by R.P. Burnham
Wearing her bathrobe, Becky Paine walked through the sliding door onto the deck and looked at the backyard. With a stockade fence, a row of high bushes at the back of the lot, and several trees both on her neighbors’ land and on hers, the enclosed space offered great privacy. It was small, fifty feet from the house to the back boundary and seventy-five feet wide, but still offered a feeling of expansiveness. At 6:30 in the morning dew glistened on the grass, early blooming flowers, and the leaves, some of them embryonic here in early May. Wisps of fog just lifting as the sun climbed higher lent an air of magic that was further enhanced by the bejeweled effect of the dew glistening on everything. High in a tree a mockingbird sang his entire repertoire. When he did the robin’s flutelike song, its real composer answered from the purple lilac bush, where she knew he and his mate were already building a nest. Just then the female robin with a drabber shade of orange-red on her breast alighted on the lawn and began hopping, stopping every few paces to cock her head and listen. A bee flitted from flower to flower on the acacia bush right below where she stood. It was so quiet she could hear the bumbling hum of its wings. She sighed in contentment. Rarely did the backyard look so lovely, peaceful and lushly verdant. She recalled an English professor in college quoting a poet—Yeats, if she could trust her memory—saying that God was a circle whose center was everywhere. The same could be said for Eden, for if it was a peaceful place of beauty and contentment without evil, then this little patch of green earth was another Eden.
It had been a long painful journey to this contentment. She was perfectly aware that the reason the world to her for almost three years had been a dark, menacing place was the same reason she could now see it as Eden: it was the state of her mind she was seeing in the backyard, and it had changed primarily because of Myron Seavey. He was coming over to the house today to help her with the gardening. They had been on dates every weekend since their first concert in March and had been growing closer with every encounter. Today marked a milestone in their relationship; it would be the first time they met without the formality of a date.
Already she was half in love with him. He was a wonderful man, kind, sensitive, levelheaded, and open-minded. He had very strong beliefs but had a way of accommodating himself to others who thought differently. He seemed to love and respect multiplicity. He was very intelligent and seemed to know everything. One thing she especially admired about him was how healthy he was—not just physically but ethically, psychologically, personally. He had no bad habits and no manias. He didn’t smoke or swear or appear slovenly. He drank moderately. He showed no signs of self-love or self-importance. She respected enormously his fidelity to his sick mother. She knew from Lynn that he had broken up with his fiancée because of that fidelity. He was simply a good man. She was more than half in love with him: she was in love with him.
He was her second love, her dead husband Bill being the first and the reason she’d lived through the long period of darkness. She was one of the thousands upon thousands in violent and gun-crazed America who lost a loved one to murder. Because they were separated at the time of his murder, she blamed herself for his being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that blame became corrosive guilt that ate her life and spirit away. If she had forgiven him for his extramarital affair, he would have been home and safe. But she hadn’t forgiven him, and that was why she knew how it felt to wake every morning to a dull oppressive pain, to get through the day with the presence of absence her overwhelming reality, to think that she would never be free from the weight of sorrow, regret and guilt. Months went by and the grief grew less intense but remained grief. Her predominant impression of those two years was of being trapped in a world of gray like a 1940’s film noire in black and white, where all the ordinary events in life like waking and sleeping, preparing meals, mothering her children, working, shopping, doing chores, all happened just as they would to any breathing person but all without joy or hope.
Occasionally the grayness lifted slightly—when her younger son Trevor spoke his first word “momma,” when Johnny, the elder son, said his ABC’s perfectly just as she had taught him, or when she received some little act of kindness from her friend Lynn MacArthur or her sister-in-law Fiona Sparrow—but more commonly instead of having the gray lift, a thunderbolt would strike and bring her back to the black despair and numbness she felt when she first was told that Bill was dead. The first Christmas after his death became one such time. She fulfilled a promise Bill had made to Johnny the previous spring when he had outgrown his bike with training wheels and wanted a real bike. Bill had told him that he was sure Santa already planned to get him one for Christmas. Johnny remembered that promise when he saw the bike under the tree on Christmas morning. His lip began trembling and then tears followed, and Trevor joined in, not understanding but feeling the sadness, which caused her to also cry. Somehow she got through that sad Christmas, but after the new year the trial of the two Nazi killers started and lasted two weeks, ending with the thug who pulled the trigger getting life and his accomplice five years. The trauma of having the whole affair on everyone’s lips nearly destroyed her.
