Chapter 4

When Mildred Hager had arrived home earlier that afternoon, she'd felt much better. She'd merely been in a low mood, she told herself. And she should have been ashamed. She had a fine husband, a fine home, two wonderful children.

What more did a woman need?

It had been a long, severe winter, and with spring late, she'd needed that walk to get her mind back into proper perspective.

Setting her thoughts firmly upon her many blessings, she stopped at the mail box and found a letter the sight of which instantly lifted her spirits.

Jean Bellamy! Mildred tore the envelope open and read the cryptic message:

Darling:

I've wrestled with the characters and they are mine. Another triumph after a bloody battle. I'll be back in Manhattan almost any time. Brace yourself for a call.

-Love, Jean

The letter bore a Los Angeles postmark. But that did not necessarily indicate an interval before Jean's call. She might have posted the letter and ridden across the country on the same plane. Jean was that way.

Mildred thrust the letter into her pocket and laughed. It made the day perfect. She'd been thinking of Jean that very afternoon and had yearned to see her.

Three months wasn't a long time, really....

She entered the house through the patio and called from the living room: "Anybody home?"

"I'm here, Mom." The answer came faintly from upstairs, faintly, but clear and warm in Mildred's heart. The casual, affectionate Mom. Only a word, but it meant acceptance when Mildred had prayed desperately to be accepted. In five full years she still hadn't come to the point where she could take it as casually as it was tossed her way. Although her outward appearance denied it, Mildred Hager was a deeply emotional and sentimental person. So much so that when Jimmie and Donna had truly welcomed her to Rebel Hill, she had gone to her room and cried for half an hour. And for quite some time afterward she had had to be careful not to let her gratitude show. They would have probably thought it quite maudlin.

"Where have you been Mom?"

"Taking a walk, dear."

Donna was in her room, probably cutting more pictures out of one of those weird hootenanny magazines. Her walls were covered with young male faces that all looked the same to Mildred's impartial eye.

As Mildred climbed the stairs, she remembered Vance's words. He'd seen no problem whatever.

"The kids? They'll love you."

"I'm not so sure. It may be difficult."

"Mildred, they aren't tots any more. They missed their mother, certainly, but they're a couple of young realists. A little selfish if you want the truth but maybe that's good. It was roughest on Donna of course. Took some forgetting of course, but then it was over...."

"Grace must have been a wonderful mother."

"And another thing, Mildred. There is nothing in you to remind them of her. She was ill for a long time. Their memory is that of an invalid. There was no drama of sudden tragedy for young minds to latch onto...."

And it had worked out as Vance had predicted. There hadn't been even shyness, only friendly curiosity at the beginning, an impudent wolf-whistle from Jimmie that shocked Mildred a little until she realized it was a compliment. Then a quick settling into family life.

There had been a single incident with Donna and that came so long after Mildred's entrance into the Hager circle that it surprised her. She had entered Donna's room one night to find her crying into her pillow, the brash, sophisticated young modern in a sudden reversion to little-girl misery.

"Would you like to tell me, dear?"

"It just came over me-all of a sudden. How she looked lying there. Mom. My-my real Mom, I mean. It was the last time I saw her alive. So fragile. So tired. She died that night."

Mildred sat down on the bed and stroked the dark, shining hair. Donna took her hand and squeezed it convusively.

"There is nothing anyone can say," Mildred told her. "I never knew your mother of course-only that she was a fine and wonderful woman-but I thought about her a great deal before your father and I were married. And I'm afraid I've been a little selfish about the whole thing since I came here."

"Selfish?"

"I loved your father very much and felt it was honest for me to do so. I was sure, though, that you and Jimmie would not realize how desperately I wanted you to accept me because you two were really the keys to my chance of happiness with your father. I knew I could never take your mother's place so I decided it would be a mistake to try. So I never made any attempt to mother you for fear you would resent it. Perhaps I should have taken that chance though. No doubt I could have done at least a little something to fill the lonely places. It was selfish of me not to." Mildred caught a sliding tear with the tip of her finger. "I'm very sorry, dear."

"Don't be-please. You were-swell."

