The Northbury Papers

by Joanne Dobson

  “Eurocentric excellence, you mean,” Latisha continued, with the indignation of the righteous. “And as for the contributions of African-American culture—”

  “That’s the problem,” Brewster interjected. “Self-interested ideological assaults on fundamental knowledge—”

  “But,” Sally Chenille’s tongue ring clicked against her front teeth, her quarter-inch-long neon yellow buzz cut seemed to bristle, “we must acknowledge the fundamental instability and relativity of all knowledge and evaluation. Postmodern feminist standpoint epistemology—”

  “But what about the postfeminist position,” Jill interrupted, in a girlish voice. For some reason—I couldn’t imagine why—Jill didn’t like Sally, and she took every opportunity to provoke her. “The issues of young women are consistently elided by the institutional hegemony of a generation of older feminists—”

  “Older!” The syllables were squeezed from Sally’s throat.

  And so it went. I’d heard the arguments before. We all had. One group ascribed to a theory of solid, traditional knowledge; the other to a concept of relevance and inclusivity. What constituted the “higher” education our students would get here at Enfield depended on the conclusions we reached in this debate. But, like me, everyone in this room had long ago made up his or her mind. And no one was about to be persuaded differently. I was surprised to see Greg taking notes, but he had pulled a scrap of paper out of his pocket and was jotting down what seemed to be fairly serious reflections. When the stormy discussion ended after a fruitless two hours, he turned to me with an intent expression, glancing down at the paper in his hand. “Karen, what do you think of Portia?”

  “Portia? Who’s Portia?”

  “I mean—as a name? For the baby? Or Rosalind? Kate? Juliet?”

  As soon as I could without being rude, I gathered up my jacket and briefcase and headed out the door. On the top step of the President’s House, I paused and breathed in the balmy spring air. An irrelevant notion wafted through my mind: It was a perfect night, I thought, to fall in love. Tony’s upcoming marriage came instantly to mind, and I suddenly slipped into a slough of desolation. Shaking my head to rid myself of the unexpected rush of emotion, I started down the granite steps resolutely; I had far more important things to do than fall in love.

  Shamega had been mute during the debate, but she’d obviously been paying close attention. By the time I reached the sidewalk, she was at my side. “So, Professor Pelletier—when we change the curriculum are you going to offer a senior seminar in the novels of Mrs. Northbury?”

  I laughed. “Yeah. Right. I had to fight to schedule a course on Emily Dickinson next fall.”

  Shamega’s mention of Mrs. Northbury reminded me that I hadn’t heard from Edith Hart since my visit to Meadowbrook two weeks earlier. Nor had I called her, not being certain if she was up to talking to me. I’d drop her a thank-you note, I decided; that would at least remind her of my existence. But I was so busy, with exams, papers, and now this damn committee, I didn’t know when I was ever going to have time to get back to Eastbrook.

  “I’ve signed up for your Dickinson course next fall,” Shamega told me.

  “Good,” I replied. “I’ll be glad to have you in class again. You liven things up. How are you, anyhow? Everything okay?” Shamega looked tired—everyone did at this time of the semester—but she also looked good. This was the first time in months I’d seen her in a dress instead of the baggy hip-hop clothes she wore to make her point—whatever it was. The soft beige cotton looked terrific against her dark skin. The buzz cut had grown out a bit, re-framing her delicate features in curls. When I looked at her now, I thought of pixies, and brownies, and elves.

  “Yeah. I guess. No more nastiness, anyhow.” She shrugged. “Just a lot of eyeballing on Tibby’s part. But, listen,” she obviously didn’t want to talk about Tibby Two, “I was only kidding about you teaching a Northbury seminar, but really I did enjoy the novel you lent me. I knew from the start that Esmeralda would eventually find her lost daughter, but I was glad when it happened.”

  “That’s called,” I intoned in my most scholarly voice, “the gratification of gendered genre expectations.” In normal tones, I went on, “And when Northbury’s in good form, she does it well. But, of course, she’s not a classic of the Western tradition.” I mimicked Miles Jewell’s deep pedantic cadences.

