Household Words

by Joan Silber

  “Rich kids,” Moe murmured darkly.

  Conversation in the room lowered when a silk-clad hostess announced a phone call for Dorcas Feldspar; one of the girls they had been watching got up, smoothing her dress and tossing her head, and followed the hostess.

  “Some name,” Rhoda said. “Good poise, though.”

  “Kids like that drive me crazy,” Moe said. “They know nothing about the world. Never will. Don’t have to.”

  “It doesn’t bother me,” Rhoda said. In truth they both felt shabby and envious; the heedlessness of these young people was somehow depressing. Why was that? Years ago, Rhoda told Moe, she and her girlfriend Ellie had saved their money and taken a trip to Europe. On the boat they met and befriended a really nice girl named Alicia Mayhew—she happened to come from a very prominent family but you wouldn’t have known it. “We never felt any different,” Rhoda said. This was a mild exaggeration, but certainly they had not been jealous—of what? They were all equally young, with an abundance of possibilities that could be turned down, like dates; the thought that certain chances never recur had been beyond them then.

  Rhoda’s dress, which had seemed very winning when she had chosen it to wear that evening, now struck her as being too short in the hem. Across from them Dorcas Feldspar, with a great deal of rustling and giggling, was resettling herself into her seat. “Move, Tommy, will you?” she said, bumping her friend’s date playfully.

  “Nothing will ever happen to these people,” Moe said. “It makes me hate them.”

  She thought that Moe was a little too pointedly proud of having been through much, having had things “happen” to him: his war limp, his poor-boy background. Her own true and constant feeling, even with Moe, was that nothing had ever happened to anyone but her.

  Leonard’s death had given her—in a reversed and twisted but permanent way—the same sense of superiority to ordinary people that having him for a husband had given her when he was alive. How could she not be susceptible to the feeling that there was something elevating in being a widow? Even the children thought they knew something that put them above their heedless contemporaries—especially Claire. Rhoda had found, in the jewelry box where Claire kept her treasures, a poem written on lined paper in her third-grade printing:

  When at night I go to sleep,

  I think of thoughts that are very deep.

  My thoughts from others I save,

  I think of loved ones beyond the grave.

  Moe was lighting a cigarette. He had stopped hating the young people in the booth, and he was talking about how well this year was looking in the plastics business. It was actually becoming cheaper to manufacture all sorts of containers, the technology had progressed at such a rate. In the faint boredom with which she followed his enthusiasm over certain chemical processes, she was reminded of how Leonard had gone on about the future of medicine; but Leonard hadn’t cared at all about the money in it, whereas Moe was interested in the money and the power in these things; she liked this about him.

  She saw his hands, as he fingered his cigarette; they were very large and long-fingered, but what was remarkable was the nails—they were wonderfully rosy and healthy, with just a line of immaculate white showing above the quick—a miracle of grooming: they were the most well-mannered hands she had ever seen on a man.

  “I wish my girls could see your fingernails,” she said. “It might inspire them in the right direction.”

  “Oh,” he said. “I get them buffed and all where they cut my hair. They asked me once if I wanted it, and it seemed like a good idea.”

  This did not seem effeminate to Rhoda; it seemed to her part of a luxury and a solidity beyond these considerations. For her the one attraction of wealth had always been its thorough and exquisite tending to detail. The satisfaction of this made her want to rest against him. When he reached forward to light her cigarette, his hands smelled pleasantly of lemony soap. He hadn’t done these things just for her, he did them all the time—there was a mastery in it, an acquirement of perfections—and she thought of all the attentions he must pay himself with such unquestioned ease.

  At the end of the evening he walked her to the parking lot where she had left her car, and while they waited for the attendant, they embraced. She felt the warm slip of his tongue in her mouth, and she was thrilled, moved by the way he held her fast. “See you soon,” he said, and she repeated it, edging away from him. She was waiting for the clear sense that this was one of life’s high moments, and it did not come. He would never be Leonard. At first she felt unspeakably sorry and bitter, but then, as her car was brought and she slid behind the wheel, desire and a pride in him returned—he was waving to her—and she felt, after all, able to like him.

