So he was becoming that which he detested most of all in humanity—inhuman, animalistic. Wasn’t he like the animal, unlike the human, in that when he was placed in a particular situation he became blinded, could not think, saw only darkness, reverted only to instinct, did not in fact have the human courage to be able to think.
What had worried him since he had come home, he realized suddenly, was truly not so much (as he had thought) what he wanted to do, to accomplish in this life, but what he would have to give up in order to accomplish whatever it was—not, he thought suddenly ashamed at his own stupidity, how he treated life, but always how life was treating him.
There was only one thing now that had any hold on him and that was the fifty thousand dollars. He was certainly in no frame of mind to be accepting it or turning it down and he decided that for the present he would let Old Gus put it in the bank for him and only draw on the interest. He had his disability check, and his car, and his three hundred severance bonus was due any day. He would give the money from the ring to Mary. But most important he had waiting for him the shack on Dismal Key down in Florida in the Ten Thousand Islands.
Quickly he was in the car, fully aware and stomach chugging excitedly, of his own weakness, knowing that if he didn’t get out of this town this day he might never be able to do it.
Faster than he had ever driven he drove east and stopped out on 41 where he had seen some U-Driveit trailers and rented one and driving, still faster than he had ever driven, to the Winnetka house, pulling up into the driveway and slamming on the brakes screechingly, he ran up the back stairs, nodded to the maid as he went through the kitchen, and upstairs to his room where he began packing furiously.
Mary came into the room a few moments later, sensing at once Nick’s desperation: “Nick, what’s wrong? Why do you have that thing on your car? Where are you going?”
He stopped what he was doing and went over and kissed her, then went right back to packing.
“Where?” she asked. And he noticed a sense of panic in her voice.
“On a trip,” he said.
“Nick,” she said slightly choked. “Nick, you’re not coming back.”
He was throwing things into the bag furiously and he could not make himself look up at her.
“I have to go,” he said.
“Yvonne,” Mary hollered leaving the room. “My God, Yvonne,” Nick heard her panicky voice.
From downstairs he heard Yvonne’s reply, and Mary going down the stairs, and Yvonne coming up the stairs seconds later and Nick knew Mary was having herself a belt in the kitchen.
“God, Nick,” Yvonne said, “do you have to do everything this way.”
“For Christ’s sake don’t you start too,” he said.
“You could have been more subtle about it,” she said.
She turned and left the room and went down the backstairs to the kitchen. Mary was on the phone talking to Old Pete.
“I tell you, Peter, he’s going away for good. You know my intuition. I’ve never been wrong when it came to my feelings about my son.”
“I don’t give a goddamn where he goes. And good riddance. The punk has done nothing but disgrace us.”
“Peter, that’s a lie,” she said. “Nick is sick. Sick from the war. I know about these things. I’ve read practically everything there is to read regarding our vets.”
“Yeah. Well, there were a lot of other boys in the service. And they didn’t act like him. How you explain that?”
“They didn’t do what our Nick did. Very few boys made the contribution that our Nick made.”
Old Pete knew now that arguing with Mary wasn’t going to get him any place today. Not with Nick involved.
“He’ll be back, Mary,” Old Pete said in a new voice. “I tell you he’ll be back. He’ll blow that fifty G’s and he’ll have to come back. You give him my love though. You give him my best, hear.”
“Don’t you want to talk to him? Your own son. Your own flesh and blood.”
“No, goddamn it I don’t want to talk to him.”
“Peter, watch your language.”
“Besides, he’s no blood of mine. He’s got a bad streak in him. Like your brother, that’s what. Like you. And your drinkin’. Where do you think he gets his drinkin’.”
“Why, Pete, you know I haven’t had a drink in months. On my God I haven’t had a drink in months.”
Old Pete, hearing that one, crossed himself piously. How those Catholics lie.
“Well, you give him my love. Tell him as a father to a son I wish him the best of everything, hear.”
