As they came into the tiny foyer and paused at the two shallow steps that led down into the living room, a girl appeared at the door of the kitchenette; a young, blond, delectable girl in a blue frock with a ruffly coquettish white apron tied about her slender waist and a long, red-handled kitchen fork in her hand.
“Hello, Cousin Phyllis. I’m so glad to see you. Dinner is almost ready—” she began, and then saw Terry. She flushed and said with pretty confusion, “Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you were alone.”
Phyllis said quietly, “Hello, Anice. I didn’t expect you quite so soon. Your wire said nothing about the time of your arrival.”
Anice looked distressed, and wrinkled her pretty brow.
“I didn’t? Oh, what a dunce I am. I’m terribly sorry, Phyllis. I wondered why you weren’t at the station. My train was late though, and it was after three when it got in,” she apologized anxiously.
“And being a business gal, I was chained to my desk until after five, so I couldn’t have met you anyway,” said Phyllis. She presented Terry, caught the fascinated look on his face and all but grinned derisively.
Anice had accepted the introduction shyly, and then she turned anxiously to Phyllis.
“I do hope, Cousin Phyllis—” her voice put a bridge of years between them, and Phyllis felt that she should have gray hair and at least a touch of arthritis “—that you don’t mind my just barging right in and making myself at home. I explained to the superintendent and he said you never got home before six and he didn’t see any reason why I should have to sit in the lobby and wait. So he let me in and I unpacked and changed. And then I thought it would be nice if I had a good, home-cooked dinner all ready and waiting for you when you came in, and so I went out and got some broilers and things and they’ll be all ready by the time you’ve washed your face and hands.”
The words tumbled out in a childish stream that made Anice seem very young and appealingly anxious to please. But Phyllis, being feminine herself, did not miss the very faint hint of appraisal that Anice gave herself before she turned to Terry and added shyly, “There’s plenty for three, Mr. McLean, and I’d be so glad if you would stay.”
Phyllis stiffened a little. After all, it was her apartment, not Anice’s, even though Anice had cooked dinner. However, Phyllis reminded herself curtly, there was no point in getting her back up over the obvious fact that Anice had dug herself in nicely and was about to take over completely.
“Phyllis and I were dining out,” Terry began, because he, too, had not missed the fact that Anice was smoothly taking over and that the invitation should have come from Phyllis.
“Oh—oh—I’m so terribly sorry. I—I guess it was presumptuous of me to expect to stay. I mean—well, after all, my first night in New York, I shouldn’t have taken it on myself to provide dinner, even if I was just thinking that maybe Phyllis would be too tired to go out.” Anice’s words stumbled and her face was flushed and she blinked her blue eyes hard to keep back the tears.
“I’m sure the dinner you’ve prepared would be much better than anything we could get in a restaurant,” said Terry swiftly, comfortingly, “so why don’t we have dinner here and then do the town—the three of us?”
“Oh!” Anice didn’t clap her hands and jump up and down as an excited child might have done, but she gave the impression that she barely restrained herself. “Oh, but that would be marvelous—I’d love it.” And then she looked swiftly at Phyllis and it was as though a sponge had washed across her face, removing all its bright joy. “But of course I couldn’t think of—thrusting myself on you. I know you two want to be alone.”
“Don’t be an idiot, Anice—of course we’d like to have you along,” snapped Phyllis shortly, and saw Terry look at her, puzzled and a little annoyed at her curtness.
“Of course. Having you along will only add to the general hilarity of the occasion, won’t it, Phyl?” said Terry, and his tone said he thought she was not very nice to have smacked the kid down so hard.
“Of course,” said Phyllis.
Anice flashed her a split-second gleam that might have been triumph, and once more her excited joy was a pretty thing to watch.
“Oh, then that would be wonderful. Oh, I’m so excited. Think of it! My very first night in New York—and I’m going to a party!” she cried youthfully. “Oh, Phyllis, do hurry and dress so we can have dinner and get started. I can’t wait to see New York at night!”
