An Independent Woman (28 page)

“That's a fine statement, true or not. But the plain fact of the matter is, my darling Philip, that you are very poor and I am reasonably wealthy. If we are joined together in the holy bonds of matrimony, then we are joined together in everything else. I have a huge inheritance from my grandfather—”

“You put that in a foundation. I know all about that.”

“I kept some. I've earned money. My brother Tom left me two million in federal bonds, which I have never touched, and I've earned more than enough money to keep this house, in spite of your insistence that you pay your share. I'm not a fool about money. It means little to me—the fortune or misfortune of having rich parents—but I acknowledge it.”

“Barbara, I'm well paid—”

“Oh yes. I know how well paid you are.”

“Barbara, I'm not poor,” Philip argued. “All the years Agatha and I were married, we saved money for a trip we never took. Since her death I've lived like a monk, and I've squirreled away over twenty-five thousand dollars.”

Barbara refrained from commenting on that.

“Well, how much will this trip cost?”

“I'm afraid to tell you. I've been laying it out with a travel agent. I'm an old woman, Philip; I can't be satisfied with youth hostels and cheap hotels, and good hotels are expensive. I love you, and I have the right to give you gifts. You drive a car that's twelve years old and has a hundred and thirty thousand miles on the odometer.”

He sighed and admitted that he'd never won an argument with her. “Suppose we compromise. I'll pay for the airline tickets, and you can pay for everything else.”

“Do you mean that? You won't be reaching into your pocket every time we want a cup of coffee?”

“I can afford a cup of coffee,” Philip said.

“Will you stick to that?” Barbara asked. “If you do, I can live with it. But everything else goes on my American Express card. And the travel tickets won't be cheap. We fly over the pole, nonstop, to Heathrow.”

“The North Pole?”

“Oh, I love you, Philip. Yes, the North Pole. But we'll be warm and comfortable, and you won't see a thing. We'll be in Israel for my birthday in November, and I don't want any silly jewelry. I want you.”

T
HERE WAS ONE MORE DINNER
at Highgate before Barbara and Philip left. The harvest had been good and the winemaking had begun. Adam predicted a superb Cabernet that would make 1984 a year to be coveted and remembered, and the white grapes were even putting forth Chardonnay that satisfied him.

The whole family was there, including Harry and May Ling, who had just returned from France. Sam, Barbara's son, and Sally's son, young Dan, himself a resident at Mercy Hospital, were seated next to Joe Lavette at the far end of the big table, so that they might confine their talk about illness and intrusive surgery to each other; while Mary Lou, Sam's wife, sat with May Ling and chattered away about Paris. Soon enough the national election would take place, and Barbara and Philip had already filled out their absentee ballots. Adam was intent on explaining to Harry why each harvest was different, and why the wine of one year tasted a bit different from the wine of another year, even though they came from the same vines. Harry and May Ling had spent a weekend at the chateâu-winery of a client of his Paris office, and he used his newly acquired knowledge of French winemaking to sustain the conversation with Adam, whose first appraisal of anyone was at least partly based on their knowledge of wine. May Ling, with Freddie on one side of her and Mary Lou on the other, appeared to be a changed woman. She had kissed Freddie and embraced him tenderly. With Mary Lou she talked about the shops in Paris and how she had argued to stop Harry from buying her things.

As for Freddie and Judith, they had eyes only for each other. Judith's nose, after a second operation, was still taped, but except for the thin lines of the scars, her face was much the same. She wore no makeup tonight, but she had experimented privately with a concealing foundation, and she already had four photography dates for the time when the bandages would come off her nose. After two dinners with her family, Freddie felt at ease and at home with the Hopes, and the date for the wedding had been set.

Here, at Highgate, Adam had gone out of his way to initiate Judith into the secrets of winemaking, and for this dinner, he had opened six bottles of the prized Rothschild Mouton Cadet, from a case presented to Clair Harvey, Jake's wife, years ago in Paris.

“This toast and this wine is in honor of the new member of the family,” he announced. “May she know the joy of the grape and the love of our hearts.”

