The Carousel Painter (17 page)
Josef arrived in time for supper, and I longed to hear what he would say about my accomplishments. By the time he was eating his dessert, I was still waiting. He’d visited with Mrs. Wilson about the spring weather and the flowers she was planning for her garden, and he had asked Mr. Lundgren about work at the glass factory and even requested a set of fresh towels from Mrs. Wilson for the next morning, but he hadn’t said one word to me. Not a word!
Deciding to take matters into my own hands, I cleared my throat and smiled at Mrs. Wilson. “I began a new job at the factory today.”
“Oh?” Mrs. Wilson’s eyebrows wiggled and gyrated like two arched plumes. “Did you hear what she said, Ralph? Carrie’s got a new job at the factory. Do tell us about it.”
Mr. Lundgren mumbled his agreement around a bite of dry pound cake. I did my best to remain focused upon Mrs. Wilson or Mr. Lundgren, but my eyes betrayed me and flitted toward Josef. His features were as taut as the strings on Mr. Lundgren’s guitar. I immediately regretted my decision, but there was no turning back. Mrs. Wilson and Mr. Lundgren were waiting to hear my report.
With somewhat dampened enthusiasm, I explained how I’d painted roses and saddles and blankets, and the court jester’s hat, of course. Mrs. Wilson asked lots of questions, and my spirits soon were on the rise.
“Mr. Tobarth even asked me to add the stripes and final shading to one of the horses he’d been working on for the past two weeks.” Pride swelled in my chest as I completed the account. After folding my hands in my lap, I leaned back in my chair and reveled in a feeling of triumph. In retrospect, it had been a very good day.
“And what did
you
think of our Carrie’s accomplishments, Josef?” Mrs. Wilson beamed like a proud parent.
Josef pushed his dessert plate away and rested his forearms on the edge of the table. “The work, it was passable.” He gave one bob of his head. “Ja. Most of the work
our
Carrie completes is passable.”
My elation vanished.
Passable?
Had I heard him correctly? Good sense argued with anger. Anger won and I challenged his comment. “You thought my work merely
passable
?”
“You will get better with practice.” He wiped his mouth with the cloth napkin and dropped it alongside his plate.
I took a deep breath before replying, careful to keep a controlled tone. “Exactly what was wrong with my work?”
“On canvas you were accustomed to painting whatever you desired. Now you must learn to follow the craftsman’s vision. Most carvers are pleased to see a painter make fancy their horses with some added decoration. But first you should learn the basic techniques.” He placed the napkin beside his plate. “And your striping isn’t well defined. Mr. Tobarth tells me you refused his suggestion to use a maulstick.”
It seemed Josef had scrutinized all of the work I’d completed. Did he want me to fail, or did he check all new painters with such diligence? I decided I’d try to elicit the information from Mr. Tobarth the next morning, but I’d need to be careful in my approach.
“What’s a maulstick?” Mrs. Wilson asked. “And why didn’t you want to use it, Carrie?”
“It’s a long stick with a knob on the end that you can use to steady your hand when painting lines and such,” I said, pulling myself back to the present. “I was confident my striping would be straight and steady without using the stick.”
“And what did you think when you had finished?” Josef leaned his shoulders forward and looked me in the eye.
The hairs along the back of my neck bristled. Josef wanted me to declare my work hadn’t been perfect. Though I had observed a slight waviness in my striping, everything inside me railed against admitting the truth. I feared he would use such an admission against me. Fingers crossed beneath the table, I said, “My opinion remained the same.”
“Ach!”
He slapped his hand through the air. “You are not willing to admit you failed.”
“I didn’t fail. I still have much to learn, but Mr. Tobarth said I did a fine job.”
“He said you did a fine job for your first day—that is not the same as a fine job, Miss Brouwer.” Josef pushed away from the table and stood. “Your striping will need to be touched up. More time lost. I am going back to work, Mrs. Wilson.”
Before I could further argue my case, he turned and stalked off.
T
he following day I waited until I was certain my conversation wouldn’t be overheard. The men ignored me, yet listening ears and whispering lips seemed to repeat everything I said. When I spotted Mr. Tobarth painting the trim lines on one of the horses, I decided the time was right and tiptoed to his side.
“Mr. Kaestner tells me the painting I completed yesterday was only passable and that the striping will need to be repainted.”
Mr. Tobarth loaded the tip of his brush with a unique shade of blue, one he’d mixed himself. With one long stroke, he laid down perfectly straight lines and then created triangles along the breastplate of a medium-sized jumper—my favorite of the carousel horses thus far.
“You did a fine job, Miss Brouwer.” He lifted his brush, reloaded it with paint, and continued striping. “It was your first day. I didn’t ’spect it would look perfect.”
I shifted my weight to gain a better view of his technique. “But have you received perfection from the men on their first days?”
“You askin’ ’bout the men who’ve been hired to do paint design or them that’s apprenticed first?” He had crouched low to align his strokes while he continued along the front of the breastplate.
“The ones hired to paint design,” I said, careful to keep my voice low.
The familiar scent of paint fumes filled my nostrils. I hunched forward to hear his response because I didn’t want Louis, the other painter, to overhear our conversation. I hadn’t failed to notice his furtive movement along a nearby rack of horses. No doubt he’d be reporting everything he heard to the other men. I wondered if he’d been eavesdropping before leaving work yesterday. Had he heard Josef and Mr. Tobarth evaluate my painting? If so, the men had probably already heard, already discussed, already taken pleasure in knowing my work had been deemed merely passable.
“Your straight-line work isn’t up to par.”
His brief assessment startled me back to the present.
