The Gilded Hour
Page 104
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“What a remarkably opinionated young woman you are,” said Stanton. “Truly remarkable, for someone of your sex and station and—origins.”
“I concur,” said Comstock. “You should be glad that this jury does not sit in judgment of you, Mrs. Verhoeven. All right, all right, Hawthorn. Dr. Verhoeven. Now I’ve got one last question.”
• • •
OSCAR WAS MUTTERING under his breath. “I’ll knock his little rat teeth down his throat if he insults her again.”
“You’d have to beat me to it,” Jack said. “Look, he’s got that damn pamphlet out. He’s like a dog with a bone.”
Sophie looked up from the pamphlet the clerk had handed to her. She said, “No, I am not familiar with this pamphlet.”
“But you are familiar with other pamphlets of this kind?”
Sophie looked at Comstock for a long moment, her expression thoughtful. “Certainly,” she said finally. “I can show you an example, if you like. This pamphlet—” She drew some folded pages out of her reticule. “This pamphlet was written specifically about methods to inhibit conception.”
Comstock’s mouth fell open in surprise, and so Sophie turned to Hawthorn. “Shall I go on?”
“Um,” said Hawthorn. “Well.”
“Please do,” said Jacobi. “I’d like to hear.”
Sophie smiled broadly, and while Jack could not see Anna’s face, the way she held her head made him think she must be smiling too. As a number of the women in the gallery were smiling.
“It’s a very professionally produced piece, as you can see. Twelve pages, with illustrations. The very kind of pamphlet that Mr. Comstock works so hard to keep out of the hands of the innocent. Right here it opens with the proclamation that ‘prevention is better than cure,’ and it goes on: ‘Vaseline charged with four to five grains of salicylic acid will destroy spermatozoa, without injury to the uterus or vagina.’”
She looked at Comstock, her expression utterly grim. “This pamphlet has been in circulation for a few years, I believe. Has your office been successful in bringing the company—” She looked at the cover of the pamphlet, as if she were searching for something elusive. “Yes, here. Colgate is the company that makes Vaseline and printed this pamphlet on contraception. Have you brought Samuel Colgate to court and charged him with violation of your Comstock laws? But wait, isn’t Samuel Colgate the president of your New York Society for the Suppression of Vice? That must put you in a difficult position, Mr. Comstock.”
The reporters were scribbling as fast as they could while the murmur of voices in the gallery grew louder. In the jury box the physicians were waiting, brows raised, for Comstock’s reply. But there was none forthcoming; for once Anthony Comstock had been struck dumb. He sat utterly still except for the tic that appeared at the corner of his mouth, fluttering and jerking.
“Mr. Comstock?” Hawthorn asked. And then, after a long moment. “If this line of questioning is finished, I have an announcement. The officer of the court has brought a note that says Mr. Campbell is returned to the city and will be available to testify here tomorrow afternoon. I hope that his testimony will be enough to allow the jury to reach a conclusion in this matter. And now we will adjourn. It’s already six.”
Jack lost sight of Comstock as people began to leave the courtroom.
Oscar said, “I can’t believe she had the courage to ask him that question. I’d like to buy her a drink. She sat up there with a straight face and asked Comstock whether he had arrested one of the richest men in the city. Samuel Colgate marched into court by Comstock, can you see it? She’s got guts,” he said again, and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe his eyes.
“She has guts,” Jack agreed. “But at this point she also has nothing to lose.”
• • •
ANNA TOOK SOPHIE by the elbow and pulled her in for a hug. It was very unlike Anna, and Sophie was both surprised and pleased.
“I thought you’d decided not to do it,” she said. “But you timed it perfectly.”
“It was harder than I imagined it would be,” Sophie said. “Once he was looking at me. But it needed to be done. Maybe it will have some positive effects, if the newspapers dare print it.” She looked up to see Oscar Maroney beaming at her, with Jack just behind.
