The Lasko Tangent

Twenty-Five

Mary showed up at my place about eight that evening, in a working girl’s Volkswagen. She wore blue jeans, a leather belt, and a quiet, expensive crepe blouse. “Hi,” she said in a soft, direct voice. “I’m glad you’re all right.”

I thanked her and led her into the living room. “You know,” I admitted, “I haven’t thought about what we’re doing tonight.”

“It doesn’t really matter. Whatever.” That was companionable, I thought. I glanced over at her. She had turned to the wall and was silently appraising the print next to the fireplace.

“That’s a Vasarely,” I explained.

She nodded, not turning. “I like it.” I couldn’t have guessed how much she knew about art. I didn’t care really, except that she was always that way.

Her eyes had moved on, scanning the room with a careful gaze which seemed somehow proprietary. “You’re certainly neat for a bachelor.”

“Yes,” I smiled, “I’m almost totally housebroken.”

She grinned back in real amusement. “I guess that was fairly condescending.”

“Fairly. Care for some wine?”

“What is it?”

I went to the refrigerator and reported back over my shoulder. “A California Riesling, cheap but drinkable. At least I drink it.”

“That sounds fine.”

I poured two glasses and bore them carefully into the living room. She was sitting on the couch across from the fireplace. I gave her a glass and sat.

She took a sip. “I hear you’re settling the Lasko case.”

“They did that,” I said pointedly.

“And you’re unhappy?” she asked, looking over at me.

“It leaves a corpse unaccounted for, and a husband missing.”

“I’m sorry, Chris.” She sounded sympathetic enough. “What are you going to do?”

I realized that I was holding up my left hand as if to deflect her questions. “The Lasko case is not for tonight. Really.”

“OK.” She was certainly agreeable, as if her edginess were melting with the case. Maybe that made some sense. But the Lasko thing was something we weren’t discussing. Not tonight, and not ever.

I had a wooden backgammon set on the glass coffee table in front of the couch. She opted for that. I put Melissa Manchester on the stereo while she set up the board. Night was coming fast, staining the corners with darkness. I turned up the dimmer on the living room chandelier and came back to the couch.

I won the first move, a six-five combination. I cleared my end point and watched her. She played with fierce concentration. I freed the other end point, then got great rolls, and strung together some points. The play moved fast. She showed me a wicked end game, smart and decisive. But I beat her, finally. This seemed to be my day for winning games. Except the one that mattered.

We talked quietly, finishing our second glass of wine while Melissa sang “New Beginnings.” I had some joints rolled in the cigarette case I kept in a bedroom drawer. I offered one to Mary. She nodded her interest.

I went to the bedroom and brought back two, turning down the dimmer on the way. We both sat cross-legged on the couch, facing each other, with an ashtray in between and the half-dead wine bottle still on the table.

I lit one. Mary leaned back and took a hit. “What kind is that?”

“Something called Meshpecon. They grow it in Mexico, or Peru, or some such place.” I pulled on it and passed it back. She took another hit, a good one.

“You know, I never asked where you took that vacation. The one”-she picked for a frame of reference other than Lasko-“a couple of weeks ago.”

“Oh that,” I said. It seemed years ago, and maybe someone else’s vacation. “New Hampshire.”

“Why New Hampshire?”

“My family owns a place up there, near the Maine border. If I schedule right, I can get it to myself.”

“You always go alone?”

“Usually.” Except for the girl in Boston, who had belonged there. I wondered if Brett went anymore. Of course she still lived there, in a way. Every so often I’d find a trace of her in the old house, like an artifact in someone else’s ruins.

“Isn’t that pretty solitary?” she was asking.

I took another hit. “Not really. I saw some friends from school for a couple of days. The best day, though, was alone. I hiked up Green Mountain, which is only a couple of thousand feet. Maybe an hour and a half worth of climbing. There’s an old ranger tower on top that gives you a perfect 360-degree of everything. The lakes and woods, farms, old villages, other mountains, all of it for miles. It was perfectly clear. I sat there for two hours. I hated to come down.”

“It sounds beautiful,” she answered softly. “It’s good to be alone without being lonely.”

That was right, I thought. Except for tonight. Tonight, alone would have been lonely, any way you cut it.

