A Flickering Light Page 30

  “Thanks for taking care of the cloth for me,” Selma said. “I’m sure sorry.”

  Russell held the oilcloth up. He looked at Selma with a question on his face. “Mama? Are you sure you want to throw this out? I can’t see the stain.”

  “You’re both blind,” she wailed. “Just do as I say. Get it out of here.”

  She shooed them out of the kitchen.

  She thought her head would burst.

  “You have to take the wedding pictures,” Voe told FJ. Jessie had offered to pick up the order at the train station and hadn’t yet arrived. These were her last days. Last days. FJ chided himself for using such terms. It wasn’t like the girl was dying. She was simply moving on, and he’d managed to keep her here much longer than she’d intended. Or rather Voe had, repeatedly postponing the dates of her wedding—for more time to prepare the food, to bring the relatives from Wisconsin to sew a dress—until now it was June, and all was at last settled and this Saturday the girl was actually marrying.

  He did wonder about the position Jessie had taken. She’d said she would wait until Voe’s marriage, and she had, despite Voe’s having moved the date back twice. Jessie had faithfully come to work as she’d agreed to, yet this Ralph Carleton job was still available, supposedly. Maybe she didn’t really have a position at all. Maybe she just gave that as an excuse to move away from this studio, from him. At least she might have chosen a job that would utilize her photographic talents. It saddened him that she hadn’t at least done that. Maybe locating a position for her at one of the other studios would be something good he could give her. He’d look into that.

  “Mr. B.? You will take the photographs, won’t you?” The girl spoke with that long vowel sound so typical to Scandinavians in the city.

  “I’m not much good at those kinds of spontaneous poses,” he said. He remembered Jessie had urged him to photograph wedding parties, but it smacked too much of that tramping work.

  “It can be your wedding gift to Daniel and me,” she said. “Jessie will help.”

  He sighed. “What kind of studio would we be if we didn’t immortalize our favorite girl?” FJ said.

  Once Voe married, there’d be but one more week with Jessie’s brightening up his days, and then what?

  “You’ll let Jessie assist? She’s done it before. Did we ever tell you how we took a reunion photograph at the normal school while you were ill? It was all posed of course, but we used the natural light and everyone bought a copy of the print.”

  “Quite resourceful, you girls,” FJ said.

  “Jessie was the one who set that up.”

  “I don’t doubt that. She has a way of making things happen,” he said, naming yet another quality of hers he’d miss.

  The three of them sat in the kitchen, Voe, Mr. Bauer, and Jessie. Mr. Bauer twisted his mustache, which now had a fine upward point at both ends. He rolled the tips. Jessie looked away, not wanting to see these little endearing habits of his that she’d be reminded of each time she saw a man with a slender mustache. Her heart had begun that thumping, a rhythm beating beware, beware, beware. It was what Jessie had chanted to herself these past weeks, the words keeping her at a distance. Voe’s marriage marked the next tow wrenching her from the Bauer Studio forever. She inhaled. It had to be. I’m still here, I’m still here, I’m still here. She vowed to maintain a professional stance.

  “Just remember,” Voe said, “I can’t assist you this time, Jessie. I mean, I’ll be in the pose, not handling people who spent too much time near the brew.”

  “Will your mother allow you to be at an event that serves spirits?” Mr. Bauer said. He turned to Jessie again.

  “I’m not serving spirits,” Voe corrected. “At least not until Daniel says, ‘I do.’” She laughed.

  Before Jessie could answer, Mr. Bauer offered, “We can take my car. I’ll come by and pick you up, Miss Gaebele, and we can—“

  “No, no. We’ll need to load the camera and plates. I’ll just meet you at the studio at nine.”

  “That won’t work,” Voe said. “You’re my maid of honor, Jessie. Remember? You’ll have to come out earlier than that, to help me dress.”

  Mr. Bauer said. “Let’s say we meet at seven, Miss Gaebele.”

  Voe beamed. “I never would have met Daniel if it hadn’t been for the two of you.”

  There were problems Jessie hadn’t considered.

