Twisted Tragedy of Miss Natalie Stewart

by Hieber, Leanna Renee

  I stared at myself and didn’t recognize the woman in the trifold mirrors. The fitting-room attendant, Fanny, truly seemed to enjoy her job, as if she were a sculptor creating a goddess. Indeed, once my corset was tightened and I was cinched, clasped, and buttoned into these many exquisite layers, I was scared to move and thought I’d best be as still as a sculpture.

  Fanny had swept up my hair and clasped it with pins hidden beneath a beaded, ostrich-feather fascinator. She left a few errant curls around my face “for whimsy and seduction,” she murmured with a grin as she lightly rouged my cheeks with powder that had a faint, glimmering hint of purple.

  In this light, all my colors seemed heightened. The auburn of my hair seemed to glow with its faint red traces, and my green eyes were lit as if a candle were flickering behind thin peridot. All I could think was how I wished Jonathon could see me now so he would know for certain that I could rise to the title of Lady Denbury and fill the role.

  Mrs. Natalie Whitby, Lady Denbury.

  Oh, that does sound nice, doesn’t it?

  “Natalie, are you pleased?” Mrs. Northe said softly, as if she was reading my mind. Perhaps she was. I blushed and nodded vigorously. “We’ll take this, Fanny. Nicely done.”

  Fanny clapped her hands. “Brava. You’re fit to make some lord seek you as his lady.”

  “Oh, indeed, she quite plans to,” Mrs. Northe said, chuckling.

  When I was back in my chemise and petticoat, Fanny helped me into my own dress, a rag by comparison, a utilitarian dress I didn’t need help with, but I accepted her help anyway with murmured thanks. I clutched my new black lace fan, an accessory that was a must during a New York summer and would replace my small, worn wooden one. I opened and shut it nervously a few times.

  Once Fanny had gone to ring up the bill, I leaned into Mrs. Northe, murmuring: “I wish Jonathon could see me in this. But I’m afraid I’ll make a fool of myself before a star of the stage. You see…I don’t always…present myself well when nervous.”

  “Natalie Stewart, you’re the bravest young person I’ve ever met.”

  “When it’s life and death, perhaps I have my moments. But in day-to-day life, in crowds, new encounters, I…falter.”

  “If in moments of crisis you are at your best, then you’ve a gift the rest of the world should envy. Think of meeting Veil, then, as life and death. If dire situations force your impetuous bravery, then you must think of anything involved with Lord Denbury as such. He needs you now, just like then.”

  I nodded. That would have to do.

  On our way out, I noticed a tray full of sparkling baubles, hair-pins, and brooches. I paused.

  “See something you like?”

  I shook my head. “I was just thinking of Maggie. She’d like these. How is she?”

  “Still in trouble. I didn’t tell her mother everything about the ritual mess she’d made in the Metropolitan after dark, but enough to make Maggie regret it. She’s quite under house arrest. You should go pay her a visit.”

  “I’d like to. I do want to be her friend.”

  Mrs. Northe sighed. “I’m afraid you’re better to her than I am, and I’m her aunt. Thank you for having the patience with her that I no longer have. It would be good of you to go. Her calling hours are Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.”

  “I’ll do so this week.”

  Mrs. Northe and I picked out a hair-pin and brooch set I could take as a present.

  ***

  A few hours later, I met Father in his office. He immediately left his paperwork and escorted me to the door. He seemed to be done taking my presence for granted too. Usually he would have made me wait.

  We rode the Lexington Avenue Elevated rail north as far as we could, then a trolley into the Bronx until the vast necropolis of Woodlawn Cemetery—a garden-style cemetery founded seventeen years ago, in the year of my birth—spread out before us.

  We strolled toward the Gothic stone pillars and iron gates. Familiar ornate tombs loomed in the verdant distance.

  “Tell me again how you and Mother met.”

  My father eyed me. “Again? Haven’t I told you this a thousand times?”

  “It’s important.”

  He smiled, the green eyes I’d inherited from him twinkling. “It was at the Cooper Union. A speech.”

  “But not just any speech,” I added.

