Bad Characters Read online

  * * *

  When Henry Medley arrived, at about dusk, he greeted his host in a torrent of epigrammatic and perfect Hanoverian German, refused the offer of the spare bedroom, and then, cajoled, accepted it. And he began to unload his gear from the taxi that had brought him up from the interurban station. (He had parted with his companions in Denver.) Besides the tent and the portable grill and the sleeping bag, he had brought two bulging Gladstones, a typewriter, a tennis racket, a pair of skis, a rifle, a fishing rod and tackle box, a recorder, a green baize bag full of books, extensive photographic equipment, and two large boxes of cuttings of field flowers from the Hudson Valley. At the sight of the skis, Mrs. Pritchard’s eyebrows disappeared into her hair; there would be no skiing near Adams for three months. Before Medley went up to his room, he produced two bottles of Bernkasteler Doktor from the depths of one of the Gladstones and asked Mrs. Pritchard, with ineffable sweetness, to make a Bowle (for which he gave her the recipe), so that he could toast “the most distinguished scholar in America.” Such was his sweetness and such, also, his air of authority that Mrs. Pritchard, that virago and nobody’s fool, was disarmed, and trotted obediently to the kitchen and began to cut up fruit.

  Before Dr. Bohrmann had got any real impression of the youth at all—beyond the fact that he lived like a gale—he found himself sitting on the western deck, sipping the wine (how had Medley guessed that this was his favorite of all Mosels—the Bowle was delicious), and answering Medley’s rapid and knowledgeable questions about the differences between ground and push moraines, about glacier flora, about the mining history of this region. The young man listened to the old man’s answers as closely as a doctor listening to a heartbeat through a stethoscope, and Dr. Bohrmann had the feeling that he was indelibly recording every fact and every speculation, however irrelevant or tenuous. It is flattering to be so closely attended and so respected, and Dr. Bohrmann glowed as he talked, slaking this burning student’s thirst.

  Henry Medley wore glasses and a beard, and a beholder, looking at the two from afar, would have said they bore a close resemblance. Nearer at hand, it would have been observed that the frames of the young man’s glasses were of thick tortoise shell and that the old man’s were gold, that Medley’s curly beard was black and Dr. Bohrmann’s was straight and frosty. An eavesdropper would have said their German was the same, but an expert would have heard the academy in Medley’s inflections and his stilted usages, and would, in Dr. Bohrmann’s accent, have heard a southern softening.

  At first, dismissing the beard as an amusing coincidence, Dr. Bohrmann’s view of the boy was an agreeable one. Henry Medley was small, constructed thriftily and well, and he emanated indestructibility from the soles of his neat little feet, shod in immaculate white sneakers, to the top of his shapely and close-cropped head. His hands were quick and nervous, and darkly stained with nicotine, for he smoked cigarettes ceaselessly, down to nothing; his clever eyes glinted as they swiftly detached themselves from one focus and fixed upon the next. His voice was high and tended to be phrenetic. Despite the voice, despite the crew cut, despite the lissome limbs, Medley gave the impression of having existed on the earth for much more than twenty-four years, and Dr. Bohrmann was sure that at seventy he would not look much different from the way he did now. He was, thought Dr. Bohrmann as the sun began to set, darkening Henry Medley’s face and whitening his perfect teeth, like a spruce, goodlooking, ageless imp. He was respectful, responsive, articulate, enthusiastic, astoundingly catholic in his information. Dr. Bohrmann, however, was pleased to note that he wasn’t perfect: there was somewhere in him a lack—a lack of a quality an imp did not need but a man could not live without. For example, when Dr. Bohrmann inquired about his journey, really wanting to know, Medley was perfunctory. “The Lincoln Highway is as hot as Tophet, and as ugly as sin—the trip was no Odyssey to put into dactylic hexameters,” and then asked Dr. Bohrmann how he would evaluate Croce as a historian. Generally people of this age were so self-centered that one was obliged to defend oneself against autobiography with the greatest diplomacy. But Medley was so unself-centered that Dr. Bohrmann began to wonder if he had a self at all. He would discuss his plans, but not his aspirations; he would talk about his ideas on a subject, but not his feelings on it; he would quote from “Voyage of the ‘Beagle,’” but would not say that he longed to go on a voyage himself. It comes from having no father, and only a mother and a dragon and dumb little blondes, said Dr. Bohrmann to himself, and he resolved to rear this orphan imp into a human creature.

