Cancel All Our Vows (18 page)

Fletcher still couldn’t figure out how she was going to react when they were alone. She seemed to be wearing her company manners. He looked over at the table and thought Martha was looking at Jane a bit oddly. Probably getting catty ideas about Jane out swimming in the moonlight with this boy, he thought.

“What are the plans, Jane? Do we wake up the kids and head for home?”

“Now, Fletcher Wyant, you let those children sleep,” Dolly ordered. “They’re no trouble at all, and Hud and Martha will return them safely tomorrow, you hear?”

Jane said, “I … I guess that will be all right, Fletch. It’s awfully nice of you, Dolly.”

“Nonsense! Martha, are you going to take a card, or are you going to sit there like a bump on a log? Make yourself a drink, Fletch.”

“It’s pretty late. I think we ought to head back. You better change, Jane.”

“All right. My play suit is still out on the line, I guess.” She went off quickly.

The card game continued. Fletcher stood and chatted
with Sam Rice. “Didn’t you get an All-American mention last fall, Sam?”

“Just one little one. The competition was rough.”

“I thought I heard the name before.”

“I’m up here with Steve Lincoln. He made most of the lists.”

“Oh sure! Defensive guard. Is he around?”

“No, he went up to the dance with Dick and Dick’s girl. I was going to go, but I thought I’d rather stay and swim with your wife.”

“Glad you did. She doesn’t like cards, and Hank doesn’t sound like he’d be much company tonight. I’m grateful to you for keeping Jane entertained, Sam.”

“It was a pleasure, sir. She’s a lot of fun.”

Jane came back into the room with her beach bag in her hand. She wore the white play suit and her sandals.

Dolly said, “Say, you’ll be cold riding in that skimpy thing. I’ll get you something to put on.” She started to get up.

“No, really, Dolly. I’ll be all right. We have a robe in the back end I can put around my shoulders if I get cold. And thanks for taking the kids. And thank you, Martha, for driving me up. See you tomorrow, hey? Why don’t you and Hank come down, Dolly?”

“I couldn’t drag Hank away from here on a Sunday. And somebody always shows up. Thanks anyway, dear.”

Fletch shook hands with Sam and, as he was saying good night to the women, he heard Jane say, “And thank you, Sam. I hope … we’ll see you again sometime.”

“I hope so too, Jane. Good night.”

Dolly was melding furiously as they walked out, and Sam was moving a chair over by the table. They let themselves out the back door and got into the car. Fletch backed it around in a quarter circle and then headed up the narrow drive in low. She sat far over on her side of the seat and she did not speak. He did not say anything until he turned out onto the paved road, headed south.

“Jane, I guess I was a plain damn fool today.”

“Yes?”

“I didn’t have to go to the office. I just woke up grouchy. I snapped at the kids and snapped at you, and I’m sorry.
Then I was just too damn stubborn to drive up here after I got your note.”

“What did you do?”

“This sounds silly. I went to the Downtown Club. It was dead. I had lunch there, a late lunch, and then had a drink, and had another drink in a dive, and went to an air-conditioned movie. I was pooped from not sleeping last night So I fell asleep in the movie and slept in that damn tight little seat for about six hours. I’ve never done anything like that before in my life. The usher woke me up. He thought I was sick or dead.”

“You … you were
asleep
 … in a
movie?
”

“Yes, dammit,” he said miserably, yet feeling the pleasant release of confession.

She made no sound. He glanced over at her, but he could not see her face. Suddenly she made a small strangled sound, and another. And she began to laugh, gaspingly. He laughed with her and then stopped as he became aware that she had become hysterical.

“Jane!” he said sharply. “Jane! Cut it out!”

She got worse. He swung onto the shoulder and stopped the car and set the brake. He took her shoulders and she was limp and helpless, making the great raw sounds of tears and laughter. He shook her hard and she did not stop. He held her and, measuring carefully, slapped her hard. The sound stopped abruptly. She lay forward, her head on her knees, crying softly.

