Spindle City

by Jotham Burrello

  “Time, sir,” Evelyn called from the hallway. “Mr. Bartlett?”

  “Time for what?”

  “Dinner, sir. Have it in my arms.” It was then that he smelled the baked scrod and lemon.

  “Yes, it is.” Joseph clicked on his banker’s lamp. “Time, indeed.”

  “Can you manage the door?”

  “No.” He blinked and slapped his cheeks with his hands.

  “Sir?”

  “Come back at half past.”

  He stretched his arm across the desk and swept everything to the floor. He fetched a clean sheet of stationery and began a letter to Will. After that letter was sealed with wax, Joseph took out another sheet and began a long-overdue letter to Mary. He found Tom Sheehan’s fine glass pointer and held it under the light. A tiny rainbow of color danced across the leather blotter. He folded it into Mary’s letter and sealed the envelope.

  Joseph stood and pushed his gun cabinet away from the wall to reveal a safe embedded in the plaster. He twirled the dial back and forth through a series of clicks and then cranked the handle down. He set the letters on top of the cash he kept on hand. Evelyn knocked. He locked and hid the safe and then opened the door. She set the dinner tray on the desk and busied herself collecting the papers.

  “Leave that for later,” he said. “Thank you for this.” He tipped his wine glass. Tomorrow he’d send Evelyn and her sister on a two-week holiday to the Cape.

  Evelyn straightened her apron and marched out. Joseph stepped around the desk to the old phonograph in the corner of the room and dusted off Lizzy’s favorite Hungarian waltz. He cranked the turntable to life; the record warbled and the speaker hissed. He sat on the floor beside the player and ate his dinner. Outside, he heard fabric rustle in the hallway.

  * * *

  He spent the days before the festival walking the city. He fell down from the Highlands at a quick clip. He found himself in the Cogsville neighborhood, standing before a pile of rubble where Sarah Strong’s tenement once stood. A dark-skinned scavenger boy dragging a scrap sled rumbled past.

  Joseph said, “What happened to this building?”

  “Burn down.” The boy’s accent was thick, clearly Italian.

  Joseph noticed the charred frames of the adjacent apartments. He set his hand on the boy’s threadbare jacket. “Anyone hurt?”

  “A lady, her baby. Wouldn’t jump.”

  The boy mopped his runny eyes with a crusty rag. Joseph jerked his hand off the boy’s shoulder. He reached into his vest for his handkerchief. He tossed the boy a coin.

  The boy’s eyes beamed like two torches on his dirty face. He said, “More questions?”

  “How old are you?”

  The boy held up two hands.

  “That’s ten,” Joseph said. “Tell your mother to take you to the free clinic.” The boy shrugged and went about his work.

  In Globe Village, Joseph attended a service with the Lebanese at St. Anthony of the Desert. In Steep Brook, a dark Patagonian man in a bright yellow shirt driving an ox stopped him to ask the time. Down south, he walked the Portuguese cemetery, visiting the Sousas and the Silvias and the Aguiars. He spent a day at Beattie’s quarry watching the men blast and drill granite blocks from the earth. Stone bound for carts, then trains out of the city. Up the Flint, he bought corned beef at Brady’s and was given free cabbage. He passed hulking mills, their oil-soaked floors ill-suited for many other northern industries. He watched greasy-faced sweepers and doffers and spinner boys—leaving the Gower Mill at dusk, their dark overalls, and probably their lungs, were coated in cotton lint. Their mothers and sisters stopped at the corner for the waiting tin peddlers, eager to trade clothing scraps for tinware. On the stairs of the textile school one evening, he passed a knot of Italians in white undershirts eating grilled eggplant and yellow peppers. Later, he watched drovers hauling cattle and swine across the Slade’s Ferry Bridge while the city slept.

  On Wednesday night, the eve of the festival, he left the house through the kitchen door. The night was cool; summer was over. He’d crisscrossed the city in the last three days, meeting many hardworking men and women, but none, he figured, could turn the tide. Earlier in the day, he met with his overseers and approved their plans to produce artificial silk; he mailed João a five-year farm plan, and instructed his lawyer to transfer the deed to João’s children.

