Burning Time

by Glass, Leslie

  “I was too young in Virginia and Hawaii. But I did in Alaska, when I was sixteen. Did I tell you I worked the night shift in a crab plant because I hated being called a spoiled officer’s kid?”

  She put her head on his shoulder. “He was the lowest-ranking officer, and we had no money. None. How could someone be spoiled who never had more possessions than could fit in a knapsack?” She looked down at her wedding ring. She still didn’t have much jewelry, and no offspring. Jason’s family had been poor, too, and he couldn’t help saving for the future. It was true what the shrinks said about background being everything. Nobody ever got over where they came from, or what happened to them when they were kids.

  “I know.” Jason put his arm around her. It was very quiet. He could hear the soft chime of the first clock in the room to herald the hour.

  “The only bike I ever had came from the dump. I painted it myself, and then I had to put it back when we moved,” Emma said. “People went crazy in the navy, but no one ever complained. Every time I went to a new place I thought the old one ended.”

  “We’re not so very different,” Jason murmured. “I was lonely, too. I worked nights in a gas station. My mother thought if I knew what it was like to work with my hands I’d choose to work with my head.” He laughed. “I still hate the smell of gas.”

  “I was covered with crab slime in twenty-below temperatures at three in the morning,” Emma said. “And had to go to school the next day. I don’t like fish of any kind.”

  “We’re not in competition for who struggled most.” Jason smiled tenderly.

  “My parents were mortified. I hung the rubber suit by the back door so everyone could see it.”

  “I guess you like mortifying people,” he remarked. “Goes back a long way.” The bitterness crept back in his voice.

  “Well, I never liked people telling me what I can or can’t do.” She pulled away from him, her face tense again. Shouldn’t have married an actress. Did he secretly think she’d fail and never be seen by anybody, just be a voice behind somebody else’s body for the rest of her career?

  He changed the subject. “But what about California? Did you date anyone from the navy there?”

  “What difference does it make?” Emma sighed. “I only lived in California one year, my senior year in high school. We didn’t live on the base then. It was my first house in a regular neighborhood. I thought I was in heaven. There was no way in the world I would have gone out with a navy man then. I wouldn’t even go to the club.”

  “The club?” Jason murmured, confused. She’d said they were poor.

  “Officers’ Club.”

  “Oh. Did you have a boyfriend that year?”

  She frowned and shook her head. “Not really. Why are we talking about this?”

  He shrugged. “You said you wanted to go back.”

  “What’s going on, Jason? Why won’t you tell me?”

  “Nothing to tell. I’m going out for a couple of days. You have a movie deal pending. You have to stay here and negotiate a good deal.”

  “I thought you didn’t want me to do it,” Emma said in surprise.

  “Well, I was wrong. You have to do what feels right to you.” He leaned forward and put his face in her hair.

  There was the slight aroma of brass cleaner on him. She thought he must have been polishing the insides of a clock during a break earlier in the day.

  He put his fingers under her chin and turned her head to make her look at him. “Look, I might have been angry at you for not telling me what you did. But you’re all I have. I love you, Emma, and I’m here for you. Don’t forget it.” He held her face between his hands and bent to kiss her.

  She shivered at his touch. He’d been avoiding her ever since the film opened and the letters started coming. But even before that, he had been withdrawn from her. He’d been married before. Sometimes she thought he had someone else. She didn’t know how long she could endure marriage without a physical life. The kiss went on for a long time. Maybe he really did love her. The clocks were bonging now, one after another, striking the hour, each in its own rhythm.

  30

  The air was sharp and cool when Jason got off the plane in San Diego and headed for the baggage area. He had left New York in the early evening, and now six hours later in California the sun was just going down. Somehow the feeling that he was not losing time made him think the trip out here was the right thing to do.

  It made sense to him now. It clicked into place after Detective Woo had phoned to tell him the letters came from San Diego, not New York. Emma was right. It was someone who felt close to her, someone who knew her. Only it wasn’t someone with any recent knowledge. It was someone from a long time ago, he was certain of it.

