You ask me why I write books; the answer is, because I am afraid
of death. Quite literally, that is: the thought of dying if rightens me. I do
not write for posterity, to console myself with some sort of immortality here
on earth, like the pleasure of appearing in libraries later on. On the contrary,
such immortality seems to me no more than a drop in the bucket, and very poor
pay for that ultimate terrifying loneliness. I write in order to be doing some-
thing to tell myself that I am alive, and that life is good.

It would be easier if I were a musician - a singer, say; or a
carpenter; or even a Christian. A musician has only to sit down at a piano, or
take a deep breath - and there it is, all the goodness of life at his finger
tips, so to speak. For an hour or so he is at the very core and center of the
universe, creating worlds, like God. When he gets up, he is worn out, like a
tennis player, and he does not have to think about anything.

And a Christian has heaven to look forward to: he sees his soul
float upward without pain and without regret, and looking exactly like him,
into regions of eternal bliss. If I, too, could look forward to such a future,
I should not bother to write any more books.

But as far as I can see, there is no evidence for it, one way or
the other. Except, perhaps, this: that now, when I am old, I feel the same as
I did when I was young. It is the same Me that stares at me out of the looking
glass; although I must confess it does not always look the same. But there has
been no change in how it feels to be Me. Well, there it is; perhaps that Me is
eternal, after all. That is mysterious, when you come to think about it.

And as far as that goes, we are constantly surrounded by mystery.
Today, after nearly ten years, the clock on my desk has started to tick again.
No one has touched it in all that time; but there it is, suddenly ticking away.
Perhaps some trick of the weather started it up again, for when I went to look at
it, the spring was unwound, just as I had left it. The ticking irritates me, just
as it used to; I shall let it run down again. It is better to let time flow
silently by, rather than be hurried against the current by a clock like a little
outboard motor.

To the question of the day, What do you know? the honest answer must
always be: nothing.

Mr. Sands does not agree with me. He is ninety, and his nose is
always either white or red. He used to be an engineer, and a very serious man,
but lately he has grown more and more merry. In many ways he is like a child,
and that makes him happy, for he expects to rejoin his daughter who died when
she was sixteen. He is glad that he will be young again when he meets her. He
does not think very often about his wife, who was sixty when she passed on.

Mr. Sands has the upper floor; and I must say we get on very well,
although there is thirty years difference between us. He comes to see me some-
times when I am working, and tells me about things he remembers from seventy
and eighty years ago. They seem more real to him than what is happening today;
the bridges which went up, one by one, over the East River, the Elevated Railway,
the first submarine - even the first motor car. Such things as the radio, motion
pictures, the airplane, all seem very new to him, and in a curious way not so
much a result of the past, as a reason for it. If there was to be an airplane,
there would first have to be a motor to fly it; starting where we are, and looking
backward, one can imagine that the atom bomb is not the result of man's having
discovered fire, but the cause of it.

That is one reason why I cannot make up my mind about heaven.

Her name was Phoebe; and she was flying home. What she had been
sent to do, was done; it had not been a very important mission, not the sort of
thing He would have sent a Seraph, or one of the Archangels to attend to. Phoebe
was only a little angel, and so she was accustomed to the smaller duties, such
as were thought proper to her abilities.

It was evening, and over the earth the rind-green sky of night, cool
as a melon, poured out its brief and tranquil light. The first stars winked like
distant fox-fires in the sky, through which the winds, the cold, high winds of
March moved like a tide from west to east. On earth the peepers sang, and the dry
grass rustled; but in the sky there was only the sound of air moving, and the
cry of gulls, lonely and harsh in the wind.

Phoebe was in no hurry to get home, for she expected that there
would be another errand for her to do as soon as she got there. She was not in
the least rebellious or unwilling, but she missed the old days with their singing, and their sense of peace and good will on earth; when it had been possible
for the younger choirs to spend long hours at play, or in simple hosannas and
expressions of joy. Then the great Archangels had gone out on important
assignments, and had returned with great victories over the Turks and the
Saracens, or accompanied by saints, often without arms or #### heads, and breathing an odor of sanctity, and joy.

There was no time to play any more, and few left to play with. Even
her own special friend, the little angel Bridgit, was at Metro-Goldwyn Mayer in
Culver City, and would not be released for #### time.

Below her, the earth curved away to the sea, dark and forbidding; that was where Leviathan lived, who was meant to battle Behemoth some day, at the end of the world. But that was just hear-say, of course - a legend, a story they told in heaven.

And there, below her, at the edge of the deep, the profound,
mysterious ocean, whose waves ever coming and going, made a long rolling sound in
the night, lay the little village of Truro, on Cape Cod.

The houses, hidden among the hollows to protect them from the wind,

were far apart; few lights were to be seen twinkling out of the darkness into
the cold green sky. But those few lights, shining bravely out across the water,
were warmer and nearer than the stars. And Phoebe felt herself drawn to them,
almost with longing.

It was lonely up there in the sky. Even though she went with God's
love, the great spaces of eternity were so wide, the sound of it was so still.
She sang a little, for company, and to keep her spirits up: Rock of Ages, cleft
for me.

She saw the scattered lights of Truro spread out below her, like
sparks in the wind. There was one light in particular, nearest to the shore: a
cottage window winking among the branches as the wind blew. It was the last human
light she would see, before she rose into the eternal sunlight and starlight of
heaven. She wondered who lived there, if children played around the lamp, as she
and Bridgit had played together in the old days, in the heavenly meadows. She
thought she'd go a little lower, to see... After all, there was no hurry.

A moment later, she stood on the ground outside the window, looking
in.

It was the a poor house, the house of a fisherman by its looks,
small, bare, and disorderly. The room she was looking at served as kitchen and
living room both: lobster pots were piled in a corner, a pair of oars rested
against a wall. In the center of the room stood an old table; and in the light
of the lamp which stood upon it, and which drew a golden circle over the worn
pine boards, a little girl sat reading. Her dark eyes were fixed upon her book
with a far away expression; it was as if she herself, her whole small, thin body,
were far away, too, in happier surroundings. From time to time, she brushed the
dark, soft hair away from her face; as she lifted her arm, Phoebe could see how
thin and white it was.

Phoebe peered in at her through the window, her nose flattened to
the glass. She did not know whose house it was, or who the little girl was. The
bare trees bent over her; behind her, in last year's vegetable garden, a scarecrow

stirred uneasily in the breeze, above the hard, bare ground. They're not very thrifty, she thought, leaving last year's overhauls out all winter long.

It was time to leave, together on her journey. Well, she said to herself, it's time to go. But for some reason, she did not want to leave. The fragrance, the little warmth of life, brief as the lilac, reached out to her in the shadows; she was filled with pity - but whether for herself, or others, she did not know. She stood uncertain, waiting - waiting for something to happen which she did not want to happen, and yet longed for, all at the same time.

