The house lay comfortably on a circle of lawn and spread its wings against the dark rise of hills behind it. The architect, who had built it for himself, had brought beams from old New England barns and pine paneling from old houses to recreate the eighteenth century within commuting distance of Manhattan. The windows had twelve panes; and the fanlight at the front door was authentic.

Robert had found the property on his initial visit to New York and had come home filled with nervous enthusiasm. Connecticut was the place! It had charm. It had atmosphere. The schools were good. The neighborhoods were safe. There were wonderful open spaces. Imagine three wooded acres on a narrow, rural road with no one in sight except for the house directly opposite, and that, too, a treasure out of Architectural Digest.

Of course, it was expensive. But with his salary and his prospects a mortgage would be no problem. She had only to read the items about his promotion in The Wall Street Journal and in Forbes magazine to know where he was headed. Besides, a house like this one was an investment, a setting for entertaining—to say nothing of its being an investment in happy living for themselves. Once Lynn had seen the place, and if she liked it, then she must get busy right away and furnish it well. There must be no piecemeal compromises; a first-class decorator must do it all.

She would fall in love with it, he was certain; already he could see her working in the flower beds with her garden gloves and her big straw sun-hat on.

So they got out a bottle of champagne and, sitting at the kitchen table, toasted each other and their children and General American Appliance and the future.

Now in late spring, the evening air blew its fragrance through the open windows in the dining room. And lilacs, the source of this fragrance, reared their mauve heads and their healthy leafage above the sills.

“Listen, a mockingbird! I can’t imagine when he ever sleeps,” Lynn said. “I hear him the last thing when I fall asleep, and in the morning when I wake, he’s still singing.”

Josie’s black eyes, too prominent in her thin, birdlike face, smiled at Lynn.

“You do love this place, don’t you?”

“Oh, I do. I know I felt in the beginning that the house was too big, but Robert was right, we really do spread out so comfortably here. And as for its being too expensive, I still have a few doubts, but I leave all that to him.”

“My wife is frugal,” said Robert.

“A lot of men would like to have that complaint,” Josie remarked. She spoke quickly, as was her habit. And again it seemed to Lynn that her remarks to Robert, however neutral, so often had a subtle edge.

Then again it seemed to her that whenever Bruce followed Josie in his so different, deliberate way, it was with an intention to smooth that edge.

“You’ve done a wonder with the house.” His gaze went over Robert’s head toward the wide hall in which rivers, trees, and mountains repeated themselves on the scenic wallpaper, and then beyond to the living room where on chairs and rugs and at the windows a mélange of cream, moss-green, and dusty pink evoked the gardens of Monet.

Lynn followed his gaze. The house had indeed been done to a refined perfection. Sometimes, though, when she was left alone in it to contemplate these rooms, she had a feeling that they were frozen in their perfection as if preserved in amber.

“As for us,” Bruce was saying, “will you believe that after two years we still have unopened cartons of books in the basement? We left St. Louis in such a hurry, we just threw things together, we never expected to be transferred, it was all so unexpected—” He laughed. “The truth is that we aren’t known for our neatness, anyway, neither Josie nor I.”

Josie corrected him. “When you have work to do for the company, you’re one of the most efficient people I’ve ever seen.”

Robert shook his head. “We were completely settled in a week. I personally can’t function with disorder around me. I’m internally compelled toward order. I know that about myself. If a sign says KEEP OFF THE GRASS, I have to obey, while there are other people who have to challenge the sign by walking on the grass.” He sighed. “People are crazy.”

“I can attest to that,” said Josie. “The things I see and hear in my daily work—” She did not finish.

“I wish you’d tell me some of them, Aunt Josie. I keep asking you.”

Everyone turned to Emily. There was a fraction of a second’s silence, no longer than a collective indrawn breath, as if the four adults had simultaneously been struck by an awareness of the girl’s beauty in her yellow dress, with her black silk hair flowing out under a cherry-colored bandeau and the shaft of evening sunshine on her eager face.

“I will, whenever you want. But so much is tragedy, sordid tragedy.” And with gentle curiosity Josie asked, “What makes you so interested?”

“You know I’m going to be a doctor, and doctors need to understand people.”

There was a fullness in Lynn’s throat, a silent cry: How lovely she is! How dear they both were, her girls! And she was thankful for their flourishing; they had taken the move so well and found their places in the new community.

“Emily did incredibly on her PSATs,” Robert said. “Oh, I know you don’t like me to boast about you, darling, but sometimes I can’t help it. So forgive me. I am just so proud of you.”

Annie’s round face under its halo of pale, kinky hair turned to her father. And Lynn said, “Our girls both work hard. Annie comes home from school, goes right to the piano to practice, and then to her homework. I never have to remind you, do I, Annie?”

The child turned now to her mother. “May I have the rest of the soufflé before it collapses? Look, all the air’s going out of it.”

Indeed the remaining section of the chocolate fluff was slowly settling into a moist slab at the bottom of the bowl.

“No, you may not,” Robert answered as Annie shoved her plate under Lynn’s nose. “You’re fat enough. You shouldn’t have had any in the first place.”

Annie’s mouth twisted into the square shape of tragedy, an outraged sob came forth, she sprang up, tumbling her chair onto its back, and fled.

“Come back at once and pick up your chair,” commanded Robert.

In reply the back door slammed. Everyone took care not to look at anyone else until Emily spoke, reproaching gently, “You embarrassed her, Dad.”

“What do you mean? We’re not strangers here. Aunt Josie and Uncle Bruce knew her before she was born.”

“But you know how she hates being told she’s fat.”

“She has to face reality. She is fat.”

“Poor little kid,” Lynn murmured. A little kid who didn’t like herself, not her fat, nor the kinky hair that she had inherited from some unknown ancestor. Who could know her secret pain? “Do go after her, Robert. She’s probably in the usual place behind the toolshed.”

Robert stood up, laid his napkin on the table, and nodded toward the Lehmans. “If you’ll excuse me. She’s impossible.…” he said as he went out, leaving a dull silence behind him.

At the sideboard Lynn poured coffee. Robert had bought the heavy silver coffee service at Tiffany as a “house gift to ourselves.” At this moment its formality in the presence of Bruce and Josie made her feel awkward; it would have been natural to bring the percolator in from the kitchen as they had always done. But Robert wanted her to use all these fine new things, “Or else, why have them?” he always said, which, she had to admit, did make some sense. Her hand shook the cup, spilling a few drops. It was an uneasy moment, anyway, in this humming silence.

It was Emily who broke through it. At seventeen she already had social poise. “So you’re all going to the Chinese auction for the hospital tonight?”

“I’ve been racking my brains,” Josie reported, “and the best thing I can come up with is to offer three nights of baby-sitting.”

“Well, if you need references,” Emily said gaily, “tell them to call me. You and Uncle Bruce sat for us often enough, goodness knows.”

Lynn had recovered. “I’ll give a ‘dinner party for eight at your house.’ ”

“Dad’s offering three tennis lessons. He’s better than the coach we had last year at school.”

“What’s this about me?” asked Robert. He came in with his arm around Annie’s shoulder and, without waiting for an answer, announced cheerfully, “We’ve settled the problem, Annie and I. Here it is. One luscious, enormous dessert, as enormous as she wants, once a week, and no sweets, none at all, in between. As a matter of fact, that’s a good rule for all of us, no matter what we weigh. Good idea, Lynn?”

“Very good,” she said gratefully. As quickly as Robert could blunder into a situation, so quickly could he find the way out.

He continued. “Annie, honey, if you finish your math homework tonight, I’ll review it tomorrow and then well go ahead to the next assignment so you’ll have a leg up on the rest of the class. You will surprise the teacher. How’s that?” The child gave a nod. “Ah, come, Annie, smile a little.” A small smile crossed the still mottled cheeks. “That’s better. You staying with Annie tonight, Emily?”

“Going to the movies, Dad, it’s Friday.”

“Not with that boy Harris again?”

“Yes, with that boy Harris again.”

Robert did not answer. Emily must be the only person in the world who can cause him to falter, Lynn thought.

“Eudora’s going to sit tonight,” she said. “Emily dear, I think I hear Harris’s car.”

“You can hear it a mile away. It needs a new muffler,” Robert said.

An instant later Emily admitted Harris. He was a tall, limber youth with a neat haircut, well-pressed shirt, and a friendly, white-toothed greeting. It seemed to Lynn that health and cheer came with him. Now he was holding by the collar a large, lumbering dog whose long, ropy hair was the shape and color of wood shavings.

“Hello, Mr. Ferguson, Mrs. Ferguson, Mr. and Mrs. Lehman. I think your Juliet’s got something in her ear. She was wriggling around outside trying to rub it on the grass. If somebody’ll hold her, I’ll try to take a look.”

“Not in the living room on the light carpet, please,” Robert said.

“No, sir. Is it all right here in the hall?”

“Yes, lay her down.”

It was not easy to wrestle with Juliet. Emily held her legs and Robert pressed on her shoulders. Harris probed through the hairy tangle of her ear.

“Be careful. She may snap,” Lynn warned.

Harris shook his head. “Not Juliet. She knows I’m trying to help.” His fingers searched. “If it’s inside the ear—no, I don’t see anything, unless it’s something internal, but I don’t think so—if it is, shell have to see the vet—sorry, poor girl—am I hurting you? Oops, I think I felt—yes, I did—hey, I’ve got it, it’s a tiny burr stuck in the hair—ouch, that hurts—wait, old lady—I’ll need a scissors, Mrs. Ferguson. I’ll need to cut some hair.”

“She won’t miss it,” Lynn told him, handing the scissors. “I’ve never seen such a hairy dog.”

“You’d make a fine vet,” Bruce said, “or M.D., either one.”

Harris, still on his knees, looked up and smiled. “That’s what I plan. Emily and I are both in Future Doctors of America.”

“Well, you’ve certainly got a way with animals. Juliet even seems to be thanking you,” Bruce said kindly.

“We’ve always had animals in our house, so I’m used to them,” Harris explained, stroking the dog’s head. “Just last week we lost one old dog. He was sixteen, almost as old as I am, and I do miss him.”

Bruce nodded. “I know what you mean. What kind was he?”

“Just Heinz 57, the all-American dog.”

“Juliet is a Bergamasco,” Robert said. “I had a hard time finding one, I can tell you.”

“I’d never even heard the name until Emily told me what she was.”

“Not many people have. It’s a very rare breed in this country. Italian.”

Lynn laughed. “I don’t think she gives a darn about being rare, do you, Juliet?”

The dog yawned, settling back under the boy’s stroking hand. Harris spoke to her.

“You feel a lot better now that you’re rid of that thing, don’t you?”

“Oh, Juliet, we do love you, you funny-looking, messy girl!” Emily exclaimed, “Although I always did want an Irish setter.”

“Everybody has an Irish setter,” Robert said. He looked at his watch. “Well, shall we go? Leave your car here, Bruce. You can pick it up on your way home. And, Emily, don’t be too late.”

“That’s a nice boy,” Bruce remarked as always, when they were in the car.

Lynn agreed. “Yes, he’s responsible and thoughtful. I never worry about Emily when he drives. Some of the others—”

“What others?” Robert interrupted. “It seems to me that she’s always with him. And I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all.”

“You read too much into it,” Lynn said gently. “They’re just high school kids.”

“Emily is not ‘just’ anything. She’s an exceptional, gifted girl, and I don’t want to see her wasting her time. Yes, the boy’s nice enough, and his family’s probably respectable. The father’s a policeman—”

“Is that what you object to?” Josie said bluntly. “That his father’s a policeman?”

Lynn cringed. Intimate as she was with her old friend, the secret of Robert’s and Josie’s dislike for each other remained unacknowledged between them. Neither woman wanted to open this particular Pandora’s box.

Bruce gave his wife a mild rebuke. “Of course he doesn’t mean that.”

It seemed to Lynn that Bruce and she were too often called upon to smooth rough passages. And she said impatiently, “What a waste of words! A pair of seventeen-year-olds.”

“Well, I don’t know,” Bruce said somewhat surprisingly. “Josie and I fell in love when we were in high school.”

“That was different,” Robert grumbled. “Emily’s different. She has a future in the world, and she can’t afford to play with it.”

“I thought you were still one of those men who think women are better off in the house,” Josie told him.

Again Lynn had to cringe. It was a relief that before Robert could reply, the car arrived at the entrance to the country club.

The membership had gotten behind the hospital’s gigantic fund drive. Actually, it had been Robert who had brought about the liaison between the club and the hospital’s trustees. It was remarkable that after only two years in this community, he had become well enough known for at least ten people to stop and greet him before he had even passed through the lobby.

The auction, in the long room that faced the golf course, was about to begin. Flanking the podium, two tables held sundry donations: glass candlesticks, dollhouse furniture, and an amateurish painting of ducks floating on a pond. On one side there hung a new mink jacket, a contribution from one of the area’s best shops.

Robert paused to consider it. “How about this?” he whispered.

Lynn shook her head. “Of course not. You know how I feel about fur.”

“Okay, I won’t force it on you. On second thought, if you should ever change your mind, I wouldn’t buy this one. It looks cheap.” He moved on. “How about the dollhouse furniture for Annie?”

“She hasn’t got a dollhouse.”

“Well, buy her one for her birthday. Let her fix it up herself. Annie needs things to occupy her mind. What’s this? Do I recognize a menorah?”

“You do,” said Bruce from behind him. “I inherited three from various relatives, and since we hardly need three, I thought I’d contribute one. It’s a Czech piece, about a hundred years old, and should bring a very good price.”

“I doubt it. There are no Jews in this club.”

“But there are some in the neighborhood, and they always give generously,” Bruce said, sounding unusually firm.

“That’s well known,” Lynn offered, worrying that Robert’s remark might have sounded too brusque.

Robert moved on again. “Hey, look here. Two Dickenses from 1890. Bleak House and Great Expectations. These are finds, Lynn.” He lowered his voice. “We have to buy something. It wouldn’t look right if we didn’t. Anyway, I want these.”

With the appearance of the auctioneer the audience ceased its rustle and bustle. One by one, with approval and jokes, various offers were made and accepted: Josie to baby-sit, Robert to give tennis lessons, Lynn to give a dinner, and a few dozen more. All went for generous prices. A delighted lady with blue-rinsed hair got the mink jacket, the doll furniture went to the Fergusons, as did the two volumes of Dickens. And Bruce’s menorah brought three thousand dollars from an antiques dealer.

