Silhouette of a Sparrow (2 page)

I pulled the chickadee cutout from my pocket and a nib of white chalk I kept wrapped in a handkerchief. The chalk was for marking patterns on cloth, but to me its purpose was to scrawl Latin names on the backs of silhouettes—names that, when I tacked the cutouts to the wall above my bed, remained hidden. I still remembered most of the Latin from the days when I pored over bird books in all of my spare time. Now that idle moments were spent helping Mother around the house and preparing needlework for my hope chest, I held onto this practice of scientific naming as a small rebellion—a secret whispered between me, the silhouettes, and my bedroom wall.

I folded the chalk back into the handkerchief. My fingers itched.

Would there be hawks in Excelsior? Herons? Woodpeckers? I had to wonder. Would it be like our trips to Grandmother’s farm when I was little, when pre war Daddy would take me out into the fields and the woods to look for foxholes and pheasant feathers? The flocks of sparrows and chickadees and pigeons above my bed cried out for variation that was hard to come by without venturing off the beaten track.
Maybe in the country,
I thought,
without Mother around for ten whole weeks
. . .

I stopped myself. What silliness. I was not a child anymore, and Mrs. Harrington would make sure I didn’t forget it.

I pulled my embroidery hoop out of my traveling case and set to work. I was halfway through the
m
in
Bless Our Home
on the corner of a pillowcase. That trunk at the foot of my bed was almost full; my childhood was almost over.

Mother’s education in the “feminine arts” encompassed more than just needlework. She’d taught me how to budget the housekeeping money, when to buy fresh produce and when to use canned, where to find the highest-quality fabrics at reasonable prices, and how to turn those fabrics into replicas of the premade dresses in department store windows. (Exact replicas, except that I always sewed mine with oversized pockets for carrying paper and scissors and chalk.)
We’re not wealthy, Garnet,
Mother would always remind me.
We don’t have servants to take care of these things for us and we can’t afford to buy everything premade. You shouldn’t expect to marry into that kind of life either. But with a little know-how you can live respectably and fashionably on a moderate income.
In just a few short years she’d turned me from a tousled little girl into a
capable young woman with a hope chest full of linens and a mind full of thoughts of housekeeping and family life. If only I could ignore the fact that my heart was as heavy as that trunk, I might be happy.

Outside my window, the terrain grew wilder as we journeyed farther into the countryside.

When I finished the pillowcase, I looked over my embroidery. The letters stood up straight, but the pinwheel daisies around them drooped a little on one side. The overall effect was pretty good. I was admiring my handiwork when the streetcar lurched and braked suddenly. I fumbled my hoop and jabbed my needle into my finger.

With a little yelp I stuck the injured finger into my mouth. The metallic taste of blood hit my tongue and then was gone. Just a prick.

“Excelsior, end of the line,” the conductor bellowed as the motorman brought the car to a screeching stop at the station. The passengers scurried to collect their things, jabbering excitedly. I stowed my embroidery, careful to keep my pricked finger off the fabric in case another drop of blood escaped, but then I kept my seat a moment and looked out the window while everyone bustled around me.

A fat woman dressed in head-to-toe Victorian whites stood on the platform, leaning on a silver-topped cane. A slender girl of about fourteen stood in the shadow of the woman’s bulk, dripping in outdated lace. Behind them cowered a colored girl dressed in simple servant garb. I waited for the crowd to disembark, looking at the trio and beyond them—to the whiz and whir of the gigantic amusement park.

Oh, how it called to me! My heart skipped around in my chest for a moment as I gazed out at the glittering spectacle that dangled before my eyes. The tiny broken-down rides at the state fair in St. Paul had never held much appeal for me, so I hadn’t expected the amusement park to draw me in this way. The bright, quick beauty of the place sparked a yearning in me—for what, exactly?
I will go,
I promised myself.
I must.

