Thoreau in Love (40 page)

By the time Henry got back to Staten Island, he was coughing badly. The roads and fields had been decimated by the flooding rains. Streams rushed over their banks. It took nearly two hours to get through the mud and floods back to the house. The yards were flooded, the grain fields flattened, the grape arbor in tatters. Susan greeted him with, “My Lord, you’re a wreck.”

“I feel worse than I look,” said Henry and coughed wet and deeply.

“Go upstairs and get into bed. I’ll have Mary bring up some broth.”

In his room, Henry changed into dry clothes and got under the covers, shivering. Before Mary came up he fell into a fitful sleep, woke in dreams about Ben, turned and tossed, unable to get Ben out of his mind. He awoke in the morning with thoughts of Ben, and with those thoughts, despair. When Haven came to wake him, Henry told him he wasn’t feeling well and that he was going to stay in his room. By the afternoon, he was able to read, but he still wanted nothing to do with the family. For three days, Henry stayed in his room, reading, coughing, sleeping, sipping broth, thinking about all that had happened, with Ben, with Stearns, with Lidian and Emerson, but mainly with Ben. He tried to piece together the whys, wondering what he could have done differently. If only I’d. . . . Why couldn’t I have. . . ? The emptiness in his gut grew.

When his coughing subsided, Henry got out of bed and, on a whim, hoping to find some sort of resolution, to fill the unfillable, he walked down the rain-rutted roads to St. John’s by the Bay. Wild grass grew high around the little tumbledown church; vines grew into the peeling, warped clapboard. At first Henry thought the windows had all been smashed, but then he realized they’d been removed, as had the walnut front doors. Tentatively, he walked in; the church seemed as empty as his own insides. There was broken glass on the floor, a few stones, but that was it, except for some shards of wood; even the pews were gone. Plundered, like me, all hope and life ripped out without a thought. He picked up one of the stones; it was cool from sitting in the dark. He drew back his arm to toss it and saw on the targeted wall that someone had scrawled PANSIE and FERRY in charcoal and drawn very detailed erect penises penetrating and about to penetrate men’s bums.

“Ignorant fools. . . . Can’t even spell.” Henry wanted to look closer at the drawings, but afraid someone would catch him, he called out, “Anyone here?” No answer. He tossed the stone by the door. Keeping his ears pricked, he walked nonchalantly over to the drawings and studied them. And started getting erect himself. He gingerly touched one of the penises, saying quietly, “Someone knew what they were doing.” Seeing the drawings made him want to masturbate. And he thought, Do it right here. That’d show them. But then footfalls crunched on the gravel path leading to the church. Not to be caught anywhere near the offensive drawings, he tiptoed back to the front doors, and, acting as if he’d just entered himself, he looked out and there was Gregory, who looked up and said, “Hello. Oh, it’s you. Henry, right?”

“Yes. Gregory, right?”

“Gregory it is.” Running through Henry’s mind was, Does he know I know about him and Ralph?

“Thought I heard someone over here. I’m staying in the rectory, watching over the place.” God, that’s fitting, thought Henry. “Not that anyone asked me to. Last we spoke I was stripping trees, right?”

“Yes, right.” Henry didn’t want to look at Gregory. Why he didn’t know. He just didn’t.

“Got work in the stables up the road after that. . . . You were a friend of the reverend, weren’t you?”

Henry kicked at some glass. Though he thought he should deny it, he said, “Yes, I was.”

Softly, Gregory said, “We talked about you, the reverend and me.”

Henry didn’t know why, but he no longer felt the need to hide his thoughts. “And we talked about you.”

“Did you now? Did he say good things about me?”

Henry looked at Gregory and saw a sadness he hadn’t seen in him before. “He said very good things about you.”

“He took my heart.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“But I’m not going to stew. Going to get me into Manhattan this afternoon. From there I’m going west. Don’t know where, don’t know how, but I’m going.”

“Good luck to you.”

“Good luck to you, too. . . . Take care.” After an awkward moment of shaking hands, Gregory let go and went out into the bright day. Henry followed. Feeling somewhat restored, he trudged through the tall grass to the road, but by the time he crested the Richmond road hill and saw the ivy-covered Snuggery, he was again aching with emptiness. But then, seeing the postman, he thought, Ben will write me. But just as soon as he thought that, he thought, Why? Why would he write me? He thinks I tossed him aside.

Sitting in William’s library with Susan that evening, Henry read an ad in that morning’s
Tribune
for travel to St. Louis. Eighteen days by packet to New Orleans, then steamboat to St. Louis. He had nowhere near the $20 needed, but it got his mind reeling. Maybe I could find him. Maybe he’ll stay in St. Louis, waiting for me. Maybe if I concentrate, send a message through the universe.

