Lorrie Moore - 100 Years of the Best American Short Stories

“I hope she dies,” his wife said.

“May!” said Ellerbee, shocked.

“It’s what she wants, isn’t it? I hope she gets what she wants.”

“That’s harsh, May.”

“Yes? Harsh? You see how much good your checks did her? And another thing, how could she afford a high-priced man like Potter on what you were paying her?”

He went to visit the woman during her postoperative convalescence, and she introduced him to her sister, her twin she said, though the two women looked nothing alike and the twin seemed to be in her seventies, a good dozen years older than Mrs. Lesefario. “This is Mr. Ellerbee that my husband died protecting his liquor store from the niggers.”

“Oh yes?” Mrs. Lesefario’s sister said. “Very pleased. I heard so much about you.”

“Look what she brought me,” Mrs. Lesefario said, pointing to a large brown paper sack.

“Evelyn, don’t. You’ll strain your stitches. I’ll show him.” She opened the sack and took out a five-pound bag of sugar.

“Five pounds of sugar,” the melancholic woman said.

“You don’t come empty handed to a sick person,” her sister said.

“She got it at Kroger’s on special. Ninety-nine cents with the coupon,” the manic-depressive said gloomily. “She says if I don’t like it I can get peach halves.”

Ellerbee, who did not want to flaunt his own gift in front of her sister, quietly put the dressing gown, still wrapped, on her tray table. He stayed for another half hour, and rose to go.

“Wait,” Mrs. Lesefario said. “Nice try but not so fast.”

“I’m sorry?” Ellerbee said.

“The ribbon.”

“Ribbon?”

“On the fancy box. The ribbon, the string.”

“Oh, your stitches. Sorry. I’ll get it.”

“I’m a would-be suicide,” she said. “I tried it once, I could try it again. You don’t bring dangerous ribbon to a desperate, unhappy woman.”

In fact Mrs. Lesefario did die. Not of suicide, but of a low-grade infection she had picked up in the hospital and which festered along her stitches, undermining them, burning through them, opening her body like a package.

The Ellerbees were in the clear financially, but his wife’s reactions to Ellerbee’s efforts to provide for his clerks’ families had soured their relationship. She had discovered Ellerbee’s private account and accused him of dreadful things. He reminded her that it had been she who had insisted he would have to get the money for the women’s support himself — that their joint tenancy was not to be disturbed. She ignored his arguments and accused him further. Ellerbee loved May and did what he could to placate her.

“How about a trip to Phoenix?” he suggested that spring. “The store’s doing well and I have complete confidence in Kroll. What about it, May? You like Phoenix, and we haven’t seen the folks in almost a year.”

“Phoenix,” she scoffed, “the folks . The way you coddle them. Any other grown man would be ashamed.”

“They raised me, May.”

“They raised you. Terrific. They aren’t even your real parents. They only adopted you.”

“They’re the only parents I ever knew. They took me out of the Home when I was an infant.”

“Look, you want to go to Phoenix, go. Take money out of your secret accounts and go.”

“Please, May. There’s no secret account. When Mrs. Lesefario died I transferred everything back into joint. Come on, sweetheart, you’re awfully goddamn hard on me.”

“Well,” she said, drawing the word out. The tone was one she had used as a bride, and although Ellerbee had not often heard it since, it melted him. It was her signal of sudden conciliation, cute surrender, and he held out his arms and they embraced. They went off to the bedroom together.

“You know,” May said afterwards, “it would be good to run out to Phoenix for a bit. Are you sure the help can manage?”

“Oh, sure, May, absolutely. They’re a first-rate bunch.” He spoke more forcefully than he felt, not because he had any lack of confidence in his employees, but because he was still disturbed by an image he had had during climax. Momentarily, fleetingly, he had imagined Mrs. Register beneath him.

In the store he was giving last-minute instructions to Kroll, the man who would be his manager during their vacation in Phoenix.

“I think the Californias,” Ellerbee was saying. “Some of them beat several of even the more immodest French. Let’s do a promotion of a few of the better Californias. What do you think?”

“They’re a very competitive group of wines,” Kroll said. “I think I’m in basic agreement.”

Just then three men walked into the shop.

“Say,” one called from the doorway, “you got something like a Closed sign I could hang in the door here?” Ellerbee stared at him. “Well you don’t have to look at me as if I was nuts,” the man said. “Lots of merchants keep them around. In case they get a sudden toothache or something they can whip out to the dentist. All right, if you ain’t you ain’t.”

“I want,” the second man said, coming up to the counter where Ellerbee stood with his manager, “to see your register receipts.”

“What is this?” Kroll demanded.

“No, don’t,” Ellerbee said to Kroll. “Don’t resist.” He glanced toward the third man to see if he was the one holding the gun, but the man appeared merely to be browsing the bins of Scotch in the back. Evidently he hadn’t even heard the first man, and clearly he could not have heard the second. Conceivably he could have been a customer. “Where’s your gun?” Ellerbee asked the man at the counter.

“Oh gee,” the man said, “I almost forgot. You got so many things to think about during a stick-up — the traffic flow, the timing, who stands where — you sometimes forget the basics. Here,” he said, “here’s my gun, in your kisser,” and took an immense hand gun from his pocket and pointed it at Ellerbee’s face.

Out of the corner of his eye Ellerbee saw Kroll’s hands fly up. It was so blatant a gesture Ellerbee thought his manager might be trying to attract the customer’s attention. If that was his idea it had worked, for the third man had turned away from the bins and was watching the activity at the counter. “Look,” Ellerbee said, “I don’t want anybody hurt.”

“What’s he say?” said the man at the door, who was also holding a pistol now.

“He don’t want nobody hurt,” the man at the counter said.

“Sure,” said the man at the door, “it’s costing him a fortune paying all them salaries to the widows. He’s a good businessman all right.”

“A better one than you,” the man at the counter said to his confederate sharply. “He knows how to keep his mouth shut.”

Why, they’re white, Ellerbee thought. They’re white men! He felt oddly justified and wished May were there to see.

“The register receipts,” the man at the counter coaxed. Ellerbee’s cash register kept a running total on what had been taken in. “Just punch Total Tab,” the man instructed Kroll. “Let’s see what we got.” Kroll looked at Ellerbee and Ellerbee nodded. The man reached forward and tore off the tape. He whistled. “Nice little place you got here,” he said.

“What’d we get? What’d we get?” the man at the door shouted.

Ellerbee cleared his throat. “Do you want to lock the door?” he asked. “So no one else comes in?” He glanced toward the third man.

“What, and have you kick the alarm while we’re fucking around trying to figure which key opens the place?” said the man at the door. “You’re a cutie. What’d we get? Let’s see.” He joined the man at the counter. “Holy smoke! Jackpot City! We’re into four figures here.” In his excitement he did a foolish thing. He set his revolver down on top of the appetizer table. It lay on the tins of caviar and smoked oysters, the imported cheeses and roasted peanuts. The third man was no more than four feet from the gun, and though Ellerbee saw that the man had caught the robber’s mistake and that by taking one step toward the table he could have picked up the pistol and perhaps foiled the robbery, he made no move. Perhaps he’s one of them, Ellerbee thought, or maybe he just doesn’t want to get involved. Ellerbee couldn’t remember ever having seen him. (By now, of course, he recognized all his repeat customers.) He still didn’t know if he were a confederate or just an innocent bystander, but Ellerbee had had enough of violence and hoped that if he were a customer he wouldn’t try anything dumb. He felt no animus toward the man at all. Kroll’s face, however, was all scorn and loathing.