Guests of August

by Gloria Goldreich

  They follow Greg and the others to the tree where shafts of sunlight plunge through the thick-leafed branches and rib the punctured red and black circlets of the cork board.

  The adults toss the darts first, laughing at each other’s ineptitude, Nessa’s dart hitting the tree rather than the board, Helene’s landing in the outer ring. Evan triumphantly hits the treble ring. They laugh at each other’s efforts. Tolerance and affection have been nurtured during these weeks of intimacy. Greg and Liane are, of course, the champions, easily meeting their mark. Paul, Jeremy and Richie achieve the bull’s eye with laconic certitude. It is no contest for them. They have the ease and grace of youth, the amused admiration of Annette and Tracy who stand side by side.

  But it is the youngest among them who triumph in the end. Matt, Cary and Donny, who could barely hit the board during the first days of this shared holiday, each in turn step up to the stone marker with confidence. Greg has taught them well. Their small bodies are perfectly pitched, their gazes do not swerve from the board. As Greg has instructed them, they finger the dart, straighten the feathers and toss with unerring accuracy. One by one, they shoot directly into the bull’s eye. They turn to their audience; their smiles radiate shyness and pride. These vacation weeks have served them well. They have achieved. They have learned. There is a smattering of applause. Their mothers run toward them with congratulatory hugs. The sun shifts, the dart board is draped in shadows. Slowly, reluctantly, gear is packed, missing sweatshirts are found, final photographs are snapped as they prepare to return to the inn.

  Jeff remains on the lawn until late afternoon when his chief resident calls to tell him that his patient’s condition has stabilized and there is no need for him to come to the hospital. By that time it is too late for him to set out for Franconia Notch. He goes into the inn, finds the plate of sandwiches that Louise left for him, and eats without appetite. He looks at his watch and wonders when his family will be back. He misses them, misses Susan. There is so much he wants to say to her, so much he must explain.

  He has been too hard on her, too hard on himself. He is suffused by a new and not unpleasant exhaustion that he recognizes. It is not unlike the fatigue of a patient recovering after a long illness, who can, at last, relax. They are safe, he and Susan. They are in recovery. They have simply gone through a difficult time. He reaches into his pocket and his fingers curl around the flimsy sheet of notepaper, the list, those small loving obligations she accomplishes so quietly. It is a talisman of her caring and he presses it to his lips.

  As he sits in the vast empty kitchen, the phone rings. He does not answer. Louise, of course, will have the answering machine on and it is not his place to pick up. It rings again and again until at last the answering machine does kick in. He is on the way out of the kitchen when he hears Polly’s voice shrilling into the machine.

  ‘Louise! Evan! Someone! Please pick up. I don’t know what to do. It’s my mother. My mother! Mommy. Oh, Mommy.’ Now her voice is muffled. Now he hears sobs and then again her voice, softer now, pleading. ‘Help me. Someone please help me.’

  He reaches for the phone, waits until she falls silent and then speaks with as much calm as he can muster.

  ‘Polly. It’s Dr Edwards. What’s happening? Catch your breath. Speak slowly. I will help you.’

  ‘My mom. I can’t wake her up. She’s in bed and I can’t wake her up.’

  ‘Polly, you must call nine-one-one. Can you do that? Call nine-one-one.’

  ‘Nine-one-one.’ She repeats the emergency number. ‘But that’s for the police. We don’t want the police.’

  He understands. Of course they don’t want the police. This is New Hampshire where privacy is safely guarded, where people are fond of saying they keep themselves to themselves.

  ‘It’s for any emergency,’ he explains. ‘And I’ll be there in a very few minutes. I’m leaving right now. I know where you live. Call nine-one-one, Polly. Tell them you need an ambulance. Take deep breaths. Drink some water and wait for me.’

  He hangs up, relieved that his medical bag is already in his car, and rushes out. It will not take him more than five minutes to reach Polly’s house. He presses down on the accelerator although he is certain that Polly’s mother, that frail and sickly woman, is almost certainly dead. He pulls up in front of the house, grabs his bag and hurries inside, following Polly into the narrow dimly lit room.

