sat back, vindicated.
"Yes, sir. As you'll see, it cites your
estimated worth of thirty million, and notes that
our average conductor's wage is twenty percent
less than that received by an apprentice
bricklayer."
Thomas Courtleigh said another filthy word he'd
never used in front of any of the members of St.
Margaret's. With shaking hands, he opened to the
editorial. He grew livid when he saw the
title.
A MATTER OF DIMES AND DECENCY
He read the paragraphs with mounting rage.
Kent was attacking the Baltimore and Ohio wage
rollback, and the one on the Pennsylvania before that.
He was also lending his newspaper's endorsement to a
peaceful strike by the members of the Trainman's
Union who worked for the BandO. Their demands were
fully justified, he said, because they were "wage
slaves" of the men who had imprisoned them in what
he floridly called "a cage without bars, a
cage of poverty and injustice without hope of
redress."
Logically, the editorial should have confined itself
to affairs in the east, but it did not. Kent had chosen
to villify Scott and Garrett-but he'd also chosen
to drag Courtleigh in. All three were characterized as
"bloated profiteers" determined to profit even more
by plucking dimes from the pockets of already desperate
working men-thievery that was akin to snatching bread from a
child's plate, he said.
"Jesus Christ," Courtleigh whispered. Hubble
gaped. 618
To his recollection he had never heard his
employer utter blasphemy within his hearing.
Courtleigh's hands were shaking as he read the
slanted, vitriolic prose to the finish. The owners
of almost every other paper in America considered
themselves capitalists, like Jay Gould or Tom
Scott or Court-leigh himself. But not this damned,
insufferable bastard who'd helped destroy Gwen's
mind and sent her to an early death.
Why had he permitted business to distract him for so
long? Why had he permitted Kent to remain
alive? He redoubled his determination to see him
dead-and soon.
IV
Hubble was almost afraid to speak.
"Any instructions, Mr. Courtleigh?"
Courtleigh flung the paper aside. He stood
up and began pacing, each long step testifying to his
anger.
"Yes. Telegraph Scott in our regular
cipher. Say I urge an immediate implementation of the
scare plan. Tell him I believe the editors of
all the friendly papers must be contacted at once.
Use those words. At once. Say that if we
wait, most of the impact of the plan will be lost."
"I have that," Hubble nodded, scribbling rapid
notes with a pencil.
The plan to which his employer referred had been
devised as a contingency, and had been developed and
refined during the last three meetings of the
consortium. It played on the fact that the average
American was terrified of Marxist socialism-or
Communism, as it was now coming to be called. The
"Communards" of 1871 had become "Communists"
six years later.
Courtleigh knew full well that there were only a
relatively few Communists within the ranks of
railroad
workers. Yet he felt that, with the cooperation of the
press, it could be made to seem that virtually all the
workers favored riot and revolution for achieving their
objectives.
So far as Courtleigh knew, never before in
American history had there been a planned
campaign to frighten the public with a straw man. He
was convinced the plan could work, given the mood of the
times, the willingness of the railroad owners to play on
ignorance and fear, and the attitudes of those who owned
American newspapers -Kent and a few other
lunatics excepted.
Hubble finished his note-taking. Courtleigh checked
what the fat lawyer had written; nodded. Hubble
said:
"If there's nothing else, I have something on my
mind-was
"There is something else." Courtleigh was thinking of
Gideon. "But go ahead."
"Thank you. I just wanted to make a suggestion
regarding Gideon Kent."
Courtleigh burst out laughing again. Hubble grew
worried until Courtleigh assured him nothing was
wrong, and urged him to continue.
"Very well, sir. As you know the strike will
probably intensify. Perhaps spread to major
junction points such as Pittsburgh,
Baltimore, Newark, Ohio, or even
Chicago. I could have Kent followed. If he should
chance to be close to even minor violence, a couple
of trustworthy men could perform the job I failed
to take care of in Philadelphia. During a
melee, we could eliminate Kent quite-ah-naturally.
And without a shred of suspicion."
The lawyer had grown enthusiastic. He was leaning
forward so that his huge paunch pressed against his thighs.
His coat fell away and Courtleigh glimpsed the
concealed pistol the other man always wore in a
sweat-blackened holster tucked near his right armpit.
Fine thing, a W and P attorney walking around

armed. Hubble claimed he'd acquired his
first gun at age eleven, when he was guarding
carriages at a bordello and needed to protect the
vehicles from neighborhood toughs. Perhaps he still
wore a weapon to compensate for his soft, weak body.
But if he wanted to climb higher, he'd have
to polish off those rough edges. He'd have to learn that
gentlemen never overcame opponents with fists or
revolvers. At least not their own.
Sweat began to slick Hubble's face as he
waited for a reaction. Courtleigh was moved
to snicker and say:
"Anxious for absolution, are you, Lorenzo?"
"Yes, sir, very. Philadelphia still weighs
heavily on my mind."
"And on mine," was the unsmiling reply. "I
laughed a moment ago because the matter I was going
to raise with you was the very one you brought up. I was going
to order you to see Kent was killed once and for all."
The fat man breathed noisily, relieved. "What
a fine coincidence! In view of your wishes, may
I make a second suggestion?"
"What is it?"
"That we not limit ourselves to reprisals against Mr.
Kent. That we also consider his family."
Stillness then. From the lawn came the shouts
and laughter of a boisterous croquet game. In the
library, the air was stifling. Hubble's cheeks ran
with shining sweat. Courtleigh sounded eager as he
whispered:
"Go on."
"Well, sir, Kent's editorial stand on the
strike is bound to run counter to that of most of the other
New York dailies. That could cause-was
A fat hand tilted back and forth.
"comlet's call it resentment. Now I've
investigated, and I'm aware that Mr. Kent is no
longer living at home. But that isn't widely
known. Also, the mansion in which his wife and children reside
is located in a sparsely populated section of
upper Fifth Avenue. Certain groups
angry over Mr. Kent's editorial policy,
certain-was The hand waggled again. "compatriotic
citizens who believe he carries the Marxian
taint, but who don't realize he's moved
away-they might take it upon themselves to mob that house.
My information says there's no longer any love lost
between Kent and his wife. Not since he took the
Sedgwick woman as his mistress. But his children are
an altogether different matter. In such a demonstration as
I've just described, those children might be
injured."
Another silence, lengthening and lengthening-
Until Thomas Courtleigh smiled.
With an expression of false piety, Hubble went
on, "We'd wish no harm to any man's loved
ones. But mobs do get out of hand. Kent's children
might even be killed."
Unblinking, Lorenzo Hubble stared at his
employer. Courtleigh glanced at the red-lit
windows. Laughter pealed in the summer dark.
He had to be returning to his guests. But he
took time to step to Hubble's side and squeeze the
lawyer's flaccid shoulder.
"Implement both suggestions, Lorenzo."
Hubble brightened. "Yes, sir. I'll go to New
York personally to arrange for the-ah-visitors."
A warning glared in Courtleigh's eye.
"Being sure that you hi no way implicate the
railroad or me."
Almost as enthusiastically as a puppy, Hubble
declared, "Oh, no, sir, you needn't fret about that,
not for a minute." .
"If both plans succeed-was Courtleigh tried
to tease, but it came hard for a man of his turn of
mind. "comPope Thomas shall grant the
aforementioned absolution." With obvious mockery, he
drew a cross in the air. "He'll give you an
increase in your salary, too. A hundred a
month."
"Thank you, sir-thank you." Hubble was very nearly
fawning.
Courtleigh started out. "Oh-and you may hire that
man you mentioned. Add another, if you wish. Two
guards should be better than one. I want no more
red-eyed radicals storming into the W and P
building looking for my head."
"I'll take care of it, sir."
Thomas Courtleigh felt an almost sensual
excitement as he left the library. The thought of
finally obtaining his revenge against Gideon Kent-and
Kent's family- was somehow more thrilling than
intimate relations with his wife had ever been.
Lorenzo Hubble was a crude, slovenly,
deceitful young man, but he had his virtues. He
wouldn't flinch from organizing a mob that would maun or
kill a woman and a couple of children.
Courtleigh stepped out onto the terrace in the cool
darkness. It was difficult to keep his face composed.
Despite the spreading strike, he was in a state
approaching euphoria. Then he recalled
one thing he'd overlooked.
He was surprised by the glaring omission, but he
supposed it was understandable given the breadth of the
discussion with the attorney. Courtleigh's accounts with
Kent wouldn't be settled until he'd dealt with that
Sedg-wick woman too.
Well, he'd take that up with Hubble tomorrow. He was
feeling so fine he could even begin to appreciate the
lawyer again. Lorenzo Hubble definitely knew
how to redeem himself.
Lorenzo Hubble knew how you got ahead hi
America,
Book Four Eleanor's Way
'100 Years"
ON THE EVENING Thomas Court-leigh conferred
with Lorenzo Hubble, Matthew Kent was again in the
press room of Kent and Son, Boston.
The July night was boiling. The dingy
neighborhood near the North End piers resounded
with quarrelsome voices and the squalls of fretful
children. Matt felt the temperature had to be better
than a hundred inside. He'd removed his shirt
to proof the last three etchings.
The work seemed interminable. He'd mixed the proper
proportions of copperplate oil with french
black and frankfort black ink powders, but because of the
heat, the customary mixing techniques didn't
produce the expected result. When he picked
up some of the finished ink on a palette knife, it
immediately dripped off the edge instead of hanging there, as
it should have. So he'd mixed it again, increasing the
quantity of both powders just a little.
Then something went wrong with one of the screws which
adjusted the pressure of the top roller on the
copperplate press, and that took another hour
to correct. It was a quarter after three before he
pulled a satisfactory print of the final etching,
The Guide, and with more hope than certainty, lightly
marked one corner with the notation 1/250-the first print
of two hundred and fifty. He hoped this plate and
all the others would last that long.
He was too worn out to take time to dry, redampen
and flatten the print properly. He grasped the
sheet by its edges, yawned and carried it toward the
stairway
leading up to the office of Dana Hughes. He
couldn't quite believe his part in the project was finished,
and he still had trouble believing that, toward the end, he'd
actually generated some enthusiasm for it.
He still considered 100 Years a jingoistic
book. But that was immaterial. When he'd arrived in
New York a year ago, Gideon had been a
man drowning. The book-and Matt's participation in
it-had been a sort of life preserver for him.
Incredible that I've put so much time into it, he thought.
But how the hell did you walk away from your own
brother's cry of help? The answer was the same as
it had been a year ago. You didn't.
Since the summer of '76, Matt had traveled more
than twenty thousand miles studying locales and
sketching figures for the plates for 100 Years.
He'd crossed the Charles River to Breed's
Hill, where the family's founder had fought, and he'd
stood with a haunted feeling in the clump of trees
at which Pickett had aimed his splendid, futile
charge at Gettysburg. He'd fallen in love
with San Francisco, and damned the dust of West
Texas. He'd gotten splattered with oil from a
derrick hi Pennsylvania, and slogged around in
water up to his hips in a South Carolina rice
field destroyed by a hurricane. He'd savored
strong cheese among shy Scandinavians in
Wisconsin, and scratched at hellish little insects
that crawled under his balls while he sketched a
heron in the south of Florida. He'd
been on riverboats and ranches, entered cathedrals
and cathouses, heard the dead murmuring in the winds
that blew over battlefields and burial grounds.
For every historical figure depicted in the
plates, he'd used a living American as an
anatomical model. For the plate of Martha
Washington darning her husband's stocking by candlelight
as Valley Forge, he'd sketched a Quaker farm
woman in Ohio. A Baptist parson in
Oregon had posed for lanky, foul-mouthed Andy
Jackson,
and a black sharecropper in Louisiana for
Crispus At-tucks.
And almost everywhere he went, if he grew discouraged
because his hand wouldn't do what his mind knew it could, he
would discard the unsatisfactory sketches for a while
and find a baseball game. Sometimes he played;
sometimes he umpired. Either way, a few innings always
restored his spirits and renewed his determination. That was
true in spite of his realization that age was catching
up with him. He could no longer sprint between the bases
as fast as he once had, or throw the ball as
powerfully or as far.
At first he'd been contemptuous of the purpose behind
all his work and travel. But then a
peculiar thing had happened. He'd forgotten all
about the purpose and lost himself in the fascination of the work
itself. It was as if he'd gone to a banquet against his
will, loathing the host but ultimately forgetting about that
as his senses surrendered in delight to the incredible
variety of courses set before him. Unexpectedly,
America was a banquet for his eyes and mind and,
sometimes, when a particular scene or face moved
him, for his heart.
The etching he'd just proofed was a study of
Sacajawea, the young Indian woman who had
guided the Lewis and Clark party to the western sea.
As his model he'd used a Sioux Indian girl
eight months pregnant. He'd been led to her in
Cheyenne, Wyoming, by Michael Boyle, the
hard-headed Irishman to whom his father had willed
Jeremiah's third of the inheritance.
After meeting Boyle, Matt understood why
Jephtha Kent had taken that step. Damned if
Matt hadn't taken to the Irishman and his
straightforward manner. Boyle made no secret
of his ambition to earn a lot of money from the retail
stores he and his handsome wife Hannah operated, and
from the cattle feeding operation they'd started more
recently. He didn't pretend he was
watching his balance sheets for the sake of God,
country, or
"progress"-a puzzling term which seemed to be the
mantle with which Americans cloaked an incredible
number of stupid or dishonest acts.
Boyle's candid admission that he wanted to make
money because he'd starved in the slums as a child was in
refreshing contrast to the pious cant Matt had heard
down in Washington. Tom Nast had taken him there
for a week, and introduced him to a flock of
politicians. He'd met Nast through a mutual
acquaintance at the Salmagundi Club, and they'd
hit it off immediately.
Matt admired the Dutchman's draughtsmanship
and imagination. Nast had invented marvelous animal
symbols for political organizations-the Tammany
tiger, the foolish Democratic jackass, the
strong and likable elephant of Nast's own
Republican party. Matt was less enthralled by the
man's crusading nature, and by streaks of outright
bigotry and cruelty in his cartoons. Nast
loathed Catholics, and it showed. And in the '72
election, when old Horace Greeley had
campaigned as a reform Republican, opposing
Grant's bid for reelection, Nast's
artwork had lampooned the famous publisher without
mercy. Many said the cartoons were a major factor
in Greeley dying three weeks after the election, a
broken man.
Nast had also been violent in denouncing Southerners
during the war. But in his eyes Matt was more
expatriate than Southerner. Nast knew of
Matt's work, especially the painting of
Wilmington, for which a private collector had paid
a handsome price the day the Centennial Exhibition
closed.
Gideon was aware that his younger brother had poked around
Washington diswith Tom Nast, but he knew nothing about
Matt looking up the Boyles in Cheyenne and
enjoying their fine hospitality-as when Michael
took him to a private cattleman's club, and
bought him a dinner of the finest beefsteak he'd ever
tasted. Matt
just didn't mention the visit because Gideon still disliked
the Irishman and his wife.
Matt had gladly taken advantage of their knowledge of
Wyoming, though. It was through Michael that he'd
located the Indian girl.
He'd drawn her relatively small, laboring
up the steep side of a low, round hill.
A row of identical hills, each only half
visible, diminished behind it like one of those visions of
infinity you could create by arranging two mirrors
face to face. The repetitive pattern of the
hills was meant to suggest the distances Lewis and
Clark had traversed. Sacajawea was walking up
the hill rather than down because he was thereby able
to portray physical strain.
He'd sketched his model in her pregnant state,
intending to use only certain details of her face
and costume. Then he'd discovered Sacajawea had
delivered a child, little Pom, during the expedition. So
the finished version showed her with a heavy belly, late
hi her term. Matt thought that made the plate much
stronger.
Sacajawea's head was turned, and her arm
upraised to urge the unseen party of men to hurry
along. He meant to imply the men couldn't keep up
with a pregnant but determined young woman. The touch
amused him-not that anyone would catch it. Well, no
matter. Gideon had agreed to let him handle each
subject as he chose. And for hull, it was a single
strong young girl undaunted by a physical burden
or by unexplored distances that symbolized the opening
of the west.
He really liked the picture. He liked the work
he'd done hi America. That was the most amazing part
of the year just past.
Heat lightning flashed outside the window of Dana
Hughes' dun, stuffy office. Matt's shoulders
and forearms ached from working the copperplate press. A
daub of ink smudged his nose. He stepped into the
office and coughed to rouse the editor, who'd fallen
asleep at his desk. They'd been working steadily for
eight days and nights to meet the production
deadline. Matt had taken all his meals at the
publishing house and snatched a few hour's sleep
on the floor at night.
Hughes blinked and knuckled his eyes. "All
finished?"
Matt reversed the etching and laid it on the desk
by way of an answer. The bland and phlegmatic
editor clucked his tongue-for him, the equivalent of
wild enthusiasm. He capped it by saying:
"I like the work you did on the plate. The shadow on
the skirt is much more natural now. This is one of
my favorites."
"Well, you can wake Frank and get him to start
printing the balance of these."
"Don't you want to do it? An etching's a
delicate business-was
"And Frank's a very capable fellow. He knows the
effects I'm after. Besides, I'm sick of the
project. Run the prints and let's see what we
have."
Hughes said nothing. What they would have were two
hundred and fifty portfolios, most of which were
unsold.
Matt knew the editor and Gideon were disappointed
in the low returns from their mail solicitation. How
many orders had come in? Twenty? They wouldn't even
meet the cost of production, let alone achieve a
surplus for charity.
Advance orders for the book itself were equally small.
Perhaps the moment was wrong for a volume such as 100
Years. The centennial was over; perhaps the book had
come too late. Or it might be enthusiasm for the
celebration had dimmed as people saw hard times still
gripping the land.
Hard, violent times. There was new labor trouble in

West Virginia. Gideon had rushed off from New
York to write about it.
Poor Gid, Matt thought as Hughes continued
to admire the etching. An honest man. An
idealist-and what had they done to him? Long ago
hung him up on a symbolic cross labeled
Radical. He'd carry the stigma all his life,
and live forever on the fringe of respectability. That
always happened when you championed unpopular ideas.
It frequently happened from the mere act of involving
yourself in public affairs. Paul Cezanne had
known that long before he was Gideon's age.
Matt jerked a grimy kerchief out of his back
pocket and swabbed his itching nose. He discovered the
ink, and got rid of most of it. He leaned on the
window sill; stuck his head out. There wasn't much
relief to be had by doing that. The stifling air bore
the smells of a seafaring town-salt and fish and tar and
turpentine. Limpid white glares occasionally lit
the chimney pots and roof tiles of the North End.
For his brother's sake, Matt hoped 100 Years
would eventually be a success. Or at least pay for
itself. The four engravers who'd reproduced Mart's
sketches on wood blocks had done a
remarkably good job. Gideon had written a
paragraph of text to appear opposite each
plate. But Gideon's involvement went far beyond
that. Far beyond even Matt's massive investment of
effort and tune. Gideon Kent, Matt
knew very well, was counting on 100 Years to succeed
because so much else in his life was failing.
Gideon's daughter refused to answer the
conciliatory letters he doggedly mailed to her every four
or five weeks. Even Gideon's mistress, a
woman Matt liked very much, was unable to rninirnize
the pain caused by Eleanor's failure to reply.
If 100 Years failed, Kent and Son would
survive and continue on its mediocre way. Gid
would survive too-physically. But there were other
ways a man could die, and over the past months
Matt had watched his brother go through a slow erosion
of hope and energy.
Several tunes Matt had been so upset
by Gideon's state that he'd almost taken it on himself
to drive to Sixty-first Street and confront
Eleanor, whom he'd never had occasion to meet.
He hadn't done it. His confidence always failed at
the last moment because of his own sorry record as a
family man. He was afraid he'd bungle a
plea for reconciliation, and make the situation
worse.
Hughes patted the margin of the print in a
proprietary way. "Oh, I do like this one,
Matt. The whole book is splendid.
The illustrations, I mean."
Matt turned his back to the stormy night sky and
perched on the sill. Sweat ran down his breastbone
to his navel. "If you're going to commend the
pictures, you have to commend the text as well. I
think Gid packed a hell of a lot of information into very
short blocks of space."
"Yes, a first rate job given his state of mind
lately. It's obvious the text and the illustrations
were done by men who love this country."
"Nonsense, Dana. I don't love America.
How can you love a nation of poltroons and
parvenues? All I'll say is that, visually,
it's an incredible place."
"You know, don't you, that the ancients believed love
entered through the eye?"
Somehow the teasing infuriated Matt, but he said
nothing. Hughes stood, stretched, and Matt heard
one of the older man's knees pop.
"Did your brother say whether he'd be taking the
train up here to supervise the press run?"
"I think he meant to do that, but that railroad strike
heated up and he raced off to have a look."
Hughes shook his head. "Running about like one of his
own news cubs-I've never thought that was
advisable. For one thing it's undignified. For
another, that's a
very troubled situation in West Virginia. Your
brother shouldn't thoughtlessly rush into danger. He's the
head of two companies now. Quite a few people depend
on him for decisions-and for jobs. He should think of that
before he goes places where he might be accidentally
injured or killed."
Perhaps it was exhaustion, or the fact that it was the end
of the night, the time of sad thoughts and bad dreams, that
suddenly put a terrible realization into Matt's
head:
Maybe that's what he hopes for now. Maybe things
have gone so wrong for him, he doesn't care about
living.
Somehow he found the idea loathsome-especially in
connection with Gideon. It insulted him; turned him
into a coward. Yet the thought persisted. Matt was
scowling as Hughes said:
"I think you should stay and supervise the running of-was
"No. Frank can do it. I'm going to wash my
face, put on my shirt and boots, and go get
drunk-in that order. When I see you again, I
expect you to hand me a finished portfolio-as well
as a finished copy of that book to which we now
owe our souls. Good evening, Mr. Hughes."
CHAPTER II
Imprisoned
IN NEW YORK City, Eleanor Kent began
that same Wednesday evening in a mood of great
excitement. An unidentified guest was to visit the
Booth Association. The weekly meeting had been
changed from Tuesday to accommodate the visitor's
schedule.
Charlie Whittaker was in charge of the affair. The
preceding week he'd announced in his usual
portentous way that the visitor was someone
important in the theatre, and was coming to flutter
Hall specifically to look over the troupe. Though
all the members including Leo Goldman pestered
Charlie ferociously, and even subjected him to a
few mild threats, he had refused to say anything
else. Consequently Eleanor's anticipation had
mounted steadily over the past few days. It was a
joy to have something about which she could be genuinely excited
for a change.
Who could the mysterious guest be? Some well-known
actor? A producing manager? Why would either sort
of person bother with an amateur club?
Well, she'd know soon enough.
She hurried with her preparations for the evening. The
sweetly scented powder she dusted on her cheeks
and the back of her hands helped offset the dank
smell the mansion acquired in the summer. She'd
picked out her lightest frock, but she still felt
uncomfortably warm as she started down the second
floor corridor. The house seemed to have that effect
lately. It produced a sense of confinement; of
stale air imprisoned in lightless rooms, and of
unhappy people imprisoned by their circumstances or, in
her case, by the lack of courage it took
to escape.
She knocked softly at her brother's door, then
went in. "Will? I'm leaving."
He looked up from his reading, his eyes lackluster.
"Do you have to go again tonight?"
"Yes!" She felt guilty about her sharpness, then
resentful of his dependence on her. only 1 could
make myself stop caring about him-and about mama-still could
leave this wretched place.
But that was impossible. She tried to go on more
calmly:
"Don't you remember, tonight we're having our
surprise visitor?"
Will gave a small shrug, as if he
couldn't comprehend the importance she placed on such
things. He should be able to understand, she thought. Her
refuge once a week was the Association, but he
had his own, available every day. His room overflowed with
stacks of books of all kinds and sizes. He
read those books at the expense of everything else.
Over the past year his marks had gone down at the
private day school he attended. He'd lost
twenty pounds, and was becoming more and more passive and
withdrawn. Eleanor felt incompetent to take him
hi hand. She'd tried playing ball with him hi
Central Park, but it wasn't the same as the
camaraderie two brothers would have enjoyed. She'd
encouraged him to walk over to the Park when boys from
downtown gathered to organize ball games. The
noisy, working-class youngsters intimidated him. He
wouldn't set foot across Fifth Avenue by himself even
though his eyes said he'd clearly like to go.
How wretched and forlorn he looked as he laid his
book aside and stood. Papa caused this when he
walked out, she thought. No matter who had started
all the arguments between her mother and father, she held
Gideon responsible for the misery hi the household
ever since her birthday a year ago. He was the one
who had chosen to desert his home and leave
her trapped here by her conscience and her
responsibilities.
"Eleanor?"
"What is it?"
Will's eyes darted past her, as if to make sure the
door was shut. "What if-what if she starts seeing
those people again? It's happened twice already this week."
Those people. The formless, faceless men who came stealing
to surround the mansion when darkness fell Only
Margaret saw and heard them.
This evening Eleanor had tried to avoid thinking 637
about her mother's condition. It was impossible.
Resentment of her father burst forth again, almost as fierce
as her resentment of the duties thrust on her by his
departure.
Still, there was concern mingled with her anger. The concern
won out. She drew Will's skinny body against her
side and held him a moment, even as the resentment
slewed hi a new direction.
still can't stand the misery of this place. Dear God,
1 must get out or I'll die.
But of course she couldn't leave. Someone had to keep
things running. Her mother was incapable. Margaret
consumed tonics and spiritous liquors from the moment she
rose in the morning until she retreated
to her room at dusk to hide from the imaginary
watchers. Fortunately she had hired an
excellent staff in her more lucid days, and that staff
required only minimum supervision from Eleanor.
Will, however, was another matter. He was a
responsibility she was failing to handle
adequately-though could anyone do it, given the
atmosphere in which they lived? It was an atmosphere
of fear, and now it turned his voice shrill and made
him clutch her forearm:
"Tell me what to do if she says they're outside
again. What if she screams, Eleanor? Tell me
what to do then."
"Send Mills for Dr. Melton."
"But Mills will be driving you to the meeting."
"It doesn't take long to reach Irving Place-was
Early hi the year the subterfuge of the Latin
lessons at Whit-taker's had been abandoned with
everyone but her mother. "comand he'll be right back.
I'll come home as early as I can, I
promise."
Disconsolate, the boy retreated to the chair. She
left him with the book in his lap, his hands on the chair
arms, and his eyes fixed on some point in space.
As she went
out the door, a puff of wind flared the curtains, and
he started violently.
Poor Will-jumping at gusts of air. Cowering from the
sight-the very thought of his own mother.
The blame all belonged to Gideon.
Eleanor had been hurt that he'd walked out.
Hurt, but she'd understood after she calmed down.
She could well believe that her mother might have lied about
certain things. Margaret was unwell.
Her father, on the other hand, was fully in control of his
faculties. He had no excuses. And so
Eleanor's pain had slowly changed to outright
animosity when Gideon didn't bother
to communicate with her, or with his son.
His failure to send his children so much as a note of
remembrance on their birthdays, or at Christmas,
confirmed her fear that he no longer cared about either of
them. Several times she'd asked Samuel whether the
day's mail contained anything from her father, and he always
said no in a strange, tense way that told her he,
too, thought it was shameful that Gideon didn't
write.
An occasional visit by a representative of the
Roth-man Bank served to remind everyone that
Gideon had provided Margaret with a more
than generous bank account. The last two times the
banker had called, Eleanor had received him; her
mother was in a stupor. Eleanor didn't understand much of
what the man said, but evidently that didn't matter;
on the essential point he was quite clear-there was money
enough to meet expenses and always would be.
Money couldn't buy forgiveness for her father, though.
If he thought it could, he was damnably mistaken.
Sometimes she did wish Margaret and Gideon would
reconcile. For one thing, she would then have been able
to meet Uncle Matthew, who'd been back in the
United States for nearly a year.
Of course he'd been traveling a lot during that
time, 639
doing illustrations for some book Kent and Son was
to publish. But his name had popped up in newspaper
gossip columns, and she'd heard the servants
clucking about his escapades. Diving into an
ornamental fish pond filled with white Bordeaux
wine during a weekend party thrown by one of the rich,
fast crowd up at Newport. Romancing some
blonde beauty at the Saratoga Springs race
track. Visiting Cooper Union to speak with the
evening art classes about tiends in Britain and in
France. He'd quoted the war cry of the
painters called the French realists-"Le soleil
est dieu"-and endorsed it, thereby touching off a
small riot between sympathetic listeners and the more
traditional students. Uncle Matt was
Bohemian; highly advanced "m his thinking; and
famous in his, disreputable sort of way. Of those
few people she could count as family, he would have understood
best her growing certainty that she would be an actress
one day. Because her father was gone, she had no
opportunity to tell Uncle Matt how she
felt-and that was one more thing for which she blamed Gideon.
Still, some of her feelings about him conflicted with her
anger. From time to time she wondered what he did with his
free time after he left Printing House Square in
the evening. Where did he live? With whom did he
take his meals? Other newspaper men? Uncle
Matt? That mistress whose existence she believed
in, even though she had absolutely no evidence the
woman existed?
Gideon's absence left an aching void in her
life. It was more than just a sense of something being gone.
Deep down, she cared about him, and worried about him.
The servants still sneaked the family paper into the
house, so she knew there was some sort of labor
trouble on one of the railroads in West
Virginia. And she'd heard cook say her father had
gone to report on it first hand, as he sometimes did with
important stories.
Eleanor's instantaneous reaction had been a
hope that he wouldn't be hurt. A few minutes
later that reac-
tion brought surprise, then disgusf. How was it
possible for her to Jove and hate a parent at the
same time? Her inability to answer the question, or
explain away her behavior, only deepened her
confusion.
Going down the staircase, she saw her mother wandering
aimlessly across the foyer. When Eleanor reached the
bottom of the stairs, some three yards separated her
from her mother. But she could smell the tonic. The odor
of its alcohol base grew steadily stronger as she
approached.
Margaret was slow to note that her daughter was dressed
for the street. When she did, she asked:
"Where are you going?"
"To the Whittakers', mama. The tutor could only
come on Wednesday this week."
Her cheeks were pink as she said it. She disliked
having to lie to her mother when everyone else in the house
knew she attended Association meetings.
She lied because references to the theatre still agitated
Margaret-although not as much as something else she now
touched on indirectly:
"That's all right-was Margaret's hand brushed at a
loose strand of hair but somehow failed to touch it.
"coms long as you're not going to see your father."
"Never," Eleanor declared. It had become a
ritual, that question and her answer. So long as she
promised not to see Gideon-as if she
would-Margaret was relatively lax in keeping
track of her whereabouts. It was about the only real
benefit she'd derived from her father's departure.
With careful contrivance, she could even arrange for
Mills to drive her to an occasional matinee, and
pick her up afterward. Inevitably, she drew stares
and comments when she entered a playhouse without an
escort. And she needn't have done it. There was a young
man who would gladly have accompanied her. But his
constant
attention had created a whole new set of
potential problems, and she had enough already.
Actually, she didn't mind going alone and causing
comment She knew most people thought she was a prostitute,
but she didn't care a snap about that.
Respectability was the last thing
professional actors and actresses worried about
Of course there was some risk when a girl sat down
by herself amidst some of the riftrafl in playhouse
galleries. But so far, by keeping a parasol with a
sharp ferrule handy, she'd avoided serious trouble.
Her acting ability helped, too. On one occasion
when she'd been accosted by a heavy-handed lout, she'd
scowled at him and ordered him to leave her
alone-threatening a long and loud scream for the police
if he didn't. Her threat had been convincing; he
left her alone.
She had to keep her wits about her during those
excursions. And she was disgusted and frightened by the
expressions of some men who let their eyes rove
over her face and her body. But the rewards were more
than worth the unpleasantries. Already this year
she'd seen Junius B. Booth, Junior's
wife Agnes in Sardanapulus, Adelaide
Neilson charming the audience in Twelfth Night,
and the team of Ned Harrigan and Tony Hart
displaying their wonderful sense of comedy timing. She'd
studied the technique of major performers such as the
gorgeous Helana Modjeska and the handsome
George Rignold, and even that of the pert little child
actress, Bijou Fernandez.
This evening Margaret seemed particularly upset
by thoughts of Gideon. She seized Eleanor's arm.
"You're positive you don't plan to see your
father?"
"Why would I, Mama? He left us. He
hasn't written, and he's only come to the house that
one time-was
Margaret's mouth curved in a curious smile.
"When you very properly refused to speak with him. You
haven't changed your mind?"
"You just heard me say I hadn't."
"Swear it."
"Mama-was
"Swear it, Eleanor. I insist."
A pain spread in her midsection as she said, "I
swear." Dear God, what a wretched game. But
she knew the alternative-severe agitation on
Margaret's part; even screaming or weeping.
Twice through that kind of harrowing experience had taught
Eleanor to humor her mother's demands for promises
like the one she'd just extracted.
Margaret's smile disappeared as she crept to the
front door. She peered through one of the narrow
windowpanes flanking it, and it nearly broke
Eleanor's heart to hear her say:
"Oh, good. They're not in the Park yet. Perhaps they
won't come tonight. Perhaps they'll leave me alone, and
I can get some sleep."
Eleanor wanted to cry, There's no one there. She
didn't because she knew Margaret wouldn't believe
her. Would, in fact, turn on her with wild
assertions that Eleanor just couldn't see the men who
came back almost every evening as soon as the sun went
down.
"Good-night Mama," Eleanor called as she
started toward the kitchen. Margaret didn't
acknowledge it, muttering monosyllables while she
continued to peer through the glass.
Eleanor dashed down the back steps and in a moment
was on her way to Hutter Hall in the calash. The
July evening was hot. The wind quickly dried the
tears of frustration that formed in her eyes.
still wish I didn't worry about Will or feel
sorry for mama. I wish I could just pack a
valise and run away from that God-awful place.
I don't know how much longer I can stand it there.
Lying to mama. Not able to do anything to help her, or
Will either.
 7 stay there, it will be the end of me. I have to get out
of that house or I'll die.
When she reached Hutter Hall, all the members were
in confusion, arranging and rearranging chairs and dithering
even more than actors usually did.
All but one, that is. Leo Goldman.
Leo was tolerated by the other members of the Booth
Association, but none of them really liked him. Most
of the boys secretly envied his good looks and
voice.
The female guests all chased Leo-with one notable
exception. She was the only one in whom he was
interested.
"Eleanor, may I speak to you?" He'd
intercepted her the moment she walked in, and was
keeping pace as she went to hang up her bonnet.
She didn't know what to make of Leo-or her
reactions to him. She liked his cheerful and confident
manner. And she positively turned to jelly when
he read certain passages of dialogue or
dramatic verse in that beautiful baritone. Since
that first evening in the cloak room they'd gradually
become more friendly. She'd never seen him anywhere
except meetings, however, and that was a barrier he was
constantly struggling to overcome.
Occasionally she was tempted to help him. But then fear
and good sense always intervened-as they did now,
behind her tart smile:
"You don't usually ask permission. Why should this
week be any different?"
He took her hand and drew her into the cloakroom.
Quickly she pulled her hand away, fearful of how she
felt. Too warm. Too eager for him to squeeze
her fingers between his larger, stronger ones.
Love hurts you. Affection hurts you. Why was she
so often in danger of forgetting that?
She knew. Leo was fearfully handsome, with those coal
black eyes and that imp's grin.
And tonight he was as determined as ever:
"How long are you going to hold out on me,
Eleanor? By working extra at the Academy,
I've saved enough to buy two gallery seats at any
playhouse hi town. When are you going to say yes and
let me take you to a show? I'll go any afternoon you
want. Any Saturday-was
She used the first argument that came to mind:
"You keep telling me that, Leo. But Saturday's
your Sabbath."'*
"As far as religion goes, my father's given up
on me," he said with a shrug. "My mother, too. They
lost hope when I sneaked out of Hebrew school
to sell papers. I'll never be able to read
the Talmud, or keep all the six hundred and
thirteen commandments a pious man like my father tries
to store in his head or, worse, observe. Why, if
Hester Street went up in flames tonight, I'm
afraid my father would first concern himself with the orthodox
way to fight fires-if there is any-and only think
of the family later. Don't worry about my
Sabbath. I figured out a long time ago that I
couldn't be an actor if I began by asking to miss
Saturday matinees. If I'm to be a good
actor, I'll have to be a bad Jew for a while and
hope I'll be forgiven."
He glanced quickly at the ceiling, miming
supplication with clasped hands. Eleanor laughed.
"Sometimes I don't know what to think of you-was
"Think that I have all this money for tickets and
carfare, and that I'll perish of misery if you don't
say yes and go to the theatre."
"You won't perish." She tried another excuse.
"Besides, I don't think my mother would allow it."
"Pshaw, Eleanor. You tell everybody around here
that you do as you please."
Her cheeks pinked; she'd been caught. 645
He stepped closer, his forearm accidentally brushing the
tip of her breast as she turned away. The
sensation melted her for a moment, then terrified her.
In a sympathetic voice, Leo said:
"I can guess one thing that might be worrying you. If
you let me take you out, I promise I'll be
polite. I know you don't like boys to touch you."
The startling statement made her whirl back to him.
"How do you know that?"
Her voice was so loud, one of the members passing the
cloak room paused to glance in. Leo scowled at
him and he went on:
"I didn't mean to make you mad. But I've seen
how you react when you're performing a scene and the
script says you're supposed to touch a boy, or
let him touch you. You hesitate for a minute before you
go ahead* Maybe none of the rest of them notice,
but I do."
He grinned to relieve her embarrassment. "That's
because I watch you twice as hard as anyone else.
Let me take you to a matinee and I promise you
won't have to worry about me getting fresh."
Again he stepped close. "You just have to say yes,
Eleanor. I can't eat any more, I can't sleep,
I'm about to lose my job because of you-was
"Oh, Leo, no-was
"It's true. I can't keep the
Academy's lobby swept or the refreshment booth
spicked up because I'm so busy wondering when you'll
give in."
"You mean if."
"When. I know you want me to take you out."
"Oh, you do? Of all the conceited, big-headed-was
"Now, now," he interrupted. "You know it's
true." He looked straight into her dark eyes.
"I see it and you can't hide it no matter how hard
you try. So you might as well quit resisting me,
and name the date. I've told you before, Miss
Kent-Leo Goldman of Hester Street didn't
come to America to wallow around being a fail
ure. I intend to get everything I want. A
famous name in the theater. Lots of money. And you."
He was still smiling in a mischievous way. But those
dark eyes bored into her, seeing emotions she wanted
to conceal. Everything he said about her feelings was true.
She wanted to say yes to him-
Suddenly cold, sharp images came stabbing into her
mind.
Images of the ruined birthday.
Of the Christmas eve when she'd peered through the steamy
window on the Yorkville veranda.
Of the night she'd broken the Rogers
group, and crouched on the stairway afterward.
"Well, Leo-was Her face took on a stiff
look that marred her beauty. "I'm afraid you
won't get everything you want. Not this year. I
won't go to the theater with you."
"That's crazy. I can tell you like me."
Exactly why I have to refuse you.
"Damn it, Eleanor, you've got to give me a
better explanation than-was
"Say, what is this, a private rehearsal?" Quite
unnoticed, Charlie Whittaker had poked his head
into the cloak room.
For the first time, Eleanor heard a hubbub in the
hall. She was furious when Charlie raked her up
and down, hunting for signs of mussed clothing. Then,
with an annoyed look at Leo, he went on,
"If you can tear yourselves away from whatever intimate
little things you're doing, our guest has arrived-my
God, Goldman, what's the matter?"
Eleanor was afraid poor, soft Charlie was about
ti caret be felled by one of Leo's fists. But
Leo kept his hands at his sides-for the moment,
anyway-and shoved his face close to the other boy's.
"Get this straight. If you ever say another word
to suggest Eleanor isn't a lady-or that
she'd permit her
self to behave in an unladylike way-I'll
knock you from here to the East River."
Giving Charlie a push, he stalked out.
Charlie pursed his lips. Planted his fists on his
hips.
"Ooo, that arrogant little sheeny. I rue the day he
browbeat his way into this organization."
But he didn't say it loudly.
CHAPTER III
The Jommer
CHARLIE WHITTAKER TOOK the
platform to introduce the visitor. He hooked his
thumbs under the lapels of his frock coat and
drummed his fingers on the outside as he spoke.
Eleanor sat in the third row. Leo was in the row
ahead, on the extreme right. He leaned forward, his
elbows on his knees and his fingers laced beneath his chin.
He was scowling.
The incident in the cloak room had unsettled
Eleanor. She did like Leo, but she knew that if
she admitted it, she was courting disaster. She was in
such a state, she barely heard the first part of the
introduction.
A freckled Irish boy named Shad
Conway was seated next to her. When he let out a
barely audible groan, she realized Charlie was still
droning on.
"comand so we are indeed fortunate to have with us the
proprietor and featured player of Bascom's
Original Ideal Uncle Tom Combination."
Shoot, Eleanor thought as she took her first good
look at the man Charlie was introducing. She
might as well have stayed home. The visitor
wasn't anyone famous, just a Tommer.
Still, she was curious as to why any professional,

