The largest check she had ever made out was Dr. Capwell’s three hundred dollars. How much was left in the account? Imprecise with numbers, she frowned as she tried to recollect her exact bank balance, which was somewhere above twelve hundred dollars. Her father was watching her with that odd, rabbitlike desperation. Curt would be home in a few weeks. She could certainly get by on two hundred plus dollars, couldn’t she?
“A thousand is all I can manage.” She reddened. Somehow she felt as if she were letting him down.
The following day they were at Union Station hugging goodbye. Both were weeping.
* * *
That week Honora’s expenses cropped up everywhere. Dr. Capwell insisted she go to a radiologist on the next floor for X-rays. He also referred her to the dentist across the hall, who charged exorbitantly to fill a small cavity. She drove into the nearby Paloverde station and the mechanic told her she was in luck, coming in now: her brakes needed relining. Langley had charged some gift ties on her account at the Broadway. Even so, her withdrawal stubs showed a reassuring balance of a hundred and thirty-five dollars and seventy-three cents.
A tropical rain slashed down on the day the Bank of America envelope arrived with her statement.
Her balance was thirty-five dollars and seventy-three cents!
“They’ve made an idiotic mistake,” she said over the thumping rain, and arranged the canceled checks in the order she had written them.
Unable to think properly, much less add in her head, she used a brown paper grocery bag for scratch paper, reconciling the checks against the stubs five times before she saw her even hundred-dollar mistake in subtraction. She began to cry. After several minutes, her sobs ended and her mind grew hard and clear. She got thoroughly drenched and ruined her cheap loafers on the way to the Western Union office.
For two days she did not leave the apartment, dozing erratically on the sofa and drinking far too many cups of tea as she awaited Curt’s reply to her cable.
Each time the baby stirred, clamminess would break out on her forehead. Her first duty lay with this helpless unborn creature, Curt’s child, who depended solely on her. Her blind, filial loyalty was gone. How could I have handed a thousand dollars to Daddy. Crystal never would have given him almost all her money.
When by the third day there was no reply, she walked through the unpleasantly hot wind—a Santa Ana, Angelenas called it—to the Western Union office. The clerk behind the counter told her the foreign currency exchanges were handled through a bank, suggesting she try her branch. Honora dog-trotted the five blocks to Cahuenga. The assistant manager told her the branch had not been cabled any funds from Lalarhein.
Honora trudged home. Though it was early for the postman, she unlocked her mail box. Inside were three thick envelopes from Curt.
The manager was slowly vacuuming the hall and this was the second of April with the rent unpaid, so Honora stepped outside, her fingers shaking as she opened the thickest letter. She gripped the fluttering pages.
March 15—the Ides
Honora, sweet,
I’ll get the bad news over with first. The soil here is more porous than the geological survey indicates. We are having problems. I can’t be home before the middle of May at the earliest.
The wind rattled bushes around her and the hard, clear light suddenly seemed excruciatingly bright. She sat on the front step, waves of dizziness washing over her.
19
Honora’s hands clenched on the wheel as she passed the wreck. One of the big trucks that plied between Los Angeles and San Francisco had gone off the road, the trailer rolling over on its side while the tall cab remained erect. Curt had told her that the steep grade of the Grapevine was holy hell on the big rig’s brakes. The mechanic had relined hers but what if the problem was recurring now?
Her neck ached with a cat’s cradle of tensions.
It was two days after she had received Curt’s letter. Two days of numbers that constantly plagued her—the sums on her unpaid gas bill, telephone bill, the price stickers on her calcium and Feosal pills, the bright figures in the supermarket.
There had been no response to her pleading telegrams.
Yesterday morning the manager had knocked on her door, her sagging face surrounded by a nest of metal curlers. “It’s the fourth, dear,” she said, the threat clear beneath her saccharine tones.
“I’m most awfully sorry, but Mr. Ivory’s deposit is in a foreign currency and the bank needs time to process it,” Honora replied, attempting breeziness. During the Sylvanders’ last penurious months in London, she had learned the humiliating art of lying to creditors.
