The Mountain Cage (37 page)

Miriam shook her head. “That’s the worst thing about getting older, losing hope. I used to think it was other things, getting creaky and arthritic and gray and just not having your physical and mental shit together the way you did when you were younger, but it isn’t. It’s knowing that nothing’s ever going to get any better, that you’re just going to drag yourself through life until you finally cash in your chips, that all the things you hoped might happen aren’t ever going to happen and that your whole life was probably for nothing. Hell, I’m almost fifty years old, and what have I got to show for it? No wonder Jason and Joelle are so confused. Why should they look forward to anything when they see their parents going down the tubes?”

“Are you going down the tubes?” Vera asked.

“Alan won’t talk about his business. He used to discuss it all the time with me. All we do now is worry about money and wonder month to month how we’re going to get by—we’re in so much debt now that everything could cave in on us tomorrow. I keep waiting for him to say he wants a divorce, even though we can’t really afford one. We’re not good for each other any more. We’d probably both be better off alone.”

Vera had opened something inside her. Miriam could not stop talking. She spoke of the constant financial pressures of the business and their children, pressures so overwhelming that she and Alan rarely talked of much else. She spoke of how they tore at each other, of how their friends were starting, very surreptitiously, to avoid seeing them quite as often, of the times she and Alan had gone out and their bitterness had pushed them into angry arguments and public scenes, of how horrified she was at some of the things she said to him even when she could not stop saying them.

“Oh, Miri,” Vera said. “Don’t you understand? That’s why I’m here, to help you.”

Miriam swallowed, struggling to control herself. She must have been unloading on her old friend for a good half-hour at least. She peered at her watch; it had been only a little after eight when she left the hotel. Now it was barely eight-ten. The Grand Canal was still empty of boat traffic, the nearest arched bridge abandoned by the tourist hordes. A gondola was tied up across the way, the gondolier resting against his long pole, so still he did not seem to be breathing. She could almost believe that she and her friend were alone in the sinking city.

Perhaps she was having a nervous breakdown. She had felt on the verge of one for quite a while. She turned toward the booths selling souvenirs, but saw no vendors there. She was imagining it, that everyone in Venice had vanished in the way she wished that her troubles would.

Vera was sitting with her left ankle resting on her right knee, the way she had when they used to sit around in the Student Union. Strange, Miriam thought, that Vera should look so much as she would have expected her to look, older but basically unchanged. Vera would not have cut her hair as Miriam had and colored it to hide the gray, or put on a blazer and a pair of tailored slacks with an elastic waistband because she was too old and carried a few too many pounds to wear jeans.

“Miri,” Vera said, “you loved your husband once, didn’t you?”

“More than anything. We weren’t just lovers, we were pals, best friends. He’d get so annoyed when he had to work late. I’d put the kids to bed and have supper with him, even if it was ten-thirty at night, just so we’d have that time together.”

“Miri, he needs you. You need him, too. Don’t let a bunch of bullshit get in your way.”

“That’s exactly the way you used to put it whenever I got depressed.” She had been going on and on about herself, never even asking Vera about her life. All she knew was that her old friend had married a man with the last name of Langella. She suddenly remembered the pale-haired woman she had glimpsed the night before, from the gondola.

“That was you,” Miriam said, “last night, in one of the houses along that side canal. Everything stopped, and I thought I was going to get a migraine, and then I saw you.”

Vera was on her feet. She seemed translucent, as though she were an image about to flicker out. “I have to go.”

“I’m imagining you. I really am going crazy.” Miriam could see the row of flowers behind Vera through her friend’s hazy form. “I dreamed you up, and now you’re fading away.”

“Go to your husband. I’ll see you later, I promise.”

Before Miriam could speak, voices around her rose in a roar. Crowds were thronging past the nearby kiosks. Miriam gripped the edge of the table, suddenly disoriented as she looked around her. There was a crowd on the nearest arched bridge, and people were milling around in front of the train station and waiting near the docks for the
vaporetto
. The pathways on either side of the canal had rapidly filled with strollers.

