A Father for Philip (18 page)

Philip looked worried. “That tree I
nicked, is it going to die now?”

“No, silly.” David laughed, wiping the
worried look from Philip’s face. “Do you die from a little cut on your finger?”

“No, but I hurt.”

“The same with the trees. Cut them a
little, and they hurt a little. Cut them right down, and they die.”

“But Jeff! What about the trees we cut
down to make the cabin, they all died!” The boy was near to tears and Eleanor
made a move to go to him. For the first time, David acknowledged her presence.
He waved a hand at her to keep out of this.

He leaned his scythe up on a tree, took the
sickle from Philip and led him to the shady spot near, but not very near
Eleanor. She felt hurt, unaccountably left out, as David began talking.

“Son, each kind of tree has a different
kind of use. And I believe each tree knows it.” Conviction rang in his tones.
“The ones we cut down to make the cabin knew they were meant to grow tall and
strong and straight so they could be turned into houses and furniture, just
like these trees here”—he gestured to the fruit trees—“know they were meant to
stand here in the sun and grow apples and plums and pears and apricots for us
to eat. Maple trees make big leaves to give us shade, and in the colder parts
of the country, give a special sap to makes that good syrup you like on your
hotcakes. The dogwoods know their purpose on earth is to grow those white
flowers just to look pretty and give people pleasure. So don’t feel badly about
the trees we cut down to make the cabin; they like being part of a home for
people to live in.”

“Just like Christmas trees don’t mind
being put in a house and decorated? Mom read me a book about a little tree
nobody wanted. We always get a tree like that, so it won’t feel left out.”

“That’s a kind thing to do for the
skinny little trees that might feel left out. But me, I’d have a living Christmas
tree, instead. A living Christmas tree grows in a big pot and you can take in
the house for a few days and decorate just like the kind you cut down. But
then, after Christmas, you put it back outside so it can grow some more.”

“Do you have a Christmas tree in a pot?”

“Uh, well, no. I haven’t had a Christmas
tree since my parents died.”

“You don’t have a mom and a dad?”

“No, but I was twenty when they died,
not a young’un like you. I just never bothered with a Christmas tree since
then, but if I ever do again, it will be a living one. When it grows too big
for its pot, it can get planted and I can dig up another little tree, put it in
a pot, and take it inside, instead.”

“That’s a neat idea, Jeff.” Philip
grinned. “When we have a Christmas tree in our cabin, it’ll be a living tree,
an’ it’ll know it’s meant to be a Christmas tree, and a real tree, too, right?”

“Right, son.”

“It’s good when everyone and everything
know where they belong, isn’t it? And Siwash doesn’t mind us sitting on his
back, and Casey doesn’t mind sleeping on the porch, because they know that’s
the way it has to be?”

“Exactly! You’re smart.” David ruffled
little boy’s hair.

“And mom said that’s why I have to go to
bed when she’s tired and I’m not, because that’s just the way life is. I was
going to ask you why, Jeff but I forgot and now I know. Even big people have to
do things just ’cause. Like trees and animals.”

“That’s right, sport. Sometimes we may
not be very happy about the things we have to do, but when we know it’s
necessary, we do it anyway. Now and then we may even do a cruel and unnecessary
thing and leave it for someone else to clean up our mess.”

“What’s that mean, Jeff?”

Yes, Eleanor thought, frowning. What
does it mean?

“It means that I’ve got a big mess to
clean up and I don’t know how to go about doing it. Just like the long grass
around the trunks of trees, it will have to cut out carefully, so as not to
leave too many deep wounds and scars.”

Philip looked as bewildered as his
mother felt. What was David saying? What was he trying to lead up to?

“Don’t you want to cut the grass, Jeff?”

“It will have to be done, son, but let’s
leave it for now and ask your mother if she feels like making us some
lemonade.”

Remembering what had recently been said,
Philip said, “She’ll make it, Jeff, because that’s what moms are for. For doing
things for their kids, just like apple trees are for growing apples. Good thing
my mom only has me to do things for.”