“God knows in your condition I’d let it ride, but the landlord’s a Simon Legree about his rents. Seven days overdue and he has me tack up the eviction notice.”
Alone, Honora staggered to the couch and lay trembling. Eviction? Where would she go? If only she had, say, an extra hundred dollars she could eke out another month. She ran a shaky hand over her cold, moist forehead. Who would lend her a hundred? What about Crystal? Gideon’s threat against Curt remained fresh in Honora’s mind and she shook her head as if warding away temptation.
But what about Gideon himself?
How could she humiliate herself—and Curt, too, by inference—by floating a loan from their enemy? Besides, to face Gideon she would have to drive almost five hundred miles each way. How would the journey affect the baby? The pamphlet said that travel, like intercourse, should be restricted.
Could beggars be choosers? Rising unsteadily from the couch, she had searched through Curt’s papers for the Texaco map of California.
When, finally, she reached the bottom of the Grapevine she pulled over and walked around the car, filling her lungs with the pervasive sweetness of the mile-square alfafa fields. Each hour, religiously, she halted for five minutes, hoping that the rests would protect the embryo.
In Bakersfield, she bought Cheez-Its and a carton of milk. She drove and halted until the oncoming headlights became hypnotic, then she pulled over on the shoulder, locking both doors, curling up with difficulty on the seat. Each time one of the big trucks passed, the old coupe shuddered. Late the following morning, she reached San Francisco. While the attendant filled her tank at a Standard station, she used the restroom to wash and change into the freshly ironed smock that she’d placed carefully in the trunk. In the metal mirror, she saw her pale, frightened face.
Parking near Maiden Lane, she climbed stiffly from the car. Her lower body felt heavy, as if the blood had congealed, and for a moment she was terrifed about the effect of the long drive on her child. Then she felt a reassuring kick.
The Talbott switchboard operator cast a suspicious, mascaraed eye at Honora’s maternity top. “Yes?” she asked.
“I’d like to see Mr. Talbott.”
“You have an appointment?”
“No, but—”
“Sorry. That’s the rule here. Nobody but nobody gets into Mr. Talbott’s office without an appointment.”
“He won’t mind my popping in. I’m Mrs. Talbott’s sister.”
“Say, you have even more of that adorable accent. Go on up.”
As Honora mounted the uncarpeted staircase, she thought of that afternoon she and Crystal had first visited Langley here. Was it only a year ago? It seemed centuries since the close-knit Sylvander family had begun unraveling.
The second-floor hall was cold and bare, empty of the overflow of drafting tables—additional proof, if she needed any, of the slump.
One of her obsessions on the long drive had been how she would sneak by Gideon’s dwarfish, elderly secretary. The woman was away from her desk. Honora opened the frosted glass door with the unobtrusive gold lettering:
G. D. TALBOTT II
President
Gideon was on his feet, his massive shoulders curved over construction plans spread on his desk. Seeing her, he came to attention, a major general abristle with authority.
Conscious of her stiff facial muscles, Hono
ra forced a smile. “Good morning, Gideon.”
“How did you get in?” he barked. “That new idiot switchboard girl—”
“Don’t blame her.” Honora felt dizzy. “I told her I was your sister-in-law.”
“Didn’t I make that clear? We have no connection.”
“You said I mustn’t talk to Crystal or Joscelyn and I haven’t.”
He glared at her. “Well? Why are you here?”
“I need a loan.” The words flowed. Why not? Hadn’t she rehearsed these sentences all the way up Highway 99? “A hundred dollars. I’ll pay whatever interest you decide.”
“A loan? Haven’t you heard? In this country our charities support homes for women left in the lurch.”
“Curt and I are married, Gideon.”
“Wear your phony wedding ring and fool the others. But don’t lie to me.”
“We were married in Tahoe.” Her voice was softer, almost a stammer.
He sat in the large leather chair behind the desk, not offering her the seat opposite him. “Then why doesn’t your ‘husband’ handle your financial problems?”
