An Unfinished Season (27 page)

Why did he do it? she asked.

Not because of a quarrel, I said.

I want to believe that, she said.

Believe it, I said.

But I can't, quite, she said, her voice breaking. I want to but I can't.

You must not—

Blame myself? No, I won't blame myself. And I won't blame Jack, either. I'll pretend we're both blameless. Isn't that the best way? she said in a tone of voice that discouraged any answer from me.

I knew nothing of suicide, except that no family wanted to admit to one. I could not imagine the despair that would cause someone to take his own life, even a terrible illness or a prisoner under torture; and then I thought probably that was what it was with any suicide, a way to stop the torture. So you hanged yourself in your cell or swallowed the bottle of pills or put a gun to your head, knowing that each day would be worse than the last and the only release would be death. I supposed that once you were tortured you stayed tortured. There was no end to the memory of it. Yet it was hard for me to understand how a memory could stay fresh year after year; surely it would fade and the wind become wolves and the wolves become wind and in time the event would become an illusion, a kind of fable. Surely a simple quarrel would not be enough for a man to end his life. I leaned close to Consuela and told her my guess about Jack Brule at Bataan but she did not respond. I don't know if she was listening or, if she was listening, she understood. She seemed to diminish as I looked at her, sinking into the cushions of the sofa, her drink cold in her hands.

She said, Thank you, Wils.

Do you want to tell me about the quarrel?

No, I don't. You can ask Aurora. Aurora can give you chapter and verse. No doubt she will anyway.

I won't ask Aurora, I said.

She'll tell you, Consuela said.

I'll close my ears, I said.

No, you won't. No one ever does.

The afternoon light was beginning to fail. Far away on the Outer Drive I heard the rush-hour traffic, all those cars bound for the North Shore and the last weekend in August. I remembered that there was a dance tonight, an end-of-summer black-tie affair at one of the Lake Forest country clubs. Aurora and I had declined, planning instead—and now I couldn't remember what it was we had planned. My scheme to spend a night together in Quarterday had fallen apart. The ten days flew by and my parents were suddenly home from Havana. I had hardly seen them since their return, though I had noticed an unusual cigarette box in the den. I took that as a sign that things had returned to normal. I looked at my watch. Six o'clock.

There'll be an inquest, Consuela said from the couch. That's what the people from the city were here about. The coroner's office.

The coroner's office? I heard myself say.

I wonder if you would mind going with me, Consuela said. With Aurora and me, to the coroner's office. I'd rather not go alone. Would you mind awfully?

Of course not, I said. Tell me about the men from the coroner's office.

They were agreeable men, she said. Their questions were upsetting but they had to ask them. They apologized for asking but they had their instructions, the law was clear, given the circumstances. Jack's death was “wrongful,” they said. It was only a formality anyway.

I know some of the people at the coroner's office, I said, trying to keep my voice under control. Was one of them a little taller than I am, gray hat, wing-tipped shoes?

Why, yes, she said.

Was his name Laschbrook?

I didn't get their names, she said. Is something wrong?

I don't know, I said. Let me make a call.

I stepped into the corridor, located the phone, and dialed the newspaper. When Henry Laschbrook came on the line I asked him what he was doing at Dr. Jason Brule's apartment, and when he replied curtly, My job, I said I was a friend of the family and would do everything in my power to see that he was fired. I knew the publisher. I would talk to Ozias Tilleman. I said the coroner's office would hear about his impersonation, a violation of the law. He would be prosecuted. Blacklisted from the newspaper business. I talked at him for five minutes, growing angrier by the minute and knowing at the same time that nothing whatever would happen to Henry. That was not the way Chicago worked. Lapse of judgment would be the explanation, competitive pressures leading to unseemly zeal and, by the way, were there inaccuracies in the reporting? When I finished, he said, Sorry, boyo, the piece is in the early edition of the newspaper. You'll find it on the newsstand. So fuck off.

