They Came Like Swallows Read online

  “You see—” His mother spread the white cloth over her knees, folded it, laid it with the others in a pile. “What we need is another person in the family. At least one other person.”

  “I think we’re getting along quite well the way things are.”

  “Perhaps. But the room you’re in. It’s ever so much too——”

  Her hand opened and lay still.

  Some one to fill up his room. Like the Mr. Crumb that stayed at Miss Brew’s, three houses down on the same side of the street.

  “We’re not going to take in roomers, are we?”

  “No, not roomers, exactly. I wouldn’t like that.”

  “I wouldn’t either.”

  Mr. Crumb had such a large nose. It would be upsetting to wake and find him in Robert’s bed early in the morning.

  “What I had in mind was a small brother or a small sister—it wouldn’t matter which, would it? So you wouldn’t rattle around in there the way you do when you are all alone.”

  “No, I suppose not. But does that mean—”

  His mother was not satisfied with just him. She wanted a little girl.

  When she got up and went out to the kitchen, he did not follow her. Instead he sat absolutely still, watching the yellow leaves contract; watching the spider swing itself out upon the ceiling.

  3

  Although the library had been familiar at breakfast time, Bunny knew that it was now subject to change, to uncertainty. His father had come home again and would be home, said the big clock in the hall, for the day…. The little brass clock with clear glass sides emerged out of a general silence, asserting that it was not so; that Mr. Morison would go out again after dinner…. They argued then. The grandfather’s clock made slow involved statements which the other replied to briefly. “Quarter of ten,” said the grandfather’s clock, untroubled by the irrelevance. “Ten till,” said the little brass clock on the mantel. So long as that went on, Bunny could not be sure of anything.

  His father had settled himself in his chair, with the Sunday paper. From time to time he solemnly turned the pages. When he read aloud he expected everybody to listen.

  “What is Spanish influenza? … Is it something new? … Does it come from Spain? … The disease now occurring in this country and called ‘Spanish influenza’ resembles a very contagious kind of ‘cold’ accompanied by fever, pains in the head, eyes, back, or other parts of the body, and a feeling of severe sickness. In most of the cases the symptoms disappear after three or four days, the patient rapidly recovering. Some of the patients, however, develop pneumonia, or inflammation of the ear, or meningitis, and many of these complicated cases die. Whether this so-called ‘Spanish influenza’ is identical with the epidemic of earlier years is not known….”

  The word epidemic was new to Bunny. In his mind he saw it, unpleasantly shaped and rather like a bed pan.

  “… Although the present epidemic is called ‘Spanish influenza,’ there is no reason to believe that it originated in Spain. Some writers who have studied the question believe that the epidemic came from the Orient and they call attention to the fact that the Germans mention the disease as occurring along the eastern front in the summer and fall of 1917.”

  By the calm way that his father crossed one knee over the other it was clear that he was concerned with the epidemic for the same reason he was interested in floods in China, what happened in Congress, and family history—because he chose to be concerned with such things.

  When Bunny was very small he used to wake in the night sometimes with a parched throat and call for a drink of water. Then he would hear stumbling and lurching, and the sound of water running in the bathroom. The side of a glass struck his teeth. He drank thirstily and fell back into sleep…. Until one night across the intervening darkness, from the room directly across the hall, a voice said, Oh, get it yourself! For the first time in his life Bunny was made aware of the fact that he had a father. And thoroughly shocked, he did as he was told.

  Ever since that time he had been trying to make a place for his father within his own arranged existence—and always unsuccessfully. His father was not the kind of man who could be fit into anybody’s arrangement except his own. He was too big, for one thing. His voice was too loud. He was too broad in the shoulder, and he smelled of cigars. In the family orchestra his father played the piano, Robert the snare drum, Bunny the bass drum and cymbals. His father started the music going with his arms, with his head. And in no time at all the sound was tremendous—filling the open center of the room, occupying the space in corners and behind chairs.

