The Pandora Effect

by Olivia Darnell

  Samuel Morris left work early to stop by City Hall. He picked up one of the city’s little welcome packets which contained a sketchy map of the local vicinity. Another quick stop by the Big Basket Supermarket and he had the perfect excuse to visit the New Castle Gift Shop. He parked his Lincoln by the curb and got out carrying the packet, a box of stationery and a large plastic bowl of fruit tied up in clear plastic with a big yellow bow on top. As president of the Chamber of Commerce, he had a perfect excuse for stopping by and wondered why he hadn’t thought of it before. It had probably never occurred to him because there had been no new businesses opened in Magnolia Springs since he had taken over the office three years earlier. In fact, it was one of his duties to welcome and encourage new business owners in their quaint little town and to offer his assistance to their endeavors. He glanced back at the upper floor of the funeral parlor across the street where he was quite sure his mother would be watching him and then shuddered at the thought of Mr. Lakey whose body was ready for viewing in one of the rooms on the ground floor. Several people stood on the portico outside. One of them waved to him and he smiled and nodded to the man before continuing up the sidewalk to the stairs leading up to the Gift Shop’s second floor.

  “QUO FATA VOCANT’ he read aloud from the small brass plate by the door bell. He hoped that the Aligers had finished the inevitable fight which must have occurred after the incident at Chilly Willy’s. A skittering noise at his feet caused him to lean forward to peer down. “How about that?” He said softly as the mouse scurried through the swinging doors leading into the mouse hole at the base of the door. He bent awkwardly with his packages to inspect the tiny facade of the mouse’s home. The mouse peeked out at him twitching its whiskers.

  The door swung open to the apartment and he straightened up too quickly, almost losing control of the fruit bowl. The petite woman he had met briefly at the video store stood looking at him. The jogging outfit had been replaced by a soft cotton pantsuit. Her feet were bare.

  “Mrs. Aliger,” he said quickly.

  “Yes?” Her eyes flickered over the fruit bowl and then returned to his face, arresting him with their dark intensity.

  “I’m Samuel Morris,” he said. “From this morning? At the ice cream parlor?”

  “Oh, yes,” she nodded. He was left momentarily speechless by her beauty. Why had he not noticed earlier how lovely she was? Certainly, his mother had not been exaggerating when she’s mentioned Angelica’s appearance. Maureen was a good looking woman, but there was something about the lady in front of him that made his heart race like a foolish school kid holding an apple for his favorite teacher. He started to speak and his voice squeaked in keeping with the school boy image. He cleared his throat and began again. “As president of the Chamber of Commerce, I’d like to formally welcome you and your husband to Magnolia Springs. We are always pleased to have new business in our community. I’ve brought you a welcome packet and a gift. A little something to brighten your... day.”

  Angelica leaned around him to look up at the clear, blue sky. All signs of the thunderstorm that had soaked Louis Parks were gone. She didn’t understand how a bowl of fruit could possibly make the day any brighter.

  “Thank you,” she said and took the bowl from him.

  “Is Mr. Aliger home?” He asked.

  “No,” she answered shortly. He felt as if he were John Smith offering a string of beads to an exotic Indian beauty who had no idea what to make of him. She looked down at the fruit as if she expected it to do something.

  “I haven’t caught you at a bad time, have I?” He asked somewhat disappointed at her reaction.

  “No, not a bad time,” she answered slowly and then stepped back. “Won’t you come in, Mr. Morris?”

  Sam stepped inside the dim coolness of the pink apartment and immediately began to appraise the fine furnishings. He followed her to the living room where she deposited the fruit bowl on the coffee table.

  He was duly impressed by the decor. Its dark beauty matched her perfectly. Certainly, she must have decorated the apartment herself.

  Angelica examined the yellow bow and then looked at him almost apprehensively.

  “I don’t know when my husband will be home,” she said and he felt that he had made a mistake coming here. If she and her husband were having problems as Maureen had told him, then the last thing he needed to do was be at the wrong place at the wrong time. “What’s in the box?”

