The Ripper's Wife(39)
I needed a quiet moment alone to collect myself; my head was throbbing and the tears I was trying so hard to hold back were fighting for their right to flow. I made my way to the second parlor, thinking I would just sit down there and rest for a while. When my hand was on the knob and the door open no wider than an inch, I heard murmured voices, a man and a woman, and the rustle of skirts. A pair of lovers? I should have shut the door and disappeared, but I couldn’t resist peeking, to see who it was.
Leaning in the window embrasure, framed by sunlight and roses, a couple stood embracing, a redheaded woman in peach satin trimmed with gold and white point lace, Christina Samuelson, and a dark-haired man in a dark suit, ardently smothering her mouth with his own, his hand greedily grasping her breast, which had sprung free from her tightly laced bodice. A smile danced across my lips. The Samuelsons were a young married couple and their union was said to be quite passionate; they had a habit of sneaking away together when evenings out grew too long and tedious, and also of leaving early to hurry home to their happy bed.
I started to back away from the door, praying it wouldn’t squeak and my skirts wouldn’t rustle. The kiss ended and the smile fell from my lips as the man lifted his head and the sun fully illuminated his face. That wasn’t Charles Samuelson kissing Christina; it was my husband! I shut the door as quietly as I could, feeling like I was slamming it on my own heart. So much for new beginnings....
This is the last time; you are not going to break my heart anymore! I silently raged at Jim as I slapped on a smile as false as the ones most of our guests were wearing. I returned to the party, smiling and graciously nodding as though nothing were wrong. As I walked by Alfred Brierley I discreetly put out my fingers to brush his in passing. I met his eyes, just for an instant, with an invitation in my own.
“Mr. Brierley.” I nodded politely.
“Mrs. Maybrick.” He smiled and nodded back.
When Jim came to my bed that night the back I turned on him was as chilly as ice. I didn’t deign to explain. Let him figure it out or let the mystery linger, I didn’t care. I had my pride. I never said a word about Christina Samuelson. What good would it have done? He would have only told me more lies, like all that rot about Mad Sarah, probably that Christina had thrown herself at him, and I would have grasped at them, like a drowning woman, so desperate to believe and keep hope and happiness alive and afloat.
The next morning when a messenger boy from the photographer’s studio delivered the beautifully hand-tinted family portrait we’d posed for prior to Gladys’s party I sat staring at it for a long time until tears blurred my eyes and I could no longer see it.
There we were, Gladys and me in lacy white dresses with sashes of violet-blue satin, an enormous satin hair bow for her and a fine feathered hat for me. We were sitting on a bench with Jim standing behind us smiling broadly with his hands on our shoulders, the very picture of a proud and happy husband and father. Bobo was leaning against my knee in a blue velvet Little Lord Fauntleroy suit and Alen?on lace collar, captured by the camera, for the very last time, with curls flowing past his shoulders. How the camera loved him, his perfect angel face and long lashes. His face should be gracing calendars and candy boxes; he was just so beautiful it seemed a crime to deprive the world of the chance to adore him.
We looked every inch the happy family. It’s all an illusion, I said to myself, a lovely illusion. Then I cast the picture aside, flung myself facedown on the sofa, and cried and cried as though my heart were breaking for the very first time.
10
Trying desperately “to melt this puzzling wall of ice” that had sprung up between us since our daughter’s birthday party, Jim decided to treat me to a trip up to London for some shopping and to see that play everyone was raving about, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, marveling about how the star, Richard Mansfield, effected the ghastly transformation from gentleman to madman right there on the stage in full view of the audience. It was the sensation of London, playing every night to sold-out houses. It had women screaming and fainting in the aisles. Pregnant women were afraid to go see it lest it leave so great and evil an impression upon their womb that they gave birth to a monster. Edwin had already seen it six times and could talk of nothing else. Every time someone mentioned it he went into rhapsodies. Regardless of where he was, he would leap up and act out scenes; a passing doctor once stopped on a street corner to make sure Edwin was all right and not in need of an immediate escort to the nearest insane asylum.
Still trying to entice me, Jim said we could stay at Flatman’s Hotel, right in the elegant heart of Covent Garden, where all the cotton brokers stopped when they were in London, and I could go shopping and buy whatever I pleased while he attended to “some necessary business.”
This “business” I knew, though her name never crossed either of our lips anymore, involved a visit to Sarah—Mad Sarah or the real Mrs. Maybrick, call her what you will; I was tired of the whole maddening muddle. Sometimes it didn’t seem to even matter anymore; I already knew our marriage was a sham. I couldn’t trust Jim anymore. I had tried, with the best intentions, to start anew, and I thought Jim had wanted that too . . . until I saw him with Christina Samuelson.
Jim also wanted to consult a new doctor, a specialist recommended by Michael, about his hands. I should have known it. This wasn’t just a treat for me. Jim shopped for doctors like I did for dresses.