The Three Sirens (7 page)

Nostalgia was what was moving her so, these moments, and immediately, she swept sentiment aside. There was a higher purpose, as Gauguin had indicated. Savages could teach the civilized visitor much. Yet, in truth, how much? The curious beachcomber in Easterday’s letter, Courtney, had made life on The Three Sirens sound idyllic to the point of Utopia. Could there be a Utopia on earth? The word Utopia was derived from the Greek, and it meant, literally, “not a place.” Promptly, Maud’s ruthless anthropological discipline cautioned her that the regarding of any single society as Utopian involved a set of value judgments based on one’s own preconceived conceptions of what is an ideal state of affairs. No real anthropologist could pretend to seek a Utopia. As an anthropologist, she might come up with some prescription of what might be a good way of life, or what might be a most satisfying culture, but she could not define one place as Utopia and another as not.

No, she told herself, she was not after some questionable Graustark. It was something else then. Her colleague, Margaret Mead, when in her early twenties, had gone to Pago Pago, briefly stayed in the very hotel where W. Somerset Maugham had written “Rain,” lived with the Samoan women, and reported to the world how absence of sexual restraint among those people eliminated sexual hostility, aggression, tension. Overnight, Margaret Mead had made a success, for the Western world was always curious about the forbidden and held forth a begging hand. And that was it, finally, Maud told herself. The Western world wanted self-help and Instant Wisdom. Whether or not the Sirens represented Utopia was not the point. Whether the Sirens society could teach civilized man anything or not was not the point, either. The real point was now illuminated for Maud: it was not what the world needed that was exciting her, but what she, herself, desperately needed.

She recalled a letter Edward Sapir had written to Ruth Benedict, when Ruth was planning to apply to the Social Science Research Council for money. Sapir had warned Ruth about her subject: “For God’s sake, don’t make it so remote and technical as last year. Pueblo mythology doesn’t excite people any more than Athabaskan verbs would …
come across with a live project—and you’ll get what you ask for
.”

Come across with a live project—and you’ll get what you ask for.

Maud sat up sharply, the leather soles of her flat shoes thudding on the floor beneath her desk. She dropped the letter on the blotter in front of her, and, hands clasped before it, she considered the remarkable find in the light of her present situation.

She had not been handed an opportunity like this since she had been on her own. It was like a gift of years. The culture of The Three Sirens—some of it known to her from other field trips, some refreshingly new—was precisely her kind of subject. She had always avoided the worn, the used, the mauled-over. She had always rejected the dull familiarity of parallel studies. She had—she would admit this to no one but herself—a nose for the extraordinary, the marvelous, the fantastic. And here it lay at her fingertips, known to no anthropologist but herself. Everything about it was favorable: instead of the usual year in the field, the limitations were six weeks, so she could have no uneasy conscience about deliberate superficiality; a subject, by its nature, that begged to be written and published, not only scientifically but popularly; and—yes—an easy solution to the problem that had vaguely oppressed her so long.

Her mind went to the letter that Dr. Walter Scott Macintosh had sent her two months ago. He had been her late husband’s college companion and her own good friend in the years after. Now, he was a Gray Eminence, an influence, less for his physical anthropology attainments than for political power as president of the American Anthropological League. He had written her, as trustworthy friend, as admirer, and as strictly between them, to whisper of a magnificent, well-paying position that would be open in a year and a half. The job was that of executive editor of
Culture
, the international voice of the American Anthropological League. The present executive editor, in his eighties and ailing, would be retired. The lifetime post would be open, with its unmatched prestige and security.

Macintosh had made it clear that he would like to nominate Maud for the job. On the other hand, several of his colleagues on the Board leaned toward a younger person, Dr. David Rogerson, whose recent papers had spectacularly reflected two field trips to Africa. Since seething Africa was in the news, so too was Dr. Rogerson. At the same time, Macintosh had written, he personally did not feel Rogerson had Maud’s wide experience in many cultures or her contacts with those in the field around the world. Macintosh felt that she was right for the position. The problem, he intimated, was to make the Board members also feel she was right, more capable to fill the job than Dr. Rogerson.

