Barkskins

by Annie Proulx

  She sat silent for a long minute, then said smoothly, “I think you need not disturb the Canadian situation. We will consider the investigation closed.” She glanced at Annag, wishing she had not been present, and saw that the woman was frowning hotly at R. R. Tetrazinni. Good loyal Annag, thought Lavinia. She will keep her silence.

  As soon as Tetrazinni left Lavinia tossed the report into the wastebin.

  “I’ll just put this into the stove,” said Annag, carrying the bin into the front office, where she rattled the stove door but carefully placed Tetrazinni’s report at the back of the supplies closet under her rain cape.

  • • •

  The Hotel Great Lakes owner, Simon Drimmel, fair-haired and handsome, was excited by his filled-up hotel and apprehensive about possible scratches on the ballroom floor. When several large crates labeled PRAIRIE HOMES arrived and Drimmel heard of the contents he ordered them unloaded on the south lawn.

  “I can’t have construction in the ballroom,” he said. “It would scar the floor. It is essential we keep the floor in flawless condition fit for satin-soled slippers. Balls are our principal income.”

  “For all you know annual exhibits during the season when there are no balls may become a lucrative source of income,” said Mr. Pye, who was managing the exhibition.

  “Ah, perhaps.” Drimmel smiled, hoping it was not to be. He very much liked the music, the perfume, excitement and beauty of the balls, the pretty gowns and shining ruddy faces.

  “Quite all right,” soothed Mr. Pye. “That particular exhibit belongs outside in any case.”

  At the end of the day, when everyone was drooping with fatigue, Lawyer Flense offered to drive Annag home “as it is on my way.”

  “Very kind, sir,” murmured Annag, gathering her bags and traps.

  • • •

  Goosey Breeley, who usually dined with Lavinia, even when there was company, said, when she heard Dieter Breitsprecher was coming to dinner, that she would take her dinner in her room.

  “That is hardly necessary, Goosey. Dine with us. It is no trouble. I had to invite him as a courtesy.”

  “No, I understand very well how such affairs work, dear Lavinia. You may wish to discuss business. It is my choice to dine in privacy. I rarely have a quiet repast free of responsibilities, so it will be a treat.” Lavinia thought she was right. It would be easier with Dieter if she did not have to include Goosey in the conversation.

  • • •

  “Mr. Dieter Bridestretcher,” said Libby the housemaid.

  “Show him in.” Lavinia, dressed in her customary black dress, sat on a crimson velvet sofa before the drawing room fire and steeled herself for the encounter. Rarely at a loss for words, she had no idea how to put the partnership offer. She should have written a letter.

  “Dieter Breitsprecher, welcome. It has been a long time.” She had not remembered he was so broad-shouldered and tall. His yellow hair was beginning to dull at the temples. His overlarge eyes, his whole smiling face seemed to her open and amiable. Immediately she felt awkward and wished the evening over and done.

  “Certain, dear Miss Duke, it has been a long time.” He spoke with almost no trace of an accent, held out a hedgerow bouquet of budded goldenrod, hawkweed, past-prime wild roses and grass-of-Parnassus. “It would have been tropical rarities—were there any.” He saw a middle-aged woman, broad in the hips, buxom in the fitted black dress, but with the strong presence of the one in charge of the money.

  “Dieter, please call me Lavinia. And thank you for the bouquet—although wild, it is handsome, and on this occasion I prefer naturalism to artifice. Will you take a glass of wine? Or would you rather have spirits?” She would toss the weeds away after he left.

  “To be truthful I would prefer whiskey—if you have it.”

  “If I have it! It is my own preference, one I adopted from my father.” She went to the sideboard and poured two glasses of what purported to be aged Kentucky bourbon. They sat before the fire and at first said nothing, glancing at each other to get a measure.

  “Well,” said Lavinia, making the effort, “has business been good for you this year?”

