Thoreau on Wolf Hill

by Oak, B. B.

  Henry had not so much as given me a glance until then, but when he reluctantly turned toward me his countenance expressed surprised recognition. “Julia Bell!”

  “Julia Pelletier now,” I said.

  “Ah, yes. So I heard.” Alas, there was no warmth in his large, intelligent gray eyes as he regarded me. “Well, if you need a ride to Plumford come along with us, Mrs. Pelletier.” With that he took my bag from me and walked briskly away.

  As we followed in his wake, Mrs. Emerson gave me a wry look, apparently amused by his abruptness. I myself was rather hurt by it. Although I knew Henry to be restrained in expressing his regard for his female friends, I had expected a friendly hand shake at least from the man who had once saved my very life.

  When we reached the carryall Mrs. Emerson’s children expressed much glee at her arrival, and as kisses were strewn about, Henry stood back and watched with a wistful expression. I know little of children, and my estimation of their ages may be off, but I venture the eldest, a girl, was no more than eight, the next oldest, another girl, was a few years younger, and the little boy was very young indeed. I had a great deal on my mind when introduced to them, so I do not recall their names, but I think each began with E. The carriage had plenty of room for my bag and me, and off we went, first heading toward the Emerson house. On the way the children prattled about a surprise awaiting their mama that Henry had made. Something to do with her gloves and a drawer built under a chair. Henry gently observed that it was no longer a surprise now, and the children, realizing this, looked very contrite. He laughed and told them never mind. A short time later he pulled up to the house, a fine white clapboard edifice with columned entrances, three chimneys, and a multitude of long windows. Mrs. Emerson invited me in for tea, but I declined, wishing to get myself settled in Plumford before nightfall.

  After helping mother and children out of the carriage, Henry suggested I take Mrs. Emerson’s place beside him, and we proceeded up the Lowell Road toward Plumford. We were like strangers together, and the silence between us stretched on for so long that I feared we would reach our destination, less than four miles away, without a single word exchanged.

  “I am very happy to see you again, Henry,” I finally said.

  “You do not look very happy at all, Mrs. Pelletier.”

  “Do not keep calling me that.”

  “Why should it displease you to be called by your married name?”

  “It is your cool formality that displeases me, old friend. You used to call me Julia. Married or not, I am still the same person, am I not?”

  “Are you?”

  “No, I suppose I am not. But you seem to be just the same, Henry. Leastways, you still have the same irksome habit of responding to a question with another question.”

  “Do I?” Catching himself, he gave out a short laugh. “I shall add that to my list of faults.”

  “A very short list, I am sure,” I said.

  “Long enough. I own that I am too ingenious at times. And that I play with words a bit too much. And I suppose my fondness for paradoxes can be somewhat annoying.”

  He supposed correctly, but what I found even more annoying at the moment was his avoidance of the subject most near and dear to my heart. “You have not mentioned Adam,” I said. “Have you seen him of late?”

  “Just a few days ago, in fact.”

  “How is he faring?”

  “Well enough considering how little rest he gets. His patients command all of his time.”

  “Yes, I suppose Boston patients can be very demanding.”

  “I refer to his patients in Plumford, Mrs. Pelletier. The town has been rife with the Consumption of late, and it was left without a doctor when your grandfather died. The Selectmen implored Adam to take over Doc Silas’s practice, and he felt it his duty to do so.”

  “What? He lives in Plumford now?”

  “He resides at his Grandmother Tuttle’s farm and practices out of your Grandfather Walker’s office.”

  My heart started pounding. “Then we shall be down the hall from each other when I take up residence in the house. Do you think Adam will find my proximity disagreeable, Henry?”

  “Why do you ask me?”

  “Because you and he are friends. Has Adam not spoken of me to you?”

  “There are some things which a man never speaks of, which are much finer kept silent about.”

  “He never mentions me at all?”

  “Over a year ago Adam told me that you had wed. I have not heard him utter your name since.”

  “I am glad.”

  “You do not sound very glad, Mrs. Pelletier.”

  “Must you keep disputing me, Henry?”

  “I am merely relaying my own observations.”

