The Box Garden Part 14

"Charleen," Eugene holds me close.

"Thank heavens you're home," Judith's mordant contralto escapes in a gasp.

"Now don't get excited, Judith," Martin says. "Give her a minute, everyone."

"Are you Mrs. Forrest?" one of the policemen demands.

"Wouldn't you like to go into the living room?" my mother frets.

"You must be calm," Eugene says into my shoulder. "You must try to remain calm."

"And your regular domicile is Vancouver?"

"Just take it easy, take it easy now."

"Keep things in proportion ..."

"You'll find the living room more comfortable."

"We have one or two questions for you, Mrs. Forrest."

"Here, Charleen, sit down. Martin, get her to sit down."

"You'd better sit down; you must sit down."

"There, that's better isn't it?"

"And when was your departure from Vancouver, Mrs. Forrest?"

"Leave her alone for Christ's sake, can't you see she's confused."

"Take it easy, Char, take it easy-"

" ... if you'll just answer a few questions ..."

"The living room is cooler and you could ..."

"Keep your balance, that's the important ..."

"Your exact arrival in Toronto was ...?"

"Hey, give her a chance ..."

"You tell her."

"I'm only trying to help."

"I think Eugene should be the one. He's ..."

"We understand this is upsetting, Mrs. Forrest ..."

"The living room ..."

" ... unfortunately they expect a complete report at headquarters."

"Charleen, listen to me. Are you listening?"

"Yes." Was that my voice? Was it?

Eugene is sitting next to me with both my hands in his and he is saying the most preposterous things. Incredible things. How melodramatic-I wouldn't have thought it of Eugene. Seth has disappeared, Eugene is saying that Seth has disappeared. What a joke. Is it a joke? It can't be because these policemen are writing things down and besides my mother doesn't like jokes. And neither, I realize for the first time in my life, neither do I.

Seth has been taken somewhere by Greta Savage. Taken away. Several days ago. No one knows for sure when. Or how. But they have both been missing for several days. Now don't get excited. No one knows where they are at this precise moment, but in all probability they are safe. Greta Savage has disappeared with my son and Doug Savage has called in the police, that is what has happened, Charleen.

"Say something, Charleen," Eugene commands.

"Is she going to faint?" Judith's arm is on my shoulder.

"It looks like it. Someone get some water."

"Are you going to faint, Charleen?"

"Darling."

"No," I say distinctly. "No, I'm not going to faint."

All I have to do is hold on to consciousness. Nothing is more important than that, for the moment nothing more is required of me. But if I shut my eyes for even a second I will never see Seth again. I must sit still, I must pretend I am composed of dry, unjointed wood, if I move one inch from this table there will be an explosion.

I must try to understand. Slowly, perfectly like a child memorizing the Twenty-third Psalm, He restoreth my soul for his something-or-other sake. He restoreth my soul for his something-or-other sake. Certain facts must be absorbed. Certain facts must be absorbed.

Doug Savage has been trying to reach me all day. The last call came from Parry Sound. He phoned at least four times today. Finally he agreed to talk to Judith. Judith phoned downtown immediately and had Eugene paged at the conference. Eugene came home at once and since then he has been trying unsuccessfully to reach Doug Savage. But Doug Savage promised Judith he would phone back at eight o'clock. That's less than an hour, Judith says, only fifty minutes now, and until then there is nothing anyone can do.

Seth and Greta have been missing all week. While I was eating English m.u.f.fins on the train, while I was kissing Eugene in the back of a taxi and, Oh G.o.d, while I was chasing around the countryside with Louis Berceau on a foolish, pointless, private, childish quest Greta and Seth disappeared; they took the Savages' car in the middle of the night-there is some confusion about which night it was, Sunday? Monday? The Vancouver police think-there is reason to believe-that Greta may have given Seth some sleeping pills. Sleeping pills! While I was eating English m.u.f.fins on the train, while I was kissing Eugene in the back of a taxi and, Oh G.o.d, while I was chasing around the countryside with Louis Berceau on a foolish, pointless, private, childish quest Greta and Seth disappeared; they took the Savages' car in the middle of the night-there is some confusion about which night it was, Sunday? Monday? The Vancouver police think-there is reason to believe-that Greta may have given Seth some sleeping pills. Sleeping pills!

