EQMM, March-April 2010

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Inside, Jake asked, “Is something bothering you?"

  Once again she whirled on him. “What do you mean?"

  "I don't mean anything, I'm simply asking a question. You've been on edge ever since we got up."

  "That's ridiculous.” Her blue eyes were icy again, challenging.

  Something was definitely wrong, but Jake couldn't fathom what it might be. It was as if she were waiting for something to happen but didn't quite know how it would turn out.

  "Okay. I'm off, then.” He stepped forward and kissed Lucy full on the lips, but her response was half-hearted, her smile strained.

  "Have a wonderful time, darling. And say hello to Andy and Maggie."

  * * * *

  On the drive to the meeting point Jake thought about their exchange. They'd had spats, of course. Who hadn't after twenty-one years of marriage? But he'd never seen her like this. She had definitely been edgy this morning, and now that he thought about it, she had seemed lost in thought last night. He and the girls had to repeat remarks and questions to get her attention.

  Jake put it aside when he pulled into the reserve's parking lot. About a dozen cars were there and people were standing around chatting and drinking coffee from thermos bottles and Starbucks cups. Jake parked, grabbed his day pack, and walked over to his very best friend, Andy, a short, roly-poly man with an infectious smile who stood with his equally plump and smiling wife and a few other people.

  "Didn't think you were going to make it,” Andy said.

  "Had to wait until the kids got off."

  "I'm going to miss Lucy,” Maggie said.

  "She had a load of stuff to do."

  A man at least ten years younger than anyone else in the group stepped forward and called out, “Listen up, folks. Let's get squared away. We have a lot of territory to cover, so we'd better get going so we can get out of here before the gates close at five o'clock."

  "This guy is really good,” Andy said.

  "Columbia, right?” a man nearby asked.

  Andy shook his head. “Yale. Yale School of Forestry. I took one of his tours in the Catskills. This is going to be a treat."

  An hour later everyone agreed. They had just emerged from woods into a broad meadow that skirted a wetland, where the tour leader stopped to allow stragglers to catch up. Jake and Andy and Maggie were walking together. Andy suddenly stopped.

  Jake looked at his old friend and became alarmed. “You okay?"

  "Honey, what is it?” Maggie asked

  Andy raised a hand to his forehead, said, “I feel dizzy,” and collapsed.

  Jake caught him and lowered him gently to the ground, at the same time shouting for help. There was a doctor in the group and he immediately began CPR. Andy, eyes closed, lay as if dead. The tour leader called 911 on his cell phone. Jake, who was quite familiar with the lay of the land, volunteered to run to the service road about a mile away on the other side of the wetland and guide the ambulance in over passable ground. The doctor was still working on Andy when the paramedics arrived and took over.

  The doctor and Maggie accompanied Andy to the hospital. Everyone else hurried to the parking lot to follow. Jake arrived at the hospital first and hurried to the emergency room, where he found the doctor from the group talking to the resident, whom Jake knew. Their expressions were grim. As Jake approached, the doctor looked at him and shook his head.

  "He didn't make it, Jake. It was massive. I think he was dead while I worked on him."

  Jake just stared at him, and finally asked, “Where's Maggie?"

  "We gave her a sedative,” the other doctor said. “She's lying down."

  "Anybody with her?"

  "A nurse who knows her well."

  Jake walked to a nearby bench and sat down. He still couldn't grasp the enormity of losing his best friend so quickly, so unexpectedly. The rest of the group began arriving. Some wept when they heard the news, but Jake couldn't cry. He was too stunned. Tears might come later, but now all he could do was sit there and stare at the opposite wall. It was eleven a.m. before he finally looked in on Maggie, but she was sleeping. Two close women friends who had been on the tour were sitting in the room. They assured Jake that they would tell her of his concern when she awoke. They were going to take her home then, and Jake told them that he would be over to see her later. But he would call first.

  He didn't want to break the news to Lucy over the phone. She had really liked Andy and Jake wanted to be there to comfort her and receive comfort when he told her of the tragedy. His mind reeled, emotions churned as he drove away from the hospital. He still could hardly bring himself to believe what had happened. He turned off the radio. He wanted nothing but silence.

