“And we came out here because of his sickness?”
Selena shook her head. “No, darling, we came a couple of months ago because we had nowhere else to go.”
“You mean, Pittsburg was through with us?”
“With you, dear. You lost your job. We had one hundred and twelve dollars in the bank. Darling, you must remember.”
I tried very hard. Nothing came. “I’m afraid I don’t,” I said.
“Oh, dear,” she pushed her hands under her hair to support her head. “Well, baby, I guess that’s all about the Aurora Clean Living League—except Jan, of course.”
“Jan? Marny talked about him. Who’s Jan?”
“Nobody knows, but he’s the only gay thing your father ever did. He hired him as a kind of man of all work around the house. Mr. Moffat produced him. He’s Dutch, from Sumatra, wherever that is. Somehow he was in the Dutch Army and then somehow he wasn’t. He’s about eight feet tall and built like something on the cover of one of those health magazines—you know, the ones that are not quite under the counter. He grins all the time and never wears anything but swimming trunks. Father and Mr. Moffat had a passion for him because he doesn’t drink or smoke.”
“Or have sex?” I asked.
“That,” said Selena thoughtfully, “we don’t know. You see, he’s kind of simple-minded, in a nice way, of course, and he either can’t or won’t learn a word of English so there’s no point in asking him.” A flat, speculative look came into her eyes. “One day I’m going to find out—with gestures.” She moved her face closer, kissing me almost abstractedly. “Darling, there’s your whole life in a nutshell. Don’t you really remember anything?”
The shadowy image of a sailor and of an iris spun pointlessly in my mind. I thought the propellers were coming back. But they didn’t. For a moment, the nearness of Selena, the liveness of her bare skin against my hand lost their magic. I felt bleak, uneasy.
“No,” I said. “I don’t remember a thing—not a solitary thing.”
“Never mind, baby. “Her voice was low, soothing. “No one really expected you to remember anything yet. Don’t bother about it. Let’s forget it. Let’s relax.”
We were still relaxing when the door opened. My mother came majestically in, carrying a tray with medicine bottles. She paused, surveying Selena lying on the bed from placid brown eyes.
“Selena, dear,” she said mildly, “I don’t think we should overtire Gordy, do you?”
Selena grinned up at her. “I’m not tiring him, Mother. We’re just relaxing...”
“Relaxing,” said my mother, putting the tray down on the bedside table, “is all very well. But I don’t know that you are quite the relaxing type. Run along now, dear.”
“But Mimsey, sweet...” Selena pushed herself up on the bed and flashed one of her blonde, sunshine smiles. “Please.”
“Darling, you’ve been here long enough.”
Reluctantly Selena rose, smoothing down her skirt. As she did so, there was a scuffling sound from the open door and a small black spaniel dashed into the room, bounded onto the bed and pranced towards my face, waving fat, feathery paws.
“Peter,” called my mother sharply. “Peter, get down.”
The dog was licking my face and batting at me enthusiastically. Suddenly, as my mother called out, I felt a tingle on the surface of my skin. A sensation, like the one that had come with the word ‘Iris’, stirred in me, only this time it was stronger. It was half excitement, half dread of something ominous just beyond my comprehension.
“Peter?” I asked. “He’s called Peter?”
“Why, yes, darling,” said Selena. “He’s your dog. He remembers you. Don’t you remember him?”
“Peter. Yes, yes. I think I do. For the first time I think I really remember.”
The spaniel had rolled over on its back and was kicking flirtatious feet in the air.
Peter...
The crawling of my skin made me shiver. The propellers came, whirring with a deafening roar. I felt dizzy. I hardly knew what I was saying but I blurted:
“The dog’s not called Peter. I’m called Peter. I’m not Gordy Friend. I’m Peter.”
A change started to spread like a shadow over that lovely, sunny room. It was one of those indefinable nightmare changes where the very blandness and security of a scene seems to cloak some lurking horror.
The change infected the two women. They were both standing by the bed, looking down at me. Both, in their way, were as beautiful as women could be—Selena golden as summer, my mother splendid as autumn. But their faces seemed suddenly marred with an expression that was hostile, ruthless.
A quick glance passed between them. I was sure of that.
Then, slowly, they both moved forward and sat down on the bed. I could feel the warmth from their bodies. Their soft, feminine nearness was almost suffocating.
