A Winter's Love

by L'Engle, Madeleine;

  “Since the war.”

  “What’s he doing over here? I thought he was some kind of big insurance muggy mug in New York.”

  “He is. His firm sent him over for a year.”

  “Nice kid he’s got, that Sam.”

  “Yes.”

  “Maybe he’ll be a beau for your Virginia.”

  “That would be nice,” Emily said. “Virginia hasn’t had many beaux.”

  “Did you before you were married?”

  “Nope.”

  “And how’s my pal Courtney? Coming to play chess with me one of these evenings?”

  “Sure, Gert, I know he’d love to.”

  “Now what I’d really like,” Gertrude said with a malicious grin, “would be to say to hell with chess and spend an evening getting drunk with my pal Courtney. Courtney looks so pretty with vine leaves in his pretty red hair. Pretty like a fox. Long skinny face like a fox and pretty chinky blue eyes too close together. He’d look pretty with a pink coat riding to hounds, with a hey and a ho and a hey nonny no and a mixed metaphor in the springtime, the only pretty ringtime.… Or in bed with me under the gay plaid of this charming steamer rug designed to cheer the low spirits of poor dear Gert de C. By all means let’s pretend we aren’t sick unto death or we wouldn’t be here and resort towns are made for romantic rendezvous so why shouldn’t I think of it?… I love to tease you, little vulnerable Emily. I don’t want your darling Courtney, little stupid monogamous Emily.”

  “You’re feverish this afternoon, aren’t you?” Emily asked.

  “I have to be feverish, because on occasion I talk the way I feel instead of playing my pretty little part? I only do it around you, my pet. When Courtney comes I let my hand hang limply over the side of the couch and sigh until he holds it, but that’s all, and a slight unnecessary cough to incite his pity; Courtney wears compassion well. And when Virginia and Mimi come I’m all brave and noble and full of wise philosophy, the wounded heroine, oh, so brave, stricken by her noble deeds instead of by her riotous living. A pardonable deception, don’t you think?”

  “And more than half the truth,” Emily said, more gently.

  “Let’s have some music,” Gertrude said. “I’m doing my damndest to like it for Kaarlo’s sake. What’ll it be?”

  “Why not finish the Pastoral? It’s still going around in my head where we left off. And I have to go in a minute.”

  “What’s your rush? Stay and keep me company. I’ve been sitting here brooding all day long.” The fire blazed up and she put her hands to her cheeks. “God, it’s hot in here. Don’t keep building up the fire.” She kicked at the steamer rug, pushed up the sleeves of her black sweater. For a moment Emily’s glance fell on the numbers branded on her arm. “Nice to see you without Connie for a change,” Gertrude said. “Not that she’s a bad brat as brats go. But it’s good for you to be able to get away from her for five minutes.… Em, I’ve been a lovely good girl all day. Would you feel like going to the Splendide for a drink before dinner? Just us—or if Kaarlo’s home early Court might like to come, too.”

  “We can’t this evening, Gert,” Emily said.

  “Why not?”

  “Abe’s asked us to the casino for dinner.”

  “Oh, hell and damn. I’m bored with behaving. I’ve a good mind to ski down alone.”

  Emily said nothing. Gertrude did not take kindly to warnings.

  “I’m bored, bored, bored,” Gertrude said. “That makes two of us, doesn’t it? Well, doesn’t it? Why don’t you say something?”

  “If I say I’m not bored you’ll tell me I’m being a sanctimonious prude,” Emily said, “and if I agree with you, you’ll ask me what the devil I’ve got to be bored about.”

  “That’s right, spoil my fun. Half the time I envy you and the other half I’m sorry as hell for you.” She pulled the blanket up about her again. “Do you know, Em, I never really ever had a woman friend before you.”

  “Should I be flattered or insulted?” Emily put the tray on the counter into the kitchen. “I’ll wash up the tea things and then I have to go. Anything I can do to start dinner for you?”

  “Oh, Kaarlo’ll open a couple of cans or make us an omelette or something. He’s a good cook. Much better than I am. Can Courtney cook?”

  Emily laughed. “No.”

  “Turn down the phonograph while you’re doing the dishes, so I can hear you.”

