The Missing Chapter...

As I mentioned earlier, part of our assignment was to imitate Wilder's style. Below is my imitation, the "missing chapter" of the novel.

Part IV:

Don Jaime

As is generally true of children born to stage mothers, little Don Jaime grew up in shadowed corners; in locked nurseries; in silence and being seen but not heard. He was born from a union of opposites: his father the Viceroy of Peru; his mother the Perichole, a grand stage actress. The hushed silence and invisibility that defined his childhood engendered in him a quiet and grave manner, fostered by his introduction to the adult world nearly upon his birth. He lived in the opera house with his mother. The wings of the stage were his playrooms; the plays were his entertainment. He thrived on Shakespeare and the best of the Old Comedy as another child thrives on yelling and climbing things. Conversely, the commonplace drama and high glamour of the place only served to drive Don Jaime more into silence. Don Jaime did not have a happy childhood, but he did not know it for want of a different experience; his life centered around glimpses of his mother; she the sun and he the half-forgotten moon.

Don Jaime was afflicted with the same unpredictable convulsions as his father the Viceroy. He bore the pain bravely and in silence as he had been taught to do; he would succumb suddenly, writhing like a helpless spider. This weakness of his frame wrought his body and spirit frail and fragile; his mother, in fleeting moments of a matronly persona, worried for his health. The Perichole was the Eighth Wonder of the World to Don Jaime and he followed her with quiet devotion and dignity whenever he saw her. The Perichole’s harsh grandeur drew a sharp line of contrast to Don Jamie’s natural dignity and they appeared a very odd couple, a parrot and a sparrow, walking together in the back garden of the theater or through the streets in silence; as two people living parallel lives, they never really connected. Indifference and fearful adoration haunted their relationship; the adoration on the part of Don Jaime was that of reverence to a god.

After a time, they moved to a country villa; and inside built a microcosm of Lima, with glamour and elegance festooning the dinner parties and evening festivities. Nothing changed: the Archbishop and Viceroy still occupied the card-table long into the night; witty comments were just as clever and subsequent laughs just as loud; Don Jaime was still pushed aside for his mother’s guests.

In lieu of spending solitary nights in the nursery, Don Jaime explored the countryside at his ease. In the shadowy garden adjacent to the towering house could be heard a rapid pulse, muffled under layers of muscle and skin and internal organs; and a rustling of leaves which wrapped a thin creature in their embrace; and a contented exhale of a young and simple heart. His limbs began to glow with the captured sun, shimmering just under the skin’s surface, held captive during the many hours he spent watching creatures and their worlds, while his mother reveled in her false one.

As time wore on, he discovered a creature from the nearby town; she crouched in the soft quietness of the woods, watching him, until he noticed and summoned up the courage to say something. Like a child coaxing a wild animal, he day by day built a relationship with her until she emerged fully from the forest. Her name was Maria, and she was the daughter of the town butcher. Maria was quiet; she did not say much; and, of all the relationships in Don Jaime’s life, she was the most meaningful of them. Once or twice, Don Jaime even found himself crossing over that great chasm which separated their lives from each other’s parallel track. It was his first real friendship, and like all first friendships, a beautiful and unspoiled innocence. Together they watched insects play in the giant strands of grass which were woven in front of their country house. Don Jaime talked uninhibited of the nature which surrounded them; and Maria listened faithfully, eager to share in his excitement.

But inevitably, he succumbed to a fit in front of her. The shame of it seemed to swallow him whole, his body folding in on itself.. It was the shame in his great, frightened eyes which kept Maria riveted until it finished; then, eyes reflecting his horror, she left hurriedly. The weakness he had exposed was too overwhelming to her. From this, Don Jaime that the world did not approve of his defect. It was this that taught him of the fickleness of humans.

Everything changed when his mother the Perichole caught the terrible epidemic of small-pox and relegated herself deeper in the country. The new house was much smaller than Don Jaime was used to. It was quaint, with a miniature garden and closet-rooms; Don Jaime missed the old, larger gardens. He was kept in his room for fear he would catch the small-pox; but after the scare was over, and upon the discovery that she would be scarred forever, the Perichole proceeded to tear out of her life anything which represented, either to her or to others, her former beauty. Don Jaime sat by as his mother slowly sold his own possessions; as his room grew barer and barer; as his mother retreated in on herself, lonely and friendless. Don Jaime did not know what to do, and so did nothing. The Perichole sank deeper and deeper into a beauty-less world. One day, Uncle Pio, his mother’s old friend from the theatre days, came to call. Don Jaime had always liked Uncle Pio. He offered Don Jaime an opportunity to study with him for a year. Don Jaime accepted eagerly, jumping at the chance to leave the hollow house and the gloom of his mother. Uncle Pio took him home through the mountains and finally across the Bridge of San Luis Rey. Then it collapsed.