Sins of the Fathers (28 page)

I made a renewed effort to be pleasant and sociable. ‘The baby was very cute,’ I said, watching the ketchup drip glutinously
on to my hamburger, ‘and so small it was hard to believe he was real.’

‘It must be odd to have a baby,’ said Teresa, unable to imagine any
creative urge which did not involve paint but willing to concede the experience could be memorable. ‘Is Vicky okay?’

‘They told Sam when he saw her this morning that it was an easy birth, but she was very overwrought tonight. In fact she was
quite unlike herself. Vicky’s always so sweet and bright and nice-natured, but tonight … well, she seemed real upset. She
even cried.’

‘Post-partum blues.’

‘Do you think so? Is that what it was?’

‘Sounds like it. But don’t worry, honey, post-partum blues are very common and they never last long. She’ll be her old self
again in a day or two, you’ll see … Coffee?’

‘Thanks.’ Now that I realized there was a simple medical explanation for Vicky’s behaviour I felt much better. ‘Sam and Alicia
seemed to think it was all my fault that she cried,’ I said on an impulse, ‘but it wasn’t. I was just surprised because they’re
giving the baby a German name.’

‘Trust Sam to wave the German flag!’ said Teresa, offering me milk for my coffee.

‘Well, they’re going to anglicize the name by calling him Eric, but personally I think he should be called after my great-uncle,
the one who left me all the money. After all, Paul picked Sam out when Sam was just a gardener’s boy clipping a hedge! Sam
owes him everything.’

‘Sam owes you a lot too. The baby should be called Paul Cornelius.’

‘Well, I know most people don’t like the name Cornelius.’ I fidgeted with my hamburger. ‘But personally,’ I said, again deciding
to confide in her, ‘I’ve always liked it. It’s different. Special. That’s why I’ve never let anyone except Sam, Jake and Kevin
call me Neil – and they only call me Neil because Paul told them to. He thought Cornelius was a difficult name for an adolescent
boy to handle, and I was too shy of Paul in those days to say how it had always given me confidence. Neil’s just ordinary
but Cornelius is a great name.’

‘Maybe the next one will be Paul Cornelius. Anyway honey, I shouldn’t worry about the trouble tonight – it’ll blow over. Don’t
forget it was a big event and emotions were running high.’

‘Right. And talking of emotions running high I wish Sam would stop behaving as if he’d found the secret of eternal youth.
It’s getting irritating – almost as irritating as Alicia talking about my
grandson
the whole damned time. Christ, just because my daughter has a baby I don’t see why everyone should treat me as if I’m ripe
for an old folks’ home!’

‘Eat up your hamburger, old man, and let’s go hit the sack again.’

An hour later in bed when we were drinking more coffee and Teresa
was snacking pound cake I dusted the crumbs off my chest and glanced reluctantly at my watch.

‘Guess I’d better be getting back.’

‘Stay longer if you want. I shan’t work any more tonight.’

‘No, I have to go and make my peace with Alicia.’

‘Was she really that tough at the hospital? Jesus, I think you’re a saint to stand it! Most other men would have divorced
her long ago and followed in Sam’s footsteps – wedding bells, a pretty young wife and a baby before the first anniversary!’

I got out of bed without a word and began to pull on my clothes. The room now seemed intolerably squalid.

‘Sorry, honey, I goofed. I practically bust a gut trying never to criticize Alicia, but sometimes the gut busts and I spill
over. Don’t take any notice of my bitchiness.’

‘You’re not jealous of Alicia, are you?’

‘Hell, what would I want to be jealous of her for? She’s welcome to her empty life!’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Honey, you know I love you and think you’re great in bed and more handsome than a film star, but can you seriously imagine
what I’d be like if I was transplanted to your Fifth Avenue palace? I’d be stark staring mad within twenty-four hours! Anyway,
what possible motive could I have for wanting to step into Alicia’s shoes? I don’t want children and having a wedding ring
wouldn’t make me paint better pictures.’

In the end everything still centred on the painting. Wedding rings, children and Fifth Avenue mansions were all unreal shadows
trying to impinge on the brilliant surface of the canvas. I knew Teresa and Teresa knew herself. I was safe.

‘Good night, honey,’ she said, kissing me at the door. ‘Take care.’

‘Paint well, Teresa.’

