Read Online All the Little Live Things by Wallace Stegner - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Wallace Stegner
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cry over the death of a pest.
So I don’t answer her at once. I merely kick the gopher back into the hole and scrape dirt over him. Catarrh would eat him happily enough, but we prefer Catarrh to eat canned cat food. Ruth is whispering in her imperturbable voice, “Joe, these are the Catlins, they’ve bought the Thomas place.”
“Allston,” I say. “White hunter.”
“It’s not hahd to believe it,” Catlin says in a down-Maine voice. He is a healthy crewcut, the kind that every now and then reminds you how virile New England still is. He looks bright, and he knows the uses of a smile. But his charming wife is another matter. She is going to have an answer to why I go around murdering harmless little beasts. She says to me breathlessly, “Why did you have to go shoot it?”
“Because he was eating my tomato plants.”
“That’s like hanging someone for stealing a loaf of bread.”
“Today my tomatoes,” I say. “Tomorrow my wife’s daffodils—no, that’s one thing he won’t eat. Tomorrow the tuberous begonias, next day the agapanthus, following that the flowering quince. Pretty soon desert, nothing but poison oak and coyote brush again.”
“I should think you’d have a nice natural garden where things are in balance and you don’t have to kill anything. Is it fair to plant a lot of plants that were never intended to grow here, and then blame the gophers for liking them?”
She is laying it down, she really believes in this. But at the same time she has a serene, promising, transparent look as if, just as soon as this little cloud passes, she will bloom out again in sun. I say to her, and I am being neither scornful nor contentious, “You like little live things.”
“You have no idea how accurate you are,” her husband says. “I’ve given up fishing because she can’t bear to think of the worms.”
“Well,” she says, “how would you like an old hook clear through you lengthways?”
There seems no answer to that one. I suggest that we repair to the terrace and have a drink and I will introduce them to some birds who are also fond of worms. As we walk through the kitchen patio, young Catlin says, half joking, half fond, the way he might speak to a kid sister he adored, “All right, get it over. Tell’m about your foxes.”
“Laugh!” she says. “But you didn’t see them!” Almost as if dancing, she swings from Ruth to me, back to Ruth. “Did you know we had foxes?”
I am tempted to tell her about the fox with the strangulated hemorrhoids, but she is a little new for that. I say only, “We’ve seen a few on the road at night.”
“I saw two,” she says. “Last night. Honestly, I never had such a nice thing happen to me. I’d just put Debby to bed and was sitting by the window resting and wondering what sort of drapes to get, and there was this little scratching noise, and a fox came right up on the slab outside. He wasn’t five feet from me, on the other side of the glass, with the light shining on him. I guess he couldn’t see me because of it, or maybe he thought I belonged. I hope he thought I belonged, because he was the cleanest, sleekest, loveliest thing....”
I suspect that I have much the same feeling, watching her, that she had watching the fox. I feel that I should move quietly, if at all. I find myself preposterously holding my breath. Then she sees us all intent on her, and her cheeks get pink. She flops into a patio chair with one foot under her, and laughs, flashing her eyes upward in an amused, challenging way.
“I don’t care, he was beautiful. He looked right at me through the window like somebody shopping, and then he whined, I could hear him, and right away here came another one just as beautiful as he was. And you know what? They were in love. They kept nuzzling one another, and whining, and peeking in the window as if they thought it might make a good den inside if they could only find a way in. They must have been there three or four
So I don’t answer her at once. I merely kick the gopher back into the hole and scrape dirt over him. Catarrh would eat him happily enough, but we prefer Catarrh to eat canned cat food. Ruth is whispering in her imperturbable voice, “Joe, these are the Catlins, they’ve bought the Thomas place.”
“Allston,” I say. “White hunter.”
“It’s not hahd to believe it,” Catlin says in a down-Maine voice. He is a healthy crewcut, the kind that every now and then reminds you how virile New England still is. He looks bright, and he knows the uses of a smile. But his charming wife is another matter. She is going to have an answer to why I go around murdering harmless little beasts. She says to me breathlessly, “Why did you have to go shoot it?”
“Because he was eating my tomato plants.”
“That’s like hanging someone for stealing a loaf of bread.”
“Today my tomatoes,” I say. “Tomorrow my wife’s daffodils—no, that’s one thing he won’t eat. Tomorrow the tuberous begonias, next day the agapanthus, following that the flowering quince. Pretty soon desert, nothing but poison oak and coyote brush again.”
“I should think you’d have a nice natural garden where things are in balance and you don’t have to kill anything. Is it fair to plant a lot of plants that were never intended to grow here, and then blame the gophers for liking them?”
She is laying it down, she really believes in this. But at the same time she has a serene, promising, transparent look as if, just as soon as this little cloud passes, she will bloom out again in sun. I say to her, and I am being neither scornful nor contentious, “You like little live things.”
“You have no idea how accurate you are,” her husband says. “I’ve given up fishing because she can’t bear to think of the worms.”
“Well,” she says, “how would you like an old hook clear through you lengthways?”
There seems no answer to that one. I suggest that we repair to the terrace and have a drink and I will introduce them to some birds who are also fond of worms. As we walk through the kitchen patio, young Catlin says, half joking, half fond, the way he might speak to a kid sister he adored, “All right, get it over. Tell’m about your foxes.”
“Laugh!” she says. “But you didn’t see them!” Almost as if dancing, she swings from Ruth to me, back to Ruth. “Did you know we had foxes?”
I am tempted to tell her about the fox with the strangulated hemorrhoids, but she is a little new for that. I say only, “We’ve seen a few on the road at night.”
“I saw two,” she says. “Last night. Honestly, I never had such a nice thing happen to me. I’d just put Debby to bed and was sitting by the window resting and wondering what sort of drapes to get, and there was this little scratching noise, and a fox came right up on the slab outside. He wasn’t five feet from me, on the other side of the glass, with the light shining on him. I guess he couldn’t see me because of it, or maybe he thought I belonged. I hope he thought I belonged, because he was the cleanest, sleekest, loveliest thing....”
I suspect that I have much the same feeling, watching her, that she had watching the fox. I feel that I should move quietly, if at all. I find myself preposterously holding my breath. Then she sees us all intent on her, and her cheeks get pink. She flops into a patio chair with one foot under her, and laughs, flashing her eyes upward in an amused, challenging way.
“I don’t care, he was beautiful. He looked right at me through the window like somebody shopping, and then he whined, I could hear him, and right away here came another one just as beautiful as he was. And you know what? They were in love. They kept nuzzling one another, and whining, and peeking in the window as if they thought it might make a good den inside if they could only find a way in. They must have been there three or four
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