The Inverted Forest

by John Dalton

  “Take the test,” she said. “It’s something you need to know about yourself.”

  He gave her an exasperated look and turned away. This, she knew, was his last gesture of protest before he consented.

  “I wish you’d told me about the test before now,” he said. “I might have practiced a few things. If I’d known this was coming.”

  A few minutes after ten the iron knocker at the front door sounded. Harriet ushered Professor Mitchell into the front hallway. She was a thin, energetic woman in her mid-fifties. A large carry bag was slung across her shoulder. “What a wonderful house, Harriet,” she said. “Thank you for inviting me over.” Behind these gracious remarks there was an efficient appraisal being made. She looked ready to get on with the task at hand.

  To her credit Professor Mitchell didn’t pause for a second when taken to the kitchen and introduced to Wyatt. She wished him a good morning and shook his hand before taking her place at the table. From her carry bag she began extracting the components of her test: laminated picture cards, puzzle pieces, colored blocks, pencils, and sheets of paper with half-completed drawings.

  “I don’t know your reasons for wanting this test,” Professor Mitchell said. “But I can tell you this. An IQ test is useful for a few things. Mostly to help students with disabilities get the help they need. For almost everything else it’s no use at all. No real predictor of what a person is able to achieve. I hope you’ll keep that in mind, Wyatt. Are you ready to begin?”

  He gripped the seat of his chair with both hands and nodded woefully.

  For the duration of the test, an hour and ten minutes, Harriet waited in the living room. She had a vague notion that she might accomplish a few minor chores while she waited. The chairs and sofa might be vigorously cleaned. Or the magazine rack set to order. She made several false starts at these chores, but in the end she kept easing back into her reading chair and eavesdropping on Professor Mitchell’s instructions. Can you use the blocks and make this design here? And later . . . Can you think of another object that might be made from this line, Wyatt? Good, yes, that works. Can you think of another? All right. And another? All right. How about one more? That’s all right then. Let’s move on to the next picture.

  Eventually there was ten long minutes of silence, and then Professor Mitchell called out, “Harriet, would you come in now, please?”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Wyatt,” Professor Mitchell said. “If it’s all right with you, I’d like to go ahead and discuss the results of the test.”

  He tried to wet his lips and shape a few simple words: Yes. All right. No use. All he could do, in the end, was nod in consent.

  In some private chamber of his mind he heard the word mercy spoken aloud. Mercy, intoned with great reverence and clarity. He lowered his face to the table as if he’d been instructed to say grace. From the corner of his eye he could see Harriet wavering in the entranceway. She took a few hurried steps across the kitchen floor and stood behind the chair he was sitting in. Both of her hands settled onto his shoulders. After a few moments he felt her lean down and embrace him from behind.

  “Are we ready?” Professor Mitchell said.

  “We’re ready,” Harriet said on his behalf.

  “All right then,” Professor Mitchell said. “I hope you won’t be disappointed to know, Wyatt, that according to the test we just performed, a test that is useful in some ways and not very useful in many others, you have an IQ that lands squarely in the medium range. We have a term for this. We say a medium-range IQ. The number earned from today’s test is ninety-seven. If we tested you again next week, it might be a few points lower or a few points higher. That’s why it’s fairer and more accurate to refer to the range of the IQ rather than the specific score.”

  He could feel Harriet’s arms clasped across his chest, squeezing him mightily. She said, “Medium range is another way of saying average, Wyatt. An average IQ.”

  He gave a slow, stunned nod. “What would it be . . . ,” he said and faltered. “What would the score be for someone who’s . . . retarded?”

  “There are different ranges for that,” Professor Mitchell said. “The mild retardation range is anywhere from fifty to sixty-nine. The range for moderate and severe retardation would be lower than that.”

  “I’ve heard,” he said. “Some people have told me that if you have a score that’s lower than a hundred, then it means you’re retarded.”

  Professor Mitchell fixed him with a steady and patient stare. “Those people would be mistaken.”

  He tried to rise from his seat, thought better of it, and sat back down. “Thank you,” he said. “Thank you, Professor Mitchell.”

  “You’re very welcome, Wyatt,” she said. She slung her bag across her shoulder and made ready to leave. “I hope you’re not upset by these results.”

  Harriet and Wyatt both answered her. “No, no,” they said.

  “It’s just that you look, both of you, like you’re in a state of shock.”

  A kind of shock, maybe. In the minutes after Professor Mitchell’s departure, he was too startled to linger inside Harriet Foster’s handsome redbrick home. He crossed through the living room and stepped out the front door onto the sidewalk. When he turned, he found Harriet at his side.

  “A walk?” he asked. It seemed to Wyatt that he’d been promised a last walk around the neighborhood.

  A bright and expansive midday was unfolding itself across the lanes and small front yards. They walked along at a brisk pace. Around them they could hear the side doors of minivans sliding shut, the squeaks of swing sets rising up from beyond backyard fences. Block after block they went, past the grocers and apartment buildings and school playgrounds. How strange that he couldn’t quite gauge the distance they’d traveled or the length of time they’d been out walking. When they passed a bank clock, they saw it was already half past noon.

