Thoreau on Wolf Hill

by Oak, B. B.

  Mr. Jackson came into the mill at that moment and started hollering at his men for stopping the saw. I hurried to him, took his arm, and led him outside, for as used as he must be to seeing death in all forms, I did not think he could bear to see what his son had done to himself. Yet when I told him what had just happened he insisted on going back in to take care of Hyram properly.

  When the Coroner’s Jury convened over Hyram’s body, the torso and head were back together and shrouded. No one asked to get a better look at the remains. The verdict, of course, was death by suicide.

  Henry and I then went to see Justice Phyfe. All the windows of his elegant house were shuttered, all the mirrors draped in black crepe. A servant dressed in black ushered us into Phyfe’s study, where he sat in dimness behind his massive desk. He could barely raise his head to regard us, much less stand up to greet us. Arabel’s death had obviously been a severe blow to his heart. He already knew of Hyram Jackson’s death, for Coroner Daggett always reports to him directly and immediately, but he was most surprised when we told him that Hyram had confessed to us that he had murdered Chauncey Bidwell.

  “What was his motive?” Phyfe said.

  Henry and I had agreed, on the way to Phyfe’s house, that there was no need to mention Arabel. What good would that do anyone? Phyfe loved his daughter and cherished her memory. Bidwell had already paid with his life for his immorality. And Hyram had brought justice down on his own head. So I simply told Justice Phyfe that we did not know Hyram’s motive for killing Bidwell.

  He gave me and then Henry a long, hard look. “Then it shall forever remain a mystery, won’t it?”

  We did not refute him.

  Phyfe requested that we return the following morning to officially testify before him and the other two town Selectmen, which we readily agreed to do. He then pulled a black handkerchief from his black waistcoat and covered his face. We left him to his mourning.

  Our last task was to return to the cottage and retrieve the incriminating bag of opium paraphernalia. We added rocks to the canvas bag, walked out to the middle of the frozen pond, and Henry pounded a hole through the ice with the fireplace poker. We stuffed the bag through the hole and watched it sink into oblivion as the wind blew through the trees on the hill. As Hyram had said, it sounded like the howl of a wolf.

  ADAM’S JOURNAL

  Wednesday eve, December 22

  Almost died today. If Henry had not been there, doubt I would be around to write this.

  He came to Plumford this morning to meet with Justice Phyfe and the other two Selectmen. They seemed eager to put an end to the Bidwell murder investigation and asked few questions of us. They even went so far as to propose the possibility that Hyram had been crazed enough to have killed Kitty Lyttle too, a theory that Henry and I vehemently spoke against. Even so I shall not be surprised if such a rumor begins to circulate about town. Whilst meeting with the Selectmen, I took the opportunity to register complaints against Solomon Wiley for laying rough hands on Noah and Julia and for bashing me on the head with a pole. Did not mention the terrifying incident in the swamp, for the more distant that memory becomes, the more I believe it must have been a nightmare. But when Justice Phyfe said that Solomon’s brother had reported him missing since Saturday, a chill did run down my spine. The three Selectmen all expressed the hope that Solomon had left town for good. Henry and I exchanged glances and remained silent.

  We left Phyfe’s and walked together in the bright morning sunlight, he on his way to the Concord road and I on my way to my office. We were about to part company when Julia came out of her house with Noah. Each had a pair of ice skates in hand.

  “Noah found a box full of skates in the attic,” she told us. “I’m taking him to Beaver Pond.”

  “What a perfect day to go skating!” Henry said with boyish enthusiasm. “May I come along?”

  “Of course,” Julia said. “Noah, go fetch a pair of skates that will fit under Mr. Thoreau’s boots.” She looked at me most invitingly. “And a pair for Dr. Adam, too?”

  I nodded. Noah gave a whoop and ran into the house. A few minutes later he came out with the box of skates. Unfortunately, Mrs. Swann accompanied him. “I’m coming too!” she informed us.

