Leaving Lucy Pear(35)

Fifteen




July third. The Hirsch children’s visit slid into its ninth day. They would be in Gloucester four more before returning to their cities. Ira sat with Lillian at his bedroom window, watching his grandsons play ball on the lawn below as their mother watched from the terrace. Adeline had the nanny but rarely left her with the children, whether out of fear or discomfort or a genuine desire to be close to them herself, he couldn’t tell. She was the opposite of Vera, who didn’t hire anyone to take care of the children or take much care of them herself. So the nanny sat in the shade for appearances while Adeline watched her own children. Julian had gone for a swim at the club while Brigitte napped. Oakes was somewhere. He couldn’t be heard for once. The whistle buoy was quiet, too. It was a hot, still day, the children the only ones moving. A sailboat tried to tack. It heeled, it sat—one of the boys from the club would have to go tow it in.

“There she is.” Lillian pointed to the far end of the lawn, where Bea had appeared from between the trees that lined the drive. Unless she was with the others, Bea always walked the drive, not through the orchard. Around her neck she wore Ira’s binoculars, which she had begun carrying all the time now, claiming she was looking at the whistle buoy, and sometimes birds. She had left early this morning, when she heard that Lillian was coming, and Ira was surprised to see her back. He guessed she might have run into Julian, and fled.

“There she is,” he agreed.

“I don’t know why Albert couldn’t grace her with a visit.”

“He’s coming tomorrow.”

“Why not today? It’s Sunday, for God’s sake. Mph.”

“It’s very hard for Julian,” Ira said. “Bea. How she’s changed. He still won’t admit that she doesn’t play. He comes home expecting her to be sixteen.”

Lillian turned to face him.

“And Bea. She still has a crush on him, you know.”

Lillian’s red mouth fell open sarcastically, a mockery of a mouth falling open. “You busybody man. Of course she doesn’t.”

Ira nearly shouted, She does! He wanted to wring her neck. But his insistence would do Bea no good. What did he need Lillian to know for anyway? Company, he supposed. Another elder. He was torn between his son’s happiness—that beautiful wife, their first baby due soon, the boy settled in a good if uninspired job at the Post—and his niece’s, which was as elusive as Julian’s was evident. He wanted Bea to have something she wanted. He found himself wondering in odd moments: whom did he love more? He knew his loyalty should be with his son. The fact that it wasn’t that simple Ira blamed on his brother, who was not even here for the Fourth of July, who said he had to go sailing with clients in Boston Harbor to “seal a deal.” Even his language was rote, as if he’d stopped actually thinking. Forget feeling. At this point Henry had all but abandoned Bea here.

“She’s happy,” Lillian said, and Ira almost felt bad for her. She might have gone sailing, too, one presumed.

Bea walked across the lawn with her hand above her eyes, the sun glinting off the top of her head. Her hair was not slicked back as usual. Since her cousins’ arrival she had let it puff into its natural state, which at first Ira interpreted as a sign of comfort, even confidence, but now, as the days wore on, saw as a kind of giving up. She wandered, lost. She flinched every time the whistle buoy called.

“You know, it might be good for you to try to walk, just a little.” Lillian’s hand clapped Ira’s knee and bounced off. He could see her surprise at his boniness, though she tried to hide it in a brave smile. “You could lean on me,” she said cheerfully. “I can help you.”

She was being honest. Ira could see this. He could also see that she was bored up here, that she wanted him to walk with her so she could go down and join the action, have a good kvell over Brigitte’s baby, aggravate Bea. It was impossible, looking straight into Lillian’s dark, angling eyes, for Ira not to think of Vera. People said time eased grief, and it was true that Ira’s came less frequently now, but when it came, it was still a blow to his gut, a wave spitting his heart onto the shore.

They heard a loud grunt, then “Oh!” from the older boy and “Oh no!” from Adeline. Bea had collapsed on top of the older one, Jack, who had smashed into her as he ran for the ball. “Oh my goodness!” Adeline cried, running toward the heap of limbs. Lillian ran, too. In an instant, she was gone. Ira tensed as if to stand but stayed where he was, his pulse too quick even to try.

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Down below, in the grass, it wasn’t such a disaster. When her knees buckled at the boy’s force, Bea felt a queer joy unspool in her. The grass was soft, the boy underneath her slick with sweat. He gawked at her in fright and she laughed—her laughter pealed up from her ribs, opened her face, made her teeth ache with fresh air. Tentatively, Jack smiled back. Then everyone was running and shouting, Emma and Helen now, too, everyone converging, and the boy wiggled himself out from under her and fled, but not before Bea grabbed one of his calves and gave it a playful squeeze. At least she meant it to be playful—she could have lain there forever, holding that beautiful, strong muscle. But he wiggled and scrambled and she let him go, running toward his ball, as the women crowded above her, chirping madly, blocking out the sun.

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