21-Not I, Said the Sparrow

by Lockridge, Richard

  Heimrich put his wet raincoat back on. He found a rain hat on the upper shelf of the coat closet and put it on. He thought of changing his shoes for heavier ones with ribbed soles. Instead, he went to the kitchen and lifted a bag of Mite’s cat litter. Enough in it for Mite’s immediate needs and also for his, Heimrich decided.

  Susan was measuring gin into a mixing glass of ice. She looked at him. “Wood,” Heimrich said, and she nodded her head. He opened the door to the breezeway, which was earning another name—“galeway,” at a guess. Wet wind poured into the kitchen. Heimrich, edging out, scattered cat litter on the ice between door and woodpile. Until it washed away, or froze in, it would provide a nonskid surface much superior to sand.

  He wrenched logs apart. They were more tightly frozen together than they had been a little over half an hour before. One by one, and sometimes frozen together two by two, he skidded logs across the ice until they were near enough to be reached from the door. He skidded a dozen or so and thought that ought to last the night.

  He inched his own way back. His foot slipped on the last step. Missed that part with the litter, he thought, and was close enough to grab the doorknob.

  Susan helped him carry logs to the hearth, where at once they began to drip. Heimrich put one of the still-damp logs he had brought in earlier on the fire. The fire hissed its disapproval. Colonel got up, with condescending reluctance, and went back to where he had been before—in the warm airflow from the Heatolater vent which they had had installed the year before, a few weeks after the January ice storm.

  They sat facing the fire again, and again clicked glasses. “To us,” Susan said. “And to that wind shift of yours, darling.”

  The martinis were tart and cold. Susan had not forgotten the soupcon of vermouth.

  “Only,” she said, “it ought to be hot buttered rum on a night like this. Or mulled wine. Only, I never mulled any—”

  She stopped. Merton heard it, too. It was loud enough to be heard over the angry wind.

  A car with chains on it was clanking up the steep drive. One of the chains had a loose link banging against a fender.

  They went to the kitchen door, Susan reaching it first. It was a Volks. Michael was driving it. His friend in the passenger seat was, only glimpsed through the driving rain, merely a blur—an unexpectedly small blur. Most of his friends were near his own six-foot height. “Standard tennis size,” Susan had called them.

  Michael drove the Volks into the garage; drove in slowly and carefully. Heimrich hoped he had left room enough. There was the power mower to consider. Michael was a careful boy. He would be considerate of the mower, and of his friend’s Volks.

  Merton reached around Susan, opened the door, and pulled her back against him, partly out of the driving rain. As the garage door began to open, he called “Watch the ice!” into the storm’s roar.

  They came out of the garage door, huddled figures in heavy short coats. Michael’s friend was indeed small, stepping carefully on the ice, steadied by Michael’s hands. Michael’s friend wore a knitted cap, and hair streamed from it, lashed by the wind. Of course, boys wore their hair long these days.

  Heimrich felt his wife stiffen just perceptibly in his arms and then his mind caught up with hers.

  Michael’s friend was not only small. Michael’s friend was a girl.

  Chapter 2

  In front of the fire, with her heavy coat off, Michael’s friend was most definitely a girl. The sweater she wore was loose; her slacks, of darker yellow than the sweater, did not cling to her slender legs. She did not, in costume, make a point of being a girl. She did not, Susan thought, need to.

  “This is Joan Collins, Mother, Dad,” Michael said, and stood beside the girl—stood close to her in front of the fire, but did not touch her. Although, Susan thought, he looks as if he wants to; as if, at any moment, he may put an arm around her. Susan said, “Good evening, Joan. Not that it is, obviously.”

  Joan Collins smiled at that. She had rather a wide smile on a somewhat thin face—an oddly decisive face. She’s not over twenty, if that, Susan thought. But, she’s a grown person, all the same. As she smiled, she shook her head slightly. Her long, straight brown hair flowed as she moved her head. What did Mother say when I was a little girl about somebody? “Her hair’s so long she can sit on it.” Something like that, in a tone of admiration. Hair had come full length again. She looked at her son, who was looking down at the girl beside him, and smiling that grave smile of his. His hair came only to the collar of his jacket. It was molded to his head. His sideburns reached only to his cheekbones. He didn’t have a beard. Which were silly things to be thinking of, under the circumstances.

