The Cookbook Collector (33 page)

“I can’t,” she gasped into her radio.

“Your friend is here,” Leon said.

“What?” She could barely process this.

“Jess,” Leon warned. “You committed to a week. If you bail, someone has to take your place.”

“I have to come down.”

A long pause on the other end. “Come down then.”

But Jess could not take the climbing line in her two hands and make that descent. Fear swallowed her up. She tried to draw strength from the redwood. The storm was over; the winds were gone. She would sit and contemplate the ants, so small and strong and organized, always moving forward, up and over every obstacle. She would marvel at the secret gardens of moss and brambles and new trees in the redwood’s crown. She told herself all this, but the crack of falling timber echoed in her ears. “Please, please, please, come get me.”

When Leon appeared, climbing nimbly, balanced beautifully on his rope, he found Jess crouching with her head between her knees. He saw exactly how frightened she was, and he looked at her with a mixture of pity and anger. Jess had insisted she could handle climbing, pronounced herself cured, insisted on a full-week shift. Now she cowered like a cat up a tree, a total liability.

He examined her with his clear blue eyes, and looking up at him, she felt his distance. She felt, despairingly, that she had failed a test, and she hated herself for failing, but she hated him more for testing her at all.

“It’s not your fault,” he said. “I shouldn’t have encouraged you. You didn’t want to be here,” he murmured.

“I did,” she said.

“You just wanted to prove to me that you could last.”

“No, I wanted to prove it to myself,” she said.

“Really? That was …” His radio crackled. “It was wrong of me to let you.” He gestured for her to stand.

“Why?” She held fast to the boards of the platform.

“Because you weren’t prepared.”

He remembered a day, a soft, windless day when they’d lain together undressed under the trees. A single pine needle had drifted down. He’d watched it fall on her white skin. “Get up. Come on.” As he helped Jess to her feet, he pushed that memory away. “Your friend is waiting for you.”

“Oh, God.”

“He came up yesterday, lecturing everybody, demanding to see you.” The next words were almost taunting. “Now he’ll get his wish.”

That was the hardest moment. That was when she wanted most to stay up in Galadriel, but her body rebelled. Her heart raced. The crash of the tree limb resounded in her ears. She could not calm herself. She had to find her way down.

Miserable, she stood before Leon as he checked her ropes, her clips, her harness, and she knew what he thought of her. She knew what he suspected, and she saw that he wasn’t angry. This was worse than anger. He viewed her coolly, absolving her even as he disengaged from her.

He clipped the steel link of her harness to the secondary rope he’d rigged from the ground. “I’m coming down with you. I won’t let anything happen, but you have to listen. Do you understand?”

Her hands were stiff with fear, inflexible. She held the rope too tightly, and her palms began to bleed. She saw the blood but could not feel.

Her ascent to the platform had been giddy, joyful. Clear sky and celebration, a picnic under the trees the night before. Sweet cool air, a calming joint, smoke mingling with the fragrant forest, pine and mulch and bay laurel. Climbing had been an otherworldly magic-carpet ride. The descent was like rappelling into the circles of hell. She saw the Tree Savers standing in their green sweatshirts. Standing silent. Waiting for her. And then she saw George watching for her as well. George, who didn’t acknowledge Jess to his friends, had no problem materializing in front of hers.

“Jess!” he called, even before her feet touched the ground. “Are you all right?”

Leon slid down and unclipped his harness and then unclipped hers.

George rushed to her and Jess stepped back.

“What were you doing?” George berated her. “Do you have any idea what might have—”

“Please, please, please, shut up,” Jess said. She couldn’t bear to talk to him in front of everybody else.

But the others were busy. Leon was helping Daisy with her harness. The Tree Savers gathered around her as she started her ascent. “Free the tree,” the Tree Savers chanted joyfully, as Daisy lifted off to take Jess’s place. “Free the tree. Free the tree. Free the tree.”

The Tree Savers were focused on Daisy. Only George was watching Jess as she knelt on the ground, clutching herself, breathing hard.

“Are you hurt? Are you okay?” George tried to help her to her feet, but she shook him off and stood up on her own.

“Let me see your hands.”

“No! Go away.”

“You can push me away as much as you want,” he said. “It won’t make any difference.”

Jess looked up at Daisy, suspended in the gloaming, small as a silkworm hanging from a slender thread.

