The Moth Page 11

  “Watch where you’re walking.”

  “But look at it, Jack! It’s beautiful!”

  I looked, but I knew what it was going to be before I looked.

  It was a big luna moth, fluttering above us, full of moonlight. When it was gone her hand was in mine.

  The algebra didn’t go so well. We’d work at it, she on one side of the card table we set up, me on the other, and the book in the middle, but we didn’t seem to get anywhere. It wasn’t long before I saw, or thought I saw, what the trouble was. What had made the arithmetic go so well was that I’d really go into it, what she didn’t understand, but of course the way to start that off right was with some stuff about how dumb she was, and then we’d have the roughhouse, but when we got done with it we had our finger on the trouble. Now there was nothing like that at all. I treated her like a lady, instead of a hoodlum, and she tried to act like one, and where we got was nowhere. And then one day, toward the end of August, it seemed to me the time was getting short and we better get fundamental if she was ever going to learn anything, so I let go with it. I mean, I hauled out the same old line, that alongside of her a parade of snails would look like graduates of the Johns Hopkins University, or something like that. But that’s as far as I got with it. She burst out crying and sat there with tears squirting out of her eyes and running down on her dress. I jumped up and put my arm around her but she ran over to the sofa and threw herself down on it, face in the pillow, and shook with sobs. “Helen, Helen, what’s the trouble? Don’t you know it was just a joke? The same joke we used to have, so we could get to the bottom of it, what it is you don’t understand?”

  “Go on, let me alone.”

  “Come on, we’ll take a drive and—”

  “Please, please!”

  “Here, let me wipe your eyes!”

  “No! No! Go on, go, go, go!”

  I walked around the room, hoped it would pass and that she’d let me talk to her, went over and patted her, but it was no soap. I left, and the next two or three days I didn’t see her.

  “Jack, where’s Helen?”

  “... I don’t know, Mrs. Legg. Why?”

  “Mrs. Brems hasn’t seen her since lunchtime. I’ve had them ring her room and she doesn’t answer, I’ve had her paged—maybe she’s just gone downtown somewhere without leaving word. But—I have a queer feeling something’s wrong.”

  “I’ll look into it and call you back.”

  I was in my room when they told me the island was calling, in pajamas from the heat, but I dressed quick, went down to the desk, picked up the master key, went to her room, and knocked. There was no answer. I went in and she wasn’t there. I was worried twice as bad as Mrs. Legg was, because I knew there could be an answer I hated to think about. I began looking for a note or something, but didn’t find anything. Her things were all in order, dresses in the closet, panties in the bureau, algebra book on her night table. Under that, when I picked it up to make sure nothing had been slipped in with it, was my picture, one I didn’t know she had, that she must have swiped from Margaret, taken in the Little Lord Fauntleroy suit when I was about her age. It was face down.

  I checked with Tolan, the house detective, for what little he knew, and rang Mrs. Legg. She and Mr. Legg were up there in about an hour, and put police and private detectives and God knows who-all to work on it. Around seven, when I was trying to stuff something to eat in me, in the dining room, Margaret came in. I couldn’t face a night on that island alone, so I took the bus.”

  “Be pretty rugged at that.”

  “Aren’t you glad to see me?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “But what’s all the fuss about that brat? Can’t she even go to a picture show or take a car ride or whatever she’s done without practically putting bloodhounds on her trail?”

  “They’re kind of worried.”

  “Well, are you glad to see me?”

  “Can’t I be worried too?”

  “What about?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I wasn’t on duty that night, and around nine I went to my room. By that time the whole place was going crazy, and even Margaret was getting mildly interested. I sat there, looking at a sign go on and off down on Centre Street, and kept trying to think what I’d do if I was a young girl and had woke up to the fact I was in love with a guy that I supposed was in love with my sister. And all of a sudden I had a horrible hunch. I rang information for the Finley number on the island, and called. If Dickie was there I was going to give a phony name and say how about doing a job for me with his boat. But I never got that far. The mother answered, and said he wasn’t there. “Do you know where he is, Mrs. Finley? I mean, I’d like to know when he’ll be back.”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “Is he out in his boat?”

  “No, the car.”

  Anne Arundel County is the beginning of Dixie, which is just one scrub woods, and Zeke’s place was right on the edge of it, forty or fifty feet off the road, in the middle of a clearing, with scraggly pine and oak and chinquapin all around it. It was one of those log-cabin jobs, known then as a roadhouse, and what went on inside I didn’t know, as I’d never been to one, but according to Denny it was considerably more than the law allowed, whether it was women, wine, or song. I got there around ten, and the first thing I had to do, after parking, was see if the Finley car was there. There were quite a few cars out front, but there’d be no trouble spotting it, because of certain dents. It wasn’t long before I found it, and from its position it had been there some time. I went over and rang the bell and pretty soon the slot opened and a piece of face showed. “Heya? Can a hungry guy get something to eat?”

  “We know you?”

  “Sure, I’ve been in.”

  “Just a minute.”

