Cloud Nine (16 page)

“
You?
Told him to
meet
you there?”

“That’s right. Now you know.”

“He called you, he...”

“No, no! I called him!”

“You?
Called
him?
At his home? And...”

“Well you seem to know all about it.”

“Sonya! I’m asking you!”

“At his office I called him, of course.”

“What did you call him about?”

“To ’gradulate him, on his marriage. It was the least I could do, I thought. After all we had been friends.”

“And, he raped you—a real friendly thing.”

“I try not to think about that.”

“I do too, unsuccessfully.”

“You needn’t make cracks, Gramie.”

“Couldn’t you
’gradulate
him over the phone?”

“Yes, of course. I did.”

“Then why the grass sandwich out in the park?”

“That was his idea. He said come up to his office, he wanted to see me. But I said meet me outside.”

“What did he want of you?”

“Screw me, was all.”

“I told you to refrain from using that word!”

“Well you asked what he wanted of me!”

“And what did you tell him?”

“Told him no, for the reason he already knew, as I’d told him that day at the house. So he said I should reconsider, as he didn’t stink any more. He said he’d used that lotion, the one that’s advertised, which he realizes now is no good, but he went for the girl in the ads. So I said after what I’d said, I owed him to give it a sniff, but I’d do it out in the park, on account if I had to throw up I could do it on the grass. So he said okay, and that’s why we were there.”

“And how
did
he smell, if I may ask?”

“Not good, but better. Enough, anyway, that I had to ’pologize for those various things I had said.”

“Did he
’pologize
for raping you?”

“That subject didn’t come up.”

“...Or did he?”

“Did he? Did he? Did he what?”

“Rape you?”

“I thought I told you he did.”

“You did, and now I’m telling you, it’s not true, what you’ve said—or if it is, it’s not the whole truth, or even a fractional part of it. Sonya, on TV one night, in connection with White House stuff, I heard a guy say: ‘The truth bears its own thumbprint, right in the middle of its forehead—and so does a lie, except bigger, from having a bigger thumb.’ It’s all a lie, what you’ve said, so maybe the other was too. Maybe it wasn’t rape, maybe you weren’t held by two kind friends of his. Who were they, anyway? Do you realize you’ve never said? And why didn’t you tell your mother, until you got knocked up? Then, and then only, did you remember you were raped.

“You know what it reminds me of? Of Lincoln’s story, of the man he was defending, as a lawyer, in Illinois, from a woman’s charge that he raped her. She took the stand and he asked her: ‘Madame, if it is true, as you say, that this defendant raped you on Tuesday afternoon, how come you didn’t tell your husband till Friday night? ‘Well I just didn’t recollect,’ she answered—and that’s how it was with you!”

I could have said more, but didn’t, and went back to my chair, where I slumped down, with no more steam in my boiler. She came over, knelt beside me, moistened her thumb, pressed it against her brow, and said: “I was raped—now what does the print say?”

“You were raped.”

“Yes.”

“Now rub again, for today.”

She stared, then got up again, without rubbing, and went back to her place on the sofa. “Okay, it was the truth, every word, but not the whole truth, of course, so it was really a lie, with an extra big thumb. Gramie, what I left out was why. And that I’m not going to tell you. I told you before, our cloud went
pop,
soon as Miss Jane came back, so I know what I have to do, get out. And I’m going to. I said I wouldn’t be inny pest, and I won’t be, that I promise you. But I have something to do first, something that has to be done, and be done by me, as I was the cause of it all—and because I’m the one and the only one that can do it. So my time hasn’t quite come. But until it comes, can I ask that you give me some peace? That you quit bugging me? I’m not going to lay up with Burl—maybe he thinks I am, but Burl can make a mistake. But I am going to use him, I hope, for what I must do,
what I must!

“What I hafta!”

She almost screamed it, being suddenly all wrought up. I went over, sat down beside her, and took her in my arms. I whispered: “Fine, anything you say. But why do you have to go?”

“Because I love you is why.”

I
REPORTED TO MOTHER
next day, driving over there as soon as I’d checked in at the office. She listened and said: “Well I wouldn’t know what to tell you—Sonya is smart, and I would swear she’s decent, so she’s not playing Burl’s game, that we can be sure of. As to what game she
is
playing, I don’t know how you find out, unless you hire a private detective, but not even he can tell you why, which is what you want to know.”

