Letty Fox

by Christina Stead

  “One hundred dollars,” I said. “Why, the program I just outlined to you would cost much more than that. My teeth have to be fixed and I’ve nearly contracted for some reducing lessons and lessons in deportment; it’s a course. I went and saw the man and he said he would undertake to make me over completely, manner, voice, figure, style of dress, for four hundred and fifty dollars. Add that to what you want to give me, and I’d barely have enough.”

  Solander gave me a shrewd look and said tartly, “Think yourself lucky at your age to get one hundred dollars.”

  He looked green about the gills and would not give it to me then, but fixed a date the same week when he would meet me in the Café Lafayette and give me the money.

  I went away in a sober mood, thinking how much more than that I needed, but I was calmed, and able to think of my father with good sense. Of course, if he gave a spendthrift like me one thousand dollars, I’d certainly throw it all in the gutter, or give it to Clays, just to buy him away from Hilda. Hilda had not much money. She was supposed to be studying at N.Y.U. but had decided to become an artist, and she spent the money on art classes and just wasted it. It occurred to me, as I walked down the street, that I would soon need the money for college, anyhow, and that it might suit me to go away to the country, say Ithaca or Wisconsin, so that they would have to give me a proper allowance.

  Then I thought, What about Clays? The best thing is to tell them, If you want to keep me in the city, give me an allowance; it will be much less than it will have to be at any women’s college, and I can dress worse in New York than in any other place. In this town the girls wear ordinary street clothing; at those other places, the bird-brained flibbertigibbets wear anything that’s advertised in the slick magazines. I didn’t like the company, either. I wanted to be metropolitan, that was the crux of the matter. But, for example, Barnard horrified me, although I could make the grade there or elsewhere. As soon as I got home, I sat down and thought over my career.

  What would I do at college? I could do anything. The high-priced careers attracted me, since I could insist upon handling the money myself, and the prestige was so great; but the women became so dreary. On the other hand, I was besieged by the temptations of Vanity Fair—throw college away, and go in for the arts, or for journalism. Clays was a man who, even if I married him, would not worry too much about keeping me; I’d have to keep myself. I had not one preoccupation, but three: an allowance, my career, and getting married early. I intended to put behind me, as soon as possible, the danger of being on the shelf; that would be one step forward. An allowance would be number two; a career was then called for, but what about the family? I wanted a family, too. I didn’t want to be done out of anything. Any such loss makes you feel such a fool, and I couldn’t endure the idea of simple and awkward girls doing better than I in the ordinary things of life. “Love should be taken like a drink of water.” Everyone who has even kissed a boy knows that is an absurdity. But there’s a place in Zurich where wine pours out of a faucet in the automat; mountain wine, local wine. In a sense, all the good things should be on tap like that. That’s how life appeared to me—the big rock candy mountain, if you only knew how to approach it.

  My brain was active; it was all on account of Clays; it seemed evident to me I had a future. What should I do? I only asked for some occupation in which to expend all my powers. I felt as if my baton were growing out of my corporal’s knapsack, just like a tree.

  A few nights later I began to fill in the papers for several colleges, and my pen would keep falling from my hands as I suddenly saw life before me. How dull the last year of school had been! I had spent a good year of my life among children, all wasting their time. I put a record on my phonograph and started a letter to Solander.