Robert said only, “I could use a cup of coffee,” as the crowd dispersed into the dining room, where dessert was to be served.

Robert and Lynn saved places for the Lehmans.

“It gets a little sticky,” he whispered as they sat down. “We should be mingling with people here, and yet I should be with Bruce too.”

“He seems to be doing all right,” Lynn observed, for Bruce and Josie were standing in an animated little group. “They make friends easily,” she went on.

“Yes, when he makes the effort. He should make it more often for his own good. Well, I’m not going to waste time sitting here waiting for them. There are a dozen people I ought to see, and I want to get the tally besides. We must have made over twenty thousand, at least. I want to get hold of a local editor, too, and make sure that my name is in the write-up and that General American Appliance gets credit.”

Robert’s fingers drummed on the table. “No. Tomorrow morning will be better for that. A few private words over the telephone away from this crowd will accomplish more.”

Josie, Bruce, and another man had detached themselves from their group and now came over to the table. Bruce made introductions.

“This is Tom Lawrence, who bought your dinner offer, Lynn, so I thought you two ought to meet.”

Robert said cordially, “Please join us, Mr. Lawrence, you and Mrs. Lawrence.”

“Thanks, I will. But there is no Mrs. Lawrence. Not anymore.” The man’s smile had a touch of mischief, as if he were amused at himself. “You assumed I had a wife, or else why would I be bidding on a dinner party? I can’t blame you, but the fact is that although I keep a bachelor’s house, I like to entertain.” He turned to Lynn. “Bruce told me that you’re a fabulous cook and I ought to bid on your dinner. So I did.”

“You bid more than it’s worth,” Lynn said. “I hope you won’t be disappointed.”

“I’m sure I won’t be.” Now Lawrence turned to Robert. “And you’re the man, I noticed, who got my Dickens. A fair exchange.”

“Not really. They’re handsome books. I wonder that you parted with them.”

“For the same reason that Bruce here parted with his candle holder—menorah, I mean. Both my grandfathers were book collectors, and since I’m not a collector of anything, it seemed to me that I didn’t need duplicates. Also,” he said somewhat carelessly, “one of my grandfathers helped found this club and the hospital, too, so the cause has extra-special meaning for me.”

“Ah, yes. Lawrence Lawrence. The plaque in St. Wilfred’s lobby.”

Lynn, watching, knew that Robert was taking the man’s measure. He would recognize assurance and alacrity. Now Robert was asking how Bruce and he had become acquainted.

“We met while jogging on the high school track,” Lawrence responded. “We seem to keep pretty much the same schedule.”

“You must live near the school, then.”

“I do now. I gave up a bigger house after my divorce. I used to live out on Halsey Road,” he said in the same careless way.

“That’s where we are!” Lynn exclaimed. “We bought the Albright house.”

“Did you? Beautiful place. I’ve been at many a great party there.”

“You should see it now. We’ve done so much with it that you might not recognize it,” Robert said. “It needed a lot of work.”

“Really,” said Lawrence. “I never noticed.”

He doesn’t like Robert, Lynn thought. No, that’s absurd. Why shouldn’t he? I’m always imagining things.

Suddenly Josie laughed. “Do you know something funny? Look at Lynn and look at Tom. Does anybody see what I see?”

“No, what?” asked Robert.

“Why, look again. They could be brother and sister. The same smooth sandy hair, the short nose, the cleft chin—it’s uncanny.”

“If so, I’m honored.” And Lawrence made a little bow toward Lynn.

“I don’t see it at all,” Robert said.

The instant’s silence contained embarrassment, as if a social blunder had been made. Yet Josie’s remark had been quite harmless.

And Lynn said pleasantly, “You must tell me when you want your dinner for eight, Mr. Lawrence.”

“Tom’s the name. I’ll get my list together and call you. Will the week after next be all right?”

“Don’t forget we are taking Emily to visit Yale,” Robert cautioned.

“I won’t forget. The week after next will be fine.”

Presently, the room began to empty itself. People looked at their watches and made the usual excuses to depart. The evening had played itself out.

“Who is this fellow Lawrence, anyway?” Robert inquired on the way home.

Bruce explained. “He’s a bright guy, and partner in a big New York law firm.”

“That doesn’t tell me much. There are a lot of bright guys in big New York firms.”

“I don’t know much more than that, except that he’s been divorced a couple of times, he’s close to fifty, and looks a lot younger. And I know he comes from what you’d call an important family,” Bruce added with what Lynn took to be a touch of humor.

“I’m not happy about having Lynn go over to a strange man’s house.”

“Oh,” Lynn said, “don’t be silly. Does he look like a rapist?”

“I don’t know. What does a rapist look like?” Robert gave a loud, purposeful sigh. “My wife is still an innocent.”

“It’s a dinner party for eight. And I’m planning to take Eudora to help. So that should make you feel better. Really, Robert.”

“All right, all right, I’ll feel better if you want me to.”

“People were saying some nice things about you tonight, Robert,” Bruce said. “About the hospital, of course, and also the big pledge you got GAA to make to the Juvenile Blindness campaign.”

“Yes, yes. You see, you people used to think all that had nothing to do with marketing electronic appliances, but I hope you see now that it does. Anything that connects the name of GAA to a good cause counts. And the contacts one makes in the country club all connect to these causes and their boards. You really ought to join a club, Bruce.”

“You know I can’t join this one.”

“That’s disgusting,” Lynn said. “It makes me want to stand up and fight.”

“You may want to but you’d better not. I keep reminding you,” Robert told her, “that reality has to be faced. Bruce is smart enough to accept it. Join a Jewish club, Bruce. There are a couple just over the Westchester line. And the company’ll pay. They’ll be glad to.”

Lynn, looking back from the front seat, could see Bruce’s shrug.

“Josie and I never did go for club life, Jewish or not.”

“It’s time you began, then.” Robert spoke vigorously. “You need to get on some of these boards, go to the dinners and have your wife go to the luncheons. You owe it to the firm and to yourself.”

“I do what I can,” Bruce answered.

“Well, think about what I’m telling you. And you, too, Josie.”

Lynn interjected, “Josie works. And anyway, I can’t imagine her exchanging gossip with company wives. You have to be careful of what you say. They judge everything, your opinions, your clothes, everything. Some of those afternoons can wear one out.”

“It’s the price you pay for being who you are and where you are. You’ll think it a small enough price, too, if it leads to a big job in Europe,” Robert declared.

A small chilly dread sank in Lynn’s chest. She knew the pattern of promotion: two or three years in each of several European countries, then possibly the home office in New York again. Or else a spell in the Far East with another return. And no permanence, no roots, no place to plant a maple sapling and see it grow. There were myriads of people who would forgo a thousand maples for such opportunities, and that was fine for them, but she was not one of those people.

Yet Robert was. And he would well deserve his rewards when they came. Never, never, she thought as always, must she by the slightest deed or word hold him back.

As if he were reading her mind, at that very moment Bruce remarked, “When there’s another big job in Europe, and with all that’s happening abroad, there’s bound to be one soon, you’re the man to get it, Robert. Everybody knows that.”

Later when they were reading in bed, Robert asked, “What are you doing tomorrow?”

“I’m taking Josie and a few friends to lunch, remember? It’s her birthday.”

“Missing the women’s tennis tournament?”

“I have to. Josie works all week, so Saturday is the only day we can make it.”

After a moment Robert, laying his book aside, said decidedly, “Josie’s too opinionated. I’ve always said so. It’s a wonder to me why he isn’t sick of her, except that he’s too much of a weakling, a yes-man, to do anything about it.”

“Sick of her! Good Lord, he’s no yes-man, he adores her! And as to being opinionated, she’s not. She’s merely honest, that’s all. She’s outspoken.”

“Well, well, if you say so. I guess I’m just a male chauvinist who’s uncomfortable with outspoken women.”

Lynn laughed. “Our Emily’s a pretty outspoken woman, I’d say.”

“Ah, that’s different.” And Robert laughed too. “She’s my daughter. She can do anything she wants.”

“Except choose her own boyfriends?”

“Lynn, I only want what’s best for her. Wouldn’t I give my life for her? For all of you?”

“Dear Robert, I know that.”

He picked up his book and she went back to hers. Presently Robert laid his down again.

“By the way, did you have the fender fixed where you scraped it?”

“Yes, this morning.”

“Did they do a good job?”

“You’d never know there’d been a mark.”

“Good. There’s no sense riding around in a marked-up car.” Then he thought of something else; it was as if he kept a memo book in his head, Lynn often told him.

“Did you send a birthday present to my aunt?”

“Of course I did. A beautiful summer bag.”

“That’s right, considering all those sweaters she knits for the girls.”

There was a hurtful, grudging quality in this comment that Lynn was unable to ignore.

“Robert, I think you treat her very badly.”

“Nonsense. I was perfectly nice to her last year at Christmas.”

“You were polite, that’s all, and it wasn’t last year, it was the year before. The reason she didn’t come last year was that she felt you didn’t want her. You, not I. I actually like her. She’s a kind, gentle lady.”

“She may be kind and gentle, but she’s a garrulous old fool and she gets on my nerves.”

“Garrulous! She hardly opens her mouth when you’re around.”

He did not answer. And Lynn persisted.

“Emily’s very fond of her. She had a lovely afternoon tea when Jean was visiting in New York last month.”

“All right. Leave me alone about Aunt Jean, will you? It’s unimportant.”

He turned and, in pulling the blanket with him, dropped the book with a loud thump onto the floor.

“Sorry. Damn! I’m restless.”

She put her hand on his arm. “Tell me what’s really bothering you.”

“Well, you may think it’s foolish of me, you probably will think so. But I told you, I don’t like the idea of your going to cook dinner in another man’s house where there’s no wife. I wish to hell you had thought of something else to contribute to the auction.”

“But cooking is what I do best. It’ll be fun. Didn’t you watch the bidding? He paid a thousand dollars for my services, I want you to know.”

“Bruce shoved him onto you. That’s what happened.”

“You’re surely not going to be annoyed with Bruce. Robert, how silly can you be?”

“I don’t like the man’s looks. Divorced, and divorced again, and—”

Trying to tease him out of his mood, she said, “Apparently he looks like me, so you should—”

“So yes, he is something like you, and you—”

He turned again, this time toward Lynn, to meet her eyes, so that she could see close up his darkening blue irises, black lashes, white lids, and her own reflection in his pupils. “You grow more lovely with each year. Some women do.”

She was pleased. “I do believe you’re jealous.”

“Of course I am. Isn’t it only natural? Especially when I have never once in all our life together—I swear it—I have never been unfaithful to you.”

The white lids, like shell halves, closed over the blue. And with a violent motion he buried his head in her shoulder.

“Ah, Lynn, you don’t know. You don’t know.”

That he could want her still with such fierce, sudden spasms of desire, and that she could respond as she had first done when they began together, was a marvel that flashed upon her each and every time, as now.…

The wind fluttered the curtains, the bedside clock ticked, and a car door cracked lightly, quickly shut. Robert roused from his doze.

“Emily?”

“She’s home. I kept awake to be sure.”

“She stays out too late.”

“Hush. Go to sleep. Everything’s all right.”

With all safe, Emily and Annie in their beds, now she could sleep too. Her thoughts trembled on the verge of consciousness, her body was warmed by the body beside which she had been sleeping for thousands of nights. Thousands.

There went the mockingbird again. Trilling, trilling its heart out without a care in the world, she thought, and then abruptly thought no more.

Tom Lawrence asked, “Are you sure I’m not in your way?”

Perched on a barstool in his glossy black-and-white kitchen, he was watching Lynn’s preparations.

“No, not at all.”

“This is a new experience for me. Usually when I have guests, I have a barbecue outdoors. Steaks, and ice cream for dessert. Fast and easy.”

Since this was quite a new experience for Lynn, too, she had to grope for something to say, however banal, to avoid a stiff silence. “It’s a pity not to use all these beautiful things more often,” she remarked as she filled the cups of a silver epergne with green grapes.

“That’s a great idea, putting fruit in that thing. I forgot I had it. You know, when we split up and I moved, my former wife and I agreed to divide all the stuff we owned, stuff from her family and mine, plus things we’d bought together. I didn’t pay any attention, just let her do it all. The whole business was a mess. The move. The whole business.” Abruptly, he slid from the stool. “Here, let me carry that. Where does it go?”

“It’s the centerpiece. Careful, the arms detach.”

The dining table stood at the side of a great room with a fireplace at each end. One saw that there was no more to the house than the splendid kitchen and what must be two bedrooms leading off this great room. A quick glance encompassed paintings, bookshelves, a long glass wall with a terrace, and thick foliage, dense as a forest, beyond it.

“What an elegant little house!” she exclaimed.

“Do you think so? Yes, after almost three years I can say I finally feel at home here. When I first moved in, my furniture looked alien. I hardly recognized it.”

“I know what you mean. When the van comes and sets your things down in a strange place, they look forlorn, don’t they? As if they knew and missed their own home. Then when the empty van drives away—oh, there’s something final about it that leaves one just a trifle sad, I think.” And for an instant she was back in the little house in St. Louis—“little,” contrasted with the present one—with the friendly neighbors on the familiar, homelike street. Then she said briskly, “But of course one gets over it.”

His reply was wholly unexpected. “I imagine that you make yourself ‘get over’ things pretty quickly, though. You make yourself do what’s right.”

Astonished, she looked up to meet a scrutiny. Returning it, she saw that except for some superficial features, this man did not resemble her at all; he was keen and worldly wise, which she definitely was not; he would see right through a person if he chose to.

“What makes you say that?” she asked curiously.

He smiled and shrugged. “I don’t know. Sometimes I get a sudden insight, that’s all. Unimportant. And possibly wrong.”

“Maybe you sense that I’m a little nervous about this evening. I’m hoping I haven’t bitten off more than I can chew.”

He followed her back into the kitchen. “Please don’t be nervous. These are all real people tonight, a few old friends driving out from New York and not a phony among them. They’ll be stunned when they see this table. I’m sure they’re expecting Tom Lawrence’s usual paper plates.”

