I was wondering what would happen if I called her up, just casually, to ask her how she was. After all it would not be such a peculiar thing to do. On the contrary, it would be thoughtful and kindly, seeing that she had called me up last spring.
“Thirteen-twelve,” Gus called. “Let’s go.”
I could not understand what was possessing me. In the first place, she was married and I was married and you did not call up married women long distance to New York.
“Darling,” she had written on the Christmas card years and years ago, “aren’t you coming back?”
“All right,” Gus said. “One more.”
Gus was paid to be enthusiastic.
“All right,” I said. “Another one, Gus. Let’s go.”
Wham the ball went. Squash was a noisy game, but it could give you a better workout in a shorter time than any other. Gus was pushing me up toward the front wall and I was trying to get back. Marvin Myles probably wouldn’t remember who I was and if she did she would think I was drunk or crazy.
“Fourteen-twelve,” Gus shouted. “Game point. Let’s go,” and he rapped his racket on the wall. The thing to do was to forget about it. I must be going crazy.
I was dripping wet and out of breath when I pulled on my sweatshirt.
“Thanks, Gus,” I said. “That was swell.”
“Thank you, Mr. Pulham,” Gus said.
Then I turned on the cold water hard, and when it struck me it nearly took my breath away. I stayed under it until I was icy cold, but when I was out the blood raced through me. When I stood by the open fire, drying myself, I felt tired and pleasantly relaxed. Mr. Boomer was waiting for me and he began to tell me about how the Elis were one length ahead at the halfway buoy and then they raised the stroke, and he asked me if I wouldn’t like a Martini and I said I would—but only part of me was there. It was a quarter after seven o’clock. The toll rates would be low. It was a silly thing to think of, that the toll rates would be low.
“There was a fine crowd in the boat,” Mr. Boomer was saying. “Nothing like the water to make friends.”
I cleared my throat and looked at the moose-head over the fireplace.
“Louis,” I called, “have you got a New York telephone directory?”
“Yes, Mr. Pulham,” Louis said, “a last year’s one.”
“Oh,” Mr. Boomer said, “so you’re going to call up New York?”
I cleared my throat again.
“Yes,” I said, “a call I have to make.”
I could not understand why I seemed to be doing a shady thing when I simply told him that I had to make a call. I began turning over the pages of the book. The name was Ransome—John Ransome; business address, Broadway; residence, Park Avenue; Rhinelander 4.… Now that I had said I was going to make a New York call, I had to.
“Louis,” I said, “give me another Martini.”
“That’s right,” Mr. Boomer said. “You can talk to Central better with another.” I was ordering another drink, because I did not have guts enough to go to that telephone booth without it, and after all what was it? Nothing more than calling up an old friend of mine in New York. The number was Rhinelander 4–…
“Just leave mine on the table, Louis,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
The number was Rhinelander 4–… I was in the booth in the hall dialing the operator; it was too late to stop.
“New York City,” I said, “Rhinelander 4–…”
“Hold the line, please,” the operator answered. Then there was a little buzz. “RX, New York—Rhinelander 4–…”
Suppose she was there, what under the sun was I going to say to her? How in God’s name could I explain to her why I was calling her up? If I just asked her how she was she would think I was crazy.
“Ready with New York,” the operator was saying. “Boston calling Rhinelander 4–…”
I heard a resonant, fluty voice, saying: “Hello, Mr. Ransome’s apartment.”
It would be the butler. Marvin had always said she was going to have a butler.
“Is Mrs. Ransome in?” I asked.
“Mrs. Ransome is at dinner.”
I felt steadier.
“Oh, well, if she’s at dinner,” I said, “I won’t disturb her.”
“Who shall I say called, sir?”
“Never mind,” I said. “I won’t disturb her,” and I hung up.
Then I pulled out my handkerchief and mopped my forehead. I remembered how I felt once in a dentist chair after I had been given a whiff of gas. First the whole world had been cloudy and I had been thinking the most outrageous thoughts, and then it had all come back with a click, and I was in the dentist’s office and he was leaning over me.
