Beloved Gravely by Christian Gehman

8/2/2019 Beloved Gravely by Christian Gehman

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beloved Gravelyby Christian Gehman

Copyright 1984 Christian Gehman


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So then that all seeming things are not things at all, if all are inter-continuous, anymore than is the leg of a table a thing in itself, if it is only a projection from somethingelse; that not one of us is a real person, if, physically, we're continuous withenvironment; if, psychically, there is nothing to us but expression of relation toenvironment.

Charles Fort, The Book of the Damned

The function of poetry is religious invocation of the Muse; its use is theexperience of mixed exaltation and horror that her presence excites.

Robert Graves, The White Goddess


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more than once. I wrote about how beautiful the dogwood and the redbud are eachspring at the time of the Dogwood Festival, and how Thomas Jefferson used to liveoutside of town on a little mountain when He was alive, and how the Blue RidgeMountains sometimes looked all blue and hazy, like they might be islands floating on thesea of Earth, but I kept getting stuck.

Then my omniscient friend suggested that I might want to start at the end of thebook, as is commonly done by European authors, according to this person; so for acouple of weeks I tried starting the book by describing the way my next door neighbor,Christian Gehman, is riding around and around and around his gigantic front lawn on hisbeloved Gravely tractor here in Cismont, Virginia, but I kept getting stuck at that end ofthe story too.

However, some good came of the attempt, because those two words belovedGravely kind of got fixed in my mind, and after I had written them what seemed likeseveral thousand times, they took on an unnatural significance.

By then I was so sick of the project I would gladly have forgotten the whole idea,only I hadpromiseda certain blue-eyed young lady I was going to write it all down.

And if you break your promises you lose your soul.

So I was sitting on my porch one afternoon, listening to Christian's tractor goaround and around and around, and I was thinking about how much I hate Gravelytractors, because they're all the same and they all try to thump you with those wickedhandlebars. I used to have a Gravely tractor of my own, and it tried to kill me more than

once before I blasted it with Spook's old Purdey shotgun.

And if you don't believe me you can see the rusting carcass in the woods behindmy house.

So I was listening to Christian's tractor and falling asleep when suddenly itoccurred to me that I did not have to start at the beginning of the story, like an Americanwriter, and I did not have to start at the end, like Europeans do; I could start in themiddle anywhere I wanted to start if that made it come any easier, and after a while, if Ihad been doing it right, nobody would care where I had started as long as the storycould walk and talk all by itself.

Acting on this principle I kept those words beloved Gravely because by thattime I believed thy sounded mystifying and momentous and majestic. I wrote them atthe top of every page, and it was just like magic. Just as soon as I stopped trying to dothings in a particular way just as soon as I didn't have a single idea in my head, theway I do when I am writing a new rock'n' roll song why, I thought of something else towrite down, and then I thought of another thing, and another, and pretty soon I was


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clipping along without ever having mentioned once upon a time.

Some of you will probably be glad to know that this book is not written in dialector spelled funny, and I hope you believe I did my best to make it easy to understand. Ireally did. I changed it completely so many times that my eyes wore out and I had tobuy new spectacles.

Fortunately, I had kept a copy of it just the way it was when I first wrote it down,and, with a few minor additions and corrections that my omniscient friend suggested,that version is what you have already begun to read.


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beloved gravely

O NEBut what about Mac and Lynley? Mac's father was rich. He owned a lot of land

in a town up near Baltimore, Maryland; owned half the town, according to Mac, andcollected the rents. He was thin. He was hard. He was eighty years old. He was aBaptist, so he never drank. He wore plain gray suits and a little gray hat, and you couldtell he was shrewd when you met him. Mac and Lynley called him the Silver Fox.Whenever the Silver Fox came to Middleville, which he almost always did on Fridayafternoons, he ate lunch at Elwood's Diner. He ate one fried chicken breast andmashed potatoes with brown gravy.

His first wife, Mac's mother, was dead. She died a long time ago when Mac wasonly eight years old. The new wife, Miss Nellie, never had any children, so Mac was theyoungest. Mac had two sisters and two brothers. One of the brothers was dead.

Mac had just returned from Africa a little bit before I met him, and on the planefrom London to New York he had fallen in love with a redhead. Her name was Melissa.

Melissa's red hair was very long and straight. She told Mac she had been over inEngland training horses, and now she was on her way to Savannah, Georgia, to staywith her father, a colonel who had just retired from the Army.

Melissa was a big athletic girl with strong bones, but she had red hair and greeneyes, and Mac went nuts about her on the plane.

Almost a year before Mac fell in love, his father had purchased two big farms anda block of apartments somewhat to the east of Middleville. Mac's sister Peggy was


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living on one of the farms in a stone house that had its own swimming pool and a tenniscourt. Peggy's job was to look after all of the business connected with the block ofapartments.

Mac moved into the other farm house.

Mac did not yet know which end of the business he would look after. He hadbeen in Africa for more than a year, and before that he had spent a long time gettingmarried and divorced and going bankrupt. Mac didn't really know if he was ready forthe United States again, but as long as he didn't have to live in the same state with hisex-wife and his two children, he was willing to give it a try.

The house Mac's father gave him to live in was a big frame house with a wideveranda that looked out over a sloping lawn to the Blue Ridge Mountains. At the end ofthe lawn was a white board fence. On the other side of the fence was a pasture, allovergrown with broom sedge and thistles. There was one grove of trees in the middleof the field. The woods began at the end of the field. The Hardware River was at the

bottom of a steep hill in the woods. The place was called Hardware Farm after the river.The previous owners, Mr. and Mrs. Bertie Burke, had moved out to Kentucky, but beforethey went away they planted rare trees here and there on all the lawns and along thedriveway. They had also laid out a formal garden complete with a boxwood mazebehind the house, and there were flower gardens and vegetable gardens on the northside of the house. Some of the gardens were closed in by English-style stone walls.The house itself was gracious and comfortable and solidly built, which was a good thing,because Mac liked to give parties.

Mac arranged for some of his furniture the stuff that had been in storage foryears to be transferred to his new house, and he arranged some of his business

affairs with his father. The divorce and the bankruptcy had all been settled by attorneyswhile Mac was wandering around in Africa. Mac was supposed to make himself usefulby selling building lots and other parcels of land out of his father's vast holdingssomewhat to the east of Middleville.

Mac's first concern was Melissa.He called her up as soon as his telephone was connected. She was happy Mac

called. The next night Mac called her again and invited her to come stay with him in hisbig old empty new house. Melissa let on that she thought Savannah was a drag, andshe said she would really like to stay in Mac's big old empty new house, but she was alittle too young, probably, to explain it to her father. Mac offered to try. Melissa thoughtthat would be worse. She told Mac she was sure he could figure something out. Thenext night when Mac called he was really excited. He was having a pig roast! He wouldinvite Melissa to come up to Middleville for the party. She could stay as far as herfather was concerned with these very understanding and respectable friends Mac had

just met, George "Spook" and Tara MacAndrews. Tara had six thoroughbred horses,and Spook was a professor in the School of Spies. Furthermore, Tara had told Mac thatthere were a lot of horse farms right near Middleville, and Melissa might be able to get a


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job training horses. Melissa said she couldn't come right away because she had tospend a few days with her family. No problem, said Mac, tell me when you can come.Together they fixed on a date. The next morning Mac rushed out and had two hundredpig-roast invitations printed on glossy, cream-colored paper. That evening when hecalled Melissa she said she couldn't go to a party that weekend after all, because herbrother Bird, a Navy pilot, was coming home on leave, and she hadn't seen Bird forthree years. No problem, said Mac, we can just change the date. Melissa said shedidn't know if her dog Bernard would be happy without her. No problem, said Mac,bring the dog. Melissa said she didn't know if she had enough money to fly up toMiddleville. No problem, said Mac, I have plenty of money. With all of that settled, theyfixed on a new date. Mac had another two hundred invitations printed on glossy, cream-colored paper. Just for good measure Mac had these engraved. Then Mac decidedthere was no reason to waste the first batch of invitations, so he changed all of thedates by hand and sent them en masse to his friend John Stuart, the president of the

Anthropology Club of the World.

I was drinking in the Blue Moon's bar one afternoon the first time I laid eyes on

Mac. It was happy hour. I was depressed. I had not been in that bar for a long timebecause, the truth is, bruises on the heart take years to heal, and if they're bad enoughthey never do heal all the way. Since mine had not begun to heal, there was no tellinghow bad the bruises might be, or for how long they might affect me.

The bar was crowded on that happy afternoon.A man wearing a white safari jacket shouldered himself into the gap between me

and the cash register. It was a small gap, and this fellow had to turn sideways to getinto it.

He was about my height, but older and heavier. He had salt and pepper grayhair, and the sort of deep sun-burned tan that comes from working outdoors in thetropical sun. A red bandanna had been tied around his neck.

"Sorry," he said, as he jostled my arm."They're in here today," I commented, excusing him."Gin and tonic," he said, pointing at the bartender. "Mac Mason," he said,

nodding toward me."Carl Phillips," I said.Mac's gin and tonic arrived."Cheers," he said, lifting his glass.I waved my whiskey at him. Mac took a gulp of his drink. He sighed. He lit a

cigarette."Having a pig roast, he said. "Like to come?"

