Illusions of Love (21 page)

Martin stood for a moment, tears streaming down his face.

“I loved you, Father, even though I disappointed you. I just wish I had been able to tell you how much I cared.”

He went to find his mother. She was sitting in the library with Sylvia. The moment Bess looked at him, she knew.

“He’s gone.”

Martin nodded. Without a word, she left the room and walked upstairs to sit by Julian’s bedside. For over an hour she wept there, but as the family began to gather she pulled herself together, drawing on some secret well of strength. She made all the arrangements and would not accept a word of consolation. What were words in view of a loss like hers?

According to Jewish law, Julian was buried at the earliest possible date, laid to rest next to his parents, next to Ephraim himself.

Standing in the crypt, Martin had a sudden vision of himself lying in alien earth, next to a Catholic wife. Then he brought his thoughts back to his mother, who stood rigidly erect, listening to the Rabbi.

When he had finished kaddish, Martin touched Bess’s arm.

She seemed lost in a reverie.

“Mother, I think it’s time to go.”

They left the small chapel, going out into the dismal December afternoon. Bess lingered briefly, watching the heavy bronze doors being closed.

“Sleep well,” she whispered, “my love … my life, until God wills that I join you.”

That night, Martin called Jenny. He was grateful she didn’t press for details of the funeral. She just told him she loved him and asked hesitantly when he might be coming home.

“I can’t really say, dear. It’s a difficult time for my mother, as you can imagine.”

Yes, Jenny knew. She had gone through it when her mother died, but in a very different way. Alone. She still felt alone and needed Martin terribly, but all she said was, “Whatever you feel is right, Martin. I love you, please remember that.”

“I will, darling, I will.”

At first, Martin imagined that once the household calmed down and the details were worked out with the attorneys he would be able to go back to New York. But he soon realized that there would be no chance of that. It would be much longer before he could get away. Martin had been named executor of Julian’s will, and there were endless details to be handled.

He called Dominic and arranged a leave of absence, apologizing for all the time he had taken off. Dominic said to relax. Martin’s acquisition of the soup account had put

the Gatti agency in the big league. Even if Martin stayed away for a year, he still would have earned his keep. Martin wished that his conversations with Jenny could go as smoothly, but meantime he turned to the problems at hand.

The bulk of Julian’s estate had been left to Bess for her lifetime, but Martin was made trustee. That was in itself an awesome responsibility and Martin found the time passing with no sign of his business obligations relenting. It seemed his father had accomplished in death what he could not in life: Martin was fast taking over the family business. Through this time his mother depended on him more and more. Although she seemed unable to share her grief or express her feelings, she was increasingly unable to let Martin out of her sight.

The one bright note in the oppressive atmosphere was Sylvia. She was almost able to make Bess laugh. When she spoke about the past, she made Bess recall only the happy times. As far as her attitude to Martin was concerned, she seemed to have fallen back into the easy relationship they had enjoyed in their teens.

When she joined him in the study one night after dinner-she had moved in with Bess again as she had during the war Martin’s guard was down. He needed to talk. Sensing this, Sylvia fixed him a scotch and soda.

“You know, Martin,” she said handing it to him, ‘silence is not golden, it’s destructive. You’re living with all kinds of ghosts. Certainly you should be able to share your thoughts with me. “

Martin sighed.

“It’s tough, Sylvia.”

“Revealing one’s self always is. But you know, Martin, I would never judge you.”

Martin got up and replenished his drink.

“I feel so guilty about my father, Sylvia. I can’t come to terms with it,” he said, going back to the couch.

“Now wait a minute, Martin. You’re not responsible for your father’s death.”

“I know that. But I neglected him over the last year. He was really

hurt when I went to work in New York. And you know how he must have felt about Jenny.”

“Martin, you’re being very hard on yourself. Don’t you understand that your father really wanted you to be happy? He may have been upset that Jenny was Catholic, but he certainly understood. Now may I make a suggestion. I really think it’s time for you to get on with your own life.”

