Too Much Too Soon (18 page)

Gideon was on his feet, his massive shoulders curved over construction plans spread on his desk. Seeing her, he came to attention, a major general abristle with authority.

Conscious of her stiff facial muscles, Honora forced a smile. “Good morning, Gideon.”

“How did you get in?” he barked. “That new idiot switchboard girl—”

“Don’t blame her.” Honora felt dizzy. “I told her I was your sister-in-law.”

“Didn’t I make that clear? We have no connection.”

“You said I mustn’t talk to Crystal or Joscelyn and I haven’t.”

He glared at her. “Well? Why are you here?”

“I need a loan.” The words flowed. Why not? Hadn’t she rehearsed these sentences all the way up Highway 99? “A hundred dollars. I’ll pay whatever interest you decide.”

“A loan? Haven’t you heard? In this country our charities support homes for women left in the lurch.”

“Curt and I are married, Gideon.”

“Wear your phony wedding ring and fool the others. But don’t lie to me.”

“We were married in Tahoe.” Her voice was softer, almost a stammer.

He sat in the large leather chair behind the desk, not offering her the seat opposite him. “Then why doesn’t your ‘husband’ handle your financial problems?”

“He’s out of the country.”

“In Lalarhein, trying to lay out a highway. So you see, I know all about Curt Ivory.” As he said the name his eyelids flickered, and momentarily the stern hardness wavered.

She felt a wave of empathy, even sympathy. Her tormenter had rescued Curt from starvation, had endowed him with an education and a profession.

“Gideon,” she said, “if it’s any consolation, he feels awful about leaving Talbott’s. You mean a lot to him.”

“No need for soft soap. You’re not getting a penny.”

She shifted her weight. “I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t at the end of my rope. Curt left me a quite a lot, but . . . well . . . I was stupid. A hundred dollars would be a huge help.”

“You and your father. Throwing away every chance, then come begging.”

“Daddy’s on his way back to London,” she said doggedly. “He’s had a top-notch offer.”

Gideon gave her a sour look, as if to say he’d believe it when he saw it. “I’ve done more than enough for Ivory already. I’m not about to
support his bastard.”

At the word
bastard
anger spurted through her body. White dots scintillated in front of her eyes, and her hands clenched into fists. She had no room for rage or pride, but she could not control herself. How dare this nasty-minded, unforgiving little millionaire who had married her aunt, then her sister, slander her unborn child?

“I’m sorry for you, Gideon,” she said in a choked whisper. “The world must always look ugly to you.”

“Get out!”

Her breath rasping, she backed from the office. Still suffused and buoyed by rage, she hurried down the stairs. As she reached the bottom landing, the front door opened and closed.

It was Crystal.

The sisters stared at one another through a dusty shaft of sunlight. These moments became an indelible, photographic image etched into their brains: neither would ever manage to exorcise this minuscule fraction of time.

Crystal, halted with one dainty gray ostrich pump pointed forward, was improbably beautiful in a silvery mink coat and matching hat.

Honora held out her hand. “Crys,” she murmured. “Crys, I’ve missed you so much.”

Crystal’s gaze had been fixed on the maternity smock. The blond head in its fur coronet tilted to the left, an ambiguous gesture that Honora took as condemnation.

“We’re m-married,” she stammered.
“Married . . . .”

Hurrying down the last three steps, she stumbled at the bottom, rescuing herself by grasping the banister, then rushing through the haze of perfume that surrounded her sister.

Up close there was no mistaking Crystal’s expression. The incomparable blue eyes held an infuriating, demeaning pity.

Honora stumbled up Maiden Lane, hunching in the dust-covered Ford with her shaking hands covering her wet face.

*   *   *

It was after midnight before she was back in Hollywood. She fell into an exhausted sleep, jerking awake before dawn. She got out her old Edinthorpe skirt, which her father had brought down with him—for some reason it was the only possession of hers that he had packed. The wool was far heavier than people wore in California. Honora used her nail scissors to open the hip seams, resewing them as far to the selvage as possible. By the time she had ironed her stitchery under a damp rag, it was after ten. In the Broadway’s Bargain Basement she spent the last of her folding money on a heavy, all-in-one foundation. The boned corset flattened and widened the gentle mound of her stomach, pushing up her enlarged breasts.

In her short, pre-New Look skirt, with her nubby pink sweater pulled down over her hips, she appeared buxom and cheap rather than pregnant.

