BUtterfield 8 (21 page)

“Where is he now? I mean whatever became of him?”

“Ah, that’s what I was going to tell you,” said Vandamm. “I was inquiring about him, whatever became of him, about a month or two ago, and fellow I see every once in a while, a professional bridge player now. I mean makes his living that way, but he used to be a customer’s man. I ran into him a short time ago at the New York A. C. and we had a glass of beer together, just friendly because he knows I don’t go in for playing bridge for high stakes. We got to talking and in the course of the conversation Jack Wiston’s name—that was his name, Jack Wiston, if you want to know his name. His name came up and I asked this friend of mine whatever became of Jack? ‘Didn’t you hear?’ my friend said. Very surprised. He thought everybody knew about Wiston. Seems Wiston had the yacht reconditioned and started out on a trip around the world. I understand he had a couple of Follies girls with him and one or two friends. When they got to one of the South Sea Islands, Wiston said that was as far as he was going, and sent everybody on home in the yacht. Bought himself a big copra plantation—”

“I’ve always wanted to ask that, what’s a copra plantation?”

“Uh, copra? It’s what they get cocoanut oil from. So—”

“I’ve often wondered when I read stories in the
Cosmopolitan—”

“Well, that’s what Wiston must have done too, because it was one of those Dutch islands. The story that got back was that Wiston didn’t believe in big nations any more. Large countries, doomed to failure, he said. The trend was the other way. There wasn’t a single major power in the world that wasn’t in sorry straits, but take any little country like Holland or Belgium and Denmark, they were weathering the depression better than
any
large country, irregardless of which one it was. The way I heard, he said he was thirty-eight, thirty-nine then, years of age, he had his good health and a reasonable expectation of at least twenty more years of an active life, and he didn’t want to be beaten to death or shot next year, 1932.”

“What?”

“That’s his theory. Next year, according to Wiston, is a presidential year, and we’re going to have a revolution.”

“Oh, hooey.”

“Well, I don’t know. A lot of fellows are taking that seriously. A lot of people think there’s going to be a change. Looks like Al Smith might get in or Owen D. Young. Some Democrat. But will things be any better? I doubt it. Hoover must have something up his sleeve or things would be a lot worse than they are right now.”

“But you said a revolution. What kind of a revolution? You mean radicals? I know they talk all the time, but I’d rather have Hoover—well, not Hoover, but I wouldn’t want to be governed by some of those people. I’ve met some of them on parties and they’re awful.”

“Yes, but what about the farmers? They’re dissatisfied. What about in Pittsburgh, all those big factories closed down? I don’t know where it’s all going to end up. All I can do is do the best I can for you and your mother, so every chance I get I’m turning everything into gold.”

“You’re not a chemist. You’re an alchemist,” said Gloria.

“Ah ha ha ha ha. Very good. Quite a sense of humor, Baby.”

“Dinner, you two,” said Gloria’s mother.

“I’m ready,” said Vandamm. He whispered to Gloria: “I’ll talk to you later about the vacation.”

 • • • 

Liggett’s story to Emily that night was that he and his friend Casey had gone the rounds of Hell’s Kitchen speakeasies, trying to do their own detective work. An old enemy of Casey’s turned up, Liggett said, and there was a free for all.

The next day he told her the truth, keeping back only the name of the girl.

He awoke that day stiff with pain and with an early realization that there was something ahead that he had to face. It was totally unlike the feeling he had in the war, when he would know each night that the next morning there would be a bombardment and the danger of an attack; it was less unlike the nervous fear in the days when he first began to row in college; the race day would be long until the race started in the late afternoon, and full of things to worry about, but then the boring alumni and muscle-feelers and door-openers would start coming around noon and by starting time the race was almost a pleasant escape. No, this was more like the time he had gonorrhea and had to force himself to the doctor’s office, horribly in ignorance of what the treatment was going to be. He had known men with it, of course, but he was sure his was a special case and he could not talk to anyone about it. This morning was like that and like a time when he stayed away from the dentist for two and a half years. It was the knowledge that the unpleasant thing ahead was something that he himself had to force himself to do, that it was in his own hands, no one else could make him do it.

