Part 2

Flannery's Bear - Part 2

Netoniel: brother, sister, father, mother, son, daughter, angel, devil, genius, coward, escapee—no one could really tell, or keep track, he changed so often—was also quite sure that he could not, or would not if he could; well, perhaps he would, only perhaps, if he could, but he could not, not any more, not for some time now, do anything about the spreading fire, his clever mirror, the growing blanket, for the thing had gotten out of hand. Way.

It was not supposed to have happened. The strands were not supposed to last, they were supposed to evaporate. They were not supposed to rise and gather and weave this ever-growing spread, miles thick now, covering the Earth like a miasma, visible only to the spirit. Growing still with each new wish of each soul, with each wish to leave the suffering behind, with each hope to be elsewhere, elsewhen. Each such yearning a new strand: miniscule as one, but monstrous as trillions.

And, yes, he had to admit it, even to others—as he on rare occasions did, over a glass of something strong at some remote pub in some remote galaxy—yes, this had indeed grown beyond his not inconsiderable acumen, and that he now had neither the patience, nor the aspiration to deal with it. Also, it might be dangerous by now, even to him.

Besides, he was pretty sure Flannery would sort it out.

“Could we have another one of these,” he yelled over at the bartender and held up his glass.

Flannery pulled the sheet out of her typewriter and read through what she had written, made a few corrections. Read it again, and could smell the cold air of her cabin kitchen as she looked over her shoulder and saw the bear standing silently in the corner, smiling his stern bear smile, thinking like her, perhaps, about emerald grass and a different wind, of a blanketless sky. If only he didn’t have to hurt her so much. If only she didn’t feel so drained.

She turned back to her typewriter, inserted a new sheet of paper, flexed her fingers to restore circulation, and resumed her typing.

“We agree then, that we must write,” said Flannery.

Neither of her siblings objected, and she took that issue as settled then.

“We must choose the best language,” she pressed on, “master it to perfection, then write as clearly as we can. We must touch each individual soul and stir him awake.”

“I take it they read,” said Gabriel.

“Yes, that they do. A lot.”

“For enlightenment or entertainment?”

“Mainly for entertainment.”

“Will such reading touch them deeply enough?”

“If we write well enough,” said Flannery.

“Which language?” asked Gabriel. “English?”

“English,” confirmed Heather.

“Same as Charles.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“English has become the Earth’s tongue,” said Flannery.

“I thought Sanskrit was the Earth’s tongue,” said Gabriel to no one in particular.

Flannery shook her head. “I wish you’d keep yourself up to date.”

“It was a joke,” said Gabriel.

“Ah, yes,” said Flannery, not all that convinced.

Gabriel looked at Heather who didn’t find it funny either.

“Sanskrit has not been spoken on Earth for three thousand years,” said Heather.

“I said it was a joke,” said Gabriel. “I am not completely out of touch.”

“Are you not?” said Flannery.

“English then,” said Gabriel.”

“Yes.”

“If we, Heather and I, as you so cheerfully promise, will drown on entry,” said Gabriel, “how do we find each other?”

“I will find you,” said Flannery. “I, and the bear, will enter first. I will get myself situated, then signal for you, Gabriel. A little later I will call you, Heather.”

“How are you going to reach us, through the blanket?” wondered Gabriel.

“The bear knows how,” said Flannery, and elaborated no further.

“Why can’t we enter together, as siblings?” said Heather.

Flannery shook her head. “No, we need to spread out a bit, both geographically and temporally.”

“Why?” Heather wanted to know.

“If we are together and something unforeseen happens, it may happen to all of us. It’s a risk we cannot take.”

Heather was not convinced. “What could happen?”

“A car accident,” suggested Gabriel.

“For example,” said Flannery. “What if we’re out driving and our car breaks down and some escaped convict misfit criminal catches up to us and decides to shoot us all. If we’re together we’ll all be gone.”

“What are the chances of that?” said Heather.

“More than zero,” said Flannery.

“I see your point,” said Heather.

“I will leave shortly,” said Flannery. “In about twenty or so years of their time I’ll call you Gabriel, so please stay available and listen. It goes by fast, remember.”

“I do, and I will,” said Gabriel.

“Five year later I’ll call you, Heather.”

“I’ll be here.”

“I will learn the language well, and I will learn their writing craft. I will document what I find and pass this on to you. And, I will write.”

“What will you tell them?” asked Gabriel. “What should we write about?”

“Anything that will remind them. We have to remind them,” said Flannery, “that they are spirits, asleep, but still spirits. However we do this, whatever stories we tell, we must remind them. Remind them so well that they do remember. So well that they wake up.”

“And when they do,” he said.

“Then they will stop creating the blanket.”

“And the mirrors?”

“For now, I just don’t know,” said Flannery. “For I don’t know how he made them, how he installed them, or where he hid them.”

“I wish we knew where Netoniel is,” said Gabriel. “Surely, if we asked him. If we groveled a little. He’d like that.”

“No one has seen him for ages,” said Heather.

