1876 (9 page)

Every American in the city was invited—some five hundred men, women and children. It was a splendid evening with music and dancing, a wizard for the children, “The Star-Spangled Banner” for the patriotic, followed by fireworks as only the French can contrive them. Our fête ended with a sky-filling American eagle (looking suspiciously like the Napoleonic bird) and the legend “The Union Now and Forever, One and Inseparable.”

“What a marvellous day!” Bigelow was misty-eyed. “Thanks to you and Emma. Mrs. Bigelow will be calling on her soon. But such a sad time, too, with President Lincoln dead and ...” He stopped. Two weeks after the f
ê
te in the Bois de Boulogne, his young son Ernest died of fever.

It was time for me to go. At the front door Bigelow helped me into my overcoat.

“What ...
who
are the Apgars?” I asked.

Bigelow was noncommittal. “There are a great many of them in the city. Loyal Republicans. Mostly lawyers.”

“There is one called John Day Apgar.”

Bigelow got the point. “He is interested in your Emma?”

“I have that impression. He was at our legation last year in Paris. We saw a good deal of him. Since then he has written her letters.”

“I believe he is the one who missed the war. He bought himself a replacement.”

“Do you regard that as wise or unwise?”

Bigelow laughed. “It depends on how seriously one feels about the Union.”

I did not tell my old friend that I myself would certainly have stayed out of that incredibly bloody and needless war had I been of conscript age. Most New Yorkers felt the same; witness, the violent riots of those years. “Do you think I should encourage such a match?”

Bigelow’s response was obvious: How does Emma feel about the young man? I do not know. John Day Apgar is known to be a competent lawyer and his family are well connected with the “cliff-dwellers”—the old nonflashy gentry who live in genteel dreariness below Madison Square. Yet, “I can’t imagine the dazzling Princess d’Agrigente living out her days in West Tenth Street.”

“No,” I said, with perfect honesty. “I cannot see it either.”

“Too far from the Tuileries, and all that imperial glitter—sham though it was. Even so, your Emma is a European, she’s not one of us.”

“I know. Yet she’s so much a part of me that I constantly forget that she was not with us in the old days when New York was different and we were young—you, of course, so much younger than I.”

“You
are
a diplomat, Charlie!”

I left him in the vestibule and made my way out into the cold darkness of Gramercy Park. The gas lamps had been lit and I found their familiar hissing a comforting note in this cold, strange city where I feel suddenly a perfect alien, entirely out of place and time.

Do the Apgars have money? More specifically, does John Day Apgar have money? Or the prospects of money?

I have found that when one starts to think of money, one cannot, finally, think of any other subject. More worries of this sort and I shall be a proper New Yorker—and so at home again, no longer alien.

THE BUSIEST WEEK of my life thus far (can I endure such another?) is almost over. A constant round of calls made and calls received. Of telegrams. Of flowers and candies delivered to Emma, who seems on the verge of vanishing into the vast bosom of John’s family.

Although not old New York themselves, the Apgars have managed to marry into every old New York family. From Stuyvesant to Livingston, they have grafted themselves onto the old patriciate, managing, according to Jamie Bennett, always to attach themselves to the top branch but one of each noble family tree.

I was much distressed to have my memories of the Empress Eugénie returned from
Harper’s
with an apologetic note; and the hope that I would do the Centennial for them. Well, that is to be
done
elsewhere, I wrote them, not pleased. The piece has now been given to Robert Bonner through a mutual (
pace
, Bryant) friend. If the
Ledger
buys it, then I shall not have to spend as many sleepless nights as I have the last few days, waiting for my plans to mature whilst each day glumly subtracting sizeable sums from our infinitesimal capital. As much as possible, I try to keep my worries from Emma. She is so forthright, so Bonapartish that she would rob a bank (or marry John Day Apgar) to save me from ruin.

“You are all that I have,” Emma said suddenly yesterday. When I mentioned that she is also the mother of two sons, she was brisk, “They will be men soon. And they’ll make their way at Paris. You are what matters to me now.”

I was deeply moved; must not disappoint her. I must find her a splendid husband here. Failing that, I must at the least get us the American legation at Paris.

Today—Sunday—we have had a most extraordinary visitation. Emma still does not know what to make of our caller.

