Mildred Pierce (27 page)

On the portico of the Beragon mansion a light was lit. She turned in through the pillars and followed the drive up past the big trees, the iron dogs, and the marble urn. She parked at the steps, and had hardly cut the motor when Monty popped out of the door, in a dinner coat, and stared as though he could hardly
believe his eyes. Then he yelled something at her, popped in the house again, and emerged, carrying a big doorman’s umbrella with one hand and dragging a gigantic tarpaulin with the other. The tarpaulin he hurriedly threw over her hood to keep the rain out of the motor. The umbrella he opened for her, and as she made a nimble jump for the portico, said: ‘God, I had no idea you’d show up. It didn’t even enter my mind.’

‘You put the light on, and got all dressed up. If you don’t look out I’ll begin wondering who you were expecting.’

‘All that was before I turned on the radio and heard what it’s really like out there. How in the hell did you get here anyway? For the last hour it’s been nothing but a story of bridges out, roads blocked, whole towns under water, and yet – here you are.’

‘Don’t believe everything you hear.’

Inside, Mildred saw the reason for the tarpaulin he had produced so unexpectedly, quite as though he kept such things around in case they were needed. The whole place was under grey, ghostly cloths that covered rugs, furniture, even paintings. She shivered as she looked into the great dark drawing-room, and he laughed. ‘Pretty gloomy, hey? Not quite so bad upstairs.’ He led the way up the big staircase, snapping on lights and then snapping them off when she had passed, through several big bedrooms, all under cloths as the drawing-room was, to a long narrow hall, at the end of which was the tiny apartment where he lived. ‘This is my humble abode. How do you like it?’

‘Why it’s – quite nice.’

‘Really servants’ quarters, but I moved into them because I could have a little fire – and they seemed cosier, somehow.’

The furnishings had the small, battered, hand-me-down look of servants’ quarters, but the fire was friendly. Mildred sat down in front of it and slipped off the galoshes. Then she took off the kerchief and trench coat, and unpinned her dress. His face lit up as she emerged like a butterfly from her very drab cocoon, and he turned her around, examining every detail of her costume. Then he kissed her. For a moment he had the old sunny look, and she had to concentrate hard to remember her grievances. Then he said such grandeur deserved a drink. She was afraid that
with a drink she couldn’t remember any grievances at all, and asked if they hadn’t better wait until the Ewings got there. ‘The – who did you say?’

‘Isn’t that their name?’

‘Good God, they can’t get here.’

‘Why not?’

‘They live on the other side of Huntington Avenue, and it’s three feet deep in water, and – how in the
hell
did you get here? Haven’t you heard there’s a storm going on? I think you were hiding two blocks up the street, and just pretended to drive over from Glendale.’

‘I didn’t see any storm.’

Following him into the bedroom, to see if she could be of help with the drink, she got a shock. It was a tiny cubicle, with one window and a hummocksy bed, on which were her trench coat and a cocktail service, consisting of a great silver shaker, a big B on its side, and beautiful crystal glasses. But not seven feet away, in the smallest, meanest bathroom she had ever seen, he was chopping away at a piece of ice he had evidently procured earlier in the day. Near him, on a small table, she could see a little two-burner gas fixture, a box of eggs, a package of bacon, and a can of coffee. Wishing she hadn’t come, she went back and resumed her seat by the fire.

He served the drinks presently, and she had two. When he reached for the shaker to pour her a third, she stopped him. ‘If I’m going to drive, I think I’ve had enough.’

‘Drive? Where to?’

‘Why – isn’t the Biltmore where we’re going?’

‘Mildred – we’re not going anywhere.’

‘Well, we certainly are.’

‘Listen—’

He stepped over and snapped on a small radio. An excited announcer was telling of bridges down between Glendale and Burbank, of a wrecked automobile on the San Fernando Road, of the fear that a whole family had been lost with the car. She tossed her head petulantly. ‘Well, my goodness, the Biltmore’s not in Burbank.’

