Keeping Secrets (7 page)

The worries were endless, like sparks from a forest fire being carried by the wind to ignite other dry timber, farther and farther away.…

Emory lay rigidly beside me. He wasn't sleeping either. Finally I said, “I suppose there's a small chance Barrista could yet be named—”

“He isn't willing to give up on that, yet.”

“How nice that would be,” I said with a gulp. “No more blood spilling … oh Lord, I'm afraid.”

He pulled me closer to him. For all the questions bursting in my mind, I was unable to frame one of them aloud. It was comforting, at least, that he was there, warm against me. “Don't worry; nothing can be done, at least for now,” he said.

“I never thought you'd be involved in anything like this.”

“Neither did I.” He kissed my hair; his voice was placating. “Please, don't worry—I wouldn't go down and enlist in the troops or anything. Hell, I'm too young to die and too vain to risk losing an arm or a leg … or something worse.”

I couldn't help smiling. Sometimes his sense of humor came just in time. “Well if that means you won't be taking a direct part, I feel better already,” I told him, but could not resist the temptation of reminding him he still could pull out, sell his interests, and put his investments in San Antonio alone.

“I have a good bit more than you realize down there,” he said, “and while it's a big risk, if it works it could bring in the biggest dividend of all. So it's worth it.”

“I've a good mind to go up to Ontario and tell those numbskull mediators what's what,” I told him.

“You sound like a suffragette.”

“It's obvious they're all too busy parading around like peacocks to see the facts.”

“You've probably hit the nail squarely on the head. And you're probably just sassy enough to push your way right into the exalted chambers up there, but once they got a look at you, they wouldn't be able to concentrate on Mexico anymore.

“Which reminds me, right now I'm a little tired of the subject myself. Doesn't this damned nightgown of yours have a bottom?”

In July Barrista returned to Mexico, and, anxious for his daughter's safety, left her in San Antonio to enroll for teaching courses at a small Catholic college in the fall. I felt a little sorry for her, alone in a foreign country, and offered to have her stay with us from time to time. However, Emory was against the idea and assured me she was well-educated, world-traveled, and had many friends among the students here with whom she would be in contact. “Nathan might like to meet her, though. They're probably near the same age.”

“He has already met her, once or twice in Mexico, and believe me there were no sparks between them. Aegina wouldn't be interested in staying with us.”

I dismissed her from my mind.

Whether because word had gotten around that the Cabot home was the guest residence of a Mexican notable, or because of my continued friendship with Woody, I began receiving occasional invitations to tea receptions, for various women's clubs, and one Thursday afternoon was invited to a coffee klatch. I had seen them in progress on my way to the market from time to time, at one or another of the larger and more impressive houses. I suppose the heat drove the ladies out on the big porches, and they'd be sitting around a table with formal tea cloth and silver service, dainty china cups, and a variety of cakes and pastries. Probably eight or ten in number, they seemed an impregnable force as I walked in solitude down the shady lanes, their chitchat halted momentarily as I passed by and gave and received a polite nod. They never invited me to join them at those times, and as soon as I was a few steps down the block, I would hear the drone of neighborhood gossip start up again, always half believing they were talking about me.

On that hot Thursday afternoon in July, a young woman named Lyla Stuttgart, who'd surprised me by introducing herself a few days earlier, came by at two o'clock and invited me to go with her to one of the more stately mansions on King William.

“Are you sure it's all right? They aren't expecting me.”

“I can bring anyone I please,” she said breezily. “We aren't all that formal around here.” I could have taken exception to that remark, but didn't.

Lyla was twenty-four years old and married, with three children. She had grown up in a house on King William, and moved but three doors down when she married Arnold. Their home—a wedding gift from her parents—was one of those raised cottages which looked deceivingly small from the front, yet spread far to the rear of the lot and included three levels: two above, with one a few steps below ground for the kitchen. On the day we met she was sitting in a little breezeway under the tall front porch, with her feet propped up, swinging a palmetto fan. When she first called out to me, I thought I was hearing things. Then I saw her, partially hidden from view by the porch stairs. Our introduction didn't seem very promising—she didn't bother to walk over to the fence—but I stopped to chat.

“On your way somewhere?” she asked.

“Haymarket Plaza. Care to come along?”

“Heavens, no. I once had my purse snatched there. You'd better be careful. Why don't you send someone to do your shopping, or have it delivered? Butler's up on River Avenue is good. My housekeeper swears by his meats.”

“I don't have a housekeeper.”

“My goodness, how do you manage without one?”

“Oh, I like doing things for myself, and the house doesn't get all that messy.”

Just then, as though by signal, two of Lyla's children came charging out of the kitchen door nearby, quarreling over a toy and bringing our conversation to an end.

Lyla had auburn hair, freckles across her upturned nose, and green eyes that lit up when the subject of high fashion arose. On coffee-klatch day, she was formally dressed in white tunic, hat, and gloves, and carried a smart-looking parasol with an ivory handle.

“I go to these things to get away from the children,” she remarked as I put on my hat. “Even with their own nurse and a housekeeper, they're under my feet all the time. How many do you have?”

“Children? None.”

“My dear, how did you manage that?”

I ignored her question and presented myself. “Do I look proper for a coffee klatch?”

“Hm … well … except that hat is awfully large, isn't it?”

“I prefer large hats.”

“You do have the carriage for them—wish I had! Last week I bought three of the new smaller ones with single plumes in the back—they're just in from Paris. Arnold nearly died of heart failure, poor dear, but I told him he could send the bill to Papa. That always shuts him up, and quick.”

