“Are you ever coming back?” I asked, afraid of the answer.
We were crossing Monument Park, walking by the statues erected to honor the men of Monument who had died in the wars.
“I'll never desert you, Paul.”
He had told me so much but there was still so much that I didn't know.
“I'm afraid,” I said, trying to keep the tremor from my voice. “It's scary …”
“I know.”
“I'm not going to use the fade,” I declared. “I want everything to stay the same, the way it is now.”
“Do you really, Paul?”
“No,” I admitted, shamefaced. I thought of my longings and my desires. The books I would write, the countries I would visit. The fame I hungered for. “But I want to do things on my own.” The fade couldn't write my books for me.
“Don't make any vows, Paul,” my uncle said, his voice grim.
A leap of intuition made me breathless. I almost asked: Did you make a vow because of what happened to Vincent? He had said that Vincent died because of him. I could not bring myself to ask that question, though.
Instead, I asked: “Where are you going?”
“It's a big country out there. So many places I haven't seen yet. And then old friends to see again in places where I've been. They're not family but they're consolations. …”
“Do you really want to go, Uncle Adelard?”
“Life is filled with things you don't want to do but have to do. And you find out in the end that it's not as bad as you thought. You accommodate yourself to the situation. Remember everything I've told you. Write it all down someday. Always be careful. Watch for the next fader. That's your mission, Paul, if there is a mission….”
We didn't speak alone again. He made his rounds of the family, brief visits with lots of laughter and gentle kidding. “Next time we're going to have a good-looking woman waiting for you,” my uncle Victor joked, but he turned away after he said the words, and I saw the doubting in his face.
“I hope the strike will be over soon,” Uncle Adelard said.
Before he left, he hugged us all, kissed the women, shook my hand with a firm grip. I found it hard to look into his eyes. “Pll be back, Paul/’ he said to me as we embraced.
A week or so later, when I drew my notebook of poems from my hiding place, I found my uncle Adelard's blue bandanna, folded neatly, freshly washed and ironed, on the closet shelf.
ith my uncle Adelard gone, the events at Silas B. consumed me completely and the fade became a part of the past summer and its witchery, along with street games and garden raids and the battle of Moccasin Pond. I learned to my delight of something that had been unknown at St. Jude's Parochial School: extracurricular activities. I joined the Eugene O'Neill Drama Club and tried out for the chorus of The Pirates o/Penzance, to be presented at Christmastime by the Silas B. Choral Group.
I submitted the story I had written about the boy and his father and the shop to The Statue, leaving it on Miss Walker's desk. She was the faculty adviser for the magazine. I had titled the story “Bruises in Paradise,” pleased by the contrast of those two nouns linked uneasily by the plain preposition.
One afternoon Miss Walker detained me in homeroom as the bell rang, and I waited in anticipation as the classroom cleared. When we were finally alone, she looked up at me, smiled, and withdrew my manuscript from her drawer. I recognized it immediately when I saw my handwriting on the title page. I had submitted it before learning that all manuscripts had to be typed.
“This is simply not acceptable, Moreaux,” she said, still smiling.
“I didn't realize it had to be typed,” I said. “I'll be taking typing next semester.”
“Typing doesn't really matter,” she said, her smile widening, as if amused by something she did not care to share with me. “The story itself is not acceptable, Moreaux. The subject matter is not suitable for our school magazine. Neither is the writing.”
Why was she smiling as she was devastating my life?
“I would suggest this,” she said, voice flat and decisive. “Concentrate on your studies this year. The transition from parochial school to public school is difficult enough. You have another transition next year when you leave here and enter high school. I understand that you have tried out for the chorus in The Pirates of Penzance. I would suggest that you withdraw from that. Your marks come first….”
The smile was frozen now. And so were those blue eyes. No softness at all in those blue eyes. Blue ice, those eyes.
