A Dual Inheritance (12 page)

“I don’t know,” said Ed, “but it’s irritating. When I look around, I’m irritated.”

“We see that,” said Helen. “Maybe you need to get some air.”

“No,” said Ed. “I’ll stop.”

“Well,” said Helen firmly, “that would be nice.” Then she gave Ed a surprisingly generous smile, a look that was almost … complicit, which Hugh noticed was all it took to make Ed relax. Hugh, too, was temporarily silenced by Helen’s assertion, and he would always use that night as an example of how—contrary to popular belief—one can never predict the direction of an evening within the first five minutes.

Because not only was the “Ingrid Bergman night” (as they all eventually referred to it) fun—and
so
much more fun than the beginning had promised—but after Ed got over the fact that Helen had obviously set him up with Connie solely because they were both Jewish, it became clear that Ed did like Connie and Connie liked Ed, and Hugh liked everyone and Helen approved, and for a month or so they all hung around together. Friday evenings, they dressed up and had drinks in the Brattle Street townhouse (the Mervas had once again set off for the Dordogne), which led to dinner and—for Ed, Hugh, and Helen at least—eventually breakfast. Connie always returned to her dormitory and was never late. She was a proud virgin, and Ed’s varied attempts at persuading her otherwise (at turns comic, pleading, and downright lewd) often punctuated these evenings. Connie didn’t seem to mind and even relished the attention, as they drank bottles of wine from Raoul’s fine collection and Hugh looked through his camera lens, as if they really were—Ed and the two girls—subjects as worthy as members of the Nuer tribe, the Dani, or—at the very least—a few melancholy film stars.

By the time Connie Graff’s high school sweetheart showed up in the middle of the Thursday typing class with
a ring that proved he wasn’t playing around
, the Friday night routine was so firmly established that the absence of Connie Graff (who wasted no time in moving back to
New Rochelle) mattered less than any of them would have guessed. Ed continued dressing for Fridays and driving Helen and Hugh around in his convertible on Sundays. They returned to the Big Deep and ate egg-salad sandwiches and drank many bottles of beer. Helen filled the empty bottles with pond water and wildflowers, lining them up, week by week, along the water’s edge. They drove to Somerville to see a big house that was completely round. While Hugh was aiming his lens at Helen in front of it, and while she was trying to pretend she didn’t notice him doing so, an old man shuffled by, walking an equally old Labrador. “I always figured my life would be better if I lived in that round house,” he said. “Go on,” he told them, “go on and I’ll take your picture.”

Hugh handed over his Leica somewhat reluctantly, but the old man backed up and was nothing if not nimble as he fiddled with the lens. Hugh stood next to Helen, taking her hand.

“No need for any funny business,” said the old man, though they were doing nothing but standing still. “That house is as regal a backdrop as you can ask for.”

Ed made no move to join them—out of, Hugh imagined, respect—but the man nearly growled at Ed, “Time’s a wastin’.”

Ed—squeezed in the middle—made up for his reticence by throwing his arms around the two of them, the force of which caused Hugh and Helen (who were, Hugh knew, king and queen of the miserably stiff photo smile) to offer up something genuine. They each hated having their picture taken, but when the old man was gone, Hugh sheepishly asked Ed to take one of just Helen and him, if only to prove to himself that they could appear relaxed and happy without Ed’s arms around them.

As for Ed: Each week he joked less and less about being a third wheel. In fact, it became evident that he enjoyed it and that Hugh and Helen enjoyed—after such secretive beginnings—maybe not a fawning audience but certainly a witness, and one who was not shy about making his presence known.

At Ami Henri, sunlight poured into the small pleasant rooms, and for a brief moment Hugh felt so contented that he thought there was something wrong with his head and that maybe he was confusing a positive sensation with a negative one, like when hot water is so hot it actually feels cold. He was jolted out of his blatant neurosis by the French proprietress, Mrs. O’Hagen—so named because of the American G.I. she’d married and promptly divorced after their arrival in Boston. Her name was at odds with her Gallic charms, and when Ed insisted on telling her so (this being his first time here), she leaned over the table, emitting the scent of onions and butter and something distinctly more earthy, and said,
“Merci,”
pointedly—Hugh couldn’t help but notice—not to Ed but to him.

