The Navigator of New York

by Wayne Johnston

  I could not make you understand in a thousand letters how much Dr. Cook’s kindness and tutelage have meant to me. I have spoken to Dr. Cook about you and Uncle Edward, and he has asked me to assure you that I will not participate in any venture for which, in his judgment, I have not had adequate preparation.

  I have changed somewhat in the short time since I left home. There is much that I must put behind me. As no one better understands than you do what I mean, I hope you can forgive my manner of leaving, which, though regrettable, was necessary.

  I will not presume to hope to receive your blessing on my choice of careers. Nor is there any chance that I will receive it for what I am about to ask.

  You may think it ungrateful, even treacherous, of me, but I must ask that you allow me to try to make my way without your help. Indeed, I must insist upon it. For so long, you were all I had. If not for you, I would have become what other people thought I was. Your love kept alive in me the faint hope that someday someone else might love me too. I so came to depend on you that I will never gain my independence except by being, for how long I do not know, completely apart from you. It is not your nature but mine that makes this necessary. Were you here, so that I could daily see your face and hear your voice, even were you to write frequently to me and I to you, the result would be one that, though you did not intend it, I would, because of my own faults, my own deficiencies, be unable to prevent.

  When I have remedied these deficiencies of mine, when I can return your affection without detriment to either you or me, I will let you know. Please believe that I long for that day, that I wish I was writing now the letter I will write to you when that day comes.

  It pains me to say that for a while, we must not see each other and must not correspond. I look forward to reading your reply to this letter, and to the day when I can write to you again. Please trust my judgment in this and know that it signals no lessening of my affections for you.

  Love,

  Devlin

  My darling Devlin:

  I expected that, sooner or later, word of your whereabouts would surface, but I never imagined that it would be in the newspapers, that in the papers I would learn where you have been and how you have been occupied since you left home.

  They have run several recent photographs of you, which, after our long separation, should make you seem closer to me, yet do the opposite. They make you seem so distant, so foreign, as if you have no past, or have one in which I played no part. You look as though, for you, far more than fifteen months have passed. How strange it was, after not having seen you in fifteen months, to come upon those photographs. It did not seem right that I was learning of your exploits just as people who had never heard of you before were doing. It seemed that these stories and photographs were notice that you would never write to me at all.

  Can you imagine with what joy and relief I received the envelope that bore your name and return address? Oh, how I miss you, Devlin. How I wish that you were here so I could hold you in my arms. I do not hope, by saying such things, to cause you any torment, or to castigate you for doing what you still believe was right. But how pointless it would be to write to you and not tell you how I feel.

  It would seem from your letter that you have changed much in the short time since you went away. I can think of nothing to attribute it to but the influence, whether good or bad, of this Dr. Cook, whose name, in the papers, figures in every paragraph that features yours.

  I must confess that while I was glad to hear you are prospering, I was dismayed to hear which profession you have chosen, for it seemed to me that of all the world’s professions, it should have been the one least likely to appeal to you. I do, as you predict in your letter, find your choice of this vocation troublesome, and I wonder if it can really have as little to do with your father as you seem to think, especially as your new associate was a colleague of your father’s and a member of the expedition on which he was lost. Can all this be mere coincidence?

  You are right, I suppose. There is much that you must put behind you, though I fear that you can no more forget the past than you can change it. I do not fully understand this quest of yours, nor why you think it more likely to succeed if, however temporarily, you exclude me from your life. However, I sense that to try to change your mind or to ask you to explain yourself at greater length would not advance my cause, which is to keep to a minimum the amount of time that must pass until we meet again. I would almost consent to this interval being a protracted one so long as it was fixed, not indeterminate, indefinite, as it is now, for I cannot help fearing that this yet-to-be-determined date may never come.

  I am very proud of you, and not at all surprised that you risked yourself to save another without any expectation of reward. You may think this insincere coming from someone who showed imperfect faith in you. But my faith in everyone, myself included, is imperfect.

  I do not wish to strip you of your new-found self-confidence. I do not wish to make you doubt yourself, though it seems to me that what is really self-knowledge is often mistaken for self-doubt. But I worry that you are far too hastily putting things behind you, that you are not ready to live in New York, or to be an explorer, or to throw in your lot with a man like Dr. Cook. What I mean by “a man like Dr. Cook,” I hardly know.

  I am happy to hear that you are well, and well provided for. But I have my doubts about this Dr. Cook, whom you so unreservedly admire and with whom you have become so close. Judging by the papers and your letter, he seems to be no less devoted to you than you are to him, which is perhaps what concerns me most—that he, a grown man who should no longer be prone to forming impulsive attachments, should have become so devoted to you in so short a time. If you had allied yourself for the same purposes with someone your own age, I would be concerned but not surprised.

  Perhaps you will dismiss my concern as mere jealousy, some measure of which I am willing to admit to. He has the pleasure of your company, but I do not. You may think I would dismiss out of hand anyone who encouraged and pledged to help you realize an ambition of which I disapprove. Again, you would not be altogether wrong. Or you may think my concern unflattering to you, as good as saying that I cannot imagine how you, in particular, could so rapidly inspire such devotion in anyone. In this case, you would be altogether wrong.

