One thing McCarthy does not do, is race the reader through his stories. Nor does he tell us about his characters. We follow at a steady pace, and decide by what they do, who they are. We’re following three different men in this, John Wesley Rattner, a fatherless young man who lives with his mother and is just beginning to stretch his limits of the world. He moves his bed from the loft out to the porch, freezing at night until his mother puts it back one day while he is away.
Marion Sylder, a bit older, whisky runner and hell-raiser. Good hearted though, it would seem, as he gives the boy who’s helped him out of an accident, one of his favorite dog’s puppies. But, he’s killed a man, a hitchhiker who tried to take him for a ride long ago.
And an old man who sees all that’s going on in the hills, the boys walking around hunting, visiting the pit where a skeleton lies quietly, Sylder running his Plymouth loaded down with booze through the woods. He’s knows who’s coming and who’s going, and they all walk through his part of the world. As we walk with the travelers, we stand with the old man, Uncle Ather. Because we know that these three men will meet up when their paths cross.
Except the hitchhiker, who lies in his water-filled open grave. And all three now know he is there.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology