Collected Stories of Reynolds Price

by Reynolds Price

  “Dalton Burke” in a high soft voice but keen as a sunbeam.

  I stopped cold and tried to guess was it human. I’d had more than one communication from the unseen world, years before I was ten; so I had some grounds for judging the matter. But in five more seconds, I couldn’t decide.

  “Dal? Answer me.” I’d also been asked to answer before by unseen voices that never spoke the question. But something made me guess it was a woman, even a girl—where the hell was she? (I’d started to cuss). I turned every way. Just thicker leaves and deeper shade on every side. All my life, what I can’t see, I seldom address; so I held my tongue.

  “D-Dal.”

  Aunt Lockie out this far alone?

  Exactly that, though it took awhile to find her. Ten yards away in a neat clearing I’d never noticed, Lock sat on a huge uprooted oak. It looked freshly killed. The roots were still damp, but we’d had no wind or lightning for a month. Anyhow it had landed at the right height for Lock. She was firmly seated, holding a limb; and for once her small feet touched the ground—in chairs they tended to dangle useless. She was cool as the day and not even panting, so I figured she’d been back here a good while. That, and the distance she’d covered, made me think she’d wrangled with Mother, badly this time. So I moved on closer. “You waiting it out?”

  Lock even smiled and refused the question. “I’m ’fust-rate,’” she said, one of her numerous old-time replies that gave me a fit when school friends were near, though many of them had similar antiques in their own back rooms. In general back then children knew many more old people than now. Living near them, having to kiss and greet them, we learned far more about the speed and goal of life than children today. But I honestly doubt it made us gladder to know them or kinder. Anyhow there was nothing Aunt Lock had done that was really first-rate— or so I thought then—except raising Dad, and that was behind her.

  That opened a path for me to say “I’m worse off than I’ve been in living memory.”

  Mother would have laughed at the solemn phrase; but Lock took me as she’d taken my father, dead-earnest at all times, even when we teased her. So now she pointed to the dry ground below, and when I sat she said “What’s your plight?”

  I told the whole story in her own way. Lock couldn’t just say “It happened one afternoon last week.” She had to back and haul a good deal to establish the day, the hour and weather. Then she’d dress whatever rooms were involved and give you descriptions of everybody with such precision that years ahead you could pick them out from an angry mob. I told her every fact she didn’t know since I left her at breakfast—the disappointment I’d had in reading class and all the other extenuators. Then I painted my crime in grim detail and said “I’ve mentioned excuses, Lock. They don’t count, do they?” I hadn’t looked straight at her eyes for a while; and even when she started, I couldn’t look.

  She said “Very much to the contrary, Dal, th-they all count against you.” From then on she barely stammered again. She’d given me lengthy thumbnail sermons before on a lot more subjects than the powers of spit, but nothing had prepared me for what came next. She said two or three more sentences on the no-count nature of childhood meanness. Then she took a brief silent pause.

  I risked a glance at her, but she was faced straight out beyond me at nothing but leaves, far as I could see.

  Then still looking off she seemed to take a wide left-turn in her mind. She said “Now I’m asked to die for you, son.”

  She’d long since learned not to call me son; it riled my mother. So trying to grin, I said “I’m Dalton, your favorite great-nephew. And Dalton’s asking for no such thing.” Jokes from Lock were scarce as snow, but I thought somehow she was teasing me. Young as I was, I knew about Jesus dying for the entire human race; but I couldn’t think Lock was meant to follow him. Bad as I felt about Zollie’s arm, I didn’t quite see myself in Hell. So I said “Lock, I’ve been died for, remember?”

  At first she nodded. Then she thought awhile longer. By now she’d all but proved she was listening, so I watched her closely. She was not watching me; she still faced the woods. And with every second her face got paler and her skin got thinner. Soon a thousand hairline veins stood out in her spotty brow and down her throat. They turned dark purple as if her blood was desperate for oxygen, dying fast. In the space of two minutes, that seemed like a month, I had to believe my great-aunt was dying because she was asked.