Outside it was dark, and turning up my collar against the chill spring wind I hailed a cab and was jolted back across the
Park to that other world on Fifth Avenue.

[3]

Whenever I came home from Teresa I always had a shower. This had nothing to do with the level of hygiene in her apartment.
At the beginning of our affair I had showered before leaving her but I still found that as soon as I reached home I felt compelled
to shower again.
I spent much time pondering on the significance of this fanatical quest for cleanliness but concluded I was responding to
the need to keep my life in two strictly sanitized compartments. The shower was an attempt at purification akin to the old
Roman custom of
lustratio
which my Bar Harbor summer tutor had once mentioned to me; the Romans always made acts of lustration after celebrating some
pagan rite and before returning to the normality of their civilized routine.

I was heading swiftly up the main staircase for my rendezvous with the shower when Alicia called my name from the hall. I
didn’t stop – the pull of the shower was too strong – but I did turn my head to look at her. She was wearing a grey dress
with a diamond clasp at the shoulder, and diamond earrings below the smooth dark curves of her hair. She looked matchlessly
beautiful. My pace automatically quickened up the stairs.

‘Cornelius – wait!’

‘Give me five minutes, would you?’ I fled to the bathroom, locked myself in, stripped off my clothes and bundled them into
a heap out of sight behind the trash basket. Then with enormous relief I stepped into the shower.

After counting slowly to one hundred and eighty I turned off the water and dried myself vigorously for a further sixty seconds.
It was soothing to follow the familiar routine. Feeling much better I knotted my towel carefully around my waist and made
sure my genitals were hidden. This was a very important part of the routine because no one, not even Teresa, was ever allowed
to see me naked from the front. It was true that Teresa had once been exposed to this view by accident on a long light summer
evening when we had kicked off all the bedclothes, even the sheet which I always took care to keep drawn up to my navel, but
she had made no comment so I had kept calm and pretended I didn’t care. Perhaps she had noticed nothing unusual. Human beings
come in all shapes and sizes, and for all I knew small testicles were a dime a dozen, equally common among those who have
suffered from mumps and those who have no idea what the word orchitis means. Perhaps at a casual glance my testicles even
looked normal. To my eyes they looked deformed but since I knew exactly how deformed they were it was hardly surprising that
to me they should seem so hideously abnormal. I often wondered what Teresa thought of my eccentric modesty, but knowing Teresa
I guessed she would have shrugged her shoulders and accepted it long ago. Teresa concentrated on the basic issues. So long
as the rest of my sexual equipment felt and acted as if it were in first-class condition she wasn’t about to bother to find
out why I went to bed with my
shorts on and only wriggled out of them when I was safely under cover of the sheet.

With the towel around my waist I unlocked the bathroom door and with shock discovered that Alicia was waiting for me in the
bedroom. My hands flew at once to my waist to make sure the towel was secure.

‘Please excuse me for bothering you like this,’ she said, and I noticed suddenly how tense she was, ‘but there really is an
immediate problem. Vivienne’s here. Apparently as soon as she heard the news about the baby from Sam she got the first flight
out of Miami, and now she wants to know why Vicky’s receiving no visitors. She says she won’t leave here till she’s spoken
to you in person.’

‘Christ! How did she get in?’

‘She arrived when we were at the hospital and the new footman admitted her. I’ve reprimanded Carraway for not instructing
him properly, but—’

‘Okay, let me fix this.’ I pressed the bell by my bed and kept my finger in place until my valet arrived at the double to
bring me fresh clothes. Then I picked up the house-phone. ‘Hammond?’ I said to my chief aide. ‘I want my ex-wife out of this
house. Give her money, buy her a meal, do whatever has to be done, but get her out.’ I hung up, switched phones and dialled
Sam to suggest that since he was responsible for Vivienne’s invasion of New York it was his duty to ship her right back to
Florida, but the housekeeper at the Kellers’ new home on East Sixty-Fourth Street told me that Sam was out to dinner.

‘Vivienne seems to believe that you bribed the doctors to keep her out of the hospital,’ said Alicia tentatively after I had
re-emerged from the bathroom with my shorts on.

