Brown-Eyed Girl

by Virginia Swift

  “That goes two ways,” Maude offered graciously. She headed for the back door, then turned to say more. “Listen, Sally. I don’t know how much you know about Meg, or her life, or how folks felt about her or how she felt about them. I don’t know exactly what’s in her files,” she said, nodding her head in the direction of Margaret’s locked office. “I haven’t looked at them, because I wasn’t asked to do so. When she died, they were all over the place. I just looked at the things she’d written on the folder tabs and put them in boxes. I didn’t even read the loose papers—just stacked them up and boxed ’em. Dealing with that stuff is strictly up to you.

  “But I do have an idea of some of the stories you’re going to find in those boxes. I lived through them and heard more. It’s not going to be easy.” Maude looked sober, apprehensive. “Various people will see to it that it’s just about as hard as it can be. Lots of people hated her. She was a liberal and a feminist, and they don’t exactly win popularity contests around here. Byron Bosworth hated her guts for more than thirty years, and from what I hear some people have hated yours for almost twenty. When Bosworth found out she’d endowed a chair in women’s history, and that his department didn’t have anything to say about who would be hired for it or how much they’d be paid, he screamed his head off. He isn’t about to give up on the idea that the money she gave the university ought to belong to him and his friends.

  “Meg wasn’t always, well, nice. And then there’s her life, her life. Meg had an interesting life. Do you really know what that means? It’s a Jewish curse to wish an interesting life on somebody.”

  Sally knew a version of this old saying, but didn’t want to interrupt.

  “Are you ready to try to understand the things she chose? Are you sure you have the imagination?” Maude caught herself in mid-tirade, and shook herself. “Sorry I got carried away. I don’t even know you.”

  Sally remained silent, eating the delicious muffin, the delectable jam.

  Maude apparently decided she’d raised enough heavy issues over a muffin and a cup of coffee. And she looked like she had plenty on her mind. “I don’t really know what you’re made of. But writing her life will be the most important thing you ever do with yours.” She pulled a bandana out of her back pocket, wiped her eyes, squared her shoulders, worked up a smile. “I’ll be in the back when you’re ready,” she said, walked into the mud room behind the kitchen, and stepped out the back door into sunlight and green.

  Chapter 4

  Her First Visitor

  Sally wanted to see the garden, of course, but she had not yet explored inside. She took her cup of coffee now, and walked toward the front of the house. One odd feature of Meg Dunwoodie’s house was that the front door was off-center, practically in one corner, and now Sally saw why. The living room, huge, high-ceilinged, and stretching across most of the front, looked like something out of a Fred Astaire movie. Tall windows stretched almost wall-to-wall, hung with sheers and silk. Creamy wool carpet, soft low sofas, overstuffed chairs, gleaming coffee tables, built-in bar, ashtrays the size of your head. Debonair silver floor lamps with sleek silk shades. A huge fireplace, faced with polished, pink-flecked gray granite Sally recognized as the same rock that composed the formations up at Vedauwoo in the Laramie Range.

  A lot of stuff, but not a trace of clutter. There was even a gigantic silver cigarette lighter, and a hinged silver book-shaped case full of ancient cigarettes, on one highgloss black lacquered end table. A huge crystal vase of pink gladioli presided over the coffee table. She thought she caught a faint whiff of Joy perfume. She could imagine Ginger Rogers in a marabou-trimmed silk dressing gown and high-heeled slippers, tapping a cigarette on the table, leaning over as Fred snapped open the lighter for her, stretching back into a chair and saying, “So tell me about the show, Johnny.”

  It seemed impossible that anyone had lived like this in Laramie. It was assuredly not possible that Sally could live here. Imagine some snowy afternoon dumping her wet book bag on a silk chair, throwing her down coat on the sofa. Her apartment in LA had been something in the nature of an extended sleeping bag.

