Private affairs : a novel (62 page)

"I'd like you to marry me and stop this goddam running back and forth to Santa Fe like a yo-yo, hiding from your offspring, who probably know what's going on anyway. I'm sorry; don't get angry; I won't say any more. Let's go to work like good little scouts and then have a peaceful dinner in some exotic spot and perhaps you'll let me kiss you chastely on the brow when it's time for you to take off in our network's winged chariot."

Even after he was most petulant he always recovered swiftly enough to make her smile. But that night Elizabeth was glad to get home, and the next day she had put him out of her mind, because she was driving to Nuevo.

The valley was soft and white, the gashes and scars of construction hidden under deep, wind-swept snow. Even the hulking earth-moving equipment and construction trailers looked like fat white toys scattered behind the town. Beneath the snow, everything was still, everything slumbered.

Elizabeth and Isabel sat with Cesar at a table near leaping flames in the fireplace, drinking coffee with cinnamon and eating freshly-made sopapi-llas with honey. Upstairs, Luz and Holly read issues of Elk and Paris Vogue that Holly had brought from Santa Fe, fervently wishing for something spectacular to happen to them. "It's as if everyone is waiting for construction to start again," Elizabeth said. "And destruction, too; they go together."

"Also jobs," mused Isabel. "And customers. And excitement for the young people."

"Tell Elizabeth about the legislature," Cesar urged. "They do not give a goddam hoot in hell for the people of this town."

"True," Isabel said. "But it would be extremely stupid to batter our heads against brick walls. One wall, maybe. Forty walls, no."

"What does that mean?" Elizabeth asked.

"It's too late to change anything. They notice me, now that I'm elected, but they don't listen, they just want to straighten me out about how there's no way the committee will start this debate again. They're too busy spending this year's millions to think about last year's, and the work's already gone on for a whole summer. Nuevo is like yesterday's newspaper, and there's nothing I can do about it."

Elizabeth put down her coffee. "Isabel, Matt told me the townspeople were given a list of places to move, and promised extra money and help in resettling."

"Promised—!" growled Cesar.

"We were promised a kick in the rear if we didn't get out when we were told to," said Isabel. "What made him think that?"

"Some report. I've asked for a copy of it. I should have had it by now."

"There is no report!"

Elizabeth was silent, her eyes troubled.

The door opened and a gust of cold air bent the flames in the fireplace. "If I'm not intruding—?" Maya said.

"Of course not," Isabel said. "Elizabeth will pour you coffee; give me your coat, your boots, your gloves, your hat—" She looked at Maya closely. "Something wonderful has happened: your eyes are shining like pebbles in the bottom of a stream. Come have coffee and tell us the news."

"I had a letter today," Maya said. She smiled at Elizabeth, trying to be demure, but her eyes were dancing. "The words are very beautiful. And I couldn't wait for you to come to my house for lunch. I hope you don't mind, but I thought I would explode if I couldn't talk about it—"

"So you will do what?" demanded Isabel. Cesar had dozed off, and she lowered her voice; she was pretending to be stern, but a smile broke through her words. "Move to California? Study politics at Stanford? Work on someone else's campaign? I'm losing my assistant—is that what you're saying?"

Her color high, Maya shook her head. "I don't know. I wanted to ask you," she said to Elizabeth. "Because you know Peter. He gets very enthusiastic, and says wonderful things, but maybe besides all that feeling, there should be a little more thinking. When he studies and writes his articles he plans and thinks and organizes, but with personal things, he . . . leaps. Do you know what I mean? The way he told me last fall that he wanted to be alone at the university, and I was hurt, but I thought, well, he believes it and it's important to him. Now he says he was wrong; he can do even better with me there, because he'll be happier. And it's much nicer to be loved than hurt, and I've prayed for a letter like this, but maybe . . . maybe I should say let's wait until spring when he knows better if he really wants me all tangled up in his life ... or maybe even summer, when he's home for a while. I mean, is it good for a woman to change her whole life because a man leaps? What if later he leaps in a new direction? I would hate to be worrying about that if I've turned my life upside down for him. But then I wonder, should I say yes because this time it may be smart to leap and if I don't, he may never want to again and then I would be miserable for the rest of my life."

