Paul Robertson - According to Their Deeds

“I want to buy it now.”

“Okay, sold. Do you want to come get it?”

“Do you deliver?” Charles asked.

“Who, me? Sometimes. My wife’s nephew, I send him out sometimes, but he breaks things.”

“I wouldn’t want it broken. Why don’t you bring it, Norman. I think it’s your turn to visit my shop, anyway.”

“Okay. I can bring it. How about tomorrow?”

“Saturday? That would be fine. We’re just open until two, but Dorothy and I will be here most of the day.”

“And now, dear,” he said, “I am going out.”

“This was the errand?”

“I’m going to visit Lucy Bastien Cloverdale.”

“Can’t you just call her?”

“She told me not to call back.”

“Well, Charles, that might mean she doesn’t want you to visit either.”

“She didn’t say that. I don’t think she’ll turn me away.”

“And you said it was terrible seeing the house changed,” Dorothy said.

“I’ve gotten over it. It couldn’t be as big a shock or insult this time.”

“Anybody ever call you Charlie?” Lucy Bastien said, leaning against the front door.

Charles blinked.

“I was wrong.”

“What?”

“Something I had just said to my wife. Never mind.”

A stale, sticky smell drifted by.

“May I come in? I just wanted to talk for a moment. I won’t be long. I hope you won’t mind?”

“I don’t mind anything. Why should I mind?”

She moved aside and Charles led the way into the front room. There was a loud crunch of wicker as they sat.

“What can I do you for, Charlie?” She threw a sloppy smile across the yellowness.

“I just had a question or two. I was looking at the books I bought at the auction.”

“Auction. Oh, the auction! What about them?”

“I was wondering… I wondered if anyone might have done anything to them. Before the auction.”

“Before.” She frowned and thought very hard. “Maybe, um, whoever he was. Maybe he did.”

“Who?”

“You know, started with a D. Derek. Maybe he did.”

“I mean after…”

“After he got walloped, you mean?”

“Right.”

“Well, let’s see. The police were here and they didn’t let anybody in the house for a couple days. I called the auction place and they said they’d come when the police went away.”

“How long was everything here in the house?”

“I wanted it out of here as fast as it could go. Figured it was worth bundles so why not sell it? I told the auction man to come get it.”

“So, just a few days?”

“I needed to get rid of it all so I could get the place painted.”

“Of course. They took everything? Even the furniture?”

“Every historic five-hundred-year-old Louis the Fortieth splinter of it. I said if it was older than the milk in my refrigerator, I wanted it out. I drink a lot of milk. You want some milk?”

“No thank you. I wonder-do you think anyone could have touched anything in the house before the auction people came and took it?”

“Nobody came.”

“Could someone have broken in?”

“They already did. Why do it again?”

“Why, indeed? I suppose once was enough. There were all those police around, too.”

“Gobs.”

“I wonder, Lucy. Why did you smash Derek’s chess set?”

A huge grin appeared. “Did he tell you I did? Well, goody! Maybe he did care!”

“Of course he’d care.”

“You think he did? Wrong-oh, buddy. I figured I could get his attention. You think I did? He never said a word, and next thing I see, the pieces are back.” Her eyes got big, and she whispered, “Spooky.”

“He got new ones.”

“Oh. That’s what it was. I hope they cost him a bundle.”

“I think they did. Did you smash many of his things?”

“No, that was the only time. I would have done more if he’d shown some appreciation.”

Charles nodded sympathetically. “Do you tend toward violence, Lucy?”

“Not so much anymore. I get tired too easy.”

“What did you say happened to your first husband?”

“He died.” And so had the conversation. “See you later, Charlie. Time for my nap. The door’s that way.”

“I am back,” Charles said.

“Just in time to go home. Is fish still emotionally disturbing?”

“No, I’ve regained my sea legs. And maybe some rice?”

“Yes, there will be rice. Did I hear from your call to Norman High-berg that we are getting a chess set?”

“Yes. Derek’s set.”

“What will we do with it?”

“I don’t know,” Charles said. “It’s very nice. We could just have it in the showroom. It would fit right in.”

“And will you tell me about your other adventures this afternoon? Mr. Jones, and Lucy Bastien?”

“They were adventures. But first, dear, I want to figure out the answers to all the questions you would ask.”

Dinner was over. The kitchen window was open to the evening air.

“What did Odysseus do to deserve such a punishment?”

Dorothy handed him a plate.

“He made Poseidon angry.”

Charles put the plate in the cabinet. “Was that wrong?”

“No, it was Greek.” She turned the water on in the sink and set a pot in it to fill. “I should have soaked this. It’s hard as a rock.”

“What did you do to deserve that?”

“I burned the rice.”

“Please. Allow me.” He took the scouring pad from her.

“Gladly, dear.”

“Can you think of any place in classical Greek literature,” Charles said, “where someone suffers on behalf of someone else?”

“Like you’re doing for me with the pot?”

“Oh, maybe on a more epic scale.” He scrubbed, hard. “Although this does seem Herculean.”

“Alcestis. Do you remember? King Admetus was about to die, but Apollo talks the Fates into giving him a reprieve as long as he can get someone else to die in his place. He thinks maybe one of his aged parents will, but they won’t. Finally his wife, Alcestis, says she will.”

“I don’t think I remember this at all,” Charles said.

“There is a play by Euripides. As she is being taken to the underworld, Admetus realizes that Alcestis is better off than he is. He has to mourn for her, and his life will always be filled with sorrow and strife. But she will never suffer again.”

“So she doesn’t suffer on his behalf.”

“In Greek mythology,” Dorothy said, “everyone suffers. Hercules happens by on the day of the funeral, tears open the tomb, wrestles Thanatos, the god of death, to the ground and makes him let Alcestis go.”

“So they all get to suffer on through life together.” He gave up on the pot and left it to soak. “If a person does something wrong, what can they do? Do they have the stain forever?”

“Well, of course not.”

“Exactly. There are two options: punishment and redemption. In the case of someone like Karen Liu, I know what the punishment would be. She would probably lose her position in Congress, and possibly go to jail. It would be worse than what happened to Patrick White.”

“If those checks really represent a crime.”

“Which we don’t know for sure,” Charles said. “But assuming they do, what is the alternate to punishment? What would redemption look like for her?”

“Everything she’s done in Congress,” Dorothy said. “You think she’s accomplished lots of good things.”

“Legally, that doesn’t matter. But should it morally?”

“What difference would that make?”

“It makes a difference to me. If I have to decide what to do with the papers, should I consider that her good works outweigh the bad?”

“That’s not exactly what redemption is.”