Selected Stories

by Alice Munro

  They didn’t wave or answer. The girl sat down.

  The bare-chested boy picked up Sophie’s bathrobe and put it on. He found the cigarettes and the lighter in her pocket, and threw them to the girl, who took a cigarette out and lit it. The other boy sat down and pulled off his boots and splashed his feet in the water.

  The boy who had put on the bathrobe did a little shimmy. His hair was black, beautifully shining, waving over his shoulders. He was imitating a woman, though it surely couldn’t be said that he was imitating Sophie. (It did occur to her now that they could have been watching, could have seen her take off her bathrobe and go into the water.)

  “Would you please take that off?” called Sophie. “You are welcome to a cigarette, but please put them back in the pocket!”

  The boy did another shimmy, this time turning his back to her. The other boy laughed. The girl smoked, and seemed not to pay much attention.

  “Take off my bathrobe and put back my cigarettes!”

  Sophie started to swim toward the shore, holding her head out of the water. The boy slipped off the bathrobe, picked it up, and tore it in two. The worn material tore easily. He wadded up one half and flung it into the water.

  “You young scum!” cried Sophie.

  He threw the other half.

  The boy with the ponytail was putting on his boots.

  The black-haired boy held out his hand to the girl. She shook her head. He dived into the folds of her skirt, she cried out in protest. He threw something else into the water, after the pieces of bathrobe.

  Sophie’s lighter.

  Sophie heard the girl say something—it sounded like “you fucking crud”—and then the three of them began to climb the bank without another look toward the lake. The black-haired boy was leaping gracefully; the other boy followed quickly but more awkwardly; the girl climbed laboriously in her hiked-up skirt. They were all out of sight when Sophie rose out of the water and hoisted herself up onto the rocks.

  The girl’s cigarette—Sophie’s cigarette—was not stubbed out but cast down in a little vein of dirt, dirt and rubbly stones between the rocks.

  Sophie sat on the rocks, drawing in deep, ragged breaths. She didn’t shiver—she was heated by a sombre, useless rage. She needed to compose herself.

  She had an image in her mind of the rowboat that used to be tied up here when she was a child. A safe old tub of a rowboat, rocking on the water by the dock. Every evening, after dinner, Sophie, or Sophie and one of her brothers (they were both dead now), but usually just Sophie, would row down the lake to Bryce’s farm to get the milk. A can with a lid, scoured and scalded by the Vogelsangs’ cook, was taken along—you wouldn’t want to trust any Bryce receptacle. The Bryces didn’t have a dock. Their house and barn had their backs turned to the lake; they faced the road. Sophie had to steer the boat into the reeds and throw the rope to the Bryce children who ran down to meet her. They would splash out through the mud and haul on the rope and clamber over the boat while Sophie gave out her usual instructions.

  “Don’t take the oar out! Don’t swamp it! Don’t all climb in at one end!”

  Barefoot, as they were, she would jump out and run up to the stone dairy house. (It was still there, and served now, Sophie understood, as a cottager’s darkroom.) Mr. Bryce or Mrs. Bryce would pour the warm frothy milk into the can.

  Some Bryce children were as old as Sophie was and some were older, but all were smaller. How many were there? What were their names? Sophie could recall a Rita, a Sheldon or Selwyn, a George, an Annie. They were always pale children, in spite of the summer sun, and they bore many bites, scratches, scabs, mosquito bites, blackfly bites, fleabites, bloody and festering. That was because they were poor children. It was because they were poor that Rita’s—or Annie’s—eyes were crossed, and that one of the boys had such queerly uneven shoulders, and that they talked as they did, saying, “We-ez goen to towen,” and “bowt,” and other things that Sophie could hardly understand. Not one of them knew how to swim. They treated the boat as if it was a strange piece of furniture—something to climb over, get inside. They had no idea of rowing.

  Sophie liked to come for the milk by herself, not with one of her brothers, so that she could loiter and talk to the Bryce children, ask them questions and tell them things—something her brothers wouldn’t have dreamed of doing. Where did they go to school? What did they get for Christmas? Did they know any songs? When they got used to her, they told her things. They told her about the time the bull got loose and came up to the front door, and the time they saw a ball of lightning dance across the bedroom floor, and about the enormous boil on Selwyn’s neck and what ran out of it.