  * * *

  That evening, at dinner, Medley was a smashing success. As Mr. Street said afterward, he had never found anyone who had so fully grasped Whitehead and Russell; the ladies were delighted with his droll descriptions of Hudson River Bracketed and his account of a meeting with a manufacturer of embalming supplies. When Medley praised the coq au vin, Mrs. Pritchard fell head over heels in love; when he gave a short talk on the viticulture of the Rhine, the Hochheimer in their glasses turned to nectar. After dinner, when the bridge game began, he sat quietly in a distant corner of the library reading the “Diary of William Dunlap” until Blossom Duveen protested and archly told her host that he was rude. Thereafter, at the end of each rubber, someone sat out, and, in the end, as it happened, Medley was always at the table. He played, said the overwhelmed logician Street, like a rattlesnake.

  At half past nine, as his elders were yawning, having had enough bridge and having finished the one weak highball they allowed themselves, Medley said, “I don’t suppose you’d like me to teach you ombre? I learned it after a close reading of ‘The Rape of the Lock.’”

  And so, for two more hours, the company spent a stimulating, if puzzling, time with a pack of forty cards, learning—or, rather, failing to learn—such terms as manille and basto, and being reminded every so often by their teacher that “There is no ponto in black trumps, and this is most important to remember.”

  When the Streets and Miss Duveen departed, they were seen to the door not only by their host but by Medley as well, who warmly shook hands with them all and cordially said he hoped they would meet again soon. Back in the library, he tidied up, emptying ashtrays, putting away the cards, plumping up the cushions. Suddenly, in the midst of his housewifery, his eyes began to water, and then he sneezed explosively and repeatedly; in the lacunae between these detonations, he grimaced painfully and mopped his face and made a sort of moaning sound.

  “Poor chap,” said Dr. Bohrmann. “I expect it’s some pollen or other from the prairie. We’ve been very dry this year.”

  “Not pollen,” gasped Medley. “That!” And with a quivering forefinger he pointed at Grimalkin, the ginger cat, who had apparently come into the house through his own entrance, which Dr. Bohrmann had had cut into the kitchen door, and was sitting on the window sill, looking with interest at the shaking and sneezing and wheezing stranger.

  What a way for the visit to begin and the evening to end! Breathing with difficulty, Medley told Dr. Bohrmann that from earliest childhood, cats had affected him thus. What was there to do? Plainly Grimalkin, an admirable cat and the lord of the manor, would not dream of changing his habits. And Dr. Bohrmann would not dream of Medley’s going up to the mesa with his tent or—for Medley, in his discomfort that was mixed with fear, proposed this—of his returning at once to the dragon and her barkless dog.

  “But look here,” said Dr. Bohrmann. “My beast has never set foot in the spare room—I assure you it’s innocent of his dangerous dander. Come along upstairs and let’s see if you don’t feel better.”

  Once in his bedroom, Medley gulped down antihistamines of divers colors and did presently feel better. He said he would stay out of the cat’s way, and Dr. Bohrmann, very unhappy over the contretemps, said that he and Mrs. Pritchard would do what they could to keep Grimalkin out of the house; at this time of year he had a good deal of business outdoors, what with hunting shrews and smelling flowers. Dr. Bohrmann would board up the cat door first thing the
next day.

  In the morning, as Dr. Bohrmann was going through the upper hall, he found the corpse of a gopher on the floor in front of Medley’s door. In spite of himself he smiled, and when he went into the dining room and found Grimalkin in his accustomed chair, opposite his own, he stroked the tom’s big manly head and said, “Rotten cat! Wicked cat! How did you get in?” though he knew perfectly well Grimalkin had got in through his own private door. The cat, according to his lifetime habit, had his breakfast of corn flakes, well saturated with heavy cream. His purr, as he ate, was loud and smug.

  Mrs. Pritchard had, since Dr. Bohrmann had known her, loved three creatures: Hedda, himself, and Grimalkin. For the cat she bought toys at the five-and-ten, grew catnip in a flowerpot in the kitchen, made special dishes (he was particularly fond of corn pudding); she brushed him, scratched him behind the ears, petted him, talked to him, suffered him to involve himself in her knitting. And when Dr. Bohrmann, strengthening himself with an unwonted third cup of coffee, announced to her that he was going to board up the cat door, and that Grimalkin must henceforth live outside because of Medley’s disaffection, she was outraged.

  “What next!” she cried. “I’ve been giving that boy some second thoughts. For all his kowtowing and his mealy mouth and his ‘Sublime chicken, Mrs. Pritchard’ and his ‘After you, Dr. Bohrmann,’ there’s something about him that tells me he’s sneaky. Put Grimalkin out of the house indeed! And what if milord takes a scunner to me? Will my door be boarded up, too?”

