‘That doesn’t give him licence to behave like Edgar Allan Poe. Even if he’d proved he is Poe. It’s wrong-drinking all day, passing out every night-’
‘Come now, Leah, you know this thing goes in cycles-’
‘It’s getting worse,’ she said flatly. ‘It used to be two weeks on and two weeks off. Now it’s three weeks on and one week off.’
‘We have to endure it for now. When a man’s lost his wife, the shock-’
Leah put her knitting aside. ‘He killed Harriet with his drinking, and now he’s trying to kill himself. I hate being the witness to two murders.’ She stood up and massaged one hand with the other, turning her back to Mack, and then turning again to face him. ‘Heavens, Lucius, don’t you think I know how it feels? She was my sister-just as much as she was his wife. But you don’t see me, or anyone else, carrying on like this, liquoring up day and night, half the time unconscious from that and sedatives and depression. Harriet was a terrible loss for me, too, but after proper mourning, and thinking about it, I found myself. My God, it’s been three years. Life goes on. On and on. Life is for the living. There’s little enough of it, anyway. We’ll all have our turn, you bet.’ She stopped. ‘Will you have some coffee?’
They always had coffee together, after his visits to Craig. He bobbed his head. ‘Yes, sure, if you don’t mind.’
Leah Decker went into the old-fashioned kitchen, and Mack followed her, finding a chair at the table. He traced the floral design painted on the maple table, and he watched Leah brewing the coffee. She was a handsome woman, he reckoned, by any standard. She might not grow old well, but she was handsome now. She had Harriet’s Slavic features, except that they were tighter, more pointed, and her hair, which was brown, not dark blonde, was swept back tight and bunned in the back. Her body was taller, straighter than Harriet’s had been, and pleasing although more rigid and unyielding. She had none of Harriet’s gaiety or humour. She was practical, sensible, and-too often recently-querulous. Mack forgave her the last, because her lot was not an easy one. After the accident, she had come to help out, to bury Harriet and to nurse Craig, and she had simply stayed on. For all her faults, she was selfless in her devotion to Craig, and always softer and more feminine in his presence. Her harder side, her complaints, were reserved for others.
Mack knew that her life here was lonely. Craig was too rarely sober or mobile or sociable. And Mack understood that things could not be easy, financially. By now, Craig’s meagre savings must have dwindled away, leaving innumerable debts, and there was little hope of salvation. Craig had one hundred pages of a new novel, Return to Ithaca, but only a handful of these pages had been added in six months. Briefly, there had been an opportunity for a teaching job at Joliet College, four miles north of Miller’s Dam. A solemn, scholarly literature professor at the college, Alex Inglis, a frustrated writer in his fifties deeply devoted to Craig’s books, had pulled strings to bring his idol into the college as an instructor. This high-hope had dissolved when, to impress the Board of Regents, Inglis had arranged a literary lecture by Craig, at Joliet, and Craig had appeared too drunk to go on.
The Craig household still survived, Mack was certain, because Leah was economical and husbanded what was left of Craig’s past. Royalties from paperback editions of the novels, and foreign editions, and television adaptations, dribbled in, and Leah made the most of them. Also, she helped keep alive Craig’s limited cult throughout the country, and interest in his old work, by co-operatively corresponding with every fan and critic, by encouraging them to write about Craig and by bedevilling Craig’s despairing agent to press continually for reprints and new editions of his four books. Thus, she maintained Craig-and herself-above water. But for how long?
And why? The last question was the one that interested Lucius Mack. Why had Leah Decker, an eligible woman no more than thirty-four, dedicated herself to this existence? Was it that she was sorry for her brother-in-law? Was it that nearness to a once promising literary figure enriched a potentially drab life? Was it masochism? Or was it-and Mack had often speculated on this point-that she secretly wanted her sister’s husband, the future security and prestige he might provide, even his love? Mack wondered.
‘It’ll just be a minute,’ Leah called over her shoulder, as she took the rolls from the oven.
‘No hurry.’
Watching Leah, Mack wondered about another thing, too. Whenever Mack or other close friends were present, and Craig was not, Leah always decried her brother-in-law’s drinking. She played Carrie Nation, and evoked sympathy and admiration. Yet, Mack wondered. Somehow, there were always fresh bottles of Scotch in Craig’s room, and Craig did not buy them. Somehow, Craig drank before Mack saw him, and after. Mack wondered if Leah actually, in subtle ways, encouraged Craig’s drinking, or at least went along with it, to reduce his potency as a man. In this way, she could have him dependent on her as part nurse, part mother, part wife. Without drink, as once he had been, Craig might leave Miller’s Dam, depart from the place and Leah’s person, and she would be left without him, in a void and an old-maid. Still, there were arguments against such behaviour on Leah’s part, such as the fact that his insobriety meant his inactivity as an artist, and this impoverished him and, in turn, Leah. What was the truth about Leah? Mack revelled in these old man’s games.
She brought two cups of steaming coffee to the table, and then bringing the heated rolls and butter, she sat down across from Lucius Mack.
Stirring sugar into her coffee with her spoon, she said, ‘You know, I’ve tried to talk to him several times these last weeks. I mean, about trying to write a little every day-do something.’ Her eyes stayed on the spoon. ‘I wish you’d speak to him sometime. He might listen to you.’
Mack poured cream in his coffee, and then sipped his drink. ‘We’ve discussed it many times, Leah. What do you think we talk about up there? A good day’ll come, I’m positive. Right now he’s caught up in this pattern of self-destruction. But at the core, he’s too tough to kill himself. He is a writer. He has a mind. One day, these factors will dominate him. One day, he’ll wake up from all of this, and the bottle will be a stranger, and he’ll say to himself-Christ, where have I been? And he’ll say to himself-it’s my turn to live again. And then, he’ll be like he used to be.’
‘Sometimes it never happens. Poe-’
‘Nonsense. Forget Poe.’
‘Well, I’m waiting for that day. Three years is an awfully long time.’ She pushed the plate of rolls toward Mack. ‘Have some. You need filling.’
As if to punctuate Leah’s dietary advice, the wall telephone in the kitchen rang.
There were few calls these days, and Leah was quick to reach the telephone and unhook the receiver. She listened a moment, and, disappointed, told the party to hold on, then held the receiver towards Lucius Mack.
‘For you,’ she said. ‘Jake Binninger at the office.’
Mack got to his feet and went to the telephone. He wedged the receiver between his shoulder and his chin, as was his habit, and listened.
Seated at the table again, Leah, absorbed in her own thoughts, paid no attention. Sipping her coffee, she almost spilt it when she heard Mack’s sudden exclamation. She looked up surprised, to see his creased face opened wide and red with pleasure.
‘Are you sure, Jake?’ he was pleading into the telephone. ‘It’s not a hoax? Read it to me again-the whole thing-slowly-now go ahead.’
Only the hum of the refrigerator could be heard, as Lucius Mack pressed against the telephone, and Leah observed him with curiosity.