A Peculiar Grace Read online

  For while he’d learned of Timothy’s death he had made no effort to come. He’d wept but in those days weeping for Hewitt was near as thoughtless as another man’s blowing his nose. And his reasons for his absence were good—good at the time and still good now. Except for one small fact: he’d failed. His courage had failed. And Timothy’s entire life had been made from courage. Hewitt had no doubt his death had been the same.

  Hewitt was near tears and screaming along the thruway beside the remains of the Erie Canal merged with the Mohawk River, with barges and tugs moving slowly and across the river a freight train running the opposite direction when he looked in his rearview and saw the New York state trooper almost tailgating but with no lights or siren and Hewitt breathed deeply, took one hand from the wheel and stroked the nail through his khaki pants and ever so slowly allowed his right foot to lessen the flow of gas to the thrumming engine. And within a mile was down to that reasonable four miles over the limit Walter advised and they continued that way, the trooper pulled back now a bit but Hewitt didn’t know if this was response to his own slowing or to make room once the blue lights came on. And then he thought What the fuck, if he’s going to pull me he’s going to. So he lifted his right hand from the wheel and palm flat up near the rearview he waved at the man behind him. As if to thank him for drawing Hewitt’s attention to the speed.

  Then the trooper pulled out in the passing lane and went by as if the Bird was already parked on the roadside. Going by the cop turned and by Jesus smiled and let loose one full round of his siren.

  Welcome to New York. And Hewitt had the presence of mind to smack one sharp hoot from the Bird’s horn. Both thanks and a shared chuckle. Citizens.

  His shirt was soaked through.

  OFF THE THRUWAY, he headed south leaving the state highways almost immediately and following the grids of back roads that in this rolling land would have been near impossible to get lost on even if he didn’t already know most of them by heart. This allowed him the dubious pleasure of passing by the farm where Emily had grown up and which he guessed was being run by her older brother. Or her father in partnership with that brother. The place looked much the same. Other farms had clearly changed, neater, tighter, all available land in cultivation, often the barns in better shape than the houses and each with the telltale signals of iron-wheeled tractors and implements and horse-drawn buggies of a plain gray or black boxlike design. When Hewitt had been here only the first half dozen or so Mennonite families from southern Pennsylvania had arrived in the area but the community had obviously flourished and grown. Several times he slowed behind a buggy with the incongruous bright orange triangle on the back. Although it seemed to Hewitt the striding trots of the retired standardbred horses drawing those buggies was a lovely and ample speed. Perhaps, however things fell out, when he was settled back in Vermont he should consider a horse and buggy. He wouldn’t need a license for that he guessed. Not to mention the figure he’d cut.

  His spirits were high. Perhaps it was his goofy sense of freedom, perhaps it was some jog of memory brought on by what lay about him or perhaps even mild humor underlying the bizarre nature, the uncertainty of this journey.

  He bypassed the village, heading into the late afternoon sun toward the western shore of the eastern branch of the lake. And here on the hill overlooking the lake, standing out like a thick mat between the neat rows of vineyards, both wine grapes and the Concord of jelly and juice fame, high above the water was a large orchard, mostly apples but with a number of peach and apricot trees. These long lakes, aided by the great lakes of Erie and Ontario to the north and west, had their own temperate zone. Those horizontal blizzards that blew in during the winter could freeze a vine but by March the air was soft and mild and the snow gone and it was the rare frost that nipped buds or blossoms.

  He went up past the orchard and above that was the old Farrell place. A small holding of sixty acres, the house and barns surrounded by pasture always let to a neighbor for heifers in the summer. The house a simple two-story farmhouse where Timothy had lived with his parents. Both of the old people were short, not heavy but low to the earth and Timothy had been a tall lanky man with ropy strong arms and body. Hewitt could barely understand the old woman at first, as if she came right off the boat and directly to this place and never left it. She’d fed him well.

