“That isn’t the kind of attitude that’s going to make me hurry back.”
“I should get used to your new rule, I guess. No matter what I say, it’s going to be wrong.”
Her long sigh was audible over the line. “Darling, let’s start this conversation over. We both love Leila. We’re both very worried about her. I would appreciate it if you would let me know what you find out. And I hope everything turns out for the best, and that she’s safe. And — please don’t take any chances over there, like flying around in some little airplane in bad weather looking for her.”
“I want to make certain they’re doing everything.”
“Please be nice to Jonathan.”
“For God’s sake, Lydia Jean!”
“Don’t try to shut him out. He’s as concerned as you are.”
“I’m not the one who goes around shutting people out.”
“We have such happy talks, don’t we, Sam?”
“So let’s try a new area. An old friend of yours will be looking you up next week.”
“Really? Who?”
“He had the needle out. And he was enjoying it. Maybe you can tell him your troubles.”
“Who are you talking about?”
“Big Tom Dorra.”
“Damn you, Sam! Damn you!”
“Did I say something wrong?”
“He is not an old friend and you know it. Do you really think I’d talk to him about us? He is physically repulsive to me. He looks — buttered. And he is absolutely convinced he’s God’s gift to womanhood.”
“You’re a legitimate target, Lyd. You turned yourself into a target by leaving me. So you’ve got to expect Tom Dorras to come around. And there isn’t a damn thing I can do about it.”
“Do you think I’m incapable of handling the situation?”
“Does it make any real difference? Tom D. will have a little smirk and a little wink for anybody who asks him if he saw you when he was up in Corpus.”
“So what fools believe is more important to you than what you know is true?”
“A lot of things I thought were true haven’t turned out so good.”
“So I’m supposed to come home just to keep you from feeling inadequate?”
“Honey, I’m adequate. Some day Tom Dorra will sign a testimonial to that effect if anybody asks him to. What’s the matter now?”
“I’m crying. Do I have your permission?”
“For the love of...”
“I don’t want to spoil the Sam Boylston image. Oh God, I thought we were getting somewhere the last time we talked.”
“The day you tell me exactly where we are supposed to be getting to, then we can start getting there. Try writing it down. It might help.”
“Good luck about Leila.”
“Thanks for calling.”
“Don’t mention it,” she said and hung up.
After thirty thoughtful seconds, he picked up the hand microphone, pressed the dictate button, and began to work his way through the stack of correspondence on his desk. After one false start, he pushed Lydia Jean and Leila back into storage cupboards in the back of his mind and closed those doors which would isolate them completely until he would be free to once again give them his attentions.
Chapter Eight
Crissy Harkinson arose a little before noon on the day after first taking the boy, Oliver Akard, into her bed. The double thicknesses of draperies kept the room in semi-darkness, the switch on the bedside phone had been turned off, and the little Cuban maid had long since been taught to work in silence until the coffee summons from the bedroom of the mistress released her from such constraint.
She remembered that her last glance at the luminous dial of the radio clock, just after the boy had slipped out onto the dark terrace and closed the sliding door, had shown that it was just four in the morning.
She trudged slowly, solidly, heavily, through the dressing room alcove and into her bath, touched the silent switch and, when the cruel lights flickered and went on, she stared mockingly and mercilessly at herself in the mirror, at the tangle of her hair, deep smudges of fatigue under her eyes, face slack under the tan, mouth pale and swollen — pulpy looking. Her body felt stretched and wearied and lamed. At thirty-six, my lady, she told herself, such a romping takes one hell of a toll, and he lives up to Kinsey’s report on that age group, and you have got your work cut out for you to hew your way quickly back down to that twenty-eight you damned well have to make him believe.
She started with an amphetamine, and then a long hot sudsy languid shower, turning to a very brisk cold shower. Then harshly astringent lotions, a soothing gentleness of cream, subtle care with the eye makeup, including the drops of magic which made them shine with the imitation of youth. The amphetamine had begun to hit, lifting her spirits, taking away the weariness which had seemed bone-deep, and after she had brushed and poked her almost-dry hair into the casual and youthful style which seemed to do the most for her this year, she selected and put on a pale, fitted, silver-blue housecoat with a fussy girlish frothiness of lace at the throat. She turned this way and that, smoothing the fabric down over her hips with the backs of her hands, moved a little closer to the mirror and gave herself what she called her Doris Day smile.
“You might just make it, kid,” she whispered.
She went to the bedroom intercom, pressed the lever and said, “Francisca?”
She heard the quick light sound of the girl’s approaching footsteps and then the merry voice of first greeting.
“I think maybe you could squeeze about three or four of those big oranges. Enough for a tall glass. And a pot of coffee.”
She went over and pulled on the drapery cords, hand over hand, opening the whole side of the bedroom to the bright day. She bent over the low broad bed and balled up the tangle of pale yellow sheets, carried them in and stuffed them into the hamper. From the linen closet she selected pale green sheets and pillow cases and tossed them onto the bed for Francisca to make it up. From the rug beside the bed she picked up the orange and white striped shift, shook it out, reflected with bitter humor she hadn’t gotten much use out of it this time, took it in and hung it up carefully.
When Francisca knocked and brought the tray in, Crissy Harkinson went to her chaise and sat and swung her legs up, and gave the maid a mechanical smile as she reached and took the tray with its short legs and set it across her thighs.
“Was come for a school theeng,” Francisca said. “Small girls on bicycle. Teekits to send off the music somewheres. One dollar from the bockus I give. Hokay?”
After a pause for comprehension, Crissy said, “That was fine, dear. Would you do the bed now, please?”
She unfolded the morning paper. Friday. The twentieth day of May. Her heart tilted for a moment, and she felt sick. It was beginning to be too long. Garry had guessed it might be two days, certainly not more than four. God, if it had gone wrong somehow, then the big chance was gone, and it was the only one you’d ever get, girl. The years are running the wrong way for you. If Garry messed it up, then you’re back to sweating out the other choices, all of them bad. There’s only one big thing left to go, and that’s this house, and when you sell it, you have three choices. Live the way you like to live on the money you get, and it will last maybe four years and then you are forty and you can decide whether it will be the sleeping pills or a cruddy little job, a cruddy little room, sore feet from standing all day behind a cruddy counter. Or invest the money and get some funny little income for life, and go see if any of the old contacts were still in the business and, out of pity or sentimentality, wanted to make room in the circuit for a one-time upper-level hooker who’d retired too many years ago, at the personal request of State Senator Ferris Fontaine. Or take the house money and make the gamble of building a front with it, maybe the tragic, youngish widow, obviously well provided for, demure as hell, visiting Hawaii or Acapulco or some damn place to try to take her mind off her grief, and then sort out the possibles and take dead aim at some old goof with a fat portfolio and stampede him into marriage, hoping his heart isn’t too damned sound. But what if the pigeon turned out to be canny enough to get her checked out first? Or what if he happened to be putting on a front with money as small as hers? Or what if he kept living another twenty-five years, so that when she finally got it — the total freedom and total security she’d wanted all her life — she’d be over sixty years old?