Victorian San Francisco Stories

by M. Louisa Locke

  Mrs. Porter shook her head and distractedly flapped her hands in front of her cheeks, where angry red splotches had replaced the soft rose color that usually lent a particular sweetness to this young woman’s face. “Oh my, no, I am so hot. Please, Miss Millie, could you pour me a glass of water? I’m parched.”

  Millie started towards the table under the front window that held the tea tray and a pitcher of water, noticing several long orange threads lying on the floor, bright against the dark brown of the carpet. She bent over, picked them up, and began to twist them around her index finger, thinking to herself of the old adage, another of her sister’s favorites, Waste Not, Want Not. She then saw several more of the orange threads, leading like so many breadcrumbs to the door to the bedroom. As she picked these up, she felt a growing unease.

  It was unlikely that the threads had come from either her sister or herself, because this morning, as they always did, they had brushed each other down and checked the soles of their shoes before leaving their attic rooms. This was one of Minnie’s rules. They were never to risk bringing the flotsam and jetsam of their craft into the homes of their clients. “We must be neat as a new pin,” she would say. They also tried to make sure that they left behind no bits of thread or cloth, but the orange thread suddenly put her in mind of the way they had been hustled out of Mrs. Roberts’s hotel suite the day before.

  Unbidden, Millie had a vision of Mrs. Roberts, her cotton chemise and petticoat catching the small loose threads from the unfinished seams and hem of the skirt they had been working on. But how could these threads have made it across town to the Porter’s home in the Western Addition?

  “Mrs. Porter,” Millie blurted out, “do you know a Mrs. Andrew Roberts?”

  Lydia Porter stopped fanning herself for a moment and stared at Millie, who felt the old familiar menagerie of panic: the tiny bird that fluttered in her chest, the coils of the snake that squeezed her throat closed and hissed in her ears, and the shaggy brown bear that loomed over her, cutting out the light. She stood still, willing herself not to faint, and slowly the comforting sounds of her sister’s voice chattering on about the benefits of drinking water with lemon penetrated her consciousness and released her from the paralyzing fear. Millie took a deep breath and walked unsteadily over to her sister, who looked questioningly at her. She wordlessly gave her the little pile of orange thread she had accumulated, and then she went and got poor Mrs. Porter her glass of water.

  *****

  Mrs. Annie Fuller looked across at her two elderly boarders, Miss Minnie and Miss Millie Moffet, and wondered if she would ever learn why they had asked her to join them after dinner. She had been glad to oblige since she didn’t have any clients scheduled for this evening (a widow, she supplemented the income from her boarding house giving business and domestic advice as the clairvoyant Madam Sibyl), and she had a deep affection and respect for these two spinster seamstresses who seemed to embrace life with such good cheer.

  However, Miss Minnie, the elder, had been speaking for nearly five minutes about the Christmas tree her family had when she was fifteen and her sister Millie was eleven, and Annie doubted very much if that had been the point of their invitation to join them in the formal front parlor of the boarding house. While Annie rather enjoyed imagining these two women as girls, stringing popped corn and dried cranberries around a fifteen-foot fir tree, her time this evening was limited. She had promised Nate Dawson, the local lawyer who was courting her, that she would be free if he stopped by, and he would not appreciate finding her chaperoned by Miss Minnie and Miss Millie since he had the unreasonable belief that they disapproved of him.

  Annie repressed a grin. Miss Minnie did have the habit of talking about the particular charms of the young men of Natchez when Nate was around. He said that this was proof they felt he wasn’t good enough for Annie. She thought that it was more likely that he simply reminded them of the gentlemen of their youth because he was clean-shaven, which had been the fashion back then, and because he treated them with such kind politeness.

