In the Garden of the North American Martyrs

by Tobias Wolff

  “But what will I do?”

  “Relax,” Louise said. “Just pick a subject and wing it.”

  “Wing it?”

  “You know, open your mouth and see what comes out. Extemporize.”

  “But I always work from a prepared lecture.”

  Louise sighed. “All right. I’ll tell you what. Last year I wrote an article on the Marshall Plan that I got bored with and never published. You can read that.”

  Parroting what Louise had written seemed wrong to Mary, at first; then it occurred to her that she had been doing the same kind of thing for many years, and that this was not the time to get scruples. “Thanks,” she said. “I appreciate it.”

  “Here we are,” Louise said, and pulled into a circular drive with several cabins grouped around it. In two of the cabins lights were on; smoke drifted straight up from the chimneys. “This is the visitors’ center. The college is another two miles thataway.” Louise pointed down the road. “I’d invite you to stay at my house, but I’m spending the night with Jonathan and Ted is not good company these days. You would hardly recognize him.”

  She took Mary’s bags from the trunk and carried them up the steps of a darkened cabin. “Look,” she said, “they’ve laid a fire for you. All you have to do is light it.” She stood in the middle of the room with her arms crossed and watched as Mary held a match under the kindling. “There,” she said. “You’ll be snugaroo in no time. I’d love to stay and chew the fat but I can’t. You just get a good night’s sleep and I’ll see you in the morning.”

  Mary stood in the doorway and waved as Louise pulled out of the drive, spraying gravel. She filled her lungs, to taste the air: it was tart and clear. She could see the stars in their figurations, and the vague streams of light that ran among the stars.

  She still felt uneasy about reading Louise’s work as her own. It would be her first complete act of plagiarism. It would change her. It would make her less—how much less, she did not know. But what else could she do? She certainly couldn’t “wing it.” Words might fail her, and then what? Mary had a dread of silence. When she thought of silence she thought of drowning, as if it were a kind of water she could not swim in.

  “I want this job,” she said, and settled deep into her coat. It was cashmere and Mary had not worn it since moving to Oregon, because people there thought you were pretentious if you had on anything but a Pendleton shirt or, of course, raingear. She rubbed her cheek against the upturned collar and thought of a silver moon shining through bare black branches, a white house with green shutters, red leaves falling in a hard blue sky.

  Louise woke her a few hours later. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, pushing at Mary’s shoulder and snuffling loudly. When Mary asked her what was wrong she said, “I want your opinion on something. It’s very important. Do you think I’m womanly?”

  Mary sat up. “Louise, can this wait?”

  “No.”

  “Womanly?”

  Louise nodded.

  “You are very beautiful,” Mary said, “and you know how to present yourself.”

  Louise stood and paced the room. “That son of a bitch,” she said. She came back and stood over Mary. “Let’s suppose someone said I have no sense of humor. Would you agree or disagree?”

  “In some things you do. I mean, yes, you have a good sense of humor.”

  “What do you mean, ‘in some things’? What kind of things?”

  “Well, if you heard that someone had been killed in an unusual way, like by an exploding cigar, you would think that was funny.”

  Louise laughed.

  “That’s what I mean,” Mary said.

  Louise went on laughing. “Oh, Lordy,” she said. “Now it’s my turn to say something about you.” She sat down beside Mary.

  “Please,” Mary said.

  “Just one thing,” Louise said.

  Mary waited.

  “You’re trembling,” Louise said. “I was just going to say—oh, forget it. Listen, do you mind if I sleep on the couch? I’m all in.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Sure it’s okay? You’ve got a big day tomorrow.” She fell back on the sofa and kicked off her shoes. “I was just going to say, you should use some liner on those eyebrows of yours. They sort of disappear and the effect is disconcerting.”

  Neither of them slept. Louise chain-smoked cigarettes and Mary watched the coals burn down. When it was light enough that they could see each other Louise got up. “I’ll send a student for you,” she said. “Good luck.”

