by Hazel Woods
• • •
Around her neck, Hensley wears a delicate piece of lace, hand-sewn into a little pouch. It hangs on a piece of black satin cord. She managed to salvage the lace from an irreparable costume belonging to one of the acrobats. Inside, she has tucked the small stone that Mr. Reid found and marked and brought back to New York City. As she stands on the train platform, waiting for the doors to open, she places her fingers on it.
Despite her worries, nobody arrives to stop her. The crowd moves around her, oblivious to her troubles. When the conductor calls out her train’s boarding, she eagerly leaves the platform, afraid that if she’d had to stand there one more minute, she would run back to Harold’s apartment and throw herself at his mercy.
Instead, she settles herself into the sleeping car that she managed to afford with the money her father had hidden in his desk, those crisp bills she carried with her all the way from Hillsboro and handed to the ticket agent without hesitation. She slides the door closed and collapses next to the window, thinking only of the west; those vast, blue skies and brown earth cracked through with a desperate longing.
When they are whizzing through the Pennsylvania countryside in the dark, and the only view in the glass is of her own tired face, she finally closes the curtains. Just as she stretches out on the berth, a piece of mail slides beneath her door.
They’ve not stopped since New York, so it wouldn’t be a telegram. Perhaps it is the next morning’s dining menu. Or a weather report. Her head rests heavily on the pillow; she is too tired to move. A stray tear cascades down her cheek. In an effort to keep her maudlin thoughts at bay, she places her feet on the cool floor and reaches for the delivery.
At first, she does not trust her own memory. But his writing is so familiar—she’d know it anywhere. H. Dench is printed in black ink on the envelope. She opens it and sees his slanted salutation.
Dear Hensley,
I, too, have chosen my own path. Would you be willing to join me for breakfast in the dining car?
The train’s motion adds to the feeling that she is falling. Reaching for the wall and steadying herself, Hensley is sure that she is dreaming when another slip of paper skims beneath her door. This one is without an envelope, but it is folded over.
Dear Hensley,
Eight o’clock suits me. I know you’ve no obligation to do so, but it would make the day so nice to have breakfast with you in, what will it be, Ohio or Indiana?
Hensley sits and presses the papers against the floorboards. She tries to see a shadow beneath her door but cannot. Is he right there? Could he be standing just outside, the train vibrating through him just as it does through her? She must be dreaming. This is not possible.
Then, as though she is still a part of some act in the circus, another piece of paper slides beneath her door.
Dear Hensley,
This is real.
• • •
Afraid of disturbing whatever alchemy has occurred, Hensley sleeps on the floor just beside the door. When she wakes, her back is bruised but the sight of the three pieces of white paper against the dark wood floor assuages the pain. She looks again at his writing and then at her father’s pocket watch she’s inherited. There are only twenty minutes until eight.
Hensley replaces the loose skirt and tunic she wore to board the train. Her condition is still partly hidden by her own desperate alterations. She combs her hair and powders the dark circles beneath her eyes. Utterly unsure of what she will find in the dining car, she embarks nonetheless.
At a small table on the northern side of the train, Mr. Charles Reid is ignoring the newspaper in front of him and, instead, staring at the door. When he sees her, he gives a casual wave, as though they’ve done this a million times before.
Without a thought, Hensley raises one hand and acknowledges him. Still not knowing if it’s real or imagined, she chooses to believe.
With the help of his cane, he stands and pulls back her chair for her. “Good morning,” he says, smiling from ear to ear.
“Good morning,” she says quietly.
They sit across from one another as the wheat fields on either side of them burst with golden sunlight. Finally, Hensley says, “I apologize for being so blunt, Mr. Reid, but whatever are you doing on this train?”
“I’m headed west,” he says, offering her tea from his pot. “And you must call me Charles.”
She smiles. “Of course you are. But why?”
“The University of California. Medical school. My path.”
Hensley nods. “So it is mere chance that we’ve ended up here together?”
“Sometimes chance needs a bit of coaxing.”
“Marie?” Hensley says, stirring sugar into her tea.
Charles shrugs. Yesterday, after he’d seen Harold, Charles returned home to find his mother sitting in front of the fireplace, the thunder outside forbidding.
She called to him. “Charles, where have you been? I missed you at breakfast.”
“Just walking again, Mother.”
“In the rain? Hm,” she said, opening her catalog again. “I do wish I’d learned to paint when I was a child. Maybe you should take up painting, Charles.”
He let his fingers move across a piece of ash that had found its way onto the marble mantel. Smudging it, letting its char trace his fingers’ path, he thought of telling his mother everything. How scandalized she would be that he’d fallen for a girl who’d been seduced by an actor. A girl who’d had a place at Wellesley! How disparaging she would be of any girl who’d written to him without a proper introduction. She would attempt to cast off his scorched heart into a pail, as though disposing of the fireplace ashes. There, now, she might say, let’s not see any more of that.
“Remember Tux, Mother?”
She furrowed her brow. “Of course. What a sweet dog. You loved him more than any of the others.” She sighed.
