The Last Girls (15 page)

Gene breathes heavily into the phone. “I am listening,” he says.

“I just talked to Ellen Henley today—that's Hawk's secretary—and I'm afraid this is all a lot more serious than I thought, more than just a ministroke, I mean, or some kind of temporary thing. Ellen Henley claims that this memory problem has been going on for months, and she's been covering it up. Oh, Gene, I'm afraid there's something terrible the matter with him. I'm afraid he's really sick.”

“So? Look, the guy has been unfaithful to you for years, Courtney. He's embarrassed you, he's treated you like shit. I'm sorry he's sick, but that doesn't change anything. He's done what he's done, and you know it. You've got to stand up for yourself no matter what, whether he's sick or not.”

This conversation is not going the way Courtney hoped. “Look, Gene, I just called because I was thinking about you. I didn't mean for us to get into all this stuff again. We already talked about it, and I explained to you that you're just not being reasonable. You know I want to be with you more than anything in the world, darling. But this is my duty.”

“What if I told you that you have a duty to yourself, Courtney? A duty to be honest, for a change? What if I told you that you have a duty to me?” Gene doesn't sound like himself at all.

“Gene, that's ridiculous. I certainly can't leave Hawk right now.”

“When, then? When can you do it?”

“Well, later. I'm not sure, exactly. Whenever Hawk gets through this medical crisis, whatever it is.”

“Courtney, that could be years. Or never.”

“Oh, I don't think so, I'm sure it's really nothing to worry about. We ought to know something by next week, I feel sure of it. Then we can talk about this other.” The tone she knows Vangie hates has come
into her voice; Courtney hears it herself, but there's nothing she can do about it now. This is the way she is. It's even what Gene loves about her, he's said so, many times: the polished preppy exterior, the predictable behavior hiding the woman within—like a bag lady in a porn flick, he says, who looks just awful until she starts taking off her clothes. Gene Minor is the only one who knows she exists.

“
This other?
That's how you think about us, about you and me? This other? Other than what? Your real life, I suppose.”

Exactly, she does not say, thinking of her photograph albums, all those pictures where Gene is
not
. It kills her to think this. But no decent person could leave somebody who's sick, for heaven's sake! “Darling, you know that's not what I mean. You know how much I love you. But it will take me a little time, that's all, to work things out.”

“How much time? Until Hawk gets well? Because he may never get well. What if it's Alzheimer's? People live with Alzheimer's for years and years. So how much time are we talking here? How about until all the children get married?”

Courtney nods and starts to agree but clearly he's not serious, he's going on and on, it's like a long bad joke.

“Or how about this? How about until all the children
die?
Of course by then we might be dead, too, but what the hell, at least we wouldn't have upset anybody, would we?”

“Gene, what has gotten into you?” But suddenly Courtney knows. “It's that woman, isn't it? That woman with the stupid name, what is it? . . . Rosalie Hungerheart. You called her, didn't you?”

“Well, I can't talk to
you,
” Gene says. “You're off on some goddamn boat.”

“I knew it!” Suddenly everything falls into place. This is not Gene at all, not the real Gene, her Gene, her Wednesday lover, her secret prince. “I can't believe you would be so susceptible to that pop psychology.”

“It's not pop psychology.”

“No? Well, what is it, then?”

“It's common sense,” Gene says. “It's talking turkey.”

Courtney just cannot believe this.

“Look”—he goes on in the most reasonable voice imaginable, it's driving her wild—“look, it's very simple. There's a clear choice here. You can choose love, which is life, or you can choose not love, which is not life, which is death, which is the way you've been living for years and years. Look, Courtney, most people don't even get the choice. They lead lives of quiet desperation, as the fellow said.”

“Oh, Gene, quit being so dramatic.”

“Sometimes I'm dramatic,” he allows. “But this is real. I want my life, Courtney. I want you.”

“But—”

“No buts. Either you want me or you don't.”

“But Gene, you have to understand how hard this is for me. I've never done a thing I wanted to in my whole life, except for being with you. I've done as I was told and then as I thought I should.”

“I know that, honey. It breaks my heart. You've been breaking my heart for years.”

