Bartle Clunes - Chapter 3
El Dorado County, 1949 - The not-so-accidental guest
Dusk was descending when they reached Bartle's winding lane. The storm had passed through, the rain had petered out for the most part. Louvina could see the steep corrugated metal roof of his small house above the back of the rise. The lane was nothing but mud holes. A dry-stone fence ran along the right side all the way up to the house. A few of the boulders had fallen in places and wanted resetting. Some bare young fruit trees stood nearby in the un-tilled field. A nice-looking pickup was parked next to a shed, about twenty yards back. Heavy clouds hung just above the place like wadded up gray blankets.
This yard looks deserted, Louvina thought. It was bare except for a watering trough, a chopping block and flat yellow grass. There was none of the usual debris or disarray one might expect to find on a remote patch of land - no broken wheels, no piles of brush or trash, no rusting machinery. “Your yard is so neat, Bartle, it looks like your house was dropped onto this hill just yesterday.”
“Yes, well,” he nodded, hesitating. “I like to keep things up, keep the chaos at bay whenever I can. It helps me think straight when there is some semblance of order around me,” he said, a little shy, perhaps, to reveal that about his nature. “This house doesn't look like much, I know. It's smaller than I would like. I plan to add on to it by and by. But it is my first try at building, and I will say this - it is sturdy.”
He turned off the engine. Maggie did a little dance, gauging the distance to the ground, and jumped off the back of the truck. He immediately began exploring around all the damp corners and dripping tufts of grass, nose to the ground, to see who had preceded him.
The oddly angular little house had a dark, weather-stained board-and-batten exterior, with two mismatched windows in the front and a larger window on the side facing the road. The floor of the porch sagged just a little. Split cord-wood was stacked to the ceiling on one side of it. A bucket of kindling, an axe and a broom stood near the door. Jutting off the south wall, a small room looked to have been added on.
“Please, come in out of the damp,” Bartle said, opening the door and stepping back. “Let's get ourselves dried off and warmed up.”
Louvina's smarter self told her right then and there that she'd best turn around that very instant, get into her truck and head straight home, as it was near dark. But her curious self would not be denied. She pulled off her muddy galoshes and stepped past him into the house. Maggie slipped in behind them quietly, nails clicking on the floor. He slunk directly over to the far wall next to the stove, turned around three times, lay down and made himself invisible. Attached to the wall near the door was a wooden peg-rail on which hung one leather belt, two plaid shirts and a denim jacket.
“Give me your coat,” Bartle said, “I'll hang it here to dry.” He pulled off his big boots and stood in his stocking feet. He invited her to sit down in the rocker. Briskly rubbing his cold hands together, he said “I will get this fire lit first off. And I think a dram of whiskey would not come amiss, just to take off this chill.”
“I wouldn't say no to that,” Louvina replied, as she slipped off her shoes as well and set them by the door. She noticed he’d already laid his evening fire neatly in the hearth, a man of forethought. She sat and looked around her. His home was quite spare. The walls were rough white plaster, unpainted. There was a curtain at only one window. “This is a fine large room you have, Bartle,” she said. “It tells me you are a man…um …not given to extravagance.”
“No, ma'am. No one has ever accused me of that. I keep just what little I need to be content. If it is not useful or beautiful, I don’t need it.” He handed her a dram of whiskey in an old pewter cup. “Slainte,” he said, a toast reflecting his Celtic ancestry.
Louvina McBean raised her glass and surprised him with the proper reply, “Slainte mhath”. He smiled and brought in a chair from the kitchen corner. They sat quietly for a minute in front of the growing fire.
Louvina sipped at the whiskey and continued to survey the room, learning about the quiet man who lived in this house. There was a closed blue door on the back wall and a yellow door ajar off to the left. The doors looked salvaged, as did most parts of his house, and not intentionally painted those colors by Bartle. In addition to the comfortable rocking chair and small reading table, she counted only a narrow iron cot with dark wool blankets, an ancient dresser, an old record player, a radio, and a small bookcase filled to capacity. His spartan furnishings looked like they were collected from someone's cast-offs, mismatched, somewhat shabby, she thought, but comfortable for all that.