Macintosh, in his delicate way, had hinted at the obstacle. Since Adley’s death, Maud had done little on her own. She had remained stationary while the younger Turks moved ahead. Beyond several papers, rehashing old field trips, she had not published at all in four years. Macintosh had urged Maud to go once more, one last time, into the field, and to return with a new study, an original paper, that she might read before the League at its next three-day convention. It would be in Detroit, shortly after the Thanksgiving holiday, and would precede the Board meeting to select the new executive editor of
Culture
. If Maud had any plan for a trip and a fresh paper, Macintosh had written hopefully, he wanted her to advise him promptly so that he might schedule her to address the conclave.

Macintosh’s letter had given her a great lift, a hope, for the position was exactly the one she needed in this time of her life. With such a position, at her age, she need no longer suffer the rigors of toil in the field, she need not exhaust herself in the monotony of teaching callow students, she need not suffer the demands of writing papers, she need not worry about security or worry about any dependence, in years to come, on Marc.

With this position, she would have a salary of twenty thousand dollars a year, offices in Washington, D.C., a cottage in Virginia, and be the nation’s anthropologist emeritus. Yet, for all this reward, for the temporary stimulation given by Macintosh’s letter, she had been unable to act decisively. She had sunk back into her spiritless rut, too inert to conceive a new study, too tired to propel herself into motion. Finally, after some delay, she had replied gratefully but ambiguously to Macintosh’s kind suggestion. Thank you, thank you, she would see, she would think, she would let him know. And, in the two months since, she had done no more about it. But now. She touched Easterday’s letter lovingly.

Yes, she was alive. She stared at the bookshelves across the room where ranged the colorful volumes on the Fijians, the Ashantis, the Minoans, the Jivaros, the Lapps, that she and Adley had written. She could visualize one more monument: the Sirens Islanders.

She heard footsteps, and knew them to belong to Claire descending the staircase. There was that, too—her daughter-in-law, Claire, and Marc. Maud did not belong in the same house with Marc, now that he was married. She suspected that he chafed to be free of her, socially as well as professionally. The Three Sirens would make that possible. Her freedom might be Marc’s liberation, also. It would help the marriage, she knew, and then she wondered why she thought the marriage needed any help at all. But this was not the morning for that. Another time.

The electric walnut-framed desk clock told her that she still had fifty minutes to her class. While it was all bursting in her mind, she had better make notes. Nothing must be overlooked. Time was of the greatest importance.

She took up Easterday’s bulky letter, handling it as if it were a fragment of the Scriptures, and laid it to one side. She placed her large yellow pad before her, found a ball-point pen, and hastily began to scribble:

“Number 1. Rough out a colorful project statement for Cyrus Hackfeld re obtaining sizable grant.

“Number 2. Consult Marc and Claire—several graduate students, too—on research clues in Easterday’s letter to build up presentation for Hackfeld. Research area of 3 Sirens—any mention in history of anything resembling it?—research Daniel Wright and Godwin—research parallel customs elsewhere to 3 Sirens—look into Courtney background,
etc.

“Number 3. Narrow down list of names for possible team to accompany us. Hackfeld likes big flash ones. Possibilities—Sam Karpowicz, botany and photography—Rachel DeJong, psychiatry—Walter Zegner, medical—Orville Pence, comparative sex studies—and others. Once Hackfeld okays, then dictate letters to Claire for all team personnel to inquire if available and interested.

“Number 4. Write Macintosh if time still open to read new paper to League symposium on Polynesian Ethnology. Tell him about Sirens. Don’t write him. Telephone.”

She sat back, studied the yellow pad, and felt that she had covered about all that was to be done immediately. Then she realized that she had omitted one task, perhaps the most important of all. She bent over the pad once more.

“Number 5. Write and airmail letter to Alexander Easterday—Tahiti—
tonight
. Tell him yes—absolutely
yes, yes, yes
!”

