by Jeffrey Lent
Jo sipped again. Ruth rolled her glass and resisted. Answering her mother, she said, “Of course. If it was you, wouldn’t you think that way?”
“I might think that way. But I wouldn’t do it. And beyond that, you’re making an assumption.”
Ruth lifted the glass and sipped. Raw as she was this was gasoline down her throat and it roiled in her stomach and then paced out her arms and flared behind her eyes. She said, “How so?”
“That Oliver will talk to this man.”
“Oh, you’re right.”
“But even if he does, especially if he does, you must wait for Oliver to discuss this visit with you. And if he chooses not to, you must accept that and allow it. What those two might talk about is not necessarily any of your business. Just because they do, does not make it yours. Unless, of course, they choose to include you. That would change everything. Myself, I don’t see that happening, but it might. My best guess, my hope, is that after this man has his talk with Oliver and leaves, perhaps, and it might be some weeks or even longer, Oliver will start to talk with you about these things. But you must wait for him. Because … Oh my dear. Because if he could, he already would have done so.”
“I know.”
“So then. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain by your silence. Even if nothing changes. Do you see?”
“It’s so hard, is all.”
“Of course it is. Men make the work of this world and we women are left to complete the messes they create. So it is, so it has always been.”
Ruth lifted her glass and finished the last swallow. “That’s a grim outlook.”
“No less true, my girl. There’s some strawberries in the kitchen you should carry home.”
“I saw them. Thank you.”
“This man? This visitor? Where is he now?”
“Like I said, he’s gone fishing for the day. Oh, like Father used to do, like you told me he did as a young man. With a bamboo rod and flies fashioned from feathers and yarn. He said he made them himself.”
Jo looked at her then, lifted her glass for the last least drop of rye and said, “So. He’s that sort of man.”
Ruth stopped in the village and bought cream, considered the evening meal and weighed against making elaborate plans, leaving it to Oliver to handle this arrival as he would. She bought a wedge of cheddar and a box of elbows. She had the fresh peas and could make a salad from the garden and that, she decided, along with the shortcakes, would provide a comfortable meal. She paused a moment and ran her mind’s eye through her pantry and was unsure of baking powder for the biscuits and so added a new can.
Up at the house she mashed the berries with sugar and stuck them in the fridge and set up the mac and cheese to slide into the oven later in the afternoon. Everything else she waited on. It was then noon and she fried an egg and toasted bread and ate that sandwich for her lunch. Then she found Lydia Bailey and set it in the basket she used for her trips to the library. Went into her own parlor and ran her fingers along the shelves there and took down A Further Range and thumbed pages but she was not in a mood for poetry and slipped it back onto the shelf.
She spent the afternoon cleaning the house. She put the casserole into the oven and went up to take a bath and then dressed in a simple summer skirt and sleeveless yellow blouse that showed off her arms well, then took her measure and left the blouse on but switched the skirt for a pair of old and comfortably worn jeans. Brushed out her hair and tied it up in a bandanna. Down in the kitchen she turned the oven on low and left the mac and cheese to finish slowly. She beat together the biscuit dough and left it on the counter, the bowl covered with a damp cloth—she could bake them while they ate the main meal. The same way she could gather the salad makings from the garden.
It was almost six of the summer evening. She considered again and then made herself a gin and tonic that was mostly tonic and carried that with the most recent Life out to the garden and the chair where she’d been interrupted all those hours ago. The sunlight was pleasant, freckled through the old apples, pooled about her, the air clear, free of blackflies or mosquitoes. A line of lumpy clouds floated above the east side of the valley, bellies dark, sides delineated by curves of blue and rose light.
Oliver arrived first and she walked around to meet him. He was, as expected, carrying a fiddle, this one without a case and so cradled in the crook of his arm.
“I’m back, Ruthie,” he said. “And boy, do I have a mess on my hands.”
“Can you fix it?”
