People Like Us (4 page)

Gus listened, as he always listened when people told him things at dinner parties, which they always did. He planned someday to write a book about these people who went out to dinner every night, and talked and talked and talked about each other, who was rich, who was broke, who took drugs, who drank, who had cancer, who was having an affair with whom, who was getting a divorce, who was straight, who was gay. There was very little they didn’t know about each other, and very little they didn’t discuss about each other.

“Odd, don’t you think, Maisie having Constantine de Rham to dinner?” replied Gus.

Matilda Clarke, used to conversational shifts at dinner parties, abandoned Evangeline Simpson as a subject. “He’s a new acquisition of Maisie’s. I think he introduced her to this ghastly common Renthal man who bought my apartment and is trying to assemble an art collection in ten minutes. Maisie probably pays Constantine a finder’s fee for digging up these new billionaires.”

“Hmm,” said Gus, signaling to Matilda that Mrs. Renthal was on his other side.

“Constantine’s very cultured, you know,” Matilda
continued. “And he’s awfully amusing to sit next to at dinner, Gus. I bet you don’t know the name of Talleyrand’s chef at the Congress of Vienna, but Constantine does. Or the name of Sebastian Flyte’s teddy bear in
Brideshead Revisited
. Constantine does.”

Across the table Yvonne Lupescu, who had already pronounced Maisie’s veal “mystery meat,” now declined the cheese. “I hate brie breath,” she said to no one in particular, although Matilda Clarke kicked Gus under the table to listen and signaled Ezzie Fenwick by pointing to Yvonne with her eyes.

“She just won’t do. She just won’t do at all,” said Matilda, holding her hand in front of her mouth, as if she expected Mrs. Lupescu to read lips. “Constantine must be out of his mind.”

“Hmm,” said Gus.

“Will you look at the way she’s overdressed,” said Matilda, tying and untying and then tying again the sleeves of a cashmere sweater she had tossed over her shoulders to protect herself from the icy blast of Maisie’s air conditioner, even though it was nearly winter outside. “When I was giving parties, when darling Sweetzer was still alive, and we still had the big apartment, I always had my secretary call my guests on the morning of the party and say, ‘Mrs. Clarke is wearing a long dress tonight,’ or, ‘Mrs. Clarke is wearing a short dress,’ so that all the women would be dressed alike. I mean, look at this woman. She looks like she’s going to the opening night of the opera in Istanbul.”

“Rather hard to pinpoint her nationality,” said Gus, studying Mrs. Lupescu’s ample mouth and wide-apart eyes.

“Oh, Peruvian, maybe,” said Matilda, giving it some thought. “Or Corsican, possibly, and maybe more than a tinge of Albanian tossed in. What Sweetzer used to call a mongrel.”

“Pretty, though.”

“Shows too much gum when she smiles. Ask Ezzie Fenwick about Mrs. Lupescu sometime. Ask Ezzie what
she did at the airport in Tangier when she didn’t have enough money to pay for her excess baggage.” Matilda rolled her eyes. “Nice china Maisie Verdurin has,” she continued, picking up the dessert plate that had been placed in front of her and turning it over. “You don’t often see the Fitz Hugh border like this. Do you suppose it’s for sale? Like all her pictures?” A waiter passing the dessert interrupted her. “Oh, look at this
créme brûlée
, will you! It’s far too pretty to break into, but I will. A million calories, that’s all.”

Across the table, Yvonne Lupescu, unrushed, stared down at Maisie’s
créme brûlée
for half a minute before tasting it and then, with a shake of her head, dropped her spoon loudly on her plate. “That’s not worth getting fat over,” she said to Bernie Slatkin.

As a rule toasts were not given at Maisie Verdurin’s dinners, except when a former President was present, or a cabinet minister, so it was unexpected when Constantine de Rham rose to his feet, after the champagne was poured, and tapped his fork against the side of his champagne glass until there was silence in the three rooms where Maisie’s guests were seated.

“I would like to propose a toast to our hostess,” said Constantine, and, encouraged by several “Hear, hears,” in the rooms, he spoke charmingly about Maisie as a formidable force in the art world of New York as well as a hostess of such note that her monthly fêtes would one day be recorded as part of the social history of the city. Maisie flushed prettily. “She has given her talent to her work,” Constantine concluded, “but she has given her genius to her life.”

No one applauded more enthusiastically than Mrs. Lupescu, as if approval of Constantine de Rham was the thing she most ardently desired, reflecting, as it did, on herself.

