American Romantic

by Ward Just

  May said from the bar, Did you have a good day?

  He said, The usual.

  I wish I could say the same.

  What happened?

  A baby died in my arms. I didn’t even know it.

  My God, Harry said.

  Little thing. She’d fit into a shoebox. Her heart just stopped.

  My goodness, Harry said. His memory stirred, conjuring the dead woman in Village Number Five. He opened his mouth to say something, then decided not to.

  I hated it, she said.

  You don’t have to do that business anymore. I told you that.

  You know something? I think I won’t.

  Good idea, he said. Bravo.

  Do you think this place is cursed?

  Harry shook his head, giving no direct answer, unless the head-shake was a direct answer.

  A week later, he left for an ambassadors’ meeting in Dakar. The envoys were to appreciate the situation in Africa for the benefit of an assistant secretary of state. On Friday evening May went alone to the French embassy, a reception for the traveling foreign minister, an ocean of champagne and platters of foie gras with toast points, two wheels of Brie and wedges of bleu and Camembert and, so incongruous she had to look twice, a plate of Ritz crackers. She had been introduced to the Belgian chargé d’affaires, newly arrived and finding his way around. Andres spoke an elegant French-accented English acquired, it turned out, at the University of Colorado. So they reminisced about Colorado, hiking and skiing, fishing in the mountain streams, and Denver restaurants, where the beef was sublime. Andres had been an exchange student and May said she was, too, in a way. She described the Northeast Kingdom, which, oddly, he had heard about, though he seemed to think it resembled Switzerland. Not Switzerland, she said, more like East Prussia with the Masurian Lakes and tiny hills and forests of fir and strict codes of conduct—well, maybe not strict codes of conduct; the Northeast Kingdom was loose so far as conduct was concerned. She had never before thought to compare Vermont with Prussia but Andres had laughed and laughed. They did not move far from the buffet table except to fetch shrimp when it came by. This was Andres’s first embassy reception but he seemed to know many of the guests, who invariably greeted him as Monsieur le Comte, and when May asked him about it he said yes, he was a count, but it didn’t mean anything and he didn’t care about it. That was one of the things he liked about America, none of that titled rubbish. He said this was his first posting abroad, not very promising but you had to start somewhere. The Belgians had been terrible in Africa—not that anyone in Belgium cared. Probably the best thing he could do was stay out of sight, become the invisible Belgian. Really, he said, we Belgians were criminals. Criminal behavior, including the king. The king most of all, fooking war criminal. Kings should be outlawed, imprisoned, or sent into exile. May was charmed by him, this Count Andres, his wit and ready smile and denunciation of his own government. May had but scant knowledge of the Belgian record in Africa. Andres was light on his feet, graceful as a dancer, and he surely did like champagne. She had the idea that, for Andres, life was not to be taken seriously. Central Africa did not seem a good choice for him.

  She said, Do you like to ride horses?

  Of course I like to ride horses. I am riding horses my entire life.

  Find two and we can go riding.

  There are no horses here. I checked.

  They say the president has a stable.

  I will present my credentials next week and ask him.

  Good, she said. I understand he wants an air force. He claims he has enemies in the north and they can only be subdued from the air. That’s what I hear.

  I will promise him a jet fighter if he will let us ride his horses.

  That should do it, May said. Throw in a couple of battle tanks.

  Washington has probably already given him his air force and the battle tanks, too. I am sure I have been outmaneuvered.

  Try anyway, May said.

  Rest assured, Andres replied.

  He asked her about Harry, how he got on with the government. Were they cooperative? May’s answer was noncommittal, though she knew Harry was at odds with the Pentagon over the air force issue—grotesque, as Harry said. She was only having fun with the horses but thought now that she had gone too far. In the brittle silence Andres asked her what she did in her spare time. She replied that she did relief work. She visited medical clinics and schools. Once she dedicated a village well. Andres seemed to sense that she was uncomfortable talking about herself, so he turned the conversation back to horses, where they might be ridden and when. Finally, as the reception was breaking up, he asked if she would like a nightcap at his villa, only a few steps from her own. May said yes, that would be nice, a glass of wine at the end of the evening. Andres said they should take his car, and she agreed. She had dismissed her driver knowing that someone would offer her a lift home. They all lived within six blocks of each other.