II

OF THE
four members of the Hayden household—four members, that is, if you recognized Suzu, Maud’s continually smiling Japanese day helper—Claire Emerson Hayden, she told herself, had been the least affected in the matter of daily routine by the arrival of the Easterday letter some five weeks before.

The transformation of her mother-in-law, Maud (Claire still found her too formidable, after almost two years, to call her Matty), had been the most marked. Maud had always been busy, of course, and efficient, too, but in the past five weeks, she had become a dervish of activity, doing the work of ten people. More than that, before Claire’s very eyes, she had become increasingly youthful, energetic, creative. Claire imagined that she was now as she must have been at her physical peak, when Adley was her collaborator.

Thinking all of this, Claire, this moment immersed to the shoulders in her luxurious bubble bath, lazily fanned a path through the foam with one palm. She permitted her mind to travel to her sketchy memories of Dr. Adley R. Hayden. She had met him twice before her marriage, when Marc had brought her up to Santa Barbara for social functions, and she had been much impressed by the tall, stooped, slightly paunched scholar, with his dry wit and broad knowledge and understanding. Even as Marc had stammered in his father’s presence, challenging him too often and being turned aside too easily with good-natured ridicule, she had found herself stupefied by Adley’s authority. She had always felt that she had made a sorry impression, although Marc had reassured her that his father found her “a mighty pretty young thing.” She frequently wished that she could have been more to Adley, but a week after their second meeting, he had suddenly died of a heart attack, and in his Valhalla, she was sure, she was still regarded by him as no more than a mighty pretty young thing.

The soap bubbles had formed again before Claire’s body, and absently, she began to smooth them. Her mind had wandered, she knew, and she tried to remember what she had been thinking. She remembered: the Easter day letter five weeks ago, and its effect on all of them. Maud had become a dervish, yes. And Marc, he was busier now, more intense (if that was possible), more nervous, more complaining about petty annoyances but above all about the questionable wisdom of the field trip. “Your Easterday sounds like a romancer,” he had told Maud just two nights before. “A thing like this ought to be investigated properly before wasting all this time and money.” Maud had treated him as she always treated him, with the infinite patience and affection of all mothers with their precocious little boys. Maud had defended Easterday’s solidity and explained that the circumstances permitted no investigation and reminded him of her infallible ear for a good thing, the result of instinct as well as experience. As usual, once overruled, Marc had retreated, and submerged himself in the burden of extra work.

Only Claire’s routine had seemed unaffected by the recent event. There was more typing and filing to do now, but these did not appreciably fill her hours. Every morning, still, she could linger in her warm, soapy bath, read at breakfast, consult with Maud, do her customary work, then participate with the other young faculty wives in tennis or tea or attendance at a lecture. And the nights when Marc was too busy to take her to a movie or out for a drive, or when there was no party, she would let him pore over his notes, do his research, correct his papers—man’s work—while she read novels or watched, with sleepy boredom, the portable television’s screen. None of this had been changed by Easterday and The Three Sirens.

Yet, Claire was positive, something had changed for her. It had nothing to do with daily routine. It had to do with a feeling—almost a tangible effervescent sac of emotion—inside her being. She had been Mrs. Marc Hayden, officially, legally, for better, for worse, forever, for one year and nine months now. With the marriage—“a good one,” her mother and stepfather had decided—the sac of feeling within had been buoyant and fun, like a bubble that carried you up, up, up, and all below was marvelous. But gradually, in the aging of her marriage, the bubble of buoyancy had subsided, settled, flattened into a dreary little puddle that represented nothing at all. That was the look of the bubble: nothing. That was her feeling toward everything: nothing. It was as if all excitement and possibility of joy had fled. It was as if all of life was predictable, every day ahead, even to the last day, and there was no hope of wonder. This was the feeling, and when she heard new mothers discuss post-baby blues, she wondered if there were post-marriage blues, also. There was no one to blame for the disappointment—surely not Marc, not Marc at all—except possibly the inexperienced bride herself, with her wilting bouquet of over-romantic and great expectations. If she had the money, she thought, she would finance a team of experts to find out what happened to Cinderellas after they-lived-happily-ever-after.