even a lowly Tom show actor, would seek out a
group of young amateurs.
Charlie shot his hands high above his head. "coman
actor who has traveled the length and breadth of the
American continent in pursuit of his art, and now
graces our humble stage with his august presence."
On Eleanor's left, the Conway boy whispered,
"Jay-sus, Charlie, calm down. It isn't the
Second Coming."
Eleanor giggled behind her hand. A year ago, such a
remark would have stunned her speechless. Now she took
it entirely in stride; one of the first discoveries
she'd made at the Association was that very
few things were sacred to actors.
"And so, devoted fellow worshipers of Thespis, it
is my high privilege and signal honor
to present the celebrated and distinguished
actor-manager, Mr. Jefferson
-J.-Bascom!"
The membership of the Booth Association and a
half-dozen female guests stood and applauded.
Leo's clapping was perfunctory. As everyone sat
down, he shot a wounded look at Eleanor. His
mouth set as if to say he'd overcome her
resistance yet.
The visitor took the platform. Eleanor gave the
actor close scrutiny. Mr. Jefferson
Bascom had a hooked nose, a large mustache,
and wrinkled skin. He wasn't unhandsome, but his best
years were behind him. He was sixty if he was a day.
She took note of the lack of any gray in his
shoulder-length black hair. A wig, she
decided. That was a clue to his character. She could think
of several vain members of the Association who were always
primping or displaying themselves hi faddish clothes. were
all actors obsessed by their own images, like that
man in the legend, Narcissus? She didn't think
Leo was. He just knew
what the Almighty had given him, and was determined
to use it to advantage.
Shad Conway leaned close and touched her arm. She
went rigid. Shad whispered:
"Want to bet Jefferson J. Bascom's a
false name? Little too close to Joe Jefferson
to be anything else."
She nodded and edged sideways on her chair, away
from Shad, while Mr. Bascom focused attention
on himself by glancing from face to face. His gaze
lingered on Eleanor's a bit longer than necessary.
She was thankful the shoulders of two members in the
row ahead blocked Bascom's line of sight when
he tried to peer at the curve of her full bosom.
The actor spoke in what she had to admit was a
mellifluous voice-almost as rich as Leo's:
"My young friends, thank you indeed for 'allowing me
to visit your meeting. I am humbly grateful for
that most flattering introduction by Mister-ah-was
"Whittaker," someone hissed.
"Whittaker," Bascom repeated without a blink.
"Modesty would force me to deny a great part of it, were
it not for one fact. The members of my troupe have
made Bascom's Original Ideal Uncle
Tom Combination unequivocally the finest
Tom show on tour anywhere. Further, it is
undeniable-was A self-effacing smile, and an index
finger pointed upward for emphasis. "comundeniable that
my Legree has become the standard by which other
interpretations of the role are judged."
Shad Conway made a rude noise and muttered,
"I never heard of J. J. Bascom before tonight."
Eleanor shushed him.
"comhowever-was Bascom began to strut back and forth
across the platform, pausing occasionally to point up this
or that word with a broad gesture. "compersonal
problems on the part of several members of the company
necessitate my replacing them before Bascom's
Combination undertakes its grand two-year Western tour
just a few short days from now. Hence my interest in this
group-and my presence among you."
A buzz of excitement traveled through the audience.
They understood. She noticed that Leo had lost his
angry expression and was looking interested. Even
Eleanor felt a little thrill. Never mind
Bascom's age or his ridiculous wig. He had
the power to hire someone in Hutter Hall for a
professional engagement.
What was his company like? she wondered. There were dozens
of undistinguished if hard-working Tom
troupes constantly criss-crossing the nation and
playing one-night engagements in towns and smaller
cities. The skimpiest company she'd ever heard
about supposedly performed the play's twenty-nine
male and female roles with a troupe of three, and
no scenery. Despite Bascom's wrinkles and his
hyperbole, his troupe surely had to be better
than that. She sat forward on the edge of her chair,
fascinated.
"comh positions on the extended tour for three new
gentlemen and one new lady."
Bascom's eyes darted to Eleanor as he said that.
He'd shifted to the left on the platform. The
shoulders of the boys in the row ahead no longer
protected her. She turned red as the actor's
distinctly unpaternal gaze traveled up from her
breasts to her throat and lingered on her lips. Leo
looked as though he might lunge at the older man.
"Those selected shall receive handsome wages," Bas-com
boomed. Eleanor doubted it. "comz well as full
traveling expenses. More important, they shall have the
privilege of joining a company which already includes
eleven fine actors and actresses, including
myself-was
Fifteen people counting the replacements.
Respectable.
"comandthe distinguished American tragedian, Mr.
Daniel Prince, who is our Uncle Tom."
When Shad nudged her shoulder, she was in better
control, and didn't start. The boy whispered,
"Aha! That fellow, I've heard of."
Charlie Whittaker turned and glowered. Shad
ignored him.
"Prince drinks so much, no playhouse in town will
hire him any longer. I'll bet he took this part
out of desperation."
"Now," Bascom said, beginning to bounce on the
toes of his cracked boots, "if there are any here
who might be inclined to read for possible inclusion in the
company-was
His gaze returned to Eleanor. 'Quickly she
glanced into her lap so he wouldn't think she was a
candidate. But she wished she could be. Going with
Bascom's troupe, she'd be free of that cursed
house forever.
"comI have brought a prompter's script of the play.
Do I have any applicants?"
Shad Conway's hand shot up. So did the hands of a
number of others-including Leo's, Eleanor was
surprised to see.
"What, no female candidates?" Bascom again
let his eye rove until it came to rest on her.
She couldn't help being flattered that he'd singled her
out, but she doubted he was interested in her acting
ability. She shook her head. His face fell.
With less enthusiasm, he waved at one of the
hand-raisers in the front row.
"All right, sir, you first. We'll be reading from the
opening scene in act one. Dialogue between Eliza
and her husband George."
There were some groans. They elicited a sharp glance
from Bascom. "Anyone unwilling to double in brass
and appear in darkie roles need not bother
to audition. I should point out that a player of Mr.
Prince's stature does not consider it beneath him
to don blackface and portray Uncle Tom."
"No, not when he can't get a part anywhere else,"
Shad laughed under his breath.
"comand further, his talented wife delights audiences
with her interpretation of Topsy. Now, young sir, you
and one of your lady friends step up here."
One by one, three young men read the scene, each
choosing one of the girls for a partner. Then came
Leo's turn. His glance slid to Eleanor before he
made his choice-the girl who'd just read.
Eleanor knew the slight was deliberate, but she
supposed she deserved it.
Leo's audition drew a favorable comment from
Bas-com, and some applause. Eleanor joined
in. Leo noticed; when he looked at her, his
face had an almost lovelorn expression for a
moment.
When Shad was called forward, he grabbed
Eleanor's hand:
"Come along and read Eliza with me."
Before she was half out of her seat, Bascom
exclaimed, "Yes, bring that young woman up here!
Seldom have I seen feminine physiognomy more
suited to gladdening the eye of provincial
playgoers."
"I'm not a candidate, sir."
"I am crestfallen. No, I am devastated.
I very much wanted to hear you read."
"I'll be glad to read with Shad so long as you know
ahead of time that I'm not trying out for the troupe."
"Capital!" Bascom rushed down the steps; he
couldn't wait to get his hand on her arm and assist her
to the platform. Leo followed the actor's every move.
Bascom took hold of Eleanor's upper left
arm. The back of his hand bumped her breast
when he pretended to slip.
"Oh, my fault. Forgive me, Miss-?"
"Kent. Eleanor Kent."
"What a fetching creature you are," he murmured,
almost dropping the prompt script. Shad caught
it. A vein started to jump in Leo's neck.
"All right," Bascom said, hardly giving Shad a
glance. "As I told the others, never mind the
dialect at this stage. I only want your feeling
for the material."
She and Shad got through just fourteen speeches before
Bascom stopped them and snatched the script away.
Eleanor was disappointed for Shad's sake. The
others had been permitted to finish the scene.
Then, to her astonishment, Bascom started turning the
pages of the script:
"I'd like you to read a very short passage we
haven't done before. Third act, fourth scene. Little
Eva's chamber. Eva is dying. That's you, Miss
Kent."
He thrust the script at her. "You don't have much
dialogue. But it's an unparalleled
opportunity to emote. As for you, Mister-ah,
ah-was
"Conway."
"Quite so. You read St. Clare's dialogue. I
suppose I needn't tell you St. Clare is
Eva's father?"
"No, sir, you need not. I have seen the play four
times."
Shad was understandably miffed; Bascom had been
looking at Eleanor while he addressed the boy.
Still with eyes fastened on her, the aging actor said,
"I shall read Tom, and Marie's one line. You two
give me as much business as you can, consistent with handling
the script. All right, here we go. And Miss
Kent-was
His scrutiny made her squirm. "Yes, sir?"
"Kindly don't hold back a thing."
She had an uneasy feeling he was trying to put more
into the plea than a reference to acting. But she
pretended to be unaware.
"Begin with St. Clare's first speech, Mister-ah-was
"Conway, Conway! Jaysus."
"Yes, yes, to be sure. Go ahead."
Shad cleared his throat, then practically bowled
Eleanor over with his first line:
"Hushl She is dying!"
Bascom spoke in a falsetto-as the white
man's cousin, Marie:
"Dying?"
Someone giggled. A glare from the actor silenced
whoever it was.
Shad peered at the stage directions, then quickly
picked up his cue. "Oh! If she would only
wake and speak once more-was
He bent his head till his face was uncomfortably
close to Eleanor's. From the corner of her eye she
saw Leo watching. There was no question that he was
jealous. Good.
Then Shad slid his arm around her waist. She
stiffened. The reaction made him noticeably
delay his next line:
"Eva darling!"
She fought to control her unreasonable fear. He was
holding her only because the script made it
justifiable. She concentrated on the reading; she had
no dialogue, but she did have a stage direction.
She opened her eyes, then slowly let a smile
form.
She raised her chin and opened her mouth as if about
to speak. She thought she was prolonging the whole piece
of business horribly. Shad's eyes were
impatient. But Bascom seemed transported.
He breathed a word not in the script
"Beautiful."
"Do you know me, Eva?" Shad exclaimed, sounding
as if he didn't much care. She was reluctant
to follow her next direction. Was Leo watching and
noticing her hesitation? It took all of the nerve
she had for her to throw her arms around Shad's neck.
"Lord God, what a face," Bascom murmured,
just before Eleanor delivered her line in an intense
stage whisper:
"Dear-papal"
Flinging her arms wide, then letting them drop, she
Collapsed in Shad's arm.
He practically foamed with emotion as he spoke his
line.
"Oh, heaven! This is dreadful! Oh! Tom my
boy, it is killing me!"
In character as the old black, Bascom pointed at
Eleanor. "Look at her, mas'r."
"Eva!" Shad paused for effect, "She does not
hear. Oh, Eva. Tell us what you see. What
is it?"
Eleanor opened her eyes and smiled.
"Oh! Love! Joy! Peace!"
She collapsed again, even limper than before. It was
the best she could do to follow her final stage
direction-Dies.
She heard clapping. Bascom said in dialect,
"Oh! Bless the Lord! It's over." Then he
abandoned the accent. "That's fine."
Shad purpled. "But I have one more long speech."
"Not important. I have an idea of what you can
do." He seized Eleanor's hand. "Miss Kent,
you were highly impressive. Highly! Are you
certain you can't consider yourself a candidate?"
She was surprised at how reluctant she felt
when she replied, "No, sir, I have
responsibilities at home."
"Oh." He glanced at her left hand. "Already
married, are you?"
"Heavens no," she began, but Shad interrupted:
"She's hardly of marriageable age, Bascom.
She just turned fifteen."
She knew Shad said that because he was hurt by the older
man's indifference to his reading, and because he wanted
to undermine her success if he could. Actors were
warm, generous people, but she'd found they could also be
supremely vindictive when professional success
was at stake.
Bascom, however, wasn't the least put off.
"Fifteen? I'd swear she's three
to five years older. So would every man, woman and child
in our audience, I'll wager."
"Well, be thai as it may-was Gracefully
Eleanor sidestepped his attempt to draw her into the
curve of his arm. "I'm not free to leave New
York just now."
Bascom shook his head. "Too bad. You read
well and move nicely and I'd love to get you
under-ah-was He coughed. "That is, with proper
tutelage and in a company as distinguished as ours, your
talent would surely flower. Well-was He fished in
a food-spotted waistcoat. Produced a soiled
card.
"comz I said, we won't be leaving for some days yet.
My office is my suite at the Paramount
Hotel in lower Broadway. That's jotted on the
reverse of the card. If you should change your mind,
please come see me."
He gave her a last, imploring glance that seemed
a trifle sad. Eleanor had quite lost her fear of
him. He was just a harmless old man in seedy clothes
and a wig that didn't fit very well. Yet, he had
a certain avuncular quality that she liked.
"Thank you, Mr. Bascom," she said, meaning it.
There were two more auditions. When they were
over, Bascom again addressed the group.
"I have been very impressed by what I have seen here this
evening. Now I shall have to mull over my conclusions.
Should I wish to call any of you back for a second
reading, I shall be in touch on a personal basis,
providing you have correctly listed your address on
the sheet which Mister-ah-was
"Whittaker," Charlie said.
"comwh Mister Whittaker provided. Thank you again,
one and all."
Once more the members and their guests rose to give
him a round of applause. Eleanor suddenly saw
that
Leo was missing. She discovered him by the door leading
to the stairs. He was clapping for Bascom but watching
her. She couldn't decipher the look in his dark
eyes just before he turned and disappeared.
Was he still hurt about the way she'd rejected his
invitation? Or was he disappointed by the inconclusive
audition? She had a strange feeling she wouldn't be
seeing him any more, and that made her sad.
As the clapping faded, she realized she'd dropped
Bascom's card. She searched the floor until
she found it
ui
About four the next afternoon, Charlie Whittaker rang
the mansion bell and asked for her. She met him hi
the library. He was out of breath.
"Eleanor, he hired him. Bascom hired that little
Jew!"
"He hired Leo?"
Pouting, Charlie nodded.
She didn't know what to think-or how she should feel.
Pleased? Sorrowful? There was no doubt about
Charlie's feelings:
"To think a sheeny would win out over Christian
actors -"
"Charlie, you mustn't keep making derogatory
remarks about Leo's religion. You're only
doing it because you're mad. We both know he's the best
actor in the club. I can just see women fainting
away when he emotes with that beautiful voice of
his."
"How'd he get a voice like that? I suppose he
thinks it's some sign God has blessed him!"
"Do sit down and get over your jealousy. The things
you're saying are very unkind. It isn't at all like
you."
He sank into a chair. "Guess it isn't.
Don't know why I should be jealous, really.
Pater and mater wouldn't let
me go on a long tour. Not yet. That's why I
didn't even audition."
"How'd you find out about Leo?"
"Bascom came to the house." Charlie studied the
carpet a while, then finally mumbled, "Leo's name
and address were omitted from the list I gave him."
"Leo's too bright to accidentally leave-oh,
Charlie. You didn't erase them?"
He transferred his attention to his kneecap.
"Well, dammit, yes I did. Nobody has
a right to be that handsome. Besides, no harm was done in the
long run. I couldn't keep up the pretense. I
gave Bascom the address the minute he asked.
I heard him tell his hack driver to go straight
to Hester Street."
Strangely melancholy all at once, Eleanor
sat down opposite her friend. "That's grand for
Leo. Just grand. I know he'll go on the tour.
He needs the money, and there's hardly room for him
in that tenement where he lives."
Charlie shot her a sharp glance. "You know quite a bit
about him, don't you? I've observed that you two are
very friendly-was
"There's nothing wrong with being friendly
to anyone! And that's all we are-friends."
He looked unconvinced. In a moment he went
on.
"I wouldn't count on Leo getting rich. Before the
meeting last night, Bascom told me he can't
pay his other people very much due to Mr. Prince's high
salary. Why do you think he came around to an
amateur club?"
"Oh, that's it, then." She felt naive. "Cheap
talent."
"Exactly."
"Still, Charlie, it's wonderful experience."
"I suppose. They are going all the way
to California eventually. I wouldn't mind that part of
it, I confess. I wouldn't mind being paid to travel
and do work that's essentially enjoy-was He stopped.
"What's wrong?"
still must leave this house.
But I can't.
And I may not even get to see him before he leaves.
Charlie could tell she was troubled. With genuine
sympathy, tie said, "Eleanor, please tell me
what's wrong. Did I say something I shouldn't
have?"
She shook her head, then fabricated a
flimsy excuse about not being herself because of some trouble
among the servants. Charlie didn't understand the
reason her cheeks were red.
"You needn't feel bad about the readings," he said.
"You did splendidly. Bascom would have hired you
hi a trice-he told me so when he picked up
Leo's address. He wasn't interested in you
merely because of your looks, either."
"Yes-well-I wouldn't be interested in two or
three years of wandering back and forth over the
prairies and mountains with Mr. Bascom's Tom
troupe, thank you. I realize it's professional
training, but I prefer to take mine here in New
York."
Her face was red again. Liar, she thought. She was in
a state of complete confusion. She knew it was
dangerous to care for a boy, yet now that Leo
Goldman was leaving, she discovered she cared for him.
And she desperately wanted to go with Bascom. But
her responsibilities to Will and to her mother prevented
it
"Charlie," she said abruptly, "I must get
back to the kitchen. Thank you for coming all the way up
here with the news."
"Why, certainly. I had some errands with the
carriage, and I thought you'd want to know."
She wasted no time ushering him to the door. When he was
gone, she walked slowly up the stairs to her room.
There she gazed at the smudged card tucked into the
frame of her pier glass.
Jefferson J. Bascom's ORIGINAL IDEAL
UNCLE TOM COMBINATION
featuring Mr. Bascom's
world-renowned personification of Legree
"Finest Tom Troupe Traveling the Nation!"
The musty, humid house seemed to close in around
her-lightless, cheerless. Tears ran down her
cheeks. She snatched the card from the frame, tore
it and flung the pieces at her feet.
CHAPTER IV
"Hell With the Lid Off"
THE CITY OF Pittsburgh rose on a
triangle of land whose western apex was the junction
of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers.
Eastward from the point to about Eleventh Street, the
site of the Union Depot, the land was fairly
level. Near Eleventh a hill rose to divide
the triangular land mass.
The hill resembled a kind of fish fin running
eastward to Twenty-eighth Street and beyond.
It was a steep and formidable barrier to easy passage
between the Allegheny and Monongahela sides although at
Twenty-eighth it dipped down sufficiently
to permit the cross street to straggle over the
summit. The principal east-west railroad
tracks lay at the base of the hill's north
slope. There was a major crossing where
Twenty-eighth intersected the tracks.
It was late Saturday afternoon following the start 661
of the strike in Martinsburg. For several hours,
individuals and families had been gathering on the
north side of the hill directly above the
Twenty-eighth Street crossing, as well as to the
east and west. Now the hillside teemed with five
to seven thousand observers, by Gideon's best
guess. Most of them had come anticipating the
arrival of the Philadelphia militia. And not a
few of them had come in anticipation of bloodshed.
He really had no call to be superior, though. As
a newsman, he was present for essentially the same
reason.
Commanded by General Robert Brinton, the
militiamen had arrived a short time ago. Six
hundred of them-about half the number placed on
active duty in response to the
deteriorating situation in Pittsburgh.
The railroad strike had spread from West
Virginia. Trainmen who worked for the Pennsylvania
in Pittsburgh had refused to operate the line's
engines, thereby idling nearly two thousand freight
cars containing durable goods as well as perishables.
All of those cars stood in the yards that stretched out
below the north face of the hill. The durables would come
to no harm, but thousands of dollars" worth of fruit
and vegetables were rotting.
Since Thursday, relatively few freight or
passenger trains had moved hi or out of the city.
Crowds of striking railroaders, their families,
and those of sympathetic steelworkers had joined together
to swarm through the yards and prevent it. Once in a
while the strikers would allow a freight with
livestock to pass so the animals wouldn't die.
Everything else came to a standstill, the steelworkers
swearing solidarity with the railroad men until the
Pennsylvania canceled its wage cuts.
There had been occasional outbreaks of violence when the
strikers came in contact with yard officials.
Local militia and the Pittsburgh police had
been unwilling or unable to stop the trouble. So
finally, on this Sat
urday afternoon, July 21, a desperate
telegraph appeal had been answered. The six
hundred Philadelphia militia had arrived on
a train whose cars had been struck and damaged
by rocks and bricks thrown by mobs at Harrisburg
and other points along the line.
Now, below the hill where the people stood or sat like
spectators hi a Roman arena, an officer of the
militia shouted an order:
"The tracks must be cleared."
A stir of excitement rippled along the
hillside. In the crowd, Gideon noticed some
members of the Pittsburgh militia. They had
retired to rest and observe their fellow soldiers from
the east. The Philadelphians, some hi smart red
blouses and some in blue, were formed up to the east of the
Twenty-eighth Street crossing. The militiamen
nearest the crossing had shifted into a formation Gideon
hadn't seen since the war-the hollow square.
Those in the square faced hundreds of roughly
dressed civilians massed at the crossing and around
it. Gideon's vantage point for all this was just about
halfway up the hill, a few steps west of the
rutted track of Twenty-eighth Street.
On command, the militiamen began to advance
slowly toward the crossing. There were a few curses,
then some shouted taunts; those at the crossing were in an
ugly mood.
So were most of their supporters watching from above.
Soon a chant began on the hill. Though it was
barely audible at first, Gideon had no trouble
distinguishing the words. Ever since his arrival late
last night, he'd been hearing the same words growled
in ale houses and shouted by bands of men roaming the
yards:
"Bread or blood! Bread or blood! Bread
or bloodl"
Trouble was coming; serious trouble. He had no doubt of
it any longer.
The mob on the hillside contained some odd
elements. 663
Gideon had encountered several groups of
well-dressed people who'd brought picnic hampers.
That reminded him of First Manassas, when great
crowds of Yankees had driven out from Washington
to watch the carnage. He'd briefly interviewed
one dentist who had come out because he'd heard there was
going to be "a good big fuss." Why in the world was the
viewing of violence so popular hi America?
Most of the men and women on the hillside
weren't picnickers, but poorly dressed working people.
Mill hands, with their wives and their children. They'd come
to show support for the Pennsylvania crews.
On a spur track parallel with the main lines,
Gideon suddenly saw dozens of men climbing up
the sides of four coupled coal cars. The men
scrambled into the coal, laughing and jostling one
another, then dabbing each other's faces with sooty
thumbs. Soon several picked up lumps of
coal-weapons inadvertently provided by the line that
couldn't meet its shipping commitments.
The spread of the strike had been swift and
unpredictable. President Hayes had sent the
requested troops to Martinsburg, only to receive
another message saying that violence there had stopped.
Meanwhile a confrontation was taking place in
Baltimore. State troops called out for the
emergency fired into a mob and killed at least ten
civilians, perhaps more.
That had happened last night, while Gideon was
aboard one of the few passenger trains permitted
to enter the city. When he stepped off and heard about it,
he was glad one of the Union's men was in
Baltimore.
He'd boarded the tram for Pittsburgh
on a hunch the city would be a major flashpoint.
When he'd come in, there had already been crowds at the
crossing which was now completely blocked. But the train
had gotten through to the depot. And during the night there
had only been small and isolated outbreaks of
violence.
This afternoon, however, the situation was entirely different.
Moving through the crowd and making rapid
notes-phrases that described what he was seeing and
hearing-he still felt like a ghoul. His hunch had paid
off, and here he was, just waiting for trouble to start.
When it did, lives might be lost. The railroad
strike was a perfect symbol of the tormenting paradox
of his profession-human suffering sold more
newspapers than happiness did.
He drifted on, all but unnoticed. He was
dressed in a shabby jacket and old trousers with a
dark blue scarf tied around his neck and a peaked cap
on his head.
He paused to introduce himself to a weary-looking
woman of middle age. "Is your husband a
railroad man?"
After regarding him suspiciously for a moment, she
answered, "No, but he's down there at the crossing
because he's a working man. It's all the
same cause."
A cloud passed in front of the sun. The
hillside darkened. The woman glanced at
Gideon's pad and busy pencil. "You sure you
aren't an eye?"
"What?" He touched the leather patch. "Do you mean
this?"
She shook her head. "I mean are you a
Pinkerton?"
He understood then. Allan Pinkerton's National
Detective Agency employed a wide open eye
as its symbol, along with the motto We Never
Sleep. Once or twice before he'd heard the
agency's operatives referred to as "eyes"-either
sarcastically or nervously, depending upon the speaker.
The woman went on:
"You sure you aren't taking down names? You ain't
gettin' mine."
"Ma'am, I told you I'm with the New York
Union. Our paper supports the strike,
provided no one starts destroying property or
taking lives-was
"Hah! Then you don't really support the strike
at all. You think Tom Scott and the rest of them
rich bastards
will give us bread just because we ask? Devil they will.
We got to take it. Scrap for it. Bleed for it."
Sadly, he realized he might h8ve been
listening to Sime Strelnik. The woman scanned his
face, contemptuous:
"Your newspaper's probably like all the rest of
them. Your bosses don't really give a damn if
people like us starve by the thousands."
Before he could argue, she turned her back on him.
He watched her walk to another worker hunkered down
a few feet away. The man was fingering a
melon-sized rock. The woman said:
"Beg pardon, mister. Have you seen two youngsters with
their hands full of leftover Fourth of July
torpedoes?" When the man shook his head, she moved
on down the hill, calling, "Lindsey? Verne?
Where'd you boys get to?"
Gideon was suddenly diverted by a flash of color
higher on the hillside. He turned, focused his
good eye, and frowned at the sight of a man with a
nondescript face and equally drab clothing.
What distinguished the man was the neckerchief he
wore. A railroader's neckerchief, like
Gideon's, except that it was an unusual
color-bright yellow. Most were dark blue
or dark red, to absorb sweat and hide dirt.
But even at that, the yellow neckerchief would have been
unremarkable except for one fact. Not ten minutes
ago, back near the Union Depot, he'd seen
a different man wearing one exactly like it.
On a chance, he gazed west along the side of the
hill. Sure enough, there was the man from the depot.
All at once Gideon felt uneasy.
The man from the depot was making his way in
Gideon's direction, moving steadily but with no
apparent haste. Gideon checked the second man
again. He was coming down the hillside to intersect the
path of the first. As the two appeared and disappeared behind
shifting groups of people, Gideon understood the reason
for the yellow bandannas. Easy identification in what
could become a very confused situation.
The men were searching for someone; their movements were too
deliberate for it to be otherwise. They studied
faces as they walked, and they didn't do it
casually. For a moment he thought the men might be after
him, but that was ridiculous. Even though his
editorials had repeatedly criticized the
Pennsylvania Railroad and its tame
legislators in Harrisburg, right now Tom
Scott had more important things to worry
about than trailing an unfriendly journalist.
Gideon could only conclude the two men were
detectives sent to the hill to spot those fomenting
violence. Spot them and, later, testify against them
in a trial.
"Bread or blood! BREAD OR BLOOD
right-brace was
The continuous chanting had grown louder. The
Philadelphia militiamen had fixed their
bayonets and were advancing slowly toward the mob
blocking the crossing. Gideon glanced over his
shoulder. The men in yellow bandannas were still drifting
his way, but paying no attention to him.
In the midst of all the noise, he suddenly had a
good thought for the opening of the dispatch he'd write when the
day was over. He flipped to a new page on his
pad and scribbled:
Citizens of Pittsburgh sometimes call their city
hell with the lid off, and not always in jest. When the
fires of the steel mills light the evening sky, the
metaphor is seen to be an apt one. Today, the
widening railroad strike gave the phrase a
new, grimmer meaning-
He put a squiggle beneath the last word, then made a
face. He was as shameless as any
ambulance-chasing
cub on the Union staff. Writing of disaster before it
happened; as if it were certain to happen.
But it was. An angry roar came from those blocking
the crossing, and from the thousands on the hillside. He
had a feeling some of them weren't sure why they were
shouting-or even why they were present. He passed
three such men, all drunk as owls and stumbling against
one another. One of the men had a pistol in his belt.
The Philadelphia militiamen at the front of the
hollow square had reached the crossing. They began
to poke at the nearest civilians with their
bayonets. Very lightly-very cautiously--barely
touching an arm here, a shoulder there. But probing,
jabbing, nonetheless.
An officer again ordered the civilians to clear the
crossing. The bayonets thrust and jabbed. Some of the
workers fell back. The men who'd climbed atop the
four coal cars watched the bayonets flashing and
grew angry. One of them threw a lump of coal.
The coal struck a militiaman's head, knocking
his black-plumed hat off. The soldiers on either
side of him spun and glared at the men on the four
coal cars. Somehow, just that attention incited the men.
From the cars there suddenly came a barrage
of coal.
This is the start, Gideon thought. He saw it in
almost every sunlit face, and heard it in the chant for
bread or blood. The militiamen dodged the
chunks of coal. Their officers bawled orders
to keep them from firing at their attackers.
While Gideon was gloomily studying the scene, his
eye was drawn to a slab-jawed fellow at the
bottom of the slope. The man was gazing up at him.
Just as Gideon noticed him, he started to climb a
footpath, heading in Gideon's direction.
Gideon's heart pounded. Exactly like the two who
had again vanished in the hillside crowds, the man
wore a bright yellow bandanna.
There was a great deal to keep track of
simultaneously, and Gideon's glance kept
flying from one spot to another-first to the crossing, then
to the man climbing the footpath, then to someone yelling
a taunt from higher on the hill, then to a couple of
giggling boys who dodged behind a wooden watchman's
shanty near the crossing.
The shack screened the boys from the civilians and
soldiers just below. The boys began to pick up
rocks, Grinning adults nearby tossed them
extra stones, sticks, and even a couple
of old shoes. When the boys had their arms full,
they jumped into the open on the east side of the shanty
and started throwing the objects at the militiamen.
None of the objects was large enough to do serious
damage. But the harassment drew more glares from the
soldiers. A rifle or two swung toward the
shanty. Several people shrieked and ducked. The boys
scampered behind the shanty again, pleased with themselves, and that
might have been the end of it if those on the hillside
hadn't begun doing what the boys had done.
Throwing shoes.
Rocks.
Broken pieces of brick.
Anything available.
One militiaman went to his knees, a bloody
gash opened in his temple by a chunk of brick. He
had his rifle halfway to his shoulder before an
officer seized his arm to restrain him.
But hundreds saw the young man start to take aim.
Defiant cries rose all over the hillside:
"Shoot!"
"Shoot, you sons of bitches!"
"YAH, YAH, YAH-WHY DON'T YOU
SHOOT?" 669
The slab-jawed man was still working his way
upward on the congested footpath. His coat flapped
and Gideon glimpsed a pistol. Again he tried
to tell himself the man wasn't after him. Perhaps the
trio hi yellow bandannas didn't even work for the
railroad. They might be agitators acting on
behalf of the International. Informants had told him
Marxists were definitely operating within the strike
movement, hoping to increase the ferocity of any
confrontation.
Suddenly there were loud cracklings, like gunshots. People
screamed and scattered. Gideon held his place and
saw two boys being collared by the woman to whom
he'd spoken earlier. Spurts of blue smoke
on the ground behind them told him the boys had ignited
some of their Fourth of July torpedoes. No one
down at the crossing seemed to realize they were hearing
firecrackers.
The loud reports, the missiles raining from the
hillside, the bloody-thirsty yells of the
civilians all combined to spread panic among the
Philadelphians. Nearly every man in uniform was
bellowing something at the civilians-profanity,
commands, pleas for reason-God alone knew what
all. In the midst of all that noise, Gideon
didn't hear the shot that touched off the
carnage. Nor did he see who fired it. He
couldn't tell whether it had come from the hillside or
the crossing. All he knew was that, without warning, the
militiamen knelt or stood and began shooting in
all directions.
A man screamed and pitched off one of the coal cars.
Another civilian fell at the crossing, hit in
the chest. Ten feet to Gideon's right, a girl of
three or four dropped her rag doll and screamed.
A man bent over her, pulled her bloodied
skirt away, and Gideon heard him cry, "My
God, half her knee's gone."
He started toward the distraught father to see if he could
help. He'd taken just two long steps in the chaos
of exploding firearms, running civilians,
thickening smoke when two men seized his arms from behind.
He writhed, lunged, tried to pull and kick his
way free but the two were strong. A well-dressed
civilian went fleeing by, holding his top hat in
place with both hands. As soon as he was out of the
way, Gideon saw the slab-jawed man
approaching from the footpath.
He wrenched his head around. Glimpsed exactly
what he expected to see-a yellow bandanna
knotted at the throat of the man holding his
right arm. He was sure the man on the left wore
one as well.
Members of the Pittsburgh militia who'd
withdrawn to the hillside were up and running now,
driven by conscience to help their fellow soldiers.
Half a dozen of them were coming from the west, on a path
that would bring them right to Gideon-but probably not fast
enough to be of help.
The slab-jawed man crowded in close. Drew out
his pistol, One of the others grabbed Gideon's
hair. The three pressed around him, making it
virtually impossible for the gun to be seen.
Rifles roared at the crossing. Hand weapons
began to answer from the hillside. Some of the
spectators were gleefully potting at he
militiamen, scattering scores of others around them.
In the confusion, these three who had obviously been
following him for some time would do what they'd been hired
to do.
"Who sent you?" Gideon gasped at *he
slab-jawed man. "Tom Courtleigh?"
"Smart bugger ain't he?" said the unseen man at
Gideons left. The slab-jawed man snickered,
his smile revealing brown teeth.
"Why, Mister Kent," he said, "we
ain't "sposed to use any names. 'Cept yours, of
course."
The muzzle of the pistol jabbed Gideon's belly.

