Quartet for the End of Time

by Johanna Skibsrud

  Come on, now, son, he said. Before the ticket collectors come.

  Douglas knew what that meant. He woke up all the way, and sure enough, then, knew where he was. He gathered his blanket and reached for his shoes. His feet were swollen, though, and so sore that he had trouble, only managing to get the left shoe on before he was forced to hop from the train.

  There was a heavy fog, and the dew was very wet on the grass as if it had rained, but still Douglas could see where the sun had begun to burn its way through the heavy cloud cover, lighting the far edges of the landscape. All that blankness, interrupted only by the rubble of the train yard. Metal spikes and rusted barrels littered the grounds everywhere Douglas looked. Half of a disassembled train car—in which, as Douglas approached, it soon became apparent one or more persons had taken up residence—rose at an oblique angle. A line of laundry had been slung in a homely fashion from its tipped-up end to an adjacent post. It was difficult to imagine how anyone could have slept in it any other way than standing up. A dog tied to a post outside looked up at Douglas as he passed, and then away. He looked lonely and bored, like he hadn’t seen anyone who mattered to him in a long time.

  So this—Douglas thought—is Kansas City? This, too, was difficult to imagine. It seemed that instead of getting nearer to anything, they had, in fact, only gotten much farther away. That, indeed, they had arrived at the very ends of the earth, and in another moment, if they took a few steps in any of the directions that now lay open to them, they would find the earth itself preparing to give way, dropping off at the same startling angle with which the abandoned train car dropped from its axle to the bare ground below. But Douglas did not have long to contemplate this possibility, or its consequences. His father was moving quickly— once more, Douglas had to double-step to keep up. And the earth did not give way. It remained so solid beneath them that he winced as his damaged feet hit it with every step.

  Finally, they came to a road with a long row of low houses strung along it. Douglas’s heart lifted at the sight. An illegible sign swung limply on the door of one of them, which Jim now entered. The Mexican—then Chet and his father—followed. Douglas, the last to enter, closed the door behind him so that the sign banged against it, startling him.

  Inside, a low light burned, only partially illuminating the back wall and leaving the rest of the place as full of shadows as the early morning had been. By that time, though at most only half an hour had passed, the sun had managed to burn its way through nearly all of the fog and had risen perpendicular to the low clouds. Next to that sudden, persuasive brightness, they were revealed to be no more than thin phantoms. Soon the inside of the tavern began to appear in just this way. Objects emerged against the dark background that had, until then, absorbed them. There were six stools at the bar. And a heavyset barman—studying them curiously from beneath a low brow.

  Both Douglas’s father and Chet chose one of the stools at the bar, then Jim sat next to Chet and the Mexican next to Jim. Douglas did not sit, but only stood in the space between the seat where his father sat and the next, until his father turned and indicated that he should sit down, too. Soon they all had a plate of potatoes in front of them, and then whiskey appeared, and every man hollered and raised his glass above his head before he drank, and then the barman laid down another, and said it was on the house.

  Don’t take much to guess where you’re headed, he said. I hope you get your bonus.

  Glasses were raised once more and drained, and Douglas ate solemnly all the while and felt the warmth and the weight of the food settle slowly within him. But before long his father turned and said, Now we’ll have to be looking into a decent pair of shoes for the boy. His stomach felt cold again all of a sudden when he heard that, though he didn’t know why. His father had turned back to the barman and now he consulted him about the various establishments in town and what the likelihood of their being open for business was, and the barman shook his head and said that there wasn’t any likelihood at all, it being a Sunday, and then his father said he would see what he could do. It being the Lord’s day, he said, after all, maybe something will work out all right. He got up, but told Douglas to stay where he was, and Douglas nodded, grateful to be allowed to stay in the bar. Then his father went out, and Chet with him, and that left just Douglas with Jim and the Mexican. The barman placed a tall glass of white milk in front of Douglas. At first he didn’t know if he was intended to take it—or, if he was intended to take it, if he was intended to pay. He didn’t have any money. On account of this, Douglas just looked at the milk where it had been placed before him, until finally the barman laughed and said, Don’t just gape at it, son! And then he was sure he was intended to drink it and he wouldn’t be expected to pay, and so he did, and it was very white and cold.

