Private affairs : a novel (21 page)

It took a minute, in her dreamy mood, for Elizabeth to grasp Matt's words. Keegan and I have talked it over. "I don't understand. You and Keegan have already decided this?"

"Of course not," Rourke said with a smile. "We wouldn't decide anything behind your back. We were discussing personnel the other day when I telephoned—"

"And I come under 'Personnel.' "

"Everyone does, my dear, including myself. All we said about you was that we were wasting your talent by forcing you to be part of the daily grind of running a department."

"We said more than that." Matt put down his fork. "We want to use everyone in the best way and it isn't best if your interviewing and writing take second place to another job. We think you should get out of editing. First, because you're too good to be doing it, but more than that: you get too tired, you have no time for yourself, you don't see your friends, and you've been worried about not spending enough time with Holly and Peter."

"I've been worried that neither of us is spending enough time with them."

"I know that and I'm going to see what I can do about it. But right now, if one of us has to cut back, it should be the one who can work anywhere. You can write your column at home; you write it there most of the time as it is, at night, after the rest of us, who only have one job, are asleep."

"I also said we weren't spending enough time with each other."

"We'll do something about that," said Rourke. "I don't want'my favorite people to be unhappy. Though of course I'm sure you didn't expect to continue working together much longer."

Of course we did; the whole idea was to work together.

"I see it all the time," Rourke continued. "Teams that start out together eventually move apart as each one finds a niche or a new path. Of course if they trust each other it doesn't matter; they take whatever direction is necessary to succeed, like the two of you. The paper flourishes, the Lovell name is becoming known, Elizabeth even has the Good Housekeeping seal of approval." He smiled at his wit. "And Matt, too: making quite a name for himself. That talk you gave in Wyoming the other day— Laramie, wasn't it?—was written up as far away as Phoenix and Oklahoma City."

"Chet's been very thorough," said Matt dryly.

"Chet gets paid for being thorough; how can I know what my executives are up to if he doesn't keep me informed? Well, popularity and success carry a price; it's no wonder you don't have enough time together. But I promise we'll do something about it."

"I think we can work on that ourselves," Elizabeth said coolly, her dreaminess gone. It was strange, she thought, that as clever as Rourke was, he didn't realize when he was going too far and too fast, or how it made her feel to know he kept such close tabs on them.

My father's shadow. The reach of his long arm. In that luxurious restaurant, being given a sample of the kind of life that came with being part of his empire, Elizabeth understood what Tony had meant. She felt a sharp longing for her home and her family. The four of us, she thought, as we were before, with the excitement of owning the Chieftain.

But it was too late. It was no longer exciting to Matt. She looked at him thoughtfully: her handsome beloved husband, who wanted to accomplish so much. He had echoed her—"Elizabeth is right, Keegan; we'll handle that problem ourselves"—and then they had begun to talk about the circulation of the Daily News and the Houston Record. So Matt was involved with Rourke's Houston paper, Elizabeth thought. And probably with other parts of Rourke Enterprises. Too late; too late. The words ran through her head. It was too late to go back to their small success. They

had to learn to handle this larger one because it didn't matter whether she wanted part of it or none of it. It was theirs.

She put her hand on Matt's, interrupting his talk. "What do you think? Do you want me to leave the features department? We wouldn't be working together if I did."

A wave of fatigue and frustration swept over Matt. He loved her so much, but Keegan was right: there was a time when people had to go in separate directions. "Yes," he said. "I want you to do it." He turned his hand and clasped hers. "It doesn't make sense for you to do anything but write: it's your strength, it's what you love, and you always say you'd like more time for it. You've trained a good staff: you could promote your assistant to features editor, come in one or two days a week until everything is under control, and write your columns at home where it's quiet and you have all the time you need. And you'll see more of Holly and Peter. You can even keep an eye on Saul; I think he's beginning to believe the Chieftain and the Sun are his. Elizabeth, it's the right thing to do."

"It's very well thought out," she said quietly.

"It's worth a try, don't you think?"

It sounded like a question, but Elizabeth knew it wasn't. Her husband was telling her he wanted her to agree, because this was something very important to him.

And if I said no, what would I win?

"Of course it's worth a try," Elizabeth said. "We can always change back if it doesn't work out."