Mary was leaning back. She sucked on the joint, making small hollows beneath her cheekbones. “This dope is sensational.”

I thought about that. “Yeah, I think that’s how Pizarro slaughtered all those Indians. They were smoking this stuff.”

She smiled absently. I looked at her again. She was beautiful. No question. But that didn’t move me, right then. I was flashing back and forth between New Hampshire and here, past and future, the girl then and the girl now. Rod Stewart’s dope-and-whiskey voice cut through the haze.

I lit the second joint. It flamed, crackled, then took hold. I passed it to her, with another glass of wine for the cotton mouth. The room was very dim. Mary’s fine cheekbones left soft shadows on her face. I was floating now. Her sudden question seemed to filter through a word at a time.

“What do you want in a woman, Chris?”

It was as if she’d looked into my head and seen the girl. But her voice wasn’t intrusive, just curious. And I was stoned enough to try. “A lot of what I look for in people, I guess. Curiosity. Dislike for the easy answer. That in a good moment they can imagine what it’s like to be an old woman or a small child. That they are more than what they do, or what they are.”

“You don’t ask much,” she said smiling.

“Not much at all.” But I’d had it once and blown it.

The Jefferson Starship came on. I looked at Mary, wondering what she was thinking.

Her voice broke the quiet. “You know, Chris, you’ve been very lucky. You’ve never wanted-or needed-anything.”

“I keep hearing that.”

“No, I mean it. Half the girls I knew growing up were married at eighteen. Sometimes I hate looking back.”

I smiled. “No need. You’ve done a lot. That’s something else I like in a woman.”

She smiled back. I reached for her then. She looked at me with a clear, black gaze. Then her arm raised in a graceful arc and pulled me down.

Afterwards a long drowsy silence, warm in the dark. An hour, maybe more. No talk needed. She stirred against me. “Again?” she murmured.

“Uh-huh. Lust is the curse of my family.”

“The Pagets or the Kenyons?”

“Both.”

She laughed quietly, then stretched herself against me. The Starship was singing “Miracles.”

It turned out she had clothes in the car. She stayed until Sunday.

Sunday night I turned on the television. My theory was that there were other things going on in the world and that they would divert me. It worked for a while. There were famine conditions in India. OPEC had hiked the price of oil. You couldn’t breathe in Pittsburgh, and another Arab had hijacked another plane. Everything was fine until a familiar face appeared.

They had caught him in the Rose Garden, in a discursive mood. “When I was young,” the President was saying, “we had no money. No one in my family had ever gone to college. I scraped to get where I am.” The camera closed in. “It is my philosophy that everyone in this country has the right to lead a good and comfortable life, even become wealthy, although I myself gave up many opportunities to make money for a career in public service.” He sounded somehow disappointed. “So,” he was concluding, “everyone has the right to climb the ladder, and everyone in this country has the opportunity to do so. I especially urge our young people to consider that. It’s one of the great things about us.”

I nearly choked up with real tears. The telephone stopped me.

“Hello, Mr. Paget?”

“Tracy? Where are you?”

“At home. St. Maarten.” The long distance made the girl-voice smaller. “I haven’t heard from Peter.” Her sad question went unanswered.

“I’m sorry, Tracy. I haven’t either. I’ve been trying, really.” I couldn’t explain what had happened Friday, and couldn’t explain my weekend, even if I’d wanted to.

Her voice cracked. “Please-can’t you help me?”

“I’m going to Boston tomorrow. To talk to the police.” I paused. “I think they’ll want to help.”

“Do you think so?” A small hope breathed in her words. It made me feel guilty.

“Lieutenant Di Pietro’s a good man. I’m sure he’ll be interested.”

“Oh,” she said. I could envision her hopeful imagining: Di Pietro the compassionate, restorer of husbands. “Mr. Paget, you’ve made me feel better.”

“Please call me Chris. And if I’m not here, you can reach me through the office. Anytime you want to talk.”

“Thank you, Chris,” she said. “You’re very nice. I’d better get off now.”

I wanted to keep her on, but couldn’t imagine what to say. I gave up. “Take care of yourself, Tracy.” That was the last thing she wanted to do. But she said she would and hung up.

The President had disappeared. I turned off the tube and stared out the window.

No one called that weekend. I guess they figured I wasn’t worth calling anymore.