by Ruth Reichl
“My lucky day.” Mitch picked up a chicken leg. “In more ways than one.” He winked at me.
“Have a pickle.” Sammy held out the mason jar. “Kirbys. I brined them myself.” He gestured toward the mansion. “I understand that you have breached the locks. What dark secrets have you unearthed?”
“A rather remarkable library. After lunch I’ll give you a tour, if you like.”
“Thank you very much, but that will not be necessary. I was on the premises long before the room was declared off-limits. I do not suppose that it has undergone a transformation in the intervening years.” He shaded his eyes against the sun and looked toward the garden wall. “On the other hand, that strange heap over there does pique my curiosity. Whatever can it be?”
“I’ve been wondering that myself,” said Mitch.
I put down my chicken thigh. “Oyster shells,” I told them. “The gardeners complained that every time they stuck a shovel in the dirt, they turned up more shells.”
“Interesting.” Mitch eyed the heap appraisingly. “New York Harbor was once lined with oysters. You could walk out at low tide and gather them by the bushel. The poor lived on them.”
“But the Timbers family wasn’t poor.” I bit into one of Sammy’s pickles, and the flavor filled my mouth. “Why would they have a yard filled with oyster shells? It makes no sense.”
“Another piece of the puzzle. Okay if I take this?” Mitch held up a chicken thigh. “It’s what I like best about my work. As you gather information, you’re coaxing a building to reveal its secrets. In the end it always fits together. You just have to find the pattern.”
Sammy and Mitch talked about old buildings for a while, and I sat listening, thinking it was a subject they both loved. After half an hour or so, Mitch stood up and began to stack the plates. He grabbed a brownie and tossed it in the air. “I’ll take this for later, okay? Thanks for lunch; when I took this job, I had no idea I’d get so lucky.”
Sammy watched him amble off. “So that is your Mr. Complainer.” As I helped him repack the wicker basket, he mused, “Although he seems like a perfectly pleasant fellow, he presents an extremely unwelcome complication. He is far too curious for my taste, and I do not like the notion of seeking Lulu’s last letter while he is on the premises. How long is he expected to remain?”
“Nobody has said.”
“I fear your presence here may slow his progress.”
“What are you talking about?”
Sammy did not dignify that with an answer. “Your young man does not strike me as a fool, and I do not imagine that Anzio will escape his attention for very long. And then where will we be?”
“You worry too much,” I said. “And I have to get back to work. There was a mountain of mail this morning.”
It was true. In the five months since Delicious! had closed, the volume of mail had increased threefold. It was as if the readers were trying to wish their beloved magazine back into existence.
Today’s most promising project was a reader looking for Talamanca peppercorns from Ecuador. “In the May 2008 issue,” she wrote, “you said that these were the best peppercorns in the world. And you were right! They are wonderfully fragrant and spicier than any other peppercorn I have ever used. They make Tellicherry seem laughable. I have been ordering them from the source you suggested, but yesterday, when I tried to reorder, I was told that they are no longer in stock. Help! I am like an addict in need of a fix. Please tell me where I can replenish my supply.”
It was the perfect distraction; an hour later I was talking to a passionate pepper importer who had a great deal to say about the fragrance and flavor of his particular pepper. I was so deep in conversation that I was startled to look up and find Mitch standing in the doorway. How long had he been there?
“Did you know,” I told him when the pepper importer finally hung up, “that peppercorns represent twenty-five percent of the world trade in spices?”
“Fascinating. But not nearly as fascinating as what I’ve just found.”
A flash of adrenaline lurched through me. Anzio! Already! “How’d you find it?”
He looked amused. “The basement is always the first place you explore in an old house.”
“The basement?” I was so confused, I didn’t have to feign surprise. The word came out oddly, all the emphasis on the first syllable.
“Yes, the basement. In many Federal houses, the basement isn’t completely subterranean. The first floor, or parlor floor, had the formal rooms, where guests were received. The bedrooms were upstairs, on the second and third floors, and if there was an office, or a library, it was generally up there too. The servants’ rooms were always on the top floor. So what’s missing from this picture?”
