FREDDIE HAD A TWENTY-FIVE FOOT CATBOAT that he’d named Thrush, and that he anchored at a marina in Sausalito in Marin County. It was a wooden boat with a tiny cabin forward, an outboard motor of ninety horsepower, and no wheel but an old-fashioned tiller—a very simple boat, built by his grandfather, Dan Lavette, more than forty years ago. All this he explained to Judith while driving out to Sausalito. The boat had been kept in perfect condition, hardly ever used by Dan Lavette, and had come to him as a birthday present from his grandmother, Jean. Now, on the Saturday a week after the wedding, he’d asked Judith to go sailing with him.
“This is the worst time for me to try to get away from the winery,” he said, “now when the crop is being harvested. Everything goes frantic, but Adam insists on Saturday as a day of rest, thank God. The Thrush is no yacht. They used to call them mosquito boats, and I guess they were the first small pleasure boats to be used on the Bay. But any idiot can sail a catboat. They’re beautiful, responsive little craft.”
“Not this idiot, Freddie. I’ve never been sailing. The men I’ve dated have had no boats—not a black thing.”
“Can you swim?”
“Can a fish swim?” Her laugh was like a soft, musical ripple. “I was captain of the swimming team in high school and again in college. I won first place in the West Coast Women’s Trials. They wanted me for the Olympics, but I couldn’t face a year of spending four hours a day in a swimming pool. My breasts are already small enough, and they were beginning to disappear under a pair of oversized pectorals. Forgive me for boasting, but you touched a nerve. Truth is, it’s my height that gives me the advantage.”
He glanced at her. She wore a sweatshirt and blue jeans, her feet in sneakers, and Freddie felt, as he often had, that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
“—which is why I’ve always kept my woolly hair cropped close. Good for swimming, and the photographers love it. But swimming—oh, Lord, Freddie, how could you live without it? I’m in the pool every day, right behind my house, twenty minutes. It’s the only exercise I take—I hate exercise. I read a book by a Welsh woman—I forget her name—who claimed, and with a lot of good proof, that the evolution that created man took place on the seashore, that women were constructed so that they could nurse their babies in the surf out of harm’s way, and that the only place where there was enough protein for the taking was on the seashore. You know, the only animals that have a brain the size of man’s are the amphibious mammals, the sea otter, the orca, the whale, and the dolphin. I wrote a long piece for Natural History about it, and they pooh-poohed it, the way they discard any new idea offered by a woman. But swimming—yes, I can swim.”
Freddie, listening with a bit of awe, admitted that he had never thought of that. Each time he was with her, he discovered a new side of her. “Who wrote that book?” he asked her.
“I’ll find it in the library, and I’ll get it for you,” she promised.
The marina man took them out to the boat. Freddie unhooked it from the buoy and began to haul up the sail. “Take the tiller until I get the sail. Just straight on, just hold it straight and steady. The wind’s from the west, so I’ll rope her on a slight tack until we face Alcatraz, and then we’ll head for the Golden Gate.” He crawled into the tiny cabin while Judith, thrilled with an utterly new sensation, held the tiller. Freddie checked his radio and then came back with two life jackets, one of which he tossed to Judith.
“Put it on,” he said.
“No way. It’s too hot.”
“It’ll cool off. Put it on or we go back. I’m the captain, remember? Law of the sea. It gives me the power of life and death.”
“Bullshit,” she said succinctly.
Freddie slipped on the sleeveless life vest, and tied it. “Seriously,” he told her, “you must wear it.” He dropped on the seat next to her. “The Bay is treacherous. I’ve seen boats flipped in a sudden squall. I’ll hold the tiller, and if you’re hot, you can take off the sweatshirt and wear the life vest.”
“All right, Freddie… I never want to have a real fight with you. I was stopped one night by a mugger with a knife—yes, a black man. We don’t discriminate. I grabbed his wrist and flipped him over and broke his arm.” She smiled soothingly and leaned over and kissed him. Then she peeled off the sweatshirt and put on the life vest. “Let me hold the tiller, please. I love it. And tell me what tacking is. I hear about it all the time.”
“All right. We’re tacking now. The wind is coming from the west. We’re sailing southwest, obliquely to the wind. That’s why I have the boom, the wooden pole that holds the bottom of the sail, roped and almost over our heads. It creates a suction and the boat moves off the direction of the wind. Now we’re in the Bay, and there’s Alcatraz, and to reach the Golden Gate, we’re going on what we call a broad reach. In other words, we’re sailing against the wind.”
“It sounds impossible.”
“If it were, Judy, we’d be in an awful fix. But look at the other boats, how they’re zigzagging. We’ll do the same thing. Now, here’s the tiller.” He loosened the sheet and told her to keep her head down. With one hand on the tiller, moving it slightly, he pulled in the boom. “Now we’re reaching. Watch the island, and you’ll see that we’re moving against the wind.”
“We are, we are! I love it!” she cried, throwing her arms around Freddie.
“Watch it!” he cried. “The tiller’s alive when you’re on this tack.”
“Let me steer, Freddie, by myself.”
“All right, but keep her into the wind. Watch the sail. Don’t let her get away from you.”
