The evenings in New York when they saw the musical comedies were more of a success. Both shows were on Saturday nights, and Trixie spent the first one at the Petersons', the parents of Trixie's best friend Janey, and on the second, Mrs. Peterson came over with Janey to keep Trixie company during the first part of the evening. Trixie could be relied on to fall soundly asleep by ten at least, and Mrs. Peterson generally stayed on until midnight before she left the house. On both evenings after the theater Vic and Melinda went to a supper club where there were dance orchestras, though Vic did not propose dancing because he felt Melinda would have refused him. For all her good humor on those evenings, Vic could feel her lurking resentment because he had cut her off from Joel and Ralph. The second of the evenings, when they got home at four in the morning, Melinda was in the kind of gay mood that sometimes inspired her to wade in the brook that went through the woods only a few yards from the house, or to drive over to the Cowans' and jump in their swimming pool, but she did those things only with people like Ralph or Jo-Jo. She didn't propose a wade in the brook when they got home, and Vic knew it was because 'he' was there, her stodgy husband, and not one of the exuberant young men. He started to suggest the brook, but he didn't. He didn't really feel that silly, didn't want to cut his feet on the stones that they wouldn't be able to see in the dark, and he didn't think Melinda would appreciate such a proposal from him, anyway.
They sat on Melinda's bed, still completely dressed, looking through some Sunday papers Vic had bought in Manhattan, all the papers except the 'Times', which was delivered to them on Sunday mornings. Melinda was laughing at something she was reading in the 'News'. She had slept on his shoulder during most of the ride home. Vic felt very wide awake and could have stayed up the rest of the night. Perhaps, he thought, his wide-awakeness was due to the unusual circumstances of his sitting on Melinda's bed—it had been years since he had sat on her bed—and, though he was interested in what he was reading about American defectors in China, another part of his mind tentatively examined the sensations that sitting on her bed produced in him. Intimacy, rapport, were not among them, he thought, or the anticipation of them. He felt a little uncomfortable. Yet he was aware of something plucking at him to ask her if she minded if he stayed in her room tonight. Just slept in her bed with his arms around her, or perhaps not even touching her—Melinda knew that he wouldn't do anything to annoy her. Then he thought of what she had said about the Cowans tonight on the drive to New York, that the Cowans had changed toward them because of his "bad taste" in telling the McRae story, that the Mellers as well as the Cowans were cooler toward them. People were shunning them, Melinda insisted, though Vic, insisting that they weren't, pointed out incidents that proved people were not shunning them at all, and reminded her that the Cowans were leading a quiet life just now because Phil was working hard on his economics book, trying to finish it before he had to start teaching again in September. Vic wondered if he should risk asking her if he might stay in her room tonight, or would she seize it as another opportunity to show him how much she resented him by refusing him indignantly? Or, even if she didn't refuse indignantly, would it so surprise her that it would spoil the pleasant mood of the evening? Did he particularly 'want' to stay, anyway? He didn't.
Melinda yawned. "What're you reading so hard?"
"About defectors. If the Americans go over to the Reds, they call them 'turncoats.' If the Reds come over to us, they're 'freedom-loving.' Just depends from what side you're talking." He smiled at her.
Melinda made no comment. He hadn't thought she would make a comment. He got up slowly from the bed. "Good night, honey. Sleep well." He bent and kissed her cheek. "Did you enjoy the evening?"
"Umm-m, I did," Melinda said with no more expression than a little girl might have used in replying to her grandfather after a day at the circus. "Good night, Vic. Don't wake Trixie when you go by her room."
Vic smiled to himself as he went out. Three weeks ago she wouldn't have thought about Trixie. She would have been thinking about calling Ralph as soon as he had left her room.
Chapter 5
June was a delightful month, not too warm, not too dry, with twice- or thrice-weekly rains that came around six in the evening, lasted about half an hour, and brought the raspberries and strawberries in the woods behind the house to a fat, juicy perfection. Vic went out with Trixie and Janey Peterson on several Saturday afternoons and gathered enough to supply both families with berries for cold cereal, pies, and ice cream for a week at a time. Trixie had decided not to go to camp this summer, because Janey wasn't going. She and Janey had registered at the Highland School four miles away from Little Wesley, a