Netoniel: Always moving now. Not too sure himself exactly where he was at the moment. What part of what galaxy. What sun, what planet exactly. He was in fact hiding. No, not hiding, not really, he told himself, that was not it, he was just staying away, thoroughly.

For still, with each revolution, he knew Earth was growing worse. With each wish, whether flimsy or heartfelt—the little mirrors didn’t care—the blanket grew thicker by that one wish turned single strand, and now, by a billion wishes every hour, a billion new strands, each yearning for fulfillment, yes now, to his mind, Earth had reached the proportions of, well, an unpleasant accident.

What had started out as a bit of a prank really, as an engineering feat, as a knot, a puzzle, call it what you will, meant to be unsolvable—though not truly, for what could be designed could always be undesigned, at least to his mind, he just wanted to make it as hard as possible for them to figure it out—had in the end, as it happened, turned out to be exactly that: unsolvable. Rendered next to unsolvable by his clever mirror, and taking that final step with the help of the unpredicted blanket, which—and he could hear it cry for release, or at least thought he could whenever he thought in that direction—apparently would not dissipate until each and every one of its wishes had come true.

He had told them, well, perhaps bragged, that he had found a way to kill the soul, and they had not believed him, Gabriel especially. Wonderful brother Gabriel. How could you possibly kill something immortal? And that amused smile of his. Superior. Knowing.

But look at them. He had done it. They were asleep now, were they not, asleep by the billions, asleep by design, his design. And as close to dead as immortality will allow. For all practical purposes, then: Dead. Success.

Except, and that was the accident part, it was only supposed to have been temporary.

The mirror: The clever reversing mirror—which he had dubbed the reflector—was indeed Netoniel’s invention. And a fine one at that. Invisible and small and effective: Wish for white, get black; wish for in, get out; wish for knowing, become ignorant; wish for peace, get war; wish for life, get death.

Sweet.

There were two tricks to it. The mirror itself, of course. It had to be designed just right, capable of sensing and interpreting any intent, any wish or hope the soul might have or make. That was the hard part. Took work. Engineering it to reverse that hope to its mathematical opposite, to flip that dream completely around and beam it back to the wisher, so he would in fact pursue the reverse of what he intended, well that was easier. Just mathematics, really.

The other trick, of course, was to make each recipient soul create, install, hide, and utterly forget doing so, his own mirror—voluntarily, sort of. But Netoniel’s hands were nothing if not sleight of, and his reach nothing if not majestic, and though it took some time—lots of people there—they all, to a soul, had in the end gladly (if quite foolishly) slavishly absorbed his blueprint and from it created each their own mirror to his very specs, and had, when done, locked it invisibly away and forgotten all about it.

Sweet indeed.

So far so good.

Then, to be truthful, he had sat back to see how long it would take the first soul to solve the riddle, to find his mirror, and maneuver his way out of the maze, for although he had boasted to Flannery and Heather—and to Gabriel especially—that no one would ever wake up, not once he was done with them, that he could in fact kill the soul, you just watch, deep down he didn’t believe so himself, for he, as well as anyone, knew that nothing, nothing can kill the soul.

Well, that’s what he thought, anyway. When after nearly a thousand years not a single soul had puzzled its way out, or had been able to leave the planet at body death, then he began to realize that his design was perhaps a tad too good.

And it was at about this time, too, that the blanket began to appear, the one thing unforeseen. He realized that it must have begun forming from the start, but now it had grown into visibility, at least for Netoniel.

At first it appeared like a haze, as a disturbance of the atmosphere, then like a mist, then like a fog, then like a blanket, a silvery cloud, only sheet thin at first, but with each additional strand a little thicker, and a little thicker, till soon it was nearly half a mile deep. How could he have foreseen that the strands would not evaporate? They should have, had in fact during his lab tests, although—and he thought of this only later, much later—he had been aware of the mirror’s presence, of course. Could have made all the difference.

And still it grew, to eventually smother the Earth with hope, with wishes, each a silvery bar over bluish prison.

A real mess in other words. So he took off, roaming galaxies and universes until he had no clear idea exactly where he was, or where Earth was for that matter, which suited him just fine.

He felt just a touch guilty, but he could live with that.

Still, Flannery would figure something out. She always did. He’d check back later to see how she was doing. Much later.

On the 4th of February, 1961, Flannery’s letter to Fiona said, among other things:

I can’t get over the Mary Ann business. I told the Sisters that if that child was a saint, her first miracle would be getting a publisher for their book. And now the more I think about the way that book was written, the more convinced I am that it is a genuine miracle.

I have been reading Mauriac’s Memoirs Interieurs, which when I finish it I am going to send to you to read what he says about Emily Bronte. He sounds so much like you he might be you. He also has some good things to say about Hawthorne. I shall claim to be the only living person who doesn’t have a theory about Emily Bronte. I don’t know anything about her except she lived on the moor. I don’t know what a moor is but I should guess a piece of land that was desolate and damp. I read Wuthering Heights once but I am going to have to read it again to see why it fascinates you so.

