Rosalie Edge, Hawk of Mercy: The Activist Who Saved Nature from the Conservationists

4. Amateur and Dilettante

For the next few weeks following her flight from Parsonage Point, Rosalie lived “mechanically,” alternating between “dumb and stunned” existence to searing pain that ripped through her again, leaving her nerves dreadfully alert. The lingering ache in her arm left her with a physical sensation reminding her of Charlie’s betrayal. She was forty-four years old. So soon after Rosalie helped women achieve the greatest power they had ever known, her identity as a woman, as a wife, had been crippled. She resolved that “the Baby Giants must never know” the circumstances that had ended their family. “The Big Man, the treasured garden, the air, the sky, the gulls flying high, the bluebirds newly arrived, the bulbs just out, the spring about to bloom in fullness—were gone. My earthquake took all these, but the Baby Giants were with me and I must see that their joy of life was not destroyed.” When Rosalie was growing up, “adultery” was whispered only when the Ten Commandments were recited, cracked the bold Alva Vanderbilt, Consuelo’s mother. While dictating the terms of daughter Consuelo’s marriage to the Duke of Marlboro in 1895, Alva had caused a second public sensation by becoming the first society lady to accuse her husband of infidelity and sue for divorce. Once free of William Vanderbilt, Alva quickly married his best friend, Oliver P. Belmont. [ chapter four Amateur and Dilettante 80 ] chapter four “All around me were women leading these half lives, practically deserted by their husbands who not only neglected them but insulted them by their open and flagrant infidelities,” Alva Vanderbilt wrote. But for women not as inured to social or financial ruin as a Vanderbilt might have been, divorce was still beyond consideration. New York’s finest ladies still left the room when the subject came up, and the state’s draconian laws in contested cases spelled catastrophe for both husband and wife. To protect their status and preserve their economic well-being, the Edges settled for half-lives rather than for divorce. Keeping their altered living situation as private as possible, they secured a judicial separation on February 14, 1924. Legal separation kept the details of their breakup confidential and ended cohabitation without terminating Charlie’s financial obligations to his estranged wife. Only to the outside world did the Edges still look married. Charlie’s monthly allowance to Rosalie was generous and dependable. Gifts and furnishings passed back and forth between them, and written communications were cordial at first. Either Charlie’s Abnormal Distortion of Conscience was working again, or he feared what she might do to hurt him professionally. His earliest letters after their separation pandered and placated: “I am afraid you are overestimating the value of the little fur jacket—I bought it as a beautiful intriguing garment—but I did not buy it as ermine. . . . Your husband Charlie.” In another he wrote: “My Dear I realize your need of a garden. If this summer you will find a place you like I will try to buy it for you and in a little while you shall have a garden again. Your Husband Charles.” And in still another he wrote: “I have deposited $1,000 in your account. . . . This account is for you and not the children.” “Thank you so very much for the Japanese embroidery. . . . I remember so well buying it in Hong Kong.” “I enclose check for $1,000. It seems that you might like to buy some new clothes.” “Please, everything in the house is absolutely yours, to do with as you will. It would hurt me very much that you should part with any of them, or think that at any future time I might claim them.” Charlie told her he had drawn up a new will and “left to [her] and the children rather more than three quarters of everything,” so that in the event of his death her circumstances would improve. This message ended with what is perhaps unintended irony, given the length of the separation, “Wishing you a very happy summer I remain your husband Charles N. Edge.” Yet her smoldering indignation gave him no room to do otherwise. amateur and dilettante [ 81 Dear Charlie, I am very unhappy over an attempt to change the arrangement to which you agreed before Christmas. I do not believe this to be your idea. The letter telling me and lilies from you chanced to...