Evergreen (49 page)

“The truth about Gran?”

“To begin with, yes.”

“You don’t have to tell me. I know it’s cancer.” This was the first time he’d said the word out loud. People always whispered it or said C.A. or else just
looked
. He didn’t know why he didn’t feel more, saying this awful thing. Was there something wrong with him, that he didn’t feel more?

“How long have you known?”

“Since last winter. That time she was in the hospital, people stopped talking when I came in the room. So I guessed that’s what it must be.”

“I see,” Chris said.

“Is she afraid?”

“She hasn’t said she was. But I should think so, wouldn’t you?”

Chris waited a moment. “What she’s really worried about is you. And that’s why I want to talk to you. She asked me to. She thought it would be easier for both of you if I did the talking.”

“She needn’t worry. I’ll take care of her. I was very good with Gramp, and you know how crippled he was.”

“I know you were. But this is different.”

“How different?”

Cousin Chris didn’t answer right away. Instead, he took the oars and the boat sprang ahead. They had to bend their shoulders under a fall of willow leafage, and in this hidden cove at water’s edge he put the oars down again. The boat lay still.

“How is it different?” Eric repeated.

Chris took his wristwatch off. It was an extraordinary watch. He’d bought it overseas when he was in the air force during the war, and he’d shown it to Eric yesterday. It could tell the date and it had an alarm. You could read the dial in the dark; it was a wonderful watch. Now Chris examined it, shook it a little, held it to his ear, frowned and slowly strapped it on again.

“Something wrong with your watch?”

“No, I just wanted to check it.” Suddenly the words
came rushing out. “Eric, the difference is, your Gran is going to die. I didn’t know any other way to tell you but like this.”

“But Jerry—he’s a boy in my class—his father had cancer a long time ago when we were in third grade, and he’s fine!”

“It doesn’t always work that way.”

“I’m going to ask Dr. Shane!”

“Do, if it’ll help you any. But he’ll tell you the same thing, Eric.” Had he been asking himself a minute ago why he felt nothing inside? Now, suddenly, there was a tightening, a pounding in his chest and his head. He thought he tasted something hot under his tongue, hot like blood.

“I don’t believe it! It isn’t true!” he shouted.

“I know how you feel. It was the same for me when my grandfather Guthrie died.”

Beyond the screen of leaves a motorboat shot by, rocking the quiet water. Billy Noyes and his father in their Chris-Craft, probably. They were always racketing around together in that boat, Billy and his father.

“I know how you feel,” Chris said again.

Neither of them spoke for a minute or two. Then another bleak thought formed itself into words.

“I’m thinking of how empty the house will be with just George and Mrs. Mather and me in it.”

“Well, that’s what I was coming to next,” Chris said. He felt for the pack of cigarettes which was sticking out of his shirt pocket in plain sight, but he seemed to have trouble getting hold of it. Then he had to fumble in another pocket for a match, and after that had more trouble lighting it.

“The thing is,” he said at last, “the thing is, you won’t be able to stay here. I mean, Mrs. Mather isn’t family, so she couldn’t be responsible for you, could she? You need to live with someone in your own family, you see.”

“Would I go to live with you?”

“Well, no. Not that I wouldn’t like it a lot, but as it works out—” He paused. Oh, if he would just say it all quickly! “As it is, well, Gran has had this on her mind for
a long time, and she’s talked about it with me and my parents and Uncle Wendell, even with Dr. Shane and Father Duncan. And they all think, they really all think that the only right home for you in the circumstances is with your father’s people.”

Chris’s voice made a final descent to a period, as at the end of a speech or a piece of music. Eric saw that he was watching him closely. He had a kind of narrow expression that said: “Well, now, that part’s done with and what’s to come next?” Eric himself had a habit of observing faces closely: the masters at school to see whether they were only satisfied with your answer or really liked it, all grownups to see whether they were telling you the whole truth or keeping something back. He saw now that Chris was telling him the whole truth.

“I didn’t know my father had anyone!”

“Oh, yes,” Chris said carefully. “He had parents and a younger sister.”

“Alive?” Eric’s voice rose, and squeaked, as it often did recently.

“Yes. Living in New York City. Or, I should say, nearby.”

“But why, but why? Why has everybody lied to me up till now?”

