“If you hurry,” Vincent moans. “I may not be alive when you get here.”
“Sounds ominous,” I think for Aunt Martha’s benefit. “I do hope your recipe is safe.”
“Sure you do,” she projects in return, “safe, as in ‘safecracking’; for you were the one pleading with me to protect your precious jewel, remember?”
“I remember,” I admit, hearing George’s knock and suffering a pang of my own - Vincent crawling to the door like a beetle on its back struggling to get on its legs – a pang of remorse for ever having wished on him such an ‘accident’. “I should’ve remembered: Melody has that effect on men…she brings them to their knees, their hearts on silver platters.”
“Oh, I know,” A.M. sighs, throwing up her hands in mock despair. “But it’s not every man who emblazons his platter with a brilliant, three-carat diamond,“ her energized voice trailing off in contrived awe, “…not that Melody is blinded, of course…her vision still true after three tests in one evening.”
“Three?” I bluster, George my assumed number two, “and who, may I ask, is the third?”
“You, nephew,” A.M. causing my imaginary heart to squeeze like a fist, “two terrestrial suitors, and one celestial,” her abrupt silence announcing the entrance of George.
“That’s about as near to an angel as you’ve placed me,” I interpose.
“Surely you refer to Melody,” she cracks, “…that I placed you near Melody,” her cackle infectious, my own spirit catching her delight, “for never would I call you an angel, Melvin! Heaven forbid! Which, as a matter-of-fact, I think it does! But allow me to comfort you just the same. Melody is grieving; and this day, this evening, has been restorative, an antidote to anguish; Vincent’s obvious regard - and George’s, too - the tonic she needs; one any woman needs. A woman never forgets how to flirt, even if position precludes it. The opportunity to practice from time to time is all the satisfaction required. And it’s important to qualify what little pleasure Melody allows herself with these gentlemen.“
“Pleasure?” I break in judiciously. “Gentlemen? Really, Aunt Martha-”
“Yes, these two gentlemen connected to you,” she continues blithely, “said connection giving her license…allowing flirtation its charm, its innocence. It’s almost as if she’s flirting with…with you.”
“My dear aunt,” I reply, after a moment’s reflection, “I do believe you could convince a man of most anything. So, why not convince these gentlemen that Melody is untouchable; is nothing more or less than a beautiful lady in want of protection?”
“Because, she isn’t,” A.M. counters, turning away from the irksome scene of George administering capfuls of his pink panacea. “Not that she isn’t beautiful, mind you; but she doesn’t need their protection, Melvin. Recall, for example, her shrewd disruption of Thelma’s questionnaires, Melody’s clever idea of planting bugs raising the fear of discovery in the most callused heart. No, she doesn’t need protection, my dear. What she needs is you.”
“But I-“
“Not your old self,” A.M. reacting to my wince of guilt, “not the tainted man you became; but a babe-in-the-woods, an innocent child with a clean slate between his cherubic hands.”
“So, let me be certain I understand,” I respond, commiserating with Vincent as he groans on his bed. “I return as my wife’s firstborn, and these two ‘gentlemen’, as you erroneously call them, will be content to count on her as a friend. Or, to put it another way, be content to count on her for nothing else.”
“Should men ever be content,” she parries, a cat-like grin squinting her sly-blue eyes, “fancy will have folded her tents, desire pulled up her stakes, and the entire circus of gods among men gone off to some better realm.”
“Comforting,” I observe with a wry smile, “although a bit discriminatory, don’t you think? Your circus troupe smacks more of a cabal of coquettes than a company of clowns. But what of these two?” I ask, returning her attention to the quack O’Malley and his pink-lipped patient, “What role will these two clowns be playing once I’m back under your circus tent?”
“Formative ones,” she mutters vaguely, “or informative, as the case may be.”
“I thought reform is the purpose of my return…another chance to get it right. But no, you’re hinting these role models here will be pointing me in all the wrong directions.”
“Wrong?” she quibbles, “What’s wrong with Vincent; other than his forgivable infatuation with Melody?”
