The Codman Place
Part Four
"Had Seven Hundred Here"
The
attic was serious territory. No
one …had been in that space. My
grandmother knew this. Actually;
she didn’t know it: SHE COULD
SMELL IT. In hindsight I now
understand that her sense of smell didn’t need to be too keen for
…relativistic-ally… HOW was an antiquarian gonna get “up there”. They’d ah have to go (“talk their way”)
through the downstairs, wangle into the upstairs and then PUSH ON to the attic. The logistics of this maneuvering without…
little bundles of money with rubber bands around them… being dropped every few
feet… did not seem… something one of the hammer-head door-knocking antiques
pickers could “pull off”. And they
hadn’t.
We
moved back to the storage room above the kitchen. My grandmother presumptively opened the attic stair door
…without asking… right away. (This
is a tactical action worth remembering for I have used it, meeting no resistance,
for years. The promptness and
grace of execution extended to an “OBVIOUSLY we’re going THERE” demeanor binds
it’s success ratio.) A short, dark
and enclosed with… lush Maine 19th Century pumpkin pine[1]…
staircase shot straight up to a dim light above. Again, in line, we all bumped up this stairs. I followed my mother who went first. At the top of the stairs was a small
open area but this quickly closed down as rows of boxes and trunks formed long
double lines back under the eves of each side of the …room. It was neat. It was, as attics go, clean. There was just light enough from the small windows at each
end, to see “everything” in one extended gaze. My mother promptly walked down the center isle between the
lines of boxes and trunks. ALL of
these appeared to be FULL. This is
unusual.
I
knew everything was full because I walked behind my mother and she reached
toward any container she thought might be empty only to find, with a slight
tug, that it was full. These
rectangular cubes of dark antiquarian color stood like silent monoliths equally
spaced from each other as if to form… in their own pattern… a Stonehenge or
antiquarian chevet… ! Even with my
weakness as youth I recall precisely my captivation with the precision of this
standing formation AND it’s hallowed ground of “OLD”. Further, and unappreciated by me at this time, but
denoted in private by my seniors, was that as these aged containers stood, it
was very evident that what was “up here” had been “up here” “a long time”. AND… excepting a very few cardboard
boxes at the head of the stairs… nothing had been put up here in “a very long
time”. Even the “head of the
stair” items held urgent fascination.
My grandmother had already picked up an odd house shaped pine box; in
the shape of a reliquary, that was covered with decoupage paper engravings of
American military heroes from the War of 1812. I can offer this precise a description of this object
because I… kept it in my bedroom for the …next decade. At the time… she simply sat it back
down without comment.
By
the time my mother and I had returned from the far end of the attic, my
grandmother had come back from the near half. My mother went up that way but I was held back by that
reliquary passing up from the darkness into the light for a moment and then,
much to my urgent dismay, BACK into darkness before I could requisition a
moment with it. My eyes had seen
“soldiers” and… at the slight noise I began to make next to my grandmother, a
jab on my side shut that sound off.
I learned the hard way to “shut-up”.
When
my mother returned from her quick walk up the isle, almost NO conversation
followed. A mutter from my
grandmother about “no furniture” and “dirty enough” clattered into my mother’s
“old clothes” and “much of it” being “to far gone”. This last was touched with the “new roof?” phrasing that I
have seen deployed by other skilled pickers. A “back-off from the subject” or false trail of chatter is
formed by offering the “When did you… PUT ON… a new roof” even though it may be
pathetically evident that NO new roof was EVER put “on”. This verbal suggestion of proper
property management plays off a homeowner’s persistent phobia of “needs a new
roof” and that means… spending “a lot” of money and… well… that DOES change the
subject AWAY from “the stuff” …most of the time. Here it worked like a golf ball being putted in from the
very edge of a hole for… NO “new roof” had become “sell the house” WITHOUT ONE
“we decided”. Clunk went the ball
into that hole and… down stairs we all went; all the way DOWN TO THE KITCHEN.
How
is that for smooth? Them two had
just looked at a “LOADED” attic and … managed to not only NOT look at
anything but had NOT discussed it in any but the most vague terms with
the owners. AND already LEFT
without these principals making the slightest effort to suggest in anyway that…
the stuff “IS SOMETHING” and they… should look at it if they plan to make an
offer on it? OH is this a wicked
skill perfected! And few can do it
with the slither of a snake shedding it’s skin that my grandmother would do
it. HER snake skin IS PROBABLY
STILL on the floor of that attic where she shed it with SUCH grace that… she
glistened with a glow of monetary intent when the whole group of us caucused
about the kitchen table.
Using
the motions of placing the rubber banded bundles of money on the “These are one
hundred dollars and those are five hundred dollars… each” kitchen table she,
inclusive of “RE-ADD that won’t you please” to my mother of the …little slip of
paper and then… bending over it again herself after placing it in plain view
before all… . “I don’t have enough
in my purse here won’t you get the LITTLE RED BAG out of my glove compartment”
to me and I did that like the “good boy” I received when I returned.
I
had missed a final number? I had,
I supposed for Richard had hundreds of dollars in his hand and his wife was
counting her handful of money and saying “This is right”.
“NOW
AS WE GO ALONG,” said my grandmother “You must tell me WHEN those rooms are
READY and we will make up for what ELSE you decide (note the
deployment of the two words) you DON’T WANT but that is as near as I think we
can figure it today from what you have settled”. (Note the affirmation of the contents…to be understood… to
be resolved and… therefore… no further need to “view” it. The specific and intentional shift is
to presume “all” is “sold” except what THEY “else” “decide” and …must bring up
as “themselves”.) “I will go and
get (her man) and why don’t you get your car while…” and she paused… “I DO
think there IS some paper and boxes in the back of my car so IF you would start
to pack in the UPSTAIRS of the barn.
MIND Richard for he will TELL YOU what is HIS.” She said all this in the round to the
room, then to my mother, then to me and then… to Richard. He nodded his approval of the
directives. His wife had reached
to him for the bundles of money but he had put her aside with one hand and the
folds had been put into two side pockets with his far hand. The wife still held on to the last
bundles and said to no one in particular the she “had seven hundred here”.
[1] : The warmth of this wood; a wide,
smooth, mellowed to a full, often times dimensional in it’s appearance,
surface, enclosed in …centuries of protective darkness (as here found) WITHOUT
the chance for repeated regular surface abrasion is not “a wood” encountered
outside of or… far from… it’s original setting. One may be “shown” “authentic New England pine paneling”, etc.,
but… outside of it’s original and… preferably forever undisturbed (by, for
example. “being painted”) placement… it rapidly looses it’s unique grip on the
eye. Here, as in many other “first
contacts”, I, as an antiquarian, am enveloped within the elegant and….
desperately difficult to actually find these days… only true way to
fully enjoy “why” “people” “relish” this “wood”. More off then not MOST PEOPLE cannot understand what I am
mentioning here because THEY HAVE NEVER, ever, BEEN NEAR such an “original
setting” so “think I’m crazy”.
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