Falconer+-+John+Cheever

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Falconer 28 their loved ones. They were free, free to run, jump, fuck, drink, book a seat on the Tokyo plane. They were free and yet they moved so casually through this precious element that it seemed wasted on them. There was no appreciation of freedom in the way they moved. A man stooped to pull up his socks. A woman rooted through her handbag to make sure she had the keys. A younger woman, glancing at the overcast sky, put up a green umbrella. An old and very ugly woman dried her tears with a scrap of paper. These were their constraints, the signs of their confinement, but there was some naturalness, some unself-consciousness about their imprisonment that he, watching them between bars, cruelly lacked. This was not pain, nothing so simple and clear as that. All he could identify was some disturbance in his tear ducts, a blind, unthinking wish to cry. Tears were easy; a good ten-minute hand job. He wanted to cry and howl. He was among the living dead. There were no words, no living words, to suit this grief, this cleavage. He was primordial man confronted with romantic love. His eyes began to water as the last of the visitors, the last shoe, disappeared. He sat on his bunk and took in his right hand the most interesting, worldly, responsive and nostalgic object in the cell. “Speed it up,” said Chicken Number Two. “You only got eight minutes to chow.” Cellblock F was only half tenanted. Most of the toilets and locks on the upper tier were broken and these were empty. Nothing but the cell locks really worked and the toilet in Farragut’s cell flushed itself noisily and independently. The air of obsolescence—the feeling that these must surely be the last days of incarceration— was strong. Of the twenty men in F, Farragut, at the end of two weeks, fell into a family group that consisted of Chicken Number Two, Bumpo, the Stone, the Cuckold, Ransome and Tennis. This organization was deeply mysterious. Ransome was a very tall and a handsome man who was supposed to have murdered his father. Farragut had quickly learned never to ask a comrade what he was
Falconer 29 doing in Falconer. It would be a stupid violation of the terms on which they lived with one another, and in any case the truth was not in them. Ransome was laconic. He spoke to almost no one but the Stone, who was helpless. Everyone talked about the Stone. Some criminal organization had pierced his eardrums with an ice pick. They had then framed him, bought him a long sentence and given him a two-hundred-dollar hearing machine. This was a canvas carrier that hung from his shoulders by straps. It contained a plastic flesh-colored receiver, a pipe to his right ear and four batteries. Ransome guided the Stone to and from mess, urged him to wear his hearing appliance and changed his batteries when they faded. He almost never spoke to anyone else. Tennis had come on hard on Farragut’s second day, early in the morning when they had swept their cells and were waiting for chow. “I’m Lloyd Haversham, Jr.,” he said. “Does that name ring a bell? No? They call me Tennis. I thought you might know because you look like the sort of man who might play tennis. I won the Spartanburg doubles, twice in a row. I’m the second man in the history of tennis to have done this. I learned on private courts, of course. I’ve never played on a public court. I’m listed in the sports encyclopedia, the dictionary of sports greats, I’m a member of the tennis academy and I was cover story in the March issue of Racquets. Racquets is the leading publication of the tennis equipment industry.” While he talked, Tennis displayed all the physical business of a hard sell—hands, shoulders, pelvis, everything was in motion. “I’m in here because of a clerical error, an error in banking. I’m a visitor, a transient, I see the parole board in a few days and I’ll be out then. I deposited thirteen thousand dollars in the Bank for Mutual Savings on the morning of the ninth and wrote three checks for two hundred dollars before the deposit had cleared. By accident I used my roommate’s checkbook—he was runner-up in the Spartanburg doubles and never forgave me for my victory. All a man needs is a little jealousy and a clerical error—bad luck—and they throw him into jail, but
Page 3 and 4: FALCONER JOHN CHEEVER
Page 5 and 6: Falconer 3 Copyright Falconer Copyr
Page 7 and 8: Falconer 5 eForeword During a writi
Page 9 and 10: Falconer 7 Falconer
Page 11 and 12: Falconer 9 but was manacled to nine
Page 13 and 14: Falconer 11 the guard. But all of t
Page 15 and 16: Falconer 13 They went up a sloping
Page 17 and 18: Falconer 15 Farragut’s first visi
Page 19 and 20: Falconer 17 “What,” she asked,
Page 21 and 22: Falconer 19 with his, deeply thrill
Page 23 and 24: Falconer 21 across his face. Her br
Page 25 and 26: Falconer 23 gamy; he thought that p
Page 27 and 28: Falconer 25 “Shall we change the
Page 29: Falconer 27 She had begun to have t
Page 33 and 34: Falconer 31 class. And willingness,
Page 35 and 36: Falconer 33 churches, at some times
Page 37 and 38: Falconer 35 convicts, and there wer
