An American Tragedy (66 page)

Clyde, fingering the offerings and guessing that what Short was saying was true, was now so troubled and confused in his own mind that he could scarcely think and speak as planned. “Very nice, sure,” he said, turning them over, feeling that at another time he would have been pleased to possess at least two. “I think maybe I’ll take this one, anyhow, and this one, too.” He drew out two and held them up, while he was thinking how to broach the so much more important matter that had brought him here. For why should he be troubling to buy ties, dilly-dallying in this way, when all he wanted to ask Short about was this other matter? Yet how hard it was now—how very hard. And yet he really must, although perhaps not so abruptly. He would look around a little more at first in order to allay suspicion—ask about some socks. Only why should he be doing that, since he did not need anything, Sondra only recently having presented him with a dozen handkerchiefs, some collars, ties and socks. Nevertheless every time he decided to speak he felt a sort of sinking sensation at the pit of his stomach, a fear that he could not or would not carry the thing off with the necessary ease and conviction. It was all so questionable and treacherous—so likely to lead to exposure and disgrace in some way. He would probably not be able to bring himself to speak to Short to-night. And yet, as he argued with himself, how could the occasion ever be more satisfactory?

Short, in the meantime having gone to the rear of the store and now returning, with a most engaging and even sycophantic smile on his face, began with: “Saw you last Tuesday evening about nine o’clock going into the Finchleys’ place, didn’t I? Beautiful house and grounds they have there.”

Clyde saw that Short really was impressed by his social station here. There was a wealth of admiration mingled with a touch of servility. And at once, because of this, he took heart, since he realized that with such an attitude dominating the other, whatever he might say would be colored in part at least by his admirer’s awe and respect. And after examining the socks and deciding that one pair at least would soften the difficulty of his demand, he added: “Oh, by the way, before I forget it. There’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you about. Maybe you can tell me what I want to know. One of the boys at the factory—a young fellow who hasn’t been married very long—about four months now, I guess—is in a little trouble on account of his wife.” He paused, because of his uncertainty as to whether he could succeed with this now or not, seeing that Short’s expression changed ever so slightly. And yet, having gone so far, he did not know how to recede. So now he laughed nervously and then added: “I don’t know why they always come to me with their troubles, but I guess they think I ought to know all about these things.” (He laughed again.) “Only I’m about as new and green here as anybody and so I’m kinda stumped. But you’ve been here longer than I have, I guess, and so I thought I might ask you.”

His manner as he said this was as nonchalant as he could make it, the while he decided now that this was a mistake—that Short would most certainly think him a fool or queer. Yet Short, taken back by the nature of the query, which he sensed as odd coming from Clyde to him (he had noted Clyde’s sudden restraint and slight nervousness), was still so pleased to think that even in connection with so ticklish a thing as this, he should be made the recipient of his confidence, that he instantly recovered his former poise and affability, and replied: “Why, sure, if it’s anything I can help you with, Mr. Griffiths, I’ll be only too glad to. Go ahead, what is it?”

“Well, it’s this way,” began Clyde, not a little revived by the other’s hearty response, yet lowering his voice in order to give the dreadful subject its proper medium of obscurity, as it were. “His wife’s already two months gone and he can’t afford a kid yet and he doesn’t know how to get rid of it. I told him last month when he first came to me to try a certain medicine that usually works”—this to impress Short with his own personal wisdom and resourcefulness in such situations and hence by implication to clear his own skirts, as it were—“But I guess he didn’t handle it right. Anyhow he’s all worked up about it now and wants to see some doctor who could do something for her, you see. Only I don’t know anybody here myself. Haven’t been here long enough. If it were Kansas City or Chicago now,” he interpolated securely, “I’d know what to do. I know three or four doctors out there.” (To impress Short he attempted a wise smile.) “But down here it’s different. And if I started asking around in my crowd and it ever got back to my relatives, they wouldn’t understand. But I thought if you knew of any one you wouldn’t mind telling me. I wouldn’t really bother myself, only I’m sorry for this fellow.”