For the first two days Doug thought he could avoid calling in the police. He had a hunch that Greta might have taken Seth to a cottage they own in the mountains in Alberta. He borrowed a car and drove all night, but when he got there, he found only rumpled beds and tire tracks. They must have spent the first night there. After that, he thought they might have gone to Winnipeg where Greta has old friends, but when he got there, twenty-four hours later, he couldn't find any trace of her. So he phoned here last night-Can that possibly have been only last night?-hoping Greta had made some kind of contact; after that he phoned the police. There had been no alternative.

The police: they are looking right across the country, but they have to move cautiously (are they dealing with a mad woman?). They don't know. I don't know. The situation has been judged too risky for public appeals, but they are making all sorts of inquiries. It seems Greta is driving mostly at night. A gas station attendant just outside Thunder Bay is almost certain they stopped there: a woman and boy resembling the police description stopped for gas and a hamburger. Did the woman appear dangerous? No. Had the boy appeared intimidated or drugged? No one had noticed. Which way were they headed? The attendant wasn't sure. All he could remember was that they were in a hurry.

There is nothing to do but wait until Doug calls again. The two police officers wait courteously in the living room. My mother frets about whether or not to offer them coffee. Eventually she decides against it. She is more confused than alarmed; her six-thirty supper has been disrupted and in some indefinable way the untouched ca.s.serole precludes the making of coffee. As always she is just outside of events, hovering-ghostlike but demanding-at the perimeter. "How could you leave him with people like that?" she scolds me sharply. "What kind of friends are they?"

Judith tries to soothe her, but Martin flushes with anger. Martin is convinced that what I need is a stiff drink, but of course there is nothing, not in this house. "I've got some Scotch in my suitcase," he says, suddenly a.s.sertive. He brings it out, and my mother, her hands still flapping wildy, finds a juice gla.s.s. But my stomach leaps and dissolves; I can't even look at it; Martin picks up the gla.s.s, regards it mildly, and then drinks it off neat.

Judith's voice floats over my head in a sort of chanting rea.s.suring descant. "Look at it like this, Charleen, they've both been seen alive and well. Yesterday. So they're okay. Maybe she's a bit on the crazy side, but she isn't dangerous, that's what Doug Savage said on the phone. He said try not to get Charleen upset because Greta wouldn't hurt a fly, it's just a matter of hours before they find him."

Martin pats me awkwardly on the crown of my head. "Look here now, Charleen, she's a little unbalanced maybe, but, G.o.d, who isn't, and you've known her for years. You know she wouldn't do anything to hurt him, nothing really really crazy. You've got to keep thinking what she's really like." crazy. You've got to keep thinking what she's really like."

Eugene sits wordless beside me. He's not a wordy man, he never was a wordy man. He's still holding on to my hands, and I'm grateful to him. There's nothing to say. And nothing we can do.

I think of the huge distance between Toronto and Vancouver, the blending agricultural regions, the mountain ranges, river systems, squares of acreage, contours, city limits, county lines, townships and backyards with chickens and shrubs and children. I try to hold that whole terrain in my head; it is a numbing exercise, though it shouldn't be all that difficult, for haven't I just crossed that country myself? Haven't I touched every inch of it? I think of all the people strung out over that distance, imbedded in their separate time zones. Seven-thirty: they're washing dishes. I can hear cutlery right across the country dropping into drawers. They're bathing children, playing bridge, reading newspapers, all of them magically sealed in their preserving spheres of activity. Out there in all that darkness is Greta's car, a blue Volvo-it has to be there-cruising past apartment houses and suburbs and farms; and these people, shutting their windows, watering their lawns, walking their dogs, they just allow allow her to go by. Maybe they even wave to her. Maybe she waves back, she has always been so friendly, so pathetically friendly. She would do anything to help a friend; she is so kind, she wouldn't hurt a fly. Remember that, above all remember that; she wouldn't hurt a fly. her to go by. Maybe they even wave to her. Maybe she waves back, she has always been so friendly, so pathetically friendly. She would do anything to help a friend; she is so kind, she wouldn't hurt a fly. Remember that, above all remember that; she wouldn't hurt a fly.

Eight o'clock. We wait in the kitchen. The silence is minutely detailed like a blueprint for a piece of immensely complicated machinery. The minutes are sharply cornered and pressing, and each one hangs rigidly separate.

