Sex Wars (36 page)

He noted in his book “24 cases Ob. Stereotype Plates, 182 Ob. Steel and Cooper Plate engravings for 22 different books, 500 assorted Ob. books.” He went through it all carefully, making a detailed inventory. The $650 left him broke. He would not be able to pay his mortgage if he did not secure backing. It was time to approach the Y.

He wrote a letter to Robert McBurney to request help and delivered it to him in person. McBurney looked at the letter and grimaced. “This is a pencil scrawl. How do you expect me to carry something like this to the board? Really. Make a fair copy in ink, please, before I even consider what if anything to do with it.”

Anthony stormed out, leaving the note. What an appalling and effeminate reaction to his plea for assistance.

But the Lord was looking out for Anthony. He received a note from the president of the YMCA, Morris Jesup. It turned out that Jesup had come into McBurney’s office to ask about some other matter, noticed Anthony’s note and read it. Anthony learned this because Jesup actually came to see him. Anthony was in his study, where he had the books and plates. One by one he was examining them. He had worked his way through about a third of his take. A novel had been open to a plate of a naked woman copulating with two men at once, one man in the usual place and the other in her rump. Quickly he stuffed it into a drawer and invited Jesup to sit.

“Rewrite the letter. Attach a description of everything you’ve done on your own from the beginning, with arrest records and outcomes. I will hand-carry it to our board and support your request.”

Anthony wrung Jesup’s hand. “I would desperately appreciate your support. I put my family in hock to seize these plates. I need help in destroying them.”

“We’ll take that up. In the meantime, I’ll cover your costs myself.” On the spot, Jesup wrote him a check for his expenses in the Haynes case and added $150.

“That’s more than the Widow Haynes charged me.”

“The extra is for your efforts.”

“Mr. Jesup, sir, I can scarcely believe you’re doing this!”

“Anthony—you don’t mind if I call you that?—so many of us have worked our lives away making a fortune for our families, and then we see our sons, who should inherit and run our affairs, seduced by corruption, by what they see as good times. The city is being swamped by dirty foreigners with corrupt customs, creating slums—breeding grounds of crime and vice. Tammany uses them and protects them. We men of substance must clean up our cities or society will rot and young men will gamble and waste the resources their fathers and grandfathers slaved to create.”

“Mr. Jesup, believe it, I am the man to head the effort.”

“I’m going to set up a meeting with the members of our Committee to Suppress Vice. You’ll find a great many of the most prominent men of business and finance are ready to support an effort to contain this contagion. Not only are our sons in danger, but our workers are sloughing off responsibilities in pursuit of low pleasures. They rush from the office to the brothel, from the bureau to the gambling hell. You’ll meet with my committee as soon as I can arrange it, and we’ll work out a formal arrangement of cooperation with your work.”

“That would be a big help. I’ve been exhausting my own resources.”

Jesup patted him on the shoulder. “I’m one hundred percent behind you. I have been looking for a strong able man to lead this fight. What’s your background?”

Anthony almost said, Similar to yours, but realized that would tip his hand, that he had scouted out the leadership of the YMCA. Better to let Jesup draw that conclusion himself. Anthony sketched out his religious and family antecedents, his Civil War experiences. When he finished, Jesup said. “You’re our man, I’m convinced. Now you must prepare carefully for the meeting I’ll host. Don’t be timid. Be forthright. Be bold. You want to persuade them you can do the job. Come with press clippings, come with lists of what you’ve accomplished as specific as possible—dates, names, outcomes. You need to show them you’re strong, responsible, and that you can head this crusade.”

“I shall, Mr. Jesup. And I am!” Anthony saw Jesup out and felt like leaping into the air and shouting to the Lord like a Baptist.

“Maggie,” he called out. “Maggie! We’re saved. The Lord has provided. We have money again. We have friends in high places!”

V
ICTORIA AND STEPHEN PEARL
Andrews—whom she had begun calling Pearlo after Cady Stanton’s usage—were reading an amazing document by a German named Karl Marx entitled
The Communist Manifesto.
Pearlo discovered that it had never been printed in the States. He was determined to share it with as many people as possible. “It hit me like a thunderclap,” he said to Victoria.

