Major Vices

by Mary Daheim

  “I don’t think you’ve seen Jill for quite a while,” Derek said after the initial greetings were exchanged. “Hasn’t she grown up?”

  Jill had grown in several directions since the cousins had last seen her as a gawky teenager. Taller than Judith, Jill Rush had a spectacular figure, wide-set brown eyes, a sensuous mouth, and lush, long brown hair parted in the middle. She eyed Judith and Renie as if they’d crawled out of the garbage cans on the back porch.

  “You’re the librarian?” Jill asked of Judith.

  “I used to be, but now I run a—”

  “And,” Jill continued, turning to Renie, “you draw cartoons?”

  “No, I’m a graphic—”

  Jill swiveled her head to look at her grandmother. “Where’s Mama? I thought she was right behind us.”

  Plastic rain bonnet and gloves in hand, Vivvie Rush unfastened her galoshes. “Holly is bringing in our things, dear,” she informed her granddaughter. With nervous, beringed fingers, she undid the buttons of her dark blue winter coat. Derek helped his mother remove the garment. “We brought along some nice wine and a box of Spanish cigars for Boo. Oh, and some brandy. My sister is awfully thrifty sometimes when it comes to guests.” Her manner toward Judith and Renie was apologetic. As the cousins recalled, Vivvie’s manner was always apologetic.

  The back door was still open. Coming around the corner of the house was a small, dainty figure carrying a large, heavy box. Judith waited for Derek Rush to help his wife. He didn’t. Holly Rush panted up the porch steps, staggered into the kitchen, and set her burden on the counter.

  “Oh!” she gasped. “That box weighed more than I realized! Whatever is in there? I thought it was only a couple of bottles and some cigars.” Holly leaned against the counter, catching her breath. At just over forty, she retained a girlish air. Her short brown hair was cut close to her head, setting off the delicate bones of her face. She offered Judith and Renie a shy smile. “How good to see you both again. When was it the last time? Not Aunt Rosie’s funeral—I mean, a happy occasion. Easter, three years ago?”

  “Thanksgiving, five,” Judith replied in a friendly manner. She saw the crestfallen look on Holly’s face and hastened to make amends. “The years go by so quickly, it’s hard to keep track. I remember because it was the first Thanksgiving after Dan died.”

  Jill had already left the kitchen. Derek suggested that he and his wife and mother also depart so that the cousins could work in peace. Noting that it was just a few minutes before seven, Judith didn’t try to detain them. There was still much to be done before dinner was served at eight.

  Derek was halfway to the dining room when he turned to his wife. “Don’t forget the carton, Holly. We’ll put it in the den for now.”

  Grunting a bit, Holly hoisted the box anew. The trio disappeared. Renie shook her head. “Poor Holly. I forgot how downtrodden she is. Vivvie’s oblivious, Derek’s callous, and Jill is so self-absorbed that I’d like to shake her until she loses her center part.”

  “They’re a queer family,” Judith allowed, then stopped in the middle of measuring out the crème brûlée ingredients. “They’ll need a key to get in the den. Should we tell Mrs. Wakefield?”

  But Mrs. Wakefield was reentering the kitchen. “I don’t have the key,” she said, looking a bit sulky. “I used to, but Mrs. Grover took it. Mrs. Rush will have to ask her sister.” The sulk became a smirk.

  Judith decided not to worry about the key. It wasn’t her problem. Making the crème brûlée required all her attention at the moment. She couldn’t allow herself to be distracted by petty family quarrels.

  Or so she thought until someone started screaming.

  FOUR

  THE GUESTS FROM Major Mush had been dispersed. In the wake of Weed’s defection, Derek Rush had taken over the duties of official bouncer. He was still at the double inner doors when Judith and Renie arrived in the entry hall. Jill had Toadie backed up against the door to the coat closet, upbraiding her aunt in strident tones while Vivvie sniffled into an embroidered handkerchief. Trixie tugged with one hand at Jill’s cream-colored sleeve and yanked at her long brown hair with the other. Mason Meade stood with his hands behind his back, humming and trying to look as if nothing unusual were going on. Holly clutched the wrought-iron balustrade, making ineffectual keening noises. Uncle Boo was nowhere to be seen.

  “Give me the damned key or I’ll bust your snout,” Jill shrieked at Toadie, even as she tried to fend off Trixie.

