A Well-Behaved Woman

by Therese Anne Fowler

  Alva took a pearl between finger and thumb and rolled it. This stone and all of these marvelous stones had rested against the skin of two women Alva admired more than perhaps anyone else who had ever lived.

  She glanced up at her husband (her husband!) with newfound pleasure and respect. “I’m speechless.”

  “But pleased, yes?”

  She nodded. “Thank you so much. Really … I can’t…”

  “It is my pleasure. You might wear them tomorrow evening.”

  “Yes, I will, absolutely.”

  He rubbed his sideburn with his thumb and said, “Well. You’ll want to retire, I would imagine,” and she said, “Yes, it was a very long day,” and Mary followed her to the adjacent bedroom to help her undress. William’s man followed him and the dogs to his room.

  Her bedroom, lighted by a happy fire in a tiled hearth, was a French dream. Bluebells on a white background covered the walls between panels of polished walnut. A high four-poster bed sat in the center, on a plush blue carpet. White satin draperies glowed in the firelight. Suppose she simply locked herself away here, just put on her pearls and lay down and closed her eyes without a care, ignored the question of whether she would have to display her body for William’s gaze, and what he might expect from her, and whether she would like the sensations, and how wrong it would be if she did …

  “It’s a long day,” Mary said. “Let’s get you undressed.”

  “Oh. Of course.” Alva extended her arms so that Mary could undo her buttons. To distract herself, she asked, “How did you pass the time?”

  “Well, I liked watching out the window. It was my first time in such a fast train—the Sixth Avenue el never goes faster than a person can walk, does it? These fancy trains are something! I can’t figure how the locomotive can be as strong as it is, to pull all those heavy cars.”

  She took Alva’s bodice, saying, “I did a little bit of reading, too. It’s a kind of magic, being able to read, don’t you think so? Mama said the best thing about Emancipation is that I could be taught right out in the open to write and read.”

  Alva said, “When I was a girl, I hardly gave a thought to you all being slaves. ‘The servants,’ that’s what my parents always said.” Alva stepped out of her skirt. “Owning human beings. I realize that my parents grew up in a very different place and time, but I don’t really understand it. Did you feel owned?”

  Mary shook her head. “I was just a baby.”

  “What are you reading now?”

  “Right now it’s the story of a young Castilian lady who’s meant to marry her cousin, but he comes home and confesses he’s already gone and married another. A Terrible Secret, it’s called.”

  “I’ll say that’s terrible.”

  Mary paused, the peignoir in hand. “But she’s a pain in the behind, so I don’t know as I blame him.”

  “And the one he did marry?”

  “Sweet and docile as a calf.”

  “Well,” said Alva as Mary put the nightgown over her head, “the author understands men, all right.”

  Dressed now in the thin peignoir, Alva was glad of the room’s warmth. She sat at the vanity and Mary handed her a tiny bottle of perfume, which she uncapped, then touched the cap to her wrists and the spots beneath her ears. How many times had she seen her mother do this very thing? How exotic the toilet of the married woman of society had seemed to her little-girl self. Her mother had taken every step of the ritual as seriously as a devout churchgoer at Mass.

  “Hair?” Mary said, indicating Alva’s still-upswept hairdo.

  “I … I don’t know. Should we plait it like usual, or…?”

  “In that novel I was telling you about? The jilted lady, she’s got ‘raven tresses’ she lets fall over her shoulders. He—the cousin—can’t keep his eyes off her.”

  Before Alva could form a reply, Mary said, “What if you put on those pearls?”

  “All right,” Alva said with a grin. This was an easy choice. “But only for a minute.” She took the strand from its box and said, “Heavens!” The string was several feet long and heavier than she’d expected. She gathered it up and held it pooled in her hands, then gestured to Mary for her help.

  “To think…” Alva said when the strand was draped in four rows that lay against her breastbone. She pressed her palm to the pearls. “I am not at all worthy of these—but, Mary—to own them…” She shook her head. “Catherine was Russia’s greatest ruler—quite progressive, so intelligent. Empress Eugénie must have prized these.”

