Frank Conroy '58 died April 6, 2005, at his home in Iowa City, Iowa; he’d been Director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop for the last 18 years, a kind of Lee Strasberg of the craft, with many well-known students, among them John Irving, T.C. Boyle, Elizabeth McCracken, Nathan Englander, and Jayne Anne Phillips — all of whom appeared on the University of Iowa campus last April to celebrate his life, humor, music, and work. They did it by reading selections from their own writing — “something Frank would have dug.” A consummate hipster as well as an inspired craftsman of aurally acute prose, Conroy had a special feeling for the young: “Teaching writing the way he did was like an extension of his own writing and music playing,” his second wife, Maggie Conroy, said — he earned money for years as a self-taught jazz piano player who jammed with Charlie Mingus (and was told: ‘You swing.’) “The young people made him feel hopeful.”

Following is a reprint of what is believed to be Conroy’s first published short story (“Frank didn’t squirrel stuff away,” Mrs. Conroy said). Appearing in the 1958 issue of the Haverford Revue, when the author was 22, it foreshadows definitive Conrovia — his tactile feeling for the minutiae of mood; a sense of the fragility of the moment; the way moments show “patterns,” but only retrospectively, so that Conroy “time” is quintessentially bluesy — always finely comprehended but too late to do much about . . . Which didn’t preclude bolts of joy and whole notes of wonder in his later works —Stop-Time (1967), a memoir; Midair (1985), a book of short stories; Body and Soul (1993), a novel; Dogs Bark but the Caravan Rolls On (2002), essays; and Time and Tide (2004), another non-fiction book about Nantucket, his favorite place in middle age.

In addition to his work at the IWW, Frank Conroy taught at George Mason University, Brandeis, and M.I.T., and from 1982 to 1987, was director of the literature program at the National Endowment for the Arts.

She thought she was awake. Yes she must be . . . that white triangle was the corner of the pillow, she could see it for an instant, pointing up into the darkness. And those black lines, they were her hair against the linen . . . yes, of course, now she could see, underneath the white triangle again that darkness was her hair, streaming off the pillow. This was not a dream. She had just been dreaming and this was not the same. There was her body, lying still and warm in a long hollow pressed in the bed. And all around her, just where the hollow began to dip, the tight sheet was wrinkled like the corner of an old man’s eye. The perfect stillness seemed to be some spell. She recognized the pillow and her hair, she felt her body . . . and yet it was as if she were floating limply in the dim bottom of some warm sea, with no control of her body, no connection between her mind and her body, no will. She would have to move, and the spell would be broken. There was her finger, that would be easy. It didn’t move. If she could make it move a fraction of an inch, just a jerk, just a tensing of the muscle, the connection would be made. She tried again but the finger lay motionless, still and senseless. She collected all her power for one burst of will, and failed. A disorganized frantic fear came over her swiftly . . . she must not give in. There was a strange sort of comfortableness to the inertia, but she knew she couldn’t give in to it. She must move! Her finger, her hand, something. Move, move, O God move . . . she saw her navel swelling . . . no . . . move, now quickly . . . singing is

Her eyes opened. Through the open window the sunlight poured over her bed and into the room in flecked beams. She hunched herself up on her elbows and stared for a moment at the familiar surroundings. The faint sweetness of the garden downstairs hung in the air. Judy, her little sister, was singing to herself in the bathroom across the hall. It had been a dream . . . slowly the tenseness left her body. She kicked off the covers and exposed herself to the direct rays of the sun that poured in over the white sill, warming her blue silk pajamas and enveloping her in a bright haze. After a moment she sat up and turned to the window. She felt the mattress give under her knees as she leaned out. In the distance over the trees she could see the slim outline of the college tower. Below, the garden spread informally. In the slight morning mist the sun was bright enough to make her squint. She heard the creak of the back door opening unseen beneath her, and as it slammed shut Romeo, the dog, trotted out in a perfectly straight line across the grass. The black and white of his coat stood out sharply against the background of green. Alison whistled softly and then ducked away as the dog turned. When she looked again Romeo had his head up staring at her window. His pink tongue dangled from the side of his mouth. She could just make out his eyes blinking slowly. Quietly, she spoke.

