The Gravedigger's Daughter

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Niley shook his head faintly.

  “What’s that? No?”

  “No, Daddy.”

  “Swear? Cross your heart and hope-to-die?”

  Niley nodded, smiling uncertainly at Tignor.

  “Not once? Never a man in this house? Eh?”

  Niley was becoming confused, frightened. Rebecca ached to pull him from Tignor’s arms.

  Tignor was demanding, “Never a man? Not ever? Not one man, never-ever? You haven’t waked up, and heard someone here? A man’s voice, eh?

  Niley tried to hold himself very still. He would not look at Rebecca, if he did he would burst into tears and cry for her. He was facing Tignor, eyelids partly closed, quivering.

  Rebecca knew he was thinking: radio voices? Was that what Daddy meant?

  Niley whispered what sounded like yes. It was almost inaudible, pleading.

  Tignor said sharply, “A man? Eh? Here?”

  Rebecca touched Tignor’s hand, that was gripping Niley’s thin shoulder. “Tignor, you’re scaring him. It’s the radio he’s thinking of.”

  “Radio? What radio?”

  “The radio. Radio voices.”

  “Hell, he’s told me, baby. He’s spilled the beans.”

  “Tignor, you don’t mean any of this. You�”

  “Niley admitted there’s been a man here. He has heard the voice. Mommy’s man.”

  Rebecca tried to laugh, this could only be a joke.

  She had a sense of things-falling-away. Walking on thin rubbery ice as it starts to sink, crack.

  “It’s the radio, Tignor! I told you. Niley has to have the radio on all day and all night, he has some notion in his head the men’s voices are you.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Tignor was enjoying this, Rebecca saw. The color was up in his face. This was as good as drinking. As good as winning at poker with his friends. Not for a moment did he believe any of it. Yet he seemed unable to stop.

  Rebecca could have walked from the room. Waving her hand in disgust. Walked away, and began to run. Where?

  Impossible, she could not leave Niley. Tignor was on his feet suddenly, dumping Niley to the floor. He caught hold of her elbow.

  “Admit it, Jew-girl.”

  “Why do you hate me, Tignor? When I love you…”

  Tignor’s face flushed with blood. His mean wet eyes shrank from hers, he was ashamed. In that instant she saw his shame. Yet he was furious with her for defying him before the child.

  “You are a Jew, aren’t you? Gypsy-Jew! Hell, I was warned.”

  “What do you mean, ‘warned’? By who?”

  “Everybody. Everybody who knew you and your crazy old man.”

  “We weren’t Jewish! I am not�”

  “You aren’t? Sure you are. ‘Schwart.’”

  “What if I was? What’s wrong with Jews?”

  Tignor made a disdainful face. He shrugged, as if he knew himself above such prejudice.

  “I don’t say it, baby, it’s other people. ‘Dirty Jews’�you hear that all the time. What’s it mean, people say that? It’s in the papers. It’s in books.”

  “People are ignorant. They say all sorts of ignorant things.”

  “Jews, niggers. A nigger is next thing to an ape but the Jew is too smart for his own damn good. ‘Jew’ you down�pick your pocket, stab you in the back, and sue you! There’s got to be some damn good reason, the Germans wanted to get rid of you. The Germans are a damn smart race.”

  Tignor laughed crudely. He didn’t mean any of this, Rebecca thought. Yet he could not stop himself as, during lovemaking, he could not stop himself from thrashing and moaning helplessly in her arms.

  Rebecca said, pleading, “Why did you marry me, then? If you don’t love me.”

  A shrewd, sly look came over Tignor’s face. Rebecca thought He never did marry me. We aren’t married.

  “Sure I love you. Why the hell’d I be here, in this dump, with this antsy kid, half-Jew kid, if I didn’t? Bullshit.”

  Niley had begun to whimper, Tignor stalked out of the room in disgust. Rebecca hoped she would hear him slam out of the house, she and Niley would cower together hearing the car start, and back out of the driveway…

  But Tignor didn’t appear to be leaving. He’d only gone to the refrigerator for another ale.

  That sensation of things-falling-away. Once the ice begins to crack, it will happen swiftly.

  She would put the child to bed, quickly. Desperate to get him in bed, and the door to his room shut. She wanted to think that once the door was shut, Niley quieted and in bed, Tignor would forget him.

