Brookland (40 page)

Ben, however, had received his commission from the governor's office; he was already known to the senate. Even Prue granted that surveying seemed, on its surface, a line of work more likely than distilling to produce a bridge architect. He could stand in her stead as the author of this plan. He had a pleasing voice and an earnest manner, and could expound passionately and knowledgeably upon the merits of the proposal. Yet Prue could not bear to consider giving him credit for work whose seed had been her own. She herself had performed most of the investigations into the idea's feasibility; she had stretched her faculties to the utmost to propose how such a structure, never before seen, might hold. She would never have been able to express her vision so well without Pearl's assistance, but it was her own imagination on view in the drawing and the wooden model. She knew it would smart to stand in the background and let another—even one so dear to her as Ben—pretend to have been responsible for that dream and that work. Prue recognized this as the ranting of her own
amour propre
, and wished she could shut it up and move on; but it was not so simple. For all Ben's kindness and generosity, it still rankled that he would become the legal proprietor of her distillery; now he would come to own the bridge as well.

Ben gathered she was in a simmer, for which insight he was rewarded with a torrent of pleading and invective. To him, however, the dilemma did not seem so heart-wrenching. He walked her to the retaining wall, sat her down, took both her hands in his own, and said, “It isn't so dire. I think we should present me as the chief author of the plan and say I have developed it in partnership with the owners of Winship Gin, as it is upon their property I must needs erect a footing and accessway.”

His idea did sound reasonable.

He said, “It makes perfect sense. In this manner, we can placate the aldermen of New York at least on this front; and should the governor, the senate, or the assembly agree to hear my petition, it will be natural for you to accompany me to Albany. It might even make sense for you to address them.”

Prue wanted to disagree, but could arrive at no reasonable objection. It was, therefore, by Benjamin's pen they dispatched letters to Mayor Varick, in New York, and to their assemblyman in Albany, one Garret Willemsen, of an old Bushwick family. They entitled the project
A Proposal for a New-York & Brookland Bridge. Benjamin Horsfield, King's County
^s
Surveyor, Architect
. Both Varick and Willemsen wrote back by return post, expressing their strong interest. Willemsen told Ben that the assembly was then afire with arguments for and against an eventual manumission of all slaves within New York State; but he believed the gentlemen would be willing to pause in their arguments to hear plans for a bridge. He suggested Ben write, with his blessing, both to Governor Jay and to the speaker of the assembly, Hendrik Stryker. Though Prue still felt the indignity, she helped Ben compose letters to both men, under Mr. Willemsen's aegis, to request an audience with the legislators. Together they also wrote up a detailed proposal, explaining the costs of the plan and the methods of construction they intended to use. They gambled that by the time Ben received his replies, they could secure the backing of Brooklyn and New York. (Prue had no idea what would become of Winship Gin if all its slaves were suddenly freed; but as Willemsen had written that the issue was still under debate, she supposed she could save up her fretting for some quieter time.)

Prue therefore scheduled a meeting with the landowners of her neighborhood for the first Sunday in August. She commissioned Cornelis's youngest brother, Claes—a freckly critter, not ten years old—to run from business to business and house to house, bearing a statement of the purpose of the meeting and a paper on which gentlemen might sign their acceptances or regrets. Much of Brooklyn already knew what she'd been scheming, if only because it was a short line from Ben's mouth to the ear of anyone who frequented the Twin Tankards. But people who'd had business on the East River had also seen Ben taking his bearings; and any who'd visited the mill yard had tried to peek into the assembly hall
window to see the emerging model bridge, though Prue and Pearl had covered it with tarpaulins when they'd locked up the room for the night or when the distillery workers had assembled. Prue had been in the Liberty Tavern little since Ben's return, but she knew opinions on the bridge were already well formed there; and although Brooklyn did not as yet have any newspapers of its own, the New York sheets ran speculations about what might be transpiring in Winship Daughters Gin's assembly hall. Nevertheless it seemed important to gather the Brooklanders together. Only in this way could they explain the scheme in all its detail, exhibit the lovely model and Pearl's miraculous depiction of the elevation, and gather signatures in favor of the plan. With Brooklyn behind them, she thought she and Ben could earn the support of New York. Remsen, Luquer, Livingston, Schermerhorn, Hicks, and Joralemon were all old, powerful Brooklyn names—much more so than Winship and Horsfield—and they would surely make Mr. Varick take notice. Mr. Varick, in his turn, had been elevated to his position by the legislature's council of appointment; Prue believed the assemblymen would value his signature.