I tore my eyes away from that smile and looked at the floor. Saw my shoes with the rubber soles my father had attached with liquid cement, scuff marks visible although I had polished them vigorously. I thought of what Jules had said: You ‘re a Canuck, Paul, and nothing you write will ever be good enough. Despite Miss Walker's remarks, I refused to believe that Jules was right. I raised my eyes to Miss Walker. She was leafing through the manuscript, nose wrinkled now, as if an odor rose from the pages.
“I want to be a writer,” I said, aware that my voice trembled. “I know I have a lot to learn—”
“Maybe you'll be a writer someday, Moreaux,” she said, looking up, “but you must have other priorities at this time in your life. Your first priority is to study. Later, there will be time to write….”
Stumbling out of the classroom, running through the corridor, trying to hold back the tears that threatened to spill onto my cheeks, I tore around a second-floor corner and bumped resoundingly into someone coming the other way. My books exploded out of my hands and the pages of the manuscript flew through the air and descended like giant, soiled snowflakes to the floor.
“Hey, what's the rush?”
Emerson Winslow stood there, brushing back that blond lock of hair, wearing a green sweater, the same soft material as the beige.
“No rush,” I muttered as I bent down to retrieve the spilled books and pages. He joined me, dropping to one knee. “ ‘Bruises in Paradise,’ “ he read aloud as he picked up the title page. “ ‘By Paul Moreaux …’ “ He glanced at me curiously. “Are you a writer, Paul?”
“I thought I was,” I said. “Until Miss Walker rejected it. It's not good enough for The Statue.”
“Do you think it's good enough?” he asked.
“I've got a lot to learn,” I said. “Priorities.”
“You didn't answer my question,” he said, smiling that lazy smile.
“Okay, yes, I think it's good enough for The Statue.” My voice sounded firm and strong. But was it good enough, after all?
Emerson Winslow shrugged, an elegant movement that reminded me of British fliers in The Great War movies who flew to their deaths with what-the-hell smiles, their white silk scarves flowing in the breeze. “That's all that counts, then,” he said.
As I assembled the pages he asked, carelessly: “Goin’ anywhere special?” As if the answer did not matter.
“No,” I said. The bleak streets of Frenchtown suddenly had no appeal for me, all those forlorn three-deckers and the shops.
“Come on,” he said, walking ahead, glancing over his shoulder. I followed him. After all, he was carrying three of my books.
The house he lived in towered above the others in that North Side neighborhood, a white turreted house like those I had seen only in the movies. Birds splashed in a birdbath in the center of the lawn. In the driveway, a man in a black uniform lovingly polished a gleaming maroon sports car. As we approached, he looked up at Emerson Winslow and said: “Afternoon, sir.” I had never heard someone my age called sir before. The man was old enough to be Emerson's grandfather, with graying hair and mild blue eyes.
“Hello, Riley,” Emerson said. “This is my friend, Paul Moreaux….”
“That's a beautiful car,” I said.
“It's a pleasure to care for,” Riley said. He didn't miss a stroke as we chatted.
Inside the house, books in glass cases and chandeliers, fireplaces and stately furniture polished to high gloss, a baby grand piano, floor
-to-ceiling windows, like none I had ever seen in Frenchtown. Nothing in this house at all like French-town. I was overcome with the realization of my ignorance. I did not know the name of anything in this house. For instance, a magnificent desk of gleaming dark wood that I knew must be more than just a desk. That it must have not only a name, but a history. And the sofa of rich upholstery, yellow. No, not yellow, gold. And the carpet of exotic design beneath my feet. Almost in a panic, I thought: I don't know anything.
We ascended a curving stairway to the second floor, the railing shining so brightly that I dared not touch it and leave a fingerprint. In the second-floor hallway, the walls were the color of whipped cream. One of the doors opened and a girl stepped out. I blinked, looked away, the way actors do in movies, then looked at her again, a double take.
It was like seeing another version of Emerson Winslow but a feminine, more dazzling version, blond hair like a helmet of curls, green eyes dancing with amusement at some private joke.
“My twin sister,” Emerson said. “Imagine going round a corner, Paul, and meeting yourself coming toward you. Only it's a girl.”
