Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances (32 page)
Read Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances Online
Authors: Dorothy Fletcher
The street where John Allerton lived, a street almost identical to that of Clover’s. Quiet, tree-trimmed, deceitfully peaceful, almost — in the welter of Manhattan’s glass and steel towers — rural, somnolent in the sunny afternoon. Yet danger stalked streets like this, loomed menacingly, ready to strike. In a city, and a world, that was so filled with boobytraps you might as well rig your own. You made your way between the twin perils of Scylla and Charybdis just about every day of your life, and the moral imperative took on new contours. You learned to compromise because in any event whatever you might do was invariably met with the primal scream: if you accommodated one person you discommoded another, robbed Peter to pay Paul; you were damned if you did and damned if you didn’t.
Even if she decided not to give up Jack (
if
she decided that) she would still have to spell out the latest, shall we say, developments. Rodney had found out, her husband had found out and no, she could not see her way clear to throw in her lot with someone so much younger. He would accept the new rules, she was almost sure, but it would diminish him in his own eyes, it would be a hollow victory. So in a way it
was
over: there was a loss of innocence, it would never be the same again. She and Jack would pretend it was, but it would have lost its ripe robustness, its earthy richness. Blight had darkened its glow, staled it, like the fading carnation in Anton Ehrenberg’s buttonhole.
She walked back up to the Colonnade and on the way saw Clover Martinson twice, once going into a cheese store and again at the Third Avenue corner of her own street, standing in front of the Sixty-eighth Street Playhouse, in a line waiting for the doors to open for the next showing. She would see her friend for a long time to come, she knew, just as she would see Jack Allerton, if their separation became inevitable, for a long time to come, maybe for the rest of her life.
This edition published by
Crimson Romance
an imprint of F+W Media, Inc.
10151 Carver Road, Suite 200
Blue Ash, Ohio 45242
Copyright © 1980 by Dorothy Fletcher
ISBN 10: 1-4405-7214-3
ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-7214-2
eISBN 10: 1-4405-7213-5
eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-7213-5
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author's imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
Cover © 123rf.com
Dorothy Fletcher
Avon, Massachusetts
One
Mike, the doorman at the big apartment house on Park Avenue in the East Seventies, watched the approach of the tall, slender, long-limbed girl who was crossing the avenue at the corner and heading for the building in front of which he stood taking advantage of the summer sun between duties.
The girl was Iris Easton, the young niece of one of the building’s tenants, Mrs. Henry Collinge. Mrs. Collinge, whom Mike admired and respected, was every inch a lady, and the same was true of her niece. Iris Easton had the most beautiful manners, quite different from some of the sassy young girls you saw nowadays. Like her aunt, she was friendly, unassuming and sweet, really sweet.
She caught sight of him, waved and, as she came up to him, said as usual, “Hi, Mike, how’s it going?”
He said it was going fine, thank you, but he knew she meant not only himself, but her aunt as well. Mrs. Henry Collinge had been a widow since the middle of last year, and her family — sister, brother-in-law and niece Iris — had rallied round, like the good people they were, never letting a week go by without one or all of them dropping in, or having her to dinner at their own house, which was not very far away.
Young Iris, in particular, played an important part in her aunt’s life, was the most frequent visitor and generally spent several hours on a weekend day with Mrs. Collinge.
Mike had known her since she was a wee thing, had seen her grow from a child into a young girl and now a lovely young woman. She must be a great comfort to the childless — and now husbandless — woman upstairs, he often thought, and once again reflected on the girl’s sweetness and kindness. So many girls lacked these fine qualities … they were too busy with their own selfish interests.
“See you later,” Iris Easton said, and went inside to the lobby.
Turning, Mike saw her lithe form walking toward the elevators. A thoroughbred, he mused, and as adorable as any dewy Irish lass.
An Irish lad he was himself, though no longer in his prime, alas, and he was one of the very few Irish doormen left in New York. Once they had all been Gaelic, come to find a better life in the land of opportunity. Some of their children had made fortunes that were not to be sneezed at, or gone into politics and made a name for themselves.
Now, however, there were few of them left in attendance at these large and plush buildings. These days the accents were more likely to be Puerto Rican.
Mike, who had seen this particular house converted from rental to cooperative, knew pretty well what the purchase prices had been, and knew too that the Henry C. Collinge’s had cost a good bit over $150,000 … and that had been in pre-inflationary days.
He wondered — and knew Mrs. Collinge’s niece wondered too — when Mrs. Collinge would get around to selling the place she was now rattling around in all alone. Alone, that was, except for Edith, her housekeeper.
Much too big for a widow lady. And no children of her own, poor soul. Of course Mr. C. had been so much older than Mrs. C. Such a young woman to be left alone!
He thought sagely, won’t be all that long before she’ll be snapped up by someone else. All that money Mrs. Collinge had been left … a rich widow would have plenty of chances.
