Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances

by Dorothy Fletcher

  Then the voices faded away and soon there was just the overall hubbub in the distance. Everything had gone very quiet and I was almost shaking: I hesitated before opening the door, for fear of finding them both — or one of them — out there; I didn’t see how I could handle that. I was too unnerved for a confrontation.

  I finally unlocked the door, threw it open bravely, and found the corridor empty.

  I stood there for a moment longer to compose myself, then, putting a bright smile on my face, walked past the luxurious sleeping quarters and back to the main salon. I saw Kathy right away: she was talking to a decorative looking Rock-Hudson type, and she must have felt my eyes on her, because she looked over, smiled jubilantly, and said, “Look what I found in my Christmas stocking.”

  Great, I mouthed back, and decided I wanted some air rather quickly, so I climbed back up to the poop, where Mr. Comstock was leaning against the rail, deep in conversation with Lester.

  It looked like business talk, and I was relieved not to have pretend-flirt with him. Then Peter found me threading my way through an animated group and claimed me.

  “Where’ve you been all my young life?” he demanded. “Your hands aren’t holding anything. What do you want to drink and eat?”

  “A drink only, please. Canadian Club with a few rocks.”

  “Water too?”

  “Skip the water.”

  With the fresh drink the impact lessened. So what, I told myself. What did it matter about the other Lestranges? I wasn’t there to woo them. I was there to live in the cottage and be Caroline’s friend whenever Caroline wanted my friendship. The hell with any of the others.

  Except for Peter. And Tom.

  But it stung. And when we drove back, at around eight, with the day coming to a purpling close, Kathy’s insincerity was repugant to me: I would rather have had her open hostility. Some honesty from her.

  She was so roguish, telling me, archly, that Mrs. Comstock had better keep an eye on Mr. Comstock, since that gentleman had asked her for my telephone number.

  “You do charm them, my dear,” she said, sighing, and then, giggling, “I didn’t do too badly myself. You saw me with Tucky Bollinger? Isn’t he sinfully attractive?”

  “He looked like Rock Hudson,” I said.

  “Yes, rather. Oh, and when you see Caroline, please tell her she was missed. She does so little these days. But then, of course, she’s older. And not what she once was. I really don’t know what’s to become of her.”

  “What slush,” Peter said. “She’s smarter than the rest of us put together.”

  “Yes, of course,” Kathy said quickly. “It’s just that she does seem to be slipping of late. Well, here we are. Would you care to come in for a drink, you two?”

  Peter was all for accepting, but I declined. “I think I’ll just run up and say hello to Caroline,” I said. “Thanks anyway, and thanks for a pleasant time.”

  “We enjoyed having you,” Kathy answered, and smiled charmingly, while Lester echoed the sentiment, and we all got out and went our separate ways.

  Caroline wanted to know all about it. “They’re not the best, are they?”

  “Just people with a lot of money.”

  “Too much, and too quickly. Well, no matter, did you enjoy it?”

  “Yes, some.”

  And I had. If it hadn’t been for overhearing the exchange between Kathy and Mrs. Comstock, it would have been an amusing afternoon.

  All that really remained, though, were the nasty words to which I had been privy. Why was Kathy so hateful in regard to me? What did they want from me? What did any of them care that their old aunt had taken a fancy to me. What did it matter to them?

  I wouldn’t treat any of them this way, I thought unhappily. I had my own life to live. They should live theirs, and leave me out of it.

  Oh, I wish Eric were here, I thought. I felt lonely, and angry.

  Kathy wanted me to leave.

  Also Emily.

  And Toussaint

  I felt quite defenseless. There was a shadow now over my pleasure in the East-Hampton cottage, and I felt a sense of loss, as if I had been violated for no understandable reason.

  14.

  Another fact that hit home with increasing cogency was Caroline’s growing dependency on me and, as a result of it, her changed attitude toward Anthony Cavendish.

