William Styron: The Collected Novels: Lie Down in Darkness, Set This House on Fire, The Confessions of Nat Turner, and Sophie's Choice (52 page)

Then he went downstairs.

Did he call Dolly before Peyton left, or afterward? This part, too, he was unable to reconstruct with any accuracy, only there was a time, he remembered, some minutes later, when he was
holding
Peyton, holding her to his breast while she wept, saying, “That’s all right, baby. That’s all right, child. That’s all right, baby.” Over and over.

She had her coat on. Her bags were in the hallway beside her. When Harry, to whom he’d given the keys to his car, backed it out of the garage, they’d be ready to go.

The things he could think to say now were impersonal, futile. “Tell him to leave the keys with the man at the ferry. I know him. I’ll pick up the car tomorrow. I’ll send your presents.”

She brightened up a little, erased her tears with powder from a compact. “O.K.,” she said. “I’m sorry, Bunny. I’m really sorry, aren’t you? Things’ll be better someday.” She gazed around the dark hallway with a lost look. “We don’t have any whisky. Do you——” He went to the kitchen and got a pint from one of the colored boys. She put it in her bag.

He bent down to kiss her. She didn’t move when he kissed her cheek, her ear, her hair. He kissed her on the mouth. “Don’t——” she whispered, pushing him away. “Bunny dear … sober up.”

Then he and she both, somehow, and Harry, were all propelled toward the porch in a shower of cheers and yells, falling rice. “Good-by …” everyone shouted, “good-by … good-by … good-by!” The car vanished down the driveway, followed by two frantic Chevrolets loaded with young people. He walked back to the door, almost fell down amid the slippery rice, but was caught by Monk Yourtee, who shrieked something about wedding nights, grandchildren.

“Go away.”

Then, he remembered—and it suddenly all became clear—he was in the hallway, dialing Dolly again and again, a new drink beside him. He watched them from where he sat by the telephone: the last dogged guests—Polly Pearson, Monk Yourtee, Cherry Pye, the willowy boy named Campbell Someone doing an impromptu, lonesome dance, Edward passed out in a pool of champagne—and the anxiety drained away from him quickly and completely. Everyone was very happy. The music which was playing he didn’t remember, but he hummed along with it, thinking of a new order in life, and when Dolly finally answered he said, “Kitten, guess who?”

“Milton!”

“That’s right,” he said, “it’s all over over here.”

“Oh, darling, what do you mean?”

“I’ll get a taxi.”

Unless you drive a car, to get to Florida from Port Warwick you must take the train in Richmond, which is far out of the way to the north, or go by ferry across the bay to Norfolk and take a different train from there. It is an inconvenient arrangement, and it is one of the reasons why many people of Port Warwick have become, in their geographic dislocation, perhaps more than ordinarily provincial; but it makes money for the ferry company and it is a pleasant trip, and everyone has become used to it by now. The ferry slip is not far from the railroad station, in fact adjoins it, in an atmosphere of coal dust, seedy cafés, run-down, neon-lit drug stores where sailors buy condoms and Sanitubes and occasionally ice-cream cones. The salt air is strong here. The wind rustles the weeds in vacant lots. Along the railroad track the Negro cabins are lit with the yellow glow of oil lamps, and in the moonlight a black figure appears to pull down the washing. The bus wheezes up to the ferry slip, takes on a group of drunken sailors and is gone. Silence descends. A restaurant door flaps noiselessly in the winds; water laps around the slip, and in front of the office, about the feet of some dozing, waiting passenger, a newspaper curls quietly. Occasionally a body is found in one of the vacant lots and, if the victim is Caucasian, the police begin their pogrom with sticks and flashlights and ominous sirens, causing nervousness and despondency among the Negroes.

Because it was not too cold, Peyton and Harry sat on a bench out in front of the waiting room, Peyton drinking whisky and water from a paper cup. The stars were out, and a big harvest moon. They had been sitting there for fifteen minutes, with only an old woman, who had a parrot in a cage, for company. Peyton and Harry said little to each other. Occasionally the parrot yelled, “My, my, why not!” in a cracked, sad voice, and the woman bent down and rapped on the cage with a withered hand, saying, “You hush, Spottswood, or I’ll cover you.” Peyton poured another drink.

A police car rolled slowly onto the slip, its siren purring adventurously and for no apparent reason at all. It halted in front of the waiting room. A puckered, elderly face and eyes blurred by steel-rimmed glasses surveyed them with cranky disapproval. The cop had a flashlight, too, which had been handed to him by his partner in the shadows, and this he turned on Peyton and Harry, although the area was flooded with light.