“Well done,” said Detective Sergeant Maroney. “I thought Comstock would have a stroke right there in front of God and man. Well done.”
Jack was smiling too, but with less obvious enthusiasm. Anna poked him.
“You don’t approve?”
“Oh, I approve,” he said, catching her poking finger and folding his hand around hers. “I just hope he lets it go and doesn’t cook up some scheme to pay you back.”
“That’s why I wouldn’t let Anna do it,” Sophie said. “There’s not much he can do to me now, is there?”
Anna was looking around herself. “For once I would happily talk to a reporter, and they are all gone.”
“Off to file a story about Samuel Colgate, the contraceptives peddler,” said Oscar. “By God, I can’t wait to see that.”
• • •
SOPHIE HAD THE Verhoeven carriage waiting; Jack wanted to hail a cab, but Anna wanted to walk. She sent Sophie home and considered Jack’s unhappy expression.
“Are you so tired?” she teased him. “That you can’t manage a half hour’s walk?”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “And if I weren’t here? You’d walk home on your own?”
Anna studied the street for a moment. There was a dead horse in the gutter at the corner of Franklin, the carcass at least a week old. A crowd of boys were busy wrenching out ribs to be used as swords. One of them already had his and used this advantage to poke a playmate in the belly. They fell into the gutter beside the horse, fists flying. Anna would guess them no more than eight.
She said, “I could lie to you.”
One brow went up, which was disagreement enough.
“In the early evening when it’s still light, Broadway is safe enough. I might have walked home alone.”
He took her bag from her and offered his free arm. “You’re lucky you still have your skin,” Jack said.
They walked along quietly for a moment. Anna kept one eye on the brawl, which was attracting little boys from every hidey-hole, all of them battering wildly at one another, crashing into the carcass of the horse and climbing out again.
“Do you want to volunteer to clean up their battle wounds?”
“No,” Anna said. “That would be a mistake. I learned that lesson soon after I qualified. Stay out of arguments.”
He wanted to know more, and Anna didn’t mind telling stories that showed her to disadvantage. At least, not with family and friends. And Jack, she reminded herself, was both.
“A girl of about seventeen, I think. She came into the New Amsterdam with some cracked ribs and a broken nose and two black eyes. I guessed it might have been her father or husband, and I was trying to think how to ask—”
Jack hummed under his breath.
“When her sister came rushing in, looking almost as bad. She had stripes on both cheeks.” Anna held up one hand, the fingers bent into a claw shape. “There was a clump of hair missing from her head above her left ear, too. Do you know the strength it takes to rip out hair like that?”
“I’ve never tried it,” Jack said dryly. “But I’ve seen it done.”
“She was screaming, and spraying blood from a split lip with every movement of her head. The sister on the examination table almost levitated. She just launched herself, or she tried to, but I put my hands on her shoulders to hold her down.”
Jack was listening, but she couldn’t read his expression.
“She might have put a rib through a lung, that’s what was going through my head,” she went on. “And I just acted on that basis. And I said to the sister who had come in, ‘Stop this nonsense, immediately.’ It didn’t have quite the impact I thought it would.”
“Yes?”
Anna shrugged. “They both started screaming at me. The one on the table for speaking to her sister rudely, and the other one for treating her sister roughly. If an orderly hadn’t come in I think they might have joined forces to teach me a lesson.”
She let out a small laugh. “And from that I learned not to put myself in the middle of a fight. I call for the orderlies instead.”
“Sensible,” Jack said. “Do you know what they were fighting about?”
“Money,” said Anna. “It’s almost always money, unless the patient comes in drunk. Then it can be about anything. The color of the sky, the name of the president, the month of the year.”
Broadway was crowded with street vendors and delivery wagons, newsboys and clerks on their way home for the day. An elderly woman with a back so crooked that it forced her to stare at the ground had turned her head sideways to barter for a measure of dried beans. Her voice was cheerful and she was grinning at the man who scowled down at her, because, Anna could see, she was about to get the best of him. It was the end of the day and he wouldn’t want to drag unsold wares home.