  Sophie wanted to invite them to the Log House. She dreamed of giving them baths and clean clothes and putting ointment on their bites, and teaching them to talk properly. Sometimes she had a long, complicated daydream that was all about Christmas for the Bryce family. It included a redecoration and painting of their house, as well as a wholesale cleanup of their yard. Magic glasses appeared, to straighten crossed eyes. There were picture books and electric trains and dolls in taffeta dresses and armies of toy soldiers and heaps of marzipan fruits and animals. (Marzipan was Sophie’s favorite treat. A conversation with the Bryces about candy had revealed that they did not know what it was.)

  In time, she did get her mother’s permission to invite one of them. The one she asked—Rita or Annie—backed out at the last minute, being too shy, and the other came instead. This Annie or Rita wore one of Sophie’s bathing suits, which drooped on her ridiculously. And she proved hard to entertain. She would not indicate a preference of any kind. She wouldn’t say what sort of sandwiches or cookies or drink she wanted, and wouldn’t choose to go on the swing or the teeter-totter, or to play by the water or play with dolls. Her lack of preference seemed to have something superior about it, as if she was adhering to a code of manners Sophie couldn’t know anything about. She accepted the treats she was given and allowed Sophie to push her in the swing, all with a steadfast lack of enthusiasm. Finally, Sophie took her down to the water and initiated a program of catching frogs. Sophie wanted to move a whole colony of frogs from the reedy little bay on one side of the dock, around to a pleasant shelf and cave in the rocks on the other side. The frogs made the trip by water. Sophie and the Bryce girl caught them and set them on an inner tube and pushed them around the dock—the water was low, so the Bryce girl could wade—to their new home. By the end of the day, the colony had been moved.

  The Bryce girl had died in a house fire, with some young children, several years later. Or perhaps that was the other one, the one who wouldn’t come. Whichever brother inherited the farm sold it to a developer, who was reported to have cheated him. But this brother bought a big car—a Cadillac?—and Sophie used to see him in Aubreyville in the summers. He would give her a squint-eyed look, that said he wasn’t going to bother speaking unless she did.

  Sophie remembered telling the story of the frog-move to Laurence’s father—a teacher of German, whose attention she had first attracted by arguing forcefully, in class, for a Westphalian pronunciation. By the time she was a graduate student, she was relentlessly in love with him. Pregnant, she was too proud to ask him to uproot himself, leave his wife, follow her to the Log House, where she waited for Laurence to be born, but she believed that he must do so. He did come here, but only twice, to visit. They sat on the dock and she told him about the frogs and the Bryce girl.

  “Of course they were all back in the reeds the next day,” she said.

  He laughed, and in a comradely way patted her knee. “Ah, Sophie. You see.”

  And today was Laurence’s fortieth birthday. Her son was born on Bastille Day. She sent a postcard: Male Prisoner let loose July 14, eight pounds nine ounces. What did his wife think? She was not to know. The Vogelsang family carried the whole thing off with pride, and Sophie went off to another university to qualify for her academic career. She had never lied about being married. But Laurence, at scho
ol, had invented a father—his mother’s first cousin (therefore having the same name), who was drowned on a canoe trip. Sophie said she understood, but she was disappointed in him.

  LATE that afternoon, Sophie found herself up in a plane. She had flown twice before—both times in large planes. She had not thought that she would be frightened. She sat in the back seat between her excited grandchildren, Denise and Peter—Laurence was in front, with the pilot—and in fact she could not tell if what she was feeling was fear.

  The little plane seemed not to be moving at all, though its engine had not cut off; it was making a terrible racket. They hovered in the air, a thousand feet or so off the ground. Below were juniper bushes spread like pincushions in the fields, cedars charmingly displayed like toy Christmas trees. There were glittering veins of ripples on the dark water. That toy-like, perfect tininess of everything had a peculiar and distressing effect on Sophie. She felt as if it was she, not the things on earth, that had shrunk, was still shrinking—or that they were all shrinking together. This feeling was so strong it caused a tingle in her now tiny, crablike hands and feet—a tingle of exquisite smallness, an awareness of exquisite smallness. Her stomach shrivelled up: her lungs were as much use as empty seed sacs; her heart was the heart of an insect.

