Night of Fire and Snow

by Alfred Coppel

  Luis was smiling at his discomfort. “We Rineharts are a fast maturing breed,” he said. “And what I’m trying to say to you in my own stumbling way is that you must never settle for less than love. For a man of your blood it isn’t such a responsibility as all that. Sex without affection can be a pretty degrading thing. I’d hate to see you have your first experience the way I did, with a tart in a brass bed. You get started that way and you develop a weakness for chippies.”

  Miguel wondered if he were talking about Becky. He remembered a day last summer when she had been out at the pool alone and had asked him to rub her back with suntan oil. The memory was both disturbing and exciting. She had loosened the strap of her halter and turned her back to him and said, “Rub, silly. With both hands.”

  He had done as she asked and he remembered the feel of her flesh, hot from the sun. Then she had said, “Lower, umm—that feels so good.” And she leaned back against his hands to increase the pressure. “I love to have my back rubbed,” she said languorously. And he said, “You have very smooth skin, Becky.” Then she had said for him to run more down on the sides and he had slipped his hands down to her hips and worked them up, kneading her firm flesh in small circles, feeling the expansion and contraction of her rib cage as she breathed and then, finally, in a rush of unfamiliar sensation, the fleshy softness of her breast muscles. And she had laughed softly and said, “You’re really a Rinehart, Miguel.” And as if that weren’t enough, Raoul had come down the path from the house just then and seen it all and had been furious for more than a week.

  Now Miguel wondered if there were something like that that made Luis say things about tarts and chippies. It couldn’t be, he thought. After all, Becky was his wife.

  Luis had grown very moody and a little tight.

  “Luis,” Miguel asked. “Do you like women? I mean really?”

  “Like them? Women are a work of art. Anything that complex has to be.”

  “They’re complex, all right,” Miguel agreed, trying to be worldly.

  “Complex?” Luis contradicted himself with a bewildering and sudden anger. “They’re as simple as bitches in heat.”

  Miguel was taken aback and didn’t know what to say. Luis was angry and he couldn’t see why. They sank into a gravid silence. It was late afternoon and still raining when Miguel took his leave. Luis was drunk and Becky had not returned.

  On Washington’s Birthday, a holiday for all Peninsula schools, Miguel’s crowd gathered at Allie Wylie’s house on Moody Road for Cokes and some dancing.

  Allie had some new Larry Clinton records, and her father had given her an electric phonograph for Christmas.

  Miguel arrived about seven, and Mr. Wylie, a small and leathery little man with a faint Scottish burr still left in his voice, abandoned the library to Miguel and Aldyth.

  Mrs. Wylie, a large and formidable woman, came in to warn Allie about playing the phonograph too loud because her father would be upstairs working on some important contracts. Mr. Wylie was a partner in the law firm of Brigham, Wylie, DeFore and Rossi with offices in San Francisco and San Jose, and he was a past chairman of the County Republican Committee. He had been a delegate at the national convention that nominated Alfred Landon for the Presidency and was, in general, an important man. He often advised Miguel to study the law, because, he said, “With this pack of crackpots in Washington, there will always be work for lawyers.”

  He and Raoul were not particularly friendly, though their politics were the same. They played golf at the country club occasionally, and once Raoul had consulted Mr. Wylie about a demurrage dispute. Miguel had the feeling that Mr. Wylie did not completely approve of Raoul, and he knew that Raoul thought Mr. Wylie a thoroughgoing bore.

  Allie was wearing a new dirndl with a deep boat neck and a flared skirt. Miguel was always amazed at the transformation that took place when Allie put aside the white middy and black skirt of Miss Harlows for something more grown-up. It made her seem much older than he, for one thing, and he wasn’t sure he liked it. Allie had had her sixteenth birthday the week before Christmas and Miguel wouldn’t be sixteen for almost a month. Allie liked to tease him about being younger than she and most of the time he took it well. But when she looked the way she looked tonight, with her hair softly arranged about her face, her lovely throat and bosom exposed, and her legs in silk stockings, it made him feel very unsure of himself and in danger of losing her. He hoped there would be no teasing tonight.

