by Randy Salem
"But..." Lee sputtered.
"No," Maggie said again. She took Lee's empty cup and carried it over to the sink.
Lee got up and went to stand behind her. She could feel the waves of unhappiness that emanated from the girl. Knew from her voice that she was close to tears. She put out a finger and, very gently, pushed a blonde lock back into place.
"Why don't you let me help you?" she said quietly. Maggie was so close. So very close that she could smell the warmth and the sweetness of her. Could reach out and touch her...
Maggie turned on the water and carefully rinsed the cup. Then she took a clean towel, dried the cup and stepped away from Lee to set it into the cupboard.
Lee felt a prickle of irritation teasing along her spine. For a girl who usually had such good sense, Maggie was acting like a jerk.
Maggie turned to face her, and as she did she smiled. Lee knew instinctively that Maggie had pulled all her loose ends together and was ready for anything. She was thankful, glad for Maggie and glad for herself, for she had come so close, so very close...
"Don't you think we'd better get down to some work?" Maggie said, changing the topic as though something had been settled. "We still haven't finished that letter and Daddy says—"
"You want to know something?" Lee said. "I'm a little sick of hearing what Daddy says. Lee says she didn't get any sleep last night and she didn't get any sleep the night before and if she doesn't get some damned soon, she's going to fall flat on her face. And from the looks of you, Miss Maggie, you could use a little yourself."
"I could," Maggie agreed without hesitation. "I feel like something ready for the garbage pail."
"So the hell with it," Lee said. She grinned. "Besides, you have to look gorgeous tonight. We don't want Pieter to feel he's getting gypped."
She shooed Maggie off upstairs and poured herself another cup of the strong, black coffee. It was true that she was tired, worn thin like she had never been in her life. Her stomach felt like somebody had been working it over with a mallet, but she knew that she would not sleep. That she would lie there in the big empty room and stare at the ceiling and think about Maggie and wonder...
About many things. And dream a little, too. Like about how simple it would all have been, if she had been the son she was supposed to have been. Maggie would have belonged to that son. Maggie would have been Kate's gift to her only heir and the family, the lousy family, would have sanctioned and approved.
But it wasn't safe to have dreams like that. They hurt too much, cut to the quick in all the wrong places. She had heard from the day she was born that she was supposed to have been a boy. In every generation there had been a boy. Only one—but that had been enough to keep the family line going. Each son had produced another. She remembered the portraits in Kate's library and silently, she cursed them, as she had often done-cursed the waning maleness in each generation that had finally produced her. She felt like a eunuch, like something that wasn't quite a woman and certainly was not a man. She loved Maggie as much, as well, as deeply as any man could. Yet she could not marry her, she could not give her sons. She could not go to Kate and say, Maggie is rightly mine.
She couldn't really, she knew, go to Kate and say anything. Kate had an empire to worry about, a family to propagate. Kate, if she had ever loved anything, had not let love get in her way. Lee could not persuade herself that Kate would listen to her, for Kate had not softened with age. She had grown hard, believing that only she had the strength, the fiber to keep the family going.
After a while, she gave up on the subject of Kate and climbed up the spiral stairway to the living room. There was little point in beating herself over the head about Kate. She'd been doing it all her life and gotten nowhere.
She poured scotch into a glass and carried it to the couch and stretched out with the glass propped on her stomach. The sun beat warmly through the front windows, burning a path across the rug toward her. She was too warm in the suit jacket and too tired to get up and take it off. Every now and then, she sat up enough to slug down a swallow of the scotch. But it didn't reach her. The pounding inside her head went on inexorably.
Only for a moment did she concern herself with regrets over Cleo. Cleo, like any woman but Maggie, was just one of those things. She would probably move Cleo and her tons of clothing into the house for a while—just long enough to take the edge off Maggie's departure. Cleo would at least keep her mildly entertained, and it was a hell of a lot easier than digging up a new body every night.
Helga, she could hardly spare a thought for. The fire had gone out of that flame a couple of months ago. Still, Helga had her good points as well as her dull ones. And she would need someone on the string, someone to hold her head when Cleo started kicking it in. Helga would do nicely for that. Helga loved to hold heads. It made her feel secure.
