An Absence So Great: A Novel (Portraits of the Heart) Read online

  Still, she made gains in her profession, if not fame. And on her list of achieved goals that allowed her to live and work in Winona for the rest of her days, she could say that she managed her emotions better now. She didn’t engage in conversations with men she didn’t know, and she’d had no encounters that she hadn’t handled well, while being careful of the man’s dignity… and her own.

  The helpers were taking up the collection in the tent now, the movement bringing Jessie back to the moment. Baskets passed down each aisle. She watched as people put pennies and a few bills into the felt-lined oak. At the end, Jessie collected the money and tomorrow would take it to the bank. She’d asked for that privilege just so the tellers became accustomed to seeing her as one of their investors.

  Ralph often preached about how giving that resulted in receiving was a way to encourage people to hope for the joys that came from generosity. “We must offer ways for the less fortunate to be generous or they’ll be deprived of the blessings,” he said when he talked of the offering portion of the evening service. Jessie supposed that maybe her blessings came in the form of the extra time she gave to Ralph’s work. She wasn’t paid for such time, but she found joy in helping people feel more comfortable as they entered the tent.

  A woman began to wail as she told Ralph about her life. Her hat was simple and her dress dark and patched, and she looked tired as she turned to tell her story to those gathered. She’d had so many opportunities given to her, and she’d wasted each and every one. “I had good parents, and I spurned them,” she told Ralph loudly enough for all to hear. “I could have worked in a hospital, taking care of people, but I found the cabinet where they kept the laudanum, and when I was discovered, I was sent away. I married a good man who finally left me when I fouled our marriage bed, and I’ve found more ways to abuse myself I shall not share. I am penniless, broken, standing before you with nothing left but an unworthy heart and these tattered rags I wear.”

  Jessie thought the woman dramatic in the telling of her tale, but Ralph treated her as though she spoke truth. “You have much more than that left,” he said. He told her she had a choice now to do the right thing, to garner her courage to live in the world where all was not predictable or right, but where she would never be alone again if she chose a safe haven for when the storms hit her.

  The woman fell to her knees, and Ralph’s helpers and local church men laid hands upon her back and head and prayed over her, their words indistinguishable. Jessie imagined those gentle hands being pressed against the woman, soft as raindrops, and she felt tears well up. Perhaps God had willed her to be there, to receive a message that she, too, had choices to make. Perhaps her dream was not yet lost. The music, the soft summer breeze, Ralph’s words, and the woman’s bright eyes as she took them in infused Jessie with the wish to take her own next step.

  It was that confidence that took her Monday morning into the Winona Savings Bank to make Ralph’s deposit but also to seek yet another meeting with the bank’s president.

  It was a gift. Fred saw it that way. He hadn’t intended to be walking past the bank on that day or at the time he did, but there he was. Jessie fast-walked past him out the door, maroon netting from her hat covering her face, though not enough to hide the tears on her cheeks.

  Without a thought, his hand went out to her elbow, stopping her. “Jessie,” he said. “Are you all right?”

  “Oh, Fred. No. It’s… I’ll be fine, really I will. I’m just so… so… disgusted with it, that’s all.”

  He coaxed her into a café not far from the bank and ordered hot tea for both of them. It was perfectly innocent, them sitting there, and if anyone should come by or ask about them, he’d introduce her as his former student. No one would think anything wrong with that. He let her talk, though her words didn’t make much sense—they were all wrapped up in something Ralph Carleton had said and her visit with the bank president. She’d been denied a loan, again. That was the gist of it.

  “He had the gall to lecture me about commitment being a banking term meaning a deposit against which one can later draw.’ I knew that. I’ve put money into the bank, and I’d hoped to have them match it, so I could make a down payment on a studio. But they won’t even consider it.”

  “Not even if your father agreed to honor the loan if you couldn’t?”

  “My parents are in no position to do that,” Jessie told him. “They have their own expenses… Roy and everything.”

