East is East (12 page)

Ruth clutched the garbage bag to her chest and gave him a terrified grin.

He grinned back at her, casually leaning into the doorframe with one long arm. She saw that he was looking down her blouse. “Did I tell you I really enjoyed talking to you the other night? I find you a very”—he hesitated, and she could hear a faint metallic voice whispering through the earphones—“a very sexy woman. Really. And I wondered if—I've got a car and all—I wondered if you might like to get off the island for an evening—tonight maybe—and have dinner or something?”

Ruth was on familiar terrain now, and as the shock of discovery wore off, she recovered her equilibrium. “I'd like that,” she said, bending to relieve an imaginary itch just behind her left knee, “sometime. Sometime soon. But tonight I'm afraid I already have plans.”

Abercorn didn't seem put off. He leaned closer and gave her a long meaningful look. “Hey,” he said, putting some gravel into his voice, “I don't know if I'll be around that much longer.”

Ruth saw her chance. “Oh? No luck?”

He shot his eyes in disgust. “The guy disappeared. He could be dead for all we know. Either that or he left the island.”

“And your assistant? With the ghetto blaster?”

Abercorn's laugh was quick and musical. “Yeah, well, that's another story.” He paused. She couldn't seem to help staring into his eyes—she'd never seen anyone with eyes that color before. “So this is your room, huh?” he said. “I was kind of hoping you might, uh—”

She put her hand on his arm. “You're sweet,” she said, “but listen, I've got to run. Really. I just realized I don't think I shut off the hot plate in my studio and—”

“All that genius up in ashes, huh?”

“Something like that,” she said, ducking out from under his arm and hurrying down the hall.

But it wasn't over yet.

She came down the stairs two at a time, the black plastic bag tucked under her arm, and her only thought was of Hiro, her pet, her secret, face down on the wicker loveseat in the shady studio in the woods. Would he be there when she got back? Would he wake and think she'd gone for the police? Would Turco boogie through the screen door and conk him with his boom box? The furthest thing from her mind was Saxby. But there he was at the foot of the stairs, crabwalking beneath one precarious end of a six-foot-long aquarium. “Ruthie,” he grunted. “I'm … back!”

She saw now that Owen was attached to the far end of the thing and that they were trying to maneuver it round the butt of the staircase and down the narrow hallway to Saxby's room. The whole operation halted a minute while Ruth descended the stairs to brush Saxby's lips with a kiss and whisper, “I missed you,” and then, flashing light, the aquarium moved on, and Ruth was out the door,
down the steps and across the lawn. As soon as she hit the woods, she broke into a run.

She was out of breath when she reached the cottage, knitting needles embedded in her sides. She wanted him to be there, wanted to talk to him, wash and bind his wounds, watch him eat and sleep and recover the lost light in his eyes—but somehow, as she came up the path, she knew he'd be gone. The cottage was unchanged. She saw the familiar porch, the windows rich with sun, the pine, palmetto and oak, and she heard the birds in the trees and smelled the sweet rich breath of the ocean, and nothing had changed. She mounted the steps, breathing hard, and gingerly swung open the screen door: the cottage was empty.

Angry with herself—she should have told him where she was going, should have brushed off Abercorn, should have run both ways—she threw the bag down and fell into the rocker by the window. He was gone. He'd never trust her now. But then so what? What did she care? Let him starve. For a long while she sat there rocking as the shadows lengthened and the calm of evening fell over her books, her typewriter, the hot plate and pitcher plants, all the familiar objects of her little life in this temporary outpost. And then, at long last, it occurred to her—and the thought was as sharp as a pinprick—that he might be testing her. Even now he might be crouched in the tangle out there, watching and waiting. All right, she thought, and got up from the chair, poured some water from the jug into a basin and carried it out onto the porch. She made a separate trip for the jug, and left it beside the basin. Then she fished through the bag and arranged the soap and Band-Aids, the towel and clothing and the rest of it on the rail, stuffed the two letters in her hip pocket and started back, through the cloistral deeps of evening, to Thanatopsis House.

In the morning, the things were gone. He'd returned the basin to its hook beside the fireplace, and she found the rag of the overalls and Clara Kleinschmidt's violated panties neatly folded in the corner. He didn't come for the lunch pail that afternoon, but she left
it there on its hook—she joked to herself that she could stand to lose a few pounds anyway—and in the morning it was empty. The same thing happened the following day and she thought they'd established a pattern, a rhythm, but she was wrong. A day passed, and then another, and there was no sign that he'd been there. Lunches spoiled. Owen was perplexed. Abercorn packed up his suitcase and Turco his boom box, and, assuring the colonists that the Japanese was no longer a threat, they climbed into their battered Datsun and drove off to the ferry. Saxby filled his aquarium with rocks, water and plants, and in the small hours of the long thick endless nights made Ruth's blood rush with his lips and his fingers and all the rest of him too. And Ruth established herself in the billiard room and at the convivial table and sat down to her typewriter with a new purpose and a delicious lingering thrill of expectation: he'd be back, her Japanese, any moment now. She knew he would. After all, she thought, how could he resist?

But now, now she had a headache and she was hungover and Owen's wake-up call had taken her by surprise. The morning was stifling, a blanket thrown over her face, and it was August already, the first week nearly gone, and there'd been no sign of Hiro for three days now. She forced herself to get up. She had work to do—she'd never worked so well in her life—and she was anxious to get down to breakfast, reign over the table and clear her head with lukewarm coffee and scalding gossip.

