The Love Potion Murders in the Museum of Man_ A Norman De Ratour Mystery - Alfred Alcorn [33]
Well, at least Diantha is happy. She positively flung herself at the young man, wrapping her legs around his midsection and carrying on in such a fashion that I feared for a moment they would attempt congress right there in the hallway. I should be relieved that she now has someone to assuage her too palpable needs. But I find myself just a bit envious, perhaps of their youth, their vigor, their sense of utter irresponsibility, as though the world is some great machine that will tick over by itself forever regardless of what they do. And perhaps they are right.
We sat down to dinner, the four of us, with lobsters, salad, the very last of this year’s corn, as well as a piquant little Sauvignon Blanc. Sixy, as Diantha calls him, slurring it into “Sexy,” wore only a T-shirt with some sort of message on it and jeans, seemingly impervious to anything like the temperature. He is a big fellow, with a bland, blunt, sensual face, and sports, if that is the term, a polished shaved head and more rings in his ears that a Papuan native. It took me some time to realize that he was speaking English. When he saw the lobsters he launched into something like, “Oh, wow, man, real bugs, too rad.” Then, to me, glancing around, “Man, you are some kind of cool dude. I mean look at this crib, man, it’s right off the set.”
Later, when we were alone, he extended his sympathy regarding Elsbeth. “Di told me about your old lady, man. I mean bummer big time. I mean like too soon, man, for the big nap.” I took this to be an expression of sympathy and confess to being oddly touched inasmuch as he appeared utterly sincere in his sentiments. Still, I do wonder betimes what planet I am living on.
Poor Elsbeth couldn’t really manage to eat much of the dinner. She did seem happy that Diantha’s friend had arrived. She told me not to fuss with her, but I excused myself from the table as well. I asked her if she wanted to take some of her pain medication, and she shook her head. “I’d rather bear anything than have my head muddled,” she said.
We spent some time together, she lying in the bed we’ve arranged for her in the alcove off the living room, me sitting beside her holding her hand, now all skin and bones and ligaments. What frail vessels we are, finally.
But Elsbeth appeared at peace with herself. Alfie Lopes, the minister in Swift Chapel, our friend who married us, came by today for something halfway between a pastoral visit and a crying fest. We held hands while Alfie improvised a little prayer about how we need to remember that each of us will be called. It is only a matter of time. And time, he intoned, quoting the much-underappreciated Delmore Schwartz, is the fire we burn in.
Perhaps not that strangely, Elsbeth comforted Alfie as much as he did her. But then my dear wife always has been strong in that way. She told me that early on she had decided not to cheat death by dying by her own hand when it dawned on her as a young girl the finality that life entailed. “Dying is not what you think,” she said as we sat together in the near dark, hearing the sounds Diantha and Sixy were making down in the basement setting up his equipment. “It’s frightening, yes. It’s too damn final. I’d rather postpone it. But it’s not strange or horrific or even malignant. It just is. And having you here is all that matters right now.”
So that I wept, but quietly, and then lay out on the narrow bed beside her, taking her in my arms and holding her, as if, like that, I might