Hamilton Stark

Chapter 4. Addendum A

THROUGHOUT THE PRECEDING MONOLOGUE, Rochelle listened attentively to her mother, motionless and almost completely silent. Or at least that is how she would later describe herself. She smoked cigarettes one after the other. When she had smoked one down to the filter, she would crush it out in the seashell ashtray on her mother’s Danish coffee table. Crossing and uncrossing her long legs with that unself-conscious, almost inevitable grace of hers, she never once took her alert eyes off her mother’s expressive, changing face. The only sounds in the room were the continual drone of the air conditioner and the soft, southern voice of Rochelle’s mother and now and then the noise of a car in the midday Florida heat slipping past the apartment building.

It’s difficult to know how the content of her mother’s jeremiad affected Rochelle. We have only her self-description, offered much later, when her attitude toward her father had been altered considerably by the things she had heard from her father’s four other wives, from the testimony of numerous people, including myself, who had known him over the years in one capacity or another, from a lengthy interview with his dying mother and another with his sisters and a brother-in-law, and when she herself had, as they say, “gotten in touch with her anger.”

One could easily speculate about Rochelle’s reaction to the news (and at that time it was news) that her father was in many ways a self-centered, immature, violent, cruel, eccentric, and possibly insane man. But I’m afraid that in my own case any speculation would be influenced by my personal relationship with her, and thus, however innocently, I would tend to work toward evoking in the reader deep feelings of pity and admiration for this amazing young woman. Also, I’m not at all familiar with the nature of Rochelle’s relationship with her mother and therefore cannot confidently say that she did not have some secret use for refusing to believe her mother, i.e., that she did not, perhaps, need to think of her mother as a liar, as a bitter, middle-aged woman filled with self-pity, a mother in need of a villain to justify the absence of her husband throughout her daughter’s childhood and adolescence.

Suffice it to say, then, that I’m not the best person to be in the position of presenting, with anything that approximates objectivity, Rochelle’s emotional reaction to her mother’s testimony concerning the character of her father. Frankly, I am too much in love with Rochelle to be of much good to anyone in this particular matter, except possibly to Rochelle herself, and probably not even that. I admire the woman, and I say it with practically no qualification whatsoever, and because I am aware of how deeply and sharply she has suffered and how she has endured with intelligence, dignity and selflessness throughout, I am filled almost to overflowing with compassion for her. Also, I confess that for several years I have desired her love in return, have sought her favor in every way I could imagine, taking advantage of every slight opportunity to court her that has come my way — and as a result, I have had to watch myself lie for her, to know that I was, on certain occasions, violating all principles, even those few principles I had once thought inviolable. I say this without apology. I offer it merely as a warning.

My vulnerability to a woman like Rochelle is well known. Or at least it’s well known to me. Many men have a weakness (I should say, a “weakness”) for women with long, wildly flowing, deep red hair. And many men have a similar “weakness” for women who are tall, as tall or even taller than they themselves are, and who are thin without being gaunt, large without being big or heavy in any way. And, too, many men have a “weakness” for women who are well shaped, neatly and symmetrically proportioned. I am surely one of each of these types of men, and if that were all there was to my beloved Rochelle, I would be safe, as it were, and could report to you anything I might believe to be true of her without having to feel that I might be deceiving you to further my own rather special interests. But Rochelle is so much more than merely a tall, well-shaped woman with long red hair, that I am consequently that much less a reliable witness to her words and feelings.

I realize that so far I’ve not said a thing about Rochelle’s character or her spiritual nature or intellect. Nevertheless, I would like to linger a little longer on what might be called her “body.” She has skin on her body that is as smooth and white as a fine young onion, or as the flesh of an apple, or as an abalone shell worn smooth by a century’s tides. Dark green (blue-spruce green, actually), her eyes are tear-shaped, slightly downturned, with long, dark lashes. Her nose is long, straight, slender, the vertical arc that insists on the perfect symmetry of her face. Her mouth is neither large nor small, but full and expressive nonetheless, with a sharp, slightly protruding upper lip, a pouting lower lip, and large, white, even teeth that seem as ready to nibble as quick to bite. Her forehead, cheeks and chin are smooth, symmetrical, but at the same time sharply defined by angles which are clearly visible in all but the severest light. Ears — small, a happy maze of tender and delicate whorls, full-lobed. Throat — slender, long, white, and at the base, a mauve birthmark the size and approximate shape of a candle flame. And I have kissed that flame.

(Please note that I do not believe it would be appropriate for me to speculate on, or even to report what I know to be the case with regard to, Rochelle Stark’s character, her spiritual nature, or her intellect. It seems to me that these attributes would be better portrayed, more interestingly and realistically portrayed, in action, in medias res, as it were, and therefore I will put off such portrayal until later in the narrative, when my beloved Rochelle’s developed inner life can be made manifest more naturally and convincingly.)