Anna Godbersen: Rumors

“Don’t tease me, Diana. I meant, were there any special guests? Perhaps one with the first initial E.?”

Diana smiled her elusive little smile. She was surprised to find within herself a small inclination to tell him, although she wasn’t certain if it was because she wanted the record set straight, or because she enjoyed telling her own story, or if it was simply that she liked manipulating what the papers printed. “I really don’t know what you mean” was her eventual reply.

He sighed. She had never seen him disappointed, and it only made her wish she could tell him more. But he was looking away from her now. He was trying to get a cigarette going even as he walked into the wind.

“Are there really no other stories for you to write?” Diana affected a sympathetic face.

“There are,” he said, his eyes meeting hers in a passing moment. The cigarette was evidently lit, and he exhaled a cloud of smoke. “But I just don’t want to pursue either of them.”

“And why not?” The rhythm in Diana’s chest had slowed to an occasional thud. Was it possible that Davis Barnard was jealous over her? Because he had heard that Henry was in love with her and that perhaps there was a wedding on the way? It was a little wild, Diana had to admit to herself, that news would have traveled so quickly, but he had, after all, been prodding her about a wedding, and it would maybe explain Henry’s keeping himself scarce on Christmas Eve….

“Because they are neither of them are very good for the Hollands, and, as you know, I never want to write anything that might hurt your family.” They had come to East Twentieth Street, and Diana looked to see if his face didn’t betray some of his meaning. She had to turn there — she was almost home. “The first is about Elizabeth; that’s why I was asking about her. Seems her engagement ring turned up in a pawnshop out west and now everyone is speculating if she isn’t alive somewhere.”

Diana’s heart sped, and she gave a loud laugh that she hoped distracted from the color going out of her face. “Surely I’d know if that were true,” she shot back, without the slightest idea whether she was convincing or not.

“It would be a wonderful thing of course…” Davis said earnestly. “Although the pawnshop isn’t a very nice element of the whole story. People wonder, if she is alive, what sort of ordeal she’s been through. I know it would be devastating to get your hopes up and then find out that she’s still dead.”

“Yes.” There were few people on the street, all of them too cold to observe what passed between a young lady from a good family and a newspaper writer on a Broadway street corner. All of the sudden, Diana wished to be home already. “I suppose Tiffany makes a lot of rings.”

“Well, they’re just rumors. No one knows for sure. Though there has been talk of tracking down the man who sold it and having him arrested.” He paused and looked Diana over. “I suppose you gave that up long ago.”

“I wonder what the other story is?” Diana was almost afraid to ask, but the cold was setting in now, and she was growing more antsy with every passing moment. She feared that if he went on about Elizabeth, she would surely betray something.

“Ah! Well, that’s not so bad either if you look at it from a certain angle, though some people would say that Henry Schoonmaker getting engaged to Penelope Hayes at this particular moment signifies—”

“What?” Diana had lost any capacity for coyness or subterfuge. Her vision had gone spotty, and it was all she could do not to reach up and put a hand on the columnist’s wide shoulder to steady herself. Gramercy was only a few blocks away, but she was stuck there, at that asymmetrical street corner with its high buildings and noisy street traffic.

“Yes, I didn’t like it either. But that’s the story. That Buck fellow who Penelope is always hanging around with told me. He’s my cousin, I’m ashamed to say, though I like to think of him as at least a second cousin….”

“Is it to be announced?” So this was betrayal. It was like being left alone in the desert at dusk without water or warmth. It left your mouth dry and your will broken. It sapped your tears and made you hollow. The news sounded impossible until she remembered the look on Henry’s face yesterday, when he’d come to her door, which she had so naïvely explained away. Perhaps he had been coming to tell her yesterday, or maybe he had wanted to take her and run away. None of that mattered anymore. Now she knew what cowardice he was capable of.

Davis shrugged. “I suppose everyone likes attention. Probably I’ll run it myself…. It’s a good little piece of news, if you get over the distastefulness of it all—”

Diana wasn’t sure what else he said. She was running down Twentieth Street at an absurd gallop, her whole body lunging forward and swaying as she did. The cold was so far under her clothes that she could hardly feel her feet. She certainly couldn’t feel her heart. All she hoped for at that particular moment was that she might be able to reach home and her sister before the sobbing started.

The Schoonmakers gave a delightful Christmas Eve fete, at which the copper-smelting heiress Carolina Broad was universally liked by everybody. She has the simple manner of our western states, but her natural beauty was still very much admired by all the young gentleman, in particular banking heir Leland Bouchard, who was accused by one or two of his fellow bachelors of filling up her dance card far too early.

…

— FROM THE “GAMESOME GALLANT” COLUMN IN THE NEW YORK IMPERIAL, TUESDAY, DECEMBER 26, 1899

DEPARTMENT STORES NO LONGER LOOKED THE same to Carolina. She had been told by Tristan that she had better get a dressmaker: Girls of her sort were not seen in ready-to-wear, he said, and she knew this must be the truth, since he told her so even to his own detriment. After all, he worked in a department store, and this would mean fewer sales for him. But it was only the day after Christmas, and all of the best dressmakers would be unavailable until at least the New Year, he had warned her when she arrived on a mission to purchase shirtwaists and accessories and skirts and a lace or two on Mr. Longhorn’s account.

The arrangement with Mr. Longhorn felt entirely easy and comfortable to her, she told Tristan when he asked. Though the older gentleman did not seem to want to hear any facts of her previous life, he did — when she hinted, over Christmas dinner in the hotel’s grand dining room, that she might have a sister in the city — say that the elder Miss Broad ought to have some presents for the holiday as well. And so Carolina had entered Lord & Taylor and looked across the rows of tables with their precious objects and felt neither fear nor unquenchable desire, but rather that she could simply have any of those things that interested her.

“At any rate, Miss Broad, you are looking very well taken care of today….”

Carolina twisted about, catching her reflection in the mirror, imagining that her contortions presented a view of her in which she possessed the long neck, the plush lips, the hazy eyes and fluffy hair of a Gibson girl. “Tristan,” she remarked with a certain languor, “I am going to need all your help today.”

Tristan watched her, drawing his hand along the edge of the polished cherry table as he did. He was in shirtsleeves and a brown waistcoat, and his chin looked soft, as though it had been shaved that morning. “Today,” Tristan replied, “there is no one else to serve. You, my lovely, are a success.”

Carolina’s cheek bent toward her shoulder. She wondered if he might try to kiss her again. Not that she supposed she should really be doing any of that anymore — but she couldn’t help but find the memory a little exciting. It was nice, she now knew, to be touched.