“It’s wonderful,” she confessed now. “It’s just wonderful—and terrible, too.”
“I think I would just feel terrible,” said Irene. “I think I couldn’t relax enough to enjoy the wonderful part.”
“You’d be surprised,” said Genevieve.
They began walking again.
“I kissed Giles Benderby once,” Irene said. “At a party. Well, he kissed me. But I didn’t stop him.”
“Heavens,” said Genevieve, truly astonished.
“So I do understand how things can get carried away. But it meant nothing. I’m not in love with Giles Benderby.”
“Of course not,” said Genevieve.
The main building came into view again at the end of the long looping path.
“Are you going to leave Robert?” asked Irene. “What about the children?”
Straight to the soft place. Perhaps this was the reason one shouldn’t have real friends as an adult; they understood things.
“They’re not babies,” said Genevieve. It bubbled to her lips involuntarily. Why had she said that? She could have said any other true thing—that she knew she needed to put an end to it, that she wanted to repair her marriage. Instead she’d repeated Maxwell’s callous comment to her, in a close facsimile of his flippant tone. “I didn’t mean that,” she said. It was true, she hadn’t meant it, but it was too late; she could see that Irene was scandalized. Betraying the husband was one thing; betraying one’s children was unforgivable.
“I didn’t mean that,” said Genevieve again.
“Why would you say it, then?” said Irene. The moments of spontaneity between the two of them, of honesty and closeness, might never have been. “I just don’t understand you.” She began walking quickly; Genevieve hurried to keep up. “And you don’t have to worry,” said Irene, still in that cool voice. “I won’t say anything to anybody.” Her expression making it clear that distaste would make a cautery to this particular bit of gossip: that disappointment, not loyalty, would seal her lips.
* * *
Clara had thoroughly disgraced herself by the time they returned to the table: nearly all of the cards were massed in a facedown pile beside Renee’s elbow. The women were chatting. Seeing Genevieve and Irene approaching, Julia scraped the cards toward herself, began a shuffle.
“Would you like to play?” Clara asked Genevieve, pushing back her chair and beginning to rise. “You can take my place; I’m hopeless.”
“No, Clara,” said Irene, seating herself and putting her hand out to Clara, who lowered herself back into her chair as Julia began to deal. “You need all the practice you can get. You have only a few more days to sort out bidding.” She lifted her eyes to Genevieve’s. “We’re having a tournament on Saturday. Come if you’re interested; maybe there’ll be a group who needs a fourth.” She picked up her hand, fanned out her cards, began rearranging them.
Genevieve lingered a few minutes, sipping her iced tea and watching the bidding, seeing how the other women deferred to Irene, how they courted her opinion, and how Irene accepted their homage, like royalty. No doubt she had organized the bridge tournament, as she had the class in Oriental art. After so long in the wings of the stage, Irene was now standing at its spotlit heart.
Genevieve set her empty glass onto the table and made her farewells. The message had been transmitted and received: Irene would keep her promise and not say a word to the others, but whatever path Genevieve chose from here, whatever happened with Maxwell Dawson, the rift was complete. There would be no more tandem salon appointments, no more cozy manicures. No room for Genevieve in the salon chair beside Irene, nor in any of the chairs at the bridge or luncheon tables from now on, not with any of the Ladies, old or new.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
NOI WAS alone in the house when the telephone in the front hall rang. Master was at work; Madame had gone out after breakfast and shortly after that Daeng had left too, supposedly to the market, but more likely to the temple. She couldn’t actually pray for something bad to happen to Noi, but she could make merit to increase her own karma, which might affect the balance of things. Choy was in the Quarters, taking a surreptitious nap. The children were in the swimming pool. They weren’t allowed to answer the phone. Neither was Noi. Nonetheless, she walked toward the heavy black instrument as it made its shrill loud call, again and again, like a fretful baby. Something to tell Sao, Noi said to herself. If she ever visits me again. Better than the other things she did not want to say, about Somchit and how foolish she had been. She put her hand out, crept her fingers around the receiver, lifted it up.
