“I wish I could just hear better.” He leans to look in. “Boy?” he says. “You here in the dark?” I come past him to find the light switch and flick it on for him. Lee, he’s standing there in the old man’s path with his hand at his mouth, looking like he don’t know whether to charge or retreat. “Leland! Boy!” the old man hollers and goes clumping toward him. “You sonofabitch you! What the hell you say? Put ’er there. God amighty, Hank, willya just look at the size of him. He’s shot up like a bean pole; get a little meat on those bones and we’ll work hell out of him. Put ’er there, Leland.” The kid’s having a tough time answering, what with the old man roaring down on him, and he gets even more flustered when Henry sticks out his left hand to shake and Lee switches and starts to stick out his left hand to shake but by then the old man’s decided to go to feeling Lee’s arm and shoulders like he was thinking of buying him for the locker. And Lee don’t know what hand to try next. I have to laugh watching them, in spite of myself. “But, say, he’s just skin and bones, Hank, skin and bones. We’ll have to get some meat on him before he’ll be worth a shit. Leland, goddam you, how’ve you been?”) Is this him? The hand on Lee’s arm was hard as wood. “Oh, I’ve been getting by.” Lee shrugged uncomfortably and dropped his face to avoid looking at his father’s frightening countenance. The hand continued on down the length of the arm as the old man talked, until it twined around his fingers with the slow, inexorable constriction of tree roots, sending little sparks of pain jumping toward his shoulder. Lee looked up to protest and realized that the old man was still loudly addressing him in that irrepressible and overpowering voice. Lee managed to convert his grimace to an uncomfortable smile; it wasn’t as if his father intended him any pain with the prolonged grip. Probably just tradition to crush the metacarpal. Every fraternity has a special grip, why not the Muscle Monkeys of Wakonda? They probably also had strenuous initiations and free-for-all socials. Why not a special Muscle Monkey grip? And am I his? He was engaged in pondering these questions when he realized that Henry had stopped talking and they were all waiting for him to speak. “Yes, I’ve been surviving. . . .” What did I use to call him? Looking into those green eyes that showed white all the way around the pupils: Papa ...? At the incredible landscape of face gullied by the Oregon winters and burned by coastal winds. “Not making a lot of headway”—while his hand was being jerked up and down like a whistle rope—“but I’ve been getting by.” Or had it been Daddy? And felt again that first billowing of wings against his cheek, the objects in the room fluttering about like pictures on a blown lace curtain . . . “Good!” The old man was greatly relieved by the news. “Gettin’ by is just about all a man can hope for these days the way these Soslists are bleedin’ you. Here. Sit you down. Hank tells me you been on the road a pretty good piece?” “Enough to last me a while.” Papa ...? Daddy...? This was his father, an incredulous voice kept trying to convince him. “Enough,” he added, “to make me think I’ll stand a while if you don’t mind.” The old man laughed. “I don’t wonder. Hard on the old himrongs, huh?” He winked obscenely at Lee, still clutching the hapless hand. Joe moved into view, followed by his wife and children. “Ah. Here we go. Joe Ben—you remember Joe Ben, don’t you, Leland? Your Uncle Ben’s boy? Let’s see, though . . . was he cut up like this before you and your—” “Oh yeah!” Joe came rushing forward to rescue Lee’s hand. “Sure! Lee was still around after I got my face lifted. I think he was even—no, wait a minute, I didn’t get married to Jan till ’fifty-one and you was gone in what was it? ’Forty-nine? ’Fifty?” “Something like that. I’ve kind of lost count.” “Then you was gone before I got married. You ain’t met my woman! Jan, come here. This is Lee. A little sunburned, but him all the same. This is Jan. Ain’t she a honey, Leland?” Joe hopped aside and Jan came bashfully out of the shadowed hallway, drying her hands on her apron. She stood stolidly beside her bandy-legged husband as he introduced her and the children. “Pleased t’meetcha,” she mumbled when he had finished, then faded backward into the hall again, like a nocturnal creature back into the night. “She’s a little edgy around strangers,” Joe Ben explained proudly, as if listing the qualities of a prize bird dog. “But these here outfits ain’t, are you?” He dug the twins in the ribs, making them jump and squirm. “Hey, Hankus, where’s your woman, long as we’re showing our stock off to Leland?” “Damned if I know.” Hank looked about him. “Viv-yun! I haven’t seen her since outside. Maybe she seen ol’ Lee here coming an’ run for safety.” “She’s up getting out of her Levis,” Jan volunteered, then added quickly, “an’ inta a dress, inta a dress. Me an’ her are going in to hear this fella at the church talk.” “Viv’s trying to be what they called a ‘Informed Female,’ bub,” Hank apologized. “Ever’ so often a woman gets an itch to be in on the social whirl, you know. Gives ’em something to do.” “Well sir by god if we ain’t gonna sit down”—the old man pivoted on the rubber tip mounted at the bottom of his cast— “then let’s get back at the grub. Let’s start puttin’ some meat on this boy.” He rocked away toward the kitchen. “You want something to eat right now, bub?” “What? I hadn’t thought about it.” “Come on!” Henry called from the kitchen. “Bring that boy in here to the table.” Lee stared numbly in the direction of the voice. “You sprouts keep out from underfoot. Joe, get your brood out from underfoot afore they get ground to dust!” The children scattered, laughing. Lee stood, blinking at the bald kitchen light through the hallway: “Hank, I think what I might like to do—” He heard the boom of the cast returning. “Leland! You like pork chops, don’t you? Jan, could you get the boy a plate?” “I might like to—” Who is this brittle old creation of limestone and wood, played by Lon Chaney? Is this my father? “Here. Put your jacket right over here. You dang kids!” “Better watch out, bub. Don’t ever get between him an’ the dinner table.” “Hank”—WATCH OUT—“I think I’ll—” “Sit here, boy.” Henry pulled him into the brightly lit kitchen by the wrist. “I got you some java, that’ll perk you up.” Tree roots. “Here you go, two or three of these chops an’ this here sweet potato...” “Maybe you’d like some peas?” Jan asked. “Thanks, Jan, I—” “You bet!” Henry thundered around the chair toward the stove. “You ain’t got nothin’ agin black-eye peas, do you, son?” “No, but, what I might do...” “And how ’bout some of this pear preserves.” “Mig............