🎧 320: They drank . . .

     They drank their drinks and made plans for the wedding, and, very late, they went to their beds. Herb made such tender love to Lorna that she thought the proposal-and-acceptance scene must have touched him, and she smiled in the dark at his sentimentality. There was, however, another reason for his tenderness. He hadn’t mentioned, in telling the story about Miss Decker, the fact that when he had looked up from his desk, surprised by Miss Decker’s arrival, he had had on his desk a letter from Bertha, the letter she had begun writing the night they left Chacallit. She had taken a long time deciding to send it, but the bitter taste she associated with Lorna kept coming back, and sweet foods wouldn’t drive it away. Finally she decided that there was only one way to eliminate it. She mailed the letter.

Dear Herb,

It pains me to have to write this letter, but now that I have gotten to know you a little bit, I know that it would be wrong not to tell you what I think you should know. I think you should know that when Lorna was a girl she did things she shouldn’t have done with our uncle Luther. I know you’re wondering how I know this, and I have to tell you that I know because I saw with my own eyes. I should have spoken up at the time, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was just a girl myself naturally. I wouldn’t even have known what words to use. I hardly know what words to use now. What they did was what the rooster does to the hen. It was what the bullock does to the cow. I’m sure you know what I’m getting at! Even if you never lived on a farm! But I’m sorry that I have to tell you that they did much more than that. I know you will understand how hard it is for me to say these things. And how shocked I was as a little girl to see these things. How can I put it? The cow does not try to swallow the bull’s pizzle, does she? Well, that’s one way Lorna didn’t behave like a cow, if you take my meaning. I’m sure I don’t have to go on. You must be able to imagine the things that went on between Lorna and our uncle Luther. And I’m sure it wasn’t Luther who started all of this. In fact, now that I think of it, I remember that it was Lorna who started it all. I remember her begging Luther to take her for a ride in his sleigh, and he didn’t want to, of course, because it was dangerous. But she kept asking him please, please won’t you take me? And he kept telling her no, that it was too dangerous. So she took his hand and put it right under her dress. I remember it now. I remember seeing it. They were in the barn. It sent a chill up my spine because it was Uncle Luther’s hurt hand, the one that doesn’t have all its fingers, and I could imagine what it must feel like to have that hand there. It wasn’t Luther’s fault though. Men are weak. I’m sorry that I had to bring you the pain of this news. I just thought that you should know.

Hoping you are well,

Bertha Reuter

     Herb had sat, staring at the letter, not at all certain what he thought of it. Then Miss Decker had arrived. After she had gone, he looked at the letter again, and he decided that what Bertha said must be true. It was the chill down the spine, Bertha’s revulsion at the thought of having Luther’s damaged hand between her legs, that made him believe it. He sat looking out the window for the rest of the afternoon, and by the time Garth called out that it was time to close up and head for home, Herb had decided that Luther must have been the man who taught Lorna the things that surprised him in bed. He couldn’t agree with Bertha that Luther hadn’t been at fault. Luther was a man; Lorna was a child. Nor could he agree with Bertha that the things she said were things he ought to know. What made her write this? he asked himself. What really made her write it? This is the sort of thing a person does to get even. Get even for what? For May’s teasing? That doesn’t make sense. Nobody would write this because of some teasing. There’s got to be more to it. Jealousy, I’ll bet. She must have been jealous of Lorna and Luther. That must be it. Bertha wanted Luther. God, how she must have taken it out on Lorna when they were kids. Poor Lorna. And poor fat, miserable Bertha. She made herself crazy.
     Herb was wrong in nearly all the particulars, but right in nearly all the essentials. He destroyed the letter. He was determined never to mention it or its assertions and never to let it affect his feelings for Lorna. In all the rest of his life, he never did mention it, but it did affect his feelings for Lorna. Every now and then, when he saw worry in Lorna’s puckered brow, he was reminded of the suffering he supposed Bertha had inflicted on her, and he embraced Lorna with a comforting tenderness that surprised and delighted her. Whenever he saw Bertha, he treated her with maddening solicitude, as an object of pity, and on the one occasion when Bertha dared whisper a reference to her letter, Herb patted her hand, smiled the smile we smile when we’re listening to the incomprehensible babbling of toddlers, and said, “Dut, dut, dut,” which baffled and infuriated her.

In Topical Guide 320, Mark Dorset considers Letters, Correspondence, Motives for: Revenge and Letters: “Poison Pen” from this episode.

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