Afternoons with Emily Page 19

  First give woman, if you dare, the alphabet, then summon her to her career; and though men, ignorant and prejudiced, may oppose its beginnings, there is no danger but they will at last fling around her conquering footsteps more lavish praises than ever greeted the opera’s idol, — more perfumed flowers than ever wooed, with intoxicating fragrance, the fairest butterfly of the ball-room.

  “I call this very overdone,” I told Emily. “His style is like Mrs. Austin’s parlor, all satin and fringe. Why would you want his opinion of your poems? You write much better than he does.”

  “But he does believe in a woman’s gifts! Somehow he speaks to me. I feel a sympathy, a kinship. So I’m choosing a few suitable poems to send to him. I feel I could bear ‘surgery’ from Mr. Higginson. He has none of that fatal CONDESCENSION toward women.”

  “Emily, are you quite sure?” I dissented with care. “His style is so ornate that he might not appreciate your simplicity. He might fault you for not using as much decoration as he does.”

  “Miranda, I have DECIDED,” she stated firmly, taking the magazine from me. She laid it in her lap and gazed down at it as she spoke. “He will give me a fair hearing, a true reading. Just knowing he is influential and available has cheered me ALREADY.”

  I thought of all the literary lions who strutted and roared at The Evergreens, where the Austin Dickinsons had established an influential salon. There the college faculty mingled with literary luminaries — poets, journalists, essayists of regional, even national, renown. Any one of these, including Emerson himself, would have been glad to advise a Dickinson and smooth her way to publication. But willful Emily turned instead to a stranger. Why? Her shy arrogance made her motives forever inscrutable — at least to me.

  I returned home, stepping carefully to avoid the March mud, and discovered a letter waiting for me on the sideboard. I did not recognize the bold hand or the crisp gray stationery. Curious, I examined the postmark. New Hampshire?

  I stared at the envelope, feeling a tingling rush of excitement. Wasn’t Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire? Surely there was only one person who could have written to me from that state. David Farwell.

  Standing in the front hallway, I carefully opened the envelope. I leaned against the sideboard and angled the paper to better catch the fading sunlight through the front windows.

  My Dear Miss Chase,

  It was a great pleasure meeting you and your gracious family. You all made me feel very welcome. I was sorry when the evening came to an end — I felt we could have talked on for hours.

  This may be presumptuous of me, but I would greatly enjoy continuing our conversation through a correspondence. I felt we had a good deal in common. Do you agree? Perhaps, then, if it is agreeable to you, I shall find I have a friend already when I return to Amherst to attend the college.

  With best wishes,

  David Farwell

  “Miranda, what are you doing standing in the hallway?” Aunt Helen stood at the other end of the hall, her arms wrapped around a rolled-up carpet. Kate stood behind her, holding up the other end.

  “I — I was just reading my letter,” I explained. I held up the paper.

  Aunt Helen nodded. “Ah, yes. From young Mr. Farwell. He sent a very nice thank-you letter to me as well.” She stared at me for a moment, and I wondered if she was trying to guess the contents of my letter. Then I realized I was standing precisely where she wanted to lay the rug.

  “I’m sorry!” I scrambled out of the way, allowing Aunt Helen and Kate to troop past me. I slipped the letter into the pocket of my dress and helped them lower the heavy carpet to the floor.

  Aunt Helen stood and placed her hands on her hips, surveying the rug. “Much better,” she declared. She brushed a stray silver hair back toward her low bun. “Yes, that David Farwell seems a nice, well brought up young man. Your father will enjoy having him as a student.”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “The college is lucky to have him.”

  I must have written six drafts before I deemed my reply to David Farwell acceptable. I now understood Emily’s flurry of paper every time she sat down to write even the simplest note. I wasn’t quite sure what to say to my new correspondent. His letter merely expressed an interest — he gave me no real information. Well, I had met the challenge of the uncharted territory Emily Dickinson had presented, I reminded myself; surely I could compose a simple letter.

  Still, I paced, fretted, crumpled. Then finally a letter emerged.

