The Enchanted Isle

11

I got to Washington around ten o’clock and, instead of taking the bus out, went all the way by cab, as I was pretty tired by then and wanted to get there. So it was $4.25, and I gave the driver five dollars. Then I went up to the front porch, walking on the grass so my footsteps wouldn’t be heard. I peeped in the front window and couldn’t see anything, but a light was on in the living room, so I knew somebody was home. I let myself in with my key, making as little noise as I could, and then from the hall saw Steve asleep in the chair by the arch, the one to the dining room. He was all sprawled out, his necktie pulled to one side, his shirt open at the throat, his belt unbuckled, and his pants half unzipped, while beside the chair on the floor were six or eight beer cans standing around. I set the bag down, opened the closet and hung up the coat, then went in the living room and sat down in the chair by the door. Everything looked the same, the furniture a little bit scuffed, the rug with rose border, the aquarelles of Venice, and the color TV by the fireplace. It came to me about Steve, that if he was more or less drunk he might start something with me, so I got out a knife I had bought at the newsstand in Savannah. On the box it said “BOY SCOUT,” but it was really a switchblade. I took it out of my handbag and sprung it open by pressing the button.

But at the click he opened his eyes.

Then he sat staring at me like a goof. He was big and thickset, maybe thirty years old, with kind of a bull look, but at the same time kind of a frog look. So he stared for some little time, then rubbed his eyes and stared some more. Then: “Mandy, is that you?”

“Well, who do you think it is?”

“I mean are you really there?”

“I think so, yes.”

“Can I come over and touch you?”

But at that I picked up the knife and warned him, “I don’t mind being touched, but if you start something with me, you’re getting this in the gut. Did you hear what I said, Steve? I bought it special for you, and you make one pass out of line, I’m letting you have it.”

“I won’t do anything to you.”

“Well, see that you don’t.”

So he came over and touched me with his finger, poking me on the shoulder, like he thought I might vanish or something. I said, “And another thing, Steve, you smell to high heaven of beer. So don’t come any closer, please. I just don’t care for beer, ’specially stale beer that makes me sick.”

“I’ll fix that right away.”

Then his pants started to slide, and he grabbed them and zipped them up, then fastened his belt. Then he went over and picked up the cans, piling them in his arms, and went through the arch to the dining room and on through to the kitchen. Then pretty soon he was back, with his shirt buttoned, his necktie pulled up, and his hair combed back neat. That way he looked kind of nice, and I thanked him for showing respect. “And the stink is gone, I hope. I rinched my mouth out, rinched it out good, with Listerine.”

He came close, and I said, “That’s better.”

“Mandy, I’ve been through the fires. When you left and I came home the next day and then your mother showed me your note, I thought I would die. I thought I would and didn’t care if I did. I didn’t want to live anymore. And then, after what happened today, the roof fell in — it’s why I started in on the beer. You have to admit, it’s not any weakness of mine, but I’d come to the end of the plank. Well? I’m not any drunk, am I?”

“OK, if it makes you feel better.”

“Then I opened my eyes, and there you were.”

“But what happened today?”

“It’s like the sun came up. And the moon.”

“I asked you what happened today.”

“All in due time, I’ll tell you.”

“It’s due time now. Where’s Mother?”

“She’s... not here.”

“Her car’s in the garage, though.”

“That’s right. She left it.”

“Well, Steve, say something! Where is she?”

“...She got married.”

“She what?”

“Got married. To that guy, the one she’s been stepping out with. Mandy, you have to know about him!”

“You mean that Wilmer? The one that has the distillery?”

“Yeah, him.”

“But how could she, being married to you?”

“...Almost married to me. Mandy, we were going to have it done, soon as she got straightened out on that thing with Vernick. But he stood in the way, and then when he wanted to get married again himself, he stood aside and that unblocked it. So she sued and that was that. But by that time she was suspicioning me, and we never did get around to it. She was free to marry any time she pleased.”

“Suspicioning you of what?”

“Mandy, you have to know.”