  He kept going over his last conversation with the young detective, and brooded all the way out on the plane about whether he should have told Emma about it.

  “There’s nothing I can do,” the girl had said over the phone. “Even if we knew who it was, it’s not against the law to send unpleasant letters, Dr. Frank. It’s a free speech thing,” she added.

  “So, that’s it?” Jason had demanded, his anger growing. “What if he gets tired of writing letters and decides to pay her a visit?”

  “Look,” Detective Woo had said. “I’m not saying I’m not going to check into it. But I have no authority right now to make any kind of, you know, official investigation.”

  Jason’s next move had been to call his travel agent.

  Now he walked slowly, checking his watch several times. He passed a bank of telephones on the way to the car rental and hesitated as he debated calling Emma. What was the point in worrying her? He didn’t usually call her the minute he arrived somewhere. He switched his briefcase, with the charts he and Charles had made, from one hand to the other and moved toward the baggage claim. Better just to find the guy, take care of it, and tell her about it afterwards, he decided.

  A thin woman in a short gray dress hurried past him going the other way. She had a hard, lean face full of fury that reminded him of his first wife. He figured the image of Nancy throwing things at him in one of her frenzies rose out of his anxiety about doing the wrong thing with Emma.

  “You’re just a man,” Nancy had kept shrieking at him, until he couldn’t stand it anymore. “You’re not the king of the world, Jason. You’re not God.”

  He turned away from the woman in gray with a familiar shudder, because Nancy had been right. There were a lot of things he just couldn’t fix, and the most painful one had been her. The old failure weighed on him. No sign of any baggage yet. He headed for the Budget counter. It was seven-thirty.

  Fifteen minutes later he was on the road with the windows of a new Ford open and the California wind blowing in his face. The sun was down, but there was still a vivid glow on the horizon in the west, like a halo over the city. The airport in San Diego was a strip of land almost in the middle of the city, with the ocean on one side. Even though he couldn’t see it yet, Jason felt a surge of energy from the briny smell of the sea. He was suddenly optimistic about his and Emma’s future. He vowed to practice what he taught and listen more. He was committed to working it out. He’d go back to New York, and they’d work it out. He turned his thoughts to things she had said about her year here.

  Emma had often told him she felt free in California. Now he could understand it. It felt good to be behind the wheel of a car, instead of in the backseat of a taxi so old and redolent of unwashed foreigners it was painful to have to go somewhere. He thought about leasing a car for the summer. Maybe after Emma finished this new film, they’d start looking for a house out of the city and go away for the weekends. Have a family. It was very radical, suddenly considering things he had resisted all his life. But he knew that, quite often, everyday things people were afraid of were what they wanted most.

  A small smile twitched at the corners of his mouth as he considered what it would feel like to buy a car, a house, a crib, and then actually have all the par
aphernalia of a successful husband and father. He had no excuse for avoiding it any longer. He would do whatever it took to make Emma happy. He further surprised himself by getting on the Five heading north to Coral Beach instead of south to the Meridien where he had gotten a businessman’s special for two nights.

  He had planned to see Emma’s parents anyway, but the sudden acceptance of the possibility of having a family together made him want to be near her. Understand her better. It was only a ten-minute drive and he had been there once. He had a pretty good idea where to turn off.

  He exited at Coral Beach. It was a pretty community, not as aggressively affluent and stylish as La Jolla, a few miles to the north. He noticed that the streets were quiet even this early in the evening, and the air was charged with eucalyptus, bougainvillea, and the slight beginning of a salty mist. Not such a bad place to live. He turned left off of Grand Encinada, fully lined on both sides with royal palms, onto Encinada Drive. Four blocks west of the ocean and five houses in on the right. Yes. The lights were on.

  Jason pulled into the short cement drive and walked across the cement path in the lawn. It wasn’t a very big lawn, but definitely big enough to be called one, and to merit having a small lawn mower in the garage. He knew it was in there because his father-in-law, Brad Chapman, had shown it to him on his and Emma’s one and only visit several years before. Brad had been as proud of the lawn mower as the house. Jason rang the bell and looked across the street as he waited.

