the Buffalo Soldier (2002)

by Bohjalian, Chris

  She thought she should be angry, but she wasn't. This was merely her mother being her mother: as oblivious as ever to what her daughter wanted to do with her life, and why. And so she simply drove the car up to the house, parked it in its usual spot by the small carriage barn, and then went inside to make dinner.

  SHE DECIDED SHE had to call Louise. She would imply that the main reason she was phoning was to offer some days and times when she was available for the case review, but then, once they were talking, she would see if there was a way to ask the caseworker what she was thinking--and whether the news that she and Terry were, at least for the moment, separated had had any bearing on the timing of Louise's letter.

  She caught the woman when she was just about to leave for the day, and offered to call back in the morning.

  No, now's fine, Louise said, and they both looked at their calendars and chose a day in the very first week in February when they would try to get everyone together.

  She scribbled a tentative time on a scrap piece of paper and then--hoping the question would sound casual when she actually gave voice to the words in her head--asked, Have you given any more thought to Terry's and my situation?

  There was a quiet at the other end of the line, and for a brief moment she wished that she had stalled just a moment longer--found a more innocuous subject to discuss with Louise before getting to the issue that really mattered to her. It might have made her inquiry seem less urgent, and she sound less anguished. But then she stopped herself from thinking like that: This is my child, she thought, my boy, and I will be as urgent and worried as I want.

  I guess, Louise said finally. Why?

  I was wondering if it had anything to do with your scheduling the case review now.

  No. I mean, I wasn't oblivious to it. But what's your concern?

  I didn't know if there was a connection--and I wanted to know.

  No.

  No connection?

  That's right. Absolutely none. Even if the two of you wind up divorced, the reality is that single people adopt children all the time. I'm serious: all the time.

  Adopt, she said, murmuring the word carefully. Repeating it gave it tangibility.

  Yeah, adopt. I presume that hasn't changed. I mean it hasn't changed for me. For us.

  No, of course it hasn't changed. I'm just...surprised. Pleasantly--no, euphorically--surprised.

  What, did you think that because--

  It doesn't matter what I thought, she said, her voice almost giddy.

  Look, all I want to do at this point is bring in the adoption social worker. That's the main thing I think we'll be discussing at the case review. Okay? I would love for you and Terry to figure out how to solve your problems for a zillion reasons, of which young Alfred is only one. But the bottom line is that the plan hasn't changed. We still want you to adopt Alfred, and I have to assume that's still what you want, too. Right?

  More than you know, she said, and she had to swallow hard so she wouldn't cry on the phone. I want that more than you know.

  "I can discourage a trooper from marrying, but in the end I cannot prevent it."

  CAPTAIN ANDREW HITCHENS,

  TENTH REGIMENT, UNITED STATES CAVALRY,

  REPORT TO THE POST ADJUTANT,

  AUGUST 12, 1877

  *

  Alfred

  A barn collapsed in Durham and killed thirty-five cows: The rain made the snow on the roof too heavy for the old beams, and the structure bowed and then broke.

  In Cornish, the custodian at the elementary school rounded up plastic buckets and left them stacked just outside the kindergarten classroom, the room with the art supplies, and the gym. Apparently at some point the ceilings in these rooms would start to leak because the melting snow on the roof would have to go somewhere, and eventually gravity would lead it inside the school.

  And Schuyler Jackman and Joe Langford both wondered at lunch in the multipurpose room how high the river would rise, and it was clear from their tones that this was a subject that disturbed them.

  Most of the grown-ups, however, including Alfred's teacher and Paul, tried to talk about the rain and the warm spell as the natural January thaw. It happened every year right about now: There would be two or three days of warm weather and rain at the very end of the month, and most of the snow pack would disappear. This year it just happened to be both a little warmer and a little wetter, and there was a little more snow running off the hills to the east.

  Still, Alfred worried. It felt to him as if there had been mountains of snow in the five weeks since Christmas, and now it was pouring and there was still so much rain in the forecast. He wasn't sure what he expected would happen, and when he was falling asleep that night, the rain drumming against the metal porch roof outside his window, he told himself he was only anxious because Laura was. And it was obvious why the rain and the water were so upsetting to her.

  WHEN HE CAME downstairs for breakfast the next morning, he heard Laura on the phone. The plastic red bowl in which she cleaned lettuce was on the kitchen counter next to the stove, and every half minute a tiny drop from a leak in the ceiling would fall into it.

  No, you don't need to, Russell, really. It's Terry's responsibility. But you're sweet to offer, she was saying, and she smiled at Alfred when she saw him. Look, I'll call the barracks, she continued, and he can come up here when he's done with his shift. That'll be fine.

  A moment later she said good-bye and hung up, and after he had sat down at the table and poured milk into his cereal, he asked her what was Terry's responsibility.