“Marvelous, wasn’t it, what Constantine said about Mrs. Verdurin?” said Yvonne Lupescu to her table. “That she gives her talent to her work but her genius to her life. Marvelous.”

“It was even more marvelous when Oscar Wilde said it originally, about himself,” said Gus to Matilda Clarke.

Throughout dinner, Ruby Renthal, terrified of the sophisticated society-wit Ezzie Fenwick, sat in silence and watched, declining to participate for fear of making another mistake. She understood from his remark that her dress was all wrong, as well as her hairstyle, just from the look he gave it with his one good eye, which she figured out was not the one that went off in another direction. And worse, her table manners, once she realized she was the only one who ate her artichoke with a knife and fork, were wrong. On the several occasions she tried to speak to Gus Bailey, she saw that his ear was monopolized by Matilda Clarke, whose apartment the Renthals had bought, but his eyes were focused on Yvonne Lupescu.

When Gus went down the long hallway to the bedrooms to find his coat, Ruby Renthal followed him. “Mr. Bailey,” she said.

Gus turned. “I think the ladies’ coats are in Maisie’s bedroom on that side, Mrs. Renthal,” said Gus.

“Mr. Bailey,” she said again.

“It’s Gus,” said Gus.

“Gus,” she said. She looked both ways in the hall, as if to see if anyone was coming, and Gus realized that she wanted to say something to him. He remembered then that she had looked at him strangely when they had been introduced. “Didn’t you use to live in Los Angeles?” she asked.

“Yes,” he replied.

“My name before I was married was Ruby Nolte. Does that name mean anything to you?”

Gus looked at her, as if the name struck a note, although her face did not look familiar to him. “Help me,” he said.

“Does the name Lefty Flint mean anything to you?”

“Oh, yes,” said Gus, quietly. The name Lefty Flint,
whenever he heard it, caused a violent reaction within him. He walked into the bedroom where the coats were hanging on a rack and turned to look back at Ruby Renthal, who followed him into the room.

“It was in your family that it happened, wasn’t it?” she asked.

Gus nodded. Something stopped him from pulling away from her.

“I used to be a redhead. I used to be an airline stewardess too, at least at the time. I went out with Lefty Flint for a while. Then I grew scared of him. When I tried to break off with him, he beat me up. He broke my nose. He knocked out two of my teeth. He blacked my eyes. He fractured my jaw. I thought I would never again have a face I could look at in the mirror.”

“Dear God,” said Gus. He sat down on the edge of the bed.

“I was in the hospital for ten days, thanks to Mr. Lefty Flint,” said Ruby.

“Dear God,” Gus repeated.

“Did you ever hear of a lawyer called Marv Pink?” she asked.

“Oh, yes, I know Marv Pink,” said Gus.

“Some of Lefty’s friends came to visit me in the hospital. They told me if I testified against Lefty, Marv Pink would nail me to the cross. My background is not of the Virgin Mary variety, if you get my point. It would all end up looking like I got what I deserved. Do you know what I mean?”

“Yes, I know what you mean,” said Gus. “It’s the fashion in the courts these days, blame the victim.”

“They paid my hospital bill, and I disappeared. It’s something I’ve always regretted,” she said.

“And Flint walked away, scot free.”

“I know.”

“How come you told me all this? I wouldn’t have known Mrs. Elias Renthal was Ruby Nolte if you hadn’t told me,” said Gus.

“I couldn’t believe it when we sat next to each other tonight. You see, I read about what happened in your family a few years later, and I always felt guilty. I felt that if I’d gone to the police at the time, what happened to you might not have happened.”

Gus nodded.

Ruby sat down on the bed next to Gus and took his hand. “I’m sorry for what happened to you,” she said.

“I’m sorry for what happened to you,” replied Gus.

“When does he get out of prison?”

“He only got three years.”

“Three years?” she said in disbelief.

“He was a jury pleaser. He wore a coat and tie, and he always carried a Bible. They fell for it.”

Ruby shook her head.

In the hallway there were voices as other people began to look for their coats. Ruby jumped off the bed and went to the mirror and started to brush her hair.

“Listen, Gus, my husband doesn’t know,” said Ruby. “I never told him. A guy doesn’t want to marry a girl who’s been beaten up like I was. Elias would have thought I was damaged goods, and Elias Renthal is the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“It’s not a thing I’d ever talk about,” said Gus.

