Natural Enemy

by Jane Langton

  Well, thought Homer, looking around the small entry hall and peering into the living room, it takes a heap o’ livin’ to make a house a home, and this one has certainly had a heap o’ somethin’. It’s certainly done a heap o’ saggin’. The floor of the living room drifted downhill to the east, accompanied by the ceiling. Homer told himself to hug the west wall if he didn’t want his hair to graze the plaster overhead.

  As the small rooms filled with the friends and relatives of Edward Heron, Homer was soon separated from his wife. He stood at one side sipping sherry, studying the public observance of Edward’s departure from the land of the living. None of the guests seemed deeply grieved. Coffee and tea and sherry were warming digestive systems, going to heads. Subdued expressions of sympathy were giving way to a noisy babble, as men and women who hadn’t seen each other for weeks or years forgot the reason they were gathered together. Time was closing smoothly over Edward Heron, leaving no seam.

  Then in a gap between grey heads and lifted coffee cups, Homer caught a glimpse of the pink cheeks and bright eyes of an old friend, Jane Plankton, the famous Miss Jane Plankton of Eliot and Janeway, a prosperous Cambridge investment firm. Homer was enchanted to see that Miss Plankton had been tossed into a corner with old Mrs. Bewley by the tide that was slowly sweeping the funeral party from the bereaved daughters at the door to the table of food and drink in the dining room to the larger gathering place of the living room and out again to the hallway and the door and the open air. Slowly Homer began to press in the direction of Miss Plankton, trying not to trample feet or destroy inherited crockery.

  “Isn’t it sad?” Miss Plankton was saying to Mrs. Bewley, coming to the point at once, as was her way.

  “WHAT’S THAT?”

  “I said, ISN’T IT SAD. I WILL MISS EDWARD. HE WAS A CHILDHOOD FRIEND.”

  Mrs. Bewley seemed to have forgotten the nature of the occasion. Her eyes were fixed on the pair of old-fashioned spectacles hanging on Miss Plankton’s polyester breast.

  “THEM LITTLE GLASSES. AIN’T THEY NICE?”

  “What?” Miss Plankton looked down in surprise. “OH, MY LORGNETTE. OH, YES, ISN’T IT AMUSING? A LITTLE AFFECTATION.” Then Miss Plankton gave a squeal of pain as Mrs. Bewley grasped the chain of the lorgnette and dragged it ruthlessly upward.

  Homer Kelly was near enough to behold this act of thievery. Squeezing clumsily past Mrs. Amelia Farhang with outstretched protesting hand, he surged forward. But Mrs. Bewley was jerking the chain loose from Miss Plankton’s hair ribbon and lowering it joyfully over her own frowsy head. As Homer drew alongside, she lifted the lorgnette and peered at him, adopting at once an air of majesty. Dropping his hand, Homer watched her stalk away with Miss Plankton’s stolen property — a ragged duchess, a threadbare aristocrat, the queen of a madhouse — and tried to control his mirth.

  Miss Plankton was charmed. “Oh, Homer,” she gasped, “what a darling woman.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Homer. “I’ll get it back. No problem. It’s just a matter of tactful reborrowing. Something like the economics of a capitalist country. As the director of a vast financial empire, you must know all about it. Leave it to me.”

  “Oh, no!” Miss Plankton was horrified. “Not on any account! I am simply hugely amused! It was a treat! She’s welcome to it! See how she simply adores it! I am truly pleased!”

  But this act of brigandage was only the beginning. The melancholy reception that had begun as a sympathetic grazing of lips against cheeks, a soft clucking of solace and consolation, an enclosing circle of friendship, ended — as Virginia said later — like a descending invasion of turkey vultures: beaks tearing, claws ripping, red wattles inflamed.

