AS THE SPARKS FLY UPWARD

by Gloria Dank

  “Snooky can tell him,” said Bernard. “He and Detective Bentley appear to be old friends by now.”

  “I don’t see why I have to do it,” said Snooky. “It’s not a pleasant thing talking to Bentley under the best of circumstances. Why can’t you tell him?”

  “I would, but I can’t,” said Bernard. “I’m going to be busy.”

  “Busy? Doing what?”

  “Doing something I’ve looked forward to for a very long time.”

  Snooky looked at him quizzically. “Really? What’s that?”

  “Packing to leave.”

  Snooky dropped Bernard off at the cabin and took the road to Wolfingham. On his way to the police station, he made one short stop. He parked his car on the main street, put his keys in his pocket, and, whistling, walked a few blocks until he found what he was looking for. It was a small store with a red-and-white striped barber pole outside.

  He went in and said to the woman behind the counter, “Is Diane here today?”

  “Yes. Do you have an appointment?”

  “It’s not for a haircut. I’d like to talk to her for a moment.”

  The woman looked him over critically. “You could use a haircut.”

  “Thank you very much. Another time, perhaps. Is she here?”

  “Downstairs.”

  Snooky went down the steps to a small salon, bright with mirrors, where a gaggle of women were sitting. Diane Caldwell was there, a cigarette in one hand, a cup of coffee in the other.

  “You should wear your hair this way, really,” she was saying. “Up. It’s the newest style. You don’t have to cut it, just curl it under like this and fasten it with a—oh!”

  “Diane.”

  She looked frightened. Her lips, Snooky noticed in a detached way, were bright purple today. Her nails were a matching purple and her cheeks were pink. “Yes?”

  “Can I talk to you for a second?”

  “Sure.” She glanced at the women around her. “Ummm … upstairs. There’s more room upstairs.”

  They went up to the main floor, their images chasing after them in the mirror-lined walls, and stood near the door, where they could not be overheard. There were several customers in the store, and the room was loud with music, conversation and laughter.

  “So then my husband said to me …”

  “We went to Phoenix last year, what weather, I never in my life …”

  “I hurt my thumb and I couldn’t blow-dry for an entire month. I’m telling you, darling, it was awful. My hair looked like a rat’s nest …”

  “Diane.”

  “Yeah, I’m listening. What is it?”

  He told her.

  She listened to his story in silence. At the end, she stubbed out her cigarette in a nearby ashtray. “I see.”

  “He was going to leave her for you.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  They were silent. Around them swirled the unrelated conversations of other lives. Diane appeared to be deep in thought, her magenta lips pursed together.

  “He loved me best, the bastard.”

  Snooky nodded.

  “I told you he loved me best.”

  “Yes. You did.”

  “Thank you for coming.”

  They shook hands, and she went back downstairs. The woman behind the counter said something as she passed. Diane threw back her head and, with a return of her old spirit, said, “None of your beeswax, Charlene!”

  ———

  Bernard packed his suitcases with a great sense of joy and relief. He trundled them out to the car and stood waiting, shivering in the cold, for Maya. During the past few days Snooky had outdone himself as a host. One excellent gustatory experience had followed another, until now, at last, it was time to leave. Even Maya agreed that they had been away too long.

  “You’re right, sweetheart,” she had said the night before, in bed. “Now that I know Snooky’s safe, I can leave.”

  “Snooky’s always safe. The shadow of death passes over his head.”

  “I certainly hope so. Why are you so grouchy?”

  Bernard moved restlessly under the covers. “Misty’s taking up too much room under here. I don’t care if she is cold, I’m tired of having her in bed with us.”

  “Put her out, then. She can sleep near the fire.”

  Misty looked at him in horrified reproach as he dumped her over the side. She resignedly padded off to sleep, as Maya had predicted, near the warm embers of the hearth. “That’s better.”

  “Why, look, darling, we’re alone,” said Maya, and edged closer to him. Bernard felt his contentment grow and expand in a joyful bubble as he gathered her into his arms.

  Now he stood shivering as Maya and Snooky came out of the cabin arm in arm. They were laughing, heads thrown back, the same laugh, the same pose. Like twins, Bernard reflected sourly. The good twin and her evil twin. Snooky was carrying Misty in his other arm. He dumped her in the back seat of the car, where she sat drooling with anticipatory nausea at the trip.

  “There she is. She looks a little green already, Bernard. If I were you, I’d drive fast, or stop often, or both. She doesn’t look to me like she’s going to make it.”

  “Misty hates to travel.”

