I say, “She’s certainly very pretty.”
“Young Ned is in raptures about her. I think her little husband had better watch out. And you should see Austin! He’s turned into quite the gallant. Sue calls it a miracle to rival the raising of Lazarus.”
“Does she indeed?”
And what does Sue make of the new belle of Amherst? Does it suit her purposes to have her husband brought back to life? Does it suit mine?
• • •
In the parlor, later. My brother, the aforementioned Lazarus, sits at the piano, striking occasional keys. He’s no pianist. When he turns to meet my watching gaze, he’s more animated than I’ve seen him in a long time.
I say, “I believe you’re in love.”
“Who has told you such a thing?” he exclaims. But he blushes with pure pleasure. No one more vain than a man in love.
“I hope you know what you’re doing.”
“How could I?” he says. “Such a thing has never happened to me before.”
Did he not love Sue, then, in the beginning? He made a great cry about it at the time, but then his passion ran into the sand. Sue Gilbert’s charm proved to be built on stony ground. And ever since, he’s carried his passion inside him, like a secret fire.
“Oh, Emily,” he cries. “If only I could tell you.”
“You can tell me.”
“You ask me if I know what I’m doing. I have no idea what I’m doing. I open the shutters, I find the sun shining, I go outside to be warmed. What else should I do?”
I move nearer to him. I speak with soft deliberation.
“Go further. Go closer.”
“Do you think I don’t want to? But I’m a respectable married man.”
I touch his arm. I do not allow such timidity.
“Do you want to die without having lived?”
He strikes a loud chord on the piano. The jangle of sound echoes in the room. I like that.
“God help me, I’m fifty-four years old! Why would she pay any attention to an old man like me?”
“Do you want her to?”
He gives no answer. He must be made to speak, and so to own his own desires.
“Do you want her to, very much?”
He stares back as if hypnotized. Of course he wants it. Just as I too want it.
“Go further, Austin. For me.”
6
Austin Dickinson’s handsome phaeton, drawn by his horses Tom and Dick, was a common sight in the lanes round Amherst. His solitary drives took him along the banks of the Connecticut River or up into the Pelham Hills. He was understood to be “botanizing.” Like his sister Emily, who tended a garden in the narrow conservatory her father had built for her along one wall of the Homestead dining room, Austin was knowledgeable about plants and found consolation for his lonely life in the turning of the seasons. Every fall the great beech and maple woods turned red, then gold, then winter stripped them bare; but every spring life returned. There was comfort here, in the face of a disappointed life, and of course in the face of death. Austin thought often of death.
The town cemetery in the corner between Pleasant and Triangle Streets was already full. Austin was planning to purchase, on behalf of the town, a wooded hillside on the approach to the Belchertown railroad, to be dedicated as a new and very different kind of cemetery. The graves would lie among trees. Here the turning seasons would remind mourners that their loved ones, though departed from view, would live again. As for heaven, Austin both believed and did not believe. He had never been drawn to the hysterical religious revivals that excited the women of the town every ten years or so, though to placate his wife he had scrambled together a conversion of sorts and made his confession of faith to the congregation of First Church. That was twenty-five years ago now.
“It’s so like you to want to build a graveyard,” his wife said to him. “Why are we to be always thinking about death?”
“I wasn’t aware that you thought much at all on the subject,” Austin replied.
“You think me shallow.” Sue was irritated by his ponderous manner of speech as much as by his words. “Why should a sad thought be any deeper than a happy one? Really, Austin, must you be so dull? You could at least try to be better company.”
Later, when Austin came down to join his family for dinner, as he paused at the closed dining room door, he heard a peal of laughter from within. It was his daughter, Mattie. Then came the answering laughter of his son Ned, and of Sue.
Is this happiness? he asked himself. Is it my fault that I don’t share it?
He formed his face into a smile and entered the room, prepared to be lighthearted. At once the laughter died. All eyes were on him, apprehensive.
“Don’t let me spoil the fun,” he said.
But the gay moment was past. Conversation through dinner was desultory. And when at last he left them, he heard the bright chatter break out again in his wake.
Alone in his study, he put Sue’s question to himself: Must I be so dull? Is there no joy in me? But even as he framed the words, he knew the answer. There was joy in him, and laughter, and love, it cried out for release, but it was locked in his heart, and he did not have the power to set it free. He needed a word, a smile, a touch from another: from one who desired his love.
All at once Austin was overcome by a wave of desolation. It swept over him, shutting out all light and warmth. At such times he hated Sue. He hated her for being a wife who was not a wife. She filled the house with life and color, but when she lay with him in his bed, it was a dead woman he held in his arms.
He threw the bitter reproof back at her. Must you be so dull?
If I am dull, it’s as a volcano is dull while it remains dormant. When the eruption comes, the land will be consumed with fire for miles around.
• • •
Strictly speaking it was not appropriate for Austin Dickinson to spend so much time with Mrs. Todd. She was a little too charming, a little too beautiful. But where was the harm in it? He invited her for drives in his phaeton, and she accepted. They shared a love of nature. Like him, she had no fear of what others call bad weather.
