Good Evening Mr. and Mrs. America, and All the Ships at Sea

by Richard Bausch

  She waved this away. “Oh, unquestionably—a little problem. We were worried about his heart. He has a history. It’s nothing—nothing to worry about at all. But he is in hospital. As a precaution. And he—wondered if I couldn’t bring you round to see him. I could drive you home afterward. I mean, I’d be happy to do that, if you needed me to.”

  “What about the others?” Marshall asked.

  “Yes, well, what about them? They’ll have to forgo class tonight.”

  “He—he just wants to see me?”

  “You’re—Walter Marshall, are you?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Well, that’s it, then. Those are my instructions.” She stood. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll just step out and tell these people that we’ll have to dispense with classes for tonight. I should’ve said so over the phone, but I wasn’t thinking very clearly. Oh, and, I don’t think Mr. D’Allessandro wants the others to know about this, um, meeting.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She frowned, staring. She seemed for a moment to be considering something about his appearance. “I don’t recall when I’ve met a more polite young man.” Now she smiled. “Makes me feel rather like an old person. You don’t see me as old, then?”

  He shook his head.

  “I’m only forty-three.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Does it strike you as odd that I’d tell my age so blithely?”

  “No.”

  She gave forth a small laugh. “Nothing surprises anyone these days, I suppose.” Then she opened the door to the studio and began to tell the others about canceling the night’s class. Albert moved across the room to where Marshall stood, and Emma moved with him. “Well, I guess we can go celebrate.”

  “I can’t,” Marshall told him.

  Albert said nothing for a moment.

  “I’d love to, Albert. But I just can’t tonight.”

  Albert indicated Emma with a slight nod of his head. “Maybe it’s for the best. She’s pretty upset.”

  “It wasn’t a heart attack,” Marshall said to her.

  She moved to stand even closer to Albert, who shook his head and seemed to want to say more. But it was a moment before he spoke. “It’s not the specific thing,” he said. “You see. It’s—you understand.”

  “Yes,” Marshall said, not understanding at all.

  “So I’ll see you on Wednesday?”

  “Wednesday, yes.”

  “We’ll have to have a double date,” Emma said in a shaky voice.

  “That would be nice.”

  The others were filing out. Albert took a step toward the door and then looked over his shoulder at Marshall. “You coming? We’ll walk you to the bus stop.”

  “Actually—I’ve got some work to do. In—in the library,” Marshall told him.

  Albert nodded, all good nature and credulity. “Oh, sure. Well, congratulations again.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Congratulations,” Emma said.

  They went out and down the stairs, and Emma called good-bye again from the door. Albert turned to look back, squinted into the light, smiling, and then went on out. Mrs. D’Allessandro stood next to Marshall on the landing, and when the door finally closed, she said, “I know that must’ve been a bit awkward for you.”

  He said nothing.

  She was putting her coat on, tying a scarf around her neck. He buttoned his own coat. “Ready?” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, what were they congratulating you about?”

  “Oh,” Marshall said, with a start. “That—I—I’m engaged to be married.”

  “To this—Alice, I take it?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “How nice for everyone,” she said. “That’s very good news.”

  “Yes, m—” His voice quavered and caught again. He cleared his throat and tried once more. “Yes, ma’am.”

  She started down the stairs. “Positively the most polite boy,” she said. “We should have you copied.”

  She drove erratically, gripping the wheel with both hands, appearing to strain in order to keep sitting upright, using the wheel as support. He looked out at the wet street, and every other car seemed to veer at them before gliding by, some of them with horns blaring. There were several near misses. When Mrs. D’Allessandro stopped at a light, she pressed the brake in one steady motion until it locked, and they pitched forward on the seat. The car skidded a few yards, and she struggled to get it straight. Marshall found it necessary to put both hands on the dashboard. They had come to a stop in the middle of an intersection.

  “Bloody rain,” she said.

  Another car swung past, barely missing the passenger-side door. Marshall let out a small shout of alarm.

