Seventeen Widows of Sans Souci

by Charlotte Armstrong

  “She’s no what?”

  Tess smiled. “There are some people who insist upon being lied to. I don’t know what else to call them.”

  Nona’s mouth fell open. A sense of illumination flooded into her mind. “A lie-ee,” she murmured. “I never heard of such a thing.”

  “It’s just my term,” said Tess. “The thing is real.”

  “Yes, it is,” said Nona.

  “I see it.”

  “I do, too,” said Nona with awe. “Why, I do!”

  Downstairs, Oppie Etting had come. So Morgan Lake told Rose about Elna Ames. Rose said, “Well, she ought to have gone somewhere, long ago. The old fool! Honestly, Morgan, why you don’t get rid of these old creeps and at least try and fill the place with younger people …”

  “Younger people,” said Morgan sadly, “wouldn’t live here.”

  “See!” she cried triumphantly. “But Winnie’s got to live here. And me! And me!” She was looking fiercely young. She had pulled herself up to narrow her waist. She had thrust her breasts forward.

  “You haven’t a gray hair on your head,” said Morgan gently.

  Rose flushed. Her passionate selfishness did not always win over his control.

  Upstairs Nona said, “But how did you get in on all that, Tess?”

  “Mr. Lake called me.”

  “He did?”

  “Well, someone was needed. I was the only one—the only mobile one,” amended Tess, “who wasn’t at the party.”

  “Why was that?” said Nona sharply. “I didn’t like it.”

  But Tess said, “There is no need to like it or to dislike it, Nona.”

  “Weren’t you offended?”

  “On the contrary, I suppose I must have offended someone,” Tess said. “Don’t you see that?”

  “You are the strangest …” Nona leaned against the table edge. Her eyes were bright with curiosity and she let it loose. “You reverse things. You say it is more blessed to receive … you say it is better to be a liar than a lie-ee.”

  “Not better,” Tess said. “It’s just my way of clarifying, or at least it works for me.”

  Nona’s throat felt dry; her whole being felt reckless. “I was robbed, you know,” she said boldly. “By my own daughter and my son-in-law. What would you do? Mustn’t I forgive them?”

  “If you want to,” Tess said. She got up and took the cups into the kitchen.

  Nona said, loudly, “It isn’t easy.”

  “No,” said Tess, “very hard.”

  Nona wandered into the living room.

  A lie-ee? She sat down, musing. Georgia Oliver with her faith that everything always “worked out” since the world was finally made of sweetness and kindness and tolerance. Was she a lie-ee? Nona felt ashamed. No, no, Georgia was kind and good. But enviable?

  Nona twitched restlessly. (To forgive was not easy. And when you reversed that, to be forgiven was very hard. Oh, now!) She took a cigarette out of a box. She saw that the ash tray already had cigarette ends in it.

  “Who was here?” she asked Tess as Tess came in.

  “Here? Oh. Robert Fitzgibbon dropped by.”

  “He did?” Nona was astonished.

  “He’d forgotten about the shower for Georgia,” Tess explained. “No one home, across the hall. So he came and talked to me.”

  Nona said in a moment, “What do you think of Mrs. Fitz?”

  “Ursula Fitzgibbon,” said Tess Rogan, “wants the history of this world to have been written by Louisa May Alcott.”

  Nona burst with one shout of laughter.

  “You asked,” accused Tess, “and I told you. You needn’t take it for Gospel, you know. Now, I think I’ll lie down. Shall we go out for dinner a bit later? Go to Hunt’s? Live dangerously?”

  “All right,” sputtered Nona, ashamed to have laughed.

  “It looks as if we might as well,” said Tess thoughtfully.

  “Yes.”

  Nona settled back, lit the cigarette. The devil was dancing in her heart. Down, devil! But was it the devil?

  Death’s wing had brushed over Sans Souci. As it will again, Nona thought, soberly now. Of course. It must. Death, danger, a little madness … all these. How can you hope to be alive or safe or sane unless you reckon with these, since they are real?

  Chapter 17

  The next day was very quiet, although the hive stirred. The widows went in and out. But none congregated in the patio or in the lobby. Greetings between them were grave and aloof.

