Read House on the Lagoon for Free Online Page B

was commissioned to build he didn’t dare take a chance like that. He was, after all, only an obscure contractor of immigrant origins.
    A few years after he established himself in Chicago, something happened to Pavel which drastically changed his life. In 1898 he had married a young violinist of Bohemian descent, María Straub, but they became estranged and María took up with a lover. Pavel found them in bed one night when he returned home unexpectedly. He beat her and pushed her down the stairs. Fearing he had killed her, he left the house in a panic.
    He fled Chicago and, taking with him a copy of Wright’s Wasmuth Portfolio, went to Jacksonville, Florida. Jacksonville was experiencing a building boom, following the great fire of 1901, which had destroyed many of its downtown structures. Pavel was bound to find work there. He attended a Methodist Episcopal church, asking forgiveness for the crime he thought he had committed, and was befriended by the minister, who was about to build a new church in the parish. Pavel offered to draw the plans free of charge, and the minister was delighted. Pavel designed a beautiful building, an exact copy of one Wright had built in Chicago. But someone on the committee of parishioners was familiar with Wright’s work and accused Pavel of plagiarism. Pavel was stunned; he couldn’t understand how anyone could say such a thing. His church would have been a faithful re-creation, stone by stone, of Wright’s masterpiece, not a mere copy.
    Pavel used to like to take walks on the Jacksonville waterfront in the evenings, wrapped in his black silk cape, and he would see groups of fashionably dressed Spanish-speaking people getting off ocean liners and boarding limousines that drove them to the train station. He asked where they came from and was told many were from Puerto Rico, a territory of the United States. At Jacksonville they boarded the Florida train and headed north.
    Puerto Rico was often in the news at the time; it was described by the press as an exotic, far-off possession, where there was a dire need for public works. The island had been a colony of Spain for four hundred years and, as William Randolph Hearst’s newspapers often pointed out, was mired in poverty. This situation more than justified the United States taking over the island after the Spanish-American War. Ninety percent of the population was illiterate, and bilharzia and hookworm were rampant. A roster of projects was to be undertaken by the federal government to better the lot of the inhabitants.
    Pavel was a keen observer. He took note of the well-heeled, elegantly dressed travelers who got off the boats from Puerto Rico, and he also read in the press about the plight of the Puerto Rican people. He surmised there must be two Puerto Ricos—one in serious need, and one which was booming. Both offered him ample opportunity for work as a contractor, and he began to consider emigrating to the island. There was another reason that moved him toward that decision: Puerto Rico was isolated enough so very few people there had heard of Frank Lloyd Wright.
    Pavel sailed for his new destination, and for the next twenty-three years he lived out his dream: in Puerto Rico he managed to become his hero. He re-created much of Wright’s work with absolute fidelity; he filled San Juan with beautiful copies of the master’s houses, which the islanders hailed as gems of architecture.
    Soon after he arrived in San Juan, he became a member of the Elks Club. It was a wise decision, because the Elks were very well connected. Only foreigners could become members, and he was immediately made to feel welcome. The Elks spoke English among themselves and were active both in private and in public institutions. They had government connections and owned many of the important businesses involved in the development of the island—the telephone company, electric power plants, foundries. Many of the Elks were Masons, like Pavel himself.
    On the day