The Fifth Avenue Artists Society (5 page)

“I'll have to try it,” I said, though in truth I thought it sounded like hell. Even though I'd dreamed of publication privately, the thought of sharing my writing—my deepest disappointments and
joys—with strangers filled me with horror. My manuscript wasn't ready, and neither was I. In part because the last artists gathering I'd attempted in June—an all-male meeting of Charlie's early childhood friends from his old neighborhood in Brooklyn—had ended badly. Charlie had said that a female presence might not be the best idea, but I'd insisted on attending anyway. I'd been desperate for the camaraderie of other serious writers. When we arrived, the host, a pock-faced man named Wayland, had immediately asked me to leave, stating that a woman's attendance was improper. Charlie had defended me, prompting a heated exchange that ended abruptly when Charlie said that Wayland was too simpleminded to appreciate the complexity of my prose. Charlie had held my hand the whole train ride home. That was one of the occasions that made me realize I'd always loved Charlie, that he was my match.

The strings began to sing behind me, disturbing the memory. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Hopper.”

“Likewise, Miss Loftin. I'll see you and Franklin next Friday,” he said. “And if you don't show, I'll come fetch you. I know where you live.” He winked at me and I stared at him, wondering how in the world he knew. He held my gaze, and I looked away, before realizing he was referring to our earlier exchange. I sat down and leaned over Mr. Trent and Doctor Hopper.

“As you should, judging by the number of times your carriage has visited my lawn. I've noticed several tire depressions in the grass. If you wouldn't mind telling your footman to keep to the drive, that'd be magnificent.”

“Oh, the atrocity,” he whispered. Dramatically placing a hand on his heart, he winked at me again and turned his attention to the players.

Y
ou don't remember where it is?”

Franklin and I were walking down yet another unfamiliar cobblestone street in Manhattan. Passing mansion after mansion, the flicker of gas lamps flung shadows of elaborate gables and openmouthed gargoyles onto the street. I knew we were somewhere near Fifth Avenue. Nowhere else—possibly in the world—was there such an abundance of wealth encapsulated in such a small area. Franklin's black evening jacket disappeared, then reappeared, in front of me as he stepped back into the light. He stopped for a moment, neck craning toward the door of a brick home that looked minuscule in comparison to the castle-like monstrosity beside it. Taking a few steps toward the door, he squinted at the number, shook his head, and kept walking.

“No. I do. It's just that I've always taken the New York and Harlem to Eighty-Sixth Street. I've never taken the elevated line in. We're farther south, so . . .” Franklin shrugged and stopped to wait for me to catch up. I walked faster. The black lace lining the white taffeta dress I'd borrowed from Bess was too long, catching on the edges of the cobblestones with each step. Bess didn't know I'd borrowed it. She'd been in the city all day, selecting materials
at O'Neill's for a hat Alva Vanderbilt had asked her to redo for her fourteen-year-old daughter, Consuelo. She'd be livid when she realized I'd worn the dress, but Mother had insisted I look presentable, and I'd barely noticed which dress she was helping me into. Instead, I'd been lost in thought. I hadn't seen Charlie in two weeks—not even so much as a glimpse from my window—and though I knew my heart couldn't bear his presence, it ached in his absence. Every morning, I woke wondering if he'd come for me, if today was the day he'd come to tell me that he'd called off his engagement to marry me instead. But with each passing week my hope was fading. Even if he loved me, he didn't love me enough.

“I recognize that one,” Frank said, gesturing toward an Italian Renaissance–style mansion with scrolled ornamentation edging the rectangular frame. I wondered how Doctor Hopper had the means to settle among the Fricks and Vanderbilts.

“I thought Hopper was a doctor,” I said, breathlessly, finally catching Franklin.

“He is. This way.” We turned down a narrow alley, past a wrought-iron fence protecting someone's garden. The light scent of English boxwoods drifted over the pungent wood smoke billowing from surrounding chimneys and I inhaled the November air, huddling into my grandmother's mink coat—a pelisse that Grandfather had given her on their wedding day.

“Not to discount physicians, but unless he's invented some new contraption, I don't understand how he lives here,” I said as I tried to keep up. Franklin strained to see the numbers on another brick house.

“They're related to the Carnegies somehow,” he said. Stunned at the comment, I watched as Franklin reached into his pocket, flipped his watch open, and glared at the time. “But I don't know the particulars.” I thought of Mr. Hopper's comment at the Sym
phony, his joking—or so I'd believed—about living on Fifth Avenue, and smiled, finding my first impression, and the irony of the whole thing, hilarious.

“Frank, maybe we should knock and ask someone. Surely one of the housekeepers would know where they live.” Franklin's nose wrinkled.

