1876 (39 page)

Emma gasped. The figures quickly separated. A shocked second as the four of us stared at one another; then we all burst out laughing and Denise and Sanford got to their feet, looking as confused as guilty lovers.

“I suppose,” said Denise, “our behaviour would be considered very wicked in Paris.”

“Quite the contrary,” I said. “You would be put on permanent exhibition at the zoo. The loving
married
couple. People would come from all over the world to look at you.”

It appears that Sanford arrived today in his car. Not wanting to interrupt lunch at Ferncliff, he had come here to see old friends, intending to present himself to Mrs. Astor this evening. Denise had discovered him, “Quite by accident. I was in the garden over there when he leapt out at me from behind a lilac bush, clapped his hand over my mouth and said, ‘I’m a veteran, ma’am, a Union soldier, and I’m going to ...’ The rest you can imagine.”

“How exciting!” Emma beamed her pleasure, but as soon as the loving couple moved on ahead of us, she frowned, was pensive.

“Did you know he was coming?”

“No. I don’t ...” She did not finish the sentence. We stopped a few yards from the tea hut, where a dozen guests were gathered about Sanford, apparently spellbound by one of his performances.

“You don’t what?”

“I don’t trust him.” Between Emma and me fell a single white locust petal.

“Does it matter that
you
trust him?”

“For Denise’s sake, yes, it does matter.” She was herself again. “But it’s none of my business. We must be neutral, as you always say.”

“But seldom am.”

I found Sanford unusually boring, even by his previous high standards. But he did bring news from Washington. “I was with Mr. Blaine on several occasions.” He sounded quietly important. We were in the carriage on our way back to Ferncliff, the light of the setting sun making a green fire of those leaves that come together like a roof over the river road.

“What does he say about the secret investigation?”

“That it’s secret, ain’t it?” Sanford cackled, like a Union veteran tramp-rapist. But seeing the look of dismay—disgust?—on my face, he assumed his grave statesman’s voice, rather worse, all in all, than the tramp’s. “Blaine says they’ve got nothing on him except some letters that aren’t incriminating but might be twisted about. He’s going to be nominated. We’ve seen to that.”

Emma and I exchanged a quick glance. Denise was half-asleep, head resting on her husband’s shoulder. Sanford, as far as I can tell, knows nothing useful.

Before dinner tonight, Emma and I met in the large drawing room; the others had not yet appeared. Masses of flowers everywhere made lovely the great room whilst causing my mucous membranes to swell. Although the smelling salts stop the sneezing, I am beginning to feel most odd, and wonder if, in time, they’ll stop the heart, too.

“I think you should go on to Newport with them,” I said, giving that advice which I am celebrated for never giving.

“I would like to go with you back to ... to ...”

“To the jungle?”

“To the zoo! I am pining for Mr. Blaine. But I agree, I think it’s best I go with Denise.” Without thinking, Emma started to re-arrange a vase of perfectly arranged Madonna lilies. “She needs looking after.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“If I knew, I would warn her.” This was swift. “I’ve just written John—with her permission—asking him to come to Newport as soon as possible.”

“For protection?”

Emma nodded. “In a way, yes. Also, it will look better. One needs, at times, a counter ...”

“A pawn?”

Emma gave me a sidelong mischievous look. “Oh, no, a knight, and a knight’s gambit often takes the queen.”

Ward McAllister sailed across the room, gorgeous in evening dress. “I have won a great victory, my dears! We are having
old
champagne with the shad! For years the Rose and I have argued.
I
say that ten-year-old champagne is superb with fish, particularly if it is flat as can be—the wine, not the fish—so, secretly, I smuggled several cases into the house and this afternoon she agreed, at the eleventh hour, to let it be served! Isn’t it terrible what the trains have done to that lovely house?” With McAllister there are no pauses in conversation, unlike his Rose.

I was again at Mrs. Astor’s side, and she declared that she would be sad to see me go. “Your beautiful daughter, too. The Princess is a charming addition to society. And quite my favourite
distant
cousin.”

I got the subject as quickly as possible from our dubious cousinage. “But then, we shall see you at Newport next month. We are staying with the Sanfords.”

“You
were
to stay with me.” Accusation in her voice; emeralds upon her poitrine.

“Perhaps another time.”

