by Max Ehrlich
He could no longer play tennis, however, because of his disability. The wound in his side, above the hip, had healed, although he still had a big scar, but something had gone wrong with the surgery, and sometimes Jeff suffered big bouts of pain in his hip. It came on suddenly and went away just as suddenly. When it happened, Jeff drank to ease the pain. She hated it when he drank. He could become surly, even cruel.
He began to drink more and more, whether he had the pain or not. Once or twice, when she was so frightened of him she would not yield, he beat her and knocked her down. She threatened to leave him, and for a while she did. But he came to her, pleading for her to come back, promising never to lay a hand on her again. And she returned.
Meanwhile, she heard rumors that Jeff had been seeing the redhead, Molly Warren. She resolutely shut her ears to all of them. Seeing no change in his ardor for her, she took this as proof that the stories were false. Then she became pregnant with Ann. In the later stages of her pregnancy, of course, she had to deny herself to Jeff. He found this very inconvenient. He paced around the house, on edge, and drank more. He began to come home late at night. He had run into some friend, he said, and they had had a drink. He began to phone two or three times a week and tell her he would be home late and not to wait up for him. She endured it, tight-lipped, but she was sure the “friend” was female. Perhaps there was more than one. She didn’t know; she tried not to think of it.
Finally, she went into labor with Ann. It was long and very difficult. There were complications, and for a time the doctor was worried, but she came through it all right. She was in the hospital for two weeks. Jeff visited her briefly each day, but he seemed uneasy, impatient, anxious to get away. And he showed very little interest in their daughter. But, she rationalized, men were not really interested in a child until it developed some kind of personality, until it could walk and talk. More than that, she suspected that he had wanted a boy rather than a girl and was disappointed.
She had just brought the baby home when she got the phone call. A woman who didn’t give her name but whose voice dripped with delight and malice said, “Mrs. Chapin, I think you ought to know that your husband has been playing around with a lovely redhead. All the time you were in the hospital.” She called the woman a liar, and the voice drawled on, “I’m sorry, dear. But if you’re really interested in where the love nest was, try the Highview Motel.” The woman hung up before she could say anything else. She had no idea who it was, though it occurred to her that perhaps it was some other woman Jeff knew, someone who was jealous, who wanted to do him harm. She could think of no one she herself knew who would want to hurt her this way. She was sure she had no enemies of this kind.
She said nothing to Jeff. If she had, he would only have denied it. And perhaps it was a vicious lie, after all. But the phone call festered in her, grew like a cancer. Finally, she felt that she had to know, or she would go out of her mind. She went to a private detective.
Two days later the detective came to her with his report. A man who answered to Jeff’s description had rented Room 14 at the Highview Motel for two weeks, from the time she had gone into labor until the day she had come home with the baby. With the man was a woman, a redhead. The proprietor had positively identified Jeff and Molly Warren from photographs the detective showed him.
Sooner or later, she knew, she would have to confront Jeff with this. The outrage in her mounted every day. It was bad enough that he had been sleeping with this woman under ordinary circumstances, but to pick the time when she was in labor with his child, and then when she was lying helplessly in the hospital, was more than she could stand. How could he be so damned unfeeling, so cruel?
After that, she denied him her body. She made excuses: she wasn’t ready yet; the doctor had told her to abstain for a while. Curiously, she still wanted him physically, although what he had done revolted her. She knew she could never forgive him, but she still wanted him. She thought she must be sick or insane to feel this way. In a twisted kind of way, she supposed she still loved him. What he had done was monstrous, unforgivable. Yet she delayed the time when she would tell him what she knew, then break off.
As for Jeff, he became mean, frustrated. He drank more and more. She ignored him and gave all her attention to the new baby. If he stayed out late or did not come home at all some nights, she did not complain. This almost total withdrawal on her part puzzled him. He knew something was wrong, but he didn’t know what. He suggested that they spend a quiet weekend at the cottage at Lake Nipmuck. She agreed to go; both of them sensed that this would be the showdown. She had thought of that night at the cottage every day of her life after that. She had dreamed of it a thousand times. She remembered every detail of what had happened, every word that was spoken. It haunted her still….
