Irwin Shaw - Short Stories - Five Decades

“Virginia,” Robert said, “I’m going to get up on this seat and scream at the top of my voice.”

“Divorced, she said, but they’re still good friends. I’ll bet they are. I’ll bet that girl is good friends with a lot of people. How about you and your ex-wife?” Virginia demanded. “Are you good friends with her, too?”

“You know as well as I do,” Robert said, “that the only time I see my ex-wife is when she wants the alimony adjusted.”

“If you keep talking in that tone of voice, they’ll never let you in this restaurant again,” Virginia whispered.

“Let’s get out of here,” Robert said blindly. “Waiter, where’s that check?”

“She’s thick.” Virginia stared at Miss Byrne, who was sitting with her back to them twenty feet away, talking brightly and waving a cigarette. “Through the middle. Grotesquely thick.”

“Grotesquely,” Robert agreed.

“You don’t fool me,” Virginia said, “I know your tastes.”

“Oh, God,” Robert murmured.

“Always pretending to be such a connoisseur of beautiful women,” Virginia said, “and secretly what you really like are old-fashioned, disgusting brood mares.”

“Oh, God,” Robert said again.

“Like that Elise Cross,” Virginia rolled on, “two summers ago on the Cape. She always looked as though she had to be packed into her girdle under pressure. And whenever I looked around for you at a party, you both were gone, out on the dunes.”

“I thought we had agreed never to discuss that subject again,” Robert said with dignity.

“What subject am I permitted to discuss?” Virginia demanded. “The United Nations?”

“There never was anything between me and Elise Cross. Not anything. And you know it,” Robert said firmly and convincingly. It was true that there had been something, but that had been two years ago, and he hadn’t seen Elise Cross since then, or anyone else, for that matter. And anyway it had been summertime then, and he had been drunk a good deal of the time for a reason he could no longer recall, and the people around them had been of that peculiar, handsome, neurotic, wife-changing type that appears at places like that in August and infects the atmosphere. He had been ashamed of himself by Labor Day and had resolved to change his ways once and for all. Now he felt blameless and aggrieved at being called upon to defend himself after all that abstinence.

“You spent more time on the beach than the Coast Guard,” Virginia said.

“If the waiter doesn’t come with the check,” Robert said, “I’m going to walk out of here and they can follow me in a taxi if they want their money.”

“I should have known,” Virginia said, and there was a remote throb in her voice. “People told me about you before we were married. I knew your reputation.”

“Look, that was more than five years ago,” Robert said doggedly. “I was younger then and more energetic and I was married to a woman I didn’t like and who didn’t like me. I was unhappy and lonely and restless—”

“And now?”

“And now,” Robert said, thinking how wonderful it would be to get up and walk away from his wife for six or seven months, “and now I am married to a woman I love and I am settled and profoundly happy. I haven’t had lunch or a drink with anyone for years. I barely tip my hat to women I know when I pass them in the street.”

“And what about that fat actress over there?”

“Look,” Robert said, feeling hoarse, as though he had been shouting into the wind for hours. “Let’s get it straight. I met her at a party. I spoke to her for five minutes. I don’t think she’s very pretty. I don’t think she’s much as an actress. I was surprised when she recognized me. I forgot her name. Then I remembered her name when she came to the table.”

“I suppose you expect me to believe that.” Virginia smiled coldly.

“I certainly do. Because it’s an exact statement of fact.”

“I saw that smile,” Virginia said. “Don’t think I didn’t.”

“What smile?” Robert asked, honestly puzzled.

“Why, Mr. Harvey,” Virginia said, cooing, “isn’t it nice seeing you again? And then the teeth and the girlish crinkling of the nose and the long, direct stare …”

“Finally,” Robert said to the waiter, who was leaning over the table, putting the check down. “Don’t go away.” Robert counted out some bills, feeling his hands shaking minutely with rage. He watched the waiter going toward the cashier’s desk, near the kitchen, for change. Then, he spoke, trying to keep his voice under control. “Now,” he said, turning back to Virginia, “what, exactly, did you mean by that?”

“I may not be very smart,” Virginia said, “but if there’s one thing I have, it’s intuition. Especially where you’re concerned. And anyway that smile was unmistakable.”

“Now, wait a minute.” Robert felt his fists opening and closing spasmodically. “It’s charming of you to think, even after being married to me for five years, that women just drop at my feet after speaking to me for five minutes, but I have to disillusion you. It has never happened to me. Never,” he said slowly and distinctly and with some disappointment.

“If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s fake modesty,” Virginia said. “I’ve seen you looking at yourself in the mirror, approving of yourself by the hour, pretending you were shaving or looking for gray hairs. And,” she added bitterly, “I’ve talked to your mother. I know how she brought you up. Drilling it into your head that the whole panting female sex was after you because you were a Harvey and you were so dazzling—”

“Good God,” Robert said. “Now we have my mother, too.”

“She has a lot to answer for,” Virginia said, “your mother. Don’t think she hasn’t.”

“All right,” Robert said. “My mother is a low, terrible woman and everybody agrees on that. But what has that got to do with the fact that a woman I met at a party happened to smile at me?”

“Happened,” Virginia said.

“I still don’t see how it could be my fault,” Robert said, trying to sound patient. “I can’t control the way people smile in restaurants.”

“It’s always your fault,” Virginia said. “Even if you don’t say a word. It’s just the way you come into the room and stand there and decide to look … male.”

Robert jumped up, pushing the table back. “I can’t stand it,” he said. “I can’t stand it any more. The hell with the change.”

Virginia stood up, too, her face rigid. “I have an idea,” Robert said as he helped her on with her coat. “Let’s you and I not talk to each other for a week.”

“Fine,” said Virginia crazily. “That’s perfectly fine with me.” She walked swiftly toward the door, through the middle of the restaurant, without looking back.

Robert watched her striding down the narrow aisle between the tables, her black coat floating behind her. He wished that he had a worse temper. He wished that he had a temper so bad that he could stay out all night and get drunk.

The waiter came with the change, and Robert fumbled with the tip. Over the waiter’s shoulder he saw Miss Byrne swing her head slowly toward him. Everybody else at her table was talking animatedly. For the first time, Robert looked at her carefully. It is true, he thought numbly. Most women these days are too damn thin.

Then Miss Byrne smiled at him. Her nose crinkled and her teeth showed and she seemed to be looking at him for a long time. He felt flattered and considerably younger and very curious. And as he dropped his eyes and left a large tip for the waiter, he knew, helplessly, that he was going to call her next day and he knew what her voice was going to sound like on the telephone.