I knew that Nick would engage Thomas in a conversation, most likely repeating himself numerous times, and that Thomas would be drawn into the Purdues' living room, quite compliantly, to seat himself on the sofa cushion, of which there was only one. The other two cushions had been shredded to ribbons by an enormous stray cat Thelma had imprudently taken in for a day some months earlier, and according to Thelma it had suddenly turned wild during the night for no apparent reason, though I stoutly believe he must have had some provocation. The sounds that we heard through our shared walls that night were unearthly. Nick had managed to encage the animal in the laundry hamper, had driven it to the Saluda River at two o'clock in the morning, and had upended the hamper, depositing the cat into the water.
I heard Thomas knock again, and I heard Nick shout, “I
said
I'm comin', by gum! Can't you hold on?”
While slowly wiping a white dinner plate with my soapy dishcloth, I remembered emerging from a taxi in Marshland, New York, in the early summer of 1973, wondering whether my grandfather was still clinging to life inside the house at the end of the sidewalk. I had turned twenty-nine the week before. As I stepped out of the taxi, my thoughts were a battleground. Though berating myself for returning to the scene of my wretched childhood, I hotly defended my right to do so and was inexplicably drawn toward the front door. I carried with me the same large suitcase that I had watched my mother pack so often when I was a little girl. The taxi driver called something to me, but not understanding his words, I merely said, “No,” and the cab lurched away from the curb with a squeal of tires.
My return to Marshland had been precipitated by a most unusual occurrence. To celebrate my twenty-ninth birthday the week before, I had attended an outdoor summer concert by the University of Illinois Symphonic Band in Urbana, Illinois. At this time I was residing in a small town in Illinois called Monticello, where I was employed as a companion and domestic for an elderly woman of considerable means though limited wits.
On my birthday that year, Mrs. DuBois had given me the day off. Her niece, who lived in Tolono, was to spend the day with her. I do not believe she knew it was my birthday. I certainly did not tell her, and I know of no way that she could have had access to any of my personal records. She was an eccentric woman, however, and often behaved unpredictably. She had merely called me in the night before and dictated that I was to go somewhere the next dayâshe did not care how I chose to spend my timeâfor her niece was coming for a visit and would see to her needs. As I left the room, I had felt something hit my back; she had thrown her car keys at me. “Bring it back in one piece,” she had said as I stooped to pick them up.
The concert took place in the University quadrangle, and I sat on a low stone bench off to one side and behind the other listeners. It was early evening by this time, and I had spent my day pleasantly, first in the public library for two hours, then in a shopping center called Lincoln Square for one hour, where I had purchased a hairbrush and a fountain pen. Next I spent an hour in a park, where I had eaten the chicken salad sandwich that I had brought with me and read several chapters of Sinclair Lewis's
Arrowsmith
, the last of which was chapter sixteen, in which Martin Arrowsmith begins to chafe under the tedium of looking down throats and writing prescriptions and in which his wife, Leora, delivers a dead child.
It was after I read Leora Arrowsmith's mournful words “He would have been such a sweet baby” that I stood abruptly, swept the bread crumbs from my lap, and prepared to leave the park. This is the danger of reading. One never knows what will be stumbled upon, what old embers may leap again to flame.
From there I had walked to a bookshop only a block from the campus and, though my powers of concentration were not at their peak, spent the better part of another hour reading the poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay and snatches of Joseph Conrad's
Typhoon
. I left the bookshop around four o'clock, having purchased a collection of short stories by Sarah Orne Jewett. Before the concert I had also visited the Museum of Natural History on the campus, had eaten a bowl of soup in the cafeteria, and had read the most recent issue of the
Atlantic Monthly
in the University library.
“He would have been such a sweet baby.”
The words had intruded upon my heart more than I would have liked. As I left the library and made my way to the quadrangle, I heard clearly the last words spoken to me by my son:
“I do not want a nap, Mommy.”