“You won’t talk to him?”
“No.”
“Mark my word Peter Stratton God will punish you for this.”
“What do you Catholics know about God.”
“You’re a senile old man. That’s what you are. Old. Old. Old.” She said it. “God will punish you for this. He will,” she said and hung up feeling already the great pang of regret for calling him old. It was the one thing, she knew, that he couldn’t bear. It made him feel, feel, like he had said that time: “Castrated, ready to die.”
“Mother,” Yvonne said.
Mary was standing by the phone fully absorbing the terrible thing that she had said to her husband who was really so very old and helpless and always meant well.
“Are you all right, Mother?”
“You don’t know how I love that boy. You don’t,” she said. “I want to be alone, to think for a moment, Yvonne. You’ll never know how a woman feels about her children. But you will someday. Then you’ll understand what I’ve been through. Only then,” she added dramatically.
“He’s going back in the Army.”
“The Army,” Mary said crossing her hands on her breast. “The Army. Oh my God he isn’t.”
“Well, where else could he go.”
“You run right upstairs and find out where he’s going. Hurry, I feel faint.”
It was perfectly obvious to Yvonne that Mary did not feel faint and Yvonne was so on the verge of the giggles from Mary’s very dramatic speech that she turned and went quickly up the back stairs.
And quickly Mary went over to the cupboard and from behind a box of Wheaties pulled a pint bottle of Four Roses and filled a kitchen glass up with the Four Roses straight and in two gulps belted it.
“Where you going, Nick?” Yvonne asked him.
“I haven’t made up my mind yet.”
“Here, let me help you fold those things.”
“Thanks,” he said. “You’d think that after three years in the Army at least I’d know how to pack.”
“You do know where you’re going, don’t you. It’s with that woman, isn’t it. With Nora.”
“No. But I wish it was.”
“You love her anyhow, don’t you. In spite of what she is.”
“Yes.”
“Pierro’s been drinking a lot lately, Nick.”
“So.”
“Won’t you tell me?”
“Honest, baby, I don’t know. I really don’t. I just know that I’ve got to get out of here as fast as I can. As far away as I can. And don’t you start giving me any of the crap about ‘running away’.”
She smiled. “I won’t,” she said. Then suddenly her voice became shaky. “Oh, Nick, I feel so sorry for you.” Then she was in his arms crying. He patted her for a while, until she stopped. “I’m just a goddamn sentimental fool, I guess.”
“Where’s Mother?”
“In the kitchen. Thinking.”
“Or drinking?” Nick asked. “Go watch her, will you. There’s no sense in her working herself up to a scene.”
“All right, Nick,” she said. “But you will write, won’t you.”
“Yes,” he said, “I’ll write.”
“You’re not going to stay in the Army?”
“No.”
“I’m glad,” she said. “I don’t understand you, Nick, but I’ve always loved you. You know that.”
“I know it, baby,
” he said in that soft tender way that he rarely displayed. “You’ll always be my little baby.”
She left and went downstairs and told Mary that Nick wasn’t going into the Army. Mary sighed a great dramatic sigh of relief and then Yvonne told her that she was almost positive that Nick himself wasn’t sure exactly where he was going or what he was going to do but that he promised her faithfully that he would write often.
Three hours later Nick was finished packing. It was really a very makeshift job. He just piled things into the suitcases and trailer, all the old things that he had saved up in the attic and a lot of pots and pans that Mary had discarded in the basement, and for good measure had made a raid on the liquor room and copped two cases of scotch, one of gin, and one of bourbon. It gave him a kind of good feeling; a kind of symbolic feeling of farewell to Old Pete.
