Chapter 15
The bandages binding brick Fontaine's left leg felt stiff and uncomfortable.
But their constriction, and the numb pain in his flesh that stirred afresh whenever he moved, was nothing compared to the sick dismay he felt when he surveyed the gutted remains of the Justus J. Peabody Settlement House.
Three days had passed since the nightmarish climax of horror down at the river dump.
Brick had wakened in the Sisters of Charity Hospital several blocks away. The knife-slash administered by Whitey Noonan had not been anywhere fatal. So Brick was forced to gather up the threads of his old existence and try to weave them again into a consistent, sensible pattern. Difficult, especially at Rita Danilov's funeral yesterday.
Simon Danilov had virtually refused to acknowledge Brick's presence. He had simply sunk more deeply into himself, staring at his hands in his lap with dull-witted resentment of powers far beyond him as the cleric spoke of the dead girl.
The girl Brick could not bring himself to gaze at in her coffin.
Equally painful had been his interview with Captain Wadsewski.
Not because he'd been unhappy watching Sergeant Kreeg dressed down, stripped of his rank and ordered by the mild-voiced Captain to appear before the police board two weeks hence. What had hurt most was Captain Wadsewski's quiet persuasion. Wadsewski wanted Brick to personally start a fund drive to raise a new Peabody House. The Captain offered what little help he could give. But he felt that Brick, being something of a public figure, would be more effective speaking to the Peabody trustees. Brick had been forced to tell him the facts of life:
Funds for the house had been turned off at the source.
Wadsewski had no answer. He merely stared at his blotter as Brick departed.
Due to the press of other activities, Brick had managed to stay away from the wreckage of the settlement for three days. Then at four this morning he'd wakened in his hotel room uptown. He had no apartment any longer, having vacated it when he made the move to Hamilton Street.
Lying in the half-light of a rainy dawn, Brick knew he must visit the spot once more.
He took an early bus and walked again along Hell's Half Mile. It was a far different journey than it had been only a few days ago. Though now it seemed like years. The hour was slightly past seven. None of the shops was open, although he could hear an occasional raucous voice behind the windows of the tenements.
From one such window, a boy of ten or so made an indecent gesture. Brick was too tired to feel the slightest resentment.
Rain slated down with stinging gray force. He moved along the wire fence, staring at the hopeless rubble. Rita Danilov's dying words had exonerated him from a little of the guilt he'd felt because of her. Nothing could 'exonerate him from his failure to keep the settlement going.
He could have appealed once more to Artemus Olsen, of course. But he felt the appeal would be futile in the light of his behaviour towards Elaine.
Why did I come here? Thought Brick helplessly. To torture myself?
Dragging his left leg slightly, he turned back up Hamilton, away from the charred monument to his failure, hands deep in the pockets of his white raincoat, jaw sunk despondently on his chest.
He heard a hiss of tires behind him. He assumed it was an early delivery truck and did not glance up. An auto slowed at the curb. Brick had a glimpse of white wall tires, a sleek curve of gunmetal-gray fender.
Resentment etched his rough face as he saw Elaine behind the rain-spattered windshield of the Bentley.
He walked rapidly away as she rolled down the window.
"Brick-don't! Not until you take this."
Turning, he saw her gloved hand gripping a long white envelope. She extended it to him. For a moment a renewed ache of longing smote him. He saw the loveliness of her face, pale, the lips only slightly tinted with pink.
He expected to be greeted by haughty resentment when he gazed into her green eyes. But he could discover no trace of it. Against his better judgment he walked back.
Elaine slid across the front seat to make room for him. She wore a navy suit, trimly cut. It hugged tightly to her big and firm breasts, breasts wide spaced and proud and-
Brick suppressed the thought furiously.
When she moved to make room, the navy skirt rose above her knees, exposing round upper thighs, so achingly tender-gold, sheathed now in smoky gray nylon. Her garters were two strips of delicate white rising toward-
Hastily Elaine pulled down her skirt.
"Better get inside, Brick. The rain is heavy."
"Thanks, I don't mind it out here. About that business at the motor lodge-"
Elaine's expression seemed tense, as if she were frightened of him. Or perhaps of herself.
"No need to apologize. I understand. I--liked what you did to me."
"Oh, for God's sake, Elaine! Don't you have any decency?"
In disgust he jabbed a smoke into the corner of his mouth, puffed it savagely. "What are you doing here?"
"I wanted to see you, Brick. I stopped at your apartment but you weren't-"
"I planned to live down here," he said with heavy cynicism. "Remember?"
"Be cruel, Brick. I deserve it. Anyway, since I didn't know where you were-I tried the Sisters of Charity Hospital, but you'd been discharged already-I've been driving here three or four times a day. I felt you'd probably come back, at least for a short visit."
"Want to dig the knife a little deeper, do you?"
Elaine suppressed an exclamation of dismay. One gloved hand pointed to the long white envelope she'd deposited on the seat after Brick refused it.
"Please take that, Brick. I told father I'd deliver it."
"What is it?" Brick sneered. "An official notice from the Peabody trustees saying that the settlement is now defunct? How can you people be so damned cruel?"
"It is a letter," Elaine said, nodding. "From father, yes. It authorizes you to receive architectural and contracting bids to build a new house on the site of the old one."
"Don't joke, Elaine. If this is your idea of a good laugh-"
"For God's sake, Brick! Open it and see."
With unsteady hands he did as she asked.
Unfolding the crinkly bond paper, he noted the engraved letterhead from the investment banking firm of Artemus Olsen. He read with astonished eyes a repetition of the message Elaine had given him.
He folded the letter, inserted it in the envelope, rain beating on his head. Face bleak, he asked her:
"Why?"
Elaine shrugged, avoiding his gaze.
"What I ask for, I usually get. I told you that."