  Dear Mr. Farwell,

  Thank you for your gracious note. I agree; I too felt we had many interests in common. I would be happy to serve as your introduction to Amherst, particularly if you introduce me through your letters to Illinois.

  I know what it is like to be a newcomer in this town. We came to Amherst from another world. Has my father ever mentioned our time in Barbados? I imagine the Greek islands must be similar — sky and water meeting each other every morning at an endless blue horizon. In Barbados it was easy to imagine an angry Neptune at work during the hurricane season and a placated Guardian of the Deep during the rest of the year. Winter in Amherst was quite a jolt to the system after island life — though I imagine to one from Illinois our Amherst weather will seem mild.

  I would be very interested in hearing about your studies. Father is quite proud of his Exeter education and counts his years there as among his happiest. Do you feel the same?

  I must go now; Aunt Helen is calling us to supper. I will be happy to hear from you again.

  Best regards,

  Miranda Chase

  I gave the paper a delicate blot, folded it in half, and placed it into its waiting envelope. If I read it over even once more, I should find fault with either a phrase or the curl of an “a” or the crossing of a “t,” and I should never send it at all. Once again I felt sympathy for Emily’s endless revisions. I went downstairs and left the letter with the other mail waiting to be collected in the tray by the front door. I tried to put any additional corrections or word changes out of my mind as I set the table.

  I heard Kate laughing behind me. “Miranda, what’s gotten into you today?” she asked.

  Quizzically I glanced at her. She pointed to the table, and I discovered what she found so amusing: I’d reversed the knives and the forks. I hastily corrected the silverware, explaining lightly, “I was just working out some phrases.”

  Kate placed folded napkins beside each plate. “Phrases to use in, say, letter writing?”

  I flushed but couldn’t help laughing at my own transparency. “Something like that,” I replied. Together we headed into the kitchen, giggling like conspirators.

  For one entire week I was distracted and anxious. Was my letter to David Farwell appropriate? Foolish? Too distant? Too familiar? Unless — until — I had a reply, I would not know.

  At school, Lolly looked surprised when I gave the wrong answer in botany — one of my better subjects. I gave a small shrug. “Just thinking about things . . .” I trailed off, hoping Lolly would fill in the gap herself with whatever made the most sense to her.

  She smiled a knowing smile. “Are you thinking about the weekend picnic?” she asked. “I was so pleased when Caleb Sweetser invited us both! I was so afraid I wouldn’t know the other girls. Have you decided what to wear?”

  I had forgotten all about the picnic — and was relieved to have something to distract me. Lolly looped her arm through mine and chatted about dresses and hats as we strolled home.

  Where I found a letter from David Farwell.

  Dear Miranda — may I call you Miranda?

  I was greatly cheered to have received your kind response. I would love to hear all about your time in Barbados and would be happy to tell you all I can about the far less exotic Illinois. . . .

  And so, with his reply, I found myself a regular letter writer. After that first note, David Farwell wrote to me every few days, simply when he felt like talking to me — the way the dolphins used to come visiting in Learner’s Cove. It wa
s an additional dimension in my life, and now that the anxious uncertain stage was over, I was once again able to concentrate on my studies — and on Kate’s wedding.

  Emily was as engrossed in the wedding plans as if Kate were her own cousin. One day, as she and I were discussing Kate’s future house, she once again delighted me with the social realism beneath her exterior affectations.

  “Kate will be given three punch bowls, and she will sit on the FLOOR,” Emily predicted. “So I am having four chairs made for her. Mr. Shiltoe is copying our pair of Sheraton side chairs — the ones in the front hall. Ours are often admired.”

  That was Emily’s way: lavish to someone she was too shy to meet! Then she breathed flame on hearing that our Boston florist was uncertain about our wreaths and bouquets.

  “Not enough lilies of the valley, INDEED! Tell him I have a whole HILLSIDE of them for Kate and for you. He may have them all. And tell him he must pick them the day before, and HARDEN them in ice water overnight. You can’t expect HIM to know that!”

