Deceptions (41 page)

This time the silence was longer. 'Where did you hear that?' he asked finally.

'Linda heard it at the university bookstore. Ha veyou heard anything?'

'Nothing I would credit.'

'You've heard it, then. And Marty is one of the professors?*

'My God, no. Is that what Linda heard?'

That's why she had to talk. Is it true?'

'The rumor? I think so. But I don't know who's involved. Accusations by themselves mean nothing; any student who's angiy over a low grade could point a finger. But there's been some talk in the faculty club that sounds more serious. Have you talked about this to anyone else?'

'I am not in the habit of spreading rumors.'

*I know. I'm sorry. What did you tell Linda?'

To keep quiet until I talked to you.'

'Did you really?'

'Well, why wouldn't I? I trust you more than anyone. And you understand better than anyone how to deal with the university. It's like all groups, isn't it? Everyone chewing on rumors for breakfast and dinner, as if they're the only real things in the world. I remember once Alexandra told me about a cruise—' She broke off.

'Alexandra?'

'Somebody at ... on the China trip. She'd been on a cruise, and she said by the third day rumors were flying: sworn testimony about who was in whose bed and who was underneath taking notes. Something like the university, isn't it? Except I suppose at the university they use better grammar in their rumors.*

He chuckled. 'You're wonderful and I miss you. Why don't you fly out here for the end of the week?'

Oh, I'd like that. 'I can't just up and leave the children.'

'We could find someone.'

'And my new job?'

'Yes. Of course. Well, what else is happening in Evan-ston?'

They talked, Sabrina discovered later, for an hour. 'The university is paying for it,' Garth said the next night when he called and she asked him. 'But you're right; it is an unseemly extravagance. If you fly out here, we'd save the university hundreds of dollars.'

She laughed but didn't answer. She would stay where she was. She missed him, but she was relieved that he wasn't there. It was better for everyone if she and Garth stayed two thousand miles apart.

Each morning she woke to the sounds of the children and the neighborhood and looked forward to the day. And each evening, when Garth called, she wondered where the day had gone.

She raced through the housework in the mornings, doing as little as possible. She was irrationally angry at Stephanie for forcing her into it; she would have ignored it entirely between Juanita's appearances, but there was too much to do. Even with Penny and Cliff helping she felt a slave to dust balls and dirty clothes and out-of-place objects.

After housework. Collectibles was like a holiday. She and Madeline were organizing the merchandise, tagging pieces with their history and price and arranging them to show off the best and improve the appearance of the ordinary. Sabrina liked Madeline; and even though she chafed at working for someone else, she was building up the job so that Stephanie could step into it when she came back. But before she knew it, it was midaftemoon and she had to hurry home to supervise the invasion of the house and the raiding of the refrigerator when Cliff and Peimy arrived, usually with friends.

Later the three of them ate dinner picnic-style on the patio. After Penny and Cliff did the dishes, Sabrina joined in a three-way game of Scrabble or Boggle, usually ended by Garth's telephone call. And later, when the house was quiet, Sabrina curled up to read in the quiet living room or the armchair in the bedroom until she found herself nodding to sleep.

On Thursday she brought home a wok and a cookbook and they made a Chinese dinner. Penny added two dozen hot dried peppers to the chicken when no one was looking. 'You should have seen us, Daddy,' she said when Garth called. 'We were all crying. But Mommy said it was dehcious anyway.' She held the telephone out to Sabrina. 'Daddy wants to talk to you and tell you he loves you.'

Sabrina's heart took a little skip. 'Is that what he said?'

'Not exactly, but isn't that what he tells you when he calls?'

Sabrina smiled and took the telephone.

'A corrosive dirmer, I understand,' Garth said.

'We'll remember it for a long time.'

Tm sorry I missed it.'

*SoamI.'

'Will you make it on Sunday so I can share it? Peppers and all?'

'If you have the courage, and we don't grow faint of heart, we'll make it just for you.'

*I can't wait. By the way. Penny was right.'

'About what?'