  Papa, what is your profession, professionally speaking? Shipper, broker, wanderer, writer, economist, journalist, plumber, or agitator? Refreshing choice. Kindly underline that which desired and also that which actually had. And don’t underline plumber in blithesome mood, because, if you want to know, I might want to go in for medicine and they’ve got professional background considerations now. If your grandpappy and pappy were doctors, then you have, mebbe, a right angle on the profession. This sounds sinister, and it is—hush—to keep out the J-e-w-s and the poor, they say. I vouch for nothing. But I was not told this by a J-e-w, Je débine les potins. Hush! With my teacher, I’m playing a Beethoven minuet, a Brahms waltz, a Bach prelude, and soon begin the Moonlight Sonata. I am getting value for the money, so are you. Stop that snickering, Papa; I chose this parlor trick my own self and if you don’t like it, it means it doesn’t like you. But, smartypants, I also know the whole of FLAT FOOT FLOOGEY and am certain that you don’t even know what the hell I’m batting about, to use your expression. I’m eclectic, buddy. Pardon the flippant tone. I’m worrying about The Man, my dress needs (which I hope you will look after); I just finished reading Milton’s Lycidas, and Barbusse’s Stalin, you’ll agree a bit different; and I feel nutty. School tomorrow, and I haven’t slept for three days, not since you promised me that money, which won’t half cover what I need. I’m not just a wastrel. I mean that literally, I haven’t slept. Why? On account I met Mr. Right. I’m going to bring this perfect specimen of manhood along, even before I find out his name. I haven’t seen him for three days. I’m serious, Papa. What I want for Christmas, I found out long ago. The most gorgeous book of Diego Rivera murals, some dollars needed—and I can’t take this all out of the centum of bucks you have kindly said you’d give me. (And which are greatly appreciated.) My soul opposes this mercenary call—but, oh, Papa, if you were young like me! (Oh, the fine touch! You’ll admit I don’t crawl on my belly for that $150 bucks I need—yes, that’s the sum I really need in earnest. The market has gone up. I am serious about the horseback riding. And the rest—girls’ stuff.)

  Lots and lots of love,

  LETTY-MARMALADE,

  always in a jam.

  My father put off our appointment, but sent me one hundred dollars, and scolded me for trying to raise the figure. The next day I lent Clays twenty dollars for he badly needed it, and I found out his name—perhaps my name, as it would eventually figure on my tombstone! It was Clays Manning.

  I am always truly grateful; I am a goodhearted girl. I wrote a song of gladness to my papa on a piece of pink toilet paper which I got out of Aunt Phyllis’s bathroom.

  Des sentiments en rose—

  Cent fois merci

  mon cher ami

  plus cher qu’amis,

  mon cher papa

  (tarantara !)

  pour ton chèque-ci

  et dans la vie

  des soins gentils

  à l’infini!

  Fin en demi-deuil (comme les ris-de-veau)—

  je to caresse

  avec tendresse

  to peux me croi(re) (faut ici accent de la barriere)

  si quelquefois

  mes manigances

  et viles tendances

  t’attristent, te blessent

  sois un brave mec

  et cette fille laisse

  tomb

  er-

  a-

  vecu-

  un grand bruit sec! Plan! Plon!

  P.S. His name is just like him—it’s Clays Manning! Isn’t that terribly English and romantic. He is the only man in the world looks good in floor-sweepers, that’s tails to you, and he looks as if he ought to be at least Sir Clays Manning, Bart. I am certain he will end up as an ambassador, although he is only a socializer of the land at present. I want you to meet him. You would get on like the Babes in the Wood. He told us all that juiciest latest about Mrs. S. and the King. When you said only a small minority has mass sympathy for the Spanish people, take for instance, Friday eve., Earl Browder in his weekly broadcast spoke on Spain and announced a meeting at Madison Sq. Garden with three Spanish envoys as main speakers? It was jammed, and $15,000 was collected—in one evening. But you’re right, most people don’t know the differe
nce between a loyalist and a rebel.

  That defeatist attitude among U.S. communists, which you condemned, and on which Clays agrees with you, is fast disappearing—the knowledge of the great task ahead of us, after election—the building of a farmer-labor party has stirred the radicals to enthusiasm. I suppose there are a few biases, but that’s a remains of the twenties and is an accepted evil. My marks are not exceptional. I must tell you I have been missing school a bit to see Hilda—well, that means Clays and another friend of theirs, Amos, interested in the farmer-labor—I am sorry, Papa. Won’t do so no more. Still my average is 85. I am concentrating at present on a report for English which is to be a monumental thing. We are supposed to hand in reports on the life and works of 5 modern poets (in itself quite a proposition!) but I am taking the whole imagist school, this is at the suggestion of—again, Clays. You must think I am goofy, and it includes: 1. Origin (symbolists of France, am using Mallarmé, Apollinaire) 2. Development and so on to 5. Interpreters, Ezra Pound, Richard Aldington, D. H. Lawrence. No more. Papa, when can I bring up this gentleman? It’s serious, serious! For me. This farmer-labor man is called Amos. It’s incredible, isn’t it? I’ll tell you what Hilda says about him, he’s a beanstalk and he’s a Casanova, but she calls him “Scrofulous Amos.”