"I'm glad you feel that way. And now-would you like me to sleep with you tonight?"

"I'd like that."

Mildred got into bed and held Donna in her arms. Donna cuddled there and cried for quite a while. Then in the morning she was far over on her side of the bed curled in a ball like a kitten and that was the last of her tears and grief so far as Mildred was ever able to learn.

And there had been no trouble whatever with Jimmie. He had accepted Mildred so casually that she wondered if he had ever greatly cared for his mother. He was a young counterpart of Vance, with the same realistic approach to life. Sane. Normal. The direct, logical approach at all times. Great enthusiasms, but never any depth of true sentimentality. Life would hold few surprises for Jimmie. He would take it in stride. Not as a gift but as something due him....

The phone rang.

Mildred, halfway up the stairs, returned to the living room to take it. It would be Vance at the club, checking as to whether they would be on time for dinner as scheduled....

"Hello, dear."

"Well hello dear yourself. It's certainly nice to be anticipated."

"Jean! Jean Bellamy! For heaven's sake! Don't tell me you've finally paroled yourself out of jail."

"A full pardon."

"The book's finished then?"

"Practically. A once-over lightly and then to the typist."

"Wonderful. When will I see you?"

"When can you come to the city?"

The thought of running down to Manhattan, seeing Jean Bellamy again, was exciting. "How about next Monday?"

"Fine. Where?"

"The Three G's?"

"One o'clock?"

"Perfect Tell me, sweet, is it a good book?"

Jean Bellamy's wordless exclamation was a sffft over the phone. "Who knows? They keep on giving me money. I keep on writing the things."

"And they get more than they pay for, yon can be sure of that. Monday then?"

"Right, darling. And give my love to that handsome husband of yours."

Mildred put the phone down and searched for the overtones in Jean's last words, hunted for sarcasm, dislike, resentment. Perhaps they'd been there, or perhaps Jean had stopped actively disliking Vance and was now only passively negative toward him....

"Who was that on the phone, Mom?"

Passing Donna's room, Mildred stopped to took in. Donna was sitting cross-legged on the bed sorting phonograph records.

"Jean Bellamy, dear. I'm having lunch with her next Monday."

"Is she coming here?"

"No, I'm going into the city. Would you Eke to go with me?"

Donna considered the invitation. She was small-boned, dainty, petitory pretty. She had a tilted nose, brown eyes, and a flawless skin. She looked nothing Eke Vance and had probably taken after her mother although Mildred could not be sure. She'd never seen a really good picture of Grace Hager.

"No," Donna said finally. "I've got a date to go swimming with the kids Monday. Thanks just the same, Mom."

"I'm sure you'll have more fun."

"I would like to meet Jean Bellamy though. She's the kooky one-the writer-isn't she?"

"Kooky? Well, let's just say she's quite a positive person."

"The one Daddy doesn't like."

"I'm sure be doesn't dislike her. He-"

"Yes he does. That's why she never visits you. They can't stand each other. Once I heard him call her that Village screwball with the monkey."

"I'm sure he didn't mean it the way it sounded."

"Where's she been? She hasn't called for quite a while has she?"

"She had trouble with her latest book."

Donna made a wry face. "I read one of her books once. Real junk."

The opinion was logical coming from Donna. Jean Bellamy wrote a popular type of light, breezy love story-the same one every time, was the way she put it-and Donna had quite sophisticated leanings where literature was concerned. She got more out of the New Yorker than anyone else in the house and could discuss writers like Kafka most ably.

"When Jean has trouble with a book," Mildred said, "she goes into seclusion on a farm in California-locks herself up with her typewriter and-" Jean Bellamy's own explanation was-"and let the damned thing seduce me into giving it the ending it wants"-but Mildred said, "and works like a demon until she licks it."

Donna wasn't listening. She said, "I think I'll trade Paul Anka. He's beginning to bore me."

"I'm going to dress for dinner, dear. We're meeting your father at the club. Remember?"

"I'll be ready."

"Have you seen Jimmie?"

"Not lately."

"When be comes in, tell him. And answer the phone if it rings, will you dear? I might be in the tab."

