A Three Day Event (11 page)

God, they were so
fucking
sensitive, these people. Last week when a tableful of Roch’s young rider students from Ontario were eating lunch and talking and laughing kind of loudly, one of
their
lot had muttered something about the anglo clients ‘taking up too much space’, as he had crudely put it…. at least according to Guy, who’d translated for her when Roch overheard too and turned and said
listen, you know how much money those four kids bring in in a season,
not just to me, but to Saint Armand,
and then he listed all the revenues from the board, their training, transport in the big van, coaching at shows, the money they spent living in town, eating in restaurants, shopping at the outlets, he’d figured it all out, the whole bit, and it was an impressive amount, Guy had said
,
you could see they didn’t like that, and Roch had ended with
hey, you want to pay the bills here? You want to pay my damn mortgage?
and looked like he was going to hit someone, but walked away instead.

Guy put down the receiver and picked up his cup. “Manon was very understanding, of course. She’s only upset for you, and wants to know if there’s anything she can do, just let her know.” He stirred his tea. “Such a
nice
woman, don’t you think? They seem so happy. They go out riding together, and they always speak so
respectfully
to each other. They walk around holding hands, I think that’s sweet, don’t you? And I think it creates a really pleasant environment when the owners–”

“Oh, do sod off, Guy,” Bridget moaned. “I’m going to puke if you keep on with these ‘happy families’ fantasies of yours. Leave me alone for a bit, go feed your fish, or count anemones or whatever, there’s a good chap.” Bridget turned her face to the back of the sofa and curled up to ride out the pain.

Before drifting off into a light doze, Bridget’s thoughts returned to the office and Polo’s questions and answers.

“This may not even be an attack on you personally, Bridget,” he had said. “Your stallion is stabled at the end under the window. It was a bright, moonlit night. Whoever it was wouldn’t have wanted to put on the lights. It may have been a kind of generic attack on the stable itself. Or on Roch. He rides the stallion, doesn’t he? Anyone seeing him–or Michel, for that matter–would think the horse belonged to them. Only an insider would know…”

That was bloody smart of him. She felt better thinking that what he said might well be true, and that she had perhaps not been a target of revenge. But she felt uneasy that
he
had thought of that, and not her. There were certain other things she would not be quite so happy for him to figure out.

* * *

Hy returned from the Centre, still in the hacking clothes he had been wearing when he got Roch’s call. Manon had showered and changed in the time he was away and looked at him anxiously for more news.

“Well, it’s not as bad as it looked at first. I mean the office part. There was another awful thing, though, Bridget’s stallion”–

“Yes, I know. Guy called a little while ago. Ugh, it’s disgusting. And they were supposed to come today for the mare–it’s why I made you hack out so early. So it must have been the same people–”

“Well, I automatically assumed so, I mean, it’s too much of a coincidence–but Polo isn’t sure, thinks there’s something out of balance there–anyway, we decided not to call the police, and there’s nothing important enough for the insurance to replace. Cleaning the walls is all, and some photographs ruined. Roch’s upset the most about that.” He paused, gnawed his lip a moment, frowning.

“Actually I wasn’t that comfortable about
not
calling the police. It makes it seem as if we were trying to hide something. But Roch was pretty insistent about the bad publicity, scaring people off if it got known. And then he was right, I guess, when he said they wouldn’t have any more idea than us how to go about finding who did it, so…”

“Is there something else? I mean, I get the feeling you’re not telling me everything.” Manon perched on the arm of the chair Hy had settled into and plucked at the wiry gray fleece that hugged his head.

“Well, it’s just–well, doesn’t it strike you as another kind of coincidence that nothing happened
here
, at our house? I mean, here we were getting these ominous anti–semitic calls–that’s bad stuff, even if it’s a prank, there’s an influence there…” Hy stood up abruptly and began pacing the room.

Manon answered, humorously, but with an edge, “Hy, I have to tell you that it’s actually a lot more fun watching Woody Allen at the movies than living with him.”

