by Irwin Shaw
“No,” Oliver said wearily, and Lucy had the feeling that he was almost ready to let the whole matter drop.
“Suddenly,” she said, speaking swiftly, pressing her advantage, “everything changes. Now is the time for conspiracy and secret visits and spying and the testimony of children. Why?”
“All right,” Oliver said. “I admit—I should have called. But it still doesn’t answer the question. Why did Tony tell me what he did?”
“How do I know?” Lucy said. “I don’t even know what he told you.”
“Lucy,” said Oliver gently, “he said he saw you and the young man in his sister’s house.”
End of dive.
Lucy took in her breath with a long sighing noise. “Oh. He said that?”
“Yes.”
She spoke in a flat, dead voice. “What exactly did he say he saw?”
“I can’t repeat it, Lucy.”
“You can’t repeat it,” she said, her voice still lacking in timbre.
“No,” said Oliver, “but unhappily, it was most convincing.”
“Oh … I’m so sorry.” Lucy bent over and he couldn’t see her face and for a moment he thought she was going to confess. “Mostly for Tony,” she said. Mistake. The dive was not over. Because it wasn’t a real dive. It was a descent in a dream, whirling, grabbing handfuls of air. “Listen, Oliver,” she said soberly. “There’re several things you ought to know about your son. Not such pleasant things. You know how he makes up stories? Let’s use the exact word. Lies. How many times have we pleaded with him?”
“He’s stopped that,” said Oliver.
“That’s what you think,” said Lucy. “It’s just that the stories become more clever as he grows older. More ingenious, more believable, less innocent.”
“I thought he was getting over that,” Oliver said.
“That’s because you don’t know him. You see him a few hours a week when he’s on his best behavior. You don’t know him the way I do, because you haven’t been with him day and night for years.” Arson, she thought, horrified with herself. Once you light the match, there’s nothing to do but stand back and watch the house burn down. And deny everything and solidify the alibi. “That’s why this has happened,” she said. “The truth is he doesn’t behave with me like a normal little boy. He behaves like a jealous, possessive lover. You said so yourself.”
“Not really,” Oliver said. “Not seriously. As a joke maybe—”
“It’s not a joke,” said Lucy. “You know how he acts when he comes into the house and I’m not there. He prowls around, looking for me. He telephones my friends. He goes to my bedroom and stands at the window waiting, not saying a word to anyone. You’ve seen it dozens of times, haven’t you?”
“Yes. And I never liked it,” Oliver said sullenly. “And I thought you liked it too much. That’s one of the reasons why I hired Bunner.”
“And then you told me to leave him alone more,” said Lucy rapidly. “To let him spend more time by himself. To force him to be independent. And you told Jeff the same things. Well, we followed instructions. Your instructions. And this is the result.”
“What do you mean?” Oliver asked, confused.
“We left him alone from time to time,” Lucy said. “We carefully avoided making him the center of things every minute of the day. And he hated it. And this is his revenge. This sick, unpleasant little story.”
Oliver shook his head. “No little boy can make up a story like that.”
“Why not?” Lucy asked. “Especially now. Among other instructions you left you prescribed a course in sex for him.”
“What’s wrong with that? It’s about time he …”
“About time he could whip together his jealousy and all this interesting new information and try to destroy us with it.”
“Lucy,” Oliver said, “are you telling the truth?”
Lucy took a deep breath, raised her head and stared directly into Oliver’s eyes. “I swear it,” she said.
Oliver turned and went to the door and opened it. “Bunner,” he called to the boy at the edge of the lake. “Bunner.”
“What are you going to do?” Lucy asked.
“I want to talk to him.” Oliver came back into the room.
“You can’t,” Lucy said.
“I have to,” Oliver said gently.
“You can’t embarrass me like that. You can’t embarrass yourself. You mustn’t degrade me in front of that boy.”
“I’d like to talk to him alone, please,” Oliver said.
“If you do this,” said Lucy, “I’ll never forgive you.” She said it not because she meant it, but because it was what the automatic, innocent wife would have said.
Oliver made a short gesture of dismissal. “Please, Lucy.”
