As we moved into the center of the town later near the end of spring my cousin purchased a two-bedroom apartment in a townhouse for he and I to stay at however he was torn away once again a few months ago to go deal with signing off the rest of his affairs in France leaving me alone in this wasteland without even the beauty of spring to keep my itchy trigger finger on my camera.
I only had $70 to my name since after I had taken up my full-time hobby as a photographer be my full-time career I had been cut out of my father's inheritance and my grandmother's will so there wasn't very many places for me to go or things for me to do really except for try and spaced out as much money as I could in order to buy food which soon proved difficult quite quickly.
I have to admit that I was quite humbled by the experience since before trying to be frugal with money in order to make a meal for myself and learn how to cook that meal was never something that I had ever been concerned with as a child or as a man since I had always lived in my parents manor and dinner and even the time or what was for dinner was simply given to me and I simply enjoyed it or I did not eat.
But living here I was confronted with another problem that already made my sour situation into quite the pickle! And that was the fact here that there was not much here for groceries at all and what there was for any sort of groceries was quite expensive not to mention the prices for proper household comforts.
I suppose that it really should not have come as that much of a surprise since most likely all of these had to be shipped in from somewhere else yet still I found it quite amazing but all the things that I could have gotten in France that I'd always grown up believing were essential to a house such as shoe polish, brandy, tobacco, tea, bread, salt, butter, milk, eggs, icebox, were enough to put me on the street.
3.00 fucking dollars for damn bread!
(In 1935 that would have been $56.64)
Apparently, though I was not the only one deterred by this, in fact, I heard young women's not too far from me complaining about not only the prices but the lack of proper women's things.
I turned my head to see a group of women that I did not recognize and would never have imagined seeing in a place like this since all the other woman I had seen other then the nuns were very thin and very frail workers wives or occasionally the wives and daughters of migrants and aboriginals but these women were distinctly higher class and they weren't afraid to flaunt it.
They smelled of sweet talcum powder and expensive perfume and they sparkled in diamonds and were dripping in pearls not to mention that they were all fluffed up in beautiful and expensively made furs.
I recognized the perfume as French perfume and their white leather gloves that they used to hold their cigarettes as being very finely German made but these women were not European or Canadian for that matter they were American and I could tell by their voices and also just something about them that they were most likely from New York or Boston however the beautiful blond woman whose voice I recognized as being the one upset seemed to have a much more southern tone in her voice.
I remember being told as a young man that it was rather impolite to stare at women in public however I hadn't had much contact with people from advanced civilization or really anyone for that matter other than my neighbors and it was quite nice to have a scent other than vodka and wood chips with a dash of wet tree musk assaulting my nostrils.
I almost had half the mind to go over and introduce myself but then I remembered quite swiftly that I was not in the most becoming state of a gentleman.
My hair had grown out and my beard I hadn't even bothered to shave and too long to even be passed off as laziness not to mention that my clothes were worn and ragged to the point where I hadn't even bothered caring for them since not only did I not really have the know-how but I did not have the resources to do so and there was no plumbing to any of the houses so I wasn't able to take a bath for at least a few weeks now other than the time that my neighbors offered me one because according to Nikolai he could smell me through the rafters.
I'm quite sure that the last thing these exceptional ladies needed while doing their shopping was someone who held the appearance of a crazy prospector gone homeless and on the bottle and most likely stank of the last can of beans he had before finally deciding to go to the shops for overpriced bread.
But just as I turned to take my leave I was stopped by the young woman calling out to me.
"Oh, sir! Hello sir! Excuse me, sir!"
I turned around a little bit slowly since I wasn't exactly sure that she was calling out to me but she waved to me and pointed to me indicating that she was indeed calling out to me and so I slowed a little cautiously and stepped a bit forward.
"Umm yes, madam?"
She smiled at me while no doubt still feeling quite cautious herself as she spoke to me in a sweet and polite voice.
She was indeed a very lovely woman, quite tall and had a fair and rosy complexion complete with a beautiful round face, bright blue eyes, and platinum blond hair almost the color of her creamy white pearls.
"I'm so sorry to be such a bother, good sir but you see, I'm having a dinner tonight and you have the only loaf of bread in the entire shop that I and my friends could find! I'm willing to pay you for your trouble sir! we're all new and ladies like us are used to living in such a rough place we can't find anything it would mean a lot to us if you could do us this favor sir?"
"oh, you want the bread!"
"Oh yes that would be so kind!"
This girl seemed kind and she and I were both in the same boat so to speak, I was more than content to give her the bread. In truth I'm not too sure if me getting the bread for myself would really be worth it in the price or in the pay-off.
"Oh, how rude of me to ask such a thing without introducing myself! I'm Bertha Welker my father is General Robert Welker. I bet you've read about the fort Welker's base in the papers, of course it was to be secret but it was out long ago, funny isn't it!"
"Haha! Yes indeed miss Welker, I'm Barnabas Brisbois!" he said with a smile as he took off his hat to greet her and the other young ladies properly then it turned awkward again so he handed her the bread.
"Well thank you Mr. Brisbois god bless!" the ladies then made their way and so did I.
The rest of the day was rather uneventful except for the fact that I mostly struggled this morning on trying to figure out what I could do other than having tea or wine since the cupboards were for the most part empty except for some stale hardtack and strangely dry butter.
Not that I would have really trusted American wine anyway not simply because of my pride as a Frenchman but because the prohibition only ended a few years ago and I'm not quite sure the Americans got their bearings for brewing back and I wasn't about to go upstairs and ask Nikolai for some of his vodka since I already had one sip barely enough to constitute as a teaspoon and it had me coughing up a storm yesterday.
However as the morning transpired into midday I noticed a loud crashing noise from outside in the street and fearing that there had been some sort of accident I put on boots in haste then almost like a horse and ran out to the front lot at the townhouse where I'm at Nikolai and his three sons outside throwing water on what appeared to be a car engine the head somehow caught fire.
I looked over to my left to see a woman who I recognized to be Mrs. Smith the bank owner's wife sitting down on my nearby log crying into her hands while she looked like she would possibly faint any moment now.
I went and spoke to her where I learned that the price of gas had risen so high that she had resorted to mixing her gas with lamp oil and even alcohol since she didn't want people to think less of her husband for being the owner of the bank and not being able to afford gas.
Eventually the panic cooled all down and everyone went home for a good night's rest which for me was quite needed, I fell into my bed and immediately regretted it since I forgot in my tiredness that my bed was just a quilt on a bored and a cheap pillow small enough for a child not an adult man but none the less I was hungry and just tired...tired of everything.
My only entertainment over the months has been writing letters to my cousin and spending time with my Russian neighbors since they are kind people and Nikolai was always open to help me learn about my new home but in truth as I laid down and tried to drift to sleep I couldn't help but wonder if my parents were right and if going home to take over the family business was better than here.