Scotch-taped inside the window of the Hollywood Boulevard Pig’n’Whistle window was a
typed card:
Part-time waitress. Experience necessary. Apply manager.

She waited while the manager put in a long-distance call to San Francisco. Al Stroud must have given her a good reference. The manager told her that the part-time job was hers.

Thirty-five minutes after Honora entered the cafe she was dressed in a freshly cleaned size fourteen uniform and taking an order.

The Pig’n’Whistle was a chain that served food hovering between tea-room delicate and short-order solid: the Hollywood branch opened for breakfast, closing at the hour dictated by California law; two
A.M
.

Part-time meant that Honora worked five hours in a split shift.

She arrived at seven in the morning, galloping until nine, when the serious breakfasters gave way to the coffee and sweetroll dawdlers. She then took off two hours to return at eleven thirty for the lunch onslaught. At two thirty, when the large side hall was roped off, her workday ended.

During her midmorning off-hours she would stumble the few blocks home to sprawl on the couch with her swollen, white-stockinged feet raised on the armrest. Too exhausted to write letters or read, not permitting herself to nap for fear she’d oversleep, she was easy prey for
visions of disaster. Was the all-in-one squashing the baby into deformity? How much longer could she continue on the job? There had been no letters from Curt—had he been injured?

It was almost a relief to force her puffy feet back into her white Naturalizers. The fast turnover of tables at Pig’n’Whistle left her no time to think.

Honora’s complexion, though not vivid like Crystal’s, had a natural, creamy luminosity. Now the skin was drab and the Max Factor pancake she used to cover the dark circles under her eyes intensified its lusterless pallor. Yet more depressing was the swelling of her delicate ankles—Curt had often kissed his way up her long, slender legs.

After Dr. Capwell had listened to her stomach through his stethoscope, she asked hesitantly, “Does it mean anything that my ankles are swollen?”

Dr. Capwell did not look up from the dog-eared filing card on which he was scribbling laboriously. “Pregnancy is no time for vanity,” he scolded. “What matters is the fetal heartbeat. It’s strong and regular.”

As she left the office, a very pregnant redhead emerged from the elevator and started along a different corridor. Honora knew a group of obstetricians shared a suite on this floor. She followed the redhead. A prettily furnished waiting room was crowded with women in various stages of pregnancy. She had never seen another pregnant woman in Dr. Capwell’s narrow, unbusy waiting room. These premises
looked rich, but several of the patients didn’t. What would she say to an unknown obstetrician?
Hello, I’m a patient of Dr. Capwell up the hall, and I’m worried about puffy ankles—can the problem be I’m waiting tables in a tight girdle?

The reception nurse, who was taking a package wrapped in a brown paper bag from the redhead, glanced at her with a tentative, questioning smile.

I can’t waste money on a visit. I have to save every penny for when I can’t work, and the hospital.

*   *   *

One cloudy afternoon in mid-April Honora sat at a corner booth eating the Daily Special of chicken croquettes, mashed potatoes, carrots and peas that was free to employees—her budgetary conscience forced her to fill up on these starchy meals no matter how tired she was when her shift ended.

At a tap on her shoulder, the minced chicken fell from her fork.

“Hello, stranger,” said a familiar voice.

Honora’s eyes opened wide. “Vi!”

The last time they were together, it must have been August, Vi had told her a certain somebody had asked her to move to San Berdoo, and it looked like wedding bells again: despite two divorces and a series of disastrous “engagements,” Vi remained blithely optimistic when it came to romance. A few days after that Honora had tried to reach Vi at Stroud’s and Al told her Vi had quit, leaving no forwarding address.

“Long time no see,” Vi grinned.

Tears stupidly brimming in her eyes, Honora instinctively rose to hug her old friend, then sank back in the false leather cushions. Mightn’t Vi feel the hard protrusion through the corset?

“Vi . . .”

“Hey, don’t choke up on me,” said Vi, her own voice none too steady as she slid into the booth opposite Honora.

“I just don’t believe it. How can you be here? What about San Bernardino?”

“Mr. San Berdoo was bad news. So here I am, back in the Pig’n’Whistle, my old stomping grounds, on the late shift. I saw the name Honora Ivory on the worksheet. Even if the Ivory didn’t fit, not too many Honoras floating around. I came in early for a look-see.”

