My Heart Laid Bare Part 5

Esopus, the lost village.

Settled in 1642 on the curve of the river where Muirkirk now stands. A small Dutch outpost of approximately seventy-five men and women who made their way upriver, from the more populous settlements south of the Chautauquas. According to one Claes van Hasbroeck, who kept a personal daybook, in addition to filing systematic and meticulous reports for the Dutch West India Company through the 1640's, when agents for the Company explored the area of Tahawaus Pa.s.s, above the great Nautauga River, it was discovered in 1647 that the little settlement of Esopus no longer existed. All traces of it had vanished from the river's bank: no houses, or farming plots, or human artifacts, or even any graves, were to be found. The wilderness had not entirely grown back, a clearing of sorts remained, though overrun with vegetation at its edges.

In his daybook Claes van Hasbroeck asks eloquently what had become of the brave settlers of Esopus: had they been killed by Indians, or sickness, or a bitterly cold winter; had they been frightened away into the wilderness to die; had their G.o.d simply abandoned them in this remote spot? But why did no human artifacts remain, no sign of human habitation?

So it happened that Esopus vanished; and vanished yet a second time in memory; for this was the heady era in which Dutch adventurers were intrigued by the prospect of "prodigious" and "fathomless" copper mines in the more southerly part of New Netherlands; and Esopus was soon forgotten, a mere notation, a curiosity in the historical records of the time.

ROBIN, THE MILLER'S youngest son, was treated cruelly by his father, and mocked by his three older brothers, and, as his mother had died, and there was no one to love him for his quiet ways, he said to himself, I will leave home and live alone in the marsh. And off he went afoot to the edge of the marsh, and for an hour or more pondered how to proceed; for many a luckless wanderer had died in this place, lured by the beauty of the smooth waters, and the swamp flowers, and the great trees, and the s.h.i.+mmering birds and b.u.t.terflies that dwelled there. Until finally a snowy white bird approached, of the size of a swan, yet possessed of long legs and a long sharp beak, and the bird asked of him where he meant to go, and Robin told him, and the bird flew off to lead him to firm ground, by which he could hurry across, into the depths of the marsh; and he was cunning enough to disguise his path behind him, so that no one could follow to bring him back home.

For three days and three nights he wandered in the marsh, seeing many wondrous sights, and, on the fourth day, he saw an old woman walking in the mist, with white hair, and white skin, and white lace on her head; and carrying in her hand a tall white candle. To Robin the old woman was young and beautiful, so he followed without hesitation when she led him to her home in the marsh, to give him food and shelter. The old woman said, Am I to be your bride, dear Robin? and Robin answered at once, Am I to be your bridegroom? for he had fallen in love, and took no note of her strange hooded eyes, and long curving fingernails, and fine-wrinkled skin like the striations on ice; nor did he see that her dwelling place at the heart of the marsh was dank and cold, for to him it was warm, with a glowing fire, and polished floorboards, and smelled of rich heated broth. So it was, Robin the miller's son became the old woman's husband, and wanted never to leave her side.

One day it happened that his brothers sought him out, for his father was old and ailing, and wanted his youngest son by his side. Like Robin they were perplexed as to how to enter the marsh, for they knew of the many wanderers who had died there; until the great white bird flew to them, and asked of them whom they sought, and did they mean harm, and the brothers said only that they sought their dear brother Robin, and meant no harm. So the bird spread his wide wings and led them to the place where Robin had crossed over, and which he had so cunningly disguised. And like Robin they wandered for three days and three nights, and on the fourth day they came upon the old woman's dwelling-place at the very heart of the marsh; and saw to their astonishment that their brother was the loving husband of an old woman, known as the White Witch of the Marsh. How is it possible, they asked, that Robin has wed her, and that he sleeps by the fireside oblivious of her evil?

As there was no way to break the enchantment save to kill the witch, Robin's brothers rushed into the house, and fell upon her at once, with no warning; striking her to the heart with their sharp knives, and killing her; and rousing poor Robin from his slumber. He struggled with them as if they were enemies, crying, Why have you killed my young bride?-for there is no one so beautiful in all the land. His brothers overcame him, and threw him down; and explained that the White Witch of the Marsh was not young and beautiful as he believed, but an old wicked woman. In scorn they showed him her corpse that he might see her white hair, and her white wrinkled skin, and the talons that grew from her fingers; yet Robin in his enchantment continued to lament the loss of his bride; and begged his brothers that they strike him to the heart as well.

Against his will, and in great sorrow, Robin was brought out of the marsh by his brothers, and restored at last to his father, who was lying on his deathbed. Seeing how he had wronged his youngest son, the miller gave him his blessing, and instructed him that the mill was henceforth to be his, and his brothers merely his a.s.sistants; and that there was a young maiden who lived close by, whom he should marry within a year. These matters Robin complied with, as his soul was shrouded in mourning, and he cared not what the remainder of his life must be.