“We can’t turn over?” she asked, alarmed for a moment.
“No, don’t worry. Just keep her into the wind.”
The Bay was alive with boats, some of them running before the brisk west wind, others on the same tack as the Thrush. Freddie, hanging on to a rope, leaned back for balance, watching Judith, impressed with the facility with which she managed the tiller. Then he sat down beside her. “Let me take the tiller. We’re coming about. Keep your head down.” The sail flapped idly for a moment and then filled out as they took the other tack.
Judith appeared to be ecstatic. “Freddie, I want a boat—I want to sail for the rest of my life.”
“You have a boat. You’re sitting in it.” Her excitement communicated itself to him. He pointed to a large oiler making its way ponderously through the Bay. “That piece of junk is going to make us wallow. Just be easy. You’re not getting squeamish?”
“Me, squeamish? Freddie, I was born for this.” And then she suddenly said, “Freddie, I love you. What right have you to that fuckin’ golden hair? You’re so goddamn handsome, and you know it—why aren’t you black or brown or something?”
“We’ll make it with the kids. They’ll come out brown or something.”
“I’ll never marry you and I’ll never have kids! Am I crazy enough to bring kids into this lousy white world?”
“It’s a damn nice world right at this moment.”
She burst into laughter as the boat pitched and tilted in the wake of the oiler. “Right on!” she shouted.
“Keep it this way,” Freddie said.
She threw her head back and in her deep, throaty voice, sang:
I sing because I’m happy,
I sing because I am free.
The Lord has his eye on every sparrow,
So he must have his eye on me!
On the next tack, a sightseeing boat passed them, its rail lined with tourists whose eyes were fixed on the black woman and white man in the little catboat. As they pitched in the wake of the sightseeing boat, Judith stuck out her tongue at the tourists.
In sudden exuberance, she pulled at the laces of her life jacket, dropped it off, and sat half naked, letting the spray wash her body. The tourist boat had passed by. She spread her arms.
“Put the damn jacket on!” Freddie yelled. “Have you gone nuts?” Yet he could not help admiring the beauty of her body, the breasts so firm and taut, her torso like a bronze sculpture.
“Put it on!” he yelled again.
“Freddie, have you ever made out in a catboat?”
“We’re close-hauled. If I let go of the rudder, we’ll go over. Please, Judy, put the damn jacket on.”
There was a note in his voice that had not been there before. Like a small girl caught in some egregious act, she put on the vest, tied it, and said, “You’re sulking, Freddie. You’re really angry at me.”
“Absolutely. You can swim to shore. I can’t.”
“Freddie, beloved, I’d never let you drown. I love you.”
“Not that I can’t swim,” he said.’ “Only, no one ever asked me to join an Olympic team… I’m not really angry.”
At the Golden Gate he swung the boat around and they ran before the wind, Judith cuddled against him. “This is glorious, Freddie. Can we do it again?”
“And again and again.”
“And I’ll never take off the vest. I promise.” She opened a picnic basket, and they munched sandwiches and drank beer while Freddie cradled the tiller under his arm.
“Tell me about your aunt Barbara. She fascinates me.”
“Yes, she’s something.”
“How old is she?”
“She’ll be seventy in November.”
“I don’t believe it. She moves like a young woman.” Judith was looking at the City now, the streets climbing the hills like lines drawn on an enormous map, the white buildings piled one on another. “The most beautiful city in the world. It’s a miracle. She’s like the City, she’s something else entirely.”
“Who is?”
“Barbara. She was in prison once. That’s what unites us. We’re a people of the prisons.”
“Who? What are you talking about?”
“The blacks. Me. My people. Freddie, do you ever use that pretty head of yours for anything but your fancy sailor cap?”
“There you go.”
“I apologize.”
“I graduated Princeton summa cum laude.”
“Freddie, darling, you’re brilliant about everything that doesn’t matter.”
“Thank you.”
“Now, about Barbara. Why did she go to prison?”
“Well, it’s a bit complicated. She was involved in the Spanish Civil War in 1938, and she was part of a group that established a hospital in Toulouse for wounded and sick Spanish Republicans and their families. She raised a lot of money from people like my grandfather and others she knew, and then she was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Committee and told to give them the names of the contributors, and she refused. Contempt of Congress. They put her in jail for six months.”
“For being decent and honorable?”
“Decent and honorable don’t pay off.”
“How did she get that way? Her family was so rich.”
“It’s not being rich that corrupts me and makes me different from my aunt Barbara, it’s having a father who left me more money than I ever needed—not Adam, who adopted me, but my biological father—what a disgusting term—Thomas. Lavette; and whenever my aunt Barbara has one of her numberless causes, marches, or campaigns, she comes to me and gets enough money to ease my conscience.”
Back at Sausalito Freddie tied up his boat while Judith furled and knotted the sail. The rubber dinghy took them to shore and, both of them starved now, they drove back to San Francisco and to Gino’s, a small Italian restaurant. “My grandfather Dan Lavette used to eat here,” Freddie told her. “Now Gino’s son runs the place. They make their own pasta, and it’s the best. When I’m filled with life and energy, the way I am now, I always want pasta. It’s genetic. I’m one-quarter Italian, you know.”