  The next week she spent much time on the phone describing him to friends, embellishing his “points” as though shouting down her vague disappointments; she talked of him so repeatedly she violated her normal sense of privacy, so that when she put down the phone she felt shamed and incontinent. Her friends were excited for her, almost too excited; they were frankly impressed by his money (which she of course had brought up) but when they squealed back over her good luck, it sounded vulgar to her.

  Still, to tell them about him was to publicly confirm (otherwise it would have been nobody’s business) that she was part of a couple again, which made her feel full of hard, ordinary strength in a way she had not in years—the enjoyment of long-denied rights. That weekend he took her to the movies; in the dark of their seats she watched his profile next to her in silent satisfaction.

  They saw Roman Holiday with Audrey Hepburn—Audrey Hepburn was a princess who thought that the only way to have a good time was to pass herself off as a commoner. Afterwards, walking toward a steak house he thought she might like, they talked about the spots where the movie had been filmed, and he told her gritty stories about Rome after the surrender, bands of children stealing clothes off drunken soldiers, socks and all. He seemed full of information, an interesting person. There was nothing very difficult about leaning on his arm while walking, asking questions and smiling during the pauses in conversation. She had not forgotten how after all.

  The streets were hot and crowded; an old man on the corner tried to talk Moe into getting his shoes shined; Moe steered her past him deftly. When they crossed the street, he switched to keep to her outer side. He seemed very well-versed in this. His height and his physical tactfulness made her feel, in her light summer dress, like another version of herself, smaller and sweeter. His favorite movies, he told her, were The Lavender Hill Mob and Henry V.

  They had reached the restaurant; after the fetid smells of the street, the aroma of broiling meat seemed rich and homey. “I hope you’re starving-hungry,” he said, and when she cocked her head and patted her stomach to show that she was, he laughed happily.

  They agreed that the next weekend he was to come visit her in New Jersey. By mid-week it occurred to her that it might be best to warn her father that there was a gentleman coming to visit on Sunday. “So when’s the wedding?” he said.

  “Don’t get your suit pressed yet.” The girls had just finished supper, and Rhoda was clearing the dishes.

  “You’re not getting any younger,” he pointed out. “What I want to know is—is it Mr. Right or Mr. Wrong?”

  “Just be friendly when he’s around, okay? Say hello or something.”

  “When Mr. Right comes, I’ll say hello,” he said, and shuffled back to his room. Claire was at this moment engaged in dumping into the dog’s bowl a sizable piece of perfectly good meat which she would not eat because she said it was all full of fat and stringy parts. I’m surrounded by purists, Rhoda thought.

  She met him at the bus stop with Claire in the front seat. “What a little doll,” he said. Claire had buck teeth and looked more like a mouse than a doll. She rubbed against him in homely sweetness. Rhoda ruffled the child’s hair. “Qui est jolie?” she said. “Claire est jolie.”

  “Know what?” Claire was sayi
ng to him, as Rhoda drove. “I got my Junior Swimmer’s license.” She held out her arm to show him the red rubber band on her wrist, a badge from day camp. “Isn’t that something?” he said, as she played with his cuffs and then held his hand. He was beaming, as adults did who were not used to the easy attentions of children.

  “After lunch we can take a Sunday drive,” Rhoda said, when they pulled up in front of the house. Claire got out of the car and ran ahead, waiting at the front door until Rhoda unlocked it.

  In her living room he circled, exploring. “You have so much room here,” he said. She thought Moe himself looked very large and outsized, hedging around the arrangement of her furniture, and when he settled into the cushions of her couch his knees rose above the level of the coffee table. The rose-veined marble table and the green damask sofa, with its woven pattern of curling scrolls and flowers, looked suddenly feminine as he sat at them eating sandwiches, a dog on its haunches in a garden.

