Sex Wars

by Marge Piercy

  “It’s a house of assignation,” Sammy said. “He has her stowed there.”

  “What’s that?” She was always surprised by how much Sammy knew of the life of the streets and the city, its underside and topside too.

  “Where men and women who aren’t married meet each other. I mean, not to each other. Usually it’s married women and bachelors or a man married to somebody else. They pay for the room for an hour or so.”

  “Out of the way, so no one sees them entering or leaving.” Freydeh shrugged. Why would a woman who had a perfectly decent husband go off for an hour’s bedding with some other man? If she hated her husband, why didn’t she just walk out?

  “There goes another one.” A woman slipped in, having walked from the end of the block. A man and a woman left together. He put her in a cab and shortly took another.

  “So what should we do?” After spending a year in jail, sometimes she found herself deferring to Sammy, as if he were a grown man—which he almost was. His voice had changed, he was five feet eight with a darkish beard he kept shaven. He did not go in for the full-bearded Jewish look of Asher. He did not even sport a mustache.

  “We sit and wait till he leaves, and then we try to get inside.”

  She nodded, too overwrought to speak again. Was she finally going to see her sister? So many years. So much pain. And the little girl, she must be five by now? If Shaineh still had her, and her keeper had not forced her to farm the daughter out. She had not seen Shaineh in so many years, would she recognize her? They said she had yellow hair. There were no blondes in their family. Shaineh’s hair had been light brown. Maybe they were pursuing the wrong woman. After all these years, how could she know? Would Shaineh even want to be found? Maybe she had adjusted to life as a kept woman and pretending not to be a Jew. Maybe she wanted to stay with this man, maybe she had fallen in love or simply settled for him and wanted no part of her past or her family.

  The proprietor asked them if they didn’t want something more, so they ate more corn cakes and drank another beer. And they waited, staring at the house. They waited.

  Finally they saw Alfred Kumble leave. He whistled for his phaeton and the footman, who had been sitting on the curb smoking, jumped up and brought the little carriage to him. Off they went, in this case with the footman sitting beside Alfred on the seat while his master gave him some kind of instructions.

  Freydeh leapt to her feet, but Sammy was halfway out the door already. They ran across to the house and rang the door. The woman opened it. “We need a room,” Sammy said.

  The woman looked them over with a jaundiced eye. She shrugged. “Two dollars an hour. You pay in advance. No rowdiness. This is a nice house.”

  Freydeh shut the door and advanced on the woman. “Never mind. You have my sister here. Shaineh. I think that man who just left, Alfred Kumble, calls her Samantha. She has a little girl.”

  “Not here she doesn’t. And who the hell are you to come barging in here? I’m under protection of the local precinct, so don’t you go bothering me or my clients. I got respectable people, people with money, coming here. Get your dirty asses out of here right now.”

  Freydeh seized her by the arm and twisted. Sammy went running up the steps and began banging on doors. “Police!” he yelled. “The police are coming to raid this place.”

  There was a great scuffling and movement upstairs. “They’re lying,” the woman yelled, but Freydeh pushed her down on the sofa and sat on her, stuffing one of the loose pillows in her mouth. Soon a great trampling echoed from the stairwell and men and women in various states of disarray came rushing out of the door without hesitation or conversation. Sammy called down, “There’s one door locked here.”

  Freydeh took the slobbered pillow from the landlady’s mouth. “Where’s the key? Tell me, or I’ll break your arms and then your legs.” She gave a twist to the woman’s arm as a warning.

  The woman shrieked as if she had broken it already. “In my desk. Top drawer. But he’ll get you for this. He’s a hard one.”

  “I’m harder,” Freydeh said. She pulled at the bell cord until it snapped. A maid appeared, saw the scene of disarray and ran off. Then she trussed the woman up hands and feet and left her on the couch bound and helpless. She found the desk, opened the drawer. A ring of keys lay there. She grabbed the ring and ran up the stairs. Sammy was standing on the third-floor landing in front of a door. He grabbed the keys from Freydeh and began trying them. The fourth key opened the door.

  Freydeh pushed past him. A young woman lay on the unmade bed in a flowered dressing gown with her face in the pillow. She sat up. There was a bruise on her cheek and on her left forearm. “What?” she said.

  “Shaineh! Is it you? Don’t you know me? It’s your big sister Freydeh,” she said in Yiddish and then again in English.

  The young woman stared at her. “Freydeh? What are you doing here? I looked and looked for you.”

  “I never got your letter till months after you came. We’ve been searching for you ever since.” She grabbed her and hugged her. “Shaineh, get dressed, we’re here to take you away. And where’s your daughter?”

  “He took her from me. The lady downstairs farmed her out. If he’s pleased with me, sometimes the woman who has her brings her to me for an hour. So I know she’s alive. She lives on Henry Street, in a house in the yard.” Shaineh stood up.

  “We’ll get her. We’ll find her and take her.”

  “He’s dangerous. He has a terrible temper.”

  “So we’ve heard. Come on, Shaineh, get dressed. We don’t have all day.”

  “He keeps me here. I ran away once.”

