Erased From Memory (21 page)

At the bottom of the steps is Scott Dillard, whose sleeve I grab on to. “Drill some sense into my head, will you?” I demand.

“Blues Enthusiast.” He more or less straightens me up. “What in hell is the matter?”

“I don’t know what’s the matter. No one will speak a straight sentence.”

“And you think I will? I’m flattered.”

“I don’t think you will. You were here and I grabbed.”

“Okay, okay.” We are on the gravel path that slants down the hill toward the prettied-up statue of Hatshepshut. “Let’s walk.”

“My dad is crazy,” I say. “My boyfriend’s in love with another woman. She spends half her time lording it over me about what great sex they have. The sheriff is trying to put my father in jail. Egon . . . what’s Egon doing with my dad? Have you been watching?”

“Yep.”

“And is it weird?”

“You could say that.” Scott puts an arm around my shoulder. He squeezes. Maybe my grandmother, if I had one, would think he is squeezing too intimately, with too much of his left-hand body impinging on my right-hand body, but at the moment I don’t think so. I regard all that as just fine. Scott is a handsome man and I’m lonely. Shut up, ancestral grand-maternal voice. “Egon is always somewhat weird, you understand . . . Listen”—Scott squeezes a bit harder—“I’m sorry you got mixed up in all this.”

“I don’t even know what
all this
is,” I say. “First, the murders. Then a whole bunch of other stuff. Something about your discoveries. Your exhibits.”

“Oh,
shit.
” He puts a lot of energy into that
oh, shit
. “I wish you’d never even heard of it.”

“Well, thanks.”

“I wish
I
hadn’t. Me. Wish I weren’t involved. I wish I were running a gas station in Center City, Kansas.”

I move away. “Cut it out. Your discoveries? All that stuff you turned up? Egon’s New Archaeology Unveiled?”

“Fuck all that.”

He’s so fierce that I step back a foot and try some remark about new knowledge always being valuable.

“Oh, yeah? How about not new, not real?”

“Of course it’s real. For God’s sake, how real is anything? And you’re in line for the Hartdale.”

“Hartdale? A whole lot of talk and publicity and garbage. And the charm is way gone.”

We’ve kept on walking. I try to sound consoling, or wise. “You’ll feel different when it happens. When that committee arrives . . .” I stop, realizing that I picture the committee as the group of grinning, toothy people who race up to your doorstep with the giant magazine contest check in the TV ads.

Scott says, “Yeah, hell.” We walk a bit farther, scuffing gravel. “Some things, at first, they seem worth anything. Any sacrifice, any concession. And then you wake up one night wondering if you’ve sold your soul to the devil.”

“Egon’s the devil?” Hey, I think, no way. Egon is laughable and ridiculous. The devil is handsome, dark, sinister, fast. Egon goes around saying, “Wonderful, wonderful.”

“I know what he’s been doing with your dad,” Scott says.

I stop our parade along the graveled walk and grab him by his other arm. “I absolutely don’t get it. Getting my father to talk about archaeology? He does okay if he remembers what century we’re in. Half the time he doesn’t know the difference between something he learned in archaeology and . . .” I stop here, stuck for an example. “And something he saw on
M*A*S*H
.”

“And half the time he does know and comes up with a fact that might help someone that was trying to fill in gaps . . . Yes,” Scott continues, peering into my probably distressed-looking face, “he doesn’t know it consistently. But if Egon can find out, someone else can, too. I don’t know what Egon’s looking for. Maybe it’s dangerous for your dad.”

I’m silent for a minute. “My father has damaging knowledge?”

“Maybe.

“Listen,” he continues. “I didn’t know whether to tell you. I didn’t want to scare you. But I guess . . . Oh, hell . . .”

Scott is holding on to me and he smells good—a combination of fresh, energetic human being and herbal something, a vaguely pine undertone, probably aftershave. I have a heavy impulse to snuggle in and hug. But the situation is unfortunate. Right now it would seem too much like coming to an imaginary daddy for comfort.

“And I saw something pretty bad,” Scott continues. “Egon was hypnotizing him.”

“Well, anybody can do it. You know that.”