I hung up the phone but I did not move. Aurora and Consuela were about to become news, their pictures and a picture of Jack Brule, “prominent society psychiatrist,” a description of the apartment and of the death, the caliber of the handgun, the nature of the wound, who found the body and the probable cause, inevitably “despondency” following an argument with—“his mistress”? “a female friend”? I hoped to God the headline did not read
LOVE NEST SUICIDE
, but I knew as I mouthed the words that that was exactly how it would read. For the late edition they would have the doctor's war record and comments from his professional colleagues, if they could get the doctors to speak for the record. The story would run for two, perhaps three days, starting on page one and progressively receding inside the paper; and then it would disappear, leaving only the echoes that would follow Consuela and Aurora whenever they made news, including their own obituaries. I wondered how much Aurora and Consuela had told them, and how vivid they had been. Henry Laschbrook would have played them beautifully, radiating compassion, wanting only to understand the circumstances, inquiring only because the law obliged him to do so, in order that his report be as complete and factual as possible. All of it in confidence, of course.

I returned to the living room, now in near darkness. I switched on the lamps and turned to face Consuela.

I said, They weren't from the coroner's office. They were newspapermen.

Consuela stirred, her eyelids fluttering. She looked at her fingernails and said, I don't understand.

They were newspaper reporters, not from the coroner's office. That was a lie. They lied to you.

They lied?

Yes, for their story. It's one of the tricks they have. Usually they lie over the telephone but this time they decided it was better face to face. That way, they could describe the apartment. The bedroom. Where Jack died.

They asked to see the bedroom and I showed it to them.

It's not your fault, Connie. You couldn't have known.

Will they print what we told them?

Yes, they will.

Can you fix it?

No, I can't.

I thought anything could be fixed in Chicago. What do they > call it? Pulling a string. When you pulled a string, things could be made to go away.

Most anything, I said. But not this. It's already in the paper.

In the paper? They seemed so nice.

Yes, I said. They have a way about them.

Consuela took a sip of her drink, made a face, and put it down. She said, I don't want to think about it. I have so much to think about and I don't want to think about this.

It's only a newspaper, I said hopefully.

Jack hated them, she said. Buzzards, he called them. Scavengers.

I feel awful about it, I said.

I had no idea, she said. They sounded so—official.

I'm going to blow the whistle on Laschbrook, I said. Speak to his boss, get him fired if I can ... I imagined the conversation with Ozias Tilleman, a short walk down a dead-end street.

Consuela offered a thin smile, and for a moment a hint of her old asperity returned. What good will that do now, Wils?

Just then we heard a commotion at the door, the aunts evidently saying goodbye in whispers. Aurora said something I could not hear and then the door closed and in a moment she was standing in the doorway, dressed, like Consuela, in a black shift, choker pearls at her throat. Unlike Consuela, she looked lovely, her hair damp at the edges, freshly washed and combed. She stood indecisively in the doorway, steadying herself with one hand, her eyes focused on the untouched cocktail glass on the table near the window. I rose slowly and went to her, holding her face in my hands, believing that we were over the worst of it.

Get out, she said.

I took a startled step backward but saw at once that she was not talking to me but to Consuela, who seemed to withdraw further into the cushions of the couch.

Get out now, she said.

Consuela moved her head languidly back and forth, neither yes nor no but an involuntary movement that signaled deep fatigue.

I want you out of my house, Aurora said.

Consuela did not look up or give any sign of having heard. She might have been alone in the room. She looked to be way inside herself, not existing in the present moment but somewhere in the distant past. Aurora's voice was ugly, a timbre I had never heard. She advanced from the doorway and now stood over Consuela, her fists clenched at her sides. Aurora was breathing deeply, looming over Consuela like a prizefighter at a knockdown.

Take your things and get out, Aurora said.

Darling, I said. Wait a minute.

She said, Stay out of this.

I won't, I said.

You don't know what it's about, so stay out of it.