If I lived here, she thought, I would have somebody to play with.

The door into the kitchen was kicked open, and a man came into the room, with an armful of wood, for the stove. He was just over being young - perhaps thirty; and his face was dark, and lined with weather. He looked at the little girl gently and anxiously. "Time you was to bed, isn't it, Milly?" he asked.

"Aw, Pa," she said.

"What you reading, then?"

Her eyes lit up as she answered.

"I don't know," she said. "There's big words in it."

And she added, with just as much enthusiasm,

It don't have any pictures, neither."

"Well, then?" he said, not unreasonably; and stooped, to throw some hunks of wood into the stove.

"I enjoy it," she said simply.

"You beat all, Milly," he said. "By God, you surely do."

Her mother was dead two years ago; and sometimes she missed her. But not very often; she was too busy taking care of her Pa, John Waye, the lobsterman. She'd have liked a sister, but not one to bounce about, like the children at the Central School; for most of the time she didn't feel good. It was something in the blood, that had a name, and was known; she didn't get any fatter, and not much bigger, and she kept white, even in summer. Lately she'd felt even more trifling than usual, and looked whiter, too, though maybe that was

said to Milly. "You got school tomorrow."

In the darkness outside, Phoebe watched him. Men were no treat to her, she had seen too many of them. But sometimes - whenshe was lonely - their sweet, warm, brief, and pitiful mortality appealed to her. After all, they were made in His image - more or less. Angels could love, too. Once, long ago, they had found the sons of men fair; that had been quite a time.

There was something beautiful about things that died. Something that waxed and waned, and grew, and changed, and caught the heart. Something that made you want to say Wait ... don't leave me ...

he forgot what was happening to him.

A nurse came in, and bent over him, then hurried out again; but he
did not notice her. The world no longer concerned him; only the small essence of
himself concerned him now, and the dark tide rising around him. Even Mary was
forgotten; he thought, instead, and for no reason, of President McKinley. For a
moment he was young again; he wore a stiff, high collar, and a straw hat.

Other inconsequential memories followed; they had the brightness
and the incongruity of a dream. With a vague feeling of happiness and of regret,
he saw his mother; but she was old, like himself. He saw the friends and play-
mates of his youth, without knowing who they were; they were familiar, but
nameless. He roamed up and down in his life, without direction or purpose; he
smelled the sweet, damp odors of the woods, he heard lake water lapping, he saw
the wind-dark ocean, he smelled the wild geranium in the sun. He remembered the
beauty of earth; he dreamed of summer.

Slowly the bright images faded and flickered out, leaving only
Mary's face, gray-haired, quiet, and full of pity, in the encircling dark.

Then that, too, faded.

irrevocably, and forever. Even the memories would be shut off from him...
the last memories of Mary, the memory of his own old body. There was no escape;
down into the dark he must go, with all humanity - forever separate, insentient,
and unknowing. A vague panic seized him, and then gave way again to the comfort
of indifference; he forgot what was happening to him.

A nurse came in, and bent over him, then hurried out again; but he
did not notice her. Already the world around him had turned shadowy and unreal,
distant and insubstantial; it no longer concerned him. Only the small essence of
himself concerned him now, and the dark tide rising around him. Even Mary was
forgotten; he thought, instead, and for no reason, of President McKinley. For a
moment he was young again; he wore a stiff, high dollar, and a straw hat.

Other inconsequential memories followed; they had the brightness
of a dream. With a vague feeling of happiness and of regret, he saw his mother;
he saw the friends and playmates of his youth, without knowing who they were.
They were familiar, but nameless. He roamed up and down in his life, without
direction or purpose; he smelled the mossy smell of mountain land, he heard
lake water lapping, he smelled the pine and broom of Cape Cod in the sun, he
saw the wind-dark ocean, He was again at dinner with the members of the Academy;
he smelled the mild geranium in the sun. He remembered the smell,
he walked on a carpet of brown pine-needles among the pines. He saw the blue
earth; he dreamt of summer,
shadows on the snow, and morning sun yellow in the summer leaves.

Slowly the bright images faded, and flickered out, leaving only Mary's
face, gray-haired, quiet, and full of pity, in the encircling dark.

Then that, too, faded.

stirred uneasily in the breeze, above the hard, bare ground. They're not very
she
thrifty, thought Phoebe, leaving last year's overhauls out all winter long.

But for some reason, she did not want to leave the window. The
scene before her, the room with its deep shadows, the golden circle of the lamp-
light, the child, grave and dreaming above her book, all served to cast a kind
of spell over her - a spell in which her own sense of loneliness played its
part. This much - or little - she had never had; this poor, this brief and
humble mortality. The sense of mortal joy and pain reached put to her almost like
a physucal presence, bringing with it a rush of pity - but whether for herself
or others, she did not know. The small glow of the lamp, so meager compared to
the flaming glaxies of the heavens, seemed somehow - and pitifully - beauteful;
the fragrance of life, warm, painful and exciting, stirred her, aroused in her a
strange unease. It was as if she were waiting for something to happen - something
she did not want to happen, and yet longer for, all at once.

great many.

But, as always, the sense of man's hunger and hope, of mortal joy
and pain, reached out and touched her, bringing a feeling of nostalgia with it,
of being left out of things, of being lonely and apart. That small, warm, human
glow, so pitiful compared to the great mysteries conflagrations of the stars,
had its own pitiful beauty. The fragrance of life, warm, painful, and exciting,
stirred her; and she felt a sharp pang of envy for those children chasing each
other across the floor.

One of them is a cripple, she thought. Being an angel, she felt
no pity for Valerie, who was suffering from rheumatic fever.

were far apart; few lights were to be seen twinkling out of the darkness into
the cold green sky. But those few lights, shining bravely out across the water,
were warmer and nearer than the stars. And Phoebe felt herself drawn to them, in
longing
sadness and love.

It was lonely up there in the sky. Even though she went with God's
love, the great spaces of Eternity were so wide, the sound of it was so still.
She sang a little, for company, and to keep her spirits up: Rock Of Ages, Cleft
For Me.

She saw
The scattered lights of Truro spread out below her, like sparks in
the wind. There was one light in particular, near the shore; it was a cottage
window winking among the branches as the wind blew. It was the last human light
she would see ... She wondered who lived there, if children played there around
the lamplight, the way she and Bridgit had played together in the heavenly
meadows. She thought she'd go a little lower, to look; after all, there was no
hurry.

It was a small house; but there were more people in it than she had
expected.

The house belonged to the Town Moderator, John Wayne, and his
wife Sara; and their widowed daughter, Alice Cook, lived with them, along with
her two children, Jack and Mabel. And this evening they had company besides,
their son Bill Wayne and his wife Milly having come over, with their children
Ralpg, Gertie, and Valerie. The children played and quarreled on the floor,
while their elders sat around the supper table, from which the plates had all
been cleared, and discussed the weather, and local gossip, with suitable pauses
in between.

