So Little Time (56 page)

Milton looked up, and the light was reflected from his glasses.

“No,” Jeffrey said, “I don't want that.”

“It would be nice,” Milton said, “if you could leave something, have something to show for it all. Of course, the income tax is unfair on earned income, very unfair.”

“Why should I want to leave anything?” Jeffrey asked. “Madge can leave it.”

“I know,” Milton said, “but it would be nice to have something to show. If you had a little backlog—”

“It's too late for a backlog,” Jeffrey said. “Never mind it, Milton.”

All he had wanted was to sign the powers of attorney. There might have been a time when he would have listened to Milton's advice, but now it sounded futile and as dry as dust.

“You see,” Jeffrey said, “I don't see any good in worrying. There'll be inflation. The whole thing's going to go.”

Milton nodded patiently, as though he had heard and heard the same remark. “There will always be money. There will always be estates,” Milton said.

“What makes you think so?” Jeffrey asked.

“Because I believe in common sense,” Milton said. “Eventual common sense. Let's look at it this way.” Milton raised two fingers. “We will either get into this war, or we won't get into this war. Now, if we do get into this war—but we're not in it yet—we must act as though we weren't going to get in it until the times comes.”

“Well,” Jeffrey said, “do what you want to, Milton.”

There was a moment's silence, a helpless sort of silence.

“You see, Milton, I've never had much money, excepting what I've made. I suppose that's why I don't mind so much.”

Milton took off his glasses and looked at them and put them on again.

“I've thought about it,” Jeffrey said, “but I don't see that there's much we can do, I really don't.”

“You mean we ought to give up,” Milton said. “You mean we shouldn't try? What do you think's going to happen?”

He looked disturbed, much more disturbed than Jeffrey. “We've got to keep on trying.”

“All right,” Jeffrey said, “you go and keep on trying.”

“Look at it this way,” Milton said. “You have your place in Connecticut. You'll want to leave it to your children. You like it there. You'd like to have your boy—what's his name—Jim—have it, wouldn't you?”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, “I'd like it, but he couldn't afford it. You know that.”

“Well,” Milton said, “perhaps, but we don't know yet. You would like to keep it for yourself, wouldn't you?”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, “but maybe I can't. I don't know.”

Milton picked up his brandy glass and laughed softly.

“My God,” he said, “you don't believe that anything is permanent tonight.”

Jeffrey was facing the fact that nothing which Milton considered permanent was going to be permanent. The apartment was not permanent. He could see the books at auction somewhere with the Georgian chairs. He could see the whole thing going.

“Oh, well,” he said, “I suppose there'll be something left.”

“Of course there will,” Milton said. “You leave it to me, Jeff. Where are those powers? Oh, there they are,” and he snapped his brief case shut and looked at Jeffrey over his glasses.

“I hope you don't talk to Madge like this,” he said.

“No,” Jeffrey said, “of course I don't. Let's go in and see the girls.”

The girls were sitting on the sofa by the fire. They looked up and smiled and moved a little, as women always did when men came in after dinner.

“Well, you weren't long,” Madge said. “Have you got everything settled so soon?”

“Yes,” Milton said, and he laughed. “There wasn't much to settle.”

“Jeff's so careless,” Madge said, “he always leaves things at loose ends. It's like having a medical check-up, isn't it? Now, I can get him packed tonight and get him off tomorrow.”

Jeffrey smiled. “And if I die on the way,” he said, “just call up Milton and open the tin box. Everything is there.”

“Oh, Jeff,” Madge said, and she looked startled, “Jeff,
please
, don't say things like that.”

Madge never liked to joke about death. But then, that was what Milton was there for, because Madge knew that Milton, or someone like Milton, would live forever.

34

Dear Jim
:…

Superficially, everything had been the same that winter as any other winter—too much the same, when it should not have been. There had been a limited national emergency, and then a national emergency, and hemispheric solidarity and lend-lease, and the Draft Act; and convoys meant shooting, and shooting meant war. With each step Jeffrey had expected something to change but nothing had, on the surface. You saw the same shops on the cross streets. You saw the same books in the bookstore windows, yet nothing should have been the same, and that was what disturbed him most. He was going out to the West Coast as he had every winter for a number of years, but it should not have been the same.

He had known for the past three weeks, ever since Hal Bliss had called him from Beverly Hills, that he would be going. Madge was used to it—she had not asked to go. He knew exactly what he was going to take and where he would stay—at the Bronxville in Beverly Hills, and Hal would let him have a car so that he could drive out to the studio. Jesse Fineman had arranged for his tickets, a compartment all the way. His bags had been brought up from the storeroom in the basement, and now they were open in the study—the heavy pigskin bag which he had bought in London, and the smaller suitcase for the train, the fitted suitcase which Madge had given him one Christmas and his brief case and the case for his portable typewriter. They were going with him, and he was leaving all the rest of it. He wished he could get the idea out of his mind that Madge and the apartment might not be there when he got back, though what might happen to them he could not remotely imagine. He tried to tell himself that it was a mood. He wished that he could get the idea out of his mind that he was saying good-by to something he would never see again, for of course he would see it all again. There had been talk of change for years and nothing could change so quickly.

“Darling,” Madge said, “I wish I were going with you.”

It was nice of her to say it. She had been out there with him once or twice, and she knew very well that it had not worked. The hours were too irregular. There never was a chance for them to do anything together, and as Madge said herself, it was all too queer—a lot of fun, but no one there was leading a real life, and Jeffrey supposed they weren't, according to her standards. She was simply being nice when she said she wanted to go—she did not really want to.

“But you know I can't, don't you?” Madge said. “I can't leave Gwen.”

“No,” Jeffrey said, “of course you can't.”