Beyond the hubbub of the park the lake sparkled. The serene expanse of water calmed me, reined in my wild heart, slowed my breath. Finally, I retied the ribbons on my sun hat, rose from my seat, and collected my luggage. Clutching my bags in a firm grip, I marched down the aisle of the streetcar and descended the stairs, stepping into the heat of the day and the buttery smell of popcorn. It was time to meet my summer guardian.

(
Bonasa umbellus
)

She presided over the streetcar platform like a grouse stuffed into an albino peacock costume.

I opened my mouth to address her—

“You are Garnet, then?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said, dipping a quick curtsy that seemed expected of me.

“I am Mrs. Harrington, your father’s cousin on his mother’s side. This is my daughter, Hannah.” At her name, the thin girl whose angular limbs seemed to be drowning in their lace and ribbons nodded her pointed chin to me in terse politeness. The haughtiness of the greeting made me dislike her immediately.

“Pleased to meet you, ma’am, miss.”

“Take her bags up to the Galpin House and unpack them, Charlotte,” Mrs. Harrington said to her maid. “Have the dresses pressed. We’ll be up shortly.” The young woman
dropped a deep curtsy and took my trunk and traveling case. She paused a moment, her dark eyes laughing with obvious surprise and relief at the lightness of my luggage, and then hurried away. I would’ve preferred to unpack my own things, but I was not about to argue. Mrs. Harrington whipped open her fan and fluttered it at her damp face. “Dreadfully hot,” she murmured.

“Have you already settled in, then?” I asked.

“Oh, yes. We take the train up from St. Louis the moment Hannah’s tutor stops lessons for the summer.” She said
tutor
with emphasis, and her meaning wasn’t lost on me; Mrs. Harrington’s exceptional children did not bother with something so common as a regular school—like the one I’d attended all my life. “Mr. Harrington and my boys care for the estate while we come up here and make our home at the Galpin in the summertime,” she continued. “The summers are simply unbearable down there if you ask me. We’ve been coming up for years, since well before they built that horrid amusement park last spring and the riffraff started arriving. Shall we make our way up to the hotel now? I’m afraid it’s a bit of a walk.”

Without waiting for an answer she snapped her fan shut and set off at a leisurely waddle down the walkway. I stifled a giggle, thinking of the ruffed grouse as Hannah turned to follow and I started to do the same.

But then something caught my eye. “Mrs. Harrington, what is that enormous building?” I pointed to a huge structure off to my right as we moved in the opposite direction. Hannah shook her head as if to stop me from asking, but the question was already out.

Mrs. Harrington stopped abruptly and turned back to me. “That, my dear, is the dance hall,” she said, biting the words off and brandishing her closed fan like a weapon. “That is where nice young ladies and gentlemen go to corrupt themselves with drink and dancing.” And that was all she had to say on the subject.

The dance hall tugged at me as if by a strand of fishing line anchored beneath my ribs. Something in there seemed to be calling to me, and I was surprised to discover that I longed to go see what it was. I’d always been fascinated by the one near my house in Minneapolis, perhaps because it was off-limits and my best friend, Alice, was always scheming ways to get in. Mrs. Harrington moved off away from the offending structure and I had no choice but to follow. The dance hall, like the amusement park, would have to wait.

While we walked, I sized up Hannah. Although Father had visited these cousins a few times before the war, I had not met them. They came into the city briefly on one of their summer trips, but I was too young to remember the visit, and Hannah must’ve been a baby in the arms of her nurse then. Now, although she was younger than me and smaller than me, she tried hard to look grown-up. Not only had she dressed in expensive white lace, but she’d also twisted her hair back in an elaborate style that exactly matched her mother’s. Or maybe her mother had done the dressing and the hair twisting, using her daughter as a turn-of-the-century doll. I couldn’t help but dislike Hannah for her vanity and arrogance, but I pitied her too. She looked so uncomfortable in that outfit, and it didn’t suit her a bit.
If I sewed her a proper dress,
I wondered,
a simpler one,
a looser one, a sundress or a summer suit
—
would her mother let her wear it?
I doubted it, and I was sure the offer would offend them both. The Harringtons may have been family, but our families were far from close. They didn’t even know about Father’s condition. I needed to tread carefully.

