Houses of Stone

by Kathy

  "Miz Fowler was in bright and early this morning with a handful of artistically hand-lettered posters. She stuck one on the bulletin board and another on the front door."

  "That must have been what she was doing so late last night," Karen muttered. "Damn!"

  Tanya laughed. She was much more relaxed than she had been at the library. "Don't you court publicity?"

  "Not when I'm speaking on 'Lady Authors of the Nineteenth Century,' " Karen said wryly. "I'll never live it down."

  "You weren't the one who selected the subject, then."

  "Good God, no. I suppose Mrs. Fowler wanted to make sure I wouldn't shock the audience by quoting from Morrison, or Sylvia Plath, or some other 'unladylike' writer."

  "It would shock them, all right."

  "Don't tell me you're a member."

  "Good God, no," the other woman repeated, grinning. "I just might attend this meeting, though. Unless you'd rather I didn't."

  "I may be in need of one sympathetic listener. Promise you won't laugh or make faces."

  "It's a deal." Tanya got to her feet. "I've got to get back; my so-called assistant is manning the desk. She's a volunteer, about a hundred years old, and the kids drive her crazy. The manager here is pretty reliable; if you don't want to stick around she'll put your load in the dryer and have it ready when you get back."

  "Thanks for the suggestion. I'll do that."

  They parted at the door. Tanya stripped off her shirt as she crossed the parking lot; under it she wore a tailored white blouse and knotted tie. Back into uniform, Karen thought, studying the other woman's slim hips and long legs. The jeans fit like wallpaper. If I had a body like that I'd probably wear them too, she acknowledged to herself—despite all my feminist principles. And I'd cover it up in public, as Tanya had done, with a long shirt. The jeans wouldn't show if she stayed behind the desk.

  She visited the liquor store and the grocery store and then went back to pick up her laundry. The interior of her car felt like a steam bath, though it was only a little past noon. She rolled down the windows, wrinkling her nose as she caught a whiff of that sickening swamp odor. It must be her imagination. Only a few drops of the foul mud had splashed her clothes, and they now reeked of some commercial scented softener.

  She had to pass the library on her way home; seeing a bright-pink placard on the front door, she pulled into the curb and stared. Mrs. Fowler had outdone herself. Not only was the poster pink, it featured a sketch of a lady in full skirts simpering from under a frilly parasol.

  It did not improve her mood to find someone waiting for her when she arrived home. He was perched on the steps leading up to the apartment, legs stretched out, head thrown back as if enjoying the sunshine. Karen brought the car to a stop and began counting under her breath. She got to forty-seven before she felt calm enough to face him without yelling.

  Meyer rose and came toward her. "Can I give you a hand with those bags?"

  There was a running joke in the profession about Bill Meyer's three-piece suits and expensive Italian ties—and how he could afford them on a professor's salary. He was more casually dressed this morning; the striped shirt had to be from Brooks Brothers or some establishment of similar prestige, but it was open at the throat and the sleeves had been rolled up to display tanned forearms. A modest amount of dark hair showed at the open neck of the shirt. He flashed white teeth in a broad smile.

  "No, thanks," she said. "I can manage."

  "Sure you can." Before she could stop him he took the grocery bags from her. "But why should you? I'm perfectly harmless, you know. I just want to have a friendly chat."

  Lips compressed, Karen started up the stairs. He was a master at maneuvering people into untenable positions. Short of wrestling the groceries away from him—which would be not only undignified but probably fatal to the vegetables—she couldn't prevent him from following her at least as far as the door. When she put down the bundle of laundry in order to search for her key, Meyer scooped it up, one finger under the string.

  "Give me a break, Karen," he said quietly. "I know we've been on bad terms. It's my fault. I don't have much talent for social relationships, and for some strange reason I put my foot in my mouth every time I talk to you. I have a great deal of respect for you, you know. I think we could be friends, if I can stop acting like an arrogant jackass. Let me try."

  "Humility is a new approach for you," Karen said. "I suppose it works with some people."

  "What have you got to lose?"

