Chapter 8 #2
There was a brief pause and then muted clapping led by Mr Matheson, standing next to the tomb. ‘Yes, Kynaston! Bravo!’ he called.
Elizabeth Finkelstein, along from Alice, leaned forward. ‘Wonderful,’ she said, her voice deep. ‘Kynaston, this is your finest hour. A series of poems is to come?’
‘Yes, linking a fiction running throughout,’ he said, sitting down, suddenly the expansive host, ladling out potatoes to himself, Betsy, Mrs Finkelstein, Mr Maynard, smiling and clinking his glass with Mrs Finkelstein’s as though they were at some medieval banquet.
‘I think you’ll like them, Elizabeth. The first is called “No One Cares about Daisy Buchanan”. ’
There was an astonished murmur, and a pause, and then Mrs Finkelstein said, ‘Wonderful! Of course! Wonderful, dear cousin Wilder.’
Alice did not clap along with the others.
She must have it wrong. Wilder Kynaston would not steal lines from her, a schoolgirl; she was arrogant for even thinking it. She looked up to see him looking at her.
‘You like it, Alice?’ he said, and he took an exaggerated, wolf-like chomp of his ham and potatoes.
‘Yes, I liked it all along,’ she said. She didn’t know how else to say it.
‘Couldn’t have done it without you, my dear,’ he said, waving a glass of cider at her.
‘I’m pleased to hear Alice has taken an interest in your writing,’ said Mrs Finkelstein. She looked carefully at her cousin, and then back to Alice. ‘She’s a clever young woman.’
‘A mind like a fox. Betsy, you and Bob raised a terrific kid,’ Wilder said and pressed Alice’s mother’s hand.
‘Aw, isn’t this fun,’ said June Cooper, who had been talking to Mr Maynard on her other side and now turned to their group.
She smiled at Alice, comfortable in her furs and smart blue raw-silk dress.
‘I look forward to it every year. Honest, American food.’ She helped herself to an ear of corn.
It was old and had brown squares dotted across it, like missing teeth.
Alice’s head rang with noise. She passed Mrs Cooper the butter. There was silence.
‘There’s smoke somewhere,’ Mrs Finkelstein remarked. ‘Where’s it coming from?’
‘There were riots in the city again last night,’ Mrs Cooper said, attacking her corn cob with relish.
She shrugged, wiping butter from her mouth.
‘The Puerto Ricans, cutting up rough again, crying wolf.’ She swallowed furiously.
‘The city’s in flames. It’s the coloureds, and the Puerto Ricans, and the Kennedys, you know. ’
‘It’s that Bobby Kennedy sucking up to them,’ said a small drab man further along the table.
‘It’ll all end in a war, I’m sure of it.
’ Mrs Cooper pushed the plate of potatoes toward Alice.
‘Have some, will you? It’s good stuff. This apple sauce is delicious.
You’re a clever girl, Alice, I hear. Elizabeth told me she’s been helping you out, that Wilder’s suggested you for Barnard – is that true? ’
Alice felt cold. She looked from left to right, unsure how to answer. ‘Not quite yet,’ she said, aware Wilder was listening. ‘I have to go there for an interview and a test tomorrow.’
‘Well, that’s exciting.’
Along from Wilder was Jack’s mother, Joan, smooth corn-coloured locks gathered in a twisted chignon the exact same shade as Jack’s hair. When Alice looked at her she very slowly turned her head away.
‘I hope so,’ said Alice.
‘If you’ve got the Kynastons on your side,’ said Mrs Cooper gaily, ‘you’ll get anything you want, my dear! I’m so glad it’s turning out all right for you, and your mom.’
The sun had begun to slip over the gravestones. The chill in the air was palpable. Alice suddenly knew she couldn’t stay. She stood up, pushing her chair backwards. It fell against Constance Guthrie, d. 1790, An Upright Woman.
‘Alice dear!’ said her mother. ‘Could you see if there’s any more mashed potato over by the brazier? For Wilder?’
‘I can’t, sorry.’ Alice pushed her chair in. ‘I have to go.’
‘Alice! Sit down,’ said her mother, laughing in a steely tone.
‘I really do have to go,’ Alice said. She didn’t know what else to say.
‘You will not!’ her mother hissed across the table. ‘I don’t know what’s gotten into you this supper but you’re sitting there like someone just doused you in water. Sit back down. And smile!’
Alice looked at her mother. She put her hand on her heart, and smiled at her. ‘I’m sorry, Mom.’ She shook her head, hastening away as fast as she could down the steps that led on to the sidewalk, which was a couple of yards below the level of the cemetery, the road sunk down in between the graves.
When Wilder came to find her, she was leaning against the wall, panting.