"But it will work out," Rourke said. "It's a real breakthrough for you. Wait until you see how much greater your audience will be, especially when we begin to buy new papers. My dear Elizabeth, this is a wonderful thing for you; I'm so pleased. Your parents will be delighted." One of the waiters brought a fruit basket to the table, with a dish of powdered sugar on the side. Rourke took a strawberry, dipped it in the sugar, and said, "Raspberry souffle for dessert. And while we're waiting, we'll have another bottle of wine. To celebrate."

Tuesday: a hot, dry August morning, the first weekday in months Elizabeth had stayed home. After Matt left alone for Albuquerque, she sat in the kitchen drinking a second cup of coffee. She imagined him driving through the landscape of sand and sage, past the Santo Domingo school silhouetted against the mountains on the horizon, past birds perched on telephone wires, heads tilted as if testing the wind before soaring on its currents, higher and higher, until they could no longer be seen from the

road where she and Matt had driven for four months, beginning their day together.

I've got to get out of here, she thought. Just to clear my head. There's so much to get used to. I'll take a drive with Holly and Peter; then I'll come back and get to work.

I can't take a drive. Matt has the car.

Something they'd forgotten: they hadn't needed two cars since buying the Chieftain because they'd been working together. Now they were back to separate jobs. And two cars.

Elizabeth picked up the telephone and called Lydia. "Mother, could I borrow your car, just for the morning? It's something we didn't think about. We'll have to buy another one."

"Heather will drive over and you can drive her back," Lydia said. "And why don't you keep it for a few days? I can use Heather's, and your father won't be going anywhere; he's decided to become a cabinetmaker."

"A cabinetmaker? He's never even sawed a piece of wood in half."

"My very words. He says if Matt Lovell can have a midlife crisis and change his life, Spencer Evans can have a late-life crisis and change his. He says he's always wanted to work with wood. He says he's restless and bored and Heather and I can handle the bookshop perfectly well and he wants to get back to nature and use only basic tools, no power saws and so on, and make beautiful things."

"He said all that?"

"All that and more. And if it makes him happy, why not? I won't see him much, since he'll be in the garage—that's why he was cleaning it; he's converted half of it to a woodworking shop—but if he's more pleasant at dinner, it's probably worth it."

"He just left you with the bookshop—"

"It's perfectly all right, dear; I love it and it's what I do best. It will work out and I'm sure we'll both be better for it."

And where have I heard that before? Elizabeth wondered, cleaning up the kitchen. She glanced through the window and saw Holly and Peter, watching for Heather, deep in discussion. They were getting along so well, Elizabeth thought. They were growing up.

"I suppose you'll disappear when we get to Nuevo," Holly was saying, shading her eyes to look up the street.

Peter squinted. "I suppose."

She picked up a branch that had broken off their olive tree and drew a circle in the packed red dirt of the street. "Maya is very pretty."

Peter nodded.

"She has such beautiful hair. It shines in the sun."

A sigh tore loose from Peter as he imagined the small triangle of hair he kept wanting to kiss except he didn't know if she'd like it . . . and then his pants bulged and he turned hastily away from his sister, walking in circles, kicking up puffs of dust.

"And she's so nice," Holly persisted.

"Uh-huh." Peter's back was to her. "She's a good listener," he said, wanting to talk about her but afraid he'd say too much.

"That's what you do? Talk?"

"What's wrong with talking? You don't ask me that about the men I talk to in the pueblos."

"You don't want to make love to the men in the pueblos."

Peter broke into nervous laughter and Holly giggled and then, with relief, Peter saw Heather driving toward them.

Seeing them laughing, Heather thought what a difference it made, having their mother home. Only one day and already they looked happier than they had all summer—although the last couple of weeks Peter had looked dreamy and out of it altogether, lost in some private fantasy. Holly looked wonderful, Heather thought, in shorts and a white shirt, long-legged, tanned, her ash-blond hair like a pale waterfall down her back. Her beauty, like Elizabeth's, always made Heather sigh with envy, but in a rather pleasant way, since you can't really envy people you adore, and anyway, she knew she couldn't look like Elizabeth or Holly unless she woke up one morning with different hair, a different face, and a different figure. Not very likely, she reflected, so I give up. And then, involuntarily, she thought: Saul loves me the way I am.

"Okay, everybody," she said aloud. "Hop in and take me back to work; I have a very strict boss."

"Oh, sure," Peter said as Elizabeth joined them and they all got in the car. "Grandma was never strict in her whole life."

