cloth mannequin lay unburnt.
âWhich way dâyou say he took off?
Henry raised the stick and pointed at a breach in the shroud of foliage centering the west margin of the clearing.
âYou follow him?
âNo, said Henry.
âWell, Iâm going to take a look.
Noah strolled over to the breach and entered the forest on the far side. Time passed, then from some way in, he called back to Henry. Henry dropped his stick beside the pit and followed the voice.
Crouched beside an object on the ground, Noah asked, âThis yours? when Henry reached him. The shoe, a manâs, but smaller than would fit either Henry or Noah, seemed pathetic beneath a stand of prematurely turned quaking aspen. Its buckle iridesced and the leather was stiff, as if it had been exposed to weather through many seasons. Not only did it look utterly foreign in this diffident and fluctuating shade, but its style was strangely anachronistic. Hurled languidly out of the human universe, it ended up here, collecting rainwater and fallen leaves, useful to no one, though once, somewhere, its leather had been tanned, measured, sewn, fitted, and the finished object placed in a nice shop window, where it was admired and bought. No doubt its owner had polished it back in the days when it was worn. Henry, who made it a habit to avoid the empty sentiment of such philosophical wayfaring, caught himself considering the shoe a perfect analogue for human endeavor, then snapped out of it, glancing into Noahâs eyes, which were frankly staring into his.
âI donât think so, Henry said, remembering suddenly thereâd been a question asked of him.
âYou sure?
Henry said, âNo, of course itâs not mine.
âDoes it look like what the guy was wearing last night?
âI donât think so, but I couldnât say for sure.
âHowâd it get up here?
âYou tell me.
The search became cursory and oddly reluctant after this absurd discovery, both having arrived at the same thought that they were not accomplishing much. No more words were exchanged, so that as they wandered about, purpose diffused and some edgy haze of defeat clouding any ability to observe, the only sounds they heard were of their own rubber-soled boots breaking fallen branches underfoot, the dead measure of breezes hissing in the high boughs above them, and the piercing random lament of some distant mourning dove. Without agreeing to give up, at least not verbally, they circled back toward the house from over west, down a gradual series of meadows that in Henryâs fatherâs day had been used for cattle and sheep, through ruined drystone ingresses whose single pole gates had long ago decomposed into mulch, having found aside from the pile of warm ash no trace of any trespasser. Noah considered the discovery of the forlorn single shoe to be barely of enough interest to warrant carrying the thing back down with them. He did, though, hoisting it aloft to one side of him at the end of a stick, carrying it as you would the diseased remains of a dead animal, like a rabid squirrel, say, depilated by rot and stiffened by rigor mortis.
Noah agreed to black coffee at the long kitchen table. Edmé had not returned yet. They spoke of other things, what was going on in town, of mutual friends, who was not healthy and who was. And afterward, Noah left, walking himself down to his car at the old steel horsegate, the shoe in a paper sack.
âWeâll just see how it goes, Noahâd said.
And Henry had nodded, wishing for all the world, once again, that he and Edmé hadnât divulged to Noah or anyone elseânow the neighbor whose telephone Edmé had used might know, tooâwhat had happened. He should have foreseen that nothing worthwhile would have come of a visit from Noah. Not because Noah was unwilling to investigateâhe had come, hadnât he? and promptly. But rather because he knew himself well enough to recognize it
âWhich way dâyou say he took off?
Henry raised the stick and pointed at a breach in the shroud of foliage centering the west margin of the clearing.
âYou follow him?
âNo, said Henry.
âWell, Iâm going to take a look.
Noah strolled over to the breach and entered the forest on the far side. Time passed, then from some way in, he called back to Henry. Henry dropped his stick beside the pit and followed the voice.
Crouched beside an object on the ground, Noah asked, âThis yours? when Henry reached him. The shoe, a manâs, but smaller than would fit either Henry or Noah, seemed pathetic beneath a stand of prematurely turned quaking aspen. Its buckle iridesced and the leather was stiff, as if it had been exposed to weather through many seasons. Not only did it look utterly foreign in this diffident and fluctuating shade, but its style was strangely anachronistic. Hurled languidly out of the human universe, it ended up here, collecting rainwater and fallen leaves, useful to no one, though once, somewhere, its leather had been tanned, measured, sewn, fitted, and the finished object placed in a nice shop window, where it was admired and bought. No doubt its owner had polished it back in the days when it was worn. Henry, who made it a habit to avoid the empty sentiment of such philosophical wayfaring, caught himself considering the shoe a perfect analogue for human endeavor, then snapped out of it, glancing into Noahâs eyes, which were frankly staring into his.
âI donât think so, Henry said, remembering suddenly thereâd been a question asked of him.
âYou sure?
Henry said, âNo, of course itâs not mine.
âDoes it look like what the guy was wearing last night?
âI donât think so, but I couldnât say for sure.
âHowâd it get up here?
âYou tell me.
The search became cursory and oddly reluctant after this absurd discovery, both having arrived at the same thought that they were not accomplishing much. No more words were exchanged, so that as they wandered about, purpose diffused and some edgy haze of defeat clouding any ability to observe, the only sounds they heard were of their own rubber-soled boots breaking fallen branches underfoot, the dead measure of breezes hissing in the high boughs above them, and the piercing random lament of some distant mourning dove. Without agreeing to give up, at least not verbally, they circled back toward the house from over west, down a gradual series of meadows that in Henryâs fatherâs day had been used for cattle and sheep, through ruined drystone ingresses whose single pole gates had long ago decomposed into mulch, having found aside from the pile of warm ash no trace of any trespasser. Noah considered the discovery of the forlorn single shoe to be barely of enough interest to warrant carrying the thing back down with them. He did, though, hoisting it aloft to one side of him at the end of a stick, carrying it as you would the diseased remains of a dead animal, like a rabid squirrel, say, depilated by rot and stiffened by rigor mortis.
Noah agreed to black coffee at the long kitchen table. Edmé had not returned yet. They spoke of other things, what was going on in town, of mutual friends, who was not healthy and who was. And afterward, Noah left, walking himself down to his car at the old steel horsegate, the shoe in a paper sack.
âWeâll just see how it goes, Noahâd said.
And Henry had nodded, wishing for all the world, once again, that he and Edmé hadnât divulged to Noah or anyone elseânow the neighbor whose telephone Edmé had used might know, tooâwhat had happened. He should have foreseen that nothing worthwhile would have come of a visit from Noah. Not because Noah was unwilling to investigateâhe had come, hadnât he? and promptly. But rather because he knew himself well enough to recognize it
Similar Books
