The Wages of Fame

by Thomas Fleming

  Eventually Hosmer went home for his supper, and George gazed at Jeremy across the top of a renewed pint of ale. “To President Jackson,” he said with a grin.

  “To Congressman Stapleton,” Jeremy retorted.

  “I could see you didn’t agree with him,” George said, nodding after Hosmer. “But he’s a good fellow. They’re all good fellows. This whole thing has been an education for me, Jeremy. I’ve met the ordinary American for the first time. I’ve learned to share his hopes and fears. I’ve been saddened by his hardships and touched by his faith in this country. Win or lose, I’ll be a different man thanks to this experience.”

  Jeremy told himself not to be surprised. George’s large heart, his quick sympathies, made him a natural Democrat. Jeremy thought George was talking sentimental twaddle, but he realized this was hardly the time or place to get into a political debate.

  “I wish I could vote for you,” Jeremy said. “Maybe I will the next time you run. It looks as if I’m not going to Philadelphia after all.”

  “You’re going to settle in New Jersey? Jeremy, that’s great news!”

  “Hear me out before you say that.”

  Jeremy told him about his meeting with Hugh and Malcolm Stapleton—and their offer. “That’s even better news,” George said. “I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have running the business side of things.”

  Jeremy had George’s consent. That was as far as Hugh and Malcolm Stapleton had advised him to go. But George Stapleton was Jeremy’s best friend, closer in his mind and heart than a brother. He could not practice even the smallest deception on him. He told George the rest of the proposition. “They want me to have a controlling percentage of the family stock,” Jeremy said. “To guarantee my independence in business decisions. Of course we’ll share the profits equally.”

  “Why did they recommend that?” George said. “I can’t imagine a situation in which you and I would disagree about anything important.”

  “Apparently, they feel it could happen. People change as they grow older. Their children—their wives—influence them.”

  George was too intelligent to deceive with such banal generalities. “Caroline. Uncle Malcolm has never liked her. But I don’t see why Grandfather has gone along. I thought he adored her.”

  “He did, until you decided to become a Democrat.”

  This was hard for George to accept. But he realized it was probably true. He was far more troubled to think he and Caroline had hurt the old man than he was concerned about who would control Principia Mills. This regret reinforced his readiness to accept the arrangement that the older generation had decreed for the companies. It was a kind of expiation, a gesture of reconciliation with Hugh Stapleton.

  “I’m sure it’s for the best all around,” he said. “I agree wholeheartedly with Grandfather’s estimate of my business abilities, and I’m delighted someone as hardheaded as Uncle Malcolm puts such a high value on yours.”

  As they drank to harmony and happiness, Jeremy realized how much he could not tell George. He could not reveal that his uncle and his grandfather had advised Jeremy to deceive him. He could not admit that he would probably have refused the offer if a strictly equal division had exposed him to Caroline’s hostility. Jeremy sipped his ale and listened to George puzzle over why his grandfather thought he might be unduly influenced by Caroline. Of course he listened to her advice, especially on politics, where she was surprisingly shrewd. “But I make up my own mind. That would be especially the case in a business decision.”

  Naturally Jeremy agreed with him. It was the beginning of years of guilt for his inability to tell his friend the whole truth. The beginning of the long, slow spiral into multiplying evasions until that terrible moment when Jeremy discovered the truth’s slow, relentless urgency, like a bullet lodged in the body, working its way to the surface by a process too obscure for the mind to comprehend.

  SIX

  A WEEK LATER, GEORGE RETURNED to Bowood to be Jeremy’s best man at the wedding. In their bedroom the candidate and Caroline talked first about the campaign. There were growing signs that he might lead the Democratic ticket in the state. Many National Republicans had endorsed him, particularly in North Jersey, where the Stapleton name was potent. But George had doubts about General Jackson’s ability to carry the state. The slanders against him—for adultery, for killing several men in duels, for hanging six deserters during his military years—were troubling many voters.