He started to drink, and then he blurted out, “All right, Marcia, what is it? Why have you been giving me the treatment? What the hell is eating you?” Then she told him. He wasn’t even contrite. Instead, he was furious. Not at what she knew but at the way she had found out. “You bitch,” he yelled at her. “Spying on me. Hiring a detective!” Then she told him that she was leaving him. At first he didn’t believe it. He apologized. “All right, I’m sorry, it was just an affair, and now it’s over, and I’ll never see her again. Does that satisfy you?” And she answered, “No. I just can’t live with what you did. I just wouldn’t want you to ever come near me again. Ever.”
Suddenly he laughed. And he said, “You lying bitch. You can’t get along without me. You’ve got hot pants for me right now.” She slapped his face. He stared at her and laughed again. “All right, baby. If you’re going to leave me, you’re going to leave me. But before you do, how about one more for the road?”
He stood before her then, smiling at her, and began to take off his clothes, until he was stark naked. She watched him, horrified. He was standing there, huge and hairy and male smelling, his great red blood-swollen penis hard and erect. He shook his hips, so that it flapped from side to side, slapping against his legs. She found the whole thing sickening, obscene.
He had been drinking a martini. Finishing it, he said to her, smiling evilly. “You’re really going to miss this, aren’t you, papoose?”
She was sitting on the couch. He put down his glass and walked straight toward her. She got up and tried to run for the bedroom, but he caught her. She fought like an animal, tearing at him with her nails, but he was terribly strong. He ripped off her clothes, tearing them to shreds, until she was naked too. She continued to fight him savagely, and he became angry. Then he began to beat her, grabbing her by the neck, hitting her around the head and shoulders, shouting drunkenly, “You’re going to be raped, baby. Might as well lean back and enjoy it.”
He threw her on the couch and mounted her. Still she fought him off. He swore and pulled her legs apart. And then, suddenly, she could not fight him anymore. Not because she no longer had any strength, but because she wanted him. She hated herself—she thought of it to this day with shame—but she wanted him. She put her arms around his back and pulled him to her, and inside she became soft and wet, and she heard him begin to laugh, and then he penetrated her, and she started to moan with pleasure. Finally, at the climax, she screamed and cried his name, digging her nails into his shoulders and hating herself for being no less of an animal than he was.
After it was over, he rolled off and stood over her. He looked down at her smiling, and she began to cry softly, because she knew how helpless she was as far as he was concerned, and she knew that he knew it. And that no matter how much he humiliated or violated her, it would always be that way.
He was still drunk, and exhilarated with his victory. He poured himself a full glass of Scotch and drank it down, and then the idea came to him to swim the lake. It was a sudden idea, pointless, insane, but he was drunk. He had swum the lake many times, he said, but never without a suit, and he was just in the mood to do it.
Weakly, she tried to dissuade him, telling him the water wo
uld be cold, but he simply laughed at her and went outside.
She lay on the couch for a while, feeling a little sick, and then she began to worry about him out there in the lake. He was drunk, and this was late September. She knew the water was very cold, and although he was an excellent swimmer, he might be overconfident, and then who knew what could happen.
She put on her fur coat and went out, got into the boat, and took it far out on the lake. For a time she couldn’t find him, but finally she picked him out.
She maneuvered the boat near him, and she could see that he was very tired. She remembered every word between them then. “Look, Marcia,” he said, “I didn’t mean what I said back there.” She watched him coldly and told him to get into the boat. “I know,” she said. “You’ve been sorry so many times before.” Then he told her he had been drunk, and he didn’t know what he was saying. He hated himself for what he had done to her back there, and he loved her and always had. And she answered that it was all right, they’d never talk about it again.
