The Ten Thousand Doors of January(24)

And then there were Mr. Locke’s gifts now on display: long silk gloves, several loops of pinkish pearls, and a drapey chiffon gown in ivory and rose that was so obviously expensive I saw women staring in disbelieving calculation. I’d even waged dutiful war with my hair, which could be defeated only by the application of a hot comb and Madame Walker’s Wonderful Conditioning Treatment. My scalp still sizzled faintly.

The conversation lurched clumsily back to life. Shoulders and backs turned decisively away, and lacy fans snapped out like shields against some intruder. Bad and I slid around them and posted ourselves like mismatched mannequins in our usual corner. The guests obligingly ignored us, and I was free to slump and tug at the too-tight buttons of my dress and watch the shimmering crowd.

It was, as always, an impressive display. The household staff had polished every lamp and candlestick until the room radiated sourceless golden light, and the parquet floor was waxed to life-threatening slickness. Enormous enameled vases oozed peonies, and a smallish orchestra had been crammed between a pair of Assyrian statues. All of New England’s faux-royalty preened and glittered for one another, reflected back on themselves a hundred times by the gleaming mirrors.

I noticed girls my own age scattered through the crowd, their cheeks flushed and their hair hanging in perfect silky curls, their eyes darting hopefully around the room (the gossip pages of the local paper always ran a column listing the most eligible bachelors and their rumored worth before the party). I pictured them all planning and scheming for weeks, shopping for just the right dress with their mothers, doing and redoing their hair in the mirror. And now here they were, glowing with promise and privilege, their futures laid out before them in an orderly gilt procession.

I hated them. Or I would have hated them, except that dark, formless thing was still wrapped tightly around me, and it was hard to feel anything but dull distaste.

A ringing clink-clink-clink sounded over the crowd and heads turned like well-coiffed marionettes. Mr. Locke was standing beneath the grandest chandelier, tapping his tumbler with a dessert spoon for attention. It was hardly necessary: Mr. Locke was always looked at and listened to, as if he generated his own magnetic field.

The orchestra stopped mid minuet. Locke raised his arms in benevolent greeting. “Ladies, gentlemen, honored Society members, let me first thank you all for coming and drinking all my best champagne.” Laughter, buoyed on golden bubbles. “We are here, of course, to celebrate the forty-eighth anniversary of the New England Archaeological Society, a little group of amateur scholars who, if you’ll forgive me my hubris, do their very best to contribute to the noble progression of human knowledge.” A smattering of dutiful applause. “But we are also here to celebrate something rather grander: the progression of humanity itself. For it seems clear to me that the people gathered here tonight are both the witnesses and stewards of a new era of peace and prosperity from pole to pole. Every year we see the reduction of war and conflict, an increase in business and good faith, the spread of civilized government over the less fortunate.”

I’d heard it all so many times I could probably deliver the rest of the speech myself: how the hard work and dedication of persons like themselves—wealthy, powerful, white—had improved the condition of the human race; how the nineteenth century was nothing but chaos and confusion, and how the twentieth promised to be order and stability; how the discontent elements were being rooted out, at home and abroad; how the savage was being civilized.

Once as a girl I’d told my father: Don’t let the savages get you. He’d been about to leave, his shabby luggage in hand, his shapeless brown coat hanging from bent shoulders. He’d given me a half smile. I will be quite safe, he’d said, as there are no such things as savages. I could’ve told him that Mr. Locke and several metric tons of adventure novels disagreed with him, but I didn’t say anything. He’d touched his knuckle to my cheek and disappeared. Again.

And now he’s disappeared for the last time. I closed my eyes, felt the cold, dark thing wind itself more tightly around me—

The sound of my own name jarred me. “—consider my own Miss January, if you want proof!” It was Mr. Locke, jovial and booming.

My eyes flew open.

“She came to this household nothing but a motherless bundle. An orphan of mysterious origin, without so much as a penny to her name. And now look at her!”

They were already looking. An ivory ripple of faces had turned toward me, their eyes like fingers plucking at every seam and pearl. What exactly were they supposed to be looking at? I was still motherless, still penniless—except now I was fatherless, too.

I pressed my back to the wood paneling, willing it to be over, willing Mr. Locke’s speech to end and the orchestra to start up and everyone to forget about me again.

Locke made an imperious come-here gesture. “Don’t be shy, my girl.” I didn’t move, my eyes terror-wide, my heart stammering oh no oh no oh no. I imagined myself running away, shoving past guests and out onto the lawn.

But then I looked at Mr. Locke’s proud, shining face. I remembered the solid warmth of his arms as he’d held me, the kind rumble of his voice, the silent gifts left in the Pharaoh Room all these years.

I swallowed and pushed away from the wall, stumbling through the crowd on legs gone stiff and heavy as carved wood. Whispers followed me. Bad’s claws clicked too loudly on the polished floor.