"Oates, Joyce Carol - We Were the Mulvaneys" - читать интересную книгу автора (Oates Joyce Carol)

Marianne had taken a much-wadded tissue out of her purse and was wiping her nose with it surreptitiously. Cormne restrained herself from saying, in her practiced-mom's way, take a fresh Kleenex out of my purse, please. Instead she looked at Marianne with a smiling frown, not wanting to appear anxious. All this while she'd been chattering, had Marianne even listened?

"Honey? Please? Look at me-what is it? Are you sick? Is it the-flu?" She paused, hopeful. How her mind was set to run, run with this new, plausible notion. "Some new strain of flu has been going around town, I guess. Plus strep throat. Strep throat is dangerous. Shall we take you to see Dr. Oakley?"

Dr. Oakley was the Mulvaneys' family doctor, a gentlemanly old G.P. they'd been seeing forever. Just the thought of Dr. Oakley was a solace-wasn't it?

Marianne murmured quickly, "Mom, no."

"But if you're not feeling well, honey? You certainly don't look well. I mean-you don't look like yourself."

"I don't want to see Dr. Oakley."

"But-" Corinne felt as if she were sinking, drowning, "-what's wrong?"

Marianne shook her head with surprising stubbornness, swiping at her nose with the wadded tissue. "I-I just don't feel like being in school right now."

But that isn't like you. I know my Marianne and that isn't like her. Instead Corinne said, "But to behave so secretively, hiding away in a Catholic church of all places!" The attempt at a joke fell dismally flat. "Well. I think we're going to see Dr. Oakley before we go home. I think that's best."

"Mom, no. Please." A look of panic registered in Marianne's sallow face. "I just-I just want to go home, Mom. I'll be all right if- I can just go home."

"You're sure?" Corinne said doubtfully.

"Yes, Mom. Oh yes."

Corinne's mind ran with this new thought: bringing her daughter home to make her well again. Was it that simple?

She drove, nervously humnung to herself. Possibly she wasn't aware of humming to herself. Or of repeatedly touching her chin, her nose. Her nose itched' The sky overhead was a harsh deep blue tracked with filmy clouds like cobwebs: reminded her of a Certain corner of the antique barn, back behind stacks of furniture she hadn't been able to reach, to clear of cobwebs, in a long time. The sun was bright but seemed to give no warmth. Over the radio came one of those earnest-sadistic announcements of "bitter cold" impending- wind from the northeast out of Canada, expected low minus twelve degrees Fahrenheit and a wind-chill factor of minus twenty-five. But how cozy the Mulvaneys would be, at High Point Farm. Dad could make a fire in the big fieldstone fireplace in the living room, Marianne could curl up on the sofa with a book, Muffin in her lap, Troy stretched on the floor in front of the sofa. But no: if Marianne really had flu, she had better stay upstairs in her room. Warm as toast in her flannel nightgown in her pretty white-rattan bed beneath the hand-knit quilt Corinne had found in a Chautauqua Falls secondhand shop. Such beautiful, fine work! A rag-quilt of dozens of squares, rectangles and oblongs, a rainbow of colors. Just because it badly needed dry cleaning, no one had cared to buy it, probably hadn't even exanuned it carefully until sharp-eyed Corinne Mulvaney came along. She would always recall Marianne's surprise and pleasure opening the present, for her thirteenth birthday: Oh Mom! It's so beautiful! Oh thanks! And a hug and a kiss for Mom, and a sly-teasing query, Did you sew it yourself, Mom?-so all the family laughed, including Mom.

That was a lovely memory. A memory to be treasured.

Yes, Marianne would doze up in her room, and Muffin beside her. Corinne would bring her hot soup (chicken-corn chowder?- so rich, so delicious) and buttery baked rolls and a tall glass of milk. Marianne no longer drank milk, no longer ingested enough calcium, Corinne was sure. That might be part of the problem. Vitamin deficiency. Obviously the girl had allowed herself to become exhausted, pushed herself too hard. Those school activities! The cheerleading alone was terribly time-consuming. (Corinne's mind was working rapidly now, constructing a narrative, an anecdote. She'd be on the phone telling her women friends for days.) Oh and you know what teenaged girls are like-dieting continuously. So self-conscious, such emphasis upon being thin. Marianne had never been thin as a young girl, but entirely normal according to the weight charts. So she'd allowed herself to become run-down, her resistance weakened. So she'd caught this flu that's making the rounds. And the excitement over being elected to the Valentine's Day prom court-the only nonsenior to be elected. You know what high school celebrity can be-exhausting!