Though Robin's bride was fair, she never conceived a child; and Robin the miller was known through the Valley for the iciness of his touch, and the frost-glitter of his skin, and the fact that, despite the modest riches he acc.u.mulated, he had no care for worldly matters, nor any wishes, it seemed, of his own.

ONCE, LONG AGO, in Old Muirkirk, in the last years of English rule, the Crown Governor Sir Charles Harwood had a beloved daughter he named Mina, who was dearer to him than anyone else on earth. So comely, and graceful, and gay was Mina Harwood, very few persons held it against her that she was the Governor's daughter, and inclined at times to pride; or that, as a result of her playfulness, one could not always judge whether she spoke in earnest or in jest.

If Sir Charles or his wife approached Mina with the kindly intention of wiping away her tears, she surprised them with a bright smile, and the admonition that they took too seriously what was but a whim; if they, or Mina's fiance, or one or another of her cousins, dared to smile at her outbursts, she charged them with cruelty, and not caring to know what was in her heart. Even as a child Mina threatened those who loved her with running away, as she called it, to her true home, but no one understood what she meant by these strange words; nor could Mina herself explain. Where was her true home, if not in Muirkirk?

One midsummer day when Mina was eighteen years old, she and her fiance and a small party of friends went picnicking on the riverbank, in the vicinity of the great Muirkirk marsh; and somehow it came about that Mina wandered off, being nettled, it was thought, by an inadvertent slight on the part of her fiance . . . and disappeared for hours. Her friends called out her name, and searched for her, to no avail; not knowing if the headstrong young girl had lost herself in the marsh, or whether in a pique of childish temper she was simply hiding in order to frighten them.

Finally Mina returned, appearing suddenly out of nowhere, flush-faced and smiling, saying in a chiding voice, "Why are you looking at me so strangely?-don't you know your Mina?" If she had truly been hurt by a stray word or gesture of her fiance's, she now forgave the distraught young man (who indeed adored her); her arms were filled with things for her friends-violets, swamp lilies, purple lobelia, a strange pulpy fruit (of the size of a large apple, but a dark orangish-purple in hue, and disagreeably soft to the touch), which she pressed gaily upon them. For the remainder of the afternoon, and, indeed, for days afterward, Mina prattled with delight of the "secret wonders" of the great marsh. How unjust it seemed to her, that the swampland was feared and loathed, when it was a place of such exquisite beauty . . . .From childhood on Mina had heard ugly things whispered of the Muirkirk swamp: that it bred pestilence; that it was a place where unwed mothers might dispose of their infants; that, in former times, it had been the ceremonial ground for unspeakable tortures and executions practiced by the Mohawk Indians. But all she had glimpsed were wonders, like the flowers and fruit she had brought back, and the tall straight leafy trees she had seen (so very tall, Mina claimed, their tops were obscured in cloud), and the black and gold b.u.t.terflies large as a man's fist (in whose delicate wings glinted "eyes" of a sort), and the nameless birds whose songs were infinitely sweeter than any she had ever heard (a bird the size of a sparrow, but beautifully marked in crimson, gold, and blue, had perched on her forefinger, Mina claimed, and had showed no fear of her), and many another remarkable sight . . . .She had been able to walk on the surface of the plankton-encrusted water, she said, for a brief distance, a most uncanny sensation indeed, as if for her, and for her, Mina Harwood alone, the laws of Nature had been overturned.

(Of the persons who had eaten the dark pulpy fruit, including Sir Charles and his wife, all reported disagreeable symptoms, vomiting, malaise, loss of appet.i.te, which Mina dismissed with a wave of her hand, insisting that the fruit was a secret "love fruit" whose juice would have a beneficial effect upon them, in time.) Weeks pa.s.sed. It was observed that Sir Charles's daughter wasn't wholly herself: for she either shrank from the touch of those she loved, or pressed herself too anxiously upon them; her manner was often arch and strained, and feverish; too relentlessly merry. She quarreled with her fiance over trifles, and declared tearfully that she would never marry him, or any man. Who was there, she asked boldly, in this world, fit to be her bridegroom? Though Mina was no less beautiful than ever, her beauty was of a wild, unsettling sort: her long dark hair was snarled and matted and smelled of brackish water; her skin was damp, clammy, very pale, like the skin of a certain species of swamp mushroom; her eyes had faded to a silvery-pale l.u.s.tre in which the pupils were tiny pinp.r.i.c.ks; even her fingers were white and puckered, as if resting too long in water . . . .

Is this my daughter? or a changeling? Mina's mother thought one day, as the girl spoke in her bright, gay, oblivious manner, for wasn't there something in the cast of her eye? the quirk of an eyebrow? a momentary frown that caused her entire smooth face to be encased in ghost-wrinkles?-as if an elderly female face were beneath, cunningly hidden. Yet in the next instant, Mina laughed, and became herself again. "Why do you look so grave, Mother?" She took up Mrs. Harwood's warm hands in her own cool ones, and squeezed them reproachfully. "I am here, after all."