  She tossed a container of pudding into his lunch bag and a second paper napkin, and folded the top shut. The roof, she answered. Actually, the roofs. She motioned toward the bowl and the leak--he noticed there was a stain on the ceiling the size of a washcloth and the color of rust that hadn't been there the day before--and went on, I don't worry about them collapsing, but we need to get the snow off before the real rains come tonight. Otherwise a lot of that snow is going to wind up here in the kitchen and in my bedroom and in the den. That's where the water trickles in when we have ice jams up there--except it isn't always a trickle. Six or seven years ago it was practically a waterfall. We had to repaint and repaper the den.

  That was Russell just now?

  Uh-huh. He spent last night at that camp with Terry, she answered, and then her tone lightened slightly. Poor Terry, I actually feel sorry for him. Russell quit his job earlier this month, and it seems at least once a week he's dropped in on his older brother for a night or two. I think he likes that camp. I believe this is the third time he's been out there.

  And he's coming here now? he asked, the question a reflex he wished he could have avoided. He was afraid Laura would be able to see how little he wanted Russell up at their house.

  Oh, no. God, no. Don't worry about that. The only reason I was even talking to Russell was that I'd missed Terry by a minute or two, he'd just left for work. And so Russell offered to stop by on his way home and shovel off the roofs, since, well, he no longer has a job to get to. It was actually a very sweet offer. But the roofs are Terry's responsibility. And the truth is, I don't want Russell here any more than you do.

  He spooned some of the cereal into his mouth and wondered if there was a way he could help. But he wasn't sure he could even lift that metal extension ladder in the carriage barn off the ground, much less carry it through the snow, heavy and thick now with rainwater, to the side of the house. He thought he might ask Paul what he should do if the roof was still leaking when he got home from school, but then he remembered he couldn't do that: The couple was off visiting their daughter in the southern part of the state and wouldn't be back until tomorrow.

  WHEN THE BUS passed the Gale River on the way to school, there were massive sheets of broken ice crashing against the banks--some easily the size of the tops of pool tables and the flatbeds of pickup trucks--and the younger children in the bus were shouting, Cool. When the bus arrived at the school building, he saw t
he custodian was up on the roof over the kindergarten classroom, the ladder flush against the sharply pitched metal, using one hand to bang against ice with a small sledgehammer while gripping the ladder tightly with the other.

  In his classroom Ms. Logan was talking to the librarian about the book fair the school would be having in February, and a small cluster of students was already gathered around one of the computers in the corner. What he noticed more than anything, however, was the low rumble that for a moment he presumed was merely the overhead, fluorescent lights, but then realized was the river. Despite the fact that the windows were closed and it was raining outside, despite the fact that the river was across the street from the school, the water was so high he could hear it.

  "[I was] no admirer of the African, believing he would ultimately destroy the white race...[Now I] think the world of the men of my company, and I am proud of what we have done."

  ANONYMOUS LETTER,

  ARMY AND NAVY JOURNAL, FEBRUARY 19, 1887

  *

  Phoebe

  She listened to Keenan Hewitt and Clark Adams talk about the sand truck that had actually wound up off the road, as they poured their coffee into Styrofoam cups and took doughnuts off the wide plate at the far end of the store's front counter. Clark was a warden with Fish and Wildlife, and his uniform looked a bit like Terry's. She knew he was married, and she was pretty sure he had teenage children at home. She guessed he was in his forties. Keenan had run a lathe at the furniture mill until he retired a couple years back at sixty-five, and was a man her father considered a friend. Once when she was in high school she'd gone to a movie with Keenan's son, Tommy, but the boy hadn't been as bright as he was handsome, and she'd been careful to make sure there was no second date. Still, even now--or at least until she'd told him she was pregnant back on Christmas Day--her father would ask her why she never saw that Tommy Keenan.

  Likewise, Clark had a nephew just about her age, and every time he was in the store, he would mention how well the boy was doing at the construction company where he was working, and how everyone guessed he'd find a woman soon and settle down.

  She wondered now if either of them would try to play matchmaker this morning, or at the very least bring up one of the young men she should consider dating. She hoped not, and when she listened to the wind outside rattle the trees and cause Clark's four-by-four to sway in its spot by the front of the store, she took comfort in the idea that these were the sort of men who found a late January storm--and a sand truck off the road--infinitely more interesting than romance.

  SHE WATCHED THE sleet outside the store's big glass windows, occasionally glancing at her watch. It was barely ten-thirty. She was working until three today, and so she wouldn't arrive at the camp where Terry was staying much before six even if the roads were any good--which, today, they most certainly were not. She'd be lucky if she got there by seven or seven-thirty. The streets this far north were sheets of black ice and the schools were closed. Only twenty minutes further south it was raining and the schools were open, but other than the interstate (which, alas, she wouldn't be on), even there the roads weren't going to be a whole lot better: In some cases, she knew, there would be small ponds of slush on the pavement, and in other cases the streets would simply be closed and she would have to make short (and, perhaps, long) detours where the culverts were clogged with ice and sludge and the water was streaming over the asphalt.

  And, of course, if she was on the road too late into the evening, there was always the chance that all that water on the roads would freeze. Then she'd be in real trouble.