“The kitchen!” I was so relieved.
“Exactly. Come see.”
I followed him into the hall, and he talked as we walked. “In houses like this, they usually put the kitchen belowground so it would be cool in the summer and warm in winter. I went downstairs to try to find the old kitchen, and I found the original hearth.”
“But Joan-Mary and Chris spent a lot of time down there.”
“I’m sure they did; wait until you see the furnace! They must have been so preoccupied with the infrastructure that they missed everything else. Can’t blame them; it’s from the dark ages. It can’t possibly be code, but it’s probably been grandfathered.” He opened the door to the basement and led me down some rickety stairs. “Be careful here. They’re rotten in some places. Hold on to me and put your feet where mine were.”
I put my hands on his waist, stepped cautiously, kept close. The basement had windows all around, but they were so grimy that even on this bright day we were plunged into murky gloom. We reached the bottom and waded into dancing dust that enveloped us in an ancient, musty smell.
A huge contraption towered over us like an enormous metallic spider, its attenuated legs impeding our progress. Mitch took my hand to lead me behind the furnace. “This thing must be at least a hundred years old,” he said, pounding on one of the long, rusted pipes with his free hand. “Watch your head.”
We ducked beneath the labyrinth of pipes, slowly making our way to the back wall. I was so aware of my hand in his that when he let it go I felt a little jolt of disappointment.
“There!” Mitch pointed proudly to an enclosed fireplace. It didn’t look like much to me, but it was dark. I went closer to inspect it, running my hands across the rough brick surface.
“See?” he exulted, coming up behind me. “It’s not just a hearth, it’s the original beehive oven, built right into the wall. That’s very rare: Almost all the old ovens were demolished when cast-iron stoves came in. I think it may be the only one in the city. Joan-Mary’s not going to be pleased.”
“Why not? Won’t she be thrilled?”
“It creates a complication.” I stared at the old oven, remembering Joan-Mary’s worry that Mitch would find something too interesting. Apparently he had. “When the Landmarks Preservation Commission gets wind of it, they may want to landmark the interior of the building.” He was right behind me now, speaking in my ear.
“But wouldn’t that make the mansion more valuable?” I did not turn around.
I could feel him shake his head. “Probably the opposite. At the moment, anyone who buys the mansion can do whatever they damn please. Even,” he added darkly, “tear down the walls, the way Pickwick did up on the fourth floor. But if the interior gets landmarked, every change will have to be approved by the commission.”
“What about the library? Wouldn’t that be worth landmarking?”
“A library”—I was aware of his breath on my neck, and little shivers ran up my arms—“even a very beautiful one, isn’t all that rare, and I’m not compelled to go running to the commission about it.”
Wait until you find Anzio, I thought. Wait until you discover it’s more than a beautiful old library. Wait until you find out it was a stop on the Underground Railroad. I had no doubt he wo
uld find the hidden room; the only question was when.
He put his hands on my shoulders, and I felt the shock down to my toes. He leaned in, whispering in my ear, “Let’s just say that Joan-Mary may regret having hired me.” Very slowly, he turned me so that we were standing face-to-face. He was speaking so low that I had to lean in to him to hear. “I, on the other hand”—his hand was gently caressing my cheek—“am very pleased she did.”
His breath smelled like fruit, like oranges and cherries. I realized I’d been waiting for this moment since I’d first seen him sitting on the steps. I looked at his hands, thinking of Rosalie as I noticed that he wore no rings. How had she known? Then he put his arms around me, and as he began to kiss me, I inhaled the clean, slightly salty tang of his body. His beard was very soft. I tried to think of the last time I’d been kissed. It was so long ago—in another lifetime, the one in which Genie was still alive. Finally I stopped thinking altogether and simply kissed him back.
