Dreams Are Not Enough (49 page)

Recognition dawned on the small, neat, masculine features, and he called, “Hey, Max. You’ve got a famous visitor.”

Maxim came to the door, tying a hapi coat about his long, bony nakedness. Seeing her, he flinched and reddened. Then, an implacably sardonic smile curved his narrow lips. He did not invite her in.

“Well,” he said.

“If it isn’t Alyssia del Mar, mother of future Cordiners.”

“Maxim, I need to talk to you.”

“Not exactly the garb for a social call, but then maybe you’ve elected me to drive you to the hospital for the blessed event as standin for the fathers—there are two possibilities, aren’t there?”

Maxim’s cruelty, which he couldn’t help or control, came from being caught out in his meticulously guarded secret. Alyssia was too distraught to notice what he said.

The young man, looking at neither of them, mumbled, “I’ll leave you guys.”

Alyssia reached for Maxim’s arm.

“What have you heard about Hap?”

Maxim stepped backward.

“I don’t keep tabs on him, star lady. Or Barry-boy, either.”

“But why did you take your phone off?”

Redness showed on Maxim’s cheeks.

“Doubtless I’ve missed some vital point,” he said.

“I’m not following this conversation.”

“His car’s been found near the relief center.”

Maxim’s smile disappeared.

“Car?”

“She said it was burned and he was in it—but she only said reportedly.”

“Who the fuck is ‘she’?”

“The newswoman. It was on the news.”

He glared at her with the same expression of loathing she had vented on her television set, then strode to his phone. Holding her breath, she watched him press numbers.

“Jessica?” he said.

“Maxim here. Let me talk to Dad.”

A short pause.

The long body convulsed. Standing in the doorway she could not see his expression, but she heard his hoarse, shaking whisper.

“Oh my God. ” A long pause.

“He is? Which hospital? The number?” He fumbled with a telephone pad, then shoved it onto the floor “Call and tell Mom I’ll be right there.”

As he hung up, she asked, “What’s happened?”

“Oh, nothing much.” Maxim spoke with a labored parody of his caustic tone.

“My father’s had a stroke because my brother’s been fried in his car, that’s all.”

“Oh, my poor love…. No!”

“And the one thing I don’t need now is you!”

“He really has been identified?”

“His body. My brother’s dead. Dead.” Tears trickled down Maxim’s hollowed cheeks.

“He should have been cutting the fucking picture. And you know why he was in Zaire—fucking Zaire? Because of you! I don’t know what the hell you did to him, but he was sick to his soul because of you!”

Maxim shoved her backward and slammed the door.

Because of you. I don’t know what the hell you did to him, but he was sick to his soul because of you.

She dropped to her knees on an exposed aggregate paving block and vomited over a spiky cactus.

Barry, reddish stubble covering his cheeks and chin, unlocked the front door.

“Alyssia,” he called.

“The task is done. The galleys are en route to New York.”

There was no reply from his wife or either of the servants.

He made his way through the house to the bedroom, where maternity clothes strewed the carpet and a small, partially packed suitcase stood open on the bed. He peered around in bewilderment. Was she at the hospital? Her due date wasn’t until May 17, was it?

He was dialing the OB’s number when he saw the note on the bedside table.

Barry, I’m going to Zaire to see what I can find out about Hap.

Juanita’s with me.

Why would she go to Africa when the baby—his baby—was due in a few weeks? And what was that about Hap?

Him, Barry thought. Always the damn Wasp!

“It’s time to go on home,” Juanita said.

“I can’t,” Alyssia replied apathetically.

They were in Kenya, in the Norfolk Hotel’s largest cottage. Though it was midafternoon, the bedroom curtains remained drawn, for Alyssia was in bed.

“You ain’t been eating. You get them awful spells. You’re due in less than three weeks.”

“Hap’s here in Africa.”

Juanita said uneasily, “Alice, he’s dead.”

“I know. But he’s buried here in Africa.”

Hap had often expressed a desire to be buried in the garden of the relief center, or so Art Kleefeld—Dr. Arthur Kleefeld—had radioed the bereaved family. The wish, Art told everyone, was a blessing, given the rapid decomposition of mortal flesh in a hot and humid climate. Art had told Alyssia all the details of the simple burial service, which was presided over by a black Episcopal priest.

