‘Oh, Christ, Lee, listen.’
‘-because that’s not the way I planned it. I only had the drinks to get up my nerve, and because I was worried I wouldn’t please you, because I’m not Harriet, and I’ve never slept with a man. But I’ll be good, you’ll see. Just have patience, and show me, and don’t hurt me-but even if you do-I don’t care.’ Her voice became smaller, and now it caught. ‘You can take me now, Andrew.’
‘Goddamit, Lee, no. Goddamit, I won’t take you, I can’t.’ He was furious with the predicament in which she had placed him. ‘I don’t want intercourse with you-or maybe I do, I don’t know-but even if I did, I wouldn’t.’
Agitated, he swung off the bed, felt under the lamp, and turned on the light. He stood beside the bed, in his rumpled pyjama trousers, hitching them up, ashamed to have to see her here. Her head, her free hair matted, was on the pillow, and now averted from the light. Her hands knotted tightly on the blanket top, pulling it to her neck.
‘What are you doing?’ she groaned. ‘Turn off the light.’
‘I won’t. I don’t trust myself in the dark. I am a human being.’
She kept her face averted. ‘Then why are you scared?’
He knew that this rejection was terrible, and so he softened towards her, made the fault his own. ‘I don’t want your pity, Lee. This-it’s not good for us. Can’t you understand, Lee? It’s nothing for a man. It’s easy for a man. It would have been pleasurable for me. You’re an attractive woman. I mean that. I think you may even be a passionate woman. But what would be the point? You’re not on earth to accommodate me-to be my bondmaid. I’m not that selfish. That’s all it would be. I could never promise you more or offer you more. So it would be wrong for me to be the first, unless you needed it. That would be another matter. But you don’t. You say you don’t. And if you haven’t up to now, I think you should wait until it means something more, until you have someone. There’s that nice fellow in Chicago-Beazley-Harry Beazley-it would mean something with him. It would mean a whole life for you. But you know me. I can promise you nothing-not love-not even affection. And marriage-I can’t think of marriage. I just won’t have it with you this way. Now, let’s not think of it or speak of it again. Let’s just go on as we have.’
For the first time, she turned her face to him. Her thin lips quivered. ‘Go into the other room,’ she said in a cold, expressionless voice, ‘until I’m decent.’
He retreated awkwardly through the drapes, and then pulled them chastely across so that they covered every inch of the bedroom entrance. Moving to the coffee table, he found a packet of Leah’s cigarettes and took one and lit it. His hand shook, as he held the cigarette, and he could not remember when, since Harriet’s death, he had been more dismayed.
He listened to the creaking of the bed, as she got up to dress, and he paced back and forth across the sitting-room.
Presently, the drape was flung aside, and Leah appeared. She wore a flannel bathrobe over her nightgown, and slippers. Her hair was long, but combed. Her face was composed, but glacial.
She advanced towards him without shame or timidity. He read her attitude at once. Her every movement spoke her thought. She was saying: I am blameless, the fault is your fault. She was saying: I offered, in all charity and kindness, to save you from yourself, and you rebuffed me. She was saying: the Lord will punish you, not me, for I am the handmaid whose name is Hagar.
Against fanatic righteousness, Craig knew that he was helpless.
‘I’ve listened to your pack of lies,’ Leah began stridently, ‘and I just want you to know you’re not pulling the wool over my eyes.’
‘Now, what does that mean?’
‘It means I see through you, better than anyone on earth. All that holy talk about thinking of me, about saving me for someone else, about not wanting to hurt me. I know the truth. I suspected it, but now I know it.’
‘Maybe you’ll let me in on your secret.’
‘You didn’t need my love, which is clean and decent, because you’ve been getting too much these last couple of days from that little Nazi whore-bitch from Atlanta!’
‘Leah!’
‘I could see it from the first minute she set eyes on you. She put her hooks in you fast. She gave you what you needed fast. She’s got one Nobel winner in the family, but that’s not enough. Now, she wants two. She saw you were weak-any experienced woman could tell that-and she played on your weakness, and now she’s got you, and that’s what is wrong. Andrew, Andrew, you’re such a guileless fool!’
He tried to repress his anger, for he knew her hurt, but it was impossible. ‘You’re the fool, Lee, if that’s what you believe,’ he said quietly. ‘Emily Stratman is as much a virgin as you are.’
‘I see, you know that. You found out?’
‘Dammit, Lee, shut up. She’s attractive, of course, and I’m not a eunuch. You bet your life I tried to make time with her. I didn’t get to first base. I haven’t touched her. I haven’t even kissed her.’
‘You were with her all day.’
‘So I was with her. So what? I was sick of the tour, and I wanted to be on my own-I told you that this noon-and she had some shopping to do, and I wanted companionship, and we went walking. That’s all. Is that wrong?’
Leah had listened, and her outrage was spent and her jealousy relieved and she saw a new hope. ‘If it’s true, it’s not wrong, and I’m sorry.’
‘It’s true, and I swear it. And everything I told you in the bedroom is true, also.’
‘You said we wouldn’t discuss that.’
‘All right.’
There was nothing more to argue about, but Leah was not ready to go. ‘I-I suppose you have to know other women besides me. Especially now that you’re famous. But what you see in a German foreigner-’
‘She’s an American, Lee.’
‘Whatever she is, I don’t care. What you can find in common with a perfect stranger-’
‘Harriet was a stranger before I met her. And so were you. And so is everyone to everyone, until they communicate. Miss Stratman and I simply walked and talked about nothing important-I showed her some of the places in Stockholm where Harriet and I had been-’
‘You did that?’ It was as if he had been an infidel who had violated Mecca. Again, Leah’s displeasure was evident. ‘You mentioned Harriet to her?’
‘Of course. Why not? I told her about Harriet and our life, certainly.’
‘How could you? It’s improper. You never talk to me about Harriet and you. How can you do that with someone you’ve only known for two days?’
‘Maybe because I only knew her two days. You’re Harriet’s sister. That makes it difficult.’
Leah pursed her lips tightly. ‘I don’t know what’s going to become of you, I really don’t. You’re simply acting without restraint in every way. You’re getting worse all the time. I can see what’s ahead for us. Drinking and more drinking, and now, added to that, strange women, with all your pitiful confessions, embarrassing both of us by pouring all your troubles into everyone’s ears. You can’t do that, Andrew, not now-now that the entire world knows you-now that you’re a Nobel winner. What would people think if they knew you killed your wife? What if it got out? I suppose you got drunk and told that to the Stratman girl? Did you?’