Submersion

[["The main emotion of the adult American who has had all the advantages of wealth, education, and culture is disappointment."->Start]] (text-style:"subscript")[(align:"==>")[[//John Cheever//->Start]]]

It occurs to you that, by taking a dog-leg to the southwest, you can reach your home by water. In your mind you see a string of swimming pools, a quasi-subterranean stream that curves across the county. The delight you take in this thought can not be explained by its suggestion of escape. You have made a discovery, a contribution to modern geography; You will name the stream //Lucinda//, after your wife. [[You have a vague and modest idea of yourself as a legendary figure. ->Contempt]]

You swim a choppy crawl. It is not a serviceable stroke for long distances, but the domestication of swimming has saddled the sport with some customs, and in your part of the world a crawl is customary. Being embraced and sustained by the light-green water seems not as much a pleasure as the resumption of your natural condition, and you would like to swim without trunks, but this is not possible, considering your project. The day is long and there's time still for [[one last easy lap in front of your audience.->Another easy lap.]] But you're eager to [[get on your way.->You climb out of the pool.]]

You hoist yourself up on the far curb – you never used the ladder – and start across the lawn. The only maps and charts you have to go by are remembered or imaginary, but these are clear enough. Your heart is high, and you run across the grass. Making your way home by an uncommon route gives you the feeling that you are a pilgrim, an explorer, a man with a destiny. And you know that you will find friends all along the way; friends will line the banks of the [[//Lucinda River//.->Grahams]]

Lucinda crouches at the curb and asks where you are going. “I’m going to swim home,” you tell her. “First there will be the Grahams’ pool. Then the Hammers’, the Lears’, the Howlands’, and the Crosscups’. I will then cross Ditmar Street to the Bunkers’ and come, after a short portage, to the Levys’, the Welchers’, and the public pool in Lancaster. Then there are the Hallorans’, the Sachs’, the Biswangers’, the Shirley Abbott’s, the Gilmartins’, and the Clydes’. “It’s a lovely day for it,” Lucinda replies. That you live in a world so generously supplied with water seems like a clemency, a beneficence. [[You climb out of the pool.]]

You step through a hedge that separates the Westerhazys’ land from the Grahams’, walk under some flowering apple trees, pass the shed that houses their pump and filter, and come out at the Grahams’ pool. “Why, Neddy,” says Mrs. Graham, “what a marvellous surprise. I’ve been trying to get you on the phone all morning. Here, let me get you a drink.” You see then, like any explorer, that the hospitable customs and traditions of the natives will have to be handled with [[diplomacy]] or altogether [[evaded]] if you are ever going to reach your destination.

You swim the length of their pool and join them in the sun. “Neddy, we missed you at the club fundraiser last month," Mrs. Graham says, studying your face. “Lucinda was never any good at managing our diary,” you say, drifting toward the bar. A few minutes later, two carloads of friends arrive from Connecticut. During the uproarious reunions you are able to slip away and dive into the neighbor's pool. The Lears hear you splashing past the open windows of their living room. Your next stop, the Howlands, are away. Strange. You cross Ditmar Street and start for the Bunkers’, where you can hear, even at this distance, the noise of a [[party]].

You go down by the front of the Grahams’ house, step over a thorny hedge, and cross a vacant lot to the Hammers'. Mrs. Hammer, looking up from her roses, sees you swim by, although she isn’t quite sure who it is. Your next stop, the Crosscups, are away. Odd. You cross Ditmar Street and start for the Bunkers’, where you can hear, even at this distance, the noise of a [[party]].

