The Laughing Matter (15 page)

“There is no help for such strangers as myself, except love.”

“Swan?”

“Yes, Evan.”

“I know the stranger's father.”

“No, Evan,” she said. “You do not. I do not.
He
does not. He
will
not know. He cannot know. The stranger is
my
stranger. I cannot be brutal. I must love him. The stranger is your stranger, too, if you love me. We do not know. You and I do not know. Red and Eva do not know. The stranger does not know. There is no truth here except the truth that is to be made out of love. And the truth then will be love. Your people are old and kind. The men of your people are fathers. They are the fathers of
all
people. They can be the father of more, Evan.”

“I
would
love,” he said. “I would love the stranger. I would love without pity, I would love without need to forgive, I would love without secret hurt, without secret hate. I
would, Swan. Without belittlement of myself I would love, but where is there in my own stranger's heart the means and nature of such love? Where is it, Swan?”

“In my own heart, Evan.”

“I would, Swan.”

“Love me, Evan. Without pity love me. Without scorn love me. Without hate love me. Let the easy lovers love one another when it is easy to love. Love me for this instant of myself loving you. Love me even for having betrayed you. Behold me, Evan, and love me with pride, with the terrible pride, the lonely pride, the fierce pride of a fool. Were it better not to be a fool, Evan?”

“Let this stranger go,” he said. “Let our own stranger come. Let it be Red's and Eva's.”

I cannot be kind to her in every instant of her being, he thought. This river-and-summer moment will soon be gone. There are other moments. The coming of the stranger in the other moments will not be the same to her then as it is now.

She turned at last and looked at him.

“Love is a lie,” she said. “I don't care, though. I don't care any more. I believed only
you
could love, but you cannot, either. If that's how it is, Evan, that's how it is. Is that how it is?”

“Yes, Swan.”

“You cannot love me ugly, mad, sick, false, fearful?”

“Loving deathly things would not be love, Swan.”

“Love is a lie, Evan.”

“Time is slow,” he said, “but a woman's wrong to a man, to herself, to her children, speeds time to death. I would not wrong you, Swan. I would restore slow time to both of us. I have been divorced from it these many hours. Love is no lie. I want you to live. I want Red to live. I want Eva to live. And I want to live in each of you. There is no other place for me to go. I am in each of you. I
am
each of you. It is no lie. Shall we try? Shall we try
now
to understand, while they sleep, so that we may know a little better who we are, and what we
may
do?”

“Yes, Evan.”

“I went to see my brother at the airport last night, not the one whose name I said. I said his name because it was the first that came to mind when I did not wish to say I was going to see my brother. You know, I know, my brother knows. No one else knows. No one need ever know. It is not impossible to forget that one of us moved farther away than the other. I would forget which of us it was. I would forget this, and I know I can. Can you forget it, Swan?”

“Yes, Evan.”

“Do you
want
to?”

“Yes, Evan.”

“Are you afraid of what needs to be done?”

“Yes.”

“Do you feel it is wrong?”

“Yes, but it must be done. I'm afraid, but it must be done.”

“Do you want to think about it some more?”

“No. The sooner the better.”

“It is right, Swan.”

“Yes, Evan. It is right.”

The boy said the words in his sleep.

“What did he say?” the woman said.

“He said, ‘It is right.' He learned to say it last night from Dade. I've promised to teach him the whole language. Had I not promised, Swan, this day might not have been possible. Time is slow. There is no end to it. It is wrong to end time, Swan. Your son asked me not to end time, and I could not refuse him.”

“My beautiful son,” the woman said.

The boy was the first to waken. He looked up and saw the sorrowful, troubled, luminous face of the woman who was his mother. He hugged the woman quickly, laughing and whispering in her ear, “It is right.” He turned to his father. “Mama doesn't understand me any more, Papa.” He said the words in the language again. “What am I saying, Mama?”

“It is right,” the woman said.

“Do
you
know the language, too?” Red said.

“I'm learning it,” the woman said.

The girl woke up and stared at her father.

“I want to go in the water,” she said. “I want to go in the water all the time.”

“No, Eva,” the woman said.

“Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” the girl said.

“No, no, no, no, no, no,” the woman said.

They picked things up, went to the car, and began to drive home. This time they all sat up front, the boy beside the man, the girl on the woman's lap.

The minute they were home Red wanted to telephone Flora Walz. Evan got the number for him.

“Flora?” he said.

“This is Fanny,” the voice on the line said.

“This is Red. Come on over and play.”

“Can't,” Fanny said. “They've gone to Fresno in the car. We're here with Mrs. Blotch.”

“Can I talk to Flora?”

He couldn't wait to hear her voice. When he did, he lost his own.

“Come on over and play,” he said at last.

“Red?”

“Yes.”

“Red Nazarenus?”

“Yes. Come on over and play, Flora.”

“Can't. We don't have a car.”

“How far is it?”

“Very far. They've gone to Fresno.”

“I know. Fay knows the way. Walk over.”

“Can't.”

“Please come over,” Red said. He called out to his father. “Papa, will you take me in the car to Flora's house?”

“Sure,” Evan said.

“I'll be right over,” Red said.

“All right,” Flora said.

Eva came out into the hall and said, “I want to go, too, Red. Papa, I want to go, too.”

“You can come,” Red said.

“He's my brother,” Eva said to her father.

Red ran out into the parlor.

“Good-bye, Mama,” he said. “I'm going to Flora's house. It's very far. They've gone to Fresno in the car. Flora's there with Mrs. Blotch. Eva's going, too.”

His body danced as he spoke. He ran to the front door, saying, “Come on, Eva.”

