“Dave?”
It was the first time she had ever called me by my first name. I felt my heart jump. “Yes, Sheila?”
“Could we have a fire tonight?”
“I’d love it.”
“I’ve... I’ve got to talk to you.”
So I drove to my house. Sam let us in, but I chased him out. We went in the living room, and once more I didn’t turn on the light. She helped me light the fire, and I started into the kitchen to fix something to drink, but she stopped me.
“I don’t want anything to drink. Unless you do.”
“No. I don’t drink much.”
“Let’s sit down.”
She sat on the sofa, where she had been before, and I sat beside her. I didn’t try any passes. She looked in the fire a long time, and then she took my arm and pulled it around her. “Am I terrible?”
“No.”
“I want it there.”
I started to kiss her, but she raised her hand, covered my lips with her fingers, then pushed my face away. She dropped her head on my shoulder, closed her eyes, and didn’t speak for a long time. Then: “Dave, there’s something I’ve got to tell you.”
“What is it?”
“It’s pretty tragic, and it involves the bank, and if you don’t want to hear it from me, this way, just say so and I’ll go home.”
“...All right. Shoot.”
“Charles is short in his accounts.”
“How much?”
“A little over nine thousand dollars. Nine one one three point two six, if you want the exact amount. I’ve been suspecting it. I noticed one or two things. He kept saying I must have made mistakes in my bookkeeping, but tonight I made him admit it.”
“Well. That’s not so good.”
“How bad is it?”
“It’s pretty bad.”
“Dave, tell me the truth about it. I’ve got to know. What will they do to him? Will they put him in prison?”
“I’m afraid they will.”
“What, actually, does happen?”
“A good bit of what happens is up to the bonding company. If they get tough, he needn’t expect much mercy. It’s dead open-and-shut. They put him under arrest, have him indicted, and the rest of it’s a question of how hard they bear down, and how it hits the court. Sometimes, of course, there are extenuating circumstances—”
“There aren’t any. He didn’t spend that money on me, or on the children, or on his home. I’ve kept all expenses within his salary, and I’ve even managed to save a little for him, every week.”
“Yeah, I noticed your account.”
“He spent it on another woman.”
“I see.”
“Does it make any difference if restitution is made?”
“All the difference in the world.”
“If so, would he get off completely free?”
“There again, it all depends on the bonding company, and the deal that could be made with them. They might figure they’d make any kind of a deal, to get the money back, but as a rule they’re not lenient. They can’t be. The way they look at it, every guy that gets away with it means ten guys next year that’ll try to get away with it.”
“Suppose they never knew it?”
“I don’t get you.”
“Suppose I could find a way to put the money back, I mean suppose I could get the money, and then found a way to make the records conform, so nobody ever knew there was anything wrong.”
“It couldn’t be done.”
“Oh yes, it could.”
“The passbooks would give it away. Sooner or later.”
“Not the way I’d do it.”
“That — I would have to think about.”
“You know what this means to me, don’t you?”
“I think so.”
“It’s not on account of me. Or Charles. I try not to wish ill to anybody, but if he had to pay, it might be what he deserves. It’s on account of my two children. Dave, I can’t have them spend the rest of their lives knowing their father was a convict, that he’d been in prison. Do you, can you, understand what that means, Dave?”
For the first time since she had begun to talk, I looked at her then. She was still in my arms, but she was turned to me in a strained, tense kind of way, and her eyes looked haunted. I patted her head, and tried to think. But I knew there was one thing I had to do. I had to clear up my end of it. She had come clean with me, and for a while, anyway, I believed in her. I had to come clean with her.
“Sheila?”
“Yes?”
“I’ve got to tell you something.”
“...What is it, Dave?”
“I’ve known this all along. For at least a week.”
“Is that why you were looking at me that day?”
“Yes. It’s why I acted that way, that night. I thought you knew it. I thought you had known it, even when you came to me that night, to ask for the job. I thought you were playing me for a sucker, and I wanted to find out how far you’d go, to get me where you wanted me. Well — that clears that up.”
She was sitting up now, looking at me hard.
“Dave, I didn’t know it.”
“I know you didn’t — now, I know it.”
“I knew about her — this woman he’s been — going around with. I wondered sometimes where he got the money. But this, I had no idea. Until two or three days ago. Until I began to notice discrepancies in the passbooks.”
“Yeah, that’s what I noticed.”
“And that’s why you turned seducer?”
“Yeah. It’s not very natural to me, I guess. I didn’t fool you any. What I’m trying to say is I don’t feel that way about you. I want you every way there is to want somebody, but — I mean it. Do you know what I’m getting at, if anything?”
She nodded, and all of a sudden we were in each other’s arms, and I was kissing her, and she was kissing back, and her lips were warm and soft, and once more I had that feeling in my throat, that catch like I wanted to cry or something. We sat there a long time, not saying anything, just holding each other close. We were halfway to her house before we remembered about the shortage and what we were going to do about it. She begged me once more to give her a chance to save her children from the disgrace. I told her I’d have to think it over, but I knew in my heart I was going to do anything she asked me to.
IV
“Where are you going to get this money?”
“There’s only one place I can possibly get it.”
“Which is?”
“My father.”
“Has he got that much dough?”
“I don’t know... He owns his house. Out in Westwood. He could get something on that. He has a little money. I don’t know how much. But for the last few years his only daughter hasn’t been any expense. I guess he can get it.”
“How’s he going to feel about it?”
“He’s going to hate it. And if he lets me have it, it won’t be on account of Charles. He bears no goodwill to Charles, I can tell you that. And it won’t be on account of me. He was pretty bitter when I even considered marrying Charles, and when I actually went and did it — well, we won’t go into that. But for his grandchildren’s sake, he might. Oh, what a mess. What an awful thing.”