Barkskins (65 page)

•  •  •

The visit to the Hobble Peterson camp did not go as well. Peterson disliked women, whom he considered brainless and backward, refused to talk to her and addressed sarcastic replies to her questions only to Andre Roque. His camp was dirty, the ground littered with wood chips, torn rags, a ragged ox hide, several broken barrels surrounded by circling flies, broken ax handles, rusted wire and worn-out saw blades, discarded boots. The drying lumber stacks looked ragged and the ends sagged. As they rode away from the camp Andre, who had been silent until now, followed her glance and said, “Them boards won't dry even.” Lavinia noted all of this in her little red book, a book that became infamous in the logging camps, for a bad report from Lavinia meant the jobber would not work for Duke & Sons again, as Peterson discovered when the spring drive ended.

On the return trip there was one night when Andre was thoroughly awake. A storm had been hovering on the horizon all afternoon. They made camp early and dinner was the inadequate New England “nookick,” parched corn ground to a powder and mixed with hot water, filling but tasteless, and as dark fell the storm arrived. Lightning cracked without interval and violent rain doused the fire. While Andre sat near, Lavinia tried to sleep but the mad winds tore their lean-to apart. They could hear trees falling in the forest and even see them in the stuttering blue flashes. With the shelter gone they were soaked through in minutes. When lightning cleaved a great pine a short distance away Andre wrapped his wet arms around Lavinia as if to take the brunt of any falling tree. Two hours passed before the rain slackened and suddenly stopped, pushed southeast by an icy wind. Andre got up, groping in the dark for a log he had set aside earlier and with his ax laid the dry interior open. He spent the next half hour with the tinderbox and char cloth, and when that was not successful put a little gunpowder on the log. The spark ignited, the log surface showed a tiny flame, which he fed with a feather stick and twiglets, then pulled out the dry branches he had cached under their bags. Only then Lavinia remembered the little box of Congreves her father had pressed on her before they left. The next morning she dug out the box, opened it and tried rubbing one of the little strips on a piece of wood and was utterly surprised when it flared up brilliantly. She held the box out to Andre, who examined the matches, frowned and handed them back. He preferred steel and spark. And a week later, back in the Detroit house, she learned that matches were dangerous.

She was copying out her notes from the trip while Ruby unpacked her bags. She heard a slight noise and a smothered word, then a shriek from the unfortunate maid, who had dropped the Congreves box and stepped on one of the spilled strips, which immediately ignited her cotton dress. Lavinia seized the pitcher in the washbasin and sloshed the contents on the fiery dress, shouted for Mrs. Trame to bring a bucketful, pushed the maid to the floor and stamped on the still-burning cloth, singeing her own wool skirt hem.

“Butter,” said Mrs. Trame. “Butter will calm the pain,” and she ran back down to the kitchen. Ruby's burns on her hands and neck were painful despite the butter. James called in a physician who pooh-poohed the butter and substituted a salve of his own making and prescribed generous doses of opium for the pain. The burns healed but Ruby's attachment to opium increased and after several months James sent the scarred and addicted maid back to Boston with a generous allowance. Lavinia replaced her with a local girl.

•  •  •

It was not necessary to go to Ohio to learn scaling. Lavinia swallowed her pride and wrote to Armenius Breitsprecher, explaining what she wanted and asking how to gain the knowledge. Both Breitsprechers were in their Monroe office, just back from surveying heavy river sections. Armenius was amused; laughing, he showed the letter to Dieter.

“Duke and Sons are our chief rival—it seems they may have to change their name to Duke and Daughter, as there are no sons except the young children of Cyrus Hempstead. James is old and it looks rather as though this Lavinia, a chit of a girl, will have a position in the company. I think we may quickly swallow them up.”

But Dieter thought it must have taken courage to write that letter. “She has spirit. Does she have brains? Do you know her?”

“I never met her. I just knew she existed. It's
lächerlich,
a woman wanting to learn how to scale logs. A rich girl's passing fancy, something she heard about but hasn't any idea of the reasons or procedures.” He crumpled and tossed the letter into the woodbox near the fireplace. It was Dieter who plucked it from the woodbox the next day and answered the letter himself, offering his personal instruction if she could manage to come to Monroe for a week.

