Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances (160 page)

There was savory coffee and a vintage brandy. It was ten-thirty before Mrs. Paley knew it.
How did it get so late?
she wondered, feeling like Cinderella as, after a walk of a few blocks along darkened, hushed Fifth Avenue, they got into a cab. How the evening had flown!

“There’s an awfully good bistro on the West Side,” Mr. Claiborne told her at her door, where the lobby porter stood discreetly off to the side as they said their good nights. “On Fifty-First Street. I haven’t been there since …”

He stopped abruptly. A couple got out of a cab and came toward them, passed with a brief glance and then went on inside. Mr. Claiborne looked up again and smiled quickly. “It’s a long time since I’ve gone over there,” he went on. “I don’t know whether it’s kept up. I hope it has. It was such a pleasant place. I’m wondering if you’d care to investigate it with me. Of course if it’s gone down, we can try another place.”

“Let’s hope it’s stayed the way you remember it,” she said. “Yes, I’d like to go to your West Side bistro, Mr. Claiborne. Thank you very much. And thanks for this quiet and comfortable evening. It’s done me a world of good.”

“Me too,” he said heartily. “I’ve enjoyed it immensely. And about this other place … would there be any particular evening that would suit you?”

“Almost any evening at all.”

“Oh. Why, fine! Then …”

He hesitated. But it wasn’t anything but shyness, Mrs. Paley thought, very sure of that. He was rusty. He wasn’t used to asking. “Friday would be good for me,” she said quickly, and walked through the lobby, nodding to Thomas, the night doorman, and feeling slightly flushed because Friday was the big night of the week in the life of any age group.
I shouldn’t have said Friday
, she scolded herself, and then relaxed as she pressed the button of her floor in the elevator, because Mr. Claiborne had seized on it instantly.

“Friday night will be perfect for me,” he had said at once, and had pressed her hand lightly as she started to turn away from him. The apartment, too, seemed friendlier, though she didn’t pay much attention to it, for she was thankfully very tired and sleepy and made her preparations for bed right away.

She was just drifting off to sleep when a thought occurred to her, a thought that didn’t do anything to even change her position in the bed. She had neglected to take her pills. For the first time since she had been left alone to take care of herself without Ed, she had gone off to bed without her sleeping pills. And with that astonishing knowledge, she drifted off.

Doug was quite unprepared for his peremptory greeting. “You’re late,” Jean said sharply. “You promised to be early this evening.”

“I’m only a few minutes over the regular time,” he protested mildly. “Are we going somewhere?”

“We aren’t going anywhere. Someone’s coming. Dinah’s new young man. You promised to be early.”

“Ah so,” he said. “I do seem to remember, now I put my mind to it, that I was instructed not to linger at any bars with the boys. As a matter of fact, I didn’t. Got held up at the last minute.”

“Famous last words,” she snapped. “If it isn’t too much trouble, how about making drinks?”

“Pronto,” he said, going over to her. She drew back, in a quite uncharacteristic way, from his customary embrace. “What’s the matter, are you feeling lousy?”

“I’m feeling rotten,” she said. “I’ve had nausea
all
day, and goodness knows what this new one is like. Mike called this morning and wanted to know what the score was with Di. He sounded grim. Which is the way I feel. Don’t touch those! There are only half a dozen a piece. That’s all we can afford. With the food bills going up and up … Damn it!”

She held a finger underneath the cold water tap.

“You’ve cut yourself.”

“Oh, let me bleed to death. That’s what I’d like to do at the moment. Just bleed and bleed and keel over. And then die.”

“You’d better get to the doctor again,” Doug said quietly. “Your nerves are getting the better of you.”

“I’m as healthy as the next pregnant woman,” she said shortly. “If it isn’t too much trouble could you get me a bandaid?”

“Sure. Honey, don’t let things get you down.”

“How can I help it? Here I was hoping Dinah would marry Mike and everything would be peaceful. Do you realize I have only five months to go? And what’s going to happen to my sister? We’ll be forced to turn her out on the street. How can I tell her? Dinah, dear, find another place to live. Your room’s needed for a nursery.”

He saw the quick tears in her eyes. “After all, there’s still five months,” he said reassuringly. “Anything can happen in that length of time.”

