Sisters (19 page)

And then she remembered: it
had been James who had pointed this out to her. He understood the
images now, whether or not he had in the beginning. But he didn't
understand Helen and what had happened between them. Helen, who'd had
her own set of images, and then had said no to the preventive
devices, and so the babies came and the miscarriages one after
another. But still she had a concept of wifely duty--until a voice
whispered to her, other women saying it was not her duty. A voice
James didn't hear until the night when Helen screamed the words at
him.

Had he been at fault? Some,
certainly--and he knew it, and it preyed upon him, though he tried
very hard not to let it. The very fact that the extent of his
wrongdoing was vague probably called up the memories more often than
if the case were clear-cut. Yes, she understood that. She knew well
the temptation to assess and reassess one's guilt as long as there
was the slightest possibility one could slip out of it. And the
consequence was inevitably to reaffirm it.

Yes, she knew about that.
In the early-morning hours the memories came so easily, and she let
them come. Painful they were, but at least they distracted her from
the fresher pain of reliving again and again the scene with James.

*

She and Albert had gone to
a ball. That was the beginning, she remembered. Not just any ball,
but an inaugural ball. Over the years, Albert had become one of the
top four or five men at the Smithsonian, and because of his position,
they received an engraved invitation to the supper dance following
Ulysses S. Grant's first inauguration. Sophie had been thrilled at
the prospect. In her mind's eye, she could still see the dress she
had chosen so carefully. It was white and cherry-red satin, the
perfect foil for her complexion, the dressmaker had said.

And she could remember
their arrival at the new Treasury Building as if it had happened
yesterday. When Albert checked their wraps, he thought he perceived
some confusion in the cloakroom. It was a wet night. The edge of her
skirt was already damp, and Albert, always a careful man, took the
time to see exactly where their wraps were hung. He wouldn't risk
their having to go abroad coatless on a rainy night.

Impatient with the delay,
she edged into the hall until she was just inside the doorway where
she could watch the entering crowd. Rotund politicos went by, looking
exactly as though they'd stepped from a Nast cartoon. There were
resplendent generals and elegantly dressed women. She counted at
least seven Worth gowns--and then she saw Philip for the first time.
He entered with a group, and as he talked to his friends, turning to
one and then another, smiling, frowning, the air seemed charged
around him. Almost visible glints of energy seemed to leap out from
him.

He saw her looking at him
and stopped in mid-sentence to return her gaze. That should have been
the signal for her to look away, but she held his eyes, and as the
crowd forced him to move on, he turned his head and kept her in his
sight as long as he could. When finally she could no longer see him,
she felt a great disappointment. Albert came, and she found some
pretext to hurry him to the spot where she'd last seen Philip, but he
seemed to have disappeared.

It wasn't until they
approached the supper tables nearly an hour later that she saw Philip
again. An acquaintance approached with him and introduced him. The
hand Sophie put out to him was chill with nervousness, and she was
glad to be wearing gloves. He too was gloved, but as he took her hand
and bowed over it, she thought she could feel the warmth of his body
passing into her own.

He took supper with them,
asked polite questions, and told them about himself, describing in
detail the illustrated monthly magazine he had just begun publishing.
He didn't ask Sophie to dance, which disappointed her, but relieved
her too. At least she didn't have to decide what to say, how to act
when the two of them were away from Albert.

When the evening was over,
she began to worry she might never have to decide, might never see
him again. But within a week of the ball, he visited her and Albert
in their Capitol Hill home. Scarcely had they greeted him when he
made the proposal which had, he said, prompted the visit. Dymond's
Monthly, the illustrated magazine he'd told them about? He wanted
both Albert and Sophie to write articles for it. Albert could do the
customs of primitive peoples, any customs, any people--Dymond's
readers loved that kind of thing. And Sophie would do fashion, taking
whatever approach she wished. Albert was doubtful at first, but
Philip's enthusiasm quickly won him over.

Although Philip's offices
were in New York, and Sophie and Albert lived in Washington, D.C.,
they saw him often, since he was in the Capital frequently and they
had their articles to discuss with him. Sometimes Sophie's eyes would
meet Philip's while they were talking, and though the conversation
continued politely and impersonally, she could see in his gaze a
longing which matched her own. Albert didn't seem to notice. He
appeared to take great pleasure in Philip's company, and whenever
Philip would leave, he always followed him down the porch stairs
asking when he would come again.

After Philip had been their
guest a few times, Albert left them alone together one evening. And
then it happened on one evening and another. and then he began to
leave them for even longer periods while he traveled. He always
departed like a man secure nothing untoward would happen in his
absence. He would put on his topcoat and bid them a warm good-bye,
kissing Sophie, putting a hand on Philip's shoulder. If they came
outside to see him off, he would inevitably lean from the carriage as
it pulled away and shout a suggestion for a restaurant or a play they
might enjoy. Did he think his affection for them would guarantee
their chastity? Sophie wondered. Like a naked sword between medieval
lovers?

It was Albert's benevolence
which caused Sophie the only guilt she felt when she and Philip did
become lovers. Most of the time when she was with Philip, the very
strength of her desire for him seemed a sanction for loving him, an
exculpation for unfaithfulness. But sometimes the idea of betraying
Albert nagged at him.

"He's been so good to
me, Philip, so kind to us both." This was one night when Philip
was in Philadelphia.

"Sophie, he knows
about us. He's known from the first time he saw us together."

"But if he knew,
surely he wouldn't leave us alone together."

"He's an old man,
Sophie. He knew he couldn't keep you forever. Someday you'd find
yourself someone younger and leave him, so he's found a lover for you
and arranged it so that you still share his home."

"No! I don't believe
that. He's not the one who found you. I found you."