“Something having to do with me?”

“You’ve been my life for a long time.”

“Is that when she moved to her room?”

“Yes, that’s when... but by that time Wilmer had showed again, after bumping into her by accident on the street in Washington one day. So they started up again. But before she could marry him, she had to arrange about you — that’s what she called it, ‘arrange,’ when she sat down and talked to me today while waiting for him. And she admitted she had hoped you would fall for me, marry me, and...”

“Well, I won’t!”

“OK, but don’t leave me, Mandy. I can stand anything but that! Not again!”

“You mean I just stay here with you?”

“I’ll behave, I promise you. But listen, you did love me once! I could feel it. I can’t be mistaken!”

“As my father! When I thought you were!”

“OK. Let me be him again!”

“Steve! It’s all I’ve been looking for!”

“Oh, Mandy, it would make me so happy!”

“Then, I’ll think about it.”

He backtracked then, to tell more, and I kind of put things together: how Mother had held off her marriage until I was out of the way, and how this morning, when she thought I was, the idea popped in her mind that she’d have a showdown about it, and then if the answer was yes, she’d call me back and tell me — but I wouldn’t say where I was. So it seemed the answer came pretty quick, that Mr. Wilmer not only told her yes but to stand by and he’d be right down, which he was in a couple of hours. So they went to Dover, Delaware, where there’s no waiting period, and then called Steve from there — and how he celebrated was to get himself slopped on beer. Before they left she brought Mr. Wilmer in, “the first time I’d met him, Mandy. A real nice guy, a big shot as you know right away, just by looking at him.” And while waiting for him she talked, “the first time in her life she ever leveled with me, to tell it like it was, friendly and straight and honest.” Then he got back to me and came to where I was, in the chair, and touched me, my cheek, hair, and knee; I still had on the hot pants I’d put on in the room at Savannah. Then he took my hand and kissed it. So then I patted him and felt like I had before, when I’d climb all over him and muss him and punch him and tickle him. Then at last I said, “OK, Steve, be my father.” He kissed me then, on the forehead. I said, “You mind if I fix myself something? I didn’t have any breakfast and didn’t get off anywhere. Off the bus, I mean, to eat.”

“You mean you haven’t eaten all day?”

“Or drunk anything either. I feel kind of funny.”

“Well, there’s eggs out there, of course, and bacon and stuff, but you’re not fixing yourself anything. You’re going out, and I’m taking you. That Bladensburg place is still open.”

So we went to the place in Bladensburg, which is a bar that also serves food, and he ordered me steak, fried potatoes, and slaw, with pie a la mode for dessert, and had the same himself, as he hadn’t eaten either. So everything was good, and right away I commenced feeling better. But it was cool and I’d put on the coat, and he kept staring at it. At last he asked, “Mandy, is that the coat? That Vernick called about?”

“Oh? She told you about that, then?”

“I was half the night calming her down.”

“She was still kind of upset, talking to me.”

“Where did you get it, Mandy?”

“Is that any business of yours?”

“I hope to tell you it is. Because if a guy gave it to you, I know what he got in return. I ask you once more, where did you get that coat?”

He got the same wild look in his eye he always used to get when he took down my panties and beat me, and I took out the knife once more. I snapped it open and held it in front of me. I said, “Suppose a guy did? Suppose he did give it to me? Suppose he got what you think? What then?”

He clasped his hands together, and I could see the knuckles whiten. Then he closed his eyes. Then after a long time: “OK, I take back what I asked. It’s none of my business where you got the coat.”

“You’re not taking my panties down?”

“Well, not here, I hope.”

He laughed but right away caught a sob before it came out, kind of gulped it back, in a way that left me shook. I mean all of a sudden he didn’t look like a bull, or even like a frog, but a guy with a round face, a nice guy that I liked very much. I felt warm toward him and reached out my hand, first putting the knife away. I patted his hand and told him, “No guy gave it to me.”

“For that piece of news, thanks.”

