“That’s funny. It doesn’t go in right. It feels as though there’s something blocking the inside.”
She took the handle out again, and held the cavity up to the light. “How queer. I can see something sparkling in there. It must be a piece of broken glass. What a weird place for it!” Taking a hairpin out of her auburn mane, she fished into the hole. “There, I’ve—I don’t believe it!” Dangling from the end of her improvised hook was a magnificent diamond ring.
Could it possibly be real? Corin took the ring gingerly from the hairpin, and turned it over. The stones glittered with a million fiery lights. Holding her breath, she drew the huge center gem across the surface of a jelly tumbler. It left an unmistakable scratch in the glass.
“Oh, for the cat’s sake! They are diamonds. She must be stark, raving loony.”
It had to be Madame Despau-Davy’s, of course. Who else ever entered the kitchen? Who but that eccentric old woman would think of such a hiding place?
Corin wondered if it could have been the landlady’s engagement ring. The setting was old-fashioned, but the diamonds were huge. It must be worth a great deal of money. She held the ring this way and that, entranced by the rainbow gleams from the precious jewels.
All at once, she was afraid. She thrust the ring back into its hiding place, screwed the handle down on top of it as best she could, washed the rolling pin carefully, and put it back where she had found it.
“I’m darned if I’ll roll out gingerbread boys with a fortune in diamonds.” She laughed shakily. “Jack’ll get drop cookies and like ’em.”
Chapter 5
“Frankly,” said Jack, “I’m not too crazy about cookies and pies and stuff like that.”
“All right, then,” Corin tossed the last crumbs to a hopeful seagull. “I won’t make you any more.”
“Atta girl. Why slave over a hot stove when you could be out having a ball with me? Feel like another dip?”
“Uh-uh. I’m all nice and dry.” She wiggled her toes luxuriously in the still-warm sand. “It’s been a glorious afternoon.”
“We aim to please.”
Those were no empty words. Jack had been trying so hard to entertain her that Corin was beginning to wish he could quit. She would gladly have swapped some of his constant chatter for a chance just to sit and enjoy this magnificent sweep of sea and sky. If only she had brought her water colors!
But Jack could not be switched off. “I don’t see why you bother with cooking at all. There are plenty of places to eat around the square.”
“I like to cook. And besides, I save a lot of money this way.”
“So what? Any doll who dresses the way you do shouldn’t have to worry about a few bucks here and there.”
She could have said, “My clothes are all homemade.” But she held her tongue. If this rich kid knew the size of her allowance, he would probably laugh himself sick. What business was it of his, anyway, if she dressed herself on baby-sitting fees and paid her tuition with the money she had made teaching crafts at a day camp for the past three summers?
Corin only smiled. “Waste not, want not, as my mother would say. We Norsk are the careful type.”
“Yes, but how careful can you get? What’s money for, but to have a ball with?”
“Yes, but not everyone’s idea of having a ball is the same as yours.” She was getting a little fed up. “For me, it’s trying to create something beautiful. Something I think is beautiful, anyway.”
“I think you’re beautiful,” said Jack.
“I think you’re nearsighted. Come on, let’s go. I’m getting goose bumps.”
“I thought you Norsk were tough.”
“I’m not all that Norsk. After all, it is September.
Here, let me give you a hand with those beach towels.”
“It’s okay. I’ll do it.”
“Look out, idiot, you’re shaking sand right in that man’s face.”
The boy laughed, gave the towels a last flip, and bundled them under his arm. “Come on Johansen, I’ll race you to the bath house.”
The old man was digging sand out of his eyes and muttering about teenage delinquents. Corin paused to murmur an embarrassed apology, then ran after Jack, her long, brown legs flashing under her blue terry beach robe.
Ten minutes later, glowing with sun and salt air, she was standing by the Morris Minor. Jack showed up at last, his blond hair slicked down and his brown polka-dotted ascot neatly tied under his expensive-looking beige sports shirt.