  Ten

  HOMER WAS ADRIFT AGAIN. HE STOOD ON THE SIDELINES IN DOUR reflection on the paradox of rustic suburban wealth. Look at this place, all old-fashioned antiquity and inherited furniture, a roomful of polite folks who had all been to Harvard. Homer was a little sore on the subject of Harvard, because the closest he himself had been to Harvard as a young man was the teeming crossing of Boylston and Brattle Streets and Massachusetts Avenue, where he had directed traffic while Harvard students surged across the street into the Yard. Later on he had acquired a cheap city-college education somehow or other, and a law degree at night school. And then he had picked up a mass of miscellaneous information by himself and written a lot of books. Christ, he had even taught at Harvard. But he still felt a faint grudge against the easy self-assurance of the kids who had flooded the intersection of Harvard Square in days gone by. Here they were, the same crowd. Grouchily Homer imagined their comfortable domestic establishments. They all lived in picture-book farmhouses, only every blade of grass was like a dollar bill, and the weathered fence rails were so much beaten silver. Homer saw them posing as old farmers too, on weekends, in their L. L. Bean Maine hunting gumboots and field coats and wood-chopping vests, but every January and February they were off to Switzerland to ski, or basking on the beach in the Virgin Islands. It was too bad the IRS didn’t require everybody to make a full public confession of family income. Homer smiled at this pleasant fancy. Suppose you had to post it beside your mailbox:

  Annual Earned Income — Wife

  Husband

  Annual Income from Investments

  What a revelation! Because nobody ever told. It was the most carefully guarded of all secrets, the one hushed fact that never came to light.

  What about these Heron women, for example, wondered Homer, how rich were they? Mary said Edward didn’t have much money. Well, how much was not very much? His daughters were probably well off. They stayed at home. They didn’t work. They probably just clipped coupons like heiresses in days of yore.

  John Hand was passing a plate of little cakes. He too had thought of Virginia and Barbara as a pair of wealthy women. But now he was disabused. They weren’t rich after all. Holding out his plate to a couple of Edward Heron’s old friends, he was shocked to hear a brutal summary of Mr. Heron’s financial misfortunes.

  “Wouldn’t you know Edward would end up poor as a churchmouse,” said the man in the bow tie, helping himself from the plate, not looking at John. “Those flowers he invented never amounted to anything. Did you know he put a second mortgage on this property?

  Poor as a churchmouse — that wasn’t fair to Mus musculus, who probably had better sense than to hole up in a church anyway, thought John scornfully. Smiling to himself, he presented his plate to the man in the conservative three-piece suit, Putnam Farhang. Mr. Farhang was the husband of the flower-arranging lady and the president of some big insurance company.

  Mr. Farhang waved John’s plate away. “Then I’m afraid those girls don’t have anything left,” he said, “beyond this mortgaged tumbledown house and forty acres of land. I understand Barbara hasn’t been using her RN degree lately. Maybe she’ll go back to work now. And as for Virginia, listen to this. I dropped in a month ago to see Edward, and there was that young woman, dirty from head to foot, dragging a huge uprooted tree on a toboggan. Must have weighed three hundred pounds. Said she’d dug it up; she was transplanting it someplace else. Why doesn’t a handsome girl like Virginia just get married? I’d take a flyer at her myself, if I weren’t hogtied already.” Mr. Farhang glanced furtively at his wife across the room, then shook his head. “Queer ducks, these Heron women.”

  John was enraged, but he merely turned his back, pretending to rearrange the cakes on his plate, and kept his ears open.

  The man in the bow tie chuckled. “Of course there’s only one way out,” he said. “They’ll have to sell off some of this property. That’s what Edward was working on when he died. Knowing Edward, I suppose he would have made a mess of it. Maybe his daughters will be able to do it right. Of course I’ll offer my services. Development mortgages, that sort of thing. Our firm —”

  John wandered away, wondering how two big important business men could gossip so freely about Mr. Heron’s affairs in front of a third party like himself. But then he caught sig
ht of a child across the room, a kid with a familiar pale face and big moony glasses. It was his own reflection in the mirror. They had thought him too young to matter.

  As luck would have it, John’s next customer was the real-estate developer who had been working with Edward Heron. The man was introducing himself to Barbara. He was blundering and floundering and putting his foot in his mouth. “Deeply sorry,” he said. “Such a loss … shocked … feel for you at this time … your father and I … about to undertake… forty parcels … cluster development.”