“I concur,” said Comstock. “You should be glad that this jury does not sit in judgment of you, Mrs. Verhoeven. All right, all right, Hawthorn. Dr. Verhoeven. Now I’ve got one last question.”
• • •
OSCAR WAS MUTTERING under his breath. “I’ll knock his little rat teeth down his throat if he insults her again.”
“You’d have to beat me to it,” Jack said. “Look, he’s got that damn pamphlet out. He’s like a dog with a bone.”
Sophie looked up from the pamphlet the clerk had handed to her. She said, “No, I am not familiar with this pamphlet.”
“But you are familiar with other pamphlets of this kind?”
Sophie looked at Comstock for a long moment, her expression thoughtful. “Certainly,” she said finally. “I can show you an example, if you like. This pamphlet—” She drew some folded pages out of her reticule. “This pamphlet was written specifically about methods to inhibit conception.”
Comstock’s mouth fell open in surprise, and so Sophie turned to Hawthorn. “Shall I go on?”
“Um,” said Hawthorn. “Well.”
“Please do,” said Jacobi. “I’d like to hear.”
Sophie smiled broadly, and while Jack could not see Anna’s face, the way she held her head made him think she must be smiling too. As a number of the women in the gallery were smiling.
“It’s a very professionally produced piece, as you can see. Twelve pages, with illustrations. The very kind of pamphlet that Mr. Comstock works so hard to keep out of the hands of the innocent. Right here it opens with the proclamation that ‘prevention is better than cure,’ and it goes on: ‘Vaseline charged with four to five grains of salicylic acid will destroy spermatozoa, without injury to the uterus or vagina.’”
She looked at Comstock, her expression utterly grim. “This pamphlet has been in circulation for a few years, I believe. Has your office been successful in bringing the company—” She looked at the cover of the pamphlet, as if she were searching for something elusive. “Yes, here. Colgate is the company that makes Vaseline and printed this pamphlet on contraception. Have you brought Samuel Colgate to court and charged him with violation of your Comstock laws? But wait, isn’t Samuel Colgate the president of your New York Society for the Suppression of Vice? That must put you in a difficult position, Mr. Comstock.”
The reporters were scribbling as fast as they could while the murmur of voices in the gallery grew louder. In the jury box the physicians were waiting, brows raised, for Comstock’s reply. But there was none forthcoming; for once Anthony Comstock had been struck dumb. He sat utterly still except for the tic that appeared at the corner of his mouth, fluttering and jerking.
“Mr. Comstock?” Hawthorn asked. And then, after a long moment. “If this line of questioning is finished, I have an announcement. The officer of the court has brought a note that says Mr. Campbell is returned to the city and will be available to testify here tomorrow afternoon. I hope that his testimony will be enough to allow the jury to reach a conclusion in this matter. And now we will adjourn. It’s already six.”
Jack lost sight of Comstock as people began to leave the courtroom.
Oscar said, “I can’t believe she had the courage to ask him that question. I’d like to buy her a drink. She sat up there with a straight face and asked Comstock whether he had arrested one of the richest men in the city. Samuel Colgate marched into court by Comstock, can you see it? She’s got guts,” he said again, and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe his eyes.
“She has guts,” Jack agreed. “But at this point she also has nothing to lose.”
• • •
ANNA TOOK SOPHIE by the elbow and pulled her in for a hug. It was very unlike Anna, and Sophie was both surprised and pleased.
“I thought you’d decided not to do it,” she said. “But you timed it perfectly.”
“It was harder than I imagined it would be,” Sophie said. “Once he was looking at me. But it needed to be done. Maybe it will have some positive effects, if the newspapers dare print it.” She looked up to see Oscar Maroney beaming at her, with Jack just behind.
“Well done,” said Detective Sergeant Maroney. “I thought Comstock would have a stroke right there in front of God and man. Well done.”
