in law would be free to
interpret as agreement if he wished. Anyway, Murray was probably
correct from a medical point of view—an ice pick in the medulla
oblongata probably wouldn’t leave one with any time to suffer. But,
God, what must have preceded it. It didn’t bear thinking about.
But he did think about it. How could he help
but think about it? Over and over, almost compulsively, Guinness
had, like a man suffering through his wife’s birth pangs, lived his
way over Louise’s final twenty minutes or so of helpless existence.
It must have been horrible: the fear, the certainty of death, the
crazy pointlessness. The stranger with his fingers buried in the
flesh under her jaw, keeping her head straight as she knelt on the
bedroom carpet. Out of the corner of her eye, just at the limit of
her field of vision, she must have seen his hand raised to
strike.
Only a Murray Harrison, a man with no
imagination, a man who had passed his life conducting inventories
of his rubber band stock, could suppose the absence of pain any
kind of comfort. More terrible than pain was the prospect of pain,
and more terrible still the prospect of death. Pain was nothing,
just a fact of existence like passion or bereavement; it could be
accepted and overcome. Fear was the final enemy, the crucible in
which intelligence, dignity, any sense of oneself as a human
creature were melted down into a numbed wretchedness infinitely
worse than any mere anguish of the flesh.
“Do you know who did this?” Murray both
sobbed and shouted, in a kind of capitulation from the comforting
fact of death’s painlessness. “Ray, do you have any idea who coulda
done this?”
The real question, of course, the one he
wanted to ask, was, “Did you do this?” There was something like an
implied forgiveness if he would only confess and relieve an old man
of his intolerable burden of uncertainty.
Guinness drained his glass in a single
swallow, setting it down on the tiny circular table next to which
he was sitting in a low armchair, the back and arms of which were a
single curve of red naugahyde, and with the same hand he poured
himself another three fingers, holding the bottle by the neck.
“No, Murray, I don’t know who could have done
it, but believe me when I tell you it wasn’t me. I know what you’re
thinking, but Creon is full of shit.” With a smooth, careful
movement he reached across the perhaps four feet of space to where
his father in law was sitting and refilled his glass.
“Here, you need this worse than I do,” he
said quietly, suddenly heavy with compassion for a sorrow that was
no less real because it had been yielded to.
As if unaware of its existence, Murray took a
sip of the whiskey. You might have thought the operation performed
by some agency independent of the will. The drink had its effect,
though, and with a slight shudder the angular, storklike figure on
the bed seemed to come back into focus.
“I never really believed you did it, boy. Not
really. But still it’s a comfort to hear you say so.”
“Yeah.” Guinness rose to go back to his own
room, leaving the bottle of Jack Daniels behind him. “Good night,
Murray.”
“Good night, Ray.”
For most of that night Guinness lay awake,
staring up at a ceiling hidden in darkness. He didn’t even try to
sleep; he was past that.
Instead of numbing him, the whiskey had
produced a version of clarity all its own, difficult but
persistent. He didn’t drink usually, and now he could remember why:
the stuff made you feel melancholy and self pitying and at the same
time left behind sufficient intellectual detachment with which to
deplore such maudlin excesses. It was like being two people at
once, and they didn’t like each other.
Louise and her father. The shame of the
clever child for the weakness of her parent, whose love is rather
like conventional piety and chiefly operates at weddings and
funerals.
Still, Murray wasn’t a bad man just because
his emotions had been
interpret as agreement if he wished. Anyway, Murray was probably
correct from a medical point of view—an ice pick in the medulla
oblongata probably wouldn’t leave one with any time to suffer. But,
God, what must have preceded it. It didn’t bear thinking about.
But he did think about it. How could he help
but think about it? Over and over, almost compulsively, Guinness
had, like a man suffering through his wife’s birth pangs, lived his
way over Louise’s final twenty minutes or so of helpless existence.
It must have been horrible: the fear, the certainty of death, the
crazy pointlessness. The stranger with his fingers buried in the
flesh under her jaw, keeping her head straight as she knelt on the
bedroom carpet. Out of the corner of her eye, just at the limit of
her field of vision, she must have seen his hand raised to
strike.
Only a Murray Harrison, a man with no
imagination, a man who had passed his life conducting inventories
of his rubber band stock, could suppose the absence of pain any
kind of comfort. More terrible than pain was the prospect of pain,
and more terrible still the prospect of death. Pain was nothing,
just a fact of existence like passion or bereavement; it could be
accepted and overcome. Fear was the final enemy, the crucible in
which intelligence, dignity, any sense of oneself as a human
creature were melted down into a numbed wretchedness infinitely
worse than any mere anguish of the flesh.
“Do you know who did this?” Murray both
sobbed and shouted, in a kind of capitulation from the comforting
fact of death’s painlessness. “Ray, do you have any idea who coulda
done this?”
The real question, of course, the one he
wanted to ask, was, “Did you do this?” There was something like an
implied forgiveness if he would only confess and relieve an old man
of his intolerable burden of uncertainty.
Guinness drained his glass in a single
swallow, setting it down on the tiny circular table next to which
he was sitting in a low armchair, the back and arms of which were a
single curve of red naugahyde, and with the same hand he poured
himself another three fingers, holding the bottle by the neck.
“No, Murray, I don’t know who could have done
it, but believe me when I tell you it wasn’t me. I know what you’re
thinking, but Creon is full of shit.” With a smooth, careful
movement he reached across the perhaps four feet of space to where
his father in law was sitting and refilled his glass.
“Here, you need this worse than I do,” he
said quietly, suddenly heavy with compassion for a sorrow that was
no less real because it had been yielded to.
As if unaware of its existence, Murray took a
sip of the whiskey. You might have thought the operation performed
by some agency independent of the will. The drink had its effect,
though, and with a slight shudder the angular, storklike figure on
the bed seemed to come back into focus.
“I never really believed you did it, boy. Not
really. But still it’s a comfort to hear you say so.”
“Yeah.” Guinness rose to go back to his own
room, leaving the bottle of Jack Daniels behind him. “Good night,
Murray.”
“Good night, Ray.”
For most of that night Guinness lay awake,
staring up at a ceiling hidden in darkness. He didn’t even try to
sleep; he was past that.
Instead of numbing him, the whiskey had
produced a version of clarity all its own, difficult but
persistent. He didn’t drink usually, and now he could remember why:
the stuff made you feel melancholy and self pitying and at the same
time left behind sufficient intellectual detachment with which to
deplore such maudlin excesses. It was like being two people at
once, and they didn’t like each other.
Louise and her father. The shame of the
clever child for the weakness of her parent, whose love is rather
like conventional piety and chiefly operates at weddings and
funerals.
Still, Murray wasn’t a bad man just because
his emotions had been
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