Coffins (10 page)

Whatever Jebediah's opinion on the subject, he kept it to himself. Indeed, a strange and uncharacteristic silence had descended upon my friend, and he scarcely spoke until the tiny casket was below ground and covered with frozen earth.

“Ashes to ashes,” he muttered as we walked away from the snow-dusted cemetery, his cane skidding on the cobblestones. “They might as well have added, ice to ice,” was all he had to say on the subject.

On reflection, Dr. Griswold had changed his mind about the necessity of the inquest. Perhaps because even many hours after the event the small corpse remained inexplicably frozen, despite the warmth of the examination room, and with no explanation in hand he despaired of making a reasonable and defensible conclusion as to the cause of death.

“He still vows not to set foot in the house, ever again,” Jebediah complained to me the day after the burial, as he began to emerge from his cocoon of silence. “As if it is the house itself, and not the inhabitants, that has offended him.”

Clearly my friend expected a response, although I was as yet unclear as to what he craved, agreement or argument. My reaction was in no way irreverent, for the Jebediah I knew thrived on argument, preferring it to what he called the “pap” of polite consensus. Still, he was in some way diminished by recent events, and the last thing I wanted to do was add to his distress by speaking insensitively on the subject. “The man took an oath,” I reminded him. “I feel certain that despite what Griswold says, if summoned he will respond.”

Jeb turned to me with his darkest look. “The weasel has one thing right. He'll never set foot in this house again, so long as I live. There's another sawbones in the village—he'll be glad enough for our business.”

“Quite right,” I said. And then gathered up my courage and prepared to raise a related subject, one that had been preying on my mind. “As to the house. Griswold may be, as you say, more weasel than man. But I don't think he's entirely wrong about the effect of the house itself.”

“Oh?”

“It is well known that a place may become infected with gloom. Have you not noticed this, Jeb? How a certain room or landscape may affect your mood, for good or for ill?”

“What are you saying?” he responded suspiciously.

I decided to abandon my carefully measured arguments and simply tell him the truth. “This is my prescription: take leave of this house for the time being, at least for the long, melancholy months of winter. Come back to Boston with me. I know a house on Beacon Street that can be had quite reasonable. A cheerful, sunny place, with no taint of bad memories. Surely a change of scene will lift your spirits. And you've friends and associates in the city—they'd be delighted to have you back, right in the thick of the action. Why there's hardly a week goes by without a rally!”

Jeb's expression was cool enough to chill. “And what of my brothers? Lucy? My father?”

“By all means, bring them along! Plenty of room for everybody! A change of scene, Jeb, sometimes that's the best thing in the world.”

My old friend stared at me for a long time, as if taking my measure, and then shook his head. “The Captain won't leave. Even if he was entirely himself he'd never abandon ship. We Coffins are born in these parts, and we die here. We travel the world but always return. We're of this place, Davis, and we can't be shut of it, or it of us.” After a deep sigh he continued. “I do, however, understand that you yourself are anxious to leave. You may go without prejudice. I've imposed on you long enough. We all have. And you've done us good service. I shall always be grateful.”

His speech stunned me into silence, to think that my intentions had been so completely misunderstood. When I finally found my tongue I attempted to make it clear that my misgivings about the house had nothing whatsoever to do with any desire to abandon my friend in his hour of need.

“I meant only what I said and nothing more,” I said with a kind of furious urgency to be understood. “It is my belief that the atmosphere of this place, and memories associated with it, may contribute to your father's illness. I believe that you, too, have been affected. But if you disagree, if you choose to remain, so shall I. Assuming that you want me to remain, that is.”

I saw that my small friend was weeping again, and that he was unashamed as the tears ran down his face. “My dear Davis,” he said thickly. “I don't know what I should do without you. You are the rock we've clung to, these last few days. These last few terrible days. It was wrong for me to take offense at your kind suggestion. Please forgive me.”