  “Yes, very good, despite the second loss to fire of our Robin’s Nest Mill. I will never again hire a pipe smoker. The sawyer would knock his burning dottle into the sawdust despite a hundred admonitions. Sorrowfully the cause has been removed—he burned himself up in this one.”

  “How wretched,” said Lavinia. “We, too, have lost mills to fire.” Another lengthy silence stretched out. Lavinia thought of the subject of the presidential election—everyone knew General Grant would win. Instead she said, “Do you travel much? Back east? Or to Germany?”

  “Once a year to New York or Boston. Or even Philadelphia, and one time to California to assess my cousin Armenius’s unfortunate circumstances.” There was an opening but she could not press her question about Armenius so soon for fear of looking an eager gossip.

  “So you had a sawmill named Robin’s Nest?”

  “Yes. Every year a robin would build her nest on a rafter above the saw. I do not know if it was the same one. It very much worried the old pipe smoker, who feared the young ones would fall from the nest onto the saw.”

  Lavinia clenched one hand. “Oh, I hope that did not happen.”

  “It did not. That mill produced dozens of robins in its time.”

  “Mills do not seem to last long. There is always some catastrophe.”

  “You are quite right.” He hitched his chair a little closer. He enjoyed talking about catastrophes and had seen a good many in the Michigan forests. “Most are entirely preventable, but men are careless and I think millmen are the most careless, though the owners and the show foreman can do a good deal of damage. For instance”—he peered earnestly at her—“I do not wish to bore you with accounts of misfortune?”

  Again, an opening to inquire about Armenius, but instead she said, “Dieter, you do not bore me, pray continue. But first let me refresh your glass. Now go on.”

  “A Maine timberman told me of his reasons for coming out to Michigan. In Maine he had a big mill. He put his mill at the bottom of a steep hill covered with pine right to the water’s edge. His plan was to cut the pine, make a slide for the logs that would carry them down into the mill, then load the lumber on ships docked in front, a very smooth and continuous operation that fell out just as he predicted. But he didn’t understand what happens to a hill when you remove the trees.”

  Lavinia had no idea what he meant.

  “What does happen to a hill with the trees removed?”

  “Spring came and all began to thaw. He told me he was standing on a nearby spit of land in a position where he could admire his mill cutting as fast as the saws could run when he saw that entire treeless hill gather itself together like a cat and rush down in a landslide of mud. It buried the mill and mill hands, sank the ship waiting to be loaded. It made terrible big waves in the harbor. Never found anything that was in its path. A monstrous wet pile of mud and stumps.”

  “I had no idea such a thing could occur,” said Lavinia. “I admire your knowledge of these dark mischances. I must send a bulletin to our sawyers not to place a mill at the bottom of a slope.”

  “Yes, or better still leave the trees in place. Tree roots hold down the soil. The branches shade the soil and protect it from heavy rain washouts.”

  “Miss Lavinia,” said Libby in the doorway, “Cook says dinner is ready.”

  “Thank you, Libby. Dieter, shall we go in?”

  Somehow they could not let go of catastrophes as a subject and over the roast lamb and fried potatoes went from landslides and fires to shipwrecks, crazy cooks, suicidal loggers, woods accidents, even a daring payroll holdup. Was this the time to ask about Armenius? Or the other, more important question? No.

  “I have heard, Dieter, that you have bought up a good deal of cutover lands. Is that true?”

  “It is. Such land can be had for almost nothing, and it gives me pleasur
e to replant and make it good and valuable forest again.”

  “But surely it will take many years before it can be cut, before it has value.”

  “Of course. But in Europe people consider the past and the future with greater seriousness. We have been managing forests for centuries and it is an ingrained habit to consider the future. Americans have no sense of years beyond three—last year, this year and next year. I suppose I keep to my old ways. I like to know that there will be a forest when I am gone.”

  “Very commendable, I am sure,” she said. “Where do you find the young trees you plant?”

  “We grow them. Breitsprechers started a pine seedling nursery some years ago. We employ Indians in spring and summer to plant for us. White woodsmen who cut trees scorn such work. But the Indians have a deeper understanding of nature and time, and we employ them when we can.”