  Karen glanced over her shoulder. The briefcase was in the trunk of the car. There was nothing in plain sight that had any bearing on her present work, except the cardboard carton of papers—and he had already seen those.

  "Come in," she said, stepping back.

  He went straight through to the kitchen, without looking at her worktable or the box of papers, and deposited the grocery bags on the table. "Go ahead and put the groceries away if you like. We can talk while you—" He clapped a hand over his mouth and then removed it to display a sheepish smile. "There I go again. That's the trouble with teaching, you get in the habit of ordering people around. Can I sit down?"

  "I suppose so," Karen said ungraciously.

  He watched without offering to help, while she unloaded the groceries. "I don't suppose you'd consider having lunch with me," he said gloomily.

  "No, thanks." Karen pulled out a chair and sat down. "This is all very pleasant and polite, Bill, but I haven't seen any signs of you changing your spots. I suppose you thought it was a huge joke to set me up for a lecture on lady writers."

  The corners of his mouth quivered. "Oh, come on, Karen, lighten up. You'd have thought it was funny if it had happened to me. It was the old lady's idea, honestly. You don't have a dialogue with that one; she makes statements and interprets whatever you say as agreement."

  Karen had to admit there was a grain of truth in that. Meyer went on, "I was trying to get in her good graces, sure. I assumed you were doing the same. Addressing her ghastly little group gives you an in. That's where you're going to get your evidence, Karen—from old fogies like Mrs. Fowler. She and her contemporaries live in the past, wallowing in memories of dead heroes and old glories."

  Joan had said something along the same lines, Karen thought. Oral tradition, family legends.

  "It's one source," she admitted. "But it's highly speculative. I've got better evidence, Bill."

  "The manuscript is the essential item, I agree. As for the genealogy, you know as well as I do that it's only the first step. I counted no fewer than fourteen women who are possible candidates. There's absolutely no way of knowing from the genealogy which of them was Ismene." He didn't give her time to reply, but went on, "Have you thought—hell, there I go again, of course you have—about the implication of the name? She must have read Antigone. That's astonishing in itself; a classical education wasn't available to many women at that time."

  "It weakened their brains."

  "And drove them insane," Meyer agreed in the same sardonic tone. "The house of stone—in the poems and in the novel—must have been inspired by Antigone's 'place of stone,' her 'vaulted bride-bed in eternal rock.' But why did she choose to call herself by the name of the weaker of the two sisters? Antigone was the heroine; defying a tyrant at the risk of her own life, she is more admirable than any of the men in the play, even her lover."

  It wasn't the first time Karen had considered the question of Ismene's nom de plume, but it was the first time she had had the opportunity to discuss it with someone who knew the literature as well as she did and whose interest was as keen as hers. "He died too," she pointed out. "He killed himself for Antigone's sake."

  "But in a fascinating reversal of conventional male-female roles. Usually it's the hero who nobly sacrifices his life for a principle, and the heroine who refuses to go on living after the sole light of her life is gone. As for Antigone's sister . . . Admittedly she does offer to join Antigone in death, but only after she has tried to persuade her sister to
accept the tyrant's refusal to give their dead brother honorable burial. And in the end, Ismene doesn't go through with it. She lives and Antigone dies."

  "Antigone talks her out of sacrificing herself. She doesn't want to share the glory."

  "That's one interpretation." Meyer raised his eyebrows. "But I didn't expect you to be so cynical about female heroes."

  "Why should they be any different from male heroes? Do you think it was love for her sister that moved Antigone, then?"

  "Why not? Ismene had offered the highest proof of her love; she was willing to die for a cause she obviously considered foolish. Their brother was already dead and rotting. What use is honorable burial to a corpse?"

  "That's a modern viewpoint. The Greeks didn't share it."

  "True," Meyer admitted. "Nor did some of our not-so-distant ancestors. I doubt the parallel between the drama and the novel extends beyond the similarity of names, however, so I wouldn't bother searching for a pair of sisters and a dead brother in the Cartright genealogy. I have, however, found Ismene's house of stone."

