Q: What makes a good marriage?
 A: Is it the shell or the wind that makes the whistling sound?

∼  Amaurón, Summulae logicales

    In the beginning there was a Champagne cork drying on a medallion rug richly decorated with the Chinese character shou. Beside it lay a crumpled cocktail dress, a combination black crêpe wiggle skirt and silk taffeta overskirt that had been mistaken for a Jo Copeland original the night before. That compliment would have delighted its maker, Shirley, who created it by simply looking at a photograph in a fashion magazine. "Not bad for a telephone operator, eh Franny? Can't have you looking like Rosie the Riveter, can we? Now, see in the new year with the time of your life. I want to hear all about it when you get back."

    Her high school chum Fran would, painting a complete picture of the waterfront Ocean Spray Hotel, a turn-of-the century landmark on nearby Cape Ann. She'd tell her all about the ballroom, the eight-piece orchestra, and every song (in exact order). Then she'd slow herself, remembering that Shirley's husband was out of work on a disability. But Shirley, who was genuinely thrilled for her, would urge her on, so Fran would add a few details about the ornate bridal suite, saying how fortunate they were that her parents had provided the two nights' stay to mark her sixth wedding anniversary.

    "We never could have done it on our own. We were fortunate Eric's parents could take the kids."

    "True, true, but tell me Franny-kid, what did he get you for a present?" Fran would mention the chocolates, eliciting an indignant "the cheap so-and-so," which would force her to admit to the big present. "It's for both of us—the entire family really—and well, just come and have a look."

    All that would take place days later over coffee. For the moment, Fran lay asleep behind the lace panels of a canopy bed, with Eric curled against her back. His forearm draped across her hip and his hand rested lightly on the silky nightgown that covered her abdomen. He sensed someone in the room, opened his eyes, and reached out, expecting to gather one of his two children into the bed for a snuggle, but saw no one in the dusky light. He was instantly glad because the sudden movement made his head throb.

   Champagne, he thought, he only sipped the stuff on social occasions to be polite, but last night, oh boy, the only alcoholic beverage his wife relished, the only one that put her in an aggressively amorous mood (he smiled to himself), it had gone down all too easily.

    Eric lay back on the pillow and tried to wet his lips. He felt the ache of his bladder, and slid his naked, sturdy frame into the morning chill. As he stepped briskly toward the bathroom he glanced up, expecting to see the heat clinging to the cathedral ceiling. After relieving himself, he hustled to the wardrobe and retrieved his burgundy bathrobe. He cinched its belt and studied the armoire. He didn't know it was Victorian, but he admired its hand-carved pediment and its trio of pineapple finials. Walnut, he decided. How fantastic to have an artisan's talents, he mused, to possess a creative skill. He wiggled his feet into a pair of deerskin slippers. What artistic talent did he possess? He could play the piano, thanks to his mother, who never seemed impressed by his improvised cadenzas.

    "I'm afraid," she'd said coyly, "you're probably better suited to making roulades in the kitchen."

    He had no idea what she was talking about and the gentleness of her tone did nothing to allay his disappointment. Would he ever create anything others would admire after he'd passed on? Certainly nothing at work, where as a foreman at Great Falls Electric he oversaw the production of components intentionally designed to become obsolete.

    He had children, of course. People always said, "Your children are your most important work, your greatest legacy." Actually, it was women who said that.

    His children—the possessive gave him pause. He had been a child once. In an instant, everything that was his father materialized in his mind for an instant, faded slowly, and disappeared altogether, leaving him with an uneasy feeling. Of what exactly? That one day his own children would become as inattentive as he had been to his own dad lately?

    This world. "Who'd bring a child into this mess?" There was a question people never asked before. Why bother? Children came when God sent them, didn't they? Not with the advent of Planned Parenthood, which offered strategies that fit families to their budgets. That organization had made young couples ask altogether new questions, not too loudly, especially Catholics like he and Fran, who listened to Fr. Flanagan rail from his pulpit against the likes of radicals like Margaret Sanger and Katherine McCormick.

    "Satanic women," he bellowed. "Be fruitful and multiply," he counseled. "God will provide," he reminded the well-to-do and assured the poor.

    Crazy world. Eric closed the armoire door, but instead of seeing the mirror on its outside he envisioned the black-and-white animated map he'd seen on television, the one with the tentacles growing out of Mother Russia and encircling the globe. The Communists walled their people in. They had American boys pinned down on the frozen battlefields of Korea. He shifted his weight, uneasy with his paternity deferment from military service. The Commies were ruthless, mindless automatons, who had the A-bomb. They could blow us all to kingdom come. It was Ike's job to see they didn't. Eisenhower had dealt with them during the war. Things were different now. Back then, when Eric and Fran were finishing high school, common cause and common sacrifice were common bonds. Now America had an army of vets marching in gray flannel suits, white shirts and ties. Helmeted with fedoras, it heard a far different battle cry, "Keep up with the Joneses!" On the turbulent sea of commerce, it was all hands on deck but every man for himself.

    Eric heard Fran roll over. He saw the inviting swell of her hip and thought, "birth control." He didn't want to go against his church, but he had seen large families struggle during the Depression. They still did. He and Fran had never discussed how many children they wanted. He sensed that for her, birth control was little more than a hush-hush curiosity and certainly no matter of urgency. He'd wanted to explore the topic, but simply lacked the temerity. So, he practiced the rhythm method on his own, carefully tracking Fran's monthly cycle, and either abstaining from sex or wearing a heavy-duty rubber prophylactic—to her fleeting surprise—when she was likely to be ovulating. His goal was no children, and he sincerely hoped he'd fail, and thereby please both God and himself. As for last night, well, a man is a man, especially on his anniversary, with a glass of Champagne in one hand and the zipper of a stunning black cocktail dress in the other.

