been right about what was there, but it would be too late by the time someone stumbled upon it.
What she and her boss were doing was puny in the face of the forces arrayed against the San: cattle, drought, poachers, the encroachment of farmers and western culture, the disillusionment of San teenagers, tuberculosis, the loss of language, tourism, the list went on.
White Dog buried her snout in Alice’s bent elbow and urged her up and out of bed.
Itumeleng was in the kitchen already, scrubbing a pot with salt. She’d burned beans in it a couple of days before. Magoo was waiting for breakfast.
Today she would call Muriel. And her mother. Tell them. The words came to her. It’s a fearful thing to love what death can touch. Her mother would understand with her whole being. Muriel would understand less.
45
Her mother’s voice came to her distantly, as though an ocean current were flowing through the phone line. Only a couple of weeks before, Alice had written her mother that she’d fallen in love with someone she felt she could love forever. Today, she told her that Ian was dead. Across oceans, she cried. Her mother offered to get on the next plane, and Alice told her no.
“I’ll quit my job, take a leave of absence.”
“No, Mom.”
They went back and forth. She heard her mother’s stifled crying. “You’re so far away.”
“I’ll find my feet again.”
“Come home.”
“I can’t, Mom. Not now, not yet.”
The connection went dead. She tried calling back but couldn’t get through. She didn’t want to return to Cincinnati. Out the window she saw White Dog sitting by the driveway. She thought of Checkers, the black and white dog of her childhood who used to sit beside her bed all night.
Her bedroom had been on the second floor of an old house. A huge silver maple grew in her neighbor’s yard, its limbs stretched toward her window. When the night was still, the leaves whispered, and when the wind was shrill, the branches tossed and banged against the house, like a raging old man. Let me in, let me in! A squirrel built a nest she could see from her window, lined with shredded bark and grass. Baby squirrels were born hairless, their eyes closed. Their parents rushed around all day and brought them sumac fuzz to eat. The nest turned fuzzy pink. The babies grew and ran about on the limbs. New people bought the house next door, and they had the tree cut down. The great limbs lay on the ground like fallen elephants. By the end of the week, only sawdust and a stump remained.
That kind of sorrow was what waited for her in Cincinnati. What would they do all day? Cry? Every morning she’d wake up to the memory of a loss. One loss would give way to another, the way a fire travels underground after lightning strikes a tree, the roots of one tree igniting the next.
She tried calling her mother again without success. There was something she needed to say.
She remembered as a teenager thinking, It’s easy enough to love a dead man. They require no understanding. They aren’t unreasonable or moody or demanding. They want nothing but loyalty. Well, your daughter’s alive. She’s living under your nose. Try loving her, why don’t you?
She’d been unfair back then. Her mother had loved her and still loved her. What more could she ask for? She’d like to tell her that she’d been as good a mother as she knew how to be. But she still didn’t want to be in Cincinnati.
Her mother called back the following day and asked her once again to come home.
“I can’t leave right now, Mom. I need to ride this out here.”
“Because he’s buried there?”
“That’s part of it.”
“I understand.”
“You’re the best mother anyone could have. I just need to be here. And I want you to be living your life there.”
“I’ll worry about you every moment.”
“Mom, I’ve got to get to work. Please don’t worry. I’m going to be all right. I have friends here who care. Will and Greta. Muriel. My neighbor, Lillian.”
“I miss you, darling. You’re too far away.”
“I know, Mom. I’m sorry. I love you.”
They said good-bye, and Alice sat for a moment by the phone. One of her earliest memories was sitting in a kitchen sink, her mother holding a bar of Sweetheart soap and running her hands over the bones of her shoulders. Never again would the love between them be that uncomplicated.
A letter arrived that