  “Well, perhaps I did not express myself accurately. Of course it does not gladden me to know that Adam has forgotten me so completely that my name never passes his lips. But neither does it sadden me, for it was my intention to put myself well out of his life.”

  “Then why have you put yourself back in it?” Henry inquired.

  “I had no choice but to come back to Plumford. How was I to know Adam would be here now? Since I parted with him, we have communicated only twice. I wrote to inform him of my marriage, but he did not bother to respond. The one and only time he wrote to me was to inform me of our grandfather’s passing. His letter was kind enough in tone until he abruptly closed it with the suggestion that I communicate directly with Grandfather’s lawyer henceforth.”

  “Even so, don’t you think he would have appreciated notice of your impending arrival?”

  “I left France in such great haste that the letter would not have arrived here before I did. I would have sent it to the wrong address anyway. I thought Adam was residing in Boston. Anyway, I am here now, and there is nothing to be done about it. I have nowhere else to go.”

  Henry draped his arm around my shoulders in such a stiff, awkward manner that it rather felt like being hugged by a tree limb. Even so, I found the solidity of it comforting. “I sense you are deeply troubled, Julia,” he said after a moment or two. “You have aged considerably since last I set eyes on you.”

  No woman welcomes such an observation as that, to be sure, but Henry’s tone was exceedingly kind and he had at last addressed me by my first name, so I took no offence. “In truth I feel older than Methuselah,” I admitted, “though I am only four and twenty.”

  “Not so young for a woman,” Henry said with characteristic bluntness. But he gave my shoulder a comforting squeeze, and I was warmed by this gesture even after he took his arm away to guide the horse.

  In a few minutes we came into Plumford. The Green was empty of people on this blustery afternoon, and the bare-branched elms and oaks populating it looked like foreboding sentinels. Henry pulled up in front of Grandfather’s house—well, my house now—and it too looked rather foreboding with all the front windows shuttered. But I took comfort in noting how soundly the house sat upon its stone foundation and how upright the massive fieldstone chimney rose from its pitched slate roof. Built well before the War for Independence, this was a dwelling that had stood the test of time, sheltering three generations of my Walker ancestors. And now it would shelter me.

  We are home! I recalled my mother saying as the stage coach stopped at the front gate sixteen years ago. Our home was in Boston with my father so I did not understand what she meant. I thought we had come to Plumford for a summer visit. Little did I know at eight years old that Mother had come back home to die. Indeed, I was as chirpy as a cricket when I alighted from the stage and heard the bell high atop the Meetinghouse tower begin to peal, as if to welcome us. The Green was verdant, shady, and bustling, the fine homes and shops surrounding it all freshly painted and spruce.

  As pleasing as my first sight of Plumford was, more pleasing still was my first sight of Cousin Adam. His eyes were as blue as the summer sky, and the summer sun had browned his freckled face and painted golden streaks in his auburn hair. He c
ould not have been more than nine, yet he had seemed as confident as an adult when he took hold of my hand and swept me off to have our first adventure together. Despite my fear of heights I did not protest as he led me up the Meetinghouse bell tower. I had already made up my mind to be his doughty mate for the rest of my days. Although the bell had stopped ringing, it was still vibrating when we stepped onto the tower balcony. From so high up we could view all of Plumford and its environs of purple-hued hills and emerald dales, dark green forest and rich brown farmland, glittering disks of ponds and a long silver ribbon of river. Adam pointed to the Tuttle farmhouse halfway up a nearby hill, where he lived with his maternal grandparents. I could get there in a jiffy, he explained, by taking the north road out of town, a path by the river, and a shortcut through the woods. For the next three years, until I was snatched away from my countryside Elysium, one of us traversed this route to meet the other almost every day.

  Recalling all this in a bright, happy flash, I jumped down from Henry’s carryall and headed toward the small, one-story building connected to the house, hoping Adam was within. Oh, how I longed to see him! Much to my disappointment, a note was pinned to the locked office door.

  If in need of Dr. Walker’s services, he can be found at the Sun.

