"We're leaving the day after Christmas. Wouldn't miss the big ball tomorrow at Miss Vye's house. Stretch has promised the Bloods we'll both be there, with bells on our toes and cocaine up our nose." Sally laughed huskily. "Just say the word and I'll buy the ticket for you, sweetie. First class, of course. We can all leave together."
"Thank you, Sally. You know I want the job, but there are a number of reasons why that timing probably won't work for me," said Marlena. "I'll let you know for sure at the party. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas Eve tonight, and Santa brings you what you want."
Sally rolled her eyes with a suggestive expression, which Marlena pretended to ignore.
Coddie had been exuberantly glad to see Marlena come in. Hoping to catch her, he’d been hanging around all day in the bar. As soon as she turned away from Sally, he hunkered down close to her and mumbled in her ear.
Did she recall flirting in the lunchroom at PAD and passing notes to him from her cubicle?
"I need to go to the bathroom, Coddie. Please let me out."
She was washing her hands when Coddie came crashing through the door. He pretended he’d mistaken the ladies' room for the men's, but she didn't buy it. He wasn't that drunk.
"All I want is to be ish your white knight in flaming--sorry, make that shining ardor.”
"Don't you mean armor?"
"I mean every word I shay to you. Shay something nice to me. Shay, I love you, Coddie.”
His eyeballs were the color of blood. Perhaps he was that drunk.
"I love you, Coddie. But your behavior is not helping us."
She pushed him off as he tried to kiss her, meanwhile repeating over and over again he was in love with her. Then his tactic changed.
"Does little Marlena want Coddie to challenge big bad Harry to a duel? He’ll do it, by God." He slammed his fist on the marble counter.
Shirley, the bartender, came through the door at that moment.
"Is there a problem, Marlena? What's he doing in here?"
“It's all right. He'll quiet down in a minute. Leave him to me. Thanks anyway."
"Let me make love to you as a Christmas gift." He whispered the suggestion into her ear, his lips slobbering.
Coddie's next proposal was that he would tear up the divorce papers and they could wing off to Vegas to renew their marriage vows.
"I'll raise Harry's bastard as my own child."
"That's a wonderful offer, Coddie. I promise I'll think about it if you go upstairs and get a good night's sleep. I have to go to Chloe's, but I can't go until you're safely upstairs."
"Can we dansch the last dansch at the ball?" he asked owlishly. He had slumped onto the floor, which he was gazing vacantly at.
"You've got it," she said, dragging him to a standing posture.
"I always loved you, even when you looked like a flag. Lemme put it into you, jus’ for one l’il second."
"I love you too, but that's out of the question."
She was maneuvering him with great difficulty through the door. She looked up and saw Ron Huddleston coming toward them.
She’d never been so glad to see anyone in her entire life. With Ron's help, she got Coddie up to his room, where he continued to rave, so finally Ron injected him with a sedative from a kit he providentially had with him.
After Coddie was settled, Ron conveyed the information that he'd reached Harry earlier in the day and had delivered the message. Had Harry called as planned?
She lowered her eyes. "No."
"Perhaps he was called away on business."
Marlena shook her head.
She was hoping Ron would invite her somewhere for a drink. Instead, he ordered her home, making it clear that there would be no bar stroll for them tonight.
"You don't look well enough to be out," he said sternly.
"What a party pooper," she taunted him, But while driving back to Mill's Creek, she thought how loving Ron was, how balanced, kind, competent, and smart. Ron would be a vastly superior father to either Coddie or Harry. They were too old and egotistical; their sexual powers were waning, and their relationship skills were woefully lacking.
Who was she kidding? Ron didn't care for her, not that way. He'd ordered her to go home as if she were a child.
Defiantly, she gunned the engine. Then she had to slow down to make the icy turn into the entranceway to Mill's Creek.
That night, around midnight, she was awakened by a sharp pain in her belly. She got up and went into the bathroom.
On the crotch of her panties was a streak of blood. She panicked.
