says no, what’s the harm?”
I raised my voice. “Do you think it’s right to ask for sex in exchange for two vacation days? Do you think it’s ethical?”
His eyes narrowed. “Ah! Your ethics; your famous ethics.” He harrumphed as if everything inexplicable I’d said now made perfect sense. “I forgot while you were sitting on my lap that you comefrom a race of social workers and agitators. All I was thinking was how much I’d like to fuck you.”
The word seared my ears, his intention exactly. He poured an angry splash of wine into his glass and gulped it down.
He waved me out—
out!
—his hand thrashing the air.
Shocked by the hate in his voice, by the loss in one quick hour of a job, a reference, a champion, I said only from a great distance, “Well, good-bye then.”
He heckled me in French, sputtering, his arms folded tightly across his chest.
I shrugged:
No comprendo
.
“You hurt my feelings very badly,” wailed Monsieur.
TEN
I traveled north by bus, holding a gift-wrapped wok and its companion Joyce Chen cookbook on my lap. It was Friday, the day before the wedding, and raining in Boston. The drizzle turned to light snow as we neared New Hampshire, to larger flakes as we crossed into White River Junction. I looked for Fife-Berry wedding guests among my fellow passengers, but had no visual test. The only other person who disembarked in Gilbert, a young man in a pea coat carrying a laundry bag, hitched a ride so fast and so playfully that I knew the driver had to be a buddy. I called the Inn, and found the stranger at the other end helpful, even warm, in a way that made me think I had been right to come.
K ris Berry, the dark-eyed, dark-haired younger brother, who resembled his father, came to pick me up at the bus station. I had no summer recollection of this Berry; there hadn’t been anyone tall and angular, and certainly no one wearing cross-country skiwear, right down to the knickers and square-toed shoes.
He had volunteered, he told me, to make the transportation runs while everyone else was decorating the dining room with—literally—boughs of holly. He preferred to be outdoors and active.Very nice to meet me, or meet me again. He knew I had been a guest of the Inn before.
I asked if everyone had arrived. He said not every guest was coming a day ahead; that was only for close friends and out-of-towners. Robin wouldn’t be arriving until morning—hair or dress or nails or some such thing. I asked if I was too early, and he said, “Hell, no; rooms are ready. Vespers at four in Middlebury, then dinner back at the Inn. A special deal—roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.”
I said, “I understand Mrs. Knickerbocker left.”
He grinned. “You remember the name of the cook from all those years ago?”
“I remember that curtain call she took every night.”
“Every
meal
, is more like it,” said Kris.
“And wasn’t the dishwasher Roland?”
“I can’t remember anything,” he said, adding, “I’m not the natural-born innkeeper they had hoped for.” He said Mrs. K. had quit about two years ago—lured to the Trapp Family Lodge, the last anyone heard.
“That seems right,” I said.
“Standing O’s for the Wiener schnitzel.”
“Does she like it?” I asked.
“We don’t talk about the big betrayal under our roof. High treason, according to my mother.”
I thanked him for the warning. “I might have gone on and on, talking about my fond memories of Mrs. K.’s roast beef au jus,” I said, immediately regretting my own last syllable. In the company of Ingrid Berry’s son, I had to name the one entrée in the world that sounded Semitic.
“Right, the roast beef and popovers,” he said. “That was probably her best meal.” He smiled a fond, distant smile. “And some desserts weren’t bad, compared to everything else on the menu.”
Good sign, I thought—derision toward Ingrid and family business.
The tires crunched on snow as the van turned onto the
I raised my voice. “Do you think it’s right to ask for sex in exchange for two vacation days? Do you think it’s ethical?”
His eyes narrowed. “Ah! Your ethics; your famous ethics.” He harrumphed as if everything inexplicable I’d said now made perfect sense. “I forgot while you were sitting on my lap that you comefrom a race of social workers and agitators. All I was thinking was how much I’d like to fuck you.”
The word seared my ears, his intention exactly. He poured an angry splash of wine into his glass and gulped it down.
He waved me out—
out!
—his hand thrashing the air.
Shocked by the hate in his voice, by the loss in one quick hour of a job, a reference, a champion, I said only from a great distance, “Well, good-bye then.”
He heckled me in French, sputtering, his arms folded tightly across his chest.
I shrugged:
No comprendo
.
“You hurt my feelings very badly,” wailed Monsieur.
TEN
I traveled north by bus, holding a gift-wrapped wok and its companion Joyce Chen cookbook on my lap. It was Friday, the day before the wedding, and raining in Boston. The drizzle turned to light snow as we neared New Hampshire, to larger flakes as we crossed into White River Junction. I looked for Fife-Berry wedding guests among my fellow passengers, but had no visual test. The only other person who disembarked in Gilbert, a young man in a pea coat carrying a laundry bag, hitched a ride so fast and so playfully that I knew the driver had to be a buddy. I called the Inn, and found the stranger at the other end helpful, even warm, in a way that made me think I had been right to come.
K ris Berry, the dark-eyed, dark-haired younger brother, who resembled his father, came to pick me up at the bus station. I had no summer recollection of this Berry; there hadn’t been anyone tall and angular, and certainly no one wearing cross-country skiwear, right down to the knickers and square-toed shoes.
He had volunteered, he told me, to make the transportation runs while everyone else was decorating the dining room with—literally—boughs of holly. He preferred to be outdoors and active.Very nice to meet me, or meet me again. He knew I had been a guest of the Inn before.
I asked if everyone had arrived. He said not every guest was coming a day ahead; that was only for close friends and out-of-towners. Robin wouldn’t be arriving until morning—hair or dress or nails or some such thing. I asked if I was too early, and he said, “Hell, no; rooms are ready. Vespers at four in Middlebury, then dinner back at the Inn. A special deal—roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.”
I said, “I understand Mrs. Knickerbocker left.”
He grinned. “You remember the name of the cook from all those years ago?”
“I remember that curtain call she took every night.”
“Every
meal
, is more like it,” said Kris.
“And wasn’t the dishwasher Roland?”
“I can’t remember anything,” he said, adding, “I’m not the natural-born innkeeper they had hoped for.” He said Mrs. K. had quit about two years ago—lured to the Trapp Family Lodge, the last anyone heard.
“That seems right,” I said.
“Standing O’s for the Wiener schnitzel.”
“Does she like it?” I asked.
“We don’t talk about the big betrayal under our roof. High treason, according to my mother.”
I thanked him for the warning. “I might have gone on and on, talking about my fond memories of Mrs. K.’s roast beef au jus,” I said, immediately regretting my own last syllable. In the company of Ingrid Berry’s son, I had to name the one entrée in the world that sounded Semitic.
“Right, the roast beef and popovers,” he said. “That was probably her best meal.” He smiled a fond, distant smile. “And some desserts weren’t bad, compared to everything else on the menu.”
Good sign, I thought—derision toward Ingrid and family business.
The tires crunched on snow as the van turned onto the
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