by Nancy Thayer
From where he stood, he could see the long stretch of family room. He had added the room onto the original old frame of the house; he had put down the wide-board floors himself and raised the walls. But Judy had created the room, she had worked the magic that made it cozy and attractive. It gleamed with comfort. She was always busy around this room and the other rooms of the house, dusting, sweeping, puffing up pillows, rearranging, and the rooms glowed with her care. Just so did she busy herself around her family, fussing over their appearances, infusing them with the right spirit, keeping them healthy in body and soul. He could not be angry with her for her fretting over Johnny. He rubbed her back, around and around, and kissed her hair.
Judy realized that she had nearly passed out, leaning against her husband, feeling his comforting touch. She had had too much to drink, too much, because she had started taking the Valium so early, and had taken so much today. Well, it was just as well, for otherwise she’d be frantic now, worrying about Johnny. Sarah had called again during dinner to ask if he’d gotten home, and Judy had lied: he went down to Southmark to check on Wilbur Wilson, she had said. The Staffords didn’t know the Wilsons; it wasn’t likely that anyone they knew would be at the hospital. Judy hadn’t been able to think of any other excuse, and she hadn’t wanted to tell Sarah the truth, that she didn’t know where Johnny was, that the last she’d seen of him, he was going out the church door with Liza Howard. What would Sarah think? She didn’t want to worry Johnny’s fiancée—or anger her. But what if Sarah called again, later tonight? What would she say then? Ron’s soothing strokes lulled her, made her want to slide right down into sweet oblivion. She pulled away.
“I think I’ll go upstairs,” she said. She felt warm, weak, lazy. “I’ll take a little nap. But I’ll set the alarm for nine-thirty. If Johnny isn’t home by then—”
“Then we’ll start calling around,” Ron said. “But, Judy, he might spend the whole night out. He has before. If he’s—really involved in—something, he might not think about calling home. I don’t think you should worry. You go on to bed. I’m sure Reynolds won’t be here long.”
“Well,” Judy said. “Be sure to offer him some pie.” She went down the hall and up the stairs, and stopped halfway to call back, “Thanks for the back rub.” But she was so sleepy that she didn’t call loudly enough; Ron didn’t answer.
She went on up the stairs and into her bedroom. The rich brown shell-patterned afghan she had crocheted was folded neatly at the foot of their king-sized bed. She set the alarm clock for nine-thirty, then collapsed on the bed, pulling the afghan up over her. Before she even thought to take her shoes off, her head hit the pillow and she fell into a blank sleep.
Downstairs, Ron checked his watch. Reynolds would be here in ten minutes; he was always punctual. Ron wandered back through the dining room to reassure himself that the table had been completely cleared and the silver candlesticks and bowl put back in their established place in the center of the table. Judy would be upset if she woke up in the morning to find even a silver bowl out of place, it would make her feel she had been lax, sloppy. She worked so hard, set such high standards, and over the years Ron had come to rely on this sense of pride she lived by. Their house seemed an oasis of stability in a troubled world; no matter how messy the town politics or other people’s lives or the world news, here was their house, set down firmly on the earth, clean, solid, well tended, uncluttered, unscarred. A refuge.
Ron went back into the family room and looked it over to see if anything needed doing. The cats had nestled together in one of the rockers, and Bruce had sneaked up onto the corduroy love seat. Judy didn’t like the animals on the furniture, because of their claws and fur and smell, but they looked so utterly peaceful there that Ron hadn’t the heart to make them get down. Pretending not to see them, he checked the rest of the room. The wood rack next to the fireplace was getting low. He might as well fill it up now.
He went out the door to the woodpile stacked against the house and, once outside, stopped to look up at the sky.
It had not been a pretty day. It had been cloudy, cool, and gray, and now the wind which had been threatening all day was rising in earnest, and a hint of rain was in the air. Tree limbs tossed, dry leaves clattered. The night had a brooding, ominous feeling about it, and Ron shivered and was glad to have on his sweater. He began to stack logs against his chest. He always thought it such a shame when the brilliant display of fall foliage was ruined by early wind and rains. Too bad that man, with all his technology, couldn’t control the weather just a little. Well, it certainly made him appreciate his house and all those things in his control that much more.
The heel of Ron’s shoe caught on a rotting board, and he kicked it back in place, shaking his head. The whole porch floor was going to have to be replaced soon. It had weathered through a good many years, but now it was past whatever salvation paint and repair could give. Judy had been asking Ron for months now if they couldn’t turn this open porch—it was really just a floor sticking out in the L of the back of the house, with the roof covering only a third of it—into a proper glassed-in porch. She had always wanted a “wicker room.” Straw rugs, white wicker chairs and chaises with puffy cushions covered in bright flowered fabric, plants and hanging flowers all around. She had a collection of pictures cut from various home-decorating magazines.
