The Butterfly Plague
Page 6
The eyes behind the bed’s veiling shifted back to immediate matters.
“Maureen?”
“Yes’m?”
“Pour a bottle of cologne into that blue bowl.”
“Yes’m.”
“Bois des Isles.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And Maureen…”
“Yes, madam?”
“If you spill any on yourself…”
“Yes, madam…”
“Change your costume at once.”
“Yes’m.”
“Maureen?”
“Yes’m.”
“You look lovely, my dear.”
“Thank you, madam.”
“Don’t forget to polish your shoes.”
“No, ma’am.”
“Now. Get me the Vogue and the Vanity Fair.”
“Yes’m.”
At last Maureen managed her escape and trundled off with her wagon down the hall.
Inside the bed there was a Virginal silence, and then a long, long sigh.
11:00 a.m.
“Mr. Maynard, madam.”
“Roscoe!”
“My dear.”
“Come and sit over here…”
“Thank you.”
“You look so elegant. Tell me your news.”
“I have spoken to Warner Niles.”
“And?”
“Intrigued, but at the moment, no response.”
“I see.”
“He was…”
“No explanation, Roscoe. Only news. Tell me who else.”
“Alistair Boyar.”
“And?”
“Intrigued…but no response…at the moment.”
“I see.”
“He was…”
“I tell you, Roscoe, no explanations. On.”
“Peter Trotsky.”
“And?”
“Intrigued—but no response.”
“Who else?”
“Ivan Dorfmann.”
“And?”
“Intrigued.”
“But no response?”
“He was…No.”
“I see.”
“Harold Houghton.”
“Yes?”
“Intrigued—but no response.”
Pause.
“Madam?”
“Yes, Maureen?”
“I’ve brought the coffee…”
“Take it away, Maureen.”
“But ma’am. You said…”
“Take it away. Mr. Maynard will not be staying.”
“Yes’m.”
“Well, Roscoe. Anyone else?”
“No.”
“I see.”
“I’d love a cup of coffee.”
“I’m sorry, Roscoe, but I’m really rather tired.”
“Very well.”
“Good-bye. And thank you, Roscoe.”
“Any time, my dear. I’m always at your service. I’m sorry things didn’t work out.”
“No explanations, Roscoe. That is all.”
“Very well. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye.”
Walking.
“And Roscoe…?”
Turning in the doorway. “Yes?”
“Don’t come back. You’re fired.”
The sound of footsteps lagging down the hall.
11:20 a.m.
“Mr. Carter Cooper to see you, madam.”
“Cooper Carter.”
“Sorry madam. Mr. Cooper Carter.”
“That will be all, Maureen.”
“Yes’m.”
“Well, Cooper. Sit by the window. Show me your profile. Yes. I always love that profile.”
“I can’t even see you, sitting way over here like this and you behind all those curtains. Does Letitia Virden hide from everyone?”
“Never mind, you haven’t come here to look at me. You’ve come to tell me your news. What about Bully?”
“Before Bully—I want to know what happened with your emissary. Had he any success?”
Letitia rattled her bracelets impatiently. “Of course not,” she said. “Did we really expect it?”
“No.”
“It doesn’t worry you, Cooper?”
“Not in the least. We don’t need them. Remember, you have me and everything I am and everything I own at your disposal.”
Letitia beamed. “Cooper, your faith in me is wonderful.”
Cooper Carter coughed.
“And now, about Bully. It is true—was it suicide?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” said Cooper.
“Unfortunately nothing. It’s a miracle of timing. I was thrilled.”
“You always had a cruel streak, my love.”
“No. I was always practical, Cooper. And I still am.”
“So.”
“Go on, then. Come to the cause.”
“No one is certain. There are only rumours.”
“And what are they?”
“They’re all predictable in my estimation. Some say it was debts, others say it was drink, some even say it had to be an accident. His daughter thinks he was murdered.”
“Nonsense. He danced right under my train.”
“That’s what they say. And she says it was murder.”
“She’s an hysteric.”
“Yes.”
“What else?”
“Well, they’re looking at the will today. Didn’t want to do that till after the funeral—and that, as you know, was yesterday.”
“Yes. I was there.”
“A little dangerous, don’t you think?”
“Not at all. I never got out of my car.”
“So—I’m afraid I have nothing extraordinary to tell you. Except that everyone was very sorry and most people think poor old Bully just got too deep in debt and couldn’t face the fact he was too old for a comeback.”
A silent, unseen reaction. Tension.
“Has my name been mentioned at all?”
“Not a word,” said Cooper Carter.
“Very well.”
“I’ll check out the will situation this afternoon.”
“By the way, you should know that George is coming.”
“Oh? Can you handle him?”
“Of course.”
“In spite of what he knows? Shouldn’t I buy him off?”
“No, my dear. Thank you, but no. There’s no need to waste your money, no matter how much there is. I can take care of George.”
They smiled.
