A Multitude of Sins (17 page)

“Do you downhill,” Roger asks, leaning over his empty plate in the half darkness. He is whispering, for some reason. Things could really turn out great, Faith understands him to be thinking: Eighty-six the girls. Dismantle plenty of jets. Just be friendly and it’ll happen.

“No, never,” Faith says, dreamily watching the torchbearers schussing side to side, a gradual, sinuous, drama-less tour downward. “It scares me.”

“You’d get used to it.” Roger unexpectedly reaches across the table to where her hands rest on either side of her uneaten salad. He touches, then pats, one of these hands. “And by the way,” Roger says. “Thanks. I mean it. Thanks a lot.”

Back in the condo all is serene. Esther and the girls are still at the skating rink. Roger has wandered back to The Warming Shed. He has a girlfriend in Port Clinton, a former high-school counselee, now divorced. He will be calling her,
telling her about his new Tennessee plans, adding that he wishes she were here at Snow Mountain Highlands with him and that his family could be in Rwanda. Bobbie, her name is.

A call to Jack is definitely in order. But first Faith decides to slide the newly trimmed rubber-tree plant nearer the window, where there’s an outlet. When she plugs in, most of the little white lights pop cheerily on. Only a few do not, and in the box are replacements. This is progress. Later, tomorrow, they can affix the star on top—her father’s favorite ritual. “Now it’s time for the star,” he’d always say. “The star of the wise men.” Her father had been a musician, a woodwind specialist. A man of talents, and of course a drunk. A specialist also in women who were not his wife. He had taught committedly at a junior college to make all their ends meet. He had wanted Faith to become a lawyer, so naturally she became one. Daisy he had no specific plans for, so naturally she became a drunk and sometime later, an energetic nymphomaniac. Eventually he died, at home. The paterfamilias. After that, but not until, her mother began to put weight on. “Well, there’s my size, of course,” was how she usually expressed it. She took it as a given: increase being the natural consequence of loss.

Whether to call Jack, though, in London or New York. (Nantucket is out, and Jack never keeps his cell phone on except for business hours.) Where is Jack? In London it was after midnight. In New York it was the same as here. Half past eight. And what message to leave? She could just say she was lonely; or that she had chest pains, or worrisome test results. (These would need to clear up mysteriously.)

But London, first. The flat in Sloane Terrace, half a block from the tube. They’d eaten breakfast at the Oriel, then Jack had gone off to work in The City while she did the Tate, the Bacons her specialty. So far from Snow Mountain Highlands—this being her sensation when dialing—a call going a great, great distance.

Ring-jing, ring-jing, ring-jing, ring-jing, ring-jing. Nothing.

There was a second number, for messages only, but she’d forgotten it. Call again to allow for a misdial. Ring-jing, ring-jing, ring-jing …

New York, then. East Fiftieth. Far, far east. The nice, small slice of river view. The bolthole he’d had since college. His freshman numerals framed. 1971. She’d gone to the trouble to have the bedroom redone. White everything. A smiling and tanned picture of herself from the boat, framed in red leather. Another of the two of them together at Cabo, on the beach. All similarly long distances from Snow Mountain Highlands.

Ring, ring, ring, ring. Then click. “Hi, this is Jack.”—she almost says “Hi” back—“I’m not here right now, etc., etc., etc.,” then a beep.

“Merry Christmas, it’s me. Ummmm, Faith.” She’s stuck, but not at all flustered. She could just as well tell him everything. This happened today: the atomic energy smokestacks, the plastic rubber-tree plant, the Pageant of the Lights, the smorgasbord, Eddie from years back, the girls’ planned move to California. All things Christmas-y. “Ummm, I just wanted to say that I’m … fine, and that I trust—make that
hope
—that I
hope
you are too. I’ll be back home—at the beach, that is—after Christmas. I’d love—make that like—to hear from you. I’m in Snow Mountain Highlands. In Michigan.” She pauses, discussing with herself if there was further news worth relating. There isn’t. Then she realizes (too late) she’s treating his voice mail like her dictaphone. There’s no revising. Too bad. Her mistake. “Well, goodbye,” she says, realizing this sounds a bit stiff, but doesn’t revise. With them it’s all over anyway. Who cares? She called.

Out on the Nordic Trail i, lights, soft white ones not unlike the Christmas tree lights in the condo, have been strung in selected fir boughs—bright enough that you’d never get lost in the dark, dim enough not to spoil the mysterious effect.