“Okay,” I rejoin, “but it’s dreadfully obvious why you omit George from your defense. His guilt is tacit-”
“Tasso?” A.M. squinting as though reading at a distance-
“Because the shaken soul, uncertain yet
Of its return, is still not firmly set.”
“What?” I’m half amazed, half disconcerted. “You forsake your Roman peers for an Italian poet some fifteen centuries later? Or am I misinterpreting your interpreting?” her epigrams, her seeming sapience at every turn, so unlike her last mortal stint that it’s only her cunning at avoiding my questions that belies her most recent identity.
“The First Crusade,” she says with an impish grin, “I was there, a little scamp chasing a knight in armor; those men in gray turning red a young girl’s cheeks. And when Tasso came out with his epic Jerusalem Delivered, I just had to meet him, his account reading like a travel guide of my former, vagabond life - though at the time of Tasso, I was a scamp once again: the mistress of an Italian bishop.”
“From whence hails your self-assumed proficiency in judging the male anatomy,” I retort, “your lover’s bishopric enlarging your reference, if not your pretense.”
“A pun’s a pun, I suppose,” A.M. sidestepping my long-awaited retaliation, “at least, it works in English – which is more than could be said for your-“
“Drop it!” I snap, “and I’ll spare you another mistake.You’re off on a lame foot, the language of love easily understood in any tongue – speaking of which, Vincent’s tongue is ghastly, the size of a fist.” My comment sparked by real alarm.
“Maybe he has allergies,” A.M. avoiding blame, “how was I to know? But now that George is here to care for him, we’d best be returning to Plainfield. Your friend will recover. I can see those things, you know…the so-called future-”
“Plain-Plainfield?” I stutter, our sudden change of course bewildering. “If Vincent is safe, then why not check on Melody before you assure me of her future, just in case some little something in your master plan goes awry; something inconsequential; something immaterial…something like those bubbles Vincent keeps coughing up.”
“If only for your peace of mind,” she allows, laughing at the sight of Vince licking a blister of pinkish bubbles from his swollen lips, “…and to leave poor Vincent in peace.”
“Peace?” I challenge. “I doubt it. And so much for the erroneous idea of ‘resting in peace’. Especially if every newcomer here has an aunt like you for a guide.”
“So what’s it going to be?” Aunt Martha dismissive. “Which one shall we unman: Melody’s bed, or Thelma’s march?”
“Crude, but to the point: Melody first, then Thelma,” I quip tersely.
“Leave it to a man to twist the simplicity of two choices into a smorgasbord of confusion,” she scoffs, “but if it’s both you want, then it’s both you’re going to have,” her nod towards the Charles setting us down on the Boston Common.
Besmirched by chimneys of the evening past, the gray and muted sky falls heavily about us, my astonishment to be on the Common checking my objection. As sullen as the sky appears, the Common is cheerful, the misty pond a perfect stage for our play of thoughts – until I think of where I’d rather be, my preference effecting instant change, the predawn sky flushing with fairy fire, the city’s marble facades receding, diminishing, catching the patina of some ancient cathedral town as the Common’s pristine beauty, all dew-drenched and still, harks back to an era when l
adies promenaded under hats, when boys walked in awe of their fathers – little girls in awe of the boys - the transcendental aura of the gas lighted scene resurrecting my stifled desires:
“W-what’s all this about?”
“You thought of Melody, didn’t you?” Aunt Martha asks matter-of-factly, “…remembered the tree…your tryst in the rain?”
“That I did,” I admit, “but is that what caused-“
“It is,” A.M. taking a seat under the old horse chestnut tree, sole witness of my proposal to Melody. “Your memory has become what we refer to as ‘golden’, as sweet as any fairy tale. And in a way, that’s what it is. For marriage can be euphoric; although, from my perspective, I think a woman often marries what she idealizes in a man. She plays the princess in the fairy tale; and later, is hard pressed to continue the pretense when reality has tarnished her dream.”
“Which is exactly what I don’t want to happen,” I remind her, “Thelma’s march is a risk we must prevent.”