  Allie put a record on the turntable to show Miguel how the machine worked and they sat on the big leather couch holding hands.

  “Would you like a Coke?” she asked.

  “Sure. Ill get them. In the icebox?”

  “Refrigerator, silly.”

  “I keep forgetting. Concha always used to call it hieleria. That’s just plain icebox. She never did get used to not having to hang the ice sign in the window.”

  Miguel, who had the run of the house, went into the kitchen and rummaged for the Cokes. Mrs. Wylie came in and Miguel said, “Good evening, Mrs. Wylie.”

  Allie looked a great deal like her mother, lacking only her size. Mrs. Wylie was a little taller than Mr. Wylie and to Miguel, she seemed the most competent and imposing woman in the world. She did everything and did it well. She even played a good game of golf and had her name on one of the cups in the trophy case at the country club.

  “Is it still raining, Mike?” she asked.

  “Not very hard. It said on the radio it was supposed to clear up tomorrow.”

  Mrs. Wylie said, “Those poor people down on the highway.”

  Miguel knew she meant the people at the Okie camp down 0n El Camino. Hundreds of families had been drifting into the Santa Clara Valley looking for work in the prune and apricot orchards, but there wasn’t enough work for them. Last year the orchardists had dumped their fruit crops rather than take the low prices the canners were paying.

  Mrs. Wylie often took baskets of food and warm clothes down to the camp, but the Okies wouldn’t always accept them. They weren’t as shiftless and eager for charity as people said. What they really wanted was work, but there simply wasn’t enough work to go around. Miguel had seen emaciated children down there, half-naked in the winter cold. He had written a story about them that Mr. Olinder had thought good enough to print in the Roslyn Ramblings, but Raoul had laughed at it and the other parents had complained. Only Mrs. Wylie and Aldyth had said anything complimentary. The headmaster, old Honeypot Hamner, had told Mr. Olinder he didn’t want that sort of thing in the school magazine again.

  “If you go out tonight,” Mrs. Wylie said, “I want Aldyth home before midnight. Tomorrow is a school day.”

  “We’ll watch the time,” Miguel promised.

  “And don’t make too much noise in the library.”

  “We won’t, Mrs. Wylie.”

  The swinging door closed behind her and Miguel heard a car drive in. From the rumbling noise it made, he knew it was Tom’s Model A.

  He uncapped four Cokes and carried them into the library. Tom and Florian were already on the couch necking and Allie had closed the French doors leading into the entrance hall and the stairway so that Mrs. Wylie wouldn’t come down and catch them at it.

  Miguel put two of the Cokes in Tom’s lap so that he had to sit up quickly and grab at them before they spilled. He took the other two over to the corner where Allie stood by the phonograph.

  “Are those two just going to spend all their time mugging?” Miguel asked.

  “We’ll be good, Spicko,” Tom said. “And if we can’t be good we’ll be careful. And if we can’t be careful, why, well name the little bastard after you.”

  “Oh, Tom, that’s awful,” Flossie said, sitting up.

  “Don’t be cruel to him, Floss,” Miguel said. He looked at her warily. She had been pretty angry when he had failed to ask for another date after Midge Kimball’s party. But she seemed all right now, running her fingers through Tom’s spiky hair and giggling.

  Tom r
olled over so that he lay across Florian’s lap and yelled softly, “Rape, rape! I’m being raaaaped!”

  “Hold it down to a low roar, will you?” Miguel cautioned. “Allie’s father is right upstairs.”

  “Oh, God,” Flossie said. “And I was just going to ask if anyone had a cigarette!”

  “If you’re going to spend all your time mugging each other,” Miguel said, “get on your feet and do it standing up. Then you can always tell Mrs. Wylie you were dancing.”

  Tom nuzzled Florian’s neck and said, “We’re not hot, we’re just affectionate.”

  Allie started the phonograph and held out her arms to Miguel. The mellow sound of Dorsey’s trombone flowed out of the speaker. Tom reached out and turned off one of the lamps. Miguel and Allie danced without talking. She reached about to his eyes so that he held his lips against her temple all the while Dorsey and a complex of voices sang “Once in a While.”

