Brookland (74 page)

As she reached the bottom of the hill, she saw the distillery with fresh sadness. The whole waterfront was covered with soot, and on the smoldering spots where the rectifying, casking, and storehouses had been, fires were burning, dispatching the blackened debris. Some of the workers wheeled barrows of charred wood to the bonfires, while others used the push brooms from the brewhouse to sweep ash into the river. The press appeared to have melted around its edges and now resembled a badly scarred old anvil; pieces of the rectifying stills had survived unscathed, bolts and screws and bits of twisted pipe. Men were picking through the detritus to find any such remains, trucking them down to the water, washing them, and placing them to dry on planks set out in the mill yard. Isaiah was up on the bridge, talking to C. Mather Harrison and directing two men in sweeping ash from the charred sides of the Brooklyn lever. The soot fell like a curtain of rain.

When Isaiah saw Prue, Ben, and Tem approaching, he gave the men some last instructions and hastened down. Harrison followed a respectful distance behind him. Prue noticed Isaiah had washed and shaved since the morning. Compared to the wreckage over which he was seeking to establish dominion, he appeared the picture of order. Ben drew him close in an embrace.

“Well met,” Isaiah said. After holding his brother a moment, he reached out for Prue and Tem the same.

Harrison removed his hat and stepped forward to shake Ben's hand. “Mr. and Mrs. Horsfield,” he said, “I cannot tell you how grieved I am for your loss.”

Prue wanted to thank him, but found herself wondering if his professed grief would prevent him from making hay of their misfortune. He himself had always proven trustworthy, but she did not think she could bear to see the words in which his paper's rival, the
New-York Journal
, would couch the tale.

“I know I am a mere acquaintance,” he continued, “but I have ever been a great supporter of this bridge, and I am sorry to see it—and you—brought to such a pass. If there is anything I may do—”

“Write nothing of it,” Ben said, no heat in his tone. “Leave us in peace.”

Harrison looked up at the ruined tip of the Brooklyn lever. “But anyone can see the damage to the bridge and the distillery. The
Argus
would be irresponsible not to print a report.”

“The other papers have sent their men already,” Isaiah offered.

Ben nodded. “Then please write nothing of our sister Pearl.”

“No, Ben,” Tem said. “If he writes a notice, it may well help us find her.”

Ben regarded her crossly, but did not respond. Prue could see how tired he was. “Very well, then, Mr. Harrison. I see there is nothing you can do.”

Harrison put his hat back on and stowed his pencil in his pocket. “You have my word, Mr. Horsfield, I shall not malign you.” Ben nodded his thanks, and Harrison bowed before setting off for the ferry. All three of them watched him go. The rhythmic sweep of the push broom kept slow time.

Isaiah waited until Harrison was well out of earshot before saying, “I have news.”

“What, has she been found?” Tem asked.

“No.”

“I believe no other news would interest me,” she said blandly. She looked over to the nearest bonfire and shook her head. “Have we any idea how much has been lost?”

“I shall take tally once we're finished cleaning. I've already written the underwriters, and shall write both to Philadelphia and to England tomorrow
to inquire about the cost of replacing the stills and the press. As for the orders, I have begun to contact our customers, explaining the circumstances and begging their pardon for the delay. I believe they will take pity on us.”

“They can get gin from John Putnam at a lesser cost,” Prue said.

“But of lesser quality, I'm told. And I believe people are larger than that.” He coughed into his handkerchief and pulled it away, smudged black. “But this is not the news of which I spoke. How much money was in the safe yesterday at closing?”

Tem shrugged her shoulders wearily.

“You were the last one out,” Prue told him. “You ought to have counted and locked it.”

He nodded, and the crease appeared between his brows. “Come with me a moment,” he said, and they started toward the countinghouse. He took the open stairs two at a time. As he turned his key in the lock, he said, “I have left all as I found it this morning.”

Even the countinghouse, whose windows had been closed, stank of the fire, and all the surfaces were dulled with a fine dusting of pale ash. The stove had not been lit, and the room felt chilly. Prue thought how strange the place seemed, without a pot of Isaiah's good coffee burbling in welcome. “I don't see anything,” Tem said.

Prue, however, did. The door to the safe was ajar, and she crouched down to peer inside. When she saw it empty, her heart flickered with anticipation, though her mind tried to quiet it. “You left the usual hundred dollars in last night?”

“Indeed,” Isaiah answered. “And I assume neither of you came down to empty it.”

Tem was shaking her head as if she'd be pleased to wash her hands of all of them.

Prue was doing her best to remain calm, but she felt she might explode. “It must have been Pearl. She had the key. She would not have taken our money only to jump in the river.”

“Exactly as I think,” Isaiah said, his face as bright as Prue believed her own must be.

“She may yet have fallen in,” Tem said.

“But we should send the riders back out at once,” Ben said. He looked too grubby and exhausted to do anything, but he said, “I'll run to
Joe Loosely's and see whom else I can find to go,” and set off down the stairs.

Tem went to pour herself a sup of gin. She first wiped the ash from the teacup with her cuff. “Don't look so pleased,” she said to Prue before taking her drink. “It's still only a chance.”

“A better one than finding her book in the river,” Prue said. The joy was still fizzing in her breast like champagne. If Pearl had tried to burn down everything Prue owned, she'd had her reasons, had not succeeded, and could yet be forgiven. If she'd taken the distillery's money, it must have been with the intention to escape, though Prue could not understand why her sister had not taken Will Severn with her, or even told him good-bye. No likeness of Pearl had ever been made, but she could easily be recognized by a stranger provided with her description. Prue thought she would be back among them soon enough. “She's fine, Tem,” she said, though she knew how little her sister would count this. “I know it.”