  “You kids probably could do with a drink,” Merton said. (Or was he, a policeman sworn to uphold the law, offering to contribute to the delinquency of minors? Michael was—(come now; remember’)— Michael was twenty. This accommodating friend of his? Well, eighteen, anyway. Both old enough to vote. So, old enough to be offered drinks.)

  “I could do with one, Dad,” Michael said. “It’s been—well, rather a long drive. And not a very—comfortable one for the last few miles. Cold Harbor’s blacked out, you know. We had the chains put on ten miles or so above Poughkeepsie. Had to wait in line. It’s been a little bumpy since then. Not that it isn’t a sweet little car, Joan’s Beetle.”

  Joan had shaken her head to Heimrich’s offer. Her long brown hair flowed again. It reached her waist.

  “I’ll just get warm,” Joan said. Her voice was light; a little hurried.

  She’s a bit uneasy, Susan thought. Uncertain. As if—well, as if she had been brought here to meet parents. The parents.

  “And get my hair dry.” Joan reached back and touched her hair. “Which it almost is,” she said. “Then I’ll have to be getting on, I’m afraid. My father will be wondering. Starting to climb walls, probably. He’s a little like that. So I’d better not have a drink, I guess. Since I’ll be driving.”

  Michael did not seem to be listening. He was looking at Heimrich as if he were expecting something.

  “No,” Heimrich said. “On your way to New York, wouldn’t it be? Not on this kind of a night.”

  “I was just going—” She hesitated. She looked up at Michael; then she looked at Susan.

  “We know, dear,” Susan said. “You were just going to drop Michael off on your way to the city to spend Christmas with your father. My son told us. Only, on this kind of a night—”

  The lights went off. They made no fuss about it. They just quit being. The fire gave the only light in the room. It was a flickering light. Susan said, “Damn!”

  “Anyway,” Heimrich said, “the waiting’s over.” He put another log on the already leaping fire. “I’d better get the drinks made before the ice melts. And you’d better change your mind, Miss Collins. You won’t be driving anywhere tonight. There’s sherry, I think. If you’d rather.”

  “There is sherry,” Susan said. “But—I’m afraid it’s the kind you cook with.”

  It was the time some people said, “Whatever you’re having.” Susan found herself hoping Michael’s girl wouldn’t be among that some.

  Joan looked up again at Michael. He smiled at her and nodded his head.

  “Well,” Joan Collins said, “maybe a little bourbon. But a very small one, please, Inspector.” Her voice hesitated a trifle on “Inspector.”

  The poor child, Susan thought. Not only a parent. A police inspector.

  “I’ll get them, Dad,” Michael said, and went toward the kitchen.

  Mite came into sight. He had been lying more or less on top of Colonel, who was warm—warm enough even for a cat. Mite went over to Joan and smelled her shoes. Apparently they smelled all right, because he sat down in front of the fire and very close to it A fire is even warmer than a dog.

  Merton Heimrich went to the telephone. It might still be alive. Telephone wires are frequently, for some reason, more resolute than power lines in the face of adversity. Although they usual
ly hitchhike up the same pole.

  The telephone was alive. Heimrich dialed WE 6-1212. He listened. The seven o’clock temperature in New York City, which meant in Central Park, had been thirty-one. “Freezing rain, possibly becoming mixed with sleet and snow. Becoming all rain before ending early tomorrow, followed by slow clearing. Turning much colder Tuesday afternoon and night. Oudook for Christmas Day, mostly fair and seasonably cold.”

  When he turned from the telephone, Michael and Joan were sitting side by side in front of the fire. There were drinks on the table in front of them. Susan was on the other side of Michael. Joan Collins appeared to be sitting on her hair. She was listening to Michael.

  “I know it doesn’t happen much in Hanover,” Michael was telling his mother. “In Hanover it rains, or it snows. And most of the time it stays below zero. And they know how to cope. Here—well, here it’s different.”

  “I’ve noticed,” Joan said.

  Michael looked at her. Then he grinned at her. Even his wide smile had gravity in it, Heimrich thought. He hasn’t changed much. He was a grave little boy.

