Track of the Cat - Walter Van Tilburg Clark by Clark Read Free Book Online

his shoulder and went in. The father’s oratorical thanks
rolled out through the open doorway.
    3
    Old Bridges sat in his place at the table, with
darkness still in the big window behind him. He scraped together the
last forkful of egg and potato on his plate and raised it and took it
into his mouth quickly, his head reaching for it like a turtle’s.
Then he laid the fork down and leaned back,
chewing, and tugged at the corners of his worn, brocaded vest, trying
to smooth it over his paunch, and looked across the table at the
mother. She was sitting with her head between her hands over a big,
leather-covered Bible. It was open to the gospel by Matthew, with the
words of Jesus printed in red, and she was reading slowly, shaping
each word silently with her lips. Her gray hair was still hanging
loose and she still had on the old gray bathrobe. The father’s pale
eyes, watering a little in the light and from the pleasure of his
meal,  examined her attentively, as if they hadn’t seen her
for a long time, and then his eyebrows rose slightly. They were
impressive brows, thick, black and peaked, and the lifting gave them
the appearance of leading independent lives on the big, sagging face,
which was otherwise dull and heavy. With the black brows still
raised, the old man smoothed first one wing and then the other of his
long, white moustache. Still the mother didn’t feel his attention,
but went on reading silently with her lips. The old man glanced
sideways at Arthur, but Arthur wasn’t paying any attention either.
He was sitting there, his chair drawn back from the table now,
whittling slowly on the wooden lion.
    The father looked back at the mother and cleared his
throat. It was a loud sound in the room where for some time there had
been only the fluttering of the fire, the slow ticking of the big
pendulum clock on the wall behind Arthur, and the faint chipping of
Arthur’s knife, but neither Arthur nor the mother looked up. The
old man cleared his throat again.
    Grace spoke in the north bedroom, near the door and
in a high, happy voice, so the words were quite distinct. "I
hope it snows for a week then."
    The father glanced at the door and changed his mind
about speaking. After a moment, he drew a cigar out of his upper vest
pocket and clipped the end off it with a little silver knife that
hung with a lodge emblem on his watch chain. He closed the knife,
returned it to his pocket, and lit the cigar. When it was drawing
well, he leaned back in his chair and blew a great cloud of smoke up
around the lamp.
    "Those young ladies are certainly taking their
time this morning," he said to the lamp.
    Neither Arthur nor the mother looked at him or said
anything.
    "But then," said the old man, genially, "I
suppose they must be hungry for women’s talk. Certainly Gwendolyn
must be, living month after month all alone in that family of sour
Welshmen."
    The mother took one hand from her forehead, and began
to follow the words with her finger as well as her mouth.
    "Though there’s little enough sociability to
be found in this house, for that matter," the father said more
loudly, staring across at her.
    The mother’s finger went on moving a word at a time
across the page.
    "Lettie," the father said.
    "Yes?" the mother asked, without looking
up.
    "If I might have another cup of coffee, please."
    "It’s on the stove," the mother said, and
her mouth moved silently again.
    Arthur laid the knife and the wooden lion on the
table and stood up.
    "For one who pretends to be a wife and a
housekeeper," the father began loudly.
    “ I’m getting it, Dad," Arthur said, and
picked up the old man’s coffee mug.
    The old man paid no attention to him, but kept
staring at the mother while his jowls grew red and began to tremble.
 
"Lettie, what’s got into you this
morning?" he demanded finally.
    The mother stopped her finger under a word, but
didn’t look up. " ‘What’s got into you?’ you’d better
ask."
    "And since when has it become a