“I . . . I . . . Well, Gib said—”
“Oh, I know all about what Gib likely said.” She rolled her eyes again to show her disdain. Then, catching the look of frustrated doubt creeping into my face, she suddenly softened her demeanor and took my hand in hers. She leaned in close, and I could smell her lily-of-the-valley perfume. “You haven’t known him very long, so you can’t know it, but Gib has
quite
the imagination.”
The first part of what Odalie had said was true: I hadn’t known Gib for very long. But the latter part . . . He had never struck me as a particularly creative type, and I very much doubted he was the secret possessor of a vast and potent imagination. It was unlikely he had conjured up the Hungarian all by himself. Odalie, on the other hand, I knew to have a very vital imagination. I was fairly certain that with the story of the Hungarian I had somehow managed to fall for one of Odalie’s creative inventions despite the fact it had come to me secondhand. And then the story she had told the other night about having a dearly departed sister named Violet! While I had been extremely touched by the generous gift Odalie had bestowed upon me when she had fastened the bracelet around my wrist, the gesture had not necessarily served to heighten the plausibility of the story that accompanied it.
What the ever-changing architecture of her stories was ultimately meant to conceal I still didn’t know at that point. Curiously, despite all her subterfuge, Odalie retained a sympathetic allure in my eyes. When Helen told stories for manipulation or for dramatic effect, nothing bothered me more. I’m ashamed to admit I secretly, and sometimes not so secretly, relished the moments when Helen got caught in one of her lies and was unmasked, much to her own horrified chagrin. I felt a sense of downright glee whenever this happened.
But it was not this way with Odalie. I’m not certain I fully comprehended why I should feel so differently toward these two women—both of whom I realize are liars—and even to this day I often puzzle over it. Perhaps I liked Helen less because I found her to be a rather desperate and therefore unsuccessful liar, whereas the case could be made that Odalie was something of a virtuoso at it. Odalie lied for sport and never bothered to hide the fact that even she didn’t believe a single word of her own lies. Helen lied out of a pathetic need to see herself through other people’s eyes; I think she convinced herself that many of her own lies were true, and somehow this made her much more despicable than Odalie. My doctor says it is our animal nature to judge the weak more harshly, owing to how survival depends upon weeding these creatures out. He says I have
highly developed animalistic tendencies
.
The way he says it, it does not sound like a compliment. He has formed other, equally unflattering opinions of me as well, although he does not always tell all of them to my face. He constantly writes notes on his little clipboard, and I try to pretend as if I don’t notice, but the other day I leaned over and spied the words
acute cruel streak
written next to my name in blue fountain pen. I have complained before that he is not particularly keen on me, but when you are in the sort of institution where I currently find myself, they are hardly looking to take a survey—which is to say, the residents’ assessment of the doctors is hardly taken under serious advisement.
Oh! But once again, I am getting away from my point. The truth of the matter is the two women in question were fundamentally different in how they treated the people to whom they lied. Helen’s lies demanded that you affirm her, that you collaborate, that you play stupid. Her mendacity was an insulting nuisance if there ever was one. Odalie understood it was sometimes your will to want to be tricked; she did not need you to affirm her world. She would create it with or without you. Instead, she invited you in ever so casually, and somehow—even when her lies were shabbily wrought—you would find yourself
wanting
to go in, if only out of an insatiable curiosity. She knew, too, not to pressure you to proclaim your belief in her untruth. That would be asking too much; in asking for that, she would risk daring her listener to pull at the loose threads she carelessly left behind and unravel it all. Her comprehension of this simple fact made all the difference.
Just then I felt Odalie looking at me. The fringe of her bangs gave a fey little flutter along the line of her dark eyebrows as the ocean breeze lifted them with a gentle, lazy ease. “C’mon, let’s not dwell on Gib’s nonsense. We ought to be having fun,” she declared. She led me toward a waiter shuttling a tray of champagne. “How about we have a refreshment like civilized people and find our hosts, eh?”
I nodded and we took off to roam the garden, Odalie still holding my hand in hers. I had to admit I felt a twinge of irresistible pride, I realized, to have people look at us and see that we were such intimate bosom friends. I suppose this was because I liked for people to think I might have such a beautiful and charismatic friend. Some girls don’t like to stand next to a pretty girl, for fear they will look more drab by comparison. I know for a fact there were several shopgirls with whom Helen refused to become friendly for just such a reason. But I’d always felt as though my value increased when I stood next to Odalie. As if extraordinary people could only be drawn to other extraordinary people, I fantasized that some of my plainness melted away.