  Allie’s hand felt warm in his, her straight back was pliant and slender in the circle of his arm. There was a clean smell about her, but faintly musky with the scent of her. It wasn’t perfume or soap, he knew, but rather just the right combination of tastes and odors that meant Allie.

  She looked up at him and laughed deep in her throat, that laugh that touched him so. “You’re so solemn,” she said.

  “I was thinking about you.”

  “I’m glad.”

  He pressed his mouth against her hair and held her closer than before. There were times he loved her so much it was a physical pain, times he could not speak for wanting her.

  He wondered if she felt this way too. She must, because when she kissed him he could feel that she did. Lately there had been a demanding quality to everything they did together. It was different from what it used to be. This wasn’t a girl with skinned knees and no lipstick. This was Allie, who loved him and was his girl.

  He glanced over at Tom and Flossie. They were necking again and he felt a stab of real envy. He wished he could throw himself at any girl the way Tom could. Then there wouldn’t be this fear down inside that he would do something wrong some day, something he wanted to do, but something so terrible that it would cost him Allie.

  He remembered that on New Year’s Eve at the country club he and Allie had gone out to sit in the back of the car, and Allie had been wearing a red formal and Miguel had slipped the shoulder strap off and bared one breast and had kissed it and then Allie had begun to cry and she had said that she wouldn’t have let him do it except that she loved him so much she wanted him to do it.

  They had almost broken up after that, with Miguel thinking that something bad might happen to them if this went on. But in the end he couldn’t break up with Allie because she was his girl and nothing was going to change that.

  “There’s the bell,” Allie said. “That must be Sandy and Midge.”

  Miguel liked Midge Kimball. She was a rather plain girl with dark hair and pleasant features and a good figure. She was one of the best dancers in the crowd and now she was going steady with Sandy Johnson, who came down from the city every weekend to take her out.

  Sandy had changed a great deal since the river days. He played football for Lowell High now. He was short and heavily muscled but he was a terrific center and he said he was already getting calls from alumni who wanted him to go to college here or there.

  This would be Tom’s last year at Roslyn, Miguel knew. The example of Sandy Johnson was too much for Oliver. Besides, Tom said Ollie couldn’t afford to send him to Roslyn any longer and there was the question of getting an athletic scholarship like they were offering Sandy. Tom would have to go someplace where he could play football for his last two years of high. Sandy had talked him into Lowell so it looked as though the two would be teammates next fall. Miguel and Allie and Florian had already promised to drive up and see most of the games.

  They turned up the music and listened to Allies new Clinton records and then the collection of Benny Goodman things. They danced to “These Foolish Things” and stomped on the floor to “Don’t Be That Way.”

  “Just listen to that Elman go, will you?” Sandy cried ecstatically.

  “That’s James, not Elman,” Florian said. “Can’t you tell?”

  “Well, that’s Jess Stacey, and that I know,” Midge said with her eyes closed.

  Mrs. Wylie knocked on the panes of the French doors and frowned.

  “We’re making too much noise,” Allie said.

  “Why don’t we go down to Garland’s?” Tom suggested.

  “Sounds terrif,” Flossie said.

  “What’s on at the Varsity?” Midge asked.

  “Swingtime, with Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire,” Allie said. “Mike and I saw it Friday night.”

  “Oh, you would,” Midge said.

  “We’d rather go to Garland’s and have a beer,” Sandy said. It was the one place they could always be sure of being served, and there was a place to dance.

  “Well,” Tom said, “let’s put the show on the road, then.”

  “I’ll get my coat and tell Mother we’re going out,” Allie said. She went out and Midge said, “At least why don’t we go to L’Omelette? That Garland’s place gives me the creeps.”

  “The reason, lovely one,” Tom said, “is that we can’t get a beer there.”

  Miguel grinned at Midge. “We tried last week and Andre asked us to leave. In French.”

  Allie came back with a bright red raincoat around her and a scarf for her hair. “All set,” she said.

  They started out the door onto the front lawn when Mrs.

