The Slipper (10 page)

“Oh, Carol dear!” Mrs. Dillon exclaimed. “I'm so glad you've come down. I wanted to speak to you.”

“What is it, Pattie? Have I been using too much hot water?”

Mrs. Dillon smiled. She wore a cream crepe blouse and wine-colored skirt and jacket, a festive sprig of holly on her lapel. Always a bit rumpled, she reminded one of a fussy, friendly pigeon. Carol adored her, as did every other girl at Thurston Hall.

“You probably
have
been, dear, but I'll withhold the infraction slip for the time being. Mustard, do move, dear—I need that report. The other girls are coming to my rooms tonight for a little party—nothing fancy. Actually, I just want to get rid of all that fruitcake. I'd love for you to come, if you have no other plans.”

“I—I'm not sure, Pattie.”

“Do drop by if you can—sevenish. We'll probably sing ‘White Christmas' and grow all maudlin and make asses of ourselves, but what're the holidays for? Oh, and thank you for the present, dear.”

“Another fruitcake,” Carol said wryly.

“That makes twelve I've received now. You can see why I want to have the party. Delivering more presents?”

Carol nodded. “I'm taking these to my friend Julie. She lives off campus with her husband.”

“Mind the walks, dear. They're slippery with ice. Hope to see you later on this evening. Move it, Mustard. I
need
that report.”

Carol left the dormitory and started across the deserted campus, turning up the gray fur collar of her soft blue wool coat with its belted waist. The grounds were covered with a light frosting of snow and the sidewalks were indeed slippery, but she was wearing her pliant blue vinyl knee boots with rubber soles. It was thoughtful of Pattie to give a party for the girls remaining at the dorm, but Carol doubted she would go. She didn't really know any of the other girls, and somehow being with relative strangers would only make her loneliness worse. She missed Nora dreadfully.

Nora had reluctantly departed for Brooklyn a week ago. “I'd much rather be trotted out and shot,” she had confided, “but if I don't go home for the holidays Sadie'll show up here driving a tank with half the National Guard in tow.” She had blithely whipped off several new confession stories to finance the trip and pay for Christmas presents—“Bradley would shit if he knew I was writing this crap, but what's a girl to do?” She and Carol had agreed not to get presents for each other, but they had gone in together to buy presents for Julie. Unbeknownst to Nora, Carol had purchased a beautiful leather portfolio and had it shipped to Brooklyn. Nora had admired it in the window of a department store and said it would be just the thing for her manuscripts.

Carol considered herself wonderfully lucky to have a friend like Nora, so bright and vivacious, so witty and irreverent, so very kind and tenderhearted beneath her tough, breezy facade. It was Nora who had suggested they buy presents for Julie.

“The kid needs a new coat—have you seen that mothy brown thing she's always wearing? Hell, let's play Santa Claus. That husband of hers isn't going to give her much, I can assure you. A scarf, if she's lucky. You can deliver the presents to her on Christmas Eve.”

During the past few weeks Julie had had coffee with them at the SUB after drama class a number of times, always a bit nervous amidst the noisy mob, never staying long, always careful to pay her share. She had started to participate in class a bit more, too, and Carol was amazed at the girl's natural talent. She confessed to Nora that Julie was already much, much better than she would ever be and Nora said that was a moot point, all three of them were going to be tremendously successful. Over coffee at the SUB one afternoon Nora made Julie a member of their ultraexclusive Cinderella club and told her she was going to get the slipper too and become a great actress and knock 'em on their asses when she hit Broadway. Julie had smiled shyly at this nonsense, but Carol could tell that she was secretly thrilled to be included in Nora's grandiose vision of the future.

“We're a trio!” Nora exclaimed. “Right?”

“Right,” Carol said.

“We're a triple threat. We're all gonna get the slipper.”

“Right,” Julie said.

“Let's drink to it. We oughta have champagne but this coffee'll have to do. Jesus! What-da they make it out of? Mud? You pay five cents for a cup of coffee and they bring you Mississippi silt—but what the hell! Here's to us, gang. All the way to the top and screw the rest of the world.”

“Screw 'em,” Julie said bashfully.

“You know what, kid? You're beginning to blossom.”

