“Russian resistance continues all along the front with heavy fighting in the vicinity of Moscow. In the meanwhile, the R.A.F. has not been idle. Continuing their air offensive, large bomber formations streaked across the Channel into Western Germany, finding their targets with difficulty because of inclement weather.”
Jeffrey raised his voice against the other voice.
“Turn that damn thing off,” he shouted at Charley.
46
Conversation in the Small Hours
Before Jeffrey was fully awake his common sense told him that the sound that had awakened him was from one of those thunderstorms that sometimes swept up the valley. Nevertheless there was a familiar booming cadence like guns, and for just an instant when his eyes were closed and he was moving into consciousness, he might have been back where the Squadron slept beyond the flying field. The sound of the thunder was not alarming as much as it was insistent. When the guns had awakened him, their cadence would rise and fall like thunder. As Jeffrey listened a flash of lightning lit up the room where he and Madge were sleeping so that he knew he had been dreaming, but the mood of the dream was left with him.
He felt very definitely that he would not live forever, and then he was wide awake and listening to the rain outside. All at once he felt very weary, for his time had not been severed suddenly in one grand sweep, as it would have been had he died out there when he was young, and as Jim might die. Instead his time had been cut off bit by bit without his having noticed, painlessly but surely. There was the lack of resilience in his muscles and the grayness in his hair. They still said that he looked “so young,” but that in itself meant that he could not be young. The years had been cut off one by one without his knowing where they had gone. There were all the things that he meant to do and which he knew he never would. There was that play which he wrote too late, and that was gone. There was Marianna Miller and that was gone—none of it would ever come back, and what there was in the present was not as important as the past.
“Jeff?” He heard Madge call quite softly to him. “Are you awake?”
“Yes,” he said, “I’m awake.”
“How long has it been storming?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “It woke me up.”
“Do you think it’s blowing in anywhere?”
“No,” he said, “there isn’t any wind. It isn’t blowing in.”
“Jeff,” she said, “turn on the light.”
“Why?” he asked. “It’s all right. Go to sleep.”
“Jeff,” she asked, “what were you thinking about?”
“About my sins I guess,” he said. “Go to sleep, Madge.”
“No,” she said. “Turn on the light.”
He turned on the light on the bedroom table, and there he was and there she was, and all the present and all the years of their intimacy were back. Madge had propped herself up on her elbow and was looking at him across the space between their twin beds.
“Jeff,” she said, “I don’t see what he sees in her.”
“What?” Jeffrey asked. “Who?”
Then he realized they were back exactly where they had been before they went to sleep. He heard Madge sigh.
“Jeff,” Madge said, “you must have thought—you couldn’t help thinking … she was very unattractive.”
Then Jeffrey sighed. He wished that Madge did not feel it necessary to go over Sally Sales in the middle of the night.
“I don’t know, Madge,” Jeffrey said. “I told you I didn’t know what I saw in her. All girls that age look alike. There isn’t anything to see. When Gwen grows up she’ll look like that. They all do.”
“Gwen will not!” Madge said.
“All right,” Jeffrey said, “all right, she won’t look like that, unless she can’t help it. They all wear the same clothes. They all do the same things. It’s life.”
“They don’t all do the same things,” Madge said. “Gwen is a lady, at least she ought to be.”
“Gwen is an overmannered silly little girl,” Jeffrey said.
“Jeff,” Madge said, “why do you keep saying that again and again? I’ve told you and I’ve told you Gwen is simply going through a phase. All girls go through it and all girls get over it.”
“Well, it’s a hell of a phase,” Jeffrey said. “I don’t believe the Sales girl ever went through any phase like that. If I had to pick between the two of them to live on a desert island with, I’d pick Sales.”
Madge laughed softly but not agreeably.
“What’s the joke?” Jeffrey asked.
Madge laughed again softly but not agreeably.
“You,” Madge said. “Dear, you’re amazing sometimes.”
“Oh,” Jeffrey said, “am I?”
“Sometimes I think you know so much about people,” Madge said, “and then you show your blind spot; but then only women can judge women.”
“Darling,” Jeffrey said, and he laughed too, “didn’t someone say that before?”
