The Harlot’s Pen Read online

  The look of horror on his face drove me back. “No, don’t hide, miss. I won’t hurt you. Come, come into my car, and we will take you where you will be safe. Joseph, pull forward for the lady,” he said to his driver.

  He held out his hand. I inched forward and took it, and he helped me into his car. Looking more closely, I thought I recognized him. I looked away, for if I might know him, he could know me. But he was a true gentleman, and if he did recognize me, he said nothing. Instead he introduced himself. “I am Fremont Older. Where can we take you?”

  Fremont Older! The editor of the Call who had so unceremoniously declined my poem and had fatefully pointed me toward the Argus. In some way, here was the catalyst of my undoing. But for the moment he was my rescuer.

  I stopped before giving my own address. What would Sam do to me? Though it could not be worse than what was done to me tonight, he would only blame me for my troubles and add to them. I paused, and then, remembering her promise, gave Jacqueline’s address.

  “Oh, the Pemberton home,” he said, and I hid my face in my hands. I should have realized that he would know them. “They are very kind people, and if they are your friends you will be in good hands.”

  I sighed with relief, and we were soon at Jacqueline and Francis’ doorstep. Mr. Older escorted me to the door and waited with me until a maid, still with sleep in her eyes, answered the bell. She eyed me first with suspicion, and then with a glimmer of recognition. I hoped she would not greet me by name.

  “Tell Francis that Fremont Older is here with an injured friend. There has been an accident, and she needs help immediately.” Mr. Older took charge before the maid could be indiscreet.

  The maid stepped aside and let us in. Mr. Older nodded to her, and as soon as she was out of sight he said, “I’ll leave you now. You will be safe here. And send me the next poem you write. The last one wasn’t half bad.”

  And before I could reply, as I stood in shock, he was gone.

  Moments later, Jacqueline was wrapping me in a blanket and ordering a hot bath. I woke up in a soft bed with a hot cup of tea at my side and a sourdough roll with sweet butter alongside, and a stack of blank paper, a fountain pen on the desk nearby.

  * * * *

  March 10, 1920

  Jacqueline sent for Sam once she deemed me fully recovered from my ordeal, and he bore me away with a show of care that I knew was a false display for the Pembertons’ consumption. Once home, I awaited the barrage, but instead he ignored me completely. I wisely shut myself not in the bedroom we shared, but in the other bedroom that we used for occasional guests.

  We tiptoed tentatively around one another, avoiding any reference to the past several days. How we could not speak of what had happened was a testament to the ultimate destruction of our relationship.

  At last, at dinner he made his announcement. Sam had ended the lease on the house as of the first of June, agreeing generously let me stay there until then. I had jeopardized his future with my antics, as he called him, and he was through with me. He was leaving for Argentina on April first, and I could stay in the house until the first of June, after which I could sell the furniture and keep the proceeds as my settlement. Other than that, he was washing his hands of me. In the future, he would dine alone.

  I nodded, grateful for his generosity, and grateful that he did no worse than end our relationship formally, as it had ended spiritually long before. Our evening passed dully, with each of us preoccupied with our own thoughts.

  On a better note, someone has posted Mrs. Whitney’s bail, outrageously set at $10,000, so she could be free while her case awaited appeal. Rumor had it Francis Pemberton was somehow involved. Bless those two, Jacqueline and Francis.

  * * * *

  April 1, 1920

  On the last night before he left for Argentina, Sam asked me to dine with him. I had been taking a tray to my room for three weeks, so it made for a change, but I was still edgy as I sat down. He ate in silence, and therefore so did I, but when we were finished, he put his glass of port down and looked at me. He cleared his throat a few times, and I waited. Finally he spoke.

  “Violetta, I don’t know how to say this. When I met you, you were beautiful to behold, and I was captivated by you. Your energy, your brave journalism, your fervent support of the Progressive movement… You’ve changed into a woman I don’t really recognize, willing to take foolish risks to yourself and to others, and you never think a minute beyond your actions.”

