— That might be his wife, it might have been for his…
— Whose wife.
— Mister McCandless, maybe she's Irene Me…
— She's got a long wait.
— Oh I meant to tell you… she came up on an elbow, — this morn…
— Misprision of treason, he could get twenty years.
— Paul?
— Meant to tell you I talked to Grissom this morning, got my appeal set up for Monday… His arm came under her shoulders, — stop making my whole God damn VA check over every month for alimony we can see some daylight.
— Paul do you think I could, maybe I could go away for a few days?
His hand closed on her breast. — Where.
— Just, somewhere I…
— Too much going on here Liz, you know that… his hand laboured her breast, — just get things off the ground we can take a week someplace.
— No I meant, I meant just me.
— But, but what do you mean just you, look all this going on you've got to be here. Just get this Ude deal on the tracks and there's three or four calls that should come tomorrow, you've got to be here for the phone… He drew her back, drew her glance from the scar gone livid from ribs to groin with the flat fall of his legs toward the screen where a warm glow suffused the lower steps of the oak staircase, issuing from the great dining room, whose two leaved door stood open, and showed a genial fire in the grate, glancing on marble hearth and brass fire irons, and revealing draperies and polished furniture in the most pleasant radiance, intruded upon by the tumescent rise in his hand. — Did you call that doctor Liz? that appointment for your insurance claim? His hand came down to smooth her knees apart, his leg came over. — Liz?
— Yes I, I'll call them tomorrow…
— Look you've got to call him, get in there for this examination so I can get my companion suit going… His fingers drew tight, separated, fretted in systematic search and seizure as her knee fell away, — get these disability benefits back I'll have a little cash, Grissom wants a thousand dollars retainer plus disbursements against sixty percent of the settlement to handle it… he eased over her, eased down where his hand intervened, — asking half a million all depends on your airline suit… his hand withdrew to close on her knee — show the, show the shape you've been in since the crash I've, how I've been deprived of, does that hurt?
— No my, my knee not so… she breathed sharply, — how it, bruises… His head dropped there, left her face ashen over his shoulder in the light playing up the glistening strain of his back from the screen where a demoniac laugh, low, suppressed, and deep, came uttered it seemed at the very keyhole of the chamber door. As she gazed, the unnatural sound was reiterated, and she knew it came from behind the panels. As though her first impulse was to rise, and her next to cry out, something gurgled and moaned, and steps retreated up the gallery toward the third story staircase. The door came open under her trembling hand and there was a candle burning just outside, left on the matting in the gallery where the air was quite dim, as if filled with smoke. Something creaked: it was a door ajar and the smoke rushed from it in a cloud. Within the chamber tongues of flame darted round the bed: the curtains were on fire: the very sheets were kindling. In the midst of blaze and vapour Orson Welles lay stretched motionless, in a deep sleep.
— I, I have to breathe she whispered, freed an arm to reach the box of tissues and he was up, bumping furniture, tripping over a shoe, gone down the dark hall, and she listened for some noise, but heard nothing. It seemed a very long time elapsed, and then she heard his unshod feet tread the matting, and he snapped the screen into darkness.
— Oh honestly, please I've asked you not to smoke in the bedroom.
— Just, fine just looking for something to put it out in… He found a saucer, drew heavily there at the window where branches caught on the rising wind outside dashed the streetlight's gleams on the pane before him. He rubbed a thumb there. — Liz…? as though he could see his smudged thumb clear, — did she wash the windows? Woman who came in to clean, did you tell her…
— There wasn't time. Now will you please put that out!
— What did she do all day? He drew again quickly before he crushed it in the saucer, — twenty five dollars what did she…
— It was thirty dollars and she was here for a half day. She cleaned.
— Thought they said twenty five look, when she comes next week tell her to do the windows, start right off with the windows… He came down heavily out of reach, — thirty dollars, start looking for somebody who speaks English can answer the God damn phone, Haitians you don't know what the hell you're in for. We used to get their blood over there, medical corps got it cheap they were so God damn poor they're selling their blood never knew what you were getting. God damn medic I told him you better be good and God damn sure where that bottle of plasma up on that hook came from before you get that God damn needle any closer.
She half rose, snapping the sheet square, pulling up the cover. — You'll have to remember to leave me thirty dollars for her next week.
— Most of the time didn't make any God damn difference… he turned, taking blanket and sheet with him. — Casualties coming in from the combat zones, they were mainly spades anyhow.
— And a dollar carfare… she snapped back a share of the cover. — It's fifty cents each way.
Lids closed against the streetlight's gleams scattered on the wall, the empty mirror, it scarcely mattered: the chase continued on what passed for sleep taking with it what passed for time till finally, eyes fallen wide again crowded with movement still as the breathing beside her, she came off the edge of the bed and brought the room and her own face back to ashen life down a winding walk, bordered with laurels and terminating in a giant horse chestnut, circled at the base by a seat, leading down to the fence. She drew the blanket close against a sudden burst of rain at the window spattering the streetlight out there over its panes and her eyes dimmed, to come wide again with the lashing rain: what had befallen the night? Everything was in shadow; and what ailed the chestnut tree? it writhed and groaned, while wind roared in the laurel walk, near and deep as the thunder crashed, fierce and frequent as the lightning gleamed striking the great horse chestnut at the bottom of the garden and splitting half of it away.
3
The river lay obscured by mist that had hung heavy since morning, casting the slow climb of the mailman up the black tributary of the road as the drift of a figure being poled on water, drawn on a steady current along the leaf sodden bank toward the step standing forth there like a landing where she'd burst out earlier, as though by chance, to intercept him before he reached the box; where now, back to working the damp wads of paper towel on the glass in the alcove, her frown reduced to a distant shade the halt measure of the old man out there on the corner with his flattened dustpan. Rain, two days of it, had brought leaves down everywhere, even a torn branch afloat on the dark current rising under the window where her motions abruptly stopped, her frown broken wide on the raincoat wilted figure looming so close he was looking right up into her face. She caught breath and her balance, barely down from the stool when the knock came at the door. Opened to a hand's breadth, she saw the frayed cuffs of the raincoat, stayed the door with her foot. — Yes? what…
— Mrs Booth?
— Is, are you Mister Stumpp?
He just looked at her. His face appeared drained, so did the hand he held out to her, drained of colour that might once have been a heavy tan. — My name is McCandless, he said, his tone dull as his eyes on her, — you're Mrs Booth?
— Oh! Oh yes come in… but her foot held the door till it pushed gently against her, — I didn't…
— I won't disturb you, he came in looking past her, looking over the room and the things in the room the way he'd just looked at her, looked her over getting her in place, getting things located. — I just came for some papers, I won't disturb you.