Chapter 26
Lucy had gone back to her old job at the Green Network, and Larry dropped around at her office to take her to tea a few days after he returned to New York. It was a dirty February afternoon, too slushy to look for a restaurant outside; so they went down to the drugstore in the building. A woman who conducted a successful household program, a radio comedian, and the M.C. of a quiz show occupied stools at the fountain.
“They ought to bring the tourists here after they’ve been to Superman,” Larry remarked. “They would find out more about radio than in those glass cages they have for visitors upstairs.”
Lucy smiled indulgently. She laid her black suède gloves on the plastic table and smoothed the fingers. “Arthur always liked this drugstore. How is he?” she asked.
“I think he’s fairly well found himself down there. Better off than he seemed to be practicing law in New York.” Larry found himself imitating her cool detachment.
She confided in her gloves, stroking the fingers as she talked. “I’m glad. Is he working hard?”
“I think he puts in a reasonably full day. He may have even dropped a few pounds——”
Her face clouded with maternal concern.
“Oh, he’s in good shape,” Larry reassured her.
“And Janice?”
“You know Janice. Going strong.”
“Did he tell you she took him to a specialist at Johns Hopkins, a doctor who’s a friend of hers?” Lucy asked.
“I didn’t have time to hear the medical details,” Larry admitted. “There was too much going on—a big party on Saturday and people around most of the weekend.”
“Arthur always liked big parties.”
Larry noticed that a minute ago Lucy had said: “Arthur always liked this drugstore.” Apparently he was the past tense. It gave Larry a twinge to hear her talk about him in that way.
“Is he getting over the feeling of being an invalid?” Lucy asked, dribbling lemon into her tea. The wedge slipped from her slender fingers. “I think he needed a change. If I had gone down to Washington with him, it would have been taking his nurse along. I think he had to do it alone.”
Lucy sighed. “She’s good for him, Larry. That’s what I really want to say.”
Good for him. Larry thought of the sleek dark head which had havocked the last few years of his life, tormenting and taunting him, trampling his sleeping and his waking——
“It’s what he always wanted, Larry. It’s what he really wanted when he married me.” Lucy’s shallow eyes turned on him. Only now he could not be certain of their lack of depth.
“Why did he marry you then?” Larry asked her.
“I suppose it was kind of a business deal. For both of us. He wanted a home and a wife he could dominate, and I wanted what I thought was security. There’s nothing wrong with a business deal that doesn’t work out,” she added, echoing an old conviction of Larry’s.
“I’m glad she found room for him at her house where it’s comfortable,” Lucy continued after a moment. “I’m glad she invites her friends over. They’re probably his friends already.”
Larry reached for her coat which had dropped over the low chair and was trailing the rubber flooring. He draped it gently over her shoulders.
“That’s all right, Larry.” Her smile faded. “It has to do with something inside of him. Something that wants to find whatever’s exceptional about his work or his friends. Or even at home. I was brought up to be unexceptional. My mother would have called it showing off if we ever tried to be different.”
Larry found himself admiring, of all qualities, Lucy’s good manners. The neutral quiet which had always shrouded her seemed to become a positive, tangible asset.
“He talked while I was down there about not wanting to be exceptional,” Larry said. “He claims that he’s happiest as a group man, working with other people. He claims that he doesn’t want to stand out in any way.”
“Maybe he talks that way, but Arthur can’t help being exceptional.” She paused. “It would be like changing the color of his skin for him to try. I used to think he needed someone plain around him for balance. Someone like me.”
“With your face?” Larry protested.
“I talked myself into thinking that no house was big enough to hold two exceptional people, but I wasn’t really honest about it,” Lucy said. “Now he can see the difference. Now that he’s around someone who can give him the kind of life he wants.”
“So that’s how you have it figured out. When did you start thinking so?” Larry asked.
“When he first asked me to marry him, I guess. You know how you do at first. You figure it out with your mind. Your common sense tells you that’s how it is. But you don’t honestly believe it. You don’t really feel it— You know it’s not what you really think.”
“But you finally did begin to think so?” he asked.
