Whitney stood there, absorbing the sting of Ben’s last words. Then Clarice emerged from the house. “It was time for a tasteful good-bye,” she told Whitney.
Whitney nodded. “That was awful, wasn’t it?”
Clarice smiled a little. “But interesting to watch, don’t you think? When the fallout disperses, call me.”
With a squeeze of Whitney’s arm, Clarice headed for her car.
Alone, Whitney struggled to sort through her emotions. When she went back inside, her mother had vanished, and Charles was sitting in a wing chair with his snifter of brandy. For an instant, they regarded each other in silence.
“Well?” Charles said.
Whitney felt a constriction in her throat. “You set out to bait him. With his friend’s death, it didn’t take that much.”
“No, it didn’t,” Charles agreed calmly. “But not just because of his friend.”
Whitney remained standing. “You’re the one who brought up Bobby Kennedy. Ben’s twenty-two, not forty—once you got him started, he was going to say his piece. What was the point?”
“You tell me, Whitney.”
“I can’t.”
“Can’t you? I saw you watching him—as was Clarice. What did you see?”
“Someone with ideals.”
“And I, of course, have none.” Charles gestured toward a chair. “Sit down, please. Can I get you something?”
Whitney sat in the opposite chair. “No,” she answered coldly. “Thank you.”
“All right, then,” Charles commenced. “To start, Ben Blaine is no idealist. Beneath the class rhetoric—and not far beneath, at that—he’s a very angry young man who knows whom he dislikes most: ‘the privileged.’ But his supposed sympathy for blacks or Hispanics or Indians? They’re just convenient weapons to throw in our face, the better to rationalize his hatred as something more noble . . .”
“You don’t even know him . . .”
“Don’t I?” Her father’s eyes bored into hers. “When Clarice compared us, she got one thing right. I do know him, far better than anyone at that table. I remember all too well how it feels to want things you may never have—to believe you may never get the chance other people were born with. But I turned that into ambition, not pointless rage.”
“Whatever Ben feels, he’ll make something of it, too.”
“As a journalist? You may be right. It’s an outsider’s profession, he’s a born outsider. He’s more than self-possessed—he’s arrogant and self-absorbed. He’ll chew up everyone around him.”
“He’s not self-absorbed,” Whitney protested. “Of all the people I know, Ben’s the one who’s most curious about who I am and what I think.”
Charles managed to look both skeptical and astonished. “More than your mother and me?” he inquired.
“Much more,” Whitney found herself saying. “You’ve known me for so long you think there’s nothing left to know.”
“For God’s sakes, you’re our daughter. Of course we know you . . .”
“Just like you know Janine?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Her father’s voice hardened. “You’re younger than I thought, Whitney. Why do you think Benjamin Blaine has taken such an interest in you?”
Stung, Whitney replied, “Maybe because we can talk.”
Charles eyed his daughter with a knowingness that made her bridle. “It’s because he wants something from you. That’s how he’s made, and that’s what concerns me most. I think Peter has the instinctive good judgment to be bothered by it, too. But he doesn’t have this young man’s weapons—he can’t play the romantic rebel, and he lacks Ben’s insolence and guile. One problem with goodness and predictability is that they have a certain sameness.”
Whitney felt the sting of tears in her eyes. “Are you saying I don’t appreciate Peter?”
“No. I’m asking you to stop and think—including about why Ben is such a presence in your life that he’s become a subject within our family.”
“Because you can’t stand him,” Whitney burst out. “You say he’s arrogant. But you took over grandfather’s firm as soon as you were able, and since then you’ve dominated every room you’ve ever been in. Except for tonight. That’s why Ben made the hair stand up on the back of your neck.”
“So which of us doesn’t know the other?” Charles said tightly. “Do you really think this boy is that important to me personally? What do you take me for?”
All at once, Whitney felt sick inside—guilty about Peter, devastated at quarrelling with the man she had always loved most. But a last spurt of honesty made her say, “I don’t think this is about politics, or me, or even about Ben. It’s about you.” She stood, voice tremulous. “I can’t do this anymore, Dad. I love you, and I don’t want to fight with you. I just need to be alone.”
She turned and walked quickly to her bedroom, closing the door behind her.
For hours Whitney thrashed in bed until she fell into a broken slumber. When she awoke, exhausted, she lingered there, reluctant to face anyone. Upbraiding herself for cowardice, she put on her robe and went looking for her father.
Her mother was in the sunroom with her coffee, riffling a copy of the New Yorker. Seeing her, Anne said gravely, “Good morning, Whitney.”
“Is Dad up?”
“Yes. And gone back to New York.”
“Why?” Whitney asked in surprise. “He didn’t tell me he was leaving.”