“Oh, you’re a man,” she said bitterly. “You think like a man; you react like a man. You just don’t look
ahead.
”

“Now you listen to me,” he said loudly. “This is our life and your sister’s life is hers. She’ll have to find her own way. She isn’t a minor, and she can find another place to live. She’s almost never here, anyway. I won’t have this mishmash, Jean. You’re not to upset yourself. You’re less than two years older than she is, and it’s time you untied the apron strings.” He watched the tears brim over, and melted, as he always did melt. “This should be a happy time,” he said, stroking her hair. “I want it to be a happy time. Our first baby, for God’s sake. We’ve waited long enough for it. Give me a break. Give yourself a break. Let her be, Jean. Just let her be.”

“It’s so hard,” she said, swallowing. “All she has to do is say yes to Mike and … I’ve planned this wedding so many times.” She went to the door between the rooms. “Right over there, in the arch by the window,” she said, pointing. “Just a lovely, simple ceremony. And then I’d know she was taken care of.”

“But, darling, she has a mind of her own.”

She stared up at him. “Yes. I know. If I could only stop this eternal upchucking. Darling, forgive me. You’ve had a hard day, I know. I’m a shrew. I love you. Now make the drinks, please. And when he comes, make conversation. I’m not up to it.”

The bell rang just then. “No, silly, it’s only Dinah,” Jean said, pushing him toward the door. “
He’s
not coming for another hour.”

Dinah looked super, and Doug told her so. She said she better had, because this was a new outfit and it had gone a long way toward impoverishing her. “The jacket’s lined with the same silk as the blouse,” she explained, showing him. “I love it, but it makes me dizzy just thinking about how much I spent on it.”

“It was worth every penny,” he assured her. “You’ll knock him dead.”

“I hope you and Jean like him,” she said a little breathlessly, and started changing the position of ashtrays and toss pillows. Doug left her and went back to the kitchen to build the martinis. “She seems a little nervous or something,” he reported to his wife. “There’s I don’t know what about her. Starry-eyed is what I guess I mean. It looks kind of bad for Mike.”

“Do your work and stop conjecturing,” Jean said shortly. “
I
think she has rocks in her head.”

The bell rang at exactly seven. Jean was in the bedroom, struggling with hair spray and still in her house slippers. “Go on out and start the ball rolling,” she hissed at Doug. “I’ll follow within seconds.”

“Don’t be too long,” he said anxiously. “I have a feeling I’ll hate this guy’s guts.”

“Me too,” she said. “Oh, dear Lord, is this pseudo-mother act to go on forever?”

Oh, poor Mike
, Jean thought when the apartment was empty again. Empty of all save her and Doug … and the African violets, which she was watering. “Poor Mike, Doug,” she shouted in to the kitchen, where in spite of a hard day at the office Doug was broiling hamburgers. When you were at a certain period of pregnancy, there were days when you couldn’t even go near an oven, and this was one of them. For herself, she would have settled for yogurt and frozen strawberries, but Doug, the breadwinner, had to stoke up.

“What?”

“I said, poor Mike.”

Doug came out, in his chef’s apron, and considered the subject. “Yeah, that’s right,” he said. “Poor Mike. The handwriting’s on the wall. She’s flipped for this Claiborne lad.”

“So have I,” Jean announced candidly.

“Oh?”

“You were impressed too.”

“He seems right enough.”

“He’s toothsome. I have to admit it.”

“Then the wedding takes place as scheduled. Different male lead, that’s all.”

She stood stock still, the watering can poised over a plant. “Oh, Doug. Do you think? He does seem to cotton to her.”

“It looks promising,” he agreed.

“You mean it?” She gazed at him, bemused.

“Just guessing, of course,” he said cautiously. “I’m only saying he’s got it bad. That doesn’t mean an engagement ring.”

“Men,” she said, flaring up. “You’re all the same. Sex without commitment.”

“Huh?”

“Yes, I know what you’re getting at. You think he’ll have his way with her and then — ”

“Toss her aside like an old shoe? Is this going to be an evening of tried and true clichés?”

“Why are you being so
hateful
?”

“I’m not.” He drifted over, greasy apron and all, and put his arms around her. “Damn it, I’m fed up with the status quo. I’m as anxious to get Di married off as you are. Then maybe we’ll have a little serenity in the family.”

