by Kitty Zeldis
“I no want say.”
“But you never gave any indication . . . You should have told me.”
“How I tell?” Henryka said. “Besides, my girls, they little then. I need job.”
Yes, of course she did, Patricia thought. She knew about Henryka’s fifth-floor walk-up above a butcher on First Avenue, the three daughters she’d raised alone. “Is there anything I can do to change your mind? Or at least persuade you to think it over for a little while?”
“No.” Henryka placed her work-worn hand over Patricia’s. “Time for me go, missus. I give notice today.”
Patricia got up and went to her room. Fortunately, Wynn was in the shower so she didn’t have to face him yet. Wynn had done something to Eleanor. And to Henryka. Was there anybody else? She remembered a secretary in Wynn’s office who’d left very suddenly, with no explanation. Was it because of him? Things had been happening—serious, troubling things, and she’d known nothing. How could she have been so blind?
Looking around—four-poster bed, pair of wing chairs, footstool, bureau, wooden settee—it seemed that everything was suddenly strange. But it wasn’t the furnishings that were unfamiliar—it was her entire life. What she thought she’d known turned out to be untrue, and what she hadn’t known was a threat, even a danger. The water in the bathroom went off. Wynn was through showering.
“You’re up early.” He came in toweling off his hair, and when he untied the sash of his robe to dress, she looked away.
“I had some news this morning,” she said.
“Bad news?”
“Yes, I would say so.”
“What’s happened?” He moved closer. Although he’d put on his boxers and pants, his chest was still bare.
“Henryka’s decided to leave us.”
“Oh.” He stepped back, and sat in a chair to put on his socks. “That’s not exactly bad news, is it? I mean, she is getting older. Maybe she wants to retire.”
“No, she’s not retiring. She started looking for another job behind my back. Dottie told me.”
“Really? Now that seems kind of sneaky. Disloyal even. After all these years . . .” He tied his shoes and looked up. “I know you’re attached to her, but we’ll have no trouble finding someone else.”
“Do you want to know why she’s leaving?”
Wynn went to the bureau for an undershirt and she saw the faint traces of the scratches she’d noticed last week. They were practically gone. “Do I have a choice?”
“She said that she was leaving because of you. Because you did something to Eleanor. And—years ago—to her.”
“What are you talking about?” His tone was truculent but his face began to get mottled—a sure sign he was upset.
“She wouldn’t give me many details, so I’m going to ask Eleanor. But I wanted to talk to you first. Did something happen between you? Something I should know about?” He was still seated and she took the other chair, facing him.
“Did she say something happened?”
“Not to me. But clearly something did and I want to hear your side.”
“This isn’t going to sound good,” he began. “I shouldn’t have gone over there but—”
“Where? To the cottage?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I was sick of how everyone worshipped Eleanor. Eleanor, Eleanor, Eleanor. She makes me feel like a second-class citizen—in my own home.”
“You don’t like her. You never have.”
“It’s true. But I was sorry and I went over to make amends.”
“When?”
“One night in August—I don’t remember the date. It was late,” he said. “You were sleeping.”
“So you went over to the cottage to offer an olive branch to Eleanor. Then what? She invited you in?”
“Yes, that’s it,” he said—too eagerly it seemed. “She asked me in and offered me a drink.”
“A drink? Of what?”
“I don’t know. Scotch, I think. Yes, that was it. Scotch.”
“Eleanor kept a bottle of scotch in the cottage? I’ve never known her to drink scotch.”
“Why are you interrogating me?”
“I’m not interrogating you. I’m just asking because Henryka accused you of something. And whatever it is, it’s serious enough to make her leave us after nearly thirty years!” Tears filled her eyes, but this was no time to cry and she brushed them away. “So please, just tell me what happened.”
“All right,” he said. “All right. I went over there, I had a drink, and then another one. She was drinking too. The radio was on and she wanted to dance, so I obliged her. She wasn’t really dressed . . .”
“What do you mean she wasn’t dressed?”
