Louise Erdrich - Four Souls

Just so, the other Four Souls lived beneath the life of Fleur Pillager. Her name influenced Fleur’s actions and told her what to do. How can I tell you this? How can I make you see? Sometimes it is too difficult for even an old man, one who loves to sling words. Sometimes I have trouble with this thought — how this surface of life that tosses and shatters is not the real surface. How we are dreams, blasts, shadows, insubstantial gusts of motion. That this stub of a grain dealer’s pencil that moves across the page of paper is not real, either, and that the truth lies on the other side of even these words.

I T WAS HARD to believe that a man who had so wonderfully stripped and profited from his holdings here on earth could so easily become that woman’s dupe. False heaven, I thought when I understood the locked door to his room, the indiscreet sounds from within, the dazed look of foolish contentment on his face. False man, I cried aloud when not more than a year after she had come to do the laundry the woman was in possession of it and the entire house. In short order, sister and myself were served legally with papers. To my surprise, we were offered a settlement so handsome that we thought it wise to accept, particularly since Placide admitted to me that she had practiced Karezza with her painting instructor for the whole past year and cared little what Mauser did. Within weeks, to the astonishment of all who lived up and down the avenue, we had secured a proper house in Saint Paul and were preparing to move. And may I now say, here, that the word “Karezza” shall nevermore pass my lips? For upon the description of that discipline, innocently outlined to the doctor by my sister, Mauser was able not only to divorce Placide but to annul their marriage in the Holy Roman Church.

To the grand sobs of Mrs. Testor (who chose nonetheless to stay) and the ill-disguised happiness of Fantan, we left. Once sister and I took up life in Saint Paul, our view of the situation gained a measure of perspective and we were able to enjoy (perhaps spitefully, I admit) as well as report on the spectacle that John James soon made with his squaw.

Certainly, she had to know that people called her squaw behind her back, but never face-to-face beyond the one time Mr. Virgil Hill described. It was his sense, he thoughtfully remarked, that having addressed her as a squaw he stood in sudden danger of evisceration. It happened (he said he was quite innocent of ill intentions) as they stood by the buffet table where a huge rare roast stood pink and lucious with the carving knife temporarily abandoned by the server. He was suddenly aware how close the handle of that knife lay to the hand of the wife of John James Mauser. It was nothing he could quantify. She did not pick up the knife or even make one gesture toward it with her fingers. Yet the air between them itched.

So I shan’t call Fleur “squaw” again at the safety of this remove, for I would not dare say it to her face. I do not believe in saying such things at a distance that one hasn’t the boldness of nerve to say in person. I am not interested in risking evisceration , you can be sure. After all, my sister so completely depends upon me that I think were I to die and leave her to her own devices, she wouldn’t survive the rigors of her art.

Enough to say that with me to run Placide’s life she did survive. The two of us did well enough. Our portion from Mauser was such a generous maintenance that we had no complaints as far as that went. And, too, the figure that John Mauser soon presented was so pathetic, so ludicrous, that we did not feel the sting of his abandonment. People sympathized quite openly with us, though there were some men cut of a questionable fabric who professed that they understood his attraction to the Indian woman. Once she began to appear at certain functions in dramatic, daring, and yet somehow decently reserved exquisite gowns, she attracted a low sort of admiration. And then she vanished, for shame we hoped. But it turned out the reason was quite different.

Mrs. Testor became my confidante. After Fleur had ceased to appear in public, I went to visit Testor once a week, bearing a small and appropriate gift — a set of candles, a sack of licorice, a bag of scented salts — at the hour when John James Mauser and his wife were accustomed to motor out to Minnetonka to take the air or to lunch in grand style at one of the most exclusive downtown clubs. Testor fixed me a cup of tea on most days and we had a cozy little chat. On the day I learned the reason for Mrs. Mauser’s concealment, I also understood that she was not at lunch but upstairs, in bed.

“She is unwell ,” said Testor, with a meaningful emphasis. I understood at once. A thick bolt of envy pierced me.

“This means an heir,” I said in a neutral tone.

“So it does.”

I was quiet. I tried to sip my tea, but its sweetness choked me. Having never been one to bemoan my lot, I made no expression of acknowledgment one way or the other. I don’t think Mrs. Testor was of sufficient sensitivity to observe how I paled and trembled. I don’t think she understood at all that sadness ran me through like a sword. I don’t think she or anyone knew then, or ever will know, with what desperate eagerness I wanted a child. I took my leave, went out to the motorcar where my little dog, Diablo, sat curled on the passenger’s seat. He had long since stopped begging me for anything, the little tyrant. He gazed straight ahead as though anxious to get back and eat the food in his silver bowl. So I got in, behind the wheel, and drove him home.

THE NEXT WORLD, of what shall consist its poisons and delights? Love in this world avoided me. And love’s issue, beyond all measure. Immersed in the saltless broth of my existence, I tried on moods. Here was Polly Elizabeth, coy in felt slippers and hair net. Here she was parading proud in a gown of Greek influence. Now a silly Fräulein holding her skirts above her head. As my sister made new friends in the more advanced artistic circles of our city, she also gained a plethora of models from which to choose. And so I was left posing in cobbled-together costumes with no one to paint me. Here was Judith holding the severed head of Holofernes. Now Saint Theresa of Avila undergoing her torment by the devil. At last I could only see Polly Elizabeth, in chains of foolishness. What was I, who was I, but one considered dangerous to others from the tedium of my company?

I found myself returning with ever more frequency to the house of my former brother-in-law. I was drawn there by the prospect of a baby, as though by a force that overpowered my will. I came to the door with a pound cake and a visiting card.

“Please bring it up to her,” I said to Mrs. Testor, who regarded me with the raw shock of someone who had seen the risen dead on the day of judgment.

“Oh, shut your mouth, Nettie,” I said, and stood my ground. “Can’t I make it up with his new wife if I want to?”

Mrs. Testor shrugged, her eyes still round, and placed the cake and my card right next to it on the silver tray I used to carry up to Placide’s studio. She brought the offering up the stairs. Came straight back down. The pound cake sat untouched. My card was turned over next to it. An eloquent rejection.

“I won’t give up, Testor,” I said. “I shall return. Is she craving anything? Can you give me a hint?”

Nettie Testor paused and bit her lip, struggling with some information. Where in the past I would have ordered her to tell it to me, now I mustered the patience to wait. I knew only humility on my part would unseal her lips. As I knew she would, Testor relented. She boiled a kettle of water, poured it into the brown teapot with the chipped spout, and while it steeped she told me that Fleur was having some difficulty carrying the child and there was concern she’d lose it. As Testor filled my cup, I was surprised to feel a sinking hollow in the pit of my stomach, and then a pang that made me shiver. I was suddenly anxious to return to my preciously assembled household library and consult the sections of my eugenic hygiene books that dealt with delicate pregnancies. I quickly drained my cup, thanked Testor, and told her I was going home to research the matter and find a cure.