The Truth About Lorin Jones

by Alison Lurie

  No, that didn’t sound right, Polly thought. “Not necessarily,” she said, forgetting the rule that an interviewer must not offer contrary opinions.

  “You think not?” Garrett stared at her tipsily, as if she knew the answer.

  “Did she ever say she hated you?”

  Garrett shook his head. “Just said, when I finally had a letter from her — wasn’t a letter, really: only a couple of lines on half a piece of drawing-paper — just said, she had to go away. Said she was sorry.”

  “She didn’t hate you,” Polly declared, transported, possessed. She didn’t need to ask any more questions; she knew everything about Lorin Jones: how long and in what distress she had stared at that piece of drawing-paper; how hard it had been for her to write those few words.

  And she knew, too, how Lorin must have felt the day she left Wellfleet forever. She raised her eyes and imagined looking around this room for the last time, unable to speak all her regret, all her resolve. Then, struck by his silence, she glanced back at Garrett. His eyes were closed again; his broad chest under the checked shirt rose and fell in a slow rhythm.

  “Well, guess I’d better be going to bed,” she said, reaching over the arm of the sofa to turn off her tape recorder. “It’s been a long day.”

  Garrett’s pale blue eyes blinked open. “Tired, are you, child?”

  “Mm. Rather.” Polly began to get up; a wave of dizziness came over her. The brandy, she thought, sitting down again on the edge of the sofa.

  “Wait a sec. Don’t go yet. I want to say —” Garrett put his hand on hers again in what no longer seemed a paternal manner. “Having you here, talking to you. It means a lot to me.” His voice was thick with emotion.

  “I’m glad I could come,” she replied almost at random, listening still to her own — or Lorin’s? — voice.

  “Y’know I can’t speak to Abigail about Laura. She still gets jealous.”

  “Mm.” Well, she might, Polly thought. Abigail is just an ordinary woman, and Lorin was unique, beautiful, a genius —

  “Having you here — it’s as if she’d come back to me in a way, y’know?”

  “I know,” Polly said, feeling the blaze of consciousness again.

  “You’re a good girl. Do a good book, I bet.” Garrett squeezed her hand again. “Give me a goodnight kiss.”

  She hesitated. But after all, why not? “All right.” She aimed for the red, mottled surface of his cheek, but Garrett turned his head at the last moment and landed a warm and definitely sensual smack directly on her mouth, at the same time pulling her against him.

  For a moment Polly let it happen; she felt and gave warmth and pleasure. It had been over a year since she’d given any man more than a peck on the cheek. Then, recollecting who and where she was, she pushed Garrett away and stood up fast; the room spun.

  “Aw. Don’t go yet.”

  “Got to,” Polly insisted through a dizzy blur. “I’m really tired. Uh, well, thanks for everything. See you later.”

  “Pleasant dreams,” Garrett called, raising himself with an attempt at courtesy, then falling back among the cushions. He gave her a woozy wave and smile, and closed his eyes.

  Polly listened as she made ready for bed, but there was no sound from below. Probably Garrett Jones had passed out on the sofa. She felt drunk and confused, angry at herself, angry at and sorry for him. She remembered Jeanne’s warnings, her own cautions to herself. For Christ’s sake, she was here as a researcher, she was supposed to be cool, impartial, detached. To sympathize with Garrett, to see him as in some ways a tragic figure, that was forgivable. But to kiss him was muddling, unprofessional, unseemly.

  Brushing her teeth over the bathroom sink, where Lorin Jones must so many times have stood to brush her own teeth, Polly emitted a cross, confused gargling sound, and spat.

  Never mind, Lorin said suddenly in her head. It was I who kissed him, not you.

  Yes, Polly thought. That’s how it was. She lifted her eyes to the mirror, and saw there a kind of double image. In the dim backlight she seemed paler, her hair darker, her eyes enlarged and shadowed, as if Lorin’s last photo had been superimposed on the reflection of her face.

  You’re drunk, she told herself. It’s only because you’re wearing a dark sweater, and haven’t had your hair cut since August. She snapped on the fluorescent tube above the glass; the resemblance vanished. Again she was stocky, round-faced, short-haired. But it had been there, for a moment.

