Saint Maybe by Anne Tyler Read Free Book Online Page A

upstart.”
    Thomas tittered and went off for the Parcheesi board.
    While the two children were setting up the game on the rug, Ian phoned Cicely. “Hello?” she said, out of breath.
    “Hi,” he said. He shifted Daphne to his hip.
    “Oh, Ian. Hi.”
    “I’m over baby-sitting at Lucy’s. Just thought I’d let you know, in case you find yourself desperate for the sound of my voice or something.”
    “Baby-sitting! When will you be done?”
    “It shouldn’t take long. Lucy promised—”
    “I have to go,” Cicely broke in. “I’m following this recipe that says
Simmer covered, stirring constantly
. Can you figure that out? I mean, am I supposed to keep popping the cover off and popping it back on, or what? Do you suppose—”
    She hung up, perhaps still talking. Ian sat down on the rug and settled Daphne on his knee.
    It was true he liked all games, but Thomas and Agatha were not very challenging opponents. They employed a strategy of avoidance, fearfully clinging to thesafety squares and deliberating whole minutes before venturing into open territory. Also, Thomas couldn’t add. Each toss of the dice remained two separate numbers, laboriously counted out one by one. “A two and a four. One, two. One, two, three—”
    “Six,” Ian said impatiently. He scooped up the dice and flung them so they skittered across the board. “Eight,” he said. “Ha!” Eight was what he needed to capture Agatha’s man.
    “No fair,” she told him. “One douse went on the carpet.”
    “Die,” he said.
    Her jaw dropped.
    “One
die
went on the carpet,” he said. He picked up his own man.
    “No fair if they don’t land on the board!” she said. “You have to take your turn over.”
    “I should worry, I should care, only babies cry no fair,” Ian singsonged. He pounded his man down the board triumphantly. “Five, six, seven—”
    The phone rang.
    “—eight,” he said, nudging aside Agatha’s man. He hoisted Daphne to his shoulder and reached up for the phone on the plastic cube table. “Hello?”
    “Ian?”
    “Hi, Cicely.”
    “On your way over, could you pick up some butter? My white sauce didn’t thicken and I had to throw it out and start again, and now I don’t have enough butter for the rolls.”
    “Sure thing,” Ian said. “So how’s our friend Stevie?”
    “Stevie?”
    “Is he getting ready for bed yet?”
    “Not
now
, it’s a quarter past seven.”
    “Oh. Right.”
    “Oops!” she said.
    She hung up.
    Ian hoped she wasn’t losing sight of the important issues here. White sauce, rolls, what did he care? He just wanted to get that brother of hers out of the picture.
    Daphne breathed damply into his left ear. He boosted her higher on his shoulder and turned back to the game.
    They finished Parcheesi and started Old Maid. Old Maid was sort of pointless, though, because Thomas couldn’t bluff. He had that sallow kind of skin that reveals every emotion; whenever he grew anxious, bruiselike shadows deepened beneath his eyes.
    The game went on forever and Daphne started fussing. “She wants her bottle,” Agatha said, not lifting her gaze from her cards. Ian went out to the kitchen to take her bottle from the refrigerator, and while he waited for it to warm he jounced Daphne up and down. It didn’t do any good, though; he seemed to have lost his charm. All she did was fuss harder and climb higher on his shoulder, working her nosy, sharp little toes irritatingly between his ribs.
    When he returned to the living room, the other two had abandoned the card game and were watching TV. He sat between them on the couch and fed Daphne while a barefoot woman sang a folk song about hammering in railroad ties. Thomas sucked his thumb. Agatha wound a strand of hair around her index finger. Daphne fell asleep halfway through her bottle and Ian rose cautiously and carried her to her crib.
    At 8:15, he started getting angry. How was he supposed to make it to Cicely’s by 8:30? Also he had to stop off at