The 158-Pound Marriage

id.

'Have a good dream,' Utch said. 'We're going to take a trip. Dream about that.'

'Who's going to take a trip?'

'You and Bart and me,' said Utch.

'Not Daddy?' Jack asked.

'No, not Daddy,' Utch said.

'Whatever you're thinking,' I said to her later, 'there's no need to involve the children, is there? If you want to get away from me, leave the children here. Go off by yourself for a while, if that's what you want.'

'You don't understand,' she said. 'I'm going to leave you.'

'Go ahead,' I said. 'But Jack and Bart stay here.'

It had been a wet spring, and a cool beginning to the summer, but the kids were happy to be out of school. When I took them to the University Club pool, I realized that the girl who followed after Jack; teasing him and allowing herself to be shoved in the pool, was Fiordiligi Winter. The scar that marred the knee of one lovely leg was the shape of a chicken's beak and the curious color of a trout's gills. I saw that Dorabella wore a bathing cap; probably her hair had not grown back. I didn't see whether Severin or Edith had brought them; I had a book with me, and I read it.

It was my fifth historical novel, just out, and I was angry at how it was being distributed - as children's literature! My publisher insisted it was not really children's literature and that I had nothing to be upset about; he told me it was being suggested for pre-teens and older. How they could have made such a blunder was beyond me. The book was called Joya de Nicaragua, and it was about refugee Cuban cigar growers, after Castro, nurturing Havana seeds on plantations in Nicaragua. The book was concerned only with the Cubans who had died in Nicaragua. Joya de Nicaragua is the brand name of a quality Nicaraguan cigar. My editor admitted to me that they weren't actually 'pushing' the book very hard; my other four historical novels hadn't sold very well; not one of them had been seriously reviewed. A self-fulfilling prophecy if I have ever heard one! And my department chairman had once again failed to list my book among the members' new publications. In fact, my chairman had confided to me that he considered my only publication to be a small article published years ago, a chapter excerpted from my PhD thesis. The thesis was unpublished; it was called 'The Application of Bergsonian Time to Clerical Fascism in Austria'. Joya de Nicaragua is a much better book.

When I brought the kids home from the pool, Utch had finished packing.

'See you in a quick while!' Bart said to me at the airport.

Jack, feeling grown up, wanted to shake hands.

After I'd come home and searched the house for signs of them which Utch might have left me, I discovered Utch had taken my passport with her. That would make it difficult for me to follow her right away.

I found her note pinned to the pillow that night. It was long and entirely in German. She knew very well that I wouldn't be able to read it. I picked over what few isolated words made some kind of sense, but it was clear that I needed a translator. One of the phrases was 'zuruck nach Wien'; I knew that meant 'back to Vienna'. Another word was 'Severin'. Who else had she meant for me to use as a translator? Of course she knew I couldn't ask just anybody who spoke the language; the note's contents might be embarrassing. Her intent was obvious.

In the morning I took the note to him. A summer morning. Severin and his daughters were in the kitchen, where he was packing a lunch for them to take to the beach with friends. There was a strange car in the driveway; the car was full of children and the woman driver, whom I didn't recognize, looked like the sort of idiot who could actually have fun in a car full of children. She seemed to think it was uproarious that Severin was packing lunch and getting the girls off, though everyone who knew the Winters was aware that Edith never did that kind of thing.

'Furthermore,' Severin grumbled to me as the car backed, honking, out of the driveway, 'it's a better lunch than she's made for her own kids. Drive carefully!' he bellowed suddenly; it sounded like a threat.

'Edith is writing,' he told me in the kitchen.

'I came to see you,' I said. 'I need a little help.' I handed him the note.

Still reading it, he said, 'I'm sorry. I didn't think she'd leave.'

'What's she say?' I asked.

'She's gone to Vienna.'

'I know that.'

'She'd like you to leave her alone for a while. She'll write you first. She says she's perfectly responsible, and that you shouldn't worry about the children.'

It was a longer note than that. 'Is that all she says?' I asked.

'That's all she says to you,' he said.

There was a long, thin knife spangled with fish scales on the cutting board; it shone in the sunlight through the kitchen windows. He must have been preparing fish for supper. Severin was so singular a sort that he could hack open raw fish in the morning. While I was staring at it he picked up the knife and plunged it into the soapy water in the sink.

'Just give her a little time,' he said. 'Everything will straighten out.'

'There's something in the note about chickens,' I said. 'What is it?'