Boys and Girls Come Out to Play (8 page)

Divver opened the newspaper, but after reading no more than a column he found the dim light unbearable. After a short struggle with his conscience he stretched his hand toward his bedside lamp and began to turn the switch with extreme slowness. Eventually there was a loud click; Divver winced and swore; the light poured over Lily’s face. “Don’t wake, honey!” cried Divver. “What d’you mean, don’t wake?” replied Lily, sitting up and breathing out a deep groan. “Did you get Art some breakfast?” she asked, pushing her hair back and staring at him with sticky eyes. “Well, no, I didn’t. As a matter of fact, I’m not feeling so hot.” “He must be starving … Art!” “I have a boil.” “You have a what?” “A boil in my ear.” “You must have drunk too much last night. Does it hurt?” “It’s pretty painful.” “Well, I guess I’d better fix Art
his breakfast. God, I feel a wreck.” “I’ll get him his breakfast,” said Divver. “I thought you said you have a boil.” “I
have
a boil; it doesn’t mean I can’t squeeze an orange.” “Well, apparently you didn’t think of squeezing one before I woke up.” “Are we going to start the day like this?” “You can start it any way you please, so long as you’ll give me five minutes to fix your son’s breakfast.”

Lily took down an old bathrobe made of towelling, much the same colour as Art’s animal—on which she now stepped and jumped away from with a dismal cry. Art ran in from the living room and threw his arms around his mother’s waist. “Hello, honey,” said Lily in a feeble voice, patting his head and wearily drawing the belt of the bathrobe into a knot. “Max has got a boil,” said Art, looking up into her face proudly. “I know he has, Art, so don’t bother him too much, because boils hurt.” “I don’t think you have to give the child the impression that I’m at death’s door,” said Divver, looking up from the newspaper. “Come on, Artie,” said Lily, “and close the door and we’ll leave your father with his boil.”

O.K. said Divver, holding the newspaper in front of his face. If she wants it that way she can have it that way. If she wants to get up when I want her to sleep, O.K. If she wants to be crucified, let her be crucified. She can spend her day any way she wants; I’ll not say another word. He heard from the kitchen the sound of frying bacon fat and Lily telling Art to put his own plate and own cup and own saucer on his own table and bring up his own chair. Maybe I should go in and just say something, thought Divver, feeling conscience-stricken suddenly and picturing himself putting his arm round Lily’s waist and kissing her softly. He decided that there was no good reason why he should; it was nothing but a matter of his wanting to.

Art came, carrying a glass of orange juice at a steep angle. “Oh, thank you, Art, thank you very much,” said Divver with
courtesy, patting Art’s head. He then called loudly: “Sweetheart, you shouldn’t have bothered, really.” Lily left the kitchen and came into the bedroom. “I didn’t hear what you said,” she said: “do you want something? I’m trying to fix Art’s breakfast.” “I just said you shouldn’t have bothered, dear,” said Divver, rather impatiently. “Oh,” said Lily, and led Art back to the kitchen. “I want you to eat by yourself,” Divver soon heard her telling Art, “I’m going to eat with your father and I’ve got things I have to talk to him about.” “But it’s Saturday.” “I know it’s Saturday, but you can’t expect to have everything the same always.”

Lily returned to the bedroom with a large tray. “I feel a louse, just lying here,” said Divver, taking his bacon and eggs. “Well, it’s silly not to eat if you can,” said Lily. “I guess I can eat, though this damn thing does hurt.” “They’re lousy things, I know,” said Lily. “Yes, they are: it’s not so much a sort of a sharp pain as the constant ache and not being able to find any position that helps.” “I remember my father getting them at least twice a year.” “I guess lots of people have them. I must be run down. I felt this coming on. I shouldn’t have stayed up talking last night. How about you?” “Well, not so hot. I somehow never seem to get my eight hours.” “Weren’t you in bed by eleven?” “Yes, but that doesn’t mean I slept. It was at least one before I dropped off, and then I had one of those nights where even though you sleep you’re not relaxed. When I woke up this morning I was just as tense as when I went to bed. Would you like a hot-water bag for your ear?” “That’s a swell idea, honey.” They kissed affectionately, but quickly, and Lily went out to the kitchen. “Are you through talking with Max?” said Art. “No,” said Lily, “I’ve only just started, so be a good boy and stay a while longer.” She returned to the bedroom and Art followed her in immediately. “I’m not going to do anything,” he said. “Well, sit on your own chair,” said Lily, “and don’t interrupt.” Art climbed on to the bed. Lily handed
her husband the morning’s mail, which consisted of one letter from a press-clipping bureau.