  “… In contrast to the outbursts of ordinary coughs and colds, which usually occur in the cold months, epidemics of influenza may occur at any season of the year, thus the present epidemic raged most intensely in Europe in May, June, and July. Moreover, in the case of ordinary colds, the general symptoms (fever, pain, depression) are by no means so severe …”

  Bunny saw that his mother was threatened with a sneeze. She closed her eyes resignedly and waited.

  “… or as sudden in their outset as they are in influenza. Finally, ordinary colds do not spread through the community so rapidly or so extensively as does influenza….”

  Bunny turned to his father. How was it that his father did not know? that he could go on reading?

  “Ordinarily the fever lasts from three to four days and the patient recovers…. As in other catching diseases, a person who has only a mild attack of the disease may give a very severe attack to others….”

  The sneeze came. His mother’s composure was destroyed by it. She fumbled for her handkerchief.

  “… When death occurs it is usually the result of a complication.”

  “James——”

  “Yes?”

  “Do you mind reading about something else?”

  “If it will make you any happier.”

  The largest and the smallest of Bunny’s agates raced along a red strip in the pattern of the library rug. Maybe his mother would come around to his way of thinking—that it was neither wise nor necessary to take on a baby at this time. Later perhaps…. Remembering the wallpaper in the dining-room he felt sure that she would go ahead with her plans. From what he had observed (he went to call on the Koenigs occasionally when there was nothing better to do) it would mean a great deal of confusion.

  “Bunny, I’ve lost my handkerchief. Get me another, like a good child, will you?”

  Bunny nodded. They would have to buy dresses, knitted hoods, and soft woolly sweaters…. The race would be over in two shakes. Then he would get the handkerchief. He could always finish what he was doing before he got up and went on an errand for his mother. It was understood between them. The smallest agate was dropping behind.

  “Son….”

  The folded paper lay across his father’s knees. “Did you hear what your mother said?”

  “Yes, Dad.”

  It was a very little way to that wide green opening in the pattern which was the goal, with a chance that the smallest agate might …

  “Then what are you waiting for?”

  His father spoke quietly, but his voice and his firmness were like two unreasonable hands laid upon Bunny’s shoulders. Bunny knew even while he resisted them that it was of no use. They would propel him straight up the front stairs.

  “Nothing,” he said, and got to his feet.

  From the doorway he looked back. The library had changed altogether. In the chimney the dark red bricks had become separate and rough. There were coarse perpendicular lines which he had not noticed before. And the relation between the pattern of the rug and the toe of his mother’s shoe escaped him.

  The little brass clock had struck ten already, and now the grandfather’s clock in the hall was getting started. There was a great to-do. The grandfather’s clock stammered and cleared its throat like an old person. Once it had begun, nothing could stop it. Though the house fell down, it would go right on, heavily:

  Bonng … bonng … bonng …
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br />   And each sound as it descended through the air was wreathed and festooned with smoke from his father’s cigar.

  “Charlie Chaplin married…. The bride, a motion-picture actress….”

  Bunny saw black clothes, a mustache and cane, feet widely turned. About the baby, he decided—it was just as well that his father had not been told.

  4

  From somewhere out of sight, beyond the passageway, came a soft tput-tput-tput…. Sadness descended upon Bunny, sadness and a heavy sense of change. There was only one thing in the world that made such a sound: his steamboat. Robert had filled the bathtub with water and was playing with his steamboat.

  Bunny stood and looked in the door of the back room, which was to be Robert’s. It was now empty except for his village. Before long, Robert would have it. Robert’s clothes would hang from hooks in the closet. Robert’s shoes would tumble over each other on the closet floor. Possession’s nine-tenths of the law, Robert always said when Bunny wanted his steamboat and Robert did not care to give it up.

