Part 40 (2/2)

(Deerfield had driven out to the house under the pretext, an absurdly transparent pretext, of having been called by Rosamund to examine Melanie. Abraham just laughed, his wife and his son were so crude in their connivance.) Much of the daytime he must surrender to his enemies. But the night remains his, the night has always been his. If only Melanie will understand . . . .Why does she shrink from her father when he wants only to reveal to her certain precious secrets: where Past, Present and Future are one, in the Heavens. ”Melanie, darling, it's all for you. These charts, these graphs, these constellations cracked open like nuts . . . how bright-glowing Sirius affects our happiness, how the dance of the Pleiades is our own, the moons of Jupiter that float in our dreams, the bright star of Aries that rises in our blood with the claim of honor.”

But the child shrinks from his whiskery embrace, and runs to her mother.

I will kill the old man!

Seeing that Rosamund's eyes are swollen, her mouth soft and hurt and trembling. Knowing the old man has struck her, surely he's threatened her, though Rosamund refuses to speak. ”What is it? He's jealous? He's angry? Why? At you? At me? When there's nothing between us?” Darian asks. ”What should I do, Rosamund? Tell me. Don't turn from me. What should I do?”

Rosamund pushes past him, out of the room; her eyes averted, her expression stubborn and fixed. Hiding her bruises, her soft battered flesh as if these were signs of grace. So Darian calls after her, ”Then go to h.e.l.l! Both of you.”

Having heard the m.u.f.fled voices in the night. The thumping sounds, the thud! thud! thud! as of a body being slammed against a wall or the headboard of a bed. Having run from his own bed to knock on the door and twist the (locked) doork.n.o.b demanding What is it? What's wrong? Father? Rosamund? Open this door, please. But Darian hasn't the right to make such demands as Abraham Licht, panting on the other side of the door, allows him to know. Nothing. No one. Go away. You know nothing.

Impulsively Darian follows her. The old man has driven off in the Packard and left them alone; Melanie is napping beneath a feather comforter; even the mailman has come and gone along the solitary Muirkirk Pike; Darian pulls gently at Rosamund, then more forcibly; grips her face in his hands and kisses her; a raw angry yearning kiss, denied for too long.

Don't, Rosamund whispers.

Darian I can't.

Darian . . .

IN THE LAST month of Abraham Licht's life, his wife and his son become lovers.

And Darian, dazed, exulting, tries to console himself. It's just love. People do this all the time.

(Like all lovers whispering, conspiring. When did you first know, Rosamund asks, and Darian confesses it was the first night he saw her, in his hotel room, the Empire State, remember?-Abraham brought you, in your purple velvet gown, you'd missed my recital, remember? and Rosamund laughs, Rosamund wipes her eyes saying but that woman wasn't me truly, not me as I am now; and Darian says, Yes but the man was me: always it's been me, in regard to you. Their surprise, which is the surprise of all lovers, is with what ease their bodies at last join, the urgency, yet the grace, as if these many months, these years, they'd been celibate yearning for only each other; miserable, yet elated; knowing it must happen someday; and so they'd been lovers without needing to touch. Darian isn't the man he'd been only a few hours ago. Darian the lover, lanky long-limbed Darian now a woman's lover, vowing he'll love her always, he'll love her and Melanie always, he'd kill for her if necessary, it's right, it's just, it's Nature, it's necessary, it's what people do. He will save her and Melanie both, he will protect them from all harm.

Some days later confiding in her, lying in each other's naked arms, a strand of her wavy hair across his face, their breaths and their heartbeats synchronized as if they were two fine-tuned musical instruments, he tells her he's heard (from Aaron Deerfield) that in town it's been believed that they've been lovers for years and that he, and not Abraham Licht, is Melanie's father; and Rosamund says sighing, I know, I've guessed.)

Short-tempered as a hornet, eyes bright with antagonism, he dismisses this ”miraculous” election: the triumph of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the defeat of Herbert Hoover, the New Deal for the Forgotten Man. ”Fools and knaves. Speak to me not of the 'glib and oily art' of politics.”

But, Darian argues, Roosevelt is different.

Yes, Rosamund agrees, daring to oppose him, Roosevelt is different.

With dignity he rises from his chair; with dignity, manages to maintain his balance; his thin cheeks, hawklike features, the stain of old ivory, a fleeting elderly beauty . . . now his heart's laid bare, for greedy daws to peck at.

STUMBLING IN THE marsh where they'll find me, but he isn't hurt, nor even short of breath; refuses to allow them to drive him into Muirkirk so that Deerfield can check him over. No no no. I am the custodian of these bones and will not consent. Though his eyesight has deteriorated. Cataracts, and maybe glaucoma. Though there's a warty growth on his throat just below the left ear. Though his old-man's p.i.s.s emerges in sullen dribbles, sometimes trickling down his leg. And his head, his brain, aswirl, abuzz, a flood of stars winking in Canis Major have bored through his castle wall and farewell king! farewell.