  As Polly climbed dizzily into bed, she realized that her distrust and fear of Garrett Jones were gone. She felt instead only what Lorin’s ghost must feel: pity and affection for her handsome, self-centered, insensitive husband, now a famous elderly man who — too late — blamed himself bitterly and longed for his child bride. Yes; but now, through Polly’s intercession, Garrett knew that Lorin had cared for him; she had kissed and forgiven him.

  “Is that right?” she asked aloud in the dark. “Is that what you wanted?”

  There was no answer. But as she sank into an alcoholic drowse, Polly’s final sensation was that Lorin approved and was there; that the whisper of the bare trees outside the window was her whisper, the cold breath of the wind against the clapboards her breath.

  7

  AT FIRST POLLY THOUGHT she was having a nightmare. There was a heavy weight on her, a smothering heat and constriction.

  “Wha! Help!” she choked out, and half woke in the half-dark to an unfamiliar room where someone much larger than Jeanne was lying on top of her, nuzzling at her neck.

  “Darling. Don’ be afraid.” The weight and the moist searching kisses, smelling of drink, continued. It was, it must be, Garrett Jones.

  “No! Get the hell off me!” she shouted, shoving the resistant bulk aside with all her strength. She struggled upright, fumbling for the mock-kerosene lamp, then finding it and switching it on.

  “Polly, my sweet.” It was Garrett; he was sitting heavily on the double bed beside her. He had changed his clothes again and was wearing white silk pajamas and a red damask robe with satin lapels, like someone in a thirties comedy of high life.

  “Please; go away.”

  “I startled you, little one; f’give me.” He reached to pat her arm, but missed. “Were you ’sleep already? I’m sorry I took so long to come to you; must’ve dozed off.”

  “Wha’d’you mean? I didn’t —”

  “You look so lovely, all warm and tousled.” Garrett swayed toward Polly, feeling for her breast with one heavy red hand. She batted it away and slid to the other side of the mattress.

  “What a charming costume. Always have thought men’s pajamas were awfully sexy on a girl.”

  “Listen, Garrett, goddamn it,” Polly was almost shouting again. “I don’t want to make out with you.”

  “I thought you ’ere waiting for me.” Now his tone was hurt and aggrieved. “I thought, surely —”

  “Well, I wasn’t.” Reminding herself that her host was drunk, Polly tried to speak quietly and with authority. “Please, get out of my room now, okay?”

  “What’s the matter, darling? You were so sweet all evening.” He smiled boozily and began to edge across the rumpled sheets and ruffled eyelet pillows toward her. “Be a little kind to me now.”

  Taking advantage of his slowness, Polly scrambled out of the bed on the far side. She circled a chintz-cushioned rocker, banging her toe; dashed out across the hall, and into the opposite room.

  “My dear girl, what’s the matter? Where are you?”

  Polly did not answer. Breathing hard in the dark, she slammed the door and fumbled for, found, and shot the bolt.

  “Polly, my dear.”

  She patted the wallpaper, feeling unsuccessfully for a light switch. On the other side of the wall she could hear Garrett shuffling about in the hall, banging doors open.

  “Polly, darling. Where are you?”

  “Go back to bed!” she called.

  “Darling, please.” Garrett was outside her door now, rattling its h
andle. Polly moved over the cold floorboards in the dark, knocking against what sounded like a standing lamp. She groped about, clutched its cold twisted metal stem, righted it, and turned it on. The room that once had been Lorin’s studio glowed into view.

  “Please! Let me in.”

  What the hell was she supposed to do now? Polly thought. She sat down on a quilted bedspread patterned with Western ranch brands, then got up again and pulled the spread back. The bed was unmade, but there were several blankets. She could spend the rest of the night here if she had to.

  “Polly?”

  Don’t answer, Polly told herself. She crawled into Garrett’s son’s bed on top of the mattress pad.

  “Polly, dear!” The door rattled violently.

  She dragged the blankets and spread up over herself, blurring Garrett’s cries.

  “Lolly!”

  Polly raised her head. Had she really heard that?

  “Darling, please!” He was almost sobbing.