  That was because Robert was five and a half years older than he was. If he said that, Robert paid no attention to him. He had to get things from Robert by bargaining, or by appealing to his mother. Only she had said, definitely, that Robert was to have this room. It was all decided, just as it was decided what Robert was going to be when he grew up—a lawyer, Robert said to people who asked him. Always that; never anything else. (Bunny was going to be an architect.) Nothing would do but that Robert must practice law, try cases before a jury, like Grandfather Blaney. And be presented with a gold-headed cane, inscribed To Robert Morison from the grateful citizens of Logan, Illinois.

  Nothing on earth could prevent Robert from becoming a lawyer; and in the same way nothing could prevent him from taking possession of the back room. Bunny knew that when the time came he would have to find another place for his blackboard and his magic lantern. He would have to pick up his Belgian village piece by piece and rebuild it in some other part of the house where people would be stepping over it every little while and complaining. And his magic lantern? What would he ever do about that? There were no dark green shades anywhere but in this room. His clothes closet had no window and was pitch dark, but it was not big enough. And besides, where would he attach the cord?

  The soft tput-tput came to an end and Robert began talking to himself arrogantly. Bunny listened for a moment and then went and looked around the corner into the bathroom. Robert was declaiming, and in order to see his face in the mirror over the wash-stand he had pulled down the toilet-cover and climbed up on it. There balancing, he continued:

  “And if thou sayst I am not peer

  To any man in Scotland here …”

  His sleeves were wet to the elbow, both of them. There was a tear in his stocking, acquired since breakfast. And one leg hung down, stiffly. Robert’s affliction, people said, when he was not there to hear them.

  Years ago, when Bunny was no more than a baby, and such a thin baby that he had to be carried on a pillow—Robert was hurt. Bunny knew only what he had been told. How Robert hopped onto the back end of a buggy and was run over. And they had to take his leg off, five inches above the knee. That was why Irene went up to Chicago and came back with the beautiful soldiers, the cavalrymen, which Robert kept on top of the bookcase, out of reach.

  Now Robert was rehearsing. When he was satisfied with certain gestures he bared his teeth at his reflection in the mirror and going back a little, began:

  “And if thou sayst I am not peer

  To any man in Scotland here.

  Highland

  or low-land,

  Far

  or

  near,

  Lord Angus, thou hast

  LIED!”

  The effect was fearful, even from out in the hall. Bunny withdrew quietly and went into his mother’s room to get the handkerchief. Then he took it down to her and came up again, this time by the back stairs.

  5

  Sunday morning was an excellent time for invading a city. It was almost noon before Bunny’s imagination flagged. But very suddenly the scene changed. Walls, gates, roofs, broken parapets and towers were then laid bare in simple actuality—two collapsible drinking-cups, a ruler, a block of stone, cardboard, brown paper, three pencils, and a notched wooden spool. After that it was no longer possible to pretend that his lead soldiers were shouting to one another and defending a Belgian town.

  In actual weariness Bunny got up and went out to the back hall, where the clothes-hamper stood, where his mother kept the ammonia-bottle and rags for cleaning. She would know some way for him to pass the interminable time between now and time for dinner. … He felt his way down the gloomy, boxed-in stairs.

  She was in the kitchen when he found her, at the table, with spoons laid out in rows and the silver polish open at her elbow. Bunny sat down without a word, and twisted his legs through the rungs of the high kitchen stool. The kitchen always seemed older than the rest of the house, although it was not. Older and more seasoned. Bunny could remember being here before he could remember anything else. The walls were dark with scrubbing, and the surfaces shone wherever there was metal or porcelain. Turnip tops flourished in bowls along the window sill.

  The spoons his mother was polishing were plain for the most part. Not very interesting to do. But she looked through them until she found one with her name written on it—Elizabeth—and with roses and pineapples, and the sun going down behind the Kentucky State Capitol. As soon as Bunny took up a piece of rag and began to polish his mother’s name, the sadness slipped away. Now that he was in the kitchen beside her, it was impossible to care very much whether Robert got the back room or whether he didn’t.

