reading for us.

Faster please. Just kidding! I'm really enjoying this.

And bizarre. But I suggest that at this point, it is such a well written book (unlike my feeble comments), you should pick up the book yourself. There is so much more that I am not sure how to interpret yet, so I have ignored those parts. This could be like a Sherlock Holmes book where one of those little tidbits matters at the end of the book, and I just don't know it.

There is a rich description of little things that I find interesting but cannot comment on. As an example: "The smell came at them as they slowly approached down the road. It seemed to have settled in a tent about the house. They went inside to battle it and immediately rushed back out. It was as though they hadn't even touched the place yet, or worse, as though they'd only succeeded in lifting the lid off the source of the odor, which still emanated, Cyprian thought, from the cleared-off floor." And all I have to say about that description is that it smelled really bad. I do an injustice to Erdrich.

It's 1934, and after 4 months of show biz on the road, Delphine has a need to go home, so Cyprian and she just now arrive at Argus. She worries constantly about her dad Roy needing her.

The smell in her home and garbage was enough to chase them out of the house and they were about ready to burn down the small building. But after a short rest outside, they decided just to burn all the contents and scrub everything, which they did. They got a room at a hotel with a bath, and got a room for Roy. Then they proceeded to clean up the urine, spoiled food, vomit and whatever they could carry, they took out and burned.

After all the cleaning was done the house still smelled as though they hadn't done anything, so they decided to investigate the celler. There was a door with a ring in the pantry, and it was covered by broken jars of peaches, dried up, and a dead dog. They managed to pry it open and stepped down into the earthen lower level. Here the smell was even worse then it was on the main level. They were flabbergasted and sickened when they saw three bodies - a man in a black suit, a woman and child.

They went to the hotel and found out from Roy after a series of questions about the deceased's clothing who they were. It seems they were there at the house for a wake of their relative. Roy had to have the wake so that Mr. Strub did not have to have a typical funeral. He'd wanted a goodtime wake, drinking, etc. When it was over, Roy went out and slept in the shed and out of grief for Cornelius Strub, stayed at a bum's jungle by the railroad tracks. He doesn't know when he went back to the house. He didn't know the bodies were in the basement or how they got into the basement. They were "Porky" and Doris Chavers and their little son, relatives of the deceased, Cornelius Strub, and of Delphine's best friend, Clarisse, whose father it was who died.

They contacted Sheriff Hock and were all cleared of any crime.

Those were the basic facts in the chapter.

What I got from Chapter 4 was the realization that Roy truly loved his daughter Delphine. He cried like a baby when she came home. He was a romantic who missed Minnie, supposedly Delphine's mother, of whom Delphine knew nothing. Roy started out drinking to mourn her death, or leaving, but ended up drinking because he couldn't stop. He kept her fuzzy pictures and looked at them frequently. Delphine kept a cigar box that she assumed was her mother's, with a scarf and small stone inside, and a small lacquer bureau. She was glad they hadn't burned down the house after all or she would have lost her keepsakes...

When they first saw the mess and the smell, Cyprian told Delphine he would help her and she figured his help was useless because he knew nothing except how to stand on his hands. But he amazed her. He carried out tons of garbage, burned it and was very sympathetic about her problems. At the hotel where they stayed at night, they took baths together, no sex, and he tenderly washed her and babied her, again, no sex. She really appreciated him and would gladly have married him if she could only know he was through with men. Cyprian on the other hand, loved her as much as he was able. He was unsure of whether Delphine had seen him and the man on the bench in Canada on their acrobatic tour.

Delphine took everything to heart. She was empathy personified, and she got that way from listening to all the drunks and their sad stories whom their dad invited to the house. She quit the Catholic school because she couldn't believe all the lies about God, then got a lot of low-paying jobs, and Roy used her money to buy alcohol. Once though, she became angry. After coming home from work at a brickyard, she was very tired, and Roy's drunken friends came into her bedroom (not for sex) and wouldn' leave. So she wacked them with a broom, then got an axe and hurled it down on the poker deck on the table and the drunks all ran out saying she had lost her mind. Then her dad got sick from being out in the cold and she had to quit her job to take care of him.

No matter who had a problem, she knew how they felt and sympathized. That's why it was strange she felt no sympathy for "Porky" and the way he died. Clarisse had told her bad things about him.

Oh, it turns out that Fidelis was wrong about dogs and their feelings. The dead dog in the pantry was the Chavers' dog who would not leave them. Roy had noticed the dog lying on the trapdoor and didn't know why it wouldn't leave. He had heard faint knocks but never associated them with anything living, as he always "heard" stuff. They were a short distance from Walvogel's and we know that the dog could have gone there for food.

We leave the family. Roy wants quiet time by the river, where he has a bottle stashed...Cyprian and Delphine unload the DeSoto and pitch a tent to sleep outdoors because the inside is still a crime scene. Delphine takes the car to buy some food and supplies while Cyprian is to watch that Roy doesn't go swimming once he gets drunk.

Delphine has so many times wished she had a mother and that she had a clear picture of her own mother, and in this mood, goes to Waldvogel's Meats where she will meet Eva Waldvogel...

Will now read Curmudgeoness' discussion....

between Delphine's mother and Eva. You are right, she was being very nostalgic about her mother when she went to Waldvogel's Meats and met Eva. I did realize that Eva had a soft spot for Delphine after hearing who her father is, and realized that she needed a friend/mother. But you are right, Delphine was also looking for that.

We seem to have stumbled onto two women who both have empathy. Eva was extremely kind.

I think the dad's tears were real, but he does go for melodrama a bit.


He may be town drunk, but he does have a good heart for having the wake for his friend, the wake the friend would have enjoyed. Evidently people came and overlooked the filth....

I have no doubt that he missed her, and it was said that he was a romantic. But I think that he was trying to manipulate her. He needs her. If she is not there, and not working, I figure he has a harder time getting booze---and apparently he cannot take care of himself...or more importantly, he refuses to take care of things.

I will put a disclaimer here---my father had alcohol problems, and I have zero tolerance for drunks. This may taint my thinking on it. But I will stand by my opinion that he is just putting a guilt trip on Delphine. Time will tell if this holds up.

Do you think that the filth was as bad at the time of the wake? I would figure it was shortly after she left, since there was so much filth obviously after the wake---since they couldn't even open the cellar door. Ugh!