  With Emily she was a little more acerbic as well; she began asking me to do things for her that Emily had been used to doing. Now she was asking me to make martinis, too, which had been Tony’s job, asking me to give directions to Claire, telling me to see that John had the car ready for her …

  I knew that Emily felt the difference keenly, and that her hostility toward me had increased because of it. However, there was little I felt I could do to ameliorate the situation. Intervening on Emily’s behalf might only serve to worsen the situation, and I had no doubt that I wouldn’t be thanked for it.

  It was for Anthony that I felt badly. I’m not even sure, to this day, that he noticed Caroline’s growing impatience with him at first. It started, to tell the truth, slowly, almost imperceptibly, and I didn’t see it at once, either.

  She had snapped at him several times on past week-ends, but then she was eccentric, and I always had the feeling that her particular attraction for me might taper off in time, too. She had been so much like a child with a new toy.

  But on this particular week-end a pattern was established that was to continue in future weeks. If she said once, “Tony, don’t be so tiresome!” she said it half a dozen times An anecdote he told would be “tedious,” or a gallant gesture toward her — a compliment, a flirtatious remark — would be deemed “political.” Nothing he did seemed to gratify her any more: she was like Queen Victoria, “We are not amused.”

  One day, at lunch, she was awful. I think she’d planned it; a private cabal on her part, a mean and mischievous trick, just to be deliberately unpleasant.

  It was on the Saturday afternoon, and I’m sure even Claire must have been astonished at the meagerness of the meal, which was so unsubstantial as to have been practically a snack. We had a thin tomato soup with a dollop of whipped cream in each bowl, and then for the main course an individual omelet that was so small per person it was almost like a bird-dropping on the plate. This was followed by a serving of bread pudding that was more or less bite size.

  For me it was fine: at work I rarely have much lunch; a sandwich, or a hard-boiled egg, or yogurt. Tony, on the other hand, was clearly unsated. “The hors d’oeuvres were fine,” he said. “When are we having lunch?”

  Caroline was absolutely hateful. She gave him a gigantic glare and said, “When you start paying the bills, we shall have a bit more to eat. What do you expect, Coquilles St. Jacques and truite meunière every day of your life? What makes you think I’m made of money, pray?”

  Tony blinked and looked a little dazed. “I say, but it was piddling, wasn’t it?”

  He laughed, and even then didn’t take her seriously. They were always sparring, sometimes drawing blood, but that was the nature of their relationship, the man-woman dialogue these two had. He asked me if he could borrow my car to drive to the village for something more filling.

  Caroline glowered and called him tiresome again. Then Emily tittered, which took Tony off the hook. Caroline turned on her instantly

  “What are you hooting at?” she demanded. “I suppose you’re dissatisfied too? Indigent as you are — ”

  Caroline, Caroline, I thought, as I saw Emily’s face turn a deep, dark red. “I didn’t say a word,” she protested, enraged. “How dare you accuse me of — ”

  “I dare anything I care to,” Caroline cried. “Who are you to tell me what I dare to? Leave the room. Instantly!”

  When Emily had left, scurrying out with her poor head held high, Tony got up and followed her out. At the door he turned and said, “You are a bitch, darling,” made a droll face at me, and Caroline and I were alone.

  She sat staring
at her beautifully-embroidered place mat. Finally she raised her head. “You must see it,” she said passionately. “How they exploit me. You do see that, Jennie?”

  I said, trying to be calm and reasonable, that she was being unfair and unjust, and that both Emily and Tony were devoted to her. At which she laughed harshly and said that was because they knew which side their bread was buttered on.

  “You just don’t know,” she insisted, “what people can be like.”

  This turned into a long and impassioned diatribe against her family. All of them, save for Peter, regarded her as little more than a nest egg for their future. They were all a bad lot and were concerned only with what monies she would leave them when she died.

  I didn’t like this side of her: she was obsessed about her large fortune and, like anyone who had had to work hard for a living, I felt a certain resentment toward inherited wealth. It wasn’t that I begrudged Caroline hers; it was simply that I felt a certain inequity.

