Rules of Civility - Amor Towles [39]
Coffee in the living room was announced just in time.
Keeping an earlier promise, Eve took Wisteria on a tour of the apartment while Bucky cornered Wallace to secure a hunting invitation for the fall. So Tinker and I ended up in the living room alone. He sat down on one of the couches and I sat beside him. He put his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands. He looked back at the dining room as if he was hoping that a seventh guest would miraculously appear. He took his lighter from his pocket. He snapped the lid open and shut and then put it away again.
—It’s good of you to come, he said at last.
—It’s a dinner party, Tinker. Not a crisis.
—She looks better. Doesn’t she?
—She looks great. I told you she’d be fine.
He smiled and nodded. Then he looked me in the eye, maybe for the first time all evening.
—The thing of it is, Katey—Eve and I are sort of making a go of it.
—I know, Tinker.
—I don’t think we really set out—
—I think it’s great.
—Really?
—Absolutely.
A neutral observer would probably have raised an eyebrow at my answer. There wasn’t much jingle in my delivery, and one-word responses just have that way of not sounding very convincing. But the thing of it is, I meant it. Every one word of it.
For starters, you could hardly blame them. Balmy breezes, turquoise seas, Caribbean rum, these are well-established aphrodisiacs. But so too are proximity and necessity and the threat of despair. If, as was painfully apparent in March, Tinker and Eve had both lost something essential of themselves in that car crash, in Florida they had helped each other gain a bit of it back.
One of Newton’s laws of physics is something about how bodies in motion will hew to their trajectory unless they meet an external force. I suppose, given the nature of the world, it was perfectly likely that some such force could present itself to set Tinker and Eve off their current course; but there was no way it was going to be me.
Bucky came stumbling into the room and collapsed in a chair. Even I was relieved to see him. Tinker took the opportunity to go over to the bar. When he came back with drinks that no one needed, he took a seat on the other couch. Bucky took a grateful swig and then vaulted back into the topic of railroad shares.
—So, you think it’s in the realm, Tink? That we could get a piece of this Ashville Rail business.
—I don’t see why not, Tink conceded. If it’s the right thing for your clients.
—How about I come down to Forty Wall and we hash it out over lunch?
—Sure.
—This week?
—Oh, leave him alone, Bucky.
Wisteria had just come back with Eve.
—Don’t be such a boor, she said.
—Come on, Wyss. He doesn’t mind mixing a little business with pleasure. Do you, Tink?
—Of course not, said Tink politely.
—You see? Besides. He’s got the whole concession. The world has no choice but to beat a path to his door.
Wyss glowered.
—Evelyn, Wallace interrupted adeptly, dinner was . . . delicious.
—Hear hear, was the chorus.
For the next few minutes, there was a thorough rehashing of the courses (That meat was delicious. The sauce was perfect. And ooh that chocolate mousse.) This was a social nicety that seemed more prevalent the higher you climbed the social ladder and the less your hostess cooked. Eve accepted the compliments with appropriate panache and a dismissive wave of the hand.
When the clock struck one we were all in the foyer. Eve and Tinker had their fingers intertwined, as much to shore each other up as to show affection.
—Lovely evening.
—Terrific time.
—Must do it again.
Even Wyss was encouraging an encore, God knows why.
When the elevator came it was the same man who had taken me up earlier.
—Ground floor, he announced once he’d pulled the caging shut, as if he had formerly worked in a department store.
—That’s quite an apartment, Wyss remarked to Bucky.
—Like a phoenix from the ashes, he replied.
—How much do you think it cost?
No one answered her. Wallace was either too well raised or too disinterested. Bucky was too busy trying to bump his shoulder into