The Headmaster's Wife(43)

He likes this, her obvious happiness. He runs a hand through his hair. “Well, nothing is done now but…”

“What does this mean?”

He laughs. “No more living in a dorm, for one.”

“Oh, that will be nice.”

“Yes,” he says. “Won’t it? A fireplace? A big house? Are you ready?”

“I’m going to explode.”

“You can’t say anything.”

She shook her head. “Who am I going to tell?”

“I know you won’t.”

“This is so amazing.”

“And I didn’t even tell you about the salary.”

“Tell me,” she says. “Tell me.”

“Put it this way: Maybe we can get a place at the beach.”

Elizabeth jumps to him then, jumps the few steps that stood between them, and he takes her in his arms. He gives her a stiffish hug, but it doesn’t matter to her. Nothing can get in the way of her happiness. Who wants this more, she or he? Before she can decide, Ethan is there.

“Wash your hands,” she says to Ethan. “We need to leave for dinner.”

Walking across the expanse of lawn to the dining hall and then, in the hall itself, sitting at their normal faculty table, she can hardly focus. She looks over to where her in-laws hold court at the most prestigious table at the far end, overlooking the entire room. She imagines sitting there. On the way back to the dorm, they pass the headmaster’s house. She has been by it thousands of times, inside it hundreds of times, but this time is different, and while the three of them walk past, she stares into the lit windows and in her mind she is moving through that great house, sitting in front of the large fireplace with the logs replenished daily by the maintenance staff, hosting parties in the high-ceilinged rooms. She looks over at her husband and for the first time in a while she sees him as she imagines others see him—this man who aspires to greatness, a man elevated above his peers, and she is proud of him.

The following Monday, Arthur spends the entire afternoon with the trustees. She knows what they are discussing. She has no idea how it is going. By four she leaves the library and gets home, but there is still no word from him. She walks over to Fuller Hall, where one of the dorm parents is a woman her age who teaches math. Her name is Karen, and if she is surprised to see Elizabeth she doesn’t say anything.

“Betsy,” she says. “Come in.”

“You have a cigarette?”

“I didn’t know you smoked.”

“Today I do.”

The students are all at athletics, and the two women smoke like teenagers. They open one of the apartment windows that looks out toward the river and they stick their heads out and smoke quickly and frantically, listening for voices coming around the corner of the dorms.

Karen says, “Everything okay?”

Elizabeth blurts it out. “Arthur might be the next headmaster.”

“Really?”

“Yes. For real. We may know today.”

Karen looks over at her. Their faces are inches away. “Well, that’s wonderful,” she says, though Elizabeth is not sure she means it. Something in the way she says it, the slightest hint of an edge. She knows many of the other faculty members don’t love Arthur. They admire him, sure, but there is always the sense that he hasn’t had to work as hard for his.

“No one is supposed to know,” Elizabeth says.

“I won’t tell anyone,” says Karen.

“You’re a good friend.”

“Oh, we’re not friends.”

Elizabeth turns to Karen, and the hurt, or perhaps the surprise, must show on her face. They are close enough to kiss. Karen says, “Oh, shit. I can’t believe I just said that.”

“It’s okay.”

“Really. I’m sorry, Betsy. That was stupid.”

“Seriously, it’s okay.”

“Fuck,” Karen says. “That was unartful. What I meant to say—oh, shit. I don’t know. I guess that you have always been aloof. Somewhat, you know? I mean, not in a bad way. Just that you keep to yourself. I should just shut up.”

Elizabeth takes a final drag on her cigarette. She looks over at Karen and then out to the river. “No,” she says, “you are right about me.”

“I didn’t mean anything.”

“I know you didn’t.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

Karen throws her cigarette stub out into the yard. Someone will think it belonged, illegally, to a student. It flips twice in the air before settling on the hard grass. “I still feel like a heel.”

“Don’t.”

“Okay.”

Returning to her apartment, she can tell from the moment Arthur looks at her—there is no hiding it—that he will be named headmaster. He makes a token play at fooling her, but even he knows it is no good. Instead he stands there with a shit-eating grin on his face and he just shrugs.

“It’s done,” he says.

Later, before they go to the dining hall for dinner, she takes a walk along the river. This is in April. The river has receded from its heights of a month ago, when it overflowed its banks tumescent from snowmelt. It is one of the first warm days of spring, and from the lacrosse fields behind her she can hear the cries of girls running up and down. She follows the river from where it runs narrow and flush to the banks to where it widens and flattens before heading into New Hampshire.