An adult stories – A Life Unknown Pt. 04 by TheDok,TheDok Authors note: What follows is a work of fiction based on real-life events. None of the characters depicted are real and any similarity to real people living or dead is purely coincidental.
This series of stories has been described by one commentator as historical with a modicum of sex and that is an accurate description. There are many stories on this site with far more erotic content and much erotic content with virtually no storyline at all. If you seek descriptions of wall-to-wall sex I would advise you to go elsewhere. There are many excellent examples of this on this site. I have tried to write an interesting story against a background of events occurring in the early part of the twentieth century and set in the United States and Great Britain and hope I have managed this. Please provide feedback and comments so that I can know if I have succeeded.
As usual, any grammatical or editing errors are mine and mine alone.
A Life Unknown (Part 4)
“Hello Lionel,” I replied. “This is a surprise.”
“Isn’t it just, Victoria. If that is your name?”
“Of course it is. I never expected to see you again. Why would I have lied?”
“No reason, I suppose.”
He looked me up and down, and then he laughed.
“Oh, look at you” he exclaimed. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost. You have nothing to fear from me. I can still remember what you said to me. “A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell.”…… “And I shan’t…But do tell. What are you doing here?”
“I live in Boston. I was invited.”
“If you know Secretary of War, John Weeks, you are very well connected Mrs…?”
I decided it was time to come clean. Or at least as clean as I could.
“Lady Victoria Cameron currently resident in Newton,” I said. “I don’t know the Secretary of War well and don’t support his politics, but I’m excellent friends with his wife.”
It was Lionel’s turn to be surprised, and I saw his eyes widen momentarily.
“Oh my,” he muttered to himself.
“Now sit,” I said. “We’re old friends after all. We have a little catching up to do, and not much time. We shouldn’t be seen together. Is your father here?”
“No. He’s in Florida. He’s unwell and couldn’t travel. The doctors say he hasn’t got long.”
“I’m so sorry,” I replied. Inwardly saying a silent prayer of thanks.
“Sorry he’s dying, or sorry he isn’t here?”
“Both.”
But mostly for not being here I thought to myself.
***
It turned out that Lionel’s family was very well connected too. Lionel’s father had been at school in Lancaster, New Hampshire, with Secretary Weeks and they had kept in touch. Lionel’s mother and Mrs Weeks were good friends, and his mother had originally planned to travel to Newton to visit and attend the party. Unfortunately, the Colonel’s illness had put paid to that.
“I have some business in Boston, so I decided to visit whilst I was here and introduce my fiancée, Mildred. I got engaged last year, and she’s a lovely girl. Forgive me if I don’t introduce you.”
As he was talking, I had been formulating a plan.
“Where are you living now?” I asked.
“I’m staying at the Lexington in Chicago. Mildred comes from there, and we’re building a house in the Gold Coast district. We’re getting married in Miami next month. We had planned to marry next year but have brought things forward so that my father can attend. I hope the house will be finished on time. I’m primarily based in Chicago. I’m a banker.”
“Do you travel much?”
“To Boston, Philadelphia, and New York mainly.”
I cast my net. He didn’t stand a chance.
“I’m in New York next week. I’m staying at The Waldorf Astoria on Wednesday night. Would you like to meet for dinner? I know I’d enjoy your company…..”
Lionel looked at me and I held his gaze. Men, especially young men, think almost exclusively with their penises. His penis also knew, all too well, what It would be missing if he turned me down.
He thought briefly before replying. I didn’t imagine for a minute he would decide to be faithful to Mildred. I imagine he was working out what lie he would tell her to enable him to spend Wednesday night in New York… and then cheat on her.
“That would be nice,” he said.
I stood.
“I’ll let you get back to your young lady and see you in New York next Wednesday. Shall we say eight o’clock? I’ll make reservations at the restaurant.”
Then I turned and walked back into the house.
My plan was simple. I was going to mix business with pleasure and fuck his brains out. Once he had spent another night with me he would have plenty to lose if he was found out or if he decided to give Lady Cameron’s secret away. For just a moment I wondered what I would have done if he had decided to blackmail me. It didn’t bear thinking about.
***
Later that evening, I told Edward that I needed to go to New York on business to see Hans and that I would be going alone. I would travel on Wednesday morning and meet Hans and then go shopping in the afternoon before returning to Boston on Thursday. I was being honest enough. Screwing Lionel was business; of a sort.
I owed Hans money and needed to visit him to deliver what was due. Even though things were on hold, I needed to keep Hans happy. Sooner or later I would need his services once more.
In the business that I had been conducting, I always dealt with cash. I did not want to bank millions of dollars in cash and then have to explain how I had made my money. Paying cash to my employees maintained deniability for all concerned. In place of depositing money in a bank, I bought diamonds or gold bullion which, with substantial sums of cash, was then placed in safety deposit boxes in several banks in Boston. These boxes now contained a small fortune in uncut diamonds, gold, and dollar bills.
Carrying cash and diamonds has its risks but I minimised the risk by travelling at irregular times and intervals, never buying a ticket in advance, travelling with George, who carried a handgun, and being met off the train in Grand Central by others on my payroll. In New York, my armed guards accompanied me everywhere. Very few people knew my identity as head of the organisation.