  “I wasn’t planning on saying anything worth listening to.” Emily turned on the light over the sink. Darkness had fallen while they were talking and in the big main room of the chalet light from the fire flickered against the dark beams, and only a faint reflected light was thrown in the windows from the snow. Emily put the tea things away and put on her outdoor things. “I’ll probably see you tomorrow, Gert. I’m sorry about the last couple of days.”

  Gertrude shrugged again, pulled down her sweater sleeves, shivered, and huddled under the blanket. Emily put another log on the fire. “I would like a nice plain white-plastered New York apartment ceiling,” Gertrude said. “I keep seeing faces in this ceiling. See that knothole up there? Doesn’t it look just like a disapproving spinster? You know, Em, I think Kaarlo got a real bang out of seeing Abe Fielding again. They just had that one mission together during the war, but I guess things sort of clicked with them. They both like the same kind of things—skiing and climbing and this sort of music. I guess we’ll have to submit to some more evenings of listening to records. Turn the phonograph off, Em. I can’t stand any more of that stuff.”

  Emily silenced the music, put the record carefully away. “Anything else I can do for you before I go, Gert?”

  “Not unless you can dig up some excitement.”

  “Wish I could,” Emily said lightly. “See you tomorrow,” and stepped out through the shed into the cold.

  Back at the villa she got the hip bath out from under the kitchen table and filled it with hot water for Connie. There was a tub in the bathroom upstairs, but even when it was filled with hot water from the ancient geyser and the window blanked out by steam the room remained so cold that all baths were taken in the kitchen near the comforting heat of the coal stove.

  “Where’s daddy?” Connie asked, pulling off her shoes and socks.

  “He went into the village to get rolls for breakfast. I forgot them this morning.”

  “With Mimi and Vee?”

  “Yes, Con. They ought to be back any minute now.”

  “Where’s my fish? I want my fish in the bath. Where’s my fish, mama?”

  “Here on the window sill where you left it last night.”

  “Why can’t I go have dinner at the hotel with Vee and Mimi Opp?”

  “Because you weren’t invited.”

  “Why weren’t I vited?”

  “Because you aren’t old enough.”

  “Mimi says I speak better French than Vee does.”

  Emily laughed. “You do, but that still doesn’t get you an invitation to dinner.”

  “When can I go to a movie?”

  “I don’t know, Con. Sometime. Not tonight.”

  “But when?”

  “If a good movie comes later on in the winter maybe I’ll take you.”

  “Daddy, too?”

  “If he wants to. Hop in the tub, now, Connie.”

  As Connie climbed in they heard the front door slam. “That’s Virginia and Mimi! I want to see them!”

  “Emily Conrad Bowen, stay in the tub,” Emily said sternly. “You’ll see them soon enough. They’ll probably come in here looking for us.”

  And in a moment Virginia’s voice came, “Mother!”

  “In the kitchen,” Emily called.

  Virginia came in and stood in the doorway. “Oh, there you are. May Mimi and I have a bath?”

  “I don’t think you’d better, darling, and then go out in the cold. Just wash up a bit when you change.”

  “Mother, it’s going to be fun!” Virginia cried, her green eyes suddenly shining out like a kitte
n’s in her little pointed face, “I’d be petrified if I had to go alone but with Mimi Opp it’ll be fun. We’ll wear our black velvet school dinner dresses and be like sisters. Like twins.”

  “Like before and after twins, then.”

  “Before and after what?”

  “Oh, you know the ads, Vee. Before eating Dr. Podder’s Porridge. After eating Dr. Podder’s Porridge.”

  “Oh. I get it. I’m Before. You do like Mimi, don’t you, mother?”

  “Very much.”

  “Have you ever heard her father play the violin?”

  “Not at a concert. He hasn’t played often in America. But Kaarlo has some of his records. He’s very good.”

  “Mama, scrub my back,” Connie demanded, and then added as Emily looked at her: “Please.” Emily took the soapy cloth and rubbed it up and down the small soft pink back. “More. More. It feels so good.”

  “My lascivious little daughter,” Emily said, rubbing. “Now scrub your knees and wash your feet.”

  “Mrs. Bowen!”

  “We’re in the kitchen,” Virginia called.

