A Bloodsmoor Romance

  “That’s never a little girl playing up there,” the maid Vanda once remarked in the kitchen, in Octavia’s presence, “that’s a grown-up man: a spirit.”

  Indeed, it often seemed that Deirdre did not possess the gift, in herself, but that it possessed her; streaming through her arms and fingers at the most unpredictable times. It exhausted her, alarmed her, and, less frequently, made her laugh sharply aloud, but it was not hers, and was not under her control. Tho’ Mr. Zinn forbade all manner of superstitious talk, as ill-befitting a household of the mid-nineteenth century, in which rational and scientific evolutionary principles were honored, the sisters whispered amongst themselves that Deirdre’s piano playing very likely did issue from another world. (“But where is this other world located,” Samantha asked skeptically, “and why cannot Deirdre speak of it? She has no more sense of herself, at such times, than Pip!”)

  That such eerie spells of “music” were deleterious to the child’s equilibrium, and to the natural harmony of the Octagonal House, was soon evident, and she was discouraged from exhausting herself at the piano, or to approach it only with Mrs. Zinn nearby; but the natural curiosity of the phenomenon was such, and the intermittent passages of real music so genuinely enchanting, that the child was frequently urged by one or another of her sisters to play—“just for a minute, while Mother is out!” And, sensing that this was a way of pleasing them, Deirdre rarely refused.

  (She did, it seems, wish to be liked—perhaps even loved—by her sisters, tho’ their affectionate advances to her were frequently rebuffed, out of ignorance, or embarrassment, or an unreasonable terror that they would like her, and she should be compelled to like them in return. Unhappy child! One day warm and the next day cold; one day hanging about Malvinia like a puppy, the next day resolutely looking aside when Malvinia addressed her; one day weeping and cuddling in Octavia’s arms, because “something bad” had tried to get her in the night, “a great big black bird” like the bird in one of the Mother Goose songs, and her arms and legs were stuck, in something like mud, and tho’ she screamed and screamed, no one came to help—another day, wrenching free when poor Octavia sought to comfort her, after a wicked bee had stung her arm. Of course she was younger than her sisters, at an age when every year is crucial: ten years old, to Constance Philippa’s sixteen, and Octavia’s fifteen, and Malvinia’s fourteen, and Samantha’s eleven. Tho’ she shared Samantha’s bedchamber, and tho’ Samantha made every effort, or nearly, to befriend her, it was still the case that her heaviness of heart, her great, dark, tear-bright eyes, and her habit of going mute for hours at a time, hardly endeared her to the sister closest in age to her; and the sister she most admired—pretty flighty Malvinia—would have none of her.)

  Deirdre’s uncanny ability at the piano might very well have waned of its own, like the disturbing poltergeist phenomena of a year or two later, had not Great-Aunt Edwina summoned the Zinns to Kidde­master Hall, in order that she might hear her niece play, for tales of Deirdre’s remarkable playing had wafted across the park, to the great Hall, despite the elder Zinns’ feeling that such reports should be suppressed. (For, wisely, Mr. and Mrs. Zinn understood that anything that served to distinguish little Deirdre, in the eyes of her new relatives, would also prevent her from a natural assimilation into the family.) But Great-Aunt Edwina, who had evinced remarkably little interest in the child beforehand, and who had in fact struck both the elder Zinns, and Judge and Mrs. Kidde­master, as more than ordinarily unaccommodating, in the matter of the adoption, would have her way of a sudden. And so Deirdre and the Zinns were brought across the park to the Hall, and Deirdre bade to play “anything she wished” at a piano in the first-floor music room, while, for some eccentric reason of her own, Great-Aunt Edwina insisted upon listening from an adjacent room, through a partly opened door. She wanted, she said, not to disturb the child with her presence; and she also wanted to be alone.

  Under such circumstances Deirdre was naturally uneasy, and added to her discomfiture was the foreignness of the Kidde­master piano, which was made of a bright gleaming satinwood, and trimmed with much ornamentation; and its keys, she murmured to Mrs. Zinn, were “sharp” against her fingers. Nevertheless, the plucky child seated herself on the stool, and played a few faint chords, and began “Looby-Loo,” one of the sillier of the nursery songs, experiencing no significant difficulty, yet playing quite without distinction—less skillfully, in fact, than any of her sisters. This continued for some minutes, and rather long minutes they were. The Zinns kept glancing toward the doorway, expecting Edwina to appear, if only to release Deirdre from her obligation: but that lady’s stately figure did not materialize, nor did her haughty voice ring out.