  Shamega grinned. “I’m glad she’s not. I had fun—for a change.”

  “Karen, wait up!” Greg was behind us as we turned onto campus. He nodded at Shamega, then turned to me. “What do you think of Cordelia?”

  I stopped, and chewed my lower lip as I contemplated. Then I winked at Shamega, but spoke directly to Greg. “What do you think of Esmeralda? I mean, as a name?”

  As I cruised past the President’s House on my way home, Jill walked down the front steps, alone. The porch light turned her red-gold hair into a spun-gold halo. I was about to honk, wave, and pass her by when I noticed Sally Chenille lurking by the gate, watching Jill intently. Sally’s heavily made-up face was expressionless, masklike. Shuddering inexplicably, I slammed on the brake and screeched to a halt. “Hey, Greenberg, can I give you a ride home?”

  Seven

  “Let me know if you find anything interesting.” Edith Hart twisted the small locket she wore on its thin gold chain. “I’m going to have to put these old bones to bed for a while.” It was Easter Sunday afternoon. In the door to the large storeroom off Meadowbrook’s kitchen, Edith leaned on Willis Thorpe’s arm and watched as Amanda, Shamega, and I began the job of sorting through piles of dusty boxes Gerry Novak had lugged down from the attic. “If you come across any treasures,” she continued, “you can show them to me later. Right now I’m a little—fatigued.” And she did look fatigued, gray and drawn, as if some plug had been pulled and whatever vital energy she’d mustered for our visit was visibly draining away.

  Edith had responded to my thank-you note with a telephone call: She was sorry she hadn’t gotten in touch earlier, but she’d been ill. She was feeling stronger now, and would I come to brunch on Sunday? I could spend the afternoon going through boxes. “There are a great many,” she’d said hesitantly, “and I’m not certain which ones have Mrs. Northbury’s things in them. But you could at least make a start at sorting them out.” Amanda was home for Easter break, and my offer to bring her along was met with enthusiasm, “Lovely. I can’t begin to tell you how much I miss young people. It would be such a treat for me to have your daughter here. And any other helpers you care to bring.” So on this rainy Sunday in late April I’d brought Amanda and Shamega to Meadowbrook, the former interested in talking to Dr. Hart about her long medical career, the latter now deep into her third Serena Northbury novel and head over heels with delight about meeting the author’s great-granddaughter.

  Edith had gone all out with brunch—or, rather, Gerry, her cook and general factotum, had. Our hostess, pale in a high-necked lavender dress of some filmy, floaty fabric, did nothing more strenuous than sit in her cushioned chair and preside over the feast. The dining room table was spread with Irish linen and a lavish Easter buffet of baked ham, cheese soufflé, green salad, tropical fruit salad, jelly roll. Accustomed to college food-service fare, the girls fell on the meal as if they were famished, and I wasn’t far behind. Edith ate little, picking at the abstemious selection of ham, dark bread, and greens Will Thorpe had chosen for her. But she entered into the mood of the party with undisguised pleasure: talking to Amanda at length about the practice of medicine, sending Shamega to the kitchen to get the Northbury jelly-roll recipe, laughing at the repartee between the girls. As I’d expected, Amanda and Shamega had liked each other immediately.

  “I can’t tell you much about Mrs. Northbury,” Edith responded to Shamega’s questions. “I didn’t know her, of course—she died years before I was born—but my grandmother, her daughter Josie, talked about her a little. It was odd: My grandmother always referred to her as Mrs. Northbury, never as Mother, as if the
public woman were more important to her than the private woman. And she didn’t tell many personal stories.” She paused, and her eyes took on a meditative look, as if she were attempting to come to some kind of a decision. Then she continued. “Maybe that was because—Gerry!” Then, after an awkward silence, “Listen, why don’t you join us? Surely you don’t need to spend the entire afternoon in the kitchen?”

  Gerry Novak stood silently in the arched doorway, an enigmatic figure. Although so far Novak hadn’t said much in my presence, his taciturn manner radiated dissatisfaction. Was it because he’d had to put together a lavish meal for us? Or was there some friction in this household I didn’t know about? Most likely, I decided, noting the dour lines etched into his face, Gerry Novak simply had a permanent chip on his shoulder. Edith had referred to Gerry as a family “connection”—whatever that meant—but he insisted on behaving like a servant. At the moment his stiff posture and stilted manner seemed less like the behavior of any actual modern American domestic employee than like a stage performance of proper servitude.

