Earth and High Heaven (7 page)

She watched her father relighting his pipe and said finally, “If you want to play the heavy father and start telling me whom I'm to know and whom I'm not to know, there's nothing I can do to stop you, at least so far as the people I invite to your house are concerned — presumably whom I see outside your house is my own business.” She paused and remarked, “You're starting a bit late, of course,” and went on, “however, if you don't pay any more attention to my opinions than you did to Tony's and Miriam's, then you're likely to end up in the same relationship with me as with them ...”

“It's up to you, Eric.”

She said incredulously, “When I ask you particularly to be nice to someone and your answer to that is to refuse even to show him the most ordinary courtesy, how on earth can you say that what happens to us after that is
my
responsibility?”

There was no response, her father did not appear to be listening. After a lifetime of making mountains out of molehills, this time, for some inexplicable reason, he was evidently determined to make a molehill out of a mountain, or determined to try, at any rate. Nothing she had said so far had had any effect; for all she had accomplished, she might just as well have done what he had suggested when she had first told him that she wanted to talk to him, and gone straight to bed.

She sat down in the chair by the radio, regarded her father curiously for a while longer and then asked, “What's back of all this, Charles?”

“I've already explained it once.”

“You've only given me half the explanation. The other half is still missing.” Strong as they were, she knew that her father's anti-Jewish prejudices and his even more pronounced anti-Jewish lawyer prejudices were still not strong enough to stand alone when they came into conflict with his innate kindness and sense of chivalry. He would blast away at nations, classes, groups, or categories of human beings, but to individuals he was unfailingly considerate, regardless of their category, or always had been, until this afternoon. He had objected violently and at length to a convent-bred French Canadian daughter-in-law, but the moment Anthony had stopped shouting and let all the misery inside him come out, his father's opposition had collapsed. It had collapsed too late to get Tony back, but once rid of the generalization and confronted with the individual, Charles had been so consistently good to Madeleine that, of all the Drakes and outside of Tony himself, Charles was the one Madeleine was fondest of. It was rather unfair, when you came to think of it, for whatever Margaret Drake's opinions had been on the subject, her sense of justice and her determination to respect her children's right to make their own decisions had kept her from expressing them, and now, after she had done her best from the beginning and her husband had done his worst as long as he could, it was her husband who was Madeleine's favourite. As Margaret Drake had once observed ruefully to Erica, Madeleine's devotion to her father-in-law was just another example of Charles Drake's extraordinary talent for having his cake and eating it. People with charm can get away with a lot.

“Do you want a drink?”

“Yes, please.”

Her father poured some whisky into a glass and asked, “How much soda?”

“Two thirds of the way up.”

He got to his feet and gave her the glass, then began to walk up and down the room, from the flat-topped desk at the one end to the row of bookcases at the other, with his hands in the pockets of his dark blue dressing gown.

As he passed her for the third time, Erica, still searching for the missing half of the explanation, remarked idly, “Of course you knew how much I liked Marc,” because in some way or other, her father always knew these things, just as he always knew when someone was lying, and when a member of his immediate family was in serious trouble. His disconcertingly well-developed intuitive processes seemed to be unaffected by the distance between himself and the person concerned; three years before, he had been in New York on a business trip and his wife had been hurt in a motor accident in Montreal, and within half an hour of the accident, Charles Drake had been on the long distance phone, asking in alarm what had happened to her. One night during the Blitz he had had a “feeling” that something was wrong with Miriam in London and had suddenly taken it into his head to cable her: “ARE YOU ALL RIGHT?” The cable had reached her in the hospital to which she had been taken a few hours before, with a piece of shrapnel embedded in her left shoulder and another one in her thigh.

