The Firebrand

by Susan Wiggs

  “Go home, Cora,” he said quietly. “See to that foot.”

  “But, sir, I can work, I swear I can.”

  He pushed open the double-hinged door. She shrank from him, her fear piercing him like a small dart. “I’m not giving you the sack, Cora. You can come back when you’re better,” he said. “That’s a promise.”

  “Thank you, sir,” the girl said, then ducked out.

  “Well,” his grandmother said, “I hope Mrs. Meeks can manage on her own.” She scowled down at her place setting. “I’ve mislaid my spectacles again.”

  “No, you haven’t,” Maggie said. “They’re right here.” She jumped up and found the glasses half hidden under a napkin.

  “Ah.” Grandmother perched the spectacles on her nose, looking as jolly as Rand had ever seen her. “Thank you, my dear.”

  Maggie sat down and jammed her hand into the bodice of her dress.

  “You mustn’t fidget,” Miss Lowell murmured.

  “I don’t like this corset. It’s stiff and it itches.”

  Rand lifted an eyebrow in inquiry. “You put her in a corset?”

  “A posture corset, sir. All young ladies must wear one.”

  The watery distress in Maggie’s eyes tore at him. “Only on special occasions,” he said, gratified by his daughter’s relieved smile.

  He put his hands together. “Shall I ask the blessing?” They all inclined their heads. “Thank you for the bounty of thy goodness,” he said. “Dear Lord, for the miracle of my beautiful daughter there can be no gratitude deeper than the thanks in my heart. May we be eternally humbled by the glory of this blessing, which you have brought. Amen.”

  “A-men,” Maggie said so loudly that Grace jumped. Maggie caught a censorious look from Miss Lowell. “Well,” she explained, “Patience always says a prayer ain’t finished until you give it a good a-men.”

  “A friend of hers,” Rand explained. “Patience Gloriana Washington.”

  “She’s a preacher at my church,” Maggie said.

  “Oh? And what church is that?” Grandmother asked. Everyone important attended First Congregational, the choice of Chicago’s Old Settlers.

  “It’s the Calvary Church.”

  Miss Lowell lifted her napkin and coughed spasmodically. “The church on Kearns Street?”

  “Yes,” Maggie said brightly. “That’s the very one.”

  “But—that’s a Negro church.”

  “No it isn’t, silly,” Maggie said with exaggerated patience. “It’s a Baptist church.”

  “A-men,” Maggie said firmly, concluding her bedtime prayer. Kneeling beside the pink-and-white bed, she looked up at Rand. “Did I remember everybody in the blessing?”

  “I think so.” He held out his hand and drew her to her feet.

  “I have a lot more people to bless nowadays, don’t I?”

  “You do, and you remembered every single one. Even Ivan.”

  At the sound of his name, the big dog thumped his tail against the expensive new carpet.

  “I’m glad you’re letting him sleep in my room,” Maggie said. “Silky always sleeps right next to me on the bed.” She cast her eyes down. “She used to, anyway.”

  “When I was a boy, I slept by myself, but I would have liked a cat.”

  “Did your mama read you stories every night?”

  His stomach clenched. He hadn’t prepared himself for this, either, but he should have realized she’d be curious about his background. When it came to questions about his mother, he could think of no answer Maggie would understand. How could he explain to a child that everything he was, all of his convictions, had been formed by the fact that his mother had walked away from him? A young boy’s heartbreak and yearning had gradually hardened into the man he had become.

  “I don’t remember much about my mother,” he said.

  “I remember every single-ingle thing about my mama,” she declared.

  He was relieved that she’d changed the subject. “Of course you do. She’s right across town, and she’s coming to see you on Saturday.”

  She bounced up and down on the bed. “How many days until Saturday?”

  “Seven.”

  She counted the days off on her fingers. Her lower lip quivered. “Can I write her a letter?”

  “Of course. We’ll post it by special delivery.”

  “Can I send her a wire?”

  “She’d probably like that.”

  “I want to send her a wire.” The lip quivered ominously again. “I want to ask her why she gave me away.”

