Garden of Lies

by Eileen Goudge

  Max had never seen his father cry. The shock of it had hit him [192] almost like an earthquake. The first thought that flitted across his mind was that Dad somehow had lost his job. But Norm Griffin had taught math at Pittsfield High since Adam and Eve; there was about as much chance of him being fired as there was of Harry Truman turning Republican. Not wanting to even try imagining anything worse, Max had told himself desperately, Must be the smoke, that’s it, the smoke’s in his eyes. ...

  But now, all these years later, Max finally had an insight into his father. Maybe it had just occurred to him that the train had stopped, it wasn’t moving anymore, this was the last stop.

  Max found a glass in the drainer. A cracked tile over the sink caught his eye. Have to replace that, he thought, then remembered why he hadn’t. He liked its imperfection, the fact that Bernice couldn’t new-and-improve it, no matter how much she scrubbed and polished.

  Like me, he thought. Can’t change me any more than that cracked tile. Though God knows she tries.

  Like Monkey, too. A tomboy, outspoken, full of beans. He’d begun calling his daughter that when she began to walk, scampering so fast on those two little feet, her banana-sticky fingers causing more mischief than Curious George. Now it was bicycles, skateboards, and God knew what else. Bernice, wringing her hands, had told him just yesterday about the latest misadventure—she had caught Monkey shimmying down the rain gutter.

  Upstairs, Max peeked in on Monkey. In the light that fanned across her face from the open doorway, she looked no more than four or five, a baby still, precious and soft. Then his gaze moved down to the tangle of long limbs poking out from under the covers, a scabbed knee, bitten fingernails daubed with chipped red polish. Nine going on ten, and in just a few short years she’d be a teenager. He noticed the Donovan poster on the wall above her maple child’s bed. When had she gotten that? And where were the stuffed animals that had always lined her bed?

  It hit him then: She’s growing up.

  His heart swelled, and Max felt a pang at the thought that she would one day leave him, go off to college; that day was soon, just around the corner.

  He tiptoed over, smoothed away a wisp of hair that was stuck to her cheek. She had Bernice’s thick swirly red hair, not carrot colored, the red of Titian and Rubens.

  [193] Was it his imagination, or had Monkey seemed more subdued lately? Fussy, too. Wouldn’t eat half what was on her plate. And tonight when he tucked her in, she had clung to him, begging him not to leave her alone in the dark.

  Bernice had dismissed it with the usual “she’s just going through a stage.” But Max had doubts. Sometimes he worried about Monkey. More than he knew was normal.

  Admit it, why don’t you? You’re afraid she’ll grow up to be like her mother.

  And what was so terrible about that? In a way, Bernice was terrific. If there was a Miss America pageant for the perfect house-keeper/cook/hostess, Bernice would snatch the crown. Her figure, too, still as slim as when he’d married her, though she had to work a lot harder at it now. A damned attractive woman. Just last weekend he’d overheard a gas station attendant whisper to a buddy, “I wouldn’t kick her out of bed.” Max smiled to himself. There was as much likelihood of Bernice cheating on him as there was of the Statue of Liberty lifting her skirts.

  Best of all, Bernice loved Monkey as much as he did. So why did he break out in a sweat imagining that Monkey would one day turn to him with her mother’s cool brown eyes and say, “For heaven’s sake, can’t you ever remember to put the toilet lid down when you’re finished?”

  Max tiptoed out, closing her door softly behind him. His headache was all but gone now. Good. Maybe now he’d even get some sleep.

  But as he crawled back into bed, Bernice awoke, a warm ball unfolding at the brush of his cold feet. She sat up, blinking, worried-looking, her red hair scrambled about her shoulders. For an instant, she looked so much like Monkey he felt something in his chest stir. He remembered when they were first married, how Bernice used to sleep naked in his arms, curled up like a kitten. How he would smooth his hand down the curve of her spine, and hold one small hard buttock in the cup of his palm; how she would pretend to be still asleep but her legs would move apart ever so slightly, just enough so he could explore further.

  “What’s wrong?” she cried out in alarm. Poor Bernice, even in her sleep, always fearful.