  The college looked the way colleges are supposed to look. Roger, the student assigned to show Mary around, explained that it was an exact copy of a college in England, right down to the gargoyles and stained-glass windows. It looked so much like a college that moviemakers sometimes used it as a set. Andy Hardy Goes to College had been filmed there, and every fall they had an Andy Hardy Goes to College Day, with raccoon coats and goldfish-swallowing contests.

  Above the door of the Founder’s Building was a Latin motto which, roughly translated, meant “God helps those who help themselves.” As Roger recited the names of illustrious graduates Mary was struck by the extent to which they had taken this precept to heart. They had helped themselves to railroads, mines, armies, states; to empires of finance with outposts all over the world.

  Roger took Mary to the chapel and showed her a plaque bearing the names of alumni who had been killed in various wars, all the way back to the Civil War. There were not many names. Here too, apparently, the graduates had helped themselves. “Oh yes,” Roger said as they were leaving, “I forgot to tell you. The communion rail comes from some church in Europe where Charlemagne used to go.”

  They went to the gymnasium, and the three hockey rinks, and the library, where Mary inspected the card catalogue, as though she would turn down the job if they didn’t have the right books. “We have a little more time,” Roger said as they went outside. “Would you like to see the power plant?”

  Mary wanted to keep busy until the last minute, so she agreed.

  Roger led her into the depths of the service building, explaining things about the machine, which was the most advanced in the country. “People think the college is really old-fashioned,” he said, “but it isn’t. They let girls come here now, and some of the teachers are women. In fact, there’s a statute that says they have to interview at least one woman for each opening. There it is.”

  They were standing on an iron catwalk above the biggest machine Mary had ever beheld. Roger, who was majoring in Earth Sciences, said that it had been built from a design pioneered by a professor in his department. Where before he had been gabby Roger now became reverent. It was clear that for him this machine was the soul of the college, that the purpose of the college was to provide outlets for the machine. Together they leaned against the railing and watched it hum.

  Mary arrived at the committee room exactly on time for her interview, but the room was empty. Her two books were on the table, along with a water pitcher and some glasses. She sat down and picked up one of the books. The binding cracked as she opened it. The pages were smooth, clean, unread. Mary turned to the first chapter, which began, “It is generally believed that…” How dull, she thought.

  Nearly twenty minutes later Louise came in with several men. “Sorry we’re late,” she said. “We don’t have much time so we’d better get started.” She introduced Mary to the men, but with one exception the names and faces did not stay together. The exception was Dr. Howells, the department chairman, who had a porous blue nose and terrible teeth.

  A shiny-faced man to Dr. Howells’s right spoke first. “So,” he said, “I understand you once taught at Brandon College.”

  “It was a shame that Brandon had to close,” said a young man with a pipe in his mouth. “There is a place for schools like Brandon.” As he talked the pipe wagged up and down.

  “Now you’re in Oregon,” Dr. Howells said. “I’ve never been there. How do you like it?”

&
nbsp; “Not very much,” Mary said.

  “Is that right?” Dr. Howells leaned toward her. “I thought everyone liked Oregon. I hear it’s very green.”

  “That’s true,” Mary said.

  “I suppose it rains a lot,” he said.

  “Nearly every day.”

  “I wouldn’t like that,” he said, shaking his head. “I like it dry. Of course it snows here, and you have your rain now and then, but it’s a dry rain. Have you ever been to Utah? There’s a state for you. Bryce Canyon. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir.”

  “Dr. Howells was brought up in Utah,” said the young man with the pipe.

  “It was a different place altogether in those days,” Dr. Howells said. “Mrs. Howells and I have always talked about going back when I retire, but now I’m not so sure.”

  “We’re a little short on time,” Louise said.

  “And here I’ve been going on and on,” Dr. Howells said. “Before we wind things up, is there anything you want to tell us?”

  “Yes. I think you should give me the job.” Mary laughed when she said this, but no one laughed back, or even looked at her. They all looked away. Mary understood then that they were not really considering her for the position. She had been brought here to satisfy a rule. She had no hope.

