Patience & Sarah

by Isabel Miller

  “I don’t want you up there alone!” I said. “I won’t let you! Just teach me. In time for New-York.”

  She smiled, and I could see I’d more or less been led. She never meant to go up on deck, and I think she really did hope all along to change my out-in-public manners, but tricks that come from sparing my feelings I can’t get much upset at.

  Later Parson asked about the trip, if we got scared in Hell Gate and like that, and we had to admit we didn’t really notice Hell Gate or anything else much. We just stayed in that mean little Ladies’ Cabin and worked on me. We’d feel the ship stop all along the way, and hear the captain auctioning again, but we never went up to look.

  I’ve regretted since the fine sights we missed, but I’m just as glad we didn’t know about Hell Gate till it was passed. To think how Patience might’ve sunk, bound round with gold like that! And nothing, nothing I could do to hold her up. I shake even now, to think.

  As to fixing me up, Patience didn’t rightly know where to start. She had me stand up in front of her while she looked me over and thought. I couldn’t’ve felt more foolish than I did standing there like a big gawk, and I might’ve called the whole thing off except I remembered it might be the secret of how to move safe in the world without a man.

  She decided to make the first thing be, to stand there. Just stand there, with my arms hanging down and my hands folded loose together in front, which meant no fidgeting and no putting my foot up on the bench and no feeling around for pockets to rest my hands in.

  “Feet closer together. Closer still. That’s right,” she said. “No, don’t look at me. Just gaze – idly. Into space. See nothing. Unfocus your eyes. That’s pretty good. Now stay that way.”

  “How long?” I asked, without moving my lips.

  “That’s good! No, don’t move. I mean, it’s good you already know how to talk without moving your lips. It’s an essential lady skill. It’s for talking about someone who is in the room. I’ll tell you when to move.”

  It was so hard. I remembered seeing ladies everywhere standing that way at stores and outside of churches and all around, and I wondered why I never thought before how hard it might be. I was tireder after a few minutes of it than after a day’s work. When Patience let me stop I just plunked myself down beside her.

  She said, “While you’re resting, you can practice not hearing. Now, gaze idly. See nothing. ‘Well, little lady, what’s a pretty little thing like you doing so far from home?’”

  I stared at her.

  “No, no! Don’t hear. ‘I like the little one myself.’ ‘No, she’s a mite on the plump side for my taste. And redheaded – that’s a mean disposition every time – and look at those beady little mud-colored eyes!’ Stop laughing. This is serious.”

  I pulled myself together. It was serious.

  “‘Well, are you all alone, my pretty one? Perhaps we’ll meet in New-York.’ Stop blushing! Don’t hear. Just keep your chin level and look away. Don’t see, don’t hear, don’t blush, it’s very simple. Please, darling, try.”

  “Make up something different.”

  “‘It’s surely been pleasant for March. I don’t recall a March so pleasant. Have you come far? And where are you bound? All alone? Are you and that other lady together? Are you sisters? Are you kin at all? Is anyone meeting you? Perhaps I could be of assistance? Why, ma’am, I don’t believe you heard a word I said.’ Good girl. And just for that you get a kiss. Yo, Sarah! It’s me. You get a kiss.”

  “I didn’t hear a word you said.”

  I gave her a little peck, though, and little as it was it made her nose flare. It kind of helped out my pride, to be the one to stop. I felt so sensible, and like she was just a foolish tot I had to watch over. It evened us up. One knew one thing, one another thing.

  I said, “How about how I talk?”

  “I like it. I love it.”

  “Talk sense. It’s not like you nor Parson. Show me your way.”

  “Honey?” She looked downright guilty. “Would you mind – very much – just letting me do the talking?”

  “What!”

  “I mean, of course, to other people? For now?”

  “Well, can’t you just fix me? There shouldn’t be too much left to fix. I got a start with Parson. It shouldn’t take long.”

  “Longer than one day, I’m afraid. And do I want to? Can’t you just not see and not hear and – not speak? For now?”

