Cancel All Our Vows

by John D. MacDonald

  “Okay, Sam. A draw.”

  There was something about the vital young strength of him that made her feel absurdly girlish. She looked at him and knew that her face had shown too much and that this was not a young man with whom you turned the cards face up. He moved closer to her in the water and put a big hand on her waist and pulled her over against him. She was conscious of the way the play suit was plastered to her, of how the cold of the water had made her nipples swell, sharp against the thin wet fabric.

  She put her hand on his big square wrist and tried to push his hand away. “Don’t be a damn fool, Sam. Good Lord, I’m …”

  “Old enough to be my mother. I doubt that. Look, dear, a whole lake all to ourselves.”

  “They’re watching us. Now stop! I mean it!”

  “Jane, you’re the nicest thing I’ve seen, anywhere.”

  She turned suddenly away from him, spinning in the water, moving away to tread water and stare at him with what she hoped was severity.

  “Don’t get carried away. I’ve got two kids there at the dock. I don’t think you’re more than six or seven years older than my boy. Now don’t handle me. I don’t like it.”

  He smiled ruefully. “That’s the hell of it, Jane. When I find what I want, it turns out I was born just a little too late. Or you came along too soon.”

  “The cry of the junior wolf.”

  “Come on up and I’ll show you my merit badges, honey.”

  “Fool!”

  “At least you’re smiling again. I like that smile. Look, this is vacation. A nice day. Nice people. A nice place. Fair warning, now. I’m after you.”

  She stared at him. “What do you mean?”

  “It certainly won’t hurt me any, and I know it won’t do you any harm. A little bonus for both of us, and nobody talks, and who knows about it but you and me.”

  “That’s pretty damn direct and insulting. What gets into you kids these days? Good Lord, when I was in college nobody ever had the nerve to come right out and …”

  “Don’t get yourself in a froth, dear. Pretty soon you’ll start talking about the nasty moral standards of the new generation. What’s nasty, dear? Asking for it like a civilized human being, or mooching around and trying to sneak up on it? The result is the same, but the anticipation is better. And just think how well co-ordinated we both are. Now slap my sassy face.”

  “Stop grinning like an idiot. What gives you the right to talk to me as if I was cheap enough to … to play around with a college boy?”

  “You did.”

  “How on earth …”

  “You said people were watching, Jane. That was your first reaction. So it makes me wonder what happens when we get where nobody is watching.”

  “Two-bit psychology, and it’s all wrong. Now get away. Don’t touch me again. Here comes the boat.”

  The boat came up and Dick took it out of gear and it rocked near them burbling softly. Deena called to them, “We decided it was a tie.”

  “So did we,” Sam said. “We decided she’s going to try to ride back on my shoulders. So after she gets on my skis, pull her tow rope in, hey?”

  “I am not!” Jane said in a low heated tone.

  Sam gave her a look of blank amazement, and said in a low voice, “Darling, this is for the amusement of the people, not us.”

  “I won’t do it,” she said.

  She recovered her other ski, put it on, got herself in position in the water, ski tips elevated, Sam beside her. The boat started up and they came dripping up out of the water, skimming along as before.

  Sam swooped near her and before she could move away, he grasped her tow bar. He yelled into her ear, “I’ll shorten my rope and you put one ski between mine.” He moved forward, holding onto her rope as well as his. Then he let himself back toward her and she had to slide one ski between his or be spilled. He reached back and took her tow bar and twisted it. When she knew she had to let go, she grabbed wildly at his waist He dropped her bar and Deena reeled in the rope.

  He yelled back over his shoulder, “Get on my skis.”

  “I know how, dammit,” she said. She kicked her skis off, one at a time, and was standing on his skis, her feet behind his. He squatted and she held his shoulders, got on him piggyback, then worked her way up, swinging her right leg over his right shoulder first, then swinging the left leg up. She hooked her feet back around him, let go of his head and balanced there, sullenly angry at him and at herself, but smiling for the benefit of the admiring Dick and Deena. Once she was firmly balanced, Sam began to cut slowly back and forth across the wake.

