After the Fire

by Belva Plain

  Their nights were splendid. At an inn where their room had a balcony, they lay one evening in a hammock, rocking under the trees until the stars came out. At Mont-Saint-Michel they opened the window to hear the enormous, terrifying tide come thundering in. Their days were splendid. In Brittany they took pictures of women wearing lace caps, they ate the famous pancakes, and they wondered at the menhirs, those ancient, secretive stones standing in rows on flat fields. Will wondered about their age and how they compared with Stone-henge. Everything interested him, whether swans on a pond, a small town's art exhibit, or a group of old men playing boules.

  On Omaha Beach, he was extremely moved. “My grandfather died here on June sixth in 1944,” he said. “This is my second visit.”

  From the top of the incredible cliff, they stared down at the sand and the waves, then back at the Nazi gun emplacements, and walked away in silence. At the American cemetery nearby, they looked at the white crosses stretching almost to the horizon and found nothing to say, for Will's expression said everything. And Hyacinth, with a passionate gesture, put her arms out to hold him.

  Now and again they had these emotional moments, but chiefly their mood was one of joyous calm. Their intimacies were unself-conscious. As though they had lived years together, they had their small routines: He brushed her hair, and she rubbed his back. Now and again they asked each other in mild astonishment how all this could have happened to them.

  On the last night, in the formal setting of what had been somebody's small château, they dressed for dinner. Hyacinth's dress had short, black lace sleeves.

  “I hadn't planned to bring anything like this,” she said. “I thought I'd be having dinner in my room, wearing a bathrobe. But Lina insisted.”

  “Of course she did. I told you, she's a smart old lady. She had faith in me.”

  “But me? She could only have been guessing about me. I never said a word to her about you.”

  Will smiled. He was about to leave the room, with his hand on the doorknob, when he stopped to look at her. “Wait a second. Just like that. Do me one favor, will you? Never cut your hair any shorter. Never.”

  “I wasn't planning to, but why?”

  “Because. I love the feel of it on the pillow.”

  Very happily she responded, “Agreed. That's reason enough.”

  Yet now, on the next to the last day, since in the morning they were to return to Paris, a thin edge formed itself upon this happiness. She had allowed herself, or rather forced herself, to forget during this enchanted week that it was deeply flawed. So it was almost uncanny that Will should choose just this moment of foreboding to say what he did.

  They were at table when he remarked, “You almost never talk about your children.”

  “Don't I? I didn't realize it. I suppose I don't want to be boring, don't want to be one of those women who talk incessantly about how bright they are, and what the teacher said, and what the coach at Little League had to say.”

  “I'm not easily bored. And your children could never bore me. Will you see them before school begins in September?”

  “I go down there to visit, and my mother does. Sometimes we go together.”

  “Do they mind this joint custody arrangement? I suppose it's fair to the parents, but isn't it confusing to the children?”

  “Well, mine seem to be fine. I think only time will tell whether they grow up with any scars.”

  Hyacinth's heart had begun to race. And some change must have appeared on her face, because Will, always keen to observe, said quickly, “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to bring up a painful thing that you can't change. Let's just enjoy what we have right now. Let's drink to us.” And lifting his glass, he touched hers. “To us. To you and to me, always.”

  Above the rim of her glass, she beheld him. So tender, so stubborn, wise, and good! And again came that terrible sense of foreboding.

  “What is it?” he asked. “What are you thinking?”

  “Only that this is our next to last day.”

  “What of it? We have the rest of our lives.” With a quizzical smile, he waited. “No comment?”

  “It's the champagne. It always goes straight to my head.” She reached over to touch him. “I love you, Will.”

  “You'd better love me. Come on, let's eat so we can go to bed early.”

  Needing to meet his cheerful tone, she bantered back, “You always want to be in bed early.”

  “Can you think of a better place?” he retorted.

  * * *

  Hyacinth's mind, unknown to Will, was already home long before they reached the hotel in Paris. It was therefore almost fitting that a fax from home should be awaiting her there. When the knock on the door came and it was handed in, Will took it, asking quickly, “Shall I read it for you?”

  “Oh, please.”

  “It's fine, dear. It's nothing, no trouble. ‘Birthday greetings. Better late than never. All's well with everybody. Kids and I send love. How about dinner, usual place. Arnie.’ ”

  “That's all? Thank God.”

  “You didn't tell me it was your birthday. When was it?”

  “I have to count. It must have been—yes, last Tuesday. I'd never notice it anymore if it weren't for my family.”

  “What, no celebration? Well, we're going to celebrate every birthday from now on. Mine's the fourteenth of January, and I want a proper cake. I want the works. Who's Arnie?”

  “He's my former husband's partner, but a very good friend of mine.”

  “He must be. ‘Dinner? Usual place?’ ”

  “He comes to New York every month or so on business, and I often go to dinner at his hotel. He's very kind, good to Emma and Jerry, and I'm fond of him.”

  “Oh. That's nice. How about a walk to stretch our legs before the flight tomorrow?”

  She was grateful that home, rather than being a spoiler, had waited until now, at the end of the week, to reach out to her. On their walk, they passed the shop in which she had seen the famous rose dress that had been the cause of so much change. It was unmistakably the place, and she could not resist telling Will.

