RavenShadow

by Win Blevins

  I don’t remember what all I got, except for a Chinese dressing gown (they didn’t call it a “robe”) so gleaming I loved to put it on but nearly refused to be seen in it. Delphine gave me a set of tapes of live performances of old-time blues, completely illegal and absolutely unique. There was an involved story about their origin. This friend’s father recorded them secretly in Chicago clubs over forty years before, the friend inherited them but didn’t much care for blues, etc. I had to promise to treat them like they belonged in the Smithsonian, which they did.

  An embryonic yuppie, before the word existed.

  One of Mike and Poe’s gifts to Delphine was really special. It was a group of a dozen matched frames and mats, and in the frames were … blueprints? Mike and Poe were grinning huge as they arranged them artfully on the dining table. I didn’t get it. Meg and Bess were watching Delphine closely.

  “Oh!” Delphine squeezed out a half-smothered cry. I couldn’t quite read her face—conflicting feelings, looked like, behind the regal eyes.

  “Delphine’s first ambition,” Mike explained for my sake, “I mean, after kissing a frog until it became a handsome prince, was to be a marine architect. These are some of her drawings.”

  “Oh, thank you!” Delphine managed. She put an arm around her dad’s waist, squeezed, and laid her head against his shoulder. She was always far more affectionate with him than with Poe.

  The blueprints showed various views of boats: side, top, bottom, sectioned, like that. They were schematic—diagrams, not art.

  “We think she showed real talent.”

  “I copied them out of textbooks,” Delphine said in a pooh-poohing tone. “I learned to draw them, not engineer them.”

  “Still,” said Mike.

  Delphine reached for one at the end of the display. Then I saw that the first eight or ten showed sailboats, the last three work boats.

  “These are my favorites,” said Delphine, pointing to the last three.

  “When Delphine developed social consciousness,” said Poe in a fastidious tone, “she stopped drawing pleasure craft and started on work boats.”

  “We’re proud of the social consciousness of all our daughters,” said Mike.

  “This is a fishing boat.” Delphine held it so I could see it, then displayed another. “Tug.”

  I reached for the last one. “What’s this?” It was the only one that made no sense to me.

  “The bottom of a ferry,” said Delphine. “The workings.”

  “Delphine was always interested in inner workings,” said Poe.

  There was a dark lining in this comment, but I didn’t know why.

  Mike’s words seemed to boom. I heard his fondness more than the content. “We thought she’d make a boat designer,” he said.

  Delphine looked up at him and held his eyes. Her eyes spoke giving in, or resignation, or some such. “The world needs me to work for change,” she said.

  Mike snapped his fingers and sang the Burt Bacharach tune, [“What the world (beat) needs now (beat) is love (beat) sweet love …”]

  That evening we played charades, a family Christmas tradition. I couldn’t believe these rich people would act so silly, and have so much fun. I got to charade Ichabod Crane, and that was a hoot.

  The other two days felt perfect. Delphine and I slept late and found our own breakfast at nearly noon. In the afternoons we went for long walks on the island’s dirt roads, sat on boulders and looked at the sea. We understood each other completely enough not to need to talk, or so I thought.

  As a family we ate huge, wonderful dinners. One evening we watched the home movies Mike had made over the years, proud papa, and the other we played parcheesi. Each night Delphine and I made love in the bed she’d slept in as a child and teenage virgin. We slept to the sound of the surf, woke in the early light and made love again, and dozed away the mornings. I felt really damn good, in a white-bread sort of way. This was fun, and after a while I would really enjoy it.

  Except that I didn’t. Not for another dozen years, until now, did I begin to see why—the why on my side. Not all of me was there. Hell, there were parts even I had forgotten about. Except you can’t forget, you can only pretend.

  Of course, there was a worm in Delphine’s rose, too.

  I didn’t see it yet.

  How Delphine Was Seeing Things

  I am going to tell this next chapter the way I think Delphine saw things. Yes, I’m taking a liberty, but she told me a world, and finally I got to read her journal and get her private thoughts on things. This is honest. Here we go.

