A Passionate Girl

by Thomas Fleming

  Next I boarded a horse car and rode uptown in the evening traffic to the Fifth Avenue Hotel. The room clerk looked owlish when I asked for Anne Fitzmaurice. “No one here by that name,” he said after a hasty scan of his register.

  “Has she left a forwarding address?”

  “Eighteen Christopher Street.”

  I knew something was very wrong. The address was far west of Broadway in a section of New York called Greenwich Village. I hurried there in a hack. As I suspected, it was a rooming house. The landlady was a round-faced, button-nosed biddy named Mrs. Lynch. I asked for Annie, and she sniffed, “Miss Fancy? You’ll find her in her room. Well soused by now, no doubt.”

  I hurried to the room at the end of the third-floor hall. There was no answer to my knock. At length I pounded and called, “Annie, Annie. It’s me, Bess.”

  A thick voice answered, “Jus’ a minute.”

  A minute turned out to be five. At last the door opened. Annie stood there looking more dead than alive. She clutched a robe about her. She had tried to pin up her hair and touch up her face for my benefit. “Where in the world you been?” she said with a forced smile. “I went to Fenian headquarters, and they said you were on some secret assignment.”

  “I went to Ireland with Dan McCaffrey and killed Lord Gort,” I said. “Surely you read about him being shot? I thought you’d see in a flash it was I who did it.”

  “Haven’t been reading the papers,” Annie said, turning away. “Come into my lovely apartment. Like it?”

  The room was about six feet square with a window that looked out on a narrow alley. The furniture consisted of a dresser, a bed, and a single straight chair. “Annie,” I said, “tell me what happened.”

  Annie tossed her head in an attempt to be flip. She went to the dresser and took a bottle of gin from the top drawer. “Want some?” she said.

  I shook my head.

  “Best thing for the glooms,” she said. “That’s what I got. A bad case of the glooms.”

  “What happened between you and Dick?”

  She took a hefty swallow of the gin. “He dumped me. Not famous enough for Dick Connolly. He can get anybody now. He’s number two man in the city. Actresses, socialites, everybody wants to play around with Dick. Why should he stay with tired old Annie Fitzmaurice? Used to me, Bess. Like a wife. No novelty. I made a mistake, Bess. Did I make a mistake with him.”

  The gin was taking effect before my very eyes. Half her words were slurred. It was horrible to watch her mouth droop, her eyes close to slits, destroying her beauty.

  “Did he give you anything?”

  “No. Said I’d gotten plenty. I did, but I spent it. That’s why I’m down here in this—pigsty. Till I get over the glooms. Mistake, Bess. Stickin’ with one man too long. Forgot what Miz Ronalds said. Keep heart—cold and private.”

  “You must stop this,” I said, and took the gin glass out of her hand.

  With an angry exclamation she snatched it back. “Don’t give me orders, baby sister. I know what I’m doin’. Curin’ the glooms.”

  “And ruining your looks.”

  Standing there with the gin glass clutched to her bosom, she started to cry. “Shouldn’t say that. Just ’cause you’re—younger.”

  “Annie. You’re only twenty-eight.”

  She sat down on the bed, still weeping. “Old, Bess. That’s old in this—business.”

  I opened the window and poured the rest of the gin bottle into the alley. “You’re talking nonsense,” I said. “At the very least you should be able to get a handsome sum from Mr. Connolly. Enough to set you up in a business of some sort.”

  She shook her head. “Dreaming Bess. I—no head for business. I want a man—to take care of me—to love me.”

  “Then go look for him. You still have all your fine clothes, your looks—”

  Again, that sad demoralizing shake of the head. “Don’t have the heart, Bess.”

  “How can you let any man do this to you? Stop it, now. Get on your best dress and we’ll go have a good dinner at the Fifth Avenue Hotel or Delmonico’s or wherever you please. Like as not you’ll catch the eye of some handsome man and you’ll be on easy street before the week is out.”

  She shook her head. “’Twould only waste your money. When I get rid of the glooms I’ll take matters into my own hands. I’ll set myself up in a house and go it with a different one every night. I’ll send Dick Connolly a list of the names at the end of each week.”

