She felt as if her meal had lodged halfway down her gullet. “In which direction do you recommend I take the revision?”
Mr. Ashworth bounced his hands apart and clasped them together on the table. “For the sake of discussion, let’s say you recast it for the adult reader. That probably wouldn’t require as much reworking of the warp and woof. Though I must tell you, I’d decline to review it again.”
Barbara wanted to salvage something from this meeting, but dejection buzzed at her like swarming flies. She struggled to suppress intruding thoughts: What would she tell her mother? Alice and Ethan? Her father’s novel was to be published next year, and she’d wanted nothing more than to put out something that would compare favorably, perhaps even overshadow his work. Might Lost Island find another publisher? If not, what would happen to her writing career? Would failure relegate her to her soul-numbing stenographer’s job? She gathered enough composure to ask, “Can you give me any advice on revising?”
“First,” she heard him say, “scour the manuscript for the overly ordinary or easily contrived bits, like that Professor Myers. He’s what everyone conjures when they imagine a professor—some old fellow who smokes a pipe, forgets his appointments and misplaces his glasses. Make him different from the kind man who tells her just to go off and enjoy herself. It doesn’t make sense, especially since she’s leaving him high and dry without his able assistant.”
She nodded. The professor. Not so kindly and paternal.
“And Jane’s motives aren’t developed. We see she’s discontented with her life. But she’s got friends who depend on her. And a job she enjoys. Her decision to embark on an adventure seems sudden, with no particular impetus. You ought to have something that pushes her to that.”
Fine, she thought—I’ll add some spark for Jane’s actions.
“And more complexity to balance out the romantic notions. For instance, how realistic is it that the captain would welcome a young lady on a working ship? I don’t know how you can make that believable. And civilization’s not all bad. People need some sort of rules to live side by side, don’t you agree?”
Barbara nodded. If this was what counted for civilization—having one’s hard work dashed because it wouldn’t sell like penny candy—she wanted none of it.
“And nature’s not all marvel and beauty. Could your young lovers land in some known but uninhabited area and have to fight off wild elements and struggle to carve out a life there? You portray the island as an idyllic place. I can’t imagine that squares with the reality of life in the wilds.”
“I see what you’re saying,” Barbara said. But he’d obviously never seen Tahiti or it’s like, where the land and sea nourished with their bounty of fruit and fish.
“And bring more complexity to the whole conflict. Have you read Nostromo?”
Barbara pitched her head back and held his gaze. “I’ve read all of Conrad.”
“Then study how he portrays the clashes between the locals and foreigners over mining prospects. It might help you develop a more sophisticated telling of the gold discovery and how it affects the young couple.”
Barbara nodded, clutching her stomach to quell its churning. Who was he—this Babbitt of the publishing world—to speak to her of Conrad? What did he know of the dreams of young people? Or of the wonders of nature? It was civilization that was barbarous. Did he fail to see there was something fundamentally and irrevocably wrong with the modern world? Didn’t he understand that was the very point of Lost Island?
He’d thoroughly whacked the legs out from under her project. How could she possibly take his advice and salvage her story? She’d set the manuscript aside, give herself time to consider her next move. Perhaps she’d take up Farksoo and the magic land of Farksolia again. There could be no question about its audience: Many youngsters had yearned for, even written, a secret language. Who among them hadn’t imagined a private world, a place where they could be free from the pretension of adults?
She hoped she would never outgrow the child’s grasp of wonder. Mr. Ashworth and his ilk were welcome to whatever joy they could salvage from their hollow world—if they could ever overcome their devotion to the vulgar dollar.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
BARBARA AT EIGHTEEN
Lake Massabesic, July 1932
The bus had barely left the station when her mother piped up with the same sour refrain. “I can’t believe you’re putting yourself in this position.”
Barbara had given her mother the window seat, hoping the sights would occupy her. That was clearly a batty idea. “Please don’t make a fuss. It’s a hiking trip. Something I’ve done dozens of times.”
