Chapter 31
There were times when everything was quiet.
There were times, now, when the gnawing and the nagging seemed to cease, and one did not feel hungry at all.
Times when they talked. Listened.
Nona was telling about herself, her childhood, schooling. Tess listened.
Nona had listened, in her turn. She knew about Tess Rogan’s childhood, schooling, life. Middle-class, moderately well-to-do, the same excitements of children, business, family, community—illnesses that came and went. Nothing odd.
“I went to the great city,” Nona was saying, in her own turn, “as soon as I was old enough, because I was young. Oh, the world was my oyster. I didn’t know exactly how I was going to open it and get the pearl, but I was going to do it. It seems to me, now, that I knew who I was, in those days.”
She brooded a while; then went on. “I fell in love. Married Val. I thought, I don’t know what. It wasn’t going to be an ordinary marriage.” She fell silent.
“I wonder what that is,” mused Tess. “An ‘ordinary’ marriage? A man and a woman—some, you know, do get in touch with each other. They let each other be and are let be. One-plus-one is more than two. It’s not arithmetic.”
“No,” said Nona. (Oh, what a little fool I was in those days, she thought, writhing.)
“Some are deeply divorced from the beginning,” Tess mourned. “They pretend. They never touch, never add up. And some do, only sometimes. I don’t know what is ‘ordinary.’”
Nona had begun to weep. “When you have been half of two and a good two and he dies—then you are less than half,” she sobbed. “You are nothing.”
Tess said, “Well, you can’t go back. You won’t be that girl who thought the world was her oyster. Never that one, again.”
“I know. I don’t want that. But then, who am I?”
Tess didn’t answer.
“Don’t detach,” wept Nona. “Help me. Tell me.”
“How can I tell you?”
“You believe in God?” flared Nona. “Why does God do it? Leave the women? Seventeen widows! Leftover. Nothings. Did He make us tougher because we had to bear the children? And so we survive? Is that it?”
Tess said, “What kind of God sets loose some rules and then is helpless and surprised at the way they turn out?”
“But what is the purpose?” Nona cried.
“I’d have to say ‘God knows,’ whatever ‘to know’ may mean in the divine context. ‘Purpose’ may be just a human idea, too. Incomplete.”
“You’ve gone off in a cloud.” Nona wept.
“We are ideally set up, here at Sans Souci …”
“Oh, what are you saying? Ideally!” Nona mopped her face with her skirt.
“We certainly are not to bear and raise children,” Tess said. “We’ve done all that. Obviously, most of us are not going to contribute to the economy or produce many goods. Not any more. Well, but there are some poor old women who aren’t so lucky They still have to earn. Or, by some tragedy, they must raise babies when they are not really spry enough.”
“I can’t understand you. You are too detached. That isn’t human!”
“Whereas you,” snapped Tess, “want to draw a map of the whole universe and spot yourself on it, and understand just where you are, just who, and just why. You are going to create a universe? That isn’t human, if you ask me. I say that to see, flat and plain, what is—that’s a good deal less detached than what you try to do. All right, my dear. Certainly you are what you see and hear, that is so. In so far as it is so, you do create your universe. But I say the real universe is there and is real, all the same. One should take notice.” Tess brooded.
“I want to do right,” Nona sniffled.
“You want to be able to figure out what is right,” Tess corrrected. “Yes, and I can’t. I don’t seem to …” “Don’t get the Laws of Man mixed up with the Laws of God.”
“What do you mean?”
“Man says you mustn’t walk down the street in your underwear,” grinned Tess. “Do you think God would mind?”
Nona’s tears turned to laughter and made hysteria. “… not a s-sin,” she sputtered.
“Three things I’m sure we ought to strive against,” murmured Tess. “Anxiety is one.”
“Anxiety! A sin?”
“Jesus advised against it.”
Nona was stopped. She couldn’t reply and her mind did not seem to be moving. People didn’t speak of Jesus, like this. Not people she knew.