  It seemed a long time to wait before his father and Chet returned. But then they did and Chet slammed down a note on the table, and his father said to Douglas, Come on, now, we’ve got some distance to cover yet. The barman raised one heavy brow like whatever it was that Chet had put before him was a great deal more or a great deal less than what he’d expected. Chet stood still, his feet spread and his head back, so that his Adam’s apple cocked itself like a gun in his throat, and with how tall he was, despite his thinness, he cut an impressive figure. Jim and the Mexican stared dimly from their corner of the bar. It was hard to make out their expressions. Jim started to speak, but before he could get a word out, Douglas’s father cut him off, saying, We’ll be seeing you boys. Then he was out the door, following Chet, and neither one looked behind to see that Douglas had followed, but he did. And so, once again, they were out on the street, with the sun high in the sky now, and only a few scattered clouds—so thin it appeared that a man might, with a single breath, have blown them away.

  IT WAS THEIR LUCK THAT, by the time they arrived back at the rail yard, a freight train was already loaded, ready to depart. They scrambled into the first empty car they found, and only then did they turn and look behind them. There was nothing there to see but spools of rusted wire, discarded engine parts, and, of course, the abandoned train car, propped at its incongruous angle, still pointing to the sky.

  Chet let out a long breath, as though it were the first time he’d breathed all day, then he stretched himself out to his full height in the far corner of the car. Douglas’s father remained sitting upright. He didn’t say anything—or even seem to breathe. In one hand, he clutched his rucksack so firmly Douglas noticed his knuckles were white. It was not until the train had picked up speed, until the wind began to blow in through the half-open door—joining them like a fourth, especially lonesome, traveler—that Douglas’s father finally relaxed his grip and laid his bag down beside him. But even with the wind and the speed of the train, and his father’s evident, correspondent relief, Douglas continued to clutch his own bag as tightly as his father had clutched his, without knowing why. And when his father dug from his bag two brand-new leather boots and extended them proudly toward Douglas, Douglas took them hesitatingly slow. He pinched them together, the way his father had done, and held them out, away from his body, like they were an animal he’d killed.

  Well? Douglas’s father said, after the boots had dangled in this way between them for some time. Douglas said nothing. Finally, though, very slowly, he lowered the boots to the floor and began to ease them onto his throbbing feet. First one, and then the other. Where the leather touched his raw right heel on its way down the shaft of the boot, he winced in pain, but as the boots were two or three full sizes too big for him, once inside he had plenty of room for his feet, even with how swollen they were, and sore. He tied up the stiff laces of the boots, which had never once yet been tied, and then he leaned back to admire them, and his father and Chet peered around to get a good look at them, too.

  Damn if those ain’t a pair of boots, Chet said. Then he whistled— one long, low note—and when finally all his breath had been pressed out through his teeth and he had no more left, he inhaled deeply a
nd began to laugh. Then Douglas’s father joined in. The two men laughed and laughed as though their sides would split and there never had been, or would be, anything funnier to them in all the world.

  BY THE TIME THEY arrived in St. Louis they were hungry again. They found a place near the station that served food. When they were asked to pay up front, Douglas’s father was almost too happy to comply. He counted out his coins slowly, taking physical pleasure in the task. Shortly after that, the food arrived. There were plates of cold meats and potatoes. There were corn fritters and fried onions. All of it vanished as quickly as it appeared, and still their hunger did not subside. So they ordered more, and ate that, too. The place had begun to fill up by then. It was getting toward dusk. After a while, two men—who must have been twins, they were both so tall, with identical round faces and round red beards—came and sat down at their table in the corner of the darkening room.

