Area of Suspicion Read Online Free PDF Page A

I remember how he would sit with us at dinner, silent, his face very old. The bad years lasted a long time.
    In 1939 Dean Products got an order from the British Purchasing Commission for Bren machine-gun mounts. Ken and I got all heated up over the war. We were going for sure. But in my past was that year in Arizona and the healed scars were too impressive on the X-ray plates. And when the checked Ken they found sugar, and he went on a diabetic’s diet. Healthy kids.
    So it was college then, and the feeling of being left out. There were all kinds of uniforms and training programs around the colleges. I went on to Harvard Business School. After I got out I went into the firm and got a full year of shop experience before Dad’s stroke, coma, and death. The war was over and things had eased, and I guess they made me boss man because there didn’t seem to be any specific damage I could do. Scared witless, I concealed it behind what was supposed to be a confident manner. Walter Granby helped. They all helped. I found out how reins can feel good in your hands, and a profit is a good thing to make because it shows you how well you’ve been doing. When I found Niki I knew that she had been the one thing missing.…
    The phone rang and I reached over and picked it up after the first ring. “Mr. Dean, sir? One moment, please. Arland is calling.”
    I knew who it had to be before she spoke, and I knew precisely how her voice would sound. “Gev?”
    “Hello, Niki.” You couldn’t say that and let it go at that. There had to be more. The standard words. “I’m sorry about Ken, Niki.”
    “It’s so—so unfair. That’s all I can think. So unfair.”
    “I know.”
    “I’m lost, Gev. Just terribly lost and alone. I want tocrawl away and hide. But there’s all these business things I don’t understand. I just talked to Lester. He said you’re upset.”
    “About Ken. And Lester irritated me.”
    “He shouldn’t have gone down there. He thought it would be all right after we couldn’t get in touch with you yesterday.”
    “I supposed he told you I refused to sign the proxy.”
    “I don’t know what he said. I hardly listened to him. Oh, Gevan, it’s raining here like it would never end. Fat gray rain. What do they say—a good day for a funeral?” The sound she made was half-sob, half-laugh.
    “Easy Niki.”
    “Lester didn’t know whether you’re coming up here or not. Maybe you should come up here, Gev. I—I want to see you.”
    Yes, you want to see me. To check on the damage, maybe. Ken never would have touched you without invitation. Bitch.
    I kept thinking of how she would look. Four years older now. Sitting with her fingers white on the telephone, a strand of that black hair swinging forward, to be thrown back with the familiar, impatient gesture. In the right light her hair would glint violet and blue. Her eyes were a strange blue, darker when she was troubled or aroused. Now she would be staring into an empty distance, her white teeth set into the roundness of underlip, and she would be wearing black …
    I could sense the pull of her, the sheer physical pull that could moisten my palms, shorten my breath, even when she was fifteen hundred miles away. I remembered my finger tips on the silk of her cheek, remembered how when my arms were around her I could feel, under my palm, the slow warm sliding of her muscles under the warmth of her back.
    “Like Lester said,” I told her harshly, “I haven’t decided.”
    “I’m sorry I said that. I wasn’t thinking. I haven’t any right to ask you to come up here, or ask you for anything, Gevan.”
    “You have a right to ask. You were my brother’s wife. I want to do anything I can for you, naturally.”
    Her voice became fainter and there were noises on the line. I had to strain to hear her. “… all this company business. I don’t know. I have to leave soon, Gev. Good-by.”
    “Good-by, Niki.” I went to the window. The rain came out of the west.