The Black Marble (3 page)

The secretary's name was Herbert.

Madeline was sure it was a rotten lie, because within a year Mason fired Herbert and married a San Marino widow without a moustache.

“Mrs. Whitfield? You probably don't remember me? We met at dinner? At the Cal Tech Atheneum?”

Madeline looked up, blankly. She was feeling the Chivas Regal more than usual.

“Remember? I was with Dr. Harry Gray?”

He was a balding little man in a lumpy warm-up suit and dirty canvas Tretorns. He made every statement a question.

“Oh, yes,” Madeline lied, “of course, you're …”

“Irwin Berg? Remember?”

“Oh, yes, Dr. Berg! Of course!”

Now she knew him. She had enjoyed talking with him at a Cal Tech dinner party to raise funds for foreign students. He was said to be an extraordinary astrophysicist and a candidate for Big Casino: a hot prospect for a Nobel Prize.

“May I buy you a drink?” His round, steel-rimmed eyeglasses were fogging and slipping over his perspiring nose.

“I'd
love
a drink,” Madeline said. She was settling down, the last Scotch working nicely now. She leaned closer and whispered, “The barman probably couldn't make change for you anyway. Since I'm a member and you're a guest, I'll buy.”

Then Madeline took the little scientist by the arm and walked him into the Hunt Room, where Edna Lofton was ordering a Virgin Mary, her muscular lacy bottom pressed against the mahogany.

Edna was laughing uproariously at one of Wendell Hargrove's dreadful jokes. Hargrove was a third-generation stockbroker and an “A” tennis player, which was the only thing keeping his fifty-year-old body intact, what with the fifth of booze he consumed at noon luncheons at the California Club in downtown Los Angeles. Were it not for his daily tennis, everyone knew that his fierce aging body could never withstand the massive bourbon dosage.

“Guess we won't need that fourth for mixed doubles, Madeline,” Edna Lofton smiled. “Marcie's going to play again. So you can go ahead.”

“Go ahead what?” Wendell Hargrove asked.

“Go ahead and have another double Scotch,” Edna laughed. Then she added: “I might even have one.”

But the damage was done. Madeline blushed painfully. Edna looked with curiosity at Madeline's companion and thrust out her hand: “Hi, I'm Edna Lofton.”

“Oh? Pleased to meet you. I'm Irwin Berg.”

Madeline said, “Dr. Berg's a guest of … who are you a guest of?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Bates. I met them at the Atheneum. They're watching the match.”

“You an M.D.?” Hargrove asked thickly and Madeline saw that he was well past any more tennis this day.

“Dr. Berg teaches at Cal Tech. He's an astrophysicist,” Madeline offered, subtly eyeing the barman, who nodded and reached discreetly for the Chivas Regal.

“Really?” Edna said. “Don't get many astrophysicists in the Hunt Club.”

Later that evening, Madeline, showered and dressed in a basic dark pantsuit, was standing alone at the dessert table deciding to pass the entrée in favor of some strudel and chocolate mousse when Edna Lofton got up from her table and crossed the dining room to talk to her.

“Is Dr. Goldberg with you, Madeline?” she asked, walking Madeline toward the empty drawing room.

“Dr. Berg. No, he's not with me. Why?”

“He's sure a cute little fellow,” Edna winked, batting her evening eyelashes.

“I suppose so,” Madeline said cautiously.

“Play your cards right, Mad, and he might invite you to some of those
fun
Cal Tech science parties at the Atheneum. A lot of
mature
, visiting professors must be awfully lonely for one of the few available
single ladies
they'd be proud to take just anywhere!”

“Edna …” Madeline sputtered, but too late. Edna Lofton had turned and was hurrying toward her guests in the dining room.

Madeline Dills Whitfield had stood alone in the empty drawing room and looked vacantly at the landscape painting as though she had never seen it before. She had seen it all her life. She suddenly longed for the paintings of hunters and hounds. In the
bar.

A
single
lady. As though it were Madeline's fault. As though she had planned to be a single lady. She had never known
anyone
who had planned to be a single lady. Madeline Dills had never even lived away from her parents except for college terms at U.S.C., ten miles from Pasadena. Had never lived anywhere else except for six months in Europe with her parents when her father sold his interest in the orthopedic clinic and took a long vacation. She had never in her life given a
single
thought to being a single lady.

She was the daughter of Dr. Corey Dills and the wife of Mason Whitfield. She had willingly surrendered her Christian as well as her maiden name.

It had always been: “Mrs. Mason Whitfield is giving a tea Wednesday afternoon …”

Madeline Dills, by Dr. Corey Dills out of Mrs. Corey Dills. Edna Lofton, by Mr. Bradford Lofton out of Mrs. Bradford Lofton. They had to give up
both
names. Androgynous.
Mr.
Mason Whitfield and
Mrs.
Mason Whitfield. Hermaphroditic!

The stag ruled. It was her heritage and she accepted it. Which is perhaps why she didn't make a fuss during the divorce. Her family trust fund was much larger than his.
She
paid
him
for his share in the home and furnishings bought as community property. No alimony. She didn't need or want his money. Her mother was hale and hearty then. Madeline didn't make a fuss and Mason said he appreciated it. He said she was a perfect lady.

Now there was the new Mrs. Mason Whitfield living in San Marino. He hadn't the decency to give up his Annandale Country Club membership. So how does one address invitations? Mrs. Madeline Dills Whitfield? The return of her names was … awkward. As awkward as having
single
ladies at dinner parties. How does one seat them? And the clubs where
single
ladies were never meant to be? It wasn't awkward, it was
horrible.

