Whipple's Castle

by Thomas Williams

  “It won’t hurt a bit,” the doctor said.

  Now, Horace thought, they are getting down to business. When they said that, they always got down to business.

  On his right, past the black machine, was a small window surrounded by metal cabinets. Outside, the winter day was dim and cold. He shook as though he had been forced to lie naked on that crusted ice and snow. He could feel the crust cutting his skin, and the doctor’s cold intentions gathering toward him. Stop it, he asked his shaking. This was fear without source, because there was no Leverah at that window, nothing, and probably it wouldn’t hurt. But it hurt already, somewhere in the middle of his bones, because he was about to explode. What, exactly, am I afraid of? he asked himself. Where would I rather be? I couldn’t even run to get there. I would stumble and let go of everything like a sick dog—like Unk when the car hit him on Bank Street.

  Now was the time of no other choice. When he’d stepped on a nail, Dr. Winston had to ream out the hole in his foot. That had hurt! And when the time had come to clean that nail hole, nothing else would do. It was the time, like all those other times that never seemed to end, but to be repeated in all sorts of varieties; like when it was necessary to set the ulna in his arm, or to put his dislocated finger back straight, or when his shoulder was dislocated, or when he pulled the tendons in his knee and it swelled up big as a cantaloupe, and it had to be moved in examination, or when the dentist said this would hurt a little bit. His parts did stupid things, went wrong all the time, and he paid in fear.

  “All right,” he said. But it was not just personal fear, either. He was afraid of what might be done by that doctor to that boy, just as he feared the moment the car hit Unk and threw his brown and white body down the sidewalk, his big spaniel ears flying. The sound of that blow. He heard the breath go like an ear popping, and the dog couldn’t breathe to scream. That was nothing; it happened all the time. Men did worse things to men, to women and to little children. David shot bullets through the bodies of squirrels, and they kicked and kicked, unable to climb. In what pain. Gordon Ward and his big men, raping Susie on the grass, common as a toilet. None of them ever seemed to fear another’s pain or fear. Never. They had appetites like the Herpes, all of them, until they had to scream themselves.

  “I won’t be able to hold my eyes open,” he said to the doctor and to his mother. “If you want me to hold them open, I’m sorry.”

  “I’ll hold them open,” the doctor said.

  11

  One evening during the week before Christmas, Harvey sat in his wheelchair, alone before the embering fireplace. The owlhead andirons blinked coals at him through their amber eyes, and the dark panels and uprights of the tall room led his eyes upward to the false balcony. No one looked down at him; no De Oestris ghost-paced two dimensionally along that narrow ledge. He was alone in the big house, and even with his third drink in his hand he could not summon any pride in his possession of this great room. That had always been something to count upon, no matter how low he was; perhaps now he had worn out this gift. If he had, what had he left to enjoy? He had come against his will to believe that all men were leaky vessels whose enthusiasms, though they once seemed so bounteous and unending, died away in all the years, and when they were gone nothing could bring them back. Passion did not ever return, and the memory of passion was the most painful of all—much more painful than the memory of inadequacy or dishonor, or even of tragedy. His father’s death had seemed, and still seemed, inevitable, sad but not wrong. But this slow death of desire!

  Near the entrance to the dining room was a framed photograph of the family, taken before the accident. He could barely see it in this light, but he knew it well enough. Even from this distance he was a straight form in a white summer suit, suggesting energy and motion. Wood stood serious and tall, Horace, David and Kate were still children, and Hank was just a little slimmer and firmer, her bones more clearly defined. It was youth, just the last few years of it, that neither of them had known was slipping away. There was a stab of pain: the firm, clear-skinned bodies of himself and his young wife, a flash, a confrontation naked and happy.

  In the picture he was slightly apart from them, a little impatient, fond of them all, yes, and smiling, but ready to go elsewhere and come back almost before they knew he had gone. The very line of his hip, where the white jacket fell straight, and his foot on the rung of David’s chair, predicted some smooth motion.