A few months went by and the pain had faded once again, but other minor events would still unexpectedly spring upon her like a predator and bring it all back. A college roommate called from Ohio to say she was planning a vacation to Maine in the summer. They had been out of touch for years, and Becky had to relive the horror of the murder in her friend’s horror. Another day Johnny was playing with his lego set when he suddenly stopped and a stricken look passed over his face. “I miss Daddy,” he said. Constantly mail came to the house with Bill’s name on the envelope, and telemarketers called to ask to speak with William Paine. Bill’s birthday was a black day, as were other days associated with their life such as the tenth anniversary of their first meeting at Bates College. A hundred articles in the house like Bill’s softball glove had only to be touched and his presence filled the room.
Mostly the way she tried to escape her thoughts was to work very hard. For four days a week she ran the Davenport Insurance Agency. Charlie Davenport, the founder, retired and turned over the operation to her. She had fifteen agents and five clerical workers under her. Often she had to take work home with her, so that even the three days a week devoted to housework and mothering were often workdays as well. And of course all seven days of the week were actually mothering days. She had to get up early, get Johnny ready for school and Trevor ready for day care. She had to plan and cook meals, shop, spend time with the boys and love them twice as much to make up for the absence of a father in their lives. Finally it all became too much for her and she collapsed in exhaustion, having what used to be called a nervous breakdown. She spent two weeks at home, looked after by her mother, who came down from northern Maine to be with her.
During this period of convalescence her friend and neighbor Lynn MacArthur spent a great deal of time with her. It was Lynn who had told her of the rumors that were circulating about Bill and that woman. Before that day Lynn used to tease her a lot. While Becky was obsessive and orderly, a classic type A personality, Lynn was laid back even while being a responsible mother and citizen. But after the separation and subsequent murder, Lynn and she had evolved an entirely different relationship, a serious one of support and mutual respect. Lynn had been long thinking that there was something wrong about this seriousness, for after two years of it in her visits she suddenly reverted to the old teasing. She joked about what a lazy layabout Becky was and wished she could indulge in such downtime. Understanding what she was up to, Becky surprised her by joking in return. “The only trouble with it is gabby women coming for a visit and I can’t escape.”
Lynn sat at the edge of the bed and took her hand. “I’m glad you can joke. It’s healthy. You need to laugh at yourself, but you also need to forgive yourself. Bill can’t forgive you because he’s gone, but you know and I know that he wouldn’t want you spending the rest of your life blaming yourself for the accident that he was at Lowell and Fiona
’s cottage when the two Nazis came. I know Bill, remember. I know what a decent and kindhearted man he was. I remember him telling Johnny not to hurt a bug. If he cared for defenseless tiny creatures, how much more do you think he cares for you and your well-being?’
That and much more Lynn said on that day. For two days after their talk nothing happened. Becky thought about the advice often but without any noticeable change. On the third morning she woke with Bill present in her memory. This was so habitual a phenomenon that at first she didn’t realize something was different. But after listening to hear if her mother or the boys were stirring, she began thinking about the strange feeling she was experiencing. She could see Bill’s face, his blue eyes shining and his hair blondish in the sunlight. He was smiling and looking happy. She could even identify the source of this mental picture. It was the first time they took Johnny to the backyard when he was close to one year old. Everything about the memory was the same; it was how she felt remembering it that was different. The guilt was gone. He was Bill, a fact, the father of her boys and the first love of her life. She was perfectly clear on that point. He would always be what he would always be. He was gone, but she would always love him. He was gone and it was okay.
Looking at the same place he had stood now on this beautiful May morning, she still marveled at the change. Everything was the same, and everything was different. For weeks after that morning she had kept waiting for the guilt to return, but it never did. She had cured herself without conscious thought. She had accepted reality.
It was that experience that made today’s contentment and joy possible. Externally nothing had changed overnight, but eventually she had a few dates with different men, and though they were unsatisfactory the lack of any spark had nothing to do with Bill’s death. Then following her friend Lynn’s suggestion, she got more involved with the community. She helped at a bake sale at the Congregational Church, where Johnny went to Sunday school and Trevor to daycare, and she also later helped decorate the daycare center for a party. Thus last fall when Lynn suggested she join a reading group at the library, she was ready when Myron showed interest in her, and today was proof of how well their relationship was going. The Garden of Eden was in her backyard because she was whole again.
She went inside and had a breakfast of toast, a wedge of cantaloupe and a glass of orange juice; then she got the coffee ready for when Myron came and tidied up a bit. She had to call her brother-in-law Lowell to tell him about the new plan, but even though she knew he was an early riser she put it off. Saturdays he always spent with Johnny and Trevor in an effort to offer them a male role model and to be as much as possible a substitute father to them. He would take them to movies and ballgames, play games with them in the backyard, and do anything else he thought boys would enjoy. Two or three times after storms he took them to the coast to see waves crashing against the rocks, something they loved so much they would talk about it for weeks afterwards and grow excited whenever they heard that another nor’easter was coming their way. In the summer he took them to the cottage at the lake and taught them swimming, fishing and canoeing; in the winter he taught Johnny how to skate and would do the same for Trevor next winter. He had also set up a college trust fund for both boys and financed a scholarship for graduates of Courtney Academy in Bill’s name. For all he did Becky was deeply grateful to Lowell; the trouble was that their relationship was coldly formal and fraught with subterranean tensions. Lowell was good to the boys because they were his brother’s sons; it had nothing to do with her.
