Irish Gilt

by Ralph McInerny

  Of course, he had lied about his job; he just told them he was employed by the University of Notre Dame. He earned more on the maintenance crew than his father had ever earned as a professor of classics. The drop in social status had spelled economic security. Marrying Bernice had been another downward step, so it wounded him the more that she had left him. During his life with Bernice, he had more or less concealed his origins, determined to dwell on her level. Now that he was alone, he had renewed his earlier interests: the classics his father had taught him even before he went to school; music. He might have been rinsing his soul of the house filled with gaudy paperbacks and the constant thunder of rock. Still, he missed Bernice, and little Henry, more than he would have admitted. His visits on the days he was permitted time with his son were seasons in hell.

  Now Bernice was working on campus! He had learned this from Marjorie when he ran into her at the supermarket.

  “I suppose you got her the job?”

  Well, there were women in maintenance, but it was pretty hard to think of Bernice as one of them.

  “Notre Dame is the biggest local employer.”

  “Maybe I’ll apply.”

  Marjorie was the kind of American woman he had imagined before he came here. One thing he had to give Bernice, she let him make the first move. When he left Marjorie he felt that he was escaping. Even if she had been a lot better looking, Ricardo still considered himself to be married to Bernice.

  Bernice. What the hell was she doing at Notre Dame? Working as a waitress, it turned out. He had sat in his pickup in the parking lot of Grace and watched her come to work. Throughout that day, he went back, unable to believe it. He was more embarrassed about her new job than she was. When he had taunted her about getting a job, he hadn’t meant it. His mother had never worked, no matter how tight things were. It was unmanly to let your wife work. A husband was supposed to support his wife and children, and in this country he could, so why the hell were all these women working?

  Then one day he saw her sitting at an outside table with an older man. Bernice was all over the guy. She must have taken lessons from Marjorie. He tried to tell himself it was nothing, just some professor she wanted to tell about all her crazy ambitions. Sure. But he found out who the guy was.

  Xavier Kittock. Like Xavier Cugat, from American movies he had seen in Buenos Aires.

  The next day, Ricardo hopped out of his pickup and confronted the guy on a campus walk.

  “I am Ricardo Esperanza.”

  “Do I know you?”

  “Bernice is my wife.”

  He just nodded.

  “You know Bernice?” Ricardo persisted.

  “The girl who works in Grace.”

  “Keep away from her. She’s my wife.”

  He stepped closer, and the man danced away. Several people stopped, wondering what the maintenance guy was up to.

  “Just remember,” Ricardo growled, and went back to his pickup.

  12

  “Kittock? Eggs Kittock?” Boris Henry reacted to the mention of the man currently doing research in the archives with a mixture of annoyance and amusement. “We were roommates here. There were three of us together. Eggs, Paul Lohmam, and myself.” For a moment, Greg feared that Boris was going to drift into reminiscing about his student days, always a threat where alumni are concerned. “What the devil is Eggs Kittock doing in the archives?”

  Greg assumed a pious look. It was not for him to divulge one person’s research to another. This moral high ground had the added advantage of making his silence seem virtuous.

  “How often does he come?”

  “Often.”

  Boris was led to the glassed-in workroom, and his attention was drawn immediately to the row of boxes on the table. He hardly glanced at them before asking why they were already out. “This is the stuff I wanted to look at. The correspondence.”

  “There’s more. It’s catalogued by year.”

  “Has Kittock been looking at this stuff?”

  “Yes.”

  With an effort, Henry let it go. There was no point in letting the archivist see how upset he was. But Eggs Kittock, for the love of God! Research? The workroom door closed after Walsh, and Henry opened the flip top of the first box, but then he just sat there. Someone was playing a trick on him. Someone had somehow got wind of his interest in Zahm, particularly the Latin American travels, and was using it to tweak him. Then he remembered. Of course. Eggs had come through Kansas City some months ago, and after a sumptuous dinner they sat up half the night talking. What hadn’t they talked about? Like an idiot, he must have said enough about Zahm for Eggs to put two and two together, though how he managed to remember anything after all they had drunk was a wonder. He looked awful when Boris introduced him to Clare late the following morning. Clare, the wonder woman, said she immediately recognized Eggs from the photograph in Boris’s office of the three roommates in their senior year. More important, she mixed him a bromo and restored him to more or less normal condition.

  “What a night,” he moaned.

  “I don’t want to hear about it.”

  Clare sounded almost flirty, and Boris looked at her in surprise.

  Maybe she thought she could jolly visiting firemen without complications. For a fleeting moment, Boris recalled their own near thing. He wouldn’t say he was jealous, but, hey, who was the boss here anyway?

  “You want a bromo, too?” Clare asked him.

  “What for?” At the moment, he would have heatedly denied feeling queasy. Drinking too much almost seemed meritorious, since he never felt the impulse to gamble then. The casinos demanded an absolutely clear head.

  Of course, he and Eggs would have talked of Paul. Their own lives, his and Paul’s, seemed obscenely successful compared with poor Eggs’s. On the basis of some patents used in communication satellites, Paul had made his pile and now had all the time in the world to devote himself to reading and music.