'About my wanting to tell you I love you.'

She felt her heart skip again, and then again. She was short of breath. But it's just because I'm tired, she thought; it's been a long day. I'll settle down as soon as I have some time to myself.

'And that my plane arrives at two in the afternoon on Sunday. Can you meet me?'

'Yes, of course.'

'What are you doing tomorrow night? More Chinese food?'

'Dolores and Nat invited us for dinner.'

'Give them my love.'

'I will.'

After dinner on Friday night, when Penny and Cliff went upstairs with the Goldners' three children, Sabrina repeated for Dolores and Nat Garth's descriptions of his lectures and the people he was meeting. 'He won't say it outright, but it seems to me he must be the star of the show.'

She caught the quick glance between them. 'What's that all about?'

'Nothing,' Nat said quickly.

Sabrina pressed her fingers to her forehead. Now what had she done wrong?

'No, Stephanie has a right to know,' said Dolores. 'We were just thinking that usually when Garth has some kind of success you bring up that job he's been offered in Stamford. And this time you didn't.'

'Oh.' / keep forgetting how much that job means to Stephanie. Fve got to ask Garth about it before I leave. I promised Stephanie I would.

Nat lit his pipe. 'You still getting headaches, Stephanie?'

*No/ she said, startled. And then an idea came to her. 'Well, yes, as a matter of fact. I wasn't going to say anything.*

'Why not?'

She shrugged. 'I knew I'd be seeing you soon to X ray my wrist and if they were still bad—'

'Are they bad?'

'Sometimes.'

'When?'

*Oh, evenings, mostly. It's probably just that I'm tired.*

'Where's the pain? Show me, on your head.'

She held her hand on the area where the headaches had been when she had her concussion. I'm sorry, Garth, she said silently. I wish I had a morecreative way of refusing to make love to you. But this is the easiest lie I can think of. And it's only for a few days, until Stephanie is back. Then the headaches will end.

'—should have stopped by now,' Nat was saying. 'I think you should check it out with your internist. Aren't we going to look at that wrist, too, pretty soon? When did you break it?*

'September twenty-second.*

Td like to give it another ten days. Call the office and make an appointment for a week from Monday. If the X ray looks good, we'll take the cast off then.'

'All right.* Now she knew. She'd call Stephanie tomorrow morning. Ten days. A long time to get through with Garth.

But he's coming home on Sunday, she thought; how wonderful it will be to see him. Then she concentrated on what Dolores was saying and told herself she had not thought such a thing at all.

It was Wednesday before Garth caught up with his work at the university and had a chance to go through the mail that had accumulated while he was gone. He was restless and fed up with the nagging details of department administration that kept him at his desk. He'd come home from Berkeley like a schoolboy rushing to his first love, remembering Ste-phanie*s warmth and laughter in their telephone calls, remembering that they had made love the night before he

left. He'd come home looking forward to long hours with his family, and then, tied down at his office, the laboratory and classrooms, he'd barely seen them.

And his wife had almost encouraged him to stay away. He had found, with despair, her warmth muted, her wariness still intact.

It had not been that way at first. At the airport on Sunday her smile had welcomed him with such delight that he slowed as he walked toward her, stunned by her beauty. 'My God,' breathed a man behind him. 'Wouldn't I like to be the guy she's waiting for?'

His heart singing. Garth strode toward her, but as he came close her smile faded and her eyes grew shadowed, as if she had been as surprised as he by her open delight.

'Welcome home,' she said, her voice controlled.

He kissed her mouth, her cool lips soft beneath his, a small tremor at the comers. And then, casually, she moved away, and he did not see the delight again until, at dinner, he unpacked his gifts. For Penny and Cliff there were models, to be assembled, of the wagons used by miners in the California gold rush. And for his wife, from a shop in Ghirardelli Square, a suede blazer, as soft as butter, simple but rich in a deep hunter's green with antique gold buttons. Eyes shining, she put it on and spun around, modeling it. 'For me,' she murmured as if to herself.

She was touched and saddened by her surprise. 'For no one else.'

