September Song (24 page)

The justice of the peace in the next village to whom I paid my fine, after lecturing me on the seriousness of my infraction and entering it on my conviction card (one more and my driver's license would be suspended), directed me to an inspection station just down the road. I passed it by. I found a secluded spot and there Kelly and I spent the day. For when your car is inspected the mechanic gets behind the steering wheel to test your lights, your brakes, your directional signals, and the presence in the van of something unburied was marked. We would travel the rest of the way by night. Laying up by day I was able at least to get some sleep.

I have met people down south who have the notion that New York City is New York State. (I have met people from New York City who have that notion, too.) As a native son I can say it isn't so. No matter how you slice it, New York is big. Kelly and I were still not home. We might be on the last lap, but that is the one for which you have to draw on your second wind. I was now both panting and holding my breath. I heard the wheels roll but in the dark you cannot tick off the familiar landmarks and it seemed to me that we were treading in place.

We had had to wait out a few thunderstorms but otherwise the weather had been on our side. I kept in touch by radio with the forecasts, although I had once heard a five-year-old say to her grandfather, who was lamenting that their picnic was going to be rained out, “Papa, haven't you learned yet that those fellows are always wrong?” One meteorologist I tuned in on said, “Well, folks, the temperature has risen twenty degrees in just the last hour and that's only the tip of the iceberg.” First laugh I had had in days.

One afternoon I was wakened by a noise like a tank battalion. I looked out to see the tail end of a snowplow. Some eight inches had fallen and it was still coming down thick. In upstate New York about the only time you can count on that not happening is mid-August. It was twenty-four hours before we could get going again.

It will not be misunderstood, I trust, when I say that I enjoyed Kelly's funeral. Not that I danced on his grave, of course. I was somber as befitted the occasion and the crowd and my standing among them. Our story had made the newspaper. The publicity drew a large turnout. They came not to bury Kelly but to praise me. I had become something of a local hero. To my supporters I said that I had done only what they would have done in my place.

When I say “supporters” I refer to my ongoing battle with the law.

The most serious suspicion was murder.

“Kill him!” I exclaimed. “Why would I do that?”

“Maybe he snored,” said the police lieutenant.

As I have said, he did. I colored.

I waived my right to counsel. Why hire someone to defend me when I had nothing to hide? I was requested to take a polygraph test and, would you believe, I failed it! Just being asked such questions is enough to make your heart pound and your blood pressure rise.

How I sweated! And sweating is one of the things they measure, being supposed to give you away as a liar. But practice makes perfect, and I passed the second test, which I requested.

No motive for murder could be established. The police were disappointed but that count was dropped. Now I am charged with unlicensed transportation of human remains. Failure to seek medical assistance. Failure to report a death. Violation of the sanitary code. Endangerment to public health. Does this mean, I wonder, however I fare in New York, that I face these same charges in every state along the way on my next Dixie raid?

Be It Ever So Humble

O
N GETTING UP
in the morning the first thing Lily Harper did, even before putting in her denture, was to make the bed. She boxed the corners and smoothed the cover as neatly as a soldier. Lily was tidy by nature; she was also tidy out of terror. Her daughter Elizabeth might burst in at any hour, inspect the room like a sergeant in the barracks, and an unmade bed was all the evidence needed for her to declare that Lily was no longer able to look after herself.

Not look after herself! If ever there was an “efficiency apartment” hers was it. Three hundred and sixty square feet of floor space: who could not keep that clean? The place was as cozy as a cubbyhole. Turn from the hotplate and there was the sink. After a meal of hers there was one pot, one plate, one knife and fork to wash. Waste disposal? She generated no waste. Nothing was ever left on her plate. Her laundry, which she did often, again both because she was naturally neat and out of fear of Elizabeth's fault-finding, fit in the lavatory. As for the occasional cockroach, who in the city was free of those? One of Lily's park-bench acquaintances reported seeing them in the most respected hospital. But just let Elizabeth spot one and it was, “Mama, you are no longer able to look after yourself.”

Cockroaches led to her health.

“Mama, you've grown thin.”

