The Parting Glass

by Gina Marie Guadagnino

  You must not only be particular about the respectability of those with whom you live, but you must try to gain their good-will and esteem, that if through any cause you have to leave, you may obtain the best recommendation from them.

  —The Duties of a Lady’s Maid

  Seanin’s plan, as he explained it to me, was a simple one, made smoother by the fact that Charlotte’s maid was one of the confederacy. The contents of Charlotte’s trousseau—her new gowns, her lace caps, her lacy petticoats, and her eyelet drawers—were replaced in twos and threes each Thursday and alternate Sundays with bolts of canvas to make up the weight, while the originals were secreted to Seanin in St. Patrick’s Church on my way down to the Hibernian. Already packed and provisioned by Seanin, Charlotte would therefore be able to slip unburdened from the house, simply and economically clad in one of my gowns, carrying nothing that might betray her purpose. I would guide her to the quay where Seanin would be waiting for her to board the SS Cortona. They would be married immediately in their stateroom by the captain, and the ship was scheduled to depart on the dawn tide. By the time Charlotte would be missed, she would be somewhere in the Atlantic out past Long Island, enjoying her first morning as a married woman. When the newlywed couple arrived in Dublin, two months later, they would be greeted by Seanin’s brothers in the Order and escorted to the modest town house he had commissioned them to purchase in his name. Installed immediately as the lady of the house, Mrs. O’Farren would be supplied an ample purse to equip and plenish the place—culled from Seanin’s earnings and my own for the past three years, augmented by Seanin’s cut of the protection money and the sale of Charlotte’s jewels, which would be pawned by a trusted member of the Order upon her arrival. The entire plan was neat as two pins, requiring nothing of Charlotte but her compliance, and a great deal of work on my part, to say nothing of what amounted to my life savings.

  It was the acquisition of my own wages, which I had been turning over to Dermot for safekeeping, that troubled me. The problem in all of this was twofold, and lay in the fact that not only was I loath to tell Dermot about the venture, but I was not, in fact, sure I wanted to go at all. Turning the matter over in my mind, I could not say what stung more: the fact that Seanin expected me to fork out three years of my wages without demure to keep Charlotte in style, or the fact that it took me several days to realize that I had a choice in the matter.

  Again and again, I played out what would happen if I went. What I had told Seanin that night in the mews had been the truth. It would be a new start for him and for Charlotte, but I could not fathom what my own role in such an arrangement would be. Would Charlotte expect me to go on dressing her hair and helping her to robe? Or would we sit companionably together in the parlor—as she and Prudence once had done—receiving callers, attended to by a maid of our own? Such a thought—that I might sit before the glass while some girl twisted my hair into braids, or raise my arms so she could do up my laces—was a welcome absurdity, and I laughed outright at the notion. Did Seanin truly think he could support his unmarried sister, as well as his fashionable young wife? If so, his connections through the Order and the Order’s influence in Dublin must run far higher than I had expected. But support me in what? Making calls to the ladies of other such households? What was it that Charlotte, an unmarried lady herself, did? The answer to that, of course, was make herself marriageable, and I was certainly not inclined to do that. My life, then, would be lived out as a guest in my brother’s household, and a hostage witness to the love between him and Charlotte.

  I felt ill as I began to play out what life in that house would be like. Charlotte, who had conceived once before, would surely get with child again, and there would be a succession of little O’Farrens before long. And I, the doting sister-in-law and auntie, would likely aid in their birthing and rearing, all the while watching their parents’ adoration of one another exhibited daily. It would be inescapable, the thing that Seanin had said to me that night he came back for Charlotte. That it was him she wanted. Him she loved. And if I went with them, I should have to watch them live their love every day.

