Secrecy (2 page)

Then all whispering and rustling stopped as the minister began. “Dearly Beloved …”

Charlotte was feeling awe, as when music went shivering through her body. She sought a word:
profound
. Deep. Yes, that was it. The serious words and the serious expressions on all the faces made her wonder whether everyone was feeling what she was feeling. Were they remembering something? Or wanting something?

Elena was remembering.
So little
, he had said.
So light
, lifting her from her feet into the air, as though the contrast between her smallness and his own tall bulk was a marvel. Yet his size and strength had been an immediate attraction to her.
At home they call me
Big Bill
, he had told her, laughing. Then there had been his calm good nature, so mature, so manly. Of course, there had also been the excitement, the adventure, of going with him to America.

She watched him now with his courteous stance and eyes directed toward the clergyman. His eyes were large, opalescent, and rather beautiful, giving an impression of vagueness or inattention, so that you were often surprised to find that he had been listening, observing, and had missed nothing. He was a man of great intelligence; of that there could be no doubt. And yet he bored her. So many things bored her.

“… forsaking all others until death do you part?”

Yes, Bill thought, that’s certainly how it was. And then great changes take place. He knew she was looking at him now, contemplating—what? So he kept himself turned toward the minister. Still, he could see her in his mind’s eye: exquisite, doll-like, with black curls thickly massed, a too-heavy frame for the delicate, witty face.

They would have to control their war of words, have to keep firm hold for Charlotte’s sake. Moving his head just an unnoticeable part of an inch, she entered his vision, this ponytailed, awkward product of two opposites. Tall and large-boned like himself, she had nothing of her mother in her that anyone could recognize. Listening, rapt, she displayed all her gentleness upon her face. So fragile, he thought, so trusting, so innocent! And then he withdrew the last, for who was ever really innocent at fourteen? Nevertheless,
she must be guarded, shielded from all unnecessary pain.

“I pronounce you man and wife.…”

It was over. Then would come the greeting and kissing, the customary humorless jokes, and the aimless mingling until it was time to move into the dining room for lunch. Charlotte had been at a wedding once before, so she knew how it would be, and knew, too, that since there was no one of her age here, she had best take care of herself.

As soon as she was past the receiving line, she made her way to the hors d’oeuvres table, where immediately she spotted some of her favorites: shrimp, tiny hot dogs, and those delicious little mushroom things. There, from a lookout station between the bar and the food, she stood with her heaped plate in hand, observing the room. It was fun to watch people and speculate about them when they didn’t know they were being watched. Not that her opinions would bother anyone! She was as much removed from the adults’ world as if she were three years old. So she surveyed the moving scene, expecting no attention and receiving none except once when Patsy Jersey’s mother congratulated her for being on the high honor roll. Mrs. Jersey was clearly a loner; shy and uncertain, she was a little brown hen on the edge of the crowd. Mr. Jersey had been talking to Elena for the last ten minutes, and they were laughing. Elena sparkled, with diamonds in her ears and on her wrists. Charlotte felt sorry for Mrs. Jersey.

All around her people came, clustered, and went away, leaving their remarks hanging in the air.

“Yes, it’s nice to see Cliff married at last. It’s time, though. He must be near forty.”

“… a lovely woman. She had that bookstore over in Ridgedale, you know. That’s how he met her.”

“The son’s a good-looking kid, isn’t he?”

“Oh, my goodness, he’s probably the most popular boy in the school. Not much of a student, but a football star and the idol of the girls.”

“Not very friendly, I thought.”

“Oh, well, at seventeen or eighteen—”

“Goodness,” Elena exclaimed, “you’re really not eating all that before the luncheon, Charlotte?”

“I’m hungry, Mama.”

“Yes, but before you know it, you’ll be way overweight, and with your build you can’t afford an extra ounce of fat. Again, dear, go in and redo your ponytail before we sit down to lunch. It’s coming loose. Are you having a good time?”

“Not especially.”

“Well, of course not, standing here all by yourself. You need to learn to mingle.”