In 1937, Erica remembered, Miriam had written her mother from Switzerland, mentioning, among other things, that she had met a young Englishman named Peter Kingsley, who was a very good skier, and had a job in a London publishing house and had spent the evening defending British policy in India. “Huh,” was Charles' comment. He took an unusual interest in Peter Kingsley from then on, and when Miriam married him two and a half months later, her father was the only person who was not surprised. And four years later, Charles had got the wind up on the strength of nothing whatever but a casual announcement from his son that he, Anthony, had met a girl named Madeleine de Sevigny, at a party the night before, and that he was taking her out to dinner on Thursday.

“Catholic?” asked Charles.

“I suppose so,” said Anthony.

“French Canadian?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Huh,” her father had said for the second time, and then the fireworks had started.

If all he had needed in Miriam's case was a letter containing four facts about one Peter Kingsley, and all he had needed in Anthony's case was a casual statement followed by two facts about Madeleine, then, in telling him about Marc and in saying so desperately, “I like him, I want you to like him,” she had certainly provided her father with more than enough to go on.

As he passed her again on his way down the study toward the flat-topped desk, she began, “You know, Charles, you really owe it to the advancement of science to go down to Duke University and offer yourself as a subject for their experiments in extrasensory perception ...” and came to an abrupt stop.

She had stumbled on the missing half of the explanation. It was precisely because her father had known how much she had liked Marc that he had refused to speak to him. Charles Drake was simply not going to have his favourite daughter, who was also, in some respects, his favourite human being, getting mixed up with a Jewish lawyer.

“Well, I'll be damned,” said Erica, viewing her father with amazement. “Of all the nerve ...”

“What are you talking about?”

“You and your little performance this afternoon. Really, Charles ...” she said, exasperated, and then as the funny side of it struck her, she began to laugh.

Her father sat down in the corner chair again and finally he said, “Do you mind telling me what in hell you're laughing at?”

“I'm laughing at you. You don't seem to realize that other people just don't behave the way you do. Incidentally,” she said, looking at him with interest, “did you say ‘Huh' to yourself when I told you about Marc?”

“I don't know what you're talking about!”

“Never mind, it doesn't matter.”

“Now what?” he asked a moment later as the amusement died out on her face.

“I just remembered Marc.” It wasn't so funny after all. She sat with her head against the back of the chair and her hands on the arms, looking straight ahead of her, remarking idly after a pause, “It seems to me you're being a little previous this time. Besides, your system doesn't make any sense. It's illogical ...”

“Why?”

“Because if something weren't going to happen, you wouldn't have a premonition about it, so since it is inevitable, what's the use of going to all this trouble to try and stop it? I'm just being academic, by the way,” she added, “because judging from the look on his face when he left, Marc Reiser has been stopped quite effectively.”

He said impatiently, “It's not the event or whatever you call it that I can see coming — that's pure fatalism. It's just that if you know how people feel, or rather how strongly they feel it, then you can tell whether or not their feelings are likely to lead to a particular course of action ...”

“That doesn't apply in either Miriam's or Tony's case,” Erica interrupted. “You went off the deep end about Madeleine when Tony hardly knew her and didn't ‘feel' anything in particular about her ...”

“I was right, wasn't I?”

“I suppose so.”

“As for this afternoon,” her father went on, “it was perfectly obvious that Reiser had made a great impression on you. Probably you'd impressed him just as much — it usually works both ways. Anyhow, it seemed to me that it was better for everybody all round to make things quite clear at the very beginning, than to let an impossible situation develop and then have to clear it up later ...”

“Yes,” said Erica. “What you mean is that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure ...”

“Of course,” he said, obviously relieved that she had finally come to see it that way.

“... and since you've always done exactly what you like, it hasn't even occurred to you to wonder whether it's up to you to prevent it or not.” She paused, surveying him, and finally added, “As I remarked a few minutes ago, Charles, you really have a lot of nerve.”

