Looking Back

by Belva Plain

  Facing the opposite wall, she closed her eyes, letting the vivid image of the page stand unhindered and alone.

  “Time’s up,” said Lester, seizing the book. He, too, looked amused.

  “Here goes. It starts in the middle of a sentence: c… nobody who holds office should accept a gift from any king or foreign state without the consent of Congress. No state can make treaties, coin money, or grant titles of nobility. No state without consent of Congress can charge import duties. No state may make a compact with another state or engage in war, keep troops or warships in time of peace.’ Then in the middle of the page, it says Article Two, Two, in Roman numerals, I mean. Then it tells how the President is elected—this is no good. We both know this, anyway.”

  “I certainly didn’t know everything on the first half of the page. But I’ll get another book. Here’s a Hemingway story. Try this.”

  Again she read until “Time’s up.” Then she spoke.

  “Somebody sees an old man sitting. He asks him what kind of animals they were. The answer is three, two goats, a cat, and four pairs of pigeons. Then he tells that he has to leave them. There’s a war on. He says the cat will be all right. Cats take care of themselves. He’s worried about the others. In answer to a question, he says he isn’t a political person. He’s tired and sits down. He asks where the trucks are going. The answer is to Barcelona. Then he says again that the cat will be all right, but he is worried about the others, and he asks the narrator what he thinks. The narrator says he thinks all the animals will be all right. The last sentence at the bottom of the page is the old man asking what they will do under the artillery, since he was told to leave because of the artillery.”

  “Great!” exclaimed Lester. “Ninety-nine percent accurate. Well, maybe I’d give you a ninety-five. You omitted the old man’s age.”

  Norma frowned and thought for a second or two. “Seventy-six?” she queried.

  “Seventy-six is correct.”

  When he had taken the book and replaced it on the shelf, he said to Norma, “I am in awe of you. You have a marvelous little machine inside your head.”

  That may be, but why must she also be so awkward? So awkward that she was unable to accept a compliment with grace, and then go ahead with some entertaining subject? She had no social graces. The very presence of this pleasant man was inhibiting. And she sat there looking at her hands, splayed out upon the pile of papers. They were nicely manicured, thanks to Amanda’s well-meant nagging.

  “Don’t be embarrassed,” Lester said, chiding her.

  “I’m not.” She had to defend herself. “I’m not,” she repeated.

  “All right, you’re not.”

  She wondered what he could really be thinking of her and was wishing that he would disappear, when he asked whether she was hungry.

  “I forgot my watch,” she said irrelevantly.

  He pointed to the big clock above the blackboard. “What has time got to do with it? Can’t you be hungry whenever you’re hungry without looking at the time?”

  “I guess I am, a little.”

  “Well, I had no lunch, and I definitely am. Would you like to go with me down to Stuffy’s for a hamburger? Nothing fancy, just the usual hamburger.”

  This was so strange! What could he want with her?

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Put the tests away. You can finish them tomorrow.”

  In Stuffy’s entryway there was a mirror where, in a passing glance, she was able to see that her hair was smooth and becomingly curved along the line of her cheek. Around her neck was a handsome black-and-white scarf, a present from Amanda, who had shown her how to tie it.

  “Frenchwomen can do wonders, just with a little thing like a scarf,” Amanda had said.

  This brief glimpse of herself was encouraging. A good many of the younger faculty would be astonished to see her here with Lester Cole. Yes, astonished and disgruntled, too.

  “I am in awe of you,” he had said.

  Lester was one man who fitted the definition of an intellectual. Perhaps he was interested in having conversation with her because, on account of the Latin textbook, he—quite mistakenly—thought that she was one, too. He was probably in a mood for good conversation tonight, that was all.

  For Heaven’s sake, it was infuriating that she had absolutely no idea how to begin! Could she start talking about the headline in today’s newspaper? Or maybe about the Second Punic War? Simply because he was male, not female, her mind went dead.