I am worried about Heather Paley. How is she looking these days? Can you tell if her father beats her as well as the boys? I may ask you to talk to her soon.

Part of Fiona’s reply, dated the 28th of February, 1961, read:

I, too, must consider the Mary Ann story getting published a miracle, especially from what you told me about it and the Sisters initially. So, perhaps, Mary Ann is a saint.

Heather Paley looks, I don’t know the best word for it, starved, perhaps. Sallow of face and a little vacant. I’ve seen her a couple of times on her way to school. She looks behind her often. Not happy.

I have never put the question to you before, but if you can, please let me know: What is your interest in the Paleys, and in Heather in particular? How did you come to know about Frank Paley and his beating his children. I am curious but have always found it inappropriate to ask. I don’t remember you mentioning them when you stayed with Robert and Sally Fitzgerald here in Ridgefield. Did you know them then? I know it’s really none of my business, but I have to ask. I hope you don’t mind. There, I’ve asked.

Flannery did not reply to Fiona’s letter until March 23rd. She simply did not know what to tell her. She read the letter again, and again deliberated what to answer. The truth, of course, was quite out of the question. Finally, she drew a deep breath and let out a long sigh, and typed the following, lying all the way:

To answer your question, Fiona (and I don’t think it’s inappropriate of you to ask), I ran into Frank Paley in 1949, while I lived with Robert and Sally. Sally and I were out walking when I first set eyes on him. He looked so morose and so bullyishly evil to me that I had to ask Sally who he was. She had no idea, but agreed with me that he looked like harboring less than saintly intentions. Would Sally find out, I asked? Why? She wanted to know. Just curious, I replied, and since Sally by this time had pretty much gotten used to my many idiosyncrasies, she agreed to find out for me.

When she told me who he was, she also told me what kind of a man he was, at least by way of rumor. A wife and child beater. A grown-up bully, taking it out on his children.

I, for some morose reason that I could not explain to myself satisfactorily, needed to know more, and by mid 1950 I knew that Ann Paley, the wife, was pregnant again, and was due later in the year.

When on Santa Lucia day—they celebrate this in Sweden apparently, don’t ask me how I know—Ann Paley gave birth to a girl, her first, and they named her Heather. I don’t know Fiona, I just felt a kinship with her, the unfortunate baby to be born into this legitimate hell.

It’s one of those things, Fiona. A chance encounter and you remain interested.

Her real concern was, of course, that Heather, in choosing the healthiest mother on the maternity ward that day—typically Heather, had, by chance and some very bad luck, also chosen the worst father possible. Had in fact joined a madhouse of a family, ruled by a little Hitler called Frank, and now she ran the very real risk of not waking up on time—by the time Flannery would have to leave—or of not waking up at all.

The day Frank Paley got fired from the phone company, his oldest son, Justin, died.

It was a Monday, the 14th of August, 1961. As he arrived for work that morning, Frank Paley was informed by his immediate supervisor, Jeff Walken, that the District Manager, up from New Haven for the day just to see him, was waiting in the lunchroom.

Ah, promotion, finally, was Frank’s first, and last, thought. What other reason could there be?

“Mr. Paley,” said the District Manager and rose as Frank entered. Jeff shut the door behind him and stayed in the room. He took up position by the door. Not unguardlike.

They shook hands. “Norman West,” said the District Manager.

“I know,” said Frank.

“Please,” said West, indicating a chair.

Frank sat down, and smiled at Mr. West. Then he turned in his chair and smiled at Jeff as well.

Jeff didn’t smile back, which did not register with Frank.

This was his moment.

“Mr. Paley,” began the District Manager.

Here it comes, thought Frank, and he was already preparing what to say in thanks.

“Mr. Paley,” said the District Manager again. “I’m afraid we have some bad news.”

Frank didn’t quite stop smiling. Something, and it was more the tone of voice than the words he heard that told him all was not well with his promotion. He did not answer.

“I’m afraid we’re going to have to let you go.”

That is of course not what he heard, he wasn’t sure what he heard, but they could not let him go, that was impossible, so that could not have been what Mr. West said.

Still smiling, he turned to Jeff who didn’t look up from inspecting his shoes. “I’m not sure I understand,” said Frank to the District Manager.

“We are going to let you go, Frank,” he said.

Still, he did not connect the words he heard with any meaning relevant to him. Again he turned back to Jeff for clarification. Jeff looked up from the floor and saw the confusion in Frank’s face.

“You’ve been fired, Frank,” he said. Not one to mince matters.

“Jeff,” began Frank. “How, why?”

“Too many complaints, Frank,” said Jeff.

“Complaints about what?”

Neither man answered.

“Complaints about what?” This time Frank spoke very loudly.

“About your domestic affairs,” said the District Manager.

“My domestic affairs? What the hell do they have to do with anything?”

“Several customers refuse to have you visit. We have a list of fifty customers that have requested, specifically and in writing, that you never visit their homes.”