“Just because our children are growing up and leaving home, we don’t have to move our lives into a little box,” she said. “I don’t want to be that way. My life doesn’t end when the children move out. We’ll still be here, Ron, and after all our hard work, we deserve the best house we can have. Oh, it would be such fun to have a wicker room. I could give the loveliest dinner parties in the summer, with candles on every table.” She had spread her hands out in front of her as she spoke, as if the tables were there before her then, instead of the slanting, decaying wooden floor. “And think how cheery it would be in the winter,” she said. “It would be like having a bit of summer in the house in the winter.”
“It would be expensive to heat,” Ron had said, feeling like an old fussbudget, a spoilsport. “It’s on the wrong side of the house to get any solar-heating effect.” Then, seeing her face: “I’ll think about it, though.”
“Johnny’s through college,” she said. “I mean, since we don’t have to pay his tuition—”
“Yes, you’re probably right,” Ron said. Not to agree would have alarmed her, and he did not want her to know that he had any worries about their financial state.
How do men please their wives? Ron thought now, pushing an armload of wood into the black iron circular wood rack, then going back outside. Women were such mysteries. Always wanting more. More and better. Maybe God made them that way to keep men from getting lazy. Maybe it was women’s wanting that was the vital force behind the gradual perfection of the species and the world. It was too bad that it was Reynolds who was coming over now. He didn’t know a thing about women; he’d be no good at this kind of discussion. This was the kind of thing Ron always mulled over with Wilbur Wilson, and Ron felt a sharp thrust of pain, missing him now. If Ron had a best friend in town, it was Wilbur, and the thought that Wilbur might die—well, it was terrifying. All the times that Ron had gone fishing with Wilbur, or just over to sit with him when he was recovering from his operation, all the times they just sat around together, shooting the breeze—Ron didn’t suppose he had ever in his life had any human contact that was closer, or meant more, than those times with Wilbur.
For the truth of it was that if there was any one human being who knew the real Ron Bennett, it was Wilbur Wilson. Wilbur had enough knowledge and the skill to know just how good a carpenter and contractor Ron was; he could actually look at what Ron had constructed and appreciate it. So he had a better understanding of Ron as a professional man than any of the members of Ron’s immediate family. And he knew Ron’s secrets—and loved him still, with a love which was different from any other Ron had known, because there was no hint of forg
iveness about it, and thus no hint of judgment. It was simply acceptance, the rarest thing. Ron did not feel sad to think that Wilbur knew him more truly than Judy; Judy was his wife, a sensitive and proud woman. She needed his protection. She could not have borne to know all the awful truths about Ron’s complex life and needs. There was no reason she should know all the truths—they were not even relevant to her.
Back outside, Ron stuck his hands into his pockets against the bitter wind, and walked around the side of the house to look down the driveway at the road. No sign of Reynolds Houston’s car; no sign of Johnny. Now Ron had no doubt in his mind that Johnny was in bed with Liza, yet another bit of information that would have distressed Judy, but which made Ron smile. Liza Howard. What a fabulous fuck she was. Ron would never be sorry he had slept with her, of all women, because of all people Ron had met in his entire life, only she had brought with her, as rich and tantalizing as her perfume, a sense of glamour, and it was this experience above all others that Ron had with each passing year thought he would never have, and longed for. He had experienced love, sex, passion, friendship. He had worked hard enough to surround himself with security. He had made friends who were wealthy. He had traveled to small islands with white sands, pink drinks, and shimmering hotels. But none of that was glamour; not even Jake and Lillian Vanderson were glamorous. They were simply rich. All of Ron’s adult life he had spent in a scurry of activity, trying to get enough money in the bank so that he and Judy would never feel threatened, trying at the same time to build up in the community an equal account of respectability and belonging. Ron did not think one could be both respectable and glamorous. He did not even really want to be glamorous, because glamour carried with it, he thought, an ever present tinge of danger, a promise of impermanence. But he wanted to touch glamour, to grasp and hold it to him, to bury his head in it, to breathe it in, and for a few hours on two different occasions, he had. With Liza Howard.
In spite of the fact that he had seen her naked, and in intimate and revealing positions, he could not think that he knew anything about her. She was so foreign to his way of life as to seem completely unreal. Oh, she had a beautiful body, and she was fabulously capable at sex. Too capable. She was too experienced, sleek, a mannequin come to life; she seemed almost inhuman. A man could be absolutely carefree with her, and sometimes Ron thought that was the essence of glamour and of all the experiences in life that he would never have. Freedom from care, responsibility, accountability. Freedom to touch just one person in this world without worrying about the consequences of that act. A carefree moment seemed to Ron the rarest thing a man could have in life. So what better person for Johnny to spend some of his remaining bachelor hours with? Johnny would come home tonight or tomorrow, exhausted and amazed, with a self-conscious grin on his face; Ron was sure of it. He turned away from the road and went back around the house, took up more logs, and went inside. It was so cold out for October, so raw.
He had dumped the pile of logs into the wood rack and put a new log on the fire and was considering helping himself to some of the Armagnac when he heard the car pull into the driveway. Then, to his surprise, he heard another car pull in, and the slamming of several doors, and voices.
