Beloved Stranger

by Joan Wolf

  It was raining when they retrieved their car from the garage and started through the city streets toward the East Side Drive. They were turning down Ninetieth Street when Susan noticed two men on the sidewalk. They were bending over a third man who was lying on the pavement in the rain. “Something’s wrong!” Susan said, and Ricardo stopped the car.

  “Wait here,” he ordered tersely and got out, locking his door behind him. As Susan watched he approached the group. She couldn’t hear and so she rolled down her window halfway. They were all speaking Spanish. Then Ricardo knelt on the sidewalk and Susan could see him feeling for a pulse. He spoke sharply to the other two, who Susan could see now were only boys. One immediately ran off up the street like a deer. On the pavement Ricardo began to apply CPR.

  Susan reached into the backseat for her umbrella and got out of the car. She went over to stand next to Ricardo and tried as best she could to shelter the man’s face with her umbrella. The rain was coming down hard and it was cold.

  Ricardo was working very hard. “I don’t know CPR, but can I help?” Susan murmured after a minute. He shook his head and kept on counting. The boy knelt next to Ricardo and his young face looked stricken. The second boy came running back. Susan understood him saying that he had called 911 for an ambulance.

  It was fifteen minutes before the ambulance arrived and all during that time Ricardo worked ceaselessly over the unconscious man. After the ambulance workers had taken over, Susan heard Ricardo giving one of the boys their phone number. The ambulance pulled away and Susan and Ricardo got back into their car.

  Ricardo started the engine and glanced at her in concern. “You must be freezing, Susan. I’ll get the heat going as soon as I can.”

  She was shivering and her feet, clad in thin dress shoes, were icy. She looked at Ricardo. His hair was soaked and there was rain still dripping from the tips of his lashes. His coat looked sodden. He had gotten the least benefit of the umbrella.

  “Do you think he’ll be all right?” she asked after they had driven in silence for a few minutes.

  “I doubt it. I couldn’t get a pulse going. And I’m not sure how long he was lying there before we came along.”

  “A lot of other cars went by,” she said slowly, “but nobody stopped.” He shrugged and said nothing. “Who were those boys?” she asked.

  “His sons. They were all walking home from work. Evidently he had been complaining of chest pains all evening.”

  “Oh dear. It doesn’t sound good.”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  The heat began to come through and Ricardo turned the blowers on full blast. They were at the Larchmont tolls before he said, “What an ending to our evening out! And I thought I would give you such a treat tonight.”

  “It was a treat,” she said quickly. “I adored the play. And the dinner. And I’m very glad we saw that man when we did. Even if he dies, at least his family will have the comfort of knowing that everything that could be done was done. At least they’ll know that someone tried, that they didn’t just have to stand helplessly by and watch their father die in front of them.”

  “I suppose so,” he murmured.

  “It’s true. Why else didn’t you give up on him? You said you thought it was hopeless.”

  After a pause he answered, “As you said, querida, one has to try.”

  She watched the windshield wipers in silence for a few minutes. Then, “I heard you giving one of the boys our phone number.”

  “Yes. I’m sure they are a poor family. The loss of a father will probably hit them hard.”

  That was all he said on the subject, but Susan knew he would help the family financially. They pulled into the Greenwich tolls and she turned to look at the suddenly illuminated face of her husband. He was like no one else she had ever known. On the surface he appeared so uncomplicated, so easygoing and casual. But under that surface geniality, he was a very complex man. He could be hard and demanding. He had a temper that frightened her when he was obviously holding it in check. She didn’t like to think what he would be like if he were ever really angry. He had enormous magnetism and charm, yet he was a very private man. What he thought and what he felt he kept to himself. Yet he had had tears in his eyes tonight for Uncle Vanya.

  He was an enigma to her, a stranger whom she lived with on the most intimate of terms. She loved him— deeply, irrevocably. But aside from liking to sleep with her, she had no idea of how he felt about her. After all, love had not been the reason for their marriage. The rain beat down against the windows of the car and Susan sighed and closed her eyes.