  Claire, who had been playing in the backyard, joined them for the promised drive. Moe seemed to think he was in the country, despite the presence of supermarkets, branches of New York department stores, and moderate to heavy traffic. He admired the way the tree branches in full leaf met overhead from opposite sides of the street. She showed him the houses in the wealthy section and the reservoir. “You’ve never thought of moving?” he asked.

  Rhoda had the same attitude toward the town as toward her possessions; any choice, once made, fixed in her a sense of superiority to those who didn’t have the same. Fifteen years ago she and Leonard had selected the town for its attractive streets and its excellent school system; it seemed to her, as it had seemed then, the most sensible of places.

  Moe entertained her with dead-end-kid stories of growing up in Brooklyn. She teased him about his accent. They began talking in mock-Brooklynese. “Holey moley,” Rhoda said. “Whatsa matter wid me? I missed the toin over dere.”

  “Over dere, over dere,” he began singing. Then he called out, “Watch out, it’s muddy.” Paved blacktop had given way to a dirt side road; rains had softened the rutted surface. “It’s a treat to beat your feet in the Mississippi mud,” he began singing. He switched to a Yiddish version—it had been a great parody years ago. Rhoda chimed in on the key words—she was laughing so hard she was afraid the car was going to go off the road. In his deep voice, Moe kept lowing like a bull their Bing Crosby pick-aninny ditty in Yiddish. He was singing “fees in der Mississippi schmutz.”

  Claire, in the back seat, went wild. She was clinging to the top of the front seat and squealing, “What are you singing? What does it mean?” She had never seen her mother like this. “Teach me the song.” They tried to explain it, but she couldn’t see the funny part. “Oh, you’re just silly,” Claire said, and they laughed harder.

  They had stopped in front of her house, by the horse-chestnut tree, whose dropped leaves crackled under the wheels. Claire thrust open the car door and ran to the back of the house, where the dog barked from his run. In the front seat Rhoda arranged her hair in the rear-view mirror; her face had a blurred, wild look, as though she had been crying or kissing. Moe leaned toward her, touched her neck, and whispered, “I love you.”

  A thrill of shock went through her—she was sure that was what he’d said—but it was too soon, too easily said, too sloppy. Still, it was nice of him. She squeezed his hand, looking down, demure suddenly. The only thing she could think of to say was thank you.

  He was not pushy about physical contact, for which she was grateful. After supper, when Claire went out-of-doors to play, they sat in the sun parlor, smoking cigarettes and letting a hesitation grow between them. For a while he held her in a great comfortable crush and then they necked like teenagers, letting their mouths move slowly over each other’s faces like cats lapping milk. His big hands were not intrusive; when she opened her eyes, he saw and stopped.

  When she talked to Harriet the next day, Rhoda described the visit as having been a “great success.”

  “I think it’s exciting,” Harriet said. “One trip to the mountains and look what you come home with. It shows the spirit of romance is not dead in this world.” Rhoda had been somewhat loath to dwell on her current triumph in front of Harriet, but Harriet’s enthusiasm seemed genuine. At present she was sitting in Rhoda’s kitchen, patting the dog under the table; she had just come from a morning golf class—she was wearing a white blouse and a knee-length white piqué wrap-skirt, and with her cropped silver hair and her deep tan, she looked, Rhoda told her, “extremely sporting.”

  “He loved the house,” Rhoda said, “especially the backyard.”

  “Well, coming from the city,” Harriet said.

  “I thought I’d take him for a walk around the reservoir the next time.”

  “He may be uncomfortable walking too long in damp areas,” Harriet pointed out. “I think his leg might bother him sometimes. It’s three miles around the lake and awfully marshy all through there.”

  Rhoda had very happily planned this as their next expedition; she felt a little irked at Harriet.

  “So you carry him. A new experience.” Harriet winked.

  Rhoda did not want this sort of experience; she wanted her old experience back. Leonard had once hiked ten miles on a trip to Canada.

  “Maybe you’ll bring the dog along with a keg of brandy,” Harriet said.

