Home Place Read online

  And yet the glove in the narration—its most striking “image,” in one use of the term—is not shown in the picture, which has its own allegorical work—about walking in, out, and away—to do. Instead, that verbal image must conclude the book, with the turns on the figure from Henry James used throughout it, in a parallel metaphor, acknowledged in the final sentence:“the bib pattern, was still there. The figure on the front of the carpet had worn through to the back” (176).

  After a good many subsequent novels, in 1968 Morris revisited the world of The Home Place in another remarkable book called God’s Country and My People. Many of the images are related—and quite a few identical to—those in that book and The Inhabitants, but the later meditations on them are significantly different, sometimes quite literal in their autobiographical or otherwise anecdotal account of the image, sometimes even more abstracted from it. For example, the photograph of the bed facing page 135 of The Home Place, and identified in the story as that of Cousin Ed, provides the occasion for a general, and central, meditation: “There’s little to see, but things leave an impression. It’s a matter of time and repetition. As something old wears thin or out, something new wears in. The handle on the pump, the crank on the churn, the dipper floating in the bucket, the latch on the screen, the door on the privy, the fender on the stove, the knees of the pants and the seat of the chair, the handle of the brush and the lid to the pot exist in time but outside taste; they wear in more than they wear out. It can’t be helped. It’s neither good nor bad. It’s the nature of life.”2

  In 1972 Morris returned once more to the “photo-text” in his Love Affair—A Venetian Journal, with its color photographs of Venice and its oddly oblique meditative paragraphs facing them. But it continued to be the patterns of prose fiction itself that would absorb him, allowing the novelist’s language to shape and frame the very images that it would itself accompany, glossing, interpreting, and even being able to recall.

  1. Wright Morris, Writing My Life: An Autobiography (Santa Rosa ca: Black Sparrow Press, 1993), 353.

  2. Wright Morris, God’s Country and My People (New York: Harper & Row, 1968), 78.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To Henry Allen Moe and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, I owe the support, material and otherwise, which made The Inhabitants and The Home Place possible.

  I should like to believe that the books themselves—pioneer enterprises in the field of publishing—are a witness to the traditions and integrity of Charles Scribner’s Sons.

  To be at all critically, or as we have been fond of calling it, analytically, minded—over and beyond an inherent love of the general many-colored picture of things—is to be subject to the superstition that objects and places, coherently grouped, disposed for human use and addressed to it, must have a sense of their own, a rnystic meaning proper to themselves to give out: to give out, that is, to the participant at once so interested and so detached as to be moved to a report of the matter.

  HENRY JAMES

  THE AMERICAN SCENE

  THE HOME PLACE

  WHAT’S the old man doing?” I said, and I looked down the trail, beyond the ragged box elder, where the old man stood in the door of the barn, fooling with an inner tube. In town I used to take the old man’s hand and lead him across the tracks where horses and men, little girls, and sometimes little boys were killed. Why was that? They didn’t stop, look and listen. We did.

  “Is he planting melons?” Clara said.

  “No, he isn’t planting melons,” I said. Clara put her hand over her glass eye, drew down the lid.

  “If he isn’t planting melons it would be nothing useful,” she said.

  “He’s fixing his inner tube,” said the boy.

  “Thanks son,” I said, and put my hand on his head. After the girl I wanted a boy so I could stand with my hand on his head, or his shoulder. But you can’t. Try it sometime. I took my hand off his head and put it on the cool handle of the dipper, pressed on the handle, and skimmed off three drowned flies. I showed them to the boy and said, “Sprinkle them with salt and they’ll be as good as new ones.”

  “How’s that?” said Clara.

  “I was just telling the boy to feed flies like that to the chickens.” I opened the screen, and tossed the water into the yard. Four or five seedy leghorns ran through the shadows, scratched for them. “You see that, son?” I said.

  “I told him to bring fresh water,” she said, “but I don’t think he’s got around to it. He’s eighty-one. He don’t get around too much.”

  “You’re not so young yourself,” I said.

  “I’m a farmer’s wife,” she said, and pulled a green stocking cap low on her head. My Aunt Clara is a raw-boned woman, a little over six feet tall, flat as a lath, and with the stalking gait of a whooping crane. In the early morning she wears a bright green stocking cap. She’s been doing that for at least thirty years—against the night air, as she calls it—the tassel dangling over the ear that once troubled her. It gives her a certain rakish look. “I’m a farmer’s wife,” she repeated, and picked up a small tin bucket, with a blue Karo label, and started across the yard. She seemed to wade through the soft, pitted chicken mounds. “There’s not a square inch of this yard,” she said, without turning to look at me, “them chickens haven’t scratched from one place to another one.” She walked behind the hedge fencing the drive, where I could see the bright glint of her cap, like a whip tassel, jogging along toward the barn.

  “What you looking at, son?” I said.

  He was out in the yard, his head between his knees. He picked up something, smelled it, put it down again.

  “What you got there?” I said.

  “Nothing—” he said, and stood up.

