Going to Meet the Man Page 5

  All during the trip home David seemed preoccupied. When he finally sought out Johnnie he found him sitting by himself on the top deck, shivering a little in the night air. He sat down beside him. After a moment Johnnie moved and put his head on David’s shoulder. David put his arms around him. But now where there had been peace there was only panic and where there had been safety, danger, like a flower, opened.

  The Man Child

  AS THE SUN began preparing for her exit, and he sensed the waiting night, Eric, blond and eight years old and dirty and tired, started homeward across the fields. Eric lived with his father, who was a farmer and the son of a farmer, and his mother, who had been captured by his father on some far-off, unblessed, unbelievable night, who had never since burst her chains. She did not know that she was chained anymore than she knew that she lived in terror of the night. One child was in the churchyard, it would have been Eric’s little sister and her name would have been Sophie: for a long time, then, his mother had been very sick and pale. It was said that she would never, really, be better, that she would never again be as she had been. Then, not long ago, there had begun to be a pounding in his mother’s belly, Eric had sometimes been able to hear it when he lay against her breast. His father had been pleased. I did that, said his father, big, laughing, dreadful, and red, and Eric knew how it was done, he had seen the horses and the blind and dreadful bulls. But then, again, his mother had been sick, she had had to be sent away, and when she came back the pounding was not there anymore, nothing was there anymore. His father laughed less, something in his mother’s face seemed to have gone to sleep forever.

  Eric hurried, for the sun was almost gone and he was afraid the night would catch him in the fields. And his mother would be angry. She did not really like him to go wandering off by himself. She would have forbidden it completely and kept Eric under her eye all day but in this she was overruled: Eric’s father liked to think of Eric as being curious about the world and as being daring enough to explore it, with his own eyes, by himself.

  His father would not be at home. He would be gone with his friend, Jamie, who was also a farmer and the son of a farmer, down to the tavern. This tavern was called the Rafters. They went each night, as his father said, imitating an Englishman he had known during a war, to destruct the Rafters, sir. They had been destructing The Rafters long before Eric had kicked in his mother’s belly, for Eric’s father and Jamie had grown up together, gone to war together, and survived together—never, apparently, while life ran, were they to be divided. They worked in the fields all day together, the fields which belonged to Eric’s father. Jamie had been forced to sell his farm and it was Eric’s father who had bought it.

  Jamie had a brown and yellow dog. This dog was almost always with him; whenever Eric thought of Jamie he thought also of the dog. They had always been there, they had always been together: in exactly the same way, for Eric, that his mother and father had always been together, in exactly the same way that the earth and the trees and the sky were together. Jamie and his dog walked the country roads together, Jamie walking slowly in the way of country people, seeming to see nothing, heads lightly bent, feet striking surely and heavily on the earth, never stumbling. He walked as though he were going to walk to the other end of the world and knew it was a long way but knew that he would be there by the morning. Sometimes he talked to his dog, head bent a little more than usual and turned to one side, a slight smile playing about the edges of his granite lips; and the dog’s head snapped up, perhaps he leapt upon his master, who cuffed him down lightly, with one hand. More often he was silent. His head was carried in a cloud of blue smoke from his pipe. Through this cloud, like a ship on a foggy day, loomed his dry and steady face. Set far back, at an unapproachable angle, were those eyes of his, smoky and thoughtful, eyes which seemed always to be considering the horizon. He had the kind of eyes which no one had ever looked into—except Eric, only once. Jamie had been walking these roads and across these fields, whistling for his dog in the evenings as he turned away from Eric’s house, for years, in silence. He had been married once, but his wife had run away. Now he lived alone in a wooden house and Eric’s mother kept his clothes clean and Jamie always ate at Eric’s house.

