Chapter Seventeen
Nellie had never ridden on an ocean ferry. In fact, prior to moving to Manhattan, she had never been on water in anything larger than a rowboat, and that was at age eight. Fortunately Long Island Sound was so calm and the New England light so clear that she could lean over the rail and practically touch the enormous schools of fish swimming alongside.
Breathing in thick salty air for the first time, she sat on the deck and looked over the newspapers she had bought that morning for the ride. The big story in all of them (other than the World) was the publication in the Los Angeles Times of the letter from Lord Sackville-West, the British ambassador to Washington, to “Mr. Murchison of California,” stating Her Majesty’s Government’s preference for the election of Mr. Cleveland rather than Mr. Harrison to the American presidency. Every newspaper had an editorial comment. If one didn’t know better, one would have thought from the outpouring of indignation that all the publishers were Irish.
Nellie knew that for the next two months, until the election, the Sun and Herald and the rest of them would unrelentingly proclaim that “Grover Cleveland is Britain’s truest friend in America.” No self-respecting Irishman would ever vote for Cleveland now. The Republicans would be returning to the White House.
And yet Nellie did not think the election much mattered. Elected politicians, even the president himself, did not have the real power in the country. That lay with the rich, people like Carnegie and Frick and Hilton. The politicians simply did their bidding and diverted public attention from the real goings-on. Elections were a bone tossed out to entertain the populace.
The real reason she didn’t pay much attention to the stories, however, was that she could think only about the Emma story. She had high hopes for her journey to New England. Mrs. Ward Howe had written back immediately, handing her reply to the World reporter who had delivered the telegram: “Will meet you tomorrow at Newport harbor. Take the morning ferry. Eager to hear about the women’s asylum.” Nellie was flattered to be recognized by such an iconic figure but more pleased that Mrs. Ward Howe was so willing to cooperate. Nellie had been hoping simply for an item to verify the poisoning. Now she might obtain some insight into Emma’s personal life as well.
Julia Ward Howe was a particular hero of Nellie’s. Ward Howe had started the phenomenon of women’s study clubs, which initially began as reading groups but eventually transformed into community service organizations throughout the country. After Howe had established the New England Women’s Club, the Boston Transcript had warned that “Homes will be ruined, children neglected. Woman is straying from the home.” It was the absurdity of that proclamation, in fact, that spurred Nellie to join the women’s study club in Pittsburg.
She was puzzled, however, as to why Howe had chosen to meet in Newport. Mrs. Howe was already in Portsmouth, her home. Newport was thirty miles away, an unwelcome journey for a woman in her seventies. What was the point of meeting there? It was mid-October, and the summer crowd would have left Newport weeks ago.
As the ferry approached Newport, Nellie saw immediately why those who could afford it would flock there every summer. It was an emerald jewel island in the middle of a beautiful ocean, surrounded by a ring of brilliantly colored hills, the leaves already turned on a breathtaking fall day. The light was as clear as any she had ever seen, with none of the yellow-gray skies of eastern cities. In fact, she couldn’t even spot a smokestack on the entire island. Newport was the playground of the wealthy, and nothing as base as manufacturing would sully their holiday.
A stringpole servant in his late fifties, in black waistcoat and tails, approached her as she stepped off the dock.
“Miss Bly?”
“Yes?”
“Good day, miss. My name is Mathews. I am employed by Mrs. Howe.” He reached for her bags.
“Thank you, Mathews.” He led her along the dock.
“Tell me,” she said, “is it far to Mrs. Howe’s home?”
“About twenty minutes, miss. But I’m not sure what madam has planned. You can ask her yourself.”
At the end of the dock, a horse and carriage was parked on the street. Seated in the back was an elderly, pear-shaped woman with a ruddy complexion, piercing almond-shaped eyes, floppy dark bonnet, and black dress with high collar.
“How was your journey, my dear?”
“Excellent, Mrs. Howe. Thank you.”