  First, she was certain her parents had been invited to the wedding. While they might not attend, they’d know that beer would be served and might try to keep her home even without knowing that she and Mr. Bauer would be riding out together. Just the two of them, alone.

  On the other hand, Jessie was eighteen and her presence honored a friend. Jessie had to be there, and she would assure her parents that she was wise enough not to do anything so foolish as to take a taste of liquor. She’d worked hard to defer to them these past weeks, as they were mollified that she had turned a corner and was on what her mother called “the straight and narrow” road. Ralph Carleton had even saved that job just for her. They’d allowed her to keep her commitment to the Bauer Studio until Voe’s marriage, never knowing how difficult the past weeks had been for Jessie, saying good-bye over and over in her mind. She’d remember from this that it’s always better to rip off the bandage rather than slowly pull it back from the wound.

  “Besides,” Jessie reminded them that evening when she brought up the subject of her Saturday plans, “there are always beer tents at the street fairs and carnivals, so temptation’s often present and I’ve survived those well.”

  “But,” her mother cautioned, “you always have a chaperone with you at such events—your uncle August or your family.”

  Jessie had never told them about the wedding she and Voe photographed, where more than ale had presented problems.

  “I have to take pictures,” Jessie urged. “For Voe’s sake. It’s my present to her.”

  “Well…how will you get out there, go the night before? There could be carousing then too, you know. She’s marrying a Swede.”

  “Oh, Mama. No, I won’t go the night before. And he’s Norwegian. They’re different, you know. Someone will come pick me up…at the studio, early, so I can get the plates and film holders I need and whatnot. Maybe Daniel himself so I can talk sense into him and make sure he knows what he’s doing.” She made light of her comments and saw her mother easing into the decision.

  “He just might need a little talking to about marrying Voe, though I think that’s a little late, don’t you? Maybe it wasn’t Voe setting the dates back, but Daniel,” her mother said.

  Jessie smiled. “It’s never too late to think marriage through, is it?”

  Her father lowered the paper he’d been reading. “I never had second thoughts,” he said.

  “You wouldn’t have lived to tell of it if you had,” her mother told him, and they laughed together. That camaraderie was what Jessie wanted one day, being as comfortable together as shoulder to shawl.

  “So it’s decided, then?”

  “May as well let her go, Ida,” her father said. “It’s going to happen anyway, knowing Jessie.”

  Her mother had sighed and said, “I guess.”

  Their acceptance of her remaining at the studio until after Voe’s marriage had surprised her. But then they had no objection to Selma’s working for the Bauer family, so it wasn’t Mr. Bauer they had issues with; it was her, Jessie, and how they felt their own daughter had compromised herself by wanting to be an independent woman.

  The second problem presented while she stood before the mirror, holding dresses up in front of her. If she wore the white eyelet dress she’d bought on the spur of the moment and finally paid for, it would look sweet and secondary to the bride, which a bridesmaid ought to be. But perhaps it was too sweet, too much like a bridal gown itself. Her mother had told her when she brought it home that it looked like a “kept-woman dress” and acted as though she didn’t believe that Jessie had paid for it hersel
f. She held up the simple suit she usually wore when she wanted to look professional. Perhaps she could wear the dress for the wedding and change into the suit for her professional duties as a photographer. She’d change at Voe’s. But no, that wouldn’t make any sense if she wanted to quickly move into the photographer’s role right after the vows. She’d wear the suit with matching blue hat, forgo the hat once she arrived at Voe’s grandparents’ farmhouse where the wedding would be held, and put it back on when she stood behind the camera. The hat with the tiny row of white flowers around the rim would mark the transition between her roles that day. Bridesmaid to professional woman.

  And what role will you play with Mr. Bauer?

  Jessie might well be asked to be in the picture as part of the wedding party. She didn’t want to be there that way; she wanted to attend as the photographer. Maybe she could pose the shots and use a long cable return to her place so she was actually taking the shot and not Mr. Bauer. She wondered at why she felt a rise of competition with him, especially now.