  She was somehow dying because of me and the cruel acts I couldn’t stop doing, young as I was. Strangest of all, the change didn’t scare me, though I finally said “Aunt Lock, hold back. You said God promised you’d never have to die.” If she heard, it made no difference at all. So I finally made the painful offer I’d tried to shun. I said “I’m to blame.” Still no good; she was past my reach.

  By then her eyes had drifted shut, and soon they also started to die. The lids, that were always paper-thin, went nearly transparent till I could see the ghost of her pupils gazing through—thank God, not at me. And her lips, that had also thinned, drew up in a thorough smile of a sort I seldom saw on Lock unless my father bent to kiss her on Christmas morning or at the supper he always cooked for her birthday. More than once Mother said “Miss Lock’s never known a whole happy day; and she means us to share her discontent.” So while I estimated that her death was less than a minute ahead of us now, I asked “Are you happy?”

  Any other time she’d have stammered badly at that big a question. And she did wait so long I thought she was gone. Then a voice, from farther out than she’d gone before, said plainly “Happy? No. But I’m honored, yes, and glad to serve.” Another long wait while every cell of her skin went still as the dead oak she sat on.

  I thought “Any second, she’ll pitch over on me.” And I braced to catch her.

  But one more time that far voice spoke. “Shut your eyes now, son, and count to a hundred.”

  I not only shut my eyes; I bent way down and hid my face in my folded legs. I figured when she fell, I could roll her aside. Then I counted slowly. As always I got confused in the 60s and backtracked some; but from 95 on I spoke the last numbers. I thought if Lock was hearing me still, she’d say what next when I got to 100. But no word came, no sigh, no breath. Even the leaves all sounded dead. I shouldn’t have been the least surprised since I almost never prayed anymore. I kept the decision a private fact; but at nine, I decided God had more work on his hands than my slim business. Still that October afternoon again I spoke out loud once more, “Sir, help me please.” Then I looked.

  I’ve said Lock never played tricks on us, but even the greatest actor on Earth couldn’t have imitated death this well. I’d seen two old greatuncles dead and a friend of mine in the wreck of his bicycle near our school. Lock was dead all right; and I still wasn’t scared or thinking ahead to what I’d tell my mother now, not to mention Dad when he got home. I put one finger out toward her, waited in midair to see if she’d flinch, then went the whole way and touched her wrist where it still gripped the limb.

  Up till today she’d kept a steady heat, lukewarm and weird, like standing oatmeal; so I’d always shied off feeling her skin except when she absolutely required it. Now though she was cool and not weird at all, peaceful really. My finger stayed on her flesh so long, I felt her go maybe five degrees cooler with not a trace of pulse or twitch.

  I stood up finally and stepped well back. No way on Earth I could get her home now with my schoolbooks and lunchbox. But I should stretch her out or she might fall—any breeze would tip her down in a heap. That’s when I suddenly thought I should listen, listen at least as hard as Lock. Whatever voice had spoken to her might have some useful advice for me. Children this side of the early teens are still smart enough to know such things. I put both hands down calm at my sides, shut my own eyes and tried to slow my heart. It obeyed so soon that, for one cold instant I thought it was stopping too. But I stayed in place; and next I heard it thudding onward, slow but trusty.

  Then a voice, the same ol
d voice I’d heard in early years, said “Leave her here, boy. She’s where I want her.” I held on a good while, hoping it would offer some word on where I should go next, who I should hunt down and what I should say.

  And eventually, once a crow had called, the voice said “Now you are free again; she saved your skin.”

  My mind was suddenly clean as a washed slate. I tried to think of my name but couldn’t. I knew just one thing, Haul your rusty ass out of here. So young as I was, I hauled it home.

  Mother was out, my sisters were on a field trip to Raleigh, the cook wouldn’t be back till five o’clock. Dad, being a doctor, might come in early or not till past bedtime. For once I hated the house being empty, but I still wasn’t what you could truly call scared. I believed the voice. I knew not to worry now about Zollie. He’d been repaid already by whoever ran the show, this peculiar day. Someway tomorrow or by Thanksgiving I’d make my amends. He and I would be friends for life; I’d be his protector.

