The Lockwood Concern (43 page)

said he was attractive, and he was. Now the tone of the gathering was different: the absence of the Desmond Farleys and Sherwood James, all three extremely conventional individuals in word and deed and appearance, had a relaxing effect on the survivors of the luncheon group. The other principal relaxing factor was alcohol. George Lockwood was spacing out his own drinks, as he always did, and Dorothy James was having only a strange concoction of gin and bitters diluted with ice water, which was all she ever took as a cocktail. There was hardly more gin than bitters in'the drink, but it was an expression of her political opposition to Prohibition. (During her suffragette days she had been in favor of Prohibition.) But Wilma and Geraldine had had something to drink before coming downstairs, and Bing Lockwood had had enough of the Orange Blossoms to have a noticeable effect. He was not drunk, but he had reached a state of euphoria that was prevented from becoming silliness by an air of masculinity to which the women responded and which his father saw as a first sip of ugliness. At half-past seven the maid announced dinner, and Geraldine said, "We'll be another ten minutes, May." "Why?" said George. "Because I for one would like another cocktail," said Geraldine. "And so would I," said Wilma. "That's the way to talk," said Bing. "I'll be happy to tend bar, Father." "Go right ahead," said George. "But if we're going to turn this into a drinking party, don't say ten minutes, Geraldine. Call May back and tell her we'll be a half an hour or an hour, or two hours. But let's not have dinner ruined." "Ten minutes isn't going to ruin dinner," said Geraldine. Now that she had the support of Wilma and Bing she was not to be intimidated. She was rather enjoying her own performance as chatelaine. All the leaves had been taken out of the dining-room table, but five was a difficult number to seat, and the table was still large. "Have you decided where to put everybody, Geraldine? If not, I suggest I have Dorothy on my right, Wilma on my left. Son, you will be on your aunt's left, and Geraldine, to the right of Dorothy," said George. "It reminds me of the open end of Palmer Stadium," said Bing. "Palmer Stadium," said Dorothy. "Do you know that I have never been to Princeton? Sherry went to Columbia. Almost nobody goes there now, but in his day it was well thought of." "It still has a very high standing scholastically," said George. "Yes, I believe it has, but I wish Sherry's father had sent him to Harvard." "Why?" said George. "Because nearly all his friends went to Harvard. My two brothers, and so many of his close friends. And it would have done him good to get out of New York. He went to Cutler School, then to Columbia, and an extra year at Columbia Law School. All in New York City." "But if he'd gone to Harvard with all his friends, it would have amounted to the same thing," said Bing. "That's the kind of thinking I'd have expected from your father," said Wilma. "Now, Aunt Wilma, give me credit for some thinking of my own," said Bing. "I will if you stop calling me Aunt Wilma. You're old enough and I'm young enough to be Bing and Wilma. And actually, I'd have been too young to be your mother, so I don't consider myself a genuine aunt. As far as that goes, Geraldine wouldn't have been old enough to be your mother." "I unfortunately would have been," said Dorothy. "Not that I'd object to having you as my son, but I-" "Age, age, let's stop talking about age," said Wilma. "It's not a very pleasant thing to think about, and I'm sorry I brought it up." "As much the oldest member of this party. I agree," said George. "Having ruled out that topic, we're left with all the other topics. What shall it be, Dorothy?" "Well - I'd like to hear more about California," said Dorothy James. "We visited there ever so many years ago, but we didn't meet many Californians." "There aren't many, are there? Didn't most of them move there from somewhere else?" said Geraldine. "That's one of the best things about it," said Bing. "I'm there because I want to be, and I'm staying there because I never want to live anywhere else." "That's exactly the same answer I got from Francis Davis when we were there," said Dorothy. "Do you all know Francis Davis? You do, Wilma. Do you, George?" "I know of him," said George. "No, Father doesn't know him, but I do. I see him once in a while in San Francisco," said Bing. "Who is he?" said Geraldine. "Is he somebody important?" "Only two ways. Financially, and socially," said Bing. "He has all those social connections back East, and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if he could raise forty or fifty million by Friday, if he had to. He's an old Beacon Hill Bostonian. He's in shipping and real estate, banking, insurance, God knows what all. And one of the worst poker players I've ever met." "You've played poker with him?" said George. "Once a month," said Bing. "If we played oftener I wouldn't have to work for a living. But we only play once a month, and never for high stakes. The most anybody ever loses in that game is three or four hundred bucks. But we have fun." "Where do these games take place? At the Pacific Union Club?" "No, God, I'm not a member there. I'll be lucky to get in by the time I'm forty. No, we take turns playing at each other's houses." "But aren't you pretty far from San Francisco?" said George. "Yes, but Francis has property near us, and he combines business with pleasure. We all do, as a matter of