The Wapshot Chronicle - John Cheever [23]
“It doesn’t seem right.”
“Please, please.” She bit her lip; she would cry and Mrs. Wapshot swiftly changed the subject. “Smell the peonies,” she said. “I love the smell of peonies and now they’re almost gone.”
“That sun feels so good.”
“Do you have a position in the city?” Mrs. Wapshot asked.
“Well, I was going to this secretarial school,” Rosalie said.
“You planned to be a secretary?”
“Well, I didn’t want to be a secretary. I wanted to be a painter or a psychologist but first I went to Allendale School and I couldn’t bear the academic adviser so I never really made up my mind. I mean he was always touching me and fiddling with my collar and I couldn’t bear to talk with him.”
“So then you went to secretarial school?”
“Well, first I went to Europe, I went to Europe last summer with some other girls.”
“Did you like it?”
“You mean Europe?”
“Yes.”
“Oh I thought it was divine. I mean there were some things I was disappointed in, like Stratford. I mean it was just another small town. And I couldn’t bear London but I adored the Netherlands with all those divine little people. It was terribly quaint.”
“Shouldn’t you telephone this secretarial school you go to and tell them where you are?”
“Oh no,” Rosalie said. “I flunked out last month. I blew up on exams. I knew all the material and everything but I just didn’t know the words. The only words I know are words like divine and of course they don’t use those words on exams and so I never understood the questions. I wish I knew more words.”
“I see,” Mrs. Wapshot said.
Rosalie might have gone on to tell her the rest of it and it would have gone something like this: I mean it just seems that all I ever heard about was sex when I was growing up. I mean everyone told me it was just marvelous and the end of all my problems and loneliness and everything and so naturally I looked forward to it and then when I was at Allendale I went to this dance with this nice-looking boy and we did it and it didn’t stop me from feeling lonely because I’ve always been a very lonely person so we kept on doing it and doing it because I kept thinking it was going to keep me from being lonely and then I got pregnant, which was dreadful, of course, with Daddy being the priest and so virtuous and prominent, and they nearly died when they found out and they sent me to this place where I had this adorable little baby although they told everyone I was having an operation on my nose and afterwards they sent me to Europe with this old lady.…
Then Coverly came down the lawn from the house. “Cousin Honora called,” he said, “and she’s coming for tea or after supper, maybe.”
“Won’t you join us?” Mrs. Wapshot asked. “Coverly, this is Rosalie Young.”
“How do you do,” he said.
“Hello.” He had that spooky bass voice meant to announce that he had entered into the kingdom of manhood, but Rosalie knew that he was still outside the gates and sure enough, while he stood there smiling at her he raised his right hand to his mouth and began thoughtfully to chew on a callus that had formed at the base of his thumb.
“Moses?”
“He’s at Travertine.”
“Moses has been sailing every day of his vacation,” Mrs. Wapshot said to Rosalie. “It’s just as though I didn’t have an older son.”
“He wants to win a cup,” Coverly said. They stayed in the garden until Lulu called them into lunch.
After lunch Rosalie went upstairs and lying down in the still house she fell asleep. When she woke the shadows on the grass were long, and downstairs she could hear men’s voices. She went down and found them all in the garden, once more, all of them. “It’s our out-of-door sitting room,” Mrs. Wapshot said. “This is Mr. Wapshot and Moses. Rosalie Young.”
“Good evening, young lady,” Leander said, charmed by her fairness, but not at all foxy. He spoke to her with