III

For three weeks nothing happened. Erica's one contact with Marc Reiser was through René de Sevigny, and the day after the cocktail party, René had gone to Quebec City. His secretary told Erica that she did not know when he would be back, except that it would not be until toward the end of the month. Erica could not get Marc out of her mind, she even tried to persuade her father to write him a note of apology, a suggestion which Charles Drake considered preposterous, and when that failed, she made several unsuccessful attempts to write him herself, but there was no way of either explaining or apologizing for her father's behaviour, and all she could say on her own behalf was that she was sorry, which was hardly enough under the circumstances. There was nothing to do but wait until René came back, and go on hoping that she would run into Marc somewhere by accident. His office was not far from hers, and Erica fell into the habit of looking for him, scanning faces in restaurants and theatres and glancing at everyone who passed her in the street, without even realizing that she was doing it.

On the last Friday in June, Charles and Margaret Drake went away for the weekend, and on Saturday morning Erica's younger sister Miriam telegraphed to say that she was arriving on the train from Quebec City at three o'clock that afternoon. Two months before she had written that she would be sailing “soon” but they had not expected her for at least another week.

The telegram was phoned to the Drakes' house and taken by Mary, the cook, who in turn phoned Erica at her office. Erica had no way of reaching her parents; their fishing cabin was in back of Lachute, separated by five miles of rivers, lakes, and mountains from the nearest village. Letters and telegrams delivered to the village simply stayed there until called for which, in her parents' case, would not be until tomorrow night when they would be on their way home anyhow.

Erica said into the phone, “You'd better make up Miss Miriam's room, Mary ...”

“Yes, Miss Drake. Will you be asking anyone to dinner tonight?”

“No, I don't think so.”

She put down the phone and sat looking at the litter on her desk for a moment, wondering whether Miriam had changed much and whether it would be easy or difficult to get to know her again. Miriam had never been very easy to know, and it was three years since Erica had last seen her, the summer war broke out, when they had had two weeks together in Paris.

There were four other people in Erica's office beside herself — two reporters who had no business to be there, sitting on the bench by the door, one of whom was asleep with his hat on, and his hands folded across his stomach, and the other yawning over the war news; Erica's assistant, Sylvia Arnold, a slim, dark-haired girl with grey eyes, a sense of humor and a clear, balanced intelligence, and finally, a very tall, bony youth of about sixteen whose name was Weathersby Canning, one of the Westmount, stockbroking Cannings, who was usually known as Bubbles. He was a combination copy and messenger boy who was permitted to write up the less important weddings.

Dismissing the subject of Miriam for the time being, Erica read over the page she had just written, which was headed “Sugarless Recipes,” and remarked, “For someone who can't cook, this really sounds extraordinarily convincing,” then pulled it out of her typewriter and threw it into the cage attached to the side of her desk.

“Who was Wing Commander Howard's wife before she married him last Saturday?” asked Sylvia.

“Margaret Denham,” said Weathersby.

“Bubbles knows everything,” said Erica.

“For the love of Mike, will you stop calling me ‘Bubbles'?”

“Why, what's the matter with it?” asked the reporter who was reading the war news.

“It hasn't any dignity.”

“I can't possibly call you Weathersby,” Erica pointed out, running a fresh sheet into her typewriter. “It has too much dignity.”

“Call him Butch,” advised the reporter.

“Butch Canning,” repeated Weathersby. “Say, that's not bad. How do you spell ‘
mousseline de soie
'?” he asked, and then as nobody answered and his phone rang, he said, “Social Department, Butch Canning speaking ...” then to Erica, “Mrs. Wallace Anderson, Mrs. Wallace P. Anderson wants someone from here to cover the A.S.A. meeting this afternoon ...”

“I can't,” said Erica. “My sister's arriving from England. What have you got on for this afternoon?” she asked Sylvia.

“One tea, one art exhibit, and one speech,” said Sylvia without looking up from her typewriter.

“Can't you cut the speech?”

Sylvia shook her head. “Some American newspaper woman who's just back from Chungking.”

“How about the art exhibit ...?” She thought a moment and said, “Butch can go.”

“I hate art,” said Weathersby intensely. “Besides, who's going to answer the phone?”

“You don't have to look at the pictures,” said Erica. “And switchboard can answer it. What does the P. stand for?”

“Pritchard.” He informed Mrs. Wallace P. Anderson that “a member of the staff” would cover her meeting, and then remarked patiently to the room in general, “I still don't know how to spell ‘
mousseline de soie
.'”

“‘
Mousseline de
what?'” asked the second reporter, waking up. His name was Mike O'Brien; he had an attractive freckled face and red hair.

“
Soie!
” said Weathersby.

“Where's the dope on the Burroughs wedding?” asked Erica, searching through the pile of papers and photographs on her desk.

“Over here — do you want it?” asked Sylvia.

“No, put it with the rest when you've got finished. I suppose I'd better do that Merchant Navy story,” she remarked vaguely. “What's the date?”

“The twenty-ninth,” someone answered.

Toward the end of the month, René's secretary had said. The twenty-ninth was certainly toward the end of the month.

“Mike,” said Erica absently, beginning on the Merchant Navy.

Mike grunted.

“Tell Butch how to spell ‘
mousseline de soie
,' only write it out for him.”

“What is it?” Mike asked Weathersby.

“How should I know?”

“Well, you work here.” Mike pondered, then as the door opened and a middle-aged man in overalls appeared, he asked, “Do you know how to spell ‘
mousseline de soie
'?”

“Nope,” said the stranger, trying the light switch and then attacking it with a screwdriver.

“How in hell would he know?” demanded Weathersby.

“He's probably a French Canadian. Are you a French Canadian?”

“Nope.”

“Put something else,” Mike advised Weathersby. He got up, yawned, and asked, “Would you like us to lunch together, Eric?”

“Is that your delicate way of suggesting that I should pay for myself or both of us?”

“Both of us.”

“I'll just put lace,” decided Weathersby.

“No, you don't,” said Sylvia. She printed the words “
mousseline de soie
” in block capitals on a pad, muttering, “It beats me how you expect to get into the Air Force when you can't even spell ...”

“In the Air Force,” said Weathersby loftily, “you are not required to spell words like
mousseline de soie
.”

“Lunch?” repeated Mike hopefully from the door.

“Sorry,” said Erica, smiling at him.

“How about you?”

“Do you mean me?” asked Sylvia.

“You don't think I'd ask Butch to lunch, do you?”

“That depends on whether or not you thought I could afford it,” said Weathersby, typing rapidly with two fingers.

“All right, I'll meet you at Luigi's at one.” Mike and the other reporter went out; Sylvia's eyes met Erica's and smiling at her, a little embarrassed, Sylvia said apologetically, “Well, you don't want him, do you, Eric?”

“Mike?” asked Erica, surprised, and shook her head.

“That's good, because I do.”

“Women,” said Weathersby derisively.

“Bubbles, get me René de Sevigny on the phone and be quick about it,” said Erica.

After a pause she heard Weathersby asking, “Est-ce que M. de Sevigny est la, s'il vous plait? O.K., Eric, he's coming.”

Erica picked up her phone. “Hello, René ...”

“Is that you, Eric? I was just going to call you. I only got back this morning and I'm in an awful rush but I'll be through in half an hour. How about lunch?”

“Love to. Where?”

“Charcot's — in the bar downstairs?”

“Yes. René ...”

“Yes?”

“How about bringing Marc Reiser with you?” It was out before she had even realized that she was definitely going to say it.

He started to answer, then stopped. “Just a minute, I've got to talk to someone — hold on a minute, will you?”

The silence lasted more than a moment, during which she sat rather nervously, drawing small squares on the back of a photograph of some officers in the Canadian Women's Army Corps. Then René said, “Hello, Eric — did you say you wanted me to ask Marc?”

“Yes,” she answered, adding uncertainly, “if you think he'd like to come.”

“Have you heard from him since that day at your house?”

Damn René, she thought, and trying to keep the awkwardness out of her voice, she said, “I wouldn't be asking you to bring him to lunch if I had.”

