CHAPTER 7
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, I ATTENDED services at the Third Congregational Church. I had chosen this particular flock because of Reverend Powers. Rare among theologians, he mirrored the spirit of impassioned inquiry that I so admired in the Professor. His choice of subjects for sermons would have shocked Reverend Audette, who took a literal view of Scriptural commands, whereas Reverend Powers preferred that his parishioners consider the meaning of any passage they encountered. This enlightened approach to God’s teachings seemed more suited to my majority and present surroundings, just as Reverend Audette’s had been to my childhood in provincial Marietta.
This morning’s sermon was entitled “The Role of Conscience in Christianity.” Reverend Powers began by recalling the recent conflagration over slavery and noted that both those who held slaves and those who demanded abolition had cited Scripture to justify their views. After reading passages favored by each side of the question, Reverend Powers closed the Bible and leaned forward on the pulpit.
“They could not both be correct,” he observed, “for as Aristotle demonstrated, two opposites cannot exist simultaneously without one giving way. If that is true, then how is the Christian to choose the proper alternative? Does Scripture, which seems to support opposites, become irrelevant in our search?”
He had paused to allow this question to sit with the congregation. Then he intoned firmly, “No! Scripture is never irrelevant to moral questions, not if we employ it correctly. The word of God does not exist merely to allow us to browse until we discover a passage that we may extract to support a conclusion upon which we have already arrived. God’s word exists to inspire us to seek the truth within ourselves, to probe our Christian consciences in order to determine what is right. Human slavery, as every person in this room of God’s house knows, was not right. It is not then possible that Scripture could justify the enslavement of human beings.”
Reverend Powers concluded by instructing each of us to seek God’s truth, not just in Scripture, but in our daily lives. “God has embedded within each of us a power for good, knowledge of what is right and what is wrong. And it is only by allowing that which God has granted to flower, to be with us as we make our life decisions, that we may live as true Christians.”
I thanked Reverend Powers profusely as I left the church. He could not have known it but his sermon was of particular moment to me. The two aspects of my life that had the most meaning—the spiritual and scientific—were often seen to be in conflict in the modern world, and how the two could be reconciled had become an even greater controversy since the publication of Charles Darwin’s stunning work thirty years ago. (That the world owed the work to the decision by the Professor’s father to opt for Canada rather than the sea is one of history’s ironies.) I was as drawn to empiricism as to God but ever since I had become involved with the science of medicine, I had encountered a surprising degree of prejudice. A shocking number of otherwise intelligent people viewed the pursuit of natural science as an un-Godly act. The misguided Reverend Squires, who had founded the League Against Human Vivisection in his determination to prevent autopsy, was hardly the only example of blind rejection of knowledge in the name of spirituality. There were even some who claimed that disease should not be treated and suffering not relieved, since each represented an expression of God’s will, which should not be interfered with by Man.
Reverend Powers’ sermon, however, had put a fresh perspective on the problem. When one introduced conscience into the question, it became a simple matter to determine whether or not any human pursuit was consistent with God’s dictates. Certainly, one needed look no further than Dr. Osler to find a man of science who lived God’s grace by seeking goodness and truth within him.
When I arrived at Rittenhouse Square, one of the large oak double doors was opened by a tall, pale-skinned, funereal servant who evoked a formally dressed Cadaverous Charlie, the Dead House attendant. When I identified myself, he stood aside, allowing for me to enter.
No one else acknowledged my arrival, nor was I ushered into a sitting room to pass the time. Instead, the servant slid away, leaving me to wait, hat in hand, for Miss Benedict to descend the stairs. This she did five minutes after my arrival, bounding down like a young boy. The energy with which she obviously embraced life was intoxicating. Instead of a dress, she wore green trousers, a pale blue man’s shirt, and a small cap common to the working classes, a mode of attire only possible if one were wealthy enough to avoid identification to the rank one evoked. I might have been scandalized if not for the knowledge that it was I who was the rustic, and she the cosmopolite.
At the bottom of the stairs, she leaned toward me and kissed me on the cheek. It was in no way a match for the passion of her kiss in the garden, but when she touched me, I felt a dizzy surge from the memory of it.
“Do you have a carriage?” she asked.
I told her a brougham was waiting outside. I had thought of engaging a hansom, but could not chance appearing unaware of the proper etiquette.
“Why was I left alone in the vestibule?” I asked. “Did your parents dislike me that much?” The feel of her lips had lingered, as the Cheshire cat’s grin.