It began yesterday with a dozen Jacquesminot roses; and a note from a Mr. Ward McAllister, asking if he might have the pleasure of our company—should the weather be good—for a tour in his carriage of the Central Park, after church.

“Whatever time is that?” asked Emma, as pleased with the roses as she was mystified, no, taken aback, no, contemptuous of a stranger putting himself forward so boldly. “Not to mention who is this McAllister?”

John Day Apgar’s arrival for tea in our suite answered both questions. The services at Grace Church (where
everyone
goes) would end at eleven-thirty, if the Reverend Dr. Potter did not go on too long. “Should you like to go to church? We have a pew?” John put the question to me but meant it for Emma.

Emma shook her head most demurely. “Remember. I am Roman Catholic.”

“Oh, yes. But you, Mr. Schuyler?”

“I converted to Rome when I married Emma’s mother. The conversion was more practical than serious, since I thought my wife well worth a mass!”

The reference passed the young man by. But Emma soothed him; remarked that she herself was not rigid in these matters—was indeed like so many of her class at Paris a Roman Catholic
pro forma
.
In other words, if one of the marrying Apgars was to affix himself like ivy to our noble (on Emma’s side) tree with its roots deep in the soil of Unterwalden, then religion need be no bar and she would marry him in the Episcopal Church without a qualm. Actually, my wife’s losing battle with the Jesuits over the deed to a certain property at Feldkirch in the Vorarlberg caused her to turn violently against the Church, and as she turned, Emma was pulled part way round with her. I myself am a deist like Thomas Jefferson—that is, atheist.

“Now that we know what time Mr. McAllister will come to fetch us, who is Mr. McAllister?” Emma touched one of the silvery pink roses. They are beautiful, particularly on a cold day in winter when the New York sky is like so many tiered layers of lead.

“Oh, he is
famous
!”
John’s emphasis of the adjective sounded ironic but was not. The Apgar style is entirely literal (in the course of one week we have met eleven Apgars and twice as many of their connections). “I’m surprised you never met him in Europe. He used to spend a lot of time in Paris. In Florence—”

“We cannot know everyone, dear John.” When I am paternal with John, I remind myself of someone that I used to know years ago and despise myself as I hear the false unction positively bubbling in my throat.

“Ward McAllister rules our society.” John’s eyes were wide; so the original Prince d’Agrigente used to look when he spoke of the Emperor Napoleon the First.

“But then,” I said, “we must have met him at your family’s house.” A dash of vinegar added to my oil of unction.

“Oh,
we
don’t know him. I mean we do but we move in different circles. Of course he sees Cousin Alice and Uncle Reginald ...” Names of the grandest of the Apgar connections were then invoked; nevertheless, it became clear that the Apgar
gens
proper do not move in the McAllister high circles, for “he is the closest friend of Mrs. William Astor. And she is everything in New York, or
thinks
she is.” A rebellious note; quickly modified with “Of course, Cousin Alice Chanler thinks her nice.”

“But what does the best friend of this marvellous Mrs. Astor
do
?”
Emma was teasing. She still cannot take seriously any New York society.

“Oh, he’s rich. From the South, I think. Then he went West when he was very young and made a fortune during the Gold Rush. After that, he lived in Europe. When he came back, he decided to give us an aristocracy or an Astorocracy, as Father says. This was kind of him, since the McAllisters themselves are no one and related to no one except old Sam Ward.” The Apgar concern with family connections asserts itself even negatively.

“Anyway, Mrs. Astor ‘adores’ him, as they say in those circles, and he helps her with her receptions, dinners, balls. The season—their season—begins the third Monday of every January with a ball at Mrs. Astor’s. The guests are chosen by Mr. McAllister. Three years ago he also started something called the Patriarchs. Every Monday, during the season, twenty-five families and their guests give a dance and a supper at Delmonico’s, usually after the opera.”

“Do you go?” Emma’s look was again teasing, but I saw something else in those dark eyes: so the eyes of justice herself must look behind their blindfold.

