The Season of Migration by Nellie Hermann

Author:Nellie Hermann
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780374711733
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

December 10

Dear Theo,

No doubt you remember my friend Harry Gladwell, whom I lived and worked with in Paris—the one who took over my position when I left Goupil’s? He must be your colleague now; I admit this is strange to think about.

Harry and I used to stay up late in our tiny apartment and read together passages from the Bible; he was new to it, and I was just coming into my fervor for it then, having recently left London and becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the art-dealing life. I remember I dragged Harry to countless sermons on our off-hours, walked him to churches all over the city to listen to different preachers and sit in different halls of worship. He said he was interested, and humored me well, but often I could see he was tired, his hair falling in his face and his feet dragging, and had only come with me so I wouldn’t be alone. I suppose I did a lot of that with you, too, didn’t I, when we were young—though then I dragged you to birds’ nests rather than to churches.

I was thinking of Gladwell today, remembering a trip I took to London to see our sister Anna—must have been three years ago now—and how I stopped off along the way to see Harry’s parents. I was in Ramsgate, England, at the time, working at that boys’ school on the coast, and every day at dusk I would walk along the ocean. It never ceased to be amazing, watching how the day waned, the waves growing luminous in the slowly dimming light, the seagulls flying lower and seeming to hush out of respect for the ritual of the coming night. I would take off my shoes and walk barefoot in the sand, enjoying the sensation of the grains against my feet. Occasionally I saw a seal emerge from a wave, its dark, massive head turning to calmly observe me before going under again, and I thought of how at ease the creature was in the ocean, which was such an inhospitable place for me. Some evenings I walked so far away from the school that I missed supper and was late putting the boys to bed, arriving back long after dark, making my way back by the light of the swinging beam of the lighthouse.

Those walks were a great balm to the confusion that roiled in me then; they encouraged me, with their joyful solemnity, to continue on despite my fears. I walked for hours and hours, back and forth over that beach, when I was preparing my very first sermon, which I gave at the little church near the school.

I remember all of that so well, and it is so strange to think of it now. I paced the floor the whole night before I gave that first sermon, wanting so much for it to go over well, hoping I was not keeping the boys, who slept in the room with me, awake with my feverish movement.

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