The House of Hawthorne (10 page)

And then he is silent.

In my journals, did I say too much about Fernando? Was I overly effusive with regard to nature? Were my descriptions of slavery too harsh, or did I not say enough? Or is he shocked that I would allow him to read such an uncensored view of my thoughts? Does he think me too forward? Is he angry with me—or even Elizabeth—for introducing him to something that might make him blush the next time he sees us?

I take to bed with a headache that steals my vision and my will to paint. I am certain that he is appalled by what the journal contains.

But perhaps he will be intrigued, enthralled. How often has Nathaniel told us that he prefers to observe people and places from the shadows? He will surely derive great pleasure from peeking in the windows of my heart and soul undeterred.

At last, weeks later, he arrives.

I hear the lift in his voice. He wants me to know he is here, but I am stricken. I do not want to see him. I cannot face him
after knowing he has read my ecstasies over men, and plants, and all manner of exotic temptations. The man’s ancestors would have had me hanging at Gallows Hill after the very first letter!

I creep to my door and listen. Elizabeth’s voice is muffled. Mary is here, and offers to fetch me, followed by more unintelligible speech from Elizabeth. I hurry over to my hammock and in a moment Mary knocks and peeks around to look at me, grinning.

“There is someone here who is quite emotional about seeing you.”

I place my hand over my heart and whisper, “Mr. Hawthorne?”

Mary nods, glances over her shoulder, and then back at me.

“Elizabeth seems adamant that you are not well enough for visitors today,” she says. “But I thought I would check on you myself in case certain motives in our sister are at odds with the wishes of the two who so enjoy each other’s company.”

“You are a good woman,” I say, bursting with love for my sister, who seems not to judge my friendship with Mr. Hawthorne. Even though her Mr. Mann continues to mourn his wife, dead now for years, he is in Mary’s constant company, thus lifting her spirits.

My head is bursting with pain, and a small conviction flutters inside of me that Nathaniel has made me wait for these many days, so I must make him wait. I cannot go running down the stairs just because he has determined that today—after weeks without a word—is the day that suits him to come and see me. No. I will not receive him.

“As much as I long to see our mysterious visitor, Elizabeth is correct,” I say. “I am not in any condition to entertain guests, and will not likely be for the remainder of the day.”

“This is an interesting game,” says Mary, almost to herself. She glances over her shoulder and back at me again before grinning and giving me a wink. She leaves the door open and crosses the hallway to George’s room.

What is she up to?

While I wait to see the results of her scheming, I reach for my brush and begin to slide it through my freshly washed hair, which has dried in a soft wave. Pinning it up will only make my head hurt worse, so I stroke it over and over again, arranging it over my shoulders in rivers.

Then comes the sound of many heavy footsteps on the stairs, and the voice of Nathaniel himself over Mary’s and Elizabeth’s.

“Are you sure he would want to receive me?” says Nathaniel. “Please do not make him feel any obligation. I only want to pay my respects to the brother so adored by such discerning sisters.”

“He has assured me that he would enjoy meeting you,” says Mary.

My heart races, and I know I should close my door, but it is too late. Nathaniel Hawthorne stands not ten paces from my bed, and just before rounding the corner to meet George, he glances at me, lying on my hammock like a sensuous cat. He tries to look away, but he cannot, and I give him a small smile before Elizabeth’s face covers his with a scowl, and she slams my door.

E
lizabeth enters my room without knocking, wearing a frown and dressed for travel.

“I want my copy of ‘Endymion’ back,” she says.

“Must you go?” I ask.

“You should not have to ask me that.”

I feel a stab of guilt. Elizabeth is leaving for Boston to live with our brother Nat, and his wife and infant, to start a boys’ school. I believe, however, that it is this dance between the two of us and Nathaniel that has taxed her beyond bearing. She cannot endure it any longer.

