A Doubter's Almanac (31 page)

“I’m not nosy, Smallette. I’m
interested
.” (
Smallette
was the best I could do for
Paulette,
to my long-standing disappointment.) I leaned my temple against the back of my father’s headrest, hoping he’d think I was sleepy.

“Nobody’s come near it in years,” I heard him say.

“That’s because they’re intimidated,” Mom replied. “They’re intimidated by its brilliance.”

I remember marveling at my mother then, noting that despite the unrelenting weight of what must have already been a thoroughly one-sided marriage, she was immediately drawn to the encouraging word. For a few moments, I thought the impasse had ended.

But after driving silently for a time, my father turned to her and muttered, “Bullshit.”

When there was no response, he said it louder. “Bullshit!”

Of course, I also knew exactly what he was talking about. My mother’s imperturbable kindness was infuriating even to me—although, being young, I was confused by such a feeling.

“Okay,” she said gently.

“You know,” he said, “you are such a
fucking
Pollyanna.”

“What I said was the truth, Milo. No mathematician can come near what you achieved in the field. Not for a long, long time, anyway. Some work just puts an end to debate.”

He slowed the car. “Why, might I ask, are you such a goddamn fucking apologist?”

My mother turned to look at me in the backseat, then at the traffic behind us. “Sweetheart.”

He slowed further. A van roared past. Bernie barked.

“Milo. This is a highway.”

“I wrote a fucking brilliant proof, Helena. And no one’s taken it up. Not one fucking single other mathematician. Not one in twenty fucking years.”

“That’s an exaggeration.”

“Not that much of one. It’s a goddamn insult.”

“It’s just another mark of its power, sweetheart. That’s all. Nobody followed Newton, either. Now please speed up a little.”

My father continued at the same rate, working the eleventh empty back into its plastic ring as first one car, then another, pulled out to pass us. I glanced out the rear window, where a line of traffic was building.

When the Leinie cans were back in their place, he withdrew his hand and drummed his fingers lazily against the wheel, like a farmer plodding along in a tractor. “By the way,” he said, glancing up into the mirror. “That’s completely absurd. Barrow preceded Newton, and Leibniz followed Newton. You don’t know a goddamn thing about it. You don’t know the first thing about a goddamn thing about what you’re goddamn talking about.”

All of this was said slowly.

“We can discuss it,” said my mother, “anytime you’d like.” Then: “Will you kindly respect the speed limit?”

“Okay,” he said, shifting his foot to the accelerator. “Kids, your mother says we should respect the speed limit.” The engine growled. We roared forward, pulling close behind one of the cars that had just passed us. A moment later, our engine shaking, we passed it. Then the two ahead. He pulled in finally for a semitrailer coming in the other direction, then pulled back out to pass.

I looked over the headrest: the speedometer was on eighty.

“Okay,” my mother said calmly. “What’s next, Milo? What exactly are you planning to do next? Children, are your belts on?”

“What’s next is nothing!” But rather than jerking the wheel or stomping even harder on the accelerator, as I somehow hoped he would do, he simply slid back into line and laid off the gas until we had slowed again to fifty-five; and then, just like that, we were driving peaceably. My mother offered him another pretzel, and he took it straight from her fingers into his mouth. When the salty tidbit appeared to soothe him further, she handed him a few more.

My mother in those days had become quite adept at calming him.

Many years later, of course, when I understood what was happening to my father, I learned about the cognitive changes that can accompany a condition like his; and I have to say, as I read those medical articles on the Internet in his dank and ruined house—a father myself at that point—I was forced to rethink many of the things I’d believed about him. Nobody likes to do that. Especially if you’ve nursed a grievance of mistreatment for a good portion of your life. But this is part of why I tell this story—to understand the truth about him, including the idea that he can’t entirely be blamed for what he did to us, and for what he did to himself, and for what happened to him.