  But on the interstate, when the traffic suddenly began to back up, he turned on the radio to traffic news and learned that there had been a fatal accident on a bridge a few miles ahead. All lanes were closed until further notice. An exit came up just as he heard the news and he turned off and began thinking of what route to take home. There were three obvious choices, but he saw ahead and behind that others had also turned off, and he expected that those roads would soon become clogged. Jake was an expert on the side roads in his own county and several surrounding ones. He decided to take a roundabout way, via Digby Road, that would add several miles to his trip, but he reckoned that once he got beyond the Great Hudson Mall the roads he intended to take would be lightly traveled and he would make better time than if he stuck to the standard routes.

  Digby Road was busy, but that was because it was a direct route from the east to the Great Hudson Mall. He finally came down a long hill to the six-lane highway that bordered the mall and just missed the light. He was in the left-hand lane with his turn signal on, ready to turn onto the highway and head south. As he looked about he spotted on the highway a Jeep Cherokee the same color and model as Lucy's. It was stopped in the left-hand lane, the driver waiting for the green light to turn into the mall. There was a woman behind the wheel.

  Jake's eyes narrowed. She was a considerable distance away. He couldn't make out her features but her profile was familiar. It couldn't be Lucy, though. They never shopped here. It was too far away. Fairview Mall, much closer to them, had everything the Great Hudson had plus a Filene's. Besides, she wanted to work around the house and the garden. Still . . . that profile. He opened the day pack on the seat next to him and took out his powerful military- type field glasses and zoomed in on the woman in the Jeep Cherokee.

  He was dumbfounded. It was Lucy. What in God's name was she doing over here? His surprise drove Andy's death at least temporarily from his mind. Lucy's light changed and she wheeled into the mall. Other cars in her lane followed. Jake strained to keep her in sight. He flicked off his turn signal and kept an impatient eye on his traffic light. Dammit! He was going to lose her. Then his light changed and he shot forward in pursuit, cutting off the car next to him. When he entered the mall, most of the cars ahead of him were turning into the entrances to the parking lot of the Walmart Superstore. He craned his neck for a sight of Lucy's car and finally saw it far ahead of him. She had passed Walmart. He jumped a light that had just turned red, drawing angry horn blasts. There were now only two cars between him and Lucy. Home Depot, Target, Staples, and Sam's Club were ahead. Which one was she going to? She passed the entrances to Home Depot, Target, and Staples. Sam's Club, then, she was going to Sam's Club. But why here, a good thirty miles out of her way? And why wasn't she home where she said she'd be?

  At the entrance to Sam's Club, which was a right-hand turn, she signaled left and turned into the back parking lot of the big Riverview Motel. A chill settled over Jake. He sped up and made a left into the lot of a Dollar Store directly behind the motel and drove parallel with Lucy, but behind her. There were half a dozen cars parked behind the motel. Lucy slowed and started to pull in beside a dark green Jaguar. Jake's eyes narrowed. The owner couldn't be the man who came immediately to mind. Impossible. It had to be somebody else. There was more than one dark g
reen Jaguar in the county.

  Lucy stopped halfway into the parking space, backed up, and drove six units down before parking. Jake glanced at his watch. Almost noon. Early for motel business. That is, normal motel business. The chill had not gone away. Now it was joined by a sense of disbelief. Not Lucy. Not his Lucy, love of his life. He parked facing the motel, facing the dark green Jaguar, and raised his field glasses.

  Lucy got out of her car, slung her Louis Vuitton bag over her shoulder, paused momentarily, seemed to square her shoulders. She looked smart in her Ray-Ban sunglasses, well-fitting Prada jeans, and a delicate blue blouse by Hanae Mori that matched her lovely eyes. She strode with quick, nervous, long-legged strides down the walkway to the door opposite the dark green Jaguar.

  The drapes of room 453 were closed. Lucy paused again and seemed to take a deep breath before raising her hand and knocking on the door. Jake's hands squeezed the field glasses until his knuckles turned white.

  The door opened wide. The man in the doorway was tall, bronzed, muscular, and appeared to be naked.