  But what life was there for me here, if they left without me? My livelihood was in Charlotte’s keeping. I had been my entire life in service, and certainly could find another position as a lady’s maid if I wanted to continue such a thing. But the thought was not an appealing one. I was not such a fool as to think that my experience as Charlotte’s maid would be typical of the next cut I might find. If I could find another cut—the thought suddenly struck me. Who would write my character, if Charlotte was gone, and what would a character written by a society girl who’d taken to her heels count for, at any rate? Most of the housekeepers of Manhattan’s ton knew me on sight. Would anyone hire the maid left behind by a disgraced mistress? Would I be blamed for not stopping her? I paused in my ruminations to curse Charlotte, who, for the sake of her family, would not stoop to bear Seanin’s child for fear of ruin, but who would now cheerfully flee with him, ruining me.

  For now, however unfairly, I had begun to resent Charlotte. How simple it all would have been if she had swallowed her pride and married Seanin when she had been pregnant with his child! Where was that hauteur now? Or perhaps, having been contracted to another man and forced to contemplate the realities of a loveless marriage, she had reconsidered the priorities of her own heart. Or perhaps now, in the wake of Prudence’s departure, Charlotte’s prior reluctance to sacrifice her family’s position in society had evaporated. Certainly, she did not share her reasons for accepting Seanin’s mad proposal with me. In our moments alone, she talked only of her love for him, her longing to be with him, her impatience until the day of our flight—for she, as Seanin did, could not but assume I would simply do as they did, and go where they went. She talked as though Prudence Graham and Elijah Dawson did not exist, and perhaps, removed, as they were, from her state of joy, it no longer mattered to her that they did. Certainly I, who was there before her, folding up her chemise into the bundle I would take to Seanin, mattered very little, and Charlotte could not seem to contemplate that I might have an opinion that differed materially from her own.

  I held my tongue. She had the right to love whomever it was she loved, be it Seanin or Mr. Dawson, or . . . I could not finish the thought. It was of no consequence. She loved Seanin. She would never have been able to love me.

  It is not to be imagined that I gave no consideration to Liddie Lawrence as I contemplated my position. Indeed, I gave great consideration to her, for if I could not reconcile myself to what I was to Charlotte—maid or sister—I was on unsure footing indeed where Liddie was concerned. I had known from the first that Liddie was a distraction to me, albeit a welcome one, but beyond that I could not have said what we were to one another. My mind kept wandering back to that first night, kissing her on the hogsheads, her breath fiery with ale and smoke. She hadn’t been caging me, or sizing me up as she would a cully. She had wanted me simply for the sake of it. It was a mystery to me that she should keep taking me to her bed without pay, or forgo accepting paying clients on Thursdays in order to spend them with me. The terms of our arrangement, such as they were, remained unspoken, and I wondered greatly if she would give me another thought if one Thursday I should not arrive. I thought, perhaps, in her practical way, she would give a little shrug and write me off as a bad investment of her time, turning her attentions to more profitable prospects.

  I lay in bed beside her, my chin resting upon her brow, wondering if I could be anybody—or any body—at all, and would her hand rest as easily on someone else’s chest? Or would her leg curl around someone else’s knee? In the sticky heat of an early September night, the places where our bodies touched were slick with sweat, bare skin plastered to bare skin. Her breathing was soft and even. I thought she was asleep before she kissed the hollow of my throat and murmured, “Sing the one about the last glass.”

  “What’s that now?”

  “The lilty one about having one more drink before you
’re off.”

  I hummed a few notes, and she nodded sleepily. “Mmm. That one. Sing it for me, Mar?”

  If I had money enough to spend

  And leisure time to sit awhile

  There is a fair maiden in this town

  Who sorely has my heart beguiled.

  Her rosy cheek, her ruby lip

  I own she has me in her thrall

  So fill to me the parting glass

  Good night and joy be to you all.

  “Mmm, that’s you all over, Mar,” she whispered, and I held her tighter, shivering though I was not in the least cold.

  Unable to make up my mind in the matter, I sought her at Dermot’s each week, making love to her quickly and abstractedly and desperately, saying as little as possible and holding her tight in her sleep. I don’t think, in all that undecided time, I ever once could look her in the eye. I was too afraid of what I might find there.

  She who trusts another with a secret, makes herself a slave; but all who are so bound are impatient to redeem their lost liberty.