It was heavier than she’d expected. She held it to the side of her face the way she had seen Daeng do, and said nothing.
“Hello?” A fierce voice came into her ear. She almost dropped the receiver. “Hello?” It was a man, a farang. “For God’s sake. Hello. Say something.”
“Hello,” she whispered.
“Hello, I’m calling for Mrs. Preston. Put her on, please.”
“Madame not home,” said Noi. “You call back.” She’d heard Daeng say that too. Usually Daeng put the receiver down immediately after saying it.
“Damn,” said the voice. “Will you please tell her that I called?” Noi nodded, not thinking that the phone couldn’t see that. “Are you still there?”
“Yes,” said Noi.
“Tell her that I called. Mr. Dawson. Tell her,” commanded the voice. “Say it back to me. Mr. Dawson.”
Noi couldn’t believe it. Had she heard wrong? Was he joking?
“Say it back to me,” said the voice.
“Mister dort sun,” whispered Noi. Mr. Short Penis. The man didn’t laugh.
“Tell her I telephoned. Tell her—” Hesitation. “Tell her to call me. Or come here. She knows where.” Noi nodded again but did not speak. “Do you understand?”
“Yes,” said Noi.
She waited, but the voice didn’t speak again. She heard a click, and then a hum rolled out from the earpiece. Eventually it became a siren, bouncing rudely in the air. She put the receiver back into place.
She didn’t know what she had been so frightened of; the telephone was easy.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
LAURA, LAST one into the water, was It for the game Philip chose. Surfacing with eyes closed, she called “Marco” and from the blend of noises tried to pick out the important ones: the curt splash of Beatrice or Jane diving under the water, or the flutter-splash of Philip kicking across the pool. A giant splash: Who was that? “Marco,” she called again. The hoarse, bellowed “POLO” told her that Jane’s older brother, Alex, had arrived and cannonballed into the middle of the game.
“No fair,” said Laura, the wake from his entry slapping her lips. Keeping her eyes closed, although the rules were already being broken.
“Keep your hair on,” said Alex, making Philip and Beatrice laugh.
Laura found herself tracking four bigger children by sound. Marco, she said, and Polopolopolo, the whispers came back to her, tangling themselves with the bees, with traffic honks from the street, a radio playing Thai music somewhere. She’d lunge with hand outstretched—and touch nothing. It was a long, lonely turn, the others laughing as they evaded her. She could hear wet footslaps around the pool, but no one called fish out of water. They were cheating, she thought angrily, but she kept her eyes closed, determined not to be a baby about it. Finally, through sheer luck, she tagged the edge of a heel kicking past her, and opened her eyes, triumphant: Jane. Now it was Jane’s turn to be sightless and seeking in the water.
“Marco,” said Jane, standing very still in the water, eyes closed.
“POLO,” shouted Alex. He let Jane get very close to him before he dove away and swam to Philip, whispered something into the younger boy’s ear. Philip looked at Jane where she was turning slowly around and around in the shallow end with her eyes closed, and the two boys began laughing together. Jane went under the surface and began tunneling in their direction. If they noticed, they
didn’t seem to care; they didn’t move to evade her, and when Jane surged up from the water and slapped Alex’s shoulder, Got you!, he just laughed harder.
“See?” said Alex. Philip nodded, his mouth open as he laughed. Laura didn’t like how Philip was when he and Alex were together. He could be harsher, cruel, something of a stranger.
“See what?” asked Jane.
The game seemed to be over. Bea and Laura swam over from opposite corners of the pool and the three girls stood puzzled in the shallow end, looking at the two laughing boys.
“Jane’s got boobies,” crowed Alex. “Want to see?” He lunged over to his sister and tugged at her swimsuit straps.