“How could you get so gorgeous so fast?” he called. “Let’s find a real fun place for dinner.”
“Can’t we just get some fried clams or something, and eat them in the car?” She was beginning to feel it had been a long day.
“Nothing doing. I’m taking you to the Ocean Inn for lobster thermidor.”
“Where’s the Ocean Inn?”
“A few miles farther up the turnpike.”
“Couldn’t we find some place closer to Boston?”
“What’s with the homing pigeon act? Aren’t you having fun?”
“Sure, but—”
“Then come on. Live a little.”
Corin shrugged and climbed into the car.
Jack started the motor. “That’s a swift outfit you’re wearing. It looks as though some designer created it just for you.”
“As a matter of fact, that’s just what happened,” she said with a perfectly straight face. The designer was Corin Johansen, of course, and the fabric a remnant she had picked up at a mill-end store; but Jack didn’t have to know that, either. Let him think what he liked.
The Ocean Inn was farther away than she had anticipated. When they finally got there, it was jammed to the doors. Jack insisted on waiting in the bar until they could get a table. He downed two gin-and-tonics while Corin sipped at ginger ale and wondered if she was going to have to drive the Morris Minor back to Boston.
However, the meal was so long in coming that the effect of the drinks had plenty of time to wear off. When their lobster finally arrived, they were so famished that they could not honestly have said whether it was good or not. They simply devoured every bite and wished there had been more. Corin began to wonder if that was how the restaurant had got its reputation for fine food.
Her clothes-conscious eye took in the expensive sportswear of their fellow-diners. This must be another of those shockingly high-priced places where people go mostly to be seen. If Jack made a habit of this sort of thing, as he certainly appeared to, he must spend a young fortune each month on food alone. It must be nice to be rich. It was even rather amusing to be thought rich. But she still wished they had settled for the fried clams.
“How about dessert?”
Jack’s question diverted her attention from a fat matron in shocking-pink stretch pants, a striking example of too much money spent in the wrong places.
“I’d love it. Something real gooey.” The lobster had not been so satisfying as she had hoped.
“Me, too. We’ll both have the ice cream pie.”
“I thought you didn’t like pie,” she teased.
“Oh, but this isn’t just pie. It’s the specialty of the house.”
The dessert turned out to be a mountainous confection of sponge cake and layers of different ice creams in a rather tough pie shell. It was topped with meringue, cherries, crushed pineapple, and synthetic whipped cream. Corin thought it looked revolting and tasted like nothing in particular; but it was filling, so she ate it. Jack seemed to think it was great.
“Honestly, I think he goes entirely by appearances,” thought the girl. “He thinks if a thing looks fancy enough, it must be good. I’ll bet the only way he knows how to impress a girl is to spend a lot of money on her. I suppose I should feel flattered.”
But at that point, all she felt was tired. The long day on the beach, the tedious wait for a disappointing meal, and the prospect of that endless drive back to Boston were putting her into a stupor. By the time they were back on the road, she
was practically having to prop her eyes open. She gave up even trying to listen to Jack’s banter and let her mind wander over her own problems: the washing that should have been done; the lampshade that hadn’t got stencilled; the cozy bed she desperately longed to be in. One of the ocelots was probably taking a snooze on her new madras bedspread right now. How she wished she were that ocelot!
When they finally pulled into the parking lot, Jack had to wake her up.
Chapter 6
It took Corin the whole week to get caught up. As she raced frantically from school assignments to personal chores, she kept reminding herself not to accept any more of Jack’s invitations, no matter how enticing they sounded.
Refusal was not easy. It seemed that every time she turned around, Jack was at her heels coaxing her to meet him for lunch, dinner, a show, a spin in the Morris Minor.
“But I can’t, Jack. I have work to do,” she was protesting for the fifteenth time since Sunday when she caught Alex Bodmin’s sardonic grin.