  “Like her owner.”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, thank you for coming. May I say it’s been wonderful working my fingers to the bone for the two of you. You are the perfect guests—almost as perfect as I am.”

  “We’re not in your league, Snooks,” said Maya, giving him a motherly peck on the cheek. “But then, of course, we haven’t had the kind of practice you have.”

  “Take care of yourselves. Have a safe trip home.”

  Bernard opened the door for Maya, then went around and got in the driver’s seat. “Just one thing, Snooky,” he said, leaning out the window.

  “Yes?”

  “Try to give us a running start before you get in your car and come visit us, all right?”

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I already have other plans. Sarah and I are heading north in a week or so. I have friends in Canada, you know.”

  This came as no surprise. Snooky had a seemingly infinite network of friends spread out over the continental United States, Canada and Mexico, all of whom appeared to be delighted to see him on a moment’s notice.

  Maya lifted an eyebrow. “You and Sarah?”

  “Yes. She’s forgiven me for searching through Gertie’s belongings. And the Wuxlers are coming back soon to claim their cabin.”

  “Have a good time,” said Bernard, withdrawing his head like a turtle into the recesses of the car.

  “Thanks. I will.”

  “Don’t go looking for trouble.”

  “I never go looking for it, Bernard. It seems to come and find me. Have a good trip.”

  “So long.”

  “So long!” called Maya. She waved at her brother as the car moved off gingerly down the bumpy road, and Misty prepared herself to be sick in the back seat.

  Bernard sat, contented as a king, enthroned in the red leather chair in his study. There was a cup of coffee steaming on his desk, Misty was snoring at his feet, and there was a light snow falling outside. The blue light slanting in through the narrow windows was, Bernard felt, the perfect touch to a perfect scene. He and Maya had arrived home several weeks ago to find that the house had not been burglarized and stripped of its contents, that old Mr. Sanders from next door had hobbled across their adjoining lawns like clockwork, once a week, to take care of the plants in the solarium and collect the mail, and that life in Ridgewood, Connecticut, was in fact as perfect as Bernard remembered it. Maya had looked over the jungle of plants in the sun room with a faintly disappointed air.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “It’s these plants.”

  Bernard looked around. The plants looked wonderful; if anything, larger, glossier and healthier than before they went away. “What? They look fine.”

  “That’s the problem, Bernard. They
look more than fine. They look terrific. They look better than when I take care of them.”

  “Mr. Sanders used to be a gardener.”

  “Mr. Sanders knows something I don’t.”

  “You could ask him.”

  Maya sniffed and turned away, twiddling disconsolately with the end of a vine.

  Now Bernard sat at his typewriter, looking at a page of the Mrs. Woolly manuscript. It was the final scene, and Mrs. Woolly was lecturing the children on the lessons they had learned. Mrs. Woolly’s great-nephew, Kiddykins, was cavorting on a slope nearby, and at the end the children went and played with him. The sun was a large bright disk in the sky, and it was hot where Mrs. Woolly was, in the middle of the endless summer of Woolly-land. Bernard grunted and ran a finger around his shirt collar. It was hot where he was, too. The rickety old Victorian where he and Maya lived was riddled with cracks where the wind blew in, so he had lugged an old space heater into his study, which was now filling the room with stifling heat. Bernard switched it off. Poor Misty, he thought. She must be nearly cooked by now.

  He got up slowly, lost in a dream of Woolly-land, and opened the window a few inches, enough to let the chill air in. He stood at the window for a moment, meditating, and as he stood there he became faintly aware of a ringing sound. His study door was closed, but it seemed to him … yes, it must be the telephone …

  He opened the door and stood listening. Yes. The telephone in the master bedroom. He scowled. Maya was out for the afternoon and she had asked him to answer the phone and take a message. Of course it would not be for him; it so rarely was. Only Maya had friends who bothered to telephone. Occasionally Bernard’s agent or publisher called, but that was all, and he had spoken to both of them only the day before.

  He went into the bedroom, sat down heavily on the edge of the great bed with its carved oak frame, and regarded the ringing telephone with a solemn expression in his eyes. Perhaps if he didn’t answer it … perhaps if he moved his hand so very slowly that he couldn’t get to it in time … perhaps then it would stop ringing and whoever was on the other end would go away, or call again at a better time, when Maya was in. Perhaps if he moved his hand ever so slowly …

  He counted nine, ten, eleven rings. At last, with a sigh, he picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

  “I knew you were there,” said Snooky. He sounded far away, disembodied, like a voice from Mars.

  “Good Lord. Where are you calling from?”

  “Banff, Canada.”

  “Oh.”

