Читать книгу Winds of Nightsong - V. J. Banis - Страница 9

CHAPTER FIVE

Nineteen twelve was a very progressive year for New York City. The new bridges and subway tunnels created a sprawling metropolis of nearly four million people, with Manhattan the most powerful of the boroughs in Greater New York. Business was booming; and Tammany Hall continued to control city politics despite the Boss Tweed scandal of years before. But even though the city was thriving, working conditions were the poorest in the nation and women were still fighting for their right to vote.

It was also a time for terrible tragedies. In March of 1911 a fire broke out at The Triangle Shirtwaist Company on the corner of New York’s Washington Place and Greene Street. The building was abominably overcrowded, with row after row of sewing machines crammed into every inch of space. Triangle was typical of the so-called sweatshops, paying girls five dollars for a six-day work week in airless rooms. The narrow passageways, the flimsy fire escapes, the single elevator took the lives of 145 workers who had either been burned alive or had jumped to their deaths.

Then, in April of 1912, the luxury liner Titanic sank on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York, and 1,513 people perished.

Susan MacNair Dillon had taken up the plight of the underprivileged years before and was a staunch supporter of women’s suffrage. Her husband, Sean, was active in New York politics, and he shared her concern for the poor and belabored. Both were fully aware, however, of the dangers involved in upsetting the powerful men who ran New York.

The Dillon townhouse was on Fifth Avenue near Eighty-second Street, across from Central Park. It was a lovely house, furnished more for comfort than show. This pleased Susan and her husband immensely, but their daughter Lorrie hated the place. Though not yet fifteen, Lorrie was already a full-fledged snob.

“It’s so common,” she always complained. “I’m ashamed to bring my friends here. Why can’t we furnish it as it deserves to be furnished and not with all these old-fashioned, overstuffed horrors.”

“You’re a little prig,” her mother told her. “You’re just like your Grandmother. Always wanting to put on airs.”

“We can afford a few airs,” Lorrie would respond. “Father is certainly rich enough.”

“Money isn’t everything, Lorrie. You’ll learn that one day.”

“I want to live in San Francisco with Grandmother.”

It was an ongoing argument, one to which Susan and Sean were almost immune.

Thursday was the one day of the week Sean always spent at home alone with his wife. The children were in school and when school wasn’t in session, Sean made sure they had somewhere to go so that he and Susan could have the house to themselves, especially the bedroom. After sixteen years of marriage, their lovemaking was both serious and social.

“I love Thursdays,” Susan said as she kissed his naked shoulder and let her hand trail down over his abdomen and grip his stiffening penis.

“And I love you, you little minx.” Sean rolled over on top of her and began suckling her nipples.

“You don’t think we’re getting too old for this sort of thing, Sean?”

“Old? Good God, woman. You’re not even close to forty.”

“I’m beginning to feel old,” Susan said as she continued to fondle her husband.

“If you don’t stop playing with that thing, you’ll have me finished before I start.”

“I like playing with your thing,” she said, smiling.

“I can think of a better place for it than in your hand.”

“Like where?” she teased.

He took his shaft and edged it against the lips of her vagina. “Like here?” he asked, easing himself into her.

“Oh God, Sean, that feels wonderful.”

“Tell me about it.” He started thrusting slowly in and out of her as she arched up to meet him.

“I wish you’d let me give you more babies,” Susan said, savoring the delicious feel of his length and thickness.

“We have enough. Two boys and a girl. Just so long as the Dillon name is secure that’s all I care about. Besides, you had too hard a time with little Petie, so let’s not push our luck.” He felt the heat building up in his loins and slowed down.

“Don’t stop.”

“I’ll never stop. I just want it to last all afternoon.” He nibbled at her ear. “I’m hot as a boiler.”

“You’re always hot.”

“It’s the Irish in me, love.”

“And you’d better not ever take your ‘Irish’ out of me, Sean Dillon.”

“Never. I love you more than my own life.”

“And I love you.”

He started to move against her again, practiced and even, the kind of lovemaking that’s only possible between two people who have enjoyed years of happiness together.

“I adore your body,” he moaned. He was getting too hot again and eased out of her. He began making love to her body with his mouth, kissing her breasts, her navel, her abdomen. He placed his face between her thighs and pushed his tongue deep inside her.

“Oh Sean,” Susan moaned as she clutched the pillow, tossing her head from side to side.

When Sean felt himself in control again, he moved up over her and eased himself back into her wetness. He took his time, moving with the graceful precision of an athlete as he brought her to one shattering climax after another.

“Sean, Sean, Sean,” Susan murmured, and he drove into her, giving himself up to the flood of release he could no longer hold back.

“I adore you,” he breathed as his whole body tensed, his toes curled, his teeth clenched.

Afterward they lay exhausted and content, listening to the pounding of their hearts.

“I think you married me just for my body,” Susan said.

Sean propped himself up and reached for a cigarette. “That’s right, love. Marrying you keeps me out of the red-light districts. I get you whenever I like and I don’t have to pay the tarts.”