  “Ah, Maggie.” He picked her up and held her close. “Remember how I said I used to walk with you until you fell asleep?”

  “Uh-huh.” She yawned and leaned her cheek on his shoulder.

  “I didn’t really walk,” he whispered.

  “You didn’t?”

  “I danced. I hummed the Emperor’s Waltz.”

  “Show me,” she said. “Do it again.”

  He cradled her head in one hand, moved in a slow, rhythmic circle and hummed the old, familiar tune. He danced for a long time, until the last of twilight disappeared and the only light in the room was the faint glow of the lamp. At some point he felt her shudder into sleep, slumping heavily against him. His arms and shoulders strained and went numb with the weight of her, but he welcomed the burden with his whole heart. “We were happy together once,” he whispered, though he knew she didn’t hear, “and we will be again.”

  Then, with painstaking care, he laid her on the bed and covered her up. “Maggie,” he whispered. “My Maggie. Your mother didn’t give you away. She gave you to me.”

  Each day, Rand left the bank early and hurried home to see Maggie. He usually found her in her suite of rooms, diligently bent over a practice book while Miss Lowell supervised, occasionally reaching down to correct her posture or adjust her grip on the pen. Maggie accepted instruction with admirable aplomb. In all that she did, her bright spirit shone through. Even when a wave of longing for Lucy swept over her, she would struggle through the moment with dogged determination, no doubt clinging to thoughts of Saturday.

  One afternoon Rand stood watching her from the doorway, telling himself she would be fine. She needed more time to adjust to the enormous changes in her life. He’d done his best to create the life he’d always envisioned for his daughter. She had servants and a governess to attend to all her needs and an ambitious schedule of special lessons in music, fancywork and deportment. Thus far, she seemed to regard her new life with curiosity and a good bit of humor.

  Her room, flounced and fringed in pink and white, was filled with toys—a miniature house furnished with fragile figurines, an army of dolls, their porcelain faces staring out from a glass-fronted display shelf, a little pram for pushing them around.

  Ivan sprawled on a braided rug with pink fringe, looking as out of place as a bull in a china shop. When Rand walked in, he lifted his big head in friendly expectancy.

  “Am I interrupting?” Rand asked.

  “Hello, there—oh.” Crestfallen, Maggie looked down at her paper. “I’ve blotted it again.”

  “Then you shall have to do it over, shan’t you?” Miss Lowell said gently.

  Rand picked up the copybook. “It’s not a bad blot. The clerks at my bank often do much worse.”

  “They do?” Maggie brightened.

  “Your father’s only trying to be polite, isn’t he?” Miss Lowell said.

  “No, this is very good work.” He held up the book and read, “’An obedient child is a joy to her sire.’ See? I can read this just fine.” He grinned down at Maggie. “But I don’t know what ‘obedient’ means. It’s a big word.” Turning back a page or two, he found a sketch of a boat on the lake, then a drawing of Silky the cat. On the page before that, he found the start of a letter: Dear Mama, Pleas come—

  Maggie saw what he was looking at, and her eyes grew bright with tears. She blinked fast and hard, as stoic as Lucy when it came to holding them back. Miss Lowell took the c
opybook and set it aside. “I’m sure we’ll do better next time, won’t we?”

  Maggie’s little hand crept out and covered her knee. The furtive movement caught the governess’s eye.

  “Sir,” said Miss Lowell, “I believe your daughter has something to tell you, don’t you, Maggie?”

  Maggie took a deep, nervous breath. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry for what?”

  She moved her hand to reveal a grass-stained tear in her dress.

  “I caught her climbing a tree in the garden, can you imagine?” Miss Lowell sounded incredulous.

  “If you would let me wear dungarees instead of dresses, it wouldn’t catch on things,” Maggie said.

  “She has the most inexcusable habit of answering back, doesn’t she?” Miss Lowell said. “We shall work on it, won’t we, Maggie?”

  “Yes, Miss Lowell.”

