Jan Karon - In the Company of Others

He walked into the bathroom, stared at himself in the mirror, fumbled through his shaving kit, went back to the room, gazed out the window. Sunlight striking the water. Sighed, went to the cupboard to pull out his extra pair of shoes, except there was only one shoe, not a pair. He flipped up the skirts of their wing chairs and looked beneath; hunkered down and peered under the bed.

‘Have you seen my other shoe?’ he asked when Cynthia came back to the room with a mug of tea.

‘Would this be it?’

She stood aside, and Pud trotted in, shoe in mouth.

‘He was in the hall with it, chewing like a puppy.’ She seemed pleased. ‘Well, I mean, think of his age, Timothy, and still chewing.’

‘Good grief.’ He made a lunge for the shoe; Pud escaped under the bed, shoe in tow.

‘Don’t take it from him, darling.’

‘But it’s my shoe.’

‘Yes, but it’s more than a shoe to him.’

‘I found his old shoe,’ he said. ‘I gave it to him, he doesn’t need this shoe.’

The raised eyebrow.

‘They’re my good loafers,’ he said, standing firm.

‘How long have you had them?’

He threw up his hands. ‘Twenty years. Twenty-five, I don’t know.’

‘Have you gotten your money’s worth?’

He remembered his good hat blowing off in a field as he drove with the top down from Holly Springs to Memphis-he had decided not to stop and retrieve it, it was only a hat, after all.

And of course this was only a shoe, and come to think of it, he might feel a bit of pride that his old-boy loafer from Mitford had replaced the prim pump from Cavan.

He yanked up the bed skirt. ‘Okay,’ he said to Pud. ‘Okay,’ he said to his wife.

‘Chewing a shoe,’ she mused. ‘Very relaxing, I should think.’ She opened her side of the cupboard, stared at the contents.

‘The robe,’ he said, not looking in that direction. ‘You’re taking it home?’

‘I was actually thinking of burning it.’

‘Great!’

She turned her gaze on him. ‘And scattering the ashes over the lough.’

‘You’re a drama queen, Kav’na.’

‘I was just kidding about burning it.’

‘I’m sure.’

‘So nice and soft, the Darling Robe-soft as the wings of a moth.’

He rolled his eyes, opened what he had used as a sock drawer.

‘Twenty-three years of blissful consolation, that robe… far too lovely to throw away, and such a deep, handy pocket-room enough for an entire sandwich-wrapped, of course. When we were living at the rectory and I worked at the yellow house, I often popped through the hedge in it, with a turkey and cheese on rye.’

The everlasting Ode to the Robe. He had lost the battle, and nothing was worth war.

‘In any case, Timothy, I’m leaving it as cleaning rags for Maureen.’

She let this gazette sink in.

‘And regardless of what you may think, she’s thrilled and so am I. And here’s the best part-a bit of something I love will be left at Broughadoon, which Maureen says will bring us back.’

‘God’s blessin’ on ye!’ he hollered. High-five and hallelujah.

‘Would it not be a beautiful thing now if we were just coming instead of going?’

‘Surely you jest.’

‘I rather like being in this family.’

He stuffed his socks in a side compartment of the suitcase.

‘After all,’ she said, ‘I never really had a family. All I saw was pushing and pulling between two people. In this case, it’s pushing and pulling among lots of people.’

‘I’ll say.’

‘Seamus is certainly glad to have this family, warts and all.’

‘Righto.’ Taking his shirts off the hangers.

‘Look at Miss Sadie-unmarried, and all those years thinking she had no family, and right down the street, Olivia Davenport, her very own grand-niece, who thought she had no family. And you wanting a brother and waiting seventy years to get one. And thinking you’d never have children but then a boy shows up on your doorstep…’

He folded a knit shirt; she thumped into the green chair.

‘It just seems that families can be very hard to come by.’

‘Granted,’ he said.

‘And now that I’ve come by this one, I’ll miss them.’

‘There’s the telephone and email and pen and paper.’

‘Not the same.’

He folded another shirt. ‘We can’t be moving here, you know.’

‘I know,’ she said. ‘Because then I would miss Mitford, and want to move there.’

She had gone into the bathroom when the knock came.

Liam with his hands behind his back, serious as an altar boy.

He couldn’t take another catastrophe.

‘For Cynthia,’ Liam said, presenting a fistful of flowers. ‘For puttin’ up with th’ Conors. There’s a vase under th’ sink.’

‘We thank you, Liam. Very much. Any plan yet for Ibiza?’

The blue eyes, the big grin. ‘Day after tomorrow. ’

It was a high-five kind of day.

‘Dinner will be early an’ quick this evening, six-thirty. After, we’d like you and Cynthia to come with us to Cathair Mohr-if you don’t mind.’

‘We don’t mind a bit, glad to be asked.’

‘Lorna an’ th’ niece are off seein’ castles, so no guests at th’ table this evenin’. ’t is a wee holiday for us, then ten cyclists comin’ to take up th’ slack th’ day we leave.’

‘Great news.’

‘Tad’s back a bit early; he’ll join us on th’ hill. Feeney’s with us for dinner, says bring your prayer book, we’re ecumenical this evenin’.’

He knocked on the bathroom door. ‘Did you hear that? We have an invitation to Catharmore this evening. Dinner here at six-thirty. Be there or be square.’

She came into the room and held out her hands for the flowers, happy.

‘I don’t know what’s going on,’ he said, ‘but I think it’s going to be good.’ He had to do something with the energy that surged in from out of the blue. He picked her up, flowers and all, and swung her around a time or two like in the movies. It just felt right.

‘Paddy’s home,’ Feeney said over dinner. ‘Looks like he’s cleared of any suspicion.’

Liam pushing his plate away. ‘Who does she want to come up?’

‘She says matters are settled with Willie Donavan, she’d like to see only family and the Kav’nas and myself. And Seamus, she says, Seamus is family.’

‘Am I family?’ Bella asked Anna.

Liam put his arm around Bella. ‘For better or for worse, kiddo.’

Tad was vested in the violet chasuble over white alb. They met in Catharmore’s front hall, greeting one another after the manner of warm acquaintances.

‘She says she’s turned her life over to God; that you came often and prayed with her.’

‘I think she was eager for you to be home.’

‘I hadn’t planned to come back so soon. The Holy Spirit literally yanked me home by the collar.’

‘What may I do?’

‘Whatever you like-pray, read a Psalm, just be here. I’d like to keep it simple, let the Spirit move. She’s set on making her confession to the whole family-can’t say I ever witnessed such an event.’

‘She seems entirely ready to be sober, to let God have control.’

‘The family are grateful, Tim, as am I. Thanks for everything.’

He grinned. ‘I was all they had.’

The others lining up in the rear hall.

‘I never got to the hard part with her,’ he said. ‘Forgiving herself.’

‘Twill take time.’

They all nodded to Fletcher as she left the bedroom. Carrying a stethoscope, Feeney entered first, then Anna, Bella, Liam, Cynthia, himself, Seamus, Paddy, and Tad. Feeney stood at Evelyn’s left, Tad at her right. The others formed a half circle around the bed, save for Paddy, who stood by the door, his back stiff to the wall.