‘Wherever it is, and however we go to get to it, we have to
cross the Los Angeles River, and by last report it’s a raging torrent, with half the bridges out and three feet of water boiling over the rest. We’re not going. The New Year’s party is here.’

He filled her glass and she began to sulk. In spite of the liquor, the main idea of the evening was still clear in her mind, and this turn of events was badly interfering with it. When he put his arm around her, she didn’t respond. Amiably, he said she was a very problematical drunk. On two drinks she’d argue with Jesus Christ, on three she’d agree with Judas Iscariot. Now would she kindly tilt over No. 3, so she’d be in a frame of mind to welcome the New Year the way it deserved? When she didn’t touch the drink, he asked for her key, so he could put her car in the garage. When she made no move to give it to him, he went downstairs.

Somewhere in the house, water began to drip. She shivered, for the first time really becoming aware of the rain that was cascading down the windows, roaring on the roof. She began to blame him for that too. When he came back, and took a sharp look at her face, he seemed a little bored. ‘Well, if you still feel like that, I suppose there’s nothing to do but go to bed . . . I pulled that cloth clear over your car, so it’ll probably be all right. I have green pyjamas and red. Which do you prefer?’

‘I’m not going to bed.’

‘You’re not very amusing here.’

‘I’m going home.’

‘Then good night. But in case you change your mind, I’ll put out the green pyjamas, and—’

‘I haven’t gone yet.’

‘Of course you haven’t. I’m inviting—’

‘
Why did you tell her that
?’

What with the liquor, the rain, and his manner, her grievances had heavy compression behind them now, and she exploded with a snarl that left her without the least recollection of all the stuffy little things she had intended to say. He looked at her in astonishment. ‘Tell whom what? If you don’t mind my asking.’

‘You know perfectly well what I’m talking about. How could you say such things to that child? And who gave you the right to talk about my legs, anyhow?’

‘Everybody else does. Why not me?’

‘
What
?’

‘Oh, come, come, come. Your legs are the passion of your life. They all but get a cheer when you appear with them in that Pie Wagon, and if you don’t want them talked about, you ought to wear your skirts longer. But you do want them talked about, and looked at, and generally envied, so why this howling fit? And after all, they
are
damned goodlooking.’

‘We’re talking about my child.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake, what do you mean, child? If she’s a child, she’s forgotten more about such things than you’ll ever know. You ought to keep up with the times. I don’t know how it was once – maybe the sweet young things were told by their mothers at the age of seventeen and were greatly surprised, you can’t prove it by me. But now – they know all there is to know before they’ve been told about Santa Claus. Anyway, she knows. What am I supposed to do? Act like a zany when I drive off with you at night and don’t bring you back until the next morning? Do you think she doesn’t know where you’ve been? Hell, she even asks me how many times.’

‘And you tell her?’

‘Sure. She greatly admires my capacity – and yours. Yours she simply can’t get over. “Who’d think the poor mope had it in her?”’

As Monty mimicked Veda, Mildred knew this was nothing he had invented, as a sort of counter-offensive. Her rage mounted still higher. She said ‘I see’, then said it over again, three or four times. Then, getting up and going over to him, she asked: ‘And how about the best legs being found in kitchens, not in the drawing-room?’

‘What in the hell are you talking about?’

‘You know what I’m talking about?’

Monty stared, touched his brow, as though in a great effort of recollection. Then, snapping his fingers briskly, he said: ‘Oh, I knew there was something familiar about that. Yes, I did give a little dissertation along those lines one afternoon. We passed a girl – she had on a uniform of some sort, and an apron – quite a pretty little thing, especially around the ankles. And I got that
off – what you’ve just quoted. Nothing original, I assure you. I had almost forgotten it . . . How does that concern us?’

He was plausible, circumstantial, casual, but a little flicker around the eyes betrayed him. Mildred didn’t answer his question. She came over close, and there was something snake-like about her as she said: ‘That’s a lie. You weren’t talking about any girl you saw on the street. You were talking about me.’