It was the longest speech she had ever made and she stopped abruptly, out of breath. Elizabeth met Isabel's eyes, but Isabel gave a tiny shake of

the head; she wouldn't touch it; let Peter's mother handle the question of whether Peter and Maya should live together now, or later, or at all.

Elizabeth started to reply; then she looked closely at Maya. "But that isn't all, is it? Something else is bothering you."

"Oh, you are very smart." Maya spread her hands. "I'm ashamed to say this, but ... I love Peter and I want to live with him, but I also loved working on Isabel's campaign and I love working in her office in the statehouse and I love talking about fighting for our town, and I don't want to miss whatever happens. ..." Her voice trailed away. "That's not nice, is it? To think of other loves instead of just Peter."

Once again Elizabeth met Isabel's eyes. "It's fine," Isabel said, adding dryly, "At eighteen you have a few years to think about what's most important to you. But you haven't got a problem about Nuevo, Maya, because it looks like there won't be a fight after all."

"You haven't given in to those robbers!"

"I've given in to the facts of life. The legislature isn't going to budge. And to tell the truth, I don't think enough people want to fight. Jobs, business, money, excitement . . . who the hell would fight all that?"

"But it isn't right!" Maya exclaimed. "I mean, of course jobs are good, and it's good that people are coming back to the valley, and tourists are good, and the new road to the ski area means they'll be here year-round so there will be jobs even after the dam and all the buildings are finished—"

"You're making the speech for the opposition," Isabel said.

"No, I'm saying that all those good things certainly will happen, but it's not right that they won't help us a bit!"

"Jobs," Isabel said.

"So my father can work in a hotel instead of his own farm. Wonderful. And Gaspar can work in somebody else's store, and Roybal can pump gas in somebody else's station. How grateful we should be! And where do we live while we work for other people? In places we rent from them, or in other towns and drive back and forth each day. So rich people who probably won't even live here, and don't give a single damn about this valley, will get richer and richer from our work, on land they practically stole from us. And that is not right!"

Astonished, Elizabeth watched the change in Maya from a bewildered girl uncertain about her future to a fierce woman willing to fight for what she thought was right. If everyone was that determined, Elizabeth thought, they could move mountains.

Move mountains? It would be better if they could move a town.

What a good idea, she thought. Find a friendly giant to pick up the

town and put it somewhere away from the dam and the center of the valley that was going to be flooded.

No, even a giant wouldn't help; he'd have no place to put it down. All the land was bought up long ago, and no one would give up enough acres for—

She sat straight, her mind racing. "Maya, Isabel, listen." She'd wondered last summer if they could build a new town, but she'd been thinking of nearby valleys. Now, Maya's words changed everything. Rich people will get richer from our work. . . . "Listen," she said again. "What if we can find a way to keep the town and also have the lake and a state park and a resort?"

"There is no way," Isabel said. "We'll be under a hundred feet of water."

"You won't be here." Elizabeth took her notebook from her shoulder bag and sketched the valley, with the town at the narrow end, the dam, the long oval that would be Lake Nuevo, the state park on one shore and the resort on the other. She drew the new road that was being cut on the high ground overlooking the future lake, making a wide arc around the dam and the resort, and out the valley at the other end. And finally, as Isabel and Maya watched, she drew a town, straddling the new road.

Maya let out a small cry. "Build Nuevo higher up—?"

"Can't," Isabel said shortly. 'That land isn't ours. I saw the plans last week; that whole area is for future expansion of the resort."

Elizabeth nodded. "So they say. But if Nuevo could be built there. ..." She darkened the new road on her sketch, connecting the town, the resort, and the state park.

"Well, wouldn't that be something," Isabel murmured. "Nobody could get anywhere without going through the town—"

"—shopping at Gaspar's store," said Maya.

"—tanking up at Roybal's gas station," Isabel went on.

"Buying souvenirs," Elizabeth said. "Picnic baskets. Tennis balls. Underwater watches. Postcards. Aspirin. Suntan lotion. Ski goggles. T-shirts."

"Tourists!" Isabel exclaimed. "Spending carelessly, as tourists do. My God, wouldn't that be something! Except, of course, that it's impossible."

