Cartesian Sonata: And Other Novellas (14 page)

Walter’s hungers were of another kind; he had no desire for dinner; and the idea of putting on some loud pomade to drive about looking for familiar logos, or even of crossing into Davenport, where there were doubtless decent places, upset him. His appetite was in his eyes. In the morning—he remembered with a smug smile one of his mirrors immediately made him appreciate—he’d breakfast on scones. But then he thought he’d have to pay his bill and leave. Perhaps he could prolong his stay one day, those bozos in Mendota wouldn’t cop the diff. He could call ahead for another B&B. Where was his book?

On the seat of his car. These were really painful thoughts … painful thoughts should be put behind him, but the fact was there was no place appropriate for pain here, it hurt to have hurts in this—sure, material—sure, commercial—although transient—heaven. Well, haven, anyway. On his way to pee he wandered a few steps, drawn to the connecting door, and noticed nearby it a white ceramic birdhouse with two green ceramic birds. Around the neck of one was hung a “Sweet Bouquet Calendar for 1994.” All the months, printed in a bell which pretended to be suspended from a nosegay of violets, were laid out on one flat sheet, each day as small then as real days must be. A key continued to block any view.

In the bath he might choose to sit, not on the john, but in a rocking chair placed almost facing it. Made of maple, shellacked for a high shine, with a brown seat and backing for comfort that was all of a piece and tied on like a straightjacket. At the end of the tub, a wine basket which he hadn’t seen. In the holes where the bottles would normally be, Bettie had stuffed rolled washcloths and small towels. Walter bent down near the swan’s reflective wings and saw his face in slivers. Attached to the wall above the washstand was a wooden rack with hand towels
and odd magazines in it: the magazines are
Readers’ Digests
, the towels are draped. With the door closed to do his business, he could see a strange basket made of spent buckshot casings glued together, and into each hole some cloth has been stuffed so the whole thing looked like a sick creature’s furry tongue. In his head, Walter praised human ingenuity. What could beat it? But were there any towels you’d dare to dry your hands on?

About now, he bet, Bettie and Emery were having supper in the Family Heritage Room, the table set with splendid china from his or her grandma’s stock. Candlelight, he thought. Covered dishes leaking the scent of sweet potatoes and ham, a nice mess of greens. It was harder for Walter to imagine what they’d be saying to one another, although the character of Emery’s voice box wouldn’t alter. And the dents at the ends of Bettie’s small mouth would fill with shadow, and the narrow eyes in that long face would seem even more intense in the glow of the candles. Then her teeth, so small they seemed set in multiple rows: they’d be intermittently bright too. Flatware from the old country, cider in mugs. Well, maybe not mugs for supper, just for luncheon. Walter would have rolled out the ornate lace cloth over the walnut table, the wood shining like a snowed-on lake through the filigreed cloth.

What he could do: he could ask to stay on, and commute to Mendota, it wasn’t so far, a drive of what? maybe seventy miles, out of here on 80, easy, up on 34. He’d want the same room though. He’d have to have the same room. He’d have to make that plain. Where were all the other guests? those in the back? not a creak of course on account of workmanship and devotion.

Walter was careful on the stairs, its steps were a bit variable, and the light was low, Ruth’s window as dark and featureless as a paneled wall. He saw Missus Ambrose—Bettie—but he mustn’t let on—in the dining room in a small pool of electric, reading a book while eating alone. He began his apologies in the
parlor and let them precede him to her table. She looked up at last. It’ll be available, she said, but at a weekend rate. Walter said he didn’t mind paying a mite more. It’s lower—the rent is—for weekends, Missus Ambrose said rather severely as if he ought to have known. Less custom, fewer traveling men, on ends. I see, Walter said, I should have known. Going out now, Bettie inquired brightly, as if a change of subject required a change of expression. Ah, nah, I thought I’d just stay in. Well, sit and have a bite with me if you like, Bettie said, a second grace goes well in God’s ear. Walter made sounds which suggested second thoughts without any coming first. Mister Ambrose didn’t feel up to eating this evening. His evils were at him, so he’s in his room resting. Walter, after some hesitation, and a glimpse of chicken breast and cooked spinach, slid into Emery’s seat with a grateful sigh. Emery’s plate did not reflect a face. The fork and knife had bamboo handles. Bettie selected a piece of chicken from a platter. So, she said, with as wide a smile as she was willing, tell me about yourself. Only—was that a chuckle?—be truthful, the Lord is always listening. Ah … well … me? ah … The tines of Walter’s fork went deeply into his piece of chicken. He saw, with appetite, a bit of juice ooze.

