by Jeffrey Ford
“What are you doing?” I yelled to him.
“Finishing the job, Harrow,” he called back. “Making the world safe for my son.” I saw his silhouette wave before he disappeared into the smoke-filled night. And then, I could have sworn I heard laughter off in the darkness. That’s how Ahab left my life, as suddenly as he’d entered it. I would never see him again.
The very next instant, I opened my eyes and I was in my parlor at home, sitting at my writing desk. I turned my chair around and saw Gabriel and Mavis across the room each curled into a corner of the couch. Madi slept in a straight-backed armchair, his chin resting on his chest. Arabella lay across the floor wrapped in a dark blue blanket patterned with golden stars. I sat in silent thought until daybreak when Misha appeared in the entrance to the parlor and announced that she’d made coffee and would make eggs for any who wanted them. I stumbled out of my chair, went to her, and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
I never did find out how I finally got home the night of our battle with Malbaster. I must have succumbed to the fear and smoke. I was told by Arabella that I should thank my brother-in-law, Tommy, without whose intervention things would have been far more complicated. Madi told me later that by the time the police showed up, a moment after I’d passed out, the three bodies—coach driver’s, Malbaster’s, and Ishmael’s—were all gone, vanished.
As it turned out, while the rest of us were chasing Ahab down to the river’s edge, Mavis stayed behind and moved the three chests of opium into Arabella’s coach. Each weighed fifty pounds, and when all was said and done, Arabella took only one of the chests as part of our deal. We sold the other two to a shifty denizen of the underworld and made quite a profit on it. The drug was rather rare at the time in New York. Later, in the ’60s, opium use would peak in Chinatown and then the drug would be in the Manhattoes to stay. During those years I wondered if it had been shipped in or if someone had discovered the other three stores of Astor’s hoard.
With the money we made, Madi and I set aside a portion to give to Fergus’s wife and child to help them get along. Otis had no family. Mavis used hers to rent an apartment for her brothers and Gabriel and herself. Arabella used her cut to publish a novel under her own name, a feminist fairy tale concerning a manticore and inspired by the works of Margaret Fuller.
Before a month was up I had a visit from Madi. He told me that our adventure had made him think about his own mother and father back in Guinea, and that he’d decided to travel there with the rest of his opium money. “There, I’ll make enough to return to America and buy land and acquire the right to vote. I’ll search for whatever remains of my family. My religion, which the ocean washed out of me and the equatorial sun evaporated from my heart, calls to me at night from the distant end of my memory. I’ll return, Harrow,” he assured me. “I will be back.”
I told him I believed he would and accompanied the harpooneer to South Street where he embarked as a seaman again on the clipper Maximus bound eventually for Dakar in Senegal. Just before he boarded, I told him Seneca Village was to be dismantled and the residents evicted. He looked past me for a moment, shook his head, and said, “I’m coming back, Harrow.”
“Why would you want to?” I asked.
“To finish the job. Make the world safe. Malbaster hasn’t gone anywhere. You can’t slit his throat. His is the irrational viciousness of white suspicion. The Pale King Toad is still out there,” he said before taking his leave up the gangplank.
As it turned out, Arabella was never romantically interested in either me or Madi, for when the Malbaster affair was a year behind us, she took up with a lovely young woman, Julianna, who was every bit as rough and ready and full of Emersonian phrases as Miss Dromen. Still, we had lunch a few times a year. I’d go over to the St. John’s Park house and we’d sit in front of the big picture window at the front of the place, sipping tea and eating dainty sandwiches that seemed to be made of nothing but bread, lettuce, and air.
The conversation was always filling. I tried whenever I saw her to get her to talk about where she had been during the interval between when the manticore had devoured her in the warehouse and she had reappeared in place of the creature next to Malbaster. Only once, when Julianna had excused herself to go to the kitchen to get another pot of tea, did Arabella say, “I was in your hearts.” I wasn’t quite sure she was serious, for after she’d spoken the words she laughed aloud and I couldn’t help but join her.
And what about old Harrow, you ask? I carried on, writing my articles for the Gorgon’s Mirror. They remained popular for some time, although never so much as when I wrote of Ahab’s quest. I stayed with Garrick nearly eight more years confabulating hokum at my steady pace and excellence until he passed away on a terrible winter evening. They found him frozen the next morning, clutching his chest, in the gutter outside the Mirror. At the funeral, I remember holding Mavis to me, a grown woman by then with children of her own. She sobbed upon my shoulder, having loved the old man more than anyone should have. Nearby, with his hand lightly upon her back, was the steadfast, sad-eyed Gabriel, who turned out a better man than his father might ever have dreamed.
