When She Was Good (22 page)

“The women’s college.”

“And is this true? Are you marrying him, or are you just some girl?”

“I’m marrying him.”

Roy raised his hands. “See?”

“Well,” said Mrs. Blodgett, “she could be lying. That’s not unheard of.”

“Does she look like a liar?” asked Roy, putting his hands in his pockets and shuffling over toward Lucy. “With this face? Come on, Mrs. Blodgett,” he said winningly. “She’s the girl next door. Actually, she practically is, you know.”

The landlady did not smile back. “I had a boy in 1945 who had a fiancée. But
he
came to me, Mr. Bassart—”

“Yes?”

“—and told me his plans. And then brought the young lady around on a Sunday to be properly introduced.”

“A Sunday. Well, that’s a good idea, all right.”

“Let me finish, please. We then arranged that she might come here to visit until ten in the evening. I did not even have to make it clear that the door to the room was to be left open. He understood that much.”

“I see,” said Roy with considerable interest.

“Miss Nelson, I am not a close-minded person, but where I have my rules I am strict. This happens to be my dwelling place, and not some fly-by-night person’s hotel. Without rules it would go to rack and ruin inside of a month. Maybe you’ll understand how that happens when you’re older. I certainly hope you do, for your sake.”

“Oh, we understand now,” said Roy.

“Don’t ever try to trick me again, Mr. Bassart.”

“Oh, now that I know the ten o’clock setup—”

“And I know your name, young lady. Lucy Nelson. S-o-n or s-e-n?”

“S-o-n.”

“And I know the dean over at your school. Miss Pardee, correct? Dean of Students.”

“Yes.”

“Then don’t you ever try to trick me either.”

She started for the door.

“So then,” said Roy, following her, “at least we’re all squared away, anyway.”

When Mrs. Blodgett turned to show him what she thought
of that last remark, Roy smiled. “I mean, we’re all forgiven and everything, right? I know innocence of the law is no—”

“You are not innocent, Mr. Bassart. My back was turned. You are guilty as sin.”

“Well, I suppose in a manner of speaking …” And he shrugged. “Now the rules, Mrs. Blodgett—just so I’m sure I’ve got them straight.”

“So long, sir, as the door is left open—”

“Oh, absolutely, wide open.”

“So long as she is out of here at ten o’clock—”

“Oh, out she’ll be,” said Roy, laughing.

“So long as there is no shouting—”

“That was music, Mrs. Blodgett, really—”

“And so long, Mr. Bassart, as there is a marriage, Christmas Day.”

For a moment he looked dumfounded. Marriage? “Oh, sure. Good day, don’t you think? Christmas?”

Mrs. Blodgett went out, leaving the door ajar.

“Bye,” said Roy, and waited until he heard the door to the back parlor being closed before he fell into a chair. “Wow.”

“Then we
are
getting married,” said Lucy.

“Shhhhh!”—rising up out of the chair. “Will you—
yes,
” he said all at once, for the parlor door had opened, and Mrs. Blodgett was headed back to the stairs. “Mom and Dad feel—oh, hi, Mrs. Blodgett.” He tipped an imaginary hat. “Have a nice sleep now.”

“It is nine forty-eight, Mr. Bassart.”

Roy looked at his watch. “Right you are, Mrs. Blodgett. Thanks for reminding me. Just finishing up talking over our plans. Night, now.”

She started up the stairs, her anger not much abated, it seemed.

“Roy—” Lucy began, but in two steps he was at her side; one hand he pressed to the back of her head, the other to her mouth.

“So,” he said loudly, “Mom and Dad felt that for the most part your suggestion—”

Her eyes stared wildly at him, until the bedroom door could be heard closing overhead. He took his wet hand from her lips.

“Don’t you ever—ever—” she said, so enraged that she could hardly speak, “do that again!”

“Oh, golly,” he said, and threw himself backward onto his bed. “I’m actually going off my
rocker
with you! What do you expect, when she was on the
stairs
, Lucy?”

“I expect—!”

“Shhhhh!” He shot up on the bed. “We’re getting married!” he whispered hoarsely. “
So shut up.
”

She was suddenly and completely baffled. She was getting married. “When?”

“Christmas!
Okay?
Now will you
stop?
”

“And your family?”

“Well, what about them?”

“You have to tell them.”