I’d forgotten what it was like to live in your senses and let time stop. When he let me go, I felt breathless and slightly dizzy, and as I came slowly back into my body and the room, I remembered where I was. I opened my eyes and looked up at him, this lovely man with the wild brown curls. His eyes met mine with so much hope.
“Don’t you ever hide your feelings?” I asked.
He put one hand on each side of my face, and for a long moment we looked at each other. He didn’t blink. “Fear doesn’t get you very far,” he said. “At least in my experience.”
I thought how much confidence it took to walk through the world with your heart on your sleeve. Hope can’t hurt. And then I thought how lucky I was to be here, to be experiencing this. Things can change in a single moment.
I thought of Lulu then, and I reached out and touched the stove again, just to ground myself. I ran my fingers across the rough surface of the old hearth, and through my heightened senses I was aware of every sound, every scent.
Maybe it was being with Mitch that made me really look at that hearth and think about the generations of women who had stood here over the centuries, cooking food for the family upstairs—and, for a little while, at least, for the fugitives hidden away on the fourth floor.
For the first time it struck me that the hidden room was very far away. Who had carried the food up and the chamber pots down? Was it the servants? Did someone in the family sneak up the stairs in the dark of night, ferrying food to the secret guests? With that thought came another one: I knew where to find the final clue. Had known, in fact, for quite a while.
“What?” Mitch had felt the tremor run through me. “What just happened?”
“I had an idea.” I buried my face in his chest. I loved the way he smelled. “It’s something I should have thought of a long time ago.”
Between Triborough Bridge and Union Square
FLUSHED AND CONFUSED, I WAS HAPPY TO FIND A MESSAGE FROM Mrs. Cloverly waiting in my office.
“It was that chocolate ice cream,” she said plaintively. “The recipe promised that it would be the richest I’d ever tasted.… ”
I remembered tasting it for Diana, remembered the Fontanari cream I’d insisted she use when she was working out the recipe. As Mrs. Cloverly talked on, I sent Diana an email, imagining her laughter as she read Mrs. Cloverly’s bizarre combination of carob powder, instant coffee, and skim milk. “She hasn’t changed a bit,” I wrote. “The ice cream was simply vile.”
As I typed, I could hear Mitch moving about the mansion. I thought he’d enjoy Mrs. Cloverly, and I followed the sound until I found him, upstairs in the photo studio. He was tapping on walls and thumping on floors, but when I told him the stories, he roared with delight. “Oh, I’d love to meet her,” he said, and then, as if this were something we’d discussed, asked casually, “Where should we have dinner tonight?”
It took a lot for me to say, “I can’t have dinner with you tonight.”
He looked more surprised than disappointed. “You’ve had a better offer in the last half hour?”
“No, but I have a previous commitment.” It wasn’t a complete lie. Mitch was going to find the secret room, and he was going to find it soon. I had to get there first. His talk about the Landmarks Commission had made me uneasy; once he knew about it, everyone else would too. This wasn’t something I could put off.
He seemed to accept that. “Rain check?” he asked.
“Rain check,” I agreed.
“Tomorrow, then?”
“Tomorrow,” I promised.
He leaned down and kissed me, once on each cheek. “I’ll dream about you.” And he began to gather up his tools.
It was almost eight by then, and I went around behind him, turning out the lights. The moon was full, and it gave the furniture a silvery glow and filled the Timbers Mansion with a sense of peace. Walking through the lovely rooms, I felt for the first time that the library belonged here. The house was reclaiming its spirit, and the library, which had stood aloof and apart for so many years, was turning back into what it was always meant to be: the heart of this home.
I went to the card catalog, kneeling to reach the bottom drawer of the old wooden cabinet. I turned the cards, one by one, until I came to “Underground Railroad,” right where I’d expected it to be.
