Fortunately she falls a little in love with Mary, too. Like calls to like, Mary says. Edwin and Elizabeth have very similar personalities—volatile, passionate. She and Richard provide the ballast. Soon the Stoddards are their most intimate friends.

Adam Badeau provided Edwin’s first entrée into New York’s literati, but what the Stoddards can offer is a cut above. He’s the only actor included in their salons, marking him out as an artist first and foremost. Critics begin to note the intelligence and sophistication of Edwin’s audience. Now when he’s onstage, he’s continually aware of the Stoddards sitting with Mary in her private box. He knows that when the applause dies away, he’ll be headed to some gathering where the adulation will continue, where his performance will be discussed in admiring detail. The trip to England was a disappointment, but not a waste. New York’s critics see a new maturity in his work that they credit to his time abroad. It’s a strange thing, to be enjoying such heady success while his country is swimming in blood. He doesn’t quite know how to feel about it. His mood changes moment to moment.

Then there is Mary. It seems to Edwin that she’s been a little sick ever since Edwina was born and is now a little sicker. She still comes to every play and she makes it through the late nights after, but he can see that she’s exhausted. She talks more to Elizabeth about her symptoms than she does to him. All Edwin knows is that she’s suffering in the places where women suffer, that there is an unnatural heat in her abdomen, and no diagnosis.

He’s well aware that the reason Mary pushes herself to accompany him everywhere is to keep an eye on his drinking. He’d promised her when they married to control it. But he can’t perform, not at his best, without. He sweats and shakes; his thoughts muddle. He feels desperate for a way out of his own skin. He can’t remember his lines and all this is put instantly right with just one drink or maybe two. All he needs is enough liquor to get through his performances.

And maybe a glass or two after to calm him down. He begins to dislike the pressure of her hand on his arm as she steers him away from the bottles and glasses. She fails to keep him sober as often as she succeeds.

Asia notes that Mary’s influence over him seems to have waned. The rest of the family might choose to believe that love is stronger than liquor. As to herself, Asia’s never doubted the outcome.

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