Then again, maybe not. Everyone in the building had always talked about how loving the Collinges were toward each other. Holding hands on the street, like a couple of kids, and when the husband started failing …
He shook his head, vividly recalling the look of pain on Mrs. Collinge’s face as her husband’s steps faltered, and his face grew ashen, his body gaunt. Kept her head held high, though, kept the bright smile on her pretty face, with hardly a line or wrinkle in it.
A lovely lady, Mrs. Collinge. And rattling around in that great place upstairs …
• • •
Iris Easton hesitated, as she found herself doing these past long months, a finger indecisively poised over the bell on the door of 11C. For years there had been no hesitation. A firm press of the doorbell, then three sharp raps on the door itself … her own personal signal.
But that was before.
Before Uncle Henry died. And everything was different now. The happy days were over for Aunt Louisa, and though the greeting would be the same, the smile of welcome as bright, there was a falseness about it, a brittle determination, and a terrible emptiness.
You would have to know Aunt Louisa very well to detect the difference, though. Only those close to her — friends and family perceived the subtle change, the profound aura of sadness. On the surface, Louisa Collinge seemed the same brisk, positive personality she always had been, quick to make up her mind and quick to act. Outgoing, influential and exceedingly good-looking, her life had been cushioned by money … lots of it.
Louisa Collinge, in short, was very much the grande dame.
On those occasions when Iris dined out with her, in the very
best
eating places, Aunt Louisa invariably got the red carpet treatment and the most attentive service. It was like going to dinner with a duchess. Uncle Henry had called her “Princess.”
Resolutely, Iris rang the bell, rapped the three times, and waited.
Edith let her in. Her aunt’s housekeeper had skin the color of mahogany, a soft voice and a mind of her own. She was strong, capable, a magnificent cook and was, quite simply, a member of the family.
“Hello, darlin’, come right on in. She’s in the living room. How are you?”
“Hello, Edith. I’m fine. You?”
“Pretty good. So’s she.”
“That’s nice.”
Edith gave her an odd little look. “I mean she really is pretty good. You’ll see. More like herself today.”
“More like herself
how
?”
“Like she used to be. Before.”
“Really?”
“Go and see for yourself. I’ve got something in the oven.”
Edith went kitchenward and Iris passed through the room-sized foyer, into the living room beyond. This was one of the old-time apartment buildings, high-ceilinged and many-windowed, and of generous proportions.
There were lovely old pieces in this room, as there were in the others, for Louisa was a collector of antiques, so that over the years she had picked up many fine things.
Louisa herself, however, was not in the living room, so Iris wandered through to the bedroom in search of her. This was down a side hall, one of the many corridors in this spacious apartment.
“I’m here, where are you?” she called.
“Iris? Come in, I’m just finishing my toilette,” her aunt’s voice said in return, and there she was, in the dressing room with the chaise lounge and the luxurious, feminine appointments, sitting at her makeup table.
She was applying eye liner and, giving a quick smile to Iris’s reflection in the mirror, completed the job with a few deft movements of her slim fingers.
Ever since she could remember, her aunt Louisa had been a role model for Iris. Louisa was a very pretty woman, not tall but well-proportioned. She had slightly uptilted eyes, which could be green or hazel, depending on what color she wore. Her face, like Iris’s, was broad in the cheekbones and, like Iris’s, tapered delicately at the chin.
She wore stunning, expensive clothes and had excellent legs, with small, fine-boned feet for which she had about a hundred pairs of shoes from places like Delman and Ferragamo. She had led a life of privileged ease, and it showed.
“There,” Louisa said. “That’s done and I’m presentable at last. I got up early enough, but then shilly shallied about doing odds and ends, and now look at the time. It’s eleven-thirty, and Edith will have my head if lunch is delayed.”
She turned, swung round and got up. “Hello, my darling,” she said, and gave her niece a hug. “How’s everything?”
“Fine.
You’re
looking very well.”
She does look better, Iris reflected. And she sounded better. That slight lilt to her voice …
“Let’s go inside,” Louisa said, and led the way to the living room. I want to have a little talk with you.”
She sniffed. “Smells like a souffle, doesn’t it? That means an early lunch, I daresay. Souffles do have a way of falling flat, so, dear, sit down and I’ll get a few things off my chest.”
Slightly mystified, but greatly heartened by what seemed a return of her aunt’s old decisive manner, Iris sat, waiting. Louisa perched on the arm of a sofa, swinging one sleek leg.
She’s so young-looking, Iris marveled, and then reminded herself that her aunt was, after all, only forty-six.
“Cigarette?” Louisa asked, holding out a silver box.
Iris shook her head, but her aunt lit one.
“Well then,” she said. “I’ll start by saying that for the past three days I’ve done nothing but cry. I scarcely went out at all. I just moped about in this big place and wept. I had Edith in tears as well, poor thing. A long-delayed reaction, and something I’d wanted desperately to be able to do … but until now, couldn’t manage. I, in effect, have cried myself out. And in doing so, am beginning to
feel
again. I was simply stony and bitter and angry, and I was enraged that I was still here, well and alive, while Henry was … was gone.