A storm is coming. No time to waste. As you move on to the next eddy of the //Lucinda River//, you hear the brilliant, watery sound of voices fade, hear the noise of a radio from the Bunkers’ kitchen, where someone is listening to a ball game. Sunday afternoon. You make your way through the parked cars and down the grassy border of their driveway to Alewives’ Lane. You do not want to be seen on the road in your bathing trunks. But this is a day for bravery. [[You dash across the road.->Levy's]]

You climb some stairs to the Bunkers’ pool, where twenty-five or thirty men and women are drinking on the terrace. The water refracts the sound of laughter and seems to suspend it in midair. "Oh, how bonny and lush are the banks of the Lucinda River!" you think to yourself. Prosperous men and women gather by the sapphire-colored waters while caterer’s men in white coats pass them cold gin. The only person in the water is Rusty Towers, who floats there on a rubber raft. Overhead, a red de Havilland trainer circles around and around and around in the sky, with something like the glee of a child in a swing. You feel a passing affection for the scene, a tenderness for the gathering, as if it was something you might touch. In the distance you hear [[thunder.]] And a moment later, a woman [[screams.]]

Enid Bunker sees you and shrieks, “Oh, look who’s here! What a marvellous surprise! When Lucinda said that you couldn’t come, I thought I’d die. . . .” She makes her way to you through the crowd. You kiss, then she leads you to the bar, a progress that is slowed by the fact that you stop to kiss eight or ten other women and shake the hands of as many men. A smiling bartender you have seen at a hundred parties gives you a gin-and-tonic, and you stand by the bar for a moment, anxious not to get stuck in any conversation that would delay your voyage. When you seem about to be surrounded, you dive in and swim close to the side, to avoid colliding with Rusty’s raft. You climb out at the far end of the pool, bypass the Tomlinsons with a broad smile, and jog up the garden path. The gravel cuts your feet, but this is the only unpleasantness as you [[leave this party behind.->Levy's]]

Luckily, there is no traffic and you cross the road without incident. After a short distance you reach the Levys’ driveway, marked with a “Private Property” sign and a green tube for the Times. All the doors and windows of the big house are open, but there are no signs of life, not even a barking dog. You go around the side of the house and see that the Levys have only recently left. Glasses and bottles and dishes of nuts are on a table at the deep end, where there is a bathhouse or gazebo, hung with Japanese lanterns. [[You dive into the chic, kidney-shaped pool.]]

After swimming two lengths, you get yourself a glass and pour a drink. It’s your fourth or fifth drink, and you have swum nearly half the length of the //Lucinda River.// You feel tired, clean, and pleased at that moment to be alone, pleased with everything. It will storm. A stand of cumulus clouds has risen and darkened, and while you sit here, you hear a rumble overhead. [[Thunder]], you think? No, just an [[airplane.]]

There is another peal of thunder. And it is suddenly growing dark. The pinheaded birds seem to organize their song into some acute and knowledgeable recognition of the storm’s approach. From the top of an oak at your back, there is a fine noise of rushing water, as if a spigot there has been turned on. Then the noise of fountains comes from the treetops. Why do you love storms? What is the meaning of your excitement when the front door springs open and the rain flies rudely up the stairs? Why does the simple task of shutting the windows of an old house seem fitting and urgent? Why do the first watery notes of a storm wind have for you the unmistakable sound of good news, cheer, glad tidings? Is this a sign to turn back? [[Of course not.->STAY]]

The de Havilland trainer is still circling overhead, and it seems that you can almost hear the pilot laugh with pleasure in the afternoon. A train whistle blows, and you wonder what time it has gotten to be. Four? Five? You think of the station where, at this hour, a waiter, his tuxedo concealed by a raincoat, a dwarf with some flowers wrapped in newspaper, and a woman who has been crying are waiting for the local. But there is another peal of thunder. [[You take off for home.]]

Reaching the Welcher’s pool means crossing the Pasterns’ riding ring, and you are surprised to find it overgrown with grass and all the jumps dismantled. Had the Pasterns sold their horses or gone away for the summer and put them out to board? You seem to remember having heard something about the Pasterns and their horses, but the memory was unclear. Your mind returns to //Lucinda//. The name seems to lose its meaning... Is it the [[waterway->Tennis]] you discovered and proudly named? Or something more [[intimate->Return]] that slips through your memory like the chlorinated waters you've been traversing?

