Searching for Caleb

"Whose little girl are you?"

"Caroline's."

"Caroline's? I thought she was the baby, I thought she died."

"Only after she grew up," said Justine. "Duncan is Uncle Two's."

"Two's? Oh, Justin Two."

He contemplated the pigeon, whose feathers reminded him of a changeable taffeta dress that Maggie Rose had once worn. Justin Two was the most demanding of all her children, he seemed to remember; the loudest and the shrillest, the most likely to interrupt a conversation. "Tell me," he said, "is he still the same?"

"Yes," said Justine, as if she knew what he meant.

He laughed.

Justine said, "Listen. You can't stay here! I went to that office in there to ask for you and they said, 'He's out by the tree, but you've only got twenty minutes. Then visiting hours will be over,' they said. I said, 'But I've been traveling since yesterday! I am his great-niece Justine Peck and I've come all the way from Caro Mill, Maryland. I have to spend more than twenty minutes!" 'Sorry, Miss,' they said, 'rules are rules.' You can't stay in a place like this!"

"It's true," said Caleb, "they do like rules."

"Will you come? We could leave this evening."

"Oh, well you see they'd never let me do it," Caleb said. "No. You weren't the person who signed me in here, they'd never just let me ... or if they did, there'd be so much paperwork. It would take some arranging.

Perhaps several weeks before they would allow me to-"

"Allow you.'" Justine said. "What, are you in prison?"

Caleb blinked and looked around him.

"Never mind, just come," said Justine. "You already have your coat on.

There's nothing you want from inside, is there? We can go over the wall in back, where it's lowest. They won't even see us leave."

"You mean-escape?" said Caleb.

"Won't you just come away with me?"

People had been saying that to him all his life. He had still not learned to turn them down.

19

Every now and then Justine would catch a glimpse of Caleb-as he passed a doorway, or skimmed in and out of view in front windows while walking the porch-and she would mistake him for Grandfather Peck and her heart would leap. She had never managed to believe that some people truly will not be seen again. Look, there was that jutting head, the glint of silver hair, the long nose pinched white at the tip! But then she would notice his eyes. The shock of brown eyes in her grandfather's face. Or she would call and he would answer instantly, wincing if she spoke to him too loudly, which she was always doing, out of habit. Or his clothes gave him away-her grandfather's, yes, but on Caleb they looked scruffy and poorly cut. She sank back, wherever she was, and Duncan looked at her curiously but said nothing. Duncan was playing Battue now, moving yellow plastic disks among a triangle of pegs. For him it appeared to be another game of solitaire, not a puzzle; he had solved the puzzle years ago. The disks clicked steadily like the beads of an abacus or a rosary, their rhythm dictated by the churning of private thoughts. What were Duncan's private thoughts? He wouldn't say. He kept the bourbon bottle beside him, always nearly empty, it seemed, its cheap wavery glass perfectly clear down to the inch or so of yellow in the bottom. Occasionally he smoked a doll-sized metal pipe containing foul-smelling leaves and seeds and stems.

Then he would grow dreamy and whimsical, although the leaves were so old now (having been stored nearly forever in an oregano bottle in the kitchen) that Justine suspected they had lost all their potency. He suggested unusual projects-for instance, planting the little round seeds on some village green. "Once a year we could have a new ritual, the Burning of the Green. All the villagers could sit around breathing the smoke and getting happy on a specified day." Justine looked sideways at Caleb to see if he were shocked. He didn't seem to be.

He was not above accepting a slug or two of bourbon himself (those rigid, grandfatherly lips poised at the rim of a bottle!) and perhaps would have tried the pipe as well, if smoke did not make him cough. Nevertheless, Justine continually felt the need to tell him, "You mustn't think Duncan's always like this."

"He's not?" said Caleb.

"No, really he's just-it will pass."