  The two workingwomen were late leaving the building. When they went forth, Kitty Forrest wore a face ravished by sleepless terror. She showed the white of her eye, like a skittish horse, as she went by the desk. Joan Braverman was close beside her. Thin, lantern-jawed, brusque, matter-of-fact, Joan was shepherding her softer chum to the doctor’s. Joan said it was wise. Joan said no use to worry until you were sure you had something to worry about. This basic misunderstanding of the very meaning of the word was supposed to be comforting.

  The widows of Sans Souci had been reminded of their mortality.

  That day was long.

  Nona Henry dined alone. Tess Rogan had gone out. Some people had called for her. She’d gone down to meet them in the lobby.

  After dinner, Nona felt restless and oppressed. She slipped across the hall.

  Robert Fitzgibbon let her in. His eyes had a red look. His breath reeked. “Mother’s abed,” he said. “Georgia’s the nurse. You come in and watch TV with me.”

  “I came to see your mother.” Nona didn’t find this man attractive tonight. An air of petulance about him repelled her. “All right for you,” he said childishly. But then Georgia called her name and Nona went into the bedroom.

  Mrs. Fitz was propped upon pillows. A soft white woolen stole was wrapped about her shoulders and under the rose-shaded lamp she looked immaculate, precious, frail.

  “How are you?” asked Nona warmly.

  “Very well, really. Now, Georgia, you go talk to Robert, please. Nona will sit with me awhile. Sit down, dear. Will you be comfortable?”

  Nona sat down and felt again the sense of harbor. The old lady’s voice lapped against her ears like gentle water.

  “Dear Georgia spoils me so. I’m perfectly all right. Perhaps just a little tired from the party. Sometimes I find it’s wise to spend a day in bed. But wasn’t it a lovely party? Such delicious food and all so pretty! It was very kind of the ladies.”

  “Too bad—” Nona began, and bit her tongue.

  Mrs. Fitz smoothed the coverlet with her pink old hands. “Poor Mrs. Ames. The poor soul. What hurts us,” said she, “we do wish we had found ways to be kinder. Don’t you think so?”

  “I suppose—” Nona said to herself, That’s true.

  “But we mustn’t reproach ourselves,” said Mrs. Fitz firmly. “Certainly you did your share. You went to help.”

  “That wasn’t much,” Nona stammered.

  “Ah, but it counted,” said Mrs. Fitz. “You are such a kind person, Nona. You will never regret it. The longer I live the more I think that is the only secret. Just to be kind enough.”

  “Kind,” Nona echoed. The word grew strange, as words sometimes will. It dropped all its trailing associations and stood naked in her mind, a syllable, a sound. Meaning what? Meaning akin? Member of the same species?

  Mrs. Fitz was rippling on. “… good hands, now. And all that can be done, of course. I didn’t know her well. She seemed a very nice woman, very quiet How is Mrs. Rogan?”

  The question was a surprise. Nona blinked. “Why, she is fine. She’s gone out to dinner and the theatre.”

  “Oh?” The syllable held the faintest flavor of reproach.

  “A date she had,” explained Nona.

  “I see. Did she know Mrs. Ames well?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Mr. Lake called her, I think, because she wasn’t at the party.”

  “That was a kindness,” murmured Mrs. Fitz. “Yet I wonder if it was a mistake. If she has such wealthy
relatives …” She frowned.

  “Kindness?”

  “I believe the thought was that an invitation demanded a gift, you see? And perhaps that would have been oppressive?”

  Nona sat still, feeling only half satisfied.

  “Was she hurt, Nona dear, not to have been asked?” Mrs. Fitz’s purple eyes were anxious.

  “No,” said Nona truthfully. “No, she wasn’t, really.”

  Mrs. Fitz sighed. “No one knows Mrs. Rogan very well.” She paused. When Nona did not speak she went on. “Robert says she is interesting. Of course, Robert has been everywhere and seen so many types. She is a little odd, so I hear. You were kind to offer to share your apartment.”

  “We get along very well,” murmured Nona.

  “Ah, but you would,” praised the old lady. “Mrs. Rogan’s a countrywoman, I understand. Perhaps that is what seems odd to us, here.”

  “Country?”

  “Isn’t she from Maine?”

  “Yes.”

  “Her husband was a—oh dear, now somebody told me!—a manufacturer of some strange thing.”