  He went and when he came back another guy was with him that I took to be Zeke. I handed him some chatter, and I’d probably have got away with it, but when I began spending some big Baltimore names I overplayed it. He shook his head. “Sorry, it’s just a little family place I run here, and we’re kind of crowded. And anyway, I’d have to know you. Some other time, maybe.”

  The slot closed and there I was. I went back to my car and tried to think. I had no proof, had nothing, except this pounding in my head, that told me to get in there, and get in quick. But I hated to go off half-cocked, hated to have this kid that I’d beaten up, that I knew was in there, see me looking silly over a twelve-year-old girl that maybe wasn’t with him at all. Then I happened to remember something. She loved gum, and it was just as regular as clockwork, when she went in any place, that she’d take out her wad and drop it over the side of the car on the ground. I went over to the Ford. I couldn’t see any gum but when I dropped to my hands and knees I could smell it. Then after I lit some matches I saw it.

  I went back and rang again and asked for Zeke and he came. When he saw me he acted sore and came out, the other guy right behind him. “Listen, you, I told you once and I’m telling you again—”

  “Just a minute, just a minute.”

  “Make it quick.”

  “I didn’t come here for a drink and I didn’t come for trouble. But you’ve got a girl in there, twelve years old, and—”

  “You’re sure of that?”

  “Zeke, in a polite way, I’m asking you.”

  “If I had, would I be telling you?”

  “You’ll be telling it to a judge in just about ten minutes if you don’t let me in there, so I can get her out. Watch your step, baby. Liquor’s one thing, and as we all know, it’s drunk in the spirit of good clean fun. But children, minor children, daughters of important people, are something else My suggestion to you is, you ask me in, or you may be piling up more trouble for yourself than anybody you know can get you out of.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Just a friend.”

  What the rest of it would have been I don’t know, because just then, from somewhere inside, was a scream, a girl’s scream, and th
en another. I dived for the door, but the two of them were there ahead of me. I got my foot inside, grabbed for Zeke, got his head out, and hooked a couple on his jaw, but then the other one came out and hit me with something, I don’t know what. I must have gone out for a second, because next thing I knew I was on the ground, the door closing in front of my face, the screaming still going on. But then the screaming stopped and a door opened somewhere and I could hear a scuffle going on. I jumped up and ran off to the side, where I could see her wrestling with somebody, maybe Dickie. She broke clear, and somebody pulled Dickie inside. Then she was in my arms and I carried her to the car. “God, what have they done to you?”

  “Nothing, nothing! ... Nothing, except try to keep me from going. I knew that was you out there. Oh, Jack, I knew it, I knew it.”

  Next thing I knew we were going down the hill to the Severn. I pulled off to one side and parked on the shore, and we sat there, looking at the Naval Academy across the river. We didn’t talk, that I remember. What did we have to say?

  11

  NEXT MORNING, WHEN I was supposed to check in at the Cartaret desk, I was somewhere on the road from Gettysburg to York, watching the sun come up over the hills, with no more idea what I was going to do next than a grasshopper. I’d been driving since midnight, when I set her down at the hotel, but where I went I don’t know, though I remember sliding around Washington, from Rhode Island Avenue to Wisconsin, so it looks as though I must have gone up through Rockville and Frederick. There had been no gay so-long-see-you-tomorrow when she got out. After an hour, maybe, sitting there looking at the Severn, we started back and she had another crying spell like she had had in the studio. I didn’t ask her what the trouble was, didn’t tell her what we were going to do about it, didn’t try to hide it that I was doing a little crying myself. We both knew what the trouble was, and we both knew there was nothing to do about it. A man of twenty-two can’t go around with a girl of twelve, or marry her, or have anything to do with her, once he begins to notice what she looks like in a bathing suit, or she does. As we drove up Charles Street she asked me to let her out before we got to the hotel, and by that I knew she was going to cook up some kind of an alibi and not mention me at all. When I stopped she jumped out, slammed the door, and ran on without looking back. I sat staring at her, partly to see that nobody bothered her, partly for one last look, as I felt I’d never see her again. When she turned into the hotel I kept on up Charles Street and turned west on North Avenue. But when I came to Mt. Royal Terrace I kept on going.

  When I got home, some time in the morning, my father and Sheila were out but Nancy was home and called down to me as soon as I stepped in the house that the hotel had been calling and that I should ring them right away. I said thanks, went upstairs to my room, and locked the door. Then I took off my clothes, put on pajamas, and lay down. After a while I heard the phone ring and then Nancy was at the door. “It’s the hotel again, Jack.”

  “I’ll call them.”

  “But they’re on the line.”

  “I’ll call, later.”

  She went and then she was back. “They say you’re due to work and won’t you please get down there as quick as you can because they’re short-handed already on account of people away on vacation, and—”

  “Can’t you understand English?”