  I had become weary of her railing against the other Lestranges, against their cupidity and callousness toward her. I kept saying I was sure she was wrong. To which she replied impatiently, “You wouldn’t know! How could you possibly know? These are desperate people!”

  “Desperate?” I asked, smiling. “Caroline, the Lestranges are far from desperate.”

  “With today’s market?” She scoffed. “Why, every one of them’s lost untold sums of money. Inflation, for God’s sake. Don’t you realize, child? Their backs are against the wall.”

  It was all highly exaggerated, and she was overcompensating. It wasn’t the money. She wanted them to love her. In the absence of love from a husband, or even friends of long years’ standing, she was reaching out for love, affection, and concern.

  And so she had turned to me, a stranger.

  I sat there feeling like teacher’s pet, and hating it. I never wanted to be teacher’s pet. I never wanted to be idolized. And that a woman who had never had a child now wanted a child, and that that child seemed to be me, was sad. It made me quite uneasy.

  And now she had turned against Tony: this whole luncheon charade had been designed to put him down. She had for some reason decided to make me the single object of her affections; the hell with Anthony Cavendish. Sooner or later he would comprehend this. He must be beginning to. Did she suspect the affinity between Tony and me? Did her sharp eyes notice anything? Did she see that his eyes followed my movements or, for that matter, did she see my eyes which — not wanting to — followed his?

  Was she jealous?

  If so, she wasn’t taking it out on me, which would seem the reasonable consequence. She was taking it out on Tony, and I knew that — sensitive as I myself was to sub rosa hostility — I would have, had her rudeness been directed toward me, felt the message to be, “Here’s your hat, what’s your hurry?”

  I remembered Tony saying, “Until my welcome wears out,” and Caroline replying fondly, “Which, as you know, will be never.”

  That was far from her present attitude, and, I thought, this week-end will not go down in my book as a banner one. My unfortunate eavesdropping on the Snow Goose, and now Caroline’s behavior toward Tony … and Emily.

  15.

  On Wednesday night the phone rang in my apartment. It was Eric’s voice on the wire — that voice, and it was like a transfusion. He said, “It’s me; I just got in from Kennedy. How are you, Jan?”

  “Am I glad you’re back,” I said fervently. “How did things go?”

  “Things went very well, thanks. I’ve missed you. Lunch tomorrow?”

  “Fine. I suppose you’re dead.”

  “I’ll be okay tomorrow. Jet leg and all. You’re well?”

  “Yes, just fine.”

  “Good. Until mañana, then.”

  I met him at Ca d’Oro and he looked robust and fit. Over the calamari fritti we discussed his trip, and I said I had tried to call him to tell him about meeting Portheus and Chartre, and so forth; he was sorry he’d been out.

  The two of us drove down on Friday afternoon in Eric’s car. This time, we decided, we would do it together. He picked me up at my apartment. It was a lovely summer day, and we stopped off for coffee and burgers half way down. We talked nonstop and I felt the world had settled into place again.

  Eric was back.

  We picked up some groceries in the village and broiled steaks on the patio grill. We sat there until dark and the onset of the mosquitos, then prepared for bed.

  Eric was asleep when I crawled in but he woke up enough to inform me that those fräuleins weren’t all they were cracked up to be. “Terrible legs,” he said, “And drearily stolid. Maybe I’ll keep you after all.”

  “I’m glad. I’d hate to be returned after all this time.”

  But he was already snoring lightly.

  Tom showed up for breakfast next morning, and was a little taken aback to find Eric there. “Oh, excuse me,” he said, retreating. “I didn’t know.”

  “That the soldier was home from the wars?” Eric said. “Do you mind, buddy?”

  “Oh, no. Hi, gee it’s nice to see you.”

  “Sit down, we’re just starting.”

  “Well, I don’t want to — ”

  “Take a load off your feet,” Eric said easily. “Nice to see you too. What have you been up to these last couple of weeks?”

  “Not much, the usual.”

  “You’re nice and tan. Mine’s worn off some. Have to remedy that.”