Mac could not possibly have known it, but there is nothing in the world I likebetter than a pig roast, unless maybe it is getting lost.

"When is it?" I asked."Tomorrow," said Mac. "I thinkit's tomorrow."Mac fumbled in one of his coat pockets and drew out an engraved invitation

printed on glossy, cream-colored paper."That's right," he went on, inspecting the invitation carefully. "It's tomorrow.

Tomorrow is Saturday, isn't it?"


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"Yes," I said. "How does one get to the party?""I don't quite know," said my friend.Not long after that I had to tell him where the airport was.

The pig roast had started before I arrived.Mac was nowhere in sight.It was late afternoon on one of those clear blue September days when scarcely

any of the trees have lost their green. A crowd of gaily-colored tents had been pitchedin the meadow near the grove of trees. Three big blue tents had been pitched rightinside the grove. The pig was roasting over a fire on the meadow side of the whiteboard fence not far from the gate. Right smack in the middle of the lawn there was apile of pipes and girders that someone had welded together. It was one of those newmodern sculptures that change all the time depending on your point of view.

There were hundreds of people sitting in little groups here and there on the lawnor going in and out of the house or wandering down through the meadow toward thetents. Some of them were peering at the pile of pipes and girders. Some were playing

Frisbee. Others were sitting in chairs on the veranda. It did look like half of Middlevillewas there.

I didn't know how I would feel about meeting any of my old friends, so I thought itwold be best to have a beer before I tried to talk to anybody.

But I ran into Spook before I got to the beer."Spook!" I exclaimed. "Good to see you. How's Tara?"I punched Spook on the upper arm."Tara's up at the house," Spook said, giving me a peculiar look. "Where have

you been all these months?""I was away," I said. "Have you seen our host?""Do you mean Mac? He's up at the house with us. Come on up I know Tara

wants to see you.""I'm going to check out a beer," I said. "And I want to look at the pig. I'll be alongin a minute."

"Are you all right?""Not really. Not yet.""But you willbe all right again. You know that, don't you?""I don't know anything," I said. "Not like I used to.""It's just going to take more time," Spook said confidently. "Look. We're up on

the second floor, on this end of the house. See that big window? Come join us we'rewatching the party."

"I'll be there," I said. "There's no reason to worry."

The night before, after Mac had come back all alone and disappointed from theairport without Melissa, he and I continued drinking in the bar a long time and thenfinally Mac told me that there wasn't any point to it that he could see but if you didn'twant to kill yourself you went on living.

"Did you ever want to kill yourself?" I asked him."Sure," he said. "Plenty of times.""What happened?"


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"Nothing.""What do you mean, nothing?""I'm still here, I guess ain't I?""Did you try it? Or did you just think about it?""I don't know," Mac said. "No one was there to keep score. Once in Zimbabwe I

sat by the window for a long time with a gun in my hand, but then I had to take a leak,and after that I just decided to go back to sleep."

I walked down past the pile of pipes and girders to the beer.There was another full keg of beer behind the keg of beer that had been tapped.

There were plenty of strong plastic cups. I filled one of them up. The beer was verycold. I drank a whole cup of it and pumped the keg up a little bit and drew another cupbefore I went down to the pig.

A stranger was turning the pig on a stainless steel spit. Already the pig was

golden brown. Fat was seeping out of the cracks in its skin. A trench had been dug forthe coals, which were heaped up higher underneath the hams and shoulders. The firehad been made partly of charcoal and partly of hickory wood, so that there was plenty ofheat from the charcoal and plenty of sweet-smelling smoke from the hickory. The manturning the spit was protected from the heat by a piece of tin that had once been part ofa standing seam roof; I could still see the crimps along one edge. The spit was notdirectly over the fire, so fat could drip down without making the flames blaze up. Thepig's eyes had been burned blind by the heat, and the pig's lips had been drawn backso that all of the white pig teeth were grinning at me in the sunlight.

I looked over at the man turning the spit and he grinned at me too."Lots of people probably ask you this," I said. "But do you think the pig will be

done soon?""In about an hour, I think. Would you like to try a piece of skin?""Me?""Are you much of a butcher?""Do you mean can I cut up a pig?""Well, can you or not?""I can do it," I said. "Do you really need help?"The man stood up. He was wearing blue jeans and a faded gray tee shirt that

said "Notre Dame Varsity Football." He put out his hand."John Stuart," he said, squinting at me with his blue-gray weather-beaten eyes.

"Do you live around here?""Carl Phillips," I said mechanically. My mind was wandering. His fingers were

crushing my hand. "I live over that way," I said, gesturing toward Middleville."Ever been to Africa?""No.""Want to go?""Yes. Maybe. Someday.""How 'bout next month?""I don't know.""Ever been out of the country?"


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"I've been to Mexico.""Mexico, eh? Well that's out of the country. Not like Africa, though. Here!"With that, John Stuart gave me a horn-handled knife. The horn was smooth and

dark gray. A blue feather had been tied to the silver pommel with a piece of red cord.John Stuart steadied the pig on the spit, and I used his knife to cut off a small

piece of skin. The skin was hot and crunchy; it tasted like hickory smoke. It was sogood that when I was done eating it I licked all the grease off my fingers.

"I made that knife myself," John Stuart observed."I like this blue feather," I said."That's from Africa.""Can I get you a beer or anything?""The girls keep me supplied. Are you coming back to help cut up the pig?"I hefted the knife and handed it back hilt first."Yes," I said decisively."Good," said John Stuart. "We'll get you to Africa yet."I sort of waved at him and set off toward the house.When I looked back from the gate, John Stuart was drinking beer out of a pitcher

with one hand and turning the spit with the other.I was careful to stop at the keg for more beer.Thinking of Mexico had made me feel dizzy. It used to hit me like that. Only a

few days before I met Mac it had been hitting me so hard that I couldn't stand up when ithappened.

But the time in Mexico had not been bad. On the contrary. In Mexico I hadwritten several good new songs; and Danielle had painted many canvases.

But after we returned to Middleville things did grow bad. The worst part of it wasthat things had been very bad for a long time before I knew they were bad, and then atthe end they got so bad that for a long time afterwards I could not believe they had everbeen good.

Nothing quite that bad had ever happened to me before, and on the day of Mac'sfirst pig roast I did not know if I would ever feel all right again enough to fall in love withsomeone else.

I found Spook and Tara upstairs in a little boudoir off the master bedroom. Theywere looking out over the lawn to the Blue Ridge Mountains. Spook and Tara and Macand a girl with red hair who I guessed was Melissa were all looking out the windowwhen I slipped into the room and pulled the door shut behind me.

"Carl!" exclaimed Tara happily, turning away from the window and throwing herarms around me.

She was slim, she was fair, and she had hazel eyes.She gave me a big kiss right on the mouth, a nice slow kiss that sizzled me while

she was pressing up against me and then she kissed me again. While she was slowlykissing me the second time, Spook put both his arms around us.

I could feel how warm they both were, and for the first time since Danielle hadleft, I thought I might live through to Christmastime.

"I hope you know how much we love you," Tara whispered in my ear."Love me?" I said, grinning."You," affirmed Spook."I was so worriedwhen you disappeared," Tara whispered.


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I could feel how warm her words were in my ear."I see you all know each other," Mac said. "Can Melissa and I get in there too?""Bring the pipe and let's get him stoned," Tara said. "I'd like to wring Danielle's

neck, she went on. "I don't think I've ever been so mad at anyone in all my life.""Why are you mad?" I asked."Because of what she did to you, Crazy Loon. Aren't you mad?""I just feel numb.""Well, you ought to be mad," Tara said."Why?""Because you would feel better if you were mad at her.""Not necessarily, love," warned Mac.We were all standing in a circle with our arms around each other. I was between

Tara and the girl with red hair. Mac lit the pipe and handed it to me. I took a toke andpassed the pipe to Tara.

"I'd be mad," piped up the redhead, "if anyone hurt me."Her voice was somehow smaller than I had expected it to be."I'm sorry," Mac said. "I don't think you and Melissa have been introduced.

Melissa Fields, this is Carl Phillips. Carl, Melissa.""Hello," she said. Flat. "Pleased to meet you.""My pleasure, I said, nodding.We did not shake hands or anything because I had my arm around her."Do you even know where she is?" Tara asked."She's in Halifax," I said."What's she doing up there?""What she always does.""What's that?" asked Melissa."She's a painter," I said wearily.Which was about half the story, but of course I did not add: she has a young man

and an older man, and one of them knows all about the other one and one does not."You can stay at our house if you like," Spook offered."I can?""You aren't still staying in your old apartment, are you?" Tara asked."Just for a while," I said."It can't be good for you," she said. "Won't you come stay with us?""I like the place," I said. "But you're probably right.""Plenty of room here at Hardware, Mac put in."Who are all these people?" I asked him."Oh," said Mac, glancing out the window again as if he had just noticed the

crowd. "They're the Anthropology Club of the World. John Stuart's the president.""Did you meet him yet, Carl?" asked Melissa."Yes," I replied. "He asked me to cut up the pig."Are you going to do it?" asked Tara. She was amused because she knew how

much I like to have that job at any pig roast."Sure," I said. "What's that pile of pipes and girders out there on the lawn?""Oh," said Mac. "That's one of my creations.""It's Leda and the Swan," Melissa said. "But you can't see it from this angle."

