The Harlot’s Pen Read online

  “Will you write up the rally?” Leticia asked. “You should, you know. We mustn’t cower.”

  I shook my head. “I can’t. You know that, Letty. After the failure of the minimum wage, I don’t dare agitate for anything that would set Sam off. But it does irk me to feel so powerless.”

  She had the self-restraint not to comment. She knew that Sam was the devil incarnate when he was angry, and his newly rediscovered respectability made him sensitive to any publicity. And yet, despite his heightened social concerns, he hadn’t married me, a fact that was only known to Leticia and Jacqueline.

  We went back to our seltzers, but my mind was burning. I had inherited an obsession with the minimum wage for women, and had turned my loneliness into belonging to a cause. And I knew firsthand the precarious security that a man’s money gave us. Cast into the world without funds or position, a woman was at the mercy of a disapproving society and a tight-fisted employer. It rankled me to have done so little, while the forces of reactionary politics and stultifying moralism were united in keeping women from a living wage.

  Again my mind froze on the image of the weather-worn whore. Although my own moral journey had been fraught, I had been sheltered by social standing and a talented pen. But without writing I had no podium to speak from, and Sam was adamant that I stay out of the public eye. I owed my current warm coat to his benevolence, and kept it with my obedience. This could not last.

  “I will do something.”

  * * * *

  November 15, 1919

  I sent my poem, the one I had pressed into the hand of Mrs. Whitney’s aide, The Rape of the Working Woman, to Mr. Fremont Older. He had gone over to the Call, to work for William Randolph Hearst. All the Progressives were crying, saying it was the end of progressive journalism, but I still held out hope. Although I had never met him personally, I was certain that he would know my work from Bulletin articles of years past, and I cherished the notion that he would see the merit in the poem.

  I reasoned that Sam didn’t read the Call. And I used a nom de plume so as to further disguise my identity. Sam, a young executive at Nathan-Dohrmann, had recently been appointed to its Board of Directors and was now out at meetings half the week. He rarely had the time to read anything anymore. It was strange to see the two faces of Sam Toppings: Corporate Director and former Progressive Party leader. The passionate man I had fallen in love with was fading, and the angry Corporate Director side was clearly winning.

  And to think he called me inconstant! Truly, men were far more changeable than women. Just because they wore the same fashions year after year didn’t make them steadfast—just badly dressed.

  I wondered what Mr. Older would say. I kept my fingers crossed.

  * * * *

  November 20, 1919

  I could have held my breath. Mr. Older’s answer read, in its entirety:

  “Dear Mrs. Toppings: No. Why don’t you send it to the Argus up in Petaluma—they’ll print anything. —- Fremont Older”

  Now that was terse! Fremont Older had always been the champion of women, especially the downtrodden. He had published Alice Smith, An Outcast at the Christian Door, a serial by Ernest Hopkins (although Sophie Treadwell wrote it.) Sophie had pretended to be a prostitute and had gone from church to church to test how the San Francisco charities would treat an outcast. We knew the results of that venture—The Civic League was so disappointed… No other paper would have run the serial. But that was before he jumped ship, so I supposed, like Sam, he knew which side his bread was buttered on.

  I hid my disappointment as best I could, but when Sam returned miraculously for dinner for the first time that week, my gloom was obvious enough to penetrate his fog of self-involvement.

  “You’re looking dour, Violetta. It would please me better to come home from a long day to see a smile.”

  I tried, feeling a grimace stretch my mouth. It was effective enough not to be replaced by a stinging slap. If only I could get some of my work published again, as I had before I met him, I might be independent again. Not that I would leave him—I would just feel less helpless.

  I supposed I could go work someplace. But no one would hire a married woman, and right now everyone supposed me married—and it would be worse if they knew the truth.