  “… and that was the Christmas when our older brother brought us back those china dolls from his trip to New Orleans. Don’t you remember, Millicent? And Jasper hid yours in the privy! Jasper was only seven at the time, but he was always getting into trouble. Mrs. Fuller, you remember, Jasper was our baby brother, and we were so used to taking care of him that we came all the way out west, just to make sure he didn’t get into any trouble out here. Of course…”

  Annie saw Miss Millie place her hand on her older sister’s arm, and the flow of reminiscences faltered. She found herself holding her breath, waiting to see if Miss Millie would say something. The two women sitting in front of her, in their identical black-silk dresses, were physically so alike they could be twins. They were both tiny, with ramrod straight postures, white hair parted neatly in the center and swept back under identical lace caps, and merry light-blue eyes. Miss Minnie seemed to walk a little more stiffly than her younger sister, and the effects of a lifetime of needlework (slight reddening around the eyes and swollen knuckles) were more prominent in her as well. But one didn’t need to look that closely to determine which of the two women was which, because the difference was unmistakable. The elder, Miss Minnie, never stopped talking, and the younger, Miss Millie, never said a word. Ever. The only reason Annie knew that she could speak was that Kathleen, her maid, had heard them talking to each other up in their attic workroom. Annie had always wondered if Miss Minnie spoke so much because her sister didn’t or if Miss Millie had given up trying to speak around her extremely loquacious older sister.

  Annie saw Miss Minnie look quickly at her younger sister, and then she began to speak again. “Mrs. Fuller, Millicent has reminded me that Miss Kathleen mentioned that your nice young man, Mr. Dawson, was stopping by this evening, and we wouldn’t want to inconvenience you. Of course, back when I was young, it was considered a lady’s prerogative to keep a gentleman waiting.”

  Annie took advantage of the brief pause that followed this last statement, and she said, “Please, Miss Minnie, do tell me how I might be of service to you and your sister. Do you need anything to make your rooms more comfortable? Mrs. O’Rourke had mentioned that you could use an additional lamp in your work room now that the days are growing so short.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Fuller, no, we are quite comfortable. No one could be more obliging. No, it is your advice we need. ‘A trouble shared is a trouble halved,’ I always say. We are quite out of our depth, you see. But we feel we must do something. It is our moral responsibility. But sister and I don’t quite agree on how to proceed. Millicent suggested that you might be able to help. Because of Madam Sibyl. She pointed out that you get paid to give advice as Madam Sibyl and that you might actually have run across a similar problem. We would be willing to pay…”

  “Oh please, Miss Minnie, there is no need. If I can be of help to you, it is my pleasure. If you could just tell me what the problem is exactly!” Annie broke in, appalled that these two hard-working women would feel the need to spend a single penny for her help.

  Miss Minnie again looked at her sister, as if expecting her to speak, but Miss Millie remained mute, so she resumed. “You see, Mrs. Fuller, it concerns two of our clients. One, a young woman, I shall call her Mrs. P, has been married less than a year, and she is expecting a child next month. We believe that her husband has taken up with another of our clients. I shall call her Mrs. J. This second client, a former actress, is married to a much older man to whom, I am sorry to say, she is frequently unfaithful. I believe that it is our duty to tell the first woman that her husband has violated their wedding vows, but my sister says that this would be too unkind, that there must be another way.”

  Annie, thoroughly surprised, said the first thing that came to her mind. “Miss Minnie, are you sure of your facts? I mean, could you be mistaken? I would hate to counsel any action if you didn’t have firm proof that there has been any wrong-doing.” She pushed away the absurd thought that these
very respectable older women had actually stumbled in on an adulterous couple in flagrante delicto, as it were.

  “Mrs. Fuller, I understand your concern. I can assure you that there is no other explanation for what we have found,” Miss Minnie said firmly. “This Thursday morning, we were visiting the first woman, Mrs. P, making adjustments to several of her garments to accommodate the last month leading up to her confinement. My sister discovered some thread on the floor of the upstairs sitting room, near the bedroom door, that could only have come from a dress we are making for the other client. When Millicent showed me the thread, I instantly understood her concern. I asked the young woman if she had ever had an occasion to meet Mrs. J, and she had not. However, she mentioned that her husband had met her for the first time two weeks ago at a dinner party.”

