The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg

by Deborah Eisenberg

  “Carl, Carl!” Dee Dee called, and Márta could hear again. Dee Dee was pointing at a plate passing overhead, on which a squat glossy hummock lolled under a quivering sauce. “Can I have that for desert?”

  “Of course,” Carl said. “whatever you like.” He and Jane and Andrew gazed at Dee Dee with a tender, elegiac indulgence, as though she were an event that had taken place on earth many years earlier, before some great catastrophe.

  “You know what?” Dee Dee said happily.

  Recalled, the others looked at her with a false brightness.

  Evidently she had nothing to say.

  “You know what?” she began again, and achieved traction. “Carl, do you know how Mother met Kevin? He works at an auction house, and she went to cruise an escritoire, but she came home with him.”

  Jane tipped a little bird bone in tribute. “Good for her.”

  “Yeah,” Dee Dee said. “That’s true, but—” She stopped, and turned the dark color that precedes tears. “But what if he doesn’t…I mean, what if he only…”

  “How well I know the type,” Andrew said as Dee Dee fell into a despondent silence. “Jane, isn’t that your friend Blaisdell over there?”

  “Where?” Jane said. “My God.”

  In the far reaches of the room, a party of red-faced young men—rich simpletons, Márta calculated, barely out of public school—looked up as a woman announced herself with the aid of a toy trumpet. One of the men was wearing a paper hat. They all pounded on the table as the woman, singing “Happy Birthday,” proceeded to take off her drum majorette’s outfit.

  It was all just barely audible. Carl appeared to be paying no attention, though Dee Dee watched with interest, and Jane was regarding the spectacle with sparkling, narrowed eyes. “Excuse me,” she said.

  Jane reached the table just as the woman with the toy trumpet refastened a final button and hurried off. Jane sat down and draped an arm around the man in the paper hat. He, and the others too, stared at her with the joyful, wondering incomprehension of men who are about to pass out.

  Andrew leaned across Dee Dee to Carl. “See the one in the hat? Guess who took Jane to Paris a couple of weeks ago when you and I were in the South of France.”

  “Really,” Carl said.

  “You were just in the South of France,” Márta observed.

  For an instant the room was a tableau. Every face, every object frozen, haloed with a warning brightness.

  “Just for old times’ sake, really,” Andrew said. “We only stayed a few days, because Carl became incredibly shirty over something.”

  Carl pushed his plate away. “Not at all,” he said.

  “No?” Andrew said. “Well, good. I can’t think why you would have done.” He turned to Márta. “Has Carl told you about Cubby and Kaye?”

  Márta looked at Andrew. The South of France. During the whole time Carl hadn’t called, when she might reasonably have assumed he was working, he had been in the South of France.

  “Well, but after all,” Andrew said, “there’s nothing to tell. Evidently they were friends of my father’s—from Kenya, possibly, but no one really remembers. It’s all lost in the mists of time and brain damage. They’re English classics, Kaye and Cubby. Titled, demented—generations of primordial aristocratic inbreeding.”

  Dee Dee listed suddenly against Andrew’s arm. He brushed her hair away from her forehead. “We used to go to their place from time to time on holiday. Carl and I. Especially if my mother was off someplace. The idea was, we’d be getting looked after.” He looked at Carl. “Which was indeed the case—we long ago came to the conclusion that the servants were wardens in disguise.”

  Carl raised his eyes to Andrew, then looked down with a faint, self-mocking smile.

  “Dee Dee—” Márta said. Dee Dee’s head was sliding along Andrew’s arm. “Dee Dee, do you want to go?”

  “No,” Dee Dee said.

  Andrew resettled her against his shoulder. “But Carl hadn’t been for years and years,” he said. “And Cubby was forever saying, ‘Wasn’t there some other little chap?’ or ‘Where’s dear, dear Carl?’ or however it all happened to come up in his mind at that particular moment. So he and Kaye were simply over the moon when I told them Carl had gotten in touch with me and was going to be staying at my place for the summer.”

  “Did I get in touch with you?” Carl said mildly.

  “Oh,” Andrew said. “That’s right. You ran into me. By chance. And then you got in touch with me.”

