In business I got a break from the F.X. Reilly Estate, which retained me to sell ten houses, rental jobs in West Hyattsville, running $20,000 apiece. It was a $200,000 deal, and I tore in, of course. I didn’t stampede, just took it one house at a time, but in a month, believe it or not, I’d got rid of them all. I rated a bonus and got it, and had reason to feel proud — but didn’t feel anything. Because Sonya was calling by now, every two or three nights, very friendly, wanting to know how things were, and I begged her, pleaded over the phone, to come back to me, but she wouldn’t.
The worst of it was, I didn’t know where she was, but suspected it was Reno. And what really made it bad was that her mother knew. She was calling Mrs. Lang too, and Mrs. Lang would call me, in a friendly way, just wishing she could tell me where Sonya was, but of course couldn’t, as she was pledged not to. That’s nice, when your mother-in-law knows where your wife is staying, and you don’t. So maybe she’d break if you coaxed, and give you a little hint, but fat chance of that, really.
And on Mother’s end, she picked up an ace when Mort Leonard, Jane’s lawyer, heard of her bust-up with Burl, and realized what it could mean — perhaps having his own opinion of Burl to start with, and perhaps having heard a few rumors. Anyway, it seems that to revoke one will you have to draw another, but in whose favor was the question Jane was faced with. So, for various reasons, there could be only one answer, and she was back once more to Mother. That put the dream back on its feet, but I took no interest and neither did she.
“I’m sick of it!” she burst out, in my office one day. “Of her, of her land, of Burl — especially of him! Gramie, he’s been calling up, since Mort wrote him about it, about this new will that she’s drawn, so he’d know the old one was void, the one that she drew in his favor — he’s been ringing me late at night, saying horrible things. I wouldn’t put anything past him! Anything!”
And then something happened that pretty well proved she wasn’t imagining things. Jane had put her car in storage, after what Sonya had said, had it towed to Clint Jervis’s lot, intending to have it checked, but putting it off for some reason. So Clint’s boy Rod began borrowing it, to ride his girl around, and one night the steering went haywire and dumped them in the ditch. Rod and the girl weren’t hurt, but the car was a total wreck, as Jane learned next morning, when the insurance office called. Mother called me and I went over, and I’m telling you, we all looked at each other, and knew what the answer was. My birthday, as a rule, hasn’t meant much to me, though of course, people make it pleasant, and you get a bit of a bang. But this year, for some reason, I kept thinking about it, the contrast it would be with the one I had last year, my thirtieth. That day had been wonderfully pleasant — a quickie visit from Lynn, a necktie from Jane, a party at my mother’s later in the evening. Even the weather had helped. My birthday’s September 12, Old Defender’s Day, as it’s called here in Maryland, when Fort McHenry held out, and The Star-Spangled Banner was born. It’s the end of summer, the beginning of fall, with the smell of Concord grapes, like winy perfume, hanging in the air. You could smell them all over that day, and if I wasn’t perfectly happy, at least I was enjoying life, which until Sonya came along, was all I really asked.
But now it was all different. There was no winy smell, as the day was overcast, and the air felt raw. Helen Musick had remembered, and given me a bottle of lotion, and Mother of course had called — but she said nothing about coming over, and no wonder, with Jane in the house all the time. I got home around six, feeling utterly depressed, because all I could think of was Sonya, and how I wished she was there. I parked in the drive, slipped the lotion in my pocket, went up to the door, put my key in and unlocked, feeling as glum as I’d ever felt in my life.
But as soon as I opened the door a terrific surprise was there, a big birthday cake on the telephone table, with a flock of candles burning, thirty-one as I knew without counting. And then at once, from the living room, came the chords on the piano, Happy Birthday to You. It played almost to the end, and then a small thready girl’s voice sang: Happy Birthday, Dear Gramie, Happy Birthday to You! For a few terrible seconds I wasn’t quite sure, as I’d never heard her sing. But then in the arch there she was, flinging herself into my arms, burrowing her nose into my shirt, drawing deep, trembly breaths. Then our mouths came together in a long, beautiful kiss. I lifted her, so her feet swung clear of the floor, and carried her into the living room. I sat down in one of the chairs, pulled her onto my lap, and kept right on kissing her, holding her close, and patting her. After a long time our mouths pulled apart, and little by little, though still trembling, we were able to talk. I said: “So — so — and so. You came.”
“I had to, I couldn’t help it.”
“Well? I told you, didn’t I? If you had to be Little Miss Fixit, okay — but everything’s fixed. So what were you waiting for?”
“How do you mean, everything’s fixed?”
“Well I told you, last time you called!”
“Yes, but I didn’t get it straight.”
“Well, first off, Jane moved in with Mother.”
“When was this?”
“That same night. When you scared her to death.”
“Then she didn’t stay with you?”
“You think I’d let her?”
“Well after all she had the land.”
“Yeah, but now she’s left it to Mother. She’s not mad at her any more. She realizes. Or whatever the hell she does. If you ask me she’s somewhat balmy.”
“About you, she is.”
“Was. She came to her senses, I think.”
“More’n I did. I’m still balmy about you.”
“Mutual. Likewise. Vice versa. Kiss me.”
She kissed me, and some little time went by. “Gramie, don’t you know why I came?”
“I’ll bite. Why?”
“That beautiful wire you sent me.”
Now if I could say I reacted to that in a way that made some sense, or that showed I had some brains, or that did me credit in any way, I certainly would — but I can’t. All I felt was put out, or bored, or annoyed, that something apart from us was edging in between, to louse up our moment, and my only clear idea was to give it some kind of brush, so we could go on as we had been going, with kisses, pats, and talk about being balmy. I said: “Uh-huh.”
“Didn’t you hear what I said, Gramie?”
“Somebody sent you a wire.”
“You sent me a wire!”
Then, and then only, at last, not caring much, or wanting to talk about it: “I’m sorry, I didn’t send any wire.”
“Well you certainly did!”
She jumped up, went to the side table, opened her bag, took out a yellow telegram, and brought it over to me. It was a night letter, a long one, leading off about my birthday, quoting The Star-Spangled Banner, and saying all I wanted to see by the dawn’s early light was her head on the pillow beside me — and more of the same, quite poetic. It begged her to come home and help me celebrate, and wound up: “Love Love Love, Gramie.”
I said: “I know nothing about it.”
She took it, crossed to a sofa and collapsed into tears. I went over, folded her in, and asked, “Is it all that important? So somebody sent you a wire, but all it said was what I’ve been trying to say over the phone a hundred times, whenever you called, that you should come back to me, back to your home.”
“But that wire is why I came.”
“I thought I was why you came.”
“I thought you sent it is why. It’s why I got shook.”