  “It’s okay,” he soothed, patting her leg. “Go back to sleep.”

  [194] Her nightgown had fallen open at the neck, revealing one small firm breast. Max felt himself begin to grow hard, and thought, No, God, not now. He hated wanting her, knowing she would give in without any real desire.

  But while he was telling himself to cool off and go back to sleep, he found himself pushing his hand further up her leg, hooking one finger under the elastic of her panties.

  “Now?” she muttered thickly. Then sighed and said, “Okay,” and rolled her nightgown up over her flat tummy, the way Monkey rolled up her jeans before wading into the ocean.

  Max stroked her for a while, hoping for a response. Jesus, oh Jesus, why couldn’t she want him too, just a little? And if she felt so totally indifferent why couldn’t she at least tell him to leave her alone? This ... taking her like this ... while she lay quiet, hardly breathing ... Christ, more like masturbating than making love.

  “Bernice? Honey, is there anything you want me to—”

  “No, you just go ahead,” she murmured politely. “It’s okay.”

  No, he thought as he entered her, it’s not okay. Not okay at all. Oh Christ, won’t you at least move some, go through the motions, pretend, just for a minute, so I won’t have to feel tike a dirty old man getting his jollies jacking off.

  Now he felt himself coming, a fierce burning rush, wrenched from him almost against his will. Christ, oh Christ ...

  He wrapped his arms about Bernice, hard, squeezing her so tightly she yelped. And for an instant, it felt good hurting her, making her feel something.

  Then he was awash in shame. How sick, wanting to hurt her.

  Then it was over.

  Bernice shimmied out from underneath him. “Be right back,” she murmured.

  No. Let me hold you, he wanted to call after her, at least let me do that. I know how you love the back of your neck massaged, won’t you let me—

  Too late. He could hear her, the thumping of the old pipes as the tap cranked on, the medicine chest clicking open.

  Max lay on his back, staring up at a light moving across the ceiling, a car passing by outside. There was a tight, hot sensation in his chest.

  [195] He heard the tap go off. Then, “Oh, Max, for heaven’s sake,” Bernice cried out in a vexed tone.

  The toilet seat. He’d forgotten to put it down. Again. Max suddenly felt so angry he pictured himself smashing it down on her head.

  He took a deep breath. Why get angry at Bernice? It was all him, his fault. He couldn’t blame her for his being too gutless to ask for a divorce. “Divorce,” the magic word that he didn’t dare utter.

  And then he thought, as he always did when he imagined leaving Bernice, of Monkey.

  Tears came, hard and reluctant, squeezed from him like blood from the great stone that lay on his chest.

  Late in the afternoon of the following day, Max stood at the window that spanned almost the entire east wall of his office. He looked out at the purpling sky, and the postcard view of the Brooklyn Bridge spanning the East River, its weblike girders turned to chrome by the footlights of the setting sun. Majestic, that was the only word for it. Who said the bridge wasn’t for sale? He was paying for it, every day too, for this corner office with its breathtaking view and for the prestige that came with it. He was paying for it with his time, his thoughts, his expertise. And was he also paying for it with his integrity?

  Jesus, he hadn’t had thoughts like those since he was fresh out of law school. Lawyers weren’t supposed to think this way. What was it about this case?

  Max turned aw
ay from the window, and sank into the chair in front of his cluttered Georgian pedestal desk. He stared at the huge cardboard blowup, propped between two antique corner chairs, of an automobile steering column that looked like something out of Cape Kennedy.

  If the plaintiff, Jorgensen, were to win, Pace Motors would be out twelve million, plus another hundred million to recall all those Cyclones and replace their steering columns. Max liked the Pace guys, had driven their cars for years, and thanked his lucky stars at least weekly for his firm’s having America’s most innovative automobile manufacturer as his client. So his first instinct had been to [196] rush to Pace’s defense, confident that Jorgensen had been high on something and that his claim against Pace was another attempted rip-off.