Early to bed. Early to rise. Early on the road. Out 80. Up 34. Above a headboard of old oak, Walter read a cross-stitched saying borne by a wide pine frame which was peppered with pin-sized wormholes: God grant me the serenity to accept my lot in life. The pinworms did their job; they accepted their lot in life, he was sure; and a piece of pine which might have passed from mill to floorboard to kindling was given character, even charm, and saved for a saying. A nightcap hung from one bedpost, a bed
jacket from the other. They weren’t meant to be worn. He hadn’t lied to Missus Bettie exactly, but he had left out a lot. He’d asked what she was reading, and she’d replied, thumb to mark her place, the
Life of Pastor Kneemiller
, something similar. Very edifying. Brave noble man. You know him. When the priests were cowering in their coops like pigeons, Missus Bettie said with some heat, he stood up, he stood firm. Ah, yes, admirable, I’m sure he did, Walter agreed, and the spinach is perfect, so fresh, a second crop is it? plant your own? how wonderful! iron up to here, and good for the blood’s color, makes it red as ripe tomato.

Missus Bettie removed her thumb and the volume fanned slowly open to the place she’d been reading as if she meant to go on. I’m an accountant, Walter said. I travel about between businesses, like now, and help them with their figuring. Helping is a holy thing, Missus Bettie said. Saint Peter keeps God’s. His keys? His accounts. Saint Peter has God’s list of ins and outs. Income and outgo, Walter joked, is what I watch. We are all accountable, Missus Bettie said, not a fork of food goes unnoticed, how it’s chewed, how it’s swallowed. The chicken’s very good, tender as— Tea? Tea, oh, well, thank you, very kind, just a spot, it hits it though, the spot, I mean. How do you keep accounts, Mister Riffytear, Bettie asked, fixing him in her look as if holding both his ears. I look at lists, Walter managed, receipts and bills of sale and lading and such. Overhead, you know. Well, I’m sure it’s over mine, what you do, Mister Riffytear, she said, wholly unaware of any witticism. Do you know a book, he said, do you know a book by Boris de Tanko called
The World’s Orphan
? Bettie’s head drew back into the dark. It made a better man of me. It made a better man.

Oh dear. What he’d said, how he’d let on. Oh dear. His bed was fitted with white sheets trimmed with ruffled eyelet. There were two bolsters matching the eyelet but decorated with a pink
crocheted ribbon containing another oval in rose velvet with an oval panel inset and on its ivory ground, trimmed in gold braid, a tiny pink needlepoint rose like a gift at the end of a journey. His second set of pillows was embroidered with a multicolored flower pattern—spring things, hyacinths and crocuses. Did he dare climb in? Layer after layer like cake: an ivory woven coverlet with puffy balls at bottom, then between sheet and coverlet a rose-colored knit blanket, and under the sheet, he could see where it hung down, the dust cover with still more ruffles. You didn’t want to dent it.

You have a family, Mister Riffytear? what do you do when you’re not fixing figures? It was just an expression but he felt chilled, so held his teacup with both hands. He hoped for another helping. The gravy was thin and clear and pure and perfectly delicious. He’d never cared for spinach much but he cared for this spinach as if the plants were plants of his own. Nutmeg, she answered when he asked. Ah. Where did you learn to fix figures?… cook?… They laughed at the way their questions had run together. But had she said fix? My mother. My mother was a minister’s daughter. Did socials and picnics most her life. Could cook for a company. I bet she could. She stood by her stove like a sentry. I bet she did. No children, then, Mister Riffytear, love’s gift to life? No, sorry, no, no wife. Yes, if it’s so, then you should be sorry, oh, I too am left at the end of my line, though there must be a meaning, mustn’t there be, Mister Riffytear, a meaning to being barren? I always wanted a boy, Walter confessed, to take— Not hunting, I hope, not killing in the leftover fields, Bettie said sharply. Oh, no … ah … bowling, he answered with a stupidity which made him blush, but she seemed not to have heard him, staring into the dark remainder of the room, speaking as though to a corner.

We must bear up under much, Mister Riffytear, she was saying. We are barely here, so short a time, yet there is much to
endure while we are here. For if you’re spared the pain of children—the pain of their appearance, the pain of their growing up, the pain of their pains, the pain of their going away, the pain of their eventual indifference—well, you must, it’s only fair, now, isn’t it, Mister Riffytear, fair that you should have another burden, because what would we do if we had no burden, no weight upon our chests, we’d fly, wouldn’t we? fly like fluff, up and away to nowhere, for we’re nothing but our burdens, so that’s why, one way or other, we were meant to labor.