  I thought she was being lazy, or maybe she thought I was too thick-skulled, and I made her start right there on the ship trying to get it through my head about was and were, and saw and seen, and went and have gone, and like and as, and not leaving the g’s off the ends of words, on and on until my head just whirled and I agreed it might take a while. I agreed to keep my mouth shut and glad to.

  The main thing left was my walk. What she wanted of me on that was no fit thing for an able-bodied full-grown person with a place to get to, but she talked me into trying. Only place to work on it was right there in that little cabin, and I could get from corner to corner across it in four steps without even stretching. Patience said we had to find a way to slow me down and shorten my step and she dug around in her pretty silk handsack for something to put on my head like Miss Amelia put books on her girls.

  There was a shawl Patience was knitting in the handsack, and it got in the way of finding anything suitable. Anyway that’s the excuse I made her. Why else would she pick a thing so rolly and slippery as a knitting needle? And expect me to keep it steady on my head? She wouldn’t’ve thought she could do it herself. I doubt Miss Amelia could’ve, even in her prime, unless she was lucky enough to have a crease in the top of her head.

  Besides the treacherous nature of the knitting needle, there was the unsteadiness of the floor tipping one way and another. Just sitting on the bench I’d lose the needle. I do think Patience made a poor choice.

  She said, “Well, the main value of it is to teach erect posture, which you have already.” And she praised how I hold my shoulders and head, which I mentioned because I wouldn’t want it thought I couldn’t carry myself at all.

  She had me walk back and forth between the corners, and when I was taking six steps where four would’ve been plenty, she said, “It will have to do. Just be haughty.”

  Maybe I didn’t do my best to mend my walk. Leastwise it never did get mended, not that day on the ship and not ever. It could be said a bigger try might’ve changed me, but hopeless is what I think.

  Someone, a sailor I expect, rapped the door and called, “New-York, ladies,” and I went weak. Patience said, “You are a very rich, very ill-tempered fifty-year-old lady who has always had her own way in everything. You do as you please, and you walk like a lord, and you are deaf.”

  We put our wraps on and gathered up our things. Our bonnet brims touched and made a little dark tunnel for a kiss.

  She said, “You are very handsome and willful and eccentric and you never speak. You see no one worth speaking to. Your faithful companion, however, speaks.”

  We went up on deck and stood apart from the crowd of men. The sun was just setting, just about the prettiest sunset ever. It seemed like special for us, because it was our day of beginning. It seemed like nature was trying to give us its prettiest thing, because it liked us.

  The river was all jammed up with ships, more than seemed right, and along the edge of the city the masts bunched up as thick as grass. I didn’t see how the captain was going to fit our ship in anywhere, but I took it for granted he would somehow. So I was surprised to hear the anchor chain unwinding right there in the middle of nothing. I took Patience as my pattern and didn’t bat an eye, though. Somebody yelled, “We berth tomorrow. Get your gear then.”

  How we got ashore was in a rowboat. Being ladies we had to get into it and be cranked down to the water. We got onto the backmost seat of the thing and then down we went. I didn’t like it a bit, swinging around fifteen foot up in the air, and without moving my lips I said as much to Patience. S
he said, “Nobody said being a lady was easier,” without moving her lips either. Then a passel of men got in by climbing down a rope net. I’ll say my choice would’ve been the net too.

  The captain himself was standing right behind us steering the boat. He gave me a good chance to practice paying no attention to being looked at. I just bore in mind how rich and quirky I was and looked off across the water towards New-York. I couldn’t see past the masts but I kept looking, in a careless sort of way.

  The captain said, “Excuse me, ma’am,” and I remembered about being deaf and didn’t move a muscle, but that lady of mine, after all her talk to me! turned around. He said, “If you’re strangers to the city, you might like this,” and he handed her a little card. “It’s a good clean lodging, not too dear, and close to the sights.”

  Patience said, “Thank you, sir. I’ll keep it in mind, if our hosts should weary of us.”