Then all packed and ready he went into the kitchen to say goodbye to Mary and Yvonne. Mary cried half drunken hysterically and begged Nick to go down and say goodbye to his father, after all his father meant well even if he didn’t understand them. They, Nick and Mary and Yvonne were American. They had background Old Pete would never have. They must consider Old Pete’s meager background. That was the least they could do. It would show what their background really meant. So finally, just in order to be able to get out of the place, Nick agreed that maybe he would stop by Old Pete’s. He wouldn’t promise, but more than likely, he lied, he would stop.
And with that final lie he kissed the women goodbye and got into his car and started for Florida.
CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE first week on Marco Island, because he felt he couldn’t afford the Marco Island Inn, Nick stayed at a small cabin at Larry’s fishing camp out near Caxambas Pass. He explained to Larry that he had come to stay indefinitely and that he wanted his stay to be self-sustaining. The first morning they drove out to Nick’s Key and Larry showed him the small shack he had built as part of the deal, then in the afternoon they fished, and after fishing went to Molly’s Beer Joint where Larry and Nick sat in a corner making up a list of supplies that Nick would have to have. Then the next morning they got up and fished together, then Nick went back to the cabin and in the heat of the day wrote Gus a long letter explaining that he didn’t want his whereabouts known, and instructions and authorization for Gus to hold the fifty thousand dollars for Nick until he could make up his mind what he wanted to do with it.
Larry helped Nick get his supplies together and let him use his boat to run the supplies out to Dismal Key and promised Nick all the guiding business that he, Larry, couldn’t handle. Larry’s advice saved Nick considerable money but Nick nevertheless soon realized that in order to get the boat, which was essential, certainly more essential than a car, he would have to sell the car. Larry advised that he go to Miami to sell it. But advised too that he wait at least a month, until the Miami market was up due to the tourist influx—and told Nick that in the meantime he could use one of Larry’s boats and an old motor if Nick would pay for having the motor put in shape.
So after one week Nick moved out to his Key. He was very proud of the Key and found it hard to believe that he really owned it. He inspected it carefully the first day, not only by boat, but by foot, and noticed how well it was building up near the south end and thought that in no time at all it would be at least another quarter mile of white sand beach. Then, because already, late in the day, he began to feel the loneliness, and the terrible lonely strangeness, he went fishing with a vengeance and got back to his shack after dark and lit his kerosene lamp and took out a book and sitting on his old Army cot, with the GI blankets on the cot, began to read. He did not read long. The mosquitos were bad in the shack and it was too warm to get under the covers and there was a stickiness coming into the air as if it were about to rain or storm. Then he thought this was the hurricane season and how, supposing—Christ if one ever hit no one would even know what had happened to him. He walked down to the beach. The sky was clear, star filled. There was a strong wind from the gulf and out over the gulf he saw the rain squalls and looking back inland he saw more squalls and thought surely if the wind did not change abruptly he would be hit by a squall this night. He sat on the beach with the small surf growing with the impending squall, watching the thick rain clouds come rolling in from out on the gulf, thinking how strange it was for him to be here now, sitting there with the wind coming harder, cooler to his face and the sound of the palm fronds rasping in the trees behind him and growing louder, until finally he saw the rain on the water not far out and made a run for the cabin, soon was asleep in the cabin with the rain coming down hard and the air cool from the rain.
In the morning the rain was gone and the sun was up hot. He awoke sweating in the bed feeling the itchy wetness of his three-day-old beard and went down to the beach and swam, with his spinning outfit caught two mangrove snappers near some rocks on the beach and pan-fried them there in the early morning. It had been a bad night. He had dreamed but could not remember the dream. He realized he must shave. It would be damn important to shave here. If you did not shave here you would feel dirty always.
All week he fished with a vengeance; a furiousness it was, determined to stick it out that first whole week—not to go into town, to Larry’s camp even, only to deliver what fish he had taken to the fish house for freezing and to get his receipts for the fish he had brought in, payable the first and fifteenth of every month.