Jack was smiling too, but with less obvious enthusiasm. Anna poked him.
“You don’t approve?”
“Oh, I approve,” he said, catching her poking finger and folding his hand around hers. “I just hope he lets it go and doesn’t cook up some scheme to pay you back.”
“That’s why I wouldn’t let Anna do it,” Sophie said. “There’s not much he can do to me now, is there?”
Anna was looking around herself. “For once I would happily talk to a reporter, and they are all gone.”
“Off to file a story about Samuel Colgate, the contraceptives peddler,” said Oscar. “By God, I can’t wait to see that.”
• • •
SOPHIE HAD THE Verhoeven carriage waiting; Jack wanted to hail a cab, but Anna wanted to walk. She sent Sophie home and considered Jack’s unhappy expression.
“Are you so tired?” she teased him. “That you can’t manage a half hour’s walk?”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “And if I weren’t here? You’d walk home on your own?”
Anna studied the street for a moment. There was a dead horse in the gutter at the corner of Franklin, the carcass at least a week old. A crowd of boys were busy wrenching out ribs to be used as swords. One of them already had his and used this advantage to poke a playmate in the belly. They fell into the gutter beside the horse, fists flying. Anna would guess them no more than eight.
She said, “I could lie to you.”
One brow went up, which was disagreement enough.
“In the early evening when it’s still light, Broadway is safe enough. I might have walked home alone.”
He took her bag from her and offered his free arm. “You’re lucky you still have your skin,” Jack said.
They walked along quietly for a moment. Anna kept one eye on the brawl, which was attracting little boys from every hidey-hole, all of them battering wildly at one another, crashing into the carcass of the horse and climbing out again.
“Do you want to volunteer to clean up their battle wounds?”
“No,” Anna said. “That would be a mistake. I learned that lesson soon after I qualified. Stay out of arguments.”
He wanted to know more, and Anna didn’t mind telling stories that showed her to disadvantage. At least, not with family and friends. And Jack, she reminded herself, was both.
“A girl of about seventeen, I think. She came into the New Amsterdam with some cracked ribs and a broken nose and two black eyes. I guessed it might have been her father or husband, and I was trying to think how to ask—”
Jack hummed under his breath.
“When her sister came rushing in, looking almost as bad. She had stripes on both cheeks.” Anna held up one hand, the fingers bent into a claw shape. “There was a clump of hair missing from her head above her left ear, too. Do you know the strength it takes to rip out hair like that?”
“I’ve never tried it,” Jack said dryly. “But I’ve seen it done.”
“She was screaming, and spraying blood from a split lip with every movement of her head. The sister on the examination table almost levitated. She just launched herself, or she tried to, but I put my hands on her shoulders to hold her down.”
Jack was listening, but she couldn’t read his expression.
“She might have put a rib through a lung, that’s what was going through my head,” she went on. “And I just acted on that basis. And I said to the sister who had come in, ‘Stop this nonsense, immediately.’ It didn’t have quite the impact I thought it would.”
“Yes?”
Anna shrugged. “They both started screaming at me. The one on the table for speaking to her sister rudely, and the other one for treating her sister roughly. If an orderly hadn’t come in I think they might have joined forces to teach me a lesson.”
She let out a small laugh. “And from that I learned not to put myself in the middle of a fight. I call for the orderlies instead.”
“Sensible,” Jack said. “Do you know what they were fighting about?”
“Money,” said Anna. “It’s almost always money, unless the patient comes in drunk. Then it can be about anything. The color of the sky, the name of the president, the month of the year.”
Broadway was crowded with street vendors and delivery wagons, newsboys and clerks on their way home for the day. An elderly woman with a back so crooked that it forced her to stare at the ground had turned her head sideways to barter for a measure of dried beans. Her voice was cheerful and she was grinning at the man who scowled down at her, because, Anna could see, she was about to get the best of him. It was the end of the day and he wouldn’t want to drag unsold wares home.