“You can’t do this,” said Frank. “The union.”

“The union has approved it,” said Mr. West.

“The hell it has,” said Frank.

Mr. West dove into his brown briefcase and extracted a typed sheet of paper. “Here,” he said. “Read this.”

Frank did. The union had approved his dismissal. He recognized the signature. Suddenly he felt completely cornered. Exposed. Someone had talked, and he knew exactly who had: Justin.

“You have been with us quite a few years,” said the District Manager. “You will receive a decent pension.”

Frank had stopped listening. Instead he was seeing Justin sneaking from neighbor to neighbor ratting on his father, holding up his bruises for them to gape at. They were not that bad. They were not really bruises. The little bastard.

The District Manager stood up, the audience was over.

Frank looked around at Jeff again, and stood up as well.

“That, I’m afraid, is all I came to tell you,” said Mr. West, and did not offer his hand.

The little bastard, he thought again, and left the lunchroom without another word.

Heather knew something was terribly wrong when she came home from school and opened the front door. Her mom was sitting, white as snow, on the very far end of the living room sofa, pushing her knuckles into her mouth, her face shining with tears. Justin was lying in a heap on the floor by her feet. Frank was in the kitchen, she could hear him moving about, his heavy feet, not sitting down, pacing like he did when he was upset.

Her mom’s eyes were fixed on the heap by her feet. They did not move when Heather entered. She was carved out of the stillness. So was Justin.

There was a small puddle spreading out from under her brother. It was dark and moved slowly. That’s when she ran for the phone. She picked up the receiver and looked down to dial the police when Frank’s fist hit her squarely on her right temple and she dropped the receiver into the oncoming blackness.

The Irish Catholic Chief of Police ruled it an accident. It was forgiven by the Irish Catholic Priest.

The newspaper, basing its account on the official police report, said it was a terrible accident. All the more terrible for being the second son the poor father had lost in less than five years. No father, the reporter concluded, no family should have to endure such loss.

From now on Frank Paley had all day at home to torment his wife and remaining children.

Heather, now her mother’s right hand and full-time peacekeeper, tried so hard to forgive her father that she actually succeeded.

Gabriel arrived in Stockholm from his little hometown up north on the 3rd of September, 1961.

At barely sixteen he was perhaps too young to leave home, but his father had had just about enough of him and his constant scribbling—dreaming on paper as he called it, mockingly and disappointedly both, since the plan had always been for Gabriel to take over the engineering business his father had built, now obviously no longer the case—so, good riddance.

Also, since his mother wanted nothing but his happiness, and since she knew he was only happy now when he was writing, it was fine with her. Besides, some of his teachers had told her that Gabriel was a genius.

So, on the 5th of September, it was a cloudless day with air so crisp you felt crystallized just walking in it, on strong recommendations from his Swedish Literature teacher who was well connected with the Academy, and also from his hometown school board, he enrolled in the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts and Letters, and set out to learn the craft.

It was not until halfway through a thesis on Strindberg that he realized that he was learning to write in the wrong language.

As Flannery sat at her typewriter and picked her way through the story, she could breathe the clear Stockholm air through her words and relaxed a little. Yes, Gabriel was coming to, albeit in Swedish. He was on schedule.

The same could not be said of Heather, whose breathing she could no longer perceive, lost now in the dense fog of the blanket, cowed there by her father and held there by her mother and the need to keep the peace.

Even with Michael and Justin gone, she still had four siblings and her mother to comfort and support. And, Heather told herself, her father needed her too, despite what he had done, or perhaps just because of it. Heather did not see him as a murderer of children, but rather as another victim of his own violence.

“We won’t wind up with mirrors, right?” asked Gabriel.

“No,” answered Flannery. “Not unless you’ve been incautious around Netoniel lately. But the blanket is now so thick that it will smother us. It has reached the ground, it fills everything. It will make us forget. Well, it’ll make you two forget.”

“There is nothing we can do to stay awake?” asked Heather.

“Nothing that I know of,” answered Flannery.

“But you, you’ll stay awake?” asked Gabriel.

“Yes,” she answered.

“The bear,” said Gabriel.

“The bear,” she confirmed.

“You also have the determination of a mule, that helps,” muttered Gabriel.

“Pardon?” snapped Flannery.

“Nothing,” said Gabriel.

“That may be true,” said Flannery. “But it will serve us well.”

Outside, the bear rolled over and continued to pretend he was sleeping.

“I still say Netoniel cleans up his own mess,” offered Gabriel.

“Yeah, well, that’s not going to happen.”

“I know.”

“It’s up to us to wake them up.”

“There’s quite a few of them,” Gabriel more muttered than said.

“Billions,” added Heather.

“I know,” said Flannery.

“And we can only wake them one by one?” said Gabriel.

“I know of no other way,” said Flannery.

“But, billions,” said Gabriel.

“Yes,” said Flannery, “Billions.”

“It’s going to take some time,” said Gabriel.

