Return to Peyton Place (34 page)

“It'll be a nice place to spend my vacations,” she told Charles.

“What do you mean, vacations?” asked Charles. “Don't you plan to live here?”

“On what?” asked Betty. “Does Leslie think I'm as rich as he is and can afford to sit on my backside all day long without working?”

“Leslie is perfectly willing to provide for the boy,” Charles objected. “You could find work here to take care of your own needs.”

“Where?” jeered Betty. “In the Mills? Like my old man? No thanks.”

“But we thought—” began Charles.

“I don't give a damn what you thought,” said Betty angrily. “I'm not going to take a two-bit job in the Mills working for Leslie Harrington. If I have to work to support myself, I can do that a lot better in New York. And that's where I'm going just as soon as I can get packed.”

In the end, Leslie Harrington settled a sum of twenty-five thousand dollars on Betty Anderson and deposited another ten thousand in an account for his grandson. In addition, he agreed to give Betty a household allowance of one hundred dollars a week and buy her a new car every year.

“In writing,” said Betty Anderson.

So Charles Partridge drew up the papers and Leslie Harrington signed them.

“One more thing,” said Betty before she signed. “There's a friend of mine in New York who used to look after Roddy for me. I want her to come up here to live with me and help with the house and with Roddy. Leslie'd have to pay her fifty a week.”

So Agnes Carlisle came to live in Peyton Place with Betty Anderson, and Leslie Harrington agreed to pay her wages. In return for what he gave, Leslie was to be allowed unlimited visiting privileges and the right to keep his grandson with him for a full day, one day a week. In the event of Betty's marriage, she was to keep all monies settled on her and Roddy, but her weekly allowance was to stop and Leslie was to be allowed the same privileges.

Betty Anderson leaned back comfortably in her new living room and Agnes brought her a drink. The two women took their shoes off and sipped their martinis.

“Now I've got it made,” said Betty. “Who wants to get married?”

“Didn't I tell you?” asked Agnes smugly. “I told you to get in touch with him, didn't I?”

“Yes, you did,” agreed Betty. “And you never made a wiser suggestion in your life.”

“For Christ's sake, Charlie,” said Leslie Harrington crossly, “are you playing cards or not? We've been waiting for you to tell us whether you can open or not.”

Charles Partridge looked at his cards. “I pass,” he said.

“One card,” said Leslie to Seth, who was dealing.

Old Leslie, trying to fill an inside straight, thought Charles. He'll probably hit, too. He usually gets what he wants. Even if there's a price on it.

At eleven o'clock, Leslie Harrington and Charles Partridge said good night to Matthew Swain and Seth Buswell.

“Let's walk a little,” said Leslie when the two men were outside.

“Where to?” asked Charles. “It's late and I'm tired.”

“I just want to walk past Betty's house,” said Leslie. “I like to make sure everything's all right before I go to sleep at night.”

“Do you go down there every night?” asked Charles.

Leslie nodded. “You never can tell,” he said. “I might catch that little bitch in a compromising situation someday.”

“Leslie!” cried Charles in horror.

“Oh, cut it out,” said Leslie. “You've known me too many years to be shocked at anything I say. Come on.”

The two men walked slowly down Chestnut Street and turned into Laurel.

Betty Anderson's house was dark and still. Leslie stopped and looked at it, stared at it as if his eyes could see right through the walls—and right into the bitter, unforgiving heart of Betty Anderson, his grandson's mother. It was not only little Roddy's love that made Leslie appear younger these days; it was also the smell of battle. He was locked with Betty in a clash of wills. Nothing made him feel younger than a good fight.

He looked at the house and thought, You've won the first battle, Betty, but the war isn't over yet. Before I die, little Roddy will be living in the big house with me.

T
HE TRAIN PLUNGED HEADLONG
into the long space that separated Lewis Jackman from Allison MacKenzie, and Lewis sat in the club car, impatient with his drink and with the way the hands on his watch moved as slowly as if they had been trapped in molasses. The wheels of the train, too, seemed to move forward in slow motion, and Lewis watched water condense on the outside of his glass and looked again at his watch.

