Philip Roth - Letting Go

Martha should know that too. Surely she would if he were to sit down and call Jaffe right now. Where else had she been going with that Christmas tree?

… Some things Gabe surmised about her now; some things he knew. He knew, for instance, that she had moved. One day on the co-op bulletin board he had seen an index card announcing a sale of furniture; he had recognized the handwriting even before recognizing the address. Then one day he had seen her, just her back, moving through the doorway of a little rooming house on Kenwood. That night, driving down Kenwood — it was not too far out of his way, one cross street was as good as another really — he had seen Jaffe’s car parked outside. That was how he had learned about the convertible too. He had seen it in front of the rooming house, and on another night, when he happened to be driving by Jaffe’s apartment on Dorchester, he had seen it again. The following week he saw it parked outside of Jaffe’s apartment on three different nights. The week after, only two. But probably it was parked there now; they would be up in Jaffe’s apartment decorating that tree.

Leaning forward again in his chair, he set about checking what he had written. Reviewing the facts of his birth, education, and professional experience, a conviction began to grow in him that bad news awaited the Herzes. He had only Libby’s insane anxieties to go on, but surprisingly, the application before him, with its listing of accomplishments, of degrees attained and works completed, led him further and further into pessimism. He was reminded (not that he had to be) of all that was unrecorded there — what he had not been prepared for, the unaccomplished. Having failed to imagine in the past what calamities there might be, he began imagining present calamities for which he had no real evidence.

Still, nothing was to be lost in giving Jaffe a ring. He would like to catch Martha in the lawyer’s apartment anyway. To be sure, she was under no further obligation to him; however, for him to find her with Jaffe now would perhaps make her aware of the suspicions he had about times past — that he had come to suspect that as soon as he had driven off to Long Island in August, she had gone to bed with her old suitor. Of course, concrete evidence was slight — only that when he had called Chicago to tell her that Markie was in a coma in the Southampton Hospital, Sid Jaffe had picked up the phone.

At the funeral nothing had been said about the phone call, about anything, in fact. He had watched her suntanned, expressionless face looking down into the grave. Afterwards the only words spoken between them had been hers. “Please, let me start from scratch.” He had thought then that she had said little out of grief and fatigue — and out of her desire to end the affair. It was a desire he saw fit to obey. No, to honor. But in the months that followed he was more and more convinced that she had said so little out of shame as well as sorrow. Now when he needed it, he summoned up the image of Martha receiving the tragic news in bed.

And he happened now to need it. He did not feel he was deceiving himself by continuing to believe that he was not an irresponsible man. Even his decision to call Jaffe about the adoption was evidence in his own behalf. Chances were it was only Libby’s morbid imagination to which he was bending; nevertheless, he did not want it said by others — or by himself to himself — that he had gone less than all the way once again. If that was what he had done in earlier days, surely it had to be chalked up partly to inexperience; youth, he told himself. But now he was older. He would simply pick up the phone and have a talk with Jaffe. He would like Martha to be reminded, should it happen that she was once again in Jaffe’s bed, that in the end it was she who had been unfaithful to him, and not the other way around.

For the moment he believed this. For the moment he believed more. Standing over the phone, he reasoned that even if he had married her, there was no guarantee that one morning a child of hers might not have rolled from his bed (or tripped down the stairs, or slipped in the bathtub, or stepped in front of a car, or swallowed a bottle full of iodine) and died.

Dear Mr. Jaffe—

I am not able to come to your office about that baby or ever. I have not told you all the truth. I am a married woman. My real name is Mrs. Harry Bigoness the other name I made up though my first name is Theresa really. Haug isn’t my Maiden name it is just something I made up because I suppose I liked the sound of it. I am only a housewife in Gary Ind. and I went astray and now I am back with my husband Mr. Bigoness and we both do not want me mixed-up in any of that business. That is all my “shameful” past and was a big big mistake. Harry knows what is best for our family especially with this “recession” on. I don’t think I should get mixed-up again. I had done all I can. I hope I am not cauzing trouble but it was a shock to me and Mr. Bigoness and now it is over and done, with. Harry says it is absolutely done, with. Excuse me.

Yours Very Truly ,

Theresa Bigoness ( Theresa “Haug” )

12/16/57

Gabe:

Here is the letter I told you about — let me know what happens.

Sid Jaffe

P.S. Please save the letter for my files. Thanks for your interest.

The mills were dark and nearly smokeless; for all the mass and solidity, without purpose. High up on concrete foundations, the wooden houses — two stories each, set fifteen feet apart — brought to mind prehistoric lake villages, dank shacks on stilts. The dwellings went on and on, as did the aerials hooked to the roofs, until blocks away the weather blurred the wires and rods, leaving what might have been ancient writing, hieroglyphics, illegible markings in the unpleasant winter sky. It was a day of dampness, of heaviness, a day without color; a haze like cold steam moved forward in puffs. Stuck to a few front doors were clumps of holly; those Christmas trees visible behind lace curtains were not aglow — there was no wasting of electricity, no sign anywhere of comfort or luxury. The big soiled cars lining both sides of the street indicated that, though it was a Tuesday and not yet four in the afternoon, men were at home. The day itself felt grainy to the skin.

Twisting the key in the door of his car, Gabe had numerous shooting thoughts, but only one that was strong and recurrent. I am in it again.

There was nothing of value in the car, yet he came around to check the far door too. His stray thoughts turned on theft, assault, violence … He informed himself that his life didn’t depend on this little trip. Yet the mills, the houses, the fact that Harry Bigoness was probably a steel worker, served to intimidate him. The man’s name could itself have been a word having to do with the atmospheric conditions, the haze, the chill, the shadows. The weather will be mostly bigoness through the late afternoon and evening. Big business. Big onus. By gones — let them be—

Bigoness. Over one of the four bells he found the name. Each time he rang the bell he cleared his throat. He looked at his clothing. The smell he smelled was not himself; it was the house exuding its odor — wet surfaces and old carpeting, a dusty weightiness in his nostrils. The varnished baseboards looked sticky. In the pebbled glass that cupped the electric bulb over his head, last summer’s bugs showed through as dirty spots. He stopped clearing his throat when he became conscious that he had been doing it. His hand shot up to his pocket. Theresa’s letter was still there; he hadn’t dropped it anywhere.