"Let's just say we're bringin" regards from a friend
in Chicago,"
Gideon wrenched to the left. The man holding his right
arm exclaimed:
"Hurry it up, Jim. Them Pittsburgh sojers
are ccrnin' right this way."
The slab-jawed man took time to glance over
Gideon's shoulder and verify the warning. Again
Gideon lunged. He couldn't free himself. The
slab-jawed man retreated one step. He took
aim. The pistol cracked, the noise all but
unnoticed in the pandemonium.
At first Gideon felt no more than a sting in his
left side. Then, rapidly, dizziness and pain
swept over him. His knees buckled. The two men
continued to prop him up while they and their leader tore
off the yellow bandannas. Then they let go and
scrambled out of the way of the Pittsburgh
militiamen.
Gideon tumbled sideways doviTi the hill.
He dug his hands in the dirt and stoppv
J, rolling as one militiaman yelled:
"Francis, we should help that fella. He's
bleedin'--"
"I wouldn't lift a hand to help any of these
civilians. They get hurt, it's then-own damn
fault for comin' out here to cause trouble."
The voice faded. Gideon lay on his belly,
gazing at the summit of the hill. Between the flickering
figures of the Pittsburgh men running by, he
saw the three thugs climbing Twenty-eighth
Street and disappearing over the top of the ridge.
All around he heard guns volleying. Men cursing
or yelling in pain. Women shrieking. Children wailing
or calling for their parents.
Someone stumbled into him. His hands lost their hold and
he started rolling again, over and over down the
hillside. The cindery soil tore his face open.
He crashed against the watchman's shanty, his
descent arrested. He could feel blood sopping his
left side. 672
Hcrw badly was he hurt? No way to tell.
He shouted. No one heard. Or if they did, they
refused to come to his aid.
He thought of Courtleigh. So full of hatred,
he'd had to pay men to balance his accounts-and
hi such a way that he could never be held
responsible. Gideon didn't like to believe
Sime Strelnik had been right, and that the
Courtleighs of the world were beyond the reach of justice. But
because they could hire others to kill for them, perhaps they
were.
How had the three men found him? Followed him on the
train to Pittsburgh? Or had they been watching at
the depot, just like the old woman hi Chicago six
years ago?
He'd never know the answer. It made little difference
anyway. He was frightened of the blurred quality of his
right eye, and of an uncontrollable heaviness of his
eyelid.
Julia's dear face flashed into his mind. Then
poor Margaret's. Will's.
Eleanor's-God, why hadn't she answered his
letters,
so that he could have seen her one time before he died?
You aren't going to die, he told himself. But he
feared it was empty confidence. The left side of his
chest felt as if it had been set afire.
He thought of Matt, The book they'd done together.
He was furious and sad that he might never see a
copy of 100 Years. He no longer
cared whether it succeeded or failed. It was a good
work, it said what he wanted to say, and Matt's
illustrations were genius. Tnat was enough.
The thunder of firearms had become almost continuous. His
left shoulder was wedged between the ground and the wall "of the
watchman's shanty. He saw distorted images of
people racing by; grotesque shapes against the ridge
and the summer sky.
"Wrong," he said, growing delirious.
"Wrong-all this. Bread, but-not at-this price-was
The almost incoherent whisper faded. He braced a
palm beneath his body; vainly tried to lift himself.
"Jesus Christ," he gasped, more as a prayer
than an oath. In pain, he fell back, his head
slamming the side of the shanty.
He fought the weight of his right eyelid. He couldn't
keep it open. He slipped away to darkness,
terrified that he'd never wake again.
CHAPTER V
The Punishers
LIKE A GREAT many theatrical people, Eleanor
preferred the fantasy of the stage to the reality of the
everyday world. Consequently she had little interest in
major news events, and seldom let them intrude
into her thinking. That weekend, though, such
intrusion couldn't be avoided. With one exception-
Margaret-everyone in the household, even Will, was
talking about the strike and the frightful headlines it had
generated:
Bloodshed in Baltimore!
Looters Threaten Pittsburghst
The Great Strike Spreads!
When Eleanor went downstairs for Sunday
breakfast, the serving girls had a nervous,
fluttery air. All of them seemed in a hurry
to rush back to the kitchen. Eleanor
said to one of them, "What on earth's making you so
jumpy, Bridgit?"
"Why, I'm anxious to keep up with the latest about the
strike, mum. Most of the papers are puttin" out
special Sunday extras."
Eleanor nearly dropped her coffee cup. The
trend toward regular Sunday editions was
accelerating, but still met resistance from some clerics and
their conservative congregations. The Union wasn't
yet publishing on the Sabbath. A few months before
Gideon had moved out, she recalled him saying it
was probably inevitable, though. The strike was
truly an event of apocalyptic importance if
the New York dailies were rushing
extras onto the streets today.
She followed Bridgit toward the kitchen. "Has
the Union put out an extra?"
"We understand it will, mum. The Union and several
others that are a wee bit behind the rest. Mills has
gone to fetch the latest batch. He should be back
soon."
Growing more and more curious, Eleanor walked into the
kitchen. All the servants were gathered around cook,
who was reading from a paper Eleanor identified as the
National Republican, published in Washington.
Tense faces turned Eleanor's way as she
walked in. Normally she would have been greeted as
befitted the mistress of the house. Today, with the world hi
turmoil, only nods or strained smiles
acknowledged her arrival.
"coman' the fact is clearly manifest," cook
read hi her resonant voice, "that communistic
ideas are very widely entertained in America by the
workmen employed in mines and factories and by the
railroads. This poison was introduced into our
social system by European laborers. Now it is
true that postwar prosperity has fa- fa-was
Bridgit glanced over her shoulder to help her with the
word:
"Facilitated."
"Just what I was about to say." Cook let the younger
girl see her displeasure. She rattled the paper,
cleared her throat and resumed, "comfacilitated the
sudden-was
Another pause. This tune Bridgit kept
quiet. Cook was forced to stumble through on her own.
"comacquisition of wealth through dubious and
unscrupulous means-Lord, why can't they use plain
words ordinary folk can understand? Where was I-ah. It
is also true that the crimes of certain men who made
haste to grow rich are-oh, you take over." She
thrust the newspaper at the butler, who finished the
sentence:
"Are reprehensible." Samuel scowled. "Since
when is it a crime to grow rich?" he asked
rhetorically. Then he went on, "Nevertheless, the
rail strike is nothing less than communism hi
its worst and most poisonous form-not only unlawful
and revolutionary but anti-American. It is the
dread Commune of 1871 reborn on our very
soil!"
He ended the reading dramatically. Reaction ranged
from ashen faces to a breathy, "Amen." Eleanor was
about to ask a question when Mills tromped
in, carrying more papers.
"The Union's out." His voice was strangely
hoarse. "It contains Mr. Kent's final dispatch
from Pittsburgh."
Eleanor rushed to his side. "What do you mean,
final?"
He was careful to avoid her eyes. "During
yesterday's violence, he was shot."
She could hardly believe it. But the black-bordered
box on page one was indeed headed Our Publisher
Injured.
Quickly she read the special bulletin copy. Her
father had been shot during mob violence at the
Twenty-eighth Street crossing of the
Pennsylvania Railroad.
He'd been taken to a hospital and, following
removal of the bullet from his left side, his condition
had stabilized.
Eleanor was conscious of the servants pressing in around
her, as anxious as she was to learn what had happened.
A part of her hated Gideon-and with justification, she
believed-but at a time like this, he remained her father.
Blood ties were stronger than any other, she was
forced to admit.
"My Lord, they burned boxcars and
rolled "em into the depot where the Philly
militia spent the night!" Bridgit exclaimed,
pointing to the ten-deck headline of the main story. But
Eleanor was scanning Theo Payne's signed
editorial statement below the boxed bulletin.
comand while the arson, bloodshed and looting in
Pittsburgh cannot be condoned in the name of the struggle for
workingmen's rights, neither can we condone comwhat is being
done in other quarters. We refer to the widely
published accusations against the strikers.
It is alleged that, to the last man, the participants
in the strike are Marxists. Such statements are not
only false and dishonorable, they are dangerous.
Society must rigorously punish lawbreakers, but
just as rigorously protect the right of legitimate
protest. It is the opinion of this journal, and this
writer, that a peaceful strike falls under the last
heading.
We want no part of Communism in America. But
neither do we want it used as an all too convenient
tar brush with which the illiterate, the gullible and the
unscrupulous alike may attempt to ruin
reputations and eliminate honest dissent.
Reactions were quick and varied. Eleanor admired what
Payne had written. But one of the other
girls who'd been reading along with her exclaimed:
"Why, he's as much as standing up for them Communards."
Eleanor frowned. "Surely you don't get that out
of it, Martha."
"Indeed I do, ma'am." Others nodded
vigorously.
"But Payne says Communism isn't wanted in
America. Look-it's right there."
"I'm reading between the lines, ma'am. I won't
say any more."
"Yes! Explain what you mean."
"Well, ma'am-I beg your pardon, since your
father is the publisher, and he's just been hurt, but-the
truth is, I trust other papers more than I trust
the Union. Other papers are more patriotic. That
one, for instance."
She pointed to another edition Cook had picked up
from the stack Mills had brought in. One of the main
headlines was clearly visible:
COMMUNISTS LEAD PITTSBURGH RAMPAGE!
Eleanor realized what the young girl was saving. The
Union had been misread, misjudged, and found
guilty of standing for something other than the best interests
of the country-at least as most of the people in the kitchen
perceived them. She was appalled that anyone
with half a brain could be taken hi by sweeping
allegations and at the same time distort or actually
ignore the exact words Payne had used to explain
the Union's position. She didn't know who was right
or wrong in the debate over the strike, but she was
learning some unpleasant lessons about human fear
and fallibility.
The butler summed it up: "If this is an
example of how trade unions work to improve the
lot of their members, I say hang every man who
belongs to one!"
No one in the kitchen disagreed. Not even Eleanor;

she was too stunned by the ferocity of Samuel's
statement.
in
Around dusk it began to drizzle. Margaret had
stayed in her bedroom throughout most of the weekend. But
she lurched to Eleanor's room around nine o'clock.
Eleanor hadn't told her mother about Gideon's
injury. She doubted Margaret would have understood what
she was trying to say, and she knew the mere mention of
her father would probably send her mother into a spell of
incoherent fury. It always did.
She'd shared the news only with W. His
face showed barely a glimmer of reaction. When she
told him Gideon would pull through, he murmured,
"Good," and walked off. It was typical of his
listless behavior of late.
A moment after Margaret entered her room, Eleanor
thought her mother must have heard the bad news from one of the
servants. She'd seldom seen the older woman so
wild-eyed:
"The men are in the Park again. I opened the window and
I could hear their voices."
"Oh, Mama, please don't start-was Eleanor
bit her lip.
There was no point in arguing with someone so disturbed.
"Please don't worry," she resumed, as
patiently as she could. "I'll inspect the
downstairs to make sure everything's locked."
Margaret's pale hand quivered near her chin.
"You've seen them too?"
"No, Mama. I'm just trying to set your mind at
ease."
"I tell you they're watching this house!"
Gently, Eleanor patted her mother until she
calmed a little. Then she took Margaret's hand and
led her back down the hall. "I'll make certain
we're safe. Leave every
thing to me. Here's your room-why don't you lie down
and rest if you can?"
Margaret peered at her in a vacant way, as if
she didn't recognize her daughter. The whiskey
stench was stronger than ever. For a moment Eleanor
understood why her father had found living with Margaret
impossible.
It took the older woman almost a minute to fumble the
bedroom key out of her pocket, then insert it in the
lock. She seemed alarmed by Eleanor's
attempts to help, as though her daughter's presence
somehow threatened the sanctity of die room. Finally
she got the door open and disappeared inside without a
word.
Eleanor heard her reiock the door. Wearily,
she turned and walked down the front stairs. Because
the evening was sultry, the window on the landing was open.
As Eleanor walked by, she glanced outside.
She stopped, her heart suddenly beating fast.
Was her mind playing tricks too? Against the darker
background of the trees in Central Park, other
shadows seemed to be stirring. Stirring and flowing across
Fifth Avenue.
Then, distinctly, she heard a man's voice.
He was calling somediing-an order, a
question-to someone else. The shadow-figures flowed
on, not fully visible or even clearly defined as
yet, but unmistakably there, a tide flooding
toward the mansion.
She glanced over her shoulder. Where was Will? Reading
in his room. The servants? Mills had the evening
off. That left Samuel, plus one footman and the
women.
And she could think of no weapons in the house except
for the antique sword hanging in the parlor.
Picking up her skirts, she raced down the last
flight just as the unlocked front door burst open.
The first of the shabbily dressed men lumbered in, a
billy ha his fist,
The man shouted to others crowding in behind him.
"There's one!" He peered at Eleanor. "You be
Kent's daughter, girl? You're too finely
dressed for one of the kitchen sculls."
She counted at least six in addition to the man with the
billy. He was middle-aged, paunchy, and smelled
of sweat and tobacco. A sore glistened on the
stubble of his right cheek. Trembling but trying not to show
it, she said to him:
"Get out of this house."
The leader snickered. "What? You're
givin" orders to us? We're the ones doin' the
dishin' out, missy. We don't care for your dirty
Cotnmimst father, his Com-minist paper nor his
Comminist family, either."
He stuck the billy in his rope belt and reached behind
him. One of the others handed him a bucket of red
paint. He flung the contents over the wall to his
left.
At the side of the house, glass broke. A dining
room window. Footsteps pounded along Sixty-first
Street.
Eleanor glanced anxiously at the staircase. The
running footsteps faded, then they grew loud again.
The men at the rear were inside the house. Cook
screamed.
"Will, lock your door!" Eleanor cried. She
spun and raced for the parlor. Laughing, the thug with the
billy came after her. So did two of his
companions.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw a man with his
pants open, and something white in his hand. The sight of
it turned her cheeks scarlet. The man hummed and
danced a clumsy jig as urine ran down the foyer
wall.
"I don't think she liked the looks of
Sharkey's ma-Chine," said one of the men crowding the
parlor door. Deep in the lightless room, she
dashed for the mantel. She wrenched the French
infantry sword from its pegs. Yanked the scabbard
off and cast it aside. Shrieks and
the sounds of breaking furniture and glass grew
steadily louder at the back of the house.
Standing in darkness with her three pursuers silhouetted
against the glow of gaslight in the foyer, Eleanor had
a slight advantage. If only she had the nerve
to use it-
The
man who'd spoken touched his crotch. "Maybe
she'll like mine a little bet-was
Eleanor ran at him. The sword would have pierced his
groin if he hadn't pivoted to the left, taking the
blade in his right thigh. His trousers tore. He
yelled but he didn't fall. He pulled a
shot-loaded stocking from his rear pocket and whipped it
against her temple.
The blow drove her all the way back to the
mantel. She struck her head; grew momentarily
dizzy. A second man leaped at her.
Hard, rough nails dug the inside of her wrist.
Try as she would, she couldn't hold onto
the sword. The man grabbed it.
"I got the sticker, Freddie." The man's
labored breathing slowed as he spoke to the leader.
"Hubble didn't tell us the gal was a looker."
Hubble? Who was that?
The man yanked her arm. "Let's get them clothes
off, gal. We're going to give you what-for-was
"I'm first." The leader shoved the other man aside.
The wounded one had collapsed into a chair, his stabbed
leg stuck out in front of him. The foyer gaslight
gleamed on the blood staining his pants,
"First," the leader repeated. "Come on, dear. Come
on, you Commimsi. bitch. Don't be shy. Show
Freddie your tits an' your other treasures, what
d'you say?"
And then two of them were all over her with strong hands
she couldn't turn aside.
They pressed her against the mantel. Her bodice
tore. She writhed, kicked, bit at the hands
groping over her body. Her struggle only seemed
to excite them further.
They got through to her undergarments, ripped them and flung
her down on the uncarpeted hearth.
Her ruined dress bunched into a hard, hurtful
knot beneath her. The hearthstone was
unbearably cold on the backs of her thighs.
Freddie knelt and worked a ringer, then a thumb between
her legs.
Pushing.
Twisting.
Hurting-
Her heart began to pound in her bare breast. She
felt sick at her stomach as Freddie touched
her-thrust at her-but not with his hand any longer. She
bit down on her lower lip while he grunted.
God, it was painful. She squeezed her eyes
shut. She couldn't move beneath Freddie's heaving
body. The second man was behind her, holding her
wrists up over her head. There was no appeal. No
reprieve. And nothing but her will to prevent them from
knowing how much they were hurting and humiliating her.
still will not scream.
She said it over and over, in silence, her eyes
closed, her cheeks wet with tears, as Freddie
jerked and gasped.
still will not let such animals hear me scream.
Animals.
Men.
The same thing.
All the same thing.
Leo Goldman might never have existed.
When the sounds of the destruction reached the second
floor, Margaret Kent dropped the bottle from which
she'd been sipping, unbolted her door and stumbled
out of her room.
She brushed away the loose hair that blurred her

