Peyton Place (52 page)

He pressed his foot down on the accelerator of his car, confident of the full gas tank and the four good tires under him as he drove swiftly toward Concord and a date with his best girl.

She was a honey, all right, Helen was, he thought. But if he didn't get to her tonight, he was going to tell her to go blow. There were too many other girls eager to hook up with a good steady civilian, one with plenty of money and a decent car.

With the idea of “getting to Helen” foremost in his mind, Rodney stopped at a liquor store on Concord's Main Street and bought another fifth of rum. Helen “just adored” rum when it was mixed with Coca-Cola. In addition to the rum, he had six pairs of black market nylon hose in the glove compartment of his car as extra persuasion.

“Oh, what're these!” cried Helen a few moments later as she held up the stockings.

Levers to pry your pants off, thought Rodney, but he said: “Pretty nylons for pretty legs,” and the inanity of it was lost on Helen, who had a nature as acquisitive as a squirrel's in autumn.

All in all, the two spent a highly pleasant evening. By ten o'clock they were both feeling very rum-warmed and comradely.

“You understand me so well,” purred Helen, smoothing the fingers of one of his hands with her own.

“Do I?” he asked, circling her with one arm and resting that hand just under her breast. “Do I?” he whispered, against her cheek.

“Yes,” said Helen, snuggling up to him. “You understand about the finer things in life. Books and music, and all that.”

Helen's biggest trouble, thought Rodney, was that she had seen too many movies. She tried to talk and act the way she imagined a motion picture actress would, after a hard day on the lot. His kisses left her unmoved if they were not of the expert, no noses bumped variety. Too bad, thought Rodney, that they had not yet begun to make the sexual act a part of every motion picture for then Helen would have fallen into his hands like an overriped grape. He sighed and thought of the girls he had known, and left who had not been movie fans. Getting to Helen, he was afraid was going to be a long, hard process, and he was not at all sure that the game was going to be worth the candle, as someone of other had put it.

“Hm-m,” murmured Helen, against him. “We go together like peaches and cream.”

“Ham and eggs,” he said, beginning to massage her breast with his hand.

“Pie and ice cream,” she giggled, moving a little under his touch.

“Hot dogs and football games,” said Rodney, putting his other hand on her thigh.

“Speaking of hot dogs,” said Helen, jumping up, “I'm hungry Let's go get something to eat.”

And that, thought Rodney savagely, was that. He'd buy his a goddamned hot dog, a dozen if she wanted, but he was good damned if he was going to bother with her again after tonight.

Helen giggled all the way down the stairs from her apartme to the car, and she giggled nerve rackingly as Rodney drove a drive-in a short way outside of the city. He did not speak.

“Oh, honey,” giggled Helen, chewing at the last of her hot do “Is my little old honey mad at poor little me?”

Unaccountably, Rodney thought, he was thinking of Betty A derson. He could almost hear those same words coming from a contrite Betty on a summer night of long ago.

“I guess not,” he said, and again he had the eerie feeling of having spoken those words before.

“Don't you be mad at me, doll,” whispered Helen. “I'll be good to you. Just you take me back to the apartment, and I'll show you how good I can be. I'll be the best you ever had, baby, just you wait and see.”

Playing at hard to get, in his turn, Rodney looked down at her and smiled. “How do I know?” he asked.

And then Helen did the most exciting thing that Rodney had ever seen in all of his twenty-one years. Right there in the car, with the lights of the drive-in shining all around them and people sitting in cars not six feet away from them on either side, Helen unbuttoned her blouse and showed him one perfect breast.

“Look at that,” she said, cupping the breast with her hand, “no bra. I've got the hardest breasts you ever played with.”

Rodney raced the car motor violently in his eagerness to be gone from the drive-in's parking lot. Helen did not rebutton her blouse, but leaned back in the seat, leaving her breast exposed. Every few seconds, she inhaled and sat up a little, running her hand sensuously over her bare skin, flicking her nipple with a snap of a fingernail. Rodney could not keep his eyes off her. She was like something that he had read about in what he termed “dirty books.” He had never seen a woman so apparently enamored of her own body before, and to him there was something wicked, forbidden, exciting about it.