More disturbingly, Mina began to behave coquettishly with nearly every man she encountered, including the minister, the elderly bishop, the chief justice and the lieutenant governor, and most disagreeable of all, Sir Charles himself!-as if an animal wildness were stoked in her by the mere presence of a man. At first this behavior was supposed harmless enough, if disconcerting; then it began to be whispered of the girl that she sought out even servants, and cajoled them into meeting with her at night; that she'd gone so far as to "give herself" to several young men in her social circle-yet not, out of sheer wantonness, to her fiance, whose very touch Mina now claimed to abhor. By one or another mannerism she was perpetually drawing attention to her physical being, and didn't hesitate, even in public, to yawn with her pretty mouth open, revealing a shocking moist redness like the interior of a snake's mouth; nor did she hesitate, in the most innocent of conversations, to give to ordinary words a lewd color by an insinuation of her voice or a suggestive movement of her body. Then again, only a while later the Mina of old would reappear, sweet, vivacious, playful in a childlike way, and perplexed that her family should regard her with such unease . . . as if this Mina didn't comprehend what the "other" Mina was about, or even that she existed. Or what disturbance she was wreaking not only in the Harwood household but through the small community.

"Why are you all looking at me so strangely?" Mina frequently asked, with a baffled, hurt smile. "Don't you know your own Mina?"

At last, in early winter, it was discovered that Mina was with child.

In fact, several months with child. So cleverly had the young woman kept her secret from even her mother.

This revelation rocked the household, and threw all the Harwoods into grief; except the guilty Mina herself, who owned the fact with an astonis.h.i.+ng arrogance, as if it were no more than a child's prank at which she'd been caught. "Why, you are all very silly," she told her family, who stared at her appalled, "to suppose that Nature can be guided according to your narrow wishes." And she laughed, showing the moist red interior of her mouth.

From time to time, over the weeks, Mina did seem to repent, shutting herself away in her room; then, haughtily wiping away her tears, she insisted upon coming downstairs as if nothing were wrong; or, rather, as if the Harwoods were at fault with their att.i.tude of despair and anger over her. Of course, Mina was questioned repeatedly about the child's father, and always claimed with a cool smile that the partner of her "sweet sin" was-why, someone very close; well known to the Harwoods; perhaps even a member "of austere reputation" of the Harwood household.

Quickly it was whispered through the Colony that Sir Charles's beautiful daughter Mina was with child, and unrepentant; that the father was rumored to be a man of her own social set (yet not, perversely, her fiance-on that score, everyone was agreed); unless it was a servant of the Harwoods (the lowest caste of whom were indentured Irishmen known for their promiscuous ways); even a Negro slave, or an Indian; or (it began to be whispered) an emissary of the very Devil. What was most remarkable was that Mina appeared to be drawing strength from the heartbreak and disorder she provoked on all sides; even as her father languished in ill health, the despoiled young woman thrived. Her cheeks were full and flushed, her silvery eyes unnaturally bright. Where the delicate Mina of old had had to be coaxed into eating properly, this Mina now devoured everything placed before her with appet.i.te; playfully ate off others' plates; laughingly commented that it seemed, overnight, her "physical being" had become a fathomless pit which it fell to her to fill.

Stubbornly, Mina refused to name the father of her child. No matter if Sir Charles angrily locked her away, or allowed her a measure of freedom as a kind of bribe; no matter if Sir Charles denounced her, or pleaded with her, or prayed for her, or refused to speak of her. As her pregnancy progressed, and her belly grew more and more swollen, Mina pouted that so much was made of it, and that she was being persecuted. "Why, when it's only Nature?-when 'Mina,' like any of you, is only Nature?" At times, strangely, she seemed to awaken to the enormity of her sin . . . struck dumb with shock and grief when she hid herself away to pray on her knees, begging G.o.d for help. In one of these queer repentant states Mina told her mother that she should be banished at once-driven into the wilderness-wrists and ankles bound and her sinful body thrown into the swamp; yet, within an hour, the other Mina returned with greater vehemence, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up her hardened face in scorn, that fools should have taken her "silly remarks" seriously.

Mina began to hint that, when her baby was born, she would hand it over to the father, for the secret would be immediately revealed. "Everyone will see, at once, seeing it." And again she laughed, her cruel cutting laugh.

Yet the outcome of the mystery was to be, tauntingly, no outcome, no resolution; for on the eve of giving birth (as her physician calculated) Mina slipped away from the Governor's mansion high above the river, and fled alone, or with an accomplice, never to be seen again in all of the Chautauqua Valley.