"All right, Mom...."

Mildred looked at the clock in the bedroom and saw that she would have ample time for a rest and a leisurely bath before Vance got home. So she undressed and stretched out under the spread.

But her body refused to relax. Not that she was overly tense. She didn't need the rest, she realized, and this was a point of satisfaction to her. After a walk like that, she was still fresh.

She got up and went into the bathroom where she turned on the shower. She slipped off her robe and stood looking at herself in the mirror, at her body.

A body that showed no wear; neither from the liquor nor the love.

Thus she indirectly faced that period of her life she had pretty well blocked out, the time after Tom's death when she'd gone adrift.

How many trips into the bottle seeking oblivion?

How many pairs of male arms in how many beds seeking the ghost of what she and Tom had had?

How true Jean Bellamy's searing words?

Here, she blocked the recollections. She could not face a recall of the words as they had been thrown at her, nor the hurt of Jean's belief that she could not possibly have been true to Tom. Jean had never stated this directly but that had been there in her eyes.

Mildred ran her hands lightly down her sides. Her reaction to her physical self was something of a paradox. She was grateful for her perfection and her vitality. But her latent appetitites, her need of an abnormal amount of satisfaction was a curse.

She concentrated her attention on her face; a rather remarkable face in that the mouth was too large and too sensuous, the nose too classically imperious. Her cheekbones were high, far higher than an artist with any sense of proportion would have placed them. And her eyes were all wrong too. They were clear, hazel, and piercing, but too large.

Yet this group of misfit features, in assembly, blended to give Mildred Hager a face of arresting beauty.

That had been Vance's unqualified appraisal the day he had first met her. This had been at a Manhattan cocktail party on the afternoon of a singular triumph, the awarding of the Penrose Soap account to Vance's agency. He was exuberant, and understandably so. Also, a little drunk.

He'd looked across at her and let his eyes move on. Then he'd done a double take and they'd snapped back. He'd walked to her m a direct line, stopped in front of her, and said. "You're the most beautiful thing I ever saw in my life. Do you come with the soap?"

The time and the place had charged it off as cocktail talk and that was how Mildred had responded.

"No, Mr. Hager. The Penrose girl on the wrapper has been doing a fine job all by herself."

That or some other casual reply. Friendly, but wary. You had to be a little careful with friendly drunks at cocktail parties, all single girls should be.

And Mildred Hager-lovely volcano-or-more so....

Mildred came out of her reverie to find herself gently stroking her breasts. She turned quickly, got in under the shower, and began briskly soaping herself. When she finished, she turned the water into as cold a spray as she could stand. Then she got out and toweled herself violently.

Twenty minutes later, perfectly groomed, extremely beautiful, she left the bedroom and went down to make the drinks before she drove to the station after Vance.

Donna was ready also.

Jimmie had not come home yet....

The evening at the dub was pleasant even though Vance got annoyed at Jimmie and refused to wait for him. He arrived halfway through dinner. He bent down to kiss Mildred on the cheek by way of apology and she reacted with mock sternness.

"You've been drinking, young man."

He grinned engagingly. "One short beer, Mom."

His attempt to ingratiate himself was lost on Donna who used her look of special disdain. "With a whiskey chaser no doubt. You smell like a brewery."

"Quiet, squirt."

"Don't talk that way to your sister, Jimmie."

"Sorry."

Vance was frowning at his son. "You know we usually eat here at the ckib on Fridays. Is keeping in touch too much to ask?"

"No, Dad-but-"

"No buts. Family obligations come first. Remember that, young man."

"Okay, Dad. I said I was sorry."

"I didn't hear you," Donna said smugly.

Jimmie stiffened his lips as he dropped into his chair. Donna grinned wickedly and pursued her advantage.

"You might follow Rafe Kolsky's example," she said primly. Rafe and his mother were seated at a table across the room. Donna caught his eyes and smiled sweetly. "He escorted his mother in like a perfect gentleman."

Throwing a dash of acid at Donna with his eyes, Jimmie got up and stood behind Mildred. "Mom, would you mind getting up so I can pull your chair out and push it in for you?"

