"No, don"t you bother," he said. "I"ll get it."
He went toward the bedroom. Mrs. Allen started to follow, then thought of Dr. Langham and stayed where she was. The Doctor would surely consider it somewhat lenient, to go into the bedroom with him, the minute he came back.
He returned, carrying the suitcase.
"Surely you can sit down and have a drink, can"t you?" she said.
"I wish I could, but I"ve really got to go," he said.
"I thought we might exchange just a few gracious words," she said. "The last time I heard your voice, it was not saying anything very agreeable."
"I"m sorry," he said.
"You stood right there, by the door-and very attractive you looked," she said. "I"ve never seen you awkward in your life. If you were ever going to be, that was the time to be it. Saying what you did. Do you remember?"
"Do you?" he said.
"I do indeed," she said. " "I don"t want to do this any more, Maida. I"m through." Do you really feel that was a pretty thing to say to me? It seemed to me rather abrupt, after eleven years."
"No. It wasn"t abrupt," he said. "I"d been saying it to you for six of those eleven years."
"I never heard you," she said.
"Yes, you did, my dear," he said. "You interpreted it as a cry of "Wolf," but you heard me."
"Could it be possibly that you had been planning this dramatic exit for six years?" she said.
"Not planning," he said. "Just thinking. I had no plans. Not even when I spoke those doubtless ill-chosen words of farewell."
"And have you now?" she said.
"I"m going to San Francisco in the morning," he said.
"How nice of you to confide in me," she said. "How long will you be away?"
"I really don"t know," he said. "We opened that branch office out there-you know. Things got rather messed up, and I"ve got to go do some straightening. I can"t tell how long it will take."
"You like San Francisco, don"t you?" she said.
"Oh, sure," he said. "Good town."
"And so nice and far away, too," she said. "You really couldn"t get any farther off and still stay in America the Beautiful, could you?"
"That"s right, at that," he said. "Look, I"ve really got to dash. I"m late."
"Couldn"t you give me a quick idea of what you"ve been doing with yourself?" she said.
"Working all day and most nights," he said.
"That interests you?" she said.
"Yes, I like it fine," he said.
"Well, good for you," she said. "I"m not trying to keep you from your date. I just would like to see a very small gleam of why you"ve done what you have. Were you that unhappy?"
"Yes, I was, really," he said. "You needn"t have made me say it. You knew it."
"Why were you unhappy?" she said.
"Because two people can"t go on and on and on, doing the same things year after year, when only one of them likes doing them," he said, "and still be happy."
"Do you think I can be happy, like this?" she said.
"I do," he said. "I think you will. I wish there were some prettier way of doing it, but I think that after a while-and not a long while, either-you will be better than you"ve ever been."
"Oh, you think so?" she said. "I see, you can"t believe I"m a sensitive person."
"That"s not for the lack of your telling me-eleven years" worth," he said. "Look, this is no use. Goodbye, Maida. Take care of yourself."
"I will," she said. "Promise."
He went out the door, down the hall, and rang the elevator bell. She stood holding the door open looking after him.
"You know what, my dear?" she said. "You know what"s the matter with you? You"re middle-aged. That"s why you"ve got these ideas."
The elevator stopped at the floor, and the attendant slid the door back.
Guy Allen looked back, before he entered the car. "I wasn"t middle-aged six years ago," he said. "And I had them then. Goodbye, Maida. Good luck."
"Have a nice trip," she said. "Send me a picture postcard of the Presidio."
Mrs. Allen closed the door and went back into the living room. She stood quite still in the middle of the floor. She did not feel as she had thought she would.
Well. She had behaved with perfect coolness and sweetness. It must have been that Guy was still not over his common illness. He"d get over it; yes, he would. Yes, he would. When he got out there, stumbling up and down those San Francisco hills, he would come to his well senses. She tried a little fantasy; he would come back, and his hair would have gone gray all in a night-the night he realized the anguish of his folly-and gray hair would not be becoming to him. He"d come back to eat crow, yes, and she"d see that he did. She made a little picture of him, gray and shabby and broken down, gnawing at a leg of cold crow, which she saw with all its feathers left on it, black and shining and disgusting.
No. Fantasy was no good.
She went to the telephone and called Dr. Langham.
The New Yorker, December 14, 1957.
The Bolt Behind the Blue.
Miss Mary Nicholl was poor and plain, which afflictions compelled her, when she was in the presence of a more blessed lady, to vacillate between squirming humility and spitting envy. The more blessed lady, her friend Mrs. Hazelton, enjoyed Miss Nicholl"s visits occasionally; humility is a seemly tribute to a favorite of fate, and to be the cause of envy is cozy to the ego. The visits had to be kept only occasional, though. With the years, Miss Nicholl grew no less flat in the purse and no more delightful to the eye, and it is a boresome business to go on and on feeling tenderness for one whose luck never changes.