He slipped her his shy grin. “I hope so. But it’ll take some time.” He was moving around her, to walk back to his shop. He said, “I’m about starved. They wanted me to stay but I wanted to get back. Is there supper? We could go to the Dot. Just let me lay this out on my bench.”
“Oliver?”
He heard her and turned. “What is it?”
“There’s a man came to see you.”
“What man? A fiddle? Ruth, just let me set this down.”
She said, “He was in the war with you.” But her voice was low, not quite trusting the news she had, not wanting, she realized after, to deliver this to him.
He said again, louder, “Let me set this down. I’ll be right back.” He ducked his lovely white head, turned and went behind the barn to his shop. She watched him go but also had stopped in some other way. For she heard the rattletrap car coming up the hill.
She stood there in the drive in the paling light as Brian drove in. He hit an old Klaxon horn at the sight of her and pulled up short, feet from where she stood. He stood out of the car swiftly, grinning at her, then bent and lifted out a wicker creel. He looked at the truck, then advanced toward her and opened the lid of the creel.
“He’s home, isn’t he? That’s great. And look.” He held the creel before her, a grand mess of trout atop a bed of ferns. “I brought dinner. Does it get better than that?”
She wanted to say she couldn’t say when they both heard the door slam shut behind the barn and so both stood mute, watching as Oliver came around the side of the barn and stopped. His eyes moving back and forth one to the other.
“Potter? Is that you?”
“Oh boy, Ollie.” Brian set the creel down and slowly walked forward, his arms spreading wide. “It sure is me. I been waiting years for this. Down to the moment. When I lifted my face from the mud and watched you walking away and knew I was almost dead.”
Ruth stood and watched Brian Potter’s arms encircle her husband and lift him off the ground. And saw Oliver looking at her over the man’s shoulder, his face a stricken confusion, a certain pleading.
Then Brian spun in a circle and she could see nothing until both men were down back on the ground, a couple of feet apart. Each with their hands on the other’s shoulders.
She leaned and lifted the creel, carried it inside and rinsed the already gutted fish in the sink and laid them in a bowl head to tail and set that bowl in the fridge. She took out the biscuit dough and worked gently. Then turned the oven back up and removed the perfect mac and cheese, set it on the stovetop and began to turn out biscuits. Doing what she could as she waited what came next.
Oliver popped open the door and stuck his head in and said, “Ruthie? I’m sorry but this guy and I are going down to the Dot and get a burger and catch up. He brought some trout, huh? We can eat it tomorrow, okay?”
Then he was gone. She stood in the kitchen, thinking, I never saw such a panic.
There then began the span of three strange days, as she counted it. Two, she imagined Oliver counted them, if he counted at all. She ate supper finally and went to bed well after ten with no sign of them, even though she knew the Double Dot closed at nine. She left the kitchen light on and the biscuits out, the berries and cream in the fridge. She left a note beside the plate with the stack of biscuits. It was after midnight when she heard the car come up the hill and then some time passed and she heard voices low and hushed through the open window. Twice the beam of a flashlight raked against the sky, t
he side of the house. The screen door opened and slapped to and she heard water run in the bathroom. Then Oliver came up the stairs with uneven steps and she lay in the dark pretending to sleep as he sagged down on his side of the bed to undress sitting down, some fumbling and a small hitch sideways that he caught with an outstretched hand, a pause as he righted himself and then finished his undressing. She could smell beer and cigarette smoke. She thought Why not? But still she lay as if sleeping and he pulled himself under the summer covers of a sheet and thin blanket, turning away from her to face his side of the bed. It seemed but moments before she heard his breath drag out into gentle snoring. Some time later she also slept.
In the morning as she waited for the coffee to perk she stepped out into the yard and saw a small canvas tent set up in the grass beside the garden, under the apple trees. There was a sag to it and one corner did not seemed pegged tight but it was not a bad job done by men in the dark. Even with flashlights. She walked out and paused by Brian Potter’s jalopy, seeing the litter of empty beer cans strewn in the backseat. She’d guessed they’d be there before she saw them. She opened the truck and found a pack of Luckies and a book of matches and sat on the running board away from the house and smoked, considering all of this. And what to do next. Or simply, what to do. And recalled what her mother had told her about leaving them be.