Outside, Phoebe peered in at the window, her nose falttened against
the glass. The Waye dog, Old Blodget, lay peacefully at her feet; and behind her
in last year's vegetable garden, last year's scarecrow flapped wearily in the
breeze. They're not very thrifty, thought Phoebe, leaving last year's overhauls
out all winter long.

And she shook her head at man's mistakes, of which she had seen a

The old poet lay dying. In the wide silence of night, his bed rocked gently and imperceptibly upon that tide which, without meaning to, he had been awaiting for the better part of seventy eight years.

Through the night-time corridors of the hospital, smelling of ether and antiseptic, the nurses moved on quiet errands, like moths. But no one was with him, for he had no family, and he believed that the world had forgotten him.

That was not exactly the case. He had been old, and unhappy, and alone for many years, ever since his wife had left him. She had been his companion in the lean and hungry early years; and she had died of rheumatic fever at the age of fifty. But his poems were still recited in the schools and colleges, where it was generally believed that he had died long ago, like Emerson and Longfellow.

Now his name, John Gaunt, was inscribed on a chart by his bed. And this name, from which, in his lifetime, had come, noble and exquisite lines of poetry, authored at last only the lines representing temperature, respiration, and pulse.

He was not sorry; though it seemed strange to think that he would not write any more poetry. Strange - but on the other hand, comforting, too; it was a comfort to lay down the burden. The world that he was leaving, was no longer the world he knew, it was no longer a place in which he wanted to live.

There had been a time when music, poetry, and art had all conspired to express the beauty and the dignity of life. Then the poets were not afraid of sorrow; and from man's suffering they drew the balm of pity. One could be proud of being a man, even though one was starving.

But that was long ago. Now the poets were full of bitterness and self-pity; and they had given up trying to give beauty and dignity to life. One starved just as much; but there was no longer any reason to be proud. A generation of pickles, he thought drowsily; and sighed.

Mary would have understood that: it was one of the jokes they used to have together. When that young English poet had brought out his book, "The Mysticals" - (what was his name? Slaughter? Maudlin? Plunder?) - Well, it didn't matter any more what his name was. He hadn't cared any more for Gaunt than Gaunt had cared for him. Mixed Pickles, Mary had called it, "Mixed Pickles," go to sleep, and

And that didn't matter, either, because very soon now he would forget about the young poets, and even about Mary. It was strange to think that it was all over, that he could never wake up and start to remember again.

Not even about Mary, with her gray hair, and her dark eyes. (For he thought of her as she had looked their last few years together.) He had never had anyone in his life except Mary; he had never loved anyone else.

The last, lonely twenty years he forgot altogether. Their taste had been bitter in his mouth - the lonely nights, the solitary meals, the days of sickness by himself - the young writers who had come to see him, and had gone away again, leaving him alone ... Twenty years; twenty empty years.

He had no hope of ever seeing Mary again. He had no faith in the hereafter.

If he had ever had anything that could be called faith, it had been faith in life, and in man. No mummery-flummery of saints and angels and heaven and hell; no rising up of the bare, worn bones, no damnation, no forgiveness. Or - for that matter - no being born again as a rabbit, or an ant; just the beauty and the pain, the joy, the dignity of man.

There had been very little of it in those last twenty years.

The bed rocked gently on the tide of eternity; and John Gaunt thought of the past, and of the future. He was by himself, now; already the little room of self was being closed off against the world, the doors shut, the curtains drawn; soon it would be sealed off entirely, irrevocably and forever. Even his memories would be shut away, out of sight and out of sound: his last memories of Mary, the memory of his own old body. There was no escape; down into the dark he must go, along with all humanity - forever separate, insentient, and unknowing. A vague panic seized him, and then gave way again to the comfort of indifference;

A nurse came in, and bent over him, then hurried out again; but he
did not notice her. The world no longer concerned him; only the small, remaining
essence of himself concerned him now, and the dark tide rising around him. Even
Mary was forgotten; he thought, instead, and for no reason, of President
McKinley. For a moment he was young again; he wore a stiff, high collar, and a
straw hat.

He saw himself in the little garret room where he had lived when he
first came to the city to make his fortune. He saw the old farm where he and Mary
had spent their last years together. He saw the pasture with its stone walls,
and the hills; he saw himself sitting on the sagging porch, talking to the young,
older writers who had come to pay their respects to him. And then, without
knowing why, he thought of a picture he had had in his room as a boy: General
Custer's Last Stand.

Other inconsequential memories followed; they had the brightness
and the incongruity of a dream. With a vague feeling of happiness and of regret,
he saw his mother; but she was old, like himself. He roamed up and down in his
life without direction or purpose; he saw the friends and playmates of his youth,
without knowing who they were; they were familiar, but nameless.

More and more the memory of earth itself returned to him; he smelled
the sweet, damp odors of the woods, he heard lake water lapping, he saw the
wind-dark ocean, he smelled wild geranium in the sun. He remembered the beauty
of earth; he dreamt of summer.

Slowly the bright images faded and flickered out, leaving
only his wife's face, gray-haired, quiet, and full of pity, in the
encircling dark.

Then that, too, faded.

ch 2

The little girl came into the room, and closed the door behind her.

"Well, she said; "are you ready?"

"You've been a long time," said John Gaunt. "You've kept me waiting."

The little girl looked at him without smiling. There was no humor in her face; but there was infinite grace. Her eyes were icy blue. "What difference does it make?" she asked quietly. "You have all eternity."

"Well," said John; "well..." He moved uncertainly in the bed. "I suppose I'd better get up," he remarked.

"You'd better," she agreed.

"Are you going to stand there, while I get dressed?" he asked, "while I get dressed?"

"It's no treat to me," she replied. "And anyway," she added, "don't be ridiculous."

But she moved over to the window while he got out of bed. It was
no trouble; he was simply standing in the middle of the floor. "I can't find my
clothes," he said.

"You won't need them," she said.

No, thought John, I suppose I won't. And lifting his hospital
gown, he looked quickly down at his body, to see if it had changed, and grown
young and beautiful. However, it was just as he remembered it; and with a sigh,
he let the gown drop again. "I thought they'd send me somebody a little older,"
he said querulously. "Somebody more my own age."

"They were all busy," said the little girl. "And she added calmly,
"I'm probably ten thousand times ten thousand times as old as you are."

"Besides," she concluded, "you didn't think that anyone would come
at all."

"No," said John meekly; "I didn't." And he added, "It was good of you, seeing that I didn't believe expect anything."

The little girl shrugged her shoulders from which two small but

heavily feathered wings spread themselves for a moment, like an eagle. "WE
watch the sparrows, too," she said.

