THE WHITE WOLF (15 page)

Sara said tonelessly, “Oh.”

The candle flames cast long, thin, swaying shadows. Pierre studied the candelabra, as rearranged by Sara. He studied the angles. He wondered if Sara had moved the one to reduce suspicion. He decided not when Sara's glance fell upon her hand and she seemed to study it without comprehension.

Her hand, slender and white, held a fork. The shadow of the fork lay on the damask tablecloth; but only the shadow of the fork; as if it were suspended without support. Pierre breathed:

“Dear God!”

She glanced from time to time, and with an air of expectancy, out of the great windows toward the lane. That was the route David would take—if he came.
She
knew he would come. But Pierre wondered what measures of restraint Trent would take.

The telephone rang. Freda materialized. She plugged an extension into the wall and placed the instrument before Sara. She pursed her lips and she wrinkled her bulbous nose. Her own thoughts would have said, “Such things newfangled I trust not.”

Sara lifted the receiver, heard the click as Heinrich, in the kitchen, replaced the other. She said:

“Hello.”

The word was alive, it was music to Pierre’s ears.

She listened then. But when she spoke again, the music was gone. The tone was sodden.

“All right,” she said.

Freda re-entered and removed the telephone and began taking away the dinner plates. When Sara said nothing, Pierre inquired:

“David?”

“Yes.”

“Is he coming over?”

“No.” She paused a long time. Then: “He said something—about Mr. Trent making other plans—in the city.”

The colorlessness of her words was reflected, Pierre now noticed, in her lips. He thought, Ah, David must still have a chance. David is still not beyond control. Well, how would Sara react? He pulled out his watch. He said: “Still quite early. Cornell’s at the Forrest. Shall we drive into town and see her show?” Sara said, “No.”

Pierre had not been optimistic. Neither had he expected an answer so abrupt. He said:

“I really wanted to see her. But it’s not much fun going alone.”

That approach might sway her, he thought. But she only took longer in making a reply.

“I don't believe so. I—simply can’t stand the city.”

Freda had cleared the table. She had placed the desserts before father and daughter; had poured the coffee. She said simply:

“I go now.”

At the door to the pantry she hesitated and looked lingeringly in Sara’s direction and then down at the plate she held—Sara’s, which Sara had scarcely touched.

FREDA’S words reminded Pierre that tonight, Saturday, was the Derhammers’ night off. He was relieved. It simplified things so. For once in his life he was glad he did not-maintain a larger domestic staff. Trent there: cook, butler, maid, chauffeur; yes, and David’s hired hands.

At last Sara excused herself. Pierre heard her slowly climbing the stairs. He pushed his chair back, walked to the sideboard and poured himself a brandy. And then he, too, went to the hall and climbed the stairs.

The door to Sara’s room stood slightly ajar. He heard water running in her bathroom. He passed on to his own expansive loom at the front of the house and stood in the dark by the window. After a little he saw the station wagon bounce along the gravel lane; Freda and Heinrich off for their night out.

Pierre could almost chart their course; a visit to a rathskeller, a pause at the German Culture Club, a visit to one of the dozen-odd cousins where they would spend the night.

He saw the red tail-light flicker and die out. His fists tightened. He walked out of the room.

He hated this more than anything he had ever done in his life. As he reached into his pocket, the steel of the key chilled his fingers. He drew out the key.

Sara’s door was still ajar. He closed it quietly. He inserted the key in the lock. And he turned the key. Then he walked back to his room and sat down. He waited.

At last, from the hallway, he heard a door knob turn. He steeled himself.’ This was it, he thought. He wondered, in the second that followed, if—actually—he would meet the test. When she called, when she pleaded, when she wept, would he maintain his purpose or would he surrender?

Here it came! The tug at the door. Another. A concerned pause. Then there followed a series of impatient struggles with the knob, movement translated by the sound of scrap ing and scratching.

There was another silence: Sara, probably, looking for her key. He could hear her moving quietly about the room. He heard drawers open and close. Then, another silence—a long, long silence.

Pierre waited for the sound of her voice. It never came.

He arose and moved through the darkness to a window that looked down upon the porch roof. From farther back along the house one of Sara’s windows threw an oblong of yellow light upon the lawn. He looked at it a long time. He thought:

“I can stand anything but this.”

He thought:

“I had no idea it would be like this.”

He had been ready for anything; anything— except silent surrender.

At last he went downstairs.

He spent the evening in his study. It was directly under Sara’s room. From time to time, he could hear Sara moving about above him. She must realize, he thought. And then he remembered how, only last night, she was not certain where she had been. Perhaps, he thought, she only dimly knows that something is wrong. Perhaps that is the reason for her apathy.

“But that's animal-like!” he exploded aloud. And then he stood staring at nothing among the echoes of his own words.

He sat down at the long table. He took a pencil and a sheet of paper from a drawer. Have to be businesslike, he thought. Have to figure all the angles.

He got up restlessly and opened a window.

A chill breeze blew in upon him. The night was cold and fine. The breeze blew his paper from the table. He recovered the paper. He sat down again.

Let’s see: have to get rid of the Derhammers. Hmm. There’s a problem, the biggest problem. He’d have to keep house for himself.

The business? And right before Christmas, too.

Well, he hadn't been training young .Webster for nothing. He’d call him Monday and tell him he wasn’t coming in for a week or two. Perhaps' longer. Webster would know what to do.

It would look funny, he thought, discharging the Derhammers. Especially, when he wasn't closing up the house. If he closed up the house, that would be all right. Well, have to face that one.