George did question the wisdom of my going alone, but his leg had been aching badly of late and I told him he needed to rest it. I advised him that I wouldn’t be carrying a great deal of cash and would not be carrying gold or jewels and he was reassured.
***
On Wednesday, at lunchtime, Hans met me off the train. We ate at the Grand Central Oyster Bar. I could have just given him the five hundred dollars he was owed, but I was in a good mood, and I have always believed in treating people properly. Whilst good treatment can’t always buy loyalty, it helps. I had forgotten that Hans Baumgartner’s name was written in George’s ledger, although he probably hadn’t. I was reminded of what my elder brother, used to say. “You can catch more flies with honey than vinegar.”
We ate a half dozen oysters and a large Maine lobster each, and I picked up the bill.
I didn’t need the oysters; I was as horny as fuck already.
We finished lunch shortly after two o’clock and Hans walked me to my Hotel. It was only a short walk, but it enabled me to clear my head. After I had checked into my room I decided that I would take a nap. I had no intention of shopping on this trip to the city; that had been a lie. I decided the time would be best spent resting before the exertions I planned for the night ahead.
I slept until six in the evening before getting up and taking a long hot bath. Next, I dressed and applied my makeup before heading to the Astor restaurant. On the way, I visited the hotel reception and requested my bed be made with fresh linen.
When I arrived at my table Lionel was already waiting for me and stood as I was seated by the waiter. I had dressed in a long blue sequined satin evening dress. It was low cut and sleeveless in the style of the times and had the desired effect on Lionel.
“You look beautiful, Victoria.”
After my large lunch, I ate sparingly; chicken a la king, with a green salad, whilst Lionel ordered a large steak. The meal was excellent, but by the time we reached the dessert course, I was impatient.
“Shall we skip the crepes Suzette,” I suggested.
“Good idea,” said Lionel.
***
Once back in the room, Lionel wasted no time. No sooner had the door closed behind us than he took me in his arms and kissed me hungrily. I kissed him back. His hands were on my bum cheeks, and I could feel his erection through the fabric of my dress. Soon I could wait no longer, and I stood back and reached behind me, and undid the fastening of my dress. It fell to the floor, and I stood in front of Lionel in just my bra, panties, and black lace thigh-length stockings. Then, as he looked on I removed my bra and my tits swung free, and I stepped out of my panties.
I was naked except for my gartered stockings; more naked than if I had not been wearing them. I was deliciously ready and could feel the moisture between my legs.
Lionel had watched me strip. His lust was obvious, his pupils wide, his lips moist.
“Strip for me, Lionel. I want to watch you. And when you’ve stripped, I’m going to fuck you silly.”
He didn’t need to be asked twice. He took his jacket off and put it on the chair, and then in order, his shoes, socks, bow tie, shirt, and trousers. He stood in front of me in just his underpants and looked me directly in the eye before stepping out of them.
His body was just as I remembered; tall, broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted with muscular thighs, and a tight arse. His uncircumcised penis stood erect and ready.
I crossed to the mirrored dressing table and bent over it with my legs apart and showed him my slit. I had placed a free-standing Cheval mirror behind the dressing table where I could see myself in the reflection, and I saw what Lionel saw.
My labia, framed by my stocking thighs, glistened with my juices. My big round pale buttocks were proudly displayed for him to see, and my tits hung down below me.
“Now, fuck me. Fuck me hard,” I demanded.
He stood behind me and then I felt him slide very slowly deep inside of me. Then, with a hand holding each of my bum cheeks, he started to move in and out. He was slow at first but soon his pace increased. His balls slapped as he pounded away and, in the mirror, I watched his lithe muscular buttocks drive himself into me.
He was not gentle, but I did not want him to be. As my pleasure grew, I became more vocal.
“Don’t stop. Don’t stop. Don’t you dare fucking stop!”
And still, he reamed me. The only thing I wanted was my physical release.
“Give it to me. Give it to me! Give it to me!!
I want it! I need it! Oh, how I need it!!
Until finally, I climaxed; long and hard, as my body writhed, my muscles clamped and held him, and I screamed.
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!
I wasn’t finished.
He lay on his back on the freshly made bed and I straddled him. As I looked down at him he reached up and took each of my breasts in his outstretched hands and I started to grind my sex against him, slowly at first and then faster. My next orgasm came quickly. Soon followed by a second and a third until they were almost continuous. It was pure eye-rolling sexual bliss.
I rolled off him.
“Don’t move,” I said.
I knelt beside him and slowly wanked him, sliding the foreskin up and down over his swollen mushroom head. I kept him lubricated with my spit and was unhurried in my work, as all the while he gently moaned with pleasure. I took his flesh inside my mouth and tugged until I sensed he needed his release, and then I formed a fist and firmly held his shaft and stroked him fast. I heard him groan loudly, his shaft grew larger in my hand and pulsed, and streams of warm salty semen filled my mouth.
We lay under the bed sheets together.
“Is Mildred good in bed?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t know. She wants to wait. You’re the only woman I’ve ever slept with.”
“You poor man” I replied. “We must make sure to give you some more a little later.”
“Seriously, Victoria. There must be lots of young men like me. Why don’t you open your bordello again?”
