Anne Tyler - Saint Maybe

In the morning the minister came to discuss the funeral service. He was an elderly, stiff, formal man, and Bee seemed flustered when Ian led him into the kitchen. “Oh, don’t look at all this mess!” she said, untying her apron. “Let’s go into the living room. Ian can feed the children.”

But Dr. Prescott said, “Nonsense,” and sat down in a kitchen chair. “Where’s Mr . Bedloe?” he asked.

Bee said, “Well, I know it sounds heartless, but he had to take the day off yesterday and of course tomorrow’s the funeral so … he went to work.”

“Is that good?” Dr. Prescott asked Daphne. She was squirting a piece of banana between her fingers and then smearing it across her high-chair tray.

“It’s not that he doesn’t mourn her. Really, he feels just dreadful,” Bee said. “Ian, could you fetch a cloth, please? But substitute teachers are so hard to get hold of—”

“Yes, life must go on,” Dr. Prescott said. “Isn’t that right, young Abigail.”

“Agatha,” Bee corrected him. “It’s Claudia’s girl who’s named Abigail.”

“And will the children be attending the service?”

“Oh, no.”

“Sometimes it’s valuable, I’ve learned.”

“We think they’ll have a fine time staying here with Mrs. Myrdal,” Bee said. “Mrs. Myrdal used to sit with them when they lived above the drugstore and she knows all their favorite storybooks.”

She beamed across the table at Agatha. Agatha gazed back at her without a trace of a smile.

Dr. Prescott said, “Agatha, Thomas, I realize all that’s happened must be difficult to understand. Perhaps you’d like to ask me some questions.”

Agatha remained expressionless. Thomas shook his head.

Ian thought, I would! I would! But it wasn’t Ian Dr. Prescott had been addressing.

He’d remembered to bring his suit but he had forgotten a tie, so he had to borrow one of his father’s for the funeral. Standing in front of his mirror, he slid the knot into place and smoothed his collar. When the doorbell rang, he waited for someone to answer. It rang again and Beastie gave a worried yap. “Coming!” Ian called. He crossed the hall and sprinted downstairs.

Mrs. Myrdal had already opened the front door a few inches and poked her head in. Her hat looked like a gray felt potty turned upside down. Ian said, “Hi. Come on in.”

“I worried I was late.”

“No, we’re just getting ready.”

He showed her into the living room, where she settled on the sofa. She was one of those women who grow quilted in old age — her face a collection of pouches, her body a series of squashed mounds. “My, it’s finally getting to be fall,” she said, removing her sweater. “Real nip in the air today.”

“Is that so,” Ian said. He was hanging about in the doorway, wondering whether it was rude to leave.

“And how are those poor children bearing up?” she asked him.

“They’re okay.”

“I couldn’t get over it when your mother called and told me. Those poor little tots! And I understand your parents won’t be keeping them.”

“No, we’re trying to find some relatives,” Ian said.

“Well, it’s a shame,” Mrs. Myrdal said.

“I don’t guess you know of any relatives.”

“No, dear, your mother already asked me. I told her, I said, ‘I’m sorry, but I wouldn’t have an inkling.’ Although just between you and me, I’m pretty near positive that Lucy was, well, not from Baltimore.”

“Ah.”

“You could sort of tell, you know,” she said. “I always sensed it, even before we had our falling out. You heard we’d fallen out, I suppose.”

“Not in so many words,” Ian said.

“Well!” Mrs. Myrdal said. She folded her sweater caressingly. “One time we went downtown together and I caught her shoplifting.”

“Shoplifting?”

“Bold as you please. Swiped a pure silk blouse off a rack and tucked it into the stroller where her innocent baby girl lay sleeping. I was so astounded I just didn’t do a thing. I thought I must have misunderstood; I thought there must be some explanation. I followed along behind her thinking, ‘Now, Ruby, don’t go jumping to conclusions.’ On we march, past the scarf counter. Whisk! Red-and-tan Italian scarf scampers into her bag. I know I should have spoken but I was too amazed. My heart was racing so I thought it had riz up in my throat some way, and I worried we’d be arrested. We could have been, you know! We could have been hauled off to jail like common criminals. Well, luckily we weren’t. But next time she phoned I said, ‘Lucy, I’m busy.’ She said, ‘I just wanted to ask if you could baby-sit.’ ‘Oh,’ I said, ‘I don’t believe I care to, thank you.’ She knew why, too. She didn’t let on but she had to know. Couple of times she asked again, and each time I turned her down.”

Ian ducked his head and busied himself patting Beastie.

“Not that I wished her ill, understand. I was sorry as the next person to hear about her passing.”

From the stairs came the sound of footsteps and his mother’s voice saying, “… juice in that round glass pitcher and—” She arrived in the doorway with the baby propped on her hip. Thomas and Agatha were shadowing her. “Oh! Mrs. Myrdal,” she said. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

Mrs. Myrdal rose and reached out in that fumble-fingered, greedy manner that old ladies take on around babies. “Would you look at how this child has grown!” she said. “Remember Mrs. Moo-doe, darlin’?” She accepted Daphne in a rumpled bunch and cocked her head at the other two. “Thomas and Agatha, I’d never have known you!”

“Now, we shouldn’t be long,” Bee told her. “It’s going to be a very simple … Ian, where’s your father got to?”

Ian said, “Um …”

“Isn’t this just like him! Check the basement, will you? Mrs. Myrdal, the tea bags are in the …”

Ian went out to the kitchen. He thought, She was only shoplifting . He crossed the pantry and started down the basement steps. She wasn’t meeting some man, she was shoplifting . He called, “Dad?”

“Down here.”

That dress was not a present from her lover after all .

His father was tinkering at his workbench. Wearing his good dark suit, his hair still showing the comb lines, he bent over the lamp from the attic bedroom. “Are we set to go?” he asked without turning.

Why, even I have been known to shoplift. Me and Pig and Andrew, back in fifth grade. It’s nothing. Or next to nothing .

“Ian?”

He looked at his father.

“Are we set to go?”

“Yes,” Ian said after a moment.

“Well, then.”

His father switched off the light above the bench. He started toward the stairs. He halted next to Ian and said, “Coming?”

“Yes.”

They climbed the stairs.

Oh, God, this is the one last little dark dot I can’t possibly absorb .

In the hall, his mother was putting on her hat. “Why is it,” she asked his father, “that the minute everyone’s ready, you choose to disappear?”

“I was just looking at that lamp, sweetheart.”

The three of them left the house and walked to the car. Ian felt bruised all down the front of his body, as if he’d been kicked.

The last time he’d been in this church was for Danny’s funeral — and before that, for Danny’s wedding. When he stood on the sidewalk looking up at Dober Street Presbyterian, all his thoughts were gathered toward his brother. He could almost believe that Danny had been left behind here, in this peaked stone building with the louvered steeple.

Inside, his parents stopped to greet Mrs. Jordan while Ian continued down the aisle. He passed Aunt Bev and her husband, and Cousin Amy, and a couple of the foreigners from the neighborhood. He caught sight of Cicely’s blond curls gleaming like fresh pine shavings, and he slid in next to her and took hold of her hand, which turned out to contain a knob of damp Kleenex. Her lashes and her cheeks were damp too, he saw when she smiled at him. She had told him when he telephoned that she wouldn’t think of not coming to this, even though it meant a two-hour train ride. She just needed to say goodbye, she told him. She had always thought Lucy was special.