"That's right," said John; "I had forgotten." And struck by a
sudden thought, he exclaimed,

"Is heaven, then, for everyone? For sparrows, too?"

"Certainly," she said.

"And dogs? And ants/ ? And spiders? And cuttle fish?"

The little girl turned her icy eyes on him; and he felt humbled,
and consoled, all at once. "You mortals," she exclaimed impatiently. "If heaven
can't contain all creation, then what is heaven for?"

"I thought it was for Catholics," he said meekly.

"It is," she said. "And Hottentots. And Jews. And as you say,
cuttle fish.

"Of course," she added, "we don't go after the cuttle fish in quite
the same way. They go on being cuttle fish."

"And the Catholics?" he asked.

"They go on being Catholics," she replied. "It's very pretty for
them."

"I see," he said; "I see. So I'm to go - being myself?"

And he gave a deep sigh.

"I don't think very much of that," he said.

"Then you don't think very much of yourself, either," said the
little girl.

"I thought a lot of Mary," said John. And he added hopefully,

"Shall I see her soon?"

"Tell me about her," said the little girl.

"She was a good and lovely woman," said John. "She had gray hair,
and her face was wrinkled from the sun and the wind. She'd put on weight."

"Hm," said the little angel.

"But I cannot remember the way she looked when she was young," said
John.

- 19 -

business," he said.

And he added dully, but politely, "I'm Edward Harendeen."

The young woman bowed gravely. "My name is Thisole," she
said. "But they call me Lucy."

"Why?" asked Mr. Harendeen.

She shrugged her shoulders. "Who wants to be called
Thisole all their lives?" she asked.

They sat together under the live oak tree, in the cool shade,
and ate their breakfast. The wood smoke from the stove drifted
in faint fragrance across their faces, the mountains rose still
and dreaming in the sun, and the sea rustled faintly on the sand
below. It seemed to Mr. Harendeen that the sky had never been
so clear or the air so bright, that he had never been so aware
of the world beyond the hills, and that life had never had such
relish. "It's turned out to be a lovely day," he said. "It will
probably be hot by noon."

- 16 -

from the earth which lay suddenly bare and empty around him,
ringed with mountains and the sea. It was a scene of great
beauty, of solitude and peace, and it spread itself out for
Mr. Harendeen all at once, and in a single moment, from the
rough meadow in front of him to the blue green hills beyond,
with the cobalt sea below, dreaming in the sun.

He stared at it in wonder. Somewhere, he thought, I have
seen all this before; I have looked down at the same blue ocean,
and I have looked up at these self-same hills - yet never
together, as now.

A sudden, inexplicable gaiety and lightness of heart took
hold of him, which he attributed to the bright sunshine, and
the clear air. This is a delectable place, he thought; I must
remember how I came. And he looked around eagerly, sniffing
the air with its hot scent of earth, mixed with the cool reminder
of the sea. Delectable, he thought; that's one of Ruth's old
words. Strange that I should have used it.

The feeling of happiness persisted, along with a curious
sense of freedom; and he was in no hurry to turn his car around,
and leave. I am already late for the office, he thought; it
would do me good to stretch a little, in the sun.

It did not seem in the least strange to him, to be walking
grasping, ahead, turning his car into summer,
across the bare, dry field toward the little rise, with the
oak tree beyond it. Or to find the roofed-over wagon there,
with its white and red sides, and the ruffled curtains at the
windows - a wagon that was really a kind of gypsy caravan, the

- 1 5 -

But the road, he saw, was narrow, and there seemed to be
no good place to turn. I'll go a little farther on, he thought,
and find a wider place.

After all, he told himself, there's no cause for fright.
I can't really be lost.

Yet all the while he was saying to himself, "what road is
this? It has no business to be here."

It didn't make him feel any better to have the road rising
as it did, always going upwards, when he knew that in one
direction from his house were the level streets and boulevards,
and in the other, nothing but bare and empty hills, coyotes and
the sea.

If it doesn't widen out soon, he thought, I'll have to
back down it. But the prospect of backing down a winding,
unknown road in a fog, was not a cheerful one, and he could feel
his heart beating a little faster than usual. He found himself
swallowing, and wished that Ruth were there to tell him what to
do.

10

of what they had a couple of centuries ago. I remember when we had a hundred-inch glass, and we thought we'd looked out clear to the edge of the universe. Then we got a two-hundred-incher, and we looked out right through that edge into more of the same thing, and no end to it in sight. Maybe a billion light-years off into space, and no end to it, All the same thing, wherever you look, and however far you look."

"That's right," said Mr. Harendeen. He had to admit, it seemed to be quite endless.

"What's more," said the old man, "you take the pattern of the stars: there's no confusion there, or hocus-pocus. They follow the atomic patterns, just as carefully as a snowflake. You know what our earth and its moon look like? A hydrogen atom."

"Do they?" asked Mr. Harendeen in surprise.

"They do," said the old man. He came a little closer to Mr. Harendeen, and lowering his voice, grasped him confidentially by the lapel. "You know what I think, mister?" he asked. "I think we're fooling ourselves."

Mr. Harendeen wished to touch his lapel, but found it difficult to do so. "Please," he said, "Mr...?"

"Call me Charlie," said the old man. He let go of his Harendeen's lapel, and turned back to the telescope. "Do you know where I think we look, when we look into a glass like this?" he said, "I think we look inward, instead of out. I think we look inward at ourselves."

Mr. Harendeen digested this remark slowly. "But then," he said, "there wouldn't be an Out. Even without the glass. There'd only be an In."

- 2 -

By spring, the bad weather was forgotten, except in
the price of lamb, which remained high. The orange trees
blossomed late, but in great profusion; roses were early. In
the mid-west, rivers rose in flood; there was an earthquake
in Seattle; and fog lay upon the California coast. Usually by
evening, and in any case by mid-summer, the fog burned itself
away.

But long before mid-summer, Mr. Harendeen was in
love.

Mr. Edward Harendeen was an insurance broker, whose
home was among the canyons near the sea. But his work was in
the city of Los Angeles; and each day he drove in to his office,
down the long boulevards, through the early morning traffic.
The sun shone in his eyes; and he tried to imagine that he was
still young, and that there was a future ahead of him.

But when there was a fog along the coast, he found
himself in a gray and sea-cold world, in which everything was
muted, secret and withdrawn. Very often, at such times, he did
not know just where he was; and this gave him a curious feeling
of slatine, mixed with fear.

For there were many times when Mr. Harendeen would almost
have almost liked to lose himself, and never find his way back
It was never more than almost, because in reality
again. But in his heart he was afraid of that rich and mysterious
world which lay outside the simple pattern of his daily life,
his drive along the boulevards, his spare, neat office, the
collected files, the inventories and premiums, the rates and
policies, the forms and liabilities; and his neat, uncomfortable
home in the canyon, in which his gray-haired, gray-eyed wife,

- 3 -

Ruth, ordered the meals, arranged the furniture, and, with her iron voice, bossed Maybelline, the part-time cook and house-worker.