The unbearably hot day in the city had been translated into a very warm but pleasantly bright day in the seaside garden where we now found ourselves. I looked around, inventorying my surroundings like a settler happening upon a strange but fruitful land. Persian rugs covered a wide stone terrace where a series of tables were laid out with an array of picturesque delicacies befitting a sultan. White tablecloths flapped in the ocean breeze. Colorful lanterns hung from every bare tree branch; they jigged about gently in the wind as though waiting impatiently for dusk so they might light the way for the festivities to continue late into the night. Among the stone statues of Apollo and Aphrodite, a string quartet played on a grassy knoll. The back lawn sloped a bit as it unfurled the distance downward from the house and finally gave way to the beach, its green tufted edge curling like a lip just over the beginning of a fine white sand. Far out on the navy sapphire of the sea, two sailboats slid along the horizon, lazily exchanging positions. We laughed and careened around the garden, the points of our heeled shoes digging into the lawn as we strolled first in one direction and then another.
From across the lawn I saw a young man shading his eyes and squinting at us. He didn’t wave, but as we staggered in sociable circles about the lawn, his eyes trailed us until eventually his body followed suit. At first, I thought nothing of it; Odalie often attracted attention wherever she went. But after thirty minutes or so it was clear this young man’s interest was particularly piqued by our presence. He wore the simultaneously focused yet distracted expression of a person trying to place an old acquaintance, and I wondered if he already knew Odalie, perhaps from yet another version of her history I had not yet heard. Eventually, he approached.
As he drew up close, I saw how extremely young he was. There was a freshly minted collegiate air about him; he could not have been more than a year or two out of preparatory school. He was not exactly short, but he was small and lanky, with a very diminutive head and slender neck, all of which lent a costume air when combined with the heavy suit he wore, as though he were a boy playing in his father’s clothes. I recall the word
doll-like
floated involuntarily into my mind. He had pale, baby-smooth skin, with the exception of two very angry-looking pink blemishes on his chin, the sores made all the more bright by the contrast they struck with his smooth white cheeks. His eyes were blue and clear, with very sparse eyelashes acting as a frame, and his hair was the lightest sort of brown that could’ve just as easily been called blond, given a slightly greater dose of sun.
“Why, hullo there. Don’t I know you?” he called in a familiar tone as he approached. Surprisingly, his voice was a deep bass and struck me as oddly matched to its owner. His face bore a funny expression; it was a kind of shy half-smile. He seemed nervous about something as he tramped across the grass toward us. Odalie turned in the direction of the young man approaching us in order to better take him in and suddenly froze. For the slenderest of seconds she resembled a silent movie-star, in that both of her hands fluttered upward to stifle a scream that was never heard from the tiny hollow of her open mouth. But it was as though she had merely flinched, or experienced a sneeze or hiccup of some sort, for the reaction passed so quickly that it was difficult to be sure it had happened at all. Before I knew it, she was smiling at our assailant with her typical cool composure, her stony feline eyes revealing nothing.
“How do you do,” Odalie said in a pleasant enough voice, yet with a decided lack of inquiring inflection. Mechanically, she put out a hand.
“Oh,” he stammered in a baffled way, looking at the outstretched hand with the incredulous air of the uninitiated. It was as though he had never witnessed a handshake in his life and didn’t understand why Odalie was offering her hand. “I’m Teddy,” he said. Odalie sought out his hand with her own and finally, when she’d managed to acquire it, aggressively shook it.
“Of course. Nice to meet you, Teddy.”
“Teddy
Tricott
,” he said, touching his chest as though to ensure we understood who he meant and placing special emphasis on the last name.
“Odalie Lazare,” Odalie said, imitating his gesture. She smiled smugly. At this, the young man’s eyes went wide. He jerked his hand away.
“Oh!” he exclaimed. “Oh—I thought . . . oh . . . oh!”
“I’m Rose,” I said, breaking into the rather awkward, inarticulate conversation with the hopes of hurrying it along. Having barely detected my presence up to that point, Teddy now turned to me, his eyes still wide, and appeared suddenly cognizant of my person.