She put her cheek against his. 'Thank you. It's perfect.'

'I thought it was the right size,' he said, with oiUy a touch of irony.' I don't think you have anything like it, but it seems to go with the different way you've been dressing lately.'

'I'm dressing differently?'

'I think so. Aren't you?'

'How?'

'Brighter, it seems to me. Or different combinations of colors. Or maybe more casual. Didn't you used to button your blouses to the collar instead of leaving the top ones open?' She was laughing, and he shook his head. 'All those times you accused me of not noticing what you wear. You

were right; Tm sorry. However, I did notice the differences. And I like the new look, however you get it.'

A happy family evening at home. And then she told him about her headaches; that she'd talked to Nat about them. And gradually she withdrew to the friendly distance she had maintained since her return from China. If anything, she seemed even more nervous.

Doggedly, he went through the mail on his desk. Near the top, dated two days ago, was another invitation from Horace Kallen, president of Foster Laboratories, to visit Stamford on October 23. Next Tuesday. Impossible; he couldn't cancel classes again so soon. But - Foster and Stamford were Stephanie's dream. And he knew they would have sophisticated facilities for more advanced research than he could do here. He could ask Vivian to take his classes; he'd only miss two. Without debating it further, he scribbled a note of acceptance and put it with the outgoing mail. Maybe that would please her.

The truth was, he was so torn by his wife's changing moods that he was beginning to think it would be better to force a confrontation at the risk of destroying everything than to go on indefinitely tip-toeing around her. A life of scientific research had taught him patience and a tolerance for the unexpected, but it had also taught him to expect results from the clues and information he had or to look for new clues and new directions. Either they were married, and would work things out together, or they weren't. And if they weren't, they would have to find a new direction, because they were living a lie.

His telephone rang, and when he answered it the vice president's secretary asked him if he would come to Mr Strauss's office for a few minutes. It was a summons, not a request, and once again Garth put off going home early.

Lloyd Strauss was only a few years older than Garth, a tennis partner and a longtime friend. Small and compact, a dark bundle of energy always in motion, he had mastered the twists and turns of university politics to rise on a straight path to the vice presidency. Everyone knew that a majority of the board of trustees was ready to elect him president

when the current president retired, and few challenged his decisions without careful thought.

'Well, the administrative board checked it all out,' he said, pacing while Garth sat on the edge of his desk. 'Went through your list of female rejects-sorry, lousy choice of words-your list of rejected female tenure-applicants. Looked into Webster's attitude toward women professors - actually, women in general - and interviewed other people in the sciences and on the tenure committee. No question, you were right; he's violated every equal-opportunity regulation on the books. Of course, we didn't have any until recently, so he's been a bastard, but a legal one, for most of his intolerant life.'

Garth stirred, and Strauss put out his hand. 'Hold on; let me finish. The administrative board is directing the tenure conmiittee to review the application of Vivian Goodman. My prediction is she'll breeze through. The administrative boani also, in its wisdom, has asked Dean Webster to take early retirement. He's sixty-two; we'll carry him for three years. Simplest way. He's been told that with the school year so young, we can hobble along if he leaves immediately. Since it would be crude to say he's been booted, I won't say it. So we're looking for a new Dean of Sciences.'

He sat at his desk and riffled through a stack of papers. Garth swiveled to watch him, knowing what was coining. It would please Stephanie, he thought. More money and prestige, regular hours, more time at home. But he would have to give up his research. And teaching. The Dean of Sciences was an administrator; he had no time for anything else. I can't sit in an office all day, he thought, while others are exploring the locked worlds I've begun to discover. If I have to make a change to please Stephanie, Foster Labs would be better.

Strauss was on his feet again. 'I don't need to tell you the first person we considered for the job was you. You have an international reputation for research and scholarship - good coverage, by the way, in Newsweek; amazing how your handsome puss in a popular magazine impresses the trustees more than a dozen scientific journals put together. So you'd bring prestige and dignity and fairness to the position. But I didn't think you'd want it.'

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