Jan Burke - Goodnight, Irene

“Oh, I’m sorry. I can’t tell you unless you promise not to be mad.”

“Anything given an introduction like that is bound to infuriate me, so I won’t make a promise I can’t keep.”

“Not worth any fury. Pete told me you were going out with someone tonight.”

I could feel my temperature rising, even though I had half-expected Pete would talk. “And?” I said, trying to control my temper.

“Well, he told me he didn’t think you’d tell me that you were going out, and that if you did, you wouldn’t tell me who you were going out with or where.”

“And what did you tell Pete?”

“It’s not important. Thanks for telling me.”

“What do you mean, it’s not important? What the hell did you tell him? I know there’s more to this than you’ve told me so far.”

“Well,” he said, hesitating, “we made sort of a bet.”

“Sort of a bet, or a bet?”

“A bet, sort of.”

“And the bet was?”

“He bet that you wouldn’t tell me. I bet that you would.”

I could feel my face flushing with anger.

“You’re a cocky son of a bitch, you know that?”

“I can’t believe you’re angry over this. I just stated my trust in your openness.”

“What kind of a simpleminded bimbo do you take me for? I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck, Frank. You weren’t betting on my openness. You were betting on-shall we say, your degree of influence over me?”

“Excuse me, Irene, but nobody can have a damn dime’s worth of influence over you. Goddamn, you are stubborn. I’ve never met a more hardheaded woman in my entire life.”

We were silent again, only this time we weren’t at all at ease. An explosive tension hung between us. We stopped looking one another in the eye. I didn’t just want to stomp off, and I didn’t want to stay there avoiding eye contact. It would have been nice to have been able to vanish into thin air. It was a standoff, all right.

“I’d better be getting back to the paper,” I said, but regretted the words as I spoke them.

“Fine.”

The Arctic Circle was warmer in December than that one word in June. I decided to try again.

“Frank, I’m sorry if I lost my temper. I just wish every cop in Las Piernas wasn’t briefed on our every move. I don’t want this to be some kind of game.”

“And you think I do?”

This steamed me. He was not cooperating. I decided I would get up and leave. Any minute, I was really going to do it. I was going to stand up and walk out and-and then what? Go to a political bash with Guy St. Germain? I didn’t want to leave things like this with Frank.

“I apologize,” I said, speaking two words I find very hard to say in these situations. “I know you don’t think of this as a game either.”

I could see the mollification process going on, and wasn’t going to step in and screw it up. I waited.

“Who is this Guy St. Germain, anyway?” he said gruffly, then softened his tone a little when he added, “I mean, do you know him very well?”

“Not really. He’s a former hockey player who’s now a vice president at the Bank of Las Piernas. I met him the other day when I went into the bank to follow up on something in O’Connor’s computer notes.”

“How does a hockey player get into banking?”

“I don’t know. We talked hockey, not banking.”

“You’re a hockey fan? Isn’t it kind of a violent sport?”

I counted to ten. In between numbers, I told myself: He is just like the zillion or so other people you run into all the time, Irene. Probably a football or boxing fan who has never watched any part of a hockey game except a ten-second clip of a fight on a television newscast. He doesn’t know hockey. Yes, it did feel like a cheap shot. Keep cool.

What I said was, “Yes, I’m an avid hockey fan.”

Quiet again. Not as bad as the previous silence. I heard him exhale. Good, he was still breathing.

“Well, I guess I’m out of sorts,” he said at last. “I’m not trying to pry about Mr. St. Germain. I just want to make sure you’re safe. I don’t trust strangers around you right now.”

“I’m going to this dinner as a reporter, Frank. Guy St. Germain and I had a friendly conversation about hockey and a brief talk about one of the employees at the bank, and he followed it up with an invitation to sit next to him at this dinner. Neither one of us is really looking forward to the fund-raiser, and we each thought it would be nice to sit next to someone we would enjoy talking to.”

“You have every right to go out with anyone you care to go out with. I’m not jealous,” he said, “just concerned.”

Yeah, right, I thought, looking skyward to see if pigs could fly after all. Aloud I said, “I’m glad you’re concerned, Frank. But I don’t think you need to worry.”

“When is hockey season?”

I thought it was a weird question, but decided to roll with it. “The pros will start up again in the fall. You can find amateur games around here all year long.”

He was quiet for a minute.

“Well, maybe you can take me to a game sometime and try to explain it to me.”

“Sure, I’d like that,” I said, feeling relieved.

All the same, he looked a little down. And tired. I decided to let him work through it on his own. Sometimes I actually do know when to shut up.

“I guess I better let you get some rest,” I said. I gathered up the paper wrappers and other odds and ends from lunch, and stood up. His ribs made it a little hard for him to stand up again, but I didn’t want to fuss over him, so I tried to act like I didn’t see him wince when he rose from the chair.

As we slowly walked away from the garden, I felt bad, as if we had somehow ruined it that day. It was like having an argument with somebody in a church.

We made our way to the front door.

“Thanks for lunch-and thanks for coming by.”

“No problem. Look, Frank-” I stopped myself from bringing up the subject again.

His bruised face turned to me in a questioning look. I thought about how he got those bruises, and felt like a complete jerk. He must have seen the guilt on my face. He reached up and brushed some loose strands of hair away from my eyes.

“Give me a call later? If you get a chance?” he said.

“Sure. How late will you be up?”

“Don’t worry about it. If I’m asleep, the machine will get it. I never know when I’m going to be asleep or awake anymore.”

We said our good-byes.

“Irene?” He called to me as I went down the walk.

I turned around. “Yeah”

“Have a good time tonight. I mean it.”

“I’ll try. Don’t worry about me, okay?”

“Can’t promise that.”

“You better work on it, Frank, or I’ll drive you nuts.”

“Too late for that warning.”

That comment had me smiling to myself all the way back to the paper.

THAT AFTERNOON, I studied up on current politics. I had kept up with most of it through O’Connor, but having the responsibility of covering it made me look at it in finer detail. At about five-thirty, Lydia stopped by my desk. “Ready to go home?” she said.

“Yeah, I’ll drop you off and then I’m going to my place-I’m going to the Hollingsworth fund-raiser and someone’s picking me up there.”

A look of concern came over her face. “I don’t think being at your house is such a terrific idea, Irene.”

“And I don’t think it’s smart for anyone to know I’m staying over at your place-I’m going with Guy St. Germain, from the bank, and even though I’m sure he’s not involved in any of this, someone else at the bank might be. So I’d rather not reveal the fact that I’m staying at your house-it might put you in danger, and I’d never forgive myself for that.”