The Final Judgment (36 page)

“Oh, they’re real.” He looked at her sharply. “That letter

you were looking at, the first time you came over, was to my aunt in Denver. She burns the envelopes and reads them to my mother on the telephone. I can never say where I

Caroline tried to imagine herself adrift, cut off from her own family, But David was lost in his memories now. “Before I could get my new ID,” he continued, “the FBI busted the people who were working on it. “I took off before anyone could find me. “I couldn’t rent a car, which would put my name in a computer. So I bought a bus ticket to Boston, the only place I could think of where there are so many students that one more would just blend in. But there were too many people to lie to, and too many people who wanted iD for jobs, to buy a car, even for drinks. And now I was short of cash and afraid to buy another identity. “I’d come face-to-face with what a luxury it was to have been David Stern.” His voice was soft again. “So I came here—the end of the world, or at least of the United States. “Vineyarders are used to transients. And they leave you alone.” He paused. “I scrounged a job, bought a car without registration, and hoped no one would find me until I figured out what to do.” Caroline watched him. “So the night we went to town . . .” I let myself go out with you, and now you might see my license. How could I know who you might talk to?” David shook his head. “But that was nothing compared to how stupid I was, forgetting myself like that. All your cop friend needed was to put me through a computer or check my registration or even just get curious.” His tone turned wondering. “If it weren’t for you, I might have ended up in the local can, waiting for some FBI guy from Boston to come around whenever things got slow. “That was when I knew I had to leave.” In the silence, she touched his face. “Where?”

“Canada.” His voice was quiet and sad. “I meant to

-r4E VlAL juroo,4E<-r 337 leave here weeks ago. But every week I made another excuse to stay. Until I knew I’d only leave when you did.” Caroline stepped back from him, trying to absorb it, fingers touching his now. “All those things you told me ...”

“Were lies, pretty much. Except the part about Bobby Kennedy. Only that it was California, not Indiana. I was there the night they shot him.” His voice slowed. “We were going to win, Caroline. We were that close ...” He did not finish the sentence. In the silence, his fingertips curled beneath hers. It was the smallest of gestures, and it brought his world down on her. The depth of his loss. The fear in which he lived. The weight of her responsibility, suddenly clear, to protect him from whoever, out of carelessness or malice, might choose to turn him in. “Can’t you fix this somehow?” she asked. His smile seemed knowing but not unkind: it was as if he saw that, in the numbness of first comprehension, she could get no farther than the desire that things be different. “Short of jail? This is not a forgiving government, or a forgiving time—too many kids far younger than me have gone there and died for most people to feel sorry for a draft dodger. I’m afraid that job’s been left to me.” He paused for a moment. “And after jail, what would I do? I couldn’t practice law here. I don’t think I’d even get to vote. I just made a bad decision. And every night I go over it, and over it, and over it .... “I’m tired of it, and sick of myself. At least in Canada there are law schools, and I can be David Stern again. Maybe after a few years I can even figure out who he is now.” It came to her then: his loneliness; his fear of others; his knowledge that—in a moment of fear and indecision—he had damaged himself in some way that would always be part of him. And then, quite softly, he said, “It isn’t much to offer you, is it?” n in a deck chair. “I want a life,” David

said softly.”I want a life with you. But I can never have one here.” Caroline felt sick. “You’re asking me to come with you.”

“Yes.” It was as if, Caroline thought, she’d been transported to someone else’s life. She had never felt so lost. He touched her hair. “If I leave here now, not knowing what you’d say, it would be the one thing I could never live with.” Caroline shook her head. “There’s just so much ..” He withdrew his hand. I know. You have your father. You have this life...”

“I have the life you used to have.” Caroline’s voice rose. “It’s not fair to lay this on my father. Until two years ago, you had my life. Now I find out that most of what you’ve told me is a lie, that your life as an American is over, and that maybe I can turn mine in and go somewhere I’ve never been and never cared about. All right, and leave my family behind.” He turned away. “That’s why I tried not to fall in love with you. Because loving you isn’t fair to either one of us. Certainly not to you ...”