  Lavinia thought that it was likely Indians were more glad of having paid work than of making forests for the future.

  “Your care for forests is well known. And I have also heard that your logging camps have numerous small bunkhouses for four men instead of one great long building that can house a hundred?”

  “Yes, it seems to me that more privacy will rest the men more thoroughly. These fellows labor greatly and appreciate small comforts.”

  She bit her tongue to keep from saying that many of Breitsprecher’s woodsmen came to the crowded bunkhouses of Duke Logging because rough living challenged their male hardiness. They despised ease and comfort. That was certainly the wrong thing to say.

  Lavinia fidgeted. She would have to make the Board’s offer soon. And if he agreed she could ask openly about Armenius. They had reviewed catastrophes and she had missed her chance to find that out. By the time the dessert came—cream-filled éclairs dipped in chocolate with a huddle of sugared strawberries at one end—they were more comfortable with each other, and she was almost enjoying his company.

  “Would you care for a stroll in the park before coffee and a liqueur?” asked Lavinia. She would ask him then.

  “What park might that be?”

  “It is a small forest park I have made with two neighbors,” she said. “It is very pleasant on a summer evening and as it is still light we can enjoy the last rays.”

  They stepped into the woods, passing under a magnificent silver maple, its long-stemmed leaves showing their silvery undersides. Dieter was amazed. “Why, Lavinia, you have preserved this beautiful little forest. I commend you.” He quoted from Uhland: “ ‘The sweetest joys on earth are found/ In forests green and deep,’ ” and thought that she was not entirely lost to the lust for money.

  The park was ten acres of mixed hardwoods with another twenty of old virgin white pine at its east end, a remnant of the extensive shoreline trees cut by Duke Logging decades earlier. A pathway cleared of undergrowth wound through the trees, and as they crossed a log bridge he could see a rill coursing downslope into a pool lit by the sun, the evening insect hatch caught in the last rays. They walked to the pines in time to see the final orange slab fade into deep shadow.

  Behind them sounded the day’s final robin cries. The wind stirred the pine tops but they only heard the rich ringing calls cheeriup cheerilee, cheeriup cheerilee.

  “They are telling us to be happy and cheerful,” said Lavinia, caught in the perfumed memory of lying on Posey’s silk pillow and listening to her hoarse low voice read of good Robin Red-breast.

  “I wonder if you know how badly the robins are hurt when we cut down their trees,” murmured Dieter. “We take their trees away and they are forced to build nests over whirling saws.”

  “Oh dear heaven,” said Lavinia. “I never thought of it that way. Why do not they fly away to other trees?”

  “They can, and do, but nests cannot be moved and then, when the young are just ready to fledge, come the choppers and fell the tree, dashing the infants to the ground.” He stopped when he saw he was causing her real pain. “Dear Lavinia,” he said. “You are very tenderhearted toward robins.” He had discovered something.

  “I know,” she said nasally, trying not to bawl. “I love them so. Do you know that if someone dies in the woods the robins come and gather leaves, cover them over . . .” And the tears ran. What could he do? Gingerly Dieter put his hands on Lavinia’s shoulders; she pressed her face against his shirt and they stood in amber afterglow with robins shouting all around them, adjuring them to cheer up, cheer up, for God’s sake, cheer up.

  She did not want his warmth even as she craved it, the smell of his shirt, her own weakness, and she pulled back. He looked at her, said nothing and they walked on, with considerable space between, to the house, to brandy and coffee in paper-thin porcelain cups, the liquid black until a spoon of cream made its miniature whirlpool.