Anne set side her magazine. “I gather you fought last night. It seems some memorable things were said.”
“There were,” Whitney admitted. “Most of them by me.”
“I gathered as much,” her mother said, not unkindly. “Nevertheless, your father regrets it, too. This morning, for once in his life, he didn’t quite know what to do.”
Whitney sat in the chair beside her. “I’m sorry, Mom. But he’s making way too much of my relationship with Ben.”
For a moment, Anne studied the greenery outside, dappled with new sunlight. “Is he?” she inquired. “Speaking for myself, I’m mystified by whatever appeal this boy holds for you. He’s from an entirely different background—a family of alcoholics, according to Clarice’s mother. I don’t mean to sound Victorian. But class still matters, if only because it creates a common understanding.”
“You understood Dad well enough.”
“Your father was different,” Anne insisted. “He found where he belonged. So what did you say to him, exactly?”
Whitney hesitated. “That he didn’t like being challenged.”
Anne shook her head in dismay. “Oh, Whitney—what man does? Not your father, not Peter, and certainly not Ben. It’s been that way since they were chasing dinosaurs and fighting over women with clubs.”
“But why should Dad always be the voice of authority? We arrange our life around him.”
“Of course we do—to all of our benefit. Your father takes care of us. Please don’t make our family a cauldron of unpleasantness.”
Whitney drew a breath. “Is he really that fragile?”
“He’s the strongest male I know. But even cavemen must have had their vulnerabilities.” Anne paused, then added softly, “Because he loves you, last night hurt him more than he’ll ever admit.”
Whitney felt her sense of guilt resurfacing. “I know how much you love him, Mom. But do you really need to protect him like this?”
“I do,” her mother replied. “He’s under pressure at work, and doing a lot for Richard Nixon—far more than you know, and with high hopes for a cabinet appointment, making Ben’s comments last night all the more unfortunate. Your father has enough on his mind already.” Anne’s brow knit, an expression Whitney knew as doubt and worry, “Usually he spends whole weeks here. But this summer he’s been running back and forth. After twenty-seven years of marriage, I still miss him when he’s gone. I want this to be a refuge for him, not a scene of familial strife.”
“You’re putting a lot on me, aren’t you?”
Anne considered her. “Perhaps I am,” she said with a trace of humor. “A serene summer, culminating in a lovely wedding. Far too much for a mother to expect.”
Suddenly Whitney thought of Janine, her mother’s favorite. “Is anything else bothering you?”
Anne shook her head, as though to banish the suggestion. “No, nothing. Just do me a favor, and call your dad this afternoon. You don’t have to apologize. Just say that you miss him, and hope he’ll be back soon.”
It was little enough to ask, Whitney thought. “All right.”
Anne’s face softened with relief. “As to Peter, when he comes back, give him the attention he deserves. That should end any lingering worries he may have about Benjamin Blaine.”
Once again, Whitney thought of Peter’s kindness and good humor, the boyish sweetness she loved, the way her heart leapt when her handsome fiancé had first whispered, I love you. “Of course I will,” she assured her mother. “At the end of the summer, I’ll be married. Like you love Dad, I’ll love Peter all my life.”
Gently, Anne touched her daughter’s wrist. “Then perhaps it’s also time to end your friendship with Ben. That would put all this to rest.”
After a moment, Whitney nodded.
Instead of calling Clarice, Whitney took her journal to Dogfish Bar.
As she expected, no one was there. At first she felt the tug of disappointment—without seeking Ben out, she could have explained how things must be. But what followed was relief; she did not feel ready to do this, or know what she might say.
Opening her journal, she found her thoughts drifting to her mother. Did some deeper anxiety remain unspoken, perhaps about Janine? But when she began writing, it was about a morning spent on the golf course with Peter and Charles.
The summer my father took up golf, I was twelve. He had never played when he was young; his life was too serious then, and he had no time. Now he got up every day at 5:30, playing nine holes with a professional he paid to instruct him. No one else was there. He would never golf with friends or associates, my mother said, until he was ready to beat them. By the end of the summer, he was telling self-deprecating jokes about his skill at a game he had already mastered.
The first time he played with Peter, I went along to watch. Peter is an athlete, easily Dad’s superior in strength and coordination. His drives went farther, and he took a pleasure in his own gifts that seemed close to innocence. But my father is no innocent, and he knew the refinements of the game.
After seventeen holes, their match was even. But by then I’d perceived that my father’s swing was the same every time, precise as a machine. And I knew, before the near-perfect chip that stole the match from Peter, that my father would never let him win.
“Just lucky,” Dad said lightly.
Putting down her pen, Whitney felt a nagging worry she could not label. Not for Peter, whom her father loved, but for Ben.