Seventeen Widows of Sans Souci

by Charlotte Armstrong

  But once upon a time there had been a girl named Nona O’Connor who had loved the theatre and the arts, and who had gone to New York to be in the middle of the great world, to shake off her small-town background. Nona O’Connor had lived in Greenwich Village, and had hobnobbed with Bohemians, had worried herself with advanced and image-breaking ideas, and had despised those who, un-pricked by thought, sheepishly conformed. Until she and Val had soberly taken the next step, and with child and with sober realism had gone for “maturity.”

  Now, as the four of them sat in Ursula Fitzgibbon’s warm and cozy living room, Nona Henry could not help feeling (and felt obliged to beat away the feeling) that she and Robert Fitzgibbon had somehow an undercurrent of thought in common, not shared by the other two.

  When his mother pressed him rather proudly to say how many times he had been around the world, Nona said, “Have you heard the rumor that our Mrs. Rogan is going around the world in June?”

  Georgia said, “Is that really so?” She was sitting in her usual peaceful pose, wearing her usual tolerant smile.

  “I, for one,” said Mrs. Fitz, “cannot imagine attempting such a journey.”

  “Who is this?” Robert wanted to know. “Who is going around the world?”

  “That’s what we’ve heard,” said Nona. “In fact, she told me so herself. There are those who think it’s just a tall tale.”

  “Supposed to be going on a luxury liner, isn’t she?” Georgia said. “And supposed to be looking for somebody to take along?”

  “Well!” said Robert. “To take along?”

  “For free,” said Nona. “There has been quite a flutter in the dovecote.”

  In so saying she detached herself from the other widows of Sans Souci.

  Robert cocked an eyebrow. “Do I know this one?”

  The devil took possession of Nona Henry. “She wears a long red coat,” said Nona softly. “Her hair is cut short. She … oh … goes to church and all that.”

  He was alerted. The secret current ran strong between them.

  “I’m sure she does,” Ursula was saying, in her sweet voice. “I really can’t believe that she is just telling a story. It really is no one’s business.” Ursula sighed.

  “Oh well, people talk,” said Georgia. “It is hard to believe that anyone has such luck.”

  “Going around the world,” said Robert. “Well!”

  “She is an odd woman,” said Ursula.

  “You know her, Mum?”

  “I’ve spoken to her, of course,” said Ursula. “When she first came, just to be friendly. But she … in fact, when I persisted …” Her brows drew into a pink frown.

  “Mrs. Fitz thought it would be nice to ask her to come watch the Rose Parade on television,” Georgia said. “But Mrs. Rogan declined. Just like that. It wasn’t awfully courteous.” Georgia turned her head. “You went, didn’t you, Nona?” Georgia was going to change the subject with her usual veering away from any uncharitable thought.

  “I felt I owed it to myself.” Nona’s mouth went sidewise, and it was the devil pulling at its corner. “One of those things,” said Nona with a shrug.

  Robert’s eyes were on her. They were the same as winking at her. (Georgia and Ursula were really rather stuffy, but he and she knew the score.)

  “Actually,” said Mrs. Fitz, not without a touch of stiffness, “I believe that Mrs. Rogan went to the parade.”

  “Did she?” Nona was surprised.

  “Sat at the curb,” said Mrs. Fitz, “on a campstool. Didn’t you say, Nona dear, that she is seventy-one?”

  Nona kept her lashes down. “So Harriet Gregory told me. Yes, Tess Rogan is seventy-one years old.”

  She looked up at Robert and his eyes were laughing.

  “Well, more power to her,” he said boldly. “What a gay old gal! Er … what church does she go to?”

  Oh definitely, he conspired. He knew, now, who had been there in the patio on Christmas Eve, who had seen and heard. He hadn’t been too drunk to remember.

  “She prefers to go alone,” said Nona demurely, “so I’m not sure.” The gleam in his eye answered and spoke to her secretly.

  As the talk drifted away Nona, suddenly uneasy, got up to go. In fact, she was horrified. Tempted and delighted and horrified!

  She said good night rather primly and got across the hall and firmly closed the door.

  What was this? Nothing! It was absolutely nothing. What if she, Nona Henry, was only fifty, not any older than Georgia Oliver? What if she was just as young …?