The younger Gino embraced Freddie. “Where have you been? I haven’t seen you in months.” He stared admiringly at Judith and then stared questioningly at Freddie.
“I kidnapped him,” Judith said.
Bewildered, Gino led them to a table. “A bottle of Highgate red?” he asked.
“Absolutely. And linguine with clams and garlic and olive oil.”
“I’ll have the same,” Judith agreed.
Each plate was enough for a family of three, and they ate and drank and ordered another bottle of wine and stuffed themselves with bread and pasta, and Judith declared that it was the best of everything; the best bread, the best wine.
“I feel human with you,” Freddie said. “I’m born again. I’m not a good Christian, so how about a born-again pagan? Will you have me?”
“I might.”
“Will you marry me?”
“Maybe. I’m ready to think about it.”
“Me, not the boat.”
She smiled. “I’m ready to think about it, Freddie. Of course, the boat comes with you. I’m a bit drunk, so when I sober up I may change my mind. Your face is red as a beet. You’re blushing.”
“I’m sunburnt. I don’t blush. My God, this is the first time you even bent a little. Judy, I loved you the first time I saw you.”
“Did you? You thought I was a classy hooker, and all you cared about was getting me into bed.”
“Is that so terrible?”
“Freddie, you’re drunk, and how are you going to get us home?”
“Very carefully.”
“You know, sweet man,” she said, “I’m glad you took it to my mama and papa that night. Otherwise, if I simply told them I was in love with a white man, my papa might have put me over his knee and walloped me. You’ve lived an easy life, Freddie. Now the hard part begins.”
“Not so easy. I was at Princeton during the big civil rights drive of the sixties. A bunch of us went down to Mississippi to register black voters. A gang of rednecks caught us. They killed one of the kids and whipped and beat me half to death. I ended up in a hospital in Mississippi.”
“Freddie—Freddie, why didn’t you ever tell me this?”
“Why should I? It was nothing to boast about. I’m here. I’m alive, and I’m all right.”
She had tears in her eyes. “Yes, you’re here. Take me home, Freddie. I want to hold you in my arms. I want to make love.”
A FEW DAYS AFTER THAT SATURDAY, Barbara received a letter from May Ling. “My dear Aunt Barbara,” it began, “We’re here in Paris…” Ruefully, Barbara reflected that she had agreed to put off their own journey until October, due to tasks Philip faced at the church. But at least May Ling was in Paris.
… and it’s wonderful. Oh, if I could only speak French the way you do! My Spanish is good, but two years of high school French aren’t enough to talk to a waiter; Harry says that we’ll go on to Madrid and Barcelona, where I will at least have the power of speech. Harry speaks French like a native, and he appears to know everyone in Paris. Of course that’s an exaggeration, but he has an office here and we’ve been to dinner three times at the homes of French people he knows. His firm has a small apartment on the Quai d’Orsay.
Harry was always so shy. I know I’m shy, but with me he was even worse, and he’s like another person I never knew. He worships me, Barbara, and I don’t know how to be worshiped. We had lunch yesterday at Le Moulin du Village—I had to ask Harry how to spell it—and I felt that I was in the most romantic place in the world, and the proprietor and the waiters made such a fuss over me. They thought I was from Java or some such place, and everyone has been wonderful to me, and when they see I don’t understand their French, they say very flattering things that Harry translates later with great glee. I tell him I don’t believe a word of it.
Wasn’t the wedding simply wonderful? I will never forget it as long as I live, and when Daddy told me that Freddie paid for most of it, I sat down and cried. I never understood Freddie, and I guess he never understood me. Mother was very sweet to Harry the day we left. Harry said to her that he had no object in life more important than to make me happy, and Danny actually kissed him and Mother wept. But she’s quite happy, because Daddy has a new nurse, and that frees Mother, who met a producer at the wedding—I don’t remember his name, but I guess you invited him—and he knew about Mother’s career, and he has a small role for her in his new picture, and I do hope she’s not disappointed, but she was so happy.
Harry is the sweetest, most caring man, and I can’t believe that he’s the terror of prosecutors, as they make him out to be.
We also went up in the Eiffel Tower. I’ll write again soon, probably from Spain. How’s Philip—I don’t mean as a husband, but how is he?
Love,
May Ling
“THANK GOD FOR SATURDAY, and you don’t have to work,” Judith said. “I wait all week for Saturday. I’m a born-again Baptist. Are you a Jew, Freddie?”
“I’m not a Jew. I’m nothing. You know that. I’m a heathen who worships a black goddess.”
“You shouldn’t say that. It’s blasphemy.”
“So be it. Adam decided to stop being Jewish today and declared it a workday. The harvest waits for no man’s religion. If he could, he’d have my mother out there picking grapes. I told him I was going sailing, and he threw a fit. Don’t think I don’t sacrifice for you.”
She sat in the stern, the tiller under her arm, her head thrown back in sheer ecstasy—“Tell Adam that I passed up a job today for this. When the harvest’s over, it’s going to be every Saturday and Sunday. But after church on Sunday.”
“You go to church?”
“You know I do.”
“And you meant what you said about blasphemy?”