  The men gathered their papers and shook hands with Mary and told her how much they were looking forward to her class. “I can’t get enough of the Marshall Plan,” Dr. Howells said.

  “Sorry about that,” Louise said when they were alone. “I didn’t think it would be so bad. That was a real bitcheroo.”

  “Tell me something,” Mary said. “You already know who you’re going to hire, don’t you?”

  Louise nodded.

  “Then why did you bring me here?”

  Louise began to explain about the statute and Mary interrupted. “I know all that. But why me? Why did you pick me?”

  Louise walked to the window. She spoke with her back to Mary. “Things haven’t been going very well for old Louise,” she said. “I’ve been unhappy and I thought you might cheer me up. You used to be so funny, and I was sure you would enjoy the trip—it didn’t cost you anything, and it’s pretty this time of year with the leaves and everything. Mary, you don’t know the things my parents did to me. And Ted is no barrel of laughs either. Or Jonathan, the son of a bitch. I deserve some love and friendship but I don’t get any.” She turned and looked at her watch. “It’s almost time for your class. We’d better go.”

  “I would rather not give it. After all, there’s not much point, is there?”

  “But you have to give it. That’s part of the interview.” Louise handed Mary a folder. “All you have to do is read this. It isn’t much, considering all the money we’ve laid out to get you here.”

  Mary followed Louise down the hall to the lecture room. The professors were sitting in the front row with their legs crossed. They smiled and nodded at Mary. Behind them the room was full of students, some of whom had spilled over into the aisles. One of the professors adjusted the microphone to Mary’s height, crouching down as he went to the podium and back as though he would prefer not to be seen.

  Louise called the room to order. She introduced Mary and gave the subject of the lecture. But Mary had decided to wing it after all. Mary came to the podium unsure of what she would say; sure only that she would rather die than read Louise’s article. The sun poured through the stained glass onto the people around her, painting their faces. Thick streams of smoke from the young professor’s pipe drifted through a circle of red light at Mary’s feet, turning crimson and twisting like flames.

  “I wonder how many of you know,” she began, “that we are in the Long House, the ancient domain of the Five Nations of the Iroquois.”

  Two professors looked at each other.

  “The Iroquois were without pity,” Mary said. “They hunted people down with clubs and arrows and spears and nets, and blowguns made from elder stalks. They tortured their captives, sparing no one, not even the little children. They took scalps and practiced cannibalism and slavery. Because they had no pity they became powerful, so powerful that no other tribe dared to oppose them. They made the other tribes pay tribute, and when they had nothing more to pay the Iroquois attacked them.”

  Several of the professors began to whisper. Dr. Howells was saying something to Louise, and Louise was shaking her head.

  “In one of their raids,” Mary said, “they captured two Jesuit priests, Jean de Brébeuf and Gabriel Lalement. They covered Lalement with pitch and set him on fire in front of Brébeuf. When Brébeuf rebuked them they cut off his lips and put a burning iron down his throat. They hung a collar of red-hot hatchets around his neck, and poured boiling water over his head. When he continued to preach to them they cut strips of flesh from his body and ate them before his eyes. While he was still alive they scalped him and cut open his breast and drank his blood. Later, their chief tore out Brébeuf’s heart and ate it, but just before he did this Brébeuf spoke to them one last time. He said—”

  “That’s enough!” yelled Dr. Howells, jumping to his feet.

  Louise stopped shaking her head. Her eyes were perfectly round.

  Mary had come to the end of her facts. She did not know what Brébeuf had said. Silence rose up around her; just when she thought she would go under and be lost in it she heard someone whistling in the hallway outside, trilling the notes like a bird, like many birds.

  “Mend your lives,” she said. “You have deceived yourselves in the pride of your hearts, and the strength of your arms. Though you soar aloft like the eagle, though your nest is set among the stars, thence I will bring you down, says the Lord. Turn from power to love. Be kind. Do justice. Walk humbly.”

