Authors: Thomas Tryon
One morning I’d been hard at work since seven when just before noon the phone rang.
“Good morning,” came that inimitable voice, “do I disturb you?”
“Not a bit. I was about to take a break and come up, as a matter of fact.”
“For lunch, I hope. And do hurry. There’s someone here dying to see you. Two someones, in fact.”
She wouldn’t say who and wouldn’t stay on the line. I went as I was: shorts, T-shirt, and moccasins. As I came onto the pool esplanade I saw two women seated under the umbrella having tea. One of them jumped up shouting “Chazzz!” in a well-whiskied baritone, then came clacking and teetering toward me on plastic spring-o-laters, dangling ten red nails at me.
It was Angie, and with her, for Pete’s sake—Belinda, looking as fetching as ever! When I kissed her cheek, I heard Maude’s laughter behind me. “Leave him alone, girls, I found him, he’s all mine now.”
“Wait a sec—
I
saw him first,” said Angie with her old-time bounciness. “Anyway, you’ve had your turn, now it’s mine.”
There was a lot of good-natured joking, Maude obviously delighted to have the two younger women there. Belinda had arrived with the best news possible: Frank had telephoned night before last, saying the part in
The Light in the Window
was hers at last; shooting would start early in the summer. I congratulated her—it was a plum role. While she glowed at the thought of doing it, I could see that the idea of facing the cameras again in something this important was also frightening to her. Angie had picked up on this and we kidded her along, telling her how great it was going to be and how it would really transform her career.
Maude listened to all this with quiet approval and I could see the pride she felt, for Belinda was not just a former daughter-in-law to her but a real daughter whom she wanted to love and protect. Then, with her usual tact, she turned to Angie, suggesting that they go inside. “Come along, darling, you said you wanted to see my new paintings. Now’s your chance.” And they disappeared into the glass-doored studio.
I moved closer to Belinda and gave her the once-over. “It seems that desert life agrees with you, lady. You look—wonderful.”
And that was truth to tell. If Angie had gone a little to late-August meadow, not so Belinda. She was still a missionary’s downfall, cool, tanned, soft-crisp, clear as a Maine lake, head back, laughing like a schoolgirl. A woman like Belinda wears well; crow’s feet, sure, a pale network of wrinkles, her face was a definite map of well-traveled roads. But she was all there, all put together, everything in the right place. How did she do it, I asked myself; what had kept this woman whole, where did she get her glow? I was so glad to see her, glad to see how well she was taking care of herself these days. Only people who had something to live for did that. And of course I recognized Frank’s hand in it all—and Angie’s.
“Long time no see, Chazz,” she said, smiling as she returned my kiss. I kissed her again, harder; after all, there were certain vested interests here, weren’t there? Hadn’t we shared bed-and-board in some earlier life?
Bloodied but unbowed, that was Blindy. “She’s won,” I thought. But of course she’d have had to, being a winner all the way. That she was—Echo Park’s gift to the movies and all of manhood, the girl who used to sing for nickels outside the Four-Square Gospel Temple, rattling a tambourine like Little Nellie Kelly. “What a glorious sight—my God, my eyes are really sore.”
“I’ll bet you tell that to all the girls.” She leaned forward and touched my hand. “You don’t look so bad yourself. And, Charlie, you have no idea how I’ve longed to see you. And how nice to have you here as Maude’s star boarder.”
I thanked her for her help in arranging things, then brought her up to date on Jenny’s activities. Belinda made sympathetic comments about my state of marital disarray, and when I vouchsafed doubts as to whether Jen and I would ever get back together again, she grew thoughtful. I knew she was thinking about the debris of her own marriages: one, Dick, the air-force pilot; two, Perry Antrim; three, Grant Potter. Would there be a fourth? And if so, would it be Frank Adonis?
“How’s the golf game?” I asked, deliberately deflecting my thought.
“Super. Never played better. How do you like the new model?” She got up and exhibited her hard-won figure.
I nodded. Indeed, I could see how all things were working to lift her out of the morass into which she’d once sunk. Ruefully I recalled the wreck of a woman whom I’d accidentally stumbled on one rainy night in Murray Hill, singing “Big Wide Wonderful World” in a neighborhood bar, and how affected I’d been by that bedraggled sight. And now, thirteen years later… what a change.
