The Saberdene Variations

by Thomas Gifford

  “I woke this morning and it was like coming out of a terrible dark tunnel full of death and pain. I’ve been trying so desperately to come to grips with Victor’s death, the part I played in it … and I’ve thought about how I’ve kept telling myself for years that our marriage was a good one. How I never really wanted to admit it was just a shell with the two of us rattling around inside, hardly ever touching—well, you, with your kindness more than anything, have allowed me to admit the truth to myself … remember that night at the Algonquin? I’d never said those things to another soul, Charlie, but I said them to you. Because I trusted you … because I knew I was falling in love with you …” The sunlight was crossing her face. I couldn’t look away. But in the shadows of my mind I kept seeing her across the table from Varada.

  … God damn it, it looks to me like they know each other. That just sticks in this old craw …

  “Now it looks like Dad’s going to be all right,” she said. “And Varada hasn’t shown up since Victor’s death. Charlie, I’m almost afraid to think it but … but it’s like the slate has been wiped clean and I can go on from here, I can build a new life … Oh, Charlie, I’ve spent so much time alone since Victor’s death, I’ve thought so much about him and you and us—I’m in love with you, Charlie, you’ve been brave for me and you’ve believed me and stood up for me and you wouldn’t have had to do any of it. And you’ve made me feel like a schoolgirl with a crush that has turned into something else, something wonderful and serious. All the things Victor told me about you are true. He said you probably didn’t know it but you were the best friend he’d ever had … I can see why, Charlie …”

  I felt totally paralyzed, a captive of confusion. Everywhere I looked I got an entirely different view of what was essentially the same subject. Victor had been so in love with her: he’d convinced me of that beyond any doubt. Yet Caro said it was a frigid marriage based on his belief in her weakness, his need to take care of her. And Samantha Barber, corroborating what Caro herself had told me, admitted she was having an affair with Victor. Samantha also contended that Caro, who knelt beside me now with the look of love in her eyes, was unbalanced and had attacked her, would have killed her …

  Victor had Caro followed by a private detective but he pulled me into it, too, wanting my help as a stalking horse—presumably to draw fire. But he had neglected to tell me the one terribly anomalous truth: that he had photos of Caro meeting with Varada—who was supposed to be terrorizing them, who in fact was terrorizing them and was about to start scaring the shit out of me.

  And now Caro was telling me she loved me, telling me that everything was getting back to normal. Until last night—she was telling me what I wanted to hear above all else. But now I knew about those photographs.

  As she watched me, Caro’s face darkened with concern.

  “Are you all right, Charlie? What’s the matter? You look like someone’s walking on your grave …” She stood up, touched my shoulder. “Is your head that bad? You haven’t heard a word I’ve been saying.” She bent down and kissed my forehead. “I should give the judge a stern talking to.”

  “I heard every word. But I admit no earthling has ever drunk quite so much—”

  “You’re such an innocent earthling, Charlie. And I’ve run you down with all my problems. I’m so sorry.”

  I looked up at her and tried to smile. It wasn’t much of a smile but she blamed Judge Edel. In a way she was right, I guess.

  “Such an innocent,” she said again.

  “That’s me,” I said.

  TWO

  Later on I gulped a handful of Advil and told her that I wanted to take her shift with Andy at the hospital. It would give her a chance to just relax and putter around the house. She nodded happily, acknowledging her need for a break.

  She followed me to the front door, hugged me, held me tight. “God,” she whispered, “I’m so glad you’re here. I feel as if my life has been pulled back from the edge. By you, Charlie. You came to save me and you have actually done it. I didn’t know real life could ever work out that way. Bravo, Charlie!” She brushed my cheek with her lips and stood in the doorway watching me head down the street.