fact. I have to go to San Francisco and Los Angeles. Out there we think nothing of driving three or four hundred miles. On a normal day I'll drive at least seventy-five or a hundred. My office is as far as from here to Reading and I go there five or six days a week. Fortunately I love to drive." "And you have got that Rolls-Royce," said Geraldine. "Oh, have you got a Rolls? If I come out and visit you, will you take me for a long ride in it? Pen would never buy one. I asked him to, over and over again, but no," said Wilma. The first mention of Pen Lockwood's name, so casual and so curt, acted on the others like an unfair trick, but the sorriest victim of it was Wilma herself. "Oh, Christ," she said, barely audibly, and looked down at her plate. Bing put his arm around her shoulder. "You come out to California, and I'll show you places the natives don't know about." "Thank you," she said, and let her head rest on his arm. She was quite drunk. "I always wanted to tour New England on horseback," said Dorothy James. "You can, you know. You start at Fort Ethan Allen, I believe, and there are maps that show you how to avoid all the main highways. Stay at little country hotels." By changing the scene she changed the subject, and no more was said of Pen Lockwood. They finished dinner in a condition of disorganization and not as the unit that had formed when they sat down. "Will you have a cigar?" said George Lockwood to his son. "Oh, now don't you two go off by yourselves," said Geraldine. "I don't think I'll have a cigar, thanks," said Bing. "No, and let's have our coffee in the little room," said Geraldine. "You haven't seen the little room, Dorothy, or you either, Bing." "You mean Father's little room?" said Bing. "No, the little sitting-room. We never got in the habit or calling it the library, but that's what we intended it to be. The library," said Geraldine. "We've never called it the library because most of my books are upstairs, and your father keeps his in his study." "Didn't I hear of some movie actress that bought her books by the yard," said Dorothy to Bing. "Search me. I've never met any of those people," said Bing. "Oh, we did! We met Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, and they invited us to lunch, but we were leaving the next day," said Dorothy. "I thought he was charming. I didn't get to talk to her." "Does she still wear those curls?" said Wilma. "Yes, but I suppose she has to," said Dorothy. "She must have been very close to thirty when we met her. It was soon after they were married." "There we are, back on the subject of age again," said Wilma. "It keeps cropping up, but at our age it somehow does," said George Lockwood. "Who will have cognac? Dorothy?" "Not for me, thank you," said Dorothy. "Wilma?" "Of course," said Wilma. "None for me, thanks," said Geraldine. "Me either, but I'll help myself to some of that whiskey," said Bing. "This is a comfortable room," said Dorothy. "It will be, I think," said Geraldine. "I like what you did with the big room," said Dorothy. "Thank you, I like it too," said Geraldine. "But we don't use it much. If we entertained more, but George spends most of his time in his study, and I come in here or else I have my upstairs sitting-room. I've become a radio fan, and that's where I have my big set. George thinks it's a waste of time, but I enjoy it." "Oh, you and Sherry should have compared notes," said Dorothy. And so on. But when the grandfather's clock in the hall boomed out the hour and they all realized that it was ten, not nine, Dorothy got to her feet. "I had no idea it was so late, and we have a big day tomorrow, Wilma," said Dorothy. "I'll go upstairs with you," said Geraldine. "I'll be up after a while," said Wilma. "Bing is going to fix me a highball, aren't you, Bing?" "If you say so," said Bing. "Well, then I'll say goodnight to you two," said George. "But don't keep your Aunt Wilma up too late. We're all rather tired, you know. Goodnight, Wilma." He kissed her cheek. "Goodnight, son. I think we'll all want to have breakfast at eight-thirty. In your rooms, if you like, but Arthur McHenry is coming here at ten, Wilma." He went upstairs with Dorothy and Geraldine, and said goodnight to them on the second-story landing. He went to his dressing-room, closed the door, and undressed. He was tired, but not sleepy. With the exception of Dorothy James, they were a disquieting lot, and he had seen enough of them for one day. More than enough, in the case of his cocky son and his drunken sister-in-law. For the moment he had seen enough of Geraldine, too, but he was accustomed to her, and whenever he wanted to, he could get away from her for a few days. Unprepared by the immediate train of thought, he found that he was thinking of his brother; now, for the first time, came a full realization of the death of Pen. Until now, until he could think of Pen as a lifeless body deep in a grave and covered with patted-down earth, the fact of Pen's death had been incomplete. The murder and suicide, the events succeeding them, carried with them a vitality of their own; but Pen in a grave was flesh and blood that was his flesh and blood and a cold reminder of the unacceptable inevitable. For the very first time in his life, George Lockwood believed that he could die, too. As he considered his life at the moment, he very nearly wanted to - and then he thought of Ernestine. He had always loved her, in a formal way, but now she meant something else to him. He wondered if he would be making a mistake to send for