They often read in bed together, discussing ideas and debating. The physical intimacy was quite secondary. Pearlo was not what she would consider a great lover—he was well over sixty and rather fragile—but she needed his mind to test her own against. He was widely read, with several languages at his disposal including Chinese. “We can publish it in the
Weekly
in its entirety,” she suggested.

“Brilliant! I’ll go over the translation and improve it. The German is more powerful.”

She particularly appreciated Pearlo these days because he encouraged her campaign for the presidency. Nobody else around her took it seriously, not even James. But she had been promised by her spirits she would be a great leader, and Pearlo believed in her.

They were seeing Vanderbilt less frequently. Victoria had little time to spend these days in the brokerage offices, leaving it mostly to James. Ten-nie went in oftener, but the
Weekly
used up much of their energy. If a client made an appointment or needed her special stroking, Victoria would rush to the offices. Until Pearlo asked her what Vanderbilt thought of the
Manifesto,
she had not considered his reaction. Indeed, he paid no attention to its appearance, for ideas he viewed as unimportant as the horse manure he stepped over in the street.

Further, he was around less because of his Frankie. She had moved him uptown into a splendid new mansion on Fifth Avenue near Central Park. She refurbished his wardrobe and kept him home several nights a
week—something new and exotic to the Commodore. He did not need Tennie’s ministrations as often, and his health—which he claimed Frankie was watching over with a keen eye—began to deteriorate. He was unaccustomed to physical weakness and tried to ignore it, but he was slowing down. Still, they met at least once a week for the Commodore to pass on information on stocks and for her to pass on in séance what she learned from her network of madams and from Josie and thus from Fisk.

Josie was happy with how her stocks had done under Victoria and James’s guidance. She had her own little nest egg, which made her less dependent on Fisk. She was flirting with other men and obviously looking around. Victoria and Annie Wood tried to tell her that she could scarcely do better, for Fisk was rich, generous and crazy about her.

“But I don’t love him. Never have. Never will.”

Victoria—who felt that if she concentrated on any man long enough, providing he was equipped with intellect and knowledge, she could love him sufficiently—found such fastidiousness of the emotions rather silly. It wasn’t hard to love somebody. Many things in life were hard, but that wasn’t one of them. And it was important for a woman to stay on good terms with all her lovers—she thought it mean-spirited to discard someone you had been in bed with and behave as if there were no connection.

Josie was suddenly giggling. “But I’ve met him! The man of my dreams.”

Victoria groaned. “A dream is an illusion.”

“He ain’t!” Josie tossed her dark curls. “He’s a gentleman and a real looker. He’s handsome, only twenty-eight and athletic—used to be a gymnast. From an old Philadelphia family. He has dark hair, the darlingest little mustache. He can dance. Oh, if you’d meet him, you’d fall in love with him too.”

“What does he do?” Annie asked.

“He’s got an oil business—the Brooklyn Oil Refinery.”

“Edward Stiles Stokes,” Annie said. “Oh dear. He’s a terrible businessman. Fisk is keeping him afloat. Does Fisk know you’re having an affair?”

“Eddie comes from money and he may be lousy at business, but he’s great in bed. And when you wake up next to him, you don’t wonder how you got into bed with a beached whale!”

“This could be a real mess,” Annie said. “When Fisk finds out, and he will—Josie, you have the discretion of an alley cat caterwauling on a fence—he can ruin Stokes, and you with him.”

She flicked her gloved hand at them. “He hasn’t found out and I have all his letters, so he’d better behave!”

“Blackmail?” Victoria asked. “Do you think he’ll actually pay you for the return of his letters? He loves the spotlight.”

“But no man wants to parade the broken heart of a cuckold in public,” Annie said, fanning herself slowly with a new ostrich fan.

“I’m counting on that,” Josie said. “I have the man I want now, and Fisk can go to hell.” She toasted both of them with a big café au lait cup.