  “Leave me alone,” Toadie rasped, raising her hands in a clawlike gesture. “I’ll gouge out your ugly eyes!”

  “Stop threatening my mother!” yelled Trixie, pulling harder on Jill’s long brown hair.

  “Oh, don’t!” squeaked Vivvie, wringing her hands. “Please don’t! My nerves! I can’t stand dissension!”

  “What?” Toadie managed to punch Jill in the stomach. “You caused it, Vivvie, you old hog! You’re the one who wanted to go snooping in the den!”

  Jill staggered, as much from Toadie’s blow as from the sharp tugs of Trixie. “Let go of my hair, you cow!” she snarled at Trixie. “Or I’ll find a blowtorch and melt your silicone boobs!”

  Judith and Renie were watching with a mixture of fascination and horror. “Silicone boobs?” whispered Renie. “When did Trixie have those done?”

  Judith gave a shrug. “When she had the liposuction? Or the eye tucks?”

  “I thought Toadie had the tucks.” Renie leaned against the wall which led to the telephone alcove and the main floor’s only bath. “Maybe they got two-for-one on a special mother-daughter deal.”

  “Could be.” Judith winced as Jill got her hands around Trixie’s throat. Toadie was fanning herself and straightening her dress. Vivvie was openly weeping. Holly was pleading with Derek to intervene. “How long do these skirmishes usually last?” Judith inquired of Renie.

  Renie looked at her watch. “Oh—five, ten minutes, unless they resort to weaponry. Don’t you remember the Christmas dinner when they all ended up in my folks’ fish pond?”

  Judith shook her head. “I missed that one. Dan wouldn’t let me come in for Christmas that year. We still owned the cafe then and he’d invited his ne’er-do-well buddies over for a free meal. One of them stole my purse.”

  “M-mmmm,” Renie responded, as accustomed to tales of woe from Judith’s earlier life as she was to the fractious Lott family.

  Derek, however, had finally interceded, pulling his daughter away from Trixie. “That’s it,” he said quietly, though there was an underlying threat in his voice. “We don’t need the key now anyway. The guests are gone and Uncle Boo can have his cigars. Besides, it’s time for cocktails.”

  “Oh, goodness!” Aunt Toadie’s charm bracelets jingled as she checked the time. “You’re right! It’s after seven!”

  “I could use a teeny martini,” said Aunt Vivvie, adjusting her hair. Or, Judith noted, her wig, since the entire coiffure seemed to move smartly to the left.

  “Make mine wine,” said Jill, heading for the living room.

  The atmosphere calmed as quickly as it had erupted. Judith and Renie withdrew to the kitchen, where they found Mrs. Wakefield laughing her head off.

  “That was great!” she cried, leaning against Zoe for support. “I wish that young gal had decked Mrs. G. Too bad the bleached blond hussy got in her licks.”

  “Stay tuned,” said Renie, going straight to the stove to check the cauliflower. “That was merely the opening round.”

  Judith was putting the crème brûlée cups into a pan of water when a buzzer sounded. “Yikes!” she cried. “I thought I left Mother home.”

  Mrs. Wakefield had gotten her mirth under control. “That’s the living room. There’re buzzers all over the house.” She pointed to a series of colored lights above the back door. “Old Boo never uses ’em, except when he falls out of bed. But Mrs. G. plays those things like an accordion. My guess is that they want their booze.”

  “Oh.” Judith shook herself. “Silly
me, I thought there must be a liquor cabinet or a bar in the living room. Shall I?” She threw the housekeeper a questioning look.

  “Somebody shall, and why not you?” Mrs. Wakefield responded. “Zoe and I’ll get the dining room table ready.”

  Reluctantly, Judith headed back to the living room. Uncle Boo, who might or might not have noticed the melee in the entry hall, was dozing in his wing chair. Jill was picking out notes on the grand piano at the far end of the room, Derek Rush was poking at the fire in the grate, Trixie was showing Mason Meade what was left of the once-sweeping view to the west, and Toadie and Vivvie were sitting on the tapestry-covered sofa as if they were indeed the closest of sisters.

  Martinis, of vodka as well as of gin, seemed to be the family’s favorite beverage. Except, of course, for Jill, who gleefully remarked that since she was still under age and considerably younger than anyone else present, she’d settle for a glass of wine. A Barolo, preferably from Casa Vinicola Bruno Giacosa.