  “We know. We tracked you down,” Sammy said. “I got the baker you worked for to tell us what he knew.”

  Shaineh was digging through a bureau putting on a chemise and then a taffeta dress and a woolen shawl. The only shoes she seemed to have were flimsy slippers, but those would have to do. “Hurry,” Freydeh said.

  “But I can’t go with you.” Shaineh stopped cold, turning. “Don’t you see? I’m a whore.”

  “So, and I’ve been in prison. You’re still my sister and Sara and Asher are here too and their kids. We’ll find your daughter. It’s my fault what happened to you because I didn’t get your letter, from fighting with my old landlord. Now we’ll make it better. At last we’ll make it better, Shaineleh. Hurry!”

  Shaineh was grabbing things right and left and stuffing them into a pillowcase. Freydeh wished she would just leave the silken flimsy things, for she’d have no use for them once she was out of this house of assignation and working at a regular job. Freydeh noticed that Shaineh’s hair was really blond. She would ask her about that later. She was a beautiful woman, with delicate features, a fine figure, skin like a doll.

  Finally Shaineh had her pillowcase stuffed and let herself be led to the hall on her tiny satin slippers. How was she going to walk in those things? It was chilly outside. Well, they would find a cab. They got her down the steps from the third floor to the second when the outside door slammed open. The landlady was running about—the maid must have untied her—and Alfred Kumble came storming in with his footman, running up the steps toward them. The footman stayed downstairs holding a bottle of champagne and a bag of foodstuffs.

  “You get out of here and leave my wench alone. I’ll have you put in the Tombs for this.”

  “We’re her family,” Sammy said. “This here is her older sister. We been looking for her for years and we mean to take her home.” He had to crane around Shaineh to speak, standing behind her on the landing carrying the overstuffed pillowcase.

  “She’s mine, bought and paid for, and you get your hands off my property. She’s mine! And she has nothing to do with you.”

  “She’s my sister,” Freydeh said. “She came over here to be with me, and we lost each other. Now she’s found. She’s no slave you can buy and sell. You people had a war about that. She’s a free woman and she’s our blood.”

  “You’re a Jew. I
can tell by your accent. You’re a dirty Jew. You just want to take her and pimp her yourself.”

  “We’re Jews, she’s a Jew, and she’s blood kin.” Freydeh tried to block him, but he was a big man and shoved her aside.

  “She’s no Jew! She’s German.”

  “I am too,” Shaineh said. “My real name is Shaineh. The madam named me Samantha. She’s my sister, he’s my nephew, and I’m going with them.” Shaineh struggled with him. “I’m going, I’m going to be free!”

  “You’re a whore and you’re mine!” he bellowed, clutching her by the waist and shaking her hard. “You’re trying to rob me,” he yelled at Sammy behind him.

  Sammy pulled his knife from his belt and lunged at Alfred, who ducked out of the way. Shaineh struggled hard but could not break free. Then she scratched at his face, tearing his cheek and trying to claw at his eyes. He cursed, shoving her away as Sammy slashed at him. She went tumbling down the steps past Freydeh. Freydeh grabbed at her to break her fall, but the silk tore in her hands and Shaineh went bumping down the steps all the way to the bottom, where she lay on the tile floor of the vestibule in a widening pool of blood from her head. She lay on her back with her limbs all twisted before the stolid footman who stood and stared.

  Freydeh rushed down to her, followed by Sammy and Kumble.

  “Now look what you crazy people have done!” the landlady yelled, wringing her hands. “Word of all this scandal is going to cost me my business!”

  Freydeh bent over the crumpled body, touching the face, the neck, the hands. Shaineh’s eyelids fluttered and her lips moved but no sound came out. Sammy and Freydeh carried her into the parlor and laid her on the sofa where Freydeh had tied up the landlady. Her head lolled to one side. A bubble of blood came from her lips and then blood trickled down to her chin.

  “I think she’s dying,” the landlady said to the man.

  “No!” Freydeh said. “She can’t die. I just found her.” Tears ran down her face and sobs shook her shoulders. She kept stroking Shaineh’s delicate skin, her face, her soft hands so unlike hers and Sara’s, her fine curls. “Shaineh, listen to me! Open your eyes, my sister, my little one, open your eyes!”

  “I’m getting out of here. It’s your fault for letting them in,” Kumble said to the landlady. “This has to be hushed up or I’ll close you down.”

  “I sent to you as soon as I could.”

  “You let this happen. I’ll spread the word.” Then he was out the door and gone.

  Shaineh never regained consciousness. Freydeh considered calling the police, but she was too wary of them, and the landlady said, “It was an accident. I saw it all. I won’t let you cause more trouble for Kumble or he’ll run me out of town. He can do it.”

  Finally a wagon was summoned and took them back to their neighborhood with Shaineh’s body. The new burial society would have immediate work. Freydeh would weep later. Once again she cursed Comstock. She had found Shaineh too late, too late to save her. Finally it was her fault. Finally it was Kumble’s fault for keeping Shaineh locked in a room so she couldn’t get away from him. Enough fault to spread around. Once the arrangements were made for Shaineh, Sammy and she headed for Henry Street to find the little girl and take her, in case Alfred Kumble should have it in mind to do something with his daughter. At least maybe they could save her. Reba, Freydeh remembered. A little girl named Reba. She dabbed at her eyes, snuffled back her tears and walked more quickly after Sammy.