News of the meeting spread through Brooklyn as would fire through a corn crib. Over the following days, a number of those Claes Luquer had not tagged—Mrs. Tilley and her daughter, the women of the old families, the Philpots, the Whitcombes from out past the Cobbleskill Fort, and three of John Boerum's tenants—stopped by with housekeeping gifts for Pearl, and asked her to add them on. Pearl had never been courted, and she loved the attention. When her sisters came home from the distillery, she delighted to show them the squab they would have for supper, or her new sewing scissors, or the peppermint candies they could all share.
Now I
really
don't know why you're so Rude to M
^r
Fisch
^r
, she wrote to Tem when he brought her a rosebush more than half her own size, its roots wrapped snugly in burlap. (This caused Tem to throw up her hands and curse.) Meanwhile, the distillery workers—many of them residents of rented rooms, men who would receive no benefit from a bridge but a straitened view from their place of employ—and the slaves proved the most eager petitioners of all. They came in groups of five or six, their hats in their hands, to ask to be included in the viewing. They came every man and boy of them, all seventy-nine. More than half of them brought a wife or sister as well.

Distillery business went on as usual. Prue ordered her weekly fuel
from Queen's County and worked out a better schedule for slop exchange with the Luquers, but she was impatient for the day to come. Pearl and Abiah set themselves to baking armloads of
koekjes
from old Jannetje's recipes. Though many burned, and many more were consumed in a testing of batches as rigorous as any performed down at the manufactory, they managed to lay enough by to sweeten an entire regiment, should the need arise. Each evening, Ben and Prue practiced their presentation on their siblings, accepting their critiques, encouragements, and vacant stares, and the howls of Isaiah's unhappy baby. They practiced each phrase until it fell from their tongues as easily as water fell from a waterwheel.

At last, on the Saturday afternoon before the appointed meeting, Pearl and Abiah scrubbed down the assembly hall floor with soap, shined it with wax, and polished the windows with vinegar. Prue argued she could have had some of the distillery's slaves perform the labor, but Abiah disagreed. “We want it done right,” she said as she filled her bucket at the distillery's pump. “And I, for one, take pride in helping you prepare for such a momentous event. I believe Miss Pearl does, too.” It was a hot summer day. As the men filed out after work, they all seemed to want to look in on the preparations. A few stopped by the countinghouse to wish Prue courage and good luck, which made her worry she had more to fear than she'd anticipated. She waited until they had all left the premises and the sun was about to go down before setting out the smaller drawings on the table. Then she removed the tarpaulins from the model, on display along one long wall; the scrolled elevation stood propped up against the other.

The next morning, she and Pearl went to church. When Will Severn saw them, his face lit up with excitement; Prue marveled that even his imagination could catch fire, thinking about a bridge. Though she tried to listen to the sermon, she was more aware of the birds twittering outdoors and the way her palms were perspiring than she was of any wisdom Mr. Severn might have to convey. As soon as the service ended, she ducked out of the church, as had become her habit, and she hoped her Sunday dinner might provide some distraction. It did not, however. Abiah was as keyed up as any of them, and looked uncomfortable in her crisp new flowered dress; and although Ben had come to join them, conversation was strained at the Winship table. The quiet in the house was
unbearable, and Prue found herself listening anxiously to the erratic ticking of their clock and watching Pearl's old cat lick its dull fur clean.

