The Summer Hideaway (28 page)

Later in the morning, he awoke to an empty room. The swim robe was hung on the back of the door.

George sat up, squinted at the blinding flood of sunlight slipping into the room around the edges of the window shade. He went to the window, raised the sash and then the window itself to look out over the quadrangle. A host of songbirds greeted him. The storm was over, leaving a world washed clean. He could even smell the springtime—damp grass and budding flowers. Overnight, winter had gone away.

A sparkling layer of dew lightly blanketed the quadrangle. Few people were out and about at this hour. The cross-country team, in white shorts and V-neck undershirts, jogged past in a cluster. Ordinarily George would feel a pinch of envy at the sight of those well-honed bodies, graceful with the innate self-confidence that came from physical accomplishment.

Not this morning, though; not with the memory of the night before lingering so fresh in his mind. As she had that first summer after the polio, Jane had made him look past his limitations and celebrate the things he could do.

After last night, he had the feeling he could do anything.

“Hey, Bellamy, you putting on a show or what?” someone yelled, startling George from his thoughts.

He realized he’d been standing buck naked at the open window, lost in memories of his night with Jane.

“That’s me,” he yelled to his friend Jeffords, who was walking toward the dining hall. “A real showboater.” He wondered how it could be that the world had changed overnight, and no one but him seemed to notice.

He turned back to the room, studied the slant of sunlight across the bed. The sheets and covers had been twisted every which way. Just looking at that bed brought back every touch, every kiss, every intimate detail of their night together. He could not believe how close they’d been.

At weddings people spoke of two becoming one. George had always considered that a lot of hot air. Each person was a separate entity, bound into his or her own skin.

Last night he’d learned otherwise, learned it was possible to break free of one’s own self and cross some mystical divide to join with another. It wasn’t just the sex, either. There was something even more powerful at work, something George hadn’t been certain he believed in until last night—love.

Finally he came to understand why writers and artists through the ages created their work as a monument to the simple human notion of love. Men had waged war,
crossed oceans, scaled mountain ranges, all for the sake of love. Epic poems, vast sculptures and even whole palaces had been created to celebrate it.

George Bellamy understood at last.

Whistling through his teeth, he grabbed his towel and robe to head across the hall for the showers. He paused and buried his face in the robe, hoping some of her essence lingered in the fabric. No such luck, though. It simply smelled like…his robe.

In fact, no trace of Jane remained in the room. She had left like a thief in the night, and somehow he’d let her slip away. In the future, he would have to keep her close.

No wonder Charles had been so adamant about marrying her.

The thought of Charles unsettled George. Last night he’d been blind and deaf to everything that wasn’t Jane. And that included his brother.

This morning, by the stark light of a new day, he was forced to confront the notion that he’d made love to his brother’s girl. His
former
girl, George insisted to himself. She had come to him, tearful and troubled. Until this moment, George hadn’t let himself consider where his kid brother had been last night.

He’d undoubtedly been heartbroken. Perhaps he’d been full of rage, smashing things, tearing his hair out.

That, in fact, was quite unlikely, George conceded. Charles had always been a ladies’ man.

Could be the reason for the rift was that Charles had strayed.

“Your loss, my gain,” George muttered.

As he picked up his shower caddy, a gleam caught his eye. Bending down, he retrieved the object from the floor
between the bed and nightstand. It was a silver earring in the shape of a daisy. Jane’s earring.

George placed it carefully, almost reverently, in the top drawer of his bureau. He let out a burst of relief, and realized he had been holding his breath in, with a strange little insane worry.

The earring was evidence that the previous night had really happened. He’d actually taken Jane Gordon to bed.

It was a relief to have physical proof; otherwise there was a danger that he’d dreamed the whole thing.

G
eorge carried the earring like a talisman in his pants pocket, replacing his lucky rabbit’s foot. He took it out while in French 505 as the professor was droning on about the nuances of the subjunctive case in the literature of French classicists.

“What’ve you got there?” asked Jeffords, holding up his textbook to whisper behind it.