Vance spoke sharply. "Stop being ridiculous."

"She bugs me."

"Sit down and drink your tomato juice."

Striving to achieve a truce, Mildred said, "The thermometer is due to reach seventy tomorrow. There will be swimming soon."

"He'd rather drag race on the other side of the Hill."

"Will you ease off?" Jimmie demanded.

Donna dodged a kick under the table and stuck out her tongue.

"Why don't you two call it a draw?" Vance asked wearily.

"I'll second that," Mildred said.

Neither of them were in favor of the idea and when Vance asked Mildred if she wanted to dance, Jimmie missed a genuine opportunity to be gallant and let his father draw Mildred's chair back.

During his courting days Vance had danced a lot with Mildred but his interest had gradually declined over their married months until a turn on the floor was now quite rare. As his arm went around her waist, Mildred remembered another night they'd danced. But she put that out of her mind quickly and concentrated on following his lead. This proved to be in the direction of a table across the floor where Tom Colby sat with his wife, Carey.

They were a morose twosome, Tom and Carey, seemingly cut from the same mold. They'd lived together too long, someone had once said-had used the same mirror too often.

There were quite a few married look-a-likes in Gams County, but it could usually be traced to relationship-earlier marriages of cousin to cousin and other far closer unions carefully deleted from family histories.

The marks remained, though, stubbornly perpetrating themselves down through the guiltless generations; identifications such as the invariable buck teeth of the Sachet clan, the characteristic popped eyes of the Remys-the hunched appearance of every Mantee shoulder.

But the resemblance of Tom and Carey Colby was purely coincidental. Carey had been a southern belle, coming to Garns County with the smell of magnolia still in her dark hair.

Carey looked up at Mildred with her "isn't it awfu!" expression as Vance steered toward the Colby table and stood by Tom's chair shuffling to the rhythm of the music.

"Any reaction on that Tad Beck business?" Tom asked.

"Something new? I hadn't heard."

"You will."

"Whatever it is," Vance said, "I'm with you."

"Will you be around tomorrow? The weather's easing. They're going to have the pool ready."

"A little early isn't it?"

"For sensible people, yes. But the kids are howling for it."

"If there's a chance for a little sun, I'll be up. How about some golf?"

Tom Colby appeared to regard the idea dismally. "I'M meet you m the bar."

Mildred gave up trying to follow Vance's shuffling. She stopped and stepped slightly away from him and smiled at Carey.

She always felt a little ill-at-ease with the native element of Rebel Hill-the people who traced their lines back into the distant past.

It was probably her imagination, she conceded, but they always seemed conscious of their geneological advantage. It seemed to Mildred that they regarded those with less than twenty years residency as upstart newcomers. Carey's homely regard seemed baleful and she hunted for something to say.

"Spring has been so terribly late this year. I was beginning to reconcile myself to snow on the Fourth of July"

"Ain't it been awful?" Carey agreed. "Tom's winter cold hangs on like a plague."

"Don't sign no petitions 'til we talk," Tom said.

Vance nodded and danced Mildred away-Back in the middle of the floor, he made a wry face. "Hon-mind if we cut out as Jimmie would say. My feet hurt."

Mildred laughed. "All that agony. Wouldn't it have been simpler just to walk over and talk to Tom Colby?"

"Maybe you're right, hon. I never was much of a dancer."

"That's ridiculous. You're marvelous on your feet."

Vance was ready to leave by ten. They looked for Donna and found her dancing with Dyland Walsh who promised to have her home by midnight.

"Okay," Vance said, "but don't make a racket. I'll be in the sack. Had a rough day at the office."

Dyland Walsh laughed politely and guided Donna off across the floor. "They make a nice-looking couple," Mildred said.

"Standard cliche for the occasion. I'll bring the car around."

But Mildred did not release his arm. "I can survive a walk to the parking lot. I'm not that old...."

There was a moon and as they crossed the shadow-dappled lawn, Mildred said, "I remember another night like this, darling."

"That so?"

"You should remember too. Another night we danced together. And then we were hurrying up Fifth Avenue. We didn't even wait for a cab. We-"

"You should have slapped my face."