Divver leaned his head sideways, the hot-water bag wedged between his ear and the pillow, and opened the envelope. Inside was a half-column review, from a newspaper in Christchurch, New Zealand, of Divver’s last book, now two years old. “Not so bad,” said Divver, reading the clipping and passing it to Lily. “Let me see,” said Art, crawling over his father’s body. “We’ll not read it now, Art,” said Lily, “we’ll wait.” She pushed the clipping under a wet saucer. “I’ve got to plan the day with your father…. I was going to go to Wanamaker’s; I guess that’s out, with your boil.” “I can mind Art,” said Divver, “though I don’t think I’ll take him out.” “Well, he needs to be taken out, but I don’t want to take him to Wanamaker’s, not on Saturday. But I’m taking him to Dr. Schweitzer this morning, anyway, so maybe he’ll not mind staying in this afternoon.” “D’you have to take him to Schweitzer?” “Yes, he has to have a Schick test.” “Oh, what for? I thought we were through with all that.” “No, this is the Schick test he has to take to make sure the last injection took. And after that comes the Dick test, to check if the Schick test took.” “If that doctor puts one of those stinky needles in me,” cried Art, making a pugilist’s face, “I’ll not let him: I’ll bite him, I’ll hit him, I’ll give him a good sock and knock him on the floor and kick him.” “Do you want to go in the next room, Artie?” said Lily: “No? All right then, keep quiet…. He’s got to have an injection in a few days, too.” “My God, I thought he’d had them all.” “He’s had diphtheria and whooping cough, but he’s never had anti-tetanus; he’s got to have that, and he’s got to have whooping cough.” “I thought you said he’d had whooping cough?” “So he has, but it wears off after a couple of years.” “Seems to me you could skip it.” “And have him have whooping cough?” “Well, you could take a chance. It’s not so bad, anyway. I
had it when I was twelve; it never hurt me.” “It wouldn’t hurt you if Art had it either: you go to an office every day; but I’m the one who’d have to stay quarantined with Artie, or maybe you’d like a big hospital bill.” “I only mean, it seems going too far to have all these things done to him.” “O.K. if you want your son to have lock-jaw …” “Do I look like the sort of person who wants his son to have lock-jaw?” “Well, if you spent half the time you spend psychologizing …” “I never psychologize, as you call it; that’s one thing I believe one should never do.” “… If you spent half that time reading the statistics on infant mortality the way it was before they began injections, then maybe you’d find out why Dr. Schweitzer agrees with me.” “Mommy, I don’t have to go to that dirty old doctor. I won’t go. Those needles hurt; I hate the old fool.” “Oh, Art, keep quiet for two seconds, can’t you? And, anyway, I want Dr. Schweitzer to look at Art’s bladder. He still wets the bed, and five’s too old for that.” “I remember I went on wetting until I was ten.” “Maybe you did, but it was your mother who had to wash your sheets and hang the mattress out of the window every morning for ten years.” “I’m never going to wet any, any more, Mom. Only children do that.” “You’ve said that before Art, and I know you’ve tried, but now Dr. Schweitzer is going to look at the place the wet comes from.” “Lily, I guess I’ve said this before, but I bet anything there’s nothing wrong with the bladder. I do wish you’d do what I’ve suggested so often.” “You mean, just do nothing?” “It’s not just doing nothing; it’s a matter of deliberately not saying anything about it. We shouldn’t even speak of his bladder in front of him. After a month I bet he’d stop.” “O.K., then during that month you’ll wash his sheets before you go to the office?” “I shall be very glad to.” “Well, I’d rather trust Dr. Schweitzer to look at his bladder. I notice you don’t say that your boil’s psychological.” “It could very well be.” “Then why not analyse it so it bursts?” “Lily, you don’t
imagine that the way you’re talking is serious, do you?” “I want to talk now, Mommy.” “That’s a fine idea, darling: come along and we’ll get dressed and go to Dr. Schweitzer for your bladder, and after I’ll take you to get those balloons.”

When Lily reappeared all the fleshy softness that had been in her face and body when she had worn night-clothes had quite disappeared: she was clamped, as by armour, in a
close-fitting
suit to which a hard round hat was the casque. Her face had petrified into the fearsome, pioneer resolution of unremitting housewifery. While Art, dressed in his best for the doctor, leaned against her haunch and waved one leg to and fro in a semicircle, Lily made a census of her handbag, her fingers speeding remorselessly through the contents, flicking aside keys, nickels, and twenty or thirty other oddments, until she seized on a piece of paper that had been savagely folded down to the proportions of a postage stamp. “Here’s the receipt for the linoleum,” she said, unfolding the stamp until it was a fair size, and handing it to Divver. “I don’t think anyone else will come.” “Am I to pay the bill?” “No, can’t you see it’s been paid? All I want to do is have him sign it.” “
He
has to sign it?” “That’s right.”

