Last Resort by Alison Lurie

his friends, his critics, and his readers. Some, no doubt, would make the connection between himself and the Copper Beech. If he portrayed it as destroyed by human stupidity, they might think that Wilkie Walker believed that he too had been driven to his death by hostile and ignorant persons. This was not only untrue, it would make him seem weak, perhaps even somewhat paranoid.
    Whereas if the Copper Beech were toppled in a great storm, all anyone might suspect was that Wilkie was gifted with precognition, since trees do not commit suicide. Today, therefore, he had moved the final version of this ending into a central position on his desk with the finished manuscript, and put the others away. As he did so he felt some regret at having to discard the other two versions, both of which contained excellent passages—some of the best he had ever written, in fact. But he knew he had made the right choice.
    About Jenny he was less easy. He had planned to make their last days together memorable and intimate, to make her happy in every way—even agreeing to the dinner party she’d proposed to give. But he had had to forgo the long, intimate, relaxed conversations he had imagined their having here in Key West. The trouble was that whenever they were alone together Wilkie was assailed by the impulse to hint at some of what was on his mind. There was even the danger that he might suddenly weaken and tell her everything, as he had more or less done for so many years. At the same time he had become aware of an irrational anger at Jenny because she didn’t know what was on his mind—irrational, because he had done all he could to prevent her knowing.
    And since he had been successful, and Jenny didn’t know what was on his mind—didn’t even guess—she did things that irritated him. She kept trying to direct his attention to meaningless national and local events, or to supposedly humorous newspaper stories and cartoons. She proposed social and cultural events, and wanted him to speak to his children on the phone. Just yesterday she had been pestering him to go with her to some film, reading the reviews out loud and telling him that some new friend of hers said it was wonderful. For a moment Wilkie had felt almost hostile to his wife. When he looked at her across the breakfast table she no longer resembled a transfigured human version of a salt marsh mouse. Instead she reminded him of another creature far from the threat of extinction, rather increasing in numbers every year: Sorex arareus, the common or garden shrew, with its shrill little twittering voice.
    But that was only the impression of a moment. It had been deeply painful today to leave Jenny without a sign, and in his mind he had tried out many last speeches: casual phrases that after the fact would reverberate with meaning. In the end he had resisted the impulse, fearing he might break down, and only called out “I’m going for my swim now.” “See you soon, then,” Jenny had called back, hardly glancing round; and he had replied, choking up, “Right.”
    His last words—his last word—to Jenny had been a lie. But a necessary one. What would happen now must seem a tragic accident. Why no, Wilkie Walker wasn’t depressed, everyone must say: he was full of energy and plans for the future. Only the night before—
    Yesterday he had planned to kiss Jenny casually yet fondly as he passed on his way to the beach, perhaps to compliment her intimately on the dinner party and what he had intended to follow it. That was what hurt, what rankled now more than the sharp occasional pain in his lower bowel. Not only his final words to his wife, but their final significant encounter had been false and meaningless. Last night, their last night together, he had planned to make love to Jenny. He had tried, strained, willed it with all his force—but all for nothing; worse than nothing.
    “Darling, it doesn’t matter. Really, it was lovely,” Jenny had said when, muttering an