Pearl Buck - The Eternal Wonder

To write books—that would give meaning and purpose to all that he might experience! When he was five, he had wanted to learn to play the piano, and he played it well now, but it was not his work. Composition, perhaps, might be, but not merely to play the works of others, however great, and he had composed music just as he had written poetry. But books, solid books, putting into permanent and lasting form what he knew by experiences and could therefore communicate. He saw books, already written, standing in a stately row upon a shelf, living their own life long after he was dead. With this solemn and imposing vision clear in his mind, he drifted into sleep. The coals in the fireplace died to ashes and outside the snow continued to fall.

HE WAS WAKENED, SLOWLY AND GENTLY sometime in the night, by a hand stroking his thighs and moving, ever so slowly, ever so gently to his genitals. At first he thought it a dream. He was beginning to have strange new dreams, not often, for his rapid and extraordinary physical growth, combined with his incessant reading and studying, his obsession with learning everything as quickly as possible, had consumed his energy. But he wakened suddenly when he felt his body respond to the moving hands. He sat up abruptly, and by the light of a newly lighted fire, he was face-to-face with Sharpe. They stared at each other for a long instant, Sharpe smiling, his eyes half-closed. He was wrapped in a red satin robe.

“Leave me alone!” Rann muttered between his teeth.

“Do I frighten you, dear boy?” Sharpe asked softly.

“Just leave me alone,” Rann repeated.

He pushed Sharpe from him and wrapped the blanket about his lower body.

“I introduce you to love,” Sharpe said gently. “There are many kinds of love. All love is good. I learned that in India.”

“I am going home,” Rann said sternly. “Kindly leave the room so that I can dress.”

Sharpe stood up. “Don’t be absurd. The snow is two feet deep.”

“I’ll walk it.”

“You are being childish,” Sharpe said. “We were talking of experience. All evening—we were talking of the necessity of experience. When I offer it to you in the form of a sophisticated love, as old as Greece itself and of Plato, you are afraid. You want to run home to your mother.”

“Perhaps you are right, Dr. Sharpe. Perhaps I am being childish. There is really no reason for me to go home in a snowstorm. It’s just that this has taken me quite by surprise and I do not wish to pursue the subject any further, so it seems best that I leave.”

Sharpe sat in the chair by the fireplace and watched Rann. “Again I say, don’t be absurd. The snow is nearly two feet deep. You have said you don’t wish to pursue the subject any further, so that’s all there is to it. I’ll go to bed and leave you quite alone. After all, I have my own pride, you know.”

“I’m sure of that, Dr. Sharpe, and I’m equally sure I can believe you will not bother me again.”

“You can be sure of that, Rann. Now I’ll go to bed. Good night, dear boy, and I’m sorry, or perhaps I’m sorry for my sake and not for yours, that things cannot be different.”

When Donald Sharpe left the room, Rann tried to put the events of the evening into some sort of order so he could understand what had happened. It was of no use, for he could not understand. He was desperately tired, he was sick with anger, with disappointment, and to his astonishment and horror, he burst into weeping as soon as he put out the light and drew the covers about his shoulders. He had not wept since his father died, but these were bitter tears too. He had been wounded, he had been insulted, his body violated—and he had lost the friend in whom he had believed with all his heart and soul. Moreover—and this shocked him to new knowledge of himself—his body, while he slept, had physically responded to the stimulation. He was angry with himself, too. Of course he could not continue now with college. What if Sharpe wanted to explain, apologize, try to establish some sort of relationship again? He, himself, was too embarrassed by his own response to even think of it.

He returned to his own home early the following day.

“I’m going away for a while,” he said to his mother, trying to speak calmly.

His mother looked across the table at him, her blue eyes opened wide. “Now? In the middle of the school term?”

He was silent for a long moment. Suppose he told her about last night? He decided against it for now. The conflict within him was too great. He had to think through the whole relationship with Donald Sharpe—his admiration for the man quite apart from the experience of last night. Would he have told even his father, had he been alive? A year ago, yes, he would have told him. But now, maturing as he was, and he was mature enough to recognize how much of this was due to the many hours he had spent with Sharpe, he felt he would not have confided last night’s experience even with his father. He recoiled from the physical disgust he felt for Sharpe as he thought of him and would recoil at any memory of it forever, but he wanted time to understand why a man of Sharpe’s brilliance and, yes, goodness—could stoop to so physical an act. Perhaps he would never understand; if not, then he must try to understand himself, and why, hating the act, he was surprised to realize that he did not hate the man. But the shock, the horror, was too recent. He needed time to sort out his feelings.

“Yes, now,” he said to his mother.

“Where will you go?” she asked.

He could see that she was trying to hide her consternation, perhaps even her fear. Her lower lip quivered.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Southward, perhaps, so that I can be out-of-doors.”

She said no more and he knew why. Long ago he had heard his father tell her. “Don’t push the boy with your questions. When he is ready to tell us, he will tell us.”

He had been grateful many times for this advice, and never more grateful than now. He rose from the table.

“Thank you, Mother,” he said gently, and went upstairs to his room.

IN THE NIGHT HE WAKED and lying quiet, his eyes opening wide, he saw his mother standing beside his bed, wrapped in her long white flannel robe. He turned on the bedside lamp and saw her looking at him.

“I can’t sleep,” she said wistfully.

He sat up in bed. “Aren’t you feeling well?” he asked.

“I feel a heaviness here,” she said, crossing her hands on her breast.

“A pain?”

“Not physical,” she said. “A sadness, a loneliness. I could bear more easily your going away if I knew what had happened to make you want to go.”

He was instantly wary. “What makes you think something has happened?”

“You’re changed—you’re very changed.” She sat down on the bed so that they were face-to-face. “It was such a mistake that it was your father who died and not I,” she went on in the same tone. She had a girlish voice, very young and gentle. But she was not old. She had been only twenty-two when he was born and she looked younger, especially now with her curly red-gold hair about her face and on her shoulders. “I should have been the one to die,” she repeated mournfully. “I’m not capable of helping you. I know that. I can quite understand why you can’t confide in me. It’s probably true that I wouldn’t know how to help you.”

“It is not that I don’t want to confide in you,” he protested. “It’s that I don’t know how. It’s so—unspeakable.”

“Is it about a girl, darling? Because if it is, I’ve been a girl myself and sometimes—”

“That’s just it. It’s not about a girl.”

“Is it about Donald Sharpe?”

“How did you know?”

“You’ve been so different since you knew him, Rannie—so wrapped up in your friendship. And I was glad. He’s brilliant, everyone says. I’ve been happy that he was teaching you—being like an older brother, but—”