Lily put on her fur coat. “I’ll be back by noon, I’m sure,” she said. “Well, take it easy, don’t kill yourself.” “Well, it’s easy to say; “I’ve two days’ washing piled up in the kitchen.” “I only mean, don’t feel there’s any hurry on my account,” said Diver, graciously waving one arm. “Well, here we go,” said Lily, nudging Artie through the door and following close on his heels in a stumbling sway.

The hall-door snapped-to behind them; Divver was alone, but thousands of shivering, high-pitched concerts of sound appeared to be darting through the air, inaudible to the human ear but charged with frightful vitality; the sort of residual tension that might persist between work shifts in an abattoir. Divver crouched down in bed and pressed his ear against the
hot-water bag; he cursed himself for having been so stupid as to have a boil; everything was going to be even more hellish than usual; neither he nor Lily would miss a single spiteful opening, and no man can defend himself against a backlog of dirty child’s clothes. Divver thought querulously of the wicked advantage women have over men in matters of illness. A husband has an ear, in which a boil forms in a frank, masculine way, the best he can do. What was this compared with the unbelievable collection of inter-communicating tubes and bags that wives succeeded in burying under the debonair surfaces of their bellies and keeping in a permanent snarl of disruptive heaving, shoving, expansion, contraction and over-all dismay—a condition for which they vindictively demanded the highest respect, as though insisting that everything had been sweet and clean until some husband stepped in and gummed it all up for the sake of his despicable pleasure. After long calculation that involved holding one set of numbers suspended in memory while hastily summing up a second set, and then dividing one set by the other, Divver reached the figure of fifty thousand dollars as the probable yearly income of Lily’s gynæcologist. He then reached about the same figure for Art’s pediatrician, by which time the pulse in his ear was drumming furiously, and it seemed that a dull knife was being pressed into his head.

Lily was the one who brought home the
Digests
and other literary trash that Divver was ashamed to be found reading and always read. Sitting up with a groan and pressing the warm bag to his ear, Divver read an article entitled “Are You Emotionally Rich?” The gist of this article was that even people who had an adequate bank balance went through life with a sense that they were missing something. When Divver had read it he answered the test-questions: “When you see a beautiful work of art such as Rembrandt’s
Descent
from
The
Cross
or Grant Wood’s
American
Gothic,
does your blood pressure rise appreciably, and are you conscious of goose-flesh
or a tingling in the spine?” “Has the woman (or man) you say you love ever caused you to feel such joy or sorrow that you have been incapable of eating a meal?” “You say you are terribly affected by, say, the suffering of Europe’s refugees or the victims of the recent coal-mine disaster in Pennsylvania. But did either episode, or any similar one, make it impossible for you to get a good night’s sleep?” “If you saw a woman, a stranger to you, hysterically beating her child in a public thoroughfare, would you intervene?” “When you are faced with a difficult situation does the saliva withdraw from your oral cavity?” “You say you have been profoundly stirred by a political address or a beautiful poem, but does much emotional residue remain the next day, or even after a few hours of commonplace distraction?” Divver was always scrupulously honest in such tests, and all his replies were in the negative, except the one about the child-beating, against which he placed a question mark.

The man arrived with the linoleum, and Divver went to meet him, expressing the pain in his ear by walking with a limp. He obtained a thick black signature and let the man out. Standing alone in the centre of the living-room, wearing his heavy bathrobe and red Turkish slippers embroidered with hieroglyphics, his depression reached a new low and he fell into a fit of shivering. The room was thoroughly furnished, but in the stillness of his wife’s and child’s absence it was desolate. And yet each fitting and decoration had been chosen with care; and Divver recalled the conferences at which things had been squinted at subtly from various angles, as by witch doctors, and then placed where they belonged with so powerful an air of gravity and secret deftness that the room had been charged with tension. Divver remembered with what extraordinary excitement he and Lily had hugged each other when the radio-phonograph filled a vacant alcove so precisely that it left on either side a chink of no more than one millimeter.
Lily had not been able to keep her eyes off it for days, and Divver had been so touched that he had come up behind her while she was waxing the cabinet and had pressed a French kiss on her lips, and murmured: “Honey, aren’t you my own soft tiny goose?” These excellent arrangements now seemed to suggest a funeral parlour: the most repellant objects were those whose convenience was most admirable, such as the glass and standard ash-trays set at ash-tapping distance from the couch and the chairs. There were pictures on the walls which Divver had not noticed for years; he now studied one of them intently and told himself that it was a work of art. The most frigid and hopeless aspect of the room was the bookshelf, with its six tiers of volumes arranged according to sizes and authors, with size taking precedence over author where necessary; new volumes were regularly added to this collection and thereafter were of interest only to visitors. The spaces between the dead spines were tastefully filled with occasional crockery, such as a glazed leopard in the act of springing, and a Japanese vase whose swollen sides held books in an erect position. We really ought to buy fresh flowers once a week, Divver thought; flowers make a big difference to a room; they make it more human.