  Annie replied, “If I understand you correctly, you believe that the thread had been tracked into the house by the pregnant woman’s husband? My dear Miss Minnie, couldn’t it have been from one of the young woman’s dresses, or perhaps the husband may have simply picked up the thread at the dinner party? Although I suppose that it is odd that it would not have been tidied up by a servant sometime in those two weeks.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Fuller, it couldn’t have come from our young mother-to-be. Good heavens, she would never wear that shade, not with her complexion. Anyway, the thread perfectly matched the thread we had specially dyed to match the material for Mrs. J’s dress. In addition, this past Wednesday was the first day we took the material to Mrs. J’s hotel suite, just the day before we found it at Mrs. P’s house. We have a standing appointment on Wednesdays with Mrs. J, since there is usually some sewing that needs to be done, even if we are not actually working on an outfit. But this Wednesday, we had the first fitting of a new dress she had commissioned. The bits of thread, I am afraid, got all over our client in the fitting, and someone came into the adjoining room while we were there so she hurried us off before we could clean it up. The only possible explanation is that the person who entered that room was Mr. P and that he immediately came into such close proximity to Mrs. J that the thread was conveyed to him. He must have then shed the thread in his own sitting room when he returned that evening.”

  Annie wondered why the older woman was so sure that there wasn’t any other explanation for the thread’s mysterious trip from one home to the other, and she said, “I still don’t see why you see this as proof of his infidelity. Even if he was the person who came into the room, perhaps there is an innocent explanation. Couldn’t he have dropped by to see her husband and, in the midst of his visit, brushed up against her skirts?”

  Miss Minnie tittered, which quite shocked Annie. Then the older woman said, “Well, he certainly brushed up against something, but it wasn’t her skirts. When we left, she wasn’t wearing much beyond her chemise and drawers, and, you see, he wouldn’t have been the first gentleman we have heard surreptitiously enter our client’s bedroom in the middle of the day when her husband was away.”

  “Oh my,” replied Annie, quite taken aback by the older woman’s blunt statement.

  Miss Minnie again looked over at her sister, who gave her an encouraging smile. “The sad truth is that we have known for some time that our client uses her dress-fitting appointments as an excuse to dismiss her maid for the afternoon so that she can entertain her gentleman friends without detection. My sister has been of the opinion that when she gets a new admirer, she commissions a new outfit, and when she tires of them, she often cancels her appointment with us. She commissioned this newest outfit right after the dinner party where she met our Mr. P. When we realized that her new admirer must be our other client’s young husband, well, you can imagine our distress.”

  Annie was speechless. Until now, she had thought of these two elderly ladies as complete innocents, delicately reared in the South, living a narrow sheltered life, and taking care of their bachelor brother until they were forced to support themselves upon his death. She was quickly revising that image.

  As if she had read her mind, Miss Minnie said, “Mrs. Fuller, I am sorry if I have shocked you. My sister and I have supported ourselves with our sewing for well over half a century, and you would be amazed at what a dressmaker learns about the families she sews for. We are often the first to know when a child has been conceived, when there is an illness, when there are financial problems, and, unfortunately, when there are difficulties in a marriage. My sister and I long ago decided that if we were unwilling to work for families where there were moral transgressions, we would starve. And we have prided ourselves in our discretion.” Miss Minnie looked directly at Annie.

  “This is why we have come to you for advice. We are afraid that the natural distance that comes between a husband and wife as the woman comes close to the time of her confinement, when she is thinking of little more than the coming child, may have made an essentially good man vulnerable to the lures of a very beautiful and charming woman. My sister and I agree that something should be done, but we disagree over what we should do.”

