It was a marriage of convenience. Hers. And necessarily so, for she was the one who had been stuck with it. Stuck with the galling inconvenience of having a husband so rare, so scarce, that he did not even fill his own shoes.
On the morning after her wedding, Avice Drinkwater, still metamorphosing into Mrs. Thomas G. Smolders, the glinting dust her marriage had stirred up hardly settled around her, found that already in her new life she had to take stock. This was it: a morning coat, a pair of men’s dress shoes, and a small brown cowhide valise containing a shirt, three collars, two pairs of socks, a woollen union suit with a moth hole in one sleeve, a bar of soap, a razor and an ivory-handled toothbrush. This was it, what she was married to, the modest props and costume of a husband, but no husband—her mate nothing more than a bone-handled, bristle-headed object.
She might have smiled at this, one of her sharp and self-depreciating smiles, sharp enough to pare down the edges of what was a full and substantial self. Except that she was not in the mood on this particular morning for self-deprecation, or for diminishment of any kind. She had absolutely no intention of being whittled down by circumstance into a whining sliver of a woman. What she felt largely was something hot in her blood, lapping her heart, boiling it, burning her inner layers, scorching her from within. If she were to run her tongue along her wrist and into her palm, she knew that she would be able to taste it even, this searing and poisonous fury. This bitterness. Let other women suffer from vapours: what she exuded—noxious fumes, scalding steam—would fell anyone who came too close.
Her sisters. How they would rally and flutter around her when they heard the news of his decampment. How sympathetic they would be, how enraged on her behalf. There would be much talk of a search, perhaps a private investigator, a lawsuit, an annulment. And how secretly thrilled they would be, wallowing in the muck of her shame, sucking through their teeth the fetid waters of her misfortune. Their warnings about her disastrous choice would be vindicated, their unkind and unacknowledged wishes gratified. How they would simper and cluck … and chuckle in her ear.
Like hell they would.
Back to stock-taking. All right, she was married, she did have a husband, and she would not be done out of one. Unless, of course, she herself were to do the deed. The deed—yes—that would strike her marriage through with a theme, would outfit it with a purpose. It would certainly give her a sense of resolution, if not comfort.
Avice had been rash about Grif, she realized, but not wrong. She hardly knew him, true, but she knew herself, knew the kind of appetite he provoked in her. He was unclaimed treasure, standing so handsomely behind a pile of less splendid goods on display at Kingsmill’s, and she had immediately wanted to (and did) lay claim. Her desire had been to hoard him, or to spend him freely, as extravagantly as she wished. She was interested in him in a way that felt as basic and elemental as a rough wind blasting her on an open shore. She was still interested in him—in how, precisely, he would look throttled, mangled, slit from tip to stern.
She wished she had a wedding photograph so that she could study it, and him, more closely. She had been too cavalier, too certain of herself; she had missed something about him, and now she wanted to find it, that intimate and revealing detail, the tiny pore in his person through which his regard for her had disappeared. She determined to find whatever reason he could possibly have had for leaving her, no matter how deeply, and surgically, she had to delve. First she would ruin him, then she would be his personal archaeologist, picking and sifting through those ruins.
In the morning light that fell through that treacherous window in the Belvedere Hotel, the one through which Grif had made his escape, Avice again surveyed what remained—the trappings of a husband, without the trapped, as it were. Her marriage definitely lacked substance, but as this was something she herself had never lacked, the problem did not seem to be insoluble. Watching the light pour in, creating an empty spotlight on the floor, a notion occurred to her. She did not need an archangel to materialize in this light, to fill her ear with revelatory news. The gist of that news probably hadn’t changed much since Biblical times, anyway. What Mary was told, Avice had already figured out: husbands consist mostly of illusion. So occupied were they with their jobs, their clubs, their recreational and civic duties (or their divine ones), that wives scarcely saw them. Occasionally, a husband might wander through the house like an animal and leave behind droppings—cigar ash, mud on the rug, a pittance to manage the household with—and while there, beget a brood of offspring, the delivery of which would eventually kill his mate. Work and grief, that was what a woman really married. When you considered it, as Avice was intently doing—her brow as rippled as a washboard, but her thoughts slippery as silk—an illusory husband might be more useful than a real one, not to mention more agreeable. If the good Lord could create a man with a pinch of dust and a little sleight of hand, then surely she could do the same with a morning coat, a pair of shoes and a toothbrush.