  But since Monday, his meeting with Caravella, the chief engineer, who had protested much too much, with a storm of technical explanations, blueprints, and test results that said less than the sweat pouring from his face; and this Tuesday, Rooney, the P.R. vice-president, flying in and working the word “settlement” into every sentence—well, Max couldn’t help but catch a whiff of something that might be rotten in Denmark.

  It wasn’t his place, he’d reminded himself over and over, to pass judgment on any real or imagined wrongdoing of his clients—but still, he couldn’t shake this slightly sick feeling, like a bad aftertaste from something he’d eaten.

  “I have those depositions you wanted, Mr. Griffin.” A voice, low and sweet, drew him from the downward spiral of his thoughts. “And your coffee.”

  He looked up, and there was Rose, a tidy stack of papers tucked against her hip, searching for a clear space on his desk for the steaming mug in her other hand.

  He relieved her of the coffee, placing it on a yellow legal pad scribbled with his hen pecks and already stained with today’s previous coffee rings. “Thanks.” He picked up the transcripts she had laid before him, and began leafing through them. “How about that independent engineer’s report?”

  “In the Xerox room. All two hundred and eleven pages of it. Including diagrams. I’m having copies made, but it’ll take a while to collate.”

  Max sighed, and muttered to himself. “ ‘Methinks the lady doth protest too much.’ ”

  “What lady?”

  “They’re called whores. The expert witnesses. The doctors, shrinks, engineers who’ll provide you with enough trumped-up data on paper to wipe the asses of the entire jury for a month.”

  He took a slug of the black coffee, and grimaced.

  “Sorry for the industrial strength,” Rose apologized with a little laugh. “It was the last of the pot.” Then the smile dropped away, and she said softly, “You don’t believe it was, how do you say ... res ipsa loquitur?”

  [197] Where had she gotten that? Obviously she’d been doing more than just typing his papers. Smart girl. Pretty too. But with everyone making such a fuss these days of women’s lib, he was careful always to keep his gaze neutral.

  But, hell, it was a treat, seeing a woman look so fresh so late in the afternoon. Face soap-and-water shiny, her cloud of dark hair smelling faintly of shampoo, white blouse ironed to paper crispness and tucked neatly into a plain navy sailcloth skirt. An unfashionable knee length, but it suited her better than the miniskirts the other secretaries all seemed to be wearing.

  No, he couldn’t imagine her in one of those, bending over at the water cooler, the lacy elastic of her panties winking out from under her hem. Anyway, she probably wore sensible white cotton underwear, the kind you bought at Sears that came in packets of two. Good Catholic underwear to go with the tiny gold crucifix at her throat.

  Max felt his face begin to grow warm. Jesus, enough. He forced his mind back to Jorgensen.

  “Well, in a way this whole thing does speak for itself,” he replied. “Sure, most accidents are due to driver negligence. But do I think this was Jorgensen’s fault?” He paused. “No. I don’t.”

  He felt better, voicing his suspicions aloud. Even knowing he had no business doing so. Somehow, he felt he could trust Rose. She had the air of someone who could keep a confidence.

  It’s her eyes, he thought. Those great black eyes of hers, they’re full of secrets.

  “But you’re not sure.” Rose reached over, straightening one of the piles on his desk. “And if Quent Jorgensen is telling the truth, that he wasn’t drunk that night, then there might be dozens, hundreds, of other defective steering columns out there. Is that what you’re getting at?”

  “You’d make a good lawyer,” he said and laughed. “Ever thought about law school?”

  He could see that he’d hit a nerve, and instantly regretted his idle words. Christ, how could he have been so thoughtless? Despite the almost excruciating care Rose took with her appearance, he’d noticed the same two skirts and three or four blouses worn over and over, the same black shoes carefully resoled each season. Law school? She probably was just scraping by.

  [198] A blush had risen in her cheeks, giving her dark olive complexion a burnt sienna glow that reminded him somehow of the Tuscany hills where he’d once been stationed during the war. She covered it with a quick laugh. “Who would baby-sit Mrs. Von Hoesling’s Chihuahua then?”