“We?” she echoes, smirking in her own sense of precedence, “is this your way of showing gratitude for my assistance? this incessant reference to we?”
“But I am grateful, Aunt Martha,” I insist, “and I’ll be even more so if we – you - can preserve her propitious memory.”
“Still want to be her prince, do you?” the first rays of dawn dazzling the dew-dripped limbs like so many diamonds in our mystical, autumn bower. “Well, perhaps you can have your wish; though not in the way you imagine. For when Melody’s travail gives life to a son, she once again has the perfect man - only the dream never fades. And if the princess is older, she is also wiser, because this time the prince is real. Where passion may once have died in her arms, it is now very much alive; a commitment beyond any need to possess; both mother and son ever ready to die for the other should circumstance force the tragedy. She will always be his light in the window; and he, her Sir Galahad.”
Moved by her sudden sincerity, I ask, “How can you know these things with such certainty? You never married…never gave birth to a child; either, or both, it seems to me, a prerequisite for such bold authority.”
“You refer to my life as your aunt, I presume,” her tone plaintive, her drill sergeant eyes gone holy mother soft, “but you forget that I’ve had many lives. And time is a great storyteller.”
“I haven’t forgotten,” I said, “though I’ll admit I’ve been wondering why I have yet to recall any of my own; for surely I’ve had a similar past, haven’t I?”
“Similar, no. Varied, yes. But you can’t recall them because you don’t need to. You’re a good student, sweetheart…all your lessons have been well learned. All except one.”
“Fidelity?” I suggest, presuming guilt.
“Actually…no,” she answers slowly, surprising me. “Had you loved completely, the negative of infidelity would not have developed. Love is your continuing lesson, not its misapplication. Love, Melvin, when it’s truly consuming, cannot be misapplied. Do you know why?” A.M. becoming animated. “Because there’s nothing left to be wrongfully given; nothing left to be thrown away.”
“But I did love Melody that way,” I argue, “I loved her completely; and I never made a conscious choice to cheat on her.”
“No, but the weakness was there just the same – and by the way, you need to know that it was you being cheated, not Melody. You were the one suffering the guilt, not her.”
“But how could I be so weak?” I ask, suffering blame even as I pose the question.
“Commitment,” she explains, the role of castigator empowering, “you held back just enough of yourself for a doubt to thrive. And once taking root, it split your resolve like an ax. Simple as it sounds, the same heart that reacts to love tells us what love is. So when that heart is divided, it can also be deceitful, the one part engaging in an errant romance while the other denies its existence.”
“Held back some part of myself?” I muse. “I can’t imagine what that would have been.”
“Ambition can play such a sleight of hand. It can deafen the caring ear. Once a pedestal is shared, the thing worshipped is no longer unique.”
“But what ambition I enjoyed was wrought solely by her inspiration,” I counter, “not by rivalry.”
“Oh, I know…and how I know,” she laments, reaching to pluck a dripping diamond, “for I, too, have been the victim of accomplishment…or rather, the victim of the pride which so often diminishes accomplishment. Before you know it, pride is all you have left to show for your efforts; your regard is for the achiever instead of the achievement.”
“I…I think I follow,” I answer haltingly, “but there is no uncertainty in my current ambition. It’s nothing more or less than to be with Melody. And not only with her, but of her…for her…from her-“
“Then, you are ready,” she interrupts, caressing my cheeks like a doting grandmother, “your transformation is at hand.” And with that, we are hovering like pleasant dreams by Melody’s bed.
Asleep, she rests peacefully on her side, one arm about a Teddy long remembered - a prize I’d won at Vermont’s famous Tunbridge Fair - her golden hair in wisps about her cheeks, their pinch of color like a blush, a glow of innocence, a certain quality Mr. Rockwell knew how to paint – Norman’s productive years in Vermont something of which we could all be proud. But, as Aunt Martha has just defined it, pride is not what I’m feeling as I gaze worshipfully at my sleeping wife. Stealing over me, like the golden shafts of light breaking over the Atlantic horizon, is an awakening, a nascent ability to disremember my former role as Melody’s prince - a performance, I admit, deserving a fall from her pedestal. I am ready. Ready for the “clean slate” Aunt Martha mentioned; and the cherubic hands, as well.
