Moving On (117 page)

She picked up a small purse from a lamp table and as she turned gave the three men a look of sullen annoyance, as if to warn them away. Patsy followed her to the powder room, which was large, with white walls and a very blue rug.

“God, I don’t like this rug,” Eleanor said. “Every time I come in this room I wish I were a thousand miles away. The rest of the house is nice.” There were two or three chairs and a long mirror and Eleanor sat down in one of the chairs, turning it around first so that her back was to the mirror. She lit a cigarette and for a second her face was concealed by the smoke. She slumped a little in her chair and sighed as if she were very tired.

“Who were those men?” Patsy asked. “They certainly were monopolizing you.”

“Oh, a bachelor and two philanderers,” Eleanor said. “You’ll probably be hearing from one or another of them in a few days.”

“Me? They weren’t paying any attention to me. I think they were mad at me for butting in.”

“That will pass,” Eleanor said.

Patsy looked in the very bright mirror and touched her hair. In the white room, with the good mirror, the shortness of it looked all the more odd. She frowned and took out her comb, but all she could do was rough it out a bit. There was no way it could be made to look like it had. Eleanor turned and glanced at her.

“They were just after me tonight,” she said. “Next week one of them will have a dinner party and ask you. You’re a fresh face. I bet one of the philanderers is pumping Ted Caldwell about you now. You must have noticed that we seem to attract the same men.”

“Ugh,” Patsy said. “Not those, surely.”

Eleanor was looking at Patsy’s hair. She reached up with a frown to straighten her own. “Mine needs thinning,” she said. “I never seem to get around to anything these days. Did Jim’s breaks heal well?”

“Finally,” Patsy said, a little nervously.

“I hear from Joe Percy that the two of you are separated. I hope you don’t mind my mentioning it.”

“I don’t.” She bent over and opened a lipstick but then closed it again without using it and sat down. The room had affected her as it affected Eleanor. It was too bright—not a room to stay in more than five minutes. And yet she didn’t feel like going back amid the guests.

“I wish I’d brought my brandy,” Eleanor said. “If we unscrewed a few light bulbs it wouldn’t be so bad in here.”

“I saw Joe a month or so ago,” Patsy said.

“Yes, he mentioned that when he mentioned Jim. I suppose I may have played a minor part in your troubles, and if so I apologize.”

“Forget it,” Patsy said. “Everybody played a minor part in our troubles. I’m sure we insisted on everyone participating.”

“The sad thing is that Jim is very nice,” Eleanor said. “He doesn’t really dislike anyone. What am I doing? Of all things to say. I’m really not very alert this time of night.”

“No, it’s true,” Patsy said. “Did Joe tell you about his love problem?”

“Yes. He told me. I wouldn’t worry too much about Joe. His real love is dead; it’s why he’s such an invaluable sympathizer. I made him come and hold my hand for a week, when Sonny was killed. Sooner or later I imagine he’ll help the young lady rescue a sister or get over the death of a lover or not feel so bad because her husband’s the way he is. He likes women so much he can cheer anyone up, if he’s given a chance.”

Just then Mrs. Caldwell looked in, obviously a little worried by their disappearance. “Anything the matter?” she asked, concern in her face.

“Oh, no, Beth,” Eleanor said, smiling. “We were just sitting here talking about our friends.”

“You’re welcome to our upstairs den,” Mrs. Caldwell whispered, but Eleanor shook her head.

“No, I’m worn out. I’d like to get back to the hotel.” She stood up and straightened her dress.

“I wish I could go with you,” Mrs. Caldwell said. “Grady’s drunk and letting the niggers have it. We had a scene with him five years ago and I think we’re going to have another one tonight.”

She went out and Eleanor turned to the mirror and looked at her hair but did nothing with it. In the bright light Patsy saw how much her face had changed. It was not heavier—if anything she had lost flesh in the face. It was as if she no longer cared to carry her beauty and was letting it leave her as it would. Some remained, some had fallen away. Eleanor seemed almost indifferent. Unhappiness showed in her eyes and in the set of her mouth; there was no longer any pride in her expression. Boredom, sorrow, disappointment, were things she was no longer attempting to conceal. She took her purse and they left the powder room and said but little more. “I wish you could come and see my son,” Patsy said, but Eleanor did not look interested. She was leaving in the morning, she said.

