The Nearly Complete Works, Volume 2

by Donald Harington

  “Let’s not talk like that, okay?” she will request.

  So we will—that is, I will—abandon the first person plural for the remainder of this untying of knots. But for a while there I will have liked to have thought, correctly I will hope, that I will have been including you in our story, as I will have been occasionally but consistently aware of you throughout. A good denouement will not merely untangle the knots of a story but will attempt to unscramble the reader’s feelings, or, to use the overworked analogy of narrative climaxes and sexual climaxes, a good denouement will leave you sighing in dreamy contentment, exhausted but satisfied.

  I will first, before taking her to see her mother, persuade her to go to Fayetteville, the Ozarks’ most civilized city, for a variety of purposes: to obtain the latest things in the way of a whole new wardrobe, to have an ophthalmologist examine her eyes and fit her for contact lenses as well as an assortment of eyeglasses, to visit a dentist for some evaluation, x-rays, and cleaning (the man, Dr. Michael E. Carter, will express amazement to learn that she hasn’t been to a dentist for a dozen years, and he will tell her that her teeth will be lovely once they are cleaned, and he will remark, “Looks like you haven’t been to a hairdresser in a dozen years either.”)

  Although she will be smiling with clean teeth at her new ability to see the world in sharp detail, it will have been a major problem to have persuaded her to allow her hair to be cut.

  “No,” she will have said, holding her long tresses in her two hands, “this is something I did. I haven’t done very much, but I grew this hair, and I plan to keep it.”

  “For how long?” I will have asked rhetorically and heuristically. “Until it reaches your ankles?”

  We will have had several lover’s quarrels centered around her locks, and I will have almost been swayed by her contention that the long hair will have been a symbol as well as a crest betokening her freedom, her originality, and her history. I will have admired her greatly on the one warm day that, totally nude like Lady Godiva, she rides Desire long enough for me to have photographed her long hair streaming down the mare’s flanks. But I will slowly and methodically have brought her around to the realization that her hair will have stood in the way of her introduction to (I will almost have said “return to”) civilization. And it will have been her desire to look her best when her mother will have first laid eyes on her that will, in the end, allow her to be taken to a Fayetteville establishment called Dimensions, where she will submit herself to the artistry of the town’s best hairdresser, Patti Stinnett, who will cut Robin’s impossibly long hair. The ends will be split, but Patti will know what to do, and the result will both startle and delight me. I will next want to stop at a good bookstore for a thesaurus, because I will have run out of fresh ways to tell Robin how beautiful she is. We (and I will be speaking only of she and I) will go to some fine restaurants and stay at the best hotel before heading down the Interstate toward Little Rock.

  When Robin Kerr will meet Karen Kerr Knight on the latter’s doorstep in the old Quapaw Quarter neighborhood of Little Rock, the former will be radiant in her beauty, neatness, stylishness and general marvelous attractiveness. The two women will only vaguely resemble each other, although I will suppose they might pass for sisters. I will note that Karen will seem to be several years younger than myself. She will of course not show any recognition at all of this old guy and this stunning blonde movie star standing on her porch.

  “Hello, Mommy,” Robin will say with a clean and lovely smile.

  Karen will need a very long moment, not to recognize her long-lost daughter, but to accept the reality and the loveliness of the apparition. She will not be able to say anything. She will burst into tears. Blinded by her tears, she will reach fumblingly to embrace Robin; her hands will find her at the same instant Robin’s find her mother, and I will admire the neighborhood while the two women have a long embrace.

  Then Karen will examine me critically. “Is this him?” she will ask. “Is this the man who kidnapped you?” I will be afraid for a moment that she will be about to strike me, and I will reflect, as I will have done more than once before, that the difference between Robin’s age and mine will be approximately the same as that between the kidnapped Robin and her abductor. “But you said he was dead,” the woman will answer her own question.

  “This is the man who kidnapped my heart,” Robin will say.

