Эд Макбейн - Last Summer

And then we sat on the edge of the shore; Sandy with her knees folded against her breasts, arms wrapped around them, skirts tucked in; David and I leaned back on locked elbows, legs stretched to where the water just touched our toes.

The night was so still.

The party sounds dissipated and then vanished completely, save for an occasional distant voice raised in farewell. There was a lingering sadness on the air, the knowledge that August was almost here, summer would soon be over. And then, as though giving voice to the permeating sense of grief, there was a sobbing sound behind us. Startled, we turned to look toward the dune, and saw nothing but the tall beach grass shifting in the ocean wind, illuminated by the brilliant moon. Puzzled, we looked at each other, and then Sandy got to her feet and walked swiftly to the dune. Climbing it, she signaled to us.

Rhoda was sitting with her face buried in her hands, sobbing bitterly.

“Who is it?” David said.

“It’s Rhoda,” I said.

“Go away,” Rhoda said. She would not take her hands from her face. Her shoulders were heaving. She had stopped sobbing only long enough to utter her command and take in a fresh gulp of air.

“Come on, leave her alone,” David said.

“No, wait a minute,” Sandy said.

“Go away,” Rhoda said again.

“She doesn’t want us here, for Christ’s sake, let’s...”

“Can’t you see she’s crying?” Sandy said.

“Well, what’s that got to do with anything?”

“He’s right,” I said. “Come on, Sandy.”

“No,” Sandy said.

“I can’t stand crybabies,” David said.

“Neither can I.”

“Well then, go,” Sandy said. “If you want to go, go.” She sat beside Rhoda in the sand and put her arm around her. “What’s the matter?” she said.

“Go away.”

Rhoda was gasping for breath now, still sobbing and trembling. She turned away from Sandy and flung herself full length onto the sand, her face hidden in the crook of her elbow. Sandy touched her hair and said, “Rhoda?”

“Leave me alone.”

“Come on, the hell with her,” David said.

“Oh, shut up,” Sandy said. “Can’t you see she needs help?”

“I don’t need help,” Rhoda said, gasping.

“Now you just stop that crying,” Sandy said. “Do you want to choke to death?”

“Nobody ever choked from crying,” I said.

“If she wants to cry, let her cry,” David said. “It’s better than her singing, anyway,” and Rhoda burst into fresh tears.

“Oh, Jesus Christ, listen to that,” I said.

“Don’t curse,” Rhoda said, sobbing.

“Come on, get up,” Sandy said.

“No.”

“Get up, or I’ll pick you up,” Sandy said.

“Leave me alone.”

“Leave her alone,” David said, “she’s a creep.”

“ You’re a creep,” Rhoda said, gasping and choking and rolling further away from Sandy, who seized her left hand, and yanked on it, getting her at last to a sitting position, and then putting one arm around her waist, and pulling her to her feet. Rhoda staggered about blindly, her eyes closed, shaking her head and hiding her face, trying to pull away from Sandy, who finally slapped her sharply, twice. The sobbing stopped at once. Gasping for breath, Rhoda stared fixedly at Sandy, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“You hit me,” she said.

“You’re damn right I did,” Sandy answered.

“Now she’ll go screaming to her mother,” David said.

“My mother is dead,” Rhoda said.

“Her mother is dead, you jackass,” Sandy said.

Rhoda was making short brave snuffling sounds now, as though wanting to break into tears again, but afraid Sandy would hit her if she did. “Do you have a handkerchief?” she asked.

“David?”

“ My handkerchief?” David said, outraged.

“Oh, come on, ” Sandy said.

“No,” David said. “Absolutely not.”

“She can have mine,” I said, and reached into my back pocket. “I haven’t got one,” I said.

“All right, damn it,” David said, “here’s mine.” He handed it to Rhoda and said, “Try not to gook it all up, will you?”

“Thank you,” Rhoda said, and noisily blew her nose.

“How do you feel?” Sandy said.

“Terrible.”

“Why?”

“They all laughed at me.”

“That’s because you’re a lousy singer,” David said. Rhoda stopped in the middle of blowing her nose, and gave him an injured look. I thought surely she would begin crying again.

“You are a lousy singer,” Sandy said.

“I’m better than Deuce.”

“He’s the worst singer in the world.”

“I’m also better than Phil.”

“You’re probably also better than Senator Dirksen,” I said, and David burst out laughing.

“Don’t laugh at me!” Rhoda said, and turned her head into Sandy’s shoulder.

“I wasn’t laughing at you. ” David said. “My friend said something funny. If I want to laugh at something funny my friend says...”

“Oh, shut up, David,” Sandy said.

“Well, I can laugh if I want to.”

“But not at her.”

“The hell with her,” David said, “I wasn’t laughing at her.”

“I like to sing,” Rhoda said defensively, blowing her nose.

“Fine, honey,” Sandy said, “but do it in the shower from now on.”

“Do it on a boat sixty miles offshore,” I said.

Surprisingly, Rhoda began giggling.

“There,” Sandy said.

“Sixty miles offshore,” Rhoda repeated, and giggled again.

“She’s a manic-depressive,” David said.

“Isn’t anybody hungry?” I asked.

“I’m famished,” Sandy said.

“Then let’s all go over to The Captain’s for some hamburgers.”

Which is what we did.

It rained again on Monday morning, the last day of July.

David’s parents were still in New Jersey, so we all went over to his house to listen to records. Eudice had just finished vacuuming the living room. She was well aware that we would make a mess of the place all over again, but she didn’t say a word to us, because she was still feeling guilty about her role in having brought David to justice.

David asked us if we would like to hear a talk for which he had got an A in a theory course, and we said absolutely not, and he said Go to hell and gave the talk, anyway. Actually, it wasn’t too bad at all. What he did was trace the development from blues and jazz to country western to swing to bop to rock and roll to the new experimental electronic stuff, sounding very much like a college professor, but nonetheless adding new dimensions to something which, until then, we had enjoyed only because the sound appealed to us.

The most important factor in modern pop, he explained, was the development and widespread use of amplification. Volume was essential to the new sound, sheer loudness that assaulted not only the ears but the entire human sensory system. It was, in fact, possible to feel (as he turned up the volume control and caused Eudice to moan in the kitchen) the buffeting of sound waves against our bodies, causing an actual vibration that was something different from the simple audio experience. For that matter, even my eyes seemed to be straining forward in their sockets as the sound got louder and louder, as though they wanted to see what my ears and my skin told me I was experiencing.

This assault, David explained, was mostly harmonic, in contrast to earlier music where the melody line was clearly heard and usually carried by one or another of the instruments. Today, he said, the melody was overpowered by background chords. These chord progressions (I had difficulty following him here) were usually similar and sometimes identical, with the result that each song had a familiar and comfortable feel to it. In other words, the effect was one of having heard any given song many many times before, a repetition that was hypnotic, demanding from the listener a minimum amount of concentration or involvement.