  I raised my eyebrows, almost ready to take him to task. I had changed? He had gone from the compelling, heart-stopping firebrand to a self-serving capitalist, from thrilling companion to a man who moved between icy aloofness and rough fury. But I held my tongue.

  “When you worked for Miss Bary, she tried to teach you to plan. You did good work, but once she left you showed yourself to be as flighty as a young girl. The idea that you wrote a radical poem and had it published without asking me, without regard to the consequences, not just to yourself but to me, still stuns me. That you lied and never once mentioned that you were running back and forth to Oakland to attend that communist’s trial, that saddens me.”

  That was quite a speech. It was as if he had written in out, memorized it, and delivered it at the table. He had schooled his face into a mask of pity, but the contempt kept slipping out. I started to remonstrate, but he held up his hand. He hadn’t finished his piece. “I know you disagree. But that’s not what I want to tell you. I am leaving tomorrow, and when I return, I don’t want to be associated with you. Many believe we are married and may still believe that we are legally bound unless we divorce. You will announce that we have divorced, and you will accept any scandal that follows. If you hope to ruin me by disclosing our cohabitation, believe me, the price you will pay will be vastly higher. I have told Mr. Dohrmann the truth, and though he disapproves strongly, he thinks only slightly less of me than before. I have reassured him that I will not leave you penniless. With the sale of the furniture you will be funded for a time.

  “But lastly, and this is hardest for me to say, I want to tell you I did love you once. I did, Violetta, though I no longer do. I loved you, and for that, I thank you.”

  He got up, left the table, and locked himself in the study. In the morning, he and his trunks had left for Argentina.

  I called the furniture broker the next day.

  * * * *

  May 1, 1920

  I received a summons to lunch from Fremont Older. I had not dared approach him since his rescue of me in March, but his parting words were never far from my brain. At last, and with great trepidation, I had written to him the previous week with a proposal, and to my relief he invited me to call on him.

  I entered the fine restaurant near the Call’s new offices and spotted him sitting alone at a corner table, a whiskey already in hand. He rose slightly to meet me as the maitre d’hôtel pulled out my chair. “Whiskey?” he asked me. I shook his head, although I would have likely benefitted from a drink.

  “Let us go straight to business, so that you may have an appetite for your lunch,” he said. “Two soles, meunière,” he added to the waiter, who nodded and left, as if I had been invisible.

  “Now, my dear, I have taken on far less promising projects in my day. I have hired female editors, I have taken convicted murderers and housed them in my own home to rehabilitate them. Backing a project destined to fail is not foreign to me.”

  I blushed. Destined to fail was not how I saw my proposal.

  “Your proposal is nonsense. You know something about workers’ rights, I do know who your father was, and you may know a bit about the minimum wage,” he added.

  I opened my mouth to remonstrate with him. I knew more than a bit.

  “But we don’t need another article on the misery of the working woman, or the unfairness of the low wages. What we need is something that will rock the boat, knock the complacency out of the newly enfranchised women. Women in California have ha
d the vote since 1911 and have done nothing to better their condition. Women will likely have the vote by the end of this summer across the nation, and California women will be able to vote in all elections. Now is the time to grab them by their lovely lapels and open their eyes, to mix the metaphor.

  “Now, how can you influence these women with no connections of your own? What can you do besides write?”

  “Play fifteen-ball pool,” I said facetiously.

  Mr. Older actually winked at me. “When you figure out an angle to write about, you have a project.”

  I looked down, stymied. I knew no one influential except Mr. Dohrmann, whom I could never again face. I had no “angle.”

  An absurd thought came to mind. “Prostitutes are future voters, too. They are the ones who have taken the brunt of the closing of the houses, and they are some of the most pathetic ones thrown to the mercy of society. Perhaps I can write about them, even influence them. If there were living wages, women would not have to sell themselves.”