“Anger, that’s another,” Tess went on. “Three A’s. Makes a way to remember them. The third A is Acting. Play-acting. Or, in the King James’s, hypocrisy.” Tess massaged her arm. ‘“All those three keep nagging at the young,” she added in a moment. “But the seventeen of us might conquer them. Now. We don’t need to invent for ourselves a role. Or try, as the young must try, to fit ourselves into the patterns of man’s devising. We don’t mind if we do, either. We’ve had all that.”
They were silent for a long time.
Nona stirred. “Tess, what is faith?”
“Not facing yourself to believe against the evidence or without any,” said Tess promptly. “Faith is the evidence. It is that-which-stands-under—the substance, you know.”
“St. Paul?” said Nona.
“I think you’ve hit it,” said Tess warmly. “That’s what we are after, now that we have been through the regular mill. We needn’t succeed or get money or win foot races. We really needn’t be too terribly respectable, either. We are free.”
Nona stared at the white floor.
“The pearl isn’t in the oyster,” Tess said. “Not the pearl of great price.”
Nona huddled there. She felt crushed and numb and stupefied.
“The Gospel according to Tess Rogan,” said Tess loudly, “and all mine and not necessarily yours. I feel very ill, Nona. My legs ache, and my back … forgive me …” She did not finish.
Nona’s mood peeled off and fell away and she sprang out of it as if she had dropped a cloak behind her. “Now, Tess,” she said bossily, “you lie back and relax as best you can. Turn a little. There. Let me massage where the ache is.”
She thought, It must be getting toward night. Again!
“Your hand?” Tess murmured.
“I have another hand,” said Nona.
About four P.M. that Saturday afternoon, the Unholy Three appeared in the lobby all together. They were going out. In the opinion of Felice Paull, Ida Milbank needed entertainment. Her mind, what there was left of it, must be fed something to think about. So they were going to a motion picture. They were going to catch the last show before the prices changed.
Agnes Vaughn had been uprooted for this purpose.
The three of them, all clad in black, were proceeding past the desk. Felice Paull swayed along with her usual majestic tread, Ida Milbank shuffled her feet, and Agnes Vaughn, the Dean of these, waddled. In through the glass doors just then came two clad in light. There was Mrs. Fitz, the opposition Dean herself, all in soft mauve, her white hair shining, and Georgia Oliver (so fair), in palest pink, attended her.
Morgan Lake found himself bracing for the impact of this meeting. But nothing happened.
The two in light colors came slowly in. The three in black stood aside. The impudent curiosity in Agnes Vaughn’s eye was ignored by Mrs. Fitz, who moved in her private serenity on her own path. The air billowed. Auras clashed. But nothing really happened.
Then Felice Paull’s weight wagged the glass door. Ida nipped through with her silly giggle. Agnes Vaughn, with a rather surprising air of sadness and resignation, hobbled after.
Mrs. Fitz bowed to Morgan Lake with Victorian graciousness as she went by. Little adorable old lady. Morgan Lake found himself compelled, by the power of suggestion, by tradition, by he knew not what, to return her bow by a most respectful inclination of his head.
But when the lobby was empty again, he found himself shaken by a strange question.
An Angel of Light had passed by an Angel of Darkness.
But—which was which?
Chapter 32
The following morning, Sunday, not one person from Sans Souci went to church.
Caroline Buff, of course, never did. She went to Temple on Friday nights. But ordinarily, at least some of the widows went to some church on a Sunday.
Leila Hull, who was a Catholic, used to go. She was not here. Elna Ames had gone faithfully. Ida Milbank had been a Catholic once, but she had lost track of all that.
Agnes Vaughn professed to be a Baptist, but she very seldom got out. Felice Paull was, in her own opinion, a most pious woman but she could not approve of some of the things that went on within an organized religion. So the Unholy Three did not go.
This Sunday, Bettina Goodenough did not “feel like” going to church. She had bought some silly little things at the Farmers’ Market, after all, and she could not imagine sitting in a pew and handing the collection plate along, having dropped in nothing. No. She would be ashamed!
Sarah Lee Cunneen said, lazily, that if Bettina wasn’t going she thought she’d sleep in, too.
