The Believers (19 page)

CHAPTER
11

"Audrey, dear, you don't have to do this," Jean said, as they walked up Central Park West together. "You can still call it off."

The two women were on their way back to Jean's apartment from the drugstore, where Audrey had been buying something for her upset stomach. In a little less than half an hour, they were due to meet Daniel and Berenice at Jean's.

"I'm not calling it off," Audrey said flatly. She wiped her slick forehead with the back of her hand and absently rubbed the sweat off on her T-shirt. It was one of those washed-out New York days of deadening gray heat. All along the avenue, droning AC units were dripping condensation onto the baked sidewalk. High overhead, the pale sun wobbled and fizzed in a milky sky, seemingly too weak and soluble an entity to be a plausible source of the monstrous temperature.

"You know," Jean said, "you're not going to achieve anything by confronting this woman. It'll just be horribly upsetting."

Audrey gave her a low-lidded look of contempt. "
I'm
not the one who's going to be horribly upset, believe me."

Jean nodded. "I think it's amazing how brave you're being, Audrey. I know that I couldn't be as strong as you in your position, but I do wish you'd be a bit gentler on yourself. Your emotions are still so raw--"

"Oh, Jean," Audrey exclaimed, "my emotions are
fine
." She paused, trying to find the right tone. "I mean, I'm
annoyed
, of course. I'm
very
annoyed. Joel's been a terrible fool. If he weren't in a coma, I'd like to give him a good smack. But"--she sighed and canted her head in a gesture of philosophical resignation--"it is what it is, Jean. There's no use crying about it, I just have to deal with it."

"Well, you don't have to deal with it right now--not when you're still in shock about the whole thing."

Audrey gritted her teeth. It was rude--it was
tactless--
of Jean to go on like this. A friend's job in such situations was not to poke and prod and insist on ferreting out your "real feelings": a friend's job was to shut up and take you at your word. "But, Jean, that's what I'm telling you, I'm
not
in shock," she said. "
You
know how Joel's always been. I'd have to be very slow on the uptake to be surprised by his tomcatting at this stage in the game."

Jean looked away, shyly. She and Audrey had rarely spoken of Joel's infidelities, except in the most elliptical way. It felt awkward to make this sudden leap into frankness without any acknowledgment of the discretion that had preceded it.

"You don't stay married to a man like Joel for forty years if you can't cope with the odd bit of bad behavior," Audrey said. "All powerful men are the same way. It's a biological thing. Look at what Jackie Kennedy had to put up with--"

"I understand, Audrey," Jean interrupted, "but this
isn't
just another bit of bad behavior, is it? He's fathered a child--"

"Oh, please!" Audrey stopped walking. "You think I care? You think I'm staying up nights because that slag had Joel's baby? You're wrong! I don't give a shit."

"I hear what you're saying," Jean said, as they resumed walking. "I do. But I still don't understand why you have to deal with this woman personally. A lawyer could do any of the negotiating that needs--"

"No,"
Audrey interrupted. "
Absolutely not.
I'm not having anybody else involved with this."

"But Audrey--"

"You tell one person, and before you know it, it's all over town. Do you have any idea what kind of a field day Joel's enemies would have with this story? The great man of the Left having a secret bastard son? Reactionaries live for this kind of thing. It's like Clinton getting a blow job from that intern, or Marx fucking his maid. 'See, look, Karl was a bit of a scallywag--he must have been wrong about dialectical materialism...' And besides, I
want
to deal with that bitch myself. I want to tell her what I think of--Oh,
shit.
"

A tall, toothy female figure was coming toward them, pushing a baby stroller.

"Oh, my God, Audreeey," she cried as she drew near. "It's been
ages
! How
wonderful
to run into you!"

"Melinda, this is my friend, Jean," Audrey said. "Jean, this is Melinda. Her daughter was at the Little Red Schoolhouse with Rosa and Karla. She's from England too. But much posher than me, of course."

Melinda laughed nervously.
Ma ha ha.
In deference to their shared nationality and the vague sense that two British women living in New York
ought
to be friends, Melinda always affected great chumminess with Audrey, but she never managed to look anything but terrified while doing so. "It's so
funny
that I should see you now," she said, "I was just on my way to the London Market to get some chocolate digestives!"

