“Is this your way of saying you’d prefer a red rose?”
“No,” she said, taking it and touching the petals. “Considering the reason I’m living in this hovel, I’m inclined to steer clear of anything red.”
“Is it too late for me to say that’s why I opted for white?”
“You’re the Oxford man, find a way to make it clever.”
Phoebe poured out the last of her gin for them and used the bottle as a vase for the rose. They sat on the sagging sofa.
“So,” he said, sipping his gin. “What spurred you to read about roses?”
“Oh, that courtly love baloney,” said Phoebe. “I have to make reference to it.”
“Is that a requirement for Robin Hood?”
Phoebe choked on her gin. She sputtered as half of it came up her nose.
“What are you talking about?” she demanded.
“Pax, pax,” he said, rubbing her back. “I saw the page in your typewriter. You’re an obvious writer for Robin Hood. I’m over the moon for you.”
“Look, no one’s supposed to know, all right? Hannah can’t be seen hiring blacklisted writers. It would bring down the show in America.”
Reg looked surprised and hurt. “You don’t think I would tell anyone, do you?”
“Not on purpose, no,” Phoebe admitted.
“Fair play,” Reg chuckled. “I could see myself boasting about my girlfriend being a writer on a fine television program, but amazing though it may seem, I’m actually capable of keeping quiet when warranted. I’d never jeopardize you.”
He reached for her hand again. She pressed his fingers but pulled away.
“It’s not really a love story I’m writing, anyway. Most of the kids who watch Robin Hood would feel betrayed. But they’re not opposed to a damsel in distress if they think she’s going to be tortured. I don’t blame them—violence, murder, and treachery make for great entertainment.”
“My hard-boiled heroine,” Reg said, kissing her on the nose. “If we aren’t going out for supper, shall I play the conquering warrior and fetch us a takeaway?”
“Great. I’d like chop suey and egg rolls from Wu’s on Bayard Street.”
“That’s New York’s Chinatown, isn’t it?”
“I’ll settle for fish and chips from that place around the corner.”
“Hardly settling, when it’s the spot the tops-and-tails crowd descend on after the theater if they fancy feeling Bohemian.” He kissed her cheek and left.
Phoebe leaned against the door, suddenly starving for battered cod and fat chipped potatoes with the oil and vinegar drizzled over them. Those, and something more.
“You’re doing well, aren’t you?” Charlie said from his own door.
Phoebe jumped. She hadn’t heard the door open. Charlie smiled and raised a glass to her.
“Joan took the boys out, letting me have the evening to work in peace. I came for a refill, heard you, figured I’d say hello.”
“Hello,” Phoebe said. “Work going all right?”
“Sure, sure. What about you?”
“Oh, it’s fine. I never have as much time as I want for writing, but it’s fine.”
“All the time in the world is never enough, is it?” He shook his head, chuckling. “Listen, you got a smoke? I’m out.”
“Coming right up,” she said, and went to get one. Charlie followed her, nodding in approval as he gazed around the flat.
“Haven’t been in here since we helped you do up the place. Looks all right. You’re doing all right. Good for you.”
Phoebe handed him the cigarette, hoping he wouldn’t ask for a light. She wondered how long it would take Reg to return. On a Saturday night, the local chippy could have a queue outside the door. Reg hadn’t exaggerated—it was hugely popular. She didn’t want to ask Charlie to leave, but she wanted to wash her face and comb her hair. Or write another scene. Anything but take care of this man who always seemed to need so much caretaking.
“Word is you sold a script to Hannah,” Charlie said. “Joan heard from Shirley it’s a good one.”
“That’s awfully swell of her,” Phoebe said. “Now I don’t feel too crazy trying my luck with another.” She didn’t mention writing for Woman’s Hour. Something told her to play down her successes.
“Always gotta try for another,” he said, nodding sagely. “The first one could be a fluke, you never know. It’s all right, though. It’s all right. It’s all right.”
She was tempted to offer him a shilling to stop saying “all right.”