So pleased was she with this inspiration that when the arrival of the newlyweds’ breakfast was announced with a tactful and muted knock at the door, Avice lowered her voice a register or two and ordered that it be left outside. For good measure she also murmured an endearment, sleepily, contentedly, and then held her breath, listening, waiting as the footsteps retreated down the hall. She jumped out of bed and ran over to the door, cautiously peeked out, then wheeled in a laden tray—fried eggs, sausages, potatoes, ham, toast—and ate it all, every last crumb, his share, hers, theirs. After all, she was eating for two.
As she drank down the last of the coffee, allowing herself to slurp it, to lick the saucer, to belch—all husbandly habits and prerogatives—she gave some thought to what sort of couple she would make, and just how she might round out the masculine half. She knew that there had always been women who had taken the part of men in life, such as those who had fought, disguised as soldiers, in the American Civil War, or that brilliant and dashing physician in the British army, James Barry. A whole successful life in the male arena and only after death was it discovered that Dr. Barry was female. How very gratifying, and evidently not impossible; but Avice wanted more than that. Half of humanity was simply not enough for her. She wanted to be, and would be, complete.
Pacing the room, as her husband had done only the night before, she circled his shoes, once, twice, then stopped before them. What had seized him so suddenly and plucked him out of this room, right out of his shoes, it seemed? Surely there was no idea so strong that it could have blown him through the window. It must have been an agency of some sort, an abduction; but then she had heard no shouts, no scuffle, no protest coming from him. There had been that noise, a gunshot she had thought, but perhaps only a trick a child might play—an air-filled paper bag slapped open. A craven, despicable trick: the deserting wretch had wanted her to think him in trouble. Well, he was that.
She slid a questing foot into one of Grif’s abandoned shoes and wiggled her toes widely. My, what big feet you have. Didn’t her friends long for fairy-tale weddings of their own? What would they make of hers, she wondered, which had turned her into a Cinderella who was required to fit the boots and role of the prince (with no want of ugly sisters, either)? She slipped her foot into the other shoe, then clomped over to the valise and dug around in it for the socks. Both pairs might help, but when she tried them on, they drooped, garterless, like rags around her ankles. Likewise, when she pulled on the shirt and coat, they hung loosely on her slender frame. She looked like a dressed stick.
Vexed, she kicked at a chair and her foot moulted the socks, which flew off into a corner. It wasn’t so much the sight of her ill-fitting male costume reflected in the dresser mirror that annoyed her, for she had funds and resources of her own (her father had not trusted Grif on that score for a moment); to procure a more suitable outfit, and one of better quality, would be an easy enough task. No, what truly and deeply irritated her had more to do with the liberty this masculine clothing afforded. He had not been required to bind and cinch and hobble himself with corsets and straps, with hooks and endless buttons and yards of heavy, imprisoning cloth. Eighteen-inch waists, skirts that dragged in the mud, sleeves that ballooned so hugely they required supporting structures underneath. He had not been stopped, paralyzed, by his very clothing. A woman’s blood could scarcely even circulate in her body, so tied was it in place. To think that he had all this freedom … and it had not been enough.
Tears sprang to her eyes, but with a tide of will she called them back. She promised herself, her better and her worse half in this union, that she would find a more useful and less feminine release for these emotional waters. Let there be no more leaking through the eyes. She was going to learn how to spit.
By mid-afternoon the chambermaid, had she been allowed into the room, might have wondered if a rainstorm had lately passed through, so gob-flecked and damp had it become. By then Avice had mastered the art of expectoration, and felt she could hawk with the best of the boys. Not that she could put out a fire, but she could send a foaming globe of spittle whizzing through the air and pinging on target with a crackerjack accuracy. If Grif just so happened to appear at the window, his miserable, pleading face bobbing into view, she’d christen it all right. She’d daub him smack between the eyes with a wet and shattering kiss of contempt.
This thought warmed her and gave her cramped feelings some range, as had that flask of courage she had discovered in the pocket of his coat. Drink, spit. Drink, spit. Really, a man’s life was a wonderful thing. She knew she had the wit to manage it, tacking such a life onto her own as one might add an extension to a house, a porch that stood open to the world. She took another pull at the flask, delighted to have found it when she frisked Grif’s abandoned coat, her fingers searching the garment’s cheap criminal cloth as if he himself might be hidden somewhere in it. (The louse.)
