Louisa and the Crystal Gazer Read online

  The excitement soon turned to a less exalted emotion when my eyes beheld the pile of shirts I had agreed to sew for Reverend Ezra Gannett. The reverend was an energetic preacher, and often left the pulpit with a torn seam or ripped buttonhole, and so his wardrobe was in constant need of renewal.

  Next to my sewing basket was a pile of papers—my stories, my openings and experiments for “blood and thunder” stories about damsels in distress, evil suitors, and dark family secrets.

  But my writing had come to a standstill, as it sometimes does, leaving me prey to a mood so somber as to be called despondency, for fear that the part of my imagination that created stories might never awaken again. Always it feels so. I am thankful it has never proven so.

  I stitched seams long into the night, listening to the crackling of the fire and the occasional muffled burst of laughter from the downstairs parlor, where Auntie Bond and her friends played cards. I could hear their voices but not their words, and the indistinct sounds added a dreamlike quality to the winter night. The flames cast shadows about the room, and my fatigue made me see movement in dark corners, though I knew nothing moved there. How easy it would be to pretend that there was something of the supernatural in that room, where voices floated in from nowhere, where shadows danced. It was the kind of dreamy mood that allowed one to think it possible to converse with the dear departed.

  As I sat over my sewing, I wondered what kind of woman would choose to take advantage of that weakness of the heart and mind and set herself up as a crystal gazer.

  Mrs. Percy and her activities had filled many newspaper columns in the three months since she had taken up residence in Boston. Most of the reports were unfavorable, yet her client list grew daily.

  I tried to imagine Mrs. Percy, thinking of nothing as superficial as hair color but of the state of her soul and her disposition.

  Instantly, as I pushed my needle in and out of the fine linen shirts in the dim candlelight, there came a voice in my imagination. “I was poor and plain, with no accomplishments or charms of mind or person, and yet Philip loved me,” it whispered. I do not know the source of these voices, only that they lead to stories, and I follow.

  And since the story was already begun, I knew I would go with Sylvia to the séance room. It would be amusing, and perhaps Mrs. Percy would inspire and help create the story begun that evening in my imagination.

  Sleep came easily that night, after my two hours at my desk—I used to sleep so well, when those pages were filled!

  Sylvia and I met the next day, at five o’clock in the afternoon, in front of Mrs. Agatha D. Percy’s house on Arlington Street. It was already quite dark in that late-winter afternoon and very atmospheric, with snow sliding down the sky in front of the gas streetlamps and the carriage horses in their striped blankets, their breath steaming before them. I suppose very few mediums meet with their clientele in full daylight, I thought.

  “This is to be a very select group,” Sylvia said with satisfaction. “I understand it is by invitation. She does not receive just anybody.”

  “Sylvia,” I said, “you sound remarkably like your mother.”

  “You see, Louy?” Sylvia said. “I do need a masculine presence to bring balance to my life.”

  Mrs. Percy’s home was a modest brick structure in a good neighborhood filled with similar brick establishments. Her house showed signs of recent improvements, though the building itself was not old. The green shutters were new and designed to exclude all light when pulled shut. A brighter-colored brick on the west side showed that the little sunroom had just been added—perhaps, I thought, for unexpected entrances of “phantoms.” Broken vines and rose canes indicated some adjustment had been made to the east side as well. I decided to take careful mental notes and describe it in a letter to Mother, along with the events of the séance, for her opinion.

  Sylvia rang the bell, her eyes as wide as a child’s at Christmas. A servant answered the door and showed us into a little waiting room.

  The maid, a pretty girl of nineteen or so, wore an expensive white lace mantilla held in place with a garnet hatpin, rather than the usual lace cap of the parlormaid. Instead of a sensible brown frock, she wore red petticoats with a purple apron over them trimmed in glass beads. From the numerous sausage curls hanging beside her unnaturally rosy cheeks and the excessive swaying of her skirts as she walked, it was plain the girl needed a mother’s stern guidance. Here was the perfect project for Abba!

  “Your name?” I asked.

  “Suzie,” the girl replied saucily. “Miss Suzie Dear.”

  “Indeed,” said Sylvia, studying her with interest.