And how about when nobody saw Sara? He could answer that with a cruise. South America? That ought to take long enough.

God! Had no idea there’d be so many complications. What about the livestock? Sell it? No. Better idea.

Item by item, he listed the problems. Problem by problem, he solved them as best he could.

Meals? He’d have to feed her. Not that; she’d been eating much lately. Well, he knew the reason for that—now. The very thought sped a shudder down his spine.

MANNING and David, father and son, flowed with the crowd at midnight out of the Forrest Theater. Trent said, with forced cheer:

“Well, David? Still like Cornell, as well as ever?”

David’s voice was flat.

“Well enough.”

Their limousine rolled to a stop in front of the theater. They rode west on Walnut Street.

“Lovely night,” Trent said.

David did not reply.

“How about a drink and a bite?” Manning said. David agreed listlessly.

They rode in silence. Neon signs—ruby and emerald and sapphire and amethyst—spread a carnival of color upon the streets. When they reached Broad Street, the crowds grew heavier and David withdrew farther into himself.

People . . . Streets . . . Pavements . . . Buildings . . . Steel . . . Lights . . . Traffic . . .

He had always preferred the open country. And now, on this first visit to the city since that strange passionate night with Sara, he found the scene almost unbearable. He would never return, he told himself, never.

Manning. Trent could not have chosen worse for David’s mood. He led David to the Club Ambassador-raucous, gaudy, gilt and velvet magnet for debutantes (and their titled escorts), married-but-tired males, and anyone else who could afford seventy-five cents per drink.

There was a little show upon a postage- stamp dance floor; the usual hefty soprano; the acrobatic Argentino dance team; the shapely young lady with almost nothing on at all except an accordion.

They found a table near the band. The band blared in David’s left ear. The bedlam talk of the half-soused crowd around the horseshoes bar pounded on David’s right.

The headwaiter, Karnes, a former waiter at the Bankers and Manufacturers, saw Trent and approached. Shortly, following a side conversation with Karnes, two pretty young girls descended upon their table.

It was, to say the least, not an outstanding success. Trent bought a round of drinks. And then another. David scarcely touched his first; failed to open his mouth. Chilled, the girls finally left. Manning thought:

“Lord! If I were a young fellow with David’s money.

He thought, in passing, of Julia.

There was too much noise .for conversation. But later, as Roger drove them home (with special instructions to take them the long way through Fairmount Park), Manning, bearing in mind his talk with Pierre, asked:

“How are the Ayrshires coming, David?”

David was running down the window on his side. He was putting his face as close as he could do it.

Somehow, the night air in the park made him feel infinitely better.

“Why,” he said. “Why—I found a buyer for them this afternoon. Renshaw up at New Hope.”

Trent could scarcely believe his ears.

“You’re actually selling them?”

“Why—yes.”

“Trying another breed, of course?” Manning asked hopefully.

“Why—no. No. I don’t think so. You see—” David searched desperately for words. “Really, I don’t care much for cattle.”

Trent, baffled, tried again.

“But you always did, David. You always did. Especially these Ayrshire.”

David shook his head slowly.

“No. I don’t think so. I don’t—remember.” Manning slumped back in his seat. Good God! He pulled a gold cigar case from his coat pocket; snapped it open, selected a corona. He bit at the end with the cigar smoker’s ceremony; he pressed it gently from end to end to make it draw. He lit it.

In the flare of the match light, Manning saw that David looked very pale. He asked: “What are you reinvesting the money in?” David looked puzzled.

“What money?”

“The money from the cattle.”

“Oh. Oh—I don’t know. Hadn’t thought.”

“Goats?”

Absently David shook his head.

“No-o. No goats. I think I’ll sell what I have.”

Manning leaned forward. He tapped David sharply on the knee.

“Look here, Dave. You were always pretty sickly as a youngster. Damned sickly. And when you grew older, well, somehow, you never got around very much. Maybe I’m as much at fault as anything, letting you do what you wanted with the farms. Look here; how does a trip sound?”

Dave did not reply.

“I mean a trip!” Trent emphasized. “Months of travel. Go to South America. And after that, what’s wrong with Hawaii? And Japan? India, Australia?”

He paused, to let it sink in. And then he thought of Julia.

“By George,” Trent said, “I’ll go with you, too.”

But David shook his head. And he said with rising inflection:

“No.” He repeated it with conviction: “No. All I want to do is to be left alone. Left alone! Hear me? I don’t want anything —just to be left alone!”

MEANWHILE Freda sat on the edge of one of the two straight-backed chairs in Pierre's study. Heinrich sat on the edge of the other. Both stared, blank-faced, at Pierre who sat behind the long table.

It was difficult to tell which of the three was the most uncomfortable. Certainly Pierre

knew that the interview was not going well.

“You’ll like it,” he said. He tried to inject zest into his statement. “You deserve it. It’ll be your home, your own home.”

There was an embarrassing silence. Pierre added hastily:

“I’ve been wanting to do something like this for you for a long time. I don’t like to call it a pension. I just want to show my appreciation for your working here so long. The livestock here. Well, that’s yours, Heinrich.” Heinrich blinked.

“After all,” Pierre said, “you’ve raised that stock, Heinrich. You’ve done all the work.” He tried to appear jocose. “Good Communist practice, I believe, gives the worker the benefit of his own production.”

Freda looked questioningly at Heinrich. Heinrich began, awkwardly, voicing the sentiments of both.

“We make out it’s nice,” he faltered. “But we make out we’ve growed this place too. We make out we ain’t no more young, Mr. Pierre.” His tongue stumbled to a halt. He looked appealingly toward Freda. She said: