City of Ash (6 page)

We were the last to arrive. Apparently, fashionably late in Chicago was only late in Seattle. Something to make up for already. Mrs. Brown, a diminutive woman in a rather plain brown silk, whose only decoration was the cameo brooch at her collar and the dangling pearls at her ears, eyed me suspiciously as we were introduced, but she was coolly pleasant.

“I do hope you enjoy your time in Seattle,” she said, her gaze dipping to my very low décolletage—it was the fashion in Chicago, but I was dismayed to find no one here wore anything even half so low. I was scandalous already, and through no fault of my own, and I saw Nathan’s jaw tighten.

But I smiled my best smile and said, “I expect to like it very much,” and was pleased when she seemed a little impressed, as if she’d expected terrible manners and coarseness from a woman as notorious as I. “How happy Mr. Langley and I were to be invited to your home this evening. We are quite the strangers here, I’m afraid.”

It prodded her into courtesy. She took Nathan and me about the room, introducing us. The party was more intimate than I’d expected—only twenty, and most of them were disappointingly undistinguishable. Not an artist or writer or even a sea captain among them. It reminded me of my grandmother’s suppers, which were so dull and boring I’d learned to escape them as often
as I could, and these people might have been her contemporaries, not in age but in demeanor. There wasn’t a woman there who didn’t look askance at my gown, nor a man who didn’t eye it surreptitiously, though everyone was polite enough, and my smile was beginning to wear as we went in to supper.

The dining room was small, with barely enough room to house the table. Mrs. Brown had decorated it prettily with evergreens and red ribbon, and candles burned brightly in a simple candelabrum of highly polished silver. The plates were simple as well, a plain white bordered with green.

Nathan was seated near Mr. Brown, and I nearer Mrs. Brown at the other end. At least Seattle adhered to the basic society rules; no man sat next to his wife. On one side of me was Mr. Thomas Porter, a tall, exceedingly thin man who also worked in the mining company offices, and on the other Major Shields, who looked to be a man who enjoyed himself. I found myself leading the conversation, as both men seemed incapable of it—as tired as I was, I tried to be witty and charming, yet neither seemed interested in clever little bons mots and philosophizing. Instead the conversation turned to politics and the possibility of impending statehood.

“There will be plenty of positions for good and honest men,” declared the major. “Men who wish to lead us into a new century.”

Mr. Porter leaned forward. “We have too few men with such ambitions. I wish to God the city council would do something with all these vagrants in the hills. Transients everywhere.”

“There are worse problems to contend with.” The major took a sip of his wine. “What about you, Langley? Have you political aspirations?”

Nathan looked up. “I should think the new company will take most of my efforts, at least in the beginning. But I don’t rule out the possibility of government service.”

“Excellent news,” said Mr. Brown, glancing unsubtlely at me. “Of course, circumspection is the order of the day in this city, as you’ve no doubt heard.”

I felt myself flush.

Nathan’s smile thinned. “Yes, of course. Well, I dislike
making decisions precipitously. I expect it will take some time simply to become used to the rain.”

The rest at the table laughed. “Oh, I think you will find it not so bad as that,” said Major Shields’s wife. “We’re in the worst of it now, but the summers will prove delightful for it.”

The conversation went on in much the same vein for three more courses, all meant, said Mrs. Brown, to showcase Seattle’s bounty: a heavy salmon pie, oyster stew, and a dessert of jellied cream flavored with red currants. As we finished the last bites, Mrs. Brown rose, saying, “Shall we leave the gentlemen to their cigars, ladies?”

It was a custom I hated and one I never adhered to in my own home, having long ago asserted that the men saved the more interesting conversation for after dinner. Many of my friends in Chicago had followed my lead. But I remembered my father’s admonitions and my resolve, so I restrained my tongue and followed the other women demurely into a parlor hardly big enough to accommodate us all. The furniture was pleasant enough, if all machine made and Jacobean in design, though there was a lovely rosewood table inlaid with ivory and set with a delicate opaline vase from which emerged the thin stems of two wax roses. A few paintings decorated the walls, mostly landscapes by artists I had no familiarity with.