Notes in 2s
2 Streets
While delving into the past in preparation for this novel, I came across an online copy of a Mitchell map (Mitchell being the name of the company that made it). It depicted the lower half of Manhattan ca. 1850. This was a real boon to me as I could trace my characters’ adventures around much of the city. I found that having it always available on my computer while writing, being able to see the lay of the land and where streets intersected, made it a kind of talisman that allowed me to daydream more deeply into the fiction. One thing to keep in mind, though, is that some of the streets of 1850s Manhattan do not have the same names today. Take, for instance, Orange Street, which plays a part in this novel. If you were to ask someone today where Orange Street is, an in-the-know New Yorker would tell you, “Brooklyn Heights.” Of course, they would be right. But in the 1850s, there was also an Orange Street that ran parallel to Mulberry Street, in Manhattan. Today it’s called Baxter Street.
Check out the Mitchell map for 1850 Manhattan if you want to follow the action in my book. You can find it at: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/1850_Mitchell_Map_of_New_York_City_-_Geographicus_-_NewYorkCity-mitchell-1850.jpg.
2 Places
For those readers who are hearing about Seneca Village and/or the Indian Caves for the first time, I want to let you know that both places are/were real.
Unfortunately, Seneca Village no longer exists. It was a settlement of free African American farmers who bought the land from a fellow named John Whitehead. In 1825, Whitehead began selling off parcels of his land, which was situated along what is now the western side of Central Park, and the village soon came into being. There are numerous theories about how it came by the name Seneca Village. I tend to think the moniker was related to the Roman philosopher, whose work was often favored by African American thinkers of a political bent. The village was successful, and it grew as the villagers welcomed Irish and German immigrants, who were spurned by much of New York City establishment for being “papists.” There are reports that Native Americans also found a home there. The same black midwife birthed both white and black children; villagers worshipped side by side in the village’s three churches. It was a remarkable place, a true melting pot, and one I wish were better known.
Then, in 1855, plans were made to create Central Park on a large parcel of land that encompassed Seneca Village. Ultimately, the villagers were evicted in 1857 (some violently), leaving the way clear for a new playground for the city’s elite—who would build homes in the area—and disbanding a site where blacks owned land (and thus had the right to vote) as well as a viable integrated community that flew in the face of the nativist and Know-Nothing factions. I was unable to find many books about the village, but there are some good online sites that will give you more information, if you are interested.
T
he Indian Caves seem like something I might have made up solely to provide a Romantic locale for one of the scenes in my novel. Doing something like that is certainly not beneath me, but in this case, I did not have to do any inventing; they exist. They can be found at the very northern part of Manhattan, in what is now known as Inwood Park. The presence of Native Americans in this area, namely the Lenape, reaches back to pre-Columbian times. The caves found here were used by the Indians as stopovers while on fishing expeditions to what are now called the Harlem and Hudson Rivers. It is said that there was a nearby tulip tree, which stood 165 feet high and had a 20-foot diameter, beneath which a Dutch representative, Peter Minuit, bought the island of Manhattan from the Canarsee tribe of the Lenape Nation for sixty guilders’ worth of beads and trinkets (approximately twenty-four dollars). The story is obviously a confabulation worthy of the humbug of George Harrow. Still, the caves are real and worth a day trip to Inwood to check out. The tulip tree, unfortunately, was taken down at some time in the 1930s.
2 People
I try not to populate my “historical” novels with too many historical personages, as I find they often clutter up the works. In Ahab’s Return, I kept it to two: Catherine Thompson and John Jacob Astor, diurnally opposite in disposition, race, and class. Neither is ever encountered in the flesh, so to speak; they are only perceived as powerful forces working their will from offstage.
I’d like to help revive the memory of Catherine Thompson. I discovered her while doing research on Seneca Village. Thompson, at age seventeen, started and ran a school for black children in the basement of the African Union Methodist Church in Seneca Village. She is credited with educating scores of children and her school was integral in inspiring New York City to create some of the first official “colored” schools. I am a teacher and I find her an inspiration and a reminder that although every teacher has the potential to be a one-person school, few would have the courage. In Ahab’s Return, Catherine plays a role as Madi’s teacher, and she inspires him to seek justice for the murdered children of the village. After reading about this trailblazing educator and contemplating what little is known of her life, I concluded that her dedication to the children of Seneca Village would have had to encompass a desire for future political and legal parity for them and, in keeping with this, she could never have let the loss of those children stand.
John Jacob Astor, on the other hand, is well known in the annals of history—someone you may have read about in high school or college. Most who know about Astor know that his initial fortune was made in the fur trade, but not as many are aware that he later became involved in smuggling opium into China. He’d purchase tons of it in Turkey and then, using his merchant ships, move it to ports like Canton (Guangzhou). When China eventually cracked down on the practice, Astor reverted to unloading the drug only in Britain. He then used his opium money to invest in New York City real estate. Of course, the premise in Ahab’s Return is that he stockpiled tons of the drug in secret locations within the city. That’s more George Harrow speculation, but not completely beyond the realm of the possible. (Note: Based on my research, it seems that opium didn’t take hold in Manhattan to any real extent until later, in the 1860s.)