  Here began Father’s tale, which I’d never tire of hearing:

  “Abraham Lincoln’s speech, the one that would make him president. But I didn’t know about that then. I was only vaguely interested in politics. All I wanted was to open a museum. I was told potential investors for all sorts of noble causes frequented the Union, so I was sure to bring my friend Weiss, who knew everyone who was anyone, along to help me navigate the crowd.

  “I was admittedly riveted by the odd-looking, tall man whose voice was reedy, almost a joke of himself, but no one laughed when Lincoln built to his conclusion. Everyone held their breath. But for me, that great man was outshone by a woman who stood near the front of the dais: tall, elegant, and utterly radiant. Weiss saw the object of my stare and chuckled: “‘Viel Gluck…Lots of luck, friend.’” I asked Weiss who she was.

  “‘Germania in all her glory,’” he said, “‘as painted by Philipp Veit in the heart of Germany’s democratic revolution. Currently she’s giving the Lutheran Society hell. She’d like them to ordain women.’”

  “I laughed. I could see from across a room of breathless people that she was full of fire and life. Lincoln would go on to be president, and I knew my life would never be the same for having seen Helen Heidel. Thankfully for us, she cared about art as much as any cause. Once Lincoln was done stunning the crowd, Weiss introduced me to her and presented my cause. And by grace alone and a good bit of planning the Metropolitan, she came to care for me.” Father’s tale ended as we reached the gates.

  And then she died in the street. Rescuing me, at the age of four, from an oncoming carriage.

  That was the part none of us said. But I thought about it every day.

  The familiar bent, old woman near the open, wrought-iron gate looked up at us with a stunning smile that transformed her wrinkled face. She wore a drooping, tattered shawl, and at her side was a baby pram overflowing with cut flowers.

  I knew what to look for: black-eyed Susans, golden daisy-like flowers with coal-brown centers. These were Mother’s favorite. Father used to call her his Black-Eyed Helen for her dark eyes and bright personality. Laying these bright flowers down on a smooth gray stone was my earliest memory.

  I pointed to the lone bright sprigs that were being drowned out by tumbling roses.

  “They’re wildflowers, of course,” my father explained, gesturing to the flowers as we crossed through the gate toward the stone mausoleums marching ahead of us, sloping rows of small Gothic and Romanesque houses in a silent city of death, shaded by lush trees and shrubbery. “But a part of your mother was always a bit wild, as if she walked barefoot in the field like a goddess of spring when merely crossing busy Madison Avenue. All auburn hair and dark eyes,” my father said gently, touching one of the dark hearts of the black-eyed Susans, “yet with such bright and golden light around her.” He ran a finger along the bright yellow-golden petals.

  I’d heard this, or some variant of it, a hundred times. I’ll never tire of it. Father said these words like it was the first time he’d ever said them. A private liturgy, a poetic ritual on behalf of a woman he loved more than I could have understood as a child. But I was beginning to understand now.

  We wound our way through lanes marked with the names of trees, past great monuments and small, some nestled cozily into the ground, others towering obelisks pointing to the sky. And angels. Beautiful angels. Looking up and seeing angels: that was another formative memory.

  Around a gentle bend we found the Stewart plot, a rectangular space allotted with granite stones yet to be carved, space enough for Father and me. Only one name was there: HELEN, BELOVED WIFE AND MOTHER.


  I was always the one to lay the flowers. We used to do this weekly when I was home, but we had fallen away from it since I was done with school. I resolved not to neglect her so again.

  Father wandered off. There were times when he didn’t quite know what to do with me, but more often than not, he sensed my mood and when I wanted privacy. Our time spent in silence for so many years had developed its own language.

  I spent countless moments just looking at her name and the inscription, as I’d done a thousand times. As if that stone was a Rosetta Stone to her life and death and could explain why she was taken from me so soon.

  As usual, I begged for a sign. I begged for her to speak to me, for her spirit to kiss my forehead. But nothing.

  “Mother, if you brought me into the strange life I’m now leading, or at least if you condone it, please don’t stay silent when I need you.”

  The rustle of the trees was the only answer. The sun was setting. My father had his moment at the graveside, and once I linked my arm into his, it was time to go.

