Private affairs : a novel (3 page)

"One dance," she said. "And then I have work to do."

He put his hand correctly at her waist. "A woman of your loveliness should be cared for and spoiled, not forced to work."

He was very serious and Elizabeth was careful not to laugh, He was an Anglo whose father had come to Santa Fe from Detroit only forty years earlier, but he was a member of the New Mexico legislature and had adopted many of the attitudes of the city's oldest Spanish families, who, like the bride's, could trace their genealogy through twelve or more generations. So Elizabeth said only, "My work is important to me," and when

the dance ended she excused herself with a formality that matched his, to find a quiet place to sit. She chose a bench between the placita and the salon, where she was inconspicuous as she wrote a description of the wedding for the society page of the Santa Fe Examiner.

"Ivory satin with seed pearls," she scrawled, glancing at the bride. "Triple-tiered lace veil, an heirloom handed down from mother to daughter since 1730 when the family, members of Spanish royalty, came to Mexico and then Santa Fe."

She wrote swiftly: the bride's genealogy, the groom's newly-established law practice, his father's influential committee chairmanship in the state legislature, a list of the guests, including the positions and family background of the most prominent, and colorful descriptions of clothes and food. But she had been a part-time reporter for the Examiner long enough to let her mind wander while she scribbled notes, and so she thought about her family: Holly and Peter, who should be home now from summer classes at the College of Santa Fe; Matt, who had advertised that week for a new assistant at the printing plant so he could spend more time at home; and Zachary—who had died three months ago but still seemed part of their lives, since everything they had done for sixteen years had revolved around him.

His death had hit Matt terribly hard, but Elizabeth, too, was shaken by it, as if it had left them at loose ends, without a reason for their life. "Carne Adovada," she wrote, describing the dinner. "Green Chile Souffle, Tocina del Cielo ..." while she thought: We need a vacation, to get away from the house and reminders of Zachary. The four of us could go hiking, or drive to Denver. . . .

But who would manage the printing plant? They'd never been able to afford a full-time manager. And what about her job? There wasn't much security for a part-time reporter, and a lot of aspiring journalists wanted to work for the Examiner, since its opposition, the Chieftain, was a small failing weekly. And Holly and Peter were involved in their own projects; they might not want to go anywhere right now. Probably they should wait for a better time. . . .

We've always said, Not now, not yet, later.

She bent again to her notes and when she had finished, went to the parents of the bride and groom to say good-bye. Guests reached out to her as she walked through the crowded room; everyone knew her, knew she was writing the story for the Examiner, and wanted to make sure they were in it and properly identified. But when they asked about her story, Elizabeth simply smiled and shook her head. Everything she wrote was her secret until it was printed.

Matt was the only one who saw her stories before she delivered them to her editor, but even he hadn't looked at most of them for a long time. So many things they didn't share anymore, she mused as she drove home. Mostly they talked about their daily affairs: the house, the children, Zachary—no, not Zachary anymore. What was wrong with her? Why couldn't she get used to it that Zachary was gone? And why did she think so much about changes in her marriage that bothered her, instead of the things that were good?

It was only a short distance from the wedding party to her home on Camino Rancheros, through narrow streets lined with adobe walls with carved wooden gates, and treetops towering above them from gardens on the other side. Adobe and trees, Elizabeth reflected. Someday, if she ever had her own column, she would write a description of Santa Fe. The words were already there, in her mind.

... a small town like a painting in two colors: dusty pink adobe and dark green trees, block after block, serene, soothing, almost hypnotic. Color comes from the people: bright Spanish and Indian clothing, jewelry, furniture, and art. But when the streets are empty, at the dinner hour and at dawn, the unbroken dusty pink and dark green are dreamlike, a tapestry washed clean of colors, then flung upon the desert to dry, blending in with pale, sage-dotted sand—

Stop it She drove through open gates to park beside her house. Why did she pretend? She didn't have a column because editors gave space to full-time writers, and she couldn't be a full-time writer—not when she also had to help Matt at the printing company and take care of a house and two children.