“Tell me you won’t go up there again,” George said.

“You’re embarrassing me!”

“I don’t care.”

“Of course not!” She started walking, taking the trail to the parking lot.

“Wait, Jess.”

She didn’t answer.

“Where are you going?”

“None of your business!” she called back.

“I was worried about you.” He jogged a little to keep up.

She spoke without looking at him. “You’ve got quite a double standard driving up here.”

In the dirt lot, she found the Honda that George had loaned her. Her hands shook, and George called after her, carrying on that she wasn’t safe to drive. She didn’t listen. Her ripped hands still shook, and the old car shuddered when she turned the key, but she never hesitated as she drove away.

26

H
er hands bled on the steering wheel as she wove from one lane to the next. She drove for miles, and her wet jeans felt like lead. There she’d been, guarding Galadriel, and what did she do? She gave up. No dimpled spider for her. No swinging birches. She drove on, and spots appeared before her eyes, tiny points of light, and visions of Daisy climbing, and George making a scene, crashing the Tree-Sit. What was he thinking? Why was everything about him? But most of all, she remembered Leon’s face. All their time together ending in his quick glance, his cold assessment, as commanders consider casualties. She was dead to him, and he wouldn’t leave Galadriel unguarded. How fast could he replace Jess once he got her to the ground?
Earth’s the place for love. Earth’s the place for love
. The words rushed like blood in her ears, even as she looked in the rearview mirror and saw George driving after her.
Earth’s the place
, she thought as she accelerated in her anger and her humiliation.

George followed in his Mercedes, keeping Jess in sight. She was right, of course, about the double standard. I wasn’t ready. We were too new. In a strange way he believed it. The collector in him believed it: His time with Jess was too new, too sweet to share. But that was selfish. That was unfair. She deserved more than that. She needed more, and he could give her more. He could do better—if she would let him.

But she drove for hours in the rattling old car, and all he could do was trail after her. When he lent Jess the Honda he had never intended her to drive so far. Certainly not at this speed. He thought she would tire and pull over, but she did not. She drove for an hour, two hours, almost three, until she seemed to calm herself, slowing down, keeping to one lane as she cut through ranch land and timbered mountains.

When at last Jess exited, George followed, assuming she needed gas, but she did not drive to a rest stop; she took a winding road lined with colossal trees to a place called Fern Hollow, where she parked in the dirt lot.

He waited, but she did not get out of her car. Cautiously he approached and saw her sitting, staring at the dark tree trunks ahead.

“Jessamine.”

She didn’t answer.

“Jess.” He tapped on the glass until she rolled down the window.

“What?”

“What are you doing to my poor old Accord?”

She didn’t answer.

George walked around to the passenger side and let himself in. He sat next to Jess and waited. He was sure that she would speak, but she did not. She kept staring straight ahead.

“Do you want me to apologize?” George asked at last. “I apologize.”

She didn’t answer.

“I was worried about you.”

She turned on him. “You embarrassed me!”

“You scared the hell out of me.”

“What are you? My father?”

“Why do you have to be Joan of Arc?”

“Why do you have to be such a cynic?”

“Why do you think that trees have rights?” He saw that she was about to interrupt, and didn’t let her. “Do you really think redwoods are sentient beings? If you believe that, then vegetables have rights, and you shouldn’t eat anything at all.”

“You don’t care what kind of Earth your children inherit.”

“I don’t have children.”

“Exactly. That’s your problem, among other things.”

“Which are?”

“That you prefer objects to people.”

“I do not …,” George protested.

“Oh, really? I think you do. I think you made all that money, and you had your great expectations, but you got hurt, and now you just hide behind your stuff, because you think your books and your maps and your typewriter collection will last. You think they’ll last forever and they’ll never leave you. So in your mind you think you’re Pip, but actually you’re Miss Havisham.”

“Miss Havisham?”

“With books instead of clothes.”

“You love the books,” he reminded her. “You’re working with the books.”

But she ignored this. “You don’t have anything left for trees or animals or the outside world, because you’ve shut yourself in. You’re a shut-in. You’re like the curator of your own heart.”

Wounded, but too proud to let it show, he spoke lightly. “I see why I resisted therapy all these years. I was waiting for you to explain me to myself. And now that you have, I can reach out to other species. Does Leon count?”

“Don’t talk about Leon.”

“Why not?”

