Brookland (50 page)

“The only thing would please me more would be to know the date.”

“We haven't one yet. We haven't spoken to Mr. Severn.” Prue opened the nearest account ledger, and glanced down at the blotched and X'dout columns of Tem's entries. Her heart dropped into her stomach.

“It's all right,” Isaiah said. “She's slovenly, but her arithmetic is correct. Would you like me to help you man the press?”

Though Tem's crazed handwriting still distressed her, Prue said, “Yes.”

“It'll be a long day,” Isaiah said. He emptied the dregs from the morning's pot of coffee into a cup of questionable cleanliness and handed it to her. “We shall have to clean the room first. I shut it down on the instant when Marcel was injured; I'm sure the blood is still there, and herbs scattered on the floor.”

“We'll manage,” Prue said, and drank the cold, bitter coffee to fortify herself.

Without Marcel to assist her, it took more than a week of working from dawn till dusk to catch up to the rest of the manufactory. Before she began her day, Prue would check on how the model was weathering outdoors and record its progress in a ledger; and every evening, she went out the turnpike to Simon Dufresne's, until Peg drew her aside and commanded her to cease her worrying. In this way, almost a fortnight passed without so much as seeing Ben, let alone approaching Mr. Severn; but Prue thought of Ben constantly, and wondered when he would come to inform her of Mr. Jay's decision.

In the last week of September, an unseasonable rain began to fall—not especially heavy, but relentless in a manner more consistent with spring than with autumn. It came down in gray sheets that rendered the landscape soft and gloomy, and in twisting silver ropes that hung like icicles from branches and eaves. Brooklyn's streets were all shin-deep in mud, and after the fourth day, Prue shut down the works and went out with Tem, Isaiah, and all their men to lay sandbags atop the retaining wall. The model bridge weathered the downpour well, which gave Prue some satisfaction. Nothing entered or left the port; Losee stopped running his boat; and even the enterprising Mr. Fischer left off the construction of his ferry house. Prue felt certain everyone but her was bitter about the loss of business the rain caused, their spirits as well as their underclothes dampened; but as miserable as she was, slipping through it with flour sacks on her shoulder, she was delighted at the good it proved a bridge would do them.

“Lord,” Abiah said, when she and Tem returned home that evening, “you smell like wet sheep.”

As she stripped in the kitchen, Tem said, “That's how we feel, as well.”

Pearl went upstairs for towels. As Prue wrung her hair out in the doorway, she saw Ben running up the path, under cover of an umbrella, yet still soaked to the skin. “News!” he hollered.

“Dammit,” Tem said, and rushed for the back stairs in her undershirt. She passed Pearl on her way back down, snatched one of the towels she was carrying, and took it up with her.

Ben stuck his head in the doorway to kiss Prue's cheek, but remained on the threshold, dripping. Prue passed him the towel Pearl gave her, and he, in turn, pulled out a letter from deep in his shirt. Even it had gotten wet, but not so thoroughly Prue couldn't read it.

“Good news,” Ben said, and turned around to shake his head like a dog out onto the stoop. Pearl returned to the stairs, but more slowly this time.

“What does it say?” Abiah asked.

Prue read it all the way through before answering. “Mr. Jay supports the legislature's proposition.” Her heart skipped a beat as she heard herself say it. “He shall send us the fourteen thousand dollars to build a small bridge on the plan we propose; and if it proves sound, both by our reckoning and by that of experts appointed by the state, he will be willing to discuss a larger appropriation.”

Ben leaned in to kiss her again, then continued to towel off his head. “At first I thought we should not be able to work on it over the winter, but on reflection I see, if we dig the foundations now, we can use the winter profitably in cutting the timber and stone to size, and assemble it come spring.”

“This is excellent news,” Abiah said.

Pearl returned with a pile of their father's clothing for Ben, with Tem close behind her in dry work clothes. “Thank you, Pearlie,” he said. “Did you hear?”

He might have guessed from her bright expression, but she nodded anyway.

“Change in my room,” Abiah said.

Ben left his boots by the door and went inside, then reemerged a few moments later in britches and a shirt that were musty and far too big for him. He had his wet clothes in a dripping bundle before him.