  “Here it’s in between,” Michael said. “Once every year or so, we get—well, what we’re getting now. And the power goes off. Sometimes for—how long, Dad?” He turned in his chair so that he faced his tall, somewhat massive stepfather.

  “Six days is the longest I remember, son,” Heimrich said. “You were about ten then.”

  “He was eleven,” Susan said. “And it was seven days, as I remember it. It was something of a drag.”

  “We didn’t have any lights,” Michael said, “or anything to cook with, except Dad roasted potatoes in the ashes. It was—oh, I guess, exciting. For a kid, I mean. Only, there wasn’t any water. Hardly any. Isn’t that right, Mother?”

  “We had to be very careful with it,” Susan said. “We get our water from a deep well, Joan.” (“Joan” or “Miss Collins”? Joan, it seemed.) “An electric pump, of course. And no way of telling how much is in the pressure tank.”

  “And no heat,” Heimrich said. “Because you can’t light an oil furnace with a match.”

  “Damn it,” Susan said. “That casserole.” She looked at Merton and her eyebrows went up.

  “Yes,” Heimrich said. “I’d think so, dear. If its generator went on. And, Miss Collins, it’s freezing up in New York, too. And not expected to stop before morning.”

  “They’re talking about the inn, Joan,” Michael said. “They leave things out sometimes. The inn—the Old Stone Inn, it’s called —has its own generator. It goes on when the power stops.”

  Heimrich’s second martini—what remained of it—was still on the table in front of the fire. It would have warmed up there. Still. Heimrich crossed the room and reached down between the two and retrieved his drink. It was just as warm as he had feared.

  “Darling,” Susan said. “It must be a—a hot buttered martini by now. I’ll fix—”

  But she stopped, because he shook his head at her. Also, he had emptied his glass. He went back across the room to the telephone. It was still alive. He dialed. He waited.

  He said “Mary?” to Mary Cushing, who managed the inn for whoever owned it now. The ownership of country inns changes from time to time. He said, “This is Heimrich, Mary,” and listened for a moment. He said, “It certainly is. Lousy is the word for it. It went on all right?” He listened. He said, “Four in half an hour or so?” He listened again and said, “Fine, we’ll be along. And, Mary, two rooms for overnight?” He waited, but only for a moment “No,” he said. “Have to keep the fires going. For young Michael and a friend of his. Yes, two rooms. The way they want it” He said, thanks and, again, that they’d be along.

  He went back to the fire and stood in front of it. He intervened between Mite and Mite’s fire. Mite was reasonably courteous about it, although he did speak, briefly. He moved enough so that the heat hit him full on.

  “All set,” Heimrich said. “It’s a lousy night. The generator went on and, Mary says, they’re lighted up like a Christmas tree. Food for four, lodging for two.”

  Joan Collins said, “Two, Inspector?”

  “You two,” Heimrich said. “Susan and I’ll have to keep—” He checked himself before he said “the home fires burning.” He said, “Keep a fire going so we don’t freeze up.”

  “We don’t really—” Joan said, and stopped abruptly, and looked at Michael. His expression didn’t say anything. But then he smiled rather briefly.

  “Need two rooms,” Susan finished, but only in her mind. She was not surprised. She had supposed as much from the way the two looked at each other; the way they carefully did not touch each other. She probably thinks we’re very rigid, Susan thought; very old and—and proper? Too old to understand? They’re—they’re so very young. And think we’re so very old.

  “So,” Heimrich said, and poked the fire back. He looked at it for a moment, and decided he could risk another log. He pulled the screen meshes together across the fireplace and stood the heavy firetool rack in front of them.

  Mite was not pleased by this. He said so. He moved back to the warmth of the Heatolater vent. After a moment, Colonel sighed deeply and went to join him. A dog just gets settled and he has to move again.

  “So,” Heimrich said, “we’ll just use one car, I think. Leave yours here until tomorrow, Miss Collins.”

  Michael and Joan stood up, Joan a little hesitantly. She said, “Only, Mrs. Heimrich—my things.”

  “They’ll be quite safe in the—” Heimrich said, but Susan,

  gently, broke in on that.