Ruth was everything that Mr. Harendeen was not; which is why he had married her. In her brisk ways and firm manner, he had expected to find security for himself; but what he found was not as agreeable as he had thought it would be. It was true that he was secure, in a way; but it was the security of a sheep, under the eye of the shepherd. It did not make him any less timid, or uncertain of himself; and after a while he resented a discipline which did not do anything to give him more courage in the world.

In fact, it sometimes seemed to him that Ruth, with her decided stand on everything under the sun, only succeeded in taking away from him the little sense of authority he possessed by reason of being a man, and the titular head of his household.

It must be said that nothing in Mr. Harendeen's business life contributed to a sense of importance, or justified him in feeling satisfied with himself. He made a decent living; and he belonged to the Wilshire District Rotary, which met once a month at Gruman's Restaurant for lunch. He believed that the insurance business exerted a wholesome influence in the world, but at the same time his own part in it seemed small, and far removed from the anguish and the glory.

The adventure of life itself, in which people suffered and triumphed, gave their hearts away, fed upon hope and light

- 4 -

airs, and woke every morning in terror or delight, was not, he knew, for him. Exist it must, somewhere - since some of it, at least, was insurable, and passed across the ordered level of his desk in the form of percentages and liabilities. But for the most part, it was as foreign to him as a breadfruit tree.

Mr. Harendeen understood these feelings of his, but he found them difficult to explain to anyone else. "It's this way, Fred," he said to his friend Fred Wadleigh (the Wadleigh of Jones, Coppicus, Hirschfield, Jones, and Wadleigh, General Insurance), as they sat together at a Rotary luncheon; "I know that what I'm doing is for the benefit of people generally. I'd have to feel that, to be any good at my job. And I suppose I'm as good as the next one," he added hastily, hearing his wife's voice telling him not to run himself down. "Just the same, when I add it all up, I don't get any carry-over for tomorrow."

"The trouble with you," said Fred, "is you're in a rut."

Mr. Harendeen glanced around the table at the busy, successful men, intent upon their food, and their business. "Tell me, Fred," he said; "do you ever feel you've missed something?"

"Sure," said Fred. "There's always something missing."

"I mean, something in yourself," said Mr. Harendeen.

"Oh," said Fred. "That. What do you want - perfection?"

"No," said Mr. Harendeen. "I only want to know what's missing."

Mr. Wadleigh reflected for a moment; then his face cleared. "Well, now, I'll tell you," he said. "Where do you go for your vacation?"

- 5 -

Mr. Harendeen replied that he usually spent his vacation
fishing on Lake Meade.

"Try Coronado," said Mr. Wadleigh. And he added darkly,
"Tia Juana."

Mr. Harendeen looked at him blankly. "What would I do
at Tia Juana?" he asked.

"H ell," said Mr. Wadleigh; "H ow do I know?"

They both rose, to sing For He's a Jolly Good Fellow,
in honor of Mr. Pincus, of the Picadilly Men's Shop, who was
making his initial appearance at these luncheons. Then they
sat down again, and Mr. Wadleigh gazed somberly into his glass
of ice water.

"They've got some good night clubs there," he said. And
suddenly clicking his fingers together like castanets, he
ejaculated:

"Senoritas!"

Mr. Harendeen experienced a moment of acute embarrassment.
Senoritas? That was hardly what he meant." (Were they virtuous
girls? Probably not.) And, in any case, Mrs. Harendeen would
be along with him, wherever he went.

"I'm afraid it wouldn't do," he said.

Fred meant well, of course - but that wasn't what he
had been talking about. Not senoritas; and not Tia Juana,
whatever it was like. What he was talking about was the taste
and sound of life - what other people had. The dark beauty and
the wonder.

Surely, they had it, they must have it. He, too, had
caught a glimpse of it once - or so he liked to think; but long

- 7 -

"Oh, dear," said Mr. Harendeen. "She won't like that."

Miss Pryne screwed up her mouth into a pout. "Are you going to tell on me?" she asked. Then she gave him an arch look. "I know you can handle her," she said.

There was something in the way she said it which made it
though she had touched him.
sound different - as though what he was about to handle was not
so much a client, as a joy. For a moment Mr. Harendeen almost
believed her; he believed that he would "handle" Mrs. Purviance.

And for a moment, life seemed like a flame, and Miss Pryne
like a moth, dancing about the fire. He could almost feel the
her hand on his arm, and she drew back a little,
warmth of it on his face.

"I won't tell on you," he said.

Mrs. Purviance had several complaints to make; for one thing,
she had not received her line record folder, or list of policies,
although it had been promised the week before. Mr. Harendeen
cleared his throat. "It appears," he began -

"I hate that way of doing business," said Mrs. Purviance.
"There's no excuse for it."

"There was a slight error," said Mr. Harendeen, "in the
books."

"Oh, there was, was there?" said Mrs. Purviance. "Either
you're to be trusted, or you're not. If you're not, I'll take
my business elsewhere."

"If you will let me explain," said Mr. Harendeen with dignity.

"I hate people who can't keep their promises," said Mrs.
Purviance. "When you say 'next week,' then I expect you to mean
what you say. You have my money, haven't you?"

- 6 -

ago, when he was young, when the lights across a valley at
night had been enough to set him dreaming, and the cobalt sea
beyond the headlands in the sun had seemed like a road to be
taken. He had never taken it; but still, sometimes, he thought
about it.

When he got back to this office after lunch, there was a
note on his desk to call Mrs. Purviance, a client, whose
policies he had been trying to get into shape. He put the call
in, and waited, watching the other men in the office as they went
about their affairs - the stout and thoughtful McIrney, the
small brisk Sobelson, with his large ears, and shining eyes.
How full of life they seemed; how earnest and purposeful; they
would never have asked Fred such a question: Have you missed
anything?

Mrs. Purviance had several complaints to make; for one
 thing, she had not received her list of policies, although it
 had been promised the week before. "But Mrs. Purviance," he
 began -

"There's no excuse for it," she said.

"I am sure," he told her, "that we are doing all we..."

"Nonsense," said Mrs. Purviance. "Either you're to be

- 4 -

Mr. Harendeen understood these feelings of his, but he found them difficult to explain to anyone else. "It's this way, Fred!" he said to his friend Fred Wadleigh (The Wadleigh of Jones, Coppicus, Hirschfield, Jones, and Wadleigh, General Insurance), as they sat together at a Rotary luncheon; "I know that what I'm doing is for the benefit of people generally. I'd have to feel that, to be any good at my job. And I suppose I'm as good as the next one," he added hastily, hearing his wife's voice telling him not to run himself down. "I make a good living. But when I add it all up, I don't get any carry-over for tomorrow."

