Philip Roth - Letting Go

Gabe only nodded his head. The doctor felt his face go incandescent — how obvious he was! His son said, “Shall we go back for breakfast? I’m getting hungry.”

They both got up. “No,” the doctor said, “I didn’t think Chicago was going to be your city forever. New York gets in a man’s blood — speaking for myself, I mean. You know that song, “Autumn in New York”—well, popular as it is, there’s some truth in it.”

“Of course my plans aren’t definite …” They started off.

“Look,” said Dr. Wallach, a finger on his son’s arm, “nobody’s plans are definite.”

“I suppose that’s so.”

He was afraid to say more. How could he tell him he was uncertain about Mrs. Silberman when he was actually uncertain whether or not he was uncertain? Suppose he confessed to doubt and married her later anyway? Could he possibly allow himself to appear even more weak, more needy, than he had already? To his own son?

Why not! Damn it, what was a family for, if not to be weak in front of?

“Would that be a breach of contract?” he heard himself asking. “Suddenly resigning like that?”

“No, no — I don’t even imagine I’ll do it. It was just something impractical, really, that I thought of in a groggy state.”

“After all, though, if you’re not happy out there, there’s no reason you should stay. You have a right to make your own decisions.”

“Dad, look …”

“What? What’s the matter now?”

“Nothing. You know, though, that when you and Mrs. Silberman marry — is this what you’re getting at?”

“What?”

“Well … let’s do get things out in the open. You know I couldn’t move in with you two. I mean if I were to leave Chicago. That would be very unrealistic for you to bank on. Surely you know that as well as I do.”

“Absolutely,” he shot back.

“Well, okay then. I’m sorry. I just began to feel that this conversation …”

“Absolutely not. I was thinking about your own welfare. Now you didn’t get anybody out there in trouble, did you?”

Gabe shook his head. “Just a change, that’s all.”

“Because if we’re going to be open with one another—”

“Yes?”

But he owed it to everybody not to whine, not to beg. He was a sixty-year-old man earning $35,000 a year; he could not act like a child. Instead of talking about his own ambivalence, he found himself talking about his son’s.

“I understand, of course, that this isn’t your mother. So, believe me, I understand your feelings.”

“Which feelings?”

“That you’re a little skeptical where Fay is concerned.”

“If I’ve been skeptical, it’s not been my business to be. Above all I want you to be happy. If this is going to bring you contentment—”

He heard the real emotion in his son’s voice, and now did indeed feel tears in his eyes. “It will,” he said, interrupting. “I’m absolutely sure of that.” He felt at once proud and ashamed of the strength he had displayed. Then his eyes were dry.

“Fine,” Gabe said. He was even smiling. “I’m not skeptical.”

“Of course. It’s a psychological thing, and I understand how that is, how that comes about.”

“Fine.”

“Though I don’t mean you’re not entitled to express your opinion. We’re both grown men, and you’re an intelligent person, obviously, and of course I’m always interested in your opinion on that ground alone. If you want to express an opinion to me about Fay, there’s no reason for me not to hear it.”

“I don’t have an opinion. I only wanted to know that you wanted this.”

“Well, why should you have any doubts?”

Gabe’s answer was some time in coming. “I don’t want to interfere. It’s not my business to tell anybody how to run his life.”

“No, no, go right ahead. I’m not a fragile icicle. I’d like to hear your objection. Why shouldn’t I be open-minded to all points of view?”

“It’s no objection.”

“What is it?”

“It’s only her drinking. It seemed to me — I might be wrong — a little excessive.”

“Well, it isn’t any more.” The doctor stopped and waited. Would there be some further objection — one he had no answer to?

“You don’t believe me?” the doctor asked.

“I believe you.”

“Because it’s a fact. She has given it up. It was only a temporary thing to begin with, a way for her to forget her husband. That’s the way I analyze it.”

“And now she’s forgotten him?”

“You see, you’re just acting psychological again. That’s not a fair remark. You hardly know the woman.”

“I’m sorry then. I didn’t mean to sound so hard.”

“Giving up something like drinking, even when it’s only been a temporary relief, shows a certain strength of character.”

“I agree. Maybe we ought to stop with this conversation. I only wanted to be sure, that’s all.”

“Sure of what?”

“That this was what you wanted.”

And what more could he say? After all, Fay had given up drinking, and that was proof of some real fiber in her. What other objection could Gabe have that would carry any weight — that she was not as smart as his own mother? Well, at age sixty you come to realize that intelligence isn’t everything. There are other qualities one looks for in a person. To go around expecting that he would meet in one lifetime another woman as fine and intelligent as his first wife was to go around expecting the impossible. Besides, he did not even know if that was what he wanted. Being more intelligent than Fay had turned out to be a pleasure for him — it made him feel like somebody. On the beach, for instance, he could hold his own now with a fellow like Abe Cole, rather than feeling it necessary to sit back and listen while Anna, say, conversed with the psychoanalyst.

Of course, there were moments when he was nettled slightly by the things Fay did not know or care about. Particularly since she had given up drinking, he had found her not so quick and lively a woman as he had been thinking she was. When they discussed the news events of the day, for instance, there was a certain vagueness on her part, and he had discovered that she was weak on geography. But surely that was to be preferred to a zeal and vivaciousness that had been inspired by drunkenness — which itself had been inspired by sorrow and loss. So what objection did he have? That she was not Anna? One, she couldn’t be expected to be somebody else; and two, in certain ways she was a much more natural woman than Anna had ever been. When she was unhappy at least she let you know it — she got drunk. The trouble with his wife had been that she had never needed anyone. Even in dying she had been a perfect lady. But how he had wished that she would break down, how he had wished that she would ask him to close his office and stick by her bed day and night. Surely it was what he would have done had it been he who was dying of leukemia. And still, how he had revered her! How lucky to have been her husband. Her taste, her ideas, her gentility, the way she had of expressing herself … But then that grace and charm had been her power. He had gone through life thinking of himself as not having ideas and preferences of his own. And that was against nature; he knew now it had helped to make him, for all his wisecracking and fitfulness, a very melancholy man. With Fay he positively shone in conversation; he felt an honest-to-goodness surge within him as she sat there nodding her head and listening. If only Anna could hear him now … But it was Fay’s ears that listened, and Fay’s eyes which, though they may not have comprehended all the fine points, at any rate revered him for speaking in their direction.