  I’ll never get back to sleep now, she thought. Maybe I should let him in. Maybe it would prove to him that Lorin had forgiven him, because he thinks I’m her. She pushed back the blankets and half sat up.

  “Lorin?” she whispered. “Is that what you want?” She shoved the covers aside and stood on the flat braided coils of the bedside rug.

  “Darling! Just wanna kiss you goo’night.”

  Polly took a step forward, and felt the chill of the polished floorboards under her bare feet. But I’m not your darling, she thought. I’m not Lorin: for one thing, she loved you, and I don’t. She got back into bed again; dragged up the covers.

  “Please, dearest. Lemme in.”

  I’m sorry, Polly said in her mind, not to Garrett but to his wife’s ghost. I can’t do it. Do you understand? But there was no answer. She was alone in the dark in a house on Cape Cod, and a drunken randy old man was trying to get into her room and her bed.

  “Hello in there ... hello?” he cried finally and feebly. There was a silence; then the sound of steps going away. A heavy confused noise, as if Garrett had stumbled and half fallen. A door closing; silence.

  Well, Jeanne warned me, Polly thought, turning over under the scratchy blankets. She remembered her friend’s body, so light and soft and fresh, comparing it to Garrett Jones’s coarse, inert bulk. I didn’t listen to her, she thought, and now look what’s happened. Among other things, I’ve probably made a permanent enemy; men don’t like to be turned down sexually.

  “Lorin, help me,” she whispered. “You got me into this.”

  But the wind outside, that was once so clearly Lorin’s breath, had subsided. This room, where she had spent so many long hours, felt cold, dark, and empty of her spirit.

  “Lorin?”

  Though there was no further sign, Polly lay awake for a long time, listening.

  “Oh, good morning.” Garrett Jones hardly glanced around from the stove; his tone was constrained, unfriendly. In the hard morning light both he and his expensive country clothes looked older and more worn.

  “G’morning,” Polly answered warily.

  “Sleep well?” He did not quite look at her.

  “Yes, thanks,” she lied.

  “Coffee?”

  “Yes, thanks.” Polly sat down, wishing she could leave at once. Probably Garrett was wishing the same thing; but there was no plane out of Provincetown until her noon flight.

  As Garrett put a mug of coffee and a plate of dry, burned-looking toast before her, they exchanged an uneasy glance.

  “Sorry about last night,” he said, stiffly and not very apologetically. “Seems like we both had too much to drink, got our signals crossed.”

  “That’s okay,” Polly mumbled. In the glare of day, it was all too clear that Garrett had never shared her exalted view of last night’s events; he had no idea that she had been acting as Lorin’s proxy, loving and pardoning him — or not pardoning him — in Lorin’s name.

  “I could’ve sworn you were giving me the go-ahead.”

  “Well, I wasn’t.” She took a gulp of lukewarm, bitter coffee.

  “Or maybe you changed your mind.”

  “No, I never —” Polly’s voice faded; not only did she not want to discuss it, she felt partly to blame for what had happened.

  “I think you changed your mind.” Her discomfort seemed to encourage Garrett; he gave her a narrow smile. “What happened? Tell me, I’m interested. Was it my age?”

  “No, uh,” she stuttered, taken aback.

  “Maybe you think I can’t please a woman anymore, but you’re wrong, you know. I’m still competent.”

  “I didn’t —” Polly flushed. “I just don’t want to get involved with you, that’s all.”

  “Well, you were certainly giving off different signals last evening.” He laughed in a meaning way.

  “I was not.” Polly felt herself becoming furious as well as nervous and guilty. “I suppose you think any woman you take out to dinner wants to go to bed with you.”

  “No-o.” But Garrett half smiled; it was clear that he did think this.

  “Anyhow, you’re married.”

  “Oh well, yes.” He dismissed this smoothly, waving a piece of unburned toast smoothed with marmalade. “I’m married. And Abigail’s a wonderful woman, of course. Very beautiful.” He looked hard at Polly, clearly communicating the idea that she was not beautiful. “And tremendously steady and kind.” This, too, was said pointedly.

  “I’m sure she is,” Polly agreed coolly, trying to control her hurt and fury.