  The houses were all pretty much the same. Eighth-of-an-acre plots with small, but nearly gracious, two-bedroom ranch-style houses, each with slightly different design accents apparently chosen at random from favorite styles around the world. Columns in front, wrought-iron curlicues around the windows, a two-foot cement wall in front of the door. Frosted or stained glass insets. All well cared for and tidy as could be.

  No one answered the bell. As Jason considered ringing it again, Martha finally peered anxiously through the sidelight to see who would stop by without calling. She didn’t live on a navy base anymore, and resented invasions on her privacy.

  Then she saw Jason and her face lit up. She opened the door so fast he realized it hadn’t been locked.

  “Land sakes,” she cried. “Emma told us you were coming, but we didn’t expect you so soon. Come on in.”

  Martha stepped back to let her famous son-in-law in. “I just spoke to Emma. I mean just—um.” She frowned anxiously. “Did you just get here?”

  Jason smiled. “Yes, within the hour. Am I disturbing your dinner?”

  “Oh, no, no. We finished hours ago. Oh, my—are you hungry? I could fix you something—”

  “I had dinner on the plane. I’m fine,” Jason assured her.

  “Oh, well, then.” She nodded happily, then less happily, in case she had done something wrong or misunderstood her famous daughter about when her famous son-in-law was coming and what she was supposed to do about it.

  To Jason, Martha looked like an older, buttery version of Emma. Her hair was still light, almost blond, but with a silvery cast to it, and her body seemed fluffy. She had filled in around the edges in a gentle way, like a marshmallow, pale and soft. She was as tall as Emma, but had an apologetic air that diminished her. The smooth pink-and-white skin on her face broke up in a thousand tiny lines as she repeatedly excused herself.

  “The place is a mess.” She pointed to the pristine living room with its unused sofa and chairs in pale colors, and pottery lamps that gave off hardly any light. “Skipper, look who’s here,” she cried.

  Martha led the way to the kitchen where her husband was sitting at the table with a glass of Scotch in front of him, studying the fan of cards in his hand.

  “Who’s here?” he demanded.

  “You know very well who’s here,” Martha said with a determined playfulness. “You old dog, you heard me talking to him. It’s your favorite son-in-law.”

  Jason advanced with his hand out. “How are you, sir?”

  Brad, the Skipper, got up and offered his with a show of reluctance. “My only son-in-law,” he said grumpily. He was a meteorologist, a weatherman, smaller than both his wife and daughter, an unhappy fact he compensated for with a brusque, almost bullying, manner.

  “What are you doing?” he demanded, as his wife gathered up the cards.

  “You can’t play now that Jason is here,” she scolded.

  “Who says so?” He turned to Jason again as if trying to decide how disagreeable to be. “How are ya?” he said finally. “Have a good flight?”

  “Yes, thank you. It was fine.”

  “Treating our baby all right?” he demanded.

  “I try.”

  “You don’t have any children,” he argued.

  Martha turned the color of the chairs in the living room, dusty rose. “Good Lord, Bradley, have a heart. Maybe they want to and can’t.”

  “Looks like he can.” Brad’s hairline mustache twitched with emotion over Jason’s looks. Jason was much bigger than he and had a lot more hair. “Never mind,” he conceded. “Not everybody’s the same, heaven knows. Have a drink. What are you doing out here? Emma’s quite the star, isn’t she?”

  He rambled on as he poured Scotch into a glass for Jason. He didn’t seem to care much about getting answers to his questions.

  “Have you seen the film?” Jason asked finally.

  “Yup, yup.” Brad nodded, sipping at his own Scotch in earnest.

  “Yup.” Martha nodded. “We sure did.”

  There was silence.

  Then Martha cocked her head. “She says she’s got another part but she doesn’t know if she wants it. Isn’t that just like her? First she does a thing and then she has her doubts.”

