Spa

by Olivia De Grove

  “Oh boy,” said Joyce to herself. “Here we go. It’s ‘Days of Wine and Roses’ all over again.”

  “What did you say?”

  “Nothing. But if she’s going to drink that fast we’d better get some food into her first. Spa cuisine is not meant to soak up booze, especially not the ration we’ve been getting lately. What is there to eat around here?”

  She picked up the soiled and spotted handwritten sheet that passed for a menu and which Cliff had been using as a coaster, and read it out loud.

  “Cou cou, jug jug, Fish Pash, Twice Laid, Sea Egg Pie, yam balls, Guava Fool, and pickled breadfruits. O.K. Mr. Tour Guide, would you like to translate that, or shall we just order blind and see what we get?”

  “Why don’t you try the Twice Laid? It’s kind of like a quiche with boiled fish, potatoes, onions, and eggs. That should help soak up the rum.”

  “That sounds about right.” She tapped Cathy on the arm to get her attention. “Cathy, do you want to try some Twice Laid?”

  “Twice Laid, nurse maid,” rhymed Cathy happily to herself, looking around for the next drink.

  Cliff knitted his brows together.

  “What can you expect?” said Joyce, catching his puzzled look. “The only adult she probably spends any time with is Mother Goose.”

  It was a different waitress who arrived with the drink, and Joyce was disappointed. She wanted a chance to talk to the maid/waitress. It couldn’t be an accepted practice for spa staff to moonlight, could it? Come to think of it, though, breakfast had been served buffet style for the last two days, so maybe she wasn’t spa staff anymore.

  While Joyce was pondering this possibility, Cliff ordered the food and Cathy attacked the cherry.

  “You think she’ll be alright?” asked Joyce, after a few minutes. “I’ve never seen alcohol hit anybody so fast.”

  “Sure, she’s fine. Once she gets something solid in her stomach she’ll be O.K. No more booze, though. I don’t want to have to carry her back to the truck, for obvious reasons.”

  Chapter 31

  Cliff sipped his drink. The beer tasted good, but not as good as he had expected. He looked over at Joyce. She was watching the two girls up on the dance floor trying to learn the limbo, and he followed her gaze.

  Regina was just going under the bamboo stick, her long legs bent almost horizontal at the knee, her blue-black hair swaying down, touching the ground and gleaming in the light of the colorful paper lanterns that were strung around the dance floor. She was so young, so “juicy” was the word that came to mind. He wondered for a moment what it would be like to have those long, long legs wrapped around his waist, and then reprimanded himself for being a dirty old man, and turned his attention back to Joyce.

  He watched her swirl the brandy, warming it with her hand, and then sip it, arching her throat as she swallowed, longing for the heat but trying to avoid it at the same time.

  “Penny for your thoughts,” he said softly.

  His question startled her out of her reverie. She put the glass back on the table. “You know, Cliff, there’s something very peculiar going on here.”

  He looked around, wondering what she was referring to. “Where?”

  “Not here here. At the spa. I’m sure that the waitress who took our order was the maid who used to bring breakfast.”

  “Now that you mention it, she did look kind of familiar.” He took a sip of his drink. “And you know something else, this morning I went to get a massage. Alfred was gone. The place was all locked up. And there was a note on the door that said ‘Gone sailing.’ What do you suppose that meant?”

  “That’s exactly what I mean. Mariette is serving the meals, I’ve been making my own bed, the food’s getting pretty repetitive. I mean, lately it looks more like the menu for the annual convention of the Poultry Growers Association of America.”

  He nodded. “You can say that again. I had no idea there was so many ways you could serve chicken. I wonder what’s going on.”

  “I don’t know, but I think I’ll have a word with Mariette. If anybody knows, she does.” Joyce nodded toward the two girls who were working their way through the crowd, back to the table.

  “It’s like sardines out there!” exclaimed Regina, throwing herself gratefully into a chair.

  “Only without the oil,” added Mariette, rubbing a bruise on her shin.

