Spring 2015
distinctly his, a formality that allowed him to build a perimeter around himself whether sitting or
walking or standing. He moved slowly and erectly and with such lack of carelessness that everyone
seemed to take a breath and hold it. He shifted in his chair with gravity, crossed and uncrossed his
legs purposely and crisply, no creases lost. There were reasons behind his movements. Motive. Purpose.
Cause and effect. He could quiet a department meeting or a restless class by assuming an upright
position and remaining perfectly still and silent until appropriate attention was delivered his way.
Of course she succumbed to the cancer. As he had been expecting for years. He as much told her
so after her mother died of the same, fairly young, still in her sixties. And then, one by one, her three
sisters back in England, two in their sixties, one in her fifties, all dying. Patricia got word here in this
university town in Middle America, a long way from them across the ocean. She never left him to
travel back. Was that his fault? Did he voice an opinion against it? In each instance she said that it
was impossible to leave him for any period. Whatever that meant. Still, after each one he again told
her of his expectations for her. Perhaps he was too matter-of-fact about it. Was he whistling past the
inevitable upright stones? But you couldn’t shock Patricia. She was never taken aback.
“Frankly dear, I don’t hold out much hope for you.”
And Patricia would smile, not even the briefest tick of irritation at him. Yes, dear. So you have said.
“Oh, I don’t mean to be brutal here, darling. But heredity is a distinct cause.”
Yes, dear. So they say. What should we make for dinner tonight?
“I’m afraid it wouldn’t reach her much at this point, sir.” The doctor was forthright, but Isaac
didn’t appreciate him anymore. “It could be any time now.” And it was.
At least she had lasted until he had become Emeritus . Their house sits on the Heights on what he
likes to believe -- what he knows to be fact -- the highest point in town.
He determined it so from elevation maps before signing and that settled the matter. Sale closed.
It sits on the very crest of their little street above the Nature Conservatory with the backyard running
down against the trails and separated by a fence he rebuilt three times by himself and by a teakwood
gate which he still takes unhealthy pride in. He stalks down the steep backyard once a week to inspect
it and open it and glare at any strollers or runners on the paths. Then he shuts it and locks it.
He keeps two square ends of old railroad ties by Patricia’s herb garden, thick creosoted things,
and he maneuvers them this way and that way to serve as fulcrums for his two heavy bars. In this
manner does he work his quarry. Quite adept at it, if he does say so himself.
“Give me a lever long enough and . . . !” He shouts his inevitable joke year after year, red-faced
and sweating, back aching, hands sore. But feeling fine. Just fine. Tremendous, in fact. And Patricia
right up above him on the summer porch waiting for the punch line and working at some needlework
that never amounted to anything. And now, Patricia not inevitable. Well, maybe he was a bit too
predictable with the joke across the years. Though he can always find a rock on this hill at whatever
spot his spade strikes. No dearth of material.
We are the reapers of rocks. Patricia explained to guests as she showed the doings of the herb garden,
the quarry work of Isaac Stritch.
The Linnet's Wings