Letting Go (53 page)

“You said he as much as told you they weren’t happy with you.”

“Libby’s exaggerating,” Paul said.

“Mommy!”

We all looked toward the doorway, where Cynthia stood, rubbing her eyes.

“What’s the matter, honey?” Martha said, getting up.

Cynthia’s eyes landed on each of us in turn. “You’re all talking too loud. I can’t sleep.”

Martha set down her cup. “We’re hardly talking at all,” she said, and chaperoned Cynthia back to her room.

Libby extended her neck its full length. “Maybe we had better go. I don’t want to wake up anybody who’s trying to sleep.”

“Libby, Paul—please stay. Let’s not run off. Why don’t we all relax,” I suggested, and went off to the kitchen. The door to the back porch was ajar, and Martha stood in the opening leaning against the wall and looking outside.

“Martha,” I said, coming up to her and feeling the cold from outside, “what the hell is going on here? I invited them over, you invited them over. Let’s not
throw
them out. I feel as though I’m in the middle of an earthquake. Let’s all at least try to be civil. Let’s get through this thing like human beings.”

“I’m all right,” she said.

“Don’t mind Libby. If it’s any solace to you, she’s really quite miserable.”

“If it’s any solace to her, so am I. So we’re even.”

“So am I, damn it! Just control yourself. Turn around, Martha. Tell me what the trouble is.”

“Married people depress me,” she said, not turning.

“I thought it was divorced people.”

“Why don’t you go back into the living room and entertain your friends?”

And I went, but before I had even sat down again, Libby said to me, “I’ve been saying something ought to be done about that John Spigliano. Somebody should hit him in the jaw.”

“He’s a pain in the ass, Libby,” I said, making a hopeless gesture, “nobody will argue that. There’s really nobody who can stand him. But you’ve really only got to ignore him.”

“Suppose,” she said, “you have principles.”

I smiled. “Still ignore him.”

“Well,” she said, “maybe you can …”

I tried now to ignore her. I looked over at her husband, who was leaning back against the sofa, his face marked slightly by a frown. “It isn’t a matter of me, Libby,” I said, “it’s simply the most sensible thing to do.”

Paul leaned forward. “Oh but, Jesus, the circular symbols in
Tom Sawyer.
” He looked to Libby, who nodded in agreement. “What incredible horseshit,” said Paul.

“Of course,” I told him. “I know.”

“Then,” said Libby, no longer in a flat voice, “why don’t you say something?”

I was puzzled for a moment, until I imagined again all the conversations that this couple—my old Libby—must have had about me. “Look, Libby, I was through all this last year. I shared your feelings exactly. But the best thing is to ignore Spigliano and do your job.”

“We certainly didn’t have anybody like him at Reading,” she said.

“So?” I answered. “That doesn’t prove anything here or there.”

“It proves something,” she said.

“Oh hell, Libby, you didn’t have to come here if you didn’t want to. I was led to believe it was so awful in Reading.”

“Nobody’s blaming you,” Paul said now.

“Well,” I replied, “isn’t that nice.”

“Actually, we were probably better off in Reading,” Libby said, “where there weren’t all these phoney and ambitious people.”

“Well, you could have chosen to stay there.”

Paul was standing. “Libby’s not feeling well, Gabe—”

“Oh balls,” I said, standing now myself, “Libby’s never feeling well.”

“I don’t think there’s any need for that kind of remark,” he said, growing fierce.

“There’s no need for anything,” I said. “You’ve got some appreciation of generosity—”

“I told you Libby’s not feeling well—”

“Well, I’m talking to both of you.”

Suddenly Martha was in the room. “Could all of you stop shouting! Could my kids get some sleep, please!”

Libby stood up and faced her. “We’re going, Mrs. Reganhart.”

“Yes,” Paul said, taking his wife’s elbow. “I think we’d better.”

