The Living is Easy Read online

  Bart was still impressed by Mr. Binney’s sudden demise. “I remember Carter Binney when you couldn’t touch him with a ten-foot pole. And now my wife has to buy his daughter a dress to wear to his funeral.”

  “And it’s not a fine dress either,” said Cleo before Mr. Judson could ask her what it cost. “Mr. Binney ought to feel kind of bad that’s the best his daughter has to wear to his funeral.”

  “You should have come back to the store. I’m a man who’s careful with money, but I’m not mean. I never refuse when there’s need. And death is a time for drawing together.” He lay on his back again, staring up at the ceiling. “So Binney kicked the bucket, and you bought his daughter a cheap black dress. I guess there’s a lesson there for us all. It don’t do for a man to walk too proud. It isn’t what you make. It’s what you save. It’s easy to throw your money around, but it’s hard on the family you leave behind.”

  She said defensively: “Mr. Binney didn’t throw his money around. He gave his children a wonderful raising. My opinion is it’s better to give your child a good foundation than to save for his future. For the matter of that, Mr. Binney didn’t expect to die a poor man. He thought he had a sound business for his children to inherit. He was just as surprised when he failed as you would be if you failed. You follow your own advice about walking proud. Nothing is certain in life except death.”

  “People have been eating since God made the world,” Bart said profoundly. “An automobile can get you places same as a horse, only faster. A readymade suit can cover a man same as a tailor-made suit, only cheaper. But nothing man is apt to think of can substitute for fruit and vegetables. That’s what I sell, and I sell the choicest. Man thinks a lot of his stomach, and he wants the best that money can buy.”

  “You told me yourself,” Cleo reminded him, “that some of the men in the market are beginning to worry about the chain stores.”

  “They’re borrowing trouble,” Bart said promptly. “Those chains will stick to tea and canned goods. Some of them tried to sell people potatoes, and people complained about the quality. Quality counts. Those chains can’t compete with the independents. People aren’t going to take their trade from a meat market owned by a butcher who takes pride in his product and give it to a cheap chain store run by somebody who don’t even own the block he’s chopping on, and don’t even care. Same with fruit. Same with everything else that don’t come in a can. And the independent retailers are going to stick by the independent wholesalers they know by reputation.”

  Cleo said crossly, “Now start on yourself and start boasting.”

  He said earnestly: “It ain’t boasting to say that when you buy a stem of bananas from Bart Judson, you know you’re buying the best the market offers. And I didn’t get that reputation by sitting down. I got it by tending bananas like you would tend a baby. I sent in my bid today for the Navy Yard contract. No reason I shouldn’t get it same as last year. Give me a few more years of the business I’ve been doing in the last few years, and we’ll be near enough to Easy Street to see the smoke coming out of the chimneys. Just you help me scrape and save, Cleo, and the day will come when you can spend.”

  “Mr. Judson,” she cried, “can’t you see? I’m not old. I’m twenty-nine. You’re middle-aged. You’ve learned patience. To me the race is to the swift. I won’t tag along behind. Your god is money. It isn’t mine. To me money’s just something to exchange for something else. I wasn’t born to pinch and sacrifice. Don’t try to make me over.”

  His voice was soothing, fatherly. “You aren’t settled yet, Cleo. Judy’s so grown for her age, she’s not much care, and the Binney girl relieves you of a lot of that. But when you have another child, you’ll have your hands full, and your mind won’t be so free to think up things to want. By the time the little shaver is sensible size, you’ll be older and quieter in your mind.”

  “Mister Nigger,” said Cleo coldly, “who told you I was going to have a little shaver?”

  “You address me by name. You told me yourself sitting right in my store.”

  “I beg to differ, Mister Nigger. You told me.”

  “Cleo, don’t you start that again. Why in the name of God did you take money from me to go to the doctor if you knew it was a fool’s errand?”

  “I never refuse money when it’s offered me,” she said imperturbably.

  “Cleo,” he insisted darkly, “what about your sister Lily? What about telling me she could help you run that house while you were carrying your baby?”