  Then suddenly, anger entered her embarrassment. It came with one of those clear glimpses of herself that ought to come more often. Why, it was absurd that she should be so humbled by this man’s mild attention! Absurd. And yet she waited passively for him to speak.

  “It’s plain that you love to teach,” he began. “Unfortunately, some people do it because it’s a respected profession with long vacations.”

  Norma felt her eyebrows rising at this rather unusual remark from the assistant headmaster. “Do you really mean that?”

  “Well, not most people, but many. For people who don’t like to compete, it’s easier. It’s not like, for instance, being in a first-class law firm striving to become a partner.” Lester smiled, and his eyes had a reminiscent look. “My father always accused me of wanting what he called ‘the easier way.’ He’s a lawyer, naturally.”

  “Well, I certainly wouldn’t call teaching the easier way,” Norma protested.

  “No, but it’s not clashing wits against wits. You’re not fighting all day. You’re helping people. Teaching is really compassionate. It’s humane.”

  Now this topic was alive! It brought to mind a chronic problem that Norma had encountered again this very morning.

  “But when you try to help and find yourself talking to deaf ears, what can you do? Just sit by and watch a human being going to ruin? A fifteen-year-old girl staring out of the window with tears in her eyes?”

  “Her name doesn’t happen to be Jessie, does it?”

  Norma was astonished. “Why, yes. How did you know?”

  “I’ve had a few sessions with her mother.” Lester’s tone was grim. “She’s quite a character, isn’t she? Poor child.”

  “I’ve talked to her many times, and to the mother, too. Jessie knows she needs counseling, but her mother thinks it isn’t necessary. She thinks Jessie should simply ‘pull herself together.’”

  “Just pull yourself together.” Lester sighed. “Simple, isn’t it? So, what do you think we can do for Jessie? Anything?”

  Another part of Norma’s mind was running parallel to the conversation. He’s really nice. I do believe, behind the authority that he shows in school, he’s fundamentally shy. He must have ten different suits, all shades of brown, from tan to mahogany. It’s funny how different he seems here, putting sour cream on his baked potato and spilling a drop of coffee on his tie, from the way he looks behind the podium at a school assembly, so dignified, even a bit austere … Yes, he’s really nice, and not hard to talk to, not at all.

  The crowd in Stuffy’s place had peaked and was now emptying out, while at the booth where Norma was barely aware of passing time, the conversation had traveled away from school to a concert, to an old movie, and to a camping trip in Alaska.

  The waiter was hovering near their table, which caused Lester to look at his watch and apologize.

  “I’ve kept you over two hours, Norma. We’re the last ones here. They’re ready to close the doors.”

  Inevitably, she had to precede him on the way out. From the rear, her legs must look horrendous. But why only from the rear? And was it conceivable, anyway, that in over three years’ time he had not noticed them before this? But perhaps he had never noticed her enough even to become aware of them. If so, there would be no next time. And thanking Lester with a mind both pleased and perturbed, Norma went home.

  “You missed dinner,” her father said. “I was worried that something had happened.”

  “I’m sorry, Dad. I should have t
elephoned, but we got talking and time flew by.”

  “Who’s ‘we’?”

  When she told him, he nodded his approval. There was a little twinkle in his eyes. “Do you know who he is? He’s Alfred Cole’s son. Cole, Armistead. One of the half-dozen most prominent law firms in the state. We have dealings with them all the time, on real estate matters, of course. There’s talk that he always wanted his son to grow up and join the firm, you know.”

  Cole, the man at Cecile’s wedding who had made that horrible gaffe. “He told me.”

  “Well, as long as he’s happy where he is at the school. Do you like him?”

  “Yes, but—” As her father’s expression spoke of too much eagerness, she quenched it with her next words. “Please don’t get any ideas, Dad. Please don’t. We had a hamburger together and talked school, that’s all.”

  “Fine, fine. Live one day at a time, as I always say. And I never get ‘ideas,’ as you call them.”