  The steps she had been taking all day completed a kind of crazy circle. I had begun by betraying Victor’s belief in me only to discover that he was using me as bait in a fairly dangerous game. And neither had he revealed his hole card, the photographs. Now I had come to doubt Caro’s role in the affair, just as she decided she really could let down her guard and show me her emotional vulnerability. I felt as if I were watching a creature madly devouring its tail until there was no head, no tail, just a mad and blinded creature. We’d all been betraying one another in terribly civil ways. But when it came to the photographs—well, someone should have told me. There’d been too many secrets.

  And of course I was keeping my knowledge of them secret, which proved, I suppose, that duplicity was one very contagious disease.

  Andy Thorne looked less well now than he had the last time I’d seen him but he adamantly insisted that he was feeling stronger every day. He said he’d be going home soon, possibly within a week, according to his doctor. “It’ll be a relief,” he said, “to get back among my own things, my books, my doodads. I still tie flies … hobbies and habits, they die hard. I can’t fish but I still pride myself on the flies. Maybe I should take one last fishing trip, fish one last stream … and if I keel over, well, we owe God a death and if I give Him mine in that stream, then I’m quits for the next, or words to that effect. Oh, damn this bed!” He struggled with two pillows until he had them straight, then sank back winded. “A heart attack is a bitch,” he said. “Or stroke. Damn thing! And I’m lucky; my sawbones never tire of dithering at me.” He grinned slowly, then narrowed his eyes, the lids crinkling like parchment, as if he were actually noticing me for the first time since I’d arrived. “I must say, laddie, you look more than a little hollow-eyed. Anything special?”

  “Yes, Professor, I’m afraid there are some things that are very special. I wouldn’t be laying this on you if there were anyone else I could talk to. But there just isn’t. You’re it, Andy.”

  I slowly and calmly took him through my encounters with Samantha Barber and Judge Edel. It took some time and he listened, eyes closed, seldom interrupting. Much to my surprise my head didn’t fly off and buzz around the room deflating. When I’d finished the recitation, Thorne’s eyes opened slowly and he licked his dry lips. “The thing is,” I said, “I just don’t know what to do.”

  “Do? Do about what, Charlie? Frankly, I’m surprised you haven’t gone back to London by now—”

  “What I should do about your daughter.”

  “I don’t understand. Why do you have to do anything about her? She’s not your problem.”

  “I’m in love with her.”

  “Little sudden, isn’t it?”

  “We’ve been in a pressure cooker together. That can speed up the process.” I shrugged. “Sometimes it just works that way.”

  “Yes, you’re right.” Thorne nodded slowly, remembering. “That’s the way Victor fell in love with her, too. In a pressure cooker.” He had begun to mumble, his voice lowering to a whisper, slurring the words.

  “Are you okay, Andy? Would you like me to call a nurse?”

  “No, no, I’m fine.” He brushed my concern away with a flick of his hand. It dropped limply to his chest. “I’m just tired. Well, if you’ve fallen in love with Caro, then it’s up to you—looking after her. You’re the one who’s got to take care of her now.”

  “I’m sure she’s quite capable of taking care of herself,” I said.

  “So you’ll be taking Victor’s place,” he said haltingly, feeling for the words.

  “Victor didn’t trust her,” I said. “How can I trust her after seeing those pictures?”

  “Now, that’s one way of looking at it, Charlie. But it’s not what your Boston detective said, is it?” He sighed. “He said Victor hired him to protect her �
�� and you could say that, couldn’t you? And Victor … didn’t think the photographs … important enough to tell you about them.”

  “But there are so many questions, Andy. Why did Varada go back to Earl’s Bridge? What was the point? Andy … why did he take flowers to Anna’s grave?”

  “Ah, Charlie. That’s a mystery, isn’t it?” He coughed and turned his head away from me.

  “Why did Caro meet with Varada? The judge said he couldn’t fathom it … they seemed to know each other.”

  “You can always just ask her—”

  “Yes, and she’ll withdraw, do her disappearing act—”

  “You may have to risk it.” He coughed again. “I don’t feel so good, Charlie. Can you get me that glass of water?”