We milled about, some finding a chair, a few standing by the window that overlooked the street and darkness grayed by rain. Mrs. Brown poured tea from a graceful silver tea service. She handed a cup to a woman who sat on the chair opposite—Mrs. Porter, I remembered—and glanced at me.

“Mrs. Langley, please, come talk with us awhile.” She patted the space beside her on the settee; when I went to it, she handed me a cup of tea as well.

“You’re living at the old Post place, I hear,” Mrs. Porter said to me.

“I do hope it’s to your liking,” Mrs. Brown interjected. “I wish we could have done more, but with such short notice … well, you understand.”

The censure was in her words. I did not mistake it; I was an expert myself at scolds hidden in graciousness. “I think it
remarkable that you managed to accomplish what you did,” I said courteously. “I could not have hoped for better.”

“We are not lacking the more graceful aspects of life in Seattle. There are many shops downtown. If you’re looking for something in particular, I do hope you’ll look to me for guidance.” Again, the quick eyeing of my bodice. “We don’t lack excellent seamstresses either. I would be pleased to recommend one.”

“Is there one trained in the French style?”

“French? Like the one you wear now?”

“Yes. It’s a Worth,” I said.

“It’s quite beautiful,” Mrs. Porter said. “Is it the fashion in Chicago?”

“Oh yes.”

Mrs. Brown sighed. “You must realize, Mrs. Langley, that Seattle is not Chicago. As beautiful as the gown is, I think you’ll find that here you won’t have need for such … immoderation. We much prefer simple elegance.”

I forced an answering smile. “Thank you, Mrs. Brown. I shall remember that.”

“I understand you held a salon in Chicago.” Mrs. Porter offered this carefully, as if fearful of the landscape.

There was a whisper, a titter, from somewhere over my shoulder. Someone else laughed. I was meant to hear both, but I ignored them completely. I grasped gratefully at the subject. “Yes. It was quite renowned. You must tell me, as I have no idea: Do authors ever visit Seattle? Or artists? My Thursday evenings had quite a following among actors as well.”

It was too much, too fast; I knew it the moment Mrs. Brown said, “I’m afraid no one would be much interested in a salon of that kind.”

This place would require patience, I realized. It was my own fault; I could not blame them for wanting to see evidence of my humility. Still, I could not help my disappointment. I struggled to keep my smile. “Of course,” I said finally.

We lapsed into an uncomfortable silence that lasted until someone said, “Did you see the new shipment of cloth at Schwabacher’s?” and they joined together in palpable relief to speak of silks and worsteds, and I drank my tea in silence.

It was only later, when Nathan stopped at the doorway of the parlor to say he was fetching our coats, that Mrs. Brown said to me in a low voice, “I feel it only fair to warn you, Mrs. Langley, that there are those here who do not welcome your arrival. In fact”—a pause, as if it troubled her to say it—“there are some who have said already they won’t receive you.” Here she looked at me helplessly.

“I understand,” I said softly, taking pity on her, wondering what it had cost her to host this supper, to introduce me to a society that had already measured me and found me wanting. “Thank you for being so forthright, Mrs. Brown. I am grateful.”

Again, that short, firm nod, as if she had dispensed with a difficult duty and was back to the usual nonsense again. “I’ve promised my husband to help you get along until you settle yourself.”

“I shall not trouble you unduly,” I promised, and I knew I was not imagining the relief in her expression.

T
hat night, I sat at the dressing table brushing my hair, thinking over the evening, which had been a disappointment, though, if nothing else, I’d gained a good idea of what I was up against. The furnishings, the clothing, the food, the talk … Those who passed for society in Seattle would barely have reached the lower rungs of the social ladder in Chicago. But I was at their mercy, and I saw my task clearly. They were so afraid of any indiscretion that they would band together to keep me out unless I showed myself above reproach in every way. I could win them over eventually, I knew, though it would take every ounce of my charm to do so.

