Frolic of His Own (3 page)

—Oscar you're not going to die, you're just banged up and how you expect to get anything done here flat on your back in the first place, it's as bad as that pain in your left arm when you were trying to finish that monograph on Rousseau and you were so worried about tenure? Because if you'd had a fatal heart attack it wouldn't have mattered whether you had tenure or not would it? She'd pulled forth the robe with its worn quilted facings and something beige all arms and legs from Hong Kong, reaching deep in the shopping bag for —these notes, it's all I could find the way you've piled things up in the library, those stacks of old newspapers why you can't simply clip something out instead of marking it with a red pencil and saving the whole paper, it's like everything else. The whole place looks disgraceful, not that anyone's coming to look at it. You hadn't even called that real estate woman.

—We have to talk about it Christina, the housing market is down and this whole inflationary . . .

—Talk about it, my God we've been talking about it for a hundred years since you used to jump out at me behind the door to the butler's pantry it's got nothing to do with the housing market, it's not a house, it's a place. Someone spending two million dollars isn't just looking for a . . .

—Two million four, we said two million four but . . .

—All right two million four! Do you expect two million four from somebody who's looking for a handyman's dreamhouse? Are you just going to lie here till somebody shows up and that veranda caves in on their heads then you'll have a lawsuit, since you seem to be getting so fond of them. Here's the mail. Where shall I put it.

—Anywhere just, where I can reach it, do you see my glasses?

—They're right here where I put them, with your precious newspapers. I thought we'd paid this plumber.

—I thought I'd wait till the end of the month when the . . .

—And these tree people? They should pay us, those broken limbs when you come up the drive, have you talked to them?

—Well I, not exactly, no.

—Not exactly? I mean either you've talked to them or you haven't.

—Well I called but the line was busy, it's all been, since you left trying to do everything there myself and get my own work done, it's been . . .

—How long does it take to write a check, you know you're going to pay sooner or later but you just can't part with it till you have to? I mean no one's asked you to do everything yourself Oscar really, since the day I got married you've behaved as though Harry had simply come in and stolen a good housekeeper from you. We are all kind of related now after all and you could make a little more of an effort with him, couldn't you? He's awfully busy in court today but he took the time to get this copy of Father's Opinion and come all the way up here to see you, like one of the family I mean wasn't that quite thoughtful?

—But he just doesn't look like anybody in the family, even on your mother's side, and I don't think Father . . .

—He met Father once, last year when he had to be in Washington, it wasn't awfully successful but that was hardly Harry's fault, was it? if you remember the shape Father was in? And I went out and got you a housekeeper after all, didn't I? Two of them, after you said the first one burned your socks, and what's happened to this new one? I didn't see a trace of her.

—If you'd like to see a trace of her look at that Sung vase in the sunroom. She put cold water in it for some blossom branches Lily brought over and of course it seeped through the terra cotta and completely destroyed the glaze. A thousand years go into that exquisite iridescent glaze and one coarse stupid woman can destroy it overnight.

—I'll look around for another one, now . . .

—Another one? Do you think you can just walk down the street and pick up a real Sung dynast . . .

—A housekeeper Oscar, another housekeeper, and what Lily's doing bringing over blossom branches in the first place, aren't things in enough of a mess there without blossom branches? You complain about disorder and then open the door for chaos herself, I mean she certainly doesn't look like anyone in the family if that's what you have in mind, driving in there this morning in a new BMW as if she owned the place. She'll probably show up here any minute. I told her what happened.

—A new BMW?

—You're lying here smashed to a pulp by that second hand wreck while she's driving around in a . . .

—No but whose BMW?

—Well I certainly didn't ask her, I mean I certainly don't want to know, do you? Think about it Oscar, because I should think you might after all, a breezy blouse half unbuttoned, blonde hair flying and enough lipstick to paint a barn I'm putting the mail right here. I'll bring checks, I'm sure you don't have any. Who is John Knize.

—Who is who?

—There's a letter here from someone named John Knize. Shall I open it?

—Oh, no that's probably just someone who . . .

—Dear Professor Crease, he's got one of those awful typewriters that writes in script. Perhaps my earlier letter did not reach you. I am researching material for a book on the Holmes Court, of which I understand your grandfather, Justice Thomas Crease, was a colourful member, well known for his conflicts with his associate Justice Holmes though it was said they were warm friends through their shared youthful experience in the Civil War, both having suffered wounds, I understand, at Ball's Bluff and Antietam. Since your grandfather lived to age ninety six it occurred to me that you might well have known him as a small child and, you're not planning to see this person are you?

—I just thought it might help to . . .

—Well whatever you thought, just remember people don't come out of nowhere to help you, people help themselves, I mean you don't picture sitting down with this utter stranger telling him how Grandfather dandled you on his knee when you were five and rattled on about the Civil War? These papers you had me drag in here because you're afraid somebody's stealing it from you and Harry's right isn't he, the rest of it's nothing but opera. I'm the Queen of the Night and here's your mysterious messenger haunting the wards for a terminal case, wheedling a requiem for the old Count to pretend he composed himself, trying to frighten me when we were children saying you'd come back and haunt the place the way I felt out there this morning, the mist just lifting from the pond and suddenly the swans, a whole fleet of them coming by as still, as still, and across the pond those reds and russets . . .

—Where the sedge is withered from the . . .

—Well exactly! the letter she'd been crumpling gone to the floor as she stood.—Alone and palely loitering, I mean if Keats could see you now. How long do they plan to keep you here.

—They don't know yet. Could you hand me my glasses? It depends on when I can walk again if I can, if I can Christina, they don't even know that yet.

