Twisted River

by Kelsey Gietl

“Is this the new Missus?” Mrs. Kincade asked followed by a brief pause. “I see. Well, I do hope she’s better than the last one.” Her volume raised, words directed at Maggie and tone clipped on each one. “Did you know that it was I who found those poor children left behind to starve? Never pictured Mrs. Frye’d go all half-cocked and leave ’em that way. You can bet your bottom dollar I won’t make the same mistake again. You harm those babies and you’ll have my husband’s pistol to answer to.”

  Hugo coughed. “Mrs. Kincade, I assure you that will not be happening.”

  “Best not.” Her voice swiveled away, now radically calmer. “Do be careful, Mr. Frye.” Another movement and the door slammed.

  “Upstairs,” Hugo gruffed. Maggie tilted her head enough to see him yank Henry up by the elbow. With a firm grip to his son’s collar, Hugo pushed Henry through the doorway. “Stay in your bedroom until you can remember to not take what isn’t yours. Study your numbers while you’re considering what punishments await thieves.” After a few swipes through his hair in frustration, Hugo retrieved Elsa’s basket and set it on the counter beside Maggie. His eyes studied her while hers studied the half-chopped potato in her hand.

  “Are you all right?” he asked quietly.

  “Perfectly.” The word expelled with heat, but its force petered out as quickly as it emerged. She chopped through another potato. “As my mother would say, ‘Never allow a man to see your tears. He’ll lord it over you forever.’”

  Hugo continued to observe her without further comment. He just stared without saying anything for the longest two minutes, enough time for their nearness to grow uncomfortable, enough time that Maggie finally set down her knife and turned her chin. Little crinkles tapered the corners of his attentive eyes, the brown specks emerging from the green, as though each contained a stagnant pond and she tossed a pebble in for the first time in ages. As if he wasn’t seeing a different side of her so much as himself. Finally, he drew a handkerchief from his jacket’s inner pocket and offered it to her. When she refused, he gently pressed it into her hand. “Please. Take it. It’s because of me that you’re miserable.”

  “I’m not miserable.” But she blew her nose anyway and nearly lost her lunch all over the kitchen. The cloth was pungent, like fermented cheese hidden underneath a soup of turpentine. “Heavens, the smell.” She flung the handkerchief and sidestepped him in haste to the adjacent bathroom. The horrid scent had leached onto her fingers and even a thorough soap scrub still left wisps behind. Thankfully it worked well enough, however, to restrain her lurching stomach.

  Hugo remained where she left him. His hands had crept into his pockets where she assumed the foul handkerchief also disappeared to. “I’m that rank, am I, Miss Margaret? So dreadful women flee in my wake?” He watched her wipe still damp hands on her apron. “I’m aware that when a person marries typically it’s no holds barred, although I didn’t think brutal honesty applied to business partners. Should we pen a contract amendment?” The small attempt at wit didn’t deliver well. Even so, the sparkle in his effervescent eyes brought a twitch to her lips.

  “No,” she said. “Your handkerchief smells exceedingly foul. Although I cannot place the odor.”

  “Chemicals from the studio. I use them in development, so by the end of the day, the smell ends up all over my fingers. Hence my hands now safely in my pockets.” He shrugged, his trouser hems rising with the motion. “Not the most pleasant; still, it does the trick. Would you like to see the studio sometime?” He offered a crooked smile. “I can show you how it all works.”

  She returned to slicing potatoes with a noncommittal wave. “I’ve seen enough in your study.”

  “There’s so much more to it than that. Imagine what I could teach you!” His hands whirled as he became lost in a tangent about frames and lenses, lighting styles and the way a camera could capture one’s face like no other. “If you’re my business partner, Miss Margaret, you need to learn the business.”

  Unable to stop herself, Maggie laughed, a deep sound that found its way to every muscle and left her stomach aching. He so reminded her of the excitement she and Tena shared on childhood Christmas mornings. Side by side, they laid with temples pressed together and arms linked as they whispered about all the wonderful presents they would receive that year. Now here she was with this little boy so excited to show her all his own special gadgets.

  “Was Emma as invested in all this as you are?” she asked.

