The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer: My Life at Rose Red (18 page)

and occupied us both until the sun skimmed the horizon. He is

quite the spectacular lover, my husband, and I must say it was

time we came together as husband and wife once again. I know

that he harbors certain reservations about my womanhood, well

aware of the suffering I underwent at childbirth, and since then

he seems to ?nd it even a bit repulsive to think of touching me as

a husband touches a wife, but the brandy apparently did the trick.

He showed no reservation last night, and I returned a great deal

of enthusiasm for the rite so that I might indicate my own satisfaction

with his decision to visit my bed. Hopefully another four

months will not pass before he elects to do so again. I will admit

here to your pages that I am ready this instant. Just the thought of

John’s embrace ?lls me with ardor. (I detest myself for succumbing

to this power he lords over me. After all his transgressions,

and there I lie in my bed hoping—dare I say it? trembling!—to

hear his knock at my door! What kind of sickness accounts for

such behavior in a woman? I dare not broach the subject with my

friends, although Tina would be safe now that she knows so

much!)

Our party was perfect. Following that, our time in my chambers

was perfect. I wonder if things are on track again. I wonder if

whatever force brought tragedy into this home is suddenly gone.

Perhaps Rose Red is a house, a building, and nothing more.

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There is nothing to be afraid of. I repeat this phrase in my prayers

and yet do not fully believe the words, the memory of Laura’s

ghost lingers so boldly in my imagination.

I want so badly to believe: Nothing to be afraid of. If only I could!

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10 july 1910—rose red

John’s partner in Omicron Oil, Douglas Posey, and his wife,

Phillis, attended dinner to-night. We hosted six other guests, but

they were inconsequential to the telling of this story. Our guests

were invited, in part, to help us celebrate the amending of the

state constitution in support of the suffrage movement. This

week, Washington became the ?rst state in the land to allow

women the right to vote. It has been a hard-fought campaign, led

by many of my friends on the hospital board, and John has

brought out the champagne to lift our spirits! We dressed the

table in American ?ags and will eat off red plates (from the Far

East) set on blue linen, with white napkins. It’s all very festive!

I sensed tension between John and Douglas from the moment the

Poseys arrived. (Douglas has purchased a splendid new motorcar

that I know incites some envy on John’s part.) Within moments

of the arrival, John took Douglas rather forcibly by the arm and

escorted him into the Gun Room off the Central Hall West. I

heard raised voices—as did all the guests. The Gun Room is a small,

masculine space, wood-paneled with long glass displays containing

John’s collection of ri?es. They started in the Gun Room,

but within minutes their voices were coming from the Smoking

Room. One passes through a stair landing to reach the Smoking

Room from the Gun Room, and John must have taken Douglas

by this route, or Phillis and I would have seen them pass through

the Parlor. Our other guests were being served smoked salmon,

Wisconsin cheese and drinks in the Tapestry Gallery. Phillis, as it

turned out, wanted my ear as badly as John wanted his partner’s.

I believed the tension between Douglas and John arose from a

European contract that John had approved but Douglas had tied

up in legal negotiations. Spain, it might have been. By delaying

the contracts, another ?rm—Standard Oil, of all companies!—

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had negotiated a separate deal, essentially reducing Omicron’s

share of that market from eighty percent to less than ?ve, and

costing John and the company tens of thousands a year. It is

funny how you can be so sure of something only to ?nd out how

wrong you are. I could not have been more wrong about the cause

of their squabble. Yes, Douglas Posey had delayed the contracts;

yes, it had cost John plenty; but the source of their disagreement

was to come out in my secret and heated meeting with Phillis,

Douglas’s distraught wife.

She is a wife in name only, being some ?fteen years her husband’s

senior. (In some ways they, as a couple, are a direct opposite

of John and me. While Phillis has the business acumen,

Douglas is the socialite. Phillis, previously married and the

mother of ?ve grown adults, knows the ways of the world. Douglas

is new to marriage and parenthood, just as I am. Beyond that, all

comparison stops.)

Phillis is a homely woman, wide of girth, deep of voice. Her

black dress could have ?t me twice over. She is in the habit of

cupping her hand behind her left ear when one speaks to her on

this side, the result of a childhood injury when a young boy struck

her with a snowball that proved more ice than snow. She smelled

too strongly of perfume, and though a pleasant enough perfume,

I’m sure, it played bitter in her company—tangy and sharp on the

back of the throat. (She would have done better without it.)

“I am vexed,” she said, a big gush of wind as from a bellows.

“And I have no one to speak with, excepting you, dear child, for I

do believe we are quite good friends.”

I hardly knew the woman at all. This told me quite a bit about

her social skills. Her husband was the one with the smooth tongue.

She should have been business partner with my John. If society

had allowed it, John might have considered this possibility.

“What is it?” I asked, somewhat anxious to get back to my

guests in the Tapestry Gallery.

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“Did John tell you? Oh, my, I can see he did not . . .” She is

a bit frightening when worked up—I think it’s her size. “John . . .

It’s Douglas, you see. Perhaps my fault, when you get right down

to it.” She looked at me, blushed and looked away. “Oh, dear.”

Agitated to be kept from my guests, I was more forward than I

might have otherwise been. “If there’s nothing to discuss . . .”

“Oh, but there is!” She produced a handkerchief from inside

her sleeve. Dabbing her eyes, although I saw no tears, she continued,

“It’s our ages, I’m sure.”

“You’re a young woman, Phillis,” I said as kindly as possible.

She looks a bit homely.

“Boarding school, when you get right down to it.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Douglas . . . well . . . you see. He’s always preferred the

boys’ locker room to the girls’—if you follow me, dear.”