  Jessie poked the pin into the felt and the roll of her hair on the top of her head. She imagined herself posing people and moving them in the way her eye wanted them to appear on paper. Mr. Bauer would want the role of exposing the film. Jessie would be relegated to his apprentice, running to the car to pick up plates and whatnot, even though she had been the one to urge him to do the outdoor shots. But they’d be using her camera. That he gave me. It would be especially difficult to convince him otherwise if she was there more as a member of the wedding party than as the photographer. She’d have to balance that.

  When she’d agreed to do the wedding photos together, she’d been interested in delaying the pain she knew would come when she finally left his employ. She could hear Lilly saying to her, “Be careful or you’ll poke your finger with the very needle you bought to sew things up.”

  It was the complication of the day.

  She’d work it out. What mattered was that she would have the time driving out with him and the time driving back. She’d allow herself to enjoy Voe’s wedding, being with him to photograph this celebration. Affection. That’s all it was he felt for her, and that’s what she’d reduce her feelings to as well. Eventually.

  Maybe these weren’t logistics problems. Maybe they were signs of her life maturing.

  FJ combed his mustache, put the paste on the tips, found his fedora hat. He took one last look at himself in the mirror by the umbrella stand. Collar starched. Tie in place. Coat brushed. Then quietly he made his way out the door to the garage in the back. Selma had stayed over the previous night. She’d assist with the children in the morning, when Mrs. Bauer was feeling especially out of sorts, as he’d taken to thinking of it. Selma sometimes helped Mrs. Bauer begin her day, even on Saturday, if he had appointments. The request was nothing out of the ordinary. He told himself that.

  He bent to brush at his pants and smelled the scent of his cologne. He hadn’t worn it for months and wasn’t at all sure why he’d put it on this morning. But he had. Perhaps it would cover that “old” smell he sometimes noticed on his wool. Old. He would be forty-five in August. That certainly wasn’t old, but his life had that gasping feel to it: his heart, his struggles with the poisonings, his emptiness of love from Jessie—Mrs. Bauer. He couldn’t say his wife’s name even to himself without thinking of Miss Gaebele.

  His emptiness of spirit.

  At least he had his children. They soothed his wounded heart, made him find gladness in being home, made him grateful that he’d met their mother all those years before. Despite what had happened between their parents, the children had been the treasure of their marriage and always would be.

  He stepped outside into the June morning. Clouds skipped across the bluffs, big puffy ones that would offer good shade for the photographs but enough sun for exposure. The air smelled of sawdust, the wind carrying the scent from the construction going on down the street and the mills in operation. Rain had fallen in the night and cleaned away the burnt-coal smell of trains and steamboats and their companions.

  He opened one half of the shed door—he’d start calling it his garage when the word felt less pretentious. It creaked on the hinge, especially loud this morning. Then he opened the other door and placed rocks to keep them from closing while he drove out. He hadn’t purchased Ford’s model the first year. He waited to see if it was a sticking thing or not. Then he’d bought the Touring Car, a 1908 model. It wasn’t really as practical as the first models produced at the Piquette Avenue plant in Detroit. This one had all forward speeds operating by a foot pedal and backward by a stick. He checked the cylindrical gas tank mounted on the frame by the running boards. Not that he needed to. He hadn’t been anywhere except the few blocks to church since he’d filled the tank the previous Saturday. The side lamps had enough oil, though he wasn’t expecting to be out at night. He walked around the car, checked the tail lamp. He wouldn’t try the tube horn; no need to wake the neighbors. But once in the country, he’d use it. He’d enjoy using it then. He decided to lower the top, folding it back like an accordion. The day was perfect for a country drive, and why not see the birds and the clouds as they drove along, let the sunlight scrub their faces?

  At the front he pulled the crank, twisted it. It took nothing before the magnetos did their work, and he stepped into the vehicle and put his hands on the wheel and started his drive out. All would have been perfect except that as he pulled beside the house he caught movement at the side of his eye.

  Russell!

  The boy waved at him in the window, then ran through the house to the front porch.

