American Pastoral Page #2

But he popped up

and dusted himself off.

And as he trotted by,

he turned, uh...

he turned to me,

his brother's friend.

I mean, I was a nobody,

and he said...

"Basketball was never like this, Skip."

[faint echo]

Yeah. Yeah, that's right.

He called me Skip.

My brother's dead.

That's why I, uh, came up from Florida,

for his funeral.

Not for this reunion thing.

The... the Swede is...

Just a sweetheart whose fate

was to get himself f***ed over

by some real crazies.

My brother, the best you're

going to get in this country,

got caught in a war

he didn't start.

Jerry...

[stammering] I have no idea

what you're talking about.

No? You don't know?

Were you alive during the '60s?

Well, I wasn't here.

I was... you know...

I was out of country

for most of the '60s.

Oh, I guess you're

the last person to hear, huh?

The famous writer,

the last one to hear the big story.

What is it, then,

th... this big story?

Well, you know he and Dawn had a kid.

You wrote to me

after she was born.

Adorable when she was little.

So, she had a stutter, that was nothing.

To hell with that.

But then Merry got older

and when she did...

I told him. I told him,

"Let her go.

Otherwise, it will rot your gut

and take your life, too."

But... he couldn't.

And now I'm burying my brother.

She was a good kid...

[voice fades into background]

[Nathan] Jerry was correct.

Here I was, the famous writer,

the last one to know the story.

But now I wanted all of it.

I wanted to hear what had become

of the young man

from whom we had expected everything.

Our hero.

Our Kennedy.

[Merry] Grandpa.

- [stuttering] Grandpa.

- Yes, Merry, what?

Lady Jane's going to have

a calf, grandpa.

I hope it's a heifer.

What's a heifer, sweetheart?

You're talking to a guy from Newark.

It's a girl, grandpa.

Oh. a girl!

I bet it's going to look just like Count.

That's who mounted her.

"Mounted"? ls that a way

for a young girl to talk?

That's what it's called, Dad.

Yeah, what's she supposed to say?

- "Make love"? It's a cow.

- [laughing]

[Lou] And what does my son

need with cows?

Why do they need to live this far

from civilization?

No offense to the locals, Mr. Orcutt,

Mrs. Orcutt, but let's be candid.

This is all rock-ribbed

Republican out here.

- That's true. That's so.

- Lou, don't start.

What did I say?

We're out in the middle of nowhere.

This is Ku Klux Klan country.

Dad, will you stop?

I don't see why my brother wants

to live here either,

but a couple of cows

doesn't make it Mississippi.

- This is Morris County.

- Grandpa!

[Seymour] Jerry's right, Dad.

No one thinks like you anymore.

We can live where we want.

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