The Promised World (12 page)

Right before he got out of the car, he told her, again, that he appreciated her taking him here. She smiled. “I’m glad I could do it, Pat. I wish I could make this easier for you.”

He wished she could, too. He was looking at the broad wooden porch and the door, realizing he hadn’t thought of what he was going to say. As impossible as it seemed that the owner of this house could be trying to hook into Billy’s family for whatever money they might have, if this was the right place, he wanted to make sure Barbara understood that there wasn’t any money to scam. Billy’s life insurance didn’t cover death by suicide, much less death by violence. He’d left his family with a surprisingly large savings account, but Ashley would need every penny of that to raise three children on her salary.

He was on the porch, still thinking, when the front door opened to reveal a red-haired man in sloppy jeans and a T-shirt. Patrick must have looked startled, because the man said, “I heard you walk up.”

“I’m looking for Barbara Duval.” The full name on the envelope. “But I may have the wrong—”

“That’s my girlfriend. Just a minute,” he said and disappeared up the stairs.

Patrick felt like laughing at how stupid he’d been to doubt Lila. This man was several years younger than Patrick. He could not be dating her mother. Patrick was so sure of this that when an older woman walked down the stairs, he kept looking behind her to see who else was coming. He was still looking when she said, “I’m Barbara Duval,” and stopped at the bottom of the landing.

She was wearing sweatpants and a tank top and had sweatbands on her wrists and around her head. She was wiping sweat off her neck with a towel.

“Obviously, you caught me in the middle of my morning workout,” she said. He realized he was staring at her, but he couldn’t make himself stop. After a moment, she said, “And you must be Patrick. Lila’s husband.”

Before he could respond, she turned around, but motioned for him to follow her into the spacious living room. It was decorated with dark, expensive-looking furniture; nothing like the bright colors and wicker accents of an ordinary beach house. The only sign that this house was by the ocean was an oar and netting above the fireplace.

After Barbara sat on the large gray chair next to the window, he said, “How did you know who I am?”

“How could I not know? Despite what Lila may have told you, I love my children. I’ve followed their lives for years.”

Patrick finally sat down across from her, on one of the leather couches. But he still couldn’t force himself to look away from Barbara’s face. The resemblance to his wife was unmistakable: in the penetrating eyes, the high cheekbones, the almost-too-soft chin, even the blond hair, though he supposed Barbara Duval’s had to be
dyed. She had to be in her late fifties if not sixty, though the only wrinkles were on her neck, her arms, and her hands. The skin on her face was unlined but looked older because it seemed strangely too tight, which made him think of the dean’s wife, who was notorious for her addiction to plastic surgery. Her body seemed to be in good shape: maybe plastic surgery, maybe exercise, probably a combination.

His hands were shaking as he took a glass of water the young guy—Barbara’s boyfriend—offered before disappearing again.

“I gather this is a shock for you,” Barbara said. “Did she tell you I was dead or just a witch? A dead witch, perhaps?”

“She never said you were a witch. She said she loved you.”

“So she only said I was dead. Well, I suppose that’s more efficient. She’s always been quite the liar. This way she could lie about loving me and not have to act like it.”

“Lila is not a liar.”

“Touching, I’m sure, but as I’m alive and well and sweating in front of you, I think you might want to reassess that opinion.”

He sat his glass on the coffee table. “Thanks for the water, but I have to get going. It was nice meeting—”

“Don’t run off yet. You just got here.”

“I really have to—”

“Will you stay if I promise not to say another disparaging word about Lila? I’d really like to know how my daughter is doing. Please.”

Patrick would have kept making excuses if it hadn’t been for the shift in Barbara’s tone as she said the word “please.” As if she really were pleading with him to stay, though he wasn’t sure why.

“I suspect you’re wondering how I can claim to love Lila in light of my remarks about her honesty or lack thereof?”

He sat back and crossed his arms. “It does seem inconsistent.”

She shrugged. “I don’t play the Hallmark card game. To me,
love demands seeing someone as they are. Myself, for example. I know I’m a sixty-one-year-old woman who is vain about her appearance, greedy about her appetites, and a variety of other less-than-flattering characteristics. But I undoubtedly love myself. I give myself everything I want: from this house to flings with the occasional younger man.” She smiled and lowered her voice. “It’s all right. If they’re only in it for the money, I’m only it in for the sex.”