“Let me,” he said, reaching for her as he sped along the highway toward Concord.

She snapped her head away from him quickly. “Look out!”

It was a scream of warning, uttered too late. When Rodney recovered himself enough to look up, the brightly lit trailer truck seemed to be right on top of him.

Each spring, it was the duty of Dexter Humphrey, as chairman of the Budget Committee, to act as moderator at town meeting. He took this responsibility seriously, reading each item of the town warrant in sonorous tones and preceding each vote with a sepulchrally voiced question.

“You have heard the item as listed in the warrant for this town. What is your wish in this matter?”

The townspeople then either voted immediately or discussed the issue until it was settled.

“The town meeting,” said Tomas Makris to the high school students every spring, “is the last example of pure democracy existing in the world today. It is the one function which remains where each man may stand up to express his ideas and opinions on the running of his town.”

Of course, thought Tom, remembering his first year in Peyton Place, that does not mean that each will be listened to, but he
is
allowed to speak.

At the town meeting held in the spring of 1944, the old, hot issue of a new grade school had not been included in the warrant because of wartime restrictions on building, but the other, equally controversial question of town zoning was in its regular position. The Budget Committee always listed the question on zoning as the very last item in the warrant, for the arguments on the issue were apt to be long and many.

“We come now,” intoned Dexter Humphrey, “to the twenty-first and last question in the warrant.” He paused and cleared his throat.

The townspeople, each of whom held a printed copy of the warrant, knew very well what the last question was, yet everyone waited for Dexter Humphrey to read it aloud.

“Whether this assembly will vote to accept Article XIV, in Chapter XXXXIV, of the revised laws of this state,” said Dexter.

A stranger might have begun to scramble furiously through the booklet in which the warrant was included, at this point, to try to locate the contents of Article XIV, Chapter XXXXIV of the revised state laws, but the townspeople knew well enough how this law read. Everyone waited for Leslie Harrington to rise to his feet, as he always did, when Dexter had finished reading the question. Never before had Leslie waited for longer than it took Dexter to read the item, and the moderator looked around now in puzzlement.

“You have heard the item as listed in the warrant for this town,” said Dexter, staring stupidly at the front row of seats where Leslie sat. “What is your wish in this matter?”

Surely, Leslie would now stand, glance at his gold watch as if he were pressed for time, and say the words he had always said.

“Mr. Moderator, I move that this question be stricken from the warrant.”

Then would come: “Second the motion,” from whichever of his workers Leslie had picked for this yearly honor.

And then Dexter would say: “A motion to strike this item from the warrant has been made and seconded. What is your wish in this matter? All those in favor?”

The “Ayes” would shake the rafters, while Seth Buswell and a few others would utter the only “Nays.”

Dexter Humphrey coughed. “What is your wish in this matter?” he demanded frantically, refusing to put the question to a vote until someone spoke.

Leslie Harrington continued to sit still, staring thoughtfully out of a window in the courthouse meeting room. Dexter's eyes sought the room, trying to locate Seth Buswell. The newspaper owner sat with Matthew Swain and Tomas Makris in a seat toward the rear of the room. Seth studied his fingernails with a deep concentration, but he did not rise to speak.

Fool! thought Dexter Humphrey angrily. Damned fool! He's been shooting his mouth off for years about zoning, and now when he has a chance to see the bloody question come to a vote, he does not rise to press his advantage.

The tension in the room mounted to an almost unbearable degree while Dexter waited. When a farmer finally stood up and cleared his throat preparatory to speaking, the gathering let out its breath as if in one gigantic sigh.

“Does this here zonin’ business mean that if I wanna put up a new chicken house, I gotta go and ask somebody?” asked the farmer.

“A pertinent question indeed, Walt,” said Dexter, who prided himself on knowing every citizen with his name on the check list. “Jared, would you mind answering Walt's question?”

Jared Clarke stood up. “No, Walt,” he said, “it don't. This Article XIV affects only dwellings for human habitation. That is, a place where people are gonna live. For instance, if you wanted to put up a house here in town, you'd have to get a permit from the board of selectmen. The board, of course, is permitted to restrict the type of dwelling to be erected.”