  Max chuckled, remembering how Mrs. Von Hoesling had tottered in the other day to discuss her late husband’s will. In the outer office, she simply had handed over to Rose her snarling Chihuahua, as if it had been a coat or a hat. And Rose, to his eternal gratitude, had taken it without comment, her expression carefully blank, simply popping it into a file drawer in her desk along with half a Danish as soon as the old lady’s back was turned.

  “You have a point,” he said.

  “If you had some way of knowing for sure about that steering column, would it really make things easier?” she asked, bending over to gather a few balled-up papers that had missed the wastebasket. He noticed how she dipped at the knees, swiveling to one side so that her hemline barely lifted in back. The nuns had taught her good.

  He rubbed his chin, scratchy with five o’clock shadow. “No, not necessarily. I can hardly afford to tell our biggest client I think they’re liars, can I? Anyway, it’s not my job. And maybe all this righteousness I’m feeling is just plain ego in disguise. ... I like having all the cards on the table, good and bad, not stumbling around in the dark. The way it stands, if what I suspect is true, and if Jorgensen’s lawyer should throw me any curve balls in court ... well, without all the facts, I could wind up looking like the king of idiots.”

  “But on the other hand,” Rose quietly pointed out, “if your suspicions were to prove unfounded, then wouldn’t you feel a whole lot better? At least you wouldn’t have to worry about some other poor shmuck ending up in a wheelchair, or maybe worse.”

  “You have a crystal ball handy?” he asked and smiled.

  “No. Something a lot simpler.” She straightened, fixing those remarkable eyes on him. Eyes both still and bottomless, only a flash here, a glint there, of the emotions that swam in some deep dark part of her.

  “What’s that?”

  “The car. Why don’t you take one out on the road? See for yourself.”

  [199] He grinned. “I wish it were that easy. This glitch ... whether it’s real or I’m imagining it ... it couldn’t possibly be in every steering column, or Pace would be deluged with lawsuits by now. I suspect that’s why they’re not being a hundred percent straight with me. They probably don’t even want to admit it to themselves. The defect might exist only in every hundred Cyclones, or every thousand. And even then, not something that would manifest itself—I’m guessing at this—except possibly at very high speeds, and only under certain driving conditions.”

  “Who knows,” Rose said, “you might get lucky.” She wasn’t smiling. Goddamn, she was serious. What kind of a woman was this, anyway?

  Max felt something inside him lift, grow buoyant for a moment. Hell, maybe she was right. Maybe it was worth a try, even if it was a long shot. He said thoughtfully, “There’s a Pace dealership not far fro
m here. I know the manager.”

  “You could say you wanted to buy one,” she put in, “take it for a test drive.”

  Max stood up, pushing away from his desk, feeling better than he had in weeks, and strangely excited.

  “You’re on,” he said, grinning like an idiot. “Yes, you. It was your idea, remember? Get your coat, and let’s do it.”

  They braked through the last toll booth on the Sawmill and then finally hit the Thruway. When they crossed the Tappan Zee, the sun had dipped below the horizon, and was now just a mellow Cointreau glow flashing in and out of the dense poplars that lined the berm on either side of the six-lane highway.

  Max couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this jacked-up, like a teenager, high on the new-car smell of virgin vinyl, stirred by the road unrolling before him.

  He looked over at Rose in the driver’s seat, her concentration square on the road, both hands gripping the crimson wheel, which matched the fire-engine-red exterior, one long bronze leg stretched to the pedal like a taut steel cable. Then he looked at the red needle of the speedometer, at seventy now.

  She had insisted on driving. No, insisted was wrong. In the dealership lot, she simply had slid into the low bucket seat behind [200] the steering wheel, looked up at him with the eager smile of a little kid straddling her first tricycle, and said, “You don’t mind, do you? I’ve always wondered what it would be like to drive one of these things.”

  And drive she had, cautiously and a little nervously at first, then with increasing confidence. They had not spoken a word in half an hour, there was no need really. It felt oddly companionable. In fact, Max had almost forgotten their real purpose in doing this.

  “I think I’ve just broken the B and B barrier,” Rose said finally, flicking him a sidelong glance, her full lips curved in a smile. It was unusually warm for April, and Max caught the faint, strangely seductive smell of her perspiration riding the air current that streamed in her open window.