Arrayed on the counters were bowls and platters of food that Lynn had already prepared at home: a dark red ham in a champagne sauce, stuffed mushroom caps, plump black olives and silver-pale artichokes tossed into a bed of greens, golden marinated carrots, rosy peaches spiced with cinnamon and cloves. Back and forth from the pantry to the refrigerator she moved. Then to the oven, into which she slid a pan of crisp potato balls, and to the mixer for the topping of whipped cream on a great flat almond tart.

When all was finished and she was satisfied, full confidence returned. “This kitchen’s absolutely perfect,” she told Tom, who was still there quietly observing her work. “The restaurant-sized oven, the freezer—all of it. I’m really envious.”

“Well, you deserve a perfect kitchen, you’re that expert. Have you ever thought of going professional?”

“I’ve thought about it sometimes, I’ll admit. I’ve even thought of a name, ‘Delicious Dinners.’ But what with a lot of volunteering and the PTA and our big house taking time out of every day, I don’t know how—” She paused and finished, “Robert is very fastidious about the house.” She paused again to add, “Anyway, I’m not in a hurry,” and was immediately conscious of having sounded defensive. “I need a last look at the table,” she said abruptly.

“Excuse me.” Tom was apologetic. “But the silver—I mean, aren’t the forks and spoons upside down, inside out?”

Lynn laughed. “When the silver’s embossed on the back, you’re supposed to let it show.”

“Oh? Now I’ve learned something,” he said. His eyes smiled at her.

They’re like Bruce’s eyes, she thought. There isn’t another thing about him that’s like Bruce, but that. Her hands moved, smoothing the fine cloth, rearranging the candlesticks. There aren’t that many people whose eyes can smile like that.

“You’ve suddenly grown thoughtful, Lynn. May I call you that?”

“Of course. Oh, thoughtful? I was remembering,” she said lightly, “when Robert bought the etiquette book so I’d learn how to give proper dinners when we moved here. I thought it was silly of him, but I find it’s come in handy, after all.”

The doorbell rang. “Oh, that’s Eudora. She cleans and baby-sits for us. I’ve asked her to help. I’ll let her in.”

When Lynn returned, Tom said, “I wish you’d set another place at table, one for yourself, now that you’ve got help in the kitchen.”

“I’m here to work. I’m not a guest,” she reminded him. “Thank you, anyway.”

“Why shouldn’t you be a guest? There’ll be all couples tonight except for me. And I really should have a female to escort me, shouldn’t I?”

“That wasn’t the arrangement.”

His smile subsided as again he gave her his quick scrutiny. “I understand. You mean, if you were to be a guest, then your husband would be here too.”

She nodded. “Anyway, I couldn’t depend upon Eudora in the kitchen. She’ll be fine to bring in the plates after I fix them and to clean up with me afterward.”

She hurried away into the kitchen. Why was she flustered? Actually, the man had said nothing so startling. And she turned to Eudora, who was waiting for instructions.

“They’ll be here in a minute. Turn the oven on low to warm up the hors d’oeuvres. Half an hour for drinks. I’ll toss the salad. It goes on the blue plates—no, not those, take the other ones.”

“They’re having a good time,” Eudora said much later. The swinging door opened and closed on genial laughter as she went in and out. “I never did see people clean plates like this.”

“Good. Now carry the cake in so they can see it first. Then you can bring it back, and I’ll slice it.”

“You sure are some cook, Mrs. Ferguson. I’m old enough to be your mother, and I never even heard of the things you fix.”

“Well, I’d never seen some of your good Jamaican dishes, either, until I knew you.”

Although she had been standing on her feet all day, Lynn suddenly received a charge of energy. What had begun as a lark, an adventure, had become a test, and she had passed it. She had been paid for her skill, and she felt happy. So, when the door opened and Tom said his guests were demanding to see the cook, she was quite ready to go with him.

“Just do let me fix my face first. I’m all flushed from the stove.”

“Yes, it’s awful to be flushed like a rose,” he retorted, pulling her with him.

In a moment she appraised the group: they were sophisticated, successful, bright New Yorkers, the kind who wear their diamonds with their blue jeans when they want to. They marry and divorce with equal ease when they want to. Good natured and accepting, it takes a lot to shock them. Robert would despise their type. All this went through her head.

They were most kind, heaping praise on Lynn. “What a talent.… You could work for Le Cirque or La Grenouille.… I ruined my diet tonight.… Absolutely marvelous.”

The evening rose to a peak. Warmed by the food and wine, the group left the table in a high, restless mood. Tom turned on the record player, the men pushed back the scatter rugs, and dancing began.

He held his hands out to Lynn. “Come, join the party.”

“It’s rock and roll. I’m awful at it,” she protested.

“Then it’s time you learned,” he answered, and pulled her out onto the floor.

At first she felt foolish. If Emily, who danced like a dervish, could see her mother, she’d die laughing. The best Lynn could do was to watch the others’ dizzy twists and gyrations and try to imitate them.

Then after a while, the drumming, primitive, blood-pounding beat began to speak to her. Quite unexpectedly, she caught the beat.

“Why, you’ve got it!” Tom cried. “You’ve got it!”

This whirling, which should have been exhausting, was instead exhilarating. When Lynn became aware that Eudora was standing at the door to signal her departure, it surprised her to find that it was already almost eleven o’clock. She would have guessed the time to be no later than nine. Pressing some bills into Eudora’s hand, she whispered, “You remembered to leave the crystal?”

“Oh, I hate to leave you with it, Mrs. Ferguson, but I’d hate to be responsible for it too.”

“That’s all right, Eudora. I’ll wash it fast and start right home.”

Back in the kitchen with the apron on again, Lynn was rinsing the goblets when Tom, with eyes alight and in a merry mood, came looking for her.

“Hey! What are you doing in here?”

“Eudora was afraid to touch your Baccarat. She knows what it costs.”

“Oh, leave it. We’re all going to dance outdoors. It’s a perfect night.”

“I can’t. Really. I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. I insist. For ten minutes. Come on.”

The outdoor lanterns gave the effect of moonglow, barely glimmering toward the edge of darkness, where the hemlock grove fenced the little clearing on which the terrace lay. It had rained during the day, and the smell of damp grass was tart.

One of the men complained, “Age is creeping up, Tom, because I’m beat. How about some slow golden oldies for a change?”

“No problem. I’ve got all the tunes your parents danced to. Now, this is really nice,” he said as his arm brought Lynn close. “When you come down to it, the old way is better.”

Unlike Robert, he was not much taller than she, so that their faces almost touched. Their feet moved in skillful unison to the swing of the sentimental music.

“You have a sweet mouth,” Tom said suddenly, “and sweet eyes.”

An uneasy feeling stiffened Lynn, and he felt it at once.

“You didn’t like me to say that, did you?”

“I didn’t expect it.”

“Why not? If a compliment is sincere, it should be spoken and accepted.”

“Well, then, thank you.”

“You still look uncomfortable. You’re thinking I’m just a smooth talker. But you are really someone special, I have to tell you. Refreshing. Different.”

She could feel his breath on her neck. The hand on the small of her back pressed her so close to him that she could feel his heartbeat. And the dreamy charm of the night changed into nervous misgiving.

“It’s after eleven,” she cried. “I have to go right away. Please—”

“So there you are!”

The harsh voice rang as Robert came from around the corner of the house into the light. Just then the music stopped, leaving the dancers stopped, too, arrested in motion, all turned toward the voice.

“I telephoned, I got no answer, I came over and rang the doorbell and still got no answer.”

“This is my husband,” Lynn said. “Tom Lawrence—but how stupid of me! Of course you know each other. I’m not thinking.” And she moistened her lips, to which there had suddenly come a curious, salty taste, like that of blood, as if blood had drained upward from her heart.

“I’m so sorry. We’ve been out here, and the music’s drowned out all the bells. Come in and join us,” Tom said cordially. “Your wife made a marvelous dinner. You’ve got to sample some of the dessert. I hope there’s some left, Lynn?”

“Thank you, but cake is hardly what I need. It’s going on twelve, and I’m not usually out at this hour rounding up my wife at a dance.”

Crazy thoughts went through Lynn’s head: He looked sinister and black, a figure in mask and cape from an old melodrama, angry-dark, why can’t he smile, I’ll die of shame before these people. And in a shrill, gay tone not her own, she cried out, “What an idiot I am, I forgot to wear my watch, all these nice people made me come out of the kitchen and dance with them, I’ll just get my bowls and things—”

“Yes, you do that,” Robert said. “You do just that. I’ll wait in front.” He turned about and walked, away through the shrubbery.

Tom and the whole company, men and women both, went into the kitchen with Lynn. Rattling and prattling, she let them help gather her possessions, and load her car, while Robert sat stiffly at the wheel of his car, and the hot, awful shame went prickling along her spine.

“You follow me home,” he said.

Past quiet houses already at rest in the shadows of new-leaved trees, his car sped like a bullet aimed at the heart of the friendly countryside. She knew that he sped so because he was furious, and knowing it, her own anger grew. What right had he? Who did he think he was?

“Damn!” she cried. That an evening, having begun so nicely, could end in such miserable confusion, with Tom Lawrence’s unwelcome attention and Robert’s nastiness!

He had already driven his car into the garage and was waiting for her in the driveway when she arrived home. I want the first word, she thought, and I’m going to have it. Nevertheless, she spoke with quiet control.

“You were unbelievably rude, Robert. I almost didn’t recognize you.”

“Rude, you say? Rude? I went there as any other husband would, looking for his wife.”

“You embarrassed me terribly. You know you did.”

“I was concerned. Close to midnight, and no word from you.”

“If you were so concerned, you could have telephoned.”

“I did telephone, I told you. Where’s your head? Didn’t you listen to me? And then I went over to find you, not in the kitchen doing this ridiculous dinner, and where were you? Dancing, if you please. Dancing.”

“I had been dancing for a couple of minutes, and I was just leaving that very second when you came.”

“You had been dancing much longer than a couple of minutes. And don’t try to deny it because I was there.”

Caught in her lie, no, not a lie, a fib, an innocent fib, such an innocent business altogether in which to be embroiled, she lashed out.

“You were standing there behind the trees snooping? It’s degrading. I should think you’d be ashamed, Robert. The way you just burst out of the dark, enough to scare the life out of people. Don’t you think they all knew you must have been spying? You were horrible. You wouldn’t have put on an act like that if any of them could be of use to you in your business. Otherwise, you don’t care what you say to people.”

“That’s not true. But it is true that I don’t give a damn about a lot of pseudosophisticated phonies. I recognize the type at a glance. I wouldn’t trust one of them any farther than I can throw a grand piano, and that includes Lawrence.”

“You’re so critical. You’re always carping. You don’t approve of anybody.”

The headlights of her car, which she had forgotten to turn off, blazed up on Robert. And he seemed, as he stood there, as strong as the dark firs behind him.

“Turn those lights off,” he snapped, “or you’ll have a dead battery.” And turning his back, he climbed the steps to the deck at the back of the house.

She turned the lights off. She was too tired to put one foot ahead of the other, too tired to fight this war of words that she knew was far from over. But with a long sigh she followed him to the deck.

“Pseudosophisticated phonies,” he repeated.

“What is it, Robert?” she asked. “Tell me what it is that makes you despise people you don’t even know. What makes you so angry? Don’t you like yourself?” And saying so, she felt the faint sting of her own tears.

“Please,” he said, “spare me your pop psychology, Mrs. Freud.”

He took out his keys and unlocked the house door. Juliet came bounding, barking fiercely, but, seeing who was there, jumped up on Robert and wagged her tail instead. He thrust her away.

“Not in the mood, Juliet. Down.” And abruptly returning to Lynn, he demanded, “I want an apology. There’ll be no sleep for either of us tonight until I get one.”

How a handsome face can turn so ugly! she thought. In the half-dark his cheeks were faintly blue, and his eyes were sunk in their sockets.

“An apology, Lynn.”

“For what? For overstaying my time by an hour? For having a little fun? You could have come in and joined the party. Tom asked you to.”

“Oh, of course, if Tom asks.”

“What does that sarcastic tone mean, I’d like to know?”

“It means that I don’t like the way he was looking at you, that’s what.”

“The way he looked at me,” she scoffed. “I don’t know how he did because I wasn’t studying his expressions, I assure you. But if,” she cried indignantly, “if he or anyone should take it into his head to admire me a little, you’d have no right to object. Not you. You love it when women fawn on you. Don’t tell me you don’t, because I’ve seen it a thousand times.”

“Now, you listen to me and don’t change the subject. But no, on the other hand now that you’ve brought up the subject, I’ll tell you this: I have never encouraged any woman. Never. Nor done anything in any way that I couldn’t do right in front of you. I’ll swear on the Bible.”

“The Bible! All of a sudden the Bible. When were you last in church?”

“Never mind. I believe. I have my moral standards. One mistake, one misstep down a slippery slope, and you can’t—”

“What is this? Who’s made any missteps? What in heaven’s name are you talking about? I can’t figure you out.”

“Damn it, if you’ll stop interrupting me, I’ll figure it out for you.”

From the roof peak the mockingbird began a passionate crescendo, then a trill and a plaintive diminuendo. The sweetness of it went to Lynn’s heart and pierced it.

“Let’s stop this,” she said, trembling. “I’ve had enough. There’s no sense in it. I’m going inside.”

He clutched her sleeve. “No, you’re not. You’ll hear me first.”

She pulled, and hearing the sleeve rip, the fine sleeve of a cherished dress, she was enraged.

“Let go of me this minute, Robert.”

“No.”

As she wrenched it away, the sleeve tore off at the shoulder.

A muffled cry came from his throat. And he raised a menacing hand. His arm shot out, grasping her shoulder, and she spun, fled, and fell headfirst off the deck into the hawthorn hedge. She heard her own terrible scream, heard the dog going wild, heard Robert’s outcry, thought, my face! and knew not to break the fall with her hands but to protect her eyes instead.

“Oh, God,” Robert said.

When he lifted her, she screamed. She was flayed, stripped, skinned on the backs of her hands, her legs, her cheeks.… She screamed.

“I have to get you up,” he said, sounding as if he were speaking through clenched teeth. “If you can’t bear it, I’ll have to call an ambulance.”

“No. No. We’ll try.… Try loosening one at a time. I’ll bear it.”

