The Secrets of Lizzie Borden (16 page)

Bridget was sick as well; she complained of nausea, of being sick several times during the night. A few times she had to stop what she was doing about the house and rush out into the backyard and vomit again. Each time she came back, moving slowly, cradling her sides tenderly as if they ached, ashen faced, with a heavy sweat shimmering on her skin. But I . . . beyond the early-morning stomach upset, I didn't feel ill at all.

 

The more I brooded over it, the more desperate I became. I couldn't bear the waiting. Even if I dispatched another dollar right away it would be
days
before another dose of Madame Saint-Genevieve's Miracle could reach me. Finally, I could endure no more; I changed out of my housedress and into a deep-blue bengaline suitable for town, put on my hat and gloves, and went out.

I remembered reading something, in a detective story or a book of household hints—I really wasn't sure which—about Prussic Acid being used to get rid of pests. The name had stuck in my mind because at the time I had just finished reading the most
thrilling
romance, in which the heroine was carried off on a white horse by a dashing Prussian cavalry officer who was nothing but a trifler and a real cad where women were concerned. He had stolen her peerless, priceless necklace of pearls to settle a debt of honor and then her heart and, by discreetly worded implication, her virtue, but a wedding quickly followed and the final page contained the comforting assurance that they lived happily ever after in the rustic magnificence of an English country estate with their eleven children. I thought perhaps . . . just a
small
dose . . . and if perchance in the unlikely event that it killed me too despite my carefulness . . . well, that would still be better than living out the rest of my life as David Anthony's unhappy and maltreated wife and the mother of his equally wretched offspring.

I was obviously
desperate
and not thinking clearly. Only later would I discover just how dangerous Prussic Acid really was, that a
single
grain brought
instantaneous
death—and to think I had been on the verge of slapping that idiot druggist after I imperiously informed him that
he
was mistaken! My face flames at the memory and I feel an utter fool! If I had been thinking more clearly, I would not have gone at all, or, if I had, I would have asked for something safer like arsenic instead, where a minuscule dose stood a greater chance of bringing about the desired result—abortion—and entailed a much slighter risk of immediate and agonizing death.

Indeed, time
would
tell me that I
really
should
not
have gone to that drugstore at all; that little foray into the wrong part of town would come back to haunt me. All I can say in my defense is that it was an act of the most desperate impulse. I didn't really think it out; I just turned my steps toward the south side of town, the one where the shops were of a decidedly inferior class, so none of the shopkeepers would know me and I was unlikely to meet anyone of my milieu, and went into the first drugstore I saw—Smith's.

The clerk, Eli Bence, was a supercilious little man, and I disliked him at first glance. But I squared my shoulders, lifted my chin, and haughtily demanded ten cents' worth of Prussic Acid. I had my excuse at the ready; I wanted it to kill moths infesting my sealskin cape.

But Mr. Bence refused to sell me any, saying that in all his years as a pharmacist he had never before heard of Prussic Acid being used for such a purpose. I held my ground and insisted I had purchased it for this purpose many times before. He then had the
gall
to tell me that sealskins are impervious to moths, which I later found out was actually true. But that doesn't matter in the least—a
gentleman never
contradicts a lady, so he really shouldn't have said it; the fact that he did shows a decided lack of breeding. No wonder he was working in a drugstore on the
wrong
side of town!

I tried to sway him, smiling and saying surely just a teeny-tiny bit couldn't possibly do any harm, except to the moths, of course, but that impertinent nincompoop Mr. Bence was adamant: “My good lady, it is something we don't sell unless by a prescription from a doctor, as it is a
very
dangerous thing to handle.”

