St. Louis August 1872
I remember this particular day with intense clarity. I have turned it over and over in my head, as one might hold a weighty jewel, a sparkling yanû, to marvel at, and reassure oneself that it is real.
After a respectable but agonizing period of four days had passed since the seance, Mr. Weiss came to the house and suggested a stroll around Shaw’s Garden. “Mrs. Boogher mentioned your love of plants,” he explained. “I’ve never paid them much notice myself, so I hope you might educate me.”
We took the streetcar along Chouteau Avenue, where the crowds were minimal. Adolphe said little during our journey except to indicate our transfers. Though he is a man of small stature, he did not hesitate to press a gruff laborer to give up his seat for me, when the stranger pretended to be lost in his newspaper.
We arrived at Tower Grove, at the western edge of the city, and entered
through a stone arch titled Floretum–the flower garden. Each bed
was sculptured around a green sward, a lawn of an emerald hue surely unknown
in nature. We paused before a parterre of showy marigolds in yellows and
oranges, arranged in concentric circles around
The tower was peaked by a Moorish dome in the shape of an onion, topped with an intricate weathervane. One could apparently climb into the structure, as there was a woman and two young girls seated in the arched windowsill looking down at us. The tower flared out at the base with an elegant eaved hip roof, supported by wrought iron pillars upon which vining plants had been trained.
“Does it meet with your professional approval?” he asked. We had barely spoken since we entered; I was caught up in wonder, and he, I realized, had been carefully observing my reactions.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” I admitted. Until then, I’d thought of flowers merely as domestic pleasures, a way to bring nature’s beauty into the controlled space of a home. But this garden was situated amid the churning furnace of the city, and these delicate arrangements from foreign lands were arrayed unprotected beneath the punishing Missouri sun.
We continued our walk via the fruticetum, planted densely with small fruiting shrubs and vines. Early fall bounty was everywhere, and while they were not meant for picking, Adolphe could not resist snatching a handful of swollen grapes for me. When we were sure we were unobserved, I snuck one into my mouth, only to spit it out immediately—it was outrageously sour. “These are wine grapes!” I protested. Adolphe hastily tossed the remainder into a shrub and we continued our walk with our heads held high, two unrepentant vandals.
“When did you come to America?” I asked.
“1866,” he told me.
“Only four years ago? But your English is perfect.”
“I was born in Vienna, it’s true, but my father was engaged in the tea trade between China and England and we traveled extensively. Growing up I heard more English than German, especially after my mother died. When my father also passed away I took over his accounts, and made my way first to San Francisco, and then to the Sandwich Islands in the kingdom of Hawaii.”
And I had thought a steamboat down the Mississippi was the journey of a lifetime!
“It has been an exciting but volatile occupation,” he continued. “I am hoping to make a more dull and steady career with the Express company.”
He directed me to sit in front of one of several broad greenhouses,
perfectly symmetrical, with twin wings of slanted glass roofs. The building
was fronted by chalk white gravel paths, each looping around a circular plot
of calendula. Before us rose an
Flanking our bench was a pair of enormous date palms, as one might have found in the fine parlors of a hostess like Mrs. Boogher. I stroked a broad leaf in admiration until a gardener in overalls gave me a disapproving glance.
“No plant is safe from your grasp!” Adolphe said, laughing.
I was mortified and attempted to change the subject. “How have you found America?”
“St. Louis suits me. I hear German spoken on the streets and I find it gives me a feeling of being home, even if that was home only for a brief part of my life. Is that odd?”
I chose my next words carefully. “No, though I find the place where I grew up brings conflicting memories. I cannot recall the good ones without being overwhelmed by the bad. I prefer to think only of the present.”
He nodded but said nothing, and I wondered how much he had heard of my early life.
We entered the main conservatory. It was exceptionally humid inside, and
smelled of humus and a pleasant kind of damp. The building was divided into
zones designed to emulate all the climates of the world. One section housed
tropical species with huge drooping leaves, big enough to hide a person.
Another collection showcased rare and dangerous plants from as far as
Australia and Madagascar. There was even a simulated desert, warmed by the
sun through the glass on all sides, and guarded by
When we emerged, the sun hung low in the sky. To the north, bituminous clouds from the city factories marred our view across the gardens. In the other direction an adjacent parkland was being cleared and planted, a grand bandstand already visible at its center. To the west the land was still prairie in those days. I felt the city and I were both on the cusp of great change.
“Thank you for a wonderful day,” I said, daring to rest my hand on his forearm.
“I hope it won’t be our last,” he replied.