  “Perhaps I could—”

  “No!” She actually looked alarmed at his offer, and that pained him.

  “I didn’t mean anything by it,” he said. He raised his hands in protest. “I wanted to be helpful.”

  “I know, I know. But I have to do this on my own, or it loses meaning,” she said. She stirred a lump of sugar into her tea. At least she hadn’t said it was his offer that so astounded her. Any offer of such support she’d likely spurn.

  “Maybe Ralph Carleton could—”

  “No. Please.” She took a deep breath and smiled at him. “I’ll be fine. Thank you for the tea. It was just what I needed. I’ll work out something else.” They exchanged small talk, he telling her of a fine photograph Russell had taken of the trumpeter swans on Lake Winona and Winnie’s latest tale, which she’d had him write down as her “story.” She’d illustrated it herself with her colored crayons. Robert was growing tall as corn, he told her. She asked about Voe, and he told her young Danny now spent time with her while she worked.

  “I’m pleased to hear it,” she said. “All of it.”

  “You ought to stop by and see them at the studio,” Fred encouraged.

  She ignored the suggestion, stood instead, and thanked him for the tea but did not offer her gloved hand. He bumped the table as he stood, dropped his cane, which she bent to pick up for him. Their eyes met. She nodded, turned, and walked out.

  His hand shook when he paid for the tea. He wanted to help her accomplish her dream, but she’d defined a border. He could walk beside her; that was all.

  “I’ve decided to sell the studio to you,” George Haas told Jessie a few days later. “I assume you can acquire the funds?”

  Jessie swallowed. She didn’t dare ask, “Why now?” She’d gone to all three banks, and none had been willing to match her investment. The presidents lectured her about a woman’s place and about the unstable market for new business and about how photography was still a young profession. She countered with how long people had been taking photographs (the War Between the States had been captured with a camera) and explained that just this year a French photographer named Charles Pathé had produced a new film that captured people moving, not just the stillness of a subject’s face. They’d been unimpressed.

  She walked out into the sunshine after meeting with those bankers, the warmth doing nothing for her spirit. She loved Winona with its bustle and bluffs, yet her efforts to make a life here as she wished seemed thwarted at every turn. At this rate, the Gaebele girls were destined to grow old in their parents’ home, working at the edges of professions but never excelling within them.

  Now before her stood George Haas, saying he wanted to sell the studio to her! It was the opportunity she’d longed for, and she didn’t have any way to bring it about. Why now?

  “I’m not certain I can purchase the studio,” she told him.

  “Oh, well.” He stepped back. “I thought—”

  “If I may ask, why now?”

  “Elizabeth continues to grow ill, and I can’t imagine her spending another harsh winter here,” he said. “I don’t relish a Winona winter while she wiles away in sunny Tampa either.” He’d made a small grin at that comment. “You’ve done a fine job here, and I see your dedication, working for Reverend Carleton and me too. The tenants are secure, so they’d bring income for you. It seemed an opportunity for both of us.”

  Credit was the only way she could conceive of this working, to buy the business and the building. “Would you allow me to pay you over time?” she a
sked.

  He put his stubby finger to his lips, tapping as though thinking. But he shook his head. “I need the additional income to secure a house in Tampa. We might keep one here too, for a time, but with two homes to contend with, I’d need cash up front.”

  “Of course,” Jessie said. “Would my savings up front be enough as a down payment?”

  “How much do you have?”

  “Nearly six hundred dollars,” she said. “Though it’s not even twenty-five percent of the purchase price, I know.”

  “I don’t know… If you could increase it a little…then maybe I could carry the remainder. With three percent interest.”

  “Give me a day or two, would you?”

  He agreed, and Jessie spent the night lying awake on her pallet on the porch, imagining what she might do. She could contact the Harms family in Milwaukee. They’d been generous to a fault and might be willing to lend her the additional sum. She could contact Joshua Behrens. His father worked for a bank in Milwaukee, and maybe Joshua could put in a word for her. Asking Fred was also an option, but she quickly put that one aside. There could be no linkage. Nothing to bind them together.