sion like a veil. Two men-two
strangers-appeared at the head of the stairs. One of
them emptied a bucket of red paint on a wall.
Then they saw her.
There was danger here. Danger. All at once she
was lucid, and in charge of herself. She calmly
locked her door from the outside. Then she glanced
across the hall, to where she thought she'd heard a
whisper.
Sure enough, she saw part of Will's white
face-half a nose, a frightened eye-beyond the narrow
opening of his door. Behind her, she heard the men
advancing. She knew who they were, of course.
She wanted to howl with fright. But she fought the
impulse long enough to say:
"Will, bolt your door and pile furniture in
front of it. Don't open the door unless you're
told to do so by Eleanor or Cook or
Samuel or someone else whose voice you
recognize."
She heard one of the men say, "Must be old lady
Kent."
"Will, do it!"
He obeyed, shutting the door. Then she turned
to confront them.
Her mind gave way.
They've come for me. Come to punish me, just as I
knew they would.
Eleanor had secretly laughed at her fears.
Margaret had sensed the disbelief a dozen times. But
the men were real. They'd been biding their time in the
Park. Waiting all through the autumn. The winter.
The spring.
Now they'd come. Now Eleanor would believe.
Screaming in a wild way that made the two roughly
clad men exchange hesitant looks, Margaret
ran from them. She couldn't flee past them, so it was
logical to flee in the other direction. Punish, the
pumping of her heart seemed to murmur in her ear.
Punish for hurting Gideon. Punish for deceiving
Gideon. Punish for alienating Gideon's children.
Too late, she remembered there was no exit at the
end of the corridor toward which she was
running. She tried to check her forward momentum.
Making a kind of mewing noise, she extended her
hands toward the nearest wall. Then she stumbled. She
saw a looming reflection of her own gaping mouth,
immense eyes, unkempt hair in the glass of the
tall window.
She fell against the window, and through it, and down. It was
only a fall of a single story, but the lawn was hard
despite its mat of trimmed grass. Had she
fallen at a slightly different angle, she might
have sustained only a broken bone or a few
bruises. But she was howling and flailing, and her head
rolled under her body, just before the impact. Her
neck broke and she died.
VI
Within fifteen minutes the house was quiet again.
Only the weeping of one of the servant girls broke
the silence. She staggered half-naked through the
downstairs, repeatedly wiping parts of her body with a
piece of towel. One of the men had assaulted her
hi an unspeakable way, and her voice was like some
battered wind instrument wailing a distorted tune.
On the floor of the darkened parlor, Eleanor roused
from the half-conscious state into which she'd let herself
escape after the men had used her. She
lifted her head. Pushed with her hands. Retched when
she grew aware of the wetness between her legs.
Finally she gained her feet and stayed upright by seizing
the mantel and holding on. Her left hand
accidentally knocked against the tea bottle. As it
started to tip over the edge, she gasped and caught it.
She was shaking as she set it back in place.
"Miss Eleanor? Where are you?"
It was Samuel. Frantically she rugged her
skirt down 685
over the tatters of underclothing. She covered her bare
breasts with her forearms and turned sideways to the
door as his shadow filled it.
"I'm-was Speak louder or he'll suspect.
"I'm in here, Samuel."
She edged toward the periphery of the gaslight. "Would
you find a blanket for me, please? They tore my
dress."
Blood shone in the hair above his left ear. "Is
that all they did, Miss Eleanor?"
She almost told the truth. It would have been comforting
to share the anguish. She couldn't:
Don't let anyone see what's been done to you.
The filthy, humiliating thing that's fouled your body
forever.
"Miss Eleanor?"
Bascom said you were an actress. ACT!
"Yes, Mills, that's all. I used the old
Lafayette sword and frightened them off."
"Oh, that's a blessing. I'll fetch a blanket.
Be right back."
His angular shadow followed him. Eleanor leaned
her forehead against the mantel. Now she knew what
men and women did together. It was hurtful, horrible,
and it only strengthened her convictions about the pain
love could cause.
Somewhere in the downstairs, the weeping of the serving girl
went on and on. So did the silent screaming in
Eleanor's head.
Hatred
THE SANCTUARY WAS an airless oven.
Gideon's tightly bandaged wound throbbed under the
hot layers of his singlet, shirt, waistcoat and
suit of mourning broadcloth. It was Monday afternoon,
a full week after the invasion of the house.
The pastor was the one who'd taken over the pulpit of
St. Mark's Methodist Episcopal Church
following Jephtha's death. He moved down to the
closed coffin. Elaborately scrolled and finished
with an imitation silver patina, the coffin
lay on trestles hidden by huge arrangements of
roses and lilies. The heat had already wilted most
of the flowers.
The pastor clasped his hands and began to pray for the
soul of the departed, Margaret Marble Kent.
Gideon bowed his head. He closed his eye and used
his right hand to conceal the upper part of his face. The
grief grew steadily stronger.
The devastating news had reached him in the hospital
in Pittsburgh. Since then, the strike violence
had flickered put in the east, only to erupt
elsewhere. The worst outbreaks had occurred in
Chicago and St. Louis. Others on the Union
would report what had happened. He'd put most of
it out of his mind.
Most, but not all. He could never forget the men in the
yellow bandannas. Or the words growled just before the
gun blew a red hole hi his left side.
He'd been wounded late on Saturday, over a
week ago. He'd finally come back to his senses
the following Monday afternoon. A doctor was waiting
to say the bul-
let had been removed with no difficulty-and to hand
him a telegraph message. Twenty minutes after
he'd read the unbelievable words sent
by Theo Payne, he was dressed and on his way out of the
hospital.
He was pale and weak. Three doctors tried
to stop him, using everything short of physical force.
They said he was risking collapse if he left
without at least a week's rest.
He left anyway. He telegraphed the grim
news to Julia comshe was lecturing in Macon,
Georgia-then went to the burned-out shell of the
Union Depot to catch a passenger train east.
In New York he'd gone neither to the Union nor
to the hotel where he'd been living for the past year.
He'd caught a hack directly to the house. When
he arrived, he was astonished to see Eleanor out in
front, shooing a carriage-load of gawkers away
from the curb. Mills was hammering boards over
broken windows.
Eleanor turned toward him just as he stepped
unsteadily from the hack. It was early Wednesday
mom-+; a cool, crisp day. Unusual weather for
July. His daughter wore a black arm band.
Except for a small bruise on the left side of
her jaw, she showed no aftereffects of the terror that
had swept through the house the preceding Sunday night.
No, that wasn't quite correct, he
realized a moment later. In her dark, oval eyes
he detected a terrible anguish.
"Hello, Father."
That was all she said. She turned and preceded him
into the house. There was no inquiry about his wound; nothing
except that lifeless greeting. But contempt
animated her face when Will ran across the
paint-smeared foyer and threw himself into Gideon's
arms.
Despite the pain Will inadvertently caused,
Gideon hugged his son and was hugged in return.
Dry-eyed, Eleanor marched up the staircase and
disappeared.
Since that homecoming, Gideon's conversations with his
daughter had been few and brief. On her part they
were terse to the point of rudeness. But one exchange
yielded a tantalizing fact pertaining to the invasion
of the house.
Gideon's first theory about the invasion was that it was
simply a spontaneous reaction to Payne's
front page statement in the Sunday extra. A
second suspicion presented itself when Eleanor
said one of the thugs had spoken a name. Hubble. No
indication of how you spelled it.
Eleanor thought Hubble had given the men
instructions about where to go and what to do. She couldn't
recall exactly when the name had been used-she
glanced away as she said that, and Gideon knew she
was lying-but she'd swear on her grave it was spoken
during the attack.
The resulting suspicion was farfetched. Yet the
moment it popped into his mind, he knew he couldn't
rest until he proved or disproved it. An
attack on a man was one thing, an attack on
women and children quite another. The serving girl who'd been
assaulted in such a foul way had been taken to her
parents* home. Gideon had sent doctors
to attend her. They reported the girl was out of her
mind with shock and shame. She might never recover.
And Margaret was dead.
If Thomas Courtleigh was responsible for all
those things-
The rage Gideon felt at the mere suspicion
was so powerful, it left him shaken for an hour or more.
He telegraphed the Union's Western
correspondent, Salathiel Brown, who was already
in Chicago. He asked Brown to look into whether the
Wisconsin and Prairie had anyone named Hubble
on its payroll.
During the days of preparation for the funeral,
Eleanor continued to concern him. She insisted she'd
only been roughed up by the men who stormed the mansion.
Her dress and chemise had been torn, and one of the
men had hit her, but she claimed that was the extent of
it.
Gideon found it illogical that the thugs would rape
a serving girl and leave a mistress of the house
untouched, particularly since it was quite clear from
inscriptions painted on the walls that the Kent
family had been the target of the attack. Eleanor
refused to change her story, even though something
flickering in her eyes from time to time hinted that there was
another one.
On the same Wednesday night of Gideon's
return, Dana Hughes had located Mart in
Roxbury, Massachusetts, where he was
drunkenly piaying the outfield in a baseball
game between two volunteer fire companies. The
editor had sobered him up and put him aboard a
southbound express the next day. On Saturday
morning, Julia and Carter had arrived from the South.
Carter's school was out for the summer and he was
accompanying his mother on the lecture circuit.
Julia and her son paid a courtesy call at the
house late that day. From the moment they
walked in, Will was fascinated by the fifteen year
old boy who had the same last name he did.
Carter had shot up over six feet, and was
astonishingly handsome-the one person in all the family
who looked as if he had Latin blood, which he
did.
Julia chose to stay at a downtown hotel. But
she brought Carter back to the mansion on Sunday,
to see whether she could help with arrangements for the
memorial service next day. Again Gideon's
eight year old son followed the older boy
everywhere. Carter didn't seem to mind. He
appeared to the enjoy the adulation, in fact
By that weekend, just prior to the funeral service, the
rail strike was all but over. Many newspapers had
warned of continued, Communist-inspired rioting; even
of revolution. But much of the hysteria had been
unexpectedly dampened by an interview the National
Republican obtained from none other than
President Hayes. Only a day after the start of the
Pittsburgh violence, the President said he
didn't consider the looting and bloodshed to be
evidence of "the prevalance of a spirit of Communism,
since the acts were not primarily directed against
property in general, merely against that of the
railroads with whom the strikers had had
difficulties."
The Marxist scare continued, of course. But the
President's calm statement had undermined it.
Gideon was too wrung out to do more than take
note.
So now it was Monday afternoon. Following the memorial
service, he planned to travel to Massachusetts
to see Margaret's burial in the family plot in
Watertown. Her remains were not actually in the coffin
as yet. Because of the season and the problem of
deterioration, the body lay on ice at the
undertaker's.
About two dozen mourners were scattered in the pews
of the small church. They listened dutifully as the
prayer droned on. Molly was seated on
Gideon's right, and Matt to her right. Gideon's
younger brother looked wretched; as if he'd been
working too hard on the book, or imbibing too
heavily, or both. Will leaned against his father's left
side. Just beyond, on the center aisle, sat
Eleanor.
Gideon turned his head far enough to study her
profile. She was staring at the minister, not even
bothering to slit her eyes in a pretense
of piety. He marveled that he and Margaret had
brought such a lovely creature into the world.
But there was still a secret grief lurking in her
gaze. It wasn't merely his opinion. Matt had
sensed it. And Julia, who was seated two rows
back, with Carter. In private, she'd told
Gideon she thought Eleanor was suffering from some deep
inner wound about which she
refused to speak. Was it Margaret's death causing
that? Julia wondered aloud. Gideon doubted it.
What, then? He didn't know.
Behind Julia sat a number of people from the Union,
including Theo Payne and his tiny, kindly looking
wife. Most of the servants were back there, too.
When the service finally ended a few minutes later,
Gideon noticed a late arrival he hadn't
seen before-the impeccably dressed Joshua
Rothman.
As the organ pealed the postlude, Eleanor left
the pew without waiting for her father to usher her to the foyer.
Gideon frowned, then took Will's hand in his and
started down the aisle. As they passed Julia's
pew, Will noticed Carter watching him, and immediately
pulled his hand from Gideon's.
Molly walked out holding Mart's arm.
Several steps ahead, Gideon went to Rothman in
the foyer.
"It was good of you to come, Joshua."
They shook hands. The banker was in his mid-fifties
and growing portly. "I apologize for disturbing the
service-was
"You didn't."
"comb my train was late. Miriam wanted to come with
me, but a-was He colored slightly. "A female
complaint has kept her indisposed for the past
month."
"I hope she'll be all right."
"The doctor assures me she will. He says this
is merely a painful phase all women pass
through." He laid a hand on Gideon's shoulder.
"You're the one I'm concerned about at the moment. How
are you bearing up?"
Gideon glanced toward the main doors; Eleanor
had already gone out and down the steps to the line of waiting
carriages. Her chin was raised and her back was
stiff as a soldier's. There's no love in her,
he thought suddenly. Or if there is, she hides it.
As if it somehow isn't proper to display affection for
anyone.
My God, have I caused that?
He realized Rothman was peering at him, awaiting
an answer. Molly and Matt passed by.
Molly clearly wanted to speak to the banker, but she
walked on so as not to interrupt what had the look of a
very private conversation.
"Bearing up? As well as can be expected, I
suppose," Gideon said. He felt himself growing
cross. His bandage itched, and the wound hurt. The
heat of the foyer was making him dizzy. His voice was
sharp as he added, "Let's go outside, shall we?"
At the door, there was the obligatory handshake and a
murmur of condolences by the pastor. Three burly
young men in cheap suits and derbies came up the
steps and entered the sanctuary; they had come with the
black-lacquered, glass-sided hearse which was standing
near the corner at the head of the carriage line.
Gideon accompanied Rothman down the steps. A
few spatters of rain dotted the wooden walk.
Perhaps there'd be some relief from the heat. He found
no relief from his bad temper when he glanced to his
left and saw Eleanor smiling and chatting with
Matt. With her own father, she was barely polite.
Coming right on top of the heat and the pain and the strain of the
memorial service, that made him unreasonably
angry.
ii
Eleanor was enthralled by papa's brother. Even in
a suitably sober suit, Uncle Matt was a
dashing figure with his hair curling over his collar,
and his mustache drooping past the corners of his mouth.
He fanned both of them with his straw boater, then
lit a cigar as she said:
"I know this isn't the time or place, Uncle
Matt. But sometime I hope you'll talk to me about
the theater."
"I confess I don't know much about it, Eleanor."

"Yes, but you're a painter, and I've read that
painters suffer just the way actors and actresses
do."
She was so fervent, she completely overlooked the
wryness of his smile as he answered, "Well, I
suppose I can give a little expert testimony in
that department Your father's told me about your interest in
acting. I'm not sure he approves."
Her eyes glinted. "He's the one who first took
me to a play."
"Watching them isn't the same as spending your life
performing them. Besides, you're older now. You're a
daughter, and he's a father-was He stirred
the humid air with his cigar, as if stirring a
cauldron. "That creates a special family
brew. I'm told fathers become highly
protective when daughters reach your age."
"I can take care of myself," she retorted. "And
I don't think he cares two phis about
protecting me. I don't think he cares about
anything I do."
"Eleanor, you're wrong-was
She rushed on: "But I knew you'd understand what I
want. You of all people hi this family must know what
it's like to feel a terrible craving to be a dedicated
artist."
Matt was amused by the passion of her words, and by the
words themselves. But he didn't let on. That would have
hurt her. It struck him that he must be getting
old, because he was beginning to take cynical note of
how intense, idealistic and optimistic young people were.
There were apprentices up at Kent and Son,
Boston, who were sure they'd own the biggest printing
house hi the land by the time they were thirty.
"I'll be glad to talk with you any time you want,"
he said, fully matching her seriousness. "I can
tell you this much right now, though. I have a friend in
Paris, a very fine painter named Paul
Ce'zanne, who's going to be well thought of one
day. He once called painting a dog's
profession. He meant it was lonely, frustrating,
unsatisfying for long periods of time-and that there was no
guarantee of success. I imagine the same can be
said of acting. To be very good at something, you usually have
to give up something else. Peace of mind, perhaps.
Or a normal life. Sometimes the choice is
unappealing and damn-uh, very painful."
"I'd give up anything to do what I want,
Uncle Matt."
"Sure you mean that?"
"Absolutely."
How fiery she was; and how cheerless. He tested her
a little further.
"Most girls your age are envisioning a marriage.
Babies-was
"I'm not. I never want to get married. I'm not
even going to let myself be interested in a boy, that just-
distracts a person."
He had the feeling she finished the sentence in a way
that concealed what she'd really started to say. Again he
was troubled by the intensity of her statements. They were
born of deep conviction-and perhaps of more than a little
pain. But she hid that. There was a quality
about her some would call strength and others hardness. It
was difficult to tell at this stage whether it would
help or harm her.
He tried teasing her:
"The gain of the theater will be the loss of the male
population, I'm afraid. I guess it isn't
amiss to pay a compliment to a niece and say she's
a very pretty young woman."
Eleanor's cheeks pinked. She wasn't
completely lacking in human feeling.
"Also a very determined one," he added. "I have a
notion you'll be a success at anything you choose
to do."
"I'm glad someone thinks so." She directed an
unfriendly glance at her father who was standing with a
stranger a short distance down the walk. Then she
gave Matt a warm, almost worshipful smile and
murmured:
"Thank you. We'll talk sometime when papa's not
around. Fd better go to the carriage now. I
suppose they're all gossiping because I'm not
wailing and sobbing like an infant."
What a curious girl, Matt thought as he puffed
his cigar and watched her enter the carriage in which
Molly was already seated. Fiery about
certain things, cold about others. Didn't she mourn
for her poor mother? Or did she keep her sorrow
buried inside?
And why had she looked at her father with something close
to loathing? Gid had said long ago that his relations with
his daughter were strained, but that seemed to be understating
it.
As far as Matt could tell, Margaret's death
hadn't brought father and daughter closer together, as
family grief sometimes did. Disturbing, he thought
as he finished his smoke. Damned disturbing.

At that moment Joshua Rothmaa was saying
to Gideon:
"Did you know your father's second cousin, Amanda
Kent, had her mansion in Madison Square mobbed
too? Just about twenty-five years ago, it was."
Gideon wrenched his glance from Eleanor, who was
getting into the family carriage. She'd obviously
enjoyed speaking with his brother as much as she disliked
speaking with him.
Once Theo Payne had told him adolescents
went through a normal period of disagreeing and even
quarreling violently with their parents. At the same
time, Payne said, they frequently chose
other adults as idealized mothers or fathers. Maybe
that was happening
with Matt. If so, it was wrong for him to be angry
with his daughter.
In response to Rothman's remark, he nodded and
said, "Yes, I did hear my father mention that once
or twice."
In a thoughtful way, the banker continued, "Amanda
died as a result of the attack. It's a sad and
interesting parallel. In 1852 the trouble came about
because Amanda protected a runaway slave.
Runaways, or contrabands as they came to be
called, were one of the hottest issues then. I mean
the question of whether they should be given sanctuary, or
returned to their masters. Amanda took a stand on
behalf of a poor black's freedom, and she died
for it. Your home was ransacked and Margaret lost
her life because of your concern with another downtrodden
class. It's curicus how idealism leads the
Kents back over the same ground-was
Gideon's accumulating tension made him
snappish:
"I
fail to see much of a comparison, Joshua. Amanda was
shot defending her house. I brought the
trouble down on Margaret and the children, but I wasn't
here to help them deal with it."
"Gideon, you mustn't blame yourself for your wife's
death."
"Why not? Everyone else does."
Instantly, he realized how self-pitying that was,
and apologized.
"Have the police located the men responsible?"
Rothman wanted to know.
Gideon shook his head. "Eleanor and the servants
were only able to provide very sketchy descriptions."
"Then you have no hope of finding and punishing the
ringleaders?"
One, he thought. In Chicago. But Rothman
wouldn't have understood, so he simply shook his head
again and murmured, "Very little." He took hold of the
banker's arm. "Come to the house for a while,
Joshua."
"Certainly-if I won't be disturbing you."
Gideon assured him he wouldn't. "Will you stay
to supper?"
"I'm afraid I can't do that. My train leaves
at six forty-five."
Gideon handed Rothman into his hired carriage.
Next he went to see Julia off. As
Matt approached, she declined the same invitation
Gideon had given the banker.
"I think it's best you devote your attention
to Molly and Mr. Rothman and the children."
"I agree," Matt put in. "I'll see
Julia and Carter back to their hotel." He
grinned. "May even steal her away from you, Gid."
Gideon didn't smile. Julia noted the tension
on his face. She laid a gentle hand on his arm.
"If you have time, come by this evening before you take the train
for Boston." Matt drifted away again, to corral
Carter. Julia stepped closer. "Above all,
try to heal the rift with Eleanor."
"It's that apparent, eh?"
"Yes."
"All right, I'll do what I can."
But he was beginning to believe the gulf was already far
too wide. His own ill humor wasn't helping
to narrow it.
Matt returned with Will and Carter. Julia's son
had his arm around the younger boy's shoulders. Will's
eyes were still red from the crying he'd done early in the
service. Carter was speaking to him in a low comforting
voice.
"I'll be up to see you soon, Will,"
Carter called as he and Matt climbed
into Julia's carriage. Will gave the older boy a
grateful glance, then preceded Gideon into the Kent
carriage. Eleanor sat against the far wall,
rigid. She barely turned her head to acknowledge
her father's presence.
Gideon squeezed in beside his stepmother. He shut the
door and thumped the roof. The carriage rolled
forward past the hearse into which the empty coffin was being
loaded by the three young men wearing derbies. Gideon
heard them cracking jokes. He bowed his head,
controlled his temper, and began speaking in a
moderate voice:
"Eleanor, I believe that you and I-was
"Papa," she broke in, "we have nothing to say
to each other."
All his resolve vanished in a renewed rush of
anger.
IV
"Molly," he growled, "you must forgive me, but
it's time Eleanor and I settled a few things. The
conversation may not be pleasant."
His stepmother frowned. "I think it would be more
appropriate if you waited until we arrived
home."
"Indeed it would be," he shot back, struck
by another spell of dizziness. He gripped the edge
of the open window to steady himself. "But I refuse
to wait that long. Eleanor, I'm sick of your
disrespectful ways and your accusing looks. There is
no reason for either."
She acted incredulous. "No reason? Papa, she
might be alive right now if you'd been here
to protect her."
"Do you think I don't know that? Do you think I
haven't thought of that every minute since I heard she was
dead?"
"Will," Molly whispered, "come sit by me." The
wide-eyed boy squeezed against her side.
"Even when she was alive," Eleanor went on, "you
never thought of what she was going through."
"That isn't true. I did."
Contempt then: "Did you really see the words that the
painters had to cover up? "Communist" spelled out
in red letters three feet high? The other filthy
things?"
"Of course I saw them. What are you trying
to say?"
"That mama was always terrified of the very thing that
happened-people attacking the house. She must
have understood your work better than I did. But you
kept on with your-your causes and never made it easy
for her to forget her fear. You kept so busy at that
blasted paper, you never made it possible for us
to live like an ordinary family."
"Now see here!" he said, his voice shaking. "You have
to understand my side of it. She demanded that I give
up my work. She wanted me to be something I couldn't
be-a drone in some safe, secure job. She
wanted everyone to obey her, but especially me. I
wouldn't, and it was wrong of her to ask-was
"So you did exactly as you please, and now she's
dead."
"Damn it, don't twist everything]"
"Gideon." Molly's lips were all but
colorless. "Don't curse, and for the love of God
don't keep up this wrangling. The poor woman
isn't even buried." She stabbed a look at
Eleanor. "Both of you show a little restraint."
He shook his head. "We're going to settle it,
Molly. Somehow my own children have been turned against
me with insinuations and outright lies. I'll never know
what Margaret said to either of you-was A glance at Will,
cringing at Molly's side. "I'll never know how
she worked on your imaginations. But I know
she did it. She lost her sense of what was right and
wrong. I could see it happening before I left. The
alcohol affected her mind, just as it affected her
father's. She was a sick woman-was
"Did you make things easier by staying with her,
Papa?"
In answer to the scorn, he shouted:
"She made it impossible for me to stay! She-was
Suddenly he stopped. The carriage swung around a