FOR A LONG moment the children were silent, rapt with listening. Millie, Darian, and six-year-old Esther. Then, in a sudden temper, as if old Katrina had willfully deceived them, Millie cried, Why Katrina, that's no proper story, I hate that story! (For though Millie was now seventeen, almost grown, and had been told the tale of the Crown Governor's daughter a hundred times since she'd been a baby, her excitable nature was such that she never failed to antic.i.p.ate an ending, a real ending. The ending that must have been.) But Katrina, offended, rose with dignity from her chair beside the hearth, and wrapped her warm-knit shawl about her thin shoulders, and said, in her typically enigmatic way, leaving Millie, Darian and little Esther to puzzle over her words among themselves, It is hardly your privilege to hate any such story, miss-as if you were not a Licht, and that fated girl's blood your own.

"IN ADAM'S FALL . . . "

In the village of Muirkirk few indisputable facts were known of Abraham Licht and his mysterious family (if "family" they were, indeed); but, beginning with that autumn day in 1891 when Abraham Licht first appeared, on horseback, to make his unexpected bid at the auction of the Church of the Nazarene, so many theories were aired, debated and sifted through and promoted as truth, hardly an inhabitant of the region was without an opinion.

(Some even argued that the das.h.i.+ng Mr. Licht reappeared in Muirkirk that day. That he was in fact a native of the countryside, born there, returning home after years of absence.) So many tales told of Abraham Licht: so many fancies spun of his women, his children, his "profession"-!

For instance: He had a wife named Arabella, mother of his two eldest sons (discounting his dark-skinned son Elisha, whose mother was unknown); he had a wife named Myra, or Morna, whom no one in Muirkirk ever spoke with except Dr. Deerfield, who delivered her of an infant girl in the summer of 1892; he had a wife named Sophie, delicate, blond, withdrawn, the mother of the youngest son Darian and of little Esther, whom Dr. Deerfield delivered in March 1903. (And what of these fated women? Arabella disappeared from Muirkirk and was never seen again, abandoning her sons to their father; Myra, or Morna, disappeared from Muirkirk and was never seen again, abandoning her little girl to her father; poor Sophie died of childbed fever within two weeks of her baby girl's birth and was buried by a distraught Abraham Licht in the old churchyard behind the rectory in which the family lived.) Of course, the most speculation centered upon dark-skinned Elisha. Who was the boy's mother?-was Abraham Licht truly his father? For here was a Negro boy who behaved as if he was "white"-who behaved, indeed, as if he were of royal blood, arrogant and "uppity" like no other Negro the inhabitants of Muirkirk had ever glimpsed. Mr. Carr, the banker with whom Licht dealt, claimed that Licht had once indicated that Elisha was a "valet" of his whom he would "trust with his life"-and with sums of cash. Reverend Woodc.o.c.k, the Methodist minister who tutored Darian and Esther, and taught Darian to play the foot-pedal organ, was convinced that Elisha was a foundling, an orphan, brought home by Abraham Licht as an act of Christian charity; for Darian claimed that "my brother Elisha" was born in a storm and a flood "on a great river thousands of miles away." If the dark-skinned boy grew to resemble Abraham Licht by adolescence, it was less a matter of physical appearance (for Elisha had distinct Negroid features: a smooth mahogany-dark skin, very dark thick-lashed eyes, wide nostrils, an upper lip thick and broad as the lower) than of the acquired: as Abraham Licht was accustomed to walking briskly in all weather, with a military bearing, head high, so was young Elisha; as Abraham Licht smiled happily, and brightened, whenever he caught sight of another person, like an actor striding out on stage to confront his audience, so too did young Elisha; as Abraham Licht was always impeccably groomed and stylishly dressed, exuding an aura of virile self-a.s.surance, so with young Elisha.

Despite the fact that the boy was after all black; which is to say, not-white.

Fortunately, Elisha Licht was rarely glimpsed in Muirkirk, now that he'd grown up. For years it was believed the youth was "away at college" somewhere in Ma.s.sachusetts. When he returned, it was for brief periods, sometimes no more than a week, so that his c.o.c.ky airs couldn't cause much harm; and if he was entrusted with business errands in the village, making a deposit at the First Bank of the Chautauqua, for instance, or paying Reverend Woodc.o.c.k his fee for the children's lessons, or spending within an hour $500 at the saddlery in a purchase "for Mr. Licht"-the handsome youth was so charming, so well-spoken and congenial, even the most rabid Negro-haters felt compelled to comment, in his wake, "Elisha Licht is different."

Except: there was one occasion, about eighteen months before the time of this narrative, when Elisha and his white brothers Thurston and Harwood were observed at the Sign of the Ram, a popular tavern on the Innisfail Pike, drinking ale together at the bar, talking earnestly, laughing loudly, seeming oblivious of the attention they drew; and in response to a remark made to him by a fellow drinker, apparently in reference to his racial ancestry or the color of his skin, Elisha flashed his dazzling Licht-smile and said, "True, my skin is black; and my soul-well, in fact, my soul is black as well."