"The trouble with you," said Fred, "is you're in a rut."
Mr. Harendeen glanced around the table at the busy, successful men, intent upon their food, and their business. "Tell me, Fred,"
he said; "do you ever feel you've missed something?" Sure," said Fred. "There's always something missing. What do you want—perfection?"

- 5 -

"Try Coronado," said Mr. Wadleigh. And added darkly, "Tia Juana."

"Hell," said Mr. Wadleigh; "how do I know?"

"Senoritas!"

Mr. Harendeen experienced a moment of acute embarrassment. "Senoritas?" That was hardly what he meant. (Were they virtuous girls? Probably not.) In any case, Mrs. Harendeen would be there with him, wherever he went.

Surely, they had it, they must have it. He, too, had caught a glimpse of it once - or so he liked to think; but long ago, when he was young, when the lights across a valley at night had been enough to set him dreaming, and the cobalt sea beyond

- 6 -

the headlands in the sun had seemed like a road to be taken --
He had never taken it; but still, sometimes, he thought about it.

When he got back to his office after lunch, there was
a note on his desk to call Mrs. Purviance, a client, whose
policies he had been trying to get into shape. He put the call
in, and waited, watching the other men in the office as they went
about their affairs - the stout and thoughtful McIrney, the small,
brisk Sobelson, with his large ears, and shining eyes. How full
of life they seemed; how earnest and purposeful; he thought their
lives must be very satisfactory. They would not have asked Fred
such a question: have you ever missed anything?

"I am sure," he told her, "That we are doing all we ..."

"Nonsense," said Mrs. Purviance. "Either you're to be
trusted, or you're not. If you're not, I'll take my business
elsewhere."

"But Mrs. Purviance -" If you will let me explain -" said Mr. Harendeau, while dignitaries

"Yes, we do -- of course --"

"And I haven't the policies. I don't even know what I
have. That's a miserable way to do business."

- 8 -

it was, forever - or at least long enough to feel himself a part of it, to feel that clear and quiet beauty within himself.

Because he was driving slowly, he saw something a few blocks farther on, at Bundy, that he had never seen *there* before. It was He saw a man peering up at the moon through a side-walk telescope, from which hung a sign: "See the Moon, 5 cents."

Mr. Harendeen stopped, because he was surprised, and because the sight seemed incongrous to him. Why look at such a beautiful evening, he thought, through a telescope?

But he found that he was curious, after all; for he had never looked through a telescope. Mr. Harendeen decided to do one thing, at least, that he had never done before.

The man at the telescope was old, but tall, with gray hair and a gaunt face. He took Mr. Harendeen's nickel without comment, and adjusted the instrument for him. Then he stepped back, and with a polite gesture invited Mr. Harendeen to look.

What he saw, was the moon, which was no surprise to him. Nevertheless, he found that for some reason, he was disappointed; and with a feeling almost of chagrin, he stepped back, and turned to leave. The old man laid a gentle hand on his arm.

"You didn't look very deep, mister," he said.

Mr. Harendeen blinked. "Deep?" he said. "I saw the moon; what else was there?"

The old man let go of his arm, and turning, touched the telescope with his gnarled, sunburnt fingers. "Well, now," he said, "I don't know. Depends on what you think the moon's made

- 9 -

of doesn't it?"

Mr. Harendeen smiled; something came back to him from his
far-off childhood. "Green cheese, of course," he said.

The old man nodded. "Fair enough," he said, and he added,
"I wouldn't dispute it. I just doubt the moon is there at all,
rightly speaking."

Mr. Harendeen looked at him quickly, for he distrusted
quacks of all kinds, and people with strange notions. "In that
case," he said lightly, "I paid five cents to look at nothing."

And he started to walk away, again, again, but the old man put out his
hand again, to restrain him.

"You saw more than that, mister," he said. "You saw the
space beyond."

"Yes," said Mr. Harendeen, "I did."

"How far would you say it was?" persisted the other man. "A
million miles?"

Mr. Harendeen computed mileage in his mind; he multiplied
space and time. "More than that," he said. "I suppose I saw
a hundred times that far. If there was anything there to see," he
added hastily.

The old man nodded with satisfaction. "You're right," he
said. "But this is just a two-inch telescope. About the size of
what they had a couple of centuries ago." I remember when we had
a hundred-inch glass, and we thought we'd looked out clear to
the edge of the universe. Then we got a two hundred-incher,
and we looked out right through that edge into more of the same

- 10 -

thing, and no end to it in sight. Maybe a billion light-years off into space, and no end to it. All the same thing, wherever you look, and however far you look."

"That's right," said Mr. Harendeen. It seemed to be quite endless.«

"What's more," said the old man, "you take the pattern of the stars: there's no confusion there, or hocus-pocus. They follow the atomic patterns, just as carefully as a snowflake, You know what our earth and its moon look like? A hydrogen atom."

Mr. Harendeen wished to free his lapel, but found it difficult to do so. "Please," he said, "Mr ...?"

"Call me Charlie," said the old man. He let go of Mr. Harendeen's lapel, and turned back to the telescope. "Do you know where I think we look, when we look into a glass like this?" I think we look inward, instead of out. I think we look inward at ourselves."

"That's right," said Charlie. "That's what I think. That's why there's no end or boundary to the sky. We keep looking and looking, at what we think is out beyond us - not stopping to

- 3 -

Ruth was everything that Mr. Harendeen was not; which is why he had married her. In her brisk ways and firm manner, he had expected to find security for himself; but what he found was not as agreeable as he had thought it would be. It was true that he was secure, in a way; but it was the security of a sheep, under the eye of the shepherd. It did not make him any less timid, or uncertain of himself; and after a while he resented a discipline which did not help him to make more of a dashing figure in the world.

EZRA, 1; 16

These are the Creatures we have called Divine,
The Holy Ones, in awe and wonder dressed,
Seraph and Angel, in their own design,
By Fire nurtured and by Chaos blessed.
Such silent portents, lighted like the stars,
were never cousin to the human race;

These are no friends from Jupiter or Mars,
No living visitors from outer space.

Ezekiel saw them, and reported this:

A wheel within a wheel; and heard their mirth
Awful and lonely on the dark abyss,

Singing to God a language not of earth,
Watching without compassion or regret
Man's wretched course upon this planet set.

It's a long, long way - forty years.

Remember how weathered and age-beaten a forty-year old
man seemed to us once? An ancient! A Dean, a Professor -
with gray in his hair, with all the wisdom of New England
in his head, and the hopes of his youth behind him.

But what hopes we had! Not at all like our
present sons - or, more likely, grandsons. The world
purred at our knees like a drowsy cat. Who ever heard of
taxes? Or television? Or Belsen? Or Stalingrad? Or
Hiroshima? Music was meant to be enjoyed, poetry to be
learned and recited (what would Tuffy have made of our
modern poets?) Collars were four inches high; an entire
generation wore ties ...

