Prizes (29 page)

“So this is it?” Raymond sighed.

To his own surprise, he was painfully reliving the early part of their marriage, the birth of the children, each christened with hope of increased happiness.

At this moment he took no joy in his victory. Perhaps it was the beer. Perhaps a moment of unguarded honesty in which he realized what a generous human being Muriel was.

He looked at her and whispered, “I’m very sorry it had to happen this way.”

“So am I,” she answered quietly.

“I mean, we’ve lived this sham so long, I can’t understand why it couldn’t have gone on a little longer until the kids were a bit older.”

“They’re both strong enough to find their way in this world. On the other hand, at my age a second chance for happiness doesn’t come along that often.”

“What do you mean?” Raymond asked, already sensing that the reply would destroy the gentle empathy of the moment.

She looked at him and murmured almost apologetically, “I want to get married again.”

He hesitated for a moment. Perhaps in his acute selfishness he had expected her to wait for him, like Patience on a monument.

“Anyone I might know?” he asked.

“I thought it was obvious,” she responded. “Edmundo and I have grown very close. Maybe it’s because we’re both cripples in a way, him physically, me emotionally.
But at least we can listen to music and communicate without the need for any words.”

“Well,” Raymond remarked, trying to mask the feelings of jealousy that had gripped him by surprise. “I guess you’ve been in love with him for years.”

Muriel lowered her head. “I suppose so,” she conceded. “But never the way I loved you.”

When she heard that her mother was remarrying, Isabel burst into tears.

Peter tried to reason with her. “Isabel, you’re not being fair. Mom’s been alone for so long—and everybody needs a partner in life.”

He was suddenly self-conscious, realizing that his unpartnered father was present and might take offense.

But Raymond simply inquired phlegmatically, “Isn’t there already a Mrs. Zimmer?”

“Up till a few months ago,” Muriel replied. “Then
she
found love, with of all people, the church organist. And actually badgered Edmundo for a divorce.”

Then Muriel said softly, “Naturally, I want Isabel at the wedding.”

“I’m sorry,” Raymond objected civilly, “but don’t you think she’s a bit too young to ride the bus—or even a plane—by herself?”

Muriel smiled bitterly. “That’s an irony, Ray, and you do have a point. But Peter’s got his license now, and if you don’t mind the idea of his driving Isabel all the way down—”

“I can make it in one day easily,” Peter interrupted with a touch of pride, “and I mean sticking to the speed limits too.”

Now all eyes were focused on Ray, who sensibly realized that he had to accommodate the majority’s wish. It was clear even to him that Isabel wanted to go.

“Uh, what time is the, uh … ceremony?”

“Well,” Muriel replied, “we’re just going to go to the courthouse and have a few friends over for a drink. If
it’ll make you feel any better, we could schedule it for mid-morning. Then Isabel could fly down on the first plane—”

“Yes, yes, of course,” Ray conceded. “There’s an eight o’clock flight from Oakland, and I’ll be glad to drive her to the airport. She can easily be back by dinnertime.”

Isabel herself was about to interject that she might want to spend the evening and even the night with the rest of the family.

But she could try and persuade her father later.

Maybe.

Upon her return to San Diego, Muriel wasted no time arranging the wedding. Two weeks later Isabel, in a frilly pink dress that she and her mother had bought in Berkeley, stood to one side with Peter as a magistrate formally decreed that henceforth their mother would be Mrs. Edmundo Zimmer.

Another pair of siblings stood on the groom’s side, a sister in her early thirties and a brother older still. Both Dorotea and Francisco had flown up from Argentina to honor their father as well as to serve as legal witnesses.

After the brief ceremony, all six of them repaired to a private room at the faculty club for drinks and a small but elegant nuptial meal.

Both Muriel and Edmundo were in buoyant spirits, and they seemed especially touched that Isabel had come. After the glasses were raised to them, Edmundo in turn proposed a toast to “the famously brilliant young lady who has traveled a long way to be here with us.”

Isabel was self-conscious, especially since Edmundo’s children had flown much farther. But she was soon completely won over by the conductor’s charm and the genuine affection radiating from his eyes.

There was a larger reception planned for that evening,
at which various members of the orchestra would be playing solos, trios, and even a wind quintet.

“I really wish you could stay for it,” Edmundo remarked sincerely. “I was so looking forward to hearing you play the violin.”

“You won’t be missing much. I haven’t had a lot of time to practice lately.”

“Don’t be so modest,” he protested gallantly. “Muriel tells me you make your instrument sing. I want you to promise me that you’ll bring it down at Christmas.”

Isabel was so enchanted by Edmundo that she resolved to duke it out with Raymond if he tried to object to her visiting again at Christmas.

Her plane landed at Oakland just after nine
P.M.
And as she walked toward her loving father’s outstretched arms, Isabel felt an inexplicable sadness.

He was everything to her. Or almost everything.

But there was no music in Raymond da Costa’s life.

29
 

Twenty minutes before midnight on Christmas Eve, Adam pushed open the door of Room 608 at the Massachusetts Mental Health Hospital. A matronly Hispanic nurse was gently trying to lull a female patient into slumber.

At first he was unsure of what to do. Although he knew that Anya desperately needed to sleep it off, he was anxious to reassure himself that she was all right.

Yet even though he was silent, she sensed his presence and called out weakly, “Adam, is that you?”

“Take it easy, Anya. Try not to upset yourself.”

