Possessions

by Judith Michael

  Katherine recalled a black necklace, coiled in a jeweler's box, in the playroom of the villa. Everything is a circle, she thought, coming around to its beginning. And when Craig comes back, the circle will be complete.

  Elissa talked on, quoting Craig, showing Katherine a shelf of his wood carvings in her bedroom, and his plans for the breakfast room. She made lunch, still talking about Craig; they ate in the living room, talking about Craig, and after lunch Elissa brought out a photo album of the two of them. They had made a marriage, Katherine realized, and in the small, cluttered room, listening to the love in Elissa's voice, she understood why Craig had not been able to give it up.

  Finally, she said, "I have to leave soon; my plane is at five. But I want to ask you something." She paused. "I'm grateful for everything you've told me, and I believe you when you say you haven't seen Craig, but I think you must have heard from him. I think he needed you too much to cut himself off— the way he did me."

  Elissa's eyes filled with tears. 'Thank you for saying that. I thought you'd hate me and think I was trying to ruin your marriage; I didn't think you'd understand. But I needed him,

  POSSESSIONS

  too, you know. I still need him—he was my friend and my son and my brother and my lover and my husband—^I*m sorry, but he was—all at the same time and I miss him . . . oh, hell and danmation." She wiped her eyes. "Anyway, I swear I haven't heard from him. I kept thinking I would; there'd been times before when a few weeks would go by and he couldn't get here, so I kept thinking he'd show up and everything would be back to where it was—but it never happened. I'm still waiting. Silly, maybe, but that's how I am. Are you?"

  "Am I what?"

  "StiU waiting."

  "Of course."

  *To live with him?"

  "I don't know. I don't think we can live together again."

  "But you're still waiting. Even though you haven't heard anything either.'*

  ^'WeU, yes we did—" Katherine stopped at the look on Elissa's face. She was terrified. She had talked on and on, tilling the hours, giving Katherine no chance to say she had heard from Craig. And now, seeing that terrified look, Katherine couldn't bring herself to tell Elissa that Craig had called Ross, wanting his wife back. "He sent me roses," she said. "On my birthday."

  Elissa's face cleared. "White ones, I'll bet. Craig told me you liked white roses."

  "Did he," Katherine said dryly. "Didn't he ever talk about anything but his family—his two families?"

  "He talked a lot about Eskimos. Didn't he talk to you about them? He loved the kind of life they led: harsh, uncomplicated, close-knit. That was how he saw it. He and Hank used to talk about Eskimos all the time."

  "Hank?"

  "Hank Aylmer. He travels to Eskimo villages in Alaska and Canada and buys soapstone sculptures to sell in the States. You met him; Craig told me you did."

  Katherine stared at her. "I'd forgotten," she said slowly. Hank Aylmer. A long time ago, Craig had said Hank Aylmer had invited them to go with him on a buying trip to Eskimo villages. Scattered all over, he'd said; a real sightseeing vacation. Scattered all over. Hank Aylmer traveling frx)m village

  POSSESSIONS

  to village, firom one province to another— mailing money to Craig's family from a different post office every month. "Where is he?" she asked. "Hank. Where is he?"

  "Home, last I heard," Elissa replied. "But he doesn't know anything about Craig; I've asked him."

  "Home? Where?"

  "Calgary," said Elissa. 'The other side of town. Do you want to call him?"

  "Yes!" Excitement was stirring in Katherine. Of course Hank knew where Craig was. If he hadn't told Elissa, it was because Craig had asked him not to. But he would tell Katherine; he would tell Craig's wife. "If I can use your phone ..."

  "Here's his number. I'll be in the kitchen if you need me."

  'Thank you," Katherine said, and dialed, tightening her grip on the receiver when he answered.

  "Hank Aylmer here."

  "This is Katherine Eraser, Hank. We met a few years ago, if you remember. My husband introduced us. Craig Eraser."

  There was no response.

  "Hankr

  "Right here. Katherine Eraser, did you say?"