  “We’ll be home soon, querida,” he said.

  “Yes.” The very cadences of his voice did strange things to her insides. He was so splendidly, competently male. Whatever the situation, she could always rest secure in the knowledge that Ricardo would handle it. He had known he might be walking into danger tonight. He had locked her safely into the car before he went to investigate. But he had gone, unhesitatingly. And if there had been danger, she was sure he would have handled that as well. She opened her eyes and looked at his shadowy profile. He was so self-sufficient. He seemed to need no one—certainly not her. The only solid achievement of her life was Ricky. And Ricky was what had brought her Ricardo. He had not even married her for her personal charms.

  She closed her eyes again. How was it possible, she wondered, to be so happy and yet so miserable and all at the same time?

  Chapter Nine

  It was almost impossible to rent a house for only six weeks, so when they went to Florida Ricardo took a large suite in one of the best hotels in Fort Lauderdale. They had two bedrooms, a living room and a small kitchen area with a refrigerator and a hot plate. When they arrived Susan quickly made arrangements for a baby-sitter. “We’re going to have to eat dinner out,” she told Ricardo firmly, “and I do not want to have to drag Ricky into a hotel dining room every night.”

  He grinned. “True. His manners leave something to be desired.”

  “That’s putting it mildly,” Susan replied. She did not anticipate finding it easy to take care of a four-month-old baby in a hotel suite, but she forebode to press the point. They had had this out before. And difficult though it was probably going to be, she was glad she was here with Ricardo.

  She accompanied him the following day when he went to report to the Yankee camp. The sun was shining, it was eighty degrees, and as she pushed Ricky along in his umbrella stroller, she felt the festive mood of the occasion.

  They hadn’t been at camp for five minutes before Ricardo was surrounded by reporters. He stood courteously, answering their questions with absolute patience and good humor. Susan came in for a small share of the attention but she found the reporters to be polite and their questions had to do with Ricardo and not with her.

  “What’s Rick been doing all winter?” a wire-service man asked her first.

  “Chopping wood,” she replied a little shyly. “Building a new garage.”

  “He looks in great shape.”

  “Yes. He’s been very active.”

  “Is this the pennant baby?” another reporter asked.

  Susan looked startled and then she smiled. “Yes, that’s right. He was born on the day Ricardo won the pennant, wasn’t he?”

  The reporter grinned. “It was the Yankees who won the pennant, Mrs. Montoya.”

  Susan laughed, “It all depends on your point of view, I suppose.”

  The reporter laughed back, his eyes bright with admiration. “I see what you mean. And you’re probably not far from the truth. Rick had an awful lot to do with winning that pennant. And the series as well.”

  She smiled and didn’t reply, and shortly afterward Ricardo moved away from the reporters to go change and she and Ricky walked over to where the other wives were sitting to watch. This had been Susan’s first encounter with the press and it left her feeling more comfortable than she had dreamed possible. It was the nature of Ricardo’s celebrity that protected her, she thought. His pe
rsonal life was a minor adjunct to his fame. It was what he did on the field that counted.

  There had never been a breath in any of the papers about their hasty marriage or the quick arrival of Ricky. The TV announcers had proudly imparted the news of Ricardo’s son’s birth, but no one had ever mentioned the fact that his parents had only been married for a few months. She had been enormously grateful for their reticence.

  And yet Ricardo was one of the most famous men in America. Wherever they went in Florida, people came up to him, for his autograph, to shake his hand, to wish him well. Men and women, teenagers and young boys and girls: the whole world knew Rick Montoya. It knew him—and it admired him. Again and again Susan was struck by the regard in which Ricardo appeared to be held by all the fans who crowded to see him. And she was struck as well by the grace and the courtesy with which he accepted the pressing admiration of so many strangers. Her husband, she thought, was that rarest of all things—a hero deserving of the name.

