Part 6 (1/2)

On Friday, my mother came walking across the lawn, dressed in a black dress. ”No one expects this of you,” Mr. Rabinowitz told her. ”You don't have to.”

”She was eighteen years old,” my mother said. ”Do you think I could blame her for any of this?”

Stevie told me that my father paid for the gravestone. He said it was very big and had an angel on it. I didn't see how this could be possible. My father didn't believe in angels.

The Rabinowitzes drove my mother to the funeral. I hadn't seen my father in four days. When I tried to talk to my brother about the angel he told me to shut up. ”I wish everybody would just leave me alone,” he said, which was unnecessary because pretty much everybody was.

Stevie and I got out the Uncle Wiggily board. I couldn't read my first card, because of the tears in my eyes. ”Read it to me,” I said, handing it to Stevie.

”Uncle Wiggily says you are moving to California,” Stevie said. ”Go ahead three s.p.a.ces.”

I put the card in my pocket. At some point I must have used it as a bookmark, because seven years later I found it again, stuck in a book in my grandparents' house, in the bedroom my mother had slept in as a child, which was now my room. There were no seasons in California. In seven years I had had to learn to remember things differently.

I had been eleven years old the last time I saw Stevie. Now I was eighteen, the same age as Cynthia Marciti.

The card had Uncle Wiggily's picture on it, a rabbit gentleman farmer in a top hat, collar, and cuffs. ”Uncle Wiggily says you will marry a man who is a lot like you are. You will have two children, a boy and a girl. You turn out very ordinary,” it said. ”Go back three s.p.a.ces.”

THE TRAVAILS.

Inspired by John Kessel's story ”Gulliver at Home.”

I hope I may with Justice p.r.o.nounce myself an Author perfectly blameless; against whom the Tribes of Answerers, Considerers, Observers, Reflectors, Detectors, Remarkers, will never be able to find Matter for exercising their Talents.

-Lemuel Gulliver September 28, 1699 Dear Lemuel, When you think of us, think of us missing you. As Betty cleared the Table from Breakfast this morning, she burst into Tears. ”There is Papa,” she said, pointing to a Crumb of Bread. And I perfectly comprehended her. I saw you in my Mind, your Speck of a Boat, no bigger than a Crumb on the whole of the Kitchen Table. G.o.d speed you back to us.

And then we sat no longer, because of all the daily Work to be done. Now it is Evening and I take Time to write. I hope you received my Letter of July 3rd. Our Betty is Ten Years today and, though only Months have pa.s.sed since your Departure, I believe she is much altered and not the little Girl you left. I feel the Pa.s.sage of Years more acutely in the Children's Lives than in my own. With a ten year Daughter, I cannot be accounted young. Already she is more than half as old as I when you came courting. I imagine therefore that she is already half done with being mine. A melancholy Thought.

But the Days grow ever more beautiful, so I shall look outside rather than in. How do you endure a Day at Sea with no Trees about you? The Elm at our Window is all turned, its Leaves as golden as Egg Yolks. The Moon tonight is as big as a Tea Tray, but of course you have that too, wherever you are.

Johnny is growing out of all his Clothes, and Betty and I are kept forever sewing. I never pa.s.s Mrs. Nardac in the Shops but that she informs me that the Islands where you are sailing are filled with Women who wear no St.i.tch of Clothing. If they cover their Bodies at all, she says, they do it with their Hair, which is longer and thicker and more l.u.s.trous than anything any Woman in London can do with Wigs. Mermaids then, I say, teazing. No, no, they are quite real, she a.s.sures me. She thinks you will not come Home this time and she wishes me to know she thinks this.

But I know otherwise! And such an Adventure we had when the Weather first chilled. Suddenly we were overrun with Ants. What you now picture, double. Ants poured into the House from every Crack in every Wall. Not just the Kitchen, they a.s.saulted us in the Parlour and even the Bed Chambers. Oh, it was War and went on for three whole Days. I plotted and laid Traps. You would imagine we had every Advantage, from Size to Cunning, and yet we could not win through. In truth, they seemed uncannily clever at times. Johnny even made use of a Weapon I must leave you to imagine. His Face when I came upon him! ”I washed away great Hordes of them,” he insisted, but I took him to Bed by his Ear and it has taken me many Days of scrubbing to see the Humour in it. And then, with no more Warning than we had at the Beginning, they vanished and we are at Peace again.

Mrs. Nardac thinks that Johnny should be sent away to School, but of course he is far too young still. I know I antic.i.p.ate your Wishes in the Matter by keeping him at Home for now. When you return, you will find us all, Your loving Family and,

Your Mary

Yuletide, 1701 Dearest, dearest, I have received Word today from a dear Mrs. Biddle that you are recovered from the fast Grip of the Sea and safe aboard her Husband's s.h.i.+p. What joyous Tidings! What Joy to write a Letter I know you will receive! I ran all the way Home and shouted the News without pausing to every Soul I pa.s.sed. Then Betty and I wore ourselves out with the Weeping and Relief. You are on your way Home to us and we are anxious to see you healthy and unchanged in your Regard. In truth, something in Mrs. Biddle's Letter betrayed Concern regarding your State of Mind, although I remind myself that she has also written here, twice in one Letter, that you are well. Eat and rest now, my Darling. Take care of your Dear Self.