  The house and barns were still standing. Slightly downhill was the forge, a large two-story structure built from round lake and river stones. With the loft where Hewitt had stayed those two summers. All was still there and none of it as it had been. Strings of hand-washed laundry beside the house, a gaggle of children in simple dresses or shirts and trousers, all barefoot. And the buggy in the yard, the shafts dropped to the ground. Hewitt went to the top of the hill and turned around and sat a moment. From here he could see the pale blue drift of smoke rising from the forge fire. And he thought Of course, someone has to fashion the hardware the Mennonites would need. It was a strange moment: an upwelling of grief that Timothy was truly gone and great relief the place had not been simply dismantled and turned into a lovely home. The site was astonishingly beautiful. He thought of the children in the yard. What a wonderful place to grow up. Although he’d only met a couple of those early Mennonites years ago it was enough so he knew he could easily drop by one day and talk to the smith, relay his history and perhaps learn a bit more of Timothy. Or not. Perhaps he would be the educator.

  Far out the deep dark water of the lake was disturbed by a breeze he could not feel, even here hilltop. Small white flares of sails marked boats and other places the water was split by ever-widening vees as speedboats raced heedless and lovely through the endless summer day.

  A pickup truck with rust-ridden fenders sailed around him and down the hill. So he put the Bird in gear and drifted on down as well. Past the forge, past the family. Small children, three to ten or so. The smith was a young man.

  He went into town. Little had changed. A new fire station had been built and on the way in a short strip with the usual fast-food outlets. There were still no parking meters. He made a quick stop at the chamber of commerce and plucked a handful of brochures from the rack and sat in the car as one after the other he discarded lodgings. In the past quarter century up and down the hillsides above the lake wineries had appeared, a rather too obvious attempt to mimic California with tasting rooms and offering bed and breakfast. He settled upon the Towne Motel despite the critical addition of that suspicious letter—the place was right in the center of the village. He had a vague recall of the place and found it easily and checked in, carrying in his bag. At least he had a room upstairs on the back which might be somewhat quieter. He ran his hand over the pillowcase. As suspected, the linens could use a shave. But no matter; for the moment it would do. He turned up the air conditioner and left.

  The next quest was a bit more complicated. He knew it was here, in the village, knew he recalled passing it. But still he worked his way up and down the main and side streets of the downtown before he found Our Lady of Compassion. He went first into the open church and made no prayer but left a twenty in the donation jar in the vestibule. Then went around back into the modest neat burying ground and walked slowly up and down the rows of stones and humble monuments. Until he found them. It was no surprise that Maude and William Farrell shared a double headstone. It was also not so much of a surprise that she had outlived her husband by five years, dying in the spring of 1983. And it shouldn’t have been but was shock enough that Hewitt fell to his knees before Timothy’s stone when he learned the man had died within the year after his mother. He wasn’t sure how long after the death he’d learned of it. Until this moment could not have placed a date to the event. But he sat now with the chiseled letters and numbers stark against doubt or monstrous self-pity.

  Fuck all. Timothy had only three more years of life than Hewitt could claim now.

  In the late afternoon the trees woven through the iron fence of the burying ground blocked direct light although the
sky overhead retained the high blue of daylight and the back of the church was lit soft flaxen. But kneeling there, time shuddered down upon Hewitt Pearce. And he did not know what he was doing. Too far from home. Seeking a woman who had rejected him when both were little more than bright hormonal children.

  He bent forward from his knees and rested his head on the cool grass. And doing so felt the big barn spike dig through his jeans pocket into his thigh. He stayed like that, thinking that the pain was somehow good for him. Then reared up and lifted his head to watch the pigeons circle the spire of the church. And finally pulled out the nail and kissed the pitted head and pressed it deep into the ground before the headstone. And sat a moment reading again the legend in the stone which was already losing its potency, then stood and bent and kissed the rounded crown of the stone and without looking back walked past the church to the street where the Bird was parked.

  If it was a last lesson from Timothy it was a good one. When the voice calls, you have to go. When you go, expect nothing.

  Anything else is grace.

