Ceremony of the Innocent

  “In vino Veritas, Francis.”

  She looked at him blearily. “I remember something that Jeremy once said. ‘Requiem for the innocent.’ He meant that about America, Francis. But I often think that it means people like me, too.”

  Francis was exasperated. “Ellen! You never really loved or trusted anyone in your life! You deserted your aunt, and left her to die alone. You never really cared for your children. I am your husband, but you are not interested in me. My Aunt Hortense did everything for you, and look how you repaid her. The Porters—they were good to you, and you betrayed them, and alienated them from their son. You don’t try to understand your children, and their needs and wants. You have left them to me alone. Ellen, you need a psychiatrist to enlighten you as to what a selfish woman you are. You were always selfish. That has been your curse.”

  Ellen drank deeply. Then she burst into tears and sobbed long and with anguish. Francis left her in disgust. She fell asleep in her chair in the library. Her last coherent thought was: What is it the world demands from people like me? And Jeremy? Corruption? Evil? Betrayal? No, they will never have it from us, even if we die.

  I must call Dr. Lubish for her, thought Francis. Gabrielle is right She is mentally ill. It is possible she always was.

  That night Ellen dreamt of Mrs. Schwartz in the dry brown garden of the little cottage in Preston. The old woman was weeping. She stretched out her hand to Ellen and stammered, “Beautiful daughter of Toscar.” Ellen reached for the rough hand extended to her but Mrs. Schwartz withdrew it, as if with terror and denial.

  Part Three

  Requiem for the Innocent

  C H A P T E R 35

  FRANCIS PORTER SAT IN THE SUAVE office of Dr. Emil Lubish on a cold January day in 1928. Everything was brown, gold, umber, with pale-gold satin draperies. It was warm and luxurious here and very quiet, even though Fifth Avenue traffic raged outside A dim snow was falling slowly, implacably.

  “And how long would you say your wife has been an alcoholic, Congressman?” asked the doctor. He was a heavy man, heavy of body, heavy of face, heavy of eyes and brows and hair. Even the folds in his cheeks were heavy, and his chin and hands and thighs. Unlike other affected Viennese psychiatrists, he wore no beard, not even a mustache. His large ears drooped thickly. His clothing was European, though he had actually been in the United States for twenty years. He exuded an odor of peppermint, tobacco, and something curiously aromatic which Francis could not identify. He had very little accent.

  Francis hesitated. The man intimidated him with his flickering eyes, strange eyes like round silver coins, intent, a little distended, and cold and probing.

  “I should think about two years, though I am not sure. She always knew that I had an aversion for alcohol except for a little, a very little, sweet wine or sherry before dinner, and she knows the law now. After we were married, and that was before Prohibition, I never permitted strong spirits in the house, even for guests. I don’t know where she gets the illegal whiskey, for she rarely leaves the house any longer, and I trust the servants, who do not particularly like my wife. She is too—vague. Too indifferent to notice them.”

  The doctor thought, humming like a dissonant bee, and pursing up his heavy lips. He said, “From what you have told me lengthily, I see here the archetype of a deeply neurotic woman, not very intelligent or educated, engrossed with herself, selfish, withdrawn, sluggish, lethargic, self-indulgent, uncaring about her family, obstinate and hysterical, frigid, petty-minded, narrow of outlook, deliberately unaware of the world about her, dissociative, depressed, anxious, childish, sometimes hostile, with an infantile passivity. A classic case. You have told me she had no father she ever knew and that she came from the lower working class. No doubt she resents that unknown father though she has been searching for him. Her first husband apparently filled her need for a father image and his death has left her the more lost. She has never outgrown, apparently, the oral, anal, or urethral phases of infantile development. Her addiction to the bottle also suggests that she was deprived of a mother’s breast. Yes. Classic.”

  Francis had cringed at some of the mellifluent words, but he nodded solemnly.

  “Her now total withdrawal from the world about her also suggests a portending psychotic condition. Have you considered institutionalizing her?”