“I know,” she said wearily, and poked at the gorgeous mass of yellow freesias Dinah’s new young man had brought. They were in an exquisite amber cup, and no one had ever given her anything quite like that before. “I’ve always been afraid of men who had sublime taste,” she admitted. “He’s heavenly, but is he to be trusted?”

“It’s Dinah’s worry,” Doug said, and they both pretended it was so, as Jean went on somberly watering the African violets and Doug returned to the kitchen to scorch the burgers.

“I like your sister,” Dick said. “Doug’s great too.”

“I’ll pass on the information to them.”

“They liked me too,” he said.

“They put on a good act.”

“Don’t give me that. They thought I was quite a guy. Which I am. Anyone care to second the motion?”

“Who, me?”

“That’s the general idea.”

Dinah smiled and looked quickly away. Looking into Dick’s eyes for too long gave her a dizzy sensation.
This is what I always wanted to feel and now I’m afraid of it
, she thought. It was on the overwhelming side. She was acutely conscious of feeling everything very keenly, as if her nerve ends had crept closer to the surface. She was keyed up, figuratively on the edge of her seat, brimming over with the wealth of sensations in her. All her perceptions were sharpened: the colors of the dresses the women at surrounding tables wore seemed so very bright and glowing; the jewel-like tones of the flickering candles on the brilliant white cloths hypnotized her. People seemed to be moving with rapid, sharp jerkiness; their gestures dazzled her. She had scarcely tasted her cocktail, but she felt drunk.

This strange business of chemistry, she thought. That one person, out of all the others you came in contact with, could have such a potent effect on you. What hidden microcosm was responsible for the fact that when she was with Dick Claiborne she was appetiteless, fluttery, breathless and if it came right down to it, a little bit sick to her stomach?

A simple matter of the sex factor, she explained to herself with simple logic, and instantly rebutted her own explication. It wasn’t that; it was never just that when you felt like this. It was something far more mysterious. She longed for his touch, yes, but she longed more to walk off into the sunset with him, to travel the world with him, to meet him on the street, unexpectedly, and flame with pleasure. She wanted to cook for him, to buy a tie for him, help him trim a Christmas tree.

“Dick, tell me about yourself,” she said.

“About me?”

“Um hum.”

“Oh. All right, glad to oblige. I’m twenty-nine, but for honesty’s sake, I’ll confess to being closer to thirty. I’m six feet tall and I weigh one-sixty, which is a little on the chunky side, I fear.”

“You’re not a bit chunky.”

“I will be if I don’t go back to my Canadian Air Force exercises. Though my family doesn’t run to fat on either side.”

“Anyway, what else?”

“I’m amiable, intelligent, and helpful to fragile old ladies who need assistance in crossing the street. Children like me.”

“Wendy and Joanie like you,” she agreed. “So that part of it’s true, at any rate.”

“It’s all true. I’m a charming guy. That’s what I keep trying to tell you.”

“And about your work.”

“My work? I like the law. Very much. I’m pretty smart at my work.”

“There’s at least one person who has a good opinion of you,” she said, smiling.

“Below the belt, that one,” he said, smiling back. “What the hell. I’m an average guy.”

“Where’d you study law?”

“Yale. Like my Dad. Where’d you study nursing?”

“Mt. Sinai.”

“What made you choose it?”

“A favorite uncle was a doctor. I grew up with a feeling for the profession, but unlike you I wasn’t smart enough to think of being a doctor.”

“Don’t believe it.” He looked steadily at her. “I’ve seen a few nurses in hospitals,” he said. “And you know what? I never saw one that looked like you.”

“How do you mean?”

“The others were terrible looking. Nurses always have thick ankles and things like that. They have severe expressions. And almost invariably, a suggestion of moustache on their upper lips.”

“Slandering my colleagues? Watch that, please.”

“But you,” he said. “You look like a buttercup. No moustache at all. Your pretty mouth turns up at the corners. No bitter look on Dinah Mason’s face. Nothing wrong with your ankles, either.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“So you like what you’re doing. You don’t mind pampering cranky sick people?”

“I was asking the questions,” she reminded him. “As I recall, I wanted to know something about you.”

“I told you about me. What else is there?”

“For example. I have a sister. Do you?”

“Uh uh.”

“A brother?”

“Nope.”

“A mother and father?”

“A father. I told you about him. We live together. My mother’s dead.”