The Winter of Our Discontent (9 page)

“I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean it. Honest to God I didn’t, Joey. I just had a couple of shocks today and besides—this is a dreadful holiday—dreadful.”

Morphy paused. “How do you mean? Oh! yes, I know. Yes, I do know. You believe I know?”

“And every year, ever since I was a kid, only it gets worse because—maybe because I know more what it means, I hear those lonely ‘lama sabach thani’ words.”

“I do know, Ethan, I do. It’s nearly over—nearly over now, Ethan. Just forget I stomped out, will you?”

And the iron firebell clanged—one single stroke.

“It’s over now,” said Joey-boy. “It’s all over—for a year.” He drifted quietly out through the storeroom and eased the alley door shut.

Ethan raised the shades and opened the store again, but there wasn’t much trade—a few bottle-of-milk and loaf-of-bread kids, a small lamb chop and can of peas for Miss Borcher for her hot-plate supper. People were just not moving about in the street. During the half-hour before six o’clock, while Ethan was getting things ready to close up, not a soul came in. And he locked up and started away before he remembered the groceries for home—had to go back and assemble them in two big bags and lock up over again. He had wanted to walk down to the bayside and watch the gray waves among the pilings of the dock and smell the sea water and speak to a seagull standing beak into the wind on a mooring float. He remembered a lady-poem written long ago by someone whipped to frenzy by the gliding spiral of a gull’s flight. The poem began: “Oh! happy fowl— what thrills thee so?” And the lady poet had never found out, probably didn’t want to know.

The heavy bags of groceries for the holidays discouraged the walk. Ethan moved wearily across the High Street and took his way slowly along Elm toward the old Hawley house.

CHAPTER TWO

Mary came from the stove and took one of the big grocery bags from him.

“I’ve got so much to tell you. Can’t wait.”

He kissed her and she felt the texture of his lips. “What’s the matter?” she asked.

“Little tired.”

“But you were closed three hours.”

“Plenty to do.”

“I hope you aren’t gloomy.”

“It’s a gloomy day.”

“It’s been a wonderful day. Wait till you hear.”

“Where are the kids?”

“Upstairs with the radio. They’ve got something to tell you too.”

“Trouble?”

“Now why do you say that?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t feel well.”

“Damn it, I do too.”

“With all the lovely things—I’ll wait till after dinner for our part. Are you going to be surprised.”

Allen and Mary Ellen boiled down the stairs and into the kitchen. “He’s home,” they said.

“Pop, you got Peeks in the store?”

“You mean that cereal, sure, Allen.”

“I wish you’d bring some. It’s the one with a mouse mask on the box that you cut out.”

“Aren’t you a little old for a mouse mask?”

Ellen said, “You send the box top and ten cents and you get a ventriloquism thing and instructions. We just heard it on the radio.”

Mary said, “Tell your father what you want to do.”

“Well, we’re going to enter the National I Love America Contest. First prize is go to Washington, meet the President—
with
parents—lots of other prizes.”

“Fine,” said Ethan. “What is it? What do you have to do?”

“Hearst papers,” Ellen cried. “All over the country. You just write an essay why you love America. All the winners get to go on television.”

“It’s the grapes,” said Allen. “How about going to Washington, hotel, shows, meet the President, the works. How’s that for the grapes?”

“How about your schoolwork?”

“It’s this summer. They announce the winners Fourth of July.”

“Well, that might be all right. Do you really love America or do you love prizes?”

“Now, Father,” said Mary, “don’t go spoiling it for them.”

“I just wanted to separate the cereal from the mouse mask. They get all mixed up.”

“Pop, where would you say we could look it up?”

“Look it up?”

“Sure, like what some other guys said—”

“Your great-grandfather had some pretty fine books. They’re in the attic.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, like Lincoln’s speeches and Daniel Webster and Henry Clay. You might take a look at Thoreau or Walt Whitman or Emerson—Mark Twain too. They’re all up there in the attic.”

“Did you read them, Pop?”

“He was my grandfather. He used to read them to me sometimes.”