Annie was out on a sleep-over at a friend’s house. And Emily must not be home yet, or she would have heard by now and come running. And she gave thanks that they were not seeing this, a happening that must seem both hideous and absurd, with the dog now leaping, now howling, as if it, too, were in pain, shattering the quiet of the night.

Weeping and whimpering she lay and, while Robert brought a flashlight from the car and set to work on her torn arms and legs, tried not to scream. One by one the thorns were parted from her flesh. Only once or twice did she cry out loud.

When finally he raised her and she stood wavering on the grass, they were both sweating and stained with bloody droplets. Wordless, they simply stared at one another. Then she stumbled up the shallow steps, moaning softly.

“I’ve turned my ankle. I can hardly walk.”

“I’ll carry you.”

He picked her up and bore her as lightly as he would have borne a child. He laid her on the bed and took her clothes off.

“Soap and water first,” he said. “Don’t be afraid, I’ll be very careful. Then antibiotic cream. That’ll do until you see a doctor in the morning.”

“I’m not going to see any doctor. You don’t need a doctor for a sprained ankle or a thorn.”

“You had eighteen thorns. I counted.”

“All the same, I’m not going,” she insisted feebly, and was perfectly aware that this was masochism, that it was her intent to make him feel his guilt, guilt for the wounded hands clasped on her naked, wounded breast, for the ruined yellow dress that lay on the floor like dirty laundry, guilt for the whole horror of this night.

“Well, suit yourself,” he said. “If you change your mind and don’t want to drive, call a taxi. I can’t take you. My desk in the office is piled with work, and work won’t wait just because it’s Saturday.”

When she crept under the blanket, he was still standing looking down at her.

“What do you want?” she whispered. “Anything you want to say?”

He lowered his eyes and took a long breath. “Yes. I was angry. But I didn’t throw you into the hedge.”

“You pushed me. You were going to hit me, you were inches from my face.”

“I was not.”

“You were, Robert.”

“Are you a crystal gazer or something, who can foretell what a person’s going to do?”

“You grabbed my shoulder and shoved me. And I saw your face. It was ugly with rage.”

“In the first place, it was too dark for you to see whether my face was ugly or not. This is garbage, Lynn.”

All she wanted was to lie in the darkness and rest. “Why don’t you let me alone?” she cried. “Haven’t you any mercy? At least let me try to sleep if I can.”

“I won’t bother you, Lynn.” He walked to the door. “I hope you can sleep. I doubt that I can. A miserable night. These miserable misunderstandings! Go downstairs, Juliet. Stop pestering.”

“Leave the dog here. I want her.”

Now darkness filled the room. The little sounds of the night were soft, a rustle in the oak near the window and the tinkle of Juliet’s tags. The dog came to the bed, reached up, and licked Lynn’s sore hand, as if comfort were intended; as always, then, comfort brought the most grateful tears. And Lynn lay still, letting them flow, feeling them cool and slippery on her cheeks. After a while the dog thumped down on the floor near the bed, the tears stopped, and she closed her eyes.

Still no sleep came. Emily was not home yet. It must be very late, she thought. But it was too painful to turn over in the bed and look at the clock. From downstairs there drifted the pungent smell of pipe tobacco, and she knew that Robert was sitting in the corner of the sofa watching television or reading, or perhaps just sitting. No matter. She didn’t want to think of him at all. Not yet.

After a time she heard the small thud of a car door being closed, followed by Emily’s feet creeping down the hall to her room. Where had the girl been so late? But she was home and safe.

At last it seemed that blessed sleep might come. It had not yet come when Robert entered the room and got into bed, but she pretended that it had.

In the morning, still feigning sleep, she waited until he had dressed and gone downstairs. Then she got up and limped painfully to the mirror, which confirmed what she had expected to see: a swollen face with small, reddened eyes sunk into bloated cheeks. The whole unsightly face was puffed, and there were dark droplets of dried blood on the long scratch. Merely to look like this was another undeserved punishment.

She was standing there applying useless makeup and trying to decide whether the wearing of dark glasses would help or whether it would be better simply to brave things out, when Robert came in.

“I hope you feel better,” he said anxiously.

“I’m fine. I’m just fine. Can’t you see?”

“I see only that you’re hurt. And that hurts me, even though right now you may not think it does. But I am just so sorry, Lynn. So sorry it happened. I can’t tell you.”

“It didn’t just happen: I’m not going to accept that stuff anymore. Somebody made it happen, and I’m not the somebody.”

“I understand how you feel.” Robert was patient now, and contrite. “I realize how it must appear to you. I was angry—we can talk about that some other time—I scared you with my anger, which was wrong of me, and so you ran and then—”

She interrupted. “And then I don’t want to hear any more.”

“All right. Come down and eat your breakfast. Let’s keep things normal in front of the girls. Annie’s just been brought home. I’ve told them about your accident, so they’re prepared.”

“My accident. Ah, yes,” Lynn mocked, wiping off the eye makeup, which made her look like a sick owl. She would just honestly let the girls see she had been crying. They’d see the injuries anyway.

Emily had set the table in the breakfast room. Coffee bubbled in the percolator and bread was in the toaster. Evidently, she had gone outside and picked a spray of lilacs for the green bowl. Emily was a take-charge person.

“You’re up early for someone who went to bed late,” Lynn said pleasantly.

“A bunch of us are driving to the lake,” said Emily, carefully not looking at Lynn’s face, “where Amy’s folks keep the boat. What’s wrong with your foot? You’ve hurt that too?”

“It’s nothing much. I just can’t get a shoe on, so I’ll stay home today.”

Annie was staring at Lynn. “You look awful,” she said. “You’ve been crying too.”

Emily admonished her, “Mind your business, silly.”

Robert spoke. “Your mother hurt herself. Don’t you cry when you’re hurt?”

No one answered. The silence was unhappy, restless with the awareness that it would have to end, and the fear that it would end badly.

“It was twenty minutes after twelve when you walked in last night,” Robert said, addressing Emily. “Did you know that?” he asked, addressing Lynn, who nodded.

“I forgot to look at the time. A bunch of us were studying at Sally’s,” Emily explained.

“That won’t do,” Robert said. “You’re damaging your reputation, if nothing more, coming home at that hour.”

“We’ll talk about it this morning, Emily,” Lynn said.

“No.” Robert looked at his watch. “I have to run. Emily, you are not to leave the house tonight. I want to talk to you. You and I are going to have a very serious talk, straight from the shoulder, one that you won’t forget in a hurry. When I’m through, you’ll know what’s expected of you.”

The emphasis on the “I” was directed at Lynn; she understood that clearly, having been told often enough that she wasn’t firm, didn’t consider appearances, and the girls would never learn from her.

“Oh, what an awful mood,” Emily said when Robert had left.

Annie got up. “I promised Dad I’d practice this morning, and since he’s in a bad mood, I guess I’d better do it,” she said in a tone of resignation.

“That’s not why you should,” Lynn said gently. “You should do it because—well, because you should do it,” she finished with a smile.

When Annie was in the living room drumming out a minuet, Lynn said to Emily, “Sit down while I have my second cup. You shouldn’t stay out so late. You know that without my telling you. Were you really at Sally’s all that time?”

“I was. Believe it or not, we were studying for finals, Mom.”

Robert’s blue eyes looked candidly back at her from Emily’s face.

“I believe you.” And thoughtfully, as if she had weighed whether or not to ask the question, she ventured it. “Was Harris there?”

“Yes. He brought me home.”

“After twelve, your father said.”

“He was sitting in the dark when I came in. Then he came to the hall and stood there just glaring at me. He didn’t say a word, and neither did I.”

“That was wrong of you.”

“I’m sorry, Mom. But he needn’t have looked so ferocious. I know I should have phoned, but I forgot to look at the time. That’s not a crime.”

“I suppose Sally’s mother wasn’t there, as usual?”

“Well, she’s divorced, she goes on dates.” Again the clear eyes met Lynn’s. “So, no, she wasn’t there.”

“Wrong. All wrong,” Lynn said. “And Harris—he’s a fine boy, I see that, and it’s not that we don’t trust you, but—”

“But what, Mom?”

“Your father is very, very angry. You must try to do the right thing, you understand, or you’ll be grounded. You really will, Emily, and there’ll be nothing I can do about it.”

There was a silence except for the balanced cadence of Annie’s minuet.

Emily reached across the table and touched Lynn’s hand. “Mom?” And now the clear, the honest, the lustrous eyes were troubled. “Mom? What’s wrong with Dad? I wish he were like other people’s fathers. He gets so mad. It’s weird.”

On guard now, Lynn answered as if she were making light of the complaint.

“Why? Because he’s going to give you a scolding that you deserve?”

“No. It has nothing at all to do with that.”

“What, then?”

“Oh, things. Just things. He gets so mad sometimes.”

“Everybody gets cranky now and then. He works very hard. Sometimes he’s terribly tired and as you say, it’s only sometimes.”

Emily shook her head. “That’s not what I mean.”

Lynn feared, although she did not want to think specifically of what it was that she feared. So she spoke with a touch of impatience.

“You’ll have to give me an example, since I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Still Emily hesitated, with a wary, doubtful glance at Lynn. Finally she said, “Remember when I met Aunt Jean in the city and she took me to tea? Something happened that I didn’t tell you about.”

“Yes?”

“Don’t be scared, it’s nothing awful. What happened is, we were talking and you know how she likes to tell about old times, when the neighbor’s house burned down and what a cute little boy Dad was, and then suddenly she let something slip about Dad’s first marriage—Mom, how is it we never knew he was married before?”

So that’s all it was. Nothing, or comparatively nothing …

Carefully, Lynn explained, “I don’t really understand why it had to be such a secret, but it’s your father’s life and he wants it that way. That must have been a terribly hard time for him and he simply doesn’t want to be reminded of it. People often do that; they just bury their bad memories.”

“The second Aunt Jean said it she looked horrified, she was so scared that I felt sorry for her. She kept saying how sorry she was, and begged me to promise not to tell, to forget that I’d heard it. And of course I promised.” Emily turned away for a moment and then, turning back to Lynn, admitted with shame that she had broken the promise. “I held back as long as I could, but last week I told Dad.”

“Oh, that was wrong, Emily.”

“I know, and I feel bad about it. You asked about Dad being so angry at me, though, and—”

“And?” Lynn prodded.

“He was absolutely furious. I’ve never seen him like that. Mad, Mom! I couldn’t believe it. He glared at me. That’s no business of yours,’ he told me, ‘and I don’t want the subject to be mentioned ever again. Is that clear?’ It stunned me.”

“I hope he won’t take it out on poor Aunt Jean.”

“I made him promise not to let her know I had told on her. So I guess it will be all right. I hope so.”

Now Lynn wondered whether Jean had said anything more, anything about Robert’s boy, for instance. There must be more pain in that loss than he had ever admitted; it was natural, then, that he would want to forget the boy’s existence. And, worrying, she asked, “Is that all Jean said?”

“Two or three words, and clapped her hand over her mouth. I told you.” Emily frowned in thought, and shook her head in doubt.

“Don’t you ever feel strange about it? If I were you—I mean, you might be passing each other on the street, and not know.”

“Hardly likely. This is a big country. Besides, why should we know each other, in the circumstances? It’s far better that we don’t. Most times a divorce is a closed chapter—understandably.”

“But aren’t you even the least bit curious? I know I would be.”

“You don’t know. One doesn’t know how to act in a situation, or how to feel, until it happens.”

No, I never would have wanted to connect in any way with Robert’s glamor girl, Lynn thought, as always with a slight bitterness, but this morning with an extra bitterness. She remembered when she had first known Robert, raw little girl that she had been, an innocent so unsure of herself, how she had flinched at the thought of Robert making love to her predecessor, so rich, so beautiful and careless, that she could afford to toss such a man away.

It was strange to be having these thoughts at the kitchen table this morning, on this particular morning.

Nervously, Emily played with a spoon. “All the same,” she said, “Dad can be very odd.”

“He’s not, Emily. I don’t want you to say that or think it.”

And suddenly the girl began to cry. “Oh, Mom, why am I afraid to say what I really want to say?”

Again fear, hot as fire, struck Lynn’s heart.

“Emily darling, what is it?”

“Something happened to you last night.”

“Yes, yes, of course it did. I fell in the dark, fell into the hedge.” She laughed. “It was a mess, falling into the hedge. Clumsy.”

“No,” Emily said. The word seemed to choke in her throat. “No. Dad did it. I know it.”

“What? What?” Lynn’s hands clenched together in her lap so that her rings dug into the flesh. “That’s ridiculous. However did you get such an idea? Emily, that’s ridiculous,” she repeated in a high, unnatural tone.

“One time before we moved here, once when you came home from Chicago, I remember, I heard Aunt Helen say something to Uncle Darwin about how awful you looked. She said she thought maybe—”

“Emily, I’m surprised. Really, I am. I’m sure you didn’t hear right. But even if you did, I can’t help what Aunt Helen may have dreamed up.”

“You wouldn’t have cried so last night if it were only the pain. It’s got to be more than that.”

“Only the pain! All those thorns? Well, maybe I’m a coward and a crybaby. Maybe I am, that’s all.”

Emily must not lose faith in her father. It’s damaging forever. A woman remembers her father all her life. My own dearest memories are of my dad. He taught me how to stand up for my rights and how to forgive; when he had to scold he was gentle.…

Lynn quieted her hands, resting them on the tabletop, and made a firm appeal.

“Trust me, Emily. Have I ever lied to you?”

But disbelief remained in the girl’s quivering lips. Two lines formed on her smooth forehead.

“He was so ferocious this morning.”

“Darling, you keep using that nasty word. He was in a hurry to get to the office, I told you. He was distressed.” She spoke rapidly. “Your father’s such a good man! Need I tell you that, for heaven’s sake? And you’re so like him, a hard worker, determined to succeed, and you always do succeed. That’s why you’ve been so close, you two. You’ve had such a special relationship. It hurts me to think you might lose it.”

“Don’t you think it hurts me too? But you have to admit Dad can be very strange.”

“Strange? After all the caring, the loving attention he’s given you all your life?”

“You don’t convince me, Mom.”

“I wish I could.”

“I feel something. It’s stuck inside my head. But I can understand why you’re talking to me this way.”

