“I was the finest judge of poireaux in the sixth arrondissement,” Thomas Hudson told the boys.
“What’s poireaux?”
“Leeks.”
“It looks like long, green, quite big onions,” young Tom said. “Only it’s not bright shiny like onions. It’s dull shiny. The leaves are green and the ends are white. You boil it and eat it cold with olive oil and vinegar mixed with salt and pepper. You eat the whole thing, top and all. It’s delicious. I believe I’ve eaten as much of it as maybe anyone in the world.”
“What’s the sixth whatever it is?” Andrew asked.
“You certainly hold up conversation,” David told him.
“If I don’t know French I have to ask.”
“Paris is divided into twenty arrondissements or city districts. We lived in the sixth.”
“Papa, can we skip the arrondissements and you tell us something else?” Andrew asked.
“You can’t stand to learn anything, you athlete,” David said.
“I want to learn,” Andrew said. “But arrondissements is too old for me. You’re always telling me things are too old for me. I admit that is too old for me. I can’t follow it.”
“What’s Ty Cobb’s lifetime batting average?” David asked him.
“Three sixty-seven.”
“That’s not too old for you.”
“Cut it out, David. Some people like baseball and you like arrondissements.”
“I suppose we don’t have arrondissements in Rochester.”
“Oh cut it out. I just thought papa and Mr. Davis knew things that would be more interesting to everybody than those damn—Oh hell, I can’t even remember the name of them.”
“You’re not supposed to swear when we are around,” Thomas Hudson corrected.
“I’m sorry, papa,” the small boy said. “I can’t help it that I’m so damn young. I’m sorry again. I mean so young.”
He was upset and hurt. David could tease him pretty successfully.
“You’ll get over being young,” Thomas Hudson told him. “I know it’s hard not to swear when your feelings get working. Only don’t swear in front of grown people. I don’t care what you say by yourselves.”
“Please, papa. I said I was sorry.”
“I know,” Thomas Hudson said. “I wasn’t bawling you out. I was just explaining. I see you guys so seldom it makes a lot of explaining.”
“Not much really, papa,” David said.
“No,” Thomas Hudson said. “It isn’t much.”
“Andrew never swears in front of mother,” David said.
“Leave me out, David. It’s over, isn’t it, papa?”
“If you boys want to really know how to swear,” young Tom said, “you ought to read Mr. Joyce.”
“I can swear as much as I need,” David said. “At least for now.”
“My friend Mr. Joyce has words and expressions I’d never even heard of. I’ll bet nobody could outswear him in any language.”
“Then after that he made up a whole new language,” Roger said. He was lying on his back on the beach with his eyes closed.
“I can’t understand that new language,” young Tom said. “I guess I’m not old enough for it. But wait until you boys read Ulysses.”
“That’s not for boys,” Thomas Hudson said. “It isn’t really. You couldn’t understand it and you shouldn’t try to. Really. You have to wait till you’re older.”
“I read it all,” young Tom said. “I couldn’t understand practically any of it when I first read it, papa, just as you say. But I kept on reading it and now there’s part of it I really understand and I can explain it to people. It’s certainly made me proud that I was one of Mr. Joyce’s friends.”
“Was he really a friend of Mr. Joyce, papa?” Andrew asked.
“Mr. Joyce always used to ask about him.”
“You’re damn right I was a friend of Mr. Joyce,” young Tom said. “He was one of the best friends I ever had.”
“I don’t think you better explain the book much yet,” Thomas Hudson said. “Not quite yet. What part is it that you explain?”
“The last part. The part where the lady talks out loud to herself.”
“The soliloquy,” David said.
“Have you read it?”
“Oh sure,” David said. “Tommy read it to me.”
“Did he explain it?”
“As well as he could. Some of it’s a little old for both of us.”
“Where did you get hold of it?”
“In the books at home. I borrowed it and took it to school.”
“You what?”
“I used to read passages of it out loud to the boys and tell them how Mr. Joyce was my friend and how much time we used to spend together.”
“How did the boys like it?”
“Some of the more devout boys thought it was a little strong.”
“Did they find out about it at school?”