Phyllis gave her a long, level look, but Anice only laughed, a little silvery laugh, and ran back to the kitchenette with an excited comment about dinner. And Phyllis, without a word to Terry, went into the bedroom to change.
Just inside the room, she paused, startled, and looked about her. For the room seemed changed. The dressing table top was divided as by a ruler into two exact halves. On one half, Phyllis’ toilet articles and her various jars of cosmetics and bottles of scent had been herded together; on the other side of the dividing line were other toilet articles and the sort of cosmetics that a blonde would require.
Thoughtfully Phyllis opened the drawers of the dresser in a corner. There were four drawers; Phyllis had always kept them in meticulous order so that, no matter how hurried she was, she could always find fresh gloves, hose and hankies in the top drawer, and so on down. But now the top drawer held slips and nightgowns as well, and the second drawer was filled with Anice’s apple-blossom-tinted lingerie—all of it new and unworn, Phyllis noted in passing. The third drawer held what had formerly been in the two bottom drawers, and the bottom drawer was filled with Anice’s possessions.
Phyllis walked to the closet and swung open the door. By then she was quite prepared for what she would find and she was not disappointed, for her own wardrobe had been crowded as neatly as such crowding permitted into exactly one half of the closet, while the other half held Anice’s possessions. And Phyllis saw that every single garment, every pair of silly little slippers, each of the three hats were brand-new and had never been worn. The labels were from the smartest of New York shops: Bergdorf-Goodman, Lord & Taylor, Saks’ Fifth Avenue.
Puzzled, a thoughtful frown between her eyes, Phyllis took her shower and came back and dressed in a simple white jersey dinner dress. When she returned to the living room, the thoughtful frown was still between her eyes. After all, she tried to tell herself, it was perfectly natural that Anice should have unpacked and made herself at home. And as for the way Anice looked at Terry, Phyllis told herself sternly, “You don’t want Terry, and maybe she does. And Terry likes her….” Nevertheless she barely smothered a little sigh.
The living room looked pleasant and cozy with the gateleg table drawn up before the long windows that looked over a small, ambitious but not too successful garden. The table was spread with a crisp embroidered linen cloth, and there was a black bowl filled with bright-hued zinnias in the center. Phyllis’ peasant china added a gay and colorful note, and the smells from the kitchenette were very appetizing.
Terry came in with a cocktail shaker and two glasses on a tray.
“Anice says she doesn’t imbibe,” he said, explaining the two glasses, and grinned at Phyllis.
“It’s not that I disapprove,” Anice said anxiously. “It’s just that…well, I never thought it was quite ladylike—though of course I don’t mean to criticize you, Cousin Phyllis. I suppose it’s—well, part of being a career girl in New York.”
“I’m not a career girl, Anice,” protested Phyllis shortly. “I am a business girl. I work for my living, not merely for a career.”
“Oh, of course. And I suppose you have to drink in order to keep your job,” said Anice candidly.
Phyllis almost choked over her cocktail and stared at Anice with active dislike in her eyes.
“Odd as it may seem to you, Anice, I’ve never yet had to get drunk in order to hold my job,” she said icily.
Quick tears filled Anice’s eyes and her young chin quivered, but she managed a tremulous smile and said contritely, “I’ve hurt your feelings,
haven’t I? And I’m just terribly sorry—I wouldn’t have done that for anything. I only meant that I didn’t disapprove of your drinking.”
“That’s damn kind of you,” said Phyllis through her teeth, before she could check the angry words.
Anice blinked, caught up her apron in two shaking hands and murmured something as she ran back to the kitchenette.
“You didn’t have to be so rough on the kid, Phyl. She seems like a good kid, anxious to do what’s right,” protested Terry.
Phyllis raised her eyebrows a little and said gently, “Et tu, Brute?”
Terry, sharply annoyed, responded, “Oh, for Pete’s sake, Phyl, have a heart! The kid’s trying so hard to make things pleasant.”
Phyllis laughed, a short, mirthless laugh, and said quietly, “Yes, isn’t she?”
Anice, suspiciously flushed and her eyes damp, the golden lashes stuck together in little points, came in bringing food, and as they settled about the table, she watched them anxiously, as though her very life depended on their liking what she had cooked.