    Eric looked into the armoire mirror and noticed a spot where the silver had weakened with age. His reflection struck him as that of a 27-year-old regular Joe. That wouldn't do. He settled his weight on one leg, cocked his face at a rakish angle, and enjoyed his haughty attitude. He especially liked his tousled hair, which he usually kept neatly combed. He hiked up the satin collar of his robe and plunged his hands deep into its pockets. He imagined a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, gave himself a nod of approval, and thought, "James Dean, who's he?"

    Then he sauntered to the fireplace. He took a moment to consider its ornate screen, a needlepoint tapestry depicting a waterfall set in a verdant cliffside. His eyes drifted up under the mantel to a basket of flowers carved in high bas-relief. He reached out with a finger and traced the swag of bellflowers that ran beneath it. Then he set his full attention on the shelf above, where a model of a three-mast China clipper lay in a cradle. His eyes pored over its exquisite details: planked over topsides, built-up bulwarks, masts, and yardarms. The intricacy of the rigging amazed him. He pursed his lips again at yet another person's artistry.

    He turned away and saw a shaft of strong sunlight on the floor. It came from a sliver in the ceiling-length velour curtains that hid an alcove where one could sit and read or stare at the sea. He crossed the room, parted the material, and stepped into a blaze of morning sun and radiator heat. He swiped some condensation from the window pane and peered out. A thin crust of snow covered the lawn, which stretched only a few paces to a shore of ice-coated rocks. The only sign of life was a seagull nibbling something golden brown. Eric craned his neck and looked down the coast toward Gloucester's commercial-fishing zone. A gray wooden pier with a shack clad in shake shingles extended into the harbor. Beside it lolled a weathered trawler, weary and tired, her hold empty, hosed down, but unwilling to lose her proud stench of decaying fish and diesel fuel. Her transom read We're Here, but the crew was nowhere to be seen. Could fishermen ever truly relax, knowing that their next trip over the horizon to Georges Bank for haddock, cod and halibut offered only one sure bet: uncertainty?

    He and Fran had visited the Fishermen's Memorial the day before. The green-blue bronze Man at the Wheel stood on a pedestal in a small park with his back to the city. He seemed so alive: his legs spread wide for balance; his hands clasping the helm and steering through an endless succession of cavernous waves; and his eyes staring vigilantly through the rain- and wave-shelled glass of his imaginary bridge. He made no effort to notice Eric, the land-lubber, who knew only how to dine in comfort on his catch.

    The plaque at his feet read, "They that go down to the sea in ships." What of them? Eric's fourth-grade teacher, Sister Mary Dympna who had grown up in the fishing port of New Bedford, made sure that all her students knew. Eric recited the psalm for Fran, "They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters, they see the works of the Lord and His wonders in the deep."

    "They don't always come back to tell about it, though," she said.

    "The Book of Genesis promised man dominion over the fish of the sea." He chuckled and punned, "but it came with a catch. The good book promised man no such authority over the sea itself."

    Eric loosened his robe while his mind rambled: bible, evolution, the Scopes Trial and the film about it with Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn, who also starred in Pat and Mike, which he and Fran had seen at the drive-in, and my goodness how she'd laughed. He wondered what old movie might be on television that afternoon. It didn't matter. Check-out was at eleven. They'd stay for lunch; mail the postcard of seagirt Tyburn Lighthouse to Aunt Sarah in Boston; and then drive north on Route 1, stopping to walk on the beach at Plum Island, if it wasn't too cold, which it would be.

    No, there was something else that Fran wanted to do. The poetry reading at three by some local poet. What was his name? He shifted the fruit basket that Fran's parents had had delivered to the room and found the notice. The Maximus Poems by Charles Olson. That made him remember the framed poem on the wall to his left. He turned and started to read Shenstone's words, "The warmest welcome at an inn . . . " before succumbing to a curious need to ad lib: To thee, fair Freedom! I retire from flattery, cards, and dice, and din . . . 'Tis here with boundless pow'r I reign, converting this dull seaport with bright Champagne, crowning my freedom at an inn.

    Eric eased himself into one of the two Queen Anne chairs beside the table. He admired the bouquet of cut flowers the kids had given Fran. He toyed with the lid of the box of chocolates, sugar being a traditional sixth-anniversary gift. He picked up a back issue of Time magazine. Its cover bore a pencil-drawing of Groucho Marx with his iconic cigar and proclaimed, "Trademark: effrontery." He felt an inexplicable sense of omen. Although he knew better, he crossed his legs and propped his feet on the table. Ah, the peace and quiet—just the break they'd needed—the luxurious drive down in his father's enormous Pontiac Chieftain Deluxe ("You can't show up in a Volkswagen, I don't care how new it is."), the finery of the hotel, the hand-in-hand stroll through the town, the tour of Henry Davis Sleeper's elegant home.

    "Get your feet down!" He swung his legs around and faced Fran. "Adopting the life of Riley is understandable in a place like this," she said with a smile, "but manners never go out of fashion." Eric said nothing as he admired her sun-enflamed auburn hair. "Well?" she asked, shifting her weight and letting the sleek nightgown caress his face.

    "They say," said Eric, "that gentlemen prefer blondes."

    "Do they?" she asked, taking his head in both her hands and softly rubbing his face against her abdomen. "Based on your performance last night," she flounced her hair, "I'd say you're no gentleman."

NEXT SECTION: Chapter 3 - Monday, Monday