For my own honor is no longer a thing that I can cherish.
Was it a day ago, or three, when I changed my clothing to a cleaner set and retrieved Albert’s card from my stained and dirty valise? With Charlotte at my front, I walked through a haze of heat and dust to the building on Chestnut Street—but this time the guard wouldn’t let me past. Most likely because I held a baby and was not clean, he disbelieved that I had legitimate business with Mr. Burnham.
So I waited in the sun, against the wall of a building across the street, as the guard kept his eyes on me. My body ached from lack of sleep and the strain of holding Charlotte and the valise. When at last a clock struck noon, Albert emerged.
Not daring to speak with him in sight of the guard, I followed him several blocks to a tavern and approached him inside. After a moment’s disorientation, he invited me to sit on the next barstool.
I whispered that I was ready to take the opportunity for work and lodging that he’d offered.
“Splendid,” he said with less enthusiasm than he might have. “You’ve got sense after all. And you’ve retrieved your baby, I see.” He gave a measured smile. “I’ll bring you to the apartment. But wet your whistle first.”
I was thirsty, so very thirsty. I accepted the drink he ordered from the stern-faced barkeep. It was a beer, my first. It tasted like the smell of urine. With the valise at my feet and Charlotte in my shawl, I took several sips, not minding how the effervescence rose to my brain. I took another sip, but Albert disapproved of my timid method. Grabbing the mug, he quaffed the frothy liquid, then banged the mug onto the bar and slid it back my way.
“Don’t be dainty, Miss de Jong,” he admonished. “It isn’t a cup of tea.”
The barkeep snickered, his body half turned to us as he dried a glass with a cloth.
“All right.” I took gulps of the bitter stuff, relieving my dry throat. Albert finished his own drink. At my final gulp, I noted a wobbliness in my mind.
“Let’s get you settled,” he said, petting my shoulder with a new forwardness. “And you can clean yourself up.”
I leaned to his ear and whispered. “It’ll be ten dollars today and twenty dollars on the first of each month?” It relieved me to be making these arrangements.
He nodded. “As I said.” Getting to his feet with some care, he added, “You’ll like the apartment. Very private.”
After having not even a square of floor to call my own, much less a wall or a door to shield me and Charlotte, I told him that privacy would be quite welcome.
He took the valise from me, and we walked to a neighborhood thick with taverns, markets, and boardinghouses. His apartment was in a new brick building near the Delaware River. Slowed by the heat, we ascended five flights of stairs. He unlocked the door and we stepped directly into the kitchen—very small, but the most modern such place I’d ever seen. Against its paste-white walls sat a new stove, cupboards, and an icebox. It had an indoor sink with a faucet, so water wouldn’t need to be hauled up and down, and a long metal tub for bathing. After we huffed a moment from the steep ascent, Albert excused himself and stepped into what might have been a water closet—since a sound of urination emerged.
I stood by the tub, embarrassed, holding Charlotte and my valise, aware of the stickiness of my skin and wishing for a thorough washing. The apartment was stifling hot, but it had a dry and pleasant smell. Charlotte stared into the air, perhaps watching the dust motes that hung in the sunlight. I kissed her moist forehead. Then I looked through the doorway to the second room.
It held a middling-sized bed in a wooden frame. On its walls were an assortment of photographs, each perhaps eight inches high, that I quickly perceived to be lewd. One showed a woman from behind, leaning away from the camera; her bare bottom and thighs took up much of the picture. Over her shoulder, her eyes were saucily appraising. There were a dozen such pictures. Did Albert know these women? Would he aim to turn me into such a one?
I was appalled; yet a shred of me rose like some maggot from a rotting feast and said, Why be ashamed? Why not love pleasure?
As I observed these sensations, aware also of the swell of alcohol in my blood, Albert left the closet and exclaimed over the “dratted heat.” He opened the main room’s windows, then removed his jacket and vest and stood before me. His high-waisted pants were held up by red suspenders, and sweat marked his shirt. Soon I would be pressed against that body. This seemed less desirable than I’d imagined in those fleeting seconds at his office.
“It’s nice no one can see in,” he said, gesturing to the uncurtained windows. “We’re the tallest building on the block.” He spoke with an ease I hadn’t seen in him before. “Make yourself at home! Put down your things.” Taking note of the baby in my shawl, he grabbed a kitchen towel from a rail on the wall and laid it in the tub. “You can rest her here. Take off some clothing!”
“If thee would give me a moment.” My voice was diminished by the strangeness. “I’ll get her to sleep and clean myself.”
I was grateful when Albert stretched his body upon the bed in the next room and turned his face away. I didn’t want his eyes to watch—to corrupt the acts of caring for my baby.
I changed Charlotte’s diaper and blanket, then fed her till she slept and placed her in the tub, hoping she’d rest through whatever would follow. Fetching a towel and filling a tin pan at the sink’s faucet, I wiped all the places I could reach under my clothing, rinsing the towel several times. At last I stepped into the other room and stood before the bed.
Albert had removed every bit of his clothing. He turned to me on the bed and laughed. “You can’t mean to stay dressed!”
Though I was frightened, the sight of his lithe and muscled form did send a jolt through the place between my thighs. I removed my skirt and bodice but kept on my chemise and corset, as well as the stockings suspended from them. I lay beside him.
In seconds he was looming over me, supported by his outstretched arms, his breath more alcohol than air. He accosted my mouth with his larger one, so that I moved my face backward to reduce the pressure. Then he raised my chemise upward and rubbed his stiffened—I’ll have to write it—penis into my thighs.
“Have you ever put one of these in your mouth?” he asked.