“I do hope it’s—well, eatable,” she said.
“It’s delicious—food for the gods. Boy, how you can cook!” said Terry simply, but with heartfelt sincerity.
“Oh, I’m so glad! I was terrified you wouldn’t like it, and I did so want to have a nice, hot meal waiting for Cousin Phyllis. I know how hard she works, and she looks so tired,” cooed Anice sweetly.
Phyllis studied her for a moment and then she asked mildly, “When did you say you got in, Anice?”
“This afternoon a little after three,” said Anice innocently.
“And you came straight here and unpacked and made yourself at home?” commented Phyllis, with almost no expression in her voice.
Terry looked from one to the other, puzzled by a sudden tension that, man-like, he could not quite grasp.
“Why, yes, of course,” said Anice, puzzled, child-like. “I do hope you don’t mind my unpacking and putting things away, Cousin Phyllis? I tried to make everything neat and tidy.”
“Oh, you did—very neat and tidy,” said Phyllis quietly. “The only thing that puzzled me was how you managed to get so much shopping accomplished in just a couple of hours, and to bring the things home and put them away.”
Anice looked at the table and then at Phyllis and said, “But there’s a nice little grocery shop just around the corner.”
“I don’t mean the food, Anice,” said Phyllis quietly. “I mean all the pretty new clothes you put away in the closet and in the dresser drawers. How in the world did you manage to accomplish so much in such a little while?”
“Oh!” For a moment Anice appeared a trifle disconcerted, and then she laughed merrily. “Oh, that. The Personal Shopping Agency did that for me—isn’t it wonderful? I sent them my size in everything and they shopped and sent me the things so all I had to do was pack them and, when I got here, unpack them!”
Now why, Phyllis asked herself as Terry said something that was supposed to ease the tension, should she lie about a thing like that? She’s been in town a couple of days, at the very least; she’d have to be to get that much shopping done. And it doesn’t matter a darn to me—so why the heck should she lie about it? There’s a purpose back of everything she does—as I should know! But what is behind this lie?
A little later, they were finishing the apple pie—Anice mourned that it was a bakery pie, because she hadn’t had time to bake one, but she could bake a much better pie than that and some time she would prove it to Terry!—Phyllis asked casually, “Did you rent your house, Anice?”
“No,” said Anice like a delighted child. “Guess what—I sold it! And I got a thousand dollars for it!”
“A thousand dollars? Why, Anice, that was highway robbery!” protested Phyllis.
Anice flushed and looked guilty.
“I suppose it was, but they wanted it just terribly. It was a veteran and his wife and they had two sweet children, and nobody wanted to rent them a house—isn’t it terrible the way landlords won’t rent to anybody with children? And they thought it would be a wonderful place for the kiddies.” She broke off and looked at Terry and at Phyllis, and then asked huskily, “Do you think I should give them back some of the money? Gran was asking nine hundred for it the summer before she died.”
“Then it’s certainly worth a hundred dollars more now than it was then, with the housing shortage!” said Terry firmly. “Dry your pretty eyes, honeychile, and forget it. I bet the vet was tickled silly to get it for a thousand bucks.”
Anice said eagerly, “Oh, he was. It was furnished, you know, and I gave him twenty-four-hour possession, and the wife almost cried, she was so glad to get settled and know she wouldn’t have to be evicted again.”
She beamed happily at Terry, childishly relieved that he had not condemned her for the price she had asked. But Phyllis remembered the generous piles of flowery lingerie, the cobwebby stockings, and the half dozen or more frocks and hats and slippers that had all but crowded Phyllis out of her own room. That outlay must have taken up her thousand dollars—for clothes like that were not cheap, as Phyllis had every reason to know. If Anice had sunk her whole thousand dollars on a new wardrobe, then Phyllis could quite understand her moving in here where she would not have to pay rent.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE EVENING WAS NOT an unqualified success so far as Phyllis was concerned, though Terry and Anice seemed to enjoy it thoroughly. Anice was quite scrupulous about sharing Terry; she danced with him, and then insisted—As though I were a maiden aunt who must be placated, Phyllis told herself, fuming inwardly—that he dance with Phyllis, leaving Anice alone at the table, to look about her with bright, excited eyes, and to imbibe copious draughts of lemonade or ginger ale.
