Star (9 page)

The Barclay home was at Divisadero and Broadway, and it was an extremely handsome brick mansion. A butler opened the door to him, and as he was led inside he
could hear echoes of a party in progress, which depressed him even more. For a moment, he wasn’t sure he could make the effort. He would have to talk and be charming, and sound intelligent with their friends, and it was the last thing he wanted to do tonight. All he wanted was to sit quietly somewhere, with his own thoughts, and his dreams of a girl he barely knew … a girl who would be sixteen the day after tomorrow.

“Spencer!” The judge’s booming voice met him almost the moment he entered the room, and Spencer felt like a schoolboy who had been shoved into a roomful of teachers.

“Good evening, sir.” His smile was warm and his eyes were serious as he greeted his father’s friend, and shook hands with Mrs. Barclay. “It’s good to see you. Good evening, Mrs. Barclay.”

Judge Barclay took him instantly in tow, introducing him around the room, and explaining that he had just graduated from Stanford Law School. He mentioned who his father was, as Spencer fought not to cringe visibly. Suddenly this was the last place he wanted to be. He felt almost physically unable to make the effort.

There were twelve guests invited to dinner that night, and one of them had canceled at the last minute. Another judge’s wife had turned her ankle on the way home from her golf game, but he had come anyway. He was an old friend of the Barclays’, and he knew they wouldn’t mind, but Priscilla Barclay was frantic as she counted out the number of guests. There were thirteen of them, including the hosts, and she knew how superstitious at least two of the guests were. There was nothing she could do about it at this late date. Dinner was going to be served in half an hour, and the only thing she could do was ask their daughter to join them for dinner. She ran hastily upstairs and quickly knocked on her door. Elizabeth was getting
ready to go to a party. She was eighteen years old, and attractive in a very restrained way. She was wearing a black cocktail dress and pearls. She was going to come out at the Cotillion that winter, but before that, in the fall, she would be attending Vassar.

“Darling, I need your help.” Her mother glanced in the mirror and straightened her pearls, and then smoothed a hand over her hair as she turned to look pleadingly at her daughter. “Judge Armistead’s wife twisted her ankle.”

“Oh God, is she downstairs?” Elizabeth Barclay looked cool and unruffled, far more so than her agitated mother.

“No, of course not. She called to say she couldn’t come. But he came anyway. And now we’ll be thirteen at the table.”

“Just pretend you don’t know. Maybe no one will notice.” She slipped into high-heeled black satin pumps that made her instantly taller than her mother. Elizabeth had two older brothers, one in government in Washington, D.C., and the other an attorney in New York. But she was the Barclays’ only daughter.

“I can’t do that. You know how Penny and Jane are. One of them will leave, and then I’ll be two women short. Darling, can’t you help me?”

“Now?” She looked annoyed. “But I’m going to the theater.” She was going with a group of friends, although she had to admit she hadn’t been looking forward to the evening. It was one of those rare times when she didn’t have a date, they had decided to go as a group at the last minute.

“Is it important?” Her mother looked her squarely in the eye. “I really need you.”

“Oh for God’s sake.” She glanced at her watch, and then nodded. Maybe it was just as well. She didn’t want
to go anyway. She’d been out until two o’clock that morning at one of the debutante balls she had gone to almost every night since graduating from Burke’s the month before. She’d been having a good time, and the following week they were moving up to their house at Lake Tahoe. “All right, Mother, I’ll call them.” She smiled graciously, and adjusted the double strand of pearls that matched her mother’s. She was, in fact, a pretty girl, but she was by far too reserved for a girl of eighteen. In many ways, she seemed considerably older. She had been conversing with adults for years, and her parents had taken great pains to include her with their friends, and in what they considered interesting conversations. Her brothers were respectively ten and twelve years older, and for years she had been treated as an adult. In addition, she had acquired the cool self-restraint that was expected of a Barclay. She was always circumspect and well behaved, and even at eighteen, she was every inch a lady. “I’ll be down in a minute.”

