The Collected Stories (13 page)

“That's true,” he said, not cerebrating noticeably. “And you loved Miss Graham, didn't you?” Here he pointed to her where she sat. Her hair had been washed that early morning. She wore a golden Chinese slip of a dress with little slits, probably to flash her tan calves through. Her sweet round rump nestled in the hard pew of the law.

“I suppose I did,” I said.

At last the attorney for the prosecuting victim had a chance at me. He had known Cindy since she was an even younger child than she was a child at present, he said, using just those words. He was close to tears. Not a hair was rooted in his head. This is description, not adventitious comment, which I can't afford, since I am unpleasantly hirsute.

Even now, time having awarded some dimension, I don't understand his line of questioning nor the line of questioning of my own brainless lawyer. I had pleaded guilty. I was not opposed to punishment, since our happy performance, it turned out, had a criminal aspect. Still they talked. I realize they had their training to consider—all those years at school. Men like these must milk the moment or sleep forever.

“Well,” he began, blinking a tear, “Charles C. Charley, you have told us that you loved that little girl at that moment but did not love her before or after and have not since?”

“I have no reason to lie,” I said. “I am in the hand of God.”

“Who?” the judge shouted.

Then they all mumbled together in an effort to figure out what could be done with the contemptible use of pious nomenclature. They could not say, of course, that we are not in the hand of God when, for all they knew, we are.

Mr. Graham's gleaming attorney returned to me. “Mr. Charley, did you love Cindy Graham at that moment?”

“I did,” I said.

“But you do not love her now?” he asked.

“I haven't thought about it,” I said.

“Would you marry her?” he demanded, twisting his head toward the jury. He felt sly.

“She's just a child,” I said. “How could I marry her? Marriage requires all sorts of responsibility. She isn't ready for anything like that. And besides, the age difference … it's too great. Be realistic,” I adjured his muddled head.

“You would
not
marry her?” he asked, his voice rising to a clinch.

“No, sir.”

“Good enough to force sex on but not good enough to cherish for life?”

“Well,” I said calmly, refusing to respond to his hysteria, and without mentioning names, “actually it's six of one and half a dozen of the other.”

“And so you, a mature man, an adult, you took it upon yourself, knowing something about the pitfalls before a young girl, this child, still growing, Cynthia Anne Graham, you took it upon yourself to decide she was ready to have her virginity ravaged to satisfy your own selfish rotten lust.”

After that little bit of banter I clammed up. Because Cindy was going to live among them forever, I was so silent that even now I am breathless with self-respect.

These castaways on life's sodden beach were under the impression that I was the first. I was not. I am not an inventive or creative person, I take a cue from the universe, I have never been the first anywhere. Actually, in this case, I was no more than fifth or sixth. I don't say this to be disparaging of Cindy. A person has to start somewhere. Why was Mr. Graham so baffled by truth? Gourmets everywhere begin with voracious appetites before they can come to the finesse of taste. I had seen it happen before; in five or six years, a beautiful and particular woman, she might marry some contributing citizen and resign her light habits to him. None of my adversaries was more than ten years my senior, but their memories were short (as mine would be if I weren't sure at all times to keep in touch with youth).

In the middle of my thinking, while the court waited patiently for a true answer. Cindy burst into wild tears, screaming, “Leave him alone, you leave him alone. It's not his fault if I'm wild. I'll tell the whole world how wild I am if you don't shut up. I made him do it, I made him do it …”

From my narrow-eyed view the court seemed to constrict into a shuddering sailor's knot. Cindy's mother and father unraveled her, and two civil-service employees hustled her out. The opposing lawyers buzzed together and then with the judge. A pair of newspapermen staggered from one convulsive group to another. My mother took advantage of the disorganization to say, “Charles, they're bugheaded.”

The paid principals nodded their heads. The judge asked for order, then a recess. My attorney and two cops led me into a brown-paneled room where a board-meeting mahogany table was surrounded by board-meeting chairs. “You didn't give one sensible answer,” my attorney complained. “Now listen to me. Just sit down here and keep your mouth shut, for godsakes. I'm going to talk to the Grahams.”

Except for some bored surveillance, I was alone for one hour and a half. In that time I reviewed Cindy and all her accessories, also the meaning of truth. I was just tangent to the Great Circle of Life, of which I am one irrevocable diameter, when my mother appeared. She had had time to go shopping for some wheat germ and carrots and apples full of unsprayed bacteria. The state of her health requires these innocent staples. Mr. and Mrs. Graham followed, and my little grimy Cindy. Mrs. Graham kept tissuing some of the black eye stuff off her smeared cheeks. Mr. Graham, sensible when answering or questioning and never devious, said, “All right, Charles, all right. We've decided to withdraw charges. You and Cindy will get married.”

“What?” I said.

“You heard me the first time … I'm against it. I think a punk like you is better off in jail. For my money, you could rot in jail. I've seen worse guys but not much worse. You took advantage of a damn silly kid. You and Cindy get married next week. Meanwhile you'll be at our house, Charley. Cindy's missed enough school. This is a very important year for her. I'll tell you one thing. You better play it straight. Charley, or I'll split your skull with a kitchen knife.”

“Say …” I said.