  “Suppose we take these pails,” I said, “and get Grandma some nice fresh water?” I took two pails from the table on the porch, gave the boy the short one, with the blue and white stripes. I took the milk pail with the wooden handle, the tall straight sides. “When I was your age,” I said, “I used to fetch fresh water every morning,” using the word fetch advisedly. I nodded my head toward the pump, where the old man was standing, fooling with his tube, before I noticed how close to the house it seemed. The last time I fetched water that pump was a block away.

  “What’s this?” the boy said, and kicked at a bump he saw in the yard. He kicked it loose, and it rolled across the yard into the weeds.

  “That’s a croquet ball,” I said, and looked around the yard for the wickets. When I was a boy I tripped over those wickets all the time.

  “Cro-kay?” said the boy, “what’s cro-kay?” He was standing with the ball, scratching off the layers of dirt. Under the dirt was a faded orange band, he sniffed at it.

  “It smells like the subway,” he said.

  There you have it. There you have it in a nutshell. Two thousand miles from New York a city boy turns up something in a farm yard, it smells damp and earthy, like a storm cave, so he calls it the subway smell.

  “You think it smells like the subway?” I said.

  “It’s smelly,” he said.

  “Put it down,” I said, “before your sister has to sniff at it.” He put it down, wiped his fingers on his clean city pants. Peggy is worse than the boy in the sense that she can’t see, feel, or smell anything, without comparing it with something else. God knows what she would think that ball smelled like.

  “What’s cro-kay?” said the boy.

  “Let’s get that water,” I said, then seeing the old man I added, “suppose you ask your Grandpa. He’s the man to answer questions like that.” We picked up our pails and walked down the trail toward the old man.

  “Thinks I—” the old man said, “tube as heavy as that’ll last forever. Well, says he, would if it was rubber, but it ain’t rubber. What is it, says I? Airsuds, says he. What’s that, says I? That’s what it is if it ain’t rubber, says he.”

  “Where’s the handle to the pump?” I said.

  “Airsuds, says he. Tha
t’s what it is if it ain’t rubber.” The old man hung the tube around his neck and put the boy’s bucket on the pump nozzle. He pulled on a piece of taped wire that went into the pump house. A motor started. “Hole in it as big as my head,” he said, and squeezed his finger into the nail tear.

  “This new rubber is not so good,” I said.

  “It ain’t rubber,” said the old man. “It’s airsuds.” He liked that word. He spit and watched the water spill into the pail.

  “What’s cro-kay?” said the boy.

  The old man took the small pail off the nozzle, hung on the milk pail.

  “This boy pullin’ my leg?” he said, but without looking at him. He gazed across the yard at the hay rick, the break in the trees.

  “You’ve got to remember,” I said, “this is the first time he’s been out in the country. In the city you don’t have yards like this. You don’t play croquet.”

  “I didn’t play it much,” the old man said, “but I knew what it was.”

  “You had it right here in the yard,” I said. “The boy’s never had a yard. If he had a yard like this he would play croquet.”

  “Seems to me somebody might’ve told him what it was.”

  “He never asked before,” I said. “There’s two or three hundred thousand boys in the city who never heard of croquet. They don’t know what it is. What’s more,” I said, “they don’t want to know.” Was he listening? He had turned his back to me to spit.

  “Viola’s kids were born and raised in Lone Tree,” he said, “but they know what croquet is.”

  “Lone Tree—” I said, my voice a little high, “is not New York. There is no grass in New York, no yards, no trees, no lawn swings—and for thousands of kids not very much sky. They live in cages,” I said, “it’s like a big zoo of kids. A cage with windows and bars.”

  “Seems to me a man with any sense, or any kids, would live some place else.”

  I managed to keep control of myself by picking up the pail. I put it down again and said—“You may not know it, but there’s several million people, Americans—” I added, “without a decent place to live. They live in trailers, tents, and four or five people to one room.” I stopped. My voice came back at me from across the yard.

  “Two empty houses—” the old man said, his voice flat, and wheeled to point at them. He pointed east, then directly across the road. My hands were shaking so bad I didn’t want to risk spilling the water. I put my left hand on the pump nozzle. It was cool. “One across the road,” he said, “be empty in a week or two.”

  I wet my lips and said, “I thought Ed lived across the road.”

  “Ed’s sick—” he said.

  “He’s sick?”

  “Be dead in a week or two.” The old man spit, stepped on the quid like it was a bug. “Didn’t see him for ten or twelve days, so Clara thought I’d better look over. He was in bed. Lyin’ there. Well, says I, ain’t it about time you was gettin’ up? Well, says he, it’s in my legs. What, says I? I can’t move, says he.” The old man felt in his pocket for his pipe, tapped the bowl on his palm. He took out a ten-penny nail and scratched the ashes off the top. “Couldn’t twitch his toes. Been lyin’ there eight or nine days.”

  “God almighty,” I said.

  “First thing I did was give him somethin’ to get a little movement. Set him on the potty. Held him like a kid. Guess he hadn’t been to the outbilly for ten or twelve days.”

  “Where’s he at now?”

