Part 17

She put her hands on his arms. “Jack, he’s not worth your time,” she said. “Anybody who would take advantage—”

“No, no, no, it’s normal. In this abnormal world we live in, you and I. If I were young and beautiful, he’d settle for that. But I’m not. I’m middle-aged and ugly. And a sap. So it takes something else ... money. I wish I had the knack of being a millionaire.”

“Damn it, Jack, you need somebody who can appreciate you.” He laughed bitterly, but she went on. “You make me hate Terry already without ever having seen him.”

“No, Laura,” he said seriously. “Don’t hate him. He’s very young. He’ll learn. It’s my fault. I can’t give him what he needs.”

“Dollar bills?”

Jack sighed. “That’s my last chance. I know it takes something else, but I haven’t got it. And now I haven’t got the dollar bills, either.”

“If I were a boy I’d fall madly in love with you,” Laura said.

This was such a startling remark that Jack had to drop his cynicism and take it in the spirit in which it was given. “Thanks, Mother,” he said softly. He looked at her, his ugly intelligent face prey to a number of strong emotions that he made no attempt to hide. It was a measure of his regard for Laura that he could let her see him stripped of wit and laughter like this. “How much do you have in the bank, Laura?”

Laura stared a little at him. But then she said quickly, “All I have is yours, Jack. It’s not much, but if it’ll help....”

He smiled a little and then he leaned over and kissed her cheek. “You’re a doll,” he said. “We both know this is a losing investment. But it’ll give me a few more days with him. After that....” He shrugged. “Well, I always seem to live through these things. I don’t know why.”

They stood uncertainly on the corner for a minute and suddenly he asked, “Where are you going now?”

“Home.”

“To Marcie?”

“Yes. I hope Burr hasn’t tried to bother her.”

“He’s pretty sick about the whole thing. I think he’ll drink it off for a day or two. You should, too. The whole thing looks screwy to me.” He looked at her. “Come have a nightcap with me.”

“Where?”

“The Cellar. Where else?”

“I’m afraid I’ll run into Beebo.”

He shrugged. “I’ve gotten to know her better.” He gazed away from her thoughtfully.

“You have?”

“She calls me all the time. ‘Where does Laura work, what does Laura like, tell me all about her.’”

“She asked you that?” Laura was slightly incredulous, but once again, she liked it. She was sorry she liked it, but she did.

“Yeah. I’m beginning to think I like her.”

“You liked her before.”

“I know.” He laughed. “I’m not making sense. I guess I mean I feel sympathetic toward her. We’re both unlucky in love. At the moment.” He looked hard at her then and said, “Please come with me, Laura. I don’t want to go home.”

“Why not?”

Again he laughed, not so pleasantly this time. “I’m afraid of what I’ll find.”

“Like what?”

“Like somebody else in my bed with Terry.”

After a moment of shocked silence, Laura put her arm in his. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s go somewhere and flatter the hell out of each other.”

He chuckled at her. “Mother, damn it, sometimes I suspect you of having a sense of humor.”

They went down to The Cellar, in spite of Laura’s misgivings. Jack seemed so unhappy that she wanted to indulge him. It was crowded as always on Friday nights, but Beebo wasn’t in sight.

“She’ll be in,” Jack observed. “She’s late on Fridays.”

They stood at the bar until a couple of stools were vacated and then sat down.

“What does she do?” Laura asked rather shyly.

“Who? Beebo?”

“She must get money somewhere. She has to pay the rent like everybody else.”

“She runs an elevator. In the Grubb Building. They think she’s a boy.”

“My God—an elevator.” It seemed wrong, even ludicrous. Beebo had too much between her ears to fritter her youth away running an elevator. “What does she do that for?”

“She doesn’t have to wear a skirt.”

Laura was stunned. It was pathetic, even shameful. For the first time she saw Beebo not as an overwhelming, handsome, self-assured individual, but as a very human being with a little more pride and fear and weakness than she ever permitted to show.

Laura didn’t know how long they had been there when Beebo walked in. She only knew she had had plenty to drink and it was time to go home. Beebo walked up to her, and Laura saw her face first in the mirror. She turned around with a start and stared at her. Beebo was wearing a dress.

A dress. And high heeled shoes. She was over six feet in the high heels. Strangely enough she wasn’t awkward in them, either. She wasn’t comfortable, but she could walk a straight line and keep her balance.

“Hello, Bo-peep,” she said quietly in Laura’s ear.

