People Who Knock on the Door (9 page)

“I’ll run you home, Art,” Gus said. “Stick your bike in the back of my car.”

Mrs. DeWitt gave Arthur five dollars. Arthur said he would be back before 2 to work a while more.

11

A
rthur went into his house via the kitchen, which was empty, though the table was set. Voices murmured in the living room; then his mother came into the kitchen, looking worried.

“Well—what’s up?” Arthur asked.

She raised a finger to her lips, and went near the door into the garage, out of hearing of the people in the living room. “It seems the—Bob Cole spoke to your father after church. Bob said he heard—something about a girl. That a girl had to have an abortion. Is that true, Arthur?”

“Who said that?”

His father was coming in. “I’ll handle it, Lois.”

“I was only asking him if it was true,” his mother said calmly.

“I’ll ask him. Is it true? Is it the Brewster girl?—Never mind your grandmother, because she’s heard it,” his father added, as his grandmother came through the broad door of the living room.

“Hello, Arthur,” said his grandmother as cheerfully as ever. “This is family business, so I’ll get out of your way. See you later.” She went down the hall toward her room.

Richard looked at Arthur. “I suppose you know if it’s true or not?”

Arthur felt like saying, “Yes,” but Maggie had kept it quiet and wanted it to be kept quiet.

“Arthur—” said his father.

“I don’t think it’s your business or anybody’s business,” Arthur said, and his father slapped him hard in the face. Arthur at once pulled his right fist back.

“Arthur!
Richard
, really!” His mother looked about to step between them.

“Hey, Mom, when’re we eating?” Robbie was coming in from the hall.

Their mother sighed. “Take some potato chips, will you, Robbie? She got a cellophane bag from the cupboard. “We have to talk for a few minutes before lunch. Can’t you go out in the yard for a while?”

“I don’t feel like it.” Robbie carried the potato chip bag back to his room.

“Are you saying it’s true?” his father asked when Robbie was out of hearing.

Arthur’s fist was still clenched, but at his side. “I’d like to know the so-and-so who said this. Who told Bob Cole.”

“It’s true, though, isn’t it?” Richard said to his mother, “Just look.”

Arthur detested his father at that moment. “Yes. And what’s all the fuss about?—Gossips!”

“All—right, Arthur,” said his father with an air of triumph and patience combined.

Arthur made an effort to sound calm. “Maggie’s keeping quiet, her family’s quiet. They don’t even—dislike me, by the way.”

“They should,” said his father quickly. “A nice girl and a nice family.”

“Yes, and they said—these things can happen.” Arthur suddenly could have cracked up then, so he stood carefully straight.

“They happen because people
make
them happen.”

“If you’re blaming Maggie, you can go to hell!”

“Arthur!—Let’s not talk like that—any of us.” His mother raised her hands in a peacekeeping gesture. “Let’s continue this discussion after some dinner, if we have to continue it. I mean that,” she added with a look at Richard.

Arthur wanted to go to his room, but was afraid he would appear to be retreating, so he stayed where he was.

“Could you call your grandmother, Arthur?” his mother asked.

Arthur walked down the hall and did so. Then he went into his room. He wiped sweat off his forehead and whirled around when he heard a knock on his door. It was his mother. “I can’t sit at the table, Mom. I think I’ll go back to Mrs. DeWitt’s.”

She came in and closed the door.

“Who told Bob Cole, Mom?”

“
I
don’t know. But news gets around this town. You know that.”

Arthur thought suddenly of Roxanne. She didn’t go to that church, but she might have said something to a few people like Greg or Reggie Dewey, who could have passed it on to someone who might attend that goody-goody church.

“I’ve got to serve dinner. Your father’s going to want to talk to you again and I want you both to keep your tempers—if you can.”

“You can tell him he’s the one making the fuss. Is he going to tell the neighbors now? Make a speech in church?”

“Of course not,” his mother whispered. “And Bob Cole spoke to your father in private, in his office there, after church.—Just when did this abortion take place? Before Mama’s visit, I gather.”

“Hasn’t yet; it’s tomorrow.”

“Oh? Your father thought it was a couple of weeks ago.”

“That didn’t work—to be exact. But don’t tell Dad, will you? Don’t say anything else about it. Just let it—die down.”

“Your father tried to phone the Brewsters this noon.”

“Oh, my
gosh
! They’re not home, so he can stop wasting his energy.”

