Amherst

by William Nicholson

  I cannot make an Indian Pipe but please accept a Humming Bird.

  A Route of Evanescence

  With a revolving Wheel—

  A Resonance of Emerald—

  A Rush of Cochineal—

  And every Blossom on the Bush

  Adjusts its tumbled Head—

  The mail from Tunis probably

  An easy Morning’s Ride—

  That without suspecting it you should send me the preferred flower of life seems almost supernatural, and the sweet glee that I felt at meeting it I could confide to none—I still cherish the clutch with which I bore it from the ground when a wondering child, an unearthly booty, and maturity only enhances mystery, never decreases it—

  Mabel didn’t understand the poem, but she thrilled to the hint in the note that Emily felt her to be a kindred spirit. Now she could be sure that she had allies in the Homestead. At the same time, Sue continued to include her in all the gatherings she hosted at the Evergreens. At Sue’s request, Mabel gave Mattie lessons on the piano. And unperceived by either of them, shy young Ned’s admiration for Mrs. Todd grew into a secret passion.

  One crisp December day Mabel joined the family, which on this occasion comprised Sue, Ned, and Mattie, on a sleigh ride. They bowled at a great pace down the Sunderland road and over the half-frozen Mill River, their breath smoky in the air, their cheeks pink. Mabel wore a fur-trimmed hood tight round her face, her eyes shining brightly with the excitement of the ride. Ned, who was driving, saw her delight and urged the horses on, until Sue had to call on him, laughing, to slow down.

  “You’ll have us all in the ditch, you foolish boy! What am I to say to Mr. Todd when he returns, if he finds a wife broken in two?”

  “What do I care for Mr. Todd?” cried Ned. “I don’t care if he never returns!”

  At the bridge they climbed down from the sleigh and threw snowballs over the ice, competing to see who could make their snowball slide the farthest. Ned discovered that the tighter the snow was packed, the farther it slid over the ice. He made a snowball for Mabel, and she threw it, and by a lucky throw it outpaced all the others.

  “But it was your snowball, Ned.”

  “And your throw,” said Ned. “We are joint victors.”

  He took her gloved hand and looked, laughing, deep into her eyes.

  “So you see, Mrs. Todd,” he said, “together we can overcome the world.”

  Mabel enjoyed Ned’s gallantries without taking them seriously. He was still a boy as far as she was concerned, though in plain figures he was only five years her junior.

  On their return to the Evergreens, Ned said to Mabel, “Now, in exchange for my driving I ask for some singing.”

  But Austin was waiting. He expressed the intention of going out for a stroll, to see the winter sunset.

  “We’ve just got back,” said Sue. “Why would we want to go out again? Make up the fire. Mabel is going to sing for us.”

  Mabel was standing by Austin’s side. Austin turned to her.

  “I know Mrs. Todd shares my love for sunsets. I ask her as a kindness to keep me company, if only to the end of the street.”

  Ned looked round to claim Mabel for the party in the house, and saw the way his father looked at her, and the way she looked back, and how they both quickly broke the look. There was nothing more to it, but in that moment, with the heightened sensibility of a lover, Ned understood that there was an intimacy between them.

  “It’s true that I do love the sunset,” said Mabel. “I’m sure I shall sing all the more sweetly after I’ve watched the day end in all its glory.”

  Ned looked on in silence. He saw Mrs. Todd reach for her coat to go out again. He saw how his father helped her to put it on. He saw the door close behind them.

  Mattie ran off to find her little brother, Gib. Sue knelt on the rug before the fire to warm her hands. Ned crossed the room slowly, and stood in silence behind his mother.

  “That was a fine brisk ride,” said Sue, “but you must take care not to wear out the horses. You know how your father loves them.”

  “Do I?” said Ned.

  Sue looked round, surprised by his tone.

  “What’s the matter, Ned?”

  “My father loves sunsets, too.”

  “What of it? What’s come over you?”

  Ned knew he should say nothing, but he was unable to hold back the bitterness rising within him.

  “My father is very attentive to Mrs. Todd,” he said.