Several of the party were saying their goodbyes when they came out, and when Patsy said she must leave too, Beth Caldwell arranged for one of the young couples to drive her home. It turned out that Eleanor had an escort, not one of the three pursuers but a short gentle-looking lawyer with a large curved nose. His name was Taylor, and Patsy learned later that he was a widower. They all stepped out into the broad driveway together and Eleanor and Patsy said goodbye as Mr. Taylor was helping Eleanor on with her light spring coat. Though he seemed very nice, Eleanor appeared to be slightly intolerant of him, and when he was slipping her coat on she stepped away and shrugged it on herself; she straightened her collar and swung her head so that her hair hung free. She gave Patsy an odd quick smile as she turned to go, a smile half friendly and half bitter. Then she turned and put her hands in her coat pocket with an authority of movement that, for a moment, brought all her presence back.

An ambulance was screaming up Fannin Street toward the hospital, the
wheeaaaw, wheeaaaw
of its siren becoming louder and louder as it drew near. While still remote, it was almost a pleasant sound, but it soon became louder and rawer and, for a few brief seconds, was much too loud. Nothing cut the sound: not the wall around Shadyside, not the great trees, not the massive houses. For a moment the sound overwhelmed the pleasantries of farewell, and, despite themselves, the people standing in front of the huge ivied house all looked toward it. Two chauffeurs who had got out of two limousines looked toward it too. None of them could see the spinning red light on top of the ambulance but they all knew when it came opposite them. Then the full reverberation of the sound struck them all and quickly began to diminish.

Eleanor turned and said a final word to her hosts and then turned again and began to walk away, Mr. Taylor with her. The hotel where she was staying was just outside the wall, scarcely two blocks away. Patsy got in with one of the nice young couples. They only had a station wagon, and they steered carefully past the two long black cars parked at the head of the driveway. As they turned into the street they passed Eleanor and Mr. Taylor. He was talking, she was walking silently. Patsy was by the window and the window was down, but she didn’t wave. Eleanor was looking across the long lawn, and the polite tones of Mr. Taylor’s voice, which Patsy heard for a second, seemed more remote from her than they were from Patsy, more remote from her even than they were from the two silent chauffeurs beside the two limousines. Eleanor was inscrutable; she was not to be reached. There loomed beyond the small polite man at her side that other figure, that man who had known her far away from the trees of Houston, in the rougher, rawer country where the two of them had had their life and been, in their strange way, a royal couple.

Her final glimpse of Eleanor made Patsy pensive. To see Eleanor was to remember Sonny. She wondered if she would ever have a man so distinctly hers that she would remind people of him. She doubted it, and it made her sad.

She was not very responsive to the dozens of questions that Miri and Eric asked her about the fancy party she had been to. Later, in bed, she was wide awake. It occurred to her that Jim had been a fool to back away from Eleanor and run away with Clara. But, as Eleanor had said, he was always nice, and he didn’t dislike anyone. She thought about him for a moment, but he wouldn’t stay on her mind. It was just a quick judgment she passed on him and then forgot. The future and the past were on her mind and she would have been glad of a sleeping pill.

Downstairs, Eric and Miri were talking about her—about what was wrong with her, about what she would do, about Hank, whom Miri had not seen and whom Eric had not known. They went on to talk about marriage, how stupidly most people went into it, how foolish they were about it, how simple it would be to have a good marriage if one were only sensible. They speculated about it far into the night, now passionately, now soberly, stopping from time to time to neck. Patsy, could she have heard, would have gone to sleep amused.

20

I
T HAD BEEN DECIDED
that Davey should have a dog. They were all at the park on a fine sunny afternoon in late April discussing it—Patsy and Davey, Miri and Eric, and Emma and Tom and Teddy. Tommy no longer liked being called Tommy; he felt that Tom was more adult. Everyone complied with his wish in the matter except Teddy, whose modus vivendi was to comply with as little as possible, at least where his brother was concerned. But, for the moment, names were not at issue. Ostensibly they were all waiting for Flap, who was in a seminar; but none of them were in any hurry for Flap to appear. It was a fine spring day, clear and breezy and unsmogged—a perfect day to sit in the park and talk about dogs.