“Well, I don't think he'd like to come.”

“René, please listen a moment. I want to ...”

Weathersby was gesturing violently toward the phone on his desk in the corner or the room; she broke off long enough to say, “Tell whoever it is to go to hell,” then heard René's voice again.

“My dear child, I am listening. I'll invite him if you like, but after the kick in the pants that he got from your father, I think you'd better leave Marc alone.”

She said desperately, “But don't you see, it's
because
of that ...”

“Is it, petite?”

“All right,” said Erica, giving up. “Forget the whole thing. Lunch à deux, Charcot's, one-thirty. Right?”

“Entendu.”

“Well, little man, what now?” she asked Weathersby. “Did you tell him to go to hell?”

“No, I didn't. It's the Managing Editor and he's still there.”

“What does he want?”

“He wants to know if you've made up your mind about his niece. Say, Eric, you're not going to let her work here just because she's Pansy's niece, are you?”

“What do you think I joined the Guild for? Don't look so frightened, darling,” she said to Sylvia. “Anybody who gets your job gets it over my dead body and that goes for Pansy's relations just like everybody else. Switch him on, Bubbles.”

She took up her phone and disposed of Mr. Prescott's niece as tactfully as she could and for the time being at any rate; finished the Merchant Navy story, did half a column on wartime clothing, sorted out the announcements of next week's meetings and with the Woman's Section of the final edition ready to go to press, she set out to walk to Charcot's.

It was a clear, sunny day with a fresh wind blowing off the river and although she was already a little late, she stopped to buy some corn for the pigeons and to chat with the old gaspésien sitting on a stool in the shade of the cathedral. He had been there with his big sack of corn and his pile of little paper bags weighted down with a stone, ever since Erica had gone to work on the Post. During the past six years she had bought enough corn from him to fill several wagons and had finally come to understand his French, which was pure Gaspé to start with and further complicated by the fact that the old man had no teeth. From year to year she had watched him grow steadily older, dirtier, poorer, and happier. He was always happy, even when it was twenty below zero and nobody would stop long enough to buy corn, and he had to feed the pigeons himself.

René was waiting for her at Charcot's, having somehow managed to take possession of one of the eight little tables in the crowded little bar downstairs. He was wearing a brown suit and his intelligent face lacked its usual expression of half-amused skepticism; he looked thoroughly tired.

“I'm starved — I've ordered a Manhattan for you, a martini for myself, and lunch for both of us.”

She took the cigarette he offered as he sat down opposite her and asked, slightly irritated, “Do you mind telling me what you ordered?”

“Lobster, a green salad, and coffee. You can choose your dessert later.”

“Thank you,” murmured Erica.

“What for?”

“For allowing me to choose my dessert.”

“Don't be American,” he said, raising one of his highly arched eyebrows. “You don't lose your feminine prestige merely because I order your lunch without consulting you. Any woman but an American would be more interested in the lobster than in her independence,” he stated, and then remarked with a complete change of tone, “You look nice, petite, though your beautiful hair needs combing. Isn't that the suit you insisted on wearing to Philippe's wedding?”

“Do you want me to go and comb my hair?”

He shook his head. “Another martini, please,” he said to the waiter who was just setting his first martini in front of him. “How about you?”

“No thanks. Where have you been all this time, René — down in St. Cyr?”

“No, mostly in Quebec City. The Conservatives have decided not to run anyone against me — there's a lot of feeling about wasting money on provincial by-elections in wartime, and besides, St. Cyr has always been a Liberal riding.”

“So you're already in,” said Erica. She considered him in silence for a moment and then said, “Tell me, René, what's your program? What do you stand for?”

He paused, gazing reflectively at the ceiling, and answered finally, “Let me see — national unity, of course; the preservation of French-Canadian independence and our way of life; compulsory education for Quebec, more and better jobs for French Canadians and a bigger share in the national wealth.”