  After dinner on Friday Delphine took a martini in each hand, power drinks, and shepherded Mike into his study. She touched his shoulder in the way that always meant daughter to father. “We haven’t had a chance to talk, Mike.” Strange to do daughter-father—I will never know if you are my father. Yet her mother, her definite biological parent, her mother she never felt close to.

  He nodded and let her steer him. “Just you and me,” she said, closing the door behind them.

  He sat in his favorite chair, an overstuffed affair of Moroccan leather. She used the ottoman. She felt a pang. Should I put myself at the feet of a man I want something from, and my head lower than his? Bad policy. But this was her daddy. And it was odd. She had stopped calling her parents Mommy and Daddy when she was a young teenager, when she first began to figure out the channels power used in the world. She called them Mike and Poe, on principle. She was comfortable calling her mother Poe, always had been, always would be. But this man was singular. Mover and shaker in the Democratic party. Major donor. Privileged to a first-name basis with congressmen, senators, federal judges. She never addressed her father as Mike without quailing a little, without wanting to say in a child’s voice, “Daddy?”

  He was waiting for her to begin. He knew her. His eyes looked sparkly and kind.

  “Mike, I need help.” She heard that her voice was firm, decisive. Good. A beggar can’t afford to sound like he’s begging. “I’ve decided on my course.”

  She watched his brown eyes carefully. They darkened for a moment, then grew very bright. Good. I have managed to surprise the great Michael Ryan, maybe even shock him.

  He took his time before saying gently, “Aren’t you coming into the firm?”

  “No,” said Delphine evenly. “I want the center of the action.” She watched his eyes. Are you thinking, Too conspicuous, not tucked away enough, a potential embarrassment? Are you thinking, a give-away of the family secret? She couldn’t tell. She could never tell. Her mother sometimes had thoughts like that. Sometimes her sisters did. She couldn’t tell about her father, never had. Did he think, You, my darkie daughter? Or You, some other man’s daughter? She’d never known. Long ago she had decided she didn’t care. She had trouble making the decision stick.

  She watched him take in what she’d said and wonder what was next. “What do you want?”

  She pitched in. “I want to make a difference. I want to finish the revolution women and minorities started in the last decade. Congress is the right forum for me.” She was speaking her heart. And it didn’t hurt to let him hear the campaign rhetoric straight from her, let him see that side of his daughter.

  Then she saw swirls behind his eyes. She guessed what he was thinking. Attractive. Well-spoken. Nicely turned out. Smart. Passionate. Knows the political ropes, grew up with them. Skin color and Negroid features … perhaps an advantage these days. Native American husband, an advantage. Home and rearing an advantage. Has made every step right so far, including this one. Yes, she’s right for it, it’s right for her. That’s what she hoped he was thinking.

  “What are you asking for?”

  Now Delphine rose to her opportunity, the invitation to claim the boon she sought. Her father would understand her as he would any bright, young, politically ambitious lawyer. “I want a spot as aide to Anderson.”

  She rehearsed the rest in her mind, ready to lay it out. Maybe four years as a legislative aide to a
liberal representative, working up positions and legislation, making contacts in the party and public to ensure re-election, finally getting to manage a campaign, getting to know every important Democrat in the state. When the congressman stands for the Senate, run for his seat.

  Mike spoke slowly and gently. “I promised Meg I’d speak for her on that.”

  “What?”

  He didn’t repeat the words, just held his sympathetic eyes on her.

  “But Meg wants the federal bench.”

  “She changed her mind. She used almost the same words you did, ‘the center of the action.’ I promised her. The day she got here.”

  Delphine had heard falcons dive at two hundred miles an hour. Her heart dived faster than that.

  “I can speak to DeLacey for you.”

  Andy DeLacey, Representative from Spokane, a good fellow and friend of her father, but strictly middle-of-the-road, not an agent of social change.

