The Agitated Elocutionist Read online

  He reached his home and climbed the steps, retrieving his key from his pocket. In the front hallway, he was met by his youngest daughter, who came up on him from behind and tapped his shoulder. He seemed more than a little perturbed as he placed his hat on a standing rack.

  “Nay, daughter,” the poker-faced patriarch muttered. “Coming at me in such a manner is not fitting. What is your business?” He stepped into the sitting room to get his newspapers and Lizzie followed.

  She smiled devilishly and slid onto the low sofa against the far wall. “Nothing, Father. I am merely curious how your day went.”

  “Twenty seven dollars in revenue for the Maple Street property,” he bemoaned, as he flipped through the papers. “Plus a plundering of my daily tills from Mr. Carpentiere who seems to have forgotten that his talents lay more in the peddling of feather beds than in the creative fiddling of my audits.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that Father. But I’m wondering if you are better off putting your energies towards the associations within the textile community, rather than building furniture that you sell at most excellent prices befitting our Commonwealth.”

  Andrew peered up from his news stories, his eyes twitching. “What the devil do you mean, daughter? Borden and Almy is doing well by me.”

  “Yes, but there is great money in banking and textiles. I hear that Mr. Livermore is without a partner these days. His former co-president is simply late of this world, having died at the mill a few months back.”

  “I have heard of such things. J.A. Borden was a far cousin of mine, and I believe he left his widow with sufficient funds. Livermore is not someone I ever had a fondness for. His reputation recently has been a bit of scandalous.”

  “How so?” Lizzie asked.

  “Many say it is a mistress. His poor wife does suffer. I say that these times are not befitting for a man of industry.”

  “I suppose there is no harm in offering him your financial services, Father. I’m sure he could be quite reasonable when presented with a flow of money. After all, he is one of the most important textile merchants in town.”

  Borden brooded by the fireplace, his fingers tapping on his watch fob. “I suppose you are correct. I shall pay him a visit anon.”

  “What better time than the present,” Lizzie said. “I hear he takes his dinner in his mansion between eleven and noon. And it is within a short walk from here.”

  “Up the damned hill!” Andrew scowled. “I swear an oath, daughter, you are going to be the death of me!”

  Lizzie smiled and patted the horsehair sofa that was so comfortable beneath her on this quaint summer afternoon. “Why Father, such a horrible thing to say,” she coyly whispered.

  4. The Dragon’s Den

  On the street, a bowler-hatted gentleman lifted his palm to his brim. “Good day, Borden.”

  “Good day, Borden,” Lizzie’s father replied, and then gave a polite nod to a passing woman. “Good day, Mrs. Borden.”

  “God’s graces on you, Mr. Borden,” she said with a solemn nod of her own.

  “And how is Mr. Borden this fine forenoon?” asked Andrew.

  “None too well. He is currently consulting for his health with Dr. Borden.”

  “Would that be the Dr. Borden of Borden Street?”

  “No,” said Mrs. Borden. “That would be the other Dr. Borden.”

  “My word, you are correct. Forgive me, Mrs. Borden.”

  “Think not upon it, Mr. Borden.” And they were past.

  “How many Bordens are there in Fall River, Father?” Lizzie asked, clutching his big knuckled hand.

  “Not enough for confusion,” Andrew said loftily, then tipped his hat to another passing gentlemen. “Good day, Borden,” he announced.

  Eventually, Lizzie and her father stood before the stately Livermore mansion. Overhead clouds passed behind its gables with gaseous indifference. “If only,” Lizzie mused, “you had bought us such a fine dwelling on this hill instead of that midget cheese-box on Second Street.”

  “Hush,” her father said, raising a single finger to his thin lips. “Do not stress my patience.”

  A harried butler answered the door and took Andrew’s card, peering up at him as if he were his better. Andrew huffed his way into the house and Lizzie followed. After a time sequestered in a drawing room, father and daughter staring at a billiard table that was so large it wouldn’t even fit into their parlor, the teakwood doors flew open and in strolled Thisbalt Ajax Livermore, holding a wide beer flagon, his mouth stuffed with a generously rolled cigar.