  Wylie called Miguel back and said sternly, “Now you be very careful. Its raining and I don’t want to worry.”

  “Ill be careful, Mrs. Wylie.”

  “See that you are.”

  The cars were parked in the circular drive, Horace Greeley, the red Chevrolet, and the Johnsons’ Mercury sedan.

  “Why don’t we all go together?” Sandy suggested.

  “Horace leaks,” Florian said.

  “We’ll go in Spicko’s car,” Tom said. “In the rumble.”

  “Are you crazy? It’s raining,” Midge cried.

  “So? We’ll close the hatch. Floss and I vant to be ah-loan,” Tom said.

  “We can’t all fit in the Chevy,” Sandy said.

  “You and Midge take the Merc,” Tom said. He opened the rumble seat of the Chevrolet and pulled Florian up beside him. When they had settled down on the floor, he said, “Byeee—“ and slowly closed the seat, making sure the latch didn’t catch.

  “Come on, Midge,” Sandy said. “We’ll leave these dopes in their tracks.”

  Miguel followed the taillights of the Mercury out the drive and onto Moody Road.

  Sandy was driving fast on the wet road and Miguel had to work to stay near him. He grinned at Allie and she moved closer to him. “I’m glad we came out,” Allie said. “I wanted to be alone with you.”

  “We’re not exactly alone,” he said.

  “Tom doesn’t count. He loves you almost as much as I do.”

  It made Miguel faintly uncomfortable to hear Allie say that. It was true Tom liked him. He liked Tom, too. He was going to miss him when he went back to the city to school. But guys didn’t love each other. They were just friends, that’s all.

  “Mike,” Allie said softly.

  “Yes, Allie?”

  “You remember when I was sick and couldn’t go to Midge’s birthday party?”

  Miguel had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. “Yes,” he said. “I remember.”

  “Somebody said you and Florian were—well, necking. Were you?”

  “Who said so?”

  “Some of the girls at school. Were you?”

  “The old biddies, why cant they just shut up, anyway.”

  “Tom said it wasn’t true.”

  Miguel saw a glimmer of hope. “Tom said that? Well, sure it isn’t true, Allie. I wouldn’t do that. Hell, old Floss doesn’t interest me that way, that’s all.”<
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  “Is that the truth, Mike?”

  “Allie, I don’t care for anybody but you. You know that, don’t you?” And that was true.

  She laughed a little. “I know. But if I weren’t around and some girl wanted to be real friendly...I think maybe you wouldn’t say no.”

  Miguel remained silent, watching the taillights of Sandy’s car through the rain-spattered windshield.

  Allie sighed. “I don’t want to give you a third degree just because I was sick and missed a party. I’m sorry. I truly am. I just love you so much I want all of you for myself.”

  “I wish we were married, Allie,” Miguel said. “Then things like what happened New Year’s Eve wouldn’t be wrong and we could do what we wanted whenever we wanted to do it—”

  Allie buried her face in his shoulder and said, “Oh, Mike, I want so much—it frightens me, really. When you touch me I get all melty inside.” She looked up at him, her face somber in the dim light from the dashboard. “I want you there—is that so awful? Does that make me cheap and dirty?”

  “Oh, Allie.” He wanted to stop the car and take her in his arms, but he was afraid of what they might do if he stopped right now. He put his arm around her and went on driving with one hand.

  Allie giggled a little and said, “You should hear what Daddy has to say when he sees kids driving along this way.”

  “I can imagine. ‘They shouldna be allowed ta drive a car til they’re too bored wi’ one another ta sit so close.’”

  Allie laughed delightedly. “You sound just like him.”

  They reached the railroad crossing at Fremont Road and Miguel passed Sandy and turned toward El Camino. The headlamps of the Merc moved in close and hung there. Miguel reached up and flipped the mirror. Sandy tried to pass and Miguel speeded up until he dropped back.

  “Mother was stopped along here for speeding day before yesterday,” Allie said. “They’re patrolling this road since the trouble about the ‘cots last year. Daddy says they’re laying for the Okies from the camp down on the highway.”