Chapter 8 #3
What he had in mind was something more sophisticated.
He spent enough of his time with the upper crust to know the kinds of things that impressed them.
Old wealth impressed them, but he didn’t have that.
Excessive wealth impressed them, but he didn’t have that either.
What he had was access to some of the finest tourmaline in the world, and while it wasn’t worshipped as diamonds, rubies, and sapphires were, he had become deeply enough involved in the gem trade to know that jewelers were beginning to branch out.
Tourmaline was a rising commodity. He could deal with it and other gemstones as well.
He wanted to build something exclusive and elegant, an establishment that would be to jewelry what Dior was to clothing, Gucci to leather, Chanel to perfume.
Patricia thought he was dreaming far too narrow a dream, but he knew that given the choice between one of their plans or nothing, she would opt for his against Eugene’s insistence on the status quo.
In the meantime, she grew more and more dependent on him, and he encouraged it. When they were in bed, she clung. He wouldn’t have stood it from another woman. God only knew Hillary didn’t.
In the end, Patricia’s dependence brought things to a head in a way he would never have dreamed.
She wanted him, and with his anger toward Eugene at a high during those few months following the altercation over Cutter, he wanted her right back.
So they were careless. Rather than waiting until Eugene was out of town, John came home from work early one day, pointed Patricia toward the bedroom, and made love to her long and hard.
Eugene found them there. Whether it was coincidence or whether he’d begun to suspect something, John never knew. Apparently, he had finished a meeting, learned that John had left for the day, and followed him home.
The look on his face when he opened the door and discovered what was taking place wasn’t quite what John would have expected.
There was neither humiliation nor defeat.
He stared at the two in the bed, John lounging with measured nonchalance while Patricia jumped up and frantically began adjusting the clothes she’d never completely removed, and his features twisted into open disgust. “How long has this been going on?”
“It’s not what you think,” Patricia cried as she pushed her skirt down from her waist and turned her back to return her breasts to her bra. “It’s not at all what you think.”
But he was looking at John. “How long?”
John shrugged. His heart was pounding far louder than it had earlier, at the moment of climax. “A while.”
“You scum.”
Fumbling now with the buttons of her blouse, Patricia tried again. “Gene, I can explain. I know this must look fishy—”
“If I’m scum,” John said, “what does that make you?”
“Nothing. No relation. I’ve had it. You’re out.”
“Don’t say that, Gene! John is crucial to the company. He wasn’t feeling well, that’s all, and—”
“I don’t want to hear it,” Eugene said.
He didn’t look at her once, but kept his eyes on John, who was beginning to worry. In all those times that he’d imagined the pleasure of telling his father that he was screwing his wife, it had never occurred to him that he’d end up on the street. But that was just what Eugene was saying.
“I want you out. Out of this house, out of my life. Today.”
“Gene, no—”
“I don’t think so,” John said, ignoring her to answer his father. He drew himself slowly up on the bed. “I’m the one who’s been holding things together both at the office and here, while you’ve been playing pool and poker with the guys up in Timiny Cove. You owe me.”
“Seems to me,” Eugene said with the briefest of glances at Patricia, “you’ve been paid.”
“Not enough.”
“John, explain it to him,” Patricia pleaded.
But John wasn’t listening to her. What was happening, what had happened, was between him and his father more than it had ever related to her.
Wrapping the sheet around his waist, he rose from the bed.
“I want more. If you want me out of this house, I’ll go.
I’ll even resign from the company. But it’ll cost you. ”
“You get nothing,” Eugene barked.
“It’ll cost you a lot. I want money.”
“You get shit.”
“If I leave, I’ll take most of the management with me.
I haven’t been twiddling my thumbs all these years.
You may have bent over backward to treat the miners like gold, but I’m the one who took the time to see that the movers and shakers around the office were greased.
They’ll come with me. One word and you’ll lose them.
There’s your chain”—he snapped his fingers—“broken in a minute. It’ll take you a while to get it fixed. ”
“By God, you’re arrogant as ever. Well, it won’t work this time,” Eugene informed him, flushed with rage.
“If anyone wants to leave, I’ll give him a push out the door.
I place loyalty above lots of other things.
If their loyalty’s to you, you can have them.
” His jaw grew even tighter. “I’m going out now.
By the time I get back, I want you gone. ”
“Gene, you can’t—” Patricia began, running after him.
“It’s done!”
John didn’t move, couldn’t move, but listened while Patricia tried to stop Eugene.
She followed him down the stairs, her voice growing frantic in a way that mirrored the feeling in John’s stomach.
He heard the slamming of doors—once, twice, again—interspersed with Patricia’s pleas and Eugene’s terse replies.
Still John didn’t move, not even when there was a final loud slam and then total silence.
For an interminable time he stood there in his father’s bedroom wearing nothing but a sheet, fighting the panic that brought a cold sweat to his lip.