  Louise was waving her arms. “Mary!” she shouted.

  But Mary had more to say, much more; she waved back at Louise, then turned off her hearing aid so that she would not be distracted again.

  Poaching

  Wharton was a cartoonist, and a nervous man—“high-strung,” he would have said. Because of his occupation and his nerves he required peace, but in Vancouver he didn’t get much of that. His wife, Ellen, was deficient in many respects, and resented his constructive criticism. She took it personally. They bickered, and she threatened to leave him. Wharton believed that she was having an affair. George, their son, slouched around the house all day and paid no attention when Wharton described all the sports and hobbies that an eleven-year-old boy ought to be interested in.

  Wharton dreamed of a place in the country where George would be outside all day, making friends and hiking, and Ellen would have a garden. In his dream Wharton saw her look up and smile as he came toward her.

  He sometimes went camping for a few days when things got bad at home. On one of these trips he saw a large piece of land that the government was selling and decided to buy it. The property was heavily wooded, had a small pond surrounded by birch trees, and a good sturdy building. The building needed some work, but Wharton thought that such a project would bring them all together.

  When he told Ellen about it she said, “Are you kidding?”

  “I’ve never been more serious,” Wharton said. “And it wouldn’t hurt you to show a little enthusiasm.”

  “No way,” Ellen said. “Count me out.”

  Wharton went ahead and arranged the move. He was sure that when the moment came, Ellen would go with them. He never lost this conviction, not even when she got a job and had a lawyer draw up separation papers. But the moment came and went, and finally Wharton and George left without her.

  They had been on the land for almost a year when Wharton began to hear shots from beyond the meadow. The shooting woke him at dawn and disturbed him at his work, and he couldn’t make up his mind what to do. He hoped that it would just stop. The noise had begun to wake George, and in his obsessive way he would not leave off asking questions about it. Also, though he seldom played there, George had developed a sense of injury at being kept out of the woods.
Ellen was coming up for a visit—her first—and she would make a stink.

  The shooting continued. It went on for two weeks, three weeks, well past Easter. On the morning of the day Ellen was supposed to arrive Wharton heard two shots, and he knew he had to do something. He decided to go and talk to his neighbor Vernon. Vernon understood these things.

  George caught Wharton leaving the house and asked if he could go play with his friend Rory.

  “Absolutely not,” Wharton said, and headed up the path toward the road. The ground was swollen and spongy with rain. The fenceposts had a black and soggy look, and the ditches on either side of the road were loud with the rushing of water. Wharton dodged mudholes, huffing a little, and contemplated Rory.

  To help George make friends during the previous summer Wharton had driven him to a quarry where the local children swam. George splashed around by himself at one end and pretended that he was having a fine old time, as his eyes ticked back and forth to the motion of the other children flying from bank to bank on the rope swing, shouting “Banzai!” when they let go and reached out to the water.

  One afternoon Wharton built a fire and produced hot dogs for the children to roast. He asked their names and introduced George. He told them that they should feel free to come and visit George whenever they liked. They could swim in the pond, or play hide-and-seek in the woods. When they had eaten they thanked him and went back to their end of the quarry while George went back to his. Wharton considered rounding them up for a nature walk, but he never got around to it. A few days before the weather turned too cold for swimming George caught a garter snake in the rushes by the bank, and another boy came over to take a look. That night George asked if he could sleep over at Rory’s.

  “Who’s Rory?”

  “Just a guy.”

  Rory eventually came to their house for a reciprocal visit. Wharton did not think that he was an acceptable friend for George. He would not meet Wharton’s eye, and had a way of laughing to himself. Rory and George whispered and giggled all night, and a few days later Wharton found several burnt matches in George’s room which George would not account for. He hoped that the boy would enlarge his circle of friends when school began, but this never happened. Wharton fretted about George’s shyness. Friends were a blessing and he wanted George to have many friends. In Wharton’s opinion, George’s timidity was the result of his being underdeveloped physically. Wharton advised him to take up weight lifting.