“What in the world did that?” he demanded.

“I … don’t know.”

“Lord, I haven’t seen you like that in years. What happened back there today, anyway?”

“Nothing, Fletch. Nothing at all. It’s just … I was miserable. And imagining you doing … all sorts of things. But … asleep in a movie!” She made another harsh sound.

“Watch it! Don’t get going again.”

“I’m … going to be all right now.”

“Shall I start the car?”

“Please.” She opened the glove compartment, dug around for Kleenex. She blew her nose lustily.

“You got pretty emotional about all this,” he said stiffly.

“It always upsets me when we have a … misunderstanding. You know that.”

“Not this much, honey.”

“Oh, I guess it was the heat and all, and working too hard yesterday, and that gruesome evening last night. This sort of … topped it all off.”

“But the hollering hysterics. That rattled me. I thought you’d had a fight or something back there. All I could think of was that Hank had gotten out of line or something.”

“No. He wasn’t any more sneaky than usual. I guess that … the time of the month has something to do with it.”

“Oh.”

She blew her nose again. She moved over close to him, almost shyly, it seemed to him. He reached down and patted her bare knee. “We’re okay now?” he asked.

“Sure, darling, Everything is fine.”

“You’re not sore?”

“No, darling. Not the least bit.”

“I think you mean that,” he said wonderingly.

“Am I usually so nasty about something like this?”

“No … but …”

“Hush then,” she said.

The miles went by, the warm night flowing by the car windows and the city pink on the sky ahead.

“That Rice boy seems like a pleasant sort.”

“I suppose he’s all right.”

“Didn’t you like him?”

“Yes, I guess so. But he is … a boy. A sort of a mixed-up boy, I guess.”

“In what way?”

“Oh, we were talking on the dock this afternoon. He doesn’t know what he wants to do with his life. You know what I mean. Sort of restless and discontented. I guess he’ll settle down someday.”

“Nearly everybody does. It isn’t such a bad fate, is it, darling?”

“No.”

As he turned into their street she said suddenly, surprisingly, after a long silence, “I love you, you know. I love you very much, Fletch.”

“Well! What brought that on?”

Her laugh sounded a bit nervous. “A statement of fact, I guess. It just seemed like a good time to say it, that’s all.”

“I give you a bad time, and still you say that out of a clear sky. Lady, your deep and sincere emotion is reciprocated in toto.”

As he undressed, he was puzzled about her. She was acting quite strange. He tried to relate it back to something that could have happened at the lake, but that didn’t make much sense. He guessed that it was due to the quarrel the night before. Things had gone bad too quickly after a quarrel. And then, as she said, the moon was also involved. A funny kid sometimes. Think you have her cased, and she comes up with a brand-new reaction. What did the man say? Infinite variety. He was about right. Damn hot in this bedroom. Open more windows. In spite of that sleep, I’m still bushed. And she looks weary. Too weary, maybe. And yet I want her. In a funny way. As though she was a stranger, almost. A stranger I saw walking into the Dimbrough’s camp in that skimpy suit, and that tall kid behind her, with the pair of them looking darn near the same age.

He was in bed first and she came in the darkness and sat shyly on the edge of his bed, half facing him. He took her hand and felt her tremble. For some zany reason she seemed to be acting shy as a bride. Her shyness made him more gentle with her than usual. He was gentle with her and it took her much longer than usual to achieve her fulfillment, and when it happened, it was a shy and gentle fury with her. Then she wept almost silently and he did not know why, and did not want to ask. He held her close and kissed her salt eyes and murmured to her, comforting sounds with few words. He held her until she slept, and after she was asleep she sobbed twice more and once seemed to strike out with her hand. As he did not want to disturb her he stood up slowly, spread the light sheet over her, walked around and got into her bed. She had been as
passive and humbly eager as in the very first months of their marriage. He lay in the darkness wondering about it, wondering about her. And he felt sleep coming for him, coming like a warm tide that started at his toes. He welcomed it and knew, from his feeling of utter relaxation, that the sleep would be good, and deep, and healing.

