“To our happy occasion.” Natasha raised her glass.
After their dinner, they drove in the same caravan downtown to Beale Street and the Rum Boogie Cafe for drinks and music. Aunt Clara and Uncle Jack danced beautifully together, alone in the middle of the small space for it, and then Leander pulled Trixie out there. The four of them looked splendid. Natasha took her new husband by the hand and led him into the gathering crowd of dancers. Faulk claimed that he did not like to dance and was no good at it, but he was very smooth. She told him so, and this made him self-conscious. He moved with her, breathing the perfumed tangle of her hair and looking through the crowd at his father and Trixie. They looked happy. He said into Natasha’s ear: “My dear wife.”
She leaned back slightly to look into his eyes and smiled and then kissed him.
“I’m so happy,” he told her. And for that moment, he found that he was.
“Yes, happy,” she said, resting her head on his chest. The room was spinning slightly, though she’d had nothing to drink. She saw Iris watching them, sitting with the others. Faulk seemed to want to perform for the old woman, turning toward her with Natasha in his arms, and grinning at her applause. Iris wore her brace and held her cane, and even so she stood for a while and moved her upper body rhythmically to the music.
“Let’s sit down after this one,” Natasha said, breathlessly.
He clung to the happy feeling, thinking of the house and all his work on it and the job and the night ahead, the days coming when they would be together, just the two of them.
Natasha, with her ear pressed to his chest, closed her eyes and swayed with him, the loud voices and music all around her. She sighed happily and raised her eyes to his and offered her mouth. He stopped dancing and kissed her, and a cheer went up around them, husband and wife. Then they separated and went on dancing because the band, which was called the Boogie Blues Band, had switched to a fast song. The lead singer started throwing strings of beads from the stage, and now some of the waitresses were doing a choreographed dance together. People stood and clapped their hands and watched and caught the long strands of colorful beads—everyone except Aunt Clara and Uncle Jack, who kept dancing. Constance shouted over the music that it all looked like a dance number from a Broadway show. People clapped in rhythm, standing on the edge of the space where the dancers moved. They were excellent, every step perfectly timed.
“I want this night to go on and on,” Natasha said to Faulk, having to shout. Iris, standing now, smiled and nodded, and then reached down and got her tall glass of beer and had a long drink from it. She sat back down, already having drunk two glasses and she seemed almost playful, beating time on the table with the flat of her hand.
When the song finally ended and everyone was seated, Faulk stood and said, “It’s been a lovely evening. Thank you all for coming.”
“Can’t hear you, priest,” Leander shouted from the other end of the table.
Faulk nodded at him, giving him the thumbs-up sign. “A lovely time. Thank you.”
“Yes, my son.”
“Wonderful,” said Trixie. Then she stood and pulled Leander up to embrace Faulk and Natasha. “We’re leaving early in the morning,” Leander said. “You two’ll come visit us, okay? Remember I’ve got this damn macular thing. My old eyes.”
“We’ll come.”
“Make him keep his word,” Leander said to Natasha, putting his arms around her and kissing her on the cheek. He smelled of talcum and cigars and whiskey. As Trixie pulled him toward their side of the table, Faulk looked across the room at Marsha and Constance, returning from the restroom in the noise, talking seriously to each other, pausing, staying where they were for the moment it took to finish what they were saying.
Natasha leaned into him. “Let’s do go now.”
He bent down to kiss Iris, then walked around to kiss Clara. Iris beamed at him, and Natasha wanted to tell him what kind of a smile that was for Iris Mara to give anyone. The others rose to wish them happiness one final time for the evening. At last, they went out onto Beale Street.
Arm in arm they walked up Third, toward Madison, to the newly remodeled boutique hotel of the same name, at which he had reserved the honeymoon suite. It was growing cooler now. Natasha pointed to a horse-drawn carriage with a woman driving it and a big Labrador retriever sitting up next to her, ears cocked as if to listen for something in the street ahead of them. Faulk stopped to appreciate it, watching it go on. The street was crowded with tourists, and you could hear the music rising to the sky over the buildings from all the cafés and bars back on Beale, rising like the light that shone there when she looked back. More carriages went by with their sparkle and shine, the horses prancing, hooves sounding on the asphalt. Each driver was accompanied by a dog.
“I love that tradition,” Faulk told her. “Every driver with a dog that rides along.”
“You forget I grew up here,” she said.
“Sorry.”
“No need to apologize, my darling.” She held his arm as they came to Union Avenue, where the light was red. To their right was AutoZone Park, the baseball stadium. For some reason the lights were on there. Two women stood at the crossing dressed in white ball gowns with identical-looking dark denim jackets on over all that soft finery. One of them was smoking a cigarette. They had just come from the Peabody Hotel and were drunk. The one with the cigarette seemed about to topple over and was being held up by the other. Natasha turned to Faulk, and he winked at her while the two women kept tottering at the curb.
“Do you believe Wuhan’s remarks?” she asked him.
“I thought Father Wuhan was a little pompous.”
“But I mean about what he said.”
“He was trying to be profound, and he ended up sounding like a dull Sunday. No—worse than that. He could’ve been a party hack spouting the line.”