It is a long way back to 1912 - into another
era, almost as hard to imagine for those who weren't there,
as the Mesozoic. But the thing is - we were there. I can
remember walking to Portsmouth (or nearly) one warm spring
day, with Charlie Walker, and very solemnly arranging the
world's future and our own. It looked good, too; there was
no place for doubt, no cause for anxiety. And I can
remember the love - it was love - the whole school felt for
Bill Bingham; and the curious love-hate we had for Eddie

-2-

Mahan, who beat us so handily at football - but was, at least, an Andover man. And Don Stewart's airy charm, and Marcel Gillis' banjo; and Heinie Kreger, that mighty mite - the towering Ach, Fripp as handsome on the diamond as a home run - the wise Emmons, the friendly Holmes - the smell of lilacs that last spring, and the sweet smell of grass at Commencement -

Welcome back, old friends and acquaintances - welcome back to the Mesozoic, to when the world was young. For all the changes - the gray hair (or none at all), the wisdom that proved to be not quite adequate, the plans that didn't turn out the way we hoped - there is still the school, there are still Hoyt and Dunbar, Williams and Peabody - though one has to search for them among the new buildings. And in those old halls, you will find, still, some memory of that incredible morning in the world, when the sun was bright and there was no end to the sky, and Authority itself stood above us, and answered to the name of Amen.

Robert Nathan

3/25/52

Despite his best efforts, people had gone about their business all over the world, enslaving others, investigating public servants,ocriminating everyone, and giving away Government secrets.

"People are all insane," said Mr Flyte, glancing at the latest poem by the winner of the Pullitzer prize, which was written in a new language which nobody understood. The world was about to end in a final catastrophe, but the poet was intent on describing something - it was impossible to say what - that reminded him of three turtles and a billiard ball.

"I do not see," said Mr. Flyte, "how this poem is expected to bring comfort to the old, or to instruct the young. Or," he added, "to excite the adult mind."

"But obviously I am in the wrong, since it has won a prize."

And he thought sadly of his daemon who had helped him to write those sonnets which had comforted and consoled him for so many years, and which had caused him to be called a sentimentalist, a moss-back, a relic of the antediluvian past, and a member of the Institute of Arts And Letters.

V

It was true: during the war, John Flyte had written a great deal, and had received an award for patriotic service in the form of a scroll from the Treasury, and a small silver medal. But with the coming of peace with its terrors and uncertainties, the collapse of the British Empire, and the encroachments of age, he found himself with less and less to say, and with a sense of belonging to the past, as far-off-lost as the dinosaurs or Queen Victoria.

He did not particularly care for the British Empire, but its decline, along with so much of the world that he knew, affected him unpleasantly.

Perhaps the women he had left behind him also had something to do with it. There were so many: the daring women, the true and loving women; like a dog among too many morsels he had dropped each one to seize another, and in the end, being of an age when it is hard to seize anything, he had none.

And almost in tears each time, he would murmur, "I don't know how it happened."

Then he would make up his mind to be free and independent, to live alone, and to learn to cook for himself. But his heart would quicken again at the sight of a pretty face or the glance of a merry and affectionate eye, and that was the end of it. Sometimes he looked at his own lined face and withered shanks in the mirror; then he would sigh and exclaim, "You are an old fool."

It did not do him any good to realize it.

The trouble was, he always thought of himself as a hero - if not today, then tomorrow. But he was beginning to wonder. At all events, he could not complain that he was misunderstood, or put the blame on somebody else. If he wasn't a hero, it was his own fault; he had simply missed the boat, somewhere along the line.

It was true: during the War, John Flyte had written a great deal, and had received an award for patriotic service in the form of a scroll from the Treasury, and a small silver medal. But with the coming of peace with its terrors and uncertainties, the collapse of the British Empire, and the encroachments of age, he found himself with less and less to say, and with a sense of belonging to the past, as far-off-lost as the dinosaurs or Queen Victoria.

Perhaps the women he had lost in his life had something to do with it. There were so many: the pretty women, the true and loving women; like a dog among too many morsels, he had dropped each one to seize another, and in the end, being of an age when it was hard to seize anything, he had none.

And he would determine to be free and independent, to live alone, and to learn to cook for himself. But then his heart would quicken again at the sight of a tender face or the glance of a merry and affectionate eye, and that was all he wanted. Sometimes to do over again. Until he looked at his own lined face and withered shanks in the mirror; then he would sigh, and exclaim: "You are an old fool."

The trouble was, he was always thought of himself as a hero - if not today, then at least tomorrow. But now he knew that he had never been a hero, and that he probably never would be. And the worst of it was that he could not complain that he had been misunderstood, or put the blame onto someone else.

If he wanted to be himself, he had simply to say that he was his fault, from first to last: he was just one of those men who were never out but to be heroes. And in the end it would all come to this: a long, drawn-out, slow, sad,哀号like a dying man.

2

that was not what he meant, and besides, even if it was true, it
did not make him happy.

For Mr. Caraway wanted with all his heart to belong to the
world in which God and His angels moved in mysterious ways, and
in which people enjoyed themselves in one another's company. The
trouble was, he did not know where to find this world, or what it
was like, though he was convinced that everybody else belonged
to it.

Therefore the most important thing, in his opinion, was to be
like everybody else.

Unfortunately, this was very difficult in Mr. Caraway's case,
because, to begin with, he did not look like anybody else. He
was small, and thin; he had a long, moist nose, and watery blue
eyes, and his hair stuck out like straw around his face, which
had a gentle and surprised expression. He did not play the flute;
but everyone expected him to.

Mrs. Caraway also was small, but indomitable. One felt that
nothing frightened her, and that she was ready for anything. At the
same time, she gave an impression of being satisfied with what she
had, not so much because it suited her, or was valuable, but because
it was hers.

The beetle lay on its back and looked up at the sky. But it did not know it was the sky, or that it was blue; it was simply a Beyond from which the beetle received from time to time certain sonar impusles, usually of a sexual nature. Even the idea of a Beyond was too much for the beetle, who had no language, and therefore was unable to think in abstractions.

But there was one thing the beetle knew: it belonged. That is, when it was right side up. It belonged to itself and to the universe, which was a universe of beetles, and full of incomprehensible disasters, unexplained fate, and mysterious powers. For instance, there was a Presence, not to be described or even understood, but nevertheless apprehended, within whose Awful Eye the beetle rested on its back. That is, if the Presence had an Eye; though, for that matter, what was an Eye?

The Presence was either enormous, or else moved in an entirely different dimension; its upper end (with which it did what?) was so far away from its lower end that it seemed unlikely to a beetle that both ends could exist simultaneously, or at the same moment of time.

