The Dark Lady (20 page)

"Rubbish! You can go for days without a drink. I've seen you."

"Only if I have something else."

"Aha! Suppose we talk about that. Why doesn't Mr. Something Else come out here anymore?"

"He's working, Ivy. You know that."

"On weekends, too?"

"Presumably."

Elesina now resumed a sullen silence. It was perfectly plain that David's absence was the cause of her bad humor, but it was not equally clear to Ivy what had caused his absence. She surmised that he had been sent packing, but she did not know why. She had hoped to provide a discreet little affair for Elesina, and what could have been handier than a handsome stepson already on the premises? It was possible, of course, that Elesina did not trust David's discretion, but what, in that case, was to prevent them from meeting in town? Ivy assumed, anyway, that her friend's fancy, and with it her irritability, would be short-lived, but she had to reconsider her estimate when the weeks passed, bringing no change in Elesina's mood. The mistress of Broadlawns even began to neglect her work on the collection and to pass her afternoons strolling listlessly on the lawn and in the garden.

One evening Ivy sought her in the rose garden and forced the issue.

"What is it between you and David? You had better tell me, for I'm not going to shut up."

Elesina closed her book and seemed to study its spine. "Oh, Ivy, it's all so ridiculous."

"What is?"

"To feel this way about a boy at my age."

"He's not a boy. He's twenty-six, or almost."

"But I'm years older, and..."

"Nine, to be exact. That might be a problem if you were fifty, and he forty-one. But at your age it's nothing. And who are you trying to kid, anyway? Since when have boys not been dangerous? I find David sexy myself. There's something about all that blondness and blue-eyedness in a Jewish boy that's irresistible. If I had half your looks and were twenty years younger, I'd give you a tussle for him!"

"Ivy, you're really the worst old pimp!"

"Only for you, love."

"Do you make nothing of the fact that he's Irving's son?"

"Ah, you see? You didn't say, 'my stepson.' You don't want to consider that too closely. Neither do I. Why should we?"

"Because it may be wicked, that's why!"

"So long as you keep things in their proper compartments, there's no need for moral hysteria. If I spit on the American flag before a squadron of marines, I'd be beaten up, and rightly so! But if I spit on it in my own room, behind closed doors ... well, that's my affair. It's neither moral nor immoral. It's just me."

"Oh, Ivy, of course, I agree with you." Elesina, suddenly friendly again, reached out impulsively to clasp her friend's hand. "I can't kid myself that I'm really concerned about being faithful to Irving. I wasn't faithful to Ted, and that never bothered me. It's true, I was faithful to my first husband, but that was only because I was still scared of Mother. No, what really bothers me is that for the first time that I can remember I don't seem to be in control of my life. I always was before. If I was going to the dogs, it was because I wanted to. Because barks and bites attracted me. If I pulled myself together and presented people with a decent Hedda Gabler, it was also because I wanted to. And men ... well, I chose my men, for one bad reason or another. I wanted to hurt Ted, and I hurt him. I wanted Irving to admire me, and he did. I always had to be the piper, don't you see? I had to call the tune. And with the various men who were my lovers—don't stare so, Ivy, there weren't all that many—I never lost my independence. It was usually I who called the halt. And I never shirked the job of telling them either."

"That takes guts."

"Maybe I liked it." Elesina shrugged. "There's always been a streak of cruelty in me. When I was a child in Southampton and the little boys at the Beach Club cut up live crabs and the other girls ran away, I stayed. It's not attractive, but I face it. And of course I've been a lousy mother."

"Not now, dear."

"But now it's easy. Now it costs me nothing. Oh, let's be honest, Ivy. That's our one virtue, yours and mine. What really troubles me is that I seem to have lost my perspective. This thing I have about David is different from what I've felt for other men. I actually want to
do
things for him. Now why should that be?"

"Maybe it's love."

"Of course it's love. But I've been in love before."

"I mean, real love."