“It was late. She was wearing some robe over her . . . pajamas, I guess. Anyway, we danced and she pressed very close to me. And I was . . . that is . . .”
“You got . . . aroused.”
He looked at her imploringly. “I did, and I’m sorry. I knew it was wrong but the feel of her was just . . . I tried to kiss her.”
“Kiss her!” Patricia may have lost her desire for Wynn but she didn’t like the idea that he was kissing anyone else. Especially Eleanor.
“She pulled away. There was a struggle and we fell. I think she hit her head on the floor pretty hard. I got scared and I left.”
“You didn’t stay to make sure she was all right?”
“No, I was embarrassed. Ashamed. I just wanted to get out of there.”
“And those scratches on your arms—Glow didn’t make those. It was Eleanor.” He nodded. Patricia was quiet, trying to take it all in. “How did Henryka come to know all this?”
“I don’t know. Maybe Eleanor told her.”
The thought of the help gossiping about them soaked her in shame. “And what about Henryka? Why did she say that about you?”
“One Christmas, forever ago, I may have tried to steal a kiss under the mistletoe. But it was a joke—as if I’d go after Henryka. She’s practically old enough to be my mother. Obviously she’s held it against me all these years.”
“She also said there was something that happened a long time ago—when I was in the hospital, after Margaux was born.”
“Are you really going to believe that?” He was indignant. “And what, exactly, is she accusing me of?”
“I don’t know what to believe. She wouldn’t say anything more.”
“Well, then what does that tell you? How can I defend myself if she won’t say what it was I did?”
“Wynn, why should you need to defend yourself at all?”
“This is an outrage. My wife, the cook who’s been on my payroll for a decade, a tutor who came out of nowhere to infiltrate my home—all of you accusing me, condemning me—”
“All right,” she said. “That’s enough. You can stop now.” He wasn’t going to tell her about the other time. Neither was Henryka. But there was a chance Eleanor would tell her what had happened in the cottage—if she asked the right way.
Wynn went to the closet. “You’ll forgive me, won’t you?” he said. “What I did wasn’t so terrible. No one was hurt, not really. I’m a man and a man has urges. Sometimes it’s hard to . . . tame them.”
“Like last night?” She hadn’t meant to say that—it just came out. She moved toward the bedroom door.
He was by her side in an instant, but she stepped away and this time he didn’t come after her. “I’m sorry,” he said. “So sorry. But if you only knew what you looked like in that flimsy slip and bra . . . I needed to feel you were mine, Trish. All mine. And that was the way.”
Once, a long time ago, those words would have meant everything to her. She’d loved Wynn then and had wanted nothing more than to be his. But she no longer felt the same way, and Henryka’s decision to leave had torn away the protective curtain that had allowed Patricia to live her life with some equanimity. She didn’t know what she would do now that it was gone.
Patricia left Wynn in the bedroom
and went back downstairs. Propped up beside a bowl on the counter was a letter that had come for Eleanor; Henryka must have placed it there, ready to take over to the cottage. Eleanor. She’d returned from the city late the night before last, taken Margaux out for the entire day and begged off dinner, saying she was tired. Eleanor, who was faultless, blameless, and clearly the injured party. And yet Patricia found herself inexplicably angry with her—had she not become part of their household, Henryka wouldn’t be leaving. The feeling passed, and in its wake came a bit of remorse for having it at all. Maybe things would be better when they returned to New York. Patricia could only hope so—she was more than ready for this strange, altogether unsettling summer to be over.
Twenty
Eleanor reveled in her return to the city. Yes, September in New York was still wretchedly hot, and the buses that lumbered up Third Avenue and down Second fouled the already fetid air with their clouds of black exhaust. Garbage was piled high by the curbs, or overflowing from cans, and the streets were thronged. But Eleanor felt protected by the noise, the dirt, and the heat. Even her prim little room above the hat shop was a safe haven and she was grateful for it. She had managed to get through the remainder of her time in Argyle—avoiding Wynn Bellamy, though just knowing she might have to encounter him kept her on the alert. Also, Tom had left quite abruptly and Henryka had given notice; Patricia seemed like a wire pulled taut and ready to snap. It was altogether a fraught atmosphere and one she was glad to leave behind.