  We brought the skates to the smithy, who sharpened the blades in a jiffy, and off the five of us tramped to Beaver Pond. Nary a cloud appeared in the crystal blue sky to filter the brightness of the high winter sun, and a golden clarity brought the world into such distinct focus that distant Monadnock looked to be just beyond the next hill. Henry seemed as eager as Noah to get on the pond. He hurried ahead of us to go talk to the ice fishermen and evaluate the ice.

  “We have a safe, crystal roof of three inches to skate upon!” he reported back. “But the fishermen told me that around that corner yonder is a cove where the stream that feeds the pond runs fast and hard, preventing the water around it from freezing. Let us all make sure to stay away from the area.”

  We strapped on our skates, and each in his or her own fashion pushed off onto the hard, glistening pond. The manner in which a person skates, as far as I am concerned, is a better indication of character and personality than any contained in the learned texts of physiognomy or phrenology.

  Noah kept to short, cautious strokes with his feet, more like walking than skating, but that did not keep him from landing hard on his tail the first few feet from shore. He was up in an instant, however, ready to try again, and after another few steps, down again he did go. Up, down, up, down, the little jack-in-the-box never gave up.

  Julia stayed poised on the shore for an instant, gathered herself, and then in one quick leap sprang out onto the ice and glided smoothly on one skate and then the other. She used her arms and legs with an elegant economy to confidently build speed and then, with a nonchalant ease, turned and glided backwards. She gave me a smile over her shoulder, the cold air brightening her cheeks, her teeth white as freshly cut ice shavings, her lips red as partridge berries. Was she recalling that it was I who taught her to skate so well? I could not get enough of the sport as a boy, and because I could not get enough of her company, either, I had insisted she skate with me. We would dash all the way down the frozen river to Concord and back again with the speed of shooting stars.

  Mrs. Swann claimed she had little experience on skates, so she must have kept her balance by sheer power of will. Yet as awkwardly as she moved, she somehow managed to skate deftly backwards when Noah came barreling toward her, once again out of control. She made no attempt to break his fall and barked at him to watch where he was going. No one could accuse Mrs. Swann of being overly fond of children.

  Henry skates, as he does all things physical, very well. Although short of stature, he is very strong, and his superb fitness gives him a refinement of movement any athlete would envy. Moreover, physicality brings him great joy, and every stroke of his blades was a bright gesture of this joy. He laughed and clapped his hands together, gamboled and whirled and made airy leaps, all to no purpose but the sheer pleasure of it.

  “We have wings of steel!” he shouted. Then he noticed Noah struggling and glided up to him. “Come, let us go look into the parlor of the fishes, lad.” He took Noah’s hand and kept him upright as they sailed off.

  I followed along, curious to see such a place myself. A group of fishermen were sitting on the shore, eating their luncheon, and we skated up to one of the holes they had cut in the ice.

  “Look down through the opening and you will see this fish parlor I spoke of, Noah,” Henry whispered as if sharing a great secret. “It is softly lit as through a window of ground glass and has a bright sanded floor. Do you espy it?” Noah nodded vigorously, perhaps more spellbound by Henry’s description than by what he was actually observing. “There below a perennial waveless serenity reigns as it does in the sky,” Henry continued. “So you see, Noah, heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.”

  Noah nodded again, and, for aught I know, he understood Henry far better than I did
. We went over to a well the fishermen had cut in the ice and looked at the fish they had caught. Ordinary pickerel they appeared to be to me, but Henry pronounced them fabulous creatures of dazzling and transcendent beauty.

  “How I would like to capture such luminous colors on my canvas,” Julia said, having silently skated up behind us.

  She casually hooked arms with me and pressed close, as in days of yore, when we were innocent children. Not so innocent anymore, I yearned to press her closer still and kiss her breath away. Instead, I pretended to continue admiring the doomed pickerel.

  We eventually moved away from the fishing holes, and Henry soon had Noah kicking a chunk of ice back and forth with him as they skated. The boy became better balanced the less he thought about falling, and as Henry advanced the piece of ice farther and farther ahead, Noah extended his stride and began to skate faster.

