Margaret from Maine (9781101602690) (26 page)

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“A twenty-one-gun salute is the highest honor a soldier can receive,” her dad said on the ride home. “That's what one of the Legionnaires said . . . the skinny one, Fred, I think. He said that if a Medal of Honor winner wanted to attend the State of the Union address, they would make room for him no matter what. He could get in ahead of all the big-shot politicians.”

“Make sure we remember to tell Gordon,” Margaret said.

“How did they know about this anyway?” her mom asked, twisting in the car seat to ask the question. “I mean, we're in Maine.”

“I don't know, Mom,” Margaret said. “Mr. Lyle said they came from Washington. It might have something to do with Tom's medal. Maybe all medal winners are given a guard.”

“Well, it was very moving,” her mom said. “I'll remember it as long as I live.”

“Those rifles were loud, weren't they?” her dad said.

Margaret nodded. A headache had begun along her scalp line and she put her forehead against the car window, hoping the coolness would ease the pain. She felt relieved to have the interment behind her. Ben and Gordon had placed the urn in the ground; she had thrown a handful of dirt on top of it. It was done. It made no sense any longer to wish anything had been done differently, or with more élan, because it was final in a way she had not been able to imagine. She was a widow—she could not think the word without thinking of spiders—and Thomas was a soldier fallen in war.

It took no time to arrive home and she saw a few people had already found drinks and stood on the porch, enjoying the last of the afternoon. Her dad dropped them off at the door and a man, a friend of Thomas's, a football player on their high school team, came quickly down the stairs and helped them out. Her dad pulled the car around back to make room for other vehicles. Her mother took her arm and led her up the stairs. Margaret smelled wood smoke coming from the chimney. Gordon, she was certain, had done that for her.

“Here we are,” her mother said when she gained the landing.

In many ways, Margaret realized, it felt exactly like a party. It had been years since they had had people in, but she recalled the feeling. Her mother went in to use the ladies' room and Margaret found herself alone on the porch, not exactly sure what to do next. She shook hands with two or three people who came forward and introduced themselves. Blake took the flag from her and it was not until she did so that Margaret remembered it was in her hands. She whispered to Blake that she would like a scotch, please, with plenty of ice. And two aspirins. Blake nodded and went off to fetch the drink.

“Tommy was quite a football player,” someone said in her hearing. “Tough as anything. Strong, too. I remember . . .”

Slowly, Margaret made her way into the house. She smelled the fireplace immediately. Her instinct told her to go into the kitchen, to find Dorothy and check that everything was in hand, but then she realized it was not her role this day. What did it matter, anyway? The reception was not meant to impress; it was a social duty, not an unfair one, she decided, and she resolved to let others worry about its outcome. She wanted to sit beside the fire, to have the aspirin and cold scotch go to work on her headache. In an hour, maybe two, it would all be over in any case, and then the house would empty and become quiet and the rhythm of farm life would close around them.

She said hello to two more people, smiled, accepted a kiss. And when she looked for Blake and the drink, standing on her tiptoes to see, her eyes fell on a face so familiar it felt like a blow to her senses.

Charlie King stood beside the fireplace, his eyes meeting hers as they always had.

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In that moment, she understood. She understood where the honor guard had come from, how they had been sent, by special request, from a diplomat she once knew. For a moment everything except their glance disappeared, and she took a step toward Charlie, her eyes on his, and she could not be sure if he came to say hello or good-bye, to pay his respects and leave or to join her life forever. Gordon stood beside him, their backs to the fire, and she could see they had talked; they had a familiar way about them, two guys, two basketball players, hanging out by the fireplace. People stepped aside as she moved toward him, toward Charlie King, toward the man who had once escorted her to a ball. And it was October, and the sun would fall into the hills quickly, and the phoebe had left weeks ago, and the great oak covering the house stood bare in the autumn coolness. The fireplace burned brightly, and she imagined its smoke going up into the heavens, a white plume slowly catching the wind and traveling to the sea. Winter would come on a quiet evening, she knew. Soon, soon it would arrive. It would come by following the rivers from the mountains into the valleys, the snow falling like ashes of things partially remembered and consumed, and all the world would retreat inside, paused and waiting for spring, for warmth, and for the heavy heads of common lilacs.

Acknowledgments

T
hanks first to Tupper Hillard, my old buddy and fellow quarterback, who read this manuscript to check the military details. He's a graduate of West Point and a man who threw a tight spiral in his day. Thanks for your many years of friendship and your readiness to do a former teammate a favor.

Much gratitude to my editor, Denise Roy, and to all the folks at Plume. Thanks for your help in making this a better book than it started out being. I'm pleased by the work we've done here and I hope you are, too. Can't wait to see what's next.

As always, thanks to everyone at the Jane Rotrosen Agency, but especially to Andrea Cirillo and Christina Hogrebe. You don't know half of what you do for people. You don't know half of what you've done for me.

I also wanted to say a special thanks to Peggy Gordijn at the Rotrosen Agency, who keeps sending my novels around the world and selling them to foreign markets now and then. It's such a kick to see something you've written appear in a foreign language, and before our paths crossed it rarely happened. So thank you. And to Mike McCormack, many thanks for all you do behind the scenes.

I also wanted to thank Plymouth State University in New Hampshire, my teaching home for more than two decades. It's a place I love. The administration granted me a sabbatical this past year, freeing me for a time to concentrate on this novel. Plymouth State University is one of the good places in the world, and I am a lucky man to work with such fine colleagues.

And finally to Wendy and Justin and our sweet dog, Laika. Always hurry home.