  * * * *

  The change of scene and of routine made it almost impossible for Susan to write. She did try, in the intervals when Ricky was napping, but she had a hard time finding the proper concentration. After an hour’s work she would reread what she had written and it would seem terrible: stilted, awkward, childish. When Ricky woke up, she would take him down to the beach and wait for Ricardo to return. He didn’t like the idea of her being “cooped up,” as he put it, all day in a hotel room. He was such an active, outdoor person himself that he regarded any indoor, sedentary activity as a punishment.

  She didn’t know why she persisted in her fantasy that she could write. There was nothing to encourage her to continue; everything seemed to say give it up, be content with what you’ve got. Yet for her, not to write was not to be fully alive. Writing was the door into her deepest self. And so, though discouraged and feeling foolish, she struggled on.

  Florida may not have been good for her writing but it proved to be beneficial in most other ways. Ricardo was happy and that was important to her happiness. And she made a new friend.

  His name was Martin Harrison and he was a writer for a very respected literary magazine with a large national circulation. He was not a sports reporter, but he was, as he himself told her, a “baseball nut,” and he had come to Florida to do an article on the Yankees for the National Monthly. He was in his early thirties, the kind of literate, intelligent, thinking man that Susan had always admired.

  She met him about a week after camp opened. She had been sitting in the stands, rocking Ricky with one hand and holding a book with the other, when he came up to her and said in his soft voice, which held just the suspicion of a southern drawl, “Mrs. Montoya?”

  Susan looked up from her book and saw a nice-looking man with brown hair and very clear hazel eyes. “Yes?” she said pleasantly.

  “I’m Martin Harrison,” he explained, “and I’m writing an article about the team for the National Monthly. I wonder if I could talk to you for a little?”

  “Of course.” Susan closed her book and gestured for him to sit down. The warm Florida weather had been good for her this last week. She had been feeling run-down and the sun and the beach had worked wonders. Her skin was tanned to the color of golden honey and her pale hair shone with the texture of spun silk. She was wearing a yellow sun dress and espadrilles and her wide-set gray eyes regarded him with charming gravity. “I’m afraid I’m rather a novice about baseball, Mr. Harrison. Talking to me is likely to prove a dead loss.”

  “I doubt that,” he said, the drawl more pronounced now. Then his eyes lit on her book. “Merlano!” he said. “Do you like him?”

  “Yes. In fact,” Susan said a little shyly. “I got to meet him last month in Colombia.”

  They talked for the remainder of the practice session and never once mentioned baseball. In Martin Harrison Susan felt she had met someone from her own world, the world of books and ideas and feelings. When he said, with a rueful laugh, “May I see you again tomorrow? I’m afraid I never got to the point of my interview,” she had assented gladly. As she pushed Ricky’s stroller across the grass to meet Ricardo she reflected that she had not realized how much she missed the company of people like Martin Harrison. She had let most of her friendships slide this last year—for obvious reasons, she thought wryly. Tonight she would begin to write some long-overdue letters.

  * * * *

  She saw Martin Harrison the following day and this time they did talk baseball. They talked about Ricardo as well. “He’s amazing, really,” Martin Harrison said seriously. “Very few people realize how tough it is to stay at the top of a professional sport. It’s got to get to you, that constant pressure to do it again and again. After a while something’s got to break—your performance or, in some cases, your willpower. Look at Borg—he just got sick of it all. And who can blame him?”

  “Ricardo likes to play baseball,” Susan said quietly. “He doesn’t seem to feel a great deal of pressure.”

  “But that’s why he’s so remarkable, don’t you see? He’s a professional’s professional in most ways. He does everything a ballplayer is supposed to do and he does it brilliantly: fielding, throwing, running, bunting. And hitting, of course. But he has the spirit of a kid who plays in the schoolyard for fun. That’s why he’s so enjoyable to watch, and why he’s such a good model for kids. He’s so clearly enjoying himself.”

  Susan looked thoughtfully at the thin, intelligent face of Martin Harrison. “Yes, that’s true.”