  Fond of them, he had thought. How fond had he ever been of his children, really? He did remember their tenderness as babies, especially Wood, his first-born. But had he ever loved anyone in some way purified of his physical presence, his pride of creation or of ownership? How did he feel about them now? It was as though his own destruction had destroyed their worth. Even I, he thought, evert a self-centered son of a bitch like me can see how unnatural a father I am. Horace, the difficult one; what had he ever done to help that child get through his darkest nights? Oh yes, he could remember times when he put his arm around those thick shoulders and tried to talk to the boy. But always, eventually, came the impasse, when his impatience won out. They had everything they needed, didn’t they? Hadn’t he managed to feed them and clothe them and give them what all the other children had (a great deal more than most, if they only knew; there were plenty of hungry kids in Leah)? Christ, if they didn’t think so they only had to look at poor Peggy Mudd, with a moron for a father and a round-heeled mother.

  Whenever he’d tried to find out what was bothering Horace he’d get frustrated and tell the boy how lucky he was. Sure. Count your blessings while a nightmare has you in its teeth. Be grateful! Be happy! Well, at least they’d found that he didn’t have a brain tumor, only simple near-sightedness.

  The fire creaked, and he threw his cigarette butt into it—carefully, so he wouldn’t have to wheel himself over and push it off the rug with the poker. He watched it smoke and glow all over as the fire ate it. His drink was almost gone, and he wanted another, but he was alone in the house and couldn’t yell for service. Too bad, he thought. That’s just too bad.

  David’s main birthday present had been his driving license, so he had taken Hank and Kate Christmas shopping. Wood and Horace were up in the woods, dragging in the tree they had picked out early in November, before snow.

  He would have to wheel himself into the kitchen if he wanted any ice. His leg felt numb, but rather ominously so, and he would have to be careful. Lately, especially after the doctors’ last prognostications—that he had a rather local but virulent form of arthritis in his hip and knee—he had begun to have an aura, a prediction of pain whose signals were at the same time certain and indistinct. If this were it, and he was doubtful and certain that it was, he would need the drink. Wood had long ago removed the doorsills between the downstairs rooms, so he could make it all right.

  In the kitchen, just as he had twisted a few pieces of ice from the ice tray into his glass, a tapping came at the door.

  “Come in!” he said. The inner door opened as the storm door shut, and Betty Mudd came shyly in and shut the door. She wore a light blue, belted, epauletted coat, and her long brown glamor-girl hair fell around her shoulders. She had on enough lipstick, it seemed to him, to choke a horse, but that was the style these days. She was very nervous, and her conventionally pretty but somewhat slack and stupid face was all set for some meaningful business. He could tell because she really looked as though she wanted a fight. Scared to death.

  “You’re lucky I was in the kitchen,” he said. “I’d never have heard you from the living room. Want a drink?” He gestured with his glass, thinking that there had been a time when that offer might have meant something more than it did now.

  “Well…” she said. “My ride’s waiting.”

  “Ride to where?”

  “Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you or Mrs. Whipple about.”

  He wheeled himself to the cupboard and got out a bottle of whiskey and another glass. “Get yourself some ice if you want it. No
body’s here but me.” He poured himself some whiskey, and she quickly and expertly put the frozen tray under the faucet, loosened the ice cubes and fixed herself a drink. She was thirty-two now, approximately. He knew that she was nineteen when Peggy was born; he knew that, and he knew that at that time he was thirty-two. That was thirteen years ago. Hank was in the hospital after having Kate, and he had dropped up to the sugarhouse to see the new baby, who was about eight weeks old. Bert Mudd was working in the woods up in Coos County, and wouldn’t be home for a week. As a friendly gesture he’d brought along a bottle, in case she wanted a drink, which she did.

  “It’s about Peggy,” she said, sitting down at the kitchen table. As she crossed her legs, her rayons gave a little electric squeak. With sadness he realized that she was still young and smooth. Sadness and affection, in a way, because she’d certainly never embarrassed him about those times long ago.

  “You want her to stay here tonight? Is that it, Betty? You’re all dolled up for a party, I can see that.”