  “Oh, so it was you, was it?” said Barbara sharply. “It was for your sake he was prowling around that wilderness on the day he died?”

  The developer didn’t seem to recognize this question as an accusation of murder. He bungled on. “Mr. Heron was making a preliminary survey, a rough plan, suggesting some of the best house sites, recommending places to be cleared for the most efficient clustering of the individual units. We were going to prepare a contract just as soon as — I hope you ladies will be able — after an interval, of course, a chance for you to recover from this sad — sit down with us in order to revitalize —”

  “No,” said Barbara. “Never. Impossible. You can just forget the whole thing. Here, why don’t you have something to eat? John, give this man some cake.”

  Obediently the man took the last piece of cake, lifted it to the gaping hole of his mouth, and gazed vacantly at Barbara’s retreating back.

  “Excuse me,” murmured John, hurrying after Barbara. In the kitchen he found her leaning against the wall of the pantry with her back to him. She turned her ravaged face to John, blew her nose, and said loudly, “It was my fault, you see. That’s the whole trouble.”

  John couldn’t think of anything to say. He picked up cakes and refilled his plate, as Barbara strode past him into the dining room and reached out her hands to an old friend.

  “William,” said Barbara.

  Selectman William Warren clasped Barbara’s hands and squeezed her fingers. He said nothing, but his eyes filled. Then he began telling her about the good times he had enjoyed with Edward when they were young men together, the trip to the Rockies in the early forties. He would show her the pictures.

  “Oh, William, I’d love to see them.”

  “I’ll bring them over one of these days. And pretty soon you can see the new aerial photographs we’re taking of the whole town. I was out the other day in a helicopter, taking a look. Fascinating, your place from the air. Oh, and listen here, Barbara, I’ve got to sit down with you girls and talk about the change in the law.”

  “What change in the law?”

  “It’s the evaluation of open land, you see. From now on it’s all going to be assessed as marketable real estate. One hundred percent evaluation. You can’t just have a house and ten acres any more, and keep the land as low-taxed property. Everybody’s going to have to put their nice fields and woods on the market, that’s what I’m afraid of. It’s no joke. Your taxes will go way up. That’s why your father was so eager to sell out.”

  “Listen, William, I don’t want any part of that. Selling out, I mean. Neither does Virginia.”

  “Good girl, Now, look here. There are a couple of things you can do. You can try to sell some of it to the town for conservation. Has to be passed by Town Meeting. That way it would never be built on. It would still be there to look at. Just some nice trails for people to walk on. Or you could make a real effort to use it as farmland. Then it can be taxed at a lower rate. You can sell hay. You can raise corn. You can —”

  “That’s where I come in,” said Buddy Whipple, looming up at Barbara’s elbow. “I can manage the whole thing. I know exactly what Barbara should do. Now, look here, Barbara, you don’t want to be pressured into handing over anything to the Conservation Commission. The whole city of Boston would be parking their cars on the road, leaving trash all over the place, trampling everything flat. Motorcycles and trail bikes all over the place. Bonfires. Don’t be a fool, Barbara.”

  William Warren glanced at Buddy, then turned back to Barbara. “If you decide to use it as farmland, then you have to make a profit of at least five hundred dollars a year, to call it real agricultural use. Come see me at the town hall, and we can work it all out.”

  “But I’ve got it all in my head,” said Buddy. “I can show them on paper in black and white. I mean, I’d enjoy it. What are friends for?”

  Barbara too seemed not to notice Buddy. “I’ll come, William. Thank you. That would be a real act of kindness.”

  Buddy grinned at their two averted faces and turned away, shrugging his shoulders. He could wait. Sooner or later he would win Barbara over. It was a trick he had discovered in childhood, how to make people like him. Now it was second nature — the big grin, the jolly disarming laughter, the bear hug, the easy arm around the shoulder. Slowly now Buddy moved through the crowded rooms, amiable, complete in himself, famous for being himself, for saying bluff hearty things. His was the largest presence in the house. Whatever empty space had been left by Edward Heron was now occupied. Buddy was everywhere — in the dining room, the kitchen, the living room, the hallway — shaking hands, embracing elderly women who had seen him grow up, talking cheerfully about “the girls” and his determination to see that they were looked after, that they wouldn’t be alone. He would be staying on in the house, looking after the practical side of things, helping out, taking care of Barbara and Virginia.