  “Oh, come, Mrs. Pritchard,” said Dr. Bohrmann. “It’s summer and Grimalkin has plenty to do outdoors. He won’t mind for a few days.”

  “A few days! Did you see those skis? Whoever heard of skiing here before October? To my way of thinking, Mr. Henry Medley brought his entire worldly goods with him and means to stay till kingdom come.”

  “Oh, lady, be good!” said Dr. Bohrmann, and he sighed. He was not used to domestic trouble and it embarrassed him. Moreover, he was not entirely sure that Mrs. Pritchard was wrong about Medley and he found himself hoping that the boy slept late; he did not feel like a deep conversation just now.

  “Very well,” said Mrs. Pritchard. “But we shall see what we shall see.” And she closed her mouth firmly, scooped Grimalkin up in her loving arms, and marched to the kitchen.

  * * *

  Henry Medley stayed with Dr. Bohrmann for three weeks and was, during this lengthy time, the most sedulous of apes. He rented a bicycle and he bought a Tyrolian hat; he appropriated Dr. Bohrmann’s politics and his taste in music and food; in company, he quoted his host continually but did not acknowledge his source. On the second day of his visit, Dr. Bohrmann began to tire of him; on the third day he began to avoid him; on the fourth, he begged a ride to Denver with Blossom Duveen, where he went to a double-feature Western while she was shopping. But Henry Medley was not aware that he bored his host; on the contrary, he often observed that their meeting of minds was enough almost to make him believe in a magnanimous God. He was very busy. Besides tirelessly picking Dr. Bohrmann’s brains, he gardened ferociously, moved the porch furniture about, played his recorder and Dr. Bohrmann’s fiddle, read his poems aloud (they were awful and long), took hundreds of photographs. At the end of the first week, Dr. Bohrmann, worn out with company and conversation, suggested that Medley join an organized tour that was going to the ghost towns, but Medley replied that unless Dr. Bohrmann went with him, he would prefer to stay at home. He did not go fishing, because Dr. Bohrmann did not fish; he did not play tennis, because Dr. Bohrmann was too old for the courts. They were invited out as a pair, and when Dr. Bohrmann had guests, Medley did the honors. “We are giving you a Piesporter tonight,” he would say, or, “We prevailed upon Mrs. Pritchard to make cold sorrel soup.” It was us and our and we until Dr. Bohrmann began to feel that his identity was ebbing away from him. Or that he had attached to his side an unmovable homunculus, who, by the way, now spoke German with a Breisgau accent and who mimicked his every thought and every gesture. The gratification he had felt on that first afternoon when Medley had seemed to listen so wisely and so well never returned.

  Mrs. Pritchard would not speak to Medley. Her hatred was murderous; it was evident that she would have liked to put arsenic in his food. And it was Mrs. Pritchard who in the end—guileful, beloved thing that she was—dislodged him. Mrs. Pritchard, ably assisted by Grimalkin. She accomplished this through the simple expedient of taking away the board that had immobilized the swinging cat door. But she was very sly. Later on, she confessed that each night she waited up until the young man had gone to bed and then she would creep down to the kitchen and take away the board; in the morning, long before either of the men got up, she nailed it on again.

  * * *

  One night, Dr. Bohrmann was in a restive sleep, troubled by his arthritis and wakened often by the brightness of the moon. He was distressed, moreover, about Medley, for this was the first time in his long life that he had ever really disliked anyone; he had come to detest that bearded and permanent fixture almost as keenly as Mrs. Pritchard did. And what was the matter with him, a man full of years and of experience, that he could not gracefully remove himself from this dilemma? He dozed, and woke, and dozed again. He dreamed sadly of Hedda. They were cycling, he and Hedda, through the Schwarzwald, toiling up a hill but talking continually, though they had little breath. “Aunt Gertrude will be cross because we’re late for tea and I promised to bring the butter,” said Hedda. Her worry at last made her weep, then sob tragically, and Wolfgang comforted her in shouts; he tried to lower his voice but he could not, and he woke himself by yelling, “We’re not too late, my darling! We have until the sun goes down.” Startled by the sound of his own voice, he switched on the light. Medley was standing in the doorway.

  “Is the cat in here?” he said.

  “Look here, Medley,” said Dr. Bohrmann in an amazing burst of courage. “I don’t like having people walk into my bedroom in the middle of the night.”