Sitting next to him in the observation car was Stephanie. Allison had introduced them during the week she spent in New York after returning from Hollywood. They left Grand Central together and had been traveling together for eight hours. And that's about as many words as we've exchanged, Stephanie thought, eight. If I didn't know better, I'd have to conclude that Lewis Jackman was a man on his way to a heavy date.

“Hello, there!” said a feminine voice behind him, and, even before he turned, Lewis was resentful at anyone who would break into his thoughts.

“Hi,” Stephanie said, disinterestedly.

“I remember you,” the girl said. “You're Stephanie. Allison's friend.”

“Yes.”

The girl would not be put off with coolness. “I'm Jennifer Carter,” she said. “My husband will be here in a minute. May we sit with you?”

Stephanie wanted very badly to say No, but instead, she said, “Of course.” She introduced Jennifer to Lewis.

“Here's Ted now!” said Jennifer, and turned to her husband. “Darling, you remember Stephanie, don't you? Allison introduced her to us last Christmas.”

“Sure,” said Ted and extended his hand. “How are you?”

“Are you going up to Peyton Place to visit Allison, too, Mr. Jack-man?” asked Jennifer.

“Yes, I am,” replied Lewis.

The girl's eyes were bright with a shrewdness that reminded Lewis of a snake, and although she was very beautiful there was something about her that was too finely drawn. Her cheekbones were too prominent and her chin had an aggressive tilt to it and her eyes darted everywhere so that they not only seemed to miss nothing but to probe beneath the surface of everything they saw.

“Allison must be a very important writer to drag a busy publisher like you so far away from civilization,” said Jennifer, and her eyes fastened on his with a demand for an answer.

“She is,” said Lewis. And the simple unemphatic way in which he said it gave his words a great deal of authority.

Jennifer laughed. “It's so hard to think of little Allison MacKenzie of Peyton Place as an important writer, as someone to be taken seriously.”

“Jennifer!” said Ted. “Don't say things like that.”

“Don't be ridiculous, darling,” said Jennifer. “I can't help it if that's what I thought, can I?”

Ted looked away uncomfortably. “Let's order,” he said.

“Good idea,” replied Jennifer. “I want a Scotch and water, please.” She turned again to Lewis. “How long have you had this high opinion of Allison?” she asked, with the same persistence that had characterized her previous questions.

Lewis wanted to stand up and tell her that it was none of her business, but he didn't.

“A long time,” he said, and his voice did not encourage further interrogation.

“Since before she got famous and began to make pots of money?” asked Jennifer.

“Yes,” said Lewis. “Even before that.” He looked at Stephanie and stood up. “I think we ought to be getting back to our seats, Stephanie.” He nodded to Jennifer and Ted and said, “If you'll excuse us.”

Jennifer laughed as he turned to walk away. “That's what people always say when they don't want to talk to you any more.”

“Jennifer!” said Ted.

“Oh, stop saying ‘Jennifer' like that,” she said crossly. “You sound like a broken record.” She sipped at her drink. “Allison isn't getting much of a prize in him,” she said. “He's as close-mouthed as you are.”

“Perhaps he resented your prying,” said Ted with more spirit than he usually showed in front of Jennifer.

“I don't pry,” she said. “I'm just interested in people.”

“Anyway,” Ted said, “he's her publisher, not her lover.”

“That's what you think,” Jennifer said.

“What makes you think otherwise?” Ted asked.

“Stop cross-examining me, Mr. District Attorney. I just know it in my bones, that's all. Big New York publishers don't come all the way to Peyton Place just to look at a manuscript.”

“You're just plain nosy,” said Ted and leaned back in his chair. “Plain nosy.”

It was true. Jennifer was one of those people who cannot visit anywhere without peeking into the bathroom medicine cabinet and checking the pile of towels in the linen closet. Whenever the opportunity presented itself, she pawed through other people's desks and dresser drawers, and it gave her a deep sense of satisfaction to know that her best unmarried friend kept a supply of preventatives in the drawer of her night table and that another friend received dunning letters from Jordan-Marsh. She knew that her father's dearest friend wore a wide elastic girdle, and every time she saw him she could scarcely keep from laughing right in his face, especially since she also knew that the same man's wife carried on a lively correspondence with a noted French cellist.