“I'll take those,” Abiah said, and hurried them outdoors, along with Tem's.

Pearl scooped up her sleeping cat from the rocking chair and sat down with it in her lap.

“Supper smells delicious, Abiah,” Ben said.

“It's only vegetable soup,” she said over her shoulder as she wrung out the clothes, “but if you're angling for an invitation, I'm sure there's
one to be had. Prue, you go change yourself, too. I can't have those wet clothes in the house; they smell rancid.”

By the time Prue returned, in her spare britches and a woolen sweater, Tem had poured five glasses of gin and taken hers to her chair, which she turned around before straddling it. Her short pigtails continued to drip on the floor. “You can't be surveying in this weather?” she asked Ben.

“No, no. I suppose I shall use the time to order some of our materials, assuming the roads to be passable tomorrow” Prue sat down beside him, and he raised his glass to her. “So, Prue, sisters. We have a wedding to plan, and I think we should take advantage of this foul weather to get to work on it.”

Tem looked him in the eye and drained her glass, as if this were a toast.

He drank his down as well, but his eyes watered. “A lucky man, who marries a distiller.” Pearl shook her head at him. “Very well. As this rain has perforce confined me to my home and near environs, I had no choice but to visit Mr. Severn this afternoon. He was quite affable; rather a change from his usual demeanor. At all events, he proposes to marry us the third Saturday of October, to give us a few weeks to plan. If it suits you, and assuming the weather permits, I'd like to suggest we set up dancing and refreshments in the mill yard.”

In Octob
^r
?
Pearl wrote.
It may be cold
.

“The twentieth,” he said. “It'll likely be warm yet. And in that way, we could ask all of Brookland, your employees, and New York's aldermen to attend without any great bother.”

Abiah whistled, closed the door behind her, and wiped her hands on her apron. “That's a lot of people.”

“Have you any relatives besides each other?” he asked.

“I believe one of our father's sisters lives in New Bedford; but we've never met her,” Prue answered.

Catharine Winship Orr
, Pearl wrote.

“And I've only Izzy and Mags, and Izzy's children. So we'll be a dozen for church. It won't matter how many for the celebration.”

“I don't mean to disappoint you, Ben,” Abiah said, “but the baking we did for your meeting in August nearly killed Miss Pearl and myself” Pearl nodded, with one hand in the cat's fur.

“I wouldn't ask,” he said. “Do you suppose Mrs. Loosely is better equipped?”

“Are we in a position to ask anything of the Looselys?” Prue asked. “Perhaps the Philpots will help.”

“And lend us musicians,” Ben said. “All that's left to settle, then, is how we'll live.”

Tem poured herself another cupful and sighed.

Ben reached across the table to have his glass replenished, as well. “Prue tells me,” he ventured, Prue thought unwisely, “you have some reservations about the living arrangements we've proposed.”

“Why'd you tell him that?” Tem asked Prue. “Not exactly, Ben. It's only I think the house will be rather small with all of us bumping about all winter. There aren't enough bedrooms.”

“We could build out from the side wall,” Prue said, gesturing to the one opposite Abiah's room. “We could build two more rooms, an upstairs and a downstairs.”

“There'll be money when I sell my house,” Ben said.

Do'n't you want to save it foryr Bridge?
Pearl wrote. The cat, miffed at being used as a lap desk, jumped down and stalked away.

“I believe the price I'll get for my house will go much farther in building rooms. I can easily afford two of them, whereas I can't have more than a foot of bridge.”

Tem accidentally clanked her glass against her teeth, then drained it. “We won't be able to do it until spring,” she said. “It'll be a crowded house until then.”

“Unless we stay in mine,” Ben said to Prue.

“I cannot be that far from the works. It won't be so bad, Temmy. It'll only be a season.”

Tem leaned forward against the back of her chair and drummed her fingers on it. “You two shall take my room—our parents' room—but we haven't resolved the rest of it. I can't share with poor Pearl.”

Ben looked at Prue for an explanation. She said, “Tem's a difficult sleeper.”

I shall manage
, Pearl wrote.
We all did, all those years before our Parents dy'd

“Or you can have my bed,” Abiah said to her, serving out the soup into bowls. “And I can sleep with Tem.”