  “Why should he not be? She’s a charming friend to us. To you most of all, I should say.”

  “No, Mother. Not to me most of all.”

  “To whom, then?”

  “You may choose to be blind if you wish,” exclaimed Ned. “I wish I could be blind.”

  With that he left the room.

  Sue was not altogether blind. Prompted by Ned’s outburst, she set to reviewing recent events in a fresh light.

  By the time Austin and Mabel returned, it was fully dark outside.

  “It must have been a fine sunset,” said Sue. “I began to think you were waiting for the dawn as well.”

  “We stayed to see the last light fade in the sky,” said Mabel. “And now I’m back and ready to take my place at the piano.”

  “I think perhaps we’ve had enough excitements for the day,” said Sue. “We take up far too much of your time as it is, Mrs. Todd.”

  Mabel looked at Sue in some surprise.

  “You know you have only to ask,” she said.

  “What’s the matter, Sue?” said Austin sharply. “Are you sending Mrs. Todd away?”

  “Ned has a headache,” said Sue. “I think it would be better if we were quiet this evening.”

  “It would be better if we were quiet every evening,” said Austin angrily.

  “Please, Mr. Dickinson,” said Mabel, “don’t concern yourself over me. I have so many letters to write. I’ll take myself off, and sing another day.” To Sue, “My sympathies to Ned.”

  “Then I’ll see you home,” said Austin.

  “Perhaps you can watch the moon rise,” said Sue.

  To this Austin gave no answer.

  For a while they walked in silence up the street. Then Austin said to Mabel, “I’m not surprised. I had expected something of this sort sooner.”

  Mabel, distressed, said very low, “What are we to do?”

  “Nothing.”

  “I don’t want Sue to hate me.”

  “If she believes I love you, then she will hate you. There’s nothing to be done about that.”

  “Why must your love for me make you love her any the less?”

  “It doesn’t. If anything, loving you makes me feel more kindly towards my wife. But that’s not how Sue works. She’ll assume that any love I give to you is taken from her. Dear God! If only she knew! I have no love for her to take. There has been no love in my life, until you.”

  A whisper: “My darling.”

  “If Sue starts to hate you, will you stop loving me?”

  “Never, ever. But must she hate me? How will that make her happy? I wish we could all love each other. Why can’t she be like David? He understands.”

  “How much have you told him?”

  “Nothing, and everything. We haven’t spoken of it openly. But we will.”

  “I envy you that.”

  “Can’t you speak to Sue? Can’t you make her not be afraid?”

  “My sweet darling,” he said with a sigh. “Not everyone has your open, loving nature. Sue will see as the world sees. I’m afraid this means we must be even more careful. We must never be seen alone together.”

  “Never alone!”

  “Not where we can be seen.”

  “Where, then?”

  “There is one place where we can meet,” said Austin, “where our secret will be kept. We can meet in my sisters’ house.”

  “Will Vinnie not think it improper?”

  “Vinnie? She’s not a booby like the rest of them.”<
br />
  “And Emily?”

  “Emily is our friend.”

  This sent a thrill through Mabel.

  “You’ve told her?”

  “I’ve told her of my unhappiness. And I’ve told her of my happiness. Emily no longer lives in Sue’s world.”

  “I know it,” said Mabel. “When I’m sitting with Vinnie, I can always feel her there. I expect it’s foolish of me, but I do feel as if she’s my friend.”

  “Emily knows you’ve given me back life itself. She loves you for that.”

  This was what Mabel had longed to hear. Emily had come to represent to her the higher truth that stood in judgment over her actions. Once she had found this in her father. A part of it now resided in Austin. But both her father and Austin, being men, were subject to female charm, and so their approval was not to be taken as without bias. Emily was beyond fear or favor. She had never set eyes on Mabel. She was the Myth. She lived apart, accepting the pain and the freedom of loneliness. For all these reasons, Mabel bowed her head before her, almost in worship. And now, she learned, her deity graciously received her prayers, and smiled upon her.

  “I wish so much that I could meet her one day,” she said.

