Ice-Cream Headache

by James Jones

  From the parking lot the Park pickup roared and then faded off down the double dirt path to the asphalt.

  Mr Lemmon turned around then.

  “Oh, hello there, Mr Merrick,” he said easily. He shook his head. “I always hate to see things like this happen, you know? Dont you?”

  Mr Lemmon had got the drop on Sylvanus, but he was not going to rub it in. All over now, his face said, lets forget it.

  “Where they taking him?” Sylvanus said.

  “Over to Sullivan. He’ll be tried probably, and fined.”

  “If he pays them any fine, he’s crazy. What he ought to do is prefer countercharges against both of them.”

  Mr Lemmon looked surprised. He shook his head. “That wouldnt do any good. That kind of thing always does more harm than good. The best thing that boy can do is write it off to experience and learn from it.”

  “Yes,” Sylvanus said. “It should teach him a lot. If he thinks about it,” he said. “Its a great credit to your Park, Mr Lemmon. Its even a fine comment on the whole of our great Middle West culture. For a minute there I thought I was in Georgia.”

  Mr Lemmon smiled. He moved his shoulders tolerantly. “It isnt my Park,” he said. “I only run the concession. It isnt going to help my business any. If I ran this Park—or this world—I’d probably instigate a change of policy in both. But I dont ran either, Mr Merrick.”

  He was right of course, and Sylvanus had to admit to himself grudgingly he was glad now he stopped him, and then their eyes met with some kind of tacit agreement that made Sylvanus Merrick feel warm, and at the same time shocked him with dislike for himself as a hypocrite. It was the first time he could ever remember having been on the other side of the fence.

  “I’m going over there,” he blurted out suddenly.

  “Over where?” Mr Lemmon said friendlily.

  “To Sullivan,” he said.

  “Well, thats up to you,” Mr Lemmon smiled. “I suppose in your business things like that help make material.”

  “Something like that,” said Sylvanus.

  Norma was waiting for him at the corner.

  “Well, I hope you’re satisfied now,” she said. “You’ve played the hero—”

  She stopped long enough to smile at Mr Lemmon whom she had not seen. Mr Lemmon nodded smiling and discreetly passed by. Sylvanus had no doubt that Mr Lemmon believed they were married. Norma waited till he was clear out of earshot.

  “—and made a laughingstock out of both of us,” she said. “Everybody on the beach is laughing.”

  “Let them laugh,” he said.

  “I couldnt very well stop them,” Norma said sadly.

  “I’m going to drive over to Sullivan,” he said. “Do you want to go along?”

  “To Sullivan? What on earth for?”

  Norma looked at him incredulously. Then, behind her, he saw the girl come up from the beach carrying their things and go up to Mr Lemmon guiltily. Mr Lemmon was very polite to her, he told where they had taken the boy and advised her to drive their car over there and pick him up there. Mr Lemmon hoped he could be of some service, and just to call on him. The girl thanked Mr Lemmon.

  “Havent you had enough heroism for one day?” Norma was saying. “Do you have to go over there and make fools of us again? Do you—”

  “All right!” he said violently. “All right! To hell with it! Lets go home, shall we?” The violence in his voice startled him even. It was obvious it startled Norma.

  “I think thats just what we’d better do,” Norma said stiffly.

  They walked along side by side. She did not say anything else. Neither did he. All during the walk down around the lake and back over across the dam with the wild cherries growing tall on both slopes and almost making a tunnel out of the road. All the way back to the cabin.

  By the time they got home she was no longer angry. She went into the little kitchen quietly and started getting the lunch. He went out on the porch to get dressed, still thinking what he had been thinking all the silent trip home, how fine it had been yesterday evening when he came home and found her there.