  “How about a rosé from the state liquor store on Heraldsgate Hill?” Judith suggested. Jill turned up her nose, but she didn’t turn down the offer. Instead, she played “The Drinking Song” from The Student Prince.

  “This,” said Judith, after Mrs. Wakefield had shown her where the liquor was stored in the kitchen, “reminds me of my second job tending bar, at the Meat & Mingle. These customers are better dressed, but they don’t have any more class.”

  Uncle Boo had been permitted a glass of wine. Apparently he’d managed to guzzle enough gin to satisfy his thirst. Opening his eyes, he accepted the finely cut Czechoslovakian goblet from Judith.

  “Thank you,” he said with a wan smile. “Did you talk to those fellows with the extra eyes?”

  Judith blinked. “The…oh, you mean the men from Mars? No, I didn’t, Uncle Boo. They were unloading gamma rays from their spaceship.”

  Uncle Boo nodded. “Weed’ll see to them. He always does. Good man, Weed. He knows an alien when he sees one.”

  Judith didn’t doubt it for a minute. She finished serving the drinks and fled to the kitchen.

  With Mrs. Wakefield and Zoe arranging the table service, Judith and Renie were able to bring dinner off on time. A second round of drinks had been served shortly after seven-thirty, this time by Renie, who reported that all was calm, if not all bright.

  “Dumb,” Renie declared as the cousins began carrying out the serving dishes. “The Lotts are dumb. How can Uncle Corky stand being married to a stupid woman? He’s really smart.”

  “Toadie’s shrewd, though,” Judith said under her breath as the family made its procession into the paneled dining room. “Don’t underestimate her.”

  Uncle Boo sat at the head of the table, with his sisters-in-law on each side. Mason Meade was next to Toadie; Derek Rush sat beside his mother, Vivvie. Holly and Jill filled out the rest of the table. The place at the far end was vacant. Judith could picture Aunt Rosie, a squat, belligerent figure with bright gold curls, presiding in her favorite shade of pink. As the eldest of the Lott sisters, Rosie had always managed to get in the last word.

  The sterling gleamed; the crystal glittered. The Wedgwood china was handsome, formal, Florentine black on white. The linens were edged in handmade lace, probably from Ireland, Judith thought. A pair of lamps with small navy shades sat on either side of a dried floral arrangement in a silver tureen. It was a table fit for a king. Instead, the gathering was made up of knaves, jokers, and a pretender-queen.

  Or so it seemed to Judith. “They look out of place,” she muttered to Renie as the cousins finally had a chance to relax by the sink.

  “Aunt Toadie doesn’t think so,” Renie replied, pouring them each a glass of wine. “She acts as if she’s running the show.”

  Having temporarily completed their serving tasks, Mrs. Wakefield and Zoe returned to the kitchen. Renie put a question to the housekeeper:

  “We’ve been wondering—whose idea was it to fix this place up?”

  Mrs. Wakefield unpinned her cap and smoothed her graying red hair. “Mrs. G.’s. Who else? Old Boo’d let it fall down around his ears.”

  Judith and Renie exchanged swift glances. “So why do it?” asked Judith.

  The housekeeper snorted. “Dumb question. The old Toad figures she’ll get everything when Boo kicks off. Why do you think she’s been hanging around him like flies on a horse’s behind?”

  At the stove, Zoe lifted the lid from a pot and forked out a mouthful of new potatoes. “Boo’s so lazy he lets Mrs. G. do anything she wants. He has no spunk. And there’s no ‘No’ in his vocabulary.”

  “You got that right,” huffed the housekeeper. “When Mrs. G. showed up this afternoon, she said the masons had been screwing off. I told her to tell the master. As usual, he just sat there like a lump. Guess who had to fire them?” She stabbed her bosom with her thumb. “Now I suppose I’ll get stuck finding another bunch of bricklayers. Mrs. G. comes in and raises all sorts of hell-oh-bill, then waddles away and expects somebody else to pick up the pieces.”

  Judith gave a slight nod. “That’s Aunt Toadie, all right. But is Boo actually going to leave her everything? What about Derek? He’s always been the favorite. Aunt Rosie and Uncle Boo helped raise him, especially after Uncle Mo got sick.”

  Mrs. Wakefield looked blank. “Who’s Mo?”

  “Mo—Maurice—Rush,” Judith explained. “He was Aunt Vivvie’s husband. He owned a plumbing company, which was a good thing, because he was chronically ill and never did much real work after he hit forty.”