SINCE THE GENTLEMAN who called himself Abraham Licht had bought the abandoned property belonging to the Church of the Nazarene in 1891, there were periods of time when he not only indicated he'd retired permanently to the countryside ("So blessed an atmosphere," he told his neighbors, "-set beside the polluted city") but gave every sign, by his zeal in becoming acquainted with Muirkirk's most influential citizens, that he planned a local career of some sort, probably in politics. So congenial was Abraham Licht, so animated and well-spoken, both Republicans and Democrats (a minority in the Chautauquas) believed he would surely go far, if he wished. But then, with no warning, Licht would break his connections by vanis.h.i.+ng from Muirkirk for months at a stretch. Some of his family he left behind, and others he took with him; but never in any pattern that his neighbors could discern. And when he returned, he often made no effort to reestablish his old connections, as if he'd forgotten them.

What was more curious, when Licht reappeared he often looked subtly changed: having gained or lost weight; having grown a beard, or having shaved one off; now older, or more youthful; now in robust good health, or slightly sickly; and so forth. Sometimes Licht dressed in the very height of fas.h.i.+on, and sometimes with the austere plainness of a well-to-do Quaker businessman. Sometimes he drove a handsome new motorcar, sometimes an old Selden buggy, sometimes he rode on horseback, exposed to the elements like a figure out of a Wild West ill.u.s.trated tale. Always, he was triumphantly himself and could never be mistaken, as observers said, part admiringly and part critically, for anyone else.

How many children has Abraham Licht?-was a question frequently posed in Muirkirk, in the bemused tone of a riddle. And what was the man's relations.h.i.+p with the old woman Katrina who had long managed his household?

Over the years, so many were the comings and goings in the Licht household, it was claimed that Abraham had ten or eleven children. Then again, it seemed he might have as few as four. By the summer of '09, a consensus was reached that there were six young people in his household, no more and no less. These were Thurston, the eldest (blond and fair-skinned as a Viking, grown taller than his father); Harwood, who was two or three years younger than Thurston (stocky, muscular, with hair the color of ditch water, of middling height); the enigmatic Elisha (believed to be about twenty years old); Millicent, or Millie, seventeen years old (as fair as Thurston, with a delicate, porcelain beauty and striking bluish-gray eyes); and the younger children, who never left Muirkirk-Darian, who was nine, and gifted musically; and Esther, who was six.

And what of Katrina? It was she who shopped in Muirkirk, and she whom tradesmen and other women knew. A formidable presence, in her mid-sixties, fierce-eyed and dignified, a woman who spoke with a distinct German accent and who wore her pewter-colored hair in braids like a helmet. "Yesss thank you"-"Nooo thank you"-"That is enough thank you": so Katrina spoke, when obliged to speak, rarely smiling at anyone outside the family, even shopkeepers with whom she'd dealt for years. Generally it was believed that Katrina was Abraham Licht's housekeeper (though entrusted by him with much autonomy in his absence) but there were those who believed, or out of mischief claimed to believe, that Katrina was Abraham Licht's own mother.

AND WHAT WAS Abraham Licht's business, or profession? How did he support himself and his family, seemingly so well?

It had long been a matter of curiosity that a gentleman of Abraham Licht's self-evident talents and background should wish to bury himself away in a remote corner of the Chautauqua Valley, at the edge of a marsh; and to make a home for himself and his attractive children in an abandoned stone church of all places. (This had been the church of the evangelical Nazarenes whose faith had died out in Muirkirk decades ago. The Church of the Nazarene, however, whose original foundation dated back to 1851, was no ordinary clapboard country church but was built of irregularly matched fieldstone, stucco and untreated timber; it had a steep roof at the peak of which was a crude, dignified stone cross; its windows were tall and narrow; its rectory consisted of four small rooms; to the rear was a churchyard of weatherworn gravestones and markers, long allowed to grow wild. The main interior of the church was plain, spartan, of "Protestant chill" as Abraham Licht described it: twelve oak pews, a pulpit of modest proportions, a foot-pedal organ, a carved hickory cross that was imposing though but three feet in height. This interior was more spectral and aqueous than holy, as a result of the atmosphere, laden with moisture from the swamp close by.) Over the years Abraham Licht had greatly improved the property, expanding the building at the rear, creating sizable living quarters adjoining the rectory, adding a stable, and the like. But why sink cash into such a property, why not buy a new house?-invest in more valuable land, in a more prestigious part of the Valley? Such questions, common in Muirkirk, were never addressed to Licht himself.

Because of this eccentricity it was vaguely believed that Abraham Licht must be a defrocked minister, possibly of an evangelical sect. For there were occasions when the public tone of his personality suddenly changed; even his voice, so rich, deep and self-a.s.sured, grew somber. He might allude to pessimistic pa.s.sages of what he called the Hebrew Bible ("And what is that, Mr. Licht? Do you mean the 'Old Testament'?" he was asked in genuine bafflement), particularly the teachings of the prophet Ecclesiastes; he murmured such Latin expressions (vae victis, tempus fugit, caveat emptor, fiat just.i.tia, ruat caelum) that seemed to signify an immense sorrow tinged with anger. Speaking with Reverend Woodc.o.c.k in the Methodist minister's office, Abraham Licht was likely to make reference to one or another of the Church Fathers, American Puritan preachers like Cotton and Increase Mather, and to quote, in a tone of seeming sincerity: "In Adam's fall

we sinneth all."