  "Jesus!” Jake said loudly.

  Smiling broadly, the man stepped aside as Lucy entered the room. He wasn't naked, but his skimpy briefs barely covered him. He put an arm around Lucy's shoulder bent, and nuzzled that sweep of her elegant neck so sweet and dear to Jake. The door closed.

  Jake lowered the field glasses to his lap. He felt as if he had been poleaxed. There was a great empty feeling in his stomach. He could not believe it. He pounded the steering wheel. “No! . . . No! No! No!” His breathing was loud, harsh. He thought he was going to be sick to his stomach and quickly unbuckled and got out of the car and leaned against it. His breath came fast. He felt weak. Was he going to have a heart attack? Was he going to die here, this morning, not fifty yards from where his wife was undressing for another man? Or was she being undressed?

  "Damn! . . . Damn! Damn! Damn!"

  He clenched his hands and walked away from his car. When his breathing slowed he stepped over the low concrete barrier between the parking lots and walked quickly toward room 453. His Vibram-soled hiking shoes were quiet on the concrete. He slowed as he approached and tiptoed up to the door and put his ear to it. At first he heard nothing, then Lucy laughed. No. No, she had giggled. Giggled like a schoolgirl.

  He stepped back quickly, stung, anger rising, regretting that he had eavesdropped. Visions of what was going on behind the closed door of room 453 assailed his imagination. The wife he adored rutting with a man he held in contempt. He wanted to smash the door down. He thought about getting the car and driving full speed across the lot into the big picture window. He trembled. He felt the tug of the towering rages of his youth that he had willed himself to control as he matured. The urge to violence almost overwhelmed him. But that masterly self-control for which he was widely admired among those who were aware of his naturally high-toned nature restrained him.

  For one thought took precedence and kept him from unleashing violence on Lucy and her lover. The children. Kate and Mimi. Innocent, trusting, loved, and loving. They must never know. There must be no violent confrontation that would bring attention, police, publicity. Above all, the children must be protected. They must not be publicly shamed.

  Which is why he did not knock on the door and interrupt Lucy's tryst. For he knew that if he came face to face with them he would not be able to restrain himself. At this moment, he could kill. And whether she committed the act or not was now irrelevant. Her intention was treachery itself. Besides, he knew what he was going to do. Not how he was going to do it, not yet, or when. He would have to think about that. Until he was ready, for the children's sake he must control himself.

  Jake walked away from the sounds coming from room 453. For a moment he stopped by the Jaguar and considered gouging deep scratches in the surface with a key. Instead, he went to Lucy's car. At least he could inconvenience them. He and Lucy carried keys to each other's car in case of emergencies. He got in, started her car, and sat there for a few minutes, watching the door of room 453. When no one appeared or peeked out from behind the drapes, he backed out to the edge of the lot and drove slowly away and up the exit road, turned into the parking lot of the Walmart Superstore, and drove around until he found a parking space deep in the crowded lot. Then he walked back to his own car. He was tempted once again to approach the door of room 453 and listen but decided not to torture himself anymore or risk releasing the fury banked within him. He pulled out and drove away. He was overpowered by a sense of massive betrayal. On the way home he broke down and wept.

  In good weather, he and Lucy always left their cars in the driveway during the day, but now he parked out of sight in the garage. In the entrance hall he stopped and looked at the handsome credenza of Chilean oak they had bought when they were first married and really couldn't afford it and agonized together over the price, but had gone ahead anyway and never regretted it. Friends and visitors often admired the piece, and Jake loved it. Now he wanted to take an ax to it and chop it into pieces and smash the heirloom china inside that Lucy had brought to their marriage.

  He dropped his day pack in his study but set his field glasses aside. It was a large room furnished in oak and leather and lined with bookshelves containing hundreds of volumes in English, French, German, and Arabic, mostly history, geography, science and technology, and contemporary affairs, but also some well-selected fiction. They were arranged by subject matter, and within subjects alphabetically by author, so he could immediately lay his hands on exactly the book he wanted, for he knew every book in his collection. His own books, ten of them, including three bestsellers, and his leather-bound collected articles were shelved behind his desk. The desk was well ordered, on it a few neat piles of papers related to an article he was writing. Their cleaning woman was not allowed in Jake's study. Jake vacuumed the room and dusted the books and furniture. Lucy had helped him until some papers he had sworn were on the desk disappeared and he accused her of throwing them out by mistake. She had fetched a feather duster and thrown it at him and told him to clean the damn inner sanctum himself.