She knew she was delaying the call because she didn’t want the feeling of peace and contentment she experienced earlier spoiled by discord. The danger of her day being ruined was twofold: Lowell could be acerbic and unpleasant or the boys might be antagonistic to Myron because he took their uncle away from them. Either would be unpleasant, but the latter would be worse, a thought that made Lowell’s potential danger seem slighter. Hearing the boys beginning to stir upstairs, she made the call.
Lowell answered. “Lowell, this is Becky. I’m calling to ask you to reschedule the boys for tomorrow. Something’s come up today.”
“Oh?” His voice was not friendly. Its curtness was patent.
She stood gazing through the sliding door. On the grass she could see both the male and female robins. “Yes, ah, Myron volunteered to help me start a garden today and will be over at about nine o’clock.”
When he remained silent, she said, “I’m sorry it’s so sudden. We talked about it last night during dinner in Portland, and I got back home too late to call you.”
“Okay,” he said, managing to sound more neutral. “Fiona and I are taking her mother to a movie tomorrow afternoon, but I can see the boys in the morning.”
“Thanks so much. I’m really sorry to inconvenience you, and I really, really appreciate all that you do for the boys. You’ve been wonderful.”
She spoke too fervently, trying too hard, but he took it well. In a friendlier voice than she had heard from him in ages, he said, “Well, I appreciate your saying that. You know it’s a pleasure for me too. How are you and Myron doing, by the way?”
“Fine, thank you. Tell Fiona I’ve got all the baby stuff collected. She can get it tomorrow if she wants.”
Before returning the cordless phone to its cradle, she continued looking out at the backyard. Not a cloud marred the blue sky, and by now it was growing warmer. A thrill of pleasure passed through her body and she smiled in gladness. “Myron,” she whispered. “Myron.”
Then Johnny’s voice brought her back to the quotidian day.
Putting the phone back, she went upstairs. Johnny announced that he had to pee. “Go ahead,” she said, going over to Trevor’s crib. He was four now and it was long past the time for replacing it. He looked up and smiled at her. “Mommy” was all he said, but it gladdened her heart.
During breakfast Johnny asked, “What time is Uncle Lowell coming. I’ve got a new rock I want to show him.”
“Lowell won’t come until tomorrow morning. Myron is coming over this morning to help start a garden.” While Trevor showed no sign of comprehending the message—they had only met Myron briefly when he came to pick her up for their dates—Johnny looked crestfallen. He didn’t say anything at first, but she knew what he was thinking. He had grown very close to his uncle.
While he ate his cereal with his brow furrowed, the silence became unbearable and prompted her to brave a question she had long delayed.
“Johnny, do you like Myron?”
“He’s okay, but…”
“But you were looking forward to seeing Lowell. I understand, but don’t worry. He’s coming tomorrow.” She debated and then rejected as unworthy telling a white lie that he had to go to Portland today on Habitat for Humanity business. Instead she tried to get Johnny interested in the morning’s work. “Myron’s going to help me start a garden. We’re going to plant some vegetables.”
“What about flowers?” Trevor asked. He was sitting in the chair on his knees so that he could reach the table.
“Today we’re just doing veggies.”
“Can I help?” Johnny asked. He seemed very interested in the project now.
“Well, mostly it’s going to be hard and heavy work. We have to turn over the soil and add compost. That part is for the adults. You can help plant the seeds.”
“Is compost the woody stuff?”
She smiled and tousled his blond hair. “No, that’s pine bark. That’s the stuff we put under some flowers and bushes so weeds can’t grow. Compost is manure used for fertilizer.”
Trevor finished his cereal and climbed down from his chair. “What’s that?”
“It’s like plant food.”
“Plants need food?”
“Fish need food,” Johnny said very wisely. “My friends Chuck and Jason feed their fish with little seeds. I’ve seen them.”
“So do plants, but not in that way. They make their own food in the green leaves, but they need minerals and nut
riments to make it efficiently. Just like you two need to take your vitamins to be strong now.”
She got the children’s vitamins and filled two glasses of orange juice. “Okay, down the hatch, and then we’ll get cleaned up.”
She led them upstairs and drew the bath water. Trevor got his plastic boat before getting in. Johnny was beyond such foolishness. Rather grandly he announced, “All I need is soap.”
