The Man Who Loved His Wife Page 5

  In the living room harsh light lay in yellow rectangles and sent up cruel blades of brightness from the polished tiles between Oriental rugs. Elaine hurried to draw the curtains. At once the mood softened. A dimmed mirror threw back her image. “I ought to comb my hair,” she said, but threw herself upon the couch, stretching her long legs and resting sandaled feet upon a cushion.

  Ralph stood above the couch and looked down upon her body. “I’ve thought of you every day.” His tone was too ardent. “I couldn’t stay away any longer.”

  She sat up abruptly, asked for a cigarette, moved to the far edge of the couch after he had leaned close to give her a light. His hands smelled of antiseptic soap. Elaine held herself tight to show indifference. He sat at the couch’s other end. The curtains blew out like inflated balloons. Elaine and Ralph watched as though this were some strange phenomenon.

  She thought of the meetings in daydreams, the conversations carried on in silence, the relief of confession. My husband wants to die. In every revery the facts gushed out; in the man’s presence she felt a cowardly fool. Some day he’ll do it. Perhaps, she told herself, it was all a product of her inflamed imagination; or worse, a guilty wish. No, no, no, her heart protested, she did not want to gain freedom that way. Her hands flew to cover the shameful color that flushed in her face.

  Through all the weeks that he had denied himself this visit, Ralph had thought about Elaine, cherished many images, tried to capture the elusive delight of her changing expressions, recalled the modeling of bone, the coral tint which often and unexpectedly brightened ivory flesh. He had tried without success to exorcise the spell by making love to a handsome nurse, had told himself severely that he did not approve of involvements with married women. “I’ve got something to show you.” With a tense hand he took out his wallet and from it took a clipping mounted on cardboard.

  “Recognize the girl?”

  “Me. But years ago.”

  Professional dignity slipped away. No longer self-contained and superior, the doctor became a diffident boy. He had found the picture in an advertisement in an old magazine given to him by a patient who had wanted him to read a story he had written. “The girl looked like you, and then I remembered that you told me you’d put yourself through college working as a model.”

  “That’s ten years ago. I was a sophomore and missed an ancient history class to pose for that picture.”

  He returned the picture to his wallet carefully while his eyes were fixed upon her. The scrutiny was almost contact. Elaine became nervous, left the couch, sought protection in deeper shadow. There was the smell of challenge in the room, in the scent of flowers, in the hot wind. Ralph’s body was long and spare, his head narrow. Fiery red hot sparks shot from his green-tinted eyes. Not daring to let him see that she recognized mood and masculinity, Elaine bustled about the room in the need to avoid contact of eye or hand. She talked in a nervous, flutey voice about the years when she had worked as a model, rushed from class to photographer’s studio, from studio to date. Her days and nights had been too crowded, she had studied when she came in after theater and dancing, had got along with three or four hours of sleep. Excitement had carried her along, she had lived in a whirl of fascinating activity. Ralph saw her as she must have been before her marriage, a gay and popular girl, teasing and enchanting the many men who had surely been in love with her.

  “But you wouldn’t have liked me then. I was too frivolous.” Recollection of frivolity brought out a stream of laughter, “I’m sure you were much more serious when you were at college.”

  “Too serious.” There had never been a moment in his life when Ralph had doubted his dedication to the profession of his foster-father. Above all in his life he had wanted to prove himself to the generous pair who had treated him as their own son.

  At last she settled down again, hands folded primly in her lap. Ralph chose the far end of the couch. In the dim room they sat like sedate children waiting to be sent out onto the floor of the dancing school. Presently Ralph moved closer and reached for Elaine’s hand. The kiss caught them both off balance.

  For months she had been thinking about this man, but not in this way, not physically. He had been her confessor, the vessel into which she had poured her fears for her husband; certainly not the instrument of relief or revenge. Surprise made her vulnerable. She clung to Ralph, accepted and returned the kiss. But only for a few instinctive seconds. With a shudder, recognizing weakness, she pulled away, pushed at his chest, made movements of rejection.

  “Oh, no, please. Please not . . .”

