Love Comes Calling (13 page)

He'd do me a favor? “So are you saying . . . we're friends?”

“Yeah. That's right. We're friends.”

“But what if—”

“Listen to me. Just let it go. Forget about it. Forget about the whole thing.”

“But what if someone was going to get hurt because I didn't say something?”

“Who could get hurt? There's this kid, this—prince, they call him. He lives up on that hill, thinks he's above all the rest of us, and he won't do anyone any favors. All that's going to happen is someone's going to get him to reconsider. Get it? That's all.”

“But what if he doesn't want to . . . or won't?”

“He's a smart kid. He'll know what side the toast is buttered on.”

“But what—”

“Don't make me have to do something I don't want to do, baby. I can be Jack or I can be Officer Feeney. Which do you want me to be?”

“Jack . . . ? I—”

“Good choice. Now. I didn't bring you here to talk about
things we're not going to talk about. I brought you here because I thought we could have a good time.”

A good time? With someone who was threatening me! Because that's what he was doing, wasn't it? Trying to keep me from telling him the truth? Not that I would because it would be much too dangerous and then I wouldn't find out anything about what those people planned to do to Griff. I still hadn't really found out anything I hadn't already known, but at least now I knew I hadn't made it all up. I tried out a Marion Mack smile. Everything was going to be fine. I couldn't admit to being Ellis, and right now I might not be doing that great a job of being Janie, but I could be a dumb Dora all right!

“Anything you say, Jack.”

I
don't know why girls insisted they had heaps of fun at places like this. An hour later, the heat and cigarette smoke had made my body numb, and the buzz and hum of the jazz the band was playing was making my mind numb too. It was a funny sort of feeling . . . as if everything had gone hazy. And crazy. As if I wasn't myself at all.

I didn't like it.

The waiter had asked if another couple could join our table. He was very apologetic about it, but Jack hadn't seemed to mind. So now we were sitting arm-to-arm, pressed against each other, and I didn't like that either.

“Ellis!”

My head snapped up before I could remind myself I wasn't Ellis. I was supposed to be Janie.

But unfortunately, Irene Bennett didn't know that. “Ellis! Over here!”

Jack leaned back and looked over my shoulder. “Who's that dame shouting at?”

I tried to look as if I had no idea, but when I turned, I saw
Irene crawling across the tops of tables toward ours. When she stood up on one and leaped toward us, Jack popped up and caught her hand, helping her clear the gap. She jumped down, planting herself between us. “Who'd have ever thought I'd see you here?”

“A friend of yours?” Jack was watching us, a bemused smile on his face.

“Jack, this is Irene. Irene . . .”

She decided to commandeer half my chair and then threw her arm about my neck. Now she was whispering in my ear. “Where'd you find him? He's delicious!” She pressed her temple against mine as if we were best of friends again.

It was my turn to whisper into her ear. “I'm pretending not to be Ellis right now. Can you call me Janie?”

“Janie! Sure, why not? Have you got a cigarette?”

“Cigarette?”

“Sure, baby. Here you go.” Jack pulled two from a pack, stuck them into his mouth, and then he pulled a lighter from his shirt pocket. He lit them both and took a big puff. Once the tips were glowing, he took one from his mouth and handed it to me.

Irene intercepted it and took it from him instead. “Ellis doesn't smoke.” She had to raise her voice to be heard.

“Who's this Ellis you keep talking about?” He was signalling madly for a waiter.

I jammed Irene in the ribs with my elbow.

She bobbled the cigarette, nearly dropping it. “What?”

I pulled it from her lips and crushed it out in an ashtray.

“Why'd you go and do that for?”

Jack had propped an elbow on the table. “No:
who
.”
Jack fairly shouted the word. “That's what I want to know. I haven't been so confused since I was at Belleau Wood, back in the war.”

“Who, what?” Irene was pouting.

I almost wished I'd let her keep the awful thing. “Irene and I were in a—a—play a week ago. And I was playing this jester and she was—”

Irene wasn't listening anymore; she was staring intently into the cloud of cigarette smoke that swirled around her head.

“She was the queen.”

Jack didn't look any less confused, but he'd finally succeeded in getting a waiter's attention. The man leaned close. Jack nodded to me. “What are you drinking?”

“A . . . coffee?” That's what everyone else seemed to be drinking.

“Coffee! What do you think this place is, baby? A diner?” He glanced up at the waiter. “Get me a whiskey. Old-fashioned. And two sidecars for the ladies.”