Suddenly she pointed out the window. "Look," she went on, "there goes Bernard. He'ssuch a beautiful boy, isn't he, Mac? Isn't he, Carl?"


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A large brown dog had paused just for a moment near the pile of pipes andgirders.

"Is that your St. Bernard?" I asked."Yes," said Melissa. She sniffed delicately. "They wouldn't let Bernard on the

plane yesterday, so we had to come up on the train instead. Bernard and I were very,very late, and Mac was so mad at us he hung up the telephone."

"That was only because I thought you were still in Savannah, love," Mac pleadedreasonably, "and I was having this fantastic party just for you."

"What on earth did you do?" I asked her."Oh, I just called Mac again and he came out and got me.""Mac is a pretty good guy," I observed."He promised he would never say mean things about Bernard again. Didn't you,

Mac?""Yes, love," said Mac. Bernard is o.k. in my book even if they won't let him get on

an airplane."He's beautiful," I said.Melissa beamed. "Did you see his tie?" she asked me, tightening her fingers

innocently on my shoulder."Well we haven't actually been introduced yet.""Oh. Do you want to meet him?""Sure I do.""Well go down in a while," said Melissa. "I expect you'll be cutting up mean Mr.

Pig soon, won't you?""I did say I would.""Do you like getting grease on your hands?" she asked."It depends on the grease.""I think grease ruins your fingernails."

Later on I learned that Melissa could rattle on like that for hours, switching backand forth from subject to subject like a butterfly inspecting flowers. She could speak fivelanguages (Portuguese, Turkish, Chinese, German and English), but she likedPortuguese best because the old nurse she used to have in Portugal would tell herstories about the Lisbon earthquake every night until she fell fast asleep.

Melissa thought Savannah, Georgia, was the dullest place in the whole world. Itwas full of old men who kept wanting to touch her. Melissa wanted a horse of her ownand a Mercedes-Benz. She knew she was lovely. She knew she was young. She didnot know any reason why she should want to be cooped up in Savannah, Georgia, justbecause her father had retired there.

Spook and Tara were the first real friends I made in Middleville. I knew them longbefore I met Danielle, and then when I was desperate and destroyed by love, Spookand Tara took me in and propped me up and fed me breakfast many times until the twoof them were certain that Carl Phillips would not give in to the dragons of despair.

Spook was a few inches taller than I was. He wore steel-rimmed spectacles.


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Despite his short sandy hair, I always thought Spook looked a little bit like Errol Flynn.He had that lithe, swashbuckling panache. He was agile and smart and he taught me tobarbecue. He loved America and apple pie and baseball.

Most of all, though, Spook loved Tara.Tara had long, very straight blonde hair that was almost white. She was so

damned beautiful that conversation often paused when she entered a room. Herfeatures were aristocratic with no trace of haughtiness or weakness. The slightaquilinity of her nose only made you want to look at her longer, as if by looking at herlong enough it might be possible to learn the secret of her radiance, the sum of whichwas always more than the sure separate beauty of her parts.

The door opened and John Stuart leaped into the room."Who's going to Africa?" John Stuart roared.Then he yelled something in African that ended with a series of thunderous

tongue-clicks.Mac laughed.

Melissa sniffed disdainfully.We all drew slightly apart from each other, perhaps because nobody wanted to

be responsible for including anyone as threateningly powerful as John Stuart in our cozylittle group.

Melissa drew away and then gazed out the window at Bernard.John Stuart suddenly caught sight of Tara her back had been turned and just

stopped and stared at her."You must be John Stuart," Spook said, sticking out his hand. "George

MacAndrews.""A pleasure, sir," John Stuart said, glancing once at Spook and then dismissing

him.

His gaze returned to Tara then, as if her loveliness were something he mightdrink in with his eyes."Tara MacAndrews," she said, extending her hand.John Stuart took her hand in both of his, and for a moment it looked as if he might

make the mistake of nibbling her fingers.Tara smiled her loveliest and most patrician smile.Mac has just been telling us about his trip to Africa with you," she said."Did you really play ball for the Irish?" Spook asked, rather boyishly."Sure," said John Stuart, winking at Tara. "I was the hunchback."Tara giggled. He released her hand."Do you go out to Africa every year?" she asked."Yes. Rain or shine and that depends on whether we go to the jungle or the

desert."Tara giggled again."O Jesus God!" exclaimed Melissa. "Bernard is getting in trouble again. Come

on, Carl you can meet him!"She went flying out of the room.I looked over at Mac. Mac shrugged, so I ran out the door behind Melissa.We were half-way down the lawn, and we had passed Mac's version of the swan

and Leda before I realized Bernard was not after the pig.


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It had taken me a lot longer than that to realize that Danielle did not really loveme. She told me she did love me so many times, and every time she told me I believedher, right up till the end. Even in her goodbye note, Danielle was careful to write thatshe loved me very much in her own wayand I should understand what that meant andbe proud of it. Despite everything else that happened, I know she was fondof me, and Ieven believe that for a long time after we first met, and then again while we were downin Mexico, she liked me so much that she did not want anybody else, and it is possiblethat she believed she was in love with me. But people change. That was her excusefor everything. People change. If I try not to know that I have changed, she asked, willthat help you write songs? Will it help me paint pictures? The first time around she saidshe knew I probably just wouldn't believe it, but Lukas was not important to her. Toprove it, she would break off her affair with him immediately. But he lives down the hall,I protested. She affected not to see what that might have to do with it. Would I becertain of her if I locked her up? Did I think I could put shackles on her heart? Shepointed out that, in a way, I had given my permission when I told her it would be all right

if Lukas painted her portrait. Lukas could paint, she went on, and sometimes it wasquite important to her to be with somebody who could paint. That was all it was. Thatwas all it ever had been. I love you, she said. Does that mean anything? I saidsomehow the idea of Lukas sleeping less than fifty feet away from us destroyed themeaning. All right, she said We'll go to Mexico. Let's get the car packed. To Mexico?I quavered. Don't worry, said Danielle. You're going to love Mexico.

And she was right about that.She was right about music and art. For a long time after I first fell in love, I

thought she was right about everything, but that was because I was only nineteen.Danielle was at least ten years older than I was. Andshe could paint. She had had herown shows in New York. Her paintings sold for high prices, and she could usually sell

every one that she painted. She used the most wonderful blues. She painted portraitsof young girls. Innocence was Danielle's favorite subject. But many things were hard tofind in America, and innocence was one of them. Blue was another. Red was evenmore difficult, but Danielle had scarcely any use for red, so red was not such a problem.Often she had to grind her own colors to get the right shade or the kind of luminoustransparency that I especially liked.

Danielle's father was a diplomat, one of those shadows that detach themselvesfrom the walls of the Elyse Palace every day at five o'clock in the afternoon. Daniellewas fascinated by America, by all Americans, and by the speaking of American. Hereyes were blue. Her hair, which was cut short, had once been red, but long before Imet her it had changed to a peculiar gray blonde color. A few freckles had beensprayed across her nose, and if she had been in the sun at all her skin would developgolden undertones. She hated winter and she dreaded its approach; she dreaded itbecause it made her fingers ache until she could not paint. She was fond of my songs,even though she loathed rock and roll, because she admired anyone who could write in

American. She knew absolutely nothing about writing songs, but she did know how toget me to write them. I loved her without reservation until I found out about Lukas, andeven Lukas did not seem important while the two of us were down in Mexico.

In fact, I forgave her as soon as we left Middleville. We were driving southwardon the Interstate when suddenly Danielle looked over at me in that merry French way,


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and she laughed and just like that I felt I must have been bourgeois and quite a fool tothink that Lukas might mean anything. Danielle had such a knack for making youbelieve in her and all the things she did believe in. She believed in Art above all else,and if something was not Art it was Kitsch or just dull, and she did not have any time forit. She had been married at an early age, to Hans Schagerstrom, a blonde-hairedSwedish ironmaster. But she had found bliss with a Swede impossible. There was alighter side to everything, however, and the lighter side to Schagerstrom was that he stillhoped she'd come back to him.

The lighter side to Bernard was that he was not after the pig.As Melissa and I ran down the lawn, we could see Bernard far ahead of us,

gravely entering the grove of trees.Because I had been smoking herbs, or else because Melissa's long red hair was

flying out behind her blue jeans, I took my eyes off her canine companion, so that whenwe reached the grove of trees I was not sure which tent Bernard was in. Other tentshad been scattered in the meadow near the grove of trees, and they were all the kind ofhi-tech nylon expedition tents that have an exterior framework of curved poles designed

to withstand the winds on top of Mt. McKinley but three big blue ones had beenpitched inside the precincts of the grove.

