“...providing I am allowed enough privacy to get dressed.”
“All right, get double pneumonia.”
“Dear heaven!” Andrew said, and a door slammed.
Lucille walked down the hall, thinking, with a smile, of Edith. Poor Edith, she thrives on imminent catastrophes and likes to think of herself as the great Averter of them... I could do the menus and make out the shopping list for tomorrow... I wonder if Giles is allergic to anything...
She went into the small book-lined room that Andrew called his den. The sun hadn’t reached this side of the house yet and the room was gloomy and smelled of unused books.
She turned on a lamp and sat down in Andrew’s chair and stretched out her hand for a memo pad and a pencil. She began to plan the menus for the week, with one eye on rationing and the other on Annie’s limitations in the kitchen. Lobster, if available, and a roasting chicken. Mushrooms, or perhaps an eggplant.
She bent over the pad, frowning. She wanted everything to be perfect for Giles, not because he was Giles and about to marry Polly, but because she was Lucille. She had the subtle but supreme vanity that often masquerades under prettier names, devotion, unselfishness, generosity. It lay in the back of her mind, a blind, deaf and hungry little beast that must always be fed indirectly through a cord.
While she planned she drew pictures absently on the back of the memo pad. Vaguely through a sea of lobsters and shrimp she heard Edith’s voice calling her.
“Lucille, where on earth are you?”
“In here. In the den.”
Edith came rushing through the door with an air of challenging a high wind.
“I think Andrew’s caught a cold,” she said with a tragic gesture. “Today of all days. His face is quite flushed.”
“Excitement,” Lucille said. Edith was smoking, and her pallor, seen through a veil of smoke, reminded Lucille of oysters.
“Oysters,” she said.
Edith looked a little surprised. “I loathe oysters. Unless they’re covered with something and fried.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t like the color of the things.”
“Neither do I,” Lucille said calmly, and added oysters to the list.
“Though I wasn’t, as a matter of fact, talking about oysters,” Edith said with a certain coldness. “I was talking about Andrew. I think he should be sensible and stay home today.”
“Oh, leave him alone, Edith.” Seeing her sister-in-law’s color rise she added quickly, “Andrew hates to be babied. The best thing you and I can do is to stay out of everyone’s way. Leave the three of them together. In a way it’s their morning, we mustn’t interfere. For the present — we’re — we’re outsiders.”
Edith looked as if she were about to continue arguing, then with a sudden twist of her shoulders she turned and sat down on the edge of the desk.
“You’re so reasonable, Lucille,” she said, almost complainingly. “I don’t know how you do it, always putting yourself in some other person’s place and coming out with exactly the right solution. It’s extraordinary.”
“I’ve had a lot of practice.” Contented and smiling she leaned back and touched her hair lightly with the tips of her fingers. The little beast had been fed and had stopped gnawing for a moment.
A few minutes later Edith went out, and Lucille sat with the memo pad on her knee, patiently waiting for Andrew to come in and say good-bye to her. But he didn’t come.
He’s forgotten you.
Well, of course he has. He’s with his children. It’s their day, after all. I said it myself.
But he has forgotten you.
Well, of course. I’m not a dewy-eyed bride any more...
She got up and went to the window and stood waiting to catch a glimpse of him as he left the house. She saw the three of them going up the driveway, close together, arm in arm. With the snow whirling around them they seemed like a compact unit, indivisible and invulnerable.
While she watched, a squat dark cloud moved across the sun like a jealous old woman.
Lucille stood, wanting to cry out, “Andrew! Andrew, come back!” as she had cried out to Mildred in the dream.
But no sound came from her lips, and after a moment she went back to her chair and lighted a cigarette and picked up the memo pad again.
She looked down at the pictures she had drawn while she was planning the menus. They were women’s faces, the faces of fat silly kewpie-doll women. They smirked and simpered at her from the paper, and tossed their coy ringlets and fluttered their eyelashes.
Detachedly, almost absently, she burned out their eyes with the end of her cigarette.
Chapter 2
Around noon on Sunday, December fifth, the Montreal Flier was derailed about twenty miles from Toronto. The cause of the derailment was not known but it was hinted in the first radio reports that it was the work of saboteurs, for the train had been passing a steep bank at the time and the number of people killed and wounded was very high. Volunteer doctors and nurses were asked to come to Castleton, the nearest hospital.
Edith heard the news on the radio but paid little attention to it beyond thinking fleetingly that death and catastrophe were so common these days that one had to be personally involved to get excited over them.
“All volunteer doctors and nurses report at once to Castleton Hospital, King’s Highway number...”
She rose, yawning, and turned the radio off, just as Lucille came in.
“What was that?” Lucille asked.
“Some train wreck.”
“Oh. Lunch is ready. Any calls for Andrew this morning?”
“Two.” Years ago Edith had appointed herself to answer Andrew’s calls on Sunday. She said wistfully, “Remember the old days when I used to spend nearly the whole day at the phone?”
“Andrew is sensible not to work so hard,” Lucille said. “His assistant is perfectly capable.”
“Still it was rather fun to be so busy.”
“Not for Andrew.” She smiled, but she was annoyed with Edith for bringing the subject up. She and Edith, between them, had made the decision that Andrew was to retire, at least partially. Now that he had, Lucille was beginning to doubt her own wisdom. Andrew’s health was better but he had spells of moodiness.
“Doctors are too hard on themselves,” she said, as if to convince herself. “That’s why so many of them die young.”
“Don’t talk about dying young. It upsets my digestive tract.” She turned away, biting her lower lip. “It makes me think of Mildred... I can’t help wishing you hadn’t referred to her this morning, especially in front of Polly.”
“I’m really sorry. It just slipped out.”
“You’ll have to be careful. She might not want Giles to know how — how Mildred died.”
“She’s probably told him already.”
“No, no, I don’t think so. Such a terrible thing.” Edith closed her eyes and Lucille saw that the lids were corpse-gray with the blue veins growing on them like mold.
“So bloody,” Edith said. “So — bloody. I... really...”
“Edith, you mustn’t.” Lucille put out her hand and touched Edith’s thin pallid arm. “Come along and have your lunch.”
“I couldn’t eat a thing.”
“Certainly you can.”
“No. Just remembering it upsets me...”
“We’ll see,” Lucille said, a trifle grimly.
She walked out, leaving Edith to wander wispily behind her like a little unloved ghost.
Lucille estimated the situation and acted as usual with good sense. Given any sympathy or encouragement Edith would mope herself into indigestion or a migraine.
“Sweetbreads for lunch,” Lucille said cheerfully.