  "Hank, don't pretend with me. You remember the name and tribe of every Eskimo from Alaska to Hudson Bay; you remember me, too."

  A rumbling laugh came over the wires. "Right, then, I do. And your two littie ones—Jennifer and Todd, right?—how are theyr'

  "Eine. They'd like to see their father."

  "Well, now. Well, now. Sometimes we lose track of friends, Katherine. I haven't seen Craig for an age."

  "Where is he, Hank?"

  "Can't say. I know he left Vancouver some time back—^"

  "Eifteen months ago."

  "Right, then, it was that long ago. But I can't say where he is now, you know. I don't keep track of him."

  "You see him every month. He gives you money and you mail it to me, always from a different town."

  "Well, now, that's . . . very imaginative. I wish I could help you, Katherine, but I can't."

  "Hank, I want to see him. I want to talk to him. Would you tell him that?"

  POSSESSIONS

  "Katherine, you're jumping to all sorts of conclusions."

  "All right, don't answer. Just listen. Tell him I got the roses he sent for my birthday; thank him for me. Tell him I want him to come to San Francisco. He knows where I live; tell him I'm waiting for him. Are you listening?"

  "Right, but you mustn't get your hopes up, Katherine."

  "Just listen. Tell him the three of us are waiting. Just the three of us. Remember that. Hank; it's very important. Tell him it's just me and the children. No one else."

  "You mean you're not bedded down with anybody, is that it?"

  She sighed. "That's it. You'll tell him?"

  "I didn't say that. I was just clarifying what you said."

  "And I want him to come to San Francisco! Will you tell him that? Please, Hank; if he won't tell me how to come to him, he'll have to come to me."

  "Right."

  "You'll tell him that?"

  "If I see him, I'll tell him."

  "When?"

  "Katherine, if I see him, I'll give him all your messages. That I promise. More than that I cannot do. Right?"

  "Right," Katherine said.

  "Goodbye, then, and give my regards to those fine children."

  "I will." She hung up the telephone, staring into space.

  Elissa came to the doorway. "He didn't know anything?"

  "He wouldn't say. I left a message with him."

  "For Craig to call you?"

  "For him to come to San Francisco. I have to see him."

  Elissa reached out her hand. "If he shows up . . . and you decide not to get together again ..."

  "I'll tell him you're waiting." They looked at each other for a long moment.

  "I wish we could be friends," Elissa said.

  Katherine gave a small smile. "I think we are, don't you?" Moving swifdy across the room, she laid her cheek briefly against Elissa's, then turned and went to the front door. 'Thank you," she said, and later, flying home, she silently thanked Elissa again—for making her acquainted, after ten years of marriage, with her own husband.

  POSSESSIONS

  Once again the days and evenings were spent at her work-table. More confident with each piece, Katherine worked more quickly than ever before, and when an idea came to her and she began to sketch it, she knew immediately whether it belonged with the jewelry she was selling now, or whether it was so striking and distinctive that it had to be put aside in a separate folder, kept on a shelf above her table, marked "Henri Ham-beau."

  "rU never sell to the top people here," she told Victoria at dinner a week after she had seen Elissa. 'They won't take a chance on me. And the small stores I'm selling to now won't buy my so-called 'far-out' designs. So when I have enough of them, I'll see what I can do in Paris."
<
br />   "You don't need Paris," Victoria said tartly. '*I intended Henri to offer you a second country; your first reputation should be made here."

  "Not with Herman Mettler talking about me."

  "He won't do it forever; he's too indolent and self-centered to pay attention to anyone else for very long."

  "But I haven't got forever; I'm barely making enough money now, and I promised Jennifer and Todd we'd look for a larger apartment. And I'd like to take a trip, just the three of us, over Thanksgiving."

  *To avoid a family dinner," Victoria declared. "Why are you so foolish? Why can't you and Ross be together while you resolve your dilemma?"

  "We're not ready," Katherine said.