  Andres drove a green Karmann Ghia convertible, the bucket seats so confined their shoulders touched. He drove at speed but knew what he was doing behind a wheel. She was not alarmed as she often was with Harry, who had no love of automobiles and drove slowly and without enthusiasm. He often took his eyes off the road. Harry looked on cars as an opportunity for sustained conversation, no telephones or meetings to break things up. Andres hardly spoke except to comment on the softness of the night, the many stars overhead, and the aroma of lilacs. Were they lilacs? Jasmine, May replied. They were two minutes from Andres’s villa, a modest bungalow hidden behind an enormous hedge. He parked in the carport and they entered the kitchen. He opened the door to the pool area and indicated chairs gathered around a table. He said he would drink beer and May said she would have beer, too. Belgian beer, Andres said, the best thing about his country. May took a seat, stretched out her legs, and looked at the stars, searching for the Southern Cross and not finding it. Things were not in their places in Africa. Untamed Africa had its own rules, ill-defined boundaries with chaos on both sides. She was drowsy, thinking that Andres brought a measure of civilization to the night. May kicked off her shoes and rubbed her toes on the flagstones, still warm from the day’s heat. Suddenly a bottle of beer was at her elbow and Andres was stepping into the pool, his own bottle held aloft in his right hand, Mr. Statue of Liberty. A moment later his head appeared at the edge of the pool, his hair slick as honey. He said, If you’re looking for the Southern Cross, it’s over your right shoulder. She looked up and stared at the Southern Cross. Andres described the prophetic properties of the Southern Cross, something he claimed to have heard firsthand from an astronomer. He turned his back on her then, allowing his legs to float. Andres was well muscled, the long muscles of a swimmer. He had not bothered to put on swim trunks. She reached out and touched his honeyed head, not slick but coarse. He wore his hair long, curling over his ears. Andres did not look or talk like any diplomat she had met. His behavior did not fit the norm either. Yet here she was at one o’clock in the morning having a party-after-the-party, so to speak.

  She wondered what it would be like if she went away with him, only a few days. But where could they go? There was no place to go in this wretched landlocked country, not a hotel, not even a rest house. She put her hands on his wet shoulders. He appeared not to notice. Andres said, I have always wanted to live in Africa, not forever but for a time, see it up close, try to fathom it. Of course that was an impossible objective. You didn’t fathom Africa, you got out of its way. You did not in any case interfere. He had always been a trekker, traveling in much of Asia Minor, once to Peru. Did you know there was an opera house in Iquitos, in the back of beyond up the Amazon, an opera house as handsome as any opera house anywhere? Trekking, you moved at your own pace and when you felt like it you stopped. If the country was banal or uninteresting you hopped a train until you found something agreeable. That’s why I joined our foreign service, he said. Though that was probably a mistake. A failure of foresight. Andres laughed then, genuine mirth. I don’t
think I like diplomatic work, always saying what you mean in a tone of voice that casts doubt. It’s a gentleman’s job certainly, and that’s what’s wrong with it. The fact is, there isn’t much to do here, this playground for idle hands. The reason I’m here is that Belgians have some mining interests in the east. I’m supposed to look out for their interests, let them know if the Russians are poaching. We have concessions and they must be kept up-to-date. Now that I think about it, my diplomatic work has nothing to do with being a gentleman. More like a fly on the wall. A fly with a fax machine.

  I think I’ll go back to trekking. Want to come along?

  God, no, she said.

  You’d like it. We could go away on horseback.