“What’s it look like?” George whispered back. In fact he’d never really studied a woman’s earring up close before, never paid attention to how they worked. It was slightly shocking to see the way the earring was made. It resembled a tiny torture device, like a thumbscrew. Apparently it stayed in place by pinching the earlobe.

Ouch.

His friend lost interest in the earring and leaned over to whisper to the guy on his other side.

The morning dragged on interminably. He couldn’t stop thinking about Jane. He couldn’t wait to see her again, though he wasn’t quite sure how to go about it. Swept away by last night’s grand passion, he had neglected to extract the most basic information from her.

Such as where she lived.

And her telephone number.

And whether or not she even had a telephone. For although the twentieth century was more than half over, he knew some homes still lacked modern conveniences, such as a telephone.

The first hint that something was amiss came all too quickly, rolling in like stormclouds covering the sun. And that hint was carried in his pocket. Jane had not only slipped away while he slept, but she’d left nothing but the earring. Maybe it wasn’t such a good luck talisman after all, he thought, turning the tiny screw one way, then the other. Why couldn’t she have awakened him? Or at least left a note?

The only way he knew to find her was to wait by the provost’s house for the end of her shift. He must have timed it wrong that first day, for he waited two hours and never saw her coming or going. Maybe it was her day off. The only one who might know how to contact her was the only person George would never ask—his brother, Charles.

On the second afternoon, he got there early and stayed late, until dusk painted the sky with smudges of charcoal.

Come on, Jane, he silently urged her.

He pictured her emerging from the ornate old house in her housekeeper’s apron. She would spy him, and a smile would light her face. Then she’d fling herself into his arms. He’d catch her and hold her close and scold her for sneaking away without a word.

And she would laugh and say a Yale man ought to be smart enough to track down the girl he loves.

Mosquitoes came out as the light slipped away. George
slapped at the pests in annoyance. He was about to abandon his vigil when at last he noticed people at the servants’ entrance. A small group of women emerged, all of them in domestic garb. They looked the same to him, like pilgrims in a play. He stood up, squinting in the light to try to pick out Jane.

The women were laughing together and chattering. There were six in all. Two of them hesitated and used a Zippo lighter to light up cigarettes. The group crossed the street to the bus stop to start their journey home.

At last he figured out which one Jane was, recognizing her slender silhouette and unruly hair escaping its combs. Unlike last time, she stayed with her coworkers, giving him no chance to speak with her alone.

Her name was on his lips, but he hesitated. If he called out, then what? Would he embarrass her in front of her friends? Worse, would they guess what had transpired that stormy night, in his dorm room? Would her reputation be ruined?

He didn’t wish to be the cause of that.

While he deliberated and debated with himself, Jane looked over and seemed to spot him. She half raised her arm in greeting.

At that same moment, a group of fellows came out of the DeWitt House, where the unruly Gamma Delta society held their meetings. These men were at the top of the social echelon here at Yale. They were George’s peers; he was one of them.

“Georgie Porgie, puddin’ and pie,” declared Greenhill, hooking an arm around his neck. A cloud of liquor breath fogged the air. They’d apparently started cocktail hour early today.

“Kissed the girls and made them cry,” finished Sterling. “What the hell’re you doing here all by your lonesome, Georgie Porgie?”

“Trolling for girls,” brayed Akers. Then he spotted the domestics across the street, at the bus stop. “Oh, look. There they are now.”

“The maid brigade,” Greenhill shouted.

George had a bad feeling about this. “Guys—”

“Come give us a kiss, girls.” Akers made a lewd gesture.

“I need to grab me one of those,” declared Wilson. “The ideal woman. She lets you screw her any which way you like, and then she irons your shirt.”

The others roared with laughter. George’s stomach clenched.

The housekeeping staff huddled closer, turning their backs to the jeering men.

George didn’t dare approach Jane now. Not with these jackasses around. He wished she could see his regret. He hoped she would understand he had abandoned her to avoid drawing attention to her. No point incurring the scorn of this lot.