  From now on, Mabel was an infrequent visitor at the Evergreens. Mattie ceased coming to her for piano lessons. Ned avoided her. Instead, Mabel took to calling more often on the sisters in the Homestead. And Austin trod the path between the trees, from the side door of the Evergreens to the kitchen door of the Homestead. Now that winter had come, half the house had been shut down, and only the rooms close to the warmth of the kitchen were in use. The parlor couch had been moved into the dining room, and here the lovers were able to be alone together. With the shutters closed and the new iron stove warming the winter air, they could sit and talk to their hearts’ content.

  For all the passion of their words, spoken and written, they maintained a curious formality when in each other’s presence. They called each other Mrs. Todd and Mr. Dickinson. They observed all the customary politenesses. For both of them this was a matter of pride. They wished it to be understood that while their love was illicit, they remained respectable people. It was their pride to claim their love as something finer than the commonplace proprieties of others. Theirs was not some mere abandoned debauch, driven by the base appetites.

  This was all well and good, but it made it hard to move on to the next phase. The shift into physical intimacy had, of course, to be initiated by the man. Austin was shy. He had no practice in the business, and was afraid he would be clumsy. He was afraid he might appear ridiculous. And secretly he was not sure Mabel would welcome such a development. Austin had his share of vanity about his personal appearance; in his youth he had been considered a handsome man. But the long loneliness of his marriage had worn away his confidence, and he no longer believed he possessed physical charm. Even now, in this astonishing flood of answering love, it was all rapture of the spirit, with no mention of the body.

  Austin was now fifty-five years old. His face was pouchy and lined, his body had lost the firmness of youth. Mabel Todd, so vital, so young, could love him for his mind. But if he were to invite her to touch his body, might she not recoil?

  Fortunately Mabel understood this. She too was proud and protective of the nobility of their love. But David had taught her a great deal about the nature of men, and she had no intention of allowing her intimacy with Austin to fall short of the fullest physical expression. She knew how the bond of sexual love held David tight to her, and she wanted the same with Austin. She wanted to please him as no woman had ever pleased him before, knowing that if she succeeded in this, he would love her forever.

  She was happy to let matters proceed slowly, because she was aware of all the obstacles Austin had to overcome in his own mind. Also there was a piquancy to this time before which she sensed gave their love its particular intensity, its pure gemlike flame. But one can’t be sighing and longing and holding back forever.

  One evening in February, in the dining room of the Homestead, she said to him, “I dreamed last night that you kissed me. Do you know, you have never kissed me?”

  “And how was it, in your dream?”

  “It was just like yourself. Tender and true.”

  “I must ask my dream self how he goes about such a thing. It’s been so long since I attempted it, I would hardly know what to do.”

  “There’s no secret to it,” said Mabel.

  She took his hands in hers and stood up, drawing him to follow her. Then she turned her face up to his. She was smaller than him, and he had to bend to reach her. His side-whiskers tickled her cheek. Then his lips brushed hers.

  Ashamed of his awkwardness, he moved away again.

  “I’m no better than a boy of sixteen.”

  “Come,” said Mabel. “Come back to me. Tell me you love me. Just not with words.”

  She drew his face to hers once more, and let her lips gently nuzzle his, making the smallest of movements. Little by little he relaxed, and his lips moved in response. In this way, wordlessly, they whispered their love to each other.

  Then he kissed her cheeks, and her brow, and her closed eyes.

  “I adore you,” he murmured. “I worship you.”

  He was frightened by the intensity of his feelings. They swept through every part of him, taking possession of him. He was filled with wonder and gratitude.

  “I give all I have and all I will ever have just for this moment.”

  Mabel accepted his love joyously. Here was a passion that transcended all other attachments. She rejoiced to know that she had awoken in this good and noble man a power of loving that made his life complete. And through him, through his love for her, her own life now had meaning.

  While they kissed in the dining room, was Emily in the passage outside? Was she on the stairs? There were moments when Mabel thought she heard the rustle of a skirt on the far side of the door.