  I thought you might like to know, if you do not already, that there is no hint in the local papers that you were ever looked upon as anything but “shy.” And everyone speaks of you as if, all along, they knew that you would do great things. Suddenly everyone talks to me about you, wants to know how you are doing and when you will be coming home—that you should be so popular now that you are gone! It all seems so perverse.

  I cannot keep this letter from rambling. I feel as though I must cram everything into it, since it may be the last letter of mine that you will read for quite some time. It almost freezes my pen to think that I have but this one chance to prepare you for your setting forth.

  I cannot think what interest of Dr. Cook’s it would serve to convince you to pursue a life for which he knew you to be ill suited and by nature disinclined. Perhaps he is merely acting out of an impulsiveness that a man his age should be able to resist. But it seems far more likely to me that his motives are in some way dishonourable. If, by voicing these concerns, I make myself out to be just the sort of suffocating guardian from whom you feel you must escape, then so be it. I would be remiss if I did not say that this sudden alliance he has formed with you does not seem right.

  I do not know Dr. Cook except by reputation, which is described by the papers as “untarnished.” Yet they say that he will not allow you to be interviewed alone, that he is as watchful and protective of you as a mother cat is of her kittens, that he fields or diverts from you any question requiring an answer of more than one word, and that even that one word must first, by an exchange of looks, be cleared with him before you say it.

  I cannot help wondering why this man, whom you esteem so highly, will not allow y
ou to speak for yourself. What harm does he think will come of it? What is it that he thinks you need protection from?

  It seems that this man is all things to you. Patron. Sponsor. Mentor. Guardian. Friend. In some of the papers, he is referred to as your “manager.” I do not like the sound of that. I would say that he was trying to gain something for himself, except that he seems to have been as protective of you before the rescue expedition on which you rose so unexpectedly to fame as he is now.

  I tell myself that perhaps Dr. Cook merely wants to advance the cause of a young man whom he senses has been kept back through no fault of his own. Perhaps I should be grateful that hardly had you left home than your “possibilities” were spotted by a man as shrewd as the papers make him out to be. “Shrewd.” “Unaffected.” “Reserved.” “Reflective.” “Watchful.” “Generous in his estimations of others.” “Laconically modest about his own accomplishments.” “A likeable, open-hearted man to whom one is immediately drawn.” A word critical of him is nowhere to be found. Yet I distrust him.

  Perhaps because of the photographs I have seen of him. At first glance, they seem undamning. I know you will think it absurd of me to read so much into photographs, to blame a man so much for having had his picture taken. But I see the two of you in those photographs, and I do not see in your eyes what I see in his. I look at his eyes and think, Here is a man whose true nature no one knows.

  This assessment of him is all that I can really give you by way of warning or advice.

  It would be pointless for me to write to him. A charmingly evasive reply is all I would get in return, if he answered me at all.

  I feel as though I should hire someone to go to New York and bring you by force back home where you belong. At the same time, I fear that if I meddle in your life, you will make my exclusion from it permanent, which I could not bear.

  I must have some word from you—I must—or the days to come will be more difficult to endure than the past fifteen months have been.

  Surely it would do no harm for you to write to me from time to time, simply telling me of your whereabouts and plans. Otherwise, I will have no knowledge of you except what I can gather from the papers. I believe I have done nothing to you that would make me deserving of such treatment.

  I hate how this letter sounds. I cannot make it sound like me. I do not know what tone I should take with you. I cannot make you understand, in a letter, why I am so afraid for you. You are too young, Devlin. Through no fault of your own, you are younger than your age. You are not ready. I wish, my sweet, my darling Devlin, that I could convince you not to go where you are bent on going. Please, please come back home instead. Surely the advice of someone who loves you and has known you your entire life should count for more than whatever you have heard from Dr. Cook, who cannot possibly know you as I do.

  Be careful, Devlin. Do not do anything simply because someone else desires you to do it or may think less of you if you refuse. Follow your true heart in all things. It is not infallible, but it is yours.

  I wish I could go on writing this letter forever. Knowing that you will read it makes me feel as though I am speaking to you now, as though you are here but must soon leave and it will be a long time before you can be with me again.

  Imagine that I am always with you, always able to hear you if you speak to me, always answering if only you remember me.

  Love always,

  Daphne

  I was at first taken aback by Aunt Daphne’s distrust of Dr. Cook. But there is so much that she does not know, I told myself. If she knew, she would understand.

  Shy. Could it be that that was all that most people ever thought I was? I so wished it was true that it seemed momentarily possible, that the whole thing, my childhood, had been a protracted misunderstanding on my part, that if I was to return home I would be celebrated by people who had all along thought shyness to be my only shortcoming.

  I told Dr. Cook that I had written her but showed him neither my letter nor her reply, saying only that I had told her it was necessary that we not have any contact with each other for a while. I said that I would keep her informed of my whereabouts and plans so that she would not be forever in suspense.

  • CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO •

  DR. COOK AND I WERE FÊTED IN NEW YORK SOCIETY AS A TANDEM of heroes, Dr. Cook for rescuing Peary’s wife and child, and I for what became known as “Mr. Stead’s encounter with Lieutenant Peary.”

  “There is no way to resist it,” said Dr. Cook. “They have chosen you to play a part. This is the sort of story they love: an unknown young man saving a famous old man’s life.”

  “It’s being made to seem as if I am fond of Peary that I don’t like,” I said.

  “Look,” he said, “you do not have to lie to them. Tell them about climbing the mast and standing in the pilot barrel. Tell them about the iceberg. Tell them about the fiords and the glaciers and what they sounded like at night. Tell them about the walrus and the narwhal. That is the sort of thing they want to hear. You cannot control the manner in which good fortune comes your way. But it would be foolish to refuse it.”

  There came our way an invitation. We—that is, Dr. Cook, his wife and I—were invited to the Fall Ball, which took place every year at the Vanderbilts’ on the Hudson, where Frederick W. Vanderbilt and his wife lived in an Italian Renaissance mansion whose expansive grounds in Hyde Park overlooked the Hudson River.

  Not only would every member of the Peary Arctic Club be there, Dr. Cook said, but they would be outshone by the other guests, “the absolute upper crust of New York society.”

  Mrs. Cook, telling her husband that she did not wish to “spend time with people who will regard my every word and deed as confirmation of the opinion they held of me before we met,” asked him to decline the invitation on her behalf. He wrote the Vanderbilts that at the time of the Fall Ball, his wife would be visiting her sister in Washington.

  Dr. Cook took me to a tailor and had me fitted for “white tie and accessories.” White tie, it turned out, really meant vanilla tie—vanilla so that it could be seen against the white background of the shirt. I was also fitted for a vanilla-coloured vest, and a milliner fashioned a removable white silk lining for my top hat. After the purchase of a long white silk scarf and a pair of white silk gloves, I was, sartorially speaking at least, ready to meet the Vanderbilts.

  We drove to the house in Dr. Cook’s horse and carriage, Dr. Cook being loath to risk having the unreliable Franklin break down in the Vanderbilt driveway in front of all the other guests who owned motorcars but regarded them as toys.

  We had a long time to talk as the pair of horses clopped along, the sound of their hoofs making our voices unintelligible, Dr. Cook assured me, to the driver, whom Dr. Cook had hired because, in the eyes of the people I was about to meet, it would not do for us to drive ourselves.

  “It is well known that by the time of the North Greenland expedition, your parents were estranged,” Dr. Cook said. “No one will mention this to you. It is highly unlikely that anyone will mention your mother at all. They will expect, on this one matter at least, the same sort of tact from you. With your father, things are somewhat different. They will expect you not to mention your father until, by doing so themselves, they invite you to.

  “It is, in part, the story behind your story—the story that will never appear in the papers and that they will not allude to in your presence—that fascinates them. They see you not only as the strong, quick-thinking, promising young man the papers make you out to be, but also as a somewhat mysterious, possibly ‘haunted’ young man with a tragic past. That you are following the vocation that brought so much unhappiness to your mother and father intrigues them. You are now among those whom they believe to be worth watching, as I once was. I do not mean that I am now regarded as uninteresting, but it is thought, in many quarters, that I am unlikely at this point to exceed my past accomplishments, unlikely to do anything surprising; that I will continue to distinguish myself in the second ra
nk of exploration. I should add that I am not so regarded by other explorers or those who follow exploration closely.

  “The front rank of American explorers is a front rank of one. It contains no one else’s name but Peary’s. No explorer in history has been more ‘backed’ than he has. The uninformed, by whom he is regarded as our explorer laureate, appointed to his position of pre-eminence for life, have given no thought to who should succeed him.

  “That someone must soon succeed him—that he is, however unwillingly, about to step down—they do not know as yet. Nor should we so much as hint at it tonight. Do not say a word to them of Peary’s condition. If they ask you what you think his chances are of reaching the pole, tell them that if any man, after three years in the Arctic, still has strength enough to make it to the pole, that man is Peary.

  “You should say nothing even faintly critical about him. We should seem to be Peary’s admiring rivals, his gentlemen competitors.

  “They will watch you, Devlin, not so much to see what you make of yourself as to see what life makes of you, to see what becomes of you.”

  “I had hoped to make a new beginning here,” I said. “Now it seems that I am regarded in New York as I was in St. John’s: as being fated to wind up like my parents.”

  “No, no, it is just the opposite. They do not know what you are fated for because most of them do not believe in fate, not really. Americans, even those who not only value social standing but believe it is fixed, immutable, do not like to think in terms of fate. There is, I know, a contradiction there, but they could not be bothered to acknowledge it. Americans like to think that anything is possible, that ours is a country of limitless opportunity for all. One cannot believe that and believe in fate.”