Just now, the thought made me weary. I stared into the mirror, which was old and wavery, flecked with spots, my reflection hard to see, nothing but the dark shadow of my hair, my eyes like black dots, and suddenly I was thinking of my last salon, the one before the exhibition had turned everything so impossible. I thought of Ambrose laughing, flushed as he drained his glass. Charles Furth saying,
“Yes, of course, Rivers, but I wonder sometimes if the world slows to a crawl for you alone. The rest of us see things in motion, details escape us. Which is why Gauguin’s vision is truer than Millais’s. Do you not agree, my
dear Ginny?”
And my answer, as Claude stood beside me, smiling,
“The world moves in slow, does it not, Charles? I think it is we who move too fast. You cannot fault Ambrose for moving with the world.”
Furth’s laughter.
“She is your devotee as ever, Rivers. You’ve armored her with your Pre-Raphaelites and none of the rest of us can make a dent.”
The candlelight flickering, sending dancing shadows upon the walls, glancing across the fat rubies encircling my wrist.

A movement in the mirror took me from the memory; I looked over my shoulder to see Nathan enter my bedroom.

“They were kind tonight,” he said quietly. “Didn’t you think so?”

I sighed and turned back to brushing my hair. “Was it kindness, do you think? I would venture to call it something else. I received a lecture on behavior along with my tea. When I mentioned to Mrs. Brown the possibility of starting a salon—”

“Good God, Ginny, you didn’t.”

“Don’t worry. Mrs. Brown made it quite clear how unacceptable they would find it.”

“And you intend to heed her?” He sounded wary.

“Oh, but of course,” I said with a bitter laugh. “For now, at least. I have promised to make a new start, and I shall.”

“You have no one to blame for that but yourself.”

I closed my eyes.

“I know it’s not what you’re accustomed to,” he said. “But these are good people.”

“I suppose next you’ll tell me that Major Shields’s snorting into his tea is an endearing habit.”

“It’s a young city. They haven’t had time to learn to be pretentious.”

“You think them as backward as I.”

“Perhaps. But there’s something to be said for those who act instead of merely talking about it. Here, they’re too busy building a city to natter on about the subtleties of a brushstroke. In any case, I should think you would like the idea of leading them into the future.”

“It will be like dragging a cow.”

“So one must go slowly.” Nathan considered me in the mirror. “Slowly, Ginny. We’ve a chance to mold this city, you know.”

“Mold it?”

“Which is not the same as stomping it into submission. I see real opportunity here.”

“Yes indeed. All that political talk. Do you mean to pursue it instead of only talking about it as you did in Chicago?”

“You don’t know what you’re saying, Ginny,” he said bluntly, and I saw the quick flare of anger in his eyes. “If you paid half the attention to me that you do to your artists, you’d know that I had intended to run for a city council position in Chicago. Your father and I had already put things in motion.”

I could not have been more surprised had he told me he was a frog-prince. “You never told me of this.”

“It required careful study of the landscape first. By the time I decided for certain, you were otherwise engaged.”

I felt myself flush. “I see.”

“It was one of the reasons to come here. What with statehood on the horizon, the opportunities are legion.”

I was surprised again, that he had been so farsighted. “This was no sudden move then. How long have you been planning to come here?”

“Since it became clear that my political career in Chicago had an impossible liability.”

“Which was what?”

“My wife, whom the whole city knew spread her legs for Jean-Claude Marat.”

In his words I heard the depth of his resentment and anger. “I’ve told you there was no affair. How often must I say it before you believe me?”

He made an impatient gesture. “My opinion doesn’t matter. Everyone believes you did, which makes it true enough.”

“It matters to
me
what you believe,” I said.

“Does it?”

“Yes, of course.”

He looked at me thoughtfully, an expression that made me uncomfortable, before he said, “I hope in time to start a political
career here, Ginny. It will depend upon you, of course. They’ll need to accept you.”

“They’ll need to accept me,” I repeated quietly. I was so disappointed that he had offered me no reassurance, I could not keep myself from saying, “I wonder that you don’t send me away. It would be so much more convenient.”

“You refused Bloomfield.”

“I don’t mean an asylum. I mean … to the Continent, perhaps.”

His smile was thin. “Ah yes, no doubt you’d like that. But what would that avail me? There would only be rumors that you’ve run after him, or that you’re cavorting with some other poor artist in Paris. It would hardly do my career any good. When one cannot control one’s wife, et cetera, et cetera.…”

How far we were from each other. I despaired that it could ever be otherwise. “You look at me as if you cannot stand the sight of me.”