Agnes Mallory Read Free Page B

said.
    I smiled up into his rheumy eyes. ‘How are you, Grand-pa?’
    â€˜How am I?’ He beamed down at me. He gave a phlegmy laugh. ‘Listen to him. How am I? What a good boy. How should your old Grandpa be? He’s great. He’s never better. You’re a loving boy. You know that? Huh? So – what? You do well in school, Harry?’
    â€˜Uh … yeah. Pretty good, I guess.’
    â€˜Sure. Heh, heh. A smart boy this Harry. Eh, Michael?’
    My father had moved to the television and turned it off. He didn’t answer. I don’t think he’d heard. He was gazing at my grandfather across the dim room with a kind of vague, angry wonder. What was he thinking? He was thinking: An astronomer! That would be my guess. Because he remembered the old man as he used to be. Stolid and imposing; dark, brown, hairy arms pressing out of his plaid short sleeves; a head hewn out of stone, jagged and Moses-browed, the deep eyes glistering with wisdom and necessity. Sneering at him. An astronomer! Mr Big Shot, Mr Intellect. Who becomes an astronomer and makes a living? A lawyer. A lawyer can always study the stars. What does an astronomer know about the law?
    â€˜Very smart boy,’ Grandpa repeated. He pressed my head so close to his bathrobe that I saw the green fabric blur. He clamped his flaccid lips shut over a cough. He coughed harder and had to grab a handkerchief off the nearby stand with his free hand to wipe the spittle from his mouth. ‘Heh heh,’ he said, patting my shoulder. He noticed my jacket now. ‘Baseball. Uh? You play baseball, right?’
    â€˜Yeah. Uh huh.’ My smile was getting a tad painful about now, but I couldn’t smell him anymore and that was something.
    â€˜A regular Babe Ruth, right?’ he said. ‘A Lou – what’s his name? – Garnig? Gellig? He died, I don’t know. You hit a lot of home runs, Harry?’
    â€˜I’m okay.’
    â€˜What? Hanh?’
    â€˜I’M OKAY!’
    â€˜He’s okay. Sure you are. Heh heh. A good boy. A good boy.’
    He nodded for a while, his skull leaden, the string jerking it up and down. My father stood slumped by the TV set. Contemplating us, his hands in his pockets. Thinking: My life! Oh-ho, my life! Or words to that effect. Remembering a woman now. By way of submerging himself in this oceanic emotion of loss, remembering a woman he had loved, the only woman ever. He had driven her home one day from the Boardwalk in Atlantic City. He was twenty-two, just back from manning a desk through the War. He had talked to her about the stars, about how much he loved the stars. He had told her about his mother’s finger pointing out the pictures of them in A Boy’s Book Of The Constellations . The flesh tones of the naked Gemini, the scarlet skirt of Andromeda, the silver flash of Perseus’ sword – all gleaming in a Brooklyn of brownstones, in the heavy velvet atmosphere of their rooms above his father’s pawn shop.
    Grandpa noticed him now, standing there. ‘How are you, Michael?’ he whispered to him over my head.
    My father blinked. ‘Hm? Oh. Good. I’m good, Dad. I’m really …’
    â€˜What? What?’
    â€˜I’m really good!’ he shouted. ‘It looks like …’
    â€˜What?’
    â€˜Looks like I may have a chance to run for the Planning Board.’
    â€˜Eh? The Planning Board?’
    â€˜Yeah, I may be running for it!’ my father cried out.
    â€˜The Planning Board …’ Grandpa went on nodding, his head slowly dropping lower, lower. ‘The Planning Board. Work. Eh. You can’t always think about work all the time, Michael. Remember that, Harrela.’ He regarded me heavily, his chin nearly grazing the grizzled wedge of flesh above his robe. ‘Children. Children are the important thing. Remember that. Heh heh heh.’ He laughed breathlessly, giving me a little shake. He