  “Mrs. Percy begs your patience,” said the maid with more pomp and circumstance in her voice. “She has not yet achieved the exact quietude required for summoning the spirits.”

  “You mean she is behind schedule,” grumbled a man who sat before the fire warming his hands. “Bad policy. Should never keep a crowd waiting.” He half rose and nodded in our direction. Mr. Phineas Taylor Barnum, the greatest showman on earth himself!

  Who would not have recognized him, with that broad forehead, tightly curling black hair just starting to turn gray at the temples, those piercing gray eyes, and that firm chin? His image had been before the public on an almost daily basis for many years, in the papers, broadsheets, and books, including as a frontispiece in his own hugely successful autobiography published just the year before. Oh, how that book had sold! Some twenty thousand copies in just months. I admit to envy. Would I ever write anything that sold as well? (Many years later, you realize, my own Little Women outsold him by many hundreds of thousands, to my perpetual delight.)

  But what, I wondered then, could the wealthy, prosperous Mr. Barnum want of a crystal gazer?

  The famous—or should I say notorious?—showman was dressed in a dark suit and would have been indistinguishable from any number of somewhat corpulent middle-aged men of business, except that his face was so very well-known. The quickness of his gaze bespoke an extraordinarily active imagination, but there was a furtiveness in his manner, a hesitancy of movement, an unexpected sliding back and forth of the eyes, that indicated all was not well with him.

  “At your service, ladies,” he said. “Mr. Phineas Barnum.” He extended his hand.

  “Miss Louisa Alcott, and my friend Miss Sylvia Shattuck.” I sat on a settee opposite him.

  “Alcott, Alcott,” he mused, plucking at his velvet lapels. “Is your father the philosopher Bronson Alcott?”

  “He is.”

  “Well, then.” Mr. Barnum screwed up his mouth and looked into the distance, then returned his gaze to me. “I am a man of quick decision. I have a proposal for him. I have heard of his ‘conversations.’ I would like to introduce events of significance, not just entertainment, to the American Museum. Would your father be interested in exhibiting there?”

  Father, kind reader, earned a dollar now and then by giving private lectures in homes to discuss issues of public morality and personal conscience.

  Sylvia’s mouth twitched. For a moment I allowed myself the luxury of imagining my noble philosopher father onstage, next to perhaps a lion and tamer or an acrobat, discoursing to the crowd on abolitionism or the progress of the soul.

  “I will mention your idea to him,” I answered demurely, “but I think such a large and very public arrangement might not suit his method of education.”

  “Of course, of course,” muttered Mr. Barnum with a downcast expression, and I saw I had given offense, despite the gentleness of the response. “I am not having a lucky year. Signor Massimo also declined my offer to appear at the American Museum.”

  Mr. Barnum seemed so forlorn that I felt I should make amends somehow. “I’ve heard that Signor Massimo will not play for large crowds in public,” I said. “He has the same philosophy of performance as Father, that smaller groups benefit more.”

  “I, too, am an admirer of the philosopher of Concord,” spoke up a second middle-aged gentleman who had s
tood upon our entry and waited, patiently, for us to acknowledge him. “I am Mr. William Phips.”

  “Phips of Canton?” asked Mr. Barnum, excited and recovered from his disappointment over Father.

  Mr. Phips bowed. “At your service,” he answered modestly. I studied him as closely as the dim light in the reception room allowed. He was tall, solidly built, and well muscled in spite of his fifty or so years. An outdoorsman, I thought. One who rides every morning, and bathes in cold water even in winter. He wore a dark suit of thick cloth cut in military fashion, with crossed-over lapels and tight breeches. He wished people to remember his military service, his clothing said. But his smile was ingratiating.

  “I am amazed, sir, to meet you!” said Mr. Barnum. “As true a hero as ever lived!”

  “Well, life requires boldness, sir,” said Mr. Phips modestly. He seemed not at all bold to me.

  “What is Canton?” asked Sylvia.

  “Why, this man is a champion!” boomed Mr. Barnum. “In 1839, single-handedly, he fought off a hundred Chinamen! The story ran in the papers for weeks! Enthralled, sir, I was enthralled!”

  “A mere dozen, not a hundred,” said Mr. Phips. “And not single-handedly. My friend August Pincher was with me, though he did not make it out, poor boy.” Mr. Phips shook his head sorrowfully.