"Mom!" Peter was waving to her from the door. "Telephone!" He leaned against the doorway, crushing morning glories beneath his shoulder as he watched her cross the gravel. He was going to be as tall as Matt, Elizabeth thought, and as handsome, beneath his tangle of red hair, once he got through the agonies of adolescence. Each day, in fits and starts, he went from a round-faced, sweet-tempered little boy to a gangly fourteen-year-old, grumbling one minute, sharing family jokes the next, lurching into furniture at home but riding a horse with grace and balance, shying away from his mother's kisses but then, without warning, putting his arms around her and whirling her about the room with an infectious laugh that reminded Elizabeth of Matt—and made her realize how long it had been since he had laughed that way.

"It's you=know=who," Peter said. "Your glamorous television star."

"Tony Rourke," Elizabeth said. "You know his name perfectly well." Kissing him on the cheek, she walked with him into the cool house and picked up the telephone in the kitchen. Instantly, Tony's smooth voice flowed around her, like an embrace.

"Dear Elizabeth, I'm at the airport—"

"Which airport?" she asked, alarmed.

"Los Angeles. I've been trying to reach you to tell you I'm on my way to New York and stopping off in Santa Fe to see you. It's been much too long. Can you meet my plane in three hours? We'll have a late dinner and then you can drive me to La Posada—I've reserved a room—and tomorrow I'll go on to New York. My plane arrives at—"

"Tony, stop. I can't have dinner with you tonight."

"Why not? Do you know how difficult it is for me to create these opportunities? My manager guards me like a dragon, my secretaries ar= range schedules that are like prisons . . . Elizabeth, Marjorie left me."

"Oh." Marjorie. Tony had mentioned her a few times in the past year, but Elizabeth knew no more about her than she did about any of his wives. Vaguely she remembered Ginger, who had been at her wedding, but since then she hadn't followed his marriages and divorces. "I'm sorry," she said.

"So am I. I liked her. She said she found me impossible to live with. True, perhaps, but perhaps I just haven't married the right woman. Why can't you have dinner with me tonight?"

"Because it's our anniversary and we're going out."

"To celebrate. How many years?"

"Sixteen."

"With the same person. Incredible. Do you still look at each other the way you did at your wedding? I keep waiting for that to happen to me. But I lost my chance—didn't I?—a long time ago."

"Tony, stop being dramatic."

"It's my nature to be dramatic. But I mustn't keep you; you want to dress up in your finery and go out on the town with your husband. And you don't want—or your husband doesn't want—Anthony Rourke, tele-vision host adored by millions, waiting in the wings. Of course I won't come tonight. But may I stop off on my way home? Next Wednesday; is that all right? You do want to see me, don't you? At least half as much as I want to see you?"

His careful voice, warm as velvet, slipped now and then into self-mockery: he never could let anyone know whether he was truly serious. Perhaps he didn't know himself. Ten years earlier, he'd left his father's com-

pany with nothing but the few dollars he'd managed to save from his extravagant life in Houston, called Elizabeth to tell her he was going to Los Angeles to become the top television personality in America—and had done exactly that. Now he was famous and rich; he lived in a mansion in Malibu; and for the past year he had been calling Elizabeth two or three times a month, saying she was the only one he could talk to, the only one who understood him, the only one who'd known him when he was young, before he got involved in the crazy play-acting of television stardom.

"Dear Elizabeth, please let me come," he said. "I need to see you. I have no one to talk to but my refrigerator, which hums back at me in some exotic language I don't understand. And I have so much to tell you: I've just finished taping some shows in Spain and on the way home I stopped off in Italy and bought a small cottage—twenty rooms, I think— in Amalfi, and I need to tell someone my news. Elizabeth, are you listening?"

"Maybe in a week or two," Elizabeth said, piqued and disturbed, as always, by the way he could make her feel desirable and at the same time like a dull housewife in a little house in the middle of the New Mexican desert, waiting for Anthony Rourke to float down to her from the heights of his glamorous world.

"By then I have to be back in Europe. How about four weeks from today? I'll force myself to wait that long."

"All right," Elizabeth said. "But for lunch, not dinner. Let me know what time; I'll meet your plane."

"Does he want to interview you or what?" Peter asked as she hung up the telephone.

"We're not famous or notorious enough for Tony's show," Elizabeth said lightly. "Would you like it if we were?"

He reflected. "I guess not. I'm not like Holly; I can't do things in public. I'd rather nobody noticed me at all." He caught Elizabeth's quick glance and added, "On that guy's show anyway. You've seen him, Mom: his favorite thing is to make somebody look like an ass . . . with a hundred million people watching."

