Once in a Lifetime (16 page)

"Put her in a home." It became a familiar refrain between the two, but it wasn't until Daphne bought the apartment on East Sixty-ninth Street that she developed a plan, and she faced Barbara with it, her eyes filled with excitement.

"Christ, Daphne, I can't."

"Yes, you can." She wanted Barbara to move into her old apartment.

"I can't support us both."

"Wait till you hear the rest of my idea." She offered her a full-time job, at a handsome salary that she could well afford.

"Work for you? Are you serious?" Barbara's eyes had lit up like a summer sky. "Do you mean it?"

"I do, but don't think I'm doing you a favor. I need you, dammit. You're the only thing that keeps my life running smoothly. And I'm not going to take no for an answer." Barbara had felt her heart soar within her, but she was terrified, too. What about her mother?

"I don't know, Daff. I'll have to think it over."

"I've already thought it out for you." Daphne grinned at her. "You can't have the job unless you move out from your mother. How's that for a stiff deal?" It was and they both knew it, but after a month of tormenting herself over what Daphne said, she got up the guts to do it. Daphne gave her two stiff drinks, and took her over in a cab to her apartment. She dropped her off with a hug and a kiss and told her she could do it. "It's your life, Barbara. Don't blow it. She doesn't give a damn about you, and you've paid your debt. Don't forget that. How much more can you give? ... How much more do you want to?" Barbara already knew the answer. For the first time in years she saw a light at the end of the tunnel, and she ran for it as hard and as fast as she could. She went upstairs and told her mother she was moving out, and she refused to accept the threats or the vengeance or the insults or the blackmail.

Her mother moved to a home the following month, and although she never admitted it to Barbara, she actually came to enjoy it. She was with people her own age, and she had a whole circle of cronies to whom she could complain about her selfish daughter. And when Daphne's new apartment was ready, Barbara took over her old place, and she felt as though she had finally been released from prison. She smiled now as she remembered the feeling. She woke up every morning with a light heart and a feeling of freedom, made coffee in the sunny little kitchen, stretched out on her bed, feeling as though she owned the world, and she used what had been Andrew's bedroom as an office whenever she brought work home, which was often. She worked for Daphne every day from ten in the morning until five o'clock, and when she went home she always took stacks of work with her.

"Don't you have anything else to do, for chrissake? Why don't you leave that here?" But as Daphne said it she was sitting at her own desk, preparing to work until the wee hours of the morning. The two were well matched, but neither of them had a normal life, and all that Barbara wanted out of life was to repay her for what she had done. She had helped her to free herself of her mother. But Daphne also realized that there was another danger, that Barbara would turn her habit for devotion and slavery toward Daphne.

"Just don't treat me like your mother!" she ranted teasingly when Barbara would appear with lunch on a tray when Daphne was working.

"Oh, shut up."

"I mean it, Barb. You've been taking care of someone else all your life. Take care of yourself for a change. Make yourself happy."

"I do. I enjoy my job, you know. In spite of what a pain in the ass you are to work for." Daphne would grin at her distractedly and go back to work, working at her typewriter from noon until three or four in the morning.

"How the hell can you work like that?" Barbara would watch her in amazement. She never stopped, except once in a great while for a cup of coffee, or to go to the bathroom. "You'll destroy your health working like that."

"No, I won't. It makes me happy." But happy wasn't a word Barbara would ever have used to describe her. There was always something in Daphne's eyes that said she hadn't been happy in years, except right after she had seen Andrew. But the events of her life were etched deep into her eyes, and the ache she still felt over the people she had lost never really left her. She put the joy and satisfaction she felt from her work between her and the ghosts that she lived with, but they were always there, and it showed, although she seldom spoke of it to Barbara.

But when she was alone in her office sometimes, she would sit and look out the window, her mind far away ... in New Hampshire with John, or a place she had been to with Jeff ... or in spite of the iron control she kept over herself, her eyes would mist over with memories of Aimee. It was a side of her no one saw, and she was careful that they didn't, but she admitted her innermost feelings to Barbara, about what her life had been like at various times, and how much she missed it, the people she had lost, like John and Jeff and Aimee. And always, always, she would talk about Andrew and how much she missed him. But, she had a different life now than she had had when Andrew lived at home. A life filled with work and accomplishment and success, publishers and publicity people, and her agent. She had a good head for business, which she hadn't realized before, and she exercised her craft well, with a deft pen and a good sense for what her readers wanted. The only thing she hated about her work was the promotional appearances she occasionally had to do, because she didn't want anyone prying into her personal life, or asking about Andrew. She wanted to protect him from all that. There was nothing about her personal life that Daphne wanted to share with the world, and she felt that her books spoke for themselves, but she recognized that her publishers felt the publicity was important. The issue came up again when she was asked to do The Conroy Show in Chicago and she hesitated, gnawing on a pencil.

"What do you want me to tell them, Daff? Do you want to go to Chicago tomorrow?" They had been bugging Barbara all morning and she had to give them an answer.

"In a word?" She grinned, rubbing her neck. She had worked late the night before on her new book and this morning she was tired. But it was a kind of tired she liked, the book was going well, and there was a sense of pleasure she always had with what she did. She didn't mind the ache in her back, or the inevitable pains in her shoulders. "No, I don't want to go to Chicago. Call George Murdock at Harbor and ask him if he thinks it's important." But she already knew the answer. Even though they were between books just then, publicity was always important, and The Conroy Show in Chicago was a biggie.

Barbara came back five minutes later with a rueful smile. "Do you really want to know what he said?"

"No, I don't."

"I figured." Barbara watched her sink into a comfortable chair with a sigh as she lay her head back against the soft white cushion. "Why do you work so damn hard, Daff? You can't run away forever." She still looked like a little girl as she sat there, but there was an undeniable aura of womanhood too, no matter how determined she was to deny it. She was kind to everyone who entered her life, her publishers, her agent, her secretary, her few well-chosen friends, her son, the people at the school, the other children. She was kind to everyone but herself. Of herself she demanded murderous goals, and almost unbearable standards. She worked fifteen hours a day, was always patient, interested, warm. The only warmth denied was to herself. She never really let anyone near her. There had been too much pain in her life, too much loss, and now the walls were around her forever. Barbara thought it again as she watched the still form in the hospital bed, and the echo of Daphne's words rang in her head.

"I'm not running away, Barb. I'm building a career, that's different."

"Is it? Looks the same to me."

"Maybe so." With Barbara she was usually honest. "But it's for a good cause." She was building up a fortune for Andrew. He would need it some day and she wanted his life to be easy. Everything she did seemed to center around Andrew.

"I've heard that story before. But you've made enough for Andrew by now, Daff. Why don't you think of yourself for a change?"

"I do."

"Oh, yeah? When?"

"For about ten seconds when I wash my face in the morning." She smiled at her confidante and friend. There were some things Daphne didn't like to talk about. "So they want me to go to Chicago, huh?"

"Can you get away from the book?"

"If I have to."

"So we go?"

"I don't know." She frowned and looked out the window before glancing back at Barbara. "I'm worried about that show. I've never been on it, and I don't really want to."

"Why?" But Barbara suspected the reason for her answer. Bob Conroy threw a lot of curves, and he was a prober. He had an extraordinary research team, and he had a knack for digging up bits and pieces of people's pasts, and confronting them with them on national television. She knew that Daphne was afraid that would happen. She had gone to great pains to keep her own story private. She never talked about Jeff, or Aimee, and she was violent on the subject of Andrew. She never wanted him subjected to idle curiosity or gossip. He lived a happy secluded life at the Howarth School in New Hampshire, and he had no idea that he had a famous mother. "Are you afraid of Conroy, Daff?"

"Honestly? Yes. I don't want a lot of old stuff to come out." Her eyes were huge and blue and sad as she looked at Barbara. "It's nobody's business what happened in my life. You know how I feel about it."