With no idea how to befriend such a companion as Hannah Harrington (and little desire to try), I walked in silence beside her and kept a bit of distance between us. She cast her eyes down. Mine took in the sights as Mrs. Harrington led the walking tour.

“This is the entrance to the amusement park,” she said, her voice betraying an edge of malice as she gestured to the arched gates. The park swelled with joyous shouting and threatened to burst out of its fence.
Later
, I thought.
Later
I tore my gaze away and hurried along in the fat woman’s wake.

Mrs. Harrington lumbered down a path that led us past the park and around the western shore of the bay.

“The docks are here,” she said, “but the grand old steamers don’t run anymore thanks to this silly new obsession with speedboats. A few of the smaller steamers, the streetcar boats, still make tours of the lake. We do enjoy a ride on the
Minnehaha
now and then, don’t we, Hannah?” The pile of ribbons nodded her answer. “Perhaps we’ll take you on it, Garnet.”

“Yes, I’d like that,” I said, imagining myself in the midst of an expanse of water—a fresh lake breeze against my face and the swell of the waves rocking me.

A strip of grass and trees ran along the western shore in front of us. “What’s up there?” I asked.

“They call this park the Commons, after the Boston Commons. It’s all public land. I’d like to build a little summerhouse in that cove up there, but the city won’t sell. Pity. We’re buying in Florida instead. That’s the new promised land, you know, and it’s very reasonable to buy at the moment. There’s wonderful money to be made in real estate, even when you buy on credit.”

I narrowed my eyes critically, but then I felt Hannah’s gaze on me and worked to change my expression to a neutral one until she looked away. Mother had often cautioned me against ever spending money I didn’t have. I snuck a look at Hannah and wondered if she was dressed that way because her family was rich, or just because they wanted to look rich.

“In any case, there are public beaches up there and lots of pretty little inlets,” Mrs. Harrington continued. “Nice clean, clear water—not like those dirty city lakes—perfectly safe for swimming if you’re inclined that way and if you’ve brought a proper bathing costume. You don’t want to seem indiscrete. So many of the young people these days . . .” Her voice trailed off for a moment. Clean, clear water. I could hardly wait to feel it cool against my skin.

“Off to our left here is the town proper,” she continued, gesturing widely with her fan. “Lovely little shops up there—all the necessities. It’s very quaint, makes a pleasant stroll. Ah, we’re nearly there.” She nodded toward a gleaming white building up ahead, set back from the park on a bit of a hill and across a narrow street, overlooking the lake.

“Oh, it’s perfect,” I said. A grand double-wide staircase led up to a veranda that stretched the length of the
building. Two more stories rested above the first, with windows looking east, over the Commons and the bay.

At last we reached the front steps. They rose gently, not steeply like in a normal house, and it was easy to climb them with grace. A bellboy bowed to Mrs. Harrington and opened the main doors at the top. The lobby was large and richly carpeted, with a huge polished wooden counter for a front desk. An ornate radio stood in the corner with pretty little sofas and cushioned chairs clustered around it, their flowered upholstery clean and bright. Electric lamps nested on shiny end tables next to glossy copies of
Ladies’ Home Journal
and the daily paper.

Mrs. Harrington led the way to our suite on the second floor. We had a modern bathroom, a small sitting room, and three bedrooms. Mrs. Harrington had already settled into the large bedroom with the bay window in the very center of the building, and Hannah’s little room nestled next to hers. Mrs. Harrington showed me to the tiny room in the northeast corner that looked out over the roof of the veranda toward the lake. It wasn’t much but it was all mine, and I could tell after just half an hour with the Harringtons that the privacy it afforded would be a relief. The maid had already unpacked my things into the dresser drawers and the closet, and the empty luggage sat on the top shelf of the cupboard like it had always lived there.