The Rebellion of Miss Lucy Ann Lobdell (12 page)

“I’m not looking for a companion,” she said. “I just want someone who’ll do what’s needed. I’d be pleased to have you if it suits.”

I walked back to the lower village, thinking about the future. I was soon to have a retreat a little like Burton’s, and only a few streets from his. In the colder months, I could sit by the stove with a book in my lap and a cup of tea beside me. Perhaps this was the place where Helen could join me. If I did well for Mrs. Parsons, if I were diligent in my duties, she might allow my niece one of the bedrooms in the main house. It was more thinkable there than at Blandin’s.

* * *

Lydia sat by the window in her pinafore, hair tangled loosely about her shoulders. I should have taken out the violin and begun the lesson, but I kept finding small things to do. I hadn’t seen her since the day of our kiss and had no idea of what was to be said. And if she were happy to see me, it didn’t show. She just sat there, almost hiding in the
Democrat
.

“Joseph,” she said finally, not looking up, “do you know Arthur Crum? I mean, do you know who he is?”

“Yes,” I said, grateful to be speaking any words at all. “He hasn’t killed his jailer, has he?”

“No, he was hanged. Listen to this.”

After Mr. Crum was pronounced dead, a scientific examination of his head was conducted by Doctor Crawford, the noted phrenologist. According to the doctor, the head was twenty inches in circumference. The perceptive faculties were said to be strong, the reflective weak. Other organs of good disposition were found to be atrophied, while the back of the head was oversized, indicating sensuality and cruelty.

Lydia rose and came to where I was sitting. Suddenly her hands were rummaging about in my hair. “Joseph,” she said, accusing me, “your soft hair is a disguise. You’re really a monster.”

I tried to look amused. “And how do you know that?”

“Because the back of your head is so large!”

“It’s not true.”

“It is,” she replied. “And I shall have to report you to Doctor Crawford. What will he say? Your sensual nature, yes, but cruelty as well? Why must the two go together?”

We danced that afternoon. I kissed her softly, but my hands did not presume to their liberties along the Dyberry. Lydia seemed impatient. She broke off the embrace but held on to my hand.

“Joseph, when we dance, do you hear music in your mind?”

“Yes,” I said. “Of course.”

“I mean, do you hear the actual notes?”

“It isn’t remarkable, Lydia. It happens all the time.”

“Not remarkable?” she said, letting go of my hand. “To hear music that is not played? Joseph, if you wanted, could you hear that music played on a piano instead of a violin?”

“Surely.”

“But I could be hearing a violin. So if we were hearing it at the same time, would it be a duet?”

“Well, I’m not sure you could call it a—”

“Would we have to be in the same room?”

I was now lost, and my face must have shown it.

“What I am asking,” she said, “is how do we do it? How are the notes made?”

“We use our faculties in some way,” I said, no longer feeling playful. “What’s this about?”

Lydia looked to the floor. “Well, Joseph,” she said with gathered courage, “if by using our faculties, as you say, we can hear music that’s not in the room, and we can hear it at the same time," her eyes came up and challenged mine, "what other melodies might we dance to?”

Before I could answer, she picked up her scarf. “Good day, Professor Lobdell,” she chirped, and down the stairs she went.

I shook my head in disbelief. She was shameless. And wonderful—that is, if she had proposed what it seemed she had. Then I thought that I had imagined too much and that it was
my
mind that needed to be washed with lye soap. But a minute later, as I was preparing to leave, I heard the door slam and quick steps. Lydia ran into the room, hurried over and kissed me on the mouth. “Tonight I’ll hear what notes I want, and you can do the same.” She gave me a wild look and ran back down the stairs.

That night, alone in the dark, I imagined Lydia. And the thought that she was thinking about me in the same way was like dried hay to a fire. Safe by myself, I could kiss her and touch her as I pleased, and I did so without remorse and with better result than anything I had known in my marriage bed. But as soon as I ceased my imaginings, the same truth stood before me—I had to put things right between us. But how? As I had discovered, resolving to put things right with Lydia and actually doing so were not the same. Our grassy nest along the Dyberry had been the perfect place to tell her, if not the truth then at least some lie that would put an end to our romance. I couldn’t do it. I was swimming in her eyes, and all I wanted was for the moment to continue.

