The Secrets of Lizzie Borden Read online

  There was a girl my senior year of high school named Lulie Stillwell who lived up on The Hill in one of the grandest houses, like a princess surrounded by gilt, marble, brocades, satins, silks, velvets, crystal, polished oak, mahogany, and stained glass, with fresh flowers in every room every day. Rumor had it that the house was actually a genuine castle, bought and shipped piece by piece from somewhere in Europe—people used to get into sedately heated arguments about whether it came from England, France, Italy, Spain, or Germany—and the sprawling emerald lawn had been imported from England rolled up and carried aboard a ship and then unfurled like a carpet when it reached Fall River. People had come from all over Fall River to watch them roll that lawn out just like a big green carpet, so I knew that was true, I’d heard so many tell of it.

  Lulie looked just like Snow White stepped out of the pages of a storybook—ebony hair, skin white as snow, lips red as blood, eyes like regal sapphires. She was almost my friend. She invited me out for ice cream and afternoon strolls a few times, and to sit beside her and listen to the band playing in the park. Sometimes she was so moved by the music that she clutched my hand. It made my heart swell with pride to know that she had chosen me over any of the other girls from The Hill. Addie Whip, Minnie Macomber, Evy, Ella, and Annabelle Sheen, Nellie Shore, Rachel Almay, Carrietta Wold, Charlotte Grosvenor, Lotta Cork, Fannie Huntington, Alicia May Covell, Cora and Cornelia Stratford, and Sadie, Alma, Fidelia, and Minerva Remington, and my own cousins Anna and Carrie Borden would all have given their eyeteeth to walk out with Lulie Stillwell, but she had chosen me—Lizzie Borden!

  Once we went to visit the little museum of curiosities housed in the back room of Gay’s, the town’s only photography studio, and saw a hen with pink feathers that laid colored eggs, a pair of dancing turkeys, a two-headed snake preserved in a glass jar, a trout that had grown a white fur coat to protect itself from the cold that was a specimen of a species found in a singularly chilly lake somewhere in Arkansas, a dead baby with one head but two faces, and, rarest of all, a young mermaid who must have perished in agonizing pain, her features, blackened by the preservatives the taxidermist had used, were so grotesquely contorted, as though frozen in the midst of a bloodcurdling scream.

  During our walks we would always stop to listen to Old Black Joe the roving balladeer sing “Down in a Coal Mine” and “Mother in the Cold, Cold Ground,” and buy a paper cone filled with gooey pink or vanilla taffy from Taffy Harry, who roamed the sidewalks in his red-and-white-striped apron selling his wares from a tray hung round his neck while his little black and tan dog barked and ran circles around Harry’s ankles. Lulie and I would share our taffy, giggling as we tried to see how far we could stretch it between us, always trying, but never quite succeeding, in stretching it across the street.

  I used to dream she was lying beside me in bed at night, brow to brow, bosom to bosom, lips barely a breath apart, sharing secrets and kisses sweeter than vanilla and strawberry taffy. I was wild to touch her the way I touched myself beneath the covers; just the fantasy left me flushing and feverish. After the circus came to town I dreamed of her in pink tights, dressed in silver spangles, with feathers in her hair, swinging on a trapeze or balanced on the back of a prancing horse. And when I read in the newspaper about a bal-de-masque up on The Hill where all the guests had come costumed as characters from Mother Goose Rhymes for weeks afterward Lulie appeared as Little Bo Peep in my dreams.

  If anyone had asked me when I was seventeen, I would have said the most wonderful day of my life was when Johnny Hiram, who was sweet on Lulie, walked into Negus’ Confectionery and saw Lulie and me sitting at one of the little round white tables draped with pink and white gingham, giggling with our heads close together over a big bowl of vanilla and strawberry ice cream drenched in chocolate sauce. He completely lost his temper because she was spending time with me instead of him and shoved the bowl into the lap of my new powder-blue skirt with the elegant knife pleats—the one I had impetuously ordered without consulting Father; I was that desperate to impress Lulie. Johnny’s face turned red as the cherries on top of our ice cream and he called me a “stupid, fat heifer!”