  Oh, she was the right one to do our talking. Who else could think so fast, not to let a boatful of men know we had no place to go and no one meeting us with night coming on? And yet get the exact help we needed? I felt a great worry lift off of me, when that card went safe into her handsack.

  It was near dark when we set foot on solid ground but there were lamps standing along the streets and nobody cared about night. What a recklessness about oil they have in that city, to light all outdoors and not even wait till pitchblack to do it, and keep everything going like daytime. I wanted to stand a while and see, but Patience hurried me along. A little brown boy wanted to carry our handbox for pay, but I played I was too rich and quirky to trust him with it. The fronts of the ships stuck in over the street and we walked along under them. I didn’t gawk up though.

  When we got away from the men from our ship, Patience took out the card. It said Catherine Street. What we were on was South Street. I said we could just go until we found Catherine Street. There couldn’t be many streets, even here, I said. But she spoke to the first constable we came to, and he told us where. It wasn’t far, but we’d been going just opposite, of course. Once we knew how to go, we got there easy.

  And the first one we saw was our captain, climbing the steps of the lodging house. The sight of him stopped us in our tracks, but he said, “Ladies,” and bowed.

  Patience sailed right up the steps, dignified as could be, head up, saying, “It appears you’ve found me out, Captain.” I was right behind her, aping her every move but keeping still.

  “I have you at a disadvantage, Miss White,” he said. “Your brother asked me to help you if I could.” Then he unlocked the door and we all went in. He lived there. It was his house. He sent everybody there that he could.

  His wife’s servants fed the three of us – it was too late for regular supper – and then we passed up the chance to play games in the parlor with the other lodgers. Patience said we were too tired from our journey. I hoped that was a tale.

  A servant girl, who was young and pretty and very tired, lit our way up to the third floor. I wanted to at least carry the water pitcher for her, but Patience shook her head when I whispered could I? So many steps we followed that girl up! I was surprised to find my feeling was touched before we got all the way. She was so tired. I wanted to rest her. It could seem that was an unfaithful wish, but I think it just meant my heart was coming to life again.

  The girl set the lamp and water down. She said, “Breakfast at half after eight.” She left. There was a key in the door. I turned it. I was never in a locked room before. There was a fire going. Nobody could open our door until we let them.

  I expected nothing could calm us, on our first chance to stay on and on together and see each other in a room nobody else could open. But we were calm. There was no hurry. I can’t say how much it meant that there would never be a hurry again.

  I sat back out of the main glow of the lamp watching her lay her things on the dresser and take off her dress and fold it neat and lay it on the other chair. We pretended I wasn’t there. It was a game we both knew without having to say, but her cheeks went bright, and she could give me a just a glimpse of her back and half her side before her bedgown billowed down and hid her again, and then she undressed the rest of the way inside her bedgown. She washed inside it too, with a soapy cloth she wet in a big white bowl she poured into from the big white pitcher, and she buttoned up to the very top before she washed her teeth. She left the bowl empty and clean. Then she sat cross-legged up on the bed and let her hair fall. I heard the tiny crackling of it lifting by itself to meet her brush. She brushed and brushed. There was no hurry. I saw her neat little toes. I saw her bosom unbound and moving up and down with her arm. Then she made her hair into one big loose braid and slid herself under the bedclothes, and looked at me.

  My turn then, to do all the same things, trying to be slow and not look at her, trying to be as beautiful for her as she was for me. She’d have to be the one to tell if I managed to.

  I thought, from having sisters, from never being alone to go to bed, I wouldn’t be shy like her. I thought I could let her see my whole skin, as easy as a sister, but feeling her eyes on me made me a blushing bride too. I was, to be honest, a little bit vain about my body, and I think I could’ve forced myself to put down being shy. But I didn’t want to force myself, any more than I’d’ve forced Patience. I wanted us to always do together what felt easiest and naturalest, and when I was down to firpins and band it stopped seeming one bit natural to treat a lovely woman with that look on her face like a sister. So I finished inside my bedgown too, and washed myself inside it. I used her soap, which smelled of lavender, so clean and good.