her. It would be a great mistake if she were to offer some plausible reason for not coming. Through the closed door he could hear the tiny strain of music from Geraldine's radio, just enough to make him aware of her futile presence. All she was now was the thin sound of a saxophone, playing an unrecognizable tune in a dance-hall in Detroit, Michigan. In other times she would be other things, but she was only that now. He had a book in his lap, a copy of Life on the Mississippi, which he knew well enough to open anywhere and close any time. It was one of a dozen such books that he kept in his dressing-room; they did not make demands to interfere with cogitation, and they did not keep him awake. The thin sound of Geraldine's radio had faded away, and the hall clock struck eleven. It was possible that he had dozed off, and he was not sure. He went out into the hallway; all the lights that had been on were still on, on the second story and on the first. He listened outside Geraldine's door, and heard nothing. He returned to his dressing-room and locked the door from the inside. He kicked off his bedroom slippers and slid open the panel that guarded the hidden stairway. He went down to his study and let himself in, so far unobserved and unobservable to anyone in the hall. He opened the study door cautiously, and now he heard Wilma's voice. He could not make out what she was saying, and then as he continued to listen he realized that she was not saying anything. The sounds she was making were murmurs of pleasure. He moved closer to the doorway of the little room and looked in. There on the deep sofa was Wilma, and his son was sucking her breast. She was stroking the top of his head. "Now me you," she said. Quickly George Lockwood returned to his study and made his way back to his dressing room. They had been leading up to it all evening, but George Lockwood had never been sure that they themselves knew it. He was now sure that Dorothy James had known it. Funny little Dorothy James had probably known it from the moment Bing arrived at his father's house, and known it with such conviction that she had abandoned hope of frustrating it. George Lockwood put on his slippers and went to Geraldine's room. She was asleep, but he stayed. In the morning they all breakfasted at their various times and occupied themselves until Arthur McHenry completed his business and the others were ready to leave. Bing's borrowed Cadillac was at the front door, and Dorothy James and Wilma Lockwood were settling in the back seat. Geraldine was standing at the rear door of the automobile, engaging in the last-minute conversation between hostess and parting guests. George Lockwood was standing in the driveway, on the other side of the car. His son went to him, hand outstretched. "Well, Father, I don't know when we'll be seeing each other again," he said. George Lockwood did not immediately speak. He looked at his son steadily. "You must be very proud of yourself," he said. Bing frowned. "What?" "I said, you must be very proud of yourself." Bing looked away. "I could cut my throat," said Bing. "But you won't," said his father. "No, I won't," said Bing. He got in the car and closed the door. Geraldine linked her arm with her husband's and they waved at the car until it had passed through the gate. "Well, that's over," said Geraldine.

BOOK 3

George Lockwood was now ready to devote more time and thought to his daughter Ernestine, and in this he was assisted by Pen Lockwood's last will and testament. It was a simple document, as simple as Pen had always appeared to be, and yet it contained two bequests that were as puzzling to George as any departure from routine on Pen's part was apt to be. In a man as simple as Pen, the slightest deviation became an eccentricity. In his will Pen established an iron-bound trust fund for Wilma. The income was to go to her throughout her lifetime, and upon her death two-thirds of the principal was to go to Princeton, and one-third to St. Bartholomew's. So far, a conventional, Pen-like document. But the surprises were in two bequests of $50,000 each to be paid to his nephew, George B. Lockwood Junior, and his niece, Ernestine Lockwood. These were to be paid in cash as soon as practicable after his death. Pen's gross estate was estimated to be in the neighborhood of $1,800,000, and the bequests to his nephew and niece were therefore not likely to make a conspicuous dent in the bulk of his fortune. Nevertheless the thinking behind the bequests was puzzling to George. Pen had been fond of his nephew and niece, and they of him, and a polite token of their mutual affection was more or less to be expected. Ten thousand apiece would have served that purpose; fifty thousand, to be paid in cash before the establishment of Wilma's trust fund, was quite another matter; especially since Pen had known that his nephew and niece had inherited about $400,000 apiece from their Lockwood grandfather, and in all probability would someday inherit from George. Why did Pen Lockwood feel impelled to supply his brother's children with so much ready cash? The date of the will did not make the puzzle easier. It had been signed eight months before Pen's death, or at a time in which Pen could have had knowledge of Bing's prosperity and was quite definitely aware that Ernestine preferred New York and Europe to Swedish Haven. Certainly she had made no secret of her intention to live what she called her own life, and her attitude toward Geraldine was one of hostility that remained quiescent so