'Tis'n't nesesery
, Pearl wrote, then shook her head, to be certain Abiah had read her meaning.

It was resolved, then. Although for reasons she could not articulate Prue still had her lingering doubts, the next week she moved her few possessions across the hall into the room that contained the bed large enough for two. In addition, it had a wardrobe, washstand, chest, and Roxana's cramped desk—little to grow accustomed to, but after having awakened facing eastward all her life, Prue wondered what it would be like to wake up here, with a wavy view of the river. Tem took her work clothes from the chest and threw them back on what had formerly been her shelf in the cupboard. Prue felt guilty for what she was doing to Pearl, but reasoned that at least now she and Tem would have their separate beds. The day before the wedding, Ben borrowed Jolly and one of the distillery wagons and brought over the trunks containing his books, instruments, and clothing, except for his best suit of clothes, which remained at his house, with his coffeepot, to serve him the following morning. Prue could not explain why she was touched to see how few possessions he had; it was not as if she herself owned many more, though the house's plates and andirons were, technically, hers. To see his life packed up so small, perhaps, simply reminded her of his innate fragility. Then, too, she reminded herself she was prey to her emotions right then. When Pearl washed her hair later that afternoon, she also felt her throat thicken when she realized this was how her hair would smell on her wedding day. Had one of her sisters reported feeling such emotions, she would have laughed at her; but there it was.

October remained warm that year, as if expressly to allow them their outdoor celebration. The morning of the twentieth, Pearl pinned white chrysanthemum blossoms beneath the collars of their dresses. Tem reluctantly agreed to wear her only remaining gown, moth-eaten as it was from disuse, but she did not want to wear the flower Pearl proffered. The day was warm and bright when the bell rang to summon them all to church; and as Prue walked out in the company of her sisters, the Livingstone and Joralemons, all in their best clothes and hats, stood on their stoops to wish them well.

Ben and his family had reached the church before the Winships. Prue could hear the cries of Isaiah's new infant through the open door; she
also saw Ben pacing within. Abiah took Prue's bonnet and laid it on a rear pew as everyone in both families, except Patience, who sat soothing her baby, assembled around Will Severn. “It is a delight to be here to celebrate this occasion,” he said to Prue. “I have often prayed for you this day would come.”

Prue thought the fervor in his shy gaze must carry some meaning, but she did not feel inclined to inquire into it. Ben, after all, stood before her, holding both her hands firmly in his own. The pleasure on his countenance would suffice.

Ben and Prue had asked Severn for the plainest possible ceremony—the witness of their siblings, an exchange of vows, the bestowal of a ring and a kiss. Though the event moved along swiftly, Isaiah's two older children found it intolerable; the elder sat kicking his feet against a pew, while the younger clutched at her mother's skirt and whimpered. Prue knew Patience could do little to control them, yet she found them distracting and wondered if others did as well. Ben, she noticed, looked at nothing but her; Tem kept glancing out the window, as if this could make the children disappear; and Pearl beamed at Prue whenever they caught each other's eyes, her narrow face unaccountably flush. In what seemed a mere moment, Severn pronounced them man and wife. As Prue reached up to kiss Ben, she felt a stab of remorse at having allowed Isaiah's children to irk her rather than concentrating on the event at hand.

As the church bell tolled out their joy, Prue and Ben led their families down toward the mill yard. Some of Prue's slaves had gathered by the distillery gate in their Sunday clothes, and they clapped to welcome Prue to her celebration. Early in the morning, she, Pearl, and Abiah had gone down to the mill yard to set up planks on trestles. Since then, the neighborhood women had arrived with flowered and checkered cloths to cover the boards and with a variety of delicacies to supplement the Philpots' stew and ribs: roast chickens, deviled eggs, cold cured ham, salads of all descriptions, smoked fish, and pickled peppers and cucumbers dripping in brine. Prue had watered down the gin the night before to prevent such roaring intoxication as had afflicted Boerum's son at the petition-signing; but along with their fiddler and the food, the Philpots had sent down four casks of beer. “Drunkenness is imminent,” Ben said to Prue, putting his hand around her arm and giving her a shake for courage. “Oh, a wedding is a fine thing.”