by John Pipkin
Sometimes the doubts returned, but Caleb was having no difficulty thinking of his mother seated on her cloud as he happily dragged the spatula from top to bottom, leaving smooth, even trails on the glass. If his hand wavered, he repeated the motion, straightening the lines in the molasses before moving on to clean another row. Caleb was more careful than the other workers, more diligent, as if the manner in which the molasses was removed might in some way affect the purity of the overall work hidden beneath. His father had taught him that everything he did, the simplest act, should be undertaken as if it were being performed for a heavenly audience. Even when he worked alone at his mathematics, Caleb made sure that his fraction bars and equal signs were perfectly straight. God was watching, always, and Caleb did not want to disappoint him in a task so simple as a straight line.
Once he had gotten the top layer of molasses off, he worked at the remaining syrup with a rag, then placed the section of window next to the others, propped against the church steps. The workmen were using a special mixture of ash and lye to remove the remaining stickiness from the panes before the glaziers began installing them in the gaping hole that had been opened in the church's nave.
The stagecoaches bound for Cambridge slowed as they passed through Adams Square, horses sniffing the sugary air, passengers craning their necks to view the curious spectacle. The molasses ran in great, heavy gobs, soaking Caleb's shirt until it clung to his forearms like ill-fitting skin. It ran down his legs, into his shoes, pooled on the dirt at the base of the church steps. It dripped in wispy filaments. Long, spidery threads stuck to his face and landed in his hair, and it was not long before the sweetness attracted a host of eager insects. Bees and wasps flew straight into the amber globs and stuck fast, immobilized by their greed. Caleb saw the lesson in this.
He surreptitiously ran his finger over the face of the angel Gabriel, traced the length of his trumpet, and then slipped the gobbet of molasses into his mouth. It was a small transgression, one in a series he had committed this afternoon in the service of a noble purpose. Caleb looked at the angel seated on the golden cloud, and he held the sweet glob on his tongue until it melted and ran along the insides of his teeth, stinging his molars. He knew then that, were anyone to ask him when he had decided to follow his father into the ministry, he would be able to identify the exact moment. How could such artistry, such craftsmanship, such skill in transport and installation, such perfection—how could any of this exist were it not for the existence of God? If heaven held but a portion of the intense color, if its sweetness were only half as cloying, if the ingenuity of angels came close to the genius before him, then it was indeed a destination to be pursued above all others. It made him happy to think that his mother waited in so marvelous a place, and he wondered if she would truly want to return to them.
Caleb looked at the bottom panes waiting to be installed first. They depicted the fallen, damned to the flames, preyed upon by serpents and insects, skeletal arms raised in vain supplication, mouths agape in fleshless astonishment. Caleb judged these panes to be the most realistic, and he had good reason. He could not know if the window's portrait of heaven was accurate, but he had once found a decayed body when he was just a boy, and he knew death's true visage. A year after his mother's passing, he had stumbled upon the body while walking in the woods on a bright spring afternoon. Beneath the trunk of a fallen tree he saw the toe of a boot and a flattened pants leg. Nearby lay a hatchet, its blade rusted, its long handle speckled with blue paint. Until that moment he had seen bodies only at wakes, lying in silk-lined coffins or on pillows of hay in simple pine boxes, but they had been prepared for viewing, the first patina of death wiped away, washed and dressed as if they had never been part of this world but were just passing through. The body he had found in the woods was a different thing altogether. He had tried to roll away the log hiding the dead man's face, but the wood no longer owned the hardness of its shape; it came apart in spongy handfuls. He pulled on the dead man's boot, felt something give way with a slippery pop, felt the hard outline of bone and little else. Caleb stepped to the other end of the log and rolled away a sizable chunk. Underneath, he found a wide-brimmed hat, a faded blue shirt, and a flattened, outstretched arm, the white bones poking through the frayed fingers of a glove. He took a closer look. It was not a glove at all but the hand's empty skin, greasy leather no longer able to cover its frame. Caleb hesitated, then lifted the black brim of the hat.