  “Oh!” He was startled by the question. He still held the stationery and the packet in front of him. “I brought Mr. Aliger a little something. Stationery.” He handed her the box and the welcome packet. “It’s just a little something.”

  “He will like it,” she told him as he laid the items on the table next to the fruit. “He has a fondness for boxes with writing materials inside.”

  “I’m sorry I missed him,” he said. “I had hoped to talk to the both of you about your... business.” He ended lamely. He had no idea what to say next.

  “Won’t you sit down, Mr. Morris. Would you like something to drink? Tea or coffee...”

  “Tea would be nice. Lots of ice.” He smiled and sat on the edge of the sofa.

  “Ice,” she repeated the word and left him sitting uncomfortably in the living room.

  A large, Siamese cat sauntered into the room and came at once to rub itself against Sam’s blue-suited legs. He petted the cat, though he didn’t like them, just for lack of anything else to do. He could hear her in the kitchen. Sam wondered how they could possibly want to live in the tiny apartment when they could have bought any house in town. It didn’t make sense. And what would Mr. Aliger do if he came home and found him there? Especially if he recognized him from Chilly Willy’s.

  Angelica returned a few minutes later and handed him a tall, clear glass full of ice and greenish brown liquid.

  “Was Reggie alright?” He asked as she took a seat in one of the leather armchairs.

  “Yes, he was uninjured,” she told him. “His father came by to pick him up a while ago.”

  “Good,” he nodded and took a sip of the tea. It was oddly bitter, but not unpleasant.

  “He seems to have propensity for trouble,” she told him. “I suppose that is the way most children are.”

  “Yes, I suppose so,” he agreed. “So you are going to have your grand opening on Saturday?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Everything is almost ready.”

  “Then you have already chosen your bank and an accountant?” He tried to steer the conversation to a useful topic.

  “Accountant?” She raised both eyebrows. “Oh, I’m sure Peregrin has taken care of all that.”

  “If he needs any assistance or advice, please tell him to stop by and see me at the Savings and Loan,” he told her hopefully. “We have several other business accounts in town. We offer a full line of services.”

  “I’m sure you do,” she said. “I’ll tell him.” It seemed he was waiting for her to do something else. These people were so unpredictable. She had no idea what to say or do next. There were many things she would have asked him, but her experience with Louis Parks earlier on had not ended very well.

  “It must be nice to have your home so close to your business,” he commented and waved one hand about the living room. “But it seems a bit cramped. I can put you in touch with a good realtor if you feel the need for more space. There are two executive homes on the market right now. One of them is out by my place. Very nice. Exceptional buys, I might add.” He wondered what she wanted him to do. He was having a very difficult time finding anything to say.

  “I see.”

  “I like to stretch my legs,” he told her. “I live out near the country club. It’s not very large as country clubs go, but it has a nice little clubhouse and the greens are well kept. You don’t have to live there to be members, of course.”

  “Of course,” she seemed to agree with him.

  “If you and your husband would be interested in joining, I’d be glad t
o sponsor you. In fact, the Thomas McGruders just joined us last year.”

  “Thomas McGruders?” She looked at him quizzically.

  “Yes. He and his wife retired out here last year. I just thought you might know the McGruders. They lived in the Highland Park area before they came here. They owned several hardware stores over in that area. He was... but I suppose not. Houston is a big place.”

  “So it is,” she told him.

  “I thought I heard someone mention that you and Mr. Aliger had moved here from Highland Park,” he added quickly realizing his faux pas.

  Angelica did nothing to confirm or deny his statement. It was no wonder Perry Aliger had problems communicating with his wife. She was lovely to look at, but she wasn’t much on conversation.