"Thirty million," Elizabeth said absently, thinking she and Matt ought to talk about Peter's shyness and aloneness. They'd thought he would find friends in high school, but instead he'd become even more withdrawn, seeming younger than others his age, spending his spare time with the Indians of nearby pueblos and letting his sister be the talented center of attention. "Isn't Holly home?" Elizabeth asked.

"She was; she went back for some kind of audition. If he doesn't want to interview you, what does he want?"

"A friend."

"Anybody with thirty million people watching him has lots of friends."

"Is that so?"

"Why wouldn't he? People stop you on the street, and you only write for one paper. Somebody like him—people probably call him all the time, invite him to parties, hang around, tell him how wonderful he is . . . Stars have plenty of friends. You know that, Mom."

"I know they have hangers-on," said Elizabeth. "People who hope to get on television or have some glamour rub off on them. But I wouldn't call them friends. Anyway, not the kind you'll have when you find people who like you just because you're Peter Lovell and fun to be with and interested in lots of things and very lovable."

"Oh, Mom." Peter met Elizabeth's smiling eyes and, almost reluc-tantly, grinned. Then they were both laughing and he gave his mother a quick hug. "Thanks."

Elizabeth kissed his cheek. "Give it time, Peter," she said gently. "You'll have friends. And girls, too."

"Yen, well. . . ."He shrugged. "I suppose. Is he coming here?"

"You mean Tony?"

"Right."

"He might, in a few weeks."

"I don't know why you like him."

"There are lots of reasons for friendship, Peter. And it isn't necessary to explain them."

He shrugged again and wandered around the kitchen, nibbling pine nuts while Elizabeth took meat and chiles from the refrigerator. Why do I like Tony? she asked herself. He makes me feel dull and backward—but he also brings me the excitement of the outside world and sometimes I need that. And he makes me laugh and feel young, and there are lots of times when I need that, too.

But Matt is the one who should do that. Cutting the meat into cubes, she frowned, wondering again what was the matter with her. Why, all of a sudden, did she keep thinking of things that were wrong? Well, maybe not all of a sudden; maybe those thoughts had been cropping up for months. But they seemed to come in a deluge since Zachary died.

And then there was the wedding that afternoon, reminding her of all the passion and excitement and hope that had been in her parents' garden sixteen years ago. Where were they now? Somewhere along the way, they'd just . . . faded. And what did she and Matt have left? A pleasant,

friendly marriage, calm and stable, that hadn't changed or given them any surprises in years.

But we're happy, she said. We have a good life, a wonderful family, a home, our own business. ...

She slid the meat into hot oil in an iron skillet, stirring the cubes as they browned. Maybe we have the perfect marriage. Sixteen years of passion would have left us a pair of frazzled wrecks.

Ruefully, she smiled. It might be nice to be a frazzled wreck once in a while. And then the front door was flung open and Holly rushed in.

"Hello, hello, hello, isn't it the most beautiful, wonderful, marvelous, perfect evening?"

"You got a part," Peter said.

"Two parts." She danced about the room. "You are looking at the first high school freshman in history—and I won't even be a freshman till September, but it doesn't matter—the first one to get two solo parts in the College of Santa Fe summer choral concert. You are looking at a future star!"

They were looking, Elizabeth thought, at a lovely young girl, almost a woman, flushed with excitement as she took another step in growing up, away from childhood, away from home. Both my children, she reflected, only a few years from going off to make their own lives. How had it happened so quickly?

"Mother?" Holly asked. "Aren't you happy?"

"Of course I am," Elizabeth said. "And proud." She hugged Holly and, as she felt her daughter's arms tighten around her, it struck her how much she loved her children, and how busy and rich and fun they had kept her life, masking a fading marriage. As if she stood apart, she saw herself with Holly, their blond heads close together. Hers had darkened over the years, like Lydia's, to a golden bronze so that Holly was the ash blond now, with Matt's deep blue eyes, Elizabeth's high cheekbones and slender face, and a pure soprano voice all her own—the only singer in either the Evans or Lovell family. "But I must say," she told Holly, "I'm not surprised. I've always known you're wonderful and I've always been proud of you."