  To the right of the front hall table, an arch into a narrow hall led to glossy wooden stairs carpeted with an oriental runner. She went up the stairs, noting that the ceiling in the second floor hallway had a pull-down door to an attic. On the left was a small spare bedroom and bath. She turned right into Margaret’s study—functional, but still remarkably large and graceful. A French empire desk, and matching chair with a needlepoint seat, was set out from the wall, freestanding on a large, pale oriental rug, facing windows that framed the canopy of the cottonwood in front of the house. Once again, Maude had added a touch, fresh garden flowers in a Spode teapot. No filing cabinets. Double doors on the wall behind the desk held a walk-in closet. She tried the doors, knowing they would be locked—the lawyer Sonnenschein had said he’d send her a key. A sofa sleeper covered in figured silk. Over the couch was a grouping of four framed pen and ink drawings. They were exquisite renderings of hands in different positions on the keys of a piano, etched in black on white, then washed with streaks of vivid red and blue watercolor, signed by someone named Blum. The cabinets held books (including all three of Sally’s!), a television, a modest stereo rig and records, mostly classical and jazz instrumentals. Lots of piano music. No piano in the house, though.

  Meg’s books were, of course, on the shelves, two thin, fine volumes from beautiful little presses, and of course the larger, slick-covered National Book Award collection, Rocks and Rage. She took it off the shelf. It fell open to one of Meg’s minor poems, one Sally happened to like particularly, “Between Memory and Hope”:

  A trembling tussle between memory and hope.

  Moment to moment, transposes:

  Tender brush of an unsuspected key.

  Quickens, jars,

  Awakens, appalls,

  One word whispered.

  One flickering

  Flash of the blade,

  Brush of the key,

  A shifting half-step

  Transforms, plays out.

  I was born of

  an irresistible monster.

  Bloody born alive,

  Hope’s poison in my veins,

  Remembering the brush of the key.

  Sally closed the book, turned to go back down the stairs. She was ready, now, to have a look at Meg’s (and Maude’s) garden, to listen to Maude describe, as she undoubtedly would, every plant variety, every weed and pest, the shapes of leaves, and where caterpillars hid in the crannies of the cauliflowers. And then she heard, for the first time, the sound of Margaret’s door chime, a sound that made her feel as if the person ringing the bell expected someone a hell of a lot more gracious and stately and important to answer the door. She was sweat-soaked, disoriented, and noticed she’d spilled coffee on her T-shirt on the way up the stairs. But then she remembered that the real lady of the house had been dead for three years. Whoever was at the door had come to see Professor Sally Alder, sweaty spandex, coffee stains, and all.

  Her heart gave a flop, but then she reminded herself that there was absolutely no reason in the world Hawk Green would come to see her. In fact, if he was even aware that she was coming back (was he? Had Delice or Dickie or Mary or anybody told him?) he was probably using his excellent brain to work out ways of not running into her, in a town of twenty-five thousand people where the numbered streets ran out at about Thirtieth.

  Don’t think about Hawk. Had he changed much? Had he gotten fat like Dickie, or would he still be tough and sinewy and rangy in the hips? Would he have wrinkled in nice crinkles around the eyes like Delice, or would he have furrows in his forehead and commas around his mouth, like Sally? Would he have that beautiful hair, long and thick and black, or had his hair begun to thin? How would he think she was looking? Oh God.

  As she went downstairs, Sally eyed the big splotch of coffee on her T-shirt and missed a step and almost fell flat. Catching herself, she took a breath, opened the
door, and peered through the storm door glass into the watery-eyed, chin-challenged face of Egan Crain.

  “Sally, old girl,” Egan chirped, brandishing a cellophanewrapped bouquet of purple-dyed daisies straight from the Safeway. “Heard you’d been sighted at the Wrangler last night. Simply smashing to have you back!”

  As long as she’d known him, which stretched back just about to the bicentennial, Egan Crain had used terms like “old girl” and “simply smashing.” He’d still not managed to perfect a real British accent (which would have made it impossible for any American to understand a word he said) but he had apparently not given up working on his half-perfect impression of an English twit.

  Egan had been born, educated, employed, and empowered in the state of Wyoming, but he came by his claim to Brithood semilegitimately. His great-grandfather had been an earl of some kind who had gone to Dubois to try his luck at ranching in the 1880s, and had managed to last through the terrible winter of 1886–87. Lord Crain had left his heirs a serious spread in the valley between the Absarokas and the Wind Rivers. Lady Crain, Egan’s great-grandmother, had been a German girl with Hanover blood. Everyone remarked that Egan bore an unmistakable resemblance to his cousin, H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, and that the biggest problem with Egan was that he didn’t realize that the resemblance was unfortunate.

