Flirtation on the Hudson

by J. F. Collen

  Nellie was literally holding her sides now, tugging at her corset, she was laughing so hard at the recollection. “The entire crowd watched the lone glove float like a lily pad on the still waters of the river, as if it were taunting Mutter.”

  Anastasia started laughing again, and even Agnes smiled.

  Anastasia resumed her tale. “The glove floated downstream and then came back, as if it were saying goodbye.”

  “Yes,” sniffed Agnes, now with a small giggle. “At last, with a small wave of its fingers it took it off on an adventure all its own.” Agnes waved ‘bye bye.’

  “Mercy! The prospect of wedded life most truly agrees with you,” said Nellie and caught Agnes’ hands affectionately.

  Agnes sniffed again. “Yes, it is all well and good. But ‘es macht nichts’ as Mutter would say. It doesn’t matter what style wedding I would prefer. Indeed, I would prefer a grand and glorious wedding at the biggest Catholic Church on Manhattan Island. Mutter has decreed a simple church wedding at Saint Patrick’s in Verplank, like our brother Patrick’s nuptial Mass two years ago. Sakes alive! No! Verplank? Pile on the agony!”

  Agnes sighed, feeling sorry for herself, and picked at the loose threads on Nellie’s eiderdown. In a subdued voice, she said, “The site of our wedding has already been determined. Since Mr. Armistead Lindsey Long is from way down south in Virginia, and I refuse to entertain the idea of ever even visiting there, let alone travel there for our nuptials, Mutter has arranged we will be wed in the boondocks of Verplank.”

  Anastasia and Cornelia exchanged glances. Yes, this is the Agnes we both know.

  “Mayhap Mutter will allow some concession to Armistead’s exceptional education and excellent pedigree,” said Anastasia.

  “Surely, you can use your extraordinary persuasive powers,” Nellie chimed in, “and convince Mutter to allow you some nod to Long’s heritage, in the form of fancy dress uniforms on the groom and his men?”

  Agnes paused in her grousing, interested. Anastasia looked amused at Nellie’s choice of words.

  That was all the encouragement Cornelia needed. She continued, “The pièce de résistance—the happy couple exiting the church through the crossed swords of the honor guard as the parade band plays Wagner’s new Bridal Chorus. It will be unreservedly romantic, just like the weddings reported in the Society Pages of the newspaper.”

  “A true fairytale,” said Anastasia, batting her eyelashes.

  “Every ounce as romantic as plain old Nancy Osgood marrying ‘Baron’ Charles Steadman Abercrombie,” declared Nellie. “It is only by tracing his lineage back to his Scottish great-great-great grandfather that can he even pretend a claim to that moniker. A claim made all the more tenuous, by-the-by, through virtue of the fact that he, himself, has never even stepped foot in Scotland. But I digress! Indubitably, a West Point infused wedding is far more glamorous, and stylish, than either couples’ ostentatious exchange of vows in New York City’s Trinity Church.”

  The sisters smiled at each other in happy anticipation of a most satisfactory, glamorous, storybook wedding.

  Chapter 23 – Don’t Know Much about History

  Sparta Cemetery, July 1850

  “A cannonball blasted through a tombstone?” asked Obadiah. “Was that precise shooting or mere happenstance?”

  Nellie smiled at him, happy to be heading out for a picnic on this lovely July afternoon.

  “Is there some military advantage to firing on the dead, untaught during my education at Saint John’s Military Academy?” Obadiah demanded, with a mock look of consternation.

  Nellie laughed, swinging her light bag containing a tablecloth, their napkins, and other necessities for a dignified picnic. Obadiah switched the heavy basket containing the food and drink from hand to hand. I have the proper equipment, the proper nourishment and the most splendid of companions, she thought.

  Obadiah took his history seriously. “Do not abdicate your responsibility to supply me with all of the requisite details—namely, whose eternal rest is marked at this site?”

  Nellie said, with appropriate solemnity, “A poor little boy, Abraham Ladew, who died in 1774 after only a brief seven years on this earth. The poor Ladew family! The tomb next to Abraham is a sister he never would have met. Tragically, she died as a mere five-year-old, before he was born.

