Gift of the Golden Mountain (16 page)

     "His folks have a place at Stinson Beach," Sam said when I asked him. "I know he spent the summer out there—but he should be back by now. This is his last year at Boalt."

     When finally Hayes did surface it was in a setting that was, as Kit described it, not only wonderfully theatrical but altogether out of the context of the times—a black tie benefit at the Opera House in San Francisco.

     That evening May arrived at Kit's wearing the long white Givenchy she had bought for the occasion, a clinging white matte crepe with one shoulder bared. Over her shoulders she had thrown her grimy, rumpled raincoat, and her hair was blowing and wispy.

     "I washed it just before leaving," May explained, "to get it dry I opened the car windows and let it blow in the wind. Are you absolutely sure you want to be seen with me?"

     Kit laughed and told her she was halfway there, but that the coat would have to go and her hair needed to be tamed. "Give me ten minutes," Kit commanded, "and absolute cooperation."

     When they left May was wrapped in white ermine, her dark hair was caught up on one side by an astonishing art deco ormolu clip in the design of a cobra, encrusted with lapis lazuli. On the street, two young women stopped and stared.

     Once settled in the back of Kit's car, May confessed, "I feel like Cinderella with a cobra over her ear."

     "You look absolutely smashing," Kit answered, "and I wondered when you were going to ask about the lapis cobra."

     "Now," May told her, "tell me now."

     "I bought that clip in London in the winter of 1939," Kit began. "Your father was in hospital there, recovering from a serious war wound—you know about that, about the Spanish war and the Lincoln Brigade and what happened. I went over to be with him and fetch him home, but it was several weeks before he could be moved, so I had a lot of time on my hands. I didn't want to wander too far from the hospital, so I took to haunting the little shops nearby. They all called themselves purveyors of antiques, but it was
really pretty much junk. There was this one shop—the man had an absolute passion for art deco and Victorian jewelry. Some of the pieces were outrageous—Lalique stomachers, and Forquet bracelets of opals and lavender enamel. They were out of style already, and of course in 1939 there wasn't much reason to dress up."

     She paused, and May pressed her hand so she would go on. "Anyway, I kept dropping into this little man's shop. It was usually empty, and he was friendly and liked to chat me up, as the Brits say—he knew stories about all the heirloom pieces.

     "Only a day or so before we were to sail for home, he brought out the lapis cobra to show me. I remember thinking it was both outrageous and beautiful. He told me that it had been made for Sarah Bernhardt, but I doubt that. I can't imagine the divine Sarah wearing ormolu. Still, I felt I had to buy something—I'd spent so much time in the shop. And I was quite mesmerized by it even though I couldn't imagine myself ever wearing it, but I didn't want to leave without it—and that's how I got the lapis cobra."

     "It's stunning," May said.

     Kit sighed. "On you, yes it is, dear heart—on you it has all the flair I knew it could have. You weren't even born, but if I believed in fate I would say it was put in that shop in London in 1939 just so you could wear it tonight."

May was standing at the top of the grand staircase, waiting for Kit, embarrassed by the eyes that scanned her. From that vantage, she picked Hayes out of the crowd. He was with an older woman whose hair was dyed a dark red. The woman was talking and he was listening attentively, so that he did not look up until they were almost to the top of the stairs. For a moment he did not recognize her, and then he did.

     Kit had returned and the red-haired woman called out in a deep whiskey voice:

     "Katherine McCord! Aren't you nice to come tonight!"

     After introductions had been made, Kit explained that Marylee Diehl, Hayes's mother, was the chairman of the benefit. There was no time to say more, because Hayes's mother was marshalling them toward the bar. The two older women walked ahead, leaving Hayes and May to fall in step behind.

     "If the folks back in Sproul Plaza could see you now," May began, teasingly.

     "You mean in my Fred Astaire uptown suit?"

     "Did you forget the top hat?"

     "You aren't quite dressed to man the barricades, either," he said, pulling back slightly to look at her, "but has anybody told you there's a snake in your hair?"

     "There is a story to this snake," she said, touching it.

     "There always is," he came back in a voice full of innuendo. "Are you going to tell it to me?"

     Kit, having decided against champagne, was waiting in front of the entrance to their box.

     "Of course," May answered quickly, "how about tomorrow? Dinner."

     "Dinner?" he said, hesitating. "Is it that good a story?"

     "You will always wonder . . ." she began, but he laughed and said, "Seven sharp. I'll pick you up."

     Watching him push through the crowd after his mother, Kit said, "Give the girl an ermine and a snake and she turns into a vamp."

     "What's a vamp?" May wanted to know, and that caused Kit to laugh with such delight that an elderly man turned and looked at them quizzically.

     "My niece doesn't know what a vamp is, Mr. Burney."

     "That's all right," the old man told them, "she's pretty enough to get away with whatever she's up to."