  The house was also locked up, but I found the back door key in its old hiding place beneath the well roof. After Henry deposited my portmanteau in the hallway, I asked him to go over to the Sun and inform Adam of my arrival. I could not very well do so myself. Although the town tavern is but a short stroll down the road, it is considered well beyond the bounds of a woman’s sphere.

  Expecting Henry to return with Adam straightaway, I did not go off to buy food to stock the bare pantry. Instead, I went down the passageway that connected the kitchen to the office and took a look around. The small coal stove was still warm to the touch, and I surmised Adam had not left too long ago. I found it mighty singular that he would go off to the tavern during office hours and wondered how much he had changed since I’d last seen him. Grandfather’s office had changed but little. Most of the furnishings were the same, from the consultation desk and chair in the center of the room to the sick-bay cot in the alcove. The Staffordshire jar filled with leeches no longer sat atop the medicine cabinet, however. Nor were Doc Silas’s blistering cups and bloodletting lancets displayed on the shelf above it. Adam had replaced them with pots of medicinal plants and containers of dried herbs, accoutrements of a far more pleasant nature. Not so pleasant, however, was the new addition of a skeleton hanging from a hook in the corner, which gave me quite a start. There was also a new examination table by the window, long and narrow, adorned with leather straps. Placed upon it was a vessel labeled ETHER. I dared not touch it. But I did caress a knitted scarf hanging on the wall peg, assuming it was Adam’s. When I held it to my face I was sure I smelled his pleasing essence upon it.

  Back in the kitchen, I rummaged around the cupboards and found a nigh empty canister of tea and a tin containing two biscuits. Inept as I am at the simplest of household tasks, it took me a great deal of effort to fire up the stove and get the sink pump working, but I eventually succeeded in doing both. I filled a kettle with water, and, as it heated, I set about opening shutters to let in the waning afternoon light.

  When I went into Grandfather’s study, I found him regarding me from the shadows, as lifelike as you please. I smiled back at his nearly finished portrait, still perched on the easel as I had left it fifteen months ago. In my haste to flee Plumford, I’d also left behind an assortment of art materials. Alas, the tubes and bladders of paint have all dried up, and I shall have to order a fresh supply. But I shall be able to start sketching immediately on the pristine drawing pad I discovered behind the desk, using a collection of Thoreau pencils I found in the drawer. How dear they have always been to me, these pencils! And how dear is the man who makes them! No matter how coolly he first greeted me today, Henry still remains a warm friend in my thoughts.

  But where is he? Why has he not yet returned with Adam? Nightfall is fast approaching. Rather than squander more time with my scrawlings, I’d best go out to the back woodpile for logs and haul them to my girlhood bedchamber. If I do not start a fire in the hearth pretty soon, my bed will be mighty cold indeed tonight. I must remember to heat up a brick to cuddle.

  ADAM’S JOURNAL

  Friday, December 3

  Joanna Wiley was buried in the family graveyard this afternoon. She managed to survive only a day after her Uncle Solomon attempted to “cure” her by the horrific mutilation of her sister’s corpse. As I watched her rough coffin being lowered, I fervently hoped such ignorance was being buried along with the poor, innocent child.

  I learned otherwise when I joined the men who had attended the burial service for a drink at the Sun Tavern. There is customarily good cheer radiating throughout the taproom, but today gloomy talk of vampirism floated in the soft light of the whale oil lamps and the haze of pipe and cigar smoke. Even our sanguine taverner Ruggles, who is usually the most levelheaded of men, participated.

  “Why, I had a guest at the inn just last week,” he said, “who knew of a man who claimed to have seen a vampyre rise from the fresh grave of a Connecticut clock maker, change into a bat, and flit toward the dead man’s home. And that very night the clock maker’s wife died!”

  More farfetched accounts of vampyres followed, all of them hearsay. Then our very own Constable Beers hoisted his bulk off his bar stool and stepped forward to relate an incident he himself had experienced.

  “I was no more than seventeen when this happened, but I shall never forget it,” he told us. “I awakened in the night to find a beautiful young woman perched upon my chest.” That got every man’s attention right off. “But this unexpected visitor to my bedchamber was not the angel she appeared to be,” Beers continued. “Instead, she turned out to be a blood-drinking demon! I had to fight her off with all my might to prevent her from draining the life out of me, a battle that went on until sunrise, when at last the she-devil fled my bed, never to return.”

