A green desire, p.1
A Green Desire, page 1
A Green Desire
Anton Myrer
For my father
and for
ROBIN
Green, green, I want you green.
Green the wind; and green the bough…
—Federico Garcia Lorca
Contents
Epigraph
One
The Hook
Two
The Pitch
Three
The Clincher
Four
The Close
About the Author
Praise
Other Books by Anton Myrer
Copyright
About the Publisher
HE WALKED THROUGH the cool October night, his shoes sinking in the sand at the water’s edge; he looked out of place in the gray business suit and white shirt, the carefully knotted tie. His pace was purposeful, but it was the purposefulness of long habit—anyone watching would have said he had lost his way, or was searching for something.
Lights from the marina across the channel floated on the tide like low, pale moons, casting a score of moonglades that shimmered with the passage of some small vessel, and then grew still. Far out in the harbor a bell buoy capped with an emerald light uttered a mournful clang-dang, the memory of the two strokes quivering on the night air long after the sound had ceased.
—Always that edge of danger about her. That hunger for forbidden shores…
He stopped, listening for the bell. His eyes had become accustomed to the dark now, and at the top of the bluff he could make out the silhouette of one house, grander than the other summer places, the railed widow’s walk crowning its gabled roof. That house was dark.
—“Don’t you tempt me, now!” Unable to resist it, daring it. Don’t you tempt me—
The bell buoy struck again: one plangent note.
Here is where it all began. The sun-drenched possibilities, the world hanging there like ripe golden fruit for whoever could leap high enough to take it. And the temptation. That began here, too. So long ago…
ONE
THE HOOK
1
THEY MOVED HURRIEDLY down Church Street in the late afternoon chill. Chapin swung their strapped books like a pendulum against his legs; Tipton was carrying the samples box carefully under one arm. In the long field across from Horace Crowell’s store Mr. Hunnacutt and the hired man were bucking up an apple tree that had gone down in the big wind storm that September. The blue blade of the two-man crosscut whined in a harsh rhythm, thin and trivial against the hollow roar of the falls. The saw seemed to control their lunging figures, as though it were animate and the men its obedient machines. Behind them the orchard rose steeply to two wooded hills capped by Macomah Mountain; black with firs, it blocked out everything but the depthless gray wall of sky.
Chapin kicked at a piece of ice and sent it skittering ahead of them. The mud ruts of the road—the deep one in the center where the horses’ hooves broke it down, the narrower grooves on each side where the carriage wheels cut their way—were stamped in waves and ridges by the cold.
“Going to snow before morning,” Chapin said. He scowled up at the mountain. Both boys had the high-bridged Ames nose and narrow, wedge-shaped jaw; but there the resemblance ended. Chapin was slender and good-looking, but there was a hint of uncertainty, of vexed impatience in his curiously pale eyes. Tipton’s face was bonier, rougher; there was a stubborn buoyancy in the way he moved. They wore corduroy knickers and pea jackets. Tipton’s cap sat jauntily on the back of his head; Chapin had pulled the visor of his down over his eyes against the wind.
“—I hate winter,” Chapin said with sudden low violence, and kicked at another piece of ice; the breath burst from his mouth in small jets of steam.
Tipton glanced at his older brother mildly. “It’s not so bad.”
“Ice and snow, ice and snow—cold and more cold…Who’d ever live here if he didn’t have to?”
“Well, just kiss it so long, then,” Tipton answered—and was instantly sorry he’d said it. Chapin’s eyes flashed at him hotly, his face turned sullen. You and your big mouth, Tipton told himself.
“Well, you can always try Tonga,” he rambled on. “Live on coconuts and mango juice. They don’t have any ice. Imagine if you could figure out a way to ship ice to the South Pacific—you could name your price!”
“Well, you can’t.”
“Somebody will, Chay. You’ll see…Here’s Mrs. Gilman’s: I want to try her again.”
Chapin looked at the Federal house set back from its dun patch of lawn. “Mother told us to be back by four. Aunt Serena’s coming out on the Boston train.”
“We’ve got time.”
“We better be getting on home.”
“Come on, Chay—you’re always backing away from it.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are. Mrs. Gilman’s a first-rate customer. Come on, now.”
Without waiting for Chapin he unlatched the picket gate and started up the brick walk. The Gilmans’ dog, a powerful Newfoundland, rose from his place by the stoop with a low growl and advanced toward them; one step, then another.
“Tip, wait—” Chapin was whispering from the gate.
But there wasn’t that shuddered wrinkling in the muzzle, the stiff legs, the lowering of the head that meant trouble. Tip had learned the ominous signs long ago. The big dog was simply waiting to see what his move would be. Prince would do the same thing in their own yard.
“He’s all right,” Tip said, going forward again, slowly, dropping his voice to a gentle sing-song. “Aren’t you, boy? You know me. Of course you know me…” The animal barked once—a short, sharp signal, greeting and warning both; then his tail began to swing ponderously. Tip patted him on the head and ruffled his ears, turned again to Chapin, who was easing up the walk now, on the far side. “Come on, Chay. It’s your turn.”
Chapin swung back the storm door and slowly twisted the flat key of the iron doorbell. There was no answer.