“My,” said Helen, fanning herself with the worn yellow menu, “someone never warmed to American habits of bathing.”

“She’s phenomenal,” said Ed. “I’m going to sleep with her.”

“Is that right,” Helen said, reading over the menu before placing it on the table.

“What’s your fancy?” Hugh asked her.

“Snails, I think,” said Helen, while looking at Ed.

“What?” asked Ed. “What’s that look for?”

Helen started to laugh.

“Helen Ordway, are you saying I don’t have a chance with Miss Bardot over there?”

“She’s hardly Brigitte Bardot. Besides,” Helen took her voice down, “she must be at least forty years old.”

“Well, golly gee,” said Ed. “Ever hear of a May–December romance?”

“You have to admit, your confidence is staggering,” Hugh said.

“And?” countered Ed.

Mrs. O’Hagen approached the table again, and Hugh ordered a bottle of wine.

“I’m suddenly so hungry,” said Ed, all the while looking at Mrs. O’Hagen as if she were a filet mignon. When Helen laughed, Mrs. O’Hagen shot her a withering look before sauntering off once again.

“You have to admit,” said Helen, offering her cigarette to be lit, which Hugh did without missing a beat, “you are constantly on the make. I’m just not sure it’s altogether healthy.”

“And why not?” Ed asked, as Mrs. O’Hagen approached once more with an open bottle—an undeniably lovely sight. “Why not aim high?” he said, drawing out his words, watching
madame
pour and then leave. “Hugh, don’t you think I should aim high?”

Hugh nodded, shifting in his seat as he watched an older couple order briskly after kissing Mrs. O’Hagen on both cheeks. He had a passing thought that the man looked like his father. But this man was shorter, balder, and his father was in the middle of the country, attending a Union Pacific shareholders’ meeting; he was spending a week on a luxury train car, a high point of his year.

“I admit,” Hugh said, “I don’t understand how you can be so blindly confident despite—I’ll go on and say it—a few rejections. You don’t exactly take it in.”

Ed knocked back some wine. “Take what in?” he asked.

Hugh glanced at Helen before settling into his chair. He tried to return to the pleasant sensation he’d had upon sitting down with Helen and Ed, but all he noticed now was the narrow space between two doorways where an African mask had always hung. The mask was gone, and it was terribly unnerving to see the empty space, which was no doubt contributing to his mood. When he’d asked about the mask several years ago, over an unusually pleasant dinner with his father, Mrs. O’Hagen had told him that she purchased it from an old woman in Dakar. She’d seemed pleased that Hugh was interested and had mentioned her decorative knives from the Congo; perhaps he might one day want to see them?

Hugh knew that Mrs. O’Hagen might remember him, but he was too reserved to ever act as if they’d met. There were reports that she conferred the honor of viewing her naked flesh upon a select few Harvard upperclassmen each year, but Hugh did not want to even consider that he could be among those few, as he would never—now that he finally had Helen—accept such a distinction.

“What?” Ed repeated. “What exactly don’t I take in? Look.” He put his elbows on the table and leaned in toward both of them. “When girls—not only girls—when
anyone
is skittish about my … personal candor, I know not to trust them.”

“Is that so?” countered Helen.

“I know not to trust them, because they clearly haven’t resolved their own personal problems. That,” Ed said, “is why they’re uncomfortable.”

“Maybe,” said Helen, taking a last long drag of her cigarette. “Or maybe they just find you overbearing.”

Ed waved her off. “What would I want with people like that?”

Mrs. O’Hagen sauntered toward their table with a bowl of cornichons. She described
les especials
—especially a leg of lamb with some nice spring peas—quite tenderly.

“You are ready?” Mrs. O’Hagen asked meaningfully. “Do you know what you would like?”