  “I’m afraid we both got caught red-handed at Chilly Willy’s today.” He decided to take another tack with her. Maybe his mother was wrong. Maybe it was Perry who held all the cards in this arrangement. “I don’t usually make a habit of following Maureen, that’s my fiancée, she sold your husband an insurance policy, I don’t usually follow her around town. I’m afraid my curiosity got the better of me today. I didn’t realize who she was with. I really felt silly afterwards. Maureen was a bit upset with me, but everything is alright now.”

  “Really?” Angelica seemed to perk up a bit. Perhaps this would be her opportunity to ask some more questions. “Did you think my husband was making sexual advances on your fiancée?”

  It sounded as if she were asking about the weather. There was very little intonation of concern and absolutely no emotion. Sam was astounded by the question. She did not sound defensive, accusatory or bitter, just curious.

  “No!” He lied adamantly. “I mean, well, I thought perhaps something was a bit strange. Maureen doesn’t usually take her business appointments to the ice cream shop. I happened to see them go in there from across the street. My office overlooks the street.” He felt he had truly opened a can of worms and felt his cheeks flush. “I guess, well, I was concerned. Your husband, I mean, Mr. Aliger is quite, well... and Maureen is after all, very... I mean... yes, I thought maybe that perhaps...” he nodded in conclusion.

  “Do you think that if we had not interrupted him that he might have succeeded?” She asked another question loaded with gun powder with the same bland expression.

  “Oh, I don’t believe anything like that was going on,” he told her. “It just looked strange. That’s all. I hope he doesn’t think ill of me.”

  “I’m sure he has no opinion of you whatsoever. He hasn’t met you, has he?”

  “No,” he told her and drained the rest of the tea from the glass. “I haven’t met him, yet. I’m sure Maureen told him who I was. She was, like I said, rather upset with me.”

  “Is it important to you that my husband have a good opinion of you?"

  Her questions had a definite clinical quality to them. Briefly, he wondered if perhaps she were a psychologist or a therapist or something like that. Could it be that she was so accustomed to her husband’s strayings that she had become unaffected by them? But if that were the case, why had she bothered to spy on him? It had to be the money. She was probably angling for a better pre-nup.

  “Well, yes, of course it is,” he said. “It’s important to me. Of course. I would like to have everyone think well of me. Especially since we might be doing business together one day.”

  Angelica sat up on the edge of the chair and leaned her arms on her legs, clasping her hands together in front of her knees.

  “Then I should think that Peregrin will be happy to form an opinion of you,” she told him. “He enjoys interacting with people.”

  Her comments were very strange. He didn’t think he had ever had a stranger conversation with anyone in his entire life and that included his weird friends from college.

  “He does?” Sam looked at her.

  “Yes,” she nodded. “He studies the thoughts of others extensively.”

  “Ah, I see.” He smiled. “Your husband is a student of philosophy. Or is it psychology? No, perhaps he’s an anthropologist?”

  “Of the three, I suppose philosophy is closest.” She returned his smile. “He believes that the answers to every question can be found in the experiences associated with interactive behavior.”

  “What questions?” He asked.

  “The esoteric questions of the universe. Where did we come from? Where are we going? What is the soul? Does everyone have one?”

  “Oh, those questions.” Sam let out a sigh of relief. “Like does God really exist and is there life after death?”

  “You are familiar with these lines of questioning?” She seemed surprise.

  “Of course,” he nodded. “Aren’t we all looking for answers to the same questions?”

  “Some of us are,” she said and continued to smile her enigmatic smile.

  “I’ve often wondered if God really exists,” he told her.

  “That question does not concern me,” she said smoothly. “There is no doubt about that. What concerns me more is the soul.”

  “You mean you believe in God, but are worried about the state of the human condition,” he offered.

  “It is no belief. It is a fact,” she told him then stood up suddenly. “But Peregrin is here now. Perhaps he would be interested in talking to you about it.”

  Sam stood as well, expecting to see Mr. Aliger standing in the doorway, but no one was there. He frowned at her and opened his mouth to ask where the man was, but stopped as the front door opened. Perry Aliger came into the living room and stopped to look at him curiously before extending his hand to him.

