The Trouble with Harriet (8 page)

“ ‘Darling Morley!’ She stopped in the middle of the pavement, placed her hands on my shoulders, and looked up at me with eyes darkened with incipient tears. ‘How I wish it could be that way! You and me adventuring on together, soaking up the sunshine, sharing life’s umbrella when it rains. It would be all I’ve never allowed myself to hope for. I always thought dreams were for other people—decent, honest, hardworking sorts who deserved to be rewarded for never putting a foot wrong.’

“ ‘Foolish heart,’ I said, kissing her for every gawker to see. ‘There is no one more deserving of happiness than you, sweet Harriet.’

“She drew breath for a shaky laugh. ‘Perhaps I should marry you. That might teach you not to be taken in by women with platinum-blond hair and a fondness for country walks.’ Tucking her hand into my elbow, she drew me on down the street, and by exercising all the restraint at my disposal, I mastered the passionate desire to press the matter further. Savor the moment, Morley, I told myself as we walked toward our favorite spot on the riverbank, where fir trees grew in shady clusters and red and white fairy toadstools nestled among the rocks. I thought, of course, that there would be many more such halcyon afternoons, as well as daffodil-yellow mornings and evenings of star-spangled enchantment.

“ ‘But not tomorrow,’ Harriet said as we leaned against the moss-covered trunk of a weeping willow, watching a troop of ducks, led by a matriarchal figure, ease themselves into the umber waters and paddle off under the little stone bridge. Tomorrow I won’t be able to see you during the day because I have an appointment and I don’t know how much time it will take.’

“ ‘With your doctor?’ The bird that had been serenading us for the last five minutes stopped in mid-trill, and the sun drifted behind a cloud that hadn’t been there a moment before.

“ ‘No, darling. But it’s a secret, and I refuse to say another word about it. Oh, all right!’ She smoothed a gossamer finger across my troubled brow. ‘It’s a good secret; at least I hope you will really like it. Now,’ she said, looking up, ‘did I imagine that drop of rain that just fell on my head, or is it getting ready to pelt?’ A rumble of thunder answered her before I could. The weeping willow swayed like a fan in the hands of a swooning debutante. The sky turned to lead. And, alas, before you could say umbrella, we were in the midst of a downpour. And even though we were able to secure a taxi right away, we returned to my boardinghouse in a very damp state indeed.

“Frau Grundman, that most congenial of landladies, quickly appeared with cups of cocoa. And handing Harriet a candlewick dressing gown, she urged her to take a hot bath down the hall. This kindness was followed by the offer to take her garments downstairs and put them in the clothes dryer. Meanwhile, I had difficulty controlling my agitation. I was convinced that my angel was about to catch her death of cold. When I told her so, she called me a silly. But when I returned from Frau Grundman’s kitchen, where I had borrowed a bottle of aspirin, I discovered to my anguish that Harriet’s eyes were already reddened. Naturally, I urged her to get into bed. I extolled the virtues of the down comforter, which Frau Grundman called a fetterbett. I filled a hot-water bottle from the electric kettle that I used for my morning tea. I even offered to read to her from the
Oxford Book of English Verse
while she settled down to sleep. Her favorite poem was ‘To Althea from Prison,’ the one about stone walls and iron bars and so on. She always adored the pathos I imparted to every
noble syllable, the way my voice would rumble on the threshold of tears. But not this time. Today there would be no Richard Lovelace.

“My adored one insisted that it was best for her to return to Glatzerstrasse in Loetzinn. She had promised her friends, the Voelkels, that she would spend the evening with them. She had seen so little of them recently and would be gone all day tomorrow. Again that reference to the surprise she had in store for me. But now I felt no inclination to press for details. My every thought was of profoundest concern for her well-being. Beg as I might, she would not take the hot bath so wisely suggested by the good Frau. It was as much as I could do to persuade Harriet to finish her cocoa. She was eager, as never before, to head down the narrow stairs into the street. Once on the pavement, I quickened my steps to match hers. It was no longer raining, but there was no saying that it might not start again at any moment. And even though I was carrying an umbrella, I felt powerless to protect her either from the elements or whatever fate had in store. I both hoped and dreaded that a taxi would come gliding to a stop as we reached the corner.