  Eric had looked into Jamie’s eyes on Jamie’s birthday. They had had a party for him. Eric’s mother had baked a cake and filled the house with flowers. The doors and windows of the great kitchen all stood open on the yard and the kitchen table was placed outside. The ground was not muddy as it was in winter, but hard, dry, and light brown. The flowers his mother so loved and so labored for flamed in their narrow borders against the stone wall of the farmhouse; and green vines covered the grey stone wall at the far end of the yard. Beyond this wall were the fields and barns, and Eric could see, quite far away, the cows nearly motionless in the bright green pasture. It was a bright, hot, silent day, the sun did not seem to be moving at all.

  This was before his mother had had to be sent away. Her belly had been beginning to grow big, she had been dressed in blue, and had seemed—that day, to Eric—younger than she was ever to seem again.

  Though it was still early when they were called to table, Eric’s father and Jamie were already tipsy and came across the fields, shoulders touching, laughing, and telling each other stories. To express disapproval and also, perhaps, because she had heard their stories before and was bored, Eric’s mother was quite abrupt with them, barely saying, “Happy Birthday, Jamie” before she made them sit down. In the nearby village church bells rang as they began to eat.

  It was perhaps because it was Jamie’s birthday that Eric was held by something in Jamie’s face. Jamie, of course, was very old. He was thirty-four today, even older than Eric’s father, who was only thirty-two. Eric wondered how it felt to have so many years and was suddenly, secretly glad that he was only eight. For today, Jamie looked old. It was perhaps the one additional year which had done it, this day, before their very eyes—a metamorphosis which made Eric rather shrink at the prospect of becoming nine. The skin of Jamie’s face, which had never before seemed so, seemed wet today, and that rocky mouth of his was loose; loose was the word for everything about him, the way his arms and shoulders hung, the way he sprawled at the table, rocking slightly back and forth. It was not that he was drunk. Eric had seen him much drunker. Drunk, he became rigid, as though he imagined himself in the army again. No. He was old. It had come upon him all at once, today, on his birthday. He sat there, his hair in his eyes, eating, drinking, laughing now and again, and in a very strange way, and teasing the dog at his feet so that it sleepily growled and snapped all through the birthday dinner.

  “Stop that,” said Eric’s father.

  “Stop what?” asked Jamie.

  “Let that stinking useless dog alone. Let him be quiet.”

  “Leave the beast alone,” said Eric’s mother—very wearily, sounding as she often sounded when talking to Eric.

  “Well, now,” said Jamie, grinning, and looking first at Eric’s father and then at Eric’s mother, “it is my beast. And a man’s got a right to do as he likes with whatever’s his.”

  “That dog’s got a right to bite you, too,” said Eric’s mother, shortly.

  “This dog’s not going to bite me,” said Jamie, “he knows I’ll shoot him if he does.”

  “That dog knows you’re not going to shoot him,” said Eric’s father. “Then you would be all alone.”

  “All alone,” said Jamie, and looked around the table. “All alone.” He lowered his eyes to his plate. Eric’s father watched him. He said, “It’s pretty serious to be all alone at your age.” He smiled. “If I was you, I’d start thinking about it.”

  “I’m thinking about it,” said Jamie. He began to grow red.

  “No, you’re not,” said Eric’s father, “you’re dreaming about it.”

  “Well, goddammit,” said Jamie, even redder now, “it isn’t as though I haven’t tried!”

  “Ah,” said Eric’s father, “that was a real d
ream, that was. I used to pick that up on the streets of town every Saturday night.”

  “Yes,” said Jamie, “I bet you did.”

  “I didn’t think she was as bad as all that,” said Eric’s mother, quietly. “I liked her. I was surprised when she ran away.”

  “Jamie didn’t know how to keep her,” said Eric’s father. He looked at Eric and chanted: “Jamie, Jamie, pumkin-eater, had a wife and couldn’t keep her!” At this, Jamie at last looked up, into the eyes of Eric’s father. Eric laughed again, more shrilly, out of fear. Jamie said:

  “Ah, yes, you can talk, you can.”

  “It’s not my fault,” said Eric’s father, “if you’re getting old—and haven’t got anybody to bring you your slippers when night comes—and no pitter-patter of little feet—”

  “Oh, leave Jamie alone,” said Eric’s mother, “he’s not old, leave him alone.”

