Gaits of Heaven

by Susan Conant

  “Let’s reassemble,” said Rita. As people drifted back to their seats, she said, “Let me summarize. We’re dealing here with two sets of alliances that were ruptured. Ted and Johanna’s marriage, and Monty and Eumie’s. The divorces left a great deal of anger. Monty’s anger at Ted, Johanna’s at Eumie, and anger of each former partner at the other. The anger of the children. Wyeth’s at Eumie and at his father, Caprice’s at Ted. And the conflict between the stepchildren. This is a family, I think, in which it’s difficult to see the alliances, but they’re here. Ted and Eumie had a strong alliance, really, a kind of enmeshment, as it’s called, so that they were, as I see it, aimed at becoming the same person. In that unit, they even included their dog, Dolfo. As we all know, Eumie’s death suddenly disrupted that enmeshment and, with it, the whole family system. Each child has a powerful alliance with the parent of the opposite sex, Wyeth with Johanna, Caprice with Monty, even though that’s also a distant relationship. And we find powerful alliances with therapists, each individual with one or more people outside the family. Another unit in this family is, as I see, prescription medication. In effect, the people living in this house had attachments of a sort to that unit, which really functioned as a member of the family, a member about which everyone agreed, a member with which every person was deeply involved. Now, we’ll separate into four subgroups. And what we’re going to do in these groups is try to come up with recommendations to share with everyone, guidelines for this family and its support system to use in planning what we can do to promote healthy, normal alliances where those are possible and to avoid some of the painful conflicts we’re seeing.”

  “All one big, happy family,” Caprice said cynically.

  “Not at all. One source of difficulty here has to do with boundaries. It may be that the outcome you decide on will be to set strict limits about involvement with other members of the family, including severing some relationships entirely.”

  “Individuation,” said Ted. “But before we separate, I’d like to say a word about the role of trauma here. And a few words about Eumie, who is still with us in spirit. We need to acknowledge the part played by her trauma in our family life.”

  “Bullshit!” The speaker was Caprice. “Ted, if you’re talking about that undertaker story—”

  “Caprice, it’s no story. Your maternal grandfather was an undertaker, as you know, and you also know that when his wife, Eumie’s mother, died, he himself—”

  “He himself,” said Caprice, “was an electrician! Eumie’s father was not an undertaker. Therefore, he was hardly in a position to embalm his own wife.”

  “Denial,” said Ted, “is a normal phase, Caprice. We don’t want to believe that these terrible events really happened to ourselves or our loved ones, so we deny that they did.”

  “Genealogy sites on the Web,” said Caprice, “happen to include a lot of city directories. Old directories. They usually have information about occupations. Professions. Repeat! Mommy’s father was not an undertaker. He was an electrician. Electricians do not embalm people. Therefore, her father did not embalm her mother.”

  “Caprice, every family has its secrets. It’s normal. Johanna doesn’t tell people about her eye job. Ai-ai-ai! Johanna, I’ve let it out! Not that you ever needed cosmetic surgery.”

  Before Johanna could respond, Rita intervened. “We’re about to break into subgroups, and I want to say with regard to family secrets that this is a family with what appear to be a great many. On the one hand, this family has a lot of blurring going on, blurring of boundaries between parents and children, therapists and patients, even people and dogs. And complicating all that is this business of who knows what about whom, and those secrets create their own unhealthy kinds of boundaries and unhealthy alliances. So, in these meetings, the rule is going to be that everyone will refrain from telling secrets that can’t be shared with this entire group. Okay. Everyone who has prescribed medication for anyone in the family is going to meet with Dr. Youngman in the kitchen, please. The three parents, Monty, Ted, and Johanna, are going to meet here with me. Ms. Cohen and Lieutenant Dennehy, you’re going to meet with us, too. The children, Wyeth and Caprice, are going to be with their therapists, Dr. York and Dr. Zinn. Perhaps you could use the family room. And those of you concerned with Dolfo, maybe you could meet in the backyard. That’s you, Holly, and Dr. Leibowitz and Dr. McBane. And those of you who don’t fit into these subgroups, just stay here in the living room, please.”