  The textile tycoon was more corpulent than Lizzie imagined. His face was a fiery splotching of skin disorders as if some fierce mold had hatched on his lower chin and spread across his muttonchops, ear and forehead. There was also the glistening of medicinal gel that gave his head the appearance of wet rotting fruit. Lizzie fought back the urge to turn away her disgusted eyes.

  “Borden,” he said, dipping his chin in Andrew’s direction.

  “Mr. Livermore,” Andrew said with reverence and a bit of awe. Lizzie had never seen her Father humbled so. “How are you doing on this fair day?”

  Livermore puckered his lips. “Pash and twaddle! Have you not heard of the unfortunate Mr. Tweed of New York? He has been apprehended and is now wallowing in a common prison cell.” Livermore puffed on his cigar like it was an extension of his face. An inky cloud wafted about his speckled head. “Borden, that is alarming news. I do not believe men of industry are respected in this day and age. No good can come of that.”

  Lizzie took a breath and interjected. “I do believe Mr. Tweed to be of a criminal disposition unbefitting an elected political official. I do not think a cell can be low or dank enough for his kind.”

  Pin-pointed eyes emerged from the darkening smoke. “Borden, you must have a sit-down with this young lady and correct her misdirected thinking.”

  “I endeavor to acculturate,” Andrew sighed. “Lizzie, however, directs her thoughts elsewhere.”

  “There is nothing misdirected about my thoughts,” Lizzie said, pulling at her ruffles. “I merely suggest that no man, no matter how wealthy or industrious, should be above the law. If Mr. Tweed had robbed New York City of millions, he must be called to justice.”

  “The courts shall decide,” Livermore said, choking on the dusty air. “Meanwhile, Tweed is indisposed to a chamber not befitting a man of his industrious character.” He paused to sip from his flagon. After lifting his dripping face from the brew, he sputtered, “But such talk merely takes us from our purpose. What can I do for you today, Mr. Borden?”

  “Lizzie here has advised me to hitch my wagon to your train, so to speak. She suggests that I invest my money in your textile interests.”

  Livermore took two puffs of his cigar and said with a grunt, “How much and how soon?”

  Andrew fell back on his heels. “Well, I suppose we can set up a meeting at the Bank to discuss the particulars.”

  There was silence in the room for a pace.

  “No particulars,” Livermore shrugged. “Just sign a check at the front office.”

  “For what amount?” her father stuttered. His legs were visibly trembling.

  Livermore’s eyebrows extended to the top of his pasty scalp. “How the blazes should I know; you’re the one who made the offer. What’s your game? I’ve seen you, Borden. You make feather beds and coffins don’t you? You grew up on Ferry Street. You raised yourself from the shame of nothing to where you are today, just like myself! Give me all you can spare, and in return I’ll give you a cut of the great expansion that is about to occur. Are you not a man of vision? Do you not have financial instincts?” He paused and savored his tobacco, then stared back at Andrew. “Is that all? What are you gawking at?”

  Andrew’s fingers clutched at his side. He seemed to be trembling from the top of his pate to the bottom of his congres
s boots. “Uh…yes, I suppose that is all.”

  “Hmmm … yes. Well, I do believe you have turned out to be a fine ally, Borden. I look forward to seeing your money.”

  “I suppose that would be advantageous to both of us. Good day, Mr. Livermore and I thank you for your time.”

  “Yes, my time.” Livermore turned towards the massive fireplace that dominated one wall of the room and stared up at the array of framed Daguerreotypes that fringed the mantle. “I have nothing but time, Mr. Borden.”

  Lizzie and her father interpreted the sight of his back and the smoke curling from his head that it was time to leave.

  Back on the front porch, Andrew stared down at his daughter and pressed his lips together. “My fortune at a clap,” he groaned.

  “Nonsense, Father. Livermore will take good care of you. He’ll treasure your contribution.”

  “What is this really about, Lizzie? My word, girl, you are never what you seem.”

  “Not what I seem, Father,” Lizzie said beaming. “But what I have seen.”