  Jason nodded, wondering if Emma had ever voiced any doubts about him. They certainly must have. He, too, colored a bit. Now they were all a little pink.

  “You two look fine,” he said.

  “We’re fine,” Martha agreed heartily. “Just fine.”

  “Great. What have you been doing?”

  “Lot to do.” Brad shook his head. “A whole lot.”

  “He goes to the Club,” Martha said. “And he has his bridge.” She nodded at the cards she’d laid aside.

  “Got to mow the lawn. You’d be surprised how fast it grows,” Brad added.

  “Get many visitors, many inquiries?” Jason asked.

  Martha frowned. Visitors, inquiries?

  “About Emma,” Jason prompted.

  “Oh, that. Of course people are just thrilled. Everybody loves Emma. All our friends ask about her.” Martha beamed.

  “Any of her friends ask about her?” Jason asked.

  “Her friends?”

  “People she used to know.”

  “Oh, she doesn’t keep in touch, never did. Even that guy who called from the high school said she was lost, remember that, Martha?”

  Martha shook her head angrily.

  “Course you do. They wanted to invite her to the reunion and couldn’t because she was on the ‘lost’ list.”

  Martha clicked her tongue against her teeth. “You’re not supposed to give her address. She wanted to be lost, Skipper. You know that. She went away and didn’t ever want to come back. It’s hard.” Martha shook her head, sadder this time.

  “But you don’t argue with Emma. She does what she says. She’s a sweet girl,” she added apologetically, “but if you hurt her, she’ll just cut your heart right out.”

  Jason nodded. She would indeed. And what had hurt her here in Coral Beach that she hadn’t told him about?

  “Don’t go on about it, Martha. If the girl doesn’t want to go, she just won’t go. What about it, Jason? She coming to that reunion or not?”

  “I don’t think so, Skipper. Was there anybody else who wanted to get in touch with her recently?”

  “Other than the guy from the school, uh-uh.” Brad shook his head.

  After a while, Jason had a glass of orange juice fresh from the tree in the yard, thanked
them, and headed south to his hotel.

  31

  April had been sitting in a booth at Noodle Palace, looking at her watch, for nearly an hour. Jimmy was now so late she had to conclude something must have come up. Something coming up in police work was a fact of life no one who knew anything about the police department could argue with. But today there was the smell of something bad in her nose, as her mother would say. Only it wasn’t really her nose. Her nose and every other part of April felt good being in Chinatown.

  Almost as soon as she got off the subway, she saw somebody she knew. A woman she had helped a long time ago trotted up to her on the street and showed off her grandchild.

  “Very pretty,” April said, stroking the child’s petal-smooth cheek with one finger.

  “No, no. Not so pretty.” The woman frowned critically at the exquisite three-year-old, dressed in an expensive padded silk jacket and embroidered shoes. “But very smart. Smart more important than pretty.”

  April nodded. “But she’s pretty too. Pretty doesn’t hurt.”

  “You nice girl. Why I don’t see you no more?”

  “I work uptown now,” April said.

  “Oh, too bad.”

  April agreed, as she went into the Noodle Palace on Mott Street and chose a booth in the window so Jimmy could see her right away. Often someone walked by and smiled at her, showing they still remembered her even though she hadn’t been working here for nearly a year.

  As she wondered where Jimmy Wong was, and analyzed his behavior lately, she watched what was going on outside on the street. She’d been a cop so long now she couldn’t look at people without memorizing their faces, watching their movements, looking for trouble.

  She observed a brownie, a traffic cop, stop a van and pull the driver over. She couldn’t witness that kind of thing anymore without thinking of the last case she had down in the 5th. A traffic cop just like the one out there now, a Hispanic, had been threatening newly arrived Asians with jail, or deportation, or both, as a result of his giving them a ticket, if they didn’t pay him off. She asked around and found four or five victims, persuaded them to testify. They got him. It felt good thinking about that even though it wasn’t so hard to find out things down here. People had trusted her.