  I was appalled but tried not to show it. I gave up trying to persuade her to come to dinner and resolved to take matters into my own hands. I made her promise to drink no more gin and left her there for the night. The next morning I rose early and was at City Hall by nine o’clock. There was a mass of people, at least two dozen, waiting in a straggling line in the hall outside the comptroller’s office. I strode past them to the inner sanctum, which was guarded by a number of clerks and assistants toiling at high writing tables, on which ledgers were spread.

  “I’m here to see Mr. Connolly,” I said to the nearest clerk, a plump, red-faced, squinty-eyed fellow with slicked-down black hair.

  “Do you have an appointment?” he said.

  “Yes,” I said.

  I was wearing my best daytime outfit, a black plush pelisse trimmed with beaver fur over a green silk gown. It intimidated him as much as my bold lie.

  “Over there,” he said, pointing to a corner office.

  The comptroller was in the process of taking off his high black hat and hanging up his French-styled green sack coat with satin-faced lapels. He was surprised to see me, but he did not lose his usual aplomb.

  “Well, well,” he said. “The Fenian trigger girl. Shot any more lords lately?”

  I shook my head. “You know why I’m here.”

  “To talk about Annie. Sit down.”

  I sat in the straight chair beside his desk. “You can’t leave her this way. She’s a wreck. You must know it’s for love of you.”

  “Is it? If that’s true, she shows it in strange ways. Like throwing lamps at my head.”

  “I might do that, but not Annie.”

  “You haven’t seen her drunk. Really drunk. I’ve tried to get her to stop drinking for a good year, but this news about your father—it was just what she was looking for. A perfect excuse.”

  “You bastard,” I said. “You know the real reason why she drinks. You won’t make an honest woman of her. It’s been eating away at her. And why shouldn’t it? She knew you were getting her cheap because she loved you.”

  A hard, cruel expression settled over his face. His eyes became hooded. I had struck home, but he would not admit it to me—or perhaps to himself. “There are people waiting to see me about more important things than this.”

  “There’s nothing more important to me. You’re a wealthy man, from what I hear. You can take care of her.”

  “I have no sense of obligation. I bet I’ve given her ten thousand dollars’ worth of jewelry.”

  “Which is worth two at the pawnbrokers. Write out a check now for twenty thousand dollars.”

  “Give me one reason.”

  “If you don’t, I will shoot as many holes in you as I shot in Lord Gort. With as much pleasure.”

  “You’ve got a gun in that purse?”

  “Yes,” I said. It was a lie. I had come here to plead for Annie, not to threaten him.

  Dick Connolly leaned back in his armchair. “I don’t think you’d do it, but why should I take a chance?” He took out a large red checkbook and wrote out the check and handed it to me. It was drawn on the Tenth National Bank. “Don’t worry, it won’t bounce,” he said. “I own the bank.”

  “You’re rising to glory,” I said, putting the check in my purse. “But what of your great talk of helping the poor Irish?”

  “We have to help ourselves first. We’ll help them in the long run. A lot more than you and your Fenian friends with your Canadian dreams.”

  “’Tis no dream,” I said
. “I saw the list of regiments last night at Moffat House. They’ve got the guns, the cannon. They’re ready to march.”

  “Where?” Connolly said. “The whole thing’s a swindle. Stanton’s unloaded a million bucks’ worth of guns and ammunition he doesn’t need on you Fenian suckers, and Seward’s just waiting for the right moment to scare Johnson into banning the whole thing. Seward thinks this will turn the Irish against Johnson and make it impossible for him to run on a Democratic ticket. Meanwhile he, Seward, washing his hands like Pontius Pilate, gets the Republican nomination and the Irish vote because he tried to help the poor feckless Fenians.”

  “Where is the proof of this?” I asked.