Laura felt a grateful response flow down to her toes from the ear. “Hello,” she said to the mirror image and then turned to face her. “Hello, Betty Jean.” She looked at her skirt.

Beebo gave her a wry smile. “You remembered?” she said. “Do you remember the good things, too?”

“Yes,” said Laura, smiling back. And surprised herself. For a moment she felt curiously receptive. She had no idea why.

Beebo gazed at her and then she put a hand on Jack’s shoulder. “Hello, fellow sufferer,” she said.

“Hi, doll.” He turned around. “We’re drowning our sorrows.” He gestured at Laura with his glass.

“So I see. Mind if I drown a few with you?”

“We’d be delighted.”

Beebo nodded at the bartender, who nodded back and fixed her a whisky and water. Beebo was on good terms with the bartenders in all the gay bars. They knew what she drank and they served her without being told. Beebo leaned on the counter between Jack and Laura.

“Where’ve you been, doll?” Jack asked, waving a hand at her dress. “Masquerade ball?”

“Party,” she said laconically, hoisting her newly arrived glass.

“Gay?”

“Straight.”

“How dull. What’s the matter with you, Beebo? You’re no fun anymore. You wear skirts and go to straight parties. Jesus.”

Beebo grinned at him. “I have one dress, lover. I get it out once a year and wear it. In honor of my father. He likes dames.”

“Yeah, but he’s not around to appreciate it.”

“Well, you are, Jackson. Give me a kiss.” And she took his chin in her hand and extracted one from his reluctant mouth.

“God!” he said, and made a face. Beebo laughed. And Laura sat and watched them and wondered what they were all doing there and why they laughed at themselves when they were all aching inside from unspeakable hurts. She felt vaguely jealous to think of Beebo at a party with people she didn’t know and had never seen. Beebo surrounded by women. Laura looked at her until Beebo returned the stare without talking, only looking at Laura until Laura had to lower her eyes. “What’s eating you, Bo-peep?” Beebo said, running a finger around the edge of her glass.

“Are pants really that important?” Laura said. She said it sarcastically because she was afraid of her tears.

Beebo laughed a little. “I don’t know. How important is that important?”

“Why don’t you get a decent job?”

“Oh,” said Beebo as she understood. She finished a second drink. “I’ve got one, baby. I’m a lift jockey. Very elevating work.”

“Not funny,” Laura said. “You work all day at a lousy job like that, and then you drink all night.”

“Does that bother you?”

“Yes. Not very much, of course. You’re not worth it. But it seems awful. All for a pair of pants.”

Beebo laughed. “Reform me, baby.”

“I don’t have time.”

“What do you have time for?”

“Work.”

“And Marcie?”

“And Marcie.” Laura didn’t know why she said it. She knew how badly it would hurt. But she was high, the go-to-hell feeling was still with her from the morning. It was either hurt or be hurt; sarcasm or tears. She looked up slowly at Beebo. At her blue eyes and her lips turned down, with an unaccustomed trace of lipstick on them. Laura wanted to hurt her. She couldn’t stop herself. She turned on her stool to face her. “You’re ridiculous,” she said. “You’re a little girl trying to be a little boy. And you run an elevator for the privilege. Grow up, Beebo. You’ll never be a little boy. Or a big boy. You just haven’t got what it takes. Not all the elevators in the world can make a boy of you. You can wear pants till you’re blue in the face and it won’t change what’s underneath.”

Beebo just stared at her, her face suddenly pale and frowning, in silence. Then she turned, leaving her cigarette still lighted in a tray on the bar, and left them without saying a word to either.

Laura and Jack sat in silence for a while after she had gone, watching her cigarette burn itself out. Finally Jack said, “If Terry had done that to me, Laura, I’d have strangled him.”

Laura put her head down on the bar and cried.

The weekend was a stalemate for Laura and Marcie. Laura was so deeply involved in her conflicts that it was impossible to talk about them. In two weeks Jean would be back. In a day her father would be gone. Burr would start hounding Marcie, and Laura still didn’t know why Marcie had let him think they were lovers. And Beebo ... Beebo ... that hurt the worst, somehow. It was so needless, so brutal. The kind of thing Merrill Landon had done to her when he was in a temper. Just to blow off steam, to dissipate the mood. Only he went even farther. He would shout and call her names, slap her, call down the wrath of his dead wife and son on her head.

Marcie couldn’t get through to Laura, hard as she tried. She, too, began to get moody. She launched into long self-reproaching speeches which tortured Laura until she begged her to stop.

