Time and Again (18 page)

I was too excited to eat much, too conscious of being here at this table under the almost silent hiss of the gaslights of the overhead chandelier, and beginning to feel worried because my man hadn't appeared. We sat, six of us, with one empty chair, Aunt Ada at the head of the oval table carving the breast of a turkey, then passing our plates to us. For a time we were silent except for murmurs of thanks as dishes were passed. I sat looking around a little, not too obviously. There were half a dozen large framed pictures on the walls. One was a sepia head-and-shoulders of a stern middle-aged man, a family portrait, I supposed; the others were black-and-white engravings of the Roman Forum, pastoral scenes, and the like. Then, all of us served, we began eating, and Byron Doverman tossed in the conversational ball by announcing that he'd just finished reading
Ben Hur.
Julia and Felix said they were surprised he hadn't read it long since. There was a little talk about
Ben Hur
then, especially about its "message," and Aunt Ada asked if I'd read it. I never had but I'd seen the movie, so I said yes, adding something or other about the excitement of the chariot race. Then Byron Doverman said casually that he'd once seen the author, General Lew Wallace, ride past his regiment when he'd been a soldier encamped near Washington during the war. As I stared across the table at this still-young, reddish-brown-haired man whose face was almost unlined, it took me a moment to realize that he meant the Civil War.

"Heard the latest about Guiteau?" Felix was asking the table in general. "Someone took a shot at him through his cell window —»

"That was in the papers," Julia said.

"Yes, but this wasn't — the story was all over town this afternoon. The bullet hit the wall and flattened into an absolutely perfect profile of Guiteau as the wretch looks when frightened."

I glanced cautiously around the table but they were all nodding soberly, accepting this as fact without a smile. Then I realized that Aunt Ada was speaking to me, asking my opinion about the trial verdict. I sat looking thoughtful, as though considering, trying to remember what little I knew about Guiteau. I hadn't read much about him, but knew he'd been found guilty, and executed. I wasn't here to reform social attitudes, and I told Aunt Ada that since he was clearly guilty I felt sure he'd be hanged.

Down the table Felix was discussing the ice crop; they'd begun cutting near Bordentown, New Jersey, he said. Then there was a little talk about the Metropolitan Elevated scandal, whatever that was. I smiled at Julia and said the turkey was wonderful; I've always thought of turkey as dry and nearly flavorless but this was succulent. It was wild turkey, Julia said, and when I looked surprised, and asked where she'd got it,
she
looked surprised. "At the market, of course." I asked about that, and found that they also sold quail, grouse, partridges, tame squabs, wild ducks including canvasbacks, redheads, and mallards, and hares and rabbits. I'd always thought hare was another name for rabbit, and started to ask about that but didn't; Julia's eyes were narrowed, and she was staring across the table at me wonderingly. I turned to Felix beside me, and just to be saying something asked if he were interested in baseball.

He said he was, a little. He'd gone to the polo grounds a few times last summer when they weren't playing polo, to see the Mets play. I said, "Who?" He said, "The Metropolitans." I nodded, and said I thought that's what he said. "How did they do?" I asked. He said, "Not so well; they had bad pitching," and I said I wasn't a bit surprised.

For dessert we had a birthday cake, Felix blowing out the candles. And then we had a birthday party! Julia and her aunt stayed in the dining room, closing the sliding doors, to clear the table. In the parlor Maud Torrence sat down at the organ and began looking through the sheet music on the rack. Felix Grier and Byron Doverman stood behind her, and when I sat down with the paper, they called me, and I knew there was no escape, and walked over.

I was able to join in on the first song, "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen," and when we finished young Felix said, "If only Jake were home we'd have a quartet!" That was my chance to ask, "Jake who?" and Felix said, "Jake Pickering, our other boarder," and now I knew his name, and felt I'd made some progress.

