That They May Face the Rising Sun

by John McGahern

‘How are you all up there?’ ‘Topping. We are all topping.’ ‘You are managing all right without Jackie?’ ‘Getting along topping. Managing fine.’ He had been schooled never to part with any information about what happened. There was much to conceal about Bill Evans’s whole life. Because he knew no other life, his instinct to protect his keepers and his place was primal. ‘Do you think will Herself get married again?’ Jamesie asked jocularly, provocatively. ‘Everybody says that you are far too nosy.’ ‘News is better than no news,’ Jamesie answered, taken aback. There are no truths more hurtful than those we see as partly true. That such a humble hand delivered it made it more unsettling. Though he pretended not to care, Jamesie knew that his curiosity was secretly feared and openly mocked. He became unusually silent.