“That is funny joke,” she remarked, her words slurring. “After all the terrible things I have done.” She was able to turn her head slowly and face him. “You should not have come,” she murmured.

“I had to,” he countered. “And you wanted me to.”

She did not reply, either to protest or to acknowledge his claim.

Uneasily, Adam said to the nurse, “It’s all right, I’m one of her physicians.”

“Very well, Doctor.” The woman nodded and made a discreet exit.

Adam immediately sat in her chair beside Anya’s bed.

“I’m so sorry,” she repeated hoarsely. “I have such talent for failure, I could not even do a good job of killing myself.”

He shook his head in consternation. “Why the hell did you do such a stupid thing? I thought we were so happy together.”

“That was precisely why, Adam. It was Christmas—I was all alone. I missed you so terribly, and I realized we could never be together.”

“Why not?” he inquired softly.

“You are married,” she responded slowly. And then added even more emphatically, “You have a child. In fact your entire life would have been happier if we had never met.”

“No,” he objected. “You’re the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me, Anya. All I want in this world is to be with you.”

“It’s wrong,” she persisted.

“Since when did love behave by a rule book? For God’s sake, stop being so hard on yourself.”

“You cannot love me,” she whispered.

“What the hell do you mean by that?” he demanded.

She answered with a sad smile, “Because nothing that good has ever happened to me in my entire life.”

He wanted to sweep her into his arms and reassure her, but she was tired, and ill. And this was a hospital. And he was a doctor.

“Let’s turn on your TV,” he suggested. “We can just catch Midnight Mass from St. Patrick’s.”

“If you would like,” she answered softly.

He switched on the set and they began to watch. Every so often he would glance at Anya, and was gratified to see that his instinct was correct. She was in some way distracted by the tranquility of the service.

Afterward he shut off the television and with soothing words tried to loosen her tenacious grip on wakefulness. Remarkably, she resisted. For it was clear that her desire to talk to him surmounted any physiological need to sleep.

Morning was fast approaching. The nine o’clock flight to Toronto was one of the few operating on Christmas Day, and Adam knew he had to be on it.

“Listen, my Russian friend,” he said, clasping Anya’s hand tightly. “I’ve really got to go now. I promise I’ll call every morning if you promise to start believing that I’m going to work things out.”

“I will try.” She smiled. It was just a slight upturn of her lips, yet nonetheless an affirmation of life.

“That’s my girl,” he said encouragingly, and kissed her on the forehead.

“Thank you, Adam.” Her smile widened. “Thank you for coming.”

“Anya, darling,” he whispered, “the next time you need to see me, try the telephone—it’s less expensive.” Their eyes exchanged smiles.

“Daddy!”

Heather had been playing with the Rosenthal brothers in the snow in front of the cabin when she caught sight of her father approaching.

He greeted her with a loving hug. “Gosh, I missed you. I must have screwed up your Christmas, huh?”

“Not exactly,” she said, but pouted. “I got my presents anyway.”

“Where’s Mom?” Adam inquired, trying to be nonchalant.

“With Charlie and Joyce taking a ski lesson.”

“Well,” he replied, “I’ll just change my clothes and surprise them at the bottom of the slopes.”

As he started inside, Heather called after him, “Don’t hurry, Dad.”

Adam turned and asked, “Why not?”

“You really did screw up
her
Christmas.”

As if this were not sufficiently bad news, she added the final punctuation to his welcome by hurling a snowball—which landed square in the middle of his back.

God, he thought to himself, what the hell have I done?

Toni zoomed down the slope as if aiming straight at him and, in a flurry of snow, braked to a halt scarcely ten feet away.

For an instant neither spoke.

Finally Adam managed, “I’m back.”

“I’ve noticed,” she answered curtly.

“Did you also notice that I wasn’t gone very long?”

“I was aware that you were gone,” she said enigmatically, leaving him to draw his own conclusions.

“Well, the crisis is over,” he announced uneasily.

She looked at him with an eyebrow raised. “Is it?”

“Toni, for God’s sake, I was making what I thought was a humanitarian gesture.”

“All night? I called home every half hour. So unless you booked into the Hilton, I can only conclude you were holding her hand.”

“Come on,” he said, raising his voice in exasperation.
“Are you crazy enough to imply what I think you’re implying?”

She stopped and faced him and her words came out in tiny puffs of air.

“Adam, you don’t have to physically sleep with another woman to qualify as being unfaithful.”

Adam’s heart began to beat faster.

She pointed a ski pole at him and pronounced, “Let’s just say you’re on probation.”

In the following days they kept up appearances for the sake of Heather and the Rosenthals. But the tension was palpable enough to be felt by all.

However hard he tried, he could not expel Anya from his mind—even for a moment.

On the morning of their departure he woke early, hurried to the main lodge and settled their hotel bill. For if Toni paid it, she would surely see the heavy charges for long-distance phone calls to a single number in Boston.

At noon they clambered aboard Charlie’s station wagon, the Rosenthals radiating health and good spirits, the Coopersmiths each in his own way knowing that somehow their lives would never be the same.

30
 

The social high point of the year for the drones—as they were fond of calling themselves—who worked in Gregory Morgenstern’s lab was the chief’s Fourth of July barbecue. It was a doubly patriotic occasion, since the professor and his family lived in the town immortalized
by Emerson, where the courageous American farmers “fired the shot heard ’round the world.”