The Group (44 page)

Only Mr. Schneider and the iceman seemed to feel as she did. The iceman wanted to be assured that her
fidanzato
was “a good man.” Mr. Schneider went further. “I understand what you are feeling,” he said. “As Socrates showed, love cannot be anything else but the love of the good. But to find the good is very rare. That is why love is rare, in spite of what people think. It happens to one in a thousand, and to that one it is a revelation. No wonder he cannot communicate with the other nine hundred and ninety-nine.”

What did surprise Polly’s friends—though not Mr. Schneider—was that Mr. Andrews was going to live with the young couple. One by one, her group mates appeared to advise her against this—Pokey Beauchamp made a special trip by plane up from Princeton. Dottie, who was in town with her husband for the theatres and staying at the Plaza, went so far as to talk to Polly’s mother. Even Helena Davison drawled a warning over cocktails in the Vassar Club lounge. Priss Crockett came to lunch in the coffee shop at the hospital. As a pediatrician, Sloan, she said, was terribly opposed. “When you have children, you will have to think of them. Supposing your f-father—?” “Goes mad again,” said Polly. “Would that be so terrible for them, Priss? He was mad off and on when we were children, my brothers and I.” That was different, Priss allowed; in those days, people did not know any better than to expose young children to mental illness—Polly and her brothers had been lucky, that was all. But even if Mr. Andrews were normal, Polly’s friends thought she would be making a terrible mistake—a mistake that this generation, at least, had learned to avoid. You did not have your relations to live with you if you wanted your marriage to succeed; it was the one thing on which you put your foot down. Opinion was unanimous on the point. If Polly wanted to fly in the face of experience, she was practically dooming her marriage from the start.

“And you mean to say your doctor
accepts
it?” the young matrons of Polly’s circle cried, shocked. “Yes,” said Polly. This astonishing news planted a grave doubt in her friends’ minds. “If he really loves you,” argued Kay, “I should think he would want to be alone with you. Wild horses wouldn’t have persuaded Harald to share me.” Polly did not reply that rumor had it that she and Harald were on the verge of breaking up. “What would you suggest I do with my father?” she demanded quietly instead. “Why can’t he live with your aunt Julia?” “He doesn’t like her,” said Polly. “But she has a
huge
apartment,” said Kay. “He could have his own quarters. And servants to look after him. He’d be much better off than crowded in with you. What are you going to do with him when you entertain? At your aunt’s he could have a tray.” In her ignorance, Polly had thought that you “lived happily ever after,” unless your husband was unfaithful, but the Class of ’33 seemed to feel that you could not relax for a minute in your drive to make your marriage “go.” Polly was quite willing to make sacrifices, having learned to do so in a big family, but that was not what her classmates meant. It was very important, they thought, for a woman to preserve her individuality; otherwise she might not hold her husband. “At least,” remarked Libby, “you’re not going to take him with you on your honeymoon?” “Of course not,” said Polly impatiently. But soon Polly’s mother wrote, anxiously, wanting to know whether it was true that Henry was going to accompany them on the honeymoon—Louisa Hartshorn had heard it at the Cosmopolitan Club.

The only person who was deaf to the general concern was Mr. Andrews, who had taken it for granted from the outset that he would live with the newlyweds. For him, the problem was architectural: finding an apartment that would house the three of them and not cost too much to fix over. He was looking at railroad apartments on the upper East Side, near Jim’s laboratory; he had seen one on the top floor of an old-law tenement where it would be possible to make skylights to introduce light into the inner rooms. They were going to be married in the spring—on the farm, the plan was; Jim’s parents would come from Ohio, and his father would perform the ceremony. It was Dottie’s hope that Mr. and Mrs. Andrews might be reconciled by the occasion and make it a double wedding. “Your father could be Jim’s best man, and your mother could be your matron of honor. And then vice versa. Terribly original.” She twinkled. “Don’t you love the thought, Polly?”

When Jim heard this, he told Polly that they had better be married right away at City Hall and get it over with. Polly agreed. So as not to hurt anybody’s feelings, they did not even take her father as a witness. They were married by a magistrate, and that night they went to Key West for their honeymoon, sharing a lower berth. From the station they sent telegrams announcing what they had done. Polly’s friends were greatly disappointed that they had not had a chance to give her a shower or any kind of send-off. But they understood that a gay wedding, under the circumstances, would have been more than she could bear. The group was awfully sorry for Polly and would have sent her a floral tribute by telegram if only they had known her address. But naturally she and Jim were lying low, enjoying the last days the two of them would have alone together ever, probably, in their lives. In Dottie’s suite at the Plaza, a few of the girls and their husbands drank a toast to her
in absentia
. “To her happiness!” they said loyally, clicking glasses. She deserved it if anyone did, the girls affirmed. The men’s sympathies went to Jim Ridgeley, whom they did not know, but as Brook, Dottie’s husband, continued to refill the champagne glasses, they concurred among themselves that he must be an odd gent to take a situation like that lying down.