  Then George mentioned, almost casually, that Sally and Jeremy were not going to Philadelphia. They would be neighbors—and partners in the Principia companies. Even more casually, he described the decision to give Jeremy eventual control of the businesses.

  “How could you agree to this without consulting me?” Caroline said. “Don’t you see how ruinous this could be to me—to both of us?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Your cousin Sally hates me. And so does your friend Jeremy Biddle.”

  George was openmouthed. “Caroline, you’re talking nonsense. Jeremy’s never even hinted such a thing. Sally is another matter. I don’t pretend to understand why or how women take dislikes to each other. But it will surely pass as you grow older and more mature.”

  “My dislike for her—and her hatred of me—has nothing to do with immaturity. It has to do with snobbery—her inborn inability to admit a mere farm girl from Ohio could possibly be her equal in taste and intelligence. I’m telling you here and now you’ve made a terrible mistake, George. You should have objected violently to the whole idea. You should still object—for my sake!”

  “How can I do that when I don’t think it’s a mistake? I don’t have much head for business. Politics—Democratic style—is all-absorbing. I won’t have time to run the business and win elections.”

  “You’ll soon be a senator. That only requires you to campaign once every six years.”

  “Your optimism exceeds mine. Most people don’t reach the Senate before the age of forty. Anyway, the basic fact remains—I agree with the idea. I welcome Jeremy as a friend and business partner.”

  “I thought I was your partner.”

  “You are too. A man can have more than one partner.” George tried to give her a reassuring kiss. “Darling, calm down. I’ve never seen you so upset. I’m beginning to fear for the baby.”

  “You don’t understand—or care,” Caroline said, avoiding his lips.

  Jeremy was forever linked in her mind with John Sladen. Jeremy’s presence lured John back into her soul. But she could not explain that to George. She left him to puzzle over her seemingly irrational hostility to his best friend—and to worry about the way she seemed to transfer some of it to him.

  For the moment, things remained relatively calm on the surface. The wedding went off without any complications. Sally and Jeremy sailed off on a two-month grand tour of Europe. While they were gliding down the Grand Canal in Venice and prowling the ruins of the Roman forum, George was trekking through South Jersey in search of votes. His Quaker grandmother won him wide approval among the numerous Plain People in that part of the state, in spite of his support for that “man of war” Andrew Jackson.

  In mid-October, George was in Trenton, just across the Delaware from Pennsylvania, when the first election results reached him. (In 1828, there was no single election day; the states set a variety of dates.) General Jackson had swept the Keystone State by a margin of two-to-one and had done almost as well in Ohio. Next came word that he had carried Kentucky, Henry Clay’s home state. Over the following two weeks, evidence of a landslide mounted. The South gave the General massive majorities in every state.

  By the time New Jersey voted, it was almost an anticlimax. As George had feared, many Quakers disliked Jackson’s violent reputation, and even more of the state’s mostly rural voters were suspicious of a man who was backed by the city slickers of Philadelphia and New York. The Garden State went for Adams, but all five Democratic candidates were elected to Congress, with George S
tapleton running ahead of the nearest contender by ten thousand votes.

  Adam Hosmer and two dozen other Democratic committee chairmen from nearby towns rushed to Bowood to congratulate George. Hundreds of citizens from their towns and the city of Hamilton joined them. George was obviously the coming man in the New Jersey branch of the Democratic Party. A celebration was soon under way on the lawn. The servants lugged out gallons of champagne punch to fuel the merriment.

  Caroline sent Malcolm Stapleton a note, suggesting he let the mills out early to join the party. She got a chilling reply.

  With an ignoramus from Tennessee in the White House, I do not think we can afford to lose a single penny of profit. We will need to husband every dollar to survive the difficult years ahead. Congratulate George on his congressional victory, nonetheless.