Mingle
, said Charlotte in scorn and silence. In front of the mirror in the bathroom she glimpsed herself: dirty blond, with pale skin and light eyes, Dad’s eyes, of no particular color. At least the braces were off her teeth, thank God. Otherwise, there was little to be said about her. Stuffed with food now, she wished she could go home.

She was seated, naturally, at the family table among a handful of middle-aged cousins and some of
Uncle Cliff’s close friends. Also quite naturally, they had put her next to Ted.

“You two are related now,” Claudia said happily, “so you need to get acquainted.”

You could tell how happy she was and that she wanted everybody else to be the same. Charlotte could not have said how she knew this. It was simply that she felt a warmth in Claudia; maybe it came from her voice or her gestures, which were unhurried and peaceful. But she ought to have known that Ted would have no interest in Charlotte.

With obvious reluctance he asked her what grade she was in.

“Ninth.”

His bright eyes, black olives, swept over Charlotte and dismissed her. Yet, since he still had to say something more, he inquired who her homeroom teacher was. “I hope not Mr. Hudson. He stinks.”

“I don’t go to public school.”

She shouldn’t have said that. The words had come out as if she felt superior because of going to private school, and of course she hadn’t meant that at all. Why did her words so often get tangled up this way? And she felt a hot flush on her cheeks.

“Where do you go?” he asked carelessly.

“The Lakewood School.”

“Oh. All girls.”

“Yes,” she said.

He turned away to the man on his other side, who had begun a conversation about football. Naturally, that would be more interesting for him than anything Charlotte was able to talk about. Still, if she were
beautiful, if she knew how to “mingle,” as Elena had said, it might, in spite of her youth, be different.

So she sat silently, watching and listening as before. It was interesting how if you watched and listened carefully, things meant to be hidden became clear. You could tell when two people who were very polite to each other did not like each other.

“A wedding trip to Italy,” Elena said in her bright voice. “How wonderful. You’ll love it. I sometimes wonder how I ever could have left.”

“I should imagine you left for your husband’s sake,” said a woman whom Charlotte recognized as the mother of one of the popular girls. Her mouth smiled at Elena while she reproved her.

Elena knew it too. Her shrug said:
Your opinions make no difference to me
. And she returned to her little flirtation with the man next to her.

Why was Dad not noticing? Perhaps he was but had too many other things to think about.

“After eighty years we have to close the plant,” Uncle Cliff was remarking to someone. “And let me tell you, we feel the pain. But textiles are moving south, or else to Asia. You know what’s happening.”

Dad worried. When he caught Charlotte’s glance, he smiled. But he worried.

Many things troubled Bill, even in the middle of a wedding feast. He wondered whether Charlotte had heard them quarreling last night. But even if she had not, she knew too much. You can’t hide things when you’re living next to each other in the same house. Even when you keep a surface calm, the current is felt, the undercurrent is palpable. How we suffer,
some of us, and how our children suffer because of us!

His glance touched on Ted and moved to Claudia. Yes, he thought, regardless of her joy today, there is a shadow on her face. Ted is a problem for her. She may not even know it. She may not yet see, or perhaps never will see plainly, what I saw the first time I met him: the contemptuous swing of his walk, the sullen mouth, the narrow eyes, fast-shifting, never looking straight at your eyes. He is a fox. He can be cruel.

And then he thought: This is absurd. What am I, a mind-reader? It’s only my mood that makes up such morbid fictions.… Elena and I will part. In spite of my best efforts, and I shall make them, it will happen, though I don’t know when. And it will be so hard for Charlotte, my little Charlotte.

On the way home Bill remarked cheerfully, “It was a nice wedding, small and intimate. And I really do like Claudia.”

“Yes, it was very pretty,” Elena said. “If only Claudia knew how to dress!”

No one replied. The comment left an unpleasant sense of gloom, quite out of proportion to its importance.

After a while Bill said, “She’s had to struggle for a living. I don’t imagine she’s had the time or the means to fuss much about clothes. Oh, look over there on the left—must be a dozen bluejays on that limb. I guess they plan to stay all winter.”

Charlotte was familiar with this effort to keep a
genial mood alive. Sometimes the effort seemed almost ridiculous, since it seldom worked. Elena laid her head back on the seat; her plump, glossy curls rested on her upturned collar; she had never ceased her animated talk all through the day, but now she was silent.