  “It’s good,” I said quietly, “to resume our routine.”

  Father nodded. “But things will change. You’re changing. I’m changing.”

  It was true. There was no denying that eventually our family dynamic would change. If Mrs. Northe became my new mother. If Jonathon actually did ask for my hand…But Father didn’t say anything further. And I was glad. One upheaval at a time.

  After a small dinner of soup and bread, I excused myself to my room.

  “I’ve got to get my beauty sleep,” I said with a smile to Father and Bessie.

  “Oh? And why is that?” Bessie queried.

  “Because tomorrow Mrs. Northe puts me in a fine dress, and I go to the theater.”

  Chapter 9

  Booth’s Theater at Sixth Avenue and Twenty-Third Street was grand as one would expect. It had been the prominent theater since it opened eleven years prior. With a granite exterior in the Renaissance style, it seated nearly two thousand people.

  Tall posters outside the grand entrance shouted ACROSS THE VEIL! The poster featured an imperious, dramatic, shadowed figure, a raven upon his shoulder, eyes blazing and the outlines of women swooning around his feet as his cloak billowed against a dark and stormy night. I was impressed that Veil commanded a theater that had housed the foremost theatrical talent of our day, albeit for a brief run.

  Golden filigree and sculpting adorned each box and level, while glittering chandeliers and sconces reflected the gaslight and cast only flattering shadows about the house. The rolling murmur of the crowd was like a lulling tide. The rustling of fine fabrics and gossiping whispers hidden behind lace and feather fans reminded me that this was a place where society was made and broken, much like a ball, where everyone was displayed. Particularly us.

  I should have known Mrs. Northe would have a prominent box, and that gazes would inevitably turn our way when our usher opened the box door, pulled back the curtain, and gestured for us to step into the warm velvet interior and to our seats.

  From a lifetime of being ignored as a mute, I was the one used to watching, not being watched. It was unnerving. I knew so little about Mrs. Northe, really. Who her friends were, what her late husband, an industrialist, had actually done to make a good deal of money, or what void I filled in her life.

  “You’re wondering about me,” Mrs. Northe said. I bit my lip. “It’s all right. Our goings-on have had little to do with outside society. You see me waving, and you know no one I know. My late husband made his fortune in coal,” she began. “A dirty business in more ways than one. Philanthropy became my passion to offset the ruthless companies. Peter tried very hard to be a good man and run a good business, but it wasn’t perfect. He never interfered in my charity, nor my spiritual affairs. I loved him very much. He was taken from me too soon.”

  She glanced around the auditorium, blinking back tears. “I’m not exactly sure I’ve recovered from Peter’s death, even after eight years. All my gifts were useless to save him. I suffered that frustration alone.” She looked away, her body tense, emotions held in like a tightening corset. “To these people, I’m merely a wealthy patron of the arts who is rumored to hold an occasional séance. My dear friends are few and far flung, some upstate, the rest in Chicago.”

  “Your gifts…were they with you since childhood?”

  “At least in part. But everything sharpened the day I watched a ship sail in with Civil War wounded and dead. I saw the ghost of my beloved cousin, fainted right into the river, and nearly died. In that space between life and death I understood that I had a purpose: to use my gifts for love and peace while so much hateful darkness seized the world. I understood then that there will always be a war over souls, and I chose in that moment to live and to fight for the light.”

  I shuddered at the word “war.” I hadn’t bargained on being a solider in that battle, but I’d been drafted anyway.

  “As to why I remain involved with you, Natalie,” she continued, “Fate brought you to me when your father wished to buy Denbury’s portrait. The moment we met, my gifts told me our fates were entwined. You came at just the right time. I was terribly lonely and bored, my gifts atrophied.

  “None of these people,” she waved her hand about the box seats and glittering jewels, “are brave, bold, or terribly interesting. Nor are they my friends. Nor are my talents useful in their shallow worlds. Wealth buys you visibility but not true friends, not happiness. Remember that. I think Lord Denbury knows this well, but in this striving, greedy city, don’t you forget it. You are meant for so much more than an average, petty life.”

