Marilynne Robinson - Home

So they went on with their game. Glory said, “I don’t recall that we ever did play checkers, you and I. I always played with the younger kids.”

Jack began to make his move, but his hand trembled and he dropped it into his lap.

“What is it,” she said.

He cleared his throat and smiled at her. “You never sneaked me upstairs with a bottle of aspirin. You were a little girl.”

“No, I didn’t mean I did it myself. I just meant I knew that it happened.”

“Sorry. I didn’t realize that. I didn’t realize at the time. That you would have been aware of it.” He cleared his throat.

“It was a stupid thing for me to say, Jack. I apologize. I hope you will forget it.”

He said, “It just makes things sound worse than they were. They were bad enough.”

“All right. I will never say it again.”

He considered. “Say what, exactly?”

“Well, you’re right. I didn’t say that I personally was the one who sneaked you upstairs. That’s just what you heard.”

He said, “I wouldn’t mind if we dropped the subject entirely. All that happened a long time ago.”

At that point she lost her temper. She thought, Why am I apologizing to this man for something I did not say, and also for what I did say, which was only the truth?

“Well.” She hoped she was controlling the quaver of anger in her voice. “At just that moment it was not obvious that all that had ended a long time ago.”

He put his hand to his face. Oh, she thought, this is miserable. Dear God, I have made him ashamed. How will we live in the same house now? He will leave, and Papa will die of grief, and the fault will be mine. So she said, “Forgive me.”

“Yes,” he said, “of course.”

Their father called, “Could one of you children come and give me a little help?”

“I’ll go,” Jack said. She put away the checkerboard, and then she looked down the hall, and there was Jack, kneeling to unlace the old man’s shoes. And his father regarding him with such sad tenderness that she wished she could will herself out of existence, herself and every word she had ever said.

THAT WAS THE DAY A PHONE CALL CAME, A WOMAN ASKING to speak to Jack Boughton. Glory said he was in the garden and she would call him, but he wasn’t there, so she went to the barn, where she found him leaning into the engine of the car. “There’s a telephone call for you.”

“Who is it?”

“She didn’t say. A woman.”

“Jesus,” he said, and he stepped past her and ran down the path and up the steps into the house. When she came into the kitchen the phone was back on its hook. “She hung up.” He said, “Sweet Jesus, I’m out of the house twenty minutes—”

“I’m sorry—”

He shook his head. “It’s not your fault. Did she tell you her name? What did she say?”

“She said she was calling from St. Louis. The connection was very bad. There was a lot of noise. She was calling from a phone booth, I think.”

“From St. Louis? She said that?”

“Yes.”

He sat down at the table. “St. Louis! Did she say she would call back?”

“Well, no. I thought I would be able to find you. I guess I thought she’d stay on the line. I should have asked.”

He drew a very deep breath and rubbed his eyes. “None of this is your fault,” he said. His hands were greasy, so he went to the sink and washed them, and washed his face, then he took a dishcloth and wiped down the telephone. “None of this is my fault, either, I suppose. There’s absolutely no comfort in that thought.” He sat down at the table. “I hope I’m not in the way here. I cannot be farther than an arm’s length from the telephone into the indefinite future. Jack Boughton in chains. All I need is an eagle to peck at my liver, such as it is. Ah,” he said, and he laughed. “At least I got a call. That’s something.” The thought seemed to lift his spirits.

“Can’t you call her? I mean, I know she was calling from a phone booth. But couldn’t you call her family and ask how to reach her?”

He shook his head. “I have been warmly encouraged not to do that. By her father, no less.”

She brought him the book she meant to read next, The Paths of Glory .

“Your memoirs?”

She said, “The girls in this family got named for theological abstractions and the boys got named for human beings. That’s bad enough without our having to be teased about it for the rest of our lives.”

“Sorry. It just slipped out. No more jokes.”

“‘The paths of Glory lead but to the grave.’ Now you don’t have to struggle with the urge to say that, either.”

“Thank you,” he said. “What a relief!”

So he sat in the kitchen reading, drumming his fingers. He turned the book to the last few pages and read the ending. “Sad!” He put it aside. She gave him a bowl of walnuts and he shelled them. And he paced. And he stood on the porch, just outside the back door, and smoked.

Two hours passed and the phone rang.

Her father called, in his sleep, “Could you get that, Glory?”

“It’s probably for Jack, Papa.”

“No, Faith said in her note she’d be giving me a call. She hasn’t called in a number of days.”

“You talked to her yesterday.”

The phone rang again. She whispered to Jack, “Answer it!” because he was just standing there, looking at her. She took the phone off the hook and handed it to him, and then she went to her father’s room. He was sitting on the edge of the bed. He looked drowsy, but he seemed set on getting up, so she brought his robe.

She heard Jack clear his throat. “Hello?”

Her father said, “That’s a very good thing. He should talk with all his sisters and brothers. Every one of them. They are anxious to hear from him.”

Jack said, “What’s that? I can’t quite hear you! He did? When? I am talking louder! No, it’s not your fault, I know that! Yes, they do get upset!”

Her father said, “Well, I can’t imagine that there could be any reason to shout like that!”

Glory said, “It’s a bad connection, someone calling from a phone booth.”

“Well, I hope so. Otherwise I’ll have to call Faith and explain. And I really don’t know how I could explain his shouting at her like that. I really don’t. She has always been very fond of him.” His eyes were closed, but she combed his hair and helped him into his slippers.

“He would never shout at Faith, Papa. So it has to be someone else.”

“Yes,” the old man said. “I suppose I should have realized that.”

Glory was trying to distract her father from the conversation, and she was trying not to hear it herself, though Jack did sound alarmed, or aggrieved, and she could not help but wish she knew what the matter was.

“If the boys could keep looking!” he shouted. “I’ll pay them! I’ll send money!” A pause. “No, I wasn’t suggesting that! I mean, I’m sure you are all doing your best, Mrs. Johnson! Believe me! I certainly don’t blame you!”

Her father said, “Yes, he mentioned a Mrs. Johnson. He’s shouting at someone we don’t even know.”

“Please, if he turns up, call any time! Call collect! Yes, thank you, thank you!”

She followed her father down the hall to the kitchen. Jack was sitting on the floor with his back against the wall and his knees drawn up, rubbing his face. He stood up and smoothed back his hair. He was pale and his eyes were red. He said, “It’s nothing. A dog ran off. I promised someone I’d look after his dog.”

“Oh yes,” his father said. “All that shouting was about a dog.” He shook his head. Her father woke up gruff sometimes, or confused. Sometimes he needed an hour or so to come into himself. Jack couldn’t know that.