  “If it hadn't been for that dress, I wouldn't be here with you. I would never have met you.”

  Never. The walls, the pavement, the very sky now fading into a melancholy gray, repeated the word. Never.

  “And you wouldn't be a designer. Funny, somebody said to me that you don't look like one, however a designer is supposed to look. He meant it well, though, and I understood because I can just as easily see you pushing a baby carriage on a suburban street.”

  “I've done that,” she said.

  “Well, you can do it again. We could make a wonderful child. Smart, beautiful, athletic, artistic, good-natured, head of the class—”

  “You forgot boastful,” she finished, pretending to laugh.

  “Touché,” said Will. “But seriously, be prepared, because we're going to have to talk.”

  “Not now, for heaven's sake.”

  “No. But soon. I suppose I am a little hasty, although that's not unusual. We know each other as well as we ever could, and time's a-wasting.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The summer at home was long and hot. They said it was the worst heat wave in fifteen years, but Hyacinth, protected by air conditioning, was too busy to think about it, and far too concerned with her problems, anyway.

  Libretti was preparing the spring line, with special attention to its Hyacinth productions, and the place was astir with buying and selling, viewing, fitting, and photographing. Hyacinth herself was to depart on a two-week tour with her trunk show to end with a splash of publicity on Fifth Avenue.

  “This is your best work yet,” Lina told her. “It's a new look for you. It's discreet and ladylike and very sensuous besides. Love must agree with you. Maybe I'm being too personal,” she added, as Hyacinth did not respond.

  “No, that's all right, Lina.”

  “You haven't said anything to me, although Will Miller has.”

&nbs
p; “I guess I've been so swamped in the fitting rooms that I haven't had a moment,” she replied, which was at best a lame response and at worst a dodge.

  She was making a stupendous effort not to think ahead. This time Will had really gone to California, where a long-drawn-out negotiation over some kind of merger was being held, and she was missing him to the point of pain. That very morning, another letter from him had arrived, and twice within the last few hours, she had taken it out of her purse to read it.

  My love,

  Do you know you are everything to me? Wherever I am, alone or in a crowd, there is a part of my mind that is always aware of you. As clearly as if you were speaking to me, I hear your lovely voice. In the darkness, I see your brave eyes, and that one-sided curve of your lips when you laugh. We've had so little time together, only a few months, and yet I know you as if I had known you all my life. You have my total trust, and I hope, I know, I have yours. It's my last thought before I sleep, and the first when I awake.

  Will

  Total trust. And guilt, a thrust into the heart, a throb in the forehead, and a startle in the middle of the night.

  What am I going to do? she asked for the hundredth or the thousandth time.

  Then there was more. Although Arnie assured her by phone that Emma and Jerry were “happy as clams,” she was not satisfied. Several times she had heard them in the background having a nasty, tearful quarrel; a few times they had also been sulky and snappy in their replies to her, so that she had afterward cried with frustration.

  Meanwhile, her work had to go forward, and it did.

  “I'm still in shock,” Francine whispered while the big Fifth Avenue show was being set up. “Who could have guessed that you, in your jeans and T-shirt, you who never gave a darn about fashion, knew so much about stuff like this?”

  “I always tell you, it's like painting.”

  Still, it did amaze her when a customer consulted her as to what shoes to wear with this or that suit, or whether that dress was strictly “after five” or might be worn at a noon wedding. It amazed her to watch the models make their smart pirouettes in garments that, not all that long ago, had been mere sketches on the backs of envelopes. There they came, parading in chalk white velvet with scarlet shoes, in yellow Turkish trousers with a beaded jacket, and in short black taffeta with a long, sky-blue petticoat and a naked back. There they came, and kept coming.

  Lina was all smiles. “Do you realize who's here?” she kept murmuring into Hyacinth's ear. “Over there in the back row, he's from Texas. You mustn't skip their store next time…. You don't know her? For goodness' sake, she practically runs the patrons' list…. Oh, he always comes with his wife and buys half a dozen gowns for the season…. You don't recognize her? She'll be on the cover of next month's issue…. The short one on the left is one of the top European shoe designers…. This is one tremendous success, my dear Hyacinth.”

  At the end there was a babble and a jostle, with Hyacinth in the very center, everyone calling her name. She had a most surprising thought: For the first time in my life, actually, I don't mind the name. It's really not as silly as I've always thought it was. I should tell Francine.

  “Hyacinth, remember me?”

  Remember Moira? They spoke every week or two on the telephone, but there was still nothing like a hug and the sight of a kind, sweet face. There was no ease like that which you felt with a real friend who never put you on the spot with a tactless question or any reference to your troubles.

  “Oh, you look marvelous, Hyacinth! I'm so glad for you. One of these days I'm going to give myself some time off and take a weekend in New York. Maybe I'll treat myself to one of your dresses. Do you make any stylish stouts?”

  Moira had a wonderful ability to laugh at herself.

  “Hyacinth, remember me?”

  Remember Martha? She could hardly have forgotten this nemesis of her girlhood.

  “Of course I do. What brings you here?”