His transcendental concentration was broken by Susan’s crinkling her paper and saying, “Isn’t it pleasant here without William?”

“It is,” said Henry. “But let me ask you, Have you ever thought of going west?”

“Lord no,” said Susan. “A pioneer I’m not.”

“I guess I’m not either,” said Henry. But that didn’t stop his mind from fantasizing different trips to St. Louis, by boat, by canal and wagon. And always finding Ben. After saying good night to Susan and climbing to his attic aerie, Henry thought, Maybe he’s hoping for a letter from me.

Henry sat and wrote a new letter to Ben, on his good stationery, telling him how sorry he was for the fear that had debilitated him, and how he’d finally gotten over that fear and had gone in search of him. Then he wrote that he was in love with Ben and wanted to spend his days and his nights with him, wherever Ben wished to live. He signed it, Your loving Henry. He folded the paper, addressed the letter to Ben Wickham, G.P.O., St. Louis, Missouri, sealed it and sent it in the next morning’s mail.

Two days later, he was surprised by a letter from Ben in the late afternoon mail. So excited he could hardly speak, he took the letter up to his room, placed it on his desk and sat, trying to calm down before breaking the seal. But he couldn’t stop shaking, so he sliced through the sealing wax and unfolded the paper. The writing was extremely tiny but legible.

My dear Henry, Because of the love I feel for you and the love I know you feel for me, I can’t let the way we parted be the end. I so want my days to be different than they are, but that’s wishful thinking. Many times I nearly returned to Staten Island to try to repair what was smashed, but, truthfully, I knew if my hopes were dashed again I would not be able to bounce back. I don’t think I ate more than a cracker after we parted, not for a week or so. I love you so much, Henry. Still my heart aches
.

I met a man in the place I was staying, who it turned out knew you. He says he’s a duke from England, but that when he knew you he was posing as a man of the cloth. I was so excited that he knew you that I was blind to all else he is. We talked all night about you, and it didn’t matter that you’d never spoken of me—no, that’s not true. It hurt me deeply that he’d never heard of me and made me realize that you and I never really had a chance. By the end of that night, I had decided to go with him to St. Louis. Presently, we are in Cincinnati
.

The night before we were to leave I decided I would not go with the duke, because I wanted only to be with you. When I told him this, he told me about a young lady who accompanied you, and whom he said you might even wed. Hearing about her from him and not from you erased any doubts I had about going west with the duke. Why I keep calling him the duke I don’t know. He’s no more a duke than I am. But I realized the forces of society are too strong and that the only way you and I could have had a life together would have been to come west, where we could travel together at ease and, more, where we knew no one. How I long to hold you in my arms. To kiss you, to feel your flesh against mine. Henry, you made me a man. You made me realize I could be who I am and not fear the consequences. Though I know you thought I was so brave, so “full-steam ahead” as you said repeatedly, I was as terrified as you were. Your love gave me strength, the strength I needed to be who I am
.

As soon as we arrive in St. Louis, the duke and I shall go our separate ways, though he won’t know that until after I’m gone. I’m surprised you and he were friends. He wants nothing more than to bilk good people out of their hard-earned money, enticing them with the promise of ten times the money they lend him as soon as he gets his “inheritance,” which he let on to me does not exist
.

As for me, using your words, I’m a saunterer, searching for the Holy Land. I will join one of the caravans going west on the Oregon Trail. I wish you the best, Henry. Oh Lord, just writing that makes my heart ache and tears fall. I had so hoped we would be together forever. I hope and trust you do not marry this young lady, as wealthy as she is, and become, using again your own words, one of those men leading lives of quiet desperation. Better to return to the town and the fields and woods that excite you so much, that make you feel alive. Know that I shall be with you always. I’ve run out of space. I love you, Henry, and always will. Devotedly, your Ben

Henry slumped in his chair. “Oh my Lord, what have I done?” His heart ached so he held his chest, desperately sucked air. He became dizzy. “He thinks I was with Bea. Why didn’t I tell him? Why am I always so afraid? I can’t go on like this. I can’t.” He pushed out his chair and, holding his desk for support, tried to stand, but the pull of gravity was too great. “I have to lie down.” He dropped on his bed, where he collapsed onto his side. And fell asleep.

Henry awoke the next morning, still clothed, still crushed by the weight of emptiness, still utterly alone. His first thought was, I can’t do this. He lay there, feeling nothing. But then, for the first time in days, maybe weeks, he heard birds chattering, leaves rustling in the cool breeze coming through his window. After who knows how long, though he saw no future for himself, the life outside his window gave him the confidence to try to rouse himself.