“What you mean to say, Jared,” said the farmer named Walt, “is that you and Ben Davis and George Caswell kin tell a man what kind of a house he's gonna build. That right?”

“Not exactly,” said Jared carefully, realizing that he was treading on dangerous ground here. “The idea of zoning,” he said, turnding to face the crowd, “is to protect property values in a town. That is its only purpose.”

“Yeah, but that ain't what I asked you, Jared,” said Walt. “What I asked was, how come you and Ben and George are gonna have a right to tell a man what kind of a house to build?”

“The type of house,” said Jared, feeling warm, “doesn't enter into it at all.”

“You mean to say then, that if I wanted to put up a tar paper shack on Elm Street, I could?”

“The way things stand now,” said Jared acidly, “you certainly could.”

“But I couldn't if we had zoning.”

“No,” replied Jared flatly. “The minute a shack goes up in a decent neighborhood, the values on all the rest of the property go down. It isn't right, and it isn't sensible. Zoning would be an asset to this community. Perhaps we could do away with chicken houses within a block of Elm Street, if we had zoning.”

“What?” It was a scream of outrage from the rear of the room, uttered by a crafty old man who had noticed Jared's contradiction of himself. “What's wrong with a man keepin’ a few chickens?” demanded Marvin Potter, who was one of the old men who hung around Tuttle's. “What's wrong with a man tryin’ to do a little something to make extra money?” demanded Marvin. “Something like keepin’ a few chickens?”

Marvin did not keep a few chickens in the back yard of his house on Laurel Street. He kept a few minks, and in summer the stench from Marvin's few minks wafted gently over Elm Street when the wind was right, so that the townspeople shrugged and rolled their eyes heavenward, while strangers looked around suspiciously.

“Chickens is one thing,” said Jared, looking sharply at Marvin, “and minks is something else.”

“And I say,” roared Marvin, “that being a selectman is one thing, and tryin’ to be a dictator is something else again.” As was the way with the townspeople, Marvin pronounced “selectman” as if it had been three words: “See-leck-man.”

“Mr. Clarke?” It was the poised, low voice of Selena Cross speaking. “Mr. Clarke, since the house where I live with my brother is well within the limits known to all of us as The Village, would zoning mean that I would have to remove my brother's sheep pen from our premises?”

Jared hemmed and smiled and coughed, but there was only one answer and he knew it. “Yes,” he said.

“Now ain't that a helluva thing,” said someone who did not rise to identify himself.

Dexter Humphrey pounded with his gavel to restore order, and Seth Buswell looked narrowly at Selena Cross. As far as he knew, Selena had always been in favor of zoning in years past, and he wondered what had happened to change her mind.

“I move,” said Selena Cross, “that this item be stricken from the warrant.”

“Second the motion,” cried Marvin Potter.

“All those in favor?”

There were perhaps six voices who agreed with Selena's firm “Aye.”

Dexter Humphrey wiped his hands with a handkerchief. He picked up his copy of the warrant and read the twenty-first item again. After he had asked his regular question, he put the matter to a vote at once, and for the first time in history, the town of Peyton Place voluntarily gave new powers to its selectmen in the matter of zoning.

When the meeting was over, Peter Drake stood in the lobby of the courthouse and lit a cigarette. Tomas Makris joined him, not by any previous arrangement, but because they both happened to be in the lobby at the same moment. Together, Tom and Drake stood and watched Leslie Harrington leave the courthouse. When the millowner walked out, he was flanked on either side by Seth and Dr. Swain, and Jared Clarke and Dexter Humphrey.

“Isn't it odd,” remarked Drake with a little smile, “that while they stood divided against one another, each of them stood strong, while today, when they stood together in silence, one of them fell. I always thought Seth hated Leslie's guts. He'll never have another chance to beat Leslie the way he could have done today.”

Tom looked at the tip of his cigarette. “Harrington has lost his son,” he said. “That's why none of them spoke but Jared. And Jared would not have spoken, if he had not been asked direct questions.”

“Someone's losing a son would never have stopped Harrington in the old days,” said Drake viciously. “How come everyone's gone soft on that sonofabitch all of a sudden?”