“Maybe you could help us with the essays.”

“Then they wouldn’t be yours.”

“Okay,” said Allen. “Will you remember to bring home some Peeks? They’re full of iron and stuff.”

“I’ll try.”

“Can we go to the movies?”

Mary said, “I thought you were going to dye the Easter eggs. I’m boiling them now. You can take them out on the sun porch after dinner.”

“Can we go up in the attic and look at the books?”

“If you turn out the light after. Once it burned for a week. You left it on, Ethan.”

When the children had gone, Mary said, “Aren’t you glad they’re in the contest?”

“Sure, if they do it right.”

“I can’t wait to tell you—Margie read me in cards today, three times, because she said she never saw anything like it. Three times! I saw the cards come up myself.”

“Oh! Lord!”

“You won’t be so suspicious when you hear. You always poke fun about tall dark strangers. You can’t guess what it was about. Well—you want to guess?”

He said, “Mary, I want to warn you.”

“Warn me? Why, you don’t even know. My fortune is
you
.”

He spoke a harsh, bitter word under his breath.

“What did you say?”

“I said, ‘Slim pickings.’ ”

“That’s what you think, but that’s not what the cards think. Three times, she threw them.”

“Cards think?”

“They know,” said Mary. “Here she read my cards and it was all about you. You’re going to be one of the most important men in this town—that’s what I said,
most
important. And it’s not going to be long either. It’s very soon. Every card she turned showed money and more money. You’re going to be a rich man.”

“Darling,” he said, “please let me warn you, please!”

“You’re going to make an investment.”

“With what?”

“Well, I was thinking about Brother’s money.”

“No,” he cried. “I wouldn’t touch it. That’s yours. And it’s going to stay yours. Did you think that up or did—”

“She never mentioned it. And the cards didn’t. You are going to invest in July, and from then on, it’s one thing after another— one right after another. But don’t it sound nice? That’s the way she said it—‘Your fortune is Ethan. He is going to be a very rich man, maybe the biggest man in this town.’ ”

“Goddam her! She’s got no right.”

“Ethan!”

“Do you know what she’s doing? Do you know what you’re doing?”

“I know I’m a good wife and she’s a good friend. And I don’t want to quarrel with the children hearing. Margie Young is the best friend I’ve got. I know you don’t like her. What I think is you’re jealous of my friends—that’s what I think. I had a happy afternoon and you want to spoil it. That’s not nice.” Mary’s face was mottled with angry disappointment, and vengeful toward this obstacle to her daydreaming.

“You just sit there, Mr. Smart, and tear people down. You think Margie made it all up. She didn’t, because I cut the cards three times—but even supposing she did, why would she do it except to be kind and friendly and offer a little help. You tell me that, Mr. Smart! You find some nasty reason.”

“I wish I knew,” he said. “It might be pure mischief. She hasn’t a man or a job. It might be mischief.”

Mary lowered her voice and spoke with scorn. “You talk about mischief—you wouldn’t know mischief if it slapped you in the face. You don’t know what Margie goes through. Why, there are men in this town after her all the time. Big men, married men, whispering and urging—nasty. Sometimes she don’t know where to turn. That’s why she needs me, a woman friend. Oh, she told me things—men you just wouldn’t believe. Why, some of them even pretend they don’t like her in public, and then they sneak to her house or call her up and try to get her to meet them—sanctimonious men, always preaching morals and then doing like that. You talk about mischief.”

“Did she say who they were?”

“No, she didn’t and that’s another proof. Margie don’t want to hurt anybody even if they hurt her. But she said there was one I just wouldn’t believe. She said it would turn my hair gray if I knew.”

Ethan took a deep breath and held it and let it out as a huge sigh.

“Wonder who it could be,” Mary said. “The way she said it was like it was somebody we know well and just couldn’t believe.”

“But she would tell under certain circumstances,” Ethan said softly.

“Only if she was forced. She said that herself. Only if she had to if like her—honor, or her good name, you know . . . Who do you s’pose it could be?”

“I think I know.”

“You know? Who?”

“Me.”

