by Ann Bannon
And Beth, thunderstruck, only gazed at him in silence, too surprised even to wonder when he had been observing her, when it began to matter to him what she did. Not until Vega began to matter to me, she thought, full of wonderment.
“Beth, she’s nuts. Please believe me. She’s goofy and she’s pure trouble. I know; nobody knows like I know. I nurse her through her emotional storms; I have all our lives. She gets these desperate crushes she won’t admit, or can’t admit, or doesn’t understand, and I go through hell with her. I don’t want it to happen with you. Life has been too pleasant these past few months. No complications. Vega’s been getting along so well.”
“Why do you fight with her so much?” Beth said softly. “If all you’re trying to do is help her. That is what you’re trying to do, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” he said, and looked away. “God knows I love her. I just fight with her when I find out what she’s done.”
“Like what?” She felt as if he was almost on the verge of a confession of some kind to her.
“Like socking Mother right out of her chair. It’s the only way she has of getting back at Mother for dominating her life. Or like getting stewed at seven in the morning when she’s supposed to be at a Chamber of Commerce meeting that’ll mean jobs for her girls. Like bugging me all the time about the money situation. And that goddamn blind spot of hers a mile square! If she’d only admit what she is and arrange her life accordingly. At least maybe she could live like other human beings then.”
“How? What do you mean?”
“I mean face the fact there are two things she can’t live with—whiskey and women. Put them out of her life. Get back to normal.” He sounded bitter.
“But Cleve, you’re normal, and you drink.”
“Not like she does,” he said quickly, untruthfully. “I go to sleep at night without a bottle by my bed.” There was pride in his tone.
“Is it that bad?” Beth said. Oh, Vega! It made her want to nurse her, comfort her.
“She’s sick,” he said. “I don’t mean the TB, I mean up here,” and he tapped his head at the temple. “You can’t provoke her, you can’t cross her. She comes unglued. You haven’t seen that side of her yet. You keep after her, you will.”
“You’ve accused her of some pretty ugly things this afternoon, Cleve,” she said quietly.
“I’m not accusing her of anything. I’m trying to show you what she’s like. What she’s capable of. I’m telling you not to let yourself get mixed up with a woman like that.”
“You don’t think I can handle myself, do you?” she said.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. But Vega can’t handle herself, that’s certain. She leaves it up to me.” He laughed, looking at his drink, but the laugh was mirthless. “Maybe it’s from being so spoiled all her life, from being a favorite child and a worshipped wife who kept two husbands out of her bedroom for years.”
Beth wondered, looking at him, his face dark and brooding, why he had really asked her there. Was he just trying to forewarn her of her potentially unhappy situation? Or was he threatening her? Beth eyed him suspiciously.
“You’re warned now, Beth, and that’s all I can do,” he said. “Except, thank you for listening. And—ask you not to mention it to anyone.”
“Are you afraid Charlie’d think you’re as daffy as I think you are?” she said.
He laughed again, a short sad noise. “I’m afraid Charlie knew that years ago,” he said. He leaned across the table and took her hands. “Beth, why in hell do you suppose I went to all this trouble for you? Exposed myself and my shameful family to you? Because I want to get laughed at, because I want to hear you say how buggy I am?”
“I don’t know why you’re doing it, Cleve. I really don’t.”
“You don’t need to freeze up,” he told her, his voice softening. “I just don’t want to see you hurt, Beth. Jesus, I know you’re normal. Don’t get the idea I brought you down here to make you feel uncomfortable. You’re as wholesome as cherry pie, you’re no neurotic self-blinded Lessie. You’re sweet and healthy. I guess I just like you that way. I guess I just don’t want to see Vega change you.” But Beth had the uncanny feeling that what he really wanted was to keep them apart, keep her away from Vega. Why?
“She won’t change me, Cleve. I am what I am. It’s too late for her to make me over, even if she tried.”
“Thanks,” he said, as if she had promised him she would never see his sister again. And then he let her go.