She considered changing into her dress, and realized she'd want a new one if they were fortunate enough to be called to Albany. She went outdoors to remove the caked mud from her boots, and would have blacked them had Abiah not taken them from her and done so herself, taking care not to sully her skirt. Deprived of her task, Prue went out to the pump and scrubbed her fingernails until her hands were raw. Tem walked out to the back fence and immediately cried, “Christ! Prue, have you seen this crowd?”

From the pump Prue answered, “I'm trying not to look.”

“Damme.”

“Tem, please.”

Tem whistled. “I didn't know there were so many people in Brookland,” she said. “We should set out; it's almost time.”

Prue knew she was correct. Ben, Pearl, and Abiah all came outdoors, with nervous expressions on their faces; after Abiah had closed the door, she kept smoothing down her dress and touching at her bonnet at intervals. “There's nothing for it but to go,” Prue said. Tem led the way out into the road.

From the top of the hill, Prue saw hundreds of people gathered in the mill yard, while still more hurried down Joralemon's Lane and up the Shore Road. She would have stopped and gaped, but Pearl put her fingers on the small of Prue's back and propelled her forward. Tem continued to march in front of them, as if clearing the path for dignitaries. Old Mrs. Livingston, her bonnet trimmed with a garish new green ribbon, fell into step beside Prue and Pearl and exclaimed her excitement, and Ezra Fischer swooped in from the other side to express his eagerness to view the work. “Thank you,” Prue said to all their compliments. Her mouth was already solidifying into a painful rictus, but she gathered this was better than wearing no smile at all. She was terrified at the notion of presenting this scheme to her neighbors; but she tried to remind herself they cared little if the bridge came from her, Ben, or the moon. The thing itself was what had piqued their interest, exactly as, when Rem Cortelyou's milk cow had given birth to a two-headed calf, the whole county had gathered to shudder and stare.

There were faces in the yard—whole clans—Prue did not recognize.
They must have come in from Bedford Corners and Midwood. Mad Ivo was waiting for her by the gate, freshly shaven and with a clean white stock around his throat. He leaned into his crutches and reached out to offer her an apple as she passed. “Thank you, Ivo,” she said. He wagged his head shyly to reply, and Prue felt blessed by him.

Isaiah was standing atop a stepladder in the middle of the fray, as if he could thus keep order. His narrow face lit up in relief when he saw them all approaching, and he climbed down to meet them.

“I hope Pearl made enough
koekjes
,” he said into Prue's ear as they reached out to hug each other. He had removed his hat because of the heat, but now his forehead and cheeks were tinged pink. “Patience and Maggie want to help set up the refreshments. They're over by the brewhouse.”

“That's good of them,” Prue said, handing Ivo's apple to Pearl. Pearl glanced at it, then looked off sourly toward the water.

Isaiah reached over to pat his brother's back. “Are you ready?” he asked.

Ben nodded, but he looked as nervous as Prue felt.

“You've no idea how excited I am to see it,” Isaiah said.

Ben and Prue had agreed that as he would make their presentation to Mayor Varick (and to the state assembly, should they have the good fortune to be summoned there), she would do the speaking here at home. She felt now as if her feet were stuck in the sand; and despite their preparations, all memory of her speech had vanished.

“You'll do admirably,” Ben said. He steadied the ladder for her as she climbed up. Prue was glad to have worn britches and her distillery boots; the climb would have been unmanageable otherwise.

As soon as Prue ascended the ladder, the crowd around her began to quiet. She was surrounded by a sea of warm bodies, including every last person of her acquaintance and a number of strangers. She imagined she understood how poor, stuttering Moses had felt, charged with addressing the Israelites, then thought if Will Severn knew she'd thought this, he wouldn't be pleased. She opened her mouth but found it thick as a half-dried pot of paste. One of her slaves reached up to offer her a tin cup of water. She drank it, handed it back down, and thanked him. “Hello,” she at last managed to say. “Good afternoon. Thank you for coming.” She
felt her want of confidence idiotic. She addressed her own men thus every week; she tried to tell herself this was not so different.

A hush settled over the crowd, and she could hear the tide lapping along the dry strand. Children, dragged to the gathering heedless of the reason why, continued to race with rocks and sticks around the assembly's periphery.