  Hugh Stapleton also declined to mingle with the Jacksonians who cavorted around the hickory pole on Bowood’s lawn. He pleaded indisposition and stayed in his bedroom. Behind his smiles and handshakes, George Stapleton concealed a growing uneasiness about his decision to become a Democrat. He was finding out that life is full of conflicted choices.

  At supper later that night, Hugh Stapleton was resolutely cheerful. He joked about surrendering his nickname, “the Congressman,” to George and toasted him and President Jackson. He gamely admitted that no one could foresee the future. He could remember more than one friend predicting that George Washington would make a terrible president. But the new congressman detected the vein of sadness in his grandfather’s manner.

  So did Caroline, but she was far more prepared for it, having spent most of her time at Bowood during the previous months. She had given up trying to soothe the old man. Unfortunately, George judged her silence as coldness.

  That night in the library, she urged George to write a letter of congratulations to Andrew Jackson. George agreed, then asked if she too was troubled by Hugh Stapleton’s melancholy. She responded by showing him Malcolm Stapleton’s note.

  “You’re the family leader now, George,” Caroline said. “You can’t let these old men—or your friend Jeremy Biddle, who agrees with them—get in your way. That’s why I fear the worst over the agreement you’ve allowed Jeremy to make.”

  “I know Jeremy’s not a Democrat, but he’s a decent, honest man,” George insisted. He fingered Malcolm’s note. “I also don’t think Grandfather shares Uncle Mal’s harsh attitude.”

  “Perhaps not.” Her cold tone indicated she considered George’s sentimental regret was irrelevant.

  “I wonder if we should try to make the old gentleman feel better about it all.”

  “There’s nothing you, or I, can do.”

  “Nothing? Caroline, a woman can do so many small, tender things.”

  “But I don’t choose to. Having been excluded from the family’s councils, why should I humble myself, play the apologist?”

  “Not even for my sake?”

  “Not even for your sake.”

  For the first but not the last time, George was learning the danger of offending Caroline Kemble Stapleton. In the weeks that followed, George repeatedly tried to communicate his regret, and his deep, unshaken affection, to his grandfather. But it was difficult to do. His time was devoured by delegations of Democrats from distant parts of the state and congratulatory letters from New York and Pennsylvania Democratic politicians, who had to be answered promptly. Swarms of government-job seekers implored him for help. Anyway, a man lacks the gift of subtle emotional communication. In spite of all George’s efforts, Hugh Stapleton remained out of reach behind his politeness, his memories.

  In December, Sally and Jeremy returned from their honeymoon and began living at Bowood while their own house was being built. Malcolm Stapleton felt they would be more comfortable there than in his widower’s cottage. Caroline did as little as possible to make them welcome, using her pregnancy as an excuse to dine in her room and otherwise avoid them.

  One morning the gray-haired local postmaster personally brought to Bowood a letter addressed to George. The old man excitedly pointed to the return address: A. Jackson, Nashville, Tennessee. It was written by Andrew Jackson himself, in his highly original scrawl.

  Dear Congressman Stapleton:

  Your letter came safely to hand yesterday. I thank you for your congratulations, which really should be extended to the people of this great nation. I am only their humble instrument. I congratulate you in turn on your election. I look forward to working with you on the great task of reforming our national government.

  I wish I could say I was elated by my election, but truth compels me to admit my mind is depressed. You and your wife know better than most the reason. Mrs. Jackson is less than happy at the prospect of going to Washington and facing many of the foul wretches who slandered her so cruelly over the past six months. But we will both do our duty in response to the people’s summons.

  I hope you and your beautiful wife are continuing to enjoy honeymoon transports and will do so for years to come.

  Again, George felt the grasp of Jackson’s paternity. He was glad, fiercely glad, he had embraced this old warrior’s cause. Thanks to Jackson’s candor, he also realized his own tincture of regret for his Democratic triumph was not so unusual. There are often gaps between public triumphs and private emotions. George was encountering one of history’s dominant motifs: irony.

