The Mystery of Right and Wrong

by Wayne Johnston

  When Myra and I were next alone—once again in the kitchen of the house on Liesbeek Road, while Hans and Rachel sat in the living room—I lost my nerve and said that I thought all the pieces were good. She looked dismayed. “You’re patronizing me,” she said, faintly smiling. “I know I’m not a good writer. I base everything I write on what other, far better writers have written. Sometimes people notice, sometimes not. I don’t care either way. I’m sorry that you feel you can’t be honest with me.”

  “Sometimes it’s hard to be honest.”

  “So your real opinion is…so harsh you thought it best to keep it to yourself?”

  “No,” I said. “I just…I don’t read those kinds of magazines. I don’t know what their editors are looking for.”

  “Why do you assume that I base what I write on what editors are looking for?”

  “All right. I thought the best story was ‘We Two Are Now One.’ ”

  She laughed, fingering her necklace. “That one? I was, for a short time, a member of a women writers’ group in St. John’s. That’s the kind of thing they were all writing, complaints about having had their hopes and dreams swallowed up by their husbands. I found an obscure American short story I thought they would have liked and used it as a model. They loved it. They admired a story based on one that some nobody had written, but they didn’t like the ones based on the work of famous writers, because those famous writers were men. That told me something.

  “Oh, I’m so disappointed with you, Wade. I think there is something in my writing, something worthwhile. It’s been published, after all. I think it would be best if, from now on, we didn’t talk about writing. You may think that this, all of this, will make it hard for us to get along. It won’t, I assure you. You have your imperfections and I have mine. That’s where we shall leave it.”

  I left that day feeling bewildered and not convinced that I had not been cast into outer darkness.

  When I told Rachel what had passed between me and her mother, she flopped down on the sofa with a copy of Het Achterhuis, which she’d taken to reading for far longer each day than she ever had in St. John’s. “You just got what Gloria, Carmen, Bethany and I call the disappointment treatment. People disappoint her all the time, but they never make her angry with them. She gets more mileage out of disappointment.”

  I was about to say I might have been more forthright with her mother if I had been forewarned, but Rachel sounded so weary of all mention of her mother that I decided not to.

  From The Arelliad

  MYRA (1984)

  Memory makes its way into Arellia. I hear my mother’s voice from within the yellow wood that I dare not venture into. It is Christmas night, late and long ago. Everyone has gone to bed but for the two of us. I am reading what she calls “that Anne Frank book,” and she has had too much to drink. Her usual limit is two, but there are times…

  “Someday, my little Rachel Lee, you’ll think that you have found true love, a young man you will never leave and who wouldn’t think of leaving you. A danger to the family is all that he will ever be.

  “True love. I’ve never had it or wanted it. It’s better to marry sensibly than to sacrifice yourself to some idea from a book. In school I knew so many lovesick girls who wound up jilted and alone and miserable ever after, pining for the man who got away.

  “Myra Weaver, I used to be. I could have done much worse than Him, not that I had much to pick from, the girl who grew up far too soon on the Cape of Hope and Grope. You’ve never heard my story, so listen well and don’t repeat a word of it to your sisters.

  “My father left my mother and me when I was ten. He ran off and we never heard from him again. Left us with nothing but a wad of unpaid bills. My mother nearly lost her mind. She said he left because of me—well, she said he never wanted children and she tricked him into it. From then on, I was nothing but a trick that my mother played on my father. Boo hoo.

  “We moved in with my uncle, my father’s brother, Dr. Uncle Michael Weaver, who had a wife but loved another. He was well-to-do, a surgeon who took us in because of how it would look if he left us on our own. He sent me away as soon as he found a place for me at convent school, the Star of the Sea Convent School for Girls, where I was brought up in a nun-run Roman Catholic world.

  “I was a convent girl who made no friends. Boo hoo. The best Uncle’s money could do was make the nuns put up with me. The other girls were from the upper crust, not meant to mix with the riff or the raff, but Uncle paid a premium to get me in and keep me there. So I became a Protestant in Catholic clothes who stuck out like a certain thumb, the school outcast, the heretic-in-residence.

