Serena (13 page)

T
HE MEETING WITH THE PARK DELEGATION WAS
set for eleven on Monday morning, but by ten o’clock Pemberton, Buchanan and Wilkie had already gathered in the office’s back room, smoking cigars and discussing the payroll. Harris also sat at the table, reading the morning’s
Asheville Citizen
with visible ire. Campbell stood in the corner until Pemberton checked his watch and nodded it was time to get Serena.

“They’re early,” Buchanan said minutes later when the office door opened, but it was Doctor Cheney and Reverend Bolick instead. They came into the back room, and Cheney settled into the closest chair. Bolick held his black preacher’s hat in his hand, but he sat down without being asked and placed his hat on the table. Pemberton couldn’t help but admire the man’s brazenness.

“Reverend Bolick wishes to have a word with you,” Doctor Cheney said. “I told him we were busy but he was insistent.”

The morning was warm and the preacher dabbed his forehead and right temple with a cotton handkerchief, not touching the left side of his face where the skin was withered and grainy, thinner seeming, as if once shaved with a planer. Caused by a house fire during his childhood, Pemberton had heard. Bolick placed the handkerchief in his coat pocket and set his clasped hands before him.

“As you have guests arriving soon, I’ll be brief,” Reverend Bolick said, addressing them all but looking specifically at Wilkie. “It’s about the pay raise we’ve discussed. Even half a dollar more a week would make a huge difference, especially for the workers with families.”

“Have you not seen all those men on the commissary steps?” Wilkie said, his voice quickly shifting from annoyance to anger. “Be grateful your congregation has work when so many don’t. Save your proselytizing for your congregation, Reverend, and remember you serve here at our indulgence.”

Bolick glared at Wilkie. The fire-scarred side of the preacher’s face appeared to glow with some lingering of that long-ago violence.

“I serve only at God’s indulgence,” he said, reaching for his hat.

Pemberton had been looking out the window and now he spoke.

“Here comes my wife,” he said, and the others turned and looked out the window as well.

Serena paused at the ridge crest before her descent. Lingering fog laid a thick mist on the ground and the ridge, but the morning’s brightness broke full on the summit. Threads of sunlight appeared to have woven themselves into Serena’s cropped hair, giving it the appearance of shone brass. She sat upright on the gelding, the eagle perched on the leather gauntlet as if grafted to her arm. As Bolick pushed back his chair to rise, Wilkie turned his gaze from the window and met Bolick’s eyes.

“There’s a true manifestation of the godly,” Wilkie said admiringly. “Such an image gave the Greeks and Romans their deities. Gaze upon her, Reverend. She’ll never be crucified by the rabble.”

For a few moments no one spoke. They watched Serena descend into the swirling fog and vanish.

“I’ll listen to no more of this blasphemy,” Bolick said.

The preacher put on his hat and quickly walked out of the room. Doctor Cheney remained seated until Pemberton told him his services were no longer needed.

“Of course,” Cheney said dryly as he got up to leave. “I forgot my input is needed only in matters of life and death.”

Pemberton went to the bar and brought a bottle of cognac to the table, went back and got the crystal tumblers. Buchanan looked at the bottle and frowned.

“What?” Pemberton asked.

“The liquor. It could be perceived as a provocation.”

Harris looked up from his newspaper.

“I was under the impression we were meeting the Secretary of the Interior, not Eliot Ness.”

T
HE
park delegation was twenty minutes late, by which time Wilkie had gone to the commissary for a bromide. Everyone shook hands, the visitors unsurprised when Serena offered hers. Pemberton surmised they’d been told she was not a woman of deference, and that it might help their cause to acknowledge as much. Except for Kephart, who was dressed in a clean flannel shirt and dark wool pants, the visitors wore dark suits and ties, lending the meeting a formal air despite the room’s rusticity. Albright and Pemberton sat at opposing ends of the table. Davis, Rockefeller’s lawyer, seated himself to the right of Albright, Kephart and Webb near the table’s center. Cuban cigars and cognac were passed around. Several of the late arrivals took a cigar, but all in the visiting contingent politely declined the alcohol except Kephart, who filled his tumbler. Gunmetal-blue streams of cigar smoke soon rose, raveled into a diaphanous cloud above the table’s center.