  Joseph walked down Columbia Street, through the smell of chowder and galvanized pork, carrying a leather briefcase. It was a foggy night, and balls of sticky light encased the streetlamps. He kept off the trolley route and spoke to no one, not even the newsies who stuck late editions in his face on every corner. Near the Pocasset mill, he turned on Anawan Street and followed the thundering roar to the falls, where the Quequechan River tumbled four stories over granite rock into Mount Hope Bay. Out in the bay, one of the floating palaces of the Fall River Line blew its whistle as it neared the wharf. Joseph imagined mill agents sipping brandy in their staterooms as the second-class dreamers, fresh from Ellis Island, stood along the starboard railing, staring wide-eyed at the city on a hill. Below, in the hold, sat the five-hundred-pound cotton bales they would spin into cloth.

  At the end of the lookout, Joseph climbed on the parapet. He sat down on the wooden planks, overcome by the unbridgeable gap between the intensity of his failures and his desire to make things right. For a moment, he regretted that he had not measured his worth in dividends like his peers. This last act would go misunderstood in their drawing rooms. He stood and climbed over the railing for a bird’s-eye view of the cascading water that gave the city its name. The end of the line. He spread his arms. Warm spray struck his face. It tasted of coal ash and metal. The crush of water seemed to jump from the cliff, separating into unique drops before reassembling into a thick block to smash into the rocks and surf. Joseph feared that the mighty river that had powered Colonel Durfee’s first mill would gradually disappear as generation after generation paved over the life source that his had so badly spoiled.

  peacemaker

  The night before the start of Cotton Week, Helen lay awake in her tiny room off the kitchen in her brother Ray’s modest cottage. His snores vibrated the shade on her bedside lamp. The jug of beer Helen had contributed to dinner enhanced the loud blasts. How could Fanny stand it? Helen figured the girl’s soft brain extended to her ears, but the beer had done its job. At one in the morning, she tossed off the covers, fully dressed—boots too. She eased the window open, stood on her desk chair, and jumped over the blueberry bush into the moonlit grass. She walked the two miles to the Hartwell farm in twenty minutes. The slaughterhouse was near the road it was the farthest outbuilding from the barn. She found the gun wrapped in an oil-stained cloth on the warped shelving, behind coffee cans full of rusted nails. On an egg run last summer, Hartwell’s oldest son had shown off the weapon, a Colt Single Action Army, which had belonged to his dead uncle—a lawman, the boy claimed. Helen asked if he’d ever killed anyone. Lots, the boy smirked. They call it the Peacemaker. The name amused Helen still, and she chuckled as she handled the gun, inhaling its stale oil aroma. She stepped toward the barn door, changed her mind, and whirled. She lined up the bloodstained slaughtering table—bang. The tool shelves—bang. The window—bang. The moon—bang, bang. The gun fell to her side. It was heavier than she remembered, and the thick grip didn’t fit her small hand comfortably. She had hoped to conceal it in her jacket, but the long barrel stuck out of the pocket like the rat’s nose. Back in her room, she wedged the gun under the mattress and dressed in her bedclothes. She desperately needed rest, but Ray’s snoring was relentless. The vibrations cut though the house as if the plaster, bearing beams, and even the brick chimney and clapboard were conductive. This snore current, as Helen called it, electrified the frame of her iron bed, shocking her very bones. She lay awake, praying Fanny might sock him one. Helen pulled Tommy’s letter out from under her pillow, the paper had begun
to tear from all the handling. She skimmed it again. This time, not tearing up when she came to her father’s name. She hid the letter and lay still, staring at the ceiling. The lampshade shook. Helen made a finger gun and aimed it at the ceiling. Perhaps she’d shoot Ray first. She needed the practice.

  * * *

  João Rose returned from the cow barn as the sun peeked over the horizon. He set a metal jug of warm milk on the kitchen counter. He carried the smell of the barn, a musty, earthy odor of hay and manure. He removed his muddy boots and then walked across the sitting room in Otis’s old farmhouse, passing beneath Hollister’s portrait of Maria over the fireplace. She came down the stairs in her bedclothes to fill a bottle. She removed the metal cap from the jug. The warm steam smelled of earth and grass. João pulled down a small leather-bound journal from the mantel and knelt on the hearth. As he thumbed through the pages, a sketch he’d made of his grandmother twenty years ago slipped out and he wedged it back in the center. He propped the book against the andirons and spread out his arms and bowed his head.