  Heart plummeting, mind reeling, Delphine considered this offer. She didn’t want to work for a middle-of-the-roader, she wanted to work on the edge of change. Besides, it wouldn’t work at all. Two young Ryan daughters laying the groundwork to run for Congress, two Ryans standing for election, even two Ryans in the House. No way. Sisters competing—ridiculous. All because she spoke up a few days sooner.

  Now she could raise her eyes, but not her heart. Mike had that look of vast kindness pasted on his face. But you know it wouldn’t work. Your offer is phony. It’s a sop.

  Mike Ryan rose. It was hard to say if he took in the meaning of her look, but he was ending the interview. “I’ll talk to Andy. When I’m back in the office.”

  All because Meg spoke up a little sooner.

  Delphine took a deep breath and let it out. She preceded her father to the door. So I will have to call you before January 1, say I’ve considered your kind offer, but I pass. Ohshit ohshit ohshit.

  He touched her shoulder and she turned to him. He took both her hands in his big ones. It felt like a nuzzle. She wondered if Meg got a hug.

  “I’m proud of you, Delphine. Proud of all three of my daughters.”

  He opened the study door and they headed for the family room.

  Everyone was reading, each in his own world. Meg and Beth had decided to spend the vacation rereading Tolkien in tandem. Delphine looked at Meg with what she knew was hatred. Suddenly, as though drawn by a force, Meg looked up from her book. Their eyes met, and knowledge passed back and forth.

  “Parcheesi!” cried Poe. The board was already set up on the table. Poe and Bess dived straight for it.

  Said Meg, “You know why games are fun in this family?”

  Said Delphine, “Yeah, everyone brings the spirit of a junkyard dog.”

  Blue rambled toward the table, grinning at Delphine. You never realize how magnificent you look, thought Delphine.

  Poe said, “Six for parcheesi. Well, let the couples play as one.”

  Delphine pushed up chairs for her and Blue. Career crushed. What the hell will I do?

  Meg and Beth started arguing over who got the green piece.

  I could move to California and start fresh. Unconnected. Some start.

  She scooted her chair close to Blue’s and looked into his eyes and tried to find some comfort there. He was smiling at her. He didn’t know.

  When will they announce Meg’s new job? wondered Delphine. Probably when it’s fait accompli. And what am I, who am I? The hanged man.

  Gulls

  Saturday afternoon, our last full day on the island, we took a long walk along the shore. Clambered over boulders, watched the surf pound the rocks and spray high into the air. It has an effect on me, landscape. It feels like walking in a different sort of time. The watery sea and the waves of sagebrush hills, the murmur of surf and the lift of bluffs, they all take me to awareness of the long, long pull, they make me feel Earth’s rhythm, time after time after time.

  Delphine spoke looking out to sea. “I had my talk with Dad.” I’d noticed how she came out of the study with her father looking serious, but I didn’t ask. With Delphine, you waited until she wanted to tell you.

  She ran the whole thing down for me, how she asked for a spot with Representative Anderson, how her ambition might be fulfilled. She gave words to her idealism and her ambition. She told the whole story right up to the climax. She looked up at me and whispered, “He turned me down. Not in so many words, but he turned me down.”

  I walked on for a few numb steps. Before I could speak, she went on.

  “He gave it to my sister. Meg.” Then she recounted the story of the offer of DeLacey, and explained why that wouldn’t work.

  It sounded rough. I knew Delphine had been angling toward this a long time, probably since she was old enough to think about politics. The way you sound, it’s worse than rough. Your Raven …

  We walked some more. I put my arm around her, but on the uneven ground it felt like her body was jostling against mine. I looked at her. You’re in your own world. Your grief. Me out, everyone out.

  I dropped my arm and walked along … feeling vague, the way I was spending a lot of my life feeling. So you wanted us to move to Washington, D.C., and you weren’t going to say anything until it was arranged. I looked sideways at her. Her head was hanging, her eyes cast down. I wonder if you were going to have Mike pull strings at NPR, get me a job, something for the hubby to do.

  I fell a step behind her. I wonder if I would have objected. Or just gone along. I stumbled but caught myself. Just gone along, I think.

  STOP IT!

