To have it all end so quickly, to see such a broad sweep of joy obliterated; it was like awakening to learn that the sun was done with shining. Of course there was the blame as well, the whispering and the gossip. How could a woman drop her own baby? How could such an accident occur?
She spent so much of her ensuing time looking backward. She knew it was a waste. If she could have turned herself around she would have. Sometimes she wished that she and James had sold everything and moved to California or Florida or Texas — one of those places where people go to rewrite the story of their lives. They should have walked away with just the clothing on their backs and left the door wide open behind themselves.
She had neither the energy nor imagination for that after the funeral. James hardly knew what to suggest. Instead she spent her life looking out at the same bit of yard that she beheld the day I died.
Now, oddly, she feels a touch of excitement, the pleasing sense that something unexpected is about to happen. Maybe it is because she is free of her house, free from all she has known for so long. Free, almost, of her life.
Mr. Hennessey refused to tell her why he was coming to call.
“A delicate matter,” he had said. “A matter better discussed in the flesh.”
Chapter Twenty One
“William?” The voice is a soft Southern purr.
“This is Barbara. I hope you remember me.”
“How could I forget?” Hennessey replies with a sense of relief. The truth is, he forgets often enough. But Barbara he remembers. The woman from Atlanta, the one in the black turtleneck dress.
He asks if she has a night free. That very evening, as it turns out. Dinner? Lovely, she replies. He says it will be a pleasure simply to listen to her voice again.
“You know, William,” she reminds him, “there’s more to me than that.”
≈
Barbara had paused, hand over the receiver, before grabbing it at last and punching in Hennessey’s number. She is old-fashioned at heart. When possible, she observes the proprieties. She’d rather surrender than conspire, or at least create that illusion, though she can run the farm when need be. Ask anyone at her company. When the firm’s pacemakers showed an unfortunate tendency to short circuit, who got called to put out the fire? When the company needed a compassionate face to sell its explanation — if the truth be told, its pathetic excuse — who appeared before the network cameras? And then who grabbed the engineers by their ties and all but locked them in the lab until they came up with a fix?
Because her world is generally one of hard facts and consequences, William Hennessey is to her an unfamiliar type. His business runs on money from his own pocket. He justifies its expenditure according to his whims. He does not require committee approval, or entertain board directives. He operates on his feelings, which seem to her uncommonly attuned. How else to explain the ease with which her dress ended up in a heap on the floor? If she had every hour back that she had ever listened to a man prattle about his golf game, or his boat, or his work, she’d have years added to her life. William had hung up her dress, made her coffee. He asked a question and then listened to her reply. He had money and taste.
Why hadn’t some other woman grabbed him?
She had not wanted to call him from home. With even a few days’ notice she would have expected him to say yes, to rearrange his schedule in whatever way necessary to fit her in. Anything less would have been … an insult, truthfully. At least she could pretend to understand if he was unable to meet her the very evening she called. At her age she had no need to go searching for disappointment.
She slips the blue velveteen dress off its hanger. It isn’t too much now, is it? The line between vulgarity and style has become so blurred. Every fifteen-year old in the country runs around barely dressed. She decides her dress is provocative but not inappropriate. She is entitled to provocation.
When Hennessey rings her room she tells him she will be right down. She stops to examine herself in the mirror. She takes a brush to her hair, rearranges the drape of her dress. She smiles, satisfied.
She spots him in a wing-back chair near the elevators. He hurries to her and kisses her neck lightly. She closes her eyes without thinking. When she opens them again she notices a woman of her age, who offeres a knowing smile.
She allows William to lead her to the hotel restaurant. The windows overlook the park with that odd fountain, a sculpture of a barefoot girl stranded in the snow. Her hands and feet are absurdly oversized, as if she has adapted to a place were things have a tendency to slip away — the ground beneath your feet, whatever you try to hold. Small golden lights gleam in the bare trees.
The restaurant’s bar is noisy, crowded. “Could we find a quieter place?” Barbara asks.
“My home,” Hennessey says, “Quiet as a tomb.”
“That might be overdoing.”
“Quieter than here, at any rate.”
The valet brings around the Cadillac. They drive down a boulevard lined with mansions from the robber baron era. The cold has frozen everything out of the air. Stars gleam in the black sky. Hennessey turns to follow the river, which is lost in the gorge below.
Barbara is surprised by her own behavior. In general she proceeds cautiously with men. Not that caution has so much to recommend it in her experience. Her former husband was one result of that strategy, followed by a few not-quite-adequate lovers. This place is so alien, with its paralyzing cold and pines smothered in snow, that her usual rules seem absurd. The brief glare of daylight barely interrupts the night. She hardly feels herself. “I’d buy myself a fur tomorrow if I lived here,” she says.
“I’ll check the closet,” Hennessey replies. He pulls into the drive and stops the car. The pines, their branches sagging under a load of snow, hush the city’s noise. Hennessey holds open the heavy oak door to his home.
