Puzzle for Fiends (14 page)

“Selena, dear, we’ve just been to see grandmother.” Mrs. Friend’s voice was gently chiding. “Really, what on earth was in your mind when you told Gordy she didn’t exist?”

Selena was quick all right. Without the slightest sign of improvisation, she gave a light laugh. “Wasn’t it stupid?”

“Then why did you do it, dear?”

“Oh, it was just that I’d been asleep, Mimsey. I was confused. Gordy was scared. I thought it was easier to reassure him that way. And then, after I’d done it, I knew he was suspicious of us. I thought if he discovered I’d lied a stupid lie it would make it worse. So I asked Marny to back me up.” She caressed Marny’s unresponsive arm. “Didn’t I, Marny?”

Marny shrugged.

Selena turned her bright gaze on Nate. “I explained to Nate too and he said, as a doctor, that I’d been right, didn’t you, Nate?”

“Yes,” said Nate.

Mrs. Friend sighed. “Selena, dearest, I’m afraid you won’t go ringing down the centuries for your intellect. Now, be a good girl. Tell Gordy you’re sorry.”

“I’m sorry, baby. “Selena kissed me on the forehead. “Next time an old lady climbs into bed with you, I’ll give you her whole life history.”

They seemed to be stuck in the groove of deceit—like Japanese envoys talking good neighborliness with the drone of their own bombers already audible overhead.

Did they really think they were still deceiving me?

“There. “Mrs. Friend smiled dazzlingly. “Everything’s cleared up now, Gordy.”

She started organizing us. Selena, Nate, and Marny were ordered off to change their wet swimming suits. I was turned over to Jan who wheeled me back to my room and, quite unnecessarily, bathed me all over again.

While his hands moved over my skin, I struggled with an idea that was slowly forming in my mind. I had not believed Mrs. Friend’s threadbare explanation that Mr. Petherbridge was coming tomorrow simply as a member of the Aurora Clean Living League. Whatever their over-all policy, I knew they expected something definite from me tomorrow and that definite thing was connected with Mr. Friend’s poem.

Maybe I could use the poem as a weapon for a counterattack.

Jan lifted me out of the tub and started to dry me. I said suddenly: “Why did Mr. Friend fire you?”

His hand, gripping the green Turkish towel, came to rest on my stomach. He stared from blue, wary eyes.

“You.” I pointed at him. “Mr. Friend say to you—Jan scram?”

For the first time he seemed to grasp my meaning. His eyes cleared. He nodded vigorously, the blond lock slipping over his forehead.

“Why?” I said. “Why he say Jan—scram? Why?”

He laughed then, a deep, hilarious laugh. It seemed to indicate that he’d been fired for some reason which to him was infinitely entertaining. He was still laughing when he’d dressed me and carried me back to the wheel chair.

Cocktails were being served in the huge living-room when Jan took me there. The family and Dr. Croft were lounging in chairs before the vast plate-glass window, chatting, laughing, like any family having a good time.

Mrs. Friend permitted me a single cocktail with Nate Croft’s sanction as a ‘special treat’. Tomorrow was to be a day of gloom, she said. We should all celebrate today.

The celebration was carried over into dinner with champagne which was served in a glass-walled dining-room by a maid I had never seen before. Netti’s successor? We were all supposed to be terribly, terribly at our ease. No one was. I frankly sulked. Marny was silent and keyed-up. Selena and Nate—and even Mrs. Friend—were much too gay for conviction. They cracked jokes about the Clean Living League; they made preposterous suggestions for shocking Mr. Moffat.

They were nervous. That meant things were coming to a head.

The poem was never mentioned at dinner but I was sure it was in all their minds. This mood of forced frivolity was a deliberate prologue to the moment when—oh, so casually and lightly—someone would suggest that it would be frightfully amusing to rehearse me in the
Ode to Aurora.

When we sat over coffee in the living-room, looking out at the staggering panorama of sky and mountain, Selena left her seat and perched herself on the arm of my wheel chair. It was an uncomfortable position. Only an excess of affection or the simulation of it could have made her take it.

I suspected the latter and I was right. Almost immediately, she squeezed my shoulder, smiled and chanted:

“
In taverns where young people mingle to sway their lascivious hips.
Really, that’s divine. I’ve been saying it over and over to myself all day. Gordy, it’ll be sheer bliss having you recite it tomorrow to all those whey-faced virgins. Come on, let’s teach you the rest.”

“Yes,” put in Nate, obviously following a cue. “I’m crazy to hear the poem. Never did, you know.”