On the table near her elbow were an open book of poetry and a book-marked antiquarian copy of 'A History of Troy'. The last ray of daylight lay gently, artistically, on three apples on the bare window sill. A shrub brushed against the window in the evening air. She thought, if this is all this man needs to be content, then he is one man in a million.
Louvina stood and walked over to get a closer look at a dark painting hanging on the plastered wall. It was a type of artwork unfamiliar to her. She studied it and then noticed two larger works on the other wall and went to examine them as well. All three paintings had bold, wide strokes, thick bursts of earthy brown, russet, ocher. Heavy black pigment looked as if it had been applied with a garden trowel. They were landscapes, but not quite landscapes, and they were surely created by the same hand. She turned and looked over at Bartle, who was watching her.
“Bartle Clunes?” she said. “You didn't paint these, did you?”
“I did,” he nodded.
“No. Truly? Well, imagine that! Right here in this room - a man who can build a house, repair a truck, comprehend Coleridge and paint pictures, too. I didn't think to ever see such a man in these hills,” she teased. “And good-looking to boot,” she added for good measure. Bartle barked out a laugh and shook his head. She couldn't remember ever hearing him laugh before. She turned back to the paintings.
“I surely never envisioned you as an artist, I will say that. You have hidden your light under a bushel, Mr. Clunes.” She returned to the first painting. “Now this, this is very fine work. I confess I don't know exactly how to interpret it, but I definitely feel something when I study it.”
“Thank you, Louvina, for finding them worth looking at. My family did not. My father certainly had no ken of artistic endeavor. He regarded my giving up the work of ranching for the study of art to be a serious error in judgement. He could not fathom why a man, his own son in particular, would want to pursue it. And he let me know often enough that my pictures were not worth a tinker's damn, and said I was wasting my time. So I left. He was a hard man.”
“What a shame that is, Bartle. The man clearly had no vision. He missed out. I am not well-versed on the world of art, myself, but I recognize these pieces as inspired. You have others here, I expect?”
“I do.” Bartle brought the flask over to add a little more whisky to their cups. Maggie had crept over by the fire and was snoring softly, drying out. “I take two or three pieces down to a gallery in Sacramento every couple of months. There is a dealer down there who shows them for me. Buys a few for himself, too, I think.”
“Have you any idea what a miracle it is to be able to earn your living doing what you love? It is a blessing most men have no experience of, don't you think?”
“Yes, I do.”
“I want to see your other work, when you've a mind to show me,” she said, sitting in the rocker. She was enjoying the warmth of the fire and his company. It was now dark out and Louvina had to confess to her foolishness. She leaned forward in the chair.
“Bartle,” she said, “I am sorry to tell you this, I should have told you earlier. My truck, which, as you have witnessed, is a catastrophe on four wheels, has no working headlights. I can’t drive it back home now until first light. I am sorry for it and I am ashamed of myself. I did know better, but this day in your company has been the most fun I have had in a long while and I was in no hurry to let it go. I do apologize for putting you out.”
“Don’t give that another thought,” he said. “This was an uncommon day all around. Why, I climbed into a vehicle driven by Louvina McBean, putting my life in jeopardy. It could have been a perilous decision! It’ll be no trouble to take you back home in my Plymouth and come back to get you in the morning, so you can retrieve your truck.”
Louvina didn't even pause to consider that option. Exhibiting a shocking breach of propriety, she blurted out, “If it is all the same to you, Bartle, I’ll just sleep here on this cot in your living room and then head back on my own when it is daylight. That’d be the least bothersome for you, would it not? I promise, Maggie and I will be no trouble at all.”
Bartle, himself exhibiting a lack of common sense, was not inclined to tell her that the room in which they were now seated, was, in fact, his bedroom and the cot his only bed. “Well, then. We had better find ourselves some supper,” was all he said.
This is so good.
I am rooting for this budding romance and hope that Bartle pops the question some day!