“You’ll get better. Especially if you use a maulstick,” he said.
“But
you
don’t use one.”
“I been doin’ this for thirty years. I used a stick when I first started. Ain’t no shame in using a tool if it helps you do a better job.” He pointed the tip of his brush toward the other room. “The carvers use any tool that helps them create the best-lookin’ animal. Painters need to do the same. If we’re gonna outshine those Philadelphia and New York factories, we got to be willin’ to push our pride aside.”
Pride?
Is that what Mr. Tobarth thought? That I’m an arrogant woman, unwilling to accept direction? Warmth climbed up my neck and spread across my cheeks. I didn’t want to admit he was right, but my refusal to use the maulstick told another story—at least to Mr. Tobarth.
He pushed up from his stooped position and stretched his neck. “If you ain’t got no questions, Louis, you can begin workin’ on the horse at the end of the second rack. We ain’t got time to be wandering around doin’ nothin’.”
“What’s she workin’ on?” Louis called out.
“Unless Mr. Kaestner told you to take over as supervisor of the paint shop, it ain’t none of your business what she’s doin’. Now move that horse and get to work.”
A silent cheer reverberated deep inside my chest and worked its way up my throat. Quickly slapping my palm tight against my lips, I managed to smother the cheer into a throaty cough. I’d learned this particular technique due to my bouts of unexpected giggles throughout the years. My method had come in handy on a number of occasions, though it did have one disadvantage: I often received forceful yet well-intentioned slaps on the back. I’d borne my share of bruises after such episodes.
Mr. Tobarth added a daub of navy blue to the azure and mixed the two colors with his brush. “You think you might want to use a maulstick today?” He glanced up while he continued to stir the bristles in the paint.
“Yes, but I wondered if I could ask you a few questions about Mr. Kaestner.”
His lips curved in a lopsided grin. “If you got questions about Josef, why don’t you ask him? You live at the same boardinghouse.”
I leaned close to his ear. “I don’t think he likes me.”
Mr. Tobarth chuckled. “You think he knows you well enough to decide somethin’ like that? You ain’t been around long enough for that.”
“Some people make immediate judgments.” I leaned in just a bit. “Don’t you think?”
He shrugged. “I s’pose. But not Josef. He’s a solid kind of fella. Takes things slow and steady—studies ’em out. Does the same with people.” With practiced ease, Mr. Tobarth drew his brush across the horse and formed a perfect line.
I exhaled a whoosh of air. I’d been engrossed in Mr. Tobarth’s every movement and didn’t realize I’d been holding my breath. “Have you known Jo—Mr. Kaestner for long? He doesn’t say much about himself at the supper table.”
“I’ve known him ’bout six or seven years—maybe longer. He started out in Philadelphia, just like me. I remember when he came to work as an apprentice. Everyone realized right away he had his father’s talent.”
“His father? He was a carver, too?”
“Prob’ly the finest I’ve ever known. He taught Josef to wield a mallet and chisel when the boy was no more than four or five.” Mr. Tobarth edged his thumbnail along a line of paint. “I doubt his mother woulda allowed such a thing if she’d been around.”
“His mother’s dead?”
“Far as I know. He’s never mentioned her to me. Neither did his father. Josef’s father died about a year before he came to Ohio. After he got out here, he convinced me to leave Philadelphia.”
He pointed to a small tin. I retrieved it from the floor and handed it to him. “If you’re such good friends, why don’t you live at the same boardinghouse?”
Mr. Tobarth stepped back and gave me a sidelong glance before he surveyed his work. “I couldn’t take the cooking at Mrs. Wilson’s place. She’s a fine lady—no doubt ’bout that—but after a couple months, my stomach rebelled, and I moved down the street to Helen Milford’s place. Miss Milford’s kinda cranky, but the food’s good and there’s plenty of it.”
“There’s always plenty on the table at Mrs. Wilson’s, too.” I felt a sense of obligation to come to Mrs. Wilson’s defense. She was, after all, a kind and generous woman.
“That’s ’cause no one can stand to eat much of her food.” He nodded toward the horses awaiting paint in the nearby rack. “You best get busy on those horses. They ain’t gonna paint themselves.”
“Can we talk some more during the noon break?”
“If ya like. I’ll be right here workin’ while I eat.”
His parting words were a reminder that I was the cause of the required overtime hours. I wondered if the other workers had ever carried through and asked that I be discharged. I doubted I’d ever know, but I found the worrisome thought abrasive. If Mr. Kaestner had been permitted to hire an experienced carousel painter, one of the opposite gender, the factory might be on schedule. Then again, who could say when a qualified man might have applied? I salved my conscience with that thought, picked up my paint box, and studied the beautiful long-necked stander. The horse was an outside horse—a fancy. That’s what Mr. Tobarth called the animals placed on the outside row. I was honored he was permitting me to work on the beauty.
The older man had already dappled the horse’s rich brown coat with subtle hues of black and raw umber. The shading delicately enhanced the muscles and tendons to perfection. According to the instructions written on a paper and attached to the horse, the broad saddle straps and reins were to receive a coat of deep green. Once the forest green dried, the scalloped flowers atop the straps were to be painted with emerald green and the centers finished in gold. The effect would be striking.
I squeezed a portion of the Japan paint into a wooden bowl and decided a touch of black would help deepen the color. I added a daub and mixed until I’d achieved the perfect color, but before I could begin painting, Mr. Kaestner signaled me to come to the sanding room. I covered the paint and hoped he wouldn’t detain me for long. Worse yet, I hoped I hadn’t done anything to get myself in more trouble.