"Ivy, you're simply proving that all pimps are sentimental! I've been examining things more dispassionately. At first, I thought it might be a premature change of life. But I'm too young for that, and, anyway, Dr. Birch says I'm fine. Then it occurred to me that I might be attracted to David
because
he's Irving's son. That I'm trying to pick mates exclusively out of the Stein family, using one for a husband, one for a lover..."

"Really, Elesina, must you be so complex?"

"Except it wasn't that. It was more as if I had married Irving because I was already in love with David. I wonder if that first day that I dined here, when I told Fred Pemberton that if Shakespeare were at the party, he'd go after David, I wasn't already snared."

"Then why did you send him away?"

"Because he was getting out of control. You warned me about that. And you were right. If he'd stayed on here, there would have been the most frightful scandal. And the worst of it is that I might not have minded!"

"I see." Ivy nodded slowly as she put together her plan. "It's more or less as I suspected. The sooner you go to bed with that young man, the better. Will you leave it to me?"

"I most certainly will not!"

"And do just as I say?"

"Don't be absurd."

"Good. I'll go into New York tomorrow."

"Ivy Trask, if you pretend to be my ambassador to David, I warn you, I shall repudiate every word you say!"

"That is the prerogative of every principal." Ivy turned to the house. "I shall have to speak to Irving. I shall need an appointment with Mr. Schurman."

Waving aside Elesina's continued protestations, she went back in and up to Irving's room. She told him that she wanted to go to New York to make her will and asked him to introduce her to his lawyers. Irving, always delighted to get her out of the house, telephoned to Mr. Schurman and made an appointment for the very next day.

When Ivy was received by the attorney in his office, she asked if David Stein could be assigned to her.

"David is in litigation," Mr. Schurman demurred. "I should like you to go to Mr. Devlin, our partner in charge of estates."

"Mine is a very simple will. I'm sure it could be handled by a novice. I'd like to think that David was in charge of my small affairs."

So it was that she found herself, fifteen minutes later, facing David across a small desk as, smiling a bit grimly, she fabricated a long list of trivial bequests. Behind him was the single window of the narrow, whitewashed office which looked out, rather dramatically, on the spires of St. Patrick's Cathedral. David was courteous, friendly, even charming. He wrote down on a yellow legal pad, in his careful round handwriting, the names of Ivy's numerous legatees.

"I think I'm going to change my mind again about the mother-of-pearl lavaliere," she said, watching him carefully for the least hint of impatience. "Harriet Tremaine would like it, I know, but it belonged to Aunt Bessie Troop, who was only her aunt by marriage. I think I should leave it to Prudence Weston, who, of course, was Aunt Bessie's own niece."

"Very well." David drew a thick, neat line slowly through an earlier note. "Does Prudence Weston have a middle name?"

"Two. Charity Augusta. And come to think of it, I don't think the amethyst bracelet should go to Emily Trask. She always loses things. She lost Grandma's amber necklace, though some think she hocked it."

"Do you suppose, Ivy, that these gifts could be covered in a memorandum? It's much easier to alter than a will if you should change your mind about any of these bequests."

"But would a memorandum be binding?"

"No, but I'm sure your residuary legatee would honor it."

"How do you know that? We haven't got to my residuary legatee yet."

"No, but I'm sure you wouldn't leave your residuary estate to a person who couldn't be trusted."

"And, anyway, why would my residuary legatee care for my junky jewelry? Is that what you mean? I don't suppose the lot of it's worth five hundred bucks."

"I didn't mean that at all, Ivy." His face expressed a proper concern at such an imputation.

"Oh, I know you didn't, dear boy! I was testing you. To see if you could put up with the garrulity of an old maid fussing over buttons and thimbles. And you can! You'd be a wonderful estates lawyer, honey. Let's reduce my silly will to a simple sentence. Everything I own to the person I love best in the world." She paused, waiting.

"And who is that?"

"Can't you guess?"

"Me, I suppose."

"Conceited ass! Elesina, of course."

David looked at her pensively. Then he studied his pencil point. "Don't you think my father will adequately provide for Elesina?"

"Who knows? If he does, your family will probably contest it."

"You think we're so greedy?"

"I don't think
you
are."

Their eyes met, but he looked away. "Thanks."