  “Wait! I want to go too!” he shouted. “Can’t I?”

  And why can’t he? The thought flitted through FJ’s head. He was a well-mannered boy, curious. He’d be good help and surely would offer no trouble. He’d enjoy the day, the drive, wind blowing his hair about. FJ could stop. Give the boy time to dress. He had time. There was no hurry, not really. It had been only six thirty when he pulled at his pocket watch just before starting the car. Why not spend the day with the boy?

  “It’s work, Son,” FJ shouted back to him. “I’ll come back early and we’ll take a spin then. Go back to bed now. Get some rest.”

  He shouted all that in a rush as he drove on by and rattled over the railroad tracks. He didn’t want to see the disappointment in Russell’s face. He didn’t want to feel the ache in his own old foolish heart.

  Jessie arrived early. She put the camera into its case, selected the glass plates, loaded several into holders. She decided to take three boxes. She couldn’t imagine taking more than thirty-six wedding shots, but then it might happen that way. Perhaps other guests would want individual photographs made. Maybe on the way back they’d shoot pictures of the bluffs, the river, or the arrow grass that bordered the edges of streams, luring ducks and geese. Scenic shots. There’d be ample opportunity for those kinds of pictures on the way toward the village of Cream in Wisconsin, where Voe’s grandparents worked as dairymen. That’s where the wedding would take place, nestled in the green valley where Holsteins ripped at grass and woods dotted the heights. Maybe they’d stop and pick mushrooms. There’d be other flowers in bloom: large lavender wild-flowers and the pasques that speared up through last year’s grasses. Jacob’s ladder, lady slippers, shooting stars, and phlox would dot the bluff slopes. She grabbed a fourth box.

  As she gathered her supplies, she thought it probably would have been better if she’d gone out to Voe’s the evening before. There’d be no pressure then to arrive on time. It might take a good hour for them to reach the farm and no telling how the roads might be. Streams ran high; they’d have to cross a creek before arriving at the wedding site. She looked at the Seth Thomas clock. Six forty-five. Plenty of time. If they didn’t arrive until eight it would still be well before the vows, scheduled for eleven. She could help Voe dress and set up the camera the way she wanted. Besides, leaving the night before meant not having this morning with FJ, alone.

&nb
sp; Guard your heart.

  She felt warm. She removed her suit jacket and was hanging it on the back of the chair, looking for any smudges she might rub away, when the puttering sounds of a car engine rolled past the studio. She looked out the window. He’d arrived. “Stop it,” she chided her heart out loud. “Just stop.”

  He drove his touring car. The top was pulled back! Her hair would be a mess, an absolute crow’s-nest by the time they arrived. She didn’t have one of those veils either. She hadn’t wanted to tell her mother specifics of her plans to arrive and depart, but Jessie certainly should have secreted a way to keep the dust from her face or keep her hat on. She needed a wrapper over her dress too. She looked around. She’d take one of the props, a colorful blanket, and put it across her lap to protect her pale blue skirt. That silk scarf she sometimes draped over a woman’s shoulder might also work as her veil of the moment, tied over her hat and around her chin.

  She watched him get out, remove his fedora, and lean over the open side to lay it in the seat. He ran his hands through his hair, pulled at his vest, twisted his mustache. Wiped at his face. He looked nervous. He isn’t accustomed to driving his car. He started up the steps.

  She wasn’t sure what moment of bright and brilliant light seared into her soul, telling her for certain that he shared feelings he’d tried to secret away. Maybe it was the way he hesitated when he looked up at her as she opened the back door to the kitchen, the way he stood on the stone step and inhaled, head cocked as if to say, Are we doing this? before he made his way inside. Maybe it happened when she stepped back to let him pass but he turned instead, so close to her she could see the hair of his mustache lift as he exhaled with his lower lip slightly out to send the air upward, cooling his red face. His face looked warm. Hers was.

  It was as though he saw her for the first time, not as an apprentice, not as someone he could talk to about cameras and lenses and poses, but as a singular woman. She saw her own desire reflected in his eyes.