  “I was an easy mark for Sister Gail, the principal, who beat me with the strap she carried like a six-gun on her hip.

  “While I was away at school, Uncle divorced his wife, kept his lover and also took up with Mother. Dr. Uncle Michael Weaver, Mother’s husband, my stepfather, wasn’t fond of his stepdaughter, whose father was his brother, Jim, with whom he’d never got along.

  “Stepfather eventually abandoned Mother. Twice abandoned she was, and twice she put the blame on me. He bamboozled her in their divorce and left us penniless. In my last year at convent school, Mother was committed to a hospital, where she found a way to end it all.

  “By eighteen, I was on my own, a poor shopgirl.

  “As you know, boo hoo’s not how the story ends. My education was first-rate. At school, I’d learned to scheme and calculate in order to survive. I did some things I had to do, and I would again. But the nuns polished my exterior. I looked and sounded and comported myself like the stars of the Star of the Sea. I got to where I am today by learning how to play the game.

  “I saw what life would be like if I held out for love. It would have been like my mother’s, except my Romeo would not have been a surgeon—a truck driver, maybe, or an office clerk.

  “So I chose your father. To be his wife was my one choice, but I let him think the choice was his.

  “He was a chartered accountant when I told him I was pregnant. I saw that he’d do right by me because he knew the world would say he was a coward and a cad if he ran off like my father did.

  “He had no one to point out my deficiencies, and I had no one to point out his, so I guess that made us even.

  “He didn’t have a way with the ladies, so he was fortunate that I wasn’t one. I never saw him talk to another woman, never saw one look at him, though (as if he thought they wouldn’t notice) he stared at them appraisingly. He stared so hard, it was like he didn’t know what they were for.

  “I sized him up well. This man would never break my heart. Neither handsome nor well spoken, the only heart he’d ever broken was his own. I saw it in his eyes—that sort of thing you can’t disguise.

  “He did just what I told him to. He seemed relieved, as if he knew he’d never find his own way unless someone took him in hand, someone who seemed to believe that there was more to him than met the eye, that, given time, he would succeed.

  “He’s all that I have ever had or wanted. I have no time for second-guessing. His wife is all I’ve ever been or ever will be.”

  Without me, He would cease to be;

  without Him there would be no me.

  So I will be my Husband’s keeper;

  that’s all I have, a piece of paper

  that certifies that He is mine,

  that He and I are intertwined,

  by God and man forever joined.

  WADE

  I was at my desk in the bedroom, trying to coax out a few words about the impossibly distant place of my childhood. The desk had the look of a stage prop in a play about a writer, my old Olivetti in the middle of it, resting on a brown-bordered green blotter, a sheet of blank paper in the carriage, a notebook beside it and, on the notebook, perfectly positioned at a forty-five degree angle, a newly sharpened, never-used y
ellow pencil. I’d felt foolish just sitting there since my run-in with Myra, who, no matter how you looked at it, was a published writer, a writer who, when she sat at a typewriter, typed words onto the page instead of just staring at it.

  “Maybe I could get started if I wrote in code,” I shouted to Rachel. “Or I could pretend to write in code. Just hit the keys randomly. Either way, who would know?”

  I immediately wished I hadn’t said it, but was rescued by the ringing of the phone. Rachel answered it and soon after shouted, “WHAT? YOU’RE KIDDING.”

  “Is something wrong?” I called, but, hearing her laugh, I went back to staring at the page. Minutes later, she burst into the room, both hands on top of her head. “Bethany and Clive just got engaged,” she said. It was almost a question.

  “That cannot be true,” I said.

  “Oh, it is,” Rachel said. “Mom is absolutely over the moon. That was her on the phone. I think she’s calling all of Cape Town. Bethany and Clive. Three weeks ago, Bethany was rolling her eyes at the mention of his name. And one hour ago, she asked him to marry her.”

  “She asked him?”