"Which tent is he in?" Melissa asked."That left-hand one," I said with a confidence I did not feel, because I did not want

that green-eyed girl to think I might be indecisive."I thought it was the middle one," she said. She lowered her voice. "Do you

suppose there's anybody in these tents?""I don't see why it would make any difference.""Damn it," she said crossly, stamping her foot. "He's been waiting for his chance

all day.""Do you want me to see which tent he's in?"

"No. Bernard's my dog. He wouldn't come to you. Sometimes he bites."Melissa frowned prettily and then she looked back up the hill. We were far fromthe house and the slope made it seem even farther. We could see people milling on thelawn and the smoke from the barbecue rising toward the blue bowl of the sky, and,faintly, we could hear the happy music of a banjo and a hammer dulcimer.

Melissa's green eyes were intriguing me; though in the boudoir where I had hadmy first glimpse of her sea-green eyes that girl had seemed too big and slightly clumsy,outside, with the blue bowl of the sky so blue above her, she seemed lithe and gracefuleven standing still.

Later on, of course, I learned that she could curse like any sailor, that she couldride a horse, and that she knew just exactly what she wanted.

But right now she's going to be furious.Bernard was not in the left-hand tent.Melissa glared at me as if it certainly hadbeen my fault that the man and woman

in that tent had invited her to join them in the name of anthropology, of course.The middle tent proved empty.Melissa stamped over to the last blue tent and shook her finger at the fly."Bernard," she said. "I know you're in that tent.""Bernard," she said, a little louder. "I am warning you. If you don't come out right

away I'll take your tie away."


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Still no reply and she stamped her foot angrily."Bernard!"

An unruffled grunt drifted out of the tent. Melissa yanked open the fly.Bernard was in the tent all right; that dog was stretched out like the Sphinx on top

of someone's sleeping bag, and he was chewing meditatively on something heldbetween his forelegs, and when old Bernard looked gravely up, I could see the happyglint in both his eyes.

The sad part started when Danielle and I returned from Mexico. Lukas still liveddown the hall, of course, but Danielle told me thatwas all completely finished; it wasspring, and things had been so good in Mexico that for a long time I believed her.Toward the end I believed her because I did not want to know the truth. But why don'tyou love me? I kept wanting to say, and at last when I did say it, her answer was: But Ido in my own way. Can't that be enough? I said it certainly would be enough if it weretrue. What's this? she bridled up. You can read my mind? You can know how I feel? Iknew it when you loved me, I insisted. You knewshe sneered But did it everoccurto

you: you might be happier with someone who was more your own age? I said I neverthought of it like that. Well, think, she said scathingly, and added: You who are so bigwith words. She was probably playing for time because she did not know what to donext.

But I was back there with Bernard and the redhead was already mad as blazes; Icould see the pink tips of Melissa's elf ears blushing red, and far above us the clear sky,deepening in color toward the blue of evening, was invaded by a hawk.

"I told you to stay away from these tents," Melissa said angrily. "Didn't I? Didn't I,Bernard?"

Bernard looked up quite cheerfully. He thumped his tail once on the sleeping

bag. He tucked his nose between his front paws, gave a playful snort, and then let off asneeze.When he lifted his head again, I could see that he had a black lace handkerchief

clutched in his jaws.Melissa stormed into the tent.Bernard was ready to play; his ears were back and he pranced around. Melissa

grabbed the handkerchief. Bernard would not let go. He still thought the whole thingwas a game. She grabbed him by the throat and dragged him out of the tent and thenshook him, tossing her red hair from side to side, until he got over that idea, and thenshe took away his black lace handkerchief, and finally she took away his tie.

She could use the most marvelous language!At last Bernard began to understand he had done something wrong. But it did

not take her long to forgive him.Bernard looked up at her with those mournful brown eyes and he cringed and he

crawled on his belly and before we were half-way back to the pig Melissa was puttingon his tie again and introducing him to me.

Bernard sat up very straight when she gave the command and he gravelyextended his paw to shake hands with me.

The three of us walked on.Bernard sneezed and walked happily beside us.


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"He's such a beautiful boy, isn't he Carl?" asked Melissa.

When I looked up at the deep blue sky the hawk was gone. Three small birdsflew from the woods across the meadow toward the grove of trees.

"Isn't he, Carl?" asked Melissa again."What?" I said."Isn't he beautiful?""Yes," I said. "Beautiful."

But it was her green eyes that I found beautiful, and if I had been in the mood Iwould have given almost anything to see Melissa looking at me with green eyes thatsaid, no, it's not possible, don't, not right now, the idea, it's not you, it's not possible,don't, it just can't be, not yet, the idea, not like that, it just can't, what about, not right

now, not like mmmmm, what you're oh! it's not possible, don't, it just can't, whatabout, what you're oh! it's not mmmmm; but anyway her eyes were only green and Isuspected Mac would be my friend, and most of all I was still numb because of all thethings Danielle and I had done, each to the other.

John Stuart was filling his pitcher with beer while a member of the AnthropologyClub of the World, a small girl with bright yellow hair, turned the spit.

This girl, adorned with little bells, was wearing blue jeans and a soft, tight-fittinglavender tee-shirt. She had a red bandanna tied around her head like a sweat band.

Some other members of the Anthropology Club of the World were setting up a

row of picnic tables. I could hear the frolicking sounds of the banjo and the hammerdulcimer, and I could smell the sweet smoke of the pig-roasting hickory fire, andwherever I looked I saw happy people dressed for the feast in comfortable, brightly-colored clothes.

The sun was just about to set behind the Blue Ridge Mountains.Seeing us approach, John Stuart waved.Melissa sniffed.I saw Mac coming down the lawn with Spook and Tara, one on each arm,

nodding to his guests, resplendent in his white safari coat, a picture of the soul ofaffability.

Mac gestured at the pile of pipes and girders. Tara laughed and clutched hisarm. Mac shrugged.

I did not know it at the time, of course, but this first party that Mac gave theparty that he gave before we really knew him here in Middleville the pig roast was thebest party Mac had ever given or would ever give; we had moments after that, atsmaller parties, when we took the fire engine out, and we had lots of happy times withboth our wives, and we even had the Anthropology Club of the World once or twice, butit was never the same.


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Mac just kept shrinking.

But then the five us converging on the kegs of beer found that John Stuart hadpreceded us. He smiled at Tara and gave Spook a beer. Melissa sniffed and said shethought it might be time to take a nap. A Frisbee floated silently above us and continuedon its way, and in the blue depths of the sky I saw two jets flash silver in the high rays ofthe sun. I watched the vapor trails diverge. We were surrounded by the people Machad met in Middleville, and by the members of John Stuart's club. I drew a beer. Wegave each other life and health. A third jet coming out of nowhere flew straight towardthe sun.

John Stuart squinted at me."Are you ready to cut up the pig?" he demanded."Yes," I replied.Just then the sun began to set behind the Blue Ridge Mountains and the whole

world suddenly turned purple.All the music stopped.

John Stuart gave me the horn-handled knife."It's all yours," he said."What is?""The pig.""What about you?" I asked."I roast," he said majestically. "I never carve."Tara giggled. Even my favorite blonde-haired beauty's hair was turning purple."You mean I have to do this by myself?" I asked, a little daunted by the pig's huge

size."Someone always wants to help," John Stuart said."Where do you want me to start?" I asked; I was bemused, perhaps by herbs,

perhaps by beer, or maybe by the purple light that seemed to come from all directions."Just start anywhere," John Stuart said, taking in the entire western horizon witha sweep of his hand.

I looked down at the knife. It was the same horn-handled knife; the same bluefeather was attached to the same silver pommel by the same piece of red string butnow the purple light made everything look purple.

"I'll help you," said Spook, volunteering."There are more knives on the table near the pig," John Stuart advised us. "But

cut the first piece with the knife I gave you.""Sure," I said. "Anything else?""Try to throw the first piece in the fire.""All right. And then?""I have to wash my face," announced Melissa. "Will you go up to the house with

me, Mac?""Right now?" asked Mac, astonished."Yes," she cooed happily. "Now."So, arm in arm, Mac and Melissa started back up the lawn. Bernard went

padding after them. I saw the partial red disk of the sun reflected by the panes of glasshigh in the windows of Mac's house. And on the lawn I saw the swan lunge toward hisbride.


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"Let's go," said Spook. "They're waiting for us."

I looked down toward the pig, and it was true; a line had formed.The members of John Stuart's club and all the people Mac had met in

Middleville had piled the picnic tables high with coleslaw and potato salad, slicedtomatoes, jugs of cider, homos bi tahini, brown rice with ten kinds of beans, lemonadeand cakes and cookies, sliced zucchini, home-made bread and country butter, carrotspears and celery stalks, ten kinds of dip, black olives, green olives, pimento-stuffedolives, radishes, eggplant, watermelon, blue cheese dressing, cucumbers in dill andsour cream, lettuce salad, herring salad, spinach salad, three bean salad, julienne ofvegetables in marinade, mushrooms stuffed with cheese and crumbs, a cheese ballrolled in pecan pieces, piles of green and red grapes, a giant bowl of waffle-cut potatochips, big hunks of cheese, piles of sliced up onion, yet another bowl of coleslaw, thisone flavored up with dill, and pickled peppers, olive oil and cider vinegar, three kinds ofapples, and three kinds of deviled eggs, good pretzels, pickled beets, two chocolatecakes, and paper plates and plastic cutlery.