long as they did not have to be in the same house for more than a week at a time. Ernestine had a room of her own in the Swedish Haven house, and Geraldine was careful not to disturb its contents, but it had seldom been occupied. Presumably Pen had been told of Ernestine's distaste for her stepmother, and even if he had only guessed it, the guess was not extraordinarily shrewd. Actually these terms of the will were not so much a puzzler to George as an irritating reminder of the degree to which he had misjudged his brother. Pen Lockwood had been the kind of man to whom you said, "Don't do anything rash," and evoke laughter from the man himself; and yet the newspapers had specifically used the phrase "rash act" in their accounts of Pen's death. Now there was this will, with its substantial gestures toward Ernestine and Bing, to create the inference that Pen Lockwood had been less dazzled by his brother than had appeared to be the case. George wondered whether he had been given the real reason for Pen's staying out of the candy company deal, for instance. He made a mental note to reexamine other instances in which Pen had opposed him. One instance worth reexamination was Pen's extreme diffidence when George was expecting automatic approval of his decision to marry Geraldine. In the long run it might turn out to be a compensative exercise if he could rid himself entirely of all sentimental feeling for Pen. Present indications were that Pen had been, in his quiet way, a tricky bastard. Why else had he provided Ernestine and Bing with so much cash? Because of the various delays of communication and travel, Ernestine had not returned from Europe, and was not present for the reading of Pen's will, which took place in the library of Wilma's house. Those present were Wilma, George, and two lawyers, and the meeting lasted less than an hour. When the lawyers had departed Wilma said, "Well, what did you think of it?" "He was rather generous to my children," said George. "And made sure I didn't make any foolish mistakes," said Wilma. "Well - don't you ever make mistakes, Wilma?" "What do you mean by that, George?" "A rhetorical question. We all do make mistakes," said George. "You probably meant a great deal more than that, but I'm not going to try to worm it out of you. I'm not up to it," she said. "I thought Bing and Ernestine had to be here." "No. Nobody has to be here." "When my grandfather's will was read, it was up in the country house near Rhinebeck. The dining room, I guess because it had so many chairs. Every stable-boy that was getting five hundred dollars. All the maids. Two men from Harvard. And family. A mild punch was served, I remember. Everybody was quite embarrassed because my grandmother, who was quite fat, and also quite deaf, let go with one of those high-pitched farts that she was famous for. She always looked around to see if anyone had heard her. They had. And she was furious. Nobody was supposed to hear her. Like the king that didn't have any clothes on. But one of the maids and one of the stableboys giggled. The maid was fired the next day." "But not the stable-boy?" said George. "I don't know why she didn't fire him. I guess because good maids were easier to get than good stable-boys. In those days." "Have you made any plans?" said George. "Tentatively. I'm going to sell this house and rent a small apartment. I hope to travel." "That seems sensible. Get Dorothy to go with you?" said George. "Oh, she'd never leave Sherry for any length of time. No, you have to find someone else. Where is Ernestine now?" "She's in London, but I want her to come home." "Why?" "Because she ought to. She should have been here long before this. When there's a family crisis, you ought not to be allowed to pretend that nothing's happened. And that seems to be her attitude. She had some excuse for not getting here for Pen's funeral, but she should have come home as soon as she could." "I'm on her side. What earthly use is there to come home now?" "Wilma, I don't want to have to be unpleasant, but I can be and I will be. I don't want you interfering in my children's lives." "Now just a minute, George. That's twice you've said things that sound to me like innuendo. Just what are you driving at?" "If I were driving at something, I'd hit harder and you'd be in tears." "For somebody that doesn't want to be unpleasant, you're getting awfully close to it." "I hope I don't have to get any closer. And so saying, I shall now make my departure. I'll be at the office all day tomorrow, and the next day I'll send up some papers for you to sign. You're going to have to sign a lot of papers, and I suggest you find a good lawyer especially if you plan to travel. You may want to sign a limited power of attorney. But don't give it to Mr. Hyme. Legally, you can, but if you do you'll be making a great mistake. Not your only mistake in that line." "I've lost interest in Mr. Hyme." "Yes, I suppose you have. But this time get an older adviser." "I think I hate you, George. I really think I do." "But not enough," he said. "Not enough for what?" "To make it interesting," he said. "But I'll bet I could," said Wilma. He nodded. "You almost did, a few weeks ago. But things may have changed since then. I have to go now, Wilma. Thanks for the story about your grandmother." "Don't make too much of it, George. She was also a very great lady," said Wilma. At the office George wrote a stern letter to Ernestine, insisting on her return to the United States without further delay. She could, of course, refuse. She