  “And he’s so—unruffled. No prima donna outbreaks. No temper tantrums. I’ve never heard him say a mean word about anyone. Since he’s been captain, the Yankee clubhouse is a far more pleasant place.”

  Listening to Martin, Susan felt deeply gratified. It meant something, that a man of this caliber should appreciate Ricardo. When the writer joined her on the beach two days later, she was unfeignedly glad to see him. She was sitting talking to him animatedly when Ricardo arrived from practice. Susan looked up as his shadow fell across her and her small face lit with welcome. “Ricardo!” she said. “Are you out early?”

  “No,” he said. His dark eyes moved to Martin Harrison and then back to his wife. Susan was wearing an aquamarine maillot suit that showed off her slender figure and pale golden tan. Her loose hair was hooked behind her ears and she wore large dark sunglasses perched on her small, straight nose.

  She smiled up at her husband from her sand chair. “We’ve been talking so much, I lost track of the time.”

  “Did you, querida?” He looked at Martin Harrison, who was sitting cross-legged on the blanket next to a sleeping Ricky. “Have you been discussing baseball?” he asked politely.

  Martin laughed and stood up. “No, we’ve been talking books. Children’s books, as a matter of fact. Your wife and I have discovered we shared a common childhood library.”

  “Oh?” Ricardo looked at Susan. “I’m going to take a swim.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Martin said. “It’s hot just sitting here.” The two men walked side by side down to the water’s edge and Susan watched them. Next to Ricardo, she thought, Martin seemed a mere boy, even though he was certainly a few years older. Ricardo dove into the waves and after a brief minute Martin joined him. They swam for quite some time, and when they returned to her they seemed to be in perfect amity. Ricky had woken up and Susan was holding him on her lap when they got back to the blanket. As Ricardo dried his face and hair her eyes briefly scanned him, going over the wide shoulders, flat stomach and narrow hips. He was deeply tanned, his skin dark and coppery, showing, as he once said humorously, his Indian blood. He draped the towel around his neck and she dragged her eyes from his bare torso and looked at Martin Harrison. Next to Ricardo’s splendid height and strength he looked pale and insignificant. Ricky began to fuss and Susan rose.

  “The prince is hungry,” she announced. “I’ll go feed him and be back later.”

  “Why don’t you just bring a bottle down to the beach?” Martin asked innocently.


  Ricardo’s eyes glinted. “Ricky doesn’t like bottles,” he said. “He likes his mother.” The glint became more pronounced, “In that way he resembles his father,” he added wickedly.

  Susan could feel herself flushing, “Behave yourself,” she said primly. “Martin has been telling me what a model of rectitude you are. You don’t want him to find out the truth about your character, do you?” And shifting the burden of her son to her other shoulder, she walked toward the hotel as sedately as she could manage in a bathing suit and bare feet. Behind her she could hear Ricardo chuckle.

  * * * *

  Martin stayed in Fort Lauderdale for the duration of spring training and Susan found herself seeing quite a lot of him. She didn’t think it odd that he should seek out her company. She assumed he felt the way she did—pleased and delighted to have discovered a person who shared so many of the same interests, the same thoughts—and he said nothing to make her think differently. He talked about his writing, and encouraged her to talk about her own.

  “You must write if that’s how you feel,” he told her firmly.

  “Yes, I know.” She smiled a little ruefully. “But it’s so hard. Just living seems to take up so much time. And effort. I know now why there were so few women writers in the past. It’s very difficult to be married and to write. I’ve been remembering quite frequently that Jane Austen was single.”

  “I’m sure Rick doesn’t mind your writing,” he said carefully.

  “Of course he doesn’t,” she answered quickly. Too quickly. “It’s just that ordinary things seem to take so much out of me. But that’s my fault, not his. Why, when I look at my mother, I realize what a mountain I make out of nothing at all. She had two children and managed to find the time to be a working anthropologist, a college teacher who has published a number of articles in her field, a wife and an energetic clubwoman. I often just sit back and look at her in amazement.”