We just sat for some time, and then she went on: “I can understand your upset, and I promise you, I’m on tension too. I haven’t mentioned it to you, but Pat Moran called up, offering a piece of a deal he’s putting together, a million-dollar apartment here in Riverdale—he’s picked up five lots, three of them vacant, two with small houses on them, so on land he’s okay. And as he means to build a garage behind his main building, no parking problem’s involved,
and
as the apartments are going to be small, not suited to families with children, there’ll be no strain on the school.

“Or in other words, it’s a good, solid project that nobody should object to. Just the same, it calls for zoning reclassification, from Residential B to A—which is why he offered me in, as he counts on me to swing it. Well, I probably could. I’ve kept my connections up, and made a few new ones lately. But, until this thing is out of the way, I have no appetite for it. Politics is partly deals—like this one—but it’s also partly combat. If you don’t like a fight, stay out. I don’t mind one, as a rule. But, with this thing hanging fire, I’m just a bundle of jitters. I can’t forget what she said, about what’s waiting for Jane—I feel as though a time-bomb were ticking somewhere. I told Pat include me out. I had to.”

Some days went by, and then one night I went home, to have the door opened for me by Sonya, all dressed up in the same blue dress she’d had on the first day in the parking lot, and the little black hat, a tiny shell made of straw, on the order of a skull cap. I kissed her, followed her into the living room, looked her over and asked: “Well? We going out? Or what?”

“Why... I am. Yes.”

“And I’m not?”

By that time, I had sat down on one of the sofas, and she sat opposite, across the table, on the other. She didn’t answer at once, but then: “Gramie, my time has come.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I said I was going, didn’t I? Well, now I am.”

“But nobody’s asked you to go.”

“Listen, what’s the good of staying? We’ve been all over that, over and over and over. No marriage can stand the strain when the wife comes between the guy and his dream, the guy and his million bucks. So, I’m shoving off, like I promised.

“But I thought it might be nice if we had a last dinner together, that we both could look back on and kind of keep in our hearts. So I got us a Beltsville turkey, and made hominy, rutabaga, and cranberry sauce to go with it—oh, and that Graves white wine that you like—it’s all timed for seven-thirty, when it’ll be getting dark and we can eat by candlelight. And talk about how nice things were when we were up on our cloud.”

“Which is still up there, incidentally.”

“No, it’s not.”

“It is, if you’d get on it, and...”

“Without the dream, it couldn’t be, and isn’t.”

I went over, took her in my arms, and tried to carry her upstairs, but she wrestled me off, and I quit—but not till I noticed how soft she was, and warm, and part of me, somehow. She said, “Gramie, don’t make it harder for me than it is. I don’t want to go, God knows. I
have
to, that’s all. So will you listen to me? What I’ve done today? So you can take up from where I left off and get the benefit?”

“What have you done today?”

“I broke up that marriage, Gramie.”

“You mean Jane’s? With Burl?”

“That’s right.”

“Then how did you break it up?”

“Does it matter? I did, that’s all. It’s what I’ve been hanging around for, what I had to do. Well? It’s done, and there’s no need to talk about it.”

“There
is
need to talk.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re keeping stuff back, stuff I have to know about.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Sonya, what is this? What have you been up to?”

“I will not talk about it.”

She went out to the kitchen and came back with the cocktail tray, making the martini at the side table. She chunked the ice with her pick, rubbed the glasses with lemon peel, put an olive with a toothpick in each, measured gin and vermouth with her eye. Then she dropped the ice in and stirred, till the pitcher began to smoke up. Then she poured and put my glass in front of me. I was still on her side of the table, and she sat down beside me. “I don’t like it, but this once I’ll drink with you, because it’s our last night.”

I raised my glass. “To us, then” I said.

“To us on our cloud when we had one.”

We sipped and I sat there looking at her, thinking how pretty she was. She asked, “Can I go on?”

“If you insist, I can’t stop you.”

