and Emma drew her knees up and hugged them, and I bent to the page in the yellow light and gave Emma my best production, because I had no daughter, and because even as I read I recognized the coming time when Emma would laugh at my little story and take up with Mr. B. S. Ample or a similar concerned citizen.
“Oh, read some more!” Emma cried, when Martin had got safely away.
“No, not now. You go up to the house.”
“Thanks, Mr. Becket,” she said, and went.
I set down my notebook and watched a johnboat move down the Kaw toward its confluence with the great Missouri. The johnboat had no lantern at its bow and was a flat graceless box like a wagon bed.
It bothered me that I hadn’t been able to talk better sense to Glendon. I kept seeing him heave his gear and then himself off that Great Northern train. Why had I not persuaded him to try the law? Certainly I could’ve worked on him, chipped away, swayed him from folly.
Susannah could’ve done so, had she been along.
Well, I’d be back in Northfield in three days. Perhaps it would be easier to tell these things to Susannah in our own sunny kitchen over cinnamon rolls.
I stood and doused the lantern and was startled to hear a chuckle nearby, out on the river. The chuckle came from the johnboat, which had drifted quite near. Staring out I saw a silver waterline, a dab of silver above it.
A man in a boat, standing up.
Jack Waits
1
Read the confessions, the memoirs, the courtroom transcripts: There is always a line the scoundrel steps across and becomes a wanted thing. Sometimes the line is theater and robbery and kicking the fellow off the bridge; sometimes it’s simply a signed sheet of paper.
Perhaps it is fitting that my own line was merely the end of a dock.
“Becket, again,” said Glendon in a low voice, tossing me a rope. “What do you suppose are the chances?”
“Glendon!”
“You were reading to a little girl as I went past. I knew your voice, you see.”
I looked up at the lit windows. “This is Royal Davies’s place. A police detective and a kind host.”
“Are you in trouble on my account?”
“I don’t think so.”
He nodded. He looked small and exhausted and melancholy, and hope awoke in me.
The porch door opened and Emma came out and shouted into the dark, “Mr. Becket? Come up for pie!”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” I called. To Glendon I said, “Come with me.”
“If I do that, I will miss Blue.”
“It is what’s right,” I told him.
“Imagine it were Susannah, and you twenty years gone.”
He looked away and grasped the dock post as if to shove off.
I said, “Glendon, it might be your final chance to give up on easy terms. Davies is a good man; you will get fair treatment.” For you see, the moment he appeared there arose a picture of the skilled lawyer, the kindly judge, the life restored. Suddenly it seemed clear—Providence had given us this opportunity. “Don’t you see? We have met again here for exactly this purpose!”
Glendon replied, in his blunt fashion, “Nope, that ain’t it.” He squinted out at the water. “Fog is coming in, I feel it on my face. Can you see far in this? What can you make out?”
“I see a bow wake where that barge is passing,” I said. Fom the shuffling and lowing there were cattle on the barge, heading down to the Kansas City stockyards, I expect. It was a great long barge.
“I don’t see it, I hear it only,” he replied. He went quiet; fatigue lay on him like blown dirt. Then “Becket,” he said, “I’m sorry to ask, but I’m going to anyway. Won’t you come along? It’s shabby of me, and there’s not a thing in it for yourself, or your sweetheart, or your cunning lad. In fact I suppose it will prove the most expensive thing you ever do, and you are bound to live with regrets and have no kind forgiving thoughts for Glendon Hale; still Blue comes before me, and I am asking you to come along and help me see this through.”
Sighing I replied,
“Oh, read some more!” Emma cried, when Martin had got safely away.
“No, not now. You go up to the house.”
“Thanks, Mr. Becket,” she said, and went.
I set down my notebook and watched a johnboat move down the Kaw toward its confluence with the great Missouri. The johnboat had no lantern at its bow and was a flat graceless box like a wagon bed.
It bothered me that I hadn’t been able to talk better sense to Glendon. I kept seeing him heave his gear and then himself off that Great Northern train. Why had I not persuaded him to try the law? Certainly I could’ve worked on him, chipped away, swayed him from folly.
Susannah could’ve done so, had she been along.
Well, I’d be back in Northfield in three days. Perhaps it would be easier to tell these things to Susannah in our own sunny kitchen over cinnamon rolls.
I stood and doused the lantern and was startled to hear a chuckle nearby, out on the river. The chuckle came from the johnboat, which had drifted quite near. Staring out I saw a silver waterline, a dab of silver above it.
A man in a boat, standing up.
Jack Waits
1
Read the confessions, the memoirs, the courtroom transcripts: There is always a line the scoundrel steps across and becomes a wanted thing. Sometimes the line is theater and robbery and kicking the fellow off the bridge; sometimes it’s simply a signed sheet of paper.
Perhaps it is fitting that my own line was merely the end of a dock.
“Becket, again,” said Glendon in a low voice, tossing me a rope. “What do you suppose are the chances?”
“Glendon!”
“You were reading to a little girl as I went past. I knew your voice, you see.”
I looked up at the lit windows. “This is Royal Davies’s place. A police detective and a kind host.”
“Are you in trouble on my account?”
“I don’t think so.”
He nodded. He looked small and exhausted and melancholy, and hope awoke in me.
The porch door opened and Emma came out and shouted into the dark, “Mr. Becket? Come up for pie!”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” I called. To Glendon I said, “Come with me.”
“If I do that, I will miss Blue.”
“It is what’s right,” I told him.
“Imagine it were Susannah, and you twenty years gone.”
He looked away and grasped the dock post as if to shove off.
I said, “Glendon, it might be your final chance to give up on easy terms. Davies is a good man; you will get fair treatment.” For you see, the moment he appeared there arose a picture of the skilled lawyer, the kindly judge, the life restored. Suddenly it seemed clear—Providence had given us this opportunity. “Don’t you see? We have met again here for exactly this purpose!”
Glendon replied, in his blunt fashion, “Nope, that ain’t it.” He squinted out at the water. “Fog is coming in, I feel it on my face. Can you see far in this? What can you make out?”
“I see a bow wake where that barge is passing,” I said. Fom the shuffling and lowing there were cattle on the barge, heading down to the Kansas City stockyards, I expect. It was a great long barge.
“I don’t see it, I hear it only,” he replied. He went quiet; fatigue lay on him like blown dirt. Then “Becket,” he said, “I’m sorry to ask, but I’m going to anyway. Won’t you come along? It’s shabby of me, and there’s not a thing in it for yourself, or your sweetheart, or your cunning lad. In fact I suppose it will prove the most expensive thing you ever do, and you are bound to live with regrets and have no kind forgiving thoughts for Glendon Hale; still Blue comes before me, and I am asking you to come along and help me see this through.”
Sighing I replied,
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