  Outside, the sky was growing lighter. The rain came down unevenly, in spurts. The kitchen curtains were turning brighter, fading, and turning bright again. Bunny looked up in time to see the pantry door open. It was Irene, tall and straight-shouldered, in a blue raincoat.

  “Surprise!” she said.

  He threw himself upon her.

  “Nobody told me you were coming.”

  “Surprise. I said!”

  She took hold of him by his arms, above the elbow, and began to turn. Round they went in the middle of the floor with the room tilting this way and that. Round they went. Round his mother went, and the cookstove, and Sophie in a pink apron, and the sink … faster … faster … the table … the stove … the sink … table … stove … sink streaking longer … upward and longer….

  After they stopped whirling, the kitchen went round and round for a while, all by itself. Always when Irene came for Sunday dinner it was that way. His mother alone was calm and unshaken. She got up from the table and went to meet Irene. They kissed haphazardly, in front of the stove.

  Irene was his mother’s sister, but she did not resemble his mother in the least. Irene’s hair was much lighter than his mother’s, and her eyes were a different color. His mother was dark. Her hair was almost black, and so were her eyebrows, and she was much heavier. They both talked about dieting all the time. An ounce of prevention, they said, and then ate hard, awful-tasting biscuits with their tea. (With Irene it was just talk; she didn’t need to be any thinner, but when his mother went to buy clothes, the saleswoman said, “Something for the stylish stout?”) And their hands felt entirely different and looked entirely different. From Irene’s hands he drew excitement, and from his mother’s the fact that she loved him. Irene and his mother were as different as the two faces of a coin And yet they never seemed conscious of the difference. They loved being together. And the things they said to each other had little meaning, often, for other people. For instance, if Irene remarked Butter’s what I’m after—they both grew hysterical. When he inquired what was so funny about that, they didn’t explain.

  “Have you enough to eat, Bess?”

  Bunny looked toward his mother and was relieved when she nodded. It would be a great pity if Irene went right away.

  “I mean plenty” Ir
ene insisted. “Because there’s no use in my staying if it isn’t going to be worth while.”

  Then without waiting for an answer she went to take off her coat.

  Bunny followed discreetly at her heels. The dining-room as they passed through seemed braced and ready for excitement. Although it was only a quarter after twelve, the little brass clock in the library started to strike. Irene did that to things. Most people’s rubbers came off easily, but one of hers now sailed halfway across the floor. The other had to be rescued from under the hall-tree. And the moment she began pulling at her gloves there was a great burst of singing from above:

  “O when I die

  Don’t bury me at all,

  Just pickle my bones

  In alkyhol …”

  Bunny felt called upon to explain.

  “It’s only Robert,” he said. “Upstairs, playing with my steamboat.” Then by way of an afterthought, “Where’s Agnes?”

  “At her Grandmother Hiller’s. She’s there for the day.”

  It was not an unreasonable place for her to be, though as a rule Irene and little Agnes came together. After dinner he and Agnes played house behind the sofa. Agnes was the mother. She made beds and dusted and swept and talked to the groceryman over the telephone (he was the grocery man) and had lunch ready for her fat sofa-pillow children when they got home from school. At the end of the day the father came home (he was the father) and spanked all the sofa-pillows that hadn’t minded their mother and gave French harps to all that had.

  Friday was the usual day for Agnes to go to her grandmother’s. On Friday his mother and Irene went to their bridge club. After school he and Agnes walked home together—Agnes to her Grandmother Hiller’s and he to his Grandmother Morison’s, who lived with Aunt Clara and Uncle Wilfred Paisley in a square white house in the same block. At five-thirty his mother called for him in the car. Irene was with her and they were wearing their best clothes. And then they stopped and got Agnes. That was the way it usually was, and he wouldn’t have thought anything about Agnes’s being there today except for the fact that a moment ago Irene was bright and cheerful. Now she was staring moodily past the top of his head.