You stay in the Levys’ gazebo until the torrent passes. The rain has cooled the air and you shiver. The force of the wind strips a maple of its red and yellow leaves and scatters them over the grass and the water. Since it is midsummer, the tree must be blighted, and yet you feel a sadness at this sign of autumn. [[Brace your shoulders.->Welchers]] [[Empty your glass.->Welchers]] [[Start for the Welchers’ pool.->Welchers]]

On you go, barefoot in the rain, through the wet grass to the Welchers’, where you find that their pool is empty. This breach in his chain of water disappoints you absurdly, and you feel like an explorer who is seeking a torrential headwater and finds a dead stream. You are disappointed and mystified. It was common enough to go away for the summer, but people never drained their pools. The pool furniture is folded, stacked, and covered with a tarpaulin. The bathhouse is locked. All the windows of the house are shut, and when you go around to the driveway in front, you see a “For Sale” sign nailed to a tree. [[You brush the unpleasant sense of confusion aside->Tennis]] [[You stop to think.]]

In the distance you hear the sound of a tennis game. This cheers you, clears away all your apprehensions, and lets you regard the overcast sky and the cold air with indifference. This is the day that you – Neddy Merrill – swim across the county. This is the day! Of course, you can retreat to the [[Westerhazys’->Return]], where your wife is still sitting in the sun. Or you can start off for your most [[difficult portage.->Mary Hooper]]

When had you last heard from the Welchers – when, that is, had you and Lucinda last regretted an invitation to dine with them? It seemed only a week or so ago. What explains your confusion? [[Is this just a slip of memory, so expectedly natural for someone of your cavalier disposition?->Tennis]] Or has the repression of unpleasant facts damaged your sense of the [[truth?->Mary Hooper]]

(enchant:?page,(text-colour:black)+(bg:white))You are Mary Hopper, out for a Sunday-afternoon drive. It is a fine day, though not hot. You see a man, close to naked, standing on the shoulder of Route 424, waiting for a chance to cross. You wonder if he is the victim of foul play, or has his car broken down, or is he merely a fool? Standing barefoot in the deposits of the highway beer cans, rags, and blowout patches, exposed to all kinds of ridicule, he seems pitiful. Had he known when he started that this was a part of his journey? Confronted with the lines of traffic worming through the summery light, he appears unprepared. He is laughed at, jeered at, a beer can is thrown at him, and he has no dignity or humor to bring to the situation. [[You drive on and hope to forget you ever saw him.->NEDDY RESUMES]]

You are Neddy Merrill, the Swimmer. You ask yourself, Why, believing as you do that all human obduracy is susceptible to common sense, are you unable to turn back? Why are you determined to complete this journey, even if it means putting you life in danger? At what point had this prank, this joke, this piece of horseplay become serious? You can not go back, you can not even recall the green water at the Westerhazys’, the sense of inhaling the day, the friendly and relaxed voices saying that they had drunk too much. In the space of an hour, more or less, you have covered a great distance. [[Your return to the party is impossible.]] [[Or is it?->Return]]

An old man, tooling down the highway at fifteen miles an hour, lets you get to the middle of the road, where there is a grass divider, and after ten or fifteen minutes you are able to cross. From here you make the short walk to the Recreation Center at the edge of the village of Lancaster, where there are some handball courts and a public pool. The effect of water on voices, the illusion of brilliance and suspense, is the same here as it had been at the Bunkers’, but the sounds here are louder, harsher, and more shrill, and as soon as you enter the crowded enclosure you are confronted with regimentation: ALL SWIMMERS MUST TAKE A SHOWER BEFORE USING THE POOL! ALL SWIMMERS MUST USE THE FOOT-BATH! ALL SWIMMERS MUST WEAR THEIR IDENTIFICATION DISCS! (align:"<==")+(box:"X=")[[[You obey the sign.->You obey.]] [[You turn back.->Return]]]

You take a shower, wash your feet in a cloudy and bitter solution, and make your way to the edge of the water. It stinks of chlorine and looks like a sink. A pair of lifeguards in a pair of towers blow police whistles at what seems to be regular intervals, and abuse the swimmers through a public-address system. You remember the sapphire water at the Bunkers’ with longing, and think that you might contaminate yourself – damage your own prosperousness and charm – by swimming in this murk. [[You dive in.]] [[You skip it.->Return]]

You remind yourself that you are an explorer, a pilgrim, and that this is merely a stagnant bend in the //Lucinda River. // You dive, scowling with distaste, into the chlorine, and have to swim with your head above water to avoid collisions, but even so you are bumped into, splashed, and jostled. When you get to the shallow end, both lifeguards are shouting: “Hey, you, you without the identification disc, get outta the water!” [[You have no choice.]]

