Three. North and South
Three
North and South
Beacon Hill, July 21, 1865
As in the days prior to their departure, Henrietta and Charlotte kept to the attic upon their return. William Stevenson was left to despair alone over the litany of facts before him: Henrietta’s sudden and unexpected marriage to a stranger and a foreigner, the separation from that very husband after just nine days, the hasty return home in the presence of yet another man and stranger, and her intention to file suit for divorce posthaste upon the recommendation of both her London counsel, Dr. Richard Pankhurst, and her father’s own colleague, Justice Thomas Nash.
William’s head was spinning.
He would only meet Constance in secret, hesitant to introduce the evolution in their own relationship to his daughters. Connie was very understanding, her predominant concern being for Henrietta. But her feminist ire was also in full flame, lit by the role that chauvinism appeared to have played in the breakdown of the briefest of marriages.
“Does Charlotte still not speak of it to you?” Constance asked during a clandestine walk together through the public botanical garden across from her home.
“Nash is my only other source and almost as tight-lipped about the entire matter. They all three seem quite attached from the catastrophe.”
“And this Mr. Nelson of Philadelphia?”
“Nash insists he is only a friend.” William bowed his head. “God help us if he ends up a co-respondent in the case.”
“But you know for certain there is to be litigation abroad?”
“Nash says it is only a matter of time. Sir Cresswell of the British divorce court reportedly moves with such speed, a decision may already have been rendered to prevent removal of the property—whatever it may be—from the country. That is why Nash advised Henrietta to sail home immediately with the object in dispute, before any such judgment could be enforced against her there.”
“And this Mr. Nelson stays in Boston…?”
William turned to her and raised his eyebrows. “As I said, attached .”
“I see.” Constance did some quick counting in her head. “So… they left on the fifth of July, arrived here eleven days later, and it is now ten days on from that. Word from the London courts could arrive any minute of which they would be unaware.”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Well, William, as you know, I believe in meeting undeterred whatever is to come. We shall fix on the absolute best legal counsel for Henrietta here at home and prevail in court. She simply made a bad bet—we all do. We win in life as much as we lose. I refuse to let this latest hardship of hers become one iota more difficult than it has to be. For goodness’ sake, heartbreak is painful enough—what monsters would we be, to add to any of that?”
William frowned. “I’m afraid there’s a complication. Only a justice of the supreme judicial court has the authority to decide divorce cases in our state. My colleagues will be considered inherently partial to my family—at least, those whom I consider friends. The chief justice, Conor, Mac, of course Nash… even Zeke has attended church alongside me. All except one will need to recuse themselves due to conflict of interest.”
Connie stopped walking, did more counting in her head, and placed her right arm over his. “You’re not saying…”
William grimly nodded. “Norton.”
“That woman-hater?” Connie stroked her forehead in misery with her other hand. “I must admit, I did not see him coming over the horizon.”
“He’s the only one with whom I have no personal relationship. If anything, he is predisposed to think ill of me, given our differences in politics.”
Connie patted William’s arm in solidarity. “Even more reason, then, to secure the best barrister we can. A good lawyer can surmount anything—and I know just the person.”
It didn’t take Justice Stevenson long to suspect that the man lounging behind the paper-strewn desk had once had romantic designs on the woman who had referred him.
William and Constance were sitting with Henrietta in the office of Graydon Saunders, a Southerner who had studied law at Harvard ten years after William. Graduating at the top of his class, Saunders had opened his litigation practice in Boston after gallivanting about Europe, where he had met Constance Davenish on her own Grand Tour at the time.
William had yet to meet this rumored romantic adversary in the judicial arena. Graydon Saunders, Esquire, had never lost a case nor had one appealed to its higher courts, so decisively did he trounce any opponents. Raised in the Allegheny Mountains, he was a robust-looking man with the carriage of a lumberjack, all heart and appetite and vigor—William had to close his eyes at the unavoidable image of Constance being lifted in Graydon’s arms.
Graydon took a pull on his cigar as Henrietta described the case. “You’re telling me this fella of yours let you go over an old man’s dying gift? Well, I never…” He took another, longer pull. “Sudden ruptures between lovers can be something fierce”—William flinched as Graydon knocked ash off his cigar end with a flourish—“and you’re sure it’s not liable to fixin’?”