I stopped the waiter with a hand to his arm. “Make that one. I don't really feel like anything.”

Irene had stopped him too. “Make mine a French 75 instead.”

Jack whistled, brow raised. “That's not for the faint of heart.”

Irene gave him a smoldering look. “And neither am I.”

Honestly! I elbowed her again.

After several minutes, the waiter deposited two coffee cups on the table. Irene snatched one up and downed it.

I gasped. “Careful—hot!”

She put it down with a raucous laugh. “What do you think was in there? Thanks, Jack!” With a wink and a kiss on his lips, she pushed off through the tables on her way back to wherever it was she had come from.

Jack asked me to dance, so we left our table and worked our way toward the band at the end of the room.

I saw Irene had stopped at someone's table and was sitting on the lap of a man I hoped she knew. It looked like . . . was it that man from the theater? The one she'd gone off with that night?

As we passed, Irene shot up, grabbed me around the arm, and pulled me close, eyeing Jack as she did so. “You've always been a nice girl, Ellis, so I'm going to tell you something. Don't ever let a man buy you a drink. They buy you a drink, and they think you owe them something.” Her grip on my arm was making my fingers grow numb.

“I won't.” I hadn't. Jack had wanted to, but I'd told him no.

“They say you just have to get over your inhibitions. So I did.” She laughed as she threw her arms up and did a shimmy, making the beads around her neck sway. It was a strange kind of hollow-sounding laugh that didn't match the look in her eyes.

The man she'd been with stood and planted a kiss on her neck, then snaked an arm around her waist.

She swatted his hand away with another of those odd laughs. “The modern girl isn't supposed to believe in romance . . . or love.”

Not believe in love? That was like not believing in happy endings! “But if you don't believe in love, what is there to believe in?”

The man reached out from behind her with a lighted cigarette. She took his hand in hers and guided it to her mouth, taking a greedy drag. Then she blew out the smoke in a ring. “What is there to believe in? You don't have to believe in anything anymore. Don't you know that? There's nothing left
to
believe in.” She took another drag before turning to kiss the man on the mouth.

He pulled her close, pressing another kiss to her neck.

She pulled away, putting a hand to his chest. “What do you believe in, Floyd?”

“I believe I'll have another drink!”

The table cheered as they all picked up their coffee cups and waved them in the air.

Though he went on kissing her neck, she grabbed my arm again. “You don't have to believe in anything, Ellis. That's the trouble with you. You just have to be happy.”

“Are you happy, Irene?”

“Delirious! Can't you tell?”

Jack tugged at my hand. “Let's go dance.” I didn't mind when he pulled me toward the stage. Maybe after we danced we could leave.

The band was playing a lively tune, and we broke out into a Charleston. Jack somehow always managed to stay close despite our twisting legs and flying arms. As the band segued into another song, Jack cleared a table, grabbed me around the waist, and set me down atop it. At least there was more room to dance up there, so I did—my beads flying and my hair spilling down into my eyes.

After the song was done, Jack gave me his hand and helped me down. Another girl took my place. We worked our way
back toward the table we'd left, but our chairs had already been claimed.

“That friend of yours. Seems like she knows how to have some fun. Sure I can't buy you a drink? Look what it did for her.”

I followed his gaze and then gasped. Irene was shimmying up on stage with some musician who was playing a saxophone. As we watched, the song ended. She turned her back to us, bent at the waist and flipped up her—oh my goodness!

“Get hot! Get hot!” Jack and most of the rest of the men in the room gave her a wolf whistle. Several of the girls were . . . clapping?! Why?

Poor Irene! She must either be ill or overcome by the heat to make such a display of herself. Someone really ought to go and cover her up. I made my way around the tables toward the stage. She was still doing it. Bending over and flipping up her skirt. Again and again and again. I put a hand over my eyes to block the view. What was wrong with her?

When I got to the stage, I reached up, grabbed hold of her hand, and pulled her down.

Or tried to.

She didn't want to come.

I dropped her arm and climbed up on the stage, and then I practically had to wrestle with her to get her to stop. When that didn't work, I reached out and grabbed her by the ear.

Someone started booing. “Aw, come on! Don't be such a wet blanket.”

She was laughing that strange laugh again. “Did you see me?”

“Everyone saw you, Irene.”

“Do you think so? I hope so!”

I gave her a none-too-gentle push toward the stairs. “What on earth possessed you—!”

