Natural Enemy Page 9

  Virginia grimaced with horror. “Oh, that’s terrible. It’s so appalling that the world should have been made that way.” She clenched her fists. “But if it’s as rotten as that, you have to know it. I mean, some of it is so beautiful —,” Virginia waved her hand at the maple tree in front of the house, a towering volume of ten thousand fresh green leaves, “— you forget that life on earth is founded on this rapacity, this nightmare.”

  She was really upset. John was astonished. “But don’t you think they’re amazing?” he said. “Spiders, I mean? They do such amazing things. They’re so complicated, and the things they do by instinct are so — well, just so fascinating.”

  “Listen,” said Virginia, frowning, staring fiercely at a ragged dishcloth hanging beside her on the laundry line, “I’ve thought about this before, and there’s a way out. You can believe in progress.”

  “Progress? I thought nobody believed in progress any more. Just — you know — in the old days. People like Ralph Waldo Emerson maybe, but nobody anymore, right?”

  “No, no.” Virginia shook her head. “I don’t mean scientific and industrial progress. I mean, people can be better than animals. Or they could learn to be, someday. Little by little. At least they’re not all cannibals, like your spider. Oh, I know what you’re going to say. We still have wars, worse than ever before, and nuclear bombs and mass murderers. We’re not even as good as Socrates, twenty-five hundred years ago. Well, I’m not saying I agree with my idea of progress. But at least it’s a logical way out.”

  “After all,” said John cheerfully, “everybody isn’t a mass murderer, right? Some people are okay.”

  Virginia’s solemnity collapsed. She laughed. “Some people are okay! Oh, that’s right. You, for instance. You, standing there looking at your spider, you almost balance out its horribleness. Really, I mean it, you really do.”

  “Well, but spiders aren’t all bad. Look, there’s something really interesting about this one.” John pointed out the place where the barn spider had lost a leg. “It will grow back. If people could replace lost limbs like that, it would be really useful.”

  “What are you two staring at?”

  It was Buddy, coming out on the porch, carrying his Winchester shotgun jauntily under one arm.

  Virginia looked at the shotgun. “What are you going to do with that thing?”

  “Oh, I’m an old sharpshooter from way back. There’s a lot of things running around in the woods, good to eat, just going to waste.”

  “Oh, you wouldn’t.” Virginia was scandalized.

  “Sure I would. And besides, every household needs some kind of protection. You know, some kind of old musket hanging on the wall. A shotgun in the closet. You never know when some madman might show up, some nut from Walden Pond.” Buddy slapped the barrel of his gun. “Say,” he said, looking up at the spiderweb, “isn’t that cute? A nice little cobweb all covered with dew.” With a casual sweep of his gun barrel, Buddy brushed it away.

  Virginia was shocked. She dropped to her knees, looking for the spider. “Buddy, you clumsy ox, what did you do that for?”

  “Well, what the hell?” said Buddy. “I’m sorry.”

  “The spider’s all right.” John pointed upward. “She’s okay. See? She’s still there.”

  Virginia stood up and looked at the spider crawling across the ceiling. “Can she make another web?”

  “Oh, sure. Every day, if she wants to. It only takes her an hour or so. I’ve watched them lots of times. I’ve got some web frames in my room. My Nuctenea sclopetarias make new webs every couple of days. Say —,” John looked eagerly at Virginia, “— would you like to see my collection?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Virginia, “I would.”

  Buddy hadn’t been invited, but he followed them up the narrow stairway. He had no intention of leaving them alone in John’s room by themselves. In spite of himself, Buddy was irritated at the way John kept winning brownie points with Virginia. And wouldn’t you know, in John’s room she was just fascinated with everything. She oohed and aahed at the spiderwebs in the wooden boxes and watched John dump a couple of spiders out of his jars and hold them in his hand. Now she was watching reverently as he pulled a box out from under his bed and opened the top.

  “What’s that smell?” said Buddy, wrinkling his nose.

  “Bran,” said John. “I raise mealworms in this box of bran. Spider fodder. The spiders like them and they’re easy to keep. Mealworms take care of themselves. They eat the bran, grow up into beetles, mate and lay eggs, and the eggs hatch and produce more mealworms, and then they pupate and change into beetles. They just go on and on, without any help from me.”