"I've never understood why people go to shops like that," Audrey replied. "If you all miss your crappy English biscuits so much, why don't you go back home?"

Melinda threw her head back and opened her mouth wide in a silent show of hilarity. "Oh,
Audrey
." She looked down at the bovine child in her stroller. "Have you met this member of my brood? This is my grandson, Zac. Daisy's a mother of two now--can you believe it?"

Audrey glanced at the boy without comment. Melinda was a terrible bore about children. Once, many years ago, Audrey had been persuaded to accompany Karla on a "play date" at Melinda's house. The ninety minutes she had spent perched on Melinda's sofa, sipping warm white wine and discussing the Suzuki method while the little girls screechingly interacted over a bucket of educational wooden blocks, had confirmed all of her worst suspicions about the child-centered life.

"Tell me," Melinda said, "has any of your lot reproduced yet?"

Audrey shook her head absently. She was thinking about the pleasure it would give Melinda if the story of Joel's illegitimate child were ever to get out--the gleeful faux empathy with which she would skip about the Village, retailing Audrey's humiliation to all their mutual acquaintance:
Did you hear? Isn't it awful? Poor Audrey.

"Really?" Melinda urged. "Not a one?"

"No," Audrey replied. "My lot are all barren, it seems."

Melinda's face sagged. "Oh..."

"Joke, Melinda."

Melinda gave another noiseless roar of laughter. "Well, you must jolly well get them to hurry up. Being a granny is such good fun! And how is everyone, anyway?"

"Joel's in the hospital."

Melinda's brow corrugated. "Oh, yes, I did hear he'd been unwell. Is he doing any better now?"

"Not really," Audrey said. "He's in a coma."

"Oh!" Melinda pressed her hand against her mouth. "Oh, gosh, Audrey..."

Audrey had given up the information only to embarrass her. Now that the words were out, she regretted them. "Well," she said brusquely, "we mustn't keep you."

"Right." Melinda nodded. "Right. I should be off. Do send my love to the girls and Lenny, won't you?"

The housekeeper was waiting for Jean and Audrey when they arrived at the front door of Jean's apartment. "They're
here
," she stage-whispered. "The visitors you was expecting, they've been sitting in the living room for quarter of an hour. The man said there wasn't so much traffic as he thought there was going to be."

"That
bastard
Daniel," Audrey hissed. "He did this on purpose, I know it."

"It's not too late," Jean said. "If you don't want to do this..."

"Don't be daft." Audrey drew her shoulders back. "Come on, let's get in there before she nicks all your candlesticks."

Daniel and Berenice were examining the framed photographs on one of Jean's side tables when Audrey and Jean entered.

"Well, this is cozy," Audrey said.

Berenice turned around. She was wearing a tight, sleeveless dress and open-toed flat sandals, decorated with shells. "Hello," she said calmly.

Audrey looked her up and down, silently auditing her flaws: the slack flesh on the underside of her arms, the mannish thickness of her calves. After a moment, she turned to Jean. "Do you think we could have the air-conditioning down? It's like a meat locker in here."

"Yes, of course. Good idea!" Jean rubbed her hands together. "Would everyone like some lemonade? I'll just go and get some.... Audrey, perhaps you could help me?"

"The state of her!" Audrey cried as soon as they reached the kitchen. "Did you see that dress?"

Jean, who was twiddling with the thermostat, did not reply.

"Talk about mutton dressed as lamb," Audrey went on. "And her legs! Ooh! She should be playing rugby for England with those things..." She let her sentence trail off. Crowing over Berenice's imperfections was not as satisfying an exercise as she had hoped. Had Berenice been very young, or very pretty, Audrey would have had the consolation of dismissing her as a tootsie, a plaything; she would have been able to laugh scornfully at the banality of Joel's old-man desires. As it was, Berenice's unexceptional looks hinted troublingly at other, more substantive qualities. If Joel had not wanted her for her beauty, what had he wanted her for?

She glanced around disconsolately at Jean's kitchen. She had not been in here since the renovations had been completed. "This turned out nice," she observed.