Thirteen

E
ARLY ONE MORNING IN
March Polly appeared at the Payne Whitney Clinic, Woman’s Division, to give a metabolism test to a mental patient who had been admitted the night before. When she came back from her honeymoon, she had stayed on at the hospital; she hoped she might be pregnant, since they had taken no precautions. If that were the case (and it was still too early to be sure), there would be no point in starting a new job that she would have to leave in October. Jim came to the hospital every day and had lunch with her in the staff dining room, where they held hands under the table. In the evenings Polly’s classmates were busy separating them at a series of “fork suppers” given in their honor. Having joined the ranks of the married, Polly and Jim were not permitted to sit together, but had to balance plates on their laps at opposite ends of a room. These parties, at which everyone was half a couple and lived in an elevator building, gave Polly a vast sense of distance. All the husbands, it went without saying, were “doing awfully well” in fire insurance or banking or magazine work, and her classmates, except for a few rebels, who were not necessarily the same rebels as in college, were “taking their place in society.” Yet there were nights when Polly felt, watching them and listening, that she must be the only girl in the Class of ’33 who was happy.

It was plain to Polly that many of her married classmates were disappointed in their husbands and envied the girls, like Helena, who had not got married. In June the class would have its fifth reunion and already it had its first divorcees. These hares were discussed wistfully by the tortoises of the class. It was felt that they at least had “done something.” Norine Blake’s divorce—she had gone to a ranch outside Reno and now called herself “Mrs. Schmittlapp Blake”—had earned her a place of renown in alumnae affairs equal to that of Connie Storey, who had become a model for Bergdorf, or of Lily Marvin, who dressed windows for Elizabeth Arden, and outranking poor Binkie Barnes, who was working as a C.I.O. organizer, and Bubbles Purdy, who was studying to be a preacher. Within the group itself, only Libby had made her mark. Kay, once so vital, had ceased to be a pace setter. Last year rumor had had it that she, who had been the first of the class to be married, would be the first to be divorced—quite a record. But she was still toiling at Macy’s as a junior executive in personnel, and Harald was still writing plays that were as yet un-produced. From time to time, he had a job as a stage manager or a director of a summer theatre, and Kay’s family was helping them in their hours of need. Opinion at the fork suppers was divided as to whether Kay was a drag on Harald or vice versa. No one had seen them recently, it seemed, except Dottie, who had made a point of it this winter, and Helena, who had had them to dinner at the Savoy Plaza when her parents were in town. The two of them, Dottie reported, were now running with a fast, poker-playing set, where she was known as “Mrs. Pete” and Harald as “Mr. Pete”; the women were older than Kay, had deep, drawling voices, and called all the men “Mr.,” including their own husbands. The game was dealer’s choice, and it cost a quarter to open; Harald was a real gambler, but Kay was just a greenhorn who held her cards so that anyone could see them and had a craze for deuces-and-one-eyed-Jacks-wild. For her part, Helena told Polly that her mother, who was a great amateur diagnostician, had announced that Kay was on the edge of a nervous breakdown.

“The patient is quite refractory,” the nurse warned Polly that morning in the corridor, as she unlocked the door. “She may not co-operate.” The woman in the bed was Kay. She had a huge black eye and contusions on her bare arms. At the sight of Polly in her starched white coat, she burst into copious tears. She was comparing their positions, Polly realized with sympathy, trying to remember whether she had ever seen Kay cry before. Rather than ask questions, which might have upset Kay more, Polly got a washcloth and bathed her swollen face. When she saw that Kay, contrary to what the nurse had said, did not offer any resistance, she found her pocketbook in a bureau drawer, took a comb from it, and gently combed her hair. She did not offer her a mirror because of the black eye. In a few moments, Kay’s sobs subsided; she sat up. “What are you going to do to me?” she asked curiously, eying Polly’s big cylindrical tank. “I’ve come to give you a basal metabolism test, that’s all,” answered Polly. “It doesn’t hurt.” “I know that,” said Kay impatiently. “But I haven’t had any breakfast!” This protest was so like Kay that Polly was reassured. To her surprise, except for her appearance, her friend seemed completely herself. “You’ll have your breakfast afterward,” she told her. “We give these tests on an empty stomach.” “Oh,” said Kay. “Heavens, I’m glad you’re here! You don’t
know
the terrible things they’ve been doing to me, Polly.” Last night the nurses had taken her belt away from her. “I can’t wear my dress without a belt.” They had taken her nightgown sash too (“Look!”) and they had tried to take her wedding ring, but she would not let them. “We had a frightful struggle, practically a wrestling match, but then the head nurse came and said to let me keep it for the night. Score one for me. After that, they made me open my mouth and looked in to see if I had any removable bridges, though I’d already told them I hadn’t. If I had had, they probably would have yanked them out. I must say, I was awfully tempted to bite them.” She gave her loud Western laugh. “I wish now I had.” She glanced quickly at Polly for approval—which Polly feared was a very bad symptom. Kay was
proud
of battling with the nurses, as if she thought she were still a student standing up to the Dean or Prexy. Did she not understand about straitjackets? It was almost as if she did not grasp where she was. Then it occurred to Polly that Kay was simply embarrassed. “I gather,” Kay went on in a different tone, “that they think I want to commit suicide. They keep peering at me through those slats in the door. Did they expect me to hang myself with my belt? And what was I supposed to do with my wedding ring?” “Swallow it.” Polly’s answer was prompt; she thought the nurses would have done better to explain to Kay. “That’s just routine,” she said, smiling. “They take away everybody’s belt and wedding ring. I’m surprised they let you keep yours. And all the rooms on this floor have peepholes.” “Like a jail,” said Kay. “‘Judases,’ don’t they call them?” Tears came into her eyes again. “Harald betrayed me. He put me in here and left me. He pretended it was the regular hospital.”