  On the only free wall space were family pictures and photographs of Jake with world leaders, including the signed photographs of four Presidents. There was also a photograph of Jake in boxing gloves and trunks standing over the fallen opponent he had knocked out the day he won the Big 10 middleweight championship. He still weighed the same and worked out every day in the exercise room in the basement, finishing up each session with the punching bag. Jake walked over and looked at one photograph in particular, his favorite of Lucy, taken before Kate was born. They had gone backpacking in the Adirondacks. Lucy was half turned to the camera, sunglasses perched on top of her head, thumbs hooked into the straps of her rucksack. Her lips were slightly parted, and her enigmatic half-smile was the stuff of Renaissance paintings. Jake wanted to snatch it from the wall and smash it and tear the photograph to bits.

  He went to his desk and called Andy's house. A close friend of Maggie's answered and Jake asked if it would be all right to come over later and she suggested after dinner. He left the study to make himself a light gin and tonic in the small bar off the living room, then returned and pulled a leather armchair to the window. He kept the drapes closed in the morning so the sun wouldn't damage his books, but now he opened them a few inches so that he had a clear view of the circular drive. He tried to think of Andy, but Lucy's betrayal drove the terrible events of the early-morning hours to the recesses of his mind. He sat and waited, brooding, sipping his gin and tonic so slowly that the melting ice diluted the drink.

  Were there signs he had missed? He had certainly spotted her edginess this morning, and now he knew the reason for it. Her behavior this morning and the signs of nervousness and hesitation as she had approached room 453 and before she knocked on the door made him think it was the first time she had cheated. Or was it? That sharp, incisive mind so many had praised over the years thought long and hard about their marriage. Had she seemed restless la
tely? Not that he'd noticed, and he considered himself sensitive to her moods. Out of sorts? He didn't think so. She was a bit high-strung, but he had always found that trait endearing. They made love often and passionately. Money worries were well past them. She loved to travel, often accompanied him on his expense-paid trips abroad, her style and beauty and gift for small talk on social occasions fitting accompaniment to Jake's gravity. It was a good, well-ordered life, exactly the opposite of the home and neighborhood he had grown up in. He liked that old saying: a place for everything, and everything in its place.

  Jake sat back and closed his eyes. He could think of nothing that should have led her to this incredible act of treachery, and that was precisely the word for it. Treachery. The opportunities presented to Jake for infidelity over the years had been legion. He was a well-known man, much in demand in chancelleries and boardrooms around the world, his insights valued, his predictions, often against the grain, of sharp turns in national and world affairs uncanny. Several smart, lovely women, well known and obscure, had either blatantly or subtly revealed their availability. He had politely spurned them all, for his love for Lucy was deep, and he was not a man for one-night stands or casual affairs. What, then, had gone wrong? What had driven her to this? And why that cretin? A man he held in deep contempt, a man who flitted from one job to another, always regaling friends and acquaintances with tales of big deals that never materialized, a man who would have had trouble holding a clerk's position had he not been anchored by a sizeable trust fund and the old-boy network. And a notorious womanizer. How could she? His smart, beautiful, fastidious Lucy. Mother of their children. How could she?

  The dark green Jaguar pulled into the circular drive and stopped directly in front of the house a little after four-thirty. Jake raised his field glasses and watched as Lucy and the man embraced and kissed. Watched as the man left her lips to nuzzle the elegant sweep of neck no longer sweet and dear to Jake. He would never again be able to do the same. Watched as Lucy pulled reluctantly away only to thrust herself eagerly back into the man's arms when he reached out and cupped her breast. Finally, she pushed away, shaking her head. She seemed to be laughing. She opened the door and got out of the car but remained bent at the open door as they talked.