corner. He was only alienating Eleanor all the
more. He had to change direction.
"All right." His voice was much softer. "Will it
calm things and help us start on a better footing
if I admit I made many, many mistakes? If
I accept my share of the blame for all that
happened?"
"You deserve all the blame! You were the one who
walked out-" She rubbed her eye, then shook her
head as if annoyed with herself. "You were the one who never
even wrote a line to find out whether we were still
alive."
"Eleanor, what are you saying?"
"That you never cared enough to write so much as a single line
after you left."
"But I did. I must have sent you a dozen letters.
Begging you to come down to the Union-I was willing
to meet you anywhere, so we could patch up our
differences-was
"That's a convenient lie now that she's gone,"
Eleanor scoffed.
"I swear to God I wrote to you! Surely someone
in the house saw the letters-was
She shook her head. "I kept asking Samuel,
but there weren't any."
"Then somehow your mother must have intercepted them. It's the
only explanation. She must have destroyed them."
Eleanor looked close to tears again. "Oh,
Papa, that's cruel. There's no end to your
cruelty. First you desert your wife and then you bring
your mistress to New York and flaunt her in
front of-was
"Don't speak about Julia!" Gideon roared.
"By God your disrespect is unbelievable. You're
not old enough to-was
"I was old enough to care for Will when you abandoned us!
Old enough to care for mama and run the house!"
"Eleanor-stop!" Will screamed. "Stop, stop,
stop it!"
Molly's eyes accused both Gideon
and his daughter. "I told you that you were going too
far." She turned and comforted the crying boy.
Gideon felt bludgeoned. There was a defeated
tone in his voice as he made his last, desperate
appeal to Eleanor's reason:
"You mustn't villify Julia. She wanted to come
to New York to pay her respects. She's a
fine woman. You may not believe it, but she's been
a strong partisan of you and Will for as long as I've
known-was
"Gideon," Molly whispered, "that will be all
Can't you see the damage you've already done?"
He could, and it broke his heart.
Will's face was buried hi Molly's skirt.
Eleanor stared out the window at passing rooftops
sprinkled by the rain that hadn't even dampened the
pavements.
He'd failed.
Exhausted, he leaned back against the cushion. She
blamed him. She hated him. She always would. The
family was sundered, and in the carriage he'd finally
faced the truth of his own role in that destruction.
Something unexpected had happened during the
ferocious, enervating argument. By admitting his
culpability to his daughter, he'd also
admitted it to himself, and done so without reservation, for the
very first time. He could no longer put all the guilt
on Margaret. He must shoulder his share, because it was
deserved.
In one way poor Margaret was better off. She
no longer had to carry that guilt. He'd bear his
till the hour of his death, never forgetting that he was the
sole living engineer of the Kent family's ruin.
The pain of it made the wound in his side a scratch;
a trifle; nothing.
An hour later, while he was talking with Joshua
Rothman in the Fifth Avenue study, Samuel
brought in a telegraph message that had just been
delivered. Gideon tore it open. Rothman
noted the younger man's harsh expression as he read the
one-line report from Sal Brown:
LORENZO HUBBLE A STAFF ATTORNEY FOR
WISCONSIN PRAIRIE.
After a moment the butler murmured, "The boy is
waiting, sir. Is there to be any reply?"
"Yes, Samuel."
Pale, Gideon strode to his desk and wrote a
message asking his reporter to investigate
Bubble's whereabouts on Sunday, July 22, as
well as the day before and the day after. No
expense was to be spared.
Samuel took the message and started to leave. At
the last moment Gideon called him back. He
watched the butler closely as he said:
"During the past year, I mailed a number of letters
to Eleanor. Evidently they didn't arrive. At
least she says they didn't."
Samuel frowned slightly. Gideon concluded he
was trying to flog his memory. At last, looking his
employer in the eye, he said:
"No, sir, I don't remember any letters in your
handwriting."
"Did Mrs. Kent ever collect the morning or
afternoon deliveries herself?"
"Yes, sir, frequently, when I was busy at
some chore. She liked to do it, she said."
"I'm sure she did," Both the butler and
Joshua Rothman looked mystified by Gideon's
extreme bitterness.
Samuel hesitated, then said, "You sound upset,
sir. Did I say something wrong?"
"No, Samuel. You didn't give rne the
answer I hoped for, but you gave me the one I
expected. That's all. Thank you."
CHAPTER Vn
Caff to Forgiveness
BY EVENING, RAIN was drenching the city. Water
cascaded from the eaves of the roof of the train platform.
The sight and sound of it carried Gideon back
nearly six years, to another rainy platform where
he'd discovered he couldn't leave the woman who was still
at his side this evening.
The intervening years had brought almost continuous and
sometimes shattering change. Through it all, only
Julia, his children and his work had sustained him. His work
had finally brought down the vengeance Court-leigh had
promised. His oldest child was his enemy. Only
Julia remained a constant. Thank God she
did, or he'd never have been able to go on.
Impatiently, he took out his pocket watch.
"Twenty after already was The Boston express left
at half past the hour. The wagon bringing the coffin
was nowhere to be seen.
A few latecomers were hurrying to board the
passenger coaches. Gideon had arranged
to accompany the coffin in the express car, whose open
door was just to his left. He didn't know
precisely why he'd decided to do that, unless it was
because he no longer had anything to offer Margaret
except his presence on the final stage
of her journey. A memorial of dubious value,
he thought with the bitterness that had infected his thoughts ever
since the quarrel with Eleanor.
He peered along the platform. The lanterns hanging
from the platform roof were dim. Blowing steam hampered
visibility even further. Rain pelted his face.
He wiped it away with his cuff. "What have they done
with the damned thing?"
Julia laid a gray-gloved hand on his arm.
"Don't fret, it'll be here." The sympathy and
patience in her voice calmed him a little. The calm
was superficial, though. Inside, he felt like a
baffled, frightened child.
Julia had sensed it when he'd stopped by her
hotel. It was she who'd suggested she keep him
company on the melancholy ride to the terminal. In
the hack, they'd embraced with an unexpected
ardor. They didn't kiss, merely put their arms
around one another and held each other tightly, as if
each needed comforting after a day too full of rancor
and reminders of their own mortality.
Now Julia said, "You didn't finish telling me
how things went after you got home."
He shrugged, his mouth setting in a bitter line.
"Eleanor refused to speak to me. It was
more peaceful than the carriage ride, but hardly more
cordial. Will said she's happy that Matt's moving
from his hotel to the house to look after things while I'm
in Boston."
"I've been thinking about that house, Gideon."
"You're still planning to come live there, aren't you?"
She said softly, "No, I don't think I should."
"Julia, we agreed-was
"I know what we agreed, darling. But just this evening,
I changed my mind. What you told me about the
conversation with Eleanor convinced me I'm right. You
built that house with a great deal of hope. But it's
become a mausoleum for bad memories.
Memories of arguments, violence, lives half
lived and half fulfilled-
but discounting all that, it remains your wife's house,
not mine. For me to move in even temporarily would be
a kind of desecration of Margaret's memory. Just
as important, I want our house to be a loving
house. Yours isn't, not any more. I'm sorry,
my dear, but that's the way I feel."
He respected her conviction, but he felt adrift
again:
"Then where will we live?"
"Anywhere else you choose. Perhaps we should
go to another city for a while. Boston, if you'd care
to involve yourself hi the affairs of Kent and Son for a
while. The change of scene might be beneficial,
and the firm will need guidance to capitalize on the
success of 100 Years."
"I'm not that confident the book will succeed."
"I am. In any case, it doesn't really
matter where we go if we're together and have work that
satisfies us."
He was about to object, then thought of something he'd done
earlier in the evening. It prompted him to say:
"You could be right about the house. After supper I went
up to Margaret's room. The mob never got into it.
I stood outside for ten minutes, wanting
to unlock the door. I didn't have the courage."
"That's perfectly understandable."
His eye fixed on the terminal at the end of the
platform. "Before we move out permanently-if we
do- that room must be opened. Everything in it must be
taken out and disposed of."
"Don't you think you should examine the things first? There
might be some items the children would find valuable. Some
keepsakes-was
His reply was abrupt and vehement. "There's nothing
in there but grimy furniture and old
clothing. Nothing worth saving. If there are
memories in the house like the ones you described, that
room's the chief source. Just as a practical
matter, it has to be cleaned out before any
prospective buyer looks at the property."
"I still think someone should examine Margaret's
ef-706
fects. I can understand why you don't want to do it.
I'd be willing to take on the chore-was
"No!" His blue eye shone bright as a gas
flame, reflecting one of the lamps inside the
express car. "Everything will be burned."
She sighed. "I can't agree with your decision.
But-was
An expressman appeared in the open door of the
car. "That box here yet, Mr. Gray?"
Gideon had filled out the shipping papers under the
assumed name, and spread some money around to assure
silence on the part of the terminal superintendent and his
staff. Passengers weren't usually allowed to ride
in express cars. If higher-ups ever found out that
permission had been given to Gideon Kent, the
radical newspaperman who regularly attacked
railroad owners, someone could lose a job. It was
better to travel anonymously.
"Not yet," Gideon answered. "I'll go check
on-wait, here it comes."
A four-wheeled wagon pulled by two freight
handlers appeared at the terminal doors. Like an
image hi a dream, it seemed to float along in the
billowing steam. The iron wagon wheels rumbled.
Rain slanting through the lamplight glowed and
splattered on the lid of the coffin.
Julia saw how pale he'd grown. She slipped
her hand in his. He didn't turn. His eye
remained fixed on the silver box.
The freight handlers rolled the wagon up beside the
wide door of the express car. They Lifted the
coffin and maneuvered it inside. Only then did
Julia say:
"Did you decide to tell the children you and I had
discussed marriage after a suitable mourning period?"
He pulled his gaze from the ram-speckled coffin.
"Yes. I brought it up at the supper table. I
didn't know whether they'd think me callous with
Margaret not yet buried. On the other hand, even
Will knew she and I
weren't getting along. And Will has really taken
to your son. All in all, I saw nothing to be
gained by a delay. Will was excited. Not so
much about you and me as about the possibility of having
Carter around all the time."
"And Eleanor?"
"You don't really want to hear-was
"Yes, I do."
He hesitated. "The first time I spoke your name,
she left the dining room."
Julia sighed again. "I know she's bound to resent
me for a while. I only pray it won't be
permanent. I'll do my best to see that it isn't.
I've already written Lucy to say I want
to curtail my travel for six months to a year.
With a little luck and some help from the Almighty, perhaps
we can give your children the kind of home they haven't
had for too long a time. Here in New York, or
in Boston-was
Glum, he said, "I don't know how Eleanor will
accept that intention. I'm just coming to realize my
daughter isn't a child any longer. My God, she
isn't even sixteen and strangers think she's
nineteen or twenty. And she certainly has no
qualms about addressing her own father in the most
disrespectful way imaginable. I'm damned if I
know what's happening to the younger genera-may I ask
what's so funny?"
Her smile was gentle; not meant to hurt.
"You, my darling. You're sounding like an old
fussbudget. Or should I say a typically
conservative parent?"
"Conservative? Me? Nonsense."
"Don't bristle so. I think it's a healthy
sign."
He refused to smile. "The hell it is. I'll
never be a good father, Julia. I've come to the
conclusion I never had it in me."
"You mustn't say that just because of Eleanor. Regardless
of how old she looks, she's young. Emotional.

Passion is characteristic of girls her age, but clear
thinking isn't." A rueful smile. "I recall
that very vividly, and with embarrassment."
No amount of banter seemed able to break his grim
mood. He turned toward the express car where the
casket lay glistening. The expressman bent over
it and began to wipe the water away with a clean rag.
"Over and over," Gideon said, "I tried to make
things go smoothly at home. I tried to persuade
Margaret that we could have a happy family even though
I gave a great deal of tune and energy to the
newspaper. She wouldn't accept that. Then
she started to make my work-and my unwillingness to give
it up-a register of how I felt about her. From then
on everything went to hell. "Smite the
Midianites." Remember that? The passage my
father picked from the Bible?" His tone grew steadily more
bitter. "I'm glad he never lived to see that in
doing what he thought I should, I destroyed my
family."
"All right," she said, softly yet with great
intensity. "There were mistakes. Imbalances. But
there comes a time when you have to forgive yourself."
Again his attention seemed to wander. "Destroyed my
family and killed my wife in the process-was
"Gideon, listen to me! Newsmen are so anxious
to perfect the world, they forget it can't be done with
human beings. Accept that fact. Forgive yourself and-was
"I can't."
His anguished cry made the expressman glance
up. Gideon turned his back on the car. Up and
down the train, brakemen began signaling with their
lanterns, streaks of light in the spectral steam.
A last passenger scrambled up the steps two cars
behind. A conductor at the end of the train called,
"All aboaaardl" Julia looked dismayed
by Gideon's reaction. She marshaled her
thoughts and said:
"Very well, if that's impossible, at least don't
speak of your wife with such bitterness. Be kind to her
mem-
ory. She helped you learn, and grow. That took you
out into the world, away from her. Resentment on her part was
only natural. You had your work, but what did she
have except tending her home and her children? What else
was she prepared to do? Permitted to do-by you and
by society? If you can't forgive yourself, at least
forgive her. No matter what you think she did,
she's gone. So be kind-was
"Mr. Gray, you'd better get aboard," the
expressman warned. In the dark at the head of the
train, the beam of the oil lantern speared out.
Gideon was somewhere else; hi memory he'd
returned to Richmond. To a footpath beside the
canal in the desperate, bittersweet weeks just
before First Manassas. Weeks in which he'd worn a
splendid, spotless uniform and whispered endearments
to a pretty, dark-haired girl.
"I loved her so," he whispered. "Where did it
go?"
Julia slipped her arms around his neck and drew his
head down. "It's futile to think of that
now. We must only make sure our love
doesn't vanish the same way. We must work
to keep it strong. And make sure your children are warmed
by it, too. Both your children-was
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
fig
ure 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.
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 hie 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 712
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
Caff to Courage
DURING THE NIGHT that Gideon was en route
to Boston with the casket, Eleanor had difficulty
sleeping. She was stiil 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 hi 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
comlove-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 Mart!
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.
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 hi an old velvet dressing gown.
An unlit cigar stuck hi the breast 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 hi 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-was
"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 m 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 W. 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, Fd say you have a
fine start The question is the same one I asked a
while ago-was
Mart'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 hi 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 hi which you're
supposed to create something. A little sketch of a washer
woman, 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 came
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 theatre, 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-was
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-was
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 theatre, you won't ask anyone's
permission. As I said be
fore, 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 and put a
match to the stove for some-was
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 re-lit his cold cigar and went in search
of tea.
ui
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

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. Bas-com, 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.
Presently the car arrived. Several male guests
got off and she got on.-As the car began to rise in
the barred shaft, the operator studied her from the
corner of his eye. Eleanor glared right back. He
looked down at his unpolished shoes.
Odors of stale smoke and dust suffused the dim
third floor. Halfway to Bascom's room, she
almost turned back. But she thought of Julia
Sedgwick moving into the mansion-and again of Uncle
Matt's words-and she walked on. Her legs
stopped wobbling.
Actually, papa's mistress had helped make her
decision easier. She knew Julia Sedgwick
had traveled all over the country, by herself, and never
come to harm.
Certainly Eleanor felt every bit as resourceful.
Besides, she wouldn't be traveling alone-
If she wasn't too late.
Anxious now, she ran the rest of the way.
Bascom's room was at the rear corner of the third
floor. She knocked. There was no response.
She held her breath; knocked again.
Again no response. He'd already gone out! She'd
come blocks and blocks for nothing. She'd
probably never find him.
Then she realized she was giving up too easily.
She knocked a third time, much louder.
Miraculously, she heard shuffling feet, then a
wordless grumbling.
The door opened. She didn't know whether to giggle
or gasp in horror. There stood Bascom with his
paunch ballooning the front of his faded night
shirt, and his jet black wig tilted down over his
left ear.
Still, he was an intimidating sight, somehow. Before he
had a chance to say anything, she screwed
up her nerve and blurted:
"Mr. Bascom, I'm here about the position with the
troupe, is it still open?"
Recognition finally erased his sleepy look. He
realized his locks were canted and hurriedly
straightened them. "Miss Kent!" he exclaimed.
At least he recalled her name.
He opened the door wider as if to invite her in.
Then he thought better of it. Eleanor glimpsed a
cluttered room not much bigger than a spacious
closet. It bore out one of Uncle Mart's
statements about the artistic life. Mr. Bascom's
quarters were about as low as you could get
His red-rimmed eyes darted toward the curve of her
hips. "Yes, I can still use you-was She didn't like
the suggestive undertone, but said nothing. She'd get the
job first and worry about handling his advances later.
"comx is Miss Kent, isn't it?"
"That's right, sir. It's kind of you to remember."

"Kind? Balderdash. I've a memory for a
provocative comah-was He stifled a belch.
"Talent."
One hand pressed his side as if he were hi pain.
His expression grew a trifle bilious
as he added, "I'll meet you down in the dining room
in ten minutes. Meantime, you may begin your
apprenticeship under J. J. Bascom by fixing one
thought firmly in mind. Unless you are specifically
instructed to do so, never, never, never wake a fellow
thespian before ten in the morning."
He slammed the door.
iv
Buoyed by excitement, she rushed back to the
elevator. She was too breathless to wait for the cage
and instead ran down the three Sights to the lobby.
Before another hour had gone by, Jefferson .t.
Bascom had hired her for his Tom show.
Then he went through an elaborate ritual of
patting and searching his patched frock coat. "Dear
me, I came down in such haste, I do seem to have
forgotten my money clip." He passed her the
bill for his enormous breakfast
She was elated to have the opportunity to pay it.
Uncle Matt was right. A little courage worked
miracles.
CHAPTER DC
From Out of the fire
CARTER AND WILL slipped out the front door after
breakfast. It was the second Saturday
in August, a mild, bright morning fragrant with the
odors of newly scythed grass in Central
Park, and of fresh paint throughout the mansion.
Both boys wore old clothes. Will's face had a
sleepy look because he and Carter had stayed up
till well after one o'clock, talking. At Will's
request, Carter had moved into the house, even though
his mother insisted on remaining at her hotel and
traveling back and forth to upper Fifth Avenue in a
hack.
At night the older boy regaled the younger with lurid
descriptions of his adventures with tobacco,
alcohol, and willing, not to say eager, members of the
opposite sex. About ninety percent of the stories
were invented, but each boy gained something from them-Carter
the sense of pride and burgeoning manhood that was
important to someone his age, and Will the sense of great
adventures that could be his when he was as old as his
new-found friend.
Carter was halfway down the front steps when Will
hesitated, looking across to the park. Behind some
trees, boys could be heard yelling.
"What's holding you, Will? You said you want to
go-was
"I know, but I changed my mind."
"None of that, now. Come on."
"Carter, IV-EVERY gone over there before. They never
let me play."
"I've told you it's probably because of the way you
ask. As if you expect them to say no. You've
got to take charge and tell them what to do. But you have
to be sly about it, so they don't realize they're being
bossed." He climbed back to the top of the stoop and
grasped the younger boy's hand. "I'll show you how
it's done. You've got to learn to make your way,
W. If you don't, you'll be stuck in a house
reading books all your life. Then you'll be white
as paste and no girl will want to look at you. You
don't want that, do you?"
"Hell no," the small boy declared in a squeaky
attempt to imitate Carter's occasional
profanity. The older boy suppressed a smile.
They crossed the Avenue, dodged through the sun and
shadow of the trees and emerged hi a fragrant
meadow. On the far side, two teams were being
organized by thirteen or fourteen boys, about
Carter's age. Again Will hung back. Carter
yanked the bill of his cap down over his forehead and
hissed from the side of his mouth:
"Keep up with me. They'll think you're
a sissy if I pull you along by the hand."
As the two approached, the other boys fell silent
and turned to stare. The boys were a rough-looking lot,
most of them shabbily dressed and none too clean.
One or two grinned, but not in a very cordial way.
Carter sauntered up to a tall, emaciated youth
who seemed to be the leader.
"Got two more players for you."
A boy with a blemished face came from the back of the
group to assume the role of spokesman. He
jabbed a finger at W. "That's the rich little twit from
across the Avenue. He's tried to butt into our
games before."
"You should have let him," Carter purred. His chilling
smile made the pimply boy blink. "He wants
to learn the game. I hope you don't hold it against
him that he's a beginner. Or that his pa's a rich
newspaper publisher. I hope you don't hold it
against me that I smoke-was
With a flourish, Carter plucked a long black
cigar from the breast pocket of his shirt. Where he'd
gotten the cigar, Will had no idea.
"Not cheap ones, either. Genuine Havanas." By then,
a couple of the boys were looking impressed. He
went on, "And I hope you don't hold
it against me that up at Dartmouth-was Faint
condescension: "That's a college-I've studied
scientific grappling-was
Will was stunned by Carter's audacity in making up such
tales. But the pimply boy lost patience and started
to swear. Carter bit down on the cigar, grabbed the
boy,
whirled him around and demonstrated his mastery of
scientific grappling by bending the boy's left arm
up behind his spine. Carter's other elbow crooked
around to crush the boy's Adam's apple.
He grinned and chewed his cigar while the pimply
boy made gagging noises. But Carter didn't
really hurt his victim, and in a moment he let go.
He dusted his hands, then struck a match on the
sole of his shoe.
He puffed his cigar in a nonchalant way. The
others didn't know what to make of him. Finally he
said:
"Did you choose up yet?"
The tall boy muttered, "We were just starting."
Carter rubbed his hands. "All right, let's go. My
cousin here-was
"That's your cousin?" another boy jeered. "He
don't look like no greaser. You do,
though."
Carter didn't turn a hair. "You've got a
quick eye. My great grandfather was Alphonsus the
Mighty, eighty-seventh king of Spain. But he
never married my great grandmother, so I'm part
Spanish and part bastard." He said it so casually,
yet with such conviction, that the only reaction was
speechless surprise. "Now my cousin here-his
name's Will-he hasn't played ball as much as I
have. He's going to make mistakes. But it looks
like we've got some pretty fair teachers in this
crowd."
Will was in awe. Carter's combination of bluster and
outrageous lying had completely overwhelmed them, and
had kept them so busy, they forgot to be hostile.
If ever there was a Kent born to sway and lead
others, it was Carter.
"And good teachers don't get sore when their pupils
mess up," Carter went on. "They show "em how
to do things right because the teacher is the older, smarter one,
and how's anybody going to learn if the teacher won't
take time to teach?"
The tall boy grinned. "All right, we'll show your

cousin how it's done." He turned toward
his friends. "I say these two can play. That okay with
everybody?"
The pimply boy stared at the ground and grumbled.
Another of the group said, "Sure, let 'em play,
it's better than having your arm busted."
"Knew you'd see it my way," Carter nodded with a
quick smile at W.
"Let's quit messing around and choose up," a
third boy said. There were enthusiastic yells, and some
clapping. Will was ecstatic. If papa and Julia
got married eventually, and they all lived together hi
another house, maybe Carter would teach him more about
getting along in the outside world. It wasn't such a
frightening place after all, provided you had a little
nerve.
He was so excited about the coming game, he didn't
notice the plume of smoke from the vacant lot on
the south side of Sixty-first. There, hired workmen were
starting to burn his mother's belongings.
"Leaving?"
Gideon's voice mingled consternation with disbelief.
His ears had tricked him. She couldn't have said she was
joining a theatrical troupe.
He rose so hastily from his study chair, a
taboret beside it overturned, spilling the
copy of 100 Years which Matt had picked up at
the express office and brought to the house the night
before. After delivermg the book, Matt had told
Gideon that because "he project was finished, he
wanted to go back to England. He'd booked a cabin
on a Cunard steamship. The vessel sailed for
Southampton on Monday evening.
The book had fallen open at the engraving which
depicted Matt's favorite baseball team, the
Cincinnati Red Stockings. 100 Years was a
handsome volume, printed
on better than average paper and bound in
good-quality cloth.
But the book was forgotten as father and daughter stared at
one another. Eleanor stood just inside the double
doors of the library. She'd put on her best
summer frock and a flowered hat. A bulging
valise rested on the floor beside her.
"Yes, Papa, leaving," she said. "I decided it
was best for all of us."
The smell of smoke filled the house. Out in the
foyer, one of the workmen appeared, draperies from
Margaret's room folded over his arms. Two
lacquered boxes rested on top of the drapes.
Gideon had retreated to the library after
breakfast because he couldn't bear to watch the removal
of Margaret's things. Nearly every item brought back
some special memory. He'd given her the
lacquered boxes as an anniversary gift.
A breeze stirred the library curtains. A
large wagon went rattling north on Fifth
Avenue carrying fifteen or twenty young people on an
excursion into the country. From the Park came the cheers
and catcalls of a lively ball game.
Gideon was hardly aware of any of it. He felt
as if someone had bludgeoned him. He raked a hand
through his hair. Jerked the belt of his morning robe
tighter. Finally, he erupted:
"I don't know what you mean, best for all of us.
It certainly isn't best for you. Girls your age
don't just walk in one morning and announce that
they're leaving home."
"I'm sorry, Papa, but this could never be my home
now. Not with Julia here most of the time."
"I told you we weren't going to stay in this house-was
He was floundering.
"It would be the same no matter where we moved."
"Eleanor-was He took a step forward, saw her go

tense, and stayed where he was. He held
out his hand. "Please. Come in. Close the door and
let's talk."
Two more workmen grunted their way down the staircase
with the secretary from Margaret's room resting on their
thighs. The desk had remained locked since her
death. When the workmen were out of sight, Eleanor shook
her head.
"There isn't any point. I'm going."
"You are not of legal age! You don't have permission
to leave!"
She flared suddenly: "I don't want or need
your permission. I could have run away without telling
you! I looked for Will but he and Carter must have gone
to the Park. I left a note for him."
Desperate now, he pointed to a chair.
"Eleanor, sit down. I beg you. Tell me
what brought this about. That blasted theatrical club you
mentioned a few days ago?"
"I have no time to sit, Papa. I'm due at the
New York Central depot in half an hour.
There's a hack coming for me. The manager of the troupe
arranged for it."
"Depot? When you said you were joining a theatrical
company, I thought you meant here in the city."
"No, it's a traveling troupe."
"Good Lord."
"I don't understand why that upsets you so much. You
gave me scripts to read. You took me to see my
very first play at Booth's-was
"Taking you to Booth's isn't the same as encouraging
you to run around the country with a bunch of
unmoral-what's so funny? Damn it, Eleanor,
answer met"
"I'm sorry, Papa. I don't mean to laugh.
I can't help it. Because of all the things you publish
in the paper, everyone thinks of you as a radical. But
here you are ranting against the immoral theater. Almost like
mama used to do-was
"My liberality doesn't extend to allowing my
fifteen 729
year old daughter to travel with a pack of godless
wastrels."
She shrugged. "I'm going, though."
How assured she sounded, in contrast to his own
confusion.
"What-what's the name of this troupe?"
"Bascom's Original Ideal Uncle Tom
Combination."
"God in heaven-a Tom Show? That's even
worse."
"You're making this very unpleasant." She was beginning
to anger. "It's a grand opportunity. I'm
to play one and perhaps two parts, and help backstage
with the wardrobe. I couldn't find better preparation
for a career as an actress."
"Who's been encouraging you? My brother? Has he
been filling your head about how fine it is to be a
free-spirited artist?"
"No, Papa. Uncle Matt had nothing to do with
my decision." But the pink in her cheeks gave her
away.
"I don't believe you," he shot back.
"Whatever Matt said, it was nonsense. A
painter's existence-or an actor's comisn't
glorious or noble. I know. My own mother tramped
around the country with her second husband. She was
miserable because Lament was a typical actor. No
sense of reality, or of responsibility-it's a
wretched, disorderly life."
Very quietly, she replied, "It can't be any more
wretched or disorderly than the life in this house."
"Eleanor, I don't want to hear that again."
She paid no attention, answering his anger with her own:
"But of course you wouldn't know anything about that. You were
always too busy to care about your wife and
your family. I don't see why you're suddenly
doing a turnabout aow."
The familiar accusation defeated him for a moment. He
lowered his head; covered his eye with his right hand.
He couldn't let her go. Despite the flip way
she 730
brushed his arguments aside, actors were amoral people,
And what did she know about men's desires at her
age- or how to deal with them? She knew nothing.
Unless-
Oh, good God. Had someone already-his
He could barely stand to think about it. If he ever
discovered that some middle-aged man had sullied his
daughter, he'd turn into a Tom Courtleigh
himself, and do murder. Only he'd do it personally.
He'd horsewhip the damned lecher to death.
Despite his panic, he tried to speak calmly:
"All right. It appears your decision's final. But
you can give me a few more facts, can't you? How
long will this junket last? A couple of weeks? A
month?"
"Two years."
"Two yearsThat
"Three if we're successful. Mr. Bascom,
the proprietor of the company, wants
to take the production all the way to California."
He had a notion that he must look like an idiot, his
mouth open and consternation on his face. And was that the
hack clattering up Fifth Avenue this very moment?
"Where did you meet these people? What do you know about
them?"
"I met Mr. Bascom at the theatrical club,
just as you guessed. We'll be traveling together like a
big family. There's even a boy in the company
whom you met once. Remember Leo Goldman?"
With a blank look, Gideon shook his head.
"In any case, trouping's nothing new for most of
them. They're quite experienced."
"And I don't doubt they'll use you to enhance that
reputation."
"That's indecent, Papa."
"It's a matter of fact. A girl your age
doesn't know 731
how to take care of herself. How to guard against- against-was
"I know what you're trying to say and I want no
part of it. Ever."
There was such pain hi her eyes, and such venom in her
tone, that he was taken aback. What had happened
to her? Had she been attacked when the house was
invaded? Julia spoke of the secret
grief she sensed in Eleanor. Was the cause something
she dared not reveal to anyone?
He shot a frantic glance at the window. The
hoof-beats of the hack horses sounded loudly
outside, slowing down.
"Do you have an itinerary? At least tell me where
you're going-was
She reached for the valise. "Medium sized cities
and small towns, mostly. Our first three
engagements are upstate."
His helplessness finally overcame his rage, and he was
no longer a father berating a child, but an adult pleading
with another adult:
"Will you write us, then?"
She broke his heart when she smiled and said:
"Of course, Papa. Just as often as you wrote to me
after you left."
And then she whirled and ran, one hand clutching the
valise, the other holding her bonnet.
He rushed to the window as she dashed down the steps to the
waiting hack. He watched the hack turn on
Fifth and clip south again. After it was out of sight,
he remained motionless at the window, a man who
realized he'd grown old in an instant. Old,
confused, and unexpectedly full of a
sense of his eventual death.
Old. His child was gone from him. As all children left their
parents.
No, that was wrong. Eleanor was different. She'd
left 732
with a heart brimming with hate that he hadn't been able
to overcome.
He heard workmen complaining out in the foyer. The
smell of smoke hung everywhere. The breeze
fluttered the pages of the fallen copy of 100
Years. Sunlight drenched Fifth Avenue, and the
dust raised by the hack drifted away and dispersed.