  Julia and I found ourselves falling into a practiced hold, her right arm crossed over my left arm, our hands clasping. On the same exact heartbeat, we both glided forth on the right foot and skated off together, our long strides in perfect harmony. And once again I felt her to be my soul mate, my other half, my completion. We made a moving, physical heaven together as we sailed past the dark, majestic pine trees lining the shore. The ice was so clear that we could see the fishes swimming beneath our feet, dashing this way and that around us. We swept around a sharp turn of the shore, our eyes locked for a second, and thanks to our mooning nearly swept ourselves into a clear patch of water and a dangerous dunking. We stopped short of the danger in a spray of silvery shavings from our skates and laughed at our foolishness and excitement.

  We turned back, totally mystified as to whether we had been alone for five minutes or an hour, such was our happy bliss. Out on the ice we spied Henry doing various leaps and dithyrambic steps from some aboriginal dance his instinct must have called up. He very much skates to his own rhythms, but his boundless energy lends his limbs, however they may gesticulate, an original, if most unconventional, grace.

  “Where is Noah?” Julia wondered, holding her gloved hand to her eyes as she scanned the shimmering ice surface.

  “There,” I said, pointing across the pond to the far shore. Mrs. Swann and Noah, hand in hand, were skating into the cove.

  Henry joined us and followed our gaze until the woman and boy disappeared from view. “I cautioned them to stay away from there. It’s dangerous to skate near a running stream,” he said. “We’d best go after them.”

  We three raced across the ice, pumping our limbs for greater speed. We curved round the corner of the cove and saw disaster before us. Noah had fallen into the tongue of water the gushing stream prevented from freezing and was clinging to the edge of solid ice that rimmed it. If he let go the inlet current would surely sweep him under. Mrs. Swann had fared better. Although she too had fallen into the water, she had managed to drag herself onto the shore, where she lay in a sodden heap. When she saw us approach she sat up and began shouting and waving and pointing to Noah.

  “Halt!” Henry commanded when we were about a rod from the boy. “The ice ahead is too thin to hold us!”

  We all three slid to a stop and regarded poor Noah. His eyes were the size of saucers, and he made a mewing sound that cut to my heart.

  “I am the lightest by far,” Julia said, “and so the least likely to break through the ice. I will get a hold on him.” Without waiting to hear any opinions on that course of action, she skated back ten feet, took three full strides, and threw herself down forward on the ice, arms and legs spread, and slid like an otter to Noah. As she extended her hands to Noah, he grabbed and hung on. In the next instant the ice beneath her gave way, and she was down in the freezing water with him.

  Henry immediately began heading for shore. “I’ll come back with a branch to pull them to safety,” he shouted over his shoulder.

  But I could not wait for a branch! The ice was thicker at the new break point because it was farther from the rushing stream, and praying it would hold me, I slid myself toward Julia and the boy, arms extended. Julia grabbed hold of one hand and Noah took the other. His grip was very feeble as the current tugged at his body, and he looked to be only a few seconds away from losing consciousness.

  “Try and push Noah up and over the edge so I can pull him out,” I told Julia. “But keep hold of my hand!”

  She nodded. Her lips were already blue with cold. She let go of the ice edge and tried to raise the boy up with one hand, but could not do it. She wrenched her hand from mine, grasped the boy beneath his arms, and as she pushed him upward, she went under. I pulled with all my might and slid Noah to me. Pushed him onto thicker ice and turned back to Julia. She had disappeared! I looked through the ice directly beneath me and saw her staring up at me from a world away, her hands pressed upward against her icy tomb. Then she turned and attempted to swim back to open water. But the current was too strong, and she was carried farther along under the ice. I tried to break through it, jumping up and down as hard as I could on my skates.

  I screamed in frustration and then got my brains to working. Tore off my skates, shoes, and coat and slipped and slid again toward the open water. My only hope was to swim to Julia and haul her back against the current to the safety of shore.

