Summer
They meet each evening that summer, when the sun winks at the horizon then hesitates briefly before sinking from sight. A mutual love of the lake binds them, as summer of 1856 blends into fall, so do their two lives blend into one. Not wanting just a summer romance, they ignore the upcoming moment at the end of October when they must go their separate ways, James to study at University of Chicago, Marguerite to her teaching position in the Marquette community.
They plan to view each other one last time as he sails east out of Munising. She will wait upon the cliff’s edge at Pictured Rocks, waving the white silk scarf he gave her as his token of love. She will then travel by steamboat to her small cabin outside Marquette.
October
James watches the prow of the steamship as it negotiates the passage, breaking through morning fog. He gazes up at the marbled cliffs, veined in copper’s greens and blues, and reds and oranges of iron. James wills his eyes to pierce the fog and detect a white silk scarf waving above.
Marguerite hikes through red maples, yellow birch, and dark hemlock, the colors above mirroring those below. Her path culminates at the cliff’s edge where she waits his ship’s passing.
From the cliff’s edge, Marguerite sees the white and red markings on the boat but can distinguish nothing else through the foam and fog. James is somewhere on the boat. Raising her arm high, she confidently waves the scarf.
The fog dissolves into rain, the rain into a brutal storm. The winds fiercely whip at the scarf, tearing it from Marguerite’s hands. She cries out as the storm overwhelms the lake with rapid intensity, and Marguerite’s view from the cliff is lost.
The boat’s rudder breaks off, the vessel flounders; passengers flail, scream, pray to the gods. When at length the storm abates, the steamship lies crashed against the rocky ledge. As James is thrown overboard, his eyes lift to the cliffs above. The last thing he sees before sinking beneath the foam is a white silk scarf plummeting from the skies.