Since almost nobody was actually born in New Mexico, Santa Fe is filled with people who came from big American cities, saw Santa Fe, fell in love with it, and moved in. That gives it a special flavor, too, in that there is a wide assortment of accents, habits, and points of view so that it isn't hidebound. Lots of artists and writers have settled there and, since World War II, a number of Europeans have chosen it as home. "Cosmopolitan but not metropolitan" was Bill's description of Santa Fe, a pat little phrase that was immediately snapped up by the Chamber of Commerce and the Resort Association as a kind of motto.
While I'd always thought Santa Fe and environs offered the most attractive kind of gaping in the world, it was as though I'd never really seen it before, and I got a kind of yen to look at it as much as possible before it was too late, like someone eating the last éclair on the eve of a stringent diet. I even took to going in every morning just to feel the town while my Bill did the errands and the heavy shopping and while Bill Parvin steered the station wagon through the tortuous streets and alleys of the town.
I discovered myself getting all dressed up to make calls on people we'd known and loved in New Mexico and finding them quite as surprised as I was that hard-boiled old Barbara Hooton was sitting primly in their Spanish living rooms making social noises. Although I hadn't confided my real New York plans to anyone—least of all to Bill—I felt a little like someone who has been told he has only a month to live and that he may as well spend it doing exactly what he wishes before The End.
I was getting soft and sappy about people I didn't even know by name—the checker in the supermarket, the man who fixed our shoes, the woman in the bookshop, the gas station attendant. "Well, good-bye," I'd say with welling eyes, embarrassing them almost as much as I was embarrassed every time we parted, usually after haggling over prices, unfilled orders, faulty workmanship, or short measure.
On the ranch I was absolutely impossible. I took to setting the alarm clock a couple of hours early, putting Bill into a perfect fury, just so I could bound up and look at the sun coming up around five every morning. It was a great sight, almost as thrilling as watching the sun set, and a sight that only Patrick Dennis, our one guest who rose habitually at five, ever saw. I took to breathing about twice as much as ever, just because the air was so delicious. Bill, however, shamed me out of that by snapping, "What's the matter with you, Barbara? Asthma? You sound like an old bulldog!"
The ranch house suddenly meant more to me than ever before. While it's true that I have always been a fairly house-proud soul in the matter of polished floors and slipcovers that fit and colors that blend and flowers—or at least some old green leaves—in strategic places, I began scrutinizing the rooms and making all kinds of mental notes. "This chair needs recovering . . . that picture is wrong on that wall . . . we should put a lamp over there . . ." And then, in a fluster of anger and embarrassment, I said aloud, "Why should I give a damn? If Bill likes the idea of being a rich New Yorker instead of a poor New Mexican, I'll never have to worry about any of this junk again. It'll be Connie's lookout, and she'll do a better job on it than I ever did."
Then it occurred to me that all I'd better be worrying about was how to cope with Connie's four large rooms of beautiful European antiques, which would apparently become ours in the bargain, in East Fifty-fifth Street and giddy things I'd be doing all day while Bill was, out earning a fortune as a big business executive. So I steadfastly turned my attention to contemplating all the things which I once would have liked to do in New York but had never been able to afford. It was a most comforting daydream.
Eventually Bill's left arm knit and he was engrossed in all sorts of restorative exercises like squeezing a rubber ball and doing runs on the lower octaves of the piano and practicing "a s d f g" and "q w e r t" on the typewriter keyboard. As our lovely October dwindled away, so did our lovely guests. At last November arrived and the last guest departed. We had reached what is known as The Slump and there was nothing to keep us away from Manhattan Island.
At last the big day dawned. Bill, who is the soul of efficiency, had gone about the ranch for a week doing all the final things that needed doing, like ordering feed and paying off the bills and checking on the pumps and fences and closing the books. He'd got out his New York City clothes, his Chesterfield coat, his dinner clothes, and all his townish shirts and ties, and he'd done it all with the most elaborate unconcern, humming an off-key selection of old show tunes, all the while.
But I, who am ordinary the kind of traveler who has everything packed in cumulus clouds of tissue paper a month in advance, showed a remarkable obstinacy about getting started. I'd shake out a couple of suits and dresses and then it would occur to me that The Girls badly wanted brushing and pedicures. So I'd stop and take over that job. I'd start to press a blouse, only to notice that Sandy was covered with burs. So I'd unplug the iron and commence the Herculean task of grooming an extra-large collie. At midnight on the eve of our departure, which Bill had brutally scheduled for six sharp the following morning, my suitcase still yawned half empty, while I was plumping pillows on the sofa in the lounge. "Barbara!" Bill bellowed, as he gazed horrified into the maw of my valise, "aren't you even packed?"
"Oh! Oh! Why, practically," I lied.
"Well, what else do you have to do?" he said.
"Oh, nothing, really," I said with a false casualness. "Just rinse out a few things, press some dresses, wash my hair, do my nails, write a couple of—"
"Well, then, get going! It'll be time to leave before you—"
"Bill, do you really think we ought to leave so soon and for so long? I mean, with the ranch just sitting here and—"
"It won't be just sitting here, dopey. Joe and Ronnie win be in charge. They know exactly what to do no matter what comes up. We're not expecting any people and even if people should come—which they won't in November—the Vigils can make them comfortable enough. Now get a move on."