“Now I’m Mrs. Curt Ivory.” Honora extended the hand with the wedding ring. Silver showed through the gold plating.

“Hey, congratulations and all.” Vi’s enthusiasm rang animatedly. “So when can us two get together to catch up?”

“Now.” Honora pushed away her nearly full plate. “I live on Cherokee.”

Vi drove them in her Chevy.

In the apartment Honora started to pick up the clutter of teacups and throw away newspapers, but Vi said, “Get a load off, sit down. Bring me up to date.”

“Here’s my husband.” Honora took the stiff, deckle-edged cardboard folder from its place of honor on the coffee table. Curt had needed a picture to send out with his résumé.

Vi whistled. “A real cutie.”

“Recognize him?”

Vi peered, “Hey, you could sue the photographer if it’s that handsome bozo who came to Stroud’s just before you quit.”

“It doesn’t do him justice, does it?”

“Not one bit. Where’s he now? At work?”

“Yes, but out of the country. In Lalarhein—that’s near Saudi Arabia. Building a road—I told you he was an engineer, didn’t I?”

“I seem to remember something like that.” Vi played with the clasp of her large, fake alligator purse. “Kid, how far along are you?”

Honora felt the blood drain from her face. “What are you talking about?” she asked tartly.

“You used to have a body like Lauren Bacall, slender, tender and tall.”

“Can’t a girl gain a few pounds once she’s married?”

“I saw right away, that’s how rotten you look. You poor ignorant mutt. If I’d only known earlier, I could of helped.”

“I happen to want the baby, and so does my husband,” Honora said coldly.

A muscle jumped near Vi’s mouth. “Will you quit with that ‘husband’ crap?”

“I see that I should have framed the marriage certificate.”

“And I’m sick of being high-hatted.” Vi’s voice rose in that swift, attacking anger. “You think I’m some kind of idiot? You ain’t slaving away at the split shift for your health, not when you’re in a family way. And I’ve seen your guy. That kind gives his wife a big house in Bel Air
or Beverly Hills and parks a sweet patootie in a dump like this!”

Honora tried to control her tears and failed.

“Hey, listen, you can shack up with Joe Stalin for all I care. I’ve been through the mill, too, you poor kid.” Vi moved to the sofa. “Come to Momma.”

Honora let herself be enfolded in Vi’s warmth, salty perspiration odors and the cloying scent of lilacs. After a minute of convulsive gasping, her tears ceased.

“Now tell your old pal what’s what,” Vi comforted.

Honora talked, steadily, sometimes incoherently. “Gideon told me I’m a fallen woman and fired Curt for doing him the dirty—as if our private lives were
his
business. And then he turned around and married my sister—I must’ve told you Crystal’s as stunning as a film star. And young enough to be his daughter.” She played down Langley’s part in the bank account fiasco. She told of the two futile telegrams and the panic she lived with about Curt. She described the long, tense drive to San Francisco, and Gideon’s turndown. She fell silent, however, when it came to mentioning that she’d seen Crystal.

Vi dabbed a Kleenex at her eyes and blew her nose loudly. “You always did need a seeing-eye dog to watch over you. But that uncle or brother-in-law or whatever he is—if you’ll pardon the French, he’s a real prick.”

“He saved Curt’s life and was generous to me. He’s just very strait-laced and Victorian.”

“A real prick, so don’t invent excuses. Does he realize what a lucky guy he is, this hubby of yours?”

“So you believe we’re married?”

“Kid, not even you with all your reading could have invented that cockamanie story.”

Honora laughed shakily. “Thank you, Vi.”

*   *   *

A few days later four letters came with Arabic stamps. Three were postmarked after she had sent her cables. She scanned Curt’s upright handwriting. He had received neither the telegrams nor the letter with her fully fleshed out announcement. But he was safe.

She jerked around the room as she read, unable to keep still. Vi, who labored on the late shift and left the Pig’n’Whistle after two, slept until noon. Though it was only a little past ten Honora dialed her number.

“Whozzit?” Vi grumbled sleepily.

“Me, Honora. Vi, I just got four letters from Curt.”

“Next time, for Chrissakes, why don’t you wake me with some good news.” Vi’s voice bubbled. “Hey, kid, I’ll pick you up from work and we’ll celebrate, really tie one on. Booze for me, milk shake for you and the kid.”