had her own money, she was twenty-six years old. He therefore was obliged to make his demands on ethical grounds, and to exercise some restraint. It is simply a matter of family loyalty (he wrote). Your brother came all the way from California despite the fact that he and I have had our differences. He returned to California without our relations having been improved, but at least I shall always respect him for the respect he showed your Uncle Pen. You will shortly be notified that Uncle Pen left you a large sum of money... Ernestine came home two weeks later. George and Geraldine were at the train to meet her in the Packard instead of in the chauffeur-driven Lincoln or Pierce-Arrow. The gesture was not lost on Ernestine. "No Andrew?" she said. "We wanted to meet you ourselves," said George. "You didn't have to go to that trouble," said Ernestine. "We wanted to," said George. After dinner Geraldine retired. "You two will want to talk," she said. "I'll be in my sitting-room." Talk did not commence the moment the father and daughter were alone together. They made several false starts with trivialities, then Ernestine changed chairs, lit a new cigarette, and opened up. "You didn't make me come back here without some reason, Father, and I've been trying to figure out what it was. By the way, I hope youre going to reimburse me for this trip, because I was planning to stay abroad." "Were you? I was under the impression that you were only going to be gone a couple of months. I'm not trying to get out of reimbursing you. But when you left you had no intention of staying very long." "Then you are reimbursing me?" "I said I would, or implied it." "Good. Well, while I was there I changed my mind. I would like to live abroad for at least a year, maybe longer. Maybe much longer. Right now I'm tempted to say I'd like to live abroad permanently." "In heaven's name, why? The obvious inference is that there's a young man." She shook her head. "There was a man, not so young. Thirty-five or so." "The usual charming Frenchman?" "The usual charming American, but married and with no intention of marrying me. All the usual objections to the charming foreigner except he happened to be an American." "Did you fall in love with him?" "Yes." "But he didn't fall in love with you?" "No. Or even pretend to. Love wasn't mentioned very often in that crowd. If you talked about love it was the next thing to talking in legal terms, and they were all trying to avoid that. Some of the people were in love, but they were very old-fashioned about the word. They were afraid to say it because of the implications. In that respect they were the most old-fashioned people I ever met. Do I make any sense to you?" "Yes, I think so," said George. "College boys will tell you they're in love with you the first time you go out with them, but those people wouldn't even say it when they meant it. Of course most of them were married." "What sort of crowd was it?" "Mostly Americans, most of them had money. The women had husbands in London or Paris. The men had wives back in the States or working somewhere. Actresses' husbands. One opera singer, whose husband was plastered most of the time. Two of the men were writers. Oh, they weren't like the Lantenengo Country Club crowd, but they weren't the Left Bank, either. They weren't literary or artistic as a crowd. Mostly they seemed to have gotten together after the war, formed their own group, and when one dropped out, someone new came along to take his or her place. Money. They all had money, but nobody was very rich." "Your man, what did he do?" "Something to do with the electrification of the railroads. Not as an engineer, but the financial part. He worked for a Wall Street firm, actually. I never quite knew exactly what he did. He called himself a trackwalker, but isn't that one of those men that go around with hammers and repair the tracks? Obviously he wasn't that." "What was his name?" She shook her head. "It no longer makes the slightest difference, to him or to me. It's a dead issue." "Not to you it isn't," said her father. "That's how little you know me, Father. When it's over, it's over." "No bitterness?" he said. "Some bitterness, sourness, yes, but I'll get over that, too. "You had an actual affair with him, of course?" he said. "Do you think I'd make so much of it if I hadn't? I'm past the hugging and kissing stage." She had acquired a new mannerism: she would gaze at the floor as though she were on the top of a mountain and looking down into the activity in the valley. It was a disconcerting mannerism that excluded her listener from participation in her thoughts, and was intended to do so. "What do you want, Father?" she said, turning and facing him. "I doubt if I'd get anything I want, from you. In your present state of mind," he said. "But you got me back here, so you might as well tell me what it is," she said. "Well, I've found out that you're miserably unhappy." "Yes, I won't deny that." "And I'd like to do something to rectify that, if I can." "Thanks, but how can you if you don't know why I'm unhappy-" "And you're not going to tell me," he said. "No. Because I don't know. A few years ago I would have worried about having halitosis. But I'm quite sure it isn't that. I'm just not getting very much out of life, and this is when I ought to be getting the most." "Who said so? Just because you're young? Youth isn't everybody's time for happiness. For some people it is, but by no means for everybody." "What was your best time?" He nodded. "Yes, I