  “Oh. Hi.” Mimi came hurrying in, her red robe pulled about her, her feet stuck in the outrageous, fuzzy slippers. “Mrs. Bowen, have you got something Virginia could wear tonight?”

  “I rather doubt it, Mimi. Why?”

  “All we’ve got is our bloody school dinner uniform. Can you imagine, Mrs. Bowen, going out to dinner at the Grand Hotel dressed exactly alike?”

  “I thought it would be sort of fun,” Virginia said faintly.

  “Why not?” Emily said quickly. “You can make a game of it. And those dresses aren’t bad at all.”

  “For uniforms I suppose they’re all right,” Mimi conceded grudgingly. “You can’t go too wrong with black velvet. But I could do with a nice décolletage instead of those cosy little white-lace collars. And honestly, Virginia, we’re too old for this twin business.” Then, seeing the quickly hurt look in Virginia’s eyes, she flung an affectionate arm about her. “Oh, okay, idiot, we’ll play twins like mad and make Sam do everything as though we were Siamese. Do you think he could manage to dance with both of us at once? That would cause a sensation, wouldn’t it? Though I suppose if we’re going to the flicks we won’t be dancing tonight. Thank goodness I managed to sneak in a little scent in spite of matron’s doing the packing, and you can use some of your mother’s—can’t she, Mrs. Bowen?”

  “Certainly. Now look, you two young ladies, run along and get dressed and then sit quietly in the living room till Sam comes for you. Where’s daddy, Vee?”

  “He stayed in the village to get a paper or something.”

  “I got his papers this morning. Bother. I wanted him to go get Thérèse. Oh, well. Go on, you two. Get dressed.”

  “I want to go up and watch them get dressed,” Connie said.

  “No, darling. You stay here where it’s warm.” Emily held out the big towel she had put to heat on a chair by the stove. “Come on, Con. Out you get.”

  Connie stood up and let Emily wrap the towel around her. “I’m still hungry.”

  “You can’t be. You had two poached eggs and three pieces of toast and two dishes of compote for dinner.”

  “But I am.”

  “You may have some bread and butter, then.”

  “With sugar on it?”

  “All right. With sugar.”

  Connie thought this over for a moment. Then her lower lip began to quiver and her big blue eyes filled with deliberate tears. “Mama, I don’t want you and daddy to go out tonight!”

  Emily knelt down by the child and put her arms around her, but her voice was firm. “Now, Connie, don’t start that. Please. Daddy and I are going, and we’re looking forward to having a pleasant evening with Mr. Fielding.”

  “Who’s Mr. Fielding?”

  “Abe Fielding. Sam’s father.”

  The lip quivered more noticeably. “I don’t want you to go. And I don’t want Vee or Mimi to go.”

  “We’re all going, Connie, but not until you’re sound asleep in bed. And Thérèse will be here if you want anything and you love Thérèse. Now. Here are your pajamas, all nice and warm. Hop in. I mended the hole in the toe.”

  “Will you take me to bed and sing to me?”

  “Yes.”

  “How many songs?”

  “Oh—six.”

  “Six long ones?”

  “Six medium-sized ones.”

  Connie thought this over. Her lip started to quiver again, then she thought better of it, and said, “I think I’d go to sleep even more faster if I had two pieces of bread and sugar.”

  Connie was settled for the night when the front door slammed. Emily got up and tiptoed out of the room, softly drawing the door to behind her. Courtney stood in the front hall, his muffler pulled halfway up over his face, his hat down over his ears. He took off the hat and hung it on one of the pegs.

  “It’s colder tonight,” he said.

  “I know. You can hear the house creak and crack the way it always does when the thermometer plummets. Darling, it’s time to change. It’ll be time to meet Abe in half an hour and I wanted you to go get Thérèse first.”

  “I’m not going,” Courtney said casually. And as Emily looked at him in astonishment: “I mean I’m not going to the casino. So there’s no need for Thérèse. You can telephone her.” He began to sing a rather bawdy sixteenth-century round.

  “Said Sir John to his Lady, as kissing, as kissing they sat, ‘Shall we now go to dinner or to you know, to you know what?’

  “Come on, Emily. Sing it with me.”