  Sometimes I need to just stop my head. Otherwise it spins like a motor not connected to transmission, wheels, and ground. When I need to do that, I look around at the hills and the sky, which were here before us and will be here after. Today I had the sea to add in. I looked first at the sweep of sea and sky, the vastness, and then at the point where they met, and there was a kind of glow, and you couldn’t see which was which. I listened to the surf muttering and then booming. After a while of this I stopped and turned my eyes to Delphine.

  She looked stricken. Her cheeks glistened with tears.

  What am I going to do-o-o-o?

  I heard it sharp as anything, but her lips did not move—Delphine didn’t say it. Her soul said it, her spirit wailed it.

  And I heard it.

  I reached for her, but she pulled back and turned away. After a moment she started walking again. I followed.

  Before long we saw a crowd of gulls fussing over something. We looked at each other, and saw the same pull in the other’s eyes, something strange and something we had in common. Delphine ran up to the edge and looked down into the clump of rocks first.

  “Sand shark,” she said. I couldn’t identify sea creatures without a menu. Whatever it was once, now it was just a bunch of frazzled flesh, bones, and innards. Soon just bones.

  We watched. They pecked and fluttered and pecked, the way carrion eaters do. And I blinked.

  Suddenly, as in a click, the scene reversed colors like a photo negative. The white gulls were black. Black-black.

  I blinked a couple more times. Still black.

  I reeled. I felt like I might fall down there, among the dead flesh and the feeding … ravens.

  The doe. That day before Christmas. I saw it again like eleven years ago. As in a dream or a vision, the ravens fluttered around the deer carcass. Only now it was like they were dancing. They flew slowly, ceremoniously in circles. Right on the beat some of them landed, on the beat they launched once more. They flapped their wings like wizards’ cloaks. They flew slowly in circles, like a constellation of black stars rounding a dead sun. They wheeled about by a prearranged and divine or satanic plan. From time to time the dark shapes coalesced into symbols, arcane representations of … I didn’t know what.

  Their leader came forth toward me, beak gaping, wings spread wide, claws down and open, grasping. In a formal way he approached, this ambassador of darkness. I wondered, What is your message? In front of
my eyes, he puffed himself up, wings spread. He squawked in my face, he yawped. He cocked his head and leered at me. Then, suddenly, he hurled himself straight into my eyes.

  “No!” I shouted. I fell down, covered my eyes with my hands. “No!”

  Time passed.

  I felt Delphine’s hands touch my face gently, her fingers loosen my hands from my eyes.

  Where was I? How long was I there? Raven went through me, or into me. I am not hurt. Yet.

  She held me and murmured comforting sounds. You’re back.

  I let my head clear. Arms, not wings. Delphine, not Raven.

  I cast my eyes around. I could see again. I stood up rockily. Getting back my balance, I stepped to the edge of the rock and looked down queasily. There were the gulls, white, strutting, content. They peered back at me. They were white, they had never been black.

  Mind, were you playing tricks on me? Or were you telling me the truth? Not the facts, but the truth?

  I stood, shakily.

  “Blue?” She put an arm around my waist.

  “I’m okay,” says I.

  She squeezed me. “We don’t need to look at that.”

  She pulled. I resisted for a moment, taking in the white gulls. Then we walked on. I shook my head. I was feeling clear. I turned to Delphine, put my arms around her, snuggled her close. You’re back.

  She kept her head down, against my coat. When she leaned away, I got a good look at her face, and I saw something.

  “Did you see the ravens too?”

  She cocked her head to the side, birdlike, and gave me a peculiar look.

  I persisted. “Did the gulls look black to you for a moment?”

  “Oh, Blue,” she said, “we’re just alike.”

  “Sometimes I live in the shadow of the Raven’s wing,” I said. “Do you?”

  “That,” said Delphine, “is our soul connection.”

  Sunday was ferry day for Delphine and me—ferry, rental car, and airplane for Meg and Bess, all the way to D.C. and Los Angeles. Mike and Poe were staying on the island a few extra days. I had the impression it was a romantic time for them, but maybe that was wishful thinking.