But, all the while, she knew it was a lie. He did not love her, he merely possessed her, and it would happen again. She knew that all she would ever be to him was a body, a kind of animal he would use for his convenience and pleasure, and that someday he would tire of her and simply throw her away. There would be more beatings, and more Molly Warrens, and more terrible humiliations. And she knew that, in spite of it all, she would never leave him, because she had this sick need of him, and she was a total slave to it.
She could not stand the thought of it. Out there on the dark lake, she saw her whole life stretching out before her, and she hated it. She knew, in that instant, that the only way she could be free of him and release herself was for him to die.
Truly, she didn’t know what she was doing. There he was, in the water, looking up at her, his hair dripping water, his face shining wet in the moonlight, and suddenly she raised the paddle and hit him over and over. She could never forget the look in his eyes then. He cried, “No, Marcia, no, no!” and tried to grab the boat. She brought the paddle down again, slamming its edge against his fingers. He let go and looked at her for just a moment, his eyes amazed, and then he sank below the surface. She had seen those eyes staring up at her from a thousand martini and whiskey glasses ever since.
She reported him drowned, and they dragged the lake and brought up his limp, bloated body. She had to identify him at the morgue for the authorities, and when she saw the white, water-puffed face, she turned away and vomited. There was no way she could ever forget that, either.
There were no wounds on him, no signs of blood or marks of any kind, except some scraped skin on his fingers. They were puzzled about that for a time, but they decided that in hitting the bottom he had probably scraped his fingers on a rock. She was Marcia Chapin, daughter of William E. Curtis, president of the Puritan Bank and Trust, and she had reported her husband drowned. When she told them her story, it was good enough for them. They called it death by accidental drowning, and that was that.
And she had lived with it all for almost thirty years, had found only one way to forget, even for a little while.
My God, she thought, I need a drink.
For a while she fought it, knowing the aftermath. She got up off the bed, put on a robe, and wandered around the house. She stared at herself in the mirror again. She looked out the windows. She opened and closed drawers aimlessly, moved ashtrays from one place to another, straightened a picture on the wall.
Finally she went downstairs and into the den, took a bottle of vodka and poured herself half a tumbler. Then she drained it.
She felt the bite of the vodka, and its courage oozed through her body. She picked up the bottle of Smirnoff again and stared at it. She felt warm toward it, affectionate. My little, dear little, sweet little hiding place, she thought.
She poured herself another drink. The photographs of her dead husband stared at her from the wall. She held up her glass to him in a defiant toast.
Damn you, Jeff, you had it coming to you.
Then she started to cry.
Chapter 28
When they came out of the movie, the night had turned warm. A full moon was out. As they walked toward Ann’s car, she said, “You know what?”
“What?”
“It’d be a shame to go right home. It’s such a lovely night.”
He slipped his arm around her waist. She drew close to him as they walked. The touch of her body excited him. A slight breeze came up, blowing her hair across his face. He could smell its subtle perfume.
“What do you have in mind?”
“A ride.”
“Where?”
“To a favorite place of mine.”
“What kind of place?”
“You drive,” she said. “And don’t ask so many questions. I’ll tell you where to go.”
They let down the top of the car. They drove through some neighborhood streets, and then, at her direction, they turned the car up a long hill lined with tall, stately trees. He stole a glance at Ann. She had her head back against the seat. Her eyes were closed, her hair was flying in the wind, and she was singing an aimless little tune.
It was all very familiar. The road, the tall trees. Only this time the car was not a 1941 Packard Clipper but a 1974 Jaguar. And the girl beside him was not a redhead but a blonde. He wondered who that redhead was of long ago.
But this was Ann Chapin, and he was still confused about her. Sometimes he saw her as his daughter, and sometimes as a stranger. Because he had been all mixed up about her, he had left her alone. He hadn’t even touched her. He knew she was puzzled by this, but how in God’s name could he explain? Ann, I’ve never made a pass at you because once I was your father.