Back in New York, Eleanor regained a measure of control, at least as far as Mr. Bellamy was concerned, and she took to arriving at the Park Avenue apartment after he left for the office and leaving before he returned. Of course living with her mother presented its own set of challenges and she had to navigate them as well as she could. “School is starting,” Irina would point out. “Do you think it might be possible to apply for a job as a substitute teacher? Isn’t there always a demand for substitutes?” Eleanor tried to deflect or ignore her comments, but it was a strain. She thought wistfully of her sitting room, bedroom, and private bath in Argyle and wished there were some way to take the best of what it had offered and transplant it here.
One morning after Eleanor had been back for about a week, Patricia stopped her before she went into the study. “Would you be able to join me for a drink at the Carlyle when you’ve finished with Margaux today? Wynn is coming home early and he’s taking her to the theater and I’d rather he didn’t know about it.”
Eleanor agreed, but for the rest of the morning, and the afternoon too, she wondered—and worried—about the purpose of this meeting. Was it about Tom? She had told him he could call her apartment during the day, while Irina was in the shop; the last time they had spoken was over a week ago.
“Everything’s all mixed up,” he’d said. “I’m all mixed up. I think I just need some time away.”
“Away where?” She’d been angry. He was mixed up, but what about her? He was batting her back and forth like a Wiffle ball and she didn’t like it.
“I haven’t decided. I may go to Martha’s Vineyard. Or even to Nova Scotia. September is the most beautiful month up there.”
“I’m sure it is.” As if she knew anything about it—she’d never been to Nova Scotia, in September or at any other time. And then he’d gone, without telling her where he’d ultimately decided on going. This new disappearance filled her with less longing than the first time and more bitterness. He’d been using her after all—maybe not intentionally, but in the end, it didn’t matter what his intentions had been. He’d made her feel cheap and disposable.
Margaux chattered about the play—The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar Wilde—and Eleanor said they could read it. Finally, the day, which seemed to pass so very slowly, was over. Eleanor phoned her mother, to let her know she’d be late, and was able to escape from the apartment with no more than a brief nod to Mr. Bellamy.
The September evening was as warm as summer but the light was appreciably different, already fading as Eleanor walked from Park Avenue to Madison and turned south. The stores were just closing and she saw women exiting with delicate shopping bags whose handles were mere ribbons dangling from their wrists. What could such insubstantial bags hold? Silk stockings? Powder puffs? A woman in a fitted red suit walked a glossy dachshund; another held the hand of a small child in a pink-and-white pinafore. All these women—so protected, so cosseted—had homes and husbands, dogs and children. Eleanor felt like an exile in their midst. Would these things that seemed to come so easily to other women ever come to her? Ruth had just announced her engagement to Marty Tolchin, the boy she’d met at the synagogue mixer. Two other Vassar friends were also newly engaged, and a third had just gotten married in Philadelphia. Eleanor hadn’t been able to attend the wedding but she’d gone in with some of the other girls for a set of crystal wineglasses and a matching decanter.
Eleanor was the first to arrive at the Carlyle Hotel, and was ushered to one of the chocolate brown leather banquettes. A waiter appeared with a menu and a glass of ice water that Eleanor sipped as she looked around at the nickel-trimmed black glass tabletops, the black granite bar, and the gold leaf that covered the ceiling. On the walls were whimsical scenes of Central Park—picnicking rabbits, ice-skating elephants, a giraffe slipping his neck between the bars of his cage. She had just glanced down at the menu—what prices on the drinks!—when Patricia appeared. “Thank you for meeting me,” she said. “I just wanted a chance to talk to you—alone.” Patricia flashed a smile as the waiter appeared and ordered a Green Dragon for each of them; Eleanor had no idea what was in it.
“Is it something with Margaux?” she asked.