“You mean I’m doing the Jewish morbid thing? Is that what you’re saying?” Hy could feel an edge in his reply, and wasn’t happy about that, but couldn’t help it.

“I’m only saying”–both of them were aware of the sudden care with which she was choosing her words–“that it’s conceivable that bad things can happen which don’t involve Jews. Right now, for example, I would say that Roch and Michel and–well, me, for that matter–we’re the ones under attack. We’re the victims this time. And since it’s quite possibly one of my own relatives who’s involved here, I would say that it’s more than a little insensitive of you to be worrying about why
you
didn’t, say, have a swastika spray–painted on the house instead of worrying about how what
did
get painted may affect me,” she finished wryly.

Hy felt an unpleasant mixture of shame and anger at what he perceived rationally to be a fair response to his remark. In his heart of hearts he knew, and yearned to say, that a million spray–painted ‘
vendu’
s didn’t yield a millionth of the malignancy or the menace conveyed in one tiny swastika. Ruthie, or Marilyn, his ex–wife, his kids and most of his friends would have understood this without any explanation.

But of course he said no such thing. Hy was an intelligent man, and the lessons of a failed marriage had not been wasted on him. There was a price, however small, to pay in the choice he had made to marry ‘out’. He loved his wife profoundly and, he hoped, forever. In a microsecond he had reviewed his priorities in life, and he acted on this assessment.

“Manon,” Hy said in a chastened voice, “I’ve been incredibly thoughtless and egotistical. I’m sorry. Please forgive me.”

Manon flew into his arms immediately with a murmur of relief and joy at a crisis, however tiny, averted. They held each other tightly, and Ruthie, who had accidentally witnessed the little tableau, retreated back down the hall. Quietly she walked into the guest bedroom, noiselessly closed the door, curled up in the reading chair, plucked three Kleenexes from the box on the dresser, and had a discreet cry. How sweet it would be once again to have someone to quarrel with, someone to forgive, someone you wished you hadn’t offended, someone to hold you, someone to make the frozen sap rise again…
oh
no, you don’t, my girl, think about something else…

The pictures, for example, that the Duchess had found and boxed for them in the rec room last night at home on Redfern Ave. in Montreal. There, she was smiling already, thinking of how wonderful they would look when Hy hung them this afternoon as he had promised. There were some Polo had probably never seen. What a cute kid he had been, especially after he got his teeth fixed.

Polo! She had completely forgotten to tell him that Nathalie had called. Nathalie had been as cool with her on the phone as she always was. Ruthie had so often wondered what she had ever done to offend, but couldn’t put her finger on a damn thing. Of course she had never mentioned this to Polo. They weren’t together often enough for it to matter. Ruthie fidgeted restlessly in her chair. Should she–but thinking back, she remembered that Nathalie had said she would call the condo offices. They would leave a message. So that was okay.

But now Polo and Nathalie were in her head at the same time as the family pictures she’d just seen after so many years: Morrie and Clarice in vibrant middle age, herself in the May of her graduating year from McGill, wearing the same sleeveless sun-dress she’d worn to that horse show, Polo, smiling and handsome in his black wool show jacket and gleaming white stock, stroking the neck of his winning horse, the huge rosette on the bridle…

And of course the capper to this convergence of motifs, Ruthie knew she was in a low and dangerously vulnerable frame of mind. Predictably, the videotape of her life whirred into ‘play’ mode, opening to that strange and unforgettable day in St. Lazare, and she wasn’t making the slightest effort to resist watching.

Why had Ruthie gone to that horse show? Because Morrie and Clarice had to go to an early Sunday wedding and Hy too because he was an usher. Because it was the most important show of the season, a qualifier for Canadian Team membership. Because if Polo won the Grand Prix, there had to be a representative for the owner, as it would be terrible if he won and there was no Jacobson there…Because it was time she saw him doing what he loved.

And how did she explain to herself what had then happened? To begin with it was the only time she had ever been to a horse show. It was a relatively long drive out there, the day was horribly hot, she hadn’t brought a hat, and she’d stood watching, sweaty and grimy from the billowing dust, for hours. It wasn’t at all the fun and excitement she had expected.