On Monday Laura went to the bank before she went to the office and withdrew one hundred and ninety-two dollars. She was going to leave herself twenty, just in case, but she left herself five instead. She had a little at home. She could get along until the end of the week. The rent wasn’t due and there was food in the house.

Jack came by at five and picked it up. “Come out for dinner with me,” he said. “I seem to have come into a little money.”

“No, thanks.”

“My treat,” he said, directing his sarcasm at himself and waggling her dollars at her.

Laura smiled faintly. “Take it,” she said. “I can’t talk to anybody tonight.”

“How’s Marcie?”

“Brooding. I get on her nerves, I guess.”

“That’s only fair. She’s made a mess of yours. How’s Burr?”

“He called her. They talked for a few minutes. He asked her to see him.”

“Will she?”

“No.”

“Not yet, hm?”

“Never,” Laura said sharply. “She’s fed up with him.”

“Well, if not Burr, somebody else.” Laura covered her face with her hands suddenly and Jack looked at her sympathetically. “Just won’t believe me, will you, Mother! You love Marcie so sooner or later Marcie will have to give in and love you.”

“No!” she said, looking up. “I know it’s not that simple. It’s just that I’m convinced I have a chance. I live with her, I know her, and she was willing to have Burr believe we were lovers.”

“She was willing to get him the hell out of her hair after a bad quarrel,” he said. “That’s all. She just let him believe it to get rid of him.”

“Please Jack,” she said with forced patience. “How’s Terry?” If he’s going to torment me, I’ll give him the same treatment, she thought.

Jack lifted his eyebrows slightly and shrugged. “Healthy,” he said. “And hungry. Jesus, how that kid eats. And he likes smoked oysters.”

Laura had to smile, though she didn’t feel like it. “Get him a bale of smoked oysters,” she said, “and leave me alone for a while. Please.”

Jack gave her shoulder a squeeze. “Okay.” He started out and then turned to ask, “How did Sarah like Jensen?”

“She said she liked him. She has a crush on Dr. Hagstrom, but she liked Carl anyway.”

“He’s smitten. Says he’s going to call her again.”

“Good.” They smiled a little at each other. “Somebody’s doing it right,” Laura said wistfully.

Jack laughed. “Never mind,” he said. “Someday we’ll die and go to heaven. All the angels are queer, you know.” And he left.

Laura followed soon after. She knew just where she was going—the McAlton Hotel. She would walk right in and ask for Merrill Landon and the clerk would say he had left, the convention was over, and Laura could quit suffering over him. He would be hundreds of miles away and she could start to forget him.

She walked over to the hotel in a matter of minutes and went into the lobby with a confidence she had not felt during the week her father had been there. She was about to kill her ghost. She looked forward to great relief.

At the desk she waited for a moment or two until a clerk could take care of her. She recognized him from one of her previous visits but fortunately he didn’t seem to remember her. “Yes?” he said.

“Is the Chi Delta Sigma convention over?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am it is.”

“Oh. Then I guess Merrill Landon isn’t staying here any more.”

“Oh, yes he is.”

Laura was startled. “He said a young lady might be asking for him,” the clerk said. “He left a message.” He looked at her dubiously, unnerved by the strange expression on her face. “Would you be his daughter, by any chance?”

Laura shook her head numbly. The clerk brought her an envelope and Laura opened it and read, in her father’s hand: “Laura, I will be here till the end of the month. Come up to my room any evening after eight.” It was not even signed. Nice and sentimental, she thought. Just like him.

“Thank you,” she told the clerk.

“Will there be any answer?” he asked.

“Yes,” Laura said. She took the pad of paper he pushed toward her and wrote on it, “Go to hell.” Then she folded it, put it in the envelope, sealed it, and wrote “Merrill Landon” on the front.

She shook all the way home. He was still there, still haunting her, waiting to pounce on her and punish her. When Marcie asked her what was the matter, Laura couldn’t tell her. It was Laura’s problem, it was intimate and awful, and she had no wish to share it. She hardly noticed how little she had looked at Marcie the past few days, how little she had responded to her. And yet in the back of her mind the question rankled: Why did Marcie let Burr believe that lie? Even for a short while? Why hadn’t she fought it harder?

But the fact of her father’s physical presence in New York obliterated other considerations. He was waiting for her around every corner, in every doorway. She was even afraid to answer the phone, and afraid to return to his hotel for fear he would have the police there waiting for her. She didn’t know on what grounds he could arrest her, but she believed her father could do anything violent and forceful. Her work suffered still more at the office. And she hadn’t the interest to stay late and make it up.