Charles nodded. “And do you remember what you told me when Father took him to be put down?”
Her face relaxed. “No, I’ve no idea. What was it?”
Charles looked at the soot-stained tips of his fingers, almost as though he’d just written a long letter. “You told me that it was better for us to suffer than the dog.”
“Of course,” she said. “Because we can understand suffering. An animal only feels pain and doesn’t know why. It cannot be told that it will end, or what it all might be for.”
Charles nodded. What it all might be for. The phrase echoed in his mind, taunting. And what is that, please? he wondered. Has she seen the ledger book keeping track of suffering and happiness, the balance due on each account?
Charles realized he knew nothing of his mother’s suffering beyond his own injury. He wondered if there had ever been another suitor, one besides his father. Had her heart ever felt like this, as though it may fatally shatter while the world carries on? If she had, surely she would know that there is no comfort. “And maybe they know just as much as we do,” he said, retrieving his cane from its place beside the couch. “Because certainly it’s all for naught.”
Just then, the bell rang.
“You’ve a good friend in her,” Charles says now, sipping his tea.
“Or do I?” Hensley says.
“I’ve no intention to force myself upon you. Nor even in front of you. But I could not let you leave New York alone, unaccompanied, distraught. Despite your recent admonishments, we are friends. I’ve documentation,” he says, patting the pocket of his suit jacket.
Hensley blushes. “Oh, Charles. This cannot be happening. I mean, I don’t know what to think.”
“Let’s have breakfast,” he says simply, handing her the menu.
By the end of the meal, she knows that he likes his eggs poached and his bacon flimsy. He prefers rye toast to all others, but an inordinate amount of butter is required upon all his bread. He takes his c
offee with milk, no sugar. His tea with sugar, no milk. His favorite fruit is a crisp, cold apple, but he enjoys melon and oranges, too. He always waits for her to lift her fork before he lifts his and even when silence stretches out between them, it is different from any other silence and neither seems to mind.
“What’s your very favorite sound?” he asks when they’ve moved to the observation car, each of them nursing a cup of coffee.
“Let me see. I do love the way hot butter in a pan greets nearly anything. That sizzle. It’s mouthwatering.”
Charles smiles. “And it’s usually morning. And the house may still be slightly dark, the windows open. A cool breeze is the only assertion of the world outside.”
Hensley closes her eyes and nods. Before she knows what she’s said, she adds, “And I wouldn’t mind at all if you sat at the table with your paper and quite ignored me.”
“Never,” he says, touching the handle of her coffee cup with his fingers as gently as if the curve of it were the curve of her waist.
Hensley opens her eyes on the blur of Illinois’ vast plains. She remembers observing the very same view as she sat beside her father so many months ago. The distance she has traveled can be tallied, but it means nothing. Numbers, calculation, logic of any kind could never have brought her to this moment. “But the upside of being ignored—if there is one—would be the regularity of my presence. It would mean each day began just so and that there was no reason to think it might not always.”
He lets his fingers linger on her cup as she reaches for it. Their skin touches and at first, the heat of it silences them.
Then Charles says, “I met your brother yesterday.”
“Harry?”
He nods. “You’ve the same freckles. Rather, the very same pattern to them.”
Hensley blushes. “How is he? Terribly angry?”
“I don’t know. He seemed concerned, surely.”
“Why ever did you go to see him? I certainly hope it was not regarding me. I’ve had quite enough of men making arrangements behind closed doors.”
Whatever moment of solidarity they’ve shared has gone. Hensley turns her body back toward the window.
“I offered him my condolences. For the loss of your father.”
“Oh,” she says, pulling a loose thread from her shawl. “That was kind of you.”
Charles sighs. “And, I must confess, I followed a societal convention regarding the proposal of marriage. I asked his permission.”
Hensley turns her face to his. “Marriage?”
Charles nods. “My greatest fear, Hensley, was that this injury might cause you to reject me. And, honestly, I don’t suppose I could fault you. I will never run, never get on one knee, never lift a girl high above my head. I am crippled . . .”
Hensley interrupts him. “Oh, but I’m so much worse than crippled. Charles, your injury is a testament to your bravery. I’ve nothing to recommend the situation in which I find myself. Nothing. It only reveals my shocking naïveté and lack of character.”
Charles looks out the window. He is moved by the sudden brilliance of the fields. It reminds him of driving across muddy roads with Rogerson, the sun setting behind them, the day’s casualties waiting for them and the innocent French fields still bursting with color.
“There were these purple flowers in France. Lots of them. And sometimes yellow. A beautiful red one, too. Maybe poppies? I don’t think I ever saw them up close. Just from the road,” he says, his eyes still on the landscape beyond the glass. “It never made sense to me. Nature so adamantly cheerful in the midst of such assault.”
Hensley leans her head against the seat. “Mmm. I suppose that would be awful. In New Mexico, the landscape reflected my own desperate misery.”
