Six. An Angel at the Table
Six
An Angel at the Table
FIRST DAY AT SEA
June 16, 1865
Nicholas and Haslett Nelson sat across from each other at one of eight long tables in the dining saloon, a wood-paneled room that curved out widely with the beam of the ship. Each table had been set for twelve to accommodate two hundred first-class passengers at two separate seatings.
The Nelson brothers, preferring to eat early as they did at home, were among the first to arrive. The dinner menu before them was also pleasantly familiar: barley broth; beefsteak and oyster pie or roast pork with stuffing (or, in Haz’s case, both); boiled cabbage and potatoes; apple tart for dessert. Wine and spirits were available, but neither brother would partake; with Sara-Beth on board, they were determined to hold on to their wits.
“She just showed up…” Nick’s repeat astonishment had by now turned into a statement of unavoidable fact, like Sara-Beth herself. He placed his napkin on his lap. “She claims to have a chaperone.”
“I doubt we’ll see hide or hair of them .” Haz raised his eyes to the ceiling. “Every time I consider giving women the vote…”
“To be fair, Sara-Beth shows little interest in that cause.”
“Only because she has plenty of other ways to get what she wants.” Haz stopped talking to stare past the left shoulder of Nick, who had his back to the entrance of the room. Nick turned around in response to his brother’s quizzical eye, fearful of Sara-Beth approaching, but saw two other women instead.
“Who is that ?” Haz asked, his voice rising. The women were different in height and age but shared the same wide-set eyes and crescent-shaped mouth.
“Which one?” asked Nick, turning back to face him.
“Does it matter?”
“You always fault Sara-Beth for treating the two of us like that.”
Haz good-naturedly laughed in agreement. The two women sat down at the end of the table directly behind him, and he leaned back from his soup bowl to listen. “They’re sisters. They sound upset about someone—a man—their chaperone?”
“But they’re dining alone.”
“Oh, yes—they’re very upset. This idea of a chaperone—surely they don’t need one,” observed Haz. “The taller one looks our age at least. And the younger—what an angel .”
“Did you know chaperon is the hood over a falcon, to stop its desire to fly?”
“You know I didn’t.” Nick’s breadth of knowledge always impressed Haz. As a schoolboy, he had turned to his older brother for answers as much as to books—only sports and stage-acting ever truly captured his attention.
The two women began animatedly muttering as a distinguished man still in his morning coat strode into the room. The dozens of other diners ceased conversation to regard his wavy blond hair and broad-shouldered form. The man looked about, reddened at spotting the two women, then immediately sought the farthest table from them.
“The chaperone, I bet,” Haz whispered to Nick. “He’s not that old and much better-looking than us—which probably defeats the purpose.” A second man now entered the room and headed straight for the two women. “That’s the reporter they told us about, from London. He knows them, too, it would seem. I wonder why they’re not already married.”
“I’m sure you’ll find out soon, Brother.”
The reporter, looking amused by the women’s quick dismissal of him, took his seat at a nearby table. Nick watched as the younger sister’s face, still frowning from that man’s overture, brightened at another new arrival. Turn ing around again, he witnessed a rather plain-looking woman enter the dining room.
“Lu! Come, do join us!” the younger sister called out, and Nick noticed the chaperone briefly look up with interest before returning to his menu. There was a great rustling sound behind Haz as the woman sat down. She was friendly and buoyant, making the ensuing conversation that much easier for the Nelson brothers to overhear.
“You haven’t even said hello to him?” they heard her ask. “Hasn’t he ?”
The angel answered. “He wouldn’t dare. He’s no fool—just our father’s lackey.”
“Hush, Charlie,” whispered her sister.
Lu? Charlie? Haz mouthed to Nick, and they both shrugged at the surprising use of male names.
“All the more reason to keep to the saloon, then,” the woman called Lu declared. “I’ve loads of ideas for fun.”
“Your suggestion of a charity performance, for one,” the woman called Charlie enthused, causing Haz to jerk his head up in surprise from his beef-and-oyster pie.
“Such a good use of our free time on board,” added her older sister. There was something pleasant about her voice—much calmer than the other women’s—that caught Nick’s ear.
“We shall condense Dickens!” Lu suddenly cried out. “We did six of his scenes for the Sanitary Fair in Boston two winters back. Raised plenty—twenty-five hundred dollars! Ran short on time and actors, though.” She looked about at the other passengers, who appeared either slightly seasick or already bored. “We won’t run short on either here— and we’ll have a captive audience.” Lu winked. “My favorite kind.”
The three women laughed freely together, and their ready camaraderie impressed both of the Nelsons. Women became friends so quickly—why was that? the brothers had to wonder. Why did men bond most over war and sport, and women over everything else? Then Nicholas and Haz shared a much more worrisome thought: Were women themselves at war with men today, given the angry clamors for their rights, and in search of reinforcements at every turn?
“But no men!” Lu proclaimed, as if she could read their minds. “We shall do all the parts.”
The brothers raised their eyebrows at each other. They had a trunk of ten books and week-old newspapers to spare, but only each other for companionship. Suddenly it felt too much like home, and they began to envy the planning taking place at the other table.
The energy in the room, filled to capacity with first-class guests, shifted with one last arrival. Sara-Beth Gleason entered, sans chaperone and wearing the most resplendent dress of all. Although possessing no sense of fashion themselves, Nick and Haz had to admire the uniqueness of her silhouette, the flatter front of her skirt only emphasizing the fuller volume in back. Neither man could begin to guess at the reduced-front crinoline underneath, recently created and shipped to Philadelphia from the French fashion house of Charles Worth.
Sara-Beth made a beeline for the brothers’ table.
“Perhaps we should go.” Nick stared down at his plate.
“She senses fear,” Haz warned.
To their surprise, however, Sara-Beth sailed right past them to join the women instead. Nick watched as Lu jumped up to offer her chair and went to fetch an extra one for herself. How on earth did Sara-Beth Gleason of the City of Brotherly Love already know these three daughters of Boston?
The table of women was full of talk of the charity performance being planned for the final night on ship. Books to adapt were discussed, and the Nelsons grew even more envious as the energetic quartet settled on A Tale of Two Cities . They overheard Lu claim that Dickens, the most famous author in the world, had yet to dramatize the novel himself, giving her imagination free rein to do so.
Meanwhile Nicholas and Haslett Nelson would have to settle for ten days of quiet time alone on deck, reading books they had both read before, and staring at the endless horizon, always more empty than clear.