The Book of Joby (68 page)

As Joby started toward the doorway, Laura said, “I’m glad you’re here, Joby. I . . . I’ve thought about you lots.”

“I’ve thought about you too.” Joby smiled. “Lots.”

Not withstanding the hundred-year storm that Christmas, it had been a mild winter, even by Taubolt’s standards, so no one was startled when spring came early, pouring into the air and earth like a sweet tonic of laughter and light. By mid-April, bare branches had vanished behind canopies of lime-colored leaves, and the emerald winter fields burst forth in brilliant flowers. Swallows returned to Taubolt’s eves, quail chicks tumbled through the grass behind their parents like little fur balls, and deer wandered boldly through yards in broad daylight with their fawns. The relentless north breezes, that always accompanied spring there, blew flurries of white and pink petals through the blossoming apple orchards up on the ridge and back in the valleys.

For Hawk, however, spring’s return was shadowed by a confusing tide of improved prospects and suppressed anxiety. There was his growing friendship with Joby, in which he was afraid to trust too deeply; his noticeable improvement at school, of which he was afraid to feel too proud; the increasingly frequent visits between Joby and his mother, in which he dared not place too much hope; and his deepening desire for Rose’s affection, which still seemed too unrealistic to pursue. He was swimming in good fortune, but felt disappointment circling in the murky depths beneath his dangling legs.

Restlessness had sent him out hiking that morning, up into the hills with no particular destination in mind, at least none that he was conscious of until he stepped out into the abandoned apple orchard and realized he’d come to Solomon’s house.

Hawk found himself sneaking through the orchard hedge, as if he might find the house reverted to the half-collapsed ruin it had been before. But, there it all was; the neat green lawn and border gardens, new paint, clean windows, wind chimes, and a cheerful stream of smoke rising from the chimney. If anything, it seemed eerily unchanged from his last visit.

He walked hesitantly to the back porch, and knocked softly on the screen
door. When no one answered, he moved to go, then heard the inner door scrap open behind him, and turned back to find Solomon smiling in the doorway.

“Hello, Hawk! Sorry it took me so long. I was upstairs.”

“Oh,” Hawk said.

“Lovely day, isn’t it? Out for another hike?”

Hawk nodded.

“Care to come in?”

“Okay.” When they were inside and seated by the fire, Hawk said, “I heard you been comin’ around town more.”

Solomon nodded. “I’m more inclined to socialize now that my house is finally in order, and the weather’s gotten so nice.”

“Mrs. Lindsay sure likes you,” Hawk said. “She’s always tellin’ Joby how charming you are.”

“I’m happy to hear I’ve made a good impression.” Solomon grinned. “She’s quite a good cook. I would not wish to be unwelcome at her table.”

Hawk ran out of small talk then and sat awkwardly, unable to find words for what he really wanted to say.

When the silence had begun to stretch, Solomon smiled and said, “Come up with any ideas yet about the end of Measure’s story?”

Hawk shook his head. “I wish you’d just tell me.”

“You’ll never learn to be a storyteller that way,” Solomon chided.

“You sound like Joby,” Hawk huffed. “He’s always sayin’ I’ll never write a book if I can’t spell this, or learn that.”

“Would you like to be a writer?” Solomon asked.

Hawk looked askance at Solomon. “You and Joby workin’ together?”

“Believe it or not, Hawk, you made quite an impression on me the day we met. I watched you listening to my story and saw something in your eyes I know quite well.”

“What?”

“A true love of stories. Not just the usual thirst for entertainment, but the kind of profound hunger that burns in the heart of a true storyteller.” He leaned forward and said, “I’m asking very seriously. Would you like to learn to be a storyteller?”

“What? Like you?”

“Like me.”

“I don’t even know what you do, exactly.”

“That’s what I would teach you.”

“Teach me?” Hawk asked. “To tell stories like yours?”

“Not just to tell them, Hawk—to
make
them.”

“I . . . I don’t know if I could.”

Solomon leaned forward intently. “Do you wish to?”

Hawk felt strangely afraid of accepting Solomon’s offer—and of letting it pass.

Solomon had been watching him keenly. Now he leaned back, looking thoughtful. “In fact, you impressed me so much the other day, I’ve written a story with you in mind.”

“A story about me?” Hawk asked incredulously.

“Inspired by you,” Solomon replied, “which may or may not amount to the same thing. You’d have to be the judge of that. Would you like to hear it?”

Hawk nodded, dying to know what kind of story it could be.

To Hawk’s surprise, Solomon did not get up and go looking for the text, but simply leaned forward and began to recite from memory:

“Gold of feather!

Fierce of eye!

Defiance in its hunter’s cry!

Clipped, its wings.

Baroque, its cage.

Deep, its grief and old, its rage.

Its master won it on a bet when it was just a fledgling chick. Thinking he’d acquired a pet, he clipped its wings and hung a stick for it to perch upon before his fawning friends and guests, and dream of aeries high and wild, swept clean of noisy pests.

Long it sat, and regal grew, and longed to soar but never flew. What kind of man acquires a hawk, to clip its wings so guests can gawk?

‘Magnificent!’ the tired refrain of flatterers who stopped to gaze, but couldn’t see the cold disdain with which the hawk returned their praise, nor notice how its talons clenched and gouged its polished perch, or feel their empty hearts laid bare by eyes God made to search.