“Just let me be here, okay.”? Alone.” He turned to her for a moment. And then, without a word, he stood and left. It was too much to absorb. For a time, she could only see the places that were part of her and, she had believed, would always be—Masters Hill; the town of Resolve; Harvard Yard; Boston; Heron Lake; the streams and mountains of New Hampshire. And then the faces of her college friends; of Jackson; of Betty and Larry; of Channing Masters, the parent who had been with her, and guided her, since the first dawn of her consciousness. And in none of them, with none of them, had she ever felt as she felt with David Stern. David. He was a real person. Beneath the harm he had done himself, he was the person she had sensed he was. For an

odd, almost giddy moment, Caroline felt elated. It was possible; they were possible. Because Caroline Masters was in love with David Stern. Happy and sad, filled with love, terrified by her confusion, Caroline went to him. He was lying on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Quietly, she said, “You have to be David to me, okay.”? That’s at least a start.” He gazed up at her, eyes filled with hope and doubt. “I really do understand,” he said. “If you can’t go, it’s for a good reason.” Caroline stood by the head of the bed, watched him in the moonlight. And then she slowly pulled his T-shirt over her head. She stood in front of him, not shy. As David looked up from the bed in silence, wanting her, Caroline wished that she could freeze this moment forever. “I love you, David.” Silent, he reached out to her. She went to him. Slowly and sweetly, David Stern made love to her. Afterward, they lay together in the dark. There were minutes without speaking. And then, still quiet, David ran his fingers down her spine. Perhaps he wanted her again, Caroline thought. She touched his face. “Tell me about your mother,” he said softly. “Everything.”

It was insane. They would lie there, looking into each other’s faces, bodies damp with lovemaking. Caroline could not imagine life without him. But her life before had been perfectly fine, the steady cretion of steps, one upon the other, down the only path she had ever imagined. The Caroline Masters she had always known was not a woman who lived in a vacuum—she was a New Englander; her father’s daughter; a graduate of Radcliffe; a person with a career ahead; even Jackson Watts’s girlfriend. Without these things, there was no Caroline Masters—there was this passionate creature, defined solely by her love for a man she barely knew, and whose real name felt strange on her lips. Who could not imagine her life with him. It was insane. She could not sleep, lost her desire for food, felt nauseous in spite of that. There were circles beneath her eyes. And yet each night she went to David. She could not decide, and there was no one who could help her. More deeply than in the months following her death, Caroline missed her mother. Her father would call, and Jackson. At the times that she was there to answer, Caroline sounded to herself like a chattering stranger. She hardly noticed their reaction. The only person to whom she could truly speak was David. 34O

In the middle of the night, he listened to her doubts and fears. “Caroline,” he told her finally, “if I’d known I’d put you through such hell, I’d never have asked you. I should have just gone away.” He looked so sad that when she left, Caroline was suddenly afraid she would never see him again. So that when she looked out the window the next morning and spotted his curly head as he sat on the corner of his deck, her eyes filled with tears. There was one week to go, and she was headed for law school like an automaton, spiritless and irresolute.

The morning after Caroline canceled her college friends’ visit on the feeblest of excuses, she walked alone on the beach. She felt like a prisoner in her own skin. Caroline sat on the beach, fighting tears. Gazing along the edge of the water, she saw the distant figure of her sister, searching for shells. Instinct told her to get up. But some deep exhausted part of her no longer cared how she appeared. All that she could manage, as Betty approached, was to stop crying. Silent, her sister sat next to her. For a time; Betty sifted sand through her fingers, narrowly watching the grains spill on the beach. A cool mist touched their faces. “Please, Caroline, talk to me.”

“There’s nothing to say. Really.” Betty was quiet. “Then I have something to tell you,” she said at last. “I think maybe I’m pregnant.” Caroline turned to her. “How do you feel?”

“Fine, so far.” Betty smiled. “But I’m way late.” Forcing a smile of her own, Caroline touched her shoulder. “I hope it’s true. Then I get to be ‘Aunt Caroline.”“

“You would be, wouldn’t you?” The thought seemed to give Betty sudden pleasure, and then her smile faded and she rested her fingers on Caroline’s arm. “I know we haven’t really been sisters always. But I wish you could talk with me.”

Caroline fell too drained to speak. Tears came to her eyes again. “Please,” Betty implored. “You can’t go on like this.” For a long time, Caroline stared at the sand. Out of wretchedness and exhaustion, she said, “His name isn’t Scott.” The words, raw in Caroline’s throat, felt like a betrayal. Betty’s lips compressed. “Is he in trouble ... Caroline grasped her shoulders. I can’t talk about this. We can’t talk about this.”