They were standing there facing each other tensely when Bunner came into the room. Oliver saw him finally. “Oh, yes,” he said, “you’re here.” He turned back to his wife. “Lucy,” he said, waiting. Without looking at Jeff she walked swiftly to the door and went out. After a moment, Oliver visibly braced himself, then gestured politely to Jeff. “Sit down,” he said. Jeff hesitated, then sat on a wooden chair. Oliver walked slowly back and forth in front of him as he spoke. “First,” he said, “I want to thank you for the letters you’ve been writing every week reporting on Tony’s progress.”
“Well,” Jeff said, “since you couldn’t get up here I thought you’d like to know what we were doing with ourselves.”
“I enjoyed the letters,” said Oliver. “They were very shrewd. You seemed to know what was going on with Tony all the time and I got the feeling you really liked him a great deal too.”
“He’s a rewarding little boy,” said Jeff.
“Rewarding?” Oliver repeated vaguely, as though this was a new concept of his son. “Yes, isn’t he? The letters gave me quite a good picture of yourself incidentally.”
Jeff laughed a little self-consciously. “They did? I hope I didn’t give myself away.”
“Quite the opposite,” said Oliver. “I got the picture of a most intelligent, decent young man. I even began to feel that, after college, if you might somehow change your mind about diplomacy, I might try to find something for you in my business.”
“It’s very nice to hear, Sir,” Jeff said, embarrassedly. “I’ll remember it.”
“By the way,” Oliver said, as though it would have been impolite to get to the main question too soon and he was casting about, looking for subjects of conversation, “that girl of yours you talked about the day I met you. I even remember your exact words. I asked you if you had a girl and you said, approximately. Is she by any chance still in Boston, in high school?”
“In high school?” Jeff asked, puzzled.
“Yes,” said Oliver. “Cheer leader for the high-school football team?”
Jeff laughed uneasily. “No,” he said. “I don’t know any high-school girls in Boston. And certainly no cheer leaders. The girl I was talking about is a junior at Vassar and actually I was boasting. I don’t see her more than five or six times a year. Why do you ask?”
“I must have gotten a little mixed up,” Oliver said easily. “Maybe it was something in one of Tony’s letters. His handwriting leaves a great deal of room for speculation.” He shrugged. “It’s of no importance. So—no cheer leaders.”
“Not a one,” said Jeff.
Oliver waited. “How about older ladies?” he said evenly. “Married ladies?”
Jeff dropped his eyes. “I don’t think you really expect me to answer that, Mr. Crown.”
“No, perhaps not.” Oliver took out his checkbook and pen from his pocket. “Has Mrs. Crown paid you regularly every week?”
“Yes,” said Jeff.
“She hasn’t paid you this week?” Oliver asked, with the checkbook open.
“No,” said Jeff. “Now wait a minute, Sir.”
“This is Friday,” Oliver went on calmly, “and the arrangement was thirty dollars for a seven-day week, wasn’t it?
That would be five-sevenths of thirty—well, let’s say roughly twenty-one dollars as a flat sum. You don’t mind a check, do you? I’m a little short on cash.”
Jeff stood up. “I don’t want any money,” he said.
Oliver raised his eyebrows. “Why not?” he asked. “You took it each week from Mrs. Crown, didn’t you?”
“Yes. But …”
“Why should this week be any different?” Oliver sounded good-tempered and reasonable. “Except that it’s two days short?”
“I don’t want it,” Jeff said.
Oliver purposely misunderstood him. “Things being as they are,” he said, “you don’t think that you ought to stay on any longer, do you?”
“No,” Jeff said, mumbling so low that Oliver could hardly hear him.
“Of course not,” Oliver said, in a fatherly tone. He gave Jeff the check. “Here, take it. You’ve earned it. I remember when I was your age I could always use twenty dollars. It can’t be so different today.”
Jeff looked down unhappily at the check in his hand and started toward the door. Then he turned back. “I suppose I ought to say I’m sorry or ashamed or something like that. I suppose it would make you feel better.”