  “You should have married,” Boris had said to Eggs.

  “It’s too late for that,” He glanced at Clare when he said it, though.

  “Oh, come on.”

  “Or I’m too selfish. You’re in no rush to escape the single state, I notice.”

  “There’s plenty of time.”

  “Clare is a very beautiful woman,” Eggs said later.

  “Is she? I don’t even notice anymore.”

  So that was a possibility, Boris thought as he sat in the workroom of the archives at Notre Dame. It would be like Eggs to plan an elaborate leg pull, but would old Paul have gone along with it? Then again, the three of them had played two-on-one jokes as undergraduates. Lots of fun, except when you were the one on the receiving end.

  What he couldn’t comprehend was the thought of Eggs Kittock sitting here in the archives doing research, and on Zahm. It made no sense. His impression was that Eggs spent most of his time on the golf course down in Sarasota, where he had settled. Eggs had been a mediocre student and would have floundered after graduation if he hadn’t gone into the service. He had been a twenty-year man in the navy, maybe a few years more. That had been his element. He had been through a good share of the hell of recent years and had survived to claim his pension. Then he had embarked on a number of quixotic schemes. The sunken treasure expedition! Once Boris remembered that, Eggs working in the archives no longer seemed a joke.

  The Three Musketeers had kept in touch by way of e-mail since Eggs got out of the navy, but the only time they had all gotten together was at a class reunion three years ago. It had been wonderful. Eggs had seemed bemused by the fact that Boris was in the rare books business.

  “Does it pay?”

  Boris made a noncommital noise. Both Eggs and Paul knew he had come into a fortune when he lost his wife and father-in-law in that plane crash. Maybe they thought dealing in rare books was just a hobby. At the time of the reunion, Boris had not yet become fascinated with John Zahm, but he had mentioned the lucrative Notre Dame facet of his business. Eggs’s visit
to Kansas City had come after that, and Boris was suddenly sure he had told Eggs of the Zahm diary. Of course, anyone who got interested in Zahm could have come up with the same hunch Boris had, but given Eggs’s interest in buried treasure it seemed a certainty that he had. The fact was that no one during all the years since Zahm died had put two and two together. But Eggs, for crying out loud. Did the guy read anything? Now that he thought of it, Boris remembered Eggs asking if there was a copy of Richard Sullivan’s book on Notre Dame among his holdings.

  “Check the Web site. I’m sure we have it.”

  “I’ve been reading Ed Fisher and Tom Stritch.”

  Two professors who had published their memoirs, which concentrated on Notre Dame. Suddenly, it no longer seemed implausible that Eggs had hit on the same idea Boris had. His hand went out to the archival box, filled with Zahm letters. They were on the table because Eggs had asked for them.

  He was no longer in a mood to pursue the spoor that had brought him back to campus. First, he had to talk with Eggs.

  13

  Seven students showed up on Saturday afternoon at the Knights’ apartment, where Roger treated them to huge bowls of popcorn and the drink of their choice. Most of them followed his example and had soft drinks, but there was Phil’s beer for those who wanted it. It was when he was talking with Rebecca that Roger learned that her uncle was on campus, working in the archives. Greg had mentioned Xavier Kittock, the man who was looking through Zahm materials, but it was a surprise to learn he was Rebecca’s uncle.

  “It must run in the family,” he said.

  “What?”

  Roger shrugged. “Well, after all, your father is a fan of Lope de Vega.”

  She laughed. “Uncle X is not at all like my father. He’s my mother’s brother. He’s not like her, either.”

  “X?”

  “For Xavier. He spent most of his life in the navy.”

  “I’m a navy man myself.”

  She sat back, as if to gain sufficient distance to take him all in. Her look was one of disbelief, so he told her of his ignominious naval career.

  “You actually wore one of those uniforms?”

  “There was less of me then. Not much less, but enough.”

  “Well, Uncle X was made for the navy. In the family, he is something of a black sheep. Before and after the navy, that is. He was discharged with a chest full of medals.”

  “And what does he do now?”

  “Golfs. He does read. And a few years ago he was part of a treasure hunting expedition. Basically, he’s retired. He’s younger than my mother, and already he’s retired. My dad can’t understand how he can spend all his time doing nothing.”

  “Golf isn’t nothing.”

  “Don’t tell me you golf, too?”

  It was Roger’s turn to laugh. “I leave that to my brother, Phil.”

  “Is he retired?”

  “I don’t think he would put it that way.”

  “What does he do?”

  “He’s a private detective.”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “It’s true.” Roger decided against telling her that he himself had a private investigator’s licence.

  “He and Uncle X should get together.”

  “They could golf.”

  “Would you mind if I suggested it?”

  Roger hesitated. He didn’t want to commit Phil, and he could imagine his brother’s reaction to the suggestion that he golf with a man who spent his days in the university archives. Of course, there was the naval career to balance that.

  “Why don’t you ask Phil?” he suggested. “But first, tell me more about your father.”

