Watchers (12 page)
Travis was stunned. But there was nothing accidental about the question mark. Crude but not accidental. Somewhere, the dog must have seen the symbol and been taught its meaning. Statistical theorists said an infinite number of monkeys, equipped with an infinite number of typewriters, would eventually be able to re-create every line of great English prose merely by random chance. He figured that this dog forming a Milk-Bone question mark in about two minutes flat, merely by purest chance, was about ten times as unlikely as all those damn monkeys re-creating Shakespeare’s plays.
The dog was watching him expectantly.
Getting up, he found he was a bit shaky in the legs. He went to the carefully arranged biscuits, scattered them across the floor, and returned to his chair.
The retriever studied the disarranged Milk-Bones, regarded Travis inquiringly, sniffed at the biscuits again, and seemed baffled.
Travis waited.
The house was unnaturally quiet, as if the flow of time had been suspended for every living creature, machine, and object on earth—though not for him, the retriever, or the contents of the kitchen.
At last, the dog began to push the biscuits around with its nose as it had done before. In a minute or two, it formed a question mark.
Travis chugged some Coors. His heart was hammering. His palms were sweaty. He was filled with both wonder and trepidation, with both wild joy and fear of the unknown, simultaneously awestricken and bewildered. He wanted to laugh because he had never seen anything half as delightful as this dog. He also wanted to cry because only hours ago he’d thought life was bleak, dark, and pointless. But no matter how painful it was sometimes, life was (he now realized) nonetheless precious. He actually felt as if God had sent the retriever to intrigue him, to remind him that the world was full of surprises and that despair made no sense when one had no understanding of the purpose—and strange possibilities—of existence. Travis wanted to laugh, but his laughter teetered on the brink of a sob. Yet when he surrendered to the sob, it became a laugh. When he attempted to stand, he knew that he was even shakier than before, too shaky, so he did the only thing he could do: he stayed in his chair and took another long swallow of Coors.
Cocking its head one way and then the other, looking slightly wary, the dog watched him as if it thought he had gone mad. He had. Months ago. But he was all better now.
He put down the Coors and wiped tears out of his eyes with the backs of his hands. He said, “Come here, fur face.”
The retriever hesitated, then came to him.
He ruffled and stroked its coat, scratched behind its ears. “You amaze me and scare me. I can’t figure where you came from or how you got to be what you are, but you couldn’t have come where you’re more needed. A question mark, huh? Jesus. All right. You want to know why I felt life had no purpose or joy for me? I’ll tell you. I will, by God, I’ll sit right here and have another beer and tell it to a dog. But first . . . I’m going to name you.”
The retriever blew air out of its nostrils, as if to say,
Well, it’s about time.
Well, it’s about time.
Holding the dog’s head, looking straight into its eyes, Travis said, “Einstein. From now on, fur face, your name is Einstein.”
Streck called again at ten minutes past nine.
Nora snatched up the phone on the first ring, fiercely determined to tell him off and make him leave her alone. But for some reason she clenched up again and was unable to speak.
In a repulsively intimate tone of voice, he said, “You miss me, prettiness? Hmmmm? Do you wish I’d come to you, be a man for you?”
She hung up.
What’s wrong with me? she wondered. Why can’t I tell him to go away and stop bothering me?
Maybe her speechlessness grew from a secret desire to hear a man—any man, even a disgusting specimen like Streck—call her pretty. Although he was not the kind who would be capable of tenderness or affection, she could listen to him and imagine what it would be like to have a
good
man say sweet things to her.
good
man say sweet things to her.
“Well, you’re not pretty,” she told herself, “and you never ever will be, so stop mooning around. Next time he calls, tell him off.”
She got out of bed and went down the hall to the bathroom, where there was a mirror. Following Violet Devon’s example, Nora did not have mirrors anywhere in the house except the bathrooms. She did not like to look at herself because what she saw was saddening.
This one night, however, she wanted to take a look at herself because Streck’s flattery, though cold and calculated, had stirred her curiosity. Not that she hoped to see some fine quality that she had never seen before. No. From duckling to swan overnight . . . that was a frivolous, hopeless dream. Rather, she wanted to confirm that she was undesirable. Streck’s unwanted interest rattled Nora because she was
comfortable
in her homeliness and solitude, and she wanted to reassure herself that he was mocking her, that he would not act upon his threats, that her peaceful solitude would endure. Or so she told herself as she stepped into the bathroom and switched on the light.
comfortable
in her homeliness and solitude, and she wanted to reassure herself that he was mocking her, that he would not act upon his threats, that her peaceful solitude would endure. Or so she told herself as she stepped into the bathroom and switched on the light.
The narrow chamber had pale-blue tile from floor to ceiling with a white-tile border. A huge claw-foot tub. White porcelain and brass fixtures. The large mirror was somewhat streaked with age.
She looked at her hair, which Streck said was beautiful, dark, glossy. But it was of one shade, without natural highlights; to her, it wasn’t glossy but oily, although she had washed it that morning.
She looked quickly at her brow, cheekbones, nose, jawline, lips, and chin. She tentatively traced her features with one hand, but she saw nothing to intrigue a man.
At last, reluctantly, she stared into her eyes, which Streck had called lovely. They were a dreary, lusterless shade of gray. She could not bear to meet her own gaze for more than a few seconds. Her eyes confirmed her low opinion of her appearance. But also . . . well, in her own eyes she saw a smoldering anger that disturbed her, that was not like her, an anger at what she had let herself become. Of course, that made no sense whatsoever because she was what nature had made her—a mouse—and she could do nothing about that.