Chapter Eleven

Jane’s sleep was so deep that when she slowly came awake on Sunday morning it was with an odd disoriented feeling. The sun was bright and even before she looked at the clock, she knew from the slant of the sun that it was midmorning. Sunday morning, she realized. And suddenly she thought of all the things she had to do.

She swung her legs out of the bed and sat up, suddenly feeling the muscle soreness in her shoulders from holding the tow rope behind the fast boat. The memory of the lake, and of the night, flooded into her mind, the very impact of it making her gasp. She sat on the edge of the bed, shocked, startled, almost terrified. Last night she had been possessed by a man not her husband. It had happened almost without warning. It was something that had never been going to happen to her. Never.

She put her hands hard against her eyes and relived that shocking moment, that sharp and unbelievable moment of bitter realization that it had happened, that he had incredibly taken from her both the will and the ability to resist. As though, in that sense, the act of union was all of the act itself, a deed accomplished, and the remaining time while she had lain flaccid under his possession had been merely a further affirmation of the conquest he had expressed in that first deep linking.

She took a deep, shuddering breath and then turned slowly, timidly, to look at Fletcher in her bed, more than half certain that he would be staring back at her, his eyes full of hate and knowing contempt.

But his back was to her and she saw the slow lift of his breathing. She remembered last night. Remembered her terror as Fletch had possessed her, a fear that somehow he
would know. That he would sense the use to which her body had been put, that he would detect some alien motion, some vile residue. And she remembered how his tenderness had made her cry, and how he had held her and kissed her eyes and how terribly close she had come in that moment to telling him. She knew that if he had asked her why she was crying, she would have told him. She would have been unable to stop her own lips. But by some merciful chance he had not asked. She stood up, feeling old and somber and soiled. Her body felt worn and heavy. She went into the bathroom and began her morning routines, finding in their homely necessity the satisfactions and faint forgetfulness of habit. She showered and, standing in the hot water, remembering, she scrubbed her body with dedicated fury.

When she came out of the bathroom Fletch was sitting up in bed, yawning mightily. He scratched his chest and gave her a sleepy grin. “God, if I’d slept like this Friday night, we’d have had no trouble.”

“A good sleep? I’m glad.”

“You look lush and lovely this morning. Either put on some clothes or come back to bed.”

“Don’t brag, dear,” she said primly, taking comfort in her traditional response. She dug out a blue denim halter and shorts, put them on and tied her hair with a scrap of matching blue ribbon. Fletch was shuffling into the bathroom as she left for the kitchen.

Her kitchen was shiny and new and spotless and comforting. She startled herself by humming above the metallic drone of the squeezer as she held the orange halves against it. She was both pleased that she could hum, and guilty about it. Was it going to mean that little, after all? Perhaps that was the best way. It happened to some other woman. To a stranger there in the deep shadow. Yet she could remember the rubbery smell of the yellow raft, the feeling of the cool glass in her hand.

Forget it, Jane. Put it out of your silly head. It happened to me but it was like … like getting run over. Or drowning. It happened so it happened and there’s no harm done, so skip it. Maybe it did some good. Maybe it taught
you that it mustn’t ever happen again. Did it happen because I had some tiny rotten place in me? A sort of curiosity? After all, there never had been anyone else. And you wonder, sometimes. Not seriously. Just idly. Now I know. It’s no good. It’s a snare and a delusion. It makes you feel dirty. It’s … an invasion of privacy.

The coffee began to make a good smell. When she heard the shower stop she put butter in the frying pan and got the eggs out of the refrigerator. She thought of how she had looked in the mirror. Just the same. Like Sam said. It doesn’t show. You don’t have to tell.