“I hope you have some knowledge of mathematics,” he wrote. “Few women do, but familiarity with numbers is quite essential in estimating log volumes. I would be pleased to tutor you in the rudiments of the art and if it is to your liking you may advance to more difficult problems.” He thought she would not reply; he made the work sound disagreeable and difficult. She wrote back with a list of dates she could be in Monroe and assured him she had no fear of arithmetic nor mathematics and particularly enjoyed calculus above all things—not quite the truth.

F
or James there was one highly annoying disadvantage to living in Detroit—his wine cellar remained in the Boston house and in Detroit there were rivers of whiskey but no wineshop. It had always been his intent to have his cellar shipped, but he shuddered when he thought how many good bottles would suffer from stirred-up sediments and take years to settle down. The longer it took to arrange for the packing and shipping the more he pined for the dark dusty bottles of choice Madeiras and clarets in their silent racks. His mouth watered. Dinner without wine was insipid. There was no pleasanter end to a day than a glass of port and a cigar by the fire.

James and Lavinia made a point of dining together at each other's table in turn. This night it was James's house. After dinner—venison roast with baked apples, potato soufflé and small business talk—in the library, each with a glass of whiskey, he said, “Lavinia, I am determined to return to Boston and arrange to have my wine crated and shipped here. While I am gone—I will be about six weeks away—I'm having a carpenter put bottle racks in this cellar. Of course I shall stay at Black Swan, though likely eat out, visit my tailor and bankers. Where did I put my—there they are.” He hung the cord of his pince-nez around his neck. “I've spoken to Cyrus and he said that while I am away anything you wish he will help you procure.” Cyrus was becoming hard of hearing and it meant strenuous shouting to explain anything to him.

“I shall do very well, Papa, and look forward to your return and perhaps a glass of champagne?”

“Oh, we will have a champagne gala,” said James. “You and I and Cyrus and Clara. I shall bring all the news of Boston with me as well as wine. If there is anything I may fetch for you give me a little list. Why not let me choose a new dress for you—something colorful?”

“Books, Papa, I would have some new books. That is all I want.” And, thought Lavinia, when you return I will know how to scale logs.

•  •  •

But two days before his departure he came storming to Lavinia's house in a froth. She invited him into the little parlor with the deep green velvet curtains making a dusky forest-like gloom; the gilt tassels glinted dully. She sat on a chair, ankles crossed; he strode up and down. “Daughter, I have just made an unpleasant discovery. I am sorry to say this but that rascal, Andre Roque, cannot accompany you again on any trips whatsoever.”

“May I ask why not?” said Lavinia. “I have always found him to be most accommodating.”

“I daresay,” sneered James, continuing to stamp across the carpet.

“Oh do sit down, Papa, sit down. And tell me calmly, what has he done? What is wrong? Why?”

James sat on the edge of a large, throne-like chair. “Why! Never mind, it is not something for a young girl to hear.”

She sat straight, both feet flat on the floor, a combative attitude. “Let me remind you I am no longer a ‘young girl' but almost a woman grown—and with a masculine mind as you have several times remarked. I am immune from vapors and fainting. I demand to know why you are forbidding me his company and protection.” Her dark eyes glinted and the red mouth pressed into a knot.

Now he was really irritated. “Very well, since you fancy yourself so advanced in worldly experience I'll tell you that Andre Roque has got his
sister
with child. He cannot be trusted with females. Some men are that way.” He thought of his lascivious old father-in-law. “I do not want him to travel with you again.” He waited for her shocked exclamation.

Lavinia said coolly, “I suppose it comes from all the children sleeping in the same bed.”

“How would you know that!” He was back on his feet.

“I surmise it, that is all.”

“A piece of advice, Miss Lavinia. Surmising is the way to the greatest error. Never surmise, never.” But what he really feared was that Lavinia might have a streak of Posey's abandoned ways and the hostler's son would sniff it out and give him an illegitimate grandchild.

