“Trouble was,” he continued. “Eleanor never was the same after that. She hardly ever smiled. The marriage took place and Fleet went back north somewhere. A year or two later your pa was born and she got a bit better, but still not the same.” He stopped again and looked at me guiltily. “Son, I never thought to say it, and I hope you forgive me. About your pa, and your ma, too, though I never met her. I sure am sorry.”
Both my parents had been killed in an auto crash about three years before. It was kind of him to mention it. “Thank you,” I said.
The sun outside was definitely fading.
“I’d best hurry,” said Walter. “Fleet started to come. back. It wasn’t often. He just turned up every couple of years or so, stayed out in the woods somewhere for a few days, then disappeared again. I guess it was to see how Eleanor was doing. Lord knows, no one but us three ever saw him. He didn’t socialize none. As it turned out, he must’ve been waiting till Eleanor was ready. I guess Eleanor was waiting till your pa went off to college. Don’t fault her, though. She was only seventeen when she was forced to marry a man she didn’t love. Thomas knew it was just a matter of time till she went off with Fleet. Years, maybe. But coming just as sure as old age. It was bad for Thomas, but son, I think we all knew it was worse for Fleet. He just kept coming back and going away, like the tide. It didn’t look like he ever took a wife of his own. The woman he wanted belonged to another man. He was a sorry sight to see in them years. Pitiful.”
I was shocked. It was pitiful, all right. However, my pity was reserved for the man who had spent twenty years married to a woman who didn’t love him, my grandfather.
“It was late spring of 1949,” Walter went on. “Thomas had a mare in foal. Like most farmers, he had a sixth sense about when the foal was coming. In those days, we used to have continuous barns, which means that out from the house was a lot of connected outbuildings. Nearest the house was the woodshed. In Thomas’s yard that connected to an old carriage house, which went on to connect to the corn shed, cow shed, dairy, and barn. In other words, you could be out in the barn and pretty far away, and enclosed, too. Eleanor didn’t know that Thomas had come in early that day to see to his mare. He’d have no reason to make any noise, and every reason to be quiet and soothing. He told me later that he heard a couple of cars, but hadn’t thought anything of it. It was dusk when he got finished. He walked back through the buildings and came out the side of the woodshed which opened to the yard. The first thing he saw was Eleanor’s things in the back of an old black Ford. I’ve often wondered why she waited till that hour before leaving. Thomas always came in from the fields about that same time. The only thing I can figure is that it took them longer to get her belongings than they thought it would. Anyway, Thomas saw the car first, then Eleanor and Fleet, and all three kind of froze. Now if he had come upon them someplace else, the story might have ended different. Thomas wasn’t naturally a violent man. But he was in the woodshed, and the axe was right to hand. Sure, he says he knew for years that Eleanor was going, but it wasn’t right that he had to see it happening right in front of him like that. It was too much for any man to bear. He picked up the axe and charged out at Fleet like a bull gone mad.”
I sat like stone, certain of the outcome of the story. Walter passed a hand through his sparse hair.
“My house,” he continued, “is but a quarter mile down, the other side of the road. In those days we didn’t turn on the TV the minute we walked in the door. It was quieter then. I heard a roar. It made my blood run cold. I’d never heard the like of it before. I rushed outside. It seemed to have come from Thomas’s direction. I didn’t even think to use my car. I just ran.
“Back here, Thomas was running at Fleet and Eleanor was trying to get in front of him to protect him. When Thomas saw Eleanor in the way, he tried to change the direction the axe was heading, but in that same fraction of a second, Fleet tried to protect her, too. He shoved her aside, right into the downswing. I won’t describe that further. I was running down the road when I heard the next scream. I think that was Fleet. Thomas was bent over Eleanor trying to pull out the...” The old man gulped and took a breath. “Anyway, Fleet went mad. He pulled Thomas off with a rage that would scare the devil himself. Trouble was, for all his strength he swung wild, like he didn’t know what direction to hit. I guess the thing that counted most was that Thomas was beyond feeling physical pain. Nothing short of a bullet would have stopped Thomas that night. I know. I tried. By the time I came running down that there driveway, Thomas was banging Fleet’s head against the oak. It took me forever to pull him off. It took me even longer to convince him Eleanor was dead. He kept trying to get to her. Landed a few good ones on me before I got through to him. I got him into the house. At the time I naturally wasn’t sure just which one had killed Eleanor, but I had no problem about which one I wanted to blame. I grabbed a bottle of whisky and went back out and poured it on Fleet. I brought Eleanor’s clothes inside and threw them in the bedroom closet. Thomas was numb, sitting like one of them statues, except his face was bloody and swollen. I left it alone for the sheriff to see. Then I called him and told everybody the story you know. Nobody but the four of us knew how those two had waited twenty years. Nobody remembered Fleet. Nobody questioned my version. Thomas might have said something at the beginning, but it was weeks before he could say anything at all. Nor did he ever say anything about what I did. About six months later, though, he asked me to come here at dusk. I guess he wanted me to know that he never meant to hurt Eleanor. I thought he’d gone crazy when he told me what I’d see. Afterwards, I thought I had.”
Well, I hadn’t. I looked out again at the benign front yard. The two men had fed each other’s imagination for forty years. Especially if Walter’s current version was true, which I believed. Only a shared sense of guilt could prompt identical hallucinations. It was too late to help Grandpa. Maybe I could still help Walter.
“My grandmother’s death was an accident,” I said. “The Indian’s probably qualified as self defense. Grandpa’s lifting the axe, in all probability, would have been attributed to temporary insanity. You should put your mind at rest, Walter.”
“It is, son. I have no regrets about what I did.”
“Then what is this all about? Even if I did see the whole thing, what difference would it make?”
“None,” he replied. “But Thomas says we won’t see it the way it was the first time. It’s going to come out different.”
“How?”
“He’s going to change it. Anyway, that’s what he thinks. He tried before, but he said he couldn’t get through from the living side. Then he figured it out, he said. But first, you got to understand Thomas. He was guilty about robbing them of the life they were supposed to have together. He said he had Eleanor for twenty years when he shouldn’t have had her at all, and he was given a fine son in the bargain. He thought it only right for her and Fleet to have their time together like they always wanted.”
“They have eternity together,” I said coldly.
Walter smiled and shook his head. “Thomas didn’t see it that way.”
“Listen,” I said using my most reasonable tone of voice. “No matter what my grandfather wanted to do, you mustn’t expect miracles. History is unchangeable.”
“Thomas said that between life and death is a time we don’t understand, when each side could get through to the other. If they met at the right time and place, they could change what happened the first time. He used to want to kill himself just to get it done and over with, but he couldn’t figure a way that wasn’t too fast. It had to come natural; then he had to hang on till dusk so he could meet them when they came again. Tonight’s probably the night. We’ll see.”