The older woman extended her hand to help Nellie up into the carriage. Her grip was surprisingly strong.
“Your stomach is heartier than mine. I never cared much for the ocean. Mathews, take us to Potter’s Inn. Miss Bly must be famished.”
The carriage started away from the docks and turned on to Thames Street, a thoroughfare of shops that ran along the water. Because the summer season was over, most of the shops and markets were closed.
“I enjoyed your stories on the women’s asylum, my dear. You showed remarkable ingenuity.”
Nellie was genuinely flattered. “Thank you—” was the best she could muster.
“I assume you are here to look into dear Emma’s death.”
Nellie hadn’t mentioned anything about that in her telegram.
“I may live a long way from New York,” Howe explained, “but some things are clear even to an old woman like me. You are obviously exceptional at ferreting out the truth. Pulitzer would not send you up here to write about Emma’s poetry. And it was perfectly apparent that something was terribly wrong with her besides the cancer.”
“How so?”
“Emma was an inveterate writer. Whether abroad or at home or summering here, she was always writing poems, letters, essays. Yet she stopped completely those final three months. Hardly a word. Something was making her too sick to write, and I know it wasn’t the cancer.”
A pall of hope and anxiety swept over Nellie.
“Did she write any letters to you during those final three months?”
“I brought them for you,” she said, tapping at her purse, much to Nellie’s relief. “So whom do you suspect?”
This woman had a way of getting right to the point. Nellie hesitated to reveal what she knew, but there was something about Julia that made her throw caution to the wind.
“Henry Hilton.”
“Excellent, my dear.” Julia nodded approvingly and took Nellie’s hand in both of hers. “We are going to have a lovely afternoon. I hope you like fish.”
They stopped at an inn with narrow wooden doors and a sign with a poorly painted fish over the entrance. Mathews helped them both down to the cobblestones, and they stepped inside to a room with half a dozen tables, a bar, and a low fire. The place was thick with the smell of fish, an aroma Nellie had her fill of on the boat ride to Newport, but fortunately it was also redolent with potatoes, onions, and steaming milk, smells she was more accustomed to. A gaunt man with gnarled hands and a face sculpted by a harsh wind greeted them.
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Howe.”
“Good afternoon, Harold. How is the fish soup today?”
‘I’ve outdone myself, if you will pardon the immodesty.”
“I will not only pardon it, Harold, I will reward it. A bowl for my companion, and one for myself.”
Julia, apparently having the run of the place, walked over to a table in the corner and sat down. For the first time, Nellie was able to see her face. She had deep wrinkles from character more than age, yet there was a fire and youthful twinkle in her eyes.
“We have less than three hours, my dear. So let’s get straight to it, shall we?” Julia saw Nellie’s disappointment immediately.
“Three hours will be enough time. I promise. And I will not be much use to you after that, if I’m not asleep before then.”
“I was hoping to hear you sing the ‘Battle Hymn.’ ”
Julia smiled. “Now I see how you got to the bottom of the asylum story. Perhaps in a while. Tell me, what is it you want to know?”
“First, may I have the letters? A friend is convinced he can perform a scientific analysis that will prove Emma was murdered.”
“I have seen enough of science not to doubt its possibilities.” She handed Nellie a half dozen letters tied with a ribbon.
“That was simpler than I expected,” Nellie said with relief.
“What is your next question?”
“Why are you so sure Judge Hilton is involved?”
Julia looked at her in surprise, her bushy eyebrows sinking into the cracks of her forehead.
“Who else could it be? She was making his life extremely difficult. He despised her for it.”
“That’s what I don’t understand. The boycott happened eleven years before her death. After all that time, why would he accelerate her death when she was about to die anyhow?”
“This was not about the boycott,” Julia scoffed. “This concerned the tribal land at Montauk.”
Nellie looked at her, mystified.
“You don’t know about this?”
“No.”