  —The Duties of a Lady’s Maid

  On the eighteenth of September, the Cortona came into port to take on cargo and make repairs before its scheduled departure on the twenty-third. Seanin had sent word upon the vessel’s arrival, and I had taken myself down to the docks on my way to the milliner’s to see it. It looked more or less exactly like a steamship. Its bare masts rose from the harbor as stevedores swarmed up and down the gangplank, shouting raucously while they unloaded crates and casks. It was in all ways indistinguishable to me from the many other ships docked, and I turned my steps toward the milliner in disgust. There were no answers for me there. It was a ship, like any other. It would take me somewhere or it wouldn’t. It was for me to do the choosing.

  The following Thursday, misery dogged my steps down Mulberry Street.

  The Hibernian was quieter than I’d seen it in some time. I approached the bar, where Dermot handed me my pint and a package that looked like a brick done up in brown paper. I hefted the compact parcel and cocked an eyebrow at him.

  “What’s this then?”

  He cleared his throat unnecessarily and said, “Your wages,” in an undertone, then chuckled mirthlessly. “Figured you’d never get around to asking me for them, so I thought I’d take the sting out of it, like.”

  I raised my pint. “I’m obliged to you.”

  “Ah, go on,” he said softly. “They’re your wages, aren’t they?”

  “You know that’s not what I was on about.”

  “Aye, I know it well enough, lass.” He smiled sadly.

  I took a sip, thinking things over. “I won’t ask how you knew, but only how long.”

  He shrugged. “Long enough. Does it matter?”

  “What you think matters a great deal to me,” I said.

  “Does it? I wonder,” he said ruefully. “You never do confide in me. Your Liddie, now, she’s always telling me this or that, and half the time she’s talking Shakespeare and I can’t understand the whole of it, but at least she’s confiding in me, which is more than I can say for you all these years.”

  “Sure and how can I, with you always knowing my mind without me saying a word?” I put my pint down heavily, the amber liquid streaming frothily along the sides. “Christ, is there a thing I’ve done since I first met you that’s been without your knowing of it? What of it you haven’t orchestrated yourself, that is?”

  “Didn’t tell you to go mooning over that wee baggage’s meant to be your mistress, did I? Sure and I’d not orchestrate the mizzle you’re thinking of running.”

  Comprehension dawned. “He was here, was he now?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

  “Aye,” Dermot said. “Came by for a chat, he did, two days ago. I had the whole of it from him. I may be part of the Order, and Tammany still has me doing my share for them, but, at the end of the day, I’m the moneyman.” He shrugged. “Easy to funnel money in and out of a pub, and I’m not opposed to what they’re after, then, am I? Anyway, that’s neither here nor there. He came by for the money, the Order’s share of the take, and I found out where he’d been these months. No notion of how far he’d gone into their inner circle. He’s done well for himself, has Seanin, and all on his own. You’re two of a kind there, keeping your own counsel. He’s had plans for a while to go back to Dublin and join the cause there. Seems yourself and your lady are just the most recent additions to the plan.”

  I set my jaw. “Kept his own counsel, sure, but free enough with mine, it seems, if you had the entire story from him.”

  He shrugged again. “It did explain a fair bit, didn’t it? Christ, lass, you’re one for the books, aren’t you? I’ve heard o’ brothers tearing each other to bits o’er the same lass, but you’re a first and no mistaking.”

  I snorted. “I’ve heard that phrase before. That’s what Liddie said. ’Bout something else, come to it, but you know what I’m on about.”

  “I expect I do.” He paused, pursing his lips. “But does Liddie?”

  “I don’t know what Liddie thinks.”

  He refilled my glass. “Might help if you asked her.”

  “It might at that,” I said, “if I knew what to ask.”

  Dermot was silent for a moment, scratching the back of his head. “Well, now, Mar,” he said. “I never knew you for a fool before. Don’t become one now. Sometimes there’re no words needed for a thing the entire world’s got eyes to see, so?”

