I'll Let You Go

CHAPTER 4. The Labyrinth

He wore a sort of embroidered pillowcase on his head, as if hiding a cockeyed bolster, its open edge ending beneath the nose so that only his lips, with their funky mob of yellowish teeth, were revealed. The jaw jutted like a thirties movie tough’s — too much bone. A slick bar of light metal rose from his collar, and the chin, with a scintilla of scar where a nurse had once dropped him, sat stalwart in its rubber rest (the neck alone would not have supported the outsize skull). Cutout holes for the eyes, lined in silk or leather, varied in shape and size. Edward designed each hood himself and was much praised for his efforts.

It excited Tull to see him. As usual, he was eager to gauge his cousin’s mood.

“What’s happening?”

Edward shrugged, pursing his mouth à la Early Cher.

“He’s upset with Trinnie,” said Lucy with the smugness of an off-duty medium.

The self-described bespectacled “girl detective” had the lambent cheeks of Aunt Trinnie, who, incidentally, had long ago taught her how to weave her hair into mandala-like plaits. Almost thirteen now, she had never trimmed a lock; today, braids dangled down to non-hips.

“I’m upset with your mother,” Edward said.

“You are? I mean, really?”

The gangster-cousin mouth roiled and twisted.

“She didn’t do it for spite, Edward,” said his sister. “Anyhow, the world doesn’t revolve around you—it revolves around me! Didn’t you get the memo?” Lucy tittered as her brother coughed up a snigger. Tull smiled; if Edward was sniggering, things couldn’t be so bad.

“Well, what did she do?” asked Tull.

“It’s the maze,” said Lucy.

“What about it?”

“He’s just amazed with it!”

Edward folded his arms outside the thin bar of the brace and glared. “It isn’t a maze, it’s a labyrinth. There’s a difference.”

“Ah! So solly.”

“A maze has tricks and dead ends. A true labyrinth’s only dead end is the center.”

Pullman shot from the hedge and lay down at the sundial, where he stretched and shivered. Lucy took a seat in Edward’s custom golf cart; with fringed canopy and fat white tires, it looked a little like a time machine — half-buggy, half-lunar mod. She put her hands on the wheel.

“You’re mad at my mom for designing it?” offered Tull, by way of opening a dialogue.

“That’s right.”

“But it was Grandpa’s idea.”

Lucy drove the quiet car in an arc around the earthen clock’s edge, the dial itself being a tall bush sculpted in the form of an enormous harp.

“Come on, Tull, don’t be naïve. She knows how much time I spend at Saint-Cloud. And we know what the labyrinth held, don’t we?”

“The minotaur,” said Lucy, cool as a cucumber.

Tull let this sink in. “I don’t see the connection.”

“Then let me clarify: I am the minotaur. The monster, OK?”

Lucy flinched. “Oh, Edward, give it up!”

“You know what they call me at school. Dilbert — and Cat-in-the-Hat. And don’t forget their favorite: Headward the First. Which at least has wit.”

“My mother would never make fun of you, and you know it.”

“I even played the minotaur at school, remember? Trinnie even filmed it.”

“You wanted to play it,” said Tull.

“I didn’t do it for them. They’re retarded. Afterward, they came up — the worst Headward offenders — and said, ‘That was so cool!’ All of them talk like kids in bad teen movies. But why begrudge them their little heartfelt charitable moment?”

Lucy laughed, loving his rancor; his impersonations were always dead-on toxic.

“Anyhow, your mother—her little verdant puzzle has me feeling … sorely mocked.” He set his arms in a favorite Jack Benny pose, and at last, Tull knew he was being had.

Without fanfare then, let it be said: it was the presumption of medical experts that Edward Aurelius Trotter would not exceed the age of five (he and Pullman bore that in common, Danes being notorious for their short life-span) — and that the boy had already lived twice that long had dumbfounded the very same, who had expected him to at least have the courtesy and forbearance to remain under house or hospital arrest. But the victim of Apert Syndrome refused to play the invalid game.

