Falconer+-+John+Cheever

Falconer 104
to carry, but I knew how kind he was being to me, and that’s the
way I feel today.”
There was applause—exactly the noise of water striking stone—
but unlike the indecipherable noise of water, its intent was clearly
grateful and polite. Farragut remembered applause most vividly
when he had heard it outside the theater, hall or church where it
sounded. He had heard it most clearly as a bystander waiting in a
parking lot on a summer night, waiting for the show to break. It
had always astonished and deeply moved him to realize that so
diverse and warlike a people could have agreed on this signal of
enthusiasm and assent. The warden passed the public address
system to the commissioner. The commissioner had gray hair,
wore a gray suit and a gray tie, and reminded Farragut of the
grayness and angularity of office filing cabinets in the far, far away.
“Your Eminence,” he said, reading his speech from a paper and
evidently for the first time. “Ladies and gentlemen.” He frowned,
raised his face and his heavy eyebrows at this error of his speech
writer. “Gentlemen!” he exclaimed. “I want to express my
gratitude and the gratitude of the governor to the cardinal, who
for the first time in the history of this diocese and perhaps in the
whole history of mankind has visited a rehabilitation center in a
helicopter. The governor sends his sincere regrets at not being able
to express his gratitude in person, but he is, as you must all know,
touring the flood-disaster areas in the northwestern part of the
state. We hear these days”—he picked up a head of steam—“a
great deal about prison reform. Best sellers are written about
prison reform. Professional so-called penologists travel from coast
to coast, speaking on prison reform. But where does prison reform
begin? In bookstores? In lecture halls? No. Prison reform, like all
sincere endeavors at reform, begins at home, and where is home?
Home is prison! We have come here today to commemorate a
bold step made possible by the Fiduciary University of Banking,
the archdiocese, the Department of Correction and above all the
prisoners themselves. All four of us together have accomplished