Swimming in the Moon

by Pamela Schoenewaldt

  We went to the Hotel Burnham, an opulent palace for businessmen. “That one maybe owns slaughterhouses,” Mamma said, pointing out a stocky gentleman in a top hat. “And those at the table could have railroads and banks and shipping companies. This is where I’d stay if my act came after the intermission. See? It’s finer than the villa.” She paraded me around the lobby, past the velvet-papered walls, carved ceilings, elevator cages in metal as delicate as lace, porters, busboys, waiters, and doormen in blazing white gloves gliding soundlessly over thick carpets. How many gloves would each man have, and what an army of laundresses must be working for them? “Enrico Caruso stayed here,” she announced, “and Jenny Lind, the great Swedish Nightingale. Arturo Toscanini will sleep in the Burnham if he ever comes to Chicago.” Her face darkened. “Maybe he’d tell Mr. Keith what I did.”

  I wished then and a thousand times after that Maestro Arturo Toscanini had never come to Naples. Years later a great doctor would insist that my mother’s anxious fear of the maestro sprang from a deep hurt in her childhood, probably connected to her father. Perhaps so, but at that moment she seemed to be conjuring the maestro himself; his swooping black eyebrows were like the wings of a hawk seeking her out for destruction.

  At least she was easily distracted. Passing the hotel’s grand piano led her to speak of Jimmy the piano man, with whom she shared a language beyond words. Under his prodding, her voice was stronger now, her range, repertoire, and performances more assured. “Still, I’m always afraid onstage,” she whispered. “Suppose the words don’t come? Suppose the notes are flat, or people hiss or throw things? We have to go,” she announced, peering at a lady’s watch dangling from her belt. She never owned a watch before or cared much for time. So many small things declared: Your mother has changed. Was I changed too from living without her? She didn’t say. Perhaps she hadn’t noticed.

  We hurried to the Haymarket Theater. “Look,” said Mamma, pointing to the playbill with a gloved finger: “Teresa D’Angelo, The Naples Nightingale.” Of course she’d be on the playbill, but to see her name in print, there on the street of a great city, nailed me speechless to the pavement until she pulled me away. “Come, I have to get dressed.” We passed through the stage door. With every step she became even less Mamma and more an act in Mr. Keith’s troupe, a tightly woven family that knew nothing of me. Strangers greeted her warmly, women in feathers, acrobats, a ventriloquist with his dummy, clowns, and a spindly memory master. Only Lydia, the girl with trained dogs, passed silently. “Those nasty dogs make more than I do,” Mamma whispered. “Wait here. I always get dressed alone.”

  Alone? We had slept, dressed, and bathed together all my life. I knew every freckle on her back. I knew when her monthly flow began and ended and her six strands of gray hair. The dressing room door clicked closed. I pressed my back against the wall, away from a buffeting flow of performers. It was there that Mario found me, announcing himself with a funny rag-doll dance.

  “Teresa has her ways,” he said kindly. Yes, and every way was new to me. As I followed him through a maze of scaffolds, ropes, props, and players to my seat, he revealed that she spoke earnestly to herself in dialect before each show. She vomited after each performance, setting a bucket offstage for this purpose. In each new city she found her way to a nearby river, canal, or lake. “I followed her once,” said Mario. “She stands there a long time, and if she thinks nobody’s around, she sings.”

  “What does she sing?”

  “Always the same: ‘Santa Lucia.’ ” Joy shot through me. “She talks about you and how well you do in school.”

  “Really?” Really?

  “Of course. But”—and now he lowered his voice—“she’s playing cards too much with the acrobats. They cheat. Mr. Keith doesn’t mind a friendly game, but if he catches you gambling, there’s a fine. He says gamblers lose their edge onstage. I warned Teresa, and she said it’s not my business. Perhaps she’ll listen to you.” I doubted that.

  Mario pulled me into a niche between potted palms. “And here’s an odd thing. Memnon the memory master always goes on before her. He says she showed him a picture from an Italian newspaper.”

  I sighed. “A handsome man with dark eyes and eyebrows like a hawk’s wings?”