  “Mr. Morris, I believe.” He smiled and Sam took his hand in relief. His relief at Perry’s smile disappeared instantly as a blue spark erupted between their hands. He jerked his hand back and looked at it frowning.

  “I’m sorry,” Perry apologized. “New carpet, you know.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Sam looked down at the silver gray rug then looked up. “Sam Morris. Pleased to meet you.”

  “Mr. Morris brought you a box, Peregrin,” Angelica told him raising one eyebrow. “It has writing materials inside.”

  Perry glanced at her and a strange expression filled his equally strange eyes. Sam felt that he was witnessing some form of private interplay... a joke perhaps. Sam was totally put out by her next statement.

  “Won’t you please sit down and talk with him,” she continued. “He wants you to form an opinion of him.”

  Sam almost fell sitting on the sofa as Perry bent to pick up the box. He seemed oblivious to the absurdity of his wife’s comment. He opened the box and ran his hand over the beige paper inside.

  “Thank you,” he said and glanced once more at Angelica before she made a hurried exit from the room. He sat in the armchair closest to the sofa and eyed Sam closely. “Now, tell me why you want me to form an opinion of you.”

  Sam laughed aloud. And Perry smiled at him.

  “I really came by to welcome you and your wife to town in my official capacity as president of the Chamber of Commerce. I wanted to offer my assistance if you should need it in your business dealings and I wanted to apologize for my... behavior earlier today. I didn’t want you to get the wrong impression of me.”

  “I never get the wrong impression, Mr. Morris,” Perry told him. “What you did was perfectly natural. So you were just discussing the existence of our Creator?”

  Sam blinked at him. There was no way he could have overheard the conversation between himself and Mrs. Aliger. Had she mentioned that to him as well? Had he missed something?

  “Uh, yes. Mrs. Aliger told me that you are a philosopher of sorts,” he answered.

  “She did?” Perry seemed amused.

  “Yes, she said you were into cosmology,” Sam continued.

  “That’s interesting,” Perry nodded. “I hadn’t realized that she had taken any notice of my interests.” He knew Angelica would be listening from the kitchen.

  Like his wife's, M
r. Aliger’s comments held no hint of sarcasm or resentment. His words and his expression were totally incongruent. No wonder Maureen had been confused by him and called him a weirdo. He almost laughed aloud at the thought of this couple ever having an emotional confrontation. But the man’s comment confirmed what Maureen had told him about the Aligers having communication problems. He could certainly understand it now.

  Angelica came back to bring a cup of steaming liquid to her husband. She placed it on the table next to him and resumed her seat in the other chair.

  “You discredit me, Peregrin,” she told him as she tucked one bare foot beneath her. “I notice everything. I don’t always comment on everything I notice. Mr. Morris was concerned that you may have formed a negative opinion. I was endeavoring to allay his fears on that front. I told him that you are very interested in the opinions and thoughts of others, yourself, and that you are also interested in human interactive behaviors. I did not think you had met him properly and therefore it would remain to be seen whether you would think well of him or not.”

  Perry’s face brightened and he looked at Sam as if to say ‘I dunno what she’s talking about.’ Sam could easily sympathize with the man. He definitely had a problem. Apparently, he had drawn his conclusions about Perry Aliger much too prematurely. It was very possible that both Maureen and his mother were right about Mr. Aliger. Maybe he really was looking for the answers and not interested in Maureen’s body after all. But his mother had been so wishy-washy. First she was accusing Maureen, then accusing Aliger and then defending Aliger and then accusing him and...Good God! He was getting a headache.

  “You sound as if you are not interested in the opinions of others,” Sam directed this comment to Angelica. Was she so self-assured, so confident?

  “I try not to concern myself with such things,” she answered. “It is a waste of my time. I prefer to draw conclusions directly.”

  “Ever the scientist,” Perry nodded. “Angelica does not feel that empathy is a necessary quality if one wants to understand the motivations of others.”