REALITY
BY CORDELIA FRANCES BIDDLE
Old City
I should explain that I write historical dramas, so as I wander the streets of Philadelphia I ponder how they looked before the curse of the internal combustion machine, and what vile secrets lurked behind the brick façades that now appear so H&G perfect. My theory (unproven) is that stone, being porous, is capable of retaining energy from the souls of the damned and despairing in the same manner that sponges hold water. Concentrate hard enough, and long-buried crimes will leach out.
I take my dog on these exploratory jaunts. I figure she adds an air of respectability to what otherwise might be mistaken for a stalker’s prowl—my beady glance measuring eyebrow windows hidden under the eaves, or mismatched brick work where once were doors.
Our route is simple: 6th Street (6th and Lombard was a red-light district a century and a half ago, the “fancy houses” now converted to upscale residences—or so local realtors insist), through Washington Square (frisbees zooming over the unmarked graves of Revolutionary War soldiers—Americans planted feet-first, Brits buried head-down in retribution), past the rear entrance of Independence Hall (oft-promulgated tales of Colonial derring-do). After that I cross 5th Street toward the Second Bank of the United States where I customarily pause to parlay with Nicholas Biddle, ancestor and financial wizard, before continuing my journey into the alleys and courtyards the tourists avoid. Nick died in 1844, so it’s a one-sided conversation, but I envision him standing there lordly and a trifle vain (Byron would have admired the long, wavy locks) amidst the marble columns that mark his particular temple to Mammon.
Now isn’t the moment for a diatribe against that snake-in-the-grass Andrew Jackson and the fiscal ruin he visited upon the nation, but let’s just say I bear the ex-pres a colossal grudge. The root of my wrath is lucre, not the noblest of motives for revenge, but there you have it. At any rate, as I stop, I ask old Nick (or old Nick’s spectral self) to find a miraculous means to shower me with money—which would permanently cure my writer’s block. I figure an ex-banker should have ready access to the celestial till. I do this while the dog noses around looking for the perfect place to pee. At least her prayers are answered.
I’ve digressed.
It was during a late afternoon at the end of September, a day that had been unremittingly dreary and depressing, and while I was nearing the Second Bank I heard them—the reenactors, that is. If you’ve ever strolled the city’s landmarks, you’ve encountered these ubiquitous street performers. They dress exclusively in period garb and bombard passersby with tales of eighteenth-century moxie. Don’t misunderstand; I have nothing against idealism, or spunk either, but I become suspicious when the Founding Fathers are portrayed as action heroes. It makes me want to canvass the Founding Mothers for their opinions.
These particular actors weren’t the predictable for-God-and-country types, however. For one thing, despite the advanced hour and waning light, they’d attracted a large, enthusiastic crowd, big enough and noisy enough that I couldn’t get near the players who stood on the pebblestone road fronting the bank. For another, the script was more trenchant than the usual family-style (read: Disney-fied) entertainment. The change of pace was a welcome variation to the traditional bell-ringing and saber-rattling. I decided to listen in. Besides, old Nick needs the cold shoulder treatment once in a while. Most captains of finance and industry do.
“He keeps slaves on his Southern plantation—which doubtless you’re aware. The crimes perpetrated upon them are demonic: floggings until their flesh comes away in bloody strips, children snatched from their mothers and sold—”
“You tell ’em, sister!” a female audience member yodeled at the actress delivering the lines. Other voices sprang into action, attempting to shush the interruption.
“I’ve a right to my opinion,” the provocateur shot back. Naturally, this was met with more orders to cease and desist.
“Let the gal finish, why don’tcha? The wife and I didn’t come to Philly to listen to you.”
“This is a free country, bro. In case you haven’t heard.”
“Just shut up, okay?”
“You gonna make me? You and the wife? Doesn’t she have a name?”
“What’s that crack supposed ta mean?”
“Whaddaya think?”
“Hey, c’mon, you two. Take it elsewhere.”