  “Excuse me,” she said, grinding the gears. “We’ll be off in a moment.”

  He nodded, then remembered to say, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “You needn’t call me ‘ma’am.’ And, in fact, I wish you wouldn’t.”

  “Yes, m…” he began.

  She turned to him and seemed about to say more. But then she sighed and looked out at the glimmering street. “Can’t get over those eyes of yours.”

  The light changed, and they jerked forward. She hit the brakes again and brought the heel of her hand against the horn. “Bloody American drivers.”

  Marshall hadn’t seen the other car this time. He had closed his eyes, facing away from her, as though looking out the passenger-side window.

  “I’ll never understand it,” she said. “Brutal country. It infects people. They come here as normal as pie and in five minutes they’re ready to kill. I never should’ve left England.”

  In other circumstances, he might’ve thought to say something patriotic. But he was giving all his attention to the road. The car had eased forward, and was gathering speed. “I always try to make the next light,” she said, speeding up. There were cars entering the street from both sides, and apparently she didn’t see them, or was simply ignoring them. He couldn’t help crossing his arms in front of his face.

  “Perfectly awful,” she said.

  Horns sounded and then receded. He sat up and looked out the back window, at the confusion of lights. When he looked at Mrs. D’Allessandro again, she had her round shoulders hunched, someone forging ahead, eyes narrowed, hands tight on the wheel, mouth partly open as if she were facing into a strong wind.

  They went through another intersection, horns blaring from both sides. And at the next intersection they skidded to a stop just as the light turned green.

  “I wish they’d bloody well make up their minds,” Mrs. D’Allessandro said.

  They went sailing through a pair of slowing trucks. Marshall read the words “Dry Cleaning” on the side of one far too close. He sat up and held his breath, one hand on the dash.

  “Are you nervous?” she said.

  “No, ma’am.” He’d actually made a croaking sound this time. He did not try to repeat the words, but only looked at her and smiled.

  “Nervous,” she said.

  They went on, through the rain and the traffic lights, the busy intersections, the shifting lanes, the veering shapes of the backs of cars. Marshall held tight, his weight pressed against the back of the seat.

  At last, the hospital came into view—they barreled past the signs and into the parking lot, the right-side wheels rolling over the curb and severely jostling the inside of the car. He hit his head on the ceiling. Mrs. D’Allessandro pulled into a parking space without slowing down, and then stopped with the suddenness of emergency. They skidded again, and bumped the curb.

  “There,” she said, turning the ignition off.

  Marshall rubbed the top of his head. There was a welt starting.

  “Are you hurt?” She took his face between her hands and stared at him. “Are you dizzy?”

  “No. My head.”

  “You’re fine.” She let go of him. “Do you have a hairbrush? You look a
bit disheveled. Here.” She combed her fingers through his hair, then took his chin and regarded him. “Best we can do, I suppose.”

  They got out of the car. He saw scratches in the finish and several dents in the fenders. It was not an old car. “Does Mr. D’Allessandro usually do the driving?” he asked.

  She seemed incredulous that he could ask such a question. “He doesn’t have a license to drive. He let it lapse five years ago.”

  Marshall couldn’t help thinking about Mr. D’Allessandro’s heart trouble. He made his way around to join her on the sidewalk. She waited, her purse held in front of her with both hands.

  “No,” she said. “I do all the driving. When there’s any driving to do. There’s less than three thousand miles on this car.”

  He looked at it again. A Ford Falcon. The name seemed absurdly diminished by the battered look of the fenders.

  They crossed the lot in the tall, misting shadow of the building. As they reached the glass doors leading inside, she took his arm and stopped him. “Is that man following us?”

  Marshall turned to look. A figure was moving across the lot, a few feet from the road, a man holding a briefcase, a newspaper under his arm. The man moved along amid the parked cars, paused at one, and began digging in his coat pockets.

  “I thought I saw him watching us,” Mrs. D’Allessandro said.