He paused, his face, largely because of the helpful and interested expression on Short’s, expressing more confidence than when he had begun. And although Short was still surprised he was more than pleased to be as helpful as he could.

“You say it’s been two months now.”

“Yes.”

“And the stuff you suggested didn’t work, eh?”

“No.”

“She’s tried it again this month, has she?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that is bad, sure enough. I guess she’s in bad all right. The trouble with this place is that I haven’t been here so very long either, Mr. Griffiths. I only bought this place about a year and a half ago. Now, if I were over in Gloversville—” He paused for a moment, as though, like Clyde, he too were dubious of the wisdom of entering upon details of this kind, but after a few seconds continued; “You see a thing like that’s not so easy, wherever you are. Doctors are always afraid of getting in trouble. I did hear once of a case over there, though, where a girl went to a doctor—a fellow who lived a couple miles out. But she was of pretty good family too, and the fellow who took her to him was pretty well-known about there. So I don’t know whether this doctor would do anything for a stranger, although he might at that. But I know that sort of thing is going on all the time, so you might try. If you wanta send this fellow to him, tell him not to mention me or let on who sent him, ’cause I’m pretty well-known around there and I wouldn’t want to be mixed up in it in case anything went wrong, you see. You know how it is.”

And Clyde, in turn, replied gratefully: “Oh, sure, he’ll understand all right. I’ll tell him not to mention any names.” And getting the doctor’s name, he extracted a pencil and notebook from his pocket in order to be sure that the important information should not escape him.

Short, sensing his relief, was inclined to wonder whether there was a working-man, or whether it was not Clyde himself who was in this scrape. Why should he be speaking for a young working-man at the factory? Just the same, he was glad to be of service, though at the same time he was thinking what a bit of local news this would be, assuming that any time in the future he should choose to retail it. Also that Clyde, unless he was truly playing about with some girl here who was in trouble, was foolish to be helping anybody else in this way—particularly a working-man. You bet he wouldn’t.

Nevertheless he repeated the name, with the initials, and the exact neighborhood, as near as he could remember, giving the car stop and a description of the house. Clyde, having obtained what he desired, now thanked him, and then went out while the haberdasher looked after him genially and a little suspiciously. These rich young bloods, he thought. That’s a funny request for a fellow like that to make of me. You’d think with all the people he knows and runs with here he’d know some one who would tip him off quicker than I could. Still, maybe, it’s just because of them that he is afraid to ask around here. You don’t know who he might have got in trouble—that young Finchley girl herself, even. You never can tell. I see him around with her occasionally, and she’s gay enough. But, gee, wouldn’t that be the . . .

THE information thus gained was a relief, but only partially so. For both Clyde and Roberta there was no real relief now until this problem should be definitely solved. And although within a few moments after he had obtained it, he appeared and explained that at last he had secured the name of some one who might help her, still there was yet the serious business of heartening her for the task of seeing the doctor alone, also for the story that was to exculpate him and at the same time win for her sufficient sympathy to cause the doctor to make the charge for his service merely nominal.

But now, instead of protesting as at first he feared that she might, Roberta was moved to acquiesce. So many things in Clyde’s attitude since Christmas had so shocked her that she was bewildered and without a plan other than to extricate herself as best she might without any scandal attaching to her or him and then going her own way—pathetic and abrasive though it might be. For since he did not appear to care for her any more and plainly desired to be rid of her, she was in no mood to compel him to do other than he wished. Let him go. She could make her own way. She had, and she could too, without him, if only she could get out of this. Yet, as she said this to herself, however, and a sense of the full significance of it all came to her, the happy days that would never be again, she put her hands to her eyes and brushed away uncontrollable tears. To think that all that was should come to this.

