September 25, 2025 • 28 mins
A surreal sci-fi series exploring speculative concepts, dreams, and philosophical what-ifs. Each episode is a cerebral journey into the mind’s deepest questions.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:35):
Mind. Welcome to a half hour of mind webs. Short
stories from the world a spec into fiction. Welcome to
(01:11):
mine Webbs. The story this time is by John Cheever
appeared in his book The Brigadier and the Golf Widow.
The name of it is The Swimmer.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
It was one of those Midsummer Sundays when everyone sits
around saying, I drank too much last night.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
You might have heard it whispered by the parishioners leaving church,
heard it from the lips of the priest himself.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Struggling with his cassock in the Vestiarian or heard it
on the golf links and on the tennis courts. Heard
it from the wildlife preserve, where the leader of the
Audubon group was suffering from a terrible hangover. I drank
too much, said Donald wester HASEI. We all drank too much,
said Lucinda Merrill. It must have been the wine, said
Helen wester HASEI. I drank too much of that claret.
(02:00):
This was at the edge of the western Hasis Pool.
The pool, fed by an artesian well with a high
iron content, was a pale shade of green. It was
a fine day in the west. It was a massive
stand of cumulus clouds, so like a city seen from
a distance in the bow of an approaching ship, that
it might.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Have had a name Lisbon, Hack and Sack. The sun
was hot.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Nettie Merrill sat by the gleaming water, one hand in
it went around a glass of gin. He was a
slender man. He seemed to have the special slenderness of youth,
and while he was far from young, he had slid
down his banister that morning, and given the bronze backside
of afrodaty in the hall table of Smack as he
jogged toward the smell of coffee in his dining room,
he might have been compared to a summer's day, particularly
(02:43):
the last hours of one.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
And while he lacked a tennis.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Racket or a sail bag, the impression was definitely one
of youth, sport and clement weather. He had been swimming,
and now he was breathing deeply, stertorously, as if he
could gulp into his lungs. The components of that moment,
the heat of the sun, the intenseness of his pleasure,
it all seemed to flow into his chest. His own
house stood in Bullet Park, eight miles to the south,
(03:08):
where his four beautiful daughters would have had their lunch
and might be playing tennis. Then it occurred to him
that by taking a dog leg to the southwest, he
could reach his home by water. His life was not confining,
and the delight he took in this observation couldnot be explained.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
By its suggestion of escape.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
He seemed to see with a cartographer's eye that string
of swimming pools at quasi subterranean stream that curved across
the county. He had made a discovery, a contribution to
modern geography. He would name the stream Luscinda, after his wife.
He was not a practical joker, nor was he a fool,
But he was determinedly.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Original and had a vague.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
And modest idea of himself as a legendary fakure.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
The day was beautiful, and.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
It seemed to him that a long swim might enlarge
and celebrate its beauty. He took off a sweater, hung
over his shoulders.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
And dove in.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
He had an inexplicable contempt for a man who had
not hurled themselves into pools. He swam a choppy crawl,
breathing either with every stroke or every fourth stroke, and
counting somewhere well on the back of his mind the
one two one two of a flutter kick. It was
not a serviceable stroke for long distances, but the domestication
of swimming had saddled the sport with some customs, and
(04:24):
in his part of the world a crawl was customary,
to be embraced and sustained by the light. Green water
was less a pleasure, it seemed, than the resumption of
a natural condition, and he would have liked to swim
without trunks, but this was not possible considering his project.
He hoisted himself up on the far curve he never
used the latter, and started across the lawn. When Lucinda
(04:46):
asked where he was going, he said he was going
to swim home. The only maps in charts he had
to go by were remembered or imaginary, but these were
clear enough.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
First there were the.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Grayms, the Hammers, the Leers, the Howlands and the gross Cups.
He would cross Ditmar Street to the Bunkers and come
after a short portage to the Levees, the Welchers, and
then the public pool in Lancaster. And then there were
the Hallerins, the Satches, the Biswanger's, Shirley Adams, the gil Martin's,
and the Clydes. The day was lovely, and that he
lived in a world so generously supplied with water seemed
(05:18):
like a clemency of beneficence. His heart was high, and
he ran across the grass, making his way.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Home by an uncommon route.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Gave him the feeling that he was a pilgrim and explorer,
a man with a destiny, and he knew that he
would find friends all along the way. Friends would line
the banks of the Lucinda River. He went through a
hadge that separated the wester Hussies land from the Grahams,
walked under some flowering apple trees, and passed.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
The shed that housed their pomp and filter.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
And came out at the Graham's pool. Why, Nettie, missus
Graham said, what a marvelous surprise. I've been trying to
get you on the phone all morning.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Here, let me get you a drink. He saw, then, like.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Any explorer, that the hospitable customs and tradition of the
natives would have to be handled with diplomacy if he
was ever going to reach his destination.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
He did not want to.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Mystify or seem rude to the Grahams, nor did he
have the time to linger there. He swam the length
of their pool and joined them in the sun, and
was rescued a few minutes later by the arrival of
two car loads.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Of friends from Connecticut. During the uproarious reunions, he was
able to slip away.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
He went down by the front of the Graham's house,
stepped over a thorny hedge, and crossed a vacant lot
to the Hammers. Missus Hammer, looking up from her roses,
saw him swim by, although she wasn't quite sure who
it was. The Leers heard him splashing past the open
window of their living room. The Hollands and the gross
Cups were away, and after leaving the Howlands, he crossed
Detmar Street and headed for the Bunkers, where he could hear,
(06:43):
even at that distance the noise of a party. The
water refracted the sound of voices.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
And laughter and seemed to suspend it on mid air.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
The Bunker's pool was on a rise, and he climbed
some stairs to a terrace where twenty five or thirty
men and women were drinking. The only person in the
water was Rusty Towers, who floated there in.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
A rubber raft.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Oh how barning in lush with the banks of the
Lacinda River. Prosperous men and women gathered by the sapphire
colored waters, while caterer's men in white coats passed them
cold chin. Overhead, a red davelin trainer was.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
Circling around and around and around in.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
The sky with something like the glee of a child
in a swing. Ned felt a passing affection for the scene,
the tenderness for the gathering, as if it was something
he might touch. In the distance, he heard thunder. As
soon as Enid Bunker saw him. She began to scream, Oh, look,
who's here. What a marvelous surprise. When Lucinda said that
you couldn't come, I thought I'd die. She made her
(07:38):
way to him through the crowd, and when they had
finished kissing, she led him to the bar, a progress
that was slowed by the fact that he stopped kiss
eight or ten other women and shake the hands of
as many men. The smiling bar tender he had seen
at a hundred parties.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Gave him a gin and tonic, and he stood by
the bar.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
For a moment, anxious not to get stuck in any
conversation that would delay his voyage. When he seemed about
to be surrounded, he dove in and slammed close to
the side to avoid colliding.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
With rusties raft.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
At the fire end of the pool, he bypassed the
Tomlinson's with a broad smile and jogged up the garden path.