“I am sorry you feel you must go,” I say, scooting from my hammock and crossing the room to retrieve Elizabeth’s book. I remove my poem from its pages and hand it to her. She snatches it and turns to leave.

“Elizabeth,” I say, my voice contrite.

How can I speak my apology out loud? For I am very sorry for her. I knew that Elizabeth cared for Nathaniel when I stepped into the parlor that day, but I also knew that she would never marry. Mother has ingrained this wish for us in our minds since we could understand language. Elizabeth has embraced this ideal for the freedom it allows her in occupation and relation, and she encourages me in the same way. How could I have known the harm of two sisters unfit for husbands befriending the same writer? I never could have anticipated the force that was activated the moment Nathaniel and I set eyes on each other. But it pains me to see that Elizabeth is hurt. She has only ever wanted what is best for me, and to be so divided from her now feels like a little death.

“I apologize that you leave so unsettled,” I say. “You are very dear to me.”

She stares at me for a moment, and then looks away. Dear Lord, there are tears in her eyes. Elizabeth never cries! I begin to feel my own eyes fill, and reach to embrace her. To my relief, she returns my gesture, and we tremble in each other’s arms, sniffling until we must pull away to attend to our damp faces with handkerchiefs.

“How ridiculous,” she says. “It is not as if I go across the ocean. I can be home for lunch any day I feel inclined.”

She places her handkerchief in her skirt pocket and again becomes serious. The rattling sound of George’s coughing reaches us, and she shakes her head.

“Life is short,” she says. “It would be a shame to ever waste opportunity or . . . love when it presents itself.”

Oh, I am crying again. Dear, dear Elizabeth has given me her blessing.

She smiles at me, straightens her posture, and departs.

Nathaniel left a note with Mary for me the day I would not come out of my room.

“To the queen of the journalizers: Pray accept this lowly serf so he may question Her Highness on the captivating insights of setting and character conjured at her fingertips, but only when it suits said queen in health and in temperament. Most Loyally, N. Hawthorne.”

I cannot stop my pleasure at his address, and I decide that I will see him the next time he arrives. I am greatly relieved that he wants to see me, and having Elizabeth’s blessing has loosened the last of my reserve in dealing with Nathaniel.

The opportunity to visit with him arrives a fortnight later. Nathaniel knocks, and I answer the door with a smile of the sweetest serenity on my face, and my hair and dress arranged almost as well as Josepha could have done. I am shocked that instead of the usual smile I am able to coerce from his dark face, Nathaniel is as stormy as a tempest. He walks into the parlor, where he commences pacing around the room with the
Cuba Journal
in his hand.

“Do you not find the inadequacy of words a tremendous frustration?” he says.

I do not know how to respond to this artist who curses the medium in which he works, so I place my hand on his arm and say, “What troubles you?”

He looks at me from inches away, and this time I do not flinch or pull back. There is a gradual change in his visage, a softening that lifts each of his downturned features like the light of sunrise. When the glimmer reaches his eyes, his entire countenance is open to me.

“Sophia, in your white clothes with your pale skin and diet of milk and bread, suspended in your hammock, you are like a dove, like the very doves about which you wrote. How do you calm me so?”

I look down at the floorboards, overwhelmed by his speech.

“There is nothing I like to do more than calm you,” I say.

He squeezes my hand that still rests on his arm, and leads me to the settee, where we sit. He places my book on his lap.

“I must ask you a very important question,” he says.

I meet his eyes again, nearly dizzy with anticipation.

“May I take your
Cuba Journal
with me when I leave next week?”

My smile evaporates. “Where will you go?”

“I will not speak of it,” he says, his face again darkening, as if a veil is placed over it.

I draw my hand from his arm.

“I have never let anyone have the
Cuba Journal
for so long,” I say. “What more could you want with it?”

“I need a friend on my solitary travels, and your voice whispers in my ear when I read your words.”

My heart softens, but I keep my exterior cool and narrow my eyes at him.