The kettle whistled, and Emily got up to turn it off. She moved with elegance, even in jeans and sneakers; her slender waist, rounding into the swell of her hips, was womanly, while her skin was as unflawed as a baby’s. Suddenly it seemed to Lynn that she was being condescended to, as if the young girl, out of a superior wisdom, were consoling or patronizing the older woman. Her very stance as she turned her back to stack the dishwasher, the very flip of her ponytail, gave rise in her mother to resentment. And she said somewhat sharply, “I trust you’ll keep these unbecoming thoughts to yourself. And keep them especially away from Annie. That’s an order, Emily.”

Emily spun around. “Do you really think I would hurt Annie any more than she’s already hurt? Annie’s a wreck. I don’t think you realize it.”

This stubborn persistence was too much like Robert’s. Lynn was under attack. Arrows were flying. It was too much. Yet she replied with formal dignity. “You exaggerate. I’m well aware that Annie is going through a difficult stage. But Annie will be just fine.”

“Not if Dad keeps picking on her about being fat,” Emily said, and added a moment later, “I wish things seemed as simple as they used to seem.”

Her forced smile was sad, and it affected Lynn, changing the earlier flash of resentment into pity.

“You’re growing up,” she said wistfully.

“I’m already grown, Mom.”

Across the hall Annie was still pounding at the minuet. Suddenly, as if two hands had come down in full angry force, the melody broke off into a cacophony of shrill chords, as if the piano were making violent protest.

The two women frowned, and Emily said, “She hates the piano. She only does it because he makes her.”

“It’s for her own good. She’ll be glad someday.”

They gave each other a searching look that lasted until Emily broke the tension.

“I’m sorry I said anything this morning. Maybe this is only a mood that will wear away.” From outside came the light tap of a horn. “That’s Harris. I’m off.” The girl leaned down and kissed her mother’s cheek. “Don’t worry about me. I won’t make any trouble. Forget what I said. Maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about. But take care of yourself, Mom. Just take care of yourself.”

The kitchen was very still after Emily went out. Then the screen door slammed on the porch. The dog rose, shook itself, and followed Annie outside. In the silence a plaintive repetition sounded in Lynn’s ears. Dad can be very strange. Take care of yourself, Mom. And as if in a trance she sat with her fingers clasped around the coffee cup, which had long grown cold.

She tried to concentrate on errands to be done, the house to be tidied and clothes to take to the cleaners, all the small ways in which living continues even when the worst things have happened, for if the pipes break on the day of the funeral, one still has to call the plumber. And yet she did not rise to do any of these things.

The doorbell brought her out of her lethargy. Expecting the delivery of some packages, she put her sunglasses back on; they were light and concealed very little, but the United Parcel man would probably not even look at her, and if he did look, wouldn’t care. Barefooted, in her housecoat, she opened the door into the glare of revealing sunlight and faced Tom Lawrence.

“You forgot this,” he said, holding out her purse, “so I thought I’d—” His eyes flickered over her and away.

“Oh, how stupid of me. How nice of you.” Absurd words came out of her mouth. “I look a mess, I fell, sprained my ankle, and can’t get a shoe on.”

He was looking at the tubbed geraniums on the top step. That was decent of him. He had seen, and was embarrassed for her.

“Oh. A sorry end to a wonderful evening. Ankles turn so easily. It takes a few days to get back to normal. I hope you’ll feel better.”

She closed the door. Mortified, she thought, I wish I could dig a hole and crawl into it. What can he be thinking! I never want to see him again. Never.

After a while, with main effort, she recovered. Alone in the house, she could admonish herself out loud.

“What are you doing, not dressed at eleven o’clock? Get moving, Lynn.”

So, slowly and painfully, she limped through the house doing small, unimportant chores, raised or lowered shades according to need, wrote a check at the desk, and threw out faded flowers, allowing these ordinary acts to soothe her spirit as best they could.

Presently she went into the kitchen. For her it had always been the heart of the house, her special place. Here she could concentrate a troubled mind on a difficult new recipe, here feel the good weight of copper-bottom pots in her hands, and here feel quietness.

A lamb stew simmered, filling the room with the smell of rosemary, and an apple pie had cooled on the counter when, late in the afternoon, she heard Robert’s car enter the driveway.

Robert’s mouth was as expressive as his eyes; she could always tell by it what was to come next. Now she saw with relief that his lips were upturned into a half smile.

“Everybody home?”

“The girls will be home in a minute. Emily went to the lake, and Annie’s at a friend’s house.”

“And how are you? You’re still limping. Wouldn’t it feel better with a tight bandage?”

“It’s all right as it is.”

“Well, if you’re sure.” He hesitated. “If that’s Emily”—for there came the sound of wheels on gravel—“I want to talk to her. To both of them. In the den.”

“Can’t it wait until after dinner? I have everything ready.”

“I’d rather not wait,” he answered, walking away.

She thought, He will take out his guilt over me in anger at them.

“Your father wants to see you both in the den,” she told the girls when they came in. As they both grimaced, she admonished them. “Don’t make faces. Listen to what he has to say.”

Never let them sense any differences between their parents about discipline. That’s a cardinal rule for their own good. Rule number one.

Now again her heart was beating so rapidly that she felt only a need to flee, yet she followed them to the den, where Robert stood behind his desk.

He began at once. “We need more order in this house. It’s too slipshod. People come and go as they please without having even the decency to say where they’re going or when they’re coming back. They have no sense of time. Coming home at all hours as they please. You’d think this was a boardinghouse.”

The poor children. What had they done that was so bad? This was absurd. And she thought again: It is his conscience. He has to turn the tables to put himself in the right.

“I want to know whenever and wherever you go to another house, Annie. I want to know with whom you are associating.”

The child stared. “The other fathers aren’t like you. You think this is the army, and you’re the general.”

It was an oddly sophisticated observation to come from the mouth of an eleven-year-old.

“I won’t have your impudence, Annie.”

Robert never raised his voice when he was angry. Yet there was more authority in his controlled anger than in another man’s shouts; memory carried Lynn suddenly back to the office in St. Louis and the dreaded summons from Ferguson to be “reamed out”; she had never received that summons herself, but plenty of others had and never forgot it afterward.

“You’d better get hold of yourself, Annie. You’re no baby anymore, and you’re too fresh. Your schoolwork isn’t good enough, and you’re too fat. I’ve told you a hundred times, you ought to be ashamed of the way you look.”

Gooseflesh rose on Lynn’s cold arms, and she stood there hugging them. It was unbearable to be here, weakened as she was today, but still she stayed as if her presence, silent as she was, was some protection for her children, although she was certainly not protecting them against these words, and there was no need to guard them from anything else. Never, never had Robert, nor would he ever, raise a hand to his girls.

Her mind, straying, came back to the present. He had been saying something about Harris, calling him a “character.” That nice boy. She could not hear Emily’s murmured answer, but she plainly heard Robert’s response.

“And I don’t want to see him every time I walk into my home. I’m sick of looking at him. If I wanted a boy, I’d adopt one.”

Annie, whose face had turned a wounded red, ran bawling to the door and flung it open so violently that it crashed against the wall.

“I hate everybody! I hate you, Dad!” she screamed. “I wish you would die.”

With her head high, tears on her cheeks and looking straight ahead, Emily walked out.

In Robert’s face Lynn saw the reflection of her own horror. But he was the first to lower his eyes.

“They needed what they got,” he said. “They’re not suffering.”

“You think not?”

“They’ll get over it. Call them back down to eat a proper dinner in the dining room.”

“No, Robert. I’m going to bring their supper upstairs and leave them in peace. But yours is ready for you.”

“You eat if you can. I have no appetite.”

She went upstairs with plates for Emily and Annie, which they both refused. Sick at heart, she went back to the kitchen and put the good dinner away. Even the clink of the dishes was loud enough to make her wince. When it grew dark, she went outside and sat down on the steps with Juliet, who was the sole untroubled creature in that house. Long after the sky grew dark, she sat there, close to the gentle animal, as if to absorb some comfort from its gentleness. I am lost, she said to herself. An image came to her of someone fallen off a ship, alone on a raft in an empty sea.

And that was the end of Saturday.

On Sunday the house was still in mourning. In their rooms the girls were doing homework, or so they said when she knocked. Perhaps, poor children, they were just sitting in gloom, not doing much of anything. In the den Robert was bent over papers at the desk, with his open briefcase on the floor beside him. No one spoke. The separation was complete. And Lynn had a desolate need to talk, to be consoled. She thought of the people who loved her, and had loved her: her parents, both gone now, who would have forfeited their lives for her just as she would do for Emily and Annie; of Helen, who—and here she had to smile a bit ruefully—would give a little scolding along with comfort; and then of Josie. But to none of these would she or could she speak. Her father would have raged at Robert. And Helen would think, even if she might not say, “You remember, I never liked him, Lynn.” And Josie would analyze. Her eyes would search and probe.

No. None of these. And she thought as always: Marriage is a magic circle that no outsider must enter, or the circle will never close again. Whatever is wrong must be solved within the circle.

She walked through the house and the yard doing useless make-work, as she had done the day before. In the living room she studied Robert’s photo, but today the rather austere face told her nothing except that it was handsome and intelligent. In the yard the two new garden benches that he had ordered from a catalog stood near the fence. He was always finding ways to brighten the house, to make living more pleasant. He had hung thatched-roof birdhouses in secluded places, and one was already occupied by a family of wrens. He had bought a book of North American birds and was studying it with Annie, or trying to anyway, for the child’s attention span was short. But he tried. So why, why was he—how, how could he—

The telephone rang in the kitchen, and she ran inside to answer it.

“Bruce went fishing yesterday,” Josie reported, “and brought home enough for a regiment. He wants to do them on the outdoor grill. How about all of you coming over for lunch?”

Lynn lied quickly. “The girls are studying for exams, and Robert is working at his desk. I don’t dare disturb him.”

“Well, but they do need to eat,” Josie said sensibly. “Let them come, eat, and run.”

She was always sensible, Josie was. And at that moment this reasonableness of hers had its effect on Lynn, so that she said almost without thinking, “But I’ll come by myself, if that’s all right with you.”

“Of course,” said Josie.

Driving down Halsey Road through the estate section, and then through the town past the sportswear boutiques, the red-brick colonial movie, and the saddlery shop, all at Sunday-morning rest, she began to regret her hasty offer. Since she had no intention of confiding in Josie, she would have to make small talk, or at least Josie’s version of small talk, which would involve the front page of The New York Times. Yet she did not go back, but drove through the little town and out to where the great estates had long ago been broken up, where new tract houses stood across from the pseudo-Elizabethan tract houses that had been put there in the twenties.

It was one of these that the Lehmans had bought, a little house with mock-oak beams and leaded glass windows. It was a rather cramped little house.

“He can afford better,” Robert had remarked with some disdain.

And Lynn had answered innocently, “Josie told me they couldn’t afford anything better because of her medical expenses.”

Robert had exclaimed, “What? Well, that’s undignified, to say the least, going all over the neighborhood telling people about one’s business.”

“She’s not going all over the neighborhood. We’re friends.”

“Friends or not, the woman talks too much. I hope you don’t learn bad habits from her.” And then he had said, “Bruce is cheap. He thinks small. I saw that from the beginning.”

But Bruce wasn’t “cheap.” Josie’s sickness had cost a small fortune, and as Josie herself had said, who knew what was yet to come? It was she who hadn’t let him spend more. He would have given the stars to her if he could.

He was in the backyard when she drove up, sanding a chest of drawers, concentrating with his glasses shoved up into his curly brown hair.

He summoned Lynn. “Come, look at my find. What a job! I picked it up at an antiques barn way past Litchfield last week. Must have twenty coats of paint on it. I have a hunch there’s curly maple at the bottom. Well, we’ll see.”

His enthusiasm was appealing to her. His full lips were always slightly upturned, even in repose; she had the impression that he could sometimes hardly contain a secret inner happiness. A cleft in his chin gave sweetness to a face that, with its high cheekbones and jutting nose, might best be described as “rugged.” A “man’s man,” you could say; but then she thought, a “man’s man” is all the more a woman’s man too.

“You’ve really been having a great time with your antiques since you moved east,” she said.

When she moved from the shade into the glare he saw her face. For an instant his eyes widened before he bent back over his work and replied, as though he had seen nothing.

“Well, of course, New England’s the place. You can’t compare it with Missouri for early Americana. You’d think that the old villages had been combed through so long now that there’d be nothing left, but you’d be surprised. I even found a comb-back Windsor. It needs a lot of work, but I’ve got weekends, and with daylight saving I can squeeze in another hour when I get back from the city. Where’s Robert? Still working, I think Josie said?”

“Yes, as usual, he’s at his desk with a pile of papers,” she replied, sounding casual.

“I admire his energy. To say nothing of his headful of ideas. There’s no stopping him.” Smiling, Bruce turned back to the sander. “As for me, I’m driving my wife crazy with this stuff. She doesn’t care about antiques.”

“She cares about you, and that’s what matters,” Lynn told him, and went inside conscious of having blurted out something too serious for the time and place.

Josie was on the sun porch with the paper and a cup of tea. She looks thin, Lynn thought, thinner since I last saw her a week ago. Still, her bright expression of welcome and her strong voice were the same as always. The body had betrayed the spirit. And this thought, coming upon her own agitation, almost brought tears to Lynn.

“Why, whatever’s happened to you?” Josie cried, letting the paper slide to the floor. “Your face! Your legs!”

“Nothing much. I slipped and fell. Clumsy.”

“Is that why you’ve been crying?”

“That, and a silly mood. Forget it.”

“It would be sillier to forget it. You came for a reason.”

Lynn tucked her long cotton skirt over her spotted legs. “I fell into the hawthorn hedge in the dark.”

“So it hurts. But what about the mood?”

“Oh, it’s just been a bad day. The house is in turmoil, perhaps because they got upset over me. And we just don’t seem to know sometimes how to handle the girls. Although it will straighten out, I’m sure. When you called, I suppose at that moment I needed a shoulder to cry on, but now that I’m here, I know I shouldn’t have come.”

Josie regarded her from head to foot. “Yes, you should have come. Let me get you a cup of tea, and then you can tell me what’s on your mind. Or not tell me, as you please.” She went quickly to the door and turning, added, “I hope you will tell me.”

“We don’t seem to know how to handle the girls,” Lynn repeated. “But you know our problems already. I needn’t tell you that Robert doesn’t approve of Emily’s boyfriend. And Annie won’t try to lose weight, she stuffs herself, and Robert can’t stand that.”