  “As I have told you, Dr. Lubish, she was institutionalized for two years following her first husband’s death. I am afraid she has never fully recovered. During those years I visited her often, and she did not recognize me. For a year, I was told, she did not speak and seemed to move about in a trancelike condition. Only at night, I heard, did she show any emotion. She would cry for hours, even after sedation. On her return to her home, allegedly cured, she remained passive and indifferent even to her unfortunate children, who, I am glad to say, have become normal and healthy since I became their stepfather. She shows no gratitude for my guidance and my care for them, though they are deeply affectionate towards me and trust my judgment.”

  The doctor nodded. “They are indeed fortunate to have you, sir. Could you induce Mrs. Porter to visit me for therapy?”

  “I doubt it. As I’ve said, she rarely leaves the house, though I take her each summer to Europe. But she has shown less and less interest in the museums of Europe, the art galleries, the opera, and other attractions. Yet I know that these used to interest her deeply before her husband’s death. In fact, she was a patron of the Metropolitan Opera and the Metropolitan Museum and the ballet.

  “And now she has regressed to the environment of the womb. Mindless. Protected. Nothing demanded of her. Warm sustenance. Self-engrossed. I fear a psychotic condition—”

  “Could you visit her at our house, Doctor?”

  The psychiatrist pursed up his lips again and the silvery orbs of his eyes studied Francis. “I should prefer her in a sheltered environment, such as the private psychiatric hospital to which I am attached, in Westchester. Intensive therapy, leading to an awakening to reality. Tell me, is she extravagant? Does she go out of the house on wild shopping expeditions, heedless of expense, then forgetful of her purchases? Is her shopping random, without direction or need?”

  “Ellen is inclined to extravagance, yes, but less than she used to be. I have argued this hopelessly with the executors of her husband’s estate. They insist she lives within her income, but I doubt it. We have four servants; two would be more than adequate. That is, they would be if Ellen aroused herself to an interest in her household and occupied herself with some of the domestic duties.”

  When Francis had called for an appointment the astute doctor had investigated his background and the background of his wife, and their financial condition, which he found very attractive and salutary. He had been discreetly informed of the great wealth of the pair, and the wealth of Ellen’s children.

  “I should like a consultation with the children of Mrs. Porter, also the executors of her husband’s estate. Institutionalizing of a patient is often a very difficult thing, Congressman.”

  “You won’t find Charles Godfrey and Jochan Wilder and the rest of the firm very sympathetic, Doctor. In fact, they all think I am an ogre, and dislike me intensely. They have done so from the beginning.”

  Again, the silvery eyes probed. Francis would have been astonished if he had known how thoroughly he had been investigated by this urbane man with the curious body odor.

  “Lawyers are usually suspicious of a second husband if the estate of the first is large,” said Dr. Lubish. “You have no control of that estate? Sad. After all, lawyers want their huge administrative expenses, you know.” He smiled. “However, if Mrs. Porter were institutionalized—after you received a court order to that effect—you could then move to be appointed her guardian, in control of her income. But you, as a lawyer, are aware of that.”

  The doctor was not surprised to see a sharp glow behind Francis’ spectacles and a quick color on the emaciated cheekbones. Then Francis said, “You must understand, Doctor, that I deep
ly love my wife. I want the best for her. I—I have loved her since she was a child. It was very disastrous that her life took the course it did. She would have been happier in her natural environment as a servant.”

  “Displacement. Yes. Very traumatic to simple characters who by nature prefer an uncomplicated and directed life. Recently a patient of mine, a former bricklayer, an illiterate man without the slightest education, fortuitously came into a great inheritance from a distant relative, whom he had never seen.” The doctor coughed. “Very sad for my patient. Thrust into a milieu alien to him, wealth, advantages, a rich house, cars, rich clothes, he went quite berserk. He spent like a madman; he drank copiously. He—wenched—is that the word? He flung his money about like that snow outside. Berserk. Fortunately friends came to his assistance, and lawyers. Just in time, as it happens, otherwise he would have been bankrupt. He is now in my little private hospital, where we hope he will eventually be cured. His son—er—was appointed his legal guardian. A very sensible young man who is prudent and concerned.”

