Thoreau in Love (22 page)

Again Henry laughed, then said, “But there’s something about him I like.”

“I know. I don’t know why, but I like him too. Oh, but Henry, I’m so sorry you missed my brother. He had to go back and I have to join him for tonight. Some charity dance at the Astor House.”

“I hope you have as much fun as we had last night,” said Henry.

“I doubt it,” said Beatrice. “You’re such a fun dancer. The young men in New York, they all have something to prove, especially on the dance floor.”

For the next hour they talked about everything, life in the city, books, Barnum’s museum, Emerson, Concord, Reverend Reed, his mouse of a wife, William and Susan.

“She is beautiful,” said Beatrice. “But I’m so sorry you missed my brother. You and he would get along famously. And talk about beauty. I wish I had his beauty.”

“No, don’t say that.”

“Oh, I know I’m attractive. But Robert is . . . well, you’ll meet him soon.”

“I hope so,” said Henry.

“Do you have any friends here? Or in New York?”

Ben immediately came into his mind, but Henry wasn’t about to bring up Ben. “No, just the ones in Concord.”

Mrs. Biddle stuck her head in the doorway and said, “Bea, dear, I’m afraid we have to get back soon.”

Beatrice shot up with excitement. “Oh, Mummy, may I give Henry a ride home?”

Mrs. Biddle cocked her graying head. “Does Henry have any idea what he is in for?”

“He grew up in the country.”

“Do you have a strong back, Mr. Thoreau?”

“I believe so.”

“Oh, please, Mummy. And when I return Herbert can drive us down to the ferry. Please, Mummy, please.”

“Oh, all right. But don’t dally. Twenty minutes at most. I’ll be waiting for you.”

Gleefully screaming, “Thank you, Mummy, thank you,” Beatrice repeatedly kissed her mother until Mrs. Biddle pushed her laughingly away. Beatrice ran off to the kitchen to let them know she would be wanting her carriage again. When Mrs. Biddle said goodbye to Henry, she wished him Godspeed.

Henry imagined a sedate affair with livery attending, but awaiting them in the circular drive was Beatrice’s four-in-hand, a bare-bones carriage pulled by a team of four spirited horses. “I told you, Jimmy, didn’t I?” she said as she took the reins from their stable boy. “Hop on,” said Beatrice. And Jimmy added, “And hold tight. You’re in for the ride of your life.” The moment they were outside the gates and Beatrice saw that the road was clear, she snapped the reins, the horses took off at a gallop, and they flew along the rutted roads of Staten Island, past The Snuggery, past the judge’s courthouse, with Henry nearly flying off into the blue on several occasions, but both of them laughing the whole time. Beatrice knew her way around the whole island, and when she finally pulled up the horses they were once again in front of the Snuggery. “This was fun,” she said. “We’ll have to do it again.” Beatrice was used to this kind of riding, but Henry was sore in places he’d never been sore before.

“Yes,” said Henry. “If I ever recover. My back, my thighs. My shoulders? How did my shoulders get sore?”

“Hanging on too tightly?” Bea giggled. “A horseman you’re not, Henry Thoreau.”

“No, I’m not.”

“If we could do it tomorrow, again, all your soreness would go away.”

“But you’re going back now.”

“I am. And I’m afraid I won’t be back for a week, if then.” Bea lifted her chin, pursed her cherry lips. For a moment Henry thought she might want him to kiss her, but then he dismissed that, thinking, No, she’s a proper young lady. He nodded and creakily climbed out of the carriage, catching his breath. “This was great. Thank you, Bea.”

Bea pulled herself up, impishly smiled and said, “Next time I’ll let the horses really run.”

“What?”

“I restrained them the whole time! See you next week, Henry.” Bea snapped the reins and the horses took off, leaving Henry in her dust.

For a moment, he thought Bea might have been angry with him—for not giving her a kiss?—but then she returned a few moments later going down the Richmond road, the horses at a blistering gallop. Bea waved and called “Yahooo!” as she went speeding by. Henry called, “Have a good trip,” though he wasn’t sure if she heard over the din of the galloping steeds. Mary greeted Henry at the door, saying that Mr. and Mrs. Emerson had been invited into the city for dinner. Then, her real purpose for greeting Henry, a curt, “Miss Biddle’s a pretty one, isn’t she?”

