The Collected Stories of Richard Yates

by Richard Yates

  Murphy said it did seem funny, and then it happened. The eyes got big, and when the voice came it was small, intense, not Murphy’s voice at all. “Reckon the war’s over?” Something fluttered down Cramer’s spine. “By God, Murphy. By God, it makes sense. It makes sense, all right.”

  “Damned if it don’t,” Murphy said, and they gaped at each other, starting to grin; wanting to laugh and shout, to get out and run.

  “Son of a bitch,” Murphy said.

  Cramer heard his own voice, high and babbling: “That could be why the artillery stopped.”

  Could it be this easy? Could it happen this way? Would the message come down from headquarters? Would Battalion get it from Regiment? Would Francetti, the platoon runner, come stumbling out across this plowed field with the news? Francetti, waving his pudgy arms and screaming, “Hey, you guys! Come on back! It’s all over! It’s all over, you guys!” Crazy. Crazy. But why not?

  “By God, Murphy, do you think so?”

  “Watch for flares,” Murphy said. “They might shoot flares.”

  “Yeah, that’s an idea, they might shoot flares.”

  They could see nothing, hear nothing except the faint, silver monotony of the bells. Remember this. Remember every second of it. Remember Murphy’s face and the hole and the canteens and the mist. Keep it all.

  Watch for flares.

  Remember the date. March something. No, April. April something, 1945. What did Meyers say the other day? Day before yesterday? Meyers told you the date then. He said, “What do you know, this is Good—”

  Cramer swallowed, then looked at Murphy quickly. “Wait a minute wait a minute. We’re wrong.” He watched Murphy’s smile grow limp as he told him. “Meyers. Remember what Meyers said about Good Friday? This is Easter Sunday, Murph.”

  Murphy eased himself back against the side of the hole. “Oh yeah,” he said. “Oh yeah, sure. That’s right.”

  Cramer swallowed again and said, “Kraut civilians probably going to church back there.”

  Murphy’s lips came together in a single black line, and he was quiet for a while. Then, stubbing his cigarette in the dirt, he said, “Son of a bitch. Easter Sunday.”

  Evening on the Côte d’Azur

  WHEN SHE’D PACKED up the remains of the picnic lunch and got the twins settled in their carriage, Betty Meyers looked around for Bobby, her five-year-old. Squinting against the sun, she finally saw him way up the beach, playing with some French kids. “Bobby!” she yelled, but he pretended not to hear and she started off to get him, slow with weariness, feeling the alien stares of men and girls who lay all but naked on the sand.

  When Bobby saw her coming he took off, and she had to run clumsily after him, knowing she must look a sight with the heavy flesh wobbling in her playsuit. Finally she caught him and gave him a couple of good hard smacks. He set up an awful howl but he came along nicely enough, once she had a grip on his wrist. The French kids he’d been playing with backed away shyly, holding their hands to their mouths. She hated to hit him—it always made her feel like hell afterwards—but he’d been asking for it all afternoon. He stopped crying by the time they got back on the promenade—still snuffling, but she could tell the worst was over. “All right, now listen,” she said. “Do you have to go? Because if you do, speak up now. I don’t want you bothering me all the way home. Do you?”

  “No, Ma.”

  “All right then. Come on.” Pushing the twins’ carriage, with Bobby walking beside her, she began the long trip back to the apartment, past the palm trees and sidewalk cafés, past the little bars around the yacht basin with their signs saying WELCOME U.S. NAVY AND MARINES.

  As far as Betty Meyers was concerned the French could keep their Riviera. They could take their whole lousy country and turn it over to the Communists tomorrow, for that matter, and she’d say “good riddance.” All she wanted was to be back in Bayonne, New Jersey, where she belonged. Oh, she knew the Sixth Fleet was supposed to be a good deal, and everything. Some of the other Navy wives made her sick the way they carried on about it—“You mean you don’t like it here? Don’t you think it’s beautiful?”—but you could always be sure the ones who talked that way were the ones that didn’t have any kids. They could lie around rubbing sun lotion all over themselves in those sexy little bikini bathing suits, sucking up to the officers’ wives and having a high old time. They could even learn French and at least be able to talk to people, maybe keep from getting cheated every time they went into a store, but what could she do?

