Her Father's House (9 page)

She held up a white velvet coat made for a child barely old enough to walk. The price tag was still on it: three hundred fifty dollars. He made no comment for the simple reason that there was no polite comment he could make. Let me get out of here, he thought again. He accepted Lillian's written directions, and left.

On the avenue, on the shady side edged with trees, he walked, his legs propelling him forward, while his mind was still back in that apartment. It had been one thing to imagine her in her new abode, but quite another to see her there.

This strange phenomenon that for lack of a better name was called “chemistry”—what was it? It seized you, it mesmerized you so that you became its prisoner, and then, if it wanted to, it vanished, leaving behind a debris of anger, shame, and nasty thoughts. There in the nursery he had had an awareness of the nearby bedroom in which Lillian must now spend her nights. Did she not find it queer to be standing outside its door beside the man whose bed she had been sharing so short a time ago? It seemed to Donald that most women in these circumstances would have accepted his papers when he rang the bell and politely gotten rid of him, but then he reminded himself that of course she was not like most women.

Nearing the place where he expected to find the nanny and carriage, he felt a disheartening reluctance. The situation bordered on absurdity. He would identify himself to the nanny, glance into the carriage where the sleeping bundle would no doubt be covered in something pink, say a few cordial words to the woman, and go away. Had he not just fulfilled his legal and moral obligation as a parent? He did not feel like a parent, but he had done what the world considered right and would continue to do so. Was that not enough?

Still he kept going, watched for a green straw hat, found it on the head of a neat little woman, and identified himself.

“Hello. I'm the baby's father.”

“
Sí, sí,
I know. You Mr. Wolfe. She tell me. I'm Maria.”

Propped against Maria's chest sat a
person
sucking milk from a bottle. This was no nondescript bundle anymore, but a
person
who actually acknowledged Donald's presence by turning her large blue eyes in his direction. He had had no idea that a human being could change that much in such a few months.

“Pretty, you think? No?” Maria asked.

From under the ruffled cap came wisps of dark hair that seemed to be wavy. The face was already feminine, he thought, although he might be wrong about that. At any rate, it was appealing, as young creatures all were, puppies or calves, all of them whose trustful dependence touched one's heart.

“Yes, very pretty,” he replied.

The innocence! Someday this child would want to know about her father and mother; she would ask what and why. It would be easier for her then if there were to be no close attachment to this father, but simply the attachment one feels toward a good friend or nice uncle who sends presents and takes one out for a treat two or three times a year. All this flashed through his mind as he regarded her.

“You want hold her, please? I fix carriage cover.”

He drew back in refusal. “She won't like it. She'll cry.”

“No, no.” Maria smiled. “You scared? Here, take.”

When he held her against his shoulder, she felt heavier than he had expected. By twisting her neck, she was able to stare directly into his face, and he wondered whether she was wondering about him, whether she knew that he was a stranger.

“What do they call her, Maria? Tina? Or Bettina?”

Maria shook her head, not understanding. “Call? Call?”

Having had three years of Spanish in high school, Donald thought he might try it out again, and he repeated his question.

Now Maria spoke freely. “They mostly call her Cookie, Mr. Wolfe. Everybody loves her. There's something special about this baby. They aren't all alike, you know. Some of them aren't very interesting. I've cared for so many of them, so I know. Sometimes on the street with Cookie, people stop to look at her and say how beautiful she is. And so good-natured. She doesn't cry much at all. Let me take her from you and lay her down to sleep. Now that her stomach's full, she'll sleep. That's a baby's life, you know, eat and sleep.”

“Then I'll be going. I'm glad to have met you, Maria.” In Spanish the compliment had a special formal grace. “I'll see you again.”

“You will be coming to the house, Mr. Wolfe?”

He looked at the woman, and seeing the kindness in her eyes, spoke frankly, “No, I can't—don't want to go there. Do you understand?”

She nodded. “After September, when we come back from the beach house, we'll be here every day. There'll be crowds of baby carriages here, you'll see.”