"You're not answering me. Why did you persuade your father to change his mind?"
Now the green depths of her eyes mirrored her pain.
"Call it a sop to my conscience."
A tentative smile slid onto Brick's face.
"Elaine, you surprise me. You-"
The smile vanished. He dropped the envelope through the car window.
"Oh, I get it. The bait. Well, no dice. If there's a new settlement on Hamilton Street, it'll be free and clear. I want to see a house go up in the worst way. But I'll be damned if I'll mortgage my soul to you to get it."
A low sob of remorse escaped her lips.
"How can you be so incredibly thick-headed all the time? Take the letter. There are no strings."
Elaine thrust the envelope back into his hands, slid back under the Bentley's wheel and started the motor.
"I knew what I've done to you, Brick. I'm sorry, though of course I don't expect you to believe me. What you do with this letter is your affair. I'm sailing for Europe on Friday. We're even, Brick. Or as even as we can be considering my behavior. Good bye."
With a quick whirring mesh of automatic gears, Elaine shot the Bentley forward.
Brick couldn't tell whether she was really crying or whether the rain-streaked glass gave the effect. He stared for a tormented moment at the wink of the Bentley's tail lights as Elaine braked at the cross-corner. Then he began to run.
"Elaine-Elaine, wait!"
Almost as if she'd been anticipating his call, praying for it the Bentley swung to the curb with a violent lurch. A window flew up in a tenement. A fat woman with hair in pincurls demanded to know who the hell was making all the racket. Brick paid no attention racing around the Bentley's bonnet opening the far door and slipping inside.
"Drive," he said curtly.
Elaine's face was very pale. She turned at the corner, headed aimlessly in the direction of the interstate bridge, a gray span smudging the rainy sky above Hamilton Street. Brick lifted the envelope.
"There has to be a new house, Elaine."
"I know, Brick. I don't understand quite why. But-"
She turned her head briefly, searching his eyes.
"Perhaps I might learn why if-you'd help me."
"The insurance business-the ball club. They're finished. I have a hell of a lot of work to do down here. By the time it's completed I'll probably be too old to go back to the club. And the insurance racket-well, that doesn't seem very important either now. I won't be an uptown do-gooder who drives here two or three days a week to see how his pet charity is going. I have to live here."
"Still trying to atone for Chip?" Elaine asked, but without rancor.
"Yes. Chip and-"
He stared through the rain-gray windshield.
"-and a girl named Rita Danilov."
"I saw the story in the paper. She died-"
"For me! She got killed so I could go on living. Do you understand why if-there's anything left between us-it'll be on my terms, not yours?"
Elaine drove another half block before she whispered.
"Brick, do you want there to be anything between us after what's happened?"
"I think you know the answer."
Again she turned, face shining.
"Then I accept the terms. Any terms, darling."
Brick's voice was quiet:
"Pull over."
She did.
"Come here, Elaine."
She fell into his arms, head thrown back, eyes misted with tears as he brought his mouth yearningly to the cool, coral-minty fragrance of her lips.
They clung together, kissing gently at first, then more passionately.
Their tongues caressed wildly, as if both were experiencing emotions too long suppressed. Elaine moved closer, the rain on the window glass all but obscuring the deserted side street.
For Brick there was nothing but the girl in his arms, the fragrance of her perfume, the cool temptation of her lips on his ear, his neck, as he kissed the column of her throat.
"When I thought I'd lost you, Brick-I realized only then how much I love you. Whatever you do-wherever you go-just let me be near."
Brick felt a surge of hope as he whispered against the curve of her neck:
"Darling, darling."
"Kiss me again, Brick. Kiss me again, deeply, and hard."
Once more their lips met, lips warming now with the stir of passion.
All the tension and torment of the past days vanished in Brick, as though a special key had been turned in a rusty lock. He slipped his arm around Elaine's waist.
He felt the soft tension of her flesh just above the elastic firmness of her girdle. Her hand guided his (to the buttons of her suit jacket, helped him while he unfastened three.
He ran his fingers under her clothes to clasp and fondle the immaculate gold perfection of her lace-clad breasts.
Elaine's mouth roved his face, his cheek, nipping flesh. She shuddered with pleasure as his hands worked first on one breast, then on the other.
She was crying and laughing all at once:
"Things will be all right. We'll start again, make everything work. If only we're together-"
Brick drew back, gazed fiercely and deeply into her green eyes.
"Elaine, I want you."
"And I want you too, Brick. Oh, yes, sweetest, kiss me. I want you kissing me."
His trembling hands slid to her knee, the whispering firmness of her knee that glided beneath his palm as he fondled her. The two of them swayed back and forth on the car seat, locked in an embrace of overpowering delight.
At last Brick drew away with an embarrassed laugh. He wiped steam from the inner surface of the windshield.
"It would be a hell of a note if we started our marriage with a morals arrest, Elaine."
"Where can we go?" Elaine implored him with love-filled eyes. "We must go somewhere. We're beginning again. I want to seal the bargain-"
She touched his cheek tenderly.
"Take everything I have Brick, as you want it, whenever you want it. But please, darling-I'll never ask for another thing-let's find a place where we can make love."
Dizzy with happiness, Brick kissed her once more. This time their mouths were caverns of excitement, deep and enduring excitement that promised him a magic life, a chance to re-build the dream of Peabody House and still keep Elaine's loveliness for his own.
She moaned as they kissed a last time. Brick got out of the Bentley, ran around to the driver's seat and started the motor. Unable to help themselves in their joy, they kissed again. With her thigh pressed against his, warm and straining with the promise of love to come, Brick engaged the Bentley's gears and drove away through the slanting rain.
Behind, on Hamilton Street, people stirred.
Shrill youthful voices were raised in the street corner argument.
Horns honked.
A new day was beginning.