  Dieter Breitsprecher found her a great puzzle. She was like the perennial locked room containing unknown objects found in every great castle. He set down his brandy glass and opened his mouth to say something about the forest park, but she interrupted and said in a rush, “Dieter Breitsprecher, there is something I wish to ask you. The Board and I would like to offer you a partnership with Duke Logging, we value your knowledge, we wish you to join us on terms we both agree on, the Board, the Board and I, we have discussed this and we want you, I, I— Libby,” she called without waiting for his response, “show Mr. Breitsprecher out.” She stood swaying and then gabbled, “Let us talk here tomorrow, Dieter, after the exhibit. You can give me your answer then, your feelings— I have enjoyed the evening so much. And we can discuss the inventors, discuss everything for the Board and I value your opinion.” And she rushed out of the room; there was no other word for it, she rushed away from him.

  He stood flabbergasted. And although he had enough presence of mind to call after her that he, too, had enjoyed the evening, it had been more like spying through the keyhole into that locked room. “Unlikely I will sleep tonight,” he said to himself. “Verdammt noch mal!”

  • • •

  By morning she had recovered her aplomb. Although she regretted her weak sniveling, Lavinia had finally said what she had to say. Now she would wait for his response. She was prepared for a refusal.

  • • •

  At the exhibit she noticed that Dieter Breitsprecher came in an hour after the doors opened. Annag Duncan moved through the murmuring crowd with a tray of cups, Miss Heinrich following her with the coffeepot.

  David Neale took notes for his newspaper, or perhaps, thought Lavinia, he was one of Tappan’s anonymous spies who reported on the characters of businessmen. Noah Ludlum and Glafford Jones seemed to be concentrating on a heavyset fellow with a jug of some thick tarry substance. Theodore Jinks and Axel Cowes had asked Mr. Drimmel to convert the cloakroom into a temporary office with chairs and table, and they sat there importantly, calling in the inventors one by one and quizzing them. She saw Dieter Breitsprecher approach Flense and Pye. They greeted each other and went outside, still talking. Flense looked at Lavinia and raised his eyebrows. What that meant she did not know. Should she follow them? Wait? Instead she went over to a lank-haired man in a rumpled linen suit who stood near the door with two other men.

  “I am Lavinia Duke,” she said. “Do you have an exhibit?” As soon as he said his name she remembered his letter. Weed, the architect, was a good talker, and he began to explain Prairie Homes. He beckoned her outside and pointed. “This is a quarter-size prebuilt model house, our Prairie Home Number One. It is small apurpose so that yesterday you could see the boxes. Today you see the model house. Did you see the boxes yesterday?”

  “Alas, I did not,” she said.

  “Why, this house was all packed flat in those boxes yesterday. All of it.” Lavinia gathered that it was an error not to have seen the packed-up boxes.

  But she did see the miniature neat attractive cheap two-story instant house complete to weather vane and lightning rod that stood on the lawn.

  “There they are,” Weed said, pointing at empty crates lined
up on the lawn. “The boxes. Each fits in a farm wagon. This house was inside the boxes yesterday.” She looked at the model. Charming it was, but her first thought was to wonder how this applied to Duke Logging.

  “Yes,” said Weed, “and there are three other models and more to come.” He stood expectantly, as if waiting for congratulation.

  “Mr. Weed,” said Lavinia, “I quite see it. But tell me about your plan for merchandising these.” Mr. Weed was fairly dancing with eagerness to explain.

  “People on the prairies need houses but got no trees. And farmers are no carpenters so they end up with a pile of sticks that falls with the first storm. If you are trying to start a farm why you can die before you get the roof over your head. But anybody can put one of our houses together, even a farmer.” He shot a look at Mr. Drimmel, who was standing under a nearby beech tree watching hotel employees set up the picnic tables. “This model, if it was the full-size Prairie Home Number One, would cost four hundred and fifty dollars including rail delivery. Two men can put it together in about fourteen days. My partners and I are hoping Duke would supply us with lumber and investment money.”

  “Ah,” said Lavinia. “But what have you reckoned about railroad transport costs? The prairies must have connection rails if they want these houses.”

  “Chicago is blossoming with railroads and the great transcontinental is very close to completion—they say within a year. Spurs will branch in every direction through the hinterlands. The railroads are coming. Put your men to cutting ties. They will be needed very soon.”