“Mother actually liked you quite a lot.”
“That leaves ‘Father,’” I reminded her.
“Father doesn’t like anyone,” Miss Benedict said as we exited. “You’re in excellent company.”
When we had mounted the carriage, Miss Benedict gave the driver an address on Mount Vernon Street, which was almost due north and, I estimated, about twenty minutes ride from Rittenhouse Square.
“What is on Mount Vernon Street?” I asked.
“Since you expressed such an appreciation for Thomas’ work, I thought you should meet him.”
“Thomas? You mean Eakins?”
“I do,” she replied. “I thought it would be enjoyable for you. Doctors likely do not have much opportunity to see the inside of an artist’s studio. Think of this, then, as an operating room of a different sort. Consider it my contribution to your education.”
“Thank you,” I replied. “Perhaps one day I can reciprocate and allow you to sit in on an autopsy.”
“Perhaps,” she agreed, not seeming to appreciate that I had been joking. “Thomas has, you know. Sat in on autopsies, I mean. He is obsessed with the study of the human form.
“It is a great honor to be invited to the studio,” she continued. “But Thomas has been through some extremely trying times. The dismissal from his position at the Academy affected him quite deeply….”
“It was not entirely without cause,” I offered, and then immediately wished I could have the comment back. But instead of the irritation I expected, Abigail reacted with aplomb.
“I will grant you that Thomas is as naïve as to the sensibilities of polite society as you are,” she said. Point taken, I thought, stung. “He could not believe that removing the loincloth from a male model in the presence of female art students would cause such a fuss.”
I decided quickly that even I would not have been that naïve.
“Before you pass judgment,” she added, anticipating my reaction, “you should know that after Thomas was dismissed, thirty-eight students resigned in protest. They established the Art Students’ League so that they could continue to study with him.”
“I’m sure he is a fine teacher,” I said.
“He is a brilliant teacher,” she replied. “In any event, he was so distressed that your friend Weir Mitchell sent him west for a ‘rest cure.’” Miss Benedict frowned. “The quack.”
“Mitchell is an excellent physician,” I countered, reflexively defending my profession. “There is no man more knowledgeable of nervous disorders.”
Miss Benedict sniffed. “He’s a quack. He thinks the brain functions like a kidney.”
We continued north, passing through an industrial area, then crossing railroad tracks into a residential neighborhood. Overnight, the weather had turned warmer, and the streets were bustling, men, women, couples, and families out for a Sunday stroll on a lovely, early spring afternoon. I could determine from their clothing that the area was prosperous but hardly rich. When we reached Mount Vernon Street, the brougham pulled up at a narrow and slightly shambling redbrick, four-story house that matched the address Miss Benedict had given the driver. As I perused the scene, I noted a solitary man at the end of the street who seemed to be simply enjoying a sunny day. He was hatless, with a handlebar mustache, and wore a short jacket and checked vest, and was made conspicuous by being the only person on the street not in motion.
I descended the carriage first and then extended my hand to help Miss Benedict down, but she ignored it and brushed past me, skipping up the steps. A woman of about forty opened the door. She had a long but pleasant face, a trim figure, and was dressed in a paint-stained gingham dress. I was drawn to her large, quite expressive eyes, which were deeply brown. Her hair was disheveled and she wore no rouge or lip paint.
“Susan!” exclaimed Miss Benedict happily and the two women embraced.
“It’s so nice to see you, Abigail,” the woman replied, holding Miss Benedict at arm’s length and taking her in. “It’s been weeks. You look wonderful.”
“As do you, Susan,” said Miss Benedict. She gestured toward me. “This is Dr. Carroll.” I extended my hand as Miss Benedict added, “Ephraim Carroll, I’d like to introduce Susan Macdowell Eakins, Thomas’ wife and one of the finest painters in the United States.”
Susan Eakins ushered us into the foyer. The hall was long, narrow, and dark, and the entranceway minimally appointed. A parlor was to the left, with walls painted brown and wide-board floor planking rather than tiles, décor more common to farmhouses in Ohio than four-story homes in Philadelphia. The scent of gas mixed with a mustiness that I associated with aging.
On the walls hung five large paintings. Each was in the carefully detailed style of the rowers I’d seen at Miss Benedict’s, but only the first four seemed certain to have been rendered by the same hand: a western scene—cowboys, obviously painted during the trip to the Dakotas; two portraits; and finally, over the mantel, a provocative rendering of a group of nude men standing on a large rock ledge that extended over a pond. His dismissal from the Academy of the Fine Arts apparently had not cured Eakins’ need to shock.
