Some Came Running (142 page)

“Not at all,” Janie said. “Nonsense! I’ll be around here a hell of a lot longer than anybody thinks. I’m a tough old son of a bitch. A hell of a lot longer than anybody’ll
want
me around, I reckon.”

“Oh, Janie!” Edith said, near tears. “That’ll never be true as long as I’m here.”

And Janie had smiled at her sweetly. Not at all like that tough, old, gravelly smile she once had had. It was as if, in a way, she knew; and yet at the same time, did not know, did not
want
to know. And yet again, Edith thought, and was to think again so very many times, maybe she did know and was just trying to make it easier for her?

“What is it?! What’s wrong?!”
How many times had she cried those words at her: And all the time, if she had only known, she could easily have fixed it up! And when she had learned it, from her talk with Doc Cost, after both of them together figured it out, it had been too late. But whether Janie had been alluding to her own affair with Frank that time, and other times, she never did find out for sure. Yet Edith suspected that she knew.

Her own feelings about her affair with Frank had undergone a number of subtle changes in the year or so it had been going on. And some changes not so subtle, too. For one thing, she found she had a great deal more sympathy for Agnes than she had ever had before. Not that she ever completely lost the very real hatred of her that sometimes rived her like lightning riving a tree. But she could nevertheless certainly sympathize with her a lot more. And this was because she understood her, Agnes’s, husband better.

He was about as petty, and jealous, and totally self-centered a man as probably existed anywhere. The truth was, he had the mind of a child. Nothing really concerned him except himself and whether he could indulge one of his various pleasures, sexual or otherwise, and if he could he was totally happy; and if he couldn’t, he was totally miserable. She had watched him all through this troubled time with Jane, and had watched him get more and more irritable because she could not go out with him every time
he
wanted her to. He had no conception at all of what she herself was going through or what Janie was going through. Oh, he talked sympathetically—at times; when he wasn’t too irritated—and he probably did feel some little sort of rudimentary sympathy for them; but only when it did not impinge upon something that he wanted.

Apparently, he was congenitally incapable of ever
really
loving anybody, and at the same time had this psychological need of having as many women in love with him as he could cluster around him—a need which he was willing, at great sacrifice, to cut down to two: one wife, and one mistress; in order not to have trouble at home. Consequently, this placed herself, she felt, somewhat in the position of being his personal whore. And yet in spite of all of these things about Frank that she had come to see pretty clearly, she still loved him. She didn’t know exactly why. Probably a lot of it was that old thing she had thought out for herself once before during a love affair—and had, however, managed to forget—which was that any woman seemed, once she had given herself and her love to a man, almost totally unable to let go of him, unable to admit that she had been wrong. Women, apparently, were both willing and capable of going through an awful hell of a lot before they would ever admit a love affair could have failed. But more than just that, it was that that very same childish quality about him which made him so totally self-centered which also made him so completely vulnerable. And because he was so vulnerable, he was extremely pitiable. And perhaps pity for him and his childish ways, when he did not make her mad, was what made her still love him. She liked to hold his head and soothe him, which was a kind of superiority, she supposed, in a way. And she knew for sure that should she ever leave him—quit her job, and leave town—that he would be broken up and in a terrible panic over it. He did need her. Or rather, let’s say, he needed her as long as he did not have her.

It wasn’t a very pretty picture, and it was a far cry from the love life she had once imagined herself as having someday; but she did still love him. The poor self-inflated, self-confused dope. And he was really very lovable at times. The truth was, Edith didn’t feel like his mistress, she felt like his mother. Was that how Agnes also felt about him?