Patrick felt the blood rush to his face, as though he were a child who’d overheard the secret talk of grown-ups. He flashed to a time, years ago, when Billy had called him naïve. Maybe his brother-in-law had been right about that.

He took a breath, hoping to calm down, and let his gaze wander around the room. On the sideboard over by the staircase were dozens of photographs, many of children. He pointed in that direction. “Are some of those pictures of Lila and Billy?”

She nodded. “Have a look, be my guest.”

He wandered over, trying to buy time before he talked about Lila. He knew he had to say something, but he also wanted to protect his wife’s privacy.

He pointed at a silver-framed photograph of Lila and Billy flanking the sides of a tree in front of a large brick house that had to be over a hundred years old. “Was this the house they grew up in?”

She nodded. “It’s been in the family for generations. It was originally built for my grandfather, a brilliant judge who was seriously considered for the Supreme Court. I can’t bring myself to part with it, though I don’t spend much time there anymore. Being near the ocean is far preferable to being in the countryside of central Pennsylvania.”

Pennsylvania? Both Lila and Billy had said they’d grown up in North Carolina. Lila had described the town she was from in great detail. She’d even told him about the summer when she and
Billy had imitated the journalists’ voices on NPR, hoping to get rid of their Southern accents and sound more “cosmopolitan” before she went off to college. And she seemed to know very little about Pennsylvania when she and Patrick moved there. Why would she lie about this? But then, why would her mother? His mouth felt dry, but he managed, “How long have you been here?”

“I bought this house about ten years ago. I’d always wanted to live by the water, and I considered San Diego and several places in Florida, but in the end, I decided on Cape May.” She glanced at him. “It’s a lovely town, and of course, it was closer to Lila and Billy.”

Before he could wonder why she would want to be close to children she never saw, he noticed another photograph in the back row. Barbara was standing next to a very unhappy-looking man. Patrick picked it up and stared at it, unable to believe what he was looking at.

“That photo was taken two years ago, the last time I saw my son.”

“You saw Billy often?” He hoped his voice wasn’t giving away how surprised he was. Could Lila have possibly known this and kept it a secret, too?

“Not often, no. The first time he needed money for his wife. She was in the hospital; he refused to tell me why. After that, he came back every year or two, always alone—he was adamant that I would have nothing to do with his family—and always with his hand out. He seemed to feel that I owed him and his sister, too, though Lila never asked for anything. I haven’t seen her since she was a teenager.”

Patrick set the picture down and came back to the couch. At least Lila wasn’t keeping any visits of her own a secret, but Billy’s behavior shocked him. What kind of man would ask his mother for money while simultaneously refusing her any contact with her grandchildren?

Barbara said, “So, tell me about my daughter.” She settled back in her chair. “Tell me everything.”

“I’ll try, but there isn’t a lot to say.” He took a long drink of water, still stalling. “She’s an English professor, specializing in American literature. She loves to teach. She’s had numerous articles published and one book about Herman Melville.” He paused, knowing he needed to add something a little more personal. “We’ll have been married eleven years this summer. We don’t have any children yet. We’re happier than most people, I think.” He nodded. “She’s really doing fine.”

Barbara waved her hand dismissively. “I know all this already. She went to grad school at Princeton. Met you there. You’re from St. Louis. Your father is an aviation engineer and your mother has passed on. You’re not particularly close to your father, but—unlike your wife—you do the good child thing and visit him once a year.”

Patrick was very surprised, but he only said, “What do you want to know then?”

“How she is. And don’t tell me ‘fine’ or ‘happy’ or any other platitude that I know is false.”

He forced a shrug. “She is happy, like I said. She has a great life and good friends and—”

“Oh, please. The person she loved above all others died less than a month ago. I knew she would be devastated, but it must be even worse than I feared. Why else would you have come to see me today?”

He wanted to leave then, but he was afraid of being rude. She was still his wife’s mother, despite how strange and incomprehensible she was to him.

