All He Ever Wanted (13 page)

(However often in these pages I might appear to be opportunistic, my love for Etna Bliss was genuine. I had never before known
such a feeling, nor have I since. And though I could not help my imaginings — can any man? — I had but the purest of motives
in anticipation of my marriage. I wanted first and foremost to make Etna happy, whatever sacrifices that might entail on my
part. I think that any man who does not feel similarly about his bride-to-be should not entertain the idea of wedlock. Marriage
entered into with even the best of intentions can sometimes be both baffling and trying. To do so with baser motives beggars
the imagination.)

(Not that I was immune to the pleasurable anticipation of physical love, however. No, no, to the contrary, I rather think
I enjoyed the sexual act more than most, for it allowed me that rare opportunity to escape myself — to shed constricting inhibitions
and enter, if for moments only, another universe entirely, one in which I ceased to be a man named Nicholas Van Tassel.)

* * *

Etna and I walked arm in arm (man and wife) back to the home of William Bliss, who had generously offered to host a wedding
breakfast. I was tongue-tied during this brief journey, and Etna was as well, and had it not been for my loquacious sister
Meritable, it might have been an awkward walk indeed. But Meritable, who had journeyed up from Virginia for the occasion,
loved to chatter and had any number of questions and pronouncements for both of us. As she was a product of my father’s second
wife, we were only half brother and sister, but the resemblance between us was unmistakable. Unfortunately, the physical characteristics
of my Dutch forebears do not normally contribute to delicacy of limb or fineness of facial feature in women, and in this Meritable
was very Dutch indeed. She was a stolid woman with a broad face and thickish lips similar to my own. She was prone to heaviness,
so that she had to walk briskly on stout legs to keep up with Etna and me, lending her queries a breathless air. Where would
we be staying the first night of our wedding trip? Had we hired a coach or would we drive ourselves? Had I looked into the
matter of purchasing the oak Roycroft dining set she had seen for sale in the newspaper? Did I think that the President of
the college would come to the breakfast, since she so very much wanted to meet him? My sister punctuated these queries with
bits of news about her brood of seven children (prolific daughter of prolific father): Peter was turning into quite the young
scholar, and Quincy, unhappily, had broken his leg. Meritable closed her eyes and uttered a short prayer when she said this,
as she was likely to do whenever she mentioned any ill fortune in regard to her children (she was terrified lest she lose
a son or daughter to accident or illness); and I cannot help but think these small missives sent heavenward successful, since
the seven children of 1900 subsequently became eleven, all of whom are alive and well today — an unlikely, though happy, statistic.

“I like her very much,” Meritable said when we had reached the Bliss house and found ourselves alone in a hallway. Etna had
gone upstairs to make herself presentable for the breakfast, though I thought her more than presentable already. I minded
her leaving my side and longed for her return. Meritable put her hand on my arm. “She does not dissemble, which I admire,”
my half sister said.

“Though silence in a woman can sometimes be a trial.”

“I think Etna feels shy today,” I said.

“Of course she does,” Meritable said, smoothing the voluminous skirts of her dress and kicking a clod of caked mud from her
boot. (Boots nearly as large as my own, I noted.) Then she added, as if explanation enough, “It is her wedding day.”

“I count myself lucky,” I said.

“She is tall.”

“Stately, I think.”

“Yes. And not too young, I am happy to see. But in the matter of children, you will want to begin straight away. There is
no time to lose.”

I was silent.

“You’ll begin tonight, no doubt,” she said wickedly, and there might even have been a wink. “I hope you’re not journeying
far.”

“Not too far.”

“A child conceived on the wedding night will be clever and charitable,” Meritable said with the assurance of a countrywoman.

“I promise you I shall do my best,” I said, and she laughed — a throaty laugh that threatened to sink beyond the realm of
good taste.

“Nicholas, you are sometimes very pompous.”

Perhaps it was the talk of sexual matters, or simply that I felt bereft without my new bride on my arm, but I excused myself
and climbed the stairs, hoping to surprise Etna and kiss her quickly out of sight of her family and the other guests. I found
my wife in her aunt’s bedroom.