Although I was greatly touched by my friend's apology, I made a dismissive motion, saying, “There's nothing to forgive,” and then went on in as light a tone as possible, to demonstrate my willingness to remain, and assist him to the best of my abilities. “What must be done? Shall we summon this other sawbones, and have him attend to Sarah? She may require a sleeping powder, or some other concoction for her nerves. Or, if you wish, I shall see to her, as best I can.” I went on, until at last the light returned to Jebediah's eyes, and he looked about him like a man under siege, but no longer defeated.

That very afternoon a telegram was delivered, containing the welcome news that another of Jebediah's brothers, Thomas Coffin, had at last arrived in New York Harbor aboard the clipper
Rapunzel
, and was returning to Portland immediately by train. I was made to understand that
Rapunzel
was owned by a consortium of investors, of whom the Coffins were the majority holders, and that the voyage to the Orient had been spectacularly successful, her sleek hull fully laden with premium teas, exotic herbs and medical ointments, and bales of silk and cotton from India.

Alas, poor Tom hadn't even a pause to celebrate his success before the shipping agents informed him of the events at home, casting a shadow over his last few weeks at sea, when he had sailed on unaware of the recent tragedies.

The last leg of his homeward journey was, like mine, aboard the swift
Raven
, and this time Jebediah and cousin Lucy and I were waiting at the wharf when the schooner sliced into the placid little harbor under full sail. It was a cold, clear day, and the horizon seemed to be half a world away. Squint and you could almost see the towers of Toledo, or China's great wall.
Raven
leaped toward us as if from a great distance, sails an incandescent white against the glittering black waters. Once again all I could do was marvel at the masterful handling as one-eyed Black Jack and his crew made
Raven
turn and dash about like a thoroughbred in the able hands of an experienced rider.

Lucy, of course, continued to wear full mourning attire out of respect for her departed cousins, and her black dress that morning included a full-length hooded cape and a dark veil. Her mood, previously irreverent and infectious despite the tragedy of Sam'n'Zeke's demise, had been unrelievedly somber since the baby's passing. She had, she confided, not seen her cousin Tom since she was thirteen and he already a ship's master. “You can scarcely comprehend the impression of a handsome young captain on a girl of that delicate age. I nearly swooned when he deigned to kiss my hand! Of course he was only joking, but how was I to know at the time? I remember running to my mother, God rest her soul, and demanding to know if Tom was a ‘kissing cousin.'”

“And what did your mother say?” I asked, eyes on the approaching launch.

“Such a look! ‘There will be none of that in
this
family,' or words to that effect. My mother was sister to his mother, never forget. No Wattle could marry a Coffin. First cousins might marry in the hills of Tennessee, but not here. Whereupon I suggested we all move to Tennessee.”

“You were willful even then.”

Her expression was unreadable behind the dark veil. “You disapprove of willful girls?”

“Not. in the least,” I said. “Or willful women, for that matter.”

When the man in question stepped onto the wharf, his expression seemed equal parts joy and grief. The first thing he did was drop to his knees and rest his head on Jebediah's shoulder. This was, I thought, an extraordinary gesture. From what I'd witnessed, the Coffins were not a family given to open displays of affection. For instance, I'd seen Jeb greet Nathaniel with nothing more than a brief, cool handshake. And when the moment came, that was exactly how Tom greeted Lucy, though she was clearly poised to receive his full embrace, having thrown back her hood and lifted her veil.

Perhaps sensing her disappointment, he attempted to make amends by praising her.

“Lucy! My word, you've turned into a ravishing beauty. Breaking hearts from Boston to Bar Harbor, I reckon. And how is your dear father?”

“Dead six months,” said Lucy with a dip of her head.

Tom, having been so long at sea, had not heard of her father's passing, and apologized for his ignorance. “We mariners can't help but sail out of the past, for even with the telegraph, very little reaches us at sea. I am only now catching up, and part of me wishes I had never docked, but sailed on unaware.”

