Love and Sleep by John Crowley Read Free Book Online Page A

brass handles like flames. Crowded against one wall, never to fit exactly no matter how it was disposed, were the nubby puce units of the sectional sofa ("The sexual sofa,” Joe Boyd joked, shocking prim Pierce). They had all seemed terribly sad to Winnie when she found them all still here, divorced from their picture window, their fieldstone fireplace, exiled with their owners to this dowdy place with its gumwood china cabinets and cabbage-rose wallpaper. But it was a long time before she suggested changing them. Not that Sam took much notice of them: that being just the point, as Winnie knew. Sam now came in and took the only large armchair in the room, his chair, which anyone else sitting in would have vacated at his approach. Sam looked as out of place seated in any other chair there as he did seated anywhere in his car except behind the wheel.
    "So what was that about?” Winnie asked him. Sam had been called down to the hospital, as he often was on Sunday mornings, usually to repair the survivors of mountain Saturday nights.
    "A child with a high fever who's had a seizure,” Sam said, and Winnie winced in pity. “I think it's just a febrile seizure—some kids get them with spiking fevers. Can't tell till he's over the fever."
    "What if it's not?"
    Sam shrugged, watching the set. “We'll try phenobarbital. Send him to Lexington for observation, if his mother'll go. It doesn't help any that the kid's pretty undernourished.” He laughed, remembering: “I asked what she'd been feeding him. She said, ‘Oh, same as ever, titty and taters.’”
    "Sam!” Winnie said. The children pretended not to hear. A white-coated scientist thrust a length of two-by-four into the focus of a huge dish antenna: the board burst into flame. A carful of miners descended into tunneled darkness; one white black-smeared face turned back to grin. The energy of the sun; the energy brought up out of the sunless realms.
    "Did you know,” Joe Boyd said, “that diamonds are really just coal in another form? You can make diamonds out of coal. If you put enough heat and pressure on them."
    " Did you know ,” Hildy mocked, “that sixty peepers can sit side by side on a pencil?"
    "Diamonds are coal,” Joe Boyd said, staring at her. “Just coal."
    "I didn't say they weren't,” Hildy said, bringing her own face, unafraid, closer to his. “Anyway I knew that."
    "I bet,” said Joe.
    " And ,” said Sam, “I have more news.” He waited to gather their attention, which he got, though their eyes didn't leave the screen. “I ran into Sister Mary Eglantine.” His boss, the hospital's Director. “And she said she's found a sister who can be released for tutoring."
    "Released?” Winnie asked laughing.
    ” ‘Released’ is the word she used. I don't know where she's been kept."
    Except for Warren, all of them had been schooled by nuns before, in Brooklyn or Long Island. The silence of their watching altered from absorption to foreboding.
    "Sister Mary Philomel,” said Sam gravely. “Seems very qualified, just fine. Taught third grade for years in Cincinnati or somewhere. Sounds fine."
    "Well I'd like to meet her,” Winnie said. “At least."
    "Sure,” Sam said. “She says she can start tomorrow."
    " Tomorrow ! Well but Sam..."
    "Sooner the better. Get this show on the road."
    He reached down for the Sunday paper lying in tents around his chair. Winnie contained her objections. Hildy slipped from the sofa and faded from the room—lots to do, if school was really starting tomorrow—and Winnie soon went out too. Joe Boyd stayed for the end of The Big Picture .
    "Dad, were you in the Army or the Air Force?"
    "Both."
    "No, which?"
    "Both. I was in the Army Air Corps, before it was a separate arm. As they say."
    Joe Boyd mulled, pondering his own choice, fly or ride. The show was over: tanks crawled unstoppably forward in ranks; men marched; planes in vigilant formation soared above. When Joe Boyd too left the room, Pierce was alone with his