  Not on your life, she said, wondering what there was about the men she knew that led them far afield, into regions scarcely inhabited, and even when inhabited, a wilderness. She thought this Andres a lonely soul and said so.

  I don’t mind my own company, if that’s what you mean. I can look after myself, always have done. I have money of my own. I can do what I want. I am unleashed. Also, I am irresponsible. Do you see the irresponsibility, May? You have only to look. I do not hide my irresponsibility. What would be the point?

  She said, I didn’t know irresponsibility had a look.

  He said, The eyes are a giveaway.

  She said, They are? What exactly do they give away?

  He said, They give away the future. I sense you are irresponsible too, except you don’t like to admit it. There’s nothing wrong with it—it’s only a way of life like any other. The trick is not to let irresponsibility slide into the unreliable. Unreliable is no good. Unreliable brings you grief along with excitement. Andres went on to elaborate the irresponsibility-as-a-way-of-life-like-any-other but May wasn’t listening. She had gone off into one of her many dream worlds, this one voluptuous, a dream world of the moment. A dream world such as Renoir might render it. Andres’s chatter did not interest her enough to go on listening to it, though she did like his voice, somewhat hoarse, French-inflected, seductive. By then she had removed her clothes and eased herself into the pool’s tepid water. The vast African night enclosed them, a velvet cap, the stars and half-moon giving them as much light as they needed. She felt she had a continent-sized oasis to do with as she pleased. The night shadows on their bodies were erotic. Andres said something funny and she laughed. They stood in the water, kissing in a pool of starlight, and then drifted away toward the deep end, submerging themselves for a long minute. May closed her eyes, they were both so slippery, slippery as she imagined eels were slippery. She stayed underwater until she thought her lungs would burst and then remained a while longer, rising finally to find a handhold at the edge of the pool, submerging once more and remaining. He never let go of her hand until they surfaced for keeps and by then the present moment was what she had, all else of no account, out of sight and unremembered. The force of the moment carried her away.

  They were together later in his study, and later still in his bedroom off the study, until morning came and they found the pool once more, the sun rising as red as an apple. They ate breakfast together, both of them ravenous. They returned to the study and his bedroom off the study and then he drove her home. He did not linger. May fell into a dreamless sleep that lasted until late afternoon. She awoke in a state of confused lethargy, the residue of desire. She lay there awhile in a state of incoherence until she heard the front door slam, Harry downstairs, Harry returned from wherever he had been. May left her bed for the shower, as hot as she could stand it, and the hours with Andres were with her still, as was the residue of desire and a thin mist of forgetfulness.

  Are you here? Harry called.

  I’m here, she said.

  Come down, he said. We’ll have a swim.

  Right away, she said. How was your trip?

  Uneventful, Harry said.

  Nine

  WITHOUT regrets Harry and May left Africa for two years in Washington, the Africa desk. They rented a row house in Georgetown and a cottage out near Middleburg where May could ride. Life was pleasant enough in Washington, the restaurants good and the company congenial. Nearly every weekend they went to Middleburg. May later described the tour as routine, which it certainly was. Harry was bored and eager to return abroad, any country would do. In good time, and thanks, he believed, to Basso Earle, Harry was sent as ambassador to the eastern Mediterranean, to an island nation that had horses galore and an atmosphere of violence. Harry earned a commendation from the Department. All in all, a successful adventure for Harry, and for May too, who liked the horses and beaches. They returned to Washington for three years and in due course arrived in chilly Oslo. Wherever they went May looked for a retirement villa, somewhere quiet, a place where they could unpack for good. A friend suggested North Carolina, perhaps the Outer Banks or the golf country around Asheville. Harry said he was a Northerner and did not care for the comforts of the South. Someone else suggested Seattle, the city of the future. Providence, Rhode Island, earned a mention, as did Burlington, Vermont, at which both Harry and May laughed.

