Wrapped in his roles, he gave them bits and pieces of lost romance. And by the time the last lines of his soliloquy faded, he too was able to forget the present, at least for a while.
Each night, after he retired, she came to him. For a while she would sit on the edge of his bed and talk of her life, about the flocks, and the village children, and Michael. She brought him books to ask their meanings and questioned him about his youth — about the life of a student in the wonderful days before the Doomwar.
Then, after a time, Abby would smile, put away the dusty volumes, and slide under the covers next to him while he leaned over and took care of the candle.
On the tenth morning, she did not slip away with the predawn light, but instead wakened Gordon with a kiss.
“Hmmmn, good morning,” he commented, and reached for her, but Abby pulled away. She picked up her clothes, brushing her breasts across the soft hairs of his flat stomach.
“I should let you sleep,” she told him. “But I wanted to ask you something.” She held her dress in a ball.
“Mmm? What is it?” Gordon stuffed the pillow behind his head for support.
“You’re going to be leaving today, aren’t you?” she asked.
“Yes,” he nodded seriously. “It’s probably best I’d like to stay longer, but since I can’t, I’d better be heading west again.”
“I know,” she nodded seriously. “We’ll all hate to see you go. But… well, I’m going to meet Michael out at the trapline, this evening. I miss him terribly.” She touched the side of his face. “That doesn’t bother you, does it? I mean, it’s been wonderful here with you, but he’s my husband and…”
He smiled and covered her hand. To his amazement, he had little difficulty with his feelings. He was more envious than jealous of Michael. The desperate logic of their desire for children, and their obvious love for one another, made the situation, in retrospect, as obvious as the need for a clean break at the end. He only hoped he had done them the favor they sought. For despite their fantasies, it was unlikely he would ever come this way again.
“I have something for you,” Abby said. She reached under the bed and pulled out a small silvery object on a chain, and a paper package.
“It’s a whistle. Mrs. Hewlett says you should have one.” She slipped it over his neck and adjusted it until satisfied with the effect.
“Also, she helped me write this letter.” Abby picked up the little package. “I found some stamps in a drawer in the gas station, but they wouldn’t stick on. So I got some money, instead. This is fourteen dollars. Will it be enough?”
She held out a cluster of faded bills.
Gordon couldn’t help smiling. Yesterday five or six of the others had privately approached him. He had accepted their little envelopes and similar payments for postage with as straight a face as possible. He might have used the opportunity to charge them something he needed, but the community had already given him a month’s stock of jerky, dried apples, and twenty straight arrows for his bow. There was no need, nor had he the desire to extort anything else.
Some of the older citizens had had relatives in Eugene, or Portland, or towns in the Willamette Valley. It was the direction he was heading, so he took the letters. A few were addressed to people who had lived in Oakridge and Blue River. Those he filed deep in the safest part of his sack. The rest, he might as well throw into Crater Lake, for all the good they would ever do, but he pretended anyway.
He soberly counted out a few paper bills, then handed back the rest of the worthless currency. “And who are you writing to?” Gordon asked Abby as he took the letter. He felt as if he were playing Santa Claus, and found himself enjoying it.
“I’m writing to the University. You know, at Eugene? I asked a bunch of questions like, are they taking new students again yet? And do they take married students?” Abby blushed. “I know I’d have to work real hard on my reading to get good enough. And maybe they aren’t recovered enough to take many new students. But Michael’s already so smart… and by the time we hear from them maybe things will be better.”
“By the time you hear…” Gordon shook his head.
Abby nodded. “I’ll for sure be reading a lot better by then. Mrs. Thompson promises she’ll help me. And her husband has agreed to start a school, this winter. I’m going to help with the little kids.
“I hope maybe I can learn to be a teacher. Do you think that’s silly?”
Gordon shook his head. He had thought himself beyond surprise, but this touched him. In spite of Abby’s totally disproportioned view of the state of the world, her hope wanned him, and he found himself dreaming along with her. There was no harm in wishing, was there?
“Actually,” Abby went on, confidentially, twisting her dress in her hands. “One of the big reasons I’m writing is to get a … a pen pal. That’s the word, isn’t it? I’m hoping maybe someone in Eugene will write to me. That way we’ll get letters, here. I’d love to get a letter.
“Also” — her gaze fell — “that will give you another reason to come back, in a year or so … besides maybe wanting to see the baby.”
She looked up and dimpled. “I got the idea from your Sherlock Holmes play. That’s an ‘ulterior motive,’ isn’t it?”
She was so delighted with her own cleverness, and so eager for his approval — Gordon felt a great, almost painful rush of tenderness. Tears welled as he reached out and pulled her into an embrace. He held her tightly and rocked slowly, his eyes shut against reality, and he breathed in with her sweet smell a light and optimism he had thought gone from the world.
7
“Well, this is where I turn back.” Mrs. Thompson shook hands with Gordon. “Down this road things should be pretty tame until you get to Davis Lake. The last of the old loner survivalists that way wiped each other out some years back, though I’d still be careful if I were you.”
There was a chill in the air, for autumn had arrived in full. Gordon zipped up the old letter carrier’s jacket and adjusted the leather bag as the straight-backed old woman handed him an old roadmap.
“I had Jimmie Horton mark the places we know of, where homesteaders have set up. I wouldn’t bother any of them unless you have to. Mostly they’re a suspicious type, likely to shoot first. We’ve only been trading with the nearest for a short time.”
Gordon nodded. He folded the map carefully and slipped it into a pouch. He felt rested and ready. He would regret leaving Pine View as much as any haven in recent memory. But now that he was resigned to going, he actually felt a growing eagerness to be traveling, to see what had happened in the rest of Oregon.
In the years since he had left the wreckage of Minnesota, he had found ever wilder signs of the dark age. But now he was in a new watershed. This had once been a pleasant state with dispersed light industry, productive farms, and an elevated level of culture. Perhaps it was merely Ab-by’s innocence infecting him. But logically, the Willamette Valley would be the place to look for civilization, if it existed anywhere anymore.
He took the old woman’s hand once again. “Mrs. Thompson, I’m not sure I could ever repay what you people have done for me.”
She shook her head. Her face was deeply tanned and so wrinkled Gordon was certain she had to be more than the fifty years she claimed.