Monty shrugged and Mildred went back to her chair and sat down. Then she began to talk slowly, but with rising stridency. She said he had deliberately tried to set Veda against her, to hold her up to ridicule, to make the child think of her as an inferior, somebody to be ashamed of. ‘I see it all now. I always thought it was funny she never invited any of these people over here in Pasadena to see her once in a while. Not that I don’t give her the opportunity. Not that I don’t remind her that you can’t accept invitations all the time without giving any in return. Not that I didn’t do my part. But no. Because you were filling her up with all this foolishness she’s been ashamed to ask these people over. She actually believes Glendale is not good enough for them. She thinks I’m not good enough. She—’

‘Oh, for God’s sake shut up.’

Monty’s eyes were black now, and had little hard points of light in them. ‘In the first place, what invitations did she accept? My mother’s, right here in this house. Well, we went all over that once, and we’re not going over it again. And to the Hannens’. And so far as I know the only invitation Charlie and Roberto ever got out of you was an invitation to go over and buy their dinner in that Pie Wagon, and they did go over, and—’

‘No check was ever presented to them.’

‘OK, then you’re square. For the rest, who the hell would expect a kid of fourteen to be doing something about every cocktail party I dragged her to? She asked about it, and I said it would be silly. Come on. What else?’

‘That may be all right for older people. But there have been plenty of others she’s met, girls her own age—’

‘No, there haven’t. And right there’s where I suggest you get better acquainted with your own daughter. She’s a strange
child. Girls her own age don’t interest her. She likes older women—’

‘If they’re rich.’

‘Anyway, she’s damned nice to them. And it’s unusual as hell. And you can’t blame them for liking it. And liking her. But as for her trying to throw some kind of a shindig for them, what are you trying to do, make me laugh?’

In some elusive, quicksilver way that she couldn’t get her finger on, Mildred felt the argument slipping away from her, and like Veda, she abandoned logic and began to scream: ‘You’ve set her against me! I don’t care a bit for your fine talk –
you’ve set her against me
!’

Monty lit a cigarette, smoked sullenly a few moments without speaking. Then he looked up. ‘Ah! So this is why you came. Stupid of me not to have thought of it sooner.’

‘I came because I was invited.’

‘On a night like this?’

‘It’s as good a time as any other.’

‘What a nice little pal
you
turned out to be . . . Funny – I had something to say, too.’

He looked with a little self-pitying smile into the fire, evidently decided to keep his intentions to himself, then changed his mind. ‘. . . I was going to say you’d make a fine wife for somebody – if you didn’t live in Glendale.’

She had been feeling outpointed, but at this all her self-righteousness came back. Leaning forward, she stared at him. ‘Monty, you can still say that? After what I’ve said to you? Just to have somebody take care of you, you’d ask me to marry you? Haven’t you any more self-respect than that?’

‘Ah, but that’s what I
was
going to say.’

‘Monty, don’t make it any worse than it is. If I got excited about it, you were going to let it stay said. If I didn’t, you were going to pretend that was what you
were
going to say. Gee, Monty, but you’re some man, aren’t you?’

‘Now suppose you listen to what I
am
going to say.’

‘No, I’m going home.’

She got up, but he leaped at her, seized her by both arms, and flung her back in her chair. The little glittering points of light in
his eyes were dancing now, and his face was drawn and hard. ‘Do you know why Veda never invites anybody to that house of yours? Do you know why nobody, except that string-bean that lives next door, ever goes there?’

‘Yes – because you set her against me and—’

‘Because you
are
a goddam varlet, and you’re afraid to have people come there, because you wouldn’t know what to do about them – you just haven’t got the nerve.’

Looking into his contorted face, she suddenly had the same paralysed, shrunken feeling she had that morning Miss Turner told her off, and sent her over to the housekeeper’s job, because there was nothing else she could do. And she kept shrinking, as Monty went on, pouring a torrent of bitter, passionate invective at her. ‘It’s not her. It’s not me. It’s you. Doesn’t that strike you as funny? That Veda has a hundred friends, here, there, everywhere she goes, and that you haven’t any? No, I’m wrong – you have one. That bartender. And that’s all. Nobody ever gets invited to your house, nobody—’