Gibbon's Decline and Fall (2 page)

“He will be so hurt if you don't go,” said Aunt Livia, whose function it was to have the Last Word.

“Yes, Carolyn. He would be hurt,” said Mama.

Which clinched it. What Mama meant was, if Carolyn didn't accept Albert's invitation, Mama would be hurt. The aunts would eat her alive. Albert and the aunts, including Albert's mama, Aunt Fan, had decided that Albert and Carolyn were to be a Crespin couple. Albert Crespin was Crespin through and through—a highly inbred member of the clan, Aunt Fan a kind of cousin to Albert's daddy and all that—unlike Carolyn, who was a Crespin only on her father's side, her father having inexplicably married outside his ilk, then unforgivably up and died before he could inculcate proper Crespin values into his only child. Though that wasn't supposed to matter, for Albert was Crespin enough for the two of them.

“Of course, Mama, Aunties, if you wish,” Carolyn said, smiling sweetly. It was what one said as a last resort. It solved problems. It quieted tempers. It got Carolyn off the hook, at least temporarily, though she had a sick pain in her stomach that did not feel transitory.

Aunts Clotilde, Atrena, and Livia exchanged superior glances. There, the faces said. One has only to be Firm With The Child. Mama was looking into her lap, her lower lip quivering ever so slightly. She was frightened of the aunts; she was well and truly hooked and gaffed. Carolyn's father had left an annuity for his widow, an annuity that could be stretched to cover clothing and salary for Mama's maid and Carolyn's education and a few small charities, but it wouldn't stretch to such necessities as housing and heat and lights and taxes, so Mama and Carolyn either lived with the family or they didn't live. Unless Mama got married again.

Which, though Mama was quite young and lovely, she would never do. Clotilde, Atrena, and Livia believed that Mama's remarriage would be Unfaithful to Dear Roger's Memory. They'd won that one long ago.

And now that the matter of Albert and Carolyn was settled, they gathered up their needlework and went off to settle
someone else's fate. Mama, with a grateful caress across Carolyn's shoulder, went in the other direction, toward the bathroom. She often spent hours in the tub, breathing moist perfumed vapors, safe in the only sanctum the aunts would not invade.

Carolyn was left alone on the summer porch, once shaded by huge old elms. She remembered summer-dusk games under the elms, herself leaning against a great tree, eyes hidden in her hands, slowly counting: twenty-nine … fifty-six … ninety-five … one hundred. Ready or not, here I come! Here I come seeking something that has no name, something hidden, something wonderful. Here I come, with no idea where it is but needing so … so much to find it. It was only her cousins, hiding out there, so why had she felt that she might find the other thing? Even now, when dusk came and she heard the voices of children playing, she remembered that feeling of mysterious anticipation. Marvel, just around the corner. Wonder, hidden in shadows, if she could only find it.

Everything had changed since then. All the elms were gone now. Once-shaded houses stood full in the glare of the August sun, as she herself now stood, no longer protected by leafy childhood, alone in the baking heat and burning light of Crespin conformity.

The Crespin men went into banking and law. Crespin women did not work outside the home except for certain charities, and they did not join many of those. If one joined groups, one might have to associate with persons one had not picked as acquaintances. One did, of course, practice one's religion devoutly, and one did entertain one's husband's business associates, but that was a different matter, akin to diplomacy. To prepare for that, one studied languages, one learned about opera and art, one even boned up on whatever esoterica a distinguished visitor was said to be interested in. In this Crespins were rather like royalty. Noblesse oblige, as a matter of course, but no damned familiarity allowed.

Crespin women, though not always pretty, were uniformly fashionable though not faddish, slender though not bony, aristocratic to a fault. They went to good Catholic prep schools, after which they might spend a year or so perfecting French or German on the Continent, under proper supervision, before attending college. At home they learned the Crespin vocabulary as they learned the catechism, and for the same reason. Salvation was dependent upon knowing What The
Family Meant. There were patronizing words to remind inferiors of their proper place, there was inconsequential chitchat to keep strangers at a distance, there were courteous words for religious occasions and implacable phrases for inculcating Crespin-consciousness in the young.

Carolyn did not fit. She made friends with the maids, she discussed anything at all with people she met on the train, she argued with Father O'Brien about the catechism, and had so far remained stocky, untidy, ungraceful, willful, un-Crespinized.

