The Clock Winder

7. JUNE 12, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

I don’t understand why you don’t answer. I keep thinking up possible reasons, new ones every time. Are you angry? But when you are you generally say so, you don’t just fade away like this. I’ll keep on writing, anyway. I’ll come down in August even if I don’t hear from you. I would like to see you before then, maybe for a weekend, but for that I’ll wait till you tell me how you feel about it.

Sometimes I imagine you just walking up my path, some sunny morning. It wouldn’t bind you to anything. If you wanted I wouldn’t even make a fuss about it — just say hello and peel you an orange to eat on the front steps for breakfast.

Mother is well. She totaled the car last week, which shook her up a little, but she escaped without a scratch. Now she has a Buick. Walked into the car lot and bought one, on sight — said a friend had told her they were all right. I was sorry to see the old Mercedes go. You wouldn’t like the Buick at all, you always had such fun maneuvering the gear shift. Whatever happened to your chauffeur’s cap? I looked for it in the old car before they took it away. I’d hate to think of it in some auto graveyard.

Andrew has been in a rest home in upstate New York. They expect to release him any day now. I wonder if he shouldn’t come back here, but there would be so many difficulties that I haven’t suggested it. He claims he’d rather be alone now, anyway; he was very insistent about it. I don’t think he has recovered from Timothy. He keeps writing Mother and asking questions and more questions, two letters a day sometimes — all about Timothy, irrelevant things like what he was wearing that day and what he ate and who he was talking to. Mother is very patient about answering him. She says that now that Timothy’s gone she doesn’t worry so much about Andrew. It’s like some quota has been filled.

You said we were all crazy. Maybe you said it just for the moment, not meaning it, but it’s all I have to go on so I keep trying to relate it to your not writing. I don’t see how it fits in. I do see how it could make you want to leave us. Do you think craziness is catching? It could be, of course. It is, if you still blame yourself for what happened. If that had anything to do with you at all, it was only on the surface.

I just remembered one time when I was downtown with Andrew, Christmas shopping, years ago. We were standing on a corner waiting for a light to change. This car passed us, going very fast, and just as it reached the corner all four doors popped open. One of those fluky things, I just laughed. But Andrew didn’t. He got scared. He said, “I can’t understand it. Why do these things happen to me? Why on my corner? I can’t grasp the significance of it,” he said. Well, I’m not saying you’re like Andrew. But things have been happening to us for years, long before you came along. Before you were born, even. Look at last summer, when we didn’t know you existed. My father died, my mother tangled with a hold-up man, Margaret got engaged to a middle-aged widower but broke it off and Melissa had a ten-day crying jag thinking she was pregnant. That’s just what I remember offhand; there’s more that got crowded out. We’re event-prone. (But sane. I’m sure of that. Even Andrew is, underneath.) Probably most families are event-prone, it’s just that we make more of it. Scenes and quarrels and excitement — but that part’s manufactured, just artificial stitches knitting us all together. What would we say to each other if we had to sit around in peace? I may not make scenes myself but I allow them, I go along with them. I see that. It’s my way of making connection with my family. Like Andrew’s peculiarities. He chose them. Every trouble he causes is just another way of talking. If you look at it like that, doesn’t it seem a waste to leave us? I know I’m talking a lot of bull.

I love you. Why won’t you marry me? I think you love me too.

Matthew

JUNE 27, 1961

Dear Elizabeth Abbott:

Having thought it over I am going to kill you.

Yours very truly,

Andrew Carter Emerson

Dear Mrs. Emerson,

How are you? I’m doing just fine.

I’m writing to see if you could send me my combination drill. It’s down on the workbench in the basement. It has a metal box that you can pack it in. I’ll be glad to pay the postage.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