Tem offered Prue the empty cup. “You know it,” she repeated, her eyes watering.

“I do,” Prue said. She did not want a drink at all.

Isaiah began moving papers about the desk. “The other question,” he said, looking at his own hands, “is how to proceed until we receive funds from our insurers.” He found the paper he was looking for, moved it to the top, and blew on it to clear it of ash.

“We've the money from the mortgage,” Prue said. Tem glanced at her sidelong, and in her own defense she said, “We can use it for the manufactory until we are reimbursed.”

Tem poured herself a second dram. “It seems risky,” she said.

“Not so much in winter as it would be in spring,” Isaiah said. “Ben cannot recommence building before the thaw, and surely the money will come in by then.” Tem drank, and Isaiah went on, “We have rather a dire circumstance on our hands, Temmy. We need three new buildings, a press, three stills, and a few hundred thousand gallons of gin, all simply to be back where we were on Monday.”

“Then perhaps the bridge should wait,” Tem said.

Isaiah said, “No. My brother is deeply indebted to Albany. He cannot abandon it.”

Tem set her cup down and shook her head. “I can't think of anything, with Pearl missing,” she said. Prue understood, and suspected Isaiah did
also. “Perhaps I'll go help with the cleaning, or see if Mr. Jones can start replacing our lost casks.”

“That would be of great service,” Isaiah said.

“I do suppose it gives me hope, to know about the safe,” she said, and went glumly toward the stairs.

“Are you at all nervous?” Prue asked Isaiah, once her sister was gone. “Right now I wish your house were secure, and you not responsible for any of this.”

“I should be, either way,” he said. “I am tied to this distillery as surely as you, and likewise to the bridge.” He must have sensed her skepticism, for he said, “The chief matter is to find out if Pearl yet lives. Beyond that, I believe we can manage everything.”

Prue nodded to him and said, “I'll go help Temmy, then. I think it'll do us both good.”

As she walked down into the mill yard, she imagined how it would feel to find Ben galloping up the road, bearing news that Pearl had been discovered at Jamaica or Croton Point. Then she imagined their young postman bringing similar news in a day or two. Neither fantasy filled the hollowness in her belly, but each provided a measure of relief.

The grounds already appeared more orderly than when she'd arrived. If dusk was descending, she thought, it was probably good news; the day had gone on a long time already, and she would gladly start anew in the morning.

She had no basis nor history for the glimmer of optimism she felt at that moment, but there it was. She did not know if she could trust it, but she felt it rustling to resettle itself within her, exactly as would a baby. She would cherish it the same way, no matter how ill it had ever availed her to do so before.

And as if in sign she had chosen the right course, Mr. Harrison proved as good as his word. His news article the next morning gave the facts of the disaster, but did not deign to speculate about its causes. A separate item told of Pearl's disappearance, and made an earnest entreaty for her safe return.

Wednesday 19 June '22
The Countinghouse

No, Recompense, my beloved;—my sister never did return. No body nor any more of her possessions washed up at the Luquer Mill, nor was her slender form found by the fishermen downstream. We sent notice of her disappearance to every municipality from Albany to Philadelphia & Suffolk, and offer'd a reward for news of her whereabouts; but all those who came seeking it proved adventurers. So far as I knew, Pearl Winship had never gone farther than Fly Market under her own power, yet she had seduced a man of God, committed arson, and ventured out untraced into the world. I had clearly taken her measure incorrectly. If she had not changed overnight, then she had never been the woman I'd supposed her.

All my years, I'd lived in loathful fear of death. I had eaten my self with worry about how people lived on the Other Side; had kept on in my father's business because it was my debt to the departed; had dreamed up a fitting monument to soar over the water & memorialise my terrour of and curiosity about what might come. Yet to ken the suffering of grieving for the dead could not prepare me for the pain of not knowing if Pearl walked amongst them. At least, I thought, had she managed to burn down both bridge & distillery, I would have been ruined outright, had cause to despise her, & begun my life anew in some other locale. Had she died, your Aunt Tem & I would have laid her in
the churchyard, mourned her, & bid her adieu. Had she sent news from Boston that she never desired to see us more, we could likewise have said,
Fare thee well
.

But you see, we could do naught. I challenge any man who claims haunting by the dead to feel the chill of being haunted by uncertainty; & I will shew you a changed man. Her absence asserted it self by degrees, like each day's new dawn; but the moment I began to feel at leisure to wallow in my grief, the chair by the fire, in which she had so liked to sit, would suddenly have a hopeful air of prophecy about it, as if it awaited her return to its lap. Or if a morning came on which I felt a tingling sensation she might be nigh, by day's end I would have seen Mr. Severn,—who knew to the depths of his faith she was dead, and mourned her accordingly, his heart cracked open by pain. I some times thought he had far more knowledge than I, & must surely be correct; & I some times thought, how could he think otherwise? To have lost her to untimely death was tragick, but for him to imagine her purposing to leave him would have been intolerable misery.

I began to treat even Pearl's mottled cat as a potential sign. When, in the first few weeks of its solitude, it would cry for her, I believed its mistress must soon come home; and when, late in winter, it crawled beneath her chair and died, I suffered anew. I had never cared a jot for this critter, but I buried my face in its cold fur and wept for all we both had lost. I tied the small corpse in a pillow slip & buried it in the yard, all around which the crocus were just beginning to push up their shoots. I marked its sepulchre with the rosemary plant Abiah has ever since used to flavour chickens & potatoes, that should my sister ever return, she would be able to find her departed friend. No doubt its cat flesh has nourished you well, just as we have all feasted on British soldiers all the years we've enjoyed asparagus in summer time.