Henrietta firmly nodded while Connie reached over and patted her hand. Graydon gave Connie an openly admiring look before turning to William, who felt the sudden heat of rivalry under his collar.
“Norton’s presiding, you say.” The lawyer shook his head. “That man thinks the sun came up just to hear him crow. Well, Justice Stevenson, I’m ’fraid you’re best to excuse yourself now, so I can strategize with the ladies unencumbered.”
William stood up, hesitated, then decided to say his piece one last time when it came to the matter of Scott v. Scott . “Mr. Saunders, so much would be resolved should my daughter pursue an annulment in either country. If we can nullify the marriage, any argument over property becomes moot. But much as I reason with her…”
Graydon held up both hands in assurance and talked around the cigar in his mouth. “Don’t you worry, Justice Stevenson. I’m not in the habit of making exertion or trouble for myself, as Miss Connie here well knows.” He winked at Constance, causing William to feel sick to his stomach all over again before heading straight to the best jeweller in all of Beacon Hill.
Henrietta and Charlotte sat on their matching sleigh beds, facing each other across the wide-planked floor. The Portsmouth travel tags on Charlotte’s steamer trunk were the only sign in the attic of their monthlong absence from home.
“And this Mr. Saunders advises annulment just like Father?” Charlotte stared at her sister in confusion. “Yet still you won’t relent?”
Henrietta stood up and began to pace. “I would have to state in court that the marriage was void from the start.” Looking down from the nearest dormer window, she noticed that the late lilac tree had lost all its violet blossoms—summer, the fairest season, was passing them by. “I was not tricked or drugged into it. I considered it a union for life and I want it resolved on those same terms. I wouldn’t know how to move forward otherwise.”
“But here in Massachusetts, the admiral’s bequest stays yours, regardless?”
“Yes.” Henrietta cast an eye at the shared desk where the telescope was safely locked away. “Valid marriage or not, under our state’s new property laws for women, any inheritance stays mine and mine alone, to do with what I will.”
“Well, that’s a whole other question. What could the admiral have been thinking?” Charlie lay back on her bedquilt, hands folded on her chest, and stared up at the ceiling. “How we need news from London right away. Nash told Father they’re trying to lay down cable across the Atlantic again. Queen Victoria’s congratulatory telegram to President Buchanan went through in half a day before the first line deteriorated.”
“It reportedly took sixteen hours to send those two hundred words from the Queen. It will take thousands more to explain whatever happens next between Denham and me.” Henrietta sat down at the desk and rested her head on folded arms of her own, then turned onto one side to observe her sister. “Have you seen him?”
“Nash?” Charlotte shook her head.
“Those ten days at sea coming back—what a blur. What would we have done without him?”
“We would have managed, Harry. We always have.”
“Or without Nick, for that matter. He is a true gentleman—one who sees things through.”
Charlotte sat up in bed on her elbows. “You need to do the same, Harry, if only to go before Father’s court.”
Henrietta sat up, too, staring at the attic rafters where Charlotte had once hung sheets for her stage; their shared childhood had never felt so far away. “Mr. Saunders says it will be a stretch to prove cruelty—my only grounds here for divorce—without physical injury. After all, all Denham really did was assert his legal rights, over there, over me.”
“And if you can’t convince Justice Norton of cruelty?”
“Then no divorce. Mr. Saunders says we could both go to Mexico, or move to Indiana for a year. But here in Massachusetts, just wanting a divorce is not enough.”
Charlie came over and put a hand on her sister’s shoulder. “Henrietta, this has been so wearing on you. Must you really act with such haste?”
“Mr. Saunders says I run the risk of Denham filing suit in London first, where I have no rights of property, and successfully obtaining and enforcing any such foreign judgment in his favor here.” She patted the desktop. “I can’t risk that.”
“Well, at least none of Boston knows of it yet.” Charlotte kissed the top of her sister’s head. “You’ll be on the docket only as H. Scott, Justice Norton—that old crab apple—will preside, and this will all be behind us soon enough.”