  She felt, under her thighs, the smooth roll and coil of his warm shoulder muscles. She was saddled on the nape of his neck, and his head was against her stomach. And slowly, as he swayed in slow rhythm back and forth across the wake, as her play suit began to dry quickly in the warm wind, she sensed the beginnings of sensual physical pleasure within herself. She cursed him inwardly, knowing that he had planned it in, this way, knowing that he already had a frightening knowledge of her. She fought against the slow melting within her. She had the crazy feeling that she was going half asleep, that her eyes and head were getting heavy. Her lips felt warm and bruised, even in the wind. And then she had no urge or will to fight against the warmnesses in her, wanting only that they should go on and on, that she should remain here, skimming sleepily under the bright sun, the masculine warmth under her, swinging back and forth across the blue and white of the wake, with the sun gleaming on the dark wood and polished brass of the boat. She knew that she had tightened herself against him and she did not care any longer whether he knew it.

  And then the dock came toward them, and she felt a sharp disappointment and they slowed suddenly as he released the tow bar, then the water of the lake closed over them, its chill bringing her back to self-knowledge, and self-disgust and a kind of despair.

  She came to the surface and his head was near her. He turned and looked at her and she felt that if he had laughed, if he had looked at her with knowing slyness, she would have reached for his eyes with her nails. But he looked sobered, and concerned and distressed, and he said so softly that those on the nearby dock couldn’t hear, “I’m sorry, Jane.”

  “N-never mind, Sam.”

  They swam to the dock, each pushing one ski. Jane hauled herself lithely out of the water. Martha Rogers looked at the way the play suit was pasted against Jane’s body and said, “Well, really, dear!” And Jane ignored her and smiled at the praise of all the others, and then stood up and said, “When you see me coming in a suit, Hank, pour me another. That’s my cup.”

  She stripped off the wet play suit, the sodden nylon panties and bra, in Dolly’s bedroom. There was a full-length mirror set into the front of the closet door. She stood and looked dubiously at the rich femininity of her body. She had the strange feeling that her body had betrayed her. She had treated it well, kept it brisk and clean and firm and young. It had been an ally, and loyal, and she had trusted it. In a strange sense it had been something which only she and Fletcher shared, both taking pleasure from it, both proud of it—and now, in revolt for some unknown reason, it had let itself be stimulated, had let itself become warm and frighteningly willing, merely because a muscular college boy had known how to seek it out, had known, somehow, that her trust had been naïve, that all along the traitor body had given the impression of faithfulness, while waiting for a chance.

  She put the suit on, wishing she had brought the older, more sedate one. She was troubled. She had believed with all her heart that there were no circumstances possible which would cause her to be unfaithful to Fletcher. She had believed that no man except Fletcher would ever possess her, and she was content in that belief, wanting nothing else.

  Yet she was painfully honest enough with herself to know that had that last ride ended, not in chill water, but on some dry and grassy bank in the warm sunshine, she might have given herself quickly, completely, to that big bronzed child, without scruple or hesitation, a
nd that afterward she would have found herself in a peculiar hell of her own devising. It was especially sickening that her children should have witnessed, even without realization, her shame and her new self-knowledge.

  It was a difficult thing to accept—that given the right circumstances, despite all her previous belief in her own staunchness and character, her heels could become as round as those of any tramp. Because it was not love involved. And Fletcher left her with no tensions of dissatisfaction. It was only a physical, inexplicable lust. A wish to be possessed.

  She gathered up her wet things and remembered the sound of the phone as she had closed the front door of the house. This was punishment for not answering it. She found a line beside the house and hung the wet things up neatly, lit a cigarette, walked slowly and casually around the house toward the dock. She looked first for Sam, saw his brown length sprawled on the dock, felt the increased tempo of her heart, and felt, anew, a sick despair.

  Chapter Seven

  Fletcher Wyant drove toward his office, nursing a dogged anger and a sense of self-righteousness. Damn kids think they own the house. Think we’re there just for their pleasure and amusement.