He walked through the unlit front hall and looked out the long strip of glass that bordered the front door. It must be Johnny, he thought, but it wasn’t. Holding their coats closed and their hats on against the rush of autumn wind, Reynolds Houston, Gary Moyer, and Peter Taylor came up the flagstone walk toward the house. They were not smiling and talking easily with one another—Ron could see as the front-porch light fell on them how grim and set their faces were, and he knew in that instant why they had come.
It was one of those times in life when eternity rolled by like a great ball of ice, touching his skin, freezing and paralyzing him. He would stand there forever, cold with fear, trapped in the knowledge of what he had done and terrified of the consequences of that act. He wanted to die.
But the doorbell rang, and the icy ball rolled past him and away, leaving him real and alive, caught in the present moment. He moved normally, because he had to. He flicked on the hall light and stood exposed in its glare.
“Reynolds,” he said, opening the front door. “Hello. And Gary. Peter. What a surprise. Come in. Come on back to the family room. We’ve got a fire going. It’s such a nasty night.”
“I know,” Gary said. “Terrible weather for so early in the fall. Still, I remember two years ago, all of October was like winter, with temperatures in the thirties, and then November came on like Indian summer, warm and bright. But by then, of course, the leaves had fallen. You know, the trappers tell me the muskrats are building high this year. A sure sign we’re in for a lot of snow.”
Gary’s blithering had taken them down the stretch of hall and into the family room. Ron took their coats and put them casually across the pine table, then handed out snifters of Armagnac—no one refused—and shooed the dog and cats off the chairs. Finally they were all settled in a charade of companionship around the fire.
“Well, gentlemen?” Ron asked. It wouldn’t do to pretend he thought this was just a social occasion. “What can I do for you?”
Peter looked at Gary, Gary looked at Reynolds, Reynolds looked at Peter.
“Ron,” Gary finally said, “there seems to be a problem with the rec center fund. It seems that more money is gone from the account than there should be at this point. For the amount of work done, I mean.”
Reynolds drew a slim notebook out of the breast pocket of his tweed jacket. “We have some figures,” he began.
“—that we’d just like to check with you,” Gary intervened, leaning forward. “Ron, some of this might be my fault, you see. When we formed this committee, well, since we all knew one another, I just didn’t bother with a lot of the legal details that perhaps I should have bothered with. I mean, if we had done this another way, for example, we’d be having regular accounting meetings once a month.”
“Of course, Gary. I understand,” Ron said. “It’s perfectly reasonable that you and the rest of the committee would want to go over the records. It’s fine with me. And it’s fine to do it on a Sunday night in front of a fire with brandy, instead of down at my office, which does not have these comforts.”
“Our figures indicate—” Reynolds began.
“Well,” Gary interrupted again, “this is sort of a special meeting, Ron, I just want you to understand that. It’s really a—just a secret meeting, just the four of us here. We haven’t mentioned any of this to the other members of the board, to Jake Vanderson or Dan Weinberg. We thought we might be able to settle it with just the four of us.”
“I’m just here for moral support,” Peter Taylor added, smiling.
“Moral support?” Ron asked.
“Our figures indicate,” Reynolds said again, his beautiful voice rising only slightly in volume and clarity, “that in the past six months you have bought materials for the rec center, paid for those materials with checks from the fund, then returned half of what you bought for cash refunds. And not passed those cash refunds back to the rec center fund. There is at least one hundred thousand dollars unaccounted for.”
So soon, Ron thought. How have they discovered this so soon?
“I see your problem, gentlemen,” Ron said, still smiling. “Yes, Gary, you’re right. We probably should have bothered more with the legal details, in order to prevent just this sort of misunderstanding. I assume you believe that I’ve personally pocketed the money.”
“Well, not exactly,” Gary began.
“More or less exactly,” Reynolds said, gazing with an almost scientific interest at Ron.
“I don’t have the figures with me,” Ron said. “This paperwork is in my office. We could go there tonight, if you want. It’s true that I haven’t handed back the cash refunds to the fund. What I’ve done is something I think much more sensible. I’ve been putting the cash into money market funds. Now, they’re not as safe as the bank savings
account, I know, but over the short term they pay a lot more interest. It just seemed silly to me to be getting five and a half percent on our money when we could be getting anywhere from fifteen to eighteen percent.”
“You’ve invested the money in your name,” Reynolds said.
“Of course,” Ron answered. “But I have it in a special account, not connected with any of my personal money, and I intend to draw out the money when I need it further along toward the end of the job.”
“And what will you do with the interest earned?” Reynolds persisted.
“It will all go into the building fund,” Ron replied. “Every bit of it.”
“Then the one hundred thousand plus dollars which have been given to you in cash refunds will be plowed back into the building fund,” Reynolds said.
“Yes, of course,” Ron replied. “I really wish you had called me about this on the phone. I could have answered your questions immediately and you wouldn’t have had to expend such energy worrying.”
“Well”—Gary almost stuttered in his relief—“I wish you had let us know that’s what you’re doing, Ron.”
“I know. I’m sorry, Gary. But you remember what a fuss Jake Vanderson made when we discussed different banks. He would have been most upset if we hadn’t used Londonton National. I suppose I just didn’t want to get into it with him.”