  The words were like a slap in the face of a swooning heroine. Karen had been leaning forward, elbows on the table, chin in her hands, forgetting her dislike of Meyer in the rare and unmatched pleasure of shop talk. There weren't many people who knew her field so well, and whose intelligence was as quick as Meyer's. Or as crafty. He had caught her completely off guard.

  "You sneaky son of a bitch," she exclaimed. "How much of the manuscript did you read?"

  "And then he said, with one of those nasty grins of his—I quote exactly—'I'm quite a fast reader. And I know how to skim the cream off a text.' "

  She was speaking to Peggy, who had called to report her arrival shortly after Meyer left. She was earlier than Karen had expected, but Karen hadn't commented on that or on Peggy's drawn, tired face. The perfidy of William Meyer still rankled. As she drove to the motel to pick up her friend she carried on a profane monologue with herself, but it was an even greater catharsis to express her rage to a sympathetic listener.

  "Have a drink," Peggy suggested. She already had one; her first question, after they reached the apartment, had been, "Where's the booze?"

  "Maybe I will." Removing the cork from the bottle of wine relieved a little of her spleen. While she worked at it Peggy said mildly, "So what's the beef? He didn't have to tell you. Did he describe the location of the place he had found?"

  "Well . . . yes. I'd have found it anyway. I had already located the clearing in the woods."

  "But not the house."

  Karen shifted uncomfortably. She didn't like to remember the attack of panic she had felt in that clearing, and she had no intention of admitting it to anyone—not even Peggy. "I only found the reference to it last night," she said evasively. "Up till that point I had no reason to suppose Ismene's house of stone was anything other than figurative."

  "I wasn't criticizing you. You've accomplished a hell of a lot in only a few days." She watched Karen pace back and forth and then added, in a sharper voice, "For God's sake, sit down and relax! I don't know why you let Meyer get to you. What else did he say?"

  "Not much. He didn't have a chance to say much—I more or less kicked him out." Karen slumped into a chair and sipped her wine. "Calling him a son of a bitch didn't exactly improve matters."

  "What . . . did ... he ... say?" Peggy repeated.

  "He didn't return the compliment." The wine, or Peggy's presence, or both, had had a soothing effect. Karen smiled faintly. "In fact, he laughed. He said he'd given me the information as a token of his good intentions, and that he'd continue to pass on anything of interest, without expecting me to reciprocate. Not that I believe it."

  "It could be he's on the up-and-up," Peggy mused. "Cherishing a secret passion for you, unable to express it because you are a professional rival as well as a beautiful, desirable woman ..."

  "Very funny." But the idea had its appeal. It would certainly be a triumph to have Bill Meyer, the Don Juan of the Modern Language Association, kneeling at her feet. Karen savored the image: Meyer submissive and stammering, like some bucolic swain, with her foot planted firmly on his bowed neck.

  The picture was as absurd as it was unlikely. "Maybe I did overreact," she admitted. "I doubt my rudeness fazed Bill, though. He'll be back. Want another drink before I start my report?"

  "Yes." Peggy rose and followed her into the kitchen. "I wouldn't say no to a cracker and a crumb of cheese, either, if you have them. I haven't had anything to eat since this morning; stopped off at the house to change clothes and pick up the car, and then drove straight through."

  "No wonder you look so tired." Karen went to the refrigerator. "I'm sorry; I should have asked. How is your friend?"

  "Dead," Peggy said. "The funeral was yesterday."

  Chapter Eight

  We paused before a House that seemed A Swelling of the Ground— The Roof was scarcely visible— The Cornice—in the Ground—

  Emily Dickinson, 1863

  The package of cheese slipped from Karen's hand. She bent over to retrieve it. "I'm so sorry," she mumbled, painfully aware of how inadequate the words must sound. "What ... I mean, was he ... What I really mean is, do you want to talk about it?"

  "Not at length." Peggy had already helped herself to the Scotch. "But I don't mind answering the questions you were courteous enough not to ask. 'What' was AIDS. He's been sick a long time, and it was not a merciful death. He was a close friend, I guess you'd say. I was married to him."