“I just have a bad feeling about this.”
Egad, how did her mother manage to pack so much bossiness into five feet, two inches? She didn’t need her mother’s permission anymore; she was 18. She stood a half head taller than her. “Honestly, I’m not a child anymore.”
“Nor are you behaving like an adult, quitting a perfectly good job to go traipsing around the woods.”
“You have a book to show for our traipsing. And another in the making.” Barbara didn’t care if Americans were clawing after work or if President Hoover thought this was a “great depression.” She hated New York. Some poor starving soul was welcome to her job.
“Yes, and you were supposed to help me with the second book. And with Sabra.”
In June, her mother had quit her job so she could write full time and bring Sabra to New York. Barbara enjoyed having her sprightly sister around, but their apartment was cramped and she had to share her room with Sabra. It was suffocating. As the bus rounded a corner, Barbara braced herself to avoid scrunching against her mother. “You two’ll get along just fine without me.”
“I’m the one left juggling my writing and an eight-year-old.”
“Nine.”
“Oh, her turning nine will make a world of difference.”
Barbara shifted to unstick her sweaty leg backs from the seat. How she longed for the shade of towering trees, the refreshing gurgle of brooks. “You’ll like Nick. I promise. There’s nothing to worry about.”
“I’ve been saying all along this was a ridiculous scheme. And it’s only gotten more so.”
“I can’t help that Denise and John backed out.” Nick had telephoned five days earlier to inform Barbara their two hiking companions couldn’t manage the trip. That had provoked her mother to even more tiresome bouts of grumbling.
“It’s not right, you wandering around the woods with a boy.”
“He’s practically engaged. To someone named Cynthia. And I have Ethan.” Couldn’t her mother understand? If she didn’t escape the crass accountability of city life, it’d destroy her. Her mind hummed with the thrill of anticipation: Soon, she’d be free again, a nymph of the woods. But no, her mother kept trying to deflate her. The best Barbara could do was steer the conversation to other subjects. She asked her mother about the outline for her next book. She assured her Sabra would do just fine with Mrs. Farnsworth to help watch over her.
Their bus delivered them to the Manchester bus station late afternoon. And there was Nick, sitting on the runner of a dusty black sedan.
“Hello,” he called, marching toward them.
How splendid he looks, Barbara thought. Helen can’t help but be impressed by his sturdy six-two frame, his wavy auburn hair, and a face glowing with camper’s tan.
“Hi, Nick,” said Barbara. “This is my mother.”
Nick turned to Helen and bowed slightly. “Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Follett.”
“Likewise, Nick. And thank you for arranging the weekend.”
“I’m glad you could come.” He gave Helen a closed-mouth smile and reached for her suitcase. “I can take that.”
They drove about five miles out of town to a winding lakeside road, where Barbara pointed to a painted sign atop a driftwood post: Rogers Retreat.
Nick nodded. “That’s the place.”
They turned and tru
ndled over a dirt road, and Nick parked alongside a boxy cabin on cement blocks. They climbed out of the car, and Barbara hitched her knapsack over her shoulder.
She stood akimbo, surveying the scene. “Quite a plucky cabin.”
Pine trees cast spiky shadows on the cabin’s log sides and its faded-green tin roof. A chimney pipe climbed one side, and a sagging porch spanned its width. In front of the cabin, a treeless area spilled down to the sandy beach, some sixty feet away, where the lake lapped lazily at the shore.
“Nothing fancy, but it’s been in the family for almost forty years.” Nick pulled Helen’s suitcase out of the trunk and signaled them to follow him.
As they fell in behind Nick, Barbara looked up at the treetops playing against the soft blue sky and gauzy clouds. Needles crunched underfoot, and the scent of pine filled her nostrils. Two days with her mother, just two days, and then she’d escape the drag and drudge of her old life.
Her mother caught up to her and spoke, more to Nick than her. “What a charming spot.”
