“Where’s Agnis? She ent come see me a once.”
“To tell the truth, I can’t say why,” said Quoyle.
“Ah, I knows why she don’t want to come by. Shamed! She’s shamed, knowing what I knows. ‘Er was glad enough to be in my ‘ouse though when she were a girl. Come to the old woman with ‘er trouble, begged for ‘elp. Snivel and bawl. Women’s dirty business! I seen ‘er digging up the root. Squinty little Face-and-Eye berry, the devil’s evil eyes watching out from the bushes. Boiled them roots up into a black devil’s tea, give it to ‘er in the kitchen. She was at it all night, screeched a bomb, the bawling so’s I couldn’t get no rest. See ‘er there in the morning, she wouldn’t look up, turned ‘er dishy face to the wall. There was something bloody in the basin.
“ ‘Well,’ I says, ‘is it over then?’
“ ‘It is,’ says the old woman. And I goes out to me boat. It was ‘er brother done it, y’see, that clumsy big Guy Quoyle. Was at ‘er from when she was a little maid.”
Quoyle grimaced, felt his chapped lower lip split. So the aunt had been to the Nightmare Isles as well. His own father! Christ.
“I’ll come by in the morning,” he mumbled. “If there’s anything you need.” The old man was looking at the photograph of the poodle. But Quoyle, turning from him, thought he saw the mad glint now, remembered Billy’s vile story about the man’s dead wife. The old woman. Assaulting the corpse. Ah, the Quoyles.
In the hotel dining room Quoyle ordered wine. Some obscure Bordeaux, corky and sour. Wavey’s graceful lifting of her glass. But it went straight to their heads and they both talked wildly of what-nothing. He heard her dark voice even when she was silent. Quoyle forgot the old cousin and all he had said; felt wonderful, wonderful. Wavey described the things in the stores, Sunshine’s new cobalt blue sweater that would set off her fiery curls. She was conscious of the new brassiere under her dress and slip. Samples from the perfume counter cast exquisite scents from her wrists every time she raised her fork. They looked at each other over the table. Briefly at first, then with the prolonged and piercing gazes that precede sexual congress. Wineglasses clinked. Butter melted on their knives. Quoyle dropped a shrimp and Wavey laughed. He always dropped shrimp, he said. They both had veal scaloppine. Another bottle of wine.
After such a dinner the movie was almost too much. But they went. Something about a French recluse who peeped through Venetian blinds and played with a bread knife.
And at last to bed.
“Oh,” said Wavey, lying dazed and somewhat bruised in Quoyle’s large arms, “this is the hotel where Herold and I came on our honeymoon.”
In the morning the attendant said the old man could not be seen. Had broken the glass from the poodle picture and stabbed at all who came near. And was tranquilized. No question of a Golden Age home for him.
37 Slingstones
“The slingstone hitch… is used in anchoring lobster pots. It
may be tied either in the bight or in the end. Pull the ends
strongly, and the turns in the standing part are spilled
into the loops.”
THE ASHLEY BOOK OF KNOTS
WEEKS of savage cold. Quoyle was comfortable enough in his sweater and anorak. The old station wagon sputtered and slugged, at last quit in sight of the Gammy Bird office. He got out, put his shoulder to it, steering with one hand. Got it rolling, jumped in and turned the key, popped the gearshift. The engine caught for a few seconds, then died again as he rolled up behind Billy’s decayed Dodge. Ice in the gas line, he thought. Maybe Billy had some dry gas.
Billy had phone messages. Two calls from the principal of Bunny’s school. Call back right away. He dialed, heart in his mouth. Let Bunny be all right.
“Mr. Quoyle. We’ve had some trouble with Bunny this morning. At recess. I’m sorry to say she pushed one of the teachers, Mrs. Lumbull. Pushed her very hard. In fact, Bunny knocked her down. She’s a large and strong child for her age. No, it was not an accident. By all accounts it was deliberate. I don’t need to tell you Mrs. Lumbull is upset and mystified why the child would push her. Bunny will not say why. She’s sitting right across from my desk and refuses to speak. Mr. Quoyle, I think you’d better come down and pick her up. Mrs. Lumbull didn’t even know Bunny. She’s not in her class.”
“Billy, borrow your truck? Got ice in my line.”
Bunny had been moved to the outer office where she sat with her hat and coat on, arms folded, face crimson and set. Wouldn’t look at Quoyle. Holding back everything.
The principal with her downy face, wearing the brown wool suit. Fingernails like the bowls of souvenir spoons. Held a pencil as though interrupted in the act of writing. An authoritarian voice, perfected by practice.
“Under the circumstances I have no choice but to suspend Bunny from school until she explains her action and apologizes to Mrs. Lumbull. Now, Bunny, this is your last chance. Your father’s here now and I want you to make a clean breast of it. Tell me why you pushed poor Mrs. Lumbull.”
Nothing. Quoyle saw his child’s face so full of rage and misery she could not speak.
“Come on,” he said gently, “let’s go get in Billy’s truck.” Nodded to the principal. Who put her pencil on the desk with a hard sound.
In the truck Bunny bawled.
“You push that teacher?”
“Yes!”
“Why?”
“She’s the worst one of all!” And would say no more. So Quoyle drove her to Beety’s, thinking here we go again.
“Mrs. Lumbull, eh?” Beety’s eyebrows up. “Be willing to bet three cookies you had your reasons.”
“I did,” said Bunny, snorting back tears. Beety pushed Quoyle toward the door. Gave him a little wave.
He heard the story in the afternoon. From Beety by way of Marty.
“Mrs. Lumbull is a float teacher, takes classes when the main teacher is sick or at a conference. Today she took the special ed class. Got ‘em all bundled up, outside. Herry Prowse is in that class. Poor Herry hits the cold air and decides he has to go pee. Tries to tell Mrs. Lumbull. Hopping up and down. You know how Herry talks. Not only does she not understand him-or maybe she does-but she makes him stand at attention against the brick wall to cure his fidgeting and every time he tries to tell her his problem she mimics him, pushes him back. Herry’s blubbering away and finally wets his pants and is humiliated. And here comes the avenging angel, Miss Bunny Quoyle, full speed ahead, and rams mean Mrs. Lumbull right behind the knees. The rest is history. If she was mine, Quoyle, I’d give her a medal. But it’s going to be tough straightening this out with the school. The principal don’t want to hear there’s trouble with a teacher. Teachers are hard to get. Even teachers like Mrs. Lumbull. So she’ll try to bull it out.”
That evening Quoyle talked to the aunt on the phone, didn’t know he would set her in motion. A screech over the wire like a sea gull. She caught an early plane, would not be turned back, and in the morning the principal saw three generations of Quoyles advancing up the frozen driveway. The aunt’s new St. John’s hairstyle like a helmet, Quoyle’s chin jutting, and Bunny between.
Got an earful from the aunt. But it was Quoyle who smoothed things out, explained in a reasonable voice, coaxed the principal and Bunny into mutual apologies and promises. Easy enough for the principal who knew that Mrs. Lumbull was moving to Grand Falls to open a Christian bookstore. Hard for Bunny who still measured events on a child’s scale of fair and unfair.