A Matter of Conviction

She was wearing a tan linen suit, the jacket unbuttoned over a white blouse. A stray wisp of red hair curled alongside her cheek. He had the impression that she had just come into the apartment and removed her hat. Her eyes were tired, and the strain of the past few days showed in the weary set of her mouth. But he knew in an instant that she, like every woman he’d ever known, had come beyond the terror and hysteria of initial shock and then rebounded with amazing resiliency to face whatever lay ahead. There was in her eyes — and he knew the look because he had seen it often on Karin’s face — a combination of strength and dignity and determination. The look frightened him somewhat; it was the look worn by the tigress guarding the entrance to her den of cubs.

“Come in, Hank,” she said. “I just got back this minute. I was talking to Danny’s lawyers.” He stepped into the apartment. “No scenes this time,” she said. “I promise.”

He followed her through a short corridor past an open bathroom door and then into a living room furnished with a suite from one of the stores on Third Avenue. A television set rested on a table in one corner of the room. Drapes hung over the single window, which opened on the airshaft between the buildings. A fire escape was outside the window. From somewhere upstairs Hank could still hear the arguing couple, their voices echoing in the shaftway.

“Sit down, Hank,” Mary said. “It’s not too bad in here. We get a breeze through that window, and it crosses into the bedroom facing the street.”

“Thank you,” he said, and he sat on the sofa. They were awkwardly silent for a moment. Then he said, “You’ve got a nice apartment, Mary.”

“Don’t kid me, Hank,” she answered. “I moved here from Long Island. I know what nice is.”

“Why’d you come back to Harlem, Mary?”

“They cut production, and Johnny lost his job. We’d saved some money, and I suppose we could have held on to the house. But a friend of ours was opening a shoe store here in Harlem. He asked Johnny if he wanted to go in as a partner. Johnny thought we should. I thought so, too.” She shook her head. “It seemed like the right decision at the time.” She paused. “If we could have seen ahead, if we could have known—” She cut the sentence and lapsed into silence. He sat watching her, wondering if the initial shock had truly passed. She raised her eyes suddenly, meeting his, and they looked at each other across a wide gulf of years, and neither said anything for several moments. Then, as if struggling with an inner secret resolve, Mary said, “Would you like a drink?”

“Not if it’s any trouble. I only came to...”

“I’m a little ashamed of myself, Hank,” she said, lowering her eyes, “for the way I behaved in your office the other day. I hope—”

“Under the circumstances...”

“Yes, yes, I know, but...” She raised her eyes, meeting his directly again. “I want to apologize.”

“Mary, there’s no need to...”

“This is — you know, you never think anything like this is going to happen to you. You read about it in the newspapers all the time, but it means nothing. And suddenly, it’s happening to you. Your family. You. It... it takes a while to... to realize it. So — so please forgive me for the way I behaved. I wasn’t myself. I just...” She rose suddenly. “We only have rye and gin. Which would you like?”

“Gin would be fine,” he said softly.

“Tonic?”

“If you have some.”

“Yes, I think so.” She walked into the kitchen. He heard her open the door to the refrigerator, heard her uncapping the bottle of quinine water, heard the rattle of ice-cube trays. She came back into the living room, handed him his drink, and then sat opposite him. They did not toast. Quietly they sipped at the drinks. Down in the areaway someone clanked a garbage-can cover into place.

“It’s funny about people, isn’t it?” she said suddenly. “How two people who once knew each other so well can meet and — and be strangers.” A curious laugh of puzzlement, joyless, escaped her mouth. “It’s funny,” she said again.

“Yes.”

“I’m... I’m glad you came today, Hank.”

“I came to tell you—”

“I like to believe that people who once meant something to each other... that... that if you knew someone very well...” She struggled with the thought silently and then said simply, “You meant a lot to me, Hank.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“When we were kids, you — you did a lot for me.”

“I did?”

“Yes. Oh, yes: You see, I’d always thought of myself as very ugly until—”

“Ugly? You?”

“Yes, yes. And then you came along, and you thought I was so very beautiful, and you kept telling me so until — until I began to believe it. I’ll always be grateful to you for that, Hank.”

“Mary, of all the people in the world, you’re hardly the one to have doubted your own good looks.”

“Oh, but I did. I did.”