Turning from the mottled mirror, she felt a pang of disappointment that her self-inspection had not resulted in a single surprise or reevaluation. Immediately, however, she was shocked and appalled by that disappointment. She stood in the bathroom doorway, shaking her head, amazed by her own befuddled thought processes.
Did she
want
to be appealing to Streck? Of course not. He was weird, sick, dangerous. The very last thing she wanted was to appeal to him. Maybe she wouldn’t mind if another man looked on her with favor, but not Streck. She should get on her knees and thank God for creating her as she was, because if she were at all attractive, Streck would make good on his threats. He’d come here, and he’d rape her . . . maybe murder her. Who knew about a man like that? Who knew what his limits were? She wasn’t being a nervous old maid when she worried about murder, not these days: the newspapers were full of it.
want
to be appealing to Streck? Of course not. He was weird, sick, dangerous. The very last thing she wanted was to appeal to him. Maybe she wouldn’t mind if another man looked on her with favor, but not Streck. She should get on her knees and thank God for creating her as she was, because if she were at all attractive, Streck would make good on his threats. He’d come here, and he’d rape her . . . maybe murder her. Who knew about a man like that? Who knew what his limits were? She wasn’t being a nervous old maid when she worried about murder, not these days: the newspapers were full of it.
She realized that she was defenseless, and she hurried back to the bedroom, where she had left the butcher’s knife.
Most people believe psychoanalysis is a cure for unhappiness. They are sure they could overcome all their problems and achieve peace of mind if only they could understand their own psychology, understand the reasons for their negative moods and self-destructive behavior. But Travis had learned this was not the case. For years, he engaged in unsparing self-analysis, and long ago he figured out why he had become a loner who was unable to make friends. However, in spite of that understanding, he had not been able to change.
Now, as midnight approached, he sat in the kitchen, drank another Coors, and told Einstein about his self-imposed emotional isolation. Einstein sat before him, unmoving, never yawning, as if intently interested in his tale.
“I was a loner as a kid, right from the start, though I wasn’t entirely without friends. It was just that I always preferred my own company. I guess it’s my nature. I mean, when I was a kid, I hadn’t yet decided that my being friends with someone was a danger to him.”
Travis’s mother had died giving birth to him, and he knew all about that from an early age. In time her death would seem like an omen of what was to come, and it would take on a terrible importance, but that was later. As a kid, he wasn’t yet burdened with guilt.
Not until he was ten. That was when his brother Harry died. Harry was twelve, two years older than Travis. One Monday morning in June, Harry talked Travis into walking three blocks to the beach, although their father had expressly forbidden them to go swimming without him. It was a private cove without a public lifeguard, and they were the only two swimmers in sight.
“Harry got caught in an undertow,” Travis told Einstein. “We were in the water together no more than ten feet apart, and the damn undertow got him, sucked him away, but it didn’t get me. I even went after him, tried to save him, so I should’ve swum straight into the same current, but I guess it changed course just after it snatched Harry away, ’cause I came out of the water alive.” He stared at the top of the kitchen table for a long moment, seeing not the red Formica but the rolling, treacherous, blue-green sea. “I loved my big brother more than anyone in the world.”
Einstein whined softly, as in commiseration.
“Nobody blamed me for what happened to Harry. He was the older one. He was supposed to be the most responsible. But I felt . . . well, if the undertow took Harry, it should’ve taken me, too.”
A night wind blew in from the west, rattled a loose windowpane.
After taking a swallow of beer, Travis said, “The summer I was fourteen, I wanted very badly to go to tennis camp. Tennis was my big enthusiasm then. So my dad enrolled me in a place down near San Diego, a full month of intense instruction. He drove me there on a Sunday, but we never made it. Just north of Oceanside, a trucker fell asleep at the wheel, his rig jumped the median, and we were wiped. Dad was killed instantly. Broken neck, broken back, skull crushed, chest caved in. I was in the front seat beside him, and I came out of it with a few cuts, bruises, and two broken fingers.”
The dog was studying him intently.
“It was just like with Harry. Both of us should have died, my father and me, but I escaped. And we wouldn’t have been making the damn drive if I hadn’t agitated like hell about tennis camp. So this time, there was no getting around it. Maybe I couldn’t be blamed for my mother dying in childbirth, and maybe I couldn’t be pinned with Harry’s death, but
this
one . . . Anyway, although I wasn’t always at fault, it began to be clear that I was jinxed, that it wasn’t safe for people to get too close to me. When I loved somebody, really loved them, they were sure as shit going to die.”
this
one . . . Anyway, although I wasn’t always at fault, it began to be clear that I was jinxed, that it wasn’t safe for people to get too close to me. When I loved somebody, really loved them, they were sure as shit going to die.”
Only a child could have been convinced that those tragic events meant he was a walking curse, but Travis was a child then, only fourteen, and no other explanation was so neat. He was too young to understand that the mindless violence of nature and fate often had no meaning that could be ascertained. At fourteen, he
needed
meaning in order to cope, so he told himself that he was cursed, that if he made any close friends he would be sentencing them to early death. Being somewhat of an introvert to begin with, he found it almost too easy to turn inward and make do with his own company.
needed
meaning in order to cope, so he told himself that he was cursed, that if he made any close friends he would be sentencing them to early death. Being somewhat of an introvert to begin with, he found it almost too easy to turn inward and make do with his own company.
By the time he graduated from college at the age of twenty-one, he was a confirmed loner, though maturity had given him a healthier perspective on the deaths of his mother, brother, and father. He no longer consciously thought of himself as jinxed, no longer blamed himself for what had happened to his family. He remained an introvert, without close friends, partly because he had lost the ability to form and nurture intimate relationships and partly because he figured he could not be shattered by grief if he had no friends to lose.
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