Farewell Summer

"Yes, sir."

"Now." Cal Quartermain leaned forward so his wicker bones creaked. "What is it you want to know?"

"Everything," said Douglas.

"Everything?" Quartermain laughed gently. "That'll take at least ten minutes."

"How about something?" said Douglas finally.

"Something? One special thing? Why, Doug, that will take a lifetime. I've been at it a while. Everything rolls off my tongue, easy as pie. But something! Something! I get lockjaw just trying to define it. So let's talk about everything instead, for now. When you finally unhinge your tongue and find one special eternal forever thing of substance, let me know. Promise?"

"Promise."

"Now, where were we? Life? There's an everything topic. You want to know all about life?"

Douglas nodded, head ducked.

"Steel yourself."

Douglas looked up and fixed Quartermain with a stare like the sky and all of time waiting.

"Well, to begin…" He paused and held out his hand for Douglas's empty glass. "You're going to need this, son."

Quartermain poured. Douglas took and drank.

"Life," said the old man, and murmured, muttered, and murmured again.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CALVIN C. QUARTERMAIN WOKE BECAUSE SOME-one had said something or called out in the night air.

But that was impossible. Nobody or nothing had.

He looked out the window at the great face of the courthouse clock and could almost hear it clearing its throat, preparing to announce three in the morning.

"Who's there?" Quartermain said into the cool night air.

Me.

"How's that again?" Quartermain lifted his head and peered left and right.

Me. Remember?

And now he looked down along the quilt.

Without moving his hands to touch and find, he knew his old friend was there. A bare subsistence of friend, but still, friend.

He did not lift his head to peer down along the sheets to the small mound there below his navel, between his legs. It was hardly more than a heartbeat, a pulse, a lost member, a ghost of flesh. But it was there.

"So you're back?" he said to the ceiling, and snorted a chopped-off laugh. "It's been a long while."

In reply, a soft pulse of recognition.

"How long will you stay?"

The slender mound beat its own private heart twice, three times, but showed no signs of going anywhere; it seemed it would stay awhile.

"Is this your very last visit?" asked Quartermain.

Who can saj? was the silent reply of his old friend revisiting, nested in a wirework of ancient hair.

I do not so much mind my scalp turning gray, Quartermain had once said, but when you find whiteness sprouting down there, to hell with it. Let the rest of me age, but not that!

But age he did and age it did. He was all of a dead winter grayness now. Still, there was this heartbeat, this tender and incredible pulse saluting him, a promise of spring, a seedbed of memory, a touch of… what was the word out there in the town in this strange weather when everyone's juices roused again?

Farewell summer.

Dear God, yes.

Don't go yet. Stay. I need a friend.

His friend stayed. And they talked. At three in the morning.

"Why do I feel so happy?" said Quartermain. "What's been going on? Was I mad? Am I cured? Is this the cure?" Quartermain's teeth chattered with an outrageous laugh.

I just came to say goodbye, the voice whispered.

"Goodbye?" Quarterman's laughter caught in his throat. "Does that mean-"

It does, came the whisper. It's been a lot of years. It's time to

"Time, yes," said Quartermain, his eyes watering. "Where are you going?"

Can't say. You'll know when the time comes. "How will I know?"

You'll see me. I'll be there.

"How will I know it's you?"

You'll know. You've always known everything, but me above all.

"You're not leaving town?"

No, no. I'll be around. But when you see me, don't embarrass anyone, all right?

"Of course."

The quilt and the sheets under the quilt were lowering, melting to rest. The whisper grew fainter.

"Wherever you go… " began Quartermain.

Yes?

"I wish you a long life, a good life, a happy one."

Thank you.

A pause. Silence. Quartermain found he didn't know what to say next.

Goodbye then?

The old man nodded, his eyes misted with tears.

His bed, the coverlet, his body was flat as a table-top. What had been there for seventy years was now totally and completely gone.

"Goodbye," said Mr. Quartermain into the still night air.

/ wonder, he thought, where, oh just where in hell he has gone?

The great courthouse clock struck three. And Mr. Quartermain slept.

Douglas opened his eyes in the dark. The town clock finished the last stroke of three.