Her mother smiled gratefully at her, and Elizabeth smiled in answer. She had rich auburn hair, which she wore in a smooth pageboy, and big brown eyes. She had creamy skin, and a trim waist, and she played an excellent game of tennis. But there was very little warmth about the girl, there was only excessively good breeding, and a fine mind which had won her countless admirers among her parents’ friends. Even in her own set she was both feared and respected. Elizabeth Barclay was not someone one fooled around with. She was a serious girl with an inquiring mind, a sharp tongue, and a strong set of her own opinions. There had been no doubt of her attending college in the fall. The choice had been between Radcliffe, Wellesley, and Vassar.

She walked quietly downstairs ten minutes later, having called her friends and apologized profusely, explaining
only that a minor crisis had come up land she was needed at home. In Elizabeth’s life the only crisis was being a guest short for dinner, or the absence of the right dress to wear because it was out being altered. There had been no real disasters in her life, no inkling of disappointment or hardship. There was nothing her parents wouldn’t have done for her, nothing her father wouldn’t have smoothed over, or bought her. And yet she wasn’t spoiled. She simply expected a certain way of life, and those around her to behave with decorum. She was unusual for a girl her age. Her childhood seemed to have ended by the time she was ten or eleven. From then on, she had behaved like an adult, someone anyone would have welcomed in their opera box or at their dinner table. But she didn’t have much fun. Fun was not important to Elizabeth Barclay. Purpose was. And actions that had some real meaning.

The guests were finishing their drinks when she came downstairs, and she looked around at the familiar faces. There was only one couple she didn’t know, and her mother introduced them as old friends of her father’s from Chicago. And then she saw another unfamiliar face, a very handsome one, conversing quietly with Judge Armistead and her father. She watched him briefly as she accepted a glass of champagne from the silver tray the butler held out to her, and she smiled as she walked across the room to her father.

“Well, well, how lucky we are tonight, Elizabeth.” Her father smiled with faintly teasing eyes. “Have you made room in your busy schedule for us? How amazing!” He put an affectionate arm around her shoulders and she smiled up at him. She had always been close to him, and it was easy to see that he adored her.

“Mother was kind enough to ask me to join you.”

“What good judgment. You know Judge Armistead,
Elizabeth, and this is Spencer Hill, from New York. He’s just graduated from Stanford Law School.”

“Congratulations.” She smiled coolly, and he took her in with appreciation. She was a cool number and he guessed her to be twenty-one or twenty-two. There was a polish about her that made her seem older than her years, an obvious kind of sophistication enhanced by the expensive black dress, the pearls, and the way she looked him in the eye when she shook his hand. She looked like a girl who was used to getting what she wanted. “You must be very pleased,” she added with a polite smile as he watched her.

“I am. Thank you.” He wondered what she did with herself, played tennis probably, and shopped with friends or her mother, but he was surprised at her father’s next announcement.

“Elizabeth is going to Vassar in the fall. We tried to talk her into Stanford, to no avail. She is determined to go East and leave us here, pining for her. But I’m hoping the cold winters will convince her that she’d rather be out here. Her mother and I are going to miss her.” Elizabeth smiled at his words, and Spencer was surprised by how young she was. Eighteen-year-old girls had certainly changed in the last few years. And as he looked at her, it struck him forcibly that she was everything that Crystal wasn’t.

“It’s a wonderful school, Miss Barclay,” Spencer was friendly but cool. “My sister-in-law went there. I’m sure you’re going to like it.” And for some reason, from his words, she assumed that he was married. It never occurred to her that he meant his brother’s wife. And for an instant, she was aware of the faintest twinge of disappointment. He was a good-looking man, and there was an intriguing magnetism about him.

The butler announced dinner then, and Priscilla Barclay
shepherded her guests gently toward the dining room. It had black-and-white marble floors, wood-paneled walls, and a handsome crystal chandelier hanging over the heavy English table. There were candles lit in handsome silver candelabra, and the table shone with Limoges in white and gold, and crystal glasses that caught the light of the candles and reflected it back onto the silver. The napkins were heavy and large, embroidered with the monogram of Priscilla Barclay’s mother, and the guests found their way easily to their seats with the hostess’s gentle directions. There were place cards of course, too, in elaborate little silver holders. And Elizabeth was pleased to find herself sitting next to Spencer. She knew instantly that her mother had done some rapid rearranging.