The gravel cut his feet, but this was the only unpleasantness.
The party was confined to the pool, and as he
went toward the house he heard the brilliant, watery sound
of voices. Fade heard the noise of a radio from
the bunker's kitchen, where someone was listening to a ball game.
(08:24):
Sunday afternoon, he made his.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
Way through the parked cars and down the grassy border
of their driveway.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
To ile Wives Lane. He did not want to be
seen on the road in his bathing trunks, but there
was no traffic, and he made the short distance to
the Levees driveway, marked with a private property sign in
the green Tube for the New York Times. All the
doors and windows of the big House were open, but
there were no signs of life.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Not even a dog barked.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
He went around the side of the house to the pool,
and saw that the levees had only recently left. Glasses
and bottles and dishes of nuts were on a table
at the deep end, where there was a bath house
or gazebo hung with Japanese lanterns. After swimming the pool,
he got himself a glass and poured a drink. It
was his fourth or fifth drink, and he get swung
nearly half the length of the Lucinda River. He felt tired, clean,
(09:10):
and pleased at that moment to be alone, pleased with everything.
It would storm the stand of cumulus cloud that city
had risen and darkened. While he sat there, he heard
the percussiveness of thunder again. The davel and trainer was
still certainly overhead, and it seemed in that.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
That he could almost hear the pilot laugh with pleasure.
In the afternoon, but when there.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Was another peal of thunder, he took off for home.
A train whistle blew, and he wondered what time it
had gotten to be four five.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
He thought of the provincial station at that hour, where
a waiter is.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Taxedo concealed by a raincoat, a dwarf with some flowers
wrapped in the newspaper, and.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
A woman who had been crying, would be waiting.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
For the local It was suddenly growing dark. It was
at that moment when the pinheaded bird seemed to organize
the song with some acute and knowledgeable recognie fishing of
the storm's approached.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Then there was a fine noise.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Of rushing water from the crown of an oak in
his black as if a spigot there had been turned.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Then the noise of fountains came from the crowns of
all the tall trees. Why did he love storms?
Speaker 2 (10:15):
What was the meaning of his excitement when the door
sprang open and the rain wind.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Fled rudely up the stairs. Why had the simple task.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Of shutting the windows of an old house seemed fitting
an urgent? Why did the first watery notes of his
storm wind half for him the unmistakable sound of good news, cheer,
glad tidings. Then there was an explosion, the smell of cordite,
and rain lashed the Japanese lanterns that Missus Levee had
bought in Kyoto the year before last year, or was
(10:44):
it the year before that? He stayed in the Levees
gazebo until the storm had passed. The rain had cooled
the air, and he shivered. The force of the wind
had stripped a maple of its red and yellow leaves
and scattered them over the grass in the water. Since
it was midsummer, the tree must be blighted, and yet
he felt a peculiar sadness at the sign of autumn.
(11:07):
He braced his shoulders, emptied his glass, and started for
the Welchers pool. This meant crossing the Lindley's riding ring,
and he was surprised to find it overgrown with grass
and all the jumps dismantled. He wondered if the Lindleys
had sold their horses or gone away for the summer
and put them out to board. He seemed to remember
having heard something about the Lindleys and their horses, but
(11:28):
the memory was unclear. On he went barefoot through the
wet grass to the Welchairs, where he found their pool
was dry. This breach in his chain of water disappointed
him absurdly, and he felt like some explorer who seeks
the torrential headwater and finds a dead stream. He was
disappointed and mystified. It was common enough to go away
(11:51):
for the summer, but no one ever drained his pool
the welchairs had definitely gone away. The pool furniture was folded, stacked,
and covered with the tarpaulin. The bathhouse was locked, All
the windows of the house were shut, and when he
went around to the driveway in front, he saw a
for sale sign nailed to a tree. When had he
last heard from the Welchers? When that is, had he
(12:13):
and Lucinda last regretted an invitation to dine with them?
It seemed only a week or so ago. Was his
memory failing? Or had he so disciplined it in the
repression of unpleasant facts that he had damaged his sense
of the truth. Then in the distance, he heard the
sound of the tennis game miss cheering cleared away all
(12:34):
his apprehensions and let him regard the overcast sky and
the cold air with indifference. This was the day that
Nettie Merrill swam.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
Across the county.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
That was the day he started off, then for his
most difficult portage.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
Had you gone for.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
A Sunday afternoon ride that day, you might have seen
him close to naked, standing on the shoulders of Route
four twenty four, waiting for a chain to cross. He
might have wondered if he was the victim of foul play.
Had his car broken down? Or was he merely a fool?
Standing barefoot in the deposits of the highway, beer cans, wags,
blowout patches, exposed to all kinds of ridicule, he seemed pitiful.