“Especially all right for a gal,” he went on. His expression and tone were perfectly pleasant, but the back of Phoebe’s neck began to tingle. “Not married. No one’s counting on you. Depending on you. And you’re selling scripts. You’ve written what, five things ever? And you’re selling scripts.”
“Look, Charlie—” Phoebe began.
“Why don’t you get that fellow to marry you, huh? You’re starting kinda late as it is. Get on with what you should do and leave space for the rest of us who need it.”
Nothing but consideration for Joan kept Phoebe from ordering Charlie out at knitting-needle point.
“Sure, Charlie, I’ll ask him about that toot sweet.”
Charlie moved with the speed of a practiced murderer. His hand seized the back of her hair, and his breath told her he’d drunk the better part of a bottle of bourbon.
“It’s not right, you hear me? It’s not right. Do you know who I am, what I’ve done? And you, you’re the one getting everything.”
Phoebe forced herself to breathe steadily. The detectives in At Your Service always said men like this became more agitated when they saw they were having an effect on their victims. Stay calm and they might lose some steam. Might.
“You’re right, Charlie. It’s not right, Charlie.” Keep using their name, that was another tactic to avoid getting murdered. Not that it ever helped the women who were already dead. “I’m sorry, Charlie. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
Tears welled up in his eyes. She decided he probably had two bottles of bourbon in him. His hand shook, but he didn’t let go of her.
“Single . . . a gal . . . it’s not fair . . .” he muttered, digging his fingers in tighter. It hurt, but Phoebe didn’t dare even gulp.
“What the devil is going on here?”
Reg was back at last, just in time to get the wrong idea.
Charlie looked around at Reg and seemed to come back to himself. He released Phoebe and backed away sheepishly, not meeting either of their eyes.
“Reg, this is my neighbor, Charlie Morrison. No doubt you’ve seen a few of the movies he’s written. He was just asking me about a scene and forgot I’m not one for acting things out. But he’ll get it just fine, won’t you, Charlie?”
Charlie’s face was still full of contempt, but he gave a small grunt and ducked past Reg back to his own apartment. The door slammed.
Phoebe pulled Reg inside, shut her own door quietly, and locked it.
“Tell me the truth, Phoebe, what was that?” Reg demanded.
“What did it look like?” she snapped, taking several deep breaths. “My drunken neighbor being a drunken creep.”
“I didn’t see you fighting him off.” Reg looked at her evenly, his eyes narrow over two heaping servings of fish and chips wrapped in newspaper.
“What was I supposed to do? He’s my neighbor, I’m friends with his wife. If I’d kicked him how and where I wanted, I’d bring my whole home life crashing down around me. He’s completely stinko, he won’t remember any of it in the morning.”
Reg looked unconvinced. “In vino veritas, you know. A man who makes a pass when he’s drunk would like to make one when he’s sober.”
Phoebe snorted. “That wasn’t a pass. That was him wanting to rip my head off. He’s upset ’cause I sol
d a script and that seems to mean I’m taking food from his kids’ mouths. He’s upset ’cause I’m working and not married.”
Reg’s eyebrows rose over his glasses. “But that seems absurd.”
“Does it? I’ll turn thirty this spring. I’m supposed to have married and cranked out some apple-cheeked children by now. I’ve broken all the rules.”
“I should think a creative person would appreciate that. Anyway, surely your being blacklisted makes you more admirable in his eyes?”
“Oh, Reg, who knows? Can we please eat now, or do you have any more accusations to throw at me first?”
He handed her a packet of fish and chips. “Pax, pax,” he said with his most crooked smile. She could tell he was still troubled but was being very English and choosing not to press the subject further.
Phoebe shoved hot chips in her mouth. “Pax” was Latin for “peace.” She wondered when—or if ever—she would know real peace again.
* * *
• • •
“Have you picked me out a hat from Harrods?” Mona asked on the phone. “I want to look my best for Ascot.” She spoke between raspy breaths. Phoebe closed her eyes. Nurse Brewster had written to her. Mona’s functions were declining rapidly. It was a matter of weeks now, if that.
“Maybe I’d better come and escort you over,” Phoebe suggested.