  “I don’t think so,” Marshall told her.

  She still held on to his arm. “You’re a good young man,” she said. “We’re going to trust you. We’re going to put ourselves in your hands.”

  He nodded automatically, meaning to say that he understood her words. But he did not understand, and as she led him into the building, he paused to say so.

  “That’s what this meeting’s about,” she said.

  Chapter 4

  Mr. D’Allessandro was in a room on the seventh floor. In the bed next to his, a man lay, heavily asleep, mouth open, head thrown back, legs spread wide, as though he had fallen over from a standing position after being hit on the chin. His snores were audible all the way out to the nurses’ station. “Can you believe it?” Mr. D’Allessandro said over the noise. “I’ve even tried turning him on his side. I’ve asked the nurse to pull the curtain at least, but nobody hears what you say.”

  Mrs. D’Allessandro pulled the curtain around the other bed, and then they all listened for a time. The snoring went on, and grew even louder—one would have been hard pressed to believe that it was a human sound.

  “Isn’t it incredible?” D’Allessandro said to his wife. “That’s what I’ve been dealing with all afternoon and evening. Incredible.”

  “Poor boy,” she said.

  “I can’t hear you.”

  She indicated Marshall with a nod of her head.

  In the next instant, with a suddenness that made them pause, the snoring stopped, then continued in a minor key, a little less loud.

  Mrs. D’Allessandro nodded toward Marshall again.

  “Yes,” her husband said with a shrugging motion, as if he were throwing a weight off his shoulders. “I see you brought our young friend along.”

  “Your perception is unfailing as usual, dear.”

  He held out a bony hand for Marshall to shake. D’Allessandro was twelve years older than his wife, yet there was about his face a tight quality, as though the skin had been stretched and polished. His mouth was turned down, and when he smiled, one’s first helpless impression was that he had grimaced with some sudden pang—it usually took a second to realize that he was pleased—and his watery eyes had a way of shifting from you even as they took you in. “So, young sir. Did Mrs. D’Allessandro talk to you—”

  “I didn’t tell him anything,” said his wife.

  He looked at her and then seemed to grimace. He was now supporting himself on one elbow. He drew a sudden breath, and paused, staring at Marshall. “You know I have very good hopes for you.” His voice when he meant to be especially emphatic took on a whispery overly dramatic quality that always made Marshall want to glance away. He almost did so now. Mr. D’Allessandro went on. “I think you’re one of the better students we’ve had here, and, frankly, I’d be very surprised if you didn’t land a good job very soon after you graduate.”

  This was something he had already said more than once. The young man nodded at him, then turned his attention to Mrs. D’Allessandro, who sighed, moved restlessly to the foot of the bed, and sat down.

  “Noise getting to you?” her husband asked without looking at her.

  In the next bed, the snoring went on, the same toneless hum, as if the patient, even in his unconscious state, were in contention for an audience.

  “I’m not bothered by the noise, Lawrence.”

  “You looked a bit distracted, dear.”

  “Get on with it, why don’t you.”

  “I was about to.” He reached out and put his thin, cool hand on Marshall’s wrist, then took it away. “My gastric distress isn’t quite what it seems, lad.”

  Mrs. D’Allessandro cleared her throat abruptly. “I told them it was your heart.”

  Again, D’Allessandro answered without looking at her. His eyes were on Marshall, and they narrowed the smallest increment. “I thought we agreed it would be an ulcer, dear.”

  “Heart seemed easier at the time,” she said.

  “It’s not what we agreed on, though.”

  “That hardly matters now.”

  “Still, it constitutes a deviation from the agreed-upon plan.” He spoke through his teeth.

  “Please, proceed with it, Lawrence.”

  “You see,” D’Allessandro said, grimacing for real this time, and never taking his eyes off the young man, “I have stomach trouble that is not exactly of the ulcer variety, like our snoring friend here.”