  “Never?” Ruggles winked and poured Beers another mug of ale. “Well, I too had nighttime visitations from a female phantom as a youth. More than once, mind you. And I freely admit I did not fight her off. Indeed, I most often let her have her way with me. You see, I came to realize ’twas not my precious blood this mischievous sprite wanted to drain me of but merely my manly fluid, of which I had a seemingly limitless supply in my salad days.”

  When the guffaws that followed subsided, an elderly cooper who used to pitch horseshoes on the Green with Doc Silas spoke up. “Best not to laugh off the notion of vampyres, gentlemen. Witiku might take umbrage and rise from the grave to prey on us again.”

  A young mechanic who worked at the carding mill laughed derisively. “Folks stopped believing in Witiku years ago, old timer.”

  “Even so, a whippersnapper such as yourself has heard of him,” the cooper replied. “That proves he is not forgotten.”

  “Well, I never heard of this Witiku,” Ruggles said.

  “Then I take it you are not originally from these parts,” said the cooper.

  Ruggles shook his great shiny globe of a head. “No, I hail from Down East in Maine, where we have more than enough Indian legends. But pray recount this Plumford one to me.” He propped his elbows on his bar and gave the old man his full attention. Indeed, we all did, although most of us had heard the tale oft times before.

  “Witiku roamed hereabouts in centuries past, wreaking havoc wheresoever he did go,” the cooper narrated with relish. “He was a most savage vampyre, for he did not just suck the blood but sometimes ate the flesh of white men. We were called the Long Pigs by the Nipmucs, and Witiku was of that tribe. He could make himself into a creature with a wolf’s head atop a man’s body when he fed upon humans, and a mortal wolf pack would travel in his wake to devour his leavings. Their den was on the rise we now call Wolf Hill, and they were greatly feared. For they were Witiku’s pack of
familiars.”

  “You are getting your legends mixed up, old timer,” the mechanic said. “The wolves that had a den atop that hill never ate humans. Just lambs and calves and such. But they were fierce all right. Tore out the necks of the cows. At night the pack would circle a farmer’s house and howl, striking fear into all within. And women and children were advised to stay away from the hill even in broad daylight. Finally the farmers and townsmen got good and sick of the pack and organized a hunt. Fifty men circled round the foot of the hill, and up they went, making a ruckus so as to trap the wolves all on top, where they shot and piked the lot of ’em. Nailed their heads to the Meetinghouse wall and left the bodies to rot by the den. And that was the end of it.”

  “Was it?” the cooper said. “What about the wolf that got away? It was said to have been as big as an ox, yet no bullet could hit it. It just up and vanished.”

  “You saying that was Witiku?” the mechanic sneered.

  The cooper shrugged. “That’s the way I heard tell it.”

  “And was that the last seen of this Indian vampyre?” Ruggles asked, ready to put an end to the tale and start pouring drinks again.

  The old man was not so ready. “Can it ever be said that the last has been seen of such a creature as that? Some believe he is just resting for a time, most likely in the Nipmuc burying ground near Farmer Herd’s far pasture.”

  “Then let’s dig him up!” Solomon Wiley strode to the front of the taproom, looking even more dour than usual in his mourning clothes. Although he’d been sitting quietly in a corner with his bereaved brother, I’d expected he would eventually take the floor. Was he not, after all, the self-styled vampyre authority? “These very hands”—he raised his mighty mitts—“have destroyed one after another fiendish vampyre. I have the gift for it. Indeed, I was a mere boy when I found my first bloodsucker. He’d been plaguing our village for months, yet no one dared seek him out. No one but me! I rode backwards on a white horse into the graveyard at night, all alone, and where the horse stopped I knew was the place where the beast was lurking. I convinced the villagers of this, and the grave was dug up. But none could do what had to be done next. Only I, a boy of twelve, had the mettle to take an ax to the vile creature the dead man had become. And he was a man I had known well when alive—my own stepfather!”