  Sally opened the storm door and stepped out on the porch, permitting Egan a stiff, near-miss hug. They had been graduate school gossip acquaintances rather than hugging buddies before, and Egan had always been good for the latest dirt. But he must figure that the Dunwoodie Center had brought their relationship to a new level.

  “Thanks for the flowers, Egan,” she said. “I’d invite you in, but I just got here last night and don’t quite know what the house rules are yet.”

  “Quite all right, my dear,” he twittered. “I mean, I think it’s up to you, something about possession and nine-tenths of the law don’t you know, but I wouldn’t want you to go to any bother.”

  She stood staring at him a beat too long, then realized that it was probably a good idea not to antagonize him before she’d even figured out why she felt like doing it.

  “Actually, I’ve just come by to welcome you on behalf of the archives, and to see if I mightn’t steal you for a spot of lunch next Thursday. Give you time to settle in, then we can have a nice chat about those moldy old papers of Meg’s,” he told her.

  “I hope to hell they’re not moldy, Egan. The house seems tight enough.” Careful, Sal. No need to be irritated.

  “Just a manner of speaking, ducky. But I do so want to talk to you about how to treat Meg’s precious legacy. After all, you’ll need some professional advice on how to make your way through the mess. I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but Meg was never what you’d call a compulsive organizer. I hear that when they unlocked the door to her office in the English department after she died, the place was knee-deep in books, papers, half-dead aspidistras, and I don’t know what! They say Maude Stark showed up and just started throwing things in boxes and carting them out. I can only begin to imagine what she’s left us!” he finished with a heavy sigh, rolling his eyes skyward.

  Sally took a deep breath, and found the sense to wonder why she was already feeling defensive on Meg’s behalf, why it bugged the crap out of her to hear Egan refer to Dunwoodie as “Meg,” and why Egan’s offer to help shouldn’t be seen as sensible and generous, even if selfserving. “I appreciate the offer, Egan, really I do.” She even laid a hand on his arm, thinking she’d learned something about diplomacy after two decades in academia. She’d find a wall to kick soon. “And I’d love to have lunch Thursday. I really need any advice you can give me.”

  “Well, dearie, I do have one piece of early advice,” said Egan. Sally hoped he wouldn’t bring up the idea of moving the papers to a secure room in the archives. She really didn’t want anybody else deciding when, where, and how she could get to the papers and do her work. Fortunately, Maude appeared from around the side of the house. She was carrying a basketful of perfectly shaped zucchinis, glowing carrots, slender green beans.

  “Do you mind if I take a few veggies home, Sally? There’s lots back there—I’ll show you as soon as you have time. Oh, hello Egan—I didn’t know you were here.”

  “Maude, ever the faithful retainer,” Egan greeted her, automatically patronizing, but evidently uncomfortable. Egan was not blessed with great height. He had to crank his head back to look Maude in the eye, so he settled for looking in the direction of her neck. “I’ve just come by to welcome our new Dunwoodie Professor on behalf of the Archives, and to be on my merry way. Do take care of our girl, won’t you?”

  “You can bet on it Egan. And she’ll take good care of Margaret’s papers, I’m sure.”

  Maude made it a dismissal, and Egan hustled to leave. He turned to Sally, saying, “I’ll ring you about the details for Thursday, old thing. Cheer-o.”

  Watching him walk down her—Dunwoodie’s—front walk, Sally remembered that she’d always thought Egan walked as if he were trying to keep a cork from popping out of some critical orifice. “Thanks for saving me, Maude,” she told the housekeeper, and meant it. Then she said more, knowing she shouldn’t and not knowing why she couldn’t seem to stop herself. Why trust Maude? “I realize I have to deal with him, but to tell you the truth, he’s always driven me bat-sh—uh, crazy.”

  “Think nothing of it,” Maude said, “he drives me batshit, too.”