—Well I hope they don't plan to turn you loose till you can, do they expect you to ride around that house in a wheelchair without breaking
your neck? She reached down to where he'd just put on his glasses with some difficulty, and took them off. —Can you see through these things at all? dipping a tissue in the water glass —let alone read through them, doesn't it ever occur to you to do this yourself? and she set the sparkling lenses back astride his nose —though this bandage hardly helps. Will there be a scar?

—Probably, they said . . .

—Poor Oscar. She stooped to kiss his forehead. —It may give your face a little character, like Heidelberg. I'll start digging up another housekeeper.

—Yes but, Christina? If Harry doesn't mind I mean, or if he's away or anything? I just thought maybe you could come back out there and spend a little time with me? Just until, and wait, this creamed ham they gave us last night . . .

—We'd still need a housekeeper, oh and I meant to tell you, Trish sends love, Trish Hemsley? She's quite fond of you you know, it's a shame you never pursued it Oscar, she could be such a help. You don't mind if I take these? folding together the crinkled paper slippers she'd just found on the night table, —I mean it's not as though you're going anywhere? sweeping back the curtain, past the lively concert of traffic backed up for seven miles at the eastbound entrance to the George Washington bridge for an overturned tractor trailer, seizing the arm of a nurse passing the door with —the far bed in there, Mister Crease? He's rather anxious about the supper menu, and whatever this medication you're giving him I wish you'd check with the doctor, he's seeing little men in black suits coming in asking him to carry messages to the other side and he's not even packed . . . on up the corridor and —oh my God . . . too late to turn elsewhere, —hello Lily.

—Oh! Is he okay?

—If he were okay would he be here? Six twelve B, do try not to tire him.

—Oh yes I, but Christina?

—What is it.

—Just, I just wish you liked me.

—So do I Lily.

612 B: past the horn concerto on tiptoe with an apologetic gasp, bursting past the curtain with —oh Oscar! Are you okay? and a lipstick smear on the bandage. —Does it hurt?

—Yes.

—Where, the bandage on your face?

—Everywhere.

—Oh Oscar. Can I get you anything? I was going to bring you flowers but then I saw I only had four dollars.

—Look in my wallet. In that drawer in the night table, Lily?

—Yes, yes can I get you anything?

—Where did you get a new BMW.

—Where did you hear that. Is fifty all right?

—Christina says you drove up to the house in a new BMW.

—It's just this person I borrowed it from Oscar. To come over and see you, I only wish she didn't dislike me so much. She just always makes me feel like a, she's so superior and smart and her clothes, she's just always so attractive for somebody her age and . . .

Her hand fluttered by and he caught it. —It's just that you're a little young, I think she worries about you, this divorce and your problem with your family, and the . . .

—It's not my fault! She recovered her hand, —is it Oscar? Because that's what I have to talk to you about.

—What's happened now.

—Because it's this lawyer. She wants another twenty five hundred dollars Oscar I just don't know what to do.

—Twenty five hun, but we gave her a three thousand dollar retainer after we paid off the first one.

—Yes but now she says I still owe her this twenty five hundred more dollars or she won't release all these papers.

—All what papers, where.

—To this other lawyer. Because since she withdrew from the case and I need another lawyer she said this new one can't be the attorney of record unless I pay her and she gives back all these papers.

—No wait what do you mean, she withdrew from the case.

—Because she said you've kept interfering writing her all these letters and calling her up and telling her what to do about the separation agreement and everything so she's withdrawing from the case, it's not my fault is it?

—Well she can't. She can't Lily, she can't withdraw just like that. Fifty five hundred dollars for what has she done, that long garbled separation agreement she couldn't wait to give away everything in sight and even that isn't signed, it's ridiculous. She can't.

—But I asked this new lawyer and he says she can Oscar.

—What new lawyer.

—Well I thought I'd get a man one again, like before, so . . .

—It's ridiculous, no. No, we can take it to arbitration, take the whole thing before a grievance committee and . . .

—But he said those committees are just all these other lawyers so they have to protect each other because they may be next so . . .

—Who said! And what if she can quit, listen I don't even know what these hospital bills will be, an insurance man's coming up here later and
I'm not even sure that they'll pay, can't you ask your brother? I'm afraid to write a check for a dollar, all this money he's getting from your father so the government can't get it, can't you ask Bobbie?

—Bobbie wants to buy a Porsche . . . Her head came down to rest on the edge of the bed, —I just get so tired, Oscar . . . and her hand followed, burrowing under the sheet. —It's just all Bobbie, it's everything for Bobbie, they won't even talk to me and they've joined some church down there, that's the only letter they've sent me about how glorious it is to be saved and how happy I'd be if I'd just accept the Lord while this woman that stole my purse is out there someplace pretending she's me with all my credit cards and everything where she used my bank credit card before I could stop it so these other real checks I wrote bounced, I can't even identify myself and she's buying these plane tickets she could be in Paris right now being me and I don't even know what I'm doing there till I get this bill for these lizard skin shoes I bought at some store in Beverly Hills where I always wanted to go, and it's spooky.

His hand had come down to smooth her hair, a finger limned her ear, traced her brow; hers came deeper, soothing a rise there under the sheet. —We'll get it straightened out as soon as . . .

—She'll find out it's not so easy being me though, that it's not as much fun being me as she thought, does this hurt?

—Just, be careful, I . . .

—Mommy kiss and make it well?

—Not, not here no, no not now . . .

—But won't it make you feel better? Where's a tissue, I'll get rid of this lipstick.

—Not, not now no, a nurse might come in and . . .

—We can just pretend I'm down straightening the sheet . . .

There was a great thump on the curtain. —Hey there!

—What's the, who . . .