  Mary said, “And now here you are.”

  “I’ll bet she misses them … and everything from that life.” Alva looked at Mary. “But I’m not sorry to have them. Mary, think of it: Catherine the Great wore these a hundred years ago.” She shook her head in wonder. “All right. Let’s put them up before I cry.”

  When the pearls were again on their blue velvet bed, Mary said, “Your hair—will you have it down?”

  “I’ll think about it. But you go on, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Mama said remind you to use the pot before you get into bed, and again right after.” At Alva’s puzzled expression Mary said, “After he’s done.”

  “Oh. Yes, of course. I’d forgotten about that. With so much else going on.” She couldn’t admit to Mary that the girl knew more about all of this than she did.

  Mary paused near the door. “You know, I’ve never seen a room so perfect as this one. Mama said when slave girls got their wedding nights, it was in a plain room with a sheet hanging up for privacy from the others. As for the husbands … I don’t mean to say our men are terrible because they aren’t, most of them, but yours, he’s so clean and so … nice. So generous. That’s a gentleman right there. Some men I know about, they’re rough and they don’t smell very good and they want girls to let them put it in their mouth before they—”

  “Put what in whose mouth?” Alva said.

  “Oh. Never mind, I was going on about nothing. Blessings on you,” Mary said, and hurried out of the room, closing the door behind her.

  Suddenly understanding what Mary meant, Alva said, “Oh. My word.” Were such things done? Would she be expected to do that? What other bizarre acts might she have to face?

  She turned toward the glass and studied the nervous young lady staring back at her. “You look like you want to run.”

  What if she did run? She was married now. Her father had been paid. Suppose she put on a travel suit and snuck out of the hotel, got herself a train ticket to someplace west. Buffalo, say. Niagara Falls. Have her own honeymoon. Put all her expenses on a Vanderbilt account. She could go on to Chicago, to St. Paul. The middle of the country was supposed to be a beautiful place, if still rather wild. She would avoid the wilderness, leave the Indians to their business, stick to the cities. Were there any cities after St. Paul? San Francisco, of course—a long way in between, though, with mountains in the divide. Mountains that were said to rival the Alps, though that was probably a gross exaggeration. People coming from the West were so often prone to hyperbole.

  Entertaining as these musings were, she knew they were born of fear, and fear was an emotion she must not indulge. Whatever was coming, she must face it straight on. She was a married woman now. No more childish worrying over things that most every woman in history had experienced, for goodness’ sake, and they didn’t all go around fussing about it.

  She let down her hair, used the pot as Mary had instructed, climbed onto the bed, and settled herself against the pillows.

  Hands in lap, or no?

  Legs crossed? Uncrossed?

  Was being uncovered too immodest? She pulled the sheet over her lap, then felt silly, as if she were awaiting her bedtime story. She got out of bed, pulled the covers back up, sat again on top.

  All this mystery and uncertainty! Was she supposed to sit up or lie down? Should she put out the lamp? Stoke the fire or leave it?

  You’re the plank, he’s the peg …

  That long-ago day in
the bathtub, before her mother came in, Alva had trailed the cloth along her thighs, one and then the other, watched the water sluice down to her center, that place of mysterious purpose. Then and now she thought of paintings she’d seen abroad in museums and at court. Languid nude females attended by cherubs, by nymphs, by handservants, by courtiers, entwined with swans sometimes, creamy breasts and bellies and thighs unabashedly displayed for the artist’s gaze …

  What are you, an animal?

  Those were celebrated works of art coveted by collectors, displayed in galleries and museums in the world’s great cities. Why was sensuality all right for art but not for life? Suppose Maman had it all wrong?

  A noise outside the door made her jump. Any moment now, the knob would turn—

  Silence.

  She waited, hot-faced, for her husband to come in.

  He would note her flushed skin and accuse her, reject her, send her back to her father or lock her away under a doctor’s care.

  He would note her flushed skin and be flattered. He’d gaze at her adoringly. He’d kiss her until she was senseless.

  Nothing. The knob didn’t turn.

  …

  The rooms were quiet.

  …

  A log cracked and shifted, and the firelight dimmed.

  …

  No sounds from outside her room.

  …

  Her heart slowed, and almost without realizing it, she fell asleep.

  * * *

  Alva woke chilled. The fire had burned down and the room was nearly dark. Her husband knelt on the bed beside her, his face near hers. He was wearing what appeared to be a nightshirt. His breath smelled of bourbon.

  “We ought to do this,” he said, not looking at her face. He reached down and took hold of the peignoir, pulled it up to her hips. “I’m sorry. I’ll try to be quick.”

  He avoided her eyes as he positioned himself, fumbled for a moment while she lay there mortified, then pressed, pushed, forced himself inside her while she fought to lie silent and rigid despite the pain. Muffling her yelps with her fist, she stared past his ear at a bedpost and willed herself not to cry.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again, not stopping. It went on and on. “I’m … trying…” he said, and now she couldn’t hold back her tears. They slid down to her ears and hair, down the edges of her jaw. She thought of them trickling, cooling, leaving trails while he kept going, the pain now a steady burn. How long this went on she didn’t know. Then his rhythm changed, became erratic, and in another moment he stilled, groaned, shuddered, and then, after a moment more, un-mounted her.

  “There now,” he said and patted her hip. Righting his nightshirt as he climbed off the bed, he continued, “When we have a child, he should learn French first, don’t you agree?” Before she could form any sort of answer, he said, “I’ll leave you to rest now. We had a long day. Good night.”

  She lay there, stupefied. The part of her body that no one ever named, the place she knew was capable of exquisite pleasure—it was meant for this?

  “Ha!” Laughter rose out of her, she couldn’t help it, and she was crying, too, and thinking, This is what we’re fashioned for, this bizarre, painful, embarrassing task? God designed it all so? He really didn’t care much for Eve, did he?

  * * *

  Waking in the pretty blue-and-white room, Alva didn’t know where she was. Then it all came back to her, and her throat tightened.

  I will not cry.

  Though the sun shone in slivers from between the draperies, the room was cold, and there was no wrapper in sight. What was she supposed to do next? Where was Mary?

  I want to go home.

  What William had done to her last night he would do again, any time he pleased.

  (There now.)

  And the only reason she would stand for it (lie down for it) was money.

  Which meant she was a kind of prostitute. Didn’t it?

  No, it did not. She said it aloud: “No, it does not. I didn’t do it only for money. And I am a great deal more to him than an object for amusement. I will run his house. I will bear his children. I will be the most gracious hostess anyone’s ever seen. He adores me—does his behavior not prove it?”

  She rose, stoked the fire, and washed at the basin. Mary came in to help with her toilet. Alva said nothing, couldn’t meet her eyes, not even when, while brushing out Alva’s hair, Mary said, “Mama says your hair is quite the asset, you know.”

  Mary twisted and tucked and pinned it, then took a beaded silver comb Consuelo had given Alva and slid it into place above her left ear.

  “All put together,” Mary said. The reflection in the glass agreed. “Now, which dress for today?”

  “The yellow one,” Alva said. “No, the green. No…” She covered her face with her hands. “I don’t know.”

  “The green,” Mary said. “It’s a happy color.”

  “Yes. All right.” Alva lowered her hands and attempted a smile. “A happy color. That’s just the thing I need.”

  William was cheerful at breakfast, which the couple took together in the dining room downstairs. Alva attempted to respond in kind, though her gaze refused to rest on him and he seemed shy as well. While she indulged herself with eggs Benedict and sausages and toast and jam, they spoke of carriages and whether she might like a new one of her own. He told her which horses were favored for the day’s races. He said he would like to buy her a new hat. Would she like a new hat? Some dresses, too? He’d noticed she had been making do. A new parasol, perhaps? She stared in silence, attempting to reconcile this scene with the previous night’s events.