“Don’t push him, Josie. He might take revenge.”

“He’s all wrapped up in being an impresario. He has a new production called
Temptations
with long chorus lines, all blondes on odd dates and all brunettes on even dates. They juggle balls of fire. There’s a giant waterfall onstage. It’s a hit and he’s ecstatic. Plus he’s putting it to the chorines, a different one every night. He doesn’t even notice what I’m doing.”

“May it stay that way,” Victoria said.

“Amen,” said Annie.

“I can tell you one thing I heard him and the weasel talking about.” That was how Josie referred to Fisk’s partner, Jay Gould. “The price of Erie is rising because there’s rumors the British investors are going to drive Fisk and Gould out. So expect Erie to climb.”

“Thank you,” said Annie and Victoria in chorus.

E
LIZABETH CADY STANTON
had told her to call her Julius as her Quaker companion did, the woman introduced simply as Amelia. Julius was affectionate with Victoria. They gossiped about personalities in the movement for hours. Julius knew Pearlo from their abolitionist days and was fond of him. If she guessed the nature of their relationship, she said nothing. When Beecher’s name came up one day, Julius vented about him. They had once been friends, but with him assuming the chairmanship of the rival American organization, she was angry. “Woman’s rights indeed,” she said. “He thinks most of the women he knows have a right to his passionate attentions.”

Victoria’s memory was jolted. She remembered the tale Susan had told about Tilton and his wife. It was a most interesting story, and she filed it away mentally. The next time she saw Theo Tilton, she would probe him about the matter.

Julius lacked the front, the pretense and hypocrisy she had come to expect
from ladies—women who had been raised by respectable and comfortable families and had married into more of the same. Julius confided that she was separated from her husband. She certainly had enough children of various ages—there were usually at least of couple of them about—but they did not define her. It seemed to Victoria that she was more of a mother on the side, almost as a hobby. She dressed well but simply, with a preference for blue.

Victoria was waiting for an opportunity to bring up the Beecher story with Theo. He had begun work on her biography. He sat across from her in a parlor at home—the little one she used for talking with friends and writing—while she recounted a period in her life and he took notes. He was writing her life as they proceeded, for he was, as Julius had suggested, facile. Tonight she was describing her marriage with Dr. Woodhull, to whom she had briefly introduced him.

He looked up, brushing a lock of his long wavy light brown hair from his eyes. “Are you still…close?”

“Sexually intimate, you mean?” She disliked euphemisms.

“Are you?” His gaze met hers and broke away.

“No. We were barely intimate when we were married. I let him live here out of charity, frankly. He’s frail and too far gone to support himself.” Something more than usual was on Theo’s mind. “Is something bothering you tonight?”

He sat silent for a moment, his gaze on her. “May I show you a small piece I’ve written?”

“You mean, other than my campaign biography?”

“Quite other… It’s a poem.”

“Certainly, if you wish.” She didn’t know much about poetry. Literature had been neglected in her education by her various mentors, but she liked to read it on occasion and always published some in the
Weekly.
She did like George Sand’s novels, peopled by passionate and active women she could identify with.

He took out of the bosom pocket of his waistcoat a folded sheet of foolscap and laid it on the table in front of her. She took it up at once. He retreated to his armchair across the room.

How beautiful thou art and darkly radiant,
As if the fulsome moon could burn the eyes
As does the sun, but thou art of the night,
Bright within dark as if in a disguise.

How dark thy hair and thy eyes, how bright
Blue as the overarching firmament.
Ah, lady who hast taken away my heart,
Do clasp me to thee and make me not depart!

“It’s written to you,” he said softly.

No one had ever written her a poem. It made her feel cherished. She met his gaze and smiled at him, not quite sure what her response should be. Should she try to critique the poem? Probably not. That was not the purpose for which he had composed it. She simply waited, smiling.

He rose, the armchair tipping over, and rushed across the room, throwing himself on his knees and clasping hers, his head landing on her thigh. “Darling Victoria, precious Victoria!”

