Quiet Dell: A Novel (38 page)

She felt drowsily warm at his touch, and then ached. Her breath quickened; the ache moved through her, but he withdrew his hands, and only looked at her as though something might devour them both. She moved to him and he stood, hands raised almost as though to stop her, but she laced her fingers in his and pulled his palms hard against her. Her eyes widened. She felt slapped awake.

“Not here,” he said. “You must go.”

“When? What time can I expect you?”

“I have reservations at the Drake. I will check in and come to you by six. Is Reynolds on?”

“You’ll stay the whole night? Yes, Reynolds is on.”

“Take a breath,” he said, smiling. “You must be your usual, composed self.”

“I shall be quite composed,” she said, but stepped back. “And I have no reason to come here, to the bank, again.”

“I have this for you,” he said, and picked up a large manila envelope from the table. “No, don’t look at them here. Give me your valise.” He slipped it inside. “You must go,” he said again, more quietly, and then in response to her questioning look, “They are Annabel’s drawings, from her room.”

•   •   •

He loved her. He had gone to that house and removed and sleeved the drawings, so carefully, for Emily, for he loved and knew her and understood why it mattered so deeply. They might have lived all their lives and not known one another, in such close proximity; Park Ridge was a streetcar commute from Chicago and her brownstone apartment building, viewed now from the small park across the street. She walked, the dog’s leash in one hand, clasping the envelope of Annabel’s drawings to her chest. The fulsome canopies of the trees lining the avenue were tipped with gold; the rain beginning to fall was almost mist. All those objects set out in the Eicher yard would be wet and ruined. She did not care; the drawings and mural were safe.

She glimpsed her fifth-floor corner windows through leafy boughs and knew she would embrace William soon in those rooms so known to her, and so changed. The bench just here faced the crosswalk and she sat to catch her breath. The dog turned a kind of circle and leapt up, tangling his leash in her feet.

•   •   •

Annabel smells the trees; their bright leaves glint like dampened fires. Emily is here by the crosswalk in a city park, and these small lawns and banks of garden are Duty’s own: he knows the gravel slides and rabbit holes, the tunneled warrens under roots and bushes. Annabel feels herself in Emily’s arms, and Duty jumping toward her, but those are only her drawings Emily holds. Annabel herself, so like those figures, needs no wands or wings or scraps of raiment. She knew it might be so; Grandmother had said perhaps one world was another:
you see what is and what will be.
A barn in Iowa fills with hay; a dark aura casts shadows before it, trailed by the powdery scent of Emily’s perfume. The grandsons are in school; Drenth like
drenched
: stolid, strong blond boys. The oldest will soon work the farm full-time; he’s nearly a man, walking back from the fields on a fall evening two years hence. Smoke curls from his grandfather’s window, as though a long wick is extinguished. He runs up the farmhouse stairs, turning on the landing. Annabel
turns with him, her white scarf flying out, and sees her own house in Park Ridge. Duty and Emily are in the playhouse and Grethe is in the mural, wearing the Japanese robe Mother painted. Colorful figures move with her: men in sampan hats and vests, ladies with sashed waists and wide sleeves. There is quiet birdsong in the paintings, but the backyard through the playhouse window is noisy with Hart’s shouts and whistling. He wields his catcher’s mitt from the back stoop, throwing a baseball for Duty. The ball flies, hard as a stone, over the empty grass, and suddenly the yard is full. People stroll about, looking through baskets and open bureau drawers. Her mother’s vanity stands awkwardly under a tree. She looks into the mirror and the long glass fogs as though steam pours upon it. The toboggan, hanging from a branch, twists with its own weight. Annabel hears the snow that swirled around it, and the wind on the hill in the park. Charles is pulling the sled and they are trooping after in their blouson hats and gloves and boots, sinking in snow to their knees. The crest of the hill is like a pedestal in a churning cloud. Charles positions the sled and they pile on, shouting and linking arms. Snow lifts around them in wide sprays and their long smooth glide is begun.