  “Who was August Pincher?” I asked.

  “A friend, Miss Alcott. A friend unlike any other, who fell in battle.” Then his face brightened, and, seeing Sylvia’s and my confusion, he deigned to enlighten us.

  “I was a private guard with the East India Company, protecting the Canton traders,” he said, pulling on his lapels and puffing out his cheeks.

  “Ah. The East India Company. I believe Father owned some stocks in it,” said Sylvia. “We have a curio cabinet filled with Indian silver vases. They are very lovely.”

  Barnum smiled indulgently. “Dear girl,” he said, “your vases are the proverbial tip of the iceberg. England’s empire and wealth were built by that company.”

  “I wish they had stopped with vases,” I said. “The company’s importation of opium from India to China was wicked. They encouraged the Chinese to partake in a habit that is deadly.”

  “But the trade imbalance had to be righted,” Barnum said. “The opium trade helps pay for that English tea you drink in the afternoon.”

  That, dear reader, was exactly what Father had said when the Opium Wars began, and why the Alcott family began drinking sage tea grown in our own garden.

  Mr. Phips cleared his throat and returned to the telling of his tale, having stood as long as he could the usurpation of his limelight by Mr. Barnum. “When that tyrant Lin Tse-Hsu decided to end the opium trade, he besieged our headquarters and sent assassins. I discovered a plot to murder Lancelot Dent, the most important trader of the Chamber. Lin sent a dozen men, all armed, to kill that one man. But August Pincher and I foiled him. We fought off the assassins and saved Dent, though August was mortally wounded.”

  “A true hero!” Barnum repeated, and I began to find his adoration a bit trying. It was a cruel and unfair war, Father had proclaimed of those events years before.

  “You were wounded—” Mr. Barnum stopped in midsentence. In his face shone the enthusiasm of the hero-worshiping young boy, though the enthusiasm was now crowned with wrinkles, and strands of gray grizzled his thick black curls.

  Mr. Phips held up a hand in protest. “We must not discuss war injuries in front of the ladies. So, you are our famous philosopher’s daughter?” He focused on me, returning the conversation to the topic of my father.

  “I heard Mr. Bronson pontificate one evening last year in Concord,” spoke up a woman who had been sitting primly in a deeply shadowed corner of the parlor and observing us silently.

  Sylvia and I turned in her direction. It is a rare personage who can occupy a room and so completely prevent my knowledge of her till she wishes to be acknowledged. This woman was an expert at secrecy.

  She was a year or two older than myself, I guessed, about twenty-five, and very pretty, though she had worked hard to downplay her native beauty. She had dressed entirely in an unflattering shade of brown and wore a plain bonnet with no lace or floral trim. Until she leaned forward and let the fire reflect on her fair complexion and pale hair, she was a shadow within the shadows.

  “Miss Amelia Snodgrass,” she said in almost a whisper. “Did I hear that you are Miss Alcott? Just last month I read the Flower Fables to my little nieces. Such a charming book, Miss Alcott. Will there be others?”

  “Thank you. I hope there will be many others,” I answered. I had worked all summer on a new collection of woodland fables, hoping for a Christmas market for the book, but had yet to find a publisher.

  “Have you come for the séance?” asked Sylvia.

  “Why else? I wish to see her with my own eyes,” said Miss Snodgrass.

  If P. T. Barnum was famous for his very public life, Miss Amelia Snodgrass was equally well-known, in certain rarefied circles, for her very private life. She was a member of one of those numerous Boston families that are rich in history but poor in funds, people who live quietly behind somewhat dingy lace curtains, using their grandmother’s silver plate and their great-grandfather’s furniture, and speaking, when they spoke, of events a hundred years old. Such people never die; they simply fade quietly away till one day one notices they are no longer shopping at Waterstone’s linen shop.

  Miss Amelia Snodgrass had recently, though, made herself an exception to that familiar biography. Her mother, for whom she had spent the past decade caring, had passed away, and she had announced her engagement to Wilmot Green, the eldest son of Green and Green Shippers and Importers. Once wed, she would be well able to replace those aged curtains and furnishings.

  But why, I wondered, does she dress in such unattractive manner? She is in a costume of sorts. What tableau is she playing?