“I quite agree that surety is preferable to the most advanced surmising,” said Lavinia, “I will do as you say,” and she offered him tea.

•  •  •

Back at the old house in Boston, James was struck by its shabby condition. The familiar interior was musty and chill with an air of fatigue, the furniture, especially the hall stand, seemed cruelly old-fashioned. The rooms looked rather mean. He thought they should not copy every detail in the new house but simply sell Black Swan as it stood and start anew in Detroit. He would have a talk with the architect while he was in Boston and cancel the copycat plans—present Lavinia with a fait accompli when he returned to the lake country.

•  •  •

Mr. Prentiss, his wine merchant for many years, was excited to see his second-best customer again. His wattled red face contrasted with his pink turkey neck stretching naked above the new style of low collar and bow tie, and James thought he should have kept to a high stock that would keep him decently covered. The merchant flapped his hands open as though inviting James to dance and said, “I am delighted to see you again, Mr. Duke. Are you returning? Oh, just a visit,
tsk.
How may I help you? Would you like to know of the new wines? I have some really good German hock. At your service, sir,” and he made a body movement very like a bow. Nothing had changed in the wineshop, the same dusty musty smell, Mr. Prentiss clucking and nodding.

“Mr. Prentiss, you look well and I trust you do well. Indeed, just a visit. And as much as I would like to explore the hock I have come on a different errand. I wish to have my cellar crated and shipped to new quarters in Detroit. But I fear breakage and disturbance will wreak havoc on the contents unless the job is carefully undertaken. Can you advise me of the best way we may do this?”

“Mr. Duke, to disturb those hundreds of bottles, to crate and jostle them halfway across the continent would ruin a great portion. It would be a true sin. Why not trade with me—a move from your cellar to my shop is not a great journey. In exchange I will give you a greater measure of aged Madeira or whatever else you like in casks and barrels that can stand the trip without damage.”

“That seems a logical course of action. Let us do it.” They spoke for a while and then the merchant asked offhandedly if Freegrace's cellar had been sold or passed to a family member.

“It passed to me,” said James. “Freegrace's will left it to Edward, but Edward's possessions have become mine. I haven't thought of Freegrace's cellar though I always heard it was very good.” His eyes kept straying to the bottles. He looked forward to an excellent dinner—with wine and more wine.

“Very good! I should say it was very good! Among the best in Boston.” He coughed. “If you think of disposing of it I would be interested in buying. I would never consider moving those rare bottles any distance.”

“Well,” said James. “I do not know the extent of what he had. But I have a set of keys at my house. Shall we meet tomorrow morning and examine what is there?”

“Nothing would delight me more,” said Mr. Prentiss, suddenly sneezing.

“Shall we meet here at ten?”

“Excellent. Now, Mr. Duke, will you take a glass of amontillado with me?”

“I will,” said James. “It will set me right. I keep having bouts of malaise.”

“Are you sure you would not rather have a hot toddy?”

“No, no, amontillado is what I crave. And please send a half dozen of the hock you mentioned round to Black Swan—I must have something to drink while I am here, though I can certainly make inroads on my cellar.”

“I advise it,” said Mr. Prentiss. “If you have special wines this visit would be the very best time to enjoy them. Now, just step into the tasting room.”

James felt it was good to be back in Boston. And tonight, he said to himself, a very good dinner.

•  •  •

He had a headache the next morning and sent it on its way with a large glass of champagne and the most savorous coffee he'd had in a year, taken at Bliss's Coffee House, where not even the waiter had changed—old Henry with the great wen on his chin, who greeted him by name. The morning was sharp with frost, the hired horse lively. He drove up to the wineshop, where Mr. Prentiss's florid smiling face floated in the window. The door opened and the wine merchant skipped out carrying an abacus and a notebook.

“I heard that Mr. Freegrace Duke kept a cellar book and I thought I would count bottles with this”—he held the instrument aloft—“and take a few notes.” He was in high humor.

It seemed to James he had never left Boston so familiar was this street, the clopping of the horse. “Brisk day,” he said. The headache was quite gone. He felt very well; sea air was certainly healthier than lake vapors. “He-up!”