Jennifer also knew that her mother-in-law had taken to reading lurid, paper-backed murder mysteries and that her father-in-law collected pornographic picture playing cards. She knew that Roberta and Harmon Carter had seventeen thousand dollars on deposit at the Citizens National Bank and that they carried fifty thousand dollars' worth of insurance, and she knew that when Roberta wanted to be free in the evening she put a sleeping powder in Harmon's after dinner coffee. But best of all was a knowledge so gratifying that Jennifer was hard put to keep it to herself. Jennifer knew that whenever she went to Peyton Place with Ted, Roberta sneaked into the little room next to Ted's and listened to her son and daughter-in-law at night.

“It must be the air up here,” Ted said to his wife. “Whenever we're in Peyton Place, you're as horny as a French whore who enjoys her work.”

Jennifer almost laughed in his face. “You make me that way,” she told him, and thought up new ways to arouse him and make him do unheard-of things to her. It excited her to distraction to know that Roberta was listening to every word and sound. Jennifer squirmed under Ted's hands and she moaned and cried out.

“You're hurting me. You're hurting me. Don't stop, darling. Deeper. Deeper.”

And then her muffled scream, and even as she cried out Jennifer thought that she could hear the sound of panting from the other side of the wall.

“Again, darling,” cried Jennifer. “Again.”

Ted put his hands on his wife's quivering body and said, “Dear God, what makes you like this?”

And, thinking of Roberta who was listening, Jennifer smiled in the dark.

“I love you,” she said. “All you have to do is look at me, and I begin to think of us like this.”

It would have been a delicious secret to share, thought Jennifer. But Ted would never understand. He'd turn cold and refuse to touch her in his mother's house.

So she had to be content with watching Roberta's face the next morning.

“What's the matter, Mother?” asked Jennifer with a sly, little smile. “Didn't you sleep well?”

“As a matter of fact, I didn't,” replied Roberta. “I guess I shouldn't have had that second cup of coffee.”

“Well, I slept like a baby,” said Harmon.

“I'll bet you did, thought Jennifer, thinking of the sleeping powders that Roberta kept locked in her dressing table.

Roberta kept her secrets locked up, but she wasn't very smart about it. She kept a ring with the keys to everything in the house under her pillow. It hadn't taken Jennifer long to find her hiding places.

As the train hurried toward Peyton Place, Jennifer smiled into her drink and wondered what was new at her in-laws. She hadn't been to the Carters' since August, and there was bound to be a whole new crop of secrets by now.

Jennifer began to complain of a headache right after the train pulled out of Concord, and by the time she and Ted reached the Carter house in Peyton Place she had convinced her husband that all she wanted was to go to bed with some aspirin and a cup of hot tea.

“What a shame,” said Roberta sympathetically. “And we were all going to the church supper tonight.”

“I won't hear of the rest of you missing it,” said Jennifer. “The three of you run along.”

“Of course not,” said Ted. “I don't want to leave you when you aren't feeling well.”

“Don't be silly,” replied Jennifer. “And please don't be stubborn, darling. If you don't go along with Mother and Dad, I'll feel like a heel and I'll have to force myself to join you. Please don't make me do that.”

At last Ted capitulated and he, Roberta and Harmon left. Jennifer waited until she could no longer hear the sound of the car, then she got quietly out of bed and went to Roberta's room. She picked through Harmon's drawers without discovering anything new and when Roberta's dressing table yielded nothing but a new supply of sleeping powders, Jennifer was petulantly annoyed. Her fingers groped under Roberta's pillow and she straightened up in shocked surprise. The key ring was not there.

Jennifer's annoyance fled on the wings of excitement, and she began to search the room. Jennifer was very good at discovering hiding places, and for that reason she discarded the more obvious nooks and crannies that Roberta might have selected. Her fingers moved expertly through the pockets of all the garments in Roberta's closet, but with no success. She examined the bathroom minutely and when she had finished there she stood for a moment in the upstairs hall, concentrating with all her mind on what Roberta must have been thinking when she hid her keys.