He had repeated them four times, each time more slowly, and I had sat on the bed beside him stroking his brow and watching him surrender to sleep.
It was the last time that I saw him outside the throes of physical pain, for when he awoke from his nap that day, he went to the kitchen where a large pot of water was coming to a boil. I was preparing to make applesauce. Though I did not witness the accident itself, it is my belief that Tyndall, having often watched as I adjusted the heat controls under boiling liquids, wanted to help by lowering the flame. He was only four years old. It was in 1966.
I was in the living room at my typewriter when I had a momentary but stunning presentiment of danger. I was transcribing medical records at the time and had just typed the word
lacerations
when suddenly I froze and a blinding terror overwhelmed me. Perhaps it was some small sound that I heard or the shadow of a movement through the doorway, but remembering all at once the water that I had set to boil, the thought gripped me:
Tyndall is in peril
. At the same moment that I bolted from my chair, I heard the screams that I shall never forget. Of course I blamed myself fully. Is there a mother reading this who would not do the same?
I said earlier that when I arrived at the site of the outdoor band concert, I had spent a pleasant day. This is true aside from the troubling thoughts of my son. I was quite accustomed by now to the torment of my memories. They were as much a part of my day as the putting on of clothing. They rushed upon me continually, often triggered by a single word or act, or more often arising spontaneously with no stimulus.
Sometimes it was simply the sight of something as common as a full trash can that brought them on. I still recall as if it were yesterday the first time I noticed that all the trash cans in our apartment were full. It had been Tyndall's responsibility, one of his “chores” as we called them, to empty the smaller cans into the large one in the kitchen, and he had been very proud of the carrying out of this lowly duty. He had been dead for many days when I opened my eyes and saw the trash cans brimming over with wadded balls of tissue. My loss struck me afresh, so deeply that I could weep no more. My tears somehow seemed now but a shallow manifestation of a sorrow too deep to release. I would not weep again, for to do so was too easy an outlet. I would gather and hold my grief within me as a great reservoir.
On the day of the band concert, almost seven years had passed since Tyndall's death. I sat on the stone bench watching the other listeners, most of whom sat or sprawled upon the grass in front of me. The band members were assembling unhurriedly, removing their instruments from their cases, talking briefly in small groups before finding their seats and beginning their disharmonious warm-up preliminaries.
I recall only the first number of the concertâa stirring composition titled
Fanfare and Allegro
âfor it was during the applause following the opening piece that the most unusual occurrence took place. My life seems to have been built upon coincidences. I was aware that someone had joined me on the stone bench, but I had not looked at the person. I knew that it was a man, however. As the applause subsided, I felt his eyes upon me. I turned my head away from him, but when I looked again I could see that he was still studying me. The conductor had by this time raised his arms to begin the next number. I rose and began walking away from the bench, intending to find another place to sit. When I did so, I heard from behind me a low, urgent call.
“Margaret? Margaret?”
Though I had almost forgotten the old fear of hearing my name called in this manner, as from one who recognized me, my heart was instantly constricted with dread. I walked faster, turning my steps toward the Student Union, but the voice followed.
“Margaret, is that you? Wait, Margaret!”
I began running, but still he came.
“Stop, Margaret, I want to talk to you!” He drew beside me and touched my arm. “Margaret! It's meâLester Kirby. Remember me?”
I stopped running and faced him. We were both breathing heavily. “You are mistaken,” I said. “I do not know you.”
But I did. You may remember my mentioning in a previous chapter the youth director at my grandparents' church in Marshland, New York, who had reported to my grandparents that I did not mingle well with my peers at the youth activities I was required to attend. I would have recognized him at once, I believe, had I looked at him when he sat down beside me on the bench, for he had not changed considerably since I last saw him some twelve or thirteen years earlier, except in his manner of dress. Whereas he had always worn a necktie when I knew him in Marshland, even to Saturday youth activities, he was dressed now in a pair of khaki trousers and a navy T-shirt.