“It's nearly eight at night, Gin. I'm not going to go traipsing up to some stranger's door.” He exhaled in frustration and the cloud of his breath drifted past me, disappearing into the night. I thought of Mother, who was likely already tucked in bed reading the new
Ladies' Home Journal,
and knew he was right. “Oh. There it is. Right there.” Franklin tipped his head forward, toward a stream of light coming from a house at the end of the block. My fingers curled around the hard edges of the leather notebook in my pocket. I hadn't asked Franklin much about this gathering, mostly because I was afraid that if I heard the answer I wouldn't go. At once, the editorial rejections my writing had accumulated in the past crept to the forefront of my mind—
these characters are one-dimensional, the pace of this story is too tedious, the subject is dull.
I didn't want to stand in the middle of a circle reading a manuscript that I knew was far from perfect, reciting words that conjured Charlie. I also knew I wouldn't be able to hold my tongue if a man like Wayland questioned my being there or insulted my work, as most male artists were wont to do—a diplomatic way of reminding me that I should be at home needlepointing or cooking. Even so, I knew what I wanted and that was to shape this manuscript into something worth reading. To that end, I would need to embrace critique and seek opinions—honest ones.

Franklin was nearly to the door by the time I realized I was still in the road staring at the towering brick chimneys and limestone-edged turrets. He turned around when he didn't find me beside him and started back down the stairs.

“Come on, Gin,” he said. His cheeks were pink and the front of his hair stood on end. I reached up and smoothed it back down in an attempt to forget the sudden flash of Mother's face in my mind, her smile when she'd seen me in Bess's dress. I'd been so occupied with wondering about Charlie's absence and how my writing would be received at the Society that I hadn't given her satisfaction much thought. But now, standing outside of the Hopper mansion, the realization dawned on me: Frank's friends, other men, wouldn't only be appraising my writing. They'd be considering my appearance, my wit, my suitability as well.

“I'm nervous,” I said. He threw his arm across my shoulders.

“For god's sake, why?”

“I've had plenty of things published for the
Review
, but I've never read anything meaningful out loud . . . especially to strangers or to men . . . well, other than to you or Charlie,” I lied. I'd never considered how other men perceived me, if they found me attractive or interesting. I'd never had to; Charlie's friendship, his love, had always convinced me that I was both of those things. But now, suddenly without him, I was unsure. I held on to the freezing metal railing and started up the scrolled concrete steps, hearing the muted sounds of laughter and voices behind the glass doors set in gilded wrought-iron frames.

“You'll never be forced to read anything aloud, though I've heard it can prove to be helpful,” Franklin said, opening the door and pulling me inside before I could reply.

We started down a dark hallway and then turned into a drawing room. At first glance, it looked just like Charlie's friend Wayland's gathering—smoke so thick we could have been floating down a southern river with Mark Twain's Huck and Jim, everyone clutching a pencil or paintbrush—but the setting was different. The sweeping gold curtains, the fresco of flying cherubim along
the ceiling, and the shiny Weber grand piano in the front corner of the room all pointed to the splendor reserved for the mansions industrialists built—a stark contrast to Wayland's plain home.

“Come on. Let's find Lydia,” Franklin said beside me. Having no idea who he was talking about, I squinted into the smoke and dim, and his cold hand found mine. The room was packed. We passed by a few painters working on projects next to easels displaying finished pieces. I watched as groups of people shifted from one painting to the next, gesturing to their peers beside them, leaning into each work as if they were scrutinizing it. We skirted around the fireplace and nearly ran into an assembly of men and women laughing and talking in the middle of the room, as if this sort of intellectual mingling between sexes were common.

“That line about love was magnificent,” I heard one of the women say to a bulky man sitting on a stool, “but the ending could've been written by a child.” I waited for the man to respond with a retort about her juvenile scrawling, but only heard a deep chuckle. I dug my fingers into the swathe of black taffeta along my arm and pinched, stunned to find I wasn't dreaming. Somehow, it seemed John Hopper had located dozens of men who considered women's artistic endeavors profound. As if my thought conjured him, there he was, reclining in a corner a few feet from the fire in a yellow upholstered armchair, surrounded by a group of at least ten women. Mr. Hopper's notebook was open on his lap, and as he dipped his head to continue reading, a lady standing beside his chair casually brushed her hand across his shoulder. The gesture was innocent enough, but at once, I recalled Charlie's comment about Mr. Hopper's reputation. I recalled the ease of our conversation at the Symphony, the way his focus had given me the impression that he was fully interested in every word I said. Was that how he drew women in?