“Gonna catch Ro . . . catcha catcha.”

Down on the lawn his short tail began to wag.

Alison got up from the bed and walked across the room to the closet. She unbuttoned the top of her pajamas and had it half off when she heard Judy leaving the bathroom. Quickly she covered herself again as her sister opened the door. She stopped, holding the doorknob. Alison could see her in the closet mirror. She didn’t turn as Judy spoke.

“Breakfast’s ready. Mother and Father are already down.”

In the mirror her thin child’s body seemed too small for the heavy pigtails. Their eyes met in the glass and Alison averted her glance.

“I’m coming.”

She heard Romeo bark once from the garden. Judy stood at the door and Alison felt her watching.

“You’d better hurry or you’ll be late for school,” she said.

“No,” Judy answered, “ there isn’t any school today, it’s my spring vacation.”

Alison picked up a brush from the top of the bureau and pulled at her hair with long strokes. In the mirror she saw herself leaning first one way and then the other as she shifted sides. Judy watched silently. The bristles cracked in her thick black hair as Alison lifted her head and did the back, up and out from the nape of her neck.

“My hair’s longer than yours,” Judy said.

There was no answer. After a moment she left, the door open behind her. Alison made the last stroke and replaced the brush on the bureau. She took off the pajama top and twisted sideways in front of the mirror, cocking her chin over her shoulder. Judy was wrong . . . her hair reached all the way down to the small of her back, just above the waist. It was longer than hers. She lifted her arms to reach back and smooth it, and her breasts rose slightly from the tension. She decided not to wear a brassiere, it was too warm.

She picked a light spring dress from the closet and slipped it over her head, arms extended. Zipping it up slowly, she was careful not to catch her skin in the metal teeth. The floor of the hall was cool and smooth under her bare feet. In the bathroom she cupped her hands under the cold water tap and splashed her face quickly. The towel felt rough and good against her skin. As she came out into the hall she could hear them talking underneath her. Judy’s sporadic high-pitched laughter cut shrill through the house. Alison turned at the top of the stairs and started down. As she descended her mother and father and Judy came into view, sitting at the table against the French windows across the room. Her father looked up over the edge of the cup of coffee he was drinking. Her mother was buttering toast. As she approached her father swallowed quickly and lowered the cup. His voice grew louder as he smiled.

“Well here she is at last . . .” She bent over and kissed his cheek, rough against her lips. His voice seemed to explode in her ear. “. . . I thought I might miss you this morning, sweetheart.”

She straightened up and then took her seat opposite Judy. Her mother, thin and gray in her dressing gown, shook a little silver bell for the maid.

“Good morning, Alison,” she said.

“Morning.”

Judy was talking to her father about dinosaurs as Alison drank her orange juice. Alison wondered vaguely what they were . . . she had heard her mother several times telling people that Judy knew all about them. She would laugh as she said it, but Alison could feel that somehow they must be important. She told herself that she must remember this time and ask someone what they were. Her mother handed her a cup of coffee, which she accepted silently. Her eyes were drawn almost automatically to the front of her mother’s dressing gown. She could never remember which one had been taken off . . . which one was real and which one was false. Madge’s thick black arm cut across her field of vision and set a plate of eggs before her.

“Daddy, how come you have school today and I don’t?” Judy asked.

Her father looked up from the paper by his plate.

“The college is different from your kind of school, Judy. It’s privately operated while yours is public, the city runs it.”

“Oh, so you mean they can each have different rules . . .”

“That’s right.”

Alison wondered what they had done with it after they cut it off. Did they bury it? Perhaps they had just thrown it away. They would have to bury all of her soon . . . three years, she had heard from the top of the stairs, three years and they would have to bury her. The coffee was hot against her lips. Her father spoke across the table.

“Edith, one of my students is coming over this morning to pick up some exams to mark . . . they’re on top of the piano if I’ve left.”

Her mother nodded. His voice went on and with a start Alison realized from the change of tone that he was now talking to her.