(13:17):
He had known when he started that this was part
of his journey, It had been on his maps. But
confronted with the lines of traffic worming through the summary light,
he found himself unprepared.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
He was laughed at, jeered at.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
A beer can was thrown at him, and he had
no dignity or humor to bring to the situation. He
could have gone back back to the western housies, where
Lacintha would still be sitting in the sun. He had
signed nothing, bowed, nothing, pledged nothing, not even to himself. Why,
believing as he did that all human obduracy was susceptible
(13:50):
to common sense, was he unable to turn back? Why
was he determined to complete his journey, even if it
meant putting his life in danger. At what point at
this prank, this joke, this piece of horse play, become serious.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
He could not go back.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
He could not even recall with any clearness the green
water of the western hasis the sense of inhaling the
day's components, their friendly and relaxed voices saying that they
had drunk too much. In the space of an hour,
more or less, he had covered a distance that made
his return impossible. An old man tolling down the highway
at fifteen miles an hour let him get to the
(14:27):
middle of the road, where there was a grass divider.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Here he was exposed to.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
The ridicule of the northbound traffic, but after ten or
fifteen minutes he was able to cross. From here he
had only a short walk to the recreation center at
the edge of the village of Lancaster, where there were
some handball courts in the public pool. The effect of
the water on voices, the illusion of brilliance and suspense,
was the same here as it had been at the bunkers,
(14:51):
But the sounds here were louder, harsher, more shrill, and
as soon as he entered the crowded enclosure, he was
confronted with regimentation. All swimming must take a shower before
using the pool. All swimmers must use the footpath. All
swimmers must wear their identification disks. He took a shower,
washed his feet in the cloudy in bitter solution, and
made his way to the edge of the water.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
It stank of chlorine and looked to him like a sink.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
A pair of lifeguards and a pair of towers blew
police whistles at what seemed to be regular intervals, and
abused the swimmers through a public address system. Nettie remembered
the sapphire water at the bunker's lit lung and thought
that he might contaminate himself, damage his own prosperousness and
charm by swimming in this murk. But he reminded himself
that he was an explorer, a pilgrim, and that this
(15:39):
was merely a stagment bend in the Lucinda River, he dove,
scowling with distaste, into the chlorine and had a swim
with his head above water to avoid collisions, but even
so he was bumped into the splashed and jostled. When
he got to the shallow end, both lifeguards were shouting
at him, hey.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
You you without the identification disk. Get out of the water.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
He did, but they had no way of pursuing him,
and he went through the reek of suntan oil and
chlorine on out through the hurricane fence and passed the
handball courts.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
By crossing the road, he entered.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
The wooden part of the Hallerin estate. The woods were
not cleared and the footing was treacherous and difficult until
he reached the lawn and the cliffed beach hedge that
encircled their pool. The Halerins were friends an elderly couple
of enormous wealth who seemed to bask in the suspicion
that they might be Communists. They were zealous reformers, but
they were not communists, and yet when they were accused,
(16:31):
as they sometimes were, of subversion, it seemed to gratify
and excite them. Their beech hedge was yellow, and he
guessed this had been blighted like the Levies maple. He
called Hullo Hullo to warn the Halerins of his approach,
to palliate his invasion of their privacy. The Halerins, for
reasons that he had never had explained to him, did
not wear bathing suits. No explanations were in Orderarily, their
(16:54):
nakedness was at detail in their uncompromising zeal for reform,
and he stepped politely out of his trunks before and.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Went through the opening. In the hedge.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
Missus Halleran, the stout woman with white hair and a
serene face, was reading the Times. Mister Halleran was taking
beech leaves out of the water with his scoop, and
they seemed not surprised to her displeased to see him there.
Pool was perhaps the oldest in the county, a fieldstone
rectangle fed by a brook.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
It had no filter, no pomp in Its waters were
the opaque gold of the stream.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
I'm swimming across the county in that said, why did
no one could exclaimed Missus Halleran, Well, I've made it
from the western houses. That must be about four miles.
He left his trunks at the deep end, walked to
the shallow end and swam this stretch. As he was
pulling himself out of the water, he heard Missus Halleran say,
we've been terribly sorry to hear about all your misfortunes.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Neddie my misfortunes. I don't know what you mean. Why
we heard that you'd sold the house and that you
were poor children.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
I don't recall having sold the house and the girls
are at home, yes, Missus Hallerin sighed yes. Her voice
filled the air with an unsse He musmable, melancholy and
ned spoke briskly. Thank you for the swim. Well, have
a nice trip, said missus Alleran. Beyond the hedge, he
(18:10):
pulled on his trunks and fastened them. They were loose,
and he wondered if during the space of an afternoon
he could have lost some weight. He was cold, and
he was tired, and the naked Halerins and their dark
water had depressed him. The swim was too much for
his strength. But how could he have guessed this? Sliding
down the banister that morning and sitting in the Westerhasi sun,
his arms were laying, his legs felt rubbery and ached
(18:32):
at the joints. The worst of it was the cold
in his bones and the feeling that he might never
be warm again. Leaves were falling down around him, and
he smelled wood smoke on the wind. Who would be
burning wood at this time of year.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
He needed a drink.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Whiskey would warm him, pick him up, carry him through
the last of the journey, refreshed his feeling that it
was original and valorous to swim across the county channel.
Swimmers took Brandy. He needed a stimulants. He crossed the
lawn in front of the Halarins and went down a
little path to where they had built a house.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
For their only daughter, Helen and her husband, Eric sochs
the sox. His pool was small, and he found Helen
and her husband there.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Oh, Netty said, Alan, did you launch it? Mother's not
really I did stop to see her parents. This seemed
to be explanation enough. I'm terribly sorry to break in
on you like this, but I've taken a chill. I
wonder if you'd give me a drink why. I'd love to,
But but there hasn't been anything in this house since
Eric's operation. That was three years ago. Nettie was he
(19:29):
losing his memory? Had his gift for concealing painful facts?
Let him forget that he had sold his house, that
his children were in trouble, and that his friend had
beenil His eyes slipped from Eric's face to his abdomen,
where he saw three pale, sutured scars, two of them
at least a foot long. Gone was his navel, and
what Nettie thought would the robing hand bed checking one's
(19:52):
gifts At three am make of a belly with no navel,
no link to Berth, this breach in the succession. Helen said,
I'm sure he can get a drink. Look at the Biswangers.