  The framed Daguerreotype of Elizabeth Wingate, nestled on Livermore’s mantelpiece, personally autographed, sitting in the prized position of dead center between images of illustrious colleagues and family members, had told her all she needed to know about the connection between the fake spiritualist and the textile tycoon.

  5. A Widow’s Predicament

  Sarah Borden met Lizzie Borden down street at the apothecary as she was leaving with a string-tied bag of rat poison. Her most excellent cousin was beaming with rosy cheeks. “Did you discover something, Miss Lizzie?”

  “I prefer to remain reserved on the subject, Sarah. For now, I wish to accompany you on a social visit to your mother. I have much to discuss with her.”

  An hour later, they were seated in the very parlor room where Wingate’s ceremonies were enacted. Lizzie sat with the Borden family, the twins bouncing around the room with urgent energy, and the Widow Borden, grim and sallow looking, was seated in her chair of mourning, her eyes begging for respite.

  “It has been a trying ordeal,” the Widow Borden was saying. “Elizabeth is doing the best that she can but these things take time. Once you have become a shade in the Summerlands, it is very difficult to maintain contact with the material world. But I’m hoping that Jonathan’s resolve to fulfill his love for me is stronger than those incorporeal bounds that are tying him to the afterlife.”

  “Or perhaps,” Sarah quipped, “we aren’t paying Wingate enough money! I’m sure if we doubled her salary, suddenly Father would start yapping.”

  “Sarah!” came the maternal rebuttal. “Please be reverent towards Miss Wingate, especially in the presence of our guest!”

  “You must consider, Mrs. Borden,” Lizzie said boldly, “the possibility that the spiritualist is not quite as effective in her conjurations as she may have advertised.”

  “Nonsense, she comes with the highest recommendations. She…”

  And Sarah joined her mother in unison, “… studied with the Fox Sisters!” and then added: “What a load of horse droppings.”

  The Widow Borden’s eyes went milky as she thought back into the past. “I went to a performance of the Fox Sisters in New York a few years back. They were performing at the Academy of Music and drew quite a large crowd. They brought back a young boy who had been crushed under a mule at a Nyack farm. He wandered across the stage with these large accusative eyes. It was the most frightful thing I had ever seen. But it filled me with the strength I needed to endure Jonathan’s death. I felt for the first time that there is hope, that he is not forever lost.”

  Sarah said grimly, “Mother, this has gone too far. Lizzie Borden is here to help you find the will, not to contact the dead.”

  Lizzie’s eyes strayed towards the Cabinet of Curiosities that flanked the far wall. It was large and heavy with bronze claw feet and decorative flanged framings. Inside lay various items, many of them primitive artifacts that the Bordens had picked up from Jonathan Borden’s sea voyages when he was a young merchant adventurer: African idol heads, JuJu sticks, and other implements of superstitious value.

  “Perhaps the will is hidden somewhere in the premises…perhaps in one of the curiosities in your cabinet. Stuffed perhaps into a voodoo doll?”

  “Alas,” the Widow Borden said resignedly. “I have examined all those items.”

  “All of them?”

  “With the exception of that …” she pointed with a trembling finger.

  Prominently, in the center cube of the cabinet, sitting alone with plenty of breathing space on both sides, was a large rectangular box, noticeably Western in style, with shellacked sea shells delicately placed in a rim along the joint lines.

  “The Spirit Box,” Sarah said. She got to her feet and started towards the cabinet, but halted, her feet glued into place. “For someone so unbelieving,” she confessed, “I am afraid of that thing. Father himself told me of the evil that dwells within.”

  “We must leave it for now,” the Widow Borden said solemnly. “It is cursed and cannot be touched or moved. When we ever depart this house, for whatever reason, we must leave it behind. Let the next resident of 9 French Street inherit our heavy burden.”

  “How did the Spirit Box get in the house in the first place?” Lizzie asked. “Surely it didn’t just appear one night.”

  “No, that it didn’t. It was my beloved Jonathan who brought it home from work one day. He said that it must never be opened, ever. Except on one occasion.”

  “And what occasion would that be?” asked Lizzie.

