Everlasting (17 page)

She pawed through the Macy’s shopping bag and ripped open the white envelope inside. She blinked. Her head felt as if it were exploding with blossoms of white fire. Her entire body went tingly and light. Inside the Macy’s bag was a thick pack of one-thousand-dollar bills. She started to count them, but her hands were sweating and shaking so hard, she couldn’t separate the bills from each other.

She felt wrenchingly nauseated. At the same time, the white stars of fire were turning black and spinning toward her. She had never fainted before, but she knew she was going to faint now. Clutching her envelope against her chest, she leaned forward and put her head between her knees. She tried to take deep breaths. She forced herself to concentrate on the ordinary sounds outside her stall: toilets flushing, water running, the roller towel flub-dubbing, women chattering in their New York accents.

She opened her eyes. She looked at the porcelain base of the toilet bowl between her legs. It seemed as white and spotless as an angel’s soul.

She lifted her head. She was slightly dizzy, but no more stars appeared. She stood up. She bent and took her alligator purse out of the carpetbag. She put the envelope of money inside. She took off the felt hat, the gray wig, the shiny black dress, the support bandages, the orthopedic shoes. Underneath the dress she was wearing a loose cotton dress. She took high heels from the carpetbag and stuffed the old-lady costume into it, along with the Macy’s shopping bag. Grabbing up fists of toilet paper, she wiped at the lipstick, rouge, powder, and Pan-Cake makeup until her face burned. She dropped the paper in the john and flushed it.

She picked up the carpetbag in one hand and her purse in the other. The only problem was the cane. She leaned it at the back of the stall, between the toilet and the wall. She opened the stall door.

The room was full of women. Head high, she pushed past them to a sink. She scrubbed at her face. She looked in the mirror. Her hair, which had been flattened by the wig, was already rising and curling, expanding in the humidity. She took a green headband from her purse and put it on, holding her hair away from her face. She put on her gold shell earrings. If anyone looked closely, they might see traces of makeup around her hairline, but other than that her face was clean and tanned.

In the outer lounge, she sat down and toyed with her lipstick and compact for a while. Her hands had finally stopped shaking. When she stood up to leave, she left the carpetbag sitting next to the chair. She strode from the room, shoulders back, head high.

She took the elevator to the first floor. Women were still beavering away, pawing through the scarves and handbags. There were few men in sight. As she walked out of the door onto Eighth Avenue, with her alligator purse full of thousand-dollar bills, she didn’t see P. J. Willington or anyone who resembled him.

* * *

F
rom Port Authority she took a bus to Newark and met Helen Norton in the bus station waiting room. They walked out together to the old blue Ford Helen had borrowed from a friend and sat in the parking lot, with the windows rolled down because of the heat, counting the bills. There were one hundred of them. Helen took one-third of the money, and Catherine took the rest to divide between herself and Piet.

“Listen, kid, I’m going to Vegas,” Helen said. She was wearing a pink-checked sundress with white cuffs and collar. She looked like a Boy Scout’s mother, taking a break from making cookies. “I figure if old P. J. ever decides he’s angry at me, even New Jersey’s too close and too small. Anyway, I’ve got friends in Vegas. I’ll have a good time.”

“Well, good luck,” Catherine said.

“Do you know, honey,” Helen said, “we’ve been through all this together and I don’t even know your last name?”

Catherine was silent a moment, thinking. Then she smiled. “That’s right,” she said in what she hoped was an inoffensive tone.

Helen looked at her. She whistled. “Kid, you’ve got brass balls.”

Assuming that was a compliment, Catherine smiled and said, “Helen, so do you.”

Then she got out of the blue Ford and went back into the bus station and bought a ticket to New York. Helen Norton didn’t come in to see her off. Catherine didn’t stand at the window watching the blue Ford pull away. They didn’t wave good-bye. They had changed each other’s lives completely, and they never saw each other again.

