The Last Good Kiss (48 page)

"My god, don't say it again," he cried, then buried

his head under the water. As he bobbed back up, he

faked a great sneeze and splashed water all over me.

His laughter rattled around the large tiled room, filling

it with the sound of breaking glass. Then he drenched

me again, shouting, "Never again! Don't ever say that

again! "

I reached out with a damp boot and shoved his head

back under the water. He grabbed my ankle with his

huge hand and jerked me off the side of the pool. We

both came up laughing like kids.

Later that same evening, as I was watching television

and letting my clothes dry, I heard a knock on the large

picture window of the daylight basement. When I

glanced up, Catherine was standing there, grinning at

me. My pants were nearly dry, so I slipped into them

before I went to open the door.

"Aren't you the bashful one?" she said, still grinning.

"My mother was an Avon Lady," I said, "and she

taught me never to answer the door unless I was

dressed."

"That makes perfect sense," she answered, then she

sighed and her grin didn't come back. "Listen, I'm

coming down with cabin fever. When I finished typing

this evening, I decided that I needed to get out of the

house. Why don't we call a truce, and you can take me

to town and buy me a drink. "

"Good idea," I said.

When the Sportsman Bar closed at two, I bought half

a dozen drinks in go-cups and carried them out to

Catherine's Porsche. As I balanced them and climbed

into the passenger seat, she reached over to touch my

cheek.

"Let's take a midnight dip," she suggested.

"Good idea."

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She eased the sports car through the darkened town

and parked it behind the hotel, then got out and

unlocked the back door of the pool house. Inside, I

lined the paper cups up along the edge of the pool as

Catherine rustled out of her clothes. Then she came

over to help me with mine.

"Shall we swim before or afterward?" she whispered

when I was as naked as she was.

"During," I said as I grabbed her and we tumbled

into the warm, slick embrace of the water.

Sometime later, we sat on the edge of the pool with

our feet dangling into the water. Wisps of steam

hovered across the rumpled surface of the water, and

like a distant echo of thunder, the spring rumbled

gently at the far end of the room. The last quarter of

the moon ticked slowly past a skylight window.

"It's so odd here at night," Catherine whispered.

"It's like the entrance to some underground world

where it's always warm and silent. That's why I

whisper. When it's closed up like this, they couldn't

hear you over in the hotel even if you screamed. "

"Don't scream," I whispered as I held my hand over

her mouth. She giggled against my fingers. When I

moved my hand, she screamed, a quick high note that

shattered the silence and echoed around the walls.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly, then giggled against

her hand.

"You're drunk, lady," I said as I fumbled for another

drink. The ice had melted, but I gunned it anyway.

"Isn't it wonderful," she sighed, leaning against me.

"I'll tell you a secret," she said.

"Then it won't be a secret. "

"You won't tell anybody," she said.

"I'm too drunk to remember. "

"In the wintertime, when I come down a t night, I

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climb out of the pool and dash outside and roll in the

snow, then dash back into the pool. "

"Everybody in town knows that," I said .

"Oh you," she hissed, then slapped me gently on the

chest. "You should try it sometime. It's like being

reborn. "

"Rolling around naked in the snow is not my idea of

a religious experience," I said.

"Sissy. "

"That's what they called the brass monkey after he

rolled around in the snow," I said.

"What brass monkey?"

"The one that froze his balls off."

"You're terrible," she said. "Except when you're

being wonderful. "

"That's what I always say."

"I'll tell you another secret, you terrible man. "

" I already forgot the other one," I said.

"You're the first man I've ever come here with," she

said, watching her feet as they stirred the water. "The

very first."

"I'm touched."

"Don't be cynical," she said. "This place is very

special to me. " She sat up straight again. In the

darkness, the strips of untanned skin glistened, and as

she turned to face me, her white breasts were as

luminous as small moons. She must have seen me

looking because she covered them with her darkly

tanned hands. "The plastic surgeon who does my work

says it's nip and tuck from now on," she said lightly.