“Absolutely. I don’t want to be worshiped. That’s bullshit, and you know it is. I’m a God-fearing Baptist, and don’t you ever forget that—and those four children you’ve scheduled for me are going to be baptized Baptists, not Episcopalian Catholics.”
“Whatever you say. And that means you’re going to marry me?”
“That way I get the boat;”
“It’s a deal,” Freddie said. “What did you think of the wedding?”
“I loved it. But you met my father. Either I get married in his church or I’m not married at all, and you’d better make it soon. I think I missed my period.”
“No. You’re kidding?” he said incredulously.
“Maybe I am, maybe not. I’ve been late before, but not when I’ve been sleeping with someone every night.”
“Hallelujah!” Freddie exclaimed, leaping back to embrace her.
“Freddie, you’ll swamp us!” She clung to the tiller as he embraced her and kissed her.
JUDITH HAD A PHOTOGRAPHY SESSION with Frank Halter, perhaps the best known of all fashion photographers, at ten o’clock in the morning. She called Obie Johnson, a cabdriver, to pick her up at nine. Judith liked to arrive early for photography sessions. She was meticulous about her work and had the reputation in the industry of being one of the easiest models to work with.
Judith did not own a car. The thought of driving in San Francisco daunted her, and she had two cabdrivers, both of them black, who were utterly devoted to her, and whom she would call a day in advance with her schedule. On this morning she wore the swimsuit she would be modeling under a sport skirt and pullover. She preferred to dress at home whenever it was possible. Simone Casis, her maid, a black woman, would come to her house from eight to twelve, dust, make the bed, and help her to dress if the costume was complicated. This morning it was a simple matter, and Simone walked to the door with her, carrying a cashmere sweater. The morning was chilly, and she was trying to convince Judith to take the sweater.
Outside, Obie Johnson, a burly black man, was standing beside his parked cab. He adored Judith and considered himself her bodyguard as well as her driver. Judith took the sweater from Simone and leaped into the cab, telling Obie, “I’m late, Obie, and Frank Halter gets snotty when I’m late.”
“Nobody gets snotty with you, Ms. Hope. Not when I’m driving.”
“Then take off.”
Obie was a better-than-good driver, but he adored Judith. He took a shortcut on Taylor, broke half a dozen traffic rules, and then swung left down Russian Hill toward the Embarcadero; and what happened was something that happens all too often in San Francisco. A truck cut him off, and for all that he stood on his brakes, he could not stop—and broadsided the truck.
FREDDIE WAS IN HIS OFFICE at Highgate when Ms. Gomez opened the door and said, “Mr. Lavette, there’s a San Francisco police inspector on the phone. He wants to talk to you.”
“Oh, what have I done now?”
Ms. Gomez put the call through. Freddie picked up the phone and said, “Frederick Lavette.”
“Do you know a Judith Hope? This is Inspector Morrison.”
“Yes, of course.”
“I’m sorry to tell you this. She’s been hurt.”
Freddie’s throat choked up. He tried to speak, but the words would not come. Then he gasped, “How bad? Is she alive? What happened?”
“They’ve taken her to Mercy Hospital. That’s all I can tell you now.”
Freddie put down the phone and left his office, telling Ms. Gomez, “I’ll probably be gone all day. Judith’s been hurt. They’ve taken her to Mercy Hospital.”
“That’s your cousin Sam’s hospital. Do you want me to call them?”
Freddie hesitated. “No, I’m going there.”
He was not a reckless driver, but now he broke all records between Highgate and San Francisco, the pain inside of him as great as if the hurt had been to him instead of Judith. He was not a person who prayed, but now he pleaded to a God he had never given much thought to, begging, “Please, please, let her be alive. I’ll care for her, I’ll be with her every minute of my life. Don’t let her die. She’s too good, too beautiful. I love her. I love her the way I’ve never been able to love another human being. Don’t take her away.”
DR. SAM LAVETTE COHEN, the son of Barbara’s first marriage, had called Highgate a few minutes after Freddie left, and now he was waiting as Freddie drove into the parking lot at Mercy Hospital, where Sam was chief of surgery. He blocked Freddie’s impulsive rush toward the entrance.
“How is she? Where is she?”
“She’s in the operating room, and she’ll be all right. She’ll live, and she has one of the best teams in the City working on her. I’d be there now, but I wasn’t on duty when she came in. So pull yourself together, Freddie. I told you she’s not critical.”
“For God’s sake, what happened?”
“She was in a car crash. She was riding in a cab. The driver was killed. Now I’m going to take you upstairs, and I want you to sit down and stay calm.”
“When can I see her?” Freddie begged.
“When she comes out of the operating room, she’ll go into intensive care. I’m going to change and join the team. I know what you’re feeling, but the only thing you can do is to stay calm and wait. I’ll try to get you to her when she comes out.”
“But what happened? How badly was she injured?”
“Later. Now, I don’t know. I only know that she’ll live.”
A FRANTIC ELOISE CALLED BARBARA and told her that according to Ms. Gomez, Judith Hope had been injured, and that she had called Mercy Hospital and tried to reach Sam, but he was not to be found, and the hospital would release no information.
“But what happened?” Barbara asked. “How was she hurt?”
