Neighbors: A Novel Page 28

  "Picked up?" asked Keese. "By whom?"

  "By another student, who's giving her a ride back to school."

  "She's returning to college?"

  "Of course."

  Keese's capacity for emotion was exhausted. "Good," he said, taking the seat that Elaine had just left.

  "Yes," Enid said cheerily as she began to bustle about the kitchen, "we're all back on an even keel, with no harm done. We can go ahead now, as always."

  As she came by on one of her excursions, Keese handed her Elaine's soiled plate. "Go ahead?" he asked.

  "Yes," said Enid, "as soon as I saw they were going to leave I called Marge Abernathy and said we'd be there tonight."

  "I think you're right," said Keese.

  "It's a relief to hear that," said Enid. "Unless you are planning to get into a brawl there."

  "I may," said Keese, "and I may not. I respond to the particular situation."

  Elaine returned, carrying her overnight case. "Hey, you guys, I wouldn't have missed this for the world," said she. From behind she kissed the top of Keese's head, then exchanged embraces with Enid, who came to her. "Got to run!" She left on a trot towards the front of the house.

  "Elaine no longer makes sense to me," said Keese. "That's something that has happened just this weekend."

  "It wouldn't be a problem if you thought of her in the same old way," Enid said. "She's the same old Elaine, really."

  "All wool and a yard wide, I suppose," said he. She made no response to his irony. He sighed. He suddenly missed Harry & Ramona. He admitted as much to Enid.

  "That squalid couple!" she said. "They made a fool of you, Earl."

  "No," said Keese, "you're wrong about them, Enid. They were all right. They were good people. They were helpful in this neighborhood. I know I sang a different tune at first, but I was totally misguided. Actually, Harry and Ramona are probably the finest people I've ever met. It just takes a while to perceive their unique quality, but once you do, you're not the same."

  "They corrupted your mind," said Enid. She brought him a cup with a measure of powdered coffee already in it. She went to the stove, where the water was steaming in the kettle.

  "No," Keese said, "you know nothing about them."

  She came with the kettle and made coffee of the powder. "Now, drink up," she said, "and then better get dressed: we're due over there in twenty minutes."

  "'Dressed'?" he asked, incredulously. "I'm wearing my best suit."

  "Oh, so you are. I guess I wasn't thinking."

  "No," said Keese, "you weren't." He resented receiving direction from such a poor observer. "And I don't want this coffee, for that matter."

  "I thought it might give you some energy before having to go out and face people," Enid said.

  "Don't try to manipulate me for my own good," he said. "There's nothing wrong with me."

  Enid's eyebrows seemed to quiver, unless that was his imagination. She did a strange little thing that may have been affection: passing behind him on her route out of the kitchen, she lingered for an instant to drum her fingertips on his right shoulder.

  Keese reached for her hand, probably also in fondness, but already she was gone. He decided after all to drink his coffee. It seemed more of a soporific than a stimulant. If he relaxed his will at all, his head fell forward. This would never do. At last he pushed himself into a standing position.

  When he reached the front hallway he could not hear a sound from upstairs. Perhaps he had napped for a while in the kitchen and Enid had already left for the Abernathys, a walk of only a few minutes. While he was thinking about this, the door-gong made its sound.

  He turned the knob without his habitual apprehension. He could not have cared less who it was—until he saw who. It was Ramona! He seized her and hugged her and lifted her off her feet.

  When he put her down she made a fist and fondly punched his arm. "So how are you, Earl?"

  "I'm not at my best," said Keese. "I miss you people."

  "I guess it's pretty obvious that we return the feeling," she said. "Here we are. We didn't get far."

  Keese felt that his eyes were damp. "You're going to stay, of course?"

  Tears welled from Ramona's eyes, and this time it was she who hugged him. Looking over her head, he saw Harry beckon.

  "We need you, old pal!" Harry shouted. Then Keese saw the dog come into view in the rear window. Baby had probably been sleeping on the rear seat.

  "I'll tell you," said Ramona, pushing Keese away so that she could look at him, "it was simultaneous: I stared at Harry and Harry at me. 'What's wrong?' we said. 'It's Earl, that's what! It's not worth doing without him.'"

  Keese shook his head. "I've never had friends like you two."

  "How often in life do you find somebody who becomes your oldest friend overnight?" said Ramona. "And then you leave him behind?"