The next number was "If I Catch the Man Who Taught Her to Dance," or something like that, and all I could do was try to follow along. Then Julia and her aunt came in, and we all sang "In the Evening by the Moonlight" and "Oh, Dem Golden Slippers." Aunt Ada did pretty well, but Julia was a little off the beat occasionally. Byron Doverman said, " 'Cradle's Empty, Baby's Gone!' " Julia said, "Oh, no," but the others insisted. Maud found the music, and — all reading the words over her shoulders — we sang what is probably the most lugubrious song I've ever heard, about this poor dead baby, and including lines like "Baby's gone to join the angels, peaceful evermore." Julia smiled at me, shrugging; she seemed to think it was ridiculous. But when Maud finished she turned from the organ saying she'd played enough, and her eyes were bright, she was on the edge of tears, and I remembered that this was a time when babies died easily; maybe the song meant something to her.

The doorbell rang, and again I wondered if it were my man. But Julia answered the bell and came back sorting through four or five envelopes, one of which she handed Byron; the others were birthday greetings for Felix. It was a mail delivery at very nearly seven in the evening, and when I said I was surprised, Julia answered with a touch of big-city smugness that mail was delivered five times a day in New York City. "Byron," she said then, "will you favor us with some magic?" He nodded, took the stairs to his room two at a time, came back down just as fast, then walked around the room pulling coins from our ears, and asking people to "pick a card, any one at all." The truth is that he was pretty good, and everyone, including me, actually enjoyed the performance.

He finished, put the deck in his pocket, and sat down. Aunt Ada said, "My uncle sent me a fan from China, and I fan like this." She began waggling her hand under her chin as though fanning herself, and everyone copied her. At her right, in a chair next to the windows, Maud Torrence said, "My uncle sent me a fan from China, and I fan like this." With her left hand she began waving an imaginary fan at her left ear, and — our right hands still waggling — we all did the same. It was my turn and I said, "My uncle sent me a fan from Czechoslovakia and I fan like this." I exposed my teeth as though I had a fan in my mouth, and began nodding my head, everyone imitating. Felix was next and he ended the game with twin fans from the Sandwich Islands, lifting both feet from the floor and fanning away. As we all copied the movement everyone burst into laughter, and it
was
funny, all of us reared back in our chairs, heads, hands and feet simultaneously waggling away.

Aunt Ada said, "Where is Czechoslovakia, Mr. Morley?"

"Why, I believe it's south of Germany."

She nodded, accepting this, and I think Maud Torrence did, too. But the two men and Julia were looking at me. I knew what was wrong; there was no Czechoslovakia, wouldn't be for decades yet, and I grinned to show I'd only been joking.

Felix's face was flushed, his eyes bright; he was having a great twenty-first birthday, and he said, "Julia?
Tableaux vivants!"

"All right." Whatever it was, she liked the idea. "Shall I choose first?" He nodded, and she said, "Then I'll need you and Byron." They walked into the dining room, pulling the sliding doors closed after them, and Aunt Ada got up and turned the lights of the parlor chandelier very low. Then she and Maud sat smiling expectantly at the closed doors of the dining room, and when they glanced at me I was doing the same. Julia called, "Ready!" and Aunt Ada, who was nearest, got up and rolled open the doors.

The dining-room lights were turned up high and bright, and the three of them stood in the doorway almost silhouetted as though on a stage; they were posed and motionless. Byron and Julia were facing Felix, who stood on one foot, the other slightly raised. Wedged under one arm he held a long stick of some sort like a crutch; his mouth was open as though speaking, his eyes wide. Julia's head was thrown back, her mouth open, her eyes as wide as Felix's. Byron looked stricken, too, the back of one fist pressed to his forehead.

They stood there, swaying slightly; we all sat and stared. Then Maud, voice frustrated, said, "Oh, I
know
it, I know it so well!"

