Thomas Wolfe: Of Time and the River, You Can't Go Home Again & Look Homeward, Angel. Thomas Wolfe
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Presently, returning to an abrupt reflective pause, she said: “Well, I may do it. I want a place where my children can come to see me and bring their friends, when they come home.”
“Yes,” he said, “yes. That would be nice. You mustn’t work all your life.”
He was pleased at her happy fable: for a moment he almost believed in a miracle of redemption, although the story was an old one to him.
“I hope you do,” he said. “It would be nice. . . . Go on to bed now, why don’t you, mama? It’s getting late.” He rose. “I’m going now.”
“Yes, son,” she said, getting up. “You ought to. Well, good-night.” They kissed with a love, for the time, washed clean of bitterness. Eliza went before him into the dark house.
But before he went to bed, he descended to the kitchen for matches. She was still there, beyond the long littered table, at her ironing board, flanked by two big piles of laundry. At his accusing glance she said hastily:
“I’m a-going. Right away. I just wanted to finish up these towels.”
He rounded the table, before he left, to kiss her again. She fished into a button-box on the sewing-machine and dug out the stub of a pencil. Gripping it firmly above an old envelope, she scrawled out on the ironing board a rough mapping. Her mind was still lulled in its project.
“Here, you see,” she began, “is Sunset Avenue, coming up the hill. This is Doak Place, running off here at right angles. Now this corner-lot here belongs to Dick Webster; and right here above it, at the very top is —”
Is, he thought, staring with dull interest, the place where the Buried Treasure lies. Ten paces N.N.E. from the Big Rock, at the roots of the Old Oak Tree. He went off into his delightful fantasy while she talked. What if there WAS a buried treasure on one of Eliza’s lots? If she kept on buying, there might very well be. Or why not an oil-well? Or a coal-mine? These famous mountains were full (they said) of minerals. 150 Bbl. a day right in the backyard. How much would that be? At $3.00 a Bbl., there would be over $50.00 a day for every one in the family. The world is ours!
“You see, don’t you?” she smiled triumphantly. “And right there is where I shall build. That lot will bring twice its present value in five years.”
“Yes,” he said, kissing her. “Good-night, mama. For God’s sake, go to bed and get some sleep.”
“Good-night, son,” said Eliza.
He went out and began to mount the dark stairs. Benjamin Gant, entering at this moment, stumbled across a mission-chair in the hall. He cursed fiercely, and struck at the chair with his hand. Damn it! Oh damn it! Mrs. Pert whispered a warning behind him, with a fuzzy laugh. Eugene paused, then mounted softly the carpeted stair, so that he would not be heard, entering the sleeping-porch at the top of the landing on which he slept.
He did not turn on the light, because he disliked seeing the raw blistered varnish of the dresser and the bent white iron of the bed. It sagged, and the light was dim — he hated dim lights, and the large moths, flapping blindly around on their dusty wings. He undressed in the moon. The moonlight fell upon the earth like a magic unearthly dawn. It wiped away all rawness, it hid all sores. It gave all common and familiar things — the sagging drift of the barn, the raw shed of the creamery, the rich curve of the lawyer’s crab-apple trees — a uniform bloom of wonder. He lighted a cigarette, watching its red glowing suspiration in the mirror, and leaned upon the rail of his porch, looking out. Presently, he grew aware that Laura James, eight feet away, was watching him. The moonlight fell upon them, bathing their flesh in a green pallor, and steeping them in its silence. Their faces were blocked in miraculous darkness, out of which, seeing but unseen, their bright eyes lived. They gazed at each other in that elfin light, without speaking. In the room below them, the light crawled to his father’s bed, swam up the cover, and opened across his face, thrust sharply upward. The air of the night, the air of the hills, fell on the boy’s bare flesh like a sluice of clear water. His toes curled in to grip wet grasses.
On the landing, he heard Mrs. Pert go softly up to bed, fumbling with blind care at the walls. Doors creaked and clicked. The house grew solidly into quiet, like a stone beneath the moon. They looked, waiting for a spell and the conquest of time. Then she spoke to him — her whisper of his name was only a guess at sound. He threw his leg across the rail, and thrust his long body over space to the sill of her window, stretching out like a cat. She drew her breath in sharply, and cried out softly, “No! No!” but she caught his arms upon the sills and held him as he twisted in.
Then they held each other tightly in their cool young arms, and kissed many times with young lips and faces. All her hair fell down about her like thick corn-silk, in a sweet loose wantonness. Her straight dainty legs were clad in snug little green bloomers, gathered in by an elastic above the knee.
They were locked limb to limb: he kissed the smooth sheen of her arms and shoulders — the passion that numbed his limbs was governed by a religious ecstasy. He wanted to hold her, and go away by himself to think about her.
He stooped, thrusting his arm under her knees, and lifted her up exultantly. She looked at him frightened, holding him more tightly.
“What are you doing?” she whispered. “Don’t hurt me.”
“I won’t hurt you, my dear,” he said. “I’m going to put you to bed. Yes. I’m going to put you to bed. Do you hear?” He felt he must cry out in his throat for joy.
He carried her over and laid her on the bed. Then he knelt beside her, putting his arm beneath her and gathering her to him.
“Good-night, my dear. Kiss me good-night. Do you love me?”
“Yes.” She kissed him. “Good-night, my darling. Don’t go back by the window. You may fall.”
But he went, as he came, reaching through the moonlight exultantly like a cat. For a long time he lay awake, in a quiet delirium, his heart thudding fiercely against his ribs. Sleep crept across his senses with goose-soft warmth: the young leaves of the maples rustled, a cock sounded his distant elfin minstrelsy, the ghost of a dog howled. He slept.
He awoke with a high hot sun beating in on his face through the porch awnings. He hated to awake in sunlight. Some day he would sleep in a great room that was always cool and dark. There would be trees and vines at his windows, or the scooped-out lift of the hill. His clothing was wet with night-damp as he dressed. When he went downstairs he found Gant rocking miserably upon the porch, his hand gripped over a walkingstick.
“Good-morning,” he said, “how do you feel?”
His father cast his uneasy flickering eyes on him, and groaned.
“Merciful God! I’m being punished for my sins.”
“You’ll feel better in a little,” said Eugene. “Did you eat anything?”
“It stuck in my throat,” said Gant, who had eaten heartily. “I couldn’t swallow a bite. How’s your hand, son?” he asked very humbly.
“Oh, it’s all right,” said Eugene quickly. “Who told you about my hand?”
“She said I had hurt your hand,” said Gant sorrowfully.
“Ah-h!” said the boy angrily. “No. I wasn’t hurt.”
Gant leaned to the side and, without looking, clumsily, patted his son’s uninjured hand.
“I’m sorry for what I’ve done,” he said. “I’m a sick man. Do you need money?”
“No,” said Eugene, embarrassed. “I have all I need.”
“Come to the office today, and I’ll give you something,” said Gant. “Poor child, I suppose you’re hard up.”
But instead, he waited until Laura James returned from her morning visit to the city’s bathing-pool. She came with her bathing-suit in one hand, and several small packages in the other. More arrived