They're having an enormous to do.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
You can hear it from here. Listen. She raised her head,
and from.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Across the road, the lawns, the gardens, the woods, the fields,
he heard again the brilliant noise of voices over water.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Well, I'll get wet.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Still feeling he had no freedom of choice about his
means of travel, he dove into the socks's cold water, and,
gasping close to drowning, made his way from.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
One end of the pool to the other.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Who send, and I want terribly to see you, he
said over his shoulder, his face set toward the Biswangers.
We're sorry he's spent so long, and we'll call you
very soon. He crossed some fields to the Biswangers and
the sounds of revelry there. They'd be honored to give
him a drink. They'd be happy to give him a drink.
They would, in fact be lucky to give him a drink.
The Beswangers invited him and Liscinda for dinner. Four times
(20:45):
a year, six weeks in advance.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
They were always.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Rebuffed, and yet they continued to send out their invitations,
unwilling to comprehend the rigid and undemocratic realities of their society.
They were the sort of people who discussed the price
of things, of cocktails, exchanged market tips during dinner and
after dinner, told dirty stories the mixed company. They did
not belong to Eddie's set. They were not even on
(21:10):
Lucina's Christmas card list. He went toward their pool with
feelings of indifference, charity, and some unease, since it seemed
to be getting dark and these were the longest days
of the year. The party when he joined it was
noisy and large. Grace Biswanger was a kind of hostess
who asked the optometrists, the veterinarian, the real estate dealer,
and the dentist. No one was swimming, and the twilight
(21:33):
reflected on the water. The pool had a wintry glean.
There was a bar, and he started for this. When
Grace Biswanger saw him, she came toward him, not affectionately.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
As he had every right to expect, but bellocostly.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Why this party has everything, including a gatecrasher. She could
not deal him a social blow. There was no question
about this, and he didn't flinch as a gate crasher.
Do I wade a drink suit yourself? You don't seem
to pay much attention to invitations.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
She turned her back on.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Him and joined some guests. And he went to the
bar and ordered a whiskey. The bartender served him, but
he served him rudely. His was a world in which
the caterer's men kept the social.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Score, and to be rebuffed by.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
A part time bar keep meant that he had suffered
some loss of social esteem, or perhaps the man.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Was new and uninformed. Then he heard.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Grace at his back say they went for broke over night,
nothing but income. And he showed up drunk one Sunday
and asked us to loan him five thousand dollars. She
was always talking about money. It was worse, really than
eating your peas off a knife. The next pool on
his list, the last but two, belonged to his old mistress,
(22:45):
Shirley Adams. If he had suffered any injuries at the
biswonders they would be cured here. Love sexual rough house,
in fact, was the supreme elixir.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
The pain killer.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
The brightly colored pill would put the spring back into
his step, the joy of life in his sight. They
had had an affair last week, last month, last year,
and he couldn't remember. It was he who had broken
it off. His was the upper hand, and he stepped
through the gate of the wall that surrounded her pool
with nothing so considered as self confidence. It seemed in
a way to be his pool, as the lover, particularly
(23:19):
the illicit lover, enjoys the possessions of his mistress with
an authority unknown to holy matrimony. She was there, her
hair the color of brass, put her figure at the
edge of the lighted civilian water, excited in him no
profound memories. It had been, he thought, a lighthearted, a
fair Although she had wept.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
When he broke it off.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
She seemed confused to see him, and he wondered if
she was still wounded, would she, God forbid weep again?
What do you want? She asked, I'm swimming across the county.
Good Christ, will you ever grow up? What's the matter?
If you've come here for money? I won't give you
another cent? She could give me a drink, I could,
but I won't. I'm not alone well. He dove in
(24:01):
and swam in the pool, But when he tried to
haul himself up under the curb, he found that the
strength in his arms and shoulders.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Had gone, and he paddled to the ladder and climbed out.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
Looking over his shoulder, he saw in the lighted bath
house a young man going out into the dark lawn.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
He smelled chrysanthemums or marigolds, some.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Stubborn ucumnal fragments, and the night air strong as gas.
Looking over had he saw that the stars had come out,
But why should he seem to see? Andromed Cephus Cassiopeia
what had become of the constellations of midsummer? When he
began to cry. It was probably the first time in
his adult life that he had ever cried, certainly the
(24:41):
first time in his life that he had ever felt so.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Miserable, cold, tired, and bewildered.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
He could not understand the rudeness of the caterer's bar keep,
or the rudeness of the mistress who had come to
him on her knees and showered his trousers with tears.
He had swum too long, he had been immersed too long,
and his nose and throat were from the water. What
he needed then was a drink, some company, and some clean,
dry clothes. While he could have cut directly across the
(25:07):
road to his home, he went on to the Gilmartin's pool. Here,
for the first time in his life, he did not die,
but went down the steps into the icy water and
swam a hobbled side stroke that he might've.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Learned as a youth.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
He staggered with fatigue on his way to the Clydes
and paddled the length of their pool, stopping again and
again with his hand on the curbed rest. He climbed
up the ladder and wondered if he had the strength
to get home.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
He had done what he wanted. He had swum the.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
County, but he was so stupefied with exhaustion that his
triumph seeing vague, stooped, holding onto the gate posts for support.
He turned up the driveway of his own house. The
place was dark.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Was it so late they had all gone to bed?
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Had Lucinda stayed at the Westerhasis for supper? Had the
girls joined her there gone someplace else? Hadn't they agreed,
as they usually did on Sunday, to regret all their
invitations and stay at home. He tried the garage doors
to see what cars were in, but the doors were locked,
and rust came off the handles onto his hands. Going
(26:16):
toward the house, he saw that the force of the
thunder storm had knocked one of the rain cutters loose.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
It hung down over the front door like an umbrella web,
but it could be fixed in the morning.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
The house was locked, and he thought that the stupid
cook or the stupid maid must have locked the place up,
until he remembered that it had been some time since
they had employed a maid or a cook. He shouted,
pounded on the door, tried to force it with his shoulder,
and then, looking in at the windows, saw that the
(26:49):
place was empty. The story this time is called This Twimmer,
(28:10):
written by John Cheever.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
It appeared in this book The Brigadier and the Gulf Wader.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
This is Michael Hanson speaking technical production on mindwebs by
Steve Gordon. Mindwebbs is a production of WYA Radio and Madison,
a service of University of Wisconsin Extension
Mind. Welcome to a half hour of mind webs. Short
stories from the world a spec into fiction. Welcome to
(01:11):
mine Webbs. The story this time is by John Cheever
appeared in his book The Brigadier and the Golf Widow.