To a casual reader, Bertie’s words would have been meaningless. “The Underground Railroad,” he had written, “operated for one brief, hopeful moment in history. Strangers reached out to one another, offering aid and the promise of a better life.” I imagined them as he must have, this improbable pair, the older man helping the young girl survive her war. “These encounters,” Bertie continued, “were mostly fleeting—ships passing quickly in the night. But sometimes the perilous undertaking forged lasting ties, and lives were irrevocably changed.” I stopped for a moment, savoring the final line. “Recipes from that time were rarely written down. Most were passed from one person to the next in a long oral tradition. The ‘New York’ archives of 1948, however, contain one extraordinary exception.”
I went into the secret room, making a point of pulling the bookcase back into place and closing the door behind me. This felt like a solemn moment. I had not thought of looking in the “New York” section, but the file was exactly where Bertie had put it so many years ago, a slim folder filed between “Triborough Bridge” and “Union Square.” I opened the “Underground Railroad” folder, knowing that Bertie had been the last one to touch it, shivering as I extracted the single envelope.
EASTER SUNDAY, MARCH 28, 1948
Dear Mr. Beard,
It sounded so romantic when you suggested meeting at Macy’s butcher shop. But when the time finally came, I wished we’d chosen a more conventional place. How would you know me? What if I was a disappointment? What if you saw me and walked away? For one terrible moment as I was crossing Herald Square, I wished I’d let Mother come with me, and by the time I walked through the door I was shaking with nerves.
I saw you right away, but your back was to me, and I just stood there, trying to decide whether to run away. Then you turned around. Until that moment, I thought that when people spoke of someone’s face “lighting up,” it was merely a figure of speech.
Oh, Mr. Beard, I have every moment stored away, and when things get sad here in Akron I’ll think about how we baked together in your little kitchen. I had the strangest feeling that we’d done it all before, that I knew what you were going to say before you said it. Even before we took them out of the oven, I knew my Snowballs were going to be too sweet. You’re right—it is a child’s cookie and I am grown now. The recipe will have to change.
Dinner at your house! I still cannot believe that Mother agreed that eighteen is old enough to drink a glass of wine. I don’t think I’ll ever forget the taste of that Burgundy, or the way it felt in my mouth, almost heavy, so different from water.
I believed that was the best day of my life—but only because Saturday had not yet come. I remember every single thing we did, from breakfast
at Rumplemeyer’s—surely that is the world’s best hot chocolate—to riding down Fifth Avenue on the top of the double-decker bus.
When I told Tommy about all the odd foods we saw in the Chinatown stores—dried shrimp and turtles and great long octopuses—he thought I was making it up. But when I told him about that poor frog hopping down the sidewalk, trying to make his escape, he laughed until tears ran down his face. I wish he could have been with us at the funny little “Chinese tea parlor,” because he would have enjoyed the way they bring the food around on trays and let you point at the dishes you want. He would have appreciated the simplicity of that—and the way they calculate the bill by counting the empty plates.
But I’m glad that he wasn’t with us at Le Pavillon. He would never have understood that meal or how much it meant to me. For the few hours that we were at the table, I felt as if I’d become a different person.
Maybe it was the way Mr. Soulé made me feel when I walked into that beautiful room, as if he’d been waiting especially for me. I remember every morsel, from the sole in its silken sauce to the chicken with black truffles. Isn’t it odd that it took a luxurious meal like that to make me understand what Mrs. Cappuzzelli has been trying to teach me all along? A great meal is an experience that nourishes more than your body.
The feeling stayed with me. The next morning, when Mother, Mr. Jones, and I were walking through those strange, crowded downtown streets, where people were sticking their hands into pickle barrels, pointing to smoked fish, and eating sliced herring, I saw the scene in a whole new way. They weren’t buying food: They were finding their way home.
We walked through Little Italy and Greenwich Village, and I tried to imagine myself in a foreign country. And while I was imagining, Father came back to me so strongly. I could smell the aftershave he used to wear, and once I was sure I heard his voice behind me. It wasn’t him, of course, but it made me feel sure again that Father is not dead.
That feeling used to make me so unhappy, but now that Mother has Mr. Jones, and I’m going off to Wellesley College, I’m not angry anymore. I’m certain that Father is alive, and, wherever he is, I hope that he is happy.