  “Hey Ma, buy me an ice cream,” Bobby said. He sure got over his grief in a hurry. “Buy me an ice cream, Ma.”

  “Come on,” she told him. “Come on. We can’t stop now.”

  They went around the Hotel de Ville and cut across the intersection where you always took your life in your hands, what with the way these people tore around with their damn motorcycles and their funny little cars. When they climbed the hill through the slummy part of town and came out on the highway, loud with trucks and buses, that was the last leg of the journey. She always had to steer the carriage with one hand here, and hang on to Bobby with the other, because once he had run ahead, gone off the sidewalk when trucks were coming and practically given her heart failure.

  “Hey Ma, you’re hurtin’ my arm.”

  “I’ll hurt it a lot worse if you don’t start acting your age. Get your hands off that carriage.”

  “Hey Ma?”

  “What is it now?”

  “I have to go, Ma.” And then the twins started to yell.

  At last she turned off into the quiet garden of the apartment house. It was a big white slab of a house, set back from the road in a grove of royal palms. It was supposed to have been a luxury hotel before the war, but Betty didn’t care if it had been the castle of the king of France—she hated the place. For one thing her apartment was too small—even now, with Eddie at sea—and for another thing she’d never met such snooty people in her life as the people who lived in that house. Even the concierge (and who the hell did she think she was?) acted like it was costing her money every time she said hello. It didn’t seem to be anything personal, because Marylou Smith, the other Navy wife who lived there, got the same treatment. They just had some grudge against Americans, and they sure didn’t care who knew it.

  There was the usual trouble with Bobby in the elevator—he always wanted to stick his fingers through the cage when it was moving—and by the time Betty got the carriage wheeled into the apartment, she was just about ready to sit down and cry. It wasn’t until she’d slammed the door that she noticed somebody had shoved a piece of paper underneath it. The handwriting looked so foreign that at first she thought it was written in French; then she made out the words.

  Make your infants be more quiet if you please. I receive many complains.

  Concierge.

  Well, that did it. The hot tears ran down her nose as she bent over the stove to fix the twins’ bottles, and she had to turn away so Bobby wouldn’t see the puckering of her face. These damn, damn, damn people—this damn, damn, damn country. She had never been so lonely in her life.

  “Hey Ma, whaddya cryin’ about?”

  “I’m not. None of your business. Go away now, willya please, Bobby?”

  The doorbell rang and she wiped her face quickly, hurrying to answer it.

  “Hi, Betty,” Marylou Smith said in her sleepy Southern way. She came in all dressed up, as usual, dragging Brenda, her six-year-old.

  “Boy, am I glad to see you,” Betty said, and the funny part was it was true. She didn’t even like Marylou much, but their husbands were shipmates and Marylou was about the closest thing to a friend she’d had since she came overseas. “Honestly, I’m gonna go nuts if I have to stay in this country one more minute. Look at this! Look what that damn little lowlife concierge had the nerve to stick under my door!”

  Marylou read the note slowly, aloud, and dropped it on a table. “Oh, that. This the first one of them y’all got? We get ’em all th
e time. I just don’t pay no ‘tention any more.”

  That was something, anyway. At least she wasn’t the only one.

  Marylou strolled to a mirror and touched up her hair. “Where y’all been all day, Betty? Been looking all over for ya.”

  “Oh, down to the beach.”

  “Yeah? You shoulda tole me you was goin’ down. I’da come along. Don’t much like goin’ down there by myself.” Marylou didn’t much like doing anything by herself, as a matter of fact—that was one of the annoying things about her. She was like a helpless kid; had to have somebody with her all the time. “Listen, Betty, let’s us have supper together tonight, okay? I got this big old roast pork, and we can cook it in your place. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Betty said. Another time she might have thought up an excuse, but tonight it seemed like a good idea. At least she’d have somebody to talk to.

  “I’ll go get all the stuff then,” Marylou said, and started for the door, trailing perfume. Betty couldn’t understand why she always dressed up like that—nylons, heels, a tight skirt—just for sitting around the house. Maybe Southern girls were different, but it seemed funny. “Now you stay here and play, Brenda,” Marylou said, shaking her finger, “and don’t you get inta no trouble while I’m gone, hear?” But Brenda was already in trouble. She had picked up one of Bobby’s toys, a broken sailboat, and when Bobby grabbed for it she gave him a shove that sat him on the floor. She was a mean one, that Brenda. “You watch your manners, hear?” Marylou said. She swung at her, missing, awkwardly stooping in the tight skirt.