  The insipid notes of “Looby-Loo” gave way to an uninspired rendition of “I Wish I Was in Dixie’s Land,” and that to a near-inaudible attempt at “Tom, Tom the Piper’s Son,” played with very little of Samantha’s gusto, and none of her rapid-fire technical skill. Just when, however, the family anticipated an end to the embarrassing little recital, Deirdre sat up very straight at the keyboard, and began pounding maniacally away—her tiny hands flying up and down the keys, up and down, performing arabesques of notes, sly and tinkling as mountain streams, or shattered cascades of ice; guttural and heavy; and mocking; and then again sprightly, and even rather beautiful. Mrs. Zinn rose to her feet, intending to seize hold of Deirdre’s hands, and bring the noise to an end, but for some reason she found it extremely difficult to move: crossing an expanse of carpet that measured no more than ten yards took her (according to Samantha’s count) some forty-five seconds—and she felt, as she explained afterward, as if she were walking through a cold, dense, sucking element, not unlike mud. By the time she reached Deirdre the music had altered greatly, and was now real music, in fact an extraordinarily lovely air later identified as Schubert’s “Adieu! ’Tis Love’s Last Greeting,” which she hardly wished to interrupt; and so she heard it through to the end, her own bosom heaving with the exquisite sentiment of the piece, and her eyes filling with tears.

  After the last notes trailed away Deirdre remained seated at the keyboard, her hands frozen, her dreamy gaze affixed to a point on the wall—as if she were in a trance, but an altogether agreeable one. The Zinns burst into applause, for the music had been wonderful, and even Malvinia was quick to praise; but Great-Aunt Edwina not only failed to appear in the doorway, as everyone naturally expected, but the door—incredibly, and so very rudely!—was pushed shut from the other direction.

  Fortunately, Deirdre was in too somnambulist a state to notice, and, the Zinns, taking care not to call her attention to her great-aunt’s rudeness, it was likely she never knew.

  MANY YEARS LATER, after Deirdre had been spirited away in the outlaw balloon, her sisters claimed to hear, very distantly, the delicate notes of that Schubert piece: particularly when they crossed a certain stretch of floor, in the small foyer of the Octagonal House, on their way to the stairs. Mr. Zinn allowed that there was some sound at that point, but he greatly doubted that it might be characterized as music: still less, that it might be identified precisely as “Adieu! ’Tis Love’s Last Greeting.” (It was one of the failings of his experimental house—as Mr. Zinn admitted—that queer whining sourceless winds glided through the downstairs rooms, whether windows were open, or no; and that chilly emanations manifested themselves, on even the warmest days. Murmurs, and high hollow dronings, and faint wailing sounds, and ghostly piano music—all scientifically explicable, of course, had one the necessary information.)

  Not many weeks after Deirdre’s departure, the sisters were about to enter the dining room, when the piano sounded—at a very great distance.

  “It is that infernal Schubert composition,” Constance Philippa cried, as the blood drained out of her lips. “Shall we never be free of it?”

  “She mocks us, she haunts us,” Malvinia murmured.

  “It is not Deirdre,” Samantha said, shocked. “It is—only the wind. It is only the wind.”


  The sisters stood for some time, motionless. Octavia’s head was bowed, and her eyes closed; and, as the piano faded, and the ordinary noises of the household returned—the loud ticking of a grandfather clock, the sound of servants chattering amongst themselves—she betook herself to say, in a voice of half-amused regret: “But how nice to think—to imagine!—that our sister considers us; that she feels sufficient emotion for us, to play again that pretty tune, and rouse our memories.”

  “It is no tune,” Samantha said emphatically. “It is not a piano, it is not Deirdre. It is only the wind—as Father has said.”

  TWENTY-NINE

  With some hesitation, and not a little repugnance, I must now describe how Miss Malvinia Zinn fell in love—violently, and blindly—within the first ten minutes of the tumultuous Under the Gaslight: when the virile figure of Orlando Vandenhoffen strode onto the stage, and his fierce dark eyes swept the audience, and his voice rang out with passion of a sort she had never before experienced—save in her most secret and most shameful imaginings.