  He had awakened with a dull headache, a distant throb behind his eyes that had banged harder when he had bent over to lace his shoes. He had awakened feeling more weary than when he had gone to bed. He knew his dreams had been weird, but all memory of them was gone. He knew that he had handled the argument with Jane very cleverly, but he had done it by skirting the truth.

  That damn Laura Corban. This was no time for any interest, speculative or otherwise, in another woman. Couldn’t help wondering what she’d be like. And it was pretty evident—she’d made it evident—that she’d be willing. No time for one of those tasteless suburban infidelities. No time to join the summer Minidoka game of musical beds.

  He nursed his anger, but despite all he could do it began to fade, leaving him filled with uneasy remorse and self-doubt. God, they were good kids. Better than most. And no harm in asking about the water skis. He was half tempted to turn around and head back to the house, but that seemed too great a loss of dignity. You had to maintain some consistency. He drove more slowly, planning how he would do it. Call from the plant and tell them the lake would be fine. Then, on the drive out there, give the kids a talking-to about common courtesy and rescind the order about no water skiing. Hank was a fool, but he could be amusing enough. And it was a nice attitude at the Dimbrough camp. Relaxed and easy. And there was no pleasure exactly like watching Jane out there, graceful as a bird on those skis. She would flash by in her trimness, and he would watch her and begin to want her, and know, with fatuous certainty, that there was nothing in the world to stop him from having her.

  Certainly was an oaf this morning. Ashamed of myself. That little sob that Dink let out as she left the room. Hell of a note, being an ogre on a Saturday morning, when it’s their last week before camp. To be perfectly honest, I don’t have to come down here to the office at all. Got up and decided to come here because I wanted to punish the whole world and myself too. For some crime. Kissing that Corban bitch, maybe. Or perhaps the crime of not sleeping well. God, will I ever grow up?”

  He parked in the slot with his name on it, and went into the offices. The watchman was sitting inside the door, his chair tilted back, reading a comic book.

  “ ’Morning, Mr. Wyant They got the air conditioning fixed.”

  “That’s fine, Mike.”

  “Maintenance says the oil cooked right out of a bearing. Sure feels good to have it back on. Going to be a worse day than yesterday.”

  “Who’s in, Mike?”

  “Some of the girls in Purchasing, and that new fella in Personnel, and Mr. Corban. I don’t right now recall anybody else. Is it true we’re going on two shifts in the shop, Mr. Wyant?”

  “That’s hard to say, Mike.” He glanced over at the live phone on the reception desk. “Say, could you plug my phone in? I’ve got some calls to make.”

  “Sure thing.”

  He went on to his office. It was comfortably cool in the office building. He wondered how much it cost to keep it running for just a few people on Saturday morning. Better do a little watchdogging about that.

  He heard the clatter of a mimeograph machine in Purchasing. The new man in Personnel glanced out at him as he went down the hall and gave him a careful smile. As soon as he was in his office, Fletcher tested his phone and got a dial tone. He dialed his home. After it rang ten times, he hung up, annoyed. All right, so she got huffy and took off with the kids. I better not find out she took them down to that public pool. Maybe she went shopping, took the kids on the bus.

  He felt oddly relieved to have a new justification for his anger. He got out the figures he had been working on when Stanley had shooed him out. Anger obstructed his concentration for a few minutes and then slowly he worked his way into the world of symbols. At the Monday meeting he would be expected to report what would have to be done to enable Forman Furnace to take on a subcontract, a large one, for parts of a field kitchen. The defense production program had finally, after many warnings, begun to pinch materials. The working capital position was shaky. There were two reasons for it. First, there were a lot of units of the regular line warehoused, waiting for the thermostat controls. Those almost completed units represented capital tied up. Secondly the prime government contractor could not give them an advance for the subcontract on field kitchens. It was mostly metal stampings, heavy-gauge work, but nothing they couldn’t handle. The trouble was the outlay for materials. There were many ways of getting the working capital position up to where the subcontract could be safely undertaken. The problem was the choice of methods. Comparative expense of each method of borrowing. Forman was sound and healthy. He worked patiently on a schedule of borrowings that would keep them in the clear, yet not obligate them too heavily for the interest payments. All this would not have to be typed for the Monday meeting. He could speak from rough notes, distribute information copies later.