She had been aware for some time, Edith had, that Frank was back sleeping with Agnes again, and had been since some time in the summer or fall last year. And with a kind of penetratingly acute acumen which had been growing in her steadily in the last year or so, Edith understood that it was herself whom she—and Frank—and Agnes—had to thank for this development. There was your really classic irony: Almost two years ago, after his wife had broken him loose from Geneve Lowe, he had been petulant and peeved and hurt and panicky. His pride was too injured to allow him to go back and sleep with his wife after she had done that to him; and probably, Edith suspected, they had not been sleeping together for a year before that. But—and here was where she herself came in—as soon as he had started a love affair with her, with Edith, which his wife knew nothing about, he felt he had got one up on her, on Agnes, felt he had
restored his dignity as a man,
in other words; and because of that he had been willing to begin sleeping with his wife again. So, in actual fact, Frank and Agnes Hirsh owed their “second honeymoon,” their new closeness and warmth, to her: Edith Barclay.

Acidly, Edith laughed out loud, and was suddenly startled to realize that she sounded almost like Jane’s old, harsh, gravelly laugh. And then, immediately, being reminded of Jane, she wanted to weep.

But probably the thing that hurt her the worst, down deep where she could not even laugh about it, was when he had adopted Walter. She herself could have really
borne
him children.
Real
children. Only—she was prevented; by everything social, and private, and public, about their relationship. And so instead, he and Agnes had
adopted
a child. Janie, during her last months there, had talked about the little boy a lot. Jane had liked him, and because Jane liked him, Edith had found herself liking him. And because Jane
could
talk about him, Edith found herself urging Jane on to talk about him, as if in some way she had a need to prod and poke this sore spot deep inside her in order to make it hurt even worse, in the same way that it was almost impossible for you to stop biting down upon an aching tooth so that the greater pain might relieve the lesser. So, in the end, she wound up knowing almost as much about the little boy as Frank and Agnes themselves knew. In a way, he was almost her little boy. After all, it was she who was really responsible for him, wasn’t it? They would never have got back together and adopted him if it had not been for her, would they?

The boy himself Edith had seen a number of times at the store. And he was a cute little codger, so solemn and like a tiny little old man. But she did not want anything to do with him. And did not even want like to be around him. So she had been very distant with him. And as if he sensed that she did not want to be around him, after the first time he never talked to her again, except when required, and kept away from her. Which was exactly the way Edith wanted it. And she admired him for his depth of acumen.

He was a smart little devil, and in truth, Edith did not think she had ever seen so mature a youngster. He was the most polite, most unobtrusive little boy she had ever seen. He very obviously did not intend to let anything break up his new windfall, if he could help it, and for that Edith doubly admired him, although she did not want to associate with him.

But if she herself did not want to associate with him, Janie had had no such compunctions. On Fridays when she cleaned at Frank’s, she had played with little Walter, and he had helped her with her work. They got to be great pals.

Oh, Janie! Edith thought despairfully. Janie! If only she had known!

The night it happened did not seem to be a bit different from any other night. How was anyone to have any idea that this was the night she was going to die? Janie was her same fragile, worn, large-eyed self as she had been every other night the past few months. Edith had cooked the supper. She had been doing that for some time. Not only so that Janie would not
have
to do it, but also because Janie
could
not do it—could not do a good job of it. They had all three eaten sitting at the kitchen table. John, as was his dull wont, had immediately taken himself off to bed. Janie had gone to bed almost as immediately herself. Edith had sat up a little while in the little living room, reading a magazine, and then she had sewed on a skirt she was altering. And finally had gone to bed herself. How, in any possible way, could she have guessed that Janie would not be there in the morning? Edith had paused at her door before she went to her own room, and everything had been quiet.

Jane, in her room, had heard her pause, and she smiled to herself. She was a good kid, Edith was. Janie waited until she heard her go on, and then rolled herself over wearily in the bed, her face to the wall again. She wanted to go to the bathroom and wash her hands, but she knew she would have to wait until the kid was asleep before she could. Good kid, she thought, such a good kid.