  Lulie leapt up and slapped Johnny so hard I’m surprised his head didn’t spin, then flew to my side, flung herself down on her knees before me, and, with tears of outrage glistening like a crystal veil over the brilliant sapphires of her eyes, swiped futilely at my skirt. But the flimsy napkin was no match against the melting mound that was already chilling my hot thighs.

  Lulie took my hand and said, “Come home with me, Lizzie.” And I did. I would have risen from my deathbed and followed her to the ends of the earth if she had asked me to!

  Her parents were away, traveling in Europe, so we had the rare privilege of her mother’s opulent rose marble bath. It was big enough for four, perhaps even more; had I been more worldly back then my fertile imagination would have surely conjured up images of delightfully decadent Roman orgies with slick and slippery naked beauties filling that rosy tub. While her maid—a real French maid from Paris, not a dirt-common, ignorant Irish Maggie!—divested me of my clothes, Lulie nonchalantly stripped off hers, leaving them where they fell for the maid to pick up later, and stepped into the tub to show me “the best part”: how the water flowed out of the mouths of golden fishes set at various heights into the wall. It was one of the first shower baths in Fall River.

  While I stood there stark naked, trying to cover my flabby breasts with one hand and my coarse frizzy red bush with the other, Lulie, imperious as an alabaster princess, sent my clothes away with her maid. To be laundered “as good as new or Johnny Hiram will pay for new!” she promised with a furious toss of her curls. “I don’t know what got into that boy, unless it was the Devil, doing such a thing to you!”

  I nodded dumbly. I couldn’t summon words to answer; all I could think about was the wonderful and terrifying fact that I was standing there in the midst of that beautiful pink and gold bathroom stark naked in front of Lulie Stillwell and that she was naked too. It was like a dream come true; I was so excited I could hardly breathe. I was sweating profusely, like an overworked plow horse, my armpits were drenched, and I imagined the sweat rushing down my back like a raging rank waterfall, and there was a silky hot slickness between my tightly clenched thighs. I was sure my unfortunate habit of flushing made me look like a fat tomato that had suddenly sprouted a stout body and four thick, sturdy limbs. And I was afraid Lulie would hear my knees knocking.

  Lulie looked like a delicate ebony-haired water nymph standing there against the rose marble and gilt fish with water pouring over her shoulder and rushing down, like a waterfall, between her little pink and white breasts. I wanted to suckle those pink tips like a greedy infant; I knew they would taste as sweet as little cakes.

  Flaming-faced, I stood and stared, like a person struck dumb or hypnotized, at the beads of water spangling the lush bush of black hair between her white thighs like little crystals.

  But Lulie just smiled, seemingly oblivious to my lust. After all, she’d been in her skin her whole life and by seventeen she knew she was beautiful and was accustomed to accepting admiration as her due. But she wasn’t blind; she never had any trouble seeing the blackboard even in the back row. Surely she could see how red my face was! She had set me on fire! I couldn’t understand it! Was she stone-blind to my embarrassment or merely a model of impeccable breeding? She was in her element, and I was a fish out of water, gasping and dying, in secret ecstasy, on a perilous rocky shore. And then Lulie laughed and reached out for my hand and pulled me into the tub, and into her arms, so close that our bellies brushed and red mingled with black down below. I’ll never forget the way Lulie giggled and smiled! There was no music sweeter than her laughter to my ears!

  In that instant, I forgot my shame, and everything else, except that we were together, touching, naked as pagans in that sumptuous pink bath, with golden fishes spewing warm water decadently down on us, while our bodies glided slickly against each
other and we took turns bathing each other with a cake of pink perfumed soap imported from Paris molded in the shape of a perfect prizewinning rose. Before I went home, I would slip that soap into my pocket, to take home as a memento of the day my dreams came true and I shared a bath with Lulie Stillwell. I used to take it out and bury my nose in the heart of that pink rose with the bath-blunted petals and dream that I was blissfully burying my face between Lulie’s legs, nuzzling her own pink petals, making her melt.

  Afterward, our bodies still flushed pink from the hot bath we had shared, we waged a playful battle, arming ourselves with fat white powder puffs that we repeatedly plunged into the pretty porcelain bowls on Mrs. Stillwell’s dressing table whenever the need arose. They were painted all around with swirls of gilt ribbon and pink roses and lavender blossoms to identify the fragrance of the powder within, nothing at all like the common tins sold at Sargent’s. We ran about the room, screeching and whooping like naked savages, climbing like nimble mountain goats over the wide quilted pink satin expanse of the bed, playfully pummeling each other with the fragrant puffs, coughing and giggling in the dense white clouds of scent that swirled around us like the sweetest snow and settled on our heads like the white powdered wigs of eighteenth-century courtiers.