She had been caught off guard when she first glimpsed him too. ‘Her’ Polo wasn’t a boy anymore, suddenly he was a man she hardly recognized, elegantly but–for her–anachronistically costumed in his black coat, white stock, creamy britches and high boots, inhabiting a world in which she had no place, and felt no welcome.

It wasn’t her unfamiliarity with show jumping that dampened her mood, though. What irritated and eventually hurt was Polo’s complete disregard for her presence. She had imagined the pleasures of reflected importance in her obvious connection to a rising competitive star in this unknown world. He knew she was there, he’d acknowledged her with a wave and a quick smile before he mounted to warm up. But after that he was totally into himself, what he was doing. Amazed at her own growing resentment, she was aware that she had never seen such purity of concentration.

Afterward, when she’d expected finally to share his moment of triumph–Polo had won several classes, including the Grand Prix, she was tremendously proud–there was some kind of delay. Ruthie saw him hand off his horse to his groom, and step aside to speak to some officials. By then she was physically uncomfortable, her face and arms tight and sore from sunburn. Her head throbbed. The heat, the pungent animal smells, the flies, the thick humid air: it was all so oppressive she felt slightly ill, and she couldn’t wait to leave. She wandered into the shade of a horse transport, impatiently waiting to congratulate him.

And suddenly there he was, walking slowly toward the stalls, not triumphant, not full of his victory, but curiously dazed. Ruthie had been shocked. It was his hour of glory, and yet he looked as stricken and vulnerable as a lost boy.

She really did not want to remember what had happened next, but the videotape was rolling and she was too fascinated to stop it. She called his name in alarm, his eyes turned slowly in her direction, he stared at her with the puzzled incomprehension of an amnesiac, and suddenly they were wrapped in each other’s arms, they were whispering each other’s names, she could feel the buttons of his jacket through the thin stuff of her dress, the rim of his glasses pressed into her cheek, she was tasting the damp salt on his skin, the dust of the show ring on his lips…

Wait! Rewind the tape
! She was making it seem as though it were a mutual surrender. The truth was, the truth
was
that
she
had run into
his
arms, whispered
his
name, kissed
him
. For a second? For minutes? Did he kiss her back? She would never know, because the next thing she remembered was half–lying on a hay bale, water running down her face, with Polo, pale and frightened, holding her up, pressing an ice–filled horse bandage to her forehead, murmuring incoherent expressions of concern and encouragement.

She recovered, had a coke and some aspirin, insisted she was fine to drive home. And she was. Physically she was fine. But she was covered in shame, on fire with it. Why did she feel so ashamed?

Ruthie knew herself to be compulsively self–analytical. Her mind, like a tongue endlessly gliding across and around the familiar ridges, grooves, spaces and joins of newly–polished teeth, was in constant, sensitive surveillance of her inner world. She could not remember a time when she had not been involved in this restless process of psychological and ethical evaluation, exploring and assessing her motivations, needs, desires, actions, and reactions.

So if she was feeling shame rather than embarrassment, there had to be a reason. And the more she thought about it, the more she fastened on the strange and anomalous relationship of Polo with the Jacobson family, and the more she considered her personal history with him, the more rooted became her suspicions about what Polo was to her.

She had to know, so she waited up for her parents to come home from the wedding, and asked to speak privately to her father. First she told him how well Polo had done in the show. Morrie had been thrilled. It meant Polo had qualified for the Canadian Team. It meant Morrie’s horse would be showing in the biggest shows: the Royal Winter Fair, Madison Square Garden. It was what he and Polo had worked for.

–
I have to know something, daddy.

–
What is it, princess?

–
Is Polo my brother? Did you ever have an aff –

–
He had smacked her face. Hit her. No one in her entire life had ever–the shock –

–
Ruthie. What happened between you? Why are you asking me that?

–
I–I–I have feelings for him –

–
Did Polo make a move on you?

–
She had been very frightened. This voice was not her father’s.