  * * * *

  November 22, 1919

  I took tea at Jacqueline’s with Leticia, which necessarily meant that I had given some thought to my winter wardrobe. Jacqueline told us that skirts would go shorter in the coming year, and straighter. It was truly hard to imagine how such bold trends got started, and now they seemed to be on an unstoppable trajectory. Leticia, of course, was always so sensibly dressed, but then, she was truly the most sensible of all of us. I was convinced she would wear her sable-collared jacket until the end of days. I supposed motherhood did that to one.

  My own mother would have reeled in horror if she had seen what I wore, my legs bared almost to mid-calf, but then, my mother reeled in horror at me since I had left home, regardless. A woman scorned was meant to cower in her home until redeemed by another man’s hand and did not fling herself amorally into the café world, splashing her name on public newspapers with anti-domestic screeds. It really wasn’t what I wore, exactly, that bothered her so. It was what my dress seemed to mean.

  * * * *

  November 25, 1919

  I sent the poem to the Argus. Despite the humiliation of having to stoop to a rural paper, I hoped that Mr. Older was right, that they would publish anything. I changed my name on it to V. Strone, sort of an approximation of Violetta Stone, so as not to use "Toppings," Sam’s name. I could not think of his reaction to seeing my name in print again, never mind his.

  There had been a time when my name, my byline, meant something. I had not, of course, used my first name, as no paper would have published a serious article by someone named Violetta, but “By: V. Stone” had been a signature for thoughtful, incisive reports from the trenches of class warfare.

  Gone now were the heady days of working shoulder to shoulder with the leaders of the Great Minimum Wage campaign. Admittedly, I had felt somewhat like a lap dog, following Miss Valeska Bary as she led us through the machinations of the Industrial Welfare Commission, hoping the raise the rate to something women could live on. But of course, as everyone knew, the bid failed. And most galling, the principal cause of the failure had been Sam’s boss’s brother, Fred Dohrmann. He had said he was only on the commission to keep it from “doing something wild.” All that work, and it had been for nothing.

  Adding insult to injury, Miss Bary had been very much less than enthusiastic about my poem. “Very well written, my dear, though I don’t know much about rhymes and similes and such. But I must say, no one will publish it—which will be a mercy.”

  A mercy? I was dumb-struck. But she had more. “If someone did publish it, you would be hopelessly ridiculed.”

  “Well, if I am, so what?” I had fired back. “If we don’t strike a note publically, we are only smooth-talking cowards!”

  I had not heard from her since Miss Bary had gone to Washington DC, where she had been appointed to the War Labor Policies Board. An exemplary woman, of course, and I missed her. And naturally, without her, the Industrial Welfare Commission didn’t stand a chance.

  * * * *

  November 29, 1919

  No word from the Argus. Sam had begun talking about going to Argentina. Nathan-Dohrmann was opening a branch of the store down there or some such thing. I mentioned offhandedly that I was sure I would learn Spanish very quickly, and he gave me an odd look. Then he said, “Why would you learn Spanish?”

  “To be able to make myself understood in Argentina.” He looked very uncomfortable. I didn’t dare ask him directly, but he obviously was thinking of not taking me with him.

  I spent several hours ruminating on the idea of being abandoned yet again. At nearly thirty, I was no longer young. I could not spend a year or three practicing my fifteen-
ball pool skills on my father’s old pool table as I had the first time I was left by a man. I was a grown woman now. A woman alone was not a secure woman, unless she either had family money or was a devoted career woman. But I knew I mustn’t pity myself, as I did have my mother’s home, perish the thought of moving back, my little fund from my father, and my pen.

  * * * *

  December 10, 1919

  Still no word from the Argus. I wondered if my poem had been lost in the mail and considered sending another pamphlet, but my pride prevented me. Instead I sought news of Mrs. Whitney, and was further dismayed to learn that she languished still in the Oakland jail and had not been offered bail.