  Emily was full of contrasts. Now she was imperious, a Dickinson of Amherst sending orders to the peasants. In another moment, she would switch to the unworldly and vulnerable poet, cowering in her privacy. But the lily news would delight Kate, I knew.

  “Emily, you’re a true friend,” I said.

  “Nonsense! Flowers have their rights, and I am their ADVOCATE. I know this is what the lilies would choose for themselves. They will enjoy being the ORNAMENT of Kate’s good fortune!”

  I was startled. I didn’t think Emily had a high opinion of marriage. “Do you consider Ethan good fortune? Kate surely does!”

  “I hear he is charming and talented; he sounds like a good match. But I meant fortune beyond Mr. Howland — I meant Kate’s voice, her divine gift. She will always have an IDENTITY — she need never be OWNED. How many women can say as much?”

  “Won’t you be able to feel that same way when you start publishing your poetry?”

  Emily became evasive again. “Not yet, Miranda. I am not READY yet. If I published now, I would be put in with all those syrupy MUSINGS that American women typically compose! Mr. Bowles prints them in every issue, and he DEMEANS the female sex in doing so!”

  “How, Emily? How can Mr. Bowles insult women by publishing their poetry?” I was truly curious as to what Emily believed.

  “Why, he CONDESCENDS, Miranda. He is showing that women are impulsive creatures but that he, Samuel Bowles, is MAGNANIMOUS — and those poems are nothing more than silly, bubbling froth. They should never see the light of day. He is encouraging BAD writing by publishing those shameful examples. No, I will never let him lump me in with those AMATEURS!”

  Perhaps Emily’s feelings about Mr. Bowles’s attitudes toward women’s writing was the reason his wife, Mrs. Bowles, seemed to have been placated. I understood from Mrs. Austin that the crisis had been averted, the frayed feelings smoothed over. I had also noticed far fewer letters addressed to the Springfield Republican editor.

  “But you say ‘not yet.’ Does that mean you will publish later?”

  “I will publish when the right time comes. I will KNOW when I am ready.”

  Emily went to her window to observe her spring birds; this was a sure sign she was about to say something difficult and important.

  “Miranda, at present neither my work nor I are strong enough for COMBAT. We could not DEFEND ourselves against ATTACK. My poetry needs to be more COMMANDING — and so do I. It is better to wait until my poetry can sweep all before it like a JUGGERNAUT!”

  I could not argue with her. Truly, Emily’s efforts were not made to popular specifications; perhaps she was right to wait for a forum that would respect her serious intellectual presence. Again, I marveled at her patient fortitude and at her confident genius. And yet while she labored on in her solitary yet expectant way, I prayed that for her sake the audience she found one day extended beyond the immediate vista of her own appreciative imagination.

  For some reason, I continued to put off telling Emily about meeting David Farwell and about our correspondence. Each letter seemed to bring us closer together, each building on the previous exchange. I felt as if we were revealing tiny bits of ourselves, a new facet each time to hold up to the light, so that by the time he arrived in Amherst, we would each have a sense of the whole. I began to feel that I understood myself better through revealing myself to Davy.

  I was pleased when he sent Kate a wedding present: a stunning silver bowl, perfectly simple, with a curved lip like a lotus flower. Father said it was a replica of the one made by Paul Revere, the Revolutionary hero. Ethan whistled and accused Kate of a secret romance. To me, in the privacy of our correspondence, Davy wrote that he wished he could have brought the gift in person so that he could be my escort. Again, I found myself in complete agreement with David Farwell’s sentiments.

  I had worried, as we were planning every meticulous detail of Kate’s wedding for weeks beforehand, that such intense anticipation would detract from the simple joy of the event. After the first hour of Kate’s wedding day, however, I realized that all our planning and preparation were essential — to give us unflawed memories.

  We were awarded a windless blue-and-white May day, with small harmless clouds. This meant our guests could be in the flagstoned north garden, where Aunt Helen’s spring bulbs were a radiance. Kate and I planted them last fall. In October, no one had mentioned a spring wedding — but somehow Aunt Helen’s tulips and narcissi and hyacinths had all come up white. With half the guests outdoors, there would be plenty of room in the temple — so our family could receive on the stage, as we had hoped.