“It—it's just nice to have friends.”

“Sisters,” Nora corrected her. “Who needs a fucking sorority?”

Carol remembered that afternoon as she shifted the shopping bag from one hand to the other and crossed the street, heading toward the row of red brick apartment buildings. The Silver Bell was closed today and Julie was bound to be home, her husband, too, probably. Carol had never met him, but he had come into the restaurant one night when Nora was there, and Nora said he was a cool number, smug and superior, treating Julie like dirt. Although Julie had never said anything about it, Carol suspected that her husband resented Julie's having friends or, indeed, any kind of life of her own. She was predisposed to dislike him, and when he opened the door of their basement flat a few moments later, she tried her best to smile a friendly smile.

“Yes?” he said.

“I'm Carol Martin,” she told him. “I've come to see Julie.”

He hesitated a moment, surprised, then moved back so that she could come in. It was much too warm inside. The radiators were crackling. Douglas Hammond wore a pair of snug brown gym shorts and a loose, ragged tan T-shirt with CLAYMORE across the chest. He was tall, extremely well built, extremely handsome in a stern, brooding way. An intellectual Heathcliff, Carol thought. He was barefooted. Behind the horn-rims, his slate-blue eyes took in every detail of her dress and person, deliberately sizing her up, and he liked what he saw. Carol could tell that. He was visibly impressed by her clothes, her demeanor, probably thought she was a wealthy sorority type. Class, style, money—those things would matter to a man like this.

“Excuse my garb,” he said. “The radiators are screwed up again and it's like a steam bath in here. Let me take your coat.”

Carol set the shopping bag down and let Doug Hammond help her off with the coat. She was wearing her cool blue linen dress beneath it, and he appreciated its exquisite simplicity. He appreciated her looks as well. There could be no denying the smoky masculine interest in those slate-blue eyes. Julie's husband was highly sexed, Carol sensed that immediately, and she returned his gaze with one of frosty politeness. Hammond smiled and moved over to hang her coat up in a nearby closet. Carol glanced around the room, saw the worn linoleum, the dingy concrete walls, the exposed pipes. A pathetic, lopsided little Christmas tree stood on a coffee table, decorated with strings of popcorn and shiny dime store ornaments. Half a dozen clumsily wrapped presents were under it.

“Sorry about the heat,” Hammond said, closing the closet door. “If I had known you were coming, I would have slipped on some pants.”

He was deliberately drawing attention to his legs. They were nice legs indeed. Carol sensed that he was vain about his body, made it a point to stay in shape despite his intellectual pursuits. She was no more attracted to him than she was to Jim Burke or Dick Sanders or any of the other virile lads on campus. Compared to a man like Norman Philips, they were a pack of callow youths. Doug folded his arms across his chest, his legs spread wide, his head tilted to one side, all smoldering masculinity. It was entirely wasted on Carol. Rarely had she felt such aversion, though she was actress enough to conceal it.

“Is Julie not here?” she inquired.

“She should be back in a few minutes. She went to the grocery store for a few things—they're open until six.”

“I—I really can't stay,” she said. “I just wanted to bring Julie these.”

She indicated the shopping bag. Doug took it and began to arrange the presents under the tree.

“Thoughtful of you to remember her.”

“They're from my roommate as well. Wish Julie a Merry Christmas for me. I mustn't keep you.”

Hammond placed the last present under the tree and set the empty bag aside, folding his arms across his chest again, biceps flexing.

“Relax,” he said. “Julie would be crushed if she missed you. We get very few visitors in our humble abode. I won't bite,” he added.

You'd like to, she thought. “Julie tells me you're going to be a lawyer,” she said. “She says you're at the top of your class.”

He nodded. “A man has to maintain his standards. It's rough, but I don't mind the hard work.”

“You're on a scholarship, aren't you?”

“Just partial—tuition and fees, no stipend for living expenses. We've got to scrape for that.”

Julie has to scrape for it, you mean. A key rattled in the lock. Hammond cocked his head. The front door opened and Julie stumbled in, clutching a huge brown paper bag full of groceries. She was wearing her old brown coat, a scarf over her hair. Her cheeks were flushed from the cold and the exertion of carrying so heavy a bag. She shifted it around in her arms and shoved the door shut with her foot. Hammond made no effort to assist her. Carol was incensed. Julie sighed and turned and saw Carol, and her violet-blue eyes filled with surprise.