She grabbed his hair and yanked it hard. They tussled for a moment, laughing and rolling about. Then Susan became serious. “Why did you marry me, Sean?”

He sucked on the cigarette. “To spite your mother, of course. I thought you knew that.”

“Oh, be serious.” She punched him and pulled his hair again.

He turned and kissed her softly. “I married you, Susan MacNair Dillon, because I happen to have fallen hopelessly in love with you and I wanted you to be the mother of my children.”

“I’ll accept that,” she said, smiling.

“Besides, you’re the only high-class lady I ever met who’d have a Mick like me for a husband.”

“You’re not a Mick.”

“I was always a Mick. Low-down, no-lace-curtains Irish. That’s me.”

“We’re very rich, aren’t we?”

“Yes. Very. But that doesn’t change where I came from. And remember, love, I don’t have a very respectable occupation. Owning a distillery may be profitable, but it isn’t considered very upstanding in the eyes of New York society. I wish I could give you more.”

“You’ve given me everything I ever wanted, Sean. You know how much I hate those snobs I went to school with. I despised the way Mother made us live.”

“Speaking of your mother, I’m going out to the coast next week. I suppose I’ll have to stop off and pay my respects or we’ll never hear the end of it.”

“She’ll be just as uncomfortable with you as you’ll be with her, if that’s any consolation. And if you don’t want to see Mother, I won’t care.”

“Why don’t you come with me?”

“As much as I’ll miss you, I think I’d rather stay here.”

“Maybe I’ll take Lorrie. She’s always pestering us to send her to her grandmother’s.”

“I want Lorrie kept away from my mother. Our daughter is enough of a little prig as it is. Mother would only encourage her snobbish tendencies.”

“I know what you mean, love, but that girl drives me up the wall. Maybe it would be best for all concerned if we sent her to that school your mother is always raving about.”

“I don’t know, Sean. I truly believe it will only make Lorrie worse than she is now.”

“She can’t get any worse. She’s unhappy with us, you must admit that. She doesn’t approve of you and your suffragettes or factory workers. And I know she’s ashamed of what her father does for a living.”

“I’ll think about it, darling.” Susan bit down on her lower lip, knowing he was right. There hadn’t been much peace in the house since Lorrie’s visit to her grandmother’s last year. Lorna had been a terrible influence on the girl. However, perhaps it would be best for everyone if Lorrie were with her own kind, pretentious little brats who thought they were better than everyone else.

“Did you say you’re leaving next week?” Susan asked.

Sean stubbed out his cigarette. “Friday, if everything goes according to plan.”

Susan was silent for a moment. Then she said, “I’ve been thinking about that fire at the shirtwaist company, Sean. You know, the one where all those people died.”

He nodded.

“We both agree that working conditions in those places are dreadful. Someone has got to stand up for those poor people who work for peanuts.”

“They can’t even afford peanuts,” he said. “But you know damned well, Susan, the owners will never tolerate even the mention of a union, if that’s what you’re thinking about.”

“I realize that. Yet someone from the outside has got to get on the inside and make the public aware of what conditions there are really like.”

“And I suppose you intend to be that ‘someone’?”

“I could pass myself off as some poor wretch who needs a job, and once I was working there I could try to get something organized.”

“I don’t want you getting involved with those sweatshop owners. It’s too dangerous.”

“Nobody need know who I am.”

“I know you, my girl. You’ll start instigating trouble the first day on the job. Now I’m giving you an order, wife. You are not to go near those sweatshops. Do I make myself clear?”

She didn’t answer.

“Susan,” he warned, wagging his finger at her.

“I only want to see what it’s like inside one of those places.”

“Hell,” he breathed. “You’ll do what you want, I know.” He flopped back on the pillows. “You’re a headstrong, spoiled little dickens. Now I’m warning you, love, if you get yourself into any kind of a mess, don’t come running to me to get you out of it.”

She knew he didn’t mean that. She traced the outline of his jaw with the tip of her finger. “Do you mean you wouldn’t take me in if I came begging?” Her hand moved over his chest and down across his abdomen to cup his flaccid penis, which immediately started to harden again.

“Stop that.”

“No.”

He chuckled, giving himself up to her manipulations. “All right, then don’t stop.”

“I have no intention of doing so.” His penis grew harder and longer and thicker as she moved her hand up and down the shaft.

“You’re going to kill me, you know that.”

“You’re good for another hundred years.”

“Not if you don’t stop torturing me this way.”

She lowered her head and took him into her mouth, pulling the shaft deep into her throat. She came off it and said, “You love it and you know it.”

“Aye, lass, that I do,” he said, then grabbed her and kissed her hard on the mouth. “You’re going to get laid again, you know.”

“I hope so, you dumb Irish Mick.”

* * * *

At dinner that evening, which was always an informal affair—family-style, Sean liked to call it—Lorrie sat pouting, glaring at the bowls of potatoes and vegetables, the platter of meat, the boat of gravy sitting in the middle of the table.