"He also reminds me how lucky I am that I didn't have

children. Trahearne wouldn't have them, you know."

When I didn't respond, she added, "Considering how

things worked out, perhaps he was right. "

"Trahearne's all the children anybody needs," I said.

"Trahearne is a great artist," she said quickly, "and

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if I've made sacrifices, they were offered to that

greatness."

"Okay," I said, sounding, I thought, properly chastised.

"You don't sound convinced," she said.

"Look, I'm fond of the old fart," I said, "but I'll let

the folks in charge of greatness and all that crap decide

that for me."

"C.W. , sometimes you exhibit an unbecoming smallness of mind," she said.

"Provincial, huh?"

"A goddamned redneck," she said, then laughed.

"You damned phony," she added, "I know all about

you. Traheame has told me everything." I didn't have

anything to say about that, either. If Trahearne wanted

to talk to his ex-wife, she was his ex-wife. "I don't tell

him everything," she said, "if that's worrying you."

"I never worry."

"I worry about Trahearne," she said seriously.

"Maybe it's time you quit," I suggested.

"No, he needs me more now than ever," she said.

"You can understand that."

"Sure."

"You're not jealous, are you?"

"I don't think so," I said. "My needs are small, and if

you want to baby Traheame, that's between the two of

you."

"Not exactly," she said softly.

"What?"

"Melinda," she whispered.

"Right.,

"You know, I think I would hate her even if she

didn't have my husband," Catherine said calmly.

"Jealous?" I asked.

"Only of her backhand."

"What?"

"Oh, when she first moved up here, back when I was

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still trying to be gracious about all this, I asked her to

play tennis one afternoon," Catherine said.

"What happened?"

"She humiliated me, on the court and in the dressing

room later when we came in for a swim," Catherine

said. "I understand that you've seen that body she

keeps hidden under all those baggy awful clothes, and

you can imagine how it made me feel when I saw it. "

Then she paused. "Not that she showed it to me. She

did her best to hide it-1 have to admit that-but I

peeked into the shower. That was the hardest moment

of many hard moments."

"You're a lovely woman too," I said.

"It's kind of you to think so," she said. "I suppose

she's better in bed than I am, too. "

" I wouldn't know," I said.

"Really," she said, sounding genuinely surprised. "I

thought she was fairly free with her favors. "

"You're not the only one who thinks that," I said.

"You're a little bit in love with her, aren't you?"

"Maybe. "

'.'Trahearne thinks you are," she said.

"Maybe I am, maybe not," I admitted. "I don't

know anymore. "

"Damn it. "

"What?"

"Are you sober enough for me to ask you something

very important?"

"Sure . "

"Do you think she would leave him? Under the

circumstances?''

"I don't know about that," I said. "She loves him but

she thinks that he doesn't love her anymore. She might

leave, but I wouldn't know what the right circumstances might be."

"Think about this for a moment," she said. "In my

purse I have three cashier's checks. One for forty

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thousand made out to the bearer. Another for twenty

thousand made out to a Miss Betty Sue Flowers. And a

third in your name for ten thousand."

"No," I said. I stood up and walked toward my

clothes.

"Listen to me," she said as she followed, "hear me

out. Trahearne is working now, he isn't drinking and he

has a chance to live and work for the rest of his life. If

she comes back to live here, he will die within the year.

You must know that."

"No," I said, "I don't want any part of this. "

"When she flies back from San Francisco, Traheame

will ask you to pick her up at the airport in Meriwether," Catherine said as she rummaged in her purse,

"and all you have to do is convince her to get back on

that airplane-or another airplane-and fly out of our

lives."

"No."

"Please," she said as she handed me a long white

envelope.

"Trahearne would just send me after her again," I

said as I hefted the slim bit of paper. Seventy thousand

dollars seemed as light as a feather, yet so heavy that

my hand could barely hold it up. I tapped it against my

cast, which was crumbling after being dunked twice

that day. "He'd just send me after her again. "