“Carol! I—I didn't know—”

“I just came by to wish you a Merry Christmas,” Carol said kindly. “Let me help you with those grocer—”

“I—I'll just put them in the kitchen—” Julie was flustered. “I had to work until ten last night and there's been no time to buy groceries until today and the store closes at—”

“You're babbling,” Doug said. “Put the groceries away.”

Julie nodded and scurried into the kitchen. Carol heard her moving around nervously, opening and closing the refrigerator door, and then she came back in and pulled off her coat and scarf and smiled her shy smile. She was wearing an old cotton print dress with puffed sleeves that made her look about twelve. Carol noticed that her brown shoes were badly worn, her thick white socks frayed, and she felt her heart might break. She wanted to fold this child in her arms, protect her, comfort her. Julie brushed a wisp of silver-brown hair from her temple and sighed, relaxing at last.

“It was so kind of you to stop by,” she said. “I bought a little present for you, and—it's not much, but I thought of you when I found it and I intended to bring it over to the dorm later on this after—”

“Why don't you make our guest some coffee,” Doug interrupted. “Iced tea might be more appropriate—it's so bloody hot in here.”

“I ran into Mr. Jensen as I was leaving, Doug. He promised the radiators would be working properly by evening. We're always having trouble with them,” she explained to Carol. “Would you like some coffee?”

“No. Please. I can't stay. I just wanted to bring your presents. They're from Nora, too.”

Julie looked surprised, then confused, and when she spied the beautifully wrapped presents under the tree her eyes grew wide.

“You—you shouldn't have, Carol. You and Nora. I wasn't able to get you anything much, just—I sent a present to Nora in Brooklyn, she gave me her address, and—” Julie darted over to the tree and picked up one of the clumsily wrapped presents, handing it to Carol. “Here,” she said. “I hope you aren't disappointed.”

Carol could tell from the size and weight that it was a book. “Thank you, Julie,” she said.

“Would—would you like to open it now?”

“Only if you'll open yours.”

“I don't know—”

Julie glanced at her husband. Doug nodded his approval, and the girls sat down on the sofa. Doug plopped down on the old overstuffed green chair with a sprung bottom. He stretched his legs out, watching with a wry, superior expression as Julie pulled one of the presents into her lap, so excited her hands were shaking. She carefully loosened the glittery silver-and-red striped foil paper and set it aside to save, then took a pair of gray suede gloves out of the box, her eyes aglow with pleasure. Carol unwrapped her book. It was old, battered, green, still a bit dusty, obviously purchased from the used-book store.
Strange Interlude
by Eugene O'Neill. Julie had erased the price marked on the endpaper, but 50c was still visible in indentation. Examining the book, Carol was surprised to find it was a first edition.

“I think you would make a marvelous Nina, Carol,” Julie said. “Lynn Fontanne did it on Broadway, I believe. Norma Shearer did the movie. I saw it on television a couple of years ago.”

“I love it, Julie. It's a first edition, too.”

“And I love my gloves. They're so beautiful—so soft.”

“Open the other two packages.”

“They're awfully big—”

Julie was as careful with the second present as she had been with the first one, painstakingly peeling away the Scotch tape and removing the expensive paper without tearing it. She gave an exclamation of delight when she discovered the gray suede knee boots. She had to try them on immediately. They fit perfectly. She gave Carol a hug, tears sparkling in her eyes. She'd never had anything so lovely, she exclaimed, and she really needed a pair of boots with so much snow and cold weather. She was stunned into silence when she opened the final present. It contained a soft pink wool coat with a heavy inner lining, made exactly like the coat Carol had worn, with a large gray fur collar. Julie stood up and put the coat on and belted the waist, the tears streaming down her cheeks now. She was absolutely radiant, despite the tears, and Carol found it difficult not to cry herself.

“I—I don't know what to say,” Julie stammered. “Oh, Carol, it—it's the most beautiful coat I've ever seen. You shouldn't have—”