Page 20 of The Last Book Party

“You were invited to thebook party?”

“You know it?” I asked.

“Of course,” she said. “I read about it years ago in Talk of the Town.”

14

The guest list for the party morphed constantly, with names added and names crossed off. The latest version, in its usual place on the kitchen table, included Henry and Tillie’s regular crowd, who came for tennis and dinner parties and backgammon; Tillie’s publisher and editor; a crew of painters and sculptors who had been summering in the Wellfleet woods for decades; a bunch of Provincetown artists, among them Lane’s father, Eric Baxter; and a handful of out-of-towners, including Winthrop and Tracy Grey. I assumed the latter were Henry’s brother and his second wife, who had maligned herself in Tillie’s eyes by reading Judith Krantz.

I was pleasantly surprised to see the list also included a few local business owners, like Bob Worthington, the owner of the Blacksmith Shop Restaurant, and Patricia Sonnenschein and Barb Green, a longtime couple who owned a landscaping business and showed up a few times a month to mow the scruffy grass around Tillie and Henry’s house. The most surprising inclusion on the guest list was Dickie Compton, a Truro Realtor who donned a seersucker suit and tie every day, even during the worst heat waves. At some point each summer, Dickie wouldstop by my parents’ house, ostensibly on a social visit, but with the not-so-hidden agenda of seeing if they might want to sell their property.

“Is Dickie Compton a friend?” I asked Tillie, who for some inexplicable reason had started discussing the guest list with me one morning when I went down to the kitchen to get a cup of coffee.

“Close friend, no. Closet poet, yes,” Tillie said, bumping the old dishwasher door closed with her hip. “And as skilled on a sewing machine as Itzhak Perlman on a Stradivarius.”

Before I could ask her to elaborate, she went into her office and closed the door. Exchanges like this were typical. With Tillie, conversations would often end with a pronouncement that could well be the closing line of a play designed to leave the audience murmuring in wonder after the curtain fell.

When I saw Alva’s name on the guest list, I realized that I hadn’t seen her since I’d returned to Truro. I decided I would stop by the library on the way home to say hello. She was my only real friend in Truro and I was looking forward to spending more time with her. As I rode toward the library, I thought Alva might also have some recommendations for accounts of the building of the canal.

I rested my bicycle against the big oak tree at the bottom of the hill on which the library sat and climbed up the cement steps to the entrance. Alva was alone—it was a perfect beach day—and using a feather duster on the bust of Henry David Thoreau on the mantel of the fireplace.

“Did Mr. Thoreauaskfor blush on his cheeks?” I said in greeting.

“Oh, you!” she said. “What an unexpected surprise.”

“And an extended one,” I said, explaining that I’d be staying well into September.

“That’s delightful!” she said.

But when I told her about my new job, she pursed her lips.

“Working for Henry Grey? I didn’t see that coming.”

“Don’t you like Henry?” I asked.

“Who doesn’t like Henry Grey?” she said, turning back to dusting Thoreau. “He’s a charmer.” She stopped for a moment, holding the feather duster up like a torch. “Charm, however, can be… how shall I put it? Disorienting.”

“He’s really nice,” I said. “When was the last time you spoke to him, anyway? You should give him another chance.”

She stepped down and pushed the little stool under her desk with her foot.

“Oh, we’re on fine terms, it’s not that. He just plays a little loose with the rules. Mind your wits, dear.”

Mind my wits? It was an oddly mixed metaphor for Alva, who was usually so precise with her words. Alva, who had an encyclopedic knowledge of Truro history, launched into a detailed story about how amused the locals had been when Henry and Tillie had bought their house on North Pamet Road more than twenty-five years ago. The house, an old saltbox, originally the home of a whaling captain, hadn’t been lived in for years and was infested with chipmunks and squirrels, which in turn had attracted a large and vicious fisher cat. “Henry and Tillie were so young and unprepared—trust fund babies, it was assumed,” Alva said. “Rumor has it that Henry climbed into the attic with an old rifle and started shooting at the shadows. He was a real Mr. Blandings.”

“A mister who?” I asked.

In response, Alva stepped over to the A–H fiction shelves under the window. She handed me an old hardcover titledMr. Blandings Builds His Dream House. I’d never heard of the book and was surprised to learn from Alva that it had been made into a movie starring Cary Grant and Myrna Loy.

“Just read it,” she instructed.

The book, which I read that evening, turned out to be a very funny novel from the 1940s about a successful New York advertising executive and his wife, who flee their midtown apartment for their dream house in the country that turns into a nightmarish money pit. It not only made me laugh, but helped me take a longer view of Henry and Tillie, who, despite their status as local celebrities, were technically still “wash ashores” like me.

15

The next day, when Henry got up from his typewriter and went downstairs to brew a fresh pot of coffee, I took the opportunity to look over his desk. I picked up an old maroon hardcover, surprised to see that it wasAnna and the King of Siam. I opened it to a page with a Post-it note and saw Henry had sketched a miniature of King Mongkut. On another Post-it, he had scribbledGo balder—with theater wig? Or bolder… and shave!Henry still had a good amount of hair. Was he seriously considering shaving it all off for his costume? The stakes of this party were higher than I had imagined.

Tillie meanwhile kept up a running dialogue about what character to portray. On my way down to the kitchen for a cup of tea later that morning, we crossed paths. She stopped me, saying, “I’m thinking of Mrs. Malaprop—wouldn’t that be fun? I can say ridiculous things all night, and it will only get easier as the alcohol flows.” Dropping her voice to a whisper, she added, “Don’t say a word about this. Promise to forget.Illiterateit from your memory!” She chuckled at her joke as she continued up the stairs.

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