  Fremont Older threw his head back and laughed. I looked back down at the table, mortified. “No, no, don’t be upset! The idea is absurd, but not as bad as your first idea. There’s potential there, and if it’s original, it sells.”

  “Sells?”

  “Papers, silly girl. That’s what we do, right?”

  I nodded, dejected. That’s what the Argus had done, and it had cost me everything. I said so to Mr. Older.

  “But everything is what counts. If you don’t give everything, you get nothing. But let us discus this. What whores do you know?”

  I, of course, knew none. “And now I don’t even know how to find one.” I thought about the girl so long ago on the Oakland street.

  “Well then, let me tell you how. There is a madam up in Sonoma who runs a most elegant house, and every influential man in California who is not impotent or a Mormon has frequented her establishment. She closed up her San Francisco shop when the getting was good and opened up in a place called El Verano. It is an extremely high class joint, the women are beautiful—and most prostitutes are not even pretty, legend to the contrary. The madam is gracious, intelligent, and well informed. She has a fine cook, an excellent liquor storehouse, and the best musical entertainment to be had. You could go to her, write about her girls…”

  He stopped, this time it was he who stared into the distance. Then he banged his spoon on the table. “In fact, become one of her girls!”

  I sat back, outraged. “You are joking.”

  “No, I am not. I can see it now: the true story of a working girl, as told to The Call! You are quite pretty, though a bit on the tall side, and well spoken. You have had, shall we say, adventures, so you will not be shocked at the tasks to which you are appointed. You will gain access to the most influential men in California. And think about the goldmine of material you will have for your writing! If you write about your experiences, changing the names, obviously, so you don’t get us sued for libel, I will consider publishing it. Your story will reach the hearts and minds of the people who matter most.

  “Meanwhile, I will back your expenses and await your report. Of course, you must not tell her I sent you. But write a brilliant series on your life as a high-class whore, and your literary future is assured.”

  I was still horrified, but Mr. Older was already talking details. “You must send it all at once, not piecemeal, so I can review it in its entirety before making a decision. I know you can write, and I know you can think. And there’s nothing left for you here in San Francisco now. So, are you in?”

  After about a minute I nodded. Fremont Older’s face split into a grin. “Now that’s my girl!” He shook my hand across the table. “You have signed on for a great adventure!”

  I shook his hand, glorying in his approval, my head buzzing with confusion.

  Only now, in the quiet, empty house, I wondered what on earth had I agreed to?

  The Harlot’s Pen

  A Serial in Parts

  By. V. Strone

  Part One

  “All of the above, you must understand, were small potatoes compared to Spanish Kitty.”

  Petaluma Press Democrat

  Kate Lombard opened the door to a tall, dark-haired woman in a demure, gray dress. She looked her visitor up and down aggressively as the woman stood silently on the wide veranda that graced the shaded front of the house. No automobile, cart, or carriage stood in the broad drive between the rosebushes or in the stone-paved area before the lawn. Troy, her Aztec hairless dog, gave a short yip and turned away, uninterested. This wasn’t a new client to welcome.

  It wasn’t often that a society lady knocked on Spanish Kitty’s door, except for the temperance ladies and the Saturday Afternoon Women’s Club members bent on reform. The lady looked right back at Kate, her eyes as dark as hers, her hair almost as black, and her lips, unrouged though they were, as full and luscious. “Good afternoon,” Kate said at last.

  “And good afternoon to you, too, Miss Lombard. May I come in?”

  Kate raised her eyebrows a bit, then stepped back from the door to allow her visitor passage. It was too warm for a wrap, and the visitor had none, but she did sport a straw hat with a gray ribbon that perfectly matched her dress. Kate’s own dress was merely a sheath of white muslin, with an overdress of light material, tied with a white, silk cord at the waist. It was after noon, but Kate didn’t usually dress until four, so her morning outfit served only to bridge the time between arising and the beginning of the work day. She felt the visitor’s eyes scan her from top to toe, taking in the easy gown and the open collar. Kate felt no urge to pull the cloth closed, and instead fought the impulse to open it further in defiance of the tired town moralists.

