Where Lilacs Still Bloom (27 page)

“Boys aren’t interested in getting out of trouble. They like getting into trouble,” my wise daughter told me.

So I expended my training on lilacs. A lilac from the President Grévy gave me a treat when it produced a deep blue the color of Irvina’s eyes. I selected that one and pollinated it with another blue and trusted providence to bring me a surprise some years forward. A single white produced a double bloom one year, and that, too, required cheering and a letter to Mr. Burbank who did not respond. He traveled a great deal, lecturing, and I supposed he had so many letters, answering mine just took up too much time.

“I’m sorry if I’ve disturbed you, Mrs. Klager.” I didn’t recognize the voice nor did I recognize the young, smartly dressed woman who stood on my doorstep. “I’m Cornelia Givens, formerly of the
Sacramento Bee
.”

Slender as a tulip stem, the young woman’s face shone brightly, and I welcomed her inside the house.

“What are you doing here? When I hadn’t heard from you, I thought—”

“I must apologize for not letting you know.” She took a deep breath as she sat on the horsehair couch I directed her to. I offered her lemonade, which she accepted, took a deep swallow and then said, “I quit my job and decided to test my ability to write for magazines and other papers, become a freelance reporter. It took longer to get established than I thought it would.”

“A freelance reporter. Good for you.”

“I’m writing feature articles now. Maybe one day I’ll work on a novel or a book of poetry, but for now I’m having the best time talking with people. I’m learning so many new things. Anyway, I’m here because I think writing about your garden is a wonderful idea. And I have a magazine interested.”

“Do you?”

Her enthusiasm washed away that little annoyance I felt at her not writing the article when I’d first suggested it. “I can
see from the front of your yard that you’ve been given a golden spade to make miracles out of dirt.” She stood, looking out the window. “Transforming, that’s what this is. How many plants would you say you have here? Would you grant me a tour?” She turned to face me.

“I guess by now I have six hundred or more, not counting the lilacs, and there are several hundred of them.”

“Oh, that’s just the sort of thing readers like. I know I can sell this. I had a long story printed in the
Atlantic
about the Lowthorpe School of Landscape Architecture for Women back east, and I visited a number of arboretums, interviewed the landscape architects and chief gardeners. I love it, even if I still can’t grow a pansy on my own.” She laughed. “I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you. I felt strongly that I needed to take advantage of my time back east before returning west and finally getting to see your gorgeous garden.”

“That’s fine, just fine,” I said. I showed her around my garden then, and she made notes, even sketched a few plants and the house and barn. She cooed at the lilacs, talked to the rhododendrons, asked questions.

Cornelia especially liked the iron-shaped garden with its daisies and petunias and pansies and the statue of a young girl that was a fountain overflowing with water. “I love the way you’ve laid it out with the color rising like a sea wave, light to dark, smaller plants to taller ones with the lilac bushes beyond, peeking around the side of the potting house. It’s quite … soothing to the eye, Mrs. Klager. The fountain, it’s
lovely too. It speaks of abundance and generosity, as the water flows over the girl’s basket.”

“Thank you for that. I change things nearly every year, much to Mr. Klager’s consternation, but I like seeing new things and how they’ll complement each other or not. And the fountain says to you exactly what I hoped it would.”

We wandered the paths, and she asked about Nelia’s direction of the bucket boys. She wrote down what they were paid. The long rows of lilacs caused her to gasp. “So many.”

“If I get one good plant out of four hundred, I’m doing well. So I have to plant a lot of cultivars, hoping they’ll produce the innovation I’m looking for.”

“It’s so much work,” Cornelia said as we neared the end of the tour and I showed her my nursery efforts in the glassed-in porch. “You and Frank do this all by yourselves? And run a dairy too?”

“Our children help, of course. And I’ve had hired help, young girls attending the new high school. My bucket boys show up regularly. It is a big production.”

“Does it, I mean, can you … make a living doing this? If you don’t mind my asking.”

“I wouldn’t recommend it as a profession,” I said. “But I have a good husband and a productive herd of cows. The price of cheese has held, and our farm is paid off.” I felt a little uncomfortable telling her this business about money. It wasn’t the sort of conversation one had with a sister, let alone a near stranger. But I didn’t want someone jumping into a
garden arena without full knowledge that they’d be in the poorhouse for a long time, unless they had other means to keep their gardens flourishing. “I don’t do this to make a living. Bringing flowers to others has been a gift I never imagined I’d be allowed to give. It was a hobby for a long time, a challenge, started when I wanted to have a larger, crisper apple that was easier to peel.” I took her to the apple orchard and showed her, explaining that in the spring, I had any number of blossoms from different sorts of apples grafted onto one tree.

“It’s so … impressive,” she said.

A bumblebee lobbed up from orange poppy blooms and flew off.