  Rand said, “Take some time for yourself, Miss Lowell. I shall visit with my daughter.” When the governess hesitated, he said, “Please, I insist.”

  “I really am sorry about my dress,” Maggie said earnestly, once Miss Lowell was gone.

  He sat on an upholstered bench beside her, feeling as out of place as the mastiff. He had an urge to take Maggie into his lap, but despite their nightly Emperor’s Waltz, he still felt awkward around her. He patted her on the head. “Don’t give it a thought.”

  “Miss Lowell said it is a sign of disrespect to destroy something given to me.”

  “You haven’t destroyed a thing. It’s just a little tear.” Rand didn’t like to see her fret over such a trivial matter. He handed her a packet wrapped in parchment and tied with string. “I’ve brought you something to look at.”

  Her eyes lit up. “What is it?”

  “See for yourself.”

  With eager fingers she untied the string and pulled away the parchment. “Oh!” she said. “Photographs. I love looking at photographs.”

  “I thought you’d like to see some pictures of yourself when you were tiny. And your family.”

  “I would! I surely would!” She studied the first picture. “This is me, isn’t it? What a funny little baby I was.” She laughed at the wide eyes and fat cheeks.

  “We were very proud of you,” Rand said.

  She took out another picture. He could see her tongue poking thoughtfully at the gap in her mouth where she’d lost her tooth.

  “Who do you think that could be?”

  “A beautiful bride and groom.”

  Rand had been deeply proud on his wedding day. All his life, his father had aimed him toward this event. The time had come for him to shoulder the mantle of tradition and responsibility. He’d been filled with a feeling of solemn purpose—to offer the world the next Higgins generation.

  “That’s your mother,” he said.

  Maggie studied the image of Diana, who looked as perfect as a marble icon, her cheeks flawless, her hair lacquered beneath a jeweled tiara holding a ghostly veil in place. She looked eerily like one of the painted dolls lined up on the shelf.

  “She’s pretty,” Maggie said. “That’s a fancy dress, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. There was a great fuss over it. She and her mother went to Paris, France, to buy her entire trousseau.”

  “What’s a trousseau?”

  “A lot of ladies’ clothes and things. I’m not exactly sure. No one has ever explained it to me. The man just gets to pay for it all.”

  “They went all the way to France to buy clothes?” Maggie’s eyebrows shot up. “Didn’t they know you can buy ready-to-wear at Haver Brothers over on Mercer Street?”

  “I suppose they wanted certain special clothes. It was a fancy wedding.”

  “I’ve never been to a wedding.”

  “You’d probably find it boring, sitting still and listening to a lot of reading and vows, but you might like it when the bride and groom kiss, and the music plays, and the bride carries a fine bouquet of flowers.”

  “I’d like to see that. Can we have a wedding, Papa? Can we?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?”

  “There’s no bride. No groom. No one who wants to get married.”

  She sat quietly for a few seconds. “What’s a bastard, Papa?” she asked suddenly, the question popping out of her like a champagne cork.

  “Where did you learn a word like that?”

  “Sally Saltonstall—she’s my best friend on account of I play with her every Wednesday—says I’m a bastard because my mama and papa ain’t married.”

  “Aren’t married. And your friend is full of sh—succotash.” He rubbed his jaw, silently resolving to have a word with the Saltonstalls.

  Maggie mouthed the word “succotash,” and seemed satisfied. Then she went back to studying the picture. He watched her face to see if she had any reaction at all to the image of her mother.

  She poked a finger at the image. “Who is that man?”

  For a moment, Rand froze. He could not even take the next breath as he stared at the picture, trying to see what she saw. A clear-eyed young man with very little character stamped on his face. Sculpted features, a firm mouth, his hair groomed to the last strand.

  “That’s—” He cleared his throat. “That was me.”

  She pulled back to look from him to the photograph. “Oh! It doesn’t look at all like you.”