  He thought. “I should like to see Mrs. Porter so I could form a definite opinion. Could you induce Miss Gabrielle and Mr. Christian to consult me first, before I visit your wife—as your friend?”

  “They would be only too happy to consult with you, Doctor. In fact, Gabrielle, whom you know through your daughter, suggested I come to you. Christian agrees that his mother needs care. Christian is corresponding secretary of the David Rogers Foundation, and Gabrielle is studying dress designing—when she isn’t traveling. They have separate establishments of their own. Very intelligent young people. Not yet married.” Francis hesitated, then said with vexation, “Christian wishes to marry the daughter of Charles Godfrey, and I am strenuously opposed to it. Most unsuitable, though the young lady is rich, I suppose. I know her mother, who is a very sly person and who was once a servant like my wife. A governess to Ellen’s children until she—induced—Charles Godfrey to marry her, she a woman of no physical charms or family or money.”

  The doctor had noticed how often Francis had mentioned money during this consultation about his wife. The word seemed an obsession to him. As a shrewd man of radical politics, like Francis, he did not find this obsession disagreeable. He was a very sophisticated man, indeed, and knew many members of the David Rogers Foundation. In fact, the Foundation had helped to establish his private hospital, as one of their “charities.” He was very rich himself. He sent considerable sums to Germany in behalf of an obscure but fiery man named Adolf Hitler, whom the Scardo Society and the Committee for Foreign Studies were studying with deep interest. One of the eminent doctor’s friends was Colonel House, who had often said openly that he hoped to see America embracing Socialism—“Socialism as dreamed of by Karl Marx.” Colonel House had completed an excellent piece of work in luring President Wilson into the Great War, which had accomplished the dream of Lenin and Trotsky and Marx and Engels. The world community, dominated by an established international elite, was well on its way.

  Francis indeed would have been amazed by what the doctor knew, and in what he was secretly engaged.

  He said, “I will ask Christian and Gabrielle to consult with you, Doctor, and then will give you a call.”

  Dr. Lubish said, “As Mrs. Porter is almost a recluse now, it is unfortunate that she has no friends or acquaintances who could support any conclusion to which we may come.”

  Francis said, “There is one. Mrs. Jochan Wilder, the divorced wife of one of Jeremy’s executors. Kitty Wilder. She has often mentioned, with sorrow, the deterioration of my wife’s personality over these last years. A very good friend.”

  Dr. Lubish knew Kitty very well, and he smiled. “I believe my wife knows her slightly. Good. I will await your call.”

  He did not think it necessary to inform Francis that Kitty Wilder was often a visitor to his wife, and that she had frequently spoken with jeering laughter of Ellen Porter and her husband. She was very vindictive, especially concerning Ellen, whom she designated as an ignorant fool, feeble of mind and intellect and entirely gross and unsophisticated.

  Ellen drew aside the heavy draperies of her bedroom. It was three o’clock in the afternoon and she had just awakened from a sodden sleep. She saw the silent snow fluttering in a small wind. The street was almost empty except for the gloom of the late afternoon and the darkening of the sky. She leaned against the cold window and closed her smarting and swollen eyes and said to herself, “It is another day. When will the days end?” She thought of a line from Alexander Pope: “This long disease, my life.”

  She no longer had a personal maid. Francis had declared that “an undue extravagance,” and she had permitted him to discharge the girl. It had not distressed her. She knew the house was becoming shabbier year by year, and she did not care. The house on Long Island had been sold last summer, and she had not protested. Even this house, which Jeremy had bought, no longer interested her. Her children were gone; she lived here alone with Francis, who had become a fretful shadow to her, and a fear.

