From a Town on the Hudson Read Online Free PDF Page B

were generally seen in Japan. They might have been living a life that, for them, was most splendid. I liked seeing them because I could learn many things about life from their routine. Since they had grown old, they spoke loudly. I could hear the sound of their voices every day. It was noisy, but I liked it because I took it as a sign of their being healthy.
    For a long time after Hannah had been taken away, the dilapidated blue car, which William used to drive to a nearby supermarket with his wife and Tom, was left parked on the street. Not knowing that the pitiful car had spent good times with its family, the summer sun beamed down on it mercilessly. The grass kept growing. A half-opened window on the second floor rattled sometimes. When I walked by the house, I could imagine hearing Tom's barking and their familiar, loud voices which sounded happy at first and then turned to anguish. I soon realized, however, that I was hearing the August wind rising. Not long after that, some men came and took out the furniture and loaded it onto a truck. They also came to survey the property. I thought the house would be torn down and a new rental house would be built there. Then one morning in the fall, I saw a big dump truck, power shovel, tractor shovel, and a few other vehicles gathered around William and Hannah's house. To me it looked like a party for dinosaurs. They fixed their weird eyes upon the house. "This is the very last chance I have to do anything for Hannah!" I thought as I rushed out of my house with a camera and asked a man who looked like he was in charge if I could take a picture before he started his job. "Sure!" He was generous in giving me space to take pictures. The house stood like a haggard orphan boy whose eyes didn't sparkle even though he saw his favorite dump truck. I said good-bye to the house as I pressed the camera shutter. There was nothing I could do for the Paiges, but I would remember their home for a long time.
    In the holiday season of 1985, as a gift to them, I had taken the Paiges a small calendar that had been sent from Japan. William seemed glad to have it, but his wife looked dubious. I realized they might not be Christian; they had no decorations up for Christmas. In 1986, they waited for me. We exchanged greetings and small gifts with each other at the Paiges' front door. That night, I saw a silhouette of a Christmas tree in their window. For me, it looked warmer than other houses and their elaborate illumination. The next morning, I found out that it was just a bare fir branch that William had carelessly cut off a tree in the corner of their front yard. On the morning of December 23, 1987, I found a vinyl bag outside our door when I opened it to see my son off to school. It was a Christmas gift from Hannah: a small jar of homemade pickled cucumbers and a long letter. I knew that William had been hospitalized since the previous fall. A little later, I saw her outside and ran down the steps to thank her. She grasped my hands with her big hands— she was wearing her old gloves that had holes in them—and shot questions at me. "Did you read the letter? Did you taste the pickles? How did you like them?" Her breath scattered in the chill air. When I told her that I liked her pickles very much, she hugged me for the first time, mumbling to herself the way my grandmother had used to do. Then with a pleasant smile she confidently told me that her husband would be back home soon.
    The earth shook as the house fell. The dust blew. The yellow-colored, iron machines assaulted the Paiges home. They pulled Williams trellis down and it broke into pieces. They smashed the window frames. Many glass jars that Hannah had kept in the kitchen were crushed crying for help. All day long I could hear the painful groans of the house being torn down. At sunset, the dust thinned out and vanished. Everything became quiet. That night, through the window I saw that only the concrete walls of the basement were