“Margaux is just blossoming.” Patricia sipped the vividly colored drink that had just arrived. “Thanks to you. So no, it’s not about her. It’s about Henryka.”
“Henryka?” Eleanor took a sip of her drink. She tasted crème de menthe and something else too. Whatever it was, it was powerful—she had better go slowly.
“Did you know she’d given notice? She’ll be gone by the end of the month.”
“Yes, I know.” Eleanor had been surprised when Henryka told her. Also sorry because she had come to depend on Henryka as an ally in the household. But why did this disclosure demand drinks at the Carlyle?
“Well, did you know the reason she gave for leaving?”
“No, she didn’t mention—”
“She said it was because of you.”
“Me? What do I have to do with it?”
“Do you remember the night she took you to the doctor in Argyle?” Patricia’s elegant fingers seemed to be holding the stem of her glass very tightly.
“She told you about that?” Eleanor was sure her face was flaming. That Patricia had known but not said anything seemed beyond understanding.
“Only what she knew—that you’d been hurt and needed to see a doctor. And that the person who hurt you was—Wynn.”
“He didn’t hurt me, not exactly, it was just that we fell and I hit my head on the floor . . .” Eleanor couldn’t finish.
“Why don’t you tell me what happened?” Patricia’s voice was surprisingly gentle. “From the beginning.”
Eleanor did not think she could bring herself to tell the story, but found she was able to do it, all the while staring down at the luminous green liquid in her glass.
“Wynn admits that he came to see you,” said Patricia. “But he said that you invited him in, offered him a drink, and asked him to dance.”
“No.” Eleanor finally raised her eyes to look at Patricia. “It wasn’t like that. You know it wasn’t. I would never . . . He was your husband. And my employer.”
“I don’t know what to think.” Patricia finished her drink and signaled to the waiter to bring two more.
“I think you know that I’m telling the truth, but to believe me, you have to accept what kind of man your husband is. And that can’t be easy.”
“The kind of man my husband is . . . I kne
w that when I married him. Or I thought I did. But people change and you can’t even see it because you’re still stuck in the past.”
Eleanor was flustered. She had never planned on sharing what had happened with Patricia and yet Patricia had found out anyway. “I wasn’t going to tell you,” she said. “I wasn’t going to tell anyone, not even Tom. And I didn’t even tell Henryka, but she guessed.”
“So, what are we going to do?” All of Patricia’s defenses seemed gone, and she was asking a question to which Eleanor did not have the answer.
“What do you want to do?”
“Well, I’m losing my cook, which grieves me more than I can say. I don’t want to lose you too.”
“You don’t?” This was a surprise; Eleanor thought Patricia would have wanted her gone immediately.
“No,” Patricia said.
“What if we never talk about it again? Pretend it didn’t happen, and after a while, it will feel like it never did.”
“Would you really agree to that? Tell no one? Not even Tom?”
“Of course. I’m the one who suggested it,” said Eleanor. She never wanted to think about that night again. Now she wouldn’t have to.
“Then I think we have a plan. Can we drink to it?” She touched the rim of her glass to Eleanor’s, and when the Green Dragons were gone, signaled to the waiter for the check.
It was dark as Eleanor walked along East Seventy-Sixth Street toward home. Irina would want to know if she’d eaten, and if so, what and with whom. Just thinking about these questions felt oppressive; having to answer would be even worse. How much longer would she have to tolerate them? She thought of the women she’d seen earlier in the evening. Would she ever join their magic circle? Ira had jilted her and Tom had vanished—but even if he hadn’t, she saw too many obstacles to imagine a life with him.
When she came to Second Avenue she turned and headed uptown. What if there were another way to live? Not with a husband, not with Irina, but—alone. The thought was terrifying. Also exhilarating. And once it had coalesced in her mind, it was followed by a rush of others. Where might she want to live? Not Yorkville, where, apart from her four years at Vassar, she’d spent her whole life. The West Side perhaps? Or downtown, in the Village, like Tom? She had some money in a savings account. What would her mother think? Her friends? But oh, imagine how it would feel to be answerable to no one other than herself.