  “You don’t need proof if you know anything about American politics,” Connolly snapped. “We told Roberts to buy the guns and ammo and lie low, drilling, organizing, until we elect our noble Saxon mayor to the governorship of New York next year. The governor of New York is always the country’s prime presidential candidate. If we put John Hoffman in the White House, there’s nothing we couldn’t do together. Instead, Roberts is fooling around with this half-baked National Union Party and with Republicans. He thinks he can deliver the Irish vote to the party of his choice—after promising to stick with us. Bill Tweed doesn’t like people who break promises.”

  Honest but not level, I thought, recalling Fernando Wood’s summation of Roberts. “Thank you for the lecture,” I said. “And the check.”

  “You’re welcome for both,” he said. “How did you get to shoot Lord Gort? By pretending to have an appointment?”

  “That’s a state secret.”

  “Say hello to Annie. Tell her I’m sorry.”

  In spite of his cold heart and crooked ways, I almost liked Dick Connolly.

  “I’ll say hello,” I said.

  Back I went to Annie’s lodging house and mounted the stairs to knock and knock once more in vain. At last she opened the door. The room smelled like a distillery. I was furious. “You promised me you’d stop drinking,” I said.

  “Gin,” she said. “I said I’d stop drinking gin. I thought a little Irish whiskey wouldn’t hurt. I can’t sleep without something, Bess.”

  “You can’t sleep because of the worry. Here’s something to banish care.”

  I gave her Dick Connolly’s check. She stared at it blankly for a moment, then glared at me. “Where did this come from?”

  “From Dick. I went to him and demanded it.”

  “Without asking me? Jesus God, what business is it of yours? You’ve ruined me with your goddamn simpleminded Fenian ways. Now he’ll never come back to me. He’s gone forever. You’ve let him write me off.”

  I was totally bewildered. “Annie, he let you down without a cent. He owed you at least this much. Here’s money to live on for years with good management, or keep in a bank as security against hard times.”

  Annie kept glaring at me, shaking her head. “You’re still nothing but a stupid Irish country girl. Don’t you see, as long as I didn’t take a cent from him, he has to come back to me. The guilt will eat at him forever. He loves me, and he won’t be able to stand the thought of what he’s done to me.”

  “You’re dreaming, Annie,” I said. “He loves nothing but the power he has now in his hands and the more power he hopes to get and the millions that will come with it. Men don’t love like we do. We must take them as they are.”

  Slowly, proudly, Annie ripped Dick Connolly’s check to shreds. She walked to the window and flung the pieces into the alley. “Get out of here,” she said. “You’ve brought me nothing but bad luck.”

  I blundered down the three flights of stairs half blind with tears. The next morning I left for Washington with Red Mike Hanrahan. He blarneyed away for a half hour about his acting days, trying to cheer me up. I finally told him Annie’s story. He shook his head. “She’s playing a long shot. I’ve seen other women try it. Sometimes it works, but not often.”

  He took my hand in his rough grasp for a moment. “It’s her life, Bess, not yours. You can’t live it for her. It’s fearfully hard to change grown men or women. I watch you and wonder if your heart won’t break before you find that out.”

  “Are you talking about Dan? You don’t think we’re a match?”

  “Listen to her. Trying to get me to talk down a wild man from Tennessee that could knock me into smithereens with a single punch. If I admit such a meaning, I can just see it coming out the next time you have a spat.” He mimicked me deliciously. “‘And what’s more, Mike Hanrahan says we’re a sorry pair.’ ‘He did?’ says McCaffrey and instantly hunts me up. Whop, one punch and I’m smithereens, and a few Tennessee kicks to make sure I’m well scattered.”

  By now he had me almost laughing. How I loved that runty Irishman. In Washington we had rooms reserved at the National Hotel. As Mike signed the register, I wrote a note to Fernando Wood and sent it up to his room. The Fenian girl has returned in search of more wisdom.

  I could see Red Mike did not approve. “If you mention it to Dan, I’ll be the one who makes smithereens of you,” I said.

  “I didn’t see or hear a thing,” Mike said. “I’m not only blind but I’ve gone deaf and dumb.”

