Random Hearts

by Warren Adler

  In the dark there was not much he could see of the outside of the house, except that it was rather large, set back, and surrounded by tall, dark evergreens. He felt a twinge of jealousy. Orson was more successful than himself, obviously wealthier.

  Before he could ring the bell, she opened the door and ushered him in. She seemed to survey him purposefully, inspecting him for hints of information. He let her do it, offering a shrug and a smile.

  "It doesn't ever end," he said.

  "Someday, maybe."

  He took off his coat. Entering the living room, he looked for the bar. Some bottles stood on a cart.

  "Help yourself."

  "I've been on Scotch tonight. With an Irishman in an Irish bar, drinking Scotch."

  He felt like blurting it out. Instead, he drank half of what he had poured.

  "I've been separating the wheat from the chaff," she said, explaining what she had done about Orson's things, his clothes, and the dog.

  "The dog, too!" he exclaimed.

  "It was more his than mine."

  "I know what you mean. I'm giving up the apartment."

  If she had heard, she gave no sign, absorbed in her own enmity.

  "Also the insurance. I've declined the insurance and everything that comes out of any suits. I'm going cold turkey."

  It hadn't occurred to him as yet.

  "It makes me feel cleansed," she said. He sat down. From the kitchen came the pungent odor of food cooking. "Meatloaf," she said, noticing his interest. "I'm sorry. It's all I had in the freezer." She had poured herself a sherry and sat opposite him, waiting. "I've braced myself," she said, offering a wan smile.

  He plunged ahead. There was no point in small talk. First must come the overriding consideration. Finding out. Knowing. A relationship had been built on this mutual purpose. On that alone. Hadn't it? His questioning surprised him. He felt an odd tremor of longing, which he dismissed. Longing for what? For whom?

  "I was with McCarthy, the detective. I wanted to know how to go ahead with this thing with the keys. You know—to find out how one goes about it." He was stumbling, inarticulate, feeling her eyes on him. He felt ashamed and wanted to tell her to look away.

  "Dammit, Viv," he said impulsively, "Lily was pregnant. Six weeks with child."

  To dispel her doubts, he went on, haltingly, to describe McCarthy's attitude, which could only be characterized as hateful. He was convinced the man's information was correct, despite the way it was proffered.

  Her face registered the same total incomprehension as in her reaction to McCarthy's first revelation. Her body seemed to stiffen as she took the blow. But as he continued to talk, the outward tension eased, and her eyes narrowed, squinting at him as if some psychic myopia were inhibiting her comprehension.

  "He really thought that by telling us about the possibility of their having an affair, he was doing us a favor," Edward said. "I guess when he saw we were going to peek under the rug anyway, he decided to show what else was swept under it. Something like that."

  Without comment, she stood up and went into the kitchen. He heard the clatter of dishes and the refrigerator door open and close. When she came back, she brought tiny frankfurters on a plate, each skewered with a toothpick. A tremor betrayed her anxiety. She put the plate down on a cocktail table and sat again, in the chair farthest from him. Don't blame me, he wanted to say. She had clasped her hands on her knees.

  "Whose child?" It was, unmistakably, a hard inquiry.

  "I don't know," he said, the words choking.

  He felt a squirming sensation, stood up, and began to pace the room. He felt her eyes following him. "Maybe if the Medical Examiner had taken blood tests. The real question is: Does it matter?"

  "Of course it matters," she said, lifting her clasped hands and banging them emphatically on her knee. He stopped his pacing and looked at her. Was it possible that a child he had conceived had died?

  "It gets us one step closer to the truth." Vivien said.

  "Except that the real truth is hiding under a ton of earth."

  It was another thing to hate them for—creating this uncertainty.

  "Unfortunately," he said hesitantly, "it raises rather intimate and distressing questions."

  She averted her eyes, looking down at her hands clasped around her knees.

  "I'm a big girl, Edward."

  "Well, then," he said haltingly, "we weren't planning a family. As a matter of fact, Lily was rather adamant. Very cautious."

