534
RUSSELL BANKS
soft and low and he speaks slowly. I'm in room forty-seven. He goes
into his pocket, and drawing out his room key, dangles it in front of
the clerk's wide-open face. I want two things, the man says. Yes,
sir, the clerk answers. First, my car. It's stuck downtown on Main
Street, right next to a place called The Home Port. It's a black
Volkswagen sedan and can be towed back here easily. Do you know
of someone you can get at this hour who'll tow my car back here?
The clerk nods affirmatively. Good. The second thing I want is to
be wakened at six. The clerk zips out his ball-point pen and writes
down carefully,
Wake
47
at 6:00.
Is that it? he asks. Yes, the man
answers. He reaches into his pocket again, this time pulling out
his
wallet, and hands the clerk a five-dollar bill. This is to cover your
trouble in making sure that my car gets back here tonight. I assume
that the towing charges can be added to my bill? Right, the old man
says. We have a kid with a jeep here all night, plowing, you know.
He'll run down and get your car for you. All right, the man says. I'll
be checking out in the morning. Yes, sir, the clerk answers. Good
night, sir.
Listen to me, it's fine for you to lie there and tell me all about
my kind of guilt syndrome, you can tell me all about it all night long
if you want, and I'll lie quietly next to you and listen closely and
with gratitude. You're an extremely intelligent woman who's blessed
with remarkable insight. I can appreciate all that. God knows how
important to both of us your particular insights into my guilt syn–
drome have been. Frankly, they've managed to save our marriage.
I can confess that. No, really. I
must
confess that. I don't want to
end up feeling guilty for unspoken gratitude, now do I? No. Okay,
then. What I was saying is that it's all well and good for you to lie
there and tell me how convoluted my guilt syndrome is, how I bury
it with wordy evasions, lies, rationalizations and buck-passing, and
it's all right for you to observe to me that one of my most effective
devices, when confronted by something for which I must feel guilt,
is simple silence and outright detachment. You're right about all that.
I'm not arguing with you over it. I concede it. Personally, I think
that these are the kinds of insights on your part that have saved our
marriage. I don't think we'd be married today if you hadn't pushed
them into my face, again and again. I mean this. Ten years we've