  She was dazed, disoriented. It had happened so quickly.

  Isn’t my husband, never was my husband. I never had a husband.

  The revelation was a blinding light in her face. She was sickened, humiliated. And yet, she’d known.

  At the time, in the shabby brick house in Niagara Falls. Hastily married by an acquaintance of Niles Tignor’s said to be a justice of the peace. She’d known.

  She was tucking Niley into bed, the child pulled and clutched at her. “Don’t cry! Try not to cry. If you have to cry, hide your face in your pillow. It makes Daddy upset to hear you cry, Daddy loves you so. And stay in this bed. Don’t get out of this bed. No matter what you hear, Niley. Stay in this bed, don’t come out. Promise?”

  Niley was too agitated to promise. Rebecca switched off the bedside lamp, and left him.

  Since Tignor had returned, Niley’s rabbit-lamp did not burn through the night. The radio was no longer on his windowsill but back in the kitchen where, when Tignor was home, it was turned on only once a day, for the evening news.

  It was Rebecca’s intention to head off Tignor, to get into the front of the house and so prevent him from entering the bedroom. But there in the bedroom was Tignor, disheveled, glaring, a bottle of foaming ale in his fist.

  “Hiding him away, eh? Making him afraid of his father.”

  Rebecca tried to explain it was Niley’s bedtime. Far past his bedtime.

  “You been poisoning him against me, haven’t you? All this time.”

  Rebecca shook her head, no!

  “Turning him against me. Why he’s so afraid of me. Nervous like a kicked dog. I never raised a hand to him.”

  Rebecca was standing very still, staring at a spot on the floor.

  Neither agreeing nor disagreeing. No resistance, and no defiance.

  “Like I don’t love him, and you. Like I ain’t doing a damn good job. All the thanks I get.” Tignor spoke in an aggrieved voice, searching in his pocket for something. He was clumsy, urgent. He took out his wallet, fumbled to pull out bills. “Gypsy-girl! Always wanting money, eh? Like I don’t provide enough. Like for five fucking years you haven’t been bleeding me dry.” He began to toss bills at her, in that way that Rebecca loathed. She was certain now that he’d lied about Herschel, he’d never met Herschel in his life, that episode had been deceptive, demeaning. She hated dollar bills being tossed at her yet she tried to smile. Even now, she tried to smile. She knew it was necessary for Tignor to see himself as amusing and not threatening. If he sensed how frightened she was of him, he would be even angrier.

  “Take ’em! Pick ’em up! This is what you want from me, isn’t it?”

  The bills fluttered to the floor at Rebecca’s feet. She smiled harder, as Niley smiled in terror of his teasing Daddy. She knew she must perform, somehow. Must abase herself another time, to protect the child. She no longer cared about herself, she was so tired. She would not be one of those mothers (in Milburn you heard of them, sometimes) who failed to protect their children from harm. Always it seems so simple, self-evident For God’s sake why didn’t she take the children, why didn’t she run for help, why wait until it was too late yet now that it was happening to her she understood the strange inertia, the wish that the storm might blow over, the male fury would spend itself and cease. For Tignor was very drunk, unsteady on his feet. His bloodshot eyes caught at hers in hurt, shame. Yet the f
ury had hold of him, and would not yet release him.

  In a mock-amorous voice saying, “Jew-girl. Whore.”

  Crumpling bills into balls and throwing them at Rebecca, at her face. Her eyes filled with moisture, she was blinded.

  “What’s wrong? Too proud? You make your own money now, do you? On your back? Opening your legs? That’s it?”

  Tignor had set the bottle of ale on the floor. Not noticing that he’d knocked it over. He grabbed Rebecca, laughing as he tried to stuff a wad of bills down the front of her shirt. He tore at her slacks, that were made of black corduroy, worn at the knees and seat. These were factory clothes, she hadn’t had time to change. He was stuffing bills inside the slacks, inside her underwear and between her legs as she struggled to get away. He was hurting her, his big fingers clawed at her vagina. But he was laughing, and Rebecca wanted to think He isn’t angry then, if he is laughing. He won’t hurt me, if he is laughing.

  She was desperate hoping that Tignor wouldn’t hear Niley pleading Mom-my!