  He became fiercer, murmured that he loved her, that he had tried to forget about her, that no woman had ever moved him so deeply and completely. Elaine seemed not to have heard. Both trembled and shrank into themselves. They heard wheels on the dead-end street, became paralyzed at the thought of having to face her husband calmly. The car turned and drove down the hill. Elaine rose and once again sought protection in the shadows. Ralph followed. Overhead a plane buzzed. They listened like people waiting for a bomb to destroy them. She threw back her head and stroked her neck in a way that Ralph found unbearably seductive.

  Having once rejected him, Elaine did not expect to be seized again. The second shock swept away all defenses. She grew limp, pressed her breasts against his body, arched backward, supple and ready. Ralph carried her to the couch. “Not here, not in this room,” she whispered as though it were the place rather than the act that would betray her husband. Her mind had cleared, she knew precisely what she was doing and loathed herself, but she had been so long deprived that she had no more will to resist. Her body felt remote from mind and heart as Ralph lifted and carried her to her own room and there, upon her own bed, took her. They made love in silence with no words of passion, no moans of rapture. Her lover was ardent and experienced, but Elaine felt less delight than the cessation of throbbing need.

  Poor Fletcher, she thought.

  Afterward she lay still, neither fully released nor repentant, but only arid and indifferent. Ralph came alive to the situation and groaned, “What are we going to do now?” All Elaine could say was, “Hurry, hurry. Please get dressed and go quickly.”

  HELPLESS IN THE padded chair, his jaw weighted with clamps, pipes, and tubes, Fletcher became the most captive of audiences. Not even the consolation of revery was permitted. Dr. Gentian indulged in the conversational flux that is the occupational disease of dentists and barbers. Although Fletcher had become accustomed to muteness he found these sessions particularly irritating because the doctor could not restrain his admiration for Fletcher’s wife. In the most jocular way he reminded the poor man of his tremendous luck in having won the devotion of a delightful girl.

  “So much younger, too. You must have something on the ball to keep her so faithful. At your age and with your trouble.” The dentist touched his own Adam’s apple.

  Medical authority gave Dr. Gentian special privilege. He did not feel restrained in speaking of the laryngectomy and its physical and psychological effects. He always had tidbits of unpleasant information. While he drilled and hammered he gave dull, repetitious lectures studded with technical phrases. From this he went on to another painful subject. One of his patients had been sued by his wife for half a million dollars. The drama had been covered by the morning and evening papers but the dentist, having looked into the protagonists’ mouths, had extra tidbits about their teeth and their passions. He knew better than any reporter why Mr. X had failed to hold the affections of his wife. “Not that you’re anything like him,” Dr. Gentian shouted over the whirring of the drill, “a big good-looking man like you. He’s a runt, a regular Mr. Five-by-Five who goes in for these tall, bleached dolls. She’s nothing, if you ask me, but a run-of-the-mill gold-digger while your wife’s true blue, all wool and a yard wide. And a million dollars’ worth of sex appeal.”

  Held prisoner in the padded chair, Fletcher thought of the chocolate-colored blotch on Elaine’s flowered silk dress. He saw her startled eyes, the
shocked and graceless movement as she backed away. A groan escaped.

  “Am I hurting you?”

  The patient, bereft of larynx and encumbered by a mouthful of instruments, could give no more answer than another strangled moan.

  A moment of rest was permitted. Then Dr. Gentian went on with his drilling and his story: “And one fine day when he was out on business his wife packed her things, priceless jewelry and four minks, and left him flat.”

  Elaine had not allowed her husband to buy her a mink coat. She had handsome wool wraps of various colors, satins and brocades for evening and an ermine-lined velvet cloak for cold nights. He saw her wearing it in New York, a young woman who had left a brutal, demanding, and impotent husband to enjoy freedom. A new vision rose. Somewhere beyond the dentist’s drill and cabinets he saw his house deserted, too bright and glaring without his wife’s gentle shadow. The house was Elaine; she had selected and furnished it, fixed its proportions, determined its colors, arranged its routines, filled it with her past, the looks and ornaments that had belonged to her family.