There was no point in arguing with such an ignorant and insolent person, and I left the store in an empty-handed huff. As I was walking down the sidewalk, I felt an ache, a clenching cramp in my nether parts, and . . . Could it be?
Yes!
It was! The ache grew more insistent, more pronounced, clutching, stabbing,
wringing
my womb. But this time I didn't deplore the pain; instead I
welcomed
it and thanked God for it. My prayers had been answered. My courses had come; if I had just been patient and waited . . . I could have saved all that time and worry, and Father's dollar, and not had to contend with such a rude, ignorant, uninformed fool as Eli Bence. I hadn't been pregnant after all! I almost laughed at myself for my foolishness! I was so relieved I wanted to dance a jig and at the same time fall down on my knees right there in the middle of the sidewalk and thank God. Instead, I quickened my steps and hurried home before the telltale red stains began to seep through my skirts. I was so happy I was practically skipping along the sidewalk.

As I neared the house, I saw David Anthony lurking outside the gate, a contented look on his face like a cat that has just swallowed a fat yellow canary and still has the telltale feathers stuck in his whiskers. He had a little brown sack of lemon drops in his hand, a silent reminder of the happy days when we had shared candies and kisses in the barn.

“
What are you doing here?
” I demanded.

“Just biding my time,” he answered with a menacing smile.

“
Go away!
” I hissed like an angry cat.

He shrugged and tipped his straw boater at me. “I'll go away, Lizzie, but I'll be back. You
will
be mine; it's only a matter of time. And when I do you'll welcome me. Think about it. . . .” He forced a lemon drop into my mouth, which I promptly spat out, but he just laughed at me. “You don't want to be a sour old maid, do you?”

I stood and watched him walk away; then I ran into the house and flew up the stairs to my room.

My former jubilation was gone. I couldn't calm down. Relentlessly, I paced the floor. My nerves just wouldn't settle. I felt a tense, taut pounding behind my eyes, and around my skull a tightening, like a vise, as though my skull were shrinking, putting intense pressure on my brain, trying to squeeze it down to the size of a walnut and then
crack
it. Suddenly I bent double. I felt the wringing pain in my womb and the blood oozing out between my legs. I felt sick and scrambled for my slop pail, but vomited all over the floor before I found it, but I didn't care. At least now I knew for certain that I wasn't pregnant, but my lost virtue, and the proof of it in David's possession, could still condemn me. Now
that
worry consumed me. But I hadn't the faintest idea what to do about it.

I lay flat on the floor sweating profusely through my clothes and gasping like a fish out of water, dying for want of breath. Behind my tightly clenched lids it was like watching a fireworks show—a dizzying explosion of vivid colors, mostly a
furious
red. Migraines often came hand in hand with my monthly courses, and in the summer heat they were always much worse. The bleeding always played havoc with my emotions, making the slightest upset seem as monumental as the end of the world. I slowly pulled myself up and lay down on my bed and drew up my knees, trying to ease the cramping, and recalled again David Anthony's ominous words: “I'll go away, Lizzie, but I'll be back. You
will
be mine; it's only a matter of time.”

His words froze my heart with fear. His dark eyes, black as the Devil's soul, told me every word was true. He would be back and try to claim me as his own, body and soul; David
would
damn me.

With every hour that passed the feeling of fear intensified, turning up the flame of pain inside my head and womb. I kept wondering
what
David would do and
when
he would do it. How much time did I have? Could I get my wits together enough to outmaneuver him? Was that even possible? I needed to talk to
someone, anyone
who would be patient, kind, and listen. I needed to unburden myself. In that moment I almost wished I were Catholic so I could go to confession. Who could I turn to? I could not disclose the full extent of my shame; my lost virtue would have to remain my burden alone to carry. I could not trust anyone not to betray me, but I
had
to get out; I needed the consolation, the balm, of human sympathy. Suddenly I thought of Alice—Alice Russell. Emma and I had known her for years. A kindly but fussy, fidgety bird-boned spinster subsisting in genteel poverty in rented rooms above a bakery.

It was already late to go calling, but I got up off my bed, tidied my hair and clothes, put on my hat, and rushed around the corner to knock on Alice's door.

When I saw her smiling, expectant face and the welcome shining in her blue eyes behind the glass lenses of her gold-rimmed spectacles, I was so relieved I flung myself into her arms.

I told Alice that I was
so
afraid that
someone
would do
something,
something
terrible!
I clung to her and confided in an ominous whisper that I had seen, several times, a dark man loitering outside the house and that I slept every night with one eye open for fear that this dark man of mystery would burn the house down over our heads. I told her about the recent illness that had afflicted our household, but I blamed it on the milk, suggesting that perhaps this mysterious man had poisoned it in the dark hours before dawn when the milkman left the cans sitting outside the back door for Bridget to bring in when she awoke. I told Alice how mortified I had been by Father's treatment of Dr. Bowen when he called round to check on us after Abby's visit. I think I said something about Father having an enemy, a fearsome, burly red-haired Scotsman, “with arms like Thor, who had spent eternity hammering at his anvil,” I added colorfully. He had come to the house and quarreled loudly with Father because he refused to rent him a store in his pride and joy the A. J. Borden Building, saying he would not let a shop for such a purpose, so surely the Scot must be a man of evil intentions, or, at the very least, a purveyor of immoral goods.

I told Alice “all” about the broad daylight burglary, and the theft of money, jewelry, and streetcar tickets from Abby's desk in the master bedroom, the eight-penny nail I had found stuck in the cellar door padlock, and that the barn had been broken into and my precious pigeons most cruelly
murdered
—
decapitated; poor creatures!
Though, of course, I neglected to disclose the fact that this was done by Father and that their plump roasted bodies had come to grace our dinner table afterward, or that Emma and I had been responsible for the crime that had precipitated it. I simply
couldn't
tell Alice something like
that!
What would she think of us if she knew?
Nice
girls—
Borden
girls,
Fall River
girls—didn't stage burglaries; it simply wasn't done.

Alice was
very
kind and consoling. I could not have found a better shoulder to cry on. She held me close and patted my back and suggested I go away for a little while, take “a lovely little holiday,” somewhere by the sea like Buzzards Bay perhaps. Undisturbed rest and a change of scenery would surely do me good, she said, and I might try my hand at some worthwhile handicraft like basket weaving, and it might also be a good idea, she added, to restrict my reading to the Bible and abstain entirely from the more lurid and melodramatic forms of literature, as they tended to stir the imagination like a witches' brew.

What she really meant but was too kind to say was:
You are letting your imagination run away with you, Lizzie
. It was clear she did not take me seriously, but I didn't care.
Confession really is good for the soul,
I marveled.
No wonder the Catholics think so highly of it!
Talking to Alice actually
had
made me feel better, though admittedly it didn't help resolve the dilemma of David one jot.

“I don't know but what
somebody
will do
something,
” I said, digging in my heels and clinging to Alice as she bid me good night and gently, but firmly, and none too subtly, pushed me out the door. “I am afraid
somebody
will do
something—something terrible.. . .
”

When the door shut behind me I felt as though I had been relieved of a great and terrible burden. I had blurted out my fears into a kind and caring ear; even though I had lied, twisted, and concealed the true source of them somewhat, I still felt better for it. I smiled, and I had to stop myself from skipping as I hurried home. It was nearly nine o'clock.

As I fastened all three locks on the front door behind me I heard voices coming from the sitting room, but I didn't go in. Father's voice, and Abby's, I recognized, and it took me only a moment to identify the third: Uncle John Vinnicum Morse, our late mother's brother, or “that ol' fanny pincher,” as Bridget called him in unconcealed disgust.

Damn, damn, damn!
I wanted to stamp my feet, pull my hair, and
scream
.

Though to all the women in the house he was a thankfully infrequent guest, in Father's eyes Uncle John was always a welcome one. He was one of the few people Father trusted, especially when it came to financial matters, and when Uncle John darkened our doorstep it was certain money was the magnet that drew him. Until recently he had been living in Hastings, Iowa, as a farmer and horse trader, but he had since moved nearer, to New Bedford, where he shared a house with a blind butcher. Though Uncle John professed to have our—Emma's and my—best interests at heart, always referring to us as “dear Sarah's girls,” neither of us really liked him and we often went out of our way to avoid him, as I understand many other women did also. To put it delicately, Uncle John was a real bottom pincher, and all of us, even the unsightly mountain of flesh that was Abby, had the bruises to show for it every time he came to visit us.