“Well sweetheart, it’s a lovely day . . . how about getting out some of that chickweed in the back?”

Judy took advantage of the moment’s silence.

“Mother and I are going into town to do the shopping . . .” she paused “. . . in the car.”

“Hush up, Judy . . .” her mother said quietly. Her father was still looking at her.

“It’ll be nice out there in the sun . . .” he said. Alison thought a moment.

“Yes, alright.” She could play with Romeo. Her father leaned back with a smile.

“Good . . . that’s fine. We’ll all be doing something.” He avoided his wife’s glance. “. . . a productive day.”

After breakfast her father walked out into the garden to show her where she should work. The grass was still wet and tickled her bare feet. The rough tweed of his jacket brushed against her arm as they walked. She was conscious of his height beside her, and the way his steps were longer. He had his pipe between his teeth. She disliked the smell of the burning tobacco and was just about to move away a bit when his arm came up behind her and lay gently across her shoulders, pulling her closer to him. They stopped in front of the bed of flowers. His arm lifted from her back and he took the pipe from his mouth to point at the ground with its stem.

“I stopped here when it got dark last night . . . there isn’t very much left.” She nodded, bent over to brush a fly off the back of her ear.

“The tools are in that . . .” he pointed at a wheelbarrow behind the flowers “. . . underneath the canvas.”

They stood silent for a moment. She watched a fat bee circling around the bright colors of the thick row of plants. The circles became smaller as it chose one of the buds and landed.

“Alison . . .”

The bee’s body jerked convulsively and with a sudden darting motion it disappeared into the soft folds of the flower. The breeze bent the branches of the tree just over their heads, and the moving leaves filtered the sun into a shifting pattern of blurred lights that played over the flowers and sparkled in the grass. Her father touched her arm and she saw the back of his hand caught for an instant in the sun. The brown hair looked almost blond until the shadow returned.

“Alison . . . your mother is going to try to get you to go into town to see about that job in the bookstore . . .”

She found the flower again. It was trembling slightly above the slender green stalk. The bee was still inside.

“ . . . I don’t want you to go.”

With a sudden burst the bee struggled through the heavy petals and was gone.

She turned to her father.

“Alright,” she said.

“It isn’t that I don’t want you to have the job . . .” His big head bent over as he stared abstractly at her feet. “ . . . But you know that mother’s operation was very hard . . .”

Alison nodded. “I don’t care, it’s alright.”

“ . . . very hard . . .” he paused, “and we don’t know how easily she’ll get over it. I’d rather you stay home where you can help your mother . . .” he looked up “ . . .and me.” She felt his hands grip her shoulders as he faced her. Looking in his eyes made her uncomfortable. “These are bad times, sweetheart, and you have to help . . . If you left me I . . .”

He stopped as they heard her mother’s voice calling, thin and far away under the sound of the leaves. His hands tightened slightly and he spoke more quickly.

“I must go, I have a class at nine,” he smiled. “I hope some of them stay awake this time, it’s a good lecture . . . how about a kiss?”

He bent over and kissed her cheek. He didn’t take his head right away, and she could feel the heels of his hands on her arms and his fingers pressing gently on her shoulder blades. He turned away and started across the grass. She saw him wave to her mother whom she couldn’t see behind the hedge, and then stop and turn to her.

“Get my briefcase on the table, will you dear? . . . I’ll meet you at the garage.” She ran up the slight rise and as she passed he lifted his hand with a smile as if to swing at her. She saw her mother re-enter the house, slamming the door behind her. Alison slowed to a walk. The skin on her shoulders was warm as the sun came through her dress. She opened the door, and then suddenly, before she went in, turned her head to look back. Her father was standing in the same place. They stood watching each other for a moment . . . then he started for the garage and she entered the house.
Her mother was sitting alone at the breakfast table with the light brown briefcase in her hands. She looked up as Alison stopped before her.

" This is what he wants, isn’t it . . .” she held the briefcase “. . . his notes.”

“Yes, he went to get the bike.”