  Chapter 5

  Katmandu Calling

  Sally developed a provisional routine. Dawn came early. Through the east window of Meg’s bedroom the sun came up and poured in just as the winsome young Joni Mitchell had imagined, so very long ago, on some butterscotch Chelsea morning.

  Get the coffee going, return upstairs to shove on running gear, head to the bathroom to brush teeth. Slip on those Birkenstocks. Back down to the kitchen for coffee, and then out the back door. This great Laramie garden, in full late summerburst, made her forget she had a lot of work ahead, dissipated worry about angry academics and greedy burglars. She walked between the rows of beans, along the low pea fences and admired the high trellises of scarlet runner beans, festooned with red blossoms, dripping with dangling green pendants. Lettuces and spinaches, cool multicolor bouquets of cauliflowers, broccoli, and pale and purple kales. Heaped mounds bursting with huge flat leaves that shaded squashes.

  Wyoming vegetable gardens had few pests. Pests weren’t stupid. Why try to survive in a place this hard? Did horn worms, zucchini beetles, stinging caterpillars, and their brethren care more about a view, or were they practical enough to opt for a place where it wouldn’t freeze eleven out of twelve months? Well, maybe they were stupid, but they wouldn’t pick a place where they would die before laying their eggs. Sally liked a view, but she figured it took a big brain to care about whether you could see the mountains from town. Big brain, yeah, but not necessarily a smart animal.

  She carried a knife, a huge canning kettle, her coffee cup. Walking among the rows, she cut this, chopped that, pinched the other, drank coffee. She walked back to the house with the big pot piled full of vegetables. She shed the Birkenstocks at the back door and left the heavy kettle on the kitchen table.

  Now she put on her socks and shoes, her Walkman, and headed out running. Then it was weird KFAT music, more coffee, a day of reading over the stuff she’d gotten from the Dunwoodie Foundation, browsing Meg’s books, picking idly at her guitar, eating Maude’s vegetables, pouring a Jim Beam to watch the sunset. For three days it went like this, but on the fourth, Monday, something changed when she returned from her run.

  The phone rang. “Katmandu calling,” said a voice.

  Less than twenty-four hours after last spring’s graduation, Dean Edna McCaffrey and her second husband had been on a one-stop flight from Denver to New York, the first leg of the marathon air trek to Nepal, via London, Istanbul, and New Delhi. After spending three months as a working guest of disciples of the Dalai Lama, she
and Tom had returned late at night, conked out, and woken to discover a dead lawn, a houseful of shriveled ferns and a nightmarish parade of answering machine messages. Some messages were welcome: “Hi, Edna. This is Sally. I’m here, ready to have a beverage and talk about Dunwoodie chairs and whatever. Your place or mine?” This made Edna smile.

  The next message, which touched on something like the same subject, was substantially less welcome. “Hello, Edna. This is Byron Bosworth. We need to talk about the History Department’s role in administering the Dunwoodie bequest. The department has met to discuss this matter, and I’ve sent a memo outlining our funding needs for the year to your office. I’ve had your secretary set up a meeting for Wednesday afternoon before school starts.” Click. Far be it for the Boz to waste words on the likes of Edna. Edna smiled at this one, too, but it wasn’t a very nice smile.

  Eighteen years ago, Byron Bosworth had told Edna’s then-husband that he thought there was “no room for faculty wives in a university that has real standards.” It was a shame that the anthropology department had seen fit to hire Edna as a part-time adjunct instructor. Edna nevertheless instructed along for another year, publishing articles and writing grant proposals, then accepted a two-year appointment at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. Her children went with her to New Jersey, while her husband remained in Laramie. They pretended the separation was only temporary.

  At Princeton, Edna had worked closely with Rodney Wertz, the king of cultural anthropology. Her own field work had taken her all over Asia and later to Los Angeles, and it seemed to her that every time she tried to imagine pristine “natives” who inhabited “homelands,” she met a Trobriand Islander wearing a ZZ Top T-shirt. People didn’t stay put, she surmised. This stunning observation had led to three prize-winning books on refugees, exiles, expatriates, and diasporas, and had eventually won her a MacArthur Foundation genius grant. Byron Bosworth probably thought she got his MacArthur.