“Plenty of people wouldn’t classify you as a straight good,” Thomas Hudson told him.
“No. Nor do I claim to be. Nor even good nor anywhere near good. I wish I were though. Being against evil doesn’t make you good. Tonight I was against it and then I was evil myself. I could feel it coming in just like a tide.”
“All fights are bad.”
“I know it. But what are you going to do about them?”
“You have to win them when they start.”
“Sure. But I was taking pleasure in it from the minute it started.”
“You would have taken more pleasure if he could have fought.”
“I hope so,” Roger said. “Though I don’t know now. I just want to destroy them. But when you start taking pleasure in it you are awfully close to the thing you’re fighting.”
“He was an awful type,” Thomas Hudson said.
“He couldn’t have been any worse than the last one on the coast. The trouble is, Tommy, there are so many of them. They have them in all countries and they are getting bigger all the time. Times aren’t good, Tommy.”
“When did you ever see them good?”
“We always had good times.”
“Sure. We had good times in all sorts of good places. But the times weren’t good.”
“I never knew,” Roger said. “Everybody claimed they were good and then everybody was busted. I didn’t have any money when they all had it. Then when I had some was when things were really bad. But people didn’t always seem as goddamned mean and evil though.”
“You’ve been going around with awful people, too.”
“I see some good ones once in a while.”
“Not very many.”
“Sure I do. You don’t know all my friends.”
“You run with a pretty seedy lot.”
“Whose friends were those tonight? Your friends or my friends?”
“Our friends. They’re not so bad. They’re worthless but they’re not really evil.”
“No,” said Roger. “I guess not. Frank is pretty bad. Bad enough. I don’t think he’s evil though. But there’s a lot of stuff I can’t take anymore. And he and Fred eviled up awfully fast.”
“I know about good and evil. I’m not trying to misunderstand nor play dumb.”
“I don’t know much about good because I’ve always been a failure at it. That evil is my dish. I can recognize that old evil.”
“I’m sorry tonight turned out so lousy.”
“I’m just feeling low.”
“Do you want to turn in? You better sleep here.”
“Thanks. I will if you don’t mind. But I think I’ll go in the library and read for a while. Where are those Australian stories you had the last time I was here?”
“Henry Lawson’s?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll get them.”
Thomas Hudson went to bed and when he woke in the night the light was still on in the library.
V
When Thomas Hudson woke there was a light east breeze blowing and out across the flats the sand was bone white under the blue sky and the small high clouds that were traveling with the wind made dark moving patches on the green water. The wheel of the wind charger was turning in the breeze and it was a fine fresh-feeling morning.
Roger was gone and Thomas Hudson breakfasted by himself and read the Mainland paper that had come across yesterday. He had put it away without reading it to save it for breakfast.
“What time the boys coming in?” Joseph asked.
“Around noon.”
“They’ll be here for lunch though?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Roger was gone when I came,” Joseph said. “He didn’t have any breakfast.”
“Maybe he’ll be in now.”
“Boy said he see him go off sculling in the dinghy.”
After Thomas Hudson had finished breakfast and the paper he went out on the porch on the ocean side and went to work. He worked well and was nearly finished when he heard Roger come in and come up the stairs.
Roger looked over his shoulder and said, “It’s going to be good.”
“Maybe.”
“Where did you see those waterspouts?”
“I never saw these. These are some I’m doing to order. How’s your hand?”
“Still puffy.”
Roger watched him work and he did not turn around.