When they were finished and dressed, she set them down in front of the TV with strict orders not to move from the couch while she took a shower and dressed. As always she was apprehensive during the ten to twelve minutes the noise of the shower wouldn’t let her hear anything. It was one more thing that made being a single mother difficult. The moment she was through with her shower, she poked her head out the door and listened. Only when she heard their voices excitedly talking about something they were seeing on the TV did she relax.
She dressed carefully while trying to achieve a casual look. She put on an old pair of jeans that were tight because of the twenty-five pounds her pregnancy with Trevor had added she had never been able to get rid of the last five. Over her bra she donned a red T-shirt. Red was a much different color from the heather tones she usually preferred, but it felt right. Looking at herself in the full-length mirror attached to the bedroom closet, she was satisfied. She was still very pretty and very shapely and looked much younger than her thirty-one years. She debated wearing lipstick but rejected the idea as inappropriate for gardening. She glanced at the clock: 8:45. She went downstairs and out to the garage where she collected a rake and a couple shovels, which she leaned against the fence. She didn’t have a pitchfork, but Myron had said that he would bring one together with the compost, which he would get before he came.
She was in the living room trying to pick up after the boys when she heard a voice ring out through the screen door. “Anybody home?”
It was Lynn MacArthur. She lived two houses down and often stopped by for a cup of coffee and a chat on weekend mornings.
Becky unlatched the screen door and turned on the coffeemaker.
“What are all the shovels and stuff for?” Lynn asked, but before she could answer Johnny ran into the kitchen demanding to know where Phil was.
“Johnny,” Becky said, “you shouldn’t interrupt adults when they’re talking.”
“Sorry,” he said without a hint of repentance and repeated his question.
“He’s home helping his father clean up the basement.”
“We’re making a garden today. Myron is coming over.”
Lynn’s eyes widened. She turned to Becky.
“It’s something we decided to do at dinner last night.” To Johnny she said, “Okay, march back into the living room while Lynn and I have a talk.” Trevor had started to join them, but hearing this he turned back to the couch, where Johnny rather reluctantly joined him. She watched them settle down. “Myron just started his garden this week. I said I’d been thinking of having one again. I haven’t had a vegetable garden since before Johnny was born. So one thing led to another, and the garden was planned for today.”
The coffee was ready. She poured them both a cup and Lynn put cream and sugar in hers. “Doesn’t Lowell usually come on Saturdays? Is he taking the boys somewhere?”
“No, I asked him to reschedule it for tomorrow.”
“How’d he take that suggestion?” Lynn knew all about the coolness between her and Lowell. They had discussed it often.
She glanced into the living room to make sure the boys weren’t listening. “He was standoffish, but you know I’ve decided any problem will come from his side, so I thanked him for what he does for the boys and told him I thought he was wonderful.”
Lynn sipped her coffee. “And?”
“And he seemed touched.”
“Interesting. It’s because he loved his brother so that he’s acting like he’s been acting. But we both know he’s a good man and that it’s about time he came around.”
“I think Fiona works on him. Besides, he really knows that it was just a tragic accident that Bill was at the cottage because we were temporarily separated. It’s not an intellectual conviction. It’s a feeling.”
Lynn sipped her coffee thoughtfully. From above the brim she asked, “How’s Fiona doing?”
“You mean about her pregnancy?”
She nodded. Huh-huh. What is she, seven months along?”
“Almost eight. Johnny! Let your brother use the paper. He wants to draw too.” When Johnny complied and they quieted down, she said, “She’s getting nervous, of course.”
“Do you think the baby will change things with Lowell and the boys?”
“Probably some, but I know he’ll always feel the boys are special. Besides, they already know their child will be a girl.”
“Fiona will make a softball player out of her.”
She spoke dreamily, probably thinking about how she felt as her pregnancy neared completion. That, at least, was what floated through Becky’s mind. She remembered the almost equal feeling of great expectation and apprehension, but the closer the day got the more her motherly instincts took over and all she had then was the expectation.
A loud deafening roar caused Lynn to frown darkly. It was the sound, all too common in the neighborhood lately, of two boys going by on motor scooters. “Would you believe Phil got it into his head he wanted one of those monstrosities?”
“I still can’t believe those things are legal. Those boys are only twelve and they’re driving motorized vehicles on the streets.”
“It’s even worse that parents actually allow them to have those things. I told Phil he was going to have to wait until he took driver’s ed in high school before he’d ever drive a motorized vehicle.”
“He’s a willful boy. How did he take it?”
Lynn frowned at the perceived criticism, but upon reflection let it pass. “He didn’t like it, but he accepted the verdict as final.”