“Not the work of it, but the result,” I agreed. “God knew that we’d need beauty and fragrance to help us through the difficult days, so He gave us flowers and let us learn on our own how their cycle of living and dying is like a garden’s rhythm, giving us hope each spring.”

Cornelia nodded, then looked at her lapel watch.

“Will you spend the night in Woodland?”

“I have a room at the boarding house.”

“You’re welcome here. It’ll save you money. A freelance writer has to pay attention to that.” I wagged my finger at her. “And wouldn’t you like to see the garden in the early morning?”

“I would at that, but I hate to impose. Besides I want to review my notes and put them in some order so I can ask better
questions in the morning. But thank you. You’re very generous with your garden and your time.”

I wondered if she’d run into Dr. Hoffman or Roy Mills.

Cornelia came back in the morning and had a few questions for Frank. She had a bit of advice for us too before she left. “If my article is published, there’ll be visitors coming here. I’ll mention that the time to come is what, between mid-April and early May? That’s when they’d see lilacs blooming, correct?”

“I submit that’s so.”

“Then my suggestion is that you have scads of lemonade made up you can sell for a penny to help compensate for the inconvenience of visitors.”

“Not inconvenient. We’d love it, wouldn’t we, Frank?”

“Maybe I’ll put a box out, with one of my signs: Give a Klager Life. Donate Here.”

“Oh, Frank.” I punched his shoulder.

“I’d also suggest you think about places for people to park their vehicles,” Cornelia said.

“Ach, no. Not that many people are interested in lilacs.”

“You’d be surprised. Keep in mind this article will reach thousands of readers, and good writing is meant to move people to action. I hope they’ll move along the rivers and the roads and come here, to Woodland, just as I did.”

I took her enthusiasm as a young woman’s enthusiasm for her work. I never dreamed that she’d be right.

N
elia instructed the bucket brigade like a nurse giving directions to orderlies. I said as much, and she laughed. “I plan to be a nurse one day. I’m going to school at the new Swedish Hospital in Seattle.”

“I’ve never heard of the place.” Nelia had just popped a blood blister on one of the boys’ hands, wrapped it, and sent him off to nurse it while he urged his bucket brothers onward.

“They’re raising funds now, and by the time I graduate, they’ll have a program where I can work and go to school too.”

“Nursing. A wonderful profession.”

“I’ll have to get over being squeamish.”

“You handled that blister just fine.”

She shrugged.

“I miss Ruth,” I told her.

“Am I not doing enough?” Nelia looked alarmed.

“No, no, you’re a wonderful worker. I just loved teaching the two of you. I wonder how she’s doing in Baltimore.”

“She’s like my sister.” I nodded agreement. “And you’re like my mother,” she said.

“Am I? That pleases me.” It did, more than I could say. I swallowed, hoping I wouldn’t push this bud of conversation too fast. “You’ve talked little about your mother.”

“I don’t remember much of her. Even Jasmine seems miles away.”

I stopped pouring beer into my snail and slug pots and listened.

“She’s buried up the Lewis River,” Nelia continued. “On the Runyan Property where we stayed.”

“You’ve had a lot of losses in your young life.”

“The work here was good healing, Mrs. K.” For the first time, I saw the girl with tears in her eyes. She’d taken tragedy and loss and been a good steward of it.

The next morning when she came over from Emil’s, I told her I had a gift for her. “I was going to wait until you left for school, as I did with Ruth, but I decided you needed this now. Its name is Chrystle. It’s a new variety. White, but still not the perfect cream I’m seeking. It does have petal edges that are crisp like they’ve been cut with very sharp scissors, and the lilac society agrees it’s a unique plant.”

“It’s beautiful.” She held the cultivar as though it were a newborn, then put it in one of the galvanized buckets. “I’ll take the best care of it.”

“I have no doubt.” I stroked her dark curls. “It’s who you are.”

Roy Mills came for Christmas dinner where our house abounded with happy conversation. Irvina was the delight of the day as she opened her presents, giggling.

Frank bantered with Roy about business, how logging brought new people and new customers to the store, whether hop farmers were doing well this season. They spoke of vehicles, weather, men things.

Then in January, Frank announced his intention to buy a Model T Ford.

“Now?” I asked.

“I need an auto in time for Lizzie’s wedding.”

“What?” Lizzie and Roy were downstairs sitting in the living room, while we were upstairs preparing for bed. A January wind howled against the house. “How …? When …?” Why hadn’t Lizzie said something? Oh, I knew Roy was interested. He often came from Swartz’s boarding house carrying a lantern in the night to make the half-mile trek. Once, a wag had painted Roy’s lantern red, which did not please him one bit. But that he planned to marry Lizzie, and she might
say yes, well, I wasn’t ready for that. No one had mentioned that!

“Man did the right thing coming to me to ask for my daughter’s hand,” Frank said. “I had to keep his confidence. Lizzie’ll tell you everything, I’m sure, as soon as the man leaves. Barely has enough privacy to court the woman with Martha and Fritz and us hovering about.”