“Then why can't we just go on like we have been until things calm down? Why not? Why can't we just have this weekend together in New Orleans? I know it's that woman. I know she's put you up to this.”

“She did not put me up to anything, Courtney. She just helped me to see the issues more clearly, that's all. I needed some help. You do, too.”

“You know her name isn't really Hungerheart.” Courtney can't help saying this. “Nobody's name is Hungerheart.”

“This is me, baby,” Gene says. “Just me. Just forget Miss Hunger-heart. And I'm telling you that I don't want to go on like we've been going on for years now. I'm old, you're old, and I'm just not willing
to do it anymore. So I'm offering you a choice, that's all. I'll meet you in New Orleans on Saturday the way we've planned, and we'll have a great weekend, and then we'll go back to Raleigh and you can tell Hawk that you're leaving, and he can mobilize Mary Bell and Ellen Henley and Lucille and all his girlfriends and his vast millions to take care of him. You know they'll do it. They'll all snap to. They won't even miss you. Besides, you'll be replaced by next year with a newer, younger, blonder Mrs. Hawk.”

Courtney is terrified that this is true. “But I can't do it right now,” she whispers. This is true, too.

“Okey-dokey, then. That's it. Then I can't make it down for the weekend either—you'll just have to shop instead of having breakfast in bed with me. You'd probably rather shop anyway.”

“Gene—” Dammit, now she's crying. But then something snaps inside causing her to sit up straight on the bed, fists digging furiously into her eyes.
How dare he?
This—this—
florist!
She hasn't been Mrs. Henry Ralston IV all these years for nothing. “I can't believe you actually have the nerve to put me on the spot like this. I do not have to suffer this kind of abuse,” Courtney says, “and I refuse to be coerced. Do you hear me, Gene? I simply refuse.”

“Whoa. You sound like a rich lady I used to know,” Gene says.

“Well, I'm certainly not going to respond to this—this—ultimatum.”

“Okay.” Suddenly Gene sounds tired. “That's it, then. Call me sometime, after you get back. I'd like to keep in touch anyway.”

He
can't
be serious. “Gene—”

“Look, baby, I'm freezing my ass off in here. It's damned appropriate though, if you think about it.”

“What do you mean?” she can't help asking.

“Oh, none of this ‘gather ye rosebuds while ye may' shit, not for Mrs. Ralston. Freezing our rosebuds on the stem, that's more like it. Nip them in the bud while there's still time or else, God forbid, they
might actually
bloom,
and we can't have that, can we, Mrs. Ralston? Can we now? No late flowering for Mrs. Ralston. No Indian summer, no second spring. In fact, Mrs. Ralston prefers silk flower arrangements in general, so much more practical, so much easier, so much less mess—”

Courtney takes a deep breath. “Gene,” she says decisively in the voice that has run a hundred committees. “I'm not even going to listen to any further nonsense. I'll see you at the Royal Orleans on Saturday. I'll be waiting in bed, with a little surprise for you,” she adds on the spur of the moment, without a clue as to what the surprise might be, but surely she'll find something, maybe a bottle of very good champagne or some little something from one of the antique shops along Chartres Street. Or a hat from that wonderful hat shop, maybe a Panama.

“I don't think you heard me,” he says. “It's my way or the highway, take it or leave it, angel buns.” He sounds like her old sweet Gene but he's not, something is really different now.

“Gene, you know you don't mean that!
I
know you don't mean it!” Courtney affects a laugh. “I'm sorry I bothered you at work, I know you're just tired, I can tell you're not really yourself. I'll call you tomorrow night, darling. I love you and I can't wait to see you this weekend. Bye-bye!” she places the receiver down firmly on the phone before he has a chance to say another silly word. He'll come to his senses, she's sure of it. But she'd better hurry, now she has to redo all her makeup from scratch, thanks to Gene for making her cry like that. Honestly! Who does he think he is?