  Ta fillette

  LETTY-MARMALADE.

  Clays Manning was getting a divorce from his first wife, an American girl named Jean, who wrote crime stories. Clays was a journalist, at present working in New York but hoping for Washington. Hilda dogged his footsteps, and always stood at his elbow like a shadow. She was a conceited little thing, who could sometimes look very pretty, and that worried me. She had been educated near Paris and spoke French as well as I did, and she had run away from this elegant French school when she was fifteen. She was older than I, but only twenty, while he was twenty-four. I was more spirited than Hilda, and not so babyish and clinging; but she had him, and I couldn’t bear it. The way she put her arm through his was simply an advertisement, He’s mine. And I knew she expected to marry him, when he was divorced. The situation was that he was divorced already, but it hadn’t taken, or wouldn’t go in England and New York State, and a lot of other things. I hoped they never could get married. Hilda had got some job writing captions for comic strips, and made half a living. She got a little money from home, too. Still, in order to find out about them, and in order to get friendly with Clays, I went to see her.

  Hilda wore Alice-blue dresses, and used to wind a lace scarf round her thin neck. She didn’t seem to care at all about dress, but she had style. She was the opposite type from me. She gave me quite a setback. It seemed that there was the daughter of a Lord in London, who had the right to call herself “The Honourable,” whether married or not, and who was mad to marry Clays as soon as his divorce was clear.

  “And even before, she’d probably take the chance,” said Hilda.

  Of course, she knew by this, she had sniffed it out, that I wanted Clays too, and she knew I would be interested in The Honourable Fyshe in London. Then—worse—they had lived together. This was frightful. When I heard that, I simply went home and cried in a heartbroken way. What could I do against those callous, brittle, elegant brutes, who are quite immoral and will do anything for their own way? I knew all about them. This Honourable Fyshe was only twenty-three and very lovely, said Hilda. That was the reputation she had. She was quite a famous beauty, and she got herself up to look very girlish, though you could see her skin fading from debaucheries, and she had gray in her hair already. But she was the kind, unfortunately, who looks very elegant with gray hair, young; and, at the same time, the premature gray had made her cynical, bored, and wretched, all in a swanky way, so that she had the most devastating air you could imagine, of the corrupt, penniless aristocrat. Of course, she rode to hounds.

  She had a higher social rank than had Clays, even with his relative who was Silver Stick in Waiting or Elementary Black Rode (I do not remember). Just how it was, Hilda explained to me, but I no longer remember. You could work it all out by looking up Burke’s Peerage, she said.

  It seems that not only was this Honourable Fyshe able to keep Clays on a string, but there was a really horrible creature that he had lived with at one time, Caroline by name. He didn’t want to marry her, but she thought she’d give fate a shove by calling herself Mrs. Clays. I can hardly bear to think of it even now. She prided herself on knowing carpets, furniture, and all that, because she pretended they had very good rugs and stuff in their family mansion; so she made Clays go round with her to all the shops and galleries. She’s the kind that’s convinced it can pick up bargains, pitting herself against all the Armenians and Persians who’ve been in it for generations. It all went with her sense of importance and she thought the Duchess of Dumbcastel’s niece (which she is, unfortunately) had a natural instinct for everything, and of course, “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof, the Lady’s.”

  This Caroline used Clays in this way. She picked out a couple of rugs at a gallery near Victoria after having shown Clays as her husband; and had them sent to her flat as “Mrs. Clays,” but couldn’t pay for them. She pretended she had a right to use them two months to see if they would wear, and said quarter-day was coming and by then she’d know if she had been cheated. Then, because she’s the niece of this Duchess, she put on airs, and thought she had a right not to pay; that’s the Curzon Street atmosphere. She just said, “Let him take the niece of the Duchess of Dumbcastel to court!” She thought he would be afraid.