  “Jan said you were abroad. In Germany.”

  “Yes, want to hear about it?”

  He listened eagerly while Eric gave him a rundown on Rhine castles and bierstubes. I had never been to Germany, and was just as interested in the verbal tour. Eric was in the middle of a sentence when the phone rang.

  It was Bobo. “Hello,” she said. “I’m so damned bored. I wondered if you’d like to have lunch somewhere. Maybe some shopping first. There’s that new boutique.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, but Eric’s come back,” I said. “I’ll have to make it some other time, Bobo.”

  “Oh, bother. Well, then. Call you again.”

  “That was your mother,” I told Tom after hanging up.

  “So I gathered,” he said, ducking his head. He wasn’t fond of her, that was clear. I watched him spoon jam onto a piece of toast, and then the phone rang again.

  This time it was Peter. “You ride, don’t you?” he asked.

  “Ride? You mean horseback? Yes, why?”

  “How about riding today? I can pick you up at around ten.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Eric’s here, and I don’t think he’s keen on riding.”

  “Oh, I see,” he said, sounding dashed. “Okay. Another time, right?”

  “Great,” I said heartily. “Take care, Peter.”

  “That was your uncle Peter,” I told Tom, and to Eric, “He suggested riding, but I told him you weren’t a horseman.”

  “Which I decidedly am not,” he said, and trickled syrup over his griddle cakes.

  As I was sitting down again the phone rang once more.

  It was Tony. “I say, she’s been beastly this morning,” he told me, speaking low, and I gathered he didn’t want to be overheard. “Caroline. I don’t have to tell you. Rescue me, love. Shall we rent a speedboat? Or anything you say. But darling, do help. I don’t know why she’s taken this tack.”

  “Maybe you’re imagining things,” I said, clearing my throat.

  “Maybe I am, but I’m a bit up to here just the same.”

  “Oh, I don’t think it could mean much. You know she’s flighty … I must go, I’m afraid. Eric’s back from Germany, and I’m doing breakfast for him.”

  There was a fractional silence and then, “Oh, he’s back?”

  “Yes, and … breakfast, you see.”

  “Quite,” he said, and hung up.

  “Who was that?” Eric asked.

  “Our friend the Viscount.”

  “Oh. What’s he want?”
/>   “Just good morning,” I laughed. “They haven’t let me rot here. They’ve all been very kind.” I smoothed young Tom’s hair. “Every one of them, including this young lad.”

  Tom looked up at me and smiled shyly.

  The phone rang again.

  Eric raised his head. “What is this, a convention hall?”

  “Some days you’d think so,” I said, and picked up the receiver.

  It was Caroline.

  “How about lunch?” she asked, briskly.

  “That would be lovely. May I ask Eric first?”

  “Eric?”

  “Yes, he’s back. We’re just having breakfast.”

  “Do tell him hello, and say I’d love to have the two of you.”

  “One moment.”

  I turned to Eric “Caroline would like us for lunch.”

  He looked a little put out. “Christ,” he said, low. “That will cut into our day, Jan.” Then his face smoothed out. “What the hell, tell her yes,” he said.

  I took the receiver away from my chest, where I had been muffling it. “Caroline? Eric says yes, of course, and thanks very much.”

  “See you later, then.”

  “Wonderful.”

  I put the phone down. “Well, that takes care of lunch,” I said. “Now how about the beach?”

  “Fine. I’ve been looking forward to it.”

  I did the dishes, Eric went in to change, then I got into my swim suit while Eric dried the things in the drainer; when I came back Tom had left. As we left the house, I saw Tom hanging about near some large trees. He looked our way and then quickly in the other direction. I called to him.

  “How about coming down to the beach with us, Tom?”

  He hesitated, but his face brightened.

  I thought I saw an odd look cross Eric’s face, but it was an almost subliminal perception, gone as quickly as it came. If I had paid more attention to that slight expression, everything might have gone differently.

  However, whatever swift thought I had vanished at once, and I said again, “How about it, Tom?”