Julia felt a painful dissonance in her own shallow breathing. Her cheeks burned. She tried to see Eva through the dramatic lighting, tried to separate her from this unsettling scene. It was as if Eva—no, her body—had become a thing, some kind of trophy offered up for the spellbound audience. Two emotional undercurrents swirled in Julia’s pulse. One was horror that the Eva she knew had been so effaced. The other was a subversive pleasure to think Eva had retreated, that she was distancing herself. It was her body, her performance, but it wasn’t her. She’d even said as much the other evening. In a way, the scene enacted the humbling impotence everyone felt when forced to yield to those with greater power: the child asking pardon from an unjust adult, the doorman thanking a rude guest. Retreat—holding back one’s self—was the only sanctuary. No wonder Eva dreamed of going to Paris. Of taking her money and escaping into the relatively benign life of a writer.
The room fell silent. Eva stood erect, both arms raised, the gold balls swaying from her hands. She began to sing. The sound came from deep in her throat, a wavering moan to answer the men’s throbbing chant. Her eyes drifted open, their gaze fixed high over the audience, and the music focused into song. Her voice had an ethereal quality, gaining clarity as it rose. The words of her song were so lost in the extraordinary timbre of her voice that only occasional fragments crystallized into a language Julia could understand. Over and over the phrase recurred: I’m just a slave of love. A dozen variations of it flowed through Eva’s lungs, her voice at times seizing, at other times rumbling.
I’m just a slave to love
Why do I crave his love?
I can’t be saved by love
Only betrayed by love
I’m just a slave to love
She began to move, the billow of weightless chiffon a cruel contrast to her chained torso. Bending back into the arms of two men, she thrust her right leg high and laid her ankle on the lowered shoulder of one of the dancers so that the chiffon fell away to her hip. Glinting in the harsh light was a thick gold cuff locked above her ankle. The slow dance continued, accompanied by a single drumbeat, the men’s chanting, Eva’s cries and moans, and the metallic clink of chains. As the pace quickened, two of the men took hold of her arms and seized the gold spheres swinging from her palms. They began to circle Eva’s outstretched arms, gradually unwinding the coiled chain as they danced. The choreography grew more frenzied, and the music, including Eva’s voice, gained power.
I’m just a sla-a-a-a-a-ve to love.
Soon all the dancers were leaping in tight circles around Eva, who dipped and spun furiously. Yards and yards of the thin, gleaming chain tumbled into the arms of her attendants.
The frenzied music and motion held the audience spellbound. Julia too caught her breath as she realized Eva’s shroud would drop to her feet when she was freed from the final loop of chain.
The scene froze. With agonizing tenderness a single dancer completed the last three circuits of Eva’s now-motionless body. She stood with her back to the audience, feet apart and arms again raised high, palms upturned. The last swath of chiffon slipped and wobbled. Finally, in silence, it drifted to the floor. Eva stood still as a statue, her back white as marble. She wore only her headdress and a thin halter and loincloth of pale-gold silk.
Julia wanted to look away but could not. Silence roared in her ears. The room was too hot. She felt as trapped as Eva, seduced by the luminous beauty of this terrible dance of conquering power. Facing Eva and the rapt audience, the dancer held out his armload of gold chain, which spilled over his forearms. A rustle swept the room: the end of the chain did not hang free. It was still connected to Eva. As the murmur grew, she threw back her chin. She shook her head to loosen the filmy chiffon of her headdress and rattle the chains draped over her ears. At last she turned to face the crowd.
For one stunned moment in the narrowed spotlight, everyone saw: the remaining chain dangled from a gold loop sewn to her halter so that it appeared to be pierced through Eva’s left breast. Then she grasped the chain coiled about her ear and tugged it free. The piled chiffon floated down, hiding her features in a diaphanous cloud. Gasps and cheers erupted.
A shower of gold rings clattered at Eva’s feet. Julia twisted her jaw to ease the pressure inside her ears, like after a sudden plummet. Her bones felt hollow, pliant, as if she might slither to the floor if she foolishly tried to stand. What exactly had she just witnessed? For a moment she was aware of nothing but that last searing vision.
A whirlwind seemed to buffet the place. Julia registered the visceral power of dance and music and theater to commandeer the breath, and also a fresh wave of horror. It wasn’t the erotic aspect per se—Julia had seen other risqué acts on the burlesque stage—but the scene itself, so enveloping one might not see it at all. There was something abhorrent about this gilded evocation of slavery, performed by Negro artists at the direction of rich white men who grew richer from it every night. That was the true obscenity. Julia cooled her face with her palms. It was almost another kind of slavery, violence disguised as art. She couldn’t make more sense of it than that. Not yet.
Everywhere around her patrons were flinging tiny rings onto the stage. Shouting “E-va, E-va,” they stood and cheered. Duveen reached for a small bowl of hollow rings in the center of the table, apparently provided