  Rachel nodded. “How else could it possibly have happened? There’s a get-together at Mom and Dad’s tonight to celebrate. The DeVrieses will be there, of course. Gloria and Max are in Amsterdam, and Mom says she couldn’t reach Carmen and Fritz.”

  “What on earth is Bethany thinking?”

  “Let’s not be like that,” Rachel said. “I mean, I feel the same way, but it’s not as if Bethany is the most normal person in the world, either. And she’s not as hard-nosed as she pretends. Really. Growing up, she fell in love all the time. I’ll wear my best dress, the one with the spaghetti straps, if you’ll wear a tie. We can buy one on the way. They’ll all be dressed to the nines. Or my parents’ version of it, anyway. Let’s say to the fives.”

  I nodded. She’d been subdued since the night of her father’s rant against the Jews and Anne Frank, and it was nice to see a hint of buoyancy.

  At Liesbeek Road, Rachel rang the doorbell. As before, Bethany came to the door, this time holding a martini palm up in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

  “Do come in, dahlings,” she said.

  “I can’t believe you’re engaged,” Rachel said. “I’d hug you if you weren’t armed to the teeth.”

  “You finally popped the question,” I said.

  Bethany raised her glass in mock tribute. “I’m off my happy pills tonight, so I’m allowed to drink. In fact, I think it’s mandatory or else I might get all depressed. The two of you are required to drink as well—a lot. You can always get a cab later or spend the night here. Do come in and give your best to my betrothed.”

  We followed her into the front room, where Hans and Myra, the DeVrieses and Clive were standing about, all of them but Hans holding martini glasses, though Peter’s was filled with what looked like cranberry juice. “Here they are,” Bethany said. Myra was beaming; Hans, his hands behind his back, seemed lost in thought. The DeVrieses flanked Clive, whose face was as flushed as if he’d just sprinted a mile.

  “Isn’t it wonderful?” Myra said to Rachel as she hugged her with one arm.

  “It is,” Rachel said. “It’s absolutely wonderful.”

  “What’s this, now, what’s this?” Hans said as Rachel kissed him on the cheek. “Making a move on the old man, are you?” Everyone laughed.

  I extended my hand to him and he took it, but not firmly. “Congratulations,” I said.

  “Bethany proposed to Clive, you know,” he said to Rachel, smiling broadly, showing more of his dentures than he ever had in my presence.

  “Yes, I know,” she said. “Don’t draw any conclusions about me from that.”

  “Well, she has always been unorthodox,” he said.

  “I think it’s very charming,” Myra said. “And these are modern times. Why shouldn’t the woman propose?”

  “In that case,” Hans said, “I assume that, in spite of what she just said, Rachel will be proposing soon.”

  More laughter. I glanced at Rachel, who looked away when our eyes met.

  Rachel and I congratulated Clive and his parents in a jumble of hugs, handshakes and kisses. “Martinis for Rachel and Wade,” Bethany said to Clive, putting her hand gently on his back. Clive made for the kitchen and came back with two glasses. “Ready, made and waiting for you,” Bethany said. As we took the drinks from Clive, Bethany stepped into the middle of the room. “Quiet, please,” she said. “I would like to propose a toast.”

  Clive lurched forward as if pushed by his parents. Dropping to one knee in front of her, he pulled a ring box from the pocket of his jacket and opened it. “Will you marry me?” he said, his voice breaking on “marry.” Myra gasped as if marriage had not been mentioned until now.

  “You stole my line, buddy,” Bethany said as if to herself. “But I guess I stole your thunder, so we’re even. Yes, I will marry the man who’s already agreed to marry me.”

  “The ring makes it official,” Theresa said. Clive stayed there, on one knee, looking up at Bethany with a stricken expression as if she had said no.

  “Well, put it on her finger, Clive,” Peter said. As Clive stood, Bethany hurriedly handed her drink to Rachel, her cigarette to me, and thrust her left hand out to Clive, her other on her hip, which she cocked in the manner of some movie star she seemed to be imitating. Clive took the ring from the box and, shaking badly, tried to slip it onto Bethany’s finger. “It goes on the one to the right of my pinky,” Bethany said to a chorus of nervous laughter, using her right hand to steady his. Together, they managed to slide the ring into place.