“I did run off with one, that much is true, that I met at the bus stop, and I meant to do something with him, I can’t pretend I did not, to get even with you for beating me up, and a little bit at Mother for letting you. I would have, but he couldn’t.”

“What do you mean he couldn’t?”

“He was scared.”

“What of?”

“Everything. Me, maybe. The cops.”

“Why them?”

“We helped out on a holdup.”

“You helped out on a... what did you say?”

“Holdup. Of a bank.”

“What bank?”

“Chesapeake Banking and Trust. In Baltimore.”

But if it had been in the Washington papers, he hadn’t paid any attention and hadn’t caught it on TV. I mean he’d never heard of our holdup, and I had to tell him about it, which I did, beginning with how we’d been propositioned, Rick and I, by that pair there at the bus stop, what happened inside the bank, how I drove the getaway car, and how we went from one place to the other. Then I told how we got to Savannah and how Rick had sent me out to call Mother. Then I told about coming back, only to find I’d been given a stand-up so he could skip with the money. By then it was boiling out of me, and I was so mad I could hardly see. I said, “Steve, if it’s murder they charge Rick with, on account of that guard being killed, and if he gets the gas chamber, that’s perfectly all right with me. I want him caught and given the works! That money’s half mine! Do you hear? It’s half mine! It’s...”

But he jumped up and put his hand on my mouth, as people were turning around and commencing to stare. He said, “You done, Mandy? You finished with your supper? Come on, we’re going home!”

So he paid and tipped real quick, and we went out and got in his car. But going home I kept it up, getting slightly wild and always coming back to it: “That money is half mine! How dare he do that to me?” When we got home I was still hooking it up, but soon as we were inside he put his arms around me, kissed me, and patted me quiet, then said, “Mandy! It’s not even a little bit yours! It belongs to the bank. Can’t you understand that? The bank and the bank’s depositors!”

“But nobody knows it was us!”

“Mandy, it’s not what they know; it’s what’s right! And what the law is! And what’s going to happen once the truth begins to come out.”

“OK, but I want him caught!”

“Sit down, let me think.”

So we sat on the sofa, he holding on to my hand while he tried to figure out what he was going to do. Pretty soon he said, “I have to call your mother.”

“Why do you?”

“To head her off from going away. And to try and get Wilmer in — put the bite on him if I can. He’s a big shot, Mandy, and that’s what this needs, first of all.”

“Where is Mother? Where are they?”

“At his home, I would assume.”

“You mean where the distillery is?”

“That’s right. Rocky Ridge, in Frederick County.”

He told a little more about what had happened that morning: Mother’s call to Mr. Wilmer, after she talked to me, and her letting him have it straight: put up or shut up, now that I was out of the way. So he put up, quick. But, as Steve went on to say, “He must have been caught by surprise, with stuff hanging fire up there, so he’d have to go back for a while, at least for one night it would seem, before taking off tomorrow for the Riviera, like she said they were going to do in that call she put in from Dover. To me, I mean. She called to say it was done, that they were married, so good-bye, good luck, and God bless.”

“Then, they must be up there.”

So he sat down by the phone in the hall, got the number from information, and called. Then: “Sal?” But even from where I sat I could hear how furious she was from the way she yelped. I couldn’t hear what was said but the sound of her voice came through, and it was just like glass — glass screeching on glass. He let her run down, then said, “Yes, Sal, I know what night it is, but you don’t, I’m sorry to say. At least not the other half of the night, which is what I’m calling about. To you it’s your wedding night. To me it’s the night Mandy came home, and that means you’re not going away tomorrow. You’re not going anywhere, Sal. She’s in terrible trouble, and you have to stand by. Do you hear me? You have to — until it’s cleared up, if it’s ever cleared up.” All that got was more screaming, but he cut her off quick. He asked, “Is Mr. Wilmer there? Will you let me speak to him?”

Then: “Mr. Wilmer?”