The last painting, on the far wall, was of two seated women. Its background was darker, yet the faces and hands of both women seemed to have been illuminated by an unseen light from the left. It was similar to others, but at the same time different.
“That is Susan’s,” remarked Miss Benedict, as I walked forward to examine it. “It’s called ‘Two Sisters.’ Brilliant, is it not?”
Although I agreed heartily that it was certainly an arresting portrait, it did not, I thought, have the power of Abigail Benedict’s rendering of Rebecca Lachtmann.
Susan Eakins led us to the stairs, informing us that Eakins was in the studio. As we ascended, Mrs. Eakins told me that her husband had been raised in this house and, upon his return from studies in Europe, had actually engaged with his father in a written contract to lease the studio and receive room and board for twenty dollars per month. His mother had died some years earlier, but Benjamin Eakins still lived here, although the old man spent most his time in his rooms on the second floor.
The studio occupied the entire top floor. Huge windows set on a slant under high ceilings faced north and let in a profusion of light. The lower panels were attached to long pushrods so that they might be opened for ventilation. Although a breeze wafted through the studio, a smell of paint, mildly acrid but agreeable, permeated the large room. Unlike the downstairs hall where paintings were hung for individual effect, here virtually every inch of wall space was covered with paintings, works in progress, and a surprising number of photographs, the vast majority of which were of unclothed men and women. The artist’s obsession with the human form had certainly not been understated.
In the center of the room, coming forward to greet us, was Thomas Eakins himself. He was about my height, slim, with chestnut eyes, hair flecked with gray on top, close-cropped without a part, showing more gray at the temples. I guessed him to be in his mid-forties. A thin wisp of beard framed his face and an untrimmed mustache adorned his upper lip. Eakins’ features were, in fact, not dissimilar to those of his wife; they might be siblings as easily as spouses. Even upon first glance, there was a kinetic quality about the man that made him seem to be vibrating even when he was standing still.
After Miss Benedict made the introductions, he extended his hand, which was stained with a variety of colors of paint. “It’s a pleasure, Dr. Carroll,” he said, his voice incongruously high-pitched. He glanced down at his fingers. “Don’t mind the paint. It’s dry.”
I told him how flattered I was to be asked to his studio and that I had admired “The Portrait of Professor Gross” on my visits to Jefferson Medical College.
“Thank you,” said the painter. “You are more discerning in that regard than the general public.”
“I am sure that the picture will eventually be recognized for its greatness,” I replied.
A thin smile darted across his face. “Perhaps you would be interested in one of my current projects.”
He directed me to a giant canvas in the center of the room—taller than I and almost twelve feet wide—held in place by block and tackle strung from the ceiling and supported by framing set about two feet off the floor. A number of smaller drawings were placed in front, as was a ladder to allow Eakins to reach the top. The painting was of Hayes Agnew in an operating theater, the portrait that had been commissioned by his students. The drawings were all preliminary sketches.
“It is not quite finished,” said Eakins, “but I think you may find it instructive.”
“Instructive” was hardly adequate—the painting was astonishing. If it was not finished, I could not tell where more work was needed. The detail was so remarkable that I felt as if I were present at the surgery. The composition depicted Agnew, a surgical knife held with thumb and first fingers of his left hand, supervising a mastectomy. Agnew himself had stepped back from the operating table and was lecturing to a packed gallery of students whilst an assistant did the actual cutting. Another assistant had just lifted an ether cone off the face of the patient, an attractive young woman with dark hair whose healthy right breast was entirely exposed. Although the realism was remarkable, perhaps even more so than in “The Portrait of Professor Gross,” the visible breast, full and shapely, gave the work an undeniable prurience.
“They asked for a standard portrait,” said Eakins, “but I thought for seven hundred fifty dollars, they deserved something more elaborate. I only received two hundred dollars for the Gross painting, you know. Each of the students who commissioned this work is recognizable in the gallery.”
“We hung it just recently,” Susan Eakins said. “Because the canvas is so large, Thomas painted most of it on the floor, either sitting in a chair or cross-legged. I was astounded that he could attain proper proportion at such an angle to the work but, as you see …”
“Susie flatters me,” said Eakins, clearly pleased to be so flattered.