“Because at sea it was safe from the hands of organized crime. A brothel in the city would attract their attention. At the least, I would pay for protection, and at worst they would not allow the competition.”
“I suppose,” he said, and the conversation was forgotten.
Except it wasn’t.
***
On the train back to Boston my thoughts turned to Lionel. My secret had now become our secret, and better still he was going to be in New York on business in two weeks and we would spend the night together again.
He had fucked me another two times the previous evening, doggy and missionary. He had been a gentleman and withdrawn before coming on each occasion. I looked forward to a new performance and started to think about what new tricks I could perform.
Suddenly I thought about our conversation regarding a brothel, and I had an idea. Maybe I could run a stable of hookers without housing them in a whore house. That way there would be little the racketeers could do. By the time I returned to Newton, I had a plan.
Edward was waiting for me on my return. First I changed out of my travelling clothes and had a bath before returning to the drawing room. It was there that I told Edward my plan.
“It could work, Victoria. But do you really need to do it? We have plenty of money.”
“You can never have enough money,” I replied. “Because you never know what is coming. And if I’m going to make money I’m sure as hell going to find an easy and profitable way to do it. Do you want to go out to work for a buck an hour? I certainly don’t.”
I spoke to Hans on the telephone and briefly explained what I wanted. First amongst my requests was that he try to track down the ladies that worked for me on the ship. I wanted half a dozen ready to start In about a month. They needed to be clean, pretty, and “honest.” I could not, and would not, tolerate girls who stole from their clients or talked about them afterward. In two weeks, I would be in New York and would talk to potential employees then.
Two weeks later Mrs Dawson met Hans at the hotel. He had arranged for nine girls to attend interviews at fifteen-minute intervals throughout the afternoon, and they all appeared to fit the bill. He had found an empty office with a telephone and four ladies to work eight-hour shifts and man the line continuously.
My “business” model was simple. Clients would ring the service at the office number requesting an appointment with one of the girls who would meet him at his residence or, more often, discreetly at a hotel.
The only thing that needed to be done was to find the clients. To do that, three avenues were explored.
Firstly Hans contacted as many of the names in George’s Ledger as he could. He didn’t inform them who he was or how he knew them but simply supplied them with the service telephone number and what it was. I reasoned that men on the take would be unlikely to have sexual scruples.
Secondly, hotel concierges throughout the city were given the telephone number to give to guests who wanted female company. They were offered a financial incentive to do this.
Lastly, later that evening after a very satisfactory fucking, I asked Lionel to discretely distribute the number amongst his banker and society friends.
I estimated that my high-class girls could charge at least thirty dollars an hour and up, depending on the service they offered. I would take fifty percent. Nine girls working twenty-five hours a week would generate around seven thousand dollars a week from which I would take my cut. That was around fifteen thousand dollars a month after overheads, and I believed a conservative estimate.
***
I was well aware of the risk that some of the girls might be tempted to go into business independently once they had their circle of regular customers. To guard against this they were obliged to agree to work for me for a minimum term of two years or leave New York if they wished to quit and continue to work before this. Hans made it clear what would happen if they reneged on their agreement.
I didn’t approve of violence but very rarely it was necessary. Most of the time the threat of violence was enough.
When a girl visited a client for the first time, a minder, waited in the hotel lobby.
We started business two weeks after I hired my stable of nine girls. By then I was back in Boston. I left the day-to-day supervision in the more than capable hands of Hans. I insisted that a written record of every appointment was made at the time it was requested. The record included the date time and venue of the appointment with the girl’s name, hourly rate, and the length of appointment agreed with the fee due.
I suspected that some or all of the girls would try to cheat me, so I advised Hans to plant a few of his associates amongst the clients to ensure the girls were correctly declaring their earnings.
In the third week of business, Mary, a girl who had not worked for me before, tried to cheat me. She stayed all night with a guy but declared only two hours’ fees and tried to pocket the hundred dollars difference. I couldn’t prove the call handler was in cahoots, but Mary was treated to a sharp dose of the dogwhip on her bare rump by Hans and then told to leave New York on pain of more if she ever returned.
After that, my ladies stayed honest, but we continued to send the occasional ringer amongst the clients.
The business started slowly, but two months after we started, eight girls were working on average thirty hours per week and generating around twenty thousand dollars a month. This was a lot of cash to both keep safe and then convert to gemstones or gold. Every day, in the morning, cash was collected from the office where it was kept in a safe overnight. The cash was then delivered to Hans who, once a week, deposited it in any one of several deposit boxes dotted around the city. At random intervals of once a month to six weeks, Edward would travel to New York, collect the contents of the boxes in the company of armed guards, and visit the diamond district before returning, still under guard, to the train.
Once in Boston gems, bullion, and dollar bills were placed in a safe in our bedroom or left in various deposit boxes in different Boston banks.
By the spring of 1924, it became apparent that I would need more girls, and Hans put the feelers out whilst some of the ladies who worked for me also knew of ladies who would like employment. As was my habit, I returned to New York and met a further eight girls who were suitably qualified. They were all clean, well-dressed, beautiful, and well-educated. My earnings doubled overnight.
