A Garden of Earthly Delights (38 page)

“I don't want her.”

“Why the hell do you want me?”

“I'm tired of talking.”

“What? What does that mean?”

“I'm tired of talking, of thinking the way she did. I'm tired of thinking.”

Clara raised the bottle to her mouth again, trying to rid herself of that trembling she hated so. She felt that her body was moving off from her, going its own way and paying no attention to what she wanted.

“I joined the Army, honey,” he said. “I came back to the States and enlisted just in time.”

“You what?”

“I've been over in Europe, you know where that is? I want somebody who doesn't know where that is,” he said. He was not smiling. He caressed Clara's arm and she did not move it away; she watched his hand moving on her skin. There were tufted blond hairs on the backs of his fingers and she thought that she remembered them, yes, she remembered every one of them. His fingernails were thick and milky, ridged just a little with dirt. Lowry was staring at her. “You've changed quite a bit, Clara. You really are a woman now.”

Clara looked away.

“I know why he loves you. I don't blame him. But he's already married and he has a family—he won't be able to do anything for you. You know that. You could never fit in with those people, you're nothing at all like them. He won't marry you.”

“Shut up about that.”

“Clara, you know I'm telling the truth.”

“He loves me. And anyway this is none of your—”

“But sitting around here waiting for someone to die—a woman you don't even know—”

“I don't know her but I hate her,” Clara said viciously.

Lowry was amused at this. “How can you hate her if you don't know her?”

“He'll marry me after she dies,” Clara said.

“You'd really like to be his wife?”

“I would.”

“I don't believe that.”

“Go to hell then! What's wrong with you? You want everything handed over to you—even a son like that, a kid given to you.
Right?” She drew her breath in sharply, watching him. She felt as if she were on the brink of something terrible.

“If he's your kid.…” Lowry said. But his answer was just vague enough to lessen the tension between them. “He's a quiet boy.”

“He's strong and growing fast. He's smart too.”

“I could see it was your boy right away.…”

“Lowry, why did you come back?”

“I was meaning to come for a long time. I sent you a letter, didn't I?”

“What letter?”

“A letter from Mexico.”

“I never got it.”

“Sure you did.”

“I never did.”

“Didn't that bastard give it to you… ?”

“No.” Clara rubbed her hands against her eyes. “What was in it, news about your wife? A wedding invitation?” Then she stared at him. “Or did you really write a letter, really? I don't know whether to believe you or not.… You were married and everything.…”

“Honey, don't be so jealous. You're still jealous after all this time.”

“I'm not jealous. I really don't give a damn.”

“I thought I wanted a different kind of woman, that's all. You and she are nothing like each other—honey, a man wouldn't bother looking at her if you were around. But I thought I wanted something that it turned out I didn't.”

“Now you want somebody stupid, somebody who can't talk or bother you,” Clara said. “Somebody to make love to and forget about, right? And you know you'll always be welcome when you come back, so what the hell?
She
threw you out right away.”

“No.”

“What the hell kind of a marriage was it?”

“Clara, don't be so angry.”

“I'm not angry.”

“Drink your beer, finish it up.”

“I don't want it, I feel like puking.”

Her being like that, being vulgar, was just enough to make him laugh a little. She could not trust herself to look at him too steadily. It was like staring at a light, at something blinding; in a few seconds the center could fade away and she might see nothing.

“So I left her and went back to the States and enlisted. I went to England for a while, then over to France. Someday I'll tell you about what happened.”

“You were over there all that time?”

“For two years.”

“You really were in the Army?”

“Sure.”

“And I didn't know it.… What if you were killed?”

Lowry laughed bitterly. “There were a few of us who got killed.”

“But Lowry, you couldn't die. What if— You—”

She ran out of words. It was so close to her, this knowledge of Lowry and Lowry's death, a possibility Lowry himself maybe could not see. He took her bottle from her and set it down and pulled her into his lap. “Would you have worried about me, honey?”

“Yes, Lowry.”

“You didn't get that letter?”

“No. Never.”

“Did you miss me?”

“Yes.”

