Sleeping Beauty (30 page)

“Well, not all that soon. He wanted to but I—” She stopped. A small, wistful smile trembled on her lips. “That's not true, you know. I was the one who wanted to. Josh wanted to wait. He said we should live in our own places, and see each other as much as we wanted, and then after a while decide whether we wanted more or not. I didn't want to wait; I was afraid I'd lose him. But of course we did it his way; men are always better at making rules, you know.”

Anne's look sharpened. “Was that an agreement between you? That he made the rules and you followed them?”

Dora frowned. “I don't know. He never said it that way. I didn't either. I mean, we didn't have to, you know; that's just how it was.”

“Tell me about him,” Anne said, and saw Dora frown again. Most people frowned, in just that way, when they were asked to describe someone they had loved and now despised. They were caught in the dilemma of wanting to describe the person in a way that made the listener despise him, too, while stopping short of making him such a monster that there seemed no possible way anyone could ever have loved him.

“He's a selfish, arrogant, mean son of a bitch,” Dora said. She burst into tears. “I'm sorry, I shouldn't say that.” She sat straight and wiped her eyes with her fists, like a child. “He's very smart—people say he's brilliant—and he can be really sweet and loving and fun to be with, when he wants to. Women are crazy about him; he's tall and good-looking, except he's been outdoors so much that he's got lines in his face that make him look older than he is. He's always tan, from the sun, and his eyes are dark blue and his hair is sort of light brown; I guess the sun makes it lighter. He spends a
lot on clothes; I liked the way he dressed. But he's not nearly as nice as he seems; he's really wrapped up in himself; he only cares about what
he
wants. He wouldn't let me bring my own furniture to his apartment, or my little animals—I collect ceramic animals; I've been written up in magazines because of my collection!—and I had to put them in storage. He wouldn't let me tell the cook what to make for dinner; he had his favorite foods and I could just eat them or go hungry. He's arrogant and cruel and a bully and a tyrant. But how could I know that until I moved in with him? He bossed me around like he bosses his workers—”

“What workers? What does he do?”

“He digs. He's an archaeologist, and of course he has workers who do most of the digging, but he says he likes to do it, too. He says he likes the feeling of unfolding the earth with his hands—I thought that was a really strange thing to say—uncovering its secrets with his hands, not with machines, so he's more a part of it, part of history, close to the people who put things in the tomb, or whatever, in the first place. Something like that. He talks that way a lot; I didn't always follow exactly what he meant, but you get the idea.”

Anne repeated the phrases to herself, liking them. Unfolding the earth. Uncovering its secrets with hands, not with machines. “What else does he do?” she asked.

“Oh, everything. He hikes and skis and sails and plays tennis and swims; he even plays polo sometimes. He's a good dancer, too. And he's an archaeology professer at UCLA, and a consultant at the Museum of the Ancient World. And he buys art and antiquities, mainly when he travels.”

Anne scribbled a note. “Where does he get the money to do all that? It sounds like a lot for a working archaeologist and professor.”

“He inherited a lot from his grandparents; they left him a fortune. He's not like any professor you ever met, you know; he seems like a playboy. He's not; he works really hard; but he has a terrific apartment and a wine cellar, and he and a friend own a racing sailboat, and he buys Versace suits . . . he likes nice things.”

“When we met,” Anne said thoughtfully, “you said he didn't care about good food; he was used to the bad food he got on his digs, so it didn't matter whether you cooked or not. That doesn't fit with the fine wines and the good life.”

Dora flushed. “Well, he does care about food. He knows a lot about it, he knows more than I do, and he has the best caterers in town for his parties. I just never could get into cooking. And he knew it.”

“How much money does he have?” Anne asked.

“I don't know. I tried to find out, by hinting, you know, but I never did. He doesn't worry about it; I know that.”

“And what about you?”

“I have enough. I have a trust fund my grandfather set up and another one from my father.”

Her grandfather, Anne thought. Ethan. We have the same grandfather. And he set up a trust for her. He must have done that for all the grandchildren. All but one.

You're at work, she told herself sharply, and focused on Dora again. “And about how much do those trusts bring you?”

Dora hesitated. “I don't talk about it, except to my accountant.”

Anne was silent.

“But if you have to know . . . about half a million a year.”

Anne nodded. “Did he know that? Did you discuss your separate incomes?”

“No, I told you; I never really asked him. There were a lot of things we didn't talk about, you know. We went out a lot in the beginning and we talked about the people we saw and the places we went, and then, after a while—the whole last year, I guess—we didn't go out much; Josh kept saying he wanted to stay home and read. It really was the most boring time; finally I just went places by myself.”

“Did he go out by himself, too?”

“A lot. Not in the beginning; we did everything together, except his work; I never knew much about that. But the last year he'd stay home and read and listen to music, or he'd go with his friends, and they were all scientists and writers, and I didn't like any of them. They talked about things I wasn't
interested in and they didn't seem much interested in what I wanted to talk about, and I figured it wasn't worth the effort. So when Josh made dates with them, I'd go to parties or call a friend to go to a movie, you know, just so I wouldn't have to stay home and feel really left out.”

“Did you ever talk about doing things separately, about drifting apart?”

“No, I never even thought about it. I mean, most married people do things on their own—”

“But you weren't married.”

“I know, but I always forgot. I mean, we were as good as married—that's the whole point of this business, going to court, I mean—we were exactly like married people. It shouldn't matter that we didn't have a piece of paper to show—”

“Did you talk about getting married?”

“Of course! All the time.”

“How? What did he say?”

“He said he wanted to marry me. He said he loved me and wanted to marry me.”

Anne put down her pencil and gazed at Dora. “Listen to me. Whatever you've told other people, you're going to tell me the truth. I won't represent you if I think you're telling half-truths or fantasies or outright lies. I'll walk away from this case the minute I find that that's happening. I can't be more clear than that.”