He touched her shoulder lightly, just short of a caress.
“Page, this is Paul Moreaux …”
“Hi, Paul,” she said, tossing my name in the air as if it were a bright balloon.
Page? Did he actually call her Page? Was Page a name?
I felt stupid again. Could not speak. Could not move. Felt the need to swallow but did not dare swallow because I knew it would make a terrible sound in the hallway and send me into disgrace.
“Page is the noble one of the family,” Emerson said. “She's going off to boarding school. Fairfield Academy …”
“I'm only going so you won't have to go,” she said ruefully. “Daddy says one of us has to be prepared to meet the world.”
She spoke the way Emerson did, carelessly, casually, as if what she was saying wasn't really important.
“I don't have to go because I don't have any talent,” Emerson said teasingly. “I'm not a whiz at anything. See what you get for being a whiz, Page?”
“A whiz,” she said, dismissing the description with contempt and looking at Emerson fondly, as if she thought he was the whiz. How I wished she would look at me that way.
As if she could read my thoughts, she turned to me and said: “You must be something, a whiz yourself, if Emerson brought you home.”
Was she teasing me? Although she was not at all like my aunt Rosanna, she had the same Rosanna quality of making me feel hot and cold at the same time, made me squirm and swallow, but all of these sensations pleasant. “Are you something, Paul?”
“Everybody's something,” Emerson said, rescuing me. “Paul is a writer.” He turned to me. “Page is a dancer. Ballet …”
Page rolled her eyes at the ceiling, looked at me, and crossed her eyes clownishly. And looked beautiful doing it.
“If she weren't my sister and I didn't love her, I would hate her,” Emerson said. “She's so goddamned good at what she does. And she does everything. …”
“Not everything,” Page Winslow said, and did an unexpected and beautiful thing. She stuck out her tongue. At him. Childish and yet perfect for that moment, just as crossing her eyes had been perfect when Emerson offered her praise. We laughed, the three of us, and our laughter floated through the hallway and I marveled that I had been called a writer by Emerson Winslow, standing with him and his sister, Page, in this magnificent house.
“Be right back,” Emerson said over his shoulder as he headed down the hallway and disappeared into one of the rooms, closing the door behind him.
I was alone with Page Winslow.
I didn't know what to say. Or do.
“What do you write?” she asked.
“Stories, poems,” I said, trying to control my voice, hoping it would not change keys on me.
“About what?” she asked, giving me her full attention, as if my answer mattered very much to her.
“Life,” I said. “What I feel, what I see. About Frenchtown where I live.” I paused, wondering if I had disclosed too much, remembering Miss Walker, wondering if I was deceiving Page Winslow. Was I really a writer or only a pretender?
She wore a white pleated skirt and a V-neck sweater of such soft pastel colors they could barely be seen: lavender, blue, pink, colors of a gentle rainbow. Her hair was more than blond, almost white, and there was a touch of blushing in her cheeks. Her breasts caused gentle roundnesses in her sweater. I didn't know where to look. Was I being a traitor to my aunt Rosanna?
I tried desperately to find something more to say while Page Winslow stood there perfectly at ease, as if waiting for the world—or me—to entertain her.
“You're still home,” I said. “Does Fairfield Academy start up later?” Start up? I felt like a fool, a Frenchtown fool, mute, inarticulate, dumb.
“I'm leaving day after tomorrow. Emerson and I were away for a year—on the continent,” pronouncing the last word as if quoting somebody else. “Sounds wonderful, doesn't it?” she asked wryly. “All that happened is that we fell behind in school—here I am going off to Fairfield almost fifteen—and I broke my dumb leg in Italy.” She sighed and lifted her hands in resignation. “Now I'm supposed to be all fit and ready to go …”
“Don't you want to go?”
“I suppose I do,” she said. “I'm not sure. Emerson's one of the lucky ones. He knows what he wants.”
“What does he want?”
“Nothing,” she said.