  For once, I was frustrated to find myself in the dog group, which felt like the dog-show class known as American-Bred, which draws a small entry and is thus less competitive than the big Open class. Furthermore, it lacks the prestige of Bred-by-Exhibitor, which is, as its name suggests, limited to dogs handled by the people who bred them. American-Bred, I reminded myself, had its uses; for instance, a dog who might be overlooked among all the others in Open could win American-Bred and subsequently defeat the winners of the other classes to go Winners Dog, then maybe Best of Winners and even Best of Breed. Indeed, all the world is a dog show, and all the men and women…except that we weren’t actually here to compete, were we? Anyway, by the time Barbara, George, Dolfo, and I were in the backyard, I felt that I was where I belonged. Oona Sundquist, George’s lawyer, had remained in the living room; George hadn’t even tried to get her to accompany us. Barbara and I took seats on one bench, and George sat opposite us on another. Dolfo was sniffing the grass in the area between the benches.

  Barbara smiled at me and said, “Dolfo. Oh, my. Dolfo. Well, aesthetic considerations aside, there’s nothing inherently wrong with him. He wants desperately to be a good dog.”

  “Don’t we all,” said George. “Me, for example.”

  Looking at me, Barbara said, “The touching thing about Dolfo is that his lovely temperament has somehow survived, triumphed, really. He loves other dogs. He’s sweet and friendly with everyone. And he’s perfectly trainable.”

  “That’s my impression, too,” I said. “He doesn’t jump on me. He sits for me. Have you had him in a crate?”

  “He’s fine! Give him the least little thing to occupy him, and he’s perfectly happy in his crate. And at my house, where I watch him every second, he’s had only one accident.”

  “Our house,” said George. “Where we watch him.”

  “There are two problems here.” I pointed to Ted’s house. “Well, more than two. But one is that it would be almost impossible to remove the odor. It’s everywhere. Wherever Dolfo sniffs, there’s a stimulus that prompts him to overmark. It isn’t as if you could completely deodorize a few areas where he’s gone before. You’d have to steam clean everything and spray the whole house with enzymes and air it all out. And the other problem is habit. Housebreaking is so easy if you can prevent the dog from ever going in the house.”

  “Habits,” said Barbara, “are the worst! But with Dolfo, the habit is established here, at Ted and Eumie’s. He doesn’t transfer it to my house as much as you’d think. So, there’s a lot of hope for Dolfo. The problem is Ted.”

  “Barbara, there’s hope for all of us,” said George.

  “Ted is very motivated,” I said.

  “So am I,” said George.

  “He really loves Dolfo.”

  George said, “Barbara, I worship you.”

  “I hate to say this,” I said, “but Ted and Eumie were basically colluding to block any effort to change Dolfo’s behavior. Without Eumie, there’s a better chance of making progress than there was when she was alive.”

  Barbara nodded in agreement. “And Ted would pay whatever it took. There must be a decontamination company he could hire, the kinds of people who clean up after industrial accidents, environmental disasters, that sort of thing.”

  I said, “And a dog trainer other than me. Someone who has no connection to the family.”

  “A fresh start,” said George. “Decontamination. Barbara, I’m an environmental disaster, but I’m very motivated.”

  “Look,” I
said, “could the two of you possibly talk about what you’re talking about? To each other? I’m a dog trainer. I’m out of my depth.”

  “The squirrels were driving her crazy,” George said. “Barbara, they were. You complained about them all the time. You kept running out yelling at them. You were banging on the windows. They chewed up the window frame when you put that feeder there.”

  Barbara said, “If a living creature bothers me, that doesn’t mean that I want it poisoned. It just means that I wish it would stop bothering me. Ted bothers me. Eumie bothered me. I don’t like to see a dog being ruined. But am I going to poison Ted? Did I sneak into their house and poison Eumie? Of course not!”