Without looking up from her knitting, Mrs. Friend said: “Marny dear, run get the book from Gordy’s room.”

Marny tossed back her glossy black hair, glanced at me for a strained, ambiguous moment and then hurried out of the room. Soon she was back. Selena took the book from her and searched through the pages.

Mrs. Friend said: “It’s a shame to make a mock of your poor father.” She looked up at me smiling. “You’ll promise to keep a straight face when you recite, won’t you, Gordy? It’ll mean so much to Mr. Moffat.”

Selena found the page. “Just two more verses, Gordy, dear.”

Nate had left his chair and was standing behind Selena, his hand resting with pretended absence of mind on her bare shoulder. Mrs. Friend put her knitting down in her lap. Marny lit a match for a cigarette with a sharp, spurting sound. They were all so conscious of me that I could feel their concentration like fingers on my body.

They were losing their subtlety.

Dreamily Selena started to recite:

“ ‘Oh, mothers moan sad for their stripling.

Oh, wives yearn at home for their spouse.

Both are down in the dark tavern tippling,

Debauched in their careless carouse.

Besotted they slump to the floor. Ah,

Ere they drown in the beer’s fatal foam,

Restore them, reprieve them, Aurora,

Our Lady of Home.’ ”

Mrs. Friend crinkled her nose. “Really, it’s enough to drive Mahomet to drink, isn’t it? I’m afraid your father wasn’t a very good Swinburne, Gordy.” She smiled at me. “Now be a good boy, dear. The first line,
Oh, mothers moan sad for their...
”

Selena was watching me under half-closed lashes. Nate was watching me. So was Marny.

“Come on, dear.” Mrs. Friend started to beat a ponderous rhythm in the air with her fingers. “
Oh, mothers moan sad
...”

“No,” I said.

Selena’s arm, thrown over my shoulder, stiffened. Nate’s mouth went tight. Mrs. Friend said:

“No—what, Gordy dear?”

“I’m not going to learn the goddam poem.”

Marny’s eyes were bright. Mrs. Friend rose and moved towards me.

“Now, dear, don’t be pettish. I know it’s preposterous. I know it’ll be embarrassing for you. But, please...”

I shook my head.

“Why not, dear? Why in heaven’s name not?”

She was rattled. For the first time the tranquil smile was so phony you could see right through it. I felt wonderful.

“I won’t learn the poem,” I said, “because this is a free country and I don’t want to learn a poem which should have been strangled at birth.”

“But, darling, I told you. For Mr. Moffat’s sake...”

“I should care for Mr. Moffat.” I paused, gauging the tension. “Why make a fuss? It doesn’t matter whether I read it or not. You said so yourself. A charming gesture you called it. Okay, so there won’t be a charming gesture.”

Dr. Croft, trying to be the gruff, boys-together doctor, said: “Gordy, old man, let’s not be ornery about it. Your mother wants you to recite it. After all, it’s not much to ask.”

I looked at him. It was better, somehow, dealing with a man after all those smothering females. I said: “I might be persuaded to recite it.”

“Persuaded?” He looked hopeful. “How, Gordy?”

“If they stopped lying and told me why they really want me to do it.”

“Lying.” Nate echoed the word sharply. “Gordy, I thought we were through with all these suspicions. I thought…”

Mrs. Friend, still flustered, opened her mouth, but surprisingly Selena spoke in first.

“All right. That’s putting it up to us. “She laughed, her husky, amused laugh. “Why not tell him the truth?”

“Selena!’ snapped Mrs. Friend.

“Don’t you see how stupid we’re being? You bawled me out for lying about Grandma. This is much sillier. He doesn’t believe us. That’s obvious. What’s the point of trying to fool him when he won’t be fooled? ’ She leaned down, letting her shining hair brush my cheek. “Poor Gordy, you must think we’re fiends incarnate. And I don’t blame you. But it’s all so silly, because the truth’s so—innocuous. There’s no reason in the world why you shouldn’t hear it.”

I looked up at her blandly smiling mouth so close to mine. I wished she wasn’t so beautiful.

“The truth,” I said, “is innocuous?”

“Of course. “Selena was watching Mrs. Friend. “I’ll tell him?”

I was watching Mrs. Friend, too. From the slight puckering around her eyes, I was almost sure that Selena was improvising and that her mother-in-law was uneasy about its outcome.

Tartly she said: “Do what you think best, Selena.”