“I wouldn’t say it was lying, exactly. They never told you that your father’s parents were dead, did they?”

“No, but they were always saying: ‘You’re all we have, Eric, and were all you have.’ So I thought—”

“Well, that was a way of putting it. Not a lie, Just not talking about it. There’s a difference, isn’t there?”

He was so shocked, so absolutely stunned. He had no feeling as to whether this was a good thing or bad.

Chris went on, “They planned to explain it all when you were older, probably would have done so before now if your grandfather had lived. Then you could have met these other grandparents.” He went on confidently, more rapidly, “Yes, that was definitely their intention.”

“But why was it a secret for so long?”

Chris paused. “You know how it is, Eric. People don’t
always agree about things. To put it quite simply, they didn’t like each other. There was a lot of hard feeling when you were taken to live with your mother’s parents instead of your father’s.”

“You mean, they wanted me, too?”

“Oh, yes, they did, very much. After all, they loved their son and you’re their son’s child.”

“But what was everybody angry at everybody about?”

“I hate to say this, Eric, although I’m sure you’ve learned a few things about this imperfect world by now … it was a matter of religion.”

“Were they—were they Catholic, then? Was that it?”

“Not Catholic. Jewish.”

Jewish! But that was—that was the
craziest
thing! How could that be?

Jewish! Like David Lewin at school. He couldn’t think of anyone else he knew who was. He remembered when David had first come to the Academy in fifth grade. Everybody liked him except one boy, Bryce Henderson. No, two boys. Phil Sharp also. They’d said nasty things to David about being Jewish and David had punched Bryce and made his nose bleed. Then the headmaster had called David in and asked him why he’d done it and David wouldn’t tell, because everybody knew the headmaster was always talking about bigotry and prejudice. “That’s something we tried to wipe out in this war we’ve just finished,” he would say. So David didn’t tell on them and took his demerit, which was really swell of him and afterward most of the guys said it was.

Yes, he was a nice enough guy, David. Once he and Jack Mackenzie had been invited to David’s house, near where his parents had the clothing store in Cyprus. It was some kind of holiday with a big dinner and wine. The father drank his out of a silver cup and everybody sang. It was neat, yet queer and foreign, too. Eric had invited David back to his house once, but that was all. There hadn’t been any reason why they should become special friends, although probably David would have liked to.

And my father was like David! Hard to
believe!
His heart was really drumming now. He didn’t
like
it. It was too odd, too strange. Different. Like David.

“I suppose they really should have told you before.” Chris was almost talking to himself, thinking out loud. “At least, I always thought they should. We all thought so.… But they did what they believed best, goodness knows, they did.”

“Did you know my father?”

“I certainly did. He was a very great person. He was one of my best friends at Yale.”

“He was?” Eric felt a smile break out on his lips, a silly smile close to laughter; and close to crying, too. And he felt excitement, the way you do at a mystery movie when you’re so scared of what may be coming next, and you laugh because you’re scared.… “Have you—I never even knew what he looked like.”

“Have I got a picture? I’m sure I’ve got snapshots of us playing tennis. I’ll look when I get home and send them to you. I’ll do it the minute I get home.”

“Tell me in the meantime what he looked like.”

“Well, something like you, as a matter of fact. I think you’re going to be tall like him. He had light hair, too, and thick eyebrows like yours.” Cousin Chris leaned forward with his chin in his hands and the boat rocked. “Funny, we were both going to be lawyers … we were both so certain of the future. And he’s not here, and I’m in the oil business. Life is changes and surprises, Eric, as you’re finding out right this minute. We never know what’s around the next corner.”

He had a sudden awareness of the planet whirling in empty space around the sun, with nothing to hold it up but its own speed. What if it were to slacken and fall? Fall where? A terror came over him. There was nothing to hold to, nothing firm, not even the ground under your feet.

“When am I supposed to go?” he cried in panic.

“When the semester’s over at the end of this month.”

“I don’t want to go to live with them! I don’t even know them! How can I go live in their house?”

Chris swallowed. He had a huge Adam’s apple and it moved under the skin of his neck as if it would pop out. Eric had watched it at dinner last night. “Listen, Eric,” he said, “I know it’s a helluva hard thing, I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes, and I’m going to level with you about that. You know I wouldn’t fool you, would I?”