“That’s it. I don’t know and I can’t find out, and according to Ms. Gomez, Freddie was terribly disturbed and took off like a gust of wind. Barbara, I’ve never seen anything like this in Freddie. Oh yes, there have been other women, but he is absolutely insane about Judith Hope. He talked with Adam and me last night. He is determined to marry her, and he wanted our agreement, which of course we gave. Adam feels that a few kids running around the place would be wonderful, and I agreed, because I can’t think of a better place for a child to grow up than Highgate. Freddie said that at first she wouldn’t even talk about children, but now that she agreed to marry him, she wants at least four kids—” Eloise had a tendency to go on and on with the telephone, and Barbara had to cut her short and promise that she would drive over to Mercy Hospital, and that she would call Eloise as soon as she found out what had happened to Judith.
Barbara called Mercy Hospital, but they would give her no information about Judith, and Sam could not be reached. She left a message for Sam that she would be at the hospital in half an hour.
It took longer than that. She was on her way out when the telephone rang. It was Philip. He told Barbara that he’d had his radio turned on, driving to the church, and he’d heard that Judith Hope had been hurt and. that she had been taken to Mercy Hospital.
“Philip, is she alive?”
“I don’t know. You know how they announce it—a breaking story and ‘keep tuned for further information.’ So I just don’t know.”
“Eloise called, but she couldn’t get any information. Freddie took off for the hospital, and he must be there by now. I’m on my way.”
“Should I meet you there?”
“If you can. You might help.”
“Yes, I’ll meet you there,” Philip said.
Philip was already at the hospital when Barbara parked her car and walked to the front entrance. There were two policemen at the entrance, and several reporters and a TV truck. The policemen were keeping the reporters out, allowing only patients, family, and doctors to enter. Barbara said that her son, Sam Cohen, was chief of surgery, and this was a family emergency; Philip showed his credentials as a minister, and after a short argument, they were allowed to enter. The woman at the admitting desk knew Barbara and told her that she would find Dr. Cohen on the fifth floor. “I’ll call for him to meet you at the nurses’ station.”
Sam, in a green operating gown, was waiting for Barbara and Philip. He explained quickly that he had only moments to talk. He had a patient who was being prepared for surgery, and he had to be in the operating room immediately. “Judith’s going to make it,” he told them in his dry medical manner. “She has serious lacerations on her face and neck and damage to the shoulders and a hairline fracture of the skull. They did the best they could. She’ll be out of critical in a few hours, I think.”
“What does that mean—’the best they could’?” Barbara wanted to know.
“The best they could. Her face was injured.”
“What does that mean?”
“Mother, I have to go,” Sam said shortly. “Freddie’s in the waiting room on this floor.”
“Is he always like that?” Philip wondered as Sam hurried away.
“More or less. They say grandchildren and grandparents love each other because they have a common enemy. Oh, God knows, Philip! He can be very sweet when he wants to.”
They found Freddie slumped on a chair in the waiting room. He rose and embraced Barbara, his face a pattern of gloom.
“Did you see Judith?” Barbara asked.
“Briefly. Yes, I saw her. Her head is swathed in bandages.”
“Sam says she’ll be all right, that the injuries are not life threatening.”
“Yes—so the surgeons told me. They also told me that her face was badly injured. What will that do to her, Aunt Barbara? Her beauty is her life.”
“What happened to the driver?” Philip asked him.
“He’s dead. They say it was a horrible crash. If she had been sitting in the front seat, she would be dead, too.”
“Her beauty isn’t her life, Freddie,” Barbara said softly. “As much as anything, you are her life.”
Dr. Hope and Mrs. Hope came into the waiting room then. Philip went to them and assured them that their daughter would recover. Dr. Hope asked about Obie, the driver, and Mrs. Hope burst into tears and went to Freddie, who took her in his arms.
“I want to see my daughter,” Dr. Hope said firmly.
“She’s in the recovery room,” Freddie said. “I’ll take you and Mrs. Hope there. I think they’ll allow us to see her, but the anesthesia hasn’t worn off yet. She’s bandaged. She can’t speak.”
FINALLY FREDDIE LEFT THE HOSPITAL with Barbara and Philip. Barbara persuaded him to come with her to Green Street. When they reached Green Street, Barbara asked him whether he had lunch, and he replied that he couldn’t eat. He seemed to be utterly exhausted. They talked for a while, and Freddie told them of the days on the catboat. Glancing at his watch, he said with surprise that it was only three o’clock. “Today has been like forever. I’m tired,” he said apologetically.
Barbara asked Philip to take him upstairs and have him lie down in the guest room. Freddie nodded, and Philip went up the stairs with him.
There was a message from Eloise on Barbara’s answering machine, and Barbara called her at Highgate. “Is he all right?” Eloise wanted to know.
“Perfectly all right. Totally miserable and consumed with worry, but otherwise all right. And Judith escaped—miraculously, I hear. The poor dear is injured but she’ll be all right.”
“I was so afraid,” Eloise said. “If anything happened to Freddie, I couldn’t go on. My heart goes out to that poor woman and the driver, but if anything happened to Freddie, I would just want to lie down and die. Can I talk to him? It’s selfish, I know— I should be thinking of Judith—but you know how I feel about Freddie.”