  “I would never,” said Cleo indignantly, “talk about carrying an unborn child in the presence of Mr. Christianson. All I have to say to that is, you’re a liar.”

  “Maybe those weren’t your words exactly, but that was the sense,” Bart pursued.

  “All right,” said Cleo resignedly. “That house has ten rooms. I’m one woman. I’m your wife. But you don’t care if I do the work of a horse, just so long as you can win some old fool argument about who said what.” She felt concerned. Her voice shook with fury. “Thea’s heartbroken in Cambridge by her father’s body, my own sister, Lily, is starving to death in New York. But that’s not enough misery for you. You won’t be contented until you drive me crazy with questions.”

  “Now, Cleo,” he said in a worried voice, “no need to take on. Just calm yourself. You work yourself up so every time I try to talk to you. Man gets so he’d rather let things slide than see you get so excited.”

  “But you waked me out of a sound sleep to pick me like you’d pick a bone. Now I’ll lie awake the rest of the night.” Seeing the face of Mr. Binney floating before me, she thought wretchedly.

  “You put your mind on what furniture you want, and think about a real nice Mission parlor set. Bet you’ll drop to sleep right off.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  His voice was beaming with benevolence. “You meet me tomorrow, and you can start choosing.”

  “Oh,” she said again. She was unprepared to tell him about the furniture the Duchess had given her. Mr. Binney’s death had kept her from getting a likely story together. She had tried to turn her mind away from everything remindful of it. Yet if she did not tell Mr. Judson now, she might find her house filled with Mission furniture, and Simeon’s sacrifice would have netted her nothing.

  She said as a feeler, “I know where I can get some used furniture for nothing, beautiful pieces good as new, enough to fill a whole house.”

  “How much do you call nothing?” he asked cautiously.

  Until he put it into her mind, she hadn’t thought about making any side money. She drew a deep breath and took the plunge. “Two hundred dollars, and worth a small fortune.”

  “Who’s selling it, and why?” And he hated having to ask. She would launch into a long story, and he would be lost in its intricacies. When he had found his way to some fact, he would be swamped in the confusion of what had gone before. A man had to have the patience of Job to live with Cleo. But she was the woman he wanted beside him when he lay dying. God help him, he could not help himself.

  “Oh, it’s been a day,” she said dramatically. “I haven’t told you half. After I exchanged that dress, I went to see this woman. Well, it starts with one day last week when Thea — poor Thea — was telling me about this white friend of hers. A lovely girl from a lovely family. Well, she got infatuated with a man who wasn’t free to marry her. He set her up in a fine house and furnished it like a palace. Now he’s dead, and she’s decided to begin a new life. She’s getting rid of everything that reminds her of the past.”

  She briefly paused for second wind and a second stoking. “And that,” she fished about, “is where the furniture comes in. She offered it to Thea for what it would cost to cart it away. But Thea and Cole will live with his mother when they’re married. So when I called Thea to rest her mind about her dress being delivered tomorrow, I asked her for this woman’s address. You’d been so good about Lily, I wanted some way to thank you. I thought this woman might up and give me her stuff —
since she was so bent on getting shed of it. But I couldn’t out and beg for it. So I offered her two hundred dollars. And when she accepted, I couldn’t back out.”

  Bart gave a disapproving grunt. “Seems to me I smell a gyp. Some women are pretty slick customers. I’ll go there tomorrow to see for myself.”

  “What in God’s name do you know about furniture? All you know about is bananas. And where are you going, pulling in that white woman’s house? You know how skittish white women are. She’d swear you’d come there to rob or worse. Just leave things to me.”

  “I don’t like all this monkey business,” he protested. “I’ve almost a mind to tell you to take two hundred dollars and buy some solid Mission furniture. Only that wouldn’t fill a house. This way it’s all smack done. You get that stuff as soon as possible and see the last of that woman. Come down tomorrow and get the cash. I don’t want to give you a check. Woman like that would add an aught, and skip the city with two thousand dollars of my hard-earned money. I don’t sleep on my feet when I’m dealing with shady characters.”

  She heaved a long sigh of relief. If you could tell a bold enough lie, you could get anyone to believe you.