“When he took sick,” Lucy explained. “I wanted him to get well. That’s all I seemed to care about. I wanted it so hard that I would have settled for anything— I was willing to forget about myself—just so he got back on his feet. Don’t think I was trying to be wonderful or have him thank me. I guess I was just scared. I prayed for him. When I saw him on crutches the first time, I didn’t want to live unless he could get well.”
“I wouldn’t want you to think I’m a fool, Larry,” she added. “But I was almost glad when he came home with you that afternoon and said he’d like to move to Washington. I knew what it meant. I knew it was his chance to get away——”
“And you didn’t mind?” he asked her. “You were willing to have him get away?”
Miserably the gray eyes assented. “It was my chance, too. It hasn’t been easy on me. It’s been a strain. Sometimes I think marriages for practical reasons aren’t much good. People should feel more than we do if they’re going to stay married. I worry that if Arthur and I go on as we are, I’ll wake up someday and find my real feelings shriveled up. I want to keep on feeling alive, Larry, and how can I if we try to go on living the way we are?”
“You know I encouraged him to take the job in Washington,” Larry acknowledged, none too pleased with himself at the moment.
“I know.”
“I wasn’t sure you were enough woman for him. Right from the beginning I was afraid of it. I don’t think I was fair to you. You’re plenty of woman, or you wouldn’t be willing to put his interests first.” He refilled her tea cup from a green china pot, anxious through some small act to make it up to her.
“Even if you’re willing to go on with him, I think it’ll backfire,” Larry told her.
“How?”
“You’ll get tired of it. You’ll be giving up your life for his, and in the long run you’ll expect payment. Even if you think you won’t. He’ll never be able to give it to you, of course, not ever enough, anyway, and in the end you’ll feel cheated.”
“You don’t have to find excuses, Larry,” she comforted him. “You didn’t break us up. He never would have gotten through his trouble without you; I don’t think he would have wanted to make the effort if you hadn’t been around giving him a boost. I don’t think any friend could have done more. You mustn’t blame yourself.”
Lucy’s fingers trailed tentatively along his sleeve. “You helped me, too. I want you to know about it. Do you remember before he got sick? I always thought it was my fault. I didn’t understand, and he frightened me. You never said anything, but you were around, and I knew I could count on you. You mustn’t blame yourself, Larry. You’ve helped both of us.”
“You understand about it now, I suppose,” he told her. “You know that it wasn’t you he was fighting in those days, it was himself.”
“I just happened to be the nearest person,” she agreed. “I was there, and when he was angry with himself——”
“That’s it. He took it out on you.”
“Janice had more sense, don’t you think so?”
“Why?”
“Because she went away. She wasn’t around. He couldn’t blame her when he was in trouble. He couldn’t possibly. He couldn’t even pretend she was to blame.”
“Maybe she didn’t care for him enough to hang around,” Larry suggested. “Maybe it didn’t mean enough to Janice. She didn’t want to try and help him.”
“I think she cared, Larry. I think she’s in love with him.” Lucy’s hands lay white and unstarched in her lap, as if in resignation.
“Love’s a big word,” Larry warned. “Right now, I’ll admit that she’s sorry for him. She sees that he’s sick and having a tough time, and she wants to do everything to make him comfortable. She’s lucky that she has a big house, and can. And don’t forget. She has a fine time when Arthur’s around. She’s not being any martyr. I wouldn’t be surprised if she were pretty selfish——”
“Does Arthur think so?” Lucy immobilized him with her calm, gray eyes. “Did he say she was selfish?”
“He’d never bring it up,” Larry said. “You know Arthur about things like that. You can get as much conversation out of him as out of a tomb. He did tell me to be sure and report to you first hand that he was getting along fine, and he gave me another message—” Larry unpinned the wilted carnation in his lapel and put it on the red leather seat of an empty chair next to her. “He wants to know when you’re planning to come down. Is Marge well enough for you to leave?”
The spoon trembled in Lucy’s hand. She might be fairly objective in discussing Arthur, but Marge’s name set off a different set of emotions. Marge must be mother to Lucy, Larry figured. Throughout her tempestuous marriage to Arthur, Marge had remained the dependable hearth, the secure shelter. Maybe when she married Arthur, Lucy had expected him to supply the parental love and security. But of course he hadn’t. She had never been able to count on his approval. At best he was kindly and tolerant. He had refused to be her father, her mother, and in any deeply emotional sense, her husband. Meanwhile, the bond with Marge held. Larry could see that any danger Marge might be in would upset her. She could talk calmly about Janice because the tie with Arthur was, in a sense, secondary, not her basic drive or consideration.
