The Laughing Matter Read online

  “It would be heaven to live here,” the woman said.

  “This is the best time of the year,” the man said. “Everything’s ripe now. The air’s full of the smell of it. I’ll tell you what I want to do. I want to use this fine rock for a pillow, stretch out and breathe the good air.” He set the boulder down, just beyond the edge of the blanket, stretched out, and rested his head on it.

  “Look at Papa,” the girl said. “He’s made a pillow out of a rock.”

  “I want to get in the water,” Red said.

  “So do I,” Eva said.

  “All right,” the man said. “Take off your clothes and get in. The rocks are slippery, so try not to fall.”

  “They’re wearing suits across the river,” Red said. “Have we got suits?”

  “Wear your shorts,” the man said.

  They got out of their clothes and waded into the water, where for ten or fifteen feet it was only a foot or two deep, with clean water moving swiftly over boulders, most of them big ones, some of them as big as the one his head rested on. He listened to them gasping because the water was cold, shouting and laughing, and he saw Red slip, get up, and say, “God damn that rock!”

  After they had been in the water five minutes they waded out and sat on the hot white sand just beyond the shade of the trees, burying their feet in the sand, working it into piles with their hands. Every now and then they looked over at their father and mother under the shade of the trees. The woman was sitting close to the man with her legs crossed under her, the way she always sat when there wasn’t a chair.

  “Evan?” the woman said softly.

  “I don’t want to talk about it, Swan. I don’t even want to think about it. One good day can make a lot of difference for them. This is their day. I want it to be altogether their day.”

  “I do too, Evan. Can I say just one thing?”

  “Let it be altogether their day, Swan.”

  “I just want to say——”

  “Don’t say it, Swan.”

  “You don’t know what I want to say.”

  “Whatever it is, don’t say it. Not for a while. I just want to breathe the good air my kids are breathing.”

  “I love you,” she said. “That’s all I want to say.”

  “I know, Swan,” he said. “Don’t say anything more. Let it be their day. We’ll eat the sandwiches when they’re hungry.”

  “I brought a bottle of wine for you,” she said.

  She fished around in the basket, brought out the bottle. He sat up to get the cork out, then drank from the bottle.

  “Thanks for remembering,” he said. He handed her the bottle.

  The woman drank from the bottle, too, then pressed the cork back into it. She stretched out, not close to him, but close enough, so that no matter how softly he spoke or she spoke they could hear one another.

  “God, what fools we are,” she said.

  “Yes, Swan.”

  “I think everybody must be crazy, and I can’t understand why.”

  “I’m not going to try to understand just now. I want to listen to Red and Eva, that’s all.”

  The woman listened with him. They didn’t hear the words, they heard the voices. They listened to the voices of their children a long time, their own voices stilled by the sound of the voices of their children. The man lifted his head to notice their bodies. After a moment he let his head return to the rock, then closed his eyes, hearing their voices, the summer voices of his son and his daughter. He didn’t open his eyes a long time, not sleeping, but not being altogether awake, either.

  “What are you doing, Red?” Eva said.

  “Looking at this sand,” Red said.

  “Let me see.”

  “Look at it. One piece.”

  “Where is it?”

  “In my hand. Can’t you see it?”

  “Where?”

  “Here,” he said, putting a finger near it.

  “I see it,” the girl said. “What are you looking at it for?”

  “It’s a piece of sand.”

  “Let me see.” She looked again. “It’s very small.”

  “You can see it, though, can’t you?”

  “I see it,” Eva said. “I see it right there.” She looked at her own hands and saw that they were covered with sand. She brushed the sand off her hands, but saw that quite a few pieces hadn’t gone. She looked at these carefully. “Look at mine,” she said. “How many have I got?”

  “Let me see,” Red said. He looked at the sand stuck to the palm of her hand. “Well,” he said, “you’ve got a lot of them.”

  “How many?”

  “One, two, three,” Red said. “Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, and many more.”

  Eva brushed more sand from her hand, then said, “How many now?”

  He looked again, counted to himself, and said, “Nine.”

  She brushed still more sand from her hand, then said, “Now how many?”

  “Three.”

  “How many are there?”

  “Where?”

  “In the whole world.”

  “Well,” Red said, “there are hundreds of places like this, I suppose, with millions of pieces of sand in each place.”

  “What are they doing there?”

  “Nothing.”

  “How many pieces of sky are there?”

  “Sky isn’t sand, Eva.”

  “What is it?”

  “Something else.”

  “How many pieces of water are there?”

  “Water isn’t sand, either.”

  “Water’s rain,” Eva said. She looked at her hand again and noticed that it was again covered with sand. “How many pieces of people are there?”

  “You think everything is sand,” Red said.

  “No, I don’t,” Eva said. “Look at the sand on my hand now. Every piece is a people. This one’s a man, this one’s a woman, this one’s a boy, this one’s a girl. And this one—— What’s this one, Red?”

  “Another man?”

  “No, a dog,” Eva said. “And this one——What’s this one?” She pointed to a large black grain of sand. “This one’s my father,” she said.