She does not actually enjoy this kind of skiing either.
Not really. Not with all the tiresome waxing, the stiff rental shoes, the long inconvenient skis, the sweaty underneath, the chance that all this could eventuate in catching cold and missing work. The gym is better. Major heat, then quick you’re clean and back in the car, back in the office. Back on the phone. She is a sport, but definitely not a sports nut. Still, this is not terrifying.

No one accompanies her on nighttime Nordic Trail 1, the Pageant of the Lights having lured away the other skiers. Two Japanese were conversing at the trail head, small beige men in bright chartreuse Lycras—smooth, serious faces, giant thighs, blunt, no-nonsense arms—commencing the rigorous course, “The Beast,” Nordic Trail 3. On their rounded, stocking-capped heads they’d worn tiny lights like coal miners to light their way. They have disappeared immediately.

Here the snow virtually hums to the sound of her sliding strokes. A full moon rides behind filigree clouds as she strides forward in the near-darkness of crusted woods. There is wind she can hear high up in the tallest pines and hemlocks, but at ground level there’s none, just cold radiating off the metallic snow. Only her ears actually feel cold, that and the sweat line of her hair. Her heartbeat barely registers. She is in shape.

For an instant she hears distant music, a singing voice with orchestral accompaniment. She pauses to listen. The music’s pulse travels through the trees. Strange. Possibly it’s Roger, she thinks, between deep breaths; Roger onstage in the karaoke bar, singing his greatest hits to other lonelies in the dark. “Blue Bayou,” “Layla,” “Tommy,” “Try to Remember.” Roger at a safe distance. Her hair, she realizes, is shining in the moonlight. If she were being watched, she would at least look good.

But wouldn’t it be romantic to peer down from these woods through the dark and spy some shining, many-winged lodge lying below, windows ablaze, like an exotic casino from some Paul Muni movie. Graceful skaters adrift on a lighted
rink. A garlanded lift still in stately motion, a few, last alpinists taking their silken, torchless float before lights-out. The great tree shining from the summit.

Except, this is not a particularly pretty part of Michigan. Nothing’s to see—dark trunks, cold dead falls, swags of heavy snow hung in the spruce boughs.

And she is stiffening. Just that fast. New muscles being visited. Best not to go so far.

Daisy, her sister, comes to mind. Daisy, who will soon exit the hospital with a whole new view of life. Inside, there’s of course been the 12-step ritual to accompany the normal curriculum of deprivation and regret. And someone, somewhere, at some time possibly even decades back, will definitely turn out to have touched Daisy in ways inappropriate and detrimental to her well-being, and at an all-too-tender age. And not just once, but many times, over a series of terrible, silent years. The culprit possibly an older, suspicious neighborhood youth—a loner—or a far too avuncular school librarian. Even the paterfamilias will come under posthumous scrutiny (the historical perspective, as always, unprovable and therefore indisputable).

And certain sacrifices of dignity will naturally be requested of everyone then, due to this rich new news from the past: a world so much more lethal than anyone believed, nothing being the way we thought it was; so much hidden from view; if anyone had only known, could’ve spoken out and opened up the lines of communication, could’ve trusted, confided, blah, blah, blah. Their mother will, necessarily, have suspected nothing, but unquestionably should’ve. Perhaps Daisy, herself, will have suggested that Faith is a lesbian. The snowball effect. No one safe, no one innocent.

Up ahead, in the shadows, a mile into the trek, Shelter 1 sits to the right of Nordic Trail 1—a darkened clump in a small clearing, a place to rest and wait for the others to catch up (if there were others). A perfect place to turn back.

Shelter 1 is nothing fancy, a simple rustic school-bus enclosure open on one side and hewn from logs. Out on the
snow lie crusts of dinner rolls, a wedge of pizza, some wadded tissues, three beer cans—treats for the forest creatures—each casting its tiny shadow upon the white surface.

Although seated in the gloomy inside on a plank bench are not school kids, but Roger, the brother-in-law, in his powder-blue ski suit and hiking boots. He is not singing karaoke after all. She noticed no boot tracks up the trail. Roger is more resourceful than at first he seems.

“It’s eff-ing cold up here.” Roger speaks from within the shadows of Shelter 1. He is not wearing his black glasses now, and is barely visible, though she senses he’s smiling—his brown eyes even narrower.

“What are you doing up here, Roger,” Faith asks.