  In a single night he’d changed from a promising young man with the world at his feet to a desperate, grieving monster scarred inside and out. He tried to remember what it had been like to look into a mirror and see that face. What did that handsome, arrogant man used to think about, dream about? What were his hopes and his fears? He’d wanted a storybook life—a wife and child, a prosperous career, the admiration of society. He’d thought that having such things would fulfill him. But he’d been wrong. He’d achieved all that and he had not been happy. Satisfied, perhaps. Proud, even. But happy? Had he ever really known what that was? After the fire he’d known only its lack, a loneliness so acute that he felt hollowed out by a sharp object. Now, with Maggie, he glimpsed occasional flashes of happiness, like sunlight filtering down through a dark forest. She was the sunlight…but the darkness was still there.

  He mentally shook himself and gave his attention back to her. “I’ve changed,” he said. “I’m older, and in the fire, the night I lost you, I was burned. The scars make me look different.”

  “They do.”

  “Does that bother you?”

  “Bother me?”

  “Does it worry you or…frighten you?” He forced out the words. He had learned to pretend not to notice that women averted their eyes from him or that neighborhood children played a game of running from “the beast,” diving for cover when they saw him coming.

  Maggie did something most unexpected. She laughed. “No, silly. Spiders frighten me.” Still laughing, she jumped up and went to the door. “Hello, Mr. Nichol. Do you want to come and play?”

  The usually unflappable butler stood in the doorway, his cheeks red with pleasure. “Perhaps later, miss, and thank you for the invitation. Mr. Mosher is waiting for you both in the garden.”

  “Who’s Mr. Mosher?”

  “A photographer.” Rand took her hand and led her downstairs. “I asked him to come and make a picture of us.”

  “Hurrah!”

  Charles Mosher and his assistant had set up their camera and tented darkroom. The photographer grinned when he saw Maggie. “No one told me I’d be photographing a real live princess,” he said.

  “And my papa,” she said, looking at the lone stool. “You must put him in the photograph, too.”

  Rand clenched his jaw. He had not been photographed since before the fire and never intended to again. “Sweetheart, I was planning on a picture of you all by yourself.”

  She folded her arms across her chest. “I won’t. I won’t. I won’t.” Her voice crescendoed with each won’t.

  Rand remembered what Viola had said about tantrums. He turned from his dau
ghter, pretending great interest in the assistant’s strong-smelling chemical brews of collodion and nitrate of silver.

  Mosher pulled on a pair of white gloves for handling the plates. “Sir, if I may say so, she might sit more still in your lap.”

  Rand wanted to object, but the truth was, his looks didn’t matter. The whole point of today’s exercise was to produce a photograph to send to Diana. “All right,” he said. “Tell me where to sit.”

  A few minutes later, he held Maggie in his lap. She squirmed, still cross with him. Mosher positioned himself behind the camera. “You have to sit still for the count of three,” he said.

  “That goopy stuff smells,” Maggie complained.

  “It’s a mixture of ether and alcohol,” Mosher explained. “And guncotton. I use it to keep the plates wet.” He framed his view. “You don’t have to smile, miss.”

  “Good. I don’t feel like smiling.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  He exposed a few plates, then promised to bring the prints first thing in the morning. Maggie sat on the grass, her knees drawn up to her chin. When the photographer left, Rand squatted down beside her. “Maybe you’ll smile for the camera next time.”

  She lifted her shoulders in a shrug.

  Though he knew the answer, he felt compelled to ask, “What’s the matter, sweetheart?”

  “I want my mama,” she stated. “And Silky. And Grammy Vi.”

  “I know you miss them, but—”

  “Why can’t we all be together? Isn’t that what a family is?”

  Simple questions, but they made him feel as though he had dived into deep water and couldn’t find the surface. “Sometimes, yes. But there are different types of families. In this one, the parents live in separate houses.”

  “I wish my mama was right here at the house, all the time. You have lots and lots of room.”

  The thought of Lucy, living in his house, seized him with unexpected heat. “She would never agree to live here. She likes being on her own, independent.” All those lovers she boasted of so shamelessly would miss her if she moved to a respectable household, he reflected peevishly. “Even if she did, people would think it…strange.”