I lay in confusion. Was there anything I knew for sure? Yes. I knew that I was in love with Lydia and that she was in love with me. Or, rather, she was in love with Joseph. So that meant that she was in love with me so long as I was Joseph. But was I? I tossed about in the dark and felt the need to talk to my God, but by what name would He know me? Then it came. If God would accept me as Joseph, then surely it would be all right for Lydia.

* * *

That Sunday, I returned to church. I wanted to be part of His flock—part of His flock as Joseph. I wanted to sing hymns. I wanted my prayers to go to Him in a chorus, so they couldn’t be separated or ignored. And as I stood and raised my voice in praise, I felt a peace come over me. Reverend Albright preached on Jesus and the Mount. I had never heard him speak so beautifully on God’s loving purpose. Even so, I wasn’t eager to come face-to-face with my minister. But when our eyes met at the door after service, I saw what I thought was regret for what had happened. “It’s good to see you, friend,” he said. “I thought we’d lost you.”

“You haven’t lost me, Malcolm,” I said, trying to assure him and the Master he served. “And I haven’t read any more books by Mr. Hawthorne.”

Reverend Albright gave an approving grunt that for him was almost a laugh. He asked me to wait, and a little later we started toward the square. A light rain was falling, but my declaration about Mr. Hawthorne, made in jest, seemed to have raised my minister’s spirits. “Yes, Joseph,” he said, continuing the conversation, “I think you and I would do better to stay with the Holy Book.”

“Indeed,” I replied, feeling light and generous, “and argue about only the smallest of things.”

I had said this to put him at ease, but Reverend Albright gave a disapproving look. “Are there small things when we speak about the Bible?”

I took a breath. This could not be a serious point between us. “My friend, when I read in Genesis that Enos was nine hundred years old, I understand it to mean that he lived many years but not necessarily nine hundred. Does that change the message of Our Lord? Is anything lost?”

“Only your immortal soul.”

It’s a joke, I thought. But my minister’s stone face said that it wasn’t.

“Malcolm,” I said, almost pleading, “can’t we can find God’s message in these stories without embracing every word?”

The rain came harder, and Albright lifted his chin as though I had challenged the truth of the Flood itself. “The road is clearly marked, Joseph. Don’t stray from it.”

I should have walked away, but I couldn’t. “Malcolm,” I said, “when you arrive at the mill, the miller doesn’t ask what road you came by. He asks about the quality of your grain.”

Albright’s eyes caught fire. “You would compare our Lord to a miller?”

“Sooner a miller,” I said, now wanting to spit, “than a schoolmaster who would discard a student over a misspelled word. I can remember no such teaching by Jesus of Nazareth.”

Malcolm Albright held up his hand as though to stop me and the rain. “Joseph, I must defend the church—just as our Lord expelled the unworthy from the temple—”

“Those were the Pharisees!” I protested. “The moneychangers!”

“Yes,” he said, with a satisfied smile. “That’s exactly who they were. They brought with them the iniquity of the day. The
isms
are the iniquity of our day—Deism, Universalism, Transcendentalism.”

I wanted to slap his pocked face, but this time I did walk away. His voice followed. “You carry their plague.”

* * *

That night, tortured thoughts circled the room like banshees. When I fell asleep these became my dreams. In one, an intruder entered my room. I watched him in the dark, unable to cry out. Then he leapt upon me and we struggled. I choked him until he was dead. Still in the dream, I lit the candle. It was Lydia dressed in a shirt and trousers.

I woke the next morning in a strange sweat. I could hear men below and went downstairs to find Blandin and several others talking in low voices. Cornell Hall had burned a few hours before, the pumper arriving in time to save the town. I had slept through it.

I walked up the street to see for myself. It was a horrid, smoldering sight. Strange too. The roof and insides were gone, but the front of the building with its grand doorway stood almost untouched, as though one could enter as before.

I wasn’t sure if my dinner with Burton was still to happen, since the lecture clearly wasn’t, but that night Burton was at his table. He did his best to act calm, but his eyes darted about in a manner that was not his. “I don’t know how it burned,” he said, “but I know who, even if he didn’t light the match.” Burton’s words were as hard as any I had heard him speak. Little doubt he was talking about editor Beardslee and his campaign against the Literary Society. I had someone else in mind.