My mother piped up. “Charles,” she said, “son, think about it a minute. What'll happen to me if you go to jail? She's very pretty. You're not getting younger. What'll happen to me? Son …” she said.

She turned to Mrs. Graham. “It's hard to be old and dependent this way. I hope you have plenty of insurance.”

Mrs. Graham patted her shoulder.

My mother regarded this as invitation to enlarge. “When you really think about it, it's all a fuss about nothing. I always say, let them enjoy themselves when they're young. You know,” she said, her eyes hazy in the crowded past, “at least it gives you something to look back on.”

Mrs. Graham removed her hand and blushed in fear.

“Don't you want to marry me?” asked Cindy, tears starting again.

“Honey …” I said.

“Then it's settled,” Mr. Graham said. “I'll find a good house in the neighborhood. No children for a while, Charley, she's got to finish school. As for you,” he said, getting down to brass tacks, “the truth is, you have a fair business. I want my accountant to go over the books. If they're what I expect, you'll be cooking with gas in six months. You'll be the biggest conditioning outlet in the county. You're a goddamn slob, you haven't begun to realize your potential in a community like ours.”

“I wish I could smoke,” I said.

“No smoking here,” my lawyer said, having brought my entire life to a successful conclusion.

In this way I assuaged the people in charge, and I live with Cindy in events which are current.

Through the agency of my father-in-law I have acquired a first-class food-freezer and refrigerator franchise. If you can imagine anything so reprehensible, it was obtained right out from under the nose of a man who has been in the business for thirty years, a man who dreamt of that franchise as his reward for unceasing labor in the kitchens of America. If someone would hand me the first stone, I would not be ashamed to throw it. But at whom?

Living with Cindy has many pleasures. One acquires important knowledge in the dwelling place of another generation. First things first, she always has a kind word for the future. It is my opinion that she will be a marvelous woman in six or seven years. I wish her luck; by then we will be strangers.

There were two husbands disappointed by eggs.

I don't like them that way either, I said. Make your own eggs. They sighed in unison. One man was livid; one was pallid.

There isn't a drink around here, is there? asked Livid.

Never find one here, said Pallid. Don't look; driest damn house. Pallid pushed the eggs away, pain and disgust his escutcheon.

Livid said, Now really, isn't there a drink? Beer? he hoped.

Nothing, said Pallid, who'd been through the pantries, closets, and refrigerators looking for a white shirt.

You're damn right, I said. I buttoned the high button of my powder-blue duster. I reached under the kitchen table for a brown paper bag full of an embroidery which asked God to Bless Our Home.

I was completing this motto for the protection of my sons, who were also Livids. It is true that some months earlier, from a far place—the British plains in Africa—he had written hospitably to Pallid: I do think they're fine boys, you understand. I love them too, but Faith is their mother and now Faith is your wife. I'm so much away. If you want to think of them as yours, old man, go ahead.

Why, thank you, Pallid had replied, airmail, overwhelmed. Then he implored the boys, when not in use, to play in their own room. He made all efforts to be kind.

Now as we talked of time past and upon us, I pierced the ranch house that nestles in the shade of a cloud and a Norway maple, just under the golden script.

Ha-ha, said Livid, dripping coffee on his pajama pants, you'll never guess whom I met up with, Faith.

Who? I asked.

Saw your old boyfriend Clifford at the Green Coq. He looks well. One thing must be said—he addressed Pallid—she takes good care of her men.

True, said Pallid.

How is he? I asked coolly. What's he doing? I haven't seen him in two years.

Oh, you'll never guess. He's marrying. A darling girl. She was with him. Little tootsies, little round bottom, little tummy—she must be twenty-two, but she looks seventeen. One long yellow braid down her back. A darling girl. Stubby nose, fat little underlip. Her eyes put on in pencil. Shoulders down like a dancer … slender neck. Oh, darling, darling.

You certainly observed her, said Pallid.

I have a functioning retina, said Livid. Then he went on. Better watch out, Faith. You'd be surprised, the dear little chicks are hatching out all over the place. All the sunny schoolgirls rolling their big black eyes. I hope you're really settled this time. To me, whatever is under the dam is in another county; however, in my life you remain an important person historically, he said. And that's why I feel justified in warning you. I must warn you. Watch out, sweetheart! he said, leaning forward to whisper harshly and give me a terrible bellyache.

What's all this about? asked Pallid innocently. In the first place, she's settled … and then she's still an attractive woman. Look at her.

Oh yes, said Livid, looking. An attractive woman. Magnificent, sometimes.

We were silent for several seconds in honor of that generous remark.

Then Livid said, Yes, magnificent, but I just wanted to warn you, Faith.

He pushed his eggs aside finally and remembered Clifford. A mystery wrapped in an enigma … I wonder why he wants to marry.

I don't know, it just ties a man down, I said.

And yet, said Pallid seriously, what would I be without marriage? In luminous recollection—a gay dog, he replied.

At this moment, the boys entered: Richard the horse thief and Tonto the crack shot.

Daddy! they shouted. They touched Livid, tickled him, unbuttoned his pajama top, whistled at the several gray hairs coloring his chest. They tweaked his ear and rubbed his beard the wrong way.