"Julia? Julia!" He stormed through the main
floor, searching for her. Cook hurried from the
kitchen. "She's across the street, sir." He
didn't understand. "You mean in the Park?" "No,
sir. The vacant lot where they're burning Mrs.
Kent's effects."
Cook's gray eyes hinted at disapproval.
Julia had been spending almost every day at the house,
but none of the servants was as yet fully accustomed
to her presence.
"She went to see to their disposition," Cook added.
"Goddamn it!"
Cook stepped back as he stalked by. "I told
her to leave all those things alone-was he said under his
breath as he rushed to the rear stairs and into the coach
yard. One of the hired men was dippering water from a
bucket. He started to wave, but saw Gideon's
face and thought better of it. "Julia?"
On the other side of Sixty-first, she turned and
came toward him through knee-high weeds. The workmen
had cleared a sizable area and trenched its perimeter
to a depth of a foot and a half before igniting the
fire. Gideon waited in the coach yard, his face
thunderous, as Julia picked up her skirts with one
hand and crossed the street. There was something black and
square in her
right Hand. He paid no attention. He spoke before
she was halfway to the curbstone.
"Julia, I specifically asked you to have nothing to do
with the disposal of Margaret's-was
"Asked?" she broke in. "You ordered me."
He seized her wrist. "Whatever verb you care
to use, you chose to disregard-was
. "Of course I did." She wrenched away.
"What's come over you, Gideon? I'm not some
slavey, to be given orders and abused at your
pleasure. If you think I am, I'll
be happy to go back to the hotel, pack my things, and
leave New York before the day's over."
Trembling, she gazed up at him. His blustery
wrath faded. He realized she was carrying some sort
of charred book, and a packet of letters whose edges were
burned. She went on in a firm tone:
"But as long as I'm here, I'll continue to inspect
everything before it's consigned to that fire. Most of
Margaret's clothing is in perfect condition. It
only wants a little cleaning, and it can be given to the
poor. I'm sorry to hurt your feelings, but I
can't stand unnecessary waste. And it's a good thing, because I
found something important. That is, one of the workmen
found it after I asked him to break the lock on
Margaret's-was
"Julia, Eleanor's gone."
"What's that?"
"I said Eleanor's left. For good. Didn't you
see the hack?"
"I noticed it, but I paid no attention. I thought
the driver had gotten the wrong address."
"Eleanor took it. She's leaving the city. Going
on tour with a Tom troupe."
She understood, but it was clearly difficult for her
to believe the news. She shook her head
and uttered a low, ragged sort of laugh. Then she
leaned against Gideon's side.
"Dear God. Two such shocks in one morning is
one too many."
"I don't know what you mean."
She showed him the book, and the envelopes with blackened
edges. The envelopes were bound in a piece of old
twine that had somehow survived the fire.
Astonished, he recognized the handwriting on the
top envelope. Then he saw the address. He
snatched the packet and riffled through it.
"These are letters to Eleanor that I wrote after I
moved out"
"So I assumed," Julia nodded. "We didn't
discover them until the desk was hi the flames. As
you can see, they haven't been too badly damaged.
Or this either."
She held out the blackened book. He'd never seen
it before. He returned his attention to the letters, speaking
his thoughts aloud:
"She must have intercepted them. Hidden them. But
Samuel said-was He stopped.
"Said what?" she prompted.
"The day of the funeral, the subject of these letters
came up with Eleanor. She denied ever
seeing them. I questioned Samuel and he told me
Margaret had frequently picked up the mail.
He also said he'd never seen any letters like this. Not
one." He shook the packet. "But she couldn't have
intercepted this many without his cooperation-or without
attracting his attention, at the very least."
"You mean to say he lied to you?"
"Evidently."
"But why?"
Gideon spun toward the house. "We'll soon
find out."
She caught his arm.
"Take the book too.
He turned back. He didn't understand why her
eyes were so apprehensive. She continued:
"It's a diary, Gideon. One which your wife must
have begun several years ago. I-was
She dabbed at her upper lip with a sleeve
kerchief. From across the street, the bite of a
workman's axe sounded, tearing into wood which another
man proceeded to pitch into the translucent flames.
A plume of inky smoke rose and drifted away.
"comI only glanced at a few entries. I think
it will require a good deal of courage for you to read the
whole thjng."
He tucked the blackened volume under one arm. Then
he stalked into the house. Julia followed.
They cleared the kitchen and confronted Samuel.
Accused and confronted with evidence, he broke down
almost at once. Yes, he'd lied to Gideon. Of
course he'd seen some of the letters to Eleanor.
Looking miserable and speaking in a halting voice,
he described how Margaret had iaformed him over a
year ago that she wantexi to see all the mail before
anyone else did. He said she'd warned him against
mistakes; threatened him with firing if so much as one
letter slipped by. He'd weighed the ultimatum-it
was from the mistress, after all, and Gideon was gone-and
from then on had made sure the postman put all
deliveries into his hand and no other.
"But I didn't realize she was holding back
certain letters, Mr. Kent. I thought it was just another
of her- peculiar whims," he finished in a lame
voice.
By then Gideon was almost drained of emotion, It was
Julia who asked:
"Why on earth did you lie to Mr. Kent the day of the
funeral?"
Samuel shifted from foot to foot. "All at
once I realized I'd gotten hi too
deep. I was afraid that if I confessed, I'd be
sacked. I have a very large family-seven children.
Jobs that pay as well as this one aren't easy
to find,"
Too weary for retribution, Gideon said, "All
right, Samuel. I'm glad it's cleared up.
Perhaps I should discharge you, but I won't. Just get out
of here."
The butler vanished without questioning his good fortune.
Gideon carried the letters and the book into the library.
Julia closed the doors. She picked up the
fallen copy of 100 Years and placed it on a
side table as Gideon opened the book's browned
pages. He read one short entry.
"Oh my God." He sank into his chair. Read
another, a third.
As Julia had said, coming right on top of
Eleanor's departure, the shock was almost too much
for a single human being to bear in a single morning.
rv
Julia asked a question about his daughter. He looked
up and briefly told her what Eleanor had said.
Then he returned to the book.
He discovered some of its pages were splattered with
curiously sinister inkblots. Others had
holes or rips in them, as though damaged by the nib
of a pen. Those were the pages on which she'd referred
to Gideon as him. The pages conveyed her hatred,
her deceit, and the steady deterioration of her mind in
a way that left him open-mouthed and made his belly
hurt.
"She did lie to them, Julia. Deliberately.
I wasn't wrong."
"No, my darling, you weren't." There was grief in
her voice; pity, too.
Suddenly he stood up, slapping the book against his
thigh. A corner of the cover broke away. Black
flakes fell to the carpet. "I'm going to throw this
back in the fire-was
He saw Julia shaking her head.
"Why the hell not?" With a trembling hand, he shook
the book again. "No one's going to see this sad,
filthy thing. It deserves to be forgotten."
"By everyone except one person. Eleanor."
"What?"
"You must get the book to her, Gideon. The book
and the letters. Let her read them. Let her be the one
to destroy them."
"Do you know what you're saying? You want me to show
Eleanor this-this testament to her mother's
deranged state?" He uttered a short, bleak
laugh. "She already thinks I'm a monster. Now you
want to confirm it."
"I want your daughter to know she was manipulated-
just as you said she was. I want her to know it so she
won't hate you for the rest of her life."
He understood. Pondered. Hesitated.
"It would only defame Margaret's memory-was
Julia seized his arms and shook him:
"Margaret is dead backslash She can't be hurt
any further. The living members of this family are
the only ones who count now. If you want Eleanor
to be your daughter in more than name-was
"You know I do."
"Then what's wrong? Are you afraid she'll
reject you again?"
His blue eyes brimmed with pain. His voice was
barely audible.
"Yes."
"Could she dislike you any more than she already does?"
A pause. "No."
"Then you must show her the diary and the letters."
Still uncertain, he stared at her.
"You must, Gideon!"
Ten minutes later, dressed and lashing the
buggy nag furiously, he went racing down Fifth
Avenue in the calash, hoping he wasn't too
late to catch her; find her; make her listen.
CHAPTER X
Tiuo farewells
THE SCHEDULE BOARD showed only one train for
upstate New York during the rest of the day-a
noon local which terminated at Albany. An
express for Buffalo, Cleveland, and points west
had departed at ten after eleven. Eleanor might have
boarded that one at the last moment, Gideon thought as
he hurried from the station into the train shed, the letters and the
diary clutched in one hand.
The local had only three second-class
passenger coaches. He sprinted past the rear one,
then the second. There was a severe and steadily
worsening ache all across his chest; his age showing.
A puff of steam obscured his vision a moment. When
the steam cleared, he saw people milling up near the
express car. Since most of them were shouting and
gesturing, he presumed he'd found the troupe of
actors. One of the men, a rascally looking old
fellow with a black wig, was waving a paper at
someone inside the express car.
"Your loutish helpers dropped three
different pieces of our scenery. The wings for little
Eva's dove, the ice floes, and the heavenly
gates. If there's so much as one scrape or tear
on any of them, this line will pay!"
Gideon shifted his attention to the dirt-streaked
win739
dows of the front passenger car. No sign of
Eleanor there. He needed to go inside and look for-
He was distracted by a ferocious yapping. Again he
looked toward the front of the train. He saw a
man with two magnificently proportioned but
carelessly groomed dogs on lonf? chains.
Apparently the man had been exercising the dosrs
on the empty track next to the platform on which
Gideon was standing, and somehow the animals had gotten
excited.
As the companions of the man in the wig closed around
him to second his protests to the invisible
expressman, the other man's dogs gave a
lunge against their chains. The man nearly pitched on
his face on this less-than * empty track.
Just in time, he righted himself. The dogs kept dragging
him forward. He jumped up and landed on the platform
with a thump, one hand clutching his wide-brimmed hat
while the other, with the chains wrapped around
it, was repeatedly yanked.
All the commotion around the express car merely
incited the animals. One of them gave another
lunge and tried to climb the front steps of the first
passenger car.
By then the owner of the dogs was only a few feet from
Gideon. The man wore clothes several years out
of date, but they still had a costly look. Although the
man was short-the crown of his hat was level with
Gideon's shoulders-he carried himself with authority.
He was slim, in his middle forties, with lively
gray eyes and wavy dark hair streaked with white.
He gave Gideon an imperious look, as if
questioning his right to be on the same platform. Then he
swung toward a portly conductor who had appeared
in the vestibule above the steps the dog was trying
to ascend. While the other dog yapped and turned in
a circle, the first kept its paws on the lowest
step. The conductor's path down to the platform was
blocked.
"Animals in the baggage car!" he exclaimed.
He aimed a kick at the dog but missed. Fangs
snapped together, inches from his shoe.
The small man might have been handsome except for a
tomato-colored nose that had grown too
large for his face. His cheeks turned the same
color as he yelled:
"Don't do that again, sir, or you'll face a
lawsuit. Ni-colai and Nicolette are not
mongrels to be abused. They are full-blooded
Borzois."
To add to the confusion, someone began yelling,
"Daniel? Daniel, why don't you ever wait for
me?" A tall, skinny, drably dressed woman
emerged from the crowd still hectoring the expressman.
Although the woman was as old as the man with the dogs,
girlish ringlets dangled below the brim of her hat,
and she'd blacked her eyes and rouged her face like a
woman half her age. Her jaw was long, her
face more than a little horselike. But she had
large, vivid dark eyes, and a voice as mellow as
a French horn.
"Daniel, you're a rude boy." She came
hurrying toward him, hiking up her skirts so
anyone could see her pantaloons. No one was
interested.
"I don't give a hang if they're the Czar's
children," the conductor snarled. "Pets don't ride
with the passengers."
The small man took a long, deep
breath and drew himself up while the wolfhounds
snapped and pranced around his legs, winding him in their
chains. All at once a little breeze carried an
odd aroma to Gideon's nose. He identified it
as hair dressing or cologne, mixed with another
scent that had a sad familiarity. Whiskey.
"Daniel Prince's d*ogs do not ride anywhere
but in the passenger section!" the actor shrieked. The
ringleted woman tried to reach-his side but was
prevented by the wolfhounds still racing in circles.
Wrapped in chain, the actor started to topple.
Gideon jumped forward and propped the man up. In

the process he got a blast of whiskey breath.
He backed away quickly to avoid being bitten by one
of the wolfhounds. It was snapping at him while the
other one tried to jump up and lick his face.
"Thank you, sir, thank you," Prince panted as
he struggled to extricate himself from the chains.
Gideon was impatient now.
"Is the Bascom Tom Company aboard this
train?"
The small man couldn't answer. The Borzois were
yanking him toward the empty track again. The
conductor said:
"Yes, the troupe's On board and I wish it
weren't Theater folks are nothing but trouble. Noisy
showoffs, the lot of them."
Less than cordial, Gideon said, "My
daughter's with the company. I'm trying to find her.
Miss Kent is her name-was
The conductor shrugged. "Believe me, I don't
introduce myself to any of them." He jumped from the
bottom step, avoided the entangled actor and
rushed to the assistance of the expressman, who was now
rolling on the platfosm, locked in a tussle with
Bascom. The latter's black wig had fallen
off, revealing a totally bald head. The members
of the troupe were yelling encouragement to both
combatants, much to the annoyance of their employer.
Other passengers began to raise the car windows and
poke their heads out. Gideon was nearly beside himself with
impatience. He'd only been on the platform two
or three minutes, but what he'd seen in that short
time renewed his fears for Eleanor's safety and
sanity.
He grabbed the handrail beside the steps and started
to climb up. A hand touched his sleeve. He spun
and found himself facing the woman with the ringlets.
"I bed your pardon, sir, did I hear
you say you are Eleanor's father?"
"That's right."
"I am Mrs. Prince." She indicated the
small man, who was still uttering feeble pleas for help
with the chains. The Borzois had worn themselves out. One
flopped at Prince's feet, tongue lolling.
"I am indeed happy to meet you, Mr. Kent.
We weren't aware anyone would be seeing Eleanor
off. She's our new Little Eva, you know. A charming
girl. Bascom raves about her talent."
"Bascom raves about anything which moves and wears
petticoats," Prince said. He studied
Gideon's shoulders, then his legs. Someone at an
open window snickered. Prince glared.
"My name is Martha," the woman said, extending her
hand. Gideon shook it. Time had marked Mrs.
Prince's face with deep lines, and there was a
certain sad quality about her arresting eyes. But she
seemed a kind and essentially cheerful woman. She
went on, "I've only chatted briefly with your
daughter, but in that time I discovered she's quite young.
Much younger than she looks, most assuredly. In a
group like this, she will need someone to look after her. She
has a young gentleman who seems willing to undertake
part of the responsibility-was
"A gentleman? Who is he?"
"Mr. Goldman. Another new member of the
company." The name had a familiar sound, but
Gideon couldn't put a face with it. "Daniel and
I shall look after her, too. We have no children.
We'll be glad to watch over her as if she were our
very own."
"Very kind of you, Mrs. Prince," Gideon said,
though he wasn't so sure the actor's attention would
be any great blessing. "It's quite important that I
see Eleanor for a moment. Do you know which car she's
in?"
"Certainly. This one. The third or fourth seat on
the other side."
"Thank you very much." He raced up the steps. 743
All at once he was terrified of failure. His
heart lubbed so hard, it seemed to drown out the
murmur of conversation in the second-class car. The
car swarmed with flies, and smelled stale and
unclean.
Eleanor didn't seem to mind. She was seated beside
an open window, maintaining a distance of two or
three inches between herself and her companion, a young man
with a great deal of dark hah:. She appeared to be
enjoying an animated conversation with the young
chap. For a moment Gideon hated a world that made a
man and his children grow old and apart
Heads turned because he was standing motionless, just to the rear
of her seat. Her head moved last of alLike She
glanced over her left shoulder.
"Papa!"
She seemed too astonished for anger. Her
exclamation brought her companion bounding up. When he
swung around, Gideon recognized him at once,
although the boy had shot up and filled out since that
night in. Printing House Square. The boy's
pleased expression showed he remembered Gideon,
too.
Eleanor said, "Papa, may I present Mr.
Leo Goldman? Leo, my father, Mr. Kent.
I think you two met years ago-was
"We certainly did," Gideon said as they shook
hands. "Every man his own king-every man his own priest."
"That's right!" The boy had an incredibly rich
baritone voice. "I'm truly astonished that a
man as busy as you would remember something I said."
Gideon managed to smile. "Yours was a much
better definition of America than many I've
heard."
"Leo's a member of the troupe."
Eleanor's tone was neither friendly nor unfriendly.
"Yes, you did mention that this morning." He no744
ticed she was looking at the book and letters under his arm.
Then she searched his face, as if to find some clue
to his state of mind.
"Leo and I met at the Booth Association," she
explained.
"And you're on your way to make your fortune, eh,
Mr. Goldman?"
"I certainly think so, sir."
"Splendid," Gideon replied, not intending it
to sound as caustic as it did. "I don't want
to be rude, but time's extremely short. I must
speak to Eleanor privately."
"Of course, sir." Leo stepped aside so she
could reach the aisle.
Gideon saw Eleanor's defenses rise as she
murmured, "Speak to me about what, Papa?"
His fear worsened. He shouldn't have come. Even though
the book's authenticity could hardly be questioned, she'd
find some way to reject it-or cast the blame for its
contents squarely back on him. He almost turned
and fled. He'd never been more frightened of losing
anything than he was of losing her affection for the rest of
his life.
But she's already lost. That's why you're here.
"About what, Papa?" she repeated.
"About these."
He showed her the handwriting on the letters.
"If you'll examine the dates, you'll notice that
I wrote you the first of these letters a few days after I
moved out. All of them were found in your mother's desk."

Her face lost color. Leo craned his head so
he could see the letters. Gideon withdrew them. "If
you'll excuse us-may we go outside, Eleanor?"
All the passengers were staring, but he didn't give

damn. All he cared about was her nod as she
preceded him down the aisle. His heart was still beating
hard as he opened the door for her.
Fortunately the platform near the foot of the steps was
deserted. Daniel and Martha Prince and the
Borzois had returned to the express car, where a
rumpled Bascom was gesturing with his wig and
haranguing a railroad official. One of the other
actors was offering the expressman a bandanna for his
bloody nose.
It all faded into insignificance as he said:
"After you left this morning, I happened
to open your mother's desk just before it was burned." The
lie was spoken to spare Julia any further ill
will. "My letters were in it, wrapped in cord just as you
see them. I then questioned Samuel and he confessed he
helped her confiscate the letters as they arrived. She
ordered him to help her. All of that's hi here-was
He opened to one of the diary's blotted pages.
"And a good deal more that isn't very pleasant. I just
want you to read a little of it."
He located the passage describing the start of
Margaret's scheming.
"Start at the sentence that reads 'I shall never do
anything so lacking in subtlety." Read from there to the
end of the page."
Her head bent over the book. In a moment her hands
began to shake. He wanted to touch her but feared that
if he did, she might fling the diary in his face.
He started at another outburst further up the
platform. It was Prince, marching angrily in their
direction. The actor had lost the battle of the
Borzois. Their plaintive yelps sounded from the
express car.
Prince's wife clung to his left arm, trying
to soothe him. Still clutching his wig, Bascom was doing
the same from Prince's right. The other
actors trooped along behind as Prince exclaimed:
"No, no, nol Explanations and apologies are
useless, 746
Bascom. You guaranteed the dogs would ride as
passengers. The gold of your word has proved itself
mere dross."
"Listen, I damned near got walloped to pieces
for those goddamn mongrels!" Bascom retorted.
"Your pardon, Martha."
Some of the actors laughed. Several passengers
leaning out the windows gasped and slammed the windows
shut. Out of sight inside, the conductor shouted a
warning about foul language on New York
Central property.
Prince ascended the steps, the perfect, and
perfectly exaggerated, picture of a. wounded
man.
"In view of your insults, Bascom, I don't
know whether I shall be able to perform in Albany."
"You better or I'll sue you from here to the
Canadian border. Martha, give him his flask
for God's sake."
The actors vanished. The whistle blew. Gideon
turned back to his daughter-
To find her oval eyes bright with tears.
"I never believed you," she whispered. "I never
believed she lied to us on purpose."
A weary smile. "I tried to convince you. But I
had no evidence. Any time you wish, you can write
Samuel and he'll confirm what I said about the
letters."
How he hated to see the vulnerability on her
face. She was young again; young and hurt. He wasn't
sure she'd forgive him for this pain, either.
She tried to hand him the diary and the packet of
envelopes. He blocked them gently with one palm,
"They're yours. Destroy them if you want. It's
up to you. I only ask you to read the letters, and some of the
diary. I've come to realize belatedly that I
caused a great deal of the trouble that beset our
household. I could have gone much further than I
did to smooth over the difficulties, but I
didn't do it because-well, because I'd fallen hi
love with Julia. No human being is perfect, as
you've discovered too early in life."
The whistle howled.
Haltingly, he began again:
"I used both Julia and the Union as excuses
to keep me away from an unpleasant situation at
home. By doing that, I also neglected you
and W. To all that I plead guilty. But-was
The conductor leaned down from the vestibule, a
ghostly figure surrounded by billowing steam.
"Miss? Get aboard, please."
"Papa, can you ever forgive me?"
The very sound of it was balm to his soul. "Of course.
I already have. You're my daughter. The ques tion
is, can you forgive me? Because of all that I did, I
Ieadon't suppose it's possible for you to love
me. But cer
jjtain
things can't be changed. I am your father. I love
you. I may have failed you, but I love you."
She was too overcome to speak.
"I only ask that you don't push us out of your
life. Julia and Will and I are all the family you
have now. I don't want you to go on this damned
trip, but if you must, then remember we're here
waiting for you to come home."
"Yes, Papa. I will."
He almost dropped to his knees to thank a God with
whom he was on less than familiar terms. She
darted another swift look at the passenger cars
beginning to move slowly toward the flare of sunlight
at the end of the shed. All at once she was
crying.
"I'm so sorry for what I did, Papa. For
all the cruel things I said-was
"It's over! Only the future counts. Write
us. Tell us what you're doing. Whether you're
safe, and well. Write to the Union because we may
be moving soon. Wherever we go, will you come home when
you can?"
"Yes. Yes."
"Oh, Eleanor-was He took hold of her free
hand.
He could feel the sudden tension in her fingers. Had

he hurt her so deeply over the past year or so that
she recoiled from the touch of another human being? He
only hoped it was his touch, and not every man's, or she
was truly a wounded creature.
"Papa, I love you.""
The cry seemed torn from her. Tears streaming on
her face, she flung her arms around his neck and
hugged him hard for one supremely joyous instant.
Then she turned and ran along beside the passenger car
and reached up to grasp the conductor's hand. Once
aboard, she gripped the vestibule rail and looked
back at him. She began to wave, her
face and form dwindling in the blaze of summer light
outside the station.
Why did she have to go? She was too young. Too
inexperienced. He was afraid for her to be alone with
those people. The Goldman boy and Mrs. Prince
seemed kindly, but what about the rest? He was
afraid for her to travel to strange places among
such a raffish crowd.
He was afraid just as any father would be.
He was her father again, he realized. Happiness
overwhelmed him, and he stood waving until the last
passenger car shrank away to nothing out there in the
August light.
He was her father again!
IV
Late that afternoon Gideon fell ill with violent
stomach pains. On the advice of his doctor, and
over his protests, Julia put him to bed. By nine
that night he was running a high fever.
Dr. Melton lanced the sutured bullet wound,
relieving a build-up of pus, and prescribed a
heavy draught of whiskey for sleep. As Julia
ushered the doctor out, he gave his professional
opinion:
"All the events you've mentioned have
undoubtedly 749
been extremely aggravating to his weakened condition.
I should imagine that if I were shot in the midst of a
riot, lost my wife and then had my
daughter-decamp with a pack of actors, my sanity
would be gone right along with my health. I can't understand
how the man keeps going-was
She smiled. "The Kents seem to be a hardy
breed." "Hardy but not indestructible. Keep him in
bed for the next three or four days. Even if you have
to use ropes."
Gideon was awake at four on Sunday when a
man from the Union brought him a long telegraph
message just in over the newspaper's leased wires.
Out in Chicago, Salathiel Brown had reached
dead end.
In circumspect phrases, Brown reported that
he'd spread his fund-he meant bribe
money-among three guards the Wisconsin and
Prairie now employed at its headquarters. The
guards had been quite happy to give him the company
version of what had happened the weekend of the
railroad strike. Lorenzo Hubble had been in
Chicago the entire tune, and the guards were prepared
to swear to it if necessary.
Brown had interviewed each man separately, in a
saloon. One of the three, a consumptive roughneck
named Kane, had gotten drunk enough to let a
damaging fact slip. In between swallows of gin and
spells of coughing, Kane said he and the others had
been paid a hundred dollars apiece, in advance,
in case it became necessary to testify to Hubble's
presence. Kane knew Brown could never prove
what he'd just heard by accident, but he threatened
Brown anyway, saying he'd do Brown serious
injury if the reporter repeated the slip to anyone.
The man seemed to enjoy that sort of bullying,
Brown noted.
Finally, Brown had done some further checking, and

