Albert's voice on the phone was husky with dust. He had awakened Henry from a difficult dream.
"You ought to come over here and take a look at this. I think you'll like it."
Henry could only manage, “What?"
Albert's voice held no patience. “Just come on over. Take my word."
And Albert was not given to pranks.
Henry showered to wash the sleep and sweat away, dressed in the same jeans and shirt he had worn the day before, and dropped down the stairs two at a time in his rush, half expecting to see a scowl on Mrs. Prowder's face for making too much noise as he passed her door. Only when he saw the door closed did he realize he was really just half awake.
He prolonged his breakfast at the Paramount Cafe on Charles Street by drinking an extra cup of coffee. He had not slept well, and the bits and pieces of dreams still floated around his head. Before cutting across the Public Garden to catch a D car at the Arlington subway stop, he had to pause briefly to watch a gathering of children, herded by half a dozen young mothers, around the brass statues of the ducklings along the walkway in the Garden. A regular sight on sunny days, but something that always entertained him. The transit in the trolley was made more brief by the scraps of memories stirred up over the last few days.
Behind his father's house in Brookline, some birds had scattered their droppings over the windshield of the van, and he broke the hose loose from the side of the house to wash it down. He arrived at his destination in Dedham, despite the traffic on Route 1, less than two hours after he had rolled out of bed.
Henry liked Precinct One in Dedham. With all the newer building which had crowded around it over the years, and the Norfolk County Courthouse looming at one side, it still managed to keep some feeling of the New England village it had been since before the American Revolution. The house Henry stood in front of, however, was a white Gothic cottage from about 1850. A steep-pitched slate roof projected in four gables in each direction, diminishing the simple white box of the structure beneath. The house itself was made elegant by tall windows which arched at the top, giving it all the appearance of an enlarged dollhouse. What remained of the original property was cramped by post-World War One neo-colonials. Enormous oaks, still holding on to their leaves late into the season, towered over the house to each side and showered the black slate roof with acorns which popped apart and rolled off onto a trampled garden.
Albert scowled down from an opening at the end of the gable above the narrow porch, where a dark green shutter was broken free.
"What took you so long? I've got guys on wages here."
He was not going to be defensive about getting up so early without explanation. “I stopped to eat. I like to chew my food carefully. That's just the way I am."
Albert was not forgiving. “You ought to get up earlier. I've been up since it was still dark. You can't catch any fish if you get up with the damn sun. Now, come on up here."
The house was cool inside. The rooms on the first floor, already nearly empty, echoed with his steps. Two of Albert's men greeted him as they passed, coming from a small kitchen, their arms loaded with trash.
The echo of Albert's unhappy voice wafted from above.
"Where the hell are you! Come up the stairs."
Behind a broad hearth with several openings, obviously once used for cooking in a distant time, Henry found the stairs, narrow and walled at both sides. At the top of the stairs, through open doors, he could see three rooms beneath the gables, all of them empty. The reverse shadows of missing furniture left patches of bright wallpaper and the odd outlining contrast of stains from long use. Albert's voice beckoned him again. Around to the front of the chimney, wood and plaster had been broken away and a man-sized hole made. Henry peeked through. There was Albert's large figure, beside a half-shuttered window opened now to daylight, sitting in a chair too small for him. The whole room, little more than eight feet across and perhaps ten feet long, was greatly cut down in size by the slant of the roof as it filled the area beneath the fourth gable overlooking the front porch. Next to the window at Albert's knee was a desk, neatly arranged with writing paper and envelopes, ready to use.
An electric light with a frosted glass shade hung by a cord from the highest point of the ceiling at the center. Low shelves, no more than four feet high, rose to the slant of the plaster wall which sealed the angle of the roof beams.
Albert's lap was full of papers. He did not rise in the cramped space, but he did smile.
"I wanted you to see this before we packed it up. I've already taken pictures. I ran out of film taking pictures. I've got to get me one of your digital cameras. I can't afford the film anymore."
Henry climbed through the broken opening and stood upright, his head close to the slant of the wall. The shadows cast by the glowing filament within the clear glass of the light bulb were weakened by the sun glare from the window.
"Holy moley."
He used the old expression just to compliment Albert's obvious satisfaction with his discovery and then stooped again automatically to better see the titles of the books, trying to avoid his own shadow against the spines. Most were popular authors like Alice Hegan Rice, Ellen Glasgow, and J. M. Barrie. He counted six Gilbert Parker novels together. John Fox and Kate Douglas Wiggin were mixed randomly with Mrs. Humphrey Ward and George Barr McCutcheon and Robert Chambers. A run of dark blue Henry van Dyke volumes filled half a section. These were the popular novels of another era, just after the turn of the twentieth century, all gathered together in the random order of a small library in use.
There was little order among the titles because none was needed. The books had the appearance of being read once and then popped on the shelf. None were especially valuable that he knew of, because all had been best sellers. What made them dear was the condition—read once and put away. Many had dust jackets, a rare thing to find now on books published before the First World War.
