Beebo Brinker Chronicles 4 - Journey To A Woman (21 page)

Before she left she cleaned up her dishes and the ones Beebo had left, including the coffee cup and the whiskey glass from the night before. She made the bed, thinking as she did it that Laura must have slept in this bed too, once. After that she straightened up the living room. It wasn't the same as keeping house for Charlie. She actually enjoyed the tasks, enjoyed the feeling that Beebo would come home to a clean house and a tidy kitchen, and it would be due to Beth's care.

She took a long look at the rooms before she closed tie front door after herself, and she had the feeling that sooner or later, some day, she would be back. She hoped so. She liked Beebo, she had learned from her, and it hadn't been the sharp, painful sort of lesson Nina Spicer taught. But just as effective. Perhaps more so.

BETH WALKED OVER TO Seventh Avenue to get a taxi. She walked with a light, swinging step, feeling a small new joy in her heart that almost amounted to hope for a happy ending to it all—the mess and bewilderment and misery of the past few months.

As she walked she noticed a short balding man ahead of bar with a noticeable aura of ennui about him, standing baggy-eyed and uninterested before a window full of leather-Work. He looked familiar, though she was sure she didn't know anybody in the city outside of Nina and Beebo.

Still ... Maybe I saw him at one of the bars, she thought, vaguely disturbed by his face yet unable to recall it. She walked briskly past him as if she had not noticed him at all. He probably lives down here. He probably goes bar hopping at night. I've seen him in a bar, that's all. But it piqued her not to remember where.

She had the taxi driver let her off at Fifth Avenue and 38th Street, near the public library. She wanted to buy something, some little house gift for Jack and Laura that would make her appearance less awkward, give them all something to say. For half an hour she wandered from store to store, north and south, trying to find the appropriate thing, ignoring Merrill Landon's strictures about budgeting her money. It had to be something really nice or it just wouldn't do.

She stopped to look into the toy window at F. A. O. Schwartz, thinking suddenly of Polly and Skipper and wondering if she could send them something without upsetting them. In the middle of the window, prominently displayed, was a big, gaudy, orange giant spring, with an elaborate bow attached to the top like a gift wrapping. A big sign leaned against the bottom: “THE SCOOTCH—bounce on it, roll in it, dive through it. The new sensation!"

After a moment she went in and asked one of the clerks about it.

"Yes, it's quite unusual, isn't it?” he beamed. “We can't keep them in stock. The kids adore them. Just like those hoops a couple of years ago. I'd be willing to bet the Scootch will outsell them."

"Who makes it?” she asked faintly.

"Who? Uh—let's see.” He up-ended a carton behind the counter. “California firm,” he said. “Ayers-Purvis Toys.” He read the name slowly. “That must be a new one, I don't recall it,” he said. “All the new ideas come from California,” he explained, smiling. “Don't know why. They breed out there like cats."

"Thank you,” she said, turning to leave.

He called after her, “Excuse me, wouldn't you like to buy one? I mean—you'll have to get one sooner or later for your own kids."

"My own kids probably have twenty of them,” she said, and left, knowing he would go to the back of the store and tell the others about the wacky customer he had.

She felt a tormented tenderness for Charlie, standing there gazing at his supreme achievement in the window. It was so silly. It was so ingenious. It would make him and Cleve a fortune. She wished him well; she wished for the first time in a long time that she had been able to adapt to him better than she had. She wished fervently that they might have made each other happy, that the children could have brought a sense of fulfillment to her life. She wished that she had been there when he came home with his face lighted up and that happy, abstract look in his eyes to tell her about his wonderful new idea, wished she could have seen Polly and Skipper with their daddy's great invention.

She leaned momentarily against the wall of the toy shop and a woman stopped to inquire if she needed help.

"No,” she said, and straightened up and walked into the crowd. She finally bought a pair of crystal candlestick holders at Black, Starr, and Gorham's. While they were being gift-wrapped her spirits revived a little. She thought of Laura, thought of her very hard. Tried to picture the man she married. Was he good to her, was he rich, was he intelligent? He was gay—did that make him swishy, too? A nancy? Or could a man be gay and reasonably masculine at the same time? She burned to meet him. She was prepared to hate him.

