Why not come down to Waring and pay me a visit? I’m rattling around here alone at our old family farm. My brother, John, stops by every day to take care of the practical things. The weather is lovely, a sort of perpetual spring. The roses bloom all winter long, and the birds show up and wait expectantly for me to bring them a snack. Our pecan trees produced a bumper crop last fall, and I’m still shelling them. You can help! Your company would do me a world of good, and I’m sure your health will return speedily after a few weeks in the South Texas sun.
This was, I thought, exactly what I needed—to get away from Canyon and all the patriotic whooping and shouting. I wrote to Mr. Stieglitz, and also to Paul Strand, to let them know what I was going to do.
25
Waring, Texas—Winter 1918
I LEFT CANYON IN THE MIDDLE OF FEBRUARY ON A southbound train. With each mile I sensed the air growing softer, the temperature warmer, the scenery gentler. The browns and tans of the Panhandle landscape were replaced by greens. My eyes needed the change. So did my body, away from the tensions that had been tearing me apart.
Leah and her brother met me at the Waring depot in an old buckboard drawn by a horse named Molly, and off we trotted to the Harris family farm near the Guadalupe River.
The farmhouse was a plain sort of place—no wallpaper infested with pink roses, or dainty white furniture, or crocheted doilies. Unbleached muslin curtains hung at the windows. The floors were scrubbed pine with Mexican rugs. The only decoration in my bedroom at the back of the house, next to Leah’s, was a vase of wildflowers beside the narrow bed. Like a nun’s cell, I thought, and much to my liking.
We sat on the front porch wrapped in quilts and rocked as the sun went down. When the air chilled, we went inside, started a little fire in the stove, and ate steaming bowls of vegetable soup. We didn’t talk about the war. In fact, we didn’t talk much about anything. It was so peaceful, not at all the way it had been in Canyon.
“I’ve been feeling so much better since I’ve come back here,” Leah said. “And the doctor says my lungs are healing. I know you’re going to feel better soon, too.”
After a few days, once I’d rested up from the train ride, we began taking short walks along the river, stopping at a farm to buy fresh eggs. Leah’s kitchen shelves were filled with colorful glass jars of luscious peaches and plums and tomatoes that she’d put up. We’d choose a couple of jars and fix a meal out of whatever was in them.
Reminders of the war were unavoidable. I wanted to forget about it, but even in tiny, remote Waring the posters had appeared with Uncle Sam’s finger pointing at us. I was strong enough then to put what I was feeling on paper. I painted a watercolor of the flag—no stars or stripes, just a blood-red flag bleeding across a stormy, bruise-colored sky. It showed exactly how fearful I felt.
Anita Pollitzer, who had given up the idea of teaching and thrown herself into suffragist causes, wrote to me regularly. I waited anxiously for letters from Alexius, stationed somewhere in France, and worried when none came. There were frequent letters from Paul Strand, and at least one each day from Mr. Stieglitz. Nearly every morning Leah and I walked into town to pick up our mail at the general store, and Leah joked that I must single-handedly keep the U.S. Post Office in business.
Slowly my strength returned, although there were still days when I felt depleted, and I was often troubled by stomach pains. Once a week Leah’s physician, Dr. Madison, drove out from Waring to examine Leah, to be sure that her early symptoms of consumption had not worsened. At the same time he also checked on me, prescribing a tonic that he believed would build my strength.
On a visit to the farm early in April, Dr. Madison pronounced that we were both doing nicely, but he warned us about the worrisome spread of a highly contagious disease he called “Spanish influenza.” He’d heard about it at a meeting at a hospital in San Antonio. It was first diagnosed at an army base in Kansas, he said, and it was like nothing they’d seen before. Those who caught it became violently ill almost at once. “The first symptoms are extreme fatigue, fever, and headache,” he told us, “and within hours, the victims start turning blue, and cough so hard that they tear the muscles in their stomach.”
“What can be done?” Leah asked, alarmed.