Eloise was overwhelmed. Adam was not given to sentimentality, and the toast was so unexpected that she began to weep, recalling her harsh characterization of him as a racist. As for Judith, her eyes filled with tears. But later that evening Adam spoke privately with Freddie, asking him what his opinion was of the Mouton Cadet.

“Good.”

“Not great?”

“Good. Not great. How great can a wine be when you get past the bullshit?”

“Do you think we could do it?”

“Maybe.”

“Let's work on it.”

“Nothing I'd like better,” Freddie said.

A
FTER THE DINNER
Sally took Barbara aside and said to her, using the term she used to address Barbara, “Bobby, dear, we must talk. Let's walk outside, just the two of us.”

Barbara told Philip, deep in conversation with Freddie and Judith, that she was going to take a walk with Sally and would join him later. It was a chilly night, and both women wore sweaters; they wandered along the curving paths among the stone buildings. After a few minutes of silence, Barbara asked Sally what was bothering her.

“The part was nothing. It was nothing, four words. I'm too old even for the character parts.”

“You're only fifty-eight, Sally, and you're lovely.”

“They want forty-year-olds for grandma parts, or old women with white hair. I don't mean you, Bobby. You know what I mean. Oh, it isn't that. Why am I always so discontent? I've been going to church in Napa, but it does nothing for me. Joe hired a nurse. At least when I was his nurse, I would talk to him occasionally. Now I hardly see him. I sit and contemplate my navel. I wish I could find someone to have an affair with. At least it would break up the day.”

“You're kidding?”

“No, I'm not kidding. I thought of divorcing Joe, but I could never explain to him why I was doing it, and I do love him—sort of—and he loves me.”

“You really want my advice?” Barbara asked her.

“Certainly I do. Why do you think I dragged you away?”

“OK,” Barbara said. “Get a job.”

“Doing what?”

“You're a superb actress. Start a playhouse. God knows, we need one here in the Valley; culturally, this place is barren. We all use Highgate and the family as a refuge, but Sam and his wife are in San Francisco, and so is your son, and May Ling and Harry will be living there. Get the local church behind you. They're always looking for ways to get people inside the not-so-pearly gates. Pull in some of your Hollywood friends, and you can sell tickets up and down the Valley and over in Sonoma, too.”

“Bobby, do you think I could do it?”

“You can do anything you want to, Sally, and don't tell me you haven't dreamed of directing a play.”

“Do you know any actor who doesn't go to bed with that dream every night? Bobby, will you help me?”

“When I come back—yes, surely. But it's a long drive from the City… You start it tomorrow. Don't put it off, and when I come back, I'll write you a play. I've always wanted to try it.”

Sally threw her arms around Barbara. “What a neat idea. I will, I will, if it kills me.”

“It certainly won't kill you,” Barbara said.

R
APTUROUS WAS THE ONLY WORD
Barbara could think of to describe Philip's arrival in London and his first stroll through the city. On the plane she had said to him, “It's odd to think of a man your age who has never been to Europe,” to which he replied, “Most of the people in this country have never been to London or anyplace in Europe, and here I am, Philip Carter, floating over the North Pole in a 747 the size of a cruise ship.”

“Not really the size of a cruise ship. We haven't come to that yet. But, Philip,” she teased him, “don't you think that if God wanted us to fly, he never would have given us the railroads?”

“Absolutely,” he agreed, and she admitted that this was a new Philip. “When Agatha and I left the Church, I felt that I had escaped, that we had been in a prison and somehow we had broken out. You see, I loved her madly for two years before we dared to admit it to ourselves and to each other; and after that for quite a while we looked over our shoulders, so to speak, like criminals always in danger of being caught by the cops. When she passed away, I had the same feeling, that they had captured one of us and taken their revenge on me.”

“And who were ‘they'?” Barbara could not help asking.

“Ah. That's the question, isn't it?”