  “No, thank you, Dr. Hart. I merely need to know if you desire anything else at the moment.” His formal demeanor was calculated to throw cold water on any attempt at familiarity.

  “No, Gerry.” Edith’s tone was resigned. “We’re fine. Thank you.”

  When he left, she raised an exasperated eyebrow at Will, then turned to me. “Gerry has lived here all his life, was born on the estate to a family that’s been at Meadowbrook since Mrs. Northbury’s time. I think of him as—well—one of the family. But there are moments when he insists on being—”

  “Difficult,” Will broke in. “Difficult is the only word describing Gerry’s attitude. And after all Edie’s done for him, sending him to college, supporting his work—”

  “Karen didn’t come here to talk about our domestic problems, Will.” A repressive glance from Edith’s dark eyes silenced her friend. “She’s interested in my great-grandmother. We should use what time we have to discuss Mrs. Northbury.” She turned back to me.

  “Really, Karen, those old boxes are your best hope for biographical information. To the family, at least by the time I came along, the most significant thing about Serena Northbury was her money. Before she stopped writing so abruptly in her forties, she’d earned a fortune—at least by nineteenth-century standards. But there’s really no one left who has much interest in this—white elephant.” Edith gestured around at her gracious, old-fashioned room, implying by extension the entire sumptuous phenomenon that was Meadowbrook.

  Will had given us a tour when we’d arrived. The grounds were green and sloping, with a large pond, a white brick barn and stables, and the small tenant cottage Gerry Novak lived in. And the house was a bit of a white elephant, a three-story, hip-roofed, brown-shingled “bungalow” few modern families could afford to maintain. But it was elegant. Double parlors, connected by paneled pocket doors, overlooked the wide, white-pillared, wraparound veranda and manicured grounds. A library, dining room, butler’s pantry and commodious kitchen completed the layout of the first floor. Ten bedrooms—large rooms for the family and cramped ones for the staff—made up the two top floors. And the multiroomed attic in itself would have provided adequate housing for a not-so-small modern family. The Northbury family money obviously had survived the decades, because the house was modernized and well maintained. From the first-floor landing, I’d looked down the curving staircase to the wide center hall and wondered who would inherit this fine home after Edith’s death. Now she was saying there was no family—at least I thought that’s what she was saying. Sad, I mused. Mrs. Northbury’s legacy would come to an end.

  “Although they were grateful for her fortune,” Edith continued, “I think the family was always a bit embarrassed by its relationship to Serena Northbury; everyone said her novels were such trash—”

  My exclamation of impatience stopped her. She examined me curiously. “You really care about Mrs. Northbury, don’t you?”

  “I care about women’s lives and writing.” I was on my soapbox now. “So many women’s stories have been lost to readers in this country. What’s come down to us from the nineteenth century? Alcott’s Jo March and Stowe’s Little Eva—that’s about it. But in reality, a goodly number of accomplished women writers were publishing, and they created some fascinating characters.”

  Edith played with her heart locket and listened attentively. Encouraged, I continued. “Mrs. Northbury was a terrific storyteller. So, she wasn’t Herman Melville—or Ernest Hemingway. So what? Do we need more stories about big fish?”

  The elderly woman laughed. “No, I don’t imagine we do. So, you’re telling me my great-grandmother wasn’t an embarrassment.”

  “No, she wasn’t. Certainly she didn’t write the kind of books in vogue today, but she has intriguing things to say about being a woman.”

  “Then why do you think her work vanished so completely?” It wasn’t a challenge; she really wanted to know.