  Joyce didn’t wait for the two to get comfortable. She turned immediately to Mariette. “Who’s Mittlehoff?”

  “What?” Startled, the girl looked up from rubbing her leg.

  Joyce repeated the question. “Who is Mittlehoff?”

  “You know about Mittlehoff?” asked Mariette guardedly.

  “Let’s just say we’ve met. Who is he?”

  Mariette turned her attention back to her leg. “Nobody, nobody,” she mumbled from beneath the table.

  But Joyce persisted. “If he’s nobody, then how come we both know about him?”

  She sat up. “Look Joyce, I … I can’t tell you. The doctor wouldn’t like it if I said anything.”

  Joyce decided to keep up the pressure. “Mariette, there’s something going on at the spa, and I want to know what it is, or there isn’t going to be any story.”

  Mariette looked shocked, and Cliff, who had been listening to all this, decided to fulfill his role of romantic hero-in-residence and intervene. “Oh come on, Joyce, give the kid a break.”

  Joyce turned on him. “Give the journalist a break and butt out, will you?”

  He looked offended. “Come on, Regina, let’s go trip a light fantastic or two, and leave Margaret Bourke-White here to get on with her career.”

  Regina looked confused. “Trip over a what?”

  He sighed. “Let’s dance.” And he took her by the arm.

  Cathy, who was tucking into her Twice Laid and making little sounds of pleasure as she chewed and swallowed, looked up as the two left the table. “What are they going to do?”

  “They’re butting out,” replied Joyce pointedly.

  “Oh.” Cathy took the hint and went back to her food.

  Joyce leaned forward and put both elbows on the table. “Look, Mariette, something is wrong at the spa. You can’t hide it any longer. The staff is leaving, the food is lousy, strange little Nazis are hanging around, and you know what it’s all about. Tell me, and I promise that I’ll make the story as sympathetic as possible.”

  Mariette chewed on her lower lip for a moment. Her plan to get Cliff together with Regina had developed complications. “Joyce, nothing is going on. And anyway, the doctor is handling it. Please don’t ask me anymore, O.K.? Just enjoy what’s left of your stay and then write a nice article about the spa.” Her voice was even, but her eyes were pleading.

  “You’re a smart girl, Mariette. You know I can’t write a glowing recommendation about this place under the circumstances.” She paused, letting it sink in. “Of course, if I knew what was going on, maybe I could soft-pedal it, but …” and she shook her head.

  But before Mariette could say anything else, Cliff and Regina returned to the table.

  “I hope you two have finished your little tête-à-tête. We had to dance so close out there, her mother will probably insist I marry her, now.” Cliff gave a lascivious grin at Regina. “Not that I’m complaining, of course.”

  Regina blushed to the roots of her hair.

  “Marriage stinks.” It was Cathy, who had finished her food and her second drink and had become very reflective.

  “What?” Joyce had almost forgotten she was there.

  “I said, ‘Marriage stinks and Michael Aloysius Stewart is a prick’.” Then she hiccuped. “Pardon me. Must have eaten too fast.”

  “Look … ah … Cathy, don’t say anything you’ll be embarrassed about if you remember it in the morning.” Cliff put a cautioning hand on hers.

  “Embarrassed? Why should I be embarrassed because he’s a prick?”

  Cliff started to say something else, but Joyce interrupted h
im. “Let her talk. It might be just what she needs.”

  “Jus’ what I need.… I need.… Nobody cares what I need.” said Cathy, her eyes filling with tears. “You’re right to get a divorce, Joyce.” She dabbed at the corner of each flooding eye with her paper napkin.

  Cliff looked questioningly at Joyce. “She still doesn’t know who I am,” she whispered back. He nodded. “She must be the only one who doesn’t.”

  “Otherwise, you could have ended up like me.” Cathy was talking to herself more than anybody else.

  Regina, feeling uncomfortable at this sudden display of adult ennui, decided to go powder her nose and take the suddenly subdued Mariette with her.

  Cathy was on a roll, now. “Do you know why I married Michael?”

  Cliff and Joyce both shook their heads.