  It would have astounded him, but she knew all about Francis and his activities. She read his books and his literature, secretly, and she knew that this was what Jeremy had loathed the most. There were many times when she decided that she must appeal to Francis to leave her, to let her live out the years of her life in silence. Only in silence could she be herself, and think, and her thoughts were terrible. Some two years ago she had ceased to regress to her earlier years, and had become aware, but of this awareness she never spoke. When it became too acute she resorted to drink, for only alcohol could blunt her terror and her agony. Life was almost always unbearable; the anesthetic lay in her hidden stores. The houseman was able to secure her supplies from a “speakeasy.” He was a crafty and slinking little man, whom Francis liked for no obvious reason except that he was obsequious to him. “He knows his place,” he would say to Ellen, who would not reply. She detested Joey, but he was necessary to her. He robbed her when he bought the whiskey “right off the boat, ma’am.” It was pure bootleg, at two dollars a pint; he charged Ellen six. It was Joey, who was very intelligent, who had guessed that she needed an anesthetic for her soul, and who had artfully urged her to drink. “Good for you, ma’am. Raise your spirits.” She had refused at first, and then had succumbed. The liquor had kept her alive “for my children,” and so she had no sense of guilt. She was even grateful to Joey at times.

  She had tried to keep her children with her, but Francis had insisted that they needed to live a life of their own, though he had cringed at the thought of their spending “all that money on themselves.” He had been deftly manipulated by Christian and Gabrielle. Gabrielle had been urging her mother to buy a house on upper Fifth Avenue, and to prevent this Francis had been able to persuade Ellen to agree that Gabrielle needed an establishment for herself. “After all, she is an adult, Ellen, and must live her own life.” As for Christian, he was a man, and needed to live as a young bachelor, away from his mother.

  Ellen had only one illusion left, and that was that her children loved her, if they no longer needed her. True, they had never shown her respect or deference or much overt affection, but she was convinced of their devotion in spite of sudden alarms in her mind and sudden overpowering doubts. She had given them everything they desired; Jeremy would wish that, she would say to herself, forgetting his discipline of his children. She had given them profound love, second only to the love she had given Jeremy. Why, then, should they not love her and be concerned for her? If she sometimes had felt a passionate urge to die the alcohol would soothe her, convince her again of her children’s love. Did they not visit her once a week, expressing their affection and their anxiety about her? It was her only consolation. Her dresser, and the library, were full of photographs of her children and often she slept with one or two under her pillow.

  Charles Godfrey had lost his influence over her, and sometimes she faintly berated him when he angrily told her that her children did not need the lavish gifts and money she gav
e them, for they had large incomes of their own. “But it gives me pleasure to give them happiness,” she would protest. “Jeremy would want it this way.” When he told her that Jeremy would not “want this,” she would faintly smile and turn away, her eyes knowing. This drain on her resources, and Francis’ spending of her money for his “causes,” sometimes found her bereft of ready cash. But Charles would not let her touch the capital of the estate. When Francis took her to Europe they went second-class on the ships. “Ostentation is a crime,” he would say. “There are others who need the money. We must not follow the example of the idle rich, Ellen. We have our charities to consider, our duty to the unfortunate.”

  She did not know exactly when she had become so fearful of Francis. It was a different fear than the one she had felt when she had first been married to him, and it was amorphous to her though always with her, like an omnipresent threat. But what the threat was she did not know. She only knew that when he was in the house she could not rest, and would keep glancing over her shoulder as if expecting some menace. She could barely bring herself to dine with him, and often left the table without eating at all, to go to her bedroom and drink, her hands trembling. When he slept in his bedroom, which was near hers, she would lie rigid, her hands clenched, her skin sweating. It was an animal fear, an animal dread. When he left the house for his office, or his endless “meetings,” she would relax into exhaustion and sleep a little. She never mingled with his friends, nor did she sit at the table with them. The threat was with them also. He always told his friends that his wife was “unwell.” She had seen them from a distance a number of times, and had shivered.

  She would often ask herself what she feared in this solicitous man who genuinely loved her, who would look at her mournfully and try to talk with her. Sometimes she would desperately attempt to reply to him, but her tongue would become thick and she could only mumble and stammer, and then flee. Then, alone, she would be sickened by guilt and would weep, for was he not kind and was he not devoted to her children?