From behind the mask of leather, the white skull stared back at him. A fat beetle pushed its way up through the dirt in one of the eye sockets, paused as if confused to find itself exposed, then waddled down over the shirt and entered the log resting on the body. A few seconds later, the beetle reemerged and crawled beneath the shirt. Caleb saw that scores of insects were shuttling back and forth, inhabiting wood, flesh, and soil indiscriminately. He did not think that there were insects in heaven, but he suddenly feared for his mother. He remembered what his father had told him—that one day the dead would triumphantly arise—and he was terrified at the thought that he might encounter this rotted body alive again and walking among them. Caleb knew that he needed to save it from further desecration. He clawed at the soft wood with his bare hands until he could not tell where the tree ended and the desiccated flesh began. He seized the old hatchet and swung wildly at the decaying log, exposing more of the human remains beneath. Caleb saw that flesh and wood had melded together, but he refused to believe it possible that God would allow a man to become as common to the earth as a fallen tree. He fled the woods in a panic and was nearly home before he realized that he was still clutching the rusted hatchet and that it had shed flakes of blue paint over his palms.
Caleb later told his father what he had found, and Marcus Dowdy explained that his discovery was neither evidence of God's callousness nor a sign that man was a soulless portion of nature.
“My son, I am certain the body was that of a heathen,” Marcus explained. “The native tribes of this land believe themselves one with the soil, so it is only to be expected that when death comes to them it comes as commonly as it does to the animals of the field. God would never allow a true Christian to arrive at so inglorious an end.”
There was, however, one detail about the dead body in the woods that Caleb had not shared with his father, because he feared it would have marred his father's explanation and, worse, jeopardized his mother's peaceful abidance. Around the neck of the dead man had hung a small leather wallet, and stamped into the decaying leather was a simple cross. Caleb had seen Catholic scapulars before, dangling from the scrawny necks of the superstitious Irish, and he knew it contained a small scrap of paper, a fragment of the Bible. There was no doubt in his mind that the rotting body had once housed a Christian soul.
Caleb thought of his father's explanation as he continued to scrape molasses from a pane of bright blue sky. The Judgment Day panes would be the brightest, most colorful of all: brilliant reds and yellows, great fugues of intertwined flames, arms belatedly outstretched for forgiveness lost. The sunlight pouring through these sections would make those who stood before them feel as though they were immersed in a burning sea. Caleb grew excited as he thought about the effect, the very air palpably stained with the brilliant crimson and gold of damnation. In his enthusiasm, he ran two fingers over the clouds pushing the ships of the faithful to America's shore. He raked a furrow through the dark molasses, contemplating the window's perfection, but as he placed dripping fingertips reverently onto his tongue something caught his eye. He looked closer at the stained-glass clouds, doubted, and looked again.
Alongside one of the lead seams that joined the colorful fragments, a web of fissures spread through the glass. A flaw! Caleb grabbed the rag and rubbed at the square of glass to see if the crack had spread. It seemed impossible that any damage could have occurred during shipment. The molasses was so thick that it would have forgiven even the harshest seas. Caleb leaned in close to examine the pane, and slowly the realization settled in. The
cracks must have occurred in the assembly of the window. Caleb found where the glazier, too lazy to replace the broken piece, had tried to cover the mistake with an extra layer of lead along the seam. It was hardly noticeable, but Caleb would forever know that there was a flaw hidden by another flaw, the second sin greater than the first. When the sun shone through the window, he would know that the bright sparkle in the clouds was the effect of cracks acting as a prism. It was unforgivable. Unlike his father, who doled out absolution like a man drunk with his own munificence, Caleb thought that some things, laziness among them, were inexcusable.
Caleb saw a bee struggling in the molasses on the glass, and he pressed his thumb into the syrup and squashed the imprisoned insect. He could see that in the years to come the great window of the Court Street Church would be a sign to him. Where others saw the sparkling brilliance of Providence, Caleb would see man's failure. It was the duty of every son to improve upon his father's deeds, Caleb thought, and though he knew his father was a good man, he thought him too lenient, too forgiving. Caleb knew that it would fall to him to root out and squash the flaws of the New World, lest the new be tainted by the degradations of the old. He had a great task before him. He was suddenly proud and happy and thankful, gravely thankful, for having been born in America, unburdened by the complacency of the past; there was simply too much work to be done.
