Read Online Young Hearts Crying by Richard Yates - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Richard Yates
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he got up to take her inhis arms that there would be no more fault-finding, no more condescension, and no more trouble in his house.
Larchmont would never be Cambridge, but the smell of this girl’s hair and the taste of her mouth, the sounds of her voice and her impassioned breathing, hadn’t changed at all from times under the Army blankets on Ware Street, years ago.
In the end, though, he decided she was probably right about the jacket copy. The world, or rather whatever infinitesimal fraction of the American reading public might bother to pick up and glance over his book, would never know that Michael Davenport had once lost early in the Golden Gloves.
Chapter Five
In Putnam County, in the fall, you can see pheasant break from cover and take off over long tan and yellow fields, and sometimes there are hesitant deer to be found among the slender trunks and shadows of oak and white birch. Serious hunters don’t much care for the region, though, because it isn’t “open” enough: there are many well-traveled asphalt roads, some with an occasional clustering of houses and stores and public schools, and there is the high, relentlessly solid intrusion of the New York State Thruway.
Near the southern edge of the county lies a lake called Tonapac, once a popular summer resort for middle-class vacationers from the city; the lake itself has long been out of fashion, but the small commercial settlement spawned at one end of it remains intact.
And it was into this drab village that the Davenports found their way one September afternoon: Michael at the wheel of the car and watching for the necessary left turn, Lucy frowning over a road map that lay unfolded on her thighs.
“Here we go,” he told her. “This is the one.”
They passed through a flat section of tidy, close-set little homes, several of whose front lawns displayed plaster Virgin Marys and lofty poles with American flags that hung limp in thewindless day, and Lucy said “Well, it’s beginning to look a little tacky, isn’t it.” But then they came to a long, curving stretch of road where there were nothing but low, old stone walls and dense masses of trees on either side, and at last they found what they were looking for: a brown shingled mailbox with the name “Donarann.”
They were here to follow up a real-estate ad that had promised a “charming 4½-room guest house for rent on private estate; beautiful grounds; ideal for children.”
“Driveway isn’t exactly in top condition,” Michael said as their tires rumbled uphill in the ruts and the billowing dust of it, but they were both intrigued by what a long and unenlightening driveway it was.
“Oh, good, you’re the Davenports,” the landlady said, emerging from her own house with a thick bunch of keys in her hand. “Did you have any trouble finding us? I’m Ann Blake.” She was short and quick, with an aging, small-chinned face made almost comical by long false eyelashes; she reminded Michael of the old-time cartoon character Betty Boop.
“I think the best thing would be to show you the little guest house first,” she explained, “in case you might find it unsuitable in some way – I love it, but I know it’s not to everyone’s taste – and then if you do think you’d like it well enough, I’ll take you around to see the grounds. Because really, it’s the grounds that are the main attraction here.”
She was right about the guest house: it wasn’t to everyone’s taste. It was stubby and ill-proportioned, made of stucco in a pale shade of pinkish-gray, with the wooden trim and shutters at its windows painted lavender. Upstairs, at one end of it, French doors led out onto an abbreviated balcony that was overgrown with leafy vines, and from the balcony a frivolous, vine-entangled spiral staircase descended to a flagstone terrace at whatproved to be the front door. If you stepped back on the grass to take it all in with a single searching glance, the house had a lopsided,
Larchmont would never be Cambridge, but the smell of this girl’s hair and the taste of her mouth, the sounds of her voice and her impassioned breathing, hadn’t changed at all from times under the Army blankets on Ware Street, years ago.
In the end, though, he decided she was probably right about the jacket copy. The world, or rather whatever infinitesimal fraction of the American reading public might bother to pick up and glance over his book, would never know that Michael Davenport had once lost early in the Golden Gloves.
Chapter Five
In Putnam County, in the fall, you can see pheasant break from cover and take off over long tan and yellow fields, and sometimes there are hesitant deer to be found among the slender trunks and shadows of oak and white birch. Serious hunters don’t much care for the region, though, because it isn’t “open” enough: there are many well-traveled asphalt roads, some with an occasional clustering of houses and stores and public schools, and there is the high, relentlessly solid intrusion of the New York State Thruway.
Near the southern edge of the county lies a lake called Tonapac, once a popular summer resort for middle-class vacationers from the city; the lake itself has long been out of fashion, but the small commercial settlement spawned at one end of it remains intact.
And it was into this drab village that the Davenports found their way one September afternoon: Michael at the wheel of the car and watching for the necessary left turn, Lucy frowning over a road map that lay unfolded on her thighs.
“Here we go,” he told her. “This is the one.”
They passed through a flat section of tidy, close-set little homes, several of whose front lawns displayed plaster Virgin Marys and lofty poles with American flags that hung limp in thewindless day, and Lucy said “Well, it’s beginning to look a little tacky, isn’t it.” But then they came to a long, curving stretch of road where there were nothing but low, old stone walls and dense masses of trees on either side, and at last they found what they were looking for: a brown shingled mailbox with the name “Donarann.”
They were here to follow up a real-estate ad that had promised a “charming 4½-room guest house for rent on private estate; beautiful grounds; ideal for children.”
“Driveway isn’t exactly in top condition,” Michael said as their tires rumbled uphill in the ruts and the billowing dust of it, but they were both intrigued by what a long and unenlightening driveway it was.
“Oh, good, you’re the Davenports,” the landlady said, emerging from her own house with a thick bunch of keys in her hand. “Did you have any trouble finding us? I’m Ann Blake.” She was short and quick, with an aging, small-chinned face made almost comical by long false eyelashes; she reminded Michael of the old-time cartoon character Betty Boop.
“I think the best thing would be to show you the little guest house first,” she explained, “in case you might find it unsuitable in some way – I love it, but I know it’s not to everyone’s taste – and then if you do think you’d like it well enough, I’ll take you around to see the grounds. Because really, it’s the grounds that are the main attraction here.”
She was right about the guest house: it wasn’t to everyone’s taste. It was stubby and ill-proportioned, made of stucco in a pale shade of pinkish-gray, with the wooden trim and shutters at its windows painted lavender. Upstairs, at one end of it, French doors led out onto an abbreviated balcony that was overgrown with leafy vines, and from the balcony a frivolous, vine-entangled spiral staircase descended to a flagstone terrace at whatproved to be the front door. If you stepped back on the grass to take it all in with a single searching glance, the house had a lopsided,
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