“I heard the hired help can be hired to do a lot more than help,” said Akers.

“Yeah, like when they say no, they mean yes. And don’t means do. And stop means go.”

“They can go all night. They never want to stop.”

George couldn’t escape the memories that drummed through his mind.
Please. Don’t. Stop.

Please. Was she begging him to leave her alone?

Don’t. Was that what she’d meant? Don’t touch me?

Stop. He’d heard her say it. But could he have missed her meaning?

Damn it. He had to talk to her.

“Maybe I’ll just go grab me one of those right now,” said Greenhill. “The redhead looks like a tasty morsel.”

“Guys, I got a better idea.” George grabbed the back of Greenhill’s jacket and aimed him in the opposite direction. “Let’s go see what they’re serving at Kelly’s Pub.” He chattered away about nothing, knowing it would take some fast talking to distract them and make it believable.

They were mean, small minds, easily manipulated. Within a few moments he had convinced them to try their luck at Kelly’s. He wanted to shout to the world that Jane was the woman he loved, but people like this would never understand.

He dared to look over his shoulder and saw her watching him, but she was too far away to read.

George tried again the next day, waiting for quitting time. For once in his life, he was going to be audacious instead of cautiously circling around, questioning himself and missing his chance. He’d gone all the way to Manhattan on the train, and he’d picked out a signed and numbered diamond ring in Tiffany’s, cheerfully going into debt over the purchase. It had flawless color and clarity, and a leather-bound certificate declaring its perfection. He rehearsed his speech in his head. He planned to approach her directly, ask right in front of her coworkers if he could speak to her.

I’m in love with you
, he would say.
It’s a permanent condition
.

Come to Paris with me
, he’d say.
Let’s live together in Paris
.

It was the perfect solution. Paris—the city of lovers. A world away from his parents and from social snobs who didn’t believe it was possible for a Bellamy to be with a working-class girl.

They would be thousands of miles away from prying eyes, and they’d have the world at their feet.

Yes
. He felt the deep satisfaction of things coming together, a plan falling into place. He couldn’t wait to tell her. He took a seat on the bench at the bus stop and tried to pass the time by reading the paper. There was a review of a new play, “Waiting for Godot,” which had just opened at the John Golden. The author, Beckett, was an Irishman, but he lived in Paris, too. George took it as a sign that he was making the right decision.

The drama featured Bert Lahr, who had played the cowardly lion in
The Wizard of Oz.
George wondered if that might be a sign, too.

“Hey, stranger,” said a voice behind him.

He glanced up from the paper, startled. “Charles.”

George’s brother was dressed in gray flannel slacks and a V-neck cashmere sweater vest. His hair was shiny with Brylcreem. In his hands he held a bouquet of flowers and a heart-shaped box of chocolates.

“What are you doing here?” he asked George. “Just enjoying the fresh air of springtime?”

George didn’t know what to do, so he nodded his head while his mind raced. Spring truly had arrived, seemingly overnight. The lane was shaded by trees draped in pale green new leaves. Huge old lilacs bore lavish clusters of flowers. Every garden bed was crowded with tulips and daffodils.

“Right,” said George. “How about yourself?”

“I’m meeting Jane,” Charles said, gesturing. “She works just over there.”

I know
. George’s mouth felt dry as dust. He had to figure out what was going on without disclosing anything that had happened. He cleared his throat, indicated the flowers and candy with a nod. “What’s the occasion?”

Charles’s ears turned red. “We had a little spat a couple of days ago.”

A little spat. The kind that had sent Jane running out into a storm at midnight, convinced the affair was over. The kind of spat that had sent her into the arms of another man. Into his bed.

“We’re good now,” Charles said hastily. “I went to see her last night and she forgave me. I think her feelings are still a little tender, though. I’ve got a lot of making up to do.” He lifted the bouquet to his nose. “Peonies are her favorites.”