  “Let me see,” Red said. He looked at the grain of sand in her hand, then looked at his father lying on the blanket, his head resting on the rock. The girl looked at him, too. “Yes,” Red said. He pointed to a very bright grain of sand in her hand. “Who’s that?”

  “My mother,” Eva said. “This one’s my father. This one’s my mother. Right here in my hand. And there they are over there, under the trees. My father told me to sit in front beside him in the car, didn’t he, Red?”

  “Yes,” Red said.

  “My father’s a good man,” Eva said. “My father’s a sad man.”

  “Sad?” Red said.

  “Oh, yes,” Eva said. “I know. When he carries me I look at his face. It’s a sad face.” She got an idea suddenly, and Red saw her face darken. “What is sad, Red? What is that?”

  “Well,” Red said. “You know what glad is. Well, sad is not glad.”

  “Why is my father sad?”

  “He’s not always sad.”

  “He’s sad now,” Eva said. “Look at him.”

  They both looked and Red said, “No. He’s just resting, that’s all.”

  “I’m tired of sitting,” the girl said. “Let’s go back into the water.”

  They got up and went back into the water.

  When the man sat up for another drink of wine he saw the woman with her dress tied above her knees holding their hands and wading with them about thirty yards down the river.

  She was trying. She was beautiful when she tried. He had never seen her flesh so luminous. He took a long drink of the cold wine and watched her with her children, her own son and her own daughter, out of her own flesh. They were beautiful, the three of them were as beautiful as any mother and son and daughter had ever been, or could ever be. Their bodies were beautiful. He had never
seen bodies so sweetly alive and so delightfully, so painfully beautiful. It’s not them alone I love, he thought. I love her, too. I still love her.

  When they came back he dried the girl while Swan dried the boy. They helped the children back into their clothes, then sat together and ate the sandwiches. She’d brought along a bottle of soda pop for each of them, which they loved on picnics, and they drank out of their bottles as he drank out of the bottle of wine. The sandwiches were thin and easy to eat. After the food Eva stretched out in front of the man. He put his arm around her, and held her hand. After a moment Red stretched out in front of his mother, and she held his hand. Soon both of the children were asleep, and the woman said again, speaking softer than ever this time, “Evan?”

  “No, Swan,” he said. “Listen to them breathing. That’s all we’ve got to do now.”

  Chapter 27

  They listened to the breathing of the sleeping boy and girl, and they heard the past breathe a sigh of regret. They heard the present breathe farewell.

  “Evan?” the woman said.

  “Yes, Swan.”

  “Will you listen to what I say?”

  “Yes, Swan.”

  “If you love me, I will live. If you do not love me, I will not live. Can you love me? Can you love me now, Evan?”

  “I don’t know, Swan. I want to.”

  “Any man can love when it’s his alone, but only a man of love can love when it’s not. Is any man a father at all who is not able to love when it is not his alone?”

  He listened to her soft speech.

  “Which of us knows who he is, Evan, except out of love?”

  He listened, tempted, troubled, and tormented.

  “Swan?”

  “Yes, Evan.”

  “There are many strangers to choose from. Let my strangers be my own. Let them be the ones I believe are my own. My own with your own, whoever they are. Let this stranger return. I would love, Swan, but I would fail, I would have to fail. It’s early. There is help for such strangers.”

  “There is no help for such strangers as myself, except love.”

  “Swan?”

  “Yes, Evan.”

  “I know the stranger’s father.”

  “No, Evan,” she said. “You do not. I do not. He does not. He will not know. He cannot know. The stranger is my stranger. I cannot be brutal. I must love him. The stranger is your stranger, too, if you love me. We do not know. You and I do not know. Red and Eva do not know. The stranger does not know. There is no truth here except the truth that is to be made out of love. And the truth then will be love. Your people are old and kind. The men of your people are fathers. They are the fathers of all people. They can be the father of more, Evan.”

  “I would love,” he said. “I would love the stranger. I would love without pity, I would love without need to forgive, I would love without secret hurt, without secret hate. I would, Swan. Without belittlement of myself I would love, but where is there in my own stranger’s heart the means and nature of such love? Where is it, Swan?”

  “In my own heart, Evan.”

  “I would, Swan.”

  “Love me, Evan. Without pity love me. Without scorn love me. Without hate love me. Let the easy lovers love one another when it is easy to love. Love me for this instant of myself loving you. Love me even for having betrayed you. Behold me, Evan, and love me with pride, with the terrible pride, the lonely pride, the fierce pride of a fool. Were it better not to be a fool, Evan?”

  “Let this stranger go,” he said. “Let our own stranger come. Let it be Red’s and Eva’s.”

  Chapter 28

  I cannot be kind to her in every instant of her being, he thought. This river-and-summer moment will soon be gone. There are other moments. The coming of the stranger in the other moments will not be the same to her then as it is now.

  She turned at last and looked at him.