“He’s exhausted. Philip took him up to the guest room, and maybe he’ll sleep for a while. Philip was good with him. I think he helped him a little.”
“Then don’t disturb him. I’ve been listening to the radio. This has started a tremendous wave of protest about the traffic laws. Cars come thundering down those hill streets as if they were racetracks.” I never realized how much Judith was loved and admired. How is Freddie? I’ve never seen him like this with any other woman.”
“Eloise, nothing happened to Freddie.”
“Will you drive him home?”
“All right,” Barbara agreed reluctantly.
“Thank you, dear—tonight?”
“Before sunset.”
“I want to hold him in my arms,” Eloise said.
“If he’s asleep, I’ll let him sleep for an hour. Then I’ll bundle him into my car and drive him down to the Valley.”
But Freddie shrugged off his mother’s sentimentality and made it plain to Barbara that he would not return to Highgate. “I’m not a child. For heaven’s sake, Aunt Barbara, I’m a middle-aged man, and the only thing that makes life worth living is lying in Mercy Hospital with her life on a thread. I’m staying here in town. If you can’t put me up, I’ll go to a hotel.”
“Freddie, of course I can put you up. But at least call her. Try to understand your mother. It’s only eight years since your brother came back from Vietnam and took his own life. Can’t you imagine what that did to her?”
“I’m well. I’m fit. Nothing happened to me.”
“Please call her.”
“All right. I’ll call her.”
“And it’s harvest time,” Barbara said gently. “Can’t you explain to Adam what you are feeling? You know what happens to him at harvest time.”
“No way. If I talk to Adam, I may say something I will regret forever. They can harvest the damn grapes without me, and anyway most of it is over. And now I’m going back to the hospital.”
Philip had listened silently to this exchange. After Freddie left, Barbara turned to Philip hopelessly. “Say something!”
“What shall I say, Barbara? Until I met you, I never actually knew what family is. I love this family. I love you. I watch Freddie and your brother Joe, and Adam and May Ling and Eloise, and now Harry and Judith and all the others whose names I still don’t have at the tip of my tongue, and of course your son, Sam, and that lovely wife of his—what is her name?”
“Mary Lou—and what has that got to do with anything?”
“You asked me to say something.”
“So I did,” Barbara said shortly.
“Well, I’m trying.”
“Oh, Philip, why do I get so snippy with you?” Barbara went to him and kissed him. “Forgive me. Go ahead.”
“All I meant was that I’m beginning to understand how it works, and I feel pity for people like myself who have been alone. When I was a little boy, I would be given a hank of wool to hold while my mother took it off my hands strand by strand and rolled it into a ball. It’s all there, but different.”
Which is that? Barbara asked herself. The Zen Buddhist or the priest? But she said nothing.
“Freddie has grown up. He must get out of that tangled ball of wool. Some of us grow up at twelve and some at forty. Leave him alone, and tell Eloise to leave him alone. This is his mountain to climb.”
“Philip, I don’t understand.”
“Try.”
“You mean her face?” Barbara whispered.
“Yes, and according to what Sam said, it was badly smashed and torn.”
“Poor Judith Poor Freddie.”
“I think you’d better call Eloise,” Philip said.
OUT OF INTENSIVE CARE, Judith was in a hospital room when Freddie returned. Still under the effect of the anesthesia, she lay with her eyes closed as evening fell. Her head was covered with bandages, except for her eyes and an area around her nostrils and mouth. Mrs. Hope sat quietly in the darkened room. Freddie bent to kiss her cheek, and then he asked in a whisper whether Judith had recovered consciousness.
“She opened her eyes. I think she saw me. Then she closed her eyes again.”
“She said nothing?”
“Only was Obie all right. I told her he was dead. Maybe I shouldn’t have.”
Freddie told her he would be back in a few minutes, and then he went out to the nurses’ station and spoke to the nurse in charge.
The nurse was a tall, stout woman, and when Freddie explained that he and Judith were to be married, she regarded him dubiously.
“When can I speak to her?” Freddie asked. “I mean, when will she understand me?”
“She’s very heavily sedated and she’ll sleep through the night. She’s a very strong woman, and all her vital signs are good. She should be able to talk tomorrow, but it will be a strain for her.”
“Can you tell me anything about her injuries?”
“You’ll have to ask her doctor,” the nurse said.
“Dr. Sam Cohen is my cousin,” he said lamely, thinking that this might penetrate her professional wall.
“Then you should ask him.”
“Is he in the hospital?”
“Not now.” She looked at a chart on the wall. “He’s scheduled to operate at nine A.M.”
He thanked her and returned to the room and told Mrs. Hope what he had learned. “It’s important that all her vital signs are good and they haven’t kept her in intensive care. That means they feel she’s out of danger.”
“Thank God,” Mrs. Hope whispered.
“She’s heavily sedated, and the nurse says she’ll sleep through the night. I’ll have a private nurse here in the morning, and there’s nothing either of us can do now.”
“I can pray for her,” Mrs. Hope said in a gentle reprimand.
“And I will. Can I drive you home?”