“Did you wish I was here?”

“Yes.”

“What about Revere, then?”

“He loved me, he took care of me—”

“Do you love him? Did you?”

“I don't know—”

“Was it hard for you, having the kid like that? Without being married?”

“No. I didn't think about that.”

“You didn't care?”

“No.”

“You wanted the kid, huh?”

“Sure I wanted him.”

Lowry smoothed her hair back. He looked at her as if she were really some distance away. After a moment he said, “He isn't my kid, is he?”

Clara's lips parted in shock. “No.”

“Does he look like Revere?”

“Mostly he looks like me.”

“I used to know Revere,” he said. “I didn't tell you this but my family was like yours—except my father did farmwork. He went from farm to farm, always getting kicked out. Finally he took off and left us, and my mother took the kids back to her mother. I was fourteen then. Once my father worked for Revere.… I didn't tell you that.”

“But I thought—”

“We're like each other, you and me, except I went places and tried to find out some things and even got shot for my trouble, while you camped down and got everything you wanted. Those are real nice plants, honey,” he said. He kissed her. “I can't tell you how much I like them. I like this house. If I hadn't been told whose house it was—”

“Lowry, I thought—I thought your family—”

“Just white trash, honey.”

“But you had a nice car, and had money to spend—”

“I was helping somebody run whiskey. My family was all gone by that time.”

“Run whiskey? Was that it?” And she could not keep the flat surprised sound of disappointment out of her voice.

“I pulled out and tried to get something going in Mexico, I had a few thousand dollars I'd taken from this bastard I worked for, and I wanted to start something—some business—but nothing turned out. I didn't know enough. I met her then—”

“Your wife.”

“She was sort of bumming around but she was a teacher too, she had a job she could point to. Her family kept sending people after her, trying to get her back home—she was staying with me then— and she maybe married me to get back at them, to make them shut up. She told me I was fooling myself with my life, running around and never getting anywhere— She was right, but what the hell.”

“No, she wasn't right—”

“What the hell.”

“Did you say somebody shot you?”

“Nothing much, just in the leg here.”

Clara touched his thigh. “Is it all right?”

“It's all right now.”

“Did it hurt awful?”

“I don't know.”

“Lowry, for God's sake—”

“What?”

“You were in the war and everything, you got shot—I never knew about it—”

“Lots of people get shot. They're getting shot right now. Or bombed to pieces, that's even better. I don't want to talk about it.”

“Were you in a hospital?”

She saw his mouth jerk as if he had to taste something ugly, so she let that pass. He was quiet. She was not angry. She said, “Were you surprised about me?”

“No. Maybe.”

“What did you think?”

“I didn't think you'd still be around here. Or I thought you'd be married.”

“This is the same as being married.”

“Not quite.”

“I have a kid.”

“Revere doesn't live with you, honey. How often does he come over?”

“When he can.”

“These days he's a busy man. How much money do you think he's making off the war, him and his people?”

“I don't know anything about it. He never says.”

“They say he's making money off it. Why not? All the trash from around here and all the hillbilly backwashes in the country that didn't get shipped over to die are working their heads off in the factories, making lots of money. Or so they think. Your friend has investments in things like that.”

“He never says—”

“Why should he? When he comes to you he forgets about it. But I knew you first, I brought you here. For two years I've been thinking about you. I didn't even think about her—my wife—I thought right past her to you.”

“Did you?”

“I thought about you all the time. I thought that if I got back here and they let me out—”

“What?”

“If I got back I'd come right here and get you and we'd go somewhere. Even if you were already married I was going to come back and marry you.”

“Marry me?”

“Now I'm going to do this: I'm going up to Canada, to British Columbia. They're giving away land there, practically. Thousands of acres. I have a little money and we're going to get clear of everything except the outdoors, we'll have a farm, I can learn how to work on one again—”

“Lowry, you're crazy—”

“Why am I crazy?”

“I don't know, it's just—I—”

“Why are you afraid?”