“Because you don’t even know him.”

“Oh, I exchanged some words with him. I think I was getting to know him pretty well.”

“George, do you think this is some kind of joke?”

“That depends on what ‘this’ is.”

“Then you’re just being snide? You’re trying to offend me? What exactly are you trying to do?”

“Let me see.” He reached for her hands.

“It’s just rope burn,” she said. “I’ll clean them up myself.”

“Let’s get some water.”

She hesitated.

“Oh, come on, Jess.”

At last, she got out. She found the park restrooms, and then followed him to his car.

“Q.E.D.,” she said when he opened the trunk and she saw his duffel bag, a case of bottled water, a tent, a first-aid kit, a cooler full of food. “You’ve got all your stuff as usual.”

“Is that such a bad thing, under the circumstances?” George handed her a water bottle. “Drink.”

There were two other cars in the lot, but no hikers visible. They walked down to a picnic table under the trees, and she let him wash and bandage her hands. He knelt down and removed her soggy old climbing shoes and wet socks. With a clean towel he dried her feet, rubbing them up and down. That was when she began to cry.

“Jess,” he whispered. “Darling.”

“Darling?” She tried out the word through tears.

“I’m sorry I compared you to Joan of Arc.”

“I’m sorry I compared you to Miss Havisham.” She paused. “But actually …”

“Oh, you’re fond of that comparison, aren’t you?” George teased softly. “You think that was pretty good, and you don’t want to give it up. I know you.”

“Well …”

“Try these.” He slipped a pair of his clean socks on her feet, and then his extra pair of running shoes. The shoes were too big, but the socks were also too big, and they padded the shoes. When George laced them, they felt like ice skates. Experimentally, Jess walked this way and that, stretching, shaking out her cramped arms and legs. She gazed at the silent, forgiving redwoods.

“I’m going for a walk.” She slipped into the trees, and once again, George followed her.

The trail was well worn, soft and springy underfoot. Tiny creatures sifted through the leaves—glistening beetles, slick black slugs, quick-stepping centipedes.

“So this is the forest of Arden,” George said.

Jess breathed deep. The damp air smelled of cedar and of pine. It was so good to walk upon the ground.

The trail descended, turning gradually like a corkscrew, until they came upon the sheltered hollow for which the park was named. Ferns carpeted the ground, covering every open place between the trees in an undulating sea of green. A redwood lay there in ruins, a natural bridge across a lively stream.

“Watch out,” George warned as Jess climbed up. The tree was relatively slender, no more than ten feet in diameter, and George found the bark slippery as he climbed after her.

“Let’s walk across,” Jess said.

“You’re not used to those shoes.”

“Stop hovering.”

“I can’t,” he confessed. “I wish I could.”

“And stop saving me all the time. It’s hackneyed.”

“Hackneyed!”

“You’re just an overbearing, old-school, hegemonical …”

“Forgive me for caring whether you live or die. Forgive me for caring about you at all, because obviously that’s suspect.”

She faced him on the redwood bridge. “Why can’t you leave me alone?” she demanded. “Why is it so hard?”

“Because I’m falling in love with you, that’s why!”

Her breath caught. “Still falling? Even now?”

“Yes. Are you?”

She looked down at the rushing water. “When will it end?”

“When we’re together.”

“Didn’t we try that?”

“Not yet.”

“We don’t agree on anything,” Jess reminded him.

“No, you see, you always say that, but that’s where we differ. We agree on vegetables—asparagus, for example. We agree on wine. I’m prepared to agree with you about the redwoods.”

“You don’t understand why they’re important.”

“Probably not. But it’s wonderful to touch something living that’s so old, and to feel …”

“To feel what?”

He looked at her exhausted face. “That life is long.”

“It’s not long for everyone.”

“Don’t be sad,” George murmured. “You’re so young.”

“Oh, I’m tired of being young. Being young gets old.”

“Be old with me, then,” George told her. “Stay with me. Come home with me. Share my books with me. Cook with me. Marry me.”

“You’d let me cook with you?”

He pulled her closer. “That’s just like you to evade the question.”

“How was that a question?” she challenged lightly. “I’m the only one who asked a question.”

“It would be your kitchen too.”

“What about your friends?”

“I was wrong before. I didn’t know…. Forgive me.”

“I thought you’d rather be alone.”