  “Well, don’t just stand there,” the woman will say nervously to both of us. “Come inside. Have some refreshments. Meet my husband. Meet your brother.”

  It will be an early Saturday afternoon, and we will be there for the rest of the day. Karen will require a long time to get her hysteria under control. She will be totally beside herself as she will introduce us to her husband, Hal Knight, and to their son, a boy of five or six named Richard, or Dicky, who will at least five or six times ask Robin, “Are you really my sister?”

  Conversation in the beginning will be ridiculously trivial. Karen: “Where did you find that gorgeous dress?” Robin: “At Colony Shop in Fayetteville.” Hal, to me: “What do you do?” Adam: “I’m retired. I ran a cooperage in California.” Hal: “What’s that?” Adam: “They make wooden barrels for the wineries.”

  Then Karen will have a flood of more serious questions, punctuated by practical questions from her husband, the professional questioner.

  Karen: “Are you all right, honey? I mean, are you completely okay?” Without waiting for Robin’s answer, she will ask me, “Is she sound? Is she having any bad problems, here—” she will touch her head “—or here.” She will touch her heart. Flattered that my diagnosis will be sought, I will answer, “Your daughter is a survivor. She has endured indescribable adversity, but she has emerged from it with all her faculties intact, and a heart of platinum.”

  Karen and Hal will stare at me with thanks, and Karen will ask, “How did you two meet?”

  Robin will answer that one. “The house where I have been living all these years was his boyhood home, and one day—in fact, it was my last birthday—he just showed up.”

  Hal will ask: “Of course I’m very eager to know who took you to that house in the first place.”

  “His name was Sugrue Alan,” Robin will say.

  Hal will smite himself on the brow. “I knew it,” he will say. “He was my number one suspect, but because he was a police officer I couldn’t seem to persuade the others that we should go after him.”

  “Where is this house?” Karen will ask.

  Robin and I will have agreed, in advance of our coming here, that we will always respect our privacy by not divulging the whereabouts of our domicile to anyone who will not already have known it, namely George and Latha. We will also have agreed that we will never tell anyone who does not already know it, namely only Latha, not George, about in-habits.

  “It’s in the Ozarks,” Robin will say. “I’m sorry but I really can’t tell you where.”

  “You don’t want me to come and visit?” Karen will say. And before Robin can answer, Karen will have a barrage of additional, possibly related questions. “You’ve really drifted apart from me during all these years, haven’t you? Don’t you blame me for a lot of things about your childhood? Aren’t you holding a lot of stuff against me?”

  “No, Mommy,” Robin will say. “I have the most happy memories of living with you and I have missed you terribly. But as I tried to tell you in that note I sent, I want with all my heart to stay there, so I can’t tell you where it is. Not that you’d try to prevent me from staying there, but just that you’d know how to find me.”

  Hal will say, “You know of course that I could probably find out very easily where you live. I could simply find the locations of any places where Madewells have lived and check them all out. So you might as well tell us.”

  I will respond to that. “Your investigation, Hal, is over, and your case is closed. The victim has been found, and the perpetrator is dead.”

  “How did he die?” Hal will ask.


  Karen will add, “You said in that note you’d tell us all about it. So tell us.”

  For the next hour or so, Robin will deliver a remarkably concise but comprehensive synopsis of her entire experience on Madewell Mountain, omitting, as we will have agreed, any mention of myself in the form of a twelve-year-old in-habit.

  At one point, little Dicky will wander out of the room, and his mother will take advantage of his absence to ask Robin, “The monster repeatedly raped you, didn’t he?”

  “Not even once,” Robin will say. “He was a sick man, physically as well as mentally, and fortunately for me he was impotent.”

  “Why didn’t you try to escape, after you’d shot him?” Hal will ask.