  “Your mother told me about it. We're still neighbors, you know, and we pass each other on the road now and then. You look marvelous, Hyacinth.”

  She was supposed to return the compliment, but somehow she did not feel like doing any more than answering graciously, “Thank you. Thank you very much.”

  “I've thought of you often since you moved away, about how we all used to be sort of mean to you in school. And in college, too, I have to admit. You must remember, although I hope you don't.”

  Well now, wasn't that an apology? And wasn't this an awkward time to make it? How should she reply? She could say coolly something like: Naturally I remember, though it was never all that important to me. But since, in a subtle way, Martha had a beaten look, she said instead, “It was a long time ago. What's been happening with you?”

  “Not much. I never married, so I live at home. I work in town.”

  Martha was still standing there and would have extended the conversation if Lina had not come rushing up with a message.

  “It's about the velvet dress. They're asking whether you'll do the same in black.”

  “I'm taking your time,” said Martha. “I'd love to buy one of your dresses. They're beautiful, but I can't afford them.”

  For an instant, Hyacinth watched her walk away. What had happened to the teasing eyes, the proud, curly head, and the toss of it? Martha acted as if she were stunned to see what has happened to me, while I feel the same about her. What a mystery it is, all of it!

  Will said, “You did this whole dinner, fancy chicken, fancy vegetable soufflé, and fancy dessert? No take-out, now that you're in New York?”

  “Why are you so surprised? You know I can cook. You said the same thing that day when you came to lunch and broke my heart right afterward.”

  “I don't know. I just am.”

  People had always been surprised, first that such a bookworm should spend so much time in the kitchen, and now that a designer and a moneymaker should do it. People clung to their stereotypes.

  Her feelings for the last twenty-four hours had been dreadfully mixed. She had been disturbed because just at the time she was filling some last-minute, ultra-important orders, Emma and Jerry had come unexpectedly on a short vacation, so now they had gone to spend a part of their time in the country with Francine instead of with her, their mother. Their father had simply found it convenient to send them someplace without even asking whether it was possible for her to take them.

  But last night Will had called to say that he was coming home on the “red-eye,” and she had been gloriously excited. At work in the perfect little kitchen, she had had fantasies of a house and a dining room with all her beloved faces around the table, his at the head. Then, as the clock moved toward the hour when he would walk in, she had been shaken by panic, really physically shaken. This time, surely, he was going to pin her down to specifics. Something told her that this was to be the night for really serious talk. It had been postponed until the hectic showings were over, and until his return from California, but now it was here.

  Under the concealing napkin, her hands were actually knotted together, the gold ring digging into her palm.

  “That last showing was a triumph, I hear. I wanted to get back for it, but there was a lot of last-minute delay, too much red tape.” He broke off. “I missed you terribly, so terribly that it hurt.”

  “I know,” she said weakly, with her eyes on the corner chair: navy blue with scattered snowflakes in two clusters, skip a space, and there were two more clusters.

  “I want marriage, Hyacinth. I want you to say when.”

  Foolish words escaped her. “Don't we need to know each other a little better, Mr. Miller?”

  He stared at her. “Don't be absurd. Don't be coy, for God's sake. Don't tease me.”

  “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to.”

  “Well, then?”

  “You know I love you, Will. But we have to—to plan. My children—this apartment—it's not all that simple. I can't rush.” With every intention to sound natu
ral, she heard her voice pleading. “We've been so happy this summer, so can't we go on for a while until—”

  “No. I don't understand what you mean by ‘not all that simple.’ There's room enough for the children and me in here until we can find a larger place. I'll find one. Give me a couple of weeks, that's all. You wanted to be fairly near their school, I know, and I'll keep that in mind. Where do they go now?”

  She sighed. “I may be changing their school, and that's another complication.”

  “These complications are of your own making, Hyacinth. I think I know what it is. You're having a vision of the first time, all the wedding fears that turned out so badly in the end, and the thought of another wedding depresses you. It's affected your nerves. Isn't that so?”

  For a full minute, Will sat still. Aware of his eyes upon her, she cast hers down and fiddled with a water glass.

  “I know you love me, Hyacinth. Then trust me. Just close your eyes and jump. We'll make a small, quick affair of it. City Hall, if you want. Ten minutes and over. Painless. Nothing to it.”

  “Then what's the difference? We can go into that room right now, and it will still be wonderful without any—”

  “No.”

  By now she was well enough accustomed to that decisive no to see without looking at him exactly how his mouth had closed upon his even teeth, upon the word and upon the subject.

  “I want to marry you, not only live with you. I'm not as modern as I've liked to think I was. I've had enough temporary stuff. I'm ready for something public and permanent, ready for a child of my own. I'm ready for your children, too. You need have no worries about that. That bothers you a bit, doesn't it? But I want to love them because they are yours. When am I going to see them?”

  “Soon.”

  “You should be getting them back after Labor Day, I suppose.”

  “They're with my mother. I'm going up there tomorrow to spend a few days.”

  “Then I'll wait till you come back to go over all our details.”

  He stood up and, pulling her to himself, held her close to kiss her hands, her arms, her throat, and her mouth.