  They had no choice but to turn around and hurry back along the same lanes and tree-shaded sidewalks. Strolling beside him, Harriet asked, “Are you happy, Wyatt? Are you pleased to know?”

  “Yes. I’m glad to know.”

  “It’s one thing—one large important thing—that you don’t have to spend time wondering about anymore. So it’s a relief, isn’t it?”

  “It is,” he said. “I have an average-range IQ.”

  “Yes, you do, Wyatt. It’s a proven fact.”

  As soon as they returned to the house, he climbed the stairs to the guest room and packed his belongings into the rollaway suitcase. He made his bed according to Harriet’s strict standards. Then he carried the suitcase down the stairs and into the kitchen, where he sat for a hurried lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup.

  The kitchen wall clock read a quarter past one. Harriet caught him glancing at it.

  She said, “We’ll need to go in a few minutes, Wyatt. Get yourself ready for that.” She reached across the table and took his hand. “Are you ready?”

  “Yes.”

  He turned to the kitchen window. Outside, in the fenced backyard, the branches of Harriet’s prized elm trees were being lifted by a languid summer breeze.

  “What are you thinking about, Wyatt?” she asked. “What are you thinking about with that average-range IQ of yours?”

  What could he say? He’d never been able to translate his most private thoughts into spoken words. It was a trait he’d shared with the state hospital campers of Kindermann Forest. But in other ways he was different. He was not of their tribe. He’d like to believe that in the deepest and wisest part of himself he’d known this all along.

  “You have a beautiful house, Harriet.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I’m lucky to be here,” he said.

  Acknowledgments

  My sincere thanks to the University of Missouri, St. Louis, for a 2007–08 Research Board Award that allowed me to focus solely on The Inverted Forest. I’m also grateful for two fellowships at The MacDowell Colony. Debbie Logan, Patrick Harned, Jo
e Betz, and Jean Dalton Young contributed to the research. Davie MacTaggart should have been thanked for the last book. Rebecca Pastor and Zachary Lazar were essential first readers for The Inverted Forest. Jen Jen Chang, also a first reader, is my essential partner.

  Thanks to Mary Troy and to the exceptional students in our University of Missouri–St. Louis, MFA program.

  I’m hugely fortunate to have Lisa Bankoff at ICM and Colin Harrison at Scribner on my side.

  Last, my love and thanks to Anna Dalton and Aimee Dalton, beyond measure, beyond words. The next book will be for you.

  A SCRIBNER READING GROUP GUIDE

  The Inverted Forest

  INTRODUCTION

  The Inverted Forest begins in the summer of 1996 at the Kindermann Forest Summer Camp in rural Missouri. The elderly camp director finds his counselors swimming naked two days before camp is set to open and fires all of them. A whole new staff must be hired. One of them is Wyatt Huddy, a genetically disfigured young man who has been living in a Salvation Army facility. Wyatt is diligent and reliable, gentle and large. All of his life he’s been misjudged because of his appearance. As a result, he harbors a deep uncertainty that he might not be as intelligent as other young men and women his age.

  Wyatt arrives at Kindermann Forest with a dozen other newly hired counselors. They are bewildered to learn that for the first two weeks of the camping season they will be responsible for 104 severely developmentally disabled adults, all of them wards of the state. In this world away from the world, the new counselors and the state hospital campers begin to reveal themselves. Fortunately, Wyatt has an unexpected ally in the camp nurse, Harriet Foster. But there are other people at camp with stranger and more dangerous inclinations. Events reach a terrifying pitch when Harriet begs Wyatt to protect a young camper from a sexual assault. From that moment forward, Wyatt and Harriet will be bound by a tragedy that unfolds across the next fifteen years.

  TOPICS & QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  1. Why does Schuller Kindermann respond so coldly to his counselors when he discovers them celebrating naked at the pool after curfew? What does his reaction tell you about Kindermann’s character and attitude toward sexuality?

  2. At the beginning of the story, Wyatt Huddy is at a crossroad: “It was as if the summer months ahead were being divided into two distinct regions: the land of staying put and being exactly who everyone knew him to be. Or the land of going away and presenting a version of himself that the children and counselors at camp might find agreeable.” What does this line of thinking show you about Wyatt’s personality and self-esteem?

  3. Harriet Foster, the only African-American employee at the Kindermann camp, was not fired with the other staff members caught celebrating at the pool: “She was a mother, after all. She was five years older than most of the counselors. She was black. They were white and, by and large, considerate, even welcoming, people. Yet they thought of her as having lived a reckless, even desperate, urban life.” How much does Harriet’s race affect how she is treated at Kindermann Forest Summer Camp? The novel never makes it explicitly clear why she wasn’t fired. Was it because of her race? Because of Mr. Kindermann’s fondness for her son, James? Or because the position of a nurse at camp is the most essential and hardest to fill?

