The Moons of Jupiter - Alice Munro [69]
“The crème brûlée,” he said. “Could you?” He ran back down as Prue got up and went into the kitchen to save the dessert. When she returned he was climbing the stairs more slowly, looking both agitated and tired.
“A friend,” he said gloomily. “Was it all right?”
Prue realized he was speaking of the crème brûlée, and she said yes, it was perfect, she had got it just in time. He thanked her but did not cheer up. It seemed it was not the dessert he was troubled over but whatever had happened at the door. To take his mind off it, Prue started asking him professional questions about the plants.
“I don’t know a thing about them,” he said. “You know that.”
“I thought you might have picked it up. Like the cooking.”
“She takes care of them.”
“Mrs. Carr?” said Prue, naming his housekeeper.
“Who did you think?”
Prue blushed. She hated to be thought suspicious.
“The problem is that I think I would like to marry you,” said Gordon, with no noticeable lightening of his spirits. Gordon is a large man, with heavy features. He likes to wear thick clothing, bulky sweaters. His blue eyes are often bloodshot, and their expression indicates that there is a helpless, baffled soul squirming around inside this doughty fortress.
“What a problem,” said Prue lightly, though she knew Gordon well enough to know that it was.
The doorbell rang again, rang twice, three times, before Gordon could get to it. This time there was a crash, as of something flung and landing hard. The door slammed and Gordon was immediately back in view. He staggered on the steps and held his hand to his head, meanwhile making a gesture with the other hand to signify that nothing serious had happened, Prue was to sit down.
“Bloody overnight bag,” he said. “She threw it at me.”
“Did it hit you?”
“Glancing.”
“It made a hard sound for an overnight bag. Were there rocks in it?”
“Probably cans. Her deodorant and so forth.”
“Oh.”
Prue watched him pour himself a drink. “I’d like some coffee, if I might,” she said. She went to the kitchen to put the water on, and Gordon followed her.
“I think I’m in love with this person,” he said.
“Who is she?”
“You don’t know her. She’s quite young.”
“Oh.”
“But I do think I want to marry you, in a few years’ time.”
“After you get over being in love?”
“Yes.”
“Well. I guess nobody knows what can happen in a few years’ time.”
WHEN PRUE TELLS about this, she says, “I think he was afraid I was going to laugh. He doesn’t know why people laugh or throw their overnight bags at him, but he’s noticed they do. He’s such a proper person, really. The lovely dinner. Then she comes and throws her overnight bag. And it’s quite reasonable to think of marrying me in a few years’ time, when he gets over being in love. I think he first thought of telling me to sort of put my mind at rest.”
She doesn’t mention that the next morning she picked up one of Gordon’s cufflinks from his dresser. The cufflinks are made of amber and he bought them in Russia, on the holiday he and wife took when they got back together again. They look like squares of candy, golden, translucent, and this one warms quickly in her hand. She drops it into the pocket of her jacket. Taking one is not a real theft. It could be a reminder, an intimate prank, a piece of nonsense.
She is alone in Gordon’s house; he has gone off early, as he always does. The housekeeper does not come till nine. Prue doesn’t have to be at the shop until ten; she could make herself breakfast, stay and have coffee with the housekeeper, who is her friend from olden times. But once she has the cufflink in her pocket she doesn’t linger. The house seems too bleak a place to spend an extra moment in. It was Prue, actually, who helped choose the building lot. But she’s not responsible for approving the plans—the wife was back by that time.
When she gets home she puts the cufflink in an old tobacco tin. The children bought