From Here to Eternity (7 page)

feeling up to it, Sir. She's none too strong, you know. Things like that excite her so." "Ah," the Col said. 'Too bad. Told my wife I was afraid of that. Ah, will she be feeling well enough by the time the Brigadier's party comes up?" "I hope so, Sir," Capt Holmes said. "I know how badly she would hate to miss it." "Ah," the Col said. "Certainly hope'll be able to come. We all enjoy her company so much. Charmin' lady, really, Captain." "Thank you, Sir," Capt Holmes said, not looking back at that red light at the bottom of the deepness. "By the way, Captain, I 'm giving another little stag next week. I 've secured the same apartment upstairs at the Club. You 're invited, of course." Holmes's eyes went opaque again as he grinned, shamefacedly. "I'll be there, Sir." "Ah," the Col said, opening his mouth and tilting back his head and looking at the other down his nose. "Fine. Good. Thats good." He opened another of his desk drawers. Capt Holmes left. The stag made him feel a little better, in spite of the pinning down. How could anyone say positively who would win? But at least he wasnt on the shitlist yet, those stags were exclusive, nothing but rank there. But down deep it did not change a thing and the porch and stairs, as he went down going home now to lunch, had lost their sense of permanence. Some day he would be reassigned, back to the States he hoped, anyway some place where there was Cavalry again. What a wild idea this had been, this going in the Infantry just to do a tour in the Islands, the goddamned Paradise of the Pacific. Still, he told himself, it isn't as if you're going to spend the rest of your life in Schofield Barracks. What can he do? He would have to speak to Karen, though. The Colonel would want her at the Brigadier's party. He would have to talk her into going, some way. If she would only consent to be nice to the old duffer, it might mean the majority even if the squad lost, this year or next. He didnt want her to sleep with him or anything like that. Just be nice to him. Walking out the truck entrance he returned the salutes of several privates coming from the PX without seeing them, and crossed the street to the house.

CHAPTER 6

KAREN HOLMES was absorbed in the brushing of her long blonde hair when she heard the back door slam and the heavy tread of Holmes across the kitchen floor. She had been brushing it now almost an hour, rapt in the purely sensual pleasure of it that required no thought, free for once in this that did not make her think of freedom, alive to these long golden hairs that singly and in masses curved themselves about the stiff long bristles of the brush, until it had, as she desired, entranced her, away from all of it. Away where nothing else existed but this mirror in" which she saw the rhythm of this moving arm that was herself. That was why she loved to brush her hair so. She loved to cook, too; for the same reason. She was an excellent cook, when she felt like it. She also read voraciously. She could even enjoy the poor books, when she had to. She was not, accurately, of the stuff from which an Army wife is made. The slamming door broke the rapture, and she found that she was staring into the eyes of her own deathmask, pale and wan with all the blood sucked out by a modern vampire called Embalmer, leaving only the gashed bloody wound that was her lipsticked mouth. It was urging her to hurry up and find the thing. Leave me, Mask, she said at it. If, replied the Mask, you shrink from evil when its cloak is flung upon your shoulders, the more closely will it wrap its suffocating folds around you. She laid aside the brush and covered with her hands the face that haunted her most of all with its futility of emptiness, hearing the footsteps of Military Doom coming swift across the dining room. Holmes barged into the room, his hat still on his head. "Oh," he said, guiltily. "Hello. I didnt know you were home. I just came in to change my uniform." Karen picked up the brush and went back to her hair. "The car is parked outside," she said. "It is?" Holmes said. "I didnt see it." "I went over to the Company this morning," Karen said, "looking for you." "What for?" Holmes said. "You know I dont like to have you over there, around the men." "I wanted you to get some things for me," she lied. "I thought you'd be there." "I had some business to attend to before I went in," Holmes lied. He undid his tie and threw it on the bed and sat down with the boot jack. Karen did not answer. "That was all right, wasnt it?" he protested. "But of course," she said. "I have no right to inquire into your actions. That was the agreement." "Then why bring it up?" "Because I wanted you to know I'm not as stupid as you maintain all women are." Holmes stood the boots up by the bed and stripped off sweat-damp shirt and breeches. "Now what does that mean? What are you accusing me of now?" "Of nothing," Karen smiled. "Its no longer any of my business how many you go out with, is it? But I wish for God's sake you could just be honest about it once." "Now," he cried disgustedly, seeing the excitement of the riding date fading rapidly before him, "Now! All I did was come home to change my uniform and get some lunch. Thats all." "I thought," she said, "you didnt know I was here." "I didnt, goddam it. I just thought, you might be here," he finished lamely, flustered at being caught in the lie. "God damn," he blustered. "Other women. What brings that on this time? How many times do I have to tell you I havent any other women before you'll believe me?" "Dana," Karen said. "Give me credit for a little brains." She laughed, and looking in the mirror, broke off suddenly, shocked at the hatred that was on her face. "If I had them," he said, self-pity in his voice, putting on fresh socks, "dont you think I'd admit it to you? Theres no reason I should try to hide it, is there? the way things are between us now?" he asked her bitterly. "What right have you to always be accusing me of that?" "What right?" Karen