“You seen a big nigger around here?”

“How big?” said Harry.

“Six feet three,” he recited, “light complexion, mustache, scar above the nose.”

“Not lately. What’s he done?”

“Slugged a old white man. Left him lyin’ right in the middle of Warwick Avenue. Thought maybe somebody down here had seen him.”

“Slugged him?” Harry said. “How do you know?”

“We got clues.”

“What kind of clues?”

“All kinds of clues. Fingerprints. He left a footmark. Say——” He halted, regarding them suspiciously. “What are you askin’ so many questions for? What business is it of your’n?”

Harry borrowed Peyton’s cup and took a drink of whisky. “I’m a taxpayer,” he said. “I’m interested in law and order.”

“My, my,” said the parrot, “why not!”

“Hush, Spottswood,” the old woman said, giving the cage a crack.

Peyton poured whisky into another cup. The policeman’s mouth became a severe and puritanical line. “Is that whisky you’re drinking, young lady?” he said.

Peyton looked back at him unblinking. “If you’ll take that silly light out of my eyes,” she said, “I’ll answer you.”

The light snapped out. “It is,” she went on, holding up the pint. “ ‘Old Overholt,’ ” she read from the bottle, “ ‘straight rye whisky, one hundred proof bottled in bond under government supervision at our distillery at——’ ”

“There’s a law you know. Commonwealth of Virginia, Public Law number one fifty-eight,” he said competitively, “prohibiting the display of intoxicants in a public place——”

Peyton yawned. “Oh, for heaven’s sake …”

The cop looked at Harry. “What’s your name? Let me see your draft and registration cards. I think I’ll run you in——”

“His name is Harry Miller,” Peyton said, rising to her feet.

“What’s your’n?”

“Mrs. Harry Miller, née Peyton Loftis.”

“Nay what?”

“Peyton Loftis.”

“You Mr. Milton Loftis’ girl?”

“Yes.”

“Well, bless my soul,” he said with a wintry smile, “you must of just got married. We had a special man sent out there last night, to take care of burglars. Bless my soul, you’re right pretty, too.”

“My, my!” the parrot croaked.

“Well,” he said, “guess we’d better be shovin’ along.” And he waved his hand. “ ’Gratulations!” The car moved slowly away, its siren moaning, vanished up the road.

“So there!” said Peyton and sat down.

He took her hand. “Loftis. Big name in these parts.”

“I’m glad it’s Miller now,” she sighed. “
God,
I’m glad. I’d have settled for Lipchitz.”

“Then you wouldn’t have Miller.”

“I know,” she said, resting her head on his shoulder. “Then life wouldn’t be worth living.”

“Tut, tut, my dear, I’m not all that important.”

“Yes, you are, too,” she said. “Give me a drink.” She sat erect suddenly, smoothing her hair. “Damn them,” she said. “God damn them!” At this the old woman gave a leap in her seat, got up and moved off into the waiting room, muttering to Spottswood about liquor and profanity.

“Take it easy, honey,” said Harry.

“I
won’t
take it easy,” she said. “I’m tired of taking it easy.” She looked down at her fingernails. “I broke one when I did it. Look here.” She wiggled her forefinger thoughtfully, displaying a nail broken near the end, with its red lacquer chipped away. “I went deep when I did it. I could have gone deeper if I’d wanted to, only I didn’t have enough time. I could have gone right down to the bone——”

“Such talk,” he put in, “you just forget about it all. Quit talking like that. You’ll feel better if you just forget the whole thing——”

“I don’t
want
to forget it. I want to remember it always. The blood coming out, the way the skin peeled away. I could feel the skin peeling away beneath the nail, then it broke——”

He turned toward her, gripping her by the wrist. “Now listen, Peyton,” he said sternly, “you listen to
me.
I know how you feel and all that. But if you keep talking about it and going over it in your mind, you’re going to make yourself miserable and me miserable, and the whole trip rotten——”

She turned away from him with a sniff, draining her cup. “Cut it out. You sound like Uncle Wiggly.”

They sat in silence for a moment, fidgeting, suddenly chilled and testy. Above them Mars rose in its course, hung pink as a gumdrop above a plump and amiable moon. A few cars rolled onto the dock, nosing up like dogs against each other’s bumpers. Across the water, silhouetted against the lights of Norfolk, the ferry approached, tooting importantly. Harry looked up at the sky. “What a wedding.”