  * * * *

  December 28, 1919

  We did have a lovely Christmas. Sam gave me a pearl necklace and matching earrings. I gave him a gold tie-stick. We dined with the Dohrmanns, Andrew and Charlotte. I could not call him A.B.C. as he would have preferred, A. B. C. Dohrmann being how he went professionally, but I thought it a woeful affectation and strange in such a businesslike personage. Andrew was charming. His five sons were even more charming, although his brother, Fred, who had been the vile naysayer on the Wage Commission, was a dour thing. It was no wonder Andrew had the total running of Nathan-Dohrmann.

  I tried to avoid all talk of politics, although Andrew did mention that he knew I was an advocate for the minimum wage. Fred, speaking like an old sock, stated firmly that too many women were working for the pleasure of it, for “pin money” as he called it. Andrew agreed with his brother that women were taking jobs from the men who were back from the war. I mentioned that it was not likely that someone would stand on her feet for eight hours a day at his store, having to be pleasant to irritable and haughty shoppers, for ten dollars a week for fun. Sam gave me a look that froze my Christmas turkey, so I stopped talking. I felt such a coward.

  Luckily Mrs. Dohrmann, Charlotte, rather, was a perfect hostess, although I could not imagine how she could even still be breathing with seven children—the two tiny daughters were beautifully turned out in dresses that made the little girls look like sugarplum fairies. Her cook was excellent. I was certain that the cook was paid more than ten dollars a week, but I restrained myself from pointing out that it was unlikely that she was working for pin money.

  There was quite a bit of talk about the Dohrmann Commercial Company expanding to Buenos Aires, which is in Argentina, and Sam became quite animated in that conversation. At home he hadn’t talked about going, though, since Thanksgiving. I was still unsure of his plans.

  By Christmas, with still no word from Argus, I guessed I should forget about it.

  * * * *

  January 5, 1920

  We rang in the New Year and the new decade with all of the high hopes we had for the future. The war to end all wars had now been over for more than a year. Men were back, and unlike in Europe, we still had most of our men, so there were fellows everywhere. They had become so much more sophisticated than they had been when they left, most of them, since before the war most had never been out of California, much less been to Paris.

  We went to a party at the Fairmont, and everyone dressed grandly. Sam bought me the most beautiful silk dress, discounted certainly at a N-D owned store, but still, the height of the new fashion, three inches above my ankle. It was of a shimmering rose-gray color, with a long waist that made me look even taller than I already was. My height, which was of course a detriment in most situations, was well-shown in the new style. Luckily for me, Sam was almost six feet high, and even in my outrageously high heeled shoes I didn’t tower over him.

  The music was new Jazz, the kind that sent one’s blood zinging through the veins. I danced all the new dances, and when Sam didn’t want to dance with me, I danced with all the other fabulous men who were at the party. Leticia did not run with the same crowd—her Albert was a staid, starched fellow, but she liked him fine—but Jacqueline and Francis Pemberton were there, and Jacqueline and I spent half our time sizing up the clothing of the ladies, and the other half dancing with all the gents.

  The New Year was always a time for reflection on what had gone before and what we could hope to come. Between dances, seated at a little table littered with empty champagne glasses, Jacqueline and I dissected the outfits of everyone present, remarking on who had embraced the new, shorter fashions and who adhered to the old high-necked, ruffle-sleeved look of the previous decade. Though the war years had simplified fashion, if anyone had dared leave her house dressed as Jacqueline and I were on New Year’s Eve—with far more leg than just an ankle showing, and no waistline at all—she would have been arrested for indecency.

  The highlight, from a social climbing point of view, was meeting Senator Hiram Johnson, the former governor. He was a founder of the Progressive Party and had run for president. He was brilliantly handsome, and we had a spirited talk about politics. He agreed that we were on the cusp, now, of a time when a woman could be accomplished in arenas previously reserved for men: painting, music, writing… “You would of course never attract the same money as men, but think of the achievements.”

  I predicted a luminous future for that fine man.

  It was a great night. What made it even greater was when we got home, Sam was too drunk and tired to bother me much, and the New Year rang itself in peacefully for once.