  “Life was more arduous then. Happily, today we are far better armed to weather life’s diseases and hazards, with a greatly increased store of medical knowledge,” Nellie said.

  They arrived at Sparta cemetery at the top of a grassy knoll, overlooking the new Post Road to the east and Revolutionary Road to the west.

  Nellie led the way to the Ladew family plot, almost centrally located in the cemetery at the top of the hill. A fancy black chain link fence encircled the family’s section.

  “Here is Sarah,” said Obadiah. He read, “‘...died Aug. 15, 1764. Aged 5 years, 7 months, and 11 days’. My that is precise.” He traced his finger across the chiseled words.

  Obadiah’s fingers next probed the cannonball hole, not with the idle curiosity of a thrill seeker, but with reverence and respect for the dead and their history.

  He looked around the pleasant, tree shaded spot. “This area is the picture of tranquility and repose. It seems strange that a stray cannon ball damaged this tombstone, yet nothing else in this area was harmed.”

  “Verily, today only this solitary, isolated, bit of damage is visible. But I must inform you—the old Presbyterian Church of Mount Pleasant used to be right there.” Nellie pointed past a group of young pines toward the far corner of the cemetery. “A farmer named Arnold Hunt donated part of his land to build the original church. It was so damaged during the Revolutionary War, why, it was shaken to its very foundations, triggering alarming stress fractures. For many years the visibly damaged, old rickety building worried its parishioners as they sat worshiping. Finally, the congregation garnered sufficient funds to build their current church.”

  “Yes. I have seen the church in its new, prime location,” said Obadiah. “Right downtown in Sing Sing on Pleasant Square.”

  Nellie nodded. “So today, we have an open, tranquil, spot, on the top of a hill to catch breezes, and an occasional glimpse of the Hudson through those shady trees, to enjoy our picnic—just the landscaping design for final resting places that is currently in vogue.”

  Obadiah shook his head and laughed.

  “William Cullen Bryant’s poem Thanatopsis springs to mind in a setting such as this. His concept that the beauty of nature is here to support us and console us, especially in the face of death, is ratified by the pastoral beauty of this spot,” she said.

  Ever ready to provide a theatrical performance, Nellie recited:

  “To him who in the love of Nature holds

  Communion with her visible forms, she speaks

  A various language; for his gayer hours

  She has a voice of gladness, and a smile

  And eloquence of beauty, and she glides

  Into his darker musings, with a mild

  And healing sympathy, that steals away

  Their sharpness, ere he is aware....”

  Obadiah clapped with appreciation. Nellie stood up and curtseyed, with a laugh.

  “Your tongue warbles the sweetest music,” he said.

  Smiling at the compliment, Nellie shook the picnic blanket. It fanned out in the breeze and landed under a shady tree. She sat down, removed her gloves, and opened the picnic basket. They settled in the comfy spot for some cold fried chicken, cucumbers, popped corn, and pickles.

  “And the pièce de résistance!” Nellie exclaimed as she pulled out a large flask.

  “With an introduction like that, that flagon cannot contain water,” said Obadiah. “But what tempting liquid refreshment could it be?”

  “Lemonade!” Nellie announced. “Fresh-squeezed this morning by my very own hands.”

  “How thoughtful.” Obadiah smiled. “And very clever of you to package it in suc
h a way to survive our little hike to this nesting place.”

  Their conversation flowed as liberally as the lemonade.

  But when they bit into the chicken all that could be heard was the sound of the breeze in the trees.

  Satiated, Nellie looked at the great puffy clouds racing over the tops of the trees and then gazed out to the beauty of the mighty Hudson. Good feeling lapped at her like the small waves of the river lapped the rocky shore below. She smiled at Obadiah and he caught her ungloved hand and raised it to his lips. The touch on her bare skin sent tingles racing up her arm to her heart.

  After a cozy moment of munching pickles and bantering bon mots, the conversation turned again to local history.

  “The British Navy was here,” said Obadiah. “It seems a trifle peculiar, upon reflection, when teaching local military history to circumvent the significance of naval battles.”

