The Gilded Cage

by Susannah Bamford

  The stage manager pointed them out to him, and he started down the stairs and across the front aisle to meet them. Toby tugged her to her feet.

  As William Paradise came closer, Marguerite was still not impressed. He had dark hair and dark eyes and a dark suit; he was mid-sized and middling handsome. This was the famous producer, the notorious lover, the man who, it was said, had broken more hearts than anyone on Broadway? She passed his like every day on the street.

  He greeted Toby like an old friend and asked about his mother, of all things, who apparently had been an actress herself twenty years before. William Paradise seemed to have a genuine interest in this woman; too genuine, for Marguerite was standing there, trying to “look like an angel,” as Toby had advised her, and growing a bit sulky. And then, finally, he turned to her.

  “Miss Corbeau.” He took her hand for an instant and looked at her. Marguerite saw that his eyes weren’t brown, but a dark, woodsy green. His gaze was keen and focused and alive; it drank her in without being in the least offensive. He smiled, and suddenly, Marguerite wanted very much to please him.

  “Will you sing for me?” he asked, as though she would be bestowing a favor.

  And even though they all knew very well how much Toby had schemed and pleaded and scratched for this audition, she followed Willie P.’s lead and nodded her head shyly, as though he had asked her to sing in his parlor, for his most intimate guests.

  She mounted the steps to the stage with Toby. He went straight to the piano.

  “Toby?” William Paradise’s voice was soft, but it carried up to the stage. “I’d like George to play for Miss Corbeau, if you wouldn’t mind.”

  Toby looked startled, but he nodded. “Of course.”

  “Thank you. Miss Corbeau, I’m going up to the balcony. George will signal you, and then you may begin when you wish. Abram, the lights please.”

  The footlights flicked on a moment later. Marguerite blinked. It was her first time standing on a stage, and she was overwhelmed. The floorboards seemed to vibrate underneath her feet and send up shock waves all the way out to her fingertips. She liked being high like this and looking over empty seats. She imagined them full of people, all looking at her. Through her nerves, her queasy stomach, she felt a sharp thrill, as though she’d just looked into the eyes of a new lover, and she had the same strong sense of fate. I belong here, she thought.

  “Take off your things,” Toby hissed. He handed the music to George on his way back down the stairs.

  She slipped out of her coat quickly and fumbled with her hatpin. Toby had gone over and over her wardrobe, and finally selected her new gold gown. It was her most flattering dress, accentuating the narrowness of her waist and giving her a bit of bosom, as it was lownecked and cunningly tucked and embroidered on the bodice. Marguerite had stuffed several handkerchiefs down the dress for good measure. A design of pale pink chrysanthemum petals was embroidered on the gold damask, and a double garland of pearls mounted on tulle with crystal pendants was drawn up in a series of loops diagonally down the skirt, held by jeweled clasps in the form of scallop shells.

  Marguerite tried to imagine that she was the luscious Lillian Russell. She struck the pose she and Toby had practiced, and when George nodded at her a moment later, she was ready. She took a deep breath and looked out into the empty seats. “Sing to the last row,” Toby had advised her. “Picture someone sitting there, someone you want to impress, even someone from your past… your father? No, I can see that’s a bad idea. Well, how about me, then, petal?”

  Marguerite smiled a bit, remembering that. But she pictured her mother, in an extravagant hat Marguerite would buy her, sitting in the last row. She nodded at George, and as the opening bars began, she took a breath and sailed in exactly as she’d practiced, over and over again.

  They’d chosen “A Bird in a Gilded Cage” for her to sing. Though the song was written from the point of view of someone looking at a young woman who’d sold herself in marriage to a rich, older man, Toby had coached her performance to suggest that Marguerite was the young woman herself “You may think she’s happy,” Marguerite had sung, over and over on those sunny afternoons, “but she’s not, though she seems to be …” Toby had been thrilled with the result, telling her that she packed a wallop better than John L. Sullivan himself

  But today, she couldn’t seem to capture that plaintive fire. Maybe it was the accompanist, who played at a slightly different tempo than Toby. Her voice was fine, but Marguerite knew, even as she sang, that she was not giving her best performance. Her tiredness showed in her voice, and she could not seem to pull herself together. As she sailed on, she frantically tried to inject life into the song, and it came out wrong. It was bad, it was wrong, she was trying too hard, and she was relieved when she could finally stop, on a note that was slightly sharp. Marguerite wanted to stamp her foot in frustration. She was never sharp. Toby had been the first to tell her that she had something known as perfect pitch.