She stroked his fine flyaway hair. “Theo, what is it?”

“I’ve fallen in love with you. The more I know you, the more I must know of you. To be near you is driving me half mad.”

“I don’t need you to go mad, Theo. Do you want me?”

In answer he rose and pulled her into his arms and began to kiss her. His mouth was full and soft. His tongue was agile in her mouth. He pushed her back onto the love seat that stood next to her chair and fell upon her, his mouth still pressed against hers, one hand clutching her left breast through the stuff of her gown. She kissed him back, enjoying his passion, enjoying the skill of his mouth. But the door stood open and any of the members of her family or her staff could pass by.

She freed her mouth. “Patience, Theo, patience a moment.”

He was contrite. “I’m sorry. Forgive me. I didn’t mean to force you.”

“No force needed.” She smiled, looking at him. He was indeed handsome. She had not thought of him in that way, but now she was interested. “We need some privacy. This way.”

She led him to a linen closet where she handed him a couple of pillows and took out a feather bed. Told him to wait a moment in the hall. She slipped into her bedroom and prepared herself. Then she motioned him to follow her up a steep flight of steps to the roof. It was a warm night and the stars were huge overhead. They spread the feather bed on the flat tar roof, where they lay together kissing, rolling to and fro, touching what was bare to touch until they were both seething. He stepped out of his trousers, peeled off his loose shirt and then helped her out of her dress, crinoline, and with practiced fingers undid her corset. After all, he was a married man. He had to be quite used to undoing women’s clothing. As he
bared her shoulders and then her breasts and lastly, letting her drawers drop to the roof, her buttocks and legs, her whole body bare at last to him, he kissed what he uncovered.

His body was lean and almost hairless, excitingly smooth. She could feel his muscles, not huge but firm. He was well made. She would like to see him in gaslight, but not now. Not right now. She could feel him hard against her, not a thick penis but long and slightly canted to the right with a full hood. His hands were strong but long-fingered. One of those long fingers slipped into her. Ah, he knew something about exciting a woman, he did. Two fingers now probed her, sliding in and out. She parted her thighs wide for him, to indicate she was ready. He slid his weight over her and pushed in. Slowly he moved at first, then picked up the tempo. He was keeping himself high against her, so that she got maximum pressure against the seat of her pleasure. He was good, this poet, he was exactly what she wanted.

“I want you, I have you,” he was blurting out as he pumped into her. “We’re bad, we’re bad, Victoria. I want you, bad, bad Victoria.”

She did not consider herself bad in the least, but who cared what nonsense he muttered when he was riding her into such excitement that she bit his shoulder and plunged up to meet him, her ass banging on the roof through the feather bed. Then she was up and over, and a moment later she felt him gush into her.

They lay on the roof in the balmy night air, sleeping in each other’s arms until something woke him and he rolled over onto her and began again. Then they both slept. She woke to the sun already burning down on their bare skin. She opened her eyes, yawned and tried to slip from his arms. He woke. He was amazingly handsome in the orange light of the morning sun, his hair loose and wild, his eyes half closed, his lips swollen. He pulled her down on him, kissing her passionately and keeping her on top. He was firm again. This time she rode him, rode him hard with her hair swishing, her breasts bouncing. She was a little sore by now but she wanted him too badly for that to matter. Finally they descended the steep stairs from the roof and she went off to draw a bath. They bathed together, facing, the water scented lavender. In the tub he played with her, sliding his fingers into her as she faced him and she came again.

When he had finally left and she put herself together, she reflected on the night. He was an amazingly resilient lover. She felt enthralled. She could not wait to see him again. She felt as if she had met the lover she had always craved. He was sensitive, he was a fine writer everyone said, he had
good politics, he was helping her in her campaign for president, and most importantly, the sex was unparalleled.

She forgot all about her intention to quiz him, but after their third night of passionate sex on the roof, he told her the story of Beecher and his wife over breakfast. He still felt overly sorry for himself.

“You must have a passionate relationship with your wife. Why become furious if she supplements your pleasure with a close friend?”