  It was too much to expect of a man. You had no right even to demand so much of yourself, if nobody else saw it but you. Life was all compromise anyway. It always had been. It always would be. There would never be any more justice than there was now. Conquer the plague and smallpox arises, conquer smallpox and typhoid arises, conquer typhoid and polio arises. It was not that he expected what he did to make any difference. And he knew how much she loved him. It was a decision that came at some time in every man’s life, he knew that too. Maybe you could call it the last death rattle of youth. Twenty-six was a good age for it. And after the spasm was over it wasnt so bad, you could have a good life.

  Nature had made it that way, hadnt she? and it was silly to fight Nature, wasnt it? He used to be contemptuous of the men like her father, like his father. Not any more. They were the men who kept the world going, and if they had to be liars to do it, well, the world was based on a lie, wasnt it? There were worse ways of living than lying. And a man could not just renounce the whole heritage, he could not escape it that way, he had to have some place to stand if he wanted to rupture himself moving the world.

  He must have known all the time he was dressing what he was going to do. Maybe that was why it took him so long. He went out to the kitchen. Norma was smiling and humming a little as she worked on the lunch. “Norma,” he said.

  “Yes, dear?” she said.

  “I’m going over to Sullivan.”

  She put down the bowl and laid the spoon carefully beside it. He guessed she must have known too, then. “Now what?” she said. “I thought we decided that, didnt we?”

  You had to admire courage like that.

  “You decided it. I didn’t. I wanted to go. I wanted you to go too. If you dont want to go, you dont have to. But dont try to keep me from going. You have no right to keep me from going.”

  “I’m not trying to keep you from going. If you want to go, go. But you’ll only be making a fool out of yourself. Out of both of us. If thats what you want to do, go ahead.”

  “It isnt really my going,” he said. “That has nothing to do with it. This is something else, between you and me.”

  She looked at him a couple of seconds and started to smile, then changed it into a laugh. “I dont see how whether some lovesick boy pays a fine for spooning has something to do with you and me.”

  “Yes you do,” he said. “I’m not saying its sensible. Maybe its crazy. Maybe it wont do any good at all. But its not the boy—I got used to seeing that in the army. Ohls’s fist wasnt aimed at that boy, Ohls’s first was aimed at you and me, Norma.”

  “Oh now,” Norma laughed. “Back onto Fascism.”

  “Look,” he said. “Lets you and me face it for once. Lets tell the truth to each other for once. We’ve both lied to each other since we first met, even. You’ve always intended for me to go into your father’s business: all the time we’ve been talking about other plans, you’ve intended that, havent you?”

  “No,” Norma said. “I’ve wanted you to do what you wanted to do. Always.”

  “Come on,” he said, “come on. Lets both quit being proud, quit being respectable, quit being loving, quit being ashamed of what we honestly think. Lets be honest. For just once.”

  She looked at him a long time. “I think it would be just as easy for you to do your writing and make some money too,” she said finally. “I think that. I dont see why you have to play a part and live in a garret and starve, to be a writer. Do you?”

  “I’ve never starved,” he said. “I live pretty good, one thing and another.”

  “You mean like tending bar at the Moose?”

  “Sure,” he said. “At least they never try to influence my thinking.”

  “Maybe that was all right for you by yourself,” Norma said. “But as your wife, Van, you owe me something too. I dont want to live like a gypsy. I dont want to be looked down on as cheap. And
low class. I want security, for myself and my children.”

  “You think your mother has security?” Sylvanus said.

  “But of course,” Norma said. “She never wants for a thing, that my father doesnt buy it for her. If its within reason.”

  “Then you dont think she ever lays awake nights scheming and worrying and scared to death she’ll lose that security, lose your father, every time he goes on one of his bats to Terre Haute or Evansville. Scared that maybe, some day, he might find one he’ll keep going back to? That there might not just happen, some place, to be some woman good enough to outsmart her and take him away from her? Do you call that security?”

  Norma moved her head and looked down at the bowl. She picked up the spoon and began to stir the salad again. “No woman ever has that kind of security,” she said.