  When I paused to cough and sneeze and swipe the powder from my lashes, Lulie lunged and tackled me and we fell as one onto the big bed, screaming with laughter.

  Did I only imagine it, or as we writhed in a welter of naked limbs and tickling fingers amidst heavenly clouds of perfumed powder did she playfully rub her pussy against mine as her fingers glided swiftly over my breasts, tickling them like the keys of the piano Lulie played so exquisitely? I like to believe the billowing powder was a Heaven-sent disguise to hide a desire we both secretly harbored but were too ashamed and afraid to admit even to each other.

  We created such a ruckus that Mrs. Morner, the Swedish housekeeper, came rushing upstairs to see what all the commotion was about. She staggered in the doorway with her hand pressed against her heart and stared aghast as Lulie, the “darling child” she had known from birth, triumphantly straddled me on the bed in a cloud of perfumed powder, plying her puff like a demented confectioner over my florid breasts while I giggled and writhed beneath her, my tickling fingers groping blindly over her bosom, lingering for a sweet fleeting instant on her nipples, like little hard pink candies, and tried to rub against her in such a way that, if I needed to, I could afterward insist was unintentional. But inside I was secretly fighting with all my might the almost overpowering urge to masterfully grab her wrists and roll on top of her and grind my loins against hers.

  Mrs. Morner fell back against the door and gave a scandalized screech, then proceeded to deliver a sharp tongue-lashing denouncing our “lewd horseplay.”

  “Shame on the both of you, running about naked as heathens! You’re supposed to be decent, God-fearing young ladies!” she cried, and ordered us back to Lulie’s room to “put some clothes on!”

  Sheepishly, daring sly, sideways glances at each other and sputtering and stifling our giggles as best we could, we wrapped ourselves in Mrs. Stillwell’s big plush pink towels—thankfully she was a woman with ample hips and breasts; otherwise they would have been too scanty to cover me—and filed dutifully past Mrs. Morner with our eyes downcast and down the sapphire, amethyst, and gold floral carpeted corridor to Lulie’s blue watered-silk bedroom where pink net water lilies, their petals sewn with shimmering tiny pink beads, bloomed upon the bedspread.

  I perched nervously on the edge of a quilted blue satin armchair by the pink marble fireplace, the towel clenched tightly over my breasts, frowning at the way the fat under my arms spilled over and feeling suddenly awkwardly self-conscious of my nakedness as I watched Lulie dress.

  Lulie was slender and delicate boned even without her corset, and not even her dressing gowns would fit me, so I had no choice but to stay as I was until her maid returned with my clothes. When Lulie stepped into her frilly white lace and ribbon trimmed batiste drawers I noticed the white powder still clinging, like powdered sugar, to her licorice-black bush. When she lifted her leg I caught a glimpse of deep pink and a wave of hot desire threatened to knock me off my seat. I wanted her to stay as she was, naked with me, to frolic and play some more, but I knew instinctively that the moment had passed and it would only be embarrassing and awkward if I tried to bring it back. So I turned my flaming face to the window and made some dull-witted remarks about the weather and how beautiful the garden was and when Lulie asked me to lace her stays my hands trembled like an old woman’s.

  Then came the disastrous day when we went horseback riding.

  I was so excited when she invited me that I told the teacher I had my monthly illness and didn’t feel well and rushed home to beg Father to buy me a riding habit; I had been too ashamed to tell Lulie that I didn’t have one and barely knew how to ride. I dreamed of something dashing and romantic like Nell Gwyn or some other heroine of history would have worn, gilt-braided burnt-orange, cinnamon, crimson, or bottle-green velvet, and I simply must have a wide-brimmed hat with a fluffy cloud-white ostrich plume held in place by a magnificent jeweled brooch as big as a lady’s clenched fist. And leather gloves and a riding crop and boots of course! I forgot all about the reality my mirror would show me—a plump, frizzy red-haired, florid and freckle faced and heavy-jawed, broad-shouldered, stout-waisted girl of seventeen—and imagined myself as one of the beautiful, elegant, poised, wasp-waisted ladies pictured in the pages of Godey’s Lady’s Book perched sidesaddle atop high-stepping steeds as they regally waved to one another, the long skirts of their riding habits cascading like waterfalls over the lean, muscled flanks of their mounts.