Alison took the case and ran out to give it to her father. He was waiting on his bike in the driveway with one foot resting on the ground for balance. She walked gingerly over the rough gravel and he let go of the handle bars to receive the case. The front tire fell at an angle, the rubber tire bumping her leg.

She stepped away as he straightened the wheel and pushed off, shakily at first, but then stronger as he gained momentum.

“Bye-bye” he cried, glancing back.

She waved and watched him turn the corner and roll down the street out of sight. Going back to the house she saw her mother through the French windows. Romeo ran over the grass from the other side of the house and went in with Alison as she opened the door. He crossed the room and went into the kitchen where she could hear that Judy and Madge were doing the dishes. She started up the stairs but her mother called to her. She stopped and turned, standing on the bottom steps. Her mother watched from across the room.

“We’re going into town . . . do you want to come?”

“Oh, I don’t know, I don’t think so . . .”

“You could see about that job, it might be fun.”

“Yes, I know, but I think I’d rather go some other time.”

Her mother paused for a moment, and then got up from the table and crossed the room to Alison. Her dressing gown fell open and her negligee flashed white as she rested her hand on the knob of the bannister and looked up.

“I’ve talked to your father about it . . . but sometimes I think because he . . . because he’s so fond of you that he doesn’t really face things . . .” she paused. “You’d like the job, you’d have your own money and meet lots of people . . .” Alison stood silently. In the kitchen Judy and Madge were laughing at something and Romeo came out into the room and sat on the rug. As her mother’s voice started again Alison saw his head turn to watch them.

“You know all that time when you were a child and didn’t talk, your father wouldn’t let me take you to a doctor or try to see what was wrong . . . he just kept saying you’d get over it.” She gathered the dressing gown around herself and tied the belt. “It’s just because he’s so fond of you he doesn’t realize.”

Alison looked at her mother.

“Well, I did get over it . . .”

“Oh yes, I know . . . but it was three years.” She turned away and started up the stairs. “ . . . he doesn’t even remember, he thinks it was a few months.”

“I’ll get a job,” Alison said, but her mother didn’t answer and turned out of sight at the head of the stairs.

Alison sat down on the steps and opened her arms to receive Romeo as he came trotting over. His coat was thick and her fingers went deep while she hugged him tightly. The front doorbell rang and he barked suddenly, startling her. She felt his body tensed and trembling under her hands. He barked again.

Judy came running out of the kitchen and went to the door. As she opened it, Alison peered through the bannister posts and saw a short figure in white trousers and a green shirt leaning against the wall. The door swung open all the way and the boy smiled down at Judy. He looked about twenty, Alison’s age.

“Hi . . .” he said. “Is your fa . . .”

“No,” Judy interrupted. “Daddy isn’t here, but he told us, so it’s all right . . . you want those exams.”

“That’s right.”

“Well, they’re right over there on the piano,” she said, pointing.

He came in and she closed the door behind him. Romeo growled and Alison gave him a little shake. The boy looked up as he crossed the room and saw them sitting there.

“Hello,” he said, stopping.

“Hello.”

Judy ran over to the piano and returned with the papers. She stood in front of him, her back to Alison.

“Here they are. I went over and got them.”

He looked down.

“Oh, thanks.”

“That white paper on the top is the answer sheet,” Judy said.

He looked over at Alison.

“You must be Dr. Wolfe’s daughter.”

Alison nodded as she got up. Romeo followed close at her heels as she walked across the room towards the hall and the back door.

“Don’t go,” the boy called after her. “Please don’t go, I didn’t mean to disturb you . . . I’m just going.”

Alison turned as she left the room.

“I have to do the weeding.”

“Oh, let her go,” Judy said, “she’s just an old sourpuss anyway.”

Alison pushed open the screen door and stepped out onto the grass. Romeo ran ahead and disappeared behind the hedge. By the time she reached the flower bed he was scratching at the soft dirt with his front paws. She got the trowel, covered with paint scars, from the wheelbarrow and knelt down next to the dog. The weeds came out easily and the earth turned silently, warm and thick under the blade of the trowel. She worked slowly up the row, pulling the short green plants and taking care not to cut the flowers or bend their smooth stalks. Looking back, she saw the lighter brown of the soil she had just turned, with satisfaction. Here and there a petal, pink and white, had fallen and lay curled on the rough dirt. Alison picked one up carefully and pressed it to her lips. It held a drop of water, cool and fragrant. The earth fell away from her fingers and she took the petal into her mouth against her tongue.