  Liddie was slow with me that night. She teased, she hesitated, she held back and took her time, kissing me with a languid passion, her limbs melting against mine. We neither of us spoke, being otherwise occupied, and, when it was over, she lay with her head on my chest, tracing patterns along my abdomen. I lay, stroking her head, aware of her hand becoming slower and heavier against my skin before her fingers stopped moving altogether and her hand lay still. Her face hidden from me, her shoulders rose and fell gently with her breath, and I watched her in the dimming light as the lone candle in the room guttered and went out.

  She stirred then, with the change of light, and moved herself up to lie on the pillow beside me, kissing me absently as she settled herself back down. “Don’t wake me,” she said, her voice thick with sleep. “Just kiss me when you go.”

  If you cannot otherwise avoid the evil which will certainly await you by rashly listening to the importunities of passion, leave the situation at once, without disclosing to any one the reason of your conduct.

  —The Duties of a Lady’s Maid

  Bidding good night to Grace Porter as we parted on the stairs, I wondered perhaps if my composure were a form of madness. Surely, I thought, I should not be able to so calmly and dispassionately bid good night to her—to Cook, to Mrs. Harrison—knowing that, one way or another, I was never going to see any of them ever again. Never mind that our enterprise rode upon my sangfroid, never mind that my entire life with these people was a complete fiction. My heart beat regularly as I gave my usual evening pleasantries whilst my mind reeled against the normality of my actions.

  Charlotte sat in silence, flushed with pleasure as I took the pins out of her hair, brushing the locks and rebraiding them into a single plait down her back. I wondered what her own good evening to her mother had been like. It was not, I knew, Charlotte’s intention to part permanently from her family, but, after a suitable period, to break the news of her elopement and by and by reconcile her family to her new circumstances. While I was of the opinion that “by and by” might be a period of years where Augusta Walden was concerned, Charlotte, with the simple naïve privilege of being an heiress and an only child, seemed unfazed by the prospect of estrangement from her mother for very long. In the weeks since we had been planning her flight, I had learned that her portion from her grandfather would come upon her marriage, and that this largesse was dependent not upon parental approval but upon grandpaternal approval of her choice of spouse. While Augusta Walden might choose to spurn her daughter upon the occasion of her marr
iage, Charlotte felt confident that, in consequence of Prudence Graham’s flight, old Thaddeus Graham would reconcile himself quickly enough to his granddaughter’s elopement rather than be parted from another of his descendants.

  Augusta Walden’s qualms, Charlotte had assured me, would be laid to rest upon the receipt of her, Charlotte’s, marriage portion. Mrs. Walden had long depended upon her daughter’s share of the Graham diamond mines. By cutting her daughter completely, she stood to lose any allocation Charlotte might appropriate her mother. Certainly, Charlotte reasoned, her mother’s wrath would be great indeed, but sheer mercenary logic would triumph in the end.

  I had listened to her think aloud over the ramifications of her actions for weeks now, wondering, not for the first time, what it must be like to live a life that could be measured in dollars. Where one kept a ledger of family affections, to be reconciled and balanced like a bankbook. I wondered if it was preferable to a life where you fought your family tooth and nail, literally sinking your fingernails into your brother’s face when you disagreed with him.

  Having helped Charlotte dress in one of my old traveling frocks—hers, incidentally, from three seasons ago—I left her sitting impatiently in the tufted chair by the cold fireplace while I checked the small leather bag containing her jewels one final time before our departure. We were to wait until the clock struck three before making our way down to the harbor. I enjoined Charlotte to rest, if she could. For myself, I sat bolt upright on my bed, staring, for the last time, at the laurel wreath on the ceiling, lit dimly in the moonlight.

  The house had been silent for hours when the appointed time came. Softly, the small bag in one hand, our boots in the other, I came to stand in the doorway between our rooms. In the gloom I could just make out Charlotte, her cheek resting on her hand, her face pointed toward the empty grate. She was so still I thought perhaps she had indeed fallen asleep, but, when I stepped into the room, she turned to me, and I saw her eyes were bright.