“No tickets, Miss,” James R. Ford told her, before she could open her mouth. She was not the only one there. A small crowd of people stood at the theater door. “Absolutely sold out. It’s because the President and General Grant will be attending.”
James Ford held an American flag in his arms. He raised it. “I’m just decorating the President’s box.” It was the last night of a lackluster run. He would never have guessed they would sell every seat. He thought Anna’s face showed disappointment. He was happy, himself, and it made him kind. “They’re rehearsing inside,” he told her. “For General Grant! You just go on in for a peek.”
He opened the doors and she entered. Three women and a man came with her. Anna had never seen any of the others before, but supposed they were friends of Mr. Ford’s. They forced themselves through the doors beside her and then sat next to her in the straight-backed cane chairs just back from the stage.
Laura Keene herself stood in the wings awaiting her entrance. The curtain was pulled back, so that Anna could see her. Her cheeks were round with rouge.
The stage was not deep. Mrs. Mountchessington stood on it with her daughter, Augusta, and Asa Trenchard.
“All I crave is affection,” Augusta was saying. She shimmered with insincerity.
Anna repeated the lines to herself. She imagined herself as an actress, married to JW, courted by him daily before an audience of a thousand, in a hundred different towns. They would play the love scenes over and over again, each one as true as the last. She would hardly know where her real and imaginary lives diverged. She didn’t suppose there was much money to be made, but even to pretend to be rich seemed like happiness to her.
Augusta was willing to be poor, if she was loved. “Now I’ve no fortune,” Asa said to her in response, “but I’m biling over with affections, which I’m ready to pour out all over you, like apple sass, over roast pork.”
The women exited. He was alone on the stage. Anna could see Laura Keene mouthing his line, just as he spoke it. The woman seated next to her surprised her by whispering it aloud as well.
“Well, I guess I know enough to turn you inside out, old gal, you sockdologizing old man-trap,” the three of them said. Anna turned to her seatmate who stared back. Her accent, Anna thought, had been English. “Don’t you love theater?” she asked Anna in a whisper. Then her face changed. She was looking at something above Anna’s head.
Anna looked, too. Now she understood the woman’s expression. John Wilkes Booth was standing in the presidential box, staring down on the actor. Anna rose. Her seatmate caught her arm. She was considerably older than Anna, but not enough so that Anna could entirely dismiss her possible impact on Booth.
“Do you know him?” the woman asked.
“He’s a friend of my brother’s.” Anna had no intention of introducing them. She tried to edge away, but the woman still held her.
“My name is Cassie Streichman.”
“Anna Surratt.”
There was a quick, sideways movement in the woman’s eyes. “Are you related to Mary Surratt?”
“She’s my mother.” Anna began to feel just a bit of concern. So many people interested in her dull, sad mother. Anna tried to shake loose, and found, to her surprise, that she couldn’t. The woman would not let go.
“I’ve heard of the boarding house,” Mrs. Streichman said. It was a courtesy to think of her as a married woman. It was more of a courtesy than she deserved.
Anna looked up at the box again. Booth was already gone. “Let me go,” she told Mrs. Streichman, so loudly that Laura Keene herself heard. So forcefully that Mrs. Streichman finally did so.
Anna left the theater. The streets were crowded and she could not see Booth anywhere. Instead, as she stood on the bricks, looking left and then right, Mrs. Streichman caught up with her. “Are you going home? Might we walk along?”
“No. I have errands,” Anna said. She walked quickly away. She was cross now, because she had hoped to stay and look for Booth, who must still be close by, but Mrs. Streichman had made her too uneasy. She looked back once. Mrs. Streichman stood in the little circle of her friends, talking animatedly. She gestured with her hands like an Italian. Anna saw Booth nowhere.