  “Neither do I. That’s the awful part. I never really stopped to think about it. He asked me. My parents liked him. My friends liked him. So I married him.” She thought for a minute. “I married him for everybody else as much as for me. But it was the normal thing to do. Everybody I knew was getting married.” She gave a deep sigh.

  “And then, after we were married, he didn’t want me to work, so I stopped working. Then he wanted babies, so I had babies. And now, when he wants dinner I give him dinner, when he wants clean laundry I do his laundry, and when he wants to make love I let him. I wait all day in that house for him to tell me what he wants me to do-oooo.” Her voice trembled and she took a minute to compose herself before continuing.

  “Did you ever see ‘The Stepford Wives’? Well, that is what it’s like, believe me. I exist to serve everybody else, and of course nobody ever asks me what I need, because if they did, I might tell them.” She took a deep breath, trying to stop a rising hiccup, but it popped out anyway.

  “Do you know what it’s like, spending all day every day with small children? They want this. They want that. And I have to give it to them, because I’m their mother. But who gives to me? Who even talks to me? Every time I go for a checkup I’m afraid they’re going to declare me brain-dead.” She hiccuped the last of the word and a big wet tear slid down her face and onto the traces of the Twice Laid.

  “Oh Cathy.” Joyce was filled with empathy, and she covered Cathy’s hand with her own. No wonder she ate so much, if she was this unhappy with her life.

  Cliff cleared his throat. “Well, you two sure are a fun pair. I think I’ll go and dance with the girls while you solve the crisis,” he said to Joyce as he got up from the table.

  “Thanks a lot,” she called after him, but he couldn’t hear her for the music.

  She patted Cathy’s hand. “Look, Cathy, it’s just the rum talking. You love your husband and you love your children. You’ll feel better about all this in the morning.”

  Cathy shook her head. “No I won’t. When I go back, everything will be just the same, and the doctor was right. I may lose a few pounds but I’ll put it all back on, because eating is the only thing in my life that I can decide to do. It’s the only control I have.” She was sobbing into the napkin now, shredding it into soggy wads of paper.

  Joyce drank the last of her brandy and tried to remember the last time she had been this depressed. What with Maxine and her marriage and now Cathy and hers, she was beginning to despair for the whole institution.

  She watched the dance floor and, in a few moments, Cliff danced into view holding a willowy Regina loosely in his arms as they swayed to the soft beat of the music. Typical, she thought. Just like Harry. He sets up the play and then leaves me to run with the ball.

  When they got back to the spa, it was after midnight. Joyce was dead tired, and all she wanted to do was crawl between the cool blue sheets and go to sleep.

  She went straight up to her room, kicked off her shoes, and headed for the bathroom. But, as she passed the telephone, she noticed the red light blinking on and off. A message? Who would call her here? Who else, she thought, picking up the phone and pushing the button for the operator on the front desk. Harry.

  The operator confirmed her suspicions and said that Mr. Kraft had left an urgent message that she call him right away no matter what time she got in.

  “How many exclamation points after the ‘urgent’?” Joyce yawned into the receiver.

  “Pardon me?”

  “Never mind. Thank you.” She placed a finger over the plungers and cut the operator off. Next she dialed the number of Harry’s private line at Destiny. After five rings, a bleary voice came on the other end.

  “Hello.”

  “Harry, it’s Joyce.”

  “Joyce? What time is it?” He sounded like he had been in a deep sleep.

  “After twelve.”

  “After twelve! Where’ve you been?”

  “Why, do I have a curfew?”

  “I’ve been trying to get hold of you all evening.” He was awake now, and sounding more like his old self.

  “I was out.”

  “Out? Out! You’re at a spa in the middle of the Caribbean, for Christ’s sake. How can you go out?”

  “Believe me, it wasn’t easy.” She changed the phone to her other ear and picked up a pencil. “Now, what’s so urgent?”

  “Urgent? Oh yeah, just a minute while I get my notes.” The receiver on Harry’s end thunked on the desk top, and Joyce could hear the distant whisper of rustling papers.