Suddenly, triumphant, Aunt Ada cried,
"The Soldier's Return!
" and the
tableau vivant
broke up, chattering, heads nodding in confirmation. Aunt Ada stood; apparently it was her turn now. "I'll need you, Mr. Morley," she said, and I followed her into the dining room, closing the sliding doors behind us. "Do you know
The Slave Auction?"
she said eagerly. I stood frowning as though trying to remember, then said I was afraid I didn't. "Never mind, I'll pose you. We'll need a gavel." She stood looking around the room, then hurried to a cabinet against one wall, opened a drawer, and brought out a big soup ladle. "This'll do; hold it like a gavel." She pulled a straight-backed chair up to the closed doors, turning its back to the door. "Climb up; this will be the auctioneer's stand." I got up on the chair, facing the doors. "Raise your gavel; you're saying, 'Going, going, gone!' " I did, and Aunt Ada knelt before the chair facing the parlor, crossing one wrist over the other as though her arms were bound. "Ready!" she called, all excited, then she dropped her head, chin on her chest.

The doors began sliding open, and though I didn't move — gavel hand upraised, my mouth open — I felt my face flush. But they all knew this one instantly, yelling,
"The Slave Auction!"
almost simultaneously. Then they were gabbling congratulations, the gist of them being that they'd guessed instantly only because we'd done it so well.

By the time we'd had a couple more
tableaux vivants — The Wounded Scout
and
Lovers ' Retreat —
I found out through various references what we were doing. We were imitating the poses of figures in statuary groups made by a man named Rogers who duplicated them in plaster by the thousands. Apparently every home had a Rogers group —
Weighing the Baby
on Aunt Ada's mantelpiece was one — and everyone was familiar with most of them. I sat like the others, trying to look as though I were recalling titles that might match the poses in the dining room. Across from me Maud sat absently scratching her initials in the frost on the windowpane beside her. It occurred to me that I hadn't seen genuine frost on a windowpane since I'd written on my grandfather's farmhouse window when I was a child. In the final
tableau —
Julia was one of the lovers, sitting on a bench and looking sad — I saw her flick a glance at me, and I thought I could read her mind; I was the only person in the room who hadn't once been able to call out a title, even a wrong guess.

Byron suggested charades next; I could tell from his manner that he must be good at them. But Felix — and I thought maybe he wasn't so good — said charades were too much like
tableaux vivants.
Julia was sitting over by the whatnot cabinet now, still looking at me a little curiously, and now she said, "Perhaps Mr. Morley will entertain us. It's your turn, Mr. Morley; we're all agreed!" Everyone else did agree instantly, and I nodded. In Julia's voice, I thought, there'd been a hint of challenge as though she were saying,
Who are you? Prove yourself!
Well, I wanted to, and sat wondering what to do, and felt a sudden flicker of panic. I looked over at Julia again; she was waiting, smiling a little mockingly.

Then I grinned at her and held up both hands, palms toward her, thumbs touching, framing her head and shoulders. "Hold still." She sat motionless, eyes suddenly bright with interest. "Turn your head only; just a little. No, the other way, toward the cabinet." She turned her head slowly, and when the light from the overhead chandelier slanted across her face, side-lighting it and silhouetting her profile against the dark wallpaper just behind her, I said, "Don't move, don't breathe." I'd already found the key to my Dakota apartment in my vest pocket, and now I turned to the window beside me, and scraping through the thin white layer of frost with a sharp corner of the key, I set down the outline of her cheekbone. I glanced back at Julia, then in one swift clean curve put down the angle of her jaw. The lines showed up well, the blackness of the outside night sharply exposed against the rime, and I worked fast. Everyone else was on his feet now, standing respectfully beside my window to watch.

It turned out well, a good sketch; in no more than two minutes I'd caught the likeness. The prominent cheekbone, the slightly too-sharp jawline, a suggestion of the small firm chin — all were there in three quick lines. The precise tilt of the eyes and — I even managed this — a feeling of the faint shadows beneath them lay there on the white of the windowpane in a few sure-handed squiggles. So did the dark straight brows and fine straight nose, I nodded, releasing Julia, and she hurried over to join the others.