Barney's Version - Mordecai Richler [106]
“If you get off there, so will I.”
“How could you do such a thing on your wedding night?”
“I did.”
“You’re blind drunk. I’m going to call the conductor.”
I showed her my ticket.
“Please, Barney, don’t embarrass me any further. Get off the train at Montreal West.”
“If I do, will you agree to have dinner with me in Toronto?”
“No,” she said, leaping up and grabbing a bag from the overhead rack. “Now I’m going to my sleeper and I’m locking the door. Good night.”
“You’re not being awfully friendly, considering the trouble I’ve gone to.”
“You’re crazy. Good night.”
I did stagger off the train at Montreal West,50 and stood on the platform, swaying, watching it chug out of the station. And then, lo and behold, Miriam waved from her window and I could swear she was laughing. My heart soared. Encouraged, I began to run after the train, trying to board it again. I stumbled and fell, ripping my trousers and scraping my kneecap. Outside, I was lucky to find a taxi. “the Ritz,” I said. “Hey, that was some game, eh?”
“Mon blood pressure est sky-high,” said the driver. “C’est le stress.”
Knocking timorously on the door of our overnight suite in the Ritz, I braced myself, anticipating the worst, but to my amazement The Second Mrs. Panofsky greeted me with a hug, compounding my guilt. “Oh, thank God you’re safe,” she said. “I didn’t know what to think.”
“Needed some fresh air,” I said, rocking her in my arms.
“I’m not surprised, but —”
“The Habs won without Beliveau and with the Rocket sitting on the bench. How about that, eh?”
“— couldn’t you have told me? We’ve been worried sick.”
Only then did I notice her father fulminating in a chair. “She wanted me to call the police to see if there had been an accident. I thought it might be more prescient to check out the neighbourhood bars instead.”
“Oh, my God. Look at your knees. I’ll get a wet towel.”
“Don’t fuss, please.” Then, beaming at her father, I said, “Would you care to join us in a nightcap before you leave?”
“I have imbibed quite enough tonight, young man, and so, most assuredly, have you.”
“Well, toodleloo then.”
“Am I to credit that you were walking the streets for an hour and a half?”
“Daddy, he’s safe and sound and that’s all that matters.”
No sooner had he left than The Second Mrs. Panofsky lowered me into a chair, wet a towel in the bathroom, and returned to dab my scraped kneecap. “Tell me if it hurts, honeybunch, and I’ll stop.”
“You deserve a better man than I am.”
“But it’s too late now, isn’t it?”
“I have behaved badly,” I said, unbidden tears streaming down my cheeks. “If you want a divorce, I will not stand in your way.”
“Oh, you’re such a scream,” she said, kneeling to remove my shoes and socks. “What you need is some sleep.”
“On our wedding night?”
“I won’t tell.”
“Oh, no,” I said, beginning to fondle her breasts, and then, apparently, I slumped back in the chair and began to snore.
7
I once dared to hope that Miriam and I, into our nineties, would expire simultaneously, like Philemon and Baucis. Then a beneficent Zeus, with a gentle stroke of his caduceus, would transmogrify us into two trees, whose branches would fondle each other in winter, our leaves intermingling in the spring.
Trees remind me of the afternoon Sean O’Hearne sat with me and Miriam on the wraparound porch of our cottage in the Laurentians, looking down at the lake, where police divers had once searched for Boogie. Boogie, who, if I were to be believed, had last been seen zigzagging down the hill, racing across the dock and, dodging my bullet, plunging into the water. Revealing a surprising poetic streak, O’Hearne, eyeing me closely, indicated the trees and ventured, “I wonder what those elms would say, if they could talk.”
“Why, that’s easy, O’Hearne,” said Miriam. “They would say, ‘We are maples.’ ”
In the years since Boogie’s disappearance, I don’t know how many times I’ve sat on that dock, willing him to emerge safely out of the waters. Why, only the other night I dreamt that Boogie, sobered by his long swim, did in fact heave himself