  “Looka here,” he said suddenly.

  She really did jerk her head around, trying to read his expression.

  “There’s always a catch. We’ll still have to buy more bedroom suites. Don’t reckon she ran a rooming house.”

  “I saw a servant or two. I don’t suppose they sleep standing up. There’ll be beds enough for the bedrooms,” she said tartly. “I’m not turning my house into a sleeping stall the very second I cross the threshold. I want a little time to feel like it’s mine before I turn it over to strangers. You don’t know how I brag to my sisters about the living you give me. Just now I was lying here wishing it wasn’t just Lily was coming. Your family’s right here. You don’t know how it feels to lie awake wondering about your sisters scattered all over the globe.”

  “If they were in trouble, you’d hear,” he consoled her. “Like you heard from Lily.”

  “That’s a man,” she said bitterly. “You mean when they’re dead, I’ll be notified, and you’ll give me the fare to go to their funerals. But while we’re all alive and young, and the living is easy, I can’t invite my own sisters to spend one week in my house.”

  “Cleo,” Bart thundered, “you know I’ve never said your sisters weren’t welcome. Up to now we’ve had no place to sleep them. I don’t care if they come for a week, even two. I’m not pretending to be a poor man. I can feed all your family for a week, two weeks, for that matter. I’ll foot the bill for their stay.”

  “I’ll write Serena tomorrow,” she said dreamily. “And Charity, too,” she added hastily. “It doesn’t seem possible we’ll all be together again.”

  “And the minute they leave,” Bart reminded her, “we’ll put an ad in The Clarion. Winter’s my slack season. I don’t want to be caught in that big house with three or four empty bedrooms that we could use the money from.”

  “You leave that to me,” she said peacefully. “There won’t be an empty room in that house. You’ll see.”

  He yawned. “Well, I guess I’m talked out.”

  She yawned. “Me, too.” She felt relaxed and satisfied. The little waves began to lap, the silvery voices of the South began their siren song. Down she went into her well of remembering . . . down . . .

  “Cleo?” His voice was soft, with the little hunger behind it. His body rolled toward her.

  She raced like a deer for the darkness. And slept.

  CHAPTER 15

  THE REUNION had been a thing to remember forever. Lily had come first with six-year-old Victoria, or rather Vicky had been the wise hen with the bewildered chick. It was she who had taken charge of the tickets, asked the conductor — with Lily’s elbow jabbing her every time he passed — how much longer it was to Boston, fetched Lily water for her seasick pill, smacked her way through the shoe box of sandwiches that she couldn’t coax Lily to look at, let alone eat, and lent a protective hand whenever they rocketed through a tunnel or rode over water. Many times Lily gave up the ghost, and was more wretched than relieved to find herself still in the land of the living.

  Victor had put her on the Boston train, and both of them remembered how she had balked on that other occasion, but neither thought to read any warning in that early reluctance. He looked at his wife and daughter, and felt very proud. They were dressed in the best that he could afford, everything new from head to toe. There had been a lot of basement-store buying, but the result was a handsome front of furbelows and frills. That the other clothes in the ancient suitcase could not match this showy splendor wouldn’t come to light if Lily and Vicky didn’t overstay.

  There were twenty dollars in Lily’s purse, to spend on foolishness, Victor grandly instructed. It was borowed money, but this was Lily’s first holiday, and he wanted to send her off in style. Such a sum was not to be sneezed at, he was happily confident. It would allow his wife to make a nice splash, and not have to stay in her rich sister’s shade. A week or so ought to see Lily back before she formed the habit of throwing money around. Whatever the trouble was with her sister, it shouldn’t take too long to settle it. Women’s matters were mostly tempests in teapots. In any case, Lily knew how he felt about finding her always at home. She wouldn’t stay a second longer than she had to.

  He only hoped that sister of hers wouldn’t fill her head with ideas. Every time Cleo wrote, Lily somehow seemed different. She never would read the letters aloud, which made him suspect that Cleo was writing things she shouldn’t. Probably saying he wasn’t good enough for her sister. Well, by all the signs, Lily was satisfied. She never looked at another man. Acted kind of scared of them, truth to tell. Victor knew without anyone having to tell him that Lily wouldn’t leave him for the best man on earth.