  Oh God, the flesh! What became of the flesh? Seventeen widows in Sans Souci, and had they all left the flesh behind? Were they gathered here, to eke out the days until they’d die, and never be touched again? Were they out of the world of men forever … all but Georgia Oliver? Was Nona Henry?

  But the aging bones did not forget how to tilt the body provocatively, even though the result might be grotesque and disgusting—even though one did not do it. Yes, the old flesh, baggy or furrowed or spotted with time, was flesh. The old mechanism was still there and still able to be triggered. And it was too bad that because they were aging and graying and wrinkling, the widows of Sans Souci had to remember to deny this truth … so as not to make old spectacles of themselves. Oh God, what became of the flesh? When the crepy eyelids still remembered how the young eyes had slipped under the lashes, and the old lips, now folded over artificial teeth, still had the skill of kissing, well learned. And the old thighs …

  Nona stood shaken in her own room. Shaken and revolted. None of that! None of that!

  (If something said to her, Come now, you are raising a devil in the flesh to disguise the subtler devil in the mind, she did not listen. Blot it all out!) She would beat down the devil altogether. She would have no more of it. She would be good.

  Study to be good. Go to church, even. Ponder these things. Learn how to grow old (since that was what she was in for) and aim to become gentle and fine like Mrs. Fitz. No more malice in gossip, then, or selfishness, or vanity, or indulgences, in food, drink, sloth … No, be good and do good, deny the flesh and the devil, and seek salvation.

  What else, the devil asked her drearily, was there left for a respectable widow of fifty to seek?

  Chapter 13

  At two in the morning on the first Friday in February, Leila Hull finally set the east wing of Sans Souci on fire. This was Morgan Lake’s nightmare, come true.

  Upstairs, in the east wing, lived Agnes Vaughn, in 204, over the entrance. Then, Georgia Oliver in another one-room apartment, 202, on the patio side. In 200, the two-room apartment at the end of the wing, lived Daisy Robinson. Across the hall along the south side, there was Tess Rogan in 201. Next, going back toward the angle, came Leila Hull in 203. In 205, there was Elna Ames.

  It was Elna Ames who first gave the alarm. She smelled the smoke in the night. She never really slept.

  The phone rang in Morgan Lake’s ear; once awakened, he could smell the smoke himself. He called the Fire Department. As he hung up, his phone rang again. This time it was Tess Rogan. “My living-room wall seems to be on fire,” said she.

  He told her help was coming. Rose was staring at him from the other bed. He said to her, “Better dress. Wake Winnie. I have to go.”

  He took the elevator. His heart was fluttering. He tried with the techniques he had had to learn to steady it. The noise of sirens ripping the night was welcome to his ear.

  Nona Henry heard the sirens and when they stopped their shrieking so frighteningly nearby, she left her bed. From the window she saw a fireman running through the patio of Sans Souci toward the entrance door. So she put on her heaviest bathrobe, and tied the belt firmly. She picked up her purse and went out into the corridor, feeling a pleasurable excitement. No one else in the north wing had yet opened her door; all was still. As Nona trotted around the corner she saw that the trouble was in the east wing.

  Agnes Vaughn was standing in her door, a terrible sight in a dirty blue wrapper with her hair
on end. She was staring across the hall at Elna Ames who kept saying, “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

  Then Georgia Oliver, in a rose-colored garment, came running toward Nona, her fair hair flying. “I’m going to Mrs. Fitz,” said she. “It’s all right, I think.” She flashed her smile and ran on.

  The firemen seemed to be in 203 and 201, both of whose doors stood open. Against the opposite corridor wall stood Morgan Lake, in a blue-and-green plaid robe, looking very cool and collected. Tess Rogan was there, standing quietly beside him. Between them, down on the carpet of the corridor with her tousled reddish (dyed) head against the wall and her eyes bleary, her legs stuck straight ahead of her, her gnarled toes turned up nakedly, not giving a damn for anything or anybody, sat Leila Hull, aged sixty-five, a widow.

  Leila Hull was under the influence of alcohol. In fact, she was stinking drunk.

  “Is there anything I can do?” asked Nona, out of breath.

  “I think not, Mrs. Henry,” said Morgan Lake. His calm was terrible. “They have the fire out.”