  “I was eight years old. I had tried to escape, but got lost. The trail that he had used to take me there was destroyed in a rainstorm. Winter was coming, and snow was on the ground.” Robin will sigh, and will take a deep breath. “But even if rescuers had shown up in a helicopter, I would not have wanted to leave. I had several pets. I still do. I love them. And I love the mountain. Adam never wanted to leave, but they made him do it. And now he has come back. And he and I will live there happily ever after forevermore.”

  A long silence will seize the room after that, as if there is nothing more to be said, and in a sense there will not be. Or it will all be denouement. It will soon be time to leave.

  “Let me show you the house,” Karen will offer her daughter, wrapping an arm around her shoulders, and the two women will leave the room.

  Hal and I will step out onto the porch to light our cigarettes. Robin will have nearly broken me of the nicotine habit, but it will be an addiction, after all, and I will need some time. I will need some time.

  “You will need some time,” Hal will say, surprising me, as if he will have been reading my mind. But he will not be referring to the breaking of my nicotine habit. “She’s young enough to be your daughter, and she’s probably just very grateful to you for coming along when you did, but now that you’ve helped her to find the rest of the world again, she might grow tired of you or she might discover someone else, you know?”

  “I’ve considered that possibility,” I will grant. “I’ll take my chances.”

  “But thank you very much for returning her to us,” he will say.

  “It’s just a temporary loan,” I’ll point out.

  “You won’t mind if I run a check on you?” he will ask. “Just routine. Just to see if you have any priors, or anything questionable in your past.”

  “My whole past was questionable, but you’re welcome to check it all out.”

  “The name of the company you worked for?”

  “Madewell Cooperage, Inc., St. Helena, California.”

  “Oh. You own it?”

  “I did. I sold it.”

  He will notice my SUV parked at the curb. “Nice wheels,” he’ll say. “You going to be able to take good care of our Robin?”

  “The best,” I’ll say.

  And there will really not be much more to be said. All the knots will be free, straight, clear. We will live happily ever after forevermore. I will take the very best care of Robin. And she of me. We will want for nothing. The homestead on Madewell Mountain will have all the comforts and amenities that we will desire or will discover through our subscription to Architectural Record. I’ll be an old man, and Robin in her elegant forties, before she will finally succeed in spending the last of the money from Sog’s heritage. We will have taken trips to England, France, Germany and Italy, with pleasurable layovers in our favorite city, New York. But our happiest memories will be of the thousands of days and nights on Madewell Mountain, in the fragrance of oakwood, the sound of the nightingales, the taste of wild strawberries, and the sight of lightning bugs. With all of our pets, including those that Hreapha will surprise Robin with on her subsequent birthdays.

  In time, the marvelous menagerie of Madewell Mountain will have two human additions, children born to us. Robin will name the first, Deborah, after the prophetess and singer of the Book of Judges, and I will name the second, Braxton, after my grandfather who built our homestead.

  Each year on my birthday I will receive from California a carton of twelve bottles of the very finest private-stock Pinot Noir, with a card inscribed “Many happy returns, André,” and each year for his birthday I will send to him the monetary equivalent in the form of a single barrel made from Madewell Mountain oak by the loving hands of Robin and the strong hands of myself. Our only hobby, hers and mine, will be the making of barrels—burgundy and bourbon barrels, as well as churns and piggins and firkins. And whenever we finish one of the latter, she’ll say, “Did you say ‘fuckin,’ Adam?” and we will of course have to do that.

  It will be so easy for us to live in the past, and to remember, to speak of, to reenact the scenes of our puberty together. Believing sincerely in in-habits, we will discover that Robin will have an inhabit of her own, who will be able to become any of the ages she has been, and to consort with my in-habit happily ever after. Our in-habits will cohabit.

  There will remain only one chapter in this story, and Robin’s in-habit will have it. There will remain only one more wonder in this wondrous journey: the moment when your in-habit, dear creative reader, will come into existence and will take possession of these pages.