Lucy was instantly solicitous of his feelings. “Forgive me, Tom. My dear old father's passing was in some ways a blessed thing, an end to a long, painful illness, although it has left me alone in the world, and nearly penniless, and reliant upon my dear and generous cousins. Whereas, poor Sam'n'Zeke—it must have been a terrible shock to hear what happened.”

“I still can't believe they're gone,” he admitted, with a nervous stroke of his thick brown mustache. Unlike most of his brothers, he kept his chin clean-shaven and his face went pink with a blush not of shame, I fancied, but of grief.

As was revealed on the way home—his sailing trunk and a matched pair of large canvas bags stowed in the carriage—he'd also not been aware of baby Casey's existence, for that happy event occurred some months after his departure for New York, and thence to the Orient. “What a cruel thing!” he exclaimed. “So many children die at that age, I wonder how parents can stand it. Poor Sarah and Nate have endured a hard blow. Are they as well as can be expected?”

Jebediah cut me a look that said
he knows nothing of the circumstances, let him remain ignorant for now
, and I readily complied, while Lucy kindly distracted him from the unhappy subject by chatting brightly and ironically about her “season” in Portland. The bustling city was a mere village compared to Boston, but still there was a kind of social register, and Lucy had been presented in the proper fashion a few months before her father had lapsed into his final illness, and when, unbeknownst to her, he had spent the last of his fortune “bringing her out.” At some length she described the gala affair, the elaborate ball gown she had worn, the problem with the punch that made lips pucker, and the orchestra that featured, of all things, an Irish fiddler, considered scandalous by the more conservative guests—although not, obviously, by Lucy herself.

“And how many suitors did you spurn?” Tom wanted to know, more out of kindness, I think, than any real curiosity. He was making an effort to be cordial, although clearly his mind dwelled on more somber events than a debutante ball.

“All of them,” Lucy replied primly. “They were not suitors so much as codfish men and lobster boys. I decided then and there that I shall be a spinster and haunt a house in my old age.”

That wrung a grin from Tom, and for a moment put a sparkle in his fine sea-green eyes. For the briefest moment a hint of his youth shone through, and then, just like that, he was a man of nearly forty years, creased and shaped by the life he'd lived.

As the carriage approached the great house upon the hill, with its austere tower glinting in the sunlight, the attempts at conversation floundered, and we drew up to the portico as silent as the mourners who follow a funeral cortege. Tom climbed down with a sigh that made me wonder how much he knew, or guessed, of what awaited him. He turned to offer Lucy his hand, but she was already down, and heading resolutely to the open door where Barky, smelling of freshly baked bread, waited to greet us.

“Master Tom,” he squeaked. “Home at last.”

9. Links in the Chain

The invisible baby began to cry shortly after midnight, but by then the evening was long ruined.

Earlier there had been a brief respite from the gloom. Despite everything, the Coffins rose to the occasion of Tom's homecoming, and made him feel welcome. Even Sarah, who had taken to her bed, emerged for long enough to attend an intimate gathering held in his honor. It was Benjamin who presided over the candlelit dinner, summoning various succulent dishes from Barky's kitchen, and then, after the cake was served, he urged the retelling of amusing anecdotes touching upon Tom's childhood.

“Jebediah, tell the time you put the toad under Tom's pillow,” elicited a tale that brought tears to my eyes, for the oft-told story was in equal parts hilarious and affectionate.

As Jeb launched into his recitation, I formed a picture of a much-younger brother desperately trying to attract the attention of a full-grown man who was something of a hero to the boy. More telling, the offending toad was a kind of metaphor for how young Jebediah saw himself at the time: ugly and stunted. Tom evidently understood this, and lavished such affection upon the “noble toad,” and in so doing upon Jeb himself, that it somehow helped the boy make the difficult transition to manhood. Of course my friend made the point without so baldly stating it, and with great warmth, but the impression to a stranger like me was indelible. The Coffins were all links in the same chain, forged together by blood and circumstance, and nothing, not even death, could diminish the strength they took from each other. Having been raised an only child by elderly, if kindly spinster aunts, I could not but be impressed, and more than a little envious of such intimate connections.