* * *

T
hat night Catherine couldn’t sleep. She paced the floor, drank warm milk, tried listening to music. Nothing calmed her. Now that the blackmail was successfully completed, the dread and excitement of action had evaporated, leaving an aftertaste of guilt that filled her mouth and stomach with nausea. She had deliberately chosen to commit a crime; by the laws of man she had made herself guilty. Yet she also felt triumphant—victorious. P. J. Willington was guilty of physically abusing Helen Norton, and in their own outlaw way, they had extracted a reparation from him that could never have come from any court.

She forced herself to lie in bed, but the air was stifling. She went into the living room and curled up on the sofa. She was exhausted, but she couldn’t sleep. Tossing and turning, she thought of herself now as a female Robin Hood, and now as a criminal.

* * *

T
he next morning Catherine found Piet in the shop basement. It was early September, but as sultry as the hottest August day. Piet was on a ladder, stretching to replace a light bulb. Because of the heat, Piet had already removed his shirt, and now she could see the long undulations of muscles beneath his smooth skin, the sweat beading along his shoulders and sliding down his back so that the beltline of his jeans was darkened by the moisture.

She’d seen Piet without a shirt before, but there was something about his body, an urgency just under his skin, that shocked her each time she looked at him. It was not just the black hair on his chest and the way it grew swirling around his nipples, or the way his jeans hung low on his narrow hips, threatening with each movement to succumb to gravity. Sometimes she saw bruises on his neck or the inside of his arm. Then she’d be overcome by a sudden image of a woman lying with Piet, clutching, kissing, biting his arm, while he did to the woman the things that made her bruise him in return.

Piet came down the ladder. Catherine caught her breath. Her presence never seemed to interfere with his breathing. They were standing very close, but still she whispered.

“Here’s your share—a little over thirty thousand dollars.” She handed him a manila envelope. “Helen’s already left for Las Vegas.”

“Great,” Piet said. He folded the envelope and stuffed it inside the work shirt he’d thrown on a chair. “Thanks. Here.” He put a box of containers in her arms. “Would you take these up? We’ll need them today.”

Arms weighted, Catherine stood staring at him. “Don’t you want to talk about it at all?”

“I think the less we discuss it, the better for all of us.”

“But—Piet. I’m still in shock—I guess I can’t believe we really did what we did. And you’re the only one I can talk to about it.”

“You think talking about it will make you feel better?”

“I guess I do think that.”

“All right. Listen. You and I both know that old Willington got his money from a father who did much worse things than we did, and who did them every day. You and I know Willington’s not going to miss the money. And we can be pretty certain no one will find out.”

“I know all that. But I still can’t believe I did it. A girl like me, coming from the background I’ve come from. Can you believe I did it? Aren’t you even a little surprised?”

Piet grinned. “I don’t know about your background. What about it? Are you the child of a pair of nuns?” Before Catherine could reply, he reached forward in a surge of energy and swooped up several boxes of containers. “The shop’s got a busy day ahead. What’s done is done. Talking about it won’t change anything.” He went up the stairs, leaving Catherine in the basement, her arms aching from the heavy containers. There was nothing for her to do but follow Piet up and, once on the main floor, obey Mr. Vanderveld’s frantic orders, which drove other thoughts out of her mind.

* * *

A
nd she had to admit, it was a relief to have so much money. She knew her father was in the city, meeting with realtors and appraisers, so when she was through with work that day, she ran down to her parents’ Park Avenue apartment. In her father’s dark den, she handed him enough cash to pay for Shelly’s last year at prep school and for another year for Ann at Miss Brill’s and stood at her father’s side while he wrote tuition checks and signed the late forms. She took them from her father, addressed and stamped the envelopes, and told her father she’d mail them herself that evening. Her father tried to smile graciously and act as if this weren’t a humiliating experience for him.

“Where did you get so much money, Pudding?” her father asked.

“I borrowed it from a friend.”

Her father smiled wistfully. “That’s the perfect way to lose a friend, you know.” He hesitated, then said, “I don’t suppose you could loan me a few thousand more? Just for a month. I’m about to sell some paintings your grandmother brought over from England as a bride. When I get that money, we’ll be able to keep this apartment.”

“All right, Dad. I’ll lend it to you, but it’s only a loan. I have plans for my money. I’ll need it back in a month.”