She heard a noise behind her and turned. Ro was gone, and through the space in the hedge the boy appeared. He stood for a moment. In his hand a white cigarette unraveled a thin ribbon of smoke that vanished as it rose above his fist into the air.

“This is a lovely place,” he said. “ . . . your mother was right.”

She wound her hand around a weed and pulled . . . too fast, the stem broke. Slipping the trowel into the dirt she searched for the hidden roots with its point. She felt in the ground the reverberations of his footsteps as he approached. Then suddenly he was beside her, kneeling with her and she could smell the tobacco over the flowers.

“Can I help?” he asked.

He smelled like her father. She didn’t answer and kept on working . . . going away from him.

“Is something wrong?”

Out of the corner of her eye she could see him . . . white, moving.

“Go away.”

“Wh . . . What?”

“Go away.”

He stood up quickly and backed off a step. She plunged the trowel into the ground and didn’t look up. After a moment he was gone.

When she finished the row she moved to the sunlit part of the garden and lay down, her cheek against the grass. She spread her arms and held the earth in her palms, fingers entwined with the grass. She realized that now she was alone, just Ro and her, the others would have left by now and wouldn’t be back for a long time.

She rolled over onto her back and stretched herself luxuriously. There were more clouds in the sky now than before, thick white mountains, but the sun was still uncovered, high up, bright in the deep blue. She smiled. Ro, where was Ro . . . She sat up and looked at the trees toward the end of the garden. He was somewhere in there, in the dark and the cool, hunting something. She whistled a few times and waited. After a moment he broke from the underbrush onto the sunlit lawn and came running toward her. She fell back and received him. Holding her head away from his wet tongue, she glanced sidelong at him and tugged and pushed with her fingers in his coat. He barked once or twice and she growled menacingly in response. He crouched down on his front paws and panted in her ear.

She found a stick and threw it out across the lawn. Ro scrambled after it and returned holding it lightly in his teeth. She raised it up again and he jumped in the air, barking, trying to reach it. She cocked her arm and he immediately prepared to run. As she threw he was off, tearing up the grass with his back legs. Each time he brought it back he jumped higher, and each time she threw it further. She had decided to stop and took the wet stick from his mouth when his body suddenly convulsed in a series of short dry coughs. As they subsided he again jumped after the stick, but she sat down and reached out to pat him..

“Alright Ro . . . lie down, that’s enough . . . lie down.”

He snatched the stick from her hand and ran out a little way onto the lawn. As he turned to look back the stick dropped from his mouth and his body arched in a sudden fit of trembling. He coughed and fell on his side. Alison ran over quickly and knelt beside him. He was breathing very quickly, and as she circled him in her arms he whined softly. He threw back his head and was still.

She didn’t really know he was dead until she saw his eyes, which were open and motionless. Then she realized he had stopped breathing. She sat for a long time, holding him. The wet stick lay in the grass where he had dropped it. After a while she placed him carefully on the ground and got up.

There was a very tall tree at the edge of the garden and she leaned against it for a moment. She reached up for the lowest branch and slowly started climbing. When she got to the top she arranged herself in a cradle of crooked branches with her back against the trunk. The breeze rustled through the leaves and she could feel the thick branches bending smoothly to the pull of the wind. Every now and then the heavy branch by her side would sway downward and she could see through to the lawn, far below. Romeo's body lay still, a black and white spot against the green.

The sun was setting and she could hear them calling her from the house, but she didn't answer. They came looking for her, and found Romeo, and took him away. They called again and then it was quiet. She pressed her back against the trunk and saw the green leaves turning orange in the horizontal rays of the sun.

The bell in the college tower sounded the hour.

Reprinted from the 1958 Haverford Revue, originally published during Frank Conroy's senior year, with the kind permission of Margaret Conroy, his widow.