  Into the sudden hollow of silence at the table, Dee Dee inserted a little hiccup.

  “I think,” Márta addressed Carl, “that it’s time to take your sister home.”

  “Jane?” Dee Dee sat up. “Where’s Jane?”

  “It’s all right, ducks,” Andrew said. “Jane’s found a friend.”

  Outside, it was still drizzling. “Will you come with us?” Carl said to Márta as he opened the taxi door for Dee Dee.

  “No,” Márta said. “Thank you.”

  By the time she reached her flat she had to fight the clamor pressing in on her just to get the key into the lock. Carl had looked at her as he said good night with a trace of surprise. Oh, that innocent face! In fact, he was so slippery that he had made her not be able to understand why she was angry herself. Which was worse behavior in its way than István’s.

  Judit sat at the kitchen table eating, directly from its deli wrapping, a cheese-and-pickle sandwich on limp English bread. “Up so late?” Márta spoke insouciantly in English.

  Judit sighed. “I was just getting some work done. Have a nice evening?”

  “Lovely,” Márta said. “Carl took me to the most marvelous place. Do you ever wonder why London is such a quiet city? It is because everyone who lives here is inside this restaurant. On the street, it is all chauffeurs waiting.”

  “How pleasant,” Judit said.

  “Very,” Márta said. “We had a great deal of champagne because Carl’s baby sister has come to stay with him. And Carl’s friend Andrew brought with him the most beautiful girl, Jane.”

  “So,” Judit said. “Your life is glamour and more glamour.” She wadded up the deli wrappings; they landed in the garbage with a deadly little plop.

  In the morning when Márta awoke, anger lay next to her like a cover that had slipped off during the night. She felt around for it and readjusted it over herself.

  What a hateful evening. How remote Carl had been, how abstracted. But how handsome! Oh, the world of difference between the banquet he seemed to offer and the crumbs that fell her way. Why, with all their talk of traveling that evening in the French restaurant had Carl not even mentioned that he was going to the South of France? What a shrew he made her feel.

  Poor Dee Dee. That poor little pit pony! Alone, a foreigner—all she had was Carl! Márta imagined herself—in a little suit, perhaps—showing Dee Dee around London; really, Dee Dee was rather cute, if you managed to think about her in the right way. Márta eyed the phone. There were swans in a park somewhere, she understood—she could show them to Dee Dee. Take her shopping. Explain to her peculiar English customs, like tea…How well, she wondered, did Dee Dee actually know Carl?

  Dee Dee was late, of course, and the restaurant Márta had designated—one whose name had echoed, potently English, all the way to Márta in Budapest—was crowded with Saturday shoppers. Their faces looked ashen and fatigued against the prettily colored walls and carpets, and the uniformed hostess eyed Márta with suspicion. Márta cleared her throat. “Yes, I’m waiting for my—” Her what?

  “Excuse me?” the hostess said. “Of course. Well, there aren’t any tables at the moment anyhow. You can see for yourself. More and more crowded all the time now. Where do they all come from? Days when you hardly hear a word of English spoken.” She lifted one foot, then the other, as though she were accustomed to perpetual pain. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed the change. Perhaps you don’t remember. It’s only in the last few years that London has become so”—sh
e cocked her head conspiratorially to indicate the roomful of tea drinkers—“cosmopolitan.”

  “Hi,” Dee Dee said from near Márta’s shoulder. In her yellow slicker she looked like a huge bathtub toy.

  “You’ll have to keep your coats,” the hostess observed morosely. “The cloakroom’s closed for renovations.”

  “That’s okay,” Dee Dee said. She rubbed at her nose with her wrist.

  “Well, management doesn’t care for it,” the hostess said. “It lowers the tone.”

  Márta burned with self-consciousness as she poured out the tea. It was all so primitive and complicated. At the tables all around them women in tweeds or chadors and men in pinstripes dealt with the fussy pots and tongs and strainers with the ease of tycoons handling ticker tape. And what about this pot of plain hot water, Márta wondered. Was she supposed to be doing something with it? No matter. Dee Dee appeared not to notice her awkwardness. In fact, for all Dee Dee appeared to be noticing, Márta could have taken her to the filthy corner caf. There was no sign of life from Dee Dee at all. Not even self-pitying monologues, let alone meaningful discourse about Carl. No, Dee Dee was quietly absorbed in stacking up the expensive little cakes that tasted like Kleenex filled with toothpaste, and eating them mechanically, one after the other.

