Mohawk

considerable satisfaction from it. Nevertheless, he realized that even if he lived to be a hundred, he would be essentially the same person doing the same tasks, neither better nor worse. He wasn’t jealous of those who had more money than he did, though to have more money would’ve been nice. But it was change he longed for, and he often thought that in an ideal world people would change their personalities every decade or so, possibly learning something to boot. Each metamorphosis would necessarily be a change for the better. No butterfly, no matter how faded or imperfect, was ever uglier than the larva it emerged from.
    Mather Grouse was not naive, of course. He knew that most people who had enough money to embrace sweet change were sidetracked before they got around to changing much of anything. They changed their wardrobes, or rotated their tires. But no beautiful butterfly was ever formed. Still, young Mather Grouse concluded that this was their own fault. The opportunity existed, even if most chose to ignore it.
    For men like himself, though, destiny was rigid. The cards had been dealt and the only choice was to play them well or badly. He himself chose to play them well but was never able to stifle the regret of the deal, of not being able to play all the hands around the table. He didn’t despise men who held winning hands, but he did object to men who held cards not all that different from his own yet were too stupid or crude to feel regret. They saw nothing wrong with the lives they led. They did not notice the film beneath their fingernails or, if they did, found it charming. Good manly grime. They noticed only its absence in other men, andwere suspicious. They discussed their members proudly, explaining where they’d been and where they planned to go next. Gave them nicknames.
    The low sameness of life gnawed at Mather Grouse like a sharp-toothed rodent, and dictated, even when he was young, that his only pride in life would derive from taking the less traveled path. And so he went home after work when he would’ve preferred a cold glass of beer. He stayed clear of gambling, though he would’ve loved to take part. He held his tongue and kept to himself, because to do things any other way was not so much wrong as self-defeating and common.
    Long after he had quietly surrendered his personal dream, Mather Grouse continued to dream for his daughter. At the risk of turning her into a snob, he began to suggest to Anne that there was more to life than Mohawk had to offer. This message was not easily conveyed, however, especially with Mrs. Grouse undercutting her husband’s efforts with her own brand of stoic resignation. But Anne was bright and very beautiful, even as a child, her skin radiant and slightly darker than either parent’s, her eyes darker still, her hair so black it threw off an almost blue sheen. To her father she was so lovely, so true, that he convinced himself that she existed on a plane that transcended ordinary destiny. She was one of the lucky ones exempted from fate, a child with unearthly defenses all her own. One such defense was a stubborness of will equal, if not superior, to her mother’s. Anne also possessed uncompromising honesty and a hatred of injustice that made her eyes leap with fire. Mather Grouse loved her so deeply that he was almost beside himself with pride and hope.
    But his cherished faith that Anne would somehowprove exempt from common fate was tested during her junior year, when it occurred to Mather Grouse that what he had viewed as her natural defenses against the crudeness of Mohawk County might under different circumstances become tragic flaws. And he suspected that she might be more cruelly vulnerable than he himself had ever been. Her recklessness, which would have terrified many a father, gave him little cause for alarm. Mather Grouse understood that such spirit would frighten the sons of Mohawk who, while as ready and willing as their fathers to plant their seed in any convenient place, would blanch at the notion of approaching Mather Grouse’s daughter. Whatever stoked the fire in her eyes made them timid, as her beauty made them unsure of themselves. They would slink up the back stairs of dark three-family houses to relieve themselves in the loins of some lonely, middle-aged woman of reputation, but like their fathers they lacked courage and will, not to mention intelligence.
    No, Mather Grouse’s fears were of an entirely different cast. Anne was