When she had radioed the center that she was in Nairobi and planned to visit, a journey that involved a small plane, a four-wheel- drive vehicle skittering along unpaved roads, plus two unscheduled ferries, Kleefeld had insisted on coming to the Norfolk. The youngish, dark-bearded doctor had remained with her from before lunchtime to well after midnight.

“He was on his way home,” Kleefeld had said.

“He’d been to Lunda, a village thirty miles from the center, to deliver soy flour—protein deficiency is rampant in the area, and I do my level best to get women to add soy to their cornmeal when they make posho, that’s their diet staple, a kind of porridge” — “How long did he stay in Lunda?”

“He arrived that day. I figured he’d spend the night.”

“Why, if it’s so close?”

“You have to take into account that we’re in the middle of tropical rain forest. There’s so many swampy areas that the roads, such as they are, wind all over the place. People just don’t travel at night.”

“Why did he?”

“He probably never gave it a thought. You know Hap, he was totally fearless.” Kleefeld scratched his beard as if to give himself time to consider his next remark.

“There was one thing that did bother me. At first, that is. I stumbled on the burned jeep myself. News travels fast in Zaire. There’s no phone lines in our area, so I’ve never really figured how word spreads, but it does. The cook should have known and told me.”

“Didn’t you find that significant?”

“In the beginning, yes, like I said. Then I heard there’d been a group of Kenyan bigwigs traveling around.”

“What difference does that make?”

“With ranking strangers around, the local higher-ups wouldn’t want any bad publicity, so everyone kept quiet.”

“Everyone?”

“Closing ranks, it’s called.”

“I don’t mean to cross-examine you,” Alyssia sighed.

“But I just can’t believe he’s dead.”

“It is difficult to realize. He was such a vital, beautiful man. But, Alyssia, I prepared the body for burial myself. He’s dead.”

“I know what you’re going through,” Juanita was saying.

“After my little Petey went, I wanted to die, too. But you’ll have the baby. If you can’t stand going back to LA, what’s wrong with France? We could” — Alyssia gave a deep sigh and then gasped. Lines of pain appeared above the suddenly glittery blue eyes.

Juanita poised over the bed, accepting that this was the onset of what she termed a spell. Since the report of Hap’s death, there hadn’t been a day when her sister was free of the merciless symptoms.

This made the third of the day—a new record. Juanita, sponging the contorted, sweat-drenched face, knew she could no longer handle it herself. Later, when Alyssia napped, she went to the desk. Never in her life having dispatched a cable, unable to read or write worth a damn, she stuffed her glasses in her uniform pocket, explaining to the dark blur of the clerk’s face that she had misplaced her specs and therefore needed assistance in composing and sending a telegram to Miss del Mar’s husband, Mr. Barry Cordiner, in Beverly Hills.

At his request, the nasal female voice reread: ‘“Miss del Mar ill at Norfolk Hotel Nairobi Kenya stop says she needs you stop Juanita.” ” When Beth had told him about the accident in Zaire, Barry’s sorrow had been so genuine and profound that he had believed himself purged and cleansed of the lesser emotions he’d nourished toward his dead cousin.

Yet, hearing the message repeated, he felt his ears and neck burn with resentful anger.

“Would you like a copy mailed to you?” asked the nasal voice.

“That won’t be necessary,” he barked. Like hell I’ll go to her!

“You’re sure you have everything you need?” Beth asked, eyeing Barry’s Vuitton overnighter, which was his total baggage.

“I’ll have her back in three or four days.” He stepped aside to allow an obese young couple laden with plastic Disneyland shopping bags to waddle past him onto the plane.

“When I was having Clarrie, I was careful, so careful. To travel around like this in her last month!”

“Stop worrying, Beth. There’s one consistent fact about Alyssia. She’s strong. She’s sturdy as a Percheron horse.”

The skin around his eyes was red with weariness. This past week he’d been up until all hours with the galley proofs of Spy, and last night he had slept not at all. His mourning for Hap had been intensified by guilt—those malicious chopping remarks would soon be seen by all who read The New Yorker.

“Oh God,” Beth said in a low, fervent tone.

“What wouldn’t I give to be having this baby!”

The final boarding call came over the intercom, and Barry’s kiss was more consolation for her losses than farewell.