  "Was she on the pill?"

  "No. She was afraid of side effects." To spare her further inquiry, he said, "She used a diaphragm."

  "She could have forgotten. It happens sometimes. I'd forget to take my pill sometimes. But Orson was always there to remind me." Her lips tightened. "I would have been happy to have more kids," she said wistfully. "Five years is a long time."

  "Lily never forgot," he said, feeling again the full fury of her betrayal. He remembered her sleep-fogged plaint, which he mimicked in his mind, "Not now, Edward. It's not in." At those times he had assumed that her thoughts were elsewhere. Sex was not one of her priorities. He had blamed that on her job and its increasing demand. A cold shiver shot through him. The last year was not a banner year for sex, he thought, his anger rising.

  "If you'd rather we didn't discuss it..." Vivien said.

  "No," he said, turning away, bending down to pick up a frankfurter. He didn't eat it but revolved the toothpick in his fingers. "We made love on Sundays. Then we read the papers." He emitted a snickering contemptuous laugh. "I won't dignify the term. We fucked on Sundays, quick, like dogs." The image riled him. "Like missionaries, if you get my drift. No pleasure at all for her. She did her duty. It wasn't always like that. Never quite like that. God, this is difficult." His eyes misted. "Probably my fault as well. You see, you can't summon up much enthusiasm when the other partner just endures it." He turned toward her. "You know what I mean?"

  "Yes," she said. "I know."

  He inspected her cautiously.

  "You felt that, too? I mean, the same way as Lily?"

  "Sometimes."

  "Him too?"

  "I always showed"—she swallowed hard—"some enthusiasm."

  "But you did have a child?"

  "What has that got to do with it?"

  "I don't understand."

  "Conception doesn't need ... enjoyment."

  Was there a tone of ridicule in her voice?

  "What I mean is," she said quickly, "it could have been your child. A diaphragm isn't perfect." She instantly regretted blurting it out.

  "No, I suppose not," he sighed.

  "So you see, it could have been yours."

  "Technically."

  "And biologically."

  He shook his head.

  "She'd get up, get out of bed, go to the bathroom. Go through the whole routine. That was a ritual. She was always careful about that. I feel certain—"

  "But you weren't there. You didn't see her do it."

  "No, I didn't. Wouldn't that have been ... well, indelicate?"

  "I'm merely stating a possibility."

  "You didn't know Lily," he said. "She was totally organized. From the beginning. Even long before, when we first knew each other that way, she was cautious."

  There was an air of unreality about what he was saying. He had never discussed such details. Even with Lily he would be circumspect, deliberately preserving the mystery, as if to discuss it clinically would brutalize their affection and detract from the spontaneity. But there had never been spontaneity. Again, he felt the gnawing shame of it.

  "She could have been distracted. All the heavy pressure of knowing two men at once," Vivien said.

  "But he also knew two women." He wondered whether it had sounded aggressive. "I mean, at the same time."

  "I don't deny that," she responded defensively.

  "Which proves that they weren't even faithful to each other. If they really cared, they would have ... cut us off completely."


  "Don't you see? That would have made us suspicious." She shook her head vigorously. "Maybe in the state they were in it didn't count. Not for them. More like a placebo for us. To lull us into feeling secure."

  "Another deduction?"

  "Yes. But it doesn't explain the child."

  "No. It doesn't explain that," he said.

  "I suppose we'll never know."

  "How could we?"

  He fought for control and discovered that he had crushed the little frankfurter, which he tossed back on the plate. "I'm sorry," he said.

  "It's all right."

  She went back into the kitchen. While she was gone, he poured himself another drink and drank it fiercely. Inside of him, the anger seemed indestructible, ready to burst out without notice.

  She called from the kitchen, and he came in. She had set the table in the breakfast area, overlooking the rear lawn. Through the window he saw the snowman.

  "I built that with Ben," she said. "It seems to be shrinking."

  He had carried in his drink, upended the glass, and smiled at her across the table.