When Miriam turned back, the chair across from her was empty; Vera was gone. She squinted, but could not see Vera’s red T-shirt anywhere among the crowds.

Alan said nothing about his call to Bernie as they left the hotel. She could not tell him about Vera, about the long-lost friend who had appeared out of nowhere and disappeared just as mysteriously, who could apparently block out sound and make everyone in Venice disappear from view. He would tell her that she was going nuts and then accuse her of trying to drive him crazy. It was almost a relief to think that she might be cracking up. Having a breakdown might be the only escape from her problems that she could manage.

Miriam studied the map of
vaporetto
routes and discovered that both lines 1 and 2 would take them along the Grand Canal to the docks near Saint Mark’s Square. “Line 1 is the local,” she explained.

“Let’s take it anyway,” Alan said. “No need to rush.”

They bought their tickets and boarded the passenger boat at the docks by the train station, managing to slip through the knots of passengers and get seats in the prow. Alan seemed content to enjoy the view as the
vaporetto
made its slow progress along the Canal, crossing from side to side and backing water as it made its stops. By the time they reached the Rialto, Alan was smiling as he watched people bargaining over the prices of flowers, fruits, and fish in the open-air markets near the high arched bridge. Maybe, Miriam thought, Bernie had given him some good news for a change.

He was still smiling as they walked from the landing toward the Piazza San Marco, taking her arm as they entered the huge open square. Mobs of tourists were already swarming through the square as hundreds of pigeons swooped above them; Miriam ducked as one bird barely missed flying into her. Alan consulted his map to get them through the narrow streets and over a small bridge to the glass showroom. She had been prepared to resist the salespeople there, but Alan ended up buying earrings for Joelle, a necklace of glass beads for her, and arranging for the shipment of a ridiculously expensive hand-blown glass sculpture of two long-necked birds that Miriam had admired.

“You certainly turned into a spendthrift,” she whispered as they made their way past a group of Japanese tourists just entering the showroom. “Exactly where are we going to put that sculpture anyway?”

“We’ll find a spot. Call it an investment. If things get tough, I can probably sell it for more than I paid.”

His good mood held throughout the tour inside the Basilica San Marco and during their lunch, which they ate at an outdoor table at an overpriced restaurant in Saint Mark’s Square. They exchanged vacuous but pleasant commonplaces about the beauty of the Basilica San Marco and reminisced about all the art they had seen in Florence and the Vatican Museums. Alan lit her cigarette with a flourish after the meal and then lighted one for himself.

He abruptly fell silent, then slumped over the table with a sigh. When he sat up again, his face was sallow under his tan. “Are you all right?” Miriam asked.

“Just some indigestion,” he muttered, crushing out his cigarette. “Miri, what would you say if I gave up the business, had Darrell buy me out?”

“What?”

“That’s one option. I could subcontract with him, so I wouldn’t actually be quitting. He probably couldn’t do it, though—he’s about as short of money as we are.” He pulled his pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket, then put them back without lighting one. “I could try selling to someone else, but there probably wouldn’t be any takers, or else I’d have to take too big a loss. I might be able to get another loan, but a lot of that’d have to go toward what’s coming due now. Or there’s always Chapter 11. All I know is I can’t go on the way I’ve been going.”

He was giving up. That was what he was telling her now. He was saying that he was no longer willing to hang on until times got better because he no longer believed that they would get better. They would be cutting back and living from month to month and trying to fend off disaster until they had nothing left.

He said, “I haven’t decided anything yet. We’re still discussing the options.”

“Why the hell did you buy that glass sculpture, then?” she said before she could stop herself. “Why the hell did you pile up even more debt for this trip?”

“Because, at this point, a few thousand lousy bucks isn’t going to put us much deeper into the hole.” His expression softened. “It’s not just that, Miri. I wanted to give you something now, while I still could.” Alan got up slowly. “Finish your coffee. I have to go change some more money.”