The name of it is The Swimmer.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
It was one of those Midsummer Sundays when everyone sits
around saying, I drank too much last night.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
You might have heard it whispered by the parishioners leaving church,
heard it from the lips of the priest himself.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Struggling with his cassock in the Vestiarian or heard it
on the golf links and on the tennis courts. Heard
it from the wildlife preserve, where the leader of the
Audubon group was suffering from a terrible hangover. I drank
too much, said Donald wester HASEI. We all drank too much,
said Lucinda Merrill. It must have been the wine, said
Helen wester HASEI. I drank too much of that claret.
(02:00):
This was at the edge of the western Hasis Pool.
The pool, fed by an artesian well with a high
iron content, was a pale shade of green. It was
a fine day in the west. It was a massive
stand of cumulus clouds, so like a city seen from
a distance in the bow of an approaching ship, that
it might.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Have had a name Lisbon, Hack and Sack. The sun
was hot.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Nettie Merrill sat by the gleaming water, one hand in
it went around a glass of gin. He was a
slender man. He seemed to have the special slenderness of youth,
and while he was far from young, he had slid
down his banister that morning, and given the bronze backside
of afrodaty in the hall table of Smack as he
jogged toward the smell of coffee in his dining room,
he might have been compared to a summer's day, particularly
(02:43):
the last hours of one.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
And while he lacked a tennis.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Racket or a sail bag, the impression was definitely one
of youth, sport and clement weather. He had been swimming,
and now he was breathing deeply, stertorously, as if he
could gulp into his lungs. The components of that moment,
the heat of the sun, the intenseness of his pleasure,
it all seemed to flow into his chest. His own
house stood in Bullet Park, eight miles to the south,
(03:08):
where his four beautiful daughters would have had their lunch
and might be playing tennis. Then it occurred to him
that by taking a dog leg to the southwest, he
could reach his home by water. His life was not confining,
and the delight he took in this observation couldnot be explained.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
By its suggestion of escape.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
He seemed to see with a cartographer's eye that string
of swimming pools at quasi subterranean stream that curved across
the county. He had made a discovery, a contribution to
modern geography. He would name the stream Luscinda, after his wife.
He was not a practical joker, nor was he a fool,
But he was determinedly.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Original and had a vague.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
And modest idea of himself as a legendary fakure.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
The day was beautiful, and.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
It seemed to him that a long swim might enlarge
and celebrate its beauty. He took off a sweater, hung
over his shoulders.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
And dove in.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
He had an inexplicable contempt for a man who had
not hurled themselves into pools. He swam a choppy crawl,
breathing either with every stroke or every fourth stroke, and
counting somewhere well on the back of his mind the
one two one two of a flutter kick. It was
not a serviceable stroke for long distances, but the domestication
of swimming had saddled the sport with some customs, and
(04:24):
in his part of the world a crawl was customary,
to be embraced and sustained by the light. Green water
was less a pleasure, it seemed, than the resumption of
a natural condition, and he would have liked to swim
without trunks, but this was not possible considering his project.
He hoisted himself up on the far curve he never
used the latter, and started across the lawn. When Lucinda
(04:46):
asked where he was going, he said he was going
to swim home. The only maps in charts he had
to go by were remembered or imaginary, but these were
clear enough.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
First there were the.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Grayms, the Hammers, the Leers, the Howlands and the gross Cups.
He would cross Ditmar Street to the Bunkers and come
after a short portage to the Levees, the Welchers, and
then the public pool in Lancaster. And then there were
the Hallerins, the Satches, the Biswanger's, Shirley Adams, the gil Martin's,
and the Clydes. The day was lovely, and that he
lived in a world so generously supplied with water seemed
(05:18):
like a clemency of beneficence. His heart was high, and
he ran across the grass, making his way.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Home by an uncommon route.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Gave him the feeling that he was a pilgrim and explorer,
a man with a destiny, and he knew that he
would find friends all along the way. Friends would line
the banks of the Lucinda River. He went through a
hadge that separated the wester Hussies land from the Grahams,
walked under some flowering apple trees, and passed.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
The shed that housed their pomp and filter.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
And came out at the Graham's pool. Why, Nettie, missus
Graham said, what a marvelous surprise. I've been trying to
get you on the phone all morning.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Here, let me get you a drink. He saw, then, like.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Any explorer, that the hospitable customs and tradition of the
natives would have to be handled with diplomacy if he
was ever going to reach his destination.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
He did not want to.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Mystify or seem rude to the Grahams, nor did he
have the time to linger there. He swam the length
of their pool and joined them in the sun, and
was rescued a few minutes later by the arrival of
two car loads.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Of friends from Connecticut. During the uproarious reunions, he was
able to slip away.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
He went down by the front of the Graham's house,
stepped over a thorny hedge, and crossed a vacant lot
to the Hammers. Missus Hammer, looking up from her roses,
saw him swim by, although she wasn't quite sure who
it was. The Leers heard him splashing past the open
window of their living room. The Hollands and the gross
Cups were away, and after leaving the Howlands, he crossed
Detmar Street and headed for the Bunkers, where he could hear,
(06:43):
even at that distance the noise of a party. The
water refracted the sound of voices.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
And laughter and seemed to suspend it on mid air.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
The Bunker's pool was on a rise, and he climbed
some stairs to a terrace where twenty five or thirty
men and women were drinking. The only person in the
water was Rusty Towers, who floated there in.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
A rubber raft.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Oh how barning in lush with the banks of the
Lacinda River. Prosperous men and women gathered by the sapphire
colored waters, while caterer's men in white coats passed them
cold chin. Overhead, a red davelin trainer was.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
Circling around and around and around in.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
The sky with something like the glee of a child
in a swing. Ned felt a passing affection for the scene,
the tenderness for the gathering, as if it was something
he might touch. In the distance, he heard thunder. As
soon as Enid Bunker saw him. She began to scream, Oh, look,
who's here. What a marvelous surprise. When Lucinda said that
you couldn't come, I thought I'd die. She made her
(07:38):
way to him through the crowd, and when they had
finished kissing, she led him to the bar, a progress
that was slowed by the fact that he stopped kiss
eight or ten other women and shake the hands of
as many men. The smiling bar tender he had seen
at a hundred parties.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Gave him a gin and tonic, and he stood by
the bar.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
For a moment, anxious not to get stuck in any
conversation that would delay his voyage. When he seemed about
to be surrounded, he dove in and slammed close to
the side to avoid colliding.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
With rusties raft.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
At the fire end of the pool, he bypassed the
Tomlinson's with a broad smile and jogged up the garden path.