I did follow her. I hope I didn’t turn too grave a shade of red.

There had been talk. This was the ?rst Phillis had ever mentioned

it.

She said, “It was a young man in the company.” John,

Douglas, everyone associated with Omicron calls it “the company.”

“An accountant,” she said. “A bookkeeper.” She lowered

her voice to where even I, as close as I was, could barely hear her.

“John walked in on them, you see? Compromised, as they were.

Douglas’s of?ce, of all places.” She adjusted to her confession

rather quickly, suddenly quite herself again. “I’ve known since

before we were married. He was quite up front about it, dear

man. Needed a wife to make the social circles, to be your husband’s

partner. I ?t the bill quite nicely, despite the years I have

on him. For my part, I don’t ask much. I take a young man myself

every now and again.” She winked, and I found myself about to

laugh. The idea of this woman with anyone was laughable. “An

experienced woman knows to marry for position. One’s more

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physical desires are quite manageable outside the con?nes of that

agreement.”

Was this how my own husband felt about it? Was our marriage

made to suit the situation, while his appetites were another matter

entirely? I did not share this attitude with my robust friend, but I

kept thoughts on the matter to myself. “Go on,” I said.

“Well, it’s just that. John caught him. Them! This very day.”

It explained John’s foul mood. Usually, on the advent of a

dinner party, he is quite entertaining and enjoyable company.

To-night he had been snarly and gruff.

“I do believe he has a mind to punish my Douglas,” she said,

her jowls quivering. “And what I’ve come to say to you . . . to ask

you . . . to explain . . . is that Douglas is quite helpless in all of

this. It’s a bit like me and the gardener,” she said with another of

those disturbing winks. “I hope John isn’t too hard on him . . .

in terms of the business, Ellen. Douglas works so very hard.”

“To let him go?” I blurted out.

“They’re partners. He cannot ?re him!” she protested. “Not

for walking the other side of the street.”

I can tell you this, Dear Diary, my mother and her friends

would have never discussed such things. Not ever. Not even

cousins would discuss such transgressions. A man taking a boy was

nothing new—except when he walked in your front door. They

were stories, is all. Your friends did not do such things. But having

had my own devilish temptations with the dark-skinned

chambermaid, I knew that such lusts surfaced. I knew that fervent

prayer was the only lasting answer. (I knew that I still secretly

looked at Sukeena in ways and at times that were more appropriate

for a man.)

When Phillis laughed at her own jokes, she looked pitiful. I

reached out and held her hand. I assured her I would talk to

John.

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“You are a dear.”

“But I warn you, John’s his own man.” I doubted this was news

to Phillis Posey. “Especially when it comes to business. And as to

this other matter . . . the accountant. I rather suspect John will

be more upset that it involved an employee, and that it was . . .

that they were in the of?ce . . . and all.” I didn’t need these

images in my head. “More that than whatever choices Douglas has

made.”

“But it isn’t a choice. Not for Dougie, it isn’t. He’s been this

way since he was a young boy. He took to swimming, diving . . .

The suits, you see?” she said, as if this explained anything. I did

not want to think about it. “All that bare skin.” I assumed her

amusement stemmed from anxiety, from her nervousness about

approaching the subject, for she dealt with this problem of her

husband’s in a most unusual way.

For me, the conversation was far more revealing of my own

situation than that of Douglas Posey. I could not in?uence John

in this matter, nor would I try to do so. John is outspoken about

homosexuals and has told me so often. He seems less troubled

with women ?nding mutual romance than men. He has expressed

openly to me the “indecency of one man touching another in any

such intimate manner.” This, from a man who installs hidden

mirrors in the lady-servants’ quarters. I can just imagine him

lustily looking on as one girl soaps the back of another!

But Phillis’s explanation of their marriage of convenience

re?ected foully on my mood. Had I, in fact, been viewed as nothing

but a brood mare—a fear that had lingered in my heart for far

too long already? Had John justi?ed his unfaithfulness by qualifying

our marriage as one of convenience: good family, good

pedigree, breed her and keep her on to raise the children while

he takes to the streets to satisfy his more pressing needs? Disgust

welled in my heart, a bitter taste at the back of my throat.

I spent the dinner as something less than a gracious hostess, as

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preoccupied by these new concerns. I drank a little too much

wine.

John and Douglas Posey had emerged from the Smoking

Room with their contempt barely disguised. I don’t believe they

shared another word all evening—not even so much as a handshake

good-bye. I retired to my room where Sukeena helped me

get ready for bed, and I nursed dear Adam. (I think he may walk

any day! He crawls—he’s fast as lightning—and pulls himself up

and looks at me with the sweetest face as if to say, “Do I dare,

Mama?” Sukeena and I encourage him: if there’s one thing a

Rimbauer needs, it’s independence and strength!)

The air was still, the night terribly hot. I lay naked on my bed,

debating whether to wear a nightgown on such a sti?ing night.

(The night nurse had returned Adam to his room.) Sukeena had

gone to my dressing room to put away my silk hosiery and the

black heels I’d worn to dinner. I felt the wine as a penetrating

heat.

John knocked and opened the door before I answered, and he

saw me exposed there on the bed. It is odd, but rarely does John

see me without my clothes. On those nights he comes to my bed,

it is already dark as he slips in beside me. During our honeymoon

he afforded me privacy, believing me modest, I suppose (and

indeed I did blush quite a bit in those ?rst few days with my husband).

But last night he threw open the door and saw me there,

fully exposed as I was, and something came over him. He has

rarely shown me the level of interest as he did in the moments