by Eva Conrad
Harvey’s Bread and Butter
Harvey Bledsoe struck mallet against metal, shaping it against the anvil. The thick iron strap glowed cherry red, and sparks ticked off as he hit it, ringing it like a bell, causing it to curl. Alice Markley sat against the shop wall on a bench and watched quietly, somewhat mesmerized by the luminosity of the hot iron in the dark interior, the clang of the mallet against the scalding-hot metal and the anvil, and the slow process of shaping the iron. Harvey was her uncle. She liked the idea that she could be a blacksmith and farrier like Harvey. She had often asked him to let her try at the work, and he had allowed it until she had come home with a hole burned through her dress, as could be expected, so her mother and father found out and that was the end of it.
That didn’t keep her from her meditations in the metallurgical shop. It was magical, this process of metal and heat and force joining together in the purpose of creating useful things. And to achieve the desired result one had to be completely focused; one had to be in a calm, steady trance and entirely possessed by the task at hand. Harvey had a safety rule: if he could not focus entirely on his work he left heat out of it, and avoided swinging his mallet, too. Those times he’d clean up the shop and do those odd jobs that usually went wanting. Sometimes Alice could help with those tasks, sweeping and washing walls and so forth. She still had the little curl of metal she had manipulated that long-ago afternoon; Uncle Harvey had kept it for her and had slipped it into her hand one day to have as a keepsake, and now it was hidden under a loose floorboard in her room. She remembered how, when she had dipped the glowing bit of metal into the blackened water it had sizzled, turning dark as a plume of steam rose from the bucket.
She would bring Harvey lunch, passing through the streets alone with her basket. Sometimes a brother might come with her, but mostly she’d walk alone, daydreaming about being a blacksmith or owning her own millinery and spending her days making over vain women and arranging decorations on hats and bonnets. Or, perhaps, she could be a steamboat pilot, in charge of the destination of a multitude of souls while hiding herself away in the pilot’s house. At any rate, none of her dreams were likely to come true, and, as she would arrange Harvey’s lunch on the table, she’d remember her destiny.
Harvey Bledsoe was kind and wise, and spare of verbiage. He would nod at his niece before seating himself at the table. She sometimes shared lunch with him. Other times she sat across from him and read whatever book or newspaper she had managed to borrow, beg or even steal. His quiet company was nice, and although he could fend for himself well enough, she preferred to have a reason to be at the shop in his company and brought lunch.
Harvey lived at the back of the shop in a small, basic lodging of two rooms divided by a wall and a curtained doorway. One room was for sleeping and dressing and the other for cooking, eating, and desk work, such as accounting. The privy was out back and there were a couple of little sheds. Harvey did his own laundry, for the most part. Any good clothing went to the laundress for washing and repair, but mostly he wore worn out clothes with holes scorched through and so much soot ground into the threads that it would never come out, anyway. So he did the bulk of the laundering himself in his little back-yard area and hung it on a line to dry. He kept a tin bathtub which he filled with water for bathing. In short, his life was as simple as possible. His sister, however, had always had great social aspirations, which required that she make a very different display of wealth, and this caused numerous issues for those in her general vicinity. At times, Harvey was in Mrs. Markley’s general vicinity.
Alice was keenly aware that her mother was embarrassed of Harvey. His hands were hard, his nails jagged and slick with the grime of his art and labor. He was a handsome man, but in the pioneering sense, his body too strong and solid to wear suits cut to a fashionable silhouette, not that he had any desire to wear such unserviceable garments. As a consequence he was invited to dinner only on nights when guests were not expected. Occasionally Harvey Bledsoe’s presence would collide with Mrs. Markley’s society, and he would, at those times, endeavor to have some good-natured fun. It was to his advantage that he had a conspirator in Alice.
On one particular evening, a couple of distinguished guests appeared in town and Mrs. Markley extended her hospitality, but forgot, in her excitement, to send Harvey word to stay away. He was already seated at the table, napkin tucked into his dirty collar and sleeves rolled up to the elbows, when Mrs. Markley brought her guests in. Harvey stood in greeting and introduced himself. The guests raised their eyebrows with interest.
Soon the finely-polished boards that made up Mr. and Mrs. Markley’s dining table groaned with the vanity of overabundance. There was celery and there were pickles and two kinds of pepper sauce and three kinds of mustard. There was chicken, beef, pork and fish. As bread was passed, the two gentlemen visitors were happy and comfortable as Mr. Markley asked them to explain their business in town.
“Well, you see, we are writers. Mr. Failty is a newspaper man. He operates the paper back in Wickly, which his son is running while we’re away. And as for myself, I write travel columns and travel books, which is what I’m about on this trip. Mr. Failty is going to publish my book, and he had a yen to travel, so here we are. I’ll be writing about the towns we pass through and the people we meet.”
“That is just wonderful!” commented Mrs. Markley.
“Would you pass the salve?” said Harvey, pointing at the butter, which had been molded into an attractive shape. His sister nearly choked on her finely prepared chicken in cream sauce; her brother was a terrible embarrassment to her, what with the ruffled-up hair and soot ground deep into the pores of his skin.
Nevertheless, it wasn’t the chicken in cream sauce or the lavish set of silver that was noted in the book about Gatestown when the copy Mrs. Markley ordered arrived; instead, the chapter contained an introduction to the town “as explained by Harvey Bledsoe in detail,” followed by some of Arlie McIntosh’s stories and a description of the town hall. Mrs. Markley’s ensuing tantrum could be heard as far as the other end of town, where her brother was chuckling as he and Alice enjoyed his complimentary copy of the book, signed with sincere wishes by the author as well as the publisher.