  Evidently, as demonstrated last night and here this morning as well, he was the truest of gentlemen, a man who did not burden his wife with strange requests, a man of impeccable manners. And she had been a plank. They were, thank heavens, precisely as they were supposed to be.

  Alva said, “Yes, that’d be lovely, thank you.”

  * * *

  Having apparently gained some confidence in the action, William repeated his wedding-night performance each successive night for twelve nights running. Only when Alva indicated to Mary that her monthly had come was there a break. On that night, Mary stationed herself outside Alva’s door. Alva listened from her bed as William arrived and Mary told him, “The missus is indisposed. For the week,” she added, and not another word was mentioned.

  Alva’s relief was profound—and yet she wondered if in feeling it, she was deficient. He had only been doing what he was supposed to do. She was supposed to want the same thing he wanted, that being to produce a child as soon as possible. In order to get with child, one had to be with one’s husband in this way. So she should want to. But she didn’t.

  You mustn’t act as though you like whatever he does to you.

  Ha! As if there were any chance of that.

  This was all so confusing.

  She must be going about it wrong, somehow.

  * * *

  On arriving home after nearly four weeks upstate, weeks that had been spent at the racetrack and the polo field and the theater, weeks of dining out with numerous new acquaintances, evenings spent disguising with cheerful conversation her grim anticipation of what would occur at night’s end, Alva shut herself in her new striped bedroom and stayed burrowed under the quilt for the entire day, glad to see no one but Mary.

  On her second day home, she went in her new carriage, wearing a new hat, to pick up her sisters at their new residence, a bright, spacious house in which her sisters each had a bedroom and the larder was well stocked. Nothing for it but to get on with married life—the married life she’d been so desperate to have, the one that was providing her with all those comforts and advantages she’d longed for. If they came with a price that she was not as eager to face—well, such was the nature of marriage, and she would be wise to remember that.

  “Is Daddy awake?” she asked her sisters, who were in the middle of luncheon. Tall windows that looked onto the street filled the small
dining room with light. The table was set with new china, ivory-colored plates encircled with delicate periwinkle blooms and leaves, perfect for the season.

  Jenny shook her head. “But he seems more comfortable. The doctor has him taking morphine.”

  “That’s good, then,” Alva said, though it was not at all good in the sense one usually intended the word to mean, and the four of them knew this.

  “Come with me,” Alva went on, “and I’ll see him later. Let’s have some fun. We’ll go to Mrs. Buchanan’s.”

  Julia said, “Mrs.—?”

  “The dressmaker. My treat.”

  Armide said, “What need have we for new dresses? Stay, and tell us all about your honeymoon. Did you enjoy the races?”

  “Speak for yourself,” said Julia. “I need new everything.”

  Alva said. “Jenny?”

  “It’s better than Christmas,” Jenny said. She and Julia went to get their wraps.

  As they were about to leave, Lulu came downstairs. “Our own Mrs. Vanderbilt! And don’t you look it?”

  Alva said, “Oh, this is only the start of it. We are off to fit ourselves out as fine ladies of good society.”

  “That daughter of mine like to have forgotten I’m still here,” said Lulu. “One postcard is all. I sure do hope she’s not as lazy being your maid as she is being a daughter.”

  “What? Lazy? Not at all; she’s doing very well,” Alva said. “She’s indispensable, in fact. We’ve been busy, is all. You’ll see her on Sunday. How is Daddy?”

  Lulu glanced upstairs. “He’s got no appetite and only wants to sleep. You might spend a minute.”

  “I will, after we get back. We’re on a mission.”

  When they arrived at the shop, Alva told the dour woman, “We don’t have an appointment, but we do have a Vanderbilt to pay the bill.”

  “Mrs. Buchanan will be happy to see you.”

  * * *

  Alva was home five days when, in her new carriage and a different new hat, she again traveled the few blocks to her father’s new residence, arriving in time to sit at his bedside and watch him die.

  A blessing, they all said. No more suffering, they all agreed.