The crowd milled about for a long while, admiring the damage and replaying the events. The horse was returned to the coachman, whom Detective Littlemore now approached. The detective had recognized George Banwell. 'Say, how's she doing, the poor thing?' Littlemore asked the coachman. 'What is she, a Perch?'
'Half Perch,' replied the driver, trying as best he could to calm the still trembling animal. 'They call her a Cream.' 'She's a beauty, that's for sure.'
'That she is,' said the coachman, stroking the horse's nose. 'Gee, I wonder what made her rear up like that. Something she saw, probably.' 'Something he saw, more like.' 'How's that?'
'It wasn't her at all,' grumbled the coachman. 'It was him. He was trying to back her up. You can't back up a carriage horse.' He spoke to the mare. 'Tried to make you back up, that's what he did. Because he was scared.' 'Scared? Of what?'
'Ask him, why don't you? He don't scare easy, not him. Scared like he saw the devil himself.'
'How do you like that?' said Littlemore, before heading back to the hotel.
At the same moment, on the top floor of the Hotel Manhattan, Carl Jung stood on his balcony, surveying the scene below. He had seen the extraordinary events in the construction site. Those events had not only frightened him; they filled him with a profound, swelling elation — of a kind he had felt only once or twice in his entire life. He withdrew into his room, where he sat numbly on the floor, his back against the bed, seeing faces no one else could see, hearing voices no one else could hear.
Chapter Nine
When we got back to Miss Acton's rooms, Mrs Biggs was frantic. She ordered Miss Acton first to lie down, then to sit up, then to move about in order to 'get her color back.' Miss Acton paid no mind to any of these commands. She headed straight to the little kitchen with which her suite was equipped and began preparing a pot of tea. Mrs Biggs threw up her arms in protest, declaring that she should be fixing tea. The old woman would not be quiet until Miss Acton sat her down and kissed her hands.
The girl had an uncanny capacity either to regain her composure after the most overwhelming events or to affect a composure she did not feel. She finished the tea and handed a steaming cup to Mrs Biggs.
'You would have been killed, Miss Nora,' said the old woman. 'You would have been killed if not for the young doctor.'
Miss Acton placed her hand on top of the woman's, urging her to take her tea. When Mrs Biggs had done so, the girl told her she would have to leave us because she needed to speak privately with me. After a good deal more importuning, Mrs Biggs was persuaded to go.
When we were alone, Miss Acton thanked me.
'Why have you made your servant leave?' I asked.
'I did not 'make' her leave,' replied the girl. 'You wanted to know the circumstances in which I lost my voice three years ago. I wish to tell you.'
The teapot now began to shake in her hands. Attempting to pour, she missed the cup altogether. She put the pot down and clasped her fingers together. 'That poor horse. How could he do such a thing?'
'You are not to blame, Miss Acton.'
'What is the matter with you?' She looked at me furiously. 'Why would I be to blame?'
'There is no reason. But you sound as if you are blaming yourself.'
Miss Acton went to the window. She parted the curtain, revealing a balcony behind a pair of French doors and opening up a panoramic view of the city below. 'Do you know who that was?'
'No.'
'That was George Banwell, Clara's husband. My father's friend.' The girl's breathing became unsteady. 'It was by the lake at his summerhouse. He proposed to me.'
'Please lie down, Miss Acton.'
'Why?'
'It is part of the treatment.'
'Oh, very well.'
When she was on the couch again, I resumed. 'Mr Banwell asked you to marry him — when you were fourteen?'
'I was sixteen, Doctor, and he did not propose marriage.'
'What did he propose?'
'To have — to have — ' She stopped.
'To have intercourse with you?' It is always delicate to refer to sexual activity with young female patients, because one cannot be sure how much they know of biology. But it is worse to let an excess of delicacy reinforce the pernicious sense of shame that a girl may attach to such an experience.
'Yes,' she answered. 'We were staying at his country house, my whole family He and I were walking along the path around their pond. He said he had purchased another cottage nearby, where we could go, with a lovely large bed, where the two of us could be alone and no one would know.'
'What did you do?'
'I slapped him in the face and ran,' said Miss Acton. 'I told my father — who did not take my side.'
'He didn't believe you?' I asked.
'He acted as if I were the wrongdoer. I insisted he confront Mr Banwell. A week later, he told me he had. Mr Banwell denied the charge, according to my father, with great indignation. I am sure he wore very much the same look you saw just now. He only conceded mentioning his new cottage to me. He maintained that I had drawn the wicked inference myself, because of — because of the kind of books I read. My father chose to believe Mr Banwell. I hate him.'
'Mr Banwell?'
'My father.'
'Miss Acton, you lost your voice three years ago. But you are describing an event that occurred last year.'
'Three years ago, he kissed me.'
'Your father?'
'No, how disgusting,' said Miss Acton. 'Mr Banwell.'
'You were fourteen?' I asked.
'Were mathematics difficult for you at school, Dr Younger?'
'Go on, Miss Acton.'
'It was Independence Day,' she said. 'My parents had met the Banwells only a few months earlier, but already my father and Mr Banwell were the best of friends. Mr Banwell's people were rebuilding our house. We had just spent three weeks with them in the country while they finished all the construction. Clara was so kind to me. She is the strongest, most intelligent woman I have ever met, Dr Younger. And the most beautiful. Did you see Lina Cavalieri's Salome?'
'No,' I answered. The famously beautiful Miss Cavalieri had performed the role at the Manhattan Opera House last winter, but I had been unable to get down from Worcester to see it.
'Clara looks just like her. She was on the stage too, years ago. Mr Gibson did a picture of her. In any event, Mr Banwell had one of those enormous buildings of his going up downtown — the Hanover, I think. We were planning to go to the roof of that building to watch the fireworks. But my mother took ill — she always takes ill — so she remained behind. Somehow, at the last moment, my father couldn't come downtown either. I don't know why. I think he was also ill; there was a fever that summer. In any event, Mr Banwell volunteered to take me to the rooftop, since I had been looking forward to it so very much.'
'Just the two of you?'
'Yes. He drove me in his carriage. It was night. He made the horses canter down Broadway. I remember the hot wind in my face. We rode up in the elevator together. I was very nervous; it was the first time I had ever been in an elevator. I couldn't wait for the fireworks, but when the first cannons burst out, they scared me terribly. I may have screamed. The next thing I knew he had clasped me in both arms. I can still feel him pulling my — my upper