“No,” he said. “I’d rather be alone if not for you. Please, Jess.”

“Please?”

“I’ll teach you how to cut onions properly.”

“Oh, in that case …,” Jess said.

“And devote my life to you.”

Jess shook her head. “Don’t.”

“Let me.”

“We have to be equal, or it doesn’t work.”

“Then we’ll be equal. We’ll share everything.”

“And what if I say I don’t want everything, I’d rather give all your stuff away?”

He hesitated and then he said, “We’d fight.”

“Yes.”

“Yes, we’d fight? Or yes, you’ll marry me?”

“What do you think?”

“I know we’d fight. We do fight,” George said. “But not so often.”

“Give us time.”

“That’s the thing,” he said. “We need more time.”

“We’ve had time.”

He looked away. “More time together. Not more time waiting.”

“How long were you waiting?” she asked gently. “Ten days?”

“Forty-one years.”

“You kept busy,” she reminded him. “You were out there getting rich and learning to cook and breaking hearts. You fell in love lots of times before me.”

Her hair was curlier under the damp trees. He pulled a lock to watch it spring back. “It wasn’t lots of times—just for the record.”

“Just once or twice?”

“Don’t hold it against me that I didn’t meet you before.”

“I don’t,” Jess protested. “Not exactly.”

“At least I didn’t make you watch.” He was thinking of Noah and Leon.

“I never made you do anything,” Jess said.

“You made me love you.”

“Not on purpose.”

“That’s how you did it. Not on purpose. You just walked in. You filled out the questionnaire, and you said I was the kind of guy who reads
Tristram Shandy
over and over again.”

“You were lonely,” she pointed out.

George sat on the log, and helped her down as well. “You’re missing the point.”

“How many times
have
you read
Tristram Shandy?”
Jess asked him.

“Marry me.”

“Five times? Six times?”

“Eleven,” George said. “Marry me.”

She didn’t answer.

“Please. Jess. Don’t be upset. Listen to me. The things I have, the money I made, the house, the collections, the cookbooks, they’re all proxies. The life I’ve led has been”—he struggled for the word—“acquisitive. I was always chasing quartos, folios, maps….”

“I’m not a quarto or a folio.”

“Exactly.”

“Maybe a map.”

“You know what I mean. You’re the one I gave up looking for. I’d live for you and live with you. Say yes. Will you?”

The afternoon was fading. A cool breeze riffled through the ferns below.

“Yes,” she whispered.

“Really?” He clasped her hands in his.

“Ow!”

“Sorry!” He kissed her fingertips. “Jess—”

She interrupted. “You made up eleven, didn’t you? You just picked any number.”

“Ah, you caught me,” George said.

Then Jess said, “I love you too.”

It was dark when they approached the ranger’s cabin near the parking lot, and left fifteen dollars for a permit to spend the night.

Jess went to the campground restrooms, and she showered, and washed and combed her hair. Since she didn’t have dry clothes, she wore George’s sweats, his T-shirt, his black fleece. They carried the cooler and the tent down to the campsite, a dark hollow, a solemn, mystic place, a conference of redwoods called the Philosophers’ Grove.

“Socrates, Plato, Aristotle,” George named the three tallest trees.

“No, Descartes, Leibniz, Spinoza,” Jess said dreamily. “And that one there …” She pointed to a deformed, double-trunked pine. “That’s Hegel.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s convoluted and full of obfuscations and …”

“Eat,” George said. And he served her apples that he’d brought from home, and figs, and even some comté cheese, which she devoured despite her vegan prohibitions because she was so hungry.

He cleared sticks and branches to pitch his tent with its arching supports. He took a rock and hammered the tent stakes into the ground. When he was done, he spread a fly sheet for rain. He smoothed his open sleeping bag and then a heavy blanket on the nylon floor.

“Come in.”

She bent down to enter, and he followed.

“Is it true that they spin fleece from soda bottles?” she asked, as he unzipped her.

“I think so.”

“That’s alchemy then.”

“Are you warm enough?” He pulled off her T-shirt.

“That’s a funny thing to ask when you’re undressing me.”

“Are you warmer now?”

“Maybe,” she said. “Yes.”

They didn’t know under the trees what day it was, or how the market closed, or how the sun rose bright on the East Coast where Jess’s father woke early, to run and glower at the McMansion abutting his property. They didn’t know it was September 11, but no one else did either.