Yet he wanted her so badly it hurt. He remembered something Freud had said or written. A father always harbors incestuous feelings toward his daughter. But again, he argued to himself, Ann Chapin was created by someone else, some other body—Jeff Chapin’s. And that body is now rotting in the grave at Hillside Cemetery. This was his body, and it was very much alive at twenty-seven, in the year 1974. It was a whole new deal, a whole different life.
Or was it?
They had been riding uphill for a long time. Suddenly they burst out into a grassy slope dotted with trees. The slope ran to the edge of a high cliff, and far below was a panoramic view of the valley, with the lights of Riverside a great blazing carpet and the river a shining ribbon cutting through the middle of it.
He had been here before, too.
They got out of the car and walked to the edge of the cliff. They sat down on a slab of rock, and for a time they studied the view, saying nothing. Then she asked, “Like it?”
“It’s beautiful.”
“They call this Granite Mountain. I guess you’d say it’s the lovers’ lane of Riverside. You know, Mother told me that my father used to bring her here often before they were married. I’m not sure, but I think he proposed to her here.”
They were sitting close together on the slab of rock, and suddenly she turned her face toward him. Her mouth was red and glistening and half-open. He kissed it, and then he kissed it again, hard, and then he pushed her back, and his hand was under her sweater, cupping the soft, curved mound of her breast. Her hand dropped to his groin, and at its first touch he grew stiff and hard, and he exulted in this because he had been afraid that, under the circumstances, he might not be able to perform.
He heard himself say, “Let’s go back to my place.”
“No,” she said. “Here. Now.”
Then she rose and took him by the hand, and they walked out of the moonlight and into the shadow of the trees nearby. After it was over, they lay quietly for a while. Then she turned her head toward him.
“You know, I was beginning to wonder about you.”
“Any further questions?”
“My God, no.” She smiled. “Not anymore.”
He took her home, and she invited him in for coffee. When they came into the
living room, they saw Marcia Chapin.
She was sprawled in a grotesque position on the couch, dead drunk.
Her head hung down over the edge of the couch so that her hair almost touched the floor. Her legs were flung wide, sprawled upward over the arm of the couch. The robe she was wearing had fallen apart, so that she was almost completely exposed. Peter saw the long white legs, the thick black patch of her pubic hair, and just above that, the diamond-shaped blue birthmark he remembered so well. On the rug, within arm’s reach, were two vodka bottles and a glass. One of the bottles was empty. The other had been tipped over and lay on its side, spilling its contents on the rug.
He averted his eyes. It was obscene. Ann went to her mother and covered her nakedness with the robe. Then she turned to him, her face taut, a little pale.
“I’m sorry you had to see her like this. Still, you were bound to, sooner or later.” Then quietly, bitterly: “My mother’s an incurable alcoholic. And she has been for a long time.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No need to be. We’re used to it.”
She went to her mother and started to shake her. “Wake up. Wake up, Mother. It’s Ann.”
Marcia Chapin’s eyes opened. She stared up at her daughter blearily. She mumbled something, tried to raise herself from the couch, but she couldn’t make it, and fell back. Peter came over.
“I’ll help you get her upstairs.”
“No,” said Ann. “Please, I’d rather you wouldn’t. I’ll get Ola. She’s upstairs in her room.”
She ran upstairs. He stood there looking down at the sleeping woman. His disgust had vanished; now he felt only pity and a certain emptiness. Again he reminded himself, this is the woman who killed me in my other incarnation, cut off my life before it had fairly begun. But now he no longer cared. He was happy with his new incarnation. Jeff Chapin was dead. In a curious kind of way, he and Marcia Chapin were even. She had taken his old life away, but she had given him something priceless in his new life—Ann. Why she had done what she had done no longer mattered. He could make a pretty good guess as it was, putting two and two together. He was willing to forget it, let it be, He was finished in Riverside now; his stay was over. He wanted to forget all about Jeff Chapin and resume his identity as Peter Proud.