“Oh, of course.” He shook himself as though coming back into his right mind. “Sorry—yes. Of course, of course.” He put out a hand, and I briefly gave him the tips of my fingers. As soon as he released my hand, Teddy resumed staring, goggle-eyed, in Odalie’s direction.
“Forgive me,” he said. “It’s just that you look like—”
“I get that all the time.” Odalie waved the apology away with a magnanimous toss of her wrist. I wondered which starlet Teddy had been about to name as Odalie’s doppelgänger. There were several to whom Odalie bore an admittedly strong resemblance. At least now the boy’s odd behavior was beginning to make a bit more sense. Odalie smiled again but could not hide the fact the smile had become hollow; I could tell she was quite done with the young man who stood before us and was ready to move on. “Say—Teddy, you wouldn’t happen to know where our hosts might be hiding, would you?”
“The Brinkleys?”
“The very ones.”
“Oh, uh, sure! Let me take you to them.” Still a little shell-shocked from his mistaken movie-star sighting, he ambled in the direction of the stone terrace. Odalie hesitated, and I detected a faint reluctance to follow the young man. Then, pushing back her shoulders with an air of purpose and adopting a casual stroll, she trailed along in cool pursuit.
“How do you know the Brinkleys? Are you a relation?” There was a strange tone to Odalie’s voice; something about it put me in mind of Helen rehearsing lines from one of the vaudeville plays she adored.
“Me? Oh, no. But I suppose I’m on pretty familiar terms. I like them well enough. They’ve always been very accommodating to me. Their son Felix would sometimes bring me home to their place in the city on weekends, back in the days when we were at Hotchkiss together.”
“Well, that was very nice of him.” Odalie had resumed her usual state of half listening.
“Indeed,” Teddy nodded with a serious air. “Sometimes the trains to Newport were just too much of a nuisance, and it was nice to be able to get away from school and go
somewhere,
you know?” Teddy hesitated and looked at Odalie from the sides of his eyes. “Say—don’t suppose you’ve spent much time in Newport, have you?”
Odalie stiffened. “Not particularly,” came her vague reply.
“Ah,” Teddy said. “That’s really too bad.” He continued stealing little suspicious glances at Odalie as we ascended the sloping lawn. When we reached the house, we followed Teddy through several drawing rooms and into a dark-paneled office where a group of people stood in a clustered circle, busily admiring an oil painting that presided over a stone fireplace. The diamond-patterned, leaded-glass windows in the room had been opened in an attempt to attract the ocean breeze beyond, but nevertheless the atmosphere was quite stuffy, and I had the instant sensation of claustrophobia.
“Yes, yes,” a woman in a summery, lilac-colored gown was saying, waving a hand toward the painting. “Why, practically
everyone
says I resemble her, but even if that’s so, it’s entirely coincidental, because the relation is all on Max’s side, you see.”
I took a good look at the woman speaking, and my mind slowly clicked: This was Vera Brinkley. Her face was memorable. She was what people often referred to as a handsome woman. Her hair was carefully waved and swept back, revealing high cheekbones and delicate shadows of the hollows just below. She would’ve been beautiful if not for the length of her jaw, which ran a little too long and squared itself off a little too sharply, infusing her countenance with a vaguely horsey impression. Her body was thin and freckled and fashionably hipless, and she was of indeterminate age: Her face whispered rumors of her late thirties or very early forties, but her neck suggested another ten years could possibly be added to that score.
“Mrs. Brinkley?” Teddy tapped her discreetly on the shoulder. The woman turned.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Teddy. You’re not in school anymore. You’re a college-man now. Call me Vera.” Teddy nodded, but also blushed.
“I have some ladies here who’ve been hunting about for their hosts.”
“Oh! Certainly, my boy. Max! Come over here, dear. Teddy has some people he’d like us to meet.” A very prim man wearing a monocle and dressed in a morning suit looked up from the box of cigars he had presently unlocked for the benefit of a group of bankers. Just as it was with Vera Brinkley, Max Brinkley had an odd combination of youth and maturity about him. His body was quite thin, yet his fleshy face was as placid as a glacier lake and his cheeks ended in two rather slight but unfortunate jowls just under each side of his jaw. His snub nose gave him an air of youth that was instantly contradicted by the monocle perched on the apple of his left cheek. It was as though he were simultaneously twenty-nine and fifty-nine, but no age between the two. He crossed the room and peered questioningly from Odalie to me, and then back to Odalie.