  The Armenian kept sending her bills, first to her parents’ home, because she lived there and used her ex-husband’s name there. In her flat in town, where she lived with Clays, she used “Mrs. Manning.” Presently the man found out about that and sent bills to Clays. Well, the man tried to scare her (as if the English aristocracy were ever afraid of bill collectors); she scolded him over the phone and called it a “try-on” and was insulted; but at the end the Armenian said he’d take back the carpets. Caroline refused to let him have them. He left them there a bit longer, to try to collect. It was a sale after all, and she is a connection of the Duchess of Dumbcastel.

  Well, that’s how this Caroline lived, and how she furnished a place to attract Clays. “Of course, it is awful,” said Hilda, “but what worries me more, is The Honourable Fyshe. She is so beastly corrupt, and doesn’t give a damn for anyone, and Clays is mad about titles.”

  “How can you say that?” I cried indignantly. “Such a man as that. Look how he wants to give up everything; abolish the king, abolish the nobility, and divide up the land.”

  “Poor innocent,” said Hilda, “if you think that has anything to do with a man’s preferences. Do you know how our chances are in getting men? Rank comes first, then money, then fame, then right at the bottom, looks. Of course, I’m talking only about eligible girls, about girls like us. The U.S.A. is jammed with lovelies—where do they get? There are so many in Hollywood, they can only get jobs in coffee pots; and so many here in New York that they’re elbowing each other out of the model agencies; and you get used up there in two years because of the competition. Beauty is simply nothing. But if you’re famous on the stage, or have a title or money, you can get on in Hollywood, or get married.”

  I had to admit this was only common sense. “And so this Honourable Fyshe is going to marry Clays, you think?” I asked Hilda.

  Hilda looked gloomy. “The only consolation is,” she said, “that The Honourable Fyshe can’t bear to leave London, except for short forays to Como or Nice or Florida, or the Channel Isles, wherever she has a reputation for beauty.”

  “Is she so pretty?”

  “A reputation for beauty is a different story; beauties often don’t have it. You are all right, Letty, but have no reputation for beauty; no one is attracted to you by common talk. The Honourable Fyshe is quite plain, but so taking, when she moves, it’s like a wind, or water; your heart turns to water, so he says. And then, think of her money!”

&nb
sp; All this talk made me feel miserable. I was a nobody. I was at home. I did not even have a basement flat to which to invite Clays. He never had a home. Girls with flats seemed to attract him. He simply couldn’t afford to be always putting up hotel rent. Then he liked company. He could not live alone, and a warmhearted man cannot bring himself to make love in a hotel for transients. He prefers women with flats. Furthermore, Hilda said, “The most attractive thing in a girl is accessibility.”

  This remark struck me with great force. I was not really accessible. If I had been—I believed, at any rate, that I would know what to do. In the meantime, as we were often a foursome, I was obliged to spend some hours almost every day with Amos.

  Hilda could hardly bear to look at Amos. He admired Clays and aped him; he even tried to ape a British accent, and when Hilda was away visiting her parents, Clays would go out with Amos, and even stayed in his room, for the company. When Hilda returned, she removed Amos’s things from her flat with a pair of tongs.

  All this made me simply desperate. I went to my father’s apartment one evening, after dinner, threw myself into a chair and told him I had to have some more of my grandmother’s money. He must give it to me.

  “Don’t you ever intend to give it to me?” I asked. “This is just an excuse, saying you’ll give it when I’m married. I don’t know that Grandmother said this. If Grandmother were alive and saw that I needed it now—now, not when I’m married, she’d say to give it to me. I haven’t even an evening wrap! Do you expect me to get an escort just in my school dress? You’ve no idea what the girls spend on dress nowadays. They have a decent home, their parents live in a regular way, and they have all they want. If their parents want to divorce, they don’t; they think of what a young girl needs. Their parents give parties for them, and think of them a little. But if you can’t do that, just give me the money. I’ve got to have it. Men won’t visit me if they see Mother and my sisters waiting for an official engagement. They feel like steers huddled up in a compound and waiting for the brand.”