  At Cornelia’s puzzled look, Obadiah said, “I recall my military academy devoted excessive amounts of time studying land skirmishes, when teaching the strategies of the battles of the Revolution. It seems they quite ignored the fact the British Navy sailed this far north on the Hudson.”

  “They went much further north than Sing Sing!” Nellie rose to the bait. “Surely your lessons included study of the original fort at West Point and the chain across the river to Constitution Island? Surely, they recounted the dramatic rendezvous of the battleship Vulture with Benedict Arnold? Or the tale of the farmers, organizing in a Bedford Tavern to reclaim their livestock ‘appropriated’ by the British for food, instead thwarting the escape of the British Spy Captain Andre?”

  Obadiah laughed again. “There may have been some mention, but the details are fuzzy. You, however, have put some heart into the tale.”

  “That ship was the very same Vulture that fired the cannon shot into poor Abraham Ladew’s tombstone,” she said.

  “That was to be my very first question. From whence did that historic cannonball originate? But then I caught an aroma of the delicious repast you prepared and I am afraid all other interests quite fled from my thoughts!”

  Mollified by the culinary compliment, Nellie drew a deep breath and smiled. “No matter, there is no dearth of information concerning local Revolutionary War intrigue. Why, I recently enjoyed reading a tale involving one of Sing Sing’s own local spies, recounted by James Fennimore Cooper in The Spy.”

  “I do adore your passion for local history, and I pray you continue with your narrative.” Obadiah leaned back against the nearest elm tree, put his hands behind his head and smiled.

  Nellie’s smiling eyes met his. Her heart did a little flip-flop at the beguiling attentiveness she saw there. She cast down her eyes, searching for an appropriately charming rejoinder. Thinking of none, she reverted to communicating her subject.

  “Revisiting my earlier tale of that same ship, The Vulture wreaked havoc on the no-man’s land of Westchester County. The British Naval Fleet controlled New York City harbor, but the territory north was in continuous flux. The British occupied some of the land, but the Revolutionaries had strongholds in other parts, triggering constant battles for the unclaimed areas. The poor residents! Daily, ships patrolling the Hudson River skirmished, firing canons willy-nilly. Causalities were constant, including decapitation by cannonball!”

  “Decapitation? Surely there is no proof that a cannonball ever decapitated a soldier,” protested Obadiah, still smiling.

  “Decapitation was the cannon’s very purpose. Moreover, my extensive study of local history led me to the journals of a certain American General, William Heath. He documents that in the Battle of White Plains he witnessed an American cannonball decapitating a Hessian artillery man,” said Nellie, triumphant that she was able to offer the direct proof Obadiah desired.

  “So eloquent are you, I have no choice but to believe you,” said Obadiah. He jumped up and gave her a bow and a hand flourish, formally deferring to her opinion. She smiled in response. He winked and settled back down into his comfortable listening position.

  Nellie nodded an acknowledgement of the compliment and continued. “In addition to the eye witness account, there is the less scientific folklore, claiming that a decapitated Hessian soldier still haunts the Northern part of Tarrytown, riding out every night from the Old Dutch Church on the Post Road, in search of his head.”

  “Is that story not the product of the imagination of the writer, Washington Irving?” asked Obadiah. “Does he not reside somewhere near here, along the Hudson River?”

  “The product of Irving’s imagination? Ha! That literary thief! In nearby Slapershaven, the original Dutch name for the sleepy harbor inlet in the hamlet of Tarrytown, there circulates some witchery—a traditional story of Brom Bones’ race with the headless horseman for a bowl of punch. Washington Irving is merely a scribe—his Sketchbook only records legends and fables that have been part of the local folklore for generations. Irving learned them from a Dutch family named Van Wart with whom he summered as a child during a ‘fever’ scourge in New York City, similar to the yellow fever plague to which poor Sarah Ladew succumbed, decades earlier!”

  “Man alive! I have touched yet another nerve. I can certainly concede that Irving might have based his well-written short story on a circulating local legend, but one ‘embellishment’ does not make him a literary thief. Let us not forget that he is singlehandedly responsible for starting the ‘Knickerbocker’ movement,” said Obadiah.