My heart was with Consuela, defenseless against Aurora's fury. She still had not spoken, having retreated somewhere into her memory, perhaps the moment she had seen Jack Brule disappear into the bathroom, the door slammed shut; and a minute later heard the shot that sounded to her like an explosion and in the appalling silence saying, Jack? in a voice not her own, waiting for the reply she knew would not come. How long did she wait before opening the door, or did they open it together, she and Aurora? Aurora was correct, I did not know what it was about, though obviously the mysterious argument figured in it somewhere. But this was the struggle of the strong against the weak, Aurora speaking with the remorseless clamor of the schoolyard bully. Consuela looked to me defeated, unwilling to defend herself or even to speak. Now Aurora was tugging at Consuela's hand as one would with a stubborn drunk.

I said, Stop it, Aurora.

She said, Help me get her out of here.

I said, We're all upset.

Are you going to help me or stand there?

Leave the poor woman alone.

Then you get out, too, Aurora said.

Don't do this, I said.

Whose side are you on, Wils? My side or her side? Look at her. She's disgusting.

Consuela had sagged back into the cushions. She still had not spoken and I could not swear she even knew where she was. But her abject manner inspired pity in me, and I thought that whatever she had said in the argument with Aurora's father—or he to her—she did not deserve this treatment. She did not deserve to be called disgusting. Aurora was so young, there was something indecent in her belligerence and contempt. Brutalizing Consuela would not bring Jack Brule back to life. And so I stepped between them, pinning Aurora's wrists to her sides and moving her away from the couch as I spoke softly in a low, reasonable voice, saying that we had to look to the future. We had to think about tomorrow and the day after. We had to decide about the funeral, where it would be and who would speak, the minister, the pallbearers, the music. I was remembering Squire's service in Connecticut, my mother and grandmother carefully reviewing the details. I said there were people to be notified and I would do that if she gave me the names and telephone numbers. I thought that by enumerating the mundane details we could allay grief, if only for an hour. We had to be practical. We had to stick together—and before I knew it, the word “teamwork” had tumbled out and I heard my father's voice merged with my own: no one ever won a strike. But Aurora was not listening. She had gone rigid, glaring over my shoulder at Consuela, who had curled up on the sofa, her eyes closed, her face slack. The glass of scotch had fallen from her hand, leaving a sloppy wet spot on her black dress. Aurora pushed against me but I held fast.

Let me go, she said.

Not yet, I said. Listen to me.

You are not on my side.

Of course I am, I said.

Then why are you on her side? What does she mean to you?

I'm not on anybody's side, I said.

I knew it. You're like the rest of them, Aurora said, beginning to struggle again.

At that moment I saw myself as a referee, the one who steps in to stop the bar fight in the name of good order. I suppose I saw myself as acting in behalf of Jack Brule, a decent respect for the memory of the dead man, loved by both women. I was appalled by Aurora's bullying and discouraged by Consuela's passivity, yet at the same time I knew there was something between them that I would never fathom, a kind of complicit rivalry. They each loved Jack Brule in a way the other could not. They each owned a piece of him but the pieces overlapped, and to claim one was to claim part of the other. The dead man had no say in the matter. I had never heard one woman speak to another as Aurora had spoken to Consuela. Of course I had heard the usual snide remarks made by one woman against another, and from them I had deduced that female friendships were complicated affairs, with much hidden from view; and now it seemed that I was like the rest of them, meaning men. I knew that at some fundamental level I was being disloyal to Aurora, my girl, the one I had promised to look after. But I thought her attack on Consuela was unworthy of her, malevolent almost, and it was my duty to put a stop to it. I had always believed that loyalty was the greatest of virtues and betrayal a vice, but it could not be as simple as that because justice was present somewhere; and just then I realized that I could not help Aurora. She had drawn a line I could not cross.

Go away, Aurora said wearily. You don't belong here.

I belong to you, I said. We belong to each other.

Not now, she said.

Yes, now, I insisted.