Cornelius is much less vulnerable than I. When he looks in the mirror what he sees is that he needs a shave. What I see, with dismay, is the wrinkles around my eyes. I am appalled because I look like my own granny. But inside, the person I really am has no relation to this mask age is slowly attaching to my face. I feel so young, so exposed, under it. I simply cannot seem to learn to behave like the very old party I am. The young girl, arrogant, open, full of feelings she cannot analyze, longing to be told she is beautiful—that young girl lives inside this shell. And, God knows, age is hard on her.

I used to envy the old; I always imagined old age as a kind of heaven. It never occurred to me that my knee would ache all the time, or that I would fight a daily battle against being slowed down, that memory would begin to fail, and all the rest. The young cannot imagine what it is to be fighting a battle that cannot be won. One keeps death at bay, but it is always there, and sometimes it draws very near, as it did for Cornelius. Then we know—we both knew—that we must live every moment to its brim of love and joy, from now on in.

Cornelius has always been a better loser than I. He can lose with grace. I still mind frightfully when he beats me at Scrabble!

Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

The Websters spent the last weekend before they closed up their house for the winter not only putting up storm windows and pine branches over the garden but taking time out to pay a call on Eben Fifield one Saturday afternoon. It had been Cornelius’s suggestion that Eben was the man to see. Christina, acting as interpreter for her husband, explained on the telephone why Cornelius felt him to be the best source of information on the subject of summer people.