When the cake arrived, it sported one lit candle, and Hugh and Helen sang a shy but boozy happy birthday. Ed’s face lit up as if no one had ever done anything nice for him before that moment, and Hugh felt a strange flip in his throat that signaled his own special breed of crying (quick start, no end in sight) and he slugged down the rest of the Bordeaux. When Ed loosened his tie and raised his glass, it was easy for Hugh to picture how his friend would age, how he might lose his hair and get rounder at the middle but he’d always command a room without doing more than this: lifting a glass and—for one brief moment—looking deadly serious.

Ed twitched—a vigorous blink—just like he did when he’d been studying all night and insisted on recounting what he knew, even as Hugh had fallen asleep on the common-room couch, leaving Ed to rattle off dates and concepts until he was completely satisfied there was nothing he had missed. “You not only have to get it all in there,” he’d explained, when Hugh asked why he had to say everything out loud, “but
you have to make sure none of it leaks out.” He talked about acquiring knowledge as if it was no different than fixing up a car, filling it with a full tank of gas.

“Hugh,” he said now, “Helen.” Again the big blink. “I want you to know that you are my friends. I would kill for you both, I really think I would.”

Hugh and Helen started to laugh. Ed did not.

“Don’t laugh.”

“Sorry,” said Hugh.

“Sorry,” said Helen.

“Thank you for taking me to this restaurant on my birthday.”

“You’re welcome,” said Hugh.

Mrs. O’Hagen came back to the table. She picked up the cake. “Happy birthday,” she said to Ed. “I will cut this into pieces. And maybe some crème?” She turned, and Ed watched her go.

“I have to sleep with that woman,” he said, his outpouring over their friendship clearly finished.

“What about getting back to how you’d kill for us?” said Hugh.

“She has slept with others,” Ed maintained, as if to soothe himself. “It is not out of the question.”

“I’d let that particular ambition fall away if I were you,” said Hugh, and Helen nodded, offering another cigarette to be lit. “What do you really know about her willingness? I think it might be nothing but wishful rumors.”

“John Winn has.”

“I’m sorry,” said Helen, “but that’s John Winn.”

“John Winn,” said Ed, “is a drunk who was kicked out of Harvard for holding up a movie-theater cashier with a water pistol.”

Helen shrugged giddily. “I’m only saying …”

“He held up a cashier—a movie cashier—”

“As if the type of cashier matters!”

“He held up a cashier with a water pistol. Are you saying he’s more sexually appealing than I am?” Ed was grinning madly now. “Connie Graff liked me!”

“Connie Graff married a dermatology resident and moved to Westchester. This is Mrs. O’Hagen,” stressed Helen, looking at Hugh for encouragement.

“It is,” offered Hugh.

Suddenly Ed backed his chair away from the table and dropped his napkin. The kitchen was at the end of a long narrow hallway and they could make out half of Mrs. O’Hagen, whose back was to them. They watched Ed approach her, stopping just shy of grabbing her behind. They watched as Mrs. O’Hagen turned around, holding a dessert plate. Ed took the plate from her hand and set it back down on the counter. Hugh and Helen said nothing, the older couple ate in silence, and the few other tables in the restaurant were empty, but, even so, no one could hear what Ed said to Mrs. O’Hagen that produced such a laugh, a laugh clearly ripening to become either a giddy reproach or—remarkably—an invitation. No one could hear what he’d said. In fact, it was as if the room was filling up with a thick and difficult silence. Hugh and Helen sat back in the banquette and, as if in response to what could only be described as the very real heat that Ed had somehow managed to generate in that small kitchen, Hugh put his hand up Helen’s skirt and Helen tilted toward him. But both of them still watched the kitchen; someone was bound to come back at any moment, after all.

Chapter Five

Solstice

“I’ve never been on a ferry before,” Ed said. “How is that possible?” He stretched out his legs and rapped his knuckles on the wooden bench. The deck was neither crowded nor empty and it was unseasonably warm for June. The sun shone, gulls swooped, and as he breathed in deeply, a salt scent came not only from the sea but also from the potato chips four pregnant women were noshing.