Flirtation on the Hudson

by J. F. Collen

Nellie tried a different tack with her father. “Mutter can accompany me.”

  Mrs. Entwhistle looked up from her mending with raised eyebrows. “Thank you for permission. Natürlich, I will accompany you,” said she, with the expression on her face that most people use when they are lighthearted and teasing.

  “Then it is quite settled,” said Nellie and scampered out of the room before either of her parents could contradict her.

  They caught a luxurious day boat to Albany, packed with tourists, flush with newfound leisure time. Nellie eschewed the steamboat’s fancy dining room and the lavish staterooms and assumed her usual post at the bow of the ship, feeling the adventure and the joy of the salty spray.

  When the river channel narrowed and they turned the first curve of the serpentine “S” course the river followed, the sure indication that their destination was imminent, Nellie thought her heart would burst with happiness and anticipation.

  Life at The Point was very different during summer tourist season. A fine carriage met the steamboat, and ferried the visitors up the hill in style.

  Anastasia giggled and whispered from behind her fan, “A far cry from our first visit, don’t you agree Nellie? No toiling up the hill watching our luggage lurch and tip precariously at every hairpin turn of the path.”

  Nellie giggled back. “No fear of glowing today.”

  From the luxury of a nicely upholstered seat in the carriage, Nellie’s first view of the heart of the campus was quite different from the sweeping barren scene she witnessed last April. A sea of tents, white canvas sailing in the breeze, flooded the wide-open Great Plain. The rift in the lawn known as Execution Hollow, usually the only interruption of the grass, was not even visible. The glare of the sun reflected by the tent tops transformed the Plain from forest green to nautical white.

  The encampment on the Great Plain was the home of the cadets through the summer months. When the carriage skirted the perimeter of the camp toward its West Point Hotel destination, she could see cadets lounging about in a rare moment of free time. A bugle blew and abruptly leisure time terminated. Nellie blinked, and the cadets were already in platoons, scurrying to obey its command.

  Leaning back on the plush velvet cushions next to her, Anastasia lamented her inability to locate Zetus S. Searle among the throngs of people and cadets.

  “I am quite certain you will find him with all due haste. I am equally certain he is anxious to find you!” said Nellie.

  “Do you think he will be at the reception desk at the hotel waiting for me, since he could not meet us at the landing?” Anastasia asked. She twisted her fan in her hands.

  “Verily, it seems likely. He is now a graduate of this fine Academy, an elevated status from cadet. Therefore, I would assume he has greater flexibility, and command of his schedule.” Nellie reassured her.

  “I would make the very same assumption,” said Anastasia, “but for the fact I have heretofore seen little evidence of schedule flexibility. I was more than ecstatic to learn of Zetus’ decision to resign his commission immediately upon graduation. It is not as if our country is at war. Moreover, Zetus is a pacifist at heart, and has no interest in ‘taming the West.’ So, it seemed the best course of business for him is the business of academia. Where better to start than here? His position understudying a professor and tutoring remedial students during the cadet summer encampment has been a Godsend.”

  They mounted the grand stairs of the hotel and crossed into the cooler recesses of the capacious lobby. There, near the reception desk stood Zetus, in front of the grandfather clock, looking even more massive in his civilian clothes.

  “My humble apologies, my sweet pumpkin, for failing to greet you at the dock. I was forced to oversee some last-minute details of the program for tonight’s Hop.”

  “You are the new dance instructor?” The words popped out before Nellie considered their appropriateness.

  Zetus blushed.

  Anastasia surreptitiously kicked Nellie in the shins for her excited utterance. “Cornelia Rose! What impertinence! Zetus is an exceptional dancer,” Anastasia said and grabbed Searle’s elbow, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

  “The head dance instructor from Boston suffers terribly from gout this summer. His continuous employment here at the Academy since Superintendent Thayer hired him, causes general reluctance to relieve him of his duties. As a junior instructor, I am assigned to oversee dance lessons in his stead,” said Zetus regaining his poise, even though his large ears remained bright red.

  “I have also had a hand in fashioning the program, to ensure the cadets showcase the steps they have worked diligently to master. Mademoiselle, may I present your dance card for this evening?”