“What does Gerry say? I remember he talked about getting a motorcycle once.”
This time Lynn flashed a smile. “He wasn’t as easy as Phil, but let’s just say I managed to talk him out of it. The thing that got him wasn’t that they’re dangerous—he just laughed when I told him Olive MacPherson says all the nurses at the hospital call them donarcycles—it was the effect it would have on Phil.”
“So he backs you one-hundred percent.”
“Of course. Isn’t that what husbands are supposed to do?”
“Well, I don’t know,” Becky said seriously even though Lynn was grinning from ear to ear. She regarded the topic as too important to joke about. “Myron’s a feminist.”
“Yeah, he is. All good men are. I liked what he said about A Doll House, how all the laws, which were made by men, stymied women and how most laws—what’d he say, ninety-seven percent?—were laws to protect property, which again benefited rich men.” She shifted in her seat and leaned forward. “You know, I just knew you two were right for each other. I wasn’t sure you saw it for the longest time.”
“Well, I did and I didn’t. But remember when he spoke about Dante and Beatrice? That’s when I saw how special he was. He’d thought about life and didn’t accept conventional answers. But if you thought we were right for each other, what was it you saw?”
Lynn smiled in a way Becky knew meant some teasing was forthcoming. “First, I noticed Myron had an orderly mind. I asked myself, now who do I know has a mania for order? I wracked my brains until I recalled that you had a slight tendency towards that virtue.” Her smile broadened. “A slight tendency, mind you, but enough to think you two would be good together.”
Becky smiled politely, but this was another subject too serious for joking. “That’s not all you saw, was it?”
“No, of course not,” Lynn said, suddenly serious again. “You’re both good people, decent and sane. Myron has sensitivity to others. He’s not judgmental. He’s not self-absorbed.”
“I agree. He’s all those things a
nd more.”
Lynn glanced into the living room at the boys. Speaking confidentially, almost in a whisper, she said, “So how far have you two progressed?”
Becky felt herself blushing. She was a very private person and did not wish to discuss what Lynn clearly wanted to know. “Everything is wonderful,” she said. “Let’s leave it at that.”
Their eyes met. “I’m just inquiring in my capacity as matchmaker. Tell me this, you two are compatible. My instincts were correct?”
She looked away and thought about Myron. Last week he had been on the verge of saying the three little words, but she had grown embarrassed and in the sensitivity to others she had already marked as one of the qualities she admired in him, he had not wished to make her uncomfortable. The next time he was on the verge she was going to act differently. So she could share with Lynn this much: “I think so. He’s a wonderful man. There’s almost nothing about him that I don’t like.”
“Almost nothing?”
“Probably nothing. I don’t know everything about him yet, after all. But,” she added when Lynn’s stare became too piercing, “I just thought of something. You didn’t start the reading group just so I could meet Myron, did you?”
She laughed. “Oh, no. I’m not that devious. I really wanted some intellectual stimulation to wake up my mind. But the more I got to know him, the more I thought of you. So when I suggested you join, I do confess my plan was already being hatched. I’m sure you forgive me.”
They both looked up at the sound of a car in the driveway. Johnny and Trevor heard it as well and excitedly came into the kitchen. Trevor said, “The garden is here!” while Johnny corrected him by saying, “No, it’s Myron.” Becky felt excited too but had to hide it. She didn’t want Lynn to see her as a dizzy adolescent. They all went through the enclosed porch to the top of the steps.
Myron, already opening the trunk of his small Japanese car, looked up and smiled. “I see there’s a welcoming committee.” He was dressed in faded dungarees, work boots and a blue work shirt with the sleeves rolled up. A Boston Red Sox cap covered his head. He looked very handsome and manly.
“Myron, come on in and have a cup of coffee before we begin. Lynn, as you see, is visiting.”
“And leaving soon,” she said. “I try to keep a healthy distance between me and work.”
“Coffee sounds great, but first I’m going to drag the compost out back.”
“Need any help?”
“That’s okay. They’re quite heavy.” He grabbed one of the large plastic bags by the end and started dragging it.
“Johnny,” Becky said, “go unlatch the gate for Myron.”
He didn’t need to be told twice. Instantly he raced down the stairs and around to the fence.
“My, don’t we have a lot of energy,” Myron said.
“I’m a boy,” Johnny said simply, explaining everything.
Becky looked at Lynn. She too was smiling at Johnny’s remark. “Those bags look heavy. We could do get a couple of them together.” So they did, finding them indeed heavy and moving them even harder than they expected. The boys were constantly underfoot, and with her hands hurting she became cross with them and told them to get out of the way. She rather wished now that she had arranged for Lowell to take them to the lake.