  Annie nodded, thinking about a number of the women who had come to Madam Sibyl with similar stories. But what could these two women do that wouldn’t simply make things worse? She certainly didn’t want to advise anything that would damage their livelihood. But giving advice was what she did daily as Madam Sibyl, so she started with what she felt they shouldn’t do.

  “Miss Minnie, I am afraid that I must agree with your sister. Telling your young client, particularly now as she nears the birth of her child, would not only be cruel but could actually endanger her health and that of the baby.”

  Annie had personal experience with the devastating effects an emotional upheaval could have on a woman’s pregnancy, but she pushed this thought away and continued. “There is the chance he may not have consummated the affair yet, but once his wife learns that he has even been tempted to stray, this could permanently ruin their future together. Have the young couple known each other long?”

  Miss Minnie said, “From what our young client has said, they have known each other since childhood, and they are both no more than their early twenties. In my experience, a woman will find comfort in marrying a man she has known for most of her life. For a man, this may produce a negative impression, that he has been too quickly confined into the strict boundaries of married life. As they say, ‘Marry in haste, repent at leisure.’”

  Annie noticed that Miss Millie stirred at her sister’s words and smiled sadly. Again, she felt that she was seeing unsuspected depths in these two women. Nodding, Annie then asked another question. “Do you think that letting your other client know that this young man has a young wife at home might stir her conscience at all? Could she be persuaded to break off the liaison herself?”

  Miss Minnie shook her head emphatically. “I am quite sure she already knows the particulars, and I cannot see her forgoing her own pleasure. She plays the lady, all charm and sweetness, but there is an underlying selfishness that betrays her. She acts as if the world owes her. My sister, who I confess has a softer heart than mine, thinks that something that happened in her past might explain this attitude.”

  Annie then said, “Well, it seems to me that there are then only two possible paths for you to take. One is to say nothing, hoping that the young husband will come to his senses on his own and break off the liaison before it irrevocably destroys his marriage. The second path would be to speak to the young man himself, who, if your judgment of his essential goodness is correct, will find the idea that someone else is aware of his transgressions enough to cause him to do the right thing.”

  Miss Minnie said, “Oh dear, Mrs. Fuller, we could never speak directly to the young man. Goodness, how could we? A lady should never mention such things to a member of the opposite sex, not even to their male relatives. Oh my, no, that simply is impossible.”

  Annie was bemused by Miss Minnie’s sudden switch back to wide-eyed innocent, and she started to apologize for upsetting her so when the younger sister leaned over to Mis
s Minnie and again placed her hand on her arm and gave her a speaking look.

  Miss Minnie nodded and then said, as if her sister had actually spoken to her, “Millicent wondered if you thought it might help if we could find a way to indicate indirectly to the young man that we worked for Mrs. J. It might make him realize how easy it would be for his indiscretions to be discovered.”

  Annie nodded and said, “It is possible that this might work, if you can figure out how to do this discreetly.”

  Miss Minnie looked over at her sister and then back to Annie, smiled, and said, “I’m sure Millicent will come up with a plan. She always does.”

  *****

  “Dear Mrs. Porter, we are so grateful you were able to accommodate our request to see you at seven. A terrible imposition, I know, so early in the morning. But one of our other clients has rather an emergency, and she needs our services at nine. We did want to get these outfits to you for their final fittings. I can assure you, you will be much more comfortable in the navy cashmere now that we have taken out the seams again.”

  “Dear Miss Minnie,” said Lydia Porter, “no need to apologize. I don’t sleep at all well of late; I just can’t get comfortable. I was glad to have you come this early. At least I had something to anticipate with pleasure; I get so bored with myself. I am sure my husband…oh, listen to me complain. I am confident the cashmere is fine; you have done such a clever job adapting my dresses to my changing state. Although at this point, there is no hiding my condition so I won’t be out in public very much. I suppose it will be good to have the navy for church. Thank heavens the high bustle isn’t in fashion this year. You wouldn’t know whether I was coming or going!” The young woman’s laughter wobbled into a teary smile.