There was smoked salmon for the first course, and tiny Olympia oysters. And by the time the main course came, Elizabeth and Spencer were deep in conversation. He marveled again at her intelligence and how well informed she was. There was nothing she seemed not to know about, about world affairs or domestic politics, history or art. She was a remarkable girl, and he had been right, she would do very well at Vassar. In many ways, she reminded him a great deal of his brother’s wife, except that Elizabeth was even a little grander. There was nothing showy or ostentatious about her. She was all fine mind and extraordinarily good manners. She even made a point of talking to the man on her right, another of her father’s friends, and then eventually she turned back to Spencer.

“So, Mr. Hill, what are you going to do now, freshly graduated from Stanford?” She eyed him with interest and poise, and for a moment he felt younger than she was, and had he had a little less to drink it might actually have unnerved him.

“Go to work in New York.”

“Do you have a job?” She was interested and a little blunt. She saw no point in wasting time. In an odd way, he liked that about her. He didn’t need to play games, and if she could ask him questions, he could do the same with her. It was actually easier than flirting.

“Yes, I do. With Anderson, Vincent, and Sawbrook.”

“I’m impressed.” She took a sip of wine, and smiled up at him.

“Do you know them?”

“I’ve heard my father mention them. They’re the biggest firm on Wall Street.”

“Now I’m impressed,” he teased, but in a way he meant it. “You know an awful lot for a girl of eighteen. No wonder you got into Vassar.”

“Thank you. I’ve been hanging out at dinner tables for years. I guess once in a while it’s useful.” But it was more than that. She was very bright, and if he’d been in a better mood, he might even have liked her. There was no mystery to her of course, no poetry, no magic, but a very sharp mind, and an incredible directness that intrigued him. And in a cool, patrician way, she was very attractive. More so as the evening wore on and he continued to drink Harrison Barclay’s wine. It was an odd way to end a day that had begun with a christening in the Alexander Valley. But he couldn’t imagine Crystal here. No matter what he felt for her she wouldn’t have fit in. In this setting, he couldn’t imagine anyone but this girl, with the forthright brown eyes and the straightforward manner. But as he listened to her, his heart still ached for Crystal.

“When are you leaving San Francisco?”

“In two days.” He said it with regret, but for reasons neither of them fully understood. He couldn’t understand the dull ache he’d felt since that afternoon as he drove back to San Francisco. And she thought there was nothing
more exciting than moving to New York. She could hardly wait until September.

“That’s too bad. I was hoping you might come up to see us at Lake Tahoe.”

“I’d have liked that. But I’ve got an awful lot to do. I start work in two weeks, that won’t give me much time to get settled before they bury me in a sea of papers on Wall Street.”

“Are you excited?” Her eyes probed his again and he decided to be honest with her.

“I’m not sure, to tell the truth. I’m still trying to figure out why I went to law school.”

“What would you have done instead?”

“Medicine, if I hadn’t gone into the army. The war changed things for everyone, I suppose … for some a lot worse than for me.” He looked pensive for a moment, thinking of his brother. “I was very lucky.”

“I think you’re very lucky to be a lawyer.”

“Do you?” He was amused again. She was an intriguing girl, and he sensed easily that there was not an ounce of weakness or indecision in Elizabeth Barclay. “Why?”

“I’d like to go to law school too. After Vassar.”

He was impressed, but not entirely surprised. “Then you should. But wouldn’t you rather marry and have children?” It seemed a more natural option to him, and it was unlikely that any man would tolerate her doing both. In 1947, one had to opt for one, or the other. It seemed a high price to pay to him. In her shoes, he would far rather have had a husband and children, but Elizabeth didn’t look convinced.

“Maybe.” For an instant she looked young and unsure, then she shrugged, as the dessert was served. And then she startled him with her next question. “What’s your wife like, Mr. Hill?”

“Excuse me? I … I’m sorry … what ever made
you think I was married?” He looked horrified and then he laughed. Did he seem so old to her that it was inconceivable he could still be single? If so, how ancient he must have seemed earlier that day to Crystal. She was still on his mind, even as he forced himself to converse with Elizabeth Barclay, although she certainly wasn’t difficult to talk to. But his mind was still far away, and a piece of his heart that seemed to have betrayed him.