The Art Student's War (62 page)

Still, it was a problem solved, a job done—something which, for obscure reasons, she’d turned into a sizable burden. It was time to lift burdens—as of this morning she’d gained twenty-two pounds and this was no time to carry unnecessary weight. She lifted another burden in the afternoon with a short call to Stevie. This was a problem that sounded too implausible to be a problem: she and Grant owned three cars.

Mrs. Ives had made good on her promise. She’d bought Grant a car for his thirtieth birthday. He’d settled on a new red Mercury convertible, which he loved so extravagantly that Bianca joked about feeling jealous—not wholly a joke. “Listen to her
purr,”
Grant would say, as they idled before a red light. Or: “Look how the sun lights up her hood.” Or: “See the way she responds to the slightest touch.”

Grant had given his green Studebaker to her—it would be the “family car.” Her own ’49 Mercury was now extraneous. Bianca thought she might extend the chain of gift giving to Stevie. Wouldn’t it be wonderful for Rita to have a car? Bianca had thought Stevie might actually accept such a gift, now that he was out of the Ford plant and flourishing at Turk’s Trucks. But what was she thinking? The offer made him indignant. A car? Rita didn’t need a car! And if she did, he could certainly provide one.

So Bianca had considered offering it to Mamma and Papa, but what was the point? Papa had a new Dodge, and Mamma’s Hudson was as good as new, she drove it so rarely. (Papa had bought her a car to encourage her to get out more. But while she always made such a point of not being an “Italian wife”—she’d driven since she was sixteen—she seldom climbed behind the wheel.) And Edith drove even less. She preferred the bus. She claimed this was because she liked to read, but in truth she usually got lost when driving anywhere. The girl with the world’s most organized mind had no internal compass.

Bianca tried Stevie again. She had taken up P. G. Wodehouse novels a couple of years ago, at Priscilla’s suggestion (she found them the perfect books for a mother—so easily picked up and put down), and decided now that it was all a matter, as Jeeves would say, of “the psychology of the individual.”

“Stevie,” she said, “it’s about the car. The old Mercury. You said you might be able to help me out.”

“What about it?” He sounded suspicious. “You needa sell it.”

“I don’t know how to answer all the questions. From potential buyers. How many engines does the thing have?—that sort of thing.”

“It’s got one, Bea.”

“I tell you, I’m in a real fix. I thought maybe you might know somebody to sell it to.”

Stevie exhaled into the phone.

“And it’s losing value. Every day. Just sitting there. Money’s going down the drain.”

Silence at the other end.

“They’re going to ask me about spark plugs. Does my car have spark plugs?”

Still an unbroken silence, though its nature had changed, she could tell. She’d begun to amuse him.

“It has six,” Stevie finally said.

“And a carburetor?”

“And a carburetor.”

“I tell you, I’m in a real fix. I need help.”

He exhaled again.

“Losing money every day … Right down the drain.”

“All right, all right. We’ll come by today. You sign it over to me, I’ll sell it when I can, give you the money.”

“But I want you to make something. I simply can’t let you do it if you don’t make something.”

“All right, all right. We’ll be by today.”

And it was as easy as that. Offer Stevie a car as a gift, he’d resent you. But offer it as a chore, a job that needed doing, and after a little huffing and puffing he’d swing by and pick it up that afternoon. It was all just the psychology of the individual.

She was reading a recent issue of
Time
, catching up on the news (the Democrats in despair, Adlai’s chances dimming), when Maggie, whom Bianca hadn’t seen in ages, dropped by unexpectedly. A new Maggie. A chin-enhanced Maggie.

She was still bruised from the procedure. She was swollen at the cheeks, and purple and yellow up and down her neck—but she was far too excited to sequester herself any longer. And far too pleased. She adored her new look. She was giggling and peering at her reflection in the front window, the mirror over the sofa, the glass of the china cabinet. She’d overcome her mortal fear of needles and knives to become the proud possessor of a new chin, a new face. It was difficult to tell how dramatic the change actually was, given the exultant way she exaggerated the effect by elevating her head and pointing her chin as she talked. But it was a small difference that made a big difference. She did look good, the new Maggie: she looked good.

But new Maggie was in many ways old Maggie, and this, too, was good: Bianca’s oldest friend in the world was back. Maggie arrived bearing a gift, a quite tasteful and lovely silver bracelet.

“What’s this for?”