  “I see.” Virginia smiled. “To the mealworms that box is the whole universe, right? Do they think it’s a miracle when light floods in and one of them gets snatched to glory?”

  “Well, what would you think,” babbled John, “if there was a big crack in the sky right now and a gigantic beetle reached out his colossal claw —”

  Buddy felt pushed aside, ignored. He could feel Virginia’s respect for John mounting, filling the small room, pressing against the cracked ceiling and the rickety windows — all for a bunch of spiders, a creepy hobby for a stupid kid. It wasn’t fair. Buddy himself was really doing big things for Virginia, knocking himself out, solving every problem as it reared its head, setting great forces into motion, big things, really big. And yet they didn’t count for anything, next to a bunch of fucking bugs in this little bastard’s room.

  Angrily Buddy picked up a catalogue and looked through it, not seeing the pages as they flipped past his thumb. The trouble was, John wasn’t really such a little kid. He might look like one, but he was — what? — sixteen, seventeen? Old enough to be gone on Virginia. You could smell it, sickly sweet in the room, like the stink of that filthy stuff in the box. But the real question was what Virginia thought of John. Was he just a cute little kid, or was he a budding entomologist and fucking big future Ph.D.? Oh God, how could you tell with Virginia?

  Sullenly Buddy stared at the pamphlet in his hand. It was a catalogue of insects you could order from some place in Georgia.

  Terrestrial isopods. Wood lice,

  said the catalogue.

  L624: pi sow bugs. Field-collected.

  Per 12 … $2.50; 100 … $17.50.

  Imagine paying seventeen-fifty for a bunch of wood lice! Buddy’s eyes drifted down the page.

  Latrodectus mactans. Black widow spider. Poisonous.

  Females only. Live delivery not guaranteed.

  Each … $7.50.

  Seven-fifty for a black widow spider? Now that was more like it. Cheap at twice the price.

  Seventeen

  THE RABBITS HAD EATEN MOST OF BARBARA’S BEANS. BARBARA and Virginia and John looked at the devastation. “You know what I could do,” said John, “I could build a chicken-wire fence. Bury it deep against woodchucks. Did you know there’s a wood-chuck hole over there? Huge, really enormous.”

  “Oh, I don’t care about the woodchucks, or the rabbits either,” said Barbara. “What really bothers me is the birds. They’re just waiting to come down and grab all the raspberries.”

  “I can fix that too,” said John. “I’ll just mow the lawn first. Then I’ll show you.”

  With the little electric lawnmower John buzzed around the perimeter of the sunken garden and whizzed back and forth across the flat lawn in front of the house. Then he gathered up a basket of grass clippings and emptied it on the floor of his room. He took a shirt and a pair of old pants out of his closet and stuffed them with the clippings. There was a dusty tennis racquet cover in a box in the loft and a beekeeper’s veiled hat hanging on a hook in the laundry. John stuffed the tennis racquet cover with newspapers, fastened the whole thing together with safety pins, crowned it with the beekeeper’s hat, hung it on a stick, and brought it down to the vegetable garden. Virginia clapped her hands and ran off to the attic for a lacy shawl and some plastic roses.

  “It’
s a transvestite scarecrow,” she said, laughing, pinning the roses to the hat, standing back to watch the shawl lift and billow in the breeze.

  “I could give it some motorized arms,” suggested John brightly. “They’d really whirl around.”

  “Never mind,” said Barbara, who didn’t believe in the scarecrow. “Let it alone. At least it looks nice.” She turned her head. “What’s that? All that shouting?”

  The three of them ran up the hill to find Buddy’s tenant at the door of the house, yelling at Buddy. Buddy turned to them with a smile of amused innocence and shrugged his shoulders helplessly. John looked with sympathy at the tenant. The poor man was out of luck. He had signed no legal documents. He had no lease, no way of fighting back against the arrogant whim of his landlord. He was stalking away in a rage.