Oh God. Please don't let me lose this baby on Christmas Eve.
She was afraid to venture very far, so she went to the window, opened it, and called out, as loud as she could.
"Hello! Is anyone out there? I need help!"
Because of his cousin's wedding, Apollo Nelson was late doing his evening chores. He happened to be walking under her window on his way to the barn.
"Halloo! Is that you, Miss Marlena?"
"Thank God! Apollo, will you come up here, please? I'm having a-a medical problem. I need for you to find my mother for me, but I can’t walk. It's an emergency."
"Yes, ma'am! Have her there in two shakes."
As he took off at a gallop, she thanked her lucky stars. Her mother slept like the dead, but Apollo would prevail. A scant three minutes later, Faith was standing at her bedside in an old flannel robe.
"Lena, don't worry, I'm here."
Faith frowned at Apollo, whereupon he made himself scarce, congratulating himself for saving the day for the gorgeous doll he was madly in love with.
“I’m in some trouble, Mama. I know you know I'm pregnant. I’m afraid I’m losing the baby. Isn’t that a kicker? I was gearing myself up to throw myself down the stairs, and now I'm freaking out.”
"Let's see what we've got here, Lena. Don't worry. This happens to women during the first months. I'll put in a call to your doctor, if you like."
"No, let's not do that just yet. I've already troubled my doctor enough for one day."
Once she'd determined her daughter was in no real danger, Faith knocked on Chloe's door and alerted her to the situation. Chloe swiftly was there, in her flannel nightgown, with extra blankets and a comforting array of stories about friends of hers and patients who'd survived similar problems with good outcomes.
The three women had a heart-to-heart huddle in the middle of the night about the pregnancy. Then, haltingly, Marlena told them of her attempts to contact Harry. But he hadn’t responded to her, remaining silent day after day, and she’d been struggling with what to do.
How did she send the message? Faith asked.
Marlena told them the message was left on his fireplace mantle days ago at the hotel, where he would be sure to see it.
"Oh my God." Marlena stared at them.
The curse! He didn't get it, did he? It must have fallen off the mantle, and he never saw it. Just like the note from Nicholas to Cassandra that lay unseen on the mantle here in Mill's Creek the night she left town. Oh my God. Letty's right. I'm accursed!
When she began moaning, the two older women feared her emotions would generate more spotting. But nothing more appeared, and two hours later, when the bleeding hadn't reoccurred, they breathed a mutual sigh of relief. With all the good nursing and comforting woman talk she’d got, Marlena had fallen asleep with a mustache of warm milk on her upper lip.
Faith whispered to Chloe, after they’d tiptoed out of Marlena’s room, "She called for me, invited me here on her own accord."
"I know." Chloe hugged Faith. "Welcome home, Granny Bellum."
"Well, just don't expect home-made bread in the morning," whispered Faith. "I'm still plain old Faith who's no good in the kitchen."
"You were a good mom when she needed you tonight, Faith. That's what counts."
It was very late, but Faith found she couldn't fall asleep. Instead, she lay awake and wrestled with some demons of her own. She reviewed her life and
the mistakes she had made.
In the end, she decided it was wrong of her to have duped Marlena all these years about her paternity. She saw no alternative now but to come clean about the whole rotten, filthy mess. She must confess to her daughter that Austin, though he wasn't Marlena's father, was the father of Chloe’s aborted child; and that, when Austin told Faith confessed this during a drunken quarrel, Faith decided to leave Austin and go to New York to see if she could find Gordon again, using the care of her father as a pretext. Of course, she hadn't found Gordon.
When all this was acknowledged--and if Marlena was still speaking to her after these terrible admissions--she would beg her daughter's forgiveness for leaving her behind in Austin's clutches for two long years.
You knew he was a sex addict, didn't you, Faith?
Perhaps, if Marlena knew Austin wasn't her real father, she would have fewer painful flashbacks, as Chloe called them.
Having sped through her rosary, Faith fell asleep, clearer in her conscience than she’d been in many years. At four in the morning, she was awakened by Marlena. She was having more spasms, and she was anxious about them.
