Ben Soul
Page 44
decades.” He picked up a silver dragon and tilted its horns, revealing a cigarette lighter. He lit it, and carefully melted the wax at one end of one of the bamboo vials. The melted wax dripped on the rosewood desk. Faw watched in dismay.
When the wax had melted from one end of the bamboo, Foy probed gently with the tweezers. “Aha!” he said, as he extracted a tiny scroll. Carefully he unrolled it.
“I need a magnifying glass to read this,” he said. He held out his hand to Faw, who sighed and took a cloisonné-decorated magnifying glass from the desk drawer. Foy snatched it, and read eagerly. He made a happy noise that Malcolm decided must be a chortle.
“This is a treasure, indeed, Little Cricket,” he said to his granddaughter. “Not worth many dollars, I’m afraid, but invaluable to scholars of Song Dynasty poetry.” He grinned again. “These are the lost poems of Bu Ti, a poetess of great renown, whose works were thought destroyed in a civil uprising in Ningwu. What a find!”
“Why would the People’s Republic be so anxious to get these poems?” Malcolm asked.
“Perhaps they did not know what the vials contained,” Faw said.
“It is appropriate that these manuscripts return to the People’s Republic, but only after I have copied them and translated them,” Foy said. “If there is any compensation offered, I will, of course, take it on your joint behalf.”
“By all means, do so,” Malcolm said. “Give them the statues, too. The one has been nothing but trouble for me ever since Quig died. Maybe this will get Vanna out of my life, too, if the tape we made for her doesn’t dissuade her.”
“So be it, then,” Mae Ling said. “Honored Grandfather, translate the poems. We will offer them in this country, as well. Perhaps we shall make some small contribution to the world’s betterment that way.”
“Perhaps I should go, now,” Malcolm said. He offered Foy Ling his card. “Here is my address and telephone number.” Foy waved the card toward Faw, who took it. Malcolm stood; Mae Ling stood with him.
“I will see you out,” she said. Malcolm shook hands with Faw, waved goodbye to Foy, who was mumbling translations from the texts under his magnifying glass.
At the door of the building, Mae Ling bade Malcolm goodbye, recommending the White Jade Cab Company as transportation home. Malcolm did not see her again, until he and the Ling family received invitations to the Chinese Consulate to hear the thanks of the Chinese people for returning a national treasure.
Nephew News
Hardin wrote Ben to tell him he had a nephew, Lawson. Ben didn’t know Hardin had written him surreptitiously, without Enna’s knowledge.
Ben Soul
817 Lost Sombrero Lane
Cowpens, CA
October 11, 1980
Ben:
This is to let you know you have a nephew. He was born yesterday at 11:30 pm. in the Berthoud Hospital. He’s healthy, and Enna’s doing fine.
If you ever change your ways, come home. Get away from that awful City.
Hardin
Ben wrote a reply that ignored Hardin’s second paragraph.
Hardin Soul
Box 27
Rural Route 2
Berthoud, CO
October 20, 1980
Dear Hardin,
I’m delighted that you and Enna have made me an uncle at last. I look forward to the time I can come east to meet nephew Lawson.
I am glad Enna survived the birth. Tell her, for me, I think she’s a brave woman.
I’m enclosing a Quit Claim Deed to my half of the farm. Consider it Lawson’s birth gift. May Lawson turn out to be the farmer’s son you want.
As for me, I know I’ll never be a farmer, let alone the good farmer you are. I’ve made my life here, on the Coast, a life I know you don’t approve. Please, don’t lose touch. Let’s keep exchanging cards at Christmas.
Peace and blessings to you, and Enna, and little Lawson.
Ben
Hardin carefully filed Ben’s Quit Claim Deed in certain farm papers he knew Enna wouldn’t examine. When the time seemed right he would tell her about Ben’s generosity. If the time never became right, she’d have the paper after he died. She could have her hissy fits then. Hardin hated confrontations with his wife.
Doctor Field’s Secret Journal
I have a new client. I have met this man. Unlike most of my clients, he is not an obscure nobody. He is famous along The Street; I have seen him often entering or leaving one or another of the shops or bars that line The Street. Once he and I were victims of a practical joke Noah played on us. That incident led to my relocating to The City from Iowa.
Most folk call my client ‘Colonel,’ or ‘Beau.’ His full name, according to the referral sheet, is Colonel Beauregard LeSieupe. I suspect that name is one he has adopted for his own purposes. He promenades on The Street in a white linen suit, a black string tie, and a white hat and shoes. He looks like a walking ad for fried chicken. According to the referral sheet, he asked for assignment as my client. The Court sentenced him to rehabilitation for drug use. I am to see him tomorrow.
My first several sessions with the Colonel were not productive. He sat on the couch and trembled. He mumbled unintelligible responses to my questions, and avoided looking at me. I offered him water; he begged for whiskey. I prescribed a tranquilizer for him. I hope it is not among his addictions. Toward the end of our fifty minutes he wept, silently and stared at his clenched hands in his lap. When his time was up, an orderly urged him to his feet. He shuffled out of my office like a slave in chains.
I have made a very tiny breakthrough after the sixth session. Something jelled over the weekend for the Colonel. I asked him, as I have each session since the second one, why he asked for a referral to me. He responded that I was the only Damnyankee he’d ever met who was any damned good. Immediately after this statement, he curled himself into the chair and moaned. He said nothing else for the rest of the session. I spoke as reassuringly to him as I could. I sensed it was unwise to probe him any more for this session. He at least does not tremble so noticeably; the tranquilizer mitigates the physical addictions he has. This is a curious case, indeed.
The medications have calmed the Colonel. In our eleventh session, I asked him to tell me how he achieved his rank. He refused to tell me that, and, instead, launched into an incident from his childhood.
“You shrinks always want to know about a boy’s mother. I was just a boy when my Mama died. She lay with a fever for a long time. The servants came and went with slippers on their feet to avoid disturbing her rest. I was maybe six, maybe seven.”
[Pause]
“I remember hearing her breathing in the night. It was like a saw going through soft wood, rasping and ragged. Sometimes I’d hear cypress trees rattling in the night wind, and waken and wonder if it was Mama trying to breathe. That’s why I moved away, away from the bayous. That sound was too sad to live with.”
[Pause]
“I have never liked rustling sounds, paper, leaves, or mice in the walls.”
[Pause]
“Mama. I called her Mama. They came and took her away. Those men, the ones in the white coats, they took her away. I was in the kitchen with the servants. They didn’t want me to see, but I looked out a window and I saw them take Mama away.
[Tears and then silence]
I have never been the same since.”
Beau refused to provide more detail, or to speak on any other subject. He stared at a point above my head until our time was up.