“Don’t think I don’t know you mean half of that,” Mona warned.
Phoebe sighed. Mona’s mental functions were as sharp as ever.
“Anyway,” Mona continued, “I’d like to get to London on a rocket ship. I need to meet Reg and Hannah and see an episode of Robin Hood being filmed.”
“I’ll start making the calls,” Phoebe said, annoyed at the crack in her voice.
“Geez, kiddo, your voice sounds as bad as mine. Hold it together. At least one of us needs to be able to complete a sentence in under a minute. What’s new with Reg? Has he deflowered you yet?”
“No, but he brought me a rose,” Phoebe said. She twisted her fingers around the telephone cord. “It’s great, but it’s so confusing,” she said, a baby sister again. “I don’t really know how I feel, or what I want.”
“You know you want to spend your Saturday evenings with him, instead of working,” Mona said, her voice stronger and more like itself. And making Phoebe feel guilty for not working Saturday evenings. “You know he’s bright and fun and funny and considerate. He loves you, which means he’s smart and has high standards. What goes through your mind when you’re with him?”
“The work I should be doing instead to try and keep you in the style to which you’ve become accustomed.”
“Phoebe.”
Phoebe looked down. “I guess . . . I guess I think that I’m happy. He makes me happy,” she whispered.
“Happier than a good plot, right?”
“Let’s not get ridiculous,” Phoebe countered, but her heart wasn’t in it. “So, what do you think? Is this love?”
“I hope so, little sister,” Mona said, without a hint of sarcasm. “No one deserves it more than you.”
Hannah came into the room as Phoebe hung up, bringing her a cup of tea and a slice of strawberry cake.
“Not to be a busybody, but your voice carries into the kitchen, so I heard the last of that.”
“I’m a New Yorker, my voice can carry into the next county when I get going,” Phoebe said.
Hannah put a hand on Phoebe’s shoulder. “I hope you told your sister the truth, not just what she wants to hear. It’s a wonderful thing, being in love.”
Rhoda ran into the room and jumped on Phoebe. “Come play with us, come play!” she ordered. “I’m Robin, Mummy’s Little John, Gemma’s King Richard, so you can be Will Scarlet or Friar Tuck.”
“What about Julie and Daddy, who are they playing?” Hannah asked.
“Daddy was s’posed to be the sheriff, but he had to go out,” Rhoda reported. “And Julie doesn’t understand the game. She’s stupid.”
“She’s little,” Hannah corrected Rhoda. Phoebe had seen a shadow cross Hannah’s face at the mention of Paul being out, but her voice was perfectly cheerful. “Why not have her be Maid Marian?”
“All right,” Rhoda said agreeably. “She’s the only one who won’t mind wearing a stupid dress. What about you?” she finished, rounding on Phoebe.
Phoebe would not have dared say she liked dresses. “I’ll be the sheriff.”
Rhoda narrowed her eyes. “Can you be properly evil?” she asked skeptically.
Phoebe squatted to be level with Rhoda. “Try me,” she said in her most menacing tone, designed to make small children cry.
Rhoda beamed in delight. “Super! Now come on, let’s play.”
Phoebe hoped to tell Hannah about the incident with Charlie and get her advice. But the game became so involved, and thrilling, she didn’t get the chance. She didn’t entirely mind. She’d had more than enough talk about men for one day.
* * *
• • •
Four days passed before Joan tapped at Phoebe’s door. She presented Phoebe with an apple pie.
“A taste of home. Can you believe they don’t ever seem to do it here? Meat pies as far as the eye can see, and no good old apple pie.”
Phoebe was uncomfortable. Joan shouldn’t be baking for her as an obvious apology when her sons would happily reduce a pie to crumbs within five minutes.
“I’d love a slice,” she said. “But the kids should have the rest. You want them bragging to their classmates what a terrific cook their mother is.”
Joan laughed faintly. “I think they believe food is conjured from thin air, nothing to do with me.”
“Eh, that’s just the face they put on,” Phoebe assured her, starting water for coffee and getting two plates. “Join me.”