  "Tough stuff," he said, "discussing this."

  "It has to be said."

  He ate compulsively while she picked at her food. A dimmer had softened the lights, leaving her face in shadow.

  "But McCarthy did have a suggestion about the keys," he said after he had gulped most of the food on his plate. While she ate, he explained McCarthy's suggested method.

  "Ingenious," she said with a faint note of sarcasm.

  "It could take forever."

  She looked up at him, but her eyes were lost in darkness.

  After dinner she brought out snifters of brandy, and they sat in the living room. Sipping the brandy, his eyes searched the room.

  "Seems like a pleasant place."

  "It was."

  They sat on either ends of the couch, her legs curled under her, his crossed in front of him. Their eyes met, and she quickly looked into the snifter while he continued to inspect her.

  "You'd think he had everything: a nice house, a pretty lady to come home to, a son, a good living."

  She looked up. This time it was he who turned away.

  "Her life wasn't without its compensations."

  "I'm not sure. Orson might have been a better bargain."

  "Like Lily."

  He put his snifter on the cocktail table and turned to face her.

  "From the beginning," he stammered, "I wanted to ask."

  "Ask away."

  "Did you love him?"

  "Did you love her?"

  "You can't answer a question with a question."

  "I certainly don't love him now," she said thoughtfully. "I don't even know who he was."

  "I mean before."

  "You mean the man that I thought he was?" She grew vague, as if she were suddenly rifling through some index file in her head. "Maybe. Maybe there was a moment."

  "Only a moment?"

  "You wanted an honest answer. I can only think in moments."

  She settled back, took a sip of her drink, then put the snifter down beside his on the table.

  "We were at my parents' house in Vermont, Orson and I. It was Christmas. No, the day after Christmas. Snow was falling, white and silent, a soft clean white blanket." Her face flushed. Was it too private for her, too intimate, to confront the vividness of the old memory? "You have to understand that Orson was a very proper young man, the model Ivy League gentleman. And you have to imagine the setting: the Christmas lights, the scent of burning pine logs, the sweet sound of the wood splitting and crackling, the feel of caressing fingers."

  Was she deliberately censoring the image for his sake? Inexplicably, he felt pangs of jealousy. She appeared to be struggling to get the words out.

  "What I gave him then, at that moment, along with the words of it, the obligatory I love you ... was my being. Everything that meant my life I handed over to him. It was an act of trust. I gave my pledge willingly, eagerly, without strings. And when he said it as well, I was sure he meant it exactly the same way."

  It was as if she were revealing some hidden sin, admitting to a crime against nature itself. Suddenly she became inert. "Goes to prove you should never, never give yourself away. You come into this world alone, you go out alone."

  "So you did love him?" For some reason he felt vaguely disappointed by her confession.

  "I committed myself to him. Isn't that what it means?"

  He started to reach for his snifter, hesitated midway, then pulled his hand back. Entwining his fingers, he cracked the bones.

  "Yes. That's what it must mean. It wasn't just saying it. It was believing in it. In its binding power. In its..." He searched his mind for a more precise meaning. "In its sense of sacrifice and selflessness. I must have felt that way, too, when I said it for the first time to Lily. Hardly as romantic as your experience. A restaurant in Georgetown, although I remember a spray of pink flowers, and I was looking into her eyes, drowning in them, I suppose. I haven't thought about it much the last few years, but when I said it, I felt the same way as you described. Everybody who says it must really feel it. It has got to come from the depths. Doesn't it?"

  She nodded and sucked in a deep breath.

  "I'll never give myself away again. Never." She said it firmly, lifting her glass.

  "Never," Edward echoed. "Never."

  Edward lifted his glass to hers. Both glasses reached out and clinked in a silent toast. They sipped, and their eyes locked. Hers appeared to him suddenly larger, deeper, darker, magnetizing. Perhaps it was the light, he thought ... an illusion. The long moment became awkward as the silence stretched. Their gazes faltered, and they both looked elsewhere. He looked at his watch, but the numbers seemed blurred. He supposed he should be going, but he wanted to stay. To continue.

