James Salter: Dusk and Other Stories

So they worked. They were students again, sitting around in polo shirts with their feet on the desk, throwing off hopeless ideas, crumpling wads of paper, staying late in the library and having the words blur in books.

They stayed on through vacations and weekends sometimes sleeping in the office and making coffee long before anyone came to work. After a late dinner they were still talking about it, its complexities, where elements somehow fit in, the sequence of letters, articles in journals, meetings, the limits of meaning. Brenda met a handsome Dutchman who worked for a bank. Alan met Hopie. Still there was this infinite forest, the trunks and vines blocking out the light, the roots of distant things joined. With every month that passed they were deeper into it, less certain of where they had been or if it could end. They had become like the old partners whose existence had been slowly sealed off, fewer calls, fewer consultations, lives that had become lunch. It was known they were swallowed up by the case with knowledge of little else. The opposite was true—no one else understood its details. Three years had passed. The length of time alone made it important. The reputation of the firm, at least in irony, was riding on them.

Two months before the case was to come to trial they quit Weyland, Braun. Frank sat down at the polished table for Sunday lunch. His father was one of the best men in the city. There is a kind of lawyer you trust and who becomes your friend. “What happened?” he wanted to know.

“We’re starting our own firm,” Frank said.

“What about the case you’ve been working on? You can’t leave them with a litigation you’ve spent years preparing.”

“We’re not. We’re taking it with us,” Frank said.

There was a moment of dreadful silence.

“Taking it with you? You can’t. You went to one of the best schools, Frank. They’ll sue you. You’ll ruin yourself.”

“We thought of that.”

“Listen to me,” his father said.

Everyone said that, his mother, his Uncle Cook, friends. It was worse than ruin, it was dishonor. His father said that.

Hardmann Roe never went to trial, as it turned out. Six weeks later there was a settlement. It was for thirty-eight million, a third of it their fee.

His father had been wrong, which was something you could not hope for. They weren’t sued either. That was settled, too. In place of ruin there were new offices overlooking Bryant Park which from above seemed like a garden behind a dark château, young clients, opera tickets, dinners in apartments with divorced hostesses, surrendered apartments with books and big, tiled kitchens.

The city was divided, as he had said, into those going up and those coming down, those in crowded restaurants and those on the street, those who waited and those who did not, those with three locks on the door and those rising in an elevator from a lobby with silver mirrors and walnut paneling.

And those like Mrs. Christie who was in the intermediate state though looking assured. She wanted to renegotiate the settlement with her ex-husband. Frank had leafed through the papers. “What do you think?” she asked candidly.

“I think it would be easier for you to get married again.”

She was in her fur coat, the dark lining displayed. She gave a little puff of disbelief. “It’s not that easy,” she said.

He didn’t know what it was like, she told him. Not long ago she’d been introduced to someone by a couple she knew very well. “We’ll go to dinner,” they said, “you’ll love him, you’re perfect for him, he likes to talk about books.”

They arrived at the apartment and the two women immediately went into the kitchen and began cooking. What did she think of him? She’d only had a glimpse, she said, but she liked him very much, his beautiful bald head, his dressing gown. She had begun to plan what she would do with the apartment which had too much blue in it. The man—Warren was his name—was silent all evening. He’d lost his job, her friend explained in the kitchen. Money was no problem, but he was depressed. “He’s had a shock,” she said. “He likes you.” And in fact he’d asked if he could see her again.

“Why don’t you come for tea, tomorrow?” he said.

“I could do that,” she said. “Of course. I’ll be in the neighborhood,” she added.

The next day she arrived at four with a bag filled with books, at least a hundred dollars worth which she’d bought as a present. He was in pajamas. There was no tea. He hardly seemed to know who she was or why she was there. She said she remembered she had to meet someone and left the books. Going down in the elevator she felt suddenly sick to her stomach.

“Well,” said Frank, “there might be a chance of getting the settlement overturned, Mrs. Christie, but it would mean a lot of expense.”

“I see.” Her voice was smaller. “Couldn’t you do it as one of those things where you got a percentage?”

“Not on this kind of case,” he said.

It was dusk. He offered her a drink. She worked her lips, in contemplation, one against the other. “Well, then, what can I do?”

Her life had been made up of disappointments, she told him, looking into her glass, most of them the result of foolishly falling in love. Going out with an older man just because he was wearing a white suit in Nashville which was where she was from. Agreeing to marry George Christie while they were sailing off the coast of Maine. “I don’t know where to get the money,” she said, “or how.”

She glanced up. She found him looking at her, without haste. The lights were coming on in buildings surrounding the park, in the streets, on homeward bound cars. They talked as evening fell. They went out to dinner.

At Christmas that year Alan and his wife broke up. “You’re kidding,” Frank said. He’d moved into a new place with thick towels and fine carpets. In the foyer was a Biedermeier desk, black, tan, and gold. Across the street was a private school.

Alan was staring out the window which was as cold as the side of a ship. “I don’t know what to do,” he said in despair. “I don’t want to get divorced. I don’t want to lose my daughter.” Her name was Camille. She was two.

“I know how you feel,” Frank said.

“If you had a kid, you’d know.”

“Have you seen this?” Frank asked. He held up the alumni magazine. It was the fifteenth anniversary of their graduation. “Know any of these guys?”

Five members of the class had been cited for achievement. Alan recognized two or three of them. “Cummings,” he said, “he was a zero—elected to Congress. Oh, God, I don’t know what to do.”

“Just don’t let her take the apartment,” Frank said.

Of course, it wasn’t that easy. It was easy when it was someone else. Nan Christie had decided to get married. She brought it up one evening.

“I just don’t think so,” he finally said.

“You love me, don’t you?”

“This isn’t a good time to ask.”

They lay silently. She was staring at something across the room. She was making him feel uncomfortable. “It wouldn’t work. It’s the attraction of opposites,” he said.

“We’re not opposites.”

“I don’t mean just you and me. Women fall in love when they get to know you. Men are just the opposite. When they finally know you they’re ready to leave.”

She got up without saying anything and began gathering her clothes. He watched her dress in silence. There was nothing interesting about it. The funny thing was that he had meant to go on with her.

“I’ll get you a cab,” he said.

“I used to think that you were intelligent,” she said, half to herself. Exhausted, he was searching for a number. “I don’t want a cab. I’m going to walk.”