  In the end, she decided to go back to the first bank she’d spoken with. Maybe with her history in both Milwaukee and Eau Claire, and her local Winona connections—“You can always find me if I miss a payment,” she’d joked—maybe they’d reconsider now that Mr. Haas was willing to sell. This time, she wouldn’t be trying to start a photographic studio from roots, but to grow one already in business, and she had a businessman willing to trust her ability to do it. She wouldn’t be asking to borrow the full amount, only to increase the down payment amount. It was her best hope.

  “We’re quite pleased that you’ve found an existing studio to consider,” the banker said, not looking at Jessie but staring at his notes. “That’s much wiser than starting up your own. With an existing studio, you’ll have customers waiting, prints to be made of existing plates, items you mentioned yourself when you first came by last year.” Jessie nodded. When you first turned me down. “But nothing has changed about our concern related to a young woman proprietor being successful. I’m sorry.”

  “But George Haas is willing to carry the loan himself. Your risk is minimal.”

  “Individuals ought not to be in the bank business,” he said, his lip curling up. He adjusted his glasses. Jessie thought idly that any portrait of him would need to tone down his wild white eyebrows, which looked like the cowlicks at the back of a baby’s head. “George Haas should think twice about carrying a loan for a female photographer.”

  “Many young women are proprietors,” she told him. “Look at Lottie Fort. She’s a successful milliner. My sister works for her. And there are female photographers, just not in Winona. You could be the first, be innovative.” He shook his head. “I am committed, ready to keep the promise that I know borrowing money means.” She hoped in her frustration she wouldn’t cry. She didn’t, but he remained unmoved. Jessie stood, thanked him for his time, and walked out. She was so close, and yet the dream fluttered beyond her reach.

  If she sent a telegram to the Harmses, they might be willing to make the loan, but she feared they’d tell Fred. And Joshua, well, she hadn’t been in touch with him since the day she’d left Milwaukee. Surely business connections that would pay a dividend to both parties had to be nurtured over time, and she’d done nothing to make that happen. Maybe that was her next step, to reacquaint herself with Joshua, but results from that would take time. George Haas wanted to sell now. Maybe she had to face facts: it was not in her future to own her own studio.

  Would working for another be so terrible? Yes, it would. She longed to achieve this dream, to decide the small things, like which brand of glass plates to purchase, how many ads to place, to prosper or fail on her own merits, not just to uphold the decisions of others. She ached to be the one to feel success or disappointment from her own efforts. It was her destiny to do this, to use her talents to bring joy to the faces of patrons by the loving portraits she made of them. Surely her gift—if she had one—was meant to nurture her and be enough to give away. What else could that proverb mean but that a desire could be realized, and that’s what brought such sweetness to the soul? Maybe her sweetness was to come in another way. She closed her eyes that night but did not sleep.

  “I’m so sorry,” she told George the next morning. “I just couldn’t work things out. Unless you’d take what I’ve saved as a down payment and allow me to make payments along the way, there’s no way I can purchase the studio. I’m so sorry.”

  “I am as well,” he told her. He patted her shoulder. “I ought to have taken you up on it earlier in the year, when things seemed more possible.” She’d been more hopeful then too, but likely it would not have mattered. He shrugged his shoulders. “I’ll advertise again in the photographic journals,” he said. “I’ll work something out. Don’t you worry about us.”

  Jessie felt a twinge of guilt that she hadn’t worried about George or his wife. She’d thought only of herself. Though she didn’t want Fred to make another offer to help—and she feared he would if he knew of her predicament—she still wished she could talk with him, share her disappointment with one who understood the dissolving of a dream. But even that was out of the question. She thought of him as her closest friend, yet one she didn’t dare confide in.