  Washington? the man nearest Chet asked. I’ve half a mind to go myself.

  The other man snorted through his nose. And half a mind not to, he said.

  It went on like that for most of the evening. Whenever one of the men said one thing, the other said the opposite. Everyone was drinking now, including Douglas’s father and Chet, but no one could keep pace with the twins. The more they drank, the more urgent the opinions of each man became, and the more and more opposed. Soon a crowd began to gather, and everyone was shouting either their unconditional support in favor of the veterans and the Bonus Bill, or their uncompromising disapproval. No one seemed to fall in between. Douglas was literally caught in the middle, with one twin on his left and the other on his right, so it was some time before he noticed the growing commotion at the center of the room. Soon, though, the crowd fell away and the cause could be plainly seen: two men, one just scrambling to his feet, the other still reeling from the recent impact of a blow. Douglas’s father stood up on his bench to get a better look, then the twin men stood up on either side of Douglas, so that Douglas had to stand up, too, in order to see anything. He saw the downed man stagger, then watched as they both began to pace like caged animals, moving first one way and then the other, their heavy fists poised. The downed man was faultier on his feet than the man who had dealt the first blow. He looked like he’d sooner duck and cover than make an advance, and when he did it was with a strange sort of flailing motion, like a wounded bird. To make matters worse, each time his arms descended—uselessly—to his sides, the poised arm of the steady man would shoot out as though it had been mechanically sprung, and it could not be stilled again until it had exhausted all possibilities of movement and direction. Again and again the steady man’s arm shot out—each time with a force that seemed wholly new.

  When his opponent fell again he made no attempt to rise, but still the blows continued to fall until, at last, the crowd—which had been lulled into a hushed silence by the steady man’s insistent advance— suddenly roused itself.

  Get that man off him! they shouted. Get him up, get him off!

  A group of four or five men descended upon the combatant then, but even their combined strength could not hold him at first. Indeed, rather than diminishing the fist, and the power it still contained, their five sets of hands only served to draw attention to it, so that even when at last it was stilled, it was that fist that still held every man’s attention in the room. More even than the man himself, whom only now it had become possible to take in as a whole. He was—Douglas realized, in apprehension and awe—a full-blooded Indian. The biggest Indian—or, for that matter, man of any breed or variety—he had ever seen. By the time Douglas realized this, however, the Indian had already shaken off the hands that held him—as though he might easily have done so all along— and made his way alone to the door.

  NO ONE FOLLOWED. The door slammed shut and the crowd rushed to fill the empty space in the middle of the room, obscuring the injured man from view. A general confusion erupted. Everyone shouted and pushed against one another, barking out questions and orders. The twin men had leapt from their seats and were now pressing toward the center of the room. Once in a while Douglas caught a glimpse of one or the other of them. Clear out! Clear OUT! came the call. But Chet and Douglas’s father remained where they were. They didn’t move, and no one else did, either. Then, when the body of the downed man was raised and carried aloft, like a prizefighter, from the room, a hush descended over the crowd. He looked, as he was carried away, anything but a champion. His head slung heavily to the side like the neck of a bird that had been broken. His shirt and face were drenched in blood.

  Now everyone emptied out into the street, following the downed man.

  Murder! someone yelled. The word rippled through the crowd, and with it, something new and terrible trembled on every man’s tongue.

  Even Douglas—who could not bring himself to speak the word aloud—felt it. Stirring in his heart as though it had always lain there.

  But then another word was pronounced, disrupting the progress of the first.

  Po-lice!

  Instantly the crowd broke, splitting into countless, conflicting directions. Douglas ran too. As if by instinct. Not looking up to see in what direction his father or Chet had gone. It was only, therefore, by what seemed a great coincidence that, after some moments had passed, he looked up and saw them both, only a little ahead.