  George showed Jackson’s letter to Jeremy Biddle as he departed for Principia Mills. He agreed it was a moving document. “I’m going to show this to Grandfather,” George said. He thought it might win the old man’s sympathy and bolster the case for his grandson’s Democratic status.

  Jeremy paused in the hall to see if the mail had brought a letter for him or Sally. His examination of the dozen or so letters was broken by a cry of anguish in the upper hall. “Grandfather!”

  Jeremy rushed upstairs to find George embracing a tearful Sally outside Hugh Stapleton’s bedroom. Caroline, extremely pregnant, was standing in the doorway of her room in a negligee and robe. In Hugh Stapleton’s bedroom, Jeremy found the Congressman stretched on the canopied bed, clothed in the old-fashioned breeches and waistcoat he favored. He had apparently finished dressing when the stroke or heart spasm seized him. He had lain down and calmly greeted death with the same composure with which he had confronted life.

  The funeral was an ordeal for everyone in the family. Newspapers in New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia published long resumes of Hugh Stapleton’s career. Not a few Democratic papers underscored his grandson George’s conversion to the party of the people. This did nothing to raise Malcolm Stapleton’s spirits. But the whole family was consoled by the dozens of eulogies that praised the patriarch’s disinterested patriotism. They applauded his loans to the Continental Congress from his private fortune in the closing years of the Revolution. They commended his support of the War of 1812 even after it had taken the life of his older son and many of his New England Federalist colleagues in Congress were urging a peace of surrender and even secession from the Union.

  Caroline insisted on participating in all the ceremonies, including the graveside prayers that laid the old man to rest beside his wife in the cemetery at Great Rock Farm, the family’s original New Jersey property, about twenty miles from Bowood. It was still a producing farm, run by the descendants of some of the black slaves who had originally worked it.

  As they jolted back to Bowood over wretched country roads, Caroline became more and more agitated. She twisted the engagement ring on her finger as if she yearned to tear it off. She was barely aware of what she was doing. Hugh Stapleton’s death had forced her to confront her guilt for taking his grandson away from him and from the family’s traditions. It was a far keener emotion than George’s sentimental regret. For a little while she had treasured the sense of fatherhood the old man had offered her. Now she was assailed by a new kind of loneliness. Jeremy’s reappearance in such a powerful role made her feel beleaguered, incapable of explaining her deepest feelings to anyone—e
ven herself.

  As Caroline stepped out of the carriage in front of Bowood, she clutched her side and cried out. The first of many labor pains had just jolted through her body. Jeremy leaped in a gig and raced off to summon the family doctor. George carried Caroline upstairs, where Sally and several of the women servants undressed her. By the time the doctor arrived, the pains were multiplying. Caroline’s cries echoed through Bowood all afternoon and into the night.

  George paced the library fearing the worst, hoping for the best, like fathers since civilization began. He and Jeremy talked about enrolling the boy in Columbia immediately, of buying him a pony and other toys—the sort of nonsense men blabber to conceal how utterly superfluous they are in this fundamental process.

  At midnight Sally came downstairs with a smile on her weary face. “Congratulations, George, you’re the father of a healthy baby boy.”

  The men rushed upstairs to find Caroline propped up in the bed, holding the infant, who had apparently taken a quick look at his surroundings, decided they met with his approval, and gone to sleep. His finely sculpted features had an unmistakable resemblance to John Sladen’s. Jeremy held his breath. Would Caroline’s luck hold?

  His worry was superfluous. As any lawyer can testify, evidence, like beauty, is often in the eye of the beholder. George picked up the child and held him against his broad chest. “He’s beautiful, Caroline,” he said. “What shall we name him?”

  . “He looks like my father,” Caroline said. “The dark hair, the mouth …”

  George hesitated. He wanted to name him after Hugh Stapleton. “I see Grandfather too.”

  “I don’t.”

  “It’s Jonathan then. You’ve earned the right to the first pick. How about Hugh for a middle name?”