Overload (49 page)

"You're scaredi You're wondering if I'll be the avenging elder sister.

Or if I'll call the cops maybe, and holler 'rape!"'

He said stiffly, "I'm not sure I want, or need to discuss with you

"Oh, come on!" Cynthia bad continued to laugh; now suddenly she stopped.

Her face became serious. "Look, Nimrod-if I can call you that-I'm sorry

if I embarrassed you, and I can see I did. So now let me tell you

something. Karen thinks you're a kind, sweet, gentle, loving man, and the

best thing that's ever happened to her. And if you're interested in an

outside opinion, I feel the same way."

Nim stared at her. As he did, he realized that for the second time to-

night he was seeing a woman cry.

"Damn! I didn't mean to do that." With a tiny handkerchief Cynthia wiped

her tears away. "But I guess I'm as happy and satisfied as Karen is

herself." She regarded Nim in frank approval. "Well, almost."

Nim's tension of a moment earlier dissolved. Grinning, he acknowledged,

"I can only say one thing. I'll be damned!"

"I can say more than that, and will," Cynthia said. "How about another

drink first?"

Without waiting for an answer she scooped up Nim's glass and replenished

it, along with her own. Returning to her seat, she sipped the scotch

before continuing, carefully choosing her words.

"For your sake, Nimrod, as much as Karen's, I want you to realize

something. What happened between you and my sister tonight was

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wonderful and beautiful. You may not know this, or understand it, but some

people treat quadriplegics the way they would a leper. I've seen it happen

sometimes; Karen sees it more. That's why, in my book, you come out as Mr.

Nice Guy. You've never thought of her, or treated her, as anything but a

woman Ob, for God's sake! . . . Here I am crying again."

Cynthia's handkerchief was clearly inadequate. Nim handed her his own and

she glanced at him gratefully. "It's the little things you do . . . Karen

told me that . . ."

He said humbly, "It all started, you know-my coming to see Karen

-accidentally."

"Most things do."

"And what went on between us tonight . . . well, I didn't plan it. I didn't

even think . . ." Nim stopped. "It simply happened."

"I know that," Cynthia said. "And while we're about it let me ask you

something else. Did you-do you-have any guilt feelings?"

He nodded. "Yes."

"Don'ti I read something once, when I was finding out how I could best help

Karen, by a man named Milton Diamond. He's a medical professor in Hawaii

who made a study of sex and disabled people. I may not have the words

exactly right, but the sense of what he wrote was: The disabled have enough

problems without having conventional guilt-laden values forced on them . .

. private sexual satisfaction takes precedence over public approval;

therefore any guilt is wrong . . . and sexually, for disabled people,

anything goes." Cynthia added almost fiercely, "So don't you have any

guilts either. Wipe them out!"

"I'm not sure," Nim said, "if I can take any more surprises tonight. just

the same, I'm glad we talked."

"I am too. It's a part of learning, and I had to learn about Karen, just as

you have." Cynthia continued sipping her scotch, then said meditatively,

"Would you believe me if I told you that when Karen was eighteen and I was

twenty-one I bated her?"

"I'd find it hard to believe."

"Well, it's true. I hated her because she got all the attention from our

parents and their friends. Some days, at home, it was as if I didn't exist.

It was always, Karen this, and Karen that! What can we do for dear, poor

Karen? Never, What can we do for healthy, normal Cynthia? It was my

twenty-first birthday. I wanted a big party but my mother said it was

'inappropriate' because of Karen. So we had a little family tea-just my

parents and me; Karen was in the hospital then-a lousy tea, and a shoddy,

cheap little cake. As for my birthday presents, they were just tokens

because guess where all the available money was going, every cent. I'm

ashamed to say it, but that night I prayed for Karen to die."

In the silence which followed, even through drawn drapes, Nim

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could hear wind-driven rain against the window. He had understood what

Cynthia had told him, and was moved. Yet, in a corner of his mind he

thought: Glorious raini To a utilities man, rain, sleet or snow meant

stored-up hydroelectric power for the dry season ahead. He pulled back his

thoughts and spoke to Cynthia.

"So when did your feelings change?"

"Not for years, and even then slowly. Before that I went through my own

guilt period. I felt guilty because I was whole and Karen wasn't. Guilty

because I could do the things she couldn't-play tennis, go to parties,

neck with boys." Cynthia sighed. "I wasn't a good sister."

"But you are now."

"As much as I can be-after taking care of a husband, house and kids. It

was after my first child was born that I began to understand and

appreciate my little sister and we became close. Now the two of us are

dear, loving friends, sharing ideas and confidences. There isn't anything

I wouldn't do for Karen. And there isn't anything she doesn't tell me."

Nim said drily, "I'd gathered that."