“Once or twice, when asked. Usually by Cousin Alice. My mother thinks the whole thing a joke in bad taste. After all, those Patriarchs aren’t really the nicest people. They’re simply the richest, the most ostentatious ...” How well I know the puritan diatribe. Those whose lives are given up entirely to the making of money are the first to cast in public a stone at the Golden Calf of their not-so-secret worship.

We were joined by John’s sister—a sallow maiden of thirty, appropriately named Faith, who brought with her a large box from Lord & Taylor, containing an expensive shawl for Emma, a gift from Faith herself (not from John, as that would be bad form). After many demurs, the shawl was accepted and Emma embraced Faith in the French manner, and Faith sighed with bliss.

True to his word, and not having been instructed to the contrary, Mr. Ward McAllister presented himself to us in one of the hotel’s smaller reception rooms, a stuffy room off the lobby known somewhat mysteriously as the Amen Corner. I immediately recognized him as the man who had spoken to us in the lobby on the day that we arrived—a plump, corseted, lavishly turned-out dandy of fifty or so, with a bad French accent and, alas, a good deal of French to go with it.

“Enchant
é
, Madame la Princesse!”
Emma’s hand was kissed, and mine was weakly clasped. McAllister called me “Mr. Schermerhorn Schuyler,” as though mine was a hyphenated name. More of that later.

“You are kind to let me show you the Sunday sights of our city which is so
crue
and yet so gaining each day in
ton
.”
Ton
was pronounced like “tong,” and is now a favourite word with Emma and me.

McAllister’s barouche was discreetly handsome. Driver and footman wore full livery. The morning was grey but not cold; even so, a great fuss was made over us as the fur blanket was carefully tucked in place.

During the first half-hour McAllister did not once stop talking to us; he also did not once look at us, for his eyes were focused on the occupants of all the other carriages engaged in the Sunday
passeggiata
of grand New York. Certainly there were hundreds of smart equipages; and innumerable fine horses, snorting steam like so many railway engines: in this modern industrial age the writer must use only mechanical references to define old-fashioned fleshly things.

Just above our hotel on Madison Square is the Hoffman House; across from it is the Brunswick Hotel, a favourite of our cicerone. “Personally, I think that
Madame la Princesse
might find the
ambiance
there more
agr
é
able
than the somewhat too large hotel where you are now staying. I mean most of the people we know from Europe stay at the Brunswick.”

The “we” was thrown over one shoulder as he raised his hat to a passing carriage filled with ladies. “Rutherfurds,” he said, as a quality poulterer might say “quail.” “And old Mrs. Tracy.” A pheasant?

Upper Fifth Avenue is indeed an improvement on the lower part. Although brownstone is still king, there are occasional, encouraging variations. At Thirty-third Street we were reverently shown the twin Astor houses: two tall thin slices of chocolate cake connected by a low wall. In one dwells
the
Mrs. Astor, as McAllister refers to his heroine (also known to her intimates as the Mystic Rose). In the other house lives the true head of the family, John Jacob Astor III;
his
wife is charming, everyone says, and interested in all the arts, not least in
that of conversation, whilst her junior
the
Mrs. Astor has no interest in any of the arts save that of Italian opera, which she attends each Monday and Friday evening during the season. Since she invariably leaves during the second interval, it is said that she has not a clue how any of the stories turn out. I must say I know a lot about the Mystic Rose after this morning’s ride.

But McAllister was not allowed the uninterrupted flow of gossip he is plainly used to. Suddenly Emma stopped him in mid-discourse. “What is that?” A huge white marble palace at Thirty-fourth Street made the neighbouring Astor twin houses look altogether the quintessence of New York dowdy.

McAllister’s small eyes looked if not steely at least penny-ish. “A Mr. Stewart, a merchant, resides there ...”

“Not
the
Mr. Stewart of the department store?” Emma’s mockery was exquisite as she invested the article before Stewart’s name with the very same awe that McAllister reserves for his Mrs. Astor’s unique “the.”

McAllister is immune to irony, like most of those who tend to—metal again!—the brassy. “The same. But of course no one knows him. No one goes to his house.”

“But
I
know him! Or I think I met him at his marvellous department store.” Emma explained to me the other day that a department store—new phrase to me—is exactly that: a huge emporium in which many different kinds of things are sold, with each kind relegated to its own section or department, an innovation apparently of Mr. Stewart.