The Ripper's Wife(104)

“Florie, you get back here!” Mama shouted after me. “We have an appointment; you can’t just walk out! I didn’t raise you to be so rude, inconsiderate, an’ ill-bred! Remember who you are! One o’ your ancestors acted as ring-bearer when Marie Antoinette married Napoleon! An’ I assure you, he didn’t attain to that high honor by actin’ the way you are now! Get back here!”

“I’m sorry, Mama.” I turned briefly on the threshold, just in time to see Mama, struggling with Napoleon, who had entangled himself in her feather boa and caught his claws in the lace yoke of her bodice, exasperatedly fling him aside, actually throwing the poor animal through the air, shouting, “Here, boy—hold Napoleon!” so that the poor lad had no choice but to drop the tea tray or have his head slammed into the wall by a fat, flying Pekingese.

I had said all that I had to say; I didn’t want to talk about it. I was afraid I was too much of a coward to stand my ground if I actually had to stay and stand there. I hitched up my skirts and ran out into the street, with Mama hot on my heels. She turned back only long enough to tell the boy, who had managed to catch Napoleon and was holding him against his chest, stroking him soothingly, while standing with the ruins of our tea on his shoes and spattering his skinny legs, that the diamonds on Napoleon’s collar were real and they’d best still be there when she got back if he knew what was good for him and she meant to count them—all 117 of them.

Poor thing! I almost went back to comfort him. The very idea that that darling boy would ever pry diamonds out of a dog collar was too absurd for words! For God’s sake, there was a rosary dangling out of his pants pocket! I had been tempted to tuck it back in so he didn’t lose it, but I knew boys that age could be a trifle skittish about being touched so familiarly by strangers and I didn’t want to scare him. But if I went back . . . that would mean facing Mama and having to go through with the appointment, with both her and Mr. Wagner, when he arrived, and maybe even the motion picture man, if he liked the idea, all against me, all talking and shouting at once, badgering me until I gave up and gave in and turned my poor brain back around to their way of thinking, and, as much as I wanted to see that child again, I just couldn’t do it. I had to keep moving, running as fast as I could, away from there, turning my back on yet another chance.

Without even looking, ignoring the blaring horns, screeching tires, and shouts of angry drivers, I darted out into the street and dived into the first cab I saw. “Drive; just drive! Get me away from here!” I shouted at the driver.

I flung myself back against the seat and wept; I never thought a day would come when I would run away from Mama. She was the only one who had never abandoned me, and this was how I repaid her, by leaving her standing on the sidewalk stamping her feet, snorting like a mad bull, and shouting at the top of her lungs outside a movie studio. I’d made her so mad she’d actually thrown her precious Pekingese into the air! As ornery as Napoleon was, I was glad the boy had caught him. I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I kept sobbing hysterically, beating my fists against the leather seat, but in my heart I knew I really wasn’t, I had done the right thing, and that, peculiar as it sounds, only made me feel worse.





Of course Mama was heartily disappointed in me. First I had forsaken the cattle baron and then the chance to have a movie made of my life.

“Heaven helps those who help themselves! Maybe someday you’ll learn that, Florie, my girl!” she said, her voice tart and scalding as she flung her furs around her shoulders, picked up her first-class ticket and her Pekingese, and flounced aboard the luxurious White Star liner that would carry her back to Paris, leaving me alone, to fend for myself, in New York.

The lectures gradually dried up and the book went out of print and people just weren’t that interested in me anymore. Invitations and marriage proposals stopped coming. Everything Mama predicted came true. But in my heart I was glad. That was not the life I wanted. I was tired of being a curiosity, a novelty, invited just so people could stare at me and pose impertinent questions or experience the thrill of being in the same room as a condemned murderess. All I wanted was my children and to live long enough to live my notoriety down, to just be me—whoever that was—again.

I could not stop thinking about them, even though they had never answered my letter. I knew where the Fullers lived, and several times I set out to knock upon their door again, the way I had in London. I’d done it once, I could do it again, I kept telling myself. But every time, I’d walk past posters with my picture, posed in profile, wearing a Paris gown and a big, fancy feathered hat, advertising my lectures, or I’d pass a bookstore window displaying my book, or someone on the street would rush up to me, to shake my hand or launch into a lengthy speech about how grievously I had been wronged, and every time my courage would falter and ultimately fail me.

I would think about Bobo and Gladys walking past those same posters, maybe even stopping to look, appalled, disgusted, hanging their heads, feeling sick to their stomachs at the sight of me and the vulgar way I was profiting from their father’s death. They might even be moved by curiosity to read my book, but what if they did and felt only shame, not sympathy? Every time I stood on the stage I’d find myself scanning the audience, squinting at every dark-haired young man and woman and wondering if my children had come to see me. After every show I’d wait and hope they would approach, but if these young people I’d spied ever did, nearness always revealed they were not the dear ones I was longing for.