  But he did “get ideas.” He had most surely had them for Larry! It had taken a long while before he had learned to accept and finally to welcome Amanda.

  Come to think of it, Norma thought for the second time that day, since Christmas Larry and Amanda have hardly been in this house. But then, they have their own lives and their own reasons, as they should have. How little we all know about each other! We present the surface, and often a good deal more than that, but the engine, the hot, vibrating power that moves us, remains unseen.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  April was chilly. The sky, like a soggy gray blanket, hung low above the earth, and the wet trees dripped. Then a steady drizzle began, so that Amanda pulled the hood over her head. Not having expected such weather, she had gone jogging too far from home and, suddenly tired now, stopped to rest by leaning against somebody’s high stone wall.

  The scene was really, in its way, quite lovely. To begin with, it was silent. There never was much traffic on the winding roads of this exurbia; at midday in the middle of the week, and in such weather, there was hardly any. Daffodils that had been naturalized on the sloping lawn across the road were beginning to bloom. A small family of robins was seeking worms on that same wet lawn. Two boys on bicycles went by, whistling; when they had passed, the quiet surged back. A great artist could paint this silence, Amanda thought. That was a queer concept, painting silence! But she knew what she meant.

  Waiting for the rain to stop, her mind drifted idly from one thing to another, from the shop and dear, silly Dolly’s troubles with her current boyfriend, to the place that she still thought of as home. How far away and long ago it seemed! Her mind leaped to the package that she was going to take to the post office this afternoon before it should close at four o’clock. Then she thought about the three musketeers; come to think of it, they had lately not been calling one another by that name. Indeed, they had not had their monthly lunch for several months. Cecile’s babies would have been almost six weeks old by now, if things had gone right. Norma had been seeing Lester Cole quite often, or so Larry had reported. Why does she not confide in me? Amanda wondered. I’m glad for her, anyway. She’s a kind soul, like Larry. He wants to start a family. I don’t want to. My best times are my days at work. Even right now on my day off, I would just as soon be working.

  A car drove by, slowed, backed up, and stopped.

  “Amanda! That is you, isn’t it? What are you doing here?” called L.B.

  She wished he had not seen her, but it was necessary to approach the car and to reply.

  “Waiting for the drizzle to stop,” she said.

  “What a day to go jogging! Get in before you’re soaked through.”

  On the car radio a Mozart piano concerto was playing. It surprised her that L.B. should be listening to the classical station and that he was sensitive enough to wait until the piece was finished before he turned it off.

  When it ended, there followed a minute or two during which neither of them spoke. The front seat was a tight enclosure, both their tall bodies confined in a too-small space, or so it felt to her. For no reason at all, she remembered that this was only the second time since her marriage when she had been alone with L.B., the other being that morning in his house when she had gone to ask about a raise for Larry. Uncomfortable with herself, she seemed to be wriggling inside her clothes.

  “Going home, I assume?” asked L.B.

  “Yes, but the rain’s almost over with, so if you’ll let me out on the avenue, I’d like to jog the rest of the way.”

  “That’s foolish. I pass your house on the way to the office, anyway. But first I have to make one quick stop, ten minutes at the most.”

  It was hard to disagree with L.B. Well she knew.

  “It’s a Victorian house on a triple-size lot. They’ve had it in the family for four generations, but the present owners have moved east and it’s up for sale. They’re conservationists and also sentimental, very interesting people; they don’t want to sell to just anybody who will divide the land. Of course, that’s the obvious practical thing to do these days. So my job is to find someone who’ll want to live in this relic and keep it as it is. I might as well find a needle in a haystack. Still, you never know.”

  On a wide street where new houses had been fitted in among the grand old mansions, L.B. stopped in front of one of the grandest, a gloomy pile of dark brick, complete with porte cochere and a pair of iron deer on the front lawn.