  “If you’re answering the phone, Bernard, I assume that my sister isn’t home, or that you have her bound and gagged in the closet.”

  “That’s right.”

  “So I’ll talk to you.” Snooky’s voice sounded so far away it was practically ethereal; Bernard felt he was hearing the voice of an angel, except for the occasional spurt of static across the line.

  “What’s going on? How’s Sarah?”

  “She’s fine.”

  “Say hello from us.”

  “I will.”

  There was a long silence, interspersed with the cheerful crackle of static.

  “Thank you for calling,” said Bernard. “I have to go now.”

  “You’re sure my sister isn’t home?”

  “Quite sure.”

  “Oh. Well, listen. I’d rather have suggested this to her, but … I’m calling to ask if the two of you would like to come up here sometime. It’s even more beautiful than the cabin—we’ve rented this Swiss chalet-type thing—and there’s more than enough room. Sarah and I would love it if the two of you could visit.”

  “No, thank you.”

  “It wouldn’t have to be right away. I know how you feel about traveling. But I think you’d be missing something if you didn’t come, Bernard. It’s breathtakingly beautiful here. The mountains are incredible, and there’s great skiing—oh, you don’t ski, do you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, you could learn. I know Maya loves to ski. I don’t ski much myself, but Sarah goes on the slopes and I sit by the fire. There’s a beautiful indoor swimming pool here, with glass walls all around. And there are caribou, Bernard.”

  “Caribou?”

  “Herds of them. They roam across the fields at dusk. The most gorgeous creatures you’ve ever seen. Caribou, or maybe elk. Sarah says they’re elk, but I’m not sure. Can you tell the difference?”

  “No.”

  “Neither can I. Gertie would have known. But they’re something, all right. You’ve never seen anything like it. The mountains go as far as the eye can see. And it’s been snowing here, Bernard—real snow—about three feet of it. It’s a winter paradise. The chalet is very comfortable, and there’s plenty of room for everybody. You could fly out of New York and be here in the morning.”

  “What’s the temperature?”

  “The temperature? Oh, I don’t know. About fifteen below, I think. Of course, at night it’s much colder.”

  “Good-bye, Snooky. Thank you for calling.”

  “Don’t go yet, Bernard. Wait a minute. Perhaps I haven’t described it fully enough. The mountains go as far as the eye can see. Did I say that already? They’re spectacular. And the caribou or elk or whatever they are run across our lawn at night. You could sit and have hot chocolate by the fire, and in the evenings I would cook for you. Beef stew, Bernard. Beef stew every night. And the stars. Did I mention them already? The stars are incredible. Sarah and I go outside and look at them for hours. You can see the Milky Way. The stars look like—like jewels across the sky.”

  “Good-bye.”

  “Wait. Do me one favor before you go. Please tell Maya I called. I know there’s only a fifty-fifty chance you will, but I’d like to speak to her. Here’s my number. Do you have a pencil and paper?”

  “Yes,” said Bernard, who didn’t.

  “Good. Here’s my number. Six oh four—that’s the area code—six oh four, five nine two—”

  “What?”

  “Six oh four, that’s the area code, five nine two—”

  “What!”

  “SIX OH FOUR, THAT’S THE AREA CODE, FIVE NINE TWO …”

  Bernard tapped the receiver impatiently. “I can’t hear you, Snooky. It’s all static on my side. Would you try that number again? Say it louder this time.”

  “SIX OH FOUR,” shrieked Snooky’s voice across the miles and miles of snow and wilderness separating Banff, Canada, from the milder plains of Ridgewood, Connecticut. “SIX OH FOUR, FIVE NINE TWO …”

  “I’m losing the connection,” bellowed Bernard. He tapped at it again. “Can you hear me? It’s just static, Snooky. Can you hear me? I can’t hear anything at all. You’re fading.”

  “SIX OH FOUR,” shrieked the voice from the northern wilderness, in a tone of mingled rage and despair. “FIVE NINE TWO …”

  “I have to go now, Snooky. I’m so sorry. I can’t hear you at all. It’s a long way, you know. A long way for a person to travel. I hope you can hear me, because I’ve lost you completely. Good-bye. Thanks again for calling.”

  “BERNARD,” came a wail from the other end of the phone. Bernard winced and held the phone away from his ear.

  “I’M SORRY,” he bawled into the receiver. “I CAN’T HEAR YOU, SNOOKY. GOOD-BYE. CALL AGAIN ANOTHER TIME.”

  “BERNARD,” cried the voice in a shrill wail. “PLEASE TELL MAYA I SAID …”

  “Good-bye,” said Bernard, and replaced the receiver gently on its hook.