Aaron Howard’s Oscar

Audrey has a long day ahead of her. The passengers on the train were ferried in coaches and by a train that came out from town filled with railroaders ready to go to work. Audrey caught the coach so she didn't get to sit and watch the men unload the tools and materials to fix the tracks. The engine would have to be jacked up and the rails beneath replaced and other damage repaired before the stranded train or tracks could be put back in service.

Audrey arrives midmorning, after the bumpy stage ride, with only her small travel bag. The rest of her luggage will come later. Arrival delivers an appeasing sigh from Audrey's chest.

The headmaster, Anselm Chouteau, is at the station to greet Audrey and give her a tour of the town and educational facilities. Mr. Chouteau points out important landmarks on the way to the cottage: church and school and stores of Main Street. The streets of the town are dotted with gas lamps that burn into the night. Given her recent railway ordeal the headmaster takes her to the small cottage the town has arranged as her lodging and agrees to meet her later in the afternoon, to her relief.

The cottage is modestly furnished in the fashion of a schoolteacher. Plenty of books and ample space for more. Doilies recline on most flat surfaces and backs of chairs. There is a fully functional kitchen with hand-pumped running water no less. Still, the lavatory is located out back.

In the parlor stands a battered whitewashed upright piano liberated from a now-defunct saloon on the outskirts of town. In her references and resume it said she played piano so the headmaster saw to it the piano was retrieved, installed and even tuned. It did not receive a fresh coat of paint.

She plucks a few notes on the piano. The sound makes her warm.

She goes to work making the house feel like a home. After she's slid a few pieces of furniture around a while and broken a dish or two she calls it quits on playing at housekeeping.

She washes, dresses and hefts her purse to head outside for a stroll around town. On the lookout for a good lunch.

There are several venues in town where a meal can be had. She decides on a restaurant called 'The Kitchen.' Seems like a good place to find some food.

She sits at a small gingham-clothed square table beside the front window. It's lunchtime and the place builds momentum toward busyness and bustle. A waiter comes to take Audrey's order: fried chicken, corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, hold the peas. One lemonade.

Audrey picks at a roll as she waits and reads a ten-cent magazine called 'Outlaw' full of fanciful tales of heroism and disgrace. The cover copy purports certain stories are written by outlaws themselves.

Waiter: Chicken, taters, corncobs, tea. Hold the peas. You look new in town. Was you on that train?

Audrey hesitates a moment recovering from her interrupted reverie.

Audrey: I am the new schoolteacher.
Waiter: Them kids'll sure be happy to have a teacher-lady so pretty as you.
Audrey: Thank you. I hope I'll be able to teach them something.
Waiter: You need anything else miss? I bet I got a hunnerd tables
ever day at lunch. No? Good. I'll come back later and check on you. Maybe some cold apple pie and coffee.

The waiter walks off to the counter and sits down. Audrey watches him putter with a napkin he can't seem to get folded. He tosses it on the counter in disgust, suddenly realizes he's forgotten to be a waiter and heads to a nearby table of rowdy tired railwaymen in greasy caps and striped, worn bib overalls.

Audrey butters and salts the corn and potatoes. The corn, the waiter told her when she ordered, was picked fresh this morning. Shucked and boiled. Except the waiter said 'biled.' She eats and reads her magazine. The waiter comes about the time she's done eating and urges her toward cold apple pie and pipin' hot coffee. Not cowboy coffee but proper coffee made in a fancy drip machine. The wonders of modern science.

After lunch Audrey tours around town. The whole place is abuzz with last night's dramatic events. She sees a couple churches, city hall, the school, sundry homes and businesses. The dentist, doctor, cigar-store Indian, maypole.

She searches for the places she'll want to go after hard days or where her long night strolls will take her. She sees a graveyard that isn't nearly large enough for the town. She guesses that means there's another outside town, probably not far off.