But after customs at Heathrow and the cab ride to Brown's Hotel, Barbara had the feeling that he would never look over his shoulder again. His face lit up as they rolled into Albemarle Street, and he smiled with pleasure as they walked into the old hotel. She had explained to him that the reason she chose Brown's was because it was, in her opinion and in Freddie's—an inveterate traveler—not only the best hotel in London, but also the most English. His eyes rolled over the entryway, delighting in everything. At the desk, for the first time in many years, he signed, “Mr. and Mrs. Philip Carter.” The room was large and comfortable, with an alcove as a tiny sitting room and a huge king-sized bed. It was eleven o'clock, London time, but they were not sleepy. Barbara asked Philip whether he wanted dinner. He shook his head. They had both eaten well on the plane.

“Then as a final step in the process of liberation, I would suggest that we go down to the bar and have a small nightcap.”

He was enchanted with everything. “They likely won't have your Highgate Cabernet,” he said.

“I am not wedded to Highgate, I am wedded to you, and when Adam is not watching, I prefer a Chardonnay. Anyway, I was thinking of a brandy.”

“Do you mind if I have a glass of their ale?”

“Mind? Why should I mind?” she wondered.

“I'm a neophyte. My England has existed only in the books I have read, but it's very real. Though not as real as it appears to be. I never read that they shine every bit of brass and that the floor squeaks. How old is this place?”

“I don't really know—perhaps a hundred and fifty years.”

“And they don't tear it down and build a high-rise in its place?”

“Heaven forbid!”

They went down to the bar. They made a handsome couple, Philip tall and slender, and Barbara with her shock of white hair, still in sweater and skirt. People smiled and said good evening as they walked to the bar. The handful of people in the bar were at tables. Barbara and Philip sat at the bar and ordered their drinks. Soon it was a half hour to midnight.

Back in their room again, they found that the maid had turned back their bed.

“Take out what you need,” Barbara said. “We'll unpack tomorrow.” She found a robe and went into the bathroom to change. When she came out, Philip was sitting on the bed in his underwear.

“I couldn't find my pajamas,” he said.

“Since when do we sleep in pajamas, Philip?”

“Well, we're in a strange place. Suppose the maid walks in?”

“Philip, darling, we are not in a strange place. We are in London, which is the most civilized city in the world, and maids do not just walk in, and I'm not going to bed with a man in pajamas. I never knew a lack of pajamas to inhibit you in San Francisco or at Highgate.”

“It's different here.”

“It is no different here, and I suggest we go to bed. And in the morning, we'll find your pajamas, wrinkle them, and lay them out on the bed, so that the maid is impressed with the fact that you're a proper clergyman.”

“You're laughing at me.”

“Yes, I am. Now take off your damn underwear and let's get to bed.”

B
ARBARA FELT LIKE A TOUR GUIDE
, alternately delighted and provoked. She recalled taking her son, Sam, to the Cemetery of Heavenly Rest in Los Angeles when he was twelve or so. It was a place she had never been to before and would never have visited, dead or alive; but she went because Sam demanded it, having read about it; and in the end she was pleased that she had seen the weird, incredible place. Philip also had prepared a list of places he wanted to see. The list was long and would have required a month's stay in England, yet she decided that she would do her best. The flight from Los Angeles had befuddled their time sense: nine hours' difference—or was it eight? Neither of them could get it quite right.

Awake at six, they unpacked their luggage. Barbara wore a pleated skirt, a blouse, and a sweater, and convinced Philip that a pair of comfortable old trousers would not offend Londoners. “A good sweater,” she said. “You don't know what the weather will be in October, and we're lucky to have a sunny day to begin.”

In the dining room for breakfast, Philip looked at the menu and blanched. “Do you see what they charge for breakfast in this place? At home—”

“Philip, we are not at home,” she said sternly. “The prices are in your menu, not on mine. That's an English custom. They relish odd forms of courtesy here. Do you remember our agreement?”

“Agreement? But these prices, when you translate them into dollars—”

“We made an agreement. You pay for the plane tickets. I pay for everything else. We sealed it with a handshake and a kiss. Several kisses, if I recall correctly. I took you for my husband as a man of honor, and you've always told me that honor rates very high with the Unitarians. For better or worse, you were foolish enough to marry a wealthy old woman, and I should be very upset at you if you keep raising this issue.”