Falconer+-+John+Cheever

Falconer 155
the room after a page or two. Eben went on reading to the neardead,
the truncated, the blind and the dying. Considering
Farragut’s passion for blue sky, he thought his brother
contemptible; although they looked enough like one another to be
taken for twins. Farragut did not like to look at his brother and he
kept his eyes on the floor. Eben read to the end of the chapter and
as they were leaving Farragut asked him why he had chosen
Romola.
“It was their choice,” said Eben.
“But the red one fell asleep,” said Farragut.
“They often do,” he said. “One doesn’t, this late in life, blame
them for anything. One doesn’t take offense.”
On the drive home Farragut sat as far from his brother as possible.
Marcia opened the door. “Oh, I’m terribly sorry, Eben,” she said,
“but your wife is very upset. We were talking about the family and
something she remembered or something I said made her cry.”
“She cries all the time,” said Eben. “Don’t pay any attention to her.
She cries at parades, rock music; last year she cried through the
whole World Series. Don’t take it seriously, don’t blame yourself.
Do sit down and let me get you a drink.”
Marcia’s face was pale. She saw the tragic household, Farragut
knew, much more clearly than he. Eben was working at that time
as a paid executive for some charitable foundation that carried on
the tradition of distributing skinny chickens. His marriage could
be dismissed, if one were that superficial, as an extraordinary
sentimental and erotic collision. There were the lives of the two
children to be considered, and their lives seemed ruined by the
reverberations of this matrimonial crash. The young man, Eben’s
only son, was serving a two-year sentence in the Cincinnati
workhouse for his part in some peace demonstration against some
war. Rachel, the daughter, had tried three times to kill herself.
Farragut had exorcised the details, but they would be remembered