     As the orchestra began warming up, Kit answered May's questions about the Diehl family:

     "She was Marylee Hayes—at one time the Hayes family owned a good part of the San Joaquin Valley. I don't know the whole story, but it seems to me there was an ugly divorce and a big custody battle and Marylee's mother was cut off without a cent. It's one of those sad stories about money and how one generation tries to control the next by manipulating them with trust funds. I don't see Marylee much. I know she is considered something of a joke by the social powers-that-be in this town. She's a talker, for one thing, and she drinks too much, for another. They think she involves herself with too many 'social' issues. She won't raise money for the opera or the symphony, but if there is a famine in Africa or a flood in Italy or an earthquake in Peru, you can bet that Marylee will be chairman of the committee."

     "What about her husband?" May asked.

     "I think he's a banker. I've never met him. But now it's your turn. Tell me about young Mr. Diehl."

     "He's a political activist," May said, "and I know he was working for Robert Kennedy."

     "Oh my," Kit said, pained, and May nodded and answered, "Yes."

     The house lights went down then, the curtain went up, and May and Kit settled into the first act of
Eugene Onegin.

When she opened the car door, the smell of food—hamburgers and french fries—rushed out at her.

     "Dinner?" she asked, lifting a box and looking at it quizzically.

     "Dinner," Hayes answered, grinning. "You've heard of needing to eat and run? Well, we're going to eat on the run. Can't be late."

     "Late for what?"

     "Late for what?" he repeated, pretending amazement. "For the basketball game. You didn't think I'd let you miss it? Surely you had more faith than that . . . I said to myself when I saw you
the other night—standing at the top of the staircase in your long white gown, snake wrapped around your ear, I said, 'Anybody that glamorous would have to be passionate about basketball.'"

     "Is that what you said to yourself?"

     "Exactly. And knowing that, I knew I would have to make a herculean effort—I'm good at those—and spare no expense, even if it meant bribing several high officials, to secure for us two tickets to tonight's game. Cal against UCLA. The hottest college team in the nation."

     "Cal?" she said, and he grimaced.

     "A game not to be missed," he went on. "You are about to have the time of your life. Better dig in before the fries get cold— nothing worse than cold fries."

     "Nothing," she agreed, unwrapping a hamburger for him.

     They threaded their way up the bleachers, balancing as they pushed through the crowd. When they finally found seats, high up in the gymnasium, he said, "You look different. No furs. No jools."

     "I make it a practice not to wear jools to basketball games," she shot back, and then, seriously: "Why didn't you just say you were busy tonight?"

     He half turned in order to look her full in the face.

     "Exactly how much do you know about basketball?" he asked skeptically.

     "Exactly plenty," she answered. "Full-court press, fast break, slam dunk . . ." She took a mouth full of popcorn so she wouldn't have to say more. At that moment the teams came onto the court and the sounds of the crowd, mixed with the hard, fast action, bounced and ricocheted off the walls and caught them up in the fast drama of the game.

     Hayes sat forward, elbows propped on his knees, his attention riveted. May watched him as much as she watched the game, fascinated by his total immersion in the action. She had been disappointed when he picked her up, sorry that they would not spend the evening talking, but now she was not sorry. Suddenly the
crowd was on its feet as a Cal player shot from the backcourt and the ball swished clean through the hoop.

     As the place erupted in pandemonium, Hayes turned and pulled her to him and May wrapped her arm around his waist and hugged him back, laughing with the excitement and pleasure of the moment.

     They stood like that for a time, arms around each other like comrades, and he looked down at her and told her he thought she might be all right, after all.

     "You must have played basketball in school?" she asked.

     "I'm not sure that's what the coach thought I was doing," he answered. "It was more like I went out for basketball at school. I sort of made a profession of doing that—going out for sports."

     "Didn't you ever get to play?"

     He grinned. "When the team was twenty points ahead, sometimes they would let me in. And I got to play the last game of my senior year—well, actually only the first quarter. But I was always voted the most determined player on the team."

     "Still is," a low voice boomed at them from behind. May turned to see an amazingly tall black man fold himself on the bleacher behind them. He put both his big hands on Hayes's shoulders and started massaging.

     Hayes introduced him as Eli Barnes, his "basketball guru."

     "I keep telling this white boy it's not just that his feet are too big," Eli said, "it's that they don't always go in the same direction."

     "You can't be serious," May came back, "he's just been explaining how he was all-state in high school, and I love the part about how close he came to being a candidate for All-American in college—though of course that was Ivy League and we all know they don't count when you're talking basketball."

     Eli whooped and slipped his arm around Hayes's neck, holding him in a mock hammerlock. "Is that right, boy?" he teased. "Is that what you told this nice lady? Confess or I'll break your lying neck."

     Hayes coughed for effect and said he confessed, adding, "Remind me to steer clear of ladies with snakes in their hair."

     "Is that you?" Eli asked.

     "Afraid so," she answered.

     "Who would have thought it?" he came back, and they all laughed.

     The two men talked about the game for a time, and it seemed to May as if they were speaking another language. Then Eli turned to her and said, "Don't you want to see our boy here play basketball? Listen here, if it isn't raining in the morning, why don't you come on out to Oakland and watch us. We play there every Saturday morning and I just know . . .

     "She's too busy for such kid stuff, Eli," Hayes cut in. "May's working for a doctorate, she's serious, man . . . beyond all this bouncing ball stuff, and she certainly doesn't want to go hanging around some ghetto playground . . . she has better things to do."