And make things, Walter added, with our hands. Like all these lovely things you have here, and have taken such loving care of, as though they were your children. Oh, as if the house, she said in a melt, were.

Bettie held her hand to her mouth, Walter supposed, to stifle a sob, and got up swiftly, turning her back to him. You’ll be staying another night then? His yes ma’am ran after her disappearing ears.

Walter thought he might as well toss a shirt and a sock in his dresser if he was going to stay another night. Settle in, even somewhat. And see what he could see in all these things, learn what he could of their names, he stumbled so, as if they were ahead of him, running away nimbly over rough stones. There was a circular doily on its oak top in the center of which stood still another candle—this one pink—in a glass tray. Around the circumference of the cloth like a crowd Bettie had collected was a decorative vase in gold and ivory shaped like a slim and elegant pitcher, a long low dish full of po … that porry flakey stuff, and a huddle of white bone china: sugar bowl—he found out when he lifted its lid—chock-full of fresh peanuts, such a nifty touch, then a soup-sized bowl which was empty, and another with a round hole in the middle of its cover, what was that for? He had this need for names. His eye, when it had finally begun to look at things, had become literal.

Two harp-shaped arms embraced the mirror, which, he supposed, was supposed to make the dresser into a dressing table. On either side, the crocheted outline of two hearts. Next to the dresser, but leaning against the wall, as so many things had to, was a satiny white hatbox topped by a wreath of what looked like pale gray weeds and tied on with a wide white bow.

Pulling out a drawer, Walter found it lined with embroidered white linen the size of the space and held down at the front and most observable corners by two cherubs cut out of soft white stone. Maybe he’d leave well enough alone.

But even this modest bit of embroidery … a loop of thread which looks nothing like a rose … and this loop, too, which is like another loop, another and another, anonymous all … each thread pulled through and started over … with the patience of the spider … nothing shows, yet, moment by moment, and in another minute—wait—one more loop or two indistinguishable from the others … and suddenly a small pink petal, the first of the rose, lines up on the canvas of the cloth. This accumulation was a miracle. Such work required (Walter was awed) … it was a sign of (he ransacked his head for a simile) … care, concern, devotion, a considerable degree of skill … gained over how many years of application? and what for? that was what was most amazing … after all, did tatting or carving or sanding or shellacking abolish war? did framing some of our often foolish, former faces in windows made of twigs or bark or knotwood boards redeem past time? All this, he waved his arm with histrionic vigor, was clutter unless you saw the composition. Without much ardent uncompromising dedication, there wouldn’t be this comfort.

The nervous excitement which had sustained him most of the day, and carried him through his tasks at The Wooden Soldier in record time—a few sums here, a few charges there, a little loss, some creative debt, nothing to it—was finally gone, and though he felt full and good he also felt weary, weak, stupid; for
instance, that chair in the corner—what kind was it? all he knew to say was Windsor, and if you just said chair—hell—the kiddiest kid knew that much—dog, cat, table, chair—he’d sat in a memorable pool of light with Bettie, fending off her questions with his famished fork, and dipping the tip of his reluctant tongue into her tea, while she wondered what sort of man he was, he was sure, with his silly western shirt and buckle, geez, buttons and belt would have to go, yet feeling no real fear from the quiz like one day he’d be frightened when they caught him—couldn’t he quit?—how would he live?—go back to school? on what? at his age?—could he recover himself and rest in a room like this, in a house full of fine things, things and images and signs you could obey, enjoy, respect? no … not when he was a bottom dealer and low roller and only a guy who made the vacancy sign go off. Good chicken. God. That too.

The chair, which he couldn’t call a Windsor even if it was the only name he knew, was … well … sumptuous … upholstered in gold velvet with a braided trim. On its seat a cotton pillow, printed with narcissus and tulips, lay in a cuddle like a cat. Between it and the bed was a small round table with a long green skirt, the green cloth overlaid by white linen like a snowflake on grass. A symphony of green, Walter marveled. Small white matching napkins were fanned like a neatly folded hand of cards. Then on a metal tray shaped like a leaf floated a glass coaster, green plastic clock and flashlight, and a stack of four candies wrapped in silver paper, objects which might have looked as out of place as workers at a social function if it were not for Bettie’s thoughtfulness about every detail. The tray’s metal edge nudged a milk glass candlestick out of which a bright red candle erupted.