  '*Nonsense! Lx)ve isn't like a roast turkey that is or is not ready. It simply is, and you must let it guide you. Why don't I call Ross now? He can join us for dessert."

  "No," Katherine said. But she was smiling, thinking someday she'd tell Ross Victoria had compared them to roast turkey.

  There was no word from Craig, nor from Hank Aylmer. Ross did not call and she did not call him. Reluctantly, Victoria honored her request and did not invite them to dinner on the same nights, so there was no place they might run into each other. Without him, Katherine's days seemed choppy: everything that happened was cut short because it could not be shared with him—a newspaper item, one of Todd's wild fantasies, a special piece of jewelry. She would feel a surge of longing,

  POSSESSIONS

  and then frustration over his allowing Craig to slip away, and then impatience because Craig had not called—until the space around her worktable was crowded with feelings and images and voices, clamoring to be heard.

  But all the time, her hands were steady, adding to her collection of jewehy, boxed, priced, and lined up on a shelf. As an experiment, she had made two belt buckles of randomly shaped silver cut out in delicate patterns like lace and scattered petals. To display them, she bought a strip of dark blue velvet and another of wine-colored silk and made two wide belts by gathering the ends into the two halves of her buckles. She wore one of them—for good luck, she told herself—the day she went to the bank, to talk about her loan.

  She had pushed it out of her mind, but when September was almost gone and she added up her bills, and what she thought she could get for her new jeweky, the numbers did not balance. They hardly ever do, she reflected wryly. But if I extend my loan for twelve months, the payments will be smaller. Then we can go somewhere at Thanksgiving.

  At the bank, she filled out the application and gave it to a loan officer, waiting for more of the probing personal questions she had answered when she first applied for the loan. But this time it was different. The officer scanned the application, typed rapidly on his computer keyboard and in a few seconds read aloud her name and address from the screen. "Loan made in June," he went on. "Payments made on time in July, August, and September. And the loan recentiy guaranteed . . ."He read silentiy. "Well, Mrs. Fraser, I see no problem; weUl begin with October fourth, next Monday, for twelve months. We'll have a new agreement for you to sign in a few minutes; the computer does it, you know; wonders of technology, aren't they?" He turned back to the terminal and began typing.

  "Just a minute," Katherine said. "I think there's a mistake. No one guaranteed this loan; that's why I brought the contracts I have with three jewelry stores—"

  "Guaranteed by Ross Hayward, according to our records, Mrs. Fraser, on September twenty-fifth. Just three days ago, in fact. So of course, there is no impediment to the extension." He returned to his typing.

  Katherine opened her mouth, then closed it. Ross knew she would refuse money, so he found another way to help her.

  POSSESSIONS

  Qever, she thought; no one with any sense would reject a guarantee on a loan.

  As soon as she was home, she called him at his office. "I was just at the bank," she said, rushing through her words to get past the jolt of longing she felt at the sound of his voice, and his surprise and delight when he heard hers. "I found out you'd guaranteed my loan. It was wonderful of you. Thank you."

  "You're welcome," he replied. "How are you? Victoria says you're woridng very hard."

  "I am. That's what she tells me about you."

  'Then she's right both times. Have you sold to any new stores?"

  "No; I'm still working on the collection for Henri. Are the engineers working on the Macklin Building?"

  "They had to put it off for two or three weeks."

  **Oh. That's too bad." There was a silence. "I went to Calgary," Katherine said abruptly. "I spent the day with Elissa."

  "Did you! That must have been difficult."

  "It was easier than I expected. She's a very easy person to be with. And she told me so many things I never knew . . ."

  "You liked her."

  "Yes. And I understood why Craig went to her. She loves him so, and she's still waiting—"

  "Even after you told her about Craig's call?"

  "I didn't tell her," Katherine said ruefully. "I couldn't; it would have made her so unhappy, and it wouldn't change anything for her, at least not now, before Craig and I . . . have had a chance ..." Her voice faltered. *To talk."