  “Soon we’ll be right over the lake,” said Laurence to the children. “See how it’s all fields on one side and trees on the other? See, one side is soil over limestone, and the other is the Precambrian shield. One side is rocks and one is reeds. This is what’s called a glint lake.” (Laurence had studied and enjoyed geology, and at one time she had hoped he might become a geologist instead of a businessman.)

  So they were moving, barely. They were moving over the lake. Off to the right Sophie saw Aubreyville spread out, and the white gash of the silica quarry. Her feeling of a mistake, of a very queer and incommunicable problem, did not abate. It wasn’t the approach but the aftermath of disaster she felt, in this golden air—as if they were all whisked off and cancelled, curled up into dots, turned to atoms, but they didn’t know it.

  “Let’s see if we can see the roof of the Log House,” said Laurence. “My grandfather was a German; he built his house in the trees, like a hunting lodge,” he said to the pilot.

  “That so?” said the pilot, who probably knew at least that much about the Vogelsangs.

  This feeling—Sophie was realizing—wasn’t new to her. She’d had it as a child. A genuine shrinking feeling, one of the repertoire of frightening, marvellous feelings, or states, that are available to you when you’re very young. Like the sense of hanging upside down, walking on the ceiling, stepping over heightened doorsills. An awful pleasure then, so why not now?

  Because it was not her choice, now. She had a sure sense of changes in the offing, that were not her choice.

  Laurence pointed out the roof to her, the roof of the Log House. She exclaimed satisfactorily.

  Still shrinking, curled up into that sickening dot, but not vanishing, she held herself up there. She held herself up there, using all the powers she had, and said to her grandchildren, Look here, look there, see the shapes on the earth, see the shadows and the light going down in the water.

  III

  Sitting by herself is my wife’s greatest pleasure.

  Isabel sat on the grass near the car, in the shade of some scrawny poplar trees, and thought that this day, a pleasant family day, had been full of hurdles, which she had so far got over. When she woke up this morning, Laurence was wanting to make love to her. She knew that the children would be awake; they would be busy in Denise’s room down the hall, preparing the first surprise of the day—a poster with a poem on it, a birthday poem and a collage for their father. If Laurence was interrupted by their trooping in with this—or their pounding on the door, supposing she got up to bolt it—he was going to be in a very bad mood. Denise would be disappointed—in fact, grief-stricken. They would be off to a bad start for the day. But it wouldn’t do to put Laurence off, explaining about the children. That would be seen as an instance of her making them more important, considering their feelings ahead of his. The best thing to do seemed to be to hurry him up, and she did that, encouraging him even when he was momentarily distracted by the sound of heavy-footed Sophie, prowling around downstairs, banging open some kitchen drawer.

  “What the Christ is the matter with her?” he whispered into Isabel’s ear. But she just stroked him as if impatient for further and faster activity. That was effective. Soon everything was all right. He lay on his back holding her hand by the time the children could be heard coming along the hall making a noise like trumpets, a jumbled fanfare. They pushed open the door of their parents’ room and entered, holding in front of them the large poster on which the birthday poem was written, in elaborate, crayoned letters of many colors.

  “Hail!” they said together, and bowed, lowering the poster. Denise was revealed in a sheet, carrying a tinfoil-covered stick with a silver paper star stuck on one end, and most of Isabel’s necklaces, chains, bracelets, and earrings strung around or somehow attached to her person. Peter was just in his pajamas.

  They began to recite the poem. Denise’s voice was high and intensely dramatic, though self-mocking. Peter’s voice trailed a little behind hers, slow and dutiful and uncertainly sardonic.

  “Hail upon your fortieth year

  That marks your fortunate lifetime here!

  And I, the Fairy Queen, appear

  To wish you health and wealth and love and cheer!”