Things quieted down then, as two guys talked to each other, deciding what should be done. Turned out Mr. Wilmer knew about the holdup from reading the Baltimore Sun instead of the Washington papers, and took an even more serious view of it than Steve did, if that was possible. Finally Steve wound up, “OK, then, Mr. Wilmer, I’ll hold everything till you get here. I’m sorry, I hated to call, this night of nights, but I had to. I didn’t have any choice. Because, frankly, I’m not sure I could swing it myself, what has to be done about Mandy. And you being in with all kinds of big wheels, especially lawyers. OK, I’ll knock it off till you get here... Yes, she’s here.”

I took the phone then, calling him “Mr. Wilmer,” and he was awful nice. He said, “Mandy, I’m your new father.”

“Steve is my father now.”

“OK, then, I’m your mother’s new husband.”

“Then, pleased to meet you.”

“Mandy, all I want to say is, you have a friend.”

“Thank you, Mr. Wilmer.”

“But who is this ‘Mr. Wilmer’?”

“I try to show respect.”

“Your mother wants to talk to you.”

So then Mother came on, and I don’t put in what she said, as this is no time to repeat it. I mean she was bitter, bawling me out for cutting her out of her trip to Europe, “which I’ve looked forward to all my life and now have to give up.” But as Steve said, when at last she hung up, “That’s your mother all over. All she thinks about, all she ever thought about, is having a good time. Where’s the Riviera? This place she was going to?”

“Somewhere in France, I think.”

“Swinger’s heaven, wherever it is.”

When we were back on the sofa in the living room, Steve said they’d be down in the morning, as soon as they could make it. He said, “The main thing is Mr. Wilmer has a lawyer, a big wheel in Baltimore, who doesn’t take this kind of case as a general rule but when he does is the best in the business.”

I said, “But what’s all the excitement about? If I turn Rick in, which I’m certainly going to do, I get munity, don’t I?”

“Immunity.”

“Immunity, then.”

“You do if you do.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“There’s no certainty to it. That’s what scared him so. Mr. Wilmer, I mean. In Baltimore, on account of that guard being dead and the papers blasting off that something has to be done, he’s not sure about anything — whether immunity will be granted or clemency consented to or any of the things that in some other case, with no death being involved, might be possible.”

“Don’t they want their money back?”

“That’s our big chance.”

So then it was time to go to bed, and I wasn’t at all sure how Steve was going to act, our first night alone in the house. I went to my room, undressed, brushed my teeth, did my hair, put my pajamas on, and went to bed. I had my own bathroom, so that much presented no problem. But then, when my light was turned out, here came the tap on my door. I thought to myself, “This is it. Now I’ll find out where I’m at.” I tried to tell myself I wasn’t going to mind, that there had to be a first time and it might as well be with Steve. Just the same, I felt pretty sick as I called, “Come in.”

He came.

He bent over and kissed me on the forehead. Then he whispered, “Good night, little Mandy.”

“Good night, Steve.”

“You see, I keep my promises.”

“For that I thank you, Steve.”

He sat on the bed and went on, “Mandy, there’s something I want to explain... why I paddy-whacked you.”

“Steve, you beat me up.”

“OK, call it that.”

“I call it what it was.”

“It was not for the reason you said, the one that you screamed at me more than once while I held you across my knee. To feel your bottom, you said. It wasn’t that at all. It was because I thought you were stepping out with that bunch Amy Schultz runs around with, and it almost set me crazy. Mandy, I couldn’t take it. Talking with her, after you left, trying to get on your trail, your mother found out that you weren’t... for that, and this other thing that you told me, that nothing went on on this trip between you and that boy you ran off with. I can stand all the rest and not mind. I can even glory in you, the nerve that you showed that day to hold steady there at the wheel of the car they put you to drive and get out of there with the money and the boy. Mandy, you couldn’t do wrong for me. It’s what I’ve been wanting to say.”

He got up then and kissed me once more on the forehead, but I pulled him to me, held him close, and kissed him on the mouth. I said, “Steve, now I know you’re my father. I love you.”

“Little Mandy, good night.”

Then he tiptoed to the door, and as he went out we waved to each other and laughed.