ISLANDS IN THE STREAM

“He’d be the most famous of all,” Andrew said. “He’d be immortal.”

“I hope nothing happened to him,” David said. “I hope he’s all right.”

“I know he’s all right,” Roger told him. “The way he was hooked and the way he fought I know he was all right.”

“I’ll tell you sometime how it was,” David said.

“Tell now,” Andy urged him.

“I’m tired now and besides it sounds crazy.”

“Tell now. Tell a little bit,” Andrew said.

“I don’t know whether I better. Should I, papa?”

“Go ahead,” Thomas Hudson said.

“Well,” David said with his eyes tight shut. “In the worst parts, when I was the tiredest I couldn’t tell which was him and which was me.”

“I understand,” Roger said.

“Then I began to love him more than anything on earth.”

“You mean really love him?” Andrew asked.

“Yeah. Really love him.”

“Gee,” said Andrew. “I can’t understand that.”

“I loved him so much when I saw him coming up that I couldn’t stand it,” David said, his eyes still shut. “All I wanted was to see him closer.”

“I know,” Roger said.

“Now I don’t give a shit I lost him,” David said. “I don’t care about records. I just thought I did. I’m glad that he’s all right and that I’m all right. We aren’t enemies.”

“I’m glad you told us,” Thomas Hudson said.

“Thank you very much, Mr. Davis, for what you said when I first lost him,” David said with his eyes still shut.

Thomas Hudson never knew what it was that Roger had said to him.

X

That night in the heavy calm before the wind rose Thomas Hudson sat in his chair and tried to read. The others were all in bed but he knew he could not sleep and he wanted to read until he was sleepy. He could not read and he thought about the day. He thought about it from the beginning until the end and it seemed as though all of his children except Tom had gone a long way away from him or he had gone away from them.

David had gone with Roger. He wanted David to get everything he could from Roger, who was as beautiful and sound in action as he was unbeautiful and unsound in his life and in his work. David was always a mystery to Thomas Hudson. He was a well-loved mystery. But Roger understood him better than his own father did. He was happy they did understand each other so well but tonight he felt lonely in some way about it.

Then he had not liked the way Andrew had behaved, although he knew Andrew was Andrew and a little boy and that it was unfair to judge him. He had done nothing bad and he had really behaved very well. But there was something about him that you could not trust.

What a miserable, selfish way to be thinking about people that you love, he thought. Why don’t you remember the day and not analyze it and tear it to pieces? Go to bed now, he told himself, and make yourself sleep. The hell with anything else. And pick up the rhythm of your life in the morning. You don’t have the boys for much longer. See how happy a time you can make for them. I’ve tried, he said to himself. I’ve tried truly and for Roger, too. And you have been very happy yourself, he told himself. Yes, of course. But something about today frightened me. Then he told himself: truly, there is something about every day to frighten you. Go on to bed and maybe you’ll sleep well. Remember you want them to be happy tomorrow.

A big southwest wind came up in the night and by daylight it was slowing with almost the force of a gale. The palms were bent with it and shutters slammed and papers blew and a surf was piling on the beach.

Roger was gone when Thomas Hudson came down to breakfast alone. The boys were still sleeping and he read his mail that had come from the mainland on the run-boat that brought ice, meat, fresh vegetables, gas, and other supplies once a week. It was blowing so hard he put a coffee cup on a letter to hold it when he laid it down on the table.

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