  When he watched the train pull away, with Lily’s and Vicky’s faces pressed against the glass, he felt the greatest and queerest wrench. He found quite suddenly that he was the kind of man who could not live without a wife.

  Down home Charity was packing a borrowed suitcase, putting her poor best on top, so that she and Penny could make a quick change just before they crossed the line and moved up front with the white folks.

  The night was outside, and the lamp was soft in the room, shrouding the leaning walls, masking the unsightliness of all the mean places, the buckling floor boards, the rag-stuffed windows, the chairs and tables that had to be lashed into usableness with rope.

  There wasn’t any use denying it. Ben was a mellow, loving man. No way in the world to call him a hard-working husband. Ben liked the bed with a woman beside him. The days in the fields were just a long wishing for night to fall, just a deep dreaming of women’s bodies that slowed his hands and feet, that made the overseer speak sharp, that cut his pay, that too often cost his job. Maybe he wasn’t the kind of man a woman should tie herself to. Maybe Cleo was right in everything she wrote. But how tear out of your heart the thing that made it beat?

  “You going to miss me, Ben?”

  He looked at her, the softness, the roundness, the flush stealing up her cheeks, the love trembling on her lips.

  “What do you think?” he asked lazily. And there was that thing in his husky voice, that worrisome thing that melted her limbs, that made her wonder how she was going to stand the time away from him.

  “You going to be true to me, Ben?” There was always some woman with her heart out for him. Wasn’t easy to look at him and look away. He carried seduction in his eyes, his voice, his slow caressing smile.

  He said with soft taunting, “How long you figure to be away?”

  “You know I’ll be back quick as I can. You know I ain’t really wanting to go. But Lily’s in trouble, and Cleo’s letter would trouble my conscience if I didn’t heed it.”

  “That Cleo and her letters! That Miss Big Dog!” The words were spat. “Wouldn’t surprise me if it ain’t her back of the bust-up of Lily and her
man. I’m giving you warning. You stay out of her clutches. I wouldn’t put it past her to turn a baby against its mother’s milk.”

  “Ben, don’t talk so loud. You’ll wake Penny. Don’t talk so harsh. You sound like you’re jealous of my sister. It ain’t natural for a man to be jealous of a woman. Cleo’s our eldest. It’s right she sets herself over us.”

  “She sets herself over me, that’s what sticks in my craw. You’d think I wasn’t half a man the way she messes in my family business. You’d think the living I give you wasn’t good enough.” And now there was embarrassment behind his rancor. “It’s the best I know how.”

  She closed the suitcase. She would strap it later. There was time for that. It was too hurting a thing to see this god of love needing assurance of his importance to her. How could she want what Cleo had, a middle-aged man? How could she shame her heart with envy of Cleo’s quiet nights?

  She crossed the room to Ben, and put her arms tight around him, feeling the quivering begin in her body, and the breathlessness riding her words.

  “No Mr. Judson ever come into my life for me to choose between him and you. Nobody ever offered me a living like Cleo’s for me to chose between it and mine. But what I have is part of me, is blood and bone. I couldn’t no more wish I had different than I could wish I’d never been born to love you.”

  He swooped her up in his arms, and for a moment only, his face bent away from hers when he blew out the lamp. In the warm dark their bodies merged in perfect oneness, and their island of the passionate night was rich in everything for their needs.

  Afterward, she lay in the languor of love, and thought of the wonder that was over, and said in the stillness, “Ben, you’ll be true to me?”

  And again his husky teasing answer, “Depends how long you figure to be away.”

  Her breath caught in a little sob. He did not want to make her cry, but he did not want to lie to her either. He could no more have denied his desire for women than he could have denied his belief in God. There was no way for him to say how long the remembrance of this last night together would sustain him. He loved her. He had married her, and he had not married the others. Of all the women he had known, he wanted her most. But there were untried women who might surpass her. He did not want to know.