Clara pushed away from him and got to her feet. Her teeth had begun to chatter; she felt that the very air about her had turned brittle. “I don't want to hear it,” Clara said. She closed her eyes and shook her head slowly. “Don't say anything to me. I'm afraid what I might do. How can I change … ? Once there was a man that looked like you, in a gas station—”

“And?”

“He made me think about you all over again.”

Lowry got up. “Honey, everything is beautiful here. This old house is beautiful. Out the window there—those trees—it's all beautiful. We'll have a place just like this in Canada, by ourselves.”

“Lowry, no.”

“You don't know what you have here, how beautiful it is. You don't understand what it is,” he said. “Over there I thought about you all the time, Clara. You were at the center of what I was trying
to think about. I remembered how it was by the ocean, and down by the river that day—how nice you were to me— Nobody was ever as nice to me as you were, Clara. I know that now.”

Clara went out into the kitchen and stood at the screen door. She heard Lowry following behind her. Her fingernails picked nervously at the screen, at tiny rust specks or dirt embedded there. Outside, Swan was digging a hole by the fence that cut off the orchard from an old pasture. “Swan?” she called. “What are you doing?”

He looked around. “This here,” he said, his small clear voice a surprise to her. He lifted the spade. After a moment, staring at her and at Lowry behind her, he turned away self-consciously.

“Suppose that was your kid, what then?” Clara said.

“It wouldn't matter, I would want him with us even if he wasn't,” Lowry said. And that answer, that should have sounded so good to her, somehow didn't; she had wanted something else. “I'm thirty-two,” he said. “I had my thirtieth birthday over there and I never thought I'd get that old. Now I'm back here and I could maybe forget about all that, if I could begin everything over.”

Clara stared at him. She did not understand.

“You're worried he's going to come?” Lowry said.

“No.”

“What are you worried about?”

She pushed past him. “I've got to fix supper,” she said.

“Forget about supper.”

“You've got to eat, and Swan—”

“Forget about it. Come back here with me.”

“Lowry, I can't.”

“Come on.”

She stared miserably at the floor. Everything was draining out of her, all her strength, all the hatred that had kept Lowry close to her for so long. It struck her that she had fed on this hatred and that it had kept her going, given her life. Now that he was here and standing before her, she could not remember why she had hated him.

“You bastard,” she whispered. “Coming back here like this— You—”

“Let me make you quiet,” Lowry said.

She looked up at his smile, which was exactly like the smile she remembered.

“That boy is still outside playing,” Lowry said. From the bed he was leaning to look out the window. Clara, lying still, watched the long smooth curve of his back. “Any other kid would come bothering you, but he doesn't. How does he know that much?”

“Smart, like his father.”

“Why is he so quiet?”

“He isn't quiet. He was afraid of you.”

“He shouldn't have been afraid of me.”

#x201C;A strange man coming up the lane, walking up the lane like that.… I was afraid of you myself.”

“Are you afraid now?”

She wanted to say angrily that she would always be afraid of him, that there was nothing she could do to keep herself from him and that this was terrible, this power he had over her. But she lay still. Her hair was tangled around her damply; she felt soiled, bruised.

“I'm sorry if … I upset you,” Lowry said gently.

He pressed himself against her again, hiding his face against her, and she felt how soft even a man's flesh can be, lying so delicate on top of his bones; and if it had all been blown apart, shot apart, what then? If the bullets that had shot about Lowry in the dark, over there in Europe, across the world in Europe, had hit him instead and stopped dead in his body, what then? He would not have come back to make love to her. Lowry's body, which was all of him that she could see and touch, would be rotted over there in a ditch in a place she would not even know by name, could not even imagine because she would not have the power to do so … and what then? She caressed his back and her hand came away wet with sweat. That was all she had to go by. She felt how weak they both were, she and Lowry, how the terrible power he had in his body and in his hard muscular legs passed over into this weakness that was not at all like the weakness before sleep but was something heavy and close to death, like lying on the bottom of an ocean of sweat, their bodies still trembling from all the violence they had suffered. She felt as if
a wound had been viciously opened up in her, secret in her body, and that all her strength had drained away through it and left her helpless again.