Oliver smiled warmly. “Not necessarily,” he said.
“Well, I’m not,” Jeff said defiantly. “It’s the greatest thing that ever happened to me.”
Oliver nodded. “It always is,” he said. “At the age of twenty.”
“You don’t know,” Jeff said incoherently. “You don’t know her.”
“Perhaps not,” Oliver said.
“She’s pure,” Jeff said. “Delicate. You mustn’t blame her. I did it. It’s all my fault.”
“I don’t want to take any of the glory away from you,” Oliver said pleasantly, “but I must say that when a thirty-five-year-old woman takes up with a twenty-year-old boy I can’t give him credit for anything more than being—present.”
“You …” said Jeff bitterly, confronting the older man. “You’re so sure of yourself. I know all about you. She’s told me. Sitting back. Telling everybody what they’re to do. What they’re to think. The people who work for you. Your child. Your wife. Having everything your own way. Being polite and frozen and ruthless. God, even now you don’t even have the grace to be angry. You come up here and find out I’m in love with your wife and what do you do? You sign a check.” With a melodramatic gesture he crumpled the check and threw it on the floor.
Oliver’s air of indulgence, of amusement, did not change. “It’s one of the arguments you always hear,” he said, “against hiring the sons of wealthy families. They don’t have the proper respect for money.”
“I hope she leaves you,” Jeff said. “And if she does, I’ll marry her.”
“Bunner,” Oliver said, repressing a smile, “if I may say so, you’re behaving like a fool. You’re being sentimental. You use words like love, marriage, delicacy, purity, and I know why, and I even admire you for it. You’re not a brute. You want to have a high opinion of yourself. You want to think of yourself as passionate, exceptional. Well, it’s natural enough, and I don’t blame you for it—but I have to tell you that it doesn’t square with the facts.”
“What do you know about the facts?” Jeff asked bitterly.
“This much,” Oliver said. “You haven’t had a love affair. You’ve had a work of the imagination. You’ve imagined a woman who doesn’t exist, an emotion that doesn’t exist.”
“Don’t tell me,” Jeff started to interrupt.
“Please let me finish.” Oliver waved his hand. “You’ve taken something that’s routine and casual and you’ve larded it with roses and moonlight. You’ve mistaken a season for a lifetime. You’ve mistaken a silly, childish woman’s easy conscience for passion, and finally, you’ll be the one who gets hurt the worst because of it.”
“If that’s the way you feel about her,” Jeff said, almost stuttering in his anger and confusion, “you have no right to talk about her. You don’t respect her, you don’t admire her, you don’t love her …”
Oliver sighed. “When you get older,” he said, “you’ll find out that love very often has almost nothing to do with respect and admiration. Anyway, I didn’t come all the way up here to talk about me. Jeff,” he said, “let me ask you to do something fairly hard—look at things as they really are. Look at the summertime, Jeff. Look at all the hotels like this one. All the clapboard palaces with thin walls and bad dance bands and postcard lakes and lazy, thoughtless, vacationing women separated from their husbands for the hot months. Women who lie out in the sun all day, bored, restless, drinking too much, looking for amusement and finding it in traveling salesmen, waiters, hired athletes, trumpet players, college boys. The whole tribe of cheap, available males with only that to recommend them. That, and the fact that they conveniently vanish when the cold weather comes. By the way,” Oliver said conversationally, “have you talked to Mrs. Crown on the subject of marriage?”
“Yes. I did.”
“What did she say?”
“She laughed,” Jeff admitted.
“Of course.” Oliver was friendly and sympathetic. “The same thing happened to me when I was just past twenty. Except that it was on a boat, on the way to France. Actually it was perhaps even more romantic than this …” He waved his arm to indicate the cottage, the lake, the surrounding forest. “Boats being what they are and France being what it was right after the war. And the lady was wise enough to leave her children at home, since she was perhaps more practiced than Mrs. Crown. It was very intense. It even included a two-week trip to the Italian lakes and adjoining cabins on the old Champlain and I made speeches to her on the boatdeck on the way back to America that I imagine were very much like some of the speeches you must have been making here on moonlit nights. And we were luckier, too. The husband never knew anything. Never appeared until we docked. Even so,” Oliver laughed reflectively, “it took two hours to get through customs and by the time we were through the gate she was having trouble remembering my name.”