  The dog gave one of his groaning yawns as he stretched to stand up. Timmy was getting gray around his muzzle. Harriet scratched him behind his floppy ears. His cocker spaniel breed had gone somewhat out of style. TV shows used collies and German Shepherds, more heroic types. He had been primarily Leonard’s dog, although he hadn’t acted especially depressed or confused after Leonard died. Rhoda remembered, with a touch of disgust at the dog’s lack of constancy, how he had jumped and fawned over Moe on Saturday.

  After Moe’s visit to the house they alternated, week by week, meeting in his city or her suburb. Rhoda had never been to his home, a two-and-a-half-room apartment in Brooklyn Heights; he suggested it once, but he did not pursue the topic when she demurred. They saw movies together, he took her to Lili and Moulin Rouge; and one steamy night they went to an Italian street festival where they ate ices, he gambled and lost on the Wheel of Fortune, and she brought back a doll on a long stick for Claire.

  Suzanne met him when she returned home from camp; as expected, she was polite but not forthcoming. He liked to spend money on all of them; he bought Suzanne a large coffee-table sort of book on butterflies—as insects went, they were not her favorites, being too commonly appreciated, but she warmed to him a bit more after that. Both children insisted on calling him Mr. Seidman and could not be coaxed into using his first name.

  In the fall they went for drives into the surrounding countryside. He had found a roadhouse off the highway—a dark, cavernous place with neon signs in the window; Rhoda never would have picked it. He drank cocktails while the kids ate hamburgers. It was called The Embers, in an attempt at urban wickedness; sometimes the two of them returned alone at night for steaks.

  His tastes were not exactly her tastes. He wore, for instance, a diamond pinky ring and heavy gold cuff links. Though he could well afford to, he never traveled—not since the war, if you counted that. He showed sometimes, in speaking of irritations in business, a crudity of language and a raw anger that dismayed her.

  He had the long lantern jaw of a gangster. She watched him in restaurants; when he chewed his meal, quietly enough, he worked his back teeth like an animal. She wondered what she had told people about him. She was afraid she had exaggerated herself out of belief. A stiffness, as though she’d been caught in a lie, sometimes stole over her—she was in the wrong time and the wrong place—but it didn’t matter because she had to be there anyway. After dinner they held hands.

  That he could speak of loving her so cheaply and so easily struck her as a lapse in judgment, a sign of insufficient depth in his character. He was, as the English would say, “a bit too free.” S
till, the words had been said; they existed, as the past did, in sublime finality. In private moments they did come back to her, and she was awash in awe; it was as though she’d awakened one morning to find that she had already slept with him. She could not have been more shaken or more haunted with impression; she was, truly, so startled as to be reduced to girlish gratitude, yielding to self-congratulations and pitiable confusions.

  In November she brought Moe to a large party at the Marantzes’. He was surprisingly quiet and shy, a nodding presence at her side. “A good-looker.” Annie winked behind his back. “Nice work, Rhode.” In general her friends were blindly encouraging in this way; he was presentable; it wasn’t up to them to look more closely. What if this is as good as it gets at my age? Rhoda thought. Millions of women had remarried on less. But they were small-minded people.

  They left the party at midnight, and as she drove Moe to meet his bus (the trains had stopped running at that hour), he said, “Your friends think highly of you. I could tell that.” The streets were empty; the car’s motor seemed quite loud and disruptive making its way through them.

  “I’ve known most of them for years,” Rhoda said.

  “What do they think about the idea of your marrying again?”

  “Some of them think of nothing else,” Rhoda said, laughing.

  “Good,” Moe said. “Very good. I’ve got them on my side then.”

  Rhoda realized that in a manner of speaking—a trivial and somewhat corny manner—he was proposing to her; she was making a turn at that moment and she couldn’t look at him. When she did catch his glance, he gave her a slow, meaningful smile. He went on about how pleasant all her friends had been to him; he had only meant to present the question, to disseminate it as information, and not to demand an answer.