JULY 2, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

Well here is half of that ten dollars you loaned me that I bet you thought you seen the last of, ha ha. I would send it all but my nephew’s wife is in the hospital getting her nerves fixed and I just didn’t have the heart to say “no.” It seems like this summer we been ailing so. My husband has the arthritis so bad he can’t leave the bed and my sister’s getting the Change and myself I have the headache alot. Well I shouldn’t complain, I can still get around thank the Lord and have a job for what its worth. Mrs. Emerson is changing ageing before my eyes and the symptom is parsimonousness. Turning into one of those old ladies that checks on every dime when there’s a fortune in the bank. She saves moldy old leftovers and gripes do I take some of the ham for my lunch then goes out and buy herself a Buick. I have talk to her about getting some new handyman as washing outside of windows is not my job but she says “no” they all steal you blind. Well Elizabeth didn’t I was quick to say and she says no, that’s true, “I never had to lock up the valubles or the liquor around Elizabeth but she was such a magpie junky things was never safe around her, old doorknobs and screws and caster cups disappearing and coming back in the shape of paperweights and chest men and rubber stamps.” I thought you would want to know how she is talking about you. She is ever criticizing how I do my work. On the phone she was telling about “my maid is going to drive me up the wall one of these days.” Lady take care who you call yours I wanted to say but held my peace. She is all the time talking like she owns people, my florrist and my pharmacist and my meat man. Well Lord knows that woman has had her share of trouble though. I must close for now as it is hospital visiting hours. I will get that other five to you when my troubles eases up.

Sincerely,

Alvareen

JULY 3, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

I tried to call you this morning but your mother said you were at work. I didn’t even know you had a job. Then by evening I’d changed my mind. You are one of those people who deflect what is said to you and then hang up, bang. But I have seen you reading everything, instructions and Occupant ads and cereal boxes, and I can’t imagine you throwing an envelope away without looking to see what’s in it. Writing’s better.

You must not know what it’s like to wait for a letter. I leave for work late, just to catch the postman. I listen for his car on the highway. Cars that aren’t his I hate, I despise the way they creep past my eyes taking up road space on trivial errands. Then I go to the back of the house and pretend I’m not interested. It’s a superstition. When he comes he’s always so cheerful. I reach the end of the driveway before he’s finished loading my mailbox and he tells me it’s just bills and grins from ear to ear. I pretend that’s all I expected. It worries me the sloppy way he handles mail; anything could get lost, fall on the ground or under his car seat and he would never notice. In grade school they showed us a film about how letters travel — canceling machines and sorting machines and finally just the feet of a mailman down a sidewalk. Now that I think about it, there were so many ways those machines could lose a thing.

Mary’s baby was born premature, a girl, and she telephoned all in tears at having to leave the baby in an incubator so mother’s flown there to keep her company. Margaret has married again, nobody knows who to. I think Mother’s going to check him out on the way back. It will do her good to travel a while. I go by the house often, just to make sure Alvareen’s taking care of things okay. The place is going to hell — grass turning brown, leaky faucets. You know Mother never got another handyman. She was distrustful of all the people the employment agency sent out to her.

Andrew is back at his old job and doing fine. I called him on his first night home to invite him here, but he says he’d like to be alone awhile.

Mr. Smodgett at the paper is drunker than ever and now the linotype operator has taken up drinking too, but come August I’m leaving no matter what. I have two weeks off and I’m spending them with you. Don’t tell me not to. I would like to take you back with me. We could live at my house or someplace better, I don’t care. If you still don’t like children, that’s all right. I won’t expect you to change in any way. I love you.

Matthew

JULY 3, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

I don’t know if you remember me very well or would even be interested in hearing from me, after all the trouble you’ve been through with my family, but this morning when I was trying to think of someone I’d like to announce my marriage to yours was one of the few names that came to mind—

Not that you would be all that interested in my wedding, I guess, but it seemed like a good excuse to get in touch with you and tell you a lot of other things I’ve wanted to say—

When you left so suddenly I realized that those last few days must have been hell for you, only none of us thought of it at the time, and I wanted to apologize on behalf of my family and also to thank you for taking such good care of Mother — she used to write about you and she was always so pleased to have something offbeat, like a girl handyman, that could make her feel unconventional right in the safety of her own home—

I hope you aren’t too disgusted with us. We are not as unhappy as we must seem. Sometimes when we are all together things start going wrong somehow, I don’t know why, and everybody ends up feeling they can’t do anything right, and anything they try to do will make it worse. Everybody. Even Mother, maybe. But we love her very much, and we are a very close family, and Matthew is closest of all. I wish I could make you see that.

Well, so I am married — my husband’s name is Brady Summers and he’s in his last year of law school — next year we’ll be moving to New York where he has a job with a corporation—

I’m going to like being so near Melissa and Andrew, who is the most interesting of all my brothers although of course Matthew is very interesting too — we will all have lunch together on Wednesdays at this little restaurant Andrew likes to go to, which will be fun—

I should say also that I’m not a frequent letter writer, so if it should happen that you’d like to keep in touch I won’t be disappointed if you wait months to answer — then too you might not want to write at all, which I would understand. Thank you again—

Sincerely,

Margaret Emerson Summers

JULY 4, 1961

Dear Elizabeth Abbott:

I picked a revolver off a policeman at a parade today. It’s for you.