“Why is she marrying ... I have forgot the name?”

“Apgar.” Although Mrs. Astor is perfectly aware that the Apgars are related to almost everyone she knows, she has decided that they themselves are not yet knowable. The Astorocracy is stern: Vanderbilts and Belmonts are too glossy, Apgars too numerous and dim. “They are in love. And as you said yourself, girls do fall in love.”

For the first time in our acquaintance, I saw in Mrs. Aster’s face a look not only of intelligence but even of humour. “Oh, yes. That’s right. I did say that.” She took a sip from her glass and made a face. “I
hate
old champagne. How am I to tell Mr. McAllister?”

I am packed and ready to take the morning train from Rhinecliff (gone are my regal days of private cars). I have just said good night to Emma, who will not be up when I leave.

We talked of the Sanfords, and of how they have managed in some mysterious way to get themselves at the very centre of our lives. Emma’s attitude toward Sanford is openly hostile, and I can only put it down to straightforward jealousy. She wants Denise for herself. I find all this perfectly acceptable if surprising, since Emma has never before had a close woman friend.

I have just thrown the vial of smelling salts out the window. I am sure it was responsible for the alarming stops and starts of the heart that I have been experiencing during the last few days.

NORDHOFF’S FACE is no longer secret. “We’ve known for months about Mr. Mulligan.”

I write this on my lap, seated in a crowded committee room of the Capitol. Mr. Mulligan is testifying, or was testifying a few moments ago. I am so hemmed in that I can barely write in this book. Against the wall, opposite me, sit the members of the special committee charged with investigating Blaine’s financial arrangements. A majority of the committee is Democratic, and scent blood. The chairman is a hard-faced man called Proctor Knott.

Just beyond me, Blaine is seated in the front row; Garfield beside him. Nordhoff is behind me, bony knees gouging my back; his sharp barks punctuate the speeches of Blaine’s defenders, a beleaguered minority.

James Mulligan is from Boston. I still don’t know who discovered him. But he is a plausible, deliberate sort of man, an accountant, who once kept the books for Warren Fisher, creator of the now infamous Little Rock & Fort Smith railway. Some minutes ago he told the committee that a director of the Union Pacific named Elisha Atkins told him that Blaine turned over $75,000 in Little Rock & Fort Smith bonds to the president of the Texas & Pacific, Tom Scott, who insisted that the railroad give Blaine $64,000 for the worthless bonds.

I think I have got this straight. There have been so many interruptions. The Republicans on the committee make it as difficult as they can for Mulligan to testify. Blaine also interferes; from time to time, he whispers to one of the committee members.

Procedural matters at the moment. Speeches. Nordhoff just whispered in my ear, “More to come.”

I whispered back, “So far it’s Mulligan’s word against Blaine’s.”

“Wait.”

Not long to wait. A Democratic member of the committee has just asked Mulligan if he has any correspondence that might be relevant to the Blaine-Fisher connection.

Blaine sits up very straight; the ears are now paler than his face. Beside him Garfield slumps.

The members of the committee seem not to know what to expect. One is trying, pitiably, with weakened teeth to bite off a large chaw of tobacco.

Mulligan clears his throat. Looks about vaguely. “Well,” he says at last, staring at the still-intact plug of tobacco. “Yes, sir. I do happen to have some ... I mean, a number of letters from Mr. Blaine to Mr. Fisher ...”

But Mulligan’s voice is drowned in the sudden uproar. “Liar!” a man shouts. There is some hooting, some cheering. Blaine is now on his feet, talking to a member of the committee who then whispers something in the ear of Chairman Knott, who meanwhile is banging his gavel for silence. The appearance of sergeants-at-arms quiets the room.

The chairman says, “It has been moved by the ranking minority member that this committee be adjourned until tomorrow ...” More shouts from the audience: fearful that we would be robbed of our drama, and we were.

The motion was seconded, and on a narrow vote was carried. The committee stood adjourned. Blaine slipped out a side door. I am now back at Willard’s, writing this late at night. No doubt about it, even for a non-African, this was a most exciting day.

I had dinner with the Garfields even though I feared that amongst the guests would be Madame García, whose passion for me is like some prairie fire quite out of control in the subequatorial pampas, assuming that a pampas is not the same thing as a prairie.

