Siri Hustvedt - The Enchantment of Lily Dahl

* * *

Lily slept more soundly than she would have thought possible and woke at her usual hour for work. Her head ached and her limbs felt heavy, but her mind was empty. She walked to the window first thing, without turning on any lights, and knelt beside the curtain, the way she used to before she knew Ed. Then she pulled it back to see if he was awake and painting. Through his window, she saw him in his underwear holding a brush near the hidden canvas. She was glad she couldn’t see the picture. It was only then that she remembered Martin in his costume with the girl in his arms. Looking at Ed, she thought, it’s already gone, now, this moment. There isn’t really a “now” at all. Even saying the word “now” is too slow for it. Now slips into then so fast, it’s nothing at all. And as ordinary as this observation was, Lily felt she was living it, and its truth hit her hard. Time was inexpressible. She turned away from Ed, headed for the shower and remembered that she had been fired. There was no Ideal Cafe for her, no job, but Lily decided to go and beg Vince to take her back. She had never begged for anything in her life, and because Vince knew her, she figured a display of humility might overwhelm him. But what if he had already hired somebody else?

When Lily opened the back door to the cafe and peered cautiously through it, she saw no new girl. She saw Bert shaking her head at her. “If you knew the trouble you’ve caused around here, you’d regret it,” she said. “Ever since you left, Vince has been on the warpath, and you know what that does to Boom — he gets all shaky and whiny. What were you thinking of, girl?” Bert leaned close to Lily and turned her head to one side. “You don’t look good, you know that? For once in your life, you look like a wreck.”

Lily looked at Bert, and as she looked, she realized her eyes felt very dry, as though there weren’t enough liquid in them. She grabbed Bert’s arm and said, “I saw her last night.”

“Saw who?”

“The dead girl. I told you, remember? Martin was dressed up in his costume for the play, and he, he was carrying her body — at the creek. Mabel saw it, too, only I don’t think she believed her own eyes.”

Bert took Lily by the shoulders with both hands. “I’ve seen it coming. You haven’t been yourself. You haven’t called me for days. That’s not normal, and I’ve been calling you, but you’re never home. She’s in love, I said, out of her mind in love, but it’s not just that. There’s something in your eyes, too.” Bert withdrew her hands. “Like you’re not right. Like you’re possessed with this, this idea.”

“What?” Lily said. “You don’t believe me? You think I would make this up? Somebody’s dead, murdered, and you think I’m kidding? Possessed? What are you talking about? You think I’m lying?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Yes, you did.”

Vince walked through the door. “You!” he bellowed at her, pointing a fat index finger in her direction. “Get out! I fired you!”

Lily shuddered at the big voice, but she didn’t move. “I came to apologize,” she said. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.” Her voice broke, and she tried desperately to recover an even tone. “Lately…” she said.

Vince strode toward her. Lily could see real anger in his face. Sometimes Vince played at anger, roared for his own amusement to stir things up in the cafe, but now he meant it, and withstanding the pitch of his emotion was hard, terribly hard. Lily was shaking. “Lately, my life,” she said, “has been…” She searched for a word. What was the word? Finally she said, “Going to pieces because, because…” Lily began to wave her hands at her sides, then near her face. When she felt the tears coming, she clutched either side of her face and started sobbing. “Oh, Vince!” she said. “Oh, Vince!”

The man’s expression changed. He looked at Bert with his mouth open and said, “What the hell is this?”

Bert gave Vince a sour look and took Lily into her arms. When she felt Bert’s embrace, Lily squeezed her friend hard. After several seconds she felt Vince’s large, tentative hand touch her back.

“Hey, hey, hey,” he said. “Where’s that crusty, hard-assed cookie that I’ve come to know and love? I mean, holy shit, Lily, you’ve got more fiber in you than this.”

Bert said, “Give the kid a break, Vince. Everybody’s got their limits. I mean, you’d scare the living daylights out of a sumo wrestler with the look you gave her.”

Vince removed his hand.

Lily felt her sobs subside, and she pulled away from Bert to look at Vince. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ll never walk out on you again. I’m not myself, it’s true, but I’m going to be myself again, I promise.” She sniffed loudly. She looked up at Vince.

“Hey there,” he said. “Your mascara’s running. Now get your butts back to work. I got Bert to cover for you,” he said to Lily. “So I’ve got two waitresses from five to eight when I only need one, and I’m going to pay you both. So I never want to hear another word out of either of you about me being a cheapskate. You got that?”

Bert and Lily nodded.

Bert heard almost the whole story from Lily that morning during the shift — told in bits and pieces between tables and on runs to the kitchen. Lily could see that Bert was troubled by what she heard, but it wasn’t clear what she actually thought of it. She shook her head and asked Lily about forty times if she was absolutely sure she’d seen a face in the tarp. “Couldn’t it have been something else? A dog, maybe, or some animal Martin pulled out of the creek?” The other part of the story Bert couldn’t get over was Lily’s visits to the Bodlers. “Why would you go there? Don’t you get enough of them here?” Lily responded to these questions with shrugs. The shoes were inexplicable. To talk about them would only confirm Bert’s worry that Lily was having some kind of breakdown. “They know Martin,” she said. “They’re his great-uncles or something like that.”

Before Lily left, Bert said, “Maybe you should talk to someone, Lily.”

“I’ve talked to you, Bert.”

“No, I mean like a minister or counselor or something.”

“You think I’m out of my gourd.”

“Would you stop telling me what I think. I’m not saying that.”

“You think Pastor Carlsen’s going to fix this? Can’t you just see him?” Lily lowered her voice and gave herself a sincere expression. She nodded gravely. “Let us turn to the Lord in his infinite wisdom.”

“He’d be more practical than that,” Bert said.

“The man wouldn’t have a clue,” Lily said.

“I’m calling you today,” Bert said.

Lily nodded and walked through the back door and up to her apartment. She knew exactly what she was going to do. She had two stops that afternoon. The first was the Stuart Hotel. For the second, she needed her flashlight.

* * *

When Ed answered the door, he didn’t look like himself. It wasn’t only that he seemed worn out and the skin under his eyes had turned blue-black or that he hadn’t shaved in days. Lily had seen him exhausted and unkempt before. She had a sense that some familiar quality in his appearance had disappeared overnight, and the man who began speaking to her was a stranger. Before she could say hello, he told her that Mabel had called and told him about last night.

Lily looked behind him at the portrait of Mabel with the blank boxes above her head. She didn’t feel like crying anymore. She felt empty.

“Lily”—Ed leaned toward her and brushed her cheek gently with the backs of his fingers—“I have something to tell you. After I hung up with Mabel, I starting thinking, and I’m pretty sure that that kid was here, Martin Petersen. But he gave me another name, said his name was Hal Dilly.”