Jesse Ball: The Lesson

They both laughed that short hoarse barking laugh again, and looked closely at Loring.

— Come over here, they said.

— No, said Loring. Leave me alone.

One actually laid a hand on her and drew her over to the house.

— Come here, aren’t you Loring Wesley? I think my mother knew you. Is this what you look like now?

— Can you see this dress she’s wearing? It isn’t fit to take a shit in. And this scarf, why it’s filth all over. Oh, no, no, you can’t go out like that. Don’t you have anyone to look after you?

At this point the mother of one of the two girls came out of the house.

Loring tried to get away.

— Mother, do you know this old woman?

The mother looked at Loring, pushed her spectacles down and looked again.

— Why, Loring, she said. Loring Wesley. What are you doing out and about?

— Just back from the, back from the cemetery, Lisa.

Loring felt that invoking her loss might make them lose interest, or give her credit, or something, and allow her to go.

— Oh, still on about that, said Lisa. Girls, why don’t you go inside.

— Just look at her clothes, Mother. She shouldn’t be allowed, not like that, she just shouldn’t be allowed.

— Leave off! Inside, girls.

The girls went off snickering in all their youthful beauty.

Meanwhile, Loring was leaning on the wall, her back partly turned to the woman, Lisa.

— Loring, dear, you mustn’t listen to them.

But then,

— You do look in a bad way. Can I…

— No, no, said Loring. I just fell. This dress was fine when I went out this morning, I just, I…I was attacked by dogs.

— Oh, I just knew something vile had happened. Well, let me walk you home.

— Oh, no, no.

— Well, if you won’t let me, you will at least let my son.

She went to the door of her house and called up.

— Claude! Claude Patrick!

Her son soon came.

— Claude, I want you to help Loring here back to her house. She is an old friend of ours.

Beneath her breath she said, She and her husband were once the most famous people in the town.

The woman went back inside.

— Goodbye, Loring. Goodbye.

This was a most helpful young man. He behaved himself on the walk like a true friend, saying comforting things, and inquiring about this or that. He seemed to have paid no attention to whatever cruel things his sisters had said, and in fact, demonstrated complete ignorance even of their existence.

— Sisters? said he. Those are just my half-sisters. My father has nothing to do with them and neither do I. Spiteful creatures. Do you know what I caught them doing the other day? They had been denied money for one reason or another and so they were angry. They went together into that field by the house and found a turtle and when I saw them they had cracked open its shell with a hammer. They were removing the turtle completely from its shell and it was crying out in pain. It sounded like a cat being squeezed to death. I will never forget it.

Loring stared at Claude with an appalled look on her face.

— What did you do then?

— I cuffed them about a bit, and used a shovel to put the turtle out of its misery.

He wiped his mouth with his sleeve.

— Anyway, he said. You can see you got off easy if they were mean to you. That’s the least they can do.

in the chair in the parlor for a very long time. She ached all over, and thought often about going up the stairs to the bed and lying down, yet she could not do it. So, she sat, painfully on the chair, and retreated into herself, and remembered watching while the boy slept. Again she looked at him out of the corner of her eye, and again he vanished.

It was nine o’clock in the morning. A brilliant sun overcame the town. Everything could at last be properly seen. The fifth visit was shortly to begin. Let us look through the house and see what such a light can do.

In the front room:

1 small table (with chess pieces), aforementioned

11 various framed photographs (a list will follow)

E. Wesley

unknown horse, apparently brown

old house with mansard roof on dimly lit avenue

girl (perhaps Loring)

well-dressed man holding an eggplant and a cleaver (apparently Loring’s brother prior to his untimely death)

man asleep face covered with bowler hat (E.W.)

pair of young people holding a steamer trunk (parents of E.W. or L.W.)

unkempt garden. man digging in the distance.

distinguished looking woman by a lake

L.W. holding newspaper with photograph of L.W. on cover, holding newspaper with photograph of L.W., etc., and headline “Girl Chess Whiz Calculates Endlessly!”

abandoned train station with a sign: For Sale in the distance, some German town.

1 poster for a natatorium

1 architectural plan for the Eiffel tower, looking quite different from the way it actually turned out

2 stuffed burrowing owls

8 old-fashioned round brooms, apparently unused

1 scythe (mounted on wall)

5 chairs (described hereafter)

two of same type by table

one high backed by fireplace

others unknown

1 fireplace paraphernalia: pokers, etc.

72 panes of glass in one particular window (an ordinary division of glass in the others)

And then into the hall, where book shelves are drawn up like curtains, close enough by that they are no use to anyone. One must press ones back against one in order to have sufficient distance to see the other. There is hardly any light at all, even now, in the hallway, and the bookshelves defeat us.

Into the pantry then, where various goods are stacked: tins of every conceivable kind. What did they previously contain? Why, toffee, cookies, sweetmeats, crackers, cured sausages, cheeses, and more. Plates, there too, and serving dishes. A rack of old knives, some worn down to be like the last sliver of a moon, just by sharpening. Years of sharpening. And the sharpening wheel, of course. Someone said to someone else, this: Ezra sharpened all their knives. He would sharpen things even that didn’t need sharpening, just to sharpen them, and when he was done, he would sharpen them some more. He took a ball-peen hammer and sharpened it until it was a hatchet. Such a thing: it’s not even possible, is it?

Then the kitchen, where we have sometimes been.

Oh, but the door has opened.

The front door opened, and Loring was there, holding it. Before her, the boy and his mother. One nodding to the other, the other nodding back, Stan stepping up from the stoop into the house and past Loring. He, continuing past her again, into the parlor.

The mother handed Loring an envelope with some money in it. The fifth visit began.

It took Stan only a moment after his mother was gone to burst out with enormous news. He virtually leapt out of his shoes.

— Loring! he said. Look at this!

He had a rolled-up handbill. It advertised:

MENDUUS,

IMPRESARIO and TECHNICIAN of the IMPOSSIBLE

daily shows at the hour of 3

admittance denied upon whim

otherwise all admitted freely

cost paid for by G.I.F.P.A.

Kenstock Theatre, Kenstock & Gravil Mews, Kenstock Township

— Well, said Loring. Well, well.

— What is the GIFPA? asked Stan. And can we go?

— The Government Initiative for the Performing Arts. Kenstock, eh?

Loring looked at Stan.

— It’s Menduus, he said. The magician you told me about! I told my sister and she found this — he is still giving shows. Will you take me there?