Treasures (47 page)

“I’ll phone Connie first,” he said to himself. “Then I’ll call Davey and tell him I’m going to buy his firm out from under the syndicate and give it to him. ‘Pay me back whenever you can. I don’t care when,’ I’ll say. Imagine his face, and Ben’s and Connie’s when—”

Pan American flight 103 went down over Scotland in clear weather at three minutes after seven o’clock in the evening.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY

I
n those terrible minutes during which one airplane blew apart in the sky, another one headed toward a smooth landing at the airport outside Louisville, Kentucky.

Anyone who had not seen Eddy Osborne for the past few years would have noticed at once as he emerged from this plane that he had altered. His features, obviously, could not have changed, and his vivid eyes were as striking as ever. His hair, too, was still as thick and fair. But there was something remarkably different about his expression, a reserve, a quietness, that one had never associated with Eddy in the past. His posture and his gait were different too; the jaunty step, the almost rollicking sailor’s bounce, was no more. He walked through the airport toward the car-rental counter with the deliberate, measured manner of a thoughtful man.

There was no one to meet him. Having been discharged from the prison a few days earlier than he had expected, he had thought he would surprise his wife, perhaps ring the bell and have her find him at the door, or perhaps be sitting there when she came home.

Under a wide, light sky the mild winter day was utterly beautiful. He thought as he drove that any day, under any kind of open sky, would be beautiful from now on if only because he would be free to come and go in it. No one could possibly feel the full meaning of those words
free to come and go
who had not once been unfree.

Now, that’s a cliché sure enough, he reflected, laughing as he did so. It had been said a million times before, yet it was nonetheless true for all that, as every cliché was true. And filled with thankfulness he laughed aloud again, clapping himself exuberantly on the knee.

He began to whistle, and stopped. He switched on the radio and turned it right off. It was better to hear the wind rush through the open windows, for he had quite forgotten the sound it made, almost like singing, one long, soft note, sustained. The air was clear and sweet. Having passed from the suburbs and into open country, he became deliciously aware of space, just space. The only confining walls were the rail fences that divided the fields from one another. Among the fields stood clusters and groves of trees, and in the sheltering shade of each of these stood a house, white clapboard or dark red brick, fine houses in a rich countryside. His own home was white; he remembered that they had discussed what color to paint the shutters and wondered now what Pam had finally done about them. His heart began to beat faster at the thought of home and Pam.

By the time he reached the stone pillars and the long graveled drive that led up to his house, his heart was drumming so that he imagined he could hear it. A sud
den fear struck him, that he would show tears and seem foolish. He parked the car and looked up at brilliant green shutters. On the second floor on the far side was the room where he would sleep tonight. He blinked and steadied himself. And another fear almost overwhelmed him, that perhaps he was dreaming all this, that he wasn’t really here but was still in Allenwood. Then he counted the five steps up to the front door. He walked up and seized the brass knocker; it was a lion’s head, and warm in the sun.

“Oh, my God,” said Pam when she opened the door.

He stood for a moment, awkward at the sight of her. There flashed before his eyes an impression of long hair lying on her shoulders, of a white shirt and white riding breeches; these flashed, then his eyes filled and he took her in his arms.

“Oh, you shocked me,” she murmured against his cheek. “I didn’t expect you until next week. I’ve been counting the days.”

“Rathbone asked the judge to let me go before Christmas, and since I’ve been a good boy,” he said, mocking himself, “he let me go.”

Kissing, they trembled against each other. “Oh, Eddy. I’m glad,” she said. “I’m glad.”

They held each other apart, examining each other.

“You haven’t changed,” he told her. “What about me? Have I?”

“I can’t tell yet. Come, sit down. Are you hungry? Thirsty? Let me get you something.”

“No, I had stuff on the plane.”

He leaned back against the pillows in the corner of
the sofa. All of a sudden there was nothing to say, or rather, there was so much to say, covering two years of their separated lives, that the task was daunting. And he remembered how many hundreds of times he had imagined his homecoming, bounding into the house, seizing and carrying her off to bed, there to quench a bursting, unbearable desire. And now that the moment had come, he wanted only to sit here and look at her.

“You do look different,” she said. “I didn’t notice it so much when you were—up there.”

“A lot happens in two years.”

She said softly, “I know.”

“How different am I, do you think? I haven’t gained or lost any weight.”

She scrutinized him. “It’s something, I can’t say exactly what. But there’s a change.… Tell me, was it awful? I never wanted to ask you. But now that it’s over—”

“Not the way they treated me. You saw. It was more what goes on inside one’s head that’s—that’s—”

He stopped, and she, seeing his struggle, said quickly, “It’s past. Let’s not talk about it. Not ever, unless you want to. For now it’s best to look forward.”

She gave him the encouraging smile that one gives to an invalid or to a troubled child, and he saw how hard this hour was, not only for himself, but for her.

“I’m required to do a year of community service, you remember? So I thought maybe I might work in a hospital here as an orderly or something, according to what they need. I should think that would be acceptable service. But I haven’t been told yet.”

She took his hand and held it between both of hers.

“Whatever you do, darling, whatever, things are going to come right from now on.”

He gave her a smile, a small wan upturning of closed lips.

“You guarantee it?”

“Absolutely! You and I are going to have fun again. We are, Eddy! Oh, I’ve been so sorry about it all, so sad for you … but it’s going to be good again. I know. I promise.”

Her eyes were anxious; she was appealing to him. And understanding that, he assumed a brighter air.

“I believe you. Now tell me things. Anything. Tell me about the horses.”

