by Belva Plain
The wind rose higher, lashing and whipping the trees. Lonely houses and barns were battened down against the storm. Through the bleak landscape, the car moved, humming; she was in a safe, warm little world that had nothing to do with the perilous world around it. And with a little shiver of delight, she glanced over at Donal, thinking, Why, I belong here now! I belong to him! Am I the same person I was yesterday? An hour ago?
He felt her glance. “What is it? You don’t say anything … but it’s my fault, I haven’t given you a chance, have I?”
“I’m thinking. I don’t know what to think. It doesn’t seem real.”
“It’s real, all right. You’re not afraid of anything, Meg? About who I am? What I do?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
As he had said, the real crimes were to house people in dirty firetraps, to underpay them in miserable factories. Meg had not grown up around Uncle Dan and Aunt Hennie without learning something! Add to that what she had learned in government classes, and how could one possibly be horrified over a simple traffic in whiskey?
“You’re so beautiful, Meg,” he said. “It’s a pity you don’t think you are.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Leah told me. We were talking about you. Don’t be angry at her. She’s a true friend to you. Get out your mirror and look at yourself.”
“Now?”
“Yes, now.”
She saw that her eyes were enormous; their gray held a glisten of lavender. Her mouth was full and moist. This was an unfamiliar face. Could it have changed so much in just one afternoon?
“Margaretta,” Donal said. “It suits you. A lady’s name.”
“It’s a stuffy name. It belonged to my mother’s grandmother and I hate it.”
“Then I’ll never use it, if you hate it. I’ll do everything to please you.” He put a hand over hers. “I’m really very soft inside, Meg.”
The words, which touched her with sudden pity (How hard his life has been, how he has fought his way!) and the pressure of his hand, which brought back the burning, the body heat that she had felt through their layers of woolen cloth, combined into a surge of feeling that ended with a little cry like a sob.
Her cry alarmed him. “What is it, what’s wrong?”
She said the first thing that came into her head. “You’ll be going back to New York—”
“But only for a few days. I want us to be married next week. Or the week after at the latest.”
Now reality rushed back. “But my parents, my father—”
“Meg, I’m not even going to ask your father. You know as well as I do what the answer would be, and I’m not going to humble myself, not going to explain or argue or plead when I know it won’t do any good. No, we’ll be married and then we’ll tell them. When it’s done, they’ll accept it and put a good face on it.”
He was right, of course. It did make sense to avoid a nasty hopeless argument and her mother’s tearful lecture: You hardly know him … we had hoped … good family … It would be hopeless. And this was irresistible. An elopement. Romeo and Juliet.
She thought of something else. “But graduation. I have to graduate. They’ll be heartbroken if I don’t. The way I begged to come here! They didn’t want me to. They gave in really because of Cousin Paul, and now if I don’t finish—”
“You’ll finish! We’ll be married, but no one will know it until June, that’s all. You’ll hide the wedding ring. I’m going to buy you another little ring, so you’ll have something of mine to wear in the meantime. You can tell the girls in the dorm that it’s your engagement ring.” He grinned. “You’ll like that, won’t you?”
“So fast, so soon,” she said, shaking her head in wonder.
“Why not? There’s never any time like the present. I’ve always worked on that theory.” He drew the car over to the side of the road. “Before I take you back, shall we say a week from Saturday?”
“Where—where will it be?”
“Around here. A civil marriage.”
“But aren’t you a Catholic?”
“I’m not much of a one anymore, I’m afraid. And you’re not Catholic, so a civil marriage will do nicely. Of course, children have to have some religion. I’ll leave that to you.”
Children. The word tied them together again, as when they had stood in each other’s arms in the woods.
“You’ll need a pass for the weekend, an invitation from a relative.”
“I’ll talk to the housemother. I’ll think of something.”
He grinned again. “No need. I’ve already done it.”