knew you'd ask me that." "Well, when were you happiest?" "I have to give you the answer you gave me. I don't know." "You must know that," she said. "Was it when you were in college? When you were first married to Mother? Now?" He pondered her questions. "Now. This minute," he said. "You don't seem particularly happy," she said. "I'm sure I don't," he said. "But at this moment, sitting here with you, I'm closer to happiness than I've ever been in my entire life." "Happier than when I was born? Happier than when Bing was born?" He nodded. "Yes. Those were times for celebration, but I'm closer to happiness with you now than I ever was before. I've never stopped to consider happiness before. And now that you've made me consider it, I don't believe I ever have been happy. No, I haven't. I've had some good times, of one kind or another, but happiness - no." "Why are you happy now? Or close to it?" "Will this embarrass you? Yes, it will. But I'll say it anyhow. This is the first time I've ever loved anyone." "Me? Now?" "Yes." "You never loved any of those women?" He hesitated. "Yes, I loved one." "Not Mother, I know that." "No, not your mother." "And obviously not Geraldine," she said. "No, not Geraldine. It was a girl who had no brains at all, no particular distinction of any kind. But I loved her in a way that I never loved anyone else or even wanted to love anyone else. A passionate dumb-Dutch girl that was the only woman ever to take me outside myself." "It was sex, then?" "Oh, my, yes. It was sex." "Is there sex in what you feel for me?" "Well, your generation believes that there's sex in everything. No, what you've done, that she did, was to take me
outside myself. Why? How? Because in her case, she loved me, passionately. In your case, I feel needed. You are miserably unhappy, and you've turned to me. Maybe that's why you came home against your will. We can't know that. We may never know. Too many subtle things we don't know about ourselves, Tina. Subtleties we can't be truthful about. Hundreds of tiny changes that occur before we grasp a recognizable thought. And it has to be a recognizable thought or we don't grasp it. And now I'm back inside myself again, trying to rationalize, to analyze, to think - and doing the thing that everybody hates me for. I don't know why I sent for you. How can I go back through a million half-thoughts I had before I recognized one, which turned out to be the thought that I wanted you to come home? The reasons are somewhere in the half thoughts, and they remain half thoughts because we don't like the reasons." "Father?" "Yes "I think you've cut yourself," she said. "Isn't that blood on your hand?" He looked at the palm on his left hand. "Why, yes, it seems to be," he said. "I seem to have scratched myself. On what, I wonder? There must be a nail loose on this chair. But there aren't any nails on this chair." "I'll get some iodine," she said. "No," he said. "You know what I've done, don't you?" "No," she said. "I scratched myself with my own fingernail." "That's an odd thing to do," she said. "It's worse than that," he said. "I got so intense in that last speech of mine that I cut myself open with my own fingernail. I've never known that to happen before." "Let me put some iodine on it," she said. "All right. But I don't want you to tell Geraldine how I scratched myself. Just look at that, that's quite a gouge. There's a small bottle of tincture of iodine in the lavatory. Tiny bottle, not more than three ounces. And a roll of absorbent cotton. Will you administer to your embarrassed father's wound? Is it administer to, or minister to? The ministering angel. Well, in future I must learn not to become so intense." "Better than biting your lip, which is what I do sometimes," she said. He tried to make light of his self-inflicted wound, but by her over-casual manner and her avoidance of his look he knew that she did not consider the scratch a trivial matter. Nor did he. She daubed the wound with iodine - which gave them something to do, her to daub, him to pretend to exaggerate the twinge of pain. He waited to see if she would invent an excuse to leave him. She did not. "Shall we talk about this?" he said, holding up his stained hand. "If you like," she said. "I think we ought to," he said. "I owe you something for coming home." "Eight hundred and some dollars," she said. "You'll never have to worry about money, Tina. You must know that. I would never use money as a bludgeon. Not on you." "On Bing?" "Not on him, either, and anyway it's too late for that. I have reason to believe he's worth more than I am, at this moment. Good for him! And I mean that. His financial independence is good for me, too, you know. He's wanted to be free of me, and now he is. But anybody who wants to be free of me makes me want to be free of them." "So you two are free of each other. Yes, I knew Bing'd gotten rich. He writes to me, always has. The past few years he's been telling me how successful he is, financially. He bought a Rolls-Royce." "I know," said George Lockwood. "And he knows all the big shots." "The big shots? What are they?" "That's slang, Father. Important people. You don't keep up with slang, I can see that." "I thought I did, but big shot is a new one on me. But I knew your brother was on good terms with them. Oh, he's doing very well indeed. In oil. Oil has always seemed to me a very risky proposition, but he hasn't lost his head. So far. He's provided for his wife and children, and now there'll be no stopping him. The money you and