The Death of Santini: The Story of a Father and His Son by Pat Conroy Read Free Book Online Page A

who had been intellectually murdered at birth. None of the Daufuskie kids or their parents were told that a white teacher was coming to the Mary Fields School that September. It had shocked the island when I stood waiting as the school bus pulled up on the first day. Later, some of the kids admitted they thought the school board might have sent a deranged Klansman to torment them and spy on their families. It was a job that would unsettle my life and cause me to take stock of my centrifugal attraction to storm and battle. I was an impulsive, combative young man lacking any skills for compromise and diplomacy.
    Because my wife, Barbara, would not consider raising her two young daughters on an isolated South Carolina island that housed witch doctors but no licensed MDs, and lacked paved roads, telephones, or a store of any kind, we had to buy a house in Beaufort.
    I owned a house before my parents did. Barbara and I purchased a two-story, many-columned, slightly run-down house on the “Point,”what Beaufort’s historic district is called. Because of the Marine Corps, I had grown up in house trailers and Quonset huts and Capehart housing from El Toro to Camp Lejeune. No one ever wanted to own a house more than I did. To me, our house was a mansion, even though it was built around the turn of the century and lacked the panache of the antebellum homes that flanked both sides of 403 Hancock Street. On the day we moved in, Barbara and I lifted wineglasses to each other as we sat on the second-story balcony hidden from the street by the feathery stutter of palmetto fronds shaken by a salt wind off the river. I felt like I had bought a palace for my wife, my children, and for me, and I still think that over forty years later.
    The following summer, my entire family came to Beaufort to stay with Barbara and me at our new house while waiting for their own house to be ready, not too far from mine. Dad had received orders for his second tour of Vietnam, and they were returning to the States after being stationed in Hawaii. My mother had rented a house on East Street, only three blocks away, but repairs on it would not be completed for three weeks. I could not wait for everyone to see the extraordinary house we had bought and begun to fix up. Famous among my friends for lacking the skills of a handyman, I had become somewhat sufficient in minor repair work and was astonished to realize my favorite store in town had become Fordham’s Hardware. My brothers and sisters had never seen me hold a tool in my hand, and I could not wait to hammer a nail for them. That my family was going to be staying with me pleased me beyond all reckoning. By buying this house, I had discovered that I had a gift for hospitality. Barbara and I loved inviting people to our home for rest and conversation, for good food and drink and safe harbor. When they arrived, my family was stunned by the house’s size and grandeur. I kissed my mother, and she whispered, “Careful, Pat. Your father’s on the warpath.” And of course, she was right.
    My father was leaving that July for his second tour of duty in South Vietnam, and he never had a meaner summer in his violent, disgraceful life. From the moment he entered my house, I thought Don Conroy and I would come to blows every time we passed each other in that spacious, wonderful home.
    “My, my, you must think you’re quite the Southern gentleman,” he said, the only time he referred to the house.
    He was on the prowl and dangerous, and my mother’s hatred of him was now an open wound between them. They could barely utter a civil word to each other except when Barbara was around. Then they would playact as though the Conroys were an upstanding family and not the American tragedy we insiders knew us to be. My mother’s beautiful face had a haunted, frantic look, and my father’s eyes were withering and cruel. In the family lore, the Conroy children will often try to select my father’s worst and most