The New Yorker Stories - Ann Beattie [214]
The Tazewells’ sunken dining room was done in Chinese red, and against the far wall there was an enormous glass china press edged in brass, illuminated from within in a way that flooded the cut glass with light. The shelves were also glass, and their edges sparkled and gleamed with a prism-bright clarity. Charlotte was not surprised to see that Martin Smith, who ran the Jefferson Dreams catering service, was there himself to oversee things. People in Charlottesville followed through—even fun wasn’t left totally to chance—and Charlotte liked that. Edith Stanton, the host’s cousin, almost Charlotte’s first friend when she had moved here to Charlottesville (she could remember their first lunch together, and Edith’s considering gaze above the seafood salad: was this nice-looking new single woman who was working down at Burwell, McKee going to fit in?), was talking with Father Curnan. Charlotte looked hard at his face—the round, open face of an adolescent, except that there were deep lines around his eyes—and saw on it the look she called Bemused Monsignor. He could nod and smile and murmur his “not to be believed” as Edith went on in her breathless way (surely she was telling him again about her session in a bodybuilding shop for women out in Santa Barbara last summer), but his interest was feigned. Edith was not a Catholic, and she could not know the sort of complicated, surprising man Philip Curnan really was. He had told Charlotte once that after working his way through Cornell (his father had an auto-repair garage in upstate New York somewhere), he had ridden across the country on a Harley-Davidson, while searching his soul about his desire to enter the priesthood. Charlotte smiled now, remembering the confidence. Just last week he had told her that there were still times when he longed to get back on a motorcycle; his helmet was still on the top shelf in his bedroom closet.
A server passed by, and Charlotte finally got a drink. Surveying the room, she was pleased to see that Nicholas was talking to the McKays’ daughter, Angela, home from Choate for Christmas. Charlotte thought of the day, a month before, when Angela’s mother, Janet, had consulted with the head of Burwell, McKee about filing for legal separation from Chaz, her husband. Chaz, a lawyer himself, stood with his arm around his wife’s waist, talking to a couple Charlotte didn’t know. Perhaps Chaz still did not know that she had made inquiries about getting a divorce. M.L., the hostess, passed in her peach-colored gown, and Charlotte touched her shoulder and whispered, “It’s wonderful. Thank you for having us.” M.L. gave her a hug and said, “I must be somewhere else if I didn’t even say hello.” As she moved away, Charlotte smelled her perfume—at night, M.L. always wore Joy—and heard the rustle of silk.
Martin VanZell came up to Charlotte and began talking to her about his arthritic knee. He tapped a bottle in his breast pocket. “All doctors dote on Advil,” he said. “Ask any of them. Their eyes light up. You’d think it was Lourdes in a bottle. Pull off the top, take out the cotton, and worship. I’m not kidding you.” He noticed that he seemed to have caught Father Curnan’s attention. “Meaning no disrespect,” he said.
“Who was being slighted?” Father Curnan said. “The pharmaceutical company?” His eyes met Charlotte’s for a second, and he winked before he looked away. He speared a shrimp and ate it, waving away the napkin a server extended in