American Pastoral Page #7

You'll see them at our house

for the barbecue.

I hear you're the artist.

And Bill is helping us on the design

for our new house.

An artist and an architect.

Architect's my day job.

Can't make a living just

being an abstract painter.

No, I should think not.

A glove, everybody understands.

These, you might be the only one.

- I think they're divine, Bill.

- Thanks, Dawn.

Still, I've got to hand it to anybody

who's got the guts to wear

that shirt and those pants.

[Lou] What? What did I say?

- [Sylvia] Lou. Every time.

- [Lou] What?

Well, I for one had enough

pretentious art talk for one night.

But you enjoyed yourself.

You had a good time.

All right, I did.

[giggles]

I'm glad you're

doing so well, Dawn.

I am doing well, aren't I?

I haven't seen you

this happy in a long time.

[Sylvia] Thank you, dear.

- You drive them home.

- What do you mean?

- You drive them home.

- Seymour.

Don't argue.

[]

[grunting]

I want my daughter.

[indistinct police radio chatter]

If you turn me in, she'll die.

She'll have no one.

- What? What are you talking about?

- Stop.

[grunting]

All right, all right. If you let me go,

I'll tell you where she is.

You take me. Where is she?

Is she here?

- You take me there.

- No. I don't want to see her.

- What?

- I can't take it anymore.

You can't take it?

You can't take it?!

[]

Wait a minute.

She's in Newark?

That's the building.

Get out of the van.

- Out.

- All right. All right.

There's a dog and cat hospital

on the second floor.

She's got a job there.

But don't go in. Wait for her.

If you go in, you'll make a scene.

She'll be discovered.

She couldn't handle that.

She'd never survive the FBI.

Take care of her, Mr. Levov.

[Young Merry] Daddy?

I'm lonesome.

[Seymour] Where do you even

get a word like that?

I like it when you hold me.

[Seymour] Then I'll never let you go.

[Merry] Ever?

[Seymour] Not ever.

[creaking]

[door closes]

[]

Merry?

[Merry] Daddy.

- [Seymour] You're not stuttering.

- [Merry] No, I'm not.

I've become a Jain, Daddy.

A "Jain"?

We're a small Indian sect.

I wear the veil to do no harm

to the organisms that dwell in the air.

- [man coughing]

- [Seymour] Merry, this is awful.

Do you walk this way every night?

Nor do we bathe,

to do no harm to the water.

We step carefully for fear of crushing

some living object.

There are souls imprisoned

in even the lowest form of life.

[]

Forgive me, Merry, but...

How can you stand this?

It's okay, Daddy.

Really, I'm okay.

You always had things over your bed.

Used to be pictures

of Audrey Hepburn.

Those are the five vows.

"I renounce all killing of living beings,

whether subtle or gross,

moveable or immovable."

[Merry] "I renounce all vices of lying

speech arising from anger.

I renounce all sexual pleasure

with either Gods or men,

all taking of anything not given."

I think you're terrified

of what you've done.

I'm not going to ask what you've done.

I made up my mind. I'm not going

to ask you anything like that.

But I think that rather than

evade punishment,

you've taken it into your own hands.

It's all right, Daddy.

I can believe that

you can't understand.

I don't believe it's a difficult

conclusion to reach, honey.

I don't think I'm the only person

who, seeing you here,

would come up with that idea.

You want to do penance,

but this is not penance.

Not even the state

would punish you like this.

- Daddy.

- [Seymour] No.

Look at what

you've done to yourself.

You could die if you keep this up.

But only to be reborn.

Will you at least take off that mask

while we're talking so I can see you?

See me stutter, do you mean?

My stutter was only my way

of doing no violence to the air.

Well, maybe you would

have been better off with your stutter

if you had to go this far.

[bed creaks]

Where have you been?

Did you come to Newark

to help me find you?

I got a ride and here I was, you see?

Coincidence? That's all?

The world is not a place on which

I have any influence or wish to have any.

As to what constitutes a coincidence,

you and I, Daddy.

Where have you been all these years?

After Hamlins, I went to Sheils.

Sheila Smith, your therapist?

She kept me for a few days

and then she sent me on to people

in the underground.

- She sent you to them? Sheila?

- Yes.

They took care of me.

But it wasn't safe to stay anywhere.

In two months, I had 15 aliases

and moved every four or five days.

I took a name from a tombstone

in a cemetery.

Merry...

One morning, I received a phone call

that I was to go to the Greyhound station.

They gave me a ticket to Chicago.

I would stay there for two days

and then travel to Oregon,

where there would be sanctuary.

I was raped the night I arrived

in Chica... cago.

Oh, my God.

Held captive and raped and robbed.

Come home with me, Merry.

You go, Daddy.

Leave you?

You think I could leave you?

- [stammering] After everything I've...

- You must.

That's exactly what you must do:

is go.

No. You're asking me

to do something impossible.

I've looked for you for so long.

I can't.

Come home.

Come home, Merry.

Please go now, Daddy.

Please go.

What's wrong, Swede?

You never told me.

- You've seen her, you've seen Merry.

- She came to your house.

Why did you let her go?

Answer me!

You knew.

It was on the news.

She blew up a building

and you hid her in your house?

When I heard,

I couldn't believe it.

But I was her therapist.

I couldn't betray her.

You did betray her!

You sent her to people,

the worst people in the world,

the ones who got her

to do what she did.

That's not true. Merry believed

in what she did.

No! A man died!

A good man. I'll never believe

that that's what she wanted.

They manipulated her.

They used her for their crazy,

f***ing politics.

You used her.

You're trying to make this

my responsibility.

You and your radical friends.

They don't believe in peace or war

or the Vietnamese people.

They just wanted to blow a hole

in the world,

the biggest hole they could

in everything that was good!

They don't care if people get killed!

And you sent her right to them!

I sent her to where she'd be safe.

She couldn't stay here.

She was a troubled girl.

Going to prison was not what she...

You think she was troubled then?

Oh, my God, Sheila,

you haven't seen her now!

How she lives! Where she's been!

- She was raped!

- No, don't say that.

Listen, I'm telling you something!

Did you hear me?

- Stop it.

- She's been raped!

My daughter!

She's sick in her body...

sick in her mind!

[]

Dawn says to get

the steaks going, Swede.

Right. Okay.

She wants me inside,

helping with the corn.

[announcer on radio] And it's going to be

close, and he is out at home plate.

He's out! It's a double play

with a tag from Ray Fosse.

And here comes Mets manager,

Yogi Berra, to argue with the ump...

[Lou] Ah, I don't believe it.

God damn this team!

- I thought Bill told you to put the...

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