In Need of a Good Wife (8 page)

Yours in Christ,
Elsa Traugott

Elsa put the letter in her boot, carrying it with her for three days before she could make up her mind about sending it. The way she saw it, she was sinning on at least two fronts. It was prideful to believe that she could manage Mr. Schreier’s household better than any of the other women Elsa imagined must be clamoring for the position. But worse still was the dark thing unfurling its tentacles inside her. She
wanted
desperately to leave New York and start again in this new place, wanted to claim the fresh air and open space for herself, for her own comfort and enjoyment. Surely the Lord was closer at hand in the wide open wilderness of Nebraska than he was in Manhattan City’s crowded and filthy streets. Without Miss Bixby’s help, Elsa couldn’t imagine how she might make such a journey. Yet if this longing wasn’t the sin of avarice, Elsa couldn’t imagine what was.

Was it wrong to mail the letter? She felt she should let the Lord decide, but neither action, mailing the letter or not mailing the letter, seemed neutral, each one promising to initiate an effect. The longing clanged on in her chest like the bell that swayed beneath the neck of Mr. Schreier’s cow, and when she could no longer bear to wait, she posted the letter.

Rowena recognized her father from behind. His fan of stiff white hair was unmistakable. He sat very still on the bench gazing out at the water, where a flock of gulls plunged toward the surface in a symmetrical formation, then scattered suddenly to contentious, screeching independence. Rowena cut a wide arc around the side of the bench to approach her father from the front and give him time to notice her arrival. She didn’t want to startle the man, and she held out hope he would recognize his daughter.

“Hello, Papa,” she called, and waved.

His gaze flicked to the brim of her bonnet and he stared as she approached. Then his eyes drifted back to the water. When Rowena sat down beside him, the man flinched and pulled his arms into his chest, crying out.

“Who are
you
?” he asked, anxiously. “Did
you
take my hat?”

He was getting worse. “Papa, it’s me. Rowena. I am your daughter. Remember?”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “My daughter is a little girl. She is playing in the back garden with that awful kitten. What is his name? He is
not
to come in the house anymore.”

“Beelzebub,” Rowena whispered.

Her father looked up at her, surprised. “Yes, that’s it. Are you a neighbor? Has he done something to your garden? I’m so terribly sorry.”

“No, Papa.
I’m
Rowena.
I
was a little girl playing with the kitten in the back garden, but time passed and I grew up. Don’t you remember? You were there for it all. My birthdays, my wedding.
You
were the one who introduced me to Richard.”

“Say what you will about that cat—he is the best mouser in lower Manhattan.”

Rowena took a breath and laced her fingers slowly in her lap, left thumb, right thumb, forefinger, middle finger, ring finger—now bare—pinkie, then clutched her hands together until the knuckles blanched.

“You remember, don’t you, Papa, that Richard died?” She looked at him but he didn’t reply. A broad maple tree stood near the bench, its leaves brown and curled and missing in patches, like a demented man who had yanked out fistfuls of his own hair. The wind off the river was chilly and Rowena shivered. She turned her body on the bench to face her father, put her hand on his elbow, then moved it slowly up to his neck, the liver-spotted rim of his ear. “Are you cold, Papa?”

“Yes, my dear. I am.” She stood and helped him up, knowing she would run her mind again and again over that
my dear
on her way home, as if it were a charm, an omen that she had chosen rightly. She took his arm and led him back to the asylum’s entrance. The building had been under renovation since Mr. Blair had come to live there a few years before. There was a satisfying proportionality to the structure; if it had been a drawing on paper, a child could fold it in half and both wings of the building would match up precisely. They passed through the foyer into the large open sleeping quarters the nurses called “the chapel,” for that was the room’s original purpose, back when the building had been an immigrant hospital. Under an archway on the far wall, they had set up an altar with a white tablecloth and wooden candlesticks, always lit beneath the cross that hung on the wall. There was symmetry, too, Rowena noticed, in the cross.
What is it about this balance
in a shape that holds such innate appeal?
she wondered.
Why do
we expect life to take the form of action and reaction, gift and reception, when it is so often out of balance?
Two long rows of beds stretched out between the door and the altar, and at the foot of each was a rocking chair.

“Papa, let’s get you comfortable,” Rowena said. “And then I have something to read to you.”

He grunted but didn’t protest and Rowena helped him over to his bed, about halfway down on the left-hand side, and eased his overcoat off his shoulders. She draped it over the back of the chair, then pulled his blankets back, taking a knitted shawl from the foot of the bed, one that had, in fact, belonged to her mother, and opened it over his shoulders. In the windowpane behind her father’s head was an image of his perfect double.

“The nurse will bring your tea in a little bit.” Rowena sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled the letter from her dress pocket. “Papa, I want you to hear this,” she said.

Dear Mrs. Moore,
I am very pleased to make your acquaintance in writing and
look forward to the time when we shall meet in person. I
cannot help but praise your beauty. Miss Bixby speaks highly
of you and assures me that your sights are set, as mine are, on
matrimony. She also tells me she has relayed to you the details
of my situation and you remain undeterred by the prairie
winter, among the other challenges. I see already signs that you
are just the sort of steadfast woman I seek. Perhaps I should
tell you a little more about myself and my home that might
help you make your mind up.

The
Gibson manse is a hectic place, as I’m sure you’ve
gathered. The dining table is never empty, with
at least the
usual
five guests at every meal. Conversation is lively, full of
stories of adventure on the prairie such as rattlesnake hunting
and wars with
the Indians—though just between us I must
admit that I suspect some of these tales are slightly exaggerated.
Nonetheless, the storytellers make good company, and they
have gotten better about remembering not to bring their guns
to the table. Since our one young lady is learning to play the
flute, we have music and sometimes, when the celebrants
behave themselves, costumed tableaux in front of the hearth.