“But what happened? Why are you here?” “First tell me where I am.” “You don’t know?” said Polly. “I suppose it must be an insane asylum,” Kay answered. “Though the nurses keep saying, ‘Oh no, dear. Nothing like that. It’s just a place for nervous people to rest.’ I made
such
a fool of myself last night when they brought me in here. I asked where the telephone was, right away. I felt like talking to somebody. They said there were no telephones in the rooms. So I said, ‘Why not?’ but they wouldn’t give a reason. I ought to have guessed then, but instead I decided that this must be some cheap wing of the hospital, a glorified ward, and that Harald had put me in here to save money—you know how he is. Then I asked for a radio, and they wouldn’t let me have one. ‘Why not?’ I said. They alleged that it was against the rules. That was
very
peculiar, I said: I had a friend who had had a baby right here in New York Hospital a year ago, and
she
had had a radio. I remembered it distinctly.” She grinned. “They must have thought I was crazy. Right after that, they took my belt away.” “They do think you’re crazy,” Polly interposed. “You’re in the Payne Whitney Clinic. It’s a private mental hospital, attached to Cornell Medical Center. This is the admissions floor, where they sort the patients out.”

Kay drew a deep sighing breath. She closed her eyes. “All right. Now I know. I had to hear it from somebody to believe it.” “But tell me how you got here,” urged Polly softly, stroking her friend’s bent head. Kay opened her eyes. “Will you believe me?” she said. “Somebody’s
got
to believe me.” “Of course, I’ll believe you,” said Polly warmly. She had come to the shocked conclusion that there must have been some mistake—as sometimes happened in hospitals. Petersen was a common name, at least in the form of “Peterson,” which was the way it had been spelled on Kay’s chart. How awful if Kay had come in with an appendix and they had sent her here through a mix-up! But that left the black eye to be explained. “It was Harald,” said Kay dully. “He beat me when he’d been drinking. When was it? It seems so long ago, but it must have been yesterday morning. Yes, yesterday morning.” “He was drinking in the morning?” “He’d been out all night. When he came in at seven in the morning, I accused him of being with a woman. I know it was silly of me, to accuse him when he’d been drinking. I ought to have waited till he was sober.” Polly checked a laugh; Kay’s self-criticism was always revealing. “But I was a bit hysterical, I guess. We’d had some people in for cocktails, and we all got quite high. Then when they left, about seven-thirty, and I was making dinner, I needed a cucumber pickle for a sauce. So I sent Harald out to get one at a delicatessen, and he never came back. I realize it was stupid; I could have used India relish. But the recipe called for a cucumber pickle. Anyway, he didn’t come back till morning. I ought to have pretended to be asleep—I see that now. Instead, I confronted him. I said he’d been with Liz Longwell—you don’t know her, but we played poker with them. She was Bryn Mawr, ’29, and her husband’s away, trying a case in Washington. Whereupon Harald said he was tired of my dirty mind, and he hit me. You know, I saw stars, the way they do in funny papers. It was silly, but I hit him back. Then he knocked me down and kicked me in the stomach. What should I have done, Polly? Picked myself up and waited for him to be sorry the next day? I know that’s the right technique, but I haven’t got the patience. I jumped up and ran into the kitchen. He ran after me, and I picked up the bread knife. I purposely didn’t take the carving knife because he’d just sharpened it and I didn’t want to scare him too much. Just enough to bring him to his senses. I waved it and said, ‘Don’t you come near me!’ He knocked it out of my hand. Then he pushed me into the dressing room and locked the door. I waited there for a while, trying to get control of myself and hear what he was doing. Finally, I heard him snore. It never occurred to him that it was getting late and that I had to go to work. I knocked on the door; then I pounded; then I took time out to put on my clothes and pounded some more. I was crying and sobbing. And not a sound came from the other room; he’d even stopped snoring. I couldn’t see through the keyhole because he’d left the key in the lock. He might have been dead.