She stopped, thinking again, I shouldn’t have come here to dump all this on her. She looks so tired, I’m tired myself, and nothing will come of all these prattling half-truths, anyway.

“I do know all that,” Josie said. “But I don’t think you’re telling me the whole story,” she added, somewhat sternly.

Like my sister, Lynn thought, she can be stern and soft at the same time, which is curious. I never could be.

“They’re good girls—”

“I know that too.”

“Maybe I’m making a mountain out of a molehill. These are hard times in which to rear children. I’m sure lots of families have problems worse than ours. Yes, I am making too much of it,” Lynn finished, apologizing.

“I don’t think you are.”

There was a silence in which Lynn struggled first with words that were reluctant to be said, and finally with words that struggled equally hard to be released.

“Yesterday Robert was furious because Emily came home too late.”

“Do you think she did?”

“Yes, only I wouldn’t have been so angry about it. And Annie, you know she wants to have her hair straightened and Robert says that’s ridiculous, and there is always something going on between Robert and Annie, although he does try hard. Yesterday she screamed at him. She was hysterical, almost. She hates everybody. She hates him.” And Lynn, ceasing, gave Josie an imploring look.

“Tell me, is it only Robert who is having this trouble with the girls? Just Robert?”

“Well, yes. It’s hard for a man to come home from a trying day and have to cope with children, when what he needs most is rest. Especially a man with Robert’s responsibilities.”

“We all have our responsibilities,” Josie said dryly.

For a moment neither woman said more. It was as if they had reached an impasse. Lynn shifted uncomfortably in the chair. When Josie spoke again, she was careful to look away from Lynn and down at her own fingernails, saying with unusual softness, “Isn’t there anything more?”

Lynn drew back in alarm. “Why, no. What should there be?”

“I only asked,” said Josie.

And suddenly Lynn began to cry. Muffled broken phrases came through her tears.

“It wasn’t just the children this time. It was because of me—at Tom Lawrence’s house—it was too late, and Robert came—and I was dancing—Robert was angry, really so awfully—of course I knew I shouldn’t have been dancing, but—”

“Now, wait. Let me get this straight. You were dancing with Tom, and Robert—”

“He was furious,” sobbed Lynn, wiping her eyes.

“What the hell was wrong with dancing? You weren’t in bed with the man. What do you mean, you shouldn’t have been? I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous,” Josie said hotly. She paused, frowned as if considering the situation, and then spoke more quietly. “And so you went home and had an argument near the thorn hedge and—”

Lynn put up her hand as if to stop traffic. “No, no, it wasn’t—” she began. For a red warning had flashed in her head. Robert is Bruce’s superior in the firm. It won’t do, no matter how much I care about Bruce and Josie, for me to undermine Robert at his work. I’ve said too much already. Stupid. Stupid.

It was just then that Bruce came into the room.

“I’m taking time out. You don’t mind, Boss?” he began, and stopped abruptly. “Am I interrupting anything? You two look so sober.”

Lynn blinked away the moisture that had gathered again in her eyes. “I was spilling out some minor troubles, that’s all.”

Josie corrected her. “They are not minor, Lynn.”

“I’ll leave you both,” Bruce said promptly.

But Lynn wanted him. It would have been inappropriate and subject to misinterpretation for her to tell him: Your presence helps me. You are so genuine. So she said only, “Please stay.”

“You’ve told me, and since I would tell Bruce anyway after you left, he might as well hear it from me now.” And as Lynn sat like a patient, listening miserably while a pair of doctors discussed her case, Josie repeated the brief, disjointed story.

Bruce had sat down in an easy chair. His legs rested on an ottoman, while his arms were folded comfortably behind his head. This informal posture, and his deliberate, considering manner of speech, were reassuring.

“So you had a row over the girls. Does it happen often?”

“Oh, no, not at all. Annie and Robert—”

Bruce put his hand up. “I don’t think you should be talking to me about Robert,” he said gently.

Lynn felt the rebuke. She ought to have remembered Bruce’s sense of ethics. And she stood up, saying quickly, “I’ve really got to run home and see about lunch. We can talk another time.”

“Wait,” said Bruce. “Josie, do you agree with me that Lynn needs advice? You’re much too close to her to give it, but don’t you think somebody should?”

“Definitely.”

“What’s the name of that fellow you knew who went into counseling, Josie? You had such a high opinion of him, and he settled in Connecticut, I think.”

“Ira Miller,” Josie said promptly. “You’d like him, Lynn. I can get you the address from my alumni bulletin. I’ll just run upstairs.”

“I’m not sure I want to do this,” Lynn told Bruce when they were alone.

“You have lovely girls,” he said quietly. “Your little Annie is my special person. You know that. And if they’re a problem or making trouble, you need to find out why, don’t you?”

He was trying not to look at her face or her dreadful legs when he repeated the question. “Don’t you?”

“I suppose so.”

“You know so, Lynn.”

“Yes.” They were right. She had to talk to somebody. There was a volcano in her head, ready to erupt in outrage and grief. Relief must come. It must. And it was true that to a stranger she would be able to say what she could not say to these old friends: My husband did this to me.

“I called him for you,” Josie reported. “I took the liberty of making an appointment for you tomorrow afternoon. He couldn’t have been nicer. Here’s the address.”

As they walked Lynn to her car, Bruce said, “I hear your dinner was a big success.”

“Goodness, how did you hear that?”

“Tom Lawrence. I met him yesterday morning jogging.”

“Oh, dear, I suppose he told you how awful I looked when he came to the house to return my purse? I was still in my housecoat, and—”

“The only thing he told me was that you should do something with your talent, and I agree.”

“It’ll be about half an hour’s drive tomorrow,” Josie said. She smiled encouragement. “And that’s even allowing time for getting lost.”

“Good luck,” Bruce called as Lynn drove away.

Robert, finding the reminder on Lynn’s writing desk, demanded, “Dr. Miller, three o’clock. What kind of doctor is this?”

These were the first words he had spoken to her that Sunday, and she gave him a short answer. “What are you doing at my desk?”

“I was looking in your address book for a periodontist that somebody asked about.”

“I don’t look at things on your desk.”

“I never said you shouldn’t. I have no secrets.” He strode to the large flattop on the other side of the room. “Come on. Look. Open any drawer you want.”

“I don’t want to open any drawer, Robert. All right, I’ll tell you. Dr. Miller is a therapist. That’s what we’ve come to.”

“That’s not necessary, Lynn.” He spoke quietly. “You don’t need it.”

“But I do. And you need to go too. Will you?”

“Definitely not. We had a disagreement. What’s so extraordinary? People have disagreements all the time and get over them. No doubt this is some bright idea of Josie’s.”

“It is not,” she answered truthfully.

“Bruce’s, then.”

Hating to lie, she did not answer.

“I’m not spending money on this stuff, Lynn. I work too hard for it. Paying some stranger to listen to your troubles.” His voice rose now, not in anger but in plaint. “I’ve never prevented you from buying anything you wanted, have I? Just look around at this house.” His arm swept out over the leather chairs, the tawny rug, and the golden light on the lawn beyond the windows.

“Furniture isn’t everything, or rings either,” she responded, twisting the diamond on her finger.

“I should think you’d be ashamed to go and spill out your personal affairs. You’re overreacting, you’re over-emotional. A man and wife have a nasty argument, and you behave as if the end of the world had come. No, I don’t want you to go. Listen to me, Lynn—”

But she had already left the room.

In midafternoon the turnpike was an almost vacant path through a pastel landscape, pink cherry bloom, white apple bloom, and damp green leafage. The station wagon rolled along so easily that Lynn, turning off at the exit, found herself an hour too early for her appointment.

She drew up before a square house on a quiet street of developer’s houses, all alike, except that this one possessed a wing with a separate entrance. A dirt bike propped against the wall of the garage and a glimpse of a jungle gym in the backyard were encouraging; the man would be experienced, and his words would not all come out of books.

Thinking it absurd to sit in the car for an hour, she rang the bell. A nondescript woman in a purple printed dress, who might have been either the doctor’s wife or his mother, opened the door. No, the doctor was not in yet, but Lynn might come inside and wait.

The wait felt very, very long. Now that she had taken this great step, now that she was actually here, an anxious haste overcame her. Let me get this over with, it pleaded. As the minutes went by so slowly, so slowly, a faint fear began to crawl up from the pit of her stomach, to quicken her heart and lump itself in her throat. And she tried to stamp the fear out with reassurance: It is like waiting for your turn at the dentist’s, that’s all it is.

But this office was too small. There was no willing stranger to talk with or even to observe.

Her heart was racing now. She crossed the little room, took a couple of magazines, and was unable to read. Nothing made sense, neither the summer fashions nor the economic development of Eastern Europe. Nothing. She got up to examine the pictures on the wall, skillful portraits and pictures of places where the subjects of the portraits had been. Here they were posed on beaches, in ski clothes, and smiling under the iron arches of the Eiffel Tower. When she had seen all these, she sat down again with her heart still racing.

What was she to say to this unknown man? How to start? Perhaps he might ask why she had come to him. How, then, would she explain? Opening sentences formed and reformed silently on her lips. Well, on Saturday night there was a terrible scene. Cruel, bitter words were spoken, words that I had not dreamed could be said in our home, where we loved—love each other. But on the other hand, don’t all children sometimes say that they hate their parents? So that it means nothing, really? Really? But Emily said that Robert … that Robert …

A husky middle-aged man appeared at the inner door. They matched, he and the woman in the purple print, so she must be his wife, Lynn thought absurdly, and was at the same instant aware that she was not thinking straight.

“Will you come in, please, Mrs. Ferguson?”

When she stood up, the walls whirled, and she had to grasp the back of the chair.

“I’m suddenly not feeling well, Doctor.” The words came brokenly. “Maybe it’s the flu or something. I don’t know. I’m dizzy. It just came over me. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll come again. I’ll pay for this visit. I’m sorry,” she stammered.

The man’s eyes, magnified by thick glasses, regarded her gravely. And she was suddenly reminded of her bruises, the unsightly marks on which scabs had not yet formed.

“I had—you can see—I had a little accident. I fell. We have a thorn hedge, so pretty, but those thorns, like needles—”

“Oh? An accident?” He paused. “Well, you mustn’t drive while you’re dizzy, you know. Please come in and rest in a comfortable chair until you feel better.”

Feeling forced to obey, she took her seat in a large leather chair, laid her head back, and closed her eyes. She could hear papers rustling on the desk, the opening and closing of a drawer, and the pounding of her blood in her ears.

After a while a pleasant voice caused her to open her eyes.

“You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to.”

“It does seem foolish to sit here and say nothing. Really, really, I think I should go,” she repeated, as if she were begging permission.

“If you like, of course. But I don’t think you’re coming down with the flu.”

“The dizziness is gone at least, so perhaps not.”

“I am curious to know why you came here at all. Can you tell me that much?”

“It’s strange. I imagined you would ask me that.”

“And did you imagine what your answer would be?”

“Josie—Josie Lehman said I should ask advice.” She wiped her sweating palms on a handkerchief. “We don’t, I mean, sometimes my husband and I don’t seem to handle the children, I mean we don’t always agree. We have a teenage daughter and a girl of eleven, she’s very sensitive, too fat, and my husband wants her to lose weight, and of course he’s right, and you see—well, this weekend there were, there were misunderstandings, a quarrel, you see, and Annie, she’s the younger one, told Robert she hated him, and I didn’t quite know what to do.”

And Emily said: Dad did it to you.

I can’t, I can’t say that.

Lynn’s eyes filmed. Fiercely she wiped the damned humiliating tears away. She had vowed not to cry.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured.

“That’s all right. Why not cry if you need to?”

“So. So that’s what it is, you see. Maybe I’m exaggerating. Now that I hear myself, I think I probably am. It’s one of my faults. I get too emotional.”

There were a few moments of silence until the pleasant voice addressed her again.

“You haven’t told me anything about your husband.”

“Oh, Robert, Robert is an unusual man. You don’t often meet anyone like him, a Renaissance man, you might say. People do say. He has so many talents, everyone admires him, his scholarship and energy, he does so much good in the community and takes so much time with the children, their education, so much time—”

I hate you.

Dad did it to you.

“Yes?” said the voice, encouraging.

“I don’t know what else to say. I—”

“You’ve told me what your husband does for the children and for the community, but not what he does for you.”

“Well, he’s very generous, very thoughtful and—” She stopped. It was impossible; she was not able to say it; she should not have come here.

“Is that all? Tell me, for instance, whether you are often angry at each other.”

“Well, sometimes Robert gets angry, of course. I mean, people do, don’t they? And often it’s my fault—”

Nausea rose into her throat, and she was cold. On a blazing summer afternoon she felt gooseflesh on her arms. And she stood abruptly in a kind of panic, wanting only to flee.

“No, I can’t say any more today. No, no, I’m not dizzy now, truly I’m not. I can drive. It’s just a headache, a touch of fever. I am coming down with something after all. I know I am. But I’ll come back,” she said. “I surely will. I know I should.”

Asking no more, the doctor stood and opened the door.

“I’ll give you an appointment, Mrs. Ferguson. I’m going away for three weeks. When I come back, if you want to keep the appointment, I will be glad to talk to you. And in the meantime it would be a good idea to keep a daily record of everything you all do together. Write it down, the happy hours as well as the other kind. Then well talk. If you wish,” he repeated. “Will you do that?”

“Yes, yes, I will. And thank you, thank you so much,” she said.

Safely alone in the car, safely away from the measuring eyes behind the thick glasses, she felt at first a deep relief. But very gradually, as the distance between herself and those eyes increased, and the distance between herself and home diminished, she began to feel instead the heat of a cowardly shame, as if she had been caught in some dishonorable act, a harmful lie, a demeaning theft, or as if she had been found wandering demented through the streets in her underwear. Why, why, had she not told the whole truth? The man had known there was something else. He had seen right through her.

The after-work traffic was heavy, so it was past the dinner hour when she reached home to find Robert’s car already in the garage. Ready for a confrontation, she steadied herself and walked into the house. Well, I did it, she would say, and I’ll face right up to him. Yes, I’ll say, I’m going again, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

They were all still at table. Robert got up and pulled out Lynn’s chair, Annie smiled, and Emily said, “I put your chicken casserole into the microwave and made a salad, Mom. I hope you weren’t saving the casserole for anything. I didn’t know.”