She had also found two train tickets concealed in an inside pocket. How could she have forgotten, having planned most of it herself—their getaway, their honeymoon? It had been intended as an adventurous lark, and a rebuke to her family: a week in a rough American city known more for its industry than its romance. What a shame if they both missed it. Of course, she was both now, but did she honestly think she could get away with it? Avice was aware that a woman travelling alone attracted too much of the wrong kind of attention. Such a woman, brazen and depraved (for otherwise she would not be travelling unescorted), was considered fair game—the very game that she herself had been so eager to be, and play, only the night before, at least the sanctioned version of it, which was supposed to make all the difference. So much for that scruple, she thought (drink, spit): new game, new rules.
She took a turn around the room, trying out a few manly walks. She sauntered and strolled. She mastered the strut, the swagger, the hemorrhoidal hobble, the caveman’s lope and lunge. The drink had ignited a votive flame in her belly, and she had begun to have a good time. She mimicked with her feet male pride and arrogance, and walked for miles, it seemed, keeping herself entertained while searching for her own ambulatory style, the style of her other. She wanted to make a signature with her own two dissembling feet that was self-assured and forthright. Nothing creative, nothing exceptional—what she wanted was a standard and dominant masculine tread. If a woman’s walk, whether helpless or seductive, was designed to attract attention, then a man’s was purely territorial, staking claim, measuring out in footfalls what was his. It was this she practised over and over, pacing it to perfection, working it into her whole body, schooling her muscles, until the artificial and adopted walk came naturally. Defense and camouflage. When she was at large in the world, she would invite neither prying nor preying eyes. No more gracious swaying and lilting for her. No more being rooted in place like a bloody useless flower.
As for her hair, that was merely a question of redistribution. Not all men were hirsute, shaggy as apes. Grif had packed a razor and so must needs shave, although Avice had never taken the opportunity to run her hand along his cheek, to discover for herself how far from boyhood his face had advanced. She stood before the dresser mirror and gazed at her own, then grabbed two fistfuls of her long, dark brown hair and held it up, tangled and in disarray after her troubled and sleepless night. The colour of muck, she thought, of mouldering leaves. Dark was better than fair—but what was to be done with it? If she wanted to play both Adam and Eve, she’d need to step back and forth through the screen of this hair. She could try to keep it tucked under a hat, but knew that the stuff fed too directly on her brain for that: it was wilful hair and was bound to make its own escape no matter how firmly she secured it in place.
She snapped open Grif’s razor and began to cut, but carefully, preserving every strand, laying it down on the dresser. She decided to have it fashioned into a hairpiece, perfect for when she was the missus. Who knows, at some point she might even require an infant, a hair baby with knots for eyes, tightly swaddled and held close to her breast.
Avice worked slowly and made a beautiful job of it, even she had to admit. Her hair lay in a curled mound, an animal newly formed. Light-headed, she leaned toward the mirror until the tip of her nose scaled its cool surface. A shrewd-eyed imp stared at her, close enough to kiss.
She couldn’t help it. She arched back, hands gripping the dresser, and let out a yelp of laughter.
By late afternoon a bribe or two had been dispensed, a few purchases made, bags (his and hers) packed and sent ahead. She was packed, although not in the usual sense, for she had stationed herself inside him, her male equivalent. She felt a bit like a tourist in her own body, peering out, ready to take in the sights with a fresh pair of eyes. Admittedly, she was nervous, fussing with last-minute preparations, straightening a cuff, dusting off her lapel, surveying the room one last time to see if there was any telling clue, anything of herself—or himself—left behind. She was ready, more or less. Smoking, swearing—she’d get the hang of these in time, these and whatever other useful male practices of bluster and release there might be. It was funny, when she thought of it, how women were expected to be so contained (as she was now) despite their reputation for sociability, for nagging and chatter. But no more.
Pausing on the threshold of the honeymoon suite, she was amused to think how she would be carrying herself over it, like any bride entering a new life. Except that she was heading out, not in.
She supposed that she had Grif to thank for this, but she was not planning on thanking him. Naturally, she would honour her marriage vows. How did they go … until death do you part, wasn’t that it? Fine. That was one vow she’d keep, the sooner the better. What had been conceived on their wedding night she’d gestate and nurture in the darkest, foulest part of herself.
She stepped out the door, her new, pricey boots fitting like skin, adding a dash of confidence to her step. She sailed down the hall as one, a happy couple united in boldness, a pair who couldn’t have been closer, and more married, if they tried.