She was standing at the mirror in an attitude of perfect immobility. Another woman’s hands might have fluttered all about
herself, correcting imagined flaws, enhancing precious charms — pinching her cheeks or refastening her hair, for example —
but Etna was completely still. So intent was her commune with her image that at first she did not notice my presence. But
it was not vanity that made her oblivious to her spy; no, it was something else, something far more dispiriting.

The golden eyes to which I had attributed so much beauty had taken on a look of despair. The luster had gone out of her skin,
and her lips, that lovely mouth I wanted nothing more than to kiss, seemed almost bloodless. It was as if I were seeing Etna
as she might be forty or fifty years hence: as an old woman who had learned to live without joy.

Do I sound excessively melodramatic? I wish I did. I had to bite my own lips to keep from calling out, and perhaps some sound
escaped me, for Etna started and swiveled in my direction. For one second, before she could compose herself, I experienced
the full force of that despair: bottomless, black, and irreparable. And though she managed a smile and put (for my benefit)
some warmth into those golden eyes, and, further, seemed at great pains to demonstrate a modicum of fondness for me, my own
joy teetered and momentarily collapsed, and it was some moments before it could pick itself up again.

Etna crossed the room.

“Husband,” she said. Whether this word had emerged deliberately or not, I do not know, but I later thought it a remarkably
brilliant choice; what other greeting was so guaranteed to please?

“Wife,” I said in kind, though something inside me was still off-balance and wavering like a dislodged ladder.

Etna put her hand upon my arm. Instinctively, my fingers closed over hers.

“The guests are arriving,” I said.

“I will go down with you.”

“The Reverend Mr. Wilford did a creditable job.”

“It was a lovely ceremony.”

“Your uncle seems pleased.”

“I like your sister. She has no pretensions.”

“We shall stay for an hour and then go,” I said.

“Yes,” she said, linking her arm in mine.

“Etna,” I said hoarsely — joy tentatively on its feet now and daring to stretch its limbs.

(I should explain here the abrupt change in ink. Immediately upon finishing that last sentence, I began to feel wretched.
I sat back in my compartment, resting just a moment — perhaps I was experiencing some motion sickness, I thought — but then,
as the distinct nausea I was experiencing grew worse, I remembered the crab croquettes we diners had had just hours before
on the train. They had had a peculiar smell, and I had thought of bypassing them altogether, but, unfortunately, hunger had
defeated common sense. I quickly succumbed to a violent fit of nausea; in fact, I was so ill the train was forced to make
an unscheduled stop in Richmond, where a doctor was brought on board to attend to me. Fearing food poisoning, though vociferously
denying it, the train personnel have been solicitous of my well-being. They have given me another berth, a more luxurious
one with leather upholstery and a mahogany table and even gold-plated fixtures in the hidden bathtub, which the conductor
tells me was once used by Woodrow Wilson during his campaign for the presidency. Unfortunately, at some point during my illness,
or perhaps during the move to my rolling parlor, my pen was lost — or stolen — and I am now using one given to me by the conductor.
I am saddened to have lost that cherished writing instrument, one that Etna gave me when I turned forty. I am also, oddly
enough, missing my previous compartment, which suited my temperament and seemed conducive to solitude and memory. Will luxury
alter my narrative? I sincerely hope it will not.)

I had hired a carriage to take Etna and me north and east to an inn in the White Mountains. As will happen in the spring in
New Hampshire, the day turned abruptly cooler. Etna and I rode side by side but had few words between us. Shortly after we
left, she fell into what appeared to be a deep slumber from which even the jolts of the muddy ruts couldn’t rouse her. Her
head listed onto my shoulder, and I was quite happy to be, for the duration of the journey, her bulwark. I slipped my arm
around my bride, and though she was not conscious, I imagined her at least content. We stopped only once, for nourishment.
Our driver, familiar with the route and mindful of the fact that we were hours wed, took us to a small inn. As I recall, Etna
ate little, while I, nearly ravenous, devoured my lamb chops. There were several other diners in the restaurant, and their
boisterous spirits provided a welcome buffer, allowing Etna and me to eat in relative silence. Though I was rendered nearly
mute with anticipation of the night to come, I considered blurting to the assembled crowd the fact of our marriage just hours
before. Each time I glanced at Etna — at her thoughtful face with those seemingly foreign cheekbones (surely there must be
some Indian in her, I thought) — I felt buoyant, nearly giddy, not unlike a man who has unexpectedly come into a large sum
of money as a result of a game of chance.