"You'd be on Elesina's side, wouldn't you, David?"

He moved his shoulders impatiently. "I don't know about sides. But so long as I have any money, Elesina can count on it."

"David, look at me. I know how you and Elesina feel about each other."

David's brow was puckered, and his staring eyes expressed something between fascination and repulsion. "What do you know about it?"

"I know she loves you."

"Loves me!"

"Yes. And that is why I came here today. Not for the stupid will, though you'll have to draw one up because I told Mr. Schurman about it. I want you and Elesina to be able to meet in town."

Ah,
now
his eyes were everything she had greedily anticipated! "Does Elesina know you're here?"

"Elesina has agreed to nothing."

"I see."

"I want to draw up a plan. And present it to her. Do you wish to know what that plan is?"

"I think I'd like to talk to Elesina myself."

"Look here, David. This thing will be done my way or not at all. Now do you want to know what my plan is?"

His answer was barely audible. "Yes."

"Elesina and I will take a course at NYU in the history of art. I have already arranged it. Your father thinks it will help us with the collection. The course will be on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at eleven. We will attend the lectures and then lunch at my apartment in the Althorpe before going back to Rye. Except I shall not go to the apartment."

"I see." His voice was still a whisper. His cheeks were flushed, and his eyes were intent on the yellow memorandum.

"I suppose you can give up your lunch hour three times a week." Ivy decided that the moment had come to relieve the atmosphere. "There'll be something in the icebox in my apartment." She uttered a sharp little laugh. "Fred Pemberton would say I'm like that character in
Troilus and Cressida.
Is it Pandarus? But people in your and Elesina's situation need help. I love her, and I know she's unhappy. I want that girl to have something out of life. And if it's David Stein the poor creature wants, then it's David Stein she'll get!"

Ivy had let emotion blot out the cynicism in her voice. The effect on David was immediate. His eyes were moist. He jumped up and went over to hug her.

"Ivy, you old darling! You're not Pandarus. You're Juliet's nurse!"

"That's better." She released herself firmly from his embrace and then stared at him with sudden fierceness. "But you'll have to promise me one thing, David."

"Anything!"

"You must promise to be ruled by me in this matter. It is going to be set up so that no human being but you and I and Elesina ever knows. Is that perfectly understood?"

For a moment he wavered. "I hate subterfuge."

"David Stein, if you don't give me your word, I walk out of this office, and you shan't see me again. Now! Do you promise?" Still he paused. "No answer? Is
that
what young men call love today?"

"I promise you, Ivy."

"Very well." She studied him severely for a moment, assessing the possibility of default. "If you expose her, David, if you cause a scandal, I really believe that I will kill you."

His laugh had a note of surprise. "Why, Ivy, I thought you liked me!"

"I love you, dear boy," she said grimly. "I always have. But Elesina is different. Elesina is my child. Elesina is my life!"

Elesina had never had an affair so exclusively physical. She and David now met only in Ivy's apartment, and there was time in their brief appointments for little else. David no longer came to Broadlawns, for reasons which they never discussed. Indeed, it was their tacit understanding, at least in the first weeks, never to mention his father at all. Elesina liked to think of her hours at the Althorpe as an enchanted existence having no relation to the actuality of Rye. Stepping out of the old grilled elevator and walking down the dark corridor to Ivy's door, she would feel like a nymph loved by a god or demigod in a legend. Or she might think of David's ivory-skinned, muscular body as a Greek statue come to life in a deserted studio for her alone. Their first encounter was quick and feverish. Not until the second or even third had they achieved the kind of union that she had read about and never really believed existed.

And yet she sometimes wondered, paradoxically, if their relationship were not more spiritual than any she had experienced. She was like Psyche, loved in the dark by a stranger. The affair was freed of the vulgarity of jealousy, of curiosity, of distraction. Orgasm with David was like the raising of a communion cup before an altar that knew no sacrament but love. There was no guilt, no adultery, no incest, no divorce, no settlements, no law, no Hitler in Ivy's darkened bedroom with this never tiring lover in her arms. God, if she could only die there! Or
had
she died there?