Mile 585
Rosedale Bend
Sunday 5/9/99
1700 hours

H
ARRIET FEELS LIKE
“country cousin come to town,” as Alice used to say, entering the Grand Saloon in Anna and Courtney's wake for the Captain's Champagne Reception. Courtney's long black sheath is slit up the side. Anna wears a flowing cape and those enormous dark glasses that cover half her face. Heads turn as she makes her way grandly through the crowd. “Who
is
she?” Someone puts a hand on Harriet's arm. Harriet shakes her head, smiles, pulls away. This trip isn't exactly what she expected, with all these silly events happening every few minutes. But then the first trip wasn't what they'd expected either. Too many mosquitoes, too much rain, too much hard work, too many people both on the raft and on shore to have it be anything like a real Mark Twain experience. But it
was
an experience, all the same. Harriet remembers Mr. Gaines saying, “There are only two plots in literature. The first one is, somebody takes a trip; and the second one is, a stranger comes to town.” He was right, Harriet realizes now, holding on to the back of Courtney's dress. Everything she can think of fits into one of those categories.
The Odyssey; Absalom, Absalom
. . . “Where's the captain?” she asks.

“Oh my God.” Courtney stops so abruptly that Harriet runs into her. “I guess that's him in that sort of wishing well thing.” Flashbulbs are popping somewhere ahead of them.

“It's an
arbor,
” Anna turns back to say sternly. “But what a gorgeous man! What a hunk!”

“Straight out of central casting.” Harriet grabs a flute of champagne from a waiter gliding past with a giant silver tray.

“Oh, look, everybody's having their picture made with him,” Courtney says. “Let's do it, too. Here, get in line.”

“Wouldn't all this be awkward if the captain was really ugly? Say he had a harelip—,” Harriet wonders.

“Don't be ridiculous,” Anna says. “The captain couldn't possibly be ugly.”

“But how do you know? I mean, is that one of the criteria?”

“Of course it is! He's got to look like this. Anybody can run a boat, and besides—” But Anna's words are lost in a groundswell, a surge that carries them forward right up to the area around the arbor, roped off with a silken cord. “Names, please?” asks an efficient girl with a clipboard, who looks familiar, too . . . Oh yes, it's the girl who runs the gift shop, the Steamboutique, Harriet realizes. Now she's the photographer's assistant, and the photographer is one of the Steamboat Syncopators, Harriet can't remember his name. Or maybe he just looks like one of the Steamboat Syncopators, they all have these little beards . . . Harriet puts her empty flute down on a white-draped serving table and grabs another one. Courtney's pulling her sleeve, spelling out their names for the picture girl. “Come
on,
” she says.

Harriet will treasure this picture in which they all look so happy, Anna smiling enigmatically on one side of the glamorous captain; Courtney on the other, with a bright, startled expression; Harriet sort of squinched in between, up against the captain's prickly shoulder with the braided gold epaulets and all the medals. Close up, the captain's
curly hair glistens with oil. His eyes are large, dark, and liquid in the manner of Omar Sharif. He smells of breath mints and something else so male that Harriet nearly swoons.
What is she doing here?
The captain says something and presses their hands. Then before they know it, they've been whisked off the stage, out of the little arbor or the wishing well or whatever the hell it is. More champagne arrives. The band whips up their tinkly background jazz and the drummer goes into a prolonged drumroll.

The captain steps forward and raises both arms. “Welcome to my world,” he sings in a big hearty baritone.

“Oh my God!” Anna exclaims.

“I guess you actually have to audition to be the captain,” Harriet whispers.

“
Hush
. I can't hear.” Anna is rapt.

Harriet has the sudden awful premonition that Anna is going to climb back up in the arbor to join him and that then they will belt out a duet. Harriet has always hated musicals, the way people dance with lampposts and burst into song whenever they feel like it; it's just so embarrassing. The captain switches into “Shrimpboats Are a-Comin'.” Flashbulbs pop everywhere. He ends with “Ol' Man River.”

“I could just
eat him up,
” Anna whispers.

The captain stretches his arms wide and holds the last note forever. The crowd goes crazy. It's over. Courtney leads Harriet and Anna out to three rocking chairs on the deck facing the open river where an endless barge slips past, followed by another. Even though they're on the shady side of the
Belle,
it's hot out here. It would be very hot without this breeze.