lotion. Carolyn and I drove alone to Yale, and I always enjoy going back to my alma mater, as my college memories are good despite the turmoil of those years in the mid-sixties. Carolyn said to me on the way to New Haven, 'Are you legally separated?'
'No. Your mother just went to visit her parents.'
'It's sort of a trial separation?'
'No.'
'Why are you sleeping in separate rooms?'
'Because we don't want to sleep in separate cities. End of conversation.' So I drove her up to Yale. As a sophomore this year, Carolyn enters what we call a 'college', actually a dorm where she will spend the next three years. She is, in fact, in my old college, Jonathan Edwards. J E, as we call it, is a beautiful, old Gothic building with arches, climbing ivy, and turrets, situated around a large quadrangle. It is, in fact, the greatest place on the face of this earth, and I wished I was staying and not leaving. Anyway, I helped her unload half a vanful of clothes and electronics, which barely fit in her room. It was a nice suite like my old place down the hall, with oak panelling and a fireplace in the living room. I met her roommate, a tall, blonde young woman from Texas named Halsey, and I wondered if I shouldn't go back to Jonathan Edwards to do a little more undergraduate work. You're never too old to learn.
But I digress. Carolyn and I walked down to Liggett's Drugstore, which is sort of a tradition, and with a few hundred other Yalies and parents, we stocked up on notions and sundries. We stowed the Liggett's bags in the van, then walked the few blocks to York Street, 'to the tables down at Mory's, to the place where Louie dwells.' Don't ask me what that means.
Mory's is a private club, and I've kept my membership for this past quarter of a century, though I doubt if I get there once a year. But though I may have resigned from The Creek, and may eventually resign from my job and my marriage and from life in general, I will never resign from Mory's, for to do that is to sever the ties to myself, to the John Sutter whom I used to know and like. I may indeed be a poor little lamb who has lost his way, but that night I was home again.
So Carolyn and I had dinner at Mory's along with a hundred other families, many of whom I noticed were missing one or the other spouse. Carolyn is not a member of Mory's, and may never be, as she discriminates against private clubs. Nevertheless, I regaled her with Mory stories, and she sat there and smiled at me, sometimes amused, sometimes bored, and once or twice disapproving. Well, yesterday's high jinks are today's insensitive behaviour, I suppose, and maybe the reverse is also true. But it was a nice dinner, an exquisite few hours between father and daughter.
The oak tabletops at Mory's have been carved with thousands of names and initials, and though we couldn't find mine without clearing off someone else's dinner, I did produce a sharp pocketknife for Carolyn, who carved away while I went around the dining room and said hello to a few old school chums. I walked Carolyn back to Jonathan Edwards, we kissed good-bye, and I got in the van, opting for the two-hour drive back to Long Island rather than prolonging the nostalgia trip, which could easily have turned from pleasant to maudlin. Regarding my legal career, my association with Perkins, Perkins, Sutter and Reynolds seemed to be rather vague, perhaps even tentative. I put myself on half salary, which is, I think, fair since I spend half the week in the Locust Valley office, albeit with my door closed and the phone turned off. But I feel a sense of responsibility to my old clients, and I'm trying to put their affairs in some semblance of order and to parcel them out to other attorneys in the firm. As for my Wall Street business, that's completely gone. My Wall Street clients would fire an attorney after two missed phone calls, so my sense of loyalty and responsibility toward the yellow-tie guys is not deep and not reciprocal. But I have to settle the question of my status with the firm and I suppose if I ever show up at the Wall Street office, I could discuss this with the senior partners.
As for the United States v. Frank Bellarosa, that seemed to be moving rather more slowly than Mr Ferragamo promised. Not only did we not have a trial date, but I hadn't had an opportunity to examine any of the five witnesses against my client. Alphonse informed me one day by phone, 'We have them all in hiding under the witness protection programme. They're very frightened about testifying in open court against a Mafia chief.'
'There is no Mafia.'