Harriet Gregory who sometimes was able to attach herself to one churchgoing group or another (without much discrimination) wasn’t going alone. And nobody had asked her.
Joan Braverman and Kitty Forrest were still spiraling around and around. Church didn’t even occur to them. One went, well-dressed, to church, to be seen and be counted.
Ursula Fitzgibbon was not feeling quite strong enough this morning. It was rather an ordeal to dress, to go, to sit so long. Georgia Oliver, of course, would not leave her. She would fix a dainty brunch. They would just relax.
So Sans Souci was dead as a doornail, Sunday morning. Between its walls were worries and fears, sloth and boredom. There were the fat Sunday papers.
“The mercy of God …” Tess Rogan was saying in a voice that frightened Nona Henry.
“Yes,” Nona said softly. She touched the old woman’s forehead. She had not used the clinical thermometer. To know whether there was fever, or how much, was not useful. Nothing could be done about it except what she had already done.
“By the mercy of God, there’s such a thing as healing.”
“Hush.”
“With all your heart and all your mind and all your strength and all your soul,” Tess murmured on. “How I used to worry at that! When I was your age, Nona. How I struggled!”
“I imagine,” Nona said. She had heated the room by the simple expedient of filling the bathtub with hot water. It was not chilly, at all, and Tess was lying down.
“How do you make yourself love God?” Tess went on. “And what is it that you must love? What did He mean by ‘love’? And how to do it? Oh, I struggled …”
“I know,” said Nona. (She did not know. She was afraid.)
“Then one day”—Tess turned her head—”I just quit. I can’t understand, I said. I don’t know anything about it. God or love or how. I just can’t do it. I’ve tried and I won’t try, any more.”
Nona’s jaw felt tight. Tess smiled at the wall. “After that,” she said, “you know, Nona, it just seeped in, just came into me. I did … and I just did. I do … and I just do. But there is no telling anyone how it is done.” The old woman sighed and her mouth seemed to begin to chew on nothing.
“How about loving thy neighbor?” said Nona almost flippantly, because she was so frightened. “That’s a problem. How about Harriet Gregory? Darned if I’d know how to go about loving her,” She smoothed back a tuft of the old woman’s hair.
“She doesn’t want you to,” said Tess sadly. “She just wants to be admired.”
“So does Mrs. Fitz,” said Nona rather sharply.
Tess said, “Forgive me?”
“Oh, mercy,” said Nona. “What are you saying, Tess? There is nothing …”
“Then you do forgive me,” Tess said with satisfaction. “You’ve forgotten how I chose to go and stay in your apartment. And I did choose.”
Nona felt pleasure.
“But do you see what it is to forgive?”
“Tell me,” said Nona. She wasn’t sure whether the old woman ought to be talking so much. But what else was there to do?
“Not enough to say to the one who did you harm, ‘I am willing to bear the pain.’ No. No. Vain. Vain. To forgive is just to be healed of the hurt given. It’s you who have to give up being hurt. Then, as you forgive, by the mercy of God you are healed. It’s all tied together …” Tess fell to mumbling.
Nona discovered herself to be in a fierce, silent dialogue with Whatever might hear and respond. “Don’t let her be sick! Please heal her!” (Nothing spoke but she somehow answered.) “No, I don’t mean to remind You to be just, although I can’t see that she deserves to suffer.” … “No, I’m not vowing that if You do this for me I’ll do something for You.” Nona was going through a series of peelings-off, layer after layer. She didn’t call this prayer. “I can’t do anything for You!” she cried silently into and unto the Unknown. “How could I? It’s all Your mercy that I even am!”
A clamp in her mind let go, suddenly. “Have mercy on Mrs. Fitz. Have mercy on me. Oh Lord, have mercy on Tess Rogan and heal her. Because … No cause … Mercy’s for no reason. It is free. It is love. Yes, I see …”
The formed words sped off into distances inconceivable and then they were gone out of her.
Tess said, “I’m feeling sleepy.”
“Shall I turn off the light?” said Nona, immediately responsive. The gaunt old face was settling to serenity.
“Please.”
“All right.”