Lyla's voice was light as a butterfly most of the time. She continued to speak on whatever subject came to mind all the way to the awesome-looking house with the mansard roof two blocks away, and quietened down only once we entered the stifling parlor—why, I wondered, did they not have coffee on the porch that day? She was quickly introducing me to a dozen or so ladies, several of whose German surnames I could not quite grasp. The conversation centered mostly on homes and children, with incidental comments now and then—some young girl's canoe ride down the river lately, and the daring new tango steps; the alarming frequency of automobile accidents out on the South Loop near the asylum, and many veiled remarks and raised eyebrows about the females involved in them.

One lady leaned near and, raising an oriental fan to shield our faces, whispered, “Until a few years ago I taught school down that way, close to Santa Rosa and Matamoros. I soon learned to spot a night lady from a mile away.” She nodded, sat back, and fluttered her fan.

My eyes widened. “Oh, and how's that?”

She leaned forward again. “Ah, you'd have to see a few to tell, but they usually go around in pairs or groups, and wear the most striking ensembles. Now and again I see them shopping downtown—” she began, but the hostess interrupted with a call to refreshments. She snapped away and flipped her fan closed, as a schoolgirl would do when caught with a naughty book. I just managed to keep from smiling.

Thankfully, a cold punch was provided as well as coffee. I filled a cup, and arranged some fancy sandwiches and cookies on a plate, then found a chair near a window and sat back contentedly to enjoy the chitchat. Lyla had long since gotten involved in gossipy whispers with one lady, and no one seemed to notice me very much, so it was easy to observe at a distance. There was something nice about the ease with which these women kept company—their world one I had never known, full of gentility and carefree days, the stability of having lived in a certain place over a long period of time, of using china and silver passed down from one generation to another, and of knowing many people close by with common interests.…

I was sitting there in something close to a reverie, when I gradually became aware of an exchange between two women not far away. They were speaking about the new popularity of the tango over here. The dance had been favored in Europe for a long while, but up to now had been held back in this country because so many considered it vulgar.

“Of course they're always ahead of us abroad,” said one. “Correctly done, I find it a stunning sight, don't you? Just last Friday I was leaving a meeting at the Menger when their afternoon tea dancing began. I stopped to watch the most handsome couple, executing the tango. When she turned to face my direction I realized it was Aegina Barrista. I met her and her father once at a party at the International Club. She's such a striking young woman, you know.”

“And who was she with?” the other asked.

“I didn't really get a good look at him, but he was dark, full-bearded—an attractive match for her.…” The remark was like a cold breath on my neck, and I clutched my half-empty plate harder.

The breeze across the river was cool that early evening. I sat at the edge of the bank and looked down the sharp curve, sounds of the ladies talking echoing over and over in my mind, vaporous images of Emory and Aegina touching, bending against each other, closely, closely, the satin ribbons of her shoes winding around her legs, meeting the edge of the slit skirt as she moved, back and forth, back and forth, her whispers in his ear and her soft giggles, his beard brushing her cheek.…

Now it all came together. Emory's refusal to invite her to our home, his comment that there had been no sparks between Aegina and Nathan, the awkward moment when I'd mentioned her name while Barrista sat at our table.

Yet it couldn't be. Emory didn't know the tango. We had watched a captivating demonstration once during an evening at the St. Anthony's, but he hadn't said he knew the dance and hadn't offered to perform it with me.…

At the Menger? Impossible. Short blocks from here. I could walk there this minute and see for myself … no, last Friday. This is Thursday. Tomorrow, then?

What did she look like?

Like Emory, of course—they made an attractive match.

But at the Menger, where we'd been so happy together.

Nonsense.

I pulled up an encroaching vine, felt the little suction cups pop under my hand as I loosened it, inch by inch, from the earth. The vines climbed all over up the trees, along the ground, up the fence nearby. Who did they think they were?

Why, Emory, why?

Nathan stopped by and looked at the vines clutched in my hands. “You can hardly kill them,” he observed.

“What?” I glanced up.

“At home when I was a kid, we had a big tree right in the center of the front yard. The vines grew up the trunk and all through the branches. Dead of winter, the tree would be bare, but the vines would be thriving still … it looked so odd.”

“Nathan, does Emory know the tango?”

He looked perplexed. “I have no idea.”

“I think he's doing it, with Aegina Barrista. Would you go to the Menger next Friday, and see?”

“Electra, I can't just—”

Then a thought flashed like a beacon. “Of course, you must know where Emory was last Friday afternoon. Think, where?”

He paused. “Why, at the office of course—”

“You're positive?”

“Let me think.” (An interminable pause as he studied the ground.) “He did leave early, though, to go by the bank on some busi—Electra, listen, I'm sure you are wrong about this.”

“Oh, Nathan, could you just check next Friday?”

“Me? But why?”

“You could so easily explain your looking for him if he were there and he saw you—a pressing business matter. And then I'd know the truth and have some time to … gather … to …”

“Don't cry, Electra.”

“Please, help me.”

“Would that be helping? I mean, I just couldn't risk it, really.”

I looked at him squarely then. Beads of perspiration covered his forehead. His eyes were wide, intense.

“You're a coward!”

“No, you don't understand …” He was drawing away and backing toward the house, arms held out, entreatingly. “I can't, you see …”

Presently I recovered and turned to look up at the house. He was inside, watching me from the window. Poor frightened fellow, strange shadow of a man. I threw a rock into the water and watched the ripples spread.

8

Nathan and I shared dinner alone that evening.

Every sound of knife grating across meat, spoon stirring in a glass, fork scraping plate was deafening. We soon gave up and faced each other.

“I'm sorry,” I began. “You see, I've tried so hard to please Emory but … today a lady at the coffee said—”

He looked away.

I ran my tongue across my mouth. “If there is something going on behind my back, you could tell me and I swear to you I would not let Emory know where the information—”

“I know of nothing,” he said, staring at a fixed point across the room.

I sighed. “All right. I don't suppose you could imagine what it's like to—”