George stood up, feeling a twinge in his bad leg. He briefly considered sticking around, confronting the situation head-on. Yet if he did that, her reputation would be in shreds. Nothing good could come of exposing what they’d done. Not now, not like this. “I’d better get going. Got a journalism seminar tonight. Robert Eisenstadt is speaking about his postwar photographs.”

“Stick around for a few minutes,” Charles suggested. “You can say hello to Jane. George, I’d really like it if the two of you would get to know each other. She’s a really wonderful girl.”

I know
, George thought again. She was all he could think about—their night together, the whisper of his kisses across her skin, the desperation that had turned, by some magical emotional alchemy, into love.

“Charles, I’m sorry,” he said, thrusting the newspaper into a nearby trash bin. “I just don’t see that happening.”

When it came to his personal life, George had never made much use of the skills and techniques he had learned as a journalist. He did now, though. Now he took advantage of everything he knew in order to discover where Jane lived. He found out her mother’s maiden name was Swift and her aunt’s married name was Scanlon, and that they lived on the east side of town. There was no individual telephone service in the neighborhood.

That evening, his search brought him to a clapboard-covered row house in a dilapidated section of Lower State Street. It was an area where workers lived between their back-breaking twelve-hour shifts at the wire plant or hosiery mill, where they yelled at their wives, raised their kids, played sandlot baseball, drank beer on their front porches and dragged themselves off to work the next day.

This was Jane’s neighborhood, he thought, handing over cab fare to his driver. He’d never set foot in it before. Compared to the manicured greenswards of the Yale campus, this was like a different planet. How strange it must be for Jane to ride the bus each day between these two worlds.

“You want I should wait?” the driver asked.

“No…er, yes.” He knew he wasn’t likely to find another taxi in the area. “Can you give me ten minutes?”

“Sure. I got nothing but time.”

George wasn’t certain why he’d said ten minutes. Maybe he figured that was how long it took to find the woman you love, to lay your heart on the line for her. And when the ten minutes were up, you either moved on or moved in.

Simple.

A couple of doors down, a mongrel cur dog gave a husky bark. There was the sound of a door slamming. George squared his shoulders, crossed a weedy patch of grass that passed for a front yard. Through the window, he could see the family, an older couple who were probably Jane’s aunt and uncle. The third woman must be Jane’s mother, whom he had not seen since the summer of 1944. He scarcely recognized her, with her hair gone white, her expression blank, her hands frantically knitting, as though her life depended on it.

The four of them were gathered around a tall radio console, its dial glowing amber. The voice of Walter Winchell drifted from the speaker, clearly audible through the open window.

George was consumed by the urge to rescue Jane from all this, to sweep her away to a different life.

Paris was waiting for them, but there was just one obstacle. She’d said it was over with Charles. She’d never said she loved him.

He suddenly felt self-conscious about the Yale sweater he was wearing, the school colors blazing in the twilight. He pulled the sweater off and slung it around his shoulders. Then he made a fist and firmly knocked at the door. He prayed Jane would be the one to answer it, but no such luck. The uncle came, opening the door wide. The house exhaled a whiff of something oniony.

The uncle was a big man with a beer belly and an unshaven face, handsome in a rough fashion. He wore work trousers and an undershirt with a pack of Lucky Strikes twisted into the sleeve. “Yeah?”

“My name is George Bellamy,” he said. “I’m here to see—”

“He’s here to see me, Uncle Billy,” said Jane, stepping through the door. “We’ll be out on the front porch.”

“Yeah, okay,” said the uncle. He scowled at George. “I thought you was one of them religious boys that goes door to door, spreadin’ the word.”

“Uh, no, sir.”

The man gave a nod, and headed back to the radio show.

It was all George could do to keep from grabbing Jane right then and there, and spiriting her away forever. Instead he said, “I’m here to plead my case.”

“There’s nothing to say, George.” They sat together on the stoop, though it offered little in the way of privacy. The neighborhood was a busy place, people calling their kids in for the night, dogs barking, pots and pans clanking, couples fighting. Bikes lay abandoned in some of the yards.