“Saving it for all of you, dear. And thank you, Emily. You’re as helpful as my right hand.”

“Annie set the table,” Emily said pointedly.

“If I had two right hands, then you’d be the other one, Annie.”

The atmosphere was tranquil. One could always sense something as palpable as wind or temperature in a room where any strong emotions, healthy or otherwise, had stirred the air. Here, now, a breeze rippled the white silk curtains, Juliet dozed under the table, and three calm faces turned to Lynn. Can they all have forgotten? she asked herself incredulously. It was true that Robert’s black moods could quickly, with the flip of a coin, turn golden. Also it was true that, when in his own golden mood, he knew how to charm a person whom he had just hurt and angered. Besides, the girls had the wonderful, forgetful resilience of youth. For that at least, she should be thankful. Still, it was astonishing to see them all sitting there like that.

Annie inquired, “Where were you so late, Mommy?”

“Oh, I had the usual errands and didn’t look at my watch.”

Unconsciously, Lynn glanced toward Robert, whose glance, above the rim of his cup, met hers. He put the cup down, and she looked away.

“Aren’t you going to tell Mom now?” asked Emily, addressing Robert.

At once alarmed, Lynn gave a little cry. “Tell Mom what? Has something happened?”

“Something very nice, I think,” Emily said.

Robert, reaching into his jacket pocket, drew out a long envelope and, with a satisfied air, handed it to Lynn.

“Plane tickets,” he told her.

“Kennedy to San Juan and transfer to St.—” she read. “Robert! What on earth?”

“Ten days in the Caribbean. We leave Saturday morning. That gives you a few days to get ready and to feel better.” He wore a proud smile. “Now, what do you say to that?”

What I want to say, she thought, is: How dare you! What do you think I am? Instead, and only because the girls were present, she replied, “The girls can’t miss school, Robert. I don’t know what can be in your mind.”

“They aren’t going to miss school. This vacation is for you and me.”

It was a cheap—no, an expensive—bribe. She could feel the heat in her cheeks. And still for the girls’ sake, she said evenly, “It makes no sense. Who’ll be in charge here? I’m not walking away and leaving a household to fend for itself.”

“Of course not. That’s all been taken care of. I’ve spent the whole day making arrangements. Eudora will sleep in while we’re gone. The girls use the school bus, and if there’s need to go anyplace, Eudora’ll take them in her car or Bruce and Josie will, on the weekends. I talked to Bruce,” Robert explained. “They’ll be glad to take the girls to the town pool, and Bruce will drive Annie to her tennis lesson. I don’t want her to miss it, and he doesn’t mind.”

Annie, who returned Bruce’s love tenfold, now interjected a plea. “You know I like going with Uncle Bruce, Mommy. Please say yes, Mommy.”

“So you see, it’s all arranged. No problems. Nothing to do but pack a few clothes,” Robert said positively.

Feeling trapped, Lynn pushed away from the table, saying only, “We’ll talk about it later. I don’t like having things sprung on me like this. Now, you have homework, girls. Leave the kitchen; I’ll clean up by myself.”

When she went upstairs, Robert followed. Once in their room, she turned on him.

“You think you can bribe me, don’t you? It’s unspeakable.”

“Please. There’s no bribe intended, only a cure. A cure for what ails us.”

“It’ll take more than ten days in the island paradise,” she said sarcastically. “A whole lot more, to do that.”

At the window she stood with her back to him. The view of trees and hill, always so restful to her soul, was melancholy now as the hill hid the lowering sun and shadowed the garden.

“The girls want us to go. You heard them.”

Of course they do, she thought. It will be an adventure for them to lord it over the house with their parents away. Why not? And she thought, too, now with a twinge of unease, Emily will stay out too late with Harris.

Robert persisted. “I’m not worried about them, you know. Bruce and Josie are as dependable as you and I are.”

Yes, she thought, when they can be useful, you will use the Lehmans, even though you don’t like them. Still she said nothing, only, for some unconscious reason, turned up her palms, on which tiny dark-red scabs like polka dots had begun to form.

“I don’t want to go,” she said abruptly.

“You saw that man today,” he said.

“I did,” she retorted, “and what of it?”

“I didn’t believe you would. I’m completely shocked. I didn’t think you really meant to.”

“I meant to, Robert.”

“And what did he—”

“Oh, no!” she cried. “You don’t ask a question like that. Don’t you know any better? Unless you will consent to go with me.”

“If it will satisfy you,” he said, seizing her words. “I don’t believe we need anything except to get away together. But if it will satisfy you, I will do anything,” he finished humbly.

And she stood there still staring at her hands.

“We’re tired, both of us.” He, whose speech was always so deliberate, now rushed and stumbled. “This last year or two has been hectic, there’s been no rest, you and I have scarcely had an hour alone together. The new house for you, new office and work for me. New faces for me, new schools, friends, all these hard adjustments—”

In the face of his distress she felt triumphant, and yet something in her had to pity that distress.

“Listen. I know my temper’s hot, but I don’t lose it often, you have to admit. And I’m always sorry as hell afterward. Not that that does much good, I know. But I’m not a bad sort, Lynn, and I love you.”

From below came the sound of Annie’s plodding minuet. Emily came bounding upstairs to answer her ringing phone. As if he had read Lynn’s mind—as he almost always could—Robert said softly, “They need us, Lynn. Our children need us both. We can’t punish them. Let’s put this crazy business behind us. Please.”

“Oh,” she said with a heavy sigh.

He paced the room while again his words rushed.

“I was jealous, I was furious that night. The sight of you dancing with that man when I had been worried about you made me frantic. You looked so intimate together. I realize now how stupid it was of me. You’re an innocent woman, you could never—” And he stopped while his eyes went bright with the start of tears. “Then you said there was something wrong with me.”

“I was very, very angry, Robert, and I still am.”

“All right. Angry or not, will you go? For the family’s sake, will you go?” He laid the thick envelope on the dresser. “I was lucky to get these tickets. They’re all booked up for honeymooners this time of year, but there was a cancellation. So you see, it was meant to be. Oh, Lynn, forgive me.”

He was still standing there, with the tears still brilliant on his lashes, when without replying, she turned away.

Down the long road beside the marshes the plane sped, raised itself mightily into the bright air, and circled southward.

“Well, here we are,” said Robert.

Lynn said nothing. Nothing was required. Resentment was still sore in her, burning like ill-digested food. Because of her wish to be finished with a hideous anger, to conceal from her children whatever could be concealed, she had been led and inveigled, tricked, into sitting where she now sat.

“You’ll be glad you’ve gone,” he said soothingly.

She turned the full force of her scorn upon him. “Glad? That’ll be the day.”

Robert, with a look of appeal, pursed his lips to caution: Shh. They were sitting three abreast. An old man, so hugely fat that his bulk hung over his seat into Robert’s space, sat by the window. The aisle seat was Lynn’s.

“Miserably cramped,” Robert murmured. “First class was taken up, dammit.”

Ignoring him, she took a book out of her carry-on and settled back. It had always been her way to “make the best” of things, and whether she liked to admit it to herself or not, there was, even in these circumstances, a certain anticipation of pleasure in the sight of palms and blue water. Having spent most of her life in the Midwest, she still found these a marvelous novelty; she had visited the lovely, lazy Caribbean islands only twice before. There’s no point, she argued now, in wearing a hair shirt. I shall swim, I’ve brought three great books, and luckily for me, I’m thin enough so that I can afford to eat; I hope the food will be good. And I don’t have to talk to Robert.

He mumbled again, “I’m going to try for first class going home. I can’t tolerate this. It’s worse than the subway.”

When she did not comment, he made no further effort, and little more was said between them all the rest of the way.

From the balcony on the first morning, she looked out upon water and sky. There was no one in sight except for the beachboys, who were setting up a row of yellow umbrellas, and far out a little bobbing boat with a Roman-striped sail. I suppose, she thought idly, if one were to head straight east from here, one would land someplace in northern Africa.

“Why, you’re up early,” Robert said brightly. “You beat me this morning. Wonderful, isn’t it?”

“Yes. I’m going for a walk on the beach.”

“If you’ll wait a minute, I’ll go with you.”

“Thank you, but I want to walk by myself.”

“All right,” he said agreeably.

The sun had not been up long, and the air was still cool. She walked easily on the firm sand at the water’s edge, left the hotel’s property behind, and continued along what seemed to be an unending stretch of beach edged by pine grove, beach grape, and clustered greenery nameless to her. Occasionally, she passed what must be the winter homes of American or British millionaires, low, gracious houses steeped in the shade of banyan and flamboyant trees.

Rounding an abrupt curve, she faced a grassy hill that blocked her path, steep as a ladder, with water on three sides. It would be a struggle to the top, but not daunted, she began the climb. Once there and breathless, she sat down to look about and gaze and was struck with the kind of wonder that fills the soul in some ancient, high cathedral.

No, not so. For here was a far greater splendor. Such blue! Almost green at the shore where the green hill was reflected, this water shaded into purest turquoise; then three quarters of the way to the horizon lay a broad band of cobalt so even as to have been drawn with a ruler. On the farthest outer edge the horizon was a thin, penciled line, above which there spread another blue, the calm, eternal blue of a sky without cloud.

The wind rushed and the tide in soporific rhythm splashed on the rocks below. Before her lay an immense dazzle, the mysterious power of brilliant light; so it had been for untold eons and would be for untold eons more, she thought, until the sun should burn itself out and the earth freeze. The thought was hardly original, but that made it no less awesome.

Lying back on the rough sweet grass, she looked up at the shimmering sky. All the transient things, the injustice, the hurt, the unfairness, what were they in the end that we should waste our lives on them? My God, how short life was!

Now came a flock of seabirds, racing from nowhere, turning and turning in their descent to skim the water and soar again upward. They were so joyous—could birds be joyous?—and she laughed at herself for thinking so and at her own pleasure in watching them. And her first thoughts returned with a thrill of sorrow, repeating: How short life is. And we walk with blinders on.

For half an hour or maybe longer, she lay while the hilltop breeze cooled the sun’s burning. Stretching, she felt how young and healthy her body was. Even her foot was beginning to ease, and the heat seemed to soothe her wounds. She felt a surge of strength, as if she had absorbed the power of the light, as if she possessed the power to do anything, to bear anything, to solve anything.

Then she lectured aloud. After all, Lynn, he didn’t want, he didn’t try, to hurt you. He’s beside himself now with regret and guilt. This can go on forever, this rage of yours, if you allow it to. But it will corrode you if you do. Listen, he could have been eaten up with rage at you because of our tragedy, our Caroline.…

And she reflected, I shouldn’t have stayed late at that damn-fool dinner. That’s what began it all. I should not have let myself be lured into staying. What if I had been waiting at home for Robert and then found him having a careless good time with a pretty woman?

She remembered Tom Lawrence’s cheek so close to her own, almost touching, his mischievous, clever eyes, bright like his hair and his fresh skin, and the cheerful effects of this brightness. You have such sweet eyes, a sweet mouth, Lynn. Flattery, all flattery, possibly with the hope that it might lead to something, and possibly not that at all. How was she to know? I know so little, she thought. Married at twenty and sheltered ever since, when and where could I have learned about the world?

No, she said then to herself, and sat up. Naïveté like that is inexcusable. I should have known better. I should at least have been smart enough to foresee consequences. My husband has a temper, that shouldn’t be news to me.…

Our children need us, he’d said. It’s true, she thought now, he is never too tired or busy to do something for them. Waiting in Washington between planes, he hails a taxi to the National Gallery of Art. We can show them a good many pictures in ninety minutes, he says, imbuing us all with his energy. He gets out of the hammock where he has been resting and runs into the house to fetch the encyclopedia because he wants to make sure he has given his daughter the best answer to her question. He sits up all night with Annie when she has her tonsils out.

He could also be harsh with them, and too demanding. Yes, yes, I know. But they were quite fine the last two days before we came here. Regardless of everything, they do love him. People say things they don’t really mean.

Our children need us. They need us both.

There’s nothing that can’t be worked out by applying some simple common sense.

Back in the room, a note lay on a table next to a book. The note said, Gone to breakfast I’ll be in the dining room or else on the beach. The book was opened to a poem, a poem that Lynn did not need to read because she almost knew it by heart. Nevertheless, she read it again.

“O fierce and shy, Your glance so piercing-true

Shot fire to the struck heart that was as tinder—

The fire of your still loveliness, the tender

High fortitude of the spirit shining through.

And the world was young. O—”

She laid the book down and shivered. He had given these poems to her when they were first married, and they had often read them together; sometimes he had read aloud in his grave, expressive voice; they had been so madly in love.

“The high fortitude of the spirit shining through.

And the world was young—”

“Oh, Robert,” she said.

She found him reading on the beach. At her approach he looked up, questioning.

“I’ve come to bury the hatchet,” she told him shyly.

Two poor tears sprang into the corners of his eyes, and he took her hand into his and held it. It seemed to her that a stream of common blood was running through their joined hands. She felt the pride and relief of calm forgiveness.

“You read the poem?” When she nodded, he cried anxiously, “Lynn, Lynn, you’re everything in the world to me. Without you I’m nothing. You do know that, don’t you? Are we all right again? Are we?”

“Let’s not talk about it anymore. It’s over.”

“We can have our bad times, but at least they don’t last. Right, darling?” He jumped up. “Well, as you say, enough. What shall we do first, now? Jog or swim?”

“Let’s walk. There’s something I want to show you, where I’ve been.”

So they retraced her path between the incoming tide and the silver twisted branches of the sea grape, past the fine houses in their gardens, Robert speculating on the price of each.

“Hey! How far is this thing you want to show me? Aren’t you tired yet? This is your second trip.”

“No, I’m a walker, and it’s worth ten trips. You’ll see.”

“You’re as young as you ever were.”

It was true. Her body in the scarlet swimsuit was as taut and limber as it had been when she was twenty. And rejoicing in this health, in the breezy morning and the decent peace she had made, she strode, ignoring her slight limp, up the hill.

They stood quite still at the top.

“I see what you mean,” Robert whispered.

This time, though, there was a sign of life in view: a white yacht moving sedately on a line with the horizon.

“Look at that grand thing,” he said. “Wouldn’t you love to own it? We could go off to the South Seas, all around the world.”