  “You know my name, but I am at a loss for yours,” Kate said, seating herself at the edge of a large, graceful chair and motioning her visitor onto the settee across from her. Troy lay down at her feet, and Kate saw the woman’s eyes flicker to the unusual dog. Kate moved the empty glasses, sticky with cordial, away from the small table next to her.

  “Miss Violetta Strone,” the woman said. “Lately of San Francisco.”

  “Enchanted,” Kate replied, and Miss Strone’s lips twitched a bit at the tone.

  In the silence, both women assessed each other. Finally, Miss Strone spoke. “You may well wonder as to the nature of my call.”

  “Indeed,” Kate replied, still drily. She did not feel compelled to help Miss Strone in whatever lofty errand of salvation brought her to Spanish Kitty’s doorstep and beyond. “It was kind of you to admit me without inquiring,” Miss Strone added.

  “And unlike me. But you were saying…”

  “I do understand, and let me assure you I have not come to moralize or proselytize. In fact, my mission may surprise you.”

  Kate stiffened slightly at the mention of a mission. In her long experience, no good came of anyone’s mission. She had been in business, or in the business if not in ownership, for twenty years, and she had limited interest in other peoples’ missions. “It undoubtedly will. But I must urge you to your point. If you have a pamphlet you wish to leave with me, or some other uplifting work, you may do so and be done.”

  Since the end of the Great War, visitors to Spanish Kitty’s Resort at El Verano had become less formal and more open to conversation and pleasure. It was still rare that a lady visited alone, and rarer still that she came into the parlor. Kate didn’t mind being rude, but she knew well the risks attendant on offending society women unnecessarily. Even in permissive Sonoma, lawsuits to shut down women’s businesses were not unknown. However, her days were busy, and her nights…

  “You are a woman of stature and directness,” Miss Strone interrupted her thoughts. “I want to work for you.”

  Kate sat back, startled. Girls often came to her, maybe once a month, to the back door of her Resort, seeking work. They were usually young, fresh, furtive, and often newly deflowered. They had no other source of funds, th
ey had little knowledge of men, and could only converse in banalities. Some acted cocky, trying to impress, and others were clearly terrified and desperate. She rarely hired them, but took them in for a week, fed them, let them earn a wage in her kitchen, and sent them on their way. She did not, in her opinion, run a whorehouse. She ran a salon. Never in her career, either in San Francisco or here in her El Verano Resort near the city of Sonoma, had a lady so approached her.

  “You must be joking, Miss Strone, though it is an amusing joke, at that.”

  “I am not,” Miss Strone replied evenly. “I am obviously not a practiced courtesan, but I can converse better than most. I am widely read, and I can cook, too. I am not a virgin—I expect that in your business such a statement will not be overbold—and I am prepared to work very hard for you. I am not from this area, and I am not known here, so I have no reputation to hold me back.”

  “Nor references to vouchsafe your truthfulness. I do not take on spies, moles, or other infiltrators. What are you really, Miss Strone? A reformer in plain clothing? A spy for a lawyer after a fee? And be honest with me, or I will escort you to the door.”

  The woman appeared to think for a moment. She did not seem anxious or frightened, nor was she brazen or falsely tough. She seemed to think that Kate’s request was reasonable and should be granted. “I am being truthful. I wish to work in your salon for perhaps one or two months. I will give you good value.”

  Kate rose. “Thank you, Miss Strone. It was a pleasure meeting you. I will see you out.” Miss Strone stayed seated, and for the first time color rose in her face. Kate continued to stand, her mouth pressed in a line. The dog stood with her, his smooth, warm and hairless skin pressed against her leg. There was something truly strange about this Miss Violetta Strone, and Kate felt a surge of nerves. “I am waiting.”