“You don’t mean it,” he whispered. “You can’t.”
“Put it this way,” I murmured, “you want to play footsy with Fiona …”
“No, boy, you’re wrong …”
“And you want me to sanction the bare feet under the table.”
“For God’s sake, I don’t.”
“But why should I? Why won’t you play footsy with Fiona and leave me out of it?”
“Don’t hurt me, boy. Don’t make it worse than it is.”
“Look,” I said gently, “do we really have to have all this male camaraderie in matters of love?”
But my confidence was exactly what he was fishing for, of course, and even as I spoke I realized that my last remark could do no more than goad him on to exactly the sentimentality I had hoped to avoid. Fiona was waiting, Catherine was waiting, the wine was chilled, the thick-lipped bell was tolling in its bird’s nest of iron on top of the squat church. Yet here I stood, drinking from the sack of Hugh’s bad conscience and knowing full well that there was no stopping him and that I could not deny his confusion, his deflating misery, his annoying dependence on Fiona’s bored but sympathetic husband. At least I was ready for him and did not flinch when the long arm rose, as it did then, and the hand fell and clamped itself to my shoulder.
“I thought you’d listen, boy. I thought you’d get me out of this mess.”
“What more can I say?”
“How much has she really told you?”
“If you want to know what Fiona calls her little trade secrets — ask her.”
“I don’t believe she’s told you a damn thing. There it is.”
“Well,” I murmured, “the only problem is that Fiona’s afraid you don’t like her enough.”
“Don’t like her enough.”
“That’s right.”
“You mean she’s unsure of herself? Fiona? And worried about me?”
“Looks that way.”
“I just don’t understand, boy. I can’t believe it. She couldn’t just confide in you like that. Manhood rebels at infidelity, it’s only natural.”
“If you must know,” I said and laughed, “she calls you Malvolio. She says she loves her Malvolio best. Will you believe me now?”
“That’s crazy.”
“Ask her yourself.”
“She doesn’t love me best. She couldn’t.”
“Oh well,” I murmured, “you know what she means.”
I shrugged. Slowly and gently I dislodged his blind hand, and turned and carefully drew in the shutters, hooked them tightly closed. And above the sound of Hugh’s stony breath and the distant bell, was that of the voice of a young girl sitting somewhere in a doorway beyond the canal and pining in loud crude song for a lost love she was not yet old enough to know? I hoped that Hugh was not too preoccupied to catch a bar or two of that high song and plainly sexual refrain.
“Feeling better?”
“Do me a favor, boy. Don’t tell her about this … talk of ours.”
“Fiona? I won’t tell her a thing.” I crossed the room, dragged open the warped door and waited for Hugh to follow. “And by the way,” I said, “I won’t tell Catherine either. OK?”
It was not the last I would hear of Hugh’s medievalism, I knew, but at least for a moment the lid was once again in place on his poor troubled pot.
“ARE THEY COMING?”
“Not yet, I guess.”
“Cyril? Are they staying away from us on purpose?”
“It’s only been a few hours, more or less.”
“It’s been a day, a whole day.”
“Perhaps they just don’t want to intrude.”
“Cyril? Give me a kiss.”
“You’re not the least bit interested in kissing old Cyril. Why pretend?”
“You’re right, baby. How did you know?”
Waiting? Letting the day die? Bridging our islands, as Fiona always said, with a few friendly sex allusions and silences that suddenly drifted away in passion? But was it possible that I had spent these six hours, eight hours, whatever they were, slumped in a wicker chair and arranging a half dozen common violets in the high narrow neck of a small clay vase the color of dark earth? Was it possible that the cigarette I had begun to puff somewhere around midmorning was still burning now, still turning to hot ash in the little white saucer not inches from my ring finger hand? Apparently so. And in her own way had Fiona passed this first day, which was already gone, merely changing her clothes, appearing now and again for my silent approval in gray slacks, rosy shorts, ankle-length gown of flaming silk, virginal white frock which must have won my approval and hers and which she was now wearing? Yes, I told myself, she had.
“Nice flowers, baby.”
“Glad you like them.”
“Maybe they’re not going to come to our little party.”
“Maybe not.”
And avoiding the arbor? Avoiding the lemon grove? Doing little, saying little, going our separate ways, keeping a safe distance from the dark and scented wall of funeral cypresses? But listening? Had I too been listening for a voice, two voices, for whatever sound of life might reach us from beyond the trees? Yes, I realized that throughout the day even I had become aware of moments of passing disappointment that Fiona’s eavesdropping had not met with more success.
“How do they keep so quiet over there?”
“God knows.”
Fiona disappearing inside again, the cigarette burning, Fiona scratching her right thigh in a flurry of thoughtless exasperation, the recollection of a small half-eaten yellow crab on a large white plate near the crook of my elbow, the watery violets defying the aesthetic pattern I had in mind — yes, everything confirmed my impression of the typical first day as a slow and sluggish reflection of the first night. It was always the same, Fiona’s briefly pantomimed reassurances, my slumping revery, her thoughts, my thoughts, the curious sensation that the adventure begun in the dark was somehow obscured, discolored, drowned in the bright sun.
“Cheer up, Cyril. Please.”
Had I glanced at her book? Had she dipped her fork into the broken shell of my cold crab? Had she stared into her tall goblet while I drank from mine? Had I missed her in the midafternoon and then glanced up to see the hand on her hip, the slow consoling smile on her distant face? And had this dying sun waked the two of us and driven Fiona to an endless toilet and me to a hot cup of coffee ground from a handful of dead and blackened beans? Yes, this was how the day had passed, true to form.
Once again I found myself observing that while the first night of adventure was always sober, despite darkness and excitement and fresh uncertainties, the first day was inevitably somnolent and oddly drunken, despite the sun overhead and the return of what I thought of as private consciousness. And once again I found myself observing how different we were, Fiona and I, and yet how similar. Because if it had taken her all day to arrive at the white frock, whereas I had climbed into the old white linen jacket without thinking and as soon as I had drunk my coffee, still my slightly rumpled white jacket and beige shirt unbuttoned at the throat revealed precisely the same taste and motivation as Fiona’s frock. Unspoken traditional decorum was always the handmaiden of unconfessed anticipation. At least our new-found friends on the other side of the funeral cypresses would appreciate if not understand the significance of the way we looked. Unless this was to be another one of those rare first days that sometimes ended, as they began, in silence.
“Oh look at them. They’re all dressed up.”
“Pretty formal, don’t you think?”
“But sweet, baby, sweet.”
So time was leaping out of the shadows after all and I was standing, Fiona was hiding one hand behind her back and hitching at a fresh pair of panties beneath the frock. The diffusion of the sunlight was already jumping into the clarity of approaching night. And simply because of a powdery blue jacket, a necktie obviously tied by a woman’s hand and a gray dress with a bright red sash at the waist? That’s all it took, I thought, a few twists of clothing and a few shared memories of a night that was not dead and only lengthening, starting over.