The beetle did not belong to the Presence, and actually wanted to have nothing to do with it; but it did belong to the universe, and was not in the least lonely or afraid. It was, besides, a universe without romantic love, or nonsense of any kind.

Oscar Caraway sighed, and rousing himself from his reverie over the beetle, stood upright. He was a small thin man, with watery blue eyes, and a long, moist nose; and it was a matter of continual pain to him, and a kind of grief, that he did not feel that he belonged to anything.

His wife Amelia would have said that he belonged to her, but

My name is Neil Flaherty, and I do believe more often in the
things I cannot understand, than in the things I can. Can I
understand the galaxies? Well - what's beyond them? And what
keeps them there, each in its own place, steady in the abyss?
I have no answer to that, and neither have you.

But an apple pie is something we can both of us see and
taste; I know the making and the method of it, and I can under-
stand it. Can I indeed? Then who made apples? And what is pie?
Oxidation, you say; but that only draws me back to the original
mystery.

Or take the television; or second sight; or witchcraft; or
God. I cannot understand the slightest thing about any of them.
But I believe in them. And there's another thing I believe in,
which is the most unbelievable of all, more so than God, even;
and on the face of it, it's only a fever and a poison. And that
is love.

Let me tell you the love story.

It was in the woods, and I was there, though not a hunter.
Why should I kill God's creatures, furry or otherwise? (I suppose
they are God's after all.) To eat, I suppose, or out of anger;
but the anger wasn't in me, and I had no home at the moment to take
a haunch of venison. I was travelling, from here to there; camping
nights, or finding a bed in some village. I'd slept in Honnicut,
and Malvern, and under Hemlock Mountain; and now I was in the
woods, between Wayne and East Toby, and on my way to Tuck's Corner.

There was nothing much at the Corners, as far as I knew; a
small house, maybe, or a room, where I could rest. Not that I

The village of Tucker's Corner stood along the Barly road; and the broody woods came down around it, almost as far as the first houses. During the sunny day one could count them, each in its own plot of ground; at night, in the darkness, they exchanged winking messages of lantern light, like a fleet of fishing boats at sea, and with much the same effect, at once mysterious and comforting.

There were animals in the woods, fox, deer, bear, lynx, ermine and badger. Under the trees the air was damp and shadowy; the great evergreens, hemlock, balsam and spruce, the beach and rugged oak, the bending pale birch, made quiet processions across the forest floor; the sun shone thru in shafts of light, like green sea-water. There was a quiet and a waiting in the woods, a kind of an uneasy hush, something a little wary. There was a witch in the woods.

At least, that was the opinion of Eliphalet Bacon, who kept the general store at Tucker's Corner. "No one's ever seen her", he said, leaning across the counter, "excepting young Hugh Pomeroy; came home one day with his tongue hanging out, barked three times like a dog, and bought himself an art calendar. One of them calendars with girls made up to look like seasons, without much on."

"Well," said the stranger. His name was Neil Flaherty, and he came to live at Tucker's a little over a year ago, for no good reason, as far as anyone could see. He was some kind of a writing man. "Well," he said.

2

"Yes", said Mr. Bacon. "June, July, August; and so on.
Playing in the garden, lying in the hay,
Mostly in the altogether."

He turned back, pulled out a box of screws, looked into it,
and pushed it back again. "Well, in the altogether,"
"I'm," he said.

"And young Mr. Pomeroy?" asked Mr. Flaherty.

Mr. Bacon closed his eyes for a moment, remembering. "Went
off to the city," he declared, "and got himself a job in the street
cleaning department. Got himself a little cart and a broom; and was
doing very well. But them new-fangled trucks came in, with the
scoops and the brushes, and a squirt of water. Don't rightly know
what's happened to Hugh and his cart."

"He barked three times?" Mr. Flaherty asked.

"Yes," said Mr. Bacon with satisfaction. "Three mortal times;
and bought himself a calendar." He regarded Mr. Flaherty soberly.
"Of course," he said, "I don't hold with witches."

"Ah," said Mr. Flaherty. "I take it you don't either," said
Mr. Bacon.

"Who does?", asked Mr. Flaherty.

"Just the same," said Mr. Bacon, "When I go into the woods, I
take a sprig of broom or marjoram with me. At certain seasons."

"I favor hyssop, myself," said Mr. Flaherty.

Mr. Bacon moved away, to wait on another customer; and Mr.
Flaherty stood there, savoring the good smell of the store - a

3

smell of crackers and pickles, of apples and cheese, of nails and
rubber, three-in-one oil, brooms, peppermint candy and vanilla soda,
bolts of cotton cloth, and stove polish. He thought about Hugh
Pomeroy and his sweeper's cart; and he thought of the new machines
everywhere, which did the work of so many Pomeroy's. Man's pride, he
thought; it is being swept off the earth by the trucks of the street
cleaning department.

Having sold a spool of No. 10 white cotton thread to Mrs.
Anderson, Mr. Bacon returned genially to Mr. Flaherty. "Then there
were the two hunters," he said, "two three years ago...was it? Yes
sir; three years next December; went in after a big buck was seen
around all autumn. Red caps and all. Not a shot was fired; and they
were never seen again. Except maybe by young Nancy Higgins, seeing
a big deer, size of a moose, walking out of the woods, at dawn, with
two riders on his back. So she says. Going out to the barn at dawn;
and there they were, coming out of the woods, the men not saying a
word, and the animal stepping along as proud and dainty as a king."

"Well," said Mr. Flaherty. "Well!"

"Yes," said Mr. Bacon. "That's a fact. Strangers they were;
and strangers they remain. Red caps and all. What can I do for you?"

"Well," said Mr. Flaherty, "I need butter, and baking soda."

"Saltine's" asked Mr. Bacon. "Fig newtons?"

"What I thought I'd ask you", said Mr. Flaherty, "was do you
know anyone would come do laundry for me?"

"Laundry?", said Mr. Bacon, in surprise. "You mean your
washing?"

4

He considered for a moment, with closed eyes; he seemed to be
ruminating. "Well now," he said at last, "there's Laura Thorny.
She lives in that little cottage out by Tuck's Hill. She might do it
for you, if she felt like it; or she mightn't. I wouldn't know."

"Laura Thorny," said Mr. Flaherty. "I could ask her."

"You could" agreed Mr. Bacon. "And she'd do it, or she wouldn't."

"Is this an old woman," asked Mr. Flaherty, "or a young one?"

Mr. Bacon scratched his chin; he appeared a little perplexed.
"Neither one nor t'other," he said; "seeing she was born thirty-
six years ago right here in Tucker's Corner. I'd say she was in the
middle of life."

Mr. Flaherty was forty-two. "I'd call that young," he said.
"Thirty-six is young."

Mr. Bacon wrapped up the butter and the baking soda, and Mr.
Flaherty took his parcel, and went off to Tuck's Hill. Thirty-six
was young enough; certainly young enough to do laundry.