  “Mr. William Cullen Bryant, in fact my personal acquaintance, would certainly disagree with the moniker ‘single-handed’!” Nellie said.

  “Perhaps,” conceded Obadiah, “however, Irving put this American landscape in artistic vogue. His claim that the world’s finest scenery abounds in the Hudson Highlands inspired many poets, pundits and the Hudson River School of artists.” Obadiah paused and looked a tad sheepish. “I might not have been drawn to Sing Sing to attend the Academy had my father not been a devotee of the Knickerbocker movement. At the time, he was Governor of our fair state, and, smitten himself with the quixotic pull of this region, he enthused me with the romantic appeal of the Hudson. Truly, I have not been disappointed in that amorous regard.” He winked at Nellie.

  “Furthermore,” Obadiah continued, “Irving also garners fame for his other Knickerbocker stories. Rip Van Winkle is one that jumps to mind.”

  “Pshaw! That story is stolen from an Old Russian folktale! Mr. Bryant can continue to wax poetic in defense his friend—it will never persuade me. Irving, the alleged literary giant, is merely an embroiderer of folklore. He has never had an original idea. Even his settings are merely poetically written descriptions of this, our own historic Hudson River Valley.

  “Truly, he has set the tales in flowery verse, painted a picture of this area with his words, but the stories themselves, Rip Van Winkle and our Sleepy Hollow legend are not of his own making. He has stolen them and touted the literary creations as his own.” Nellie folded her arms and shook her head.

  Obadiah smiled at her with tenderness in his eyes. Nellie saw those tender eyes flicker to her lips and she tingled at her speculation, how would those smiling lips feel against mine?

  “Today you have tapped several facets of history that are foreign to me, therefore I dare not refute them. It is evident you are quite the ardent defender of causes you champion. An admirable trait in a woman,” Obadiah said. He cleared his throat. “If truth be told, I admire you. I envision... I hope we share many future picnics together, discussing any passion of yours—in fact, whiling away the hours undertaking anything your heart desires.”

  Nellie looked at him in wide-eyed delight.

  Obadiah leaned over and caught her hand again, gently pulling her toward him.

  Nellie’s heart galloped.

  He kissed her hand and looked up at her. At the touch of his lips a tingle of pleasure traveled up her arm. She caught her lip in her teeth.

  Seeing her favorable response, he gathered her in his arms and kissed her lips in ear
nest.

  Mercy, the day grew suddenly warm! Nellie thought.

  If this isn’t butter upon bacon! History and... some mystery.

  Chapter 24 – Déjà vu

  Sing Sing, August 1850

  “But Papa, this time I will be the escort of just one cadet,” Nellie pleaded.

  “As ye were with that young lad Otis?” asked her father, still shaking his head in the negative.

  Nellie had finally relented and decided to accept another invitation from a cadet at West Point. The mysterious Lawrence Simmons Baker, the cadet who had escorted her from the Catholic Church to their carriage such a long time ago on her first visit to West Point, had been corresponding since then. When Agnes announced her engagement to Baker’s friend Armistead Long, Baker’s letters took on a tone of desperation, petitioning Nellie to grace him with her presence.

  Nellie made up her mind to accept his latest invitation, and now pleaded her case. “But there were no incidents when I accompanied Otis. Of course, I did entertain advances from some of the other cadets, but solely because I was Elmer’s companion under protest. This time, I would be appreciative of the opportunity to become better acquainted with a potential suitor, most especially as he is a suitor of my own choosing. Surely the difference is readily evident?”

  Mr. Entwhistle still stood, rigid, looking from the invitation to Nellie and back again.

  Nellie turned her persuasive talents on her mother. “Mutter, West Point has become quite the destination during the summer months. Dignitaries from all walks of life—artists, writers, politicians, merchants, and industrialists converge there for the sublime scenery and the scintillating musical performances. The Academy in the summer provides just ambiance and distinguished society, just the right milieu in which a young debutante should circulate.”

  Her mother remained unmoved, the hem of her sister’s dress turning rapidly through her hands as she shortened it with quick basting stiches.