“ ‘Darling, don’t look so worried.’ Harriet tucked her hand into my elbow as a couple of cars went splashing past. ‘I promise you I’m not going to catch pneumonia. Truly, I’m a lot tougher than you think. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been in such a rush to leave. But I really didn’t like to put Frau Grundman to all the bother of drying my clothes. I’ll be able to have a long laze in the bath when I get back to Loetzinn without worrying that I’m using up all the hot water.’

“ ‘How can I help but worry, knowing how ill you’ve been.’ A passing lorry further muffled my voice.

“ ‘Morley, you’re going to make yourself ill fretting about me.’ Harriet stepped off the curb to hail a taxi. It stopped within inches of her feet. Before I could move, she was inside and rolling down the window. Just a couple of inches so I couldn’t see her face as well as I wanted to. ‘Good-bye, darling, it’s been wonderful from start to finish. An absolutely perfect day, I mean. Now hurry back to Frau Grundman’s and have her make you some more cocoa.’

“ ‘Harriet!’ I moved to press a hand to the glass, but she was already a blur moving off into traffic. As I trod disconsolately back to the boardinghouse, the rain came down again in stinging darts, and I continued on under the black canopy of the umbrella.

“My bleak mood continued throughout what was left of the afternoon into the evening. Before turning in for the night, I partook of a glass of Frau Grundman’s homemade peppermint schnapps, and I woke in the morning feeling groggy and still out of sorts. My soul was further soured by the sunshine streaming through the window, for what was sunshine without Harriet? Oh, to have phoned her! But her hosts, the Voelkels, were not on the telephone. Harriet had explained early in our relationship that this was one of their eccentricities and not to be weighed against their supreme generosity.

“When the noon hour approached, I forced myself to take a constitutional through the town and even stopped at the bakery for a confection or two. Replete with flaky pastry and plump, juicy raisins, they rallied my spirits. I even ventured into a nearby cinema where I watched an American film that made me proud to be all things British. On this high note I returned to the boardinghouse, to be somewhat deflated on being informed by the kindly Frau that Harriet had not telephoned. My beloved had indicated that she was liable to be occupied for the better part of the day. Patience was called for, I told myself whilst tucking—somewhat languidly it must be said—into an early dinner of schweinerhaxe—pork with sauerkraut and dumplings. Frau Grundman’s repertoire was not extensive, but she was an excellent cook and very generous with the second helpings.

“There were only a couple of other guests staying at the time. Both Japanese. Still, I lingered in the dining room at the conclusion of the meal to sip a glass of cherry brandy (it was not as good as the schnapps) and toss out the occasional, congenial snippet of conversation. My efforts appeared to be well received, if incompletely understood. A pity, for I recall mentioning that I had a daughter living in Chitterton Fells, a charming village by the sea in England, and I was sure that the Japanese gentlemen would be welcome to pay an extensive visit if ever they were in the neighborhood. One always wishes to take one’s ambassadorial duties seriously.

“I reentered my room moderately restored. But as the evening dwindled from dusk to darkness, my heart grew heavy once more. Perhaps part of the blame may be laid upon the dumplings. But oh, how I repined for my absent Harriet. My ears strained for the sound of the phone. It did not ring that whole long night. I dreamed I heard it when I finally sank into the stupor of troubled sleep. Every couple of hours I would start up in my bed, but all was still and silent as the grave. At last dawn came and with it the renewed optimism that I was a fool. Harriet must have returned very late to Glatzerstrasse in Loetzinn. She would soon be with me, delighting my ears with all the details of her yesterday. When she had not arrived by midmorning I assured myself that she had slept late.

“When afternoon came without her, I went for an hour’s walk around my room. By evening I was so distraught, I swore at the toll-painted wardrobe and could not face the thought of food, although Frau Grundman begged me to let her feed me a spoonful of Wiener schnitzel. There followed a sleepless night, and by the next day I was bedridden. Time became a drifting sea upon which I floated in utter hopelessness, save for enfeebled flounderings back to life and hope when a knock came at my door. But it was always the Frau, never she who I yearned to clasp in my arms once more.

“ ‘This cannot go on so, Herr Simons.’ Frau Grundman stood over me with tears in her eyes on the afternoon of the third day. “You must shake yourself together, sit your feet to the floor, and get on the trousers; then you go into Loetzinn, find Glatzerstrasse, and see these people where your friend lives.’

