by Warren Adler
"The barn door's closed. It's over. Leave it alone. The more you know, the more you'll shit. Accept it. They worked you over, and they got theirs. Dumb fate did your work for you. There are millions out there who'd like it done like that. Bam! Crash! Down the tube!"
"You don't understand."
He was seeing red now. "You think they were playing potsy? They were fucking you over!" He felt a howl come roaring out of his chest. "They didn't like the home cookin'. Not hers or yours. Don't talk to me about lost trust, commitment, relationships, honesty. When I was a kid, they talked about honor. Shit! You know what you're gonna find in that place? One bed and ten thousand dirty pictures and sheets stained with a million lost kids." He belched. "Except one." Hell, he had tried to do this fellow a favor, but he wouldn't leave it alone. McCarthy felt the rising tide of cruelty. "You've already been hit by a semi. You're about to get hit by a tank."
A frown furrowed Edward's forehead.
Poor bastard, McCarthy thought. Why the hell should he escape the full brunt of it? Share the pain, boys.
"She was pregnant."
"Pregnant?"
The man turned ashen and fell against the back of the booth as if he had been pushed. McCarthy's anger drained.
"Sit next to an Irishman in his cups, and he thinks you're a priest."
He watched as the man took deep breaths, puckering his lips. McCarthy was sobering now, the damage done.
"So," he said, cooling. "The more you know, the more it helps."
"Why...?" Edward began.
"Loose ends." He shrugged. "I told you I don't like mysteries. The stewardess was also pregnant. It gave me an idea. The Medical Examiner ran the test just before we shipped her. A lucky hunch. Hell, it was only the day before yesterday. I might have called you." In a pig's ass, he thought. He got up unsteadily. Case closed. Enough for one evening.
"And the ends? Are they still loose?"
"For you. Not for me. Figure it out."
He started to amble away, unsteadily. Edward came up behind him.
"How long?" he demanded. McCarthy turned and faced him.
"About six weeks. Tell you anything?"
The man swiveled on his heel, moving again.
"Don't blame me," he shouted after him. "I didn't put the poison in the cup!"
23
Still in her coat, Vivien sat on a chair in the kitchen and watched Hamster sniff at the foot of the snowman, which had been yellowed by his incessant piddle. Dark patches emerged where the snow had disappeared, and the large lawn had a scraggly, unhealthy look.
When Hamster began scratching at the door again, her resolve hardened. Hamster was Orson's gift, his choice, and he and Ben had nursed him through puppyhood, which provided absolution for what she was about to do. Opening the door, she let him in. He shot straight to his dish, sniffed, licked the residue from the plastic, then turned to her, tail wagging, his round brown eyes moist with expectation.
"Sorry, pal," she whispered, bending and scooping him up with one hand.
With a firm hand, she had drawn this line in her mind. She hadn't been conscious of any pattern at first. Now it was clearly evident, and she relished the discovery. It wasn't simply a question of justice or even punishment. It was more like an exorcism. What had belonged to Orson, what reflected his point of view, his tastes, his alleged affections, his personal choices and effects, would be trashed. And the line had been advancing with each additional revelation. The Salvation Army had already carted away much of the physical evidence of his life in this house.
Returning home, she had noted immediately that the removal diminished the feeling of his presence. She could, of course, have burned these things. She regarded her decision not to as proof that she had not lost her sense of compassion or humanity. It was, after all, a bonanza for the Salvation Army: a Washington lawyer's smart preppy wardrobe, complete with more than a dozen pairs of shoes; his sports equipment—tennis racket, golf clubs; law journals, random files; writing materials; paper-weights. She had stripped the walls of his study of prints, three carved duck decoys that had come down from some hunting relative, old pipes, his rack, even his coffee mug, the one that literally said His. Everything!
There were other things of his still remaining in the master bedroom: his jewelry (studs, cufflinks), shaving tools, cologne, and aftershave. Not another night must go by with such things in the house.
Now it was Hamster's turn, and she considered the act of disposal a true test of her resolve. She carried him out to the car and put him in the seat beside her. He liked to ride in cars, propped up on his haunches; his eyes roved the passing streets for fellow dogs at whom to bark a greeting.
When she and Orson went out of town in the past, they would send Ben to her parents' and board Hamster at a nearby farm. Often the people who ran the place would take "orphaned" dogs and try to find them compatible homes. It was not, she assured herself, like putting him to sleep.
As she drove into the dirt road that led to the farm, Hamster's body grew tense. His body shivered with fear as he huddled close to her.
"I'll try," the woman who ran the farm said. "But it's not as easy as you think."
"I'll pay for his board for as long as it takes."
"All right. But I can't give you any guarantees."
"I understand perfectly," Vivien said, writing out a check for a month's board.
Exile or death, she thought, experiencing the gnawing malice of her intent. She had deliberately kept the animal from going with Ben and her parents to Vermont. Perhaps later, if he could not be placed, she would develop the courage to put him to sleep, an idea that, despite all the ferocious intensity of her resolve, frightened her.
The telephone was ringing when she got home. She answered it, breathless from running, hoping it would be Edward. It was Dale Martin.
"We've been going over Orson's policies," he began after the amenities. "You'll be quite comfortable. Then there's the suit against the airline...."
She listened with disinterest. Dale was also beyond the line.
"Are you there, Vivien?" Dale asked, after he had droned on without a response from her.
She felt compelled to grunt an acknowledgment.
"You'll be a very comfortable widow, I'm happy to say. The policies alone, including the firm's key man insurance, comes to a tidy seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and you'll undoubtedly get double that when the airlines pay off." He paused. "I know it won't bring Orson back, but it will ease your personal situation, financially speaking."
He seemed to be winding up the conversation, the part that she had been waiting for.
"I want none of it," she said firmly. "Put it all in trust for Ben."
"Will you say that again?"
She did.
"That's nonsense," Dale exploded, then softened quickly. "You're still overwrought, Vivien. You're not thinking rationally. We're talking big bucks."
"I want only the house and my own savings account." They're the only things that are really mine, she thought. It was she who had chosen the house, decorated it, lavished it with her care. "I'm going to sell it." It was impossible to remove Orson's aura completely. With everything else, the house, too, had to go.
"The market is lousy, Vivien. You won't get what it's worth."
"We'll see."
"Look, Vivien, I'm your lawyer—"
"I know. Just set up the trusts. I don't even have to be a trustee."
"You can't be serious. In the will, you are the sole inheritor. Orson set it up to protect you."
Against what, she wondered. Betrayal is not protection. Remain cool, she told herself. Remembering Orson's year of lies buttressed her decision. To take any money from him or his planning would insult her integrity, her self-respect. Accepting his money was like—she groped for the correct words—like validating evil.
"It's not a rational decision, Vivien."
"The client is always the boss." Those were Orson's words, which further inflamed
her. She wanted to expunge that, too. "Just do it my way," she said, and hung up. No debate was necessary. To placate her anger, she went upstairs and confronted the master bedroom. She threw everything that remained of his, willy-nilly, into compacter bags. Despite the denuding of his possessions, the room still reeked of him. She saw his indentation in the mattress. On the night table next to his side of the bed was a row of books he had liked to read to lull him to sleep. Men's books. Seeing them, she recalled how many of his books and records were still in the house. Some of them seemed even more personally his than his clothes. They would be the next to go.
She slid the bags into the compacter and listened to the crushing sounds, to bottles breaking, releasing the mingled scents of cologne and aftershave. Jewelry flattened. He had a little reading lamp for his special use, and she heard the bulb making a popping sound as the compacter's anvil came down. Finally, it was all in one solid rectangle, which she carried out and put in a garbage can. This done, she attacked the books and records, stuffing them into old cartons. She separated the books carefully. Most were his, but the records were mostly hers. It did not amaze her in the least how few of these items were really shared possessions. They had been two strangers living side by side, she thought bitterly as she carried the cartons to the driveway—another bonanza for the Salvation Army.
Yet, despite the fury and thoroughness of her efforts, Orson's presence was still tangible in the house. It was as if his persona permeated the air, like the lingering stench of smoke after a household fire.
By the time she had dragged the last carton outside, it was dark. Still, she was vaguely dissatisfied, and the tension, instead of dissipating, was accelerating. To calm herself, she poured out half a tumbler of whiskey and drank it down in a few quick swallows. It didn't calm her; instead, she began to sob uncontrollably, overcome with an emotion resembling grief. She knew it was not for Orson. Perhaps it was for the old lost life, which had been just fine with her. If it had been without the shattering complexities of love or passion or whatever emotional earthquakes could occur in this life, it was at least serene, calm, tranquil, safe. That was it. Recovering somewhat, she bent low over the sink and washed her face in the water. She felt unsafe, drifting. Who could possibly understand her state of mind? Only Edward.
Reaching for the phone, she dialed his home number. It rang into eternity. Then she hung up in despair. The population of her world was reduced to two. Two survivors. She felt some vague anxiety about his absence. He should have made himself available when she needed him, she thought petulantly. Then she remembered the question she had asked him earlier:
"If she had lived, confessed all, would you have forgiven her?"
"She didn't," he had answered, stating a truth which testified that all transpired events were inexorable and unchanging.
The telephone's ring stabbed into the darkening silence. Edward! No. It was her mother, and she felt a twinge of guilt at her disappointment. She had promised Ben that she would call. Where was Ben? she wondered. On which side of the imaginary line? It was painful to contemplate. Flesh of her flesh. Blood of her blood. If only he were not the image of Orson. A living reminder. Surely such feelings were unnatural. They made her feel very guilty. Yet, she could not deny them. Not to herself.
"Are you all right, darling?" her mother asked.
"Fine. Just getting things settled."
"You must be strong, Vivien."
"I am, Mother."
"Ben is fine," her mother said.
She listened as Ben's day was minutely described, as if each moment of his five-year-old life were precious and eventful. He would be in good hands, she knew. As her mother talked, her mind swirled with images of the clear, sweet winter air, the mountains majestic in their coats of snow, frosty windows, rosy cheeks, her father's pharmacy, where she had spent happy teenage afternoons dispensing malts and exchanging the kind of information that needed no computers to store or impart. Ben would surely thrive in that atmosphere. The image assuaged her guilt.
"Mommy!" It was Ben's voice suddenly intruding. She had hoped to avoid that. A lump sprang into her throat, preventing her from responding.
"Mommy?"
"I'm here, darling," she said, clearing her throat. "Isn't it wonderful up there with Grandma and Grandpa?"
"Will I go home soon?" The words wrenched at her heart. She heard an echo of Orson's voice, and it jolted her.
"You just be a good boy, Ben," she said, shocked at her own reaction.
"But when will I go home, Mommy?" Ben said. "I want to be with you and Hamster."
It was too awful to put into words, she knew. Too awful to confront. Too illogical and unnatural and hateful and obscene. I can't help myself, she wanted to cry out. When she spoke again, her voice was tremulous.
"Mommy has some things she must do"—she hesitated—"first." The extent of her hypocrisy and evasion startled her. Orson's legacy, she told herself. He had crushed her instincts, tangled her emotions. She heard Ben's voice, but she could not find the courage to respond.
"Are you all right, dear?" her mother asked in that gentle, concerned tone that had nursed her through childhood sicknesses and the routine traumas of a young girl's life, always a sure-fire remedy. But not now. With Ben off the phone, she regained her composure.
"A little strained, Mother."
"You shouldn't be there alone."
"I need this time, Mother." She caught the insistence in her tone.