“You know yourself what it means to have a first baby at forty-two,” Lucy said. “The doctor keeps saying she’ll get along all right, but she’s been wretched. Simply wretched. Do you remember how she used to giggle?”
The hysterical cackle that broadcast Marge’s unfulfillment with Ed rang now in Larry’s ear.
“She never does any more. She doesn’t even smile.”
“Wait until the baby comes. She’ll feel better. By the way, how’s Ed?”
“Having labor pains,” Lucy smiled. “He hasn’t slept eight hours any night in months.”
“He’ll lose his jitters outside the delivery room. When is the baby due?”
“In a few more weeks. The doctor doesn’t know exactly. I can’t leave her. You see why, don’t you, Larry?”
“I see some things,” he admitted cautiously. “How about Phil? Does he look after you?”
She fondled the rim of the thick white cup with her finger. “He trots me over to Marge’s every night, and on weekends he makes me get away and go to the movies.”
“He’s been around for a long time. He must mean it. Nice boy, Phil.” Larry hadn’t intended the remark to sound patronizing. A nice boy was what Lucy needed, someone to be young with.
“What do you think I should do, Larry? If Arthur decides to stay down there? You’re his friend, of course, and it isn’t fair to ask your advice, but I can’t go to Marge and Ed. They’re too upset right now, and anyway I’m not sure they would understand.” Lucy dropped her hands limply into her lap. “It’s a strange thing, Larry, considering how he used to act around them, but do you know they’re fond of him? Ever since Arthur took sick and started to be a little more considerate. When I spoke to Marge this morning, she asked me if I’d had a letter from Washington. She asks me almost every day. I think Arthur means a great deal to her.”
“Don’t they care for Phil?”
“They take him for granted. You see, to them, he’s not special like Arthur. Just because he’s nice to all of us and never raises a fuss—” She paused thoughtfully. “Arthur takes him for granted, too. Phil’s that kind of a person, easy going, no trouble to be with.”
“You don’t take him for granted, do you?”
“I feel comfortable with him, and you were right before, Larry. I’m tired. I’d like to forget problems and fussing. If I could sit somewhere quietly with someone who likes me for myself——”
Larry looked at the gray-blonde lashes, quiet on her cheek, and felt at peace, the way he had a year ago at the funeral of a friend. It was as if he had witnessed the death of her turmoil and sharp emotions. It was a kind of amen to the small, ignoble discords between the Bemroses.
“Phil can’t advise me. He’s too mixed up in it. Tell me what you think,” Lucy urged.
“How can you be sure what to do? Washington may not work out,” Larry reminded her. “In a month or so—” He shrugged. “There may be a blow-up. You can’t tell about a woman like Janice.”
If they clashed, it would be a good, earthy blow-up that let off steam, Larry knew, not a nagging quarrel, but because Arthur and Janice cared enough for it to matter. The thought comforted Larry.
“All right.” Lucy sighed. “I know you can’t be sure, and anyway you don’t want things spoiled for him. You’re afraid someday he’ll want to come home, and you think the place should be there waiting for him. There’s no rush about deciding, and of course it always will be there.” She tidied the wisps of hair under her nursemaid bonnet of blue ribbon. “I better go. I promised Ed that I’d help fix Marge’s supper.”
On the way to the Broadway car she promised to go to Washington, since Arthur insisted, as soon as Marge was out of the woods. Although Larry knew it wouldn’t repair the frayed moorings of their marriage, he felt better for having obtained her word. Bemrose was almost certain to question him.
The trolley was a good four or five blocks away, and they stomped on the corner to keep warm. “Does Phil want babies?” Larry asked her.
“Why?”
“You ought to have some. You’d be good for them.”
She touched the back of his thick, lined glove. “Poor Larry,” she sympathized.
While he was brushing his teeth that evening, he realized what she had meant. Poor Larry. No kids of his own. Poor Larry, an inveterate father hen with no babies. Poor Larry, fussing over Bemrose because there was no one else to fuss over.