The Secrets of Lizzie Borden (29 page)

I ordered my wedding gown and a lavish trousseau from my favorite dressmaker, Mrs. Cummings on Elm Street, all to be rushed and ready in time for Christmas. I even paid extra for her to take on two more girls to help her. She promised me that she would be discreet and neither she nor those in her employ would spread any gossip about me. If anyone inquired she said she would tell them that the clothes were for a European excursion.

In early December, as the home Orrin and I would make together was nearing completion and the furnishings were being put in place as they arrived, he took me there one afternoon after school. It was already getting dark, and we both knew it was not, by society's standards, an entirely proper thing for us to do, but I had already begun to notice that as each year passed such things mattered less and less to me, if they had ever truly mattered at all. He built a fire in the new fireplace crafted of great river stones and brought blankets and cushions for us to rest upon.

We never discussed it, and there was really no need to; we both knew what was about to happen. There was no need for words of any sort, passionate or practical. The silence between us was a comfortable one, a quiet, mutual contentment, that needed no conversation or nervous, awkward chatter to fill it; the love and trust between us was more than enough.

He lifted the hat from my head and laid it aside, and then he took my hands, first the right and then the left, and slowly, starting at the tips, eased the gloves from my hands. Then his fingers were at my throat, carefully unfastening the row of black silk braid frogs fastening my dusky mauve velvet coat.

I shut my eyes and shivered as his knuckles and wrists brushed against my breasts as he patiently worked his way down the front of my coat, then, after pausing first to kiss me, pushed it from my shoulders and freed my arms from the wide pagoda sleeves. I turned my back to him, presenting the row of tiny pearl buttons his mother's maid had painstakingly fastened for me that morning. His fingers moved diligently downward, and as the pearls parted from the buttonholes I felt the cold kiss of the air upon my skin followed by the warmth of Orrin's lips.

I shifted my position and rose up onto my knees so he could gather up the velvet skirt, cumbersome layered flounces fading from deepest plum to the most delicate pink, and lift it over my head. I kept my back to him, bowing my head and blushing a little, shivering with cold, and nervous eagerness, as I felt his hot blue gaze burn my bare shoulders, followed swiftly by his ravenous lips. I had never felt the sun on my naked skin, but this was what I imagined it must be like. Then his hands were on my shoulders, kneading and caressing, and his lips were at the nape of my neck, then the sides, roaming over my shoulders, covering me with a hundred hungry kisses that made me so dizzy and weak I had to shut my eyes and pray that I would not faint.

His fingers fumbled with my corset until I was blessedly free of my restrictive whalebone cage and could breathe deeply and easily and feel my breasts rise and fall naturally. My nipples hardened and glowed like rosy embers through the thin wedding-veil-white silk of my camisole. I gasped in delighted surprise as his hands crept round to gently cup my breasts. I sighed and arched my neck and leaned back against his chest as his lips once against found the sensitive curve of my neck while, through the thin silk of my camisole, his hands massaged my skin where my stays had plowed angry red furrows before he lifted it over my head.

I can't remember every detail, the distraction of pleasure began to deliciously muddle my mind, but I was soon shed of my petticoats and lay back. I felt the warmth of the fire on my skin as he unlaced my boots, then peeled off my pink satin garters and rolled my black silk stockings down, kissing my knees, ankles, and toes as he bared them. Then I felt his hands at my waist, gently easing my drawers down over my ample hips. My legs lifted of their own accord to help him, and I felt the lace and pink silk ribbons that trimmed them tickle my naked ankles.

I sat up and wrapped my arms around Orrin's neck, and our lips met in a soul-stirring kiss, passionate, devouring, and deep. I pushed his brown broadcloth coat from his shoulders and left him to deal with the sleeves while I tugged and struggled with his green silk tie. I had never undressed a man before, and my fingers fumbled nervously over the row of buttons down the front of his white linen shirt. My fingers were even clumsier when it came to undoing the row of little black buttons on the front of his trousers. I found myself flushing bright as a boiled lobster when I felt his manhood straining against them, eager to come out and play. But this time I wasn't frightened or repelled in the slightest—Orrin was
nothing
like David Anthony!

I had to pause for a moment to bow my head as I blushed and smiled sheepishly, nearly laughing out loud at myself, at the shock and surprise of my unexpected carefree, brazen wantonness. Here I was, a confirmed spinster, an old maid of thirty-seven, sitting on a plaid blanket before a stone fireplace, orange flames crackling and dancing, casting their shadows over our skin, stark naked, with my legs spread wide in indecent abandon, all modesty forgotten and forsaken—and good riddance to it! To see the most intimate part of my body all Orrin had to do was look down, but I didn't care if he did; I
wanted
him to. I know I should have felt at least some degree of unease and embarrassment, but I didn't, not at all, not the least little bit, it all felt
so
natural and right. This beautiful, blissful experience with Orrin was God's gift, the one I had been waiting for all my life, blundering and rushing out and searching the world for when I should have known better; all I really had to do was be patient and wait for it to come to me, all in God's good time. Orrin's love renewed my faith and I felt myself reborn in his arms.