Faith tended to her daughter until she was soundly, peacefully asleep. After that, she slept on a cot next to Marlena’s bed. She prayed to the Blessed Virgin her child would come through this crisis whole and happy.
Chapter Thirty Four
December 25, 1977
At the crack of dawn, Marlena, Chloe, Faith, Annie and Apollo quietly assembled before the tree and opened their Christmas gifts. The occasion was subdued, but joyous.
Chloe said she must go back to bed and get her beauty sleep before the big ball--this made Marlena feel like Cinderella.
"But there's so much to do!" she objected.
"Not by you, Miss Marlena. Anyway, it's all done," said Annie. "Thanks for washing the windows yesterday."
Faith took Marlena's placid retreat to her bedroom as a sign that it was time to fulfill her resolution. Without a knock, because she was too nervous even to stand at the door, she barged into Marlena's room. She found her daughter sitting up in bed, reading. Without preamble, Faith blurted out her confession.
As Marlena listened to the incredible airing of her mother's dirty laundry, her eyes grew big as saucers. As it happened, their color fit into Faith's confession.
"That's why I never commented on your beautiful eyes, Lena. They’re exactly like your father's--Gordon's, that is. Luckily for me, you got the remainder of your looks from the Zanellis. Okay, from cousin Cassandra, with her red-gold hair and beautiful face and figure."
Faith said that ever since she'd arrived back here at the scene of the early days of her marriage, she'd been forced to review her own part in creating a shambles of what a solid home life should look like.
She now realized Chloe had never loved Austin, and that she, Faith, had made a terrible mistake in giving up the man she loved to marry him.
Marlena was stunned. “Chloe and Daddy?”
Hurrying along, Faith said she'd married Austin for an even more critical reason. She couldn't convince Gordon, who had got her pregnant after a single act of post-war intercourse, to marry her in the Catholic church.
She’d sought to appease God and preserve the Zanellis' respectability by marrying Austin and pretending the child was his. She had put these considerations above her own and her daughter's welfare. For her duplicity, and for leaving Marlena alone in Alta with Austin, she now begged forgiveness.
"Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. I couldn't go through this holy day with the terrible sin on my conscience, not with your being so honest with me about your troubles. My plan was to convince you to pretend the baby is Coddie's. It worked for me, so it might work for you. But now I'm not so sure, and I'm ashamed of myself for thinking that way."
When she'd finished what she'd come to say, Faith stared fearfully at Marlena. She was prepared to endure a torrent of abuse or years of stony silence.
"Oh, Mama!"
To Faith's astonishment, Marlena fell on her mother’s neck, weeping, and kissed her. It was the first exchange of emotion between mother and daughter in a dozen years.
"You don’t know what it means to me that you've confided in me," said Marlena when she was able to speak. "I know how I've hurt you by my silence, and I'm sorry. I promise you'll be proud of me again one day."
"I've always been proud of you, Lena."
"Mama, those words are the best Christmas present I've ever had."
Mother and daughter were still sobbing and hugging when Chloe knocked.
Wiping her tears away, Faith got up and opened the door.
"Ready, you two? Annie has prepared a huge brunch for us. Then it's nap time for Marlena, seriously. You've got to get some rest, dear, before the party tonight. Doctor’s orders."
Chapter Thirty Five
The last person Annie Witherspoon expected to see Christmas morning was Harry Drake outside her window. She was cleaning up the brunch remains when, unlikely as it was, there he was on cross country skis, grinning owlishly at her through the leaded glass window in his snow goggles. His nose was painted white with sun block. She screamed.
Annie had a fear of clowns, a phobia which Chloe had successfully treated her for, but Drake's sudden appearance was both clownish and unexpected.
"Must see Marlena!" he shouted as she retreated from the window. The wrapping papers from the gift exchange were still piled in a corner of the parlor, and there were a million things to do before the ball tonight. Now this blackguard appears, Annie thought resentfully as her panic subsided.