They talked on. Cynthia told him more about herself. She had married at

twenty-two; one reason was to get away from home. Since then her husband

had held a succession of jobs; his present one was as a shoe salesman.

Nim surmised that the marriage was barely adequate, if that, and Cynthia

and her husband stayed together for lack of an alternative and the sake

of their three children. Before her marriage, Cynthia had taken singing

lessons; now, four nights a week she sang in a second-rate nightclub to

supplement her husband's meager pay. Tonight was a nonsinging night and

Cynthia would stay with Karen, her husband taking care of their one child

still at home. Cynthia had two more scotches while they talked; Nim

declined. After a while her voice became slightly slurred.

At length Nim stood up. "It's late. I have to go."

"I'll get your raincoat," Cynthia said. "You'll need it, even going to

your car." She added, "Or you can stay if you want. There's a couch makes

up into a bed."

"Thanks. I'd better not."

She helped him on with the coat and, at the apartment front door, kissed

him fully on the lips. "That's partly for Karen," Cynthia said, "partly

for me."

Driving home, he tried to push the thought away as being predatory and

disloyal, but it persisted: So many attractive, desirable women in the

world, and so many available and willing to share sexual pleasures.

Experience, instinct, her own unmistakable signals told him: Cynthia was

available too.

2IR

5

Among other things, Nim Goldman was a wine buff. He had a keen nose and

palate and especially like varietal wines from the Napa Valley, which were

California's finest and in good years rated with the premium wines of

France. So he was glad to go to the Napa Valley with Eric Humphrey-even in

late November-though he wondered why the chairman had invited him along.

The occasion was to celebrate a homecoming. An honored, victorious,

sentimental homecoming of one of California's most distinguished sons.

The Honorable Paul Sherman Yale.

Until two weeks earlier he had been a revered Associate justice of the

United States Supreme Court.

If ever a single individual merited the accolade "Mr. California," un-

questionably it was Paul Sherman Yale. All that a Californian might wish or

strive to be had been exemplified in his distinguished career, now drawing

to a close.

Since his early twenties wben-two years ahead of most contemporaries-he was

graduated with honors from Stanford Law School, until his eightieth

birthday, which he recently celebrated, Paul Yale had filled a succession

of increasingly important public roles. As a young lawyer he established a

statewide reputation as a champion of the poor and powerless. He sought,

and won, a seat in the California Assembly and, after two terms there,

moved up to become the youngest member ever elected to the state Senate.

His legislative record in both houses was remarkable. He was the author of

early legislation to protect minorities and outlaw sweatshops. He also

sponsored laws which aided California farmers and fishermen.

Moving on from the Senate, Paul Sherman Yale was elected the state's

Attorney General, in which office be declared war on organized crime and

sent some of its big-narne practitioners to jail. A logical next step was

to Governor, a post he could have had for the asking. Instead be accepted

President Truman's invitation to fill a vacancy on the U. S. Supreme Court.

His Senate confirmation hearings were brief, their outcome a foregone

conclusion since-both then and later-no breath of scandal or corruption

ever touched his name, and another sobriquet sometimes applied to him was

"Mr. Integrity."

While serving on the highest court, he wrote many opinions which

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reflected his broad humanity, yet were praised by legal scholars as being 14

pure law." Even his dissents were widely quoted, and some prompted

legislative changes. Amidst it all, Mr. justice Yale never forgot that he

and his wife Beth were Californians and, at every opportunity, declared his

continuing affection for his native state.

When, in due season, be concluded that his work was done, he resigned

quietly and the Yales left Washington, typically without fuss, returning-as

Paul Yale expressed it to Newsweek-"westward and home." He turned down the

suggestion of a massive testimonial banquet in Sacramento, yet consented to

a more modest welcome luncheon in his beloved birthplace, the Napa Valley,

where the Yales planned to live.

Among the guests-at Yale's suggestion-was the chairman of Golden State

Power & Light. Humphrey requested, and obtained, an extra invitation for

his assistant, Nim.

En route to Napa Valley in the chairman's chauffeur-driven limousine,

Humphrey was affable while he and Nim worked on plans and problems, as was

usual on such journeys. It was obvious that the chairman bad put his

displeasure with Nim behind him. The purpose of their present journey was

not mentioned.

Even with winter close at hand, and several weeks after harvest time, the

valley was extraordinarily beautiful. It was a clear, crisp, sunny day,

following several days of rain. Already early shoots of bright yellow

mustard weed were growing between the rows of grapevines-now stark and

leafless, and soon to be pruned in readiness for next season. Within the

next few weeks the mustard would grow in profusion, then be plowed under to

fertilize and, some said, add a special pungency to the flavor of grapes

and wine.

"Notice the spacing of the vines," Humphrey said; be had put aside his work

as they entered the central portion of the valley where vineyards stretched

far into the distance to the lush green hills on either side. "The