Vega’s lips met hers a half hour later and this time Beth felt none of the resentment she had the first time, no desire to scold her and run. Instead, it was Vega who was irritable, rushed and nervous. She was preparing for a fashion show that night at the Hollywood Knickerbocker Hotel, and there were clothes and girls all over the studio.
Beth knew, without being told, that there was no time for her today, and it aroused a keen hunger in her for Vega’s company. She watched the lovely woman glide smoothly about, her excitement showing only in her eyes, and Beth experienced an unwelcome qualm of jealousy for the second time that day. The girls, the young models, were so lithe and fresh. She found herself imagining their sweet young bodies full of tender untried places, and a sort of fever came over her.
It came as a shock when Vega asked her to leave. She pulled Beth aside and said in a warm whisper, “Darling, really, I’m up to my ears in this. I forgot all about it Tuesday. I just forgot everything Tuesday, all I could think of was you.” And Beth wanted suddenly, urgently, in a sweat of fear and delight, to put her arms around Vega and kiss her indecently until her desire was satisfied.
“I hate to ask you,” Vega said, “but—well, let’s put it off till next week. I’ve got so much to do. Beth, don’t look so disappointed!” She smiled like an angel of the devil and Beth said, almost humbly, “Don’t kick me out, Vega. Can’t I help? I’ll do anything.”
“No, you don’t know a damn thing about it. I’ve got to do it myself. Now go, darling. Be a good girl and go.” And she gave Beth a kiss on the cheek. Beth nearly suffocated for one lovely moment with the urge to pull Vega back into the shadows and tell her how beautiful she was, how unfairly beautiful.
But Vega left her and Beth was soon completely alone in the swirl of frenetic activity. Girls in tulle, girls in tights, girls in skin-fitted sheathes—all so young, all so feather-headed with excitement. Beth watched them a moment, enjoying the practiced movements, the bursts of nervous giggling, the fascinated preening at mirrors. Until she was jostled once too often and felt her solitude in the inconvenience she caused.
Shortly afterward she left. But she spent the whole evening in a misty fantasy of Vega that even Charlie could not penetrate with his grumblings about Cleve.
“I think he was out somewhere swilling booze this afternoon,” he said. “He came in about five and he was loaded. If it happens again I’m going to raise the roof.”
“Why does he do it?” Beth asked vaguely. “He’s happy with Jean, isn’t he?”
“I guess so. At least she never complains. He could shove a knife in her ribs and all she’d do is hand him that same old smile. But that isn’t it. Something is bugging the guy. Always has been, since I first knew him, like he’d committed murder and gotten away with it, and then discovered he couldn’t live with his conscience. It almost seems sometimes like he’s trying to tell you about it. But he just ends up telling you to be careful.”
Beth looked up at this, remembering her afternoon with Cleve. “Be careful of what?” she said.
Charlie shrugged. “Who knows? He never gets it said.”
Chapter Seven
BETH AND CHARLIE BOTH JUMPED WHEN THE PHONE RANG AT one-thirty in the morning. Charlie grumbled, “I’ll get it,” but Beth had a sudden premonition and said, “Oh, never mind. I’ll go.”
Willingly he turned over, muttering, “Probably a wrong number. Some drunk, or something.”
It was Vega and she sounded hysterical. “Beth! Oh, darling, thank God you
’re there.”
“Where else would I be at this hour of the morning?” she said, keeping her voice low so Charlie wouldn’t hear the conversation. She was both thrilled and alarmed to hear that cautious smooth voice, charged now with desperation.
“Beth, you’ve got to help me. I’m in a ghastly predicament. I’m just frantic.”
“Where are you?” Beth asked.
“At the Knickerbocker.”
“The hotel?” Beth was relieved; the trouble couldn’t be too serious.
“Yes. It got so late. Some of the girls wanted to stay, so I said it was okay. Oh, I called their mothers and everything. You have to be so damn careful with them, with all these repulsive conventioneers around. It’s like trying to smuggle a hoard of diamonds through a convention of international jewel thieves. And if anything happens to any one of my angels—holy God, it’d ruin me! I’d be run out of town on a rail.” She stopped talking suddenly, as if to catch her breath, as if the tension in her had drained her resources.