  Emily stood very still. At last she said, “But, Court, why?”

  “Because I feel like singing rounds.”

  “No. Why aren’t we going to the casino?”

  “I’ve been fighting a scratchy throat all day and if I go to that crowded, over-heated place it’s bound to turn into a bad cold. If I behave sensibly and sit at home with a book I can in all probability lick it. I stopped at the Splendide and had a couple of brandies and I’m feeling very warm and comfortable and not in the least like going out again. So I’m not going.” He started to sing again, another round.

  “Banbury ale! Where, where, where!

  At the blacksmith’s house! I would I were there!”

  —More than a couple of brandies, Emily thought. Oh Court, I wish you wouldn’t.…

  But then she thought quickly, defending him in her own mind as though from an attack from the outside—He’s disappointed and unhappy! No wonder he wants to forget it once in a while.

  —But I want to go tonight!

  Aloud she said, “I know Abe has made reservations ahead. He’ll be—he’ll be awfully disappointed.”

  “I don’t think it’ll make that much difference to him. There’ll be other nights—what’s wrong with next week?—and I’m damned if I want to come down with a cold right now. You know I always have the devil of a time shaking one. You must admit going out at this point doesn’t make sense. Abe’s a good fellow. He’ll understand that.”

  “All right,” Emily said, her voice flat with disappointment. “I’ll call him and say we can’t go.”

  “There’s no need for you to stay home,” Courtney said. “I know how you love a party and there haven’t been very many this winter.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Emily said, her voice a little sulky. “You know perfectly well I’m going to stay home with you.”

  Courtney picked up his muffler where it had slithered off the hook. “Come on out of the hall. It’s dark as a dungeon and cold as an icebox here. Let’s go in the kitchen. No, I don’t want you to stay home with me. You know I detest being fussed over. Go along and have a good time. Was Abe going to pick us up?”

  “No. I think we were to meet him at the casino.”

  “I don’t like your walking there alone at night. Are Gert and Kaarlo going?” Courtney led the way into the kitchen, pulled up a chair and sat down.

  “No,” Emily said
. “I was with Gert this afternoon so I’m sure they’re not going. And I’ve walked to the village plenty of times alone in the evening. And Abe will see that I get home safely. But I don’t think I should go without you.”

  “Oh, come off it, Emily! I don’t want you hanging around wishing to hell you were at the casino. As for me, nothing could please me better than having an evening completely alone. One of my chief pleasures this winter is that there’s no Tommy O’Hara to tell me which social functions he expects me to at tend and I get a positive satisfaction out of turning them down.” He hitched another chair closer and put his feet on it. “I don’t envy you. It’s bitter cold out tonight. I shall wrap myself up in a blanket and read. Connie asleep?”

  “I hope so, by now.”

  “Virginia and Mimi?”

  “Upstairs changing for their big date with Sam. I’ll make you an omelette and some toast and coffee before I go.”

  “I’m not particularly hungry.”

  Emily put her arm about his shoulders. “You don’t think I’d go off to feast at the casino and leave you unfed, do you? It won’t take me a minute.” She took eggs from a bowl on the shelf, then said, “Court, I’m not a bit happy about leaving you. Are you sure you don’t want me to stay?”

  “Damn it, Emily, I told you I didn’t, didn’t I?” He pulled a paper out of his pocket and began to read as she prepared his meal. “I am hungry after all,” he said, smiling up at her suddenly with the singularly sweet smile that had become very rare that winter; she smiled back and put his plate and a steaming cup of coffee on the kitchen table.

  “There’s some good compote in the icebox for dessert,” she told him. “I’m going up to change now, darling. There’s lots more coffee in the pot if you want it. I’ve just shoved it to the back of the stove.” At the door she turned. “What do you suppose the K in Abe’s name stands for?”

  Courtney paused with his fork halfway up to his mouth. “I don’t know. Kevin? Kabalevsky? Kuala-Lumpur? Kouangtong? Kilkenny? Konstantin? Konstantinople?”

  Emily laughed, a happy laugh, now that, like a child, she had her way, now that she was going. “Why do lots of modern Greek names begin with K and no ancient ones? Or at least none that I can think of? I’m off, darling, or I shall be late.” She ran upstairs.