They walked toward the house, David and
Philip few paces behind Eleanor, and she heard her husband say, “But your mom
hasn’t always had just you to think about. She has been, over the years, a
daughter, a wife, a mother, a landlady, and a friend—sometimes all at the same
time. That’s a lot for any one person to be, and it must be hard sometimes to
be all those things together. It’s no wonder your mom wants you to go to bed
when she’s tired.”

“Yup,” said Philip. “Too bad she can’t
just stand around growing apples.”

~ * ~

Grant came back on Wednesday.

“Hello, Ellie,” he said, sitting across
from her in the arbor. “I’m sorry about the other night. I said a lot of things
I shouldn’t have, about what I want, about thinking you owe me, about the…
about Philip. Will you forgive me?”

“Of course, Grant. I understand. You had
a right to be upset. I shouldn’t have sprung it on you like that. But this
doesn’t mean I’ve changed—”

“Never mind that. I said a week. I want
to wait until then. But there’s no need to apologize for ‘springing it on me’. There
would have been no easy way to tell me he was your husband.”

“Not ‘was’, Grant. Is.”

“Yes. Well. Have you told the… told
Philip yet, who his ‘friend’ is?”

“No, no I haven’t. If—when I decide what
I’m going to do—that’ll be time enough to tell him. I will tell him, Grant, and
I will let David have a part of his time. I can’t do anything else.” She rose
and left the arbor, having heard the school bus arrive.

Grant followed her up the sloping path
to the fence, and the puppy, frolicking at their heels, tripped him. “Why don’t
you keep that little pest on a leash?” he snapped, reverting to type.

“Why should I, in my own yard?” she shot
back.

“Because he’ll have to get used to being
on a leash when you move to the hotel. I won’t have him running loose there.”

Eleanor blew out a long breath. “Grant,
I told you. I will not be—”

“Ellie, please. Just wait a few more
days before you make a hard decision.”

Why? Do you think you’ll have dug up
some dirt on him by then that will make me look favorably upon you?

But, he’d had already said he wouldn’t
listen to a refusal before Friday, and that he wasn’t going to take no for an
answer, so what was the point in getting involved in an argument when Philip
was coming down the path? “I thought you wouldn’t have a dog at your hotel at
all?”

“Well… I’ve been thinking, it does seem
a little unfair to the… to Philip.”

So now he’s willing to make the effort,
Eleanor thought with bitterness. Now that it’s too late. But, said a small
voice inside her, it always was too late. I wouldn’t have married him anyway.
If I had been going to, I wouldn’t put all those obstacles in the way.

At that moment Philip came through the
gate, swinging it closed quickly so the pup could not escape. He stooped,
laughing, and deposited his lunch kit and his plastic bag on the ground, before
scooping up Casey into his arms. The pup wiggled in ecstasy and licked Philip’s
face with a wet, pink tongue. “Cut it out Casey! Oh, that tickles. Hi, Mom.
Where’s Jeff?”

“Hi, honey. How was your day? Have fun
at school?” Philip nodded while trying to keep his nose from being chewed off.
“Aren’t you going to say hello to Grant?” asked Eleanor, gently prodding her
son’s manners. It didn’t matter how poorly the two got on together—manners were
manners and important.

“Oh… Yeah,” he said without enthusiasm
and with scarcely a glance. “Hi, Grant. I didn’t see your car.”

“I rode over. Glider needed the
exercise. Say, Phil, I hear you’re pretty good rider these days,” Grant said,
attempting heartiness but achieving only falsity.

“Just on Siwash,” Philip replied
sullenly and Eleanor shot him a telling look.

“Oh,” said Grant jovially, “if you can
ride one horse, you can ride them all. Come on and give old Glider a try. He’s
in the paddock by the farmhouse.”