  Anastasia squealed with delight. “Nellie, observe the clever design. The dance card is a fan!”

  She artfully snapped the fan. Its folds sprang open, revealing pretty pink flowers emblazoned around printed words on heavy gold pressed paper, laced together with pink ribbon.

  Nellie stepped closer and admired the program. She read, “Summer Hop Friday August 29th, FINAL COTILLION 1850 Summer Encampment,” as she ran her finger over the engraved words on the fan’s outside closure.

  “How delightfully intricate! How finely executed!” Anastasia gushed.

  Zetus’s grin lit his whole face.

  He looks pleased as punch, Nellie thought.

  “Each dance is listed,” said Zetus, taking Anastasia’s gloved hand and running her finger over each fold. Anastasia read, “1-Pigeon wing, 2-Double shuffle, 3-Hoe-down, 4-Waltz, 5-Reel, 6-Quadrille.”

  “Only six dances?” Nellie cried, her dismay at missing any opportunity to dance making her tactless.

  “Cornelia! What ails you? Must you blurt every gauche thought as it enters your head?” cried Anastasia. She practically clucked like a mother hen as she patted Zetus’s hand to reassure him.

  Mercy, Anastasia must be truly smitten to react so.

  Zetus patted Anastasia’s hand in return. “It’s of no consequence, my beloved. Cornelia, as you must have already perceived, our Hops are strictly regulated. However, if you spread the fan out so....” Zetus pulled the fan out further, revealing four more spokes and continued. “...You will see we have the usual number of dances, including a polka. The paper was stuck.”

  They all laughed.

  “Our Hop will conform to the regularly apportioned time, of course, from 8 o’clock to 10 post meridiem precisely. We have ample time for ten dances, and I promise you, my men have excelled at their lessons. I must say, I enjoyed a bit of sport and levity myself in the process. You will not be disappointed in the cadets’ execution of my instructions.”

  After they supped on a delicious light tea.... Dash it, even the food is finer! Nellie thought... they had just sufficient time for donning their evening dresses before the hour of the Final Cotillion arrived.

  When Nellie, her sister, and mother came down the hotel stairs into the soft evening, it was not the last vestiges of the evening sun that took her breath away, but the candlelight flickering in the dusk along the path around the perimeter of the tents on the Great Plain.

  “How dreamy... the candlelit path enhances the already romantic scenery to the point of leaving me starry-eyed!” Nellie said, drinking in the scene.

  “The sight engenders my delighted swoon,” confirmed Anastasia.

  “Where does it lead?” asked Mrs. Entwhistle.

  “To the Cotillion!” both girls replied.

  The ladies had barely entered the main floor equestrian-practice-area of the academic building turned dance hall when someone grabbed Nellie’s elbow. She swung around.

  “At last we meet again. I have often despaired that this most desired reunion would only ever occur in my fantasy,” boomed a drawling voice.

  A tall courtly cadet bowed low over Nellie’s hand, the act obliterating his face, leaving Nellie unsure of his identity. He straightened and she deduced he must be the mysterious Lawrence Simmons Baker. He remained shrou
ded in mystery until the last possible moment, she giggled to herself.

  Cornelia curtseyed and said, “Cadet Lawrence Simmons Baker, I presume? It is truly a pleasure to at last be properly introduced.”

  “Here you are in the flesh!” exclaimed Baker, and Nellie gave an inward gasp at his rough language. “I do thank you for your gracious and faithful correspondence as I endeavored to turn our long-ago chance meetn’ at the quay and then later in the Churchyard, into a courtship.” Baker practically sang the words in the cadence of his deep Southern accent.

  A courtship? Nellie thought. If that don’t beat the Dutch! But when he quite literally swept her off her feet for the first dance, she relaxed in his arms and savored the blissful movement. She smiled and floated through the ‘pigeon wing’ as if her feet had wings of their own.

  “I have long dreamed of dancing with one so skilled in this fine art,” Nellie said, as she swirled and swayed. “Moreover, I am not merely speaking in platitudes, nor am I simply flattering—my speech is quite sincere.”

  “I so very much appreciate your honesty. And of course, your highly desired compliment,” said Baker.