Selena nuzzled closer to me. “Gordy, darling—the poem.” Her voice was caressing, suspect. “Of course it’s important. And you were awfully smart to realize it. We didn’t tell you because—well, it was really Mimsey’s idea. You see, it’s all tied up with your drinking too much. Mimsey’s always been worried about it. Then this amnesia came, and she thought maybe, since you’d forgotten everything else, you’d forget your craving for alcohol. She was scared that by telling you the truth about tomorrow—about the poem, it would make you think of yourself as a drunk and spoil your chance of being cured.” She turned to Mrs. Friend. “That’s true, isn’t it, Mimsey?”

This was being okay with Mimsey. She had quite regained her composure. She had even picked up her knitting and was working the needles.

“Yes, Selena,” she said. “Gordy, dear, I do so hope you’re going to be good about drinking now.”

Nate, also more relaxed, chose the opportunity to put in one of his fancy medical pontifications. “There’s a good chance of it, Gordy, old man. The obliteration of a personality, however temporary, may well also obliterate the craving for alcohol which the maladjustment of that personality induced.” I glanced at Marny. Marny was the key. There was no expression on her face. She was sitting, flat-eyed, watching Selena.

“Okay,” I said. “So far so good. You’ve been lying because you were trying to save me from the beer’s fatal foam — you and the Aurora Clean Living League.”

“My dear Gordy, it’s not like the League.” Mrs. Friend purled or plained or something. “Of course, none of us mind a little drunkenness now and then. There’s no moral attitude, dear. It’s just that we don’t want you to impair your health.”

“Thank you,” I said. “Now—give about the poem.”

“It’s awfully stupid, baby.” Selena’s hand was stroking the short hairs at the back of my neck. “It’s all something dismal from your father’s will.”

I looked at Mrs. Friend. “That’s why Mr. Petherbridge is coming? He’s not really a member of the League at all.”

She flushed faintly but said nothing.

“Yes, baby,” said Selena. “That’s why Mr. Petherbridge is coming. In fact, that’s why Mr. Moffat and the Clean Living League are coming too.”

“To hear me recite the
Ode to Aurora
?”

“That,” said Selena, “and a couple of other things. Oh, it’s so absurd. Let’s get it over with. Your sainted papa was dreary about drink. Check? You drank. Check? Your father wanted to stop you drinking. Check? So he did this. He made this corny will. You get the money because you’re the only son. Sure. But you only get it provided you’re cold sober thirty days after his death, sober enough to recite the
Ode to Aurora
before the entire Clean Living League and then, afterwards, sign their abstinence pledge. Mr. Petherbridge is coming as a referee. If he finds you living an irreproachable domestic life and if you can recite the poem and sign the pledge, you get the money. It is your father’s way of making you teetotal.” She kissed me on the ear. “There, baby. That’s the awful, awful truth we’ve been so evilly keeping from you.”

I glanced at her. She couldn’t have looked more innocent.

I said: “And if I’m not sober tomorrow and I can’t recite the poem and if I won’t sign the abstinence pledge?”

She shrugged. “Then, darling, no money for Gordy. The whole works, great gobs of it, goes to the League to cleanse Southern California and rinse out its mouth with soap.”

They were all looking at me now. Mrs. Friend, bright-eyed, said:

“So you see, darling, how terribly, terribly important it is for your own sake for you to learn the poem?”

I stared back. “Sure,” I said,” but why are you all so worked up about it? Just out of sweet, spontaneous affection for me?”

“Of course, dear,” said Mrs. Friend. “After all, you recite this poem and you’re terribly rich. You don’t recite it and you’re destitute. I don’t want my son to be destitute.”

I looked at Marny. I rather thought that she shook her head infinitesimally.

I went on: “But your inheritance is all right whatever happens to me? Yours and Marny’s?”

“Of course, dear,” said Mrs. Friend.

Marny suddenly got up then. She stood, young and tense, silhouetted against the great view of evening mountains. “Don’t believe her,” she said.

Mrs. Friend shot her a horrified look. Marny stared back, her young face fierce with contempt.

“For God’s sake, now you’ve started, tell him the truth. What’s the matter with you? Do you lie for the sheer fun of it?”

I smiled at her. My ally was crashing through after all.

I said: “Which means that you all do have a personal interest in this too?”

“Of course we do.”

“Marny!”

Marny tossed back her glossy black hair, ignoring her mother’s sharp exclamation. “They make me sick with their dreary deceits. Okay, Mimsey. Do you want me to say it for you? Gordy drank. Selena couldn’t stop him. You couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t stop him. Father held us all responsible. We didn’t struggle with the devil enough, he said. So we’re all in the same boat. It was up to us to see he was cured of drinking. Father saw to that all right. Neither you nor me nor Selena get a red cent of the money unless Gordy passes this test in front of the League.”