Jonathan Franzen - Strong Motion - A Novel

“Yes.”

“What if I’m wrong?”

“Well, you’ll know that if you’re right, I’ll be grateful to you. And if I’m grateful to you, you’ll be very, very happy to be a friend of mine.”

“You mean money.”

Melanie looked down at her purse as though sorry to find it on her lap. “Preferably not. But whatever your style is. I wouldn’t want to give you something you didn’t find useful.”

“But if I’m wrong anyway?”

“I don’t expect you to be wrong, but if you are, I’ll know that you tried very hard to be right. I’ll know that I did everything I possibly could to make the right decision, that I consulted a person I trusted, and we simply had bad luck. As I said, it’s not that I’m so greedy. It’s that I can’t bear the responsibility.”

“This is Sweeting-Aldren we’re talking about.”

“That’s right.” Melanie laughed nervously. “I hope you didn’t find that out from Louis. He makes a point of being indiscreet.”

“I think I can help you,” Renée said.

“You haven’t seen him again, have you?”

“Pardon me?”

“You said you knew him. You meant the day of the earthquake. You didn’t see him again after that.”

“No, actually. Actually I did. He invited me to a party at your daughter’s.”

“Oh.” Melanie paled, touching her mouth. “I see. And did you go?

“Yes.”

“You didn’t tell me that.”

“I tried to.”

“You did not tell me that.” She twisted sideways in her seat, touching every part of her face with her fingers, as if she wasn’t sure it was all there. “And that — that should have been the very first thing you told me.” She nodded to herself. “The very first thing.”

“I tried to.”

She swung violently to face Renée. “Are you involved with my son? ”

“No!”

“Have you been involved with him?”

“No. No! I went to a party with him. And a few weeks ago I— went to dinner at your sister’s. Your daughter’s. He seemed to think he needed a date. He was very polite to me.”

“Did you talk about me?”

“Not at all.”

“How come your hands are shaking?”

“Because you’re scaring me.”

“Did you tell him that I’d called you?”

“I mentioned it, yeah.”

“How many hours?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“How many hours have you spent with him?”

She shrugged. “Ten. Eight. I don’t know.”

Melanie leaned across the table and searched Renée’s face, touching it with her gaze as she’d been touching her own face with her fingers, her fear growing as it sent roots deeper into the gap between the sweetness of the face and the underlying possibility that Renée was lying. It was pathetically evident how much she longed to trust Renée. But she couldn’t get a definite answer from the face, and she’d placed such hopes in it that she couldn’t bear to keep on looking, lest she find her suspicions confirmed. “Oh God.” Again she turned sideways on the banquette. “Oh God, I don’t know what to do.”

“Why don’t you call Louis and ask him? If it’s so important to you.”

“Ten minutes ago you were trying to convince me not to trust you. Now you’re doing the opposite. It’s because I mentioned money. I dare you to say it’s not true.”

“What’s happened is that you seem to think I have some reason to be lying to you.”

“You’re not the same person I spoke with two months ago. And now I see why. Now I see why. How could I have not thought of this? Oh, why didn’t you tell me?”

“Are you ladies ready to order?” With a flourish the waiter produced a ballpoint pen.

Making severe eye contact with him, Melanie donned her glasses and placed her order. Then, while Renée ordered, she clutched the glasses in her fist, squeezing them so hard the plastic creaked, and stared hopelessly across the dining room. Renée covered the fist with her hand. She was thinking so hard that her lips stirred faintly. “I said I could help you,” she said. “I know what you should do with your stock, and you’ll be very happy you asked me. I’m going to help you.”

Melanie tilted her head back and swallowed.

“I’m going to tell you what to do,” Renée said. “And I’m so sure I’m right that I’m going to back it up with whatever money I have.”

The light in her face had become a glittering, intoxicated implacability. She stroked Melanie’s hand. Suddenly fingernails sank into her wrist. A face rushed forward; it smelled of breath, perfume, ingratiating skin cream. “Are you involved with my son? ”

“No!”

“And you want money from me .”

“Yes.”

“You want to make a deal .”

“Yes.”

Melanie slumped back into her seat. “All right.” A full minute passed as she sat and bit her lips, her fears obviously undispelled. Finally Renée asked if she wanted wine.

“Not for me, thank you. You may order a glass for yourself.”

“Can I order a bottle?”

“Whatever you like.”

“Why don’t we relax and enjoy ourselves?”

Melanie shook her head hopelessly. “It would have been better to avoid money as a topic. It would have been better to wait. You can mock me now, but I really did have hopes for a different kind of lunch.”

“I’m going to give you good advice. You won’t be sorry.”

“I’m sorry already. I’m sorry to have involved you in this. I’m sorry to be involved in it myself.”

“Let’s just finish, then. Let’s just do the last thing. And then we can relax.”

Melanie stiffened at this mention of the “last thing.” She hesitated and hesitated before she finally took a matchbook from her purse, wrote a figure on the inside, and nudged it across the tablecloth.

Renée read the figure, took the pen, and calmly added a zero. “I may want more,” she said. “If I’m right. You’ll need to give me a few days. But I definitely won’t take less, unless. ” She considered. “Why don’t I take whatever cash I have in the bank and put it up as security? Then we can have a — what would you call it? A sliding scale. The less right I am, the less you give me. If I’m wrong, you keep the security.”

“I’m not going to discuss this with you. We’ll meet on Tuesday.”

“See if you can do better in the meantime.”

“I may do just that.”

“Uh-huh. Talk to Larry Axelrod.”

“Perhaps.”

Renée ate a plate of carpaccio drenched in yellow oil. She kept emptying her wineglass, until she began to glow like an object in a kiln, her selfconsciousness transmuted into volubility as she did her Why I Hate Boston number, her California’s Even Worse number. Melanie might have been listening to a daughter whom she liked and had every reason to be entertained by, and yet seeing in her only reminders of her own heavy heart. Of her relative proximity to death, of her inability to relax and enjoy a lunch, of her estrangement from the world of things that young people talk about. This really does happen to parents who are unhappy, even those who love their children.

Her tongue curled as she added up the figures on the check. Renée was glowing as if she’d been through a snowstorm. Back on the planet of ceaseless car traffic, in front of the hotel, she asked for money for a cab. Melanie opened her purse on her hip and dug a twenty out. “I’m sure you think it’s silly of me to keep asking. Perhaps it doesn’t even matter. But—”

Renée’s fingers closed on the bill. “But.”

“Well, only whether there is some involvement between you and Louis.”

She took Melanie by the shoulders. “What do you think?”