“I love to see the great black clouds roll over the land,” she told him. “I love to be in the woods when the clouds burst, and I press myself close to some great trunk, begging its shelter, as the rain draws its curtains all round me.”
Every word she spoke found an echo in his secret heart. He realized, almost for the first time, as he listened to her, that he loved nature because it was uncontrolled. Before knowing Mabel he would have spoken of the rhythm of the seasons and the consolation he found in the sense of a vast design. Now she showed him nature’s other face: the wild, the explosive, the dangerous, the intensely felt. At once he knew that this was what he craved. This grave and orderly gentleman was hungry for storms.
They called each other Mr. Dickinson and Mrs. Todd. There was nothing indiscreet in their country rambles; they never spoke a word to each other that could not have been shared with their absent spouses. And yet over that summer and fall of 1882 a bond formed between them that astonished them both.
“I truly believe,” Mabel said to David, “that Mr. Dickinson is one of the most remarkable men I’ve ever met. He has such a sensitivity, such a delicacy—I don’t know how to express it. I find I admire him more and more every day.”
“He’s a fine fellow,” said David. “A little on the gloomy side, perhaps.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you knew him as I do,” cried Mabel. “He’s as gay as a child when the mood takes him.”
“Aha!” said David, drawing her onto his lap. “I see you’re falling in love with our venerable treasurer.”
“Would you mind terribly if I was?”
He kissed her, and eagerly she kissed him back.
“Not if it makes my puss happy,” he said.
She curled the ends of his mustaches in her fingers and tickled his lips.
“Of course I’ll always love my lover, my husband,
my David.”
One September late afternoon Austin and Mabel drove into the Pelham Hills, and stopped at a turn in the road that opened out onto a wide view to the west. Nearby there stood a little timber-clad house painted a russet red. Mount Holyoke rose up to the south, the range of lower hills to the north; and before them, so framed, the wooded land fell away to Amherst and Plainville and Hadley, and to the bright curling ribbon of the Connecticut River.
They left the carriage and stood side by side at an old two-bar fence, at the very moment that the descending sun dropped below the hood of cloud and flooded the valley with rosy light. They gazed at the scene in wonder, in reverence, as if this sudden glory had been arranged for their exclusive benefit. The sun dropped rapidly, changing the colors of the land minute by minute. There was no wind, and no sound in all the world but for the whiffling of the horses behind them. They neither spoke nor met each other’s eyes. Mabel rested her hand on the bar of the fence, as if to steady herself against this assault from the sky. After a moment Austin’s hand also gripped the fence. The sun deepened and darkened to a dull crimson and touched the rim of the distant hills. They both became aware at the same time of the murmur of the crickets all round them, a sound that only served to intensify the perfect stillness of the evening.
The sun slipped behind the hills, and the sky burned, and the light among the trees where they stood by the red house faded almost to night. Austin’s hand moved and touched Mabel’s. She stayed still, seeming not to have noticed the contact, but not withdrawing. Austin’s heart beat fast, but his gaze remained fixed on the dying glow in the west. In that single touch lay all his hopes and dreams. Feeling the warmth of her hand against his, the long-dormant yearnings of his body awoke, and he almost fainted with the ache of it. But still he didn’t speak.
Then the twilight was deepening and they must be on their way, or they were in danger of finding themselves benighted.
“Thank you for showing me that,” said Mabel, as they set off back down the hillside road. “It felt as if it were our own private sunset.”
“So it was,” said Austin. “I don’t believe anyone else in Massachusetts saw it but us.”
“I don’t believe anyone else saw it as we did,” said Mabel quietly.
Mabel found herself in some considerable state of turmoil. Every day that passed drew her closer to this remarkable man, this pillar of the community, this embodiment of all that was respected in the town—and yet to her, increasingly someone dear, someone precious, someone fragile. She felt his nearness like a flame, a flame that trembled in the wind and could so easily be extinguished. She knew beyond doubt that he loved her. Not as David loved her, not as a pet, not as an ally in a world of envy; Austin loved her fiercely, dangerously. She felt it in him, and it thrilled her beyond measure. He shook when he was near her. He went pale and blushed. He sought her out at every opportunity. It was in her power to wake this sleeping man, to bring this dead man back to life. How could she refuse?
So do I love him? she asked herself. He was more than twice her age, but this seemed to have no relevance. His soul is no older than my soul, she told herself. Souls have no age and do not die.
Is it permitted to love him? Is my love not promised to my husband and to no other man?
She had no answer to this, except the knowledge that matters were otherwise. She found no difficulty in loving both Austin and David. She wondered if perhaps there was something wrong with her, some gap in her moral makeup. Of course she knew that in the eyes of the world she was not allowed to love two men. But the world was a sad fool; she had known that for a long time. The law of the world kept most men and women trapped in lives of loneliness and desolation. How could God have willed that?
• • •
The following Sunday Austin told her he had obtained an invitation for her to call at the Homestead.
“My sisters have heard that you’re a famous singer. They would be honored if you would sing for them.”
“A famous singer!” said Mabel, laughing. “I think not. So am I to sing for both your sisters?”
“Vinnie will be your hostess,” said Austin. “Emily will listen from beyond the door.”