Eva said, “Yesterday when I wanted to go, Mama, they wouldn't let me. Remember? But today I
am
going. I'm going with my brother to Flora's house. Is it Flora's house? I think it's Fanny's. I'm coming, Red. Good-bye, Mama.”

From the porch Evan said, “Come on, Swan. Ride with us.”

“You take them and come back,” Swan said. “They've said such nice good-byes, I'd spoil it by going.”

“I'll be only a few minutes,” the man said.

When they were gone she went to the telephone and called Palo Alto.

He didn't speak a moment, then said, “I'm going back to New York. I've bought my ticket. Are you all right?”

“Yes,” she said.

“I mean——” he said. “I've been awfully worried about you. Are you sure you're all right?”

“Yes. Yes,” she said.

“Well, take care of yourself,” he said. “Take care of your children.”

“Good-bye,” she said.

He was the one.

She knew it need not have happened. It had happened because
she
had insisted, but she could not then, or now, understand why. Had she forced it to happen in order to have come to pass what
had
come to pass?

She was glad he didn't know, at any rate, perhaps didn't even suspect.

She was suddenly overwhelmed by the absurdity of what had happened, but at the same time almost wished she could be with him once more, one last time, to seek to know perhaps one thing more, though what it was she could not guess.

She wept for him, and for his secret son.

She then went to the bathroom, vomited, and afterwards washed her hands and face.

The man drove slowly down the country road, loitering as if the car were himself.

“Do you know where it is?” Red said.

“Papa knows where
everything
is,” Eva said. “Don't you, Papa?”

“Do I, Eva?”

“Of course, Papa.”

“Do you know where Flora's
house
is?” Red said.

“It's over here someplace,” Evan said.

“You see, Red,” Eva said. “He knows.”

“He
doesn't,”
Red said. “He's going to look for it. Over
where
someplace, Papa?”

“Down this road a little,” the man said, “or down the next road, or down some other road.”

“Down this road,” Red said, laughing. “Down the next, down some other.
Where
is it?”

“Papa knows,” Eva said. “Papa knows everything.”

“Papa knows everything,” Red said, laughing.

“Papa even knows when I was
born,”
Eva said. “Don't you, Papa?”

“I think Red does, too,” the man said.

“Do you, Red?”

“Sure.”

“I don't,” Eva said.

“How could you?” Red said. “You were just born.”

“I was
me,”
Eva said.

“I was me,” Red said, laughing.

Red was finding comedy in everything because he was going to see Flora Walz. His sister was finding love in everything because she hadn't been left behind, because she was going with him, because there
was
—because there
could
be—love in everything.

Evan Nazarenus loved them, and they knew it. They knew it from the way he was their father again. The panic and the weeping were gone out of them because they recognized him again as the one who was their own father, a slim, slouching man with hair all over his fingers and arms, brown and red, not black like the hair on his head. His children loved one another now because they had seen their mother and their father through a whole day the way the best days they had ever known had been, their mother
loving, their father loving, each of them quiet and patient, not loud and angry, or loud only on purpose, for fun, for the making of play, and angry only to make the play all the more interesting, the way Red, having learned from his father, pretended to be angry when he repeated the strange things his sister had said, the easygoing things his father had said, having fun about Red's eagerness to get to Flora's,
Down this road, down the next, down the other
.

Red and his father were going to have a talk sometime because his father had told him they were. It was going to be a talk about his father's angry voice the other night. Sometimes Eva made Red angry. He pushed her sometimes, and she
said
he hit her, but he only
pushed
her. He
had
hit her, though. He had hit her a lot of times, but not as many times as she had made him angry. Sometimes he just let it go.

“That looks like a nice house,” Red said. “Maybe
that's
Flora's house.”

“Fanny's,” Eva said. “It's Fanny's house. Fanny doesn't cry when her head's cracked open.”

“Fanny doesn't cry when her head's cracked open,” Red said, laughing. “Fanny doesn't cry when she
cries
, I suppose. Fanny laughs when she cries, I suppose.”

“Fanny laughs when she cries!” Eva said. “Isn't that funny, Papa?”

The house was neither Flora's nor Fanny's. The name on the mailbox was Amos Blotch.

It's around here somewhere, the man thought. If it's his wife who's staying with the girls, they are probably neighbors.

He wanted to surprise his son and his daughter by driving
right in, by taking that chance, or by catching the name on the mailbox in time to make the arrival neat and natural, make it seem as if he
did
know. He knew it would thrill the girl, and make the boy feel good. It would make
him
feel good, too, because so far they had not wandered around, they had gone straight down a road, they hadn't stopped and gone back, or tried another road.

He saw a white frame house, as clean as it could be, set back from the road fifty yards or so with a lot of lawn up front and two enormous eucalyptus trees. He believed this might be the house of Warren and May Walz. He didn't make out the name on the box, for the lettering had faded, but he drove right in, all the way up the driveway, and there he saw the three girls in the large back yard, a very old olive tree at the far end of it, and a woman with glasses sitting in a canvas chair, reading a book.

“You see, Red?” Eva said. “Papa
does
know where everything is.”

“Did you know where it was, Papa?” Red said.

“Well, here we are,” the man said. “There's Fay and Fanny and Flora.”

He stopped the car and Red and Eva jumped out and ran to the girls, who ran to them.

The woman got up, keeping her place in the book she was reading, and smiled.

The man greeted her and said, “I hope they won't be too much trouble. If you'll telephone when they're ready to come home, I'll come and get them.”

“Do you want them to stop when it's dark?” the woman asked.

“Whenever the Walz girls are ready to stop will be all right,” he said. “They've had naps and a peaceful day.”

“All right,” the woman said.

The children were under the olive tree, making plans for the first game. He got into the car and began to drive back.