  “Ta-dah,” Bethany said, raising her hand so that all could see the ring—the diamond was sizable. Everyone applauded.

  “Clive picked it out when we went for the vodka and vermouth,” Theresa said.

  Bethany lowered her hand to waist height and splayed her fingers as we all gathered around to admire the ring we all knew had been paid for by Clive’s parents. Bethany gazed at it as if the sight of it on her hand seemed as unlikely to her as it did to me.

  “You were going to propose a toast,” I said to Bethany, thinking to rescue her from an awkward moment.

  “Yes, I was,” Bethany said, “but nothing I could say could top this. Nothing at all.”

  A few minutes later, Rachel and I found ourselves alone in the kitchen with Bethany. “They wanted to get champagne but I insisted on martinis,” she said. “I get no kick from champagne, but mere alcohol drives me insane. I have to blame something.” She locked eyes with Rachel. “Out with it,” she said. “You look like you think I’ve gone all the way around the bend and back again.”

  “I am surprised,” Rachel said.

  “Well,” Bethany said, “if I had waited for him to ask first—but he did get down on one knee just now.”

  “You know that’s not what I mean,” Rachel said.

  If I had waited for him to ask first. I remembered Rachel telling me she thought I should ask her out. You don’t have to, but I think you should.

  Bethany put her martini on the counter and lit up a cigarette. “I know, I know,” she said. “I was just kidding. Wade, would you rather have a beer? You’re not nursing that martini, you’re doctoring it.”

  “No changing the subject,” Rachel said. “I want to know what’s up.”

  “What’s up is that I got engaged today. For most of the usual reasons. I swept him off his feet. I guess he loves me or something. So what if I don’t love him. He is smitten and no one else is beating down the door. He may not be a knight in shining armour, but he’s a nice guy, and most guys are not so nice. His father and mine grew up together. My mom likes his mom. He wants a quiet, normal life. He has a job he hates so much that it may make him love his wife and kids all the more. You know, Rachel, not every woman finds a man who loves her just as much
as she loves him. The odds are heavily against it. Even fewer meet one who plans to be a writer, but I have to say, I don’t like Wade’s chances of becoming one unless you get down on one knee and beg him to.”

  “That’s just the martini talking,” I said, grabbing Rachel as her index finger came within a few inches of Bethany’s face. She took a deep breath and lowered her hand.

  Bethany plucked the olive out of her martini and put both on the counter. “Wade,” she said, “what you are witnessing is a standoff between two sisters. Rachel is wondering when I last had a bite to eat and kept it down, and I’m wondering why the underside of her left hand is so smudged with ink. My version of her wrist test.”

  Rachel glanced down at her hand, which was, indeed, smudged with blue ink, more so than I had ever seen it. How had I not noticed? Rachel shook her head. “I haven’t been writing my diary. I can’t help it that I’m left-handed and therefore write everything left-handed.”

  “What have you been writing, Wade’s novel?”

  “Knock it off,” Rachel said, but Bethany persisted.

  “We’re on to each other, Wade. She knows why I’m wearing this loose-fitting dress, and I know why her hand is blue. We know each other’s tricks. She worships a book written by a dead teenager and is diarizing day and night. Take my word for it, she is. And people think I’m nuts.”

  Bethany and Rachel looked at each other as if both of them were shocked by what Bethany had said. As Rachel’s eyes welled up, Bethany pulled Rachel close and buried her face in her hair, whispering something. Rachel whispered something back. When they let go of each other, they were both smiling and crying at the same time. “Let me get that beer, buddy,” Bethany said to me, rubbing tears away with both hands, then patting my chest.

  For the rest of the evening, Bethany and Clive sat side by side on the loveseat, holding hands. I felt certain they had never held hands before, let alone kissed. Rachel and I sat side by side on separate chairs, not holding hands, the flagrant opposite of Bethany and Clive, a couple with no plans to get engaged, let alone married, with no plans period except to go on living in disgrace.