  His smile died mid-laugh. “No. She did a marvelous job of listening to me squawk then pretending like she actually cared.” He snapped his fingers and with it, his boyish attitude returned as quickly as it left. “The trick, Miss Margaret, is to act extremely enthused about whatever your husband is interested in. It makes him feel important, and as a bonus, he will reciprocate when you cluck on about knitting needles or whatever silly thing you women like these days.”

  “Certainly not knitting,” Maggie scoffed. She reached into the lower cupboard for a stock pot. “Lady Alexander was lucky I could mend a fallen seam.”

  Taking the pot from her hands, Hugo tilted it under the sink tap. “We can change that. My sewing machine and I have taken up together quite nicely these past few years. But that lesson is for another day.”

  He stripped off his jacket, tossed it over the nearest chair, and gestured for the knife in her hand. “Tonight we at long last celebrate our partnership with a proper meal.”

  NINETEEN

  November 24, 1912 –

  Two weeks later

  “If it wasn’t so awfully cold, we could take some outside,” Hugo admonished for the fourth time that afternoon. He scrunched his brow and peered up at the studio’s skylight. “A pleasant sun on a day this cold is flat out cruel.”

  “Stop your grousing. You wanted to show me the studio, didn’t you?” Closing one eye, Maggie squinted into the small window on the back of Hugo’s boxy camera, currently secured to the same wooden tripod he used for the Kischs’ family photo. As he instructed, she analyzed the frame’s width compared to the angle of late autumn sun through the second story skylights of Frye Photography.

  The weather had turned cold last week, the collection of vibrant red and gold leaves along the Mississippi riverbank turned brown overnight. Even so, it hadn’t been enough to dampen her spirits. Ever since the night she and Hugo finally celebrated their partnership, she had been able to sleep and able to smile. With their newfound understanding—and Hugo’s assistance—meals were now edible and conversation no longer lacking. When she settled herself into bed, the baby’s feet set to tapping their nightly dance, and she was actually glad to feel them.

  “So I squeeze this and it releases the shutter?” Even though Hugo nodded, Maggie paused with her eye to the viewfinder and fingers around the bulb. “Won’t this waste the film?”

  “Only if you consider it a waste,” Hugo said. “Others might consider it art.”

  “I consider it a photograph of an empty settee.” She waved a hand above the camera. “Sit, please. You will be my first subject.”

  Hugo continued to hover near her elbow. “Now that would be a waste of film.” He whistled to Molly and Isa sitting on the floor, currently deep into building their own contraption from a box of old camera parts. They had been more than enthusiastic to visit the studio while Henry, on the other hand, refused to ascend the studio stairs. After much fuss, Hugo finally relented to his son remaining in the downstairs parlor with Damaris.

  “Girls,” he called. “Come be in Miss Margaret’s photograph.” With a squeal, they ran over to plop themselves down on the sofa.

  “And you too, Mr. Frye.”

  Tilting her face away from the viewfinder, Maggie fixed him with a cold stare. “You’re always taking the photographs. How long has it been since you were in one?” She pointed again at the empty space between his daughters. “Sit, Mr. Frye.” With a half-hearted grumble, he dropped onto the sofa and fixed the camera with a flat stare.

  Turning her attenti
on back to the viewfinder, she squeezed the bulb like he showed her and heard a click as the shutter collapsed upon itself. “Brilliant!” she squealed. “I did it, didn’t I?” She reached for the back panel to retrieve the film slide.

  “Leave that there!” Hugo leapt forward as she flipped the clips up and the back panel opened. He sighed. “That floods it with light and overexposes the film.”

  Maggie stared at the rectangular slide in her hand. It didn’t look any different than when they inserted it. “Overexposure is bad, is it?”

  “Not if you want your photographs undecipherable.” He took the slide from her hand. “I’ll find another, and you’ll try again.” Casting her a scowl that contradicted his smile, he headed behind the curtain that separated the workroom from the rest of the studio.