  Marshall was unable to decide what to do with his own facial expressions—whether concern was called for, or the polite smile of being in humor with the other man, or a frown of sympathy. There was a light in D’Allessandro’s eyes, as if he had just told a joke, though presently the grimace-smile returned, and his wife shifted her weight impatiently at the foot of the bed. The snoring seemed to be growing louder—such a series of fluting and bellowing drafts of air that they stopped and listened again, for a moment.

  When it lessened, Mr. D’Allessandro shook his head, and then sat up, arranging his pillows behind him. “Crank the bed up a little,” he said to Marshall.

  “Here,” said Mrs. D’Allessandro, rising. She wound the crank with a competent speed that looked a little like temper. When he was satisfied, her husband said, “That’s better,” arranging the blankets across his lap. He was sitting almost straight up. She returned to the foot of the bed.

  He smiled, or grimaced, at Marshall. “My stomach is hurt from a blow, you see.”

  Marshall did not see, and it must’ve shown in his expression.

  “Someone hit me there. Hard.”

  “Oh, Lawrence,” Mrs. D’Allessandro said. “For mercy’s sake, do get on with it, will you?”

  “There’s a way of going about these things, Esther.”

  She said nothing. He moved in the bed, arranging himself, smoothing the blanket over his legs, frowning with pain. Then he cleared his throat, and coughed. Marshall thought of rooms where people died, watching as Mrs. D’Allessandro brought a little slide puzzle out of her purse and began furiously trying to work it. The incongruity of this, along with the mounting sense of catastrophe in the room, made him consider trying to extricate himself. But he was curious, too. And now Mr. D’Allessandro turned to him and started talking about the ageless appeal of speed, of swiftness, of competition—racing men, racing women, racing horses, racing dogs, racing cars—and of trying to predict and capitalize on the results of such contests. His dear father and both of his dear uncles, may they rest in peace, had worked around the horses, had spent the best part of their lives at the track. He had grown up among them, and oh, that was the life a boy ought to lead—being around horses and hor
semen, walking the animals, feeding them and grooming them, and being there for the sights and sounds and excitements of the race; being five years old and standing between shouting men at trackside, seeing a flashing confusion of thundering hooves go by, kicking up the raked, red dirt and shaking the whole world, it seemed; and how good it was to stand in the raised, dry dust of the race, the fine, floating dust that gathered in clouds on the summer breezes, and mixed with the smell of the horses. He made it clear that he was drawing from fond memory, the clearest and best recollection, the kind that made your heart stir again.

  His wife kept working the little puzzle, clicking the pieces into place with a strange, distracted efficiency.

  “Well, young man,” Mr. D’Allessandro said, “do you—do you see what I mean?”

  Marshall nodded, though he did not see at all.

  “The point of all this,” Mr. D’Allessandro went on, grimacing or smiling, “is that one must try to enjoy these things without diminishing one’s, shall we say, resources. In short, lad, I’m afraid I’ve let the love of these things wrest from me my ability to discipline myself. And the result is that I’ve incurred some few problems of arrearage.”

  “Oh, God,” Mrs. D’Allessandro said without looking up from her puzzle. “Micawber.”

  Her husband said, “My wife is English.” Then he paused, sighed, and seemed to collect himself. “There are some gentlemen I owe money to, you see, a—rather a lot of it, I’m afraid. And they’re not—ah, particularly interested in the hows and wherefores of the matter. No. They want their money without reference to the hows and wherefores. And since I can’t take blood from a stone—well, you get the picture. I gave them a large payment, see. A lot of what I owe them, and it’s put me in a sort of a bind vis-à-vis the school.”

  “Vis—” Marshall began. He had just seen the phrase in print somewhere.

  “The school,” Mr. D’Allessandro said. “Yes. I’m afraid if something isn’t done I won’t be able to continue for the rest of the—the school year, you see. Next term. And because of these, er, these very insistent gentlemen—well, it’s a bit—it’s actually imperative that I receive another term’s tuitions, and even that I increase their number. Which, my young friend, is where you come in.”