  He kneels beside the bed, its clean linen sheets already sour with the unmistakable scent of death. He does not even have to examine the skeletal yellow-skinned woman, her thin gray hair plastered to her skull, who lies motionless. Still, he feels for a pulse, listens for a heartbeat and holds a mirror to her lips, knowing full well that no breath of life will cloud it. Polly, in a pale-blue sun dress, hovers near him, her eyes red with tears that continue to fall as she sways from side to side.

  ‘I called her. And she didn’t answer. And then I tried to wake her up. And then I tried to breathe into her mouth. In and out. In and out. But she didn’t move. Even though her eyes were open. See. They’re still open.’

  Jeff nods.

  ‘It sometimes happens that way,’ he says gently. ‘You did everything you could, Polly.’

  He leans forward and with practiced fingers, because he has done this so many times, he gently closes the fragile eyelids of the dead woman. As always, he is fearful that the delicate skin might crumble at his touch although he knows that of course this will not happen.

  Carefully, he pulls a blanket over her face.

  ‘Your father?’ he asks. ‘Where is your father?’

  ‘At work. Or on his way home. I didn’t call him. I didn’t want to scare him.’

  ‘Of course.’

  There is the rumble of wheels, the trill of a siren. Jeff goes to the window. A police car has pulled up, followed by an ambulance. He speaks quietly to the officer, to the gangly acne-pocked emergency medical technician. He sits with Polly in the kitchen as the body is lifted, placed on a gurney and wheeled out of the house.

  ‘She weighed nothing. Nothing at all,’ the police officer muttered.

  Polly weeps and weeps. ‘I’m scared,’ she says. ‘I’m so scared.’

  ‘It’s all right. I’ll wait here with you until your dad comes home,’ Jeff assures her.

  ‘I can’t breathe,’ she says plaintively.

  ‘It’s too warm in here.’

  He stands at the door and watches as first the ambulance and then the police car pull away. Then he takes Polly’s hand and leads her, as though she were a small child, out to the rickety front steps. They sit there, side by side, and because she is trembling, he places his arm about her shoulders.

  They are still sitting there when the first cars headed for Mount Haven Inn head down the road. Susan, her face pressed against the window, sees them and her heart turns over in despair.

  And Jeff sees his wife’s frozen face and knows what she is thinking. But this is not a time for explanations, not when Polly cannot stop trembling and her breath comes in tortuous gasps.

  ‘It will be all right. It will be all right.’

  His reassuring words are meant both for Polly and himself.

  FIFTEEN

  The news of Polly’s loss dispels the elation of the group’s day at Franconia Notch. Nessa organizes a collection and they all write generous checks. Louise prepares a hamper of food which Evan delivers. He returns to report that everything is being taken care of. The neighbors are caring for Polly and her father and making arrangements. He mentions this with proprietary pride.

  ‘That’s how things happen here,’ he says. ‘This is New Hampshire.’

  He is reminding the guests that they are, in the end, outsiders, unfamiliar with the customs of the small town where privacy is inviolate but community concern and action is a given.

  ‘Is Polly all right?’ Jeff asks.

  Susan does not look at him. Carefully she butters a piece of bread for Matt. Carefully she fills her water glass. Her own thoug
hts shame her. She, who has always admired her husband’s capacity for compassion, would have him be indifferent to Polly at such a time. She knows herself to be jealous without cause, and she knows too that Jeff is aware of that irrational jealousy. He has not, of course, said anything about it to her. That is not his way. He has, instead, retreated into silence.

  ‘Polly’s a strong girl,’ Evan says. ‘But it’s hard to lose a mother.’

  Helene and Susan exchange an uneasy glance. It had not been hard for them to lose their mother. They see themselves as the unnatural daughters of an unnatural mother, their lives crippled by her excesses. Even now, all these years after her death, they cannot forgive the dead woman for her cruelty to Helene, for filling Susan with fear and uncertainty. Trust no one. Suspect everyone, she had cautioned her elder daughter. That cruel maternal legacy had lingered, filling Helene with fear of replicating her sadistic harshness, frightening her out of motherhood. It has hovered like a cloud over Susan’s happy marriage. That cloud has darkened dangerously during this long season of their discontent.