  The second their father disappeared, Isa hopped feet first onto the settee. “Bounce!” she squealed as the sofa springs groaned under her enthusiasm. Maggie caught her mid-bounce, swinging the sprout onto her hip while at the same time her stomach visibly fluttered. Molly grinned and with light touches, prodded the baby until he—or she—returned another playful response. Entertaining their new sibling had become the girls’ favorite game these last few weeks. Maggie knew she shouldn’t indulge them, that attachment now would only make everything more difficult when it eventually came time to part ways. But Molly and Isa were the same tiny sprouts she and Tena started out as, wide-eyed and wondering, unable to believe their mother was anything but lovely. Molly splayed her fingers over her stepmother’s stomach, her grin lighting a face as lovely as a sunrise. No one else looked at Maggie like those girls did.

  It was only the pregnancy speaking, she reminded herself. Only two more months, then she wouldn’t feel such sentiment at the slightest of things.

  When the baby’s little foot pressed against her palm, Molly gently nudged it back and held her breath until the tiny movement came again. She exhaled, finally bringing her gaze back to Maggie’s. With a voice full of wonder, she whispered, “You must be Daddy’s most special friend.”

  “I suppose that’s an accurate descriptor.” Most special friend was certainly more accurate than wife. Isa squirmed from Maggie’s arms to land in a heap on the floor beside her sister. She used Maggie’s leg to climb up where she could press an ear to her stepmother’s middle. “Baby?” she whispered. “Hello, baby.”

  “You are special,” Molly continued seriously. “Otherwise Daddy wouldn’t bring you here. He never lets us come here neither.”

  “I don’t hear anything,” Isa pouted.

  Molly poked Maggie and the baby let off a proud kick to Isa’s face. “Ow!” Isa cried. Backing off, she wagged a finger at Maggie’s stomach. “Bad baby! No hit!”

  Lunging, Maggie snatched Isa around the waist, eliciting wild giggles as she tickled the child. “Never?” she asked Molly. It seemed impossible that a man so absorbed in family would refuse his children entrance into such an important piece of himself.

  Molly shook her head, pretty crimson curls bobbing against her shoulders. “That’s why Aunt Damaris was angry at dinner. This is her and Daddy’s special secret place. Even Mama never saw it.”

  Never? Maggie dashed through the reasons Hugo may have invited her here and not Emma. Only one made the most sense. He hadn’t. Molly was barely two when her mother left; the simple memories of children were not the complex truths of adults.

  “A quid for your thoughts?” Hugo asked as he rejoined them. Thoughts still jumbled with Molly’s innocent words, she stared at him too long without replying. He frowned. “Was that wrong? It’s not a quid?”

  Maggie flinched and her eyes finally focused. Hugo was holding the small black Brownie camera that he seemed to carry around everywhere. It was the same one he brought to Charles’s funeral. He once told her it was so simple to use even Henry and Molly could do it. “Apologies,” she said. “I’m afraid I wandered off for a minute.”

  “Is everything all right?”

  She buried all further consideration within her smile. “Of course, but if the saying is ‘a penny for your thoughts’ then it wouldn’t change when in England. A quid is most equivalent in nature to an American dollar.” She laughed when his brow scrunched in confusion. “Just you wait, Mr. Frye. When you visit England someday and hear talk of florins and tuppence and groats, I dare say you’ll be glad for the simplicity of American currency.”

  “At the rate I’m going, an overseas holiday will not be on the schedule for another two thousand years.”

  “Two thousand years? If you’ve discovered the secret to immortality, please do share with the rest of us.”

  “See, Mrs. Frye, you’re more clever than you let on.” With a wide grin, Hugo handed her the Brownie. “Let’s try some with this one instead. Girls, back to the sofa, please.”

  He found her clever? she thought. Well, she had certainly been called worse. Rarely had she been called better.

  Balancing the black Brownie on her swollen abdomen, she peered down into the viewfinder. Hugo’s inverted appearance filled the glass, an arm around each of his daughters and the twinkle that seldom left his eyes these days.