  “That’s what Memnon says. She always wants to know if this guy’s in the audience. Memnon keeps telling her he doesn’t do faces. He remembers cards, numbers, things like that. She got angry once and nearly wouldn’t go on, screaming that he’d have to remember this face once he saw it. Mr. Keith fined her for ‘backstage disruption.’ So what’s up? Did Hawkeye do her wrong?”

  The jostling crowd had turned us face-to-face. Mario put his stubby hand on my arm. “I see. Long story, none of my business. Well, nobody gets into vaudeville without a long story. But, listen, Lucia”—he stepped closer and lowered his voice—“to stay in Mr. Keith’s troupe, she can’t let her story be a backstage disruption. She has to keep her grip. Well, enjoy the show. I have to put on my face.” Mario slipped away. His own act came after the intermission, where Mamma longed to be.

  Acts floated by. Lydia and her dogs, tap dancers, a hypnotist and a mime, acrobats and a tightrope walker, a joke-telling juggler and President Theodore Roosevelt impersonator whose story of big-game hunting laced with political jokes had the audience howling. Finally Memnon came on, flawlessly memorizing strings of numbers, dates, and random objects shouted out from the audience. Mamma would be next. “Breathe, Lucia,” she would have said. A piano flourish and the master of ceremonies demanded applause for “the Naples Nightingale, direct from Europe.” I clapped so loudly the woman next to me leaned over and asked: “Have you seen her before? Is she good?”

  “Yes,” I said. “She’s wonderful.”

  A golden spotlight beamed down on Mamma, frosting the plume of her creamy, wide-brimmed hat. A violet gown draped in swirls to her feet with ruffles of lace at the breast and sleeves. Her hair was huge with swirls and loops. The hands in long, dawn-gray gloves lifted gracefully and pressed her heart in thanks for the applause. Men whistled, bringing scurrying ushers, for at Mr. Keith’s vaudeville, audiences must be decorous. I drank in the glorious sight of her.

  She settled her feet, a gesture so slight under the swirls of skirt that only a daughter would notice. When she opened her mouth, a huge voice flowed out: “Give My Regards to Broadway,” a rousing song that many knew. How was that voice possible for any woman? It was so much richer and more soaring than I remembered or could have imagined. The heave of her breasts, lift of her hands, and sway of her body, how had I not seen this mastery in the boardinghouse? When she sang “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” the audience joined in, but her voice floated effortlessly over theirs. She sang “In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree” so earnestly that one would think we had apple trees around the villa. For “My Wild Irish Rose,” she sounded pure Irish. Her last number was “America the Beautiful.” She might barely know the meaning of these words, but one could swear she’d lay down her life for the country. A graceful curtsy rewarded the thumping applause. When had she learned to curtsy? I clapped until my palms stung. People would go home now, of course. What act could ever best hers?

  No, they sat and cheered a fire-eater. At intermission people excitedly spoke of him, a young magician, and the Roosevelt jokes. “That Nightingale was pretty good,” a woman said.

  “Sure,” her companion agreed, “but why Naples? She’s got to be American.”

  Beaming like a fool, heart pounding, I made my way backstage after the show, worming past ushers and guards with “My mother is the Naples Nightingale.”

  “Don’t keep saying you’re my daughter,” Mamma fretted as she washed out her sick bucket. “They’ll think that I’m old.”

  “You were wonderful,” I said over and over. The glaze of performance was fading, and she was becoming herself again. I could come in the dressing room now because “nothing bad” had happened in the act. So I sat on a wobbling stool and watched her remove hat,
gloves, and a mass of rats, hairpieces, and hairpins. She applied a thick cream to her face paint, washed and wiped until her own olive skin appeared where American white had been. I helped her out of a boned, padded American Beauty corset and into another one less formidable, and then a dark green walking dress.

  “You see?” she said earnestly. “I’m still your mother. Let’s go eat.”

  Aside from Lula’s, I’d never eaten in a restaurant before, never been waited on or had doors opened for me. Mamma seemed accustomed to all this, even impatient when the waiter was slow with our plates. She ordered my first sundae and watched me devour that fabulous concoction of airy whipped cream, dense chocolate syrup, and silky ice cream. “Do you want another tomorrow?” I did, yes, absolutely. “There’s no gold on the streets in America,” she noted, “but you can get ice cream sundaes.”