  He had been a successful pathologist in Fort Worth, Rebecca said, a specialty that left him time for the pursuits that increasingly interested him. The move to Texas had prompted him to learn Spanish, and that had led to an interest in Spanish literature. Hence Lope de Vega.

  “I’d like to meet him.”

  “And he wants to meet you. Next time he visits I’ll set it up. Meanwhile, I want to talk to your brother.” Off she went to Phil, who was in the den watching television, staying out of the way of Roger’s class.

  “Thanks for letting me come.” It was Josh Daley.

  “Have some more popcorn.”

  Josh had some more popcorn as he explained why he had shown up for Roger’s class.

  “What’s your major?”

  “History.”

  “What period?”

  “Modern European.”

  “How modern?”

  “Post-Reformation and into the eighteenth century.”

  “Spain?”

  “Some. Why do you ask?”

  “Spanish literature is Rebecca’s father’s passion. The golden age, one of the most fascinating of all, with St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross as well as Cervantes and Lope de Vega.”

  “That’s Rebecca’s middle name.”

  “Now you know why.”

  Was Roger actually suggesting that the way to Rebecca’s heart was via her father’s interest in Spanish literature? When Josh thought of it that way, it sounded pretty silly. Still, being polite never hurt.

  “Thanks for the tip,” he said.

  14

  Xavier Kittock had found his return to campus everything that he had expected. The weather was contrast enough to Florida’s to give zest to life. He sprang out of bed in the morning and into the shower as if he were on some demanding schedule, and he loved it. Ever since getting out of the navy, he had been fulfilling the dream of indolence that carries one through the working years. When it comes, though, it swiftly loses its charms. The thing about a vacation is that it’s temporary, a furlough; retirement just goes on and on. Who would have thought that you could get tired of golf? The expedition to find buried treasure seemed to bring him back to active duty, and it led to other things. Now, back at Notre Dame, he had a routine. His room was only a notch above a student room; there were all kinds of places to pick up breakfast. At 11:30, he went to Mass in Sacred Heart Basilica, surprised at how easily piety returned in this setting. Then there were the long hours in the archives.

  Suddenly this idyll had been disturbed. First, there had been Bernice, the girl in the eatery at Grace, where he often went for a long lunch after a morning in the archives. He felt like an ass when he remembered telling her he was a writer. That had led to her telling him of her ambitions. Hers seemed a commentary on his own imaginary aspirations. It was pretty obvious that Bernice wanted to be an author, but it was unclear whether she could be a writer. Was he any better? They both wanted the title without the effort. This sense of similarity made him more sympathetic to her rather than less. Then he had been publicly confronted by her husband!

  Lying on his bed, shoes kicked off, hands behind his head, he sought on the ceiling the memory of that encounter. His first impulse was to tell the man that he had it all wrong—Bernice was so much younger, the accusation was ridiculous—but how could he justify himself with people slowing down and listening in as the man all but shouted his accusation on a campus walk? Then he was gone, and Kittock hurried away to his room and the replaying of the humiliating episode. One thing was sure, he would never return to the eatery in Grace. If he got serious about any woman at his age it would be Clare Healy.

  Now Boris Henry was looking for him. Greg Walsh had phoned Kittock and managed to get out that message with some effort. Kittock thanked him and hung up and then wondered why the archivist felt he should warn him about Boris. Of course, it was Zahm. Kittock thought of Boris seeing that row of boxes on the table in the workroom of the archives. Naturally he would think that Kittock was poaching on his territory.

  Well, he was. At the reunion, on a walk around the lakes, Paul Lohman had gone on and on about the transformation in their old friend, from lawyer to leading rare book dealer. “What he doesn’t know,” Paul said in admiration. “He sounds like a professor with a dozen specialities. Do you know The Great Gatsby
?”

  “The novel?”

  “Boris quoted from it. ‘I was that narrowest of specialists, the well-rounded man.’”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Ask Boris. He carries a lot of Notre Dame stuff. He says it sells like candy. You know the hall we lived in, Zahm? Named after a priest, John Zahm. He’s become a big interest of Boris’s.”

  That was all, at least about Boris. He and Paul played nine holes, and Eggs took it easy on his old roommate. His own handicap was down to four, but he was almost ashamed of that, listening to Boris Henry’s exciting life. Then had come the visit to Kansas City and the exciting news about Zahm’s travel diary. So he got hold of Weber’s biography of Zahm, and the next thing he knew he was sitting in the archives at Notre Dame asking the archivist to bring him stuff on Zahm. Well, it was one thing to fool a girl who worked in Grace. Boris wouldn’t need two minutes to see how little Eggs Kittock had learned during his weeks in the archives.

  He called the Morris Inn and asked for the room of Boris Henry. He was registered, but Kittock didn’t leave a message. Better to just go over there and meet him when he came in.

  Half an hour later, as Kittock entered the Morris Inn lobby, a girl rose from a chair and hurried up to him. Good God, Bernice.

  “I thought you would be staying here,” she said.