“That didn’t hurt much, did it?” the dentist was asking.
When I stepped out of the telephone booth it was just like that. It was all over, and I had done what I was going to do—I had called her up. It was all over—and that was that. I would never have to go through that again. All of a sudden I felt fine. I began to wonder what Kay was doing and what the war news on the radio was. My Martini was waiting for me in the big room.
“Well,” I said, “that’s that.” I could give Mr. Boomer my full attention now. I had never been through anything like it before, and it was over.
“Did you get your call?” Mr. Boomer asked.
“Oh, yes,” I said, “I got my call. They were at dinner.”
Of course I could call her up in an hour when she had finished dinner, but I knew I would not. I had been on a long and dangerous journey and now I was safely back, and Marvin Myles was gone.
I had been careful, as soon as I got back to town, to put my ring of town keys in my left-hand trousers pocket. A good deal of my life seemed to consist of reminding myself of such small details—to be sure I had my keys, to be sure I had my wallet with my automobile license, to be sure to stop at the drugstore to get some more shaving cream. I patted my pocket at least three times, because there would be trouble if I came home without my keys. Once when I returned from a Club dinner, perhaps having had a little more to drink than was necessary, I had been obliged to ring the door bell for nearly half an hour before anyone woke up. Although that was a good many years ago, Kay had never forgotten it. The last thing I wanted that night, on top of everything else, was to have Kay think that I had gotten mad and had gone off and gotten drunk, like other people’s husbands she had heard of. When I walked home from the Club the rain had nearly stopped, and the whole city was bright and brisk as it always was in early autumn. There were all sorts of window displays of new dresses and blue and red and green hats and hunting costumes, and the florists’ windows were filled with house plants. I stopped and bought a dozen pinkish-yellow roses for Kay, in case she was still awake, so that she would know I had been thinking of her.
All the lights were out except the one which we always kept burning in the hall. I set down the roses in the vestibule and got out my keys. There was the key to my locker at the Squash Club and one for my locker at the Country Club and one for the cash box in my desk at the office, and the safe deposit key, the automobile ignition key, and the front-door key, and the basement key, besides a lot of others which seemed to have no purpose at all, but which I was afraid to throw away. I could not recall distinctly what the edges of the house key looked like, so I tried three others before I found the right one. The hall inside was close and stuffy, and Bitsey began to bark.
“Shut up,” I said.
He knew me perfectly well, but he always barked. I took off my raincoat and my hat and walked upstairs very quietly. When I opened the door of our bedroom I heard Kay move, so I knew that she was awake before she spoke.
“Harry,” she said, “is that you?”
“Yes,” I said.
I heard her yawn, and then she switched on the light beside the bed.
“What on earth were you doing rattling the front door?” she asked. “I thought you were a burglar.”
“I couldn’t
find the right key,” I told her.
“Oh,” Kay said, and I handed her the roses, all wrapped in green waxed paper.
“Oh,” Kay said. I thought she would be pleased, because she always was when I brought her flowers, and in a way she was, but somehow not exactly in the way I expected. Instead, she looked a little bothered as though she were thinking of something else.
“They’re so darned innocent, aren’t they?” Kay said. “Even though they were grown in a hothouse. You’d better put them in the washbowl.” Her voice was soft and sweet, but somehow I was vaguely disappointed.
“Kay,” I said, “I’m awfully sorry I was cross.”
I wanted it all to be finished, the way it always was after she and I had quarreled—clear with nothing left. Kay moved uneasily and clasped her hands behind her head.
“Oh, that’s all right,” she said. She sounded tired and resigned. “It was all my fault.”
“Oh, no,” I said, “it wasn’t, Kay. I didn’t mean to take that letter away,” and I reached into my inside pocket and drew Marvin’s letter out. “I wish you’d read it now.”
Kay shook her head quickly.
“Oh, no,” she said. “It doesn’t make any difference.”