“What is it?” Betty’s fingers tightened. “Larry and I are worried sick about you, all right? And so is Father.” Caroline swallowed. “They can’t know,” she murmured. “Just you.” After a time, Betty nodded. Caroline felt her eyes shut. “They’re after him—he didn’t report for induction.” She paused and then looked directly at her sister. “He’s asked me to go away with him. To Canada.” Betty paled. “My God, Caroline.” The hushed shock in her voice seemed to run through Caroline. Of all people, she thought, Betty might understand. “I know,” Caroline said. “It would change my whole life .... “

“Then how can you even think about it?”

“Because I’ve never loved anyone like this. I never even knew I could.” Her throat felt tight. “Do you know what that’s like?” Betty gave a first, faint smile. “The feeling you can’t get close enough, that he can’t get deep enough? That you’d dredge your soul for him?” Her voice sounded husky, rueful. ‘‘The world of a new love affair is like insanity. And part of the delusion is that you think you’re the only one it ever happened to .... “

“I don’t think that,” Caroline said sharply. “It’s just that it’s happened to me.”

“Just like it happened to me—with Larry.” Betty paused. “But he never asked me to throw away my family and

everything I knew. And after a few weeks or months, I wouldn’t have. Because I was able to put Larry in the context of a life I wanted and see that he was part of a whole. And that fortunately for me—he fit.” Her hands grasped Caroline’s shoulders. “You have a whole life planned, Caroline. Scott—or whoever he is—doesn’t fit that. And this person whom I’m looking at now isn’t you.”

“But is it my life,” Caroline burst out, “or just the life our father gave me.”?” Betty looked astonished. “Is Canada your life?” she retorted, and then her voice softened. “I know he feels like the love of your life. But he isn’t—if he were, he wouldn’t be asking you to change your life. Because that’s not how love is supposed to work .... “

“But you have so many rules for things—how love is supposed to work; how families are supposed to work. David’s not pushing me—”

“David?” Caroline hesitated. “Yes.” Somehow this seemed to deflate Betty. Her voice was quiet again. “I’m so sorry, Caroline. I never imagined this happening to you.” Caroline felt her sister’s sadness. “What do you mean?” Betty looked down. “That you always seemed so smart and strong to me—that you’d never need anyone the way I need Larry.” She tilted her head. “Here I was wanting to help you, and now it’s me who’s shaken. I guess even more for Father than for me.” She paused, then finished quietly. “I can’t replace you for him, Caroline. No one can.” It was a hard concession, Caroline knew. Silent, she squeezed her sister’s hand. “Since your mother died,” Betty said at last, “he’s been so alone. Sometimes I’ve thought that the hope of practicing law with you is the main thing in his life.” It was as if, Caroline thought, David had numbed her to this painful truth. “I know,” she finally answered. “But does that mean I should do it?” Betty looked at her again. “It hasn’t just been Father,

Caroline. it’s been you. He didn’t get you into Harvard Law School—you did.” Her voice grew sharper. “You’re saying you can’t define yourself for Father. How can you define yourself by a decision made by someone who, two months ago, you didn’t even know existed. And such a bad decision.” It was nothing more, Caroline silently acknowledged, than she had told herself. Betty watched her face. Quietly, she said, ‘,’Talk to Father, Caroline. It’s the least you can do. For him, and for yourself.” Caroline touched her eyes. “I can’t,” she said miserably. “David may have a deadline. But you don’t. You can go to Canada anytime.” Once more, Betty’s voice was soft. “Let him go, then talk to Father. Because I couldn’t stand to watch what you could do to him.” The thought of Betty, the neglected one, trying to hold the threads of their family brought tears to Caroline’s eyes. “Please,” Betty said. “For both your sakes.” Caroline took her sister’s hands. “What I do, and how I do it, has to be my decision. Please, promise me.” Betty watched her, and then her gaze broke. “All right,” she said.

I’m going to Boston,” Caroline said. “To Cambridge, really.” In the darkness, David was quiet. “To see your old stomping grounds? Or your new ones?”

“I don’t know yet.” She touched his arm. “Part of it’s that I can’t seem to think here.” He brought her close. A little sadly, he said, “That was the idea.” She flew to Boston the next evening.