“Well, it'll be a while anyway, because I'm out of the city on business. I'm out of the city on business a good deal of the time.”

“You, too? Mr. Buzley has business all the time, and they take vacations all the time. When they're not on vacation, Mrs. Buzley is never home. She's a very busy, busy lady.” And Maria shook her head.

She doesn't like Lillian, Donald thought as he walked away, otherwise she wouldn't treat me so warmly. To be fair, though, who knows why she doesn't like Lillian? It might be only for the perfectly natural resentment a woman could feel toward a younger employer who had everything.

Retracing the morning's steps while reviewing the morning's events, he re-passed the limestone front of Lillian's building on the other side of the avenue. There beneath the green awning she stood, beside her a man who was obviously Howard Buzley. Elderly, gray, round-shouldered, and no taller than she, he was linking arms with his trophy wife in her summer dress.

Donald went on down the avenue and turned toward home. This day had been, to say the least, unsettling. The baby had confused him. He wouldn't know how to describe his feelings if anyone were to ask him to describe them. She was his, but she wouldn't be growing up with him, so she really wasn't his. She would always be a charge on his conscience, but little more. And if he had to have such a charge, why couldn't she at least have been a boy?

At home again, there were messages on the answering machine. Ed Wills had a windfall for him, a ticket to a Broadway hit tonight. Another friend had a girl for him, one he'd be sure to like. Actually, he was too dispirited to do anything. But on second thought he ought to call Ed and accept the extra ticket. It wasn't healthy when in this frame of mind to shut oneself up at home like a hermit, and he wasn't going to do it. It wasn't healthy.

   

In his tentative, diplomatic way, Augustus Pratt inquired now and then about what was going on in Donald's life. He was not one of the kind who gave cheery predictions that, meant to comfort, only made the recipient feel worse.

Yet on this morning when he summoned Donald to his office, it was to give him two pleasant pieces of news.

“You've been home for three months now, Donald. Are you by any chance itching to hop onto a plane again?”

“It would be just what I need right now, Mr. Pratt.”

“Good. I'd like you to see to a matter in the San Francisco office. Hugh McQueen is waiting for you. I didn't think you'd try to beg off, you see. Not that you ever do.” There went that rare, benign twinkle. “It's highly likely that you'll both be flying to Anchorage, because one of our clients is in the hospital there. You haven't ever seen Alaska, have you? No? Well, you'll have a thrill. Take a few extra days to get beyond Anchorage and look around.”

“I can't tell you how much I appreciate that.”

The San Francisco office didn't need Donald, he knew. This trip was purely a thoughtful gift.

“The next thing I want to mention is the bonus. The firm has had a remarkable year, and the bonus reflects it. I'll keep you waiting in suspense until you see it next week.”

“All I can say besides thank you is that I'm very lucky.”

“Well, in some ways, Donald, you are.”

He was already thinking about how he would invest the bonus for the baby. He had more than enough for his own wants. All he spent very much on were books and good luggage to take wherever he was going, to the Moscow office, or now, to Alaska.

“Oh, before you leave,” said Pratt, “I want to tell you that I'm fairly sure you'll need to be in Italy for a few days in the late fall. After that, you'll be glad to stay home for a year or so. Let some of our new people see the world.”

“Is it the bank in Rome again?”

“No, a corporation in Florence that wants to buy property here in New York. Our sellers here want us to look them up on their home ground. It'll only take a few days.”

“I understand,” Donald said automatically.

Florence. He had hoped never to see that beautiful city again.

Chapter 8

I
n an old house near the medieval wall, a family was gathered for a typically Italian Sunday dinner, the father at one end of the long table, the mother opposite, with all the numerous rest of them, including Donald as guest, in between. Directly across from him was the grandmother, holding a six-month-old baby girl.