The handsome young desk clerk at the Norfolk bore a marked resemblance to Leontyne Price. She said apologetically, “I’m sorry, Mr. Cordiner, but Miss del Mar is no longer with us.”

“That’s impossible! She just cabled me.”

The ledger was turned to face him.

“Third line down, sir. See? She checked out two days ago.”

“Doubtless to the hospital,” he said.

“I’ll phone around.”

“I wasn’t here, you understand, but, well, naturally we discuss the arrivals and departures of our famous guests. She went to the Embakasi Airport.”

A Lufthansa flight was about to depart, and Embakasi bubbled with redly tanned German tourists as well as the usual mass of Kenyans in dashikis and Asians whose women in their bright, gilt-embroidered saris resembled fantastic, flightless birds. Barry shoved his way from ticket counter to ticket counter. Everyone he spoke to knew who Alyssia was, of course, but nobody had seen her. Finally a baggage handler sidled over. He had been working the Air France counter yesterday and there had been a very expecting lady with a big hat who looked like Alyssia. She and a much older woman wearing glasses had left on the flight to Paris.

Barry landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport after nearly two full days of travel, his ankles swollen, his nerves frayed from sleeplessness and uncertainty. Alyssia! The inconsiderate bitch! Couldn’t she have at least left an address for him? In Nairobi he had ascertained that France was their final destination. But where were they? At the chateau? Somewhere in Paris? His lips were set in a line as he went through passport control, and he decided to begin his search at the Plaza-Athenee, the Paris hostelry favored by Alyssia. But when his Avis car reached the Peripherique, the freeway that belts the capital, he found traffic at a curdled standstill. It took him fifteen agonizing minutes to reach the first ramp. Getting off, he headed for BellevillesurLoire.

As he drove between the stone-ball entry posts into the small park, the sun emerged from behind a cloud. A good augury, he decided, and was not surprised to see that the new garage stood open to show a dark-green Peugeot whose license plates indicated it a rental.

Flinging open the front door, he called, “Alyssia?” His voice echoed through the bare, stone-floored hall. There was no answer. He shouted again, with no response, and was on the verge of going outside to reassure himself there was indeed a car in the garage when footsteps sounded upstairs.

Juanita came down to the first landing.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

He was so taken aback by her tone—not an iota of her normal servility—that he felt his jaw drop. Then his indignant wrath, reinforced on the two-hour drive from Paris, exploded.

“That’s a bottomlessly stupid question! If you cudgel your brain, you might possibly recollect sending a cable informing me that my wife was ill and needed me. Where is she?”

“She don’t want to see anyone right now.”

“Well, I intend to see her.” Barry was climbing the stairs with ponderous purpose.

“She’s feeling awful low at the minute,” Juanita said, not shifting from her position in the center of the landing. Arms bent at the elbows, thick legs flexed, she reminded him of a Masai Mara lioness guarding her cub.

He reached the step below her.

“Having circumnavigated the globe, I am not about to be turned away by you!”

“It’s never been any secret that you don’t think much of me—but don’t take it out on her.”

“Is she in the bedroom?”

“Please, Mr. Cordiner.” Now the maid was all humility.

“Won’t you hold off a few minutes?”

Brushing past her, he stamped up the remainder of the staircase, noting that one of the replaced balustrades was too white. He silently denounced Alyssia for the mismatch. If she hadn’t dragged him to Africa to announce the baby—was it really his? —he would have been here to oversee the stone masons

“At least let me warn her you’re here,” Juanita was pleading behind him.

Barry flung open the bedroom door.

Alyssia lay on the high, old-fashioned bed, a mount of pillows propping her. Eyes closed, she labored for breath, her swollen torso arching with each stentorian gasp.

Fear doused Barry’s ichor with such force that he leaned against the doorjamb. He had taken no prenatal classes; his limited knowledge of childbirth was gleaned from reading Tolstoy, and his sleep-deprived brain leaped to the assumption that he’d found his wife in the final convulsions of labor.

“Where’s the doctor?” he whispered urgently.

“She don’t need him,” Juanita replied.

“But she’s having the baby!”

“Not yet.”

Discounting this as a servant’s ignorance, he snapped, “I’ll call him.

Where’s the number? “