Goddam that son-of-a-bitching Frank Hirsh, she thought fierily, for perhaps the ten millionth time in the past year and a half. Goddam that son-of-a-bitching Jew bastard. She knew he was a Jew. She just knew it. That ornery, slippery, dirty bastard. You might know he would pull some damned trick like that. Christ, he would have tried to make her herself, Jane, years ago if she hadn’t been so hefty he was scared she might hurt him if she ever did get in bed with him. Damn him, she thought half-affectionately, the fire subsiding in her for lack of fuel. Well, it was the kid’s problem. She’d have to solve it for herself. I’m too old to try to do anything about it; and John’s too dumb. And anyway, nobody oughtn’t to nose into affairs of the heart like that, especially when it’s somebody else’s heart.

She rolled back over on her back again and stared upward in the dark, worn out, and yet not sleepy. Damn it all.

If she only just knew where she could have got it. That was the damned thing. Back over a year ago, when she had first thought she got it—the time she had been so scared she had give it to Old Vic Herschmidt—it had gone away of itself and she had thought she was all right. She decided it just must have been a strain. Men got strains and had a running; could women get them, too?

But then, just when she was beginnin to feel all right and git her confidence back, beginnin to lose a little weight and feel better, then the son of a bitch had started up again. She was only sleepin with two guys at the time, and she knew it couldn’t have come from either one of them. So she had decided it had to just have been from that other time, and that she hadn’t really got cured up after all. And yet, she hadn’t give it to either one of them. Well—

At least, she hadn’t give it to nobody, she thought with relief again. That little boy Walter; she had to be so careful around him. It would be awful if she was to give it to a little kid like that, and she still scrubbed herself religiously.

It was probably that that was makin her lose all this damned weight. But she had never heard of the clap doin anything like that to nobody. She really ought to go down and see Doc Cost about it, Jane thought miserably. But she just couldn’t. She just couldn’t have nobody find out about it. People laughed at her enough as it was, by God. Just because she was big and hefty—used to be, anyway—and talked in a voice like a rock crusher, people thought she didn’t have no feelins. But she had feelins just like everybody, by God. And she just couldn’t have nobody find out. But most expecially the kid. Expecially, Edith. It would shame the kid to death. Hell, it would shame herself to death.

Old whore, she said once again to herself bitterly. That was what she was all right. And everybody knew it, and laughed about it. No wonder the kid use to get mad about it. So damned wore out all the damned time, she thought wearily, and moved her legs again. She really ought to git up and go wash, but Edith might not be asleep yet. And thinking this, she finally fell asleep.

She woke up suddenly, her heart beating in her ears and no idea of what time it was, to a terrible pain in her groin. She had never had no pain like that before. It almost made her grunt out loud. She lay feeling it, hard and bright there in her belly; and then, just when she thought she was going to have to yell, it went away to only a tiny dull ache. Janie relaxed, and took a deep breath. Now what the hell was that? She had never felt nothin like that before, by God. She relaxed herself down into the bed with relief and lay looking up into the dark. Wow! She hoped she didn’t have no more pains like that, by Christ! But in a few moments, as she lay still relaxing from it, she began to feel the pressure in her belly. She lay back and shut her eyes as it kept on growing stronger. Now, what the hell? She suddenly felt woozy, and then she began to feel cold, and then she found she couldn’t get her breath. And the uncomfortable pressure in her belly kept on growing stronger, and it was then that she realized she was dying.

She lay for a moment, finding it hard to believe. It was like something had bust loose inside her. Was she maybe bleedin to death inside? They would find her in the morning. And when they found her, they’d find her old belt on her. No, they mustn’t find that. Was she really
dying?

No, sir, by God! By God, I’ll show the sons of bitches! And powerfully, using the arms that even now, thin and weak as she was, still had the rock-hard muscles of a man, she surged up in the bed. I’ll show all the sons of bitches! and yet at the same time was still the same thought in her mind that she mustn’t make no noise that might wake Edith. Powerfully, with those strong man’s arms, but quietly, she grasped the top of the headboard and pulled herself up into a sitting position. Sons of bitches! Think you can kill Old Jane Staley? Then she fell over sideways on her face, and everything faded out.