"No questions. Just general depression."
"Wrong kind of hospital, Tal."
"But the right kind of personnel."
"Need some kind of therapy?"
"Something like that."
She looked at her watch. "Come back at twelve. We close at noon on
Saturday. I'll feed you and we'll cook up something to do."
The day was not as dreary when I drove away. I returned at twelve.
I went up to the house with her, and the three of us ate in the big
kitchen. Dr. Buck Stamm was a skilled storyteller. Apparently every
misfortune that could happen to a veterinary had happened to him. He
reviled his profession, and his own stupidity in getting into it in the
first place. After a cigar he went off to make farm calls. I helped
Ruth with a few dishes.
"How about a plain old tour of the surrounding country," she suggested.
"There are parts that are very nice."
"Then dinner tonight and a movie or something?"
"Sold. It's Saturday night."
She changed to slacks and a tweed jacket over a yellow sweater and we
took my car. She gave me the directions. We took small back roads. It
was pretty country, with rolling hills and spines of rock that stuck
out of the hills. In the city the day had been gloomy. Out in the
country it was no better, but the breeze seemed moist with spring. The
new leaves were a pale green. She sat slouched in the seat with one
knee up against the glove compartment and pointed out the farms, told
me about the people, told me about the history of the area.
At her suggestion I took a back road that led to a place called
Highland Lake. She told me when to slow down. When we came to a dirt
road we turned right. A mile down the slippery, muddy road was a sign
that said _B. Stamm_. I went cautiously down an overgrown drive through
the woods until we came to a small cabin with a big porch overlooking
a small lake less than a mile long and half as wide. I could see other
cabins in the trees along the lake shore.
We went onto the cabin porch and sat on the railing and smoked and
talked and watched the quick winds furrow the lake surface.
"We don't get up here as much as we used to when Mother was alive. Dad
talks about selling it, but I don't think he will. He hunts up here in
the fall. It's only eighteen miles from town, the shortest way. It's
pretty primitive, but you know, Tal, this would be a good place to
write."