  “But they could have,” said Sylvanus. “If they would only stop living their lives like your mother lives hers.”

  Norma moved her head on her neck again, looking down at the salad. “I’d rather we didnt discuss my parents,” she said. “I think we can leave them out of this. If you want to go over to Sullivan and make a fool out of yourself, you just go right ahead.” She looked up at him. “Only remember this, I wont be here when you come back.”

  He nodded. That was what he had dreaded. He had tried to avoid it every way he knew how.

  “You’re still using yourself as a carrot under my nose to threaten me, arent you?” he said.

  “If you want to put it like that, yes,” Norma said,

  “You ought to know it wouldnt work any better than it did last time. You ought to know it would only force me into it more.”

  “But this isnt the last time,” Norma smiled cheerfully. “This is now. Go to Sullivan, if you want. There wont be any coming back and giving in dutifully. This time I mean it,” she smiled.

  “Okay,” he said. “I hear you.” She still believed it would work.

  “We cant go on like this forever,” Norma said. “We might as well settle it, once and for all.”

  “You mean settle who’s boss,” he said. “Settle who wears the pants.”

  “Is that whats bothering you?” Norma smiled. “No,” she said. “Not at all. But if you cant do one simple thing like this that I ask you—You do owe me something, Van,” she said meaningly.

  “Yes,” he said, “and you always make damned sure I never forget you gave it to me, dont you?”

  “Thats a rotten thing to say to me,” she said contortedly.

  “You asked for it,” he said. “You ought to know. You’ve always said I was a regular blackguard without ethics. Well, you decent women put too high a price on that thing for its actual worth. Some day the bottom will drop out of the market. Some day,” he said, “in spite of the decent women, this country will have to start advertising something besides sex. If it just lasts that long.”

  “But theres no need to get angry, Van,” Norma smiled at him. “I’m only doing what you’ve been wanting, what you’ve been hoping I’d do.”

  “I’m not angry,” he said. “What in hell gave you that big idea?” She still believed the old carrot would work.

  “You really ought to be grateful,” Norma said sweetly. “I’m really doing you a big favor. I’m giving you the chance to get free. All you have to do is go to Sullivan. Then you can lie to yourself and say I left you and get out from under without having your conscience bother you. But then,” she smiled, “you always have known just how to handle me, havent you, Van?”

  “You’re quitting me,” he said. “I’m not quitting you. Your loving old daddy cant very well get me out and horsehide me for betraying his daughter when its you quitting me. Now can he?”

  “Ha,” Norma said. “Is that whats scaring you?”

  “But cheer up,” he grinned. “Cheer up, kid. Theres plenty of other men around you can work on. It wont take you a week to find one, and you can use what you’ve learned on this one to help you sink the old hook into the next one. Most women need a couple failures to get their technique down letter perfect, anyway, dont they?”

  “You son of a bitch,” Norma said.

  “Kind of hit home, didnt it?” he grinned.

  “Get out,” she said. “Go back to Arky and Russ and their Terre Haute pigs they keep in stock. Thats where you belong. Go on, get out. Get out. You dont leave a thing, do you? When the warrior dies they not only burn the wives and the weapons and horses but even the dogs and the cats and the utility bills. Dont they? Get out.”

  “I was just leaving,” he grinned, and went out the front door and down the homemade brick steps, thinking it was the first time he had ever really been actually glad they were not married, because there was nothing to make him come back now, thinking he should have mentioned that too.

  But outside, where she could not see him, the grin faded out. He could not hold it. He was not mad any more. He felt sick at his stomach. Human beings could be so rottenly disgustingly stinkingly honest, when they got mad enough, and let themselves go.

  As he walked out through the trees to the car the house was stiffly silent behind him as if she was listening. He walked very slow, hoping she’d call him. If she called he would go back. But he could not go back on his own hook. Because it would only be the same thing all over again. As soon as she realized she had won she would start right in making him pay. And nothing he could say would be able to reach her.