As we left the inn, I noted a trinket shop across the street. I helped Etna into the carriage and asked her to wait for me.
I wanted something — some tangible gift — to give to my new wife, to mark the day. I was dismayed, however, to find that the
shop contained only secondhand items. I fingered a veil of lace and discovered a moth-eaten hole; I looked at a silver-backed
brush that might have done but for a small stain in the bone of the handle; I had high hopes for a Florentine writing case
until I lifted the lid and saw it was connected by only one hinge. I was ready to abandon my idea altogether when I moved
a worn velvet hat from a display case and saw, beneath the glass, a matching set of items such as a woman might carry in a
purse: a small mirror, a pillbox, a case for calling cards. Each was made of gold with an intricate mother-of-pearl cover.
The shapes were pleasing — the round mirror, the oval pillbox, the rectangular card case — and the objects seemed like treasures
a child would find tucked away in a grandmother’s jewelry box. The set had some age, and I exaggerated what flaws I could
find (the silver backing of the mirror was beginning to flake) to get the price down, though in the end I needn’t have bothered.
The shopkeeper seemed not to know their value. I paid for the set, had it wrapped, and brought it to the carriage.

“But I have nothing for you,” Etna said when I put the package in her lap.

“Of course not,” I answered. “This was merely a whim. Well, more than a whim. I wanted you to have something to mark this
wonderful day.”

I held my breath as she untied the package. It was the purest gift I had ever given. I felt, as she let the silk ribbon slip
through her fingers, that the best of me was now available to her. I had never wanted so to please another human being as
I did then. All of hope, I believe, was contained within those folds of tissue.

She opened each small case in turn and then ran the tips of her fingers over the mother-of-pearl inlay. “Thank you, Nicholas,”
she said. “They are very beautiful.”

“Love me,” was all that I could manage.

I cannot now recall why I chose the Mountain Inn for our honeymoon. I suspect it had something to do with my finances, nearly
exhausted as they were by the renovations to the house. Surely one might otherwise have gone to Paris? Or even to Italy? Yet
I had selected a lonely inn perched upon a granite summit in the heart of the White Mountains, which, at that time of year,
was still host to inhospitable winter. (I can’t think how I’d have known about the hotel. I must have booked it on the recommendation
of a colleague. Was Moxon to blame?) Even now, just the visual image of that monstrous inn causes something inside of me to
empty out with despair.

It was immediately clear that we were not expected, that the person to whom I had written and from whom I had received a reply
was nowhere in evidence. Nevertheless, said the young fellow who finally answered the door, a room could be made up. He would
not turn us away, he said, his phrasing having the unfortunate effect of making us feel like unwanted refugees. I was more
annoyed than I wished to be; I could barely restrain myself from upbraiding the man. Etna was embarrassed, I think, and tried
to soothe my ruffled temper. “It doesn’t matter,” she kept saying. “It doesn’t matter.”

“But it
does,
” I said, too sharply to her, for she turned her head and did not comment again.

We were shown to a room on the second floor. The view was, most assuredly, impressive, as had been promised, but it was a
feature I was too distraught and cold to notice just then. A gust of wind had blown the ashes from a previous fire in the
hearth across the floorboards, and one could see from the doorway the sag of the bedsprings. The chamber was frigid and smelled
of mildew.

“This is all you have?” I asked.

“It’s not really the season, sir, is it?”

“Can you make a fire?” I asked the boy.

“I will,” the boy said.

“And what about a meal?”

“You’ll be wanting a meal, then?”

“Of course we’ll be wanting a meal. Many of them, in fact.”

“Many of them, sir?”

“Damn you, this is our wedding trip!”