She was certain she had heard something of a scream. Danger had been in the air all morning, and her heart had been on edge and on guard. She directed her ears to take in evidence—had no wish to cry wolf, women today did not cry wolf—and remained certain she had heard something in or around her store, all the while Virgil continued talking, laughing, making some point. She detected a cry—was it a cry? Thought of Marian, knew something was wrong, raised a hand to silence Virgil. “Listen!” Her eyes and ears were cocked.
Virgil angled his face in perplexity. Listened. Listened.
Something was in the store, near Marian, the front, near the cash registers; Beatrice knew something had entered the store and was approaching, knew more than she wanted to know. As she stepped over to open the door further, Marian’s voice cried through the intercom, “Mother, it’s Dad; he has a gun!” and Beatrice knew in a heartbeat that all she had ever worked for was falling toward the floor like a vase of flowers.
Her eyes shot to Virgil, while her heart was cascading. They knew in their interwoven hearts that horrible retribution was upon them. Warren with a gun. She had always known it could happen, had known every day, had waited for it in her tortured heart, and here it was but a moment away and closing upon her.
The office door was pushed fully open and there were his eyes, his withered face, his shrunken self—the weapon’s steel barrel. Virgil did not move from the side of the office where he stood. “Warren, good God—let’s be reasonable here,” he uttered, and Beatrice knew from his voice that all was hopeless and lost.
Warren had eyes only for her eyes. He was saying something, but what it was, and what she was saying, hearing, thinking were hardly ordinary within her drumbeat of impending hurt, unfinished business, dreams unfulfilled, her store suffering violation beyond belief. More than once she heard, “Both of you, you always knew!”
She tried to process, calculate. What moves or words might save her? What appeal might get through to him in the face of no time remaining? There were his fierce eyes, the threat of him, his gun and voice, his awful authority. Was there an opening left? she was asking herself as she heard him say he had only wanted to forgive her, had only wanted to shake her hand! “You wouldn’t give me one minute of your time!”
She tried to say she knew he had a complaint, of course she knew that, and there was a crack! and her sudden flinch as Virgil broke for the door, dashed off among candle holders, salad bowls, wind chimes, leaving her where escape was blocked and she remained the object of Warren’s terrible wrath.
Reason … granting him his due … honesty, how might she get through to this person she had controlled so easily? Well, yes, she would have him know, fine, yes, of course he had the power now, it was in his hands … and she was certainly willing to sit down and hear him out, to give him minutes in whatever cafe or diner he’d like to visit. She would speak the truth, too, would love to speak the truth, because she had been its captive, too, in case it was something he had never paused to realize! Did he think it was easy being in love with a married man who was a power broker? Was in demand? Was attractive to other women, who went home to another? Why hadn’t he known? Why had he been so incapable of being a man and doing something for himself? Why had he been so blind he couldn’t see that he had to remain in the picture or the picture would look wrong!
“I only wanted to love you as your husband!” she heard him wail at her, as if from a distance.
Appeals kept racing through her mind: She would have him know how long and hard she had worked, how everything was falling into place at last, how they finally had the Thomaston account, and she was finally going to be a grandmother—Warren, we’re going to be grandparents! To please put the gun down, to please find it in his heart to forgive her because he would ruin Marian’s life, too. Did he think life for her or their grandchild would ever be the same if he did what he was threatening to do? Nor had he been so easy to control himself—you weren’t, Warren, she would have him know, coquettishly, oh so fairly—and he should know, too, that there had been a time on the harbor after dark when Virgil had laughed and said he hoped her husband hadn’t named his boat Cuckold, and she had laughed too, she had, but then had cried and her heart had broken with horrible guilt when she saw how cruel she had been, and she was begging him, dear God, to please not hurt her, please, she was—but it was then that Beatrice tucked her chin in anticipation and was slammed in the chest, jabbed through with a hot poker, jabbed maybe again, found herself sitting down onto the floor while pins-and-needles raced throughout and dizziness traveled to her face, skull, arms.
She knew Marian was crying, knew that her beloved child was squeezing her and crying to her, knew she was doomed and sought forgiveness, sought harmony while part of her was sailing toward California, while she glimpsed a sunlit haze in the air and a roomful of giddy young women with cups and saucers, while on an autumn day a sixth-grade boy was trying to kiss her within the air of the lyric of a lovely song. She heard Marian crying, and she reached a finger to her tiny granddaughter in her white dress, sought the baby’s tiny fingers and dark eyes through light on the horizon, sought its silken hair, its delicate forehead and blue veins encircling all.