And soundlessly, Charlotte implored: Say something, answer him. Inside, near her stomach, or perhaps actually within her stomach, things quivered.

Bill cried out, “Do I see snowflakes?”

The day had started out mild, but while they had been indoors, the sky had gone gray and cold. Hard, Charlotte thought, like an iron lid.

“They’ve been predicting an early winter,” Bill resumed, “and I think I’ve noticed squirrels doing more scurrying for food than usual. Have you noticed, Charlotte?”

“No, but I’ll watch out tomorrow.”

“How I dread the winter.” Elena sighed. “This miserable climate. Just getting out of bed in the morning—my flesh shrinks to think of it. Where are you going, Bill? I thought we were going straight home.”

“I want to take a look at the plant first.”

“What on earth for?”

“Sentimental reasons, I suppose.”

From where the car stopped on the opposite bank of the river, the old Dawes Textile Building looked as if it had been long abandoned, although it had only been closed for the last two months. Already it was a relic, Bill thought ruefully, one of a string of old industries on countless East Coast rivers that the century
had passed by. Of its many small-paned, old-fashioned windows a good number, tempting targets for stone-throwing boys, were already smashed. Soon rain and snow would rot the interior. Birds and rats would nest unless—unless a buyer should come along and rescue it. But there was a singular dearth of buyers for a place like this one, three floors high, eighty years old, four acres square with another thirty acres, mostly swampland, behind it. In front of it the river rolled toward the distant ocean. There was no sign of life in any direction. For a few moments they all sat staring into the faded afternoon.

Suddenly Elena said, “No one’s ever going to buy this thing. Kingsley is a decaying town. In fact, it’s decayed already. No one’s built anything here since 1890 except for the mall out on the highway.”

Bill corrected her. “That’s not quite true.”

“Well, you should have sold out five years ago to the conglomerate. Now you’re stuck with it.”

“You know very well why we didn’t. We held on, tried to keep going to save our people’s jobs.”

“So now they’re unemployed anyway. You’re too soft, Bill. You always have been. A rugged six feet four, and soft inside. My God, when I remember the fuss you made about Mrs. Boland! And she survived, didn’t she?”

He did not say that she had survived because Cliff and he had given her a nest egg large enough for her to live on the interest it paid. Instead, he said, “Mrs. B. was my father’s secretary before she was mine. She was an old widow with an older widowed mother in a wheelchair, for God’s sake. Of course we ‘made a
fuss,’ as you call it.” And then, giving way unwillingly to his impatience, he added, “Claudia would understand. She’s been there herself.”

“Oh, Claudia,” Elena mocked.

Something broke in Charlotte. “Why don’t you stop?” she cried. “You’ve been fighting over this business ever since I was in fifth grade.”

Bill said instantly, “You’re right. How about dropping the subject, going home, and getting something to eat? It’s been a long time since lunch. We’ll light a fire and maybe toast some marshmallows.”

“That’ll be nice,” Elena agreed. She turned around and smiled at Charlotte. “People said lovely things about you, darling. About how smart you are in school and what a pleasant girl you are. I was really proud.”

It was dark when they reached home. Darkness in the fall felt different from the summer dark, which, gauzy and shot through with skylight, invited you to stay outside in it. Now it was thick and heavy here, pressing against the black windows as if it were trying to get in. Charlotte spread out her hands before the fire, not because she was cold, but because it was friendly.

She had been eating her way through sandwiches, apples, and marshmallows, when Elena exclaimed, “Where do you put all that food?”

“In my stomach,” she answered.

“I can’t believe it,” Elena still exclaimed, although she often described herself as one who never gained an ounce and could afford to be greedy.

“Charlotte is growing,” Bill said, putting a stop to the subject.

After that they talked, the two parents, quietly and sensibly as people should. Charlotte, reading a magazine, had no interest in what they were saying. It was just good that they were being nice together. Maybe this niceness would last for a long time, for two or three weeks, as it often did. Only once did she come to attention, when Elena said something about Florida and was stopped by Dad’s look of warning:
Not now. Not in front of Charlotte
, it meant.