I took a walk that night, by myself. I pulled up my collar and went all the way down to the lake, where the waters were behaving like an ocean, breaking onto the dark rock barrier, then rushing out with the sound of violent tugging. I could not distinguish where the black water ended and where the black sky began. What I saw—actually, what I could not see—frightened me, but I hung on as long as I could, looking straight out into it, as though fear might run through me like a cathartic, and leave me a less cautious man. Finally I broke away and dashed across the deserted park and onto the lighted streets. Walking back to Martha’s apartment very slowly, I did not do a great deal of thinking because I could not figure out what to think about.

The table had been cleared and pushed back to the wall; the coffee cups, brandy glasses, and bottle had all been put away. I turned off the hall light and in the bedroom got into my pajamas, while Martha lay there with her eyes open, smoking. The bedside lamp was on, but her gaze was focused only on the smoke that rose above her head.

I sat down by the window, pushed back a corner of the shade, and peered outside. I said, “What a night.”

Martha only pushed herself up a little, as though my remark had caused her some postural discomfort. Her hair was still down over her shoulders, and from time to time her eyes twittered from the smoke; that was all that moved.

“It was stupid of me to have chosen to invite those people,” I
said. “I should surely have realized what was going to happen beforehand.” She said nothing. “I don’t know why I felt the necessity to extend something that is really quite over. I should never—”

“Gabe,” she said, “we have to do something about the money situation.”

I rose, and I paced until I could contain myself.

“I told you,” I said, “that I’ll pay for that bottle. If you want, I’ll make out a check right now. Or give you cash, if you object so strenuously to my checks.”

“What about the groceries?”

“Oh hell!”

She went on smoking in that contemplative, bitchy, distracted way.

“What’s come over you?” I asked. “What did I say? We’ve been through all this, over and over it, as a matter of fact. Okay, money is a problem, and I’m willing to work it out. But what is it you want me to do, Martha, pay for everything? Is that what you think will work better? Are you sure about that?”

“Well, I prepare the food,” she said. “You don’t pay for that. The gas I cook with I happen to pay for. The same goes for the electric lights in the kitchen. Be reasonable, please.”

I leaned toward her over the foot of the bed. “You’re kidding me or something, aren’t you? Look at me—aren’t you? What do you want me to do—hire you as a cook?”

“You treat me like one, why not?”

“Do I? Look at me, damn it! Do I? Do you think,” I demanded, “I’d hire a cook with two kids?”

She pushed her cigarette into the ash tray beside the bed. “I don’t know if this is working out.”

I tried deep breathing—a metaphoric way, I suppose, of pumping up the will. “Martha, if you’re willing, we ought to wait until tomorrow. We’ll both feel more ourselves in the morning. This has been a bad day from the start. The money mix-up, and Theresa, and the Herzes. Paul Herz is a strange fellow, impossible to get to, and Libby—Libby’s very tough to figure out.”

“Not so tough.”

“Maybe not. I suppose she got very screwed up seeing your kids. Two handsome children getting ready for bed, Cynthia’s book … It probably upset her.”

“Those two handsome children seem to have the remarkable ability of upsetting everybody.”

“I can’t be responsible for her, Martha.” I went back to the window and found myself staring into the drawn shade.

“That’s your type though, isn’t it?” Martha said. “The svelte, skinny Mediterranean ones.”

“Christ, why don’t you go to sleep and take your rotten temper with you.”

“What—did you have an affair with her? Is that what she was up to with all that pecking away at you? Why didn’t she look at me, I’d like to know? Can’t anybody talk directly to me? Am I just the new lay—do you do this often, old man, so everybody’s in on it except the dumb blowsy mistress herself?”

“I’m going to turn the light off. You’re not jealous, which you know, and you’re not making sense. I don’t go for these midnight accusations.”

“You don’t really dig us big fat Nordic slobs, though, do you?”

I looked at her. “I’m crazy about fat Nordic slobs, as a matter of fact.” I went over and switched off the bedside light, but then I could not bring myself to get into the bed beside her. I sat on the edge.

“This just isn’t working out,” she said.

