When would you want to do that?
Now. This evening. I want you to take me out for dinner right now this evening.
It’ll be my pleasure, he said. I’ll have to clean up first.
I’ll be waiting for you, Rose said, and hung up.
He showered and changed into his town clothes and drove into Holt in the pickup. It was still light outside and would be yet, now that daylight savings had started, for another two hours.
He went up to the door and she came out at once and he walked her to the pickup. She seemed disturbed by something. They went out to the Wagon Wheel Café on the highway as before, and over dinner she told him about taking the Wallaces to see their children at the foster home at the west side of town. He asked questions when he needed to, but mostly he only listened, and afterward he drove her back to her house.
Will you come in for a while? she said. Please.
Of course. If you want me to.
They stepped inside and she said: Why don’t you have a seat and I’ll make coffee.
Thank you, he said. He sat in his accustomed chair and looked around, studying a painting of hers he particularly liked, a watercolor of a stand of trees with their leaves all gone, just the bare trunks remaining, a windbreak on a hill, and brown grass on the hill against a winter sky. She had other pictures on the walls, but they seemed too bright to him and he didn’t like them as well. He could hear her out in the kitchen. You want any help? he called.
No, she called back. I’m coming.
She came in and set his cup on the side table next to his chair and she sat down on the couch across the room and placed her cup on the coffee table before her. Then, without warning, she began to cry.
Raymond set his cup down and looked at her. Rose. What is it? Have I done something wrong?
No, she said. She wiped at her eyes with the back of her hands. It’s not you. It’s not you at all. I’ve just felt sad all afternoon. Ever since we went to the foster home. It was okay really, but it just seemed sad to me.
There wasn’t nothing else to be done about it, was there? he said.
No. But I’ve felt like weeping all afternoon. I told them everything would be all right. That was a lie. I didn’t tell them the truth. This isn’t any kind of a priority for the police. The police aren’t going to find her uncle and they won’t get their children back. Those kids will be kept in foster homes till they’re eighteen or till they just run away. Everything is not going to be all right.
Probably not, Raymond said.
Her eyes filled with tears again and she took out a handkerchief, and Raymond sat watching her, then he stood and crossed to the couch and sat down and put his arm around her shoulder.
She wiped at her tears and turned to face him. I’ve done this kind of thing so many times, she said. And today they could only mention their physical ailments. I don’t blame them for that. That’s all they know how to talk about. So I called the doctor and made them an appointment. But what good can any doctor do?
Not enough, Raymond said. A doctor couldn’t of done nothing for my brother, either.
She looked up at him. His iron-gray hair was so stiff on his head, his face so red from all the years of fierce weather he’d worked in. Still, she could see the kindness there. She settled into his shoulder.
I’m sorry to go on so, she said. Thank you for listening. And coming over here to sit next to me without my having to ask. It means a lot to me, Raymond. You mean a lot to me.
Well, Raymond said. He drew her slightly closer to him. That goes both ways, Rose.
Then she began to weep again, against his shoulder while he held her. They sat for a long time in this way, without moving, without talking.
AND NOW, OUTSIDE THE HOUSE, BEYOND THE SILENT ROOM they sat in, the dark began to collect along the street.
And soon now the streetlamps would come on, flickering and shuddering, to illuminate all the corners of Holt.
And farther away, outside of town, out on the high plains, there would be the blue yardlights shining from the tall poles at all the isolated farms and ranches in all the flat treeless country, and presently the wind would come up, blowing across the open spaces, traveling without obstruction across the wide fields of winter wheat and across the ancient native pastures and the graveled county roads, carrying with it a pale dust as the dark approached and the nighttime gathered round.
And still in the room they sat together quietly, the old man with his arm around this kind woman, waiting for what would come.
Acknowledgments
The author wishes to acknowledge the generous support and encouragement of:
Mark Haruf, Verne Haruf, Edith Russell, Sorel Haruf Arnold, Whitney Haruf, Chaney Haruf, Mark and Gin Spragg, Rod Bina, Tony Watkins, Kit and Sandy Carpenter, Jeff Donlan, Liz Gersbacher, Stephanie Dillard, Theresa Saucke, John Niedfeldt, Rollie Deering, Dr. Tom Parks, Dr. Paul Ammatelli, Karen Greenberg, Meg Viets, Peter Brown, Carol Devine Carson, Liz Van Hoose, Kathryn Laughon, and especially JJ Laughon; and Peter Matson and Jody Hotchkiss, longtime friends and agents; and Gary Fisketjon, friend and the best of all editors; and Cathy Haruf, always.