The Anything Box

"Here you are," he said slowly and Ellena's eyes flew to his face.
He smiled carefully. "Make them plenty crisp and step it up!"
Ellena's smile was relieved. "Crisp it is!"
"Where's a rag to wipe my shoes off with? Shoulda worn my waders. There's
mud and water everywhere this year."
"My old petticoat's hanging over there on the tree—if you don't mind an
embroidered shoe rag."
Crae took down the cotton half-slip with eyelet embroidery around the
bottom.
"This is a rag?" he asked.
She laughed. "It's ripped almost full length and the elastic's worn out. Go
ahead and use it."
Crae worked out of his wet shoes and socks and changed into dry. Then he
lifted one shoe and the rag and sat hunched over himself on the log. With a
horrible despair, he felt all the old words bubbling and the scab peeling off
the hot sickness inside him. His fist tightened on the white rag until his
knuckles cracked. Desperately, he tried to change his thoughts, but the
bubbling putrescence crept through his mind and poured its bitterness into his
mouth and he heard himself say bitterly,
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"How long were they here before I showed up?"
Ellena turned slowly from the stove, her shoulders drooping, her face
despairing.
"About a half hour." Then she straightened and looked desperately over at
him. "No, Crae, please. Not here. Not now."
Crae looked blindly down at the shoe he still held in one hand. He clenched
his teeth until his jaws ached, but the words pushed through anyway—biting and
venomous.
"Thirty miles from anywhere. Just have to turn my back and they come
flocking! You can't tell me you don't welcome them! You can't tell me you
don't encourage them and entice them and—" He slammed his shoe down and
dropped the rag beside it. In two strides he caught her by both shoulders and
shook her viciously. "Hellamighty! You even built a fire in the tent for them!
What's the matter, woman, are you slipping? You've got any number of ways to
take their minds off the cold without building a fire!"
"Crae! Crae!" She whispered pleadingly.
"Don't 'Crae, Crae' me!" he backhanded her viciously across the face. She
cried out and fell sideways against the tree. Her hair caught on the rough
stub of a branch as she started to slide down against the trunk. Crae grabbed
one of her arms and yanked her up. Her caught hair strained her head backwards
as he lifted. And suddenly her smooth sun-tinted throat fitted Crae's two
spasmed hands. For an eternity his thumbs felt the sick pounding of her pulse.
Then a tear slid slowly down from one closed eye, trickling towards her ear.
Crae snatched his hand away before the tear could touch it. Ellena slid to
her knees, leaving a dark strand of hair on the bark of the tree. She got
slowly to her feet. She turned without a word or look and went into the tent.
Crae slumped down on the log, his hands limp between his knees, his head
hanging. He lifted his hands and looked at them incredulously, then he flung
them from him wildly, turned and shoved his face hard up against the rough
tree trunk.
"Oh, God!" he thought wildly. "I must be going crazy! I never hit her
before. I never tried to—" He beat his doubled fists against the tree until
the knuckles crimsoned, then he crouched again above his all-enveloping misery
until the sharp smell of burning food penetrated his daze. He walked blindly
over to the camp stove and yanked the smoking skillet off. He turned off the
fire and dumped the curled charred fish into the garbage can and dropped the
skillet on the ground.
He stood uncertain, noticing for the first time the scattered sprinkling of
rain patterning the top of the split-log table near the stove. He started
automatically for the car to roll the windows up.
And then he saw Ellena standing just outside the tent Afraid to move or
speak, he stood watching her. She came slowly over to him. In the half-dusk he
could see the red imprint of his hand across her cheek. She looked up at him
with empty, drained eyes.
"We will go home tomorrow." Her voice was expressionless and almost steady.
"I'm leaving as soon as we get there."
"Ellena, don't!" Crae's voice shook with pleading and despair.
Ellena's mouth quivered and tears overflowed. She dropped her sodden,
crumpled Kleenex and took a fresh one from her shirt pocket. She carefully
wiped her eyes.
"'It's better to snuff a candle . . .'" Her voice choked off and Crae felt
his heart contract. They had read the book together and picked out their
favorite quote and now she was using it to—
Crae held out his hands, "Please, Ellena, I promise—"
"Promise!" Her eyes blazed so violently that Crae stumbled back a step.
"You've been trying to mend this sick thing between us with promises for too
long!" Her voice was taut with anger. "Neither you nor I believe your promises
any more. There's not one valid reason why I should try to keep our marriage
going by myself. You don't believe in it any more. You don't believe in me any
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more—if you ever did. You don't even believe in yourself! Nothing will work if
you don't believe—" Her voice wavered and broke. She mopped her eyes carefully
again and her voice was measured and cold as she said, "Well leave for home
tomorrow—and God have mercy on us both."
She turned away blindly, burying her face in her two hands and stumbled
into the tent.
Crae sat down slowly on the log beside his muddy shoes. He picked up one
and fumbled for the cleaning rag. He huddled over himself, feeling as though
life were draining from his arms and legs, leaving them limp.
"It's all finished," he thought hopelessly. "It's finished and I'm finished
and this whole crazy damn life is finished. I've done everything I know.
Nothing on this earth can ever make it right between us again."
You don't believe, you don't believe. And then a wheezy old voice whistled
in his ear. Nothing works, less'n you believe it. Crae straightened up,
following the faint thread of voice. Happen some day you'll want to go
fishing— you won't forget.
"It's crazy and screwy and a lot of hogwash," thought Crae. "Things like
that can't possibly exist."
You don't believe. Nothing works, lessen— A strange compound feeling of
hope and wonder began to well up in Crae. "Maybe, maybe," he thought
breathlessly. Then— "It will work. It's got to work!"
Eagerly intent, he went back over the incident at the store. All he could
remember at first was the rocking chair and the thick discolored lips of the
old man, then a rhythm began in his mind, curling to a rhyme word at the end
of each line. He heard the raspy old voice again—
Happen some day you'll want to go fishing, you won't forget. And the lines
slowly took form.
"Make your line from her linen fair.