  “In case of his death. He said it must be turned over to his lawyer at once. That only Joseph Coffin of New Bedford, his life-long solicitor, knew how to undo the curse of King Philip.”

  “Odd, I never heard of a lawyer practicing the spiritual arts.”

  “It struck me as odd as well. But Jonathan himself filled us with such fear that we cannot even touch it to give it to Coffin. We figured we’d rather let it sit there and contain its evil rather than take the risk of Coffin exposing us all to woe.”

  Sarah said quietly, “There may be a connection with Thisbalt Livermore and that box.”

  “Hush!” said her mother.

  “There’s no point in withholding information from the only person who can help us, Mother.” She turned to Lizzie. “Livermore was over for dinner with his dreary wife, this raggedy thing he drags behind him whenever he wants to make a splash on the social register. And in the middle of cigars and brandy in the billiards room, Livermore excused himself and went to find the water closet. When he didn’t return, Father set out to fetch him and discovered him in the parlor trying to break into the Cabinet of Curiosities with a hatchet. He was snarling like a dog, in fact. Father said it was the most frightful thing. A week later…he…” Sarah fell forward with a sudden sob.

  Lizzie put her hand gently on her cousin’s shoulder while she regained composure. “Why would Livermore be interested in the cabinet?” she asked.

  “He may have been after the box,” the Widow Borden said. “I do believe he is drawn towards evil, and wants to corrupt us all by discovering its secret.” Then her face became more drawn than ever and she moaned, “A week later my poor Jonathan was found dead in his office. He was slumped back in his chair with the most hideous look of horror on his face. His hand was outstretched on the table pointing towards the far book case. We never knew the significance of the gesture. But I believe that he may have been visited by the shade of Awashuncks, Squaw Sachem of Seconet.”

  Her hands flew to her face and tears fell copiously from her red eyes. “Oh, I am the most wretched woman who ever lived! I yearn for peace! And for Jonathan!”

  “Mrs. Borden,” Lizzie asked. “Is there any reason to believe that Elizabeth Wingate is also interested in the Spirit Box?”

  “Nay, in fact she seems to dismiss my fe
ar of it as trivial. She claims that when we settle the affair of my poor husband, she will address the box.”

  “Address it?”

  “Perhaps I shall let her remove it from the premises. She knows how to handle it, more so than Solicitor Coffin would. Yes, I’m sure Miss Wingate will know how to contain the evil of the box and then it will no longer be in our house.”

  “Yes,” Sarah interjected. “Let her have it. Let the curse be on her head, the old fake!”

  Lizzie Borden nodded thoughtfully. “Mrs. Borden there may be more to this than meets the eye. I do believe I can help you, but I need your cooperation.”

  “And what would that be? Anything to remove this curse from my life!”

  “I need you to schedule a séance with Elizabeth Wingate, here tonight, and invite me along. I need to be present at the conjuration of your husband.”

  The Widow Borden composed herself by dabbing a handkerchief to her red cheeks. “Why yes, that can be arranged. Mrs. Wingate is always pressing me to make another attempt each and every night.”

  Lizzie pressed her hands happily down onto her knees. “Fine then, tonight it is. And with your leave, invite along into our company any members of the legal profession you happen to know, anyone with an open mind for such supernatural matters. Just send a note round my home with the exact time of our congregation and I shall be here a half hour before to set up.”

  “Set up? Whatever can you mean?”

  Lizzie rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “Oh, I merely meant that I will prepare myself for the proper mood. You never know what will happen. It is not every day that I get to meet shades of dead Indians!”

  6. The Electromechanician

  Homer Thesinger was called by many in Fall River the “Boy Inventor,” but his preferred term for his chosen profession was Electromechanician, a word he had first seen used in Telegrapher magazine to describe Mr. Thomas Edison, Homer’s most valued role model. He spent his days in his father’s basement on Prospect Street tirelessly tinkering with his electrical and telegraphic apparatus, his endless flywheels, batteries, electromagnets, relays and receivers, determined to be one of the first to make marked improvements in multiplexed signaling. He was regarded by most as intellectually promising but lacking serious prospects when it came to a career.