  4. When the counselors of Kindermann Forest Summer Camp discover sexual relations going on between the male campers at night, they impose some harsh and ridiculous punishments. What is your reaction to how the counselors deal with this awkward situation? Is it just? Or is there a hint of cruelty in this punishment? Clearly, some of the campers have had sexual relations with one another back in their state institutions. Should they be allowed to continue these relations at camp?

  5. In Chapter 7, Schuller Kindermann speaks about the nature of disabled people: “Do the retarded want to vote and marry and have children? Do they want to sleep with one another? Some would say that they do want these things. Why? Because it is what we are supposed to want. We are all human, you and I and the retarded. Therefore we must all want the same things. . . . But if you can find a retarded person who hasn’t been influenced by these expectations, they will always be ambivalent about such matters. They don’t care either way. They don’t particularly share our wishes and desires. Our appetites.” What prompted this speech? Do you think Schuller is qualified to make such statements?

  6. There are moments when each character reveals a range of personal phobias and concerns, particularly Schuller Kindermann’s aversion to sexuality: “Since boyhood he’d been willing to look inward and weigh carefully his private inclinations. Long ago he’d understood something singular and important: whatever it was that made people miserable or frantic or deliriously happy with longing, whatever strong compulsion made them lie down with strangers or writhe alone in their beds, whatever this was, it was not present in himself.” What do you make of this? Literature is full of characters that make painful and absurd mistakes because of the strong pull of desire. But Schuller Kindermann has no interest in sex or romance. What are the hazards of living life without desire?

  7. Christopher Waterhouse first appears in the novel as a seemingly model camp counselor, even as Linda Rucker begins to question his integrity and intentions. At what point did you begin to share her doubts about Christopher? At what point were you certain that Christopher Waterhouse was, as Linda suggested, “a very selfish and destructive person. The very worst kind to have working at camp.”

  8. The emotional and physical abuse inflicted on Wyatt Huddy by his sister, Caroline, is revealed through a flashback. It also explains his relationship with Captain Throckmorton and how Wyatt came to work at the Salvation Army. What do these insights reveal about Wyatt’s demeanor, growth, and essential self-worth?

  9. Linda Rucker doesn’t have the physical appearance people expect in a camp program director. She may not be traditionally ladylike or beautiful. But she’s unquestionably a highly competent, perceptive, and compassionate employee. How does her outward appearance work against her when it comes to earning the loyalty of the new counselors? How does Christopher Waterhouse use her appearance against her?

  10. Was the firing of Linda Rucker fair? How much, if any, of the gossip about Christopher and Linda do you believe to be true? Do you sympathize with Schuller Kindermann’s decision to terminate Linda Rucker after eighteen years of employment?

  11. “A strange place, summer camp. It was a small enough world that the shape of your private life could be widely known or guessed at. And still everyone managed to cling to their unwise behavior, their private intensions. The counselors. The campers.” After learning about the ensemble of counselors who come to work at Kindermann Forest, what are some of their motives for joining the camp staff? What are some of their “unwise behaviors”?

  12. Did Christopher Waterhouse deserve to be killed for his actions? How do you feel about Wyatt Huddy after the horrifying events on County Road H? Is murder by the hands of Wyatt Huddy justified?

  13. The Inverted Forest leaps forward fifteen years and chronicles, among other things, Marcy Bittman Lammers’s complicated reaction to Christopher Waterhouse’s death. What do you make of Marcy’s warm regard for Christopher and her hard-fought campaign to honor him with some type of memorial? What’s the source of her loyalty to Christopher?

  14. Are you satisfied with the way Wyatt and Harriet’s friendship deepens over time? Is Harriet right in assuming that Wyatt needs to take an IQ test? How will the results of this test benefit him in the future?

  ENHANCE YOUR BOOK CLUB

  1. Apert syndrome, the genetic affliction Wyatt Huddy was born with, affects 1 out of every 200,000 live births each year in the world. It is important to acknowledge that the brain is not affected by this syndrome, and most people with Apert syndrome live healthy and fulfilling lives. Do some research on this genetic disorder to understand Wyatt Huddy’s struggle. Discuss your findings with your book club.

  2. Another great character in literature suffering
from a disability is the immortal Benjamin “Benjy” Compson from William Faulkner’s masterpiece, The Sound and the Fury. Compare the struggles and triumphs of both Benjy and Wyatt as they make their way in a world embracing their disabilities, facing a cruel world that ostracizes them because of forces beyond their control.

  3. Most new fiction writers spend a long time struggling to produce and publish their first novel. Visit the author’s website at htt://www.daltonnovel.com/author.html and read John Dalton’s essay titled “Done Yet? Struggling with the Novel” about the long effort writing his first novel, Heaven Lake.

  © THUMAWADEE SARUBUT

  JOHN DALTON is the author of the novel Heaven Lake and the winner of the Barnes & Noble 2004 Discover Award in fiction and the Sue Kaufman Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and is currently a member of the English faculty at the University of Missouri–St. Louis, where he teaches in their MFA writing program. Dalton lives with his wife and two daughters in St. Louis.

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  COVER DESIGN BY REX BONOMELLI • COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY PAUL MADDEN

  Also by John Dalton

  Heaven Lake: A Novel

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