You climb out of the pool. The lifeguards have no way of pursuing you, and you go through the reek of sun-tan oil and chlorine, out through the hurricane fence and past the handball courts. The Hallorans’ beech hedge is yellow, and you guess it is suffering from a blight, like the Levys’ maple. As you push through the hedge, you think of [[calling out]], but then wonder if it's less rude to [[approach silently]].

You call “Hullo, hullo,” to warn the Hallorans of your approach. The Hallorans do not wear bathing suits. No explanations are in order, really. Their nakedness is a detail in their uncompromising zeal for reform, and you step politely out of your trunks before you go through the opening in the hedge. Mrs. Halloran, a stout woman with white hair and a serene face, is reading the Times. Mr. Halloran is taking beech leaves out of the water with a scoop. They seem neither surprised nor displeased to see you. Their pool was perhaps the oldest in the neighborhood, a fieldstone rectangle fed by a brook. It had no filter or pump, and its waters were the opaque gold of the stream. “I’m swimming across the county,” you say. “Why, I didn’t know one could!” exclaims Mrs. Halloran. “Well, I’ve made it from the Westerhazys’,” you say. “That must be about four miles.” You leave your trunks at the deep end, walk to the shallow end, and swim back. As you pull yourself out of the water, you hear Mrs. Halloran say, “We’ve been terribly sorry to hear about all your [[misfortunes]], Neddy.”

Mindful not to give the appearance of a prowler or peeping tom, you cross the road and enter the wooded part of the Halloran estate. The footing is treacherous and difficult, until you reach the lawn and the clipped beech hedge that encircles the pool. The Hallorans are friends, an elderly couple of enormous wealth who seem to bask in the suspicion that they might be Communists. They are zealous reformers, but they are not Communists, and yet when they are accused, as they sometimes are, of subversion, it seems to gratify and excite them. Mrs. Halloran, a stout woman with white hair and a serene face, is reading the Times. Mr. Halloran is taking beech leaves out of the water with a scoop. They seem neither surprised nor displeased to see you. “I’m swimming across the county,” you say. "Why do such a thing?" Mr. Halloran replies without looking up. The question stupefies you. It had seemed so obvious and just – yet you find yourself without an answer. Mr. Halloran adds, "I suppose it's as good a way as any to deal with your [[misfortunes."->misfortunes]]

“My misfortunes?” you ask. “I don’t know what you mean.” “Why, we heard that you’d sold the house, and that your poor children...” “I don’t recall having sold the house,” you say, “and the girls are at home.” “Yes,” Mrs Halloran sighs. “Yes,” Mr Halloran sighs. Their voices fill the air with an unseasonable melancholy, and you say briskly, “Thank you for the swim.” [[“Well, have a nice trip,”]] says Mrs Halloran.

Beyond the hedge, you pull on your trunks and fasten them. They are loose, and you wonder if it's possible to lose so much weight in the space of an afternoon. You are cold, and you are tired, and the naked Hallorans and their dark pool has depressed you. The swim is too much for your strength, but how could you have guessed this, sliding down the banister that morning and sitting in the Westerhazys’ sun? Your arms are lame. Your legs feel rubbery and ache at the joints. The worst of it is the cold in your bones, and the feeling that you might never be warm again. Leaves are falling around you and you smell woodsmoke on the wind. Who would be burning wood in the fireplace at this time of year? [[You need a drink.]] [[Onward.]]

