“Yes,” Garp said.
“You don't approve, do you, Mr. Garp?” she asked him. “You don't approve of me at all.”
“I'm sorry you're so unhappy,” Garp said. On the seat beside her in her messy car was a paperback of Dostoevsky's The Eternal Husband: Garp remembered that Mrs. Ralph was going to school. “What are you majoring in?” he asked her, stupidly. He recalled she was a never-ending graduate student; her problem was probably a thesis that wouldn't come.
Mrs. Ralph shook her head. “You really keep your nose clean, don't you?” she asked Garp. “How long have you been married?”
“Almost eleven years,” Garp said. Mrs. Ralph looked more or less indifferent; Mrs. Ralph had been married for twelve.
“Your kid's safe with me,” she said, as if she were suddenly irritated with him, and as if she were reading his mind with utter accuracy. “Don't worry, I'm quite harmless—with children,” she added. “And I don't smoke in bed.”
“I'm sure it's good for the boys to watch you take a bath,” Garp told her, then felt immediately embarrassed for saying it, though it was one of the few things he'd told her that he meant.
“I don't know,” she said. “It didn't seem to do much good for my husband, and he watched me for years.” She looked up at Garp, whose mouth hurt from all his forced smiles. Just touch her cheek, or pat her hand, he thought; at least say something. But Garp was clumsy at being kind, and he didn't flirt.
“Well, husbands are funny,” he mumbled. Garp the marriage counselor, full of advice. “I don't think many of them know what they want.”
Mrs. Ralph laughed bitterly. “My husband found a nineteen-year-old cunt,” she said. “He seems to want her.”
“I'm sorry,” Garp told her. The marriage counselor is the I'm-sorry man, like a doctor with bad luck—the one who gets to diagnose all the terminal cases.
“You're a writer,” Mrs. Ralph said to him, accusingly; she waved her copy of The Eternal Husband at him. “What do you think of this?”
“It's a wonderful story,” Garp said. It was fortunately a book he remembered—neatly complicated, full of perverse and human contradiction.
“I think it's a sick story,” Mrs. Ralph told him. “I'd like to know what's so special about Dostoevsky.”
“Well,” Garp said, “his characters are so complex, psychologically and emotionally; and the situations are so ambiguous.”
“His women are less than objects,” Mrs. Ralph said, “they don't even have any shape. They're just ideas that men talk about and play with.” She threw the book out the window at Garp; it hit his chest and fell by the curb. She clenched her fists in her lap, staring at the stain on her dress, which marked her crotch with a tomato-sauce bull's-eye. “Boy, that's me all over,” she said, staring at the spot.
“I'm sorry,” Garp said again. “It may leave a permanent stain.”
“Everything leaves a stain!” Mrs. Ralph cried out. A laughter so witless escaped her that it frightened Garp. He didn't say anything and she said to him, “I'll bet you think that all I need is a good lay.”
To be fair, Garp rarely thought this of people, but when Mrs. Ralph mentioned it, he did think that, in her case, this oversimple solution might apply.
“And I'll bet you think I'd let you do it,” she said, glaring at him. Garp, in fact, did think so.
“No, I don't think you would,” he said.
“Yes, you think I would love to,” Mrs. Ralph said.
Garp hung his head. “No,” he said.
“Well, in your case,” she said, “I just might.” He looked at her and she gave him an evil grin. “It might make you a little less smug,” she told him.
“You don't know me well enough to talk to me like this,” Garp said.
“I know that you're smug,” Mrs. Ralph said. “You think you're so superior.” True, Garp knew; he was superior. He would make a lousy marriage counselor, he now knew.
“Please drive carefully,” Garp said; he pushed himself away from her car. “If there's anything I can do, please call.”
“Like if I need a good lover?” Mrs. Ralph asked him, nastily.
“No, not that,” Garp said.
“Why did you stop me?” she asked him.
“Because I thought you were driving too fast,” he said.
“I think you're a pompous fart,” she told him.
“I think you're an irresponsible slob,” Garp told her. She cried out as if she were stabbed.
“Look, I'm sorry,” he said (again), “but I'll just come pick up Duncan.”
“No, please,” she said. “I can look after him, I really want to. He'll be all right—I'll look after him like he was my own!” This didn't truly comfort Garp. “I'm not that much of a slob—with kids,” she added; she managed an alarmingly attractive smile.
“I'm sorry,” Garp said—his litany.
“So am I,” said Mrs. Ralph. As if the matter were resolved between them, she started her car and drove past the stop sign and through the intersection without looking. She drove away—slowly, but more or less in the middle of the road—and Garp waved his wooden spoon after her.
Then he picked up The Eternal Husband and walked home.
10. THE DOG IN THE ALLEY, THE CHILD IN THE SKY
WE'VE got to get Duncan out of that mad woman's house,” Garp told Helen.
“Well, you do it,” Helen said. “You're the one who's worried.”
“You should have seen how she drove,” Garp said.
“Well,” said Helen, “presumably Duncan isn't going to be riding around with her.”
“She may take the boys out for a pizza,” Garp said. “I'm sure she can't cook.”
Helen was looking at The Eternal Husband. She said, “It's a strange book for a woman to give to another woman's husband.”
“She didn't give it to me, Helen. She threw it at me.”
“It's a wonderful story,” Helen said.
“She said it was just sick,” Garp said, despairingly. “She thought it was unfair to women.”
Helen looked puzzled. “I wouldn't say that was even an issue,” she said.
“Of course it isn't!” Garp yelled. “This woman is an idiot! My mother would love her.”
“Oh, poor Jenny,” Helen said. “Don't start on her.”
“Finish your pasta, Walt,” Garp said.
“Up your wazoo,” Walt said.
“Nice talk,” Garp said. “Walt, I don't have a wazoo.”
“Yes, you do,” Walt said.
“He doesn't know what it means,” Helen said. “I'm not sure what it means, either.”
“Five years old,” Garp said. “It's not nice to say that to people,” Garp told Walt.
“He heard it from Duncan, I'm sure,” Helen said.
“Well, Duncan gets it from Ralph,” Garp said, “who no doubt gets it from his goddamn mother!”
“Watch your own language,” Helen said. “Walt could as easily have gotten his “wazoo” from you.”
“Not from me, he couldn't have,” Garp declared. “I'm not sure what it means, either. I never use that word.”
“You use plenty just like it,” Helen said.
“Walt, eat your pasta,” Garp said.