“Nothing, once someone has contracted it,” Dr. Madison said grimly. “Death comes quickly with this terrible disease. Our main worry now is how to keep it from spreading. My advice to you two ladies is to avoid going out in public.”
The doctor put away his stethoscope and left us staring at each other uncomfortably.
“Well,” I said with false cheer, “since we seldom go out in public in any case, we should be just fine.”
Waring was a tiny community, with a population of about two hundred fifty souls, a tenth the size of Canyon, but it supported a corn and grist mill and a cotton gin, a stone quarry and a lumberyard, a boarding house called Oak Ranch that catered to consumptives, and a general store that also acted as a post office, pharmacy, and gathering place for local farmers. On our last trip to town I had bought a few yards of linen, some spools of thread, and a packet of needles so that I could stitch some new underthings for myself and for Leah, too. But now we felt that we had to avoid going there. Leah’s brother came by the farm once a day to make sure we had whatever we needed. He brought our mail and kept us informed of the news from what we’d come to think of as “the outside world.”
Although I wasn’t completely over the illness that had brought me low in January, I was ready to start painting again. I’d felt compelled to do the flag painting as a statement of my fears about the war. Now I wanted to do something else. Because Leah and I had become quite comfortable around each other, I suggested that she pose for me.
“Of course, I will, Georgia!” she said. “What would you like me to wear?”
I decided to come right out with it. “I want to do some nude paintings in watercolor.”
Her startled look bordered on shock. “Of me? Without clothes?” Her face pinked up, and she seemed flustered.
“Nudes are usually not wearing clothes.”
“I’m not sure I can do that, Georgia. I think I’d be too embarrassed.”
“I understand. A dozen years ago, in my first life drawing class, I was taken aback when the model turned out to be a muscular young man with only a scrap of cloth concealing his privates. He wasn’t in the least uncomfortable being nearly naked in front of a class of young ladies; we were the ones who were uncomfortable. But we got over it. I promise that it will be an abstract rendering. No one will know it’s you.”
Leah hesitated for less than a minute. “All right then,” she said. “Let’s get on with it.”
Lest she change her mind, I grabbed my watercolor box and brushes and paper. Leah undressed, and I sketched the basic outline of her body as she sat on a chair, one leg crossed over the other, one arm raised.
The sound of my voice kept her relaxed and compliant, and so I talked as I worked, telling her the story of the first time I met Mr. Stieglitz at his show of Rodin sketches. “I thought they were just scribbles. A lot of people agreed and said they were some kind of fraud being foisted on the public.”
“What did you say?” Leah asked.
“I was too embarrassed to say a word,” I admitted. “I didn’t have the good sense to appreciate them at the time.”
“You’ve made me blue,” she said when I showed her the finished painting. “Except for that blotch of red on my shoulder. Is that supposed to be blood?”
“No. I just wanted some red there.”
“What you said is true. No one would ever know it’s me.”
I did several more of her, rolled them up, and gave them to John to mail to Mr. Stieglitz the next time he went by the general store.
We passed the weeks of spring in enforced solitude because of the wildfire spread of the Spanish flu. We went for much longer walks along the river, and I painted and spent hours every day writing letters to Anita and Paul and Mr
. Stieglitz and my sisters, and to Alexius, hoping they would reach him in France. I did not write to Francis, since my older brother and I no longer saw eye to eye on much of anything, or to Papa, who never wrote back.
My health improved, although there were occasional setbacks, but I was skeptical of what Dr. Madison had told us—that Leah’s “tubercular condition,” as he called it, was benign and that there was practically no chance of me catching it from her. He assured us both that she was getting better and that we shouldn’t worry.
I was grateful to have a place to stay, and I liked Leah, but she had become clingy. She refused to go on walks alone and insisted that I go with her. When I was painting and the light seemed perfect and I wanted to keep on, she fretted over how late it was getting and said it was time to stop and eat. She was quite strict in her belief that we should eat our evening meal together at precisely the same time every day. I was growing restless.