“We have lots of that,” Flannery bit back.

The bear: Not a bear, of course, far from it. Some knew him as Semyaza, the leader of the supposedly evil angels—who weren’t evil in his opinion, a little rebellious maybe. Some knew him as the constellation of Orion, his favorite home. Flannery knew him as both of these, and as the bear, her self-appointed guardian.

A few knew him as Gadal, or said they did, but that would make him Netoniel’s brother—which in turn would make him Flannery’s brother, so there is probably not much truth to that.

Still listening intently behind what appeared to be hibernating eyelids. He did not like what he heard for he did not like Earth, not even a little, and it was now clear to him that he would have to go, too. To keep an eye on her. To keep her awake.

He made a big deal of turning over in his sleep, knowing full well that they all turned to watch him, knowing full well that he was listening, knowing full well he knew full well, as well.

But Flannery meant for him to hear, so they continued their conversation.

Gabriel watched the bear pretending to sleep.

“One by one,” Flannery added, less sternly. “And that’s why we have no other option: we must write.”

Gabriel looked back at her from studying the bear. “They have radio now,” he said. “And moving pictures. They’re sure to have television soon enough, too. Can’t we use that?”

“No,” said Flannery. “Only stories, in books, will work.”

“Why?” asked Heather.

Flannery studied her for a while. “Moving pictures, and soon television,” she said, “spells everything out. Foreground, background, expressions, size, movements, sounds, everything. They leave,” she paused to find the right word, “they leave nothing to imagine, nothing for the spirit to create with his own energy, for his own eye.”

She looked over at Gabriel to make sure he, too, was listening. He was.

“Only the written story meets the reading spirit half-way, outlines—suggests may be a better word—what to create and the spirit does the rest, filling in all the blanks. A well-crafted story is really created as much by the reader as by the writer. And written well, by someone who understands what happens when it is read, it will demonstrate to the reader that he can indeed still create, that he does in fact create, that he is still fully capable. That he is still awake,” she added after a brief pause into which no sound entered.

Gabriel nodded both his understanding and agreement. Heather, too.

“So we must write. And not only write, but we must write very well, and we must be read, widely read.”

“Is this perhaps easier said than done?” suggested Gabriel without a trace of cynicism.

“It is,” confirmed Flannery.

“We must become very good writers,” said Heather.

“We must become amazingly good writers,” Flannery confirmed again. “Magicians, I’d say.”

That’s a good word for it, thought the bear to himself, and turned over again. As noisily as before. To make sure they’d notice how asleep he was.

He stood quietly in the corner of her room, a transparent, shadowy figure of a bear, watching her write. Some of his fingers, slender tendrils of death, massaged her lungs and heart and kidneys and liver and drained her strength. He loved her, did the bear, more than just about anything, so it pained him to hurt her. But he knew of no other way to keep her reminded, to keep her awake. By killing that about her which was perishable, he constantly reminded her of that about her which was not. And it kept her awake, well, awake-ish anyway—the blanket had now grown too dense for her to remain fully lucid, at all times, even with his help.

So, he stood quietly in the corner of her room, watching her write, constantly hurting her with tendril fingers, absorbing ever more of her physical life. Constantly reminding her: what part of her is perishable, what part of her is not.

Flannery’s Journal entry for August 5th , 1961 read as follows:

I know how to write now, damn it. I know how to write well. I know how to paint. I know that a good story is literal in the same way that a child's drawing is literal. When a child draws, he doesn't intend to distort but to set down exactly what he sees, and as his gaze is direct, he sees the lines that create motion. The lines of motion that interest the writer are usually invisible. They are lines of spiritual motion. That is what I put down. And I know how to do that well. How come I am not read then?

I have also learnt that as a writer I must first, last, and always, remain a true observer, so that I, like Socrates, can hold up a true mirror for the people, where they can see their true selves. Isn’t that my mission, our mission. Why then can I not reach them? Why am I hardly read?

Of course I’m not very refined. I see only what is outside and what sticks out a mile, such things as the sun that nobody has to uncover or be bright to see. I used to worry over not being subtle, but subtle will not work for these people. However, it seems that neither will being blunt. Why am I not reaching these people?

I’ve sold thousands of books, but thousands will not do it. I need to sell millions. Many millions. And I’m not.

I had better compile what I have learned about this craft of writing for Heather and Gabriel. It is going to be up to them. Actually, at this rate, it is going to be up to Gabriel. I think Heather may be lost.

Yes, Heather, dear Heather. Where are you now?

At that time Heather, not yet eleven years old, had only one mission in life: to help her mother. Actually, it was more than that. Her real mission, which she would not, could not, articulate, not even to herself, was to help her mother stay alive. But in her mind she had abbreviated this to simply: help her mother.

Having Frank around the house constantly was a continual torment. From his first demand for coffee and toast in the morning, to his last demand for another whiskey at night, the day was a barrage of orders, requests, barbs, directives, suggestions, sarcastic observations, and, if anything he said was not acted upon, or laughed at appropriately, or acknowledged with due respect quickly enough for his liking, beatings to go along with them.