We fell into easy conversation, centering, naturally enough, on Angie, Maude, Frank, and, of course, the Program. Alcoholics Anonymous was a special link between us, we were still both “friends of Bill.”
Later, Belinda went to help Maude with lunch—Ling had taken the Rolls in for servicing—leaving me and Angie to do some catching up on our own.
“Belinda tells me you two’ve been having some time of it,” I said. “She really looks terrific, doesn’t she?”
Angie was all enthusiasm. “I just love that gal, she’s such a peach. We had the best time at Scottsdale.” The voice was the husky one I’d known from the old days. “And, Chazz, how about her and Frank? Did you ever think it would happen?”
I pondered that. Had I ever? Yes, I supposed I had, maybe—sometime. “Do I smell orange blossoms?” I inquired.
“Gosh, I don’t know, nothing’s been mentioned. You know me, I never like to pry. And anyway…”
“Yes?”
“Well, there’s Faun to consider. Now that she’s come back.”
“Oh? Is Faun—‘back’? To stay?”
Angie shrugged. “Who knows? She’s mercurial. To say the least.”
“I guessed as much.”
Angie ran her lacquered nails through her hair and shook her head; then she sighed. “Oh God, Chazz, if you only knew. If the world only knew.”
“The world does, doesn’t it? Know a lot, I mean.”
“I guess so, but that’s not Belinda’s fault. They’re always snooping around her personal life. They’ve had it in for her for so long. And don’t forget, little Faunie was always good at making the headlines on her own.”
“No,” I said, truthfully. “I haven’t forgotten.” Arson, stabbing, other felonies; no, I haven’t forgotten.
Faun Antrim was scarcely the ideal offspring. For longer than I seemed to recall, she’d been Belinda’s
bête noire
, upsetting the applecart at every turn, and I could only wonder if she was planning to go on making trouble forever. I couldn’t say that until recently Belinda had been the best of mothers, but now, from all reports, she was really trying. Having got her own self straightened out, she was struggling to help Faun. The trouble was, so far as I could make things out, that it was simply too late.
Not that it would have been an easy matter to pinpoint when and where Belinda had gone wrong with her daughter. Faun had been a model child through her eighth year, at which point something seemed to have snapped and her behavior changed so drastically that people found it hard believing she was the same girl. She became highly emotional, demanded her own way, was impossible to handle. Measures had been taken. First she was placed in the hands of a highly recommended doctor of psychiatry who initially declared himself pleased with the progress the child was making, then after eighteen months gave up in disgust. Next came an expensive private school specializing in boilerplate cases, where Faun created so many disturbances that the mistress of the place “reluctantly” let her go. After that, a series of private tutors and instructors was hired, each in turn coming to the house to tutor the girl in school subjects as well as sports and deportment. One of these instructors had been that hapless Bucky Eaton on whom Faun developed a serious crush, and when he repelled her advances, she took steps to punish him, burning the stables down, stabbing him, and falsely accusing him of rape.
Desperate, Belinda next sent the girl to stay with friends in Surrey, where she could indulge her lively passion for horses, and when this move turned out badly she was shipped off to Switzerland, to the most fashionable girls’ school in Lausanne. Things, however, had
not
worked out on the shores of Lake Geneva.
I was about to ask Angie another question when her scarlet-lacquered nails flew to her mouth in surprise. Turning, I saw standing in the doorway a figure slightly reminding me of the young Lana Turner making her entrance in
The Postman Always Rings Twice
, a young woman who gave the impression of a blank near-prettiness, filling out a white halter and shorts, a towel wound around her head turban fashion and wearing plastic mules with spike heels. Her physical endowments were generously displayed, and the whole effect of sexiness was underscored by a healthy tan that had obviously required a good deal of time and effort to acquire. The eyes were hidden by dark glasses, so I had only the mouth to go by. Pretty, luscious, but mean, I thought. Strictly forbidden fruit.
“There you are, Faun,” Angie said smoothly, “we were just wondering where you’d got to. Will you come and meet our friend?” She gave my name and I partly rose in my chair.
“Hello there, nice to see you,” I said noncommittally.
