“You’re being unpleasant,” Alice said coldly. “Sorry I can’t stay to hear the rest.”
Johnny stared at Philip, bewildered. “What in hell’s got into you? I’ve never heard you talk like this.”
“He wants me to coax him to stay,” Alice said with an ugly smile. “And I didn’t. And I don’t intend to. I’ve quit my job as wet-nurse to the artistic temperament.”
She walked to the door, her legs weak and heavy with rage.
When she closed the door she could hear Philip’s voice begin again, a smooth drone. She walked slowly up the stairs and the drone became fainter and fainter and died so gradually that there was no moment of death, only a vanishing.
She sat down on the top step, too feeble to go on. She covered her face with her hands, but a minute later she was on her feet again. Someone might come along the hall and see you. Don’t give yourself away to anyone. Keep yourself to yourself. Forever and ever. Amen.
The control she had forced on her body spread to her mind. She repeated silently to herself the comforting formula she used in bad moments. “I am Alice. I am Alice Heath.”
Chapter 4
She rapped on Kelsey’s door and Kelsey’s voice rang out sharply.
“Who’s there?”
“Alice.”
“Oh.” There was a pause, then a grudging, “Well, come in.”
Alice opened the door. The room was murky with twilight and Kelsey lay on the lounge melting into the darkness like a ghost.
Alice turned on the lamp beside the bed. Kelsey heard the click as it went on and turned her head slowly toward the light.
“Why did you put the light on?” she said.
“I wanted to talk to you.”
“I don’t need lights, Alice. The night is my time. In the night you’re no better than I am.”
Alice sat down at the end of the lounge. “Don’t talk like that. You’ll only get excited.”
Kelsey’s eyes brooded on the lamp, sullen and unblinking, eyes that were unfaded and looked as good as new.
“You’re no better than I am in the dark, Alice. You have to listen too, sift out the sounds. You have only your ears like me.”
“Kelsey...”
“Remember how I used to be afraid of the dark?” She put out her hand to Alice and clutched her. “Well, I still am. I’m still afraid of the dark. I want to scream and scream and tear away this black curtain. I’m afraid of it. I can hear the night coming at me in waves... What are your eyes like, Alice? I forget your eyes sometimes.”
Alice drew in her breath. “Brown,” she said gravely, “like a cow’s.”
“I see them in the wall, but they may have changed. Oh, yes, your eyes are in the wall, soft like a doe’s.”
The fingers clutched at Alice’s arm, tight and hot. “If I wanted one of your doe eyes, you’d give it to me?”
“Please...”
“Why, you’re crying!” Kelsey said. “Aren’t you?”
“No.”
“I believe you’d give me one of your eyes.”
“Yes.”
“Ah, but I can’t take it, so you’re safe. You’re safe. Everybody’s safe but me, closed in here in the darkness by myself, lonely.”
“If you... if you wouldn’t talk like this or think like this — Kelsey, please. If you’d learn to go out with Prince you could be — be more independent. You could go out for long walks by yourself if you liked.”
“With a dog for my eyes?”
“Better than nothing,” Alice said with bitterness.
“For you, perhaps, for you anything is better than nothing. But not for me. There’s nothing for me, no miracle, no operation, no hope.”
Alice got up and began to walk about the room, her arms folded across her breasts. She said silently, “I am Alice Heath,” but the formula failed her. It always failed her in her relations with Kelsey, it couldn’t fortify her against the love-pity-hate she felt for Kelsey, undo all those years when she had looked after her and been jealous of her and proud of her.
Kelsey’s eyes followed the sound of her steps up and down the room.
“Don’t prowl,” she said after a time.
Alice swung around, her arms falling to her sides. “I have something to tell you.”
“Oh?”
“About Philip.”
Kelsey rolled her head impatiently. “Is it the usual? Am I to be nicer to him? Don’t you ever get tired of being Philip’s advocate?”
“He’s going away.”
“So?” Kelsey said mockingly. “Where is he going?”
“New York, I think.”
“Why?”
“Because you don’t intend to marry him,” Alice said.
“Intelligent of him to find that out.”
“I urged him to leave. I don’t think the two of you could make a go of it. He can’t stand up to you. He’s too sensitive, on his own account and on yours.”
“Poor weak Philip, eh?” Kelsey said, smiling.
“There’s no reason why he should stay, Kelsey. You haven’t been in love with him for a long time; perhaps never, I don’t know. Don’t ask him to stay this time.”
“And you want him to go?” Kelsey said. “You really do, Alice?”
“Of course.”
“You liar, Alice.” She sat up and her eyes sought the sounds that were Alice to her. “You liar! You puling little lovesick...”
“No! Please!”
“Do you thing I’m deaf?” Kelsey screamed. “Can’t I hear you gasp over his name like a breathless adolescent? Can’t I hear you purring over him? ‘That was lovely, Philip.’ ‘Please explain this, Philip.’ You say Philip as if it were a watchword, a prayer, little Jesus James!”
“I don’t,” Alice said, gasping. “You’re wrong. I don’t — think anything of him.”
“All these months I’ve listened to your love-sounds and it’s made me sick, do you hear? It makes me vomit to hear your soft sighs and the catch in your voice.”
She got up from the couch and stumbled toward Alice with her hands out.
“Do you hear me? Are you still there? Thank God I can’t see! Thank God I don’t have to look at your face drooling with love, and your eyes sick and tender and stupid like a cow’s.”
“You can’t,” Alice said, “you can’t say these things to me!” She put out her hand to touch Kelsey but Kelsey felt the movement and drew back.
“Get out of my room, Alice. Sneak back to my lover. You, Alice with your two good eyes, get out of my room.”
She raised her hand and pointed. “Get out.”
There was a silence, then the hiss of Alice’s breathing, and Kelsey’s voice, torn into shreds. “Alice?”
“Yes.”
“I am pointing to the door?”
“Almost,” Alice said quietly. “Pretty nearly. You have a good sense of direction.”
“But I wasn’t pointing right at the door?”
“No.”
Kelsey threw out her arms wildly and her right hand struck Alice’s shoulder. With a cry of pain Alice staggered back.
Almost instantly Kelsey was quiet again.
“Ah,” she said in a pleased voice. “I hit you, didn’t I? Not on purpose. It was an accident, but I’m not sorry for it. I had to do something to you, didn’t I, for getting Philip away from me?”
“No,” Alice said. “Philip doesn’t know I’m alive.”
“Oh, but I know that!” Kelsey cried. “I must punish you just for trying.”
She leaned over and groped with her hands until she found the bed. “There. I am not lost any more. Go and bring Ida, Alice.”