“I was just giving Gwen a ride home from town,” the Judge tells March.
“Was Gwen in town?” March asks Hollis. “I didn’t realize that.”
Now the Judge knows what’s wrong. March seems like a sleepwalker. Wake up, he wants to tell her. Open your eyes.
“Looks like it,” Hollis says.
“Well, come in.” March is still beautiful when she smiles. “Have some tea.”
When the door is opened wider, the Judge can see into the kitchen. It is dimly lit and bare, as if no one lived there.
“With a cook like Mrs. Justice for a wife, the Judge certainly doesn’t want our tea,” Hollis says. “Isn’t that a fact?”
Hollis and the Judge look at each other. Unless the Judge is mistaken, and he rarely is about such things, there is an attempt at intimidation beneath the surface. He’s seen it before, at hearings and trials, and he knows precisely what this sort of man is trying to tell him. Don’t fuck with me. Don’t even try.
“Louise would love for you to come to dinner,” the Judge tells March. “How about Friday?”
March looks at Hollis.
“That won’t work out,” Hollis says. “Friday isn’t good.”
March loops her arm around Hollis’s waist. “I guess we have plans. Please tell Louise thank you anyway for the invitation.”
“Well, we’ll be in touch.” The Judge nods. “We’ll figure something out.”
Hollis remains by the back door until the Judge has gotten into his car and pulled down the driveway. When the Saab turns onto Route 22, Hollis heads for the little blue bedroom where Gwen has been listening to every word through the thin plaster walls.
“What’s wrong?” March says, following Hollis, not that he’s listening to her. In his opinion she doesn’t need to understand this; he can take care of the girl, after all.
Hollis stands in the doorway to the little room. Gwen is on her bed, a blanket wrapped around her, though it’s flimsy protection. She feels all clenched up, as if she were expecting to be hit.
“If you ever bring the Judge out here again,” Hollis tells Gwen, “you will seriously regret it.”
“Wait a second,” March says, confused.
“Let me handle this.” Hollis cuts her off. “Do you understand what I’m saying?” he asks Gwen.
Gwen is going along with her plan of no resistance. She nods, agreeing to whatever crap he’s spouting, grateful that the blanket is covering her and he can’t see that she’s shaking. Grateful that her mother is there, for March’s presence seems to offer some immunity from Hollis coming any closer.
“I don’t want him or anyone else on my property,” Hollis informs March. “This girl needs to know that.”
He’s got that look on his face March knows far too well. He’s in a mood, he won’t back down; he’s thinking only of the doors which were closed to him, not of how they’re all open to him now.
“That’s fine,” March says. “The Judge won’t come back here.”
She counts to ten and by the time she reaches that last number, Hollis has gone outside to cool off. The screen door slams behind him, and there’s an echo, cold wood against colder wood. They can hear his footsteps on the frozen ground on this quiet December night. They can hear the clatter of a typewriter as Hank works on his senior paper on the Founder, and a soft whining from Sister, who is hiding under the bed, fur darkened by dust. March goes to the window and sees Hollis out there by himself, looking up at the stars.
“He doesn’t mean any of that,” March says to her daughter. “Not really.”
Gwen looks at her mother. She feels an odd tenderness, the way one might when finished with crying.
“Mother,” she says simply, as if she were teaching sums to a six-year-old, “he certainly does.”
21
Susie Justice gets home in a hurry, after a whirlwind trip to Florida. In six days she has been to Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale, and Miami, then hop-skipped over to Orlando. She’s writing a four-part series for The Bugle about vacation possibilities and retirement options, which will be chock-full of places to stay and eat and swim. She will not, however, mention in this cheery article how dreadful it is to come back to the cold once your trip is over, although she might suggest it’s best to have the person who retrieves your mail while you’re away take a look at your oil burner as well, as Susie’s seems to have died during her absence, and she comes home to a stone-cold house, with pipes that are close to bursting.