Nathan Long

The air was salty with moisture as the intern stepped out of her car holding the manuscript. She was familiar with this kind of weather, having once spent a summer studying in Edinburgh.

The intern had driven out of the city into the countryside to visit the editor, who now appeared suddenly beside her car door. His smile was a flat line, which seemed to say he was pleased with the world in general, though with nothing in particular.

Instead of looking right at him, the intern stared at the weathered boards of his house, the newly tiled roof. She held the manuscript behind her back.

"You find the place all right?" he asked.

"No problem," she said and looked over at him. The editor wore a nappy, blue cardigan so comfortably, it seemed as though he had been born in it. How appropriate, the intern thought, and drew her head to the sky. "Do you like this weather?" she asked.

"Fine," he said, "I like it fine."

"Good," she said, "me, too." In his presence, everything she uttered seemed clumsy and plain.

"Jo’s fixing lunch," the editor said. "Want to see the place?"

Three months ago, the intern had moved to the city and taken on an evening waitress job, just to work at the journal. This editor was well known within traditional literary circles, and she was lucky to have gotten the position. She had made few friends, for she spent her spare hours reading manuscripts, looking for a story she could present to him, certain of its brilliance—she wanted to find a diamond in the rough.

At first she was suspicious when he’d invited her, after only two month’s work. An older man, way out in the country. She’d turned him down, and for the first time felt a power equal to his silent reign in the office. But then a male confidant at the journal had assured her, "Don’t worry; other women have gone. He brings everyone out there, eventually. And his wife is always around."

The intern felt the manuscript moisten in her hands as they stepped past a gate into the large backyard, which sloped gently down to a pond.

"What have you there?" the editor asked.

"I found this last night in the pile," she said. "Don’t worry, it’s a copy."

The editor nodded and held out his hand.

"It amused me," she said. She tried to speak with humility, but she broke a smile and looked away, out past the fence, where fields of uncut hay swayed in the wet wind.

"I’ll give it a look," he said. His yard was neatly mowed and a pile of grass clippings lay at the edge of his land, collapsed into a perfect dome.

"Good first line," he said. "Ironic, no?"

"Yes, that’s why I thought. . ."

"I see," he said absently, and read on.

They took tiny steps toward the pond. The intern looked in every direction, except at the editor’s face. She stole a glance back at the house, a modest home it seemed now, with a large window on the right. She couldn’t help but wonder if it faced out from the kitchen, if his wife (what was her name?) were watching them descend toward the water.

"It’s getting more ironic," he said, shuffling a page to the back. "An intern, an editor. Very intriguing."

"I didn’t think it was us," the intern said, meaning the journal—but her words now had nuance, she realized. She was not saying too much, like she sometimes did.

They were nearly at the pond’s edge, though the editor kept walking; the pages were held close to his face, for he had not brought his reading glasses with him. The intern let him take another step, then stopped him a few feet from the water.

"Oh!" he said, stepping back. "I would have ended up like Virginia Woolf, drowned in my own pond."

"Yes," the intern said, "though she died in a river, I think."

"Did she?" he muttered, still reading. "I thought it was a pond."

The intern closed her eyes and felt the stickiness of the air. She pictured herself back in Scotland, reading a damp paperback at that small metal table on the far side of a public garden she’d discovered one afternoon. That summer, she had imagined herself a writer as she drank hot cocoa, to keep warm against the chill of the mist. She had even written stories and sent them out, but none were accepted. After being a part of the reviewing process, she doubted a real editor had ever seen the pieces themselves. That’s fortunate, she now thought, and smiled.

When the intern opened her eyes, the editor was on the final page, reading the last few lines.

"‘She drives away.’ How classic," he said, "for such a experimental story."

The intern glanced at the tiny ripples the wind formed on the surface of the pond. Something about their evenness made her giddy.

"Well," the editor said. "Quiet curious, though I’m not prone to that kind of thing." And he gave her a perplexed look.

"Neither am I," she said, "usually. But this one. . ." She could think of nothing more to say in defense, though this might be the moment he would decide. She felt a small choke in the back of her throat and waited.

The editor only gestured toward the house—for it was time to eat—and so the intern turned around. As they walked back up hill, he clutched the pages in his hands, forming a cone behind his back. "Strange weather," he said.

The intern saw his brow furrow. He seemed to be contemplating the air with such sternness, like it were a problem of physics.

"Scottish mist," she said.

"What’s that?"

"They call it Scottish mist."

"They do? Who?" he said, with his familiar grin.

"The Scottish," she said, with what she thought was brilliant nonchalance. She imagined being a third eye taking in the buoyancy of the scene.