  Chapter fifty

  Her mother will have said to her, when alone, “It just kills me that you grew up missing out on so many things. Don’t you ever think about all the things you missed?” And although she will have nodded in acknowledgment that she will indeed have, her mother will have begun enumerating all the things she will have missed: education, friendships, fun, and knowledge of current events, of the world, of things like etiquette. “Every mother wants to teach her daughter some manners,” she will have said. “But I was deprived of that chance. I was deprived of the chance also to help you with your social life, with boys, with going out on dates. My God, you never had a date! With nice boys your own age. And here you’ve taken up with that man and have nobody to compare him with! He’s handsome and well-spoken and courteous, but he’s the only guy you’ve ever known, except for that bastard who stole you away from me. It just kills me that you’re planning to marry him and will have to live the rest of your life without knowing if there might be a far more desirable man.”

  “I’m not planning to marry him, Mother,” she will have said. “He has been married before, and doesn’t think much of the institution.”

  “Really? So you’re just planning to go on living in sin together up there in your hideaway?”

  “Mother, I’ve read the Bible several times, cover to back. It was practically the only book I had to read. I have a pretty good idea of what sin is. Adam and I are without sin.”

  “Do you mean he’s impotent too?”

  Robin will have laughed. “Far from it.”

  “I guess the point I’m trying to make is that you have nobody to compare him with. How do you know if another man might not be…better in bed?”

  “If any man were better in bed than Adam, he would be too much for me.”

  “Oh, let’s not get to talking about such things, but I just want you to know how much I missed you, and how much I cried for you, and how much I will always regret all those lost years of your life.”

  “You never forgot me, did you?”

  “Of course not! And your stepfather and I never stopped looking for you. Your Grandpa Spurlock is still looking for you, so you’d better let him know that you’ve been found.”

  Robin will be keeping lists of things to do, and she will add to that list a visit to Pindall to see her grandparents. She will not have mentioned to her mother the fact that Adam once met Grandpa Spurlock on the trail leading up to her Madewell Mountain aerie, and that if on that occasion either Grandpa or Adam had found her, she would have been deprived of some of the most wonderful adventures of her entire experience. But the Fate-thing will always have a way to prevent such happ
enstances.

  Her mother will have told her about an organization called The Robin Kerr League, a nationwide group of the parents of hundreds, even thousands of abducted children. Her mother will have begged her to go on television or make a videotape to address the members of the League and tell them to have hope because she herself never gave up hope, etc., but Robin will have had to remind her mother that there will not be any publicity whatsoever about her existence.

  It will have been a condition of their meeting and their resumption of their relationship as mother and daughter that there will not be the slightest public mention of the story.

  Occasionally Robin will perforce give some further thought to some of the questions her mother will have raised, particularly one that will have already engaged her: despite her deep love for Adam, will she not be haunted by never having had a date to compare him with? Will she be completely happy with a man twenty-eight years her senior? Is it possible to fall in love only once and never again? To have that first love last forever?

  Although she and Adam will watch innumerable movies because they both will love and crave that form of entertainment, their principal diversion will remain an overpowering thirst for reading, and they will consume enormous quantities of novels, the reading of which will provide Robin with a vast knowledge of human relationships that life will not have given her. Those many novels will also confirm her in her belief that her story will be unique, as well as settle whatever lingering doubts she might have about being madly in love with a man so much older. Eventually Robin will be strongly tempted to write a novel herself, but this future tense that Hreapha will have bestowed upon her will not extend that far into the future. And although she will come to understand the meaning of such novelistic concepts as self-referentiality, or self-reflective postmodernist fiction, she will have some difficulty accepting the idea of a novel wherein the main pursuit of the hero and heroine, apart from sex, is the reading of novels. Even if the setting for their reading, in that comfortably refurbished living room (the davenport alone will remain), with a nice fire going in their Vermont Castings woodstove, with glasses of Pinot Noir at hand or better yet the Sauvignon Blanc that Adam will make from his own grapes, will be sufficiently novelistic unto itself. Yes, she will allow, it might just be possible to write a novel about the reading of novels.