  "It does seem like a logical idea," she said, breaking the silence.

  "What?"

  "McCarthy's. You know, checking locks against the key."

  "Yes," he said, "logical. But time-consuming." His alertness became acute. Seize it, he urged himself. His heart pounded with expectation, and he grew excited as he remembered McCarthy's plan. The shrinking circles. It would take a battalion, McCarthy had said.

  "I'd invest it ... the time," she said haltingly.

  "We could draw the circles, map out a route, and do it methodically. Why not? I'll get a map. We can work it out."

  "But your job..." she began. "Maybe I could start working on it during the day while you're at the office."

  "Yes," he said eagerly. "But what about you? Your son..."

  "I told you. He's with my parents." She frowned, and he sensed that she did not want the issue raised.

  "No," he said firmly. "We do it together." He slapped the table. "A question of priorities. There's nothing more important for us."

  "Nothing," she said. He could observe her anger beginning to flare, feeding his own.

  "And there is no shortcut?"

  "McCarthy would know."

  "They mustn't get away with it, Edward," she said, her voice rising. "Leave us like this, twisting in the wind."

  The intensity of her fury brought McCarthy's words swarming back at him, stinging. "I didn't put the poison in the cup."

  "They won't," he assured her.

  25

  In the morning, awakening from a drugged sleep, Vivien struggled to remember where she was. Orson's presence still lashed out at her. Would it ever go away?

  Despite the absence of his things in the bathroom, his aura persisted. She performed her morning ablutions by rote, as she had done for years, brushing her teeth, washing the moisturizer from her face, brushing her hair, reaching into the medicine chest. Without thinking, she took a pill from the white plastic dial and flung it into her mouth.

  "My God, he's dead!" she cried at her confused image in the mirror. Still, the old habit persisted, as if he had been standing over her. It was absurd. Not realizing, she had been taking them every day. The
matter of Lily's pregnancy suddenly clarified itself, and she ran to the phone and dialed Edward's number.

  It took a few rings for him to answer. He seemed out of breath and annoyed until he heard her voice.

  "I've been gathering her things," he said, the irritation gone. "They're coming to cart them away. Everything. I'm never coming back here again."

  "Where will you live?"

  "A hotel. Anywhere. As long as it's not here."

  She hesitated, then steadied herself as she formed the words, but she did not speak them. Surely they had achieved a level of intimacy that made it possible. She remembered last night. Once again it had validated the importance of their alliance. She would be merely offering another deduction to bring them still closer to the truth.

  "Edward," she said tentatively.

  "Yes."

  "Have you still got her things? I mean, what she took on the trip. What was recovered."

  "Yes. They're here waiting to be trashed."

  "It's pure instinct—nothing conclusive—all part of the things we discussed last night, those intimate things. I'm glad I can't see your face." Her own was hot with a sudden flush.

  "I don't understand."

  "Perhaps you won't even when I say it. You said ... well, you said that on Sundays..." She waited for his response.

  "Yes, I remember."

  "You felt certain that she used the device. You said she was quite disciplined about it."

  "The diaphragm?"

  "Yes."

  There was a short silence as she waited for him to comprehend. Definitely a gender gap here, she decided.

  "Now remember carefully. You said Sundays. Even recently."

  "She was always fastidious about that." He paused. "Yes, even recently," he muttered.

  "Would she have known she was pregnant?"

  "She had a cycle like a clock. Once, two years ago, she was a week late. She had herself checked out." She sensed the dawning in him of this new revelation.

  "Now look among the things that were brought up from the crash—her personal things."

  As he searched, something nagged at her memory. A story by Philip Roth in which the diaphragm had become a symbol of commitment. Odd how her perceptions had multiplied, vibrating instincts and picking up distant symbols, as if she had lived in a thick soupy fog for years, all those years with Orson. In the distance she heard his footsteps. They grew louder. Then his voice came back.