  “Bed in town with a lady to watch him. Day and night. Well, says I, ain’t you a little old for this kind of tinkerin’? Says he, I ain’t too old to enjoy it.”

  I put my hand out toward the boy, but he ducked. “You want to help your Grandma look for eggs?” I said.

  “I want to know what cro-kay is,” he said.

  “Ask your daddy later,” I said, “run along now and look for some eggs.”

  “How’d he know where to look for eggs?”

  “Well, I’ve told him a thing or two,” I said. “After all, his daddy was born on a farm.”

  The old man looked at me. He twanged his nose between his thumb and forefinger—“I thought you was born in Lone Tree?”

  “Lone Tree is a small town,” I said, “and I was born on the edge of Lone Tree. We had a horse and some chickens. We had a cow—for a while,” I said.

  “I didn’t think you was born on a farm,” the old man said. He picked up the smaller pail and started for the house.

  As my boy was eyeing me, I said, “I could walk right from here and put my hands on some eggs. I used to do that all the time. All summer,” I said.

  “I’d think about it first,” the old man said, “as them old liens are gettin’ pretty touchy. They catch you foolin’ with them eggs an’ they’ll cacklc half the night.” Alongside the corn planter he came to a halt, put down the pail. He took the inner tube from his neck and looped it around the seat post of the planter. “Come to think of it,” he said, “used to wonder why them chickens was so fretful in the summer, and in the winter was just as nice an’ quiet as you please.” He gazed across the yard, toward the shade elm and the house, where the croquet court used to be. “My, them Plymouth Rocks was sharp—let it get a little dark an’ they come in along the drive. Them fool leghorns get tangled in them wickets, every time.”

  “You know where an egg is?” the boy said.

  “There’s your sister,” I said, and pointed at Peggy standing in the door of the barn. She’s a good deal like her mother, so I said— “What have you been into?”

  “Nothing—” she said.

  I put the pail down and walked toward her across the yard. She was holding her new apron like she had made a muss in it, but instead of running she waited for me. I came up and looked at the white egg in her lap.

  “That belongs to the chickie,” I said, in her mother’s best manner. “It’s the chickie’s egg. It isn’t our egg. We’ll put it back.”

  “The chickie gave it to me,” she said.

  “All right,” I said, “go find Grandma and show her what the chickie did.” She started off. “Take your brother along,” I said.

  “I’ve got my hands full now,” she said, and sighed like her mother.

  “What’s cro-kay?” said the bow

  “There’s your mother at the screen,” I said. “She’s been helping Grandma. Canning. Let’s both take your mother a nice cool drink.” I went back to the pump for my pail, but when I looked around the boy was gone. The barn door was swinging, and two swallows were noisy on the wires.

  “See those birds?” I called to my wife. “They’re barn swallows. They live in the barn.”

  “Not a bad idea,” my wife said.

  That could be taken several ways, but not right at the moment.

  “How’s my little dove?” I said, and smilingly walked toward her. But I seemed to have forgotten how to carry those milk pails. I put it down and looked at the water on my white buck shoes.

  “Parboiled—” she said, in answer to my question, then “If you’re going to play at being Old McDonald you can first come in here and change your clothes.”

  “When I was a boy—” I said, biding my time, “there was a fine clipped lawn right where I’m standing. I used to mow it. Play croquet every afternoon.”

  “Where are my babies?” she said.

  “They went off to find some eggs,” I said, and left the pail where it was till I had changed my shoes.

  My wife opened the screen, then let it slam and followed me into the kitchen. Clara’s beets were cooking on the cob range. There were newspapers spread on the table and over the lid of the water bin, with lapping red beet rings from the dripping mason jars.

  “Boy!” I said, “Pickled beets!” and took a deep breath.

  “Suppose you stand right there and inhale it,” my wife said.

  “Now look here—” I said.

  “I didn’t come out here,” she said, “to be parboiled in another woman’s kitchen.”
/>   “I don’t know as she asked you to,” I said.

  “What do you expect me to do?” she said. “Sit in the front room in the rocker while she’s out here parboiling?”

  “That’s a good word,” I said, “so long as you don’t overdo it. You keep telling me you were born on a farm, so I just took it for granted you could live one day where the old lady’s lived all of her life.”

  “I can carry a bucket of water,” she said.

  “If you think you can control yourself,” I said, “it might interest you to know that I’ve located a house. Right here in the neighborhood.” That calmed her.

  “We can’t furnish a house right now,” she said.

  “This house is all furnished, all ready,” I said. She looked at me. “You don’t have to pickle beets,” I said, “there are other things you can pickle, and I suppose you’ve noticed how your babies like the farm.” She had. “But a good deal depends on your being able to control yourself. If they thought that one afternoon in the kitchen was more than you could stand—”

  “Suppose you walk over there and lean over that stove,” she said.

  “You seem to forget,” I said, “that I was born and raised out here.”

  “I’ve often tried to,” she said, “but I can’t.”

  “If that’s the way you feel,” I said, “suppose you call the kids and tell them we’re leaving.” I went to the screen, cleared my throat, and called, “Oh Peggy!”