At the hotel she collapsed on her bed and slept the rest of the day. When she awoke, late in the afternoon, she wrote Merrill Landon a note to say that Laura, his lost Laura, was found. She gave him Laura's address and told him she was married. “And you have a granddaughter,” she added “Betsy.” She asked him to forward a note she enclosed to Charlie, so it would have a Chicago postmark on it.

To Charlie she wrote: “I saw the Scootch in the shop windows today. For what it's worth, I'm proud of you. I hope you make a million dollars. The kids must love it. I'm fine, don't worry about me. I haven't made my mind up yet on anything. Take care of yourself and give the children my fondest love. Beth."

She cried while she wrote it, knowing she had no right to the tears. They were tears of self-pity more than anything eke. She had given up a lot when she gave up her children, her home, her conjugal rights. She had given them up on a gamble, in the hope that she might someday find something else, something that would mean more to her. But she hadn't found that something yet and it scared her to feel herself suspended between two worlds, belonging to neither. And she had done it all, deliberately, to herself.

* * * *

Beth took a taxi to Laura's apartment building. It was a short ride in the pleasant twilight, with the sun almost down and the air cooling.

She asked at the desk for Mr. and Mrs. Mann.

The clerk telephoned up and then asked Beth who was calling, one hand judiciously placed over the receiver.

"Mrs. Ayers,” Beth said doubtfully.

"Mrs. Ayers,” the clerk repeated, gazing down at the floor and speaking into the receiver. He glanced up again at Beth and then handed the phone to her.

"Hello?” she said, her heart pounding, rising in her throat, her ears geared for Laura's light voice.

"Mrs. Ayers?” It was Jack. He sounded rather growly, but pleasant.

"Yes."

"I'm afraid I don't know you."

"I—I'm an old school friend of Laura's,” she said, wishing the trembling in her would go away just long enough for her to make a serene first impression on him.

"Oh,” he said. And then, with just a hint of enlightenment, “Oh. Well, then, won't you come up?"

"Thanks, I'd love to."

She got into the elevator, feeling the light nervous sweat break out all over her body, trying not to clutch her present too tightly in her clammy hands and ruin the wrappings. She watched the numbers of the floors flash above her until they got to four. It seemed an eternity.

She found the door promptly, but it was another matter to ring the bell. She felt suddenly faint and hated herself, trying to take up her courage and smooth her dress and compose her face with a multitude of ineffectual fluttering gestures. At last she stopped and stood rigidly still for as long as she could bear it, her eyes tight shut and the sweat loosed uncontrollably all over her. And then she reached for the bell.

Before she could push it the door opened and she gave a small but audible gasp. A short dark man, crew-cut and horn-rimmed, smiled at her.

"Took so long I thought you must have gotten lost,” he grinned. “Mrs. Ayers? Come on in. I'm Jack Mann."

"Thanks,” she said from a husky throat, and followed him into the living room, grasping the box with the candlesticks in it so closely that the white tissue paper pulled apart under one of her thumbs. She looked about the room with quick scared eyes, her whole being prickling with the possibility of Laura's presence.

"Sit down,” Jack said. He watched her with a mixture of amusement and curiosity that was friendly enough. Beth obeyed him, lowering herself halfway into her chair and suddenly remembering her gift.

"Oh, here,” she blurted, rising abruptly and thrusting it toward him. “I—I brought you a little something. I remember Laura used to like crystal and cut glass, things like that."

"Thanks,” he said, accepting it. “Yes, she still does. Shall I keep it till she gets home? She ought to be the one to open it."

"Isn't she here?” Beth stared at him, still half out of her seat.

"If you froze that way,” he said with a grin, “you'd be a pretty unhappy girl."

And she sat down suddenly, embarrassed.

"Yes, she's out,” he went on. “I mean, no, she's not at home.” He put the gift on the table in front of him and sat down opposite her in a leather chair, asking if she'd like a drink, how long she would be in New York, a dozen urbane civilities that they batted back and forth with a show of casualness. And all the while they studied each other surreptitiously, Jack with the bemused air of a man trying to place a face, and Beth with the intense interest of a rival.

"So you and Laura went to school together,” he said.

