Эд Макбейн - Mothers and Daughters

His mother died in August. He could remember the funeral, black umbrellas, rows and rows of black umbrellas, but no rain. It was not like in the movies. He remembered feeling a sense of disappointment. The sun was shining in Glen City that day, so hot, and they carried umbrellas because of the hot sun, with the dust climbing the black trouser legs of the men carrying the coffin, and his father weeping, the tears mingling with the dust on his face, streaking his face. Matthew did not cry. He thought only, They shouldn’t be carrying umbrellas when it isn’t raining.

The scent of her lavender clung to the silent house. He could hear his father weeping in the library. He went into the room, opening the door slick with linseed oil, the house was so still, he could not remember the house ever being so still. His father turned his head so that Matthew would not see the tears. “I want to be a lawyer,” he said to his father. “Like you.” His father nodded and said nothing, his face still streaked from the dusty sunny street of the town and the walk to the cemetery. He wondered if his mother had gone to heaven.

There was not as much family any more, it seemed. Somehow, the house did not reverberate with singing and laughter any more. Oh, they came, yes, but it wasn’t the same any more, and there didn’t seem to be quite as many uncles or aunts or cousins, somehow the old house went still, and even the scent of lavender vanished after a while, leaving only the smell of linseed oil and magnolia and the sweaty smell of the servants. There was not as much family any more. There were girls now. He could remember learning about girls. He could remember when he was sixteen and Sue Ellen unbuttoned his trousers and said, “This is the first time I’ve seen one up close. It’s ugly as hell.”

“I don’t think so,” he said. He was trembling. He sat in the grass on the high hill overlooking the town, and he watched her exploring fingers, and he trembled with desire for her.

“You don’t think so, huh?” Her grin was evil. He wanted her more desperately than ever. “You think I’m gonna let you put that ugly ole thing in me, Matthew Bridges?”

“I think so, yes,” he said.

“Oh, you think so, huh?”

“Sue Ellen, I know so,” he said, trembling, but managing a forceful tone. Her eyes narrowed. She looked at him speculatively and, it seemed to him, with new respect.

“Why should I let you?” she teased, her voice softer now.

“Because I want to,” he said.

“There’s lots of boys who want to,” Sue Ellen whispered.

“Yes, but none of them want to as much as I do,” and he pinned her to the grass, and he would remember later only that she said, “Don’t tear them, Matthew Bridges! They cost me a dollar forty-nine!”

He missed the family.

He didn’t know why the house had to be so empty all at once. He missed Birdie’s songs on the piano, and her touch of yellow. He missed his uncles in their white suits, telling dirty jokes where the ladies could not hear them. He missed the rush of preparation. He missed the scent of lavender.

When he was eighteen and a senior in high school, his father called him into the library one day and they faced each other in that room where, it seemed so long ago, his father had wept and tried to hide the tears and Matthew had not cried at all. His father sat in the overstuffed easy chair, his shoulders stooped, his head bent, an old old man at fifty-four, and Matthew stood before him in his white school sweater with the orange-and-black Glen City letter he had earned on the swimming team, his shoulders broad, his face clean with the vigor of youth. They faced each other.

“Do you still want to be a lawyer, Matthew?” he said.

“I do, sir.”

“Then I’ve got to caution you against the reputation you’re building in this town.”

“I don’t know what you mean, sir.”

“You know what I mean, Matthew.”

“No, sir, I do not.”

“Don’t give me the ‘sir’ baloney, son,” Matthew senior said. “I gave my father the same baloney when I was your age, in this very same room, and he probably gave it to my grandfather, too, so we’ve got a long line of Bridges who are used to it, and unaffected by it.”

“Well, sir, I—”

“There is a friend of mine in this town whose name is Orville Kennedy, and he has a young daughter whose name is Helen Kennedy; I believe the name may ring a bell. Orville happens to be my law partner. In fact, we have been practicing law together for the past twenty-five years, did you know that, son?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Yes, well, Orville tells me that you, my honored son with all your ‘sir’ baloney, has been seeing his daughter regularly and leaving the poor girl weak with exhaustion. Is that true, son?”

“I don’t know whether she’s weak or not, sir.”

“I am referring to the allegation of intimacy, son, and not to the state of her health.”

“I know Helen pretty well, sir.”

“Yes, in the Biblical sense, I’m sure. Orville happens to be a friend of mine. And my partner.”

“That’s too bad.”

“What do you mean, that’s too bad?”

“That he’s a friend of yours. And your partner. But I don’t see what that has to do with Helen. She likes me.”

“That would seem apparent,” Matthew senior said dryly.

“Yes, sir, I guess it would.”

“But cut it out.”

“Why?”

“To begin with, my partner Orville doesn’t like it. Helen’s serious and you’re not.”

“I—”

“Don’t deny it. If it wasn’t Helen, it’d be somebody else’s daughter. She’s a good girl, son, and she wouldn’t behave this way if she didn’t care for you. That’s the first thing. The second thing is that the reputation you’re building isn’t going to help you any when you enter the firm. So cut it out.”

“No, sir.”

“What?”

“I don’t plan to enter the firm, sir, and I don’t plan to cut it out with Helen or with anybody else.”

“What?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Maybe you didn’t understand me.”

“I understood you, sir.”

“I’m not asking you, son.”

Matthew stared at his father and said, “I’m eighteen.”

“So what?”

“I just thought you might like to know.”

“I know how old you are, and I also know you’ve been accepted at Harvard and will be leaving for Boston in the fall. That still leaves the summer, and I expect your behavior to be impeccable from here on in, and what the hell do you mean, you don’t plan to enter the firm?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Yes, sir, yes sir, what? I’ve got a practice that—”

“Sir, I do not expect to practice law in Glen City.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t think I like it here, sir.”

“Why not?”

“Well, now, I guess it would take me until midnight to give you all my reasons.”

“I’m not going anyplace,” Matthew senior said.

“Well, I have a date,” Matthew answered.

“With Helen?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why don’t you like Glen City?”

“It’s too small.”

“It’s a good town.”

“And too cold.”

“The winters here are as mild as—”

“I meant the people.”

“The people are friendly.”

“No. The town’s changed. It’s not the way it used to be.”

“How did it used to be, Matthew?”

“Warm and exciting and... alive. I guess, alive.”

“Do you think you’ll find it different elsewhere?”

“I can look, sir.”

“I’m an old man,” Matthew senior said suddenly and apparently without meaning. His son stared at him for a second and then went to the door.