Nona got up from where she had been kneeling. She arranged the shower-curtain coverlet over Tess, a little higher. She turned off the light and laid herself down upon the hard floor, and pulled her end of the curtain over.
Her cheek went down upon a towel.
In the dark Tess said, “Sleep well.”
“You, too.”
Nona lay still. Strange, that fierce prayer or whatever it had been, was over and done, and now here she was lying, a thinning hungry body in an extremity, and all was deeply familiar. A body. So, muscles forced to relax because the hard floor would not. So body, seeking rest …
Primitive. Direct. “Like camping,” thought Nona, “and we are all countrywomen.”
During the Sunday afternoon some of the widows stirred, in and out. Four of them met in the patio.
So it happened that Sarah Lee Cunneen cried out to Caroline Buff, “You mean to say you’ve never been to the Farmers’ Market! Why, Mrs. Buff!”
“I have heard about it,” said Caroline Buff. “I would like to go.”
“Let us take you, then.” Sarah Lee went bursting along, taking no notice of the slight stiffening of Bettina Goodenough’s neck. “We’d just as leave go again. Why not? Listen! Maybe tomorrow?”
“It would be good of you,” said Mrs. Buff with some enthusiasm.
“Monday’s a good day. Not so crowded, either. Let’s make a date. Bettina has a car. No trouble at all.”
“I’d be free to go tomorrow,” said Mrs. Buff glancing at Bettina. Her fine cool eyes went on to look at Harriet Gregory. “Mrs. Gregory too?”
Harriet said, “I don’t think so.” Her face formed the travesty of a smile that was “good breeding” plastered over a distinctly projected standoffishness. “Excuse me.” Harriet swung away, nose up.
“How about it?” said Sarah Lee in her husky voice. “The three of us, then …” Her hand moved, indicating that Harriet Gregory never mattered. “About ten o’clock, say?” Sarah Lee didn’t quite kowtow to wealth but she was, nevertheless, rather pleased to think that there was something they could do for and with Caroline Buff.
“Perhaps, since you have only just been there …” Caroline Buff looked at Bettina Goodenough again. “Some other time?”
“Listen!” But Sarah Lee’s voice died.
“I am already obliged to you ladies,” Mrs. Buff sa
id smoothly. “Will you let me take you both to dinner, tomorrow evening?”
“O.K. by me,” cried Sarah Lee in her vulgar way. “But I don’t know what you mean, obliged.”
“I did appreciate the invitation to your party,” said Caroline Buff, “even though I wasn’t able to be there. Now, shall we meet in the lobby, say, about a quarter of five? I suggest an early hour because I have in mind a very delightful restaurant on La Cienega.” She glanced at Bettina once more. “We can take a taxicab.”
“Ye Gods!” cried Sarah Lee. “That’s ridiculous! All the way to La Cienega? Would cost a fortune! Bettina has a car.”
Bettina began to laugh. “Of course, I have a car. Very glad, Mrs. Buff. Ha. Ha.”
“How very nice that you run a car,” said Caroline Buff. “How very kind of you to say you’ll take us. It would be more convenient.”
“Listen!” howled Sarah Lee in joy.
“No trouble at all,” said Bettina. “Ha. Ha.”
“You know, she’s very nice,” said Sarah Lee confidentially, a bit later. “Say, maybe she’ll ask us in, eh? I’d like to see her place. They say she’s got carpets that thick.”
Bettina kept laughing.
Bettina Goodenough knew for a fact that there was not enough gasoline in her car to take them all the way to the great cluster of fine restaurants on La Cienega Boulevard, in Los Angeles, and back again. She had no credit card. She had no money. What she had was a bit of ham in her refrigerator and other odds and ends of food that she surmised would last until her next dividend check came in. She did not know what she was going to do.
One thing she would not do. She would not ask Caroline Buff to buy the gasoline. Another thing, she would not explain to Sarah Lee Cunneen, either. She did not want to do that. Sarah Lee would be so quick, too quick: “Well, for Pete’s sakes, why didn’t you tell me? Listen!” Bettina Goodenough did not want anyone’s charity.
Seventeen Widows of Sans Souci Page 30