  “Eumie wasn’t poisoned,” George said.

  “What do you call an overdose?” Barbara demanded. Her tone was sharp, but she was addressing George. “Maybe his lawyer should be here after all,” she then said to me, “instead of back inside where she can keep an eye on Lieutenant Dennehy.”

  “Barbara, I did not murder Eumie. Squirrels are not human beings.”

  “They are living things.”

  “So are rats. Cockroaches. Fleas. Mosquitos.”

  “Squirrels,” said Barbara, “don’t transmit disease.”

  “Neither do rats.”

  “Yes, they do.”

  “Barbara, the point is that everyone draws the line somewhere. Now, I knew you wouldn’t approve, and that’s why I didn’t tell you, but I did it for you. I love the pleasure you take in feeding birds. I watch you when you’re filling the feeders and keeping your lists of the species you see in our yard, and you’re so beautiful. The squirrels were your enemies. That’s how I saw it. They were like fleas on a dog. Barbara, I know I never should’ve done it. It was stupid, stupid, stupid.”

  “It wasn’t just stupid. It was cruel.”

  “This is none of my business and totally outside my field of expertise,” I said, “so please tell me if I’m out of line. But I can’t help noticing that the two of you are still living together. That’s a good sign, maybe. And we’ve mentioned decontamination. A fresh start. George, I honestly think that your perspective has changed and that you really are sorry. Barbara, I’m sure he really will never do anything like this again.”

  “Never,” said George. “Barbara, if there were anything I could do…”

  “Such as what? To the best of my knowledge, even the best intentions won’t restore life to the dead, George.”

  “What I’ve been wondering,” I said hesitantly, “is whether there’s a possibility of redemption. And room for some compromise. Barbara, maybe if you agreed to some new policy about the squirrels at your feeders. Tolerate them? Even feed them. And George, you just said that if there were anything you could do…well, I wonder whether the two of you might be able to think of something.”

  George said, “Barbara, you need new bird feeders. With baffles. And we can get squirrel feeders. It’s what I should’ve done instead.”

  Barbara looked eager to speak. The second George finished, she said with great emphasis, “Urban wildlife.” She paused and then repeated the phrase in a tone of surprise and wonder as if it were a treasure she had discovered and was eager to display. Look what I’ve found! Urban wildlife! “George, the urban wildlife groups always need volunteers. In fact, I’ve thought about volunteering, not just donating, but—”

  George rose from his bench, stood in front of Barbara, and held out both hands.

  She took them in hers. “We could,” she said. “We could both volunteer.” Tears were running down her cheeks. George began to sob.

  I know when to disappear. I did.

  CHAPTER 47

  In my eagerness to give the reconciling couple the privacy they needed, I made straight for the steps to the deck. Only as I entered the family room did I realize that I’d given no thought to where I was going. In any case, I couldn’t stay where I was. Wyeth was slumped down in one of the big leather chairs, and Peter York, Missy Zinn, and Caprice were engaged in an intense discussion. As I passed through the room, I caught only fragments.

  “…no reason the two of you ever need…,” Missy was saying. Then Caprice spoke angrily about the trip to Russia that Ted and Wyeth were to take in July.

  It happens now and then that two dogs in the same household or kennel come to hate the sight of each other so violently that they must be kept completely apart. At a guess, this group would offer the recommendation that Caprice and Wyeth have no contact with each other. I gave the matter only a moment’s thought. My attention belonged elsewhere, as did I.

  By elsewhere, I refer, of course, to dogs and specifically to Sammy and Lady, who had suddenly started to make noise. Pointers can and do bark in the normal fashion usually rendered as woof-woof or ruff-ruff. Alaskan malamutes are capable of barking, but they also produce yips and growls and howls, weirdly feline purrs, and the long strings of syllables that malamute fanciers refer to as “talking” because intonation marks these utterances as assertions, questions, exclamations, interjections, or commands. The most characteristic malamute syllable, woo, attains its maximum aesthetic potential when emitted repeatedly and operatically in an ecstatic woo-woo-woo-woo!