  “Northbury—ah—Mrs. Northbury, that is—was writing women’s novels at a moment when the literary establishment was undergoing a kind of—how can I say it?—a kind of masculinization, I guess. In the late 1800’s, magazine editors decided what was quality literature and what wasn’t. And they were mostly men. And by the early twentieth century that job had been given over to the academic establishment, white male intellectuals who didn’t have much tolerance for women’s literature. And it wasn’t just white women writers who were disregarded; black literature, immigrant literature, working-class literature: Whole genres of writing were disappeared, I guess you could say. Just totally written out of literary history with a few scornful remarks. Poof! There goes Charles Chesnutt. Poof! There goes Serena Northbury. Never to be taken seriously again.”

  “Hmm,” Edith said, looking thoughtful.

  The pause gave me an opportunity to hear myself—I was preaching. Again. “Sorry,” I said, sheepishly, “I get carried away. It was a much more complicated process than you want to hear about. But I think a lot was lost … all those stories about women’s lives—and loves.”

  “That’s what you meant in class, isn’t it,” Shamega broke in. “When you were talking about eradicated female subject positions.” In this social situation the words sounded pretentious, but it was nice to know someone had been listening.

  “Did I really say that?” I laughed. “Well, yeah. That’s when universal experience—in other words, the stuff literary scholars think is worth being written about and taught—came to be defined by rafting down the Mississippi or being bricked up with a cask of Amontillado, rather than, say, giving birth or raising a family.”

  “Really?” Edith seemed absorbed by what I was saying. “And you’re doing something to change that?”

  I shrugged. “A number of scholars are. And a biography and literary study of your great-grandmother would help.”

  “Hmm.”

  “Edith.” Will Thorpe was observing his friend with concern. “Don’t you think you’re overextending yourself? Remember—”

  She waved a dismissive hand at him, but the light had indeed gone out of her eyes; she looked bone-weary. “Karen, I’m truly interested in what you’re telling me, but Will’s right—I need to rest now. Why don’t you start sorting through the things from the attic? We’ll talk later.”

  Mountains of dusty boxes and suitcases topped leather-strapped steamer trunks. The storeroom was full, but, according to Edith, Gerry had emptied only two of the attic rooms. I had a daunting task ahead of me. “Okay, kids,” I directed, “there’s a lot of old stuff to go through here, and it would be easy to get sidetracked. But remember, I’m looking for things that have to do with Serena Northbury and her books. So focus on stuff that looks as if it comes from the mid- to late nineteenth century. The rest isn’t any of our business. We’ll stack the Northbury artifacts over here outside the door, and the rest …” But neither girl was paying attention.

  Amanda pulled an orange beaded flapper dress
out of an old leather valise. “Look at this thing. Wow!”

  “Wrong period,” I said. “Northbury died long before the Roaring Twenties.”

  “Yeah, but this is super.” A pair of white spats was next out of the suitcase, and Amanda buttoned them around her ankles atop her Nike high-tops. I sighed. I didn’t know if she was going to be any help or not.

  I tackled a battered blue hatbox stuffed with old envelopes, and was thrilled to find Serena Northbury’s careful, rounded signature at the close of the first letter. I placed the hat box and its treasures in the hallway to sort through later, atop a dusty cherrywood lap desk monogrammed with the initials S.N. I was tempted to pull out letters and read them right on the spot, but efficiency demanded we organize the material first, separating the Northbury artifacts from the rest of the family belongings. If we didn’t, we could be stuck in this storeroom for months.

  “Ohhhhh—this is cool.” Shamega wafted a red feather boa through the air, wrapped it around her neck, then struck a pose. In spite of her baggy pants, she looked exotic and decadent. She didn’t look like someone who was ready to spend hours poking through musty old papers.

  Firmly, I closed the top of the dilapidated suitcase she and Amanda were plundering, fastened the tarnished clasps, and hefted it over to the far corner of the room. “This is a serious endeavor we’re engaged in here, kids. There’s no time to mess around. Who knows if I’ll ever have an opportunity like this again. Concentrate on Mrs. Northbury.” A pasteboard stationery box caught my eye. I opened it. Eureka! Neat stacks of letters addressed to Mrs. Serena Northbury at an address on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. My Northbury pile was growing.

  At the end of two hours, Amanda, Shamega, and I had separated out a modest heap of Northbury belongings and were sprawled on the hall carpet, looking through boxes.