  With a smile, she lined up the frame and flipped the lever.

  ~~~

  The next hour flew by and before Maggie knew it, she was able to capture photographs with nearly the same proficiency as either Henry or Molly—or at least so Hugo claimed. She returned the Brownie to its case and stepped downstairs in search of Henry. Damaris glowered at her from the swivel desk chair she occupied, brows nearly knit together. In one hand she held a camera casing, a dingy rag in the other, and an assortment of other bits and pieces sat upon a towel on the desktop. Grunting, she slid the rag along the edge of the camera with the precision of one cleaning a revolver and from her scowl, probably wishing it was one.

  “Is my brother leaving soon?” she asked. “Sunday is supposed to be my day off.”

  “He’s packing the cases as we speak.”

  “Good. No sense stuck in here when I could be outside with my camera.”

  “You’re a photographer too?”

  “What’d you think, stupid? I was just the hired help?” Seizing two unrecognizable camera parts, she slid one inside the other and flipped a latch back into place. “Let’s get somethin’ straight, sweet cheeks. I know this equipment better than my brother does and capture photographs a whole lot better too. For instance, that one’s mine.” She pointed at a framed landscape of spectacular white polished buildings set against a background of fir trees and white-capped mountains. The plate read Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition, 1909.

  “Lovely,” Maggie admitted. Damaris obviously had inherited the same talent as her brother, although she suspected the woman rarely received the public accolades Hugo did. If that was the inherent reason for her bitterness, perhaps all Maggie need do was extend the olive branch. “Damaris, for your brother’s sake, perhaps we could—”

  “Listen, child,” Damaris cut in. “We ain’t family. At least not to me. So don’t apologize for being who you are, because I certainly won’t.”

  So much for the olive branch. The dove must have flown away from the ark and drowned itself. “Point noted,” Maggie gritted. “Have you seen Henry?”

  Damaris jerked her chin towards the rear office. “Alley.”

  “Thanks.” She snatched her coat off the rack.

  Judging from the shambled wreckage of Hugo’s office, it became clear why he chose Mr. Huppert for his lawyer. Two overflowing filing cabinets stood against one wall, an unlit potbelly stove in the opposite corner, and between them, a table littered with coffee mugs and a half-filled percolator. Stacks of paper—including several old overdue notices from Donovan—occupied the desktop along with a pile of flat twine-and-paper wrapped commissions ready for delivery. On the wall behind the desk, two thin boards had been tacked together to create a makeshift shelf on which sat five framed photographs—Henry, Molly, Isa, and a glowing youthful Emma. The final photograph was
of Hugo.

  Barely out of his youth, Hugo stood on the sidewalk outside Frye Photography Studio, one hand propped to his hip as the other braced the camera standing at his side. With the faintest of smirks and his signature tousled locks, he stared the photographer down as though to say, “I own this place and this camera, and with it, I can do anything.” He was pre-heartbreak, ready and waiting to conquer the world. In a way, his expression reminded her of Reuben; however, the similarities between her current partner and her old flame ended there.

  Hugo’s son on the other hand often reminded her all too much of a younger version of Reuben. When she opened the door to the alley, Henry’s sullen stare and clenched fists folded across his chest ignited memories of the day she first interrupted Reuben mid-mourning in the cemetery. He had berated her cheerful attitude and for not considering the pain he endured through his sister’s loss. Without intention, her smile drew him in like flies to honey, an attraction she couldn’t recognize then and barely understood now—one day in many she would redo if she could.

  “Henry,” she said gently. “It’s time to head home. Your father’s waiting.”

  “So? I’m not going.” Henry’s voice could have been Reuben’s. Cold, angry, distant—the sound of a child afraid of his feelings, afraid of what it could mean to share them. The gentle swell of her abdomen left her imagining what would be if this baby shared that same inner turmoil.

  She carefully maneuvered the rickety stairs into the windswept alley and longed for the day when her coat could again button fully. “Henry, let’s not have another squabble. Can’t you at least try to be pleasant for your father’s sake? He wants us to be a family.”

  Henry’s eyelids narrowed to slits. “No, he doesn’t.” He kicked at the bottom step, running his shoe into the wood until a piece chipped away. Then he proceeded to do the same with the other foot.

  “Your father would not approve of that behavior.”

  Another chunk of wood shot into the alley. His shoulders extended in the most minuscule of shrugs. “Aw, go on and let him scold me. I don’t mind.”