  At the moment, Sammy was not delivering himself of the malamute Ode to Joy. He was speaking rather than singing, but I couldn’t tell what he meant. Something’s up, perhaps? Lady was adding high-pitched, nervous barks that expressed agitation, excitement, or fear. I was more puzzled than alarmed. Both dogs were crated. Steve’s van was locked. It was hard to imagine what was triggering the outburst. Another dog? Maybe a loose dog had decided to sniff around the van or even jump on it. In any case, the dogs needed to be quiet. Peter and Missy were already throwing me questioning glances.

  I hurried out of the family room and through the kitchen, where the prescribing physicians were meeting. Vee Foote was once again shaking a pill from a prescription bottle into her hand. “Dander,” she explained in a thick voice.

  “Vee, are you sure you’re not overdoing it?” Quinn Youngman asked. He began to say something about antihistamines.

  When I’d passed through the front hall and reached the porch, I paused for a second not only to put on my shoes but to prop the door open with someone’s leather clog so that I wouldn’t lock myself out. From my vantage point, I saw no sign of a roving dog or of anyone or anything else near Steve’s van, but my view was blocked by the gigantic Lexus and the BMW in Ted’s cobblestoned parking area.

  “Hey, guys!” I called out as I rushed down the stairs. “Enough! I’m coming.” I wasn’t worried. My only concern was that the dogs were annoying people; I want my dogs to be a source of pleasure to everyone or, failing that, to refrain from being a source of even the slightest displeasure. By the time I was in back of the van, the dogs were silent. I stopped for a second to get the keys out of my pocket and heard what sounded like a woman’s voice coming from inside the van. The radio? The van was old, but the radio worked. It had certainly never turned itself on.

  And it hadn’t this time. When I reached the side of the van, I saw that the sliding door was open about three inches and that the interior lights were on. I had locked that door. I knew I had. Could Steve have inexplicably left his veterinary meeting and for some unknown reason decided to come here to Ted’s and…? The explanation made no sense. And a set of keys dangled from the lock in the van’s door. Steve never left his keys in the lock. I slid open the door to discover the last person I expected to see, namely, Steve’s horrible ex-wife, Anita the Fiend, who was kneeling on the floor in front of Lady’s crate. Anita, who hated this van, despised dogs, and really had it in for helpless little Lady!

  “What the hell are you doing?” I demanded.

  She turned to face me, and even before she spoke, I realized that there was something wrong with her. Well, there had to be. She hated dogs, yet here she was in Steve’s van with two of our dogs. But she looked peculiar, too. Her eyes had that brightness I’d noticed when I’d seen her in the afternoon
, and her long blond hair was wild and tangled. She was dressed entirely in white: white silk shell, white canvas pants, white shoes with three-inch heels. Even I, with my limited fashion sense, saw that the dressy sleeveless top and the high heels didn’t go with the casual pants. Furthermore, although the evening was cool, the silk shell had sweat stains at the armpits. It’s said of tall, slim, beautiful, fashionable women like Anita that they look like models. Anita really did; she always looked ready to be photographed for Vogue. Or she always had.

  When she spoke, her speech was so rapid that I had to listen closely to understand her. “I’m thinking about getting a dog. A dog! I’m seeing them with new eyes. The eyes have it! The ayes! Ai-ai-ai! With green eyes, like Steve’s. How lucky that I kept his keys! On key and off key. Tequila. Steve doesn’t like it. But he loves me. He lusts after me. I’m beautiful, you see. I have the face that launched a thousand ships. Helen! Why the hell didn’t my parents name me Helen? From now on, I am Helen of Troy. No! A hair dryer! It’s a brand of hair dryer. I don’t need it. My hair is beautiful as it is. It reaches out to catch the vibrations of the universe.”