Charles smiles. “I find it reassuring now. The important things carry on. The sun continues to warm and feed those things that want to live. Let’s not be arid and bleak, Hensley. Let’s not spend these days withering and dying. Let’s carry on, shall we?”
“Of course we shall,” she says, looking straight ahead. “But you mustn’t add to your misery.”
“Here is where you have lost sight of what misery means.”
Hensley takes her eyes off the passing scenery and looks at him. He has not had a good shave this morning and there are whiskers on his chin illuminated by the sun’s glare. “I assure you, I know misery, Charles.”
“But my misery, Hensley Dench, is looking ahead at a life without you. Regardless of your condition. Regardless of your mistakes.”
Hensley moves her eyes back to the window, then closes them. His words have dislodged something that she’s worked so hard to contain. Her fingers vibrate with the possibility of loving him. “Please,” she whispers, her eyes still closed, “let this be real.”
In the darkness of her own mind, she feels him lift her hand and the tender weight of his lips upon it. She dares not open her eyes. Instead, she exists there, with the train’s unceasing motion beneath her, and Mr. Charles Reid’s breath making her fingers warm.
The baby’s head is becoming heavier against Hensley’s groin, but she does not mention this. She tries not to imagine all of the things that can still go wrong. Walking the length of the dining car carefully, mindful of the narrow space between the tables, she glances at other couples and marvels at the simplicity of it all. Hensley and Charles eat dinner slowly and watch the landscape turn from its often breathtaking striations of blue and gold and green to a blur of dusky shadow and, finally, to a looking glass reflecting their own familiar faces.
When it is time to retire, they walk along the passages, lingering between cars where the wind whips at their cheeks and they can briefly let their hands lock and, occasionally, their lips touch, each invariably tasting of sugar and soot.
In the mornings, Hensley has taken to writing notes while still in her nightclothes. The porter doesn’t come until eight o’clock to replace the berths. She sits in her bed and composes something brief. Dear Train #25, You are the favorite piece of steel I’ve ever met. Carry on.
Then, without having even brushed her hair, she sticks her head out into the passageway, sneaks out, and slides it beneath Charles’s door, three to the west. Moments later, she can hear him pull open his door and, then, with a beautiful, dry crescendo, the paper reappears in her compartment. It reads, Dear Admirer, I’m not sure I’ll ever live up to your adoration. But I will carry on.
A few more times before eight o’clock they are able to deliver these notes undetected.
I had a dream that your joints were made of poppies. We kept watering cans on every ledge.
Couldn’t sleep. The porter brought me a whiskey. I saw a shooting star out the window.
Does it hurt?
Not too bad usually.
I’m sorry.
You should be, because if you could have seen that leg . . .
Was it the most handsome part of you?
By far. Definitely. No way you’d ever resist me. No way.
Charles has found a small bungalow with jasmine vines growing across the front porch to rent near his medical school. It has two small bedrooms, a bright kitchen, and a living room with a fireplace. Each morning, he listens to the hammering of a resident woodpecker searching for its breakfast and wonders if today he will have a telegram.
Ever since the impossible afternoon on which he disembarked three stops before Hensley, they’ve continued to write letters. She is staying with Teresa, who traded the goblets for a dairy farm outside of San Marcos.
She was standing upon the platform in all of her womanly beauty when I arrived. Her long dark hair contrasting starkly against the white blouse she had tucked into blue dungarees. Berto was waiting for us in the truck, similarly transformed into a strong, capable man. The only evidence of his bout with polio is a pronounced limp. I told him that all the best men have one these days. They
remain grateful to you for your care.
I exist outside of their routine. They rise long before the sun and by the time I wake, there are gallons of milk jugs already emptied, ready for the afternoon. Occasionally Teresa allows me to prepare their lunch, but mostly she insists that I spend the mornings on the porch watching the black-and-white herd meander across the green hills. I do so dutifully, losing myself in the memories of our train journey. I’ve already written to Marie, conveying my endless gratitude for her tenacity and loyalty.
The landscape here is so green and soft. It reminds me of my mother. As I walk, I close my eyes so that I can imagine the tender breeze is her touch. There is a border of cypress trees that cast steep shadows in the morning and evening and I step into and out of their darkness, mimicking a sort of shadow tag that I remember her playing with us in the park. The rosemary plants coax me back toward the house, as well as the scent of Teresa’s lamb stew and blistering, buttered tortillas.
Charles spends each evening reading her letters, closing his eyes against the night air and imagining what he would tell her if she were next to him.
I’ve never been so lonely in my life. That you are just a hundred miles away is torture. I’d gladly trade the smell of the sweet jasmine for the smell of manure if it meant I were closer to you. I wish you would allow me to be there. Each evening I worry that the next day’s news will be unwanted. I try to stay focused on the stack of books they’ve supplied me with here, but inevitably my thoughts turn to you and your well-being.
Your mother’s memory will serve you well. After all, you are standing in the same dirt that she once did, my dear Hensley. We both know that the mystery of this absurd continuum called life will remain unsolved. But the mysteries contain comforts, too.