By the time she had worked up a good fat hate for the whole world, the glass was empty and the sun gone below the windowsill. She heard Maggie coming down from the top floor and glanced up to watch her descend the staircase.
She had always thought the spiral stairs a little silly until she watched Maggie coming down them. It was like a game of hide and seek, the way her knees peeped out from the edge of her skirt, then disappeared when she rounded a spiral, then were there again. Maggie had nice knees and good legs, legs that had walked a lot and been out in the sun.
The rest of her looked damned good too. Lee sat up slowly, taking in the whole picture a little at a time, so it wouldn't touch off the scotch. She had on a green dress Lee had not seen before that fit in a way that was at once both demure and exciting. Her hair looked softer, shinier, and it waved neatly, but not tightly against her head. She had taken a long time with the make-up and done a good job. Lee felt all of her reaching toward the girl, wanting to go to her, to hold her...
"Do you like it?"
"If I answered that honestly," Lee said, "you'd slap my face."
She watched the color deepen in Maggie's cheeks and she knew, for one moment, that if she reached out to Maggie, Maggie would run to her arms. She knew it and it was all she had ever wanted to know. But she could not tell this to Maggie. Not now and not ever.
She sat very still as the girl went on down the stairs to the first floor. In only a few moments, she would have to sit there and watch Pieter eyeing Maggie, feeling her up with that stupid, stolid expression of his, taking her measurements with his little pig eyes. She had seen Pieter look at women before. Pieter, who liked women the way some men did, as though they were nothing but flesh to be pawed over and mauled. Pieter, who had probably never done anything to a woman but look and drool.
She heard the bell and the click of Maggie's spike heels. And then the three of them coming up the stairs.
Maggie, quick and alive. Pieter, plodding and slow. Trudel, moving over the earth like a mongoloid Neanderthal. Lee got up as they came in and crossed to the liquor cabinet.
"May I fix anyone a drink?" she said automatically, looking straight at the cocoa-filled pot in Maggie's hand.
"We're having cocoa," Maggie said.
Pieter said, "Yah."
"Yah," Trudel echoed.
The Ten Broecks had not changed, as she had known they would not have. They never seemed to age, to lose or gain weight, to grow or shrink an inch. And still they said, yah—as if they had just climbed off the boat. Lee poured herself more scotch and knew that it wouldn't help a bit.
Maggie set the ceramic pot on the coffee table and stepped to the walnut cabinet for cups. Lee heard the girl fiddling around behind her, getting things out, but she was not looking at Maggie. She had fastened her eyes on Pieter—on his bloated, red face—and she had decided that it might be fun to kill him.
The Ten Broecks sat down together on the couch, dropping like two hinged halves. Carefully, Lee forced herself to look away from Pieter's face and went to sit down behind her desk, needing the advantage of distance.
"It is warm today," Pieter said in his foghorn voice. "W
e have hyacinths in the yard."
Lee had never quite known how to respond to Pieter's brilliant dialogue. He sounded, somehow, like a children's reader that was badly out of date. Neither he nor Trudel had ever set foot in the Netherlands. But they spoke and moved and behaved like classic examples from the old sod.
"We have a few things growing," Maggie said brightly. "I was out just this morning digging around the tulips." She retired with her cocoa to a sling chair across from the couch, and Lee watched the three of them sitting there, drawn into themselves now that there was nothing more to say.
Finally she pulled open the top drawer of her desk and searched around till she found a fresh pack of cigarettes, then offered them to the other three.
"We do not smoke," Pieter said, speaking at once for the three of them. He did not even glance at Maggie for her reaction.
"Maggie doesn't either," Lee said pointedly, knowing that no point she could throw would dent that thick skull. Still she had to try, for Maggie's sake. At the rate Pieter was going, Maggie would be dead of suffocation... or boredom... in a week.