Eight-fifteen. Why doesn't Doug call? Something has happened. One of the policemen asks if he might phone in a report.

"No," I gasp.

Eugene shakes his head, "Better not tie up the phone here." The policeman nods politely and asks if he might use the next-door neighbour's phone.

At this my mother looks up, horribly alarmed, and I see her mouth twist into its tight diminishing shape. I know that shape, its denials, negations, interdictions, the way it closes to inquiries, the way it forbids, the way it ultimately blames and refuses. Now. She is going to do it now, going to give one of her terrible, unforgiving no's.

But she doesn't. Bewilderment-or is it fatigue?-makes her thin lips collapse. She nods a shaky a.s.sent. Then she rises and puts the kettle on.

In a moment the policeman returns; there are no further developments, he tells us. We will have to wait a little longer, that's all.

My mother is moving around the kitchen putting her trembling hands to work. (What have I done to her, what have I done to her this time?) Now she is making tea, now she is arranging jittery cups on a tray. Judith gets up to help her and together they begin to make sandwiches. How extraordinary, my mother actually has a package of boiled ham in the refrigerator. And cheese. Sandwiches are disaster fare; who would have thought my mother had a sense of occasion. She and Judith stand with their backs to us b.u.t.tering bread. They are exactly the same height; I never noticed that. Their elbows move together, marionettes on a single lateral string. Abstract kinship suddenly made substantial. But why am I thinking about ham and cheese and kinship? Why am I not thinking about the centre of this disaster; why am I not thinking about Seth?

Because I can't bear to.

Seth dead. No, that's not possible. It's not possible because my life isn't possible without him; it's not possible when I'm sitting here, wired with reality. Pulse, heartbeat, nerves, breath, sudden sweating, hurting consciousness, all the signs of life failing me now by not failing. In this kitchen every small sound is magnified; my mother's half-invalid, half-despairing shuffle, the policemen laughing in the living room (laughing!), Martin crashing into his ham sandwich, the sugar spoon which strikes with dead neutrality on the formica table. And my eyes: suddenly I can see with wolfish clarity. I can see the neat hem on my mother's sheer kitchen curtains, her tiny over and under and over st.i.tches, and through the curtains a glittering, mocking, gla.s.sware moon is coming into view. Evening. Nine o'clock. Doug Savage, why doesn't he phone? Seth dead. No, it's not possible.

Sleeping pills. Greta stuffing Seth with sleeping pills; she is so small, such a weak, wiry woman, something dark about her face, always a sense of shadow. But Seth is quite strong for his age, well developed, remarkably healthy. His health is startling; something G.o.dlike nourishes him despite his inheritance; I've never been able to understand it. I picture his strength against Greta's weakness, and a tiny flashbulb of hope goes off under my skin; she can't possibly harm him.

Then I remember how clever she is, how she is veined with a wily unaccountability. Her secrecy about Watson's letters; she hints she has heard from him but says nothing more. And her sudden, piercing, illogical bursts of purity. Madness? Not really madness. How did Doug once put it to me? "Greta is rational enough, it's just that her rationality is not as evenly distributed as it is in more balanced people." Certainly she is not a fanatic, not in the accepted sense of that word, but she suffers from blinding pinp.r.i.c.ks of virtue. The way, for instance, she once burned Doug's thesis on the diseases of short ferns because she believed it had been conceived to fill an artificial academic requirement. (Only by good fortune had she overlooked the carbon.) Her weaving too is girded by purity; the way she refuses to touch synthetics and swears to give up weaving altogether if she is forced to work with wool which is chemically dyed and treated. Then there is her violent anti-smoking stance. And her contempt for Eugene and what she considers his cra.s.s profession. Her leaps into various systems of the human potential movement. Her bright, birdlike fixations: the insistence (I suddenly remember) with which she had determined to pick up Seth at school last week. Then there is her refusal to have children; here perhaps her fanaticism is grounded on objectivity, for she would have made a shocking mother for all her devotion to Seth. But most painful to me has always been her clinging admiration for Watson; she once confided in an orgy of tactlessness that she "reverenced" Watson's decision to alter his life. She keeps track of him with pa.s.sionate persistence, long after everyone else has given up, smothering him with letters, forcing him to acknowledge her existence, coercing him by her indefatigable energy to keep her supplied with news of his latest incarnations. Ah, Greta, poor Greta, poor, twisted, b.u.g.g.e.red-up Greta, where are you? It's nine-thirty and I'm going crazy, where are you?