said, looking at him in the mirror. Under the indictment of her eyes Holmes cringed. "All right," he said dejectedly. "That again. How long will it be, I wonder, before I am allowed to live that down? How many times do I have to tell you, It Was An Accident?" "That makes it all all right, I suppose," she said. "That takes all the scars away, and we can just pretend it didn't happen." "I didnt say that," Holmes cried. "I know what its done to you. But how was I to know? I didnt know it myself until too late. What more is there for me to say, except I'm sorry?" Looking back at her in the mirror he tried to be indignant, but had to drop his eyes. The uniform on the floor shamed him with the existence of the wet spots of his body water on its cloth. "Please, Dana," Karen said shrilly, franticness in her voice. "You know how much I hate to talk about it. I'm trying to forget it." "All right," Holmes said. "You brought it up. I dont like to think about it either, but neither one of us will ever be allowed to forget it. I've lived with it for eight years now." He stood up wearily, walking to the closet for another uniform, temporarily defeated. All the anticipation of this afternoon's adventure was gone now, hardly seeming worth the trouble. "So have I lived with it," Karen called after him. "You got off easy. At least it didnt scar you any." Furtively, on the side away from him, privately, she slipped her hand down to her belly, feeling with her fingers the thick ridge of the scar. There lies the evil, she thought hysterically, the grape torn open and the seed plucked out and left withering on the vine. All the foulness of all the soppy secret dampness, the sliding slippery airless dark came back on her now and overwhelmed her as the gaseous bubble burst in her mind, scenting it with the memory of foulness that she must escape. In the closet Holmes made up his mind to go riding anyway, whether he wanted to or not, because to hell with it and he'd take a bottle. Under the unpleasantness he dreaded he grinned back at himself. When he stepped out in fresh underwear the change in him was already apparent. The dejection and the guilt were gone and in their place was sureness. He had assumed the hangdog air of a synthetic plaintiveness that was his defense that always wrested victory from the acceptance of defeat. Karen recognized the attitude. In the mirror she could see him in his underwear, massive, hairy, legs bowed grotesquely by so many hours on a horse - at Bliss he had been the captain of the polo team - and the thick black hair on his chest padding out the T-shirt like excelsior a cushion. His face, heavy bearded, had that gross blue sensuality of a fecund priest, and the same proud-suffering air. He had only shaved below his collarline, and the black curls reached up to the shaved neck like living flames sucked up a flue. Her stomach flopped in her sickeningly, like a big fish slimy on the hook, at the sight of him who was her husband. She moved along the seat before the dressing table until she could no longer see his reflection. "I saw Colonel Delbert this morning," Holmes said. "He asked me if we were coming to General Hendrick's party." His big jaw set, watching her levelly, he moved over to where his image was before her in the mirror again, casually, as he was putting on the breeches. Karen watched him do it, knowing what he was doing now, yet still unable to keep her nerves from jangling like a plucked guitar string. "We'll have to go," he said. "Theres no way out of it. Also, his wife is having another tea; I got you out of that." "You can get me out of the other, too," Karen said, but her tone had lost its commanding air and was half-hearted. "If you want to go, go by yourself." "I cant keep on going by myself forever," Holmes said plaintively. "You can if you tell them I'm sick, which will be the truth. Let them think I'm an invalid, I'm near enough to make it ethical." "Simmons has been shipped down from football," he said. "That leaves a majority open. The Old Man told me about it, then asked if you werent coming to the party." "The last time I went to a party where he was, you remember, I came home with my gown torn nearly off." "He was a little tight," Holmes said. "He didnt really mean anything by it." "I hope not," Karen said thinly. "If I wanted a man to sleep with I'd pick a man, not that beery tub of guts." "I'm serious," Holmes said, transferring the insignia from the dirty shirt to the clean one. "Your being nice to him might mean all the difference now, since this Simmons thing has opened up." "I've helped you with your work all I can," she said. "You know I have. I've gone to parties I've hated. Its been my part of the bargain, to play the loving wife. But the one thing I wont do is sleep with Colonel Delbert for you." "Nobody wants you to. All I'm asking is that you be decent to him." "You cant be decent with a lecherous old rou6. It makes me physically sick." Unconsciously, she picked up the brush and began to brush her hair again, distractedly. "A majority is worth getting physically sick over," Holmes said, pleadingly. "A man with a majority now, if he graduated from the Point, will be a General officer when this war thats coming ends. All you have to do is smile and listen to him talk about his grandfather." "A smile, to him, is only an invitation to put his hands between your legs. He's got a wife. Why doesnt he take it out on her?" "Yes," Holmes said tautly. "Why doesnt he?" Karen winced before the accusation, even knowing it was purely theoretical. Before this melancholy suffering-lover role the nerve ends of her body vibrated shatteringly. "It was your part of our agreement," Holmes said sadly. "All right," she said. "All right. I'll go. There I said it, now lets talk about something else." "What are we having for lunch?" Holmes said. "I'm hungry, hungry as hell. I've had one hell of a day, listening to Delbert. He can talk your leg off. Then having to argue half the morning with the kitchen force, and this new transfer