She lit a cigarette and sat back to watch them through her smoke screen. It was like being at a play for which she had memorized the dialogue, the movements of all the characters. Yet it might be interesting, just for the hell of it and for the scotch in her veins, to try to shake it up a bit—see how the characters behaved when someone threw a rotten tomato onto the stage.
"I suppose Kate has made arrangements for the marriage," Lee said off-handedly, directing herself not to Pieter, but to a spot on the white wall behind his head.
"Yah," Pieter said. "For Sunday. In the morning."
Trudel said, "Yah.”
She felt Maggie watching her, but she would not look at the girl as she spoke. "In that case," she went on, "I'll be needing a secretary the first of next week. You know, Kate's made me head of the firm."
"Yah," the Ten Broecks said together.
It had a slightly different ring. Just enough to tell Lee what she wanted to know. Kate had set things up very comfortably for her. She would get from the Ten Broecks and from the rest of the family—the same deference, the same obedience that Kate got. Not because she had earned it, but because Kate demanded it.
"Well, I've been thinking it over," Lee said slowly, feeling a little sick at what she was about to say, "and I've decided on someone to succeed Maggie."
"Yah?" they said, sounding like a caricature of themselves.
"Yes," Lee said. It almost came out yah, but she caught herself just in time. "I would like you, Trudel, to take over Maggie's job. It's not exactly an easy one, you know."
She watched the pink and purple chase each other through Trudel's cheeks. She knew that Trudel dare not refuse, for fear of enraging Kate, and that Trudel dare not accept, for fear of losing Pieter.
"I need someone to live here at the house," Lee went . "I do a lot of my work here, see people here, that sort of thing. And since Pieter's getting married, I thought you'd be the logical choice. I mean, he'll be moving to Ravensway and I didn't think you'd want to stay on at the farm by yourself."
She sat back and folded her hands on the desk and waited.
Maggie said, "It's not such a bad idea, Trudel. Really it isn't. Lee's very easy to live with."
She sounded hopeful, almost anxious, and Lee didn't blame her. Living with Pieter was enough for any one person to have to endure. But she wasn't at all sure Maggie wasn't getting the better part of the deal.
"Trudel has worked for me," Pieter said.
His few words said it all. That he intended to keep Trudel working for him. But that he would give up without a fight if she waved Kate under his nose.
"Kate's put the choice in my hands," Lee lied blithely. "I need someone with experience in the firm. Trudel has that. And I think we can probably find someone else for you without too much trouble." She turned to Trudel. "What do you say?"
No one had ever heard Trudel speak three consecutive words. Now she stared dumbly at Lee, unable to find even two.
"Trudel will do what you want," Pieter said dully.
"I asked Trudel," Lee reminded him gently.
He touched his sister's arm and it looked as though he wanted to shake her. But he said nothing and his hand remained still on the heavy tweed of Trudel's sleeve.
"I will do what Pieter says," Trudel rumbled from behind her chins. "He is my brother."
Lee heard the gurgle of delight Maggie could not contain. And she sighed, settling into herself, content that she had been able to do something, some very little thing, to make Maggie's life bearable. Still, it was almost like nothing, there was so much she wanted to do for Maggie. So very much.
Maggie poured another round of cocoa, then refilled Lee's glass and brought it back to the desk. As she set it down, she touched Lee's hand and looking up, Lee saw that she was smiling.
"I could kiss you," Maggie murmured.
And Lee said, "Yah."
CHAPTER SIX
The Ten Broecks stayed only an hour, but it was long enough to give Lee a headache no amount of aspirin could cure. She stayed at her desk while Maggie showed them out, sitting with her feet propped on a drawer and her arms folded on her chest. And she thought about Trudel. Trudel, who never spoke, who had nothing to say anyhow, who had a shape like a sausage. Trudel, who would be sharing her house.
And she sighed. In a way, it was a kind of justice that she should be stuck with Trudel Ten Broeck for the rest of her life. A twisted, perverted justice such as Kate might have conjured up. It was her punishment for having refused to live at Ravensway and carry on the family tradition. Her punishment, for forcing Kate to find Maggie a husband so that the estate would have tenants. For in her heart she knew that not even Kate would have chosen Pieter for Maggie except under dire circumstances.