“More than once, I found him here in the morning, asleep at the foot of the canvas,” she informed us.
“It is a remarkable work,” I said.
“Thank you,” he replied. “It is real. That is what is most important. A photograph would provide no more accurate a rendering. Tell me, Dr. Carroll, can you detect any significance more to your area of endeavor?”
“A comparison with your previous medical painting, you mean … of Gross?”
“Precisely correct, Doctor,” he said. “So then, what do you see?”
“In the Gross painting,” I offered, “both the surgeon and his fellows are wearing street clothes, while here Agnew and his assistants are wearing gowns.” It was a lucky thing he hadn’t painted Burleigh.
“That is the easy one,” said Eakins. “Go on.”
“There are only medical personnel near the operating table, which is set off from the gallery by a barrier.”
“Yes.”
“Yes, yes,” agreed Eakins with impatience, “but you are missing the most significant difference.”
I didn’t particularly enjoy being quizzed like a student, but with Abigail standing attentively, waiting to hear my response, I forced myself to think on the point. Then I had it.
“The aseptic instrument tray,” I said.
“Indeed,” he said. Eakins’ intensity was so great that it was fatiguing simply to be in his presence. “Since I painted Gross, immense advances have been achieved in surgical technique, and I wished to portray them. Lister’s teachings on asepsis have finally penetrated American medicine. But there is one recent development that I have not included because Agnew has not.”
“Surgical gloves,” I said, now fully up on the game.
“Exactly. Gloves were introduced earlier this year, but are still experimental. But they will be in common use shortly, I am certain. Halsted is a brilliant man.”
“Yes.”
“I’d like to paint him one day,” mused Eakins.
My notice turned to the hangings on the walls. Nudes in art were quite traditional, but I had been unaware that the practice had been transferred to photography. As I looked a bit closer, I could not help but to observe the identity of one of the models.
“Yes, Dr. Carroll,” said Eakins, motioning to a series of photographs of a frontally nude male holding a nude female in his arms, “those are of me. I hope that a man of your learning and sophistication is not repelled by the human form.”
I was too busy staring at the photographs and realizing that they were, in fact, of my host, to remark on my sophistication.
“Photography is the future, Doctor,” he continued, leading me by the elbow, “although with Eastman’s invention I expect a proliferation of amateurish profanities.” George Eastman had introduced the box camera the previous year and photography had instantly become a wildly popular avocation.
“Look at this series. I took them about eight years ago.” He had stopped at a group of seven photographs of a young woman, completely unclothed, standing either facing the camera, with her back to it, or in left profile. In the frontal poses, she wore a black mask that totally obscured her face. The mask created the sense that the woman had been forced to pose, that her clothes had been removed against her will. To my embarrassment, I found the series arousing, forbidden. But Eakins himself seemed oblivious to the sexual content.
“Look at the musculature,” he declared, “how the entire physique changes depending on whether the model stands evenly, favors one leg, has her hands at her sides or on her hips.” He spun me toward him. “Anatomical accuracy—that is what we get from photography!”
He continued to prowl along the walls, past array after array. One was of a group of unclothed men on a rock ledge at a pond. I found this photograph disturbing as well, and wanted to look away but, not wanting to appear a prude, I instead commented how precisely he had recreated the scene in his painting.
“Painting life is life,” Eakins said. “We explore the human condition through truth, not romanticized images. My God, I despise the Pre-Raphaelites!”
I did not know what a Pre-Raphaelite was but did not say so. I was aware, however, that while both Miss Benedict and Eakins saw painting as a quest for truth, each saw its realization in opposing artistic styles. Finally, we came to one group of photographs, those of a nude woman from the back and in profile, and I involuntarily stopped.
“Quite correct, Doctor,” said Eakins, “it is Susan.”
It was indeed—eight photographs of the bared breasts, buttocks, and pubis of my hostess. Her figure was quite magnificent and it was all I could do to hold myself from spinning around and comparing the photographs to Susan Eakins herself. Would nudes of Abigail Benedict be here as well?
Eakins took my stupefaction for awe. “Yes, these are wonderful, are they not?” he said.
“That’s enough, Thomas,” interposed Susan Eakins, unexpectedly at my side with Miss Benedict. “Allow Dr. Carroll to breathe for a moment.” Standing next to a stranger who was looking at nude photographs of her did not seem to bother her in the least. “Have you eaten?” she inquired of me.