Yet he will not consent.

Saying coldly, even as they half carry him back to the house, ”Abraham Licht is in perfect health for his years, his circ.u.mstances and his suffering.”

DO YOU THINK he knows? the guilty lovers whisper to each other as all guilty lovers whisper, frightened and yet exulting in their adultery. Do you think he . . . senses? Poor Abraham! Kissing, tongueing each other, wis.h.i.+ng only to press together so there's no separation between them; not even the separation of thought. Knowing they're in danger should the old man guess their adultery yet unable to resist loving, their bliss, their greed, what are they to do, what is the right thing to do, the decent thing, the moral thing, the ethical thing, the pragmatic thing, for they must make love for they love each other so, it's anguish to be denied their love, their bodies' urgency, after so many years of denial, they no longer think of Abraham Licht except to torment themselves Do you think he knows? And, if he does . . . !

What must happen, must happen.

Prowling the leafless forest and marsh, at least the outer edges of the marsh where the earth is frozen; crusts of ice like broken teeth beneath his booted feet; his nostrils like a stallion's flaring steam-”Who's that? Who?” The woman singing to him; humming; combing her long pale hair in the mist, he doesn't hear, he ignores her, like Odysseus he'll stop his ears and will not hear, it isn't time; the heavy shotgun slung beneath an arm for Abraham Licht, Esquire, is a country gentleman, a gentleman-farmer, a hunter, seeking in the idle diversion of sport some replication of The Game, for The Game is both hunter and prey, prey and hunter; in herringbone tweed trousers baggy at the knees, a stained cashmere topcoat, rakish old homburg propped on his head like Jimmy Walker. In the three-way mirror in the dressing room at Lyle's Gentlemen's Clothiers, Lexington Avenue, Abraham Licht modeled to perfection this coat, fitting his broad shoulders snugly yet comfortably, $740 was not too high a price for such style and beauty, $7,400 might as easily have been tossed down for he was a millionaire in those halcyon days. AT&T up. Standard Oil, up. Cole Motors, up. Westinghouse, up. And Liebknecht, Inc., steadily rising.

Still the woman sings, teasing and seductive. If his eyes were better he'd see her . . . but maybe he doesn't want to see her. He stalks away, swinging the shotgun at his side. It's loaded but he hasn't yet wished to test its power; he knows the detonation will be deafening; Darian will hear, and make a fuss; Rosamund will hear, and make a worse fuss. Ice veins have formed in the creases of his face, like burning wires.

SOME DAYS, CLEAR-FROST days, Melanie begs to come with him.

”Daddy, can I? Daddy please!” Smiling up at him, the pink knitted cap already on her head though crookedly since she'd pulled it on herself. ”Momma won't know.”

”Yes, darlin'. If you hurry.”

But Momma does know, Momma always knows and calls her back.

For the shotgun terrifies Momma. ”Abraham, for G.o.d's sake. Don't.”

”It isn't loaded, Mrs. Licht. What's to fear from an unloaded gun?” he teases. ”If your conscience is clear.”

The child is his child after all. That, he knows.

Clambering outside, calling as if it doesn't matter to him in the slightest, ”Coming with your Dadda, puss? Or no?” and Melanie laughs, and dashes after him; and her mother calls sharply, ”Melanie, no,” and the child is rooted to the spot, already her little nose is running, laughing she'll run to Dadda's side, no she'll turn and hurry back into the house, he relents, he forgives her, he understands, it isn't yet time, go back to the house darlin' and comfort your momma, running like a frightened cat back to the opened door where, breath steaming, winter sunlight flas.h.i.+ng in her eyegla.s.ses like flame, her mother calls her name.

”Melanie. Melanie!”

THIRTY-THREE YEARS OLD and it's the first great pa.s.sion of his life, and will be the only great pa.s.sion of his life for he'll marry the woman after his father's death, let all of Muirkirk buzz with scandal. Never has Darian been so inspired; never so crazed; even away from his studio he's composing music, even in his sleep, wild ecstatic music of love fulfilled, of love so ravenous it can't be fulfilled; forbidden love; guilty love; the love of sister and brother; transcendent love; ordinary love, what people do all the time. He's on fire with ideas! Can't transcribe them quickly enough, his fingers are aching! A symphony for voices . . . a trio for flute, cello and echo-chamber piano . . . wordless oratorios . . . a sonata in which aleatory sounds complement the piano . . . a four-hour piece for chamber orchestra, special instruments and chorus to be t.i.tled Robin, the Miller's Son: A Tale of Destiny . . . which will eventually be performed when the composer is forty-two years old, as irony would have it on 10 May 1942, at Carnegie Hall, by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, such a long time to wait! the composer's admirers marvel but Darian Licht isn't a bitter man, Darian Licht's a man perpetually on fire, perpetually in love.

Or so his music proclaims.

<script>