Heather kept away from beatings by moving faster, pleasing harder, smiling more than anyone else in the house. All the while she sank deeper and deeper into the anesthetizing fog of Netoniel’s blanket.

And so she no longer had any idea of who she was, why she had come, or that she had picked the entirely wrong family for her mission.

“To stick out,” said Flannery, “to attract attention, I will become a Catholic writer. There are not many of them, especially not in the American South.”

“How will that help?” asked Gabriel.

“I will become as visible as a pig on a sofa,” answered Flannery. “We have to be noticed to create an audience, a readership.”

“Why not be noticed for excellent writing and many books?”

“There are too many writers already who are both excellent and who have written many books. Each of us needs an edge.”

“And you’re sure that’s going to do it?”

“What?”

“A Southern Catholic writer?”

“As I said, I’ll stick out.”

“I’ll say.”

“What?”

Gabriel didn’t rise to that bait, instead he asked, “What’s mine?”

“Edge?”

“Yes.”

“You should be born in a non English-speaking country. Sweden, or some such place,” answered Flannery. “Very few foreign born writers have achieved prominence in English. Each one of them was certainly noticed.”

“Whom?”

“Nabokov,” for example,” said Flannery. “Or will be,” she added. “He is Russian. And there is Joseph Conrad.”

“Konrad Korzeniowski,” said Gabriel.

“You know him?” asked Flannery.

“I’ve heard of him, yes,” said Gabriel. “Only just recently departed, as a matter of fact.”

“My task,” began Heather, off on one of her quotes again, “which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel—it is, before all, to make you see. That—and no more, and it is everything. If I succeed, you shall find there, according to your deserts, encouragement, consolation, fear, charm, all you demand—and, perhaps, also that glimpse of truth for which you have forgotten to ask.”

This time, however, Gabriel did complete it: “To snatch, in a moment of courage, from the remorseless rush of time a passing phase of life, is only the beginning of the task. The task approached in tenderness and faith is to hold up unquestioningly, without choice and without fear, the rescued fragment before all eyes in the light of a sincere mood. It is to show its vibration, its color, its form; and through its movement, its form, and its color, reveal the substance of its truth—disclose its inspiring secret: the stress and passion within the core of each convincing moment.”

He paused for breath, and continued: “In a single-minded attempt of that kind, if one be deserving and fortunate, one may perchance attain to such clearness of sincerity that at last the presented vision of regret or pity, of terror or mirth, shall awaken in the hearts of the beholders that feeling of unavoidable solidarity; of the solidarity in mysterious origin, in toil, in joy, in hope, in uncertain fate, which binds men to each other and all mankind to the visible world.”

“Impressive,” said Flannery.

“So you’ve read him too,” said Heather. Not a question.

“I have,” said Gabriel.

Flannery and Heather exchanged glances.

“Well,” said Flannery. “Wonders never cease.”

“What? Why shouldn’t I have read him?” said Gabriel.

“It’s surprising, that’s all,” said Flannery.

“Why?”

“I would have thought you’d find him rather dry,” she said.

“I don’t know about that,” said Gabriel.

“He was a great craftsman,” said Heather.

“That he was,” said Flannery.

“And Polish, to boot,” said Gabriel.

Heather nodded.

Then Flannery saw it fit to add her contribution of Conrad. She took a deep breath, looked past Gabriel and out through the small window at the hills beyond, and spoke slowly: “The good artist should expect no recognition of his toil and no admiration of his genius, because his toil can with difficulty be appraised and his genius cannot possibly mean anything to the illiterate who, even from the dreadful wisdom of their evoked dead, have, so far, culled nothing but inanities and platitudes. I would wish him to enlarge his sympathies by patient and loving observation while he grows in mental power. It is in the impartial practice of life, if anywhere, that the promise of perfection for his art can be found, rather than in the absurd formulas trying to prescribe this or that particular method of technique or conception. Let him mature the strength of his imagination amongst the things of this earth, which it is his business to cherish and know, and refrain from calling down his inspiration ready-made from some heaven of perfections of which he knows nothing. And I would not grudge him the proud illusion that will come sometimes to a writer: the illusion that his achievement has almost equaled the greatness of his dream.”

“We should form a Conrad fan club,” said Gabriel. Then, when neither of his sisters answered, “And you think Swedish will do it?”

“Yes,” said Flannery.

“So I will be noticed.”

“That’s one thing.”

“And the other?”

“When you learn a language other than your native one, you have to learn it consciously, you have to fight to possess it. It makes for a better understanding, usually. And you have to understand English better than anyone alive if you are to succeed.”

“So why not all of us, then?”

“In Sweden?”

“For example.”

Flannery considered for a while. “We can’t take that risk.”

“What risk?”

“The risk that you will not wake up fully and so never learn English.”

“If I’m awake enough to write, I should be awake enough to remember which language to write in.”