"But Albert invited me
to stay here. Albert arranges for us to be alone."

"How can you say that?
He likes you. You're his friend!"

"I suppose that under
the circumstances it's better he like me than not."

She was quiet a moment,
thinking. "You believe he's deliberately arranged the affair
between us."

"I think he saw an
affair was likely, and so he arranged it in the way that served him
best. The man's no fool, Sophie."

"You can't believe
what you're saying. I can't believe it. For one thing, you wouldn't
let him do it, manipulate you like a puppet."

"Do I have a choice?
Will you leave him, divorce him, and come live with me?"

"How... how could I?
He's been so kind. He is so kind to both of us."

"Exactly my point.
Dammit, Sophie. I hate the situation we're in, but he's managed it so
that it's the only way. And it will be until you can see that he's
using kindness to hold you here."

After that, she began to
look at Albert more closely. But if he were wearing a mask, she could
not see through it. He seemed a genuinely good man, just as he always
had, happy to make her happy, happy simply to be with her. He seemed
unchanged from their first days together, kindly and beneficent as
ever.

Until the morning he
wouldn't speak. He arose, dressed, even ate breakfast without
uttering a word.

His silence made her
uneasy: "Albert? Albert?"

The face he turned toward
her was composed in an expression of calm indifference.

"Albert, what's wrong
with you, Albert?" As she put her hands on his shoulders,
something came into his eyes. He seemed to know for a moment who she
was, but the knowledge brought pain. His face twisted, and then with
visible effort he rejected whatever was tormenting him, thrust it
away--and emptiness returned to his eyes, calm to his face.

Sophie sent for Philip at
once, and he brought a doctor with him, the first of many they
consulted. At first the medical men advised patience, but Albert did
not improve. Each day he withdrew from her into himself, refusing to
dress, refusing to eat, finally refusing to move from his bed. He lay
there for days, his knees draw up to his head. The doctors became
more and more pessimistic, shaking their heads and saying they could
not understand what had happened to him. But Sophie knew. He had
found out about her and Philip. She was sure of it.

Then the doctors began to
say Albert would never improve, and his care began to be more than
she could manage. She found a place for him in the Virginia
countryside, and for months she visited him every week.

She continued to go there
even after she knew there was no point to it. Albert improved enough
so that he got up every day and walked with a nurse or sat with the
other patients. with help, he would eat, but he wasn't there in the
attenuated body sitting motionless in the sunshine. There was no one
behind the blank, staring eyes. Finally she missed one week, then
another, excusing herself because she had so much to do. The writing
which had been a pastime was now a full-time vocation. She needed
money, and she wouldn't take any from Philip except in exchange for
her writing or for editing he asked her to do. At first there were
one or two pieces he requested she go over, and then gradually she
became the final editor for every article in his new publication,
Dymond's Ladies' Magazine.

When Philip first started
trying to convince her to divorce Albert and marry him, she wouldn't
listen to him.

"It'll make no
difference to him, Sophie. Don't you see that?"

She put her hands over her
ears. "No more, Philip. Please, no more."

He was relentless. "He
did it to himself, Sophie. He created a situation he thought he could
live with, but he couldn't. He was a victim of his own machinations."

"He didn't do it,
Philip. We did it to him."

It was almost two years
before she agreed to divorce Albert and marry Philip. She let Philip
think he had convinced her that he and she were not to blame, but in
her heart of hearts, she still blamed herself for what had happened
to Albert. Just herself, not Philip, because he so thoroughly
believed in what he said, that it was, for him, the truth.

It was the biggest
difference between them: Philip never second-guessed his own
motivations. Over the next decade, as the Dymond publishing empire
expanded and grew, she watched the way her would put the past
together in a pattern that was comfortable, then turn his back on it.
She wasn't like that. She kept picking up the pieces and fitting them
together this way and that, always hoping to find she hadn't been
wrong, that she had done the right thing. But in the end, she always
knew she had been at fault, and the admission brought pain especially
because she was aware that if she could redo it all, she would
undoubtedly choose the same course.

Every autumn, she made her
way to rural Virginia to see Albert. After Philip's death, it had
been hard to go, but she went, and always she found Albert unchanged.
He didn't even seem to age. It was as though time had stopped for
him.

It had been almost a year
now since she'd seen him. It seemed a much shorter time because she
was so busy. So much happened, so much changed from day to day. One
constant was the sadness she felt, sorrow for the hurt she had done
to a kind and gentle man.

Was it something like this
James felt about Helen? The situations were not the same. The people
involved were very different. And yet for all the variety of ways
there were for unique personalities to hurt one another, Sophie
wondered if in the end the same feelings of guilt didn't envelop us
all. If we could break out of remorse long enough to look closely at
others, surely we would see fellow penitents tortured by similar
sorrows for different sins. In a way, the world was a gigantic house
of mirrors...

The thought broke off,
leaving Sophie gasping, caught halfway between horror and laughter.
House of Mirrors. Imagine her mind doing that to her, bringing her
unsuspecting to this point, then pushing her right off the edge;
letting her think such high-flown thoughts, then tossing her over
into absurdity. The House of Mirrors. That's what Ida Hamilton's was
called. That was the name of Cheyenne's most elegant whorehouse, the
name of the place James said he had been the day Helen died.

Sally was chasing Tom
around the dining table, or perhaps Tom was chasing Sally. Sophie
suspected that neither of them knew who was the hunter and who was
the hunted--and that neither of them really cared. Sally was
screaming with delight, and Tom barked wildly. Esther watched them
condescendingly, helping the hurrying maid, who was clearing the
breakfast dishes, time her forays to the table so as to miss the
small bodies hurtling round and round. Sophie had to shout to make
herself heard. "Has your father left, then?"