Miss Nicholl worked as secretary to a stern and sterling woman. For seven hours a day she sat in a small room lined with filing cabinets where at half-past twelve precisely was put upon her desk, next to her typewriter, a tray set forth with the produce of the stern and sterling one"s favorite health-food shop. The job was permanent and the lunches insured Miss Nicholl against constipation, yet it is to be admitted that her daily round lacked color and height. Those were fine occasions for her when, her work done, she might cover her typewriter and go to call on Mrs. Hazelton, to tread the gleaming halls, to sit in the long blue drawing room, to stroke the delicate c.o.c.ktail gla.s.s and warm her spirit in its icy contents.
And her enjoyment did not die with her leave-taking; indeed, it took on strong new life. She would go home to the house where she roomed, summon Miss Christie who lived across the hall, and tell about her excursion into elegance. Miss Nicholl had a keen eye and a magnetic memory; she described every curve of furniture, every stretch of fabric, every ornament, every arrangement of flowers. She went long and full into the details of Mrs. Hazelton"s costume, and all but called each pearl by name. Miss Christie was employed in a combined lending library and gift shop, all a-twist with potted philodendron; in her life there was none such as Mrs. Hazelton. She hung on every word of the recital. So did Miss Nicholl.
Fortune had upended her cornucopia to hurtle gifts upon Alicia Hazelton. She was beautiful, modeled after the design of an earlier day, when there were not just good-looking women, there were great beauties. She would have been perfectly placed in a victoria, holding a tiny jointed parasol, or tooling down the avenue on the box of a coach, seated next the gentleman in the grey topper who managed the reins. She was large and soft and white and golden. Though she was quite complacent about her ma.s.sive shoulders and bosom, her real pride lay in her exquisite feet and ankles. Mrs. Hazelton knew too much about her style to essay short skirts, and she never would have slung one knee over the other, but each time she sat she tweaked up her draperies and left on view those ankles, lightly crossed. And she was rich. She was not wealthy or well-to-do or comfortably off; in the popular phrase, Mrs. Hazelton was loaded. And she had had three husbands and three divorces. To Miss Nicholl, whose experiences had not encompa.s.sed so much as a furtive pressure of the hand, there seemed to be always present behind Mrs. Hazelton"s chair an invisible trio of the adoring and discarded.
If Mrs. Hazelton had been asked, she would have answered that she had known Miss Nicholl for, oh, Lord, ages and ages-so long she couldn"t remember how the acquaintanceship had begun. Miss Nicholl could have reminded her. Once, the stern and sterling one had sent Miss Nicholl to Mrs. Hazelton with tickets for a charity benefit, under orders to see the lady in person and get the money for them right then. Mrs. Hazelton, warmed with the altruistic exercise of writing a check, had invited Miss Nicholl to sit down, had given her a c.o.c.ktail, and, as she left, had bidden her to drop in any time.
Miss Christie had not had these circ.u.mstances explained to her. Exact words were never spoken, but Miss Christie had come to live in the belief that Miss Nicholl and Mrs. Hazelton had grown up together, would in fact have made a joint debut had it not been for the death of Miss Nicholl"s father, too innocent a soul to mistrust the dastard who managed his financial affairs; so Miss Nicholl had had to go to work and, naturally, her path had split wide from Mrs. Hazelton"s. But they always kept in touch with each other. Miss Christie thought that was simply lovely.
As fervently as she cherished Mrs. Hazelton"s invitation given at their first meeting, Miss Nicholl did not presume on it. She never did drop in. She always telephoned to inquire if she might come in for a little while the next day or the day after it, on her way from work. If she was told that Mrs. Hazelton would be out or occupied or ill, she let weeks go by before she tried again. Frequently there were long dry reaches between her visits.
It was after such a lapse that Miss Nicholl telephoned one day and heard Mrs. Hazelton answer the call herself and warmly tell her to come that very afternoon. When Miss Nicholl had replaced the receiver, she went through three different sorts of glow. The first was of pure pleasure, the next of exasperation that the blouse she had on was well into its second day, and the third of stormy frustration that Miss Christie had been summoned to New Jersey to attend the sickbed of someone spoken of as Auntie Dee-dee, and would be away at least overnight.
