Mr. Bridge_ A Novel - Evan S. Connell [20]
“Walter,” she said, making an obvious effort to control herself, “I insist on a divorce. Right now. At once. Do you understand?” Before he could answer, she stamped her foot and rushed into the house.
He put down the snail poison carefully so it would not tip over and destroy the new grass. Then he stood up, brushed off his trousers, and followed her. She had gone upstairs. She was in the bedroom. The door was locked. He tapped at the door but there was no response, so he went downstairs to the kitchen and opened a bottle of beer. After this many years of marriage she had gone berserk. He sat down at the kitchen table to drink the beer and consider what he should do next, when he realized that she was glaring at him from the pantry.
“I thought as much,” she cried in a soft, fierce voice. “You’ve never cared about me. Just look at you! Look at yourself! Drinking beer!”
“Now for Heaven’s sake, India,” he said. “Stop acting ridiculous. You know perfectly well I care for you.”
“I don’t expect you to understand. You’ve never understood. Lois told me she had never seen a man so wrapped up in his own affairs. Half the time you don’t know if I’m dead or alive.”
“Why, that’s not true,” he said. “That simply is not true.”
“Go right ahead,” she remarked when she saw him glance at his beer, which was foaming pleasantly near the rim of the glass. “Go right ahead. I’m the last person on earth to spoil your pleasure. We can discuss the divorce after you’ve enjoyed yourself. I can wait. I don’t mind waiting. My life has been spent waiting on you and the children. None of you have been aware of it, but that’s all right. I realize you’ve written me off.”
He patted the chair next to him. “India, won’t you sit down?”
“Thank you, I prefer to stand. Lois read my horoscope the other day. It says ‘Your emotional destiny is to lend courage, strength, truth, and tolerance to the world. Express your idealistic love nature fearlessly but sensibly so that you command respect as well as love from those dear to you.’ That doesn’t make the slightest difference to you; not that I expect it to, because you are completely wrapped up in your own affairs. The office, the office, the office, the office! I’m not blaming you, Walter. You are what you are. It scarcely matters if we see you only at the table. We can get along without you.”
However, she did sit down beside him, and when he put his arm around her she did not throw it off.
She never explained what he had done wrong, and after thinking quite a lot about this incomprehensible fit of hysteria he decided the best procedure was to ignore it.
23 Call Me Avrum
“Mr. Bridge, is it not?”
A squat, bald Jew dressed in an expensive blue pinstripe suit skipped out of a doorway with an umbrella hooked over his arm. Mr. Bridge stopped walking and looked down at him suspiciously. The suit was an attempt at good taste, but it failed because it was obvious. He carried a copy of the Wall Street Journal but he held it so that it could be noticed. On his plump, pink, manicured little finger sparkled a diamond ring. Mr. Bridge looked again at the umbrella. There was no reason to be carrying an umbrella. The sun was shining, no rain had been forecast. This man was not to be trusted. Whatever his business, he was shallowly successful, and the business probably was marginal. He had the air of a slum lord. He could be a political lobbyist or a North End liquor wholesaler. He might be an osteopath or a cut-rate dentist. He was not a corporation executive or a reputable businessman. Whatever he did, he was not to be trusted. He was shrewd. He was repugnant. He was an opportunist. Under no circumstances