“I will, I will. But just lay
off
for a while.”

“Roy … it has to be now.”

“
Now?
” he said.

“Yes!”

“But my mother is in bed,
and quiet down!
” After a moment he said, “Well, she is. I’m not lying. She goes to bed at nine and gets up at five-thirty. Don’t ask me why. That’s how she does it, Lucy, and how she’s always done it, and there’s nothing I can do to change her at this stage of the game. Well, that’s the truth. And furthermore, Lucy, I have had it for tonight, really.”

“But you must make this official. You just can’t keep me living this way. It’s a nightmare!”

“But I’ll make it official when I think it should be!”

“Roy, suppose she calls Dean Pardee! I don’t want to be thrown out of school! I don’t need that in my one life, too.”

“Well,” he said, smacking the sides of his head, “I don’t want to be thrown out either, you know. Why else do you think I told her what I did?”

“Then it is a lie and you don’t mean it
again!
”

“It’s not! I
do!
I always have!”

“Roy Bassart, call your parents, or I’ll do something!”

He jumped out of the bed. “No!”

“Keep your hands away from my mouth, Roy!”

“Don’t scream, for God’s sakes! That’s
stupid!
”

“But I am pregnant with a human baby!” she cried. “I’m going to have your baby, Roy! And you won’t even do your duty!”

“I will! I am!”

“
When?
”

“Now! Okay?
Now!
But don’t scream, Lucy, don’t throw a stupid fit!”

“Then call!”

“But,” he said, “what I told Mrs. Blodgett—I had to.”

“Roy!”

“
Okay,
” and he ran from the room.

In a few minutes he returned, paler than she had ever seen him. Where the hair was clipped short at his neck, she could see his white skin. “I did it,” he said.

And she believed him. Even his wrists and hands were white.

“I did it,” he mumbled. “And I told you, didn’t I? I told you she’d be sleeping. I told you he’d have to wake her up and get her out of bed. Well, didn’t I?
I wasn’t lying!
And I wouldn’t be thrown out of school. Why did I say
that!
I’d only be thrown out of this room—and what difference does that make anyway? Nobody else cares about my self-respect anyway, so why should I worry about it?
He
doesn’t worry about it!
She
doesn’t worry about it! And you—you were going to
scream!
My self-respect, oh, the heck with that, all you want to do is scream and confuse people. That’s your way, Lucy—to confuse people. Everybody’s way. Confuse Roy—why not? Who’s he, anyway? But that’s over! Because I’m not confused, Lucy, and from here on out that’s the way things are going to be. We’re getting married, you hear me—on Christmas Day. And if that doesn’t suit people, then the day after—but that’s it!”

The door opened upstairs. “Mr. Bassart, there is that shouting
again! That is not music, that is clear shouting, and it will not be tolerated!”

Roy stuck his head out into the hallway. “No, no, just saying good night to Lucy here, Mrs. Blodgett—finishing up the old wedding plans.”

“Say it then! Don’t shout it! This is a dwelling place!” She slammed her door shut.

Lucy was crying.

“
Now
what are the tears for?” he asked. “Huh?
Now
what hundred thousand things did I do wrong? Really, you know, maybe I’ve had just about enough complaining and criticizing of me, you know—from you included, too. So maybe you ought to stop, you know. Maybe you ought to have a little consideration for all I’ve been through,
and just stop, damn it!
”

“Oh,” she said, “I’ll stop, Roy. Until you change your mind again—!”

“Oh, brother, I’ll make that bargain.
Gladly.
”

Whereupon, to his surprise, she threw open the window, and out of anger, or spite, or habit left the room as she had entered it. Roy rushed into the hallway to the front door. Noisily he opened it—“Good night,” he called. “Good night, Lucy”—and noisily he closed it, so that upstairs Mrs. Blodgett would continue to believe that everything was really on the up-and-up, even if a little too loud.

Tuesday, Aunt Irene for lunch at the Hotel Thomas Kean.

Wednesday, his mother and father for dinner at The Song of Norway.

Thursday, Uncle Julian, a drink in the taproom of the Kean, lasting from five in the afternoon until nine in the evening.

At nine-thirty Roy dropped into a sofa in the downstairs living room of The Bastille. The corner in which Lucy had chosen to wait for him was the darkest in the room.