***
I had become Lionel’s mistress. He had married three weeks after our first liaison at the Waldorf Astoria and we met at irregular intervals maybe eight or nine times a year. Whenever Edward was in New York, Lionel would be in Boston on business, He would always stay at the Buckminster but then visit me in one of the many other luxury hotels in the city where I would book a room. I would arrange this by dispatching Edward to New York whenever I knew Lionel would be in town.
It felt deliciously sexy to be fucking Lionel. I had slept with five men, three unmarried and two married. Of the two married men, one was my dead ex-husband George who had been absolutely crap in bed, and the other was Lionel. That made Mildred the first woman I had “wronged,” and it excited me that I was sleeping with another man’s wife. I don’t know why. It wasn’t that I needed to feel wanted. After all, Edward still loved me and had crossed an ocean during a world war to find me.
I was fond of both Lionel and Edward. I didn’t love Lionel but loved fucking him. I was beginning to believe that I never really loved Edward; I had thought I did. I was beginning to understand that love for anybody but myself was probably not in my nature.
Nonetheless, I was intensely loyal to Edward and knew that I would never leave him. He had had a hard life. He had survived both the sinking of the Lusitania and the trenches and been wounded twice, on one occasion very badly. He deserved my loyalty, but I also believed “what you don’t know can’t hurt you.”
Edward was a lucky man because he was happy with what he had, whilst I always wanted more.
Lionel was a lucky man because I was a fucking good screw and I was giving him something he wasn’t getting from his wife, with minimal risk, and no strings attached.
***
The money continued to roll in and it was in 1924 that I visited an art exhibition in New York at The Anderson Gallery. I was incredibly impressed by the bold colourful images of leaves and flowers and bought half a dozen paintings for a thousand dollars each. Edward thought I was crazy, but I loved them and hung them in our large bedrooms. The artist was named Georgia O’Keeffe and over the next five years, I bought another dozen of her paintings many of them depicting New York skyscrapers. Little did I know the value that these paintings would attract by the time I was old and grey. I bought them because I liked them and had the money to buy beautiful things.
The years passed and by 1928 my fortune had grown. I had amassed more money than I needed for several lifetimes. I was a respected member of the Boston elite with a loving “husband” and a lover and….. I was bored.
My escort business virtually ran itself. More precisely Hans ran it for me, and I stayed anonymously in the background. He was now well paid; three hundred dollars a week. Compared with what I was making this was very little and I am sure that the only reason he stayed loyal to me was the hold I had over him. The Ledger proving he took bribes was safely locked away. I suppose he could have absconded with a week’s take, but I was paying him enough for that to make little sense.
***
Then one morning in early May 1929 my world turned upside down when Edward was killed. He had collected a month’s takings from our deposit boxes as usual and was on his way to the Paramount Diamond Exchange at Canal and Bowery when he was ambushed.
He was travelling in a car with two guards and the driver when a car pulled out in front of them. All four of them were shot and killed by several hoodlums carrying machine guns before the cash they were carrying was stolen.
I learned of the shooting from Hans who quickly took an interest in events and telephoned me with the bad news. I was understandably distraught by what had happened. Hans still did not know of my relationship with Edward although that was no longer of great importance. I remember the instructions I gave Hans.
“Find out who did this and let me know. I want them dealt with. And Hans, I want Major Holme’s part in this made public. Make sure he is identified. Speak to the newspapers and make sure they report his death and his name. Pull some strings. Give them his name if necessary. Do whatever you have to do. Is that clear?”
No sooner had I replaced the telephone in its holder than I broke down and cried. One more of the men in my life was dead.
Very late that night Hans telephoned me again. He had moved fast. One of the guards who had died had been a last-minute replacement for another individual called Jimmy who had not turned up for duty, and Hans had been very suspicious. He was even more suspicious when Jimmy could not be found at his lodgings. Hans had placed men at the bus and railway terminals and eventually caught Jimmy trying to leave the city with Wilma his girlfriend and five hundred dollars in cash. At first, they swore blind that the money had been earnt by Wilma, one of my girls, and he knew nothing about the ambush.
“But after a little persuasion he remembered that he did tell someone about the cash pick-up, said Hans. He owed a lot of money to a small-time hood who runs a bookmakers. This guy threatened to cut Wilma if Jimmy didn’t give him the information he needed to hijack the car with the cash. Jimmy was supposed to get a cut of the money and was promised nobody would get hurt. He says he ran before he took his share. Said he wasn’t a killer.”
“Do you believe him?” I asked.
“He took a heap of persuading. He’s busted up pretty good. He’s resigned to ending up at the bottom of the Hudson but is pleading for us not to harm Wilma. Says he loves her. So yes, I believe him. She admits to keeping cash back from you.”
“Which one is Wilma?” I asked.
“The redhead with the big tits and huge arse.”
Earlier in the evening I had been white-hot angry and would have happily seen anyone involved in Edwards’s death, dead and buried, or wearing concrete boots at the bottom of the Hudson, the East River, or the Harlem River. By the time I was speaking to Hans, I had had time to think. If you have read this far, you will know I never acted rashly, and that night, yet again, I controlled my emotions.
Or maybe I allowed my emotions to control me? For the first time in my life, I felt guilty. it was my greed that had made me want more and more and ultimately got Edward killed. He died doing something I wanted, not something that he wanted to do.