Why hadn't I seen the signs, have I been blind? Am I blind?

And this Weidman boy, what was his first name, an awkward, well-intentioned and stiffly courteous boy, who'd written that pathetic but somehow pushy, aggressive letter to Marianne-was he possibly in love with her? Exerting pressure on her emotionally? Marianne was not the type to speak of such things, she'd worry she was betraying the boy's confidence. But if the boy was pursuing her, so much more doggedly than other boys had pursued her, Marianne would be terribly distressed. Nothing worried her more than the possibility she'd hurt someone's feelings. But why didn't Patrick seem to know about any of these things?

Corinne depended upon her second-oldest child to inform her of "situations." He'd long been her ally, in his prickly way. A kind of miniature adult as he'd grown up, surrounded by children and childish behavior. (Yes, Dad and Morn frequently behaved childishly. That was a fact.) Corinne wondered if in all families of a certain size and heft there are those who, regardless of age, know; and those who carry on obliviously, happily, because they don't know. The blissful well-being of the latter depends upon the complicity of the former--but what if the complicity breaks down?

Corinne was leaving Mt. Ephraim, picking up speed. This familjar reassuring route. Like a horse knowing its way home. Past the Eastgate Shopping Center (where Corinne had intended to shop, at Kinart and T-J's, no time for that now) and the fast-food restaurants, gas stations, car wash. (Oh, she'd promised the family she would have the Buick washed, hadn't she. Well-another tune.) There was Spohr's, Hendrick Motors, Harvey's Fence City. Country Club Lane and Hillside Estates-expensive houses looking like cardboard in their snowy nearly treeless lots. In the front yard of a rundown old Victorian farmhouse once owned by friends of the Mulvaneys, now rented by strangers, was a red Olds Cutlass sedan FOR SALE!

BARGAIN! resembling an older beat-up model of the very car Mike Jr. had bought, and was making exorbitant payments on each month, to his dad's disgust. Thank God Route 119 was reasonably dry and clear, they'd be home soon. Out here, you could breathe! Snowy fields stretching away for miles like the tundra, stubbled with broken cornstalks. You never outgrow the landscape of your childhood, Corinne supposed. What's oldest in your memory you love best, cherish. She hoped she and Michael had provided their children with a landscape that would accompany them all their lives. A solace, a comfort.

If in fact they actually left the Chautauqua Valley. But why? Why would they ever leave?

Corinne was about to ask Marianne what sort of soup she'd like when they got home, there was chicken-corn chowder left over in the refrigerator, always more delicious the second time, how's about that?-turning to Marianne with a smile, but seeing the girl's face registering horror. What? What was wrong? Corinne was confusedly aware of something dashing in front of the station wagon at the crest of a hill-a gray-funy shape blurred with speed-and before Corinne could think to brake the vehicle's front wheels ran over it with a thud-and beside her Marianne began to scream, and scream.

THE LOVERS

They'd met in the summer of 1952, at Schroon Lake in the Adirondacks. Corinne was waitressing at a resort hotel, Michael had summer employment with a local construction crew. It had not been love at first sight except as each would insist afterward. Perhaps Corinne was telling the truth-she'd flushed and stammered in Michael Mulvaney's presence when they were first introduced. My God, of course I knew! How could I not know! Michael would recall and retell with zest, how many times, how he'd first laid eyes on his wife-to-be in a loose, giggly group of girls, summer employees at Schroon Lake including the girl with whom he'd been "involved" at the time. (Michael Mulvaney's second "involvement" of the summer, in fact-and the season had scarcely begun by July 1.) Hey sure I knew! One look, even with that hair of hers, I knew.