Wonder Boys - Michael Chabon [133]
“Now listen, everyone,” Crabtree began, trying to interpose himself between Mrs. Leer and me. She skirted him and got up into my face. Her dress gave off a sour tang of cedar.
“You have a lot of nerve, mister,” she said.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Her sharp tone caught Walter’s attention and he looked up from the jacket.
“Yes,” he said, still without quite meeting my gaze, not so much afraid to look at me, I thought, as embarrassed for my sake. My cannabinolic paranoia shot up another notch. Could all of them tell that I wasn’t straight? “You and I need to talk.”
“I guess we do,” I said. I wondered how much Sara had told him. The safest assumption, I decided, was, probably, all of it.
Crabtree gave Walter’s arm a reassuring squeeze.
“Walter, if we could just—”
“I don’t think you’ll find anyone in this room who’s very happy with you right now, Grady,” said Sara, ominously. She looked over to a corner of her office where there was an immense nylon duffel of the sort used by skiers to carry their gear. I didn’t have too many doubts about what was inside. The image of Doctor Dee lying dead and zippered in a nylon bag struck me at that moment as incredibly poignant. I suddenly recalled his penchant for arranging sticks into almost intelligible hieroglyphic patterns in the grass of the Gaskells’ backyard. He had spent his entire life feverishly trying to communicate some important message that no one had understood and that had now died with him, undelivered. At the thought of this I did a surprising thing. I was surprised by it, anyway. I sat down, with a loud creak, in one of the cowhide-and-chrome office chairs, covered my face in my hands, and started to cry.
“Grady.” Sara came over and stood beside my chair, near enough to touch me. She didn’t touch me. “Terry?” she said, her voice half pleading, half accusatory. She thought Crabtree must have given me something from his fabled pharmacopoeia. I was a drinker when we met, of course, but it had been several years since she’d last seen me in tears, and never when there were other people around. I should add here that when I say that I sat down and started to cry I don’t intend to convey an impression of copious tears aflow and lusty Pucciniesque sobbing. I was capable of only the most trite display of macho grief, choked, all but silent, a slight dampness around my eyes, like someone trying to stifle a yawn.
“Yes.” At last Crabtree, having watched me steer the entire operation off the road and into the brambly shoulder, slid over and took control of the wheel. “Mrs. Leer, Mr. Leer, how do you do. My name is Terry Crabtree, I’m a senior editor at Bartizan. I’ve been reading James’s work this weekend, and I’ve discovered for myself what a brilliant young talent he is. You must be very proud of him.”
Oh—well …” Fred Leer watched his wife’s expression for a cue. She nodded. “Of course we are. But—”
“Walter, if you and James and the Leers would like to come with me—Sara, is there someplace we could talk? Walter, I have a number of things I need to discuss with you. I had a chance to read your book.”
“Did you? But I—I feel I ought to—”
“I was very impressed.”
“Walter,” said Sara, her tone crisp and administrative. “Why don’t you show Mr. Crabtree and the Leers into the Hurley Room? I’ll look after Professor Tripp.”
Walter hesitated a moment, looking at his wife. His craggy face was pinned up at the corners in a hard smile that might have been angry or merely tolerant. I could still feel him deliberately not looking at me. Of all the ways he could have chosen to react to my presence, I figured a disgusted hauteur was neither the least desirable nor the least deserved. He held the jacket over one arm and petted its collar with soft automatic strokes. His emptied-out gaze was fixed on the face of his wife. He was giving her one last chance, I thought. She put her hand on my shoulder. He nodded and followed Crabtree and the Leers out of the office.