While Bill talked on about theater tickets and people we simply had to see, I set about my packing at a tortoise's pace. With my hair still damp and a large knot in the pit of my stomach we set off on the dot of six, after having embraced Joe and Ronnie and May and The Girls and Sandy and all the horses.
I felt rather teary as we drove past all the beloved, familiar sights of Santa Fe and I knew in my heart that I'd never see them again. Then Bill got past the Santa Fe neighborhood and began picking up speed.
"Gee," he said, "I can't wait to see The Teahouse of the August Moon."
"Neither can I," I chimed in, "or that new English thing about the twenties—The Boy Friend."
"And we've got to go back to that little French restaurant on West Fifty-somethingth Street. You know—the one where we had those good mussels and the bill was so low."
"Oh, yes, Bill. I know. Chez Somebody. And a decent Chinese meal, too. I don't mean just a chop suey parlor, but the real McCoy."
"And a trip to the Blue Angel," Bill said. "I don't much care who's performing there, but a trip to the Blue Angel is essential."
"It certainly is," I said, brightening. "An absolute must."
Streaking along the deserted highway, I began to forget my melancholy for New Mexico and to think of nothing but life in the big, bustling maelstrom that is New York.
I was tired from having had no sleep the night before, and as my head began to nod I could hear the tires rhythmically striking the seams in the highway. "Manhattan, Manhattan, Manhattan," they seemed to say. "Manhattan, Manhattan, Manhattan."
19. Greeks bearing gifts
There's something about approaching New York that is always thrilling. Flying over its diamond brightness at night just before that scary, steeplechase landing at the water's edge of LaGuardia is too exciting to describe. Seeing the city from shipboard—even if it's only the Staten Island ferry—is like gazing at a corny but drenchingly romantic Maxfield Parrish mural. And even approaching New York from the nasty, pungent Jersey Flats, as Bill and I did, can be beautiful if you look onwa
rd and upward, instead of to the left or the right, and try your level best not to breathe. There stood New York in the November haze, looking pearly and ethereal and much, much cleaner than it actually is.
In a few minutes we were there, and in a few more minutes we were in our own little overheated hotel room with a bellboy who dashed about pulling blinds up and down, switching lights on and off, and practically showing us how a flush toilet worked, as though we were hopeless hicks who had never seen such wonders before, while Bill and I fished around for a suitable piece of change to serve as ransom money for our suitcases. (I don't know why it is that neither of us ever has anything larger than a nickel or smaller than a twenty-dollar bill when a bellboy is involved. It's always been that way.)
Two tremendous bouquets and three telephone messages made it clear that Connie had been anticipating our arrival and I was in the bathtub when she called again. Could we dine with her and her beau? We could.
An hour later we set off on foot to cover the few blocks between our hotel and Connie's apartment.
Coming to New York for the first time is wildly exciting, but almost too exciting because of the confusion. There's just too much to see to be able to get acclimated Even more fun, I think, is arriving in New York the second time, because the city never stands still. Turn your back on the place for a month and some old landmark has disappeared and a new skyscraper has taken its place. New York had pulled all kinds of tricks on us in our year and a half absence.
"Look, Bill," I said. "That little John Frederics building is down. What do you suppose they did with all those hats? And look up there. There isn't any Sherry's. Just think of all those wedding receptions and luncheons for lady poets."
"Say, they're certainly swanking up the Old Ambassador, aren't they?"
"And look! That must be Lever House!"
"Now, that's nice!" Bill said. "That really is a good-looking building."
"I rather preferred Park Avenue the old way," I said, reactionary to the end. "Now it's solid business buildings as far up as you can see. And, just look, would you—they're even starting to tear down that immense apartment house over there."
"Cheer up, Barbara. St. Bartholomew's is still the same."
"More pigeons," I said. "But why do they have to pick on Park? Couldn't they have rebuilt some crummy old avenue like Third or Second?"
"Well, don't get upset about it," Bill said. "We're only here for a visit."
"Are we now?" I said, but my words were drowned out by the din of one of those good old-fashioned New York traffic jams involving six taxicabs, a big black limousine, a policeman, and a terrified woman driver from the suburbs who kept screaming that she could have sworn that Fifty-fifth Street was eastbound. We hadn't seen anything so exciting since the Rodeo de Santa Fe.
We turned into the tree-shaded elegance of Fifty-fifth Street and eventually found ourselves being hugged by Connie and ushered into her living room where a blazing fire, a tray of drinks, and a fine specimen of a fiancé were waiting.
To say that Connie's apartment was beautiful or tasteful or elegant or smart or anything pallid like that is just to waste words. It was perfect. That, I think, covers everything. It occupied the drawing-room floor of what had once been a most posh old town house between Park and Lexington Avenues. The rooms were large and high, with floors and French windows and moldings done with a kind of attention to detail that neither time nor money can achieve nowadays. The furnishings were superb, each piece a treasure. But there was nothing "interior decorated" about the room, either. Well, I said it was perfect, didn't I?