  At once Fletcher felt that he must leap from the dentist’s chair, desert the barber, jump into the car and speed to her side. He did not. Dr. Gentian was allowed to finish, to spend galling moments in trivial talk, to consult his book and arrange another appointment. Again prisoner in the barber’s chair, Fletcher listened to political and scandalous gossip, heard praise of women, boasts of male prowess. He allowed the manicurist to pick at his cuticle and thought of his wife speeding in a taxi toward the airport. At long last he was free to pick up his car.

  Cindy was to have waited at the parking lot. It was absurd to have expected her to be on time. Fletcher passed the time by studying displays in shop windows. He was tempted to buy an enameled brooch for Elaine, a box of chocolates, a twenty-dollar art book, a Japanese kimono. Before the operation, when his voice was whole, he used to burst into the New York apartment shouting, “Hi, lovable, I’ve brought you a present.” Recently he had brought her a pair of amethyst earrings which she treasured less for their value than the price he had paid in pride in letting a strange shopkeeper hear his mangled voice.

  Today a gift would be a gesture of penitence. She would understand too well, offer tact too generously. Better let the whole thing blow over . . . unless she had already packed and left him.

  At the parking lot he found Cindy waiting and reproachful, swearing that she had not been more than three minutes late. Her hands were empty. She had bought nothing, merely enjoyed looking at things too costly for her modest purse. Fletcher did not bother to comment. At the time of the divorce he had established a trust fund for his daughter. Cindy’s income was around seventy-five dollars a week, secure and permanent. What had she to complain about?

  “I think it’s time we had a heart-to-heart talk, Daddy. It’s impossible to say anything in front of Don, he’s so proud.”

  Fletcher only half listened. Rush hour traffic, changing lights, heedless drivers, the glare of late afternoon sunshine, long lines of cars belching gas fumes, compounded his impatience. He drove too fast, cheated the changing lights in the urgent need to find Elaine at home, loving and unchanged. He framed the words of apology, heard her laughter and forgiveness.

  Cindy talked on and on about Don’s misfortunes, not only in the office where they gave the best cases to members of the partners’ families, but in previous jobs. “He simply doesn’t have the connections in New York. And it’s too brutal there, Daddy, you don’t know.”

  The boulevard climbed a small hill. A shaft of sunlight smote Fletcher’s eyes. Elaine’s laughter dissolved, the smile vanished. He saw her empty room, the dressing table bare of her jewel case, her jars and bottles, a note on the polished wood. She would say she had borne his moods as long as possible and that she was sorry, so terribly, terribly, tragically sorry. Hidden in a place where no one would ever think of looking for them, Fletcher kept a secret store of sleeping pills.

  “We’ve never asked you for any favors. Or money either,” said Cindy with a little grimace of humility. “Money doesn’t matter so terribly much to us except that you’ve got to keep up appearances. People would never want to pay a man a decent salary if they think he needs it.” The absolving stream of laughter mingled with the shriek of a passing police car’s siren. “Not that my husband expected anything, but people did talk a lot about me having a rich father. I told Don the truth, that seventy-five a week was every blessed cent I had in the world, but still there was the impression. Could I help it that Mom keeps up that big house and all? It wouldn’t have been natural if he hadn’t expected some excellent contacts at least. And when we came out here . . .” The laughter fluttered indecisively. Since Fletcher gave her no encouragement Cindy went on, “We did think you’d need a legal representative. Or something. Of course Don would have to pass his bar examinations but he’s been reading a lot on California law. It’s not too different basically, he says.”

  They turned off the boulevard onto a shady street. In a passing taxi Fletcher noticed a passenger in a large black straw hat. It was the kind of hat Elaine wore on sunny days. Fear stabbed at his heart again. He turned to look backward.

  “Please, Daddy, watch where you’re going!”

  He had crossed over the yellow line. He pulled the car over and pressed his foot hard upon the accelerator.

  “Daddy! We’re in a twenty-five-mile zone.”

