that nice man that time we went down to Florida, remember. Anyway, Mim’s decided that Roger might be better off if he lived with her Cousin Ernestine down in Birmingham, where the climate’s not so harsh. We know how tender-hearted you are, Earl, and we didn’t want to burden you unnecessarily with a sad leavetaking, so we’ve already been down to the depot and shipped Roger off.” Well, it caused Father some pain to realize that I’d given up my dog, but after a while, when he saw the thing in perspective, his spirits began to brighten, and the rest of us felt better too because now we could get more sleep. In no time at all we were able to cope and shield Father again from the bad news that seemed to come from everywhere that winter.
“‘It was marvelous to see Father grow lively again. I can’t say that he recovered his health, but not having to hear bad news all the time did restore a certain confidence and vigor to the man. And the winter too seemed to be declining in its fierceness, the back of the cold spell had been broken, and though it wasn’t actually warm, the terrible snow had begun to melt—though here and there there were still high drifts and all the curbs were piled with the stuff. It wasn’t just that we knew how to handle the bad news better now that Roger was off our mind; it was that the bad news itself fell off. One day Father even felt well enough to go out for a walk. It was fun to see him in so fine a fettle—Father was a marvelous man to be with when he was feeling good—and I joined him. He was so cheerful that he didn’t seem to be the same man, and once he even bent over to gather up some snow for a snowball. I thought he might hurt himself doing a thing like that but he was up again as spry as any boy and threw the snowball all the way across the street to hit the tree there a lovely bull’s-eye. This made him so happy he couldn’t contain himself and he just stepped bold as you please into a pile of snow at the curb, but then he got this horrible look on his face, and he dropped down on his hands and knees and began uncovering whatever it was he had felt in the snow. Well, it was Roger’s frozen body and when he stepped on it he’d snapped its neck.
“‘I had to carry Father back to the house on my back, and I think he must have been dead by the time we got there. I took his body in through the back door because I knew Mother and Rose would be in the parlor, and out of habit I didn’t think they should see this.’
“The funny thing is,” Dick Gibson told his audience, “I don’t remember hearing any of this. I mean, I must have or how would I know it, but I don’t recall much of anything that went on in that room the months I was there. Was I silent the whole time she spoke? Was it a monologue? Did I ever drink the bouillon? Did Miriam get into bed with me during her story? Did I fall asleep? What happened?
“I wasn’t in love with Miriam. It’s more probable, though unlikely, that she was in love with me. She made me comfortable, more comfortable than I’d ever been in my life. Perhaps because she was a nurse. Nurses have lousy reputations because of what they do for men. I mean the bedpans, the enemas and the pubic shaves, I mean the deathbed vigils and hearing folks scream. I could be myself with Miriam, vent my gas, kiss with a bad taste in my mouth, grunt over my bowels in the toilet. So when I ask if I could have fallen asleep it isn’t out of fear of not being on my mettle as a lover. I was in a trance, a catalepsy, a swoon, a brown study, a neutral funk. I was languid, gravid, the thousand-pound kid in Miriam’s room, sensitized as human soup. And if I heard her at all it was in my ilium I listened—as deep as that—harkened in my coccyx, my pajama strings all ears, and my buttons and the Kleenex under my pillow.
“‘What is wrong with you, Mr. Desebour, may I ask?’ Doctor Pasco, the Home’s young director wanted to know.
“‘I have the
“‘It was marvelous to see Father grow lively again. I can’t say that he recovered his health, but not having to hear bad news all the time did restore a certain confidence and vigor to the man. And the winter too seemed to be declining in its fierceness, the back of the cold spell had been broken, and though it wasn’t actually warm, the terrible snow had begun to melt—though here and there there were still high drifts and all the curbs were piled with the stuff. It wasn’t just that we knew how to handle the bad news better now that Roger was off our mind; it was that the bad news itself fell off. One day Father even felt well enough to go out for a walk. It was fun to see him in so fine a fettle—Father was a marvelous man to be with when he was feeling good—and I joined him. He was so cheerful that he didn’t seem to be the same man, and once he even bent over to gather up some snow for a snowball. I thought he might hurt himself doing a thing like that but he was up again as spry as any boy and threw the snowball all the way across the street to hit the tree there a lovely bull’s-eye. This made him so happy he couldn’t contain himself and he just stepped bold as you please into a pile of snow at the curb, but then he got this horrible look on his face, and he dropped down on his hands and knees and began uncovering whatever it was he had felt in the snow. Well, it was Roger’s frozen body and when he stepped on it he’d snapped its neck.
“‘I had to carry Father back to the house on my back, and I think he must have been dead by the time we got there. I took his body in through the back door because I knew Mother and Rose would be in the parlor, and out of habit I didn’t think they should see this.’
“The funny thing is,” Dick Gibson told his audience, “I don’t remember hearing any of this. I mean, I must have or how would I know it, but I don’t recall much of anything that went on in that room the months I was there. Was I silent the whole time she spoke? Was it a monologue? Did I ever drink the bouillon? Did Miriam get into bed with me during her story? Did I fall asleep? What happened?
“I wasn’t in love with Miriam. It’s more probable, though unlikely, that she was in love with me. She made me comfortable, more comfortable than I’d ever been in my life. Perhaps because she was a nurse. Nurses have lousy reputations because of what they do for men. I mean the bedpans, the enemas and the pubic shaves, I mean the deathbed vigils and hearing folks scream. I could be myself with Miriam, vent my gas, kiss with a bad taste in my mouth, grunt over my bowels in the toilet. So when I ask if I could have fallen asleep it isn’t out of fear of not being on my mettle as a lover. I was in a trance, a catalepsy, a swoon, a brown study, a neutral funk. I was languid, gravid, the thousand-pound kid in Miriam’s room, sensitized as human soup. And if I heard her at all it was in my ilium I listened—as deep as that—harkened in my coccyx, my pajama strings all ears, and my buttons and the Kleenex under my pillow.
“‘What is wrong with you, Mr. Desebour, may I ask?’ Doctor Pasco, the Home’s young director wanted to know.
“‘I have the
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