‘Christ!’ I fought my way into a clean T-shirt and grabbed the sweater my valet was offering me. ‘Well, all I can say is,’
I said, wrenching on my pants, ‘that if that woman thinks she can bust into the hospital and upset my little girl—’

I was interrupted by loud voices shouting in the corridor, and almost before I could button my fly the bedroom door was flung
open as Vivienne, hotly pursued by Hammond and his two henchmen, burst across the threshold.

‘How dare you order your punks to manhandle me!’ she screamed. ‘I’ll sue you, you bastard!’

‘So sue me. I’ll wipe you off the map.’ I turned to my aide. ‘Hammond, you’re fired. Get out.’ I had managed to step into
a pair of loafers before anyone had noticed I was barefoot. A man may just possibly be able to exercise power without socks
on but without shoes he can only look ridiculous.

‘Now you listen to me, you sonofabitch—’ Vivienne was shouting at me.

‘Be quiet!’ I blazed, discarding my neutral expression and level voice so abruptly that everyone in the room jumped. ‘How
dare you burst in here as if you were still mistress of this house with the right to come and go as you please! And how dare
you harass my wife by creating these disgusting scenes!’

‘I want to see my daughter! I want to see my grandson! What right have you to keep them from me? They’re mine as well as yours!’
Vivienne suddenly collapsed in a heap on the bed. She was wearing a powder-blue suit, very high heels and a load of gold jewellery
which clinked when she walked. Her tears were making deep furrows in her make-up. She looked wrecked, raddled and revolting.

‘Cornelius,’ said Alicia in a quiet composed voice, ‘I know Vicky can’t receive any more visitors tonight, but couldn’t Vivienne
at least see her own grandchild for a few minutes?’

‘Oh, for God’s sake don’t keep mentioning that word grandchild! Do you think Vivienne wants to be reminded she’s nearer sixty
than fifty these days?’

‘Isn’t he a bastard?’ said Vivienne to Alicia. ‘He’s not even proud to be a grandfather! You’d think he’d go crazy over this
grandson, wouldn’t you – particularly since he’s never been able to produce a son of his own!’

I wanted to vomit. I even turned aside for fear I might begin to retch but before I could take a step towards the bathroom
Alicia said with the most exquisite dignity: ‘Please, Vivienne – it’s a great disappointment to me that I’ve failed to give
Cornelius the children he would certainly have had with someone else. You may not care what you say to him but as one woman
to another I must ask you not to intrude in a private matter which is so full of sadness for me. Now as far as the present
problem’s concerned I’ll personally take you to the hospital and make sure you’re admitted – if Cornelius gives his permission.
May I have your permission, please, Cornelius?’

I did not look into her eyes for fear of the pity I might find there. I just walked over to her without a word, took her hands
in mine and kissed her on the cheek. Then I kicked off my loafers, sat down and pulled on my socks. My eyes felt hot. I was
dumb with the humiliation that she had felt obliged to tell such a lie on my behalf. I wanted to retch again when I realized
how pathetic she obviously thought me.

‘Wonderful!’ Vivienne was saying sarcastically. ‘I just adore cosy little marital love scenes! Well, now that you’ve shown
me you’re still
capable of kissing your current wife, would it be too much to hope that you’ll fall in with her offer to take me to the hospital?’

‘You’ve caused Alicia enough trouble for one night,’ I said, stepping back into my shoes. ‘I’ll take you.’

‘Thanks, but I’d rather go with a sympathetic woman who understands how disgracefully I’ve been treated!’

‘You’ll go with me and like it,’ I said, and set off ahead of her down the corridor.

[4]

‘What a lot of time we’ve spent screaming at each other in the past,’ said Vivienne, powdering her nose in the back of my
new azure Cadillac. ‘Looking back I can see what a waste of energy it all was. I’ve got news for you, darling. When you get
old – truly old like me – you form quite different ideas about the kind of things that are important. The most important thing
for me now is to reestablish my relationship with my daughter and see as much of my grandson as possible. Wasn’t it just the
craziest piece of good luck that we produced Vicky? That honeymoon in Palm Beach at Lewis Carson’s gorgeous château – God,
I can hardly believe it happened, so much has happened since. Remember how you’d given up smoking and used to munch chips
in bed after we’d made love? It’s funny but I can hardly believe that you and I, now two strangers sitting side by side in
this heavenly car – darling, what divine upholstery! – were once two lovers wrapped up in the most torrid affair in town!
Doesn’t it seem just the teensiest bit fantastic?’