Rowena stopped and looked up at her father, who stared blankly at the empty wall. She smiled, genuinely pleased by the description so far. “Doesn’t it sound wonderful, Papa?” she said. “Dinner parties with five or more guests every night! I can only imagine how many maids Mr. Gibson employs.” She turned back to the letter to see that the man did have a few concerns about the company he had been keeping, and rightly so.

But on the whole we are out of balance, each of us in need of
the influence of a refined lady’s manners and speech. I lament
that only half of them have yet learned to read and am
counting on your education and abilities in this regard.

Grown men and women,
illiterate
—what a scandal!
Well
, Rowena thought,
it won’t be long after my arrival that I set
that
right
.

As for myself, I suppose some folks have called me handsome. I
work hard to maintain this household and what I need most in
the world is a partner’s help. I am

Ever yours,
Daniel Gibson

“Well, Papa, what do you think?” Rowena tucked the blanket on either side of his hips, unable to look into her father’s face. “Daniel Gibson,” she said softly, then cleared her throat, trying to wrestle the emotion out of her voice for what she had to say next. “Papa, I am going to have to go away for a while.”

This harnessed his attention for a moment and he made true eye contact with Rowena for the first time since she could remember. “What’s that?”

She gave him a weak smile and wondered if any of his strange behaviors were put on, to convince her or the nurses that he had given up trying to rein himself back in. If a man was only half crazy, people might expect things of him. The danger of breaking into tears seemed to have passed, like a cloud crossing over the sun, and Rowena spoke now in a firm voice. “I have to go to Nebraska, Papa, so that I can marry Daniel Gibson. Aside from you, there’s no one left for me here in New York. Once I get set up there in the town, Destination, I will send for you. It sounds as if there is plenty of room in the house.”

Rowena’s father watched her without saying a word, then folded his hands the way she had when they were outside on the bench, one finger at a time. “If you are the one who took my hat,” he said, “I would like very much to have it back now.”

“I didn’t take your hat, Papa,” she said, standing and kissing him on top of his head, then smoothing his unruly hair. “I won’t be leaving until the spring, so you will just have to put up with me until then.”

Each time she left a visit with her father at the asylum, Rowena had to turn abruptly on her heel and walk straight for the door as quickly as possible, without turning to look back at him. Turning to look back was far too dangerous.

On her way out of the building she had to pass the office of the asylum’s head clerk, Mr. Harrison, who stood waiting by the door.

“Mrs. Moore,” he said, stepping toward her. “I was hoping chance might lead our paths to cross today.”

Rowena sighed. “Well, there is only one way out of this building and you have been planted here for some time. I don’t believe we can credit fortune for our meeting.”

He smiled as if he were highly amused by her remark. “Mrs. Moore, we must discuss the balance of your account.”

Mr. Harrison was the worst sort of man to owe money, and Rowena owed an awful lot to all sorts of men, so she should know. She preferred the terse, impersonal collectors, with their firm deadlines and strongly worded letters, to a man like this, who feigned patience and compassion when what he was really doing was figuring out how to punish you for your transgressions.

“Yes, sir, we must.” Rowena pressed her heels together and planted them into the floor, straightening her back. She imagined she was a tree climbing up, up, up out of this place.

“As you know, we are deeply honored to count such a respected man as your father among the people we serve.”

“I’m not sure, Mr. Harrison, that he is so respected any more. I have yet to see a single of his former colleagues come to visit.”

“The insane, are … well, a troubling group of people for those who don’t understand them.”

“They are a troubling group for those who
do
,” Rowena said, then softened her voice. “I don’t blame them for not wanting to come.”

“You father is more fortunate than some, in that he has a devoted daughter who comes to him each week to oversee his care.”

Rowena bit the inside of her cheeks to keep the bitter laugh inside. She didn’t want to think about how they might neglect her father if they didn’t know she would be there, faithfully, every Saturday. What would happen to him after she left New York?

“But, as I’m sure you understand, Mrs. Moore, the level of care we provide here is very costly.” Rowena appraised Mr. Harrison’s suit: rich brown wool, a gold Albert chain, freshly polished.

“Oh, I understand very well where all the money goes.”

Mr. Harrison narrowed his eyes. “I am going to ignore that rude remark because I am a man of
beneficence
. It is what makes me so good at my job. The fact is, Mrs. Moore, that you have not responded to our requests for payment that is long overdue. I would hate to see your father’s care suffer because his daughter was capricious with his money.”

His money
, Rowena wanted to scream,
is in the
fire pit in the
backyard
. The idea that Mr. Harrison, through orders to his nurses, might take his angst out on her father was more than Rowena could bear. But instead of screaming, she conjured once again the image of a tree, swaying just a bit in the wind. Rowena reached into her pocket for the thick envelope of banknotes and handed it to Mr. Harrison.

He blinked at it in surprise, then lifted the flap and counted. “Well, very good, Mrs. Moore. We are settled then.”

“For now,” Rowena griped, buttoning her cloak and pulling the hood up over her hair. Outside, sleet had begun hammering on the diagonal. It would be a long and treacherous walk home over icy cobblestones.

“Godspeed, Mrs. Moore,” Mr. Harrison said from the doorway of his carpeted office, where twin fireplaces on either side of his desk warmed the room and a silver pot of coffee steamed on a tray.

Rowena felt her jaw tighten. “If you could refrain, sir, from speaking to me anymore, I should
very much
appreciate it.”

She stepped out into the weather, feeling relief tempered by an eerie recognition that, once again, the world’s sense of balance had asserted itself over disproportion. For who would have guessed that the value of her gold wedding band was exactly, to the dollar, the amount she owed Mr. Harrison?