“Oh,” Roger says out of the gloom. “I just thought I’d come up.” He crosses his arms and extends his hiking boots into the snow-light like some species of high-school toughie.

“What for?” Her knees are both knotted and weak from exertion. Her heart has begun thumping. Perspiration is cold on her lip. Temperatures are in the low twenties. In winter the most innocent places turn lethal.

“Nothing ventured,” Roger says. He is mocking her.

“This is where I’m turning around,” Faith ventures. “Would you like to go back down the hill with me?” What she wishes for is more light. Much more light. A bulb in the shelter would be very good. Bad things happen in the dark that would prove unthinkable in the light.

“Life leads you to some pretty interesting places, doesn’t it, Faith?”

She would like to smile and not feel menaced by Roger, who should be with his daughters.

“I guess,” she says. She can smell alcohol in the dry air. He is drunk and is winging all of this. A bad concurrence.

“You’re very pretty.
Very
pretty. The big lawyer,” Roger says. “Why don’t you come in here?”

“Oh, no thank you,” Faith says. Roger is loathsome, but he is also family, and she feels paralyzed by not knowing what to do—a most unusual situation. She wishes to be more agile
on her skis, to leap upward and discover herself turned around and already gliding away.

“I always thought that in the right situation, we could have some big-time fun,” Roger goes on.

“Roger, this isn’t a good thing to be doing,” whatever he’s doing. She wants to glare at him, then understands her knees are quivering. She feels very, very tall on her skis, unusually accessible.

“It
is
a good thing to be doing,” Roger says. “It’s what I came up here for. Some fun.”

“I don’t want us to do anything up here, Roger,” Faith says. “Is that all right?” This, she realizes, is what fear feels like—the way you’d feel in a late-night parking structure, or jogging alone in an isolated factory area, or entering your house in the wee hours, fumbling for your key. Accessible. And then, suddenly, there would be someone. Bingo. A man with oppressively ordinary looks who lacks a plan.

“Nope, nope. That’s absolutely not all right.” Roger stands up but stays in the sheltered darkness. “The lawyer,” he says again, still grinning.

“I’m just going to turn around,” Faith says, and very unsteadily begins to move her long left ski up out of its track, and then, leaning on her poles, her right ski up and out of its track. It is dizzying, and her calves ache, and it is complicated not to cross her ski tips. But it is essential to remain standing. To fall would mean surrender. What is the skiing expression? Tele … Tele-something. She wishes she could tele-something. Tele-something the hell away from here. Her thighs burn. In California, she thinks, she is an officer of the court. A public official, sworn to uphold the law—though not to enforce it. She is a force for good.

“You look stupid standing there,” Roger says stupidly.

She intends to say nothing more. There is nothing really to say. Talk is not cheap now, and she is concentrating very hard. For a moment she thinks she hears music again, music far away. It can’t be.

“When you get all the way around,” Roger says, “then I want to show you something.” He does not say what. In her
mind—moving her skis inches at a time, her ankles heavy— in her mind she says “Then what?” but doesn’t say that.

“I really hate your eff-ing family,” Roger says. His boots go crunch on the snow. She glances over her shoulder, but to look at him is too much. He is approaching. She will fall and then dramatic, regrettable things will happen. In a gesture he possibly deems dramatic, Roger—though she cannot see it—unzips his blue snowsuit front. He intends her to hear this noise. She is three quarters turned around. She could see him over her left shoulder if she chose to. Have a look, see what all the excitement’s about. She is sweating. Underneath she is drenched.

“Yep, life leads you to some pretty interesting situations.” He is repeating himself. There is another zipping noise. This is big-time fun in Roger’s worldview.

“Yes,” she says, “it does.” She has come almost fully around now.

She hears Roger laugh a little chuckle, an un-humorous “hunh.” Then he says, “Almost.” She hears his boots squeeze. She feels his actual self close beside her. This undoubtedly will help to underscore how much he hates her family.

Then there are voices—saving voices—behind her. She cannot help looking over her left shoulder now and up the trail where it climbs into the dark trees. There is a light, followed by another light, like stars coming down from on high. Voices, words, language she doesn’t quite understand. Japanese. She does not look at Roger, but simply slides one ski, her left one, forward into its track, lets her right one follow and find its way, pushes on her poles. And in just that small allotment of time and with that amount of effort she is away. She thinks she hears Roger say something, another “hunh,” a kind of grunting sound, but she can’t be sure.