“He’s out of the country.”
“In Lalarhein, trying to lay out a highway. So you see, I know all about Curt Ivory.” As he said the name his eyelids flickered, and momentarily the stern hardness wavered.
She felt a wave of empathy, even sympathy. Her tormenter had rescued Curt from starvation, had endowed him with an education and a profession.
“Gideon,” she said, “if it’s any consolation, he feels awful about leaving Talbott’s. You mean a lot to him.”
“No need for soft soap. You’re not getting a penny.”
She shifted her weight. “I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t at the end of my rope. Curt left me a quite a lot, but . . . well . . . I was stupid. A hundred dollars would be a huge help.”
“You and your father. Throwing away every chance, then come begging.”
“Daddy’s on his way back to London,” she said doggedly. “He’s had a top-notch offer.”
Gideon gave her a sour look, as if to say he’d believe it when he saw it. “I’ve done more than enough for Ivory already. I’m not about to support his bastard.”
At the word bastard anger spurted through her body. White dots scintillated in front of her eyes, and her hands clenched into fists. She had no room for rage or pride, but she could not control herself. How dare this nasty-minded, unforgiving little millionaire who had married her aunt, then her sister, slander her unborn child?
“I’m sorry for you, Gideon,” she said in a choked whisper. “The world must always look ugly to you.”
“Get out!”
Her breath rasping, she backed from the office. Still suffused and buoyed by rage, she hurried down the stairs. As she reached the bottom landing, the front door opened and closed.
It was Crystal.
The sisters stared at one another through a dusty shaft of sunlight. These moments became an indelible, photographic image etched into their brains: neither would ever manage to exorcise this minuscule fraction of time.
Crystal, halted with one dainty gray ostrich pump pointed forward, was improbably beautiful in a silvery mink coat and matching hat.
Honora held out her hand. “Crys,” she murmured. “Crys, I’ve missed you so much.”
Crystal’s gaze had been fixed on the maternity smock. The blond head in its fur coronet tilted to the left, an ambiguous gesture that Honora took as condemnation.
“We’re m-married,” she stammered. “Married . . . .”
Hurrying down the last three steps, she stumbled at the bottom, rescuing herself by grasping the banister, then rushing through the haze of perfume that surrounded her sister.
Up close there was no mistaking Crystal’s expression. The incomparable blue eyes held an infuriating, demeaning pity.
Honora stumbled up Maiden Lane, hunching in the dust-covered Ford with her shaking hands covering her wet face.
* * *
It was after midnight before she was back in Hollywood. She fell into an exhausted sleep, jerking awake before dawn. She got out her old Edinthorpe skirt, which her father had brought down with him—for some reason it was the only possession of hers that he had packed. The wool was far heavier than people wore in California. Honora used her nail scissors to open the hip seams, resewing them as far to the selvage as possible. By the time she had ironed her stitchery under a damp rag, it was after ten. In the Broadway’s Bargain Basement she spent the last of her folding money on a heavy, all-in-one foundation. The boned corset flattened and widened the gentle mound of her stomach, pushing up her enlarged breasts.
In her short, pre-New Look skirt, with her nubby pink sweater pulled down over her hips, she appeared buxom and cheap rather than pregnant.
Scotch-taped inside the window of the Hollywood Boulevard Pig’n’Whistle window was a typed card: Part-time waitress. Experience necessary. Apply manager.
She waited while the manager put in a long-distance call to San Francisco. Al Stroud must have given her a good reference. The manager told her that the part-time job was hers.
Thirty-five minutes after Honora entered the cafe she was dressed in a freshly cleaned size fourteen uniform and taking an order.
20
The Pig’n’Whistle was a chain that served food hovering between tea-room delicate and short-order solid: the Hollywood branch opened for breakfast, closing at the hour dictated by California law; two A.M.
Part-time meant that Honora worked five hours in a split shift.
She arrived at seven in the morning, galloping until nine, when the serious breakfasters gave way to the coffee and sweetroll dawdlers. She then took off two hours to return at eleven thirty for the lunch onslaught. At two thirty, when the large side hall was roped off, her workday ended.
