Box Set: The ArringtonTrilogy (91 page)

By the time fall approached, Richard hadn’t
been away from me one night. I became accustomed to my new
surroundings and our stable routine. I came to expect passionate
nights, sleepy days, and hard, grueling work at the theater.
Richard always managed to bring me exquisite jewelry, expensive
perfume, and things that no one wore where I lived.

“You never take me out. I can’t wear such
jewelry here,” I said one chilly Sunday evening.

“You can wear it when you are on tour,” he
replied.

I sat up naked in bed, no longer ashamed of
my scars, and looked down to where he lay beside me with his arms
folded under his head.

“You are coming with me, aren‘t you?”

He leaned up on his elbows and gave a weighty
sigh, then said, “You know I can’t.”

“Then I won’t go!”

“It’s written in your contract. You have to
go.”

I threw off the covers and hastily put on my
robe, as the room was chilly and damp. I had never read my own
contract; I had never received a dime of the money I earned. I left
it all for Richard to take care of. I began to regret not reading
the paper that bound me to Bart Wilco.

“I expect you to come with me. How can you
watch over me if you are here in the city with Judith?”

“Who said she would be in the city?”

“Winter is coming. Where else would she
go?”

“Paris, London, Berlin. Who knows with
Judith?”

I poured the last cup of coffee and then
approached Richard, who stood to dress.

“You come with me or I will walk. I don’t
care what the contract says.”

He went to reach for me, but I pulled away in
anger. When I was in his arms, I thought of nothing but him and our
intimate union, but when the covers were off, reality could
sometimes hit like me a smack in the face.

“All right, all right, you win. I will find a
way,” he said, resigned, and that’s when I allowed him to hold me
again. “I said I would do anything for you, and I meant it,” he
murmured into my thick hair, as I began to kiss his exposed
chest.

“As I would for you, Richard,” I murmured
between hot kisses.

“Baby, you make me happy,” he groaned when I
lowered down to kiss him down
there
. I heard how it pleased
men, and I so wanted to please my man. I was certain Judith would
never do such a crude thing; she seemed too prudish. Being a part
of the theater helped me become less a prude and more and more like
the girls who enjoyed revealing their sensual bodies and using it
to their advantage. They slept with any man who had money, married
or unmarried. Though I wouldn’t want any man but Richard, I knew I
finally had everything it took to win a man over and have him as
mine alone.

Somehow, Ned learned about my present living
situation and was aghast at my compromise to live with a man he
claimed took me for granted
.

“I’ve told you before, Mr. Griffin, I don’t
want anything to do with you,” I snapped. I knew he often lingered
around the theater, though I didn’t know where he found the time,
considering the enormous success of his own production, and waited
until I was alone to approach me.

“If you join my cast, you will live in one of
the most luxurious apartments in the city,” he claimed as I
prepared to leave the theater and climb into the carriage that
would drop me off several blocks away from my apartment, where I
would then walk the remainder of the way. Most often, Richard was
there in the carriage waiting for me, but on this evening, to my
dismay, he was with Judith, and promised he would come see me late
in the evening.

“I am perfectly happy,” I told Ned. Now
please leave me be. You and I will never do business together!”

“You know Richard is not exclusive,” he said
with one thick brow curiously raised.

“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked,
just before he reached me and held his hand out to assist me into
the carriage.

“Lillian, you sweet thing. Open your eyes.
You’re not his only catch, simply his finest,” Ned said, and I
stared at him with a sick, unsteady feeling in the pit of my
stomach as the carriage sped off.

Richard was outlandishly late to arrive at
the apartment that evening. I had dozed off after drinking almost
an entire bottle of the wine he had brought for us the night
before. When he climbed into bed and began to undress me, I pushed
him away. “Where have you been?”

“I was with Judith. She and some of our
friends had dinner and drinks. I lost track of the time. I’m sorry
my darling,” he explained and reached to pull me back into bed. My
head ached, the room was dark and cold, and I began to shiver.

“Don’t just stand there and glare at me. Get
in bed and let me love you.”