“I thought I might stay here the night. Dr. Hope will be here at nine to pick me up, but I thought I would stay. There were a lot of people in the corridor about an hour ago, but the nurse would not let them into the room. There were some reporters and a man—I think his name was Frank Halter. He’s a photographer, and he was very upset—” She paused to wipe away her tears.
“I don’t think they’ll let you stay all night. I’ll stay until Dr. Hope comes, and I’ll be here in the morning.”
THINKING THAT AT LEAST Barbara and Philip could provide a clean shirt and a toothbrush, Freddie returned to Green Street that evening. He telephoned Sam from Barbara’s study and asked whether Sam could arrange for a private nurse. When Sam agreed, Freddie said, “Now, please, Sam, tell me about her condition.” Freddie sat at Barbara’s desk, staring at a picture of a freighter that flew the leopard flag of the Levy—Lavette Line. The ship was called the Clair, named for old Jake’s wife, Clair Harvey.
“Her condition is good,” Sam said with a note of irritation that always entered his voice when he was asked a medical question by a relative.
“What does ‘good’ mean? For God’s sake, be more specific.”
“Just take it easy, Freddie,” Sam said more gently. “I know you care for this woman. As I told you, there’s a very faint hairline fracture of the skull.”
“Well, that’s serious, isn’t it?”
“No, I don’t think so. There’s no sign of brain trauma, and it will heal quickly. It doesn’t incapacitate her. There’s a slight fracture of the cheekbone and some damage to her face. Her nose was broken and there are lacerations. There’s no sign of damage to the spine and her limbs respond properly. I’m trying to put this simply. She had a team of the best surgeons we have working on her. We’ll remove the bandages from her face in a week or so and begin taking out the stitches. We had to use more than thirty stitches.”
“Oh, my God—”
“No. Don’t go bonkers over that. At the worst, she’ll be a candidate for plastic surgery.”
Freddie’s hand was shaking as he put down the phone. For a long moment he sat and stared at the picture of the freighter, the odd thought crossing his mind that a ship always merited the feminine pronoun—quite naturally, since it carried life in its hold. Judith was pregnant. Had she lost the child? Why hadn’t he asked Sam that? He started to call him back, and then hesitated and put down the phone. That was between Judith and himself. Would the doctor know?
He joined Barbara and Philip in the living room. They were listening to music on the radio, and Philip switched it off as he entered.
“Did you reach Sam?” Barbara asked him.
“Yes. I hate to call doctors at home. They’re touchy about it.”
“Freddie, you’re mumbling,” Barbara said.
“Am I?” Then he raised his voice and said, “She is pregnant.”
“Judith?”
“Yes, Judith. I forgot to ask Sam about that—and I’m afraid to call him back,” he added hopelessly.
Tenderly Barbara said, “I think you should tell us what Sam said.”
He told them, almost word for word, and added, “Do you know what it means? Her face is cut up and smashed. She had the most beautiful face in the world, and now it’s gone. A broken nose. Thirty stitches. Barbara, she was so beautiful.”
“She still is,” Philip said.
Freddie appeared about to say something and then swallowed his words. For a few moments they sat in silence. Then Freddie asked, “What was on the radio when I came in?”
“Something by Mozart.”
“Would you turn it on?”
Philip switched on the radio, modulating the sound. “Suppose,” Barbara said, “your face had been smashed up like that, Freddie? Would she still love you? Accept you?”
“No, don’t lay that on me,” Freddie responded, almost angrily. “You know the answer.”
Barbara shrugged. “Why don’t you say that men and women are different?”
“That’s not fair,” Philip put in. “That’s simply not fair, Barbara.”
“I’ll leave it to Freddie,” Barbara said. “Tell me, Freddie, am I being unfair?”
Staring at the floor, Freddie did not answer. They waited, and finally Freddie said, “No, you’re not being unfair. You’re talking about love, which I suppose is the most overused word in this country. I think I love her—but—well, we’ll see, won’t we? I’m very tired. I think I’ll go to bed.”
ELOISE HAD NEVER SEEN ADAM QUITE SO ANGRY. “Doesn’t he know that we’re pressing the grapes! The Chardonnay was his own damn foolish notion! Doesn’t he have any sense of responsibility? I sent a wire to him at the hospital, where he seems to have taken up residence!”
“Adam Levy,” Eloise said coldly and firmly, “have you become so old and mean with that white beard of yours that you’ve forgotten what it means to be in love? Don’t you dare talk to me about pressing grapes! You were pressing grapes before Freddie was born. He’s at the hospital because the woman he loves needs him more than you do. The truth is that you don’t need him at all. You have Candido and you have me. He’s with the woman he loves.”
“That’s another thing—”
“Don’t you dare say it! One word about her being black, and I will never forgive you! Never!”
“I wasn’t going to say anything about her being black,” he pleaded. “We just received two truckloads of white grapes. I said I would think about it, and he went ahead and ordered them, and he isn’t here. And he bought them from Delfuzio, who makes the lousiest wine in the Valley. I don’t do business with Delfuzio. Freddie knows that, and the driver wouldn’t budge until I paid him cash. You know how low we are on cash after the harvest. What is it with you—do you think I’m a racist?”