Yours very truly,

Andrew Carter Emerson

Dear Matthew,

How are you? I’m doing just fine.

I have a job taking care of an old man who I like very much. I’m having a nice summer.

The reason I’m writing is to tell you not to come in August. I’m not angry or anything, I just don’t think there would be any point to it.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

JULY 11, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

What do you mean, point? When did you start caring whether things had a point?

I’m coming anyway. This is important. You are the first person outside my family I’ve ever loved and I’m worried you may be the last.

Matthew

Dear Margaret,

Congratulations on your recent marriage which I was very happy to hear about. I’m not much for writing letters but will try to keep in touch.

I know that your family is very nice and I always did like your mother, only I had to start school again. Thank you for writing.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

JULY 15, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

I know that my last letter must have sounded rude. I’ve been thinking things over since then. I woke up last night and suddenly I saw this whole situation in a different light — not me being steadfast and patient but just pushing you, backing you against a wall, forcing a visit on you and talking on and on about love when you don’t want to listen. Is that how you see it, too? You’re younger than me. Maybe you’re just not interested in settling down yet. Maybe I was always afraid of that underneath, or I would have called you on the phone or come down there one of these weekends.

You will have to discuss this with me somehow. I don’t know what to think any more.

Mother is back from visiting Mary and Margaret. I don’t know that traveling did her that much good after all. She looks tired. When I went to see her yesterday she was just putting the permanent license plates on the new car. She didn’t have the faintest idea how to go about it. I suppose Dad or Richard always did it before, and then you last March. Anyway she was just circling the car with them, looking at the plates and then the car and then the plates again and holding a little screwdriver in her hand like a pen. I would have given a million dollars to see you coming across the grass with your toolbox. I even thought you would, for a minute. I kept looking for you. Then when I was putting the plates on for her Mother started crying. Without you we are falling apart. The basement has started seeping at the corners. Mother says she wouldn’t even know what to look under in the yellow pages, for a job like that. Elizabeth should be here, she said. She knew the names of things.

I don’t know how to think all this through any more, except to ask if you would mind writing and just telling me if you love me or not, no strings attached. If you don’t want me to come in August, I won’t.

Matthew

Dear Alvareen,

How are you? I’m doing just fine.

I’m writing because I asked Mrs. Emerson to send my drill, but so far she hasn’t. Could you do it, please? The combination one, that sands and grinds and all. It’s on the left-hand side of the workbench. There is a metal case you can put it all into compactly. If you mail it to me you can keep that other five dollars, I bet the postage will come to nearly that anyway. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

JULY 18, 1961

Dear Elizabeth Abbott:

The bullet will enter your left temple. Although I prefer the heart, for reasons which I am sure you understand.

Yours very truly,

Andrew Carter Emerson

JULY 23, 1961

Dear Elizabeth,

Well I have mailed the drill like you asked. It’s no surprise about Mrs. E. not sending it as I believe she is mad at you, also out of town quite alot. Turning into one of those visiting mothers. She had a fight with Margaret’s new husband who she didn’t hit it off with and came back early. Now she’s off seeing Peter in summer school. Melissa up there is going through some kind of breakup with her boyfriend and always calling on the phone “where is she, you think she’d be home the one time I wanted to talk to her.” Honey I don’t know I tell her. I only come in with my key and dust out these rooms that is seldom used anyway. If I had the strenth I would find me another job. My husband is so bad with the arthritis he just all the time moans and groans. Well the Lord knows what He is doing I suppose. I must close for now as I am not feeling too well myself these days.

Sincerely,

Alvareen

JULY 25, 1961

Dear Elizabeth Abbott:

Now prepare to die.

Yours very truly,

Andrew Carter Emerson

Dear Andrew Carter Emerson:

Lay off the letters, I’m getting tired of them. If I’m not left alone after this I’ll see that you aren’t either, ever again. I’ll fill out your address on all the magazine coupons I come across. I’ll sign you up with the Avon lady and the Tupperware people. I’ll get you listed with every charity and insurance agency and Mormon missionary between here and Canada, I’ll put you down for catalog calls at Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward. When they phone you in the dead of night to tell you about their white sales, think of me, Andrew.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Abbott