Harris folded the newspaper and laid it on the table.

“I see you’ve folded the paper to my most recent editorial, Mr. Harris,” Webb said.

“Yes, and as soon as my constitution allows, I plan to wipe my ass with it.”

Webb smiled. “I plan to write enough articles on this park to keep you well supplied, Mr. Harris. And I won’t be alone. Secretary Albright informs me a
New York Times
reporter will arrive this weekend to write about what land has already been purchased, as well as complete a profile on Kephart’s role in the park’s creation.”

“Perhaps the article will discuss Mr. Kephart’s desertion of his family,” Serena said, turning to Kephart. “How many children were left in Saint Louis for your wife to raise alone, was it four or five?”

“This is not really relevant,” Albright said, looking at the table as if for a gavel.

“It’s very relevant,” Serena said. “My experience has been that altruism is invariably a means to conceal one’s personal failures.”

“Whatever my personal failings, I’m not doing this for myself,” Kephart said to Serena. “I’m doing it for the future.”

“What future? Where is it?” Serena said sarcastically, looking around the room. “All I see is the here and now.”

“With all respect, Mrs. Pemberton,” Albright said. “We are here to discuss a reality, the creation of a national park, not engage in sophistry.”

“The sophistry is on your side,” Harris said. “Even with the land you’ve bought, this park is still nothing more than a fairy dream on a goat hill.”

“Rockefeller’s five million dollars is real enough,” Webb countered. “This country’s eminent domain law is real enough also.”

“So the threats begin,” Harris said.

The door opened and Wilkie entered. He apologized profusely to all though Pemberton noted the old man’s eyes were on Secretary Albright as he spoke. Albright stood and offered his hand.

“No need to apologize, Mr. Wilkie,” Albright said as they shook. “It’s
good to finally meet you in person. Henry Stimson speaks highly of you as both a businessman and a gentleman.”

“That’s kind of him to say,” Wilkie replied. “Henry and I go back many years, all the way to Princeton.”

“I’m a Princeton man myself, Mr. Wilkie,” Davis said, offering his hand as well.

Pemberton spoke before Wilkie could respond.

“We are very busy, gentlemen, so please tell us about your proposition.”

“Very well, then,” Albright said, as Wilkie took his seat. “The initial price we offered Boston Lumber Company for its 34,000 acres was, I admit, too low, and with the generous help of Mr. Rockefeller we can make a far more substantial offer.”

“How much?” Pemberton asked.

“Six hundred and eighty thousand.”

“Our price is eight hundred thousand,” Pemberton said.

“But the land has been appraised at six hundred and eighty thousand,” Davis objected. “This country is in a potentially long-term depression. In this market our offer’s more than fair.”

“What about my eighteen thousand acres?” Harris asked.

“Thirty-six thousand, Mr. Harris,” Davis said. “That’s two dollars an acre, and, as with Boston Lumber, a substantial increase on our initial offer.”

“Not nearly good enough,” Harris replied.

“But think how much you already have profited here,” Webb said with exasperation. “Can’t you give something back to the people of this region?”

Serena raised her index finger to her chin, held it there a moment as if bemused.

“Why is this pretense necessary, gentlemen?” she said. “We know what’s going on with these land grabs. You’ve already run two thousand farmers off their land, that’s according to your own census. We can’t
make people work for us and we can’t buy their land unless they want to sell it, yet you force them from their livelihood and their homes.”

Davis was about to speak but Albright raised his hand. The Secretary’s visage achieved a profound solemnity Pemberton suspected was an innate talent of undertakers as well as career diplomats.

“An unfortunate aspect of what has to be done,” Albright said. “But like Mr. Webb, I believe it’s ultimately for the common good of all people in these mountains.”

“And therefore all should sacrifice equally, correct?” Serena said.

“Certainly,” Albright agreed, and as he did so Davis grimaced.

Serena took a sheaf of papers from her pocket and placed them on the table.

“This is part of the bill passed by the Tennessee legislature. In it are provisions stating that a number of wealthy landowners will be exempt from eminent domain. They get to keep their land, even though it’s inside your proposed park. Perhaps your
New York Times
reporter can do an article about that.”

“We had to have their support at that time,” Davis replied. “If we hadn’t, the park would have been doomed from the start. That was 1927, not today.”

