Leaving Lucy Pear(57)

Two girls and a boy walked out of the perry shack and stared. It struck Josiah then that he might be going mad, that he should reverse the Duesenberg, drive to the quarry, ask Sam to pour him a whiskey, and get to work. But one of the girls shouted, “Mama!” and the boy ran toward the car, reaching a hand toward the freshly waxed hood so that Josiah was obliged to jump out, crying, “Careful, son, it’s hot!” the words tumbling him into a further valley of dissemblance. Then Emma was there, her body centered in the doorway, blocking any view, her green eyes lit with warning. He had not seen her in nearly three weeks.

“Mr. Story. Can I help you?”

“Good morning.”

“It’s not even seven o’clock.”

“I realize,” Josiah said, though he hadn’t. He heard himself say, “I’m sorry for the . . . surprise. But I may have a new position for you. Beginning today.” He walked toward the door, drawn helplessly to her pink gums and small breasts even as her progeny scampered around him, the boy yanking on Josiah’s trouser leg.

“I’m afraid I’m not available, Mr. Story. My husband needs my care.”

“Of course,” Josiah said, barely listening, only wanting to be closer to her.

“I’m afraid—”

“Emma? Who’s there?”

“No one!” Emma called back into the house. “Just Mr. Story.”

“Just? Bring him in!”

Emma flared her nostrils at Josiah. Then he was inside the Murphy house, his head close to the ceiling, his whole clumsy, stupid self very high above Mr. Murphy, who appeared, in the panicky, half-blind way Josiah took him in, like an old bear. Josiah didn’t look at the man below his massive beard. “My apologies, Mr. Murphy . . .”

“Nonsense. After all you’ve done for Emma.”

Josiah waited. Would there be a punch line? But Mr. Murphy looked sincere. Josiah laid a hand, palm up, between them, a cautious offering. “I’ve found another position that might be perfect for her.”

“I’m grateful, Mr. Story, but as I said, Mr. Murphy . . .”

“Emma,” Roland said. “You can’t turn it down.”

“Rolly . . .”

“You’ll take it, Emma.”

Emma’s eyes had gone gray with anger. Josiah looked away and found the boy at his side, staring up at him. “Mister, my daddy losed his leg we don’t know where it is or if’n it’ll come back I wished for Santa Claus to bring it but now is only summer but maybe you know where it is or do you know Santa to tell him to come early?” He inhaled as if he’d been at the bottom of a pond. Josiah smiled. Yes! he wanted to say. I know Santa. I am Santa! But the boy was being pulled outside by his sisters. “Take him swimming at the cove,” Emma called after them. “I’ll be right out,” she said, looking at Josiah’s feet.

He realized she meant for him to leave. “We’re much obliged,” Mr. Murphy said, and Josiah, with a tip of his hat, left. In the yard he watched the children grab up towels and thump the walls of the perry shack, calling, “Lucy! Lucy! Come to the cove!” At the one, glassless window, the dark girl came into view. “Johnny” hadn’t been to work since the Mendosa; she couldn’t go, Josiah realized, unless Emma went somewhere, too. The girl looked at Josiah now as if daring him to call her out, her brown eyes a collision of toughness and fear. Her ambivalence about his seeing her—the caution that had kept her in the shack when he arrived, and whatever urge now brought her to the window to stare at him—was so visible to Josiah, and so familiar, that he nodded. She nodded back, ever so slightly, then ran down the hill with the others.

? ? ?

“There is no job,” Emma said as Josiah maneuvered slowly down the hill, unable to take his eyes off her face in the rearview mirror.

“That may be true, but I can get you one.”

“He’s home. I can’t . . .”

“Can’t what? What are you talking about? I’m talking about a job.” He paused. He had no real desire to tease her, only to have her. “Susannah’s been home the whole time.”

“That’s for you to sort out.”

Josiah chose a narrow, nameless dirt road. Almost all the nameless roads led up into the woods until they narrowed to the point of disappearance, and this one did the same. He cut the engine, allowing Emma’s remark to sift through him, a lit coal finally landing in his dark, angry stomach. “I need you to do something for me,” he said.

Emma scoffed. “Really.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a scissors he’d grabbed on his way out of the house. He hadn’t been sure he would have the courage but here he was, waving them at her across the backseat.

“Careful! What are you doing?”

“Cut my hair.”

“No.”

“It’s a mess,” he said, pushing the scissors toward her. In fact his hair had finally grown to how he liked it, but it wasn’t Josiah Story for Mayor hair, and Susannah had told him yesterday that she would cut it today. But he was so angry at her he couldn’t bear the idea, so angry he was taunting her by having Emma cut it. Of course in all likelihood Susannah wouldn’t even notice, just as she hadn’t noticed he’d been driving around in his one-of-a-kind Duesenberg with his lover, bringing her to their bathhouse instead of to a hotel, running naked—he’d run naked, more than once!—back to his own bed, his prick not even dry. Susannah’s privilege finally their great equalizer, for it made her blind, and Josiah free.