“I simply cannot understand why we can’t have the servants wait table,” Lorrie said as she sullenly helped herself to a piece of meat. “We dine like peasants.”

“We dine very well,” her father reminded her.

“Yeah,” her younger brother, David, put in. “I don’t like all those different knives and forks and having to take whatever is put on my plate.”

“You’re a cretin.”

Petie, who was nine, asked, “What’s a cretin?”

“An idiot, a fool,” Lorrie sneered.

“That will be enough, Lorrie,” Susan said calmly. “We are all hearty and healthy enough to serve ourselves without taxing the help. They work hard enough as it is to keep us comfortable.”

“Grandmother would never tolerate this,” Lorrie complained as she began picking daintily at her food. “We don’t even use salad forks.”

“One fork is as good as another,” her father reminded her. “It all goes into the same mouth.”

“That’s revolting.”

“And you are becoming a perfect little snoot, Lorrie,” Susan said, losing her patience.

Lorrie jutted out her chin. “I want to live with Grandmother. At least she lives like a civilized human being.”

Sean decided to tease her. “Your mother and I have been thinking that perhaps you’ve been associating with the wrong type of friends, Lorrie. After you graduate from school I think I’ll find you a job with me at one of my distilleries.”

Lorrie was horrified. “Work? In a brewery? I’d rather die.”

Sean smiled. “Oh, it wouldn’t be very hard work. Perhaps somewhere in the bottling department where all you’d have to do is check to make sure the capping machines are operating correctly.”

“Father!” Lorrie gasped. “You wouldn’t?”

Sean laughed. “Calm down, girl. I was only having a bit of fun with you. When you’re finished with school I’ll have you sent to one of those finishing schools you’re so anxious to attend.”

“Grandmother says there is a very fine one near San Francisco.”

Susan frowned. “I do not want you living with your grandmother.”

“Why not? She’s the only one in this family who truly understands me.”

“I understand you,” Susan said. “That’s why I will not have you spoiled rotten by her.”

“Then I’ll run away and get married,” Lorrie threatened.

Her father turned to his wife in surprise, then frowned at Lorrie. “Get married? To whom, in heaven’s name?”

“I’m old enough to marry anyone I please. And there are a lot of boys who would ask me if I encouraged them.”

Susan was shocked. “Lorrie, you aren’t serious?”

“I’m fifteen. Lots of girls get married before fifteen.” She gave her mother a straightforward look. “And they don’t have to, either.”

Little Petie asked his older brother, “Why would they have to?”

David, who thought himself quite an adult at eleven, whispered, “I’ll explain it to you later.”

Susan glowered at her daughter. “You are becoming just a little too corporeal, Lorrie. I’m afraid I’ve been a bit lax about supervising your social life.”

“Really, Mother, don’t be so primeval. This is 1912, not the Dark Ages.”

Susan and Sean exchanged glances.

Later, when he and Susan were alone in the drawing room, Sean said, “Perhaps we should think about my taking Lorrie with me to California. New York may be just a bit too wild for a girl her age. Your mother would be able to communicate with her better than you or I. They speak the same language, and I know your mother is a stickler for propriety. She might be just what Lorrie needs now.”

Susan shook her head but didn’t choose to tell him about the night she’d walked into Ramsey’s rooms and found her mother and Ramsey naked on the bed. “I don’t know, Sean. Let me think about it. I must admit, though, that Lorrie is becoming quite a handful.”

“If she’s even hinting about getting married, then there must be somebody in the background she hasn’t told us about. I think we should get her out of New York before she does anything stupid.”

“Yes, perhaps you’re right.”

“The girl’s an extremely pretty little thing. I’m sure there are dozens of boys trying to get at her. I’d feel better if she were away from her friends for a while. I just didn’t like the way she was talking at dinner tonight. There’s something gnawing at her.”

“You may be right, Sean. Maybe she should go to Mother’s, just for a short while.” She put aside the glass of port she’d been sipping, thinking that her mother was older now and still mourning her husband. “Incidentally, what’s taking you to California?”

He grinned. “Well, I’ve been thinking about opening up a new distillery out there. And there’s something else: I’ve had a couple of offers to go in on those new moving pictures.”

“Moving pictures? You’re not serious?”

“Dead serious. There are an awful lot of people going to the Nickelodeons. They even say that within the next decade they’ll be making talking pictures.”

“You’re crazy,” Susan said with a laugh.

“Just getting in on the ground floor. Now don’t get all riled. I’m only going to check things out, have a look around. I want to see what kind of money they’re bringing in before I invest a penny.”

“Moving pictures,” Susan said, more to herself than to him. The idea was simply unthinkable. However, Sean had always had a very good eye for profitable business investments.

Susan said, “Take my advice, darling, and don’t mention this to Lorrie. The next thing we know she’ll be wanting to become one of those moving-picture sirens.”

“Fat chance,” Sean laughed. “Our Lorrie is too intent upon becoming Queen of England.”