15
Henry David
Truth be told, it is a glorious spectacle, if one can part the burning from the burned. This is what comes to Henry as he appraises the destruction from the top of Fair Haven Hill. In the midst of terrific loss, he thinks, there is yet beauty to celebrate, for nature is never chapfallen. He feels life return to his spent legs, feels the cramped tingling subside, and he pushes himself to his feet. He is invigorated by the thought that he may find means to recuperate this day; the fire is a wonder to behold, and he is almost sorry that he alone is present to appreciate the awful force he has unleashed.
He skids sideways down the hill to be closer to the heat and smoke. The way is awkward and steep, and he stumbles, boot heels braking his descent, plowing up small stones like arrowheads and shallow, spidery roots. Halfway to the bottom he stops, crouches on the slope, and listens to the fire, trying to decipher its brute, rapacious language. He reckons the flames are distant by two hundred yards or so, close enough to reach Fair Haven Hill before help arrives. But Henry is no longer panicked by this possibility. He has stopped hoping that the woods might be saved. He has given up denying the truth of what has followed from his hand. He decides instead that he must endeavor to make the most of his regret; it is the only lesson to be taken from the tragedy. He tells himself that, henceforth, he will no longer turn from guilt; he will pull regret to his core, feel it deeply, and be happy for it.
Though he so often courts solitude, right now he would gladly welcome the company of Edward, or Waldo, or Isaac, or some beautiful specimen of Young America, that he might demonstrate to another how the bright orange flames mimic autumn's vibrant decay, how swirling cinders pay homage to celestial majesties, how the fire's roar echoes the flying tumult of the cataract. To be here in the final moments of the woods is consolation and privilege. The fire is close enough for Henry to hear its labored grumblings, feel its muted thunder against his breastbone, and it comes in waves, a slow throbbing, like the dying pulse of a giant. Henry squats lower, wraps his arms around his knees, and wonders at the beauty of the flames.
And then he hears something else, an exhalation issuing from the trees like an angry whisper, and the sound forms itself into a word, clear and distinct and impossible: woodsburner. The accusation wakes Henry from his reverie. He reels from the slap, bracing himself on backward-flung arms, then scrambles to his feet and peers into the shrubs nearby to see if someone is there, hiding from the flames. Henry holds a finger to his lips—on occasion he has caught himself muttering out loud when he is alone—but still he hears it, a voice begotten by the wind, a haunting in his ears: woodsburner, woodsburner, woodsburner. He turns and scrambles back up Fair Haven Hill with long, low strides, elbows fluttering, and the words pursue him. He glances over his shoulder, expecting to see his mysterious accuser a few steps behind.
When he reaches the crest, Henry puts his hands over his ears and shuts his eyes and tries to ignore what he has heard. He revisits the many insignificant causes that have brought him to this moment, but his thoughts cannot drown out the hissing indictment from the woods. He presses his palms hard against his head until his ears make their own roar. He sits, hunched forward, hands at his ears, and searches for a way that he might parcel out responsibility for what has happened—Edward wanted a chowder, the shoemaker at the river gave them matches, the woods were unusually dry, the wind unusually strong—and next his thoughts alight upon someone else who might shoulder a portion of the guilt, a writer he met a year and a half earlier, then newly arrived in Concord: Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Long-faced, clean-shaven, carefully buttoned, Nathaniel had at once struck Henry as a man poorly suited for life outdoors. Over dinner with Nathaniel and his wife, Sophia, Henry learned of his host's miserable rustic experiment at the Brook Farm community, where shoveling manure had proved far less agreeable than tallying weights and tariffs at the customs house in Boston. Nathaniel praised Henry's love of nature, and he professed his eagerness that they undertake a river excursion together, though Henry detected in him a reluctance to dirty his clothes or hands.