  “Don’t that bother you?” she asked.

  “No, not the way you think. You mean about gallant Bertram Mudd out there in his foxhole? No, I’ll tell you the truth. I’m a little jealous of that young buck out in the car, whoever he is.”

  She gazed at him affectionately for a second, during which time she looked exceedingly stupid and appealing. Maybe it was because she was almost the exact opposite of Hank that he’d occasionally lusted after her. She was one of those soft women who moved any way you wanted them to, who never seemed to need anything for themselves but a man on them, and whose softness after a while became an awful bore. But pretty, and made of warm flesh and blood.

  “She could work for you, and I’ll send money. I got a chance for a dollar an hour, see, in Worcester, Massachusetts, in a war plant. They teach me and all that. Plus overtime, time and a half.” She ran out of facts, and looked at him worriedly.

  “Are you sure you’ve got the job, Betty?”

  “Sure I’m sure.”

  “It isn’t just something he told you, you don’t think?”

  “Well, he told me about it, all right, but I’m sure it’s true, Harvey. I seen ads in the paper they put in. Said you can make sixty dollars a week!”

  “That’s a lot of money. You going to be a Rosie the Riveter?”

  “Maybe!”

  “Have you told Peggy?”

  Quickly she bit her lip and dropped her head. When she looked up, tears were pouring out of her big pale eyes. “I can’t tell her!” She bawled out loud, making sounds surprisingly like “boo-hoo!” In spite of his cold observation of these symptoms, he was touched.

  “You could send for her,” he said, feeling kind and rather inspired to have invented this lie. “When you get all settled you could send for her and Wood could put her on the train.”

  Suddenly she smiled. Did she know this was a lie? He didn’t think she did. She smiled so wide he saw her pink gums, and noticed that one canine tooth had gone bad in these last years.

  “Oh, Harvey! Thank you so much! I’ve just got to go now. I’ve really got to go.” She took the rest of her drink in a gulp and went to the small mirror over the sink. “Shit, oh dear,” she said evenly, “I’m a royal mess.” She bent closer to fix her face, taking the necessary tools from her pocketbook with expert hands. With hard, professional motions that seemed to him impersonal, almost cruel, she fixed the face of a stern stranger.

  “I’m no spring chicken,” she muttered with her lips awry. “I’ve got to take care of my phiz.”

  “You’re still a pretty girl, Betty,” he said.

  “Thank you, Harvey.” She turned to him, all remade. “We had some fun too, didn’t we?”

  “Lots and lots of fun,” he said.

  “I’d kiss you, but I’d leave a big red raspberry glob on you.”

  “Good luck, Betty.”

  “Thanks again, Harvey. Bye now!” Gaily, off to the party. And she was gone.

  “Now I know all about the war,” he said out loud. “It’s fun time for morons.” And time for inflation that made his money lose value, God damn it. Sixty dollars a week! And also time for taxes and controls that kept him from making enough more. God damn Roosevelt, globaloney and alphabet soup. But he still had some irons in the fire.

  He wheeled himself and his drink back through the dining room to his table before the fire, and stared into the coals. Ah, poor Betty Mudd! He could see her riveting all the boiler plates on inside out and upside down. No, her talents were more gentle and natural, and for a while she’d have a good time in the city. What the hell could he do about it, anyway? Could he make her stay in Leah? When Wood and Horace came back he’d send them up to get Peggy and her things.

  Peggy had been a little black-haired critter in a clothesbasket, back then. Betty had so much milk in her big breasts they were bluish and hard, and the milk was warm and sticky on his chest. Her pubic hair hadn’t grown all the way out again since they’d shaved it off at the hospital, and it was furry and a little scratchy. She was nineteen, then, and youth firmed even the essential vacuousness of her face. She was a fine young animal full of red blood and heat, without regret. Without regret.

  It was a strange night, for December—a thaw under an almost full moon. His new glasses had come just that afternoon, and Horace could see the face of the man in the moon. Then, with a blink to shift his mind a little, he could pick out what his mother called “the Gibson Girl.” There she was, a dark cameo head against the ivory moon.

