The Beggar's Pawn

by John L'Heureux

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  THE BEGGAR’S PAWN

  John L’Heureux was a novelist, short story writer, and poet who taught at Stanford University for several decades, heading the Wallace Stegner Creative Writing Fellowship for many of them. His stories have appeared in the New Yorker and other publications, and his novels include A Woman Run Mad, The Shrine at Altamira, and The Medici Boy. He was a Jesuit before publishing his first novel, Tight White Collar, in 1972. He died in 2019.

  Photo by Dagmar Logie

  ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

  The Heart Is a Full-Wild Beast

  The Medici Boy

  The Miracle

  Having Everything

  The Handmaid of Desire

  The Shrine at Altamira

  An Honorable Profession

  Comedians

  A Woman Run Mad

  Desires

  Jessica Fayer

  Family Affairs

  The Clang Birds

  Tight White Collar

  No Place for Hiding (poems)

  One Eye and a Measuring Rod (poems)

  Picnic in Babylon: A Priest’s Journal

  Rubrics for a Revolution (poems)

  Quick as Dandelions (poems)

  The Uncommon Touch (editor)

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  penguinrandomhouse.com

  Copyright © 2020 by Joan Polston L’Heureux

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: L’Heureux, John, author.

  Title: The beggar’s pawn / John L’Heureux.

  Description: New York : Penguin Books, 2020. |

  Identifiers: LCCN 2020004063 (print) | LCCN 2020004064 (ebook) | ISBN 9780143135234 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9780525506911 (ebook)

  Classification: LCC PS3562.H4 B44 2020 (print) | LCC PS3562.H4 (ebook) | DDC 813/.54--dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020004063

  LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020004064

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover design: Lucy Kim

  Cover image: Laura Kate Bradley / Arcangel

  pid_prh_5.5.0_c0_r0

  For our friend Deborah Treisman

  Contents

  PART ONE

  PART TWO

  PART THREE

  PART FOUR

  PART FIVE

  EDITOR’S NOTE

  PART ONE

  1.

  They first met Reginald Parker ages ago—in the innocent part of the year 2001—before disaster struck at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at a time when it was still possible to think ours was a virtuous country and everyone liked us and terrorists were just a plot complication in the movies. We had no idea then what forms terrorism could take, at home and away, in that innocent time ages ago.

  Anyhow, they met Reginald Parker while they were out walking their new puppy, Dickens. They were David and Maggie Holliss, and Dickens was not actually their puppy but their son Sedge’s. They were dog-sitting for Dickens while Sedge went through the ritual of getting a divorce. It was his fourth divorce and the Hollisses were not happy about it, but they liked the puppy and they were pleased when Reginald Parker stopped them and said, “What a wonderful little dog. What do you call him?”

  “He’s still a puppy,” Maggie said, “but he’s house-trained.” This was partly true.

  “We call him Dickens,” David said.

  “Dickens as in Charles? Or as in, ‘He’s a little dickens’?”

  “Charles, I think,” Maggie said. “He’s got a bookish look to him, that little face. He’s part Labrador retriever.”

  “Well, he’s a wonderful little dog. Puppy.” He scratched the dog’s ears and then the soft fur on his chest. “Good Dickens. Nice Dickens.” He smiled at them as David tugged lightly at the leash. “So long, Dickens.”

  They were on their way to the local dog park and when they were safely out of earshot Maggie said, “He seems very nice.”

  “His hair is too long,” David said. “And he’s intrusive.”

  “He’s good looking, in a way,” Maggie said.

  “He needs a shave.”

  Maggie gave him one of her looks. “I thought he seemed very nice,” she said.

  That was how they first met Reginald Parker.

  * * *

  —

  THEY MET HIM FOR the second time a few days later, again while they were taking Dickens to the dog park.

  “My old friend Dickens,” he said, and knelt down beside the dog to fondle his ears. Dickens gave a tentative lick to his face. Reginald had not shaved since they last met.

  “I didn’t realize why he was called Dickens,” Reginald said. “I didn’t realize you were Professor Holliss. I should have, though. Practically everybody around here is a professor of something or other. But I didn’t put two and two together, your specialty and the dog’s name.”

  “Are you growing a beard?” David asked.

  “It’s very becoming,” Maggie said. “Or it will be.”

  Reginald stood up and fingered his bristly chin. “I’m a writer,” he said. “I figured it goes with the territory.”

  “A writer!” Maggie said. “Yes. Yes. What do you write?”

  “I’m working on a novel right now.”

  “A novel!” Maggie looked at David, who said nothing. “How exciting!”

  “Well, I haven’t published yet,” Reginald said. “You know what the publishing industry is like these days. Nobody wants novels. All they want is memoirs of my life as a drug addict.”

  “Oh, dear,” Maggie said.

