Jane Smiley - Some Luck

She blushed.

He said, “Come on in.”

JUDY WAS MAKING HIM her special red velvet cake for his birthday, and they were having it for breakfast. She set a slice — bright red with white icing — beside his fried egg, and said, “Happy birthday, baby.” Then she put her hands on her hips. “It’s Hoover’s birthday, too. But I don’t hold that against you, personally.”

She sat down. Her egg was soft-boiled, sitting in an egg cup — it made him uneasy to watch her eat it. This is what she knew: That he worked in Ohio and came to Washington every month for four days (that was fine with her — she didn’t want him or anyone around all the time, anyway, she hated kids and was not the marrying kind); that he used to stay with his sister when he was in Washington, but now stayed with her. That he had served in North Africa, Italy, and the south of France. That he didn’t care about politics one way or the other and wouldn’t talk about it (a relief — all day at the office, all she heard was politics). That he grew up on a farm somewhere (she had never traveled west of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, or south of Asheville, North Carolina, so her idea of where was hazy at best). That when they went to the Smithsonian, he preferred the anthropological exhibits to the historical ones. That he had been to New York City and New Jersey on the way to and from Europe, and he would go back with her sometime to see where she had grown up. That he read The Saturday Evening Post and sometimes Time , but nothing more taxing than that. That he didn’t know the name of the secretary of state or the governor of Iowa, at least right off the top of his head. She thought this was hysterically funny. He also didn’t know that a woman named Frances Hodgson Burnett had written a famous children’s book, one of her favorites, called The Secret Garden .

She said, “What kind of birthday cakes did you have as a child?”

“My mother is a great believer in angel food.”

“Ugh. So dry!” She leaned across the table and kissed him.

“Once in a while, a pound cake with burnt-sugar icing.”

What she didn’t know was that this was their last morning together. Frank didn’t think she would mind terribly. He was going to say that he had decided to get engaged to a girl in Dayton. Supposedly, her name was Margaret, and they had been dating off and on for a year. That part would be insulting, but only insulting. After breakfast, when she got on the streetcar to go to the Justice Department, he was going to meet Arthur and give him his last report. Arthur was going to take notes, and then that would be that.

He didn’t like the cake much, so he concentrated on his toast and the last of his egg, which was good — she knew how to get the edges crispy. They were fairly well suited to one another, neither capable of much in the way of passion. He had tried a couple of things over the two months since they’d started sleeping together — kind words, expressions of fondness (though not quite love). A couple of times, he had pinned her shoulders to the bed and not let her get up, just long enough to make her feel trapped and scare her a bit, but that didn’t arouse her, either. He’d grabbed her wrist and twisted her arm behind her one time. After that, he didn’t hear from her for two weeks, so he called to apologize and said he was drunk. In short, she was not susceptible as far as he could tell — she didn’t even like gifts much. Two things he’d brought her — some Arpège and a couple of pairs of hose — she had exchanged for Chanel N °5 and a bra. She was a practical young woman. Frank liked her.

She set the dishes in the sink while Frank shaved, and then they got dressed. It was just before eight when they stepped into the street. She put her arm through his. The streetcar stop was two blocks away. At first they walked in silence; then she said, “I hate having to go to the office today. It’s supposed to be a holiday.”

“Why are you going to the office?”

“I should have done some straightening up and file sorting before this, but I didn’t. What are you doing?”

“Going back to Dayton.”

She halted suddenly. “You are? You didn’t tell me that.”

He didn’t say anything. When they had walked a few more paces, he said, “Judy, I’m not coming back.”

She took her arm out of his.

It only took about five minutes. When she got onto the streetcar, she looked back at him. He smiled, and waved. He had described “Margaret.” Fortunately, Judy had never met Lillian, so she didn’t know he was describing Lillian. As he walked to where he was meeting Arthur, he thought that maybe this was the best relationship he’d ever had — mild and easy. Even so, he was glad it was over.

When he found Arthur, he did what he had to do to put him in the proper mood. He said, “So — how’re my nephew and my niece?” If he asked, they could get it over with.

“Debbie took a bit of egg for breakfast. She liked it. She smacked her lips after she ate it.” Arthur laughed. “But Timmy wouldn’t sit up to the table at all. He got Lillian to set his plate on the floor, and then he got down on his hands and knees and ate like a dog.”

“You’re joking, right?”

Arthur shook his head.

“My folks must never hear about this.”

Arthur laughed. “And he’s wearing his cowboy outfit today. Canvas chaps, six-guns, and all.”

Frank could only shake his head.

Arthur thought the best place for talking about Judy was the observation deck of the Washington Monument, and at nine, they were the first on the elevator, though because it was a holiday they weren’t the only ones. They stood by the window overlooking the Tidal Basin, which was not frozen, but frosty, and watched the cars cross the 14th Street Bridge until the crowd got back on the elevator. Arthur said, “Slow but sure, right?”

“She’s in the office today. She says she’s getting organized. But it is a holiday, and no one else will be there.”

“Okay,” said Arthur.

“She answered the phone twice last evening. Once at eight and once at eight-twenty-one. She didn’t converse either time. The second call, I wandered into the hallway, and I heard her say, ‘Sorry. No one here by that name.’ ” Arthur wrote down the times. Frank said, “Still no discussion of politics, ever. When my aunt and her husband were commies in Chicago before the war, it never stopped. Never. They couldn’t help themselves. I’ve never heard Judy use a single phrase, not even ‘working class’ or ‘imperialist.’ Not even ‘bourgeois.’ I don’t think she knows what the Lumpenproletariat is. She went to New York for Christmas.”

“Gubitchev was there around Christmas.”

“When I asked her if she wanted to go to a production of The Nutcracker , she said she had to go to New York. I said I already had the tickets, could she postpone her trip? She said I could stay in her apartment.”

“Did you look around?”

“Of course. But I didn’t find a thing. Nothing in Russian, not even a translation of a Russian novel.”

“I do not get it,” said Arthur.

“She hates Hoover,” said Frank. “Remember Melvin Purvis?”

Arthur nodded.

“I mean, she’s my age, why would she care, we were kids. But I think she really hates Hoover. A month or so ago, she was furious that he had told one of the other women she had an ass like a mule and her face was twice as bad. The woman started to cry, and Hoover threw a wad of paper at her. Judy couldn’t stop talking about that one.”

“He is a jerk,” said Arthur.