He could have been listening more carefully to his host, the accountant who, on the next-to-last-day before Donald's return to New York had kindly saved him from a solitary dinner at the hotel. He could have looked out the window toward the wintry garden, at the silver candelabra, or at the fine wainscot on the wall. But he was only seeing the baby.

“You have children?” asked the hostess in halting English.

“No,” he replied.

It was better that way, less complicated, less painful. This sudden pain had surprised him. The baby in her lacy dress, no doubt put on because it was Sunday, had hurt him as he would never have expected to be hurt. There she sat, a queen gurgling over her milk, waving her fat little hands and smiling around the table at the people assembled there to honor her on her throne.

“Six months,” Donald said. “I had no idea they came so far in six months.”

“Ah, yes,” responded the father, nodding wisely. “You'll find out when you have your first one. In another six months, and maybe before then, she'll take a few steps, and then before you know it, she'll talk and go to school and argue with us.”

Bettina Wolfe was already seven months old. . . .

He turned politely to his host. “You were telling me about that fund to keep Venice from sinking. How do they expect to prevent it? I know almost nothing about engineering.”

   

Love grows like a weed. It is often said that a weed is only a plant that is growing where it is not wanted; some of the loveliest, the daisy, the honeysuckle, and the black-eyed Susan, are weeds. Such were Donald's thoughts. He did not want this love to grow. Most definitely had he made up his mind that financial responsibility was all he would undertake. He knew his flaw: wanting all or nothing. If he had not been an A student at law school, the chances are he would have quit. If he couldn't be a father like that one in Florence, what was the use?

But try to get rid of honeysuckle where it has already fastened its strong vines, or of daisies that have already spread their seeds.

   

I suppose, thought Donald, it really began on the day I first saw her smile. If it had not been for the mutual recognition between Maria and me, I would have walked right past that row of benches and baby carriages. There was no resemblance between the baby I remembered from four months ago and the tiny person who was standing, actually standing, at Maria's knees while clutching her hands.

Maria called out my name. It must have been the startling cry that made the baby turn her head toward me, he thought. She must already have had a smile on her lips because she was pleased with the new experience of standing, for the smile was certainly not for me. Even I in my ignorance knew enough to understand that I was merely getting the tail end of it.

And yet he was to carry that expression home and keep it with him.

“Changed, hasn't she?” Maria said, speaking in Spanish. “You hardly know her, do you? Yes, she wants to walk. See how she's hoisting herself on my lap? And you should see her crawl. I could put her on the grass to show you, but it's dirty. We haven't seen you in a long time, Mr. Wolfe.”

They walk, they go to school, and soon they are arguing with you.

“I've been very busy working out of the country, otherwise I would have come.”

“Ah, yes, work. That's true. Come, Cookie. We'll get back into the carriage and have our lunch. Sit down, Mr. Wolfe, and watch your girl eat lunch.”

Your girl. Bettina Wolfe.

“You called her Cookie?”

“That's what they call her. Her mother hugs her and calls her Cookie, so I do, too.”

As he had been invited, Donald sat. If he had been asked to describe his feelings, he would very likely have fumbled with words. He was outside himself, observing himself as he observed his child.

“She can drink from a cup, but she likes the bottle better sometimes,” Maria explained. “I give her the cup at night when she's in her pajamas. Her mother doesn't like to have milk stains on these good clothes. Not that you can't wash them out easily enough, but—” Maria did not finish.

Something annoys her, Donald said to himself. And he asked her whether she always had to work on Sunday.

“Yes, because I need the money. I have a family in Mexico. But I don't mind. What else would I do? Mr. Buzley pays me so much. He's a nice man, very, very nice, and I don't say it only because he pays me so much extra. No. It's too bad you can't see how he plays with Cookie. He gets down on the floor with her and plays. Yes, he's a very nice old man. You want to see a picture? I cut it out of the paper to show it here in the park. Nannies all like to ask you who your boss is, so I show them this.”