“I have not grown thin. I always was. The one time I wasn't was when I was carrying you. Much obliged for your concern, but I'm fine.”

Moreover, she had Mr. Ellis to keep watch on her. There was his rap now, dependable as an alarm clock.

Through the closed door Lily said, “Good morning, Mr. Ellis.”

“Good morning, Mrs. Harper.”

“How are you today, Mr. Ellis?”

“Very well, thank you, Mrs. Harper. Yourself?”

“Very well, thank you.”

“Have a nice day.”

“Thank you, Mr. Ellis. And you too.”

The boyfriend down the hall, Elizabeth called Mr. Ellis. She suspected that Lily and he were in league to keep out of their children's clutches. She was right, they were.

This morning Lily was going shopping. Today it was to be the A & P. Unlike most housewives, who favored one market because there they knew where to find the things on their list, Lily spread her patronage over them all. For her, shopping was not a chore, it was an outing, an adventure. She never made a list. Nor did she shop, as did many on fixed incomes, adding up their purchases on a pocket calculator as they went along so as to stay within their budgets. She pushed her cart down the aisles taking from the shelves whatever suggested itself.

Yet she was nothing if not choosey. Before settling on an eggplant or a head of lettuce she considered and rejected half a dozen. To win her approval a cut of meat, a ham, a turkey must undergo a thorough inspection. She was not immune to a bargain, but quality, not cost, was her prime consideration. She mistrusted off-brands.

It was evident to anyone watching her that Lily was a savvy shopper. Her age too testified to experience. The assurance with which she selected items encouraged elderly men, new to keeping house for themselves, and indecisive young apprentice housewives to ask her advice. Being in no hurry, she was generous with it. When asked what one did with artichokes, avocados, parsnips, she explained at length. Although she herself was unconcerned about prices, she sympathized with those who were. This led to many friendly chats.

Caravans of jet planes made of today's supermarket an emporium that put the world at one's fingertips. They had abolished the seasons. Somewhere on the globe, mere hours away, the blush was on the grape, the melon was sweet on the vine. There were fresh figs in February, tomatoes in March. There were potatoes from Idaho—ah, Idaho! snowpeaked mountains, ski lifts; dates from Saudi Arabia—sand, camels, veiled women. Danish trout, Polish ham, Dutch cheese, Mexican enchiladas. The market was like the Garden before the Fall, with all the tempting goods in reach.

When her cart could hold no more Lily took from it a can of soup and a loaf of bread and, leaving it parked in an aisle, went to the quick checkout. As she was paying for her purchases she felt a grip on her shoulder.

“Come with me,” said the man.

“Mama,” said Elizabeth. “Mama, I'm talking to you. This is it. You hear me?
This
is IT. I have never been so humiliated. How that man lectured me! Well, I don't blame him. Have you no idea how many man-hours are lost in putting all those things back in their places on the shelves? He told me that every store manager in town has been on the lookout for you. Well, you've been nabbed. Your little shopping sprees are a thing of the past. They've got you on videotape. You can never show your face in a supermarket again. I'll give you until tomorrow to pack your things. You're off to the home. And high time,” she concluded with a sniff at her surroundings.

Lily knew the home. When newly widowed she had volunteered a day's work a week there, until she could stand it no more.

“Home” was a cruel misnomer. Home was just what it was not. It was a graveyard full of living ghosts. Home might be nothing more than a sparsely furnished room, but so long as it was yours and yours alone you were you.

Pallid as creatures that lived under planks, the inmates were propped in rows along the walls to drowse. The waking and howling of one would set them all howling like the dogs of a neighborhood. The bedridden stared at the ceiling. Those who were able stalked the corridors, their split gowns exposing their backsides, a look in their eyes as though searching for the selves they had lost. The most pitiful were those who knew where they were. “Get me out of this place. Get me out of here,” Lily had heard them plead with their relatives. Sharp instruments, cords, even bedsheets were kept from them. During Lily's time there one inmate drowned herself in a toilet bowl. Another suffocated his screeching roommate with a pillow.