One thing I knew was that I was finished with my illegal ventures. I was thirty-nine years old, rich as fuck, survivor of the sinking of the Lusitania, with two dead brothers, four dead lovers, and an estranged sister. It was time for a change. All afternoon I had been asking myself what Edward would have wanted.
I was certain he wouldn’t any more blood spilled pointlessly.
“OK, Hans,” I replied. “Here’s what I want you to do. Killing Jimmy would achieve nothing apart from drawing attention to yourself, so let him go. He’s a poor, dumb, stupid fuck and you don’t need the heat. Wilma has knowingly cheated me, and going forward you need to make an example of her. It’s business. I suggest a couple of dozen with your dogwhip on her big bare arse before you send her on her way. Maybe get the girls to watch “in order to encourage the others.
Major Holmes is to be cremated and I will meet you in New York to collect his ashes when they are ready. For the time being, do nothing about the bastard who had him killed.”
***
Three weeks later, I met Hans as arranged. I remember it was a warm June morning. We sat in a café near the station and drank coffee. Hans ordered a beef on rye sandwich, but I was not hungry and had had my fill of New York City.
I took the casket containing Edwards’s ashes and placed it on the seat next to me, and without thinking kissed my fingers and placed them on the wooden box. I had noticed there was no name on the box.
“He was more to you than you let on, wasn’t he?” said Hans.
“Yes,” I said. “He was. Hans, I’m through. I’m retiring from the business. I want you to have it. It wasn’t meant to cost the Major his life. I have enough money to go legit now and that’s what I plan to do. After today you’ll never see or hear from me again. It was good doing business with you, but this part of my life is over.”
I held out my hand and he shook it.
“Good luck Mrs Dawson, or whomever you are.”
“Good luck to you too,” I replied. “Take my advice, Hans. Don’t be too greedy. Get out whilst the going is good. I’ll leave it to you to decide what to do about the man who arranged the heist.”
I turned and walked away. I did not look back. There was nothing left to look back at. I never returned to New York again.
On the train, I pondered over my next moves. I knew that the one who had ordered the heist would not live long and was glad. I did not know his name and had not ordered a hit, so my conscience was clear. I also knew that Hans could not afford to let him live.
Nobody in Boston knew that Edward was dead. Although the newspapers had carried the story of the shooting, Edward had been identified as “a New York resident, Major Charles Holmes, with no known criminal affiliation.” The cause of the shooting “remained unclear.”
I had told my neighbours that Edward was in Europe on business.
***
The previous week I had met Lionel in Cleveland Ohio. We spent three days together at the Hollenden Hotel. This was the longest period I had been with Lionel since I had met him. We spent the days relaxing and sightseeing and the nights fucking. I missed Edward and mourned for him but in some strange way his death had made me desperate for sex and I was quite insatiable. It was as if his death had awakened a need for me to prove that I was still alive.
It was on our last evening together that Lionel asked me to marry him!
“You know that I love you, he had said. Now that Edward is gone you will be alone. I know now is not a good time, but I probably won’t see you for another month. You know Mildred and I have not been getting on well. Well, she has left me and gone back to her parents and has finally agreed to a divorce. Do you think that sometime you and I might marry?”
This was not something I had been expecting and for a moment I was completely nonplussed and looked vacantly at Lionel.
He misinterpreted my hesitation.
“I’m sorry. It was very inappropriate of me to ask. I don’t want to appear unfeeling but…”
By then I had recovered my poise.
“Give me time,” I replied.
He nodded.
“OK. There’s plenty of that. I seem to have been waiting for you forever.”
He didn’t know it, but there might be less time than he thought. I planned to leave Boston and disappear. Nothing was keeping me there anymore. The only fly in the ointment was Lionel. I still wasn’t sure what to do about him. He knew that I wasn’t who the world thought I was, and he knew most of my secrets. I had to make up my mind whether or not he came with me in the next chapter of my life. I might have been screwing him for the last six years, but that was pretty much all we did. I didn’t know him that well outside of bed and I wasn’t ready to commit. It would be all or nothing. I was a healthy woman, six months on the right side of forty years old, with a voracious sexual appetite. And a once-a-month illicit bonk wasn’t going to do it for me.
I was also reminded of something that I had heard somewhere. “When a man marries his mistress he creates a vacancy in that position.”
We continued to meet monthly over the summer, and he did not mention the topic again although I remained unsure as to what I wanted.
***
On October the 29th the stock market crashed, and fortunes were lost overnight. That evening Edward telephoned me. he was in a blind panic.
“What am I going to do Victoria? My stocks are worth nothing. I’m broke. I’ve still got my job but for how long? What the fuck am I going to do.”
I didn’t tell him he was a bloody fool putting his hard-earned cash into overpriced stocks. Instead, I tried to calm him down.
“Do you have any cash?” I asked.
“A little.”
“Do you have a mortgage?”
“No. My father gave me the money to build the house.”
“Ok. That’s good. I’ll wire you five hundred dollars.”
“I don’t want your money, Victoria.”
“But you want me. the two come with each other. This is not a time for pride, Lionel. Call it a loan if you wish. Today’s Tuesday. Can you meet me in Cleveland at the weekend and we’ll talk?”