As additional members of the crowd joined the enlightening argument and then settled into a tenuous peace, they—and I—pressed closer to the improvised arena. I couldn’t see the performers yet, but the initial actress’s vocal quality and range was impressive, a professionally trained instrument that could hit the back of any theater. I wondered what she was doing hustling tourists for tips.
“This isn’t merely abolitionist fervor. My entire life is affected by his shameful philosophy.” She paused to let the dramatic tension build. As I mentioned, she knew her stuff. “For I must also consider the mulatto bastards his seed has produced—”
A gasp from two protective parents arose. The crowd opened to let them and their children scurry through, the boy and girl lagging behind, eyes glued to the ground lest anyone assume the totally dorky choice to vamoose was theirs.
“I thought these dramas were supposed to be clean and wholesome,” the mother muttered while the son, who looked to be about eight, demanded: “What’s seed? It’s not like grass stuff, is it? I know what a bastard is.” In the silence, his falsetto voice boomed.
“Hush, Anthony, we’ll talk about it later—”
“That’s what you always say, Mom!”
“At least the play’s educational,” the father offered with a wary chuckle. “That’s what we wanted, wasn’t it? American history made fun—”
“Paul, how can you?” Having registered her disapproval, Mom spun away from Dad and bent down to her son. “Don’t use the word bastard, honey.”
“Dad does—”
“What your father says and does isn’t always suitable. You may as well learn that right now.”
“Like when he—”
“That’s enough, Junior.” This time it was Dad who did the scolding. He was now carrying the boy’s sister, a yellowhaired girl of four or five who clung to his neck and stuck out her tongue at her earthbound brother. As the father held his daughter aloft, a grin of false indulgence spread across his face. It didn’t begin to conceal his dismay at being the focal point of a bunch of tittering strangers.
“But you do, Dad. When we watch the Phillies, you—”
“Anthony, that’s enough.”
“Bastard, bastard,” the little girl sang out.
“Look what you made your sister do, Junior. I want an apology. Now.”
“What do you expect, Paul, if you set the kind of examp—?”
“Drop it, Sheila.”
“I’m not allowed to tell the truth, is that it?”
“Now. Drop it now.”
With the audience torn between eavesdropping on a family meltdown and watching professional performers, a space became free for me to slip forward (dog in tow) until the actors were in sight. Two women and a man, dressed not in homespun and breeches and tricorne hats but in full Victorian regalia: the women draped in silks and expensive paisley shawls, the man in a fitted coat and tall beaver hat. He had his back to me; the women were also turned away, their faces concealed by their bonnets’ wide beribboned brims. All three might as well have stepped from the fashion plates in Godey’s Lady’s Book, the period’s answer to an amalgam of Cosmo and Redbook. I shouldn’t have been surprised at their outfits; reenactors are obsessive people. They don corsets and crinolines, tight wool trousers and tighter cravats, whether the heat index measures a hundred degrees Fahrenheit or sleet is slinging itself sideways. In my opinion that’s odd.
“All the while, he struts around the metropolis, esteemed by his peers as if the gentleman farmer from the Carolinas were unconnected to the God-fearing churchman dwelling in Society Hill,
” Actress Number One continued. Her tone had grown more strident; her posture (or what I could see within her voluminous clothes) was rigid. “How can this be? Wasn’t the transatlantic slave trade abolished in 1808? Then why does the government allow this evil to persist?”
The argument hit a chord with the audience. There were cheers; several people clapped. It seemed a likely time for an educational interlude, a Q&A during which the cast traditionally breaks character and engages in a group discussion, encouraging onlookers to air their views on whatever political message is up for debate. I took this as a cue to vacate my spot. Besides, I figured the dog was growing bored standing in one place while a lot of human types made noises that had nothing to do with food. However, the actress who’d taken the lead wasn’t about to relinquish her soapbox. I opted to linger a bit longer.