  9

  The dark of the passage, moving towards the closed dining room door. Nearer now, faint sounds become audible from within: the hiss of clothing, the hiss of breath.

  Hands reach up to touch the panels of the door.

  I listen. I hear. I feel.

  Does he touch her? Does he feel her?

  • • •

  Later, in the bedroom. The only light in the room is faint moonshine through the windows. The silver glow reflects in a dressing table mirror. Indistinct in the frame there stands a shadowy form, hand touching cheek.

  My cheek is warm.

  • • •

  The pen writes by the light of an oil lamp. Follow the writing, letter by letter:

  Seraphic fear

  Each night I die, each morning I am born again.

  Bright light falls on green plants. A spray of glittering water bursts from the rose of a watering can, throwing a sudden rainbow in the little conservatory. I call this my Garden of Eden. Vinnie approaches, birdlike, ever present.

  “Do you believe in the Fall, Vin?”

  She shakes her head, says, “I’m not clever enough for that.”

  “I don’t believe in the Fall. I find no snake in the grass.”

  “Sue will have nothing more to do with Mrs. Todd.”

  That makes me smile. I speak of original sin, the great lie invented by priests, and Vinnie speaks of Mrs. Todd. And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds, and binding with briars my joys and desires. Blake’s garden of love is filled with graves.

  “Austin will not be bound,” I say.

  Vinnie thinks I speak of Sue and the wagging tongues of the village, but I speak of briars, with their lacerating thorns. The crown forced onto the bleeding head of a savior long ago. Only he failed to save me, so I mean to do the job myself.

  “Austin,” says Vinnie, awed, “is in love.”

  “And Mrs. Todd too? Is she in love with Austin?”

  Vinnie looks perplexed. The question has not occurred to her. If a man deigns to offer a woman his love, the wo
man is honored and grateful, and gives her love in return.

  “She could never allow his attentions if she were not.”

  “Perhaps,” I say, “she’s an adventuress.”

  “An adventuress!” Vinnie is shocked. “I hope not! Poor Austin!”

  “Happy Austin!”

  I believe Mrs. Todd to be an adventuress. I have an adventure for her.

  10

  Alice sets out for Yale early in the morning, to be at the Sterling Memorial Library as it opens at 8:30 a.m. It’s still dark, and a deep mist hangs over the roads. She drives slowly. By the time she reaches the interstate at Northampton, the sun is rising and the mist lifting, but the traffic is building up with the morning rush. All through Hartford her progress slows to a crawl. Such immense roads, and so little movement.

  Her mind is full of Mabel and Austin, and the puzzle of how to tell her story. It seemed so simple when she pitched the outline to her stepfather and his producer, back home in the summer. But it’s turning out to be more complicated than she bargained for.

  “It’s the ending that defines the story.” All very well for Jack to pronounce in his teacherish way, but real life doesn’t go in much for endings, other than death. And even death can leave you up in the air. Contemplating the way Mabel’s great love affair unfolded, Alice finds herself helpless in the face of brute dates. Austin died in 1895. Mabel lived on for almost forty more years, half a lifetime without her great love. What sense does that make of a life?

  One answer is that life makes no sense. Things just happen. This is Nick’s view of the world. You do what you want, insofar as you’re able, and then you die.

  Every instinct in Alice rebels against this conclusion. Somehow, somewhere, there’s a way to tell Mabel’s story that grants dignity to her passion. In the Sterling Memorial Library Mabel’s letters and diaries are stored. There are far too many documents to read all she wrote, but in the course of this coming day Alice hopes to find a key that will open a door, or perhaps a key that will close a door, and so permit the final credits to roll.

  The interstate delivers her with a disconcerting suddenness into the heart of patrician Yale. She finds herself cruising past immense nineteenth-century buildings separated by wide green lawns. She leaves her car in a parking lot on College and Crown. It’s coming up to nine in the morning as she walks back up New Haven Green with its two island churches, past Bingham and Welch, grand complacent halls built in an age when privilege was a virtue. Little Amherst College, founded by Emily’s grandfather, is humbled by the comparison. Here in Yale is the full pomp of learning.