Patsy was wearing an old sweatshirt that had once been Jim’s and blue jeans and sneakers and was perched atop the jungle gym looking down at Davey, who was holding the bottom rail of the jungle gym and looking up at her occasionally. He was used to her being up there when they were at the park and was not disgruntled. A small brown and black mongrel was sniffing Davey’s pants leg, and enough other dogs were around to lend point to the discussion. A large Doberman ran by from time to time, and Felicity, the unloved border collie, was sitting nearby, her leash tied to a swing pole, wishing someone would come and pet her. The boys were playing in the sand-pile and Emma and Eric and Miri sat at one of the concrete tables being dogmatic about dogs.

Everyone had very firm opinions on the matter except Patsy, who would have to foot the bill, and Davey, whose dog it would actually be. Davey would have liked any reasonable dog, and Patsy was afraid she would too. The longer she contemplated dogs and their infinite variety the less specific she felt. In regard to dogs she was handicapped by an almost total open-mindedness.

Her friends had no such problem. Each of them knew exactly what kind of dog would be best. Even Tom had an opinion. He favored bulldogs, as being effective against burglars.

Emma, the sentimentalist, favored cockers, because she had had one as a child and had loved it and remembered it vividly. “You can’t go wrong with cockers,” she remarked several times. She wore a new green maternity dress and was showing her pregnancy. She sat filing her nails.

“Oh, hush about cockers,” Patsy said, remembering that they were the one kind of dog she didn’t much like. “They fawn,” she said. “Every one I ever knew fawned.”

Emma shrugged and tried to tidy her untidy blond hair. “So?” she said. “Don’t be harsh and intolerant. They’re very friendly and they need a lot of love. I fawn too. It’s the only way I can get any attention in this world.”

“Boo hoo,” Patsy said. “You and your self-pity.”

Actually she and Emma were on great terms, though they carped at each other constantly about self-pity. The only thing they really pitied themselves about was that they would soon lose each other as companions. In three months the Hortons would be gone to Iowa.

“I still think you should get him an Afghan,” Eric said. “I’ve always wanted one.”

“But you’re hardly Davey,” Patsy said. She remembered the beautiful Afghan that had been at the motel in Phoenix. It made her see Eric’s point. She too would like an Afghan. It would be the perfect dog for her. She saw herself a woman of mystery, going walking at night in the mist with her beautiful dog. She would walk around on foggy nights and become a legend. Undergraduates would whisper when they caught a glimpse of her, and her Afghan would go everywhere she went.

But she was hardly Davey, either. The dog was for him, and he didn’t give her time to be a woman of mystery, anyway. “Davey’s too young for an Afghan,” she said. “They’re supposed to be very sensitive. A kid would drive one crazy.”

Eric did not seem to doubt it. “Scotties?” he said.

“Too much hair,” Miri said. “It’s too hot for hairy dogs in this town. It wouldn’t be able to go outside all summer. Just get him a plain sensible terrier. Any kind of terrier.”

Miri had come to feel that she was much more sensible than any of them. Sensible had become her favorite word. Pregnancy and Eric and general good health had made her a little smug. Patsy, remembering the shape Miri had been in only six weeks before, was sometimes amused at her pretentions to sense, and sometimes a little annoyed by her quiet smugness. But in regard to dogs she was forced to admit that Miri was probably right. In view of the climate of Houston, a short-haired dog was indicated.

Eric stood up and stretched. “Let’s all go get a milkshake,” he said. “Flap won’t be out for thirty minutes yet.”

Patsy and Emma were silent, not interested. The park was too nice. It was almost four o’clock and soon the park would be full of mothers and young children. Emma was pregnant, Patsy not hungry. They shook their heads. Miri looked up at Eric. She was feeling lazy, but he clearly wanted to go, so she stood up, obedient for the moment. “Want us to take the boys?” she asked Emma.

“Sure, if they want to go.”

The boys did. But Teddy’s sneakers were untied, and so full of sand they could barely be tied. He had not mastered his knots, and he sat on a bench while Emma tied them. Miri and Eric were holding hands, waiting. Emma brushed some of the sand out of Teddy’s brown hair and entrusted Tommy with thirty-one cents. “That’s for two two-dip cones,” she said.