As Jack, not a whit discouraged, went off with the always-willing Angela, Alex slouched over to her. “What’s the matter? Don’t you like the kid?”
Corin shrugged. “He’s all right.”
“Then what’s this jazz about having to work?”
“It just so happens that I do. Mister Millstein gave us a new assignment today.” And she hadn’t done so brilliantly on the previous one. The teacher’s mild suggestion that she try to put some thought into her work still rankled.
“How come Millstein?” said Alex. “The new girls usually fall for Sears.”
“What are you talking about? I haven’t got a crush on anybody, not that it’s any of your business. I’m trying to learn something.”
“But you’re a glamorous art student.”
“What are you, some kind of a nut? There’s nothing glamorous about it. You slave like a dog and ruin your hands.
“You might catch a husband, though.”
“I don’t want the kind of husband you have to catch.”
“You just want to work.”
“Yes, I do. And if you’ll please get out of my way, I’ll go up to my room and get started.”
“All right, I wasn’t trying to make you sore.” Alex gave her one of his rare smiles. “You don’t fit into the picture, that’s all.”
“Why not?”
“Well, you dress like a model and hang around with a playboy.”
“I don’t hang around him. He hangs around me. And I make my own clothes, if you want to know, because I can’t afford to buy them. And if I take pains to make them look decent, it’s because I was brought up to have self-respect; and it wouldn’t hurt you to develop a little.” Furious, she brushed past him and stormed up to her room.
Having decided never to speak to Alex Bodmin again, she was rather at a loss when he came up to her the following day after class. Mr. Millstein was giving her a rather scathing criticism on her current assignment, and asked Alex for his opinion; so there was nothing she could do but listen, with her cheeks flaming.
Embarrassed as she was, she could not help noticing that he had evidently taken her scolding to heart. He had on a clean shirt and a baggy sports jacket instead of the gray sweater; he had even got a haircut. When the teacher turned to another student, he stayed with her.
“This thing isn’t so bad, really. But if you softened the edge here, and brought a suggestion of that blue tone down into the foreground—”
She saw instantly where she had gone wrong. “Yes, I can fix that easily enough. I should have noticed it myself.”
“Look, if you could hit it right every time, there wouldn’t be any point in your coming to school.”
“No, I guess not. Only it makes me so mad at myself when I overlook something obvious.”
“Me, too.”
“But you never do.”
“What are you talking about. Look at this mess here.” He thrust his sketching pad angrily under her nose.
Corin studied the exquisite drawing almost with awe. “It’s perfect, and you know it. What’s the matter with you, anyway? How do you ever expect to sell anything if you go around telling everybody how rotten you are?” “I don’t know.” He gloomed down at her for a moment, then a shy grin spread over his gaunt face. “You sound like Hink. Hey, that reminds me. Mister Hinkley’s opening is this afternoon. He’s having a one-man show at the Morse Gallery.”
“I know. I saw the notice on the bulletin board. I’m planning to see it this week. But students aren’t supposed to go to the reception, are they?”
“Not without an invitation. Alex shuffled his feet. “Er—Hink said I could drop by if I wanted to. I don’t suppose you’d care to come along?”
“Of all the half-witted questions! Just let me shove my stuff into my locker and comb my hair. It won’t take five seconds. I’ve never been to an opening in my life.”
“All you get to eat is a paper cup of lousy sherry and a limp cheese cracker.”
“I wouldn’t care if they served paint remover and charcoal sticks,” she said impatiently. “Help me with this layout pad, can’t you?”
“Here, I’ll put it away. You go get cleaned up.”
Corin dashed to a girls’ washroom, scrubbed her face and hands, ran a comb through her titian hair, freshened her lipstick, and rushed back to the reception room.
“Let’s go.”
A real opening, by a distinguished artist! This was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to her.
Alex was certainly no gay gallant like Jack. He made no effort to entertain her on the walk to the show or even to adjust his pace to hers. She practically had to run to keep up with his indolent-looking slouch. By the time they came in sight of the Morse Gallery, she was gasping for breath.