She also knew a thing or two about men the morning after drinking and didn’t even have to go inside to check what she had. Instead took the truck out of gear, then pushed it out of the drive as she reached to twist the wheel and got the truck headed down Beacon Hill, jumped in and twisting the wheel and turned the key, held the clutch down as she put it in gear and gained speed. Popped the clutch and drove into the village. She bought a dozen eggs and a pound of bacon sliced thick and went back up the hill, killing the engine to roll in quiet. No one was about although as she passed through the yard to the house she heard deep, nigh-drowning snores from the tent.
She had two big iron skillets and in one she cooked the pound of bacon, stirring it round and round. Too much to cook in flat strips. She lifted pieces out as they cooked and also cracked eggs into a bowl. She left the grease in the pan and got out the trout and cut off the heads and rolled the fish in flour with salt and pepper. Then she fried the trout in the bacon grease and soft-scrambled eggs in the other pan. She worked with deliberation, half hoping one or another of them would arrive and see her preparations. She drank a couple more cups of coffee as she did this work. When it was all done she was still alone. She stepped outside and retrieved another cigarette and smoked that and waited.
The day was fine, clear skies, warming sunlight cast upon her, orioles among the apple trees, hummingbirds working the bee balm in their stammer of flight. Heard feet coming downstairs. She ground out the cigarette and went back inside.
Oliver was in the clothes he’d worn the day before as he poured himself a cup of coffee with the hidden caution of a man atremble. His hair was wet and she knew he’d held his head under the bathroom spigot. The rakes of the comb harrow-marks. He glanced at her, looked away, then turned to her. He lifted the coffee and blew, sipped and then set down the too-hot cup. The saucer rattled.
“Ruth,” he said. Then stretched a hand to indicate the food. “This is grand.” His eyes were red and filming and she thought he might cry.
She wanted to ask if Oliver and Brian had achieved what they’d intended the night before. But was afraid how it might sound. A condemnation. She was not sure if that was what he would hear or what she might hold. The man sleeping in the tent would leave or not—that was all she knew for sure. And did not want to be part of that decision.
She said, “Are you all right, Oliver?”
He tried out a smile. Said, “Well, my head feels like it got caught between a hammer and a anvil, if that’s what you mean.”
In the same kind tone she said, “Is it a good thing that he’s here?”
Now he got some coffee, his eyes away from her. Then back. “It’s terrible, is what it is. But it’s what he needs. If that makes a lick.”
She nodded. And then said, “Today?”
He ate a curled strip of bacon. Then poured more coffee and held the fresh cup with his hand wrapped around it and said, “We’re not done, yet.”
She nodded and said, “I didn’t think so.” Then she said, “What I’m going to do is make myself scarce. You two do what you need to do. And however long it takes, it doesn’t matter. He’s welcome, is what I’m saying.”
“You don’t have to go anywhere, Ruthie.”
“I think I do. But that’s about me, not you. I just want you to spend as much time with him as you want. As much as he needs. Perhaps what you need also, some way. And I’ll be about. So, if he gets to be too much, all you have to do is tell me. All right?”
After a time he nodded. Then he said, “The trout. He’ll be upset, they get cold.”
She said, “It’s June. And a warm day. They won’t get cold. But go wake him if you want. Because I’m heading out. Mother needs some help, though she won’t say as much. You know.”
He said, “I love you, Ruthie. I really do.”
“I love you too, Oliver.” And pulled together every frayed nerve she had, scared as she’d ever been, but walked around him, not stopping to give him the hug she wanted to give. And left the house. Leaving him within it. Knowing he was not alone and the man outside in the tent was but a small bit of what had joined her husband in their house.