She trudged to the back kitchen door, opened it a crack, and said Miz Marlena was not to be disturbed. Would he like to come back later? Then Harry pitched a fit. She’d witnessed it several times before, when he was young man sniffing around Miss Chloe. Annie shook her head and compressed her lips into a thin upside-down U while Harry hurled aloft his ski poles, so his valet had to chase after them.
Then her mistress arrived on the scene. While Annie grumpily retreated, Chloe courteously invited her old friend in. Harry sat in Annie’s nook, looking silly with his painted nose, while his hostess poured strong coffee and listened to his side of the story.
"I guess by now you know all about Marlena and me," he began in a resentful tone. "If you don't, you're the only one in town who hasn't heard the gossip."
"Yes, but not because Marlena spilled the beans."
Chloe told Harry how she’d first learned of their relationship from a colleague who’d spotted them in Santa Monica.
"Marlena was horrified when I asked her about it. All she did was confirm what I already knew."
Harry admitted he’d deliberately ignored an urgent message from Marlena, via Dr. Ron, to contact her, but that he felt justified in doing so.
"Why, Harry?"
Chloe’s trained eyes flashed when he told her he believed Marlena was lying about a trumped-up pregnancy.
“I heard about her supposed condition yesterday, from Codwell Dimmer in my own hotel bar, no less. He's claiming I'm the father."
"From Coddie you heard that she's pregnant?"
"From fucking Dimmer, of all people."
"How very odd."
"You haven't heard the worst. I'm being framed. They're after my money."
He described how divorce papers had been strategically placed in Marlena's hotel room, clearly left out for him to see, and how this ploy had been quickly followed by others, culminating in Dimmer's sudden appearance and his claim Harry had knocked up his wife.
Then Harry laid out his darkest suspicion: Marlena was in cahoots with her husband. The plan was to pressure him into leaving Lila and marrying Marlena, so she could get his hands on his real estate holdings.
She had even masterminded over-the-top vandalism in the bar, Harry recounted indignantly, to call attention to her plight and guilt him into marrying her. “If they think I’ll be railroaded and swindled, they have another think coming, by bloody Mungo."<
br />
"Who's Mungo, dear?"
"A Scottish saint. My good luck charm is a Saint Mungo medallion I wear around my neck. It was handed down to me from my father, who got it his father. I only take it off for formal occasions, like your ball tonight."
"The cursing, no doubt, was also passed down from Curly Drake. He was known for colorful language, though your father was not."
But Harry wasn't to be derailed by any side excursions into family history. He began pacing about the kitchen, shouting about Marlena’s perfidious nature.
"Keep your voice down, Harry. Marlena is sleeping. She had a rough night."
There was no sign that Harry had heard her last comment or, if he heard it, cared.
"The little tramp will NOT lay a hand on my properties OR me. It'll be over my dead body. I swear by any saint you can name, Christopher, Mungo, Judas Priest, the whole bloody lot. She won’t force my hand with a pregnancy that might belong to ANY SWINGING DICK IN TOWN."
Chloe threw up her hands, startling Harry.
“I’m aware of how deeply engrained is the fear of being cuckolded, my friend. Indeed, a study in New York City has recently uncovered the fact that in almost a quarter of all pregnancies, the sperm didn’t belong to the named father.
"However, anyone who knows Marlena and the crazy depths of her obsession for you will never doubt you indeed are the father. Just when I think you couldn’t do any worse, Harry Drake, you outdo yourself. It’s amazing, what an unfeeling cad you are.”
Harry stopped his pacing and stared at her in disbelief.
“Cad? What nonsense are you talking, woman? Marlena’s not like us, so why are you defending her? She's a low-born nobody. I never thought of her as the mother of my child, as I did when I was with you.”
Chloe found his comment to be very annoying, but all she said was “Let's not revisit the past, shall we? The present is difficult enough.”
He came back to his chair, took a gulp of coffee, and sighed loudly.
The Fire Night Ball Page 19