“Would you like me to bring you a plate of something?”

“No, Mom. No, thanks.”

As soon as she was gone, Arthur gasped. He clenched his fists and swung his arms a couple of times, then went quietly into the bathroom, which was the next room, and washed his face in cold water. He thought to get out of the house by the front door, possibly unseen, but his father saw him.

“Oh, Arthur,” said his father, getting up from the table. He came round into the front hall, carrying a napkin in his hand. “I’d like you to tell me where the Brewsters are this weekend.”

“I don’t know where they are,” said Arthur, and walked out.

To arrive at Mrs. DeWitt’s again was a pleasure, a little like arriving at old Norma’s cosy house, even though Mrs. DeWitt’s house meant labor. Arthur didn’t see her as he leaned his bike against the toolshed and thought perhaps she was still eating lunch, because hardly forty-five minutes had passed. Arthur started picking up the sawed roots from the grass. He worked slowly and steadily, hardly thinking about what he was doing. By this time tomorrow, the operation would be over, Maggie’s ordeal. She was due home Tuesday midday. And Maggie still liked him—it seemed—just as much as ever! That thought, that fact, was like a fortress to Arthur, a mighty defense against his crackpot father.

Arthur jumped when he heard Mrs. DeWitt’s high, thin voice near him.

“Back already, Arthur! Come in and have some ice cream. You can’t have had a big dinner in that short a time.”

He begged out politely.

A few minutes later, Mrs. DeWitt came out with a glass of iced coffee and a big piece of coconut cake on a tray. Arthur had a little of both and finally tossed the rest of the cake where Mrs. DeWitt wouldn’t see it. It was nearly 5, when he returned the tray to her kitchen. He didn’t see Mrs. DeWitt, so he took off, sweaty and tired.

He thought of going by Gus’s house, which was almost on the way, but he wouldn’t be able to talk freely to Gus. He couldn’t talk to Norma Keer either, though Norma would probably be the most understanding of all the people Arthur knew. It wasn’t fair to Maggie to talk to
anybody
, and that was exactly why his father was being unfair. Maybe even Robbie knew now.

As soon as Arthur got home, his mother met him in the kitchen and beckoned him back into the garage.

“Your father spoke with the Brewsters. I didn’t want it to surprise you,” she whispered. “Richard’s trying to—”

“Dammit, how’d he find them?”

“He phoned Sigma Airlines. He knew from somewhere that Maggie’s father is with them, and they said—I don’t know, Arthur, but your father said it was urgent and they told him Mr. Brewster was at their hotel this weekend. So your father reached them and said—said he didn’t approve of the abortion,” his mother finished in a still softer whisper.

And his mother had told his father that the abortion hadn’t been done yet. Arthur felt near exploding. “Well, well, he doesn’t approve! Who is he? Isn’t that the Brewsters’ business? Has he gone
nuts
?”

“Sh-h. You might as well say that—about this. He’s said so much, even Robbie knows. I tried to keep it from Robbie, naturally. And I did try to persuade Richard to keep out of it.”

“Hope the Brewsters told him to go to hell.”

“Well—in a way they did,” his mother replied with the start of a smile. “I spoke with Maggie’s mother for a minute. She sounded nice, I must say. Told me not to worry. And Maggie wants to speak with you. Wants you to call her.”

“You mean now?”

“The number’s by the phone. Call her before eight,” his mother said and went back into the kitchen.

Arthur followed her. It was not yet 6.

Since his father was in the living room, Arthur did not glance in that direction, though his grandmother was there, too. Arthur went into the bathroom, dropped his clothes on the floor and stepped under the shower. He also washed his hair. Then he grabbed his dirty clothes in one hand, checked the hall, and nipped into his room. Naturally, his father wasn’t going to quit the living room to give him any privacy to phone, he thought as he put on clean clothes, but Norma would let him phone from her house. She would be delighted to render that little service.

Arthur went into the living room to get the number his mother had mentioned. He greeted his grandmother.

“Hel
lo
, Arthur,” she said with a sigh, as if she’d had enough of something, maybe of his father.

His father sat hunched with folded hands on the edge of an armchair seat, and Robbie sat in another armchair, straightening out a tangled mess of cord in his lap, looking all ears. Arthur picked up the piece of paper and started for the front door.