  A few days later John saw the tenant’s car bumping down the driveway. It was packed with wife, children, baby, au pair girl, dogs, cats, suitcases, bassinet, playpen, and a large green parrot in a cage. The evicted father of the family leaned out of the driver’s seat and shook his fist at John. The dogs barked. The parrot squawked.

  “Don’t look at me,” murmured John. “It’s not my fault.”

  No sooner were the old occupants out of Buddy’s house than the new ones were in. Up the driveway lurched the cars of the friends and supporters of ex-Governor Howard Croney, and Croney’s own Lincoln Continental, hired for the duration, and the big red-white-and-blue campaign vans with loudspeakers and huge signs mounted on top — RE-ELECT CRONEY, EXPERIENCE COUNTS.

  One day a small yellow car pulled into the driveway and stopped behind Virginia as she was filling a watering can at the faucet under the kitchen window. Virginia didn’t hear the car. She was paying close attention to the change in pitch of the pouring water. As the echoing chamber in the watering can grew smaller, the musical splash tinkled higher and higher. When the driver of the car got out and slammed the door, Virginia looked up in surprise.

  “Would you be so good as to tell me where those idiots are swarming?” said Madeline Croney. “I know it’s around here somewhere.”

  Virginia recognized the ex-Governor’s wife. Feeling a gush of sympathy, she smiled and directed her up the hill.

  Croney himself stopped at the house the next day and beamed at John. “Hello, son. Isn’t this a lovely home you’ve got here! I’ve come for Mr. Whipple. And of course I’d be pleased to meet your parents, shake their hand.”

  So Buddy was busier than ever. He was away and up the hill, then down again, brimming at the supper table with political savvy and inside talk. Croney had made him campaign coordinator for the western suburbs of Boston. “He wants me to call him Howie,” said Buddy proudly.

  “Listen here, Buddy,” said Barbara, “why don’t you live up there now? I should think you’d be a lot more comfortable in your own bed.”

  “Oh, no,” said Buddy. “I wouldn’t want to leave you people alone. And, say, that reminds me. I’ve got to go to the town hall and talk to William Warren about the things we’re planning to do down here. You know, for our new agricultural status. Hey, something occurred to me the other day. We could call your trees a woodlot.”

  “The trees?” said Barbara. “The copper beech trees? The white pines?”

  “Well, you know, you just call it timber, and you get a different assessment. It doesn’t mean you have to cut them down. And there’s the orchard down there. Sooner or later you could clear out the jungle and prune the trees.”

  “I like that jungle the way it is now,” said Virginia stubbornly.

  “How about the pond?” said Barbara dryly. “Why don’t you stock it with fish and have a fish farm?”

  “Not a bad idea,” said Buddy, grinning.

  “Now, look here, Buddy,” said Barbara. “I won’t have you lying to William on our behalf.”

  “Of course not,” said Buddy. “Tell you what. Why don’t we go see him together? You tell him about your place. I’ll tell him about mine.”

  “Good,” said Barbara grimly.

  Buddy went to bed, pleased with his progress on all fronts. It was just a matter of knowing how to do things, of reaching forward to arrange the shape of things. You had to think ahead. Not like most people, who just lay flat on their backs and let the future roll right over them. His own mind was always darting in front of him, exploring his options, examining possible actions, comparing them with each other, thinking about it and thinking about it, until the right one seemed to shine in a shaft of light. And then there were always a lot of steps to be taken first, and sometimes sudden opportunities opened up in front of you when you least expected them, and you could always tell when you were on the right track, because the rewards would begin to pour in, and the congratulations. But sometimes there was only the secret knowledge that things were working out. Like that letter this morning, from Dolores Leech. Without even knowing it, Dolores was playing her part in the unrolling of Buddy’s brilliant future.

  Dear Buddy,

  Good Lord, you couldn’t have been more right. Mrs. Bewley is living in a pig sty. Well, a chicken sty actually. Chicken fecal matter is all over the floor, and I’ll bet she has poultry mites in her hair. The house is falling down around her ears. Her physical health seems to be good, except for her hearing problem, but of course her mental condition is deteriorating. I understand from my cousin on the police force that she is also a repeated minor offender.

  I think she should be in a nursing home, one like Ferndale Manor in Waltham. I suppose she would have to be kept in Total Care, because of the kleptomania. Think of those sticky fingers of hers among all those old ladies with their prize doilies and needlepoint pillows and bric-a-brac and so on, all crowded into their little rooms! Total Care means a lock on the door, but there would be daily excursions to the sun-porch, the dining room, the TV den and so on, with an aide in constant attendance. She would be a trial to the staff, but I see no other solution.

  I cannot allow a human being to continue to exist in such appalling conditions.

  Yours,

  Dolores Leech, RN

  Plumbing still gurgling merrily! Garage still functioning! Thanks to you, Buddy, dear!

  Eighteen

  BARBARA WAS EARLY FOR HER APPOINTMENT WITH WILLIAM Warren at the town hall. At the last minute she had persuaded John to come with her. John and Barbara found Amelia Farhang in the lobby of the town hall, working on one of her more ambitious flower arrangements, setting it up on a table between the information booth and the water fountain.

  Amelia was eager to explain to Barbara the philosophical foundation of her composition. Jamming a flower into a hole in her piece of driftwood, she talked breezily over her shoulder. “You see, Barbara, this tall overarching delphinium stands for heaven. And this little blade of pampas grass symbolizes man. This horizontal cattail — drat, it won’t stay flat — represents the earth. Do you see? Universal elemental principles in the language of the flowers.” Mrs. Farhang stuck a wad of clay like a piece of chewed bubblegum to the driftwood, attempting to rigidify, sustain, and undergird the earth.

  “Where’s Mr. Warren’s office?” said John.

  “Down the hall,” said Barbara. “I told Buddy I’d meet him here. We’d better wait.”

  “He’s here already,” said John. “Hear him behind that door? That’s Buddy.”

  “So it is,” said Barbara. From the next room they could hear Buddy’s hearty laugh breaking out over the confused rumble of talk. A loud voice proclaimed, “Going once, going twice.”

  “Sounds like an auction,” said John. “What do they auction off in the Lincoln town hall?”

  “Only one thing, I guess,” said Barbara curtly. “Real estate. For default of taxes or something, I suppose.”

  The door was opening. Mrs. Barker, the town clerk, came out with one of the selectmen, then Buddy Whipple with the town treasurer, George Shipley. George was clapping Buddy on the back, congratulating him on his successful bid. “Although I must say, Bud
dy, I don’t know what the hell you want that piece of land for. Even the Conservation Commission couldn’t see any point in adding it to their collection. Wouldn’t join up with anything they’ve got anyplace else. And too skinny for much of anything except maybe a right of way. And who’d want a right of way to a swamp? Well, I’m glad it’s off our hands, anyhow. Say, Buddy, listen here, we’re going to have another piece coming up shortly. Taxes haven’t been paid in twenty years. We’ve lost touch with the owner entirely. Another damned useless little piece only a few hundred feet from side to side. Are you interested?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” said Buddy. “I might be. Where is it?”

  “Out Tower Road, near Route 117. Little swampy piece.”

  “Well, no, I guess not. No, not really.”

  “But the one you just bid on is mostly swamp too, right? What did you take that one for, if you don’t want the next one?”

  Buddy laughed. He caught sight of Barbara and John and gave them a big wave. “Oh, I don’t know. How many swamps do I want to get bogged down in anyway? What do you say, John? You want a swamp cheap?”

  “No, thanks.” John smiled feebly and shook his head.

  “Well, hello there.” Someone else had emerged from the auction room and was greeting Barbara. A sharp-faced woman with a complicated hairdo waved her pocketbook. “Remember me? Dorothy Gardenside? I got it back. My bag. I called up the police department, and next day they returned it safe and sound without a word of explanation. Well, then, how are you, dear? Have you girls made any decision about staying on in the old family homestead? I’ve got some really scrumptious apartments, some fabulous condominiums. Just call me any time. I’d really adore to show you around.”

  Barbara shook her head, not trusting herself to speak, and Dotty Gardenside drifted away to gush over Mrs. Farhang’s flowers.