There was a feeling of déjà vu in it—the panic, the fear, the sense of having the floor knocked out from under his feet.
He’d felt that way when his mother died, and he hadn’t intended ever to feel it again.
But there it was. His future hung in a limbo that was the antithesis of the satisfaction he’d expected.
Stunned, he let the sheet slip to the floor and reached for his clothes. He was pulling on his pants when he heard the first of the sirens. Life in the city was filled with sirens, and since he was embroiled in an emergency of his own, he ignored them.
With his shirt buttoned, though hanging loose, he scooped his tie and jacket from the floor, drove a hand through his hair, and went to his own room long enough to drop his things.
He needed a drink. He couldn’t think straight.
He had to decide whether to stay or go, what to say or do, how to handle Eugene.
It wasn’t possible that his father had meant all he’d said.
He was angry and upset. A man didn’t just write off his son—his vice president—that way.
Mired in confusion, he was halfway down the stairs before he felt the draft from the door. Marcy had opened it and was leaning out, looking down Mt. Vernon in the direction of Charles. The sirens were louder than ever.
John wasn’t sure what drew him to the door, whether it was a premonition, a need for diversion, or simple curiosity. But he found himself looking over Marcy’s shoulder at a jumble of blinking red lights.
“Fire?” he asked.
Marcy shook her head. It was a minute before she said, “The lights are in the middle of the street. Looks more like an accident.”
John felt odd. “Where’s Patricia?”
In the pause that followed he was convinced that Marcy knew precisely what had been going on behind her mistress’s closed doors so many afternoons and evenings. But he was past the point of caring. “Is she in the living room?”
Eyes on the blinking lights, Marcy shook her head.
“The kitchen?”
“Isn’t she with your father?”
“I don’t know. Is she?”
“I heard them talkin’, then they were gone. Maybe they’re down there stuck in that mess.”
John’s heart was pounding again, not so loudly, but heavily. “Where’s Pam?”
“At her friend Cindy’s. She’ll be home b’fore long.”
He turned back into the house and called, “Patricia?” When there was no answer, he went to the foot of the stairs. He was sure he’d have known if she’d gone back up after Eugene had left, but he had to check. “Patricia?” The only answer was another siren.
Swearing softly, he grabbed his coat from the closet and threw it on as he trotted down the stone steps outside.
The closer John got to the lights, the faster he walked. There was something too familiar about the blue of the car that was crushed between the Mack truck that had rammed it and the unyielding brick wall of the corner drugstore.
“Jesus,” he breathed as he wove through the emergency vehicles. “Jesus.”
“Hey, fella,” the police officer called, “better stay back.”
“I know them,” he managed to say. Breathing hard, he watched as the truck was hauled back from the wall.
“You know who they are?” the policeman asked, but John couldn’t take his eyes from the mess that had once been his father’s car.
“What happened?” he whispered.
“Looks like they came barreling down Mt. Vernon and either skidded into the intersection or ran a red. Who are they?”
“John!” came a breathless cry from a short distance away.
He looked over to see Pam running up, her eyes wide and curious.
“Cindy’s parents dropped me two blocks down so they could turn off before they hit this.
What happened?” She leaned sideways, then stood on her tiptoes in an attempt to see past the police cars and ambulances.
Swallowing hard, John put an arm around her shoulder. It was the first time he had ever touched her in what could have been called a protective way. Turning her away, he began to lead her quickly up the hill.
“Hey, bud,” the policeman called, “we need an ID.”
John ignored him. He held Pam’s shoulder, squeezing tightly each time she tried to look back. He wasn’t sure why he was protecting her; she had to know sooner or later. But later seemed better, when things were cleaned up and he knew who was hurt and how badly.
She tried to look back again, but he forced her forward. He didn’t have to look back to see the crush of that car against the wall; it was a vivid picture etched in his mind. If he could save Pam that, it would go a long way toward easing his guilt.
“What happened there?” she asked, suddenly more frightened than curious.
“An accident. You don’t want to see. I’ll take you up to the house, then go back. I’ll tell you about it later.”
Pam didn’t argue, but she must have known that his behavior was strange. Once more she tried to look back over her shoulder. When he wouldn’t allow it, she asked, “Is my mother home?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Is Daddy?”
“No.”
In a tone that was as unsteady as any he’d ever heard from her, she asked, “Do you know where they are?”
“I’m not sure. I’ll find out.” He quickened his step and hers along with it. Marcy was still at the door, too far away to see the car or its color or, mercifully, its contents. “Take her inside,” he ordered, then jogged back down the street.
He arrived in time to see Patricia’s broken body being put into an ambulance for a short, high-speed ride to the hospital. It was a while before Eugene was freed from the wreck. He too was put into an ambulance, but the ride was less rushed. He had died the instant the car hit the wall.