Suddenly, Last Summer Page #3

one summer in the Pacific.

You see, my son,

Sebastian, was looking for...

Looking for what?

Rare, hungry birds.

That isn't what you started to say.

You're too quick for me.

No. I was going to say my son,

Sebastian, was looking for God.

But I stopped myself

because I thought you'd think:

"What a pretentious young crackpot."

Which Sebastian was not.

This is something

I've never told anyone before.

Something so strange, so terrible.

Forgive me if I sound quite mad,

but it's true all the same.

Sebastian saw the face of God.

I'd like to hear about that.

Yes, yes.

One long ago summer,

sitting right here in this garden...

...Sebastian said to me,

"Mother, listen to this."

And he read me

Herman Melville's description...

...of the Encantadas,

the Galpagos Islands.

He read me that description

and said we had to go there.

And so we did go there that summer...

...on a chartered boat,

a four-masted schooner...

...the sort of boat that

Melville would have sailed on.

We saw the Encantadas.

But on the Encantadas

we saw something...

...that Melville hadn't written about.

We saw the great sea turtles

crawl up out of the sea...

...for their annual egg-laying.

Once a year, the female

of the sea turtles...

...crawls up out of the equatorial sea

onto the blazing sand beach...

...of a volcanic island

to dig a pit in the sand...

...and deposit her eggs there.

It's a long and dreadful thing,

the depositing of the eggs in the pits.

And when it's finished...

...the exhausted

female turtle crawls...

...back to the sea half-dead.

She never sees her offspring.

But we did.

Sebastian knew exactly when

the sea turtle eggs would be hatched...

...and we returned in time for it.

You went back?

In time to witness

the hatching of the sea turtles...

...and their desperate flight

to the sea.

The narrow beach, the color

of caviar, was all in motion...

...but the sky was in motion too,

full of flesh-eating birds.

And the noise of the birds...

...their horrible savage cries

as they circled...

...over the narrow black beach

of the Encantadas...

...while the new-hatched sea turtles

scrambled out of their sandpits...

...and started their race to the sea.

Race to the sea?

To escape the flesh-eating birds...

...that made the sky

almost as black as the beach.

And I said, "Sebastian, no.

No, it's not like that."

But he made me look.

He made me see that terrible sight.

-What was not like that?

-Life.

I said, "No.

No! That's not true!"

But he said it is.

He said, "Look, Violet.

Look, there on the shore."

And I looked and saw the sand

all alive, all alive...

...as the new-hatched sea turtles

made their dash to the sea...

...while the birds hovered

and swooped to attack...

...and hovered and swooped to attack.

They were diving down

on the sea turtles...

...turning them over...

...to expose their soft undersides...

...tearing their undersides open...

...and rending and eating their flesh.

Sebastian guessed that possibly...

...only a hundredth

of 1 percent of their number...

...would escape to the sea.

Nature is not created

in the image of man's compassion.

Nature is cruel!

Sebastian knew it all along,

was born knowing it, but not I.

I said, "No, no, those are

only birds, turtles, not us."

I didn't know then it was us.

That we are all of us trapped

by this devouring creation.

I couldn't, wouldn't face

the horror of the truth...

...even that last day

in the Encantadas...

...when Sebastian left me...

...and spent the whole

blazing equatorial day...

...in the crow's-nest of the schooner,

watching that thing on the beach...

...until it was too dark to see.

And when he came down the rigging,

he said, "Well, now I've seen Him."

And he meant God.

Do you believe he saw God?

He saw the whole thing there

that day on the beach.

But I was like you. I said no.

I refused to believe...

...until suddenly, last summer,

I learned my son was right.

That what he had shown me

in the Encantadas...

...was the horrible...

...the inescapable truth.

Oh, Violet, honey.

You gave me a turn,

coming in like that.

Hi, Aunt Vi.

What are you two doing here?

We came for cousin Sebastian's

clothes, like you said.

Remember?

So we just kind of let ourselves in.

I must have just got hold of

this letter when you frightened me.

Caught on your sleeve probably.

This is Mrs. Holly, the mother

of the girl at St. Mary's...

...and that is her son, George.

Apparently, in a weak moment, I said

he could have Sebastian's clothes.

You haven't forgotten what you said

last week at Elaine Tutweiler's?

Said since I was going

off to college...

...I could have his clothes,

which were going to waste.

That's right, you said that.

I heard you say

that son here could have...

All right, I stand accused of

generosity. Now will you please...?

Aunt Violet is generous,

so generous to her family, Mr...

I didn't catch your name.

-Dr. Cukrowicz.

-Doctor? Are you a doctor?

-Violet, you're not ill again?

-No, Grace...

Oh, I'm so relieved.

I was afraid you had another

of those strokes of yours.

Those hysterical seizures.

I've never had a seizure nor a stroke.

We were discussing your daughter.

Cathy?

My poor lamb, my poor little girl.

Doctor, can you help her?

I'll try to if I can.

Mama, look here! White silk.

"Made in Rome."

Oh, boy. Is this one gonna

pick up lipstick?

I said take the clothes, George.

Don't flaunt them in my face.

Why don't you both

kindly let yourselves out?

Get the rest of the clothes

another time.

It won't take me two seconds

to finish up.

It's impossible to believe...

...that Sebastian won't

walk through that door again...

...with all those bright young people

he used to know.

All laughing and carrying on...

...saying those witty, sophisticated

things that were way over my head.

He was such a tease too.

You know, doctor...

...he told me that the piece of lace

on this table...

...was made by these blind nuns...

...in Belgium. Imagine!

I thought I'd gone through everything.

Who is that?

-lt's the girl.

-Why, that's my poor angel.

-That's Catherine.

-I wonder why he put it there.

Well, maybe he liked her.

George, take your plunder

and get out of here.

-Okay, Aunt Vi.

-This must have been taken last spring.

Cathy's wearing her

Mardi Gras ballgown.

Remember, Vi, how lovely she was?

And you loaned her your fur coat.

I remember everything.

I guess it was not exactly

a happy evening.

What did happen?

She was... She is a lovely girl.

And I must say, of all my relations...

...my delightful relations,

she was the one most like me.

That's why you've got to save her...

...because madness is the most horrible

doom there is on this earth.

Every item here has been

inventoried by the insurance people.

I'm sure they'd be upset

if anything were missing.

What do you think I am?

On that subject, George,

my lips are sealed.

Now, both of you, please go.

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