“Darling,” Madge said, “I’m not finding fault. I know you can’t help it, because you do have a very queer taste in women. I don’t mean vulgar exactly. I just mean queer. Now I know you like that Mrs. Newcombe. I do watch you sometimes, darling. I suppose it’s because you’ve been in the theater so much, where everyone is overdressed and overemphasized and overemotional. There are all those theater people like Marianna Miller.”
Jeffrey sat up straighter in bed.
“Madge,” he said, “maybe I’d better go downstairs and see about the windows. It’s a little windier now. It may be blowing in.”
“I don’t know why you always change the subject when I talk about Marianna,” Madge said, “because I like her, Jeff. I really like her very much. I know how good she is professionally, but you know what I mean. There are all sorts of little things about her that you seem to miss.”
“What,” Jeffrey said. “What sort of things do I seem to miss?”
“All sorts of little things,” Madge said. “And you’re so sensitive and so perceptive sometimes. You’re able to be so devastating about so many people. You tear poor Fred and Beckie apart, for instance, and yet you don’t see any of those things in Marianna Miller.”
“What things?” Jeffrey asked.
It was as though he had been awakened again by the sound of the thunder. Madge seemed to be talking unnecessarily about something which was over long ago.
“I like her, dear,” Madge said. “I like her very much and she’s very sweet in a great many ways, but I don’t see why you’ve never seen that she’s a little on the dull side. I suppose it’s her looks that make you miss it. And she is pretty when you add her features all together and don’t take them individually. I know she has a certain charm, and I love having her with company because she’s so gay. But I don’t see why you don’t see that she’s overemotional and a little vulgar.”
“Vulgar?” Jeffrey asked. “Why is she vulgar?”
“Now don’t be hurt, dear,” Madge said. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have said vulgar, but egotistical, and there are any number of other little things—”
“Go ahead,” Jeffrey said, “what little things?”
Madge laughed again and this time her laugh was soft and happy.
“Darling,” she said, “you’d find out in a day if you’d ever lived with her. There are all sorts of things that would drive you crazy and that’s why I’ve never worried about Marianna—little small-town cosmetic-counter things—that Bellodgia, clouds and clouds of Bellodgia, and those billowy dresses and that bouncy little obvious way she has, and that sort of a night-club-hostess voice. Of course, you don’t notice because all a man sees is her face. He wouldn’t see that she doesn’t wash behind the ears.”
“My God,” Jeffrey said, “Marianna washes all the time.… She washes and washes.”
“Why, Jeffrey,” Madge asked, “how do you know how much she washes?”
“Perhaps I just assume it,” Jeffrey said. “Never mind it, Madge.”
“I don’t mind it,” Madge said, and she laughed again. “I always feel perfectly safe when you’re with Marianna, because I know you couldn’t stand her for a day, but I didn’t mean to be hard on Marianna. I just brought her up, just as an example, because—”
“Because what?” Jeffrey asked and he sat up straighter.
“Because it shows you’re so oblivious in some ways. Now that little thing—what’s her name? I keep forgetting it.”
Madge puckered her forehead and smiled, seemingly amused by her own forgetfulness, but of course she knew her name.
“You mean Sally Sales?” Jeffrey asked. They were back again with Sally Sales. No matter how long he lived he still made curious and disturbing discoveries about himself. There in the middle of the night he seemed to be more involved with Sally Sales than he was with Marianna Miller, perhaps because of his earlier thought that Marianna Miller and all that he associated with her was gone for good, cut off by time, while Jim was still a part of him. He could see Jim helping Sally from the train and that light on her hair and that embarrassed understanding between them, and her loneliness in the hall.
“Of course,” Madge said, “I don’t know why I keep forgetting. Sally Sales. Jeff, didn’t it occur to you, really, that she’s a little common? That’s what I can’t understand in Jim, because I would have thought Jim would see it. He’s always been very fastidious. You do admit, don’t you, that she’s common?”
“How do you mean?” Jeffrey asked, and he was anxious to know. He did not want Sally Sales to be common.
“Any woman would see,” Madge said. “Of course, superficially she’s rather pretty, and she has a pretty figure. I suppose you noticed her figure?”
“If she’s all right superficially, what’s wrong with her?” Jeffrey asked. “And I didn’t notice her figure.”