The light changed, and they crossed with the others, who walked up Union toward the parking garage. Natasha and her new husband went on along Third, toward Madison.
“I’m so relieved,” she said. “I was afraid you weren’t horrified.”
“I felt sorry for him, to tell you the truth. I was hoping he’d get to the end of it without realizing what effect it was having on us. I mean it wasn’t harmful or rude or anything. It was just—well—way, way off-key.”
“And revealing.”
“Very revealing. So a poor little boy died—mostly to be a character in a story about when this priest, the hero of his own story, was an impatient, inattentive young man. And the dead boy earns status as some kind of exemplar? And I don’t think the guy had any idea what an act of naked self-regard it was, telling it that way, this thing that was all about him and his own moral life, a paradigm of sins remembered and forgiven—and—and somehow all of it a comment about my leaving the priesthood—and there we were, waiting to get married.”
“You’re a gentle and good man, sir.”
“That’s a lovely thing to say. Thank you.”
They stopped and embraced, and kissed.
“At this rate, we’ll never get there.”
“I’m enjoying every second,” she said.
He kissed her once more, and they went on. “Anyway, Wuhan was a mistake.”
“You really didn’t like him,” Natasha said. “Did you.”
He laughed softly. “Not very Christian of me, is it.”
“I’ve been a little worried about the religion.” She hadn’t known she would say this.
“Hey, did we just meet?”
“Well, it does worry me a little. It worries me that I don’t feel it the way you do.”
“Everybody’s different,” he said, hearing the inadequacy of it. “We’ll find our way, you know?”
“But does it upset you?”
“No.” He smiled tolerantly.
She stopped and stood on her toes to kiss him still again. It was a long, tender kiss. They held hands and went on up the street. She looked at the restaurants and bars, and the hill beyond where t
he river shone with the perfect reflection of the lights outlining the bridge to Arkansas.
Under the marquee of the hotel was bright light. The doorman spoke to them pleasantly about the winter air coming down from the north. He missed the cold nights in Minneapolis, he told them, opening the big, ornate brass-handled door and holding it for them. Faulk thanked him and handed over three dollars. He had deposited their bags earlier in the day, before the wedding, and had struck up a conversation with the doorman. They were already friends.
“You’re so good with people,” she said as they entered the lobby.
“Well, one learns to care for one’s own kind.” He grinned sardonically and rolled his eyes to the ornate ceiling with its carved baroque look of the decorations on a wedding cake. “You’re good for my old ego.”
“Don’t say old.”
“It is old.”
“Come on, Michael—”
“Well. It’s older.”
She patted the side of his face. “Poor man.”
They went to the roof and had a glass of sweet vermouth on ice. The waiter was a man close to Faulk’s age. They talked about how beautiful the city was at night. Natasha noticed that the waiter was missing the little finger on his left hand. This upset her unreasonably, and when he brought the vermouth she drank it quickly and thought of ordering another. She watched Faulk sip his and reached over to touch his knee. The air was growing cooler. They looked out at the rooftops and saw the faint twinkle of the river through the mist settling everywhere, as if spilling out of the stars, which shone dazzlingly through broken fragments of moving clouds. He drank his vermouth. There were two other couples nearby drinking beer, and an elderly pair on the other end with a pot of coffee between them and two snifters of cognac.
“I think I’d like a cognac,” Faulk said. “That looks good.” He got the waiter’s attention. The waiter walked over, a white towel draped on his forearm exactly as if he were someone imitating a waiter. Natasha cast her gaze into the night sky, thinking of the missing finger. Such an odd thing for her mind to fix on, and it was this kind of inward plunge toward revulsion that kept happening to her; how easy it was for things to turn nightmarish. She had the thought and then sought to reject it.
“Can we have two glasses of Hine VSOP?” Faulk said.
“Coming right up, sir.” The waiter walked away.
“We’ll have a real honeymoon in France, for the whole spring. If that’s what you want.”
“Yes.” She was disinclined to think about it now but wanted to please him. And then the full import of what he had said came to her. “Isn’t it what you want?”
He watched the old couple sip their cognac.
“Michael. Isn’t it what we want?”
“Sure.”
The waiter brought the two snifters of cognac. Faulk picked his up and swirled the liquid and breathed the sting of it into his nostrils.
“Why did you say it that way? If that’s what I want?”
“I don’t know. I just want you happy. If you’re happy, then I’ll be happy.”
“I am happy.”
He sipped the cognac, and she took a little of hers, watching him. He seemed to be pondering something, looking at the other people, and then out at the river, tapping his fingers lightly on the table, not even quite aware of it.
“So, then—you’re happy?” She waited.
“The world doesn’t feel all that safe a place to travel right now.” He signaled the waiter.
“You’re going to have another?”
“Just one more. I’m nervous.”
“So am I.”
The waiter came over, and Faulk held up two fingers. “The same.”
She finished hers and handed the empty glass to the waiter.
“I’m happy, too,” Faulk said. “Let’s keep to that.”
“Are you getting drunk? Are we getting drunk? On our wedding night?”