That was the start of the great depression when thousands lost their homes and their jobs. Lionel kept his job at the bank albeit with a reduced salary although he constantly worried his bank would fail like so many others.
In November we met again in Chicago and this time I spent a week with him. It was then, on my fortieth birthday that I explained what I wanted.
“I can’t marry you whilst folk in Boston believe Edward is still alive, When I return home I will announce his death in Europe and will start to wear black and enter a period of mourning. When that is finished, if we still want each other, I will marry you.”
After that, I saw Lionel more frequently and for longer periods. Our sex life was wonderful, and I found myself liking him more and more. But…. at the back of my mind remained a nagging doubt. Did I want to marry him?
In April 1930 I closed up my house in Boston and returned it to the rental agency. I put my artwork and valuable furniture in secure storage and ensured my jewels, bullion, and cash were secure in deposit boxes in the city. Then I paid my staff off and informed the members of the Boston community that I was travelling back to England to look after my sick sister. I told Lionel a half-truth; I was travelling to Queenstown (by then renamed Cobh) to scatter Edward’s ashes on the sea. I didn’t tell him I needed Just a little more time to think, and that there was still a chance he might never see me again.
I would think about it and decide in due course.
***
I arrived in Cobh on the last day of April aboard the Cunard liner RMS Scythia. I travelled first class and enjoyed the voyage more than any of the previous three. It must be remembered my first Atlantic crossing was with an uncaring husband, on my second voyage I was torpedoed, and I finished my crossing in a fishing smack, and the third passage was also during a war when a further sinking could have happened at any time.
I stood alone on the deck in the dawn light and looked out across the water as the Scythia approached the Irish coast. Even though I was wrapped up against the chill, I shivered. For several hours we hugged the land a few miles away on the port side of the vessel. In the late morning, we approached our destination and a strange feeling of foreboding passed through me. I believe we had passed over the grave of the Lusitania where over a thousand souls perished, and Victoria Jamieson and Edward Jefferson survived.
And then, a short while later, we entered the natural harbour where the port of Cobh lay, and Victoria Jamieson disappeared to be reborn as Victoria Cameron.
Once I was on dry land, I booked into The States Hotel on the waterfront and then visited two local banks where I rented a safety deposit box and placed seven fifty-troy-ounce bars of gold in each of them. The bars were heavy weighing over three pounds each, and I needed to make several trips before I was finished. I had brought this gold with me, and this was to be money I would live on whilst in Ireland and England. What was left would remain in the UK for any future needs.
After a short walk, I returned to the Hotel where I spoke to the concierge and enquired as to whether a Dr O’Reilly and his wife were still living in the town. He told me that he would find out for me, and ten minutes later a young, uniformed bellhop knocked on my door and handed me a note with their name and address. I asked him to return to my room in half an hour when I would like him to deliver a note to them for me, and he agreed.
I quickly penned a note to the doctor and his wife inviting them to dinner with me at the hotel the following evening at eight o’clock and explaining that I wished to thank them for the kindness that they had shown me after the sinking of the Lusitania. I asked them not to mention my presence in the town. I signed it Mrs Victoria Cameron
When the bellhop arrived I tipped him well, and he promised to deliver the letter promptly.
I was most surprised when just under an hour later he reappeared holding a white envelope in his hand. He explained that the doctor had been at home and had asked him to wait whilst he replied and had then asked him to deliver his message.
When the bellhop left I opened the envelope. The reply was brief but thanked me for my kind offer which they would be happy to accept.
***
I rose late the following morning and had a leisurely breakfast. In the mid-morning, I walked the quarter mile to Cobh Cathedral. It was situated high on a hill overlooking the harbour. I entered and sat for over an hour in the calm, cool interior and reflected on the events in my life which had taken me there. What if I had never met George Jamieson and married him? What if neither Edward nor I had not set foot onboard the Lusitania or survived the sinking?
Suddenly, I felt a deep sadness and realized how alone in life I was. Death seemed to stalk those around me and leave me untouched.
I prayed. First I prayed for the soul of Edward, whose death had brought me prematurely back to Cobh. I prayed for forgiveness for causing his death. Then in turn I prayed for my parents, my two brothers, David and James both dead before their time, and my lovers William and Arthur. And I prayed for the dead of the Lusitania some of whom lay buried close by.
Lastly, I prayed for myself and for guidance in how I would spend the rest of my life. I did not pray to change. I was wise enough to know that people rarely do that. A leopard does not lose its spots. I was a survivor by nature and would always act in my own best interests….and I would continue to be a seductress.
But I prayed to do no further harm to those around me. And maybe to do just a little good.
I left the cathedral reinvigorated and with fresh resolve. I knew what I must do.
My next port of call was the Old Church Cemetery but first I visited a bank and removed a bar of gold from my box and returned to the hotel where I asked for it to be placed in the hotel safe.
Later, in the afternoon, I walked the mile or so to the cemetery, which was north and just outside the town and stood in silence by the graves of the one hundred and ninety-three Lusitania victims who lay buried there, their journey to Liverpool rudely interrupted.
As I left the cemetery to return to the town, it started to rain heavily, and I was soaked through when, half an hour later, I reached my hotel.
***
Back in my room, I took a long hot bath, following which I took a nap. I asked to be woken at half past six to give myself time to dress before dinner. I had already made reservations for dinner that evening and spoken to the chef regarding the menu.