“But I’m grateful, Cooper. You’re very loyal.”
“You pay me well, my dear.”
“As if I paid you with money! Or needed to!”
Cooper laughed.
“Don’t be so cynical,” said Letitia. “Come and say good-bye.”
A hand and forearm emerged, so entwined in silk that hardly any flesh was evident. Cooper Carter walked across the room. He lifted the hand; he kissed its fingers; the voice begged one last look at his richly masculine profile; he gave it…
And left.
12:00 noon
“Mr. Damarosch.”
“George.”
“Hullo.”
“You may go, Maureen. This time, definitely coffee and sherry.”
“Yes’m.”
Pause.
“Well, George. We meet again.”
“Where the hell are you? I can’t even see you. What in the name of God are you pulling now, Letitia?”
“Now…George.”
“Don’t you ‘now George’ me. I want to see you. Get the hell out of that bed.”
“No.”
“I’ll drag you out, Letitia.”
“No you won’t.”
“Yes I will.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Children.
“If you take one more step, George, I’ll shoot you.”
A gleam of metal made an announcement through the gauze. George retreated.
“Bitch.”
“No, George. No languag
e.”
“Language be damned, it’s what you are.” He sat down.
In the bed beyond the curtains there was a sigh and the sigh sent a tingle through George Damarosch, sitting there paunchy and spruced over with the odors of male toiletry. He blinked. His eyes watered. He stared with a slightly thyroid pop, leaning forward, feet together, fingers balanced on his knees, his lips working out the patterns of possible words, but silent.
Suddenly, the voice from the bed said, “How’s Naomi?”
“Letitia, you know we’re divorced. For years. Years. Why must you say her name?”
“She’s part of you. I can’t avoid her name anymore than you can avoid your own.”
“I never loved her.”
“That’s a lie. A hopeless, stupid lie.”
“I never loved her…”
“You adored her. Worshipped her. Built her a temple. That’s why you hate her so.”
“Never.”
“Always.”
“You. You. It was always you, Letitia.”
“Nonsense. When you married Naomi Nola I didn’t even exist. Tell me how she is.”
“I don’t know. I never ask.”
“Shall I tell you, then?” said Letitia.
“I’m not interested. I don’t want to know,” said George.
“She’s dying.”
Maureen came in with the tray. She set it down. Poured the coffee and sherry, passed these, passed the biscuits, and left.
“Dying?”
“Of cancer.”
Silence.
“Who told you this? How do you know everything? You’ve been away for years. Now, you suddenly come back and you know everything. Everything. How?”
“That doesn’t matter, George. I know. That’s all”
“It does matter. It matters. Who have you seen?”
“No one.”
“Who have you seen?”
“Your temper hasn’t changed one bit, has it?”
“Who!!”
“I swear to you—no one. I merely heard that she was dying of cancer. I just—heard it. That’s all. Really, George. You’re so possessive.”
“God damn you! You come back to me after sixteen years just to tell me my wife is dying.”
“I haven’t come back to you, George.”
“You’ve come back…”
“Yes. But not to you.”
“I love you, Titty.”
“Don’t call me Titty. You love everyone.”
“Love everyone. That’s nonsense.”
“Shall I read the list?”
“List? List? What list?”
“This list…” Rattlings of paper are heard. “Corrine, Eudora, Belle, Marie, Norma…”
“Oh, for God’s sake.”
“And Peggy. You love everyone.”
“Lonely old man…”
“What?”
“I say, I’m just a lonely old man.”
“Where are your children?”
“What damn children?”
“Ruth and Adolphus. ‘What damn children,’ indeed. Don’t you ever see them? Talk to them? Write to them?”
“Hah! What about your children?”
The bed froze.
“I don’t have any children. You know that.”
“Fairy tales!”
“How may a Virgin have children, George?”
Silence.
“How, George? Answer me, how?”
“I know your secret, Letitia. I know the lie. Don’t forget, I was there the day it began. In the garden…”
“There? Where? What garden?”
“At Falconridge.”
The gun went off. The ceiling shook. George climbed over the back of his chair.
“Sit down, George.”
George sat down.
A little smoke made its way through the bed curtains and curled up through some peonies toward the ornately plastered ceiling. George watched it die.
“I understand that Ruth has come back from Germany,” said Letitia.
“I—I—I…”
“Have you seen her?”
“I—I…”
“How is Dolly?”
“I…”
“George?”
“Oh.”
“It’s all right, Maureen. Go away.”
“Yes’m.”
“Help yourself to sherry, George.”
“My God. I…”
“Go on. Help yourself to sherry. Have you got a heart condition? I didn’t know that. What’s the matter? By God, George, if you die here, I’ll…”
“Oh. Oh. Oh, my God. You shot at me.”
“Come on. Pull yourself together. That’s right. Here.” A hand appeared through the curtain, holding out an emptied sherry glass—silk and rings and red-lacquered nails. “I’ll have some, too.”