"Mmm," Jean said. "I'm not sure I should have chosen stainless steel for the appliances, though. It's endless upkeep." She took out a jug of lemonade from the refrigerator and began setting out bowls of nuts and olives on a tray.

"What
are
you doing?" Audrey demanded.

"Oh!" Jean stared doubtfully at her tray. "Is this not appropriate? I just thought food might be helpful..."

Audrey turned away. "Whatever. Make it a fucking cocktail party if you want."

When they returned to the living room, Berenice and Daniel were sitting side by side on one of Jean's leather sofas. Berenice had a plastic file folder on her lap.

"What have you got in there, then?" Audrey asked. "Is that your evidence?"

"Audrey," Daniel said, "I think it would be helpful if we could all--"

Audrey terminated his sentence with a glacial stare. "I suggest, Daniel, that you speak when you're spoken to." She turned back to Berenice. "So come on. Show us what you've got."

"What is it that you want to see?" Berenice asked. She leaned over the coffee table and scooped a handful of nuts into her mouth.

"Well, now, Daniel says you've been boasting about the love letters Joel's written you. Why don't we start off with those?"

"I didn't bring any personal correspondence with me."

"No, I bet you didn't."

Berenice handed her a sheaf of papers. "You'll find my son's birth certificate and the Acknowledgment of Paternity form that Joel signed. There are also copies of all the checks that Joel has sent me over the years."

At the sight of Joel's daddy-longlegs signature on the top page, Audrey felt her hands begin to tremble. She leafed through the papers quickly. "Well done, love," she said, looking up after a moment. "You've got it all covered, haven't you? You're quite the expert at this sort of thing, I can see."

Berenice shook her head. "No, Audrey, not an expert."

"Why don't you just go ahead and tell me how much you are looking to get out of me? I can tell you now, there's not a lot."

Berenice shook her head. "I need you to know, Audrey, this is not just about the money for me."

"Oh,
really
? Is that right? What is it about, then?"

"Many things. I appreciate that you're feeling a lot of hostility toward me right now, and I want you to know that I honor your anger. At some point in the future, though, I would like to think that you could come to an acceptance of me. For our children's sake, at least. It's important to me that Jamil have a relationship with his brothers and sisters--"

"Are you
high
?" Audrey interrupted. "My children know all about you, and believe me, they want nothing to do with you, or your bastard son."

"Audrey!" Jean cried.

"Tell me, Berenice," Audrey went on, "why didn't you have an abortion when you got pregnant by another woman's husband?"

"Audrey," Jean cut in, "this is not a productive line of conversation."

"No, it's okay," Berenice said. "I'll answer that. I did consider an abortion."

"Ahh, what was it made you change your mind?" Audrey said, "Did you see a little sonogram and come over all soppy about your unborn brat?"

The room fell silent. Audrey looked around at Daniel and Jean and Berenice, frozen in the headlights of her wrath. Out of the depths of childhood memory, a phrase came to her, something she had read once in a school history book:
King Henry was much feared by his people but he was never loved
. "Okay," she said wearily, "let's just get this over with." She pointed at Berenice. "You'll get your money. Whatever it was that Joel was giving you before. But you will have nothing to do with my family. You and your son will stay away from me, my children, and Joel, is that clear?"

Berenice looked down at her lap. "If you insist."

Audrey smiled bitterly. "All right, love, you can stop the theatricals now. You've got what you wanted. Just fuck off, would you?"

She watched as Jean led Berenice and Daniel out into the hall. Then she went and lay down on the sofa with her feet up on Jean's coffee table. It was incredible, she thought. Within half an hour, she had managed to dissipate every shred of her own moral advantage. She had convinced everyone in the room that
she
was the chief offender. Even Jean had been horrified by her behavior.

How had she ended up like this, imprisoned in the role of harridan? Once upon a time, her brash manner had been a mere posture--a convenient and amusing way for an insecure teenage bride, newly arrived in America, to disguise her crippling shyness. People had actually enjoyed her vituperation back then, encouraged it and celebrated it. She had carved out a minor distinction for herself as a "character": the cute little English girl with the chutzpah and the longshoreman's mouth. "Get Audrey in here," they used to cry whenever someone was being an ass. "Audrey'll take him down a peg or two."