Joyce Oates - Sourland

In Drex’s excited narration Madeleine had witnessed a street mugging — a savage senseless murder — a white male pedestrian attacked by a gang of black boys with switchblades — his throat so deeply slashed he’d nearly been decapitated. (In subsequent accounts of the stabbing, gradually it happened that the victim had in fact been decapitated — even as, horribly, he’d tried to run away, staggering forward until he fell.) (But was decapitation so easy to accomplish, cutting through the spinal cord? — Rhonda couldn’t think so.) The attack had taken place in broad daylight in front of dozens of witnesses and no one intervened — somewhere downtown, below Houston — unless over by the river, in the meat-packing district — or by the entrance to the Holland Tunnel — or (maybe) by the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel, one of those wide ugly avenues like Eleventh? Twelfth? — not late but after dark. The victim had tried to fight off his assailants — valiantly, foolishly — as Drex said The kind of crazy thing I might do myself, if muggers tried to take my wallet from me — but of course he hadn’t a chance — he’d been outnumbered by his punk-assailants — before Madeleine’s horrified eyes he’d bled out on the street. Dozens of witnesses and no one wanted to get involved — not even a license plate number or a description of the killers — just they were “black” — “carried knives” — Poor Madeleine was in such shock, these savages had gotten a good look at her through her windshield — she thought they were “high on drugs” — only a few yards from Madeleine my God if they hadn’t been in a rush to escape they’d have killed her for sure — so she couldn’t identify them — who the hell would’ve stopped them? Not the New York cops — they took their good time arriving.

Drex spoke with assurance and authority and yet — Rhonda didn’t think that the stabbing had happened quite like this. So confusing! — for it was so very hard to retain the facts of the story — if they were “facts” — from one time to the next. Each adult was so persuasive — hearing adults speak you couldn’t resist nodding your head in agreement or in a wish to agree or to be liked or loved, for agreeing — and so — how was it possible to know what was real ? Of all the stories of the stabbing Rhonda had heard it was Drex’s account that was scariest — Rhonda shivered thinking of her mother being killed — trapped in her car and angry black boys smashing her car windows, dragging her out onto the street stab-stab-stabbing…Rhonda felt dazed and dizzy to think that if Mommy had been killed then Rhonda would never have a mother again.

And so Rhonda would not be Drex Hay’s sweet little stepdaughter he had to speak sharply to, at times; Rhonda would not be living in the brick Colonial on Winant Drive but somewhere else — she didn’t want to think where.

Never would Rhonda have met elderly Mrs. Hay with the soft-wrinkled face and eager eyes who was Drex’s mother and who came often to the house on Winant Drive with presents for Rhonda — crocheted sweater sets, hand-knit caps with tassels, fluffy-rabbit bedroom slippers which quickly became too small for Rhonda’s growing feet. Rhonda was uneasy visiting Grandma Hay in her big old granite house on Hodge Road with its medicinal odors and sharp-barking little black pug Samson; especially Rhonda was uneasy if the elderly woman became excitable and disapproving as often she did when (for instance) the subject of the stabbing in Manhattan came up, as occasionally it did in conversation about other, related matters — urban life, the rising crime rate, deteriorating morals in the last decades of the twentieth century. By this time in all their lives of course everyone had heard the story of the stabbing many times in its many forms, the words had grown smooth like stones fondled by many hands. Rhonda’s stepfather Drex had only to run his hands through his thinning rust-colored hair and sigh loudly to signal a shift in the conversation Remember that time Madeleine was almost murdered in New York City… and Grandma Hay would shiver thrilled and appalled New York is a cesspool, don’t tell me it’s been “cleaned up” — you can’t clean up filth — those people are animals — you know who I mean — they are all on welfare — they are “crack babies” — society has no idea what to do with them and you dare not talk about it, some fool will call you “racist” — Oh you’d never catch me driving into the city in just a car by myself — even when I was younger — what it needs is for a strong mayor — to crack down on these animals — you would wish for God to swipe such animals away with His thumb — would that be a mercy!

When Grandma Hay hugged her Rhonda tried not to shudder crinkling her nose against the elderly woman’s special odor. For Rhonda’s mother warned Don’t offend your new “grandma” — just be a good, sweet girl.

Mr. Karr was living now in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for Mr. Karr was now a professor at Harvard. Rhonda didn’t like her father’s new house or her father’s new young wife nor did Rhonda like Cambridge, Massachusetts, anywhere near as much as Rhonda liked Princeton where she had friends at Princeton Day School and so she sulked and cried when she had to visit with Daddy though she loved Daddy and she liked — tried to like — Daddy’s new young wife Brooke who squinted and smiled at Rhonda so hard it looked as if Brooke’s face must hurt. Once, it could not have been more than the second or third time she’d met Brooke, Rhonda happened to overhear her father’s new young wife telling friends who’d dropped by their house for drinks This terrible thing that happened to my husband before we were married — on the street in New York City in broad daylight he witnessed a man stabbed to death — the man’s throat was slashed, blood sprayed out like for six feet Gerald says it was the most amazing — horrible — thing he’d ever seen — the poor man just kept walking — trying to walk — with both his hands he tried to stop the bleeding — Gerald shouted out his car window — there was more than one of them — the attackers — Gerald never likes to identify them as black — persons of color — and the victim was a white man — I don’t think the attackers were ever caught — Gerald opened his car door, and shouted at them — he was risking his life interfering — he’s utterly reckless, he has the most amazing courage — the way Gerald describes it, it’s like I was there with him — I was in middle school at Katonah Day at the time — just totally unknowing, oblivious — I dream of it sometimes — the stabbing — how close Gerald and I came to never meeting, never falling in love and our entire lives changed like a tragic miracle…

You’d have thought that Mr. Karr would try to stop his silly young wife saying such things that weren’t wrong entirely — but certainly weren’t right — and Rhonda knew they weren’t right — and Rhonda was a witness staring coldly at the chattering woman who was technically speaking her stepmother but Mr. Karr seemed scarcely to be listening in another part of the room pouring wine into long-stemmed crystal glasses for his guests and drinking with them savoring the precious red burgundy which appeared to be the center of interest on this occasion for Mr. Karr had been showing his guests the label on the wine bottle which must have been an impressive label judging from their reactions as the wine itself must have been exquisite for all marveled at it. Rhonda saw that her father’s whiskers were bristly gray like metal filings, his face was ruddy and puffy about the eyes as if he’d just wakened from a nap — when “entertaining” in his home often Mr. Karr removed his glasses, as he had now — his stone-colored eyes looked strangely naked and lashless — still he exuded an air of well-being, a yeasty heat of satisfaction lifted from his skin. There on a nearby table was Gerald Karr’s new book Democracy in America Imperiled and beside the book as if it had been casually tossed down was a copy of The New York Review of Books in which there was said to be — Rhonda had not seen it — a “highly positive” review of the book. And there, in another corner of the room, the beautiful blond silly young wife exclaiming with widened eyes to a circle of rapt listeners Ohhh when I think of it my blood runs cold, how foolishly brave Gerald was — how close it was, the two of us would never meet and where would I be right now? This very moment, in all of the universe?