Yes, I do know it; I know from working in the animal lab. We had a book on hypnotism; we all read it and we hypnotized the animals to get them relaxed. Bunny rabbits get hypnotized by a straight line on the floor and repetitive stroking. We also tried it on each other; human beings require more elaborate measures. Like, “Now think yourself into a calm, quiet place; now let your shoulders relax, now loosen up your arms, let go your fingers . . .”

Try that. You can almost do it to yourself.

Okay. But my dad. When the person is all relaxed, you suggest stuff like, “Go back into your past. Remember the time when . . .” Oh, hell and hell. My dad. His mind is frail anyway. A poor little wobbly, imprecise mind.

“His grasp on reality . . .” I say aloud.

“Yeah. It’s not too definite.”

“You saw Egon do this?”

“They were in his office and I was in the hall. Egon didn’t know I was watching.

“And your dad was way under. It was bad. Flat on his back and Egon doing this flim-flam about
relax, undo your toes, the ends of your toenails, feel your feet unclench, feel your arches loosen, let your feet turn outward
, and so on and on. I came by Egon’s office and heard a couple of sentences and wanted to bang on some pots to disrupt his routine. Except I thought it would scare your dad.”

When I just stare at him, Scott says, “That’s dangerous stuff. I don’t know what it does to an older brain, but I’ve seen what happens with a younger and upset one . . .” We’ve been walking slowly down the gravel path from the residence and we’ve reached a marble bench with lion armrests; Scott strokes the lion’s carved mane. “I had a friend my age once who . . .” He doesn’t finish this sentence.

This scares me. “Of course it’s dangerous, Scott. It’s dangerous for him; I know that; he’s got this old fluffy mind; who knows what’s going to push it over or bury him completely or wreak some irreversible harm. Oh, damn, damn.”

I sit down on the bench. “It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have let him come here, knew it was a lousy idea, but he wanted it so much, and I just said, okay, okay . . .”

“Ed has different ideas at different times. About what he wants.”

“Oh, come on. He wants to feel useful. That’s his thing these days. Feeling useful.”

“Well, I guess he was useful on this; Egon was hovering around, saying, ‘Oh, yes, yes,’ and making that hand wave he does, and Ed was talking in that funny monotone people get when the stage magician puts them under . . .”

“Talking about what?”

“Egyptian poetry; I couldn’t exactly get it; he was chanting. Middle Kingdom stuff, I think. And then something or other that really bothered Egon; he yelled out, ‘Wake up, Ed, wake up.’ Real bad. You’re supposed to wake the subject slowly.”

“Did it upset Daddy?”

“Sure it upset him. He flailed around and almost fell off the couch. Egon got so involved in patting him and smoothing him—‘Oh, my, oh, dear,’ he was saying—that he didn’t see me there and I sloped off. But I guess your dad was okay; he was at dinner later; he looked okay.”

“Okay is not okay. Scott, you’re supposed to be a friend. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Who says I’m a friend? Is it safe to have friends around here? Anyway, I am telling you now.”

We walk a few feet before I say, “And you didn’t hear what Daddy said? The thing that set Egon off?”

Scott’s tone is guarded. He says no. Maybe it’s because he keeps his face turned away that I think he’s lying.

I wait a minute and then announce, surprised at how firm my voice sounds, because I’m feeling awful, “We’re leaving. We’re leaving tomorrow.”

“A good idea.”

He adds, “Yeah, a good idea. Sorry you got into this. Not really your affair.

“Oh, hell,” he adds this with extra intensity, as if the coda is,
It’s my affair and I’m stuck with it
. . . “I’ll be sorry to have you leave. Can I come visit?”

“Sure.” I say this automatically because I’m thinking about how to persuade Daddy to come with me, and knowing that it will be difficult. But when I think about Scott visiting me at the Manor, I find that yes, that would be okay. Good, in fact. “Sure, come anytime. The work I do there isn’t that fascinating. I can always rip myself loose.”

 
 
The trouble with having an agenda with my father—that is, something I want to discuss and am planning an approach to—the trouble with that is the way my preoccupation shows. My dad guesses something is up. He raises his guard.

He and I are walking in the museum garden. He’s looking at me sideways. “Daughter, dear, I am guessing. Something troubles you.”

Oh, nuts.