Sarah talked to her one afternoon at the end of the week. “Guess what?” she said, to start out in a friendly vein.

“What?”

“Carl Jensen called me again. We’re going out tomorrow night.”

“How nice, Sarah. I’m glad for you.” But she spoke without enthusiasm.

“Are you?” Sarah’s voice was pointed enough to catch Laura’s attention and warn her that something was wrong. She looked up. “Yes, of course I am, Sarah. I’m sorry, I’m not myself lately. I—”

“You’ve been in a fog all week. Another one of those headaches?”

“No. I mean yes. I don’t know. I just don’t feel alive.” She laughed listlessly.

Sarah sat down beside her. “Laura,” she said firmly, “you could do real well in this job. If you wanted to. Everybody here likes you. Everybody’s pulling for you. You’re a good typist and you’re a smart girl. Jeanie liked you a lot, and she’ll be back here in another week. There’ll be three of us, and things could go a lot better ... but Laura....”

“But I haven’t worked out too well,” Laura said for her. “Is that it?”

“You haven’t worked at all sometimes. Other times you work your tail off. That’s the trouble, Laura, you’re so erratic,” Sarah said. “You stay late and knock yourself out one night, and then a week goes by and you can’t do a damn thing. You drag along all day, you just don’t seem to care.

“I hate to pull a philosophical on you, but gee, Laura, we’re dealing with sick people. Sometimes these X-ray reports spell life and death for somebody. We can’t dawdle over them. Doctors are waiting all over the city for these things. Dr. Hollingsworth is swamped. We can’t let him down.”

“I know.” Laura felt the way she had in third grade when she feigned sick to get out of playing a role in the annual spring pageant. The teacher had talked to her in much the same tone of voice, and used much the same arguments. “Everybody’s pulling for you, we all like you, don’t let us down, Laura, don’t let us down.” But the thought of going out on that stage had appalled her. The whole audience melted down to one man—Merrill Landon. She had done it, finally, to prove she could. But his amused criticisms afterward had nearly killed her.

“I haven’t been feeling well,” she murmured to Sarah.

“Well, you’d better start feeling better, honey. Because Dr. Hollingsworth and I had a little talk today. He asked me what was wrong with you. He thought maybe if you and I talked it over you might tell me what was the matter.” She spoke carefully, in a discreet voice.

But Laura stood up, offended and frightened. “Nothing’s the matter,” she snapped. “If he doesn’t like my work let him come to me and tell me about it himself.”

Sarah stood up, herself slightly offended at this display of ingratitude. “He came to me because he wanted to spare you any embarrassment, Laura. I should think that would be obvious.”

Laura relented a little. “I’m sorry, Sarah. I can’t explain it. I just can’t, it’s impossible. If he wants to let me go, I have no choice. I’ll leave.” But she was not as resigned to it, as stoical, as she sounded.

“Can’t you try to do a little better, Laura?” Sarah said kindly. “If I could tell him we had a little talk and you promised to try to do better. Or you’d been sick, or had a problem at home, or something. Anything.”

Laura gave an unpleasant little laugh. Then her face dropped and she said, “I have no excuses, Sarah. I’m not a good enough liar to cook one up. I just—” And here she burst unexpectedly into tears and Sarah had to try to comfort her.

“Look, honey,” she said, after Laura had recovered a little. “Do you want the job? Do you?”

“Yes,” Laura said. “I want it.”

“Will you try to be more consistent, then? And I’ll tell Dr. Hollingsworth you’ve been having trouble at home you don’t want to talk about.”

“That’s such an obvious fib, Sarah.”

“No, it’s no fib. I heard you talk to Jack on the phone last week,” Sarah said. “I know there’s something going on.”

Laura went shaky and pale, and the blue shadows that had been growing in the past weeks under her eyes deepened. “What do you know?” she demanded.

Sarah became alarmed at her appearance. “Well, nothing really, only you sounded so upset, I thought maybe—”

“What did I say?”

“Oh, I don’t remember.” She tried to push it off casually, but she had thoroughly scared Laura, who recalled with biting clarity now Jack’s voice saying, For God’s sake, Mother, keep your voice down. “What did I say, Sarah?”

“Nothing so very bad, Laura.” Sarah stared at her. “I just got the impression you had a quarrel.”