  Nellie raised her eyebrows with a touch of irritation at his immodesty.

  But when she sighed with disappointment at the dance’s end, Baker sighed too. ‘Tis a bit surprising for such a self-assured, bold man to sigh, she thought. Mayhap we have sentiment in common after all.

  He held on to both her hands, pulled back and took a long look at her. Nellie smiled in return.

  Suddenly Baker dropped her hands and ran off.

  What in Tarnation? Nellie thought. She watched him dart through the crowd and make a beeline towards the table at the entrance. She leaned slightly backwards, and saw him talking with animated facial expressions to the hostess.

  Mercy! He procured a writing instrument?

  In an instant, he was at her side again and grabbed her fan program, signing his name on all the spots on her dance card, with a flourish.

  The two hours of dancing flew by as swiftly as Baker and Nellie’s feet flew over the riding hall floor. The music swelled louder with the final Strauss waltz. The grandeur of the musical arrangement and the excellence of the musicians culminated in producing the stirring music that filled her head and heart. Flushed with excitement, the music coursing through her veins, Nellie abandoned herself to the joy of dancing.

  With the last strains of music still playing in her head, Nellie floated on Baker’s arm out of the building into the star-lit night. They paused at Fort Putnam, the citadel perched on the highest point of the campus, observing the spectacular view of the Hudson, easily visible in the moonlight.

  Before she floated back down to earth, they were upon Flirtation Walk.

  Meandering down the path, still dancing in her head, Nellie let the softness of the moonlight feed her heady mood. They paused at a nook on the path that served as yet another scenic overlook.

  “‘Scenes of wild grandeur, peculiar to our country,’” Nellie whispered.

  “‘Tis the middle watch of a summer’s night,’” recounted Lawrence.

  “‘The earth is dark, but the heavens are bright’....” Nellie recited in reply. In an instant Cadet Baker was standing behind her, pulling her back into his... buttons! Oh no, button-crushed from behind... tight against his chest. He encircled his arms around her small waist and drew his lips close to her ear.

  “‘The moon looks down on ol’ Cro’nest,’

  “‘She mellows the shades on his shaggy breast....’” The cadet turned her toward the bump dubbed ‘crow’s nest’ protruding from Storm King Mountain, one of the two ‘frowning hills’ just within sight from their nook on Flirtie. Nellie felt enchanted by the charm and romance of the evening. The moon was high and bright and the stars, indelible bursts of light in all sizes from pinpricks to fists, seemed close enough to touch.

  She smiled at the stars and said softly, “‘...and seems his huge grey form to throw,’”

  “‘In a silver cone on the wave below.’” They both said together.

  Nellie said, “The Knickerbockers have done a capital job of filling the Highlands with new legends. Why that very mountain upon which the crow’s nest rests, would still be called ‘Butter Hill’ instead of ‘Storm King” were it not for the fine persuasive essays of Nathaniel Parker Willis.”

  “Yes, if y’all examine that water closely, I am sure you will join me in seeing Drake’s ‘Culprit Fay,’” teased Lawrence. “As enamored as I am with this romantic scenery, though, it does not hold a candle to the river-wrapped woods of the mighty Mississippi Delta.”

  Nellie turned around in his arms to face him. Hot words of protest rose to her lips.

  Baker placed a long, slender, tapered finger on those lips and drawled, “Now, now, Ma’am. I do humbly apologize for striking a sour note during our lovely perambulation. I can see that I should not exhibit the audacity to compare the fine scenery of your native land on a magical night such as this to any place as plebian as the muddy shores of my native scenery known as Ol’ Miss.”

  Placated, Nellie visibly relaxed. Lawrence moved right in and planted a long, lingering, passionate kiss on Nellie’s lips. Nellie’s heart shot over the moon, catapulting her whole body along with it.

  Before she could protest, or even catch her breath, Lawrence turned her around again, pulling her back into his buttons, twisting her petticoats around her legs. He leaned his head close again, this time lining his ear with hers. “See here,” his arm brushed the side of her breast as he pointed to a spot across the river, a tad up from the shore. “The lights of the grand industrialist Gouverneur Kemble’s estate in Cold Spring....” His arm moved along her breast as he lifted it towards the sky. Intentionally? she wondered. “...Mimic the little stars of light around that constellation.”