They registered at the Ritz-Carlton in Boston. Over his shoulder, she watched him sign in firm letters, double-sized, Mr. and Mrs. Donal Powers. On her left hand, the wedding ring, a wide band of diamonds, bulked under her glove; the right hand wore a small sapphire surrounded by more modest diamonds. Her fingers, rubbing against each other, assured her that she was awake.
In a hall mirror, as they followed the bellboy to their room, she saw herself; the gentian-blue wool suit did look bridelike.
“Good God!” her roommate had said, “it looks like a bride’s going-away suit!”
“I couldn’t resist the blue,” she had answered quietly. Wouldn’t it be a conversation piece for them all when they found out the truth!
Donal tipped the bellboy and locked the door. The windows faced the Common, where people were strolling as though it were just an ordinary day. He raised the shades to the top and the room went bright with sunshine, so that the bed was illumined like a throne.
“We’re too high up for anyone to look in, and I want to look at you. See all there is to see.”
He pulled the spread from the bed. “We’ve only got a day and a half, so let’s make the most of every hour.”
She kept being surprised at herself. Her daydreams had been different; in them, she had been hesitant, wondering and awkward. But she was none of these now. Instead, she went into the bathroom; with steady hands she removed her clothes and put on a nightgown; took the pins from her hair and let it fall to her shoulders; felt her heart, which was pounding, and went back into the bedroom.
Next to the bed, he waited for her, wearing a dark silk robe. His eyes widened with pleasure.
“You’re not afraid,” he said.
“No. Did you think I would be? I always used to think I would be.”
“You didn’t know yourself. You’ve wanted this ever since you first had any idea what it was. Come here.”
He reached out and pulled the nightgown back over her head. Then he let his robe drop and they fell upon the bed together.
At the very same hour, in New York, Paul was hanging up the telephone. “Alfie thinks it’s really serious,” he told Marian. “He says that if the man proposes, he’s sure Meg will accept. Probably in the summer, right after graduation.”
“What does he want of you?”
“Well, he has an idea Meg might listen to me. He wants me to ‘put all the cards on the table,’ ‘talk to her like a Dutch uncle,’ you know how Alfie is. And he thinks that you and I might know some suitable young man to come to the rescue.” There came a sudden recollection of Donal Powers’s amused, sardonic gaze. “As a matter of fact, I was expecting to be in Boston next month, but I could move it up … will you make a reservation for lunch or tea or something with Meg, week after next? We’ll stay at the Ritz. I think you should come along. Maybe you can talk to her, give her a woman’s point of view.” Paul grumbled. “I don’t know why I get saddled with advice to the lovelorn.”
“You get saddled with everything in your family,” Marian said with a sigh. Fine lines creased her forehead. “I worry about you, Paul. You ought to think more about your health. You’re overworked and you’ll end up with high blood pressure before you know it.”
“No, no, I’m fine. Strong as a horse.”
Meg sat with her back to the windows, so that wisps of her hair, escaped from its smooth-tied length, were blond in the light. She had always s
eemed older than her age; matronly was the word, Paul thought, as though whatever might have been spontaneous in her was being held down—as it had been. But now, this minute, she was radiant. And he remembered having been shocked by that same radiance on the night Donal brought Dan home.
“You haven’t had much experience, known many men,” he said, trying to be tactful.
“How many do you have to know when you’re sure?” Meg replied. There was a tremulous brightness in her eyes.
He pursued the subject ineffectually. “You’re very young.”
“Most people are very young when they fall in love, aren’t they?”
“Yes, but to take the first one without waiting—” Paul began, and was interrupted.
“You both took the first one. I remember your wedding, being a flower girl—”
Now Marian interrupted. “We had known each other a long time. And what’s more important, our families had known each other. We knew what we were getting.”
“I think that’s terribly snobbish,” said Meg, sitting up straighter. “I’m sorry, but I don’t see what families have to do with it at all.”
Yes, she had changed. The way she sat … the way she moved her hands … there was a ring on her right hand, a very blue sapphire, which Paul had not seen her wear before.