"Probably not," Heather agreed. "Which is why I love her."

"Instead of Saul," Holly said wisely, "who is very strict."

Elizabeth, sitting in front with Heather, turned around. "You seem to know a great deal about it."

"We've been with them a lot lately, listening to them fight, while you were in Albuquerque."

"A little more respect, please." Heather's face was red. "We don't fight. We have long talks."

"Right," said Peter.

Elizabeth turned back to Heather. "Not going too well?"

"Sometimes." Heather's lower lip trembled. "He keeps telling me what I should do. He's a lot older and he's been all over the world and won

prizes and seen everything, and maybe he does know what's good for me, but I'd like to find out for myself and make up my own mind. Don't you think I ought to? At least try?"

"Yes," Elizabeth said as they pulled up in front of the shop on Canyon Road. "Is it really all right if I keep the car for a while?"

"Sure. Lydia and I will use mine, and Spencer has disappeared in a cloud of sawdust. Keep it until you buy a new one. Make it fancy. And expensive."

"Why?" Elizabeth asked, amused.

"Consolation prize. See you later."

Consolation prize. Because she was the one staying home, while Matt drove off and conquered the world?

But he was right; one of us should spend more time with Peter and Holly. And I have my writing. I don't need consolation.

Still, a fancy car would be nice, she thought, turning on the air conditioning as they left Santa Fe and drove toward the Sangre de Cristo mountains through rolling, reddish-brown hills, dry grazing land, and clumps of scraggly trees. We can afford it now, and why shouldn't I have a nice one? I'll be driving around the state, interviewing people; I might as well be comfortable while I do it.

The divided highway was almost empty and Elizabeth speeded up beyond Canoncito, beginning the climb into the mountains. Holly sat beside her, Peter lounged in back, and they talked about the summer that was coming to an end.

"You know what we sound like?" Holly asked. "Like school, when everybody comes back at the end of vacation and compares notes."

"True," agreed Peter. "And what have you been doing with yourself, my dear Mrs. Lovell? Running a newspaper? How very interesting. We've been busy, too; I have visited my very good friend Maya Solel in Nuevo, and friends in nearby pueblos, learning their legends—in fact, I plan to write a book about them, taking after my famous mother whose work has appeared in Good Housekeeping magazine. And my lovely sister also has been active; she takes singing lessons, practices many hours each day, visits her friend Luz Aragon in Nuevo, attends the opera . . . You may know all this, though it is possible word may not have reached Albuquerque—"

"That's enough, Peter," Elizabeth said quietly. "I know I haven't been around much lately, but you don't have to overdo it. I'm here now."

"And maybe it's not so bad," said Holly in her mother's defense. "I mean, maybe families take each other for granted when they're always together. At least now we appreciate having you here."

"I always appreciated having my parents here," Peter said pointedly.

"Peter, will you shut up!" Holly demanded.

"Of course," he said. In the rearview mirror Elizabeth saw the odd, trance-like look that had appeared for the first time a couple of weeks earlier, about the time she was in Houston. Love or worry, she thought. I hope it's love.

"I appreciate you both," she said. "And nothing your father and I have done means we don't appreciate you or love you. We had a job to do; we told you about it; and we asked you to be patient for six months. Was that too much to ask?"

"No," Holly declared. "Peter's just going through sexual anxieties and worrying about being a senior."

"What?" Peter demanded.

"It's okay; I understand," Holly said. "Maybe I'll be scared, too, when it's my turn. Last year of high school, getting ready to leave home and face all that competition in college, being alone in the cold, cruel world—"

"Bullshit."

"Peter," Elizabeth said.

"Sorry. But she's wrong."

"She may be. But if she's right, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Give it some thought."

Peter shrugged. "Sure." He wondered whether he should argue about the "sexual anxieties" part and decided to leave it alone. He couldn't beat Holly in a discussion, but he could really get to her by refusing to answer. Pulling off his hiking boots he put stockinged feet against the window and lay back on the seat. Nice being alone; he could dream.

Holly was silent, too, as Elizabeth drove through the main street of Pecos and turned into the Pecos Valley. They climbed steadily on the narrow road, following the Pecos River between steep mountain slopes covered with pine, juniper, gambel oak, and the slender white trunks and quaking leaves of aspens. Above the narrow valley, the sky was a deep blue arch.