“Perhaps you should not let it trouble you.”

Oh, yes, I should.

“I have found that the worker who worries while he is attempting a delicate job . . .”

“Daddy”—I can’t stand any more of this—“it’s time to leave here. To leave the museum. To go back to the Manor.”

He is equable. “I will miss you.”

“You have to come, too. You’re needed back at the Manor.”

“No, I’m not.”

“They count on you, dear.”

“No, they don’t.”

“They miss you at the Manor.”

“Not much.”

“They talk about you a lot.”

Sometimes I think my dad’s Alzheimer’s is partly under his control. He can summon it up when he needs it. Now, for instance, he decides to have some short-term memory problems. “Manor? You are going back to a manor? What manor would that be?”

I don’t waste time on this. “We’ve been here a long time.”

“Yes. Very profitable.”

“Both of us have had a nice holiday.”

“I have not had a holiday. I’ve been working.”

“Now it’s time to return.”

“You may come back here to visit.”

We stop, side by side on the gravel path, with our faces turned toward each other. I say, “Oh, sweetheart.”

“Yes,” he agrees cheerfully. “I am your sweetheart.”

“Let’s walk down the hill,” I say. And off we go, cheerful, synchronized.

My dad is a very good walker.

I must say, this stay at the Scholars’ Institute has improved his physical condition.

The museum lands stretch out on both sides of the main building.

“Ah. We are going to look at the trains,” my father says in a voice of discovery. “I was out here last night with that lady. The one with the belt.”

Bunny. I wish Bunny wouldn’t try to get chummy with my father.

“Trains appeal to the curious personality,” he announces. “These are the only trains in these parts.”

I say, “They have trains near the Manor, too.” He pays no attention.

These trains are Southern Pacific, like most of the ones in California. They don’t carry passengers anymore, but there are still beautiful long freights and engines with satisfying whistles. The freights seem to come by about twice a day, but I’ve never tried to clock them. Maybe I should; he’s acting so interested.

I remind myself of our main topic. “Tomorrow,” I say, in a tone of high conspiracy, “I’ll help you pack your suitcase.”

No answer to that. He looks at the trains. “I think I know a song about a lonesome whistle.”

A string of freights is parked on the siding: several orange-painted, old-fashioned, wooden SP cars, the ones with the sliding doors, and a chain of flat cars piled with containers waiting to be transferred onto long-distance trucks. Plus, near the end, a couple of refrigerator cars, bright white and waterproof-looking.

Daddy gives a satisfied sigh and settles down on the bank. He rests his feet on a rock and links his arms around his knees. “I like to think about where they are going.”

Sometimes he sounds perfectly okay at the start of a conversation and then veers off suddenly when your attention is deflected.

“This one would not be going into Constantinople. It is too late in the day. That is a very tiring journey. Sometimes you have to stand up the whole way.”

Constantinople is the old name for Istanbul and is in Turkey, and my mother is supposed to be there. Is it good or bad that he perhaps thinks of her?

 
 
The grass makes prickles, which feel nice through my jeans, a sharp warm reminder about being alive. Susie says the museum is death-oriented, and sometimes recently I’ve felt she’s right, what with the two (or one-and-a-half ) murders. But I’ve never felt that way about the Egyptian burial cult. That’s life-oriented—eternal life-oriented. How good that would be, the kind of eternal life they imagined, relaxing forever under a date-palm tree. I reach for my dad’s hand.

We’re facing a refrigerator car on which someone has been very busy with spray paint. A name, which may be Jay, or Fay or Tay or maybe it’s a tag, JAY or whatever, has been done several times in that angular script they like. I wonder if the angles are to keep the spray paint from dripping too much.

There are some designs, too. Squiggles and lines and loops, in blue and black paint.

My father, also, is looking at the refrigerator car. He leans forward. Finally he says, “Aha.”

He likes to say “Aha.” People don’t say that anymore.

“Someone has drawn me an ankh.”

After he points and I apply myself, I can see that, yes, some of the squiggles and loops resolve themselves, perhaps, into an ankh, the two loops, the knot, the middle stem.

It’s a pleasing design. Continuity, integrity, enclosure, fulfillment. I can understand it becoming a symbol for life.