“Get off, pig,” cried Jane, pushing at his hands and kicking back away from him.
Laura hadn’t noticed before, but now she could see the soft little points on Jane’s chest, under the fabric of the bathing suit. Had they been there the week before? Jane’s face was growing red as she struggled with her brother; Laura put her own hands over her suit straps in sympathy.
“Make them stop,” Laura cried to her sister, but Bea had retreated to the deep end of the pool and was treading water there. Laura didn’t like Bea either when Alex was around; she got shy and giggly. Normal Bea would have waded in and sorted them all out in a moment. Laura swam toward the boys. “Stop it,” she shouted at Philip.
“You’ll have them too,” said Philip, with a kind of hysterical glee. He used both hands to press Laura’s head under the surface. Her gulp of surprise took in water as she went down. Philip held her there, her panicked eyes open in the green froth-streamed underwater world while she tried to twist away, pinching desperately at his arms and legs, her fingers slipping on the muscle.
Finally, when her lungs felt as though they were bursting, the pressure came off Laura’s head and she came up choking and sobbing and gasping. Jane and Alex were still grappling, Jane holding both of her swimsuit straps with one hand at the root of her neck and using the other hand like a blade to drive water into her brother’s face. Bea was still frozen at the other end of the pool.
“Bea!” screamed Laura, still coughing. “Bea! Make them stop!”
“What is going on here?” said Genevieve, appearing at the side of the pool, carrying her gloves in one hand and her handbag over the same wrist. At the sound of her voice, the knot of children burst apart. “I could hear you all the way from the street. What on earth were you fighting about?”
“Nothing,” all of the children said in ragged unison.
“We’ll be quieter,” added Beatrice.
“I’m going home,” said Jane, getting out of the water. She slapped her feet angrily on the wood all the way around, and down the steps that led to the little side gate between the neighboring gardens. They all watched her go.
“What did you do to Jane?” asked Genevieve.
“Nothing, Mrs. Preston,” said Alex as the gate banged behind his sister. “She’s just like that.”
“Mum, come swimming with us,” said Philip.
A weak ploy, thought Laura. Intended to distract, destined to fail. Genevieve didn’t swim. She had a bathing suit, but not a swimming kind; hers had a little skirt and a cluster of daisies appliquéd to one shoulder. She’d worn it at Pattaya last year, where she’d mostly stayed under an umbrella on the sand, and gone only knee-deep into the sea. She had never put even one toe into the heavily chlorinated blue water in the swimming pool at 9 Soi Nine.
“Play Marco Polo with us,” Philip coaxed. “I’ll teach you. It’s easy.”
It was hard to tell what their mother was thinking as she stood there looking down at them all. The sunglasses hid so much of her face.
“Thank you for the invitation,” she said, finally. “But I must decline. Philip, you have judo in an hour. Don’t forget to get the water bottles from Harriet.”
“I won’t,” said Philip. His voice was dull; he was no longer smiling.
“No more rough playing,” said their mother. “Or you’ll all be out of the pool until tomorrow.”
When she was gone, Laura pulled herself out of the water with a suctioning heave and slapped her feet hard on the wood like Jane had, until she reached the steps down to the garden. She ran across the grass and up into the house, past her mother, who was taking her hat off in the foyer, up the long stairway to her bedroom, where she closed the door behind her. The air-conditioning wasn’t on, since it was the daytime; the room was dense with humidity. She peeled off her suit and wriggled clammily into a pair of shorts and a shirt.
“Lolo,” said Philip from outside the door.
“Go away,” she said.
He pushed the door open, stood in the doorway.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly. She shook her head, buckling her legs to sit on the bed behind her, clutching her balled-up dripping suit and looking down so he wouldn’t see the tears trembling on her eyelashes. He took a step toward her. “I’m very sorry.”
The kindness in his voice broke the sorrow open in her then, and to her horror she was sobbing like an infant, gasping and shuddering and bubbling snot from her nose.