  She didn’t share her sadness with her family either. She acted cheerful. Nor did she tell Gertrude or Ralph when she went to work that next day.

  At the Polonia, she buried herself in the retouching room and worked late into the evening. She’d fallen behind, having taken time off for all the bank appointments, and she found the time moved swiftly as she took the blemishes from a woman’s pocked cheeks and trimmed the eyebrows just a bit from the man who seemed to scowl. There was artistry in what she did, and that soothed her. She ought to be grateful to have a job she liked. So it was dark when she left Fourth Street, locking the back door. The studio had a small apartment, but George never used it; he rented the upper offices to a doctor and an optometrist so the building had “professional” tenants. Jessie wondered if she ought to approach one of them about loaning her the money to buy the building and studio. Perhaps that’s what George would do next: sell the business separate from the building, though clearly that wasn’t what he wanted. The rents from the tenants provided income during slow photographic times, which is what made the investment such a good one. Why hadn’t she emphasized that to the banker?

  She walked swiftly in the November wind, brushing fallen leaves as she moved along the street to her Broadway home. She pulled the muffler up around her neck and face, careful not to steam her glasses as she breathed hard in her swift cadence. The air smelled of snow, a brisk wind swirling the fur at her cheeks. She liked walking at night, though this wasn’t a full-moon evening. She could usually see just the steps ahead of her, reminding her that most of life was like that: taking one step at a time and following the light at hand rather than worrying about the steps in the darkness beyond.

  She scampered up the stone steps and at the door stomped her feet of the leaves and mud, then peered into the window through the lace drapes to read the clock in the hall. Its chimes struck ten times. She’d have a cold supper, that was certain.

  “Well, it’s about time,” Lilly said when she opened the door.

  “I worked late.”

  “You might have let us know,” Lilly said, arms crossed over her breast.

  “I’m sorry. You’re right, I should have called you.”

  “Or at least answered the studio phone when we called it,” Selma said. Her sister’s eyes sparkled. Her parents stood there. Had they been waiting for her? Was something wrong?

  “The darkroom is in the back, away from the phone,” Jessie reminded them. She hung her coat on the rack, sat on the bench, pulled the rubber boots from her shoes. Her parents said nothing, just stood there. “Were you calling to see why I was late?”


  “We wanted to tell you to go to the bank before they closed!” Selma screamed.

  “Selma, ladylike, please,” her mother corrected.

  “What?”

  “The-the-the b-b-bank c-c-called,” Roy said.

  “They did? Why didn’t anyone tell me! What did they say?”

  “You’re to contact them in the morning,” her mother said. “They want to discuss your business proposition apparently. They wouldn’t give us any details, of course. Will you?”

  “They do? They called here? Oh, Mama, this might mean they’ve changed their mind and will actually make the loan!” She grabbed her mother’s stiff shoulders and danced around her, the woman’s apron lifting in the swirl.

  “What loan?” her father asked.

  “How will I ever sleep?”

  As she told them of George Haas’s change of heart, her father looked both encouraging and sad. “I wish we could put up the money for you,” he said.

  “I don’t expect you to. I want to do this on my own, Papa. Me and the bank and George Haas. You have good places to spend your hard-earned money.” She looked at Roy.

  Her father patted the back of her hand. “I’ll say a prayer for your meeting with the bank,” he said. “I can do that and would have done it all along if we had known.”

  “I didn’t want to embroil you in another possible disaster.”

  Having them share her hope was nearly as good as imagining that Fred, too, would be cheering her on—if he knew.

  A small voice in the back of her mind wondered if Fred might have intervened, but there wasn’t any way he could have known of George Haas’s intention to let her buy the studio from him or of her latest visit to the bank. It had all happened too quickly. No, this was strictly a gift—as Ralph said when she told him the next morning. She asked him for an hour’s time to keep an appointment at the bank and blurted that she might be moving on at last to a studio of her own. He grinned widely. “You see. Prayers are answered.”