  Tignor had stopped hurting her, Rebecca thought it might be over, except there came a sudden explosion of light at the side of her head. Suddenly she was on the floor, dazed. Something had struck the side of her head. She had no clear idea that it had been a man’s fist or that the man who’d struck her was Tignor.

  He stood over her, prodding with his foot. The toe of his shoe between her legs, making her writhe in pain. “Eh, baby? What you like, is it?” Rebecca was too slow and dazed to react as Tignor wished, he lost patience and straddled her. Now he was truly angry, cursing her. So very angry now, and she had no idea why. For she had not fought him, she had tried not to provoke him. Yet he was shutting his hands around her neck, just to frighten her. Teach her a lesson. Shaming him in front of their son! Thump-thump-thumping the back of her head against the floorboards. Rebecca was choking, losing consciousness. Yet even in her distress she could feel cold air rising through the cracks of the floorboards, from the cellar below. The child in the next room was screaming now, she knew the man would blame her. He will kill you now, can’t help himself. Like one who has ventured out on thin ice in full confidence that he can turn back at any time, he is safe so long as he can turn back even as in her terror she was thinking he must stop soon, of course he would stop soon, he had never gone on so long, never seriously hurt her in the past. There was the understanding between them�wasn’t there?�he would never seriously hurt her. He would threaten, but he would not. Yet he was choking her, and stuffing bills into her mouth, trying to shove bills down her throat. Never had he done anything like this before, this was entirely new. Rebecca could not breathe, she was choking. She struggled to save herself, panic flooded her veins. The man was jeering, “Jew! Bitch! Whore!” He was furious, exuding a terrible righteous heat.

  In all, the beating would last forty minutes.

  She would believe afterward that she had not lost consciousness.

  Yet there was Tignor shaking her: “Hey. There’s nothing wrong with you, cunt. Wake up.”

  He pulled her to her feet, trying to make her stand. Though Tignor himself was swaying, like a man on a tilting deck.

  “Come on! Stop faking.”

  Rebecca’s knees had no strength. The hope came to her, quick as a lightning flash, that, if she sank to her knees, Tignor would take pity on her at last and allow her to crawl away like a kicked dog. And somehow, in that instant, it seemed to her that this had already happened. She would hide beneath the stairs, she would hide in the cellar. She would crawl into the cistern (the cistern was dry, the gutters and drainpipes of the old house were badly rusted and rainwater could not accumulate) and hug her knees to her chest, she would never testify against him even if he killed her. She would never!

  But she hadn’t crawled away. She was still in that room. A lighted room, and not the cellar. Through the webby fabric she saw it: the neatly made bed with the quilt spread, Rebecca hadn’t yet turned back with her chambermaid’s exactitude, for nighttime; dark-gold circular shag rugs bought for $2.98 in Chautauqua Falls, in the post-Christmas sales; the straw flowers on the bureau that Miss Lutter would have admired. Tignor was grunting, “Wake up! Open your eyes! I’ll break your ass if�” He was shaking her, slamming her against a wall. The windowpanes vibrated. Something had fallen and was rolling across the floor, emitting foam. Rebecca would have slipped down like a rag doll except the man held her, striking her face.

  “Talk back to me, will you! Shame a man in his own son’s eyes.”

  Tignor dragged Rebecca to the bed. Her clothes were torn, and strangely wet. Her shirt had been ripped open. It would infuriate him to see her breasts, she must hide her breasts. Her naked female flesh would madden him. Tignor threw her onto the bed, he fumbled at his trousers. He blamed her, stupid cunt. His trousers were no longer sharply pressed. In the farmhouse on the Poor Farm Road, Niles Tignor had lost himself. He had lost his manhood, his dignity. His shirts were clumsily ironed, creases at the collar. A blind cripple could do better!

  There was Niley, pulling at Daddy’s legs, screaming for him to stop.

  “Little fucker.”

  Rebecca knew now: she had made a terrible mistake. The worst mistake a mother can make. She had endangered her child out of stupidity and carelessness.

  A bright blood-blossom on the child’s mouth, nose.

  Rebecca pleaded with the man straddling her: not to hit Niley, to hit her.

  Not him: her.