But, oh, its master, he could tell. He saw the hawk’s pain all too well. And soon he found he couldn’t bear to meet the raptor’s regal stare.

‘Damn!’ the angry man would cry, ‘I wish to God I’d set it free! But now I dare not let it fly, for surely it would turn on me and have revenge for all the years I’ve kept it prisoner here. Why, I could never leave my house, and not look up in fear!

‘There you sit, and there must stay. My mistake, but you must pay. I fear you’ve grown too fierce to free. But then, you’ll live in luxury. I’ll guarantee you that at least. Come now! What other bird of prey need only sit and preen and feast?’

The hawk’s cold gaze said, ‘Go away.’

And deep inside its master’s gut, the grubs of conscience gnawed, and whispered that he’d ruined a creature made to fly by God.

In time the man would not go near the golden bird he’d once held dear. He didn’t want it spoken of, this thing he owned but couldn’t love. He bade his servants see that it got every kind of dainty fare in hopes it would accept its lot, and cease that cold accusing stare that fixed him now from in his mind, and haunted him in dreams, in which he fled in vain to hide from angry raptor screams.

But though he never saw the bird, it chaffed him raw to know that somewhere ’neath his roof, those eyes still glared their chill reproof, until, at last, a desperate man, knowing there would never be escape in any other plan, he told his servants, ‘Set it free.’ It had been a year and more since he had had it clipped, as no one would go near it now for fear of being ripped.

So, fearfully, they went to do the dreadful task, as ordered to, afraid that they themselves would be the ones it raked as it went free. But some while later back they came to say the cage was open wide, but that it seemed the bird was tame, for it just sat there, still inside. And none of them, for all they tried, could get the bird to leave. It didn’t seem to comprehend the concept of ‘reprieve.’

So!
he thought.
We set it free, but
here
is where it
wants
to be. I’ve been driven mad with guilt while it’s
enjoyed
the nest I built!

And suddenly, where guilt had burned, leapt flames of angry fire, which quickly turned remorse and shame to proud and spiteful ire. And off he stormed to where the cage sat open near the sill, forgetting how he once had feared the bird he went to kill.

Through the door, in righteous rage, the ‘master’ burst, to find the cage
open.
And the hawk inside, with one shrill cry and wings spread wide, flew forth with talons raised to rake the man who now cringed down in fear, and saw too late his great mistake. The hawk had waited for him here.

But though he lay there now, defenseless, no attack occurred. Though it could have savaged him, the mighty hawk demurred.

And when at last the ‘master’ dared to look and see why he had fared so
well against the hawk’s attack, he flinched to find it looking back from where it perched upon the sill, eyeing him with such disdain, that just the memory, even still, inflicts a wound of greater pain than any that its beak or talons might have tried to tear—a wound from which the man still finds no refuge anywhere.

Blazing, its eyes!

‘Coward,’ they said.

‘An earthbound bug that’s better dead.’

And then, with one defiant cry, the golden bird was in the sky.

‘Watch me sail the endless blue!’ screeched the soaring hawk on high. ‘I have sat the perch like you, but you will never learn to fly! I’d not stoop to tear the flesh of one who clipped my wings for fear!’

And then its ‘master’ wept for shame, and watched the proud hawk disappear.”

Solomon leaned back at last in silence.

Hawk sat amazed, still burning with the bird’s longing for freedom, still filled with its final, triumphant cry, wishing he too could fly free of every cage, every captor. “Am I the hawk?” he asked timidly.

“I’ve heard it said that in dreams, all the characters are you,” Solomon replied. “Poems have much in common with dreams, I think.”

“It all rhymed!” Hawk said, realizing that it had, in fact, been a poem. “How did you . . . I wish . . .”

“What do you wish?” Solomon pressed softly.

“I wish I could make something like that.”

Solomon smiled. “Then let me try to teach you.” He got up and left the room, but returned a moment later with a small roll of paper tied in ribbon, which he handed to Hawk. “Here’s a copy of your own. Take it home. Read it, and think about what you’d like to do.”

Hawk took the poem with a kind of reverence. “Can I show it to Joby?”

“By all means. I hope you will, in fact.” Solomon’s smile gave way to a sober expression. “I know you’ve been disappointed all too often, Hawk, but there comes a time to see the open cage and risk letting go of one’s long captivity. If I’m not mistaken, you’ll know what I mean.”

Hawk did know what he meant and so much wanted what Solomon seemed to promise that he could hardly face the fear it caused him. And in that moment, he saw that his fear of Joby, of success at school, of Rose, were all the same fear. Somehow, as if by magic, Solomon had answered the question Hawk had not known how to ask!

“So what do you think of him?” Mrs. Lindsay asked.

“Oh, Solomon’s the real item, all right,” Tom replied. “It’s odd Jake didn’t mention him sooner, though, don’t you think?”

“I think Solomon wanted some time to get his bearings.” Mrs. Lindsay smiled. “And Jake doesn’t say much unless there’s reason to.”

“Isn’t that the truth. He’s more tight-lipped than ever lately. Have you noticed?”

She nodded. “It’s a bit unnerving, with everything that’s happening.” She looked around as if to make sure they were unheard. “You know this spring I’ve had all kinds of guests who’d clearly planned to come here. It’s as if the border has vanished altogether.”