“Should, yes, but there’s Netoniel’s blanket, don’t forget, and it can alter things.”

“So,” said Gabriel, “if we all were, say, in Sweden, and none learned English, well, yes, I see what you mean.” After a brief moment he added, “And it’s crucial that we write in English?”

“Yes, absolutely. Most of the world that truly matters will know and read English by the time you are published.”

“What if we’re translated?”

“Something is always lost in the translation,” said Flannery. She stressed the word always.

The bear picked this moment to turn over again, noisily.

“Who else?” Gabriel asked into the spell of silence which followed.

“Who else, what?” asked Heather.

“Who else wrote in English as their second language. And caught attention.”

“Isak Dinesen,” said Heather.

“Anaïs Nin,” said Flannery.

They both looked for others.

“That’s only two,” said Gabriel. “Nabokov and Conrad makes four. Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“I am,” said Flannery.

“How can you be so sure?”

“They all made the world sit up and take notice,” said Heather.

“And that is what you must do,” said Flannery.

“Well, there’s Ayn Rand,” said Gabriel suddenly, happy to have added to the list. “She’s doing it.”

“So she is,” said Flannery.

“Didn’t Borges?” said Gabriel, who wouldn’t let it go.

“I don’t think so,” said Heather.

On the 16th of September, 1961, Flannery wrote the following letter to Fiona:

I am wondering if Beckett on Proust arrived. I’m sure I sent it, a couple of days, I think, after the Critique.

Next weekend will be peachy and we will meet you at the rural mailbox and reserve you a seat Sunday amongst the nail kegs.

Shot has been restored to us and our troubles have begun. He can’t do anything yet and so he sits and decides what he is going to do with the wealth he has accumulated from his accident. This is a very demoralizing situation. A wealthy sitting Negro.

I am going to keep the swans in the back yard until they produce offspring. Then I am going to retire the parents to the pond and bring the young ones up myself. They seem very content to sit on the grass and show no disposition to walk anywhere. We may dig a pool in the back yard, but I don’t know. They snort and hiss but are really quite timid.

I would like to see that D.S. Savage book. Don’t bother to mail it, just bring it when you come. The thing I am writing now is surely going to convince Jack that I am of the Devil’s party. It is out of hand right now but I am hoping I can bring it into line. It is a composite of all the eccentricities of my writing and for this reason may not be any good, maybe almost a parody. But what you start, you ought to carry through and if it is no good, I don’t have to publish it. I am thinking of changing the title to “The Lame Will Carry Off the Prey.” Anyway that analysis of yours about why Jack argues the way he does sounds pretty right to me. Entirely subjective. He says the artist leaves the herd and so becomes “evil.” But whose eyes is he using here? The eyes of the herd. Abraham left the herd and did not become evil. Nuts.

Are we going to be seeing Benton and Anna Magnani or what? We haven’t heard from him, but I can’t imagine him making anything but a triumphal tour of his journey to Mobile.

Also, please bring any news you can find about Heather. I really worry about that girl.

Fiona was sitting with Flannery in her bedroom cum study telling her about life in Ridgefield, about people they both knew, about writing, about publishing, and then, as if they both had been avoiding the subject up till then, Flannery asked about Heather.

Fiona, too tall to fit comfortably in any of Flannery’s chairs, began to play with her long, dark hair, twisting the end of it around and around her finger until her finger nearly reached the scalp, then she let the long strands fall and began again. While she answered: “I have made a point of walking by their house now and then,” she began.

Flannery eyed her with a concerned frown. “And?”

“And, I have seen her several times. Going to, or coming from the store, loaded down with groceries.”

Flannery, sensing that Fiona was getting to whatever news she meant to convey, said nothing.

“She’s wearing bruises almost constantly. Some on her face. Mostly though on her arms and legs.”

“He beats her?”

“It’s the only conclusion I can draw.”

“How does she look? Sad?”

“Absent,” answered Fiona.

“Absent?”

“Yes, that’s the best description.”

“Absent,” said Flannery again, this time only to herself. And then she wished the bear would let her cry.

“And me,” said Heather. “Where?”

“Oh, I think the United States, but about five years after Gabriel,” answered Flannery.

“Not foreign then? German, perhaps?”

“Or South American,” suggested Gabriel.

“No, not German. The Germans are not well liked at the moment. And as for South America, those countries always seem in a flux, too risky by far, I think.”

“Where then, where in America?” Heather wanted to know.

“I will call for you.”

Heather accepted that. The bear sat up and looked around, as if the valley and surrounding hills were unfamiliar features to him. Flannery took it to mean that their conference was drawing to a close.

So they finalized their plans, and finished their tea. Heather, ever the tidy one, insisted on doing the dishes and a little sweeping before they left. Gabriel and Flannery humored her by keeping out of the way. Once Heather was done, they left the cottage.

The bear, upright now, stood by the door and waved morosely as they made their way through the tall grass, as if he would never see them again. They turned and waved back.

He would, he decided, follow her as soon as they were out of sight.