  “Well, it doesn’t surprise me at all,” said Dolores Leech, the town nurse, standing on tiptoe to give Buddy a peck on the cheek. “You sound just like your dear father.” Dolores lowered her voice. “Honestly, Buddy, I don’t know how to thank you for your generosity. If it hadn’t been for that loan of yours, I don’t know what I would have done. Since Carl died I’ve barely been able to pay my property taxes. Do you know, I’ve actually been thinking seriously of lowering my property assessment by getting in a carpenter and a plumber and tearing down the garage and ripping out the downstairs bath? I must say, Buddy, I’d certainly rather be in debt to you than to the town treasurer. Are you sure you can really spare it?”

  “Oh, go on, Dolores,” said Buddy, “of course I can. Look at me, a single guy, no family. And I’ve got some people renting out the big house now. And there are some other things in the works. Irons in the fire — you know. Say, listen here, Dolores, what do you think of the race for governor?”

  “Oh, dear, wasn’t that plane crash the most tragic thing? I must say, I don’t know what I think about Lieutenant Governor Bramble. He’s not exactly — I mean, I just don’t know if I want to vote for him in the fall or not. I’m going to wait and see who the Republicans put up. At least they’re honest. You know what I mean.”

  “Look, Dolores, the lieutenant governor may not even get the Democratic nomination. Suppose, just suppose, the nominee were ex-Governor Croney? What would you think of that?”

  “Croney? Howard Croney? Oh, come on, Buddy, everybody knows he’s a crook.”

  “No, no, I think you’re doing him an injustice. Listen here, I think he may be exactly what the state of Massachusetts needs right now. You know, somebody aggressive like that, starting big projects, building, bringing in lots of public-works jobs. Think it over. Don’t make up your mind too soon.”

  “Well, if you say so, Buddy. I certainly do respect your opinion.”

  On the other side of the room Virginia had turned away from her visitors. She was looking out the window, trying to collect her wits. Her face ached with smiling. There was a mosquito on the window, and Virginia rested her mind on it, welcoming its remote disinterest. It wanted nothing from her but a drop or two of blood. She watched as the mosquito lifted from the glass and settled its delicate legs on her arm. Only an hour ago she had been standing beside the rectangular spade-cut in the grass of the cemetery, and therefore she was feeling particularly mortal at the moment, transitory and passing like her father. Whereas the mosquito was eternal. All mosquitoes were the same mosquito. This mos
quito was a million years old, a billion. In her foolish insistence on being distinct, one person and no other, Virginia Heron was here for a day, gone tomorrow. One smack of a giant hand and she would be extinguished.

  “Look at the poor thing,” whispered Muffy Weatherbee to her friend Peggy Glover, gazing at Virginia’s back. “Those two girls will be all alone now.”

  “So tragic,” said Peggy politely. But Peggy was gazing with fascination at the mantelpiece, the wainscoting, the furniture. “Have you ever been in this house before? The whole place must be really quite historic.”

  “Oh, Peggy,” giggled Muffy, “I’ll have to confess I’m being really pushy, coming here today. I didn’t even know Mr. Heron at all. I was just curious to see his house. Of course, I knew Virginia. I mean, we grew up together. I mean, we went to the first few grades together, before I went to Concord Academy. I remember her in fifth grade, kind of tall for her age and gangly. She sort of hung back and never put her hand up, but she always knew the answer. Everybody was sort of in awe of her, you know? Even then. I remember,” mused Muffy, gazing into the past, “she had this funny sweater. Well, anyway, what I meant to say was —,” Muffy waved her hand at the ceiling, the floor, the wall. “I was wondering if the SOS Committee should take this place on.”