Reverend Woodc.o.c.k would then counter by saying that such a pessimistic vision had been modified by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, surely; the New Testament had modified, if not entirely erased, the dour claims of the Old; just as the New World of North America had surged far in advance of the Old World of Europe. "Our Savior entered history to alter it," the soft-spoken yet impa.s.sioned Woodc.o.c.k insisted, "and bring us the 'good news' of salvation." Abraham Licht would murmur, staring at the older man's face as if he hoped there to see the promise of his own redemption, "Ah, did He! Is that it!"

More worldly Muirkirk citizens were scornful of the mere idea that Abraham Licht, one of their own kind, might have once been a minister! Instead, Licht had obviously been a man of the world, possibly an actor; trained in the cla.s.sics, and most of all Shakespeare; possibly he was an actor at the present time who for reasons of privacy hid away periodically in the country incognito. For on the dreariest midwinter day when the sky above the Chautauqua Valley glowered a soulless white like dirty snow, and all of Earth seemed flat and stale, didn't Licht carry himself with the arrogant self-confidence of a Hamlet, an Oth.e.l.lo, a Lear?-wasn't his broad, handsome face flushed with good health as if illuminated by footlights? Didn't he seem, pausing after certain of his remarks, to be awaiting applause?

And there was mysterious Elisha (valet, adoptive son, b.a.s.t.a.r.d son!) with the bearing and personality of an actor too, like P. T. Barnum's famous Master Diamond, who'd been the most celebrated Negro performer of his day. And there was pretty, volatile Millicent with the airs and fetching, if unpredictable, ways of a Broadway ingenue. The wife of the owner of the Muirkirk Journal, who loved opera and traveled by train to New York City expressly to attend openings at the Met, claimed that Abraham Licht had "obviously been trained in opera": for it happened that one fine June day when she was working in her rose garden in Muirkirk, imagining herself alone and singing a few bars of Tannhuser's Venus in her bower, she was answered by a rich baritone voice out of the very air!-the rogue Tannhuser himself stealing up behind her with hands clasped in mock gallantry, eyes bright with pleasure, in the guise of Abraham Licht.

And it didn't go unremarked how musically gifted the child Darian was. At the age of four, this amazing little boy with his father's dark, brightly alert eyes was already composing melodies in his head, and he'd learned to play both the piano and the organ, so far as his small hands allowed him, by the age of eight. "A prodigy"-as Reverend Woodc.o.c.k called him.

But other observers scoffed at the notion that Abraham Licht had ever been a "mere actor . . . entertainer." A certain sobriety in his manner, his forceful personality and his habit of seemingly firsthand war reminiscences (one of his favorite subjects was the recent War with Spain and the "filthy little war" with the heathen Filipinos) argued that he was obviously an ex-military man, of officer status. Yet if questioned closely, Licht grew evasive and changed the subject; which led a contingent of Muirkirk veterans, the oldest of whom had fought for the Union in the War Between the States, to suspect the man of having been dishonorably discharged from the Army, or a deserter. ("For what ex-military man will deny his past except if there is something in it to shame him?"-so their reasoning went.) Dr. Deerfield, the only Muirkirk resident to have ever set foot in the mysterious Licht household, disagreed with all these theories, insisting that Abraham was some sort of collector or dealer of antiques of all kinds: furniture, arts and crafts, clothing, costumes, aged books and maps. Though Deerfield had seen little of the Licht residence apart from the room in which Abraham's wife Sophie was bedridden, he'd had a distinct impression of a household crammed with odd, miscellaneous items-"Some of them fairly ugly, in my opinion. But then, what do I, a country doctor, know about 'antiques' and 'objects d'art'?"

But there was the opinion of Edgar Carr, president of Muirkirk's First Bank of Chautauqua, who, claiming to know firsthand of Abraham Licht's "wildly fluctuating" finances, believed that the man was either a professional gambler (his specialty Thoroughbred racing) or one of the notorious new breed of Wall Street speculators, capable of making, and losing, and again recouping, hundreds of thousands of dollars in a day's trading, by abstruse manipulations Carr himself could not fathom. Such gentlemen, Carr said, were spiritually descended from the "dark geniuses" of Jay Gould, Lord Gordon-Gordon and their brethren-individuals we can't help but admire yet would never wish to do business with.

"Depend upon it," Carr would say, with a wink, "-Abraham Licht is first and foremost an American capitalist, whatever his self-definition, his product or his services! He wors.h.i.+ps one thing, and one thing only: money."

THE PILGRIM.

The tragic history of the Church of the Nazarene, Risen (for such was the sect's full name), had much to do, all of Muirkirk agreed, with the unwholesomeness of its setting: for, unwisely tempted by the cheapness of land bordering the Muirkirk swamp, the sect's young minister decided to erect his church building on a dirt road a quarter mile off the Innisfail Pike, scarcely more than a rutted cattle trail at the time; and so very near the marsh, residents of the area joked that the church was in it.