“Oh, it's all in good fun.”

Good fun was spitting watermelon seeds off the back porch at the shore . . . or changing pepper shakers for the salt shakers. “I don't even know what to say to you. What would the dean think?”

“You should pay attention to your own potatoes! What's it to you what I do?”

“I don't even think you
know
what you're doing . . . do you?”

“People like it. Men like it. Didn't you hear them whistling?”

“Some men would whistle at any girl. And a decent man would have turned away. Some things just shouldn't be done. By anybody!”

“I'm not a Lowell or an Eton or a Cabot. And I don't have a Prince Phillips either. I don't have the luxury of knowing my family's already got my future taken care of. Girls like me have to do for themselves. We have to take what we can get.”

“And you're hoping to find someone worth having here?” I turned her so she could look out on all those drunken faces with their red-rimmed eyes.

“Just—” She pushed me. “Go away. You're being a party pooper.”

As I stumbled, she disappeared into the crowd. The band started on another song, and then everyone went back to drinking and talking and laughing. Suddenly I was tired of it all. Was I the only one not having a good time?

Up ahead, at the far end of the room, I could just about make out the door. Inching past tables, slipping between all the people, I finally reached it.

When we'd first come in the sun had been out; it had long since set. But at least it was quieter outside, and I wasn't standing shoulder to shoulder with people I didn't know.

I climbed the stairs and turned into the alley, then sat down on a curb.

Every day, in every way, I'm getting
better and better.
Tears started to slip down my cheeks.
Every day, in every way, I'm getting better and
better.
I was supposed to be getting better! Why wasn't I getting any smarter? Or at least a little less stupid? And what was I doing here with a man who was connected to killers? Maybe I'd already gotten as better as I was ever going to get.

A wave of despair swept up from the pit of my stomach and rolled right over the top of my head. For the first time, the thought occurred to me that perhaps I'd chosen too big a part for myself to play. Who was I trying to kid? Sometimes I couldn't even remember to pretend to be Janie. The suspicion I wasn't even good at the one thing I'd always thought I was good at began to grow. And if I wasn't good at acting, how could I expect anyone to put me in a movie? But I
had
to be good at acting! I had to keep Jack thinking I was just some dumb Dora. He was my best chance at keeping Griff alive.

I covered my face with my hands and sobbed. I couldn't do anything right. I shouldn't be here; I should be at the Exeter with my father.

Why did I have to be me?

Mother and Father wanted me to be good. Griff wanted
me to be his girl. Jack wanted me to keep my mouth shut and forget about what I'd heard, and Irene wanted me to go away. But I couldn't do any of those things. I couldn't be the person everyone wanted me to be. It was like that chapter I'd read from Romans at the Missionary Aid Society: I'd tried, over and over again, to be the person I knew I ought to be, and I'd only ever ended up making everything worse. If I tried any harder, they'd just all end up hating me even more.

So that's why I was going to Hollywood just as soon as I could get away from here. I'd leave today, right now, only I'd promised Janie I'd keep her job for her. And there was Griff to worry about, and Jack. And now there was Irene too. There were too many people who needed too many things.

It would be easy if I were the film actress Colleen Moore. Then I could just tell Mother and Father I wasn't a good student and I never would be, and they'd just smile and say they knew and they loved me anyway. If I were Colleen Moore, I could tell Griff I wasn't any good for him and why couldn't he just see that, and then he'd embrace me and say,
“
I guess there was no harm in trying.”

How could I ever be myself when they were certain I was somebody different? How could I look them in the eyes and say something I just knew was going to disappoint them?

I nearly laughed aloud. Why was I worrying about disappointing everyone? It was the only thing I seemed to be good at doing. I disappointed someone nearly every day.
Every day, in every way, I'm getting worse and
worse
. That's the phrase I ought to be repeating.

“Janie?” Jack's call floated toward me from around the corner. He must be looking for me.

I dabbed at my eyes with the heels of my hands, trying to hide the traces of my tears.

“Janie . . .” Jack appeared around the corner. “There you are! You shouldn't be alone out here by yourself. Come back inside.”

If I had to go back inside that smelly old place, I'd just about scream! I tried on a pout. “Do we have to? It's so noisy. And stuffy. And besides, I couldn't even hear you talk in there.” I rose and linked my arm through his.

“I suppose we don't have to. But then . . . what would we do?”

“Why . . . we'd . . . we'd walk.”

“Walk?”