  If she hadn't taken that vacation earlier in the month, she probably would have asked Frank and Jeannine if she could leave early, but she didn't want to impose on their good nature again. She'd just have to call Terry so he wouldn't worry, and then take it slow. She'd get there whenever she could, and it was better to get there late but in one piece than to wind up hydroplaning into a ditch or, worse, another car. The last thing she wanted was to get in a car accident with a baby in her tummy, while on her way to--finally--doing the right thing.

  Trying to, anyway.

  As much as she enjoyed Terry's company--as much as she might even love him--she had vowed that this was the very last time she would see him, at least while he was married. This was it, it had to be. She and her father had fought again last night, this time not because she was pregnant but because, for the third time this month, she was refusing to tell him where she was going. He--her whole family, actually--knew she was going to visit the man who was the father of her baby, and the idea that she still wouldn't tell them who it was was beginning to infuriate them.

  As, she realized, it probably should. And while she was able to give lip service to the notion that it was none of their business, the reality was that there couldn't be much future in any activity you couldn't talk about. And so she'd decided, once and for all, there was already too much pain in the world, and she simply would not be responsible for causing this woman who was Terry Sheldon's wife any more hurt than she had already endured.

  "Honorable discharge: Rowe, George, Sergeant, B Company, October 13, 1877."

  U. S. NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS SERVICE,

  TENTH CAVALRY MUSTER ROLLS,

  1877

  *

  Terry

  He was exhausted by early afternoon, it had just been that kind of day. Still, he hoped he'd be able to get to Laura's--his house, too, he reminded himself, it was still his home, too--before dark. It wasn't merely the ice jams that concerned him, it was the reality that the river was probably roaring by now, and it was only going to get worse, and that would surely make Laura's day particularly difficult. There hadn't been snow the day their daughters died, but it had been exactly this sort of cold, heavy rain.

  Today he'd already been on the site of three nasty car accidents, each one triggered by the slippery roads and the bad visibility: There were thick pockets of fog on top of everything else, a result of the warm front hitting all that cold on the ground. There were flood watches across the state, and he just knew there would be whole wading pools of brown water in an awful lot of basements.

  He pulled the collar of his jacket up over his neck, radioed in that he was leaving his cruiser, and started toward the old couple by the side of their gray Lincoln. He could see right away they were chilly and wet and annoyed, but otherwise they looked unhurt. The rear of the car looked pretty banged up, and he was almost upon them when he realized that although the front of the vehicle was in the remains of a snowbank, it was the left taillight and that corner of the bumper that were most mangled. He understood then that the couple was not simply frustrated because the man had been driving and lost control of their automobile and they'd had a close call; they were upset because someone else had careened into them, and then driven away and left them by the side of the road.

  He shook his head and realized his day was just going to get worse and worse. Phoebe was coming over that night, but even that realization was causing him more stress than pleasure: He really did want to take care of the house first, and he really did want to do a good job. Moreover, how could he possibly go straight from his wife to his...lover? Some guys could probably do that, but could he?

  He'd have to, he guessed.

  Moreover, he'd seen Alfred exactly once in the last month, when he watched the child's riding lesson one afternoon and then gone out for pizza with Paul Hebert and the boy. And though he felt guilty about his almost repellent lack of involvement--especially with the child's case review next week--his life already seemed an unwieldy tangle of relationships (all of which, he had to admit, he was completely mismanaging), and he didn't see how he could find the time to see the boy more. Still, he felt bad. He felt bad about Laura and he felt bad about Alfred, and he couldn't stop thinking about them while he stood in the rain with the older couple as they described the teenagers in their sporty Grand Am who'd been tailgating them for at least two or three miles. When the kids had finally
tried passing them, they sent them sliding off the road, banging into the left rear of their car in the process, before speeding away.

  According to the woman, they'd never even looked back.

  You get a license plate number? he asked, but--as he'd expected--their eyesight wasn't that good. Still they had a description of the car, and they were pretty sure it was from Vermont. That would help. They'd find the kids eventually.

  When the wrecker arrived, the fellow from the service station asked them if they'd heard about what was happening over the mountains in Montpelier. Apparently the Winooski was over its banks, and there was a foot of water in the streets within a block of the capitol. Worst flooding since 1991. Then he towed the Lincoln from the ditch, and Terry climbed behind the wheel to make sure it was still working. It was, and so he sent them on their way and continued running the roads himself. He hadn't been driving long when the radio calls started to come in en masse, a deluge from every corner of the county, it seemed, where there were people and there was water. The Otter Creek had taken down a bridge in New Haven, and a part of Route 17 was impassable; the waters were over the top of two stretches of 125, making the strip of highway between East Middlebury and Ripton particularly treacherous; and an ice dam had built up just east of Durham, and the water was pouring into the first floor of a small company that made candles and the Italian restaurant just beside it. There were power lines down and there were phone lines down, and he was one of exactly three troopers in the county on the road at that moment. Three. No one was hurt, at least not yet, and that gave him some small measure of relief. But he also realized the odds that no one would be hurt when he logged off his shift were probably too small to calculate.