"Who says it is?" Elizabeth asked. "Has anyone suggested it?"

"Of course not. We don't own the land!"

"We would if someone gave it to us."

"You've found a saint? Or an idiot? Who else would give up a hundred acres because we ask nicely?"

"That's what we're going to work on. We're going to find some pressure points."

"Pressure points," Maya said thoughtfully. "Is that like blackmail?"

"Persuasion," Elizabeth said with a smile.

Isabel reached across the table, putting her hand on Elizabeth's. "I love you for wanting to help. I admire the devious workings of your mind. But if you do anything for us now, you'll be going public against your husband and his newspapers."

"I know," Elizabeth said briefly. She turned to a fresh page of her notebook. "Let's make a list of what we're going to do."

Isabel squeezed her hand. "Okay, you don't want to talk about it. You want to plan strategy. Who am I to refuse, when I see that glint in your eye?" She put her other hand on Cesar's shoulder. "Padre! Wake up! Things are getting interesting around here."

"Try to forget the camera," Elizabeth told Jock Olson. A technician was clipping a tiny microphone to the pocket of his denim shirt, and Olson was looking at it warily, as if waiting for it to bite. "After a while you won't even notice it. You weren't nervous when we talked yesterday; you wanted to get acquainted first and we had an ordinary conversation. This is no different."

"Except for a few million people who'll be seeing it."

Elizabeth gave him her warmest smile and watched him respond almost automatically with his own smile and an easing of his tense shoulders. "No one wants to make you look foolish," she said. "We all want you to be as wonderful as you were yesterday."

They sat in armchairs in a studio in Albuquerque, where Olson was working for the winter. Behind them was a backdrop of an enlarged photograph of Nuevo as it had looked the previous summer, with two hundred trucks kicking up dust, construction equipment biting into the mountainside, and clouds of dirt and debris blasted into the air by dynamite.

Elizabeth nodded to the cameraman, then led Olson through a description of his farm background, his first job as a worker at Albuquerque Construction, and his new job, beginning last summer, as crew chief on the Nuevo Dam. Relaxing, he answered Elizabeth's questions about how he felt about construction work and being crew chief; he became animated and joked about "this dam job we're doing at Nuevo."

Elizabeth laughed, then said curiously, "What damn job? Is something wrong with it?"

"No," Olson said immediately. "It's fine. Lots of guys would give their eye teeth to have it."

"But it can't all be fun."

"It's not supposed to be fun; it's work. Hard work, with lots of hassles. But the pay's good and it's a steady job. Something always needs to be built somewhere."

"What kind of hassles? Bosses looking over your shoulder—?"

"No, what are you talking about? Nobody looks over my shoulder; I'm a professional. Me and the engineers and the general contractor—we work together."

"But then who's hassling you? Not your workers; they know you're in charge. So who else is there?"

"Look, Mrs. Lovell—"

"Elizabeth."

"Right. Elizabeth. Look, there's a town there. People live there. They don't like us."

"But they don't even know you."

"We buy things in town, we eat there, we talk to them; there's some cute chicks around. ..."

"They don't want you to talk to the chicks? The young girls?"

"Right. But that's not the main thing. Shit, they don't—sorry, I forgot; shouldn't say that—they don't like us because we're building a dam that will flood their town."

"But that's your job."

"Tell them that. They think if we disappeared the dam wouldn't get built."

"But someone would build it."

"That's the thing. You see that; I see it; they don't want to. But there's too much money at stake. There's gonna be condominiums there, a club house, golf course, boating docks . . . This is big, big money, and ain't nobody in the world gonna let anything stop the dam because if it's not there, there's no lake or anything else. The people in that town don't know shit from shinola—sorry, I forgot—the people can't stop it. Last summer some of 'em tried: stood in the road, you know, when the trucks were coming, but nobody got hurt. Mostly they talked; damn if they didn't about yak us to death. Between the ones who wanted us gone and the ones who wanted jobs, I damn near went nuts. I kinda felt sorry for a lot of 'em; they were so sure everything would be hunky-dory if we'd just get the hell out and leave them alone."