Read Online The Color of Water in July by Nora Carroll - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Nora Carroll
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looked over her shoulder and saw that the cottage had already disappeared from sight, even though she knew it couldn’t have been more than a couple of hundred yards away.
“The paper birch tree . . . ” Russ was reading to her all about the unusual tree with the white scored bark that gave the North Woods their distinctive look. “The bark was used for canoe making and as a treatment for rheumatism . . . ”
Jess felt relieved that nothing around them looked familiar. She saw trees everywhere, some birch, some beech with the smooth gray-green trunks, a few of last winter’s pale, dry leaves still clinging to the lower branches under the canopy of green. She felt no special resonance here, their quiet footsteps on the forest floor, Russ’s loud voice. These woods, she thought, evoke nothing.
Then, without warning, she realized that they had entered the stand of giant white pine. Around her on all sides, there were tall tree trunks, ruddy brown and covered with rectangular markings. The trunks rose up straight as the masts of schooners and then disappeared above the beech, poplar, and maple leaves. Jess knew that the branches of the giant white pine spread out above them, forming a supercanopy over the other trees.
“Russ,” Jess whispered, her voice hushed. “Look!” she said.
Russ glanced up from the field guide for a moment, and looked around him.
“What is it?” he said in a voice that seemed to Jess to be much too loud. “I don’t see anything.”
“It’s the giant white pine—see the dark trunks of the taller trees?”
Russ looked around, and then back down at his book.
“Giant white pine, giant white pine . . . Ah, here it is . . . Nope! There aren’t any around here. Logging. They’ve all been gone since the turn of the century.”
Jess looked at the spot where she remembered once feeling deep reverence. She could hear the echo of a modest, worshipful voice. Jess felt tired then, and she sat down on a sawed-off tree stump, a stump that still bore the traces of hacking and burning left by loggers—poachers, no doubt—almost a hundred years before. She could hear birdsong now. A lone pine warbler, wasn’t it? At first, she felt sure it was a pine warbler . . . but then she felt less sure, and finally decided she did not know. She watched Russ’s yellow jacket bobbing down the path ahead of her, and then she stood up and followed the path out of the wood—to where the sidewalk started up again, flanked on either side by the green of neatly clipped lawns.
Just as they stepped out of the woods, it started to pour. Russ pulled the rip cord tight on his Gore-Tex jacket, smiling the smile of a little boy with a new toy. Jess felt the cold raindrops penetrate her thin T-shirt, and with a shiver started to jog back to the cottage.
The rain did not let up. They returned to the cottage—Jess damp, Russ dry—where Jess lit a fire in the fireplace. The old cottage was shadowy inside. Russ got absorbed again in doing research on cottage architecture, and Jess roamed around the cottage aimlessly, feeling as if she was looking for something but couldn’t quite remember what.
A stack of leather-bound photo albums caught her attention. Mamie had been a meticulous album maker, carefully labeling her photos and aligning them with little black paper corners. Jess looked through the albums, starting with the ones that showed herself as a child, always prim and proper with a white ribbon in her hair. She remembered posing for pictures, always doing Mamie’s bidding: Here is Jess with her dress on, on the way up the walk to dinner. Here is Jess in her first two-piece bathing suit, with the little strawberries that dangled from the bows on the side. When Jess stopped to think about it, Mamie must have bought most of her clothes. Jess had always worn American clothes; she remembered that her clothes used to arrive in boxes from time to time: Florence Eiseman dresses, and patent-leather Mary
“The paper birch tree . . . ” Russ was reading to her all about the unusual tree with the white scored bark that gave the North Woods their distinctive look. “The bark was used for canoe making and as a treatment for rheumatism . . . ”
Jess felt relieved that nothing around them looked familiar. She saw trees everywhere, some birch, some beech with the smooth gray-green trunks, a few of last winter’s pale, dry leaves still clinging to the lower branches under the canopy of green. She felt no special resonance here, their quiet footsteps on the forest floor, Russ’s loud voice. These woods, she thought, evoke nothing.
Then, without warning, she realized that they had entered the stand of giant white pine. Around her on all sides, there were tall tree trunks, ruddy brown and covered with rectangular markings. The trunks rose up straight as the masts of schooners and then disappeared above the beech, poplar, and maple leaves. Jess knew that the branches of the giant white pine spread out above them, forming a supercanopy over the other trees.
“Russ,” Jess whispered, her voice hushed. “Look!” she said.
Russ glanced up from the field guide for a moment, and looked around him.
“What is it?” he said in a voice that seemed to Jess to be much too loud. “I don’t see anything.”
“It’s the giant white pine—see the dark trunks of the taller trees?”
Russ looked around, and then back down at his book.
“Giant white pine, giant white pine . . . Ah, here it is . . . Nope! There aren’t any around here. Logging. They’ve all been gone since the turn of the century.”
Jess looked at the spot where she remembered once feeling deep reverence. She could hear the echo of a modest, worshipful voice. Jess felt tired then, and she sat down on a sawed-off tree stump, a stump that still bore the traces of hacking and burning left by loggers—poachers, no doubt—almost a hundred years before. She could hear birdsong now. A lone pine warbler, wasn’t it? At first, she felt sure it was a pine warbler . . . but then she felt less sure, and finally decided she did not know. She watched Russ’s yellow jacket bobbing down the path ahead of her, and then she stood up and followed the path out of the wood—to where the sidewalk started up again, flanked on either side by the green of neatly clipped lawns.
Just as they stepped out of the woods, it started to pour. Russ pulled the rip cord tight on his Gore-Tex jacket, smiling the smile of a little boy with a new toy. Jess felt the cold raindrops penetrate her thin T-shirt, and with a shiver started to jog back to the cottage.
The rain did not let up. They returned to the cottage—Jess damp, Russ dry—where Jess lit a fire in the fireplace. The old cottage was shadowy inside. Russ got absorbed again in doing research on cottage architecture, and Jess roamed around the cottage aimlessly, feeling as if she was looking for something but couldn’t quite remember what.
A stack of leather-bound photo albums caught her attention. Mamie had been a meticulous album maker, carefully labeling her photos and aligning them with little black paper corners. Jess looked through the albums, starting with the ones that showed herself as a child, always prim and proper with a white ribbon in her hair. She remembered posing for pictures, always doing Mamie’s bidding: Here is Jess with her dress on, on the way up the walk to dinner. Here is Jess in her first two-piece bathing suit, with the little strawberries that dangled from the bows on the side. When Jess stopped to think about it, Mamie must have bought most of her clothes. Jess had always worn American clothes; she remembered that her clothes used to arrive in boxes from time to time: Florence Eiseman dresses, and patent-leather Mary
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