  “Not my life. I’ve never been a drug addict. Not really, I mean. I mean that’s the kind of thing they want. You must find that, too, in your field, Professor Holliss. No?”

  “No. Nobody wants to know about my drug addiction.”

  They all laughed, nervous, and Dickens barked as if he understood.

  “I’m Reg Parker,” Reginald said, sticking out his hand, “and you’re Professor Holliss, I know, and you must be Mrs. Holliss.”

  They shook hands and said hello, yes, hello.

  “I’m a great admirer of your work on Dickens,” Reginald said.

  “Thackeray, you mean,” David said. “My only work on Dickens is trying to get him not to pee on the kitchen floor.”

  David Holliss was known for his work on Thackeray and had been briefly famous for his work on Stephen Crane. But now, late in his career, it was Thackeray whom people seemed to remember though they often confused him with Dickens.

  “Thackeray, of course, I meant Thackeray. Sorry about that.”

  “People do that all the time. Maybe it means I should work on Dickens.”

  “He’s working on Gissing now,” Maggie said.

  “Gissing?”

&n
bsp; “New Grub Street Gissing. The writer as a kind of production-line worker. Poverty. Desperation.” She paused. “The long climb from lower-middle to upper-middle class. It’s great stuff.”

  “Maybe we could talk about your writing sometime,” Reginald said. “I’d like that.”

  David took a step backward. “Thanks for the offer, but I never talk about writing while it’s in progress. Foolish of me, probably, but I just don’t. Besides, I’m still doing research. But thanks. And good luck with the novel. I admire anybody who undertakes a novel. It’s like signing up for . . . well, I don’t know what . . . a suicide mission, I guess. We’ve gotta get moving.”

  As if on command Dickens bolted after a squirrel and was tugged back by his leash. “See,” David said.

  And so they left Reginald Parker and continued their walk.

  “A suicide mission?” Maggie said.

  “Nosey Parker,” David said.

  They walked in silence for a while, pausing to let Dickens savor all the delicious smells left by other dogs.

  “Good boy,” David said as Dickens lifted his leg on a holly bush.

  “You weren’t very friendly,” Maggie said.

  “He’s lonely, is all.”

  “Poor soul,” Maggie said.

  David said nothing until they got home. Then he said what he had kept himself from saying during the whole long walk. “You shouldn’t have told him about Gissing. My work is private. You know that.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m still researching. I still haven’t read all his novels. Who knows, I may never write the damned book.”

  “I’ve said I’m sorry.”

  “It’s too late to be sorry.”

  “If you can hold on a minute, I’ll go and kill myself.”

  “Do you see what he’s caused, that Parker? We’re fighting and we never fight. That man is trouble.”

  * * *

  —

  BUT PARKER WASN’T TROUBLE, at least not then, in the innocent part of the year 2001. After that one conversation he seemed to understand that David’s writing was off-limits and so he let it alone. The dog, however, was not only a safe topic, it was a welcome one. Over the next months the three of them met often on their morning walks. Dickens would bound forward, tugging at the leash, eager for the pats and chest rubs of his new bearded friend.

  “I just love this dog,” Reginald said.

  “I’m surprised you don’t get one of your own,” Maggie said. “They make a morning walk a lot more enjoyable.” She had come to the conclusion that he was a bachelor, starving for his art, and he needed a dog as a companion. On the other hand perhaps his morning walks were in service of his novel, a kind of thinking time before he sat down to write, and so a dog might prove to be a distraction. She’d have liked to ask him about this, but she worried that any talk of writing would lead to questions about David’s work on Gissing and thus to unhappiness at home.

  “I could never afford a dog,” Reginald said. “Not a beauty like Dickens. Could I, Dickens? No, I couldn’t. Never.” And he gave the dog a firm pat on the behind.

  Later, Maggie said to David, “He could never afford a dog. That’s what he said.”

  David recognized the tone and could tell she was thinking of buying him one.

  “Don’t,” he said. “Let sleeping dogs et cetera.”

  * * *

  —

  ONE DAY WHEN DAVID was not feeling up to a walk—he had thrown his back out while putting on his shoes—Maggie took Dickens to the park by herself and, as she thought she might, she ran into Reginald Parker. He was walking with his head down, apparently lost in thought, and it was only when Dickens poked his cold nose into Reginald’s hand that he looked up, surprised, and greeted them both.

  “Thinking of your book?” Maggie asked.

  “Book?” he said. He looked confused.

  “The novel,” she said. And then, “I always forget. Writers don’t like to talk about their work in progress.” She noticed that his pupils were dilated as if he were on something, and she remembered Sedge when he was high on grass.

  “I was a friend of Iris Murdoch,” Reginald said.

  “Really! How exciting. Did she talk about her work in progress?”

  “To her friends, she did.”

  “Well, that is exciting. Iris Murdoch. A Severed Head. The Black Prince. I love Murdoch.”