During her midmorning off-hours she would stumble the few blocks home to sprawl on the couch with her swollen, white-stockinged feet raised on the armrest. Too exhausted to write letters or read, not permitting herself to nap for fear she’d oversleep, she was easy prey for visions of disaster. Was the all-in-one squashing the baby into deformity? How much longer could she continue on the job? There had been no letters from Curt—had he been injured?
It was almost a relief to force her puffy feet back into her white Naturalizers. The fast turnover of tables at Pig’n’Whistle left her no time to think.
Honora’s complexion, though not vivid like Crystal’s, had a natural, creamy luminosity. Now the skin was drab and the Max Factor pancake she used to cover the dark circles under her eyes intensified its lusterless pallor. Yet more depressing was the swelling of her delicate ankles—Curt had often kissed his way up her long, slender legs.
After Dr. Capwell had listened to her stomach through his stethoscope, she asked hesitantly, “Does it mean anything that my ankles are swollen?”
Dr. Capwell did not look up from the dog-eared filing card on which he was scribbling laboriously. “Pregnancy is no time for vanity,” he scolded. “What matters is the fetal heartbeat. It’s strong and regular.”
As she left the office, a very pregnant redhead emerged from the elevator and started along a different corridor. Honora knew a group of obstetricians shared a suite on this floor. She followed the redhead. A prettily furnished waiting room was crowded with women in various stages of pregnancy. She had never seen another pregnant woman in Dr. Capwell’s narrow, unbusy waiting room. These premises looked rich, but several of the patients didn’t. What would she say to an unknown obstetrician? Hello, I’m a patient of Dr. Capwell up the hall, and I’m worried about puffy ankles—can the problem be I’m waiting tables in a tight girdle?
The reception nurse, who was taking a package wrapped in a brown paper bag from the redhead, glanced at her with a tentative, questioning smile.
I can’t waste money on a visit. I have to save every penny for when I can’t work, and the hospital.
* * *
One cloudy afternoon in mid
-April Honora sat at a corner booth eating the Daily Special of chicken croquettes, mashed potatoes, carrots and peas that was free to employees—her budgetary conscience forced her to fill up on these starchy meals no matter how tired she was when her shift ended.
At a tap on her shoulder, the minced chicken fell from her fork.
“Hello, stranger,” said a familiar voice.
Honora’s eyes opened wide. “Vi!”
The last time they were together, it must have been August, Vi had told her a certain somebody had asked her to move to San Berdoo, and it looked like wedding bells again: despite two divorces and a series of disastrous “engagements,” Vi remained blithely optimistic when it came to romance. A few days after that Honora had tried to reach Vi at Stroud’s and Al told her Vi had quit, leaving no forwarding address.
“Long time no see,” Vi grinned.
Tears stupidly brimming in her eyes, Honora instinctively rose to hug her old friend, then sank back in the false leather cushions. Mightn’t Vi feel the hard protrusion through the corset?
“Vi . . .”
“Hey, don’t choke up on me,” said Vi, her own voice none too steady as she slid into the booth opposite Honora.
“I just don’t believe it. How can you be here? What about San Bernardino?”
“Mr. San Berdoo was bad news. So here I am, back in the Pig’n’Whistle, my old stomping grounds, on the late shift. I saw the name Honora Ivory on the worksheet. Even if the Ivory didn’t fit, not too many Honoras floating around. I came in early for a look-see.”
“Now I’m Mrs. Curt Ivory.” Honora extended the hand with the wedding ring. Silver showed through the gold plating.
“Hey, congratulations and all.” Vi’s enthusiasm rang animatedly. “So when can us two get together to catch up?”
“Now.” Honora pushed away her nearly full plate. “I live on Cherokee.”
Vi drove them in her Chevy.
In the apartment Honora started to pick up the clutter of teacups and throw away newspapers, but Vi said, “Get a load off, sit down. Bring me up to date.”
Too Much Too Soon Page 14