He thought he was awake very early and long before Emily, but when he groaned a little in a way that was like a sigh, she was standing at his bed before his eyes were fully open. She had been sleeping in a chaise-longue which she had moved into his room. His first angry thought was that she had done that to try to catch what he might say in his sleep, but her manner and her words changed this: “What is it, darling?”

He looked up at her, taking a good look at her for a change.

“Go on back to sleep, darling. It’s ten minutes of six. Or shall I get you something? A bedpan?”

“No. I don’t want anything.”

“Does it hurt? Is it painful where they hit you?”

“Who
hit me?”

“The men, the friends of Casey’s that beat you up. Oh, you poor dear. You haven’t tried to move. You don’t know yet that you’re hurt. Well, don’t try to move. You’ve been badly beaten up, darling. Do you want me to get in bed with you? I’ll keep you warm and I won’t bump you. You don’t want me to close the window, do you? Get some more sleep if you can.”

“I think I will,” he said. Then: “What about you?”

“Oh, don’t worry about me. It’s almost my regular time to be up anyway. The girls will be awake in another half or three quarters of an hour.”

“I don’t want to see them.”

“I know. I won’t let them come in. You go on back to sleep. I’ll connect the buzzer.” She referred to the line which ran from the button beside his bed to the kitchen, a line which had not been used since it was installed.

She had made the offer to get in bed with him and followed it up quickly with more talk because it meant something to her, and he had not taken up the offer immediately. She would not ask him again. Whatever he wanted she would do, and he did not want her to lie beside him.

She went to her own room. It was too early for the mail, too early for the
Times
and the
Tribune.
There was something wrong about reading a book so early in the day, like ice cream for breakfast. She thought she might have a bath, but it was too early for that too; that is, there was so much power behind the wide-mouthed faucet in her tub that it would be inconsiderate of the girls’ sleep to run a tub now. It had been a source of unexpressed complaint; Emily meant to have something done about it, but it was one of those things that made her accuse herself of being a far from perfect housewife; one of the things she did not do because it was good enough, in satisfactory working condition, and only once in a while she would be reminded that there was room for improvement. Thinking of the girls she went to their room.

Barbara was actively at sleep, lying on her right side with her left arm almost straight up on the pillow. Compared with Ruth she was lying in a twisted position. Ruth was lying on her back with her mouth open just a little and her arms stretched out, at first reminding Emily of the Crucifixion, but then almost immediately of a Red Cross poster. Ruth was the daughter she would watch and be proud of; Barbara would be the one she would guard and protect and make sacrifices for if they became necessary. But it was Ruth who interested her now, because Ruth was closer to Weston, and it was Weston who was all on Emily’s mind at present.

She might be dead, might Ruth, lying there so still, so quietly asleep with one leg bent a little but not enough to take away from the illusion of death which—knowing it to be an illusion—Emily created for the moment.

Ruth opened her eyes without moving any other part of her body, without moving so much as a muscle. She had that close but superior look of one who comes awake completely and effortlessly. “Mummy,” she said.

“Shh.”

“Is it time for school?”

“No,” Emily whispered.

“Good.” Ruth smiled and closed her eyes again, then opened them again to say: “Why are you up so early?”

“I don’t want you to make any noise. Daddy isn’t feeling well and we mustn’t make any noise.”

“What’s the matter with Daddy?”

“He was beaten up in a fight last night.” Emily did not know what she was saying until she had said it. It had not occurred to her to lie to this child of hers. The words were out, and Emily looked for a reason for the frankness. She could find none.

“Oh.” Ruth said it and said it again: “Oh.”

Emily could see what was going on in her mind, could tell it from the two ohs. The first was pain and the quick sympathy that you would expect from Ruth. The second was wanting to ask how, where, when, by whom, how badly—and a firm control of her tongue.

“He wasn’t
badly
hurt,” said Emily, “but they hurt him. When Barbara wakes up don’t say anything about it to her, dear.”

“She’ll be noisy, though. You know how she always is.”

“Tell her Daddy has a headache and not to make any noise.”

“Is there anything I can do? I don’t want to go back to sleep now.”

“The best thing is to keep quiet, not to make a sound that will disturb Daddy.”

“How did they hurt him?”