Frank's hand jerked me forward, away from Mr. Hopper and his admirers. I inhaled, choking on a particularly pungent cloud of burning tobacco. I heard the hollow wail of a cello beneath the noise and the higher trill of a violin suddenly stop mid-note.

“Frank! You're here.” The smoke seemed to subside around us and I blinked to clear it from my eyes as a petite blonde shoved her violin into the cellists' occupied hands and lunged for my brother. Her arms circled his neck and he pulled her close, hands resting on the gray satin wrapping her tiny waist. The embrace was so intimate, so familiar. I stared at him, shocked that he'd clearly fallen in love without mentioning it—just like he'd failed to mention the Society. It was unlike him to withhold things from me.

“Miss Lydia Blaine, this is my dear sister, Miss Virginia Loftin,” Frank said. I tipped my head to Miss Blaine who leaned in and hugged me.

“Oh, it's so wonderful to finally meet you,” she said. “Franklin has been telling me all about your marvelous family and your incredible writing. Where are your other sisters this evening? I've been keen to meet the pianist.” She smiled. Her blue eyes were kind and I forced a grin back despite my irritation at Frank, wondering how long they'd known each other.

“Well, actually, Virginia was the only one officially invited,” Franklin said. Miss Blaine leaned over to pull him close. “We went to the Symphony with John last week and they got to talking, so he asked her to come.”

“Frank tried to invite the others. We were hoping to convince Alevia, the pianist, to attend, but she's quite shy and doesn't like to waste her time socializing when she could be practicing,” I said, rolling my eyes at the dedication I wished I had. “And Bessie wasn't home when we were getting ready to leave so we didn't ask her.”

“Actually, I chose to leave her out,” Franklin said bluntly. “I didn't want to coddle her all night. And Mae isn't artistic, though she was otherwise occupied in any case. She gives English lessons to the orphans at Saint Joseph's each Friday, and after she's finished tonight, she has plans to see
Mrs. Jarley's Wax Works
with Henry Trent.”

“What?” The word came out of my mouth so quickly, Miss Blaine laughed. Mae hadn't told me anything. Franklin grinned, fingers drifting over Miss Blaine's hand, and I looked away, eyes locking on his face. “Why would she keep it from me?” Mae had always been private, but she usually confided in me. I held back my questions, though I kept my eyes fixed on Franklin's and then cast them toward Miss Blaine, hoping he'd catch my meaning. Why would
you
conceal so much from me? I thought. His lids widened, suggesting he understood and would tell me later, but then he shrugged.

“She didn't mention it to me either. I couldn't find her so I asked Mother if she knew where she was and she told me that Mae was at the orphanage, but had arranged to accompany Henry to the play afterward.” Remembering how taken they'd been with each other at the Symphony, I hoped the affection would remain. Mae had always dreamed of a husband and children, and Mr. Trent shared her same passion for education. The thought struck me. Charlie and I had been well matched, too. Everyone thought so.

“I'm so glad you came,” Miss Blaine said, interrupting. “In the three years we've been holding these meetings, I've met tons of people, of course—John tends to invite anyone with an affinity for art—but it's so rare and nice to meet a new friend.” She reached to squeeze my hand. She was lovely and warm; I couldn't understand why Franklin hadn't spoken of her.

“I'm thrilled to be here,” I said. “And so glad to have met you, too. Franklin has sung your praises.” I shot a tight-lipped grin at Frank. He cleared his throat.

“Lydia is a remarkable violinist,” Franklin said. On cue, she plucked the violin from the cellist, lifted the instrument to her chin, played an arpeggio, and curtsied.

“I can't give myself all of the credit. I'm mostly remarkable by force. My cousin is married to Walter Damrosch and my father has a great appreciation for the arts, so since I was a child, I've been encouraged to play and play well. I'm not sure why, considering all of this training will likely go by the wayside once I'm married. I don't really have much interest in it, anyway.” Lydia's lips dropped into a scowl for a moment, then lifted back as she smiled.

“But what about all of the work you've put in? You must love it a little,” I probed.

“I'd stop playing this instant if Frank asked me to, but you wouldn't, would you?” Inches from Franklin's face, he shook his head and lifted her hand to his lips. “Oh, I'm sure you'd like to say hello to John, wouldn't you?” Before I had a chance to reply that I didn't care, she had me by the wrist and was dragging me back through the smoky room, away from my brother who simply waved at me.

Insisting that I meet everyone, Miss Blaine had introduced me to at least fifty people by the time we made it all the way around the room. We listened to romantic poetry, paused to appreciate the matchless styles of several artists who'd drawn or painted everything from hay fields to street dwellers, and finally stopped in front of a cellist playing a piece that wailed with such heartache it brought tears to my eyes.