Lilac Spring. Ruth Axtell Morren
bright cloth billowed in the air as they held it.
Silas went to retrieve some stones with which to anchor it. When he returned, Cherish had placed the food in an inviting display on the cloth, and he realized how hungry he was.
“Here.” She handed him a thick sandwich. “Bread baked this morning. My first culinary endeavor since I’ve been back, I shall have you know.”
The sandwich looked inviting, spread thick with butter and stuffed with slices of ham and cheese. She took out a mason jar and removed the lid. “Sweet tea. I didn’t bring any glasses, so we shall have to share this between us.” She set it down against the basket.
“Everything looks delicious,” he said, wanting to make her feel good about her efforts in the kitchen with her aunt.
When she had served herself, she sat across from him and smiled. “This is my private homecoming.” She looked out across the bay. “I thank God for the privilege of seeing a bit of this great, vast world, but I’m even more thankful to be back home to my small corner of it.” She took a deep breath, her eyes half-closed, her chest rising and falling, drawing Silas’s gaze once more to the flowers tucked there.
“This is one of those ‘moments of azure hue’ Thoreau wrote about, don’t you think? How I missed this smell—sea, sun, a hint of sweetgrass and an indefinable something else.” She opened her eyes and focused on him once again. “Perhaps its essence is the company I longed for, the faces I grew up with.”
Once again he had the sensation she was referring specifically to him. Before he could think about it further, she bowed her head and gave thanks for the food. She peeped up at him again as she said “amen.”
“I hope you like it. My arms are still sore from kneading dough!”
He found it hard to think beyond the fact of Cherish’s womanhood and how it was affecting him.
He bit into the bread—soft and wholesome tasting, the ham smoky and salty, the homemade cheese sharp, the mustard gracing it all adding just the right amount of tangy spice.
“Well, you haven’t spit it out or choked on it, so I suppose it will pass.”
“It’s very good,” he hastened to say.
They ate in silence some moments. When she took the jar of cold tea and put her head back to drink from it, Silas couldn’t help noticing her neck, long and graceful as she took deep drafts from the jar.
Then she lowered her head and handed it to him. He reached out his arm and took it slowly. How many times had they done similar things years back? He held the cold glass jar and looked at it, hesitating, the act suddenly taking on intimate proportions. He tilted his head back and sipped from the same liquid she’d drunk from.
She rummaged in the basket again and brought out something in a napkin. “La pièce de résistance, or should I say the final test?” She unveiled the item, revealing golden tarts. “Strawberry preserve tarts, also baked this morning.”
She offered the napkin-wrapped tarts and he took one. “You had quite a morning,” he commented.
“I’m exhausted. I could lie down and sleep an hour here.”
“It’s delicious,” he was quick to tell her this time after the first bite, and he didn’t exaggerate. The pastry was light, the filling just the right degree of sweet and tart.
“Well, I can’t take all the credit. Aunt Phoebe was hovering around me like a hummingbird, telling me exactly what to do and how long to do it. Next time I prepare you a meal, I shall do it unsupervised.”
Again the words conjured up something exclusively for him. Silas shook away the thought. In an effort to dispel the unfamiliar sensations she was awakening in him, he said, “Tell me about Europe.”
She tilted her head to one side, a small smile playing at her lips. “Europe…what a vast topic. Actually that brings another thought to mind.”
Her smile turned to a frown. “I’ve been meaning to ask you, why were you such a poor correspondent while I was away? Let me see…” She held up her fingers, counting. “One, two, three…yes. Only a few short scrawls during my entire year abroad. I sent you dozens of postcards, and all I got in return was ‘Dear Cherish, I trust this finds you in health. Your travels sound interesting. Nothing much new around here. All is well, Yours sincerely, Silas van der Zee.’”
He felt his face warm as she quoted his meager correspondence back to him. “I guess there just wasn’t much to tell. Everything was about the same.” How could he write about the joys of seeing trunks of trees being formed into ships and boats, when every postcard and letter of hers presented a vivid image of a new city, a new experience, new faces?
“That’s nonsense. You know how much I love to know what’s going on at the shipyard.”
“I’m sorry,” he answered. “I just didn’t think it would interest you.” He looked across the meadow to the bay. “The happenings at Winslow’s Shipyard, much less the life of one Silas van der Zee, seemed inconsequential in comparison to the adventures you were having.”
“You were so wrong,” she said quietly. Before he could analyze her serious tone, she began to gather up their things.
“You must have met a lot of interesting people over there,” he said as he helped her, wanting somehow to make up for his delinquent correspondence efforts.
She glanced at him. “Do you really want to know?”
Remembering how she used to tell him everything about her school life, he nodded. “Of course I do.”
“Well, Cousin Penelope must know everyone there is to know on the Continent,” she began, her enthusiasm returning.
He reclosed the jar of tea and handed it to her.
“If Cousin Penelope didn’t know a person she felt worth knowing, she found someone who did and wangled an introduction,” she continued, placing the jar of tea back into the hamper. “Society is very formal across the Atlantic. You can’t just present yourself to someone. An introduction must be arranged.”
She stooped to gather up the tablecloth. Silas stood and took it from her and shook it out away from them.
“Take for example at a dance—excuse me, I mean a ball or an assembly—you can’t just dance with anyone who asks you. You must first be formally introduced.”
She giggled suddenly. “When we were in Vienna, I was requested by a third party to dance a waltz with a certain titled gentleman. He wouldn’t be so bold as to force himself upon the young ‘American demoiselle.’ No, that would be most improper, so he sent an emissary, a female relative—titled, of course. Once I gave her my consent—to an introduction only—he approached and the formal presentation was carried out.”
She took the folded cloth from Silas and laid it atop the picnic basket before facing him and assuming a very straight stance, her hands clasped behind her back. “So, having navigated the appropriate channels, Prince Leopold Christian Otto von Braunschweiger von Black Forest von Wiener Schnitzel von something or other—” the longer she spoke, the thicker grew her false German accent and she bowed low, clicking her heels as she did so “—was presented to me in all the glory of his many family names. I was most impressed, and I gave him my lowest curtsy, like so.”
Silas was laughing at her antics by this time, relaxed once more. She was, after all, the young girl he’d always known. He watched her maneuver an exaggerated curtsy.
“I was afraid my knees would creak, and I almost toppled over—oh goodness!” Here she miscalculated and began to fall forward. Silas stepped into the gap and caught her just in time. She laughed up at him, her hands resting lightly on his shoulders. “Thank you, Silas. I don’t think Prince von Leopold could have been any more agile.” She frowned. “He wore a monocle, you know. It might have popped out if he’d been forced to exert himself so.”
Silas