The innkeeper brought two bowls of the fish soup. “Here it is, Mrs. Howe,” he murmured. “I’ll stake my reputation on this one.”
“Your reputation would survive even that soup they serve down the street.”
Pleased to be praised by the great woman, he set down the bowls and left.
“Are you aware of a man named Austin Corbin?” Julia asked Nellie.
“He owns railroads.”
“He holds a monopoly on train transportation on Long Island and in much of New England. Mr. Corbin is a very wealthy man and a very twisted man. He and Judge Hilton share a hatred for Jews. The American Society for the Suppression of Jews is their joint enterprise.”
When Nellie had read about Judge Hilton in the World archives, she came across numerous stories about the organization that turned her stomach. “We pledge ourselves to spare no effort to remand the Jews to the condition that they were in the Middle Ages or to exterminate them utterly,” Corbin and his supporters had proclaimed.
“Judge Hilton, as you must know, squandered much of the fortune he inherited from A.T. Stewart—himself also a person not to my liking—and received an appropriate amount of ridicule for it. Apparently he was determined to prove the world wrong and demonstrate he could make a success of himself in ways beyond the good fortune of inheritance. He approached his friend Corbin and offered to supply him with capital he might need for any venture of his choice. Corbin, I’m told, had one in mind, a project so ambitious it was beyond even his means. I’m not sure what it was exactly, but Emma apparently stumbled across it and incurred their wrath.”
“She never mentioned it to you?”
“No, only that a young woman had written seeking her help, and that the woman’s cause was legitimate. She said that Hilton, in his crude way, even confronted her on the street about it when she was walking with her sisters. Here she was barely able to stand, and he began screaming at her, in threatening and coarse language. What a horrible man. How is your soup?”
“Excellent.” Nellie made a point of eating around the fish and concentrating on the potatoes and onions. “And you have no idea what the venture was?”
“She never told me. Only that it involved the Montauk tribe on Long Island.”
“I know nothing about them.”
“Well, you will find out all you need to know soon enough, my dear. There is a ferry from Newport to Sag Harbor in a little over two hours. I have arranged for the woman who sought out poor Emma to meet you at the dock. She and I have been in correspondence since Emma’s death.”
Suddenly Nellie glimpsed the depth and intelligence of Julia Ward Howe. “That is very kind of you.”
“Not at all. Now, during these next two hours I thought we would finish our lunch and then I would show you some items of Emma’s past. The more you know about the dear girl, the better your story will be, I imagine.”
“As long as I hear a verse before I leave.”
“If you insist, my dear.”
“I do.”
“How did you become so close with Miss Lazarus?”
They strolled along Thames Street, arm in arm, with the carriage trailing behind.
“You know about Emerson taking her under his wing?”
“Yes.”
“He urged me to invite her for tea. She was only fifteen at the time, but her brilliance outshone everyone in the parlor. I suspect she found me boring.”
They stopped at a white Colonial building with two rows of four arched windows on each side and a Jewish star in front.
“This is the Touro synagogue, the oldest in North America,” said Julia. “Emma’s great-great-grandparents were the founding members.”
They walked up three steps and inside to a large meeting hall with dark red carpeting and a balcony supported by twelve pillars. Over the ark on the east wall was a hundred-year-old painting of the Ten Commandments.
“After the Revolution, when the country first achieved independence, Emma’s great-great-grandfather invited George Washington to visit the congregation. Their exchange of letters is the most stirring I have ever read. Washington’s reply is by the side wall.”
Nellie walked over to a glass case near the staircase leading to the second floor. In the case was a letter, handwritten in ink on parchment paper.
To the Hebrew Congregation in Newport Rhode Island.
Gentlemen,
While I receive, with much satisfaction, your Address replete with expressions of affection and esteem; I rejoice in the opportunity of assuring you, that I shall always retain a grateful remembrance of the cordial welcome I experienced in my visit to Newport, from all classes of Citizens.