  She hadn’t meant about the fire. She had meant about Leila Hull. Nona hadn’t seen a human being as drunk as this in years.

  Tess Rogan said, “Somebody is coming for her. Mr. Lake has telephoned … there is nothing we can do.”

  Nona stepped backward, not wishing to be in any way a nuisance here. Somebody came running. She turned and there was the girl, Winnie Lake. Her hair was up in pins. Her slim body was lost in a loose quilted coat. Her face looked pinched and shrewd and even angry.

  “They have it out,” said Nona. “Just better not get in their way.”

  The girl stopped, so close to her that Nona could feel the vibrations of her body. “But is Dad all right?” asked Winnie fiercely. “Dad’s got a whacky heart. He shouldn’t have to do this! That old drunk!” Winnie’s young lips closed over worse words, hardly suppressed. “Dad always said she was dangerous! This is bad for him!”

  Nona touched her. “He seems all right,” she said gently. The girl’s concern gave her great pleasure.

  “Dad?” Winnie burst away.

  “It’s all right,” Nona heard him say to her. “Just go down and tell your mother …”

  The girl stood still, looking tensely up into his face. He smiled and touched her cheek with one finger. “All right,” he said. “All right, dear.”

  Winnie turned and ran back the way she had come.

  Nona felt moved almost to tears.

  Now Bettina Goodenough came out of her door looking frightened. She minced along in mules.

  But the fire that had been burning somehow within the partition between Leila Hull’s room and the living room of Tess Rogan’s apartment was out, although the corridor had begun to reek disagreeably. A nasty powerful sickening odor rose.

  At this moment, a strange man came running from the top of the stairs. “Aunt Leila? Is she all right? What happened?” he panted. “You’re Mr. Lake. Look I …”

  The man’s panic collided with Morgan Lake’s calm and was slain. The two men turned their backs and began to speak together softly. Tess Rogan stood aloof. On the floor, Leila Hull mumbled and rolled her head against the wall.

  The stranger turned swiftly, crouched, and lifted the drunken old woman off the floor. He was young enough and strong enough and frightened enough to carry her, and so he did, taking her away just as she was—barefooted, but with a dress on that flapped, half unbuttoned. Nona moved aside to let them pass. The man’s eyes were rolling. One imagined that visions of lawsuits danced in his head. The woman’s face was perfectly stupid. She did not know where she was, where she was being taken, or why, or what she had done.

  Nona looked away and caught on Morgan Lake’s pale face a ripple of compassion. Quickly it vanished, and he was icy calm again.

  The affair was just about over. Firemen continued to move about in the two apartments. Nona realized that there had been an attack from a ladder at the window. There had been water. There had been axes. But the fiercely efficient burst of activity was over now. Nothing was left of the fire but that disgusting smell. The whole crisis—danger, alarm, effort, and happy resolution—had actually taken a very few minutes.

  Leila Hull had been mercifully spirited away within this time.

  She realized that the stirred-up hive was buzzing now; the corridor was crowded. As Morgan Lake and Mrs. Rogan moved toward her, she discovered that several women were standing behind her. Besides Bettina Goodenough there was now Elna Ames and Agnes Vaughn. Joan Braverman and Kitty Forrest, from their one-roomers in the north wing, were there, looking dazed, leaning together. Georgia Oliver was back again. And bearing down upon the group from the rear loomed the large shape of Felice Paull, draped in lavender.

  Felice Paull demanded to be told what had happened, managing to look at the same time hurt that secrets were being kept from her.

  Morgan Lake told her and them all. “Just a small fire in Mrs. Hull’s apartment,” he said, suave and soothing. “It is all over. No one hurt. Not a lot of damage. Mrs. Hull is quite all right. She has gone with a nephew of hers. There is no danger, ladies. Thanks to Mrs. Ames. And Mrs. Rogan. And the Fire Department.”

  Agnes Vaughn said, “We might have been roasted alive in our beds!” She looked delighted. “I suppose she was drinking, eh?”

  It was Elna Ames, usually so unassuming, who replied impatiently. “We weren’t hurt. It’s all over. Be quiet!”