Rather than repair downstairs, she offered refreshments at a small table in the studio. We partook of sandwiches, fruit, and lemonade amidst the smell of oil paints, as Susan Eakins recounted how she had first met her husband. She had, it seemed, come to the 1876 exposition expressly to see “The Portrait of Professor Gross.” Although the painting was ultimately consigned to an army hospital, she had seen it in a gallery, and decided she would study with whoever had been brilliant enough to create it. She enrolled at the Academy the following week, and eight years later, she and Eakins were married.
“I’m told you found my behavior with female students at the Academy somewhat questionable,” Eakins said abruptly. Miss Benedict had obviously mentioned the remark I had made in the coach. “It’s quite all right, you know. I would feel the same in your place…. What a harebrained thing to do. That Eakins must live in the ether. Well, Doctor, I studied with Jean-Léon Gérôme in Paris, one of the most renowned painters in France. Do you know what he is most famous for? Slave auctions—painting nude women surrounded by leering men before being taken to what I believe is referred to as ‘the fate worse than death.’
“The real issue, of course, is not my judgment, but this country’s commitment to Puritanism. It stifles creativity everywhere. Can you really tell me that the Neanderthals surrounding medicine are any less backward than those surrounding art? I simply choose to ignore them. I hope for the sake of the sick that you do as well.”
He was correct, of course. The Professor would never allow Revered Squires or Elias Schoonmaker to suppress his researches, so why should Eakins allow the trustees of the Academy of the Fine Arts to dictate to him? Still, the pursuit of science was intrinsically moral—art was more questionable.
Eakins’ argument also made me more curious about the true nature of the relationship of these three people. Their mutual ease and understanding might merely be friendship—how easily wealth mixed with art—but might also be something more. There was little reason to believe that they would hold more inhibitions in their sexual behavior than they had exhibited anywhere else in their lives. I tried to feel disapproving, but their mode of living was magnetic. What must it be like to live in almost total freedom? Unfettered by society’s conventions, where the very definition of morality is of one’s own making? I had always been taught that such a way of life would lead inexorably to wickedness, yet I felt a draw to this group that could easily overpower reason. Part of that draw, a terrifying large part, was the longing I was developing, deep and desperate, for Abigail Benedict.
“I’d like to show you another canvas,” Eakins said, urging me out of my seat and directing me to the far end of the studio. “I painted this one seven years ago, but I am sending it to Paris to be submitted to the Salon. I’d like your opinion.”
Before me was a painting of an elderly man wearing glasses, seated at a table, leaning over a large sheet of writing paper, completely absorbed in forming characters on the page. The subject was at once intense and serene.
“It is arresting,” I offered.
“Yes,” agreed the painter. “It is called ‘The Writing Master.’ The model is my father. As you can see, I am capable of painting clothed figures.” He gestured back to the table. “But come, Doctor. We must talk.”
After we were again seated, the painter, now quite calm, asked softly, “I wonder, Dr. Carroll, if we might ask your assistance in a matter of some importance?”
“Of course,” I replied. “I am at your service.”
“Thank you, Ephraim,” said Miss Benedict. She reached out and squeezed my hand. “I knew you would help.”
Excited as I was to feel Miss Benedict’s hand on mine, the gesture left me wondering just what I was about to be asked to do. Eakins noticed my expression and laughed easily. “Don’t worry, Doctor, it is nothing nefarious, although there is some delicacy involved. We would ask your discretion.”
“I believe I may be trusted with a confidence,” I replied. This explained the invitation to the studio. There was undoubtedly a professional question in the offing—drug addiction or venereal disease, most likely—but I waited for Eakins to tell me what his predicament might be. I was stung a bit at Miss Benedict’s lack of candor, but nonetheless pleased with the prospect of demonstrating professional sophistication in a room where I lacked sophistication in every other way.
But instead of the painter, it was Miss Benedict who spoke. “It concerns Rebecca Lachtmann … the subject of the portrait I showed you last evening.”
“Is Miss Lachtmann having a medical problem in Italy?” I asked, taken aback.
“Not exactly,” Miss Benedict replied. Her face, which had reflected only unease the night before, now showed grave concern, fear. “Rebecca does have a … situation … but she is not, I fear to say, in Italy. She has not, as far as I know, ever been to Italy.”
“Where is she then?”
“She is here in Philadelphia.”
“Her parents believe her to be overseas, however?”
“Yes,” said Eakins.
“Why, then, are you seeking my assistance?” I asked, bewildered.