  I held the plastic cup of ice water out to him. Suddenly he grabbed my wrist, his fingers tightening in a spasm of pain. The cup fell from my hand, water soaking his chest and the sheets. His eyes rolled back, the whites seeming to bulge. He sounded like he was choking.

  I began yelling for a nurse.

  Chapter Fifteen

  ONE

  ANDY THORNE HAD SUFFERED ANOTHER heart attack. Nobody seems to call them heart attacks anymore and maybe that wasn’t what it was but that’s the sense I made of it. The next day a team of surgeons performed a lengthy triple bypass somewhat against the normal odds. During the night before the surgery Caro remained at the hospital and was more or less constantly on the scene for several days after it.

  “He’s all that remains of my past, Charlie,” she told me during a brief rest stop at the brownstone. “With him gone I’d feel as if I’d never been there at all. No one to validate my memories, as they say. He just can’t die, Charlie, I’m not ready for that yet.” She’d smiled tiredly and momentarily rested her head on my shoulder. “You may be my future,” she whispered, “but my dad is all that’s left of what went before. I can’t lose him. Maybe if I stay with him he’ll draw strength from me … Maybe there really is some kind of psychic energy, something I can give him. A lifeline to pull him through.”

  I had plenty of time to think about her, to worry about her, and I kept seeing her standing over Samantha Barber with the poker in her hand, Victor bursting into the apartment and stopping her from committing a murder. I kept seeing all those photographs spread out on the table and the judge saying they know each other. I had plenty of time to wonder just what I should do. And then she’d come home from the hospital, eyes bleary and red from worry and lack of sleep, and I’d ask myself how I could doubt her decency, honesty, sanity. Well, I’d seen the photographs. For starters.

  But, but …

  I was overwhelmed by her courage and the strength of her will. She simply would not let her father die. She insisted that he live, she damn well demanded it. “There’s been too much death in my life,” she said. “Enough is enough, Charlie.”

  Her morale would not crack. Nor would her composure. You looked at her and you knew she’d never heard of a crack-up, a nervous breakdown. That had all happened to another person in another time because this woman was impervious. Death was overmatched when he came looking for Andy Thorne.

  It almost broke my heart, her courage. She’d been through so much of what was unspeakable, she’d thought she was out of it, and then the forest of sorrow, like something predicted in Macbeth, had come after her, had closed around her again. But she refused to capitulate.

  Eventually Andy Thorne’s condition stabilized. The doctors assured her that he was out of danger and that if she didn’t go home and get some rest they’d be treating her for exhaustion. She came home and slept for fifteen hours.

  While she slept I decided that I simply couldn’t confront her with Samantha Barber and the judge and Alec Maguire. Whatever had been going on was over. I also decided that I would have to leave New York. Varada had apparently given up his campaign of terror, so I could leave. It was all too complicated. I couldn’t seem to make any sense out of it. Neither could I be the cause of her being hurt anymore. I’d go back to London and maybe later, when the heat had been turned down for both of us, we could see one another again. What would happen would happen. Not much on the nobility scale but good intentions, anyway.

  The next day, rested and smiling and beautiful, in linen with pearls swinging from her delicate ears, she came to me in the garden where I was planning my farewell address. She settled on the bench beside me. Her scent was subtle flowery for the high summer afternoon. Two cardinals which had taken up residence in the garden flickered brilliantly among all the green, all the shadows. She touched my arm.

  “How are you holding up, Charlie?”

  “Me? It’s you, Caro, you’re the one. You look wonderful. So beautiful you make me buzz—” She cocked her head. “What are you doing?”

  “Shhh. I’m listening for the buzz.”

  “It’s a metaphorical buzz,” I said. “Just looking at you makes me happy.” This was not how I had planned the farewell address.