  It brought back all the times I’d held her and loved her and smelled that smell, and I started to long for her so much I almost went to her right then. But I made myself be slow, and wash my mouth with salt and mint, and clean the bowl. Then I took up the lamp and walked over to the bed. I set the lamp on its tall stand there. Outside the wind was smacking the house, a good March window-shaker, cold.

  Patience stretched her arm out under the covers and lifted them, and when I was safe inside she bent arm and covers around me and held me tucked up warm and close like a chick under a wing. Our weight made a hollow in the bed and it bent up around us like a nest. I listened to the wind and thought: I needn’t walk in it. I can stay right here with a mother that will never drive me away from her breasts and give them to some new child. All night I can be by her, and drink from her just by tipping my head. I can drink there whenever I can bear to pause from drinking the dear spit of her mouth, and without even leaving her mouth I can take them in my hands, all this heavy softness, and feel the ends pucker into little pebbles, little knots, little fingertips, little buds, little rose hips, pushing into the palms of my hands, all the nights of my life. I can be against her and be warm no matter how sharp the wind may blow, and when I get warm enough I can throw the covers off and let the lamplight show me any part of her I want to see, and she can never be shy with me or hide from me again. Who can count the times the waves will take her unexpected in the deep of a kiss and throw her teeth against my lip and nick it? But she will heal the nick with a touch of her tongue, always, and hug me down to give me the feel of the lovely waves she makes again and again for me, all my nights.

  Where are we, high or deep? “Heaven,” she says.

  We’re high then. We stay here so long, like gulls that don’t have to move to stay up.

  Chapter Two

  There was a wink of time next morning when I didn’t know where I was or who with, and then I felt Patience breathing beside me, and remembering hit me so sweet I wished I could forget again so I could remember again that same way. But I never forgot again.

  I turned my head and looked at her asleep there. What finally made me stop was not getting tired of the sight of her, which could never be, but that I started worrying what time it was, for I’d lost all track.

  I stole out of bed careful as a mouse and went and peeked out between the curtains. We had us another bright da
y, and the sun was just up, which made it six, give or take a quarter. So there was no hurry about getting Patience up. I wanted her to sleep and sleep in her pretty way.

  Naturally the fire was long ago gone out, which was nothing I wasn’t used to, but my underwear felt like snow to put on because I hadn’t thought it would be right to keep it under the covers with me the way I would’ve back home. Fact is, at the time I didn’t think of it. So there I was throwing on my clothes, with my whole body shaking and my teeth snapping together, when I looked over at my darling and she was awake and looking at me and getting ideas. I have to thank that cold underwear for the good sense and self-control I showed. I didn’t get a single idea back at her, and it’s easy to see how the day would’ve been spent if I had.

  I did take her underwear over and tuck it in beside her to get warm, and she did get her arm around me and try to pull me in, but I said, “Woman, once is enough to get up on a winter’s morning.”

  It did me good to have her want me, and to not be scared to refuse her. There’d been a time when I wouldn’t’ve dast do that, but after last night I could know we felt the same, and I could keep my own opinions and make my own mind up, and be the one to think of all the things we had to get done today.

  She said, “You’ve become sassy overnight,” in a way that made me feel she didn’t think sassy was very bad.

  I said, “If you don’t want me sassy, you mustn’t do me like you do.”

  I just never felt so grown-up and worthwhile and proud and able to manage in my whole life before, all because she’d wanted me so much and I’d had enough to give her and make her melt like that and then sleep like that, and wake up with her face full of light.

  I said, “You can sleep a little more. It’s early yet. I’m going to go look around a little.” I knew she wouldn’t go back to sleep. It was just a way we both understood, without having to say.

  I went downstairs, whistling “I’m Bound for the Kingdom.” I couldn’t stop myself, but I kept it as low as I could.