Some other members of John Stuart's club had laid the pig out on a woodentable. It was waiting for the two of us.

And then the red remaining rim of sun was swallowed by the Blue RidgeMountains and the music started up again, a plaintive little threnody plinked out uponthe hammer dulcimer that then was taken up first by the banjo and then by a recorder;after that the harmony was joined by someone with a Gibson B-45-J jumbo twelve-stringguitar, and then a pretty girl armed with a tambourine began to dance upon the lawn,and for the first time since Danielle had left I felt the urge to play returning as I headedfor the pig.

When I looked back my favorite blonde-haired beauty waved to us. Behind her Icould see the shadows of the swan and Leda, and beyond that pile of pipes and girdersI could see the purple windows of Mac's house.

Then Tara waved to us again. Beside her I could see John Stuart with his elbowbent.

The purple shadows, lengthening, had almost reached the beer. A troupe ofswallows swooped about the meadow catching bugs. The air was cool but pleasantand the sky was clear. Above the Blue Ridge Mountains the entire sky had turned thecolor of translucent amethyst.

I cut a big piece of flesh off the pig, from one of the hams, and hurled it into thepig-roasting hickory fire. The sweet flames began to curl around it.

"Hey," protested Spook. "Why'd you do that?""John Stuart told me to," I said.

Just then a black dog with one torn gigantic ear came along and snatched themeat out of the fire and ran off into the purple shadows spreading from the grove ofoaks.

"Spook," I croaked. "Give me some beer.""Did you see that?" Spook marveled as I drank deeply from the pitcher.


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"What?""That dog.""What makes you think it was a dog?""You saw it though, didn't you?""Don't speak of it," I said. "It might come back."I placed the empty pitcher near the pile of knives. Spook selected a thick-

handled knife with a fat, curved blade.We started cutting up the pig.

Back in the good days with Danielle when I was young and innocent and Ibelieved love was the only thing that mattered, she and I lived right on top of Hollow Hill,in an apartment that had once belonged to Edgar Allan Poe, and we were happy to be

just the two of us. From the front side of the house, and from the windows of our livingroom above the portico, Danielle and I could look out on the town of Middleville. Fromour big kitchen window on the back side of the house, we could see all the way to thehorizon where the Blue Ridge marked the end of Albemarle, and every day the sun went

down behind those mountains in a cloud of gold and purple light, and every day the sunrose just for us above the city in a haze of lavender. Danielle was painting. I waswriting songs. And we were happy for a season. Winter started. Then Lukas movedinto the next-door apartment. Lukas had a fireplace in his apartment. We had none. Atfirst the three of us were friends. Danielle liked to go across the hall to get her feetwarm there in front of Lukas's fire. Lukas asked if he could paint her portrait. I agreed.So Danielle kept her feet warm over there with Lukas several times a week. At first shecame back full of smiles. Then something changed. After a little while I asked her whatwas going on. She said it was nothing important. But it was important to me, so Ipressed her until she confessed. Alors, she said We'll go to Mexico. When we gotback, it started up again with Lukas, but Danielle denied it. I still wanted her because of

all the good times we might have again. I did not understand that sometimes the oneperson you love most decides you just don't matter quite enough. I thought you couldstart anywhere and make love bloom again. I thought the truth would be a good placeto begin. I thought that making her admit the truth would help bring back the good timeswhen we were in love. So it was all because I was so young and such a lunatic that Ifound myself, one might when I had made a point of telling Danielle I would be gone forseveral hours, creeping through the cobwebs of the dark, deserted servant's hallwaytoward the door that opened into Lukas's bedroom. I crept along the passageway andthen burst in armed only with a camera. My object was to photograph the truth. And inthose photographs Danielle is screaming; she has pulled the covers up with both herhands. Lukas jumped up off the bed and made a run at me. I popped him with the flashand blinded him, and then slipped out the door. Danielle left later on that night, perhapsbecause the thought of being photographed at such a time did not appeal to her. Ormaybe she just didn't want to see my pictures of the truth.

The blue of evening crept in from the east while Spook and I were working on thepig. I did not know the members of John Stuart's club, but I knew many of the peopleMac had met in Middleville. Some recognized me; I was famous, in a local way, andthey all knew I was a singer. Some did not recognize me; I no longer had my beard and


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I was thin. I said hello to everyone I knew whether they recognized me or not, andSpook and I made barbecue for all of them, and we ate barbecue ourselves, straightfrom the pig. Whenever we ran dry the little blonde girl dressed in lavender broughtback a pitcher full of beer.

Then Tara and Melissa came to see how Spook and I were doing. We wereworking and we still had lots of pig.

When I glanced back over my shoulder, I could see Mac and John Stuartstanding near the keg of beer. Mac's hand was resting on the little blonde girl'sshoulder. She looked up at him. Mac shrugged. John Stuart laughed.

I threw Bernard a bone and, looking up, I saw the first star of the evening."Look," I said. "Let's make a wish."Melissa said star bright for all of us. Bernard crunched on his bone. Crunch,

crunch. The purple shadows reached the beer. Again I heard John Stuart laugh. Iwatched Spook plant a kiss on Tara's ear. She had a beauty like the stars. Spookwhispered something and she smiled. A little breeze fluffed out Melissa's hair.

My wish was that Spook's would come true.

So I was a rock 'n' roll singer and she loved to dance.

Danielle and I set out across the border from Laredo, Texas, with no destinationclearly pictured in our minds. We planned to travel here and there until we reached the

jungles of the Yucatan that still conceal the giant temples of forgotten Indians andmaybe after that we would wind up in the big Olympic city, Mexico, for a leisurely look atthe Anthropological Museum.

We planned an indefinitely long excursion.But then we both caught Asian Flu.I caught it first, while we were somewhere on the road between San Luis Potosi

and Guadalajara. I felt fine when we started out that morning, but by lunchtime I wascranky for no reason, and then after lunch I ached all over and the sunlight hurt myeyes.

Danielle said it was obvious I had a fever I had probably been eating food inthe marketplace or something, but we ought to push on anyway, at least as far asGuanajuato, because there was a good hotel in Guanajuato, the Santa Cecilia, and wewould be able to stay there in great comfort until I felt well enough to continue our

journey.It was a very long drive through the mountains. We arrived around nine in the

evening.Even though it was dark, I could see that the Santa Cecilia El CastilloSanta

Cecilia, they kept calling it had thick stone walls and crenellated battlements just like areal castle, and later on I found out that they had a portcullis, too.

The lobby was decorated with a lot of heavy and uncomfortable Spanish-stylechairs and some mirrors. I was too sick with fever to do anything but just collapse inone of those chairs while Danielle talked to the clerk.

I sat there looking up at the beautiful brickwork in the high-arched ceilings andthe enormous crystal chandelier that was suspended from the highest part of the vaulton a heavy iron chain while Danielle pressed her demand for a room in Spanish andthree other languages (one of them thoroughly unknown to Man). Through a narrow


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window that stretched from the blue and white tile floor to the beginning of the high-arched ceiling, I could see the lights of Guanajuato spread out in the valley far below us.

The clerk scowled ferociously and then assured Danielle that there just werentany rooms because of Christmas (which he called the Navidad) and the place was filledup, they had people coming in from all over Mexico, old and valued patrons who hadbeen spending the holiday season in that hotel for a number of years, people who cameespecially to see the Navidadand the globos, and he was truly sorry, senora, FelizNavidad, but he just could not give us a room.

With that he stopped scowling and smiled.Danielle smacked herpassaporte into the desk clerks hands.

At first he didnt get the idea, but then, almost against his will, he started flippingthrough it, slowly, glancing up now and then, and when he came to the page withDanielles picture on it, he looked up all smiles saying Why of course the senora couldalways have a room at El Castillo Santa Cecilia, and would the Senora mind signing theguest book?

So Danielle signed us both in.The desk clerk, smiling now, gave her French passport back to Danielle, and then

commanded the two Indian porters to carry our bags up to the room. We followed themthrough miles of long, dim, cavernous and drafty passageways.

Our room was like the lobby, only the brick arches werent quite as high. Thebricks were all hand made, though, and the arches had a sort of irregular grace thatwas very beautiful to look at when you were lying in bed. If you stood by the windowyou could see the lights of the town twinkling down in the valley.

A plump chambermaid, part Indian, appeared out of nowhere, unpacked ourbags, turned down our beds, and started running a hot bath for me. I sat down in one ofthe carved Spanish chairs.

I had seen Danielle do that trick with the Franch passaporte several times before when we crossed the border in Laredo, for example, and a couple of times after that,

once at each checkpoint. It always worked just like magic, and at first I thought Daniellemust have some kind of diplomatic immunity because her father worked at the QuaidOrsay, but then later on I found out she always kept a twenty dollar bill folded up onthe page with her picture.

Our chambermaid, part Indian, a beautiful, uncomplicated woman, sat down onthe edge of the tub and chucked her hand under the running water every couple ofseconds to encourage a warming trend.