In the living room the policemen have turned on the television. Hawaii Five-O. Screams, sirens, the sound of bullets, throaty accusations, weeping, all so bearably unreal. What a poor tissue fiction is, how naively selective and compressed and organized, justice redressed in exactly sixty calculated minutes, the violence always just marginally tolerable, the pressure just within the bounds of human acceptance, tragedy in an airtight marketable tin.

Martin paces. My mother and Judith wash plates and cups, and Eugene goes next door to phone a car rental firm. He has decided that the minute Seth is located we must have a car to get to him.

I think bitterly of Watson. Wherever he is, he is being spared this hour. Of everything he has left undone as a father this seems the worst.

Even Louis-I think of him with a flash of envy-even Louis in his furnished room, so wonderfully protected from all this. So innocently unaware. What peace not to know.

And Brother Adam, you with your abstract wisdom, your fire-escape view, you know nothing of what I'm suffering, you are a dream, you don't even exist for me now.

And Seth, what are you thinking, wherever you are? Are you safe?

Judith, always compulsive, is tidying the kitchen. She covers the tunafish ca.s.serole with a dinner plate and puts it in the refrigerator. Then she swirls a wet cloth over the table, picking up my purse and putting it on top of the cupboard.

"What's this?" she asks, picking up an envelope.

I am slow to react; am I losing consciousness after all? Then I say, "Oh. That's mine."

It is the envelope containing the child support cheques, my last connection with Watson. A business envelope, eight-by-eleven in business-coloured brown. Closed with a huge paperclip.

I open it idly, and the cheques slide out on my lap. What a lot of cheques, twelve for each year, and yes-I count them-enough to last until Seth's eighteenth birthday. And a stack of addressed envelopes with a rubber band around them. There's even a sheet of postage stamps. How wonderfully organized of Watson, beneath his many layers he must still be in touch with that boy prodigy of his youth and with his dull parents who always paid their bills, in touch too with his unknown, sober ancestors who never ran away from their debts.

There is something different about the final cheque: it is dated for Seth's eighteenth birthday, May 21, and it is made out for five thousand dollars. Five thousand dollars! I feel my breath harden; how had Watson managed to save five thousand dollars? He must have been exceedingly careful over the years to save that much money. But how pointless, how useless, a piece of paper for a son who is missing. A son who can't be found.

I can't help it. I'm starting to cry. I can't help it. This piece of paper, this five thousand dollars-it isn't enough. It's so futile, it's just like Watson to make a gesture like this, so stagey, so impressive and so utterly, utterly useless.

But there's something else in the envelope. Still crying I pull it out. It's another piece of paper, a page raggedly torn from a notebook. But the message on it is carefully typed.

I have to read it twice before I realize what it is. It is Watson's farewell note, the one he must have stuck on the screen door before he left the Whole World Retreat. Rob and Cheryl, those two good children, had been more than worthy of the trust he placed in them, guarding not only the cheques but his final words of good-bye. How absurd, though, to write a farewell note on a typewriter, how somehow incongruous, how like Watson. The note he once left me, the one I burned in the barbeque, that note had been typed too. I had forgotten Watson could type; I had forgotten a lot about Watson. But I had not forgotten his embarra.s.sing penchant for prophecy; reading his words of good-bye, it all seems suddenly very familiar.

Dear Brothers and Sisters, These words are written in love and sadness.

The life of the spirit is love but it is also containment and peace.

It is time for me to leave you.

Time to go East.

You will understand.

Understanding is all.

Two things I ask of you.

First, care for the land which We have made green.

It will feed you purely.

But the gra.s.s will give you Peace and delight.

Care for the gra.s.s before the grain.

Secondly, I leave an envelope of envelopes.

Please mail one each month for me.

I put my faith in all of you.

Remember There will be other lives Other Worlds.

Watson Forrest

At last the telephone is ringing. Eugene leads me to the hallway, holding my arm as though I were a thousand years old. Everyone-Martin, my mother, the two policemen-gather around me.