It's a lucky thing alcohol doesn't affect people nearly as much at sea level as it does up in, say, New Mexico, because I was drunk with the beauty of the place–and the thought that it could very easily be ours—before I accepted the first cocktail.
And the evening was perfect, too. Connie had got her man, all right, and flashed something that looked like the Hope Diamond to prove it. She was gay as a linnet and the beau was just right for her. The dinner was magnificent—cooked, served, and washed up by Connie; oddly enough, for all her money, Connie didn't keep a maid or even a cleaning woman, but flapped around the flat to her heart's content, cooking and washing and waxing and dusting. After dinner we strolled on to the Blue Angel and after that we country folk were good and ready for bed.
"Well?" I said tentatively to Bill as we let ourselves into our room.
"Wasn't that fun?" Bill said.
"Loads of fun, Bill. I haven't had an evening like that since—well, not since we left New York."
"Neither have I. Say what you will, there's just something about New York that no other city has."
"True," I said guardedly.
"And that's some apartment."
"Oh, it's beautiful," I said with some conviction.
'It must set her back a fortune in rent."
"Actually it doesn't," I said. "She pays less than a hundred a month."
"You're kidding," Bill said.
"No. She told me so herself."
"Well, if we could have a place like that, at a rent like that, I wouldn't mind moving right in.”
"Indeed?" I asked. Then I changed the subject. "I liked her young man, didn't you?"
"Very much," Bill said. "I'm having lunch with him tomorrow. With him and Connie's cousin Aristotle or Achilles or something like that."
"Oh?"
"I think he's the one who runs all of Papa's enterprises. He wants to meet me for some reason."
"Well, that'll be nice," I said. "Won't it?"
The days in New York tumbled out at a dizzying rate. Bill and I usually went our own separate ways during the daylight hours and then joined forces with other people after dark. Life was fast-paced, very gay, and very social. We saw just about all the people we had wanted to see and were royally entertained by them all. But most of our time was spent with Connie and her fiancé. Connie and I had lunch together almost every day, either in New York's most lavish restaurants or in truck drivers' hangouts up and down the less fashionable avenues, and Connie went on being just plain Connie whether she was eating in the Colony or at Joe's Quick Service Diner. And her young man kept Bill hopping at noontime, too, along with Connie's tycoon-type cousin, who was christened neither Aristotle nor Achilles, but Pericles. I didn't like to ask what they were up to, but all of it seemed to involve eating practically raw chops in those mysterious and gloomy-looking buildings that are said to be exclusive men's clubs.
And in typical Connie fashion, Connie was very cagey about seeing who paid what. For example, when we were doing things that were expensive, Connie would telephone casually and say, "Somebody gave me four seats for an opening tomorrow night. I hear it's going to be a big hit, and, besides, the tickets are free. Will you join us?" She had undoubtedly bought the seats at fifty dollars each from some scalper, but she sounded awfully convincing. Whenever we went out to some particularly rich meal, Connie engineered it so that it would be at a club where only a member could sign the check and no guest was allowed to do so much as tip the cloakroom attendant. Or she'd telephone and say, "I've got a new recipe that has to be tried on someone. Why don't you and Bill serve as guinea pigs, then we can all go to a picture or something afterwards." But when it came to inexpensive treats like the movies or a quick drink between the acts of a musical or an outing in the country, Connie sat demurely by and gave Bill ample opportunity to pick up the check. In this way we felt neither like dead beats nor poor relations and Bill was never put in the embarrassing role of gigolo or hanger-on. It was a thoughtful artifice and not one many women would have been able to arrange so cleverly. Being another woman, I finally caught on, but only after it was too late.
We'd been in New York for more than a week before Connie even approached me about taking over the ranch. It was one of those bleak, penetratingly cold New York days when you don't know whether it's going to rain or snow but you wish it would do something. I'd made a stab at shopping that morning, only to find I co
uldn't afford anything I liked and didn't like anything I could afford. The wind whistled through my coat. I had a slight headache—yes, it was from partying the night before, but that didn't make me feel any better about it—and I'd nearly been struck down by a taxi that swept through a red light on Fifty-seventh Street. Connie said she'd meet me at an especially posh restaurant and when I got there I discovered I was the only woman in the place who wasn't wearing some form of mink. It was one of my low-ebb afternoons, and a martini before lunch did nothing to alleviate my gloom.
"Well, what do you think?" Connie said brightly over the dessert.
"About what?" I said.
"Well, you know, Barbara. About changing places, kind of. You and Bill taking over my apartment while we buy the ranch business from—"
"I—I'm still game, I guess, Connie," I said. "But I haven't said anything about it to Bill yet. Not a word. And I don't intend to force his hand. You know what I mean—that hysterical little wife who pouts and wheedles and throws crying jags until hubby is bullied into doing just what she wants."
"I should certainly hope not," Connie said. "But I don't think you'll have to. My cousin Pericles is probably inviting him to be a junior executive at this very minute. And I bet he'll snap it up. Bill was interested in the family business."
Guestward Ho! Page 24