“I hadn’t any business being angry. It was just that it hurt me when you laughed, because I was in love with her and she was in love with me.”
“Harry,” Kay said, “let’s not go into it any more.”
“It was a long time ago,” I said, “an awfully long time ago. I just don’t want you to think that there’s anything in it, because there isn’t.”
“I know there isn’t,” Kay said. “There wouldn’t be with you.”
I sat down on the edge of the bed and took her hand and kissed it.
“All right,” I said, “but you’re not angry with me any more, are you, Kay?”
“No,” she said, “of course not.”
“Because it doesn’t do any good,” I said. “When it’s all over, there you are and there I am. I don’t know how to put it, but it all comes out in the wash.”
“Please!” Kay said. “Please, don’t say any more, and get me an aspirin—and then let’s go to sleep.”
“It’s awfully nice we’re both here, Kay,” I said. “Last night and the night before and the night before that—I was awfully lonely without you.”
“Oh, Harry,” Kay said, “please, let’s go to sleep.”
We were back where we always were, just Kay and I, and I was wondering if the children were all right and whether I ought to get up to see if they had enough over them. I was wondering if the market would still be going up tomorrow and whether my partner, Tom Maxwell, had done what I had asked him about General Electric. I could feel myself sinking off to sleep. Thank Heaven, I had not spoken to Marvin Myles.
XXXIV
With Pleasure Rife
Yes, autumn was always a busy time. The war had brought about a brisk rise in the stock market which was quite a responsibility. Tom Maxwell and I had to decide whether to advise our clients to take profits or to let them ride. I finally got Tom to sell out some steel and commodity stocks right on top of the bulge, though I agreed with Tom that this was not usually good practice for investment lists which were essentially long-term, but, as I pointed out, there had not been an opportunity to take a profit for quite a while. I was asked to sit on the investment board of one of the larger trust groups, and though I could not do it, it made me feel that I was getting somewhere. It even made me wonder what might have happened if I had started out in a large bank like the National City or the Chase. It was conceivable that I might have had a vice-presidency by now. Yet I was contented with what I was doing. I rather liked running my own show as long as my clients were satisfied, and they must have been because we were getting more business.
Yes, superficially everything was going well that autumn. George had gone back to school and was playing on the second team and Gladys was getting good reports and several stocks in the family estate which I had thought were worthless had begun to come to life. Nevertheless, something at home seemed to make me restless. Kay and I were with other people very often, but when we were alone and talking everything over, she never seemed to concentrate. She seemed to have a hard time that autumn working out plans, and now and then she acted as though they bored her. She seemed bored, for instance, when Bo-jo Brown’s wife asked her to be on the committee for the entertainment at our Reunion. I was very pleased that Kay was asked, and I thought she would be. Instead, she forgot to go to the get-together tea.
“You know, Kay,” I said, “when I think of you with all those other girls it makes me awfully proud.”
“Proud?” Kay said. “How do you mean?”
“You look so much better than any of them,” I told her, “so much prettier.”
“Well, that isn’t saying much,” Kay said.
“I know what you mean,” I told her. “A lot of them look discouraged and tired.”
“It isn’t that,” Kay said. “They all look frustrated.”
“Maybe everybody gets frustrated after a while,” I said. “Perhaps it’s part of life.”
“Yes,” Kay said, “but life is meant to live.”
It occurred to me that Kay was always talking about living that autumn. Several times when we were out at dinner I heard her saying something about the right to live, and I imagined that she got it from some book at the Book Club. It always seemed to me that living was just living, but when I said this once at dinner Kay did not like it. Kay went down to New York in October to see about her clothes, and when she came back she seemed a whole lot happier. She began to talk about the Yale game and she did not seem to be absent-minded any longer. Bill King was definitely coming for the game and we would have a party. I was awfully glad that Kay was interested in the game, but I did wish she would pay a little more attention to our Class.
