“I don’t think he’s one of my people,” he said.
His mother shook her head vaguely, as if bothered by a fly. His grandfather drew in a mouthful of smoke, exhaled, and cast a glance toward him that only appeared to be casual. He wandered over to the couch with the same false casualness and sat down near his mother. She waved smoke away.
“You seem to care about this nurse.”
“Oh, Daddy, for Pete’s sake,” his mother said. “He’s seventeen years old.”
“That’s what I mean.”
“I haven’t seen her since I was ten.” Tom sat down on the piano bench. “She was a good nurse, that’s all. She understood how to treat patients, and Dr. Milton just sort of came in and out. To have Dr. Milton decide whether or not Nancy Vetiver is in trouble just sort of seems upside-down, that’s all.”
“Upside-down.” His grandfather uttered the words neutrally.
“I’m not trying to be rude. I don’t dislike Dr. Milton.”
“And of course you have no idea what is going on at Shady Mount. Which is serious enough to call Boney all the way back down-island.”
Tom began feeling resentful and trapped. “Yes.”
“Yet you unthinkingly take the side of this hospital employee over the doctor. And you assume that this same doctor, who delivered you and came out to help your mother a few nights ago, has no right to criticize her.”
“I’m just going on what I saw,” Tom said.
“When you were ten years old. And scarcely in a normal frame of mind.”
“Well, I could be wrong—”
“I’m glad to hear you say it.”
“—but I’m not.” Part of him wondered what was making him say these things.
Tom looked up and saw that his grandfather was staring at him. “Let me remind you of certain facts. Bonaventure Milton grew up two blocks from where you now live. He attended Brooks-Lowood. He went to Barnable College and the University of St. Thomas Medical School. He belongs to the Founders Club. He is Chief of Staff at Shady Mount, and he is going to be Chief of Staff at the multimillion dollar facility we’re going to build out here. Do you still think it would be upside-down, as you say, for Dr. Milton, with his background and qualifications, to criticize or judge this nurse, with hers?”
“She has no background,” Gloria said in a faint voice. “She came to our house and expected a tip for nursing Tom.”
“No, she didn’t,” Tom said. “And—”
“It was in her eyes,” Gloria said.
“Grand-Dad, I just don’t think Dr. Milton’s background has anything to do with what kind of doctor he is. Cops and jitney drivers deliver babies. And all he does for Mom is give her shots and pills.”
“I had no idea you were such a hot-blooded revolutionary.”
“Is that what I am?”
He regarded Tom for a moment. “Would you like me to inform you of what this so-called situation at Shady Mount is all about? Since you are so interested in this nurse’s career?”
“Oh, no,” said Gloria.
“I’d like that. She was a great nurse, that’s all.”
“I will telephone you when I know what has happened. Then you can make your own determination.”
“Thank you,” Tom said.
“Well, I’m not sure I have any appetite left, but let’s go through to lunch.” He placed what was left of his cigar in an ashtray and stood up, holding out his hand to his daughter.
The dining room at the back of the bungalow opened out on a wide terrace. The table had been set for three, and Kingsley’s wife stood beside it as they came out. She was wearing a black dress with a lace collar and white apron, and, like her husband, she visibly straightened when she saw them.
“Will you be having a drink today, sir?” she asked. Mrs. Kingsley was a thin old lady with sparse white hair skinned back into a tight bun.
“My daughter and myself will have gin and tonics,” Upshaw said. “No. I want something stronger. Make that a martini. You too, Gloria?”
“Anything,” Gloria said.
“And get Karl Marx here a beer.”
Mrs. Kingsley disappeared through the arch into the dining room. Tom’s grandfather pulled out Gloria’s chair and then sat at the head of the table. Tom sat opposite his mother. It was cool and shady on the terrace. A breeze from the ocean stirred the bottom of the tablecloth and the leaves of the bougainvillaea growing along the divider at the end of the terrace. Gloria shivered.
Glendenning Upshaw glanced sourly at Tom, as if blaming him for his mother’s discomfort, and said. “Shawl, Gloria?”
“No, Daddy.”
“Food’ll warm you up.”
“Yes, Daddy.” She sighed. Her eyes looked glassy to Tom, and he wondered if he had missed seeing Dr. Milton give her a pill. She sat waiting for her drink with parted lips. Tom wished he was sitting at the long table in the Shadow’s house, having a conversation instead of whatever this was.
Then the memory of the leather-bound journal reminded him of something his father had said.
“Grand-Dad, didn’t you give Friedrich Hasselgard his start?”
Upshaw grunted and frowned. He still looked sour. “What of it?”
“I’m just curious, that’s all.”
“That’s nothing for you to be curious about.”
“Do you think he killed himself?”
“Please,” said Gloria.
“You heard your mother, do her the honor of obeying her,” Upshaw said.
Mrs. Kingsley came back with a tray of drinks and passed them out. She did not seem to expect thanks. Glendenning Upshaw took in a mouthful of cold gin and settled back in his chair, tucking in his chin so that his face turned into a landscape of bumps and hollows. He had begun to look less unhappy as soon as he had tasted his drink. Friedrich Hasselgard had just disappeared, Tom thought: he had climaxed his career of government service by taking a three hundred thousand dollar bribe and killing his sister, and then he went out on his boat, and Glendenning Upshaw took a little swallow of a martini, and Friedrich Hasselgard watched himself disappear.
“Anyhow, I suppose he killed himself, yes. What else could have happened?”
“I’m not too sure,” Tom said. “People don’t just disappear, do they?”
“Upon occasion they do.”
There was a silence, and Tom swallowed a mouthful of pale, slightly bitter Pforzheimer beer. “I’ve kind of been thinking about a neighbor of ours lately,” he said. “Lamont von Heilitz.”
Both his mother and his grandfather looked at him, Gloria in an unfocused way that made Tom wonder what kind of pills Dr. Milton gave her, his grandfather with a quick astounded irritation.
Gloria said, “Lamont? Did you say Lamont?”
His grandfather frowned and said, “Drop the subject.”
“Did he say Lamont?”
Glendenning Upshaw cleared his throat and turned to his daughter. “How have you been, Gloria? Getting out much?”
She fell back into her chair. “Victor and I went to the Langenheims’ last week.”
“That’s good. You enjoyed yourself?”
“Oh, yes. Yes, I enjoyed myself.”
“Didn’t you think it was interesting that Hasselgard disappeared from his boat on the same day the police killed that man in Weasel Hollow?” Tom asked. “What did you think about that, Grand-Dad?”
His grandfather lowered his glass and turned heavily toward Tom. “Are you asking me what I thought, or are you asking if I thought it was interesting?”
“What you really thought.”