  “I’m sorry, sir, I wouldn’t have, only—” and he was seized with a violent paroxysm of sneezes. His red eyes streamed and his breathing, after the sneezes, was stertorous. Obviously he was in for an asthma attack.

  Dr. Bohrmann sat up in bed and he grasped at a straw. “Poor chap,” he said kindly. “I’m afraid my old ginger tomcat has outwitted us. That’s the way they are, you know—foxy.”

  Medley, in a choked voice, said, “I have concealed this from you, sir, but every morning for a week now, that cat has brought some unspeakable piece of carrion to my bedroom door. Tonight, though, it went the limit. It got into my room through some diabolical system of its own, and now the room will be dangerous for me for days.”

  Dr. Bohrmann smiled behind his concealing hand. “I’m sorry for that,” he said, and clucked his tongue.

  “I don’t suppose you would … No, I don’t suppose you would.”

  “Would what, Medley?”

  “Would—oh, no, sir, I won’t propose it.”

  “Get rid of Grimalkin? Is that what you’re trying to say?”

  “Well, in a manner of speaking.”

  “No, I would not. I’ve had my handsome ginger tomcat for fifteen years, and I’ll have him till he dies.”

  “Then, if he’s to have the run of the house,” said Medley, “I’d better move out to the yard.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you, Medley,” said Dr. Bohrmann, ashamed of his cunning and pleased as punch with it, “if Grimalkin has got your number, and it’s plain that he has, moving outdoors won’t do a particle of good. He’ll get into your tent and plague you there. No, Medley, my boy, I’m afraid Grimalkin has us over a barrel.”

  A frenzy of sneezes—the intellectual face turned red and blue. When the storm was over, Medley leaned weakly against the door and groaned. When he spoke again, there was a decided testiness in his voice. “If I had known you had a cat,” he said, “I wouldn’t have made this trip. Isn’t there anything we can do?”

  “I’m afraid not,�
� said Dr. Bohrmann. “I’m just afraid there isn’t a thing we can do.”

  “I could go up to the mesa, I suppose?”

  “I wouldn’t recommend that,” said Dr. Bohrmann. “It’s rattlesnake time.”

  “Then what shall I do?” He was plaintive and pathetic, and for a split second Dr. Bohrmann almost weakened, but he remembered in time the sapping tedium of Medley’s monologues and interrogations, and the feeling he had that Medley had robbed him of his own personality, and he said, “It looks like Hudson River Bracketed and the barkless dog for you.”

  * * *

  In the morning, when they met at breakfast, Henry Medley was pale and shaky; obviously he had had a very bad night. Dr. Bohrmann, who had slept excellently after his visitor left his room, tried to start a conversation about Spanish cave drawings. But the wind was out of Medley’s sails; he smiled wanly and asked to be excused.

  The taxi came an hour later, and Medley piled his mountain of belongings into the back seat. Mrs. Pritchard, beaming, brought him a box lunch. Grimalkin, sitting in a lake of sun under the weeping-willow tree, was cleaning a shoulder blade.

  “Now you write to me,” said Dr. Bohrmann heartily. “Now auf Wiederschen, Medley.”

  “Goodbye,” said Medley sorrowfully. “To think that a cat … I might almost think there was a plan behind it.”

  “Have a good trip, son,” said Dr. Bohrmann, and shuddered at the appellation.

  At last, sulkily, Medley got into the taxi, and then he rallied and his old self reappeared. He said, in German with a South German accent, “If Grimalkin ever goes to join his ancestors, perhaps you will invite me again? We haven’t scratched the surface of our common interests.”

  But happily the driver started the motor and went off before Dr. Bohrmann was obliged to reply. Mrs. Pritchard had gone into the house and now came out again with a dish of sardines, which, without a word, she handed to Dr. Bohrmann; he received it without a word and took it to the heroic tom, who accepted it with an open diapason of purrs. The old man, squatting on his heels beside the cat, surveyed his pretty garden with delight and looked at his house with amazement. How beautiful and bountiful was life! How charming it was of accident to cause contrast: it was good to be cold, so that one could get warm; it was good to wear out so that one could renew oneself; it was really a lovely thing that Medley had come and had gone. With these heartwarming and reasonable thoughts, Dr. Bohrmann watched his cat finish the last fishtail, and then, fetching his big black umbrella, he began to work in his garden. He uprooted the field flowers Medley had brought from the Hudson Valley, not in anger but because they had never really belonged with the rest of the planting, and just as he threw them into the lily pond, Blossom Duveen drove up.