“First, about her, Mrs. Sibert—well, I keep calling her that, but she’s really Mrs. Stuart, from being married to Burl. But, she’s kicking him out—I imagine she already has. So, soon as I blow, get over there. Drive to her house, stretch her out on the floor, and give her what she wants from you—which was
her
dream all along, not this crazy thing with Burl. Then you’ll get back
your
dream, and of course the million bucks. Be gentle with her, she’ll cooperate.”

“What else?”

“I’m taking the car you gave me.”

“What else?”

“I’m keeping the thousand dollars that you put to my account, as I’m going to need it to live on, while I’m getting started again—I can get a job as a waitress, I’m pretty sure of that—but I don’t want to feel afraid, or go home with my tail between my legs. So, I’m keeping that thousand, and some more I have too, that I
imbizzled
since we got married, from the household money you gave me. That’s another thing I want to thank you for, how nice you treated me, giving me more than I needed—Gramie, you’re one hell of a nice guy.”

“Then what are you leaving me for?”

“I said. It’s not a what, it’s a who. Mrs. Sibert.”

“What else?”

“Did you hear me? I
imbizzled
four hundred dollars.”

“Sonya, I love you.”

“Well? I love you. It’s why I’m leaving.”

“How about one last trip on our cloud?”

“If I took it I couldn’t go.”

“That’s the whole idea.”

“No, Gramie! I must go! I hafta.”

It was getting dark, and she took the tray to the kitchen, along with both our glasses. Then she tinkled her bell and called, and I went back to the dining room. The table was beautifully set, with roses as a centerpiece, arranged flat in a glass dish, a candle on each side, and tomato salad waiting, ready to eat. When we’d finished it she took the plates and brought in the turkey, a cute little one, perfectly cooked. Then she brought the hominy and rutabaga and cranberry sauce, and I did the carving.

She served me my giblet sauce, correcting me when I called it giblet gravy. She said: “It’s sauce, not gravy—I made it as it says in
Joy of Cooking.
It’s more digestible than gravy, and tastes better.” Then she poured the wine. Graves is a wine I like, a Bordeaux white, fairly dry, with a trace of sweet—but what I liked most about it was that she liked it too.

For dessert she served ice cream bricks with brandied cherries. Then for the grand finale, she served
coffee diable,
lighting it, and blowing the candles out. In the blue flame she looked like a girl from some kind of dream world, and I wanted to cry. “What’s the matter?” she asked.

“I love you.”

“Then, we love each other.”

I went in the living room, where in a few minutes she joined me, carrying her handbag and little spring coat. I must have had a look on my face as she dropped them on a chair, and said, “Well? My other things, my bags and stuff, are all packed and in the car.” She sat beside me on my sofa, giving me all sorts of directions about the turkey, the hominy and how to cook it, or warm it up, or whatever I was supposed to do with it, and I guess I listened, though I haven’t the faintest idea what she said. Then she stopped and pulled my arm around her and started inhaling me. “If only you didn’t smell so nice,” she whispered. “Now kiss me. Kiss me good-bye.”

I kissed her. I held her close, so close I meant never to let her loose. She didn’t seem to mind, but kissed back, so our lips were glued. That’s when the doorbell rang. “Oh for Christ’s sake!” I growled.

“You better see who it is.”

“To hell with them—let them go away.”

“Want me to go, Gramie?”

“I’ll do it.”

I went to the door. Jane Sibert was there.

I
F THERE WAS ANYONE
I wanted to see just then, I can’t think now who it was, but if there was one person on earth I certainly did not want to see, it had to be her. And apparently, she felt the same about me. She had on a spring coat, much like Sonya’s, and a white dress that went nice with her soft blue hair, but her eyes were hard, and looked away as soon as she saw me. She said: “Good evening, Gramie, I hope you’ve been well. I’m calling on Mrs. Kirby, if she’s at home.”

I asked her in and said I’d see, but almost at once Sonya was there, with a bright, chirpy greeting. “Why Miss Jane,” she sang out, “what a nice
co-instance.
I was fixing to go see you, to drive out to your place, later on in the evening. And so you saved me the trouble. Why don’t we go in and sit down.” Sonya led the way to the living room, sat Jane down on a sofa, took the other one herself, and waited till I camped on a chair, before asking: “What brings you, Miss Jane? What can I do for you?”