At any rate, it was later that afternoon, at the Macon Dalles, that the real event took place. There was a liquor store not far from the park entrance, and as usual it lifted him into a brighter mood. We managed to have a pleasant hike, winding our way through a grove of sycamores that cast a thousand permutations of green onto the spring grass that was just coming out of seed along the paths. At the river, we turned south. Below us, in the first run of boulders, the water began its concert. When we arrived at the spot where the path moved onto the stone ledge above the channel, my father bent down and lifted Paulie onto his shoulders. An uncertain smile crossed her face. As we moved along the narrow sill of rock, he began wobbling like a tipsy horse. Bernie ran up behind him, barking. An iron railing was built into the outcropping, and when he leaned over it my sister squealed. I wasn’t sure whether it was a squeal of terror or a squeal of delight, but when he leaned back to safety again I saw that her smile had deepened. She pressed her knees against his flanks.

“Milo,” said my mother.

He leaned over the railing again, and Paulie squealed anew, letting go of his shoulders this time and waving her hands in the air as though her roller-coaster car had paused at the peak of the hill.

“Milo. Please.”

Bernie nudged Dad’s leg, trying to move him back from the edge, but my father pretended to stumble toward the water.

My mother inhaled sharply.

“Mom, it’s okay,” said Paulie. She rolled her eyes.

“No, it’s not okay, honey. It’s not okay at all. Milo, please set her down.”

“It’s okay. I like it, Mom.”

“Set her down, Milo.” Then, louder: “Milo!”

He turned and looked at her, shaking his head. Then he complied. As soon as Paulie was on the ground, he bowed to all of us with an exaggerated flourish, like a rickshaw driver.

“Wow,” said my sister, rolling her eyes again, “Mrs. Kill-the-Party.”

“Thank you, Paulette.”

“Miss Fall-off-the-Cliff-and-Break-Your-Neck,” I said.

“Nobody’s going to fall anywhere,” said my father. “Are they, Bernou?” Then he said, “Here, boy,” and patted Bernie on the head.

This was the end of the conversation. We walked on, and when we reached our picnic spot, my mother spread out the meal. Ham salad and coleslaw and sugar cookies, all of my father’s favorites. We ate. But I could tell that the incident had upended his optimism. He sat so that we couldn’t see his face, his head turned toward the churning water, and rather than let his wife fix his drinks for him in the glass tumbler that she’d lugged up the trail, he kept his liquor-store bag next to him and lifted it straight to his lips. The paper had formed itself to the neck of the bottle. As soon as he finished his sandwich, he took the bag with him and walked to the edge of the cliff.

The rest of us remained behind, sitting cross-legged on the checkered red blanket that was covered with our half-eaten sandwiches. I remember his silhouette that day, standing against the cellophane sky. There weren’t many places in Ohio where a man could oversee vastness; but that was what he was doing, his somehow heroic frame contemplating the remaining westward reach of a continent that, over the last decade, he’d been slowly recrossing.

“Your father’s feeling philosophical,” said my mother. She’d risen to her knees and was putting away the utensils and sliding the uneaten coleslaw from his plate onto mine. His sandwich was being finished off by Bernie.

“He was fun today,” said Paulette.

“Yes, he was,” said my mother. “Your father does enjoy these outings.”

Just then his silhouette bent forward at the waist, and over the rumble of the water we heard a staccato cough. His free hand went to his mouth, and the one with the bag in it went out to the side, to steady his balance. He remained bent forward for several moments before he stood again, still facing away from us. Then he brought the bag up to his lips.

My mother’s hand touched mine. “Hans.”

She rose and began moving toward him.

She was stepping gingerly, as though sneaking up on a bird, and as I followed her I did the same. At one point, her arm came back and found mine. He still hadn’t turned, and when we neared him she slowed again, approaching watchfully. She said, “Milo?” First she tapped his shoulder, then she took hold of it.

He turned, and his eyes were red. I wondered how she’d known.

“The thing I will never do,” he said, wiping his cheek with the bag, “is hurt them.”

“Of course we know that,” said my mother.

“I will never, ever, hurt my children.”

“Of course not, my love.”

Tears were on his cheeks.

I stepped up next to my mother. I should have turned away, should have given him the privacy he wanted, but I found, as always, that I couldn’t. I couldn’t ever turn away from him when he was like this, when the battle-dented armor behind which he spent his days had momentarily been lowered. For a moment I could see the man behind it.

“Never ever hurt them,” he said.

“Of course not.”

“Get away from here, Hans,” he said through a sob.

“Fuck you, Dad.”

He recoiled as though he’d been slapped.