  Brenda skittered away out of reach, still holding the sailboat, and started acting up. “I’m gonna tell Daddy on you,” she told her mother, fresh as you please.

  “What you gonna tell him?” Marylou demanded, hands on her hips. It was funny to watch them together—they were like two little kids. “You’re so smart, what you gonna tell him?”

  “‘Bout your boyfriend,” Brenda said, and this time Marylou didn’t miss. In two quick high-heeled steps she bore down on the little girl and hit her so hard the sailboat fell on the floor. “Don’t you tell no lies, you little liar!” she yelled over Brenda’s howling. “I’ll teach you to go telling lies!”

  Well, really, Betty thought, and it was hard to keep from staring. This would be one to tell Eddie when he came home—he always did say Marylou looked like a little tramp. Not that Betty had anything against the girl—and she was no prude or anything—but still, when a person’s own kid said something like that, it really made you think.

  “Don’t know what gets inta that little head of hers, makes her talk that way to her own mother,” Marylou said. “Now you hush your cryin’, Brenda, and see if you can’t act nice. Hear?”

  The way it worked out, Betty did all the cooking. Marylou just sat around the kitchen smoking cigarettes, not even offering to help set the table, but Betty didn’t really mind; at least by doing everything herself she could be sure it was done right. The dinner itself was a rat race, what with the kids throwing bread and gravy at each other, and yelling all the time, and afterwards there were a million dishes to wash. Marylou did the drying, which was some help, even though Betty had to keep stopping to show her where the various plates went. But finally they were through and the kids were all put to bed—they put Brenda in the twins’ bed and let the twins sleep in their carriage—and they could relax over a cup of coffee in the living room, looking out at the evening sea through the tall trunks of the royal palms.

  “You got a right pretty view from here,” Marylou said, squirming contentedly on the couch. “I like it a whole lot better’n the one we got.”

  “Yeah, it’s nice,” Betty said, “but I dunno. I’m so used to it now I don’t hardly notice it any more. Might just as well be wallpaper or something.” When Eddie was home his carrier was anchored within sight of the windows; it had been sort of nice to lie here and see its big silhouette out there on the water—reassuring, as if it were there to watch over her. Now a different part of the fleet was in, and the bay was crowded with smaller, funny-looking ships—minesweepers, she thought. “Six more weeks,” she said. “Right?”

  “Is that all it is, six weeks? I thought it was seven. No, lemme see”— Marylou counted her red fingernails —“yeah, you’re right, six weeks.”

  “God, I can hardly wait, can you?” But even as she said it Betty knew it was only partly true. Lonely or not she was no fool, and she remembered the last leave well enough—Eddie complaining (“Can’t’cha keep this place clean?”) and worrying about the kids messing up his damn precious dress blues. And the evenings: play cards and quarrel, quarrel and play cards. “Listen, Marylou, this time when they’re home, whaddya say we go out more, the four of us, instead of sitting around playing canasta every night. Eddie and I only went out twice the whole time he was here last time. And I mean you need to get out once in a while—get dressed up and go to one of those nightclubs in town, maybe just take a walk along the promenade or something—at least get out of the apartment and feel like a human being.”

  Marylou gave a little glancing smile that made her look just like Brenda. “Don’t you like just goin’ out with a girlfriend? Because I was just gonna say, why don’t you and me go out tonight?”

  “Ah, I dunno. Just the two of us, alone?”

  Marylou shrugged, her eyes wide and bland. “Why not?” she said. “Lotta good places to go. There’s this one real cute little place called the Hollywood Bar, you probably seen it, and inside it’s just like the States, everybody’s so friendly and all. Lot of the sailors take their wives there, and I mean it ain’t like some of those places you see around. You don’t see no whores in there, what they call business girls, or anything like that—”

  “Ah, I dunno,” Betty said. “Look, I don’t want to sound like a prude or anything, Marylou, but I mean I got three kids and I got a lot of responsibilities. I’d feel kind of funny going out like that.”