“Oh, Arthur! I’d like a word with you.” His father stood up, arching his back as if he had had a hard afternoon in the armchair. He beckoned Arthur into his parents’ bedroom.

Arthur pushed the paper into his back pocket, and followed his father.

His father closed the bedroom door. “I’ve found out that operation won’t take place till tomorrow. There’s time for you to stop it or help to stop it right now. Tonight.”

Arthur was aware of his father’s bulk, of his aggressive chin jutting forward as he bent close. Arthur stepped back.

“It’s your duty to say your word about it. I’ve said mine to both the Brewsters.”

“It’s for Maggie to say—and for nobody else to say.”

“Maggie’s hardly more than a child! Seventeen.—I’m talking about the importance of
life
, Arthur.”

“I’m not going to do it. And it’s not your business,” Arthur went on, when his father started to say something, “to tell the Brewsters what they should do. It’s embarrassing to me.”

“
You
dare talk about embarrassment?”

Hopeless, Arthur thought. He turned toward the door. His father came after him, and Arthur drew his left arm out of reach, having had the feeling his father was about to grab it. Arthur went out and down the hall to the front door and out. Norma would forgive him this once, he thought, for crashing in without phoning first.

“Arthur!” Now his father stood on the little front porch of the house.

Arthur trudged back the few steps he had walked. He stood on the front walk.

His father had closed the door. “That child,” he said in a low voice, “can be cared for by us, by the girl’s family. If you don’t persuade her, if you don’t insist, it’ll be the greatest mistake—one of the greatest mistakes you’ll ever make in your life.”

Arthur sighed, wordless and angry.

“You’ll never go to Columbia, if you let this happen.”

Arthur had foreseen that. He nodded curtly and went on across the lawn toward Norma’s, up her front steps, and he knocked.

Norma opened the door, not at all annoyed by the interruption, because she was only doing some mending in the living room, she said. One of Norma’s curtains was spread over most of the sofa where she usually sat.

“Looks the way my house is going to look next week,” Arthur said. “Mom and Grandma are making a lot of new curtains.”

“I’m just hemming mine. Hem came undone.”

“To tell you the truth, I came over to make a phone call, if I may. Indi, and I’ll reimburse you. Okay?”

“Cer—tainly, Arthur. Private, I gather. Would you like me to disappear in the bedroom?”

“Oh, not that private,” said Arthur, though he would have preferred to be alone. “May I make it now?”

“Go right ahead.” She returned to her curtain on the sofa.

Arthur dialed the hospital number and asked for room eight sixteen.

At this point, Norma went into her bedroom at the back corner of the house, trailing the curtain behind her.

“Hello, Maggie,” he whispered, when Maggie answered. “How are you?”

“Oh, fine. In bed already.” She sounded cheerful. “Lovely room. Color TV. Mom’s here.”

In the room, Arthur supposed. “I’m so damned mad that my dad called your folks up. Some so-and-so at his
church
told him, and I didn’t know that till one o’clock today. Then—I was out all afternoon working till—just now, when I found out he’d phoned. I’m very sorry. Can you tell your mother that?”

“Don’t worry so much. I think my father took care of it.”

“What time’s the—that business tomorrow morning?”

Now Norma was coming back, carrying a purple sewing basket, still trailing the curtain.

“Eight o’clock.—Too bad your father’s so upset. There’s no reason to be.”

Arthur felt much better. Once again, Maggie’s fantastic calm worked its magic. She was the one suffering, the one in danger, and she sounded saner than anyone else!

“. . . Now Mom’s back. I think she wants to speak with you.”

“Hello, Mrs Brewster. I was saying to Maggie—I’m sorry about my father—”

“I think Warren and I handled it pretty well. Tried to. I’m afraid this family doesn’t see eye to eye with yours.”

“I don’t either. It’s my father, not my mother.”

“Tomorrow it’ll be over and we can all forget it. You tell your father that. Want to speak with Maggie again?”

“Hi, Arthur. Now the doctor just came in—so I’ll have to sign off.”

“I’ll phone tomorrow noon to ask how you are. All my love, darling.”

Arthur turned around and looked at another world: Norma sewing away with her legs and feet hidden under the curtain. He fished for money in his pocket, and left two singles by the phone, knowing his call would cost a bit less.

“Success?” asked Norma.

“Oh, sure. Thanks, Norma.—Living room’s pretty busy at my house lately.”