My mother took my hand. Selena’s smooth fingers rested on my arm. My mother was smiling a smile so serene and gentle that it was almost impossible to believe in the expression I had caught a moment before.
“Darling boy.” Her voice was rich, cooing. “Of course you’re Gordy Friend. What foolish ideas you have! We tell you you’re Gordy Friend, dear. And who could know better who you are than—your mother and your wife?”
Selena
left, taking the dog with her. My mother continued to sit on my bed. Her friendly bosom, framed by the neck of her austere widow dress, was very close to me. Her thick, hot-house perfume overpowered the scent of the roses. She was still holding my hand and smiling that “everything’s-going-to-be-all-right” smile.
“My poor baby,” she said. “So miserable it must be—not remembering.”
My outburst of a moment before was becoming confused in my mind. I couldn’t remember what I had said. It had been something to do with the dog. Something had flashed in and out of my mind, leaving a residue of uneasiness. Somehow, far back in my consciousness, I was still suspicious of this woman sitting at my side. But I could no longer track down the source of my suspicion.
She was stroking my head now, letting her cool hand move softly over the bandages.
“Head ache, darling?”
The white bosom, the tranquil face on the stately neck, the very untidiness of the piled auburn hair all conspired to soothe me. It seemed silly to be suspicious unless I could remember a reason.
“Yes.” I said. “My head does ache a bit. What happened just now with the dog? What did I say?”
My mother laughed. “Nothing, dear. Nothing at all.”
“But it was something—something about the dog’s name.”
“Don’t worry yourself, sweet. Please don’t worry.” She leaned forward, kissing me on the forehead just under the bandages. Ever since my return to consciousness, I seemed to have been smothered in kisses. “You’ll have funny little quirkish illusions, dear. Nate said you would. Things getting tied together in your mind, making patterns that seem real to you but aren’t. That’s all.”
She patted my hand and rose, moving to the tray of medicine bottles on the bedside table.
“Now, it’s time for your pill. A nice rest. That’s what you need. You’ve had a fearfully taxing first afternoon, haven’t you? Me, Marny, Selena. I’m afraid we are a trifle overwhelming.”
She turned, a capsule in one hand, a glass of water in the other. She sat down, smiling.
“Open your mouth, dear.”
I felt an impulse to refuse the proffered capsule, but it was a feeble one, for I could think of no valid excuse for not taking it. There was something too about this woman that tempted me to invalidism. Her breadth, her quietness made me want to forget my problems—what were my problems?—and yield to the voluptuous lure of the pillows.
I let her slip the capsule into my mouth and tilt some of the water after it. I swallowed.
She patted my hand. “That’s a good boy, Gordy. Now, smile for Mother.”
I smiled. Somehow she had made us conspirators together.
“Darling boy.” She kissed me again. “Now, before you know it, you’ll be off to bye-byes.”
And it happened almost exactly that way. One moment I was watching her idly rearranging the pink roses in the bowl. The next moment unconsciousness, heavy as an eiderdown quilt, engulfed me.
When I awakened, I was alone. There was no more sunshine. A grey-green evening light from the windows gave the room a submarine quietness. My headache had gone. My thoughts seemed exceptionally clear. I remembered all the people who had come into the room that day. I remembered everything they said.
I’m Gordy Friend, I said. I’ve had an accident and I’ve lost my memory.
I lay still in the bed. Gradually I became conscious of the rigidity of the casts on my arm and my leg. For the first time, I thought of them not merely as props in my role as a patient. I thought of them as the restrictions they were.
I’m here in this bed with a cast on my arm and a cast on my leg, I thought. I’m helpless. I couldn't get away.
There was nothing to have to get away from, of course. I was Gordy Friend. I was in my own home. I was surrounded by love and care. But the realization of my helplessness seemed, perversely, to bring a sensation of impending danger.
My gaze, moving uneasily around the room, settled on the side table. On it stood a vase of stock, white and sulky purple in the fading light. Before I went to sleep hadn’t there been a vase of irises there? Iris. I was gropingly aware that irises had some significance and that their absence had significance too. My sense of uneasiness grew, stretching almost to the borders of panic.
What if I’m not Gordy Friend?
I thought suddenly and with no conscious reason.