“ ‘I have never been there. They are of a reclusive nature, and Harriet felt obliged to maintain their privacy,” I fretted.

“ ‘Then you go up and down the street till you find the right place.’

“ ‘I had thought of that.’ I lay pleating the sheet with my hands. ‘But it could take days. I understand it is a long street, and Harriet never told me the number.’

“ ‘So you just stay here to look up at the ceiling?’

“I was about to concede that she had a point when the telephone rang and Frau Grundman went plodding downstairs to the old-fashioned instrument in the hall. My heart had started beating again—uncertainly, as if trying to refamiliarize itself with the tempo. It would be her daughter, I told myself. Or, just possibly—the summer rush being over—someone inquiring about room rates. Despite such rationalizations, I sat forward on my pillows and was even extending a foot out of bed when back she came.

“ ‘Herr Simons!’ Her voice came and went in gasps.

“ ‘Yes, Frau Grundman?’ It was all I could manage.

“ ‘That telephone call, it’s from Herr Voelkel.’

“I could neither move nor speak.

“ ‘He gave me the message; you are to go right of this minute to number 84 Glatzerstrasse. Or if not so soon, when you are able. It was not a friendly voice he has, but that could be because he was upset and looking all around inside his head for the words.’

“ ‘What did he say about Harriet?’ I flung off the bedclothes, and Frau Grundman retreated with averted eyes to the door.

“ ‘Nothing. He did not speak her name.’

“A sob bubbled its way up my throat.

“ ‘Get dressed, Herr Simons. All will turn out for the better; you will see it is so.’

“
‘Yes,’ I whispered. When the door closed, I endeavored to gain some mastery over my emotions. The eternity of waiting was near an end. Perchance the picture was not as black as I had painted it. I would discover that Harriet had been ill, felled by a violent infection of the lungs from being caught in the rain, but she was rallying and asking for me. Or it could be her old illness that was the culprit. I must fasten on the fact that I now would be there to nurse her back to vitality. The terrible, foolish fear that she had chosen to vanish from my life would be set aside. That she, a goddess, had chosen to love a mere mortal would always be the sweetest of bewilderments!

“I do not have a clear memory of dressing and leaving Frau Grundman’s establishment. Did I have socks on my feet, let alone a matching pair, when I got into the taxi that bore me away to Loetzinn? I could not describe that ride, or the direction it took or how long it lasted. All that is certain is that I found myself standing outside a tall, narrow house in Glatzerstrasse with a yellowish white front door and an iron railing at the basement windows. A pale, solemn house that seemed ill-fitted to contain Harriet’s lustrous presence. An old woman garbed in servile black answered my knock and, without inquiring who I was or waiting for me to introduce myself, beckoned me inside and closed the door with a soft click. Her heavy-lidded eyes were as dark and forbidding as the hall in which we stood. Its walls were papered in a red flock with speckles of black and gold, the staircase was almost monstrous in its elaborate carving, and a stuffed black bear loomed large in a shadowy corner. The old woman opened a door to our left, pointed a gnarled finger, gabbled something incomprehensible, and slipped away the moment I entered the room.

“This was no more cheery than the hall. Indeed, if possible, it was more oppressive to the human spirit. The walls were paneled in black oak; the narrow window was draped in heavy plush. There were cigarette butts in the ashtrays, and the fireplace looked as though it had not been cleaned in years. Above it hung a portrait of a lifeless-looking cat that appeared to have been stretched to cover the width of the canvas. Alas, my poor Harriet! Such were my thoughts as footsteps sounded behind me, and as I turned, I saw a small man, with a foxy face, wearing an Edwardian-style black suit with a wine-colored velvet waistcoat and a silk cravat at the neck of his dandified shirt.

“ ‘Mr. Simons, I presume?’ His German accent had slight Cockney overtones. “I am Ingo Voelkel. My housekeeper, Fraulein Stoppe, told me of your arrival. And I ask that you will accept my wife’s apologies for not coming down to greet you. Anna is reclusive by nature and at present unable to face seeing anyone. It is good of you to come so promptly. But of course you will have been anxious about our dear Harriet.’

“ ‘She is ... ?’ I strove to keep my voice level.

“ ‘Dead.’ Herr Voelkel spoke the word as if it were a day of the week.