  He and Wood rested, sitting on a log they had cleaned of the damp, crusted snow. When Wood lit his pipe his face gleamed in the match flame, and a puff of the rich smoke floated by, keeping the shape Wood had given it with his breath.

  The heavy snow collected in the webbing of their snow-shoes, so they’d had to stop often and tap them to free them up. The tree was a balsam fir he and Wood had found before snow, and they had marked its location so well they’d gone straight to it in the moonlight. Wood carried a flashlight and the pulp saw, and he carried the hatchet on his belt in its leather sheath. He chopped off the lowest branches so Wood could get the pulp saw in to the trunk, just at snow level. When the tree rolled softly over, as if with a sigh, they began the long drag back down the hill.

  As they rested, sitting on the damp log, Horace felt his bones lying easy in his muscles. He breathed the cool air freely. He had sweat, and now, as his skin cooled, this rest was so easy, and the air was full of the sweet scent of spruce and pine. Wood was there, quietly resting too. Horace thought how good it would be if always he and Wood could be together and do some kind of work as hard and pleasant as this. This hill could last forever, like the steep downturn of the world, and they could drag the tree down the snows of the world past hemlock and maple and birch trees in groves or standing like that rock maple, a giant singleton with its bare branches spread against the moon. Darkness turned to light at their approach, and the soft wind passed right through walls that weren’t real blank walls but skeins of brush and branches. They, too, always found a passage through the darkest obstacles, and came down the long hill toward the bundled roofs and the orange window lights of Leah.

  When Wood puffed on his pipe, the coals inside the bowl lighted his finger and thumb as he cradled the small fire in his fist. When he spoke, at first Horace heard only the warm, fatherly sound of the voice, deep and calm, and his brain registered only that sound and his own feeling of gratitude. The tree, though; Wood had said something about the tree. He’d said that it was about the best one they’d ever found. It would stand nearly twelve feet tall in the high room, and they’d decorate the top of it from the stairs and with a stepladder.

  Tonight Kate and his mother would get out the decorations that were packed lightly in their big boxes, Wood would test the strings of lights, and Kate would string popcorn on thread. He would watch them as they carefully, carefully hung the brilliant, beautiful, so fragile glass globes. Then at the last came the tinfoil icicles,
and around the base the snow-white cotton batting. Then the tree would glow like a whole new universe of good intentions, rewards and love. While the tree stood, his life was different too, even in the dark. Other forces came into the house with the tree, and they were good.

  Peggy came home from choir practice quite late. Because they were doing part of Handel’s Messiah, they had long sessions. The note was half under the sugar bowl, in her mother’s large round handwriting.

  Dearest Peggie—

  I have a chance to make good money and help the war—I am aranging with Mrs. Whipple about you for a wile she will explain—I could not see you because of my ride is waiting—I will write you soon—

  always love—

  Your Ma

  She sat down at the table and read the note again, then went to the closet and pulled the curtain aside. Yes, her mother’s clothes had been picked over. Her best dresses and her blue coat were gone. All her shoes were gone except the old pair of runover fleece slippers, which sat there pigeon-toed and abandoned.

  Her mother had gone away, and wasn’t going to live here any more at all. Her mother said in the note she was “aranging with Mrs. Whipple,” but what could her mother arrange? She’d never arranged anything before, so how could she suddenly pretend to be responsible and arrange anything? She’d run off with some man who had a car, who would probably turn insulting and cruel. She’d be lost. She didn’t know how Peggy and sometimes the Whipples really took care of her. But hovering above this concern was another person, a mother who was large and strong, who gave everything that was ever given, who had cared for Peggy, and who, still endowed with strength and immense warmth, had gone away and left a child. Left a child alone in a house that could no longer be used as a house at all, because the adult person had gone. The small Christmas tree looked pitiful now, at this news. With its few colored balls and crooked tinsel star, it stood forlornly on the trunk, obviously the work of a child.