  Harry was unenthusiastic about settling in America, so somehow they never got to North Carolina or the rainy state of Washington but toured again and again in Tuscany and Provence, the Low Countries, the Frisian Islands, Scandinavia, and the south of Spain. Once to Sardinia, twice to Tunisia. May thought they ought to take a look at Cambodia, but Harry said alas no, not Southeast Asia if she didn’t mind. He added, Cambodia did not have amenities. Instead, it had an appalling history of violence. To which May replied, So did the Northeast Kingdom. She did see possibilities wherever they went. Wasn’t Lucca lovely? Ronda was a jewel. But the possibilities never quite added up. What May wanted was to be free of embassies, the bodyguards and the protocol, a fresh language for each tour; and that was Harry’s life, the one he had chosen long before he met her. To Harry, the embassy was a world of its own, its own face, its own secrets, unique complexities, unique personalities. May wanted to be rid of traveling because she had come from a long line of people who stayed put. She wanted to stay put and she didn’t much care where, except she did prefer America. She asked Harry once if he wanted to return to Connecticut, near his family’s house in the hills around Salisbury. Oh, no, he said, I don’t know anyone there, not anymore. I like to stay in touch. A man is not in touch in Connecticut. I am not a gardener. I do not play golf. What would I do in Connecticut? To which she replied that if he rode horses he would find Connecticut congenial, a paradise. And if not Connecticut or Tuscany or Andalusia or Provence or Sardinia, well then, where? We’ll know it when we see it, Harry replied. That answer did not satisfy May and she went away in a snit. The truth was, Harry refused to think about retirement and May could think of little else. She had come to think of the foreign service as a bespoke penitentiary.

  Many in their community said that May was filled with grievance and self-pity, a most unsuitable, perhaps unstable personality for the work she was called upon to do and the places she was obliged to do it in. Entertaining was a chore, the conversation always swirling around government and politics. She had a fixed idea that Harry could not forget the war, as she could not forget the English hospital. Wasn’t it tragic to see a woman so out of her depth, so unsettled in her own skin? Yes, she had lost a child owing to a simple mistake. No one would wish that on any woman. But when her friends suggested adoption, May shook her head and refused to discuss the matter except to say, I wanted my own child, not someone else’s child. The more exotic procedures, just then coming into practice, did not appeal to her either. She believed that fate had taken a hand and voguish procedures would not stay the hand. And yes, the diplomatic life was strenuous and not to everyone’s taste, but wasn’t the essence of service an appreciation of complexity and compromise and simply soldiering on? What did Harry see in her? She was a pretty woman, yes, but pretty women were a dime a carload and this one was eternally discontented whereas Harry was cheerful, an optimist, good-humored and det
ermined to make the best of things. He was very good with staff. A superior diplomat in all respects, the country was lucky to have him. Wasn’t that the point after all? The foreign service rewarded savoir faire, and savoir faire was not May’s long suit. One caveat: No one ever criticized May to Harry’s face. If asked, he would have said he loved her from the moment he saw her. They were destined to be together forever. How were such things explained? Answer: They were not explained, at least not explained to anyone’s satisfaction. Still, May was kind. She was courageous in her own way and resourceful. She felt things deeply, hence her moments of near-crippling melancholy. That she had survived her harsh Vermont family was a miracle. What others saw as restiveness and indecision, Harry saw as thoughtfulness and grit. Not that the grit did not, from time to time, turn to putty. Not that she wasn’t, now and again, overwhelmed. A life inside the government had its own special demands. A foreign service officer felt he owed best efforts at all times. He took an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States no less than the president. Harry believed that May was included in the oath, and if the situation were reversed, the same would apply. May said to him once that she was living half a life, and when he asked her what that meant she said she wasn’t sure, only that what she said was true. Then she thought a moment and said that half her life was missing, gone away somewhere out of reach. She was driven to take refuge beyond the government’s reach. Twice she left him, twice she returned.