“Little Sophy,” he says with a cheeky grin. “You are a
changeling. One moment you are a sweet dove; the next you are a naughty woman. I never know which you will be, and I cannot say which one I like more.”

I stand and walk across the room to the fireplace, feeling my anger grow as he laughs behind me. When I turn to glare at him, he is contrite.

“I must be alone for a while,” he continues. “So much is confusion right now, and I need to clear my head. There are so many letters from so many of you. I do not trust myself with anyone.”

Is his concern for Elizabeth at the root of this leave-taking? I wish I could tell him that she no longer stands between us, but it is too soon—far too soon to speak such words aloud.

He looks at the
Cuba Journal
in his lap and runs his hand over the binding. Again I am covered in chills, and must turn away from him to regain my composure. I cannot stand the thought of being without him for an extended period of time, and the discovery horrifies me.

“I need to write and think without distraction,” he says. “But I also know this: I need to have you . . . near me.”

This is the first time he has admitted any kind of affection for me, and I wish I could feel nothing but bliss. Instead I am confused and angry and so many other unpleasant emotions. Is this love? If so, I know why the poets are so conflicted.

“Please, Sophia. You have no idea how your journal has fueled a writing fire in me, one that was in desperate need of kindling. I am on the edge of something.”

In his gaze, I feel our souls rise up to meet each other, and
allow that communion of thought and intention to fill the silence.

If I let him go without trouble, he will see my strength, and that will fuel his growing affection for me and deplete all other distractions. If my uncensored words are in his hands when he is alone, we will be more deeply bound to each other.

“Very well,” I say. “Take my little book that holds the essence of my soul with you. Just please come back to place it in my hands after a short time. I will be unsettled until we are reunited.”

And unsettled I am.

As soon as Nathaniel walks out of our home, I am overtaken by chills and my hands feel as if they have been submerged in melting snow. My entire body holds a clamminess that drives me to my room, where I stare out the window, down the path Nathaniel has walked so often. I am plagued by the idea that I will never again see him. He is nothing but a shadow in my mind, and I cannot even perfectly conjure his face in my delirium.

I am sure the beggar girl will appear to torment me, and I scan the young summer landscape, but do not see her anywhere. I see only the graveyard below my window, and I know in my heart that Nathaniel will be there before I am given a chance to tell him of my love. He is going to die on his mysterious trip!

It has been days since I have indulged in morphine. I have not had headaches, so I have tried to restrain myself, but now the physical need is back, gnawing from the inside out, demanding satisfaction.

“Mother!” I shout.

She arrives in seconds.

“What ails you, Sophichen?”

I clench my teeth and make my request. “I know I have not needed morphine for days, but I feel an ache coming on.”

“You know Father says you should try to suppress the ache.”

“I know, and I also know that we must wean ourselves from the need. Only one dose today, and I will be more functional. If I do not have it, I will be of no use to this household, and will only be able to shiver in my hammock.”

“You do not need to worry about being of use. You are an artist, Sophy. Your calling is different from that of your sisters or your brothers.”

“But I want to help. I want to sit with George at the very least, and if I am overcome like this, I cannot even offer him simple company.”

I clench my teeth again, praying she will grant my request.

A film of memory clouds Mother’s face. She is a nurturer. Any success this household has experienced has come about because she educated us, cultivated our talents, taught us girls to make lives apart from men. She does this—quite against the standards of the day—with the vehemence of a Puritan preacher. She sympathizes with the holy beauty of a preserved self, separate from others. Elizabeth subscribes to Mother’s teachings as if they are gospel, and for most of my life I did too. Until Cuba. Until now.

“Please, Mother. Just today. Tomorrow we will try something new.”

She finally nods, though her face is troubled, and when she returns with my coveted antidote, I snatch it from her fingers and drink it down before she has a chance to reconsider. The warm waves overtake me, bathing my head, then my shoulders, then my torso and legs in divine lethargy and peace.