  It was late when we finished eating, and I was tired after the early rising for the train, the thrill of the show, and the opiate bliss of my sundae, but she led me between monstrous buildings at the heart of Chicago and then along Lake Michigan, where whitecaps frothed the dark waters. Finally as we circled back to a small hotel by the theater where the players lodged, I asked: “Mamma, are you happy in vaudeville?”

  “Yes, mostly. Mr. Keith says we have to take care of each other like family because we’re out on the road alone.” In the gaslight, her eyes glittered. “But there’s fighting all the time, Lucia. Who’s higher on the playbill, whose act is longer? Who gets more applause? We’re all paid differently. Why do those nasty, yappy dogs get more than I do? Why?”

  “I don’t know.” She was silent until we reached our room.

  “The magician says I should sing ‘The Bee That Gets the Honey Doesn’t Hang Around the Hive’ because it suits my voice. But Memnon says no, it’s a trick because the pastors will complain and then I’ll get a red card from Mr. Keith. You see? Who can I trust? And Toscanini could be watching. He could shout something during my act.”

  We were in our nightgowns now. With her hair tied neatly back, she still looked young enough to truly be my sister. “Toscanini’s in Italy,” I said wearily. “Can’t you forget about him?”

  She sat down stiffly on the edge of our bed. “Any American opera house could bring him over.”

  “But he’s not here now!” I said much too loudly. Her shoulders curled in, her head bowed down. Ashamed, I took her hands. “Mamma, I meant, don’t worry about things that haven’t happened. Isn’t this better than factory work? You eat in restaurants, sleep in hotels, and people clap for you.”

  “Yes,” she said finally. “I’m not on my knees, scrubbing. And there’s no count, no Galuppi. So yes, it’s better.” With that, weariness covered her like a blanket. She kissed me, stretched out in bed, and was asleep. Lying awake in my first hotel room, I wondered if some deep hurt had gouged away her capacity for joy, as a bad break in the leg leaves a constant limp. Better, I concluded sadly, would have to be good enough for her.

  We slept late in the morning and went out for what Mamma called “brunch” and my second sundae. Hurrying back to the matinee, I asked the question I couldn’t frame the night before: “Mamma, you wrote that you’d won money gambling.”

  “I never gamble,” she said flatly.

  I studied her face cut into the crisp blue sky, calmly absorbing admiring glances as we passed taverns and street corners. “You played cards for money, but that’s not gambling?”

  “No, because I’m not a gambler. Besides, we played Italian games, scopa and briscola, not poker. This is America, Lucia. Everybody plays for money. The dollars I sent you for new clothes came from scopa. Didn’t you know?” How could I know? “I just have to make sure Mr. Keith doesn’t find out.”

  “But he could find out, or someone could tell him.”

  “One of my enemies?”

  “Just someone.”

  “Don’t worry so much. Besides, don’t you want a beautiful graduation dress?”

  “A dress doesn’t matter,” I said hastily.

  “I’m your mother,” she said sharply. “I can decide what matters.” We walked the next blocks in silence until we reached the theater. Then she stopped by the stage door and took my hands. “I’m sorry, Lucia, but listen. Suppose you come travel with me? I’ll be calmer if you’re here. Mario could get you work in the office. You could have sundaes every day.”

  Yes, to travel with the vaudeville would be exciting. I could eat in restaurants, sleep in hotels, and wear fine clothes. I could see America and not just the streets of Cleveland. Mamma might be calmer and perhaps she wouldn’t gamble. But to give up graduation, to yank out a dream so deeply anchored? She studied my face. “Never mind,” she said finally. “I have to get ready. Mario got you a seat in front so I’ll see you when I’m on.” She disappeared into a milling crowd of performers.

  Mario found me outside my mother’s dressing room. He was already in costume. “There’s a telegram for you, Lucia,” he said, holding up the frail yellow envelope. I stepped back. “It could be good news.” But the little mouth inside his painted smile showed how unlikely this might be: everyone knew telegrams brought only bad news.

  I read the few words: “Yolanda’s labor started early. She’s asking for you. Come home soon. Roseanne.”

  I knocked on my mother’s door and explained why I had to leave. She frowned. “They can get a midwife. You’re going tomorrow anyway. At least stay for the show.”

  “I’m sorry, Mamma. If I leave now, I can just make the next train. Yolanda needs me. She’s alone.”

