A Wild Surge of Guilty Passion by Ron Hansen Page B

its nail and trudging through snow to the kitchen and the scandal of his Scotch whisky.
    There were, finally, some pleasantries after that, some journalism at dinner about the past week’s doings, Jane’s joyless acceptance of the gift of a jeweled barrette, and Isabel’s quiet accommodation of his imaginary lust that night. It all seemed unreal, like the alliances of hotel guests sharing a restaurant table or some radio voice in the club room. Waking in the middle of the night, Judd saw his luggage on the floor, the hinged jaws opened, his blue canvas laundry bag now gone to the basement but his toiletries still there and much of his clothing still neatly folded, as if this were just another stay-over and he’d soon be ready to journey onward.
    In the morning, Judd took Jane to Sunday school but let Isabel and Mrs. Kallenbach go to the church service without him, as shame caused him to lie that his mother wanted him sooner than noon.
    Mrs. Margaret Gray was surprised by his earliness and not yet fully dressed, but she gave him fresh coffee and a slice of hot apple pie that she’d made from a jar of preserves. And then, as always, she just watched him eat. She said she didn’t know if she’d be putting up fruits and vegetables next summer. It was so hard on her hands and arms. She wondered if he was getting enough sleep. Was he losing weight? Bud seemed kind of mopey to her; he seemed to have something on his mind. She didn’t see the point of his visiting if he wasn’t going to chat. Oh no, she didn’t have errands for himor anything else that needed doing. “You go have a nice afternoon with that little girl of yours,” Margaret Gray said. “She’s been missing her daddy, I’ll bet.”
    As a state senator, Jimmy Walker got legislation passed that allowed attendance at movies, plays, and public sporting events on Sunday afternoons. So Judd could take his daughter to the Orpheum theater and a matinee showing of
The Lost World.
He asked her as he bought the nickel tickets, “Have you heard of the famous English sleuth Sherlock Holmes?”
    Jane nodded uncertainly.
    “Well, this movie we’re going to see is based on an original novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.” She seemed mystified.
    “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created Sherlock Holmes.”
    “Oh.” Jane seemed downcast. “Is this a mystery?”
    “No, it’s science fiction.”
    “I hate science.”
    “Don’t say ‘hate.’” Judd guided his daughter inside the theater and found she disliked the seats he chose, so they moved. Seeking to get her to smile, he asked, “Where does the general keep his armies?”
    She sighed.
    “Have I told you that one?”
    Improbably bored, Jane asked, “Up his
sleevies
?”
    She’s been poisoned,
he thought, and ran out of things to say to her. But for more than half an hour he just watched her watch the movie, loving how flashes of on-screen light flared in her widened eyes and how the raging dinosaurs scared Jane enough that she once clutched his hand and cowered into him so that half her face hid in his overcoat sleeve. But the scene ended too soon and she sat up again and she coolly extricated her hand from his, just as Isabel would have.

     
    Ruth finished the Sunday-night dishes thinking of Judd, and she was thinking of Judd as she wiped the kitchen stove’s white enamel, the humming Frigidaire, the soft suede of the kitchen’s maple countertops, then tossed the damp dish towel down the laundry chute. She felt addicted to Judd and desperate for him, and when she heard Albert whistling in his basement workshop she hated the noise so much she held her hands to her ears as she hurried to the foyer. She failed in the effort to calm herself as she called in Swedish,
“Moder?”
    Josephine Brown was upstairs helping Lora with her multiplication tables. She walked out to the hallway and quizzically looked down.
    “How about a luncheon here tomorrow?”
    “You mean with a guest?”
    Ruth was queasy with urgency, but