She ran a brush through her hair and pulled it back in a ponytail, made up her eyes and brushed her teeth, then slipped into a pair of shorts and a halter top, no brassiere, and dug her white cork-heeled canvas sandals out from under the bed. As she passed through the silent room, Laura Grobian looked up from her soft-boiled egg and acknowledged her with a dip of the head and a blink of the famous haunted eyes, and Ruth felt a quick little surge of triumph. Then it was through the oak doors and on into the convivial room, where she was greeted by laughter, cigarette smoke
and shouts of “La Dershowitz!” and “Up so soon?” and “She's feeling it now!”

Bob, Sandy, Irving Thalamus, Ina Soderbord and half a dozen others were gathered at the long dark table, a rubble of thrice-read newspapers, books, manuscripts, egg-stained plates, mugs and ashtrays scattered about them. The big silver rocket of a coffee pot sat on the sideboard, along with a serving pan of waffles and a bowl of fruit compote. Rico was in the kitchen, making toast, eggs and Canadian bacon to order. Ruth ducked her head through the swinging door to the kitchen and caught him flipping an omelet behind his back. “Pretty fancy,” she said, tailing it with a low whistle.

Rico gave her a gold-capped smile. He was twenty-two, six inches shorter than any man ought reasonably to be, and his big black circular eyes devoured his face in sadness. “No sweat,” he said.

“Could you make me a poached egg when you get a chance?” she asked, leaning in and balancing on one leg. The kitchen smelled rich and potent. “And maybe some dry wheat toast, two slices?”

“No sweat,” Rico said, and he flipped the omelet again, just to show off.

Ruth poured herself a cup of coffee, laced it with Sweet'n Low and hovered over the table till Irving Thalamus cleared a spot for her. “Sleep tight?” he said, giving her a lascivious look as she sat down beside him and crossed her legs. His eyes were hooded, the lids puckered and dark. He looked as if he should be wearing a burnoose and sandals, counting camels and harem girls somewhere out in the Negev.

Ruth gave him a rueful smile. “Too much booze,” she said, “but Sax and I took a little stroll after we left you.” She paused. “That revived me, all right. And I slept like a stone.”

He dropped his eyes and began to fiddle with his fork, building a little pyramid of scrambled egg in the center of his plate. The card from his son—a freshman at Yale—had been bitter stuff. The son was planning to spend the holidays with the estranged wife in Mount Kisco; Irving Thalamus had apparently written to offer him a room in the house he was renting on Key West. The son had
written back to say no, unequivocally, and to add that he considered his father a hypocrite, a narcissistic overpraised hack and a moral dwarf who couldn't keep the patriarchal penis in his pants. The letter from the agent was worse. So bad Ruth had experienced a momentary pang of guilt while reading it—but it was only momentary, because, after all, she was an artist, an intellectual, and she made her own rules. The agent—one of the most venerable in New York—had written to say that Irving Thalamus's publisher, the publisher who'd done his last six books, was advising him against coming out with the new novel.
Dog Days
was an embarrassment. Misguided. Incoherent. The publisher—and the agent concurred, gently and at length—knew that he would see the light. In six months' time, with a little distance, he'd repudiate the work himself. He would. And he had his career to think about now, his future in the pantheon of American letters, and why spoil it with an ill-considered move at this juncture? The agent signed off by trusting that the rest cure in the bucolic atmosphere of Thanatopsis House was doing him a world of good.

“So how's your new story coming?” he said, swinging his hard jaw back to her.

She knew he didn't want to hear the truth, knew that the only answer to that question was to grumble, denigrate herself, whine about the blank page and how useless she was and wonder, awe in her eyes, how he managed to produce one astonishing book after another. She took another sip of coffee, set her mug down and leaned in close to him. “I've never worked better in my life,” she said.

“Hey, terrific,” he said, “that's great, it really is.” His eyes looked wounded.

Bob shouted something about poker that night and then rose to leave the table. Ina Soderbord, wearing a pink sweat suit though it must have been ninety already, got up to leave with him and Ruth raised her eyebrows. Irving Thalamus nodded in affirmation. Then Rico cha-cha'd out of the kitchen, a muted blast of salsa music coming with him, and set down Ruth's plate of egg and toast. She took a moment to upend the egg on the toast and dose it with salt
and pepper before she turned back to Thalamus and asked the question that had, by all rules of writerly etiquette, to follow from his: “And how about you?
Dog Days
going well?”

He gave her a strange look, the look of a man who's had his shorts stolen and his mail rifled. But no, how could he know? He'd talked about nothing but
Dog Days
since she'd got here—she wasn't giving anything away. “Oh, that,” he said, shrugging. “Fine. Okay.” He paused. “I'm on to something new now anyway, something totally different for me, a real departure. I'm excited about it.” He didn't look excited. Or he looked about as excited as a middle-aged legend contemplating moving his bowels in the communal bathroom, which is exactly what he was.

She was going to say something banal, like “I'm really happy for you” or “It's the least we can expect from you, Irving,” but he turned to her suddenly and his face lit up. “Hey,” he said, “you hear the news?”

She hadn't. She pursed her mouth and folded her hands in her lap. She was expecting something juicy, something to chew over and digest and laugh about till lunch, the thrilling little kernel of gossip that would make her whole billiard-room routine for the next week. The last thing he'd given her—and it was too much, she couldn't have invented anything better—was the news that Peter Anserine had climbed the stairs to his room one night only to find Clara Kleinschmidt, lumps and all, reclining across his bed like the naked Maja—and the best part of it was, she didn't leave till the morning. “No,” Ruth said, arching her back and darting a quick glance round the room, “tell me.”

“I can't believe it,” he said. “Guess who's coming—for a
six-weeks'
residency?”

She couldn't guess.

Plates rattled in the kitchen, Bob took Ina's hand and sauntered out the door, Sandy yawned, stretched and stood up. Irving Thalamus leaned toward her, his eyes bright, his grin as sharp as a watchdog's. “Jane Shine,” he said. “Jane Shine's coming. Can you believe it?”