  Dee Dee’s eyes were fixed on Márta’s plate, where a little cake sat inscrutably, bitten. She was trying to think of something to say. It was difficult, though—especially since Márta had been frowning since they’d sat down. Dee Dee felt cold and rubbery. What if Márta hated her? What would happen then?

  After her mother had announced to her that she was to be sent to Carl for the summer, Dee Dee had been racked by rapid alterations between joy and misery, hope and panic. She had seen Carl only once. When she was a child, probably around four. Where had they been? She, Carl, their mother, of course…It was a big house. The floor shone, there were flowers in huge vases, several women—tall, broad-shouldered, with long, whooshing skirts; a fat man with dark hair. Someone said, would the baby like to see the pony? Carl took her hand. She was the baby. Carl led her outside, the house darkened behind them. In a grassy little enclosure a white creature pranced and curvetted. Dee Dee stared straight ahead. Was she feeling her own hand holding Carl’s, or was she feeling Carl’s hand holding hers?

  Dee Dee carried the memory privately, a picture in a locket. She never asked her mother about it. At the worst times, she allowed herself to take it out and contemplate it. The angelically serious boy stayed older than she was; he was ahead of her, drawing her along as though she were secured to him by some unseverable attachment. As indeed she was.

  When Dee Dee descended the stairs the morning of her departure for London, her mother had looked at her narrowly. “You’ve simply got to lose five pounds,” she said. “Ten would be better. You can get away with things as a child that you can’t at your age, you know.”

  All right. All right. If Carl was ashamed of her, if he didn’t want her around, Dee Dee would take off on her own somehow. She had with her a reasonable amount of money—her mother and her father had been separately, guiltily open-handed, and at an early age she had cultivated the prudent habit of skimming small amounts from her mother’s unguarded cash against unforeseeable eventualities. There were times, during the savage quarrels between her parents, between herself and her mother, when, her face stiff from the strain of shame or tears or fury, she imagined herself liberated—cast out, fugitive, all the trashy screen of words left behind; words and the trashy names of things and accusations and expectations. The rocking of the darkened carriage, the purifying monotony of hooves, of tracks. Looking out at the flowing night, clean, unknown, dignified, new. Dependent on no one, loved by no one…

  But when Carl greeted her at Heathrow there was no sign of recoil. He kissed her on both cheeks and picked up her bag. She had recognized him immediately; he was just as he ought to have been.

  Early in the evening Dee Dee had awoken in her new room. The walls were covered with something green, like ribbon. Silver-framed photographs were scattered on a polished dressing table. Standing in the doorway was a woman with long, blondish hair. “Hello,” Dee Dee said.

  “Hello,” the woman said.

  Where was Carl? Where was Andrew? “I’m Carl’s sister,” Dee Dee said.

  “Right.” The woman shook out her hair. “Carl said.” She sat down on the foot of Dee Dee’s bed and yawned. “I’m Jane,” she said. “Here for long?”

  Jane was wearing a kimono and her feet were bare. “I don’t know,” Dee Dee said.

  “Mm,” Jane said. She reached for one of the silver-framed photographs. “I suppose not…”

  Dee Dee crawled out from under the covers and peered over Jane’s shoulder. The photographs were all of people from some other time. They looked not real at all—implausible, approximate, costumed. “Who are they?” Dee Dee said.

  “Andrew’s posh relations, I should think,” Jane said. “This must be his mum—looks enough like him, doesn’t it?”

  She handed Dee Dee the photograph. It was true; as Dee Dee saw Andrew’s face within the woman’s, the opaque surface of dated style melted. The woman’s skin warmed, her curls had just sprung back from a breeze. A starry, dangerous blur of excitement hung in front of her eyes like a little veil, and her beauty rose from the black-and-white paper like steam, so evanescent it suggested imminent fatality—a car, a boat, a wild animal…Dee Dee handed the photograph back to Jane.