I still couldn’t see her eyes, but she nodded as she slouched across the tiling to throw herself into a convenient chair. “Hello,” she returned with a pout. “I guess you heard all about me from God’s gift to the cowboys here. Talk about a round-up—you should have seen this one in Phoenix.” She stuck her tongue out at Angie—not the best impression she could have made—then reached across me to snag one of Angie’s cigarettes, using her lighter to light it. Blowing out an exaggerated stream of smoke through the curled tube of her pink tongue, she gave me what might possibly pass for a smile and said: “How did we manage to get you into the menagerie? Are you the new zookeeper?”
I explained that I was the tenant of the Cottage. “Another one,” she said, and blew some more smoke. “Watch out, they’ll have you washing windows before you’re done.” She raised her glasses and directed Angie a mocking look. “He looks about your speed, Angie dear; I suppose you’ll be shacking up down there like you did with the Olympic team that year.”
“What a sweet thing to say,” Angie replied. “You must have taken your nice pills this morning.” She gave Faun’s cheek a pinch, only to have her hand slapped away angrily. Faun flicked her cigarette away across the lawn and gave me another lemony slice of smile.
“I hear your wife left you for another man,” she said. “Too bad. Though, did you ever stop to think maybe you unloaded her at the right time? Exactly what do you do, anyway?” She might as well have asked, “How much money do you make?” Another cloud of smoke. Angie delivered me a silent plea.
“I’m a writer,” I said.
“Jeez, another one—what kind?”
“Well, several kinds,” I returned, trying to keep it light.
Angie dipped her oar again. “Charlie writes movies and plays and novels—all kinds of things. Who knows, he may just put you in a book, kitten.”
“Kitten,” I suspected, had long sharp claws and loved to drag them across the silk upholstery. I watched as she ran her tongue along her lips, top and bottom, then formed her mouth into a little O.
“If he writes movies, why doesn’t he write one for Mummy? God knows she could use a job.”
“Your mother
has
a job, she doesn’t need me.”
Just then Belinda came out between the sliding glass studio doors. She had changed her clothes and was wearing a short tommy coat with a bathing suit underneath. “There you are, Faun. Have you two met? Good. Chazz, be an angel—Ling’s not back yet, and Maude could use a strong arm to carry out the lunch tray.”
I was up and moving in an instant and I heard Faun mutter something about me as she went off toward the studio. “What a nerd,” is what she said.
That was a new one on me. When I returned with the tray, the four of us gathered around the umbrella table to eat the giant salad that Ling had left for us. We didn’t miss Faun at lunch—it was far easier to talk without her there.
Presently Faun reappeared in the far doorway of the studio. She’d put on a bright pink bikini that must have been dipped in Day-Glo. Aware that we were watching, she tripped over to the diving board, gave a little spring, and neatly executed a swan-dive. When I admired her form, Belinda seemed pleased.
“She’s always been good in the water—takes after her grandmother.” She patted Maude’s hand affectionately. “I even hoped for a minute she might do something with it, but—” She stopped and dealt with her salad. As the talk rolled on, I kept mum, letting the women carry the ball. Maude demanded a full rundown on the golf tournament—she herself had played the game until her last siege of back trouble. Then, when the subject of golf was exhausted, she asked Belinda, “What news of Frank? Did he get to Scottsdale?”
Belinda nodded, and Angie chimed in. “Of
course
he did—he won’t leave the girl’s side these days. Frankie’s in love—I mean he’s
in love
!”
She glanced over at Faun, who in the interim had performed several more dives—for our benefit, I thought. As she surfaced after yet another one, I caught the expression on her face and got the impression that she didn’t care much for our friend Frank. After a while she got up and dragged the blue plastic float to the far corner of the pool. I’ll say one thing, it was a gorgeous figure, everything inherited from her mother. Lying supine on the inflated mattress, one knee bent, she resembled one of those suntan-lotion ads, like a giant billboard plastered up above Sunset Boulevard. It was in the genes, all right; plus the athleticism Perry had been famous for. Still, I had the feeling she was completely conscious of her effect, was in fact striving to achieve it. She’d move her arm or straighten the one leg and change the angle of the other, or do something with her hair, sometimes hum along as her little plastic radio played.
When lunch was done Maude disappeared for her customary nap and I said I should be getting back to work. Angie offered to see me home, and as we walked down the steps to the Cottage, we continued where we’d left off talking about Belinda.