September 18–19, 1931

She made dinner for him often, for he spent every weekend now at her apartment, and drove in midweek as well. He’d inquired, and was buying the apartment next to hers through his lawyer; the large two-bedroom would give them the entire floor. Later, all
will be in Emily’s name. It was a surprise that he could not keep much longer; the construction of breaking through was involved, and the renovation of an expansive outdoor terrace, private from the street. She would go to West Virginia for the trial, for a full month, she said, to be in the town as preparations began. He’d engaged an architect and planned to begin renovations then, cutting doors and pocket doors, finishing the walls, while she was gone. The interior décor would occupy her when the trial was over, and planning the terrace garden would help her envision a future, their future.

She should be in Clarksburg now, she often said; she would have gone there already, he was sure, but for him. He waited for something else to interest her, some case as important, but he knew there was no such case until the trial was over and the man executed.

She talked at least weekly to Sheriff Grimm, who seemed to be in charge, to Gretchen Fleming, the Lemke woman’s sister, and to O’Boyle. Eric phoned her frequently, calls she cut short when William was with her, but the two seemed to enjoy a close platonic friendship. Eric called her “cousin.”

Just tonight, Eric had assured William that he watched over Emily carefully. They both knew, Eric said, as though in confidence, that Emily could be impulsive, and was too attractive to behave quite so independently. William made no comment. A dinner party, given by the
Tribune
editorial board, eddied around them; Emily was on the other side of the room. Emily was his, William reflected; he should be her protection and could not publicly offer it. They’d attended the function separately, appearing merely acquainted as they took part in conversations concerning the Powers case, the ongoing controversy around Prohibition, the economic climate, the mayor’s well-oiled administration. Every man in this room, Eric included, William knew, was a millionaire, and would double his wealth as the Depression limped on.

Dinner was served at a long table accommodating eighteen or twenty. Emily was seated with Eric at the far end. William noticed that some seemed to view them as a couple. They traveled together
and were known to partner in covering a crime that only seemed to snowball in anticipation of the trial, which it was said might take place in an opera house, like an entertainment. William’s own dinner conversation preoccupied him; the lawyers opposite were interested in a joint investment that could prove very profitable, but he glanced at Emily to see Eric touch her wrist and gaze at her over their raised glasses. The man seemed at pains to give the impression they were intimate. She was using Eric’s attentions to avoid looking at William, to appear engaged. Eric signaled the waiter to refresh her drink, for Prohibition was a mere joke at private parties such as this.

Finally, guests began departing. Eric announced to the host, in everyone’s hearing, that he would escort Miss Thornhill home, and helped Emily on with her wrap, touching her hair as though he often did so.

William concluded his conversation, unhurried, setting up a series of meetings in the coming week; commercial real estate was a freshly consuming interest now that he spent so much time in the city. He took his own cab to Emily’s apartment and entered by the stairs, walking the five flights up. He was no longer concerned about meeting anyone in the hallway, for he knew the only other apartment on her floor was empty. He unlocked Emily’s door with his key, calling out, “Darling?” and she answered, over the sound of the filling bath.

He moved toward her, into the bedroom, aware of the open bathroom door and the moist, steamy air.

“I’m just getting into the bath,” she called to him. “Come in if you like. What took you so long at the party?”

“Business. More reason to work in Chicago.” He heard the water move as she lay down in it. He wanted to go into the narrow room and look at her, reach for her, but he stood at her dresser and confronted his reflection in her mirror. Water splashed. He thought of Catherine, bathed by Mary like a child, in a plastic seat that kept her upright in the tub.

Catholic marriages could be annulled. It was an arduous process,
but Catherine did not know she was married, and he could afford to care for her. But he had taken a vow. And to legally acknowledge Catherine’s condition as reason to end their marriage seemed a betrayal that flew in the face of this gift to him, this miracle.

“William?”

He heard Emily in the bath. Water, dripping and pouring. She was soaping her arms, her legs, her beautiful limbs that clung to him and pulled him against her, that he stroked and held in every possible configuration. He felt it was all preamble, the ground of his deepening knowledge, desire, need for her, and was momentarily astounded to find himself standing in her bedroom, a room now so familiar.