“My dear, I…”
“Sit down, George. Sit down. Relax. Drink your sherry.”
The figure in the chair was ludicrous. Its crumpled blue suit with the ash on the lapels—its dusty black shoes—its frayed collar and its twice-turned cuffs—its badly tied cravat and its lustreless stick-pin were all the signs and symbols of a fallen Titan. But the man inside the clothes behaved as if there had been no fall; as if, like Cooper Carter, he still trailed clouds of lackeys to do his bidding and bank accounts to pay them with. He behaved as if a Rolls-Royce waited at the door and a dozen appointments were being ignored as he railed at Letitia. He behaved, in short, as if he was still the same George Damarosch who once had a right to enter this room unannounced—who could come here just because he wanted to: because he was George Damarosch. But now, as he began to speak again, it was the new George who spoke: the one in the crumpled suit and the dusty shoes.
“I have loved you since I first set eyes on those hands, Titty. How well—how easily I remember. That hand that lifted back your hair on a summer’s day. You were the Little Virgin then, in earnest. How we all loved you, Titty. Every one of us. The whole of America sat at your feet, those lovely little Virginal feet. That day at Falconridge, and you, dressed in blue—always in blue—dancing across the lawn with Bully. Damn! Damn Bully Moxon! Laughing. Laughing. Oh—such laughter. You were every dream I ever dreamed come true.”
“Yes. I remember. It was so.”
“Carving your name on the steps…”
“One down from Wally Reid, one up from Marie Dressier.”
“Not a fitting place, between those two, but how was I to know? Oh, Titty, how was I to know? Nobody knew how great and powerful you would become.”
“George?”
“Yes?”
“The Little Virgin needs your help.”
“Anything. Anything.”
“I need a million dollars.”
George dropped his sherry glass on the floor. It was empty.
“I haven’t got a million dollars,” he said. “I haven’t got any. You know that. I’m broke—forgotten.”
“Will you get it for me?”
“No.”
“Then, good-bye.”
“Good-bye? You’re mad.”
“Good-bye, George.”
“No!”
“Yes. Good-bye.”
George went to the center of the room. The window behind him, cruel, showed his roundness and the shortness of his stature.
“May I have—one—last look?”
“No, George. No more looking.”
“Oh, please. Just one…last look, Letitia.”
“No.”
“Your hand. Not even your hand? Your foot?”
“Good-bye.”
George went to the door. “Why do you want a million dollars, Titty?”
There was a pause. She would dissemble, just a little.
He didn’t know it, but she smiled.
“To save America, George,” she said. “That is my mission.”
To save America?
“I hope you get it, then.”
“I will.”
“Yes. I s
uppose you will, being you.”
“So?”
“Good-bye, Little Bitch.”
“Good-bye, George.”
He was gone. The door clicked.
From the bed, a sigh. Longer than before. Quite final.
The Little Virgin’s appointments were over.
The Chronicle of
the First Butterfly
August 8th to September 16th, 1938:
Western North America
The journey covered a distance of roughly fifteen hundred miles. It began on an island off the coast of British Columbia and ended just south of Santa Monica, California.
The traveler was a butterfly—a monarch (Danaüs plexippus), a male. It had spent the past few months on the edges of a pine forest near a quiet inlet on the southeast coast of its island. The prevailing winds blew from the northwest.
On the eighth day of August, a Monday, it was sufficiently cool (sixty-five degrees Fahrenheit) and there was enough of the scent of flowers lying to the south to prompt the butterfly to commence its journey.
Part of this journey would be over water, but the monarch would avoid this whenever possible.
For a week it moved steadily southward, roosting between twilight and dawn—more because of the cooling air than the darkness. Its roosting sites were near water if possible, and the trees it chose were maples and pines. Occasionally it found a willow tree, but these were rare.
It fed on its way from the abundant fields of nectar-filled flowers that were scattered in its path. Prize feasts were provided by late-blooming milkweed. It had first spread its wings earlier that summer on the leaf of a milkweed plant.
This butterfly was a lonely traveler. It journeyed without companions. Others would follow after (some had gone before it) and perhaps it sensed this. Every night, having selected its sleeping place, it would spread its wings out wide as a signal that it was there. Clutching a leaf with sickle-shaped claws, it would wait in this display until darkness fell and the dropping temperature prompted it to fold its wings again. But it remained alone.
From time to time the butterfly encountered cities and towers in its flight. Whenever this happened it rose to a great height above them, riding the gentle breezes and allowing itself to be taken by them on its way.
On five occasions there was rain. Once there was thunder and lightning and the wind rose to such a great force that it seemed the butterfly would be torn apart. During the rain squalls it clambered far away from the piercing drops into crevices on the faces of rocks. But when this wind rose and the rain was driven from the sky like so many pellets of lead, and when there seemed to be darkness everywhere and the temperature dropped and it could barely move across the ground because of the cold, it seemed that the butterfly must perish.