Read Thoreau in Love for Free Online Page B

were tearing.
    As Ben removed Henry’s plate, he asked, “Bread pudding?” Henry shook his head until Ben whispered, “I made it myself.”
    “Yes, please,” said Henry, and devoured the plate of pudding Ben set before him.
    After supper, Susan suggested to Henry that they go on deck, her stomach having been settled by the calm seas and the bread pudding. Henry asked Ben to join them and Susan glared. Mrs. Hawke said, “You go on, Wickham,” which gave her husband apoplexy. “You’re not going anywhere, Somers” he said. “I’m not finished with you.”
    As Susan and Henry squeezed through the passageway, she took his arm. “You make me so happy, Henry,” she said.
    Thinking, I hope she’s not another Lidian, and then, wanting to dispel that thought, Henry said, “But if you would, Why did you leave your family? Especially so soon after giving birth?”
    Susan thought for a moment. “It was as if I was sinking into a well and I couldn’t get out. I didn’t want another child. Had I stayed, I would have drowned. And, yes, I suffered with the mean, judgmental looks I received in Concord, especially from Lidian, but it was far better being there than at home. Now let’s go on deck.”
    Watching their step, they strolled the deck, admired the heavens and commented on how pleasant it was with just enough breeze to fill the sails. All the while, Henry thought about Ben, wondering where he was, wishing he was seeing this beauty with him. Soon, he and Susan went inside, where lighted lamps hung beside their respective doors. Henry took his into his cabin and hung it on the wall, then he picked up his journal with the thought of writing a poem. But when he opened to the blue-lined page where he’d left off, he saw what he’d written: “ Nauta Juvenis . I’ve just met a young sailor named Ben Wickham.” He thought for a minute, then wrote:
    What is it about Ben Wickham that makes my heart pound? I don’t will it. And why am I embarrassed? Though I feel I have something to hide, do I really? Emerson said to speak the rude truth. What I feel I must hide is the force that drives my nearly every thought, determines my every action, makes me who I am. Isn’t this force I feel I must hide in fact what makes me Henry Thoreau? When I wrote Stearns that I was moving to New York, he replied that I was finally about to begin my life. I’m finished with hiding Henry Thoreau. This is my new life. There is some connection between me and Ben. But is it just a flickering light, to be doused when morning comes?
    Henry slipped out of his cabin and went on deck, hoping to see Ben. “I’ll give him till I count to a hundred.” Slowly he began to count to himself, then even more slowly. The empty night and millions of stars made him feel insignificant. Twice he lost count, but then the slightest crescent of moon appeared low in the sky, and it was so achingly beautiful Henry forgot all about counting. “Beauty is truth,” he said, and then out of nowhere the nightmare he’d had that afternoon came into his mind. Please, no.
    The stern hatch opened and like a savior there was Ben. But he walked past Henry without saying a word. Crushed, Henry said tentatively, “Ben?”
    Ben stopped. “Who’s that?”
    “Henry. Henry Thoreau?”
    “Oh, Henry. Sorry. I was a bit preoccupied. And I can’t see you at all. My eyes are still inside.”
    “You were going along the deck pretty well.”
    “I can cross the deck blindfolded. I know where everything is.”
    “Try closing your eyes for a moment.”
    “Okay. They’re closed.”
    “Now open them.”
    “Oh, that’s dead.”
    “Dead?”
    “Some slang I picked up in New York. Dead—the best there is. I can see everything now. How are you?”
    Henry was thrilled that Ben had taken his suggestion. “I’m great, now that you’re here.” Henry surprised himself with his honesty. “Before you appeared. . . .”
    “Being at sea can do that to you. All the things you bottle