Henry thinks of Nathaniel's pale fingernails, trimmed and clean, tidy hands for writing stories and novels, better suited than Henry's for bright papers squarely stacked, slanted desktops, and well-cut nibs. Then Henry looks down at his own chipped fingernails underwritten with soil, fingertips blunt like broken sticks, accustomed to scrawling in notebooks with nubbins of discarded pencils. As if to prove his thoughts, he claws a primitive design in the dirt and wipes his hands on his pants. Despite their differences, Henry had been attracted by the graveness in Nathaniel's eyes, and they formed an immediate friendship without forethought of what that friendship might bring. It is not wholly unreasonable, Henry thinks, to conjecture that their relationship has, in its own small way, contributed to the present tragedy. After all, had Nathaniel not been a friend, Henry would not have offered to sell him his boat—the very boat that Henry and his brother John had built with their own rough hands. Henry had only sold the Musketaquid because he could not take the heavy boat with him to New York when he left to tutor Waldo's nephews. But now he suspects that if he still owned his old boat the Concord woods would not be burning.
Long before they drove the first nail, Henry and John had decided that they would name their boat Musketaquid, after the Indian name for the Concord River. For years, they had discussed taking a trip on the river, and each season the waters beckoned to them impatiently, asking when they were coming. Henry did not understand the urgency then; they were young men, and there seemed an endless reserve of long summer days in which such an adventure might be taken. Yet the river called as if each summer might be the last. Even in winter, Henry felt the frigid current tugging at him, and all he need do was look at his older brother staring out the frost-etched window to understand that he was feeling the same pull. When they finally committed to the journey, they decided that their old boat, the Rover, was too ordinary for the task. A trip on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers required a superior vessel, and they set about selecting each plank with this journey in mind, as if they were consecrating stones for a cathedral. They gave the new boat wheels and a set of sturdy poles for transport over land; they gave it two masts, two sails, two sets of oars, and room enough to store a tent and all the supplies their adventure would require. Henry and John had agreed on every detail down to the green and blue paint. And the boat performed admirably on their journey, taking them past hundreds of brooks and farms and hills and men whom they had never heard of before and whose names they never knew.
Henry still thinks the Musketaquid a dignified, man
ly name. But Nathaniel Hawthorne apparently took it for granted that his seven dollars also purchased the right to rechristen the proud boat the Pond Lily. Henry did not believe that any man could possibly imagine himself destined for adventure in a boat called the Pond Lily. And what further disheartened Henry was that Nathaniel simply did not appreciate the fine vessel he had so cheaply purchased; he did not connect with its obedient temper. All Henry ever had to do was will the boat this way or that. But, even after repeated lessons, Nathaniel complained that the Musketaquid was sluggish, heavy in the water, and impossible to steer.
If Nathaniel had not renamed the once noble vessel, Henry might have considered borrowing it today; instead, he embarked in Edward's small boat, and Henry deferred to his young companion in the choice of where to come ashore. Had Henry been at the helm of the Musketaquid, he might have chosen not to stop so early in the day, might have insisted they not cook a chowder at all, or he might have been bold enough to suggest that they ignore their hunger and continue on until dusk. By then, the wind would certainly have lessened. With the Musketaquid beneath him, he might even have elected to make the excursion by himself.
A loud crash signals another fallen tree, and as Henry watches blood-red embers coil skyward he admits that these are foolish thoughts, the desperate overreachings of his troubled reason. He cannot blame Nathaniel Hawthorne any more than he can blame Edward or his brother, though he wishes he could have spent this day with John instead, paddling the Musketaquid as they had done five years earlier. There had been no disagreements between them on their trip down the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, and in the span of an immortal summer week they had garnered experiences to fortify them for a lifetime of winters. What a piece of wonder it was, those days spent on the river together. In no time before or since has he felt greater contentment, or companionship as complete. He is still nourished by memories of the sheer volume of life everywhere on display—swaying alders, birches, oaks, and maples, scurrying mice and moles and splashing muskrats, floating cranberries and wheeling gulls, and John behind him at the oars, smiling quietly in the bright flashes from wind-driven waves. Henry meticulously recorded every detail of their journey in his notebooks, and he sometimes believes he might work his notes into a proper book, given the time. He wishes he could abandon his pencil-making duties and live alone with only his notebooks, so that he might finally write the book he has long had in mind. If John were here to help guide him, Henry knows he would at last find the time and the means to finish the project. John always seemed at the ready with solutions.