Peyton said nothing, poured herself another drink.

“Look,” he said, “take it easy on that bottle. Part of it was nice, though, honey. The service, I mean. I liked Carey Carr. And that old fellow—what was his name?—Houston. And your old man.”

“He’s an ass.”

“No, I don’t think so. He was stewed to the eyes and confused. I think he thought you had attacked him, rejected him or something. He’s not an ass, he was just sad——”

“He’s an ass. He’s lived fifty years in total and utter confusion, made a mess out of his life.”

“Don’t be too bitter, baby——”

“Bitter!” she cried, “don’t be bitter, you say. How can I be anything else when I see where his kind of life’s led him? How can I be anything else? Don’t you see—he’s never been beyond redemption, like Helen. That’s the terrible part. Can’t you see? She was beyond hope I guess the day she was born. But Daddy! He’s had so much that was good in him, but it was all wasted. He wasn’t man enough to stand up like a man and make decisions and all the rest. Or to be able to tell her where to get off. And that idiotic woman he’s been messing around with all his life. What a farce! I’ll bet he goes back to her.”

“So——”

“What do you mean,
so?
So it’s awful, Harry. That’s what. I don’t mean I have any righteous feeling about him and her. God knows she’s better than that … that
harpy!
But isn’t it awful? Aren’t things bad enough in the world without having him crawl back to that idiot? Oh, I feel so sorry for him. Don’t you
see
the trouble—?”

“Yes——”

“You do not. For heaven’s sake, Harry, don’t be so Christlike. Quit trying to spare my feelings. Tell me what you think of them. Tell me you despise them as much as I do! Tell me. Use your head, Harry. Go on and say it!”

“No, I——”

She jerked away from him. “Oh, honest to God, you’re impossible.” And with mustering despair he watched her getting drunk, frantic and unreasonable. The ferry came, warped into the slip with unhappy squeals against the pilings. They assembled their bags, paid a Negro fifty cents to help take them aboard. On the enclosed upper deck, to which they ascended without saying a word to each other, there was a harsh light and an overheated smell. They sat down on the rattan bench, still without speaking. The windows were frosty with steam. Other passengers straggled in—a middle-aged couple, two sleepy soldiers, an overalled youth with pimples, the old woman with the parrot. Spottswood was now covered up, and as she passed by the woman glanced at them reproachfully; then she sat down at the far end of the deck. A juke box was playing somewhere, and behind a counter, selling soft drinks and hot dogs and souvenirs—
Come to Virginia,
the ashtrays read,
Cradle of the Nation
—stood a young man absorbedly picking his nose. He wore the air of overwhelming tedium people have when, though hardly stirring from their tracks, they move miles each day, and when Harry asked him for ginger ale, the bottle was warm.

“It’s warm.”

“It’s all we got.”

“But it’s warm.”

“Take it or leave it.”

“Here, baby,” Harry said to Peyton, “mix it with this. Or on second thought,” he added, pulling the bottle from her coat, “maybe you’d better wait until we get on the train. We’ve got two hours yet, you know.”

She looked up at him with red, weary eyes. “O.K. I’ll just finish this one.”

He sat down beside her again and she rested her head against his shoulder. He put an arm around her, murmuring “Sweetheart,” but she said nothing. From beneath the deck there was a throbbing; the boat moved out of the slip, past an arm of the peninsula where the gas tanks loomed up bleakly in the darkness, past a light buoy with its winking red eye, and on into the bay. The juke box was playing “Frenesi.” One of the soldiers sprawled out on the bench across from them and went to sleep. Presently Peyton said, “Harry. Where did you go?”

“When?”

“When she came and took me upstairs. Why weren’t you there?”

“I was talking to your father.”

“But I saw you talking to someone else, too. Just when I left. Some girl or other. Polly Pearson.”

“She’s quite a kid,” he said. “She thinks the world of you——”

Peyton pulled away from him, digging into his wrist with her hand. “That’s not the point, Harry! Don’t you see—I
needed
you then. If you’d been there maybe it would have been different.
You
could have done something. But you weren’t there. You left me just like you always do. When I needed you.
Why
didn’t you come and rescue me? Didn’t you
see
——”

He made a soothing noise. “No, honey, now listen. Please don’t give me a hard time about all this. I’m on your side, baby, believe me. Really. Just don’t raise hell now; this is our honeymoon, unquote. If I had known, it’d been different, but I didn’t know, I didn’t realize——”