Jacob Have I Loved

In 1941, Louise and McCall “Call” Purnell spend the summer crab fishing on Louise’s small skiff. Louise is 13, “tall and large boned, with delusions of beauty and romance” while Call is a year older, “pudgy, bespectacled, and totally unsentimental” (5). They are each other’s only friends. Louise appreciates that Call does not tease her, but she complains that he never laughs at her jokes and is unable to appreciate the information she gleans from Time magazine.

They sell the crabs they catch and split the money. While Call goes home for dinner with his mother and grandmother, Louise returns to her home and gives the money she earned to her mother, Susan. Even her twin sister Caroline’s disdainful remarks about how much Louise stinks and her grandmother’s loud complaints cannot fully erase Louise’s pride in her day’s work. However, that good mood is short-lived. Over a dinner of their mother’s she-crab soup, Caroline announces, “in that voice of hers that made [Louise] feel slightly nauseated” (16), that she is going to spend the summer writing her life story as a record for when she becomes famous. Louise abruptly leaves the table, unwilling to hear more about Caroline’s plans to tell a story in which Louise is only a supporting character.

Chapter 2 narrates Louise’s parents’ courtship and marriage. Her father, Truitt, was born and raised on Rass Island and fought in France during WWI. When he returned home after being wounded, he found that his childhood sweetheart had married someone else, but he fell in love with Susan, who had come to the island to work as a teacher.

As a crab fisherman, Truitt hoped Susan would give birth to sons who could help with the family business. Instead, Susan gave birth to twin girls: Louise and Caroline. Louise, who arrived first, was strong and healthy, but Caroline had trouble breathing and spent two months in the hospital.

Because of the drama of Caroline’s birth, her mother and grandmother have difficulty remembering anything about Louise’s. Louise asks where she was while the midwife took care of Caroline. Susan responds that she was likely placed in a basket but cannot quite remember. When Susan went to the mainland with the infant Caroline, Louise was left with her father and grandmother, neither of whom remember anything about her during that time. Susan sees Louise’s distress and tries to comfort her by saying, “You were a good baby, Louise. You never gave us a minute’s worry” (19), but from Louise’s perspective, the worry Caroline gave her parents made them love her even more.  

Louise recalls a snapshot of her and Caroline as 18-month-old babies. The “tiny and exquisite” Caroline is laughing, her face ringed with blonde curls, while Louise hunkers behind her, a “fat dark shadow” (20). Louise recalls her childhood as one where Caroline continued to receive the care and concern of her mother, while Louise grew closer to her father. Truitt treated young Louise “with a certain roughness” (20), almost, but not entirely like a son. He taught her to row a skiff but would not let her join him on his fishing boat.

The family realized Caroline’s talent for music at a young age, first on the piano and then with singing. Susan takes Caroline to the mainland for singing lessons every week. The costs of traveling to the lessons are high compared to the Bradshaws’ income, but the family makes sacrifices “as a matter of course” (25). Louise is simultaneously proud of her sister’s talent and jealous of the attention she receives, especially as she recalls what it was like to turn 13.

In December 1941, Louise and Caroline are listening to the radio when the attack on Pearl Harbor is announced. In a rare moment of shared feeling, Louise and Caroline hold hands as they contemplate the coming war. Mr. Rice, their school music teacher, is joining the Army and will leave after Christmas. He plans to hold the usual school chorus concert beforehand. Louise suggests that they should cancel, as it would be inappropriate to celebrate while people are dying, but Mr. Rice dismisses her concerns, and the other students laugh at her. After school, Louise runs to the marsh crying and stays there until Caroline makes her come home.

From her place in the chorus on the night of the Christmas concert, Louise is as deeply moved by Caroline’s solo rendition of “I Wonder as I Wander” as she is annoyed by Caroline’s response to the praise she receives for it. Back at the Bradshaw home, Caroline mocks the performance of a less talented classmate, amusing her father but causing Louise to feel more resentment.

Louise tries to pray before bed, but the words make her feel more isolated, “like being with Caroline” (38). Louise recalls her mother’s comment that she never made her parents worry. However, she knows that worrying about someone is part of loving them. She goes on to imagine a scenario in which her parents and sister would be forced to notice and even to defer to her; though the details are few, she specifically imagines forcing Caroline to address her as “Sara Louise,” not as “Wheeze,” which has been her nickname since she was two.

Louise and her grandmother are alone in the house, waiting for Caroline and Susan to return from the mainline, when Grandma complains about hating the water. Louise reflects that, among Rass Islanders, the water is the province of men and a cause of anxiety for most women. She fears a future spent waiting on shore for the men to return from the water. Louise spars with her grandmother, responding to her religious barbs with sarcasm, before backing down. Grandma tells Louise to meet her mother and Caroline at the ferry to help them with the groceries; by the time Louise is ready to leave, her grandmother has forgotten her own command.

Louise meets her father, just returning from his boat, at the ferry. As they unload the groceries into the wagon, a stranger with a big white beard, a seaman’s cap, and a big coat disembarks from the ferry and heads down a dirt path across the marsh. Louise wants to find out more about this mysterious man, but she must help carry the groceries to their home, walking among the tombstones that line the main street.

Rumors spread about the stranger from the ferry. Grandma and others conclude that he must be Hiram Wallace, who left the island decades ago. He has taken up residence at the long-abandoned Wallace family home, which Louise and Call once explored before being spooked by a stray cat. The islanders recall incidents from Hiram’s past, including the young Hiram’s cowardly behavior during a storm on the water that led to his departure.

However, Louise imagines the old man must be a German spy because the house on the water looks out toward the bay where the larger military ships might be seen in the distance. She and Call sneak out to the house to prove this theory; Louise pictures President Roosevelt giving her medals for such bravery and cunning. When they arrive to the house, the old man invites them in for tea.

The old man never tells them his name, so they call him the Captain. He is friendly and welcoming, and he makes Call laugh in ways that Louise cannot. She resents that the Captain, like everyone else, calls her “Wheeze,” and that he finds the name funny. She also feels that the Captain only likes Call, not her, and fears that he will take her only friend away, leaving her with nothing.