“Don’t change too much money,” she said. “You might just be tempted to spend even more if you do.”

He walked away. The only reason he had been pleasant up to now was so that he could spring his news on her, his talk about his options, his admission that he had failed. Miriam stirred her coffee, feeling rage and remorse.

From the Bridge of Sighs in the Doge’s Palace, Miriam peered through the grille at the harbor. On the isle across that lagoon, she could see a church of red brick and marble, a false promise of sanctuary. The Bridge of Sighs, she had read in her guide, had been named for the prisoners who sighed as they were led across it to the Doge’s prisons, knowing that this would be their last glimpse of the lagoon. It would probably be close to her last glimpse of the harbor as well, since they would have only two more days in Venice.

The enclosed bridge led them to a dark and bare stone room. A group of Japanese tourists were there, taking photos of one another. She followed Alan back across the bridge. “What an ostentatious display of wealth,” she said as they made their way through an ornate hallway to an exit. “And those paintings! They’re gorgeous, but my God. ‘Doge So-and-So Worships the Virgin Mary.’ ‘Doge So-and-So Accepts the Tribute of Venice’s Subject Cities.’ ‘Doge So-and-So and His Son Adoring the Holy Eucharist’ and looking mighty damned full of themselves as they do. All they needed was ‘Doge So-and-So Kicks Some Serious Butt’ and ‘Venice Accepts the Tribute of the Universe.’“

Alan usually chuckled at her witticisms, even when they were not particularly funny. As long as they were cracking jokes or making ironic remarks, they would not be fighting. Alan was not smiling; he did not even seem to be listening.

“What time is it?” he asked as they went outside.

Miriam glanced at her watch. “Almost four.”

“I’m not feeling too well, Miri. Maybe I’ll head back to the hotel.”

“Oh.” She repressed the comments rising to her lips about how it had been his idea for them to take this trip and now he wasn’t even making the most of it and that he could have taken a nap at home for free. “What are your symptoms?”

“I think lunch really disagreed with me.” He stepped closer to her. “Isn’t anything important. I just need to rest. Wander around some more if you want—you can come back when it’s time to get dressed for dinner. Reservation’s not until nine.” His brown eyes looked watery and bloodshot. His voice sounded as though he was pleading with her.

“Go ahead,” she said. “I’ll meet you later.”

He made his way through the crowds on the walkway, passed a row of gondolas, and moved toward the
vaporetto
dock and ticket booths. Miriam wandered back toward Saint Mark’s, wondering what to do now. She could walk along the Grand Canal to the Rialto and do some window-shopping there. She could have ridden as far as the Rialto with Alan, but was afraid they would have been lashing at each other again before they got that far. “Miri.”

Miriam lifted her head. Vera was coming toward her, still in her T-shirt and jeans. “I told you I’d see you again.” Vera reached out to take her hands.

“Vera.” Miriam clasped her friend’s hands tightly. This woman could not be an apparition; she was here, as solid as Miriam herself. “We’ve been sightseeing.” She was determined this time not to let Vera see her distress. “We did Saint Mark’s Basilica and the Doge’s Palace.” She would have to make excuses for her husband’s absence. “Alan went back to our room. He has indigestion from lunch. I hope you get to meet him eventually.” Her voice had risen slightly.

“Then you have some time,” Vera said.

“Oh, I have a lot of time. If Alan isn’t feeling well enough to have dinner, I guess I’ll have even more time.”

Vera slipped her arm through Miriam’s. “Why don’t you come with me?”

“Come with you where?”

“You’ll see.”

They walked toward the landing. For a place that had been swarming with people only a few moments ago, the walkway along the harbor was surprisingly empty. Out in the harbor, two large cabin cruisers were embedded in the water, brought to a stop by the waves that had seemingly stiffened around their hulls. It was happening to her again, the disorienting and yet welcome sensation that time had stopped and that she and Vera were somehow apart from the rest of the world.