With no strength for Mary’s jealousy, Henry smiled wanly, said, “Yes, Miss Biddle is,” and went up the stairs to his room. He took off his clothes and collapsed onto his bed, thinking, Could this be my Beatrice, with me the American Dante?

For the next days, while his body healed, Henry lived on the hope that he and Beatrice would see more of one another, and who knows, maybe some day tie that knot he’d been so assiduously avoiding. Mrs. Biddle had certainly taken a shine to Henry, and Beatrice seemed quite smitten. Though Henry wondered often about Bea’s younger brother, he convinced himself that his attraction to Bea was nothing like his attraction to Ellen, which he knew now was more likely because he wanted to be near Edmund.

Susan was agog at the possibilities. At her urging, Henry wrote a note to Bea, telling her how much he’d enjoyed their time together, and how sore he still was. In the following morning’s mail he received a note from Bea apologizing for the rough ride, but that she’d so enjoyed his company that she hoped they’d see one another again very soon. Henry wished the note had been from Ben.

Friday after lessons, Henry decided to find the sea beach. Susan wanted to talk about Bea and all the good things she’d found out from Madame Grymes, but Henry wanted to go, and so, sure what her answer would be, he asked her to accompany him.

“No thank you,” she said. “But do come back soon. Oh, Henry, I’m sure Bea is the one for you!” Henry put on his old straw hat and, checking that he had his brother John’s plant book in his pocket, he went out the door. The sky was so clear and deep blue Henry felt he could reach up and stir it with his hand. Everywhere flowers were blossoming, yellow lilies beside the lanes, old maids in the fields, purple phlox and dog roses. Henry had always been partial to showy blossoms, but that day he began to see plants most people wanted nothing to do with, but which John had pointed out and drawn in his plant book. He knelt beside an ugly, broad leafed prickly thing a foot high and checked to see if his brother had drawn anything like it. He had.
Burdock
, John had written.
People scorn you as a perversion of nature. But aren’t you entitled to as much respect as a peony?

The chest-high wheat whispered in the wind, and before he was anywhere near his destination a grizzled old woodchuck with white whiskers diverted his attention and took him on a wild-woodchuck chase to an old Indian path he hadn’t come across before. Henry loved it when new avenues presented themselves. He gave up the chase and followed the old trail. Going into the dark and quiet of the woods reminded Henry of stepping into the dark and quiet of Trinity church. There were sounds in the woods, but they were quiet sounds, the trickling of a stream, the gentle rustling of the spring green cedar needles above and around him. He followed the worn path several miles down through the beautiful woods and finally to a raised path over a salt marsh where totally different sounds and smells tickled his senses. Here, snipe and terns made their home, as did swamp dogwood, wild cherry and sumac. A wind rustled the trees and whistled through the head-high marsh grass, cooling the sweat on his neck.

The marsh led to sand dunes over which Henry saw masts and a tip of white canvas against the cerulean sky. Excited to see the sea, he ran to the top of the dune, where a fresh sea breeze flattened the grasses and blew off his hat. Luckily it caught on the high marsh grass. The ship was a frigate. But this was no ocean. The rolling combers he’d expected to see crashing on the shore were but an inch or two in height.

Near where Henry emerged, a fishing boat had been rolled up to the dune on logs, its net draped on stakes to dry. There wasn’t a fisherman in sight, although a pile of rotting fish the tide had partly covered gave off a wicked stink.

Four mangy curs came running up the shore, splashing into and out of the water, chasing one another and their own tails. Attracted by the scent, they circled the fish, then dug in face first—only to discover that they’d been beaten to their perfect meal by snapping crabs. Wild dogs wildly shook their heads and splashed around in the shallow water, trying to rid their snouts of the clamping claws. Other dogs barked and growled at the snapping crabs, who stood their fish. After a short standoff, the crabs retreated, and the dogs tore at the outlying bounty, spreading it on the sand so they could blissfully roll in the putrid flesh—eau de Staten Island.

