palm, the tiny black figure of a horse, which Harry Owen quickly acquires, hefts, feeling the strange, porous lightness of this object, which is both and neither: wood and stone, wood nor stone. Feels the warmth of it, which is like the warmth of a living thing, though it is a borrowed warmth. Stolen.
This was made by a master carver
, says Owen admiringly, all his tweeds and whiskers bristling with desire for the object, the smooth glistening blackness of it, the flared nostril, the shapely hoof, the veins beneath the polished skin, which have not been neglected by the evidently obsessive maker, these seeming to throb almost with life, though, of course, this is impossible, it is so tiny, simulacra merely, tempting simulacra, it longs to leap into his gaping pocket, to nestle there, that is what Harry Owen thinks, or rather feels.
Says Leo Dell’oro grudgingly,
My father made it—
But this is excruciating, this blushing, the rubbing of the heel of the right hand against the left wrist, he can admit nothing, concede nothing, and always in the background the shadow of the small, severe man with round glasses, his posture stiff, upright, trudging up Church Street, in Whitby, in the rain. Carrying, in his pocket, a small box, tied up with a black ribbon.
Requiescat in Pace
.
Intaglio in jet of a child’s face, oh, those pin curls, and the initials in seed pearl around the border.
How ashamed he was, my father, accompanying his father up Church Street, in the rain.
It is always raining there, in Whitby. Summer and winter both.
• • •
Your father is a great artisan.
Yes.
Bitterly.
He’s a very great carver. He’s a better carver than he is a man!
• • •
It is a question, whether Harry Owen will return the coveted object, or add it to his collection. I can feel him hesitating, running his greedy thumb over the lustrous skin that is not skin, that is neither wood nor stone, neither animal nor vegetable nor mineral but some other substance in between; and as for Leo Dell’oro’s evident discomfort, well, never mind that. There is a shelf in a room in Half Moon Street that has an empty space. Or a cabinet, with a glass front, and a cunning inscrutable latch.
Once locked it will not open easily.
• • •
He made it for me when I was sick once. When I was a boy. This horse, Lath, stood by my bedside, and kept watch til I was well again. I almost died—
Afterward if ever I dropped it, I said the rhyme, to ward off bad luck.
There is petulance in this. Now Harry Owen must concede. There takes place a regretful separation, at the conclusion of which the small horse made of jet slides back into my father’s pocket. Safe now.
Come! Now you must tell me! What has this father of yours done to deserve such harsh words? Have you always felt so? Did he punish you, perhaps, too harshly? Too often got drunk? Partook overselfishly of the roast? I am interested in this issue of fathers and sons, what keeps them together, what drives them apart—
Is that what separates you from your father? That he “partook too selfishly of the roast”?
Here it is again, that bitterness of Dell’oro by which Harry Owen remains unperturbed, into which he thrusts a doleful and lengthy scientific silence, sharply punctuated by a disappointed stiffening of the whiskers, until at last Dell’oro, compelled, must speak again.
As a child I admired and loved him. I wanted to be a master carver, like him. It wasn’t until later—and anyway, it’s not what he did to me, but something I learned about him. He’s a rascal—a rascal and a sneak—and he doesn’t even know that I know it.
Is that why you’re here, then? To get away from the rascal?
I’m here because Professor Girard invited me.
And because it suits you.
Yes, it suits me. What of it? You’re no different
. Pugnacious outjutting of chin.
The tweed withdraws slightly, pleased or not with the perspicacity of its research subject,
This was made by a master carver
, says Owen admiringly, all his tweeds and whiskers bristling with desire for the object, the smooth glistening blackness of it, the flared nostril, the shapely hoof, the veins beneath the polished skin, which have not been neglected by the evidently obsessive maker, these seeming to throb almost with life, though, of course, this is impossible, it is so tiny, simulacra merely, tempting simulacra, it longs to leap into his gaping pocket, to nestle there, that is what Harry Owen thinks, or rather feels.
Says Leo Dell’oro grudgingly,
My father made it—
But this is excruciating, this blushing, the rubbing of the heel of the right hand against the left wrist, he can admit nothing, concede nothing, and always in the background the shadow of the small, severe man with round glasses, his posture stiff, upright, trudging up Church Street, in Whitby, in the rain. Carrying, in his pocket, a small box, tied up with a black ribbon.
Requiescat in Pace
.
Intaglio in jet of a child’s face, oh, those pin curls, and the initials in seed pearl around the border.
How ashamed he was, my father, accompanying his father up Church Street, in the rain.
It is always raining there, in Whitby. Summer and winter both.
• • •
Your father is a great artisan.
Yes.
Bitterly.
He’s a very great carver. He’s a better carver than he is a man!
• • •
It is a question, whether Harry Owen will return the coveted object, or add it to his collection. I can feel him hesitating, running his greedy thumb over the lustrous skin that is not skin, that is neither wood nor stone, neither animal nor vegetable nor mineral but some other substance in between; and as for Leo Dell’oro’s evident discomfort, well, never mind that. There is a shelf in a room in Half Moon Street that has an empty space. Or a cabinet, with a glass front, and a cunning inscrutable latch.
Once locked it will not open easily.
• • •
He made it for me when I was sick once. When I was a boy. This horse, Lath, stood by my bedside, and kept watch til I was well again. I almost died—
Afterward if ever I dropped it, I said the rhyme, to ward off bad luck.
There is petulance in this. Now Harry Owen must concede. There takes place a regretful separation, at the conclusion of which the small horse made of jet slides back into my father’s pocket. Safe now.
Come! Now you must tell me! What has this father of yours done to deserve such harsh words? Have you always felt so? Did he punish you, perhaps, too harshly? Too often got drunk? Partook overselfishly of the roast? I am interested in this issue of fathers and sons, what keeps them together, what drives them apart—
Is that what separates you from your father? That he “partook too selfishly of the roast”?
Here it is again, that bitterness of Dell’oro by which Harry Owen remains unperturbed, into which he thrusts a doleful and lengthy scientific silence, sharply punctuated by a disappointed stiffening of the whiskers, until at last Dell’oro, compelled, must speak again.
As a child I admired and loved him. I wanted to be a master carver, like him. It wasn’t until later—and anyway, it’s not what he did to me, but something I learned about him. He’s a rascal—a rascal and a sneak—and he doesn’t even know that I know it.
Is that why you’re here, then? To get away from the rascal?
I’m here because Professor Girard invited me.
And because it suits you.
Yes, it suits me. What of it? You’re no different
. Pugnacious outjutting of chin.
The tweed withdraws slightly, pleased or not with the perspicacity of its research subject,
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