Yet when he called the same evening after visiting Short, his manner redolent of a fairly worth-while achievement, she merely said, after listening to his explanation in as receptive a manner as she could: “Do you know just where this is, Clyde? Can we get there on the car without much trouble, or will we have to walk a long way?” And after he had explained that it was but a little way out of Gloversville, in the suburbs really, an interurban stop being but a quarter of a mile from the house, she had added: “Is he home at night, or will we have to go in the daytime? It would be so much better if we could go at night. There’d be so much less danger of any one seeing us.” And being assured that he was, as Clyde had learned from Short, she went on: “But do you know is he old or young? I’d feel so much easier and safer if he were old. I don’t like young doctors. We’ve always had an old doctor up home and I feel so much easier talking to some one like him.”

Clyde did not know. He had not thought to inquire, but to reassure her he ventured that he was middle-age—which chanced to be the fact.

The following evening the two of them departed, but separately as usual, for Fonda, where it was necessary to change cars. And once within the approximate precincts of the physician’s residence, they stepped down and made their way along a road, which in this mid-state winter weather was still covered with old and dry-packed snow. It offered a comparatively smooth floor for their quick steps. For in these days, there was no longer that lingering intimacy which formerly would have characterized both. In those other and so recent days, as Roberta was constantly thinking, he would have been only too glad in such a place as this, if not on such an occasion, to drag his steps, put an arm about her waist, and talk about nothing at all—the night, the work at the factory, Mr. Liggett, his uncle, the current movies, some place they were planning to go, something they would love to do together if they could. But now . . . And on this particular occasion, when most of all, and if ever, she needed the full strength of his devotion and support! Yet now, as she could see, he was most nervously concerned as to whether, going alone in this way, she was going to get scared and “back out”; whether she was going to think to say the right thing at the right time and convince the doctor that he must do something for her, and for a nominal fee.

“Well, Bert, how about you? All right? You’re not going to get cold feet now, are you? Gee, I hope not because this is going to be a good chance to get this thing done and over with. And it isn’t like you were going to some one who hadn’t done anything like this before, you know, because this fellow has. I got that straight. All you have to do now, is to say, well, you know, that you’re in trouble, see, and that you don’t know how you’re going to get out of it unless he’ll help you in some way, because you haven’t any friends here you can go to. And besides, as things are, you couldn’t go to ’em if you wanted to. They’d tell on you, see. Then if he asks where I am or who I am, you just say that I was a fellow here—but that I’ve gone—give any name you want to, but that I’ve gone, and you don’t know where I’ve gone to—run away, see. Then you’d better say, too, that you wouldn’t have come to him only that you heard of another case in which he helped some one else—that a girl told you, see. Only you don’t want to let on that you’re paid much, I mean,—because if you do he may want to make the bill more than I can pay, see, unless he’ll give us a few months in which to do it, or something like that, you see.”

Clyde was so nervous and so full of the necessity of charging Roberta with sufficient energy and courage to go through with this and succeed, now that he had brought her this far along with it, that he scarcely realized how inadequate and trivial, even, in so far as her predicament and the doctor’s mood and temperament were concerned, his various instructions and bits of inexperienced advice were. And she on her part was not only thinking how easy it was for him to stand back and make suggestions, while she was confronted with the necessity of going forward, and that alone, but also that he was really thinking more of himself than he was of her—some way to make her get herself out of it inexpensively and without any real trouble to him.

At the same time, even here and now, in spite of all this, she was still decidedly drawn to him—his white face, his thin hands, nervous manner. And although she knew he talked to encourage her to do what he had not the courage or skill to do himself, she was not angry. Rather, she was merely saying to herself in this crisis that although he advised so freely she was not going to pay attention to him—much. What she was going to say was not that she was deserted, for that seemed too much of a disagreeable and self-incriminating remark for her to make concerning herself, but rather that she was married and that she and her young husband were too poor to have a baby as yet—the same story Clyde had told the druggist in Schenectady, as she recalled. For after all, what did he know about how she felt? And he was not going with her to make it easier for her.