“When my father was alive, I would have been able to,” Martin said.

“But now I can’t bring myself to leave my mother here, alone.”

Sylvia took a large swallow of her drink, wondering why she was trying to send Martin back into another woman’s arms. She knew she didn’t want him to stay if he would be unhappy. Taking a deep breath, she said, “Stop trying to fill your father’s shoes. Marry Jenny. If you feel you must stay with your mother, bring Jenny out here to live.”

“But you and I both know that my mother hasn’t accepted her, and in her present condition, I doubt whether she is well enough to cope with that situation.”

“So what do you intend to do? Is it fair to Jenny to keep postponing her?”

“I don’t quite like the way you phrased that. My intention was to marry after the first of the year, but certainly she can understand that under the circumstances I can’t put my own wishes first. Dammit, Sylvia, my mother is my responsibility and I simply can’t abandon her.” Martin got up and began pacing the floor.

“I’m so confused, Sylvia, I don’t know what to do. I want to do what’s right for both Jenny and my mother. I feel as if I’m being pulled apart. Please, Sylvia, what do you think I should do?”

“If you really love this girl, then your place is with her,” Sylvia said, her voice a knife in her own heart.

“Your mother will survive.

We all are left with scars, but time heals many of the wounds. And your Jenny isn’t going to be content much longer with phone calls. A month is a long time to wait, and even “I love you” can start to sound hollow if always over the phone. “

Martin knew Sylvia was right. He decided he would face his mother the next day.

Back in New York Jenny was even more impatient than Sylvia suspected.

With every passing day she became more uncertain of Martin’s commitment. She was so afraid that he would sense her annoyance that she had taken to writing him letters. That way she could tear up complaints she would have regretted later.

In the letters she mailed, she expressed only her fondest thoughts:

My dearest, she would write, I’ve been thinking of you all day.

Darling Martin, I keep remembering the little things that I could do for you Honey, New York is covered with snow. Yesterday we had the worst blizzard in thirty years . Darling, the promotion at Macy’s was simply wonderful fire engine red lipstick is going to be the rage come spring. Dearest Martin, it’s so terribly lonely without you. When will you be back? I love you.

Martin’s response was always a telephone call promising to call again the next day, to return as soon as he could.

But as the days moved on slowly, phone calls no longer sustained her.

Her loneliness overwhelmed her and she became increasingly depressed.

Her anxieties finally forced her to a decision. It was nearly dawn when she finished the last draft of her letter.

Dearest Martin,

I know it’s been a terrible time for you, but it has been equally difficult for me. I have sat here, night after night, drowning in my loneliness, wondering where our life is going. Today has been the most devastating of all, since I have thought of nothing else but you, and where I fit into your life. I have reached a crossroads. You belong to a totally different world, one in which I would never fit.

If you truly loved me, you would have allowed me to share your grief but you have shut me out. If you love someone, and are unable to help them in their sorrow, you feel useless. You and I both know that we

are lost to each other. I’m going away because I love you, Martin. It is the only way. I hope and pray you do not lose yourself.

With all my love, Jenny

Martin read the letter in a state of shock. Frantic, he picked up the phone and called the apartment, but Jenny was not there. Suddenly the words . I’m going away because I love you, Martin, stung him with such force he thought he might pass out, as though he’d been punched in the gut. In a state of panic, he called Dominic to see if he could reach Jenny, but Dominic said she’d quit her job and given up her lease on the little apartment she had insisted on keeping until their marriage.

Martin read Jenny’s letter over and over until he’d all but memorized it. Could it have been over a month since he had seen her? What a fool he’d been. Even Sylvia had warned him to return to New York. Now he’d lost Jenny. He picked up the phone and called Dominic again.