  Jamie laughed a peculiar, high, clicking laugh which Eric had never heard before, which he did not like, which made him want to look away and, at the same time, want to stare. “Hell, no,” said Jamie, “I’m not old. I can still do all the things we used to do.” He put his elbows on the table, grinning. “I haven’t ever told you, have I, about the things we used to do?”

  “No, you haven’t,” said Eric’s mother, “and I certainly don’t want to hear about them now.”

  “He wouldn’t tell you anyway,” said Eric’s father, “he knows what I’d do to him if he did.”

  “Oh, sure, sure,” said Jamie, and laughed again. He picked up a bone from his plate. “Here,” he said to Eric, “why don’t you feed my poor mistreated dog?”

  Eric took the bone and stood up, whistling for the dog; who moved away from his master and took the bone between his teeth. Jamie watched with a smile and opened the bottle of whiskey and poured himself a drink. Eric sat on the ground beside the dog, beginning to be sleepy in the bright, bright sun.

  “Little Eric’s getting big,” he heard his father say.

  “Yes,” said Jamie, “they grow fast. It won’t be long now.”

  “Won’t be long what?” he heard his father ask.

  “Why, before he starts skirt-chasing like his Daddy used to do,” said Jamie. There was mild laughter at the table in which his mother did not join; he heard instead, or thought he heard, the familiar, slight, exasperated intake of her breath. No one seemed to care whether he came back to the table or not. He lay on his back, staring up at the sky, wondering—wondering what he would feel like when he was old—and fell asleep.

  When he awoke his head was in his mother’s lap, for she was sitting on the ground. Jamie and his father were still sitting at the table; he knew this from their voices, for he did not open his eyes. He did not want to move or speak. He wanted to remain where he was, protected by his mother, while the bright day rolled on. Then he wondered about the uncut birthday cake. But he was sure, from the sound of Jamie’s voice, which was thicker now, that they had not cut it yet; or if they had, they had certainly saved a piece for him.

  “—ate himself just as full as he could and then fell asleep in the sun like a little animal,” Jamie was saying, and the two men laughed. His father—though he scarcely ever got as drunk as Jamie did, and had often carried Jamie home from The Rafters—was a little drunk, too.

  Eric felt his mother’s hand on his hair. By opening his eyes very slightly he would see, over the curve of his mother’s thigh, as through a veil, a green slope far away and beyond it the everlasting, motionless sky.

  “—she was a no-good bitch,” said Jamie.

  “She was beautiful,” said his mother, just above him.

  Again, they were talking about Jamie’s wife.

  “Beauty!” said Jamie, furious. “Beauty doesn’t keep a house clean. Beauty doesn’t keep a bed warm, neither.”

  Eric’s father laughed. “You were so—poetical—in those days, Jamie,” he said. “Nobody thought you cared much about things like that. I guess she thought you didn’t care, neither.”

  “I cared,” said Jamie, briefly.

  “In fact,” Eric’s father continued, “I know she thought you didn’t care.”

  “How do you know?” asked Jamie.

  “She told me,” Eric’s father said.

  “What do you mean,” asked Jamie, “what do you mean, she told you?”

  “I mean just that. She told me.”

  Jamie was silent.

  “In those days” Eric’s father continued after a moment, “all you did was walk around the woods by yourself in the daytime and sit around The Rafters in the evenings with me.”

  “You two were always together then,” said Eric’s mother.

  “Well,” said Jamie, harshly, “at least that hasn’t changed.”

  “Now, you know,” said Eric’s father, gently, “it’s not the same. Now I got a wife and kid—and another one coming—”

  Eric’s mother stroked his hair more gently, yet with something in her touch more urgent, too, and he knew that she was thinking of the child who lay in the churchyard, who would have been his sister.

  “Yes,” said Jamie, “you really got it all fixed up, you did. You got it all—the wife, the kid, the house, and all the land.”