  “I don’t know,” said Nona, who had never asked Tess Rogan this question. (Which was rather odd, she now reflected.)

  “Canoes,” said Mrs. Fitz triumphantly. “That does seem so strange. Canoes!” She sighed.

  There was in Sans Souci a shadowy hierarchy of prestige derived from one’s husband’s status, which persisted even now that the husbands were gone. Nona Henry was well aware of this. It was (she knew when she felt honest) the reason she did not volunteer the fact that Val had owned a motion-picture theatre. This was not a prestige occupation.

  Highest rank went to the professions and, within them, to fame. Mrs. Fitz, with her noted Judge, ranked very high. (Mrs. Buff, with her Banker, had a sheer prestige made of simple money.) Daisy Robinson’s Doctor, Sarah Lee Cunneen’s Doctor, and Bettina Goodenough’s Attorney ranked up there, too. Harriet Gregory kept trying to convince everyone that her (unpublished) Writer was of the elite. There was a rumor that Marie Gardner’s husband had been a Professor, which was respected, and vaguely pitied too.

  For the rest, Businessmen. Leila Hull’s Veterinarian was counted a businessman.

  There was no Clergyman’s widow in Sans Souci. Sans Souci was not that “reasonable.”

  All this slipped through Nona’s mind. So Liam Rogan had manufactured canoes? This would seem odd to Ursula Fitzgibbon. Nona, sitting in the rose-soft light of this bedroom, thought with fond amusement that a canoe was about as far from Mrs. Fitz’s ken as an object could possibly be.

  But Tess Rogan? Nona found that she could imagine that body, upright from the knees, and those arms swinging in free grace. Tess Rogan in a canoe? But not now!

  “She’s seventy-one,” Nona murmured.

  “And quite remarkably strong and well,” said Mrs. Fitz, with admiration lingering upon each syllable. “Country people. Of course, I think they are closer to … well … to the earth than we.”

  Nona wondered for a moment if by “the earth” Mrs. Fitz meant crude health.

  “They live so much with nature,” said Mrs. Fitz. “They see animals …” She looked a bit queasy.

  (Oh, death had brushed a dark wing over Sans Souci. Left a feather in the throat.)

  “We can’t do any more for poor Elna Ames,” said Nona softly. “Any of us. We mustn’t talk about it.”

  “You are wise,” said Mrs. Fitz gratefully.

  But Nona found herself turning in her mind Tess Rogan’s strength. Yes, it had been either strength or a total lack of sensitivity … in that room of pain and struggle. Was this of the earth? Of the country? Nature and animals? Rhythms and cycles? Her mind jumped. But you don’t manufacture canoes in the woods, she thought suddenly. Not this century!

  “… dear children,” Mrs. Fitz was saying, “press me to say I’ll come and live with them. Of course, I wouldn’t wish to trouble Robert and Georgia, for the world. Although I may not trouble anyone for long.” Her fine features took on a look of sorrow and Nona’s heart curled. (That feather in the throat?)

  “How could you trouble them?” she chided gently. “They want to be near you.”

  “I am blessed in my children,” said Ursula, “and in my friends, my dear. You comfort me.”

  Ah, she’s a darling, Nona thought, quite melted.

  When Nona left her, she found the living room still taken over by the TV screen. Georgia Oliver was seated in her relaxed way, with her normal smile upon her face. She rose at once to say good night and thank you. But Robert Fitzgibbon remained sprawled in his chair, a glass in his hand, his still-handsome, boyish face glowering toward the entertainment.

  Later, bedtime, Nona Henry, in robe and slippers, came out of her bathroom, leaving the door just a little ajar, the light on in there, for Tess’s sake. She moved to the slot between the beds, turned Tess’s spread back and the blankets diagonally down, then opened her own bed and snapped off the lamp on the little square table between her and the window. She leaned over it to take hold of the lower sash and raise it.

  The night was moonlit. The street below looked clean and deserted, although the hour was not much after ten. Nona could see over the fat mass of the leaf-draped wall to a strip of grass and the curb. There were palms in this parking strip, and moon-made shadows of the tall bare trunks were slanting a series of bars across the pavement.