The sun blazed through the window, dazzling my eyes. I had never encountered people like this before, people who threw words away like toys they had tired of playing with. In Frenchtown, people spoke only to say what they meant.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“That's the problem,” she said. “I don't know what I want. At least Emerson knows what he doesn't want. What do you want?”
“Everything,” I said. “I want to write. I want to see the world. I want …” And dared not say it. Love. Fame. Fortune. To live in great cities and sail across oceans. To have my books in libraries.
“I envy you,” she said. And again I looked for mockery in her voice. Envied me? Shy and gangling and tormented by my ignorance in this house, here in a place I did not belong, among people who were like beings from another planet, not only from the other side of town.
Emerson returned, having changed into gray slacks, sharply creased, and a crisp white shirt. At home, I changed into worn overalls and an old faded shirt after school. I knew my few moments with Page Winslow were over, done with, as she headed for the stairs. She was leaving Monument the day after tomorrow. Would I ever see her again?
“Toodle-oo,” she called, pausing at the top step.
The unlikely words were perfect, the way sticking out her tongue and crossing her eyes had been perfect.
Both Emerson and I echoed, “Toodle-oo,” laughing as she went on her way, sailing down the stairs, her feet barely touching the carpet.
“Did'ja ever hear of Bunny Berigan?” Emerson asked, in the emptiness of the hallway following Page's departure.
I shook my head.
“You haven't lived yet,” he said.
I followed him down the hallway into his bedroom. He closed the door behind us and I was struck by the sudden sense of privacy. His own room, his own bed and bureau. A Harvard pennant, maroon with white letters, hung on the wall above his desk. (“My father's alma mater,” Emerson said, shrugging.) Framed pictures on the walls, showing Emerson and Page in various stages of growing up. In bathing suits at the beach. In formal suits and dresses. At the foot of his bed, a phonograph, records stacked neatly on a shelf below. There was a record on the turntable.
A moment later, I heard for the first time the tortured beauty of Bunny Berigan's trumpet, golden notes bruised with sadness, rising and falling, and then his thin, reedy voice:
I've flown around the world in a plane,
I've settled revolutions in Sp
ain …
Spellbound, I listened while Emerson went to the window and looked out. I bent my head to the speaker, letting the music fill my ears and my being, closing my eyes, isolating myself. Bunny Berigan swung into his solo after the vocal, the trumpet like a cry from the depths, wild and melancholy, more powerful than words, more telling than a voice. The trumpet spilled notes on the air almost haphazardly, yet I sensed that it was moving toward a climax, as if the trumpeter were building an invisible and impossible structure in the air, rising, rising, toward a pinnacle that was both triumphant and blazing with eternal loss and sadness. The trumpet staggered ever upward, reaching, reaching, and I thought of the poem by Robert Browning: Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,/ Or what's a heaven for? and then the high note was attained, an unbelievably impossible note that was like a breath held a moment before death comes. Then silence and the scratching of the needle on the record.
I could not speak, held by the music and wanting to hear it again, immediately, the way I wanted to call Page Winslow back again but could not, could not.
Later, we talked about books and movies and the stage plays he saw with his family in Boston. Winterset and Ah, Wilderness!” My father and mother love the theater.” He exaggerated theater, drawing it out to several syllables, pronounced it thee-ah-tah, rolling his eyes.
“What does your father do?” I asked.
“Nothing,” he said. Then, sighing, “Well, something, I suppose. Having to do with banks and stocks and bonds. He's off to Boston a lot. My mother does things with charities. What she calls busy-busy….”
He did not ask me what my father did and I didn't volunteer the information. He turned up the volume on the record and we listened in silence. Why did I feel that keeping silent about my father's work was like another sin I needed to confess?
When the record ended, I told him that I had to leave. The bedroom was shadowed, the afternoon sun feeble as it spilled into the window. Later, I had to deliver my brother Bernard's newspaper to Mr. LeFarge.
“You'll have to come again sometime,” Emerson said as we walked down the stairway and across the hallway to the front door. “I'll have Riley run you home.”