he were left by your Uncle Pen is going to seem like small change to him." "Not to me, though," she said. "No, if you wanted to, you could live abroad for the rest of your life on the income from it. Not at the Paris Ritz, or Claridge's, but comfortably. As it is, you're a rich American, with your present income." "Yes," she said, and she was again looking at her private valley on the floor. He examined his hand. "I wasn't trying to change the subject," he said. "You didn't," she said. "We digressed to Bing, but that's part of the subject, isn't it?" "Yes," he said. "So is your Uncle Pen. His legacies. Your income. And me cutting myself open with my fingernail." She nodded. "And me the rich American in Europe," she said. "Do you know very much about this family?" "Our family?" she said. "Not as much as I ought to, I guess. I didn't realize there was very much to know. Is there? I've always had the feeling that the Lockwoods had a knack for making money, but were never quite respectable. That's strange, because after a hundred years we ought to be very respectable. Some families get there in one generation, and we've had three. Is that right? Yes. I'm the fourth generation - and look at Bing. He's going to be so rich that the others will seem poor by comparison." "You put your finger on it. We never have seemed quite respectable. Do you know why?" "My great-grandfather killed some people, I knew that. But the rest of you've been pretty well behaved - until poor Uncle Pen-" Excuse me. Did your trackwalker friend desert you on account of Uncle Pen?" "It may have been coincidence," she said. "But you don't really think it was?" "No, I don't really think so. His manner toward me changed. It was mostly the way he looked at me, as if I'd been masquerading as a fairly nice girl but was really a strumpet. And he's very ambitious, very cagy." "You're going to encounter that for the rest of your life, or at least until you marry and change your name. Is that why you want to live abroad?" "Not the original reason, but when all that happened to Uncle Pen, I had a hunch what it was going to be like at home. My cagy gentleman friend was a clue. And then I thought, good heavens, what must it be like in Swedish Haven and Gibbsville? It was the older women in Gibbsville that first made me feel that my petticoat was showing. At dancing school, at children's parties. They'd look at me." "Yes," said her father. "And I can see them. Hands folded in their laps. Unable to find anything wrong with you, or the way your mother dressed you. And not saying anything, because your mother was a Wynne, and the Wynnes were coal money. And we had some Stokes connections. But your name wasn't Wynne, or Stokes. It was Lockwood. How well I know that Gibbsville look, and I could have erased it in a twinkling if I'd married a Gibbsville girl and moved to Lantenengo Street. If my father had married a Gibbsville girl. Or even if your Uncle Pen had married one of their virgins and settled down there. So we never became quite respectable in their eyes, and I daresay we never felt quite respectable on account of that. The Lockwoods took Swedish Haven by brute force. The brute force otherwise known as the almighty dollar. And there was never anyone here that dared to oppose us. After all, your great-grandfather killed two men, right here in this town, and we don't know how many others he may have killed in the Civil War. He was never without a pistol, and half the town owed him money. If one of your ancestors could have been an honest judge, you might never have seen that Gibbsville look. But even your most respectable relative murdered his mistress and killed himself." "You've been under a strain, Father," said the girl. He looked quickly at his hand, then at her. He smiled. "I half expected to see I'd scratched myself again," he said. "Yes, I have been under a strain, and this is the first time I've admitted it." "Let's not talk anymore," she said. "Do you think I get myself all worked up, as your grandmother used to say?" "You never used to at all," she said. "Let's go for a walk?" "A walk? Where to?" "Nowhere. This past week I've been doing twenty times around the deck every day, and I always ended up just where I started. The saloon bar." "All right, let's walk," said George Lockwood. "Can I borrow a coat from you?" she said. "I'd rather not go upstairs." "Certainly," he said. "There's a nip in the air." "She chose his army trench coat, which he kept in the hall closet. He put on a camel's-hair polo coat, long and belted, and a cap. "You have style, Father," she said. "Have I? Thanks, I've always spent too much money on my clothes, and encouraged your brother to. It isn't only how you look in good clothes. It's how you feel. But I couldn't help noticing that your brother is economizing in that respect. Perhaps that's part of getting free of me. Care to have a walking stick?" "Yes," she said. She smiled. "Boys have started carrying canes again." "I've seen them. Malaccas. But I'm taking something heavier. When I was building this house I killed two copperheads in one day. I've never seen one since, but if you ever walk to the top of the mountain, look out for them. And there are rattlesnakes up there in the rocky part." "I thought they stayed in their holes at night." "Don't count on that," he said. They left the house and went through the gate, down the hill toward the county road. "I think you'll find a pair of gloves in that coat." "It is nippy," she said. "If you get tired, tell me," he