  Morgan Lake said, quickly, “There is one thing, ladies …” He turned. “Mrs. Rogan, you cannot sleep in that apartment. I’m afraid you cannot even stay there, until we do the repairs and some painting and get rid of this odor. But the only vacancy I have is III and it is a mess, I’m sorry to say … painter’s pots and ladders. I wonder—” now he looked, without singling out, at the group of women—”whether one of these ladies might be willing … Mrs. Rogan will need a place to sleep.”

  He had turned their attention from the scandalous danger to the prospect of charity.

  “I’ve only got one room,” said Agnes Vaughn promptly, “one double bed.” She showed her brown teeth. Nobody in her right senses would want to occupy a double bed with Agnes Vaughn, as Agnes knew.

  Georgia said sweetly, “Oh, I would be glad! Of course, I have only the double bed. Still, maybe I could move in with Mrs. Fitz. I could give you my place.” Georgia, so sweet and generous …

  “That isn’t necessary,” Nona heard herself saying. “I have an extra bed, and of course …”

  Bettina Goodenough moistened her lips but did not speak.

  “You could come down to me,” boomed Felice Paull. “This is a disgrace! The owner is responsible.”

  The widows were not turning back to consider the fire. They were being tested, and knew it.

  Kitty Forrest piped up. “Joan and I have to go to work so early. Otherwise, I … at least …” She faltered. Kitty Forrest was the flabby one, in a beige bathrobe.

  “Oh, me too,” croaked Joan Braverman. The thin one, whose robe was blue. “But only the one room—not so comfortable.”

  Elna Ames had only the one room. Her bed was loathsome, being made of pain. She said nothing.

  Now Sarah Lee Cunneen came puffing to join them. “Where’s the fire? Is it out? What’s happening?” Her lively eyes peered about.

  Agnes told her. “Jolly old Leila Hull pretty near burned the place down,” she said with satisfaction. “Now, she’s gone but Mrs. Rogan needs a place to stay. She can’t stay in that stink,” said Agnes, brutally truthful.

  “Well, how about my place?” said Sarah Lee at once. “Listen!”

  All this while, Tess Rogan herself had not spoken. She was wearing a long dark blue robe of some woolly material. It was decent. Her short hair showed no disorder, nor did her face. Her blue eyes were even faintly entertained.

  “Look, you just come on down,” said Sarah Lee in her gruff, vulgar, cordial, good-humored voice.

  “Thank you,” said Mrs. Rogan, “but Mrs. Henry has
already asked me. I think that might be best—at least for now.”

  “Well, suit yourself.” Sarah Lee took no offense.

  They all heard a kind of cry and looked toward the end of the wing. Daisy Robinson had just put her head out of her door. “What is going on?” they heard her say impatiently. Her hair was a frizzle and bristled above her keen profile. “Has there been a fire?” Daisy looked quite skeptical.

  Morgan Lake went toward her. A fireman came out of 203 and joined him. The group of widows milled.

  Agnes Vaughn said to Felice, “Well, I’m not going to close an eye, and neither are you, so come on in.” She started off on her tiny feet.

  Nona said, over heads, to Mrs. Rogan, “Perhaps I had better go ahead and be sure your bed is ready?” Tess nodded without smiling.

  Nona turned. She could hear Agnes saying, “Daisy Robinson and all her brains! Hoo! Hoo! The place could have burned down around her ears and she’d never notice. Leila Hull was drunk, as usual. You want to bet? Say, where’s Ida? She’s missing this!”

  “The owner,” Felice said, “is legally responsible.”

  As Nona walked past them where they had halted at Agnes’ door, Agnes said to her cheerfully, “And you’re stuck with a roommate, eh, Mrs. Henry? Well, good luck to you.”

  Nona went on around the corner without a reply. What reply was there? Agnes Vaughn was right, as a matter of fact. And Nona felt dismay, and a bit of anger too.

  Of course, one offered to take a homeless woman in. Of course, one rose to such a situation, and made the offer. If one had any charity. If one wanted to be good and do right. Yet why hadn’t Bettina Goodenough, with her prize and especially spacious apartment, made any offer at all? Begrudged the nuisance of it, did she? And why hadn’t Sarah Lee persisted a little more, extrovert that she was? Or Felice, the bossy one. Why hadn’t she been more bossy, and overridden Nona Henry, who was so new here—and did not know Tess Rogan, or want to know her?