“But, my dear child,” Aunt Clotilde had said on a former occasion, “Crespin women do not Work Outside the Home. They certainly do not go into the professions.”

“Crespin women do not go into anything but becoming interfering, arrogant old tyrants, so far as I can see.”

Carolyn's mama, shocked: “Carolyn, apologize to your aunt at once!”

“Mother, I
am
sorry, but it's you and me I'm sorry for. You weren't born a Crespin, and I'm evidently a throwback or something. I don't want to be a Crespin woman! I want to be a lawyer.” Was it just that Father had been a lawyer? Or was it a longing for the real, the true, the eternal, rather than whatever the Crespins were?

Though she was fifteen at the time of that outburst, she had been Sent To Her Room. It was typical of Crespin culture that single women even in their twenties might be Sent To Their Rooms, and wives at any age likewise, though with a quiet word whispered into an ear. “My dear, you're overwrought. My dear, go lie down for a bit.” It did no good to rebel. The custom predated the Victorian age and had all the power of tradition. Women, when in public, were always groomed, poised, gracious, and socially adept, and Carolyn would conform or else. There were inevitabilities at work; in the end the aunts would have their way. They were the spinners of history, the passers on of tradition, those who trimmed and chopped away all spontaneity. Even the temporary freedom offered by college, the exposure to ordinary people, was part of the plan.

As for Albert, he was an American hero in the postlarval stage, a lawyer with the FBI. Albert was devout; he worked indefatigably with the Knights of Columbus. Albert had Served in Korea, albeit (strings had been pulled) in the office of the judge advocate. Until the time a few years back when
Senator Joe McCarthy had gone down in flames, Albert had been one of the senator's more ardent supporters. Even now Albert saw himself as standing between America and all those who would sully her purity.

On the night of Carolyn's graduation from St. Mary's, Albert had taken her out to dinner and told her all about their plans, his and hers: They would be engaged when she graduated from college and married six months later, to allow time for the various prenuptial festivities that the aunts would arrange. It was too soon for a ring, but he presented her with an eighteen-karat charm bracelet, announcing in a patronizing tone that he would add pretty charms over the next four years. Carolyn supposed it was a kind of option plan. One charm bought him a Carolyn foot, another paid for a leg, another gained him the left tit. By the time they were married, she'd be all paid for, the last charm claiming the necessary part for the wedding night.

So, all right, she'd go to Washington and be shown where Albert worked. One thing the aunts were right about. She was safe with Albert. Albert had never provoked in her the tiniest throb of lust. His kisses were chaste, his embraces perfunctory, and she might as well be out with Father O'Brien. As a matter of fact, Father O'Brien, for all his years and his cassock, had more of a twinkle than Albert did.

Washington was very much as Carolyn had supposed it would be. Hot. Full of tourists. Not in the FBI building, of course, which Albert escorted her through in the manner of a high priest showing the ritual objects. How do you do, Mr. So-and-So? How do you do, Mr. So-and-So Else? Laboratories. Offices. Why in God's name would anyone look at this stuff? It was dull. Albert was dull.

“Carolyn, may I present my colleagues, Mike Winter …”

Yet another. She offered her gloved hand, made the polite smile at Mr. Winter, smooth and slim and rather weary looking for a person only a few years older than she, midtwenties, perhaps.

“And Hal Shepherd.”

She turned to Mr. Shepherd, looked up into warm brown eyes, felt her smile broaden in response to the one on his face, felt her mind melt like ice cream, glow like summertime at the beach, like picnics and the Fourth of July. Hal … Mr. Shepherd.
Older than the other one by at least a decade. He was like a teddy bear, like a sea wind, like a glass of fresh lemonade. His hand was warm and firm in her own.

“Carolyn. You bring light into otherwise dusky lives. I love your hat!”

And Carolyn, who'd been more than a little self-conscious about the hat, crowed inside like a baby rooster. This was a feeling she'd never had before, a kind of airy euphoria, a bubble of smile stuck in her middle.

“Mike and Hal and their wives will be joining us for dinner this evening,” said Albert.

And the bubble grew shrunken and chill, whirled on itself, became a dust devil, a withdrawing wind. Wives. Well, of course wife. Of course he was married. He was in his thirties, like Albert. Of course, of course. Still, his smile stayed warm as they went down a wide corridor, as he put out an arm to save her being trampled by a group of purposeful, oblivious men who were headed in the opposite direction.