“It's never the same when you're gone,” Madge said. “There's never any point to anything, but Beckie will take care of me. I'll go to all sorts of things that you don't want to go to, and Jim'll be coming down. Jeff, have you heard from Jim?”

“No,” Jeffrey said, “not lately.”

“I wish he'd write more often,” Madge said. “He's so careless about writing.”

“It doesn't mean anything,” Jeffrey told her. “He's got too much to do. Boys don't like to write.”

“I know you think it's silly, my worrying,” Madge said. “But Jeff, I think he's getting over it, about that girl.”

Jeffrey had been looking into his empty pigskin suitcase. When Madge was with him, something always came up that mingled discordantly with humdrum detail. If they were making toast in the kitchen, for instance, when the couple was out, they would suddenly begin talking about the bills, or whether So-and-so was going to get divorced, and then before you thought of it, the toast was burning. He always hated to combat the inertia which came with packing. He was wondering what shoes he would take and where he would put them, so that they would not get mixed up with his shirts, and at the same time he was trying to make a list in his mind of everything he needed. And now Madge brought up Jim.

“What makes you think he's over it?” he asked.

Madge looked at him and looked away. The study was bright and sunny, almost too bright from the glare on the river, and he could see the roofs of the buildings downtown, shining wet from the melting snow. He could see plumes of steam rising above them.

“He's hardly mentioned her,” Madge said. “When I brought her name up, he didn't even seem interested. You can tell, you know. Jeff, we mustn't stand here talking. You've got to pack. There isn't much more than an hour and don't throw things in at the last moment, the way you always do.”

Then Jim was gone, and they were back at the business of packing again. He knew Madge so well that he knew exactly what she would say, and it must have been the same for her, but now that he was going away there was no sort of irritation in that sense of knowing her too well. Instead, there was value and charm in being so completely used to someone. He felt as if he were going away for a long time, as though he might never see her again, and he found himself anxious to remember how she looked, just standing there helping to pack his bags—not that her suggestions were ever necessary. Madge always said that he just threw clothes in and never folded them. He always replied that there was no need of fussing for days over something you could do in half an hour. He remembered the time they had hurried with their packing in Paris and the upper drawer of her wardrobe trunk had slipped out and she had sat laughing, with stockings and lace nightgowns all around her. She did not look much older now. Her chin had the same upward tilt—he had always thought her chin was beautiful—and she had the same reproving expression which she always wore when he was packing, as though he knew nothing whatsoever about it.

“It won't take long when I start,” he said. “I just have to decide what I'm going to take.”

He opened the door of his clothes closet and stared at his suits all pressed, all in a neat long row. Madge had always been very good about putting clothes in closets, sending coats to cleaners' and keeping out the moths. There they hung in an even row, his cutaway, his tails, his dinner coat, the tweed jacket he wore in the country, his gray flannels, his spring suits, his winter suits, all of them—too many of them—and down below on a little shelf, secure with their trees, were all his shoes—too many shoes. He would take his dinner coat and the gray flannels and one light summer suit, and then there would be the suit he was wearing. Then there would be the shirts …

“Jeff,” Madge said, “why don't we call Joseph? Tell him what you want, and Joseph will put them in.”

“He wraps everything in tissue paper,” Jeffrey said.

“Darling,” Madge said, “that's the way you ought to pack.”

Then, for some reason, he felt a lump rise in his throat. It was just as though he were never going to be there again, as though he would never see that study again, as though he would never again wear those clothes which he was leaving behind him.

“I wish I didn't have to go,” he said. “I wish I weren't going.”

“Darling,” Madge said, “we'll do all sorts of things when you get back. We'll be moving to the country and there'll be the garden and the seed catalogues. I'm going to start getting the house open when you're away, and I'm going to see that Mr. Gorman gets the seeds in right. Jeff, I wish we could get someone else beside Mr. Gorman.”

That was another subject. You could never tell when it might come up. Madge had always felt the man in the country was a mistake.

“Never mind Gorman now,” Jeffrey said, “I've got to pack.”

“The apple blossoms will be coming out when you get home,” Madge said, “and the children will all be back.”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said. “Well, I've got to pack.”

He began doing exactly what Madge said he would, throwing everything quickly into the suitcase.

“Jeff,” Madge said, “don't be in such a hurry. Fold them.”

“They'll have to be pressed, anyway,” Jeffrey said. “I'm in a hurry now.”

“Jeff,” Madge said, “did you put the money into the account?”

“Yes,” Jeffrey answered, “and you've got the number of the Bronxville—I left it on the desk. You can get me any time.”

“You'll call me when you get there, won't you?” Madge said. “And if you have time when you get to Chicago, you'll stop and see the Harkers, won't you?”

“I can't get to Lake Forest, Madge,” Jeffrey said. “There won't be time.”

“Well,” Madge said, “try to see them. They always hear about it when you go through Chicago, and you never see them.”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, “I'll try, but there isn't time to get to Lake Forest.”

“And give my love to Hal Bliss,” Madge said, “and don't go out to too many parties.”

“There won't be any parties,” Jeffrey said. “When I'm not at the studio, I'll be asleep.”

“Darling,” Madge said, “don't be so annoyed. I want you to see people so you can tell me all about it.”

“I'm not annoyed,” Jeffrey said. “I wish I weren't going.”

“Darling,” Madge said, “you do like everything, don't you?”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, and he did like it, now that he was going.

“Then try to think of things to tell me,” Madge said.

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, “and if you want anything, call up Minot.”

“Yes,” Madge said. “Now, think what you've forgotten. You must have forgotten something.”

The bags were closed. It was half an hour before train time, but he knew that he might as well be going. He always hated to say good-by and then stand and talk.