“It’s for you, silly.” Maggie laughed. “Because you’re my oldest friend and I haven’t seen you in ages.”

Yes, the bracelet was beautiful and this was one of Maggie’s many puzzles: her gifts were almost always in exquisite taste, though her own clothes and jewelry typically verged on the tawdry. It was as if her gifts declared:
I know good taste but it’s not for me
.

They drifted into the kitchen and Maggie said, “Do you have any wine?” and then she answered herself, “You always do,” and Bianca said, “It’s the Italian in me,” and she poured Maggie a glass of red wine and herself a glass of ginger ale. (She’d grown very tired of milk.) And soon they were giggling away, just like the old days, Maggie rattling on about her horrible mother-in-law and Bianca about the latest visit to Mr. and Mrs. Ives. “You look so good,” Maggie said, and Bianca said thank you, and Maggie said, “We look so good,” and they both laughed, and Maggie said, “You’re having a new baby and I have a new chin,” and Maggie laughed more brightly still and it was suddenly apparent that this was the first occasion—unveiling her new chin to her oldest friend—when Maggie had felt completely comfortable with Bianca’s pregnancy.

But Maggie was restless in the kitchen. She sat with legs crossed, upraised foot kicking to and fro. Then she got up and examined herself in the back window.

They wound up in the little room behind the den, which Bianca hesitated to call her studio, since she so rarely attempted art in it. Bianca had never warmed to the space, actually, though uncertain whether she
disliked the room itself or the self-reproaches it fostered. “Henry,” Maggie said, and pointed.

Yes, here was Henry Vanden Akker, in the portrait with Gauguin’s jungle ferns and van Gogh’s jungle star clusters. It was the doomed boy who once wrote a poem invoking her as his landfall and harbor light. The portrait hung on the wall, along with one of her landscapes and two of her still lifes.

“Henry,” Bianca echoed.

“It’s quite good,” Maggie said, not knowing what else to say.

“You never met him,” Bianca replied. And added: “But it is good,” because it was—or because, anyway, it was the best portrait poor Henry would ever have.

Standing side by side, shoulders almost touching, the two old friends contemplated Henry’s portrait.

“No, I never met him,” Maggie said. “But I heard enough about him.”

“Yes, you did,” Bianca said. “You sure did.”

“Did you ever tell Grant?”

“Tell Grant what?” Bianca said.

Bianca was being coy, and Maggie had every justification for her slightly reedy tone: “About the last night you and Henry spent together.”

“No-o.” Bianca took a seat in the blue leather chair and motioned Maggie toward the love seat. “But I meant to.”

“But you couldn’t. Under the circumstances.”

“But I really did
mean
to,” Bianca protested. Maggie was often far too ready to excuse small deceits, white lies. “It just wasn’t possible.” Bianca took refuge in Maggie’s phrase: “Under the circumstances.”

“I know what you mean,” Maggie said.

Tensions hovered in the air, but these were the old tensions, far preferable to the new tensions. At the base of the new tensions lay the wasting fear that Bianca really didn’t like the person Maggie had become: a woman who, as the wife of a wealthy and important man, accepted wealth and importance as her due. The new Maggie engendered a suspicion that Bianca had stayed in touch with her old friend for merely sentimental reasons—that she was someone Bianca could easily do without. But at the base of the old tensions, which had caused the two girls to squabble and needle each other endlessly, lay the knowledge of Maggie’s indispensability. This was the Maggie she had dragged
through the rain to a branch library in order to make her confession:
Maggie, the very worst thing has happened…

“I took the portrait down once,” Bianca said, “and you know what? Grant insisted I put it back up.”

Yes, she’d told Maggie this story before, but she must recall it again, for this was one of Grant’s handsomest traits: his heartfelt eagerness to acknowledge heroism wherever it surfaced, whether on the athletic field or on the battlefield … Grant had spent the War Stateside, at a flight-training school in Wichita Falls, Texas, but he was quick to acknowledge those who had made “the ultimate sacrifice.” He considered himself “one of the lucky ones.” He didn’t merely
say
this. (It was the sort of thing men felt obliged to say, hoping to look endearingly modest.) No, he
did
consider himself lucky, in most every aspect of his existence. Grant moved through his days—God bless him—grateful for his home, his children, his wife, his life.