“There is something mystical about a woman with child,” A.M. whispering as though Melody might hear, might awake to distract my ear, “…something divine.”
“Like the Madonna?”
“Not what I meant,” she corrects. “No. It’s as though woman conceives in the flesh, then forgets that lowly union to wing aloft, to breathe divinity, to create with the gods her gift of life beyond mere mortal means. And where that gift is born of love, that love aspires to deify the child; what mortal passion may have wrought, now sanctified, ordained, blessed by a chaste and sustaining ardor.”
“You make birth into a religious experience,” I say with warm agreement.
“And so it is, in as much as the cause is redeemed by the effect. For you see, Melvin,” she goes on earnestly, “I’ve suffered from the cause…from its wrongful worship; my battle with the passions, my attraction to the bed and its pleasures, the irritant in my judgment of you and your like mistakes.”
“You needn’t apologize,” I think with new humility, “not to me…not with my own failures so recently exposed. But surely you don’t mean to imply that ‘the bed’, as you put it, is to be avoided.”
“Of course not!” her eyes becoming limpid, tear-cleansed, “of course not! In fact, the bed of love is to be desired, to be sought after; and once found, to be held in reverence, to be regarded as sacred. Temple sacred; though I’m sure you’ll agree it would hardly be respectful to pile refuse before a temple door, which is what you were doing when-“
“Got it,” I break in, not wishing to hear my sins recounted. “But now that we’re on the subject - and I’m virtually in bed with Melody - I find it odd to feel no attraction…I mean, there’s an attraction…an overwhelming desire; but-“
“I know,” A.M. eager to explain the enigma. “What you are feeling is the very power of creation, the same love holding the planets in orbit, a love surpassing mere physical intimacy. It’s the pulse at the heart of it all, sweetheart; the love of all loves: your mother’s call…her waiting womb. That little infant is you, Melvin, curled safe in your sacred cradle, in the warmth of your mother’s love.”
“Oh! And how I love her in return!” I whisper.
We are columns left alone
Of a temple once complete -
(C P Cranch)
XX
If Aunt Martha’s victim feels any better from the sunlight freshening his room, George can’t discern the improvement, Vincent’s clothes like chainmail as he moans in the effort of dressing. But with each man discreetly disappointed by the other’s presence, the weekend’s awkward beginning finds redemption in Melody’s company: Vincent buoyed by her gift of smiles and George playing guide for a tour of the sights. This, to his advantage, too; for with Vincent confined to the backseat, George has Melody alone at his side.
“Where to, my man?” he calls over his shoulder to Vincent.
“Why don’t you make the choice, George?” Melody interjects, the flash of her pendant catching his eye. “If Vince isn’t up to a walking tour of Cambridge, we can still enjoy a drive about town. Or perhaps a drive out of town?” her wink putting to trial his peevish thoughts - for in her garden of delights, he and Vince are but two hired hands and he dare not be judged the lessor one.
“To Concord we go!” George rubbing his hands together with an air of satisfaction and enterprise. “It’s the least we can do for Vincent. Otherwise, he’d have only the memory of a shipwrecked night; a night we’ll help him forget by exploring Concord under the bright and steady sun.”
“Aaah, steady is just the word I need,” Vince sighs from the back seat, a wan smile accentuating his tubercular aura, “…but what about the little figure on your dash, George? Saint Christopher, is it? why are his hands clamped over his eyes?”
“Are you suggesting George drives as fast as he lives?” Melody’s laughing blue eyes disarming the question.
“Perhaps Saint Christopher doesn’t approve of the face in the rearview,” George postures, gunning into the Beacon Street traffic to an immediate blare of horns. “Then again…maybe it is my driving!” the swell of laughter dispelling any trace of enmity.
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