The editor laughed outright. "The Scots," he said, "of course."

The intern then realized her mistake, a stupid Americanism. She had been taught several times while in Edinburgh not to use the adjective, Scottish, yet it had slipped back into her speech, unexpectedly, like a crow who descends suddenly into a chimney and flaps wildly through the house.

The editor held the door open and the intern stepped in out of the damp air. Inside, the room smelled of garlic, tarragon, and wine. The editor’s wife came over and shook the intern’s hand. "You’ve come in at the perfect time," she said. She was a large woman and wore simple, cleanly-pressed clothes, protected by an apron, itself spotless. After offering the intern a glass of wine, she assigned her husband a few simple tasks. The editor set the manuscript on the counter and went to work.

The intern thought she would be pleased to see this man slicing tomatoes, or pleased that he knew she was watching, yet he moved the knife with such precision, the gesture seemed without a trace of domesticity. Each slice was exactly the same width and fell carefully upon the last, until they formed a neat, layered pattern, like clay tiles on an Italian roof.

"I’m always charmed to have new interns," his wife said as they sat, "though my rule is to leave work behind while we eat." She might have sounded rude, except for the good-natured lull of her voice, and that she accompanied her proclamation with a bowl of fresh green beans sprinkled with slivers of almond. The steam clouded the intern’s face and gave her a sense of comfort she had not felt since she had arrived.

The three of them ate and talked, not discussing the journal (except once by mistake), the dinner accented by the unobserved clinking of silverware and glass. For a moment, the intern all but forgotten that the man across from her had, for the past two months, held a silent, unnamable authority over her.

After lunch, the editor stood and stretched. The intern offered to clear the table, but the wife insisted no. They brought blueberry pie and coffee into the living room, a large room so completely stacked with books, the shelving wrapped around each window and door. The manuscript, left on the kitchen counter, slowly unfurled in the dry warmth of the house.

The editor looked among his books, drew one down and leafed through it studiously while his wife and the intern ate dessert and talked. After a moment he interrupted them, as though their conversation were only perfunctory, to say that the intern had been right, Woolf had died in a river, The Ouse, her body found beneath a bridge.

The intern said nothing, but could feel herself shining in the room, the wife’s eyes upon her. She sipped her coffee, looking down into the black liquid, which reflected the colorful spines of several books. Everything seemed right, even if the editor said nothing about the story. But why? Because she had been right? The editor then mentioned the weather, telling his wife the term the intern had used.

"Oh, dear heart," the wife said, "you knew that term, Scottish Mist. I’ve heard you use it."

"Perhaps," he said, almost scowling. "I don’t recall it."

His wife’s words were meant only as soft admonishment, but the intern wondered, was the editor only pretended not to know? Was it the same with the river Ouse? What a small game to be locked within! She felt a panic, then an ease overcome her, as though released from all the world and its desires. Perhaps this was how Woolf felt before she sank.

They talked on about the weather, then the journal, until a brief silence—which happens in even the most comfortable conversations—blossomed, and the intern stood, taking this moment to leave. Everyone was gracious. The intern thanked the wife, the wife said it was a pleasure, and the editor offered to walk the intern to her car.

Outside, the weather had shifted, the wind calming and the moisture all but gone. The intern opened her car door, discovering the bottle of wine she’d brought as an offering. She handed it to the editor, saying, "Here," with a brazenness she hoped would overshadow her mistake, though now she was hardly concerned.

"Why, thank you," he said. "And listen." He looked up at the sky—one uniform gray cloud hanging from horizon to horizon—as though he were checking his thoughts against God’s. "About that story: I like what happens in the end. It’s strangely. . . tragic."

"Yes, " the intern said, stepping into her car. She closed the door and started her engine, a wave of thoughts washing through her. She thought about her long drive home through the suburbs into the city, back to her near-barren apartment where a stack of manuscripts lay. She had glanced at them all already, and though none had shimmered with promise, she still needed to read them thoroughly. She would stay up late and get little sleep, for—as she just recalled—she was scheduled to cover a breakfast shift at the restaurant for a pregnant waitress who had called in sick.

The intern rolled her window down. The editor lowered his head so he could see within.

"No," the intern found herself saying, "that story wouldn’t be right for us."

The editor frowned. "It might be," he said. "It is a good story." He let out a thin line of air between his lips. His house seemed large again, behind him. "Let me consider it."

"No," she said. "I’ll tell the author he should send it somewhere else. I think that’s right." She put the car in gear. But before she drove off, she touched his hand, which still rested on the door. She knew it would make him uncomfortable. "The food was delicious," she said. "Please thank your wife."

© 2002 by Nathan Long

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