  “I have to admit it, though, she’s not exciting; not like Laura. Never was, really.” Garrett’s tone was almost confidential now, though not pleasant. “And now. ... Well, Abby’s fifty-three this year. And you know, with most women, after fifty there’s not much juice in them. They kind of dry up, like grapes left on the vine.” He grinned and shook his heavy, handsome head, as if both enjoying and deploring the sexual double standard. “How old are you, Polly, by the way?”

  “I’m thirty-nine, if it’s any of your business,” Polly said furiously.

  “Really? I thought you were younger.” It was clear that this was not a compliment. More likely, Garrett was excusing himself for having put so much effort into trying to seduce her. He gave her a hard, cool glance, and added, “I should’ve known. Young women today, they don’t make a fuss about a man’s being married, in my experience. They’re free romantic spirits; they make love to anyone they fancy.” He smiled in a reminiscent way. “And any time.”

  “Well, I don’t,” Polly said with force.

  “No, quite.” Now his look conveyed that she was middle-aged and inhibited; perhaps also that she didn’t get that many opportunities.

  “As a matter of fact, if you want to know, I’m a lesbian,” Polly said, speaking these words aloud for the first time in her life.

  “Really?” Garrett blinked.

  “That’s right.”

  “Ah.” He smiled broadly, easily, for the first time that morning. “Well. Excuse me. If I’d known —” He sat down at the highly polished Early American table opposite her. “You should have told me that last night, really,” he added pleasantly, leaning forward. “Now, shouldn’t you?”

  “I suppose so,” Polly admitted.

  “I realize it’s not the easiest thing to say.” Garrett’s whole manner had changed; it was open and friendly. “But it would have avoided a lot of trouble. I wouldn’t have made a fool of myself, or given you such a fright.” He laughed. “And, by the way, I want to assure you of my discretion. I won’t say anything to anyone.”

  “That’s all right. I mean, thanks,” Polly added grudgingly, wondering whether she should believe him. But what difference did it make anyhow? She was a lesbian, since the night before last.

  “That’s not much of a breakfast,” Garrett remarked, looking at her plate, on which the burned toast remained. “Let me make you some bacon and eggs.”

  “Uh —”

  “Come on.” He smil
ed. It was clear that his self-esteem and goodwill had been completely restored.

  “No thanks.” Polly still felt cross and embarrassed. She cast around in her mind for something hurtful to say that would not be discounted as coming from a lesbian.

  “Well, then, if you’ve finished breakfast,” Garrett interrupted her search, “I’d like to take you out to the barn, show you some of Laura’s work that’s still here.”

  “I — all right,” Polly agreed, shelving her impulse in the service of a higher good.

  “Now I don’t want you to get too excited,” Garrett cautioned over his shoulder as Polly followed him along a path beaten through long faded grass that matched his gray-blond hair. “Laura took almost all her finished work with her when she ran out on me. She couldn’t bear to be separated from any of it, maybe you’ve heard that.”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “I think myself it was because she remained a child in so many ways. Her paintings were, what do the psychologists call it, a kind of security blanket for her. Well, here we are.” Garrett shoved open the weather-beaten sliding door of the barn. He had resumed his windbreaker and peaked captain’s cap, and his aspect was again nautical and jaunty. “I keep Laura’s drawings in this old fridge. You should get yourself one, y’know. It’s as good as a safe if there’s a fire.”

  From the rusted chrome shelves of the refrigerator Garrett removed a worn black portfolio tied with tapes and two manila folders. “Here, you can see.” He opened one of the folders and began to turn over sheets of paper. “It’s mostly just notes, unfinished sketches, that sort of thing. Just what Laura left behind when —”

  He did not finish the sentence, but Polly was not listening anyhow. Her attention was fixed on the drawings: some of them quick sketches, others detailed impressions of a shed, a skeleton leaf, a sleeping cat. They were executed in pencil and pen, a few lit with white or brown chalk, others with streaks of blue or sea-green wash. Realistic as most of them were, there was an oddness, a characteristic attenuation Polly recognized instantly.

  “I tell you what,” Garrett said. “Let’s take everything into the house where it’s warm.”