The gravel cut his feet, but this was the only unpleasantness.
The party was confined to the pool, and as he
went toward the house he heard the brilliant, watery sound
of voices. Fade heard the noise of a radio from
the bunker's kitchen, where someone was listening to a ball game.
(08:24):
Sunday afternoon, he made his.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
Way through the parked cars and down the grassy border
of their driveway.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
To ile Wives Lane. He did not want to be
seen on the road in his bathing trunks, but there
was no traffic, and he made the short distance to
the Levees driveway, marked with a private property sign in
the green Tube for the New York Times. All the
doors and windows of the big House were open, but
there were no signs of life.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Not even a dog barked.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
He went around the side of the house to the pool,
and saw that the levees had only recently left. Glasses
and bottles and dishes of nuts were on a table
at the deep end, where there was a bath house
or gazebo hung with Japanese lanterns. After swimming the pool,
he got himself a glass and poured a drink. It
was his fourth or fifth drink, and he get swung
nearly half the length of the Lucinda River. He felt tired, clean,
(09:10):
and pleased at that moment to be alone, pleased with everything.
It would storm the stand of cumulus cloud that city
had risen and darkened. While he sat there, he heard
the percussiveness of thunder again. The davel and trainer was
still certainly overhead, and it seemed in that.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
That he could almost hear the pilot laugh with pleasure.
In the afternoon, but when there.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Was another peal of thunder, he took off for home.
A train whistle blew, and he wondered what time it
had gotten to be four five.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
He thought of the provincial station at that hour, where
a waiter is.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Taxedo concealed by a raincoat, a dwarf with some flowers
wrapped in the newspaper, and.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
A woman who had been crying, would be waiting.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
For the local It was suddenly growing dark. It was
at that moment when the pinheaded bird seemed to organize
the song with some acute and knowledgeable recognie fishing of
the storm's approached.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Then there was a fine noise.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Of rushing water from the crown of an oak in
his black as if a spigot there had been turned.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Then the noise of fountains came from the crowns of
all the tall trees. Why did he love storms?
Speaker 2 (10:15):
What was the meaning of his excitement when the door
sprang open and the rain wind.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Fled rudely up the stairs. Why had the simple task.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Of shutting the windows of an old house seemed fitting
an urgent? Why did the first watery notes of his
storm wind half for him the unmistakable sound of good news, cheer,
glad tidings. Then there was an explosion, the smell of cordite,
and rain lashed the Japanese lanterns that Missus Levee had
bought in Kyoto the year before last year, or was
(10:44):
it the year before that? He stayed in the Levees
gazebo until the storm had passed. The rain had cooled
the air, and he shivered. The force of the wind
had stripped a maple of its red and yellow leaves
and scattered them over the grass in the water. Since
it was midsummer, the tree must be blighted, and yet
he felt a peculiar sadness at the sign of autumn.
(11:07):
He braced his shoulders, emptied his glass, and started for
the Welchers pool. This meant crossing the Lindley's riding ring,
and he was surprised to find it overgrown with grass
and all the jumps dismantled. He wondered if the Lindleys
had sold their horses or gone away for the summer
and put them out to board. He seemed to remember
having heard something about the Lindleys and their horses, but
(11:28):
the memory was unclear. On he went barefoot through the
wet grass to the Welchairs, where he found their pool
was dry. This breach in his chain of water disappointed
him absurdly, and he felt like some explorer who seeks
the torrential headwater and finds a dead stream. He was
disappointed and mystified. It was common enough to go away
(11:51):
for the summer, but no one ever drained his pool
the welchairs had definitely gone away. The pool furniture was folded, stacked,
and covered with the tarpaulin. The bathhouse was locked, All
the windows of the house were shut, and when he
went around to the driveway in front, he saw a
for sale sign nailed to a tree. When had he
last heard from the Welchers? When that is, had he
(12:13):
and Lucinda last regretted an invitation to dine with them?
It seemed only a week or so ago. Was his
memory failing? Or had he so disciplined it in the
repression of unpleasant facts that he had damaged his sense
of the truth. Then in the distance, he heard the
sound of the tennis game miss cheering cleared away all
(12:34):
his apprehensions and let him regard the overcast sky and
the cold air with indifference. This was the day that
Nettie Merrill swam.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
Across the county.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
That was the day he started off, then for his
most difficult portage.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
Had you gone for.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
A Sunday afternoon ride that day, you might have seen
him close to naked, standing on the shoulders of Route
four twenty four, waiting for a chain to cross. He
might have wondered if he was the victim of foul play.
Had his car broken down? Or was he merely a fool?
Standing barefoot in the deposits of the highway, beer cans, wags,
blowout patches, exposed to all kinds of ridicule, he seemed pitiful.