  “What?” Jane said, glancing at her.

  “I don’t know,” Dee Dee said. London. Only a few days earlier she had been talking to her mother, and they had started to quarrel, and her mother had said, “All right, I’ve had it. I’m sending you to Carl.” Dee Dee looked at Jane in amazement. “I was just there,” she said, “and now I’m here. Mother and I were just talking, and now I’m here…”

  Jane stood up. “Well,” she said. “That’s the way it works, isn’t it. Anyway”—she smiled kindly from the doorway as Dee Dee pulled on her jeans—“Carl’s pleased.”

  Dee Dee stared soberly into the silver-framed mirror and carefully combed her hair.

  That’s the way it works. She wandered out to the stairway. Carl’s pleased.

  It was pitch-dark when Dee Dee next woke up. What had awakened her? There was the familiar unevenness in the air of recent disturbance.

  But where was she? She felt around for a light—oh, yes. Andrew’s house. She felt a bit strange. From dinner maybe. She remembered: she’d drunk a lot of wine. It had been very noisy. Jane had been there, and Carl, and Carl’s friend Márta, and Andrew. How nervous she’d been! She’d talked a lot. But what had she said? And how had she gotten upstairs?

  She listened carefully into the lush undergrowth of silence. At first she could make no sense of it, but then she heard something from downstairs. She got up, as she had so often at home, and crept out to the landing. All the closed doors around her! More frightening than the faint light from below.

  Dee Dee edged herself down the stairs, halfway to the next landing. Legs extended on the sofa into her view. Andrew’s—those were his socks. “I’m sorry,” someone said quietly. Carl. He sounded far away. “Really,” he said. “I really am.”

  “Must we discuss it?” Andrew said.

  Dee Dee strained into the silence. “What?” Andrew said.

  “Did you say something?”

  Dee Dee could feel Carl sigh. “No,” he said.

  “But I said, must we discuss it?” Andrew said.

  Carl cleared his throat. “No,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “What?” Andrew said. “You’re what?”

  “Don’t,” Carl said. “Please.”

  “Don’t what,” Andrew said. “Please what. Oh, God. Why are you here?”

  “I don’t know,” Carl said. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry,” Andrew said. “Just tell me why you’re here.”

  “I thought it would be—” Carl said. “I
don’t know.”

  “You don’t know,” Andrew said. “Of course you know.”

  “I wanted to be—I thought we’d be able—”

  “You see,” Andrew said. “Oh, how idiotic. You see, this is what you say now. This is what you always say. But then it’s you who always—”

  “I know,” Carl said. “I’m sorry. But not anymore.”

  Darkness boiled up around Dee Dee. After a minute Andrew spoke again. “Then why are you here?” he said. His voice twisted like a wilting flower. “Why are you here?”

  The next evening Dee Dee was waiting on the sofa when Carl returned.

  “Where is everyone?” Carl said.

  “Jane never came back,” Dee Dee said. “I guess. And Andrew wanted me to tell you he was going somewhere with Timothy.”

  “Ah,” Carl said. “Hm. Well, in that case.” He looked around at the walls as though he were trying to remember something. “Takeaway all right?”

  Dee Dee stretched out on the sofa, her empty plate balanced on her stomach. Carl sat in a high, straight-backed armchair; he appeared to be sitting in a bell jar of light. The boy who had hovered by her, always available in moments of extreme need, who had led her from one year to the next—had that boy become this man? “Carl—” Dee Dee said.

  “I was thinking,” he said. “You know, it’s idiotic, your being here in Europe and just lying around the house.”

  “It’s only Friday,” Dee Dee said. Where was Carl? “I only just got here yesterday.”

  “I ought to take some time off,” Carl said. “Or arrange with my firm to go someplace.”

  “Go someplace?” Dee Dee sat up. “I mean—”

  “Someplace else,” Carl said. “After all, why should you stay in London? It’s so—well, and also it’s…”

  Dee Dee ran her hand over the velvety covering of the sofa. It was only last night that Andrew had lain in this very spot.