“You know, the strangest thing happened,” Bianca said. “The other night. I was sort of half awake. I tried to call up Henry’s voice, and you know what? I couldn’t. Maggie, I couldn’t hear it. And suddenly I got this panicky feeling. Something terrible was going to happen to Henry unless I could call up his voice. And I had to remind myself, Henry’s been dead for going on ten years. Whatever horrible thing is going to happen to him? It’s already happened.”

“Ten years,” Maggie said.

“And his poor parents! Their only son! Afterward, each time I visited, they were more wasted away. Are they still in Pleasant Ridge? Still alive? I’ve often wondered.”

“You didn’t stay in touch.”

“They clearly didn’t want to. And you remember, I got so sick.”

“I remember.”

“And maybe I was scared? Uncle Dennis tells me I nearly died …”

“You could look them up in the phone book now.”

“I could. I’ve thought many times of doing just that.”

“You could do it right now,” Maggie said.

“I could. But I’m not going to.”

They regarded each other—the pregnant woman and the woman with the newly enhanced chin—and Bianca found it heartening to feel all the old bonds intact. Maggie Szot had always been the one to extend a dare, Bea Paradiso the one to shrink from fears she couldn’t quite explain—but still grateful for the dare,
hungry
for the dare …

Bianca started—jumped back, really—when the front door opened. It was Grant, home from tennis. Grant hardly seemed to register Maggie’s presence, let alone her enhanced chin. His face blazed with excitement. “Bianca, Bianca, ja hear the news?
Ja hear the news?
About Roy Bootmaker?”

“What on earth—”

“It’s our milkman,” Grant said to Maggie.

“Oh I’ve met Mr. Bootmaker.” In the old days, before she’d married Walton, Maggie had frequently dropped in for morning coffee.

“Bianca, he’s a
hero!”
Grant said. “Bianca, I’m telling you! Mr. Bootmaker! He’s an honest-to-God hero.”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“You haven’t heard the news, obviously. I’ve just heard it from Mrs. Applegrew.” Mrs. Applegrew lived down the block. “I tell you, Roy Bootmaker is a hero.”

“Grant, for heaven’s sake, sit down and tell us properly. Start at the beginning.”

Grant dropped down beside Maggie. He loved delivering stories, and this was just the sort of story he loved best …

Yesterday, on his route, Roy Bootmaker had stopped at Mr. Bickey’s. (Mr. Bickey lived just down the street, Grant explained to Maggie. He’s the neighborhood recluse and a very sour old man, Bianca added. He never goes out, but he replaces his Cadillac every year, Grant said. He has trouble going out, his legs are all swollen, he walks with a cane, Bianca added in fairness.)
Anyway
, yesterday Roy Bootmaker stopped at Mr. Bickey’s. He expected a note in the milk chute, Mr. Bickey’s usual practice, but there was none. Mr. Bootmaker knocked on the side door and rang the front doorbell, but no answer. The kitchen radio was on, however, which was also odd, since Mr. Bickey wasn’t the sort to go out and leave a radio running. The cat was meowing loudly in the kitchen; apparently, it hadn’t been fed. Mr. Bootmaker circled back of the house and peered through the garage window. Mr. Bickey’s Cadillac was inside, which was odder still …

Mr. Bootmaker and his father (his father drives the truck, Bianca explained to Maggie) continued with their milk route, but an hour or so later, going miles out of their way, they returned to Mr. Bickey’s and knocked and knocked and rang the doorbell. The radio was still running. The cat was still meowing, hungrier than ever. They knocked on the neighbors’ doors. No one had seen Mr. Bickey. The car was still in the garage. Convinced that something might be seriously amiss, Mr.
Bootmaker boosted his father on his shoulders (as you know, the son is quite large, Bianca explained to Maggie, and the father’s quite diminutive), and they found a kitchen window not fully closed. The older Mr. Bootmaker (he’s seventy-seven years old, Bianca supplied) eased himself through the window and opened the side door for his son, Roy Bootmaker. Roy called and called. And then he thought he heard a voice.

Roy raced upstairs (and Bianca could visualize him doing just that, in his size 12½ EEE black shoes) and looked around. He found Mr. Bickey in the bath.

“In the bath!” Bianca exclaimed.

“In the
bath
. Mr. Bickey had had some sort of stroke. Hours before. He couldn’t climb out. The water had grown cold and he was naked and shivering. He wasn’t going to live long, an old man like that, lying paralyzed in a cold bath.”