discovered that no reliable witnesses could actually
place Hubble in Chicago during the weekend in
question. In other words, the report concluded, it
appeared that Hubble had been out of town, and that for some
reason, the W and P was prepared to prove
otherwise.
Gideon flung the crumpled message on the
floor beside his bed. Courtleigh's guilt was
unmistakable. But what the hell could he do about it?
He could think of nothing except the kind of
unthinkable act to which Sime Strelnik had
predicted he'd be driven to by this sort of
frustration.
He was sorely tempted. Only after an hour of
reflection, and a conversation with Julia, did good
sense prevail.
vi
Late on Monday, dressed for traveling, Matt
came to his brother's bedside. Hot sunlight
blazed in the room, slanting from the west above the
park. Gideon felt much better. He insisted
he'd accompany Matt to the Cunard pier.
"I won't hear of it," Mart said. "Julia's
going with me. I'm only sorry the trip to the west
side won't be longer. There isn't time for me
to take her away from you."
Gideon laughed, then sobered. "I'm sorry you
won't stay."
"I stayed much longer than I ever expected to,
Gid." Matt pulled up a chair. "There's too
much of me still in England, and not enough of me here."
"There's a lot of you here now that the book's
published."
"Maybe." A shrug. "By the way, I was hi that
palace of a bookstore on Union
Square this morning-what's the name of it?"
"Brentano's. August Brentano opened it last
year. It's already the best store of its kind on the
East coast. For
an immigrant who used to peddte newspapers and
magazines in the streets, August is doing very
well."
"They told me 100 Years is selling
briskly. If the treed continues, maybe the
fortunes of Kent and Son have finally been reversed.
I'm afraid the etchings are a disaster. There'll be
precious little money for charity-was
"Matt, in a few years one of those sets will be
priceless."
The younger brother studied the older with affection. "I
don't know which of us is the biggest bull thrower."
"Before you go- Gideon coughed then. Winced; the wound
was hurting like fury, and leaking pus again. "comthere's
something I need to ask you."
Matt pulled out a cigar. "Ask away."
"Did you speak to Eleanor about an acting career?"
Matt strode to an open window and gazed across at the
Park, trying to sound offhand.
"Yes, we had a conversation. She asked my
opinion on some things."
"Such as whether she should leave home?"
Matt pivoted. "That question didn't come up
specifically."
"By implication, then?"
Matt, slipped his cigar back in his pocket.
He didn't avoid his brother's gaze. "I
suppose you might say so."
"Did you encourage her to go?"
He sighed. "Does it really matter? I think
she'd have gone whether I encouraged her or not. Or
whether or not you approved. I got the very clear
impression that she couldn't do anything else with her
life. When that happens to someone, you just have to accept
it"
"still don't have to accept it!"
Quietly: "Gid, your age is showing."
"What the hell does that mean?"
"You're a very liberal thinker in some ways. But
you'll never understand the kind of life I lead-or the
kind Eleanor wants to lead, either. Never understand it
fully, I mean. Hell, I don't myself, or
I'd have never let Dolly walk out on me and
travel halfway round the world to have our son. In
any case, I think I know what's worrying you.
Her age, and her virtue." Gideon
reddened as he went on, "Contrary to what you may
think, artists are not all ravening lechers. Some of
them are the kindest people on earth. Crazy, but kind.
I'll tell you this. I'd sooner see your daughter
in an acting troupe than cast adrift in a room
full of politicians. Those bastards would have her
compromised in ten minutes."
"You're saying actors won't?"
"Of course I'm not saying that. People are people. But you
need to have more faith in your own child. Eleanor's a
strong, capable young woman. I suspect she can
take care of herself. She did while you weren't
living here, didn't she?"
Propped against damp pillows, Gideon grimaced
and murmured, "Point scored."
Matt came to the bedside and embraced him.
"Look, my esteemed older brother. It's too
late to change what Eleanor's done. You said she
softened her feelings toward you when you proved
Margaret had been deceiving her. Be thankful for that.
Be proud of her ambition and her spunk. She'll
probably turn into a Kent we can all admire,
I know newspapermen are professional scolds.
But don't let it carry over to your family.
Don't find fault with Eleanor.
Enjoy her! We forget how little time we really have
to enjoy each other. You're a damn lucky man,
Gideon. You have a fine son and daughter, and a fine
lady who loves you-was
"Julia?" He smiled. "I couldn't survive
without her."
"Don't try. I swear, if she had yellow
hair and blue eyes, I'd abduct her. By the
way, do you know how late it is?"
"See here," Gideon teased, "you're prosperous
enough to afford a watch. If I'm wrong, I'll buy
you one."
I'MATT grinned. "No thanks. I don't like
being reminded
Iof how little time I have left." He glanced out the
win-
Idow
toward the sun-drenched Park. "To judge by the
Ilight, I'd better be going along or 111
miss the ship."
I8ationext time don't make it so long between
visits."
I8Listen," Matt said with his old, sardonic
grin,
I8working on that book, I sucked out the
meat of this
bar bar concountry, just as if was a ripe orange.
There's nothing
It-left. Til come home again when I think something
else
Imight interest me. Such as the christening of a new
Inephew, maybe-?"
I8I'm too old for fatherhood!"
I8And for all that goes with it?" Matt said with a
Ibbstraight face. "For Julia's sake, I
sincerely hope not."
bar bar He picked up his boater, waved and left
his brother
bar to musing in a dazzle of sunlight.
IN-O, Gideon thought, he would never understand all
Iof Eleanor's motives, nor what deep need
drove her to
Iperform in front of an audience. But Matt
seemed to
Iunderstand, and to think it was an acceptable life. Un
Ieasily,
he decided to trust his brother's judgment.
IW-AS his daughter talented? She'd always shown
off at
Ihome-and sometimes in public, when she
shouldn't
Ihave. Much to his surprise, he found himself
conjuring
Ian imaginary scene in which he and Julia sat hi
the
Ifront row of a great playhouse and watched an
immense
Ired velvet curtain descend. Then it rose
again, and
IE-LEANOR stepped to the footlights to receive an
ovation.
IW-ITH his eye closed, he saw it like a painting
in his
Imind. The image was unexpectedly a very pleasing
one.
Ivii
IJ-ULIA accompanied Matt aboard the Cunard
Steam-
Iship
Persia, kissed his cheek fondly, and left the
ship as
Istewards hurried around the decks, ringing gongs to
send all visitors ashore. She waved at
Matt from the
pier, then turned and walked toward Tenth
Avenue.
Mills was waiting with the calash on the other side of
Tenth, unable to get closer because of the usual
congestion.
Even though it was already sunset, a time of shadow and
deceptive red light, this part of the West Side still
swarmed with people and vehicles. Every half block or
so, piers jutted into the river-ferry piers serving the
rail lines operating from New Jersey, and shipping
piers where the Cunarders and other seagoing vessels
docked. The Jersey bluffs were all but hidden
by hulls and masts. There were paddle steamers, screw
steamers, even some beautiful clippers still traveling
the tea routes to India and China.
Tenth Avenue was clogged with freight wagons,
drays, hacks and private carriages.
Passengers, seamen and longshoremen hurried past
Julia as she waited for an opportunity
to cross.
She was thankful Gideon had stayed behind, hi bed.
He desperately needed rest, and a time of peace,
after the stress of the past few weeks.
Perhaps their lives were smoothing out at last. Gideon
and Eleanor might never come to a complete and
harmonious understanding of one another-that was
almost too much to ask-but at least there'd been an
armistice, and some sign of affection on Eleanor's
part; a sign Gideon had desperately needed for a
long time. Now if they could only locate a
suitable house-Boston looked more and more like a
possibility because of Gideon's expressed
desire to delve into the affairs of Kent and
Son-they might be able to look forward to a period that
was free of turmoil and unhappiness.
All in all, she felt quite fine on this warm summer
evening as the shadows of hurrying men lengthened around
her. One halted just to her left. She glanced back
from the traffic she'd been watching and saw that the man
was wearing a heavy coat. Odd garb for August.
The coat didn't even fit. The sleeves were too
long, and
concealed the man's hands, just as an old hat concealed
most of his face.
He was one of the army of beggars still tramping the
streets, she supposed. Because she felt at peace
with the whole human race this evening, she started to open
her reticule even before the man made his plea.
But the beggar said nothing. Her eyes opened wide as
the man's right hand rose. The cuff of the coat fell
back. A sliver of metal flashed in the
sunset.
He rammed the knife through Julia's dress into her
stomach, released the handle, whirled and ran before
anyone moved to stop him. By then Julia had fallen
to the ground.
CHAPTER XT
Sky full of Stars
A FEW HOURS after Julia was struck down, a
train carrying the Bascom troupe sped westward through
the darkness and solitude of the Mohawk Valley.
Eleanor dozed a while, then woke abruptly.
She didn't know the exact hour, but she was sure it
was somewhere in the middle of the night. She just couldn't
make herself comfortable in the unfamiliar confines of an
upper berth. Her restlessness was heightened by all the
confusing and disappointing things that had happened in the past
twenty-four hours.
She put on her robe. Carefully, she poked her
legs out between the curtains. She wiggled around until
she was on her stomach, then stepped down, making
sure her bare toes didn't press too hard on
the curtain of Miss Ruthven's lower berth. If
she didn't cut her own career short with wretched
acting, Miss Adelaide Ruth
ven would try to cut it short for her, that much
she knew after only one performance.
Adelaide Ruthven was a good fifteen years older
than Eleanor. She was a talented and experienced
actress, with a face that resembled the blade of an
axe. That was fine for character roles. For Bascom,
however, she played Eliza. The troupe's first
audience had had some difficulty accepting Miss
Ruthven as a mulatto. In fact there was a great
deal about Bascom's Original Ideal Uncle
Tom Combination that audiences would have difficulty
accepting, Eleanor now believed.
Safely down in the aisle, she tiptoed through the
swaying, clacking Pullman. The car was dimly
illuminated by small, metal-shaped lamps at either
end. She passed Leo's berth. His presence was
something else that troubled her. She felt the same
strong attraction for him that she'd felt at the
Booth Association. She was still afraid to admit
it, though. Thank heavens the troupe had kept busy
preparing for and playing the opening performance. She hadn't
had to deal with Leo yet. But occasionally he gave
her an intense glance that said she'd have to do so soon.
Perhaps she'd be sent back to New York, and that would
solve it.
She opened the door and stepped out on the
platform between her car and the next. Chilly wind gusted
against her cheeks and set her hair streaming behind her.
The weather had turned unexpectedly cool. Dark
hills went slipping by on either side of the train.
Above, between the cars, she saw one of the most dazzling
and breathtaking displays of stars she'd ever set eyes
on.
For a moment the sight of the sky took her mind off of
her miserable opening night performance, and all the other
attendant difficulties. How clear the stars
were! Hundreds of them; thousands-a shimmering
canopy stretching from horizon to horizon. Some of the
stars were brilliant white, some bluish, and a few
had a red
cast. Individual stars brightened or dimmed as the
train kept moving and changing her perspective.
The berth had been stuffy. She welcomed the bite
of the night ah", even though her bare feet were cold.
She clung to the platform rail, savoring the wind's
sweetness as it blew her hair against her cheek one
moment, snapped it out behind her the next. She closed
her eyes and raised her face to the stars. Her
feelings overwhelmed her.
Feelings of shame at having accused her father of being
responsible for all the trouble in the
household. That terrible book she could barely stand
to read had proved how mistaken she'd been.
To be sure, Gideon would always bear some of the
blame. He'd said as much himself. But he hadn't
abandoned the family entirely by choice.
Margaret's schemes, the products of her sick
mind, had driven him out by making it intolerable for him
to stay-just as he'd told her. She hadn't believed
him then. She'd played into her mother's hands, and
unwittingly behaved exactly as Margaret wanted
her to behave.
She was beset by feelings of failure, too.
Feelings of having made a dreadful mistake.
And feelings of homesickness.
She'd expected to miss Will, but she hadn't
expected to miss the Fifth Avenue house with all
its unhappy associations. She even found herself
missing her father. The strange new longing had been with
her ever since she'd impulsively embraced him
on the depot platform.
She found herself a little more tolerant of his relationship
with Julia Sedgwick, too. She could never condone
the relationship-that would be a kind of betrayal of her
mother-but at least she understood why some such relationship
had been necessary for her father.
The whole sorry business merely proved again that
love was hurtful, and that she'd best dampen her
feelings for Leo Goldman. Besides, she'd
probably have no
opportunity to indulge them. Considering the show in
Albany earlier tonight, she'd be lucky to be with the
troupe one more day.
ii
The company had arrived in Albany late on
Saturday. They were to play the New Novelty
Theatre on Monday evening. In violation of local
ordinances, the theatre was surreptitiously
unlocked on Sunday afternoon so Bascom could conduct
a rehearsal for the benefit of the new
players-Eleanor, Leo, and two older men who
seemed chiefly interested in their friendship with one
another.
To Eleanor's disappointment, only she and the three
new men were present for the rehearsal. And rather than
walking them through the entire show, Bascom sat them in
chairs and supervised a swift reading of the
dialogue. He only made one or two comments
to each person. Eleanor had hoped for intensive
discussion of character motivation. Instead, she was given a
curt, "Louder there." Or, "That's where
you roll your eyes. By God, they'll cry
buckets."
The session lasted about two hours. Then they spent
another hour following Bascom around while he showed
them where the various flats, flown backdrops, and
pieces of special machinery would be positioned for
each scene. Eleanor made frantic notes on
her sides of dialogue. So did Leo. The
older men didn't bother.
She had already been warned that Bascom never arranged
stage pictures, or directed entrances and
exits, let alone whole scenes. If the actors
formed a pleasing picture, or played a scene with
special skill, it was solely by accident-and if the
picture or the performance was duplicated on another
evening, it was due solely to the effort of the cast.
Late on Monday, Bascom did call the whole
company together for another line rehearsal, this one with
the actors and actresses sitting or lounging around
the stage wherever they wished while they clipped off the
dialogue at top speed. Even reciting that way,
Eleanor drew spontaneous applause for
Eva's death scene-and her first looks of animosity
from Miss Ruthven. What a pity Monday night's
show hadn't matched the intensity, or the
success, of the rehearsal.
In addition to playing St. Clare's daughter,
Eleanor doubled in brass as a female
spectator at the slave auction in act five.
And, wearing men's clothing, she was a supernumerary
patron in the tavern scenes, including that in the first
act in which Eliza appeared wfth her young son
Harry. The role of Harry was unrealistically
played by a midget named Elmer Fiddler. During
the rest of the show, Fiddler, who was thirty or so,
supervised the movement of scenery. A white
midget, made up as a mulatto boy was only
one of many anomalies in Mr. J. J.
Bascom's tawdry and slapdash production.
Before Eliza-Miss Ruthven-escaped from the
riverside tavern, Eleanor was already drawing
glares from the older actress. She had to suffer through
the rest of the show before she found out why. And "suffer" was
none too extreme a word. The evening quickly became
a disaster for everyone.
The first trouble came during the pursuit of Eliza
across the painted ice floes. Dan Prince's two
Borzois had been off the boards for about six
weeks. They were not yet re-accustomed to the stage
lights. While the piano in the orchestra
pit thundered out its menacing music, Nicolette
jerked on her leash and began barking. She wouldn't
stop. Then Nicolai looked stage left, instead
of stage right at the fleeing Eliza, and relieved
himself.
The audience howled. But worse was in store.
Leo Goldman was far too young to play
Eleanor's father, St. Clare. Even with his stirring
voice, he couldn't carry it off, and the audience let
the players
know it. Loudly. Eleanor was so unnerved, her
opening scene as Eva totally lacked the conviction
she'd given the part in rehearsal. She knew she was
floundering and doing a lackluster job, and the more she
fretted while she was on stage, the more nervous she
became.
Then, behind the scenes, she found herself cornered in
semi-darkness by J. J. Bascom. He insisted
he needed help getting into his Legree coat.
That turned out to be a pretext for pawing her. She
made him cross by repeatedly pulling away.
"Your coat fits perfectly, Mr. Bascom."
She yanked it smooth around his collar, again dodged
his groping hand and hurried off.
Either Bascom was still angry with her when he
made his first entrance, or bombast was his regular
style. Whatever the reason, he roared and foamed and
overacted dreadfully in the part of the overseer. Dan
Prince, on the other hand, was surprisingly good as
Tom, even though he reeked of whiskey during the
entire six acts-something that reminded Eleanor of
her late mother, and further unsettled her.
One of the other actors derisively told
Eieanor that Prince drank to make his slurred
dialect that much more realistic. She thought it was a
nasty, vindictive thing for an actor to say about a
member of his own company. Probably the man was just
jealous of Prince's talent. It was another jolting
lesson. The theater certainly wasn't the
glamorous and idealistic place she'd imagined.
Drunk or not, Prince drew loud and
spontaneous applause when he ascended to heaven in
the final tableau. The applause might have lasted
longer but for another mishap. Eva-Eleanor-was
seated on a cutout dove hung beside the gates of
heaven. One of the wires supporting the dove
suddenly broke. With a surprised screech,
Eleanor fell to the stage. She landed in a
graceless sprawl, discovering a moment later that her
wig of
yellow curls had tumbled off. Dazed, she thought
she should retrieve it as fast as possible. She
started crawling toward it but was frozen in place by the
booming sound of laughter.
Considering all the flaws in the show, the audience was
surprisingly generous with its applause at the final
curtain. Prince took the last bow, Bascom the
penultimate one, and Martha Prince the one before
his. Despite her age, the actor's wife was
marvelous as Topsy. She'd danced the character's
breakdowns with a liveliness that startled and enthralled
Eleanor as she watched from the wings.
While the sets were struck and crated under the
profane supervision of the midget stage manager,
ladies of the town came in with hampers containing a
cold supper for the company. Several adolescents-so
Eleanor thought of them, having gotten through one
complete professional engagement, albeit
wretchedly- lingered on the sidelines. The young people
watched the actors enviously, but were too shy to speak
to them. For a brief moment she felt vastly
superior. Then she remembered her poor performance
and decided she was being an arrogant ninny.
On top of that, she noticed Miss Ruthven staring
at her in a hostile way. After that,
Eleanor couldn't eat so much as one piece of cold
chicken.
The moment the townspeople left, Miss Ruthven
again collared Bascom and yelled her complaint. In
the first tavern scene, Eleanor had been sitting
upstage near a cutout window. She'd done her
best to pantomine the part of a lively, convivial
rustic. Too convivial! Miss Ruthven screamed
to the manager. Eleanor had deliberately upstaged
her-and then done miserably in her own part.
Eleanor tried to apologize and tell Miss
Ruthven the first crime was unintentional. The
actress turned her back. She threatened to quit
the company and return to
New York to accept an ingenue role unless
Bascom discharged Eleanor, who by then was ready
to burst into tears.
Abruptly, Dan Prince came lurching on
stage, his neck still stained by his blackface
makeup. Rings of it surrounded his red-rimmed eyes
as well. He could barely stand upright as he passed
Leo Goldman. He gave the young man an
affectionate pat, then moved on to Eleanor and put
his arm around her. He acted drunk but he sounded
sober:
"Addie, shut your mouth. We all know-that is, those
of us who are experienced hi this troupe know- that you
insist on initiating all newcomers. Very well,
you've done it. Miss Kent was brilliant in
rehearsal and rotten on stage. You've had the
same experience a hundred times, I'll wager.
So let her alone and stop those silly threats. You
know full well that no New York manager is
going to hire you to play an ingenue any more than
he's going to hire me to play a romantic lead."
He glowered. So did she. Then Miss Ruthven
whirled and stamped off stage. Prince squeezed
Eleanor again, belched softly, and staggered away.
That ended the battle, but she suspected the war would
continue.
There on the swaying platform, Eleanor asked herself
whether it was worth staying in the company and struggling
against Miss Ruthven's obvious enmity. She just
didn't know. In one evening, she'd lost her
enthusiasm for trouping. The applause from the audience
seemed ludicrous in view of the production's
excesses, miscast-ings, and mistakes. The
scenery showed its age. So did the costumes.
Altogether, Bascom's was a third-rate troupe.
No, tenth-rate-or worse.
She gazed at the starry arch of sky in a forlorn
way, letting the night wind spread her hair like a
dark flag again. She felt small. Frightened. She
wanted to go home-
The door of her car crashed open. In terror, she
pressed against the rail. For a moment she saw no one
in the dark rectangle. But she was certain it was the
troupe's proprietor, come to find and discharge her.
A cloud of whiskey fumes floated out, followed
by Daniel Prince in a quilted dressing gown with a
large hole in one elbow.
He shut the door behind him. A sudden sway of the
train hurled him sideways. Eleanor shrieked
softly, grabbed the dressing gown and kept Prince
from tumbling down the steps and over the chain to the rocky
embankment.
"Mmm," Prince muttered. "Damn rough
roadbed. Guess I'd better hang on."
He reached for the rail and missed. On the next
attempt, Eleanor guided his hand.
"Thank you," he said, using the words as the cue for
sliding his left arm around her shoulders. He felt
her stiffen. "Martha woke me. She heard you leave
the car and thought I should see whether you were all right."
He was sounding surprisingly sober all
at once. "Care to. tell me your troubles?"
"I was awful in the play, Mr. Prince."
He thought a moment. "I couldn't agree more. But as
I told Addie, it's happened to every actor. As you
gain experience, you'll learn to save yourself in
rehearsal so there'll be energy left for the performance.
You shouldn't worry too much. The audience didn't
go so far as to throw things. Only your colleagues
knew how really bad you were," he finished with a
chuckle that took the sting from the remark.
"Well," Eleanor replied, "I don't know
whether I'll be around long enough to learn from my
mistakes."
"Mmm," he said again. "Are you homesick?"
"V."
"So Martha and I suspected. I hope that will
pass. After a night or two, you'll be splendid
as Little Eva,
take my word. Even Goldman won't be half
bad once he learns how to use makeup to age
himself. Handsome boy, Goldman."
"Mr. Prince, I don't mean to offend you, but
except for the scenes when you or your wife were on
stage, the whole show was terrible. The audience knew
it, too."
He digested that. "Of course they did. But they
stiDo enjoyed themselves. They helped create the
illusion that they were witnessing a passable performance.
We created the illusion that we were presenting one-and more
important, we sustained it afterward. You'll find that
actors are superb at convincing themselves they were grand
when they weren't at all. You have a candor that's
refreshing, Eleanor-was He squeezed her shoulder.
"And you do have talent. I, by contrast, shall never be a
performer of the first magnitude. I might have had some
chance at one time, before certain-appetites of mine
got the better-well, never mind that. Merely let
it be said that I do have an eye for spotting talent in
others. Even more of an eye than old Horace."
"Who?"
"Horace. Bascom. That's his real name."
It struck her as funny, somehow. She laughed, and
Prince went on:
"When Horace auditions females, he tends
to be mesmerized by bustlines and speculations about who
might be willing to warm his bed." There was an odd
undertone of disgust in the actor's voice. His eyes
drifted to the passing hills. "This time Horace
chose wisely-as regards ability, I mean
to say. I was genuinely impressed by your
reading at the rehearsal. I do believe that with the
proper guidance and a few strokes of good fortune*
within ten or twelve years you can be an actress who
is respected and sought after by the leading producers and
managers. I'd even go so far as to say you might
well be one of the reigning ladies of the American
stage."
For several moments she couldn't speak. And then she
could only think of something hopelessly inane:
"That's very kind of you, Mr. Prince."
"Kindness has nothing to do with it, my dear. I told
you the truth. If you do achieve what I think you can
achieve, limitless possibilities will be open
to you. The most important, I suppose, would be in
connection with a marriage partner."
She wanted to tell him she had no interest in that
sort of thing. But she didn't want to interrupt and
perhaps hurt his f eelings.
"You'll be able to do much more than select from one or
two gentlemen of promising but unrealized
potential. You'll have a flock of 'em after you.
Men who've already made their marks. Piled up
fortunes, or gotten hold of the reins of
political power. It won't be a case of too
narrow a choice, but too wide a one.
And it all comes from making the stage your conquered
province. You can do it. You have the beauty. I am
now satisfied that you have the talent. The only thing
lacking-indeed, the ingredient even more essential than
natural ability-is ambition. Without it, you'll
never reach the pinnacle. With it, you'll be there while
you're still young and vigorous enough to enjoy it."
It was a dazzling prospect, and his sincerity almost
convinced her it was a realistic one. But she didn't
want a husband, ever. She especially didn't
want a husband who was a Congressman or a
stockbroker. She only cared about one person, and
she hardly dared admit that to herself-
Prince took her silence for suspicion.
"Believe me, there's no ulterior motive behind
all I've said. Indeed, I shall be happy to look
after you hi a most fatherly fashion, and see that
Bascom doesn't drive you wild with his pawings and
slaverings. Has he started?"
"Oh, just a bit. I fended him off, though." 766
"Good. It isn't hard."
"No, it isn't."
"Horace is really quite a decent fellow.
Godawful actor, but a decent fellow. As soon
as you've discouraged him once or twice,
he'll be off chasing some skirt he's spied in the
audience. How he keeps it up at his age is beyond
me. Just be assured, my dear-I have no interest in
you as a bed warmer."
"I've never worried about that," she told him
truthfully. "You and Mrs. Prince seem very
happily married."
His laugh was touched with cynicism. "We are. In
our profession, marriage is a great convenience.
Two can eat more cheaply than one. Martha and I
constantly help one another with lines, and with
interpretations-we fix each other's costumes-it's
an ideal arrangement. As for romantic
inclinations-was He shrugged. "Mine do not lie in the
direction of the female sex."
The statement had an aggressive ring to it, as if he
were deliberately defying her conventional notions of
morality. And in truth, she was shocked. She'd
heard of men who felt as he did. His thoroughly
masculine manner had deceived her-though come to think of
it, she'd noticed him being almost excessively
cordial to Leo ever since the troupe left New
York.
She hid her feelings. The tension went out of the
moment. Musing, he went on:
"But if I have any suspense passion, it's for the
applause. I see the same worn, shabby
backdrops that you do. I stand in the wings and watch
Nicolai misbehave in front of several
hundred people and I think, my God, this is a
profession for madmen, and the people are equally mad to pay
fifty cents to view such a debacle. But then the
final curtain approaches, and I ride to heaven in
my gold car, and the sound that comes swelling up from the
house makes me quite willing to deceive myself for the rest of
my life. Deceive myself into be
lieving this tawdry existence is beautiful. That it's
art That it matters. You, though-was
Another squeeze. This time she managed to stay
relaxed.
"You won't have to practice that kind of deception when
you're my age. Before long, you'll leave Horace
and Addie and the rest of us far behind."
Suddenly the door opened. Prince quickly lowered his
arm. "Oh, Goldman. Good evening," he said rather
stiffly.
Eleanor was embarrassed. So was Leo:
"Good evening-ah-I was only looking for
Eleanor-excuse me-was
Prince waved. "No, come out, come out
I'm just leaving."
Leo hesitated, then moved past him to stand near
Eleanor. The older man added, "Make sure she
doesn't stay out here too long, my boy. We
don't want her coming down with a sore throat or
chilblains."
Eleanor leaned forward and planted a kiss on his
cheek. "Thank you," she whispered.
He blinked and reached for the handle of the door. The
train swayed on its way around a long curve.
Prince lost his balance. Leo grabbed Ms arm.
"Don't fall, sir."
With a look so intense, it made Leo glance away,
Prince patted his hand and then disengaged. "Oh, no,
my dear boy," he said with a little smile. "That
happened many years ago."
He touched two fingers to his brow-a salute that
somehow had great panache despite the hour and the
setting. Then he turned, opened the door, and
stumbled as he went inside. "Goddamn it," they
heard him mutter as he disappeared, "I hate
spoiling an exit."
"Are you all right, Eleanor?"
"My," she said, "I seem to have my share of
guardians this evening."
"It's very late. Almost dawn, I'll bet.
Prince wasn't- bothering you, was he?"
"I think he's the last person who'd ever try that."
"I'm not so sure." Leo rubbed his upper arms
slowly; he'd donned an old, faded overcoat
on top of his night shirt. His feet were bare, like
hers. "I was worried when you came out here by yourself.
Then Prince trailed you and I got even more
worried."
"Were you lying in your berth listening?"
A nod; a rueful smile, "I couldn't sleep
either. I was thinking."
"About what?"
"Y."
She tingled, hearing that word-and suddenly she realized
her fear of affection had weakened ever since her
reconciliation with her father. It was as if that moment had
shattered some invisible chain, just a moment ago, she'd
kissed Dan Prince and not even thought twice.
Still, she remembered how the men who'd come to the house
had hurt her. A tightness spread through her loins and
up into her breasts. She sensed that a crisis had
come; one which Leo could know nothing about
Nor did she dare tell him. Instead, she said:
"I was doing some thinking too. I played
my part so badly in Albany, I was actually
thinking of resigning from the troupe and going home.
Mr. Prince encouraged me to stay-was
"Good!"
"comand I decided I had to because it's wrong to be a
quitter. People in our family just don't do it."
All at once she felt incredibly tired.
"We'd better get some
rest, Leo. We have to play Syracuse tomorrow nigh-
no, tonight. It's already Tuesday, isn't it?"
She started to move by him to the door. She didn't
trust herself out here alone with Leo. She knew how
he felt, and if she broke down, it would only
lead to-
His hand closed gently on her forearm. She started
to protest, then saw by starlight that his mouth had set in
that determined way. He said softly:
"Before you go, I want to tell you one thing. I thought
you were wonderful tonight."
"Oh, Leo, I wasn't."
"Then we disagree."
"I was so afraid-was
"Of what?"
"Everything."
His face was suddenly very close. And there
were delicious feelings in her arm where he held her.
The tightness was melting, and no matter how she warned
herself about the danger, she didn't seem to care about
it. The starlight, Prince's reassuring words,
Leo standing so close and touching her so tenderly all
conspired to allay her fears and leave her open to a
flood of wondrously new emotions.
"You mustn't be afraid of anything, Eleanor," he
said. "Not of yourself, and not of me. I know things have
hurt you hi the past. I don't know what they are,
I just see it in your eyes sometimes. But you mustn't be
afraid of me, because I love you, and I have since that
day I saw you at the Academy. I'd die before
I'd hurt you intentionally-I'd die if I hurt
you accidentally, too. I'm going to make you love
roe. I never thought we'd be together on this tour, but
now that we are, I swear I'm going to make you
love me as much as I love you."
Then his head blocked the stars as he bent to kiss
her.
For the first few seconds she was terrified. She
tasted 770
the warmth of his lips, and felt their gentleness; felt
how lightly, almost respectfully he held her with
just one arm resting over her shoulder. The
fear faded.
She slid her arm around him, drew away just a little
and said in a hushed voice:
"Do you know, I think you might."
Then she kissed his mouth with the ardor she'd denied far
too long.
rv
After the kiss, he was the soul of courtesy. He
continued to hold her, but he sensed the lingering tension in
her and went no further. He put his old overcoat
around her. Miraculously, both her chilliness and
her tiredness vanished in an instant.
They stood talking in that shy, excited way lovers
have, speaking of where they were going-far out beyond the
Mississippi-to places they had only read
about. She was unexpectedly, unbelievably
happy. She could look forward to working. To perfecting
her craft. And to being with Leo. Perhaps Prince's
prediction would come true, and Leo's as well.
Finally they fell silent, and she nestled against
Leo's chest. He stood behind her, his arms around her
and very lightly touching the undersides of her breasts through
her robe. With his lips close to her ear, kissing
gently every moment or so, they watched the immense
banners of stars the night had unfurled.
The sky made her think of the flag. How many states
had she seen in her lifetime? Only Virginia,
New York, and those between. But the flag had
thirty-eight stars now-Colorado had come in during
the centennial year-and a population of nearly fifty
million people.
Fifty million! So many-and so much country,
westward beneath the arch of stars.
How wonderful to see it with someone like Leo. The
prospect thrilled her. She'd write papa and
tell him everything she was doing-
Well, almost everything.
"Leo?"
She covered her mouth to hide a yawn she couldn't
hold back. Then:
"Yes."
"I have to go to bed."
He cleared his throat in an exaggerated way.
"At your service, madam."
To her astonishment, she found she could make light of
something terrifying. Perhaps it would always be terrifying;
perhaps the shame and the pain could never be expunged. Yet
she took it as a hopeful sign that she was able
to tease him:
"By myself, Leo Goldman. We aren't
married yet."
"We will be."
She laughed. "You're impossible."
"And patient. Very, very patient."
On tiptoe, she kissed him, then took his hand and
led him into the darkness, her fingers twined with his in
perfect trust.
CHAPTER XII
Julia's Fate
ORDERLIES IN BLOOD-SPECKLED
white aprons moved up and down the hallway where
Carter and Will waited. The boys sat on a bench
whose old wood was nearly as bleached and pale as their
faces. It was three in the morning; Tuesday. From
time to time Will reached out to pat Carter's hand.
The second floor of the New York Hospital
at Duane and Broadway reeked of strong soap
and other, less appetizing substances. Julia had
been rushed to the hospital by ambulance, while
Mills had taken the calash to upper Fifth
Avenue to summon Gideon.
Carter and Will had said they wanted to accompany
Gideon to the hospital. The boys had been
waiting on the bench for nearly five hours. Carter
sat motionless, staring at the old, worn
flooring. The gas jet above the bench cast a
sickly, wavering light on his face, and on Will's
sagging head and drooping eyelids. Will jerked upright
when a woman screamed in the distant reaches of the
hospital.
He shuddered. Carter put his arm around the smaller
boy and held him.
Some five minutes later, Gideon emerged from the
nearby ward. His step was unsteady, his face pale
and perspiring from the fever that still plagued him. Both
boys watched Gideon. His expression quickly
dulled the hopeful light in their eyes.
Carter's voice was barely audible as he asked,
"Any change, sir?"
Gideon shook his head. He sank down on the
bench next to Julia's son. "It may be hours,
or days, before there's a change one way or another.
You're too old for me to lie to you, Carter. Her
condition is extremely serious. In the war, the
surgeons always despaired when an ambulance brought
in a man who had a stomach wound. The consultant
I called in. Dr. Bradwell, is one of the
best in the city. But even he's almost helpless. There
just are no techniques for treating a wound like your
mother's."
"Then will she-will she die?"
Gideon seemed stricken hoarse. "As I told
you, we may not know until tomorrow, or for several
days."
Will couldn't tell whether his father was overcome with
sorrow, or with anger. A little of both, he thought as
Gideon said:
"Very slim."

At sunrise, Gideon persuaded the boys to go
home with Mills while he kept the vigil.
Shortly after eight, he was called from Julia's
bedside to speak with a police inspector in the
hallway.
The inspector reluctantly informed him that a
sweep of Tenth Avenue had turned up no
reliable witnesses to the stabbing. Several people had seen
it, but most recalled the attacker only as a
poorly dressed tramp. No one could remember a
face, or a voice. The witnesses even disagreed
on what the attacker was wearing. The inspector had
three descriptions, no two of which matched.
Gideon had suspected it would come out that way. He
simply stared at the inspector until the man
doffed his derby and mumbled that he'd keep
Mr. Kent apprised of any new developments.
Then he put on his hat and shuffled toward the
stairs,
Gideon went back into the ward and presently fell
asleep in the chair beside Julia's bed. When Dr.
Brad-well woke him, afternoon sunlight was streaming
in. In the bed beyond, a young man who'd lost a leg
in a street railway accident moaned in pained
slumber.
Bradwell surveyed Julia's still hands resting on
the sheet. The backs of her hands were so white, her
veins were clearly visible.
"You'd better go home and rest a while," the
doctor advised him.
The pain beat like red waves in Gideon's mind.
"I have to wait until I know whether she'll make
it." He
had never experienced such pain before; not with Margaret,
not with his own father-never.
"Mr. Kent, I've told you before-was Bradwell
sounded a trifle impatient "It may be days.
There is nothing you can do."
He saw Thomas Courtleigh's face. Yes there
is.
"All right. I'll go home."