Joan automatically took over, measuring out the coffee and serving them pie. She sat down and stared at her slice. Phoebe slid the pack of cigarettes across the table to her, but Joan waved them aside.
“I’m so embarrassed,” she said, clutching at her neck.
“It’s okay,” Phoebe said automatically. Though it wasn’t.
“He told me yesterday. He’s embarrassed too. He didn’t mean to lose his temper with you, I hope you know that.”
Phoebe wondered what exactly Charlie had told Joan.
“He’s not like this, not really,” Joan went on. “He’s just under so much pressure. The boys, you know.”
“I know,” Phoebe said. She wished Joan would stop, would let them both pretend it had never happened. That would be the British way of doing things, and Phoebe decided it was seriously underrated.
“He certainly has no objection to single women working. After all, you have to do what you have to do. Not everyone can land a husband, or has family to help.”
“That’s good of him,” Phoebe said, inwardly seething. How could men who were so dedicated to Marxist ideals of equality be so Cro-Magnon when it came to women? “Family to help,” indeed—as though she should be the spinster aunt in a spare room, whom everyone would love more if she could be considerate enough to promptly drop dead.
“No, I mean it,” Joan insisted. “Honestly, I don’t think he would have minded if I were still writing stories and sold one. Money is money. Of course, I don’t have time, much less any ideas these days.”
Stories? Joan was dismissive, waving away her own work of another life ago, stories in women’s magazines, silly fluff that bought her little luxuries like more hats than she reasonably needed and, on at least one momentous occasion, was sold as an option to one of the studios. That had helped buy their bungalow in Los Feliz. “I wish you could have seen it.” Joan sighed. “The trees! Orange, peach, avocado. Can you imagine? I hope whoever lives there now didn’t cut them down.”
“I bet you could come up with a good idea easily enoug
h,” Phoebe said encouragingly. “Start with a woman baking an apple pie in London, you’ll have something great before the oven timer pings. It already sounds like a winner for Good Housekeeping. And money is money, as you say.”
“No, no, I’m far too busy helping Charlie,” Joan said. “And the boys, you wouldn’t know it, but they really do take an enormous amount of time and energy.”
No, Phoebe wouldn’t have known. Neither boy ever seemed to be around much, even Alvie, who was only eleven. But then again, Phoebe didn’t know what went on behind closed doors—except big band music. She wondered if Charlie ever grabbed Joan’s hair as he had hers. Her fist clenched around her fork.
“What about your families?” Phoebe asked, making her voice bright to hide her rage. “Can’t they help a bit?”
“Oh, well, I suppose they’d like to in their way,” Joan said, not meeting Phoebe’s eye.
“I don’t like to take charity either,” Phoebe said comfortingly. “But if you’re so worried . . .”
“It’s different for you, all right?” Joan said with a sudden snap that made Phoebe jump. “Charlie was in the party, lots of our friends were. And then they all ended up on the blacklist. You only got a taste of it, what the FBI Hounds get up to. Your phone was bugged, right? So, sure, we could only talk in code, and even that was dangerous. Still is. Everyone wants to keep the heat off everyone else, and themselves too. So it’s easier not to talk at all. As for family, well, you’re the exception. Most of us abroad, family stops writing. It’s not that people think you’ve done anything wrong. But it’s hard to accept, a family member living like this. It’s embarrassing. The blacklist, all of it. And they’ve got their own circles, their kids, their work, they can’t risk it getting tainted. My father’s a high school principal—if someone calls him a subversive, or finds out his daughter and son-in-law are blacklisted Reds, he’d likely be tossed out on his can. He’s got six years till retirement, he’s not taking any chances, and why should he?”
Joan looked away, and Phoebe wished she could hide the photographs of Mona and Anne, and Anne’s cartoons, so proudly displayed on her wall. All that proof of the love she still received from home. Her arms hurt, wanting to hug Mona and Anne. She would have liked to hug Joan, but for once Joan’s body was cold and aloof, unwilling to be warmed back into cheerfulness.
Red Letter Days Page 26