  Karen's hand slipped again. The cheese fell onto a plate this time. "I didn't know you were married," she gasped, forgetting tact in astonishment.

  " 'Was,' I said. We split up fifteen years ago, after he found the courage to admit he preferred his own sex. I had," Peggy said without expression, "suspected that earlier."

  "But you went to be with him when ..."

  "When he asked for me. Sure I did. I got over my anger and hurt a long time ago. He didn't want to hurt me. He was a nice guy; we could have been friends if he'd been able to face the truth. It wasn't as easy to do that twenty years ago."

  "It still isn't easy, I guess." Still reeling mentally from the barrage of revelations, Karen offered a plate of cheese and crackers like a burnt offering. "Are you all right?" she asked.

  Peggy grinned. She still looked tired—small wonder, Karen thought remorsefully—but it was her old smile. "I'm not infected, if that's what you mean. He called me as soon as he found out, even though he was sure it hadn't happened until after we separated."

  "That was a decent thing to do."

  "He was a nice guy," Peggy said again. "As for my mental state—well, it hasn't been a pleasant week, but I'll survive. When you're my age, you become more accustomed to losing friends." She stuffed a cracker into her mouth and added indistinctly, "The intellectual challenge you are about to offer will distract and divert me. Tell me all."

  The distraction proved effective; it was Karen who called a halt to the discussion, though the hour was still early and they hadn't covered all the possible ramifications.

  "You must be exhausted, Peggy. I'll take you back to the motel. Unless you want to stay here tonight."

  Peggy admitted she was ready for bed, but she refused the invitation with all her old acrimony. "I'll bet the mattress is almost as thin as the towels. The old lady didn't exactly knock herself out furnishing this place, did she?"

  "It's adequate. Are you sure you don't want company? I'll stay with you if you like."

  "The only company I want is this genealogy." Peggy tucked it and the notes she had made into her bag. "Don't get sentimental and mushy, Karen, I don't need a shoulder to cry on. You needn't pick me up tomorrow. I know how to find the place now. Suppose I get here about nine? I'll bring doughnuts or something equally unhealthy. We'll finish planning our campaign, and then drive out to have a look at the house. Do you suppose your friend Cameron will be working there tomorrow?"

  "Probably." Karen located her keys and opened the doo
r. "Watch the steps, they're steep. Why do you want to see the house? I told you—"

  "I am not questioning your data," Peggy said, determinedly patient. "I just want to see the damned place, okay?"

  "Okay, okay." Karen unlocked the trunk and put the briefcase inside.

  "Cautious little creature, aren't you?" Peggy said. "Do you haul that manuscript with you everywhere you go?"

  "Yes, I do. There's no safe hiding place in the apartment. It wouldn't take much strength to force the door."

  "That was not a criticism, just a simple question." Peggy settled herself with a grunt and reached for the seat belt. "I have to admit I keep losing sight of how valuable the damned thing is. Not in monetary terms but—"

  "I wouldn't lose sight of the monetary terms," Karen said grimly. "How much do you suppose Bill would pay for a copy?"

  "Please don't say things like that," Peggy pleaded. "The idea opens up too many horrible possibilities. Bill's not the only one who would pay for a copy, you know. You shouldn't have called him a son of a bitch."

  "He is a son of a bitch."

  "Who knows?" Peggy murmured. "Life is full of surprises. That is what makes it so interesting."

  Cameron was descending a long ladder when they caught sight of him. Karen deduced he had been painting the shutters or woodwork of an upper window, and had left off when he heard the car.

  "Who's that?" Peggy demanded, staring. "Not the prim and proper business gent we had dinner with? Wow! Who'd have thought he had such a good-looking pair of—"

  "Shhh! He'll hear you."

  "He can't possibly hear me. Anyhow, what's wrong with expressing admiration of a shapely body? Men do it all the time. The rest of him isn't bad, either. Except for his expression. I don't think he's happy to see us."

  "Peggy, if you don't shut up ..." Karen hastily got out of the car and hailed their obviously unenthusiastic host. "Good morning. I'm sorry if we disturbed you. You remember Dr. Finneyfrock?"