“Isn’t that pretty solitary?” she was asking.
I took another hit. “Not really. I saw some friends from school for a couple of days. The best day, though, was alone. I hiked up Green Mountain, which is only a couple of thousand feet. Maybe an hour and a half worth of climbing. There’s an old ranger tower on top that gives you a perfect 360-degree of everything. The lakes and woods, farms, old villages, other mountains, all of it for miles. It was perfectly clear. I sat there for two hours. I hated to come down.”
“It sounds beautiful,” she answered softly. “It’s good to be alone without being lonely.”
That was right, I thought. Except for tonight. Tonight, alone would have been lonely, any way you cut it.
Mary was leaning back. She sucked on the joint, making small hollows beneath her cheekbones. “This dope is sensational.”
I thought about that. “Yeah, I think that’s how Pizarro slaughtered all those Indians. They were smoking this stuff.”
She smiled absently. I looked at her again. She was beautiful. No question. But that didn’t move me, right then. I was flashing back and forth between New Hampshire and here, past and future, the girl then and the girl now. Rod Stewart’s dope-and-whiskey voice cut through the haze.
I lit the second joint. It flamed, crackled, then took hold. I passed it to her, with another glass of wine for the cotton mouth. The room was very dim. Mary’s fine cheekbones left soft shadows on her face. I was floating now. Her sudden question seemed to filter through a word at a time.
“What do you want in a woman, Chris?”
It was as if she’d looked into my head and seen the girl. But her voice wasn’t intrusive, just curious. And I was stoned enough to try. “A lot of what I look for in people, I guess. Curiosity. Dislike for the easy answer. That in a good moment they can imagine what it’s like to be an old woman or a small child. That they are more than what they do, or what they are.”
“You don’t ask much,” she said smiling.
“Not much at all.” But I’d had it once and blown it.
The Jefferson Starship came on. I looked at Mary, wondering what she was thinking.
Her voice broke the quiet. “You know, Chris, you’ve been very lucky. You’ve never wanted-or needed- anything.”
“I keep hearing that.”
“No, I mean it. Half the girls I knew growing up were married at eighteen. Sometimes I hate looking back.”
I smiled. “No need. You’ve done a lot. That’s something else I like in a woman.”
She smiled back. I reached for her then. She looked at me with a clear, black gaze. Then her arm raised in a graceful arc and pulled me down.
Afterwards a long drowsy silence, warm in the dark. An hour, maybe more. No talk needed. She stirred against me. “Again?” she murmured.
“Uh-huh. Lust is the curse of my family.”
“The Pagets or the Kenyons?”
“Both.”
She laughed quietly, then stretched herself against me. The Starship was singing “Miracles.”
It turned out she had clothes in the car. She stayed until Sunday.
Sunday night I turned on the television. My theory was that there were other things going on in the world and that they would divert me. It worked for a while. There were famine conditions in India. OPEC had hiked the price of oil. You couldn’t breathe in Pittsburgh, and another Arab had hijacked another plane. Everything was fine until a familiar face appeared.
They had caught him in the Rose Garden, in a discursive mood. “When I was young,” the President was saying, “we had no money. No one in my family had ever gone to college. I scraped to get where I am.” The camera closed in. “It is my philosophy that everyone in this country has the right to lead a good and comfortable life, even become wealthy, although I myself gave up many opportunities to make money for a career in public service.” He sounded somehow disappointed. “So,” he was concluding, “everyone has the right to climb the ladder, and everyone in this country has the opportunity to do so. I especially urge our young people to consider that. It’s one of the great things about us.”
I nearly choked up with real tears. The telephone stopped me.
“Hello, Mr. Paget?”
“Tracy? Where are you?”
“At home. St. Maarten.” The long distance made the girl-voice smaller. “I haven’t heard from Peter.” Her sad question went unanswered.
“I’m sorry, Tracy. I haven’t either. I’ve been trying, really.” I couldn’t explain what had happened Friday, and couldn’t explain my weekend, even if I’d wanted to.
Her voice cracked. “Please-can’t you help me?”
“I’m going to Boston tomorrow. To talk to the police.” I paused. “I think they’ll want to help.”
“Do you think so?” A small hope breathed in her words. It made me feel guilty.
“Lieutenant Di Pietro’s a good man. I’m sure he’ll be interested.”
“Oh,” she said. I could envision her hopeful imagining: Di Pietro the compassionate, restorer of husbands. “Mr. Paget, you’ve made me feel better.”
“Please call me Chris. And if I’m not here, you can reach me through the office. Anytime you want to talk.”
“Thank you, Chris,” she said. “You’re very nice. I’d better get off now.”
I wanted to keep her on, but couldn’t imagine what to say. I gave up. “Take care of yourself, Tracy.” That was the last thing she wanted to do. But she said she would and hung up.
The President had disappeared. I turned off the tube and stared out the window.
No one called that weekend. I guess they figured I wasn’t worth calling anymore.
Twenty-Six
Boston was sunny this time, its warmth cut by a fresh breeze. That was something. I had begun to associate Boston with drizzle, corpses, and old girlfriends, like some back-lot of the mind where I stashed half-digested fears.
I picked up my bags and went straight to the car rental. The girl at the counter had a cute, pug nose and a fey expression which turned wary when she saw me, as if I were about to make an indecent proposal.
“I’m not here to make an indecent proposal,” I said, “just rent a car.”
Her eyes widened slightly. “Well, that’s original anyhow.”
“I’ll take something cheap, if it runs. You know, this job must be great for your ego.”
Her smile was wry. “Not really. You should see the people who try to come on to me. Wrinkles and halitosis. The one today had breath bad enough to melt my fillings. God, I wonder what they’re like at home.”
“God knows. My personal thing is dressing up in a wet suit and flippers and jumping out of closets. But I could tell right away you weren’t that kind of girl.”
“Thanks,” she deadpanned. “Will a Mustang be OK?”
“If you don’t have an Edsel.”
“I rented the last Edsel to the guy with the bad breath,” she said, and took my name down on the rental form.
She handed across the keys and told me where the lot was. Then she looked at me. “Will you be returning the car here, Mr. Paget?”
“I think so.”
“Good,” she smiled.
You never know. I thanked her and started to leave. “About the wet suit and flippers,” she called out. “Try