  She didn’t dare look at Toby. She wouldn’t get another chance, not with William Miles Paradise, and would even Toby want to continue with her when she’d let him down so badly?

  William Paradise stood up in the balcony. “Thank you, Miss Corbeau,” rang out through the darkened theater. The footlights clicked off. Marguerite missed the warmth of the lights on her face. George got up from the piano and wandered off into the wings. It had taken less than five minutes, and it was over.

  Slowly, Toby rose from his position in the fifth row. She could sense it rather than see it, for her head was down. Suddenly, she felt ill again. Sweat popped out on her forehead, and she was dreadfully warm. Marguerite pressed a hand to her mouth.

  “Well—” Toby began, but he stopped abruptly as Marguerite picked up her gold skirts in both hands and ran to the wings, where she deposited her second breakfast of the morning on her new gold kid boots. With Toby standing over her, exasperated and angry, catching the jeweled hair ornament when it tumbled from her curls, she retched and sobbed bitterly.

  When she’d finished, she weakly lifted her head and looked straight into the cool, amused eyes of William Miles Paradise. She hated him more than she’d ever hated anyone.

  “I’m sorry,” she gulped. She was dreadfully afraid that her nose was running, but she’d be damned if she’d swipe at it with her hand. She’d already been humiliated enough.

  “Don’t worry, it’s happened before,” he said. Then before she could realize what his intention was, he reached into her bosom with two respectful fingers and extracted a handkerchief. With a mock bow and a twinkle in his eye, he handed it to her with a flourish. “Your handkerchief, Miss Corbeau,” he said.

  Darcy and Tavish Finn arrived with smiles and presents and large trunks, for they were planning a two-month stay in Europe. “We need ideas,” Tavish said, “new experiences, new people, and I want to learn French.”

  “And I want to spend time with my mother,” Darcy put in. “I haven’t seen her in more than twenty years. It’s a fine thing to forgive someone by mail, but it’s time we faced each other. Though I must say I don’t like the timing one bit.”

  Darcy’s mother, Amelia Grace Snow, had been a famous beauty who scandalized New York society by running off with the painter James Fitzchurch. The family had never heard from her again; Darcy had been forbidden to speak her mother’s name. She’d written to her mother soon after she was married, however, and they’d struck up a thriving correspondence. Since Darcy’s father had died in the great blizzard of ’88, Amelia and James had been able to quietly marry at last.

  “What’s the matter with the timing?” Columbine asked as she poured them all glasses of sherry. “I would think spring is the perfect time to go to Paris.”

  “She means now that Amelia is married she can’t shock everyone by seeing her,” Tavish said with an arch glance at his wife. “Darcy would much rather visit her mother while she is living in sin.”

  Darcy laughed. “You are too awful, Tavish. You know
that’s not true.”

  “It is true, and I had the black eye to prove it.”

  “Oh, dear, have you two come to blows so soon?” Columbine asked with a grin.

  “Not that old story, Tavish. I declare, you must tell everyone you meet. I think the entire train thinks I beat you.”

  Tavish raised one eyebrow at his wife and turned to Columbine. “It was at a very elegant dinner party at the Vesey Montclairs. They tolerate me, but they adore Darcy because she’s a Grace and a Snow, you see. Why do all society people in America feel compelled to use two names? Anyway, needless to say they’ve never read one word of what she’s written, or they’d ride her out of town on a rail.”

  “We should never go there again,” Darcy put in.