He was a fair-skinned man with the soft, rounded features of a child and a mottled flush upon his cheeks. His brown hair, finely textured, curled slightly above his ears. When speaking before a group, I recalled, he had always talked too loudly, in a strained pitch, and had fidgeted nervously with his fingers, intertwining them and clicking his thumbnails together. This he did now as he stood before me.
“Lester Kirby,” he repeated as if to prod my memory. “From Marshland.”
We stared at each other while the band behind us played something slow and stately. It may have been “Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral” by Richard Wagner, but I cannot be certain.
“Leave me alone,” I said, then repeated, “I do not know you.”
“I knew it was you as soon as I saw you,” Lester said.
“Please go away,” I said.
“Look, Margaret, I don't want to bother you. I just wanted toâ¦well, I don't know. I just saw you and recognized you. Listen, Iâ¦I don't even live in Marshland anymore. Haven't for over three years now. I haven't even been back to visit since I left. I still get a letter from Pastor Gibson every now and then, but I don't write back. I just wanted toâ¦to say hello to you. I'm not trying to scare you.”
Lester Kirby's eyes were searching mine, but I read no censure.
“Why are you here in Urbana, Illinois?” I asked.
“Graduate work,” he said, then shook his head. “Yeah, I know, I am sort of old for this kind of thing. Seems like I've been in school all my life.”
I recalled now that while he had served in an associate capacity at the church in Marshland he had been commuting to a college near New York City. I believe that he was studying at the time for a master's degree in some field related to history. Many of the illustrations that he had used in what were called “challenges” at the end of every youth activity were from history, and he was particularly fond of the American Civil War era.
He had somehow come into possession of an authentic uniform of a Union commander and had brought it to church one day, along with a bayonet and bullet casings. He felt strongly that men of ungovernable passions had stirred the nation to a precipitous war, that had men of reason prevailed, there never would have been a War Between the States. This was a view I found to be of interest, though, of course, there is never proof to be had for such conjecture. I wondered now what Lester Kirby's response would have been had I chosen at some point during those Marshland years to confide in him concerning my grandfather's unspeakable brutalities against me.
We must have stood in silence for some time, for when he spoke again, I realized that far behind us the band had ended its second number and a pattering of applause could be heard. “I never knew why you ran away, Margaret,” he said now, “butâ¦after it happened and all the talk died down, I started wondering if maybe you didn't have a good reason. Iâ¦I never knew, though.” He suddenly stopped fidgeting and buried both hands inside his pockets. He glanced down at his feet and then once again looked earnestly upon my face.
“What field are you studying?” I asked him.
“Historiography,” he said. “I'm working on a doctoral degree.” He laughed somewhat self-deprecatingly. “Who knows if I'll ever finish? I'm almost forty and still going to school.”
“One should never be done with learning,” I said.
He asked me whether I too was enrolled in a course of graduate study at the University and seemed almost disappointed when I answered that I was not. I told him that I did not live in Urbana but had come only for the day. Again, the expression in his eyes gave me reason to believe that he wished otherwise. I suppose he was lonely; he did not seem to be the type of man to attract friends easily. He was nervous and retiring. I cannot imagine why he would have taken the position in Marshland as associate pastor and youth director, for he had never seemed comfortable in the role. Even to me as a teenager, he had given the impression of trying too hard to do something for which he was ill suited.
I had always wondered if my grandfather had invented a plausible story to explain my absence after I disappeared from Marshland. It would have been difficult, though not impossible, for my grandparents to disguise the fact that mine was a sudden and unexpected departure. To set the matter to rest, I asked Lester before we went our separate ways whether my grandfather had ever spoken of me after I left Marshland.
Lester grew thoughtful. Once again he removed his hands from his pockets and began interlacing his fingers. “No, at least not that I ever heard,” he said. “It always seemedâ¦odd to me, really, but then your grandfather wasn't the kind of man to say much about anything, if you know what I mean. He sort of kept to himself.”