“Be ready for me at ten,” said Elizabeth.

The bed was made. Now Lily sat waiting in her coat, hat and gloves.

There came a rap on the door.

“Good morning, Mr. Ellis,” she called.

“Good morning, Mrs. Harper.”

“How are you this morning, Mr. Ellis?”

“Very well, thank you, Mrs. Harper. Yourself?”

“Very well, thank you.”

“Dress warmly if you're going out today.”

Too softly for him to hear she said, “Goodbye, dear Mr. Ellis.”

She allowed him time to return down the hall. Then she stood and took a last look around the room.

“Goodbye,” she said, as though to herself.

So that it need not be broken open she left the door unlocked behind her.

A Heart in Hiding

I
T WAS HIS MORNING
to make breakfast. They took turns. For today he had in store a treat. This being a Sunday they would lie abed late, reading the paper over their tea. Not that it mattered anymore what day of the week it was nor what hour they got up, but you felt less guilty lazing while others were not at work either. Leaving her sleeping, he stole downstairs, clinging to the rail, testing his footing before proceeding. The old stairs creaked, and so did his joints.

He got the paper from the porch. While around the world war raged, here the scent of lilacs perfumed the air and a wren sang his love song.

In the kitchen the cat stirred from sleep, stretched herself and yawned. As he poured a saucer of milk she twined around his legs.

“Puss, Puss, always underfoot,” he said. “Someday you're going to trip me, I'll fall, break my leg and be taken to the hospital. Then won't you be sorry?”

Having heard this many times before, Puss purred.

He laid out the makings of the meal. As he was peeling the caps of the mushrooms an old song tapped at the door of his memory. He welcomed it like a long-lost friend. He had picked it up from a street singer on the Via Partenope during that sabbatical year in Naples long ago. Now to recall the words he had first to translate them.

I'll build myself a house in the middle of the ocean

Made of peacock feathers.

Me voglio fa na casa mmiez' 'o mare

Fravacata de penne de pavune
.

Of silver and gold I'll make the grates

And of precious stones the balconies.

D'argento e d'oro voglio fa lli ggrare

E de prete preziose lli balcune
.

When my Nennella appears

Everyone will say:

“Now the sun has risen!”

Quanno Nennella mi se va affacciare

Ognuno dice, ognuno dice:

“Mo sponta lo sole!”

Trallalallalla llallarallalla
.

Who said his memory was going bad!

He put the mushrooms and the tomato slices in one pan of slowly simmering butter, the kippers in another, set the kettle on to boil and spooned the tea into the pot.

Climbing the stairs, balancing the tray, he raised his voice and sang again the song's last verse. She would waken to fond Italian memories.

He was winded when he gained the landing. He paused for breath, then went down the hall and entered the bedroom singing the refrain:
Trallarallalla lla … la … la
…

She was dead.

When the body had been taken away he sat awaiting the onslaught of grief like a man in the electric chair. But the switch was not thrown. He felt nothing. Nothing whatever. He shook his head like shaking a watch to make it tick. It responded with
tra la la la
…

Without her it was as though the day had not begun. The house was silent. Always before it had been filled with music every waking hour. There was a radio in the bedroom, another in the kitchen, a player and records by the hundreds in the den. He sometimes called her his Anna Livia Plurabelle, and quoted, “‘Sea shell ebb music wayriver she flows.'” She liked all kinds: symphonic, chamber, opera, jazz, the popular songs of their youth. Now it was as though the house had been submerged.

After forty-two years it must have come to seem to him that their marriage would just go on and on. It ought to have been the very opposite with each passing day. But when he warned himself that it could not go on forever like this, it was more to scare himself into a fuller appreciation of his good fortune than it was out of conviction. It was not that he took his wife for granted, but rather that he could not imagine—could scarcely even remember—life without her, and he could neither remember nor imagine not living. He had marveled at how it was that of all the potential pairs on this earth he and she had found each other as unerringly as lock and key. Throughout his working life as a professor he had been much at home; since his retirement they were together at all times, seldom out of each other's call. To accept the sudden end of so permanent a partnership was impossible.