She heard the girl coming up the stairs and watched her head emerge above the level of the floor. Maggie looked pretty good, all things considered. Tired around the eyes, a little drained of spirit, but not by any means deflated. She admired the spark of self preservation in the girl that kept her smiling when Lee herself would have been in tears. And yet, it irritated her.
"Well, I'm glad that's over," Maggie said as she came over to the desk. She picked up the ashtray Lee had filled to overflowing and dumped it into the basket. "The two of them together make me nervous."
"You look as though you might live," Lee said, more caustically than she had intended, but annoyed by Maggie's tone. It was not fair that Maggie's mood should be soaring when her own was drooping so low.
"Why not?" Maggie said cheerfully. "Now that you've got Trudel all tucked away..."
"Oh, for chrissake," Lee exploded. "Don't try to tell me you've got stars in your eyes for that bumbling Dutchman. You can't stand him any more than I can and you know it."
"True," Maggie said gently. "But I'm going to be married to him, Lee."
The finality and the futility of it knocked the venom out of Lee. She picked up the empty glass and rolled it slowly between her palms. "I didn't mean to give you a hard time," she said. "You know that."
Maggie took the glass and set it onto the tray with the cups and spoons. "We're going for the license tomorrow morning," she said. "So I'll be a little late for work."
It was the last straw. Lee knew she could not spend the rest of the evening facing Maggie's quiet, simple acquiescence. To marry Pieter was one thing. But to take it sitting down...
She stood up roughly, knocking the chair back against the wall. "There won't be any work tomorrow,'' she said crisply. "I won't be here."
"Oh," Maggie said. But it was not surprise. Lee wanted to grab her and shake her until she stopped smiling, until the facade cracked and the truth started spilling out. Yet she dared not do that to Maggie. A little self-deception was necessary for Maggie right now. When she got around to facing the facts, then it would be time enough to worry.
Lee strode briskly across the living room, down the stairs, and
out to the kitchen. She poured a mug of cold, bitter coffee and drank it standing, her nerves too edgy now for relaxation. In a minute, she would slam out the front door, slam into the car, and then speed to somewhere, anywhere that promised oblivion. If she had any sense at all, she would stay there, stay away from Maggie until the girl had been safely married off, safely bedded down with Pieter.
But she had no sense now—only fear—fear for Maggie and fear for herself. Maggie would die, married to Pieter. Of boredom, frustration, misery, and probably disgust. And Lee would die, too, if Maggie married Pieter—just die.
She slammed out the front door, but left the car where it was and flagged a cab at the corner. She'd had too much scotch, too much aggravation for driving. All she wanted was to sit back and close her eyes and stare at the blank wall of her mind.
The cab did not take her far, hardly a dozen blocks, and then she was out again, standing on the sidewalk blinking up at the front of Helga's house and wondering why the hell she had come to Helga.
It was one of the few mysteries in her life for which she had an answer. If anybody could take her mind off Maggie, Helga could do it.
The apartment door swung open in her face and Helga's catlike litheness pounced.
"My roaming Romeo," Helga boomed in her whisky-thick voice. "Where in the hell have you been?"
Lee felt herself grabbed by both arms and pulled into the room. She heard the door slam loudly behind her. And then she was facing the girl, alone with her in the center of the ring, looking for a corner to back into. For Helga was angry—very, very angry. And Helga in a rage was a power to contend with.
"You lousy bastard," Helga steamed. "Two nights in a row. You've got your damned nerve, Lee Van Tassel. I could have been out having myself a time, instead of sitting here like a fool waiting for you."
She was almost, but not quite, too angry to speak. Lee had never seen Helga reduced to a state beyond words. In fact, Helga had more words to say on any subject than anyone else Lee had known. She especially delighted in railing at Lee. Before, the sight of Helga's beautiful face pinched and drawn to a white-hot fury had always stirred something in Lee, had made her capitulate and promise. Now, she just watched—curiously detached—seeing Helga clearly for the first time and not liking what she saw.