  “Love is a lie,” she said. “I don’t care, though. I don’t care any more. I believed only you could love, but you cannot, either. If that’s how it is, Evan, that’s how it is. Is that how it is?”

  “Yes, Swan.”

  “You cannot love me ugly, mad, sick, false, fearful?”

  “Loving deathly things would not be love, Swan.”

  “Love is a lie, Evan.”

  “Time is slow,” he said, “but a woman’s wrong to a man, to herself, to her children, speeds time to death. I would not wrong you, Swan. I would restore slow time to both of us. I have been divorced from it these many hours. Love is no lie. I want you to live. I want Red to live. I want Eva to live. And I want to live in each of you. There is no other place for me to go. I am in each of you. I am each of you. It is no lie. Shall we try? Shall we try now to understand, while they sleep, so that we may know a little better who we are, and what we may do?”

  “Yes, Evan.”

  “I went to see my brother at the airport last night, not the one whose name I said. I said his name because it was the first that came to mind when I did not wish to say I was going to see my brother. You know, I know, my brother knows. No one else knows. No one need ever know. It is not impossible to forget that one of us moved farther away than the other. I would forget which of us it was. I would forget this, and I know I can. Can you forget it, Swan?”

  “Yes, Evan.”

  “Do you want to?”

  “Yes, Evan.”

  “Are you afraid of what needs to be done?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you feel it is wrong?”

  “Yes, but it must be done. I’m afraid, but it must be done.”

  “Do you want to think about it some more?”

  “No. The sooner the better.”

  “It is right, Swan.”

  “Yes, Evan. It is right.”

  The boy said the words in his sleep.

  “What did he say?” the woman said.

  “He said, ‘It is right.’ He learned to say it last night from Dade. I’ve promised to teach him the whole language. Had I not promised, Swan, this day might not have been possible. Time is slow. There is no end to it. It is wrong to end time, Swan. Your son asked me not to end time, and I could not refuse him.”

  “My beautiful son,” the woman said.

  The boy was the first to waken. He looked up and saw the sorrowful, troubled, luminous face of the woman who was his mother. He hugged the woman quickly, laughing and whispering in her ear, “It is right.” He turned to his father. “Mama doesn’t understand me any more, Papa.” He said the words in the language again. “What am I saying, Mama?”

  “It is right,” the woman said.

  “Do you know the language, too?” Red said.

  “I’m learning it,” the woman said.

  The girl woke up and stared at her father.

  “I want to go in the water,” she said. “I want to go in the water all the time.”

  “No, Eva,” the woman said.

  “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” the girl said.

  “No, no, no, no, no, no,” the woman said.

  They picked things up, went to the car, and began to drive home. This time they all sat up front, the boy beside the man, the girl on the woman’s lap.

  Chapter 29

  The minute they were home Red wanted to telephone Flora Walz. Evan got the number for him.

  “Flora?” he said.

  “This is Fanny,” the voice on the line said.

  “This is Red. Come on over and play.”

  “Can’t,” Fanny said. “They’ve gone to Fresno in the car. We’re here with Mrs. Blotch.”

  “Can I talk to Flora?”

  He couldn’t wait to hear her voice. When he did, he lost his own.

  “Come on over and play,” he said at last.

  “Red?”

  “Yes.”

  “Red Nazarenus?”

  “Yes. Come on over and play, Flora.”

  “Can’t. We don’t have a car.”

  “How far is it?”

 
“Very far. They’ve gone to Fresno.”

  “I know. Fay knows the way. Walk over.”

  “Can’t.”

  “Please come over,” Red said. He called out to his father. “Papa, will you take me in the car to Flora’s house?”

  “Sure,” Evan said.

  “I’ll be right over,” Red said.

  “All right,” Flora said.

  Eva came out into the hall and said, “I want to go, too, Red. Papa, I want to go, too.”

  “You can come,” Red said.

  “He’s my brother,” Eva said to her father.

  Red ran out into the parlor.

  “Good-bye, Mama,” he said. “I’m going to Flora’s house. It’s very far. They’ve gone to Fresno in the car. Flora’s there with Mrs. Blotch. Eva’s going, too.”

  His body danced as he spoke. He ran to the front door, saying, “Come on, Eva.”

  Eva said, “Yesterday when I wanted to go, Mama, they wouldn’t let me. Remember? But today I am going. I’m going with my brother to Flora’s house. Is it Flora’s house? I think it’s Fanny’s. I’m coming, Red. Good-bye, Mama.”

  From the porch Evan said, “Come on, Swan. Ride with us.”

  “You take them and come back,” Swan said. “They’ve said such nice good-byes, I’d spoil it by going.”

  “I’ll be only a few minutes,” the man said.

  When they were gone she went to the telephone and called Palo Alto.

  He didn’t speak a moment, then said, “I’m going back to New York. I’ve bought my ticket. Are you all right?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “I mean——” he said. “I’ve been awfully worried about you. Are you sure you’re all right?”

  “Yes. Yes,” she said.

  “Well, take care of yourself,” he said. “Take care of your children.”

  “Good-bye,” she said.

  He was the one.