“I can’t live without him,” she said now.
Paul sighed. After more than an hour of careful, reasoned argument, he had gotten nowhere. He knew he was beaten. Alfie was beaten.
“I won’t live without him,” she said shamelessly.
Marian had a look of distaste. Her lips were tightly closed, giving her face a look of forced patience.
“I know he sells liquor. He’s told me all about it. Why not? The best people are breaking this stupid law. It won’t last anyway.”
Marian opened her lips. “May we ask, has he proposed to you definitely, formally?”
“Why, of course!” Meg’s eyebrows rose. “Why else would I be speaking like this?”
Rebuked again, Marian flushed. It occurred to Paul that perhaps he should have brought Hennie instead. Soft and motherly as she was, Meg might have listened to her; she had always loved Hennie. Though probably it wouldn’t have mattered. The girl was in the delirium of first love. She was either making a terrible mistake, or else this was to be her lasting love, the real one. Who was to say?
He called for the check. The two women went to the ladies’ room while he waited. Loneliness chilled him as he sat there by himself, surrounded by the discreet murmur, the refined ritual of teatime. Two couples at a table nearby were talking, or rather the women were talking; the men seemed satisfied to let their wives keep up the chatter. Inane chatter. They were women of middle age, with gray hair marcelled in iron wavelets. Sexless women, not like that glowing, perhaps foolish, girl who “won’t live without him.”
He met Meg and Marian in the lobby.
“Well, it was good to see you anyway, Meg. Don’t be angry with us, will you? We mean well.”
She kissed him. “It’s all right, Cousin Paul. I still love you. I always will.”
They watched her get into a taxicab and then went up to their room. Marian took her hat off and flopped into a chair; the air sighed out of the cushion.
“A silly infatuation,” she said. “I do think you might have been more forceful, though.”
“I didn’t want to blacken the man completely, once I saw that she intends to go through with it. You can say just so much, then there’s a point of no return that you reach, and she’d never speak to us again.”
“How much do you really know about this Powers?”
“I’ll talk to Ben again. I don’t think he can tell me too much, or wants to. But I’ve made other inquiries. He’s known in political circles and in business. He’s immensely rich and will be richer, although that certainly doesn’t matter to Meg. I doubt she even knows it.”
“She had a handsome ring. Did you notice?”
“I noticed. Who knows? He might be very good for her, in spite of all. Since that’s what she wants.”
He thought, I’m talking nonsense. But she was so glowing, so trusting and happy … Powers is tough, he gets what he wants … and he wants our Meg because she stands for something he never had.
“Well, maybe it will work. He may be very good for her,” he repeated.
“I don’t see her with him at all. The girl’s simply mesmerized.”
Well, yes, he knew about that …
“She’ll live to regret it if she does marry him,” Marian said. “A physical attraction and nothing more. Disgusting. As if that were all there is in life.”
Paul wanted to say, “You don’t know the first thing about passion,” but didn’t answer, and picked up the newspaper instead.
There was a small item. “Adolf Hitler sentenced to five years in Landsberg prison,” he read. He’d never serve out the time. They were making a hero out of him already. They hadn’t seen the last of that “funny little man,” as Joachim called him.
A wave of melancholy came over him now, after this fruitless day, here in this stiff, unfriendly room, with the overnight cases on the floor and Marian gazing somberly out of the window.
“I think I’ll take a walk,” he said. “Look in at some galleries on Newbury Street.” Always pictures, whenever he was upset. “Want to come?” he asked. Annoyed with her, he yet felt sorry to leave her sitting here alone.
“No, it’s too blustery. Boston’s always so cold. I wish we could start home now.”
“Too late. We’ll take the first train in the morning.”
“I’m sorry we came. It was a fool’s errand.”
“Not really,” he said calmly. “At least we tried.”
“You’re not going without a hat, are you? You lose half your body heat when your head is cold, Paul.”