That water never did get warm. After ten minutes, Danielle said she could go.I tumbled into bed and fell asleep before Danielle had even taken her clothes off.

On pig roast night, the purple shadows of the grove of trees had all beenswallowed up by the approach of night, but Spook and I went on with cutting up the pig.

Behind us, Tara and Melissa were admiring each others clothes. Taras clotheswere from Gadsden, Alabama, and Melissas were from London, England, but from whatthe two of them were saying I gathered that it did not seem to be any easier to findclothes that would fit in London, England, than it was in Gadsden, Alabama or inWashington, D.C., where Tara often went to shop. Melissa said she would love to goshopping in Washington. Tara said she would be happy to take her the next time shewent.


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After clothes, they discovered the horse.Tara had six thoroughbreds. She hoped Melissa would be able to come over to

see the black colt, Histrionic, and perhaps, if she had time, to help work with the newmare, Scarlet, who had been mistreated by her former owners. Melissa let on she hadpractically been training horses for a man in England, George Forsythe, who went to allthe major European shows, and Melissa added it was scandalous what they would doto horses on the Continent to keep them going. Tara wondered if it wasnt pretty muchthe same all over, probably, because of the amount of money involved, and she saidwhat bothered herabout the situation was the way inferior bloodlines were perpetuatedby the use of drugs. Melissa said she thought the Germans were the most elegantriders; the French were also good, of course, and so were the English very goodsometimes indeed. I know what you mean, said Tara; Spook and I saw them last yearin Washington. Melissa asked if Spook could ride. Yes, said Tara, but he doesnt,much; Spook prefers to play baseball, and lately, of course, he has been very busyfinishing his big new book. Then Tara asked if Melissa had known Mac very long. Notreally long, Melissa admitted; We met on the plane coming over from England. But abook thats exciting. What is Spooks new book about? Oh, said Tara, politics; just

politics and economics and the forms of government. She added that Spook now hadtenure at the School of Spies. Melissa wanted to know how long Tara and Spook hadbeen married. Three years, Tara told her. Melissa said she couldnt conceive of beingmarried what was it like? Tara said she didnt know how it was for the rest of theworld, but she and Spook were still in love.

I heard John Stuart laugh again, a deep bass laugh that boomed up from theshadows all around us; and around us now the dusk was palpable and thick, as if thespreading purple shadows had all been adsorbed on the particles of cool night air.

Melissa sniffed.

When I glanced around, I saw John Stuart sauntering, with Mac, toward Tara andMelissa. They had left the little blonde girl by the beer.What ho, the pig! John Stuart cried.I waved to him as if I did feel nonchalant.He shouted a command in African.

At once two members of his club ran off into the darkness and returned withtorches, which they set up behind me and Spook.

I had not fully realized how dark it was getting.My dear Melissa, Mac said, extending his arm in a courtly way. Will you dine

with me?Oh, she said. Is it time to eat?John Stuart nodded condescendingly to Tara and strode up to me.Did you do what I said? he demanded.Yes, I replied.What happened?You know what happened.John Stuart threw back his head and laughed. Spook started to say something,

so I stepped on his foot. John Stuart went on laughing. I thought Spook might still wantto say something when John Stuart stopped, so I handed him the empty pitcher.

Spook, I said. Why dont you and Tara go get us some beer?


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Spook took a few steps, then stopped and looked back doubtfully.I scowled at him and gestured with my hand. He went.Marvelous, o marvelous, John Stuart crooned, as if he had been laughing at a

private joke.Of course I had forgotten all about the little blonde girl, and of course Tara did not

have any inclination to walk back up to the beer, because she was hungry. In fact, shesuggested to Spook that he might want to go wash the grease off his hands so theycould eat dinner together.

The next thing I knew, Spook was walking up to the big house past the pile ofpipes and girders with the little blonde girl in tow.

John Stuart seized Spooks knife and cut himself a chunk of tenderloin. Heseemed very strong. Even the muscles rippling underneath his shirt seemed strong.He sank his teeth into the tenderloin with an animal delight. A trickle of juice ran downhis chin. He wiped it away with the back of his hand.

I did not say one word to him.Mac approached, the soul of courtliness, with Tara and Melissa on his arm.Well sir, said Mac, addressing John Stuart. It is time for dinner. Will you join

us, Carl?Not just yet, I said. I want to keep on cutting up the pig.That reminds me, said John Stuart. Did you ever get a chance to meet my

daughter?Your daughter?Yes, he said, smiling sardonically. My little blonde-haired daughter. I told her

to keep your pitcher full.She did that very well, I admitted, a trifle disconcerted. But I had no idea she

was your daughter.Oh yes, John Stuart said. Her name is Laura.She wants to meet you, Carl, Mac added. She went out to Africa with us last

year. She did? I said stupidly.Then Tara and Melissa smiled at me.The torches fleered behind them in the evening breeze.

And far away I saw the lighted windows of Macs house, and overhead I saw athousand stars.

I could not find the star that we had wished on, but I knew it was there.The breeze felt chillier.

Above the eastern edge of Albemarle, where inky night was swallowing the blueof evening, I could see the rising moon.

My good friend Mac assured me he and Spook and Tara and the Stuart clan,along with sweet green-eyed Melissa and Bernard, would be eating supper near one ofthe campfires. Mac hoped I would be able to join them.

I said I would join them when I finished cutting up the pig.I gave my friends the choicest pieces from the tenderloin, and after that they

worked their way down the tables laden with exotic home-made delicacies, Mac andMelissa one side of the line, Tara and John Stuart on the other, calling back and forth as


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they discovered the best tidbits.I went back to making barbecue alone.The crowd was hungry and I worked until the pig was almost gone. Then

someone nudged me from behind. I whirled around.It was the little blonde girl with a pitcher full of beer.What have you done with Spook? I demanded.Spook is eating dinner with your friends, she said.She always looked so innocent and unafraid.He is? I asked, dumbfounded. It seemed much more likely that she had cut him

up in little pieces for the black dog on John Stuarts orders.Thats where he is. Why dont you go wash your hands while I make up a plate

for you?Do what?She smiled at me. She handed me the pitcher full of beer.Drink this, she said. Sometimes it helps.I took a drink, and when I looked at her again I knew that she was just the little

blonde girl dressed in lavender. I took another drink and I discovered that she had blue

eyes.Well? she asked.Well what?Well are you going to wash your hands or not?

The banjo and the hammer dulcimer were tinkling behind me as I walked up thelong sloping lawn; no one was in Macs kitchen but the lights were on. The sink, a largeshallow sink made of soapstone slabs, like a laboratory sink, was bare of dishes. Thefaucets were bronze, a good solid, marine-grade bronze of the type that will never

corrode. The cold tap kept on dripping slightly. There was no hot water. I washedcarefully, using a cake of brown soap that I found in a wire holder. Then I used the pointof John Stuarts knife to clean my fingernails. I rinsed the knife and thrust it into my belt.There was no towel near the sink, so I set off into Macs big empty house to look forone.

There were no towels in the downstairs bathroom, either, so I went up the stairs.I walked along the hallway toward Macs bedroom.The door was closed; I pushed it open.Something in the dark room snarled at me.I fumbled for the light switch on the wall beside the door.

The Asian Flu kept me in bed for several days, but later on I was well enough toeat dinner in public; and, one evening after dinner, a waiter named Nino Cervantesshowed us out onto a little porch under the Castillos campanile just as the sun wasgoing down and the Mexican sky had turned deep purple, rimmed at the western edgeby a band of gold.

Cervantes showed us out there with great civic pride so we could see exactlyhow the little town looked folded in a fold of hills below us with the night above it and the


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streetlights down there twinkling like fallen stars, and just exactly at that moment, thegentle bells above us started ringing out their beautiful and random tune.

Danielle and I, on our walks through the city, discovered that it had a jail, twomarkets (one indoors), a well-kept park complete with fountain, a prestigious university,a Municipal Building in whose vestibule reposed a magnificent Orozco mural, a postoffice, many book stores, and a bakery, El Vapor del Antiguo, where they made thecrispest little honeyed tidbits, called campechanas, and not only because it was theyear of the Olympics, but also because that city, Guanajuato, was the Cradle of theRevolution a complete set of carved stone heads, representing all the leaders of therevolution, had been arranged in a long avenue beside the highway just outside thegates of the city, not far from the mummies.

Usually, you drove past these carved stone heads on the way into the city, andthen plunged down into the underground race course that had once been part of thesilver mines but now formed an important part of the citys traffic circulation pattern; butsometimes you came up outof the underground race course and drove outof the citypast the avenue of heads, because the municipal government in the Cradle of theRevolution was always changing things around, it was a tradition, and just when you

had gotten used to all the one-way streets, the municipal government would sendpolicemen out to every corner with orders to reverse the traffic flow, and if they caughtyou going the wrong way on a one-way street you had to pay a fifty dollar fine, and ifyou were a gringo, maybe you would have to pay two hundred dollars; it depended onthe judge.

But because of the University they had there and the Revolutionary Tradition,that little silver-mining town had a cosmopolitan spirit, and Danielle said the light wasvery good for painting, we might stay a while, so we rented a house the little clayhouse in the suburb of Marfil.