“I can do this,” he said quietly, and lifted himself to his elbows.

After more minutes he rose, shaved, rinsed his face in cool water and ventured to the outhouse. He knew Ben was gone, and that there was nothing he could do to get him back. That afternoon, he walked through the woods to the seashore, but in his thoughtful ramblings he realized that these woods seemed lacking without Ben, tame really. He longed for Concord.

In the last week of August, as Susan and a healing Henry took in a cool afternoon on the front porch, the postman came up the walk, saying he had a letter for Henry. Henry hoped it was another from Ben, but as soon as he saw the handwriting, he knew it wasn’t. “It’s from Concord, from Ellery Channing.”

“Ellery Channing,” said Susan. “That strange, strange man.”

“He is strange,” said Henry. “But the kind of strange I like.” Henry was determined more than ever to live his life as Henry Thoreau, no matter what anyone thought.

Ellery wrote that he was coming to New York to see Henry. While happy for the Concord company and diversion, Henry was also embarrassed to see Ellery. Rather than “grinding up a thousand Concords,” as Ellery had said he would do, Henry felt he’d been ground into a fine powder. Plus, he didn’t want to tell Ellery about Ben, and Ben was still so much on his mind. But then Ellery was in New York and wrote again, threatened that if Henry didn’t come in to see him, he would make the trip to Staten Island. He suggested that they go across to New Jersey for the “Grand Buffalo Hunt, Free of Charge” that he’d seen advertised in the papers.

Henry had seen the ads. The Grand Buffalo Hunt—real Indians hunting buffalo the way they do on the Great Plains, so dangerous they couldn’t hold it in Manhattan—was to take place in Hoboken, New Jersey. He wrote Ellery back, saying it’s “just the thing to raise my spirits,” and suggested they meet at William’s office on Thursday morning. He tried to get Susan to go, but she wanted no part of it. “Have you ever seen live buffalo? Look, read the ad. These ‘dangerous beasts’ come directly from the New Mexico prairie. And it’s free.”

Henry met Ellery on Wall Street and was surprised at how happy he was to see him. Crowds were already streaming across Wall and down the Broad Way to the Hoboken ferry slip. Henry wanted to go right away, but Ellery had one thing on his mind. He took Henry’s arms and looked him in the eyes. “I’ve come to take you back.”

“What are you talking about, Take me back? Take me back where?”

“Oh, Lord, it’s so good to feel these strong arms. Concord, Henry. You’re coming back to Concord with me.”

“I am not. Now, let’s go or we’ll miss the boat.”

“I’ve never seen so many people.”

“Neither have I,” said Henry.

“Do you think they’re all going to the buffalo hunt?”

“I’m afraid so. Now come on.” They ran across Wall and down the Broad Way and hit a wall of people fanned out from the ferry terminal. “Come on,” said Henry, “we’re not going to wait and miss it. Let’s go.” Getting dirty looks and elbows the whole way, they slithered through to the front of the mass of men, women and children funneling in to the ferry slips; every available ferry was taking on passengers. Ellery, trailing behind, holding Henry’s arm for dear life, called, “Is this what you really want? All these crowds?”

“I’m finished with Concord.”

“No, you can’t be finished with Concord.” A breath of air opened up as part of the crowd went left, part right to two different slips. Ellery grabbed Henry by the chest. “Concord’s part of you, Henry. This part of you. It’s your heart, Henry. And you’re Concord’s heart. Everyone misses you.”

“Oh, who, Lidian?” Ellery got spun in front of Henry as the crowd jammed up again. “No, not Lidian,” said Ellery over his shoulder. “Who cares about Lidian? Emerson talks about you all the time and wonders how you’re doing.” Henry, pushed up against Ellery from behind, now held on to Ellery as they were crushed in the stalled crowd. “Emerson does? In his letters he seems not to care at all.” Ellery turned all he could, his head, and said, “And I miss you. Concord’s not the same without you. Tell me you’ll come back.” Henry was pushed harder into Ellery, who had no place to move. “I’m not coming back. There’s nothing for me in Concord.” The crowd suddenly moved, jerking Henry and Ellery sideways, frontwards, backwards. “There’s me,” said Ellery, and he pushed back, crushing Henry, but it was a happy crush. The mood of the crowd was excited, expectant. Ellery said, “Hold me tight so we don’t get separated.” and Henry was just able to get his arms around Ellery’s torso. “This is fun, isn’t it?” said Henry.