  Greg, who loves his own parents, pities his wife and her sister. It occurs to him that they who never mourned their own mother may, perhaps, envy Polly her grief.

  The somber mood in the dining room is deepened when they become aware of the inexplicable and abrupt departure of Andrea and Mark Templeton. Michael and Liane are visibly upset. So much time, so much hope, had been invested with Mark. Is it possible that he has simply abandoned the project? Michael confers with Simon who, in turn, is tight lipped and angry. He stalks out to send an urgent email to Mark Templeton but, of course, there can be no reply until the morning.

  ‘I’m sure he must have finalized arrangements with his investors,’ he tells Michael. ‘He made a commitment. And like I told you, if he doesn’t buy in, I’ll find someone who will.’

  Wendy, unsurprised but angered by her in-laws’ departure, offers vague explanations.

  ‘I think something unexpected came up regarding their property in California and they had to attend to it,’ she says.

  ‘But they didn’t even say goodbye,’ Donny says plaintively.

  ‘They’ll call you and explain,’ she assures him, but she wonders if that will happen. Mark and Andrea are not in the habit of offering explanations. Still, she has no regrets. She said what had to be said. She and Donny will manage.

  Louise sets the salad bowl on the table and motions the waitress to bring in the turkey platter. She does not tell Wendy that Mark Templeton had left an envelope for her at the reception desk containing a check that covered his family’s bill for their stay and generous gratuities for the staff as well as a brief note. Mark claimed that they had neglected to cancel an important doctor’s appointment and had to return home at once. He added a graceful postscript telling her how he and his wife had always enjoyed their vacations at Mount Haven Inn. He wishes her success in the future. It is, she realizes, a valedictory message. Mark and Andrea Templeton will not be returning to the inn.

  ‘But they really should have said goodbye,’ Donny insists.

  ‘Probably there wasn’t time. Probably they had to rush to catch a plane,’ Daniel says gently as Wendy struggles to formulate another, more satisfying answer.

  She recognizes that Mark and Andrea, faithful to the pattern of their lives, did not think of Donny. Their grandson had not entered their emotional equation. Only their anger had absorbed them. The impact of her words had been lost on them. They had abandoned Donny even as they had abandoned Adam all the days of his life. They would remain within their own comfort zone, living their own lie. Oh, there would be birthday gifts and Christmas packages for their grandson and, in all probability, a trust fund. The checks, she assumed, would continue to arrive on the fifteenth day of the month. As indifferent as they had been to Adam’s life, they had been responsible; they had observed the necessary formalities. They had never forgotten his allowance, never forgotten his birthday. The Brooks Brothers parcels had arrived promptly each year. And that faithful remembrance had continued after his death with the remittance of financial support, birthday gifts, and Christmas packages to her and to Donny.

  Wendy imagines them righteously describing their New Hampshire vacations to Californian acquaintances.

  ‘Our son’s birthday,’ Andrea probably says. ‘We spend time with his widow and his son. We visit his grave.’

  She might even shed a discreet tear. Their friends, of course, will respect their grief, admire their courage. But the macabre reunions are over. Wendy wonders wryly how they will explain that to their friends. Perhaps they will say that they are old, they are exhausted. And yes, they are old, they are exhausted. Sighing, she turns to Donny.

  ‘Daniel is right,’ she says. ‘Your grandmother and grandfather must have had a very good reason to leave without saying goodbye. They love you. You know that.’

  She puts her arm about the boy, draws him close and knows that he does not believe her.

  There are no Scrabble games that evening. Greg does not play his guitar and even the pinball machines and the ping pong table are abandoned. Death has come too close. A need for solitude is upon them. They find quiet corners and turn the pages of their books, now and again looking up, fighting against a fatigue that threatens to blanket them with a sleep for which they are still unprepared.

  Annette and Paul finger the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle and then, by tacit consent, opt for a desultory game of checkers.

  ‘Polly’s like three years older than us,’ Annette says sadly. ‘She’s in college. A sophomore. Maybe a junior.’

