It didn’t do, thinking of the lost world, and so Dulcy left it again. The pale young man, who had chosen a seat across from a stocky man who talked loudly about the insurance business, was big-boned, with a good wool coat, an expensive hat he now placed on the seat next to him, and thick, well-cut hair. He didn’t seem quivery, or agitated, or prone to exclamation points, but he was thin, with a kind of diminished look that might have come from illness, or alcohol, or shot nerves. Dulcy couldn’t tell if he was twenty-five or thirty-five, but she liked his face, and she could tell he deeply regretted his choice of seatmate: the insurance man hadn’t stopped talking.
Run now, or regret, she thought. But the young man raised a finger for the porter, and his pragmatism pulled her back to the newly imagined husband, her necessary creation. Dented, she thought, but not weak. Sick was not weak, until the heartbreaking end of things; she’d be good at these details. This husband had died young, not more than thirty. Perhaps a tropical illness—not a sexual one—with consumption as a nail in the coffin. They had traveled widely, spending their time alone together in anonymous places, and he’d left behind little sign of his existence.
The cardplayers were insulting each other, dropping cards in mock disgust and giggling, wheezy and raucous. They were wearing black, too: the world was made of mourning women. Someone was always dying, and someone was always dusting off black silk. The thick insurance man must have liked this notion: “They might not all be dark complexioned, but they think that way. Warm climates, you know. I’m of the hope that the Irish will simply kill them off.”
The younger man tapped the pages of his open book—shield of the traveler—and beamed up at the very, very dark porter, who’d arrived to save the day. When he left, his companion started in again, but in a strained whisper; here was a man who didn’t want the staff to add anything extra to a meal. “They’re trying to join all the orders.”
“Dark people?” asked the young man.
“Slavs, Italians, Spaniards. Not to mention the truly dark ones.”
“And who are your people?” asked the young man. The question sounded polite; it might not have been. His eyes drooped, and he curled his lip well; in that sense he might have fit into Carrie’s short story. He could be a Pinkerton; Victor couldn’t resort to Henning’s brothers again, but he might have hired a detective—would a Pinkerton have a sense of humor? And what did it matter, anyway, if someone was following them?
Dulcy moved in her seat, and felt her damage, and wondered why her brain felt so strange and shuttered and peaceful. The window gave her a thousand more spruce trees, a million more snowflakes: she felt like she was watching her mind dissolve. Someone had opened a pane, and flakes touched her face and pushed the stink of cigars to the back of the car.
“Scotch and German,” said the insurance man, oblivious.
Her sharper Remfrey brain, the one she would never shed, thought xenophobic prick , and she floated away again to her promising, very dead husband. Tubercular or feverish, possibly wounded: an American back from the Philippines, an Englishman who’d served in Africa? She wouldn’t know enough to be believable; Walton had been a flawed parent but adept at steering his daughters away from soldiers. She circled the idea of a mountaineer, but she’d seen so many crushed and splintered animals and vegetables and minerals that self-inflicted injuries—injuries of amusement—lacked nobility. Though how was climbing any riskier than sleeping with everyone who volunteered?
The porter reappeared with large brown drinks, and the young man put his book down and used the same hand to take tip money from his pocket. The big talker seized an opening. “In any event, we’re flooded with thieves. All of them highly sexed.”
“Oh God,” said Carrie, eyes still shut. “Get me some water. Who is the person who drones?”
“You’ll see him soon enough,” said Dulcy. She was fascinated by the young man’s expression as the insurance man blathered on, a look that was both tight and wild-eyed. He was cornered, and he looked it. Maybe he’d drink too much. Maybe he’d scream, or have a fit.
“Of course, real tradesmen are another question,” said the big man. “These people are good with stone. A man of ability will always be recommended and make his way, don’t you think?”
“No,” said the young man, though he smiled enthusiastically and reached for the glass, again using his right arm. Dulcy was sure now that something was wrong with the left. “I don’t think that, at all. I think for some reason you would rather have bad work from a Scottish mason than brilliant stuff from a Sicilian or Romanian.”
A normal flush started on the neck; the insurance man’s nose turned the color of a raspberry. He looked around for an escape, but there were no empty seats. “It’s only a guess,” said the young man. “I’m happy to admit I’m often wrong. Stay and argue with me.”
Dulcy smiled as she turned to the window, temporarily in love with the world again.
???
In the dining car, Dulcy gave Carrie one of Walton’s pink stomach pills. They watched passengers and made guesses out of boredom, mostly unkind: the bearded men in the back sat too close to each other; a little man who stared at the ceiling like it was God must be a dipso. Carrie thought the blowhard college boys in one corner were charming—fictional heroes should be morose, but real men had to be sunny. Alfred honked like a goose—a wealthy, intelligent goose—and had a scrubbed, optimistic face.
Dulcy guessed the college boys were spoiled weasels, but at least they didn’t look like they were related to Henning. A handsome blond man was unreadable: he had classic features, but the set of his face never really changed, which could be indicative of deep thought or none at all. A woman with gray hair and a gray blouse—she looked as if she were in the process of becoming a ghost—cut up meat for an ancient man whose bright eyes scanned the people on the train. Dulcy didn’t think he could talk, but he’d studied the menu the way she did: earnestly. “Are they married?” she asked Carrie.
“Of course not, nor biblical. Impossible. She’s his nurse, or his niece or daughter. She avoids even thinking of birds and bees.”
Unlike those well-raised Remfrey girls. Dulcy ordered oysters, a salad of beets and apples, salmon with Chablis sauce. Carrie had vol-au-vent à la Toulouse and saddle of lamb, with asparagus and hollandaise on the side. Dulcy hoped the pill kept working, so that neither of them had to see any of these dishes twice. They had glasses of Heidsieck and slices of citron cake with boozy berries and thick cream. The mood improved. Dulcy shut out the things that had ended, the things she couldn’t change and that Carrie didn’t understand. Neither of them brought up Walton in the luggage car, and neither felt self-conscious about this. Dulcy emptied Carrie’s champagne flute; Carrie finished the cake crumbs on Dulcy’s plate and nattered about finding a wedding gown with a forgiving waist.
“After I find a forgiving funeral dress,” she added. “Do you supposed Victor will actually get on a train?”
Dulcy watched one of the college men snap the other with a Princeton scarf, a Victor flag.
“I imagine he’ll become calmer once he makes the money back,” said Carrie. “What did his letter say? That he loves you again?”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Dulcy.