He takes her coat. They stand in the foyer quietly as she surveys William’s domestic arrangements. Doilies and violets, odd touches of fussiness hardly suited to a middle-aged man. Flowered wallpaper dating from who-knows-when. William has not mentioned that he lives with his mother, but that is the only possible conclusion. It figures, she tells herself. She finds an interesting man and he is tied to his aged mother’s apron.
“Here, try this,” he says. He holds a coat for her.
“William, what is this?” She runs her hand over the silver fur.
“Fox, I believe,” he replies, not quite answering her question.
She pulls the collar up around her face. She is no stranger to luxury, yet she finds the unfamiliar touch of fur intoxicating.
“Perfect,” Hennessey says. “This must be why I kept it. It’s yours.”
“I couldn’t possibly…”
“Of course you could.” He brushes his lips against her forehead. “Next a glass of brandy and I’ll start supper.”
“Tell me how I can help.”
“Stay out of the way.”
She follows him through the dining room, toward the kitchen. For the moment she doesn’t care about the provenance of the fur. She’ll find out soon enough, she supposes.
He swings open the kitchen door and points her to an armchair tucked in a corner, bracketed by frost-covered windows. Hennessey hands her a small glass of brandy. She watches him work over the old enameled stove. He hums lightly to himself as the knife beats against a worn cutting board.
Hennessey keeps his blades razor sharp. He polishes them on a stone during those nights when he can’t sleep. It is all of a piece to him; the knives, the seasoned iron pans, the home, the automobile, all of it tended and right. And now Barbara, with his mother’s fur framing her face. He wonders if she will accept the gift. He wonders if he should have offered it.
What would his mother have wanted? Certainly not that her fur end up with a woman he barely knows. His mother was a product of her time, scarred by the Depression, frugal to the end. She should have given the fur away decades ago. Her tired features had only seemed more frail
when framed by the sumptuous fur.
He never brought women home while his mother was alive. He and his mother had an understanding. Some nights he failed to return. She did not bother him with questions. He did not offer explanations. Barbara would be the first to sleep in his bed, under what was now his own roof, since his mother’s death.
He scrapes up the garlic he has minced and drops it in the pan. “That smells wonderful,” says Barbara. She settles more deeply into the warmth of the brandy and the fur.
≈
Her again, Mrs. Hennessey broadcasts. Then, What are you doing here?
The same as you, I answer. Investigating. Spying. Your son and my mother are…
This is my home.
Was, I believe.
Is, was. Wait, that’s my fur!
Was. Under new ownership. So it appears.
She won’t get away with it.
I don’t see how you’ll stop her. Based on my experience.
Your experience. She offers this with a snort. Maybe you haven’t applied yourself.
≈
Barbara is not surprised to wake in the middle of the night. She’d had more wine than was sensible. She is in a strange bed, beside a man she barely knows. The wonder is that she slept at all. She fell asleep still sprawled over William, not waking when he shifted her to his side. Now his arm is draped over her hip, his torso pressed against her back. She takes his hand and places it on her breast. She would be pleased to awaken him.
He’d left a dim light burning on the dresser. Heavy curtains cover the windows. A Persian carpet fills most of the room. It is so very quiet that she thinks she hears not only her own heart beating, but William’s as well. She doubts that is possible, or even desirable. Outside of the office she has no interest in life’s unreliable mechanics.
She has grown accustomed to making certain allowances for men of William’s age. The extra weight, the gray hair, the amount of coaxing required to attain what had once been easily had. For encouragement or understanding to be unnecessary, to enjoy simple, heedless sex, was an unfortunately rare pleasure. She shifts against him slightly, hoping to feel him stir. Instead, just that steady sound of a beating heart.
She can barely make out her clothes hung over the chair in the corner. She’d used the fur as a robe before bed, the satin lining cool against her bare skin. When William had pushed it aside and the tendrils of fur brushed against her, she could not help but sigh.
The fur is bunched up now at the foot of the bed. It reminds her of childhood — monsters made from shadow and imagination. She squeezes William’s hand more tightly to her breast.
What if she were the lady of this house? Where would she begin? It all seemed of a piece; the cottage in the woods, the furnishings left from decades ago. He is settled in a way that suits him. She supposes that explains why no other woman already occupies this bed. There seems to be no room for the alterations, the improvements, that any woman would feel obliged to make. A deal-breaker, as she said in the office. A pity, considering. But that could change, now with his mother dead. She is encouraged by that detail. Quite a bit could change.
Barbara gets up to go to the bathroom. She grabs the fur and pulls it over herself again, then opens the door as quietly as possible and steps into the hall.
He’d left the bathroom light on with the door ajar. These old houses could be baffling, especially compared to her apartment back home. A few rooms, sparely appointed, everything streamlined and gleaming. She pushes open the bathroom door.
As she does she catches something from the corner of her eye. She gasps before she can think, then closes the bathroom door behind her so quickly that it clatters against its frame.
Once shut inside the brightly tiled bath she comes quickly to her senses. The light reflected off the varnished door. She was spooked by a reflection. A woman of her age, behaving like a child.
But when she is finished she cannot help but hold her breath as she opens the door. She throws the fur at the foot of the bed and nestles herself tightly beside William again.