He removed his tuxedo jacket, his vest, the studs of his pleated shirt. He put them in the mahogany tray she’d purchased for him. “Emily,” he called in to her, “does your friend Eric know about us?”

She hesitated. “What do you mean?”

“What do I mean? That seems an evasive answer.” He waited. He knew she would come to the door of the bath, and look at him gravely; they did not converse from separate rooms.

She stood, her robe unbelted, gazing at him, as though considering entering the bedroom. “I certainly haven’t told him about us, and he hasn’t asked.”

“He gives the impression, in public, that he would not need to ask such a question, because he would already know the answer.”

“Are we speaking in riddles?”

William kept the room between them. “He assured me, in a private moment tonight, of your safety in his care, on the Powers case, as though aware of the depth of my concern. He then implied the depth of
his
concern, and his delight in you, to everyone at the party.”

She walked toward him, her robe open, smelling of roses. The moisture of the hot bath clung to her hair. She nearly spoke, but hesitated.

“Eric is a very attractive man.” William was arranging his shirt
studs into an even row, within the tray. “About your age, isn’t he? Well off. Family money. And never married.”

She stood by the dresser.

“Is he a homosexual, Emily?”

She watched William. “If he were, or people thought he might be, that would be quite dangerous for him, wouldn’t it. He would be ruined in every society, but for a small, secret one. I’m sure we can’t imagine.”

“You care deeply for him, don’t you?”

“Of course I do.”

“Then we need say no more about it.”

She touched her warm hands to his shoulders and chest, following the thin furred line down his belly to the clasp of his trousers.

“I have something for you,” he said, “something very important to me.” He took the object, a small suede change purse, from his trouser pocket and put it in her hand. “It was my mother’s. I don’t know why I want you to have it, except that she carried it with her always, and I have kept it in my desk for years, all the years, it seems, that I have waited for you.”

She sat, and held the purse, and opened the brass clasp.

“It is empty,” William said, “and smells faintly of roses, like you. I sometimes feel that what I can offer you, so deeply felt and meant, has an element of emptiness. It’s not the marriage I wish for us. It may never be.”

Her eyes shone up at him. He turned off the lights, and went to her.

•   •   •

They slept, so conscious of one another that they woke together. She opened the drawn curtains near 10:00
A.M
. and prepared coffee, fruit, eggs with ham, and thick brown bread. They sat in armchairs opposite one another, at the marble slab of her kitchen table. They ate without speaking much, only smiling. Emily poured his coffee full again, and got up to warm more milk.

William watched her, aware of her inside the robe, of her
hands, touching cups and plates. These moments of pause transported him; he wished only to extend them, to control the hands of the clock on her kitchen wall.

She turned to him and reached for his hand. “What are you thinking, looking at me so?”

“Only that I feel a warmth such as children feel, perhaps, completely in the moment. Being here, talking to you.”

“Yes. We are talking, like anyone.”

“We are going to get better and better at this.”

“At talking, William? And breakfast?”

“At everything, Emily.”

She touched his throat, his hair. “If we were married, wouldn’t we get used to one another, finally, walk about, have breakfast every day, read the paper in our armchairs—”

“Emily, we do walk about and have breakfast, but I will never get used to this. Whether we marry is in God’s hands. But having been married, and lived so alone for so long, I can only tell you this is nowhere usual.”

She moved to sit beside him, nestled close in the wide upholstered chair. “I’m more like you than you know. Work, my constant, acquaintances rather than friends, and no relatives but my mother, who doesn’t know me, as Catherine doesn’t know you. I would simply have gone on as I was.”

The phone rang, startling them both.

“You needn’t answer,” William said.

“No one would ring me on the weekend, unless it was important.”

The phone rang, and stopped, and began again.

“Forgive me, I must answer.” She picked up the receiver, and held it so that William could hear Eric on the other end.

“I’ve had a phone call from Grimm.” Eric was calling from the street, nearly shouting into the phone. “He expects a riot tonight, a lynch mob at the jail. Crowds are gathered. I am flying to Clarksburg.”