By the spring of 1962 Gabriel was at the head of his class. By some margin.

Well, even that is an understatement. By then he had mastered every point of craft his teachers could muster and impart and was more or less considered a genius both by the faculty and his fellow classmates.

He had completed a three-year curriculum in less than six months and now, in order to advance from there, he was going through the Swedish masters to absorb as much from them as he could. His only regret, and a faint one at that, in delving into writing as a craft was that it had to some extent ruined his reading for pleasure. Now he was always reading with an eye to effect, how was it achieved, with an eye to craft and technique, to seeing how the plot developed, to seeing how the characters were grown and drawn, to understanding the story’s structure, to see what worked. In a word: to learn.

And learn he did.

It would appear, too, that he never slept, or ate, hardly. He lost weight, but didn’t notice. He was possessed with the need to know, with the need to understand how to touch the souls of others. And he pressed on. Another book, another midnight oil. And then another.

Heather broke her leg that spring of 1962. Or, rather, Frank broke it for her. This gave her some time away from the house, in the hospital. Lying on her back with her casted leg hoisted up at a forty-five degree angle, there was nothing much to do but read, had she felt like it, or think, had she been able to. She managed neither. All she did instead was worry.

About her mother, about her siblings, about Frank and about what he was doing to them now. About the house and how she wasn’t there to clean it, about the bruises and cuts and scrapes they all carried as evidence of a hell she didn’t even perceive as odd anymore. It had evened out to what life was: a stretch of endurance through beatings and toil. She could conceive of nothing else, and she wanted nothing more than to go home and help her mother endure it, too.

School was out early June, but even so, Gabriel decided not to go home. He would rather stay on in Stockholm for the summer, he said.

“But your dad and I want to see you,” urged his mother over the phone. “To see how you’re doing. We’ll pay for the train.”

“Dad just wants to see if I’ve ‘come to my senses’ yet,” said Gabriel.

His mother’s silence confirmed his guess.

“I have so much I still want to study,” he said. “There is so much to know about writing, you can’t even begin to imagine.”

“Are you eating enough?” asked his mom.

“I’m fine, Mom.”

“Have a girlfriend yet?”

“Who’s got time for those?”

“Just wondering.”

“No, Mom. It’s just me and the books.”

“They seem to think you’re quite something.”

“Who said?”

“Adolf Larson.”

“Yes, he likes me. When did you speak to him?”

“He thinks you’ll really go places. Are you sure you don’t want to spend the summer here at home?”

Home. Suddenly, as if he had never defined the word: it was a stranger to him. Home. He tasted it, then said something he immediately wished he could have taken back.

“This is home now, Mom.”

She didn’t answer and Gabriel knew he had done damage.

“This is my life now, Mom, and home is where your life is.”

He would never forget her reply, for he realized that she did in fact understand. That, unlike his father, she knew him.

“Then,” she said, “you will always be home.”

“Yes,” he answered. “Yes, you are right.”

He was sure she would cry a little once they hung up, but not much. His mother was not given to tears.

He said goodbye and hung up, and then collected what he’d need for his day at the library.

One of his teachers, Soren Wallengard, a tall and prematurely balding man of Danish decent, was staying on in town that summer as well, and when expressing surprise at running into Gabriel at the library that morning, he learned that Gabriel was staying on too. Perhaps on a whim, or perhaps wanting to do what he could to help his brilliant student, he invited Gabriel to come and stay with him and his wife Ann-Marie at least until school started again in the fall, to be on hand with any assistance he could give, he explained. They had plenty of room, he added.

Gabriel gladly accepted, not the least, were he to be absolutely honest with himself, because of their lovely daughter, Barbro. If his teacher had noticed the attraction, he didn’t say.

What he did say, however, at dinner that night, was that Gabriel, if he continued to devote himself to the craft, would become a giant of Swedish letters. And he made sure his daughter heard.

On September 8th, 1962, Flannery wrote this letter to Fiona:

I think that’s great about going to New York if that’s what I make out in the letter. I stayed there once very cheaply at the Y on 38^th Street or 37^th maybe off Lexington Avenue. Fourteen years ago that was and it was $2 a day and you could get your breakfast in the building. There was then a very good co-op cafeteria on 41^st Street between Madison and Park. The only place in New York that I could afford to eat downtown where I didn’t feel I was going home with pyoria.

We called Benton on the phone when we got the news. He was at the hospital and sounded properly flustered. He told us Jenny was fine and then started right away telling us about his teeth, which it seems had been removed the week before and he had just got out of bed for the event. Not all his teeth removed, that is, just some embedded wisdom teeth. I hope you see him in New York.

On the basis of the fact that you use ten fingers to work a typewriter and only three to push a pen, I hold the typewriter to be the more personal instrument. Also on the basis of that you can read what comes off it.

When will you be back from New York? I am planning to visit Ridgefield sometime soon, before it gets too cold up there. I must see Heather.

Can I stay at your house?

Part 3

Thoughts? I'd like to hear them.
Ulf Wolf

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