“She’s a cute kid,” said Terry when he and Phyllis were dancing for the third or fourth time.
Phyllis looked up at him with a faint smile.
“I knew you’d think that,” she told him coolly.
Terry flushed. “Meaning, I suppose, that you think I’m falling for her.”
“And if you are, Terry, surely that’s your privilege,” said Phyllis, and there was a faint edge to her voice. “After all, you’re heart-whole and fancy-free.”
“And you don’t give a damn, so what am I waiting for?” Terry finished for her.
“Well, Terry, you’d make some woman a darned good husband.”
“And you’d pass me on to her, though I remember quite well your saying of her, ‘I’ve seldom met anyone I liked less,’” Terry reminded her grimly.
Phyllis danced for a moment in silence and then she said flatly, “What I can’t understand, Terry, is why she would have lied about the time she arrived.”
“I also remember you say she was famous for ‘telling the truth and shaming the devil,’” Terry recalled.
“I think I’m going to have to revise that,” Phyllis admitted her error. “She couldn’t possibly have arrived this afternoon, for she has done a good two days of hard shopping. There’s evidence of it all over the place.”
“She told us she had the stuff bought by a personal shopper and sent down south to her.”
“Which was as barefaced a lie as I’ve ever encountered,” Phyllis pointed out grimly. “No woman in her senses shops for hats by mail, nor for slippers, nor for the kind of frocks and stuff she’s got. It doesn’t make a scrap of difference to me if she’s been in town a week or a month or even a year—it’s just that I can’t understand why she should bother to lie about it.”
Terry nodded. “That does seem a bit odd. How long does she plan to stay?”
“She said in her wire until she could find an apartment,” answered Phyllis slowly. “But from the way she’s settled down—of course apartments are practically nonexistent nowadays.”
Terry was alarmed. “You don’t think she plans to stay with you permanently, do you?”
“I’m beginning to be a little frightened, Terry,” Phyllis admitted.
Terry was frankly downcast.
“Well, if it gets more than you can take, remember I’ve got a little place and you’re welcome to share it permanently, with or without the formality of a trip to City Hall—though I’d much rather prefer the formality.”
Phyllis laughed and slipped her hand through his arm as the music ended and they started back to their table.
“I’m not quite sure how much of Anice I can take, Terry, so don’t be startled if I take you up on that,” she told him.
“I’ll be startled into a seventh heaven if you do. I hope Anice stays forever and develops horns and cloven hoofs, if that’s what it takes to send you flying into my arms,” said Terry frankly.
“You’re much too nice to be accepted as a counterirritant,” Phyllis told him, and smiled intimately up at him, as he drew out her chair for her at the table.
Anice looked swiftly from one to the other and her mouth thinned ever so little. But almost immediately she began to chatter in her pretty, childish way that Terry found diverting but that would, he was shrewd enough to realize, become unbearably boring in time.
Shortly after twelve, Phyllis stated firmly that as a business gal she must have some sleep and that Anice and Terry might continue the fun if they liked. Anice looked eagerly at Terry, but he shook his head.
“I’m a working man myself, kid. I have to have a few hours’ sleep so I can look all bright-eyed and alert on the job,” he told her, and patted her hand as though she had been a child. “But we’ll do this again soon.”
With that Anice was forced to be content. A little later Terry said goodnight to them both in the apartment lobby, and his eyes told Phyllis how reluctant he was to leave her like that. In fact, the look in his eyes was so eloquent that Anice was thoughtfully silent on the way upstairs, and when the two girls were in Phyllis’ bedroom getting ready for bed, she asked frankly, “Cousin Phyllis, do you mind if I ask you a very impertinent question?”
“Not if you don’t mind my not answering it, if it’s too impertinent,” Phyllis answered lightly, though her eyes were wary.
No Nice Girl Page 3