On pig roast night that black dog who had one gigantic ear jumped off Macs bigbrass bed and, snarling viciously, leaped for my throat.

I threw up my hands. The black dog crashed into my chest, bowling me over,and then bolted down the hall behind me. By the time I had struggled up to a sittingposition, the black dog had disappeared, but whether it had disappeared into one of theother bedrooms or down the stairs, I could not say.

I stood up carefully and locked Macs bedroom door.Macs big brass bed divided the bedroom into two sections. On the far side of

the bed, the door to the boudoir had been left open. On the near side, a few feet to myleft, past a mahogany chest of drawers that supported an antique mirror, was a dooridentical to the door of the boudoir, but this door was closed.

I opened it.

In Mexico, Danielle and I lived high up in the mountains just outside the Cradle ofthe Revolution, Guanajuato, in a clay house in the silver-mining suburb of Marfil.Throughout the hills behind our house there were working silver mines, but, moreimportantly, there were abandoned mines where bits of amethyst could still be found.


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Across a small dark room I could see, through a window, campfires burning.They disappeared into my own reflection when I snapped on the light. Clean whitetowels were hanging on a rack beside the white porcelain sink.

I surveyed my image in the mirror above the sink. A black smudge marred thecenter of my forehead. I felt weak. My hands were trembling. I washed my face againand then my hands, using the Ivory soap that I found in a blue and white striped dish onthe glass shelf above the sink, and then I dried my hands and my face on one of Macsclean towels.

I turned off the bathroom light and wandered back into Macs bedroom, feelingvery tired and not much in the mood for company. At first I was tempted to stretch outon the patchwork quilt that had been thrown across Macs big brass bed, but then,remembering the one-eared dog, I wandered out into the boudoir instead of lying down.I stood there in the darkness near the open window, only a few feet above the verandasgreen tin roof, watching the sparks rise from the watchfires of a hundred circling camps,

and looking down the meadow toward the colored tent in which Bernard hadmisbehaved. The pile of pipes and girders had now disappeared into the shadows.

One of the blue tents was now illuminated from the inside, as were several of theother tents. I could see them clustered on the ground like fallen globos and beyondthem I could see the dark bulk of the ramparts of the Blue Ridge Mountains far away.

Underneath me on the wide veranda, one wayfaring stranger started playingRed River Valley on the harmonica, and for a moment I was filled with a longing sointense that I wanted to die.

The clay house that Danielle and I rented in the silver-mining suburb of Marfillooked out across the village soccer field and past the fragrant, sewage-laden RioGuanajuato to the thick-walled hacienda of Senor Boldoni, the Italian architect andbuilder, and then past Boldonis mansion and the other villas built along the river, Godknows why, to the highway and the hill above the highway, and the white-washedhouses of adobe that the ordinary Mexicans had built upon the hill.

On any Sunday afternoon, long after Danielle and I had heard the church bellstolling from the church across the river, all the boys and adolescents of the village, andeven some of the young men on their motorcycles and their half-wild palomino ponies,would come out to play soccer on the flat playing field between our house and the deadriver. It was madcap and haphazard. It was Mexico, and cruel.

When I found Spook again, his wife was nestled in his arms. Mac was sitting inthe grass near Spook and Tara. Melissa, sitting close to Mac, was ruffling Bernards bigfurry head. The five of them, contentedly, were staring at the flames.

The little blonde girl, Laura, bad John Stuarts blue-eyed daughter, was sittingcross-legged between Mac and Spook. She had a plate of food on her lap. A fullpitcher of beer was resting on the ground beside her.


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John Stuart was nowhere in sight.I sat down next to Laura.You came back, she said.Who said I wouldnt?Mac said he didnt know where you were going and then you were away for

such a long time that Tara said she thought you might have gotten so discouraged thatyou just went home.

Whos that? Mac asked, looking around. Carl? Is that Carl?Thats who it is, I said.

A knot popped in the campfire and a plume of sparks accelerated toward therising moon.

Are you hungry? Laura asked.Im cold, I said. Id like a beer.Felipe, Spook said drowsily, looking back over his shoulder.Is that Carl? Tara asked, snuggling sleepily in Spooks warm arms. Ask him

where he was all this time.He was washing his hands, I said.

Right, said Spook. He was washing his hands for an hour and forty-fiveminutes.

Was it that long? I guess I spaced out.Try one of these stuffed grape leaves, Laura said.She held out the plate of food.Is your name Laura? I asked, taking the stuffed grape leaf with two fingers.You see? she said. You remembered my name.Laura, I said. Thats a beautiful name. Hey this is good. It tastes like

cinnamon. But wheres the spanakopita?Right here, she said, turning the plate and pointing to a piece of flaky pastry.

Did you think we wouldnt save some for you?

I dont know what to think these days, I said, popping the whole piece ofspanakopita into my mouth.I want to thank you, Carl, for cutting up the pig, said Mac.Dont mention it, I said around the layers of the flaky crumbs and the smooth,

spinachy custard of that excellent spanakopita. I had a good time.I suddenly became aware that Laura had been looking at me with eyes so clear

and bright that even in the firelight it was easy to see how blue they were.She tossed her head. Her blonde hair brushed against the collar of a scarlet

cashmere sweater.Did you make the spanakopita? I asked.Oh no, she said. I only make dessert.Werent you wearing a tee shirt the last time I saw you?Thats right. I didnt think you would remember.What happened to the tee shirt?I hoped my luck would change.Did it change?Not yet, she sighed.Lucks funny that way, I agreed.She looked up at the stars.I looked up at the rising moon.


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And not long after that, she lured me down to the deep shadows on the slopebetween the campfires and the colored tents.

The two of us had been around the Universe, just talking, and then Laura told meshe knew some good constellations that could help you find your way at night by land orsea, only we would have to move away from the light of the fires before we could seethose stars.

So I was lying in the meadow grass, and Laura, sitting next to me, was pointingat the stars. The moon was rising partly full, and by its light, and by the firelight, and bythe faint light of the stars I watched the west wind playing with Lauras silky hair, Iwatched the blood-red softness of her cashmere sweater clinging to her perfect, pear-shaped little breasts, and then without a word of warning with a smooth and supplemotion, like the bad kings pretty daughter or Nokomis in her wigwam, Laura modestlyremoved her sweater, and I saw her sway above me, saw her flesh like ivory tremblingwith the breeze and with her heartbeat in the moonlight there above me and her eyes,

her eyes were smiling, blue as sunlight, when she kissed me and let down her hair.

But then as soon as I rolled over, John Stuarts African knife pricked my thigh.I felt the sharp point quickly penetrate my skin and several layers of my longest

muscle when Laura pressed her weight against me. Then I felt the warm blood runningdown my leg.

I suppose I must have stiffened up, because Laura asked if anything was wrong.Damn, I said. Do you have any band-aids?Band-aids? she said. For what?

Because your fathers knife is cutting me, I said.And then we had to do things by the book, because first aid in an emergencyshould be administered only by people who know what theyre doing.

So Spook and Laura tended to my wound. She had a first-aid kit in her blue tent(the middle one); she went to get the bandages while Spook was helping me limp to thehouse.

We went upstairs because I knew Mac had some towels there.The cut was shallower than, judging only by the large quantity of blood, any of us

had expected it to be. The point of the knife had made a small triangular hole. My legwas covered with blood.

Laura and Spook washed my leg and got it bandaged up without much trouble.Spook found a pair of Macs blue jeans that would fit me. Laura said she had someherbs from Africa in her blue tent she had suddenly remembered them if anyonewould like to smoke.

Can you walk that far, Carl? Spook asked.It doesnt really seem to hurt that much, I said.Why dont you lie down for a minute or two, Spook suggested. Laura and I will

go get you something to smoke.I think that is a better plan, I said.What shall I do with this knife? Spook asked.


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Just set it on the bureau, I said. Its my responsibility.Are you going to be all right? asked Laura.I think if I just lie down.Well be right back. Shall I prop up your leg?I can do it, I said. Come back soon.The two of them went out.

But then instead of lying down I wandered back into the boudoir. A cool breezeblowing in the open window brought me now and then the smell of woodsmoke from thefires.

My leg hurt where John Stuarts knife had cut me.I sat down on the window sill to rest.The crescent moon was rising toward her zenith. Sparks rose toward the stars

from every fire.I saw Spook and the little blonde girl jogging toward the meadow stride for stride.

Below me on the wide veranda I heard someone playing love songs on an oldguitar.

One Friday down in Mexico I walked to town to buy a batch ofcampechanasfresh from the oven of the bakery El Vapor del Antiguo. Danielle had been very sickwith the Asian Flu for several days, and I had been so busy taking care of her that I losttrack of the date. Walking into the city past the avenue of heads, I was totally surprisedto find the plaza thronged with crowds of people.

A mariache band was playing near the fountain in the park. The mineros had all

come in from the silver mines by truck. Many of them were still wearing their steelmining helmets because they had come directly from the mines to take part in thecelebration. All the campesinos had walked in from the mountain villages. They wereold men, most of them, because the young ones had all gone into the mines or the jailor the army, and they stood there gravely with their wives, if they had wives, wearingtheir spotless pantaloons of white linen, holding their big sombreros solemnly, andlistening to the speeches that the mayor and other dignitaries of the government weremaking from the platform on the little bandstand near the fountain.