  “She means her night things, dear,” Susan said, in the compassionate tone women use for the obtusity of males. ‘We’ll put whatever you need in the big car, Joan. Your overnight things.”

  “But,” Joan said, “I can’t go to a restaurant looking like this. Dressed like this.”

  “On a night like this,” Susan told her, “everybody will be wearing whatever they happened to have on when the lights went off. Anything warm enough, anyway. But we’ll take you whatever you want, my dear.”

  They went out through the kitchen, which was closest to the garage door. They went cautiously across the breezeway ice. Michael put an arm around the slim girl to steady her. (Also, Susan thought, because there was a reason to hold her close.) Heimrich put an arm about his wife’s shoulders. (Yes, Susan thought, for the same reasons. But the kids won’t notice that, or believe that possible.)

  What Joan needed was one of the two largish suitcases which occupied the back seat of the Volks and a small overnight case which Michael extracted from the little trunk which occupied the space allotted the engine in other cars. They fitted handily in the Buick’s trunk. The Buick made rather a fuss about starting, and

  Heimlich swore at it. Perhaps, sometime, Detroit would be able to combine antipollution devices with an engine willing to run. Heimrich rather doubted it.

  Finally, the engine seemed content. It stalled, of course, when Heimrich put the pointer at “R.” But it agreed to start up again.

  They inched down High Road. They stopped at The Corners, where the traffic lights were not working. There was no traffic on Van Brunt Avenue. But the avenue had been sanded; 11F was, after all, a state road. It rated at least a modicum of sand.

  Even with the studded tires, the Buick tried to skid as it was turned into the brightly lighted parking lot of the Old Stone Inn. Heimrich curbed it. There were a dozen or so cars in the lot. They seemed to cringe in the damp cold. Four of them were already iced over. The others were obviously only recently expelled from the dry refuges of nearby garages. Rural areas are suspended precariously at the ends of overhead wires. Within a ten-mile radius, only the inn had light and heat. A few houses, of course, had bottled gas to cook with. During ice storms, the less provident Van Brunt residents turned to the inn, if they were within creeping distance.

  The way from car to taproom entrance had been sanded. The footing was tricky but not really difficult But Michael held
his girl close in a protecting arm as they walked the few yards to the door. So. Heimrich did as much for Susan.

  The taproom was bright and warm and a fire leaped in a fireplace. There were a dozen or so people at tables, tables nearest the fire being favored. Susan and Merton knew all but two—the two who, alone, wore “party” clothes—the man a dinner jacket, the woman a long dress. The rest wore what the blackout had caught them in, which was largely sweaters and slacks. Oliver Finley also wore climbing boots. The Finleys did live at the top of a considerable rise above the Hudson.

  They found a table, not as close to the fire as they would have liked. All right. First come, first warmed.

  “We can eat here,” Susan told Joan. “Or in the main dining room. There isn’t any fire in there, but the food comes quicker. On the other hand, the drinks come slower. We take our choice.”

  It was a way of welcoming Michael’s girl in. The welcome was accepted. Joan Collins smiled, more warmly than she had before. She said, “Here’s nice, isn’t it? Only, I’d like–”

  Michael did not let her finish. He stood up, although he had not really sat down.

  “I’ll get your things,” Michael said. “Dad?”

  Heimrich tossed him the car keys. Michael went out into the rain.

  The bar waitress came. In deference to the weather outside, if in defiance of the temperature in the taproom, she wore a sweater over her uniform. She said, “Good evening, Inspector, Mrs. Heimrich, isn’t it a terrible night?” All over Van Brunt, the town of Cold Harbor, a considerable part of the Northeastern seaboard, people would be telling other people what a terrible night it was.

  “Awful,” Heimrich said. “Two very dry martinis, up, no olive. Tell him twists, but not dropped in. Two bourbons on the rocks. A little extra water in one.” He looked at Joan Collins, who smiled and nodded agreement “And we’ll eat in here. Order later.”

  “We’re being sort of busy tonight,” the waitress said. “People not being able to cook at home and all. Because of this awful weather. Two martinis up and hold the olives. Two bourbons on the rocks. Old Forrester be all right, Inspector? Because that’s what Joe’s serving, tonight, it being so close to Christmas.”