"I'm not pressing you, dear. We'll keep Ben for as long as you like." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "He's fine. Really he is." She paused, faltered, cleared her throat. Vivien felt the psychic inspection. The woman could always sense danger. Hadn't she called immediately after the plane crash? The thought brought back the full impact of the betrayal, inflaming her again with a monstrous anger. The fury of it roared back on the winds of recent memory.
They had just been up for the Christmas holidays. Was it only a few weeks ago? It seemed like eons. The holidays? The joyous reminder retreated in her mind, stoking the ashes of the smoldering anger.
He had left the day after Christmas and had returned the day before New Year's Eve. Searching the pattern of past Christmas holidays, in which he stayed the entire time, she remembered that he had done this for the past two Christmases. Busy stuff at the office, he had told her, and it had meant nothing to her, hardly a blip on the screen of her security. He had been so devilishly clever, so devious. The full fury of her humiliation roared back at her. Orson had trampled on her most highly prized virtue: her sense of trust. He had had to deceive not only her and Ben but her parents, abusing their admiration and pride in Orson as a son-in-law. In a way, the deception had even encapsulated their town, Vermont, and New England, defaming the images and memories that she held so dear. And the Christmas spirit as well, its goodness and innocence.
"I think maybe you should register Ben in day school, Mother."
"Day school?"
"I think that would be best." She waited as the implication settled in her mother's mind.
"You don't think that would be disruptive?" Her mother's tone brightened. "Unless you're planning to come up and be with us?"
"I've made no plans," she said, conscious of her coldness.
"He's your child," her mother said with a sigh. "Please remember that." Vivien remained deliberately silent, waiting for her mother to continue, certain of her reaction. "Of course, I'll do whatever you say. I suppose it will be the best thing for him under the circumstances."
"Yes, it will, Mother." She drew a deep breath. Before she said good-bye, she said, "And kiss Ben for me." How often would she be saying that? she wondered.
She hung up and lay back on the couch, looking at the ceiling, fighting off the phantoms of guilt. Of course, she had Orson's memory to help her with that.
24
Edward was thankful that the streets leading back to the Rayburn Building were deserted. It was not danger that concerned him. He was already a victim
. Inexplicably, his principal fear was that others would notice his shame. He had to see Vivien. Only Vivien could share this new knowledge. Only Vivien would understand. He passed a phone booth, started to dial her number, then aborted the call.
The information was too raw. It needed time to be sifted, mulled over, sorted out, perhaps softened. He did not want to overburden her with both the hurt and the complexity of dealing with it. It might have too many implications that would associate the pain with him, the way he now felt about McCarthy, who was, after all, only the bearer of the awful message.
There was also something terribly personal about the information—all those biological implications, the phenomenon of procreation. He had always been put off by the clinical details of conception. Yet between couples, he and Lily included, the subject and practice was unavoidable. Wasn't creating life, progeny, a central issue in a marriage?
By the time he reached his car in the parking lot, he could not bear the thought of going home. Home was no longer a concept that existed; it was hardly even a place. Tomorrow, he decided, he would give notice, sell everything but the clothes on his back. In his heart he felt a malevolent desire to set the place afire, obliterate all evidence of his life with Lily.
What McCarthy had told him had to be shared with Vivien. She could not, nor would she want to, be spared the knowledge. It was part of the truth. And wasn't the truth going to be the ultimate cure? He called her from a phone in the parking lot. She answered on the first ring, as if she had been waiting.
"I must see you," he said.
"Of course."
He was greatly relieved. She gave him careful directions to her house.
"Have you eaten?"
"No." Swallowing, he tasted the sour backwash of the Scotch.
"I'll pull something together."
"Brace yourself," he said before he hung up. It was unfair, gratuitous. She had offered no response. Brace herself for what? It seemed a male dilemma. Whose child was it? He searched his mind for answers, some definitive certainty. Finding none, he concentrated on his driving, observing that he had not yet reached the edge of sobriety.