Tired of walking, she goes back to her house and finds a note tacked on the door. It is the invoice of her luggage and words expressing the railroad agent's desire to interview all parties aboard the train, should they have any important information.

Her steamer trunk, two suitcases and several large boxes of books have been deposited on the livingroom rug by the burly deliverymen. Unpacking is a relief as she frees her belongings and introduces them to the new home they will create and inhabit.

She has never learned to travel light. This is a complete move. It is supposed to be the beginning of her career as a schoolteacher. She brought all the things she thought she'd need to put a house in ready order. There are mismatched dishes already in the cupboard. Something she forgot to bring. They always crack up on long trip anyway. Those railroaders pay no care to fragile signs. It's rare they can even read so long a word. But they have the brawn part of the job down pat.

Audrey unpacks.

Books first, of course. The most important things she owns are these boxes of printed pages bound in cloth and leather. She is enamored by the colors and scents and heft of each book and all of them lined up together on shelves, or in piles cluttering a room. Books in any formation satisfy Audrey.

She starts by opening the boxes and putting books on the nearest shelf, simply to have the comfort of the books' presence. This mutates into a more subconscious system whereupon she wanders through the cottage and strategically places favorite books in readily and easily accessible locations and learns better the layout of her new abode. A few good novels in the bedroom. A book of light verse in the kitchen window. A few plays in a particular corner near a comfortable chair. Slowly the shelves of the house come to form and she is able to empty the boxes to her satisfaction. Still there are plenty of rounds of sorting ahead of her. One of the pleasures of owning books is moving them around and simply touching them.

After the books she sees to her boxful of sheet music, printed and handwritten scores she has collected. She places her favorites on the piano. The rest she stows in the piano bench to be referred to when she needs a tune. When she plays the piano she has the luxury of roosting on a box's worth of scores. After she fills the piano bench she sits and plays her favorite tune before she continues the chore of unpacking. It is a tune she has written. Playing and hearing it in this new location makes the cottage resemble a home. Notes and chords. Energy and vibrations envelop the interior of the small structure and absorb into its fiber like mercury captured in the cavities of a cellulite sponge.

There is a second much smaller bedroom, barely large enough to accommodate the bed and Audrey's breath. She imagines this room as the study. She has little need of a guest room. With a desk or table to replace the bed and a few shelves it could be a cozy nook of a study.

She quits with the paper goods and moves on to the luggage. She puts clothes in the closet and bureau. Lays knickknacks out here and there. She hangs a photograph of the city. She places a small ivory elephant on a tall corner shelf and begins to feel at home.

The livingroom is inviting and suits its own purposes. She will be able to use and enjoy it. The bedroom is the most comfortable room in the house. It calls for naps on hot summer afternoons and rising early of a morning as the day's first rays filter through the printed muslin curtains.

Anselm Chouteau, the headmaster, knocks the brash fish knocker on the cottage door. He wears a striped suit and a black string tie. His watch chain gleams as she opens the door.

Anselm will make a very suitable boss for Audrey. He is reasonable and cooperative. He is the type of educator who does the job because it is his passion.

Audrey: Good afternoon, Mister Chouteau.
Chouteau: Good afternoon, Mademoiselle. I trust you find your quarters accommodating.
Audrey: Yes. It is more than satisfactory. I need a table or a rather large desk for the study.
Chouteau: I have just the thing in storage at the school.
Audrey: Oh thank you. I'll swap you that bed if you'll have it. This cottage is idyllic. How I have longed for a study.
Chouteau: The children will be happy to start school this year, for once. A new teacher is much more exciting to them than a new pupil.
Audrey: I walked through town earlier. There's a real furor over the train robbery.
Chouteau: Not to worry. It will die down in a couple days.
Audrey: I wish it would.
Chouteau: Soon you will have the diversion of throwing yourself into the beginning fall term. Are you free to visit the school and perhaps to join my family for supper this evening?
Audrey: Yes. I'd be delighted to get my mind off all this chaos.

Audrey puts on her hat and they are out the door.