Kent Haruf - Plainsong

She didn’t say anything, she didn’t refuse. And so he began to kiss her and caress her once more and after a while he lay on top of her, holding himself up, and after a while longer he came inside and began to move slowly, and in truth it seemed to be all right. But still she was worried.

Later, they lay in bed quietly. The room was not a very big one. He had nailed a couple of posters on the walls for decoration. There was one window which had a shade pulled down over it and outside the window was the noise of nighttime Denver traffic.

Still later they got up from bed and he called on the phone for pizza and the delivery boy brought it and he paid the boy and made a little joke which made the boy laugh, and after he was gone they ate the pizza together in the front room and watched what there was on television until midnight. The next morning he got up early and went to work. And then she was lonely as soon as he left the apartment and she didn’t know what to do with herself.

Three hours after dark they stopped the pickup at the curb in front of Maggie Jones’s house and got out in the cold and went up onto the porch. When she came to the door she was still in her school clothes, a long skirt and sweater, but she had taken her shoes off and was in her stocking feet. What is it? she said. Will you come in?

They got as far as the front hall. Then they began to speak, almost at the same time.

She never come home today, Harold said. We been driving all over these streets looking for her.

We don’t even know where to start looking, Raymond said.

We been driving the streets more than three hours, looking everywhere we could think of.

You’re talking about Victoria, of course, Maggie said.

There don’t seem to be any friend we could talk to, Raymond said. Least we don’t know of one.

She didn’t come home on the bus after school this evening?

No.

Has she not come home like this before?

No. This is the first.

Something must of happened to her, Harold said. She must of got taken off or something.

Watch what you say, Raymond said. We don’t know that. I’m not going to think that yet.

Yes, Maggie said, that’s right. Let me make some calls first. You want to come in and sit down?

They entered her living room as they would some courtroom or church sanctuary and looked around cautiously and finally chose to sit on the davenport. Maggie went back to the kitchen to the phone. They could hear her talking. They sat holding their hats between their knees, just waiting until she came back into the room.

I called two or three girls in her class, she said, and finally called Alberta Willis. She said she’d given Victoria a note from a boy waiting in a car out in the parking lot. I asked her if she knew what was in the note. She said it was private, it wasn’t to her. But did you read it? I asked her.

Yes. But just once, she said.

Tell me please. What did it say?

Mrs. Jones, it didn’t say anything. Only come see me in the parking lot, and then his name. Dwayne.

Do you know him? I said.

No. But he’s from Norka. Only he doesn’t live there no more. Nobody knows where he lives.

And did Victoria go out to him in the parking lot, like the note said?

Yes, she went out to him. I tried to tell her not to. I warned her.

And did you not see her after that?

No. I didn’t see her again after that at all.

So, Maggie said to the McPherons. I think she must have gone with him. With this boy.

The old brothers looked at her for a considerable time without speaking, watching her, their faces sad and tired.

You know him yourself at all? Harold said finally.

No, she said. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen the boy. The kids know him somewhat. He was at some of the dances last year, this past summer particularly. That’s when Victoria met him. She told me a little about that. But she wouldn’t ever tell me his name. This is the first I’ve heard any part of his name.

Did that girl on the phone know the rest of it?

No.

They stared at her again for a time, waiting for anything more.

So she isn’t hurt, Harold said. Or lost.

No, I don’t think so.

She isn’t lost, Raymond said. That’s all we know. We don’t know about hurt.

Oh, I want to believe she is all right, Maggie said. Let us think that.

What brought her to leave though? Raymond said. Can you tell me that. You think we did something to her?

Of course not, Maggie Jones said.

Don’t you?

No, she said. Not for a minute.

Harold looked slowly around the room. I don’t think we did anything to her, he said. I can’t think of anything we might of did. He looked at Maggie. I been trying to think, he said.

Of course not, she said. I know you didn’t.

Harold nodded. He looked around again and stood up. I reckon we might as well go on home, he said. What else is there to do. He put his old work hat on again.

Raymond still sat as before. You think this here is the one? he said. That give her the baby?

Yes, Maggie said. I think it must be.

Raymond studied her for a moment. Then he said, Oh. He paused. Well. I’m getting old. I’m slow on the uptake. And then he couldn’t think what more there might be to say. He stood up beside his brother. He looked past Maggie, out across the room. I reckon we can go, he said. We thank you for your kindly help, Maggie Jones.

They went out of her house into the cold again and drove off. At home they put on their canvas coveralls and went out in the dark, carrying a lantern to the calf shed where they’d penned up a heifer they’d noticed was showing springy. She was one of the two-year-olds. They’d noticed her bag had begun to show tight too. So they had brought her into the three-sided shed next to the work corrals the day before.

Now when they stepped through the gate, holding the lantern aloft under the pole roof, they could see she wasn’t right. She faced them across the bright straw and frozen ground, humped up, her tail lifted straight out, her eyes wide and nervous. She took a couple of quick jittery steps. Then they saw that the calf bed was pushed out of her, hanging against her back legs, high up beneath her tail, and there was one pink hoof protruded from the prolapsed uterus. The heifer stepped away, taking painful little steps, humped up, moving toward the back wall, the hoof of her unborn calf sticking out from behind her as though it were mounted in dirty burlap.

They got a rope around the heifer’s neck, made a quick halter of it and snugged her tight to the shed wall. Then Harold took off his mittens and pushed at the hoof for a long time until he was able to move it back inside, and then he went inside with his hand and felt of her and tried to position the calf’s head between the two front feet as it was supposed to be, but the head wasn’t right and the calf would not come. The little heifer was worn out now. Her head hung down and her back was humped. She stood and moaned. There was nothing to do but use the calf chain. They put the loops inside the heifer over the unborn calf’s legs above the hocks, then fit the U-shaped piece against the heifer’s hindquarters, and began to jack the calf out. Ratcheting it out of her. The heifer was pulled against the rope around her neck and head and she moaned in harsh pants and once raised her head to bawl, her eyes rolled back to white in terror. Then the calf’s head came out with the front legs and suddenly the whole calf dropped heavily, slick and wet, and they caught it and wiped its nose clean and checked its mouth for air passage. They put the calf down in the straw. For the next hour, while the heifer stood panting and groaning they cleaned the prolapsed uterus and pushed it back inside of her and then sewed her up with heavy thread. Afterward they shot her with penicillin and stood the calf up and pointed it toward the heifer’s bag. The heifer sniffed at the calf and roused a little and began to lick at it. The calf bumped at her and started to suck.