It is not for us to present a study of what M. Apert in 1906 identified as acrocephalosyndactyly here; neither shall we delve into the flattened occiput, bregmatic bump, mandibular prognathism, high arched palate or anti-Mongoloid palpebral fissures incurred by those unfortunate genetic heirs. Suffice that Edward’s feet and gloved hands, though eminently usable, were webbed, and his skull had what the technical books called a turret or tower-shaped effect, cracked as surely as Carcassone’s La Colonne. To add — or detract — from his misfortunes, he handily shared an artistic streak with Aunt Trinnie that showed itself in the swankly poetic hand-sewn hoods (naturally, she had tutored him in the art) that on occasion sported papier-mâché prosthetics: a beak, an ear or some such excrescence. To his credit, Tull reveled in his mother’s attentions toward his cousin, for he knew Edward took her absences nearly as hard as he.

And how was the precocious cousin treated at school? As noted, he was first tormented by “Gimme head, Headward!” and its varied variations — then Special Ed, Dilbert, Cat-in-the-Hat and, finally, Casper (the boy, when stung, could be less than friendly and more than trenchant). Only once, around a month or so after he’d begun to wear the self-stitched hoods, had a bored and motley crew unveiled him; ever stalwart, Edward replaced the hood and claimed not to be bothered. His stoicism, and the fact that he never reported the crime, duly impressed — from then on he was watched over and given tender respects and, because of his vast intellect and sagacity, consulted and revered.

“Edward,” said Tull with a frisson of relief. “There’s something I don’t get. If a labyrinth doesn’t have dead ends, how can someone get lost?”

“You can’t. It’s impossible. The myth’s a metaphor — we don’t want to get out. We’re hardwired for failure. It’s in our genes. Even flies want to fail.”

“What do you mean?”

“Put a hundred flies in a jar and leave the lid on awhile. Take it off and only a few escape.”

“What does that prove?”

“Psychologists say the flies suffer from ‘premature cognitive commitment’: meaning, the commitment that they’re still trapped.”

“That is so brilliant,” said Lucy as she maneuvered the buggy into a harbor of manicured bush. “See? Fits perfect. Though I’m not sure it’ll turn.”

“Back up, Lucy!” said Tull with proprietary zeal. “You’ll ruin the hedge.”

Like the Tin Man, Edward swiveled on the bench to watch while she threw the buggy in reverse. “What’s a $400,000 hedge?” He shrugged, nonchalant.

She cleared it, then turned back to her brother. “Tell him about Joyce.” Then to Tull: “Our mother has a pet project.”

“Animal CAT scans?” asked Tull, pleased to elicit a smile from the invalid.

“Mother Joyce has been searching for a calling,” said Edward. “The middle-aged need their passions, you know.”

“We were hoping,” said Lucy, eyes atwinkle, “that it would be in the form of a personal trainer.”

“Or pool man.”

“That would have been the best.”

“At first, we thought she’d adopt a disease, but that’s tricky. My particular anomaly’s too shamelessly grotesque to build a telethon around. Too obscure. Unphotogenic.” Lucy chortled, then nudged a tire against Pullman’s back; he twitched an ear. “Then Mother read an item in the Times about a baby in a dumpster. A drive-by: someone tossed it in and the thing died. People don’t leave kids on doorsteps anymore — they’d have to park the car, God forbid. Park and toss and you’re ahead of the game. And what does Mother do when she reads about said odious crime? Remember, this is no ordinary woman! This is a filthy rich woman with too much time on her hands! She goes to the morgue to claim it, that’s what. But they won’t just give it to her, they make her wait thirty days. I, for one, find it comforting to know the finders-keepers rule has such broad and universal application. Voilà! a month later, there she sits, morgue-ready, far away from the Hills of Holmby. Comes the Man — from her emotionally charged description, we read between the lines and deduce the deputy to be a burly cretin with, no offense to you, Tull, sweaty, orangish body hair. From the distant end of the hall, Frankensheriff walks toward her. Clump clump clump. And what does Frankensheriff do? Hands Joyce a Hefty bag dripping with the baby’s remains!”