“Did you see who that was?” Albert whispered to Hal, ignoring Carolyn, forgetting Carolyn. His voice was awed, almost worshiping.

“Webster,” said Mike in a toneless voice.

“L. S. Webster?” asked Hal, his eyes angry. “What's he doing here?”

“It has to be important,” breathed Albert reverently. He stared avidly after the group moving down the hallway. Carolyn, every perception sharpened, took in every detail: Hal's face, Mike's face, Albert's face, following their eyes to the men moving away down the corridor. The man at the center of the group was only a shape, taller than the others, who, when he turned his head to speak, displayed a classically elegant profile set off by pale skin and black high-arched brows. A killingly handsome man.

Albert whispered, “Lord, what an honor, just to see him.…”

“Why's that, Albert?” asked Hal, one nostril lifted even as his eyes slid across Carolyn like a caress. “Why an honor?”

“Well, because. He's the founder of the American Alliance. The founder of the International Alliance. The richest man in the world!”

“Quite possibly,” said Hal almost with distaste. He took Carolyn's arm, squeezing it gently. “Weren't you taking this young woman to lunch?”

“What? Oh. Carolyn. Yes. Sorry.”

Hal and Mike went away, both of them frowning, though Albert didn't notice. Albert took Carolyn to lunch, and after too many moments of silence Carolyn reached for topics of conversation. “That man we saw, Webster? Who is he, exactly?”

Albert placed his finger across his lips to indicate he had heard her, then chewed at purposeful length, swallowed, and patted his lips with his napkin. “He's an international financier, Carolyn. An entrepreneur. In addition to the Alliances, he founded and supports the Institute of International Studies in London. He's enormously respected.”

“Because he's so rich?”

He gave her an admonishing look. “Well, I'm sure there are some who respect him for that reason. I, however, respect his opinion, because he's right! He's also very powerful. He knows everyone, has access to everyone. If you want to see the pope, or the president of France or the king of Saudi Arabia, he can get you an appointment.” A little laugh. “That is, if he wants to, of course.”

Just to make conversation, Carolyn asked, “Does he have family?” It was a Crespin catechism question, always asked, about anyone.

“I haven't any idea,” said Albert, rather startled. “I don't think he allows any public intrusion into his private life.”

Including, it seemed, where he lived, what citizenship he claimed, where he'd been educated. Funny, Carolyn thought, that Albert could so obviously adore a man about whom he knew so little. Crespins were usually more discriminating than that, or pretended to be.

“What do you think he was doing at the FBI?” she wondered.

“He was with the director,” said Albert in the rather haughty voice Crespin men adopted in speaking to wives and daughters who had ventured too close to the boundary of Men's Business. “Which, in and of itself, makes it improper for me to speculate.”

“The director was in that group of men who walked by us?”

He nodded dismissively, with a shadow of a smile, as though to say, “There, aren't you a lucky girl to have seen him.” She felt an ambiguity, as if in a dream, where one should know where one is but does not. The director of the
FBI had been in the group, but at the time, Albert had commented only on Webster. Mike and Hal, too. How very odd.

That night Albert took them all to dinner in an expensive restaurant, where, so Carolyn thought, the menu had more flavor than the food. Mike's wife, Tricia, was sleek and dark and outspoken; Hal's wife, Barbara, was little and plump and quite witty. Carolyn tried to ignore the heat in her face every time she looked at Hal, and was able to admire the pictures Barbara passed around, two toddler boys, rotund little staggerers with Hal's eyes and Hal's curly, lovely-looking mouth.

Then they all went to see the new Hitchcock film with Cary Grant—all that chasing about on Mount Rushmore—and Albert took her back to her hotel room, kissed her chastely on the forehead, and bid her good night. She showered and braided her hair and climbed into bed. The night was quiet, the bed comfortable, but something kept nagging at her. Eventually she fell asleep, only to waken repeatedly, her heart pounding at a sense of imminent peril. She knew all about these night terrors, though she hadn't had them since she was a child, after her father had died. Then they had been provoked by loss and pain. What had provoked this one she couldn't imagine. All she could remember of the dream was a voice saying ominous and terrible words. It wasn't Albert's voice. It wasn't anyone she knew. Eventually, about dawn, she fell deeply asleep.