The life span of the church was approximately nine years, counting the two years it took to complete the building, during which time the minister and his family, and any number of his followers, were laid low by so many flus, fevers, bone-aches, malaises, and the like, that it seemed to some that G.o.d Himself was putting their faith to the test (as, indeed, He had put Job's, to Job's great glory); yet to others, that Satan dwelt near, and resented any incursion upon His domain. For, in late spring, and continuing well through October, a sickly sort of atmosphere pervaded the church buildings, a tropical, damp, lugubrious air that seemed very nearly visible, and tactile, a wild commingling of odors, rich, rank-smelling pollen, and animal decay, and brackish water, and gases of a feculent nature, all wafted sluggishly about, and weighed down, it seemed, by an unnatural heat that had the power to attach itself to human flesh.

"But G.o.d has set us down in the wilderness, to conquer, and to thrive"-so the impa.s.sioned young minister preached, in the very face of any number of afflictions.

Despite his faith, however, and that of his followers, G.o.d showed, it seemed, very little mercy for the Church of the Nazarene, Risen: for the building was beset by dry rot, and mildew, and beetles, and termites, and slugs, and leakage, and that sickly oppressive malaise of the air; wind-funnels tore at its roof, and floods destroyed its floors; poisonous snakes invaded the rectory; the well was contaminated by seepage from the cemetery; the congregation dwindled from sixty members, to forty-five, to thirty, to ten . . . .At last, in the summer of '90, the minister himself succ.u.mbed to a virulent strain of influenza, and died, it was said, an aged man though not yet forty; deranged, and raving, and cursing G.o.d. For had not G.o.d betrayed His Covenant, in this accursed corner of the world?

THE CHURCH OF the Nazarene, Risen, was therefore declared in bankruptcy; and given over to its numerous creditors, land, buildings, and fixtures, to be sold at public auction as quickly as possible.

At which time, on a warm October afternoon, a small crowd of less than thirty men gathered, as much out of curiosity and idleness as interest; for it was thought unlikely that anyone in Muirkirk, knowing the church's history, should wish to make a bid on it. Lichen thickly encrusted the stone, the roof shone emerald-green with patches of mossy rot, puddles of brackish water lay on the floorboards; large white coc.o.o.ns damp with spittle had been spun about the hickory cross, repulsive to see. On all sides the air was aqueous and unmoving, as if concentrated in thought: yet what might such a thought be!-and who, or what, empowered it!

No sooner had the spiritless bidding begun on one or another portable item, a three-legged stool, a water-stained hymnal, a canopied baby carriage, than a das.h.i.+ng young man, a stranger, appeared on horseback, at a gallop; astonis.h.i.+ng the gathering by declaring, in a ringing, breathless voice, that he was making a bid for the entire property-"I offer you eighteen hundred dollars cash."

Which sum was held to be in such excess of the d.a.m.ned property's worth, no one would have cared to challenge it.

And so, by a miracle, within the s.p.a.ce of twenty minutes, the Church of the Nazarene, Risen, buildings, fixtures, land, was sold to the highest bidder: one "Abraham Licht," resident at that time of Vanderpoel.

TRUE TO HIS word, the gentleman paid in cash. One-hundred-dollar bills, that seemed to staring observers far larger in size than any American minted bills they had ever seen, yet were, as a banking official declared, wholly legitimate.

Abraham Licht smilingly described his profession as "land speculator."

What an amiable, attractive young man, broad-shouldered and in excellent physical condition, like a soldier, or an athlete, or an actor; probably not more than thirty-one or -two years old, but with a mature, rea.s.suring manner. Licht stood slightly above six feet in height, yet seemed taller; with thick wiry l.u.s.trous hair, a mahogany-brown threaded with blond or silver; his shrewd, quick-darting, friendly eyes were described by some as brown, by others as black, by others as sky-blue. His cheeks were partly covered by precisely trimmed whiskers and moustache in the style of the late James G. Blaine, the "Plumed Knight" of Congress; what one could see of his jaws suggested strength, steeliness, resolution. His handshake was vigorous, if slightly cool; beneath his social poise, there was an air of excitement, or fevered strain; his fedora was c.o.c.ked back on his head in a way that could be interpreted as casual, or careless; his dark gabardine "city clothes" were of a stylish cut but soiled from perspiration and the dusty effects of travel by horseback. Licht's horse was a deep-chested black gelding with a blade of white between his eyes, a beautiful specimen badly lathered from the run and no longer in the prime of life.

Why had Abraham Licht ridden out ninety miles from Vanderpoel to this unpublicized auction, why his particular interest in Muirkirk, a village at that time of less than two thousand inhabitants?-Licht answered all questions put to him frankly, with a guileless, friendly smile, yet afterward, everyone realized, he managed to answer none; and had only one urgent question to put to them: Was the Church of the Nazarene, Risen, properly deconsecrated?

THE FORBIDDEN.

Who is he, with the almighty eye, the voice of a bugle!-why does he pursue them!

They have clambered to the highest peak of the roof to escape-they are crouched behind the crumbling brick chimney where the starlings nest-now they will step off into s.p.a.ce, now they must spread their wings and fly, fly to the top of the highest tree- 'Allo, 'allo, my little ones-'allo I say!

Who is he, has he only one eye, gla.s.sy and glaring, puckered in suns.h.i.+ne, and the other an empty socket (have the crows picked it out) hidden by a leathery black patch?-tramping after them, a giant, big booted feet, ivory-headed cane rapping rapping rapping, 'allo my little ones, 'allo my sweet little birdies, bewhiskered and solemn, rubbery red lips, clenched white teeth, black riding coat bunched at the shoulders (is he a dwarf grown to the size of a giant, is he a troll dressed in a gentleman's costume), handsome black Western hat sloped low over his forehead, 'allo little birdies, where will ye fly, Old Sir Ebeneezer Snuff has y'r number, Old Sir Ebeneezer Snuff knows both y'r names, what-ho Master Darian, what-ho Mistress Esther, where will ye fly, my sweet little birdies, Old Ebeneezer Snuff sees all in Heaven, and Earth, and the Darksome Regions Beneath, with his one all-mighty eye!

Has he only one eye, and the other picked clean by crows?

Is his voice, slicing the air, meant to hurt?

They have flown to the topmost branch of the oak tree to escape him-they have flown to the topmost branch of the tallest tree in the marsh-and now that ridge of cloud overhead, ribbed and shadowed, like steps, and they are steps, steps leading up-up and up into the sky- But Old Ebeneezer is too quick, Old Ebeneezer scoops them up in his arms, snorting, clacking his teeth, did they think they might escape? did they think they might fly away into the sky? Old Ebeneezer gives them wet smacking whiskery kisses, What-ho, Master Darian, what-ho, Mistress Esther, squirming like eels, wild and frenzied and hot, shrieking with laughter, it isn't good for little Darian's jumpy heart (Katrina has warned), it isn't good for little Esther's delicate nerves (Katrina has warned, has warned), but this is Old Ebeneezer who loves them, Old Ebeneezer who adores them, My sweet ones, my darlings, O my darlings I am home!-and today the honor falls to Esther to peel away, with trembling fingers, the silly scratchy beard, the Distinguished Silver Goatee, and, ah! what a fit of giggling just to see the sudden clean-shaven chin, the familiar chin, big strong snapping jaws and clackety-clackety teeth, Where did you think you might fly, sweethearts, where were you headed, my darlings?-the hot tender kisses, the heated love, O my darlings, I am home!-the hat whipped from his head to sail, to sail where it would-the thick-waved hair scented with powder, whitish-silver dust (to make them sneeze)-and now it is Darian's privilege to peek beneath the eye patch, the terrifying black eye patch, to see at last if the socket is empty (but it cannot be empty), if the socket is picked clean (but it cannot be picked clean), and, ah!-what relief, what heartstopping joy, for of course Father's eye is there as always-Father's eye has been there (must have been there) all along-winking out now slyly, brightly, blindingly- The children bucking about on Father's strong shoulders, Father's high, high shoulders-so high!-their heads brus.h.i.+ng against the ceiling, their heads brus.h.i.+ng against the ceiling, their heads brus.h.i.+ng against the sky, My angels, my sweetest sweetest innocents, do you love your poor old Sir Snuff?-the center of all the world, here. So long as Father is home.

(But will you go away again?-Oh, never.

And will you take me with you when you go?-Oh, never.)

And there are presents for all, of course there are presents, that is part of the reason, isn't it, for Father being away so long, so very long this time, March, April, May . . . well into June?

No matter. Father is home now and home is the center of all G.o.d's world now.

For Esther a pretty French doll with blue paperweight eyes, wood and papier-mche body (a doll of high degree, boasts Father, signed by one "Jumeau, Paris 1883"); for Darian a s.h.i.+ny black-and-ivory harmonica which he can play within minutes; for Katrina, doubtful Katrina, a new coffee grinder, look here he'll unscrew the old and screw in the new, right here beside the sink, just at the height Katrina requires.

But there is more, of course there is more- For Esther, sweet shy Esther, a pair of white eyelet gloves trimmed with embroidered violets; for Darian a glossy-covered songbook, Gems from Erin, Book II; for Katrina an enormous black silk umbrella with a carved ivory handle, look how it opens with an explosive snap-!

And, again for Darian, a "pocket sundial"; and for Esther a keepsake box (enamel, mother-of-pearl, chips of colored gla.s.s like demented winking eyes); and for Katrina a potpourri jar of wavy gla.s.s-which at last melts Katrina's mask of a face into a smile.

And we all applaud! Squeal, stamp our feet and applaud!