  HE WENT BACK to the motel and showered the road grime away. He was hungry but more than that restless. At loose ends—a term he disliked not only from his long experience within an elaborate version of that condition but for what it had implied ever since. He sat on the edge of the bed. He thought of calling home to check on Jessica but dismissed the notion. If she didn’t answer he’d have more to worry about but if she picked up the first question she’d ask was the last he wanted to answer. He looked at his watch. Quarter after seven. He was winging it now, trying to determine a schedule of, he had to admit, a person unknown. And one whose circumstances were drastically altered from routine. Still he might make some guesses. Casting away the variables, the evening events, the presence of her children.

  Chase yourself in a circle. The one thing he would not allow was ruse of any sort, even the mildest kind. Not even calling the clinic where she’d finally worked with her late husband.

  Simplicity is not always what’s desired. He could indeed go out to eat and have a couple beers and come back for an unpredictable night’s sleep and start the next day already feeling one step behind. Or he could quit fucking around.

  He dressed in clean jeans and a French blue dress shirt and rolled the sleeves up over his elbows. Considered his shoes and settled on his plain black sneakers. The old-style Converse with not a fancy trick about them. Knowing if somehow he did manage to pull off an audience with her and was wearing more formal shoes she would at some point notice and know he was nervous.

  Deep sudden resolve. What he’d been waiting for. Into the bathroom to brush his teeth until his gums hurt and a last swipe of a damp hand through his hair. Then the motel ritual—wallet, room key, car keys. Last moment he grabbed his charcoal soft-draped sport coat and folded it over his arm and went out into the much warmer air of early evening. Down the steps and to the car. He paused a moment and then said Fuck it and laid the coat over the passenger seatback. If he should need it, it would be there.

  He put the top down on the Bird. And went through the small blocks of downtown, heading south, toward the road that ran along the east side of the branch of the lake. Toward the East Lake Road. Driving to where he knew South Avenue ended so he could backtrack the avenue from there. His best bet.

  Driving by the Keuka Farms drive-in he saw the outside tables were gone, the parking lot larger and the storefront also. And a drive-through window. Trying to meet the expectations created by the national chains. Hewitt could smell the burgers and fry grease as he went by. They should’ve kept it the way it was. As if he could pull in and that girl would come out again, over and over forever with his cheeseburger and fries and milkshake and hook it on to the rolled-down window frame and lean a little to peer in so he saw the opening at her throat toward her breastbone and she’d say, “I know who you are.”

  He drove on and slipped a back-angled turn on to South Avenue. The street signs here still white with black letters. He was seeking 804. Almost all the houses were old and almost all set back from the road but there were giveaways. Every now and then a small metal oval on a post showed the house number. He was in the 200s. He went along, over cross streets where the numbers jumped higher. Settled low into the seat, his elbow out the window, he steered with his right hand. He could always backtrack. Although he wanted, really wanted, to find the house first try. It felt important.

  And there it was.

  An elegant late Victorian with a wraparound porch extending from the lower floor, a smaller porch framed on the second floor and a round tower running up one side. And all of it, from the porch railings to the gingerbread trim along the eaves and highlighting each window frame and dormer and door, all of it in a multitude of colors. Unlike similar homes that at most boasted a single color for the house and another for all the trim, this house was painted in the fashion it had been built for. It was beautiful. And Hewitt thought he could’ve driven the street with no attention to numbers and known this was hers.

  The yard sloped down to the street. A simple lawn. Surmounted by a pair of big oaks and a string of shagbark hickories and a hedge of spotty evergreen along the street. Some sort of juniper or cedar. Un-tended. A line of old dying Lombardy poplars waving in the lake breeze above. Of course, he thought. Just keeping the lawn mowed summers was enough. Nobody who lived here, nobody who had lived here, had time for flower gardens.

  He was feeling a little foolish in the Thunderbird as he went up the white peastone drive. His jeans were stuck to his butt and thighs and loops wet his shirt under his arms. Even with the top down he felt a flush on his forehead. As if he’d run here. And maybe he had. But once again it was too late to turn back now.