“Why are you trying to make it so ugly?” said Jeff. “Why does that make it better for you?”
“Not ugly,” Oliver said, “merely ordinary. Pleasant—that summer in Europe is one of the most agreeable memories I have—but ordinary. Don’t be so unhappy because at a certain age you happen to have gone through an experience that other young men have had before you.” He bent down and picked up the crumpled check from the floor. “You’re sure you don’t want this check?” He held it out, offering it to the boy.
“No,” said Jeff.
Oliver shrugged. “Whatever you say. As you get older, you learn to treat money more carefully, too.” He smoothed out the check, looked at it absently, then with a sudden movement threw it into the fireplace. “Incidentally—that phonograph is yours, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” said Jeff.
“I think you’d better take it with you,” Oliver said. “Now. And anything else around here that belongs to you.”
“That’s all there is,” said Jeff.
Oliver went over to the phonograph and snapped out the plug. He wrapped the cord neatly around the instrument and tucked the plug firmly through the twist of wire. “I think you’d better stay away from here from now on, don’t you?”
“I’m not making any promises.”
Oliver shrugged. “It makes no difference to me. I was merely thinking of your own peace of mind.” He tapped the phonograph. “Here we are.” He waited, smiling pleasantly. Jeff, his face set, came over and put the machine under his arm and started out. As he got to the door it opened and Lucy came in.
After Lucy had left the house, she walked blindly down toward the lake. She stopped at its edge, staring out across the water. The clouds had parted a little and there was pale, wet moonlight picking out the tips of branches, the pilings at the end of the hotel dock, a mast on one of the small sailboats tied a few feet off the end of the dock.
It was cold along the edge of the water, and Lu
cy shivered. She hadn’t put on a sweater and she couldn’t go back into the house now and get one.
She thought of what the two men were saying to each other in the living room. She tried to imagine the conversation, but it was impossible. In other times and other places, men had killed each other in situations like this. Not only in other times. She remembered a story she had read in a newspaper a month or so ago. A sailor had come home unexpectedly and found his wife with another man and had shot them both. Then he had shot himself. It had been all over the front pages for two days.
Well, nobody was going to shoot anybody else in the living room. Maybe that was what was wrong with them. All three of them. Maybe something like this was only valid and worthwhile if people were willing to shoot each other as a consequence.
She turned and looked at the house. It looked exactly the same as it had looked all summer and the summer before. The light streaming peacefully, too brightly, through the curtains of the living-room window, making the wet grass gleam on the lawn in front of the house. And several windows away, the light was on in Tony’s room, shaded, from the lamp on his desk. She wondered what Tony was doing. Reading? Drawing his pictures of horses, boats and athletes? Packing, preparing to run away? Listening?
She shivered. Suddenly, she knew that the worst thing was going to be facing Tony, whether he was listening or not. She turned away from the house and looked out across the lake. How easy it would be just to walk out and keep going, out into the blackness, out into the simple blackness … Well, she knew she wasn’t going to do that, either.
She listened to the tapping of the water against the dock-pilings, small, monotonous, familiar, the same sound as last summer, as all the summers before that. She wished it was last summer. She wished it was any time before tonight. With everything to be done over again, and done better and more wisely, not with that insane, rushing, diving, automatic, dreamlike inventiveness. Or next summer, with everything settled, forgotten, punished.
She wished that they could go back a half-hour, to the moment when she came into the house and saw Oliver standing there, and knowing it was going to be bad, and being frightened of him and at the same time feeling that sensation of warmth and gladness that she always felt when she saw him after being away from him for some time, a sensation of rootedness, familiarity, connection, a subtle, comfortable relinquishment of the responsibility of being alone. She wondered if she could ever explain that feeling to Oliver, and explain that it could exist at the same time that she was making love with another man, at the same time that she was lying to him about it, at the same time that she was pretending to be outraged and innocent.