  Father scoffed at my pretensions, my “silly notions” that he blamed on my reading matter: “Velvet riding habits and feathered hats, I never heard such folderol in my life!” Plain black or brown broadcloth, he said, was what respectable women wore when they went riding. “Only those spoiled and silly ninnies up on The Hill who don’t know the value of a dollar wear anything else,” he continued, and went on to declare that their fathers were all “jackasses who don’t have the sense to rein their daughters in. It’s their backs that need a riding crop, not the horses they ride!”

  Abby—still trying to be my friend—tried to soften the blow by buying a reddish-brown broadcloth that would “work wonderfully” with my hair, and making me a new shirtwaist of white eyelet with thin bands of bright orange satin ribbon and wide white ruffles at the collar and cuffs and trimming my otherwise boring brown hat with a lovely swathe of rust-colored veiling and a dainty spray of colorful silk flowers she had been saving for something special “just like this—my Lizzie’s first riding habit,” she beamed as she drew me close and kissed my cheek.

  We only had three days and Abby stayed up late and worked long hours every day at the sewing machine and doing the more delicate work like finishing the buttonholes by hand so that everything would be ready in time for our Saturday ride. But when Saturday finally came and I stood before the mirror I burst into tears and almost howled the house down. I lashed out at my reflection with my newly purchased riding crop and boots, then flung myself sobbing onto my bed, kicking the mattress and pummeling it with my fists, because I was so ugly. The tailored riding habit made me look even more broad shouldered and mannish and did nothing for my stocky figure and florid complexion. I looked nothing like the smiling sidesaddle beauties in the ladies’ magazines! Lulie was sure to think I was ugly and wouldn’t want to be my friend anymore, and I couldn’t blame her. I didn’t even want to be seen with me! Not even the loan of Abby’s mother-of-pearl peony wedding brooch could ease my torment.

  Sidesaddle on an ebony steed from her father’s prizewinning pedigreed stable, Lulie looked every inch a princess in deep-blue velvet to match the precious gems of her eyes, with antiqued silver buttons set with sapphires, and there was an ostrich plume, just like the one I had dreamed of, curling back gracefully over the brim
of her hat, like a fluffy white cloud. Her jacket, edged in silver braid, cinched tightly in at the smallest point of her perfect hourglass waist, then flowed out gracefully over her hips. Her hair was all in ringlets, and a brooch shaped like a bouquet with flowers formed of pearls and sapphires, adorned her throat, beneath which spilled a jabot of the finest milk-white lace.

  I stood there feeling lumpy and miserable, and ugly as a fat brown toad, beside the unimpressive dun-colored mare Father had grudgingly hired from the livery stable for me. I wished the ground would open wide and swallow me before Lulie’s sapphire eyes flashed cold blue fire and imperiously banished ugly, unworthy me from her exalted and elegant presence. But to my immense relief, when she saw me Lulie just smiled, and I saw no condescension or pity in her ruby lips or sapphire eyes. I wanted to jump for joy and throw my arms around her and kiss her a hundred times.

  As we rode away together I prayed for a sudden downpour that would drench us to the skin, sending us scurrying back to the perfumed bacchanal of the rose marble bath again.

  When we stopped to rest, the beautiful dream became a terrible, ugly nightmare in real waking life and broad daylight. We stood together under a big shady tree, leaning against its massive trunk, laughing and hugging each other the way girlfriends do. I dreamed of laying her down on the warm emerald grass and lifting her sapphire skirts, the elegant French heels of her boots tangling in the snow-white ruffles of her drawers as I tugged them off. I impulsively put my hands around that tiny blue velvet waist and pulled her closer, reveling in the feel of her bosom brushing against mine, and then—I couldn’t help myself!—I kissed her, deep and lingeringly, the way I imagined it was done in all the novels that I had read, only in their pages it was men who always did the kissing.