Madge sighed again and looked straight ahead of her at the shadows in the corner of the room, as though she were conjuring up Sally Sales and her pretty figure.
“Her ankles, Jeff,” Madge said. “Didn’t you notice her ankles?”
“Yes, I did,” Jeffrey said. “She couldn’t help it. She was wearing high-heeled shoes.”
“Yes,” Madge said. “Those dreadful little shoes and the bag that matched.”
“No kid knows how to dress,” Jeffrey said, “when she’s as young as that.”
“Her mother might have taught her,” Madge said. “It shows where she came from.”
“My God,” Jeffrey said, “look what Gwen manages to buy when you let her in a store. No young girl knows how to dress.”
“Darling,” Madge said. “Gwen’s years younger, and she’s going through a phase, and suppose you let me worry about Gwen’s clothes, and don’t keep comparing her with Gwen.”
“I only say,” Jeffrey said, “that no young girl knows how to dress, and no boy does either. You’ve got to be older before you know how to wear clothes. Look at that uniform of Jim’s.”
“He was stunning in it,” Madge said. “What’s the matter with it?”
“Never mind,” Jeffrey said. “I wish you wouldn’t be so hard on her, Madge.”
“I’m not, dear,” Madge said. “I feel a little sorry for her really—but that hair-do and the lipstick—ugh, that lipstick!”
“Kids don’t know about lipstick when they first try it out,” Jeffrey said. “You didn’t know about it. Ugh, your own lipstick!”
“Why, Jeff,” Madge said, and she laughed, “why haven’t you ever told me you didn’t like it, dear?”
“Because I’m not a woman,” Jeffrey said, “thank God; and what about Gwen’s lipstick?”
“Jeffrey,” Madge said, “please. Don’t keep trotting out poor little Gwen, when she’s going through a phase.”
“All right,” Jeffrey said, “maybe little Sales is going through a phase.”
“I hope she is, dear,” Madge said, “but I don’t think she’ll change much. She’s a little old to change.”
“Old?” Jeffrey repeated. “My God, Madge!”
“Not in terms of you and me, dear,” Madge said, “but if you notice her eyes and forehead you’ll see what I mean. Of course she’s older than Jim—perhaps three or four years older.”
“Well, she isn’t,” Jeffrey said. “She’s just nineteen.”
Madge laughed.
“Why darling,” she said, “I didn’t know you’d got so far with her. It didn’t seem to me she said anything to anybody. When did she tell you? After dinner?”
“She didn’t tell me,” Jeffrey answered. “Jim told me.”
“Jim?” Madge repeated. “Why don’t you ever tell me anything, Jeff? I tried to talk to Jim about her and he was so self-conscious and elusive—What else did Jim tell you, Jeff?”
“Ask Jim,” Jeffrey said. “He can tell you if he wants.”
“Don’t be so mysterious, dear,” Madge said. “Please don’t act as if Jim were grown-up and you were men sticking together.”
“I’m only being fair,” Jeffrey said. “She’s his girl, she isn’t mine. Go ahead. What else is wrong with her?”
Madge looked at him sharply and her forehead wrinkled.
“Jeff,” she said, “you act as if she were your girl. You really do.”
It startled Jeffrey, because she was right in a way.
“You’re not jealous, are you?” he asked.
The wrinkles in her forehead deepened.
“Darling,” she said, “I suppose you read that somewhere, the mother-son complex. I suppose I’m secretly in love myself with Jim and I don’t know it. Jeff, you must have noticed her voice. You’re so sensitive to voices. And the words she used. Everything was ‘sweet, sweet, sweet.’”
“Listen, Madge,” Jeffrey said. “Don’t you know she was scared to death? Don’t you see she’s awfully young?”
“I wish you’d stop it, Jeff!” Madge said, and her voice had a wholly different note. “Don’t keep saying she’s young.”
“Well, she is,” Jeffrey said. “She’s young.”
“If you keep saying that,” Madge said, “I’ll scream! Do you or don’t you want Jim to marry her?”
“Madge,” Jeffrey said, “the storm’s over now. Let’s turn out the light and go to sleep.” But she said it again.
“Do you,” she asked, “or don’t you want Jim to marry her?”