“Who else do you love?” I hissed.

“No one. I tell my wife I love her because
I’m obligated, but I don’t mean it. You know that. You know you are
my true love,” Richard said softly.

“That’s not what Ned Griffin told me,” I
retorted with my arms folded under my breasts.

Richard threw off the covers and immediately
began to dress.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m not going to put up with your behavior.
I don’t come all the way down here in the middle of the night to be
treated with such disregard. If you want to listen to Ned Griffin
and his lies, then go ahead. I will go back to my wife and sleep
with her.”

I was speechless. Richard was furious with
me, turning his back on me and running to his wife. I had made a
terrible mistake. I should have never let Ned’s accusations creep
into my mind to make suspicious of the only person in the world who
loved me.

“I’m sorry,” I implored as he continued to
dress. “Please forgive me. I had too much to drink. I wasn’t
thinking clearly!”

“Indeed you weren’t. Now let go of my
arm.”

“Richard, please!” I cried when he reached
for the door. He stopped and slowly turned, and I rushed to him,
placing dozens of kisses on his face, sobbing and pleading with him
to forget what I had said.

“Will you ever listen to that man again?” he
asked coolly, standing like a statue - cold and resolute.

“I swear to you, I won’t. I was a fool, I’m
so sorry,” I sobbed.

Richard took me in his arms then and held me
close. “He is dangerous. Ned Griffin will fill you full of lies,
just to get you. Stay far from him. You are mine, do you
understand?” he said with a fire in his eyes I had never seen
before. Oh, how protected and loved I felt.

“I will stay far from him, I will,” I swore
as I took off his coat and hat and placed them on the edge of the
bed. “Will you stay with me and hold me?” I murmured as I began to
undress him. He ran his hands through my hair and said he would. He
forgave me, and I was grateful. And when he finished loving me,
before he fell asleep, he made me promise to be faithful to him.
“You will not have any words with him, ever?”

“Not ever.”

“That’s my girl,” he whispered, and he kissed
me goodnight.

I couldn’t sleep at all that night; I tossed
and turned with nagging fears of Richard someday abandoning me, as
all others before him.

Later that week I overheard the girls talking
about Ned. He had been robbed, beaten, and left for dead in the
back alley behind his theater. He was in a local hospital and was
expected to make a full recovery, though he had three broken ribs.
That night, Richard had come to the apartment looking disheveled,
with a cut lip. He told me he had fallen at home, but when I heard
what happened to Ned, I knew the truth. I decided not to confront
him, although I was left feeling uneasy about Ned’s injury. I
wondered if Richard had set out to kill him. I was afraid of the
answer.

Three days before the company was due to
leave for our tour, to my dismay, Richard told me he had to go the
estate for an extended weekend.

“I tried to get out of it, but Judith is
growing suspicious. I haven’t been up all summer. It is some kind
of autumn gala, another grand ball. I will return as soon as I can,
maybe even steal away a day early. Please understand, I don’t want
to go.”

Richard wasn’t staying for the night. A coach
was waiting downstairs. I was taken aback, unprepared for such
news. We were planning on an intimate dinner, a romantic evening. I
was dressed in my finest dress, excited that Richard had finally
agreed to take me to a fancy restaurant where someone might see us.
We had been careful for so many months, and willing to take the
slim chance of being caught together and Judith possibly finding
out. I was always begging for Richard, pleading and crying for him
to stay with me. My words of despair were all but ignored and had
little effect.

“I will meet you at the theater on Monday and
will go on tour with you. We will spend months together. In order
to do that I must appease Judith and tell her stories of travels I
have been required to do for my editor. Now be a good girl and kiss
me goodbye,” he said, and when I did, his lips didn’t linger long
enough for me to even remember.