  “Come,” he said, inviting Amanda, “you can give me your opinion. My only thought is that young people with a lot of money, a lot of children, and a lot of energy to spend on fixing it up might take it. Maybe.”

  They entered a wide, high space, dim and cold as the inside of an empty barn. But unlike the simple, pungent scent of hay, this scent was mingled: clean dust, faint cooking spices, wafts of powder and perfume—or so she imagined—were the remnants and reminders of the lives that had once been lived here.

  Standing at the center of the huge parlor, turning her head toward the huge, vacant spaces on either side of it and up the broad staircase that must lead to further huge spaces above, she felt suddenly a vague, romantic melancholy. It was as if from somewhere in the deserted house, she was hearing voices and strains of music.

  L.B. was looking at her with curiosity. “What are you thinking of?” he asked.

  Feeling too self-conscious to tell the truth, she gave a prosaic answer. “Of the construction. They don’t build like this anymore.”

  “How true! Look at the doors, solid chestnut. Come into the dining room. Look at the wainscoting, the workmanship.” L.B. spoke enthusiastically. “And the fireplace marble. I imagine that this brown-and-white coloration must be fairly rare. At least, I never see it, and I see a good number of pre-World War One houses. Take notice of the fireplaces. There’s one in every room, even in the kitchen opposite the coal stove. Come see.”

  The stove was a great big crouching bear, Amanda thought, letting imagination run away with her.

  “They kept it, too, out of sentiment, I suppose. Great-grandmother must have cooked on it.” L.B. shivered. “It must have been cold here in the winter, and probably it still is, even with natural gas. Everything’s too big, windows and ceilings too high. Do you want to see the upstairs?”

  She had no particular interest in seeing it. Nevertheless, she followed him up the steep staircase, down a long hall, all through the big, high-ceilinged bedrooms and the big, antiquated bathrooms, while he pointed out every feature of style and construction as if he were trying to sell the house to her. This friendly change from his former distant attitude, let alone his former stinging rebuff on that Sunday morning, puzzled Amanda—not that it mattered.

  Did it matter? Well, yes, it did. When a person’s behavior toward you is inconsistent and causes you to feel puzzled, you want to find the explanation.

  “Be careful,” he said, preceding her down the stairs.

  His back and shoulders in the well-tailored dark blue suit were impressive. And if that was an absurd reflect
ion, it was no more so than the commonly used one about uniforms being aphrodisiac.

  When he stopped at the bottom of the stairs and turned to her, she was still a step above him, so that their heads were level with each other. A steely light from the window fell on his face, and amazingly, for the first time, she saw that he had a cleft chin. It was almost a dimple, a strange, soft feature to see on that commanding face, and strange to discover it only now after so long.

  “Well, will you buy it?” he asked with a touch of laughter in his tone.

  “A few million dollars for a makeover,” she responded, giving back the laughter, “could turn it into something delightful. The first thing it needs are yards and yards of brilliant colors to get rid of the gloom. Then rugs and silver and many paintings on these long walls. The Hudson River School, big ones, each to cover half a wall, would help.”

  “Yes, a good deal, it would. You’ve learned a lot for a country girl since you came to live here. You talk like an interior decorator.”

  “Yes, I was a country girl,” she acknowledged. “But in the shop, the boutique, among those women, I’ve seen how the other half of one percent lives.”

  “And you learned from books:: Norma tells me your house is filling up with books.”

  He was still blocking her way so that she was unable to descend the last two steps. His direct, bold gaze, so typical of him, was a sharp reminder of that humiliating Sunday; yet something else, perhaps the sight of the just-discovered dimple, provoked her into a boldness of her own, and she said directly, “You could come and see our house for yourself. Why have you been staying away from us?”

  “I could ask you the same question.” And when she failed to answer, he answered for her. “Because you—you, not Larry—did not want to see me, either.”

  “Why should I want to see you? You were nasty to me when I came pleading for Larry. And then you gave him what I asked for, anyway. You gave more than I had ever dreamed of asking.”