“No,” she responded seriously, “even if we could afford it, which we likely never will, I wouldn’t want it.”

He shook his head as if she were beyond understanding.

“What do you want? Don’t you ever want anything?”

Still very seriously, she told him, “Only peace and love, that’s all. Peace and love.”

“You have them. You shall have them.” He dropped down on the grass. “Sit here. Let’s stay a minute.” When she complied, he turned serious too. “I know I’m not always easy to live with. I’m not home enough. I’m a workaholic. And you’re very patient, I know that too. At the office and on the commuter train I hear stories that can make one’s hair stand on end, about women having nervous breakdowns, drinking alone during the day, or else having an affair with a hairdresser.” He laughed. “Imagine you having an affair! I think you’d flee in terror if a man were to lay a hand on you. And when I hear all this, don’t think I fail to appreciate what you are, the time and effort you put in with the children, your solid health, your good cheer, everything. I should do more. I should take more upon myself.”

“You do plenty. More than many fathers do. Much more,” she said sincerely.

“No, I should do better. You don’t play piano, so you can’t help Annie with it. I was thinking she should switch to popular music. It will help her socially when she’s a few years older.” He sighed. “And I worry about Emily and that boy. I know you don’t like to hear it, but—”

“Not now, Robert. It’s too beautiful here to think of worries, even though I don’t agree that Harris is a worry. Shall we go back?”

Half walking, half sliding, they descended the hill and trudged along the shoreline, their feet slapping through the wet sand.

For a time neither spoke, until Robert said, “Oh, I just want to say one thing more and then—you’re right that this is no place or time for problems—but is Emily just being an average teenager, growing away as she’s supposed to grow, or is there something else? Lately when we’re together I’ve had the feeling that she’s annoyed with me.” And when Lynn did not reply at once, he said, sounding wistful, “I wish you’d be truthful if there’s anything you know.”

She hesitated. “She feels that you weren’t always open with her and shut her out.”

“Shut her out? From what?”

“Oh, things. Little things. For instance, she said—when she mentioned Querida a while ago you were furious. You shouted at her. You wouldn’t tell her anything.”

He protested. “Of course I wouldn’t. Why does she need to know? That brilliant aunt of mine! It’s a wonder she didn’t let slip about the boy too. There’d be a hundred questions about that, wouldn’t there? Well, my conscience is clear. I’ve done right by him, but he’s no part of my life. The bank informs me that he lives in Europe. I don’t even know in what country. I don’t support him anymore. He’s an adult. It’s a complete separation. There’s nothing unusual about that these days, with families dispersed over the globe.” Stopping his agitated walk, he stood still, looking out over the water. “Why are we talking about this foolishness, anyway?”

“You asked about Emily.”

“Yes. Yes, I did. Well,” he said, looking down at her with a troubled expression, “is there anything else?”

I’ve gone partway, and I might as well go all the way, she told herself. And fixing her eyes upon Robert, she said quietly, “She thinks you did that to me the other night.”

He took a deep breath, and she saw how her words had struck him.

“And what did you say? Did you—explain? Did you—”

She answered steadily, still with her eyes fixed on his. “I told her that was arrant nonsense. That I was astonished she could ever have such a thought.”

Robert bowed his head. They were two people in pain. How odd, Lynn thought, to stand here in this streaming sunlight, with all this animated life around us, children on floats, people splashing into the waves, calling and laughing, while we have a dialogue so tragic, so profound. No one seeing them here could possibly guess. She pitied the man who stood there with bowed head, and she touched his arm.

“Enough, Robert. I’ve had no breakfast, and I’m starved. Is there a place on the terrace where I might get a cup of coffee and a roll?”

His response was a grateful, a humble, smile. “Of course. I’ve explored the whole place and all its hidden corners. There’s a hidden corner with umbrella tables in the shade near the pool. Let’s go. And after that, a swim. And after that,” he said, recovering, “there’s a fishing trip scheduled for this afternoon, a short one to an out island in a catamaran. Or we might sign up tomorrow for an all-day trip with snorkeling and a picnic lunch on one of the farther islands. Or would you like a water-ski lesson? I looked over the schedule this morning.”

She had to smile. It was so like Robert to organize, to account for every minute.

“Swim first, then take the others as they come. Remember, you said we needed to relax.”

“Right. Right you are.”

Later in the afternoon they came back laughing at themselves after their first lesson on water skis, and took seats in the shade near the pool. Little groups of young couples were chatting at surrounding tables.

“Honeymooners, most of them,” Robert observed. “You could be a bride yourself. You don’t look any different from them.”

“Brides are older these days.”

“You’re turning just faintly brown,” he remarked.

“In spite of sunblock and a shady hat? I’ll go home looking like a lobster. Ah, well, since that’s the case, I might as well be fat too. I’ll have ice cream.”

She was aware as she ate that he was watching her, as if he were enjoying her enjoyment. She finished the ice cream with a feeling of satisfaction, thinking, How physical we are! The taste buds are satisfied, the stomach is filled, the air is fresh, not too hot and not too cool, and somehow all our troubles vanish—for a while, anyway.

A lizard, green as a gem, slid along a wall. Blackbirds stalked among the tables picking up fallen crumbs. A tiny yellow bird alighted on the table, paused on the edge, and then, on its frail, twiggy legs, hopped to the ice cream dish where lay a small, melted puddle. Totally still, Lynn sat watching the little beak thrust and thrust again; with the other part of her vision she was still aware of Robert watching her with the same affectionate concentration that she was giving to the bird.

“It’s adorable,” she said. “That little brain can’t be any bigger than half a pea.”

“It’s you who are adorable,” he told her.

An elderly couple sitting at the next table overheard him, for the man, catching Robert’s eye, smiled and nodded.

“We were watching you two on water skis,” he said with a heavy German accent.

“Oh, we were both awful,” Robert answered. “It was our first time.”

“So you were very brave, then. My wife and I”—he raised gray eyebrows in an expression of mock sorrow—“we are too old to learn new things.”

And so a conversation began. Introductions were made, and brief biographical sketches drawn. The Hummels were from Stuttgart; he was a banker, semiretired, but only semi; they did a good deal of traveling, mostly in Eastern Europe of late, where so many astonishing changes were occurring. This trip, their first to the Caribbean, was purely for pleasure, to celebrate their fiftieth wedding anniversary. Later, at home, there would be a party with family and friends, but first they wanted this time alone.

“And is today the day?” asked Robert.

“Today is the day,” Herr Hummel acknowledged, and his wife, a portly woman with beautiful upswept white hair and no devices behind which to hide her age, nodded and smiled.

“It’s so lovely here,” she said. “Usually we go to the Riviera for sun, but it is nothing like this. All these strange, wonderful flowers—” And she waved toward a clump of shrubbery that bore in clusters what looked like red beads, each the size of a pinhead. “What do you call those?”

“Ixora,” Robert answered.

“Ah, you study flowers,” said Mrs. Hummel.

“Not really.” Robert laughed. “I just happened to pass some on my way to breakfast this morning and saw a marker with the name.”

“He remembers everything,” said Lynn.

“So you have,” Mr. Hummel remarked, “a memory like—what is the word? Like a camera, you know.”

“A photographic memory,” Lynn said. “Yes, he has.”

“Perhaps,” said Mr. Hummel, “you will tell me if I go too far, intrude on your time, but perhaps you will have a drink of champagne with us tonight? It is tomorrow we leave. Perhaps you will have dinner with us, a table for four?”

“Why, that would be very nice,” Robert answered cordially.

When they were alone, Lynn was curious. “Why did you say yes to dinner with them?”

“Well, he’s a banker with connections in the new republics. It never hurts to pick up information and connections wherever you can. Besides, they’re nice people, and you can see they’re feeling a little bit lonesome.”

She was amused. Even away on vacation his mind was with General American Appliance.

“It’s dress up tonight,” he said. “I read it on the bulletin in the lobby. Dancing and entertainment.”

“Limbo and calypso, I’m sure. Funny, I keep loving calypso no matter how often I hear it.”

“That dress is perfect, well worth the money.”

White silk was even whiter and pearls more luminous against sun-tinged skin. She was pleased with herself.

“Where’s the bracelet?” Robert asked.

“Which one?” she replied, knowing which one he meant because he always asked about it.

“The cabochons. The good one.”

“It’s much too valuable to take traveling,” she told him.

It was indeed a special piece, always remarked upon whenever she wore it, and yet she wore it only when he reminded her to. It made her remember the sinking despair of that bleak windy night on the bench overlooking Lake Michigan. It wasn’t healthy to relive a night like that one.

The Hummels had reserved a table near the dining-room balcony overlooking the sea. Champagne was already in a cooler. They were beaming, he in a summer dinner jacket and she in light blue chiffon, rather too fancy. A pair of solid burghers, Lynn thought, and felt kindly disposed to them. Fifty years married!

“It is so nice to be with young people for our little celebration,” said Mrs. Hummel. “You must tell us more about yourselves. You have babies at home?”

“Not babies,” Lynn answered. “Not babies. A daughter of seventeen and an eleven-year-old.”

“My goodness, we have grandchildren older. A boy twenty-seven. He works in Franz’s bank,” she added proudly.

The conversation now divided, Mrs. Hummel describing to Lynn every member of her large family, while the men, led by Robert, pursued a different direction. With half an ear Lynn, who was hardly interested in the Hummel grandchildren, was able to hear some of the men’s talk.

“I’m starting a course in Hungarian,” Robert said. “I don’t know where I’ll get the time, but I’ll have to make the time.”

“A man of your type makes the time. I know your type.”

“Thank you, but it’s a difficult language. An Ugric language, related to Finnish, I’m told. I decided to start with it because, by comparison, Hungary is already somewhat prosperous. My firm deals in home appliances, as you know, and as the country gets richer, the demand will grow.”

“Have you been in Hungary yet?”

“No, I want to prepare a team for Russia, Poland, and the whole area before I talk to the top brass—the president, that is. I’ve got to get a better handle on the languages, though. It makes an impression if you can show your contacts that you’re at least making the effort to learn their language.”

“You’re right. It’s true that not everybody speaks English. People seem to think that everybody does.”

“—often think boys are easier to bring up,” Mrs. Hummel was saying. “I suppose your husband would love to have a boy.”

“I guess he would, but two are enough, and he adores our girls.”

“Actually, I’m in marketing, but one needs to broaden one’s scope. I have to know what they’re doing in product development if I’m to do a competent job in marketing, don’t I?”

“Ya, ya. Technology changes by the hour. You give me your card, I’ll give you mine, and if I can be of any help, who knows, we may work some good things out together. No?”

“I’d be delighted. Now I think we’re neglecting your great occasion. I’m going to order another bottle, and we’re going to drink to the next fifty years.”

“Your husband is a very ambitious, very intelligent young man, Mrs. Ferguson,” Mr. Hummel told Lynn.

“It’s heartwarming,” Mrs. Hummel said, “to see a couple still young and beautiful together. All these discontented couples, I never understand, so many of them. Franz and I are seventy-three. I’m seven months older, but we never tell anybody.” All four laughed, and Lynn said politely, “Neither one of you looks his age.”

“Really?” Mrs. Hummel was gratified. “If it’s so, it’s because we have been so happy with each other. My mother always told me—there is a sprichwort—a saying, about not going to sleep angry.”

“Never let the sun go down on your anger,” Lynn said. “My mother told me that too.”

“Ah, yes. And it works, it really does.”

“Interesting types,” Robert said when they got up to dance.

“Rather out of fashion these days in this world.”

“Well, if they are, it’s too bad about this world.”

They were in the open courtyard. When the music paused, one heard the swish of the waves, hushed now at low tide. Into the perfumed night the music blended. “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” and “Always and Always” they played.

It might be corny, Lynn said to herself, and yet the music is as lovely as the day it was written before I was born. And it still appeals to a longing that doesn’t die, no matter what the style or the generation and whether people admit it or not.

“Do I dance as well as Tom Lawrence does?” Robert whispered.

She drew back and reproached him. “For someone who can be so tactful when he wants to be, I’m surprised at you.”

“I’m sorry. It was meant to be funny, and it wasn’t at all. I’m sorry.” He kissed her ear and held her more closely. “Forgive me.”

Passing the Hummels, who were dancing stiffly apart, the two couples smiled at each other.

“Never let the sun go down on your anger,” Robert murmured. “Were going to remember that.”

Yes. Yes. A whole fresh start. The champagne is going to my head. Such a lovely feeling. And above Robert’s shoulder the sky was suddenly filled with blinking stars.

“Are there more stars here? Is that possible, Robert? Or am I drunk?”

“You may be drunk, but it does seem as if there are more because there’s no pollution, and the sky is clear. Anyway, the constellations are different here. We’re close to the equator.”

“You know so much,” she whispered.

And she looked around at the men moving to the music in slow circles. Not one could compare with Robert, so distinguished, so admired, so full of knowledge, with such marvelous eyes, now gazing into hers with that long, long look.

“I can’t help falling in love with you.” Their bodies moved to the nostalgia and the yearning, were led by it, slowly, closer and closer; as one body, they were barely moving, swaying together in one spot.

“I can’t help falling in love with you,” he sang into her ear. And she thought: I was so angry that I wished he would die. Oh, God, oh, God, and overcome with tears, she reached up to his mouth, and there on the dance floor, kissed him over and over.

“Oh, my dear, my dearest.”

“Let’s get out of here,” he whispered. “Say good-night to those people and get out of here. Quick, I can’t wait.”

In the room he slammed and fastened the door, crying, “Hurry, hurry!”

“I am. Don’t tear my dress.”

“I’ll buy you another one.”

He seized her and carried her to the wide, cool bed. Palms rattled at the window and the sea wind blew all through the first time and the second, and then all night, long after they had fallen asleep.

They swam and went deep-sea fishing, then played tennis, took long runs on the beach, and lay resting in the shade. Others went to the free-port shops and returned with the usual bags of liquor and perfume, but Lynn and Robert went no farther than a sailboat could carry them. After the Hummels departed, they were always, by tacit agreement only, together.

In the mornings when the first tree frogs began to peep, they made love again.

“No work, no errands, no telephone, no clock, no kids,” he whispered.

It was delicious, unhurried luxury. It was like being remade, like being married all over again. Robert had been right. This was what they had needed.