Orrin said he loved every part of me and then proceeded to prove it. My body was like a virgin island and there was not a part of me this bold conquistador did not explore with his eyes, mouth, and hands. And I . . . I was equally bold with him; I didn't give a fig for all society's teachings about womanly modesty. I could not let any shyness, real or instilled or affected, inhibit and deny me this joy. I
gloried
in the feel of his skin against mine, with no barriers of cloth between us, not even the sheerest, most delicate silk, and the delicious warmth and weight of his body atop mine.

As he entered me, Orrin looked deep into my eyes. I held his gaze, and I felt our souls merge and become one just as our bodies did. Then I was lost in a heady, dizzying maelstrom of pleasure and sensations that defy my ability to accurately describe them. Some things are not meant to be put into words, and this, I think, is one of them.

When I felt him start to withdraw from me in precaution, to prevent his seed from taking root, I wouldn't let him. I wrapped my legs tight around him and pulled him closer, drawing him deeper into me.

“You were the first baby I ever held, Orrin,” I said to him, “and I want the second to be the one we made together.”

And it was not too late, though I was closer to forty than thirty and the perils of childbirth increase as a woman ages. I still bled every month, and I was not afraid. When I thought of having a child—
our
child, Orrin's and mine, born of our love—the danger seemed so very far removed I couldn't even see it as a speck upon the horizon. And even if it had stood looking right over my shoulder, breathing the fetid breath of Death right onto the back of my neck, I still would have chanced it; it was a risk well worth taking.

Every night in the casinos of the world people risk their money for more money, or just for the thrill of it, or to stave off boredom; I thought surely the miracle of a new life was worth greater stakes. An old life for a new life, and if one trumps the Reaper the rewards are infinite beyond measure. I had gambled with my life before. I had risked death via the hangman's noose or a living death walled up behind the bricks and bars of a prison, and I was not afraid to try my luck again. Before, I had done something wrong to try to make my world right. I had taken lives to give myself a life, the life I had always longed for. My motives had been material and selfish, but this . . . this was noble and pure, and right in
every
way; this time I would risk my life to bring a new life into the world, to create something wonderful and good. And if I lost my own . . . it would still be worth it. But I hoped that once again—
please,
God, just
one
more time!—my luck would prevail, and I would win and live to hold our child in my arms and nurture and watch him, or her, grow and thrive, and be there to tie our son's silk cravat on his wedding day or adjust the fall of our daughter's heirloom lace veil and coronet of pearls and silken orange blossoms on hers.

Afterward, Orrin fell asleep with his head upon my breast. And for the first time in my life I felt as if my bosom had a purpose—to provide a pillow for my beloved's head. I stroked his wild red hair and caressed his freckle-spotted shoulders, my fingertips, light as a feather, tracing the length of his spine as the fever sweat of love cooled against his naked skin. And though there was a fine new ceiling blocking my view, I was
still
looking at the stars. But I still felt no need to wish upon them; I would give my wish to someone who needed it more. My dreams were already coming true. I felt like my life had for so long been a great big jigsaw puzzle, with all the pieces scattered about willy-nilly with no rhyme or reason, some here, some there, some near, some far, some missing altogether, but now, since the day I stepped off the train in Swansea and straight into Orrin Gardner's arms, the pieces were all falling into place, and
nothing
was missing after all. For the first time in my life, I truly felt complete. I was in love. I truly was the happiest and luckiest woman alive!

“We met again because we were meant to be together,” those words were to come back to haunt me, as the worst and cruelest mockery of all. And they are
still
there, like a ghost in my dreams, they
still
haunt me in an endless echo, but
now
they only bring pain; they have completely lost their beauty; there is no miracle or marvel, or hope, only mockery—stinging, bitter, mean mockery!

There is nothing crueler, I think, than a miracle that is snatched away like a cup of cool sweet water from the parched lips of a man who has just crawled out of the desert sunburned and dying of thirst. God works in mysterious ways; sometimes the answer is
yes;
sometimes the answer is
not yet;
and sometimes the answer is
no;
but, regardless of the answer, and the tears and joy, the ecstasy and despair, the frustration and fulfillment, it may bring, God is under no obligation to explain Himself, He does not deign to tell us why, and we are left to ponder the mystery and grope blindly for the solution ourselves, though we may never find it.

I sometimes wonder if those who do not believe in God are happier since they have no faith to lose or become disillusioned in, no higher power to prostrate themselves before, to pray and beg and cry out the eternal despairing
Why
to with no real hope of receiving an answer. They accept such things as the way of the world, the luck of the draw, as a gambler does the roll of the dice or the fall of the cards. Perhaps the more romantically inclined chalk them down to chance, or fate, if they believe in that either, if they believe in anything at all.

“Everything happens for a reason,” some say in sage and lofty tones as if they have some wisdom that the rest of us are lacking. But, if this is true, and the reasons really are there, perhaps we are, for the most part, doomed to blindness where our own lives are concerned. Perhaps it is all a matter of distance and perspective? I've tried and tried, but the reasons still elude me. And even if I knew why, it would not change anything. Why does not come bearing the gift of Peace of Mind. The heart is often stone blind and deaf to Reason. It is stubborn and recalcitrant; it wants what it wants.