Madam (40 page)

Up on the second floor, in the Forbidden Parlor, as Anderson called it, a smaller but no less fancy crew of black girls sashayed about, sharing cordials with suited black men. From under a dashing headdress of feathers and jewels, Beulah held court. The guests would never know that Beulah had hardly recognized herself in the mirror after the beautician had been at her for over an hour. “My, oh my,” she’d gasped at her painted lips and cheeks and her tamed, slicked hair. “Lord, oh Lord!”

But one person was conspicuously missing from the festivities. Up on the fourth floor, Mary stood in the cupola, her flushed cheek pressed against the coolness of the window. She didn’t know what she’d expected to feel on her inaugural night, but it wasn’t this unsettledness that made her stomach churn.

She’d chosen to wear an emerald hue, feeling it was the color of new beginnings, so Paulina had sent to Paris for an emerald dress made to Mary’s measurements by the House of Worth. The dress was the loveliest Mary had ever seen, and yet it took two others to hook and cinch her into it, pulling her corset so tight she couldn’t take a full breath. The dress’s satin was thick and hot, and the crinoline beneath was stiff and scratchy. The neck extended up to Mary’s chin, and she felt her skin inflame from the rigid lace. She wouldn’t be able to sit, and she’d try not to drink anything, even though she was surrounded by fancy indoor toilet rooms. She even worried over her gorgeous emerald earrings, fearing the heavy jewels would tear right through her newly pierced earlobes. She was fulfilling her long-standing wish of getting all dressed up, complete with velvet gloves—yet in her daydreams, she hadn’t been a prisoner in her outfit.

In her hand, she gingerly held the printed photograph that the funny little man had taken, and she pressed it against the window to study it. There she was, back in that dank crib, in her tattered chippie and the torn striped stockings she’d taken from the trash. If only she could go back in time and tell that girl everything would be all right—and plenty more than all right. But then it occurred to her: that girl in the picture, the Mary of the Alley, she had such a look of composure, such a presence as she toasted herself with her splash of Raleigh Rye. Only now, as Mary was able to look back on her Alley life from this perch in what seemed another world, did she realize she’d been all right all along. It made her sad to think she’d so often dreamed of being someone else. This woman in the photo, this was the stuff of who she was. She wasn’t these fancy clothes, or this makeup, or these jewels. She wasn’t who she was because she was a madam.

Mary moved to the bureau that had been Mama’s—the only piece she’d brought with her from her former life. Opening the top drawer, she removed the A-B-C train cigar box. She propped the lid to reveal a roll of cash. She liked the box to feel heavy with her own money. In it, she set the photograph next to the postcard of The Arlington Hotel. She brushed the hair from the back of her neck and burrowed underneath the lace to unfasten Mama’s locket. She kissed it before dangling it into the box, next to Peter’s broken watch. She cradled the watch for a moment, clicking open its cover then snapping it shut just as he would do. She replaced it and closed the bureau drawer.

From downstairs, she could hear the spirited piano music rising up through the raucous din. She straightened her back, pressed her shoulders down, and lifted her chin.

Mary Deubler left the room and locked the door. Madam Josie Arlington descended the staircase.

E
PILOGUE

New Orleans, 1997

As I write this I feel like a schoolgirl again. I had drudged up this dear diary from a box in the attic—dare I say the last entry was from 1945, on V-Day, noting the momentous occasion! And now I am noting another occasion, momentous to only one person, and hardly so: it is the eve of my one hundredth birthday. Who would have ever thought? Certainly not I. It is an unsettling feeling to have outlasted every human being I know. I feel, in a way, like the frozen caveman who, in a rather cruel experiment is thawed and revived, only to realize that the world is unrecognizable.

This part of the world admires age, but not the person; that is to say, other than superficial awe at one’s ability to have withstood time, people are, for the most part, cold and unfeeling toward the elderly. At least that has been my experience; then again, perhaps I brought this attitude upon myself. Perhaps the seeds I’ve sown were not always those of love and devotion, and this is how my final crop will be reaped.