But once the bags were safely deposited in the backyard and Myron had placed his pitchfork with the other gardening implements, she recovered her good spirits. They went inside where she poured the boys a glass of orange juice and got coffee for the adults. Like her, Myron drank his coffee black. They sat at the kitchen table while the boys went into the living room with instructions not to spill their juices on the couch or the rug. Some TV show on PBS caught their interest, however, so they were very quiet as the adults chatted.
After declining an apple turnover, Myron said, “I saw Angus at the library the other day. He was brown as a berry and peppery as usual.”
“Sounds like my dad all right,” Lynn said.
“He still wants to do Macbeth when we start in the fall.”
Lynn picked up Myron’s baseball cap which he had placed on the chair beside her and examined it. “That reminds me. I’ve got two more recruits, I think they will be good.”
Myron asked who they were by tilting his head and raising his eyebrows.
“Melissa Brisbane and her husband Ralph. He’s a woodworker and makes exquisite cabinets and furniture. Melissa’s a teacher.”
“I’ve met them. Yes, they sound good. Angus also wants to do some Sir Walter Scott.”
“You don’t seem enthused about that,” Becky said.
He shrugged, “He’s okay, but I don’t think he’s a very good writer. He’s sloppy and really just turns out potboilers. But I could be talked into doing The Heart of Midlothian. I do like that novel.” He reached in his breast pocket and extracted some packets of seeds. “Here’s the seeds, by the way.”
He handed them to Becky, who examined them: peas, lettuce, spinach and radishes.
“I’ve also got some onion sets, and a few weeks from now it will be time for tomatoes. I’m going to start some under lights at home. Shall I start four or five for you?”
“Oh, yes, thank you. A garden without tomatoes is like a day without sun.”
“Myron,” Lynn asked, “what brought my father to the library? Any-thing interesting?”
“He was looking up some facts on Robert the Bruce. He said something about settling an argument.”
“I bet it was with Mike McNabb, his neighbor. Those two are always arguing about who’s best, the Irish or the Scotch.”
Myron smiled. “A little family squabble?”
“It grows even darker, though. Dad has a lot of lowland Scots in him, which is English blood. One time when he and Mike were arguing about cultural contributions of each country, Mike said that the Scotch had a couple of dry philosophers like Hume and Adam Smith and Robert Burns was their one good poet, but the Irish had all the poets and writers. Then he listed Yeats, Wilde, Shaw, Joyce, Beckett, Synge, O’Casey and Swift.”
“I see where this is going,” Myron said with a grin. “What did Angus say?”
“He said that all of them except Joyce were really English and Protestant.”
“He’s right. What did Mike say to that?”
“He denied it and got so mad they didn’t speak to each other for two weeks.”
Myron touched Becky lightly on the shoulder and smiled. “Shows you how dangerous facts are.”
She smiled back, but feeling the thrill of his touch she was momentarily speechless.
Lynn’s loud laugh saved her from embarrassment. “My father will love that one,” she said.
Composed now, Becky said, “Do you groan or smile when you see Angus walking into the library?”
“Oh, I smile. I don’t run and hide. Believe me, with some patrons that’s what I want to do.”
“If I were you, I’d hide from my father. That man can be trouble. But you have to serve the public, don’t you?”
“That’s me. Service with a smile. By the way, did either of you notice the article about the mercury poisoning case in last night’s paper? I just saw it myself this morning.”
“Yes. I think it’s awful that poor little boy was poisoned,” Becky said.
“Olive MacPherson says the boy is slowly getting better, but he had such a massive dose of mercury he may have permanent damage.”
Myron looked at Becky. “Remember that young man I told you asked me about Ridlon Recycling? Chris Andrews is his name. Did you see in the article he claims now to have proof that it was Ridlon.”
“Of course Ridlon denies everything and is outraged,” Lynn said. “Gerry says he’s a very powerful man and has friends in high places. Let me guess—”
“He’ll finagle his way out of it,” Myron interrupted.
“Yeah, probably.”
“If he did it, I hope he gets punished,” Becky said vehemently. “To poison a child just to make extra mone
y, it’s despicable. He’s despicable.”
Lynn rose and brought her cup to the sink, where she rinsed it out. “Yes, he probably is, but he wouldn’t be the first one to get away with murder. But I’ve got to go and leave you two to your labors.”