  “So Mrs. Vesey Montclair turned to Darcy and asked her if she would actually receive her mother should she leave a card at our hotel. And Darcy replied sweetly that she was going to call on Amelia first thing without, of course, mentioning that Amelia is now Mrs. Fitzchurch. Darcy almost killed poor Matilda. I swear, Columbine, the poor thing choked on her fish—I thought my own filet terribly bony—and Reverend Collier had to pound her on the back. Whereupon Mrs. Vesey Montclair’s emerald brooch popped its clasp, flew across the porcelain dishes and landed a mean one on my left eye.” He turned back to Darcy. “Case closed.”

  Darcy swatted him. Her quiet gray eyes were full of merriment. “I can see why you are opposed to marriage, Columbine,” she said. “How I wish sometimes that you had converted me. Or perhaps I should become an anarchist.”

  “That blackguard Mr. Birch certainly tried to convert you,” Tavish said, scowling.

  Columbine sat up. “If he’s such a blackguard, Tavish, whyever did you send him to me?”

  “Send him to you? I didn’t.”

  “But he said—”

  “Oh, I might have mentioned you—perhaps at one time might have said, if you get to New York, look her up … something like that. Before I knew what he was, that is. I know how much you adore radicals,” Tavish said, grinning. “But you didn’t get a letter of introduction, did you?”

  Columbine shook her head. Lawrence had told her the letter had been lost in the haste of his journey. She had meant to write Tavish about it, but she had forgotten, and soon it seemed unimportant.

  Darcy looked concerned. “Mr. Birch came here, Columbine?”

  “Yes, a couple of months ago,” Columbine said neutrally. “He had some trouble in San Francisco, he said.”

  “I’ll say,” Tavish growled. “Some say he caused it.”

  “There was no proof, Tavish,” Darcy said quietly.

  “I know. But it was a bad business. I hope you didn’t get entangled with the man, Columbine. Frankly, I don’t trust him a bit.”

  “Columbine probably saw through him in the first five minutes,” Darcy said decidedly. “She’s such a good judge of character.”

  “Mmmmm,” said the cowardly Columbine. She picked up the decanter. “More sherry?” she asked brightly.

  Marguerite wore her white bengaline gown with Irish lace and no jewelry. She arranged her hair in a simple style. She had the cook make Edwin’s favorite lunch. She was tender with him while he ate, solicitously asking him about the brokerage business, and only letting an occasional soft sigh escape her. When he had finished, he poured himself another glass of Bordeaux and pushed back his chair.

  He patted his lap. “Come here, little one. Something is troubling you.”

  Marguerite slipped off her brocade chair and went to sit on his knee. His arm curved around her waist. “Tell me,” Edwin said softly. He loved solving Marguerite’s little problems. “It can’t be so bad, can it?”

  She leaned against his shoulder. “Oh, Edwin. I’m so happy, and yet I can’t seem to stop weeping. I hardly know how to begin.”

  “At the beginning, dear,” Edwin said. He thought he sounded wonderfully masterful. Like his father, nearly.

  Tears sparkled on her thick black lashes. “I’m going to have your child, Edwin,” she whispered.

  Edwin felt as though ice water had been poured over his head, having the dual effect of shocking him and freezing his brain. “What?” he asked stupidly.

  “At first I wasn’t certain. But now I am.” Marguerite peeked at Edwin. He looked awfully, well, stupid, with his mouth open like that. “Isn’t it wonderful, darling?”

  He pushed her off his lap so he could stand. That action, the first curt gesture he’d ever made toward her, started Marguerite’s heart beating. She leaned against the table. The queasiness was constant with her now, and she desperately told herself she could not be sick, not now.

  He fumbled in his pocket for a cigar. She closed her eyes. Not a cigar! She would lose her composure for certain.

  “Please, Edwin,” she said weakly. “I must ask you not to smoke. I’ll be ill.”

  Automatically, Edwin returned the cigar to its case. “How could you do this!” he burst out, wheeling around to glare at her. “Father will never forgive this.”

  A slight widening of the nostrils was the only sign that Marguerite was furious. She must not show it. She must salvage this, she must. She must not lose her temper. “He doesn’t have to know, Edwin. We can marry.”

  “We cannot marry in time, I would have to elope. Even if we could marry, it is impossible.”