  You Irish Aren’t Part of This Country

  Before I finished unpacking, a note was handed to me by one of the black bellboys. If you are truly in search of wisdom, you have come to the wrong man and the wrong city. But if you wish to hear the latest pessimisms from a disappointed politician, he is at your service from 10:00 P.M. until you grow weary of his aged maunderings.

  While Mike went off to buck the tiger at Chamberlain’s gambling house and learn what he could from the caucus of politicians regularly assembled there, I ascended to Fernando’s suite on the sixth floor. He waited for me in the shadowed room, resplendent in a red silk robe with a blue velvet collar. I wore a black lace mantelet over a blue silk gown. Politely, with that ironic detachment that was his safeguard against love, he asked me if our friendship was to be conducted on the same terms as my previous visit. I coolly informed him that I still valued both pleasure and wisdom. So after another delicious late-night supper we performed the sensual ritual of bath, perfume, bed.

  Without the dimension of surprise, I was less aroused than the first time. In the very midst of it, even as my breath quickened and my heart beat faster, I found myself thinking of Annie. It was a strange fate that made her so unfitted for this sort of exchange. While I, with my moon-mind watching from above, was far better suited to be a woman of pleasure.

  It was a dangerous thought, the beginning of a fatalism that went back to the need to accept the murderous scene in Gort House. Dissembling now, I lay beside Fernando after the consummation and whispered, “I’m glad I don’t come here often. I could fall in love with you.”

  He liked the compliment. He brought me a robe and sat me at the table once more to end our dining with crêpes suzette and champagne. Then he got out his brandy and his cigar and told me I was a girl when I came to him the first time. Now I was a woman. He could see it in my face, feel it in my measured response to him in bed.

  “Is it because you’ve killed your man? Southerners believe that, you know. Of men. Perhaps it’s true of women, too.”

  “How they fascinate you still, the Southerners,” I said, preferring not to answer his question.

  “They were the only aristocrats we had in this benighted country.”

  “I’m no lover of aristocracy.”

  “You mean the earldom you placed on my head the last time was a mere compliment?”

  “They had their place in the old days, but these are new times.”

  “How true. How unfortunately true.”

  “How sets the political wind for Canada?”

  “Foul weather is all I can see. The president and Congress are at each other’s throats morning, noon, and night. The Republicans are determined to humble the South for a generation and suck every cent out of it that they and their business friends can get. The Southerners
play into their hands by refusing to give any Negro the vote and secretly encouraging night-riding thugs like the Ku Klux. The president still thinks he can rally a third party—the National Union—against the fanatics of both sides, but I begin to doubt it. I can’t believe that Seward, who thinks as I do, has a different opinion. As for Stanton, he’s already chosen his client. As secretary of war, commander of the army, he has his foot on the South’s neck. He’s working with the people who want to keep it there—the Republicans.”

  “Doesn’t the president know that?”

  “It’s amazing what the president doesn’t seem to know. He clings to Stanton—and Seward. He doesn’t seem to understand that both of them have to ruin him to get what they want. I’m beginning to think they may use the Fenians to do it.”

  “How?”

  “By double-crossing them—and blaming it on the president.”

  “What would Seward gain from that? Doesn’t he see that if he helps the Fenians win Canada, we’ll be heroes to every Irishman in America? We can place every Irish vote in the land behind him.”

  “But the Irish are only ten percent of the vote. They can make a difference in a close election, but Seward no longer thinks it will be a close election. To get the Republican nomination, he has to go along with Stanton and with Congress.”

  I remembered what Dick Connolly said about the whole thing—selling us the guns, encouraging us to go for Canada—being a swindle. I told Fernando this theory. He laughed sourly and shook his head. “Connolly and Tweed are swindlers, so they think like swindlers. Seward thinks on a different scale. There’s another reason for letting you threaten Canada. Seward is claiming that the British owe us two hundred million dollars for the damages the Alabama and other raiders did to our commerce. He’s letting the Fenians threaten to take Canada to force the British to negotiate a settlement. If they buckle and agree, he’ll sit on the Fenians and simultaneously make himself look like a diplomatic genius and a peacemaker.”

  “Could any man do such a thing?” I said. “Lead us on to make fools of us before the whole world?”