Two days later, Julia rallied for a few
hours, then began sinking again. Gideon sat with her
all Thursday night and into Friday morning, listening
to her shallow breathing and saying to himself that he had to go
on alone even if she died. The trouble was, he
knew he couldn't.
Perhaps because he was exhausted and still sick, sometime during
that long night something seemed to click over in his
mind, just as it had the night be walked out on
Margaret. Around seven, he kissed Julia's
chilly forehead. Her lids barely stirred. An
hour later, up on Fifth Avenue, Carter
discovered him packing a valise.
The boy thought Gideon looked strange and wild.
He spoke almost incoherently, as if he'd lost his
*d. In a way, he had.
IV
"Out of town?" Theo Payne exclaimed later that
morning. "At a time like this?"
Gideon stood beside Payne's desk at the
Union. "I'll keep in touch by telegraph.
Brachvell said there is absolutely nothing I can
do here."
The editor's eyes narrowed, ""You're
going to Chicago, aren't you?"
Gideon didn't answer,
"There's nothing yon can do out there, either. I've
followed the dispatches Sal Brown sent back. I
know you think that bastard on the W and P was
responsible for wrecking your house-was
"And for Margaret. And now Julia. And for the death of a
boy named Torvald Ericsson. And for God knows
how many more that he's starved or cheated into ruin.
Competitors, employees-was
"You thought you could get at him through that name your daughter
heard. What was it? Huxtable?"
"Hubble. One of his attorneys."
"It hasn't proved out has it?"
Gideon shook his head.
"You've got to be realistic, Gideon. In this
country- in every country and every era-certain men are
virtually untouchable. Their power, or their money and
those they can hire with it, put them above the law. It
shouldn't be so, but it is. It's the way of the world. In
the United States we seem to be going through a long
period of just that sort of thing. We'll either rise up
against it, and curb it as best we can, or the rot that
it's generating will spread and destroy everything that's
admirable about this country. In any case,
it isn't just your crusade."
Gideon didn't say anything.
"Look," Payne exclaimed, "you've run into a
mao who's above the law! Why waste your time with him?
You'll only make yourself feel worse. You'll
find the lawyers are no better in Chicago, and can
do no more than lawyers right here. Courtleigh
probably owns or can buy most of the Chicago
police department, too. What can you possibly
do?"
"I don't know," Gideon lied, "Search for new
evidence, maybe-was
Payne shivered. "That isn't what you plan at
all."
Gideon looked away. The little man began
to plead.
"For God's sake listen to me, Gideon.
Don't let one 776
rash act eradicate everything you've become.
Don't reduce yourself to his level. Remember
who you are. Remember the family you represent.
Don't let the Kents be accused of conducting their
affairs the way Court-leigh conducts his."
Gideon seemed oblivious. "Takte care of the
paper, Theo. You don't need me to run
it. You never did. But I do thank you for all you
taught me. Maybe I've done a little good in the
last few years."
"And you can do a great deal more if you don't allow
yourself to be driven into-was
Gideon had already turned and walked out.
Payne shivered a second tune, upset by the
rage he'd sensed hi the younger man, and by the finality
of his remarks. It all implied something he didn't
want to think about, but found he couldn't avoid.
At least not until he yanked the drawer of his
desk open and reached inside.
In a dingy little gun shop on the Bowery, Gideon
stood for a long time studying the contents of the
flyspecked display case. Finally he pointed.
"I'd like to see that one."
The shopkeeper opened the back of the case. "Are you
sure? This is a LeMat. It's twelve
to fifteen years old. Manufactured hi France,
and imported mostly by the Rebs during-was
"I know what it is and who used it."
"Yes, sir, all right-anything you say."
Gideon examined the mechanism. Despite the
revolver's age, it was hi excellent working order.
He laid it on the glass. "I want
two dozen rounds of ammunition to go with it."
"Right away."
The revolver seemed the natural choice since the
last 777
hand gun he'd owned had been the LeMat he lost
the night of the Chicago fire. A LeMat went
all the way back to the very beginning of his trouble with
Tom Courtleigh.
Gideon put the box of ammunition in his valise,
laid the wrapped revolver on top and secured the
clasps. He had a sad, sinking feeling as he paid
for his purchases. He was sorry it had come to this. But
Sime Strelnik had been more realistic than he.
Strelnik had predicted long ago that he would deal
with the bosses this way, out of frustration and
despair-even though Strelnik had never guessed
Gideon's motive would be so personal.
He ordered the driver of his waiting hack to stop by the
hospital. The hack stayed at the curb while he
went inside. There was no change hi Julia's
condition. He knew from the eyes of the orderly to whom
he spoke that those working on the ward expected her
to die.
So nothing mattered any longer. Nothing but settling
accounts the only way left to him-the way
Courtleigh had always settled his. What happened
afterward- arrest, trial, imprisonment,
execution-was of no importance.
He climbed back into the hack and two hours later
was aboard a westbound train.
CHAPTER XIH
The Law and the Lawless
AT A STATION midway across Indiana.
Gideon left the train and sent a telegraph
message to the Union. He asked that someone learn
Julia's condition and wire the information to him in care
of the central Western Union office in Chicago.
The train pulled into the city an hour and a half
later. Gideon checked into the new Palmer
House, flung his valise on the bed and washed his
haggard face. He was exhausted. He'd spent the
entire journey wide awake. He just couldn't
sleep when he was traveling. Someday he should try
to teach himself to-
Someday? A humorless smile wrenched his mouth. There
weren't any more somedays.
He unpacked and loaded the LeMat. He studied
the revolver for several minutes, turning it one way
and then another in his hand so as to see it from different
perspectives. What he planned to do was
wrong. Absolutely wrong. It made him no
better than Courtleigh. But he had no intention of
canceling his plans.
He shoved the LeMat into the waistband of his
trousers, between his shirt and waistcoat, and buttoned
the latter. With his frock coat on, there was a
detectable bulge, but only a very slight one.
It was a mild August morning. With an unsmiling
face, he moved through the pleasant bustle of the
rebuilt downtown to the telegraph office. He
stopped outside. He almost didn't want to receive a
message. He knew what it would say.
Finally he went in. The clerk at the counter said,
"No, Mr. Kent, nothing for you. But we've received
no messages from the east for the last three or four
hours. Sometimes storms knock down the wires and
cause delays in transmission."
For an instant Gideon was both disappointed and
relieved. The clerk went on, "The trouble's
usually located and repaired fairly quickly. Perhaps
if you drop back in an hour or so-was
"No," Gideon said with a slight shake of his head,
"that will be too late."
Thomas Courtleigh's office was located on the
top floor of the new Wisconsin and
Prairie Building two blocks below the river on
Michigan Avenue. Gideon rode up in an
ornate elevator cage and stepped off in a
gloomy corridor.
To his left, at the corridor's end, he saw
heavy doors with elaborately etched inserts of
frosted glass. One door carried the word General
in gold leaf. The other said Offices.
He walked slowly, passing the closed door of
what appeared to be a service closet or work
room. On the other side of the door, a man was
coughing. It had a consumptive sound.
He passed through the main doors to a reception area
and was directed down a hall to a similar but
smaller area which could only be reached by the roxite he
was taking; thus it had a certain privacy. The
small anteroom held two cluttered desks at
which a pair of clerks-one in his thirties, one bald
and much older- faced one another. On a bench against
the far wall lounged a burly young fellow in a
garish plaid suit. He had a derby perched on
Ms knee and a Police Gazette in hands covered
with an assortment of cheap, bright rings. The lump of a
bolstered pistol was, unmistakable on his left
side.
Gideon gave his name to the senior clerk. He said
he wished to see the president.
There was no response to the name, and a dubious one
to his request. Would Mr. Kent state his
business? He would not. Well, the bald man would
take a card into the sanctum-he pointed to the heavy
scrolled doors of dark wood-but he didn't
hold out much hope.
Gideon produced a card, and the clerk's reaction
was pronounced. Evidently the New York
Union was well
known at W and P headquarters, even if
Gideon was not.
The clerk handled the card as if it were soiled.
"You'll have to allow Mr. Freeman to search you,"
he told Gideon while starting for the double doors.
"It's a policy we have been forced to institute
since demonstrators broke in here-no doubt
encouraged by radicals like you."
With that parting shot, the clerk vanished. The burly young
man stepped to Gideon's side. "Raise your
arms over your head."
Growing tense, Gideon obeyed. The bodyguard
patted him here and there while speaking to the other clerk:
"When's Kane coming back? I haven't
had breakfast yet"
"He'll be back soon, I'm sure."
"Where the hell is he, coughing his guts out again? I
don't like working around a man who's that sick." He
finished the search and stepped back. "Nothing on
him."
Gideon made an effort to keep his breathing calm.
One of the heavy doors opened. The bald clerk
emerged, looking astonished.
"Mr. Courtleigh will see you immediately."
Gideon smiled, but there was no mirth in the bright
blue eye. Its cool ferocity made the bald
clerk step aside.
"I thought he would," Gideon murmured, and reached
for the ornate gold doorknob.

The office was huge and impressive. It occupied
more than half of the frontage of the top floor. The
view was splendid from the row of tall windows to the
left of the massive walnut desk where Thomas
Court
leigh sat. The sun sparkled on the whitecapped
lake. There were scraps of sail visible near the
shore- pleasure craft-and a dozen or more lake
steamers spread out from the mouth of the Chicago
River to the horizon.
Yet the office itself seemed incapable of absorbing
much of the outside light, and the moment Gideon heard
the doors click shut behind him, the subterranean
feeling only increased. The place was joyless and
dark. Perhaps because of the heavy wood tones of the
ponderous furniture, the wainscoting, the
ornately carved fireplace and the chimney piece.
The walls were hung with idealized oil paintings of
W and P rolling stock, and with trophies of
hunting expeditions. Directly behind Courtleigh,
huge stuffed heads of a bison and a big-horned
buck deer jutted out. Glassy eyes lent the
heads an aura of sinister life.
The furnishings definitely contributed to the cheerless
atmosphere but so did the two unsmiling men staring
at Gideon. One was an obese young fellow, a
stranger. Gideon had anticipated at least one
bodyguard outside, but he'd hoped the president
would be alone in his private office, though of course
he'd known there was no way to assure it.
Well, even with all the restrictions, he would do
what he'd planned. The fat employee would be no
problem. He looked soft and weak.
Thomas Courtleigh tented his fingers.
"I'm genuinely astonished, Kent. I never
imagined you'd have the audacity to call here."
Courtleigh's auburn hair showed gray streaks
now. Wrinkles radiated from the corners of his
eyes. A pronounced paunch bulged the front of
his waistcoat and trousers. He'd been working in his
shirtsleeves when Gideon came in, and somehow
he looked as old and tired as Gideon felt.
"To what do I owe this dubious pleasure?"
Court782
leigh's hazel eyes were unreadable. "Surely you
didn't travel all the way to Chicago merely
to speak to me."
"But I did."
"Oh?" That one syllable carried an edge of mild
surprise. The beginnings of worry; alarm.
Gideon laughed silently as he stood before the
desk strewn with ledgers and memoranda.
"I'm a little surprised you'd admit me to this
office, Courtleigh."
"Mr. Courtleigh thought it might be amusing."
The wheezy voice brought Gideon's head around.
He'd turned his back on the obese young man who
overflowed a chair between two windows. Now he gave
the man a closer inspection.
The man's clothing was rumpled and dirty. His left
lapel bore specks of food, and one or two were
tangled in his silky mustache. His goatee needed
combing. All the hair on the lower part of his face
heightened the nakedness of his skull.
Though the young man had truculent eyes, Gideon
still didn't think he'd cause much trouble. The guard
was the problem. He'd have to strike quickly, before the man
could be summoned.
Sure enough, what he'd hoped for was right in front
of him. A blade for opening correspondence. It
lay within easy reach. The point wasn't as sharp as
that of a regular knife. But if driven with
sufficient force, Gideon was sure it could pierce
the skin, and kill.
Sweat began to gather on Gideon's forehead.
Courtleigh raised a hand. "No, no,
Lorenzo-was
Lorenzo? Lorenzo Hubble?
"com^th who oppose the formation of capital and the rights of
property owners-the very foundations of this country-can't be
considered even remotely amusing. They're
dangerous. Mr. Kent is dangerous. He's a
radical. A Marxist-was
"Or so you'd like everyone to believe,"
Gideon said. 783
"Yes, there you've hit it." Courtleigh smiled.
"It doesn't really matter whether you are a
Marxist, it only matters that the public is
convinced you are. If the allegation's repeated often
enough, the public will eventually believe it. As you
may have guessed, I and certain of my friends are
dedicated to that process of repetition -"
He frowned because Gideon was ignoring his little
speech, and staring at the obese man. Sounding
pettish all at once, Courtleigh said, "Mr.
Kent, Mr. Hubble. One of our attorneys."
Another smile; nasty. "And not in great favor
around here at the moment"
Gideon nodded. "I know the name."
Hubble's tiny eyes blinked. "You do?"
"My daughter heard it the night of July
twenty-second. From one of the men who broke into my
house and killed my wife. The man said he'd
received his instructions from someone named Hubble."
The obese man shot a worried look at his
employer, then blustered, "What land of ridiculous
charge are you making, Kent? Do you think I'm the
only man in America with that name? You said July
twenty-second? The weekend of the
strike? I was right here in--"
"Chicagoea*" Gideon finished. "Fve already
checked into that story. But I don't believe it."
He swung back to the desk. "Because I know how
Mr. Courtleigh has felt about me all these
years. He destroyed my house. Endangered my
children. Caused my wife's death and probably the
death of another mutual acquaintance who's lying in
a hospital hi mortal danger right this moment.
Oh-and we mustn't forget the thugs sent
to Pittsburgh. That's quite a list, isn't it? But
it's nothing more or less than what you promised six
years ago. I never thought you'd carry through on those
promises, but you did. Sick man that you are, you
did-and you've covered your tracks so you can't be
touched. Not unless someone's willing to settle with you
on a personal basis."
"Settle?" The word had a dry, papery sound.
"Settle," Gideon said, pronouncing it very
clearly. He was trembling now. "And pay the
consequences afterward. I'm willing."
Courtleigh seemed to lose confidence and shrink back
against his chair. He tried to smile, but it was a mere
twitching of the lips. "Surely this is a joke-was
"After all those things you did to me and my
loved ones? Hardly."
"Lorenzo, you'd better get Freeman or
Kane-was
The fat man struggled out of his chair; took a
step. "He can't be armed, Mr. Courtleigh. They
wouldn't have permitted him to come in if-was
"That's right," Gideon broke in. "I'm not
armed. I had a gun when I started out this morning.
I took it back to my hotel and left it there. I
wish I could say I did it because I was high minded.
I wish I could say I did it because I came to my
senses and realized violence only begets more of the
same. Unfortunately none of that's true. I just
recalled that I'd heard you employ guards here, and
I knew Fd never be allowed in this office if they
discovered the revolver."
He fought to keep his glance off the filigreed hilt
of the letter opener. He judged the distance. If
Courtleigh remained in his chair for a few
seconds, he could reach him; drive that dull point
into his throat.
Gideon's head hurt. His right eye was blurring a
little. He felt he was being swept down some long
chute and couldn't stop himself.
Hubble took another step. His left hand
slipped up over his paunch to unbutton his stained
coat. Gideon saw Courtleigh glance toward the
lawyer, but because of the eyepatch, he couldn't see
Hubble himself.
"And I wanted very much to meet you face to face,"
he went on. "I wanted to see whether you'd hide
behind
your money and your authority even here, and deny you were
responsible for all those things."
"Deny it?" Slam, Courtleigh's fist struck the
desk suddenly. Papers slipped to the carpet; a
ledger thumped. He jumped to his feet. "I would
never deny that in this office. You and I go all the way
back to Sidney Florian. You cost me the life
of a valuable man, and then you cost me the health and
sanity of the woman I married, and finally you cost me
Gwen herself. Deny what I did? Of course I
won't, you bastard. You deserved every bit of it. And
more!"
The words hung echoing between them. Gideon dared not
glance down at the letter opener for fear Courtleigh would
sense his purpose, and snatch the weapon out of his
reach. But pressure was building a terrible ache hi
his forehead. In his imagination he saw Theo Payne
accusing him with his eyes.
Gideon tried to concentrate on his surroundings.
Hubble was somewhere behind him-out of sight.
Courtleigh seemed to sense an advantage. He
smoothed his hair with a palm. Brought his strident
breathing under control. Continued:
"But of course, what you said earlier was entirely
correct. You can't touch me, or prove a single
one of your allegations. Should you be foolish enough to print
any of them in that rag you publish, no one would
believe them-least of all anyone charged with enforcing the
law."
"Because you're above it, aren't you?"
Courtleigh smiled again. "So I like to think. I
take your remark as a compliment, Kent. Since
we're being so frank, let me tell you one more thing.
Hubble has botched several assignments for me, and
he'll be a long while regaining my full favor.
One of the botches involved Miss Sedgwick. On
my instructions, Mr. Hubble sent a man after her.
The man followed her for several days before he found his
opportunity. Now I understand
she's still alive. I presume she was the mutual
acquaintance to whom you referred-?"
No answer. Courtleigh shrugged.
"It doesn't matter. I hope she
dies. But if she doesn't, be assured of this. The
next man I send will succeed."
Gideon's control broke. He shot his left hand
out and caught Courtleigh's throat, and with his right hand
seized the blade on the desk.
IV
Courtleigh was soft. Gideon had no trouble
dragging him forward with one hand. Or perhaps the rage that
he finally released lent him unexpected strength.
Courtleigh's thighs struck the edge of his desk.
Gideon kept pulling, his face red. As he
pulled, he pressed the point of the opener against
Courtleigh's neck and watched the man's
expression.
"Hubble!" That was the one word Courtleigh managed
to squeal as Gideon dragged him across the desk,
spilling more papers and ledgers. With his right hand he
dug the opener deeper into the skin. Another moment and
he'd pierce it; draw the first blood. He'd
keep pulling and pulling until he'd impaled
Courtleigh's throat on-
Remember the famity you represent.
Don't let one rash act eradicate everything-
"Help, someone help in here!" Hubble was shouting
while Gideon silently cried out for
Payne to leave him alone and let him do what was
deserved and long past due.
Bubble's voice seemed far away:
"Let go of him, Kent! I have a gun-was
It didn't matter. Only Courtleigh's huge,
horrified eyes mattered, and his face bloating under
Gideon's constricting hand. The metal point went
deeper.
Deeper-
Dorft let the Kents be accused-
Bellowing like some gored animal, Gideon jerked the
opener back and flung it behind him. With the frustration
pouring through him, he doubled his right hand and smashed it
into Courtleigh's face which had somehow become his own.
All of it had taken no more than a few seconds.
Hubble leaped forward to grab Gideon's
shoulder-"Stop it, Kent!"-as Courtleigh's nose
exploded with blood. Hubble's fingers tore
Gideon's coat. He twisted his head to the left
and saw a pistol in the lawyer's hand; evidently
drawn from a concealed holster.
Hubble's face contorted as he aimed at point
blank range. Gideon released Courtleigh and
flung himself to the right. He heard the office doors
crash open an instant before the pistol
thundered.
The bullet grazed the side of Gideon's neck,
or at least he thought so as he fell. His back was
toward the desk and the reception area. He broke his
fall with his hands. Dragging himself to his knees, he
shook his head to try to clear it. He heard a pained
cry.
Courtleigh was bracing himself on the desk with one hand.
He had a sick, disbelieving expression on his
face. So did the lawyer. Hubble's fat fist
all but bid the mechanism of his pistol. A curl
of smoke climbed from the barrel.
"You stupid-stupid-was Courtleigh gasped. He
couldn't go on. There were tears in his eyes as he
fell forward, his face striking the desk and sliding
off. He struck the carpet and lay still. Hubble's
bullet had found the wrong victim.
Frantic, Hubble glanced at the gun. Gideon
was vaguely aware of voices behind him. People in the
doorway. Two or three of them. One-it might have
been one of the clerks-exclaimed, "Don't let
anyone else in here! Block the corridor-was
All at once a sly glint showed under Hubble's
hah* 788
closed lids. He looked at
Gideon, then flung the pistol. It hit the
carpet and skidded up near Gideon's braced
left hand. Hubble spun toward the people in the
doorway.
"Get the police. He killed Mr.
Courtleigh. You saw it. You all saw it and you'll
testify to it, won't you?"
The bald clerk nodded quickly. "I saw it,
Hubble. I'll swear to it."
And then someone else spoke; the cheaply dressed
guard who'd replaced Freeman in the outer
office:
"I won't testify to that, Hubble. You shot him.
I watched you do it right after I opened the door, you
dishonorable son of a bitch."
Slowly, Gideon raised his head. He knew he
had gone insane. The deterioration of his mind must have
started when he let grief persuade him to put all
his principles aside and plan Courtleigh's
death. It had started then and culminated in
this-mirage; this- hallucination of a damned, deranged
man.
Who heard his dead brother's voice.
Who saw his dead brother's face.
The guard was looking at Gideon with
disbelief and something akin to agony. Gideon staggered
to his feet. In a barely audible voice, he
said, "Jeremiah?"
The bald clerk glowered. "What the hell's he
saying, Kane?"
"Jeremiah, it's impossible that-was Gideon
began.
Hubble didn't understand either. But he had more pressing
worries:
"For Christ's sake, Kane, how much do you want?
Five thousand dollars? Ten?"
"I won't take a penny," Jeremiah said. "You
killed him."
"Nobodyll accept the word of a known killer!"
Hubble shrieked.
"Maybe not, but after I tell my story, they'll
break down these other witnesses and get the truth.
You're not going to send this man to prison on my
say-so."
"Why do you care about him?" Hubble screamed.
"He's a radical! A Communist! Courtleigh
hated him!"
"Never mind," Jeremiah said, gazing at
Gideon. "I won't lie."
Hubble yelled a wordless syllable of
rage. Gideon couldn't believe the incredible ruin
he saw in his brother's face. Jeremiah was a young
man. A young man, Born when? Forty-six? That
made him thirty-one. He had the look of middle
age. His upper lip puffed as if he wore false
teeth that fit badly. A pair of spectacles
stuck from the breast pocket of his jacket. There was a
white streak in his hair. Phlegm rasped in his
voice; it had the sound of diseased lungs.
But he was alive. How? How?
Suddenly Hubble came lumbering at Gideon, who
was too startled to do more than sidestep and push him
away. Hubble ducked for the floor. Gideon
shouted:
"He's going for his gun!"
But Jeremiah saw. His lips compressed and he
reached under his coat with his right hand. Hubble snatched
up his own revolver.
Jeremiah's gun tangled in the lining of his coat.
Hubble fired. Jeremiah stepped backward, hit
in the middle. But he got his revolver loose at
last. Hubble saw that and tried to aim a second
shot.
Jeremiah's gun boomed. Hubble shrieked, in
genuine pain this time. He staggered
backward, spun and crashed against one of the tall
windows. He broke it and fell over the shards still in
the frame.
Pedestrians below saw the revolver from Bubble's hand
land in the street, frightening a dray horse. A
wagon driver shouted and pointed upward at the
grisly
sight of a man slumped over the sill of a broken
window on the top floor. From beneath the man's head,
streams of blood began to flow down the face of the
building.
vi
Jeremiah lay on the anteroom carpet. It was
wonderful and peaceful to know that it was all finished, and
that he'd never again need to fear Kola's prophecy
or the irreversible disease eating in his lungs.
He'd never again suffer the torment of having others
fail to recognize his name or have to endure the misery
of the animal teeth wired to metal rods and badly
fitted into his mouth to replace all the teeth that had
rotted.
He couldn't believe he'd found his brother here in
Chicago. He'd had no time to wonder how it came
about. But the attempt to ramrod Gideon into the hands
of the police had been all too clear, and
he'd done what he had to, and now there was a
bullet in him and he could rest.
He felt cool and comfortable as Gideon knelt beside
him. How had Gideon lost an eye? In the war?
If Michael Boyle had ever informed him about that
loss, he couldn't remember.
Gideon looked well for his age. Jeremiah
hadn't seen him enter the W and P offices. It
must have happened in those moments he was away, wracked
by another fit of coughing.
Someone said, "The police are coming."
Someone else said, "Yes. Hubbffence's dead, I
looked at him."
"Jeremiah-Jeremiah-how did you get here?"
Gideon said in a hoarse voice, touching his
brother's face. "We thought that after Atlanta-we
thought-was
"Oh," Jeremiah said, "that's a long story, as
they say."
And one I'd be ashamed to have you hear, 791
"Why does he keep calling him Jeremiah?" a
distant voice put in. "His name's Jason
Kane."
"What are they talking about?" Gideon asked.
"I had some-different names-because-it was
necessary."
Someone said, "He's Jason Kane around here.
He was a famous trigger artist once, before the
liquor got him."
And a lot of other things.
"Jason Kane," his brother said. "My God,
Jeremiah, my newspaper almost ran a piece about
a gambler named Jason Kane who was tarred and
feathered in Kansas City."
"Same customer, I'm-was Violent coughing.
"comsorry to say."
"My God," Gideon said again. "Out of nowhere, you
saved me from prison or worse-Jeremiah, can you
hear me?"
"Just-fine."
"They say there's an ambulance on the way.
We'll get you fixed good as new. Then there are a
hundred things I have to ask you-was
He felt the cold sweeping up through his limbs. In
panic, he thought, Jason Kane made a mark.
Not a good one. Not till the end. Maybe what
he'd done for Gideon would balance a little of the rest.
"Lots-of things-I want to ask-you-too-was
His voice was weakening. He felt tears, just like the
ones he saw on Gideon's face.
Suddenly the pain pierced him. He groped out with his
right hand. "Oh, Gid-hold on to me."
His eyes widened. Gideon closed his fingers around
Jeremiah's, cradling one hand in both of his and
crying as his brother's pain-wracked face smoothed
abruptly.
A strange half smile quirked Jeremiah's
mouth. His eyes cleared for a moment. He looked at
Gideon with absolute lucidity.
"I just-realized-it was-you who did this. Hubble
comshot me but it-was because of you."
Gideon knew his brother was out of his head because he was
saying something that sounded like an accusation. Yet he was
smiling.
"So-everything happened as it was supposed to. Just as
it was supposed-was
His head fell over.
Gideon spoke his brother's name twice, then
picked him up in his arms. Kneeling there, he held
Jeremiah while the warmth drained out of the body.
All the questions would be forever unanswered.
vu
With Thomas Courtleigh and Lorenzo Hubble dead,
the office clerks had no reason to risk perjury.
They told a straightforward story to the
Chicago police. Gideon was ordered to come
to headquarters to give a statement, and to attempt
to clarify the puzzling matter of the identity of the dead
guard, whom the clerks said was named Jason Kane.
That sure bad a familiar sound, one of the
policemen thought. He couldn't place it, though.
Gideon continued to insist the man known as Kane was
also his brother. It confused the police. It would
take some sorting out. Meanwhile, one of the
policemen was dispatched to get an undertaker.
Gideon's engraved card earned him polite
treatment from the police despite the way he kept
confusing them on the matter of names. When he insisted
he wanted to telegraph New York for his
attorney, the policemen saw no reason to deny the
request. He was, after all, a newspaper
publisher. One of the clerks verified that.
He was too numb to feel much of anything as they
escorted him out of the building and into a police
wagon. One of the officers even apologized for the
shabbiness of the transportation. He wasn't a
prisoner, but they wanted to accompany him to the station
and had no other vehicles available.
He didn't care. He felt dead inside,
condemned to a life without Julia.
And Jeremiah, who had been alive, after all, was
dead.
God help him, he'd never forget the sight of that
ravaged face. Nor would he ever be able to unravel
the riddle of his younger brother's strange words there at
the end.
Well, what did it matter, any of it? The world
belonged to his children; to Eleanor and Will, and to Louis"
son. There was nothing left in it that he wanted or
cared about.
A police inspector accompanied him into the
Western Union-office where he wrote a
telegraph message to the law firm that
represented the Union. He asked one of the
firm's senior men to board the first express for
Chicago, to help him clear up certain
difficulties with the police. He said he didn't
believe he was being charged, but that a lawyer's
presence was probably advisable.
As he started to leave, the clerk held out a sheet
on which a message had been penciled.
"Your reply came in about forty minutes ago,
Mr. Kent."
He didn't want to take it. The clerk forced it
on him.
Gideon glanced at the four words. New tears
sprang to his eye.
The message was signed PAYNE. It said SHE
WILL LIVE.
Will, the physician.
Eleanor, the celebrated actress.
Carter, the political boss,
Tom, the soldier.
These four
live the ultimate tragedy and triumph
of the Rents
as their tangled fates sweep them
from the frontiers of India
to the swarm of Ellis Island ...
the opulence of Newport,
the horror of the Haymarket,
the heroism of San Juan Hill
in
The Americans
eighth and final volume
of
The Kent Family Chronicles
Afterword
These last paragraphs for The Lawless are starting through
the typewriter at two-thirty in the afternoon
on New Year's Eve, 1977. It has been a
complex, exciting and sometimes frightening year.
Above all, it's been a year for which this writer owes
great thanks. Thanks for the continuing support and
patience of readers who were promised this novel much
earlier than they'll receive it-and for the opportunity
to see 1978 ring in. Last summer, there was a day
or two when I wondered if I would.
The Lawless was begun by a heavy smoker and finished
by a non-smoker who threw the weeds away when he
walked into a hospital last July, and hasn't
missed them since. The book was about half complete
and only moderately (as opposed
to catastrophically) behind schedule when I went under the
anesthetic to have a suspicious bit of lung
removed and trundled to pathology. There were no
dire findings-hence the thanks expressed above. But
a long period of the summer and early autumn just
plain disappeared.
Then came the time of a long-scheduled trip to Paris
to walk and authenticate some of the routes Matt
takes in this portion of the Kent story. My wife and
I hesitated to go. I was only partially recovered,
but street maps can only tell you so much about a
city. We took the trip, came home,
and virtually all of Matt's adventures went through
the typewriter again. Before, I'd had only the
facts. Now-so I hoped and still do-I had a little of the
spirit of the city of Paris, too.
While revisions on the book were being finished, a
production unit was set up at Universal City
Studios in Hollywood to begin preparation of the
TV miniseries based on The Bastard. Working in
theaters has taught me the risk of predicting how
a collaborative effort such as a play or film
will work out. A single ill-chosen cast member can
wreck the chemistry of a stage comedy, for instance.
But I have every hope for a TV production which readers
of these books will like. The show's executive
producer, John Wilder, who adapted The
Bastard for television, and the gentleman who wrote
the final tele-play, Guerdon Trueblood, have
come up with a version which-in script form, anyway-could
not make the writer of the book any happbber. It's
a good omen with which to start the year.
The three or four weeks immediately following the
surgery noted earlier were discouraging ones. My
family helped keep my spirits up. So did the
ever-ebullient Lyle Engel, and Marie Reno, the
very kind and capable editor in chief of
Jove Books, HBJ'S new incarnation of the
Pyramid imprint. Marie has since decided
to return to the creative vineyards-she writes a
mean novel herself comandthe loss is deeply felt.
For Lyle and Marie's patience and good cheer when it
was most needed-and for the subsequent encouragement and good
humor of Jove executive editor Lucia
Staniels, I am herewith duly grateful.
As I am to the two greatest manuscript typists
on the North American continent, Rose Ann
Ferrick and Evelyn Shaw.
Permit me a touch of sentiment on New Year's
Eve. It's good to be alive and in America.
JOHN JAKES
About the Author
JOHN JAKES was born in Chicago. He is
a graduate of DePauw University, and took
his M.a. in literature at Ohio State. He
sold his first short story during his second year of
college, and his first book twelve months later.
Since then he has published more than 200 short
stories and over 50 books-chiefly suspense,
nonfictiop for young people and, most recently, science
fiction. With the publication of The Furies, volume
four of the Kent Family Chronicles,
he became the first author in history to land three
novels on the best-seller lists within a single
year. The author is married, the father of four children, and
lists among his organizations the Authors Guild,
the Dramatists Guild, and Science Fiction
Writers of America. In both 1976 and 1977
he was awarded honorary doctorates for his
contribution to the Bicentennial observance-. He
says the most satisfying aspect of the phenomenal
success of the Kent family novels is "the mail
which reports that a reader has been motivated
to seek out some good nonfiction in order to read about
American history in greater detail. That kind of
direct response is what writing is all about-
and it makes all the hard work worthwhile."