  He drove the rest of the way at thirty and felt like a cripple. The ascent of their hill seemed endless. In the driveway he sounded his horn. The signal often brought Elaine running out to meet him. The kitchen was empty, the stove cold and without the pots that ought at this hour to have been bubbling and giving out pleasant odors. Her bedroom was too tidy, but the jars were still there, the jewel box and perfume bottles. In the living room the cushions were plumped up and in place. No newspapers and magazines littered the tables of the den. Alone, deserted, voiceless, and spent, Fletcher thought once more of his hidden pills.

  At the end of the corridor a door opened, “Are you back? Oh, dear, I’m late. I didn’t hear you come in, the shower was on, I guess.” Elaine ran toward him, sweet-scented and warm. Of their own volition his arms curved around her. She pressed herself close to enjoy his strength. Resentment and fear fled, he forgot frustration, believed himself the man he had been, pulled open the white toweling robe to feel her soft flesh.

  Cindy appeared. Elaine, self-conscious when her husband’s daughter witnessed the most ordinary caress, jerked herself away. Fletcher grunted, furious because the priceless, hopeful moment had been interrupted.

  “What’s this?” asked the girl.

  “A hat,” Elaine said.

  Cindy held it aloft, a man’s hat, high-crowned, narrow-brimmed. “Whose?”

  “Dr. Julian’s. He was here this afternoon.”

  Elaine moved backward toward the wall, as if deeper shadow could make her invisible. After Ralph had left, she had changed the sheets on her bed, stood under the shower, soaped herself in the hottest water she could bear, rinsed with a cold stream, seeking discomfort as partial penance.

  “Who’s he?”

  “A doctor. He took care of me when I had the flu, and he’s a friend, too. He asked for you Fletch.” There was no response. Elaine’s voice reached a higher pitch, was forced down as she added, “He used to live in this house. He stops in to see us sometimes. He was visiting a patient in the neighborhood.”

  In the redundant, shrill explanation Fletcher sensed disquiet. Visions flashed, nude bodies writhed, sparks shot high, miniature suns dazzled, a carousel of arms and loins, caresses, attitudes, breasts, positions, all at a giddy pace. Fury rose, phrases came to mind, savage anger stifled by affliction and helplessness. Elaine had disappeared. Her bedroom door was closed. She had shut herself away from him.

  At the corner bar in the den he filled a glass with ice, poured unmeasured whiskey. The drink brought no solace. This day had been an endurance contest against trivial irritation
s. Tomorrow would be no better. To regain self-esteem he looked backward to a past seen as a flashing parade of challenges and victories. Setbacks and losses were forgotten, for in the end he had put across big deals, recouped losses, kept ardent faith in himself. Fletcher Strode! Better off dead than enduring this life of petty defeats; showing the spleen of a spoiled child, throwing food at his wife, sulking because she had talked to another man.

  Elaine had never given him any real cause, his reasonable mind argued, to suspect disloyalty. On another level he ached to punish the faithless creature, to keep her forever from the pleasures of love. The diary was brought out of its hiding place, touched reverently like a secret scripture or a secret weapon.

  Her doctor paid another call on a healthy girl. Is the redhead in league with her? Perhaps Dr. Julian is only her sucker being used to provide her with some pill or poison that will do the job on me. Maybe a pain-killer because she is soft and would not want to see me suffer. I do not think she would dare tell him about her diabolical plan. Maybe she consults him about the psychological condition of her poor husband. It would be clever if she told him she worries about me wanting to commit suicide. How little they know about me. As if Fletcher Strode would take the coward’s way out . . .

  He stopped to read what he had written, proud and somewhat astonished by his use of words. Elaine came into the room so silently that Fletcher saw her as a vision transformed to reality; not the jealous vision of a woman writhing in lewd love, but the specter of a living angel. She wore a long hostess gown of some filmy material that swayed as she moved so that soft womanly curves and youthful suppleness were happily revealed. To shield himself from the thrust of pleasure aroused by her presence, he growled without the slightest effort to overcome disability, “What’s taken you so long?” and at the same time locked his diary away in the desk drawer.