"Yes. Just for a year.” She thought she liked him, which was something she hadn't planned on. He was ugly, in the nice sort of way that women like. There was a friendly intelligence in his face. And he was short. Beth guessed that he and Laura might be near the same height. Beth was taller than he, quite a bit taller in her high-heeled shoes. But he was quick and graceful and very much at ease, and it made her easier within herself, for which she Was grateful. He went to a small built-in bar in a corner of the living room and fixed her a drink. It gave Beth a chance to look around. It was a spacious room, an unusually roomy apartment for midtown Manhattan.

He must be doing well to keep Laura like this, she thought.

"When do you think she'll be in?” she asked in a voice loaded with careful disinterest.

"I don't know. She's out with a friend. They were going to a concert, so it could be rather late. If you'd told us you were coming...” He smiled and shrugged, handing her the Scotch and water.

"Thanks. I guess it was silly not to. I wanted to surprise her."

"Well, it sure as hell will surprise her if she hasn't seen you in nine years. If you'd gotten here ten minutes earlier you would have caught her."

"Probably just as well I didn't. I might have ruined her evening.” She was thinking of the “friend” Laura went to the concert with, and Jack, though his eyes opened wider at this, pretended not to have heard.

"Where's your daughter?” Beth asked suddenly. “I thought you had a daughter."

"Really? What gave you that idea?” he asked with a little frown of curiosity visible between his eyes.

Beth cursed her own clumsiness silently. “I should have told you right away,” she stumbled. “I ran into a friend of Laura's—oh, just by accident—or I never would have found you. She told me about—Betsy."

"Oh. That explains it. I was about to ask how you found us.” He said it slowly and she knew he was amused but somehow she didn't mind. She had the feeling he was being amiable because he liked her, not because it was his obligation to a guest. “Who was the friend?” he asked.

She didn't want to throw it at him, as if she had been down in the Village sleuthing and run into Beebo as a likely wall of information—as if she and Beebo were in cahoots. Bui his smile broadened at her delay and she finally said, with a little sigh that meant she was surrendering all her subterfuges, “Beebo. Beebo Brinker. You know her pretty well, I guess."

"Pretty well,” he said with the emphasis of understatement, and laughed outright. “Good old Beebo. How the hell did you find her? Well, I guess it's not so hard at that,” he answered himself. “Anywhere south of Fourteenth Street you can't miss her. Was she wearing her boots?"

"Her boots?"

"Yes. She wears them when she's mad at the world. Makes her feel manly.” He said it without ill-will but full of old familiar affection.

"No boots,” Beth smiled. “But lots of advice. Lots of stories."

"She must have been bowled over when she found out you knew Laura,” Jack said. “She's still in love with her."

A queer little flash of disappointment, almost alarm, went through Beth. “She recognized me,” she said. “I guess Laura told her quite a bit about me. Showed her some old snapshots, or something."

"Then you must be Beth,” he said. “I thought so but I didn't want to embarrass you.... Beth the Incorruptible."

"What?” she exclaimed.

"That's what I used to call you,” he said. “In the days when I couldn't stand you. Purely sarcastic, you can be sure. But that was before I met you. Laura used to make you seem that way when she talked about you."

Beth began to grin. Suddenly, strangely, she felt at ease. “You know, it's the damnedest thing,” she told him. “I met her father in Chicago a couple of weeks ago, and he knew me right away. I met Beebo in a bar last night and she said, ‘My God, you're Beth!’ And now you've got it figured out too. I feel like a celebrity."

"Around here you were a celebrity, for quite a while,” he said. “We all had to learn to live with you—all of us who lived with Laura. Papa Landon got you thrown in his face one night at the McAlton Hotel—all about that year you and Laura roomed together. After Laura told him she cracked him over the head with a glass ashtray and beat it. Gave him a concussion, but he recovered. They've never seen each other since."

"My God!” Beth breathed softly. “He spoke of her so lovingly. As if it had all been forgiven, if not forgotten."

"I suppose it has,” Jack said. “I suppose he'd like to find her again and patch things up.” His eyes were bright on her. “But it wouldn't be a very good idea."

"No? Why not?” Her mind flashed to the note she had mailed that very afternoon with Laura's address and married name in it.