The reflection on the days of difficulty and danger which are past is rendered the more sweet, from a consciousness that they are succeeded by days of uncommon prosperity and security. If we have wisdom to make the best use of the advantages with which we are now favored, we cannot fail, under the just administration of a good Government, to become a great and happy people.
The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent national gifts. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.
It would be inconsistent with the frankness of my character not to avow that I am pleased with your favorable opinion of my Administration, and fervent wishes for my felicity. May the children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree, and there shall be none to make him afraid. May the father of all mercies scatter light and not darkness in our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in his own due time and way everlastingly happy.
G. Washington
“That was Emma’s heritage, and she took it seriously. I remember the first time she visited here, as a girl of seventeen. She was never the same. And if that weren’t enough …”
Julia walked up three short steps to the bima, the lectern overlooking the congregation, and pointed to a square piece of carpeting.
“Miss Bly, do you mind lifting that?”
Nellie bent down and found a seam in the carpeting. She lifted the cloth and saw the handle to a door in the floor.
“Open it, if you would,” said Julia.
Nellie lifted the door and saw a large room paneled with wood and benches.
“This was used by Patriots fighting the British and then by runaway slaves before the Emancipation. Congregants would hide them here, and if the authorities ever came by, there were tunnels that led to escape. Emma treated it as a calling. Her poems switched from odes to love and life to the plight of her people, the plights of all peoples. Oh, her family did not like that, but no matter. Eventually came the boycott with Hilton and the Stewart Department store and then her work with the immigrants.”
“Apparently her sisters were not similarly affected.”
“No.”
“They showed no interest whatsoever in her death. They would not even discuss it, as if it would embarrass them.”
“I’m not surprised. Come.”
They walked outside to the carriage. Julia held on to Nellie as they walked down the steps. The moment they were on flat surface, Julia sped up again. Nellie had trouble keeping up.
“Mathews, the Beeches, on Bellevue Avenue.”
Mathews helped Julia into the carriage, followed by Nellie.
“Not long after Washington’s visit, the capital of Rhode Island moved to Providence, along with the seaworthy traffic. Many of the Hebrew families left Newport and moved to New York. That included Emma’s family, in the 1830s. But the family wanted to maintain a connection to Newport. And so they built the Beeches.”
“Their home has a name?”
“All the mansions in Newport do, my dear. But theirs was the first.”
They rode along Bellevue Avenue and arrived at a three-story mansion with a wraparound porch and deck that Nellie estimated from the number of windows to have eight bedrooms. It was one of the largest homes she had ever seen.
“This was their summer home?”
“When Emma was a young girl of twenty, we would have tea and parlor games here every Monday. The house was very warm in those days, filled with laughter. The war was over and everyone was free of serious worries. But then Mr. Gould tried to corner the gold market, a great panic set in, and the mood turned somber again.”
Nellie thought better than to tell her that she had met Gould and he had actually provided useful information.
“And then came the incident with Mr. Seligman,” said Nellie.
“Yes. And her work with the immigrants. Emma rarely made it back here.” Julia referred to the house with a sweeping gesture.
“This is the dichotomy of the Lazarus family, and indeed of many families in America. You have the side that helps patriots and runaway slaves and the other that lives like robber barons. And each is embarrassed by the other.”
They arrived at the dock for the ferry to Orient Point with little time to spare. On the carriage ride, Julia had indeed sung a verse of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” but insisted Nellie sing along with her. Julia’s voice was strong, the conviction coming from deep inside, on this song that Nellie had sung hundreds of times. Nellie’s heart swelled at the experience, and her spirit soared like never before with “His truth is marching on.”
Just as Nellie was about to leave Julia to walk onto the ferry, Julia took her by the arm and spoke earnestly.
“Your task will not be an easy one, my dear. Hilton and Corbin are powerful men. But do not despair. If we could defeat slavery, anything is possible.”