Shirley Jackson - We Have Always Lived in the Castle

“Now listen,” Charles said. He had brought down a handful of sticks and dirt, perhaps to prove to Constance that they had really been in his room, or perhaps because he was going to clean it away handful by handful; the sticks and dirt looked wrong on the kitchen table and I thought that perhaps one reason Constance looked so sad was the dirt on her clean table. “Now listen,” Charles said.

“I cannot work in here if that young man is going to talk all the time,” Uncle Julian said. “Constance, tell him he must be quiet for a little while.”

“You, too,” Charles said in that soft voice. “I have put up with enough from both of you. One of you fouls my room and goes around burying money and the other one can’t even remember my name.”

“Charles,” I said to Jonas. I was the one who buried money, certainly, so I was not the one who could not remember his name; poor old Uncle Julian could not bury anything and could not remember Charles’ name. I would remember to be kinder to Uncle Julian. “Will you give Uncle Julian a spice cookie for his dinner?” I asked Constance. “And Jonas one too?”

“Mary Katherine,” Charles said, “I am going to give you one chance to explain. Why did you make that mess in my room?”

There was no reason to answer him. He was not Constance, and anything I said to him might perhaps help him to get back his thin grasp on our house. I sat on the doorstep and played with Jonas’s ears, which flicked and snapped when I tickled them.

“Answer me,” Charles said.

“How often must I tell you, John, that I know nothing whatsoever about it?” Uncle Julian slammed his hand down onto his papers and scattered them. “It is a quarrel between the women and none of my affair. I do not involve myself in my wife’s petty squabbles and I strongly advise you to do the same. It is not fitting for men of dignity to threaten and reproach because women have had a falling out. You lose stature, John, you lose stature.”

“Shut up,” Charles said; he was shouting again and I was pleased. “Constance,” he said, lowering his voice a little, “this is terrible. The sooner you’re out of it the better.”

“—will not be told to shut up by my own brother. We will leave your house, John, if that is really your desire. I ask you, however, to reflect. My wife and I—”

“It’s my fault, all of it,” Constance said. I thought she was going to cry. It was unthinkable for Constance to cry again after all these years, but I was held tight, I was chilled, and I could not move to go over to her.

“You are evil,” I said to Charles. “You are a ghost and a demon.”

“What the hell ?” Charles said.

“Don’t pay any attention,” Constance told him. “Don’t listen to Merricat’s nonsense.”

“You are a very selfish man, John, perhaps even a scoundrel, and overly fond of the world’s goods; I sometimes wonder, John, if you are every bit the gentleman.”

“It’s a crazy house,” Charles said with conviction. “Constance, this is a crazy house.”

“I’ll clean your room, right away. Charles, please don’t be angry.” Constance looked at me wildly, but I was held tight and could not see her.

“Uncle Julian.” Charles got up and went over to where Uncle Julian sat at his table.

“Don’t you touch my papers,” Uncle Julian said, trying to cover them with his hands. “You get away from my papers, you bastard.”

“What?” said Charles.

“I apologize,” Uncle Julian said to Constance. “Not language fitting for your ears, my dear. Just tell this young bastard to stay away from my papers.”

“Look,” Charles said to Uncle Julian, “I tell you I’ve had enough of this. I am not going to touch your silly papers and I am not your brother John.”

“Of course you are not my brother John; you are not tall enough by half an inch. You are a young bastard and I desire that you return to your father, who, to my shame, is my brother Arthur, and tell him I said so. In the presence of your mother, if you choose; she is a strong-willed woman but lacks family feeling. She desired that the family connection be severed. I have consequently no objection to your repeating my high language in her presence.”

“That has all been forgotten, Uncle Julian; Constance and I—”

“I think you have forgotten yourself, young man, to take such a tone to me. I am pleased that you are repentant, but you have taken far too much of my time. Please be extremely quiet now.”

“Not until I have finished with your niece Mary Katherine.”

“My niece Mary Katherine has been a long time dead, young man. She did not survive the loss of her family; I supposed you knew that.”

“What?” Charles turned furiously to Constance.

“My niece Mary Katherine died in an orphanage, of neglect, during her sister’s trial for murder. But she is of very little consequence to my book, and so we will have done with her.”

“She is sitting right here.” Charles waved his hands, and his face was red.

“Young man.” Uncle Julian put down his pencil and half-turned to face Charles. “I have pointed out to you, I believe, the importance of my work. You choose constantly to interrupt me. I have had enough. You must either be quiet or you must leave this room.”

I was laughing at Charles and even Constance was smiling. Charles stood staring at Uncle Julian, and Uncle Julian, going through his papers, said to himself, “Damned impertinent puppy,” and then, “Constance?”

“Yes, Uncle Julian?”

“Why have my papers been put into this box? I shall have to take them all out again and rearrange them. Has that young man been near my papers? Has he?”

“No, Uncle Julian.”

“He takes a great deal upon himself, I think. When is he going away?”

“I’m not going away,” Charles said. “I am going to stay.”

“Impossible,” Uncle Julian said. “We have not the room. Constance?”

“Yes, Uncle Julian?”

“I would like a chop for my lunch. A nice little chop, neatly broiled. Perhaps a mushroom.”

“Yes,” Constance said with relief, “I should start lunch.” As though she were happy to be doing it at last she came to the table to brush away the dirt and leaves that Charles had left there. She brushed them into a paper bag and threw the bag into the wastebasket, and then she came back with a cloth and scrubbed the table. Charles looked at her and at me and at Uncle Julian. He was clearly baffled, unable to grasp his fingers tightly around anything he saw or heard; it was a joyful sight, to see the first twistings and turnings of the demon caught, and I was very proud of Uncle Julian. Constance smiled down at Charles, happy that no one was shouting any more; she was not going to cry now and perhaps she too was getting a quick glimpse of a straining demon because she said, “You look tired, Charles. Go and rest till lunch.”

“Go and rest where?” he said and he was still angry. “I am not going to stir out of here until something is done about that girl.”

“Merricat? Why should anything be done? I said I would clean your room.”

“Aren’t you even going to punish her?”

“Punish me?” I was standing then, shivering against the door frame. “Punish me? You mean send me to bed without my dinner?”

And I ran. I ran until I was in the field of grass, in the very center where it was safe, and I sat there, the grass taller than my head and hiding me. Jonas found me, and we sat there together where no one could ever see us.

After a very long time I stood up again because I knew where I was going. I was going to the summerhouse. I had not been near the summerhouse for six years, but Charles had blackened the world and only the summerhouse would do. Jonas would not follow me; he disliked the summerhouse and when he saw me turning onto the overgrown path which led there he went another way as though he had something important to do and would meet me somewhere later. No one had ever liked the summerhouse very much, I remembered. Our father had planned it and had intended to lead the creek near it and build a tiny waterfall, but something had gotten into the wood and stone and paint when the summerhouse was built and made it bad. Our mother had once seen a rat in the doorway looking in and nothing after that could persuade her there again, and where our mother did not go, no one else went.