  Marylou shrugged again and brushed a cigarette ash from her shapely thigh, looking a little hurt. “Okay,” she said, “but it don’t seem to me like there’s any harm just sittin’ around havin’ a drink, maybe talkin’ to a boy or somethin’. I know my husband wouldn’t mind.”

  “Well no, mine prob’ly wouldn’t either. It’s just that I’d feel funny about it, is all.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, just because—oh, I guess it’s all right if all you do is talk. I mean—” She felt foolish, afraid she was blushing. “I mean, I hope that didn’t sound like I thought you—” But anything she said now would only make it worse. She laughed. “Ah, don’t mind me, I guess I sound like an old prude or something. I’m sorry. Sure, you’re right.”

  This time Marylou’s shrug was elaborate. “Don’t make no difference to me, honey. You wanna go out? Okay. You don’t? That’s okay too.” And all at once Betty knew she would go. It was as if she’d had it in the back of her mind all along—all evening, all day. “Okay, let’s,” she said. “But listen, we won’t stay out long, because I don’t like leaving the kids alone, okay? And we’ll have to wait till we’re sure they’re asleep before we go.”

  “Sure,” Marylou said. “I ain’t in no hurry.” She settled back and smiled. “You ain’t gonna wear that, are you, honey?”

  Betty laughed, looking down at her wrinkled shorts. “God no, wouldn’t I look a sight? I oughta take a bath too, if we’re going out. Listen, help me decide what to wear, Marylou, okay? C’mon over here to the closet.”

  Lazily Marylou got to her feet and watched as Betty went through her dresses, jangling the wire hangers. “I like that one there,” she said. “That’s real cute.”

  “This?” Betty said. “Don’t you think it’s a little too—I don’t know—too formal or something?” But already she had decided to wear it. It was her best dress, an expensive black satin that Eddie liked, and she hadn’t worn it since the last leave, the night he took her to see a Cary Grant picture that was playing in town. (They’d planned it for days,
and they’d already paid and sat down in the theater before they discovered the sound track was in French—they couldn’t understand a word of the whole picture, and she was so disappointed she almost cried.) “Okay,” she said, taking it out. “I’ll wear this one, then.”

  She bathed quickly and put on fresh underwear and nylons (she hadn’t worn nylons since the last leave either, and they felt funny on her legs). Then she brushed up her suede pumps, put on the dress and fixed her face and hair, and when she was ready she stood posing in the mirror. “How do I look?”

  “Real cute,” Marylou told her, but Betty knew it wasn’t true—especially when Marylou came to stand beside her. Betty would be the first to admit she wasn’t much for looks. She was only thirty but she looked a lot older, especially in the body—she never had gotten her figure back after the twins. Her teeth were funny too, and now her forehead was peeling from a new sunburn, and the powder had only made it worse. She tucked in a few stray hairs and turned away, resigned. “Okay. Now let’s check the kids and then we’ll leave.”

  Marylou was right about the Hollywood Bar—it certainly did take you back to the States. It was long and dark, with leather seats and black mirrors, and it even had a jukebox. The man at the cash register greeted Marylou by name when they came in, friendly as anything, and though his accent was more English than American there wasn’t anything French about him. They sat down at a little table against the wall, ordered beer and looked around. The place was loaded with American sailors. Right across the aisle there were four of them—two bored-looking chief petty officers and a couple of very young kids—and the others were crowded at the bar. There were hardly any other women. Marylou seemed content to just sit there quietly, but Betty felt she had to talk—just make conversation to keep from staring around the room. So she talked, hardly listening to Marylou’s replies, turning her glass nervously. An odd feeling came over her that was strangely familiar—tight in the chest, warm, about to giggle—and then she remembered. It was exactly the way she used to feel in Miller’s Drug Store back in Bayonne, years ago, when she and her girlfriends used to stop in there after school to fool around with boys. The thought startled her, and the next thing that happened made it worse: the two young sailors from across the aisle got up to go to the men’s room, and as they passed they stared down at her and then at Marylou with a funny look in their eyes—sort of tough and scared at the same time. She didn’t like it. “Marylou, you know what I think?” she whispered. “I think they think we’re a couple of French whores or something. Business girls, or whatever you called them.”