“Why did you?” she said. She could still feel his hand on her head, the betrayal and terror and surprise.
“I don’t know,” he said. He sat on the bed and she drew her legs away from him and clutched her knees to make herself small, so that no part of her would touch him. “I have to go to judo soon.” She could hear tears husking his voice.
She kept her head bent to her knees, her shirt growing wet from the bathing suit against her chest, and she wouldn’t look at him. She cried into her wet ball of bathing suit, and he didn’t try to come closer or hug her. He stayed where he was and let her cry, bearing the punishment, accepting the loss he had caused her, accepting it as his loss too.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
GENEVIEVE HAD felt a moment of dislocation, looking down at the children as they bobbed in the water, slick-headed like a group of seals. She had that impression again, of a shutter blink and a jump forward in time. They’d been pale and small and obedient; now they were brown-skinned and loud and wild. And they had secrets. Come swimming, Philip had said; there had been something hidden in it, something the children were not telling. How had they grown old enough to have secrets from her? And then Laura running into the house, and Philip chasing after. Clearly, there was something going on.
Those neighbor children were a bad influence. They’d been at the Preston house almost every day this summer, inviting themselves to swim. Genevieve had met the mother once or twice over the garden gate; she seemed a careless type with her frizzy hatless head and perpetually sunburned nose. Genevieve couldn’t forbid the children playing together—that would be immensely awkward—so she’d redoubled the discipline among her own children to counteract the poor example. When we get home, she thought, they’ll go into a good strict school, first thing.
“Annie,” Genevieve called, and when Sarah appeared instead, Genevieve pointed. “Do you mind wiping?” Wet marks from the children’s feet, across the floor and up the stairs.
“Mr. Dawson,” Sarah said, pointing to the telephone. The girl looked embarrassed for some reason, saying the name.
Genevieve stood still. “You answered the phone?”
Sarah stammered the message He say call him. “Thank you, Sarah,” Genevieve said.
She climbed the stairs, head ringing. How foolish she’d been to think of Irene as the only danger. Maxwell Dawson could reach into her life and destroy it if he chose. She had put that power into his hands. She reached the second floor and looked into Philip’s room; it was empty. She heard murmuring from the girls’ room next door, and she found Philip and Laura there. Some childish spat between them, Laura crying and Philip looking remorseful. “What’s happening, Laura, are you hurt?” The girl, face against her knees, turned her head from side to side.
Genevieve had a feeling she should do more, should say more, but there were too many things jostling for her attention
at the moment. Whatever this was could wait.
“Get dressed for judo, Philip,” she said. “We’ll have to leave now; I need the driver to drop me somewhere on the way.”
* * *
Noi listened with exquisite anticipation to each sound of departure. First the slam of the car door after Madame and Philip got in, then the growl of the engine moving up the driveway, finally the clang of Kai shutting the gates.
When they were gone, she went out to the outdoor laundry area. The house next door was playing loud radio music, and she hummed along as she unclipped dry clothing from the line. She folded everything carefully before laying it into the basket. She took the whites from the washer, pushed them through the wringer, then hung them up on the line. Rain would come later, it was inevitable, but now the sun was strong and hot and with any luck everything would be dry before then.
* * *
“How dare you telephone my house,” Genevieve said.
“How dare you try to end this,” Max said. “How dare you pretend this means nothing.”
They stood apart from each other in room 510.
“I never said that,” she said.
His face softened a little. “Tell me you don’t long for this room,” he said. “That you don’t live in these hours. And the rest of the time is just… waiting.”
It was so close to how she’d been feeling for the past month that she found herself nodding.
“I want to be the one to take you to parties,” he said. “I want to quarrel and make up. I want to be the only one who shares your bed.” His breath was coming short. “That’s what I want. What do you want?”
No one had ever asked her such a thing; she’d never asked herself.
“I am offering you a life,” he said. “Your whole life.”
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