Elizabeth and Susan returned to the kitchen to brew a pot of tea. Alone with Margaret, I was timid, as though I were the guest and she the host. I do not know why I should have felt so. Her smile was warm; her goodwill genuine; her manner not in the least haughty or privileged. (Vanity is seldom found in someone who has been looked down on since childhood.) She spoke of her afternoon ride, the loyalty of her two escorts, the consideration of Mr. Barnum, who had arranged for her outing, and of pleasures common to us all. Once again, I admired her wry observations, humor, and good nature, which I supposed had escaped the bitterness and cynicism that blight the hearts of men and women living in an absurd world.
“The ladies seem amiable,” she said. We could hear them fussing at each other, like a pair of hens, as two women will who find themselves occupying the same kitchen. “They’re considerate.” I supposed she was alluding to the footstool.
“They are,” I agreed. “I’m lucky to have found such obliging employers.”
“What is it that they do?” she asked.
I told her of their endeavors, which impressed her favorably.
“I regret only one thing,” said Margaret when I had finished. “That I haven’t any work to do of real importance.”
I hesitated, thinking how best to reply without seeming to disparage her. “You give people pleasure,” I said tentatively.
She glanced at me; she might have even glared. If so, the indignation that sparked her angry look quickly passed into resignation. She sighed and said, “Their pleasure is in feeling themselves—for a moment—lucky.”
Yes, I thought. That is the case.
“My role is unfulfilling. I might as well be hanging on a butcher’s hook.”
I must have looked appalled, because she clarified the gristly image.
“They devour me with their eyes until there is nothing left.”
“Who does?”
“The curious who come to view me. They leave with the rapt expression I’ve seen on the faces of the holy sisters after having eaten the body of Christ.”
For the first time in our acquaintance, she had allowed me to glimpse a woman whose contentment might be a pretense. I recalled that, when I had been in her dainty room, I had felt like a spectator of a play performed on a miniature stage—a drama written for a single character whose purpose eluded me.
“I’m sorry,” I said, having searched my mind and found nothing else to offer her.
She smiled, and her face softened into a gentle, almost beatific, expression. She waved a hand as a saint would distributing her blessings. “You must not mind me, Ellen. I don’t mean half of what I say. You are one of those rare people.”
“What sort of people?” I asked, intrigued.
“That inspire confidence in others. I’ve not known many in your world.”
“Mr. Barnum?”
“Mr. Barnum is another one, but then, he is not of your world. We’ve made room for him in ours.”
I could not make out whether “your world” referred to that of the fully grown or to one inhabited by people who see others only in terms of themselves. I had thought of myself as a decent, intelligent woman, mostly without prejudices. Had a war not already been fought to free the slaves, I’d be an abolitionist. Had I a ballot to cast, I’d vote to protect the poor and helpless, whether they were immigrant Irish, Germans, Chinese, Jews, blacks, or nativists festering in the putrid belly of the Five Points. Suddenly, I was conscious of excluding “freaks,” in the common parlance of the time, from my sympathies. Frankly, I had never thought of them at all except as circus and sideshow performers who were as irrelevant to matters of prejudice as a trained seal. Then at the spiteful urging of a bad conscience, I turned on Margaret in my thoughts, faulting her for having chosen to live in the private world, the little world, of the circus instead of confronting the cruelty of the big one. My anger was irrational, and I left the ugly words of reproach unsaid.
I glanced out the window and saw the world’s tallest man elegantly smoking a cigarette, while Mr. Ashton appeared to be suffering an extremity of boredom. Yawning theatrically and sighing prodigiously, he cracked his knuckles and shuffled his feet, determined to raise the dust, which he regarded with distaste and swatted with his hat, as at a cloud of midges. The horse had its head in a feed bag, its colorful plumes waving this way and that in the breeze, its harness bells ringing each time it lifted its head and snorted. What fun! I said to myself. Maybe a circus life is not such a poor one after all.
Elizabeth and Susan entered with a silver teapot and china cups too large for Margaret’s tiny hands. She accepted the situation with the easy manner and good humor of any other fine lady. I cut the cake and dealt out slices on Elizabeth’s wedding plates, which we balanced on our knees. We were delighted with ourselves and with one another.
Plates clean save for crumbs and the cups drained to the leaves, I carried the remains of the ritual of hospitality into the kitchen and returned in time to hear Elizabeth inviting Margaret to stay.
“You’ll have a room of your own, furnished to your requirements,” she inveigled. “I’ve taken to you, Miss Hardes—May I call you ‘Miss Margaret’ or, if you would allow me the privilege, ‘Margaret’?”
Margaret graciously indicated with a nod of her head that her hostess might adopt the latter familiarity.
“I’ve taken a liking to you, Margaret, and I know that Susan has also.”
“Very much so.”
“And, of course, you and Ellen are already friends,” said Elizabeth to sweeten her offer.
Margaret looked to me as if for assurance, which I gladly gave.
“What would I do here?” she asked after a pause, in which the two suffragists had leaned forward expectantly.
“You would do what you can,” replied Elizabeth, the image of a benevolent grandmother. “We share in the housework, although an Irish woman comes to do the unpleasant chores. You’d do whatever you are able—whatever you found pleasant and profitable.”
“Could I assist you in the cause of woman’s rights?” asked Margaret, looking at that moment as if she could be of no help at all. The truth is that I couldn’t picture her in any occupation other than that of circus eccentric.
“You can do the cause immeasurable good if you would accompany us on our lecture tours!” replied Susan, rubbing her bony hands together so ardently, I expected them to smoke.
“A world of good!” confirmed Elizabeth.
“I don’t think I could speak in public. Not in the way you envision.”
“You wouldn’t need to say anything,” said Elizabeth.
“Unless it pleases you to do so,” said Susan.
“You would be an example.”
“An example of what?” asked Margaret.
“Of abjection!” cried Elizabeth.
“Of humiliation!” croaked Susan.
“But I’m not abject or humiliated!” protested Margaret, clenching her small fists.
“A victim of the exploitation of weakness and a disadvantaged condition, then.”
“I don’t feel myself to be disadvantaged or especially weak.”
“You are a woman,” replied Elizabeth evenly. “As such, you are disadvantaged in law and weak in the eyes of men.”