  She stood out there five minutes arguing about it before at last she went. I must have slept then because next thing I knew it was three or four o’clock in the afternoon and I had to have something to eat. I put on a robe and went down and while I was frying myself some eggs Nancy came in the kitchen. “Well, my goodness, Jack, it certainly seems you’re acting very peculiarly. You could at least call them. They’re entitled to some explanation.”

  “I’ll get around to it.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Just taking a little rest.”

  “From what, may I ask?”

  “That desk—answering questions.”

  She flounced out of there, but in a minute, when I was at the table, tucking away the first food I’d had since the night before, she was back. “Well, what do you suppose that child did yesterday?”

  “What child?”

  “The one you tutored. Helen.”

  “... She been up to something?”

  “She just up and ran herself away?”

  “You don’t say.”

  “Mrs. Brems was just telling me—she got on a train yesterday, went over to Washington, took in all sorts of picture shows and the good Lord only knows what else—and didn’t get back till twelve o’clock last night.”

  “I’ll be doggoned.”

  That meant Helen had put over a story, so she wouldn’t have to answer questions about me, and neither one of us would be mixed up in it, together anyway. I listened to Nancy, all about how the police had been called in, and cracked dumb. After a while she went out, shaking her head over what young people were coming to, and I went up and dressed. Then I slipped out, before my father and Sheila would get home. That night, at least, I remember where I ate. It was in the Princess Anne Hotel at Fredericksburg, Virginia.

  It kept up three or four days. I’d come in late, slip upstairs, and be in bed with the light out and the door locked before anybody could say anything to me. In the morning, I’d wait till the Old Man went out, and then I’d get up, shave, dress, and go downstairs. If Nancy or Sheila had anything to say, I’d get interested in the paper, or stall somehow, and then I’d roll out my car and shove off. By the second day Margaret was calling every half hour and then she didn’t call and then nobody called. It seemed to me, as I’d told Nancy, that I meant to call her “later,” or some time, but later never seemed to come. Then her letters began coming in. She had a clammy way of writing, about three cap I’s to the line, with every other word in quotes and all sorts of stuff about how ideally we were suited to each other on account of both being so artistic. But clammy or no clammy it was easy to see she was suffering from the same old yen, that the family had the heat on, and that she was going through hell.

  One night, when I got in around two, my father was waiting for me. He called me in his study, where he was stretched out on the couch, and there was a highball beside him and a tray on the table. He made me a drink before he started. “Jack, there are one or two things I’d like to ask you about.”

  “Such as?”

  “What’s happened at the hotel?”

  “Just felt like a little rest, that’s all.”

  “Have you quit your job down there?”

  “... Yes, I guess so.”

  “What about Margaret?”’

  “I haven’t seen her.”

  “Is the engagement still on?”

  “I’d say it was off.”

  “May I ask why?”

  “I changed my mind.”

  “In other words, it’s none of my business?”

  “The way I hear it, a marriage concerns two people.”

  “That may be true or it may not be true.”

  “Since when?”

  “It involves two people provided he’s his own man and she’s her own woman. If not, it concerns, or can concern, quite a few more. And in this case, as Legg is responsible for his daughter and I’m responsible for you, the degree of your independence may not be quite as great as you think.”

  “I’m free, white, and twenty-two.”

  “You’re also broke, or nearly so.”

  “I wouldn’t bring that up if I were you. But since you do bring it up, we can go into this question of your responsibility. You had quite a lot to say about that once before and you may remember I had quite a lot to say about it too, all opposite to your idea about it. And the way you discharged your responsibility was to lose me every cent I had, that I’d earned with no help from you, and that I’d pleaded with you to let me keep. Now, since there’s nothing you can do about your responsibility, no job that you can give me, no restitution of any kind you can make me for what your previous decisio
n cost me, I’d say minding your own business for once in your life would be a very good idea.”

  I wasn’t looking for trouble, and didn’t go in there with anything all learned up to shoot at him. But I guess it was in me and had to come out. It surprised me, the amount of pressure there was back of it, but nothing like as much as it surprised me, the way he took it. He held up his hand to stop me, but in a patient, calm way, as though he’d been all over that a good many times in his mind, and had maybe got a little further, figuring on it, than I had. “Jack, you’re wholly right, but you’ve got things backwards. You’re hacking at the general, that’s in the past, that nobody can do anything about, and overlooking the particular, that lies in the future, or could at least, and that might be of help, in your case... Of course it’s unconscionable, what we’ve done to you. But don’t get the idea you’re an exception.”

  “Who is ‘we’?”

  “This generation. My generation. I’m not the only one. We’re all in it. We thought the laws of sense had been repealed, back there in the 1920’s, and we went hog-wild. We squandered your heritage and there’s nothing left, nothing, but what you and millions of other boys like you can salvage out of it, and perhaps rebuild, when things get going again. In your case, you hold it especially against me that you earned the money I lost on Sam Shreve’s advice. Is that five thousand dollars any better, would it have bought you any more, than the five thousand dollars I could portion you with, in view of your impending marriage—”

  “My cancelled marriage.”

  “I’ll not admit it! I still have hopes for it!”