“And I haven’t eaten,” he said. “I haven’t even eaten!”

“I have some crackers in my room,” she whispered.

“They’re not going to treat me like this,” he said, glaring
down his legs at the tips of his Army shoes. “I won’t sit by and listen to threats, I’ll tell you that.”

“… Do you want me to get the crackers?”

“That isn’t the point, Lucy! The point is, pushing me around! Thinking he could make me sit there! Just
make
me, you know? Well, I don’t need them that bad, I’ll tell you that. And I don’t want them either, not if they’re going to take this kind of attitude. What an attitude to take—to me! To somebody they’re supposed to care about!”

He got up and walked to the window. Looking out at the quiet street, he banged a fist into his palm. “Boy!” she heard him say.

She remained curled up on the sofa, her legs back under her skirt. It was a posture she had seen the other girls take while talking to their boy friends in the dormitory living room. If the house mother came into the living room, it would seem as though nothing unusual were going on. So far no one in the dorm knew anything; no one was going to, either. In her two and a half months at school Roy hadn’t left her alone enough to make any close friends, and even those few girls she had begun to be friendly with on the floor, she had drawn away from now.

“Look,” said Roy, coming back to the sofa, “I’ve got the G.I. Bill, haven’t I?”

“Yes.”

“And I’ve got savings still, right? Other guys played cards, other guys shot crap—but I didn’t. I was waiting to get out. So I saved! Purposely. And they should know that! I told them, in fact—but they don’t even
listen
. And if worst ever came to worst, I’d sell the Hudson, too, even with all the work I put in it. Do you believe me, Lucy? Because it’s true!”

“Yes.”

Was this Roy? Was this Lucy? Was this them together?

“But they think money is everything. Do you know what he is, my Uncle Julian? Maybe I’m just finding out—but
he’s
a materialist. And what a vocabulary! It’s worse than you even think it is. What respect for somebody else!”

“What did he say? Roy, what kind of threats?”

“Oh, who cares.
Money
threats. And my father—him too. You know, by and large, whether he knew it or not, I used to respect him. But do you think he has any emotional respect for me, either? He’s trying to treat me like I’m in his printing class again. But I just got out of serving my time in the Army. Sixteen months in the Aleutian Islands—the backside of the whole goddamn world. But my uncle says—you know what he says? ‘But the war was over, buster, in 1945. Don’t act like you fought it.’ See,
he
fought it. He won a medal. And what’s that have to do with anything anyway? Nothing! Oh—up his.”

“Roy,” warned Lucy, as some senior girls came into the living room.

“Well,” he said, plopping down next to her, “they’re always telling me I should speak up for myself, right? ‘Make a decision and stick to it, Roy.’ Isn’t that all I heard since the day I got home? Isn’t my Uncle Julian always shooting off about how you have to be a go-getter in this world? That’s his big defense of capitalism, you know. It makes a man out of you, instead of just hanging around waiting for things to come your way. But what does he know about Socialism anyway? You think the man has ever read a book about it in his life? He thinks Socialism is Communism, and what you say doesn’t make any difference at all. None! Well, I’m young. And I’ve got my health. And I sure don’t care one way or the other about ever being in the El-ene washing-machine business, I’ll tell you that much. Big threat that is. I’m going to photography school anyway. And you know something else? He doesn’t know right from wrong. That’s the real pay-off. That in this country, where people are still struggling, or unemployed, or don’t have the ordinary necessities that they give the people in just about any Scandinavian country you can name—that a man like that, without the slightest code of decency, can just bully his way, and the hell with right and wrong or somebody’s feelings. Well, I’m through being somebody he can toss his favors to. Let him keep his big fourteen-dollar cigars. Up his, Lucy—really.”

The next morning, when the alarm rang at six-thirty, she went off to the bathroom to stick a finger down her throat
before the other girls started coming in to brush their teeth. This made her feel herself again, provided she skipped breakfast afterward, and avoided the corridor back of the dining hall, and forced soda crackers down herself from time to time during the morning. Then she could get through the day’s classes pretending that she was the same girl in the same body, and in the same way too—alone.

But what about last night? And the night before that? The fainting spells had stopped two weeks back, and the nausea she could starve to death every morning, but now that Roy’s body seemed to be inhabited by some new person, the truth came in upon her as it never had before:
a new person was inhabiting hers as well
.