“Sure. Didn’t you hear, papa? No, I guess that was when you were in Abyssinia. The headmaster was going to expel me but I explained Mr. Joyce was a great writer and a personal friend of mine so finally the headmaster said he’d keep the book and sent it home and I promised I’d consult him before I read anything else to the boys or attempted to explain any classics. First, when he was going to expel me, he thought I had a dirty mind. But I haven’t got a dirty mind, papa. That is, not any dirtier than anybody else’s.”
“Oh yes. He was going to confiscate it but I explained it was a first edition and that Mr. Joyce had written in it for you and that he couldn’t confiscate it because it wasn’t mine. I think he was very disappointed not to confiscate it.”
“When can I read that book by Mr. Joyce, papa?” Andrew asked.
“Not for a long time.”
“But Tommy read it.”
“Tommy is a friend of Mr. Joyce.”
“Boy, I’ll say I am,” said young Tom. “Papa, we never knew Balzac, did we?”
“No. He was before our time.”
“Nor Gautier? I found two swell ones by them at home too. The Droll Stories and Mademoiselle de Maupin. I don’t understand Mademoiselle de Maupin at all yet but I am reading it over to try to and it’s great. But if they weren’t friends of ours I think they would expel me sure if I read them to the boys.”
“How are they, Tommy?” David asked.
“Wonderful. You’ll like them both.”
“Why don’t you consult the headmaster as to whether you can read them to the boys?” Roger said. “They’re better than what the boys will dig up for themselves.”
“No, Mr. Davis. I don’t think I’d better. He might get that dirty-mind idea again. Anyway, with the boys it wouldn’t be the same as though they were friends of mine like Mr. Joyce. Anyway I don’t understand Mademoiselle de Maupin well enough to explain it and I wouldn’t have the same authority explaining it as when I had Mr. Joyce’s friendship to back me up.”
“I’d like to have heard that explanation,” Roger said.
“Shucks, Mr. Davis. It was very rudimentary. It wouldn’t have interested you. You understand that part perfectly well, don’t you?”
“Pretty well.”
“I wish we would have known Balzac and Gautier, though, as friends the way we knew Mr. Joyce.”
“So do I,” said Thomas Hudson.
“We knew some good writers, though, didn’t we?”
“We certainly did,” Thomas Hudson said. It was pleasant and hot on the sand and he felt lazy after working and happy, too. It made him very happy to hear the boys talk.
“Let’s go in and swim and then have lunch,” Roger said. “It’s getting hot.”
Thomas Hudson watched them. Swimming slowly, the four of them swam out in the green water, their bodies making shadows over the clear white sand, bodies forging along, shadows projected on the sand by the slight angle of the sun, the brown arms lifting and pushing forward, the hands slicing in, taking hold of the water and pulling it back, legs beating along steadily, heads turning for air, breathing easily and smoothly. Thomas Hudson stood there and watched them swimming out with the wind and he was very fond of the four of them. He thought he ought to paint them swimming, although it would be very difficult. He would try it, though, during the summer.
He was too lazy to swim although he knew he should and finally he walked out feeling the breeze-cooled water fresh and cool on his sun-warmed legs, feeling it cool around his crotch and then, slipping forward into the ocean river, he swam out to meet them as they came in. With his head on the same level theirs were on, it was a different picture, now, changed too because they were swimming against the breeze coming in and the chop was bothering both Andrew and David, who were swimming raggedly. The illusion of them being four sea animals was gone. They had gone out so smoothly and handsomely but now the two younger boys were having difficulty against the wind and the sea. It was not real difficulty. It was just enough to take away any illusion of being at home in the water as they had looked going out. They made two different pictures and perhaps the second was the better one. The five swimmers came out on the beach and walked up to the house.
“That’s why I like it better underwater,” David said. “You don’t have to worry about breathing.”
“Why don’t you goggle-fish with papa and Tommy this aft,” Andrew said to him. “I’ll stay ashore with Mr. Davis.”
“Don’t you want to go, Mr. Davis?”
“I might stay ashore.”
“Don’t stay in on account of me,” Andrew said. “I’ve got plenty to do. I just thought maybe you were staying in.”
“I think I’ll stay in,” Roger said. “I may lie around and read.”
“Don’t let him maneuver you, Mr. Davis. Don’t let him charm you.”
“I feel like staying in,” Roger said.
They were up on the porch now and everyone had changed to dry shorts. Joseph had brought out a bowl of