There on a page of photographs taken at various social events were Mr. and Mrs. Howard Buzley at a charity dinner, he looking just as Donald recalled having seen him, and she superb with elaborate pendant earrings and naked shoulders. His eyes glanced over a gushing paragraph about “Mr. Howard Buzley with his lovely wife Lillian,” and glanced away.

And wasn't that a great step upward in the world, to be in the Sunday newspaper, and mustn't she be thrilled!

Maria kept talking. Understandably, she was feeling a certain drama, a bit of excitement in this situation. She must be wondering what he, the former husband, was thinking. It was only natural. Tomorrow she would be telling the other nannies about the father who meets the baby in the park.

Cookie, with something in her mouth that looked like a cracker, but was, as Maria explained, a teething biscuit, was staring at him. Was she curious about him? How much thought was possible at eight months?

For his part, he was thinking that he did not care about the name “Cookie” when two women passed, and he heard one say, “Isn't she adorable? It's the Buzleys' baby.” They walked on and he heard no more.

But Maria had heard. He was convinced of it when suddenly she said, “If I'm still here when she starts to say some words, I'm going to teach her right away to say ‘Daddy.' ”

He looked at her. She, returning the look, gave him the feeling that she wanted to tell him something, but was unsure about it.

“What did you mean by ‘if I'm still here'?” he asked. “I thought you liked the job.”

Maria shrugged. “I do like it. But you never know, do you? Oh, now she's sleepy. Do you want to rock her? Push the carriage back and forth a little.”

The gentle, rocking motion began to soothe Donald. Before him passed a parade of children in bright clothes, a tiny redhead riding her three-wheeler and a troop of boys kicking fallen leaves. An autumn peace settled over the afternoon and, the better to feel it, he closed his eyes while the sun warmed his shoulders.

Suddenly Maria's voice cut through the peace. “I don't understand. Have baby, go out all the time. All the time. Sleep and go.”

“Were you speaking to me?” he asked, not sure whether he had correctly heard the murmured Spanish.

“I'm sorry! I was talking to myself. I get angry sometimes. Excuse me.”

“Excuse you for what, Maria?”

“I didn't mean it for you, Mr. Wolfe. I'm sorry.”

But of course she had meant it for him. And rather firmly he said to her, “Look at me, Maria. If there's anything wrong, you should tell me.”

There was a silence. Perhaps she had spoken out of pique, or for some simple reason, such as resentment over having had a scolding from Lillian, and was now sorry she had revealed her feelings.

Very quietly, Donald commanded her, “You started to say something about the baby's mother. You don't have to be afraid that I will repeat it. We are not friends, Mrs. Buzley and I, but I need to know, Maria. I need to know, and you must tell me.”

“She's never home! She buys things for Cookie and kisses her, but that's not being a mother.”

Very true, he had to agree, but not what you would call child abuse. Sighing, he gave Maria a compliment, thinking it better to drop the subject for the time being.

“I'm glad the baby has you for a nanny, Maria.”

“I'm glad, too.”

“I'm going to give you my telephone number,” he said, producing a card. “Here's where you can reach me during the day. On the other side I'll write my home number.”

“Will you come back next Sunday, Mr. Wolfe?”

“Yes, I'm going to come every Sunday unless I have to be away from the city. Telephone me on Sunday in the morning, and if I don't answer, you'll know I'm away.”

Maria nodded. “I will call you, Mr. Wolfe. Now I think we'll go home. The sun's gone in.”

For a short distance Donald accompanied them. Then at parting, he took one more look at the sleeping baby, watched the carriage safely across the avenue, and went on his way.

He was a person who especially disliked uncertainties, who would gladly undertake a mountain of hardships, as long as he could look ahead. But the future now was hidden in cloud; he had a very uneasy feeling that everything was not as right as it should be. The only sure thing was this newborn love for his child. And filled with these inconclusive thoughts, he walked rapidly toward home.