Page 39 and 40: Falconer 37 It was half and half. H
Page 41 and 42: Falconer 39 outstripped the human s
Page 43 and 44: Falconer 41 planted with costly fir
Page 45 and 46: Falconer 43 avoid excitement. It se
Page 47 and 48: Falconer 45 water, wiped his ass on
Page 49 and 50: Falconer 47 Liechtenstein. His back
Page 51 and 52: Falconer 49 against the image of th
Page 53 and 54: Falconer 51 will not go to the club
Page 55 and 56: Falconer 53 rise. This clowning was
Page 57 and 58: Falconer 55 twice a week. There’s
Page 59 and 60: Falconer 57 at him,” said Farragu
Page 61 and 62: Falconer 59 much a citizen. As a ta
Page 63 and 64: Falconer 61 find a church. In the p
Page 65 and 66: Falconer 63 shoulder—and I lay on
Page 67 and 68: Falconer 65 “You are not the most
Page 69 and 70: Falconer 67 took the funicular up,
Page 71 and 72: Falconer 69 Farragut was still limp
Page 73 and 74: Falconer 71 fall, Farragut stood at
Page 75 and 76: Falconer 73 forty-five-thousand-dol
Page 77 and 78: Falconer 75 won’t stuff their wiv
Page 79 and 80: Falconer 77 Now watch me smile. See
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Falconer 79 you outside the infirma
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Falconer 81 University. He would be
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Falconer 83 mileage he could expect
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Falconer 85 once, when he got off t
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Falconer 87 ice cream and coffee. A
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Falconer 89 experience of alienatio
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Falconer 91 one another doesn’t g
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Falconer 93 money was. They took Ca
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Falconer 95 anything but did I know
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Falconer 97 remembered the panic he
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Falconer 99 As the day of the cardi
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Falconer 101 Farragut got what he h
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Falconer 103 target and out the doo
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Falconer 105 what we might compare
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Falconer 107 He took off his robe a
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Falconer 109 It was an August day;
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Falconer 111 daughter of Ling Chou
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Falconer 113 thought, immeasurable,
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Falconer 115 “I don’t know the
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Falconer 117 PETER, HAS ARRANGED FO
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Falconer 119 squares and put this i
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Falconer 121 only get into the show
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Falconer 123 churches where a beref
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Falconer 125 another and the thin,
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Falconer 127 his thighs and his che
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Falconer 129 “No, no, no,” said
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Falconer 131 cashmere sweaters, sil
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Falconer 133 flames and a rush of s
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Falconer 135 about your willingness
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Falconer 137 was just big enough to
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Falconer 139 Wall, or the Amana Pri
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Falconer 141 with palms. She rams t
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Falconer 143 I ain’t going to sin
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Falconer 145 Farragut had stolen an
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Falconer 147 worse and then she sug
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Falconer 149 believe it. Like there
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Falconer 151 intended for his last
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Falconer 153 from the back. They we
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Falconer 155 the room after a page
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Falconer 157 there’s your piano a
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Falconer 159 before I’ll be mista
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Falconer 161 got no fear, no fear a
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Falconer 163 his grave was no more
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Falconer 165 of some stair. The bla
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Falconer 167 At a distant corner un
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Falconer 169 Farragut put his arms
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