  There came that convertible, swooping in. Nona thought, Well! Winifred Lake is early tonight. She had come to know Winnie’s hours. She had seen this car many times, or heard it, as it swooped in here just below her bedroom window. She had watched the disembarking, the farewell embraces, often enough to want to turn away in distaste. Knowledge of something that was surely a secret, and perhaps not a nice one, made her uneasy. She did not intend to watch them now, but there was no time …

  The car came in fast. Its brakes screamed a little like a human cry. It jolted to a stop. There was swift violent movement. What? The door burst open. The figure of the driver gave a heave of some kind, the figure of the girl went tumbling, flying, crashing. The car door crashed closed. The car took hold of the pavement with its rubber toes and pelted away.

  All this—so tumultuous and shocking—was over in ten seconds. Then the street was silent and bare and clean; but a moon-shadow lay strict, with no flutter, across the girl’s still body as it was left, crumpled there upon the grass.

  Why, he had thrown her! Brutally! Wickedly! Was she hurt? Nona’s blood raced. Why, how wicked! How brutal! How terrible!

  She ran out of her bedroom, out of her apartment, and down the corridor on swift, soft-slippered feet. Yes, she had known all along it was secret and evil! Perhaps she ought to have interfered before or ought not to interfere now? But there had been no one else to see! And if the girl was hurt!

  What should Nona do? Thought caught up as her feet padded swiftly down the stairs. Should she turn into the lobby, dressed as she was, and get Oppie Etting to go with her? Yes, wise … but the car had gone. There was nothing dangerous out there. Wiser to see? For this was evil and secret.

  Nona turned away from the lobby at the first floor and went rapidly down the north wing to the fire door at the end. She pushed on the bar that released it. Without thinking why, she stooped and picked up a small stone and put it between the door and the jamb to leave this way back in available. In case. In what case? She did not know. She knew that she must know whether the girl was hurt. That first. That first.

  She found herself on a narrow, almost overgrown walk between the building and the wall. She went along it, fending branches, slipped through the arch and ran back along the public sidewalk.

  Winnie Lake had lifted herself enough to be resting her upper back against the rough bark of the palm.

  “Are you hurt?” Nona panted. “I saw that. Did he hurt you, Winifred?”

  She moved around to where she could see the face.

  There was a smudge of earth along the cheek. The eyes had a sick-a
nimal look, a dumb suffering.

  “I’m not hurt,” the voice said feebly, without passion.

  “Let me help you.” Nona leaned to put her hand under the armpit. The girl’s torso twisted away.

  “I’m okay,” she said. “Just don’t …” The last vowel began to rise in pitch.

  “Come, let me help you in and we can call the police,” said Nona impatiently. “You don’t have to put up with this sort of thing. I saw it. Whoever did this to you can’t get away with it.”

  The girl expelled her breath like a little cry of despair.

  “I can’t,” she said.

  “Can’t you get up? Is it your leg? Your ankle? Shall I call Mr. Etting?”

  “No,” said Winnie. “No, please …” It was a wail.

  “But, my dear …” Nona was crouching. Her face was close to Winnie’s face. The girl’s eyes were not staring numbly now. Fear curled in them. And hatred, too. Let me alone, can’t you? they cried. You old biddy!

  So Nona rose to a standing position and heard her knees crack, loud in the stillness. Her knees were old. I’m just an interfering old crow, she thought—or so she sees me. Am I?

  She stood there, thoughtful, and her personal dignity came home to her. She knew the girl was beginning to get her feet under her and to scramble up. Nona did not touch her to help her. She said quietly, “You are no dear of mine, but I meant to help you, and still will, if if you’ll tell me how.”

  Winnie said, breathlessly, accusingly, “Are you going to tell?”

  Nona said, “You little idiot! I’ve seen a great deal out my window that I haven’t told yet.”

  The girl’s face rippled in the moonlight. She had thought she’d been invisible, Nona remarked then, with satisfaction. Her young life invisible to the old biddies—the finished lives. She had thought no one knew. Do her good to learn!

  The girl said, “Don’t tell my mother. Promise you won’t tell, Mrs. Henry, please?”

  Nona said, “You are filthy dirty. Your leg is bleeding. Nobody will have to tell, you know.”

  Winnie looked down at her own slender leg. She extended it into the moonlight. The stocking was ruined. The scratches were bleeding. “I could say I fell.”