McMurtry, Larry - Novel 05 (27 page)

 
          
 
When I walked into Jean Arber's antique shop,
in the cracked shopping center in
Wheaton
, Jean was on the phone, talking in such low
tones that I assumed she was talking to her husband. Belinda was sitting on a
beautiful
Pennsylvania
dower chest, swinging her heels, which as
usual were in tiny red sneakers. Her sister Beverly sat over in a comer by a
larger but less remarkable chest, attempting to fit a paper dress she had just
cut out onto a paper doll.

 
          
 
At the sight of me Belinda leaped from the
chest and dashed to her mother's lap. She was not seeking shelter— she merely
wanted her mother to get off the phone.

 
          
 
"He's here, Mom!" she said loudly.
"Let's go."

 
          
 
Jean continued to talk in low tones, ignoring
her daughter to the extent that such was possible. She cupped a hand over
Belinda's mouth, cutting off further orders. Belinda countered by bouncing up
and down in her mother's lap, impatiently and not gently. Annoyed, Jean opened
her legs and managed to roll Belinda to the floor, where she bumped her head.
The head bump was not gentle, either.

 
          
 
Belinda got up and snatched a metal-cased tape
measure off the desk and drew back her arm as if to throw it at Jean, at which
point Jean covered the receiver with one hand.

 
          
 
"If you throw that you're going to get
spanked," she said, with a flash in her eye. "And no Baskin-Robbins,
either. Put it down."

 
          
 
Thus confronted, Belinda compromised. She
didn't throw the tape measure, but she ignored the order to put it down.
Instead she marched around the desk and advanced on me.

 
          
 
"Stand still," she said. "I'll
jist measure you."

 
          
 
"Do you think this dress goes with her
hair?"
Beverly
asked, holding up a paper doll dress.

 
          
 
"I think so," I said.

 
          
 
Belinda kicked me. "Stand still, I
said," she said.

 
          
 
"I was standing still," I protested.

 
          
 
"You talked," she said serenely.
"Let's see your boots."

 
          
 
Beverly
scooted over to help her and Belinda
carefully measured my boots from heel to boot top.

 
          
 
"Tall boots," Belinda said.
"Did you bring the soft car?"

 
          
 
"I brought it," I said. Meanwhile my
eyes were roving scoutlike over the antiques. Except for the dower chest none
of them looked really expensive, but they were well chosen. There was a wooden
snow shovel that I liked, and a charming silver ewer that I would have liked to
look at. Unfortunately it was right next to the phone and I couldn't look at it
because I didn't think Jean would welcome me that close to the conversation.

 
          
 
However, I could look at Jean, and I liked
what I saw. There was a nice color in her cheeks, perhaps caused by the heated
argument she was having. Beverly and Belinda went to the door to make sure the
soft car was really there, then, after whispering a bit, began to work on their
mother. Belinda put the tape measure back on the desk and began a slow, easy,
seductive ascent back into Jean's lap.
Beverly
followed, and Jean soon had two girls in
her lap, their wild ringlets obscuring her modest bosom, their clean little
ears not a foot from the phone. Inevitably, she was forced to take notice.

 
          
 
She took it with a huge sigh, covered the
receiver again, and looked down at the undemanding curly heads just beneath her
chin. At that point they turned and smothered her with kisses. She peered at me
from between them, the receiver momentarily hooked on her shoulder.

 
          
 
"I hate to ask," she said, "but
could you just take them?"

 
          
 
She opened a drawer and scattered two or three
dollar bills on the desk.

 
          
 
"Take some money," she said.
"I'll feel less guilty for doing this to you. I really have to finish this
call. He won't stop unless I explain. If you'll just take them they can have
anything they want. Stuff them till they burst. All I've heard is
Baskin-Robbins for thirty-six hours."

 
          
 
"I hope you both bust!" she said, to
her daughters. "I hope you eat so much ice cream you vomit. It'll serve
you right."

 
          
 
Then she looked at me with silent appeal.

 
          
 
Belinda popped out of her lap and laughed
merrily.

 
          
 
"
Ice cream don't
make you vomit," she said, marching around the desk and catching one of my
fingers.

 
          
 
"Don't you want to come, Mom?"
Beverly
said. When Jean shook her head she slid
down and ran to join us.

 
          
 
For tiny people the girls had ferocious
appetites. Giant banana splits were not much beyond their capacity. In ten
minutes they had reduced two of them to a trough of rich strawberry-streaked
chocolate syrup.