You cross some fields to the Biswangers’ and the sounds of revelry – again, that the brilliant noise of voices over water. [[They will be happy to give you a drink.->Biswangers]] [[They will be honored to give you a drink.->Biswangers]] [[They will, in fact, be lucky to give you a drink.->Biswangers]]

Whiskey will warm you, pick you up, carry you through the last of your journey, refresh your feeling that it is original and valorous to swim across the county. Channel swimmers took brandy. You needed a stimulant. You cross the lawn in front of the Hallorans’ house and go down a little path to where they had built a house for their only daughter, Helen, and her husband, Eric Sachs. The Sachs’ pool was small, and you find Helen and her husband there. “Oh, Neddy!” Helen says. “Did you lunch at Mother’s?” [[No.]] [[Yes.]]

“Not really,” you say. "But I’ve taken a chill, and I wonder if you’d give me a drink.” “Why, I’d love to,” Helen says, “but there hasn’t been anything in this house to drink since Eric’s operation. That was three years ago.” Your eyes slip from Eric’s face to his abdomen, where you see three pale, sutured scars, two of them at least a foot long. Are you losing your memory? Has your gift for concealing painful facts let you forget that you have sold your house, that your children are in trouble, and that your friend has been ill? [[You still need a drink.]]

The lie catches in your throat. Wasn't there a time when you could abandon the truth without pause or strain? Perhaps that facility has faded, along with so many other gifts of youth. Helen and Eric seem to sense that you have stained their happy Sunday. You try to recover the false words as they hang in the air, "What I mean to say is that I did stop to see your parents.” That ought to be explanation enough. "You're looking for a drink, aren't you Neddy?" Helen’s voice carried neither reproach nor sympathy. "It's the cold. A whiskey would put me right. [[It’s just the cold"->You still need a drink.]]

“I’m sure you can get a drink at the Biswangers’,” Helen says. “They’re having an enormous do.” “Well, I’ll get wet,” you say, still feeling that you have no freedom of choice about your means of travel. You dive into the Sachs’ cold water, and, gasping, close to drowning, make your way from one end of the pool to the other. “Lucinda and I want terribly to see you,” you say over your shoulder, your face set toward the Biswangers’. “We’re sorry it’s been so long, and we’ll call you very soon.” [[You climb out of the pool, feeling a wobble your arms.->Biswangers]]

The Biswangers invite you and Lucinda for dinner four times a year, six weeks in advance. They are always rebuffed, and yet they continue to send out their invitations, unwilling to comprehend the rigid and undemocratic realities of their society. They are the sort of people who discuss the price of things at cocktail parties, exchange market tips during dinner, and after dinner tell dirty stories to mixed company. They do not belong to your set – they are not even on Lucinda’s Christmas-card list. The party is noisy and large. No one is swimming, and the twilight, reflected on the water of the [[pool->Biswangers Pool]], has a wintery gleam. There is a bar, and you start for it. [[Grace Biswanger->Gatecrasher]] comes toward you, not affectionately, as you have every right to expect, but bellicosely.

“Why, this party has everything,” Grace says loudly. “Including a gate-crasher.” She can not deal you a social blow – there was no question about this – and you do not flinch. “As a gate-crasher,” you ask politely, “do I rate a drink?” “Suit yourself,” she replies. She turns her back on you and joins some guests, and you go to the bar and order a drink. [[Whiskey.]] [[Champagne.->Whiskey.]]

The bartender serves you, but rudely. Yours is a world in which the caterer’s men keep the social score, and to be rebuffed by a part-time barkeep means that you have suffered some loss of social esteem. Or perhaps the man is new and uninformed. Then at your back you hear Grace say, “They went broke overnight – nothing but income – and he showed up drunk one Sunday and asked us to loan him five thousand dollars...” She was always talking about money. It was worse than eating your peas off a knife. Lucinda understands. Your wife is blessed with the grace and good manners befitting her station – and yours. Lucinda always understands. [[You should return to her.->Return]] You dive into the pool, swim its length, and [[push on.->go away.]]