“Vega, tell me what happened!” Beth demanded, worried.
“Well, I—we—” For a moment Beth feared Vega would burst into tears. Her honeyed voice broke and Beth grasped the phone in sweating hands, imagining the worst.
“Vega, did some bastard try to—” she began but Vega interrupted.
“No, nothing like that, I just—Beth, darling, would you mind driving over here?”
In the astonished silence Charlie called out, “Beth, for the love of God. Who is it?”
“It’s Vega. And shut up, you’ll wake up the kids,” she hissed at him.
“Vega!” he spluttered. “What does she want?”
“I don’t know. Please shut up.”
“Well, tell her to go cram it, and come to bed.”
“Beth, I need you. Will you come down?” Vega asked, her voice rough and soft and tantalizingly near to Beth. Beth stood in the dark, feeling her heart skip and a queer concentrated pleasure flash through her body. Beg me, Vega, beg me, she thought. Work for me. I want you so. “It’ll take an hour,” she hedged.
“Not at this time of night. Oh, darling, I’m so miserable. Please come to me. I haven’t got a single cigarette and those s.o.b’s at the desk won’t send any up. I haven’t even got enough whiskey for a lousy nightcap. You will come, won’t you? And bring me some groceries?”
And Beth understood then why she was calling. Cleve had already warned her: Vega couldn’t sleep without a bottle by the bed. There was a moment of acute disappointment when she wanted to throw the phone down and smash it. And then it came to her suddenly that Vega could have called somebody else, even Cleve. But she chose her instead.
“I’ll come,” Beth said weakly. “I’ll come, Vega.”
“Bless you, Beth, you’re wonderful. I swear, nobody else is crazy like I am but you. I knew you’d do it. Darling, you make me feel so much less lonesome.”
“I’ll be there as fast as I can,” Beth said, and hung up.
Beth tried to find her clothes in the dark without waking Charlie. But he was listening for her. Suddenly he switched on the reading light over the bed. For a second or two they were both blinded: Beth on one foot in the closet, pulling on a stocking, and Charlie leaning on his elbow against the pillow. When he opened his eyes and saw her he got out of bed and went to her without a word. Beth felt him come toward her and she was afraid of him; really afraid. He was a big man with a hard body and a strong streak of jealousy in him. His love for her was still alive but it was uncomfortable and a little the worse for wear and disappointments over the years. He was in no mood to deal gently with her.
She felt his angry hands close on her arms and jerk her forward so that her face snapped up to his. “Now what’s all this about?” he said.
“I’m going downtown,” she said.
“To Vega’s?”
Beth looked away. “Let go of me, Charlie.”
“Answer me, Beth.” He had no intention of letting go until she confessed what she was up to. And maybe not then.
“Vega’s downtown, at the Knickerbocker. She wants some cigarettes and things, and I told her—”
“Cigarettes!” he flared. “And things! What things?” When she refused, panting with indignation, to tell him, he said disgustedly, “And booze I suppose. And you’re going all the way into Hollywood in the middle of the night to take them to her. Good God, Beth, I didn’t know it had gone this far.”
“What’s that supposed to mean!” she cried. “I haven’t done anything wrong! You have no right to hint that I have.” She was furious with the strength of her fear; the fear that always rose in her like a red wall at the suggestion of abnormality and shut off her judgment and good sense. Her voice stirred the children, asleep in the next room.
“You haven’t done anything wrong yet,” he amended. “But you go down there tonight and you will.” He was so cold, so bitter, so chagrined that she quailed at the sight of him. The moment his hands dropped from her arms, as if she were too wretched for him even to touch, she turned and fled from him, snatching up a coat from the hall closet. The liquor and cigarettes were ready in a paper bag on the hall table and she grabbed them on the way out.
In the bedroom Polly woke up and began to cry. Beth heard her when she started the car, and she wondered at every panicky second why Charlie didn’t stop her, why he didn’t run after her and shake her till her bones came loose, or strangle her. She could feel his fury like a tangible thing wafting to her through the mild night air. Backing out the driveway with dangerous haste she felt that if she had not been fighting mad herself, desperate and determined, his anger would have swallowed her up and subdued her.