2 Many Books
The following are some of the books I used for research while writing Ahab’s Return, in case readers are interested in learning more about the world I’ve tried to depict in its pages. I’ve broken the list into two basic sections: Ahab (Melville’s character and the whaling life) and Manhattan (the history of the city and its citizens). I’ve also read all of Melville’s fiction from “Bartleby the Scrivener” to The Confidence Man, and even waded through Mardi, his dense, Busby Berkeley–esque musical of the South Seas. Of course, a good deal of my research was done on the web and in the databases of Ohio Wesleyan University, where I teach part time.
Ahab
Ahab by Harold Bloom. One volume in Bloom’s series of Major Literary Characters. If you’ve never seen any of these volumes, they’re compendiums of essays about a given major literary figure. Joining Ahab in the series are Faust, Satan (Paradise Lost), Gatsby, Clarissa Dalloway, Emma Bovary, Hamlet, and so on. I think there are about thirty volumes in all. I didn’t really borrow anything from this book, except for the realization of the multiplicity of ways in which Ahab may be perceived. It inspired me to be bold with my own view.
Ahab’s Trade: The Saga of South Seas Whaling by Granville Allen Mawer. Everything and anything you’d like to know about the history of the whale fishery in the South Seas.
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick. A wonderfully readable nonfiction account of the tragedy at sea that influenced Melville’s writing of Moby Dick.
Manhattan
Five Points: The 19th-Century New York City Neighborhood That Invented Tap Dance, Stole Elections, and Became the World’s Most Notorious Slum by Tyler Anbinder. The definitive book on this treacherous lower Manhattan neighborhood. A book of great riches for the fiction writer, depicting the way of life for the lower and immigrant classes of early Manhattan.
Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 by Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace. A serviceable overview of the history of early New York.
City of Dreams: The 400-Year Epic History of Immigrant New York by Tyler Anbinder. Another fine book by Anbinder, focusing on those who came to America to find a new life—their problems, challenges, contributions, and triumphs.
The New Metropolis: New York City, 1840–1857 by Edward K. Spann. A book I found at a garage sale that just happened to focus on exactly the time period I was writing about.
P. T. Barnum: America’s Greatest Showman by Philip B. Kunhardt Jr., Philip B. Kunhardt III, and Peter W. Kunhardt. An excellent, lavishly illustrated biography of Barnum. Barnum plays a part in the life of the city during the time of my story. His influence may be felt as well in the sensationalist penny press newspapers like Harrow’s Gorgon’s Mirror.
Black Gotham: A Family History of African Americans in Nineteenth-Century New York City by Carla L. Peterson. A fascinating study of the African American experience in Manhattan through Peterson’s own family history (from 1819 into the new century). This book explodes assumptions about the role of African Americans in New York.
Root and Branch: African Americans in New York and East Jersey, 1613–1863 by Graham Russell Gao Hodges. A remarkable book that offers a comprehensive history of African Americans in New York from the very first until 1863.
My Seneca Village by Marilyn Nelson. I was unable to find stand-alone books about Seneca Village. For information on it, I relied heavily on the Internet. I did, though, find this one children’s book of poems, which is worth the read for both adults and children (age five and up) seeking an entry into the phenomenon of the village. This book boasts both great research and terrific writing. Nelson is a nationally recognized poet and a former poet laureate of Connecticut.
Acknowledgments
No one embarks on a voyage like this without help. A debt of gratitude to my agent, Howard Morhaim, without whom I’d never have gotten out of port. Also to the book’s editor, Jennifer Brehl, an ingenious editor, collaborator, and friend, who kept a steady hand on the wheel and navigated this craft through treacherous waters. A word of thanks to my son Derek for the cover’s manticore and to Owen Corrigan for the cover’s design. And of course, to the family, without whom the journey would be nothing.
About the Author
JEFFREY FORD is the author of The Physiognomy, Memoranda, The Beyond, The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque, the Edgar Award–winning The Girl in the Glass, The Shadow Year, and The Drowned Life. He lives outside Columbus, Ohio, and teaches writing at Ohio Wesleyan University.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Also by Jeffrey Ford
Vanitas
The Physiognomy
Memoranda
The Beyond
The Fantasy Writer’s Assistant
>
The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque
The Girl in the Glass
The Empire of Ice Cream
The Cosmology of the Wider World
The Shadow Year
The Drowned Life
Crackpot Palace
A Natural History of Hell
The Twilight Pariah
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
ahab’s return. Copyright © 2018 by Jeffrey Ford. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
first edition
Cover design by Owen Corrigan
Cover illustrations: by Derek Ford (manticore); from the New York Public Library (map)
Title page illustration by Hein Nouwens/Shutterstock, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data