  Peter, trailing, said, “And she, the Fairy Queen, appears,” and at the end of the verse Denise said, “Actually, I am the Fairy Godmother but that has too many syllables.” She and Peter continued to bow.

  Laurence and Isabel laughed and clapped, and asked to see the birthday poster at closer range. All around the poem were pasted figures and scenes and words cut letter by letter out of magazines. This was all in illustration of the past year in the life of the Great L. P. (Long-Playing Laurence Peter) Vogelsang. A business trip to Australia was indicated by a kangaroo jumping over Ayers Rock, and a can of insect repellent.

  In Between Exciting Trips, and the caption, the Great L. P. Found Time for His Special Interests (a Playboy Bunny displayed her perky tail, and offered a bottle of champagne as large as herself), and for relaxing with His Loving Family (a cross-eyed girl stuck out her tongue, a housewife threateningly waved a mop, and a mud-covered urchin stood on his head). He Also Considered Taking Up a Second Career (a cement mixer was shown, with an old codger superimposed). “Happy Birthday, L. P. the Great,” said a number of farmyard animals wearing party hats and hoisting balloons, “From Your Many Loyal Fans.”

  “That’s remarkable,” said Laurence. “I can see you put a lot of work into it. I particularly like the special interests.”

  “And the loving family,” said Denise. “Don’t you love them too?”

  “And the loving family,” said Laurence.

  “Now,” said Denise, “the Fairy Godmother is prepared to grant you three wishes.”

  “You never really need more than one wish,” Peter said. “You just wish that all the other wishes you make will come true.”

  “That wish is not allowed,” said Denise. “You get three wishes, but they have to be for three specific things. You can’t wish something like you’ll always be happy, and you can’t wish just that you get all your wishes.”

  Laurence said, “That’s a rather dictatorial Fairy Godmother,” and said he wished for a sunny day.

  “It already is,” said Peter disgustedly.

  “Well, I wish for it to stay sunny,” said Laurence. Then he wished that he would complete six more steps and that there would be broiled tomatoes and sausages and scrambled eggs for breakfast.

  “Lucky you wished for broiled,” said Isabel. “The top element is working. I suppose it would be too much to ask the Fairy Godmother to bring Sophie a new stove.”

  THE NOISE that they all made in the kitchen getting breakfast must
have kept them from hearing Sophie’s voice raised, down at the lake. They were going to eat on the veranda. Denise had spread a cloth over the picnic table. They came out in procession, Denise carrying the coffee tray, Isabel the platter of hot food, the eggs and sausages and tomatoes, and Peter carrying his own breakfast, which was dry cereal with honey. Laurence was not supposed to have to carry anything, but he had picked up the rack of buttered toast, seeing that otherwise it would be left behind.

  Just as they came out on the veranda, Sophie appeared at the top of the bank, naked. She walked directly toward them across the mown grass.

  “I have had a very minor catastrophe,” she said. “Happy Birthday, Laurence!”

  This was the first time Isabel had ever seen an old woman naked. Several things surprised her. The smoothness of the skin compared to the wrinkled condition of Sophie’s face, neck, arms, and hands. The smallness of the breasts. (Seeing Sophie clothed, she had always perceived the breasts as being on the same large scale as the rest of her.) They were slung down like little bundles, little hammock bundles, from the broad, freckled chest. The scantiness of the pubic hair, and the color of it, was also unexpected; it had not turned white, but remained a glistening golden brown, and was as light a covering as a very young girl’s.

  All that white skin, slackly filled, made Isabel think of those French cattle, dingy white cattle, that you sometimes saw now out in the farmers’ fields. Charolais.

  Sophie of course did not try to shield her breasts with an arm or place a modest hand over her private parts. She didn’t hurry past her family. She stood in the sunlight, one foot on the bottom step of the veranda—slightly increasing the intimate view they could all get of her—and said calmly, “Down there, I was dispossessed of my bathrobe. Also my cigarettes and my lighter. My lighter went to the bottom of the lake.”

  “Christ, Mother!” said Laurence.

  He had set the toast rack down in such a hurry that it fell over. He pushed aside the dishes to get hold of the tablecloth.