“Oh, we have some beauties in the stalls! Yesterday we had two foals born, both treasures. And I’ve finally found a perfect man for the stables after having three absolute disasters in a row, one too lazy to get up in the morning, one more often drunk than sober …”

He was only half listening. The exuberance that he had felt while driving had suddenly flattened, as bubbles flatten when the bottle is opened. He tried to analyze his feelings. Was there a trace of some vague fear inside him?

Looking around the room, over her head into the wide hall and beyond it, he saw that the dining room table was set with flowers and candelabra. At this distance it was not possible to see how many places were set, but it was obvious that guests were expected.

Pam, following his glance, explained, “I asked a few people to dinner tonight for a pre-Christmas party, people
I’ve been owing. I thought I’d get it over with before you came home. I didn’t think you’d want to have guests right away.”

“No, I wouldn’t.”

“So I’ll just run to the phone and cancel. I’ll be right back and when I come, I’ll bring a tray of goodies for you. Even though you say you’re not hungry, I don’t believe it. You can’t have had a decent meal since—”

“Since I went to prison, you mean. It’s all right to say it, Pam.”

“We are going to forget it, Eddy Osborne.” She kissed him. “Now, stay there and rest. I won’t be long.”

When she had gone, he closed his eyes again. The room was scented with the pine branches, garlanded for Christmas, that hung from the mantel. There was, besides, a whiff of Shalimar on the shoulder of his jacket. At Christmas he had always put a bottle of it in the toe of her stocking. He could see her now, could see them both, sitting on the floor scattering ribbons and tissue paper as they opened each other’s gifts. They hadn’t had a care. Would it really ever be that way again?

At that he became angry at himself. Life wasn’t over, for heaven’s sake! Pam was right in urging him to look only forward. He had never in his life been moody, and he wasn’t going to succumb to moods now. And he forced himself to stand up and feel energetic, to be glad, glad, as he had been on the drive from the airport.

He began to look around the room again. It was odd how changed an object became when it was transplanted. He had to look twice to recognize some things. For that matter, the house itself was strange to him. He
had been in it so briefly, after all, and then it had been in disarray with painters and plumbers coming and going. He walked out into the hall, which was airy, light, and long enough for a man to take a good run in. The staircase curved up to a landing where stood a tall clock from his collection. The Waterford chandelier that had once hung in Pam’s sitting room now descended from a thick silk rope two stories long.

Then he crossed into the dining room, where poinsettias were heaped in Connie’s great epergne at the center of the table. He counted the place settings. There were twelve. He noted that the Royal Crown Derby service plates, which had always been kept for special occasions, were laid out, as was the heavyweight vermeil flatware. The furniture was eighteenth-century English, and he wondered what had happened to the marble-topped French pieces they had used in New York. If she had sold them, they must have brought over half a million dollars, he reflected. But she had not sold his favorite paintings. His Berthe Morisot hung over the fireplace, and the two Mary Cassatts had been placed between the triple windows.

As he went on through the rooms, it pleased him to see how she had kept his favorite possessions and that they were safe here, protected like children in this solid house.

From the pantry her voice carried as she telephoned her guests. Surely it was good, he thought, for her to have had some pleasures while he was away. On a table in the library a magazine lay open to a double page of photographs. There was the fine, symmetrical facade of
this house, with Pam in riding clothes standing on the front steps. There was Pam at the stables under a clock and a gilded weather-vane. And Pam again, taking the jumps at a horse show. Finally, Pam in evening dress, the Grecian, columnar sort of dress that she always wore, standing in a group at—Eddy bent to read the caption—“the benefit for the hospital, the high point of the social season.” He was reading further when she came in.

“I’m sorry it’s taking so long to go through the list, but anyway, the coffee’s on in the meantime—oh, you’re looking at that silly article.” And she said, apologizing, “It must seem to you that all I did was enjoy myself, while you had nothing.”

“There was no reason why you shouldn’t enjoy yourself. You couldn’t have helped me by locking your door and pulling the blinds down.”

And yet it came to him suddenly that his entry into this life that she had established here might not be easy for her. Nor easy for him either.

“Why don’t you sit down and read the paper while I finish my calls.”

“Maybe I will.”

However, he was too restless to sit, and laying the paper aside, he went upstairs to explore. It pleased him again to see things like his Rowlandson prints in the hall and his pink jade Chinese horse on Pam’s chest of drawers. By the braided trim on all the curtains he recognized the hand of their New York decorator, who had been persuaded—for a handsome fee, no doubt of that
—to come to Kentucky. His was, however, the hand of a master, and that pleased Eddy too.

Then something caught his attention, a pipe lying in an ashtray on a small lamp table in the bedroom at the end of the hall. It might have been his eyes that found it first, or it might have been his nose, scenting the pungent tobacco. For a moment he stood blankly seeing the thing, not comprehending it. Then, despising the immediate, crowding thought, the unworthy, stupid, cheap suspicion, he turned away. But it happened also that the closet door which faced him was ajar, and the unworthy, cheap suspicion drove him to reach out to the knob. Then he withdrew his hand. Then he seized the knob.

In a tidy row hung a man’s riding clothes, half a dozen suits, a raincoat, an overcoat, tweed jackets, and a silk bathrobe, an entire wardrobe. Pajamas hung on a hook. For some crazy reason, Eddy was afterward to remember, he did not want, in that first instant, to believe what he saw. A cousin, perhaps, some relative who had come to live with her? But she had no relatives.… And then he became frantic; he ran to the chest and opened drawers. There were underclothes, there were socks, sweaters, and shirts with London labels. In the adjoining bathroom there hung a terry cloth robe. On a shelf were shaving things, a brush and a comb.