The entire room looked as if it had been left one day a hundred years before and never touched again.
"She was an itty-bitty thing.” Albert said. “I don't think she was more than five feet tall, or else she would have bumped her head at every turn."
Henry knelt, his knees pressing through his jeans to the coarse weave of the Indian rug spread from side to side over the wide yellow pine boards on the floor. On the opposite side of the room the shelves were filled with the limp leather of Roycrofter volumes, many of these laid sideways. Above this was a cigar box missing its lid, and partially filled with never-used postcards, collected from xGreece and Italy, France and Spain. A separate gathering of English scenes rested beside the box.
Henry finally asked, “What was her name?"
Albert answered with a tone he reserved for his elders. “Helen Mawson. Quite a traveler. The grand tour. She saw it all."
Henry nodded. “She loved to read. She loved books."
"And looky here.” Albert handed him a sheaf of papers from his lap. “These were in the desk drawer. Letters from people she visited. Dozens of them. She wrote everybody she met. She must have been a good writer, too. Listen to this."
Albert pulled a pale sheet from the pile in his lap.
"'Oh, my dear, we have missed you since you have gone. Your letters have made us wonder how we might have wasted precious time when we had you here. I read your description of the little town of Rye to Sophie, and she cried. Please write again soon, and let's plan another visit for the coming year if you are free.'” Albert looked up. “That was from 1911. But all the letters are like that. They all praise her own letters to them. I wish we had one of hers to see what the fuss was about."
Henry said, “I'd like to see her picture."
What did women wear in 1911? Were they still wearing corsets then? Beneath their skirts they wore something called a chemise, he had read. He had always wondered what that might have looked like. And they wore drawers, not panties. And her hair would be long, of course.
Albert shook his head. “I haven't seen any pictures."
Henry looked around again. On the slant of the wall near Albert's head was a map of Europe. There the visual politics was greatly simplified by geographic swaths of color: Germany ranged in pink from Baltic Russia to the Rhine, the Austro-Hungarian Empire bulged in green from the Adriatic to the Black Sea, and the yellow of the Ottomans reached from the Persian Gulf to well beyond the Aegean. Henry imagined for an instant the young woman—she would be young, wouldn't she?—turning from the letter she was writing on the desk to check the map.
He said, “What do you think happened to her?"
Albert's face fell to a flat expression of resignation. “She must have died. This room was sealed up. Look behind you—where I broke through. That was a door. It's still locked—and whoever locked it was not content with that. They put lathing over the wood and plastered it. I felt like Carter entering the tomb of King Tut. But I knew it was here. I could tell from outside that there had to be a room here. And I figured, if they were going to tear it all down anyway, I might as well see what was in it.” Albert's eyes scanned the shelves as he spoke.
Henry asked, “Who owns it all?"
"Well, the house belongs to a fellow named Rogers. But he's not even here. He lives in Florida. Herb Stanley, the builder, hired me to clean it out so they can tear it down. Everything I take out is mine. Only, they start ripping the place apart tomorrow, so we have to get this all out of here today. Pronto. Now."
Henry winced at the thought. “Why tear it down?"
Albert shrugged. “To build a bigger one. It's too small."
Henry said, “It's big enough for me ...."
Henry knew Albert was no happier at the thought than he was. Albert's tone hardened again. “Well, if you have three or four hundred thousand dollars handy, you can probably negotiate something."
Henry had little to answer that. “Damn!"
Albert heaved his shoulders again in resignation. “I see it every week. But not with something like this in it. This is a time capsule. I haven't seen anything like this in all the years I've been hauling trash. You see bits and pieces, but never like this. It's a tiny museum."
Henry took a breath. Behind him, by the break in the door, was a broad chair with wide, flat arms. Henry rose from his knees before sitting there to survey the room.
This was the chair she must have used when she read the books. He turned. A slender brass floor lamp with a flowered shade was directed down at him from behind.
Henry said, “What's your plan?"
Albert sighed unhappily.
"Junior's off getting some boxes at the liquor store now. I figured we'd pack it up as best we can and then load it into your van—it's dry in there, right? No rust holes in the roof yet—and then we can sort it out later. The furniture's not much. The shelves are homemade. Just this little desk and that Morris chair you're sitting in."
Henry's hands gripped the flat oak of the arms. “Morris chair? It has a name?"
Albert nodded. “After William Morris. It's a recliner. I've seen them before. You could drop the back down and take a nap, if you had the space to do it. We can get this room cleared by lunchtime if we get snappy about it, and then you can see if you can sell some of these books. I'll get rid of the furniture on my friend Bernie."
Henry ran his hands over the wood, caressing it, and nestled himself further in the chair.
"I always wanted a chair like this ... to read in."
Albert said, “Better to nap in."
Henry squinted at Albert. “I'd like the chair. I'll buy the chair for whatever Bernie will pay."
Albert waved him off. “You've got no room for it where you live."
Henry shook his head and turned. “I'll figure something out—and I want this little lamp, too."
Albert sighed with resignation and then yelled for his helpers. They were both on the front porch smoking, and their voices mingled with the fresh air from the window. Henry was guessing that Albert had his own thoughts about the chair. But Alice did not like him bringing things home. She had put an end to that many years ago.
When Junior returned with the boxes in his father's big truck, Henry began the packing with Albert while the others finished with the downstairs. As they worked, Henry learned that the house had been occupied until recently by an elderly couple who had bought it in the 1940s. Prior to that, Albert knew nothing.
Henry carefully released the map from the plaster and folded it with the letters. The dry inkwell, the pens and the pencils, the hardened gum eraser, and even the small blotter with the name of an English maker of jellies on the back were put into a box together with an assortment of clips, bookends, and a brass letter opener emblazoned with the name of a Boston stationery company now long gone. As Henry packed the books, he resisted the urge to look into the titles he had never seen before. The Roycrofter books were packed separately so that the dried and powdering leather would not mark anything else.
More of the door was broken away to pass the desk and the chair through. Only when the chair was lifted from its dark corner did they see the rosewood box, its lid unclasped over the bulging of its contents. As hands grabbed the chair through the opening, Henry knelt and lifted the box, wary of opening the lid further and spoiling his instant hope for what it contained.
Albert stopped his packing and grunted with impatience.
"Go ahead."
Henry raised the lid slowly, enjoying the small drama. The cream yellow of the letter paper appeared new. The blue ink of the handwriting had not faded or darkened.
Albert said, “Attagirl."
Henry asked, “Why here?” His hand waving at the floor.
They both stared at the box as if its contents were inexplicable. Henry used a finger to tip the upper edges of the pages without removing them. A moment passed, with only the sound of the fellows downstairs moving over the old floors.
Henry thought out loud. “Her father ... ‘Dear Papa,’ they all say. He might have placed them there. He might have sat in the chair to read them as they arrived."
Albert muttered, his thoughts on that distant past, “He might have put them there before he sealed the room."
Henry placed the box securely under his arm, pressing the lid shut and closing the clasp. The rug was rolled, baring the wide pine boards and revealing a brighter yellow beneath.
Henry asked, “What about the wood? Can't they save the wood?"
Albert shook his head. “That's up to the contractor. They might save some. My job is the trash."
By noon, the room was as empty as the others. Henry's van was loaded, and he drove back to Brookline in slow traffic with his mind happily lost in the Edwardian Age of Robert Chambers, Ellen Glasgow, and Edith Wharton.
Many years before, still in high school, Henry had read a book by Jack Finney called Time and Again. His memory of the book came back strongly as he drove. That book was an account of a time traveler, a passage from the present to the past—from the 1970s to the late-nineteenth century in New York—but the discovery of the little room beneath the closed gable in Dedham was as near to traveling through time as Henry ever expected to experience. He was happy for the escape. He was happy for the chance just then to be gone from this time he was living in.
When finally he sat alone in the van, behind his father's house with the motor off, he opened the box, unable to wait any longer. The first letter on top, still creased from having been folded square, was dated April 5, 1915. The heavy commercial black lettering which topped the sheet with the name of the Biltmore Hotel in New York City only served to exaggerate the delicate beauty and curve of Helen Mawson's pen line in blue ink.
Dear Papa,
You are still angry. I know. I can see your face as you read this. But it was Mama's wish. The money was for me to spend in just this way. When you are finished scowling, I know you will be happy that I have arrived safely. I am staying at the Biltmore because it is so close to the station.
Please don't worry about the price. They have smaller rooms for butlers and maids, and I have talked my way into one of those. I will be careful with my funds.
There are several shows I want to see before I leave. The Ziegfeld Follies are the biggest sensation just now. And there is a Sherlock Holmes play which I will see for you and tell you all about. The city is just too marvelous for me to find enough words. Imagine, a hundred times over, our puny Washington Street. They build what look like the honeycombs of gothic bees wedged between columns of marble and all pulled like taffy into the sky. And merchant signs sprout everywhere, like a million gaudy flags of every color and size. Conjure a whole city of businesses turned on end so that a citizen never need travel beyond the clink and whir of the elevator. Then multiply it countless times. Boston is so pitiful by comparison. Why, certainly the automobile cars you hate so much will be obsolete in no time. We will all be taking the elevator!
I went directly to the Woolworth Building, and it is even more incredible than I imagined, not only scraping the sky but piercing the gloom of evening like an ancient sword. The clouds move from its path as it soars, and the earth tilted beneath my feet as I stared in wonder. See the postcard I have enclosed.
You must come, someday, and see this place. You cannot think that you would make Mother happy by staying home. Her spirit is in me. I must fly.
Dearest love,
Helen