  “I didn’t steal your farm from you. It wasn’t my fault you lost it. I gave you a better price for it than anybody else would have done.”

  “I’m not blaming you. I know all the things I have to thank you for.”

  There was a short pause, broken, hesitantly, by Eric’s mother. “What I don’t understand,” she said, “is why, when you went away to the city, you didn’t stay away. You didn’t really have anything to keep you here.”

  There was the sound of a drink being poured. Then, “No. I didn’t have nothing—really—to keep me here. Just all the things I ever knew—all the things—all the things—I ever cared about.”

  “A man’s not supposed to sit around and mope,” said Eric’s father, wrathfully, “for things that are over and dead and finished, things that can’t ever begin again, that can’t ever be the same again. That’s what I mean when I say you’re a dreamer—and if you hadn’t kept on dreaming so long, you might not be alone now.”

  “Ah, well,” said Jamie, mildly, and with a curious rush of affection in his voice, ‘I know you’re the giant-killer, the hunter, the lover—the real old Adam, that’s you. I know you’re going to cover the earth. I know the world depends on men like you.”

  “And you’re damn right,” said Eric’s father, after an uneasy moment.

  Around Eric’s head there was a buzzing, a bee, perhaps, a blue-fly, or a wasp. He hoped that his mother would see it and brush it away, but she did not move her hand. And he looked out again, through the veil of his eyelashes, at the slope and the sky, and then saw that the sun had moved and that it would not be long now before she would be going.

  “—just like you already,” Jamie said.

  “You think my little one’s like me?” Eric knew that his father was smiling—he could almost feel his father’s hands.

  “Looks like you, walks like you, talks like you,” said Jamie.

  “And stubborn like you,” said Eric’s mother.

  “Ah, yes,” said Jamie, and sighed. “You married the stub-bornest, most determined—most selfish—man I know.”

  “I didn’t know you felt that way,” said Eric’s father. He was still smiling.

  “I’d have warned you about him,” Jamie added, laughing, “if there’d been time.”

  “Everyone who knows you feels that way,” said Eric’s mother, and Eric felt a sudden brief tightening of the muscle in her thigh.

  “Oh, you,” said Eric’s father, “I know you feel that way, women like to feel that way, it makes them feel important. But,” and he changed to the teasing tone he took so persistently with Jamie today, “I didn’t know my fine friend, Jamie, here—”

  It was odd how unwilling he was to open his eyes. Yet, he felt the sun on him and knew that he wanted to rise fr
om where he was before the sun went down. He did not understand what they were talking about this afternoon, these grown-ups he had known all his life; by keeping his eyes closed he kept their conversation far from him. And his mother’s hand lay on his head like a blessing, like protection. And the buzzing had ceased, the bee, the blue-fly, or the wasp seemed to have flown away.

  “—if it’s a boy this time,” his father said, “we’ll name it after you.”

  “That’s touching,” said Jamie, “but that really won’t do me—or the kid—a hell of a lot of good.”

  “Jamie can get married and have kids of his own any time he decides to,” said Eric’s mother.

  “No,” said his father, after a long pause, “Jamie’s thought about it too long.”

  And, suddenly, he laughed and Eric sat up as his father slapped Jamie on the knee. At the touch, Jamie leaped up, shouting, spilling his drink and overturning his chair, and the dog beside Eric awoke and began to bark. For a moment, before Eric’s unbelieving eyes, there was nothing in the yard but noise and flame.

  His father rose slowly and stared at Jamie. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “What’s the matter with me!” mimicked Jamie, “what’s the matter with me? what the hell do you care what’s the matter with me! What the hell have you been riding me for all day like this? What do you want? what do you want?”

  “I want you to learn to hold your liquor for one thing,” said his father, coldly. The two men stared at each other. Jamie’s face was red and ugly and tears stood in his eyes. The dog, at his legs, kept up a furious prancing and barking. Jamie bent down and, with one hand, with all his might, slapped his dog, which rolled over, howling, and ran away to hide itself under the shadows of the far grey wall.