Burton had spent the afternoon trying to find another hall to host meetings. None had agreed. Beardslee had referred to the Society as
godless
so often that the churches were not eager to help. He asked if I might speak with the Methodists. I told him how I’d been cast out by Reverend Albright. Burton smiled, perhaps the first of his day.

“Be happy to be done with him,” he said. “The poor fellow would be better off down at Ludlow’s, putting dried beans on the scale.” That made me laugh, but when I looked up, Burton was not laughing with me. “Joseph,” he said, “you don’t need his approval. You don’t need anyone’s approval.”

Burton had never before spoken to me in such a manner. His words signaled an odd change to our conversation, and I wondered if the fire had affected him in some way. He leaned toward me and brought his voice down.

“My friend, you are not like other men.” A chill ran up my back. “If you know me, then you know that such things do not escape my notice. You do not act like other men. You do not speak like other men. You are different. I know it, and no one else need know, but you don’t have to pretend with me. I believe that we could have a closer relationship. A special relationship.”

I held still, not entirely certain what was happening. I think the blood ran from my face. Burton became alarmed.

“Joseph, you needn’t fear anything from me.”

“I know that,” I said in a whisper. I pushed the spoon about with my fingers while I wondered whether it was still possible to pretend that I hadn’t really understood his meaning. Then I took the napkin from my lap and put it by my plate. “Kenneth,” I said, using his Christian name for the first time, “you have befriended me, and I hold you in the highest regard. But I need now to retire.” I stood up. “I look forward to many more evenings with you at this table.” What that meant to him, I don’t know. He seemed in disarray, for once unable to control a situation with his words. I bade him good night and fled back to Blandin’s, straight to my room.

I lay on my bed in the dark, my head aching. Only then did I allow myself to think of Burton’s proposal, for I had feared displaying any reaction to it in his presence. Now I felt revulsion. But why? Because I believed his feelings toward me were unnatural? That he loved me as a man? I had to laugh, for if Burton had feelings of desire toward me, they would have to be more natural than what I was feeling toward Lydia Watson.

But perhaps I had it wrong. Maybe Burton had fallen in love with the woman he had discovered. I wrestled with that idea but could remember no occasion when Burton showed the smallest interest in a woman. No, I was sure that I had understood him, but even if I hadn’t—even if Mr. Kenneth Burton loved me as a woman and wanted me for a wife or even a hussy—it didn’t change a thing. I loved Lydia.

I
WAS SHORT with my students. I wanted them gone. I wanted to listen to Lydia read the news. I wanted to laugh at the troubles of others. But when the class did leave, Lydia was in no mood to play jester to my frowning face. She asked if I had eaten worms for breakfast.

I owed some explanation, but I certainly couldn’t tell her about Burton. “I’ve been cast out of the church,” I said, offering what I could. “Albright thinks I’m a Deist, whatever that is.”

Lydia would now say something bad about Reverend Albright, call him a sour pickle or something. She didn’t. “Oh, why do you care?” she said, annoyed. “It’s all just hocus-pocus.
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not MONEY, I have become as sounding brass and
—”

“Lydia stop! Stop mocking everything.” She stepped back, seeming frightened by my outburst. A moment passed. “I’m sorry,” I said holding out my hand. After a hesitation Lydia took it, and we came together, rocking gently in an embrace. “Just speak your heart,” I said softly, “that’s all you need do.”

I thought we might stay entwined, but suddenly Lydia released herself. “Well then, speak it I will.” She paused and then continued in a softer, less certain voice. "Joseph, I lie in bed at night and wish that you were with me, to touch me and kiss me and talk to me when I wake up in the lonely hours. But there’s something you must know.” She took a breath. “I’ve seen the life my mother lives. I don’t want anything like it.”

I held my face steady. “What would you have in its place?”

Lydia tugged on her sash. “Minnesota.”

“What? The territory?”

“My cousin has written of its beauty and open spaces. I don’t need comforts, Joseph. I want to be free. I want to go to Minnesota and raise horses.” Lydia blushed. “Well, didn’t that sound just awful. What must you think?”