   

If it had not been for Bettina, or Cookie—and how he disliked both names!—Donald would have most easily been able to put Lillian back in his past along with other things anybody would want to forget. But as the months passed, she kept reappearing in one way or another. It was amazing to him that these vignettes on the social page of the newspaper, if often enough repeated, could make a
personage
out of a
person
. Once you got started—and often it only took a hired publicist to make the start—you simply kept going because you were a
name
. He didn't put it past Lillian to have done just that.

It was Maria who brought him these clippings, which Lillian must have displayed to her with pride. She also brought tattle, as harmless as those first reports about Lillian's being out all the time. Tattle of this sort embarrassed him; it was lowering to listen to it.

Yet, occasionally there were certain reports that worried him, an account, for instance, of a furious quarrel between the Buzleys that had awakened Maria in the middle of the night. He had come to know Maria very well. One had only to use some common sense, plus a bit of intuition, to see her whole. She was an honest, canny little woman, no longer young, who had learned a great many things about humanity during the course of her hard years. In a miserable, hungry village, she had struggled to survive, and it would not be easy to fool her.

Strange as it might seem to an outsider, what he most wanted to hear was that the Buzley home was a good one, a peaceful one; since Lillian's house was to be the child's primary home, let it be sound and solid. One particular argument, he found out, had been over Lillian's going out alone to a late-night party when Buzley had been detained at a meeting. I don't like that at all, Donald thought, not at all.

“Cookie is lucky to have you for a father,” she said one day.

“But you don't know anything about me,” he answered, “except that I am the divorced husband. I could have been a terrible man, it could have been all my fault.”

“No, no, not your fault. I have eyes. I can see. She needs to have somebody talk to her. Look, Cookie, what's that?” she cried, changing the subject.

“A wow-wow.”

“Good. And who's that?”

“Daddy.”

“I have to talk English to Cookie,” Maria explained. “It is her language. We play games. She's very smart. We say ‘peekaboo' and ‘where's Cookie?' She thinks it's funny when I say ‘where's Cookie?' Look, Mr. Wolfe. Two more teeth coming. Six teeth already. Show her your watch. What's that, Cookie?”

“Tick tock.”

Something was bothering Maria. He felt like telling her to come out with it, to stop dangling it in the air between them. Instead, he lifted the baby out of the carriage, and taking her by the hand, set off on a walk.

There is something, he thought, about the sight of a tall man leading a doll-sized creature that makes people turn and smile. A man passing by with an active boy about two years old gave Donald just such a smile with an added twinkle. They recognized each other, these Sunday fathers. He wondered what their stories were, each one surely being unique, since no two people are alike. Yet how different were theirs from his?

And so when the very short walk was over and the baby back in the carriage, he spoke bluntly to Maria.

“Tell me what you meant when you said that she needs to be talked to. What's going on in the family? If you trust me, you will answer me, Maria.”

“It's the same, Mr. Wolfe. We live alone, just baby and I, Mr. and Mrs. go out, the cook goes home every night, and we are alone.” She stopped.

“You've told me that many times,” Donald said patiently. “There's something else you haven't told me. What is it?”

There was a long, long pause. And then Maria said, “I hate to say it. . . . I think she has another man, Mr. Wolfe.”

“Another man? Mrs. Buzley has another man?”

“I think so. He telephones in the morning when Mr. Buzley is gone. I heard a few times. And I saw once. She came home in a taxi. Yes, I think so, I do.”

It seemed to Donald that he was looking at the approach of disaster, a speeding car in the wrong lane, and he sighed. “A young man, Maria?”

“Younger than Mr. Buzley.”

“But you could be making a terrible mistake.”

“I could, but I don't think so.”

So he left it at that and went away. What, after all, could he do?

Sometimes he almost wished that his baby would remain a baby. Time raced; she was almost two. Life was only going to be more complicated with the years, when unanswerable questions would be asked. They plagued him now, and would have plagued him even more if he had not put up some sort of resistance to them. Who is the man whom Maria suspects? Or is there such a man? And why those nighttime arguments? Are Lillian and Buzley going to stay together?