  “We planned the stage for big occasions,” said Ethan. “Now Kate and I and our wedding are your first truly large event.”

  “And Kate’s first concert will be our next,” Father stated.

  We arranged the two dozen little apple trees, which had been huddling on the terrace, flowering hopefully in their burlap bags. Ethan, two of his friends, and our stableman, Sam, moved eight trees to the back of the stage and concealed their roots with laurel. They carried the others to the corners of the temple, to the walls between the windows, and to the gravel beds in the atrium.

  Suddenly we were in an enchanted wood — a forest of white blossom, pink buds, and tiny pointed leaves. Ethan, who designed it, called it the “bride’s orchard.” After the wedding, we planned to plant a dozen of the apple trees by our kitchen garden. The other dozen would go to Kate and Ethan, in the same wagon as Emily’s chairs.

  Vera and her helpers bustled in and out of the kitchen, fixing platters and cooling wine. Because the bride and groom were scheduled to take the 6:04 to Boston, the wedding was going to be at two — that is, too late for lunch and too early for supper. The caterer brought little lobster biscuits and a lacy cake, but we would not serve a real meal.

  I went to check my arrangements, completed yesterday evening; all were thriving. I used apple blossom and white lilac with budding laurel in the parlor and the dining room. Then I made each of the urns at the front door into a white lilac bridal bouquet with satin ribbon streamers. This frivolity was very becoming to our serious Greek facade.

  Under the portico, I met a stranger glaring at my arrangements. “Say, who’s the competition here?” It was the florist from Boston!

  “The bride’s cousin did the flowers,” I told him, not revealing my identity as his competitor but relishing the professional jealousy. “May I have the wreaths and the bouquets now?”

  I saw Lolly coming up the street, wearing her Sunday bonnet, so I knew it was time to start dressing. Lolly and I carried the florist’s white boxes upstairs. Kate was in Aunt Helen’s room being laced; her wedding dress hung in the window like a beautiful silk ghost.

  Lolly did my stays and lifted the yards of green over my head. Then we tied tiny green ribbon bows among the flowers of my wreath. Lolly pronounced the iced lilies “as crisp as a salad.” She was a model of subdued helpfulness. I was learning that at a t
ime like this, women of all ages seemed to put aside all pettiness and vanity, and join selflessly in the enterprise. This was never discussed; it simply happened.

  Kate was a tall white lily herself. She wore the modish small basque bodice and bell skirt of the time, so becoming to brides — and Kate Chase Sloan must surely have been the loveliest among these. Her dark hair was smooth and shining, pulled back into a severe classic knot. Emily’s lilies framed her face in a starry crown fit for Titania.

  There were two carriages for the bridal party. Hoops were hard to transport — one heard about fashionable ladies who required a whole carriage — so we practiced yesterday. Aunt Helen, Lolly, and I rode in the first carriage, and Father and the bride in the second. When we came to the First Congregational Church, we saw the carriages of the wedding guests all along Main Street and around the green. The groom and his family were greeting friends. Mr. and Mrs. Howland were from New Bedford; they were shipbuilders and Quakers. They loved Kate already; how could they not?

  We climbed out carefully, and Lolly arranged our dresses. As I carried Kate’s train up the steps, we saw that all the pews were filled. Kate clutched my hand; I smiled and nodded. She and I had conspired for a bride’s surprise.

  “Just stay here,” I told Father, Aunt Helen, and Lolly. “We’ll be right back.”

  We left behind three astonished faces and climbed the little spiral stair, which I had swept so carefully yesterday. We signaled Mr. Tate, the organist and our coconspirator, from the balcony.

  Mr. Tate began the unmistakable grace notes of Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” and Kate’s voice floated over the congregation like a benediction. She sang her wedding present to Ethan.

  The glorious sound and gesture brought tears to my eyes, and from my hiding place I could see Father’s face twisted as if he were struggling with his own. Ethan’s father and mother took each other’s hands and smiled. Ethan glowed with joy, as did Kate.