These campesinos were a very gentle folk, perhaps because of their advancedage, and they had allowed the vigor of the miners in the crowd to push them out to theedges of the park. They were content to watch the festivities from far away.

In the center of the park were many Mexicans of quality, and some tourists, too,seated on folding chairs.

The entire town was filled with a happy bustle.I drifted along the outskirts of the park a short way, wishing I had brought my

camera, and wondering what all the fuss was about. Before I had gone very far I raninto my friend Nino Cervantes, the waiter from El Castillo Santa Cecilia.

Cervantes said he was glad to see me, asked after my health, which was good,let on his was more or less the same, and said he was distressed to hear that Daniellehad fallen sick with the same illness, which, because of the year, he called the Olympic


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Flu.He informed me that Don Manuel, the owner of the Castillo Santa Cecilia, had let

down the portcullis in the night, much to the surprise of many gringo guests, who foundtheir autos had been trapped inside the hotels courtyard.

He said we might if I had time adjourn for a little while to a place he knew ofon the other side of the park, where we could take lemonade in comfort.

As we strolled along the outskirts of the celebration, I said, using my imperfectSpanish, With your permission, Senor Cervantes, may one ask the function of thishappy crowd?

He looked at me strangely as we started up a hill.They are celebrating the new year, of course.Ah. Is that it? And the end of the old year, perhaps? I said lightly, wishing to

pass over my ignorance of such an important date.That too, Cervantes said. And the moment between. The mayor refers to it all

in his speech.He does?Yes, and he makes the same speech every year, having inherited it, along with

the seals of his office and the secrets of the traffic circulation patterns, from the previousmayor, God rest his soul, who was killed when rocks fell on him in the silver mine.

We turned in at a little lemonade joint, El Rotondo, from whose patio we couldsee everything that happened in the park below us. On the other side of the park wecould see the green dome of the Municipal Building. The air was so clear in thosemountains that we could see all the way across the valley to the battlements ofElCastillo Santa Cecilia, where, because it was a day of celebration, there were bannersflying. The air was very cool that day despite the sunshine because we were so high upin the mountains. Behind us in the kitchen of the lemonade joint Cervantes and I couldhear two little children crying. From the park below us came repeated choruses ofmariache music and, from time to time, the muffled rumbles made by speechifying

dignitaries.I asked Cervantes, Will the celebration last all day?I think so, he replied judiciously. And tonight there will be a carnival in these

streets beside the park. You can see the booths there with their shutters closed. Andthere will be dancing in the park for everyone.

Will there be any fireworks?Who can say? But sometimes, I believe, they do have fireworks.We drank another lemonade, and then Cervantes asked me if I had visited the

mummies yet.No, I replied. I feel it might be disrespectful to the dead.To be sure, he said. You are right. But everybody does it.

These mummies of Guanajuato, thought by many travelers to be excitingcuriosities, are formed by the natural action of certain minerals in the Guanajuatan soil.These minerals prevent the natural decomposition of the buried corpses. Mexico beinga Catholic country, all the Mexicans adhere to Catholic customs regarding the burial ofthe dead. The more prosperous Mexicans are enabled by their wealth to purchaseburial plots, or crypts, outright, but the poorer classes generally are forced by poverty to


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rent theirs month to month, or, in some cases, year to year. The surviving familymembers bear these mortuary costs as well as they can, for among the Mexicans aburial in consecrated ground is held to be a thing of no small consequence. In manyinstances, however, after a period of years, the ground rent fails, sometimes becausethere are no family members left alive in that vicinity, but more often because the familyhas become too poor to pay the ground rent for all of its deceased members. In mostlocalities, this failure of the ground rent poses no extraordinary problem, because thenatural process of decomposition clears the grave for a new interment after a shortperiod of time but in Guanajuato, where the action of the soil preserves the bodies, itis necessary to exhume the mummies formed by mineral action when the ground rentfails. The mummies are removed to a nearby cavern. This cavern, I believe, had oncebeen part of Guanajuatos silver mines, and in its various chambers, I hear, themummies are heaped up like firewood. Some of the better-preserved specimens aredisplayed in a dimly-lit antechamber where, upon payment of a small fee, they may beviewed by any interested person. As far as I know, the Catholic church receives therevenue from this curious practice in addition to the ground rent on the graves and theproceeds from the sale of crypts. These quaint practices encourage Mexicans to a

belief in Satan, who appears in many of their stories as a large black dog.

On pig roast night I heard the bedroom door click open in the room behind me.Theres no one in this room, I heard Tara say.Nobody but the two of us, John Stuart agreed. I heard him pull the door click-

closed.Is this your knife? my favorite blonde-haired beauty asked.Indeed it is, John Stuart replied.

And I was just about to tell them I was in the boudoir when the bedroom lights

clicked off.Far away, like an answering beacon, a light in a blue tent on the outskirts of thegrove of trees blossomed out of the darkness.

I heard a rustling of clothing in the bedroom.Dont, said Tara. Not tonight.

Another rustling and then the gentle thud of lips against her lips.I dont think, Tara said.The blue light in the middle of the meadow pulsed and throbbed.I knew I really ought to cough.Look, said Tara. I dont really mmmmm.I knew it would be unlucky to stay where I was, and I began to wonder if I could

escape through the window.Dont, my favorite blonde-haired beauty said. Dont. And then, relenting: Just

dont tear my blouse.I heard the sound of buttons popping open, and then there was a long ear-

straining avid silence during which I considered sliding down the drain pipe or somehowlowering myself from the gutter at the edge of the roof.

But my curiosity had been aroused, and so I lingered, watching sparks rise fromthe campfires toward the moon.

The sound of heavy breathing crept into the room.


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The brass bed rattled noisily and then was ominously still.I heard the sound of clothing slipping to the floor.I too have heard the waves beat on the shore.Ah, sighed Tara. And again, a longer, more luxurious, sweet exclamation:

Aaaaahahahaaaah.The springs beneath her, plangently, began to creak.

I slipped my legs outside the sill and started for the corner of the roof. The tinboomed underneath me once. Behind me I could still hear, sweetly, the uncoiling andthe coiling of the springs.

I poked at the gutter with my foot. It was filled with wet leaves. The blue lightnear the grove of trees throbbed and diminished and my leg began to wish it had stayedon the window sill.

I turned around, knelt down, and then, as luck would have it, the entire guttergave away.

The boxwood bush beneath me broke my fall, but tossed me forward so that mycranium smashed very hard against the railing of the wide veranda.

I woke up lying on the couch in Macs big living room. Melissa had been dabblingat my painfully bruised forehead with a cooling cloth, and Mac was asking Laura if shethought they ought to take me to the hospital.

Oh, Im all right, I said. Dont you be worrying.What happened anyway? asked Spook.I stepped out on the roof to see the stars, I said.

Youll be all right, Melissa said. Drink this tea that Tara made for you.Is Tara here? I asked.She stepped around where I could see her. Melissa held a cup to my lips. I

swallowed once or twice convulsively; it was tea laced with brandy and honey.And Tara stood there right in front of me: so cool, so blonde, so fair.Are you all right? she asked.I dont think so, I replied.Did you break anything? asked Laura.My leg hurts where the knife went in.Can you move everything?I checked. My parts still move, I said.Feel any nausea?Just a little bit. Not really.Any gaps in your memory?I looked up at Tara. She smiled back at me from far away.No gaps, I said. I can remember everything.Are you dizzy?My head hurts quite a lot.Thats from the bruise, said Laura. Well I think youll be all right. But you

ought to stay in bed for a couple of days. And if your head begins to hurt more than it


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should, go see a doctor. You might have a mild concussion.You can stay here, Carl, suggested Mac.Melissa smiled at me so kindly that her green eyes and her long red hair made

up my mind.

Now I will sing of sadness and the death of songs as no man in the prior timesdared sing; I will sing requiems for songs that died of loneliness and dirges for the songsthat died aborning; I will make you hear the drum beat slowly as the grave fills up withclods of dirt, and I will make you understand my desolation.

Long ago there was a time when I could bravely not write songs because I felt socertain that my songs already existed, complete and perfect in themselves, somewhereup above the world. In those days I thought all my songs would be there waitingpatiently for me whenever I found time to write them down. And so, because I didbelieve unwritten songs could never be destroyed by passing time, I went off chasingrainbows with a glad heart, and I soared into the sky on big balloons; I married, I grew

vegetables, and all the rivers let me float away in a canoe.In those days long ago I used to write my songs on paper bags or cardboard

boxes, on old envelopes, or in the margins of a book by Gustave Flaubert, or on thestrange legal onionskin paper that Mac used when he sold a building lot. It made nodifference to me what kind of paper I used, because I only wrote the songs down afterthey were finished, and because I only wrote them down to fix the finished version in mymind. Oddly enough, I only wrote the words down never the music because I couldalways remember the music if I had the words in front of me.

I used to keep the wri

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Beloved Gravely by Christian Gehman