We are all healthy here. Carolers came to the Window last Night. They sang of good King Wenceslas and Bethlehem. Snow fell, but gently, on their Scarves and Caps, while their Voices rose into the Air. Tonight all is Snow-Silent and I cannot choose which it is I like best, the Silence or the Noise of the World. Greedily, I would have them both. The Whole of it is the only thing that will suit me tonight. Mrs. Biddle said that you have such Stories to tell us. And we, you!

Such a Merry Christmas G.o.d has given us!

Your Mary

August 8, 1702 Dear Lemuel, I have been melancholy since you left. I so wanted you Home, and then nothing matched my Hopes. I am sorry for the Quarrels and sorry, too, that you made your Departure while we were still quarrelling.

You have made fine Provision for us and left me no Fear that we shall ever fall upon the Parish. The little Flock of Sheep you left has already increased its Number by Five. For this I am grateful. The new House is Tight and Warm, in spite of being so Large. Since you spent so little Time in it, it often feels entirely mine. I cannot picture you at the Table or in the Bed. I never see you, sleeping under a Book in the Parlour, as I did in our old, damp Cottage. And since you chose, much against my Wishes, to send Johnny to School-really, he is not nearly so grown as you think him-it is a quiet House with me sometimes in one End of it, and Betty far away in the other. I find myself missing even Mrs. Nardac.

But I do confess I often enjoy the Size of it. Not when I am dusting, perhaps! But I like a Room up the Stairs. As I write this, from my Desk I look down on the Fields and Lanes and Gardens as if I had the Eyes of the Trees. I look down on all the other tiny Nests of the tiny People. They love, they fight, they dispute, they cheat, they betray, but I am far above it and absolutely untouched. And then Betty comes, with a Sc.r.a.pe or a Slight to suffer over. A Letter arrives from Johnny, and between those Words the Headmaster has allowed him to send, I can read his Misery. I am part of the World again, with all its Hurts and Affections. And I cannot remember why I ever thought it best to be otherwise.

Yesterday Betty found a Fledgling blown from its Nest. She has brought it inside and made the softest Box, but its Wing is damaged and I fear we can never release it. She is kept up constantly, even at night, with feeding. No one is more tender with Small Creatures than a Young Girl, and yet my Heart rebels against a Wild Thing kept forever in a Box.

We complete our Menagerie with Rats! Large as Dogs they sound as they pound over the Roof, but I have engaged a Man to deal with them. Money can buy Men for many but perhaps not all Purposes.

Mary October 5, 1706 Dear Lemuel, Where does this find you? This is a Letter I shall have to send in a Bottle with a Cork, by a strong Arm. It will wash ash.o.r.e some months hence in Paradise and the Natives will read it, wondering if such a Place as green as England can really exist.

I fear my last Letter was uncharitable. I meant to be generous, but forgot. You know my Temper, little as you have seen it over the Years. I wished the Letter back as soon as I had sent it. Likely you did not receive it and are reading this in Wonder of what I might have written.

So I will only repeat that I was disappointed by your hasty Departure, but this time I was not surprized. We no longer seem to fit together, you and I. When you are Meditative, I wish to be Doing: when I am larkish, you choose that Moment to be sober. You are so credulous, I must learn again each time not to teaze. We are two Magnets, with an attractive but also a repulsive Power over one another. I fear the closer we stand, the more the Latter is evident.

”You married a Dreamer,” Mrs. Balnibarb said to me in the Lanes but yesterday, ”and no Woman can live in the Clouds.” Yet I think I am one Woman who could, and wait only the Invitation. Time would teach us to mesh again, but Time is the one thing I never have from you.

Betty has a Beau in Mrs. Balnibarb's middle boy, William. Are you pleased? He calls each Thursday and is as clean and polite as you could ask. He is a Farmer's Son and I count his Prospects tolerable. Her Feelings are more difficult to discern. She colours if his Name is spoken but makes no effort in his Presence to delight him. She is still so young and I will counsel Delays if my Counsel is sought. I am sure this is as you would wish.

We shall at least want him a more sensible Man than his Father. Mr. Balnibarb often walks the Lanes so lost in Thought, I have seen William forced to cuff him soundly on the Ear, lest he walk into a Tree! And he has now given up that Farming proved over the Centuries, in favour of new Methods of Planting and Irrigation designed by a Scientist in London and circulated in our little County by Pamphlet. This Pamphlet argues the Water will have more Vitality if it is Pumped uphill before being spread downhill. Its Author has surely never seen a Field in his Life. As a result, all the Farms but Balnibarb's enjoyed a most bountiful Harvest.

Our own Walnut Tree was so loaded with Fruits this year, it was dangerous to walk beneath. Nuts, like missiles, rained down at the slightest Breeze. We sit in front of the Fire and have our Pleasure, picking out the Meats and dreaming away the Evenings.

I do request that you discourage Johnny from going to Sea. I fear your Stories have had the opposite Effect. This is most unfair to me.