“Guess there’s nobody home,” he said quickly. “Why don’t we—”
“No—now, wait. Give her time to finish up what she’s doing. Now. Ring again.”
The door opened. A strange face, angular, hair bound up in a wild turban of yellow muslin, chamois cloth in one hand. What kind of woman would be house-cleaning at three-thirty in the afternoon? Piercing blue eyes flaring behind steel-rimmed glasses, jaw you could hang a lantern on. A perfect stranger.
“Mrs. Gilman?” Chapin asked almost inaudibly.
“No—I’m her sister. Staying with her. Who are you?”
“I—we’re Chapin and Tip Ames.” Chapin glanced apprehensively at his brother, and then the dog. “Could we—speak to Mrs. Gilman?”
“She’s upstreet visiting, I don’t know when she’ll be back. What is it you boys want?”
“Well, we’re—the thing is we’re, uh, going around taking some orders…”
The woman’s eyes narrowed still further, she was scowling now. All wrong. Chay was going about it all wrong. As usual. Couldn’t he see? You had to make it attractive, exciting, a kind of adventure—you had to make a prospect feel she was taking part in a ceremony, a voyage of discovery soon to be filled with visions and wonders. It was like the ceiling of that church in Ravenna in Miss Abbot’s stereopticon—all those little colored pieces winking and flashing, making up the whole design…They were going to lose a sale; it was as plain as the nose on your face.
“Orders?” the woman was saying impatiently; she was feeling the cold now. “Orders for what?”
“Well, you see it’s—for soap. A kind of soap.” Chapin faltered again. “But if this is a poor time for you—”
“Actually we’re not representing any ordinary soap, Ma’am,” Tip broke in. “We’re representing Shalimar Soap. It’s a unique opportunity because it’s truly a wonderful soap, so different from the run-of-the-mill brands you see on the market. And the reason it’s superior to other soaps, Ma’am, is because Shalimar Soap is made from oil of palm, the celebrated oil of the Spice Islands—an oil that works its way right into the very pores of the skin, softens it, restores it…”
He had the sample box open now, was holding out one of the smooth oval golden bars with its lotus design traced in low relief. “Just feel that, if you will, Ma’am. Isn’t it the softest, creamiest texture you ever held in your hand? Just smell that tropical fragrance. That’s palm oil, Ma’am, and nothing can match it…” The words seemed to flow without effort, exciting him with the very ease of their passage, like a Fourth of July sparkler glowing and fading, glowing and fading; it was as though a celestial magician had slipped into his skin and all he needed to do was listen to him, let him release his rainbow showers of persuasion…He felt utterly certain of everything in this world.
“Folks here in Holcomb Falls, all over the Berkshires in fact, are taking to Shalimar Soap because they’ve learned it’s the most softening, fragrant soap money can buy. Because Shalimar lasts half again as long as other soaps. And in times like these that’s important, I’m sure you’ll agree.” He looked up at her then, smiling expectantly.
“Bless my soul,” Mrs. Gilman’s sister said. Her eyes kept darting from his face to the cake of soap she still held in her hand. She’d forgotten all about how cold she was. “You sound as though you really mean it…”
“I certainly do, Ma’am. I won’t sell a product I don’t believe in, a product that would make a liar out of me, and that’s the truth. Our mother swears by it—you’ll find Mrs. Gilman uses it, and
“It certainly has a pretty odor…” She raised it to her nose again; her thumb traced the lotus design lightly.
Now. Close.
“Doesn’t it? Now we have a special offer this season, a carton of twelve bars…”
The woman bought two cartons of Shalimar Soap.
“Perhaps while we’re talking, Ma’am, you’d be interested in this new style of ring for the Gibson Girl collar,” Tip went on smoothly. “It’s made by the Standish people—see, it fastens both above and below. Guaranteed to hold any collar perfectly in place…”
The woman bought a packet of a dozen. Tip was writing up the orders when Florence Gilman came through the gate; she burst into laughter.
“Hello, Addie! See something you liked?” She was a heavy, good-natured woman with a round, cheerful face. “Hello, Tip.”
“Well,” her sister said, “it does seem like a wonderful soap, Flo.”
Mrs. Gilman laughed again; reaching down she caught Tip to her gently and tousled his hair. “Don’t you feel too bad, Addie—I can’t ever turn him down! Neither can anyone else in town. He can charm the tail off a brass elephant! You can always tell when he’s coming—whistling like a perfect wood thrush, that boy…”
Her deep, rich laughter followed them out the gate. They moved on downstreet toward the sound of the falls.
“—I don’t know how you do it,” Chapin said querulously. “I’m damned if I do…”
Tip pursed his lips. “You can’t ask them if it’s a poor time, Chay. You’re practically daring them to agree, and close the door on you.”
“But you could tell we were interrupting her—”
“Of course we were! Every time is a poor time. But that’s the time you’re there—you have to make it count.”
“She wasn’t interested in soap, anyway.”
“Then you make her interested.” He paused. “You’ve got to be more confident, more sure of yourself.”
“But I don’t feel confident!”
“Then you’ve got to act as if you are.”
