“All right, all right,” Grant said. “Let’s knock it off. Get with lunch, okay?”
Belle hurried into the kitchen, fighting back her tears. She felt as if her whole body had been assaulted and bruised — he could hurt her without even trying to, she thought bitterly. The fact that he didn’t try to made it worse. All men know that trick. They were born knowing it.
She took the bottle of rum from the pantry and poured herself a long drink. Why shouldn’t I? she thought. He doesn’t care what I do. I’m like a dumb animal as far as he’s concerned. A pat on the head, a kick in the ribs — neither gesture had any feeling in it.
Duke limped into the kitchen a little later and she raised her glass to him. “First today.”
He didn’t bother to answer her. Filling a tumbler with rum, he turned back into the living room. “Laughing boy,” Belle muttered, and raised her glass.
As Duke settled himself into a chair the stairway door opened and the nurse stepped into the room. “How’s the kid?” he said.
“She’s asleep, but she feels quite cool. I’m just going to heat her bottle.”
“I told you there was nothing to worry about.”
“Yes, she seems better.” She waited for him to continue, but he was obviously bored with the subject; picking up a magazine, he began to leaf through it, occasionally reading a title aloud in a flat, listless voice. The nurse turned, met Hank’s eyes briefly and walked into the kitchen.
“This’ll send you,” Duke said. “How To Keep Your Wife’s Love After Forty. You need a little help in that department, Eddie?”
Hank stood up and Grant said, “Where are you going?”
“I thought I’d shave. Okay?”
“Yeah — go ahead.”
As Hank started up the stairs Duke said, “There’s the old man’s training for you. Clean minds in clean bodies.”
“He sounds real interesting,” Grant said.
Duke dropped the magazine on the floor and took another long swallow from his drink. He felt the rum burning in his stomach, and then the sensuous heat moving slowly and pleasurably downward, warming his belly and his loins.
“We’ll get the news from Creasy in a few hours,” Grant said. He sat forward on the edge of the chair, his elbows resting on his knees. “We’ll know if the Bradleys have the dough. After that there’s nothing but the pickup.”
“They’ll have it,” Duke said. “They want the kid back.” He lit a cigarette, then settled himself comfortably in his chair and flipped the burnt match in a high and accurate arc toward the fireplace. From where he sat he could watch the nurse working at the kitchen sink. It was a pleasant sight; a square of sunlight struck the wall beside her and its reflections gleamed like tiny jewels in her silky black hair. She wore a white silk blouse with short sleeves, and a skirt that fitted her neat waist and hips without a wrinkle — sprayed on, he thought, smiling faintly.
“I wish to hell we didn’t have to let Creasy handle the pickup,” Grant said.
Duke noticed that she had changed her pumps for slippers — high heels were probably too noisy in the baby’s room. That must be it. His thoughts drifted around her pleasantly and languorously. She wasn’t sexy. You couldn’t call a blouse and skirt a sexy outfit. But something about her got to him.
“Creasy’s a sharp little character,” Grant said.
“Sure he is,” Duke said.
“And the pickup plan is perfect. Even if the cops were in on this they couldn’t cover it.”
Duke was staring at the girl, his lips curving in a smile, his eyes soft and sleepy.
“But I’d rather be there myself,” Grant said. “I’m going stale here.” He flexed his arms and shoulders and drew in his stomach. “Too many starches, too much sitting around. I’d like to spend some time on a beach. Get a tan. You ever notice how a few days in the sun makes you look younger?” Grant fumbled for his cigarettes. “Look, Duke, you think Creasy can handle the pickup?”
“What?” Duke was paying very little attention to Grant: his worried voice was nothing but a droning accompaniment to Duke’s lazy thoughts.
“You think Creasy can handle it? Hey! Are you asleep?”
“No, just dozing. Yeah, Creasy’s all right.” The nurse was measuring something into a spoon and with her arms raised he could follow the soft curve of her breast against the silken blouse. He remembered the time they had been together in the Bradleys’ bedroom. Everything came back to him with a curious vividness; he could close his eyes and see the cool, spacious room, the uncompromisingly suggestive pinks and blacks of the color scheme; he could almost feel the thick nap of the carpeting under his shoes, and smell the faint but compelling scent of the perfume that permeated the air. And she had been clean and sweet in her white uniform, chatting away innocently with him, unaware of his sudden, reckless need for her...
“Duke? You think Creasy will get ideas about an extra slice of the money?”
“Why not?” Duke said irritably. Grant’s voice was becoming a nuisance, a nagging interruption. “People always get ideas. That’s why they’re always in trouble.”
“That’s all he’ll get then — ideas,” Grant said.
When she had come into the nursery (almost taking him by surprise) he had caught her from behind — an arm around her body and a hand on her mouth to cut off her screams. She had fought and squirmed like a wildcat. Duke took a slow sip from his drink. The slim light body straining against him had been very exciting: he remembered that he had almost been sorry when the fight went out of her.
Duke put his glass down and sat up straight in his chair.
“You bring any cards?” he asked Grant.
“No, I wasn’t planning to stay, you know.”
“You picked the nice end of the deal. Waiting in New York wouldn’t be so bad. You could at least get a drink and the papers.”
“We won’t be here much longer.”
“Great,” Duke said. He could feel a restless ferment in his breast. The need for whiskey, the conflict with Grant, the wait that stretched ahead of him — it all seemed to be churning inside his head.
The girl left the kitchen and started up the stairs. She wasn’t wearing stockings, he noticed; the fine down on her legs gleamed brightly as she stepped through a splash of sunlight. Her skin was very white. He watched her as she went up the stairs, studying the fluid swing of her hips and the delicate muscles drawing together in the backs of her slim legs. Innocent, hell. She knew what she was doing, he thought as his turbulent, illogical anger suddenly found a channel deep enough for its pounding violence.
“I’m going up to keep an eye on my brother,” he said to Grant. His voice was casual and Grant didn’t look up from the magazine he had been leafing through. “Good idea,” he said, turning a page.
Hank heard his brother’s heavy limping footsteps as he was drying his face awkwardly with his one good hand. He put the towel over the rack and then stood completely still, following Duke’s progress along the hallway. A door opened, creaking faintly through the silent house, and he knew from the sound which room Duke had entered — the one the nurse and child were using.
Hank stepped into the hall and stared at the closed door of the nurses’s room, caught in a paralyzing inertia. It was the fear of Duke that held him, the fear that had been part of him all his life; like the color of his eyes and skin, it was something that would never change. And with the fear there was guilt. Together they formed a ruthless twisted syllogism: Duke deserved the breaks, so keep out of his way and let him have everything he wanted — if you had this beaten into you a sufficient number of times it began to make a crazy kind of sense...
And then he heard a cry from the nurse’s room. The sound was smothered abruptly, but by then he was moving down the hallway, his paralysis snapped by the desperation in her voice. He wasn’t aware of his decision until the door opened under his hand and he saw them struggling together in the middle of the darkened room. Duke held her against him with one arm, his free hand forcing her head back at a sharp angle. She was helpless against his effortless strength; her arms were locked against her sides and her slippered feet churned futilely in the air.