  In my own room though, my private belongings began to wake me. Familiar objects, like a Barlow knife and a silver dollar from the year I was born, stared back at me and saw my shame and my wild rescue. An actual human being just now had volunteered to be my scapegoat and pay some debt I owed to justice. I had felt bad enough just on my own; but nothing had made me understand how hard the sky or the voice behind it viewed my cruelty and all such acts here and elsewhere always. Being not just young but normally human, I hoped the voice would let me lead my parents to Lock and say no more than that I’d discovered her, coming from school, dead there in the woods. And since the last place I’d said a prayer was in my bed, I lay down there, got still again and asked if I could take my father to the woods and not explain why Lock died on me.

  I thought the voice was ready to speak, but no word came that I could hear.

  I told myself the answer was Yes. I still think it was.

  The cook came in a while later and worked on, singing so high she woke the local bats before sundown. Soon after five Mother was suddenly downstairs with her, laughing and saying “No, no, no.” I stayed in my room and finished my homework, praying that Dad would turn up shortly, then would climb up to take his evening leak and check on me. I honestly think, till the day he died, he thought I’d evaporate some unannounced morning between the time he left me at breakfast and touched me upstairs again at six. I’d known forever he prized me more than both my sisters, I understood my disappearance would ruin his life, I mattered that much in all his plans. But I wouldn’t know why till I had one satisfactory child of my own, the green-eyed daughter who rewards me still.

  When I heard Dad finish washing his hands, I was still on the bed. I rolled to the wall and balled myself up to look like sleep.

  He came in anyhow, sat on the edge and tapped my hip. “Sarge, you sick?”

  Just before I had to respond, I suddenly wondered if that was it. Was this whole afternoon some kind of sick dream? Was I laid up now in a hospital bed with a record fever, a puzzle to science? Was I the dead person and this was eternity? Had Zollie gone home and prayed for justice and all I was going through now was just my strange but fair deserts? I’d been saved though; I still trusted that. So I turned to face Dad and said “No, tired.”

  Dad studied me to test my honesty. Then he nodded. “School-tired.” He had disliked school as much as me, and he always said how amazed he was that he spent thirty years on something that bitter. Whatever, it had made him a first-rate surgeon, widely sought. Next he sat on quietly, watching his hands. He had told me more than once lately how much he was hoping they’d last him out till he had to retire. He thought sometimes they’d begun to quiver.

  So I whispered clearly “Stop looking; they’re still.” It made me think of Lock dead of course, but I kept my secret.

  He searched my face again and then laughed. “You know too much.”

  I said to myself He’s righter than ever but I laughed too.

  “How’s Lockie feeling?” That was nothing strange. He knew how Lock and I most afternoons listened to the radio from four to five— “The Lone Ranger,” “Terry and the Pirates.” Lock’s favorite was “The Phantom,” who knew “what evil lurks in the hearts of men.” Every day without fail, Dad would see me first and ask about Lock—had we liked our programs? If I said yes and that Lock was normal, he could put off paying a before-supper visit to her back room and risking Mother’s temper.

  With him I always knew I could reach for the truth at once, no fooling around. I told him “You need to see something right now; but don’t ask questions, not yet at least. Let’s get downstairs, quiet as we can, and out to the woods.”

  The way he replied was the reason I’d loved him all my life and honor him still, long past his presence. He said “Then lead me.”

  Silent as braves we got outdoors, on through the yard and into the trees without so much as a yell from Mother, though she had to be watching at the kitchen window.

  When we were a good ten yards into thicket, and our backs were hid, I stopped and faced Dad. I even asked him to step back a little. “I need to tell you something hard.”

  He’d after all had people die in his hands, his literal hands; so his face didn’t frown, and he stepped well back.

  When he pulled a red dogwood leaf to chew, I suddenly thought I’d spare him the mystery, Lock’s awful merciful words before leaving. I said “Aunt Lockie has passed away. I found her body back deep in here when I came home from school. Her heart just stopped, no sign of blood. I couldn’t lift her. She was peaceful and safe, so I didn’t tell Mother but waited for you.”