Thank God for Marian Milford's homosexual brother, Lance. He danced beautifully, had impeccable manners, and for ten years had eased dinner problems in Old Pasadena society by escorting half the widows and divorcées in town to social and charitable gatherings. Old Pasadena and San Marino had an exceedingly low divorce rate thanks to the continuity and tradition of society. And thanks to disapproving parents who structured wills and trusts which pauperized many a misbehaving daughter who opted to take the bit in her teeth like less constant, free-spirited sisters over the hill, on the west side.

The Dalmanes and Chivas were interacting. Madeline was about to drift asleep when Victoria sat up.

“Oh, no, Vickie!” Madeline groaned. “Not now. I'm dead!”

But Vickie yawned and stretched languorously and got out of bed. Madeline moaned, got up reeling, and stood naked in the moonlight, reviving when she threw open the French doors to the cold January air.

Suddenly she hoped that someone, anyone—man or woman—would see her through the rain and white oak trees and Canary Island pines. Perhaps someone higher up San Rafael, in a hillside mansion, a gardener, a maid, anyone. She was dizzy, yet she stood defiantly naked under a leering moon, convinced that if someone
could
see her through the wall of camellias that someone would be aroused by
her
naked body.

Then she looked down into the valley and saw that the rain had cleared the smog from the Rose Bowl. It would be an ugly carnival on Sunday when Super Bowl XI hit Pasadena, but she and Vickie would be across town winning the Beverly Hills Winter Show. She and Vickie would be basking in attention, glory,
celebrity.

Vickie looked at Madeline for a moment, then turned and trotted over to an American Beauty. She squatted beside a puddle of fallen rose petals and emptied her bladder. Then she shook herself, scampered across the lawn, in through the French doors, and leaped up onto the bed.

The Dalmanes and Chivas turned Madeline's legs gelatinous. She closed the doors and threw herself into bed, hardly noticing the crumbs of mud and garden mulch on the pearly sheets.

“You're impossible, Vickie,” she scolded. “Impossible!” Then she stroked Vickie's neck once, twice, and her hand fell limp.

Madeline had a wonderful dream that night. Vickie won best in show, easily earning the last of fifteen major points she needed to become a champion. And then she went on to Madison Square Garden to win. She became the unquestioned grand champion—the finest miniature schnauzer in America.

Vickie grunted uncomfortably for a moment. She growled and squirmed until she managed a puffy fart. Then another. Now she sighed happily and licked Madeline's face. Then she snuggled, and snored, and slept as deeply as her drugged mistress.

3

The Terrier King

The natural mascara around the eyes of the Dandie Dinmont was the blackest he had ever seen.

“Look at those saucers,” he said, admiring their roundness. Then he turned to the girl, looked at her breasts and grinned. “Your saucers are beautiful too.”

The girl feigned naïveté and said, “Not as pretty as the Dandie's, Mr. Skinner.”

Then Philo Skinner turned his critical eye back to the Dandie Dinmont and startled the girl by flashing the straight razor so quickly in the face of the terrier. She was glad she hadn't gasped. He was mercurial, but with good cause. Philo Skinner was a top terrier man on the West Coast. In the past six years he had big wins at Madison Square Garden, Chicago International and Beverly Hills. With a Lakeland, a Kerry blue and a Dandie. The girl knew that if she could survive his temperamental eruptions, like the one earlier in the evening when she left a tassel
inches from the bottom of the ear leather in a Bedlington terrier (he measured it), and if she could get used to never being paid on time and having a few “clerical errors” in her paycheck (always errors which made her check
short
), and if she could repel his sporadic sexual advances, well, Philo Skinner was a champion dog handler. A
champion.
And she could learn.

“Don't ever let me see
you
trying this,” Philo Skinner said, holding the Dandie firmly under the chin with the long fingers of his left hand while the straight razor in his right stripped the nose from the top to the tip. The Dandie's white topknot was electric from back-combing.

“I'd be scared to death to do that,” the girl said. “Those barber razors are scary.”

“Well, careless people can misuse a stripping knife as well. You ever hurt an animal here and you'll find your little fanny out in the street.”

He deliberately let his gaze drop to her little fanny, which was pointed up nicely through the gap in her white smock as she leaned across the grooming table.

“I'll be real careful always, Mr. Skinner,” she said.

“Never use the knife when working under the eyes,” he said, looking back to the patient little terrier. “Roll the finger and thumb together the way the hair grows. See? How old are you, Pattie Mae?”

“I'm nineteen, Mr. Skinner,” the girl said, marveling at those darting, tobacco-stained fingers.

He plucked the eyes clean, even to the lashes. He was so expert and quick the dog almost dozed through it.

“Can you guess how old
I
am, Pattie Mae?” he asked, releasing the dog's chin and stroking the little animal behind the ears.

Oh, shit! She hated it when these old guys started that crap. It was impossible for her to guess the age of anybody over thirty let alone an old turkey like Mr. Skinner. His dyed black hair was all thin and scraggly. And he was all wrinkly around his droopy eyes and mouth. And those crappy gold chains around his neck and those Dacron leisure suits didn't fool nobody. Shit! Those nylon shirts open clear to his belly button, she could see the gray hairs all over his bony old chest! He could play all the Elton John tapes he wanted to, he was still just an old fart.