She drove down the Pasadena freeway and into Hollywood, her mind stewing. If Charlie hadn’t made such a fuss there wouldn’t be any trouble. I’ll be home in the morning, the kids don’t ever need to know the difference. And if he could only realize—oh, God, make him realize—how happy I can be if I just have somebody to love. To have fun with. Somebody like Vega. Why doesn’t he understand how good I can be to him? How patient with the kids? If he could only share me, just a little bit, just once in a while, with…with a woman.
She was amazed to find herself reasoning like this: Beth, who hadn’t given a conscious thought to other women for nine years; Beth, who thought she was solidly normal for so long, who even married a man on that conviction; Beth, who had turned Laura Landon out of her life one day many years ago with such reassuring feelings of superiority and normalcy. That Beth, that very same girl, was tearing through the night on a fool’s errand at the whim of a beautiful spoiled woman who probably didn’t give a damn what her personal feelings were.
Vega: Beth saw her in her mind suddenly, whole and clear, every detail of her, as she had seen Laura in her dream some weeks before. Strangely, life was worth living for a woman like that. Problems could be solved, boredom could be faced, chores could be accomplished, if Vega could only love her. With love, with passion, with romance in her life again, Beth’s children would be more bearable. She could love them again because love was being reawakened in her and there would be plenty to go around. Why couldn’t Charlie see it that way, see what joy and peace his family would know if Beth were only satisfied?
She felt a flare-up of stinging resentment at his apparent selfishness. He’d understand one of these days; he’d have to. Beth was so eager for Vega’s company, so full of pleasure and trembling anticipation, that nothing could have stopped her then, not even the thought of Charlie’s wrath.
She pulled off the freeway and into the stop-and-go traffic on Hollywood Boulevard. The great avenue was a strip of brilliants pasted on the black night. It might have been past two in the morning but it was Friday night, too, and the big brassy street was humming. Lights twinkled and flashed, announcing a hundred shows, a thousand succulent and sinful beauties, a million laughs. Posh shops displayed their slick wares in a weird radiance unknown to the daytime hours.
And the people swarmed down
the walks and across the street looking urgently for fun, dressed in their courting clothes or their tourist sport shirts. They smiled at every light, every open door, every burst of commercial good humor. Beth watched them when she had to stop for lights, and they did not strike her as pathetic or lost or bored. They were having fun, they were all dressed up, and they were doing Hollywood right. She even found herself envying them.
The night clerk buzzed Vega’s room for her, giving Beth a narrow-eyed examination all the while. “She says come up,” he said, leaning toward her on the counter.
“Thanks.” Beth turned away, but he called her back.
“Miss,” he said and smiled at her sparkling eyes. “She’s been giving us a rough time tonight. We’re not supposed to take stuff up after midnight. And those girls with her are pretty noisy. I wonder if you’d tell her to tone it down a little. Would you mind?” He glanced at the paper bag full of whiskey under her arm.
“She’ll tone it down,” Beth said. “You won’t hear a damn thing, I guarantee.”
“Thanks,” he said, and watched her fanny as she walked away toward the elevator.
She was full of a reckless elation, a taut and wonderful excitement that she didn’t dare to analyze. She rode up in the elevator and all she thought about was Vega: the sight of her, the scent of her, the smile. Not what she would do once they were alone in that room together; not what she would say. Just a mental vision of that fine-featured face, that elegant body, too thin, almost too well kept, too pale. But oh, deliver me! So beautiful! Beth thought.
She knocked lightly on Vega’s door. The hall was rather noisy, with half-suppressed laughter and an occasional squeal floating from the adjacent rooms. Beth had just time to hope that none of the girls was sharing Vega’s room when the door opened and Vega herself nearly fell into Beth’s arms.
“Oh, you’re here!” she cried. “Thank God! Did you bring it?” Beth could feel the tremor running through Vega and watched her with fascination as she seized the package of whiskey.