(13:17):
He had known when he started that this was part
of his journey, It had been on his maps. But
confronted with the lines of traffic worming through the summary light,
he found himself unprepared.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
He was laughed at, jeered at.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
A beer can was thrown at him, and he had
no dignity or humor to bring to the situation. He
could have gone back back to the western housies, where
Lacintha would still be sitting in the sun. He had
signed nothing, bowed, nothing, pledged nothing, not even to himself. Why,
believing as he did that all human obduracy was susceptible
(13:50):
to common sense, was he unable to turn back? Why
was he determined to complete his journey, even if it
meant putting his life in danger. At what point at
this prank, this joke, this piece of horse play, become serious.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
He could not go back.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
He could not even recall with any clearness the green
water of the western hasis the sense of inhaling the
day's components, their friendly and relaxed voices saying that they
had drunk too much. In the space of an hour,
more or less, he had covered a distance that made
his return impossible. An old man tolling down the highway
at fifteen miles an hour let him get to the
(14:27):
middle of the road, where there was a grass divider.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Here he was exposed to.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
The ridicule of the northbound traffic, but after ten or
fifteen minutes he was able to cross. From here he
had only a short walk to the recreation center at
the edge of the village of Lancaster, where there were
some handball courts in the public pool. The effect of
the water on voices, the illusion of brilliance and suspense,
was the same here as it had been at the bunkers,
(14:51):
But the sounds here were louder, harsher, more shrill, and
as soon as he entered the crowded enclosure, he was
confronted with regimentation. All swimming must take a shower before
using the pool. All swimmers must use the footpath. All
swimmers must wear their identification disks. He took a shower,
washed his feet in the cloudy in bitter solution, and
made his way to the edge of the water.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
It stank of chlorine and looked to him like a sink.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
A pair of lifeguards and a pair of towers blew
police whistles at what seemed to be regular intervals, and
abused the swimmers through a public address system. Nettie remembered
the sapphire water at the bunker's lit lung and thought
that he might contaminate himself, damage his own prosperousness and
charm by swimming in this murk. But he reminded himself
that he was an explorer, a pilgrim, and that this
(15:39):
was merely a stagment bend in the Lucinda River, he dove,
scowling with distaste, into the chlorine and had a swim
with his head above water to avoid collisions, but even
so he was bumped into the splashed and jostled. When
he got to the shallow end, both lifeguards were shouting
at him, hey.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
You you without the identification disk. Get out of the water.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
He did, but they had no way of pursuing him,
and he went through the reek of suntan oil and
chlorine on out through the hurricane fence and passed the
handball courts.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
By crossing the road, he entered.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
The wooden part of the Hallerin estate. The woods were
not cleared and the footing was treacherous and difficult until
he reached the lawn and the cliffed beach hedge that
encircled their pool. The Halerins were friends an elderly couple
of enormous wealth who seemed to bask in the suspicion
that they might be Communists. They were zealous reformers, but
they were not communists, and yet when they were accused,
(16:31):
as they sometimes were, of subversion, it seemed to gratify
and excite them. Their beech hedge was yellow, and he
guessed this had been blighted like the Levies maple. He
called Hullo Hullo to warn the Halerins of his approach,
to palliate his invasion of their privacy. The Halerins, for
reasons that he had never had explained to him, did
not wear bathing suits. No explanations were in Orderarily, their
(16:54):
nakedness was at detail in their uncompromising zeal for reform,
and he stepped politely out of his trunks before and.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Went through the opening. In the hedge.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
Missus Halleran, the stout woman with white hair and a
serene face, was reading the Times. Mister Halleran was taking
beech leaves out of the water with his scoop, and
they seemed not surprised to her displeased to see him there.
Pool was perhaps the oldest in the county, a fieldstone
rectangle fed by a brook.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
It had no filter, no pomp in Its waters were
the opaque gold of the stream.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
I'm swimming across the county in that said, why did
no one could exclaimed Missus Halleran, Well, I've made it
from the western houses. That must be about four miles.
He left his trunks at the deep end, walked to
the shallow end and swam this stretch. As he was
pulling himself out of the water, he heard Missus Halleran say,
we've been terribly sorry to hear about all your misfortunes.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Neddie my misfortunes. I don't know what you mean. Why
we heard that you'd sold the house and that you
were poor children.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
I don't recall having sold the house and the girls
are at home, yes, Missus Hallerin sighed yes. Her voice
filled the air with an unsse He musmable, melancholy and
ned spoke briskly. Thank you for the swim. Well, have
a nice trip, said missus Alleran. Beyond the hedge, he
(18:10):
pulled on his trunks and fastened them. They were loose,
and he wondered if during the space of an afternoon
he could have lost some weight. He was cold, and
he was tired, and the naked Halerins and their dark
water had depressed him. The swim was too much for
his strength. But how could he have guessed this? Sliding
down the banister that morning and sitting in the Westerhasi sun,
his arms were laying, his legs felt rubbery and ached
(18:32):
at the joints. The worst of it was the cold
in his bones and the feeling that he might never
be warm again. Leaves were falling down around him, and
he smelled wood smoke on the wind. Who would be
burning wood at this time of year.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
He needed a drink.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Whiskey would warm him, pick him up, carry him through
the last of the journey, refreshed his feeling that it
was original and valorous to swim across the county channel.
Swimmers took Brandy. He needed a stimulants. He crossed the
lawn in front of the Halarins and went down a
little path to where they had built a house.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
For their only daughter, Helen and her husband, Eric sochs
the sox. His pool was small, and he found Helen
and her husband there.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Oh, Netty said, Alan, did you launch it? Mother's not
really I did stop to see her parents. This seemed
to be explanation enough. I'm terribly sorry to break in
on you like this, but I've taken a chill. I
wonder if you'd give me a drink why. I'd love to,
But but there hasn't been anything in this house since
Eric's operation. That was three years ago. Nettie was he
(19:29):
losing his memory? Had his gift for concealing painful facts?
Let him forget that he had sold his house, that
his children were in trouble, and that his friend had
beenil His eyes slipped from Eric's face to his abdomen,
where he saw three pale, sutured scars, two of them
at least a foot long. Gone was his navel, and
what Nettie thought would the robing hand bed checking one's
(19:52):
gifts At three am make of a belly with no navel,
no link to Berth, this breach in the succession. Helen said,
I'm sure he can get a drink. Look at the Biswangers.
They're having an enormous to do.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
You can hear it from here. Listen. She raised her head,
and from.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Across the road, the lawns, the gardens, the woods, the fields,
he heard again the brilliant noise of voices over water.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Well, I'll get wet.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Still feeling he had no freedom of choice about his
means of travel, he dove into the socks's cold water, and,
gasping close to drowning, made his way from.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
One end of the pool to the other.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Who send, and I want terribly to see you, he
said over his shoulder, his face set toward the Biswangers.