Ha, ha, said Alphonse, and he added, 'They didn't mind the grand jury, but now they're getting cold feet.'
'Four Colombian drug goons and a gun moll have cold feet?' 'Why not? So for that reason, Mr Sutter, I've asked for a delay in the trial date. I'll keep you informed.' He added, 'What's your rush? This should make you happy. Maybe the witnesses will refuse to testify.'
'Maybe they were lying from the beginning,' I pointed out.
'Why would they do that?'
He and I both knew why, but I wasn't allowed to bug him. 'Maybe', I said, 'it was a case of mistaken identity. All Italians look alike, don't they?' 'Actually, they don't, Mr Sutter. I don't look anything like Frank Bellarosa, for instance. By the way, regarding mistaken identity, I discovered that you were at your country club at about one P.M. on January fourteenth, for lunch with your wife.'
'So what? I said I saw Bellarosa at about nine A.M., then again at about noon.' 'And you went home, took care of your horse, presumably showered, changed into a suit, and were at your club at one P.M.'
'They don't call me superman for nothing.'
'Hmmm,' said Alphonse. I mean, this guy thought he was Inspector Porfiry Petrovich, hounding poor Raskolnikov into a confession, but I found him a bore. Anyway, I was more convinced than ever that Alphonse was stalling and would continue to stall until somebody out on the street solved his problem. He didn't have long to wait.
Regarding my relationships with friends and family, that was also on hold. Part of the reason for this was that I was keeping out of touch, which is no easy thing to do these days. Try it. But I disconnected my home fax, changed my phone number to an unlisted one, and had all my mail forwarded to a P.O. box in the Locust Valley Post Office, which I never visited. Also, Ethel as gatekeeper proved to be a lot more nasty than George ever was, and nobody gets past the gate while Ethel is in the gatehouse. When she's not around, the gate is locked. Jenny Alvarez. Well, that relationship, too, is on hold, which is best for all concerned, as men and women say to each other when they get involved, panic, run, brood, call, run, and so on. But really, there was no use complicating the situation any more than it was. Actually, I didn't even know if Jenny Alvarez cared anymore, and I would have been relieved to hear that she didn't, and pretty annoyed and hurt, too. But I did watch her nearly every night on the news at eleven, and Susan asked me once if I had suddenly become a news junkie. Spouses who are carrying on often display a change in behaviour, as we know, but watching the news is not usually a tip-off. Goes to show you. But watch I did, and I hoped that one night Jenny Alvarez would just break down on the air and cry out, 'John! John! I miss you!' or at least, I thought, perhaps when she was out in the field reporting, and she was turning it back to the anchorman, Jeff what's-his-name, she would say, 'Back to you, John.' But that never happened, at least not on the nights I was watching. Anyway, I had moved into one of the guesthouse's guest rooms, the smallest one, badly and barely furnished, where we always put people whom we don't want around for more than twenty- four hours. Susan had said to me, 'I understand your reasons for not wanting us to sleep in the same bed, of course. But I'm glad you decided not to move out. I very much want you to stay.' 'Then I will. How much is it a night?'
'Twenty dollars would be fair for that room, but I can let you have a better room for only five dollars more.'
'I'll stay in the smaller room.'
Well, we're still making jokes, and that's a hopeful sign. Right? It's when it becomes really grim that it becomes insufferable. So we lived in that sort of cool limbo that husbands and wives have invented and perfected for the purpose of coexisting until the moving van arrives or until they fall into each other's arms and swear undying love forever, which in connubial terms means about thirty days.
In truth, I was angry, hurt, and vindictive every morning, but by noon I was philosophical, resigned, and willing to let fate take its course. By late evening, however, I was lonely and ready to forgive and forget, unconditionally. But then the next day, the cycle would start over again. Unfortunately, Susan called from Hilton Head about eight A.M., one morning when I was in cycle one, and I said a few things that I regretted by evening. Things like, 'How's William Peckerhead of Hilton Head?'
'Settle down, John.'
Or, 'Did you want to speak to Zanzibar?'
