Maplecroft (The Borden Dispatches #1)(21)

I know you said I’d find no respite from exhaustion with you, and I’m not sure if you’re making a joke or being morbid. Sometimes in your letters, I simply can’t tell.

This is why we must speak face-to-face, quietly, over drinks in that wonderful parlor. We can sip scotch or whichever wine you have on hand (you still haven’t shown me that cellar, and I’m beginning to take offense). We’ll turn the lights low, let the fire burn down—for I doubt it will be so cold, by the time I arrive. And I can tell you everything about these last two plays. And you can tell me everything that’s bothering you. All the things that make you want to push me away. I demand to hear them, no matter how dark they might drive the conversation. I’ll listen. I’ll do nothing but listen. I feel like I always talk—for the benefit of others, as often as not. I don’t even use my own words.

It’s tiresome. I’d rather listen to yours.

I doubt your sister would care to join us, but you must invite her. I wish she liked me better. You love her and I love you, but therein lies the problem, doesn’t it? At any rate, I’m sorry. I’ll leave it alone. This is meant to be a happy letter, not a reproachful one.

I am looking forward—not backward!

Backward is a grim, unpleasant place. If there are worse gossips or backbiters than actresses, anywhere on the face of the earth . . . I’m not sure I’d believe it. Wicked fiends, the lot of them—surpassed only by directors, whose evil nature is exceeded only by the pen-fiddlers who write for the papers, and tell the world of our triumphs but describe them as the most dismal of failures.

I’ve just now reread what I’ve composed so far. If I had more paper at my immediate disposal, I’d throw these sheets away and begin again. I’m rambling, and doing so with embarrassing inconsistency.

I’m tired, Lizbeth. That’s the root of it all.

The days are so long in the theater company. Twenty-four hours, and they want them all. Half the week I sleep atop a pile of costumes backstage, with a bottle in my hand (if I’m lucky) or your letters (if I’m luckier still). Then I awaken when the first hands arrive, or Mary and I often do—and sometimes Anne stays, too. They expect the most from us, more even than they want from their leading men.

And look, now I’m sulking.

Forgive me. I’ll stop wasting ink, and wasting paper.

This is a happy letter, because it announces that soon, you and I will be together. And we will drink and sleep and make whatever sort of merry we please. It will be lovely, and it will last as long as we like.

Don’t bother to write and tell me to stay. It won’t work. I’m well past taking “no” for an answer. If you turn me away, it will kill me. Maybe that would please your sister, but I don’t think it’s what you want.

I wouldn’t ask you to choose between us. There’s no reason you ought to, and no reason you have to. We’re grown women, she and I, and we will behave accordingly.

I will see you shortly! So shortly . . . another two weeks, and then however long it takes to pack and book the train tickets. I’ll send a telegram in advance of my arrival, so you’ll know when to pick me up.

All my love, of course. Always.

GL (though don’t you dare address me so.)





THIS KNOT I KNIT, THIS KNOT I TIE



Emma L. Borden


APRIL 11, 1894

Here comes Gertrude.

Oh, she hates to be called that, I know—she’s a proper actress now, with a proper actress name. Why Lizzie indulges her, I have no idea. Or I do. I have several ideas, and none of them are very polite.

Though it might seem nasty of me to suggest it, I daresay the situation is not wholly different from older men who marry down, and younger women who marry up. And there it is. We are spinsters with fat pockets and purses, and we are pariahs so far as the entire county is concerned. Meanwhile, “Nancy” is a pretty, popular girl with a small measure of fame, if no fortune to speak of. (She avoids the subject, but I have gathered that her origins are somewhat dubious.)

Actresses come in two types, as I hear it: fabulously wealthy, and pitifully destitute. The difference between them is alleged to be the quality of their suitors.

All things being equal, I suppose it’s safer than a street corner.

But Lizzie loves her, and I tolerate her. The girl isn’t often untoward, but she’s routinely uncouth and so very, very young. Plenty young enough (and if I am to be fair, beautiful enough as well) to find a rich man to keep her.

So yes, I can make my guesses as to what keeps her coming ’round. They’re better than guesses, and anyone who suggests that ladies don’t do such things doesn’t know much about ladies. Or anyone else, I expect.

Thank the good Lord above for thick walls and large, sturdy houses. Our rooms are adjacent, but without a measure of shouting, no one is likely to hear anyone else.

Under more ordinary circumstances, this slight distance is a source of distress to Lizzie . . . she wants me nearer, closer, more easily guarded and defended even at night. (Especially at night.) I appreciate her protective streak, and indeed, it’s kept me alive this long; but there are times when I find the attention stifling.

My resentment is unfair, in every way. It does not reflect on her in the slightest. It’s only my old longing for the easy independence I took for granted when I was Lizzie’s age. I am jealous, and that’s the extent of it.