The Accidental Tourist

“What’s all that barking I hear?”

“Don’t worry, he’s shut in the kitchen. Come on in.”

He held the screen door open and Julian stepped inside. “Thought I’d bring you the material for Paris,” Julian said.

“I see,” Macon said. But he suspected he was really here for some other reason. Probably hoping to hurry the Canada book. “Well, I was just this minute touching up my conclusion,” he said, leading the way to the living room. And then, hastily, “Few details here and there I’m not entirely happy with; may be a little while yet…”

Julian didn’t seem to be listening. He sat down on the cellophane that covered the couch. He tossed the folder aside and said, “Have you seen Rose lately?”

“Yes, we were over there just this morning.”

“Do you think she’s not coming back?”

Macon hadn’t expected him to be so direct. In fact, Rose’s situation had begun to look like one of those permanent irregularities that couples never refer to. “Oh, well,” he told Julian, “you know how it is. She’s worried about the boys. They’re eating glop or something.”

“Those are not boys, Macon. They’re men in their forties.”

Macon stroked his chin.

“I’m afraid she’s left me,” Julian said.

“Oh, now, you can’t be sure of that.”

“And not even for a decent reason!” Julian said. “Or for any reason. I mean our marriage was working out fine; that much I can swear to. But she’d worn herself a groove or something in that house of hers, and she couldn’t help swerving back into it. At least, I can’t think of any other explanation.”

“Well, it sounds about right,” Macon told him.

“I went to see her two days ago,” Julian said, “but she was out. I was standing in the yard wondering where she’d got to when who should drive past but Rose in person, with her car stuffed full of old ladies. All the windows packed with these little old faces and feathered hats. I shouted after her, I said, ‘Rose! Wait!’ but she didn’t hear me and she drove on by. Then just at the last minute she caught sight of me, I guess, and she turned and stared, and I got the funniest feeling, like the car was driving her—like she was just gliding past helpless and couldn’t do a thing but send me one long look before she disappeared.”

Macon said, “Why don’t you give her a job, Julian.”

“Job?”

“Why don’t you show her that office of yours. That filing system you never get sorted, that secretary chewing her gum and forgetting whose appointment is when. Don’t you think Rose could take all that in hand?”

“Well, sure, but—”

“Call her up and tell her your business is going to pieces. Ask if she could just come in and get things organized, get things under control. Put it that way. Use those words. Get things under control, tell her. Then sit back and wait.”

Julian thought that over.

“But of course, what do I know,” Macon said.

“No, you’re right.”

“Now let’s see your folder.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Julian said.

“Look at this!” Macon said. He held up the topmost letter. “Why do you bother me with this? I just wanted to appraise you folks of a wonderful little hotel in… A man who says he wants to ‘appraise’ us, do you really suppose he’d know a good hotel when he saw one?”

“Macon,” Julian said.

“The whole damn language has been slaughtered,” Macon said.

“Macon, I know you feel I’m crass and brash.”

This took Macon a moment to answer, only partly because he first heard it as “crash and brass.” “Oh,” he said. “Why, no, Julian, not at—”

“But I just want to say this, Macon. I care about that sister of yours more than anything else in the world. It’s not just Rose, it’s the whole way she lives, that house and those turkey dinners and those evening card games. And I care about you, too, Macon. Why, you’re my best friend! At least, I hope so.”

“Oh, why, ah—” Macon said.

Julian rose and shook his hand, mangling all the bones inside, and clapped him on the shoulder and left.

Sarah came home at five-thirty. She found Macon standing at the kitchen sink with yet another cup of coffee. “Did the couch get here?” she asked him.

“All safe and sound.”

“Oh, good! Let’s see it.”

She went into the living room, leaving tracks of gray dust that Macon supposed was clay or granite. There was dust in her hair, even. She squinted at the couch and said, “What do you think?”

“Seems fine to me,” he said.

“Honestly, Macon. I don’t know what’s come over you; you used to be downright finicky.”

“It’s fine, Sarah. It looks very nice.”

She stripped off the cellophane and stood back, arms full of crackling light. “We ought to see how it opens out,” she said.

While she was stuffing the cellophane into the wastebasket, Macon pulled at the canvas strap that turned the couch into a bed. It made him think of Muriel’s house. The strap’s familiar graininess reminded him of all the times Muriel’s sister had slept over, and when the mattress slid forth he saw the gleam of Claire’s tangled golden hair.

“Maybe we should put on the sheets, now that we’ve got it open,” Sarah said. She brought the sack of linens from the front hall. With Macon positioned at the other side of the couch, she floated a sheet about the mattress and then bustled up and down, tucking it in. Macon helped, but he wasn’t as fast as Sarah. The clay dust or whatever it was had worked itself into the seams of her knuckles, he saw. There was something appealing about her small, brown, creased hands against the white percale. He said, “Let’s give the bed a trial run.”

Sarah didn’t understand at first. She looked up from unfolding the second sheet and said, “Trial run?”

But she allowed him to take the sheet away and slip her sweat shirt over her head.

Making love to Sarah was comfortable and soothing. After all their years together, her body was so well known to him that he couldn’t always tell the difference between what he was feeling and what she was feeling. But wasn’t it sad that they hadn’t the slightest uneasiness about anyone walking in on them? They were so alone. He nestled his face in her warm, dusty neck and wondered if she shared that feeling as well — if she sensed all the empty air in the house. But he would never ask.

While Sarah took a shower, he shaved. They were supposed to go to Bob and Sue Carney’s for supper. When he came out of the bathroom Sarah was standing in front of the bureau, screwing on little gold earrings. (She was the only woman Macon knew of who didn’t have pierced ears.) He thought Renoir could have painted her: Sarah in her slip with her head cocked slightly, plump tanned arms upraised. “I’m really not in the mood to go out,” she said.

“Me neither,” Macon said, opening his closet door.

“I’d be just as content to stay home with a book.”

He pulled a shirt off a hanger.

“Macon,” she said.

“Hmm.”

“You never asked me if I slept with anyone while we were separated.”

Macon paused, halfway into one sleeve.

“Don’t you want to know?” she asked him.

“No,” he said.

He put on the shirt and buttoned the cuffs.

“I would think you’d wonder.”