She didn’t want to see her mother. She didn’t want to see anyone at all. She drove to the village and parked behind the school and used her key to let herself in. She thought she’d do a final tidy or do some work preparatory for the start of school almost three months away. But there was nothing to do. She sat at her desk and faced the ranks of empty student desks. A single fly buzzed about the room, striking window after window seeking escape. After a bit she stood and opened two of the windows a scant foot each, then walked behind her desk and pulled down the world map and studied it—it was almost new and so showed the new boundaries, the new world. The world the war had replaced or remade. How vast it all was. How small. No cities were shown on the map, only the zones of occupation. As if Germany had been obliterated and replaced by blank spaces that had no room for people or cities, towns, states. Only overlords. She didn’t feel this was a bad thing but rather something earned, the product of war, the spoil of war, a rightful end. And yet there was no way to comprehend anything of what role her husband had in that destruction. Not that if she’d seen a city name or anything more precise, she’d have had any knowledge to tag upon it. But still she felt there should be. Even if those were simply more unknowns.
She sat again behind her desk, looking out upon the empty room. Recalling how filled it had been, seeing those faces. Then thought about what she’d soon be seeing. Those children coming up. She knew them. The din and clatter in the hallways, those certain faces turned toward her, expectant. And thought how much older they’d appear, come fall.
At noon she drove up Beacon Hill. The jalopy was parked in the drive, the truck gone. For a moment she worried about Oliver driving, then thought this might be a good thing. Then thought of men and knew she had no idea who was driving.
Inside, the kitchen was clean, the skillets clean and dry on the stovetop; the bowls and plates and coffee cups washed and upside down in the strainer. As if to let her know they were paying attention. Or what men did when there was no woman there. She had no idea. The heat was turned low under the percolator.
She ate cold mac and cheese. Then poured a cup of coffee and drank that bitter scorched brew. And sitting at the table, surprised herself by speaking out loud. “If I sit here waiting I’m going to lose my mind.” Her thoughts had been a muddle; speaking, she held sudden clarity. She’d seen the same thing happen with a student laboring over a draft of an essay, pages long: Five minutes of talk with her and their thesis came clear.
She went up to her bedroom and pul
led off her jeans and blouse and put on her one-piece bathing suit and then her jeans and blouse over that. She rolled a towel and carried it downstairs, nested the three empty quart berry baskets, then opened her purse and tucked her driver’s license in one back pocket and a five dollar bill in a front pocket. And was out the door.
She drove down the valley on a hot summer afternoon. Some few clouds. The recently harvested hayfields gaining the brighter green of new growth. Cornfields along the winding branch of the river. Knee high by the Fourth of July and it would be, pale stalks against the dark alluvial soil. She crossed the bridge over the White River in Royalton and drove north along the bigger river, the broader valley, the hills farther back and oddly stepped by the glaciers—hills here running west to east and she was driving west. The eastern hips of the hills were low, then rose on an even plane going west until a sudden knob, an upward thrust of hard stone, then a declivity and the slow beginning of another hill. But not broken by valleys, more a series of steps climbing toward the spine of the Green Mountains some thirty miles west, that ran north and south the length of the state.
Along this road, the River Road, were turnouts, all riverside. Clumps of cars in each one. A summer afternoon. She knew the one she wanted and pulled in and carrying her towel walked down a path to the river. A bend here formed a deep pool but there were also jutting tongues of granite out into the river, beaches of pebbles but mostly larger slabs of stone layered one against another. Riverside elms and maples threw dappled shade and from one big limb a heavy rope hung, knotted three times toward the end, dangling over one of the high slabs to be ridden out over the deep pool and then the sudden drop.
But even this pool was not so swift or deep as others—why she’d chosen this place. There were fewer young men there, only a handful of older teenagers. A gaggle of preteen boys and girls mingled and kept apart. A couple of older teen couples on blankets as remote as possible which was not much. Mothers and young children. She’d wanted peace, away from the world of men and so had found it. Upstream from the bend one older man stood thigh deep in the water casting flies in long deliberate arcs, his clamped pipe emitting blue jets of smoke.