  He nods. She is frightened and he is frightened. What happened to Polly might happen to them. They too are vulnerable to devastating loss. Parents die. Friends disappear.

  Tracy and Jeremy drive into the village with Richie. They want to nurse beers, listen to music and forget that the wings of death have, for the first time, brushed so close to them.

  Matt, Cary and Donny wander the room with their hands thrust into their pockets. They select a game from the shelf on which Louise stores the battered board games abandoned each year by departing youngsters. A piece is missing and they select another. The instructions are complicated.

  ‘It’s a stupid game,’ Cary says. He tosses the cards into the air as Donny and Matt pelt each other with the plastic playing pieces. They are, for the first time since their arrival, in the throes of boredom. The lassitude of the adults is contagious.

  ‘Aren’t you boys tired?’ Susan asks. ‘You really had a very busy day.’

  ‘Leave us alone. We’re not tired,’ Matt retorts angrily.

  He seethes with rage at his mother who will not be happy, who will not smile at his father. She is placing them – all of them – in jeopardy. He knows what he fears and he also knows, for the first time, the liberating power of anger.

  Susan blanches and turns away from her son, his mood so alien to his sweet nature. She shrugs into her cardigan and goes outside, grateful for the cold evening breeze that ruffles her hair, grateful for the narrow path of silver moonlight that she follows across the lawn. She looks up and sees that the light is on in their room. Jeff is up there, sprawled across the bed, staring at the ceiling. This is the posture he assumes in the aftermath of death. It is how she has always known that a patient of his has died despite all his efforts. She has learned over the years how to comfort him at such times, how to lie quietly beside him until the warmth of her body melts the fear and sorrow that grips him. But she will not do that tonight. Not tonight.

  Michael checks his email again and again. His laptop flies open and shut with staccato precision.

  ‘Stop that,’ Liane says. ‘You’re making me nervous.’

  He looks hard at her, sees that she has not turned a single page of the book she is supposedly reading, a tic that he has never seen before plays nervously at the corner of her mouth. His heart sinks. Is it possible that all the emotional gains of these past weeks will be lost if Mark Templeton has indee
d withdrawn his support, if the venture capital is not forthcoming? The familiar, cold vise of despair tightens about his heart. Unable to sit beside his wife a moment longer, he seeks out Louise in her office.

  ‘You’re certain that Mr Templeton did not leave a message for me?’ he asks.

  ‘I’m certain,’ Louise says. ‘I’m sure he’ll contact you tomorrow.’

  But she is lying. She is certain that Mark Templeton will not call, will not write, will not email. He has, for whatever reason, severed all ties with Mount Haven Inn and the guests of August.

  Michael returns to the rec room where Simon and Daniel are playing chess. He will not bother Simon again tonight. But Nessa, curled into the deepest of the worn leather chairs, barefoot as always, in a voluminous blue gown that matches the polish that dots her toenails, leans toward him.

  ‘Simon will call California in the morning, Michael,’ she says softly, and he smiles gratefully at her, envying Simon his wild-haired wife, who is so instinctively kind, so wonderfully indifferent to the judgment of others.

  ‘I know. Thanks.’

  ‘It’ll be OK,’ she adds.

  ‘Yeah. I know.’

  He glances across the room at Wendy, who has spent the evening with her sketchbook open but the charcoal stick is motionless in her hand, as though she cannot decide what she might draw next. Now and again she glances at Daniel. He in turn smiles at her, leans back, studies the chess board, and makes his next move. What will her own next move be, she wonders, and uses her charcoal stick to draw a whimsical question mark surrounded by stars.

  ‘I’m bored,’ Donny complains to his mother.

  ‘You’re not bored. Only stupid children are bored.’ Her reply is automatic. He has heard it often enough before.

  Louise brings a pitcher of cocoa, a platter of cookies. Like children in need of comfort, they sip the warm sweet drink, munch the cookies and then go to their rooms. They seek elusive comfort in their memories of the happy day at Franconia Notch. They are relieved that the evening of sadness and loss is over.