  “Even if we could? What are you saying, Edwin?” Real tears gathered in her eyes now. “I thought you loved me.”

  “Marguerite,” he said desperately, “don’t you understand? My family, my position? This is impossible.”

  “Stop saying it’s impossible! I’m afraid it is possible, Edwin, for I am standing here carrying your child. Despite your Eastern method of control,’” she added bitterly.

  He stared at her. “Exactly. I timed myself, I controlled my fluids—”

  She made a disgusted noise. “That’s ridiculous. In the beginning, perhaps. But there were many times that—”

  “There’s someone else,” he said. “You have another lover. I can see it in your face. My God, I should have listened to my friends. I should never have trusted you.”

  Her mouth was open. She wanted to fly at him in a rage. Her Edwin, her pale, elegant Edwin, was accusing her like this, like a bully, like a… man?

  “You are despicable,” she said.

  “You see that Toby Wells almost every day. The driver told me.”

  “What are you saying? You know I take music lessons from him.”

  “Sometimes you stay for two hours or more—”

  “Because what do I have to return to? An empty house with only an Irish maid to keep me company. You keep me here, I can never go out—”

  “I demand an answer!” Edwin shouted. “Who is the father of that child?”

  Marguerite stood rigid, her hands clasped into tiny fists at her sides. She wanted to fly at him, she wanted to scratch his eyes out, she wanted to murder him. But instead she turned her back and left the room.

  She went to the library and sat on the sofa, her whole body shaking. She could hardly think or move. Where to turn? she wondered dizzily. Where to turn? She heard footsteps down the hall, heard the slam of the front door. Edwin was gone.

  “What will I do?” she asked the empty room. Never in her worst nightmares had she imagined this.

  Bridget knocked lightly on the door. Her blue eyes rounded in concern when she saw her young mistress. “Can I do something for you, ma’am?” she asked solicitiously.

  Marguerite shook her head. “Just leave me alone, please.” But as Bridget nodded and turned, Marguerite spoke up. “No, Bridget, I’m going out. Will you put out my gray cloak, the one with the white velvet trim, and my new hat?”

  A kind of calmness came over her as she dressed to go out. She knew the answer now. Edwin was terrified of his father. For all his talk of his independence, he still answered to Winthrop Stiers. How Toby had snickered whenever she blithely said that Edwin was his own man! She should have listened to
Toby; he had tried to warn her about Edwin. But now even her best friend had turned his back. Toby was furious with her for humiliating him at the theater. She would have to solve her own problem.

  Winthrop Stiers was the key, she thought as she hailed a hansom cab on Madison, for Edwin had taken the private carriage. She remembered clearly how Edwin had said that his sister-in-law Rosamond had won his father over. Well, she was prettier and more charming than Rosamond, Marguerite felt sure. And Rosamond, in her fifth year of marriage, had yet to produce a child. Winthrop Stiers was heavily disappointed, Edwin had said.

  The carriage pulled up in front of the Stiers’ quiet brownstone on Fifth and Thirty-Sixth street. This was the neighborhood of the Old Guard, those venerable New York families who refused to follow the steady drive uptown, as millionaires pushed farther and farther up Fifth Avenue with their palaces and their limestone castles. Here the money and the mood was quiet and restrained. Marguerite knew that these brownstones were vastly more confident than those grandiose piles, but she still would prefer to have a Renaissance palace like the one Alva Vanderbilt had commissioned than an ugly old brownstone. When she and Edwin married, perhaps his father would build them a new house farther up Fifth, near the Valentine Hartleys, the epitome of the smart younger set.

  But still, even the brownstone cowed her a bit. She hesitated on the walk, looking at the curtained windows. A momentary still voice within her told her to stop and reconsider. But Marguerite was on fire from Edwin’s reaction. She knew in the very depths of her that Edwin had not meant to be cruel; it was just that he was still a boy, unable to stand up for himself. She would have to arrange everything. She would have to do it, for Edwin would hem and haw and put her off for weeks, even while her belly grew rounder and she was bursting the seams of her dresses. And what else could she do? Where else could she turn?