I knew instantly that the thought was preposterous. My mother, my sister, my wife, my doctor had all told me I was Gordy Friend. Only a plot, too insane or too fiendish to imagine, could give all four of them motive to deceive me.
But the thought, with all the force of commonsense marshalled against it, persisted, nagging like a boil almost come to a head.
What if I'm not Gordy Friend?
The door opened a crack and Marny peered around it. Her young face wore that hushed expression of someone looking at a sleeper.
“Hello,” I said.
“So you’re awake.”
She pushed the door open and walked to the bed. As before, she carried a small shaker of Manhattans and a single glass. She tossed back her glossy black hair and sat down by the roses, watching me brightly.
“Hello,” she said.
Her young, oval face, with its cool eyes and splashed scarlet mouth, was both appraising and friendly. I found her brittleness reassuring... more reassuring than my mother’s lushness or Selena’s animal vitality would have been.
“Still drinking?” I asked.
“Don’t be silly! That was lunch. This is dinner. They’re just going to bring you yours.” She poured a Manhattan into the glass. “I thought you might like a cocktail so I sneaked one up.”
My half-lulled suspicions grew alert again. “I thought you said I wasn’t supposed to drink?”
“Of course you’re not, darling.” She laughed, showing small white teeth and the glimpse of a pink tongue. She leaned towards me almost wantonly, stretching the glass out. “But what’s a little veto between sister and brother?”
“The woman tempted me,” I said, and took the drink. Its stinging taste on the roof of my mouth was good.
Marny, her legs crossed, was still watching me carefully. “Selena,” she said suddenly. “Like her?”
The false stimulant of the liquor made me even more alert. I was definitely on my guard now—on my guard against something I didn’t know for a motive I did not understand. “Do you?” I parried.
Marny shrugged. “What difference does it make what I feel? Selena’s not my wife. She’s yours.”
“Is she?” Something made me ask that question quickly.
“What do you mean—is she?” Marny’s thick, curled lashes batted, and she snatched the half-full glass from me. “Really, Gordy, has half a Manhattan made you pie-eyed?”
The door opened and my mother came in. Her gaze settled on Marny.
“Marny, I hope you haven’t been giving Gordy a drink.”
Marny stared back blandly. “Of course not, Mimsey.”
“I’m sure Nate wouldn’t like that at all.” My mother crossed to my side and smiled. “Hungry, dear? They’re bringing your dinner up.”
“I guess I can eat,” I said.
“Good. Have a nice rest?”
“Fine. I feel fine.”
I kept my mother under unobtrusive observation, trying to catch some trace of falseness in her expression. She was smiling at me, half humorously as if she had guessed my vague suspicions and was trying to emphasize their absurdity. “No more troubles, I’ll be bound,” she said. “No more foolish fancies.”
“That I’m not Gordy Friend, you mean?”
Marny’s lashes flickered again. She half turned to glance at her mother and then seemed to change her mind. My mother patted the girl’s head. “Run along, dear. Dinner’s ready downstairs.” As Marny left, she turned back to me. “Don’t you remember anything at all yet? Not even me?”
“Not yet,” I said.
The maid, who had looked in before to announce the doctor, entered carrying a tray. “Ah, here’s your dinner, dear,” said my mother. “When you’re through I’ll send Jan up. He can take care of all those unfeminine bedroom things.” Almost as if relieved at the arrival of dinner as an excuse for going, she murmured one of her “darling boys” and departed.
The maid slid an invalid bed-table from a corner and arranged the tray on it in front of me. She was in uniform and obviously trying to maintain the colorless discretion of a well-trained domestic. She wasn’t very successful. She was too plump and her hair, peroxide blonde and tightly waved, suggested hot-dogs and dates in bars with sailors. I remembered my mother had called her Netti.
“Thanks, Netti,” I said. “That looks fine.”
She giggled. “It’s nice having you eating again, Mr. Friend.” Dinner, on beautiful blue and white Spode, looking inviting. Here, I thought, was an easy way for dispelling my foolish doubts once and for all. If there was some crazy conspiracy, surely the maid would not be party to it.
Casually I asked: “Well, Netti, has my accident improved my looks?”
She giggled again, patting at the prim cap on the far from prim hair. “Oh, Mr. Friend, don’t ask me. I wouldn’t know.”