It is true, my past is flawed, and not necessarily by circumstance but by deliberate choice. My choices. It is long past time I make amends, but, alas, I will, in the time I have left, see that things are put right. Dare I say I was blinded by anger at the tender age of seventeen and did the unthinkable: turned against my own blood. Had my mother been able-minded, surely she would have shaken some sense into me, but dear Charlotte Deubler had suffered a stroke and had lost many capacities before passing several years later, may her soul rest in peace.

It was on my aunt Mary’s deathbed, her premature deathbed, brought upon by her own will it seemed, that she revealed to me her true identity—for I had been so sheltered as to not know that my dear, kind auntie, who had funded the best education for me in the most revered convents of Europe, made her fortune by sins of the flesh.

I will never forget the moment she told me. I was at her bedside in her lovely home on Esplanade. I held her hand, which was unusually cold, despite her fever.

“I must tell you the truth. All of it,” she said, her breath labored. I couldn’t believe my ears as she told me that she was known by a different name for reasons that were unsavory. I recall gasping, cursing her for lying. But this was only the beginning of the truths she insisted on revealing, even though I begged her not to. I didn’t want to know, I truly didn’t. I loved Auntie with all my heart and couldn’t bear the thought that she was a sinner.

“My livelihood,” she said, her chest heaving, “was made on Basin Street, in Storyville.”

I knew very little of Storyville, other than the mutterings I’d hear about debauchery, immorality, the Devil’s plot. It took me some moments to even process what she meant by this, that is how sheltered and naive I was.

“I am known as Madam Josie Arlington,” she’d said. It all seemed a cruel joke.

“That’s impossible. You’re Mary Deubler,” I insisted, forcing the frail woman to repeat herself again and again: “I am known as Madam Josie Arlington, one of the most notorious, wealthy, and feared madams.”

I collapsed into tears and it became she who was trying to console me. But I would have none of it. I cursed her. Yes, cursed her given name. Dare I say I even spat at her bedside. I ran from the room, and that was the last time I saw my aunt. I can only imagine that I hastened her already untimely death. And I am positive it was I who created the cardinal sin: I disrespected her passage, not showing my face at her funeral, not honoring her memory.

Please, dear God, please forgive me.

Many years later, I came across a note of Auntie’s, which I kept in my own files all these decades. She wrote:

“No woman’s innocence was taken on the grounds of my establishment. I was responsible for no woman’s entry into the profession; each woman lived and worked within The Arlington house of her own free will.”

It is this note, I believe, that reveals her true motives. As I read it now, I feel a sense of pride, at long last, to be her blood.

Despite my years of disgust at her legacy, I have, for reasons I could never explain, preserved what artifacts remained from my aunt after the city set torch to Storyville at the beginning of the Great War (it seems the District had proven too tempting for soldiers at nearby base camps). I will bequeath my aunt Josie Arlington’s collection to the University of New Orleans archives. Her history, in the form of her photographs, her jewels, the Blue Book directories, her license to own a brothel within the District, her record albums signed by Mr. Jelly Roll Morton, and her portraits taken by E. J. Bellocq—the few that remain, even those with her face vandalized—these are all record of a time gone by, a time that should be remembered and taught in classrooms, both the history of New Orleans and the history of feminism. These are relics that should no longer be hidden from view, speech, or thought. My greatest hope is that others may learn from her just as I have, albeit shamefully late.

I pray that my sweet aunt will open her arms to me when we see each other in Heaven.

May God Rest Her Soul,

Anna Deubler Brady

H
ISTORICAL
N
OTE

W
hile
Madam
is based on the true events of Storyville, which existed from 1898 to 1917, we did utilize dramatic license to fill in missing information, to provide detail and context, and to create a linear thread that we felt would best compel the story. All of the major characters are based on real people; although, we used composite characters in limited circumstances, such as: Mary Deubler had two brothers, Peter and Henry. We merged the two since we could find very little about Henry, although he was father to Anna; Peter Deubler was murdered by Philip Lobrano. Mayor Walter Chew Flower held one term during the period when Storyville was inaugurated; however, we merged his character with Mayor Martin Behrman, who was New Orleans’s longest-term mayor in history—from 1904 to 1920—and who spoke many of the lines of dialogue throughout the book that we attribute to Flower. Judge Beares was actually a senator who pre-dated Storyville, although he did meet his fate at the hands of New Orleans’s first high-class madam. While all other characters based on real people were documented to have been in Storyville, we utilized dramatic license to have them all appear during Storyville’s inaugural year; for example, Louis ArmAcknowledgments