“Hans!” said my mother.

“I was kidding. We always say that. It’s a joke.”

My sister came up behind. “Get away, Hans,” she hissed. “You’re making it worse.”

My father turned on her. “You,” he said, pointing. “You’re one, too.”

“One what?”

“One silly, fucking Pollyanna.”

“What?” Paulie sat down on the ground.

“Jesus H. Christ,” said my father. “All of you, get the hell away from me!”

“We’re right here,” said my mother. “It’s all right, Milo.”

“It’s not all right,” I said.

“Correct, Hans! You are
correct
.” He turned to us, smiling weirdly now, then emitted another sharp sound, something between a laugh and a hiccup, and covered his mouth again with his hand.

“Why don’t we all go finish our sandwiches,” said my mother.

He pivoted once more to the water. For a few moments, we all just stayed there, frozen, my father looking off into the distance, my mother smiling determinedly at his back, while from behind us came the
hzz-hzz
of Paulette’s sniffling and the
ph-hah, ph-hah
of Bernie’s panting. Then my mother touched him on the shoulder again. That’s when he wheeled. As though shooing a pernicious fly, he swung his hand and struck her backhand across the face.

She fell to the ground.

Paulie screamed. I grabbed Mom under the shoulders and stood her up, then led her away across the rock. At the blanket, I let go, and she slumped down into the ruins of the picnic. Bernie was baying. I turned angrily to my father, who’d resumed his posture on the cliff; then back to my mother, who lay crumpled on the ground like a dropped marionette, tears on her cheeks.

Paulette approached, sniffling.

“Shut up, Smallette. What’s the matter with you? He
hurt
Mom.”

“He hurt me just as badly. Did you hear what he said?”

Now my mother stirred. She rose, wiped her cheeks on her blouse, and looked around. Bernie was sprinting back and forth between the cliff edge and our blanket, as though doing line drills. “Please, you two,” said my mother. “Please, I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?” said Paulie. “We don’t have to go back with him.”

“Then how do you propose we get home, Smallette?”

“We’ll leave him here.”

“Please,” my mother said again. “Please.”

“Are you sure you’re all right?” said Paulie. “You can tell us.”

“I’m fine, honey. I’m sure he’s terribly sorry.” But these words seemed to affect her almost as deeply as the slap had. She slumped forward again, and the tears came freely. She was leaning on all fours now, trying to control herself, her gasps punctuating the rumble of the river. I saw my father turn toward the sound, then back to the water.

He stood there like that, his back to us, for a good long time while my mother’s crying slowly diminished. Soon Paulette had stopped sniffling, too, and with a starched-blouse propriety she set about gathering up our picnic trash. She knelt rigidly and replaced everything in the wicker basket, her face a mask now of resolve. I think my sister had always imagined herself a war nurse; and here we were at last, at war.

I myself was passing the skirmish by rubbing my mother’s shoulders, and she was raising her head now and then to thank me.

It might have been a quarter of an hour later that my father, at the edge of the cliff, finally turned to us again. He leaned forward and set both hands on his hips, then dropped the bag to the ground.

My mother rose to her knees.

He tilted up his head so we could see his face—he was smiling, rather sheepishly, it seemed. My mother smiled back.

Then he coughed again.

Afterward, there was a moment marked only by the tympanic rumble of the river and by the wobble of his slightly swaying torso against the sky. The next cough was shorter but strangely crisp, like the snap of a stick. His hand moved to his breast pocket. When it came away, I saw it—the smashed pomegranate again. He looked up, frightened. The globule had attached itself to his shirt, like the gaping, purplish wound from a bullet. I swallowed. I was still on my knees, still patting my mother’s shoulder, and she was still looking up at me, still vaguely puzzled, as though I were a sympathy machine that she’d somehow forgotten how to switch off; but suddenly she shoved away my arm and sprang to her feet. The blanket was in her hand, and we were running. When she reached him, she pressed it to his face and lowered him to the ground. My father thrust away her attempts and cupped his hands over his own mouth. He was on his knees now, every few seconds spasming forward at the neck and emitting from his lips another crisp hack followed by a bright red stream of blood, a stuttering river that quickly became a spreading puddle below him, into which he leaned forward finally and collapsed.