“You’ll have it.” Her father clapped his hands together and rose with his old take-charge, let’s-lead-the-teams-onto-the-field sort of air.

“Well, time for a drink, don’t you think? To celebrate.”

Chapter 6

New York, 1964

“
P
iet,” Catherine said one afternoon in late September, “come have coffee with me.”

She studied Piet as they settled into a booth and ordered coffee. She had worked with this man for three years. She had committed a crime with him! But she knew nothing about him. What did he want in life? What did he care about?

He was invaluable to the shop, that much was certain. He was strong and energetic, and he dealt with the flower wholesalers down on Sixth Avenue and Twenty-eighth better than she ever could. All those delicate feminine blooms being handled by tough, gruff, callused bruisers always seemed ironic to her. It took brute strength to haul ice-weighted boxes of hundreds of fresh blooms shipped in from Long Island or New Jersey or Florida. These men who brought the cartons of flowers from truck to wholesale house had to be strong. Often they were men new to this country, working at manual jobs until they perfected their English. Catherine, who spoke only English and French, couldn’t understand most of them.

But Piet could talk to them, in Portuguese or Italian, complete with universal male gestures. If he tried to bargain with them for better prices, they laughed and joked and hit his arm. When Catherine tried to bargain for a lower price, they only chewed on their toothpicks or cigars and let their eyelids droop down over their eyes, their lips curling upward in that age-old superior smile of the stronger sex. Piet, on the other hand, was always polite to Catherine. Sometimes maddeningly polite.

Their coffee, in thick white mugs, was set before them. Piet looked at Catherine, waiting.

“Piet. I want to buy the shop.”

His expression did not change.

“I’ve been thinking about it constantly since we—got—the money. Your aunt and uncle are tired. They need to rest. They’re running the shop into the ground. But you and I could do wonders with it. Piet, do you want to buy the shop with me? Be my partner, at any percentage?”

“Thank you, Catherine, but no,” Piet said unhesitatingly, as if he were refusing a piece of pie. He met her eyes. “I have other plans for my money.”

“What?”

Piet shrugged.

“Jesus, Piet, we’ve known each other for three years now! Think what we’ve done together! Can’t we at least talk to each other?”

Piet remained silent, unruffled. She might as well talk to a tree.

“All right. At least tell me this much. If I do manage to buy the shop, would you stay on? You know I’d need you.”

“Yes. I’d stay on. For a while.”

“Oh, Piet, I have so many ideas! If this all works out … well, there’s so much I want to do, and—” She stopped. “I’m forgetting it is your aunt and uncle involved here. No matter what sorts of changes I make, they will be hurt. Offended.” She held her hands out, palms up. “Piet, I don’t know what to do.”

“Look, Catherine,” Piet said. “My aunt and uncle are decent, hardworking people. I love them. They have been wonderful to me. But I can still see their errors. They
are
running this shop into the ground. They’re afraid to try anything new. They’re old. Not in years, but in mind. You
should
buy the shop. It would be best for everyone.”

Catherine stared at Piet. His words were so sensible. That they had come from such a sensual mouth was amazing. She would have thrown her arms around him and kissed him in gratitude if he had been anyone else.

Instead, “Thanks, Piet,” she said quietly. “Well, we’ll see what I can do.”

* * *

C
atherine had often overheard the Vandervelds discuss selling the shop with each other, and from time to time Mrs. Vanderveld confided her worries to Catherine. They were only barely making a profit. Now that they were older, the work was becoming more difficult and tiring. It took a good amount of physical energy and stamina to create even the most ethereal floral display. Piet and Catherine did all the heavy work, but even so the Vandervelds were exhausted at the end of the day.

Every night in September Catherine sat in her room making lists. Planning. On Wednesday, her day off, she called carpenters and painters, getting estimates. She kept an appointment she had made with a lawyer, a man who knew her father well enough to appreciate her background, but not so well that he was aware of the financial difficulties her father had gotten himself into. Not so well that he would ask her where on earth she had managed to find enough money to buy the flower shop.