He mumbles and, to Barbara’s disappointment, pushes her hand away. He feels hot to the touch. He throws off the comforter and says something she cannot understand. His eyes spring open. He turns and stares at her as if he has never seen her before.
“William?” she says, concerned. Frightened, she realizes in the next heartbeat.
He does not reply. Instead he swings his legs to the floor and stands naked beside the bed. He glances around the room. His breathing sounds ragged, as if he has just run up a stairs. He moves to the foot of the bed and gathers up the fur, which he holds in his outstretched arms. He leaves the room. A door opens and closes. When he returns he is empty handed. He sits on the edge of the bed briefly, then curls up beside her again.
“William,” she whispers. She does not want to startle him. In her family it was an article of faith that you should never wake a sleepwalker. She can’t remember exactly why.
He pulls himself against her thighs and back, settling tightly against her. She tucks his hand against her breast again. She shivers from the cold of the house, which clings to his skin. Eventually she drifts back to sleep.
Slattern, Mrs. Hennessey declares. To me she says, There. I hope you saw that.
≈
Barbara wakes to the smell of coffee and bacon. She looks for the fur, supposing she will wrap herself in it again. A moment later she remembers William carrying it off in his sleep. She slips naked down the hall to the bathroom and quickly turns on the hot water.
He has set out a white towel for her, neatly folded beside the sink. She steps into the shower and pulls the frosted glass door shut.
The water is so hot it takes her breath away. Steam billows around her. She has the sense that she is floating in a cloud. She has hardly felt like herself since walking in the door. She blames the fur, at least in part. Less clothing than costume. The feel of it against her skin turned a switch. Then there was the wine and brandy, plus the rare pleasure of a man attending to her. She is so far from home that she cannot apply all the rules by which she normally lives. The things she has done in his bed do not shock her, not exactly. But in the light of day she is … Somewhat embarrassed, she supposes, but also a bit proud. He will have something to remember her by.
Now she has the sense that William is watching from the other side of the glass. Let him watch. She does not object. She makes a point of appearing oblivious.
When at last she turns off the water and opens the door, he is not there.
She hurries back to the bedroom with the towel wrapped around herself. She is disappointed to put on her own clothes again. She feels as if she is breaking a spell.
“Perfectly timed,” says Hennessey when she enters the kitchen. He stands at the stove in a long purple robe. He looks like a magician who has made breakfast appear. He sets her plate down beside a cup of coffee on the small kitchen table, then pulls back the chair for her.
“Back in your civilian clothes,” he says.
“Not from desire, sir,” she replies. “I’d rather wear that lovely fur but I’m afraid it’s disappeared.”
“Disappeared?”
“I didn’t think you’d remember.”
“I certainly don’t.”
“You were like a zombie, walking in your sleep. I said your name but, William, there was nobody home. You carried my fur off somewhere.”
“Let me see about that.”
He pads in his slippers down the hall to the bedroom. She hears doors open and close. He gives her an odd look as he passes through the kitchen again, toward the front door. She hears him opening what she assumes is the closet. Hennessey returns with the fur draped over his arm.
“Here you are,” he announces, holding it open for her. “It was hung up.”
She surprises the both of them by slipping off her clothes and enveloping herself again in the fur’s warm touch.
If Mrs. Hennessey managed to get her fur returned to
its closet, then I am relieved to see her work overturned. I do not care to admit that I’ve spent sixty years letting the world of the living run its course while I have lingered in the shadows, watched the misery, and convinced myself that I am dead and ineffectual.
≈
He will not consider calling a cab, even though what looks to Barbara like a blizzard rattles the windows throughout breakfast. Hennessey shovels a path to the car, through snow that is already a foot deep. Teetering in her ridiculous heels, Barbara is forced to lean on his arm to make the short trip to the snow-crusted Cadillac. Gusts of wind rock the car.
At the hotel door, Barbara slides across the seat to give Hennessey a prolonged kiss. She says she will call next time she is in town. Even as she says the words she wonders if they are true. Her behavior had been so uncharacteristic. At her age she is uncertain that she cares to surrender so thoroughly her sense of herself. She pulls the fur tight around her neck and steps out into the cold wind.
Hennessey heads back toward his home. The familiar streets are transformed. Drifted snow cloaks the pavement. He follows the tire tracks in the snow and hopes for the best. He cannot see to the end of the block. The heavy purple clouds seem within reach.
The river gorge seems bottomless, obscured by the wind-whipped snow. He is relieved to reach his own drive and pull the car into the pine-sheltered yard. In the wind the trees sway, the branches groan.
Hennessey parks beside the door. He sits quietly as the snow settles on the windshield. Sleepwalking: there was something new. Then again, alone in his house, how would he know? He was not so surprised to learn that he had put the fur away. Like a zombie, as Barbara put it. Like a zombie he put away his mother’s clothing in the dead of night.
He taps the steering wheel and considers the few steps back into the house. He cannot help but think that his mother waits for him inside. She had been there year after year, always eager for his return. The months she had been gone were few in comparison. There is no logic, he tells himself, to our habits of mind.
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