  On New Year’s day, Mr. Dohrmann’s driver took us out in the automobile, and we went down to Redwood to wish my mother a Happy New Year. She had moved us, widow and fatherless girl, out of San Francisco a few months after my father had died. I had little sympathy for her then, furious at being hidden away in a backwater, and I had escaped to Berkeley and college as soon as I was able. In retrospect, when I had been abandoned at the altar, waiting for a man and a period that did not come, I saw merit in hiding my face. But she had remained in Redwood, bitter and alone. I had moved on.

  Poor woman, she could barely get in and out of her rocker anymore and was pretty hard of hearing. But age seemed to have softened her, since she received me and Sam somewhat graciously, given the harshness of prior years.

  “A woman with a past should be scrupulous in her behavior if she wants to reenter society,” she had said when I first introduced Sam. I had tried to forgive the rudeness, knowing that elders couldn’t move as swiftly with the times. If a man and a girl wanted to live together, I had explained, marriage was no longer necessary. Sam had said he didn’t believe in marriage, that it was a bourgeois construct, although he didn’t seem to mind the luxury we now lived in. Sam and the Progressive movement had embraced me, given me a home where I belonged. I was lucky he would have me.

  Three days into the new year, I opened the newspaper to shocking news. The Department of Justice had raided meetings and work places all across the nation, including in California, and had arrested three thousand people, all accused of “plotting together to rise up and destroy the fabric of the United States government by violent means,” as a certain Mr. Palmer, the head of the Justice Department, was quoted as saying in the San Francisco Examiner. Anyone who was at a meeting, or near a meeting, was arrested. This was the same Department that had seized Mrs. Whitney. In response to complaints at the Congressional hearing immediately following, that the officers had no warrant, the Department of Justice stated, “This is no time to split hairs when our country’s very foundations are at stake.” Mr. Palmer was quoted as saying that membership in the Communist Labor Party was warrant enough. Not everyone in our nation’s capital agreed.

  It was against that frightening backdrop that Leticia and I worried over Mrs. Whitney’s upcoming pre-trial hearing. We hoped they would dismiss the charges against her, but given the arrests of so many, it was hard to feel optimism. We made plans to meet at Leticia’s home to await word, along with other progressives, while men from the Progressive Party staffed the telegraph so we could all know the results as quickly as possible. I was deeply grateful that I hadn’t been caught up in that net back in November.
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  * * * *

  January 7, 1920

  They didn’t free her. The judge set her trial for January 28 and continued to hold her without bail. The reports said she was a shadow of her former self, and although she stood proud and adamant, she was thin as a rail and coughed throughout the hearing. Those of us receiving the news in Leticia’s quiet salon vowed a mass attendance at the trial to give her hope.

  Unlike Leticia, whose Albert was stolidly in support of her views, and Jacqueline, who did exactly as she pleased, I was faced with the question of how to attend without Sam’s knowing. The irony of living in an untraditional relationship with a former community leader of the Progressives and fearing his wrath if I attended the trial of the greatest Communist leader of our time was not lost on me.

  It wasn’t always like this, of course. We were approaching the third anniversary of our time together. We had lived together through a long war, an exciting peace, and now, an angry domestic stalemate.

  * * * *

  January 15, 1920

  The fourteenth was the anniversary of the day we met. I could still see him, tall, commanding, his green eyes glimmering as he stood before the group of Progressives at the Bateau Ivre café. I had ventured out with Leticia, who had been my friend in the two years I had attended college in Berkeley before becoming catastrophically engaged. Most assumed it was the war that prevented my marriage. It was only she, and later Jacqueline, who knew the truth.

  The horrors of the war in Europe were far away from us that night, and we were all fired up about the new unions. Sam had given such a stirring speech I stood up and applauded. I had looked around, and mortified, realized that I was the only one. Fortunately, it was a kind laughter that engulfed me. Sam sat down at my table and bought himself a whiskey. A few months later, he took me home, and in effect I never left.