  Ah! so that is the great Vandenhoffen! I must have him, the reckless young lady vowed. I must—I will!—else life holds no further pleasures for me, and the graveyard warmly beckons—

  So the besotted Malvinia inwardly declared, all the while staring at Vandenhoffen’s craggily handsome face, in which a portentous calm now contested the ferocity of the previous moment, and a lofty, tortured dignity sought to display itself: so staring at Vandenhoffen, and following him as he moved swiftly about the stage, that she was oblivious to the other actors, and failed to appreciate the set (a remarkably realistic depiction of the interior of a genteel home); and even to grasp the substance of Vandenhoffen’s speech.

  She was seated beside her cousin Basil Miller, in the Millers’ comfortable box, and tho’ it was her custom, with Basil, to whisper and giggle at most theatrical productions, and even during the opera, she was mysteriously silent throughout the first act of the Daly play, sitting quite erect, her gloved hands gripping her fan, her beautiful head held high—as if, perchance, she fancied that Orlando Vandenhoffen might glance up at her.

  An extraordinary man—an actor of arguable genius—bold and dashing and impetuous—capable of a virile pathos rarely seen on the American stage, and a profound, raging passion—an aristocrat in every inch of his tall masculine frame—the possessor of a stern, noble, pale brow, and a lofty profile, and those remarkable, fierce eyes which had won so many female hearts: thus the famous Orlando Vandenhoffen, in the second year of his American tour, fresh from a popular success in Under the Gaslight at the Fanshawe in New York, and now taking Philadelphia audiences quite by storm. Was there ever such a man! poor Malvinia wondered, staring so intensely at him that her eyes began to ache, as if she had stared too long at a flame. His every gesture—the flamboyance of his walk—the ringing power of his voice—the dark curls at his temples, and his thick mustache, and the perfection of his jawline—the hypnotic spell of his very presence . . .

  Her heart beat tempestuously, but steadily, beneath the molded bodice of her ivory brocade gown, and the cherubic ringlets on her forehead and cheeks grew somewhat damp from a fine film of perspiration that arose, as a consequence both of the o’erwarm theater, and the near-unbearable tension of the play. So infatuated was Malvinia with the leading man, and so convinced that at any moment he might glance up into the Millers’ handsome box, that she paid little heed to the other actors, as the play unfolded, and even felt some jealousy of the leading lady (whose conventionally attractive face, and nondescript figure, she deemed unworthy of Vandenhoffen’s admiration); yet the general sense of the plot communicated itself to her, and she thrilled with the other members of the audience, female and male alike, who leaned forward in their seats, and held their breaths like children, as, in the final act, Vandenhoffen’s villainous enemy bound his insensible form to a length of railroad track (which struck Malvinia’s feverish eye as very realistic) while, in the distance (again, most realistically depicted), a locomotive bore down upon him! Tho’ Malvinia, as an experienced theatergoer, certainly knew that the situation was naught but illusion—melodramatic, and forced, and supremely unlikely—and tho’ she knew that, as a spectator, she was being crudely manipulated to feel such tension, nevertheless she could not steel herself against the exigencies of the moment: she uttered a series of breathless little screams, and peeked through her gloved fingers, exactly like the most credulous members of the audience. The hero was so handsome—so noble—so good! What if, by some hideous reversal of fate, he should not be untied in time, by his beleaguered leading lady? What if the playwright, like a malevolent jesting God, had conspired to terrorize his audience, by sending Vandenhoffen to his death?

  I cannot bear it, the distracted Malvinia thought, leaning so far forward that her whalebone stays cut deep into her flesh, if he should die! Dear God, I swear to You I cannot bear it—

  (Most of which she would confess to Vandenhoffen, upon the occasion of their first intimacy—giggling wildly, and blushing, and squirming about like an eel, under the mischievous influence of champagne—at a time when a woman of more normal moral fibre would have been crushed with shame.)

  But the heroine ran screaming to his rescue, and tho’ the massive locomotive bore down noisily upon them, and not a few ladies in the audience swooned in terror, Vandenhoffen was untied, and rescued in time—and the villain foiled. And Malvinia, poor quivering Malvinia, could not stop herself from shedding childish tears of gratitude, tho’ she knew that it was only a play, and an ingenious stage setting, and that Vandenhoffen was an actor: that is, one who cannot be killed.