  He came back on the line. “Right. Listen to this … uh.… Research came up with a Norbick Mittlehoff who used to work for the Banco Internationale de Suisse.” She could tell he was reading from somebody else’s notes, because he kept stumbling over the words. “Uh … it says he left there about eighteen months ago and went to work for a Baroness Von Hasselberg.” He stopped reading. “Of course we don’t know if this is your Mittlehoff.”

  “He’s not my Mittlehoff. He’s the doctor’s Mittlehoff. And even if it is the same person, what you’ve told me makes it all about as clear as mud, anyway,” she said, irritably. “Was this what your urgent message was all about?”

  “I thought it might be important.”

  “Harry at …” she looked at her watch “12:47 in the morning, nothing is important but sleep.”

  “It wouldn’t be 12:47 in the morning if you had been in when I called you earlier.” He sounded annoyed.

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means I want to make sure that story is ready on time, and how can it be when you’re out gallivanting all over the Caribbean?” He paused for a breath. “Who did you go with, anyway?”

  “With? What makes you think I was ‘with’ anybody? Besides, it’s none of your business.”

  “As long as you’re on an assignment for me, everything is my business.” His voice was getting louder and louder.

  “Is that right? Well you can just.…” And she was just about to tell him about how she felt about that, when the phone went dead.

  “Men!” And she slammed the phone back into its cradle, and strode off into the bathroom.

  Chapter 32

  Reluctantly, Harry hailed a cab and headed for 77th and Madison. He was reluctant because, for those who like their corn pancakes blue, their asparagus white, and their redfish black, the Upper East Side is epicurean heaven. For those who care less about the esthetics and more about appetite, however, it was another destination entirely. The only appetite these bistros, eateries, and grills were dedicated to satisfying was the appetite to be seen in the right places with the right people, eating the right food. Therefore, the food was almost guaranteed to be an exercise in bizarre chic, with chefs up and down the avenues trying to outdo each other with a variety of incompatible comestibles forced into combinations and styles that would cause a grandmother to faint dead away.

  But, as everyone who was anyone, knew, it was not really the eating of the food but the creation of the “culinary experience” which was the ultimate goal. This phrase was tacitly understood by those who frequented such establishments to mean that eating the food was of les
s importance than observing it, discussing it, remembering when you had something just like it in Portofino last summer, and generally letting it go cold on the plate.

  Harry thought it was all bull. He therefore approached the acid-etched doors of The American Grill with what can only be described as a certain lack of enthusiasm.

  Inside it was steamy, with peculiar-smelling vapors erupting from the kitchen every time a waiter scurried through the swinging doors, spray from the glass-washer stinging the bar patrons with its hot, chemical effluvium, and sixty-odd people sweating from the excessive heat caused by cramming that many of them into only a few-hundred square feet.

  Harry paused by the door and was momentarily crushed against the cigarette machine by the rollicking exit of a table of four who were either terribly anxious to get back to work or terribly anxious to get out of The American Grill. When they had gone, he stepped out into the aisle that divided the long, narrow room in half, and looked around.

  It was a cross between a laundromat and a hospital waiting room. Anonymous grey carpet covered the floor, cane-back chairs held up, not by legs but by a length of bent chrome tubing, rested under white-clothed tables that nestled beside stark white walls. The only break in the searing austerity of the décor was a thick grey stripe that ran around the room about four feet off the floor.

  Harry scrunched up his eyes, trying to see if his son was seated somewhere in the depths of the restaurant. But it was hard to make out anyone more than a few feet away, because the only illumination came from a scattering of light fixtures which consisted of inverted, V-shaped strips of aluminum masking one sorry bulb. As such, it was not bright enough to get even the most desperate of moths excited. Emphasizing the paucity of fixtures was the circumstance that the lights were on dimmers and the dimmers were on “low.”

  Why, asked Harry of himself, had he let Bradley pick the restaurant? He was in the mood for a steak sandwich and fries, not bark soup and duck liver soufflé.