  “Right,” Renie chimed in. “Mo Rush was a hypochondriac who finally had to die to prove he was really sick. Of course, he was almost eighty at the time.”

  The blank expression remained on Mrs. Wakefield’s face. “Maybe I met him once. I don’t remember.”

  “Probably not,” said Judith. “He was always too sick to go anywhere. That’s why Aunt Rosie and Uncle Boo hauled Derek along on their trips. The poor kid would never have gotten out of the house otherwise.”

  Zoe had buttered one of the extra rolls and was munching away in her unconcerned fashion. “When I was a little kid, Derek would hang out here a lot. He was years older than I, but he didn’t mind horsing around with me. We spent a lot of time hiding in the bushes.”

  Judith tried not to look askance. Zoe’s remark didn’t seem to perturb Mrs. Wakefield, however. “Derek Rush can be a pain sometimes, but I figure it was his upbringing. It looks as if he expects that poor wife of his to spoil him silly. Maybe he’s making up for lost time.”

  The housekeeper’s assessment struck Judith as credible. From what she knew of Derek, he was selfish, thoughtless—and yet likable. The hint of menace in his lupine manner was born of a wily determination to get his way. With a coddled father and a distracted mother, young Derek had learned to go it alone.

  The buzzer sounded from the dining room. Glancing through the door, Judith could see Aunt Toadie with her lips pursed and an expectant expression on her face.

  Renie wrinkled her pug nose. “Refills for the trough?”

  Judith nodded. “That’s my guess, unless they’re complaining about Uncle Boo’s face falling into his potatoes.”

  “He passed out?” Renie joined Judith at her vantage point. But Judith had been joking: Boo was contentedly munching away on a meaty lamb bone. He had a linen napkin tucked into his collar and appeared to be ignoring the rest of the diners.

  Mrs. Wakefield bustled past the cousins. “I’ll handle this. You’d better get your dessert ready to roll.”

  The crème brûlée was done to perfection, with its amber crackle shining under the oven light. Judith set the cups on a tray, then checked to see if the coffee had finished perking.

  “More rolls, seconds on the broccoli,” Mrs. Wakefield reported, returning to the kitchen. “Hit it, Zoe.”

  Zoe did, though she took her time about it. Five minutes later, the entree plates were ready to be cleared. The Wakefields were hauling dishes from the dining room when Weed stroll
ed in from the back stairs.

  “Great TV set,” he declared, hands in his pockets and a rapturous look on his face. “Next time I’ll plug it in.” Weed Wakefield wandered off to the servants’ quarters in the basement.

  Mrs. Wakefield and Zoe had delivered the crème brûlée, coffee, and tea when the buzzer sounded again. Judith was ready to tear her hair. “Now what?” she demanded in an impatient tone.

  The housekeeper wheeled around, heading back to the dining room. A minute later, she returned, relaying the message that Toadie wanted to speak with Judith. Gritting her teeth, Judith entered the dining room.

  Toadie was spooning the last of her crème brûlée into her mouth. She held up a hand while she finished swallowing. “Ah, there, mustn’t talk with one’s mouth full.” Toadie gave Judith a smile that went only as far as her nose. “By and large, the meal was rather good, Judith. However, you might want to cook the lamb a bit longer next time. I found some pink meat close to the bone. The potatoes were a trifle overdone—they should have a bit of snap and never, never, any squish. The same with the broccoli. As for the cauliflower, you should come up with a new sauce. The Allemande and the béchamel are too similar. Are you sure you used fresh Parmesan cheese for the cauliflower? Did you add one egg yolk or two for the béchamel? When I simmer sauces, I always…”

  Since Judith had never eaten a meal prepared by Aunt Toadie that hadn’t come out of a box, a can, or a package, she couldn’t stand any more criticism or questions. Toadie’s garnishing standby was an envelope of dehydrated Mr. Sauce. Indeed, Judith suspected that Toadie had looked up the béchamel and Allemande recipes in a cookbook.

  “You ate everything but the centerpiece,” Judith broke in. “We hardly need to wash the dishes. I think you licked them clean.” Judith turned on her heel and went back to the kitchen. Derek looked startled; Holly appeared crushed; Aunt Vivvie seemed on the verge of tears; Uncle Boo had crème brûlée all over his chin.

  “That does it,” Judith muttered, black eyes flashing at Renie. “Let’s clean up this place and get out of here.”