I was already sitting in the restaurant when, precisely at eight o’clock, my guests arrived and were shown to the table.
I stood and greeted them. Mrs O’Reilly had aged in the fifteen years since we had last met. She was now in her late fifties, a little stouter, and her hair was starting to grey. Dr O’Reilly did not appear to have changed a bit.
“I’m so happy you could join me for dinner,” I said.
“It’s our pleasure,” said Dr O’Reilly. “You look well, Mrs Cameron.”
“You look just as I remember you,” said Mrs O’Reilly.
“And so do you,” I politely lied.
“Thank you for saying so but I fear it’s untrue,” she said smiling.
The meal was served. We ate seafood chowder, roast lamb with mint sauce and vegetables, and eclairs for dessert. It was washed down with Champagne. Mrs O’Reilly and I sipped sparingly whilst Dr O’Reilly, who could hold his liquor, finished off the best part of a couple of bottles.
At some point in the evening, Mrs O’Reilly asked me about my husband. I didn’t want to lie.
“I’m a widow,” I said. “I’m carrying the ashes of my Edward whom I met on the Lusitania. He survived the sinking and the Great War and then followed me to Boston only to die in a car in New York. I want to spread his ashes on the sea on the anniversary of the event.”
“I’m truly sorry,” she replied. “Life can be very cruel.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” said Dr O’Reilly.
Mrs O’Reilly had grown quiet and appeared to be thinking… then she spoke again.
“Speak to the coxswain of the Courtmacsherry Lifeboat. They lay a memorial wreath over the wreck each year. If you tell them who you are I’m sure they’ll take you out with them.”
Later, towards the end of our evening together, we were drinking our coffee when I ordered a bottle of fine brandy to be brought to the table.
“I remember sharing a whisky with you,” Dr O’Reilly, I said. “Please will you share a brandy with me now?”
As we savoured our cognac I made sure nobody was sitting close to us, and the waiter was busy clearing tables on the other side of the room. I took out the bullion wrapped in a white handkerchief and passed it over the table to the doctor and spoke.
“Please will you take this as a mark of my thanks for what you did for me and the passengers of the Lusitania? The living and the dead. It’s long overdue. May I suggest you don’t let anyone else see it. You’ll understand after you’ve opened it.”
He was intrigued and unwrapped the heavy gold bar. When he saw what it was his eyes opened wide with astonishment and Mrs O’Reilly gasped.
“Is this what I think it is?” he croaked.
“It’s pure gold, I replied. Fifty troy ounces.”
“We couldn’t possibly take this. It must be worth a fortune.”
“Why can’t you take it? The men of Cobh took me from the sea and saved my life. Without the people of this town, many others would also be dead. My husband was a very rich man and left me a very rich woman. If you do not want this gold you can do what you wish with it. You are a doctor. I am sure many poor people in this town cannot afford your services or the medicines they need. It is my gift. It comes with only one stipulation; Nobody but us must ever know where it came from.
“God bless you,” said Mrs O’Reilly.
Dr O’Reilly said nothing but drained his glass of brandy in a single gulp.
“Can I trouble you for another very large brandy?” he asked.
I passed him the bottle.
***
I spent the next few days treading water waiting for the 7th of May, which that year fell on a Wednesday. I took long walks in the countryside around Cobh, and I visited the nearby city of Cork with its imposing gaol, castle, and cathedral. One evening, I went to the doctor’s house for dinner where I drank more whisky than I normally would. I spent a lot of time reading. On Sunday I attended mass at the Cathedral where a prayer was said for the dead of the Lusitania.
A local newspaper got wind of my presence in town and that I was there to cast Edward’s ashes into the sea. I supposed somebody from the lifeboat crew had spilled the beans when they had agreed to take me with them on the anniversary, and I had made a sizeable, and I thought anonymous, contribution to the lifeboat station.
At first, I was disquieted by the thought of featuring in a local newspaper article until I realised how unlikely It was that any member of the Boston elite, who knew me as Lady Victoria Cameron, would ever read it. There had been no photographs taken of me either, so nobody in New York who knew me as Mrs Dawson would pay much attention to the article. In any case, I would never see any of my old acquaintances in the future. I had no plans to visit the Big Apple ever again and would only visit Boston to raid the contents of my deposit boxes before disappearing, once more, into the vastness of America.
***
And so, on the fifteenth anniversary of the sinking, I sailed with the crew of the motor lifeboat Sarah Ward and William David Crosweller. At precisely two o’clock in the afternoon, we stood in a line on the rolling deck close by the railing. The sea and the cloudy, overcast sky were grey, and the water was choppy. Somewhere beneath us lay the wreck. The crew removed their head coverings, and the coxswain said a prayer before throwing a wreath into the sea before he nodded to me. I stepped to the railing and opened the polished wood box and sprinkled Edwards’s ashes into the water.
“Goodbye Edward, my love. Sleep well,” I whispered before throwing a posy of yellow and white spring flowers after him. I shivered, and suddenly I knew why.
The crew returned to their stations and the engines roared as the boat turned and sped towards the distant shore, leaving my future grave behind us.