“My God,” Jeffrey said, “I don’t know. Let’s turn out the light and go to sleep.”
“You don’t know?” Madge repeated, and her voice rose higher. “You don’t know?”
“No,” Jeffrey answered. “It just seems to me he’s in love with her, awfully in love with her, and she’s awfully in love with him. You and I don’t know what may happen. We were awfully in love ourselves once, Madge.” He was sorry for her because she was as much involved with it as he was and she too was identified with Jim. She too was living his life vicariously and passionately, and there was nothing you could do about it the way the world was going. The thunder was moving off eastward to the Sound but it still sounded like artillery. The air was fresher as it always was after rain.
“Oh, Jeff,” she said.
He did not answer.
“Jeff, I wish you wouldn’t keep acting as if Jim were going to die.”
It made him answer very quickly.
“I never said that,” he answered. “And don’t you say it, either, Madge.”
“You act that way,” Madge said.
“Madge,” Jeffrey said, “I’m tired. Let’s go to sleep.”
“Jeff,” she began, “oh, Jeff, don’t you see …”
There was enough light in the sky to show the outlines of the maple branches against the window. He could see the leaves moving softly because a light breeze was coming up. He was listening to her ideas and everything she said was true. It was absurd because they were so young. Their characters were not developed and they both might realize later that they had made a mistake. Then there was the matter of difference of background. She an
d Jeffrey had struggled with that difference—and how could Jim marry a girl if he could not support her? As soon as Jim saw her with some nice girls … Jeffrey lay there listening and staring at the dark.
“They’ve been in love quite a while,” he said.
He lay there listening, staring at the dark. There were those verses from Ecclesiastes again. For everything there was a season, a time to love and a time to hate, a time to laugh and a time to weep, and a time to live. The way things were going, God knew there was not much time.
47
Just around the Corner
Jeffrey was old enough to know that nothing ever turned out quite the way one hoped, but he had looked forward for a long time to those ten days when Jim would be at home. He had thought of them ever since he had come to the country that June and he had not considered them entirely in terms of himself. He had thought of the whole family being together, and of getting back again to the family where he belonged. He was more conscious than he ever had been before that Madge and the children were all that mattered and all that he had left. Then, also, there were all those things that he wanted to say to Jim, now that Jim was grown-up, but for which there seemed to be no time now that Jim was back. Jeffrey felt as though he were only standing watching in a helpless sort of way, listening to the children’s voices and to Jim’s voice, and somehow he was not an essential part of it. Everything seemed to be going very well without him, almost as though he were not there.
Madge said, because Madge was conscious of it too, that Jim’s infatuation for Sally Sales had spoiled it all, and sometimes Jeffrey agreed with her, but not entirely. He did not want to impose on Jim; he only wished that he were not standing looking while the time went by, because there were so many things he wanted to do with Jim which he thought Jim would like. He told himself that it was not Jim’s fault, that Jim had no time for him.
He did not want Jim to feel any obligation toward him and he told himself so carefully every day. Yet when Jim got his orders in the middle of the week to report to a camp near Portland, Oregon, Jeffrey wished that they might have gone over Jim’s plans together. Jeffrey could have told him a good deal about the West Coast and Oregon. He still felt that he knew camps and the army better than Jim did. There were things that might make you very unhappy in the army if you did not understand them. When you were young, for instance, all field officers seemed very old and as far removed from the realities of military life as a group of strange animals. When a young officer came in contact with his superiors he generally considered them overbearing and stupid and usually they were. Nevertheless, he wanted to tell Jim that this apparent stupidity and this West Point conceit, which every civilian officer hated, was apt to cloak a distinct combative ability when you got into a fight. He wanted Jim to realize that he must suspend judgment on majors and colonels and to realize that they were not as bad as you thought they were. He wanted to tell Jim a great many things that had happened in the A.E.F. in France which he had never told anyone, but which he thought might be useful if they got into war. He wanted to tell Jim to remember that everyone was afraid and not to be ashamed of it. He wanted Jim to realize that there were times to be careful and times not to be. He wanted to tell Jim about Stan Rhett that day they were shot down; and there never seemed to be an opportunity—never the time or the place. Madge or Charley was always there, or Sally Sales. There was never any time.
So Little Time Page 57