8

Nathan and I shared dinner alone that evening.

Every sound of knife grating across meat, spoon stirring in a glass, fork scraping plate was deafening. We soon gave up and faced each other.

“I’m sorry,” I began. “You see, I’ve tried so hard to please Emory but … today a lady at the coffee said—”

He looked away.

I ran my tongue across my mouth. “If there is something going on behind my back, you could tell me and I swear to you I would not let Emory know where the information—”

“I know of nothing,” he said, staring at a fixed point across the room.

I sighed. “All right. I don’t suppose you could imagine what it’s like to—”

His hard glance shot through my words. “But I could … I could imagine more than you think.”

“Well then, just tell me, was there ever anything between Emory and Aegina Barrista? My suspicions are based on more than what I overheard today.”

“Why don’t you ask him?”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“I just can’t, that’s all,” I said. I could not tell him the true reason was that, since I had forbade Emory to mention my past, I had no right to trespass on his unless I was certain he had failed to leave part of it behind.

As I hesitated, Nathan studied me, then queried earnestly, “You’re afraid to ask him, aren’t you?”

“Of course not … I just … don’t want to bring on a confrontation that would make me look foolish, that’s all. If you’d rather not say, it’s all right.”

“Well, if it will ease your mind I’ll tell you what I know, but you must give me your word you will never tell Cabot what I said.”

“I already have.”

He relaxed somewhat and leaned back. “They courted when Cabot first came to know Barrista, but he stepped in as things became serious.”

“Why?”

“Several reasons, from what I gathered.… Aegina was only twenty-one years old, and her father felt Cabot was too old for her. Also, I think he wanted Aegina to marry a Mexican caballero—one of his choice, probably.

“But mainly Barrista didn’t want his daughter marrying out of the Catholic faith.”

“I see. How long ago did all this happen?”

“About a year before you came here, it was over and done.”

I swallowed hard, realizing for the first time I may have been second choice, our marriage one of rebound for Emory. “Knowing Emory as you do, would you be willing to wager a guess about the two of them now?”

He considered. “I suppose he could be seeing her. She was—is—a beautiful young woman, with dark eyes and hair. He was taken with her, all right. They used to throw big parties at the ranch in Mexico when Cabot was there, and he and Aegina would dance all night—” He stopped abruptly and blinked. “I never saw them do the tango.”

I nodded, and he continued, “Next day they’d be off to the bull fights together. They both enjoyed the bloodthirsty sport. She had a wild streak in her, just like him.”

“I see.”

“But she couldn’t stand next to you, Electra, not by any stretch of the imagination. Finally a man—even one like Cabot—likes to settle down to a fine lady, and live respectably,” he said, then leaned forward and added, “Listen, you probably don’t realize what a different man he was before you came. He has straightened up a lot, by comparison.” He rose from his chair. “That’s all I know.”

“Thank you. And don’t worry, Nathan. This will work itself out.” I watched him leave the kitchen, his steps quick and jerky, and wondered again at his fear of Emory. He was at times like a figure of spun glass, resting precariously on the open palm of an unpredictable hand.

I retired early and lay in bed thinking. It was just possible that even if nothing were now between Emory and Aegina, the fact that there once was might make for discomfort between Emory and her father. Perhaps it was a subject that had once brought them almost to blows, and now that so much depended upon the friendship of the two men, they took extra care to avoid conversation about Aegina. That would explain a great deal. The man seen with her at the Menger may have only resembled Emory.…

A couple of hours later Emory came in and I pretended to be asleep. I heard his hat plop on the bureau, his pants being shimmied off, and smelled the strong odor of his cigar. He didn’t bother me, although he lay for a long time awake.

Finally I could stand it no longer and framed the question that would be the quickest, easiest stab at the truth: “Emory, is there someone else?”

He didn’t answer. I decided, with relief, he was asleep. The question had sounded disgustingly superficial. At daybreak I awoke to the feel of his fingers stroking my hair, and turned to him.

I believe from that time on Nathan took it upon himself to try and make up for any way he felt Emory was letting me down. He was always offering to drive me to one place or another, though it was easy to see he was reluctant to get behind the wheel of Emory’s automobile because he drove as though there were a traffic officer breathing down his neck all the time.

Should I make the slightest suggestion or just hint at something needing to be done, he was at work on it immediately, even when there was obviously no hurry necessary. One morning I told him I’d noticed a charming little summerhouse in one of the yards on King William.

“I could build you one even finer than that,” he offered at once.

“Oh, I don’t know whether Emory would like—”

“He wouldn’t mind, as long as it was for you. I’ll work on some plans tonight, and when I get them to suit you, I’ll go down to Steves Lumber and buy the wood. Maybe we could situate it in front of the Spanish oak in the side yard, between those two big magnolias. That way you’d have plenty of shade on it.”

“Yes, and I could plant roses around it. Let’s paint it white, to match the trim on the house,” I said, infected by his enthusiasm.

As a matter of fact, while the summer of 1914 wore on, I was eager for something new to occupy my mind and demand my energies. I found myself constantly expecting Emory’s announcement that he was bound again for Mexico, and would brace myself for the worst each time he broached a new subject in conversation. He spoke little at first about his plans with Barrista, and as he was often preoccupied I didn’t urge him to discuss them (I wished more than once that something might happen to make the Mexican troubles dissolve).

Only the daily newspapers kept the situation near. In mid-July Huerta finally gave up under Wilson’s pressure and left the country, friendless, and reportedly “subtle and bitter” in his denunciation of the United States. Reading the Huerta story—assuming then it was an epilogue—I could not help but wonder why Fernando Barrista wanted the weight of Mexican troubles on his shoulders. And Emory—how much wealth or personal gratification could possibly be worth the strain and pressure of involving himself in matters he needn’t even bother with? His insatiable thirst for winning went back, of course, to the indignities he suffered in his bringing-up.

Sadly, as much as I loved and understood him, my presence in his life could not completely fill his sense of need. In a way I was even a part of what drove him: as his wife, I could always be referred to as the “reason” he had to make good. How badly it would reflect on him if I did not have a big home and lots of expensive clothes to wear … and, several years hence, what a failure for him if I did not have even a second home, a staff of servants for each, and a substantial amount of the year spent traveling to one place then another. That I wanted none of this did not matter to him in the least. And I couldn’t tell him why I had every reason to remain modest about wealth.…

Emory was spending fewer and fower evenings at home, and I was certain he was putting up Nathan to lie for him about the reasons. The young man never looked me in the eye when he told me another, then another excuse about why Emory would be arriving home late.

Yet this concern was pushed aside by something far more ominous.