  After the cast had taken five curtain calls, and the heavy velvet curtains had swept triumphantly together for the final time, Cousin Basil turned casually to Malvinia and asked, with a slight smile: “Would it amuse you, dear Malvinia, to drop by Mrs. Broome’s tonight?—for I have, you know, a standing invitation.”

  Malvinia was still dabbing at her eyes, and found it difficult to attend her cousin, let alone respond to him with courtesy. But she managed to say, in a faint voice: “Mrs. Broome’s? Mrs. Horatio Broome? Why, whyever do you ask?—when you know I am not allowed, and I halfway think I should not wish to be allowed . . .”

  Mr. Miller allowed Malvinia’s words to trail off into silence, and the silence to expand dramatically, before he said, his smile now deepening (for the mischievous young man had not been insensitive to Malvinia’s agitation throughout the play, and he believed he knew well its cause): “Why, I bring the subject up only because some members of the cast—tonight’s cast—have been invited over: you know of Mrs. Broome’s salon, surely, and how far the poor delightful creature will fling her net!—and I thought, perhaps naïvely, that you might wish to be introduced to Mr. Vandenhoffen, should he deign to appear.”

  Malvinia, still trembling from the evening’s emotional strain, the translucence of her lovely cheeks now lightly touched with pink, as if with a virginal blush, and her tear-bright eyes glittering, felt compelled in her surprise to ask Cousin Basil to repeat himself: tho’ she had heard him perfectly, the name Vandenhoffen having pierced her bosom like a white-hot blade.

  (UNBEKNOWNST TO HER family, Malvinia had behaved very precipitantly, in rejecting young Cheyney’s hand. She irresponsibly scorned him, it seems, as retaining too much of Bloodsmoor to please her! Indeed, the fickle young lady so gave herself airs, on the matter of Cheyney, that, after one of the frequent explosions at the gunpowder mill, which unfortunate accident involved, it was said, upward of a dozen French-speaking workers, of those regularly brought to the States, to work for the Du Pont de Nemours concern—after thoughtless rumors spread across the Valley, from house to house, regarding the fact that sinewy fragments of human flesh, and shattered bone, adorned the barren-limbèd trees, in the vicinity of the mill—why, our haughty Miss Zinn confronted the hapless Cheyney himself, with some histrionic declaration, to the effect that she could never countenance such an exploitation of men, whet
her they be ignorant French peasants, or no: for she deemed it all very unchristian, and very uncouth. And, this being reported back to her sophisticated city cousins, they roundly applauded her, and showed not a whit of concern, for the nonpluss’d Cheyney!)

  Fortunate it was, indeed, that Mrs. Zinn knew naught of this development, but continued in her fond delusion that Malvinia favored Cheyney; and would, one day soon, consent to be his bride.

  OVER THE YEARS, Malvinia had acquired some notoriety, within her family, for always demanding special favors: pouting, and weeping, and cajoling, and begging, and simpering, and persisting, till she had her way. Consequently, her parents were pressed into granting her divers concessions: further lessons on the piano (for it greatly vexed her, that Deirdre could play with such versatility); acting and elocution lessons, at the Philadelphia Girls’ Academy (for such lessons, she claimed, would aid her immeasurably at balls, and at other difficult social occasions); French lessons (for someday, surely, she would visit France—and how awkward, to be unable to converse with the natives!); singing lessons (for, after having been enraptured by the magnificent Adelina Patti, in Bellini’s La Sonnambula, she was convinced that she had a trainable soprano voice). Certain of these requests her parents granted, for Malvinia was so persistent in her demands, it was generally easier to give in than to resist: but a plea for special acting lessons, under Professor So-and-so, made in the autumn of 1880, they had refused for financial reasons, thus incurring their daughter’s anger. (Indeed, Malvinia had all but quarreled with her belovèd father, on the matter of these troublesome lessons, her mother having refused them outright, as a needless expenditure. “But I assure you, Father, I must apply for these lessons,” Malvinia cried, her lovely cheeks blanching, “for all my friends—nearly all my friends—will be taking them: and I shall feel such a countrified little fool!” Mr. Zinn swallowed his amusement, or it may have been his irritation, and said, gently enough: “And I shall feel such a countrified fool, my dear child, if you do take them.”)