It was early May, and I had been there for four months. On Dr. Madison’s next visit, after he’d listened to my chest and assured me that my lungs were clear, I made an excuse to follow him outside. “Doctor, I want to visit San Antonio for a few days—just for a change, some fresh ideas for my work. Can you suggest a place I might stay, something inexpensive?”
He thought for a moment. “My sister Martha lives in San Antonio. I know she’d be pleased to have you as a guest. I’m going there tomorrow. When shall I tell her you’ll arrive?”
“The day after tomorrow,” I said, and prepared to break the news to Leah.
After we’d finished breakfast the next day, I said, rather abruptly, “I’m taking the train to San Antonio tomorrow. I want to do some painting there, before I go back to Canyon to teach the summer courses, and I’d best start now.”
This was not the whole truth. I had not yet made up my mind to return to Canyon, and I was not even sure I’d be welcome there. But I had very little money, and I knew that I had to earn some, somehow.
Leah reacted with dismay. “You’re going to San Antonio? Are you strong enough? You’ve lost so much weight, and you’re so pale, Georgia!”
“I’m fine,” I said. “Stop worrying about me.”
I packed a few things, promising to be back in a week or two. Leah’s brother drove me to the depot, where I caught the local train for the half-hour ride to San Antonio. I was relieved to get away.
26
San Antonio, Texas—Spring 1918
MISS MURIEL MADISON HAD A ROOM READY FOR me, in the back of a handsome old house on a quiet street. I immediately wrote to Paul and to Mr. Stieglitz, telling them that I had “escaped,” and to send letters in care of Miss Madison.
I was waiting for a reply from my two faithful correspondents when a boy in a Western Union uniform arrived at Miss Madison’s on a bicycle with a telegram:
STRAND ON TRAIN ARRIVE SAN ANTONIO MAY 12 HOTEL LANIER STOP STIEGLITZ
Paul was on his way!
My hostess had warned me not to go out walking around the city alone. Fort Sam Houston and Camp Bullis were nearby, and recruits being trained at the army base thronged the streets of downtown San Antonio. I ignored her warnings—I had spent too much time in cities like Chicago and New York to be put off by a group of rowdy young soldiers having as much fun as they could before being shipped off to fight a war. But it would be nice to have a man around, just in case.
The twelfth of May was a Sunday, and the streets of San Antonio were silent except for the sound of church bells. The morning was fresh and cool when I set out. I found the Hotel Lanier near a park close by the Alamo Mission. The pomegranate trees were covered in bright orangey-red blossoms. The desk clerk at the Lanier told me the train was due in at half past eleven. I left a note for Paul, telling him I would meet him by the bandstand in the park at one o’clock. That would give him time to rest a little after the long journey.
I found Paul waiting for me when I returned. He didn’t kiss me, as I expected he might, but took my hands in both of his and held them while he looked into my eyes. Then, seeming to remember that we were in public, he let go of my hands and took my elbow instead. “You need to eat something,” he said. “You’re too thin. Come, we’ll have lunch somewhere.”
We found a little Mexican place by the river, Cafe Del Rio. Paul protested that he knew nothing about Mexican food. “But I do,” I teased. “I’ve been in Texas for quite a while. I’m practically a Texan now.”
I ordered enchiladas with fried eggs on top and pinto beans. While we waited for our lunch, we talked. The food came, and still we talked. There was so much to say about our work, the watercolors I’d been doing in the past weeks, the photographs Paul had been taking of New York street life. The waiter brought dessert, then coffee.
Almost a whole afternoon had gone by when I jumped up, grabbing Paul’s hand. “Let’s go exploring!”
Since my arrival in San Antonio two weeks earlier, I’d walked through the city every day until I was too tired to walk any farther. Now I wanted to show everything to Paul. He let me pull him along, laughing when I stopped to pick a flower from a pomegranate tree and pinned it to my dress. I knew that black showed off the red flower dramatically.
“I’ve never seen you so enthusiastic about anything!” Paul said.
“It’s because I’m so happy to see you.”
He hesitated and then plunged ahead. “Stieglitz wants to see you, Georgia.”