"But the truth was, I-"

Vance patted her hand. He seemed uneasy-almost embarrassed. "We did crazy things in those days, didn't we?" He turned his head to run an eye along the forest line beyond the lawn. "A good, lush spring even if it is late. We'll have misquitoes as big as Polaris missiles."

"Do you remember our first spring together? It was wet and rainy, but it was the most beautiful spring I've ever known."

She found his hand and took it in hers but they reached the car just then and he freed himself to open the door for her. Then he was behind the wheel saying, "Hon, will you see if I left some cigarettes in the glove compartment?"

Mildred could have cried easily at this point, but she squeezed back the stupid tears as she fumbled with the catch. She was being ridiculous-idiotically tense and over-sensitive. She found a pack of cigarettes and tore it open blindly. She pushed the lighter and took out a cigarette while it was heating. She lit the cigarette and held it within the arc of Vance's vision. "Here you are, dear."

But at that moment a match flared as Vance lit his own, dexterously manipulating the match pack with one hand. He glanced over. "Oh, sorry. I found one in my jacket pocket. Didn't know I had it."

Mildred's throat caught and then she realized how she was weighing his every word, magnifying even his gestures. The word again was ridiculous. But it seemed that she could not help it. An inner dread was forcing her into nonsensical behavior.

"Here," she said. "Take the pack, dear. You'll need it...."

When they got home, Vance dropped her at the front door and drove on back to the garage. She was in the bathroom when he came in and she called, "Would you like a nightcap, dear?"

He entered the bedroom yawning. "Not me. I'm bushed. Me for the sack."

She was preparing carefully for bed, taking a second quick shower. Perfume lightly applied. Her hair just right.

"What was Tom talking about, dear?"

"Huh? Oh, Tad Beck's stirring up trouble, I guess."

"Tad seems to consider himself the club's arbiter."

"Trouble is, nobody wants an arbiter."

Tad Beck was repulsive Mildred conceded; a huge, slack-mouth toad of a man who dominated the politics of the club. A man everyone feared, he'd appointed himself the dictator of protocol, social acceptance, and promoter of all that tended to maintain the snobbish restrictive barriers that walled both the club and the Hill away from the surrounding areas.

"Beck and Wellington make a real team," Vance said.

Ralph Wellington, a fifty-year-old juvenile, was from one of Games county's oldest families. There was still some money, but land and ancestoral prestige was the bulk of his heritage.

"Why is Ralph so slavishly devoted to Tad?"

"Because Beck holds the line. Ralph is a part of the decayed past that Tad protects and fosters."

"Do you think the rules of admittance are too strict?"

"That's a tough question. We need new blood but there doesn't seem to be any place to get it."

"I'm sure everything will work out all right," Mildred said.

Another minute or two and she was ready. She wore sheer black nightgown that reached only to above her knees, the kind that had once-by his own admission-driven Vance slightly mad, the perfume that used to send him nuzzling into her hair.

She moved to the doorway and stood there with the bathroom light behind her. A scant year ago, he would have caught his breath. She would have heard him whisper: "Don't move. Don't even breathe. Just stand there and let me get the picture I want to remember forever...."

Only a year ago. One turn of the earth. Could a thing so wonderful die in so short a time?

"You are completely and totally adorable...."

It seemed an age since she'd heard those words.

"Stay just that way-on your hands and knees. Of course that's all right. You're lovely that way-so very lovely...."

"Are you awake, Vance?"

"Humphf?"

Once his voice would have choked: "Why did you take so long in the bathroom...?"

"Oh, Mildred-Mildred-you stupid sentimentalist!"

Thus she castigated herself as she looked down at him.

"Have I told you lately that I love you very much?" she whispered. "Humphf?"

Perhaps it was the wistful misery in her voice that caught him and brought him back from sleep. He turned over and opened his eyes and smiled up at her. "Guess I've been a little careless on that score myself."

She moved close to the bed and his hand came out to touch her. He ran his hand down her arm and she pressed against him. But the hand stopped short of what she thought might be its goal. Vance patted her in comradely fashion.