He fished so long and hard in the hot sun that he began after only three days to sleep well and was so tired he did not even think about Chicago or what had happened since he had come home. The last day of the first week Larry stopped to tell him he had a party to guide the next day. It was his first party guiding and he stayed up late, for him, getting the equipment he would need in perfect condition, proudly, and could even feel an excitement over his first day as a professional fishing guide.
In the early morning he picked his party up at Larry’s dock. They were a man and a woman from Miami and did not know much of fishing. Nick was very patient with them. They were lucky and caught several large snook trolling and later in the day Nick tried for tarpon and they tied into two around eighty pounds but their inexperience caused them to lose them both. But at the end of the day they were so gratified they not only paid Nick his twenty dollar fee but tipped him ten dollars besides and hired him for the next day and even asked him up to the Marco Island Inn to have a drink with them. Instead Nick went to Molly’s with Larry. Everyone had already heard of Nick’s luck that day. Everyone always heard of everyone else’s luck. Nick had actually done better than Larry that day and many came around kidding Larry and they drank a lot of beer.
Days passed. Nick grew strong, deeply tanned, remarkably adjusted to his new life. He began to read more now, found time for other things; repair work on his shack, trips back into the Glades. His great need for continuous, long hours of fishing began to evaporate. He went often to Molly’s seemingly satisfied to pass the evening there; to discuss where the day’s catches had been made; to drink beer leisurely and to listen to the history of the Mangrove Coast as it had been passed down by word of mouth, completely unaware that in three short weeks he himself had become the topic of considerable conversation, that already there was a legend springing up about him.
Right before Nick was to go to Miami to sell his car Larry told him about a boat that was for sale up in Naples and Nick went up to look at it. It was exactly what he wanted; an eighteen foot skiff with a 15-horse Evinrude outboard. Larry thought it was a good buy, he knew the boat, and the owner, and Nick made a deposit. In town, the clean wealthy town, Nick decided to spend the day. He decided to splurge on a big lunch down at the Cove, one of Naples’ better restaurants. In the Cove he began to drink martinis and for the first time since his first night on the Key began to feel the loneliness again. He looked around at all the wealthy people in the crowded restaurant feeling once again all that inadequacy, that left-outness that he always seemed to have. At the bar he tried to st
rike up several conversations but the urgency was too strong within him and the people, even the bartender, seemed to ignore him. He drove, very drunk, back to Marco, to Molly’s. And very drunk was driven by Larry to one of Larry’s fishing shacks where he spent the night. Next morning he went out to his Key to pick up some clothes knowing as he stood in the boat that the first thing he was going to do when he got to Miami was to try and find Nora.
He found her in mid-afternoon by the pool at the Royal Hotel. He had stopped at a gas station on the outskirts of town and put on his summer khakis (he was still not officially discharged). She was having a drink and reading Time magazine when he came up. He was so deeply tanned, so physically keen, at first she had wondered if it were really he. They went into the bar.
“I wish you hadn’t followed me, Nick,” she said.
“I didn’t,” he said wondering the instant he had said it if maybe he was actually following her. Then explained to her where he was living and what he was doing. He had come to sell his car.
“You’re down to that.”
“Yes. Or up to it. I don’t know which.” She had a deep tan, too, but he thought her eyes were tired. And she had lost weight. “I guess I should have called,” he added. “Can we have dinner?”
She hesitated but for a moment: “I’ve a date, Nick,” she said. “But I guess I can get out of it. If I can get Cindy to take it I’ll be free. Where are you staying?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I was only going to be here one night. I thought I’d stay with you. You staying here at the Royal?”
“Yes.”
They could both feel it—the awkwardness. But to them it was familiar. They sat at the bar drinking. She had made up her mind (why?) to spend the evening with him, was not going to let the awkwardness destroy it. At first they talked about odd things (undoubtedly due to the awkwardness), things they usually wouldn’t have spoken of: the weather, fishing, what kind of a season Miami was having now that the war was over. She didn’t mention Chicago, or how hard she had been working, and finally she said,
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