  “Well, for a happy man, sonny, you’re looking pretty down in the dumps. I know how neglectful I’ve been but I think I’m back from the far side again. Neglect is now a thing of the past. Give the girl a kiss, Charlie.”

  She kissed me and I tried to make it warm and loving. There was no way to get that particular slow curve past a power hitter. I didn’t want to be yet another burden for her. But I couldn’t fool her. And I owed her something, too. Honesty.

  “Charlie, listen to me. You’ve seen me through the very worst time of my life. This has all been so much more horrible than what happened eight years ago. A hundred times worse. I’m not the same person I was then. I’m stronger. You’ve helped me prove myself. To myself most of all. I haven’t cracked up. I haven’t come to pieces the way Victor always thought I would. You’ve helped me there, too. Now, Charlie my boy, you’ve got something on your mind. Something bad. And I’m going to help you. It’s time for me to return the favor. Let me. Please, Charlie.” She stood up and took my hand. “Come on. Let’s go for a walk in the park.”

  TWO

  Central Park lay exhausted in the midday heat. Humidity hung like nets in the trees. The kids in the fields and the joggers and the strollers moved slowly, like creatures struggling to get free from prehistoric ooze and losing the battle. Toy sailboats bobbed gently on the pond without a breeze to catch. Little children watched in surprise as their ice cream cones melted in their hands and nursemaids screamed at them. Stray dogs lay on their sides in scraps of shade, tongues drooping disconsolately on the grass. I sensed one hell of a kinship.

  Caro swung along beside me looking composed and oblivious to the heat. She wouldn’t let me off the hook. She had to know what was bothering me. So I told her.

  “Samantha Barber called me,” I said. “She had a story to tell me.”

  “Okay. What kind of story, Charlie?”

  “A story about you.” I gave it to her, the whole business. She didn’t try to laugh it off. She nodded solemnly at one point, shook her head, bemused. None of it shook her and when I came to a halt she took my hand and swung it between us as we kept walking.

  “Oh, I’m sorry you had to hear all that. It must have made you wonder which end was up!” She grinned at me, her face full of trust. “There’s a lot of truth in what she says. Would you like to hear my commentary?”

  I nodded.

  She brushed a stray wisp of honey-brown hair from her forehead, pursed her lips for a moment. “Samantha has never gotten over the way she lost Victor. She just thinks that way—she sees it as losing Victor to me and of course that’s absurd. Their relationship ending had nothing whatever to do with me. That’s just a fact, whatever she thinks. I’m not apologizing for Victor—he may have been his usual brusque self, shy, aloof, when he broke it off with her. He may have seemed uncaring, even brutal. I can understand that. Then he married me and it was more convenient for her to blame her frustration on me. But she never forgot him, obviously. He’s not the kind of man a woman can just forget
… he wasn’t. Samantha probably kept current on whatever gossip she could pick up about us. She knew her man, I guess, because when she let Victor know that she was still sexually available to him, well, Victor was fairly quick off the mark. She hadn’t married Barber yet and deep down I expect she thought she could get Victor back—if she played her cards right.

  “I didn’t know about their affair until Samantha called me and asked me to come around for tea. I’d noticed some vaguely unusual behavior on Victor’s part but he often went through periods of depression or withdrawal whatever the cause. I got used to his moods. And when his old flame called, well, I began to get the idea. This was about three years ago, if anyone’s counting.

  “Tea turned into a major combat zone. Never experienced anything like it. The real problem was that Samantha had been drinking something other than tea before I got there—apparently working up her courage to face me. She really didn’t pull any punches, either. She told me all about her sexual relationship with Victor in precise detail. I couldn’t believe some of the stuff she included. I must have said something like ‘enough already’ but she was just getting up a full head of steam. She was at great pains to inform me that Victor was tired of my nuttiness—her word—and would leave me in an instant if he weren’t so worried about my going mad and killing myself. She just went on and on and I kept telling myself that I would not allow myself to break down in front of this creature.