“Edward, that is gross.”

“You’re serious,” said Tull, happily playing straight man.

“And Mother vows — this being the first in a series — Mother vows the next time she comes, she’ll do things a little differently. Two weeks later, she makes good. Hands the sheriff one of those humongous Hermès scarves from a few seasons back with an African theme, because the next little dead baby’s black. Oh, Mother Joyce thinks of everything! Frankensheriff appears in said distant hall—clump clump clump — weeping as he approaches, sobbing as he hands it off! He’s caught the spirit! Touched by an angel! Frankensheriff stands converted!”

“But what does she want?” asked the incredulous Tull. “What’s she going to do with them?”

“She wants,” chimed Lucy, “to bury them.”

Pullman rose indifferently, and in doing so, violently jostled the buggy, whose tire had been resting on his flank.

“Weird,” said Tull.

“And the perfect thing is that it’s not even an original thought! There’s a woman who’s been burying throwaways for years — that’s where Mother got the idea. From People magazine. You see, her tragedy — and ours — is that Mother Joyce cannot even be original in her Buddha Compassion phase.” Edward yawned with boredom, circling back to his aunt. “You know, there were so many things Trinnie might have done besides build a fucking maze. I mean, she could have gone Versailles: some conical hedges, a hegemony of hedges — big drippy grotto with waterworks automata — no Hefty bags here! Maybe un grand escalier … I did see them haul in a Rodin, but your mom assured it wasn’t the centerpiece; that’d have been such a cliché. She’s too clever by half.” He clutched his hands theatrically to his bosom. “ ‘Aunt Trinnie, this is too cruel!’ I said. ‘A labyrinth—and here me, with my deformity — Mini-Me the Mini-Minotaur!’ ”

“And how did she respond?” asked Tull, playing along.

“With something very … Trinnie-like,” answered the cousin.

“I believe,” said Lucy, “it was: ‘Edward, shut the fuck up.’ ” Her brother rasped and hooted, then Lucy got a grand idea. “You know what we should do? We should just drive in! Come on, Edward! Journey to the center of the labyrinth — I dare you!”

“We’ll tie some yarn to the cart,” said Tull. “In case we get lost.”

“I’ll pass.”

“He’s afraid,” shouted Lucy gleefully. “Edward’s afraid!”

“That would be you,” said the cousin. “I’ve seen how far you’ve gotten. You won’t even go in with Pullie.”

“That isn’t true,” she said defensively. As impossible as it may seem, the Trotter children were, in regard to the maze, wary of exploration.

“Then no one’s been to the center,” said Tull.

“What? Not even you?” asked Edward, a bit stunned.

“Well, when would I? They only just finished it.”

“Nearly two weeks ago, they did,” said Edward, thoroughly pleased. “Well, well, we are a timid group!”

“Then let’s do it,” said Tull. “What’s the big deal?”

“The big deal is what your mother put in the middle of the damn thing.”

“The Rodin?”

“Guess again.” He paused, striking his Benny pose. “A dumpster fetus — what else?”

While Tull and Lucy laughed, exhaustion darkened Edward’s face like a cloud, and his sister sprang to help. They walked from bench to buggy, supporting him on each side. Lucy got in to drive and smiled at Tull, pained and poignant; Edward would need to skip a few days of school to get his strength back, and she hoped he wouldn’t have to go to the hospital. Pullman cantered about the carriage, then licked Edward’s hand, but the cousin twitched it away. As Lucy drove the serpentine path to the house, the Dane galloped toward a rakish figure on the hill: Grandpa Lou.

Trinnie shouted at the children that it was time to see Bluey, then Ralph shouted to her that they would be late and she hurried off. As they entered the living room, Tull called out hello, but the old man didn’t hear.

He was already down on all fours, chuffing with Pullman at the door of the Palladian doghouse.