Mabel was more excited than she liked to admit. Only a very privileged few crossed the threshold of the Homestead. Emily was a recluse, and Vinnie, though happy to go about the town, was the fierce guardian of her sister’s privacy. In begging his sisters to receive Mabel, Austin must have given them to understand that she was a special person in his life.
Austin arrived promptly at the Amherst House to escort Mabel the short distance down Main Street to the Homestead. Miss Vinnie opened the door herself, a small fluttery woman with sharp, noticing eyes.
“Oh, Mrs. Todd, you’re too good to us. We’ve heard so much about you. All the town seems to be in love with you at once. Come in, come in. Though to be loved by the residents of Amherst is no great compliment, I’m afraid. Did you ever see so many sour faces in all your life?”
Mabel entered the dark hall and followed Vinnie into the almost equally dark parlor, where there stood a low box piano. Austin followed.
“I don’t know that our instrument will be up to your usual standard, Mrs. Todd. I’m no musician myself. Our father bought it for us when we were girls, but I’m afraid we neglect it sadly. And Austin of course has not a single musical note in his body.”
“That’s enough now, Vinnie,” said Austin. “I’m sure you have a cup of tea and a slice of cake for Mrs. Todd.”
Mabel set herself down at the piano and unfolded the music she had brought with her. Vinnie fussed about her, offering compliments and disparagement in equal measure, and throwing quick glances of fascination at Mabel’s hair and dress and hands.
“You really are quite a wonder to us poor rustics, Mrs. Todd,” she said. “So much style almost dazzles us. Austin is half blinded. But then he never did see very well in the first place. As for Sue, all I ever hear is Mrs. Todd this, Mrs. Todd that. I fancy you are the perfect woman.”
“Oh, very perfect,” said Mabel. “So please not to come too near me, or you’ll discover I’m mortal.”
Mabel looked about her as she prepared her music, and found the home of the Myth just as it should be. The furniture old-fashioned, the lamplight feeble, the shadows deep. In such a lair, untouched by the busy world, a magician would be free to cast her spells. No husband to serve, no society to please, and a dragon at the gates to repel intruders.
But the castle gates had opened. She had entered. And when she sang, Emily would be listening at the door.
Tea was brought in by the servant.
“Thank you, Maggie,” said Vinnie. “I’ll pour.”
And so the time came for the performance.
“Your sister won’t be joining us?” said Mabel, pretending not to know how matters stood.
“No,” said Vinnie, “Emily doesn’t go into company.”
But as she spoke, she threw a meaningful glance at the closed door to the hall. Mabel felt a shiver of excitement. Was the Myth there now, hearing all they said?
“I understand she writes poems,” said Mabel. “I’d love to read some of them.”
“One or two have appeared in the Springfield Republican,” said Vinnie. “But other than that, Emily’s poems are for herself alone.”
“I find that hard to believe,” said Mabel, hoping Emily was listening. “Those who write do so to be read, and to be understood.”
Vinnie went a little pink at this, and glanced again towards the door.
“My sister’s poems are unlike other poems,” said Austin. “They’re more in the nature of thoughts spoken aloud, thoughts without pattern or coherence, as thoughts can be.”
“Austin is a fool, as you can tell,” said Vinnie. “He knows nothing at all about Emily’s poems.”
“I grant you there are flashes of great beauty,” said Austin.
“Flashes of great beauty!” said Vinnie with scorn. “What do you know about
great beauty? Come, Mrs. Todd, sing to us if you will. Austin, if you have nothing sensible to say, pray be silent.”
“I have no intention of speaking while Mrs. Todd sings.”
Mabel opened the lid of the little keyboard and stretched out her elegant fingers. She arranged the sheet music on the stand before her, where it caught the light from the oil lamp. She looked round and saw Austin’s eyes fixed upon her. She turned back to the piano, touched the keys, and sent her music out across the long room to the closed door.
She sang “Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes” and then “The Last Rose of Summer.” As she came to the end of the last line she found Austin’s gaze still on her. He seemed not to have moved a muscle.
She sang:
“Oh, who would inhabit this bleak world alone,
This bleak world alone?”
She played out the last few notes and then closed the lid. Vinnie and Austin clapped softly. From beyond the door Mabel thought she caught the sound of scuffling feet.
Vinnie came to her with her hands reaching out, her face shining. Mabel offered her hands to be clasped.
“What an angel you are,” said Vinnie.
The servant entered, carrying a little silver tray.
“From Miss Emily,” she said, presenting the tray to Mabel.
On the tray was a glass of sherry and a small sheet of paper. Mabel took the paper and held it to the light. It was a poem.
“For me?” she said.
“You are honored,” said Vinnie.
Mabel read the poem in silence.
Elysium is as far as to
The very nearest Room
If in that Room a Friend await
Felicity or Doom—
What fortitude the Soul contains,
That it can so endure
The accent of a coming Foot—
The opening of a Door—
“Do you think she wrote it just now?” said Mabel, convinced that it must be so.
“It’s possible,” said Vinnie.
Austin took the paper and read for himself.
“The usual profligacy with capitals,” he said.