When he didn’t speak for a long, uncomfortable moment, she said, “Forgive me.” Her voice had changed again. Now she sounded kind, or maybe even sorry for him? “I was under the impression that you were aware that my daughter loved her brother far more
than any of the men she was involved with. You’re her husband. I thought this would have been abundantly obvious to you.”

Patrick felt his face grow warm. “I’d rather not discuss this.”

“Most of her boyfriends realized this at some point and broke it off with her. Even Nathan What’s-His-Name, the man she was engaged to right before she met you, eventually figured this out, though he was a bit dense, I think. He dropped out of med school after two years, but perhaps that wasn’t an academic failure. Perhaps he just gave up once he realized that our Lila’s heart had already been given away long before he came on the scene.”

Now Patrick was stunned. He knew about Nathan, but Lila said they’d only dated for a few months. There was nothing about an engagement, and certainly nothing about him breaking it off with her. Lila’s version was that Billy and Nathan hadn’t gotten along and so she dumped Nathan. She did mention that Nathan had left medical school shortly after; he’d never thought to ask why.

Even if Barbara had some of the details wrong—and there was no way to know about that—she was right that Lila had chosen her brother over Nathan. Just as Patrick had known she would have done in his own case, if he hadn’t gotten along with Billy. Why had this never struck him as wrong until this moment?

“But of course it wasn’t her fault that her brother was so vastly superior to every other man she encountered. Billy was like my grandfather. He was a genius, as I’m sure Lila never tired of telling you.”

Barbara was going on about Billy’s IQ scores but Patrick wasn’t listening. He was thinking about a discussion they’d had a few years ago, when he’d asked Lila why she was willing to listen to Billy for hours and yet she never asked Patrick questions about his research anymore. She said that math was outside her area of expertise, but as he pointed out, she could have at least asked about the basic ideas. He didn’t remember how the discussion ended, but he was positive it wasn’t
with Lila saying that he, Patrick, was a genius. She’d never said that in all the time they’d been together. Apparently, she didn’t believe it.

“However,” Barbara was saying, “he hardly made use of his brain in the life he chose to live. No doubt he blamed me for that when he wasn’t blaming the poor white-trash woman he married only because he didn’t believe he would ever really fall in love with anyone.”

“Ashley is not white trash. That’s an unfair assessment.”

“Perhaps you’re right. I suppose I’ll find out myself soon enough, now that Billy isn’t here to keep me from her and his children.” She paused. “I wonder if he was afraid I would tell his wife that the only woman he ever really loved was his sister. Of course, I would never say such a thing, but he—”

“It’s not true,” Patrick said. Though he wasn’t sure about this. He wasn’t sure about anything at that moment.

“No, sadly enough, it is. He couldn’t love anyone but Lila, I’m afraid. The truth is my children had a most unnatural bond from before they were teenagers.” Barbara smiled. “Emphasis on the unnatural.”

It took him a minute to realize what she was implying, and when he did, he stood up. He no longer cared about being rude; he had to get outside, where he could breathe. This was becoming a revolting conversation, and if that opinion made him naïve, so be it. He would rather be the most naïve person in the world than someone who could talk as casually about this as Barbara Duval did.

He made it to the door, but before he could turn the knob, she was there, talking again. “You think I’m hinting that Lila and Billy had an affair? I don’t doubt that they wanted to, especially Lila, but—”

“Enough,” he hissed. The admonition was intended for her, but also for his own mind, which was bombarding him with the sudden relevance of the fact that his wife never seemed to want to have
sex with him. But it wasn’t relevant. Of course it wasn’t. This was all a bizarre nightmare.

“What kind of mother do you take me for, that I would allow my children to do such a thing? Believe me, I tried everything to control my daughter. I’m sure she seems quite innocent now, but as a child—oh my god—she was the proverbial bad seed. You can’t imagine the havoc that girl wreaked on my—”

He managed to turn the knob, finally, and he raced outside and down the porch steps like he was escaping a fire. If Barbara said good-bye or anything else, he didn’t hear it. He was down the block before he realized he could stop now; she hadn’t followed him. At least he should slow down before somebody saw him running in panic like he’d just left the scene of a robbery.