“Rebecca’s problem is of a very personal nature,” Eakins offered. “She did not want her parents to know … her father can be an extremely difficult man….”
“Ephraim has met Jonas,” Miss Benedict interjected somberly.
“So, Dr. Carroll, you know what we mean,” Eakins continued. “Rebecca made elaborate plans to deceive her parents into believing that she was touring Italy when, in fact, she was in the city seeking assistance. But now we have lost touch with her.”
So I was not being asked for medical expertise at all. This was a far more pedestrian errand. “You wish me to make inquiries to see if she is a patient somewhere under another name?”
“That certainly,” replied Eakins. “But also if she has sought treatment through less traditional channels.”
“I am not aware of less traditional channels,” I replied coldly.
“You must help us, Ephraim. Help me,” said Miss Benedict, her voice just above a whisper. “But please do not ask for more information. There are issues of personal intimacy involved.”
I had not come here to be enlisted in an intrigue, especially one initiated by moral weakness. Moreover, I would not know where to begin. Rebecca Lachtmann might be anywhere. She was, in actuality, unlikely to be a patient in any hospital, at least in Philadelphia. Anyone of her description would attract attention no matter what name she used. Yet if I refused to offer assistance, I was certain that I would not see Abigail Benedict again.
“I am not sure how much I can be of help,” I replied, “but I will be pleased to do all that I can. Do you have a sketch?” I glanced about at the walls. “Or a photograph?”
“I have a photograph,” said Eakins. “You will use it discreetly, of course.”
“I understand the nature of your request,” I replied evenly.
Eakins nodded, stood up, and walked across the studio to a large case with many drawers. He pulled open one of the drawers, riffled through the material inside, and extracted a plate. I wondered of what nature the photograph he returned with might be, but Eakins was no fool. The print, although slightly grainy, was of only the head and shoulders of a beautiful young woman with light hair. She was recognizable as the woman in the painting I had viewed at Miss Benedict’s, but only because I had been aware of that fact in advance. More disturbing, however, was another resemblance, one that I had discounted when I had been assured that the subject of the portrait was alive and well in Italy.
I studied the photograph carefully and, though the similitude was strong, there was no way to be positive that this was the woman I had seen in the Dead House. Distrust coincidence, the Professor always said. It would have been foolish to conclude that a cadaver I had glimpsed for a second or two in an ice chest and a photograph or a portrait that had intentionally distorted reality were all of the same person. But neither could I definitively conclude that the three pieces of data were unrelated. Distrust coincidence, perhaps, but do not discount it. I must approach this problem as any other—accept coincidence only as a working hypothesis, and then test that hypothesis until it is disproved. Or not disproved. “Less traditional channels.” Perhaps. It seemed that I might be able to be of some assistance after all.
As Miss Benedict and I reemerged on Mount Vernon Street, the sun was lower in the sky and a coolness had once again set in. The streets remained busy, although most of the families had disappeared, replaced by couples. As we were about to enter the brougham, I observed a mustachioed man in a derby. He was, I was certain, the same man who had been loitering about on our arrival, but he now wore an overcoat and was at the opposite end of the street from where he had been taking the air previously. What’s more, he had been joined by a second man, similarly attired, and they seemed engaged in conversation. When we were seated in the coach, I looked out the window, but the corner at which the two men had been standing was now deserted.
“I’m very grateful to you, Ephraim,” Miss Benedict said.
“Thank you,” I replied, but did not turn to face her.
She once more placed her hand on top of mine. “Is there something the matter?” she asked.
“You did not need to pretend an attraction in order to enlist my aid. I would have been happy to help in any case.”
Miss Benedict did not withdraw her hand. “Is that what you think?”
“Would you think differently in my case?”
“Perhaps not,” she admitted. “But you are mistaken all the same.”
“Are you saying that your need for someone in the medical profession to help you find your friend has no relevance?”
“I can understand your suspicions,” she said simply. “But they are without foundation.”
“And what about Eakins? Do you deny that you have feelings for him as well?”
“You are asking if I am involved with Thomas. The answer to that question is no. I was at one time, however. I will not deny it. I have been involved with a number of men. It is not uncommon in my circles, Ephraim. Does that make you care for me less?”
Now she had asked it. I felt my training, everything that I had learned about propriety, the contrivance of her behavior, pushing at me, but after only a moment’s uncertainty, I pushed back. “Nothing could make me care for you less,” I answered.