said. "You're not wearing the best possible shoes for hiking." Halfway down the hill he stopped. "Your grandfather had a plan to buy up all the land from here to Richterville." "All the way to Richterville?" she said. "I used to wish he'd gone through with it, but as things have turned out I'm just as well pleased he didn't." "What things?" "Well, obviously your brother never intends to live here. And neither do you. That would only be a lot of land for me to dispose of." "You would have been the squire," said Tina. "You'd have enjoyed that." "Yes," he said. "It's very pretty in the moonlight," she said. "And the farmers seem to have gone to bed." "They have to. They'll be up at four in the morning. Feed the stock, get the milking done. And those enormous breakfasts. They need them. They'll do a day's work before noontime, and another day's work before they go back to bed. Yes, I'd have enjoyed being the squire. I have a feeling for this valley that I don't altogether understand. None of us were born here, although your Grandmother Lockwood was born at one end of the valley - Richterville - and your grandfather was born at the other end - Swedish Haven. And you have many cousins that you never heard of that live not far from here." "Who are they?" He smiled. "I don't know them either," he said. "Hoffners and Hoffner connections." "That was Grandmother Lockwood," she said. "Yes, they were pioneers. They cleared the land, cultivated it, brought in the livestock. The Lockwoods, as far as we know, were a different sort altogether. They were opportunists. But I will say for them that they stood off their opposition for a whole century. They made no friends, but they did the next best thing, which was to repel their enemies. Where would you like to live when you settle down?" "You don't believe I could settle down in Europe?" "No. This is too much a part of you, whether you know it or not. Your brother is starting all over again in California, but he's really only repeating what Moses Lockwood did a hundred years ago." "I don't think place makes that much difference to me," she said. "I do. In over a hundred years we've had no connection with the Europeans or the European ways of life. It's probably closer to two hundred years, if we belong to the New England Lockwoods. I don't know that we do, but I don't know that we don't. But no matter where you lived in Europe, you'd always be a foreigner, to them. Always. And as you got older that would make a bigger difference to you. You're nothing if not American." "I could live in China, if I married a man who lived in China." "Well, I've never been to China, but it might be easier for you to live there than in Spain, or France, or Italy. Occidentals form their own little communities in China, much more so than they do in the European countries. Americans are never absorbed into Chinese life, and they're never absorbed into French life either. But in France and the other European countries they'd like to be, and it's impossible." "What are your plans for me, Father?" "Plans, none. Hopes, many. I would hope that you fall in love with an American, marry him, and live somewhere in the United States. Preferably on the Eastern Seaboard, but the Middle West is only a sleeper jump away." "Have you got someone picked out for me?" He hesitated. "Oh, yes. Likely young men that I see at the Racquet Club and downtown New York. But you'd never consider anyone I recommended - and you shouldn't." "I owe you an apology. I'd somehow suspected that you had picked out someone closer to home. And hence the sales talk about this part of Pennsylvania." "No, I'm afraid I don't know any of the young men around here. Friends of your brothers, but I never see them. I never go to the country club, and when I go to Gibbsville I see Mr. Chapin and Mr. McHenry, but not any of the younger fellows. The Walker girl married Julian English, and I'm glad to see he's out of the way. You always liked him." "When we were younger I did. Every girl I knew had a crush on Julian at some time or other, except Caroline. So she turned out to be the one that married him." "Lord help her. We're in no position to criticize anyone, but I don't like to see a girl like Caroline wasted on him." "Charm, Father. You had it too," she said. "Your choice of tenses isn't very complimentary." "All right - you still have it. But you have something else now." "What?" "That scratch on your hand," she said. "I like that better than charm. I've had enough of charm to do me for a long time." They stood in silence for a little while. Presently he spoke. "I do own as far as the eye can see - in this light," he said. "In this light, and from this angle. I suppose that ought to be enough." "Isn't it?" she said. "Oh, I suppose it is," he said. "But if I'm content with that much, or that little, it proves I haven't got the vision that your grandfather had. Literally, I'm not as far-seeing as he was. He and your great-grandfather could see miles farther than I can. My world is very small, isn't it?" "I don't know. Is it?" she said. "I'm beginning to think it is. Myself. You. My wife. My house. And from here to that stand of timber in back of the Schweibacher farm. The Schweibacher farm that I own. All told, it isn't exactly a dream of empire, is it?" "No, thank goodness," she said. "Wait a minute before you start thanking goodness. Your Grandfather Wynne wanted to be a missionary. He never was, but that was his dream. And if you stop to consider, missionary work is a form of conquest." "A form,