I dived into the water a couple more times and then went back to where they were sitting.
“I’m sorry,” I said to Robert. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
“It’s okay. You don’t have to apologize. I’m your friend, you know,” he added after a pause.
I looked at him and smiled sadly, the way you smile when you feel like crying, and Robert answered me with the same kind of smile: there was no strength in it, only the loyalty of one beaten man to another. This was one of those moments when people feel that something special is happening, something they can barely grasp and don’t have a name for. Our moment was lifted from the movie Casablanca, a movie we both liked to see from time to time: the closing scene when Bogey and Claude Rains slowly walk into the fog that covers the airport.
Suddenly we were jolted by a piercing scream. The woman’s kid had thrown his ball at a man in a deck chair a few yards away. The man, dressed in khaki pants and a short-sleeved shirt, was quietly watching children splash around in the water. He had a sweet smile on his face, the kind of smile only a man who’s never known the joys of fatherhood can have. But that smile belonged to the past now: the kid’s ball had knocked the man’s wig off his head, and his face was red with rage. He held his grayish hairpiece in his left hand, and his right was gripping the boy by the arm; people were shrieking with laughter.
“Where’s your father?” the man yelled.
“I won’t tell you,” the kid said. I could see from his expression, even though his arm must have hurt terribly, that he was trying to be brave.
“Oh, yes, you will!”
“I won’t!”
“You won’t?”
“No!”
When the man placed the kid across his knees to give him a good spanking, I stood up and went over.
“Let him go,” I said. “Stop molesting that child. Shame on you!”
“Is this your kid?”
“Let him go!” I said, pulling the kid out of the man’s clutches.
“You should teach him better manners.”
“Why? He’s not my kid. Just like that hair isn’t yours. You should be ashamed.”
“He’s not your kid?”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “I’ve always wanted daughters only. Like King Lear.”
Something awful bit my hand; when I looked down I saw it was the kid. He met my gaze. Standing with his feet wide apart he was getting ready to slug me. “Bug off, you sad creep!” he said to me. “I can take care of myself!”
“See?” the wigless man said and nodded with satisfaction. “The way Americans bring up their kids!”
“Keep your cool, sonny,” I said to the kid. My hand was on fire. “Take your ball and go play somewhere else.”
The kid had a crew cut; if he hadn’t, his hair would have stood on end from sheer anger. “Next time mind your own bloody business,” he told me.
“Okay.”
He was still looking at me, and I had the impression he was trying to judge his chances of knocking me down. He couldn’t decide whether to kick me in the shins or butt me in the belly with his head, a blow Poles call “the ram.” “I bet my daddy could kill you,” he said at last.
“Maybe.”
“My dad is awfully strong, you know? Once he beat the hell out of two sailors in Naples. Under a bridge, or maybe in a tunnel. Is that your dog?”
“Yes,” I said.
“What’s it called?”
“Spot.”
“Like in that story by London?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” he said, shaking his fist at me. “Next time remember to mind your own business.” He went off carrying his ball.
“Insolent little brat,” the bald man said, still holding his hairpiece in his hand. “I should have given him a good thrashing.”
“Better thrash your wig,” I said. “If I were you, I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing something like that. It makes you less attractive to women. I’ve read that skin-heads make better lovers. They have more room in their skulls for their hormones.”
I went back to my chair.
“Thank you,” the woman said.
“Not at all.”
“Do you like children?”
“No,” I said. “Though I like your kid. I admire his spunk. My sister’s got a boy just like that.”
“It’s hard to bring up a boy when you’re alone,” she said, getting up, collecting her things.
“Are you going already?” I asked.
“It’s almost six,” she said.
I got up and took the bag from her hand. “I’m sorry I was so rude. I shouldn’t have shouted.”
Looking at her face, I thought three or four years from now no head would turn when she walked down the street or went into a movie theater. It’s odd how women’s looks suddenly disappear and the women themselves, too, vanish without a trace at the age when men become truly handsome and mature. Women’s faces grow cold and gray, and they begin to speak in sharp high voices that have no love, no despair, only a kind of miserable wisdom that prevents them from doing reckless things.
“It’s okay, really,” she said. I gave her back the bag and she smiled at me. “I’m sorry you’re having problems.”
“Not anymore,” I answered. “Not since I made up my mind to go.”
She left and I went back to Robert. His skin had taken on a reddish tint, but I knew tomorrow it would be pale as ever.
“What did you tell her?”
“Don’t worry. Did I do it right before?”
“You sure did.”
“I feel sorry for the dog,” I said.
“Don’t think about it.”
“And I feel sorry for her, too. I feel sorry for them all. Tell the dog to leave me alone.”
“Leave him alone,” Robert told the dog. The dog went away.
“I feel sorry for all of them,” I said again. “They have just one more summer. That’s when they try for the last time, with all the money they’ve been saving for God knows how many years. Then they disappear and are no longer around. I don’t mean they leave or go away. They just vanish. And nobody gives a damn. As if they never existed.”
“If that mood ever strikes you while you’re with her, remember to keep your mouth shut. Otherwise you could ruin everything.”
“Don’t worry.”
“Sometimes I don’t know what to expect from you next.”
“Robert,” I said, “if I had a woman of my own, would I have to talk to her, too?”
“You’d think of something to say.”
“No, I wouldn’t. The only thing I’d tell her would be: ‘Please, I beg you, don’t ever talk to me. Don’t say a word until the day you decide to leave me.’”
“Not bad, not bad at all. One can tell you’re talking from personal experience. But you should speak a little more slowly. I have to keep reminding you of that. Okay, let’s go to eat.”
“Did I do all right?”
“You sure did. You’re great. I told you that long ago, you just don’t have enough faith in yourself.”
“It’s because of the dog,” I said. “I can’t look at it. I wish everything was over.”
“It almost is,” he said. “I can feel the money in my pocket. But I just thought of something. You’ve got to shout.”
“When?”
“When you refuse to go away with her. Do you see why? People who know they’re wrong always shout. They want to drown out their thoughts with noise. When a man knows he’s wrong and is acting against his own convictions, he starts shouting. Don’t forget this. It’s very important. A simple psychological trick, but it works. You won’t forget?”