You glide through their pool with feelings of indifference, charity, and some unease, since it seems to be getting dark and these are the longest days of the year. The twilight has a wintery gleam that seems to you unseasonable. One woman has wrapped herself in a pashmina shawl the color of turning leaves. A man wears a cashmire scarf, tossed effortlessly over one shoulder. With a grunt that draws glances from nearby guests, you heave yourself from the water. The bartender stands behind his makeshift counter and watches you [[approach.->Whiskey.]]

The next pool on your list, the last but two, belongs to your old mistress, Shirley Abbott. If you have suffered any injuries at the Biswangers’, they will be cured here. Love – sexual roughhouse, in fact – is the supreme elixir, the painkiller, the brightly colored pill that will put the spring back into your step, the joy of life in your heart. You had an affair with Shirley Abbott. [[It was last week.->Mistress]] [[No, it was last month.->Mistress]] [[Or maybe the affair was last year?->Mistress]]

You can’t remember. But it was you who broke it off, yours is the upper hand, and as you step through the gate of the wall that surrounds her pool, it seems to be your pool, since the lover, particularly the illicit lover, enjoys the possessions of his mistress with an authority unknown to holy matrimony. She is here, her hair the color of brass, but her figure, at the edge of the lighted, cerulean water, excites in you no profound memories. It had been, you think, a lighthearted affair, although she wept when you broke it off. She seemed confused to see you. If she is still wounded, WILL she, God forbid, weep again? “What do you want?” she asks. [[“I’m swimming across the county.”]]

“Good Christ. Will you ever grow up?” “What’s the matter?” “If you’ve come here for money,” she says, “I won’t give you another cent.” “You could give me a drink.” “I could, but I won’t. I’m not alone.” [[“Well, I’m on my way.”]]

You dive in and swim the pool, but when you try to haul yourself up onto the curb, you find that the strength in your arms and shoulders has gone, and you paddle to the ladder to climb out. Looking over your shoulder, you see, in the lighted bathhouse, a young man. Overhead, you see that the stars have come out, but why should you see Andromeda, Cepheus, and Cassiopeia? What has become of the constellations of midsummer? Going out onto the dark lawn, you smell some stubborn autumnal fragrance on the night air. [[Chrysanthemums.->Cry]] Or perhaps [[Marigolds.->Cry]]

[[You begin to cry.]]

This is probably the first time in your adult life that you have ever cried – certainly the first time in your life that you have ever felt so miserable, cold, tired, and bewildered. You can not understand the rudeness of the caterer’s barkeep, or the rudeness of a mistress who had once come to you on her knees and showered your trousers with tears. You have swum too long, been immersed too long, and your nose and throat are sore from the water. [[What you need now is a drink. ->Three]] [[Or some clean dry clothes.->Three]] [[Or some company.->Three]] [[Or all three.->Three]]

You can cut directly across the road to your home, but instead you go on to the Gilmartins’ pool. Here, for the first time in your life, you do not dive, but rather go down the steps into the icy water and swim a hobbled stroke that you learned as a child. A [[Sidestroke.->stroke]] No, a humiliating [[Doggy Paddle.->stroke]]

You stagger with fatigue on your way to the Clydes’, and paddle the length of their pool, stopping again and again, with your hand on the curb, to rest. You climb up the ladder and wonder if you have the strength to get home. You have done what you wanted – you have swum the county – but you are stupefied with exhaustion. [[This triumph seems vague.]]

Stooped, holding onto the gateposts for support, you turn up the driveway of your own [[house.]]

The place is dark. Had Lucinda stayed at the Westerhazys’ for supper? Had the girls joined her there, or gone someplace else? Hadn’t you all agreed, as you usually did on Sunday, to regret your usual invitations and stay at home? [[You try the garage doors.]]

Rust comes off the garage door handles. And they are locked. Going toward the house, you see that the force of the thunderstorm has knocked one of the rain gutters loose. It hangs down over the front door like an umbrella rib, but it can be fixed in the morning. [[You try the front door.]]