***
I arrived back in my room a couple of hours later. It had been a windy day and I was brushing the knots out of my hair when I had a thought. It had been almost a month since I had had a man and I was horny as hell. I realised that since leaving Boston I had not felt the itch but now it was back stronger than ever. It was as if I had sublimated my sex drive out of respect for Edward, but now he was gone, and it was time to move on.
I stripped naked, lay on the bed with my legs spread wide, and started to touch myself. As I did, I thought of Lionel and his beautiful body and long thick manhood, and I fantasised that he was deep inside of me. It was that afternoon that I understood with perfect clarity that I both wanted and missed him and that I did not want to be completely alone when I started my new life.
Later that evening I telegrammed him in Chicago.
Staying States Hotel Cobh. Leaving Cobh for London tomorrow. Staying at Ritz. Plan short stay only. Will telegram when sailing back. Plan to move west on return. If you still want me then come west with me and I will marry you. Love Victoria.
Two days later I booked into the Ritz. I had travelled by train from Cork to Paddington Station in London via Fishguard and then took a cab from the station to the hotel where I had made a reservation.
On my arrival, a telegram was waiting for me at the hotel reception.
Love you and will follow you to end of the earth. Hurry home. Lionel.
***
To be continued…
Endnote
John Wingate Weeks (1860-1926) was a Republican politician who was Mayor of Newton between 1902 and 1903. Between 1905 and 1913 he was a member of the House of Representatives from Massachusetts and between 1913 and 1919 he was a Senator. He was appointed Secretary of War in 1921 by President Warren G Harding. He successfully advocated for the establishment of the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior in Arlington Cemetery but was opposed to giving women the right to vote.
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Georgia Totto O’Keeffe (1987-1986) was a highly influential American modernist artist. She produced paintings of large flowers, New York skyscrapers, and desert landscapes of the American Southwest. In 2014 Sotheby’s sold her painting Jimson Weed/White Flower No.1 for over 44 million US dollars.
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In June 1929, the body of the hoodlum, Gandolfo Curto aka Frankie Marlow was found in Queens. He was a bookmaker, bootlegger, nightclub owner, and boxing manager. No one was ever convicted of his killing.
***
The saying “When a man marries his mistress he creates a vacancy in that position” has been attributed to Oscar Wilde. A similar sentiment, “When a man marries his mistress he creates a job vacancy,” was reported to have been said by Sir James Goldsmith, the Anglo-French businessman on the occasion of his marriage to his mistress, Lady Annabel Birley.
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The Wall Street Crash of October 29th, 1929, “Black Tuesday” was the worst stock market crash in United States history and happened when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange collapsed. Stocks had been driven to inflated prices by speculation and when the bubble burst entire fortunes were lost. This marked the start of the Great Depression.
Between 1929 and 1933, 9000 (30%) banks failed in the United States with a loss of 7 billion dollars of depositors’ assets. Millions of people lost their life savings and, in 1932 alone, over a quarter of a million Americans lost their homes.
***
The RMS Scythia was a Cunard liner built to service the route between Liverpool and Queenstown, and Boston and New York. She sailed this route between 1921 and 1939, and between 1940 and 1948 was a troopship, returning to duty in 1950 as a passenger liner carrying people from Europe to Halifax in Canada and New York. She was scrapped in 1958 after 37 years of service and was Cunard’s longest-serving ship until 2005 when the RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 broke her record.
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The States Hotel in Cobh opened in 1854 and was at first called the Queens Hotel. This was in commemoration of Queen Victoria’s first visit to Ireland 5 years earlier in 1849 when she first set foot on Irish soil in Cobh harbour.
It was originally built as a boarding house for merchant seamen.
In 1915, at the time of the sinking of the Lusitania, it was owned by a German called Otto Humbert. After the sinking anti-German sentiment caused him and his family to take refuge in the hotel wine cellars when a crowd gathered and threatened to burn the building down.
Instead, members of the crew and first-class passengers who had survived were accommodated here, and the hotel was converted into a temporary hospital.
In 1921, following Irish independence, the hotel was renamed the States Hotel, and in 1939 it was renamed again and became the Commodore Hotel.
***
The Old Church Cemetery is the resting place of one hundred and ninety-four of the Lusitania dead in three mass graves and twenty-four individual graves. The graveyard is also the resting place of several other notable individuals. These include Fredrick Daniel Parslow (recipient of the Victoria Cross) Dr James Roche Verling (private physician to Napoleon Bonaparte when he was imprisoned on St Helena), and Robert Forde (a member of Scott’s Terra Nova expedition to the Antarctic).
Five US Navy personnel killed during the First World War are buried here together with one hundred and twenty-seven commonwealth war dead from the same war.
***
Every year, for one hundred and eight years, on the anniversary of the sinking of the Lusitania successive Courtmacsherry lifeboat crews have laid a wreath over the place where the wreck lies.
On the day of the disaster, two lifeboats set out to save survivors. Neither of these was motorised and the James Stevens No.20 was towed to the scene by a tug whilst the second lifeboat the Kezia Gwilt was rowed to the site of the sinking.
It was a windless day and setting sail would have been ineffective, so the crew rowed twelve miles, taking three and a half hours, to reach the scene. By this time no one in the water was still alive and they spent six hours recovering bodies.
***