  He parked and got out and turned all the way around as if admiring the view, swinging his arms to stretch them. All the sudden he felt the day’s journey. Nothing, he reminded himself, compared to Emily’s recent journey. He sincerely hoped he wasn’t about to be an idiot. Then lifted up the charcoal blazer and slid into it. It was a best guess. He had no idea how he should appear before her. His hands were shaking and his legs didn’t feel much stronger. He went up the steps to the front porch and was about to knock when he saw the bell button. He pressed it and could hear the echo from far within the house. He moved foot to foot and then, refusing to try to see in the bubbled leaded glass of the door, turned a quarter away so he had a view of the lake.

  The door opened and a boy about sixteen stood there in the opening. Looking much too small for the space he was trying to fill. In new jeans and a white polo shirt he was clearly not happy. With this job or any other.

  Hewitt was stunned. Although he’d guessed it from the newspaper photos he was unprepared for this beautiful scowling boy. Who except for gender was what Hewitt had very nearly glimpsed in memory when he passed the ice cream and burger joint moments before. Hewitt pushed back the front of his jacket and stuffed his hands in his pockets. Wordless. Fuck he was wordless already. And his face piping pearls of sweat.

  The boy saved him. “You’re the insurance asshole right?”

  “Well.” Hewitt had a minor coughing fit, wiping his eyes. “Actually—”

  “Actually.” The boy drew the word out to farce. Hewitt trying hard to remember his name but it was gone as an ice cube in his armpit. The boy said, “Actually, you hate coming late in the day like this but it was the best you could do.”

  Hewitt said, “Truth is, I’m not. What you think. But I’d speak to your mother. If she’s home.”

  The boy looked at him.

  Hewitt reached out and took hold of the door. Which was floating free halfway open and halfway closed. He said, “Why don’t you do us both a favor. Go tell your mother there’s a man at the door wants to speak to her. That way, at least you’re cut loose.”

  “Who the fuck are you?”

  Hewitt moved so one foot was just in the hall and the boy stepped back. Hewitt said, “Nobody you know. I’m sorry about your father. I truly
am. But at the moment I need to speak with your mother. Now. You’re a good guard dog but all I have to do is call her name down this hall and she’ll at least come to find out what’s up. Which is not what I want but I’ll do it if I have to. That’s it—you’re John, aren’t you? I just remembered. So, John. Do you want to get your mother or should I?”

  John studied Hewitt. Hewitt did the same. The boy was so goddamn beautiful and so tender and so tough Hewitt wanted to touch him, shake his hand, something. He waited.

  John turned and left the door open and walked down the hall as he called out, “Mom? I think it’s the insurance asshole.”

  Hewitt watched the boy disappear. Glanced over his shoulder and saw plenty of daylight and the car sat right there, waiting. He stepped back on to the porch, tripping on the sill.

  He heard footsteps coming up the hall. And tried to recall the last time he’d heard her feet hitting square on the ground. But could not. Then she was standing before him in a plain white sleeveless dress, her hair cut above her shoulders as the last photograph he’d seen of her and her head tipped to one side trying to place him.

  He said, “Emily. I never was worth a shit at timing but I want to tell you I hate this has happened to you. I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry.”

  She stood in the door. As if this run of words meant nothing to her. As if her grief was intact and untouchable. As if she’d heard countless versions of the same in the past two weeks.

  Her lips opened in a crooked oval over pressed-tight teeth. She said, “Hewitt? Is that you?”

  He said, “I’m afraid it is.” And in the golden late light of day he tried to bring a small grin to his face.

  He never knew if she saw it. “Oh, God no,” she said. And the door swung shut in a decisive thump. Then he heard the lock turn.

  LIKE A BERSERK siren the telephone chattered staccato bursts. Hewitt groaned and rolled over. The bedside clock revealed it was quarter after seven. Only one person might have been able to track him down, and he was as far from ready to speak with her as one of those howling winter nights lost up in the woods under an oystershell moon twenty years ago. He lay on his side with the pillow wrapped around his head. Somehow the room had grown not just warm but hot overnight. After four rings the telephone quit and the red message button began to blink. He could swear to God he could hear the faint electric pulse within the button. He was in horrible pain. Then he was out of bed where he finished vomiting into the sink just in time to sit on the toilet. Christ he was too old for this. For all of it. Hewitt had made his share of hangover promises but never in such depth of humiliation.