Read Cloudland for Free Online Page B

ancestors, the early settlers of Nova Scotia. He opened the door into a room with a large window that faced a majestic white pine tree. In contrast to the profusion of green in the rest of the house, there were no plants at all in the office. Neatly arranged with stacks of medical journals and manila files, his desk faced the door, apparently good feng shui. Two club chairs were placed equidistantly in front of it, the wall behind him paneled with bookshelves that seemed to be filled mostly with psychiatric volumes.
    I looked around. “No couch.”
    “I do research reading here. Don’t see patients out of my home.”
    “Well, that’s good, as I’m not quite ready for patient status.”
    He took me seriously. “I don’t mind obliging friends and acquaintances who, like you, are having trouble sleeping. If I couldn’t sleep and thought you could help me, I’d be camped out on your doorstep.”
    But I’d already been distracted by something I picked out in the bookshelf, a novel called No Name, by Wilkie Collins, and I asked Anthony if he’d read it.
    Turning around, he scanned his library until he found the eight-hundred-page nineteenth-century novel. “Oh yes,” he said. “I did read that … quite a while ago. Great story, as I remember.”
    “His stories are great,” I opined. “Was it recommended?”
    He thought a moment. “Yes, as a matter of fact. By a colleague.”
    “Any particular reason?”
    He frowned, trying to remember. “I believe I was interested in the story of children losing their birthright because their parents weren’t married when they were born. And how people suffered under that law.”
    “So, the psychological implications,” I suggested.
    “Right.” He crossed his arms. “I should assume you’re a fan.”
    I told him I’d read everything Wilkie Collins had ever published. Several times over. My dearest friend and former college roommate from Wesleyan is a Victorian scholar who spends a lot of time doing research in the UK. Theresa has managed to track down and send me all of the unavailable novels, including some obscure volumes that had seen printings of only several hundred copies. “I’m a defender of the Wilkie Collins faith,” I told Anthony. “I think in his own way he’s as good as Dickens.”
    “Tall claim, that. I don’t know if I would agree.”
    I told him that when I taught nonfiction and magazine writing at Saint Michael’s College in Burlington, I used to argue with some of the nineteenth-century people in the English department about the merits of Wilkie Collins, whom they taught mainly because of the feminist interest in The Woman in White. “Maybe two of his novels were on the syllabus,” I told Anthony. “As part of what’s called ‘The Novel of Sensation.’”
    He paused and then said, “You stopped teaching at Saint Mike’s last year, didn’t you?”
    I cringed. “Involuntarily.”
    “They let you go?”
    “In a manner of speaking.”
    With a gentle tone he said, “I heard from somewhere about a love affair with a student.”
    This was not where I wanted the conversation to head. “Former student,” I said after resisting the question. “It went on for a year. Whether or not I was let go because of that relationship, Saint Mike’s certainly wouldn’t admit to it. They didn’t have to, because I was an adjunct.”
    “I think I saw him once, standing at the end of your driveway as I went by. Dark hair, well built.”
    “Probably was Matthew.” A queasy feeling came over me. I sat down in one of the club chairs. And then without even realizing it would happen, I felt the tears dripping down my cheeks. Damn, I thought.
    Anthony had gone perfectly still, staring back at me with a kindly expression. And in the most gentle voice said, “Here are some tissues,” handing me a box. I took them and stanched my weeping. “So you’re still missing him?”
    “I’m sorry, can’t talk about it.”
    Anthony raised both his hands in a