Nearly every Twenty-fifth-year class has a tea right after the Yale game. It had been found from the experiences of other classes that it was much better if we all saw as much of each other as we could before the Reunion. Lucy Green, Sam’s wife, was in charge of the tea and at the end of October she asked Kay to help her. The note came at breakfast time, just as I was leaving for the office.
“Who is she?” Kay asked. “She signs herself ‘Cordially, Lucy,’ and I don’t even know her.”
“It’s just that you don’t remember, Kay,” I said. “She’s Sam Green’s wife. You remember Sam. He was at our wedding.”
“I don’t remember,” Kay said.
“Sam?” I told her. “Sam is one of my oldest friends.”
“Well, I’ve never heard you mention him,” Kay said.
I had not even thought of Sam for several years. That was the way it was with a lot of my oldest friends. For no good reason they seemed to disappear, but it did not change the way I felt about Sam.
“That’s true,” I told her. “I don’t know why it is that we haven’t seen anything of Sam and Lucy. Sam was in my form at School and he was in my entry at college. I don’t ask you to like Sam but there he is, and he gave us that after-dinner coffee set for a wedding present.”
“Which set?” Kay asked.
“The one you didn’t like,” I said, “the one with butterflies that you couldn’t change because it came from Philadelphia. Now, Kay, it isn’t going to take long to go to that tea.”
“I married you,” Kay said. “I didn’t marry your college class.”
“I’m only asking you,” I said, “to try just for an hour to be nice to them.”
“Now, Harry,” Kay said, “I’d like you to name a single instance when I haven’t been nice to your friends—yes, a single one!”
I began one morning in November to go over our security list for tax-loss sales. Since Tom Maxwell was never as good as I at detail, I closed myself up in our conference room and told Miss Rollo that I did not want to be disturbed by anyone until lunch. I had just got the papers out on my desk and every
thing ready when Miss Rollo opened the door softly and adjusted her glasses on her nose.
“It’s Mr. Brown and Mr. Purcell,” Miss Rollo said. “They say they have to see you.”
She did not have time to say any more, because the door opened wider and Bo-jo Brown came in with Jack Purcell just behind him.
“Why, hello,” I said. “It’s awfully nice of you to come in.” It was nice of Jack, because he was always very busy, and it was nice of Bo-jo too, just to drop around.
“Come off it now,” Bo-jo said. “Why weren’t you at the committee lunch yesterday? Are you going to work for the Class, or aren’t you? What about the Class Reports?”
“What Class Reports?” I asked.
“God almighty,” Bo-jo said, “the Class lives, the big anniversary book! You said you were going to help me with it. We went all over it last spring at lunch.”
“See here,” I said. I had almost forgotten about that lunch last spring. “I never really promised, Bo-jo. I only said I’d help you if I could.”
Bo-jo slapped me on the shoulder.
“Now, look,” Bo-jo said, “you’re not going to be a yellow-belly, are you? We’ve got to get this Reunion going, and it’s getting stalled. Now look at me. I’ve got as much to do as you, haven’t I? And Jack has just as much. Well, I can’t do this whole job alone and neither can Jack. You’ve got to help and Cynthia’s got to help.”
“Who’s Cynthia?” I said.
“Hell’s bells,” Bo-jo shouted, “she’s your wife! Don’t you know your own wife?”
“That isn’t her name, Bo-jo,” I said. “It’s Cornelia.”
“Now, don’t you kid me,” Bo-jo said. “Her name is Cynthia. Isn’t it Cynthia, Jack?”
“No,” Jack answered, “it’s Cornelia.”
“Well, it doesn’t make any difference,” Bo-jo said, “and we haven’t any time to argue. We’ve all got to pull at this together—wives and kids and everybody. Look at Bill King. Now, I never thought much of that squirt, but he surprised me. He’s been breaking his neck over the Class play. You’ve got to snap into it, Harry.”
“Now, wait a minute, Bo-jo. I didn’t say I wasn’t going to help.”
H. M. Pulham, Esquire Page 40