 
          
 
While they were mucking around with their
spoons in the gooey troughs of syrup I pumped them. It might have been an
immoral tactic, but I didn't care. He who hopes to find out about women can't
be too picky about tactics. Besides, the girls were easy to pump. They were
quite without reticence, and saw no reason why the
world—or
at least myself—
shouldn't know all about their family life.

 
          
 
"What does your daddy do?" I asked.

 
          
 
"Teaches people to dance," Belinda said.
"He already teached us."

 
          
 
"Old dances,"
Beverly
said. "That people did in olden
times."

 
          
 
"He has pigs, too," Belinda said,
holding up one fist and slowly opening her fingers until four of the five were
sticking up.
"Four pigs.
I
feeded them."

 
          
 
This information merely confirmed the opinion
I had already formed of Jimmy from my one glimpse. A man who taught archaic
dances and kept pigs was bound to possess extensive charm.

 
          
 
"I bet he's a nice daddy," I said.

 
          
 
"He is," Belinda said, puddling her
syrup.

 
          
 
"Only he forgets,"
Beverly
said.

 
          
 
"Yeah," Belinda said.
"Once he forgetted me!"

 
          
 
"And me,"
Beverly
said. "We had to spend the night with
Mary."

 
          
 
"Who's Mary?"

 
          
 
The girls shrugged.

 
          
 
"Daddy's friend,"
Beverly
said.

 
          
 
"She's got the
Longest
hair," Belinda said, waving her spoon at me for emphasis. When she waved
it a small rivulet of pinkish chocolate syrup ran down into her sleeve. I
grabbed the spoon just as the first drops went under the sleeve.

 
          
 
Belinda coolly looked down her sleeve.
"Not much spilled," she said, ripping five or six more napkins out of
the napkin holder. She got most of the goo off her coat and then licked her
wrist until it was more or less clean.

 
          
 
When the three of us marched back into the
shop Jean was slumped in her chair, staring forlornly at the crumpled
one-dollar bills she had meant for me to take. The girls dashed around and
jumped in her lap.

 
          
 
"Give me some kisses," Jean said,
"so I'll know what you ate."

 
          
 
The girls happily complied. Jean pretended to
be stumped, requiring a good deal of kissing as she tried to puzzle out the
flavors. While they were kissing I looked closely at the dower chest, which was
a really wonderful piece. It had everything it needed to have except a price
tag.

 
          
 
"I think I've got it," Jean said.
"
Beverly
had chocolate pineapple and Belinda had
pineapple strawberry."

 
          
 
Both girls laughed cheerfully and lolled like
tiny harem girls across their mother's lap.

 
          
 
"Banana spluts, four flavors,"
Belinda said, yawning.

 
          
 
"Three," Beverly corrected.

 
          
 
Belinda studied her fingers to see if it was
four flavors or three, but lost interest in the question before she made up her
mind.

 
          
 
When I looked around at Jean she was watching
me quizzically. It was not lost on her that I was deeply attracted to the dower
chest. The look in her eye made me feel awkward. It was obvious that the chest
was her favorite thing. If I bought her favorite thing, at this stage of her
life, I would probably take a small part of the heart out of her, something I
was loath to do.

 
          
 
On the other hand, she did have an antique
store, open to the public, and the point of a store is to sell. Probably Jean
had just begun to edge over the wavery line that separates the long-time
collector from the novitiate dealer. If I didn't buy the chest somebody else
would.

 
          
 
"Nice chest," I said. "What'll
you take for it?"

 
          
 
Jean yawned and slumped down in her chair, as
relaxed as the girls. They were all sprawling more or less voluptuously. She
still had the nice color in her cheeks.

 
          
 
“What am I offered?" she asked, grinning.

 
          
 
"You're the seller," I said.
"You have to make the price."

 
          
 
Jean yawned again. She seemed to be fading
before my eyes, but she was not uncheerful. She had fine green eyes and at that
moment they were alight with merriment, although I didn't know why. She wound a
finger through Belinda's ringlets.

 
          
 
"I'm too tired to price a chest,"
she said. "Besides, it's my favorite thing. If you buy it I'll cry."

 
          
 
I walked over to the desk and picked up the
silver ewer. It didn't have a price either. There were a number of small white
price tags scattered on the desk, but so far none of them had prices on them.