  I sat stunned, taking in everything she’d said. I hadn’t expected her to open up so, but I was glad she had. Before I could query further, the orchestra in the pit struck a melancholy chord. A slow dirge of a tune began, similar to Bach’s infamous organ Toccata, yet original and dramatic, mournful and glorious. As the music swelled, the gallery gates were opened and an intriguing crowd pressed forward.

  Into an open, standing-room gallery at the front of the theater filed a group of men and women entirely in black, as if they’d all just come from a funeral. Yet their faces were full of excitement and expectation, as if waiting for a god to descend. Some clasped hands, and some waved from one side of the gallery to the other, as if they all knew one another. Many glanced shyly at the ground, and in each body—I could interpret the language of each one’s body as if they were speaking—there was a trembling vulnerability conquered only by the radiant excitement on their faces when they stared toward the footlights, which cast a glow upon the red curtain.

  The program stated only: “Assembled works of Great and Melancholy Literature, resonant to Body and Spirit, and Transcendent of Mortal Coil. Music inspired by Dark themes from Bach and Chopin.”

  “When he first appeared on the theatrical circuit,” Mrs. Northe said, “a friend in Baltimore raved about him, saying I’d appreciate his sensibilities. Though he never embraces spiritualism directly, the notion of body, spirit, and transcendence of mortal coil are parallel.”

  “And he has quite a fascinating following.” I nodded toward the crowd below.

  “Everyone needs a muse,” Mrs. Northe said appreciatively, drinking in the crowd, examining them, perhaps using her gifts for insight. “Especially the melancholy. We live in a Gothic age. It’s refreshing to see a crowd who acknowledges it, those who cannot ignore pain and darkness yet come together in celebration, a living memento mori…”

  There came a sung note, and everything went still and dark.

  Girls in the black-clad crowd swooned, leaning on beaux at their side or holding hands with their friends. If I wasn’t mistaken, many of the boys swooned too.

  Out stepped Nathaniel Veil. He was tall, black haired, onyx eyed, and clad in a fine black dress suit, his presence wild. If Jonathon had the clear breeding of an English lord, Nathaniel Veil seemed as though he could have been raised by a mythological god in some forbidden forest before bei
ng taught how to be a gentleman.

  He sang, and I recognized the lyrics as from Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night because of the chorus: “For the rain it raineth every day…”

  Veil’s arrangement was keening, the strings supporting his vocals as if he wasn’t just one lone man in black but his own chorus. Somehow he was singing for the world and to each one of us, balancing grandeur and intimacy.

  The song led into poetry, Poe’s “The Raven.” The curtain rose, revealing a castle, and Veil stepped into a red-drenched chamber the narrator would leave “nevermore.” The scene was a Gothic novel come to life, and for the next hour, we were treated to a cavalcade of characters and music, from the literary adventures and outrageous trials of Otronto and Udolpho, to the verse of Hamlet and more from my personal favorite, Poe.

  A celebration of sadness and mystery, morbid and macabre, ghosts and haunting, somehow the play was spectacularly alive. With slight changes of wardrobe, a cloak or hat added or removed, Veil transformed fluidly between characters. All of them, despite their darkness, struggled on toward a faint light at the end of a long tunnel, toward hope. Toward life. And Veil’s magnetic presence never let us forget how very alive he was as he discussed crossing the veil itself.

  After the curtain call and encore, a rousing rendition of Poe’s “Annabel Lee” (so fitting to end with Poe’s final completed poem), I sat in the darkness of the box for a moment, watching as the rest of the house adjusted to the brightening house lights. The gas jets lifted their flames to a warm yellow height, and I felt like those in the fore seemed to, that I was being roused from a trance. Those swaying bodies in black below all looked to be in the same pleasant stupor.

  “That was incredible,” I said. Mrs. Northe nodded and we remained seated in silence a while longer before I steeled my courage for my task.

  “How does one get…backstage?” I asked.

  “Leave it to me.”

  Skirts rustling, we exited into the dress circle where other murmurings of fine fabric were layered with delighted whispers (or horrified murmurs, depending on if the ladies liked the show). Regardless, no one was unaffected. One either loved or hated it. One had to be willing to let go and release themselves to the adventure. Much like the recent course of my life.