“And I’d like to talk to him.”
“Then perhaps you’ll consider coming east?”
“I can’t possibly do that. I’ll be teaching summer courses at West Texas again this summer.”
“Surely you could get out of that if you wanted.”
“But I can’t. I need the money. I have none, you see. I’m down to my last few dollars. And I’m worried about my sister. Claudie’s finishing up her student teaching in some godforsaken little town, and then she’ll be back in Canyon. I don’t think she fits in very well there, and I should perhaps be there to guide her.” I stopped and laughed at what I’d just said. “That’s something of a joke, you know. I’ve never fit in there either, and I’m probably not the one to give her advice.”
Later, I asked Paul how long he intended to stay in San Antonio, and he smiled and said, “I have no deadline. None at all.”
It was evening when Paul took me to Miss Madison’s, and I was so weary that I fell into bed without even bothering to fix myself supper.
For the next few days we went for more walks along the river, always ending back at the same table at the same Mexican restaurant. I introduced Paul to tacos and tamales and bowls of spicy chili.
We discovered a district of handsome old houses built nearly a century earlier by prosperous white merchants, and we explored a sprawling neighborhood where Mexicans who had come across the Rio Grande lived in simple adobe cottages with smoothly rounded corners and sensuous shapes. Donkeys plodded along dusty lanes, and chickens ran around; children played, shouting in Spanish, and women in embroidered shawls and long, bright skirts shopped at an open-air market.
I carried my paint box and brushes and paper with me, found a bench to sit on, and painted what I saw. People gathered around to watch me, their usually animated voices quieted. Paul set up his camera to take pictures—he’d become well known for his candid pictures of individuals caught unaware—but the people in that San Antonio neighborhood apparently didn’t like to be photographed, and the streets were suddenly deserted.
One day he borrowed an auto, and we drove to Fredericksburg, a lovely town of old stone houses built by German immigrants nearly seventy-five years earlier. Given the anti-German sentiments I’d witnessed in Canyon, I wondered how the descendants of those long-ago immigrants were faring. Still, the place was appealing. I thought I’d like living there.
Paul moved out of the Hotel Lanier and into a boarding house a few blocks from Miss Madison’s. We spent every afternoon and evening together. I painted, and he took pictures, many of them of me. After two we
eks of exploring San Antonio with Paul, I left Miss Madison’s and returned to Leah’s farm. Paul began spending time with us in Waring and photographing Leah, too. She was not beautiful, but he’d come to appreciate the elegance of her long, slender body, pale skin, and raven-black hair.
Paul and I talked about everything—what he was trying to accomplish with his photographs and I with my paintings—but our conversations almost always turned back to Mr. Stieglitz.
“He’s a deeply unhappy man,” Paul said.
“I thought so,” I agreed. “But I have no idea why he’s so unhappy.”
“He has been trapped in a loveless marriage for many years.”
I knew that Mr. Stieglitz was married, but in all the time we’d spent together, and in all his letters, he’d never once mentioned his wife. I didn’t even know her name.
“I’ve met her just once,” Paul went on. “She’s from a very wealthy family who owned a brewery. Her brother was a partner in Stieglitz’s early business ventures, and she was very pretty and good company and it was expected that they would marry. There’s one daughter, Kitty, who’s off in college now. He’s confided to me that they have absolutely nothing in common and that the marriage was a total failure from the beginning.”
“But they’ve stayed married,” I said.
“They have, but they no longer live together. He says he had to leave to preserve his sanity. The situation has been extremely depressing for him.”
That was the only time we spoke of Mr. Stieglitz’s marriage.
Leah and Paul and I had been getting along famously, but then the situation in Waring began to fray.
A farmer named Zeller who lived up the road had been giving Leah difficulties. One night soon after I’d arrived in January, someone had crept around the house with a lantern, shining a light into our bedrooms. Leah grabbed a pistol that she kept handy and yelled, “I’ve got a gun!” The man ran away.
Girl with Brush and Canvas Page 19