Brookland (77 page)

When at last she confessed to her husband the extent of her concerns, Jonas urged her to forget her mother's errors and remember instead how difficult it must have been to vouchsafe them to her daughter. He reminded her how precious a burden such confessions were to bear. Recompense knew her husband was correct, and did what she could, the remainder of the summer, to engage her mother warmly and not to dwell on the repercussions of her actions. If there was some art, some dishonesty, in her own letters, Recompense preferred this to the possibility of driving her mother off forever. She surprised herself, harboring such a preference.

In early October, Recompense was delivered of a healthy daughter, who did, indeed, have the strange sloe-black eyes. Jonas gave his consent for the child to be named Pearl Horsfield Sutler; but the infant seemed to have little in common with her namesake, and babbled the day long. In the spring of 1823, Prue left the distillery in Tem's care, and she and Ben traveled up the Hudson to meet their granddaughter. By then, Recompense had forgotten much of her righteous anger over her aunt's and her father's mistreatment; or if she had not forgotten, she did when she saw her mother's face light up in happiness upon first holding the baby girl.

Pearl Sutler died of malaria that summer, before learning to walk or talk. Though the disease had been rampant that season, both Recompense and Jonas were shocked numb by the blow, and Recompense could not even bring herself to inform her family of it until well after the funeral. When she did, she considered writing her mother how even she now kept her eyes open for Pearl Winship, a small older woman, her black hair streaked with gray; how whenever she saw a dark-haired woman her own age disembark from the ferry, she wondered if it might not be her lost cousin. Then she thought better of it, and simply sent her mother the news.

I wish to acknowledge the founder and the administrators of the Bard Fiction Prize for their generous financial support, and Ledig House International Writers' Colony and the Vermont Studio Center for time and space in which to write.

Many thanks are due to everyone at Farrar, Straus and Giroux for their fine work on
Brookland's
behalf, but I particularly wish to express my gratitude to my editor, John Glusman, his assistant, Corinna Barsan, and Jonathan Lippincott, who designed this book so beautifully. I also wish to thank my agent, Eric Simonoff.

I owe especial thanks to Kirsten Bakis, both for being my first reader and for bequeathing Jolly to me from her own novel. I thank Laura Harger, Marshall Curry, and Jack Robbins for their invaluable help in reading later drafts; Michael Bardin and Ken Levenson for their assistance with architecture and engineering; Aoibheann Sweeney, Adam Snyder, Lauren Harrison, Jon Austin, Jeff Dolven, Graham Burnett, Edmond Miller, Philip Gura, Joe Martin, Ben Strauss, Kevin Grau, Bibi Gaston, and Judith Berger for answering questions while I was fact-checking; and Cecile Barendsma for the Dutch swears.

And lastly, dear Chris—I realize I promised you a book about the Brooklyn Bridge, but I hope this will suffice.

Emily Barton
Brooklyn, NY
October 2005