  Plunged into the water, the shock of the cold taking precious air from my lungs. Went under the ice and saw her but fifteen feet away, drifting not just farther away but downward too as her heavy, soaked clothes weighed her down. The current pushed me forward, and I was quickly at her side. Seized her arm and turned back toward shore, but swimming against the current turned out to be far more difficult than I’d surmised. Indeed, I was exhausting myself yet making no progress whatsoever. It began to seem a hopeless struggle until I heard a sharp clicking above our heads. Looked up and saw Henry jumping on the ice and pointing with a long branch. He was motioning toward a faint light that indicated to me a hole in the ice. Began to swim toward it, pulling Julia along with me.

  My lungs burned in earnest now, and my movements were growing uncoordinated from the cold, but at least now I was swimming crosscurrent rather than against it. Glanced at Julia. She was no longer moving her limbs, and her eyes were closed. Gripped her arm tighter and struggled toward the light.

  But the light began to dim, and I realized that I too was losing consciousness from lack of air. Began to fade into a black torpor when, most strange to recount now, I somehow experienced slipping from my body as smoothly and easily as a snake slipping out of its old skin. I rose through the imprisoning roof of ice, free of my body, and observed my corporeal self from above, still trapped under the ice with Julia. As my spirit hovered over the frozen pond, I heard Julia’s spirit calling to me from the water. Do not leave me! Suddenly I was reeled back into my body like a fish on a line, struggling for survival once again.

  Held Julia close, determined to save us both, even as I felt the boney hand of Death brush against my face. Ignored it. It then poked me in the chest. Hard. Opened my eyes and saw that it was not a skeletal hand at all but a long tree branch. Twenty feet or so away I could dimly discern the lower portion of a man standing in waist-deep water and holding on to the branch. Realized Henry had jumped into the ice hole. Wrapped my arm around Julia’s waist and grabbed the branch. Henry pulled us hand over hand to him and, taking hold of my hair, yanked my head out of the water. In the next instant I had Julia’s head up as well. Rejoiced as cold air filled my lungs, but then my pounding heart nearly froze when I saw that Julia was not breathing with me.

  Henry and I got her out of the water. I laid her head to one side on the ice and pushed down hard against her chest, repeating the motion, up and down like a bellows, to free the water from her lungs. After the longest wait of my life, she suddenly spat out water in a most unladylike burst, gasped, coughed out more water, and began sucking in whistling gasps of air, one after another. What music!

  Minutes later the ice fishermen came running to us with sleds equipped with blankets and brandy
for just such mishaps as this. They had already attended to Noah and to Mrs. Swann on the shore, and, after wrapping us up too, they drove us all back to Plumford in their wagons.

  The first thing I had everyone do, including myself, was change into dry clothes. I gave Henry some of Doc Silas’s clothes to wear, which fit him far better than mine would have. Henry fired up the kitchen stove, and we huddled around it, but Julia and Noah could not stop shivering so I prescribed hot baths for both. We filled the wash tub in the kitchen alcove with hot water for Noah and carted up gallon cans of hot water for the hip bath in Julia’s chamber. Mrs. Swann offered to assist her in bathing, but Julia insisted she could manage on her own.

  After the bath had warmed Noah up I put him to bed and layered quilts over him. No longer shivering, he fell asleep immediately, and I stayed by his side for a bit to listen to his respiration. He is a fine-looking boy except for his cleft lip, and my recent research has led me to believe I can rectify this deformity. As I studied Noah asleep I imagined him lying on the operating table in the MGH amphitheater as I performed the corrective surgery; he would be just as peaceful thanks to this new practice of inducing deep sleep with ether. I intend to do the operation gratis, but even so, the hospital costs will be steep. How fortuitous it will be if the woman on Beacon Hill that Julia and Henry heard about turns out to be Noah’s mother. Apparently she is near death, and time is of the essence if Noah is to be acknowledged as the rightful heir to her fortune. But she has not as of yet responded to Julia’s note.

  Left Noah breathing soundly and returned to the kitchen where I found Mrs. Swann still apologizing profusely to Henry for her reckless behavior on the pond. Henry hardly deigned to look at her, and when he did it was with disdain. I avoided looking at her too, for she was most unattractive to behold in a voluminous robe of stiff bombazine, her head swaddled in a fringed shawl, and her face covered with a thick layer of cream she claimed would save her complexion from reddening after such a prolonged exposure to cold and wind.