“I wasn't lying!” Dora cried. But in a minute, beneath Anne's steady gaze, she looked away. Her lower lip thrust out; tears filled her eyes. “He never said it. I waited and waited and . . . sort of . . . mentioned it, you know, once in a while . . . but he never did. It was like he got deaf every time I brought it up.”

Anne picked up her pencil. “What
did
he say to you?”

“He said he liked being with me; he could relax with me. He said he hoped to live to a biblical age because he wanted to live with me for a long, long time. That was another of his odd ways of talking. He said he wanted to do a lot of traveling with me and show me the secret corners and
hidden spirits of places I thought I knew. I thought that was peculiar, too, and anyway, when it came down to it, we didn't do much traveling together. He said he wanted to bring me seraphim and serpents because my world was too narrow; I never did figure out what that was all about.”

Anne felt a sharp pain, unfamiliar and disconcerting. No one had ever said such things to her.

Of course not, she told herself firmly. There was no place for fantasy in her life. But she was puzzled by the picture Dora drew of Josh Durant. How odd that an arrogant tyrant, cruel and self-centered, would speak with such tenderness, in phrases a poet might use.

“That's not all he said,” Dora went on. “I just can't remember the rest.”

“You don't remember?” Anne asked. “You've only been apart a short time.”

“Well, but he hasn't said things like that for years. He said them when we were first together. He said nice things all the time in those days. But not lately. I moved in and he started changing.”

“Right away?”

“Well, not right away. In a while.”

“How long?”

“Oh, I don't remember. Maybe a year.”

“You were the one who wanted to move in, you said. He wanted to wait. What changed his mind?”

“Well, we were together all the time and it seemed obvious.”

Anne waited.

Dora's shoulders slumped. “I kept telling him how unhappy I was. I really was, you know; I hated going home to an empty apartment, it was like being banished from his life. So I kept telling him how I wanted to do things for him and how I couldn't stand it that he didn't care enough about me to live with me and how miserable I was, and lonely. . . . I guess I made it hard for him. But we were having such a good time in those days it didn't make sense to me that we weren't really together, and I didn't have to wait
to see how I felt; I wanted him all the time. So it took a while but then he said yes and we were really fine for a while, until he changed. We were fine for a year. At least a year.”

There was a pause. Anne looked back through her notes. “You said you didn't talk about your incomes. Did you have any kind of agreement, financial or otherwise, when you started living together?”

“You mean like a contract? No.”

“Did you have an oral agreement?”

“Like what?”

“Did you set a specific length of time you'd live together—six months, a year, two years—before talking about something more permanent? Did you agree on sharing living expenses—food, mortgage payments, and so on? Or how you'd divide your possessions if you separated? Did you agree in advance to keep separate bank accounts?”

Dora was shaking her head. “We were in love. We didn't think about money and we certainly weren't about to talk about it. I mean, we were moving in together; we weren't making rules for splitting. We weren't even
thinking
about splitting. We never thought we would.”

“Did you ever talk about children?”

“No. Josh hates kids.”

“And you?”

“Oh, I'd like two or three. I kind of stopped thinking about them when I was with Josh.”

Anne turned her notebook to a fresh page. “Tell me about your friends.”

“What about them?”

“Who they were, how often the two of you saw them, how much you talked to them about yourselves. Did you tell them you thought you'd be married someday? Did he ever mention marriage to them? Did couples compare notes about living together and talk about the future?”

“Not that I can remember. I told you, the past couple of years we didn't see a lot of other people, not together anyway, that was what Josh wanted. He wanted everything his way: his friends, his restaurants, his places to travel, his furniture, his apartment.”

“And what did he say when you objected?”

“I didn't.”

“You never said a word about what you wanted?”

“I told you, he made the rules.”

“But you also told me you wanted to marry him and kept mentioning it. Even though he made all the rules and you didn't like them?”

“I loved him! I still do!”

“That's the first time I've heard you say that. Did you really love him? Do you still?”

“I adore him!”

“I don't believe you.” Anne gave her a long look. “You'll have to tell me what you want out of this. What you truly care about and how much is just quick and dirty revenge.”

Dora's eyes narrowed.
“Quick and dirty . . . ?
Who the fuck do you think you—” She caught her breath and leaned forward. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, what a terrible way to talk to you. I can't imagine what got into me; I just don't
do
that. Maybe it was that word. Revenge. It sounds so . . . bitchy. It isn't revenge; it would never be that. I just want something out of this—” Her eyes filled with tears. “Something I can hold. If I can't have Josh, if I've really lost him forever, at least I want him to admit—in public!—that I was as good as a wife to him and I deserve the same things a wife would get. Respect, for one. I'd rather have love, I'd rather be a wife, but if I can't have those, then I want respect. And money. He would have had to pay a wife alimony; he would have rewarded her for years of being everything he wanted, and loving him and caring about him; he would have had to make sure she was taken care of before he found himself . . . somebody new . . .”

She put her hands to her face and sobbed quietly. Bravo, Anne thought. She had been right: Dora would be superb on the witness stand. It was even possible that much of what she said was the truth. Probably Dora herself did not know for sure anymore what was fact and what was imagination fueled by anger and disappointment. Neither, Anne supposed, did Josh Durant.

Thank God I don't have to go through this
. It was a thought
that came to her regularly as she dealt with her clients. Thank God she stayed far from intimacy, far from even contemplating living with someone or worse, marrying him, far from ever having to feel this corrosive anger and disappointment, this fury that sprang from the ashes of love, this blur of truth and falsehood that dulled reason. And it was reason, clear, hard-edged reason unsullied by emotion, that Anne had made the center of her life, in fact, her very being.