"Yes, but you can't keep everything a secret forever. What if it did come out, would that be so awful?"

"For me, yes. I don't want anyone's pity, and neither will Andrew. We don't need it." She straightened her back and sat up in her chair, looking nervous and defiant.

"All it would probably do is make your readers love you more." She knew better than anyone how much they already did. She answered all of Daphne's fan mail. Daphne had a way of pouring out her soul in her books, so that her readers felt they knew her. In fact, they knew her better than she liked to admit, the secrets of her soul were what made her books real, but she passed them off as fiction.

"I don't want them to love me more. I want them to love the books."

"Maybe there's no difference."

Daphne nodded silently from where she sat and then she stood up with a sigh. "I guess I have no choice. If I don't go, I'll never hear the end of it from George Murdock. They've been trying to get me on that show for the last year." She looked at Barbara then with a smile. "Want to come? They have some nice shops in Chicago."

"Do you want to spend the night?"

"Sure." She had a favorite hotel now, as she did in. almost every major city. They were always the quietest, most conservative and yet always the most elegant hotels in each city. Hotels where dowagers wore sable coats, and people spoke in hushed whispers. She ordered room service in her room, and enjoyed the comforts of what her work brought her. She had grown into it well, and she had to admit that there were aspects of her success that pleased her greatly. She no longer had to worry about money, she knew Andrew's future was secure. She had invested well, and she bought expensive clothes and antiques, and paintings she liked whenever she had the opportunity. But at the same time there was nothing showy about Daphne. She didn't use her money to flaunt her success., she didn't throw lavish parties, or try to impress her friends. It was all very quiet and simple and solid. And in a funny way, she knew that it was exactly what Jeffrey and John would have expected. She had grown up well, and knowing that pleased her.

"You're on the show at ten o'clock. Do you want to go in the morning or in the afternoon? You should rest for a while and have dinner before we go to the studio."

"Yes, Mother."

"Oh, shut up." Barbara jotted some quick notes on her pad and disappeared as Daphne went back to her desk with a worried frown and stared at the keyboard. She had told Barbara that she had an odd feeling about doing the show, a strange, unhappy premonition. And Barbara had told her she was being silly. She remembered it now as she sat watching Daphne's face, so battered by the car that had hit her. It seemed a thousand years since they had been in Chicago.

Daphne and Barbara arrived at the studio at exactly nine thirty. Daphne was wearing a simple beige silk dress and her hair was coiffed in a quiet, elegant chignon. There were pearl earrings in her ears, and a large, handsome topaz ring she had bought earlier that year at Carrier's. She looked elegant and successful, but not opulent and showy. It was typical of Daphne. As usual, Barbara was wearing one of her navy blue suits. Daphne always teased her that she had fourteen that all looked alike, but she looked neat and trim and her straight black hair fell in a smooth, shiny sheet to her shoulders. She looked younger now that she had left her mother. And in the past year Daphne had noticed that she had become increasingly attractive. She looked more like the photographs of the girl who had been at Smith, and there was laughter in her eyes now as she looked at Daphne.

She leaned over and whispered as they were ushered into the standard waiting room, with comfortable chairs, a bar, and a maid to attend to their needs. "Don't look so uptight. He's not going to bite you."

"How do you know?" But she always got nervous before she went on talk shows. It was part of why she took Barbara with her. It was also nice to have a friend along, to chat with on planes, and help sort things out at hotels when things got loused up with their reservations. And Barbara had a marvelous ability for keeping everything in control. With Barbara around, the luggage never got lost, the meals arrived in Daphne's room on time, there were magazines and books and newspapers to read, the reporters were ushered to the door when she'd had enough, and her clothes were always pressed before she had an interview. She made everything seem miraculously easy.

"Do you want a drink?"

Daphne shook her head. "That's all I need, to go on half bombed. Then I'll really tell him a thing or two." They both grinned, and Daphne settled into a chair. Even at times like this she wasn't really a drinker.