‘You all right, Alice?’ he said.
She looked up at him. ‘I’m not sure. I can’t breathe.’
‘Come and sit down.’ He put his hand on her shoulder, but she shook it off.
‘Leave me be,’ she said.
‘What’s up?’
‘What’s up?’ She laughed. ‘You fixed it for me to get a place at Barnard. You want me out of the way, now your book is getting published. Because you stole my poem.’
He laughed and rubbed his face. ‘Oh dear, that again. Alice, it’s not your poem.’
‘You know it is. You know I gave you those lines, those ideas.’ She wiped her wet face clumsily with her palms. ‘How could you?’
They were down in the hollowed-out lane, the cemetery raised high above them.
The lane was the one that carts and people and carriages had trundled up and down for almost two centuries.
The sounds from the dinner above them floated over to her.
Wilder leaned over and licked a tear from her cheekbone, his teeth grazing her skin.
She was so startled she couldn’t react, not immediately.
He gave a snuffling, grunting sound, and his lips moved down her cheek.
She could smell cider and rye whiskey on him. Sweat, something else. Then he stopped.
‘We’re not so different, are we?’ he said, smiling at her, and continued trailing feathery kisses toward her mouth. As his wet, warm, large tongue licked her face, she gave a small gasp and pushed her hand against his chest. He did not move.
‘It’s your tears. I’m tasting your tears, Alice, tasting them away, honey.’
He moved his tongue into her mouth and she stiffened, and cried out, and he pressed against her, so that his mouth covered hers and she could not make a sound. His teeth clashed against hers. He was stronger than her. Much stronger.
‘Stop!’ she tried to call out, but it was like being trapped. His right hand roamed over her body, then under her skirt, over her panties – he cupped her, squeezed her thighs hard, like she was a steer and it was market day. But his mouth stayed on hers, his tongue moving, pushing into her.
‘We’re the same, you and I,’ he said, breaking off for a second, spittle drenching her face. ‘I hoped you’d – I hoped you’d like it, Alice.’ He was panting. He had a glassy, far-off look in his eye.
‘What the hell,’ Alice tried to shout, but his mouth was on hers. She could not breathe.
When she remembered what to do, it was with a start.
She heard Dolores’s voice, cool in her ear, in her bedroom, when they’d been talking about a guy who’d put his hand up Dolores’s skirt one time in the city.
‘Twist their balls. Grab and twist, the harder the better, then just break away, Allie, break away.’
So Alice grabbed, as ferociously as she could, and his head jerked in shock, banging against hers so that her skull hit the stone wall of the cemetery. She twisted the handful she was holding as hard as possible, rage flooding her.
He yelped and swore. ‘You little bitch.’ He stepped back, bending over and breathing hard, his hair falling in his face.
‘Don’t touch me again,’ she said, sounding calm. ‘Don’t –’
Footsteps came from the ground above them; Alice felt a flood of relief that now it would be over, that she was safe. She looked up and saw her mother’s face, leaning down into the cutaway lane.
Her mother stared at her.
‘It’s all fine here, Betsy darling,’ Wilder said. He patted Alice’s shoulder, seemingly uncaring that her skirt was hoicked up around her waist, his shirt untucked. ‘Go back to the table.’
Betsy nodded. ‘Yes. Of course. If it’s all fine, that is.’
And she walked away.
‘You ought to be quiet now, my dear, and stop making such a fuss,’ Wilder said, turning to Alice, and he smiled, gathering himself together.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his forearm then with a pressed pocket square he pulled from his jacket, as if her wetness, her tears, were repulsive.
He grabbed his crotch area again, wincing. ‘Do you understand?’
‘You’re disgusting,’ she said, backing away from him. ‘Get away from me.’
‘I can’t,’ he said, with a laugh. ‘You silly girl, you talk about free love and understanding, so what’s a kiss? It’s nothing. What’s a few borrowed phrases here and there? They’re nothing. Elizabeth Finkelstein tells me she’s fixed the place at Barnard, and that’s all to the good –’
‘You bought me a place there,’ she said. ‘So my mom is even more grateful to you. And you’re in control.’
‘I didn’t buy you a place. Elizabeth mentioned you to me after the meeting and I said I’d write them a recommendation – my name carries some sway –’
He tainted everything. His mark was on everything.
‘They want me because of you. And her, telling them to take me.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. It doesn’t work like that.
However, you can make sure certain conversations …
happen. Elizabeth is my cousin and we have another cousin who happens to be dean of admissions.
So you might say we have some sway. The Kynastons endowed a chair when Barnard was founded.
We support women’s right to education. You’re a clever girl; you have a soul and a brain, but it needs training.
We’re almost family. And we’re the same. I’m an artist –’