  “Joseph Bartlett, in the name of the Father and the Holy Mother, I bless you. If you have quebranto from an evil eye of a man or woman, or the way you work, I bless you, that it goes to the ends of the ocean, where nobody ever hears the crow of a rooster. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

  João lowered his arms, exhaled, and sat back on his haunches.

  “On the trip back, buy the cod-liver oil,” Maria said.

  João nodded. He closed the notebook and set it back on the mantel.

  “Take one of the children,” Maria continued. “But I need to stay with the baby.”

  João shook his head. “I’ll go. I will tip my cap and return.”

  “What of the soldier?”

  “I said I will deliver your message,” João said, his voice rising.

  “He will sleep at Kitty’s and paint in the meadow overlooking the bogs. The fresh air will do him good.”

  João stood. “You owe him nothing.”

  She touched her forehead. “The scars have faded from this old face.”

  “I don’t want him near you.”

  “I know,” Maria said. “But it’s my wish.”

  “He’ll paint where I tell him.”

  “And, sweet husband,” Maria said, her voice softening. “Say a blessing for yourself.” She turned up the stairs, leaving a milky vapor in her wake.

  * * *

  The steamer passed the Bristol Ferry Light into Mount Hope Bay as the morning sun climbed over Fall River, catching the gold crosses atop the twin spires of Saint Anne’s. From the top deck of the Priscilla, they shimmered, seemingly floating over the bay. Farther on, the observatory at Durfee High School came into view. Its round dome slit open like a giant eye watching over the city. Seagulls swept over the boat, dive-bombing toward their breakfast, only to bank up at the waterline into twisting S curves around the steamer’s two black smokestacks. One bird waddled down the white railing toward Will, stopped an arm’s-length away, and shifted his head side to side as if recognizing him from Bliffin’s Beach, then darted off to join a screeching funnel cloud of birds chasing a passing lobster boat. Two tugs motored toward the Priscilla. Will descended the starboard stairs, the Labor Board’s invitation poking his ribs as he walked. At the gangway, he checked his watch. The luncheon started at eleven thirty. He had plenty of time. He spat on the lapel of his suit jacket and used his nail to scratch the mustard stain from yesterday’s lunch. He had gone from his law office to the North River pier for the overnight trip. He licked his mustard-stained finger. He pitied his father, but had come to accept that textiles were in his blood, too, and so did the partners at his new law firm. He wondered if he should have cabled his father. They hadn’t seen one another in nearly a year. At the Borden Flats reef the lighthouse bell rattled and the Priscilla’s steam whistle blasted a reply. The boat slowed, and an alarm rung deep within her steel hull. The boilers rumbled and the floor planks vibrated beneath Will’s feet as the paddle wheels reversed. Across the bay, the brick smokestacks passed clear air. Will removed his hat and leaned over the railing, hoping the rumor about Helen being engaged was false. Hard to tell with that girl. The cloudless blue sky stretched to the horizon.

  * * *

  Hollister sat in the pavilion shelter gazing out over South Park thinking he had someplace to be, as Michael haggled with a Frenchy about Roger’s depiction of his wife. Since Michael’s sister succumbed to the flu, he’d been in a sour mood, convinced he’d contract it soon. Time was Michael’s enemy. But the Frenchy had a point; Roger’s portrait wasn’t much. Michael had discovered Roger outside the Fall River Evening Drawing School, a novice for sure, but a vet with a talent for quick caricatures. Confusion reigned Roger’s first month. Folks weren’t sure who painted what, though the sign clearly stated one-dollar caricatures to the right; three-dollar portraits to the left. Michael had also added a food stand and a souvenir cart for Cotton Week. Earlier that summer he’d moved out of June Street into his own rooms; he’d dedicated half to housing Hollister’s real paintings, one of which he’d shipped to Robert Dunning’s former dealer in Boston. Though Hollister’s paintings didn’t have the bright colors of the Fall River school, they were still lifes nonetheless—the type of detailed characterizations that had put Dunning on the map.