We're sorry he's spent so long, and we'll call you
very soon. He crossed some fields to the Biswangers and
the sounds of revelry there. They'd be honored to give
him a drink. They'd be happy to give him a drink.
They would, in fact be lucky to give him a drink.
The Beswangers invited him and Liscinda for dinner. Four times
(20:45):
a year, six weeks in advance.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
They were always.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Rebuffed, and yet they continued to send out their invitations,
unwilling to comprehend the rigid and undemocratic realities of their society.
They were the sort of people who discussed the price
of things, of cocktails, exchanged market tips during dinner and
after dinner, told dirty stories the mixed company. They did
not belong to Eddie's set. They were not even on
(21:10):
Lucina's Christmas card list. He went toward their pool with
feelings of indifference, charity, and some unease, since it seemed
to be getting dark and these were the longest days
of the year. The party when he joined it was
noisy and large. Grace Biswanger was a kind of hostess
who asked the optometrists, the veterinarian, the real estate dealer,
and the dentist. No one was swimming, and the twilight
(21:33):
reflected on the water. The pool had a wintry glean.
There was a bar, and he started for this. When
Grace Biswanger saw him, she came toward him, not affectionately.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
As he had every right to expect, but bellocostly.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Why this party has everything, including a gatecrasher. She could
not deal him a social blow. There was no question
about this, and he didn't flinch as a gate crasher.
Do I wade a drink suit yourself? You don't seem
to pay much attention to invitations.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
She turned her back on.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Him and joined some guests. And he went to the
bar and ordered a whiskey. The bartender served him, but
he served him rudely. His was a world in which
the caterer's men kept the social.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Score, and to be rebuffed by.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
A part time bar keep meant that he had suffered
some loss of social esteem, or perhaps the man.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Was new and uninformed. Then he heard.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Grace at his back say they went for broke over night,
nothing but income. And he showed up drunk one Sunday
and asked us to loan him five thousand dollars. She
was always talking about money. It was worse, really than
eating your peas off a knife. The next pool on
his list, the last but two, belonged to his old mistress,
(22:45):
Shirley Adams. If he had suffered any injuries at the
biswonders they would be cured here. Love sexual rough house,
in fact, was the supreme elixir.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
The pain killer.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
The brightly colored pill would put the spring back into
his step, the joy of life in his sight. They
had had an affair last week, last month, last year,
and he couldn't remember. It was he who had broken
it off. His was the upper hand, and he stepped
through the gate of the wall that surrounded her pool
with nothing so considered as self confidence. It seemed in
a way to be his pool, as the lover, particularly
(23:19):
the illicit lover, enjoys the possessions of his mistress with
an authority unknown to holy matrimony. She was there, her
hair the color of brass, put her figure at the
edge of the lighted civilian water, excited in him no
profound memories. It had been, he thought, a lighthearted, a
fair Although she had wept.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
When he broke it off.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
She seemed confused to see him, and he wondered if
she was still wounded, would she, God forbid weep again?
What do you want? She asked, I'm swimming across the county.
Good Christ, will you ever grow up? What's the matter?
If you've come here for money? I won't give you
another cent? She could give me a drink, I could,
but I won't. I'm not alone well. He dove in
(24:01):
and swam in the pool, But when he tried to
haul himself up under the curb, he found that the
strength in his arms and shoulders.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Had gone, and he paddled to the ladder and climbed out.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
Looking over his shoulder, he saw in the lighted bath
house a young man going out into the dark lawn.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
He smelled chrysanthemums or marigolds, some.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Stubborn ucumnal fragments, and the night air strong as gas.
Looking over had he saw that the stars had come out,
But why should he seem to see? Andromed Cephus Cassiopeia
what had become of the constellations of midsummer? When he
began to cry. It was probably the first time in
his adult life that he had ever cried, certainly the
(24:41):
first time in his life that he had ever felt so.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Miserable, cold, tired, and bewildered.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
He could not understand the rudeness of the caterer's bar keep,
or the rudeness of the mistress who had come to
him on her knees and showered his trousers with tears.
He had swum too long, he had been immersed too long,
and his nose and throat were from the water. What
he needed then was a drink, some company, and some clean,
dry clothes. While he could have cut directly across the
(25:07):
road to his home, he went on to the Gilmartin's pool. Here,
for the first time in his life, he did not die,
but went down the steps into the icy water and
swam a hobbled side stroke that he might've.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Learned as a youth.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
He staggered with fatigue on his way to the Clydes
and paddled the length of their pool, stopping again and
again with his hand on the curbed rest. He climbed
up the ladder and wondered if he had the strength
to get home.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
He had done what he wanted. He had swum the.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
County, but he was so stupefied with exhaustion that his
triumph seeing vague, stooped, holding onto the gate posts for support.
He turned up the driveway of his own house. The
place was dark.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Was it so late they had all gone to bed?
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Had Lucinda stayed at the Westerhasis for supper? Had the
girls joined her there gone someplace else? Hadn't they agreed,
as they usually did on Sunday, to regret all their
invitations and stay at home. He tried the garage doors
to see what cars were in, but the doors were locked,
and rust came off the handles onto his hands. Going
(26:16):
toward the house, he saw that the force of the
thunder storm had knocked one of the rain cutters loose.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
It hung down over the front door like an umbrella web,
but it could be fixed in the morning.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
The house was locked, and he thought that the stupid
cook or the stupid maid must have locked the place up,
until he remembered that it had been some time since
they had employed a maid or a cook. He shouted,
pounded on the door, tried to force it with his shoulder,
and then, looking in at the windows, saw that the
(26:49):
place was empty. The story this time is called This Twimmer,
(28:10):
written by John Cheever.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
It appeared in this book The Brigadier and the Gulf Wader.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
This is Michael Hanson speaking technical production on mindwebs by
Steve Gordon. Mindwebbs is a production of WYA Radio and Madison,
a service of University of Wisconsin Extension
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