T
hroughout our many years of research, we owe a debt of gratitude to scholars, art historians, and Storyville-philes who inspired and guided us along the way. One of our earliest and favorite sources was Al Rose’s
Storyville, New Orleans: Being an Authentic, Illustrated Account of the Notorious Red-Light District
. Rose’s book is an encyclopedic and photographic romp through the Storyville and jazz era, and much of his collection of photographs and archives can now be found at Tulane University. Al’s son, Rex Rose, inherited the torch and is one of the foremost experts on E. J. Bellocq. Rex has been extremely helpful in corresponding over the years, and we are grateful for his time and resources. We benefitted greatly from Alecia P. Long’s
The Great Southern Babylon: Sex, Race, and Respectability in New Orleans 1865–1920
. Ken Burns’s
JAZZ
PBS series provided some of the feel and context that informed this book, and Alan Lomax’s
Mister Jelly Roll
and
Jelly’s Blues
by Howard Reich and William Gaines allowed us to hear Jelly Roll Morton’s (aka Ferdinand LaMenthe’s) voice in our heads and to utilize some of his own words. Likewise, we gleaned details from Danny Barker’s
Buddy Bolden and the Last Days of Storyville
. New Orleans historian Katy Coyle graciously sat down with us and spoke of her years researching Josie Arlington and Storyville. Steven Maklansky, director of the Boca Raton Museum of Art, who previously curated at the Louisiana State Museum and New Orleans Museum of Art, could hardly contain his passion when he talked with us at length about the mysteries of E. J. Bellocq. For help with tracking down the photos used throughout the book, we thank
Mascot
maven Sally Asher, Florence Jumonville at the University of New Orleans, Sean Benjamin of the Louisiana Research Collection at Tulane University, Robert Ticknor at the Historic New Orleans Collection, Donna Ranieri from the Frank Driggs Collection, Irene Wainwright at the New Orleans Public Library, Vintage NOLA, Fred Wilbur, and Corey Jarrell.

But no amount of research and writing could have made this book happen without the support and encouragement of our super smart and delightful editor Julie Miesionczek. Not only did Julie offer invaluable guidance and insight, but she’d keep us chuckling with little notes on edited pages alluding to a lovably quirky side: “Forgive me for any little bite marks on the manuscript, I have a pet bird (a parrotlet) and he’s always trying to get involved in what I’m doing.” Of course, we would never have found Julie if not for the fantastic team at the Sandra Dijkstra Literary Agency. Jill Marr believed in this project from the get-go, and when she received the very first nervously e-mailed pages, she promptly read them, then e-mailed back, “Proceed with confidence.” Jill, the biggest of thank-yous, you are truly a writer’s dream! Andrea Cavallaro, you’re the ace every writer wants—thank you for your determination and for making the stuff of dreams happen. Also, our gratitude goes to the supportive staff of Plume, especially Phil Budnick, Kathryn Court, Liz Keenan, Jaya Miceli, Lavina Lee, and Eve Kirch.

We want to give a huge thank-you to all the friends and family who took time to read (and in many cases reread . . . and reread again) various drafts and then give us the real, honest truth (thus, the various drafts!). Also included here are those who offered encouragement and support along the way: Anita Ugent; Keith Christian; Deborah Martin; Kari Ugent; David J. Cohen; Christian A. Jordan; Willie Mercer; Diane Haithman; Jonathan Weinberg; Deborah Vankin; Elena DeCoste Grieco; Alyssa Rapp; Sheryl Kennedy Haydel; Shawn Barber; the Snotty Girls’ Book Club, including Lesley Chilcott, Shana Mabari, Heidi Adams, and Christina Ross; and Kathleen Dennehy, Brian Groh, and the Monday Night Writers Group.