“In the ribs mostly, and punched him in the face. Don’t worry about him, Ruthie. Try to sleep again.”

She smoothed her daughter’s hair, as though Ruth had a fever, and ended with a few little pats on the forehead. She went to the kitchen and started the coffee percolator. She sat down and waited, staring straight ahead and thinking about Ruth with her lovely intelligent innocent eyes, and her sing-song voice when she said: “What’s the matter with Daddy?” All the innocent things about her eyes and her face and her ruffled hair and her voice—then she thought of the form outlined under the bed-clothes. At this minute, probably in New Haven or in Cambridge, some young man who would one day . . . No, it would be all right. It would be love with Ruth, one love. Barbara was the one to worry about, with one love after another, and many pains and the need for watching. Emily thought she knew for the first time why she thought oftener of Ruth. The reason was that Ruth and she understood each other; Ruth understood about Barbara, and she understood about herself. That was good—but it was too neat. No; if Ruth understood so much then she must be unhappy about something else. What? She went back to the thoughts of Ruth’s little-woman’s body. It was all there, ready to move in on life; the breasts were small, but they were there; the hips were not large, but they were there; and part of the intelligence, or part of the information behind the intelligent look of the eyes was the knowledge Emily had imparted to Ruth nearly two years ago. Ruth knew the mechanics of the female, as much as could be told in words. No, no. The look of those eyes, it wasn’t an intelligent look; it was just that they were intelligent eyes. There was a difference. But Emily made up her mind that she would watch Ruth with boys,
because of
love.

She poured the coffee and took a cup in to Weston’s room. “I brought you some coffee,” she said.

What she did not know was that he had meanwhile manufactured the antagonism that was necessary before he could tell her the truth. Also he wanted to tell her because he felt that if he told her the truth as it was up to this minute, he would not be so much to blame if something else was going to happen—and he was not by any means sure that nothing else was going to happen. He had to see Gloria again, he knew that, and he knew that even though he didn’t want Gloria now, the next thing he would want would be Gloria.

“Will you get me a cigarette out of my coat pocket, please?” he said. “Thanks. Emily, I want to tell you something. That’s probably the last favor I’ll ask you to do for me, and when I tell you what I’m going to tell you you won’t want to do any more.”

“Do you have to tell me now?”

“Right now. I won’t go through the day wanting to tell you. I’ll go crazy if I do.”

“Well, in that case.”

“You sound almost as though you knew what it was I want to tell you.”

“I can guess. It’s about a woman.”

“Yes.”

“Well, then I don’t want to hear it now. I know you’ve been unfaithful. You’ve stayed with another woman. I don’t want to hear the rest of it at this hour of the morning.”

“Well, you’ll have to hear it. If you don’t mind, please, I want to tell you now.”

“Why?”

“Emily, for Christ’s sake.”

“All right.”

“I want to tell you the truth about this because it’s a very special thing. Can you look at it this way? Can you, uh, think of me as someone you know that has nothing to do with you, not married to you, but someone you know? Please try to. Well, this man, me, last Saturday night . . . ”

From the time he reached the point where he told about bringing Gloria to this apartment Emily did not try to follow his words. He told the story in chronological order up to that point, and she got a kind of excitement out of listening and wondering how he would reach what was for her the climax of the story; the awful climax, but the climax. She knew what was coming, but she never expected to hear the words: “So I brought her here.” The words were not separate; they were part of a sentence: “. . . got in a taxi and I didn’t have any baggage so I brought her here and we had a few drinks and . . . ” But the last words that she paid attention to were: “So I brought her here.” After that he went on and on. She knew his throat was dry because his voice broke a little but she did not offer to get him a glass of water. Every once in a while he would ask if she was listening and she would nod and he would say she didn’t seem to be, and then continue. She had been sitting on the bed when he began. Once she changed her position so that she sat in a chair beside the head of the bed and she would not have to look at him. “Go on,” she would say. Let him talk himself out. She didn’t care how long he talked. She was back from Reno, back in Boston, it was 1932, the girls were at Winsor School, she was avoiding her father and his well-meaning solicitousness. Mrs. Winchester Liggett. Mrs. Emily W. Liggett.