The Laughing Matter Read Free

dropped in this silver bowl over the fireplace. They
were
red, I think.
Very
red, I mean, not the color they are now.” He walked to the kitchen. “Do you want to smell them, Mama?”
    The woman looked at the roses.
    â€œI’m going to cry,” she said.
    â€œYou’re
not!”
    â€œI am!”
    She went to the piano in the parlor, sat on the bench,and wept, the boy following her and watching her face, the girl standing beside the boy, the man getting up from his chair.
    â€œYou’re not
crying
, are you, Mama?” Red said. “Mama’s not crying, is she, Papa?”
    The boy put his arms around his mother and said, “Mama, for God’s sake, you’re not crying, are you?”
    The little girl put her arms around her brother. “Mama,” she said, “don’t cry. What’s she crying for, Red?”
    â€œWhat’s the matter, Swan?” the man said.
    â€œI can’t look at beautiful things ended, that’s all,” the woman said. “The sight of them scares me to death.”
    â€œCome on, Swan,” the man laughed.
    â€œI want figs off a tree,” the woman said, “the way it was this afternoon. I want everything that way. Forever.”
    â€œForever?” Red said. “What’s she mean?”
    â€œAh, Swan,” the man laughed. “Cut it out, will you?”
    â€œNo,” the woman wept.
    The man put his arms around the three of them.
    The woman stopped weeping and began to laugh suddenly, hugging and kissing everybody.
    â€œMy kids,” she laughed. “My man, and my kids.”
    She was up quickly and back to the kitchen, as if nothing had happened. What did his mother mean? Why did she cry, and then laugh and kiss everybody? He took the roses back to the silver bowl on the mantel over the fireplace and put them back in it. Then, standing on the chair, he looked at his father, who was standing at the open front door, looking out.
    â€œPapa?”
    â€œYes, Red.”
    â€œWhy did Mama cry?”
    â€œI don’t know. Swan,” he called suddenly, “I’m going for a walk.”
    She came running out of the kitchen.
    â€œWait for me!”
    â€œSure, Swan.”
    â€œThe hell with the fudge,” she said. “Who wants fudge, anyway? I don’t know why I start things like fudge in the first place. Where’ll we walk?”
    â€œHow about town?”
    â€œReally?”
    â€œTo the depot and back?”
    â€œTaxi back?”
    â€œSure.”

Chapter 4
    Most of the way on the walk to town Evan carried the little girl. When they reached the lights of the town, though, she got down to find out what it was all about. There was a difference here that she couldn’t account for, until at last she noticed the sky, as if it were a burst of fireworks.
    â€œI’m going to grab them,” she said. “I’m going to grab the stars.”
    â€œEvan?” the woman said. “Look at that sky. Look at the stars in that sky.”
    â€œYes.”
    The four of them were looking straight up at the stars when a woman with three girls came blinking out of a movie and, speaking with laughter in her voice, said, “I’m May Walz.”
    Red and Eva turned away from the stars to look at the three girls. The five of them were soon at work at a game of skipping on the sidewalk while May and Swan talked, and Evan listened. Then the woman, heavy and hearty, asked her daughters to latch onto her, which they instantly did, all of them holding hands.
    â€œCome on over,” Swan said.
    â€œWon’t it be too late?”
    â€œNo. Come on over and we’ll sit on the porch and talk.”
    May Walz and her daughters went along.
    â€œThey were
all
girls,” Eva said. “Where’s their boys?”
    â€œThe father didn’t want to go to the movie,” the woman said. “He stayed home.”
    â€œWhere’s