Henry sat upwind of the fish in the cooling breeze, watching terns, gulls and osprey dive into the sea. A black cormorant bobbed on the water, its head darting this way and that. Then it dove underwater, out of sight, and surfaced half a minute later ten yards away with a small fish in its beak. Sandpipers pecked their thin beaks into the sand, feasting on tiny crabs and buried bugs. As he gazed intently on this drama, Henry became aware that he was also an object of attention—a young man perched on a log a ways down the wide beach seemed to be watching him just as intently. The third time Henry looked at him, the young man waved.

“Henry?” he called out. “Ralph Reed. We met the other night, at the Emersons?”

Anxiety immediately crippled Henry, but he forced himself to get up, and by the time they met, halfway between where they’d been sitting, he’d overcome most of his nerves. A crust of beard covered Ralph’s face, new since Henry had met him. “It’s no wonder I didn’t recognize you, Reverend.” said Henry. “And I must say, it’s strange to see a reverend at the shore.”

“Perhaps I’m a strange reverend. But truly, my work takes me near the shore, and I love the water.”

“I’d hoped to see crashing waves.”

Ralph laughed. “Closest to here you’ll find such waves is Long Island.” He pointed east, out to sea. “Or maybe Sandy Hook, over in New Jersey.” He pointed down the beach to their right. “But please, call me Ralph.”

“Ralph it is,” said Henry.

“I was about to take a dip,” said Ralph, pulling open his shirt buttons. “Care to join me?”

Nervously, Henry nodded, stripped off his clothes. And followed a whooping, naked Ralph into the frigid sea. And as quickly as they dived in they leaped out, two blue-bodied Krishnas, the breath knocked out of them by the icy water. Sopping dark hair covered Ralph’s chest, legs and buttocks; his crotch hair was full and thick. They sat shivering on the warm sand; then Ralph, like a wet dog, shook water all over Henry, who laughed and thought, Maybe I misjudged this Ralph. He seems very sincere. Ralph shivered and said, “I knew we’d cross paths again, but what a pleasant surprise it was this soon.” They lay back and talked and laughed, about the world, the world of Staten Island, and finally about the unseen world.

“Do you really believe all that religion you preach?”

“What do you mean, all that?”

“Hellfire, for instance. Do you believe that a merciful god would condemn souls to burn for eternity?”

“I am not even sure there is a God, much less hellfire and all that.”

“No God? What kind of minister are you?”

“The best kind, I think. A seeker, not a preacher.”

“But that’s like me! I’ve always described myself as a seeker. And you have a church on Staten Island?”

“Not much of one, I fear. I’m minister, chief cook and bottle-washer at St. John’s by the Bay, that little tumbledown clapboard church by the water.”

“Looks like it hasn’t been used in years?”

“There are many on this island who wish that were true,” said Ralph. “I also minister to the spiritual needs of the old sailors at Snug Harbor, and to the quarantine village.”

“You are a surprise.”

“You too. Beatrice is very nice. Is she your fiancé?”

“No, no, no. We only just met that night. But yes, she is very nice.” Henry didn’t know what else to say, and for a few moments there was an uncomfortable silence between them. Then Ralph sat up and said, “Look, Henry, there’s a clipper.” And when they sat up to look closer at the passing ship, Henry saw that the reverend’s tree sat up before him. Henry snickered and surprised himself by saying, “And you a reverend, no less.” They both laughed at that, and then, looking down at his still-straight-up cock, Ralph said, “Unfortunately, also a man.”

Henry grew erect as well, but they just sat there, looking out at the sea. The reverend knew all the vessels that passed: “That’s a hay boat. There’s a cutter; she’s patrolling for smugglers; schooner, schooner, schooner; that two-masted nasty thing with its mainsail forward—ketch. Sloops you know, but aren’t the different sails wonderful? Look, white ones over there, brown, and there, there’s my favorite, the red of dead roses.”

“Isn’t your wife named Rose?”

Ralph laughed and then raised his eyebrows at Henry in a hopeful gesture. “Jane, actually. But everyone calls her Toppy.”