  Harry shouted merrily: "All aboard! Pottsville, Partridge Hollow, and Peanut Town! Connections to all points of view. All aboard!"

  "You mean you want me to come along?" asked Keese.

  "Damn right," said Ramona.

  "You don't want to stay here? Lots of room!"

  "No," Ramona said. "The moment for that has passed. It's essential to keep the initiative. Lose it, and they'll run you ragged. Your sequences will be off."

  "Golly," said Keese. "Let me think about that for a minute."

  "No, Earl, it's no good if you hesitate. The gears won't mesh, and you can't roll. They'll nail you to the wall."

  "C'mon, Earl, while we've got the wind!" Harry shouted from the window of the car. "Open the scuppers and belay the fo'c'sle. Grog for all hands!"

  The wolfhound continued to stare inscrutably.

  "Where would I ride?" asked Keese. "I don't know if Baby likes me."

  "Sure he does!" said Ramona. "He thinks the world of you, Earl. C'mon, I'll prove it to you." She turned and went down the path.

  Keese followed her for a step or two, then stopped. "Wait a minute," he called to her. "The lights are on and all that food's spread over the kitchen counter—"

  "You've got to make a choice, Earl," said Ramona.

  Keese looked up at the windows on the second floor. Was Enid there? For that matter, was Elaine still at home? Had her departure been another hoax?

  He turned back and said to Ramona: "You're right, of course."

  "Hi, fella," said Harry when he reached the car. Harry leaned across and shook hands. Keese felt something that tickled.

  Harry opened his fingers and revealed that on one of them he wore a little round device which faced palmwards.

  "My God," said Keese, "can that be a Joy Buzzer? I haven't seen one of those since I was a kid. I didn't know they made them any more."

  "Get in, buddy," said Harry.

  "I don't know about the dog," said Keese. He looked through the window at the impassive Baby.

  "Get in the front."

  "No," Keese said, "that would be dodging the issue."

  "He's got a point, Harry," Ramona said, and she reached around to the crank of the rear window and wound it down. Baby gingerly put his long white snout on the sill. It occurred to Keese that if he had seen only Baby's eyes he might have thought them those of a human maniac.

  "Give him your hand, Earl," said Ramona.

  "Would he bite it?"

  "That's what we're going to find out."

  Keese sighed and extended his hand towards the wolfhound. Baby looked steadily past him. "I suppose he's neutral." He patted the dog's head, which beneath the thin layer of white fur felt hard as marble. Still without looking at Keese, Baby produced a wet red tongue and licked his hand briefly.

  "See?" said Ramona. But it was she who climbed into the back with the dog.

  "Or do you want to drive, Earl?" Harry asked. "It's still really your car."

  "No, no," Keese said, with a fending-off gesture of false horror. "One choice is enough. I wouldn't know which way to head."

  Harry started the engine. "The import
ant thing is that we're a team."

  Keese said: "I hope it works out as well as being neighbors."

  They rolled past the smoking ruin, reached the corner, turned left, and soon were behind the screen of trees that would have concealed the car from Keese had he only been watching from his front lawn. He had his fatal stroke not long afterwards. He was helplessly conscious for a time while it was under way. He was aware that his friends recognized his predicament as genuine and not as some device of guile.

  Harry sped up the engine. He said: "I'm certainly not going to think the worst of you, Earl, old pal."

  Dying, Keese realized that Ramona had leaned forward to pat his shoulder.

  She said: "Earl, it could happen to anybody."

  About the Author

  THOMAS BERGER is the author of more than twenty novels. His previous novels include Regiment of Women, Adventures of the Artificial Woman, and The Feud, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. His novel Little Big Man was made into a successful movie and is known throughout the world.

  Also by Thomas Berger

  Adventures of the Artificial Woman

  Arthur Rex

  Being Invisible

  Best Friends

  Changing the Past

  The Feud

  The Houseguest

  Killing Time

  Little Big Man

  Meeting Evil

  Nowhere

  Orrie's Story

  Regiment of Women

  The Return of Little Big Man

  Robet Crews

  Sneaky People

  Suspects

  Who Is Teddy Villanova?

  THE REINHART SERIES

  Crazy in Berlin

  Reinhart in Love

  Vital Parts

  Reinhart's Women

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 1980 by Thomas Berger

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  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 79020307

  ISBN: 0-7432-8759-2

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