  There was a long silence as they both recalled her anger at Ross for not telling her about Elissa. "Well," Ross mused aloud. *That sounds like something I once said."

  "I should have told her," Katherine said faintly.

  "Probably. But you cared about her feelings. She's lucky to have such a friend."

  Don't rub it in, Katherine told him silently. After a moment, she said, "I guess I'd like to think about that."

  "Good." His voice was warm.

  "I wanted to tell you something else. I talked to a friend of Craig's, the man who's been mailing the money each month—"

  POSSESSIONS

  "He said he had?**

  "No. But he didn't deny it, either. I'm sure he's in touch with Craig and I left a message, asking Craig to come here."

  *To come back to you?"

  "I said I had to talk to him. I'd hoped to hear from him by now, but it may take Hank a while to reach him. If he does. But I think he'll be here soon."

  "Do you know what you'll say to him?"

  "I'm thinking about it."

  "Good," he said once more.

  "Ross, I haven't told Victoria and Tobias about Elissa."

  "Of course not."

  Katherine heard the door open; Jennifer and Todd, home from school. "I'd better go," she said. "Thank you again. I'm grateful for your help."

  "I was glad to do it. Take care of yourself, Katherine."

  Hanging up, she turned to see two grouchy faces. "What's wrong with you?" she asked.

  "Nothing," said Todd, and went to the refrigerator.

  "Jennifer?" Katherine asked.

  "They announced the Father's Dinner today; it's in two weeks."

  "Father's Dinner?"

  Todd slammed the refrigerator door. "Some dumb teacher thought it up; they didn't have it last year. You're supposed to bring your father and there's this big dinner in the gym and then some of the fathers and their kids put on a show."

  "It's to honor fathers," Jennifer added. "Whatever that means."

  "We thought we'd borrow Ross," said Todd off-handedly as he cut a chunk of cheese. "But he hasn't been around lately, has he?"

  "No," answered Katherine. "Do you want crackers with that?"

  "Sure. Where is he?"

  "Where he always is. He's pretty busy . . ."

  "Yeh."

  Katherine took down a new box of crackers and handed it to Todd. "Sometimes people stop seeing each other for a while. They're still friends; it's just that they aren't together all the time."

  POSSESSIONS

  **Or ever," Jennifer said. "Did you have a fight?"

  "We had a disagreement. And then we decided we were . . . getting in each other's way when we needed to think about sonie important things."

  "Like what?" Todd asked.

 
"Like whether we should be together so much when I'm waiting for your dad to come back."

  Todd screwed up his eyes, then blurted, "Do you love Ross more than Dad?"

  Katherine's throat tightened. I should have expected that, she thought. "I love them in different ways," she said at last. "And I love you in another way. And Victoria and Tobias in another—"

  "Then why can't you be with Ross while you're thinking about waiting for Dad?"

  "Because I get distracted," Katherine said a little frantically. "It's hard to explain ..."

  Todd shook his head glumly. "It's a cnx;k." He tilted his head at Katherine. "How come you can't fmd a man who'll stay with you?"

  "Todd!" cried Jennifer. "That's mean!"

  "It sure is," Katherine said, feeling bruised. How much do you excuse, she wondered, because they're young and bewildered and don't have much control over their lives? Not much. I get bewildered, too, and I didn't have much control when Craig decided to leave. "It was a low blow and I think I deserve an apology."

  Todd scowled. "Well, I'm sorry. It was just that I was wishing we had a father."

  "You're not the only one," said Katherine.

  "How about Uncle Tobias?" Jennifer giggled. "We could borrow him."

  "I think you'd have a wonderful time," Katherine replied.

  "Seriouslyr*

  "Seriously. He's never been a father; it would be a new experience for him."

  "I want him!" Todd shouted. "He's better than Ross!" He glanced at Katherine's expressionless face. "I mean, nobody else will have a father anything like him."

  "Can I call him?" Jennifer asked.

  POSSESSIONS

  "Why not?" said Katherine. "And then I'd like some help in the kitchen. We're having guests for dinner."