The house is locked, and you think that the stupid cook or the stupid maid must have locked the place up, until you remember that it had been some time since you and Lucinda had employed a maid or a cook. You shout, pound on the door, try to force it with your shoulder, and then, looking in at the windows, you see that the place is empty. [[♦->Start]]

You have signed nothing, vowed nothing, pledged nothing – not even to yourself. Why go on? You turn back toward the Westerhazys'. Not in an act of cowardice but, in fact, an act of courage. The true test of character, you realize, is knowing when not to deprive a party of your presence. Besides, Lucinda will be worried. Sunlight breaks through scattering clouds above, and the afternoon seems suddenly infinite. The Westerhazys' sapphire pool glitters ahead. The party has grown in your absence. More cars line the curved drive. You hear familiar laughter spill across the lawn before you even round the hedge. "There he is!" someone calls, “Neddy’s back!” And the attention of the gathering swivels toward you like the camera on a Hollywood film set. They've been waiting for you all along, it seems. Lucinda stands by the edge of the pool in her white swimsuit, her figure silhouetted against the pale green water. She turns, her face lighting up with a particular smile reserved for you only. "Neddy, darling," she says, extending a fresh gin toward you. "We were beginning to worry." [[You take the drink.]] [[The pool is too perfect to ignore.->The End]] [[You hesitate.]]

The gin is cool and invigorating. “Neddy” Lucinda says, “I want you to meet Sam, a film producer who has taken a house in the county this summer.” "Your wife just told me about your idea to swim home through the neighbors' pools.” Sam says, his sunglasses pushed up into his hair and his open-necked shirt seeming both casual and expensive. “Brilliant concept." "Just a lark," you say. "But what a vision." Sam's eyes brighten, “I'd like to use it for my next project." You sip your gin, feeling a pleasant warmth – the idea for the //Lucinda River// was enough, more meaningful in its conception than its execution. "To your magnificent lark," Sam says, raising his glass. [[You down your gin.->You hesitate.]]

(text-style:"blur")[You slide into the pool. The pale green water receives you without resistance, and you note with some pride that your body displaces it exactly as it had in your youth. You float on your back, gazing up at the perfect summer sky. The smell of chlorine and cut grass is fragrant. The sounds of the party are musical. The perfect sun, refracting through the pale green water, casts dappled patterns across the faces of your friends and family. Your daughters are here, tennis-tanned, dancing. They move like actors in a film. Your life is full. You sink down, beneath the surface. You think you could stay here forever, in this suspended moment where everything is beautiful. And nothing hurts. [[♦->Dead Start]]]

The Westerhazys' pool, fed by an artesian well with a high iron content, is a pale shade of green. You stand at its edge, suddenly arrested by what seems, in the particular glow of late afternoon, a moment of consequence. Shall you [[dive->NEDDY RESUMES]] back into your private adventure – that chain of swimming pools stretching across the county like stepping stones. It was designed to lead you home, but where else might it take you? Or is it time to [[slip->The End]] back into the familiar but unchallenging embrace of the pale green poolwater before you? You feel, obscurely, that something important hangs in the balance.

You might hear it on the golf links and the tennis courts, hear it in the wildlife preserve, where the leader of the Audubon group is suffering from a terrible hangover. “I drank too much,” says Donald Westerhazy, at the edge of the Westerhazys’ pool. “We all drank too much,” says your wife. The pool is a pale shade of green. It’s a fine day. The sun is hot. You are Neddy Merrill. Far from young, but with that special slenderness of youth. Just this morning you slid down the banister and gave the bronze backside of Aphrodite a smack. Some have compared you to a summer’s day. You sit by the green water, one hand in it, one around a glass of gin. You have just been swimming and are breathing deeply, stertorously, as if you can gulp into your lungs the intenseness of your pleasure. Your mind drifts to your home, eight miles to the south, where your four beautiful daughters might be eating lunch or playing tennis. [[An idea materializes...->Consider Idea]]

It’s one of those midsummer Sundays when everyone sits around saying, [[“I drank too much last night.”->The Beginning]]

You have a simple contempt for men who do not hurl themselves into pools. You cast off the sweater hung over your shoulders and [[dive in.->Dive In]]