Around the school, it was easy to forget that quiet, modest Mr. Hinkley was a celebrity in the art world. But the gallery was mobbed by the time they reached it. Through its huge plate-glass window, they could see their instructor, looking desperately uncomfortable in a neat gray suit instead of the familiar tweed jacket with the leather patches on the elbows. As usual, he was fumbling at his pocket for the comforting bulge of his aged pipe; but today it was not there.
“Poor Hink,” Alex chuckled. “He hates all this like poison.”
“Then why does he do it?”
“Money, of course. His shows are always sellouts.” He steered her up the stairs and into the crowd, grumbling, “This is a waste of time. We won’t be able to see a thing.”
For Corin, however, it was enough just to be there. Being tall, she even managed to catch occasional glimpses of the paintings over the heads of the chattering art lovers. They were watercolors handled with a broad freshness that was thrilling to see.
“I knew he was a well-known painter,” she exclaimed, “but I never dreamed he’d be this great. Why on earth does he bother to teach?”
“Because he wants to,” said Alex. “Why does anybody do anything?”
“Lots of reasons. Because you have to. Because you think it’s right. Because you can’t help it.”
“Don’t kid yourself. You always have a choice. If you feel compelled to do something, it’s because that’s what you really want to do in the first place.”
“Even if it’s something awful?”
“Sure. Some people are awful. Anyway, what seems bad to you might look great to me.”
Somebody’s elbow was poking into Corin’s ribs, and somebody else was dripping sherry down her back. This was hardly the place for a philosophical discussion. But Alex’s attitude was getting under her skin, as usual.
“I think you’re wrong,” she said. “A minute ago, you told me Hink hated this sort of thing. Now you say no-body does anything he doesn’t want to. You’re contradicting yourself.”
“That doesn’t follow at all. He’s simply choosing the lesser evil for the sake of the greater good. Hink’s got six kids. Three of them are in college this year, and he needs every nickel he can g
et his hands on. If he didn’t show, he’d have to give up teaching and painting and go to work for an advertising agency, or something. He’d hate that a lot worse than dressing up once a year and letting a bunch of art collectors tell him what good taste they’ve got.”
Their teacher was evidently trapped in some such situation at that moment. He was being talked at by a dark-haired, exquisitely dressed, middle-aged man who was waving his arms excitedly toward the paintings on the walls. As Hink caught sight of his pupils, an expression of relief crossed his face.
“Alex,” he shouted. “Come over here.”
“Come on.” The tall student grabbed Corin by the wrist and wormed his way through the crowd.
The artist greeted him like a long-lost brother. Then he turned to the dark man. “Mister Oswega, I want you to meet a young man you collectors will be fighting over a few years from now. Alex Bodmin is the most gifted student we’ve ever had at the school; and we’ve worked with some talented kids over the years.”
“But if this is true,” the man in the beautifully tailored suit waved his arms more wildly than ever, “I must see your work, Mister—”
“Bodmin.” Alex looked horribly embarrassed. “I don’t have anything to show.”
Of all the stupid remarks! Corin’s red-headed temper boiled. If this idiot didn’t have the sense to see the break of a lifetime … She took a deep breath, and grabbed the bull by the horns.
“But he’s working on something I’m sure you’ll find tremendously interesting when it’s finished, Mister Os-wega. He ought to be ready to show it in a week or so. Won’t you, Alex?” She hacked viciously at her fellow-student’s ankle.
Hink grinned and gave her a surreptitious pat on the shoulder. Alex stared at her in pain and bewilderment. The collector’s white teeth flashed.
“Marvelous! When can I see this great new masterpiece? Is it a watercolor?”
“No, I–I guess it’s an oil,” mumbled the young man.
“Better and better! Of watercolors I buy already this afternoon three from your magnificent genius teacher. Oils I need more.”
The Fat Lady's Ghost Page 4