  They ran together then, for something close to a mile—turning from the paved road onto an uneven gravel track, and then again, down a sloped grass path and into a large and open field. Only then, panting for breath, and careful, for some reason, not to look one another in the eye, did they stop.

  They were alone. Douglas looked back toward the road, but he could not really even see it now. Perhaps they had left it behind them much longer ago than he’d thought.

  Then he felt something—almost like the sensation that had stirred in his heart just moments before when the word—murder—had hesitated, unspoken, on his tongue. Only different this time. A terrific, electric sensation, which shot down the length of each of his arms and—without making contact with anything there—coursed through them again before settling in upon, and scorching, his heart. He was—he realized only now—too late—empty-handed. His bag, with his father’s name embroidered in red letters on its side, had been left behind—wedged beneath a table in the corner of a bar in which a man had been murdered, and which they themselves had recently fled.

  —

  LYING BETWEEN THE FEET OF HIS FATHER AND CHET THAT NIGHT, wrapped in the thick sweaters they had dug from their own packs to cover him, Douglas felt heavy and warm. Still, he was very far from sleep. That was all right, though—he didn’t wish to sleep. He concentrated on the known shapes of his father and Chet beside him, so that he would not. He was just barely able to make them out—two dark outlines against that further darkness beyond.

  Only a few minutes must have passed, though it felt like much longer, before one of the shapes sat bolt upright, then lit a cigarette.

  It was Chet.

  Goddamn, he said. It’s dark as hell in these woods.

  It did not occur to Douglas until that moment that Chet might also be afraid.

  A short time later Douglas’s father sat up, too.

  Dark as hell, he agreed. But not the darkest wood I’ve seen—not even close. And then, as on so many occasions before, he began to speak of the darkness of Belleau Wood. But there was something different in his voice this time. The Holy Ghost, if he was present at all, was as still and unseen behind it as the darkness itself.

  The woods—Douglas’s father began—were choked with such a darkness that night it was impossible to tell where one thing ended and the other began. There was the darkness of the wood itself, of course, but there was something else, too. Some other darkness, which had no adversary, so that you might just as soon pause to rest slumped against the stump of a man’s leg as against the stump of a tree. It was something … other, he said. Something at last—finally—removed from the earth, and therefore
from men. So that it didn’t even have anything to do, any longer, with war—it was just … darkness. A wasteland of downed trees, their leaves gone—as if they had never existed at all. Even the earth, blasted by shell craters and shallow, hastily dug trenches, had begun to give way. Suddenly, and without warning: a leg would be plunged knee-deep into a dugout, or a bloated corpse, or a simple absence of ground. And all around—everywhere—as if someone had taken the known world and shaken it upside down, there were helmets and guns strewn on the ground. Blankets, half buried in mud. Boots, Mauser rifles, Springfields. Letters, unopened; fragments of letters. Unexploded grenades.

  No—it wasn’t war, Douglas’s father said. It was something else. In each moment, newly defined. In each moment, abandoning every possible definition. It wasn’t, that is, any thing. It was only … a crushed nose, a gouged-out eye. You might even find yourself confronted by a corpse, and think it was your own grave you had stumbled into. It would not be, then, without some pleasure that you might observe your own body—that you might marvel, from that distance, at the neatness of your wounds. At how even the most violent ruptures of the flesh and especially the bone revealed beneath them a finite, observable system— like the busted-up insides of a clock or a car. Even without understanding the particular function of any one individual part, or being able to imagine that it had ever been, or would be again, a working, functional whole—there was, you found, a limit to the mystery that each part, in itself, contained. You could confront yourself like that out there, Douglas’s father said. In all of your simplicity. Naked of mystery. You could stare, like that, into the face of your own death, and find in it something so familiar and strange, and with a pull so deep, it was a wonder it was possible to look away from it again. That you could, in fact, be startled from it so easily—by something as simple and inconsequent as a shell, fired at close range.