  “I have to go,” he said.

  Maggie couldn’t wait to get home and tell David that Reginald Parker, however strange he might be, was in fact a friend of Iris Murdoch.

  “How’s that possible? She’s dead.”

  “Well, he was, I mean.”

  “Maybe there’s more to him than we think,” David said. “Iris Murdoch. Really?”

  Maggie did not mention that Reginald had been high on grass. Or something.

  * * *

  —

  OVER THE NEXT YEARS David continued to pick away at his research on Gissing and, so they imagined, Reginald Parker continued to write his novel. They talked about him from time to time when they ran into him on their morning walks, but other than that they gave him no thought whatsoever. When they did meet, always by chance, Dickens remained their common interest and, except for the weather, their only topic of conversation.

  One morning Reginald walked back with them to their home.

  “What a huge house,” he said. “I had no idea.”

  “We’ve been here forever,” Maggie said, embarrassed, since there was too much house for just the two of them. “All the kids grew up here.”

  “It’s beautiful without looking pretentious,” Reginald said. “Not like some of them.”

  They didn’t know what to say and so they said nothing.

  “I live in the guest cottage behind the Lorings. You know their house?”

  “We know the Lorings, to say hello,” David said. “Very nice people.”

  “He’s at the law school,” Maggie said. “It’s a very big house.”

  “For just the two of them,” Reginald said. “And he says he’s a Marxist. So much for theory and practice.” He seemed to want to say more but he just looked at them.

  “Well, it’s been lovely,” Maggie said.

  David gave him the offhand wave that signaled goodbye.

  He watched them go up the driveway to the back entrance of the house and then—thinking what?—he turned away.

  * * *

  —

  THE HOLLISSES AND PARKER remained acquaintances merely. They were not friends. They did not drop in for neighborly visits. They were academic types living in Professorville—a neighborhood of academics—and the neighbors felt no need to socialize. And everyone, everyone who mattered, preferred it this way. Then, in 2009, there came a moment when their relationship changed.

  Maggie had gone to the front door to get a parcel from the UPS man and stood examining the label when suddenly Dickens wiggled past her and dashed down the front walk after a squirrel. The squirrel made for the live oak in front of the house, and from a high branch it dropped to the ground and streaked across the pavement to a tree on the opposite side of the street. Dickens pursued the squirrel frantically and stood beneath the tree barking in frustration and wagging his tail. Maggie looked up and down the street, saw there were no cars coming, and called the dog home. “Good boy,” she shouted, “come on, Dickens! Come on!” Eventually Dickens gave up on the treed squirrel and started across the street toward her. At that moment the UPS driver put his truck in gear and began to move slowly forward. Dickens was crossing toward Maggie but paused to look back toward the squirrel. And at that moment the UPS truck sped up. Maggie screamed, “No!” and Dickens turned back to her. Out of nowhere—she had seen no cars, nobody walking—Reginald Parker suddenly appeared in the street in front of the truck and threw himsel
f bodily between the truck and the dog, shouting, “Stop! Stop!” The brakes squealed and the truck came to a dead halt but not before Reginald was flung against its window and then back onto the pavement. The dog sprang free. The UPS man slumped over his wheel and Maggie stood frozen at the front door while Dickens, his belly flat to the grass, approached her on his front paws. Reginald lay in the road, motionless.

  The driver did not move and Maggie did not move until finally, slowly, Reginald’s arms twitched, and then his legs, and then he sat up. Everyone came back to life.

  The UPS man got out of his truck and ran over to Reginald, saying, “Don’t move. Just lie flat,” even though he could see Reginald was already sitting up. Maggie let the door slam behind her and dashed down the path to the street. And Dickens, no longer to blame, ran to Reginald and pressed his wet muzzle against his neck.

  “I’m fine,” Reginald said. “I’m just shaken.” But the palms of both hands were scraped and bleeding.

  Dickens nosed about after Maggie, uncertain what was expected of him. She patted him and rubbed him all over to make sure he was okay and then she turned her attention to Reginald.

  She and the UPS man helped him to his feet. Reginald stood for a minute, getting his balance, and then, each with an arm around him, they walked him up the path into the house. They settled him, cautiously, on the living room couch. Maggie got a bowl of hot water and a tube of Neosporin and a roll of cotton gauze, and when she returned, the UPS man, frantic still, made it clear that he was eager to go. He left. Reginald sat quietly, his hands on his knees with his palms turned up, looking around him and taking in the grand piano, the comfy furniture, the paintings of family: the Hollisses with their three children when they were still babies, and then, separately, each of the children painted when they were in their teens. A huge bay window looked out over the back garden.

  “I’m so sorry,” Maggie said, kneeling at his side and sponging his scraped palms with a clean white towel. “It’s my fault,” she said. “I should have been watching him more closely.”