Still, Miss Nicholl could depend on her memory never to slack; as soon as Miss Christie returned, after Auntie Dee-dee had either recovered or done whatever it was she was going to do, Miss Nicholl would be quite ready with the account of the appointment with Mrs. Hazelton. So the glow of pleasure came back and stayed. It was high in her when she arrived at Mrs. Hazelton"s and caroled to the maid who opened the door, "Well, Dellie, it"s been a long time since we"ve seen each other, hasn"t it?"
It is heartening to speak easily with the servants. It shows how solidly you are accepted in the house.
Miss Nicholl had made her telephone call at a most fortunate time for herself. For four days, Mrs. Hazelton had not stirred beyond her own walls. For four days, she had heard no voices save those of the maids and that of her little daughter, who was kept at home by a cold. Worse, she had heard scarcely a word of her own. The servants were too adept to require spoken orders, and there are limits to the number of times you can ask a child if she has any fever. Miss Nicholl"s proposed visit took on something in the nature of a G.o.dsend. The Nicholl admiration was thick and sweet, and Mrs. Hazelton craved honey. Besides, Miss Nicholl was older than Mrs. Hazelton by a year or so and looked it by a decade. A thing like that can be a comfort on a dismal day.
Yet, as she awaited her guest, Mrs. Hazelton"s antic.i.p.ation was not without alloy. The thought of Miss Nicholl always brought with it a nasty little guilt. She supposed she really ought to do more for the poor thing. But what more could she do? It was unthinkable that you could tuck a folded twenty-dollar bill into her dry palm; such people were so impossibly sensitive about being objects of charity. You could have her come to see you, feed her a drink, let her look at your pretty flowers, maybe give her some little thing you were through with-such a donation, unlike cash, wounded no feelings. Perhaps she might let her come oftener, and she must remember to keep Mary Nicholl"s name on the Christmas list. Such plans were soothing to a degree, but still the guilt sneaked back, and with it came, of course, the irritation toward the one that caused it. Mrs. Hazelton, sitting waiting for Miss Nicholl, tapped her foot.
But when Miss Nicholl came into the drawing room, she was welcomed charmingly. The two ladies exchanged embraces-Mrs. Hazelton smelled like a summer afternoon in Heaven-and sat down opposite each other, smiling. It was no trouble to smile when looking at Mrs. Hazelton. With the folds of her chiffon tea gown flowing along her figure and her little Yorkshire terrier lying curled at her feet beside the high-heeled tapering slippers that were made for her in Rome, she was like an admirably composed canvas. The dog, Bonne Bouche-she had been christened before Mrs. Hazelton bought her-wore on her head, in the manner of the fashionables among her tribe, a bow of satin ribbon holding back her silvery bangs. Bonne Bouche was all that Mrs. Hazelton could ask of a pet. She was tiny, she was noiseless, and she had a real talent for sleeping. Mrs. Hazelton loved her truly.
Mrs. Hazelton"s view from across the room was less agreeable. Before her eyes was Miss Nicholl, sitting there, as was her way, with no part of her touching the back of the chair.
"Dreadful the way we never see each other," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Oh, this city, this city! So rushed you don"t have a chance to lay eyes on an old friend. It"s been so long, I honestly thought you might have changed-I swear I did. But nothing like that. You never do change, you lucky thing, you."
With the exception of the last four, Mrs. Hazelton could not have uttered truer words. Miss Nicholl had not altered in appearance since back beyond her school days; it is possible, indeed, that those who had gazed on her infant face had found her a seamy baby. Her features were less chiseled than hewn, and long lines ran beside her mouth and across her grainy brow. She was of a ruthless trimness. Her belt was cinched so tight that, looking at it, you could hardly draw your own breath, the stiff waves of her hair were netted to her skull, her skirt snapped sharply at her legs. She wore, to pin the collar of her blouse all shipshape, a pansy of lavender enamel with a minute diamond forming an unconvincing dewdrop on one petal. Mrs. Hazelton had never seen her without this ornament. Nor had anybody else.
"Oh, I"m the same tacky old me," Miss Nicholl said. "But you-well, you"re lovelier than ever."
"You really think I don"t look too awful?" Mrs. Hazelton said.
"I never heard such talk," Miss Nicholl said. "You"re just plain gorgeous, that"s all you are."
"Oh, now really!" Mrs. Hazelton said.
The maid entered, carrying a tray on which were c.o.c.ktail gla.s.ses and a crystal shaker. She set the tray on a table, filled two gla.s.ses, gave one to Miss Nicholl-who cried out, "Why, Dellie, how nice!"-and the other to the hostess. The ladies sipped. Dellie, as quietly as she had come, left them alone together again.