"You're a knockout in that thing Millie. I sure am a lucky guy."

In her heart and in her mind, then, she knelt and kissed him and drew his hands to her body in the manner of a lover's hands. In the wishful world within her, he responded and drew her down and took her in the old wild way.

But only in her mind; only in her heart. In reality, she stood stiff and miserable, waiting for what was not going to happen; waiting and asking herself why:

Why can't I show him how I really feel? Why can't I make love to him the way he used to make love to me? Why are things so different between us? So different than they used to be with Tom? Whence this stupid, unyielding pride? Am I afraid of being rejected? He would not reject me. But-

Wasted questions. She knew the answers so well. The panic did not stir for this night or tomorrow night or next week or next month or next year.

The panic was for all the tomorrows to come and the hunger he knew nothing about.

The answer had been given her long ago by Jean Bellamy the day Jean had hunted her out in that horrid little cocktail lounge on Third Avenue, after she'd had a year of nasty little cocktail lounges. Jean had sat down across from her and said, "Listen precious, don't you think this nonsense has gone about far enough?"

"Go away. Let me alone. Tom is dead. I want to die too."

"Oh, my aching back! Will you cut it out? Tom's been dead for a year. Will you quit using him as an alibi? It was a good marriage, yes, but it wasn't any deathless passion. Why won't you face the truth?"

"The truth was that-"

"-that he was a guy who could take care of you. You hit the jackpot when you married Tom Bendixon. He was just what you needed-an overactive dynamo who could match you move for move and make you yell uncle."

"You're being obscene! We loved each other!"

"Sure you did, you idiot. But perfect understand-mg and an unlimited mutual drive were the keys. Can't you understand that? Baby! You're talking to Jean, now, and there aren't any secrets. We both know that if Tom had been an ordinary male your marriage would have conked out in six months. Let's get honest again, precious. Let's recap all the things we threshed out together. By whatever fancy name you want to call that, you need men. You chew men up and spit them out like a meat grinder. You wear out men like I wear out shoes. You've got to have men."

"Shut up! Shut up! I'll throw this gin in your face!"

"Sure you will. But you won't face the truth. You'll go right on lying to yourself-telling yourself your sliding nobly to hell on a toboggan of grief when all you've really done is quit like a yellow dog."

"Go away! Let me alone!"

"Tell me, precious, how many understanding bums have you sobbed out your loneliness to? Bums you met in bars and ended up sleeping with?"

"Jean-please! Leave me alone! Leave me alone!"

"Honey, I'm not trying to hurt you. I'm only trying to snap you out of it. You're too valuable to be thrown away like this."

"Jean-I'm so miserable!"

"Well I'd think you would be. How long since you've had a square meal...?"

Mildred had passed out in the cab on the way to Jean Bellamy's apartment that night. Jean had called a doctor. He put Mildred under sedation and when she awoke, forty-eight hours later, with Jean stroking her forehead, she saw those months after Tom's death as an impossible nightmare-unreal time spent in some phantom world that no longer existed.

Mildred bent down quickly and kissed Vance. "Would you like a little company, mister?" she asked softly.

"Sure-sure thing, hon." He lifted the covers and made room for her beside him.

She lay down and pressed her long body close to his. He smiled sleepily and formed a cradle for her in the crook of his arm. She kissed his ear as she took his free hand and laid that on her breast. She shivered in response to his movement.

But that was movement without passion. He was merely getting comfortable. His eyes half opened. "You forgot to turn out the light, Millie...."

She lay motionless for a long time feeling the beat of his heart as that slowed down and became the faintest of vibrations. His breathing was even and measured, his hand inert as he ignored the hard rise of the nipple against his palm.

After a while she got up and went and sat on the window seat. Outside the moon was round and bright.

"By whatever fancy name you want to call that, you've got to have men...."

By whatever fancy name. Nymphomania: A female's morbid preoccupation with love. That was fancy enough.

She left the window and turned out the dressing room light and got into bed again. She lay very still and realized after a time that she was in the formal position of death-rigid, her hands folded-needing only the casket and the mourners around her looking down.

A premonition?

Like New Orleans?

She slept