“Sit up,” she said. She made Polly drink. “Now, let’s go outside. I can’t sit here anymore.”
“I have to be near the phone.”
“Just to the terrace. A breath of air. We’ll hear the phone.”
Agnes helped Polly up, an awkward jerking operation. “Good Lord,” Agnes said. “Good thing we’re not running for our lives.”
Polly stiffened. “How can you make jokes, Agnes? People are dying. Real people.”
“I don’t see how anything I say can make a difference,” Agnes said defensively, though she was stung.
“Just be decent!”
They stepped outside and Agnes looked for Sylvie. She hadn’t mentioned Maud to Polly—she was too frightened now. “You’re right,” Agnes said, steadied, as always, by the sight of the sea. “It’s so horrible I don’t know what to say.”
“Yes. We don’t have to talk.”
They both ambled around the terrace. Polly did some deadheading.
“Oh Lord—I hope Maud’s all right,” Agnes said. She looked over at Polly.
“She is,” Polly said quickly. “I’m sure she is.”
Agnes’s heart pounded. “You really think so?”
“Yes. Wouldn’t we sense it if she weren’t?”
They looked at each other and their eyes widened. They hadn’t sensed it years ago, when Lydia died, and then Nan. They were surprised. They looked away.
“I wish James would call again, though I don’t know what more he can say at this point. I wish I were home.”
This stung. “What’s this place, then? Not your home?”
“Oh Agnes. Not now.”
“I mean it. This is my home. I thought it was yours, too.”
“It is. And Philadelphia is your home, too. Don’t pick a fight.”
“I’m not picking a fight. You’re the one who wishes you weren’t here right now.”
“Agnes, my husband is dead. I should be with my children and grandchildren, if we are in a war. Don’t you think that’s reasonable?”
It was. Of course it was. Yet Agnes wanted Polly on Fellowship Point, within walking distance. Agnes wanted to be the most important to her. “I heard thee tell them to come here.”
“I don’t know what’s going to happen.”
“No. You’re right,” though what Agnes was conceding to wasn’t clear. Something about uncertainty, something painful that made Agnes feel left behind.
“Forgive me, Nessie, I just want to hold them. This is so awful.”
“It is. Maybe we should pull ourselves together. I think I’ll go home.”
Polly nodded. “I’ll come later? For our drink? Or earlier. I could come for lunch. Would Sylvie mind?” Polly rambled, turning in circles again and wringing her hands.
“Of course not.” Agnes was tense, and wanted… something. Like… resolution. Definition. Truth. But in what form? How was that even possible under the circumstances? Truth: she wanted to hit something. Or someone. A small hurt to distract from the enormous one. She flexed her hands, making fists, opening, making fists again.
“Polly—how does James feel about leaving the Sank to the land trust?”
Polly wobbled her head around, looking everywhere but at Agnes. She got her vague look. Her fingers fidgeted. Agnes smelled blood.
“Sylvie told me she saw him coming off the golf course with Archie and Hamm Loose the younger. Teeter, his name is, I think.”
“They all grew up together and are friends,” Polly said. “You know that.”
“Are they? Were they? I think maybe James wants to wait me out. Wait until I die. My shares will go to you and Archie, and then to James. They have some scheme in the works. You might have told me yourself, Polly.”
“Agnes, how can you even be thinking about this right now? The world is blowing up!”
“We put it off last year, because of Robert and Dick. We didn’t get it done this year, either. Archie is a problem, yes, but I’m suddenly realizing how reticent you’ve been about the plan.”
“I’ve had other things to think about. Dick died! And I have met with the land trust people. I’ve gone to every luncheon you have set up. I told the boys about it in no uncertain terms.”
Agnes registered that she needed to use the bathroom—in fact she was desperate. But she was locked into combat. “Did you even talk to Dick about the land? As you said you would?”
“Don’t speak of Dick.” Polly’s voice was low.
“Why not? I miss him, too.” Agnes was well aware that she was behaving like a teenager, but she couldn’t help it.
“Really? You always thought Dick was such a lightweight. And why? Dick didn’t do anything to you. He only wanted to be taken seriously. You could never give him that. You couldn’t be nice.” She tossed her handful of faded flowerheads over the terrace wall.
“I wasn’t going to perjure myself for his ego, no. So for that, you’d let this land be developed? You must really resent me.” Agnes squeezed her muscles down there. She didn’t want to break the momentum.
“No. Oh no, Agnes. Don’t put that on me. This is none of my doing, none at all. You have always been welcomed in my family, but you go home and sneer, don’t you? You think I don’t know? I have known you for eighty-one years. I know everything about you.”
“Great. You can work with Maud on my memoir after I’m dead.”
“Oh, I will. I’ll tell her everything. I’ll tell her about little Nan Reed’s accident! And how you wrote all those books and got rich to make up for it! But you can’t, can you?”
Agnes let go. Vesuvius erupted. Pee ran down her leg and into her shoe. It was pure relief.
Polly put her hands to her face. “Oh Nessie, I’m so sorry, I don’t believe that, I’ve never even thought it before—” She stepped toward Agnes.
A siren began to blare, the declaration of emergency. The first was joined by a second, and then more, sirens wafting across water from small Maine towns.
Agnes stepped backward, away from Polly. “How could you not believe it if you said it? It’s what you’ve been thinking for forty years.”
“No. Nessie, I’m sorry. I’m out of my mind today.”
“Fuck you, Polly.”
There was a pause. “You won’t accept my apology?”
“Why should I?”
“You know, I think I’m beginning to understand. It’s not so much that you want to preserve the Sank. You want to keep the Point away from my children. I don’t know why, but”—and a light came into her face—“but I do. It’s the thought I have never allowed myself to have. You’re jealous of me, Agnes.”
There it was. Polly was just like Grace Lee after all. Agnes felt rinsed, clean, exalted. She stood up straight and towered above the scene. “I came over to make sure you were okay. But you’re always okay. Good old true-blue Polly. Seemingly so gentle, but really far tougher than I am. I’m wasting my time.” She walked down the steps onto the grass.
“Shut up, Agnes,” Polly said behind her back.