He smiled. “It’s been a great night. I’m drunk on that.”
The waiter came with two more cognacs and set them down.
They watched him move off.
“Because we’re nervous?” she said.
“I’m getting calm.” And in fact, he felt suddenly quite calm. Bizarrely, gratifyingly superior to her. The realization of this obliterated the calm. He couldn’t believe the turns of his own mind.
“I’m shaking,” she said. “I think it’s getting too chilly to be up here.”
“You look so beautiful, sitting there.” There was only the surge of anxiety now.
“After this, can we go down to the room?” she asked.
“Should I carry you across the threshold?”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“At the house, then.”
“Michael, really.”
He watched her for a moment, sipping the cognac. She had been loving and charming tonight and had even seemed calm, as he was now far from it. He touched her glass with his and drank the cognac and held the complex taste of it on his palate. It occurred to him that he was drunk, and that this explained his sudden panicky mood. He had been needling her about the threshold in order to break out of the cloud of fright.
“I’m worried about my drinking,” she said. “I had a vermouth and now the brandy. And I had a beer at the café. And wine with the dinner.”
He gave her his gentlest smile. “If you’re worried about it, I think that’s a sign that you’re healthy about it, too.”
She shook her head. “I’m gonna finish this brandy and then stop.”
They were quiet for a few moments. They had both become watchful inside, aware of the silence as being somehow like a pause in some struggle they were engaged in together. He drank the rest of his cognac, and then the rest of hers, and felt the easing inside as it warmed him.
Others came to the roof, though the night was indeed growing chilly. A waiter lit the gas lanterns above the tables. Faulk ordered one more cognac because she seemed to enjoy the heat coming from the gas lanterns. They listened to the chatter that went on around them. A man kept looking over at them, and she noticed it.
“Probably one of my old parishioners,” Faulk said. “Though he doesn’t look vaguely familiar.”
“Can we go to our room now?” she said. “The lamp feels good, but I’m getting cold.”
“Oh,” he said. “Darling. We’re going to be so happy.” He drank the rest of the cognac and, after signaling the waiter, reached into his jacket pocket.
Tomorrow they would spend the first part of the day here, downtown. They would have coffee at the hotel and then take a walk in the old part of the city. They would eat breakfast in the penthouse restaurant at the Peabody.
“I’ve never been so glad,” he told her. “I can’t explain it, but that’s the feeling.” A nagging little mote in his soul rebuked him with the fact that much of what he felt now had been produced by the brandy. “I am,” he said, against that knowledge. “I’m very glad.”
She wanted so to believe him. And to believe it was true for her, as well. She told herself that she had done nothing wrong, and she was not going to give in to the idea that she must spend any amount of time atoning for something she did not do. As they went into the light of the hallway to the elevator, she kept her hand in his. There was nothing to fear anymore. She was safe. Back in America. Back in Memphis. Home. Nothing wrong anymore.
As they got onto the elevator, she took a deep breath and tried to settle her own nerves, feeling this happy moment and the unease of the past days like warring parts of her soul.
For him, it was exactly the same.
9
In the room, he undressed her, and she stood and let him. It was unlike the lovemaking they had done before. There was an element of the staged about it—a compensation for something on both sides, as if without being fully aware of it as such, they were performing some ritual to exorcise ghosts. She lay in his arms looking into the dark beyond his shoulder and murmured his name, but she could not qui
te feel it as pleasure; it was work. She moved to help him finish, feeling ashamed and wanting more but finding herself unable to shake free of the thoughts and images that troubled her.
When it was over they lay side by side in the quiet, hearing only each other’s breathing and the low hum of the heater vent.
“Well, Wife?” he said.
“So lovely,” she told him.
“Did you come?”
“Too much brandy.”
“Cognac.”
“I thought they were the same.”
“Technically. There’s something about how they do it in Cognac, though. Double pot stilled.”
“Explain.”
“Next time.” He smiled.
“You don’t know, do you.”
They laughed together. And nothing about what they had just done in the bed mattered beyond the fact that they were together, and close.
“Shall we have a little ‘next time’ tonight?” he said.
“If you want to, of course. It’s honeymoon night.”
“But we know each other so well already.”
“What a thing to say.”
“Well. A little truth can’t hurt. Truth’s good, don’t you think?”
She was conscious of another specific way he could have meant this. She got out of the bed and went into the bathroom, where she washed herself and brushed her hair. The silence in the room behind her was not calming. When she returned to the bed he was lying there with his hands clasped over his chest, regarding her.
She touched his wrist. “Kind sir.”
“Better clean up myself.” He rose, yawned, and stretched.
“If you want to make love again …” she began.
He coughed and cleared his throat, going into the bathroom. He had heard her, of course, but he felt obscurely that somehow his dignity was involved. He looked at himself in the mirror and uttered the word “Please,” like a whispered prayer. He cleaned his teeth and urinated into the bowl, and then went back to stand over the bed. She lay there, eyes closed, on one side, hands together under the side of her face.
“You awake?”
She opened her eyes and looked at him. “I thought I was. But I was talking to Iris so I must’ve drifted.”
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