“Penny?” Tod asked.
“What?”
“A penny for your thoughts,” he said. “You looked so bloody serious.”
“If I told you, I’d embarrass you… and myself”
“Try me and see.”
She paused then said, “All right. Light me a cigarette, buy me another drink, and I’ll tell you my life’s story. A little sad piano music, if you please, Hoagy.” She grinned impishly at her own joke.
She gazed toward the window, studying her reflection in the glass. She pointed at her image, “See that woman. I sometimes think that is the real me… something seen dimly, infrequently.” She squinted and blew smoke at the reflection. “Sometimes I don’t see her for months. Sometimes she won’t go away, like now. Look at her, staring at me. She’s accusing me.” “Oh? Have you done something you shouldn’t have?”
Sylvia ground out her half-smoked cigarette. “No, it’s the other way around. I haven’t done a lot of things that I should have. When I was very, very young… say about four, I knew what I wanted to do; I wanted to be a doctor and help people. Then my father he and I were very close… died when I was six, and the doctors couldn’t help him. I hated doctors then. When I was in junior high school, I was sure I would be a famous movie actress; that lasted until I was about fourteen when I decided I would rather become an Olympic swimmer. That lasted about four days; the coach took one look at my form and said no dice. Then I thought I’d be a famous writer or artist. No talent. When I got out of school, I thought about joining the Peace Corps or something like that. But I knew I just couldn’t spend time in some dirty-floored hovel trying to make someone do something they really didn’t want to do… or holding someone else’s sick child. I was in my third year at Scripps College and had changed my major six times in the three years when I suddenly realized I really didn’t give a damn about school either. I came back home. Mother took me with her on a round the world tour on the Caronia, she hoped I would meet some nice eligible male who had acceptable social qualifications.” She snorted and there was a touch of bitterness in her voice. “We’re very social and very rich, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know,” Shelton said softly.
“Oh my, yes.” She mimicked the words, “Terribly rich!” Then she became serious again. “My maiden name was Mayfair.”
Tod cocked one eyebrow and was impressed in spite of himself “Stephen Mayfair? Mayfair Aircraft? Mayfair Boats?”
“The same. Daddy’s.” She fell silent as the waiter brought the second round of drinks. When he left she raised her glass again. This time she paused only a second before saying, “To us!”
Shelton nodded his approval and touched glasses with her.
“Where was I?” Sylvia asked then answered her own question.
“Oh, yes! Aboard the Caronia, eighty beautiful days, forty exotic ports, eighty romantic nights!!’ “ She knew her bitterness and sarcasm were showing, but she didn’t care. “I couldn’t get interested in any of the males; they bored me stiff Mother kept pushing me off on Bruce; she even had his table changed from the Second Officer’s to the Captain’s where we sat. He gave me the creeps. Mother nearly exploded when I told her he looked like the crooked banker in a Western movie.” She grinned as she saw Tod’s appreciative smile.
Sylvia held her glass up to the candle and inspected its contents, deliberatingly whether she should continue or not. She mentally shrugged and went on. “I… ah… began to think there was something wrong with me. There I was, twenty-one years old and still a virgin and not the least bit interested in any male I had ever met. Except one I met when I was fifteen. He was fifteen, too. And I would have given in to him if he’d known what to do. He didn’t. His name was Ron. He was tall and blond and skinny and was going to be a poet. He used to read poems to me that he’d written, and some of them were so sad and beautiful that I used to cry, you know.” She paused and stared out the window at a fishing boat plowing its way into the harbor. “I saw him again a couple of years ago. Already bald at thirty, working as assistant manager in a chain shoe store, married, five kids, no longer writing poetry… or anything.” She looked up, grimacing. “Jesus, this is getting depressing. Sure you want to hear the rest?”
“I’m interested,” Shelton said.
“Okay, then. Back to the old Caronia. I’m on board, you see. Mother is pushing Bruce, the blue plate special at me. Bruce is socially acceptable. He’s a nose talker Harvard and some precious private finishing school on the East Coast. He’s also fifteen years older than I. Divorced. He kept coming on like gangbusters. I couldn’t see him or the panting Third Officer or the deck boy who looked as if I were a hot fudge sundae and he hadn’t eaten for a month. So… ah… well, I started thinking there must be something horribly wrong with me. That maybe I was a lesbian. There was another girl on board a Swede who definitely was a lesbian. I mean, she had made no bones about that to me. She just up and told me that she was les and wanted to know if I was straight or gay, and one way or the other would I be interested in letting her make love to me. Finally, I think it happened between Gibraltar and Egypt, one night I went with her to her cabin and let her do what she wanted. I felt I had to know. She did everything to me… and nothing for me. After it was all over, and I hadn’t reacted. I felt dirty and sick. When I got on deck, I saw Bruce. He made his usual proposition; I said why not.’ He… he… laid' me the same evening. It hurt a little, not much. Nothing happened. Absolutely nothing. He told me that he had used protection,' but he lied. He took away my hymen and left in its place a baby. It wasn’t until later that I realized the son of a bitch had done it on purpose.”
Shelton watched as she fumbled angrily for a cigarette; he didn’t have a chance to light it… the hovering waiter beat him to it.
Sylvia exhaled a boiling cloud of smoke. “We got… we had to get married. Mother was thrilled, in spite of the circumstances. Two days after we started our honeymoon, I lost the baby. You know… it was the first real thing I had wanted in a long time; I wanted to be a mother. And even that was denied me. Since then, Bruce has repeatedly stated that he doesn’t want a child.” She sighed. “He even had his tubes or something tied off so he couldn’t.”
She was silent for so long a time that Shelton thought she had decided to stop talking, but then she began again. “We had parties, got our pictures in the society pages of the newspaper, attended all the socially proper things like polo at Pebble Beach, the Regatta, and so on. I joined all the proper society matron organizations, the Junior League, the Hospital Auxiliary, the Symphony Guild.” She looked directly at him, and her eyes mirrored her misery. “I was bored to death with it all. I started dying little by little. There was a thick shell of indifference growing around me, shutting off the fresh air and sunshine. By the time I was thirty years old, that shell seemed impenetrable to me. I… I even tried… to kill myself once last year.” She smiled sadly. “I failed at that, too. Failed so
badly that not even Bruce knew I had tried. Not that he would have given a damn one way or the other, except for the bad publicity.” She paused, cocked her head to one side and asked, “May I have another drink?”
Shelton used his forefinger to indicate he wanted the drink order repeated, and the waiter… standing like a silent sentinel just out of earshot… nodded his understanding… Sylvia continued to stare at Tod. “You know something?” “What?”
“I’m glad I didn’t commit suicide.”
“I’m glad you didn’t, too.” He meant it.
“That thick old shell of indifference I was telling you about you broke through it as though it wasn’t there at all. You just shattered it. Crash! Tinkle… tinkle… tinkle. It was an egg, and out came the ugly duckling.”
“No… out came the swan. Long slender neck, graceful, queenly… and I’ve got good tits, too.” She giggled then put her hand quickly to her mouth. “Oops. Say… are you trying to get me drunk? I haven’t had anything to eat all day.” Her eyes narrowed wickedly, and she grinned as she bit her lower lip, “… at least nothing to eat in the food department.”