"Oooo-yummy!" Miss Nicholl said. "What a treat! I haven"t had a c.o.c.ktail since-why it must be since the last time I was here. Sometimes I simply long for one-times when it"s just beginning to get dark. Well, one thing about being poor-I"ll never fill a drunkard"s grave. When you can"t afford c.o.c.ktails, you have to get along without, that"s all. Oh, I"m not complaining. I"d be a fine one to complain, now wouldn"t I, when I can sit here with you. There you are, just the way I always think about you. No, wait a minute! Isn"t there something different? I can"t quite decide what it is. Now, don"t you go tell me. Oh, I know! Didn"t you used to wear two long strings of pearls?"
Mrs. Hazelton had done so; now she wore only one long rope, while around her neck were three tight strands. Some time before, she had chanced to look in her mirror when there was a mean light falling on it. She saw signs, and chilled as she saw them, of certain swags under her chin, if not yet reality, then certainly warning. So she had taken one length of pearls to her jeweler"s where it was cut into the triple neck-band, to clasp her throat and keep its secret.
"I had the other long one made into these," she said. "They"re smarter. So many women are wearing them like this."
"Naturally, after you started the style," Miss Nicholl said. "Yes, they do look smart, I suppose. But if I must be brutally frank, I"d have to say I think I like them better the way they were."
"Oh, you do?" Mrs. Hazelton said.
"I always feel that pearls show up better in a long string," Miss Nicholl said. "You know-like flowing. I suppose it"s because I love them so much-well, you know me and pearls. Really, there are times I"ve thought to myself, if I ever decide to go wrong, I"d do it for pearls."
"Fortunately, I"ve never had to do quite that," Mrs. Hazelton said. Miss Nicholl laughed. Mrs. Hazelton joined her, courteously, after a moment.
"Just to look at you," Miss Nicholl said, "a person would know you"d always had them."
"Of course, such things are a matter of luck," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Some people seem to have all of it," Miss Nicholl said. She took rather more than a sip of her c.o.c.ktail. "Well, tell me about everything. How"s our little girl?"
"She"s fine," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Oh, no, she isn"t, either. She"s got a cold."
"Poor little trick!" Miss Nicholl said. "She must be pretty big now, isn"t she? It"s so long since I"ve seen her." Miss Nicholl"s pause let it be known that the time lag was no fault of hers.
"Yes, she"s enormous," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Well, after all, she"s eleven."
"Such a fascinating age!" Miss Nicholl said. "You and she must have high old times together."
"Yes, Ewie"s great fun," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"You still call her Ewie?" Miss Nicholl asked.
"Everyone does," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Well, it"s kind of cute, of course," Miss Nicholl said. "Still, it does seem a shame. Stephanie is such an adorable name."
"Not," Mrs. Hazelton said, "when you remember that her father"s name was Stephen."
"Do you ever talk to her about her father?" Miss Nicholl asked.
"My dear, the child is only eleven years old," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Now tell me what you"ve been up to, while my back was turned," Miss Nicholl said. "For all I knew, you might have gone and got yourself married again."
"No, thank you," Mrs. Hazelton said. "No more marrying for me, thank you very much. You know the old saying: once bit, twice shy." She sat back mysteriously confident that the adage applied to her case.
"Oh, you"re wise!" Miss Nicholl said. "Wise and beautiful-you"ve got everything. What do you need a husband for? Now me, I don"t for a moment regret I never tried marriage. People say, "But don"t you ever get lonely?" I wouldn"t pay them the compliment of listening to them. All I do, I just simply say to them, "If a woman can"t think of something to do to keep herself from being lonely, it"s her own fault." "
"That"s what I think, certainly," Mrs. Hazelton said.
But she did not. She did not know what she thought about such things lately. She had been back from her last visit to Nevada for a long while during which she had done nothing startling to keep herself vivid before her friends-G.o.d, how people do get used to you! On her previous returns from her quests for freedom, invitations had whirled about her like blown snow; now they trickled in, slow and thin. Oh, of course there were various bids for her presence, but there was no excitement to them. And actually, once or twice, the plea that she come to dine had concluded with those words that are like the thud of clods on a coffin-lid: "Just us, you know-you don"t mind if we don"t get a man for you, do you, darling?" Lord in Heaven, was she, Alicia Hazelton, becoming an extra woman?
"You"ll never have to worry about being alone," Miss Nicholl said. "You-with the whole town clamoring after you."
"Oh-that," Mrs. Hazelton said. Suddenly she looked closely at Miss Nicholl. "Mary," she said, "tell me. What do you do evenings?"
"Why, I don"t know," Miss Nicholl said. "Different things-" She broke off in a high, wild cry; Mrs. Hazelton"s daughter had come into the room. "There she is!" shrieked Miss Nicholl. "There her was! There"s her mother"s ewe lamb!"