They saw her out and then immediately got to work in the backyard. After checking the sun and discussing various alternatives, they chose for the site of the garden an area near the back fence that had a southern exposure offering the most light. First Myron marked the boundaries of about six feet by eight feet by using the shovel to cut a line in the grass; then he began turning the soil over with his pitchfork. The boys had accompanied them to the backyard, of course. Myron found a chore for them to do, which was to pick through the mounds of earth his pitchfork turned over and extract any rocks they could find. They did this for about half an hour before they showed signs that they were getting bored with and tired from the work, at which time they were liberated and allowed to go play on the swing set. Becky took their place, wearing a pair of work gloves to protect her hands as she pawed through the soil. During this intensive labor they were all business, and the only conversation concerned matters at hand. Myron commented that the soil looked dark and healthy. Becky asked for instructions when they came upon a tree root. A large white grub was examined and shown to the boys. Placement of the different vegetables was discussed. The work was hard, and twice Becky asked if he needed a rest, but he said he would rather get all the soil turned over first and then have a rest before they mixed in the compost. After an hour and a half they finished the first stage of the operation and took their break. They went inside and had a glass of water and a bathroom break before settling at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee. This time Myron accepted the apple turnover. The boys had got a soccer ball out and were kicking it around in the backyard.
Myron, watching them with interest, said, “Hard work makes me hungry, but those boys seem to have inexhaustible energy.”
“Unfortunately they do, which makes it necessary for a mother to try to match their energy level. I hope you don’t mind the work.”
“Oh, no. I like gardening.”
“I do too. I find it relaxing. What is it you like about it?”
Myron finished his turnover and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. “I find it relaxing too, but I like it for many other reasons. To explain them, I’d have to get philosophical. Are you ready for that?”
She smiled. “Of course.” She leaned forward like a student prepared to listen attentively to her professor.
“Well, it’s the perspective it gives you. All week long I wear a colored rag around my neck that constricts my breathing and makes me an official, card-carrying member of the middle class. I’m a regular civilized man. I have a role to play, the role of a librarian. Don’t get me wrong. Mostly I love the work, but when someone asks me what’s a good stock to invest in when I’d much rather have a question about what the Reformation and Luther did to make possible modern democracy or why Saturn has rings, I feel as spiritually constricted as my tie makes my neck feel. But gardening is not playing a role. It has nothing to do with classes and the way society divides people. It’s real. It’s elemental. People for thousands of years tilled the soil for their sustenance. It’s direct, working with the earth itself. The tomatoes you grow aren’t packaged in plastic and sold by the pound with a middleman making eighty percent of the profit. So it’s a way of connecting to our human past. Dirt and sweat and planning for the future are real. Have you ever heard the lines from William Morris’s The Earthly Paradise?
When Adam delved and Eve span
Who was then the gentleman?
“Those lines speak to that desire we all have to just be human without barriers, to have equality. It’s probably what lies behind the yearning for a golden age and a return to Eden.”
She had listened to his dissertation closely because anything he said was interesting to her. Now she saw a connection. “Funny, I was just thinking of Eden this morning. I came out on the deck when I first got up and looked at the backyard. It was so peaceful and so beautiful that that’s what I thought about. It was how I imagined Eden.”
“I know the feeling. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does you feel special and privileged to be alive. Even in winter sometimes when I’m cross-country skiing and the sky is blue, the snow white with blue shadows and the trees shining, I feel as if I’m seeing Eden.”
“I’m sorry you get a lot of boring questions at the library.”
“This week, besides Angus’s visit, I actually got a very interesting question about the universe.
“From a student?”
He nodded. “A high school student who wanted to write a paper about the end of the universe. He’d seen a Nova program on PBS about the conflicting theories and got interested.”
“What are they?”
“The conflicting theories? Either there’s enough matter in the expanding universe for gravity to win out and have the expansion collapse back on itself, or if there isn’t enough matter it will expand forever and eventually become cold, inert matter.”
“I don’t know,” Becky said. “I find such ideas depressing.”
“Oh, I don’t. Not necessarily at least.” He leaned back and took his knee in his hands. “First of all because it’s an impossibly remote event in time. Twenty-five billion years from now—something like that. But secondly it’s true. The universe will end and with it the end of time happens. There will be no consciousness anywhere. That sounds pretty bad, but what I like about it is that it forces you to think beyond materialism. Science answers questions of how. But the really important questions ask why. Why is there a universe and why are we alive? Those questions lead to spiritual considerations. When the end of time comes everything will be lost. All human knowledge, even Shakespeare and the best of humanity, will be lost, will be gone. Memory will be no more. Yes, these are awful things to consider, but they are the kind of things a Unitarian librarian finds himself thinking about. They force you to ask how one must act to live well. Remember when we did The Heart of Darkness and talked about Kurtz’s “The horror! The horror!”? He was enacting his own doomsday. He was self-judging himself. It’s a very Protestant thing, even though Conrad was a Catholic. When the day comes that I step into eternity, I want to know I wasn’t a mean, sniveling sneak thief of a man, that I wasn’t blind to the wonders of the world, and that I did no harm. I want to be on the side of light when I step into darkness.”