“Call the best detective agency in the city. I don’t give a damn what it costs. ” I’m going to find her. “

But as the weeks passed with no trace of Jenny, his hopes of success faded. He flew back East to search himself, but with no better results. While there he spent a long time talking with Dominic. In the end, both friends agreed it would be best for Martin to quit the business. He could not ignore the debt he owed his father. The time had come for him to assume his rightful place as a partner in Roth, Seifer, Roth, Steam & Hines.

Even as Martin closed his apartment and handed over his agency accounts to Dominic, his mind was filled with memories of Jenny.

Everywhere he walked in the city images of her laughing face rose to haunt him. How could he have let her get away?

His last night in New York, when no trace of her had been found, he went out with Dominic and got very drunk. Oh God, he thought as he threw himself across his hotel

bed, / loved her so much. Why couldn’t she have been patient? Didn’t she understand that while I owed her my heart I still owed my parents my heritage and loyalty too?

When he woke to catch his plane, his face was wet with tears.

bed, / loved her so much. Why couldn’t she have been patient? Didn’t she understand that while I owed her my heart I still owed my parents my heritage and loyalty too?

When he woke to catch his plane, his face was wet with tears.

All through the spring back in California, Martin could not stop thinking of Jenny. He was glad that picking up his father’s clients kept him so busy. His mother fretted as he left the house at six, only to return after dinner. Many times he would come home to see Sylvia and Bess playing cards. Though Sylvia was always around, she never foisted herself on him and he was grateful for the attention she paid his mother, attention that he could find neither the time nor the emotional strength to offer. The only antidote to the pain of Jenny’s leaving was work, and his goal each day was to exhaust himself so that when he finally went to bed he fell asleep instantly.

As spring blossomed into summer, Martin found himself besieged with social demands. He received numerous wedding invitations and rather than argue with Bess found it easier to call Sylvia and go. Sylvia never made any demands and seemed to respect Martin’s grief. If either Bess or Sylvia’s mother got their hopes up, they were wise enough to keep their thoughts to themselves.

Martin was aware that he and Sylvia were regarded as a couple by their friends. They were usually seated together at dinner parties and often asked out as a pair. Martin became increasingly comfortable in Sylvia’s presence.

For a long time he prayed that Jenny would call or write, but he realized he could not live out the rest of his life with mere hope. He wanted a home and children. He wanted the stability his parents had enjoyed. He knew he would never feel for anyone the unreserved passion he had experienced with Jenny, but maybe, as his father had said, there were other kinds of love equally satisfying.

It was at about this time that he began to see Sylvia in a different light. She was right for him in a way Jenny never could have been. He began arranging to go for walks with her in Muir Woods, sail on the Bay, picnic on the board walk in Sausalito. By the end of the summer everyone seemed to take it for granted that they would marry, and Martin found himself sharing the assumption.

One night when they were finishing dinner at Trader Vie’s, Martin reached across the table and took Sylvia’s hand.

“I love you, Sylvia.”

She looked away and fumbled with the sugar.

“Do you really, Martin? I mean really? I have the feeling that you’re still as much in love with Jenny as ever.”

Don’t lie, he told himself.

“Sylvia, I can’t deny that Jenny was important to me. Maybe she will always be part of my youth, but I’m ready to grow up now and I want the kind of life you and I can build together.”

“But losing her still hurts, doesn’t it?”

“I can’t ^ay it doesn’t but it’s gotten to the point that I can look at our affair objectively. I suppose there’s not a lot of logic about love, but at least now I can see that if we had married we probably wouldn’t have been very happy. Believe me, I want to live with you. I need you.”

She didn’t answer.

“Of course,” he said.

“I haven’t even asked if you’d have me. I’m not much of a bargain, I grant you, but for what ever it’s worth, I want to marry you and spend the rest of my life trying to make you the happiest lady in the world.”

She started to cry. Leaning over the table, he lifted her face and kissed her.

“Please marry me, Sylvia.”

This was a moment she had dreamed about for so many years. Marrying Martin was something she wanted more than anything in the world. And, if he had asked her before Jenny, she would have been filled with joy.