I followed him out and caught a fleeting
glimpse of his coach, which sped him off to the picturesque estate
where there would be beautiful people in dapper clothes, eating the
finest delicacies. They would be dancing, conversing, and drinking.
Judith, I imagined, would stay beside Richard, and he might just
give into her desires, just to keep her happy. I cringed at the
thought of Richard holding and loving anyone but me. It pained me
to think of him in bed with her as I had seen before, and the
thought of him whispering he loved her made me want to burst into
tears. Then there was Heath. Would he be there by Sarah’s side? I
wondered. Would his blue eyes drink her in when they danced, would
he hold her close and smile lovingly down upon her?

I shook my head from such overwhelmingly
miserable thoughts and strode over to my dresser where I had a
fresh bag of white powder Richard had left for me. It was supposed
to last the whole tour, but I considered inhaling the entire amount
at one time, choking my unhappiness with the medicine I was now so
dependent on to keep me going. Yet as I stared at my reflection in
the large, round mirror on the long dresser, I remembered the time
I took Momma’s medicine and nearly died. I easily recalled the pain
and anguish in Daddy’s tired, cried out eyes. I suddenly began to
cry when my thoughts drifted to the man who I thought would care
for me always, love me, and protect me from harm. He had betrayed
me in the worst way. Daddy abandoned me, left me with a woman he
knew hated me. She had taken out all of her anger toward my mother
on me.

I sat on the cold floor next to the bed and
sobbed. I shivered and rocked myself like the frightened little
girl I was. I wept until I was too tired to shed another tear,
until I forced myself up and over to the dresser where I took as
much powder as I needed to make myself content, almost happy. Then
I didn’t care as much, hurt as much, or yearn for any man who
didn’t need me as much as I needed him.

Drinks and my magic powder kept me going
through the lonely weekend. Monday finally arrived, and I had my
things packed for the long, dusty, bumpy, sleepless road trip
through the southern states, moving from city to city, where I
would perform songs and skits that entertained hundreds and
hundreds of people. The once dreaded shabby hotel rooms I had
stayed in I now craved, since they were ten times nicer than the
apartment Richard had me living in. I longed for the company of the
showgirls. Even though they disliked me, I enjoyed the simple
pleasure of having people around me.

I expected Richard to be waiting in the
carriage for me as I stopped at the corner after lugging my heavy
suitcase many blocks away from the apartment building, but there
was no sign of him or the carriage. It was beginning to rain, and I
was pushed and shoved about as I stood on the swarming street
corner, waiting and waiting.

Finally, after waiting for nearly an hour,
soaked from the rain, I decided to pay for a carriage ride to the
theater. I had a small amount of money with me, which Richard told
me to use only in an emergency. I speculated this was one of those
times. After all, I needed to get to the theater on time for the
departure and it was pouring rain. Richard, I believed, must have
been on his way, and would likely be waiting at the theater when I
arrived.

Mr. Wilco hurried over to the carriage to
assist me out and led me to the stagecoach without word. I expected
to find Richard seated inside. When I was in and seated, Mr. Wilco
leaned into me and looked closely at my face. He had never done
such a thing before.

“Where is Richard? Isn’t he here?” I cried
looking out the small curtained window of the stagecoach.

“Have you come down with something? You
appear sick,” Mr. Wilco commented in his customary gruff
manner.

“Richard was supposed to travel with us,” I
said in a panic.

“My dear girl, settle down. He can’t make it
this time he told me to tell you, but has made plans to arrive on
train when we reach Savannah.” He pulled out a handkerchief and
insisted I dry my tears, then added, “Are you certain you are not
sick?”

“I’m fine,” I managed to choke out, then
dropped my head against the side panel of the coach and closed my
tired eyes.

Onward we went, leaving the crowded, noisy
city behind . . . and Richard. I began to see what was going on; it
became more than apparent that what Ned Griffin had told me must
have indeed been true. Richard was having another love affair,
behind my back. He must have found another beautiful young girl to
seduce and love. I wasn’t his exclusive lover, as I had wanted to
believe. Instead, I was another notch on his bedpost, and for that,
I was livid. With each passing mile, I became more and more
enraged, thinking and remembering all of his whispers of love and
devotion. All lies! I couldn’t wait to see him in Savannah. I would
send him out of my life and inform him that I never see him
again.