“We expect nothing more than to be treated like other wealthy landowners,” Serena said.

“That just can’t be done now,” Davis said, shaking his head.

“Can’t or won’t?” Harris jeered.

“We’ll get this land either way,” Davis said, his voice now strident, “and if it’s by eminent domain you’ll be lucky to get half what we’re offering now.”

Albright gave a deep sigh and leaned back.

“No final answer is needed today,” he said, looking at Buchanan and Wilkie, who’d been silent during the exchange. “Discuss it among yourselves. And consider the fact that Mr. Rockefeller is a businessman like all of you, yet he has given five million dollars. Think about how little in comparison we’re asking of Boston Lumber Company.”

Buchanan nodded. “We’ll certainly discuss the matter.”

“Yes,” Wilkie said. “We appreciate your coming all this way to talk to us personally.”

“My pleasure,” Albright said and raised his hands, palms open in a gesture of mollification. “As I said, nothing need be decided today. We’ll be in Tennessee this weekend but back in Asheville Monday. We’re beginning negotiations with your fellow timberman, Colonel Townsend. His Elkmont tract has more virgin hardwoods than any land in the Smokies, yet we’re offering you the same price per acre as him.”

“He’s taking your offer seriously?” Serena said.

“Very much so,” Davis said. “He’s smart enough to know a small profit is better than a big loss.”

Secretary Albright stood and the rest of the delegation rose as well. Wilkie and Buchanan accompanied them as they walked back to the train.

“A total waste of time,” Harris complained on the office porch.

“I disagree, Mr. Harris,” Serena said. “We may have learned about a tract we can invest in together.”

“Ah,” the older man said, his smile broadening enough to show glints of gold. “That would be something, wouldn’t it? Buying Townsend’s land out from under them would really throw a monkey wrench in this park business.”

Harris paused and watched as the train pulled out and headed back to Waynesville. He took out his car keys, jangled them loosely in his palm before enclosing them in his fist, mimicking a throw of the dice.

“Let’s get it in touch with Townsend. They’ve mined copper on that tract. I don’t know how much, but I can find out. This could be a boon for both of us, virgin hardwoods for you and copper for me.”

Harris walked out to his Studebaker and drove off. As Pemberton and Serena walked toward the stable, Pemberton saw Buchanan and Wilkie lingered beside the tracks though the train had disappeared over McClure Ridge.

“I believe Buchanan’s wavering.”

“No, he’s not wavering” Serena said. “He’s already decided.”

“How do you know?”

“His eyes. He wouldn’t look our way, not once.” Serena smiled. “You men notice so little, Pemberton. Physical strength is your gender’s sole advantage.”

Pemberton and Serena stepped inside the stable, pausing a moment to let their eyes adjust. The Arabian stamped his foot impatiently at Serena’s approach. She unlatched the wooden door and led the gelding out.

“Wilkie wasn’t as resolute as he usually is either,” Pemberton said.

“Hardly,” Serena said. “They stroked him like a housecat and he purred.”

She paused and lifted the saddle, placed it below the horse’s withers.

“So if Buchanan sides against us,” Pemberton said, “you believe Wilkie could be swayed as well?”

“Yes.”

“So what should we do?”

Serena led the Arabian to the mounting block and handed the reins to Pemberton.

“We’ll rid ourselves of Buchanan.”

She strapped the gauntlet on her right forearm and opened the adjacent stall where the eagle waited quiet and unmoving as a soldier at attention. It’s a Berkute, Serena had told Pemberton the week after the creature arrived, much like the golden eagles she and her father hunted with in Colorado, only bigger and stronger, more fierce. The Kazakhs hunted wolves with them, and Serena had claimed Berkutes attacked even snow leopards given the opportunity. Looking at the eagle’s huge talons and muscled keel, Pemberton believed it possible.

Serena emerged from the stall, the bird on her arm. She stepped onto the mounting block, then slipped her left foot in the stirrup and swung onto the saddle. Serena’s legs and hips clinched the horses saddled midsection as she balanced herself. It was a deft maneuver, equal parts strength and agility. The eagle raised its wings a moment, resettled them as if also balancing itself.

“Are you still hunting with Harris Sunday?” Serena asked.

“Yes.”