“It’s not merely the Southerners who are to blame. Here in our own city the textile mills supply fabric, so-called cot-tonade, for those despicable slave owners—”
“Haven’t I experienced that abominable situation myself?” the second actress interjected, her tone also incensed, although her interpretation was subtler than Actress One. “And our calico is traded for human cargo along Africa’s Niger River. But, I repeat, what’s to be done in your case? Your husband’s within his rights. As demonic as it—”
“Within his rights? Oh, where’s your sense of decency and equality? What about the burning of Pennsylvania Hall during the Anti-Slavery Convention, or the rioting that ensued? Entire blocks of houses set on fire. Men and women dying in the conflagration and their homes reduced to ashes. And this the City of Brotherly Love!”
Louder applause followed the bellicose speech. A few people whistled and stamped, their shoes drumming a tattoo against the stones. The instructive vignette was taking on the rowdy passions of an Eagles game. I began worrying for my dog’s safety. The team’s reputation as being pooch-friendly is a sullied one, but that’s another story.
“What you say is true,” the male actor picked up the cue. “Now we face riots over laborers’ rights, which increase the civil unrest. But men and women—and children—must be paid fairly for their work.” There was authority in his delivery, and sorrow that sounded genuine. I was sorry I couldn’t see his expression. I was also impressed at the amount of research the playwright had done. I know this period well. The facts were solid.
“But what about your husband?” Actress Number Two persisted. I watched her lay a gloved hand on the man’s sleeve, an indication that the scene was about to shift focus. Attentive though the audience was, the encroaching dusk, combined with the siren call of Geno’s Steaks, would soon take its toll. It was time to address another topic. “I assume you haven’t mentioned your critiques to him.”
“Oh, I have. Naturally, he repudiates my arguments. No matter. I intend to divorce him, and desert his bed and wicked habits forever. Indeed, I should never have wed him, but I think you know that well enough.”
“Well, duh!” two female audience members whooped in unison, although their advice might as well have been whispered. The performers never reacted to the commotion.
“You say nothing in response,” Actress One eventually sighed. “But what other choice have I? I can’t continue as I have been. Turning a blind eye to his numerous peccadilloes. Feigning devotion when what I feel is abhorrence. I see no other solution but to sunder our marriage bonds. Speak, please. I know you’ll support me in my plight. I must divorce him, mustn’t I, Martha?”
“Martha?” This time I was the one who attempted to interrupt the proceedings. Martha …? It couldn’t be. Or could it? Had the unimaginable happened? Had people I believed I’d never encounter miraculously materialized? No. No, it was inconceivable. Fictional characters don’t leap out of the pages of books and confront their authors. I studied the actress called Martha: the narrow waist and fashionably full sleeves, the cameo eardrops and brooch, the reticule held in a gloved hand. Of course, she was a reenactor. A good one, certainly, and wearing more costly accoutrements than most, but that didn’t mean she was the genuine article, a resident of 1840s Philadelphia transferred to the modern city. Probably the name was pure happenstance. Or perhaps I’d misunderstood. And yet … And yet, what if truly it were she? What if fantasy had turned into fact? “Martha … Beale?”
She made no sign of having heard my words, but she turned and faced me. Despite the fading daylight, I knew in an instant that this was no counterfeit. It was Martha Beale in the flesh. Her aquiline nose and proud jaw, her pensive eyes, the tall, stoic frame: who else could it have been but she? Practical, resolute Martha who’d finally broken free of her dictatorial father’s troubling legacy. And there she was, gazing in my direction as though the encounter was a commonplace occurrence.
How to explain what I felt seeing her standing before me after all these years? Shock is too pallid a word; I was utterly confounded. It simply wasn’t possible that she was living and breathing, but somehow she was. I stared at the broad steps leading up to the bank; pollution had cut runnels in the marble; the columns were streaked and crumbling, so I knew the time wasn’t 1843 but the present. And then there were my fellow audience members: exposed bellies bulging over hip-huggers, facial piercings, flip-flops despite the season, the sartorial trappings of the twenty-first century. This was no figment of my imagination. Martha was alive. Now. I reached out my hand. I couldn’t help myself. “I’m—”
“Hey, no touching the actors,” a nearby participant ordered. “That’s like harassment or something.”
“But she’s my—”
“Gab all you want after the show. For now, ya shut yer yap, capisce?”