  “Truly the moon creates a perfect night for viewing the scenery,” Nellie agreed, but she stepped away from his embrace. Baker caught her hand to pull her back. Before she allowed herself to be tugged back into his arms she tried to subtly thwart his intentions, at least verbally. “However, ‘tis a pity we missed the moonlight serenade boat ride, proposed by the others.”

  “We have not missed it. Quite the contrary! I have chosen this exact spot to position you for maximum enjoyment and optimum experience of that very boat ride. I do believe you will find far greater excitement and exhilaration here. You shall participate fully in the event without the compulsory ride in that rocking, unstable, boat.” Once again, those strong arms encircled her. He pulled her back into his buttons. He turned Nellie, this time toward the south.

  “The boats will pass around Gee’s Point in a matter of minutes. I believe there is only a mild wind, so we shall be able to hear the serenade selection just as perfectly as if we were in the boat next to the band’s.”

  As he finished speaking, the first boat came around the point into full view. In the bright light of the moon, Nellie could make out the white gloves of the cadets flashing in unison as they pulled on the oars. A murmur of delight rose from the boatload as they viewed the moon’s beams playing on the waves in front of them.

  “With the serpentine twist of the river at this bend, I suppose the boats would have been in the shadow of the Point on the other side of the mountain,” said Nellie.

  “Hush now!” commanded Lawrence. “Listen!”

  He was right, the first strains of music wafted up to their perch as the boat carrying the band rounded the point. ‘A Little Night Music’! This selection is perfect, Nellie thought. When the boat completed the turn, the music rose to their ears clearly and sweetly in the still summer air.

  Baker’s breathing was getting louder in her ear. She pulled her head a bit to the side to hear Mozart’s Allegro better but Lawrence’s head followed. Suddenly wet lips began to nibble at her ear. Nellie’s initial irritation at not being able to hear the music soon shifted to tingles of delight. How decadent... how scintillating... how titillating.... Nellie could fe
el herself melt at the warmth and passion of the kisses on her ear and then her neck.

  Once again, literally to the tune of Romanze, Andante, the cadet turned her around, sliding his lips from her neck to her ear to her cheek... to her lips. Mercy... she thought. Skillfully done. He kissed her again and ran his hands down her arms, sending shivers of delight along the same path. Once again, he encircled her in his arms and swung her around.

  He whispered in her ear. “Next we will hear Weber’s Hunter’s Chorus as the oarsmen steer the Moonlight Serenade boats right under the Crow’s Nest of Storm King.”

  “’Where the eagle builds her eyrie,’” Nellie whispered back.

  “Watch,” Baker ordered, turning her head toward the boats now squarely in front of Storm King.

  “Why have they stopped rowing?” Nellie asked.

  “From this point on the oarsmen will rest on their oars, thus allowing the tide to drift the flotilla back down the river. When this musical piece concludes, they will dock at the North Dock, and we will proceed to ‘Kissing Rock’.”

  Nellie’s stomach did a flip-flop at that declaration, quivering in anticipation. She watched and listened, pulsing with the music and the heat of the kisses the cadet bestowed lavishly and in rapid succession on her ear and neck. This spot must be re-named kissing lookout! The thought ran across her brain, dodging in between the mind-numbing passion ignited by Baker’s kisses. As the music swelled to its crescendo, Baker swung her around again for another long, passionate kiss and an encasing embrace, in a smooth and seemingly well-practiced move.

  Well practiced? Why does it seem that this well-orchestrated interlude is well practiced? She thought with only part of her brain as the other part soared with her emotions.

  When the cadet moved his lips down the front of her neck in a long slide down her décolletage to the top button of her bodice, Nellie’s brain snapped to attention. Dash it! I am a fool.

  She put her hand under the cadet’s chin and pulled his eyes up to her own eye level. “While quite enamored of this surfeit of affection, I do hate the niggling feeling tugging on my intellect that perhaps this is not quite the spontaneous outpouring of affection I supposed.”