  “Fifteen minutes, Nightingale,” somebody called. “Don’t be late.”

  “When will I see you again?”

  “Soon, very soon.” We kissed. She stroked my hair, held me, and whispered, “Never mind about what I said. You wouldn’t like this life.” And she was gone, closing the door firmly behind her.

  Mario assigned a lanky young stagehand named Harold to help me get my bags and catch the train to Cleveland. As we hurried off, Harold related how he’d run away from his father’s dairy farm to join Mr. Keith’s show in Cincinnati. “What I want from life,” he announced, “is never to milk a cow again and never to shovel cow shit.” I said I hoped to finish high school and then somehow go to college. As we waited by the tracks he cocked his head, observing me. “You’re different from your ma. She’s always jumpy, like somebody’s after her. She does sing bully good, though. Anyway, here’s your train. A-river-dare-chee, like you Eye-talians say.” As I stepped on the train, he bolted away.

  I worried about Mamma’s “jumpiness” and fears as we barreled east through cornfields and small towns, first in sunshine and soon in a drizzling rain.

  Chapter 9

  YOLANDA

  I sent Charlie a telegram and arrived soaking wet at the boardinghouse. Roseanne met me by the door. “We’ve been waiting and waiting for you. Hilda the midwife is on her way. Hang up your coat and go to your room. Hurry.”

  Yolanda lay heaving, clutching a crucifix. “Lucia,” she gasped. “Nobody told me it hurt so much.”

  I mopped her brow. “When Hilda comes, if you want, we could take you to the hospital.”

  “Where Irena died?” she gasped. “No.”

  “Should I get your mother?”

  “She’s sick.”

  “Mrs. Reilly?”

  Despite the pain, Yolanda managed a grimacing smile. “Noise? Blood? Mess? She’d hate it. Ohh, another one.” Her wildly waving hand caught mine and crushed it as the next cramp came. The whites of her eyes blazed. “Stay with me, Lucia,” she groaned.

  “Of course, of course, I’m here. I won’t leave.”

  “All I want is to hold my baby.” Yolanda tore her hand from mine, arching her back, beating the mattress. I wanted a diploma. How different our dreams were.

  “You’ll have the babe in your arms soon enough, love,” said a new voice, Hilda, the midwife. White hair framed gray eyes as calm as a foggy morning. So much changed with her comin
g. Yolanda’s panting eased. She shifted her bulk, watching avidly as Hilda set out supplies on a starched linen cloth: herbs, oils, a neat stack of clean cloths, thin cord, needle and thread, pulling ropes, rubber bulb, stethoscope, listening tubes, scissors, and a basin. Her niece Claire sponged Yolanda’s face and arms. In the coming hours, Hilda had only to hold out her hand for Claire to put in it the proper tool as if she were Hilda’s own thoughts taking bodily shape.

  Hilda passed her hands over and within Yolanda’s body. “We’ll be here awhile,” she finally announced. “It’s not time to worry yet, but the baby’s in the wrong position. We need to have it head down.”

  “How can we do that?” I asked.

  “You’ll see.” Humming softly, she oiled her hands and massaged Yolanda’s belly, her humming easing in and out of speech. She asked a few questions, nodding at each answer. When Yolanda groaned, the humming deepened.

  Exhausted by travel, the drumming rain outside, and the anxious strain of Chicago, I was kept awake all night by constant errands: to the kitchen, to another midwife for certain herbs and once for a medical book. When Claire asked for cushions and a blanket, I ran off eagerly, sure they would serve the baby. But they were for me to rest in the corner. Yolanda called for Charlie, moaned for him, swore she saw him, and cried that she’d die without seeing him.

  The baby would not turn. Hilda and Claire considered and rejected bringing Yolanda to a hospital for a cesarean cut. Dangerous as a breech delivery could be, they feared the cutting more. “We just have to make it turn,” Hilda repeated.

  Yolanda was utterly spent. When I bent over the bed, her eyes seemed weighted, too weary to meet mine. Dawn brought no break in the rain. The road outside was a streaming swath of mud. The baby did not turn by ten in the morning, or by noon. Listening to Yolanda’s belly, Hilda reached out a free hand. Claire produced a damp cloth that Hilda used to wipe her own face. “The heartbeat’s down,” Hilda whispered.