“My tent’s pitched over there.” Nick motioned toward a clearing thirty feet to the side of the cabin. “Some nights, I sleep under the stars.”
Inside, Barbara dropped her pack on a hand-hewn pine table and glanced around the cramped room. “Looks well outfitted.”
A built-in storage bench jutted from one wall. Beside it, a three-foot counter of pocked linoleum held a rust-stained sink with a hand pump perched over it. On the other side of the room, two cane-seat chairs and a clunky rocker clustered around a cast-iron stove.
“It’s cozy,” said Helen, smiling at Nick.
Nick motioned them to follow him down the short hall. “You two get the bedroom.”
An iron-frame bed with a faded quilt crammed against one wall. Opposite it stood a scratched-up pine dresser.
Helen looked around, her gaze landing on the candle on the dresser top. “I’m sure we’ll be quite comfortable.”
But Barbara knew her mother was probably thinking she’d miss having electricity to read by at night.
Nick placed Helen’s suitcase by the dresser and pointed down the hall. “That’s the bathroom. But it’s just a toilet and sink.”
Barbara looked out the bedroom’s rear window. A trail led to a clearing with a tin tub latched to a beam between two trees. “What’s that contraption?”
“A shower my father and I rigged up. There’s a watering spout welded on the other side. You let the sun warm the water and tip it with a cord. Not what you’d call luxurious, but it does the trick.”
“Speaking of which, I’m thirsty for some cold well water,” said Helen.
“I’ll pump us some,” Nick said, and they all headed to the main room.
“Then let’s go exploring,” said Barbara.
Helen brushed back the hair straggling over her brow. “You two go on ahead without me. I believe I’ll unpack and have a rest.”
At dusk, the three of them gathered around the fire pit outside the cabin. They munched on the cheese, now limp and sweating, and bread and apples Barbara and her mother had brought.
Helen, seated at the place of honor, the sturdiest of four homemade Westport chairs, sipped cocoa they’d warmed over the fire. “Tell me, Nick, how’d you come to study at Dartmouth?”
“My father graduated there. When the time came, he insisted I go, too.”
“What are your plans now?”
“I started looking for a job,” he said, hunching a shoulder. “But my father told me I’m too serious for my own good and ought to take a year to wander about.”
“How many classes did you take from Oxford Meservey?”
“Three. He was a wonderful professor.”
“Yes, I’m sure Barbara has told you how close our families are.”
Barbara frowned at her mother. “Of course, I have.”
Darkness had crept in, and Barbara watched the fire flicker over Nick’s arch, bushy eyebrows, accenting the square jut of his jaw and deep set of his eyes. His faux-sinister appearance filled her with deliciously daring pleasure.
Now, if only her mother would relax and enjoy the crackling fire. But no, she persisted with her questions.
“Did you have many literature courses? At one time, I knew all the faculty in the English department.”
“A few,” said Nick. “I especially remember Professor Peterson.”
“He must be new.” Helen smacked a mosquito on her neck. “Who are your favorite authors?”
Nick hesitated, as if weighing his choices, then blurted out, “I like that new writer, Dashiell Hammett. Especially The Maltese Falcon.”
“Oh? I’ve not read him.”
Helen might as well have rolled her eyes, Barbara thought, for all the disdain in her clipped response. She thumped her cup down on the arm of her chair and turned to Nick. “I’ll have to give him a try.”
Her mother barely missed a beat. “Do you want to teach, Nick?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Probably not. My cousin works at Polaroid, and he said they like to hire people in physics.”
“Have you applied to them?”
“No, my father told me to wait.” Nick dodged a swirl of campfire smoke. “After he finished college, he took a train to the West Coast and back. Said he learned more doing that than all his years at Dartmouth.”
Her mother angled her body to the side, looking askance at Nick. “And for you, that means hiking the Appalachian Trail?”
“Yes, and maybe some other travel after that.”
“Your mother’s not worried about you?”
Nick clapped his hands over his knees. “Mother’s got my little brother and sister to keep her busy.”
“Yes, well, it’s easier for young men to be on their own.”
Ugh, Barbara thought, here I am, striking out on a woodlands adventure and mother’s harping about school and work and obligations. Well, I’ll just have to distract and reassure her—better that than let her spoil my newfound freedom and friendship with Nick.
Over their campfire the next morning, Barbara took charge of the pancakes and served her mother first. When they hiked around the lake, she made a point of showing off her foraging prowess: “Look at that patch of wild strawberries” and “I’m looking forward to feasting on fiddlehead ferns boiled and fried with cornmeal.” As they contemplated the evening stars, she pointed out the constellations and explained how one could navigate by them as well on land as at sea. And to show off Nick’s scientist side, she drew him out on gravity and electricity and as many other topics as she could muster from her knowledge of physics.
On Sunday, everyone rose early and breakfasted. Barbara and Nick gathered all their supplies so they could take stock. Helen hiked off to check with the neighbors who’d offered to drive them to the bus station. The plan was for Barbara and Nick to see Helen off, provision themselves, and then travel north to Millinocket.
Nick spread his knapsack contents on the floor beside Barbara’s supplies. They had the basic requirements: two lightweight sleeping bags; a six-pound tent; two tin plates and cups; a pot and skillet; and utensils for two. But now it was time to get serious.
Nick leaned over and gathered up the food bags. “We’ve got to cram as much nutrition as we can in the least space. Do you think we’ve enough staples?”
“Plenty of flour and sugar and cornmeal, but let’s get some dried eggs before we hit the trail. And some lard, too.”
Nick cocked his head toward the window. “Tent’ll be dry enough to fold up soon. I’d like to get a mosquito screen for it. It’d be more comfortable for you that way.”
“That’s fine, but mosquitoes have to eat, too.”
Nick poked through his stack of clothes—one extra shirt, a pair of shorts, one scarf, and a dungaree jacket. “Not much by way of clothes. Do you think it’s enough?”
“Mother wouldn’t approve. You should have two scarves—one to wear while you launder the other.”
“One will do,” he said, frowning
. “I can wash it out easily enough.” Then he must have spied the smirk she sported, for he let loose a chuckle.
“And what about a pair of slippers?” Barbara asked. “So you don’t have to wear those old hobnails in the evening.”
Nick kicked his legs out from under the chair and regarded his feet. “I’ll just go barefoot.”
“You heathen. I suppose you think you needn’t shave while you’re in the woods.”
“You won’t report me, will you?”
“Not if you protect me from the wild beasts.”
Nick widened his eyes. “Like hungry bears?”
Out they came with a string of dangerous things—great thundering boulders, a charging bull moose, forty days of flooding rain, an old woman in a gingerbread house, a huge pit for trapping hikers, and a big bad wolf—until they convulsed with falling-down, limb-jerking laughter.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
BARBARA AT EIGHTEEN
The Appalachian Trail, July-August 1932
Giddy with glee, Barbara and Nick traveled by bus to Millinocket and hiked to Chimney Pond in Baxter Park, the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. Campers they met there warned them: The Maine section of the trail is rough, hardly marked, and they’d better plan on plenty of bushwhacking.
With a good seventy pounds between them, two topographic maps, one compass, and abundant resolve, they pushed their way south through thick woods of spruce, pine, and hemlock. Fortified by pancakes and mush, they skirted rocky ledges and sloshed through swampy stretches. They scrounged blackberries, sought out streams for watering and washing, and stretched their legs in front of campfires.
On their third night out, after managing some thirty miles, they set up camp by a crystal-clear pond. They pulled out their fishing string, dug some worms, and caught five sunfish. Tiny they were, but delectable fried with cornmeal coating.
As they relaxed at shore’s edge, Barbara massaged her calves. “We should’ve brought a donkey.”
The Point of Vanishing Page 21