  My father was strong on the order of iron, strong but ready to love what he loved. I’d seen him cry only once till then when a girl child died as he touched her heart to repair a valve. He climbed to my room that terrible evening, not stopping for Mother, and sat on my bed and said “This one finger touched her heart—for the first time, son, to give her the life she ought to have—and it stopped, stock-still.” Here in the woods though, dusk coming down, he let my news pass into his eyes. Then he looked back awhile.

  I thought he was hiding his grief this time—Lock was his mother to all intents—and I said “Don’t mind. I won’t tell a soul.”

  But he faced around and was smiling a little. He said “Have you told me the real truth, Sarge?”

  I must have looked troubled.

  “She’s not been killed? You said no blood—”

  I raised my hand in the standard boy’s oath. “Sir, she’s peaceful.” That much was true.

  Dad was no sunny-sider; he tended to frown. Till now I’d never heard him say any death was a blessing. I thought he meant Mother; it would finally lift the load of poor Lock off her mind and back. I nodded. “That’s why I didn’t tell Mother. I saved it for you.”

  Dad shook his head and waved me off; I’d misunderstood. What came next was the hardest thing he ever told me. “I’ve waited for this through long years now.” He looked inward past me and stepped on forward to take the lead for maybe five yards. Then he recalled he didn’t know where she’d be. I would need to guide him.

  He’d never conceded that job to me, not till that moment; but I stepped forward proudly. As I passed him I touched his arm for an instant. “It’s not bad, I told you—not one scratch or bruise.”

  As we went it suddenly dawned on me some dog might have found Lock and mauled her face. So I moved on faster than he usually walked, to get there soon enough and warn him back if her body was changed. For at least five years, I’d forged alone through these same trees, trying to imagine I was threatened by Indians and vicious beasts, all barely hid an arm’s reach off. And I always tried to imagine bravery, how to walk toward what might be my death without the hair of my neck rising cold. Finally that dusk—with Dad behind me, trusting my knowledge—I was truly fearless. My blood ran warm and steady and smooth as an August river, and the hundred-yard trip seemed longer than Lewis and Clark’s whole cross-country trek.

  By the time I rea
ched the edge of the clearing, the evening light could barely get through the circling pines. But right away I felt relief. Lock was still upright on the fallen tree, her eyes were still shut, one hand was holding the small limb for balance. I knew a single gust or a hard footstep might tip her forward in a heap on the ground, so I waited in place till Dad caught up.

  Faced with a problem, he mostly reacted speedily. Now though he waited silent on my left.

  I looked to his profile, and at first he wouldn’t face me.

  Then he relented and his gray eyes were calm. He all but whispered “Sarge, you’re wrong.”

  I quickly tried to guess his meaning—what else was this old lady but frozen in rigor mortis by now? What had I misunderstood?

  Dad reached across the gap between us, took my hand and slowly walked toward her.

  In my eyes anyhow Lock seemed to quiver as fast as a hummingbird’s wing, a visible blur. I figured the force of our gentle footsteps was reaching her body, but it hurt to see, and I must have pulled back on Dad’s hand a little.

  Anyhow he turned me loose and went on.

  I stayed where I stopped, maybe ten feet back.

  Dad slowed his pace but went right to her.

  She was dead as ever, to my mind at least. Even the bird’s-wing blur was still. For the first time I saw what you see on death masks— whatever fears and pains they knew, the dead faces of famous men, like Napoleon, are smooth as children. Maybe death is that easy. Or more likely maybe, before they can mix the plaster and make your mask, the pull of gravity eases the lines of fear and age, leaving you young and hopeful again. My great-aunt didn’t look young or glad; but she did look tranquil, a whole new thing in the years I’d known her. I saw Dad’s hand reach out toward her hand; and I thought Lord God, she’ll powder to dust. I’d read about ancient maidens who powdered when their perfectly lovely corpses were touched. Nothing happened though that I could see. He’d only laid two light fingers on her, and soon I figured he was hunting a pulse.