“I guess you wouldn’t.”

“You know I wouldn’t. So listen to me. These have got to be good people. They couldn’t have had a son as kind and good as your father if they weren’t. They’re going to love you; they love you already! It isn’t their fault that you don’t know them. And they’re as close to you really as Gran and Gramp, don’t forget.”

I don’t want to go, I don’t want to go … 
.

He thought of something. “What about George? I can’t go without George!”

“I’m sure you can take him.”

The dog, hearing his name, pricked his ears and looked from one face to the other as if asking a question. Then he laid his enormous paw on Eric’s knee.

“Why can’t I live with you, Chris? I wouldn’t be any trouble, I really wouldn’t.”

“I know you wouldn’t. But you see Eric, Fran and I are going to Venezuela for the company, it might be for four or five years. And we have three children already.”

“I could help with the children.”

Something rippled across Chris’s face. Eric thought he looked as if something hurt. “Eric, I wish I could. But Fran is expecting another baby, and she can’t—she doesn’t feel she can take on any more responsibility. You see what I mean? Do you, Eric?”

He didn’t see, and he didn’t, wouldn’t, answer.

“I know it’s hard for you to understand. My brothers are bachelors, my parents travel all the time now that Dad’s retired, Uncle Wendell’s past eighty. But you do have another
place where you’ll have a home and an education and—Eric, you’ll see, you’ll be happy there! I’ll write to you, all the time, and you’ll answer and tell me what you’re doing and how happy you are, you’ll see you will. Eric? You do understand, don’t you, that it’s not because we don’t
want
you? Eric?”

He knew that if he were to answer his voice would come out in that high silly squeak again. There was a pain in his throat, and he didn’t want to bawl like a little kid. He hadn’t cried in years.

Suddenly he was bawling like a little kid, sobbing, his breath in gasps. He couldn’t believe the sounds he was making. He was so frightened and ashamed of himself, and alone, cold and alone. And, hiding, he put his hands over his face.

For a while Chris didn’t say anything. Then he began to talk in that way he had which was so quiet, as if he were almost talking to himself again and didn’t care whether you were listening or not.

“I cried when my friend was shot down over Germany. Yes, I remember how I cried. I saw the plane go down, a long flame like a red pencil across the sky.… For a long time I had nightmares and woke up crying. I saw a lot of grown men cry in those years. Yes, yes.”

The boat bobbed. George left his seat and went to lie down on the bottom, his nose resting on Eric’s shoe. After a few minutes Eric felt a handkerchief being thrust into his hand. He wiped his nose and eyes and looked up. Chris was turned away from him, still not looking at him. Then Chris bent to the oars and began to row, parting the lime-colored curtain. They came out into sun and water so bright that it made you blink. They moved slowly toward home.

“Cousin Chris? Do I have to go right away? Couldn’t I just stay here till the end of the summer, and then leave in time for school in the fall?”

Chris looked at him for a moment. Then he said gently, “That wouldn’t be a very good plan,” and Eric understood
that he was saying,
Gran may not live until the end of the summer
.

“So then,” Eric began, “are you going to tell them?” He didn’t know what he was supposed to call them. He couldn’t say “Mr.” and “Mrs.,” could he? But he certainly couldn’t say “Gran” or “Gramp,” either. “Are you going to call them up and tell them that—” He couldn’t finish.

“That’s already been done. As a matter of fact, they’re on their way here now to see you.”

“Today? This afternoon?”

“Yes, it’s much too sudden for you, I know. I was supposed to get here last week to talk to you, but I had to go to Galveston instead and that’s why it’s all being done at the last minute. I’m sorry.”

“I just wish I’d had more time to think about it before they came.”

“Maybe in a way this is easier. Not to have so much time to think about it, I mean.”

George climbed back up on the seat, his great head almost on a level with Eric’s. The dog leaned heavily, closer, as if he knew. Eric was sure George knew when to give comfort. He thought of the time he had been scolded, his worst and only real, furious scolding, the time when he was ten and he had started the car up and taken it out the driveway. And then there was the time, not long after that, when Gramp had had his heart attack and died out on the porch after dinner. He remembered going up to his room, and sitting there all that evening with his arm around George just like this. There was something between himself and George that he’d never felt with anybody else.