“
What
isn’t working out?”

“Cynthia is very upset.”

“Cynthia was upset before I got here.”

“Not the same way.”

“All right then,” I said, rising. “Then I’ll move out. We’ll break it off. This is ridiculous, Martha. What is it you want anyway?”

“I don’t want you to move out!” she said.

“Then what do you want?”

Suddenly she had flipped on the light and was squatting on the blanket. Her nightgown was hiked up to her knees upon which were planted her fists. “Stop raising your voice!” she demanded. “Everybody just hates for those kids to get some sleep! What do you mean you’ll move out? What do you think this is, a hotel? You’ll move in one week and out the next? I’ve got kids to think about. This is no flophouse, you!”

“Why didn’t you think about your kids when I moved in?”

“Why didn’t
you?
”

“I did,” I said. “I thought about it plenty!”

“Well then, keep thinking about them, buddy. Don’t be so fast to pack your bags.” Her hair had fallen over her face, and she shook it back, showing a face puffy with rage. She stood up, violently
grabbed a cigarette from the night table, and lit it. She began to tramp around the room, all her pounds and inches coming down through her bare feet onto the floor. She puffed at the cigarette, giving no thought to the flutter of ashes onto her nightgown.

I said nothing for several minutes. Then calmly: “You were the one who said it wasn’t working out, Martha. Not me. I came back here tonight prepared to forget that stupid Armagnac fuss, dedicated to barreling through this miserable night, and starting in again tomorrow. You suggested I leave.”

“The hell I did,” she said. “Can’t you remember from one minute to the next? Nobody told you to leave—you volunteered to pack your bags.”

“And what do you expect somebody to do if you tell them a hundred times that it isn’t working out? Don’t you think tonight’s been a mess and a trial for me too? Do you think you can just go around telling people it isn’t working out and that they’re going to
stand
there? What a night! What a
day!
You, that lousy Armagnac, Theresa whatever the hell her name is—

“Haug. And that’s my affair, not yours.”

“That’s fine with me. Frankly I’m sick of other people’s troubles. Libby Herz, sitting there with those brooding sullen eyes, and why? Because I didn’t steal her away from Paul back in Iowa? Well, don’t look at me as though I’m nuts—I don’t know either. I’m really finding it difficult to keep up with what certain people want of me. As a matter of fact I
didn’t
sleep with her, Martha, and I didn’t have an affair, though one night about three or four years ago, I don’t even remember any more, I kissed her. I admit to the crime: I kissed the girl. But I never got her down in bed—though you might want to know it crossed my mind. I don’t have a pure and rarefied soul, and I’m not without base instincts—but I’ll also tell you that I didn’t do it, and that’s a fact. But you see, now apparently she
wanted
me to. I was supposed to come along and rescue her!”

Martha looked immeasurably skeptical. “Why didn’t you?”

“Because she was married to her husband, Martha. To that big skinny silent prick, Paul.”

“I see.”

“You don’t see anything. For some reason that makes me a beast in your eyes, and a coward. I’ve been going around for years thinking I acted honorably, and now it’s my
fault
I didn’t put it to her.”

“Nobody said that.”

“Well, I’m no social worker. I’m tired of meddling in people’s lives!”

“It isn’t meddling, I shouldn’t think, when people are in trouble.”

“What is it you want me to come out for, adultery?”

“Don’t sound moralistic, please. Not you. The minute you see a stray female you take her to the hardware store to have duplicate keys made to her apartment.”

“That’s right. I have no feelings. It was heartless of me to have you cook a roast for dinner, because it made the Herzes feel shame and dismay. I shouldn’t have talked about the wine, because that made Herz unhappy too. I can assure you he’s home now hating my guts for that damn roast beef.”

“He ought to hate me too,” she said, “I paid half!”

“We should have had smelts then! Smelts and stale bread and, I don’t know—orange pop! And you shouldn’t have worn those jazzy gypsy clothes either—you should have worn something gray and washed-out, something with a rip in it.”