My fears were justified. Once again the huge black eyes flashed their terrible invitation whilst the four breasts heaved in near unison whenever she looked my way, which was often.

“I prayed to our Lady of Santiago that you would return, and our Lady has answered my prayers!” So Madame greeted me.

“My own cup runneth over,” I said, rallying as best I could. Fortunately, Garfield drew me to one side. “How are things with your friend Tilden?”

“I suspect he will win.”

Garfield frowned. “That would be a terrible thing, you know. Not that Governor Tilden is not an honourable man,” quickly added. “But if he does succeed it will be due to a damnable combination of former Confederates, Catholics and the whisky interest.”

I was amused by Garfield’s sincere bigotry; and liked him no less for so perfectly reflecting the prejudices of his class and party.

We were eight at dinner, and to my surprise one of the eight was Puss Belknap. “I think she has suffered quite enough,” said Lucretia Garfield, in an aside to me. “Poor Puss,” she added on principle.

“I have so missed you and your lovely Emma!” Puss was in excellent form. “I will never, truly
never
forget the way you two rallied round me in my hour of agony, which still goes on, of course.”

“Will there be a trial in the Senate?” I have not been keeping up with the Belknaps as I should.

“Oh, yes!” Puss was bitter. “This is an election year, remember? And the Democrats will do
anything
to blacken us, which is why my angel will go on trial next month even though, as Senator Conkling himself said only the other day, the Senate has
no
jurisdiction at all because my angel is no longer a member of the Cabinet. Oh, they wish us to know the very depths of disgrace, the absolute bitterness of martyrdom!” But for all Puss’s Southern rhetoric, she seems to be enjoying herself; in any case, there is little likelihood of the Senate obtaining the two-thirds vote needed to convict.

“Now, of course, that demon from the lower depths, that Mr. Bristow, is after Mr. Blaine, who is as honest a man as ever served his country in the halls of Congress.”

“I am certain of that.” Puss did not notice my small joke. She blames all of the Administration’s troubles on the ambitions of Bristow combined with the savagery of the Democrats.

“Why, it is a positive duty of a congressman to help those railroads which have made this country of ours what it is today. Of course Mr. Blaine may have been a little bit careless, now and then, along the way, ’cause he’s got no head for business, you know. And he certainly made a big mistake when he took that mortgage for his Fifteenth Street house—a very good investment, by the way—from Mr. Jay Cooke.”

This was startling, I have just mentioned the matter to Nordhoff, who will look into it; he was suitably grim; he believes there is no end to Blaine’s corruption. At times I wish that I could take all of this as seriously as Nordhoff does. But I cannot. I regard the politics of the country as an ongoing comedy, which, this evening, has suddenly sheered off into wildest farce.

After dinner, while the gentlemen were still at table and working their way through a quantity of madeira, a messenger arrived for Garfield, who excused himself. From the parlour I could hear Madame García not only thumping out on the upright piano a ballad of unrequited Argentinean love but singing as well in a voice as piercing and as brazen as Fate,
my
fate.

Garfield returned; handsome face very thoughtful. We were expectant.

“What news?” From a Western senator; long white beard stained with tobacco juice.

“I suppose everyone will know by tomorrow.” Garfield sat down; manner most grave. “A note from Mr. Blaine. This afternoon he visited Mr. Mulligan at his hotel and they had a—well, a sort of reconciliation. Anyway, Mr. Blaine is now studying the letters and ...”

“Mr. Blaine has got the letters in
his
possession?” I was not certain that I had heard right.

Garfield nodded. “Yes. Mr. Mulligan was—obviously—most agreeable. Certainly he realized the importance of those letters to Mr. Blaine, not to mention to the leadership of our party and, of course, to the whole country.”

The Western senator applauded. “That Blaine has got more nerve than any man I know.”

“Well,” said Garfield, as though quoting Cicero, “a pound of pluck is worth a ton of luck.” I think he meant what he said, assuming that he was listening to himself.

I could not wait to tell Nordhoff, who was waiting for me in the bar at Willard’s. As usual, Nordhoff knew even more than I.

“I’ve just been with Mulligan. God never made a greater fool.” Nordhoff was not entirely sober—something very rare with him. He was also in a state of fury.