“Ruby?” called out Elias in the hallway.

“In here, Elias,” she called back.

“What the hell’s going on in here?” asked Elias, staring at Gus sitting on the bed and Ruby brushing her hair in the mirror.

“Just getting my coat, Elias,” said Ruby.

“Maisie wants us to look at the picture,” said Elias.

“Elias, this is Augustus Bailey. My husband, Elias Renthal. Mr. Bailey wrote that article you liked on Laurance Van Degan.”

“Pleased to meetcha, Mr. Dailey,” said Elias. He shook hands without looking at Gus.

“Same,” said Gus, taking his coat. “Nice meeting you, Mrs. Renthal,” he added. Their eyes met in the mirror, and Gus walked out.

“That guy’s old enough to be your father,” said Elias.

“So are you,” replied Ruby, still adjusting her makeup at the mirror.

“So am I what?”

“Old enough to be my father.”

“What the hell is this? We go to our first New York party, and you end up in the bedroom with some guy.”

“Oh, calm down, Elias. I end up in the bedroom with the coats, talking to Mr. Bailey. He’s a writer. He writes about rich people. One of these days, you and I are going to have to get to know guys like that, when we start moving in this town. And, listen, this dress of mine is a disaster. There’s a guy here tonight called Nevel who—”

“A guy called Nevel?”

“Leven spelled backwards. He designed Maisie Verdurin’s dress, and the young Altemus girl who’s Laurance Van Degan’s niece. I’m going there tomorrow, so get out your checkbook, big boy, because he costs an arm and a leg, and I’m going to buy him out.”

“Okay, okay. How’d you know this Dailey?”

“Bailey, not Dailey, Elias. If he was from Wall Street, you’d remember his name.”

“Bailey then.”

“I sat next to him tonight at dinner, and I met him once before in L.A. I met a lot of people before I met you, Elias, and if you’re going to start getting jealous every time I run into someone you don’t know, we’re going to have a boring few years in front of us. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Elias.

“Now smile.” She put her finger under his chin.

“I’m smiling.”

“Love me?”

“Love you.” He kissed her shoulder.

“Same here. Now let’s go look at that six-million-dollar Monet and see if it’s the right color pink.”

No one lingered after dinner at Maisie Verdurin’s parties;
the evenings always ended with the liquored coffee, after which there was a mass exit for the elevator. That night the consensus was that Mr. and Mrs. Elias Renthal were never going to make it in New York, no matter how much money they brought with them from Cleveland.

“How was Mrs. Renthal?” asked Matilda Clarke in the crowded elevator.

“She called her evening dress a formal,” said Ezzie. “And she ate her artichoke with a knife and fork.”

“Imagine people like that in my apartment. Sweetzer must be turning over in his grave. He grew up in that apartment,” said Matilda.

Gus closed his eyes. He felt protective about Ruby Renthal. “I thought she was very pretty,” he said, “and very nice.”

“Hmm,” said Ezzie.

“Gus, come out to the country for the weekend,” said Matilda Clarke, when they got out on the first floor. “Rochelle’s coming, and maybe the Calders, if Nestor gets back from Hollywood.”

“Thank you, but I can’t.”

“Where are you off to?” insisted Matilda.

“I’m going in the other direction this weekend,” replied Gus, smiling at Matilda.

“You’re always going off some place mysterious, Gus,” said Matilda.

Outside Maisie’s building several homeless people slept on the sidewalk, with packing cases beneath them and over them. On the street limousines were lined up waiting for the departing guests. “They shouldn’t allow this,” said Ezzie Fenwick, as he gathered Matilda Clarke and Violet Bastedo into the back of Violet’s limousine, careful that the long skirts of their dresses would not be caught in the door.

“Can you help me out? I don’t have anything to eat,” said a beggar, holding his hand out to Ezzie Fenwick as he was about to step into the car.

Ezzie, frightened by the proximity of the young man, put his hand in his pocket and handed him some silver without looking at him and then hopped into the limousine with a litheness that belied his age and girth.

“Did you give him anything?” asked Matilda.

“It’s hard to say you have no money when you’re getting into a limousine wearing a coat with a fur collar and black patent-leather pumps with grosgrain ribbons on them,” answered Ezzie.

The three sat in silence for a moment, while the chauffeur pulled his car out in front of the other cars.

“Let’s go hear Bobby Short,” said Violet Bastedo.