“Starting young, you mean.”
She nodded. “At sixteen I had read more than a thousand books. I knew all the big names in American lit, so it was just a matter of putting them together with prices and keeping up with the new hotshots. But it’s also in my blood. I got it from my father: it was in his blood. It took off in a different direction with him, but it’s the same stuff when you get to the heart of it. Books…the wonder and magic of the printed word. It grabbed my dad when he was sixteen, so he knows where I’m coming from.”
“Does your father deal in books?”
“He wouldn’t be caught dead. No, I told you his interest went in another direction. My dad is a printer.”
She finished her coffee and said, “I’d give a million dollars if I had it for his experience. My father was present at the creation.”
I looked at her, lost.
“He was an apprentice at the Grayson Press, in this same little town we’re going to. I’m sure you’ve never heard of the Grayson Press, not many people have. But you can take it from me, Mr. Janeway, Grayson was the most incredible book genius of our time.”
6
There wasn’t much to see of North Bend, especially on a dark and rainy night. I got off at Exit 31 and Eleanor directed me through the town, which had long since rolled up its awnings for the night. The so-called business district was confined to a single block, the cafe, bar, and gas station the only places still open. But it was deceptive: beyond the town were narrow roads where the people lived, where the Graysons had once lived, where Eleanor Rigby had grown from a little girl into a young woman. We went out on a road called Ballarat and soon began picking up numbered streets and avenues, most of them in the high hundreds. It was rural by nature, but the streets seemed linked to Seattle, as if some long-ago urban planner had plotted inevitable annexations well into the next century. We came to the intersection of Southeast 106th Place and 428th Avenue Southeast: I still couldn’t see much, but I knew we were in the country. There was a fenced pasture, and occasionally I could see the lights of houses far back from the road. “Here we are,” Eleanor said abruptly. “Just pull over here and stop.” I pulled off the road across from a gate, which was open. My headlights shone on a mailbox with the name rigby painted boldly across it, and under that—in smaller letters—the north bend press. We sat idling. I could hear her breathing heavily in the dark beside me. The air in the car was tense.
“What’s happening?” I asked her.
“What do you mean?”
“Is there a problem?”
“Not the kind of problem you’d imagine. I just hate to face them.”
“Why would you feel like that?”
“I’ve disappointed them badly. I’ve done some things…stuff I can’t talk about…I’ve let them down and suddenly it’s almost impossible for me to walk in there and face them. I can’t explain it. The two people I love best in the world are in there and I don’t know what to say to them.”
“How about ‘hi’?”
She gave a sad little laugh.
“Seriously. If people love each other, the words don’t matter much.”
“You’re very wise, Janeway. And you’re right. I know they’re not going to judge me. They’ll just offer me comfort and shelter and love.”
“And you shudder at the thought.”
“I sure do.”
We sat for another minute. I let the car idle and the heater run and I didn’t push her either way. At last she said, “Let’s go see if Thomas Wolfe was right when he said you can’t go home again.”
I turned into the driveway. It was a long dirt road that wound through the trees. The rain was beating down steadily, a ruthless drumbeat. In a moment I saw lights appear through the trees. A house rose up out of the mist, an old frame building with a wide front porch. It looked homey and warm, like home is supposed to look to a tired and heartsick traveler. But Eleanor had begun to shiver as we approached. “Th-there,” she said through chattering teeth. “Just pull around the house and park in front.” But as I did this, she gripped my arm: my headlights had fallen on a car. “Somebody’s here! Turn around, don’t stop, for God’s sake keep going!” Then we saw the lettering on the car door—the vista printing company—and I could almost feel the relief flooding over her. “It’s okay, it’s just Uncle Archie,” she said breathlessly. “It’s Mamma’s uncle,” she said, as if I had been the worried one. A light came on, illuminating the porch and casting a beam down the stairs into the yard: someone inside had heard us coming. I pulled up in front of the other car at the foot of the porch steps. A face peered through cupped hands at the door. “Mamma,” Eleanor said, “oh, God, Mamma.” She wrenched open the door and leaped out into the rain. The woman met her on the porch with a shriek and they fell into each other’s arms, hugging as if they hadn’t seen each other for a lifetime and probably wouldn’t again, after tonight. I heard the woman yell, “Gaston!…Get out here!” and then a man appeared and engulfed them both with bearlike arms. I had a sinking feeling as I watched them, like Brutus might’ve felt just before he stabbed Caesar.
Now Eleanor was waving to me. I got out and walked through the rain and climbed the steps to the porch. “This is the man who saved my life,” Eleanor said dramatically, and I was hooked by the woman and pulled in among them. The man gripped my arm and the woman herded us all inside. “This place is a shambles,” she said, picking up a magazine and shooing us on. I was swept through a hallway to a well-lit kitchen where a tall, thin man sat at the table. He got to his feet as we came in, and we all got our first real look at each other. The woman was young: she might easily have passed for Eleanor’s older sister, though I knew she had to be at least my age. But there wasn’t a wrinkle on her face nor a strand of gray: her only concession to age was a pair of small-framed granny glasses. The man was burly: my height and heavier, about the size of an NFL lineman. His hair was curly and amber and he had a beard to match. The man at the table was in his sixties, with slate-gray hair and leathery skin. Eleanor introduced them. “This is my father, Gaston Rigby…my mother, Crystal…my uncle, Archie Moon. Guys, this is Mr. Janeway.” We all shook hands. Rigby’s hand was tentative but his eyes were steady. Archie Moon gripped my hand firmly and said he was glad to meet me. Crystal said that, whatever I had done for their daughter, they were in my debt—doubly so for bringing her home to them.
There was more fussing, those first awkward moments among strangers. Rigby seemed shy and reserved: he hung back and observed while Crystal and Eleanor did the talking. Hospitality was the order of the moment: Crystal wanted us to eat, but Eleanor told her we had stopped on the road. “Well, damn your eyes, you oughta be spanked,” Crystal said. She asked if we’d like coffee at least: I said that sounded wonderful. Eleanor said, “I think what Mr. Janeway would like better than anything is some dry clothes,” and Crystal took my measure with her eyes. “I think some of your old things would fit him close enough, Gaston,” she said. “Get him a pair of those old jeans and a flannel shirt and I’ll get the coffee on.”
Rigby disappeared and Crystal bustled about. “Get down that good china for me, will you, Archie?” she said, and Moon reached high over her head and began to take down the cups. Eleanor and I sat at the kitchen table, lulled by the sudden warmth. Impulsively she reached across and took my hand, squeezing it and smiling into my eyes. I thought she was probably on the verge of tears. Then the moment passed and she drew back into herself as Moon came with the cups and saucers and began setting them around the table.