Prewitt." He looked at her closely. "It completely exhausts me nervously." She waited until he finished. "You know this is the maid's day off." Holmes's eyes crinkled painfully. "Is it? By god! What is today? Thursday? I thought today was Wednesday." He looked hopefully at his watch, then shrugged. "Well, its too late to go up to the Club now. Wouldnt I do it though?" Karen, feeling him watching her closely, tried to go on brushing to escape the sense of guilt because she was not offering to fix a lunch for him. He never ate lunch at home and it was not in her part of the bargain they had made, yet still he was making her feel like a heartless criminal. "I guess I'll just have to catch one of those lousy sandwiches at the PX," Holmes said resignedly. He fidgeted around for a minute and sat down on the bed. "What do you eat for lunch?" he said with the air of one who shamefacedly makes a great imposition. "I usually just fix soup for myself," Karen said, breathing deeply. "Oh," he said. "You know I dont eat soup." "You asked me, didnt you?" she said, trying to keep her voice from going higher. "I fix myself soup. Why should I lie?" Holmes got up hastily. "Now, darling," he said. "Now take it easy. I'll just go on over to the PX. I dont mind. You know what it does to you to get upset. You just cant stand it. You'll have yourself sick in bed." "Theres nothing wrong with me," she protested. "I'm no bedfast invalid," thinking how he had no right to use that word with her, to call her darling. He always did it, in these spells, and the word was like a skewer pinning her to the beaverboard among the other butterflies of his collection. In her imagination she saw herself rising up, telling him what she thought of him, packing a bag and leaving, to live her own life and earn her own way. She would get a job and an apartment someplace. What kind of a job? she asked herself. In your physical condition what can you do? what training have you? Besides to be a wife. "You know your nerves arent strong, darling," Holmes was saying. "Just quiet down now and take it easy. Just relax." He walked over and put his hands soothingly on her shoulders, gripping them affectionately and lightly, and looking solicitously into her eyes in the mirror. Karen felt them on her, holding her down, tying her down, as her life was tied down, and she had the same sensation she remembered having as a child when out in the woods she had caught her dress on the barbs of a wire fence, and she had lunged and plunged and pulled until she got loose leaving half her dress behind, even though her mother was coming all the time to help her. "Thats it, relax," Holmes smiled. "Now you just fix yourself lunch the way you would if I wasnt here and I'll eat whatever you have for yourself. Now. Hows that?" "I can fix you a toasted cheese sandwich," Karen said weakly. "Okay," he smiled. "Cheese will be fine." He followed her out to the kitchen and while she got the lunch ready, sat at the kitchen table following her with his eyes. When she measured out the coffee, his eyes watched her solicitously. When she greased the skillet and set it on the burner, his eyes watched her, carefully protecting. Karen prided herself on her cooking, it was her only art an,d she had learned to do it well and with the least amount of wasted time and motion. But now, for some reason, she forgot about the coffee, and it boiled over. When she grabbed up the pot she burnt her hand. Holmes jumped up with magnificent speed and grabbed a dishtowel to wipe up the stove. "Now, now," he said. "Just forget it. I'll clean it up. You sit down. You're worn out." Karen put her hands up to her face. "No, I'm not," she said. "Just let me fix it. I'm sorry I boiled it. I can fix it all right. Please. Let me fix it." It was then she smelled the smoke. She caught the cheese sandwich just in time to keep it from burning. It was black on one side. "Thats all right," Holmes smiled bravely. "Now just forget it, darling. I dont want you to get upset. This is perfectly all right." "Let me scrape it for you," Karen said. "No, no. Its perfectly all right like this. This is good. It really is." He chomped on the sandwich to show how fine it was. He ate it with gusto. He did not drink any coffee. "I'll catch a cup at the PX," he smiled. "I have to go back over to the Company to sign some papers anyway. You go in and lie down and get some rest. It was really a fine lunch, truly it was." Karen stood in the screendoor watching him go down the alley. After he was gone she went back in the bedroom. She put her hands down at her sides and forced herself to relax them. She coughed once or twice, rackingly, but she did not cry. She made herself breathe deeply. She relaxed her muscles, but the nerves inside them went on fluttering frantically. Furtively, as if it had an intelligence of its own, her hand moved up to her stomach and touched the ridge of scar tissue, and the horror she held of her own body, of the pusiness, of the cheesy degenerations, began to rise up queasily. The grape torn open and the seed plucked out,
withering before it ever came to fruition. That isnt so, she told herself, you know it isnt so. You've borne his heir for him, who can say your life is fruitless? How can you be fruitless? You've been a mother, haven't you? There must be more, there must be, something told her, someplace, somewhere, there must be another reason, above, beyond, somewhere another Equation beside this virgin + marriage + motherhood + grandmotherhood = honor, justification, death. There must be another language, forgotten unheard unspoken, than the owning of an American's Homey Kitchen complete with dinette, breakfast nook, and fluorescent lighting. Among the broken bathroom fixtures and the sticky brightly colored rainwashed labels on the emptied cans, Karen Holmes 'was searching through the city dump of civilization, desperately hunting for her life, and the muck she got upon her fingers didnt matter. There was so much of it already, Karen felt, upon her.