  “If you want a portrait,” Michael shouted, “the line starts there.” Frenchy shook his head. “Well, then take this and scram.” Frenchy pushed the canvas away, and Michael waved over two thick-armed vets. After the Christmas crush, he’d hired security to keep the peace. Folks believed the men had real authority in their uniforms. They lifted Frenchy off his feet and carried him into the grass. His plump wife waddled close behind.

  Michael waved his hand before Hollister’s face. “Couple more to go.”

  “I have to be somewhere.”

  “Where?” Michael’s patience for Hollister’s moods was wearing thin.

  “I can’t remember.”

  “Here’s the deal. You paint a few more, and I’ll tell you where you have to be. Now grab your pencil. You’ve got plenty of time.”

  * * *

  George Pierce’s wife, Mildred, lifted lint from her husband’s suit jacket with a strip of tape. He’d been tapped to present Joseph with his humanitarian award at the luncheon.

  Mildred said, “Why haven’t you told him? I think you should have told him already. He’ll be angry if he hears it from someone else.”

  Pierce continued to comb his mustache. “Why? Because at the end of the day, he’s not one of us.”

  “He wasn’t one of you when he helped divert the strike last year?”

  “No.”

  “Didn’t your fathers work together to pass the Saturday half holiday?”

  “Enough of that.”

  “Here.” She handed him the labor union sash he wore at banquets and parades. She thumbed the silk. “Didn’t Mr. Bartlett’s slogan win you a seat at the AF of L Congress?”

  “‘Diplomacy Not Defiance’ wasn’t liked by all the members.”

  “Merging of unions was Mr. Bartlett’s mantra.” She kissed her husband’s bearded cheek. “Tell him your plan.”

  “It was everyone’s idea.” Pierce brushed her hand off his shoulder and shooed her away. “Even the great Samuel Gompers said it behind closed doors.”

  Mildred choked up. She bowed her head, snorted. then said, “He sent dinner after Timothy died.”

  Pierce sighed. “Come now, sweet.” He motioned to embrace her, but she stepped out of his reach.

  “You speak to that man,” she said sternly. “And don’t touch the ale until after your speech.”

  “Enough of that,” Pierce quipped. “I have a meeting.” He snapped up his hat and walked to the door. He pulled the knob, paused, and then turned back to his wife. “We needed to h
ave someone on the inside, didn’t we? If it weren’t Bartlett, it would’ve been another Highlands knob.”

  “He was a friend.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “You play dirty pool, George Pierce.”

  “It’s the American way,” he said, and slammed the door.

  * * *

  Mary Sheehan had signed Pete up for the footraces at the Cotton Week field days, but the boy woke with a fever, and she decided to keep him out. Perhaps he’d compete in tomorrow’s events. She sat in her sitting room drinking the last of her Earl Grey from one of Hannah Cleveland’s old orange-

  patterned teacups. The tea tin had been last year’s birthday gift from Joseph, delivered from the Troy Store in a red velvet box. She maneuvered her oversized sewing scissors around page five of the Herald News. The scissors were ill-fit for the job, but they were all she could find. She took the clipping and accompanying photograph of Joseph, whose location she couldn’t place, and pasted them into a family scrapbook she kept hidden in the bottom drawer of the rolltop desk. The book held clippings from before Tom’s death, along with steamer tickets, Tommy’s clips, and theater playbills. With her thumb, she pressed down a stubborn crease that ran between Joseph’s eyes, but that only made it worse. Now it split his face. “The two halves of Joseph Bartlett,” she said aloud. The hall clock chimed. In a few hours, the town would celebrate him. Deservedly so, she thought. She wanted to see it. She shut the book and tucked it beneath a mound of letters. She sipped her tea and sucked her teeth. The dregs of the tin were bitter. The doorbell rang, and she jumped to her feet to answer it before whoever it was woke poor Pete.

  “Good morning, ma’am,” said the blue-clad messenger. His head rose just above Mary’s hip. “Are you Mary Sheehan?”

  “Well, indeed I am.”

  “The man said to give this to you—only you.” Mary recognized the handwriting on the envelope. “Care not to drop it. Something’s in there.”