Her mouth fell open. “Oh! You fool,” she said. “If I don’t watch you, you trap me every time. Well it’s better than gloomy.”

“A pretty kettle. Man confesses to sins of the flesh with wife’s best friend. Is laughed to scorn.”

“That’s not nice talk.”

“Perhaps man should have denied it. Then at least his wife would have honored him with suspicion. My darling, I swear to you by all that’s holy, that never by word or deed have I ever made a pass at Margie Young-Hunt. Now will you believe I’m guilty?”

“You!”

“You don’t think I’m good enough, desirable enough, in other words you don’t think I could make the grade?”

“I like jokes. You know it—but that’s not something to joke about. I hope the children haven’t got into the trunks up there. They never put anything back.”

“I’ll try once more, fair wife. A certain woman, initials M. Y.-H., has surrounded me with traps, for reasons known only to herself. I am in grave danger of falling into one or more of them.”

“Why don’t you think of your fortune? The cards said July and they said it three times—I saw it. You are going to get money and lots of money. Think about that.”

“Do you love money so much, cottontail?”

“Love money? What do you mean?”

“Do you want money enough so that even necromancy, thaumaturgy, juju, or any other dark practices are justified?”

“You said it! You started it. I’m not going to let you hide in your words. Do I love money? No, I don’t love money. But I don’t love worry either. I’d like to be able to hold up my head in this town. I don’t like the children to be hang-dog because they can’t dress as good—as well—as some others. I’d love to hold up my head.”

“And money would prop up your head?”

“It would wipe the sneers off the faces of your holy la-dedas.”

“No one sneers at Hawley.”

“That’s what you think! You just don’t see it.”

“Maybe because I don’t look for it.”

“Are you throwing your holy Hawleys up at me?”

“No, my darling. It’s not much of a weapon any more.”

“Well, I’m glad you found it out. In this town or any other town a Hawley grocery clerk is still a grocery clerk.”

“Do you blame me for my failure?”

“No. Of course I don’t. But I do blame you for sitting wallowing in it. You could climb out of it if you didn’t have your old-fashioned fancy-pants ideas. Everybody’s laughing at you. A grand gentleman without money is a bum.” The word exploded in her head, and she was silent and ashamed.

“I’m sorry,” Ethan said. “You have taught me something— maybe three things, rabbit footling mine. Three things will never be believed—the true, the probable, and the logical. I know now where to get the money to start my fortune.”

“Where?”

“I’ll rob a bank.”

The little bell of the timer on the stove took up a slow-spaced pinging.

Mary said, “Go call the children. The casserole’s ready. Tell them to turn out the light.” She listened to his tread.

CHAPTER THREE

My wife, my Mary, goes to her sleep the way you would close the door of a closet. So many times I have watched her with envy. Her lovely body squirms a moment as though she fitted herself into a cocoon. She sighs once and at the end of it her eyes close and her lips, untroubled, fall into that wise and remote smile of the ancient Greek gods. She smiles all night in her sleep, her breath purrs in her throat, not a snore, a kitten’s purr. For a moment her temperature leaps up so that I can feel the glow of it beside me in the bed, then drops and she has gone away. I don’t know where. She says she does not dream. She must, of course. That simply means her dreams do not trouble her, or trouble her so much that she forgets them before awakening. She loves to sleep and sleep welcomes her. I wish it were so with me. I fight off sleep, at the same time craving it.

I have thought the difference might be that my Mary knows she will live forever, that she will step from the living into another life as easily as she slips from sleep to wakefulness. She knows this with her whole body, so completely that she does not think of it any more than she thinks to breathe. Thus she has time to sleep, time to rest, time to cease to exist for a little.

On the other hand, I know in my bones and my tissue that I will one day, soon or late, stop living and so I fight against sleep, and beseech it, even try to trick it into coming. My moment of sleep is a great wrench, an agony. I know this because I have awakened at this second still feeling the crushing blow. And once in sleep, I have a very busy time. My dreams are the problems of the day stepped up to absurdity, a little like men dancing, wearing the horns and masks of animals.