Free The Fifth Heart by Dan Simmons Page B

found to be vulgar in the extreme. Charles Adams had a cruel sense of humor, so unlike his brother’s generosity, and enjoyed—James knew—seeing the edge of that humor embarrass or hurt others. Yet James had no doubt that Clover had said precisely those words; it was her dismissive style and, yes, her Boston Brahmin’s use of rude American dialect. It had hurt James’s feelings extremely upon the hearing. But he had kept Clover as his friend, and that barb—and others Charles Adams and others had relayed to him—had done nothing significant to lessen his sorrow when James had learned of her death more than seven years earlier.
    If Henry James wished to be
truly
indiscreet about Adams’s brother Charles, he could have reported the cruel statement by Charles that John Hay had relayed to him as far back as the announcement of Henry Adams’s and Clover Hooper’s marriage—“Heavens! No! The Hoopers are all as crazy as coots. Clover’ll kill herself just like her aunt!” Indeed, Clover’s Aunt Carrie had killed herself when she was several months pregnant.
    And upon return to Boston after many months of the newlyweds’ honeymoon in Egypt and Europe, it was William Dean Howells who had written to James about yet another truly vulgar comment in a letter from Charles Adams to Howells—“To see Henry these days, I have—quite literally!—to tear him from the arms of his new bride! For Henry’s always in clover now! (Joke! ha! ha!)” The “ha! ha!” alone would have made James distrust Charles Adams for life.
    “Tell me more about Henry Adams,” said Holmes.
    James found himself shrugging—a gesture he had long ago given up in Europe. It was a sign of how upset even retelling the Clover-anecdote had made him. “What more do you need to know?”
    “Far more than we can cover before this railway voyage ends in Washington,” said Holmes. “But for now we shall settle for what else Henry Adams was known for at the time of Clover’s death other than being descended from two American presidents and being a member of his wife’s
salon
of the Five of Hearts.”
    “If I gave the impression that the Five of Hearts was solely, or even primarily, Clover’s
salon
, I was mistaken to do so,” James said rather waspishly. “Everyone in it, except perhaps Clara Hay, was a powerful personality. For four of them, save for Clara who tends toward the literal in a pleasant way, their wit and even their sense of humor matched perfectly. They punned without mercy. I once observed in person that when one of the Adamses’ terriers came home with a scratched eye, John Hay immediately announced that it was obviously a
cat
aract. Clarence King’s instant addition was . . . a
tom-cat
aract.”
    Holmes waited.
    “Henry Adams was a respected lecturer in medieval history at Harvard University,” said James. “He turned from academic circles to become one of America’s most respected historians. He and Clover were consummate collectors—Adams continues to be so—and, as you may see if Adams is home and invites us to visit, their home reflects an astounding level of both high and advanced taste in everything from Persian carpets to Ming vases to exquisite works of art, including Constables and Turners, chosen before most art collectors could recognize those estimable gentlemen’s names. Their home, designed by the late H. H. Richardson as was the Hays’,
is
a work of art.”
    Holmes nodded as if he were taking mental notes on these most elementary of facts about a shy but world-famous man. “And Mr. John Hay?”
    “A very old and rather close friend of mine,” said James. “I met Hay through William Howells—a famous editor and also an old friend—years ago and have enjoyed seeing him and his wife Clara many times in England, on the Continent, and in the United States. He is an extraordinary man.”
    “So far all of these Five of Hearts sound extraordinary,” said Holmes. “At least by American