“I’m not sure. I’m learning a lot about racism.”
“Have I ever said anything—one word?”
She softened and kissed him.
“And haven’t I given him every Saturday off so he could go sailing in that damn boat of his?”
“You’re Jewish. You give everyone Saturday off.”
“Not in the harvest season.”
“He’ll be back the day after tomorrow.”
“How do you know?”
“I spoke to him. They’re taking the bandages off today,” Eloise said gently. “So let’s go out and look at those grapes, and we’ll talk about Chardonnay. Everyone else drinks it, you know.”
EACH DAY FOR A WEEK, Freddie had shown up at the hospital and had spent most of the day with Judith. She had closed herself off. She would have no visitors. After the third day, she whispered to Freddie to tell her mother and father not to come. She would see them at home. She accepted Barbara twice, but grudgingly. As the room filled up with flowers and plants, her annoyance increased and she told Freddie to get rid of them. He loaded his car with them and took them to Judith’s home, where Simone, Judith’s housekeeper, begged for a chance to visit her. He said that he would speak to Judith, but Judith refused. Photographers, advertising people, friends, and reporters lined up outside her door, and it was Freddie’s job to refuse them entry—and no easy job it was.
She said once, speaking slowly and with difficulty, “Why don’t you go away, Freddie, and leave me alone? It’s over. I’m six feet of nigger woman without a face.”
She was out of bed, as she had been after the second day, and staring at her bandaged face in a mirror. They had changed the bandages twice, but always when she was safely in bed, and now, as Freddie stared at her splendid figure, he said, “I’ve never been much of a face man. It’s your gorgeous ass and tits that turn me on.”
A vase of flowers had just arrived, and she picked it up and threw it at him. He dodged it, and after the crash a nurse came running into the room. Freddie explained that he had dropped the vase, and Judith was laughing, the first time he had seen her smile or laugh. “You’re a nasty, unfeeling son of a bitch, and it hurts me to laugh.”
“No pain, no gain.”
“Get out of here. I never want to see you again.”
But he stayed.
Each day Freddie appeared with an armful of newspapers and magazines, endured the barrage of her anger and annoyance, read to her, told her stories, and sat beside her while she slept. Barbara had persuaded him to remain at her Green Street house. One night he went to see a play with Barbara and Philip, and another night he went off to see a film by himself. When he spoke of switching to a hotel, reminding Barbara of Benjamin Franklin’s statement that fish and guests begin to stink after three days, Barbara and Philip talked him out of it. “We want to know you, Freddie. Philip does, anyway.”
But it was himself that Freddie wanted to know. Seven days after the accident he spoke to Sam and told him what he had in mind.
“I don’t see why not,” Sam said. “Only be careful.”
He turned up at the hospital at eight o’clock in the morning, and Judith said to him, “Get out of here! I don’t want you here! They’re taking off my bandages today.”
“I know.”
“So get out of here. I told you I don’t want you here.”
“Yes. But I’m not going.”
“I have rights here,” she said. “I can tell them to throw you out.”
“No, you can’t. I fixed it with Sam. I have some rights, too. I’ve invested in you.”
“What did you ever invest?”
“Love. Time. Dreams.”
Judith stared at him and said nothing. A nurse’s aide entered with Judith’s breakfast, and she ate hungrily. Then Sam and another doctor came into the room, along with a nurse, who removed the tray stand.
“Lie back, Judith,” Sam said.
“Get him out of here.”
“I can’t,” Sam said. “Lie back and don’t be difficult, and don’t move. We’ll take out most of the stitches.”
“Damn you, Freddie,” she said.
Freddie stood across the room, watching while the bandages were removed and the stitches were snipped out, to be replaced with strips of tape. Her nose received a new plastic bandage. Her face was marred, but still it was her face.
“The scars will fade,” Sam said. “I’m going to discharge you today. You’re healthy, and very lucky. Come back next week, and we’ll see about your nose.” Then he and the other doctor left the room, the nurse following them.
Judith climbed out of bed and stared at herself in the mirror. “Yich,” she said.
“You’re very beautiful,” Freddie said, “and I like those strips of tape.”
“Why don’t you get out of here!”
“In due time.” He opened his briefcase; took out a pair of blue jeans, a sweatshirt, and a pair of sneakers.
“They’re yours,” he told her. “I got them from Simone. Put them on.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re going sailing.”
“You’re crazy! You’re absolutely crazy! I’m sick. I’m in a hospital.”
“You’re no sicker than I am.”
“I can’t go sailing,” she whimpered. “I’m through with you. You’re through with me.”
“Like hell I am. And you can go sailing. I spoke to Sam about it. So get dressed and let’s get out of here. I never want to see the inside of a hospital again.”
THE SOFT WIND BLEW, and the tack took them across the Bay, past Alcatraz. Sitting with the tiller, she stretched her long length, with one arm reaching toward the cloud-flecked sky.
“Oh, Freddie!” she said.
“Stay on the course. We’re close-hauled. When I tell you to come about, do it neatly. Both hands.”
“Yes, sir. How long can we sail?”
“How’s your head? No headache?”
“None.”
“Forever.”
“That’s what I want, Freddie. Forever.”