Cradling the telephone, Nancy raised her glass. It was now almost empty, for she had been taking generous swallows during the conversation. She wandered back to the kitchen and sat down at the table again under the hot breath of the window fan.
Now what? Damn it all, it was only two o’clock.
Having noticed the time on her oven clock, Nancy was reminded that she had better put the roast in for dinner. David would probably get home between four and five, howling for his food after all that exercise and cold beer. Well, why not? thought Nancy. An early dinner would leave the evening free... just in case something interesting turned up. Meanwhile, here was the pitcher of gin-and-tonic, and no one to drink it with. David didn’t approve of her drinking alone; he said it was a bad habit that could easily lead to alcoholism. But would it hurt if she had, well, just one more before putting the pitcher into the fridge?
Nancy poured it and drank while preparing the roast for the oven. After she got the roast in the oven she poured herself just one little drinkie more.
But it was damn funny about Lila, she thought.
Where could Lila be?
5
With the roast in the oven, Nancy was at odds’ ends. She wandered about the house, even going upstairs to make the bed; but all the while there was a little voice in her head that kept asking where Lila was.
“How the hell should I know?” Nancy said.
She was coming downstairs again from straightening the bedroom when the persistent little voice suddenly reminded her of what Mae Walters had said on the telephone. Mae had said something about asking Larry, hadn’t she?
“That’s right,” the voice said. “She did.”
“But he isn’t home.”
“Then show a little initiative. He told you last night he was going to his office. He’s probably still there, sulking.”
“I’m sure Larry wouldn’t thank me for meddling in his marital problems.”
“He might actually appreciate it. If Lila’s left him and Larry doesn’t know it, he’d be grateful to you for telling him.”
Having been convinced by the little voice, Nancy determined to earn Larry Connor’s gratitude. Conveniently, David having gone to the club in Jack Richmond’s Corvette, the vintage Chevvie which was the Howell family’s sole vehicle was available in the garage. To Nancy’s gratification, it started immediately. She drove downtown, a mere few minutes’ drive.
Larry Connor’s office was on the ground floor of a small brick business building in mid-block on Main Street. The day being Sunday, she was able to park directly before Larry’s office. His plate-glass window had his name on it in bold gold lettering. The monk’s cloth window curtains were drawn.
Nancy knocked three times on the street door. The monk’s cloth remained unruffled; the Venetian blind behind the street door remained closed. Well, what did I expect? Nancy thought; but on the chance that Larry might still be sleeping the sleep of the utterly miserable, she drove around the corner to the alley that ran behind the business block and up the alley to mid-block, where she turned off into the small private parking area. Startled in spite of herself, she saw Larry’s Buick parked in his private space.
She got out of her Chevvie and walked across the alley and knocked on Larry’s rear door. Still no answer; and when she tried the door, it was locked. He wasn’t asleep after all. With his Buick in the lot, he was obviously hanging around the neighborhood somewhere, too heartsick or sullen to go home.
And what am I doing here? Nancy asked herself.
But in some inexplicable way she was committed.
Her first assumption was that Larry had gone over to the cocktail lounge of the hotel to take on a manly load; but then she remembered that on Sundays the lounge was closed. He might be killing time in the lobby, of course, reading the Sunday papers or watching television. She decided to look there after having a peep at Applebaum’s Cigar Store, which was another favorite hangout for the temporarily homeless.
Larry was not in either place. Nancy even checked with the hotel clerk on the chance that Larry might have taken a room instead of sleeping in his office; he had not.
Well, I’ve done my duty, Nancy said to herself. He was probably in one of the bars that violated the Sunday closing law; and if he was, he could jolly well make it home by himself, even if he had to do it on his hands and knees. She had gone to considerable trouble, Nancy thought, but there were limits to good neighborliness; knocking on the back doors of illegally operating booze parlors defined one of them.
So Nancy drove home and stowed the Chevvie in the garage and let herself in the front door. Checking the roast in the kitchen, she noticed a can puncher lying on the counter by the sink, from which she made the logical deduction that David was back home and drinking more cold beer, damn him; whereupon Nancy marched grimly out the kitchen door into the backyard and, sure enough, there was David. And not only David, but Jack Richmond, too — didn’t he ever have a house call to make? — and they were both drinking cold beer, after having obviously consumed a large number of previous cold beers at the club. Nancy could always tell when David had been consuming a large number of beers because, at such times, he always had a cringing look when he saw her.
“Hello, men,” Nancy said calmly.
Jack Richmond started to rise as a gentleman should, but the deck was apparently tilting. He sank back in the yard chair with a groan, and Nancy sat down in another after moving it pointedly to a place some distance from where her husband was seated.
“You want a beer, lovey?” David asked. He wore the cringing look, all right.
“No,” Nancy smiled. “There’s what’s left of a pitcher of gin-and-tonic in the fridge. I’ll have some of that, please.”
“Permit me,” Jack said gallantly.
This time he mastered the deck, though not without lurching. While he was gone the Howells sat in total silence. Finally the good Dr. Richmond came back with the pitcher in one fist and a glass in the other, walking on a tightrope. He carefully poured from the pitcher and carefully handed the glass to Nancy.
“Thank you, Jack,” murmured Nancy.
“Think nothing of it, m’dear,” said their guest with a leer.
“Why in the devil,” growled David suddenly, “are you making whole pitchersful of gin-and-tonic in the middle of the day?”
“Because, darling,” Nancy replied after a hefty slug, “I had nothing to do and no one to do it with. Except to drink, which is something you can do beautifully alone. I know, dearest, that’s the way wives become alcoholics. Through boredom.”
“Oh-oh,” said Dr. Richmond.
“Hell,” said David Howell.
“And did you have a nice golf game?” Nancy purred.
“Yes, we did!” her husband said. “We played eighteen holes, and I shot a ninety-two.”
“Is that good, dear?”
“It’s not bad for a now-and-thenner,” he replied shortly.
“Oh, it’s very good,” said Jack Richmond.
“It must be exhausting to play eighteen holes of golf on a hot day,” Nancy said. “I suppose it’s practically essential afterward to have a large number of cold beers in the club bar?”
“It is far and away the most essential part of the whole business,” Jack said enthusiastically. “Sometimes, in fact, the golf can be dispensed with entirely.”
“What I would like to know,” David demanded, “is why you had to make so much. Were you planning an orgy or something?”
“So much what, darling?” Nancy said.