“She’s not an actr—”
“Lady. Shut the hell up.”
I examined the other supposed performers. Of course, it was Thomas Kelman and Becky Grey Taitt, two other personalities from my newest novel. How could they have been absent if Martha was present? Kelman with the scar that traced a silver line diagonally across his cheek, and the somber expression that turned to joy whenever he looked at Martha; Becky, quixotic, effusive, temperamental, and a celebrated beauty.
You’ll wonder why I hadn’t recognized them immediately. These three are the products of my brain, after all. Without my fingers and keyboard they wouldn’t exist. When I tell their stories, I don’t write them, I live them. Each of my fictitious persons has its doppelganger in me, and I in them, and in the other characters in my books too. Villain or victim, they and I share one soul, one heart, one mind. Think what you will about the consequences of multiple personality disorder; I embrace the condition.
“Oh, my friends.” Tears filled my eyes; I dispensed with all doubts. How Martha and the others had conjured themselves out of fiction and into reality was too stupendous a question to pose. Besides, I’m no scientist. I stretched out my arms.
“Shut. The. Hell. Up,” a burly guy with thick, hairy forearms snarled. His calves, visible beneath hip-hop length shorts were hairy too. Hirsute might be a better literary description. Or simian, perhaps. His legs bowed like an orangutan’s. “You made the actors clam up. My kid was really into this. You like that, spoiling things for kids?”
He was right about the lack of conversation emanating from the impromptu stage. The boon companions of my days and nights had fallen silent, although I was certain the cause was Becky’s declaration that she intended to divorce William Taitt. I decided to rectify the situation. There, with evening fast approaching, with the background rumble of horse-drawn tourist carriages and the drone of the drivers spewing out farfetched data about the birthplace of liberty, I would do my part as a patriotic citizen. I would welcome each and every stranger, and give them the benefit of my insights into our city and its customs.
“That’s because Becky—Mrs. Taitt—announced she was going to leave her husband. Martha and Kelman are mulling over her words. Divorce is commonplace now. It was scandalous in the mid-1800s. Unheard of, actually.”
The man glowered, moving
his mouth in wordless spasms as if he were trying to lip-read. I realized a dissertation on Victorian-era mores was reaching a trifle higher than desired.
“Let me back up and explain the situation. I’m an author, their author. These are my characters. I specialize in historical novels. You may not read that genre, but it’s what I write. And I’m guessing you’re here because you enjoy learning about history, isn’t that correct? You like drama blended with fact.” I smiled at the confrontational creep and all the other playgoers who were now viewing me with a mixture of hostility and confusion. Despite their antipathy, I beamed. Showing off your creation(s), even when the moment is improvisational and the audience unreceptive, is a heady experience.
“This is Martha Beale, a Philadelphia heiress, and Thomas Kelman, her suitor. He wasn’t born into her social sphere, but never mind about that at the moment. More important is the fact that he has a special political appointment to the city’s mayor. I should explain that there was no centralized police force at the time in which my novels are set. Kelman solves crimes. That’s his raison d’être. And Becky, well, she really is an actress. Or she was. A famous one. From England. She’s retired from the stage at the moment; her husband’s a member of the aristocracy. As you just heard, he owns a plantation in the South, which wasn’t uncommon. Many upperclass Philadelphians were married into Southern families. Our commerce was also closely intertwined. That’s why the city was bitterly divided at the onset of the Civil War. You have only to read S.G. Fisher’s treatise on race to appreciate how impassioned sentiments were, though I warn you his views are alarming. I’m getting ahead of myself. I apologize. The period in question, which Becky, Martha, and Thomas are presently discussing, is twenty years prior. You heard mention of the riots in—”
“Christ, lady, you’re a regular nut job.”
I studied the faces peering at me through the gloom. That seemed to be the general consensus. I also got the impression everyone wanted me to pipe down, so they could get back to watching the scripted drama instead of a disagreement between two audience members. The problem was that it wasn’t scripted. Not by me, at any rate.
Philadelphia Noir Page 19