  FORTY-TWO

  VICTORIA WAS WEARY through and through. The only way she could make money was on the lecture circuit and the country was growing more conservative, she could feel the change. No one wanted to hear about woman’s rights or messages of sexual freedom and spiritual joining. Finally she began lecturing on her interpretation of the Bible. She was frightened for herself, for Zulu Maud and helpless sweet Byron. James sat in New York with his cronies and waited for her to return with enough for them all to live on.

  The next time she was there, seizing what rest she could before traveling again, he was extremely critical. “It’s embarrassing, you catering to the most conservative elements. Lecturing about Revelations! What are you thinking of?”

  “Money. Survival. What else?”

  “You can’t sell yourself that way. That’s true prostitution.” He was pacing with his slight limp. He was a fine-looking man, but she was no longer moved when she looked at him. “You’re betraying everything we believe in.”

  She lay on the bed in her room in the boardinghouse where they were stabled—that was how she thought of it. Each to a stall. Ready to be taken out and galloped again, no matter how weary and saddle-sore. “I’m not sure what I believe in.” James had been in jail too, but on smaller bail and for a short time. She no longer felt at one with him. “James, I think we’re coming to a parting of the ways. I know we both believe that when love and desire are gone, the marriage, the partnership is over.”

  He stopped short. “You don’t mean that. You need me.”

  “For what?” she asked coldly.

  “To remind you of what we truly believe in.” He put his hand on her shoulder, caressing her. His hand strayed down her back.

  “What you truly believe in.” She sat up, shaking off his hand. “I became notorious bleating out those ideas. I went to jail for them. I endured calumny for them. But I cannot find in myself that old belief. The spirits are no longer talking with me. I have led them into the mud and they have abandoned me. Now what I truly believe is that I must feed and clothe my children.” Mine, not yours, she added mentally. You’ve never taken that much interest in either of them. No, when she looked at him, she simply saw bills piling up and debts coming at her. “We had a good long ride together, but it’s over, James.”

  “You’re tired. You’re saying things you don’t mean.”

  “I’m tired and I’m saying things I mean with all my heart and intellect and will.”

  “We’ll discuss this when you return.”

  “There’s nothing to discuss between us. I’m seeing a lawyer tomorrow.”

  “Don’t do anything till you return from your next circuit. In the meantime, let me write a new speech for you that is far more appropriate.”

  “Don’t bother.”

  She saw the lawyer and began divorce proceedings. Whether they were legally married or not, she wanted to be sure they were legally divorced. Then she went back out on the road with Tennie and Roxanne, heading toward Pennsylvania, Ohio again and Michigan this tour. Audiences would pay to hear her talk about Revelations when they would no longer pay for her message of liberation. The towns were smaller, the audiences smaller—and most of them came out because of her notoriety. She was making less for lectures and traveling farther and harder. All of her old friends had fallen away except for Annie Wood, who was preparing to retire to New Orleans to live out her life in comfort. She would take an assumed name as a widow. She would bring her mulatto maids with her. If she ran out of money, she could always take up her old profession and run a house there.

  Yes, Pearlo and the freethinkers, the woman’s rights advocates had disappeared from her life. Isabella had fled to France, where Theo had gone after the end of the trial. Josie had moved to Paris too. Victoria’s friends had faded or moved away, and she was left as she had started, with her family. Tennie and she spoke of how they could survive, determined not to go back to Ohio with Roxanne and Buck to take up the old life.

  Vanderbilt was dying, the papers said. They were in Chicago, in a cheap hotel. The Tribune said reporters were staked out at the new mansion on Fifth Avenue his young wife had wanted. Every week rumors of his death spread through the financial district, but every week he bestirred himself to prove he was alive. He no longer left his mansion, addressing reporters from the door or inviting a couple of them in. He had never forgiven the sisters. Still, Tennie kept all his letters and the presents he had given her, speaking of him kindly as the old boy. “I hope he’s not in too much pain. He gets cross when
he’s hurting.”

  “Let his wife worry about that.”

  “Vickie, if it hadn’t been for Ma, we’d still be his kittens, you know it.”

  “Sometimes I think you should have married him.”

  “A bit late to worry about that. Are you going to divorce James, really?”

  “I am. He’s cozy in Manhattan while we’re knocking ourselves out in Peoria and Louisville and Sheboygan. He complains about everything I do. It isn’t up to his standards. I’m betraying his ideas. He doesn’t face the audiences I have to please or get booed off the stage.”

  Tennie began to massage Victoria’s shoulders. “You’re worn out. After this loop, we’re going back to New York and rest for a while.”

  “In a boardinghouse. Will we ever again have our own quarters? A little comfort? Some pleasant furniture and carpets and beds that are our own? Ever? Or will we always be poor now and hunted. I know that monster Comstock is still after me. He sends spies to listen to my lectures to make sure I’m not talking about sex, ever.”