Philip shook his head, his mouth set in
a rebellious line and started to walk away. Grant grabbed him by the shoulder.
“I give a five dollar bill to any kid who can stay on Glider for five minutes,”
he said coaxingly.

“No! No thank you,” replied Philip
remembering his manners for once.

“How about ten bucks then… Fifteen?”

“No! I don’t want to ride Glider!”

“Oh, come on and—”

“Grant! Stop it!” Eleanor shouted.
“Don’t try to bribe him.”

Grant let the child go and Philip raced
away, through the gate by the orchard, running in the direction of the woods,
not even stopping at the house for his customary snack or his bike. The pup
tumbled along after him, yelping, till Philip picked him up and ran on.

“I… That was a mistake, wasn’t it?”
Grant asked miserably.

“Yes,” agreed Eleanor between her teeth,
seething with fury. “It certainly was.”

 “I’ll go now… But I’ll be back on
Friday.”

Oh! Would he never give up? “Don’t
bother.” Eleanor said this to his departing back, but he either failed to hear her
or chose not to. He did not bother to close the gate. Eleanor did, firmly.

~ * ~

By Friday morning Eleanor was no nearer
to knowing what to do about her future relationship with David. Her husband had
stayed completely away from her since Sunday when he’d cut the grass and made
his cryptic comments, and she refused to allow herself to ask Philip about him
and his activities.

But one thing she did know was that the
nearer her time came of meeting with Grant grew, the more apprehensive she
became. She did not fear he would harm her physically. Certainly not that. But
she was still afraid he might have made good on his threat to have David
investigated and use the results of that investigation—if they showed David in
a poor light, which she sincerely doubted they could—and use even lies and
innuendo to hurt her through hurting her son.

If only she could ask David if it was
likely Grant could find anything damning in his past. Though she believed he
could not, if accusations were to be made against him, didn’t he have the right
to hear them? She would meet with Grant because she knew he would show up. As
he said, he never broke a promise, even when she saw it as a threat. But if
David were there with her, not in evidence maybe, but near enough to step out
if need be, she wouldn’t feel so alone.

Who do I think I’m kidding? I want to
see him, is all, so why make up frail excuses? Just go.

She walked slowly across the yard behind
her cottage, along the path, and for the first time in nearly eight years,
stepped over the little trickling creek and into the daisy studded meadow,
heading for the trees beyond. Where the path entered the forest, she stopped
for a moment to look back. The farmhouse stood as it always had, gaunt and
gray, alone on top of its little hillock with the dark red barn off one side.
Faintly, through the branches of the spreading alders, she could see the silver
shingles of her own roof and the golden glint of sunlight shining on a window
pane. She turned and went into the forest, to the other side of the hill.

The path wound through the cool dimness,
around tall evergreens, past old moss covered nurse logs with delicate
seedlings struggling for air and light. In sunny patches, huckleberry bushes
dripped bright red berries from slender branches and long before she expected
it, Eleanor found herself at the edge of the clearing.

It was raw and new, terrible looking as
are most new clearings; the earth torn here and there, moss folded over in
great pads to expose snakelike brown roots of trees and underbrush. Sharp,
jagged stumps stuck up like broken molars, but the ground had been raked tidy
all around the neat little log cabin which stood in the center, its chimney
rising askew against one side of the building. And there, just as she had been
told, at the corner of the cabin, stood the dogwood tree, far bigger than it
ought to have been, still with a few white, five-petaled blossoms in evidence.
On the far side, the brush had been cleared away, and the bend of the creek
bubbled brightly over the rocks of its bed.

Eleanor walked quietly nearer, feeling
like an intruder. But how can I be? she asked. Isn’t this my glade? Hadn’t this
been her special place until a brash young man had entered from out of the dark
surrounds and taken her for his own? Her heart thundered as she was struck by
an overwhelming urge to see, just one more time, the little mossy hollow under
the dogwood tree.

The stable was empty, neither David nor
the horse around, and Eleanor stepped down into the cool, magic place of sweet
memories.