  When he opened the car door he paused to give her a last chance to call. Instead, she started to sob. The sobbing came out clearly through the summer stillness under the trees. She was using the sobbing to make him feel guilty enough to come back without being called. She still believed the old carrot would work.

  The old familiar sound of the sobbing hanging on the quiet peace of the air made him so furious with outrage he wanted to smash his fist into something. Into the Middle West maybe. The sobbing rode like an old-fashioned ketch, outmoded by steam, on the waves of blue air, affronting him with its absolute female confidence, so that in the midst of the fury he was suddenly bored, tired of the whole thing, the same going over and over, that never made any decision except the same old weary resorting to ruses that in the end they both always employed. He did not want that any more.

  He got in the car and slammed the door hard. The sobbing stopped suddenly, as if shocked. But the echo seemed to hang on in the air over him, as he backed out to the asphalt.

  He felt as if somebody had just taken handcuffs and a big rope off of him—so that he could reach in his hip pocket and find his wallet was gone.

  VI

  He drove straight in to the courthouse in Sullivan. There was nobody there except one deputy in the sheriff’s office and the usual handful of loiterers out on the steps. The boy had already paid his fine and left with his girl. Mr Philips and Mr Ohls, they told him, had gone right back to Fandalack. He had not passed Philips and Ohls driving in, so he figured they must have stopped off somewhere to have a couple of beers before going back. It was hot work there, at the Park.

  He drove very fast going back to the cabin. She was already gone. The sheets were gone off the beds and the curtains she had put up had been taken down. The place already had that fusty vacated smell in it. It was the same smell that had been there when he moved in. The salad bowl was still sitting on the sideboard with the spoon in the uneaten salad. He started packing his own stuff. She had not taken the extra food she had brought up for him. He packed it too. There would not be enough money left to go to Michigan now, but he could take a cabin at Lake Lawler for a month on the refund from the Park. His beans and bacon and bread and the two cans of coffee were still there. He packed it all.

  Mr Lemmon was very nice about the refunds for the boat and the cabin. He did not ask Sylvanus down to the basement for a parting beer. Maybe he thought Sylvanus was leaving because of the boy. Sylvanus did not enlighten him. He was keeping his mind on Lake Lawler.

  For a man who had made a fool out of himself twice in the same m
orning Sylvanus felt pretty sharp-edged yet. Lake Lawler was no Fandalack, but it served a purpose. Norma would have considered it more his kind of a place anyway, because while it might have been high class in the ’20s, it had all been down hill for Lake Lawler since then so that they had started catering to a less finicky clientele, and Norma’s parents would not let her go there any more, so it would be a good place not to run into Norma, and he felt he was not quite up to running into her yet for a while, and it had a dance pavilion with a jukebox on the lip of the lake and a beer concession behind it and there were plenty of dark places to park cars, he might even run into Russ and Arky down there, and if there were no bass in the lake there were at least bluegill and crappie, and it was privately owned so there would be no uniformed hoods running around wearing themselves out protecting its purity, a month at Lake Lawler looked pretty good, he did not feel so bad about leaving Fandalack.

  VII

  There was a red-headed widow from Mount Carmel, Illinois, staying at Lake Lawler, leasing one of the bungalows—as distinguished from cabins—around on the other side of the lake, who was interested in artists and writers and did not like the Middle West either. She was afraid of a new husband taking her for what the first one had left her. She felt she had earned it and she meant to enjoy it. But she did not let this hurt her appreciation of art. She had chanced to read two of Sylvanus Merrick’s stories, and when she found out he was him, in the flesh, she was anxious to see what his novel was like. So he started in to read the whole thing to her. She bought wonderful scotch, and he thought perhaps he might get new ideas by watching her reactions. But when he read what he wrote to the widow she giggled at all the wrong places, the same places Norma Fry had always used to look shocked at. He even found after a while that he would take to defending the Middle West against her attacks.