John Barth - Giles Goat-Boy

"Imagine a nice girl married to such a man!" Max concluded — we were almost across the river by this time, and I pointed Croaker downstream towards the fire. "It almost wonders me whether we should trust her."

"You won't wonder when you see her," I assured him.

"Well, I saw right much of her already. And you too — which you shouldn't have enjoyed it like you did." However, he added to my relief, during his anxious half-hour alone on the beach he had reviewed my behavior in the light of comparative cyclology and decided that while yielding to such temptations would in his opinion disqualify me for Grand-Tutorhood, simply being tempted in itself did not, at least not necessarily: Laertides, after all, had deliberately attended the sweet Sirens' singing and even commanded his crew to change course from their true destination and head for the rocks. The difference between us, which must caution me for the future, was that Laertides, being properly forewarned, had seen to it both that his freedom of action would be suspended and that his commands would be ignored during his temporary madness, his relapse from herohood.

"It's a kind of insurance," Max declared. "Nobody can be a hero every minute of every day; even Enos Enoch must've had times when He wished He was just another freshman, He wouldn't have to get Himself nailed up. What's important is to see you can slip, and make sure nobody pays attention when you say ' Pfui on Commencement!' If you won't stop up your ears and eyes, you got to tie yourself to the mast like Laertides did, and tell me not to mind your crazy talk." The self-binding, he explained, was figurative: I must let him be my Mast as well as my forewarner and tie myself to him with the Rope of a solemn vow, to submit to his restraining whenever I was tempted to compromise my difficult mission. There occurred to me certain objections — questions, really, of a theoretical nature — to what he said: it was easy enough for us to maintain, for example, that Laertides' Siren-chasing moods were the improper ones and his home-striving moods the proper, inasmuch as we saw both from the poet's perspective, and the choice moreover was inherent in the premise of the fable. What would have kept a real Laertides, I wondered, from telling himself that the Sirens' voice was actually his wife's, or that only now, having heard them, did he realize that their rock, and not the rocky coast of home, was his true destination? Other tales there were in which the hero's conception of his task was not so insusceptible to doubt as Laertides' had been — but it so relieved me not to be scolded for the lust that had possessed me (and not to have to worry about it further myself), I saved these reservations for some future time.

"Tell this ape he should put me down now," Max requested. " Ach, what a pair of roommates, Eblis Eierkopf and this one!"

I did so, gratified at the promptness with which Croaker heeded the pointing of my stick. It seemed to control him better than either word-commands or pressure of the heels: a mild whack athwart his hip with it, for instance, even served to check his jumping up and down when Anastasia came to meet us, her fine eyes raised uncertainly to mine. I remarked that she was alone, The Living Sakhyan and his party having gone their way.

"Mrs. Stoker," I said (recalling how such things were done in an etiquette book Lady Creamhair once had fed to me): "Max Spielman, my advisor."

"How d'you do," Anastasia murmured, and Max nodded shortly. I attributed the coolness in her voice to embarrassment, and so assured her that Max now understood and was grateful for her noble intentions, held her in no way responsible for G. Herrold's drowning, and sympathized with her for what she had suffered.

"I'll speak for myself," Max interrupted. "Look me in the eyes once, young lady." She did so, still maintaining her odd reserve. "This fellow here has got a job to do, more important and dangerous than any other job on campus; it's just what Maurice Stoker would try to keep him from doing. So: did you do what you did to save us from Croaker, or did your husband send you out here to stop this young man? Tell me the truth — it wouldn't surprise me if he'd set Croaker on us too, and that whole story about Eierkopf was a lie."

The girl did not answer at once; she bit her lower lip and seemed about to cry.

"Don't scold her so, Max! She's just had bad things happen to her."

"Dear girl," Max said more gently, "if you really been raped I kiss your feet and beg your pardon. Passèd are the raped, like it says in the Seminar-on-the-Hill. But it's not easy to trust a person that lives with Maurice Stoker."

"You don't understand him," Anastasia said distractedly; she put her hand to her forehead. "I think I've got to sit down. It's hard to know what to say after all I've heard about you…"

"Heard?" Max cried. " Ja sure, from that Dean o' Flunks husband of yours!"

She shook her head, still standing. "From my mother, Dr. Spielman! And from Uncle Ira, and Grandpa Reg!"

"What's this?" Now Max was wide-eyed, and the girl seemed on the verge of swooning. He stepped to steady her; she hid her face in his shoulder. "Young lady, who are you?"

Her voice came muffled from his fleece. "My name used to be Stacey Hector. I'm Virginia Hector's daughter… and I guess… yours too."

Having made this declaration, Anastasia lost her voice entirely and wept into Max's wrapper, while my advisor, shaking his head from side to side, could say only, "Yi yi yi yi!" and pat her hair. I suggested we move to the abandoned fire, and went astride Croaker to fetch more sticks against the night-chill. Max was protesting, when I returned, that while he had indeed loved Miss Virginia R. Hector extremely, he was innocent of her impregnation and could not understand why she had persisted in accusing him. To which Anastasia replied, it was not her mother who accused him, at least not in recent years; her mother had alas gone somewhat out of her senses and declared by turns that she had never been pregnant at all; that she had been pregnant but by no mortal man in the University; that Anastasia was no child of hers; etc., etc.

"It was Uncle Ira and Grandpa Reg who blamed you," she said. "I used to ask them who was this Max that Mother talked about when she'd had too much to drink — she used to drink a lot — "

"Yi yi!" Max groaned.

"— and when I was older they told me my father was a bad man named Max Spielman that had deserted my mother and caused a lot of trouble before they fired him. Please don't do that…" Max had set himself to kissing her sandals and beating his forehead upon the sand. "I never hated you the way they said I should. I used to wonder what could have made you treat Mother like that, and I decided it must have been something you couldn't help, or you never would have done it. I used to wish I'd meet you, so I could let you know I didn't hate you for anything, and even if you cursed me or hit me, the way people do sometimes, at least you'd have me there to do it to, and it might make you feel better about Mother and me. Maurice is that way, and Uncle Ira used to be too."

"Georgie!" Max cried. "Hear the voice of sweet Commencement!" He then declared to Anastasia, still on his knees before her, that so pass him Founder he was not her father, but the victim of heartbreaking accusations and false charges, the motive whereof he despaired of ever learning. That he nonetheless cursed and reproached himself for not having stood by the woman he loved, understanding (as one with half Anastasia's own loving nature would have, he was certain) that his dear lady's indictments were the fruit of some desperation; he would never forgive himself, he vowed, for not having pled guilty to the false paternity, so sparing Virginia Hector the dismal afflictions it seemed had come upon her, and Anastasia the egregious burden of illegitimacy.