  As he was beginning to feel satisfied with his conclusions, Ellis Corban came into the office, hearty and smiling.

  “The wife and I certainly had a good time last night, Fletch.”

  “Well, I want to thank you for inviting us, Ellis.”

  “That’s the sort of thing we ought to do more often, believe me. We old married characters ought to date our wives more often. They get a real kick out of a dance like that. And I must say the club serves wonderful food. Say, what I wanted to ask you, Laura just phoned me. She was trying to phone Jane and there’s no answer at your house. Laura wants to know what sort of thing to wear when we come over tomorrow afternoon. Jane forgot to say, and Laura forgot to ask her.”

  “Well, if it’s hot like today, it’s pretty informal. Sport jackets and slacks, and the women wear cotton dresses or blouse and skirt and some of them bring sun suits and change and lie around and toast.”

  “Fine, that’s just what we want to know. About three?”

  “Somewhere around that time, Ellis.”

  Ellis studied a thumbnail. “Say, I hope I wasn’t out of line when I … sort of briefed you on Laura.”

  “Not at all.”

  “She … well, she seems to think this corporation executive setup has some silly angles.”

  “She’s not alone.”

  “Eh? Oh, I see what you mean. Sure. Funny kid, though. I really don’t think it would make any difference to her if I was a … plumber or something. She’d probably like it better. Quite a background, you know. Her father was a widower. Pretty much of a bum, from what I can gather. He dragged the kids all over the country. They adored him. He got killed during the war. Got knifed in a drunken brawl in Oklahoma. There was just the two kids. Her brother, Josh, I never met him, was killed in the war. And there were two boys she was engaged to—and they both got killed one after the other. Hard lines.”

  “Where did you meet her?”

  “Oh, right after the war. I was with another
firm, the job I had before I went with Tuplan and Hauser. We farmed out some work with the GE labs, and I went there to follow it up. She was working there. I don’t know. She seemed … like in the fairy stories when you were a kid … enchanted or something. Neither alive nor dead. A good worker, though, they told me. I had the feeling that I could … make a lot of things up to her. I …” He flushed and smiled too broadly. “I’m talking too damn much.”

  “I shouldn’t ask so many questions.”

  “You must have married Jane when you were both pretty young, Fletch.”

  “I was twenty-two and she was nineteen. I guess it’s one of those traditional kind of things, Ellis. Grew up on the same block right here in Minidoka. I started taking her out when she was fifteen, and I used to come home on vacations from college. There just never was anybody else for either one of us. Funny, we both used to talk about getting away from this town. We were away, for a while, but we came back.”

  “You seem so well suited to each other, Fletch.”

  Fletcher glanced up quickly, slightly annoyed, and surprised a look almost of longing in Ellis’ eyes. A kid with his nose against the toy window. Though he didn’t like the man personally, he had a sudden warm feeling of pity for him. Except in his keen financial understanding, Ellis seemed to be one of those men who are but half alive. And Laura, no matter what else she might be, seemed as intensely aware and alive as anyone he had ever met. A keen, roving, inquisitive mind, a constant appraisal of environment and its interaction on her. Whereas Ellis accepted his environment, asked only comfort, while he exercised his specialist abilities. In that moment he saw Ellis as a mother hen, standing and flapping and tukkawing on the bank, while the duck child paddled in blithe circles.

  Out of embarrassment Fletcher changed the subject quickly. “Take a look at this schedule, Ellis. What do you think?”

  Ellis sat on the corner of the desk and studied the pencil notes. As always, he seemed to come intensely alive when he studied figures. His expression and his manner changed.