He was speaking so fervently that Becky felt a strange awe. She knew he was sharing his deepest being with her. She reached out and put her hand over his. Their eyes met. “I know you’ll have a clear conscience always. It means a lot to me that you’re here today.”
“It does to me too,” he said simply.
The sounds of Johnny and Trevor squabbling disrupted their intimate and philosophical conversation. Becky went to the sliding door, called them in, gave them each a granola bar and a glass of lemonade, and then had them pay a visit to the bathroom. While all this was occurring Myron repaired the sliding screen door by clearing out caked-on dirt in the track. The door had jumped its track when Johnny pulled it open too quickly. It had been doing this for months, but after his repairs it operated perfectly.
The gardening was easier now. With his pocketknife Myron slit the plastic bags of compost and poured them on the ground, where Becky consolidated the compost into the soil using a rake.
The boys went back to their soccer playing. Occasionally the soccer ball would bounce into the garden, from where Myron deftly kicked it back to them. After a while it became obvious that the ball ended up in the garden too often to be an accident. As a result a spontaneous break occurred. Myron showed Johnny how to kick the ball on its side to give it spin and make it bend. Johnny tried it several times without much success, so Myron demonstrated in slow motion exactly where to strike the ball. “If you get good at it, you’ll be able to go around the wall in a penalty k
ick.”
He asked Johnny if he played at school or in a boys’ league, and after Johnny said that he did, he returned the question to Myron.
“Yes, I played on the varsity team in high school and played club soccer in college. I was an attacking midfielder most of the time.”
“Uncle Lowell doesn’t play soccer. He plays baseball.”
“I bet he’s good at it.”
“Yeah, he is, but now he plays softball. When you get older, see, you play softball.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that.”
“He shows me stuff about hitting and fielding, but you can be my soccer coach.”
“Me too,” Trevor said. “You can be my coach too.”
“Okay, it’s a deal.” He put his palm out, and both boys, knowing what to do, slapped it.
“So, Trevor, how are your soccer skills?”
“He’s not very good,” Johnny said.
“I’m just learning. Johnny says that I’ll never be any good.”
“You’re just a kid, that’s why,” Johnny said. He gave his brother a sharp look, as if to accuse him of snitching.
Becky watched this interaction very carefully while pretending not to. The one thing she was thinking about when she told Lynn she didn’t know everything about Myron was how he got along with children. He always saw them so briefly when he came to the house that there was no real way to draw any conclusion. But now the question was answered. Myron, the perfect man, was good with kids. Her heart swelled with love, and she felt tears well in her eyes. Embarrassed, she turned away and rubbed them.
Trevor was showing Myron his kicking skills, which confirmed Johnny’s assessment of his brother: they were very rudimentary. He kicked the ball without any control. It could go anywhere. Once, comically, he actually kicked the ball perpendicular to the direction he was facing. “That’s a move guaranteed to confuse a defender, Trevor,” Myron said, but Johnny was less diplomatic. He snickered.
She was about to chastise him, but Myron already had the situation under control. “Johnny,” he said, speaking very gently, “I bet when you were first learning to kick a soccer ball it didn’t always go where you wanted. But you learned from your mistakes, didn’t you?”
Very solemnly Johnny nodded.
“Well, so will Trevor.”
“Here,” he said, picking up the ball, “watch my foot, Trevor, while I kick it. I’ll do it slow so that you can see. I want to put the ball under the first swing. See where my foot strikes the ball?” He did it in slow motion and the ball went right under the swing.
Trevor tried it three or four times without much success, but his next kick was perfect.
“That’s a good one, Trevor. Good shot!”
Johnny wanted to try it, but Becky said, “Johnny, Myron and I have to get back to work.”
“Okay, we’ll just do a couple, Johnny.”
He kicked a couple without much enthusiasm, and Trevor, catching his mood, looked crestfallen too. Myron exchanged a glance with Becky. “We do have to finish the garden, boys, but I tell you what. If it’s okay with your mother, after we get the gardening done we’ll all go out to lunch. How’s that sound?”
It sounded good to them. They recovered their good spirits and even seemed to take care not to interfere with the work of finishing up the composting. Another twenty minutes passed and the moment came. Myron picked up the seed packets and handed them to Becky. “Here are the seeds. You do the honors. We’ll have to pray to Ceres that the garden will prosper, and of course aid the gods by watering after we put the seeds into the ground. Whichever works best doesn’t matter as long as we get a garden green. I do recommend watering, though.”
She knew behind his jocular tone he was expressing a faith in the future. She felt it too. These seeds, tiny, hard and seemingly inert, held the promise of future nourishment. That was how life was—just like love.
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