Chapin gazed down at Holcomb’s Paper Mill, looming now like an impregnable brick fortress behind its screen of maples; the sullen growling of its beaters and pulpers mingled with the roar of the falls.
“I just can’t do it, Tip. I’m standing there and they look at me—as if I’m trying to sneak into the parlor and steal something—and everything goes right out of my head. I can’t remember what you told me…”
“You remember well enough in school.”
“That’s different. In class we’re all studying the same subject. Here I just—can’t think of what to say.”
“Well, you’ve got to. If I can do it, you can! I can’t do it all by myself.”
“Maybe—maybe I can get a job.”
“Doing what? You aren’t even fifteen…We have to help Mother,” Tip said with sudden sharp force. “She needs every cent we can make. We have to do it!”
Chapin dropped his head and they walked in silence for a time. In a low, fretful voice he said: “I wish Dad would come home.”
“Well, he won’t.”
Chapin stopped. “How do you know that?”
“Mother said so. He isn’t coming home, ever again, and you’d better get that through your head…He doesn’t care about us.”
“He does care! He loves us—he told me so himself…” For a moment he stared at Tip, his pale eyes dark with anger. “You hate him. You’ve hated him ever since last Christmas.”
Tip thrust out his lower lip. “Maybe I do at that.”
“—Well, you can take that back,” Chapin shouted. “I mean it!”
Tip watched his brother. Chapin was fifteen months older, half a head taller, and weighed almost twenty pounds more. They’d had four fist fights over the past two years, and they all had ended the same way. But he couldn’t go back on what he felt. Not about this.
“No,” he said, and shook his head.
Chapin flung their books on the road and rushed at him. Tip dodged neatly, set down the box of samples with care, and turned to face him. Chapin came in flailing both hands; Tip blocked one blow, took one high on his temple, another on the side of his neck that almost snapped his head off; he grabbed his brother’s jacket and hung on, teeth gritted. Chapin finally flung him off—suddenly wheeled around and kicked the box of samples with all his might; the side of the carton burst open.
“There!” he snarled. “That takes care of that—!”
Tip went for him, then. He was conscious of nothing but rage—a cold, measuring fury he’d never felt before. Chapin caught him on the forehead and again in the neck but it didn’t matter—nothing mattered but that samples box. He hit Chapin full in the face, a blow he felt all the way to his shoulder, and the older boy backed away with a cry.
“You ever touch that box again I’ll kill you,” he said in a careful, quiet voice, not his own. “You hear me?”
They stood glaring at each other, panting. Chapin’s eyes were filled with tears; he kept dabbing at his nose although it wasn’t bleeding. Tip could see him trying to summon up courage for another rush. He waited, his rage draining away. His whole head hurt.
Just then the mill whistle blew—a high, piercing blast, like a runaway freight train, that touched off half a dozen neighborhood dogs in a howling chorus. A few seconds later the bell in the town hall tower on Main Street struck the hour; four even stately strokes, the notes bowling on and on through the thin November air till they came against Macomah Mountain and sent back one last dying echo, faint as memory. Chapin looked away then, dropped one hand to his side and felt his nose with the other; and Tip went over and picked up the box of samples.
“We’ve got no time for this, Chay,” he said. “Let’s get on home, now.”
“No!” Chapin answered, but in a different tone. “You’ve got to take that back. About Dad…”
Tip looked at him steadily for a long moment. “All right,” he said. “I take it back. Now, let’s go.”
“—Why, they’re beautiful!” Aunt Serena Aldridge exclaimed. She was sitting in the kitchen in the platform rocker, the one their father had always used, near the window that looked down to the river. Months ago the Ames family had moved into the rear of the old house; the parlor had been made over for Miss Abbot, who was small and doughty and taught grades four through six. Miss Pierce, who wore a bright orange wig and whom Chapin had nicknamed the Poison Parakeet to the delight of the ninth grade, occupied their parents’ old bedroom.
“Very—elegant—indeed,” Aunt Serena repeated; you could see she was impressed. Chapin had brought out his stone collection and she was examining it with interest, her forefinger tracing the different samples nestled in their square compartments of black velveteen. Aunt Serena had a long, straight nose and clear blue eyes which she was in the habit of dilating extravagantly at crucial moments. In the muted yellow light of the lamp she looked formidable and handsome—like those grand French countesses just before the Revolution, or the Greek goddesses Miss Abbot talked about who were always swooping down on mortals and transforming their lives. Her rich chestnut hair was piled high in a pompadour; she wore a twill traveling suit of hunter’s green with silk lapels. Aunt Serena always traveled in style—whether it was a year’s tour of Europe or a quick trip by rail such as this one—with an awesome array of valises and hatboxes and jewelry cases; she said she liked the feeling of having her things around her wherever she might find herself. She had never married—through choice, Tip had heard his mother say once, tersely.
“Tip, take care of the fire, please,” his mother said. She was standing at the stove now, making gravy. He went over and knelt on one knee, inserted the crank and shook down the ashes smartly, then slipped two small pieces of oak into the firebox.
“This one’s remarkable,” Aunt Serena was saying to Chapin. “Do you know what it is?”