  “Baby! Damn cry-baby!” Tignor lifted the screaming child by an arm, and threw him at the wall.

  Niley ceased crying. He lay quietly on the floor, where he’d fallen. And Rebecca, on the bed, lay quietly now.

  The fabric over her face had tightened. She was blind, her brain was close to extinction. She could not breathe through her nose, something was broken, blocked. Like a gasping fish she sucked for air through her mouth, all her strength went into this effort. Yet she could hear, her hearing was sharpened.

  A man’s heavy panting, beside her. Wet snorting noise in his throat. Tignor had lost interest, now she’d ceased to fight him. He’d collapsed on the bed beside her. Amid the churned-up bloodied bedclothes he would sleep.

  It was like slipping beneath the surface of water: Rebecca kept losing consciousness, then waking. A very long time seemed to pass before she had the strength to wake fully, and get to her feet. She moved so slowly, so awkwardly, she expected Tignor to wake, and grab her arm. Almost, she could hear his grunted words. Cunt! Where’re you going! But Tignor did not wake, Rebecca was safe. She went to the child, where he lay on the floor. Her face was bleeding, her left eye swollen shut. She could barely see him yet knew: he was all right. He would be all right, he too was safe, there could be nothing seriously wrong with him. It could not be. His father loved him, his father would not have wished to hurt him.

  She whispered to Niley. He was safe, Mommy had him. But not to cry any more.

  Niley was breathing, in shallow erratic gasps. His head fell forward at a sharp angle. His neck is broken Rebecca thought even as she knew it could not be so, and it was not. She had no strength and yet she lifted Niley, staggered beneath his weight carrying him out of the bedroom. He was breathing, he was not seriously hurt. She was certain.

  In her dazed state Rebecca would not have supposed herself capable of walking from the bedroom to the kitchen and yet she managed to carry Niley into the kitchen, and did not drop him. In the brighter light of the kitchen she saw that the child’s small face was bleeding, and swollen; there was an ugly scratch at his hairline, leaking blood; his skin wasn’t flushed as usual but waxy-pale, with a bluish cast. His eyelids were not fully closed, crescents of white showed faintly. For here was the mechanism of vision, and yet there was no vision. Like a doll’s glassy eyes if you pushed the lid up with a thumb.

  “Niley. Mommy has you.”

  He was alive, he was breathing and alive and beginning to stir, whimpering, in Rebecca’s arms.

  “You’re all right, honey
. Can you open your eyes?”

  His thin arms, legs: they did not appear to be broken.

  Femur, clavicle, pelvis: not broken.

  Cranium…Not broken.

  Oh, she wanted to think so! Groping with her fingers, running her fingertips over him, the weakly stirring arms and legs, the head pitched forward against her chest. If his skull was fractured, how could she know? She could not know.

  She washed Niley’s face, and her own. The child was groggy, but waking. He had not the strength to cry loudly, for which Rebecca was grateful. Rebecca washed her hands, her arms, her chest that was smeared in blood. Pausing to listen, if Tignor was waking and would come after them.

  But the fury had spent itself, for now.

  She had known for weeks that she would leave him and yet: she had not acted. Now she was desperate, and must act. She could not think where to go that would not be a mistake, a net to capture her and Niley and return them to Tignor.

  Not the Meltzers’. Not the Chautauqua Falls police.

  Never the police! She shared her father’s distrust and dislike of the police. She seemed to know that these men, men so very like Niles Tignor, would sympathize with Tignor, the husband and father. They would not protect her and Niley from him.

  Niley was lying now on the kitchen floor, she’d placed a towel beneath his head. He was all right now, he was breathing almost normally. His face was not so white, some color had returned to his cheeks.

  She would carry him out to the car, she would not take time to change his clothes. She would not even force a jacket on him, only just wrap him in a blanket.

  It seemed to Rebecca then that she had done this: wrapped Niley in a blanket. She had carried him out to the car in the driveway, and placed him gently in the backseat. And there he would sleep.

  She returned to the bedroom where Tignor lay on the bed as she’d left him, snoring. She would not have thought herself courageous enough or reckless enough or desperate enough to return to this room of such devastation, that smelled still of her terror, and yet she had no choice. The way out was through Tignor, she had no choice but to reach into his trouser pocket, to extract his car keys.