He put on his hat and went downstairs. The shops were full of gay things, spring clothes, flowers and books and pictures. At a gallery window he stopped to look at a drawing of a horse leaning over a rail fence; the head was wonderful, with an expression in the large, sad eyes that only a man who knew horses and loved them could have put onto paper. He thought idly that Alfie would like it, not because he would appreciate the art, but because it would make what he’d call a “nice piece,” a rural scene for the library at Laurel Hill, where he played at being a farmer. Good old Alfie! He was due for some pain when Meg brought Donal Powers home!
Loving … Meg and that man. And he with Marian, who clung and believed that she loved, while not knowing what love could be.
Still, was it her fault if she was made that way? Some listen to Beethoven and are moved to tears, some hear only the technical quality of the performance, and still others don’t want to listen at all.
He walked back toward the hotel. I know I came home from Europe resolved to make it work, he said to himself. In a way, I suppose, one might say it is working; this is all, very likely, that most people ever get.
And yet, absurd as it was, he had been envious of Meg, of little Meg, this afternoon. To want like that, and to be getting what one wanted!
Five
The boy Hank lay at the edge of the pool, with the sun burning nicely on skin that had been chilled after a long cold swim. One hand still trailed in the water, while he lay comfortably, letting his thoughts drift. It was nice here at Cousin Meg’s house. He had been coming to the pool every summer, ever since Cousin Meg got married. It wasn’t city like his own house, and not country either, like Uncle Alfie’s, which was wonderful, with horses and hikes up through the woods and a waterfall and fishing in the lake. This was in New Jersey about halfway between Uncle Alfie’s and the city, on a wide curving street with big houses, far apart on lawns as green as the billiard table that Cousin Donal kept in a special room. There was a shady porch with striped awnings; there were flowers and little tables under umbrellas where Cousin Meg served cookies and lemonade. The pool had a hedge around it and the water was blue because the bott
om was painted. There was a brightness over everything on a day like this, and he was happy because summer was just starting.
His eyes traveled across the lawn to where the nursemaid rocked the baby carriage in which Tommy was asleep. Timmy, who was a year older, was sitting in the playpen. Beyond them, the driveway was filled with cars, shiny as black glass. Expensive cars, he thought, wanting to know more about cars. There were always men coming and going at this house, at least whenever he came on a Saturday or school holiday with Ben. Business associates of Cousin Donal’s. He knew about that, because Ben talked pretty freely to him and didn’t treat him as if he were a child who couldn’t be trusted.
He loved being with Ben. It was a year or more ago that he had stopped calling him “Daddy.” He didn’t know why he had; it just seemed more manly to call him Ben, and Ben didn’t mind at all, although his mother thought it wasn’t proper. Ben had said, No, he’s ten years old, he’s almost a man, it’s okay.
Grandpa Dan didn’t treat him like a little boy either, but his grown-up way was different. It was more like teaching, as when he would say serious things, explaining carefully, “You’re old enough to understand.” He loved being with Dan in his laboratory, watching him move about with all his tubes and flasks and wires, his fitting and measuring; he’d seen how connected wires buzzed and sizzled into sparks, and wheels spun around. He’d listened as Dan told about electrical charges in the universe, and how sounds could travel under the ocean or through the air. He could see how you could get so curious about science that you would always want to know more and more.
Often they would go out to lunch together and meet Dan’s friends, who would shake his hand and say, My, he is the spitting image of you, Dan. Hank could see that Dan was a kind of special person to those men. Dan’s downtown friends were poor people, not hungry-poor, but certainly different from the people Ben knew.
Funny how he loved them both, and they were so different.
Once in the park, a boy stole his roller skates. Ben had been very angry. I’d wring his neck if I caught him, he’d said. But Dan said, “Of course, it’s wrong to steal, but you have to try to understand. Where I teach, there are boys who can’t ever have a pair of roller skates, and so when they see some lying around and nobody looking, why you see, the temptation’s just too great.”