  We had just finished exchanging pleasantries when Suzie Dear returned to the parlor, carrying a brass tray of teacups and tiny biscuits folded in a strange manner.

  “Cook’s a Chinawoman,” she explained with distaste. “We had noodle salad for supper yesterday. Imagine such a thing.”

  Suzie stood in the doorway, and over her shoulder I saw a small woman dressed in blue brocade trousers and tunic, peering in at us with evident curiosity.

  “Chinese? Is she, now?” asked Mr. Phips, interested. He rose, but as soon as he moved the woman in blue turned and fled, her long black braid swaying against her back. Mr. Phips sat back down, and Suzie passed the tea and biscuits.

  “Orientals!” exclaimed Miss Snodgrass with disapproval. “I suppose it is because it is so very difficult to acquire decent help these days that so many are resorting to Irish and Orientals. We are late. When will Mrs. Percy receive us?” This question was directed to Suzie Dear.

  “Soon, I expect. More people are coming for this séance. A Mr. and Mrs. Deeds, and an Eye-talian, a Signor Massimo, have been invited.” Suzie put the tray on the table and left with a toss of her curls.

  Signor Massimo? Meeting the great pianist would be almost as wonderful as hearing him play. Now I was pleased I had come.

  “Oh, late, late!” trilled another woman’s voice. I looked up and saw two other people standing in the doorway, led there by buxom Suzie Dear.

  Miss Snodgrass shot Suzie a look of repugnance, of hatred almost, if I may use such a strong word.

  The newly arrived woman who had trilled was fanning herself furiously and leaning against the doorjamb as if she would faint. “Oh, my, my,” she exclaimed. “Late, late!”

  “Yes, she is,” boomed P. T. Barnum’s deep voice. “Bad policy, keeping customers waiting.”

  “I referred to myself,” said the woman petulantly. “Have I delayed the séance?”

  “You have not,” said Sylvia. “Mrs. Percy has delayed us. And Mr. Massimo, who is not here yet.”

  “Oh, my,” trilled our most recent arrival. She turned to the man at her side. “W
e have not delayed them. Isn’t that fortuitous, Mr. Deeds, isn’t that fortuitous?”

  “Indeed,” he replied. “But I thought we were not to speak names here?”

  Really? No one had informed Sylvia and myself of that requirement. Or perhaps the Deedses wished even more privacy than Amelia Snodgrass, who cringed in the shadows away from the light.

  “Oh!” And the creature, Mrs. Deeds, fanned herself even more vigorously. “Do forgive me, dear!”

  “Too late,” boomed Barnum. “We have made introductions all around.”

  “Rude to do otherwise, rude,” said the new arrival, clicking her fan shut with a practiced gesture. “I am Mrs. Deeds, Mrs. Ezra Deeds. My husband.”

  Jack Spratt and wife, I thought. She was as large as he was thin. Middle-aged, matronly, overdone with lace and floral corsages, and rings glittering on all her fingers but her thumbs. A huge diamond brooch flashed on her bosom, and about her throat she wore a thick collar of pearls from which was suspended a large diamond surrounded by emeralds. It was an evening piece, most inappropriate for daytime, but even so, it was beautiful.

  Miss Snodgrass stared at the new arrival as if stupefied, her mouth open but no sound coming out of it.

  “A lovely necklace, Mrs. Deeds,” said Mr. Barnum, tilting his head closer to see it better.

  “A new piece in my collection,” said Mrs. Deeds.

  “On loan, not